++Chapter III: Mirrors of Life++

"Life is just a mirror, and what you see out there, you must first see inside you."

Wally "Famous" Amos

By the time Jessica had finally found her way back to her room, several hours had passed, drawing the afternoon gradually into evening. Thanking the girl who had shown her the way back to the residential hallway, she hesitated outside of the door for a few moments. Something didn't feel right. Nervously, she pushed the door open, halting at the scene inside.

"Is it – normal for people to react that way to teleportation?" she heard Kim asking.

"Most people feel, at the very least, some side effects from it, " a masculine voice answered, "but I think that your friend just had a little fright from being transported so suddenly from the Danger Room. She should be alright when she awakens."

"Nat?" Jess breathed, taking a few more steps into the room. She gasped, suddenly, and rushed to Natalie's bedside, staring down at the unconscious girl. "Oh my gosh, what happened to her?"

Kimberly scrambled off of her bed and rushed over to her friend. "Jess, you're alright! Where on earth did you go? I turned around and you were just – gone!"

"Your friend blacked out after being teleported out of the Danger Room, " Xavier informed her quietly. "She should awaken soon. She'll be alright."

"I got distracted by a painting in the hallway, " Jessica replied, a trifle sheepishly. Her wide, hazel eyes snapped to the professor sitting quietly by Nat's bedside. "Who're you?" she managed to get out.

"I am Professor Charles Xavier, " the owner of that name answered. "Welcome to my school, Jessica."

Jess relaxed a trifle. "Oh. Thank you. It's nice to meet you, " she replied, somewhat awkwardly.

"Professor, Logan said that you were – oh."

All three heads turned toward the voice in the doorway. "Come in, Scott, " Xavier said at last. "These are the new recruits that Storm and Logan brought in from Florida. Jessica, Kimberly, this is Scott Summers, also known as Cyclops."

Scott walked over to them, offering a hand for either to shake. After a moment, Kim took it, albeit a little hesitantly, and released it fairly quickly. "Professor, you wanted me to inform you if we had found anything else in regards to Magneto's activities."

The professor turned his attention briefly from Natalie to his field leader. "Yes?"

A small "Mrrrph" alerted Jess and Kim to the fact that Nat was waking up, and the girls exchanged looks of relief.

"There's been an unconfirmed report of some sort of mutant attack in Washington state, " Scott continued, "but we don't know yet if anything's actually happened there. According to the newscast, a bunch of vandals attempted to break into the Space Needle – but it doesn't look like the sort of work that a vandal would do."

Natalie chose that moment to fully awaken, and groaned as she cracked open first one eye, then the other. "What happened?" she muttered, groggily.

"Ah, Natalie, you're awake, " Xavier smiled. "You lost consciousness after Kurt teleported you out of the Danger Room." His expression briefly turned serious. "There's a reason that it's called the Danger Room, you know." He paused. "Normally, there are a few other side effects that come with the teleportation, but you seem to have evaded most of them, fortunately."

"Is she one of the new students, too?"

Nat peered blearily toward the man who had spoken. "Who's that?"

"Scott Summers, field leader, " Scott said, as he came forward to introduce himself. "I also go by Cyclops."

Slowly pushing herself into a sitting position, Natalie blinked at him for a long moment, expression contorting into a grimace. "I'm Natalie, " she managed to get out, before promptly doubling over and vomiting all over his teal, polo shirt.

Kim stumbled backward in her haste to move out of the way, bumped into the side of the professor's wheelchair, and promptly fell to the floor, wincing and rubbing at her head.

Jessica grimaced and hastily swung up onto the nearest bed – Kim's – and kept herself as far away from the sight of sickness as she could.

Professor Xavier closed his eyes briefly. "Disregard what I said a few moments ago about managing to evade most of the side-effects," he said after a moment.

Scott blanched, and with a quiet, "I hope you'll pay for this to be dry-cleaned, " he quickly left the room.

"I'll leave you three to get cleaned up and ready for dinner, " Xavier said at last, wheeling toward the doorway. "If you feel that you need medical attention, Natalie, I'll have someone take you down to the infirmary."

"I'll be alright, " Nat muttered thickly, wiping at her mouth with a sleeve. "Just give me some time to change. I'll come to dinner, but I can't guarantee that I'll eat anything."

He nodded, understandingly. "Of course. I'll see you all at dinner, then."

"How'd you end up there, Nat?" Kimberly wondered aloud as the door closed behind the professor.

