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Words in italics are telepathic conversations, thoughts, or dreams
Chapter 4
Rally sat quietly in her room by the window, watching the stars. It was a clear night and the moon was hanging high in the sky. She heard the other students down stairs laughing and playing, having a good time. Oh how she wished she could be with them, too. Why couldn't her powers just come already?
The brown-haired teen walked over to her bed and flopped down. She didn't even have any clothes to change into or her iPod to keep her company. In fact, she had none of her possessions except for the clothes on her back which were torn and filthy. That thought made her want to cry. Everything she owned was destroyed. Rally didn't even know who was going to take care of her father's dead body because her grandparents and mother were also dead. The only relative she knew of who might be alive was her brother, but he was much older and had disappeared many years ago and hadn't contacted them since. Rally hated him for that. They were so close, but he just left without a trace. She felt anger building up inside of her, but calmed herself down. It wasn't worth the energy to get upset over something that wasn't going to change.
"Rally?" Jean's voice called from outside her door, interrupting her thoughts, but Rally was glad for company.
She walked over to the door, opened it and found not only Jean, but Scott and Kurt.
"Hey, how are you doing?" Jean asked, coming into her room with the two men following her.
"I'm alright." Rally answered.
Jean smiled, knowing full well that Rally was suffering on the inside. "I'd like you to meet, Kurt. He's a teleporter."
"Hello, Rally." The blue mutant smiled, trying not to cause fear in the child.
"Hi." She smiled back.
"We came to see if you needed anything." Scott said.
"Yeah, like clothing or other essentials." Jean continued.
"Well," Rally looked around her room. "I'm kinda lacking everything. All I have is this t-shirt and these pants and those sneakers." She said, pointing to a pathetic pair of shoes sitting by the closet.
All three x-men looked at her gray t-shirt. It was torn at the sleeve and had blood stains on it, plus dirt everywhere.
"What happened to your arm, Rally?" Jean asked, taking hold of her arm and pulling up her sleeve. The red-head saw four deep impressions in her skin on the one side of her upper arm and on the bottom side of her arm, there was one deep impression. Jean's mouth gaped in horror.
"It was the mutant who attacked my home, Sabretooth or whatever." Rally said calmly, not thinking much of her injuries.
"Why didn't you tell us? This is serious, Rally. You need medical attention right away."
"I didn't think it was that big of a deal. It stopped hurting." Rally answered innocently.
"Pain is all in your head. You can make it disappear, but not the injury and the damage being done." Jean then looked up at night crawler. "Kurt, can you teleport us to the medical center?" She asked, wanting to help Rally as soon as possible and make sure she had no infections.
"I don't know. I've never tried to teleport more den vun (than one) person." He answered, worrying of trying and failing.
"I think it's about time you tried." Scott said.
"I don't vant to hurt anyvun." Kurt replied.
Jean put a hand on Kurt's shoulder. "If anything happens, I'll use my telekinesis." She smiled, reassuring him.
"Okay." He said. He walked up to Rally and began picking her up but paused, noticing the expression on her face, "Do you mind?"
"Uh, no, go ahead." She said, as he finished lifting her in his arms.
"This will be the safest place for you." He told Rally. He turned to the others then. "Hold on to me tightly." Scott and Jean both grabbed hold of him and held on.
"Here ve go." He said, hoping it worked.
The group turned into a blue puff of smoke and in a second, appeared in the living room. They looked around at the confused faces of the students and then realized they were not where they were headed.
"Sorry." Kurt apologized and teleported Jean, Scott, and Rally to the Medical center. "Miscalculation." He said as he put Rally down.
"Wow. That was…amazing." She said to Kurt, with a look of awe on her face.
He smiled. It wasn't often he made children happy. "Other mutants have much more amazing abilities than me." Night crawler said.
"Like what?" She asked, extremely interested. She never realized how cool mutant powers could be.
Kurt looked over at Scott and Rally did the same. Scott smiled, taking the hint to demonstrate his powers. He closed his eyes and removed his sunglasses. The young girl watched intently, as he peeked open one of his eyes and let out a red laser blast that shot into the wall. He immediately shut his eye and put his sunglasses back on, not wanting to destroy anything further.
Both men looked at Rally. Her mouth was gaping open and she was staring at the hole he had created and the smoke coming from it.
"So that's why you wear sunglasses all the time." She said understandingly.
Scott chuckled. "Yeah."
"Alright, enough messing around." Jean said motherly. "Come on, Rally, let's get that arm cleaned out and bandaged."
The brown-haired girl walked over to Jean who was standing by a table with a needle in hand. Jean saw the fear in her eyes at the sight of the needle.
"It'll only hurt for a second, Rally. You'll be fine." She smiled.
Rally hoisted herself up on the table. "Okay." She said not really believing the telepath.
"Boys, would you mind leaving? I'm going to give Rally a full inspection after this to make sure she has no other serious injuries and I doubt she wants men in the room."
Both of the men looked at Jean and each other embarrassedly. "Oh, uh, yeah. We're leaving now." Scott said.
The two girls watched as Scott and Kurt hurriedly walked out of the room. Jean laughed and rolled her eyes. "Men."
"Yeah." Rally giggled in agreement.
"So," The red head talked as she cleaned up the young girl's injuries, "Tomorrow we'll go shopping for clothing so you have something to wear, but in the meantime, you can get a shower and we'll find you something clean to sleep in."
"Sounds good." Rally replied and smiled. She liked Jean. She never had a mother or a motherly figure in her life and she wasn't even sure what having a mom felt like. All she ever had were men in her life. Tough, emotionless men, but now, the young girl had a woman to talk to, someone who could help her with her girl problems.
Rally's train of thought was broken as she flinched, feeling pain of the needle penetrate her skin. "What is that?" She asked, referring to the fluid in the needle.
"It's infection fighting chemicals. It will kill any bacterium that has gotten into your body already and it will form a barrier, protecting your wounds from more bacteria entering them."
"It sure does hurt."
"It will go away once all the bacteria is dead, Rally. Don't worry." Jean reassured. "I'm going to bandage you up as a precautionary measure. I don't want anything interrupting the healing process."
"Okay." The girl said, trying to hide her pain.
In a few minutes, Rally's entire upper arm was covered in white bandages.
"That should do it." Jean said as she finished. "Now, I just want to check the rest of your body for anything else that needs attention."
"Alright." Rally said.
She sat patiently as the red head looked her over.
"Rally, what are these marks?" Jean traced over four scratches running down the girl's entire back.
The woman felt the young girl's emotions twist as she remembered another painful memory.
"They're from long ago." She said.
"What did this to you?" Jean asked with concern and curiosity.
"Sabretooth. It was the first time he came." Rally replied.
Jean looked at her with confusion. "The first time? You mean today was not your first encounter with him?"
Rally shook her head. "No."
"I have to inform the Professor." Jean took off her white doctor's coat and hung it up. "Why don't you go get a shower, Rally, and later, I'll be by with some clean clothes for you to sleep in."
"Alright." Rally said, hopping down off the table. Jean was already out the door before the young girl could ask her how to get back to the dorm area. Since Kurt had teleported them there, she really had no idea where she was in relation to her room. The Professor had left the medical center out of the small tour her had given her.
Uncertain of which way to go, Rally wandered down the hallway and made a couple turns but only ended up in unfamiliar territory.
"You lost, kid?"
Relief filled Rally as she turned around to face Wolverine. Of course, she wasn't entirely comfortable around him since there only two encounters had been tense, but she was happy to find someone who knew their way around the mansion and could get her back to her room.
"Kind of." She laughed weakly.
"You are. Come on. Follow me." He said and began walking. Obediently, Rally followed in silence.
Wolverine could feel the young girl's unease around him and it made him feel a little remorse. This was his….daughter and she was uptight around him.
Trying to make Rally feel comfortable, Wolverine asked, "So, how you feeling, kid?"
"Fine." She said.
Logan turned around and raised his eyebrow at her, "Fine?" That's when he noticed the bandages. He stopped walking completely, feeling instant anger at whoever had done this to his daughter. It surprised Wolverine at his instant protectiveness over this girl who he had just found out was his kid. "What happened to your arm?" Logan asked, trying to hide his anger, but Rally noticed it. He could not hide it well.
She was a little scared by his change of emotion. "It's…it's nothing. I just got a scratch."
"Just a scratch takes that much bandaging?" He asked, suppressing his anger, seeing as Rally was even more uneasy.
"Jean wanted to make sure it didn't get infected." She explained, not wanting the mutant to worry.
Realizing he wouldn't know how bad it was unless he talked to someone else, Logan asked, "Who did this to you?"
"The mutant…the mutant you saved me from." She said timidly.
Wolverine growled at the thought of his brother. Then next time he met up with Sabretooth, he was going to pay for what he had done. How dare he even touch his daughter or inflict pain on her?
"Logan?" Rally said, snapping him out of his vengeful trance. The young girl had no clue what was going on. All she knew was that out of the blue, this man had gotten very upset and it had to do with her injuries.
"Yeah, kid?" He replied calmer, seeing her small face filled with concern and fear.
"Is everything okay?" She asked, becoming less tense as she saw him returning to normal.
"Yeah." He attempted a smile but failed. "Let's go." Logan commanded, turning around. He led Rally in silence to the bottom of the giant staircase leading up to where the students resided.
"Thank you." Rally said graciously. Without Wolverine, she would probably still be lost.
"Don't mention it, kid." He responded and watched as the young girl, his young girl headed up the stairs to her room.
End of Chapter
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