The first week Raven spent in that smelly little basement flat was uneventful, to say the least. She'd plonked her bag down on the bed, whipped out the money for this months rent, and waved it in front of a rather stunned Lorna's face, stating she that she was good to move in. Lorna took one look at the money, and nodded, rushing upstairs to put it in the - no, their - landlady's post box. Raven was left alone in the small room, her oversized leather handbag now emptied onto the bed. She sighed wearily, and looked over the contents of the bag - a couple of spare pairs of underwear, and couple of t-shirts and trousers, toiletries and four wallets that contained multiple identities she had secured for herself back in the seventies. Oh, and those old polaroids of her and...well. She tended not to look at them often; they made her much too melancholy. Instead of looking at them, she returned them to her bag, and began packing her clothes into her draws underneath her bed.

Lorna didn't return for a good 10 minutes, and when she did, she popped her head round the door briefly to say: "I've got a class in an hour or so, so I'm gonna head out, but when I get back, we can get to know each other, yeah?" She didn't even give Raven a chance to reply before she flounced out the apartment, door slamming behind her.

Left alone in the dingy apartment, Raven took a shower, and then took a nap in her new – surprisingly comfy – bed. Well, it was meant to be a nap. She ended sleeping 12 straight hours (she supposed that that grotty youth hostel must have taken the peace out of her sleep) and she awoke to a post-it note on her forehead.

Hey there new roommate!

I've got class until 7, but we can get to know each other when I get back!

Love,

LORNA xxxxx

Raven meandered around the flat, realizing she had gone to sleep naked. She supposed it was a good thing there were no windows in the basement; otherwise the neighbors would be greeted with quite the eyeful. Instead of going out and contributing to society, or at least introduce herself to the housekeeper, Raven decided to flop down on the sofa, and watch television as herself for once in a while. Except, the television watching, which was only meant to go on for a couple of hours, ended up taking up most of the day, until Raven decided it was time for dinner and ordered a takeaway. Then, somehow, she was tired again, so she slept for another 10 hours.

And so it continued for the entire week. Raven would do absolutely nothing all day, fall asleep early and wake up to a post it note on her forehead. The two girls would not cross path, and so Raven began to slip into a cycle of nothingness, until one day, Lorna came home early.

Raven barely had time to stand up and switch to her human form before her roommate was jumping onto the sofa, a large plastic bag clinking as she threw it down next to Raven.

"Afternoon!" The ever-chipper Lorna yelled into Raven's face, "I came home early so we can do roommate stuff!"

"You know, Lorna, you really don't have to, I know you're busy –"

"Nonsense, look," Lorna pulled the bag upon and trust it under Raven's nose, "I bought drinks and pedicure sets and stuff, we can have a girly night in!"

Sighing, Raven pushed the bag away from her face. She didn't really do alcohol; it tended to drop her awareness, and with it, her human face. "I appreciate the thought, but I really can't."

"Do you have a test tomorrow?"

That startled Raven somewhat. "I beg your pardon?"

"University? A job? Pop quiz?"

"Well, no –"

"Then you're fine! Sit down, grab a beer."

"I'm not sure..."

Lorna gave her a glare, brushing her brown perm out of her eyes. "Sit. Down."

"O-Okay." Raven sat back on the ratty sofa, whilst Lorna bustled around in the tiny kitchen for a bottle opener. She heard the crack of an oven door opening, and Lorna came rushing back into the room, metal utensil in hand.

"I put some pizza's in so we have something to eat, considering you ate through all my food this week." Raven cringed. She had meant to go out, she really did. Lorna sighed as she handed her new roommate a beer, "What do you do all day, anyway?"

Raven shrugged. If she was honest, she had really no idea. She supposed was watching TV most of the time, but nothing really went in. There were tons of doodles in her notepads, and she'd even looked at her old family photos a couple of times, but apart from consuming all the food, nothing. Realizing that Lorna was expecting an answer, Raven yelped out the first thing that came to mine. "Job hunting."

"From the sofa?"

Raven mentally hit herself. God, that was a dumb thing to say. "Well, thinking about job hunting."

Lorna nodded her head vigorously, "I get it, it's gonna be hard for you adjust to English life, right?" It was Raven's turn to nod, as she finished off her beer, "Whereabouts in America did you come from?"

"Uh, New York." Lorna was handing her another beer.

"Oh, that's ace! I've never been to America..." Lorna drifted off whimsically, seemingly run of things to say, "D'ya wanna watch more TV?"

"Sure." Lorna grabbed the remote and turned on the BBC.

"Here, have another beer."

Crap, thought Raven.

Somewhere after their fifth beer, Lorna decided it would be a good idea to start playing 'Never Have I Ever;. Raven wasn't so sure; it was getting harder to see the finer details of the television, and the last time she played this with Erik, they had ended up robbing a bank drunk.

She voiced her displeasure and was met with an over-sized baby whining. "Oh please, please, please! It'll be fun, you don't have to explain your answers..." Lorna then decided to whip out the most powerful weapon in her arsenal; puppy dog eyes.

Raven didn't last two seconds. "Jesus, fine."

"Yay! Lemme just grab those shot glasses..." Rifling through the bag, Lorna produced some plastic shot glasses and a bottle of vodka. With an unsteady hand, she poured two shots out. "D'ya wanna start?"