"I saw this section of the wall acting like an elevator, " Natalie explained hoarsely, "and decided to check it out. It took me down to this really strange place – it looks more like something out of a science fiction movie than part of this rich mansion. There was this keypad with glowing buttons. I pushed one, this robot came in saying that it was going to attack me, and, well -- " She blanched, face greening slightly again.

Jess's eyes widened. "There's a place like that, here?" she asked, incredulously. "Wow."

"Yeah, " Natalie nodded, after a moment, "and I highly doubt that it's something the government would be happy knowing about. Then again, I'm sure they'd be ticked off to just learn that this school exists for mutants." She paused, rubbing briefly at her eyes. "Who was the guy that rescued me?"

"The professor said that his name was Kurt, " Kim replied. "He's a very – distinctive looking creature. I don't think it'd be very difficult to point him out in a crowd."

And just as Kimberly predicted, it wasn't difficult at all to point him out to Natalie. During dinner, she had nudged Nat, pointed to the blue guy as he walked in and took a seat at the dining room table, and nodded, eliciting a sudden grin from her friend. She couldn't help but notice that Natalie stared at Kurt quite frequently throughout dinner, and had to duck her head several times to hide her amused expression. Someone seemed quite taken with – someone.

During dinner, Professor Xavier delivered their schedules to them. Oddly enough, all three of the girls had classes at separate times, except for the one entitled "Mutant and Human Relations, " which was predictably taught by Xavier himself. They were each taking courses in history, mechanics, the sciences, literature, and mathematics, which wasn't too different from the sort of course load they were accustomed to having in high school, or from the ones that Kim and Jess had expected to see at college that fall.

"I have history first thing in the morning, " Kim noted aloud as they made their way back to their dormitory via the staircase after dinner, "and – oh, drat. Math is immediately afterward. And what's worse, this is calculus. I barely took any of that in high school."

"Yeah, well, at least you don't have to study physics first thing in the morning, " Jessica griped as her friend made a face. "I'd take history over that any day."

"Least you don't have trigonometry right after breakfast, " Natalie replied, staring down at the rest of her schedule with a look of dislike as they climbed the second flight of stairs. "The only thing that sounds remotely enjoyable on here is the class on mechanics – well, and maybe that one on mutant and human relations. Everyone's required to take that one, right?"

"That's what it sounds like, " Kimberly answered, methodically scanning her own schedule. "I have independent study written in for an extra class, at the bottom," she remarked, somewhat absently. "I guess that's so that I can study a bit of my Latin, perhaps?" She glanced up, noticing that her friends were too absorbed in their own schedules to really give any sort of response, and then peered back down at the paper, eyes narrowing slightly. The instructor for "Independent Study" was listed as "Xavier, Charles."

"I think everyone trains immediately after classes, " Nat's voice broke in, tugging the girl out of her thoughts. "The girl that I sat next to during dinner – she said that her name was Rogue – mentioned that everyone goes into the Danger Room on different days."

Jess sighed as she opened the door to their room, and plopped down on her bed, carefully folding the schedule and setting it on the table next to her alarm clock. "Well, I don't know about you two, but I'm going to try to get some sleep before tomorrow. Somehow, I think that we're all going to need it."

"Sound advice, " Kim murmured. "I think I'll just settle for checking my email tonight. Nothing more."

"What, you won't sit up with me until 2:30 in the morning?" Nat joked, pulling off her combat boots as she took a seat on her own bed. "Got any idea on who's going to be in any of your classes?"

"Not a single one, " Kimberly responded, turning to look at her friend. "Why? Do you?"

Natalie just shrugged, and standing, began tucking her spare clothing into the dressers across the room. "Not really. But I hope that Kurt's in at least one of them."

The telepath exchanged a surprised look with Jess, and grinned, briefly.

"Pages twenty-five and twenty-six will be your homework assignment. Show your work and make sure that you have all problems completed. Class dismissed."

Kimberly groaned as she picked up her books and tucked them in the crook of one arm, briefly rubbing at her forehead with the hand of the other. Her first day wasn't even halfway over with, yet, and she already had to come up with a proposal for a term paper on some sort of trend in history, and complete two full pages of calculus problems. Then again, she reminded herself, she and Jess were in the collegiate classes, which received a heavier workload than the high school ones.

"Kim!"

The girl turned, smiling at Jessica as she emerged from her art class. "Hey, Jess. How was it?"

"Interesting, " Jessica said after a moment. "Our teacher sure has a – unique – concept of the subject."

"Everyone has a different way of viewing things, " Logan said gruffly as he strode out of the classroom. "Remember that." He paused, looking Kim up and down briefly. "One of the new students we brought in, right?"

Kimberly nodded a little. "Yeah. I just kept quiet the whole time, so I wouldn't be surprised if you forgot that I was in there, honestly." She grinned and stuck out her hand. "I'm Kimberly."

"Logan, " he replied, shaking her hand briefly, "also known as Wolverine in some circles."

"Pleasure, " she responded in kind, casting a glance toward the open door behind him. "So you're the art instructor, I take it?"

He nodded. "I have no idea why I got stuck in this position, but all of the good ones were taken." He grimaced a little. "Really, I don't know what Xavier was thinking, giving me a roomful of children to teach …"

Kim suppressed a chuckle with great difficulty. "Well, it was nice meeting you, Logan." She turned to her friend. "C'mon, Jess. Our next class is the one we have with Nat. We don't need to be late!"

By the time the two girls managed to locate Xavier's study, the class had already begun. This was the one class that they instinctively knew would be impossible to sneak in late to, without being detected. After all, with the world's most powerful telepath as your teacher, there was nothing that would escape his notice.

"Mutant and human relations are, in fact, intertwined, " Xavier was saying as the door to his classroom swung open, "and that is one of the most important lessons that I want to impress upon each of you. You can't affect one without in some way affecting the other." He glanced up, briefly meeting the guilty gazes of two students with a small smile. "Good morning, Kimberly, Jessica. I'm glad that you two could join us."

"We got lost, Professor, " Kim explained quickly as she moved to take a seat with Jess, next to Natalie.

"Rather understandable, " he nodded, then resumed addressing the class at large. "During this class, we will cover many different subjects and gain different perspectives on each of them through studies in literature and current events that could potentially be altered or affected by mutants. We will also bring up many ethical questions, and, more importantly, discuss the answers to them."

"How'd you guys get lost?" Natalie whispered, glancing momentarily at her friends.

"Well, you try finding your way here from Logan's classroom, " Kim retorted, shaking her head. "It's on the other side of the building, practically!"

"How'd you make it here without making a wrong turn, anyway?" Jess wondered.

Nat's expression turned smug. "Oh, I had someone show me the way." She leaned briefly toward them. "Kurt's in my trigonometry class. He walked with me to the room to make sure that I'd make it on time."

Kimberly raised an eyebrow. "Really?" Her smile turned mischievous. "I think someone likes someone a bit, hmm?"

Jess snickered softly under her breath as Natalie turned away, muttering furiously under her breath.

" … of Ernest Hemingway, " Professor Xavier finished, then finally turned his gaze onto the three newest students. Almost in perfect unison, the rest of the class did, too. I would appreciate it if you saved your conversation for after my class, he reprimanded, then said aloud, "Now, if you'll all pick up the copy of the book in front of you and turn to page one-hundred and nine, we're going to read about a clean, well-lighted place."

The rest of the class progressed smoothly, and Kim found herself enjoying it a great deal more than her first two classes of the day. Having studied Ernest Hemingway roughly two years previously, the motifs and allegories were not lost on her.

"The apprentice is the unlearned, as of yet untrained. He has not learned the ways of the 'code', and therefore must learn from the examples of the exemplars around him, " Xavier said, shutting his book. "The exemplars already live by the 'code', and by imparting it upon their apprentices, create a cycle, as Hemingway wants us to notice." He paused, glancing briefly out over the class. Nearly all were still paying attention. "Now, since all of you in this particular class are somewhat new to this school – some, newer than most – I must ask you to think about what we have covered in today's lesson. Can any of you see the beginnings of a connection between what we have discussed, and our lives?"

"A clean, well-lighted place is a safe place, " Jessica began, slowly, "and this school is a safe place for mutants, like us … so this mansion is a clean, well-lighted place with exemplars and apprentices in it?"

"We are the apprentices, " Kimberly replied, quietly. "The code that we must learn to live by will show us how to live peacefully with the rest of humanity as educated, powerful individuals. You and the other X-Men are the exemplars who will impart your knowledge of how to do so upon us."

"Ah, yes. Very good, both of you, " the professor nodded, pale gaze shifting from one thoughtful expression to the next. "That will be all for today."

A/N: I actually have this story written up to the eighth chapter thus far, so if you're interested in seeing more, click that little button that will let you review. :)