Stumbling Along the Path

"Does it ever wake you in the middle of the night?" Erik asked, "The feeling that one day, they'll come for you? And your children?"

Xavier wheeled around, "I feel a great swell of pity for the poor soul who comes to my school looking for trouble."

Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters or universe. They belong to Marvel and FOX Studio.

Jean was leaving the Professor's office after more rigorous mind exercises. She stopped by the kitchen to see Scott, Kurt, and Ororo sitting around the table sipping coffee and talking. She walked in and began to pour her own cup of coffee, wore out from the lack of sleep she had gotten the night before. She took a sip but it was black and bitter. She went to the fridge and grabbed some French vanilla creamer and put a bit in her coffee, before stirring and trying it again. She gave a sigh of relief; it was much better now.

"What are you guys talking about?" Jean asked, suppressing a yawn as she pulled out a chair next to Scott.

"The Coffee House is doing a trivia night, winners get a gift card, we we're talking about going." Scott said, teeming with geeky excitement.

"We figure with Ororo's worldly knowledge, Kurt has music and movies, I've got sports and anything hands on, we probably make a decent team… Wanna join? You could cover our science and literature corner." He asked, nervously.

"That sounds like fun. Should we invite Jubilee or Peter, though? Is there a maximum group size?" She asked.

"Jubilee is going out with her foster parent's for the day, and Peter is with family from Poland." Ororo chimed in, she had already done her make up and looked very classy in the sweater she had gotten.

"So it's just us four. Okie dokie. When do we leave?" Jean said, she was still in her lazy day clothes and needed time to fix her hair and maybe have Ororo help her with her makeup.

"It starts at 7 in the evening. So wir are wanting to go here in an hour." Kurt said, as he accidentally threw in some German.

"Well I better go get ready. I'll meet you guys back down here in a bit. O, would you like to help me with my makeup. Your eyeliner is rad, and I can never figure out to get it even so I tend to just ignore it." And with that Jean and Ororo got up and began heading out while talking about the trick to a good solid cat eye that was even on both sides.

Kurt turned to Scott, "You are quite fond of ihr, no?"

"Huh?" Scott asked, shaking his head and taking his gaze off the doorway.

"Das red head, Jean." He chuckled, finishing off his cup of coffee.

"I mean, she's nice, and she is beautiful, I just don't think I'm her type. I can't tell if she's just being friendly, or being flirty. And I don't want to make things awkward if she is just being friendly, ya know?" He started to ramble awkwardly before catching himself.

"You kann see it when she looks at you, mein freund. If I did not know any better, I would think you two were altes ehepaar."

"A what?" Scott asked, utterly confused.

"An old married couple!" Kurt burst into laughter.

Scott laughed and began to feel his face turn red, he quickly buried his face behind his cup of coffee.

Meanwhile, Peter sat on the couch watching as they talked about the amends made to the MRD bill. Luckily, there would be no requirements at this time for mutant registration, but should a mutant pose a threat, which Peter made note was extremely subjective, they could apprehend and detain mutants.

Peter wondered how it was legal for them to detain someone without them committing a crime, he got annoyed and turned the TV off.

"Pietro, Malina and Michal and I are going out for dinner. I'm leaving you in charge, please do not do anything… that you shouldn't." She whispered the last part, to let him know exactly what she meant.

"Yeah yeah, okay. What about the girl?" He added, pointing upstairs to where Wanda was.

"Her parent's assured me she would probably not leave her room, she apparently is a very reserved and quiet girl. Should work out fine for you." She sighed, grabbing her purse.

"Please, stay home tonight." She said as she headed out the door with his Aunt and Uncle following.

Peter nodded and got up, the door closed loudly behind his mom and he ran down grabbed his goggles and had his hand on the door when suddenly, the door disappeared and reappeared on the ceiling, in a strange warped way.

"Where are you going?" Wanda asked, a red energy swarmed around her hands.

Peter let out an annoyed sigh, "Of course. Our family is so fucked up."

"What?" Wanda, now confused, put her hand down, reality returning to it's proper place.

"Is that all you can do or is there more?" Peter asked nonchalantly, his hand back on the door, unimpressed by her party trick.

"Where are you going?" She repeated, ignoring his question.

"Out." He said, about to open the door again when as he opened it, the door knob glowed red and the door shut.

"I want to go too." She stated, her hand glowing the same colour as the door knob.

"I wasn't looking for a tag along…" He sighed.

"Michal and Malina never let me go anywhere, they are afraid of me. Are your parent's not afraid of you?" She asked, the door knob returning to it's bronze state.

"Just my mom. And no, she's just afraid for me. And my dad is just like me. But he's out of the picture." He let go of the door knob and turned to face Wanda.

"Out of the picture?" She asked puzzled by the phrase.

"Gone. Not dead. Just not here." He put it plain and simple.

"Oh. My parent's are both gone too. Michal and Malina are my adopted parents. I have only heard stories about my father, they never talk about my real mother." She opened up the door as she spoke.

"It blows, but what are you gonna do?" Peter shrugged, as he started to walk out the door.