"Um, okay." Raven wracked her mind for something she hadn't done. Murder. Check. Armed robbery. Check. Attempted assassination of the president of the United States. Almost check.

"Well?"

"Never have I ever..." Quickly, quickly! "...Kicked a cat." Lorna winced, and downed her shot, much to Raven's surprise. "Do I even want to know?"

"It was an accident, and it wasn't a nice cat."

"But it was a cat!" Raven exclaimed.

Lorna shook her head, and poured two more shots, "It was the one time! Anyway...never have I ever stolen a car."

"Damn." Chuckled Raven, knocking back her shot, wincing slightly as it burned the back of her throat.

"No way." Lorna stared at her roommate incredulously.

"Yes way. I needed a car," Well, thought Raven, Erik needed a car. "Right, lemme think of another one..." Lorna's shocked face made her laugh. He slow burn in the bottom of her stomach was finally coming through. "Uhh, never have I ever babysat."

Lorna glared at her while she took her shot. "Now, that's just cheating."

Raven chuckled into her hand, "Not my fault if you're a nicer person than me."

A pitiful light entered Lorna's eyes as she clasped at Raven's hands, looking like she was on the verge of tears. "I don't believe that for a second, I bet you're the nicest person ever. And I, uh..." Her sentence drifted off into little sobs.

"Maybe we shouldn't play this game anymore, Lorna." Lorna had stopped crying and was rocking herself, clutching the vodka bottle. Reaching in, Raven gently unclasped her roommate's stiff hands, and eased the bottle out of her appendages. "Do you wanna go to bed?"

"Uh-huh."

"Okay then, let's just get up –" In an attempt to maneuver Lorna to standing, Raven actually pulled the both of them onto the floor, amongst the discarded beer bottles. That was weird, she didn't feel that drunk, but then again, she never did. Raven just needed to put Lorna to bed and then she could stop resisting the pull to drop her human façade.

The bottles were rolling across the floor as Raven pulled Lorna along into their bedroom, the both of them giggling like children. The flailing limbs that were keeping the two of them upright – Raven wasn't sure who's they were – knocked off some of the paintings on the walls of the corridor, and the pressure of opening the door got to them, as the two of them fell on each other the moment it opened.

Then, Lorna started hiccupping. "I think I'm a bit –hic – drunk."

"Me too." Raven hefted the student up under the arms again, shuffling her over to the bed and trying to place her on the sheets without jostling her too much. "I'm just gonna go and turn the lights off, okay?"

"Mm hm. Raven?"

"Yeah?" Called Raven from the corridor.

"How come you're in England, like, where's y'family?"

Raven stumbled back into the now pitch black room, throwing off her clothes. "It's a long story, y'dun wanna know." Jesus, she thought, I really am drunk.

"But we're friends, aren't we?"

"Yeah, sure." Raven slipped under the covers of her bed, feeling her willpower go limp. "You sure you wanna know?"

"Yeah!"

"I was adopted when I was younger by this great family. Really rich, British actually. I was sommat like eight? I grew up with their son and he was great. So great. I really miss him sometimes..." She didn't mean to say that! Damn, as long as she didn't tell Lorna Charles' name – "His name was Charles –" Damn it Raven, "And he was a massive nerd. We got into some heavy criminal stuff and I ran off with his best friend –"

"So wait," Interrupted Lorna, "Were you with that Charles dude?"

Ha. "No. No I wasn't." Raven sighed, and rolled over to her side. "I guess I thought we could've been, but I was always too different for him." He couldn't deal with my skin colour, she thought.

"What a racist shit!" Exclaimed the darkness on the other side of the room. Damn, Raven must've said that out loud. She forgot she was wearing the face of that Indian woman.

"Sommat like that." She sighed into her pillow, "Anyway, the guy I ran with, Erik –" There wasn't really any point hiding their names anymore, " – got put in prison, and he tried to kill me so we kinda split."

"So you came to the UK to get away from him?"

"I guess."

"Did it work?"

Raven had to think about that. Sure, she was away from Erik and Charles, no chance of seeing them in this little basement flat, but had she really escaped them? Because they were always there in the back of her mind, one way or the other. "I guess." She replied.

There was silence in the dark room for a few minutes, Raven presumed Lorna had fallen asleep, until a heavy voice drifted out of the darkness: "You awake?"

"Mmhmm."

"Can I ask you a serious question?" Raven heard rustling as Lorna stumbled over to sit on the side of Raven bed.

"Get back into bed, Lorna."

"Mmkay." Yet more rustling, as Raven realized that Lorna was crawling under the covers next to her.

"Your bed, Lorna."

"Nooooooo, I can't move." Lorna's head popped up on the pillow next to Raven. "Can I ask you that question now?"

"Fine, what is it?" Raven's brown eye's met Lorna's green ones in the semi-darkness, being surprised to find them worried.

"What do you think about mutants?"

Raven went rigid; had she forgotten her human face? When she slept, had the disguise slipped? If Lorna had seen it, and joined the dots with the footage from that Peace Conference..."Why do you ask?" Raven choked out.

"I – uh...don't worry, about it, it was a dumb question. It's just..."

Raven started sweating, "What?"

"Nevermind, night Raven." With that comment, Lorna turned her back on her roommate and relaxed into the bed. "Thanks for being such a chill roommate."

"We're friends, aren't we?"

"Yeah." Chuckled Lorna.