I don't own X-men, but regardless the original characters that I'll be using in here do belong to me.

Time for the battle of wills! Woot! Who will come up on top this time, Naomi, or daddy?

Chapter 42

"We don't have time for this Naomi," Her dad stated, "get in the car, or we're going to miss our flight."

"Rune want's to embed small rocks in your dad's car's tires." Emily stated mentally to her. "I'll just tell him to wait on that one, shall I?"

She reached back and gave Rune's hand a squeeze, "Why do you think I'm here dad?"

"You're uncle's deluded you into thinking your a mutant," He said sharply, "Naomi, you're just a sick kid, you're not a mutant, now get in the car and we'll get out of here and you'll never have to see any of these people again."

Naomi could see her mom sitting in the front seat of the car, she smiled and waved from within at her daughter. She looked the same as when she'd left, a few more gray hairs in the straight dark brown pile down her shoulders. Her dad still looked exactly the same, dark eyes, dark hair and scowling. He climbed out of the car and slammed the door. She managed to suppress the slight flinch. "Naomi, do you want to make this into a fight? You know how this ends."

"Not this time." Naomi stated. She could sense others watching from windows all over the building. She swallowed, performance pressure much? She thought to herself. "I know you don't want to hear it, but what you said I'm not, is exactly what I am. I'm a mutant."

He shook his head, "They've brain washed you Naomi, you're not a mutant. They're freaks all of them."

The ground trembled slightly. She glanced over her shoulder at Rune, his jaw was clenched and his hands in fists at his sides.

"Then I'm a freak." Naomi stated, "and proud of it." She took a breath and raised a hand in his direction. His shadow peeled up off the ground and came to stand directly before him. "I'm a mutant, or can you do that?"

"Someone else is doing that Naomi, they're just making you think you can do this thing." He waved a hand at his standing shadow, it crossed its arms and shook its head at her father. It slapped him across the face once, shocked he stumbled back a step. The shadow dropped.

"I'm the one who's been training, I'm the one who has been going to bed exhausted some nights while I try and grasp something new about my powers. No one can do what I can do." She stated loudly. "You can't do anything to me anymore!"

He walked up the stairs, "You are my daughter, you are coming with us if you want to or not!" He grabbed for her arm.

She braced herself, closed her eyes and exhaled.

His hand went through her arm, he stumbled forward a step and nearly collided with Naomi. Moments later her image dissolved completely into shadows and fell into the ground.

"Four seconds," Naomi said appearing on the driveway behind her father, every inch of visible skin was shimmering, ebony black, "Damn, I was hoping it would hold for a little longer than that."

He spun to face her. "What... how...?" He walked several steps toward Naomi, she vanished before he set foot on the final step, she came back up behind Rune. "Cut this out Naomi!"

She laughed, "Did you know, the word 'shadow' has several different meanings." She leaned on Rune, he was surprised at the heat coming off her skin he reduced the gravity pressing on her hoping to make anything easier for her. "There's the black things that follow you