"I'm going to go with you." She floated down the stairs and stood next to Peter. She was just a bit shorter than him.

"Fine, but you can't use your powers outside. We're kinda out casts here, and people aren't a huge fan of mutants." Peter said, as he looked at his goggles and sat them on the end table by the door.

"Why?" She asked, as they both began to walk outside.

"People fear what they don't understand, or at least that's what my Professor keeps telling me. But sometimes, I wonder if they don't just really hate us for no reason…" He sighed.

"Professor?" She asked.

"He's this rad bald dude." Peter stated, as they walked down the road heading to the diner.

Jean came downstairs wearing her blue and grey striped sweater and a pair of high waist khakis, her make up fully done for the first time in a while thanks to Ororo. She had perfect cat eyes with a little bit of blue shadow high lighting it, and a deep red lipstick. She didn't need any blush, because she was blushing hard enough as she walked down the stairs.

Ororo had a smirk on her face, proud of her work. She had styled her own hair in a poofy Mohawk style, she too had cat eye liner with a mix of purple and pink vibrant eye shadow which complimented her dark complexion well, her lips were done in a neutral color just a shade lighter than her skin.

Scott couldn't help but stare, the make up made the girls look older, and much more intimidating to him. He was just wearing a button up shirt and his jacket. He turned to look at Kurt for something to say. Kurt just winked at him and pushed him forward.

"So… uh… we ready to go? I figured if we got there early we could get a cup of coffee while we wait and maybe do some trivia questions for practice.

"That sounds good to me, Scott." Jean smiled, she grabbed her jacket off the coat rack and headed for the door.

Scott held open the door and gave a nod to Jean as she walked to the car with Kurt and Ororo following behind them.

Jean sat down in the passenger seat and buckled up. She used the mirror to look at Ororo and Kurt in the back seat who were all making kissy faces at her as Scott opened the driver's door.

Ororo reached in between Jean and Scott and turned on the radio as Scott started driving away from the mansion.

They all sat in silence minus a bit of humming from Ororo to some catchy tunes, it wasn't a long drive to the coffee house, especially with Scott being a bit of a speed demon with the car.

Jean saw Peter walking with some girl as they passed the diner, she thought it was peculiar that he was walking for once, but ignored it, figuring it must have something to do with the girl he is with.

Scott pulled into an open lot, and parked the car. They all simultaneously got out of the car and started walking down the strip to the coffee house. The coffee house was a small building with one floor, there was a bunch of comfy places to sit, a small stage where they occasionally had live music, and of course the bar where they served all sorts of coffee and snacks.

Jean walked over to the counter where there was a sign up sheet and a bunch of pens.

"We have to have a team name…" She said, picking up a pen and tapping it on the bar.

"Well we are the X-Men." Scott laughed, as she smiled and filled in the paper with their team name and went to go get a seat.

They all sat down while Ororo and Jean went to order everyone coffee, Jean started feeling a bit overwhelmed by all the noise in the coffee bar. Ororo noticed Jean wincing and told her to go ahead and sit down while she ordered the coffee. Kurt at the same time was getting up to use the bathroom.

"Everyone is staring at us…" Jean whispered to Scott as she sat down.

"I feel bad for Kurt. I'm really worried someone is gonna call the MRD just for us all being here and wanting to play trivia…" Scott admitted.

"The MRD? Did that bill get passed? Are you serious?" Jean started getting upset.

"An amended version of it. No Mutant Registration Act, but if any of us pose a threat to society, they can apparently just call the MRD and detain us…" Scott sighed, "It was on the news earlier today. You were with the Professor… I thought he would have told you?"

"We should just leave. What if something happens?" Jean hands started shaking nervously.

"It's fine. We are gonna just answer trivia questions and drink coffee. The only threat we pose is that we are gonna kick some trivia butt." He joked, reaching out and holding her hands to calm her.

Jean took a deep breath as Ororo and Kurt returned, "You're right. Let's do this."

A woman got up on the stage with a microphone and list of questions and answers as the Barista passed out a sheet of paper number 1-45 on it.

"The first 15 will be general trivia, then movies, and then just some Star Wars trivia, and then a bonus question for extra points."

The team all looked at each other and smiled, victory would be theirs.

The first round was a bit of a struggle, with some questions on things that they knew nothing about. But soon they started getting into the swing of things, and were in second place by the Star Wars trivia round came about.

"What was the name of Luke and Leia's mother?"

"Padmè Amidala!" Jean whispered as she grabbed the pen to scribble down the answer.

"Number 34, how many members are on the Jedi council?"

"Well that's not fair. It depends on the time line. I mean in the Clone Wars there were a lot more Jedi council members, but then that got sort of messed up…"

"I would just write 12, I mean there were twelve when Anakin was presented to the council, I think… I can't remember…" Jean chimed in.

"What is the type of armor wore by Boba Fett?"

"Madalorian. Easy." Kurt said.

They went back and forth with with questions until it came to the bonus round. They were still in second place as the last question was getting read off.

"What were the last spoken words in the Empire Strikes Back?" She read.

"Was it not just Luke going 'Ow!'?" Ororo asked.

"Pretty sure that's it." Scott said, thinking to himself and playing out the final scenes in his head.

"Okay, tally up your points. Round one questions worth 1 point, round two is worth 3 points, and round three is worth 5 points, pass them off to another team for scoring."

Jean took the paper and walked over to the group behind them. The man looked her up and down and looked over at their table and then very reluctantly switched off papers.

Jean and Scott scored the other teams paper, they had done okay, but had left a lot of questions blank. Jean could hear the other team grumbling about them, before finally one of them spoke up.

"Ma'am, I would like to ask how you knew all these answers." He called out to Jean.

"Um… which ones? I'm a biology major… and a Star Wars geek…" She nervously said.

"Sure you didn't use any mutie powers to get the answer, how do we know you all ain't cheatin'?" He accused them, his group nodding silently.

"I just read the books. Plus I once watched a documentary on Otters… so I learned that their home was called a Holt. There was nothing better on TV." She rambled.

The man was angered by her response, "I think they should be disqualified. Mutie scum." He spat at her feet.

Scott pushed his chair back and stood up and walked over to the man, "I think you need to apologise to the lady. We are just trying to have a nice night out. We are just college students. We basically are full time fact learners. The Pythagorean theorem doesn't do any good in the real world, so we came to trivia night to put some of the boring knowledge to use. We're just trying to have a good time, sir." He said, pushing his glasses up the bridge of his nose a bit.

"You all put us at an unfair advantage. When there are muties who can read minds and control minds, how do we know you didn't steal other's answers? And what are you doing with glasses on in here anyway? Looking sketchy as hell…" He said, reaching for Scott's glasses.

Scott took a step back, and held his glasses tight to his face with his hand. The man stepped forward and pushed Scott's hand away and grabbed his glasses. Scott put his arm up over his eyes and clenched them shut.

"Hey, give those back right now!" Jean said, grabbing the man's hand.

"What are you gonna do about it? Make a move and I'll call the MRD." He threatened.

Jean let go of the man's wrist, still seething with anger, the man's hand began to be forced open, dropping the glasses on the floor.

"What the hell did you do, you fucking mutie?" He cussed.

"I didn't do anything. You dropped them yourself." She said, picking up the glasses and handing them to Scott.

"Now why don't we just go back to our game?" Ororo suggested to the man.

"Why don't you go back to where you came from." He shouted, murmering slurs under his breath.

"That's about enough, sir!" The Barista shouted, "Now you can either hand them their paper, or you can leave."

"You support this? What are you a mutie too?" He asked the man at the bar.

"That is none of your business. You can either hand them the paper or I will have someone show you out." He said.

Jean looked at the man who couldn't be older than they were, his hands were clenched and frozen… But he shook it off as the man got up and grabbed his stuff and left with his group. The woman, presumably his wife, turned to their group with a sad look in her eye and mouthed an apology to them.

"Thank you, sir." Jean said, sitting back down, shaking from the confrontation.

"It was nothing. I wasn't gonna let him talk that way about our customers, if I lose costumers I don't get a pay check. Plus, you guys have been regulars since I started working here so I value you guys more than some loser." He joked, rubbing his hands through his blonde hair.

Jean smiled and nodded at him, taking Scott's hand to console him. They quickly announced the winners which were in fact the X-Men and gave them their gift card.

As they left and were walking down the street the same man came up to them.

"MUTIE SCUM!" He shouted as he threw a glass bottle at Scott.

Jean went to stop the bottle but was too late as it came into contact wit his head, breaking and cutting him.

Jean angrily threw the man across the road, and took off her jacket to stop the bleeding.

"Screw him…" She said, as she put the cloth to Scott's head and they walked back to the car.

"Who here can drive?" She asked, knowing that technically neither Kurt or Ororo had their licenses.

"I can try." Ororo said, taking the keys and hopping in the driver's seat.

They all hopped in the car, Kurt taking passenger seat this time. Jean slid into the back seat holding the sweater to Scott's head.

"You're going to ruin your jacket." He groaned, sliding his glasses back up on his face.

"I have others." She sighed, forcing back tears over everything that had happened.

Ororo was not a good driver, but she got them there in one piece and not getting pulled over. And that was all they needed.

"Professor!" Jean yelled through tears as they walked into the mansion.

"Yes, Je- what happened?" Xavier asked, wheeling quickly up to the group.

Jean explained everything in detail, forcing the words out through the tears. The Professor shook his head and sent Scott to go see Hank to get patched up.

"I had feared this would happen… hopefully it was an isolated incident and maybe it won't happen again. We cannot fight hate with hate." He said.

"I know, Professor. I just don't know why they hate us so much. Especially after we worked so hard to save them in Cairo." Jean sobbed.

"People fear change and what they do not understand. We just have to get them to understand in a civil way. It takes time to make a difference." He said, patting her on the shoulder.

Jean knew he was right, but she could not stop replaying the scene over and over in her head.

"Also I would like to go back to the coffee shop with you guys tomorrow, I think we may have another recruit. A Mr. Robert Drake." The Professor said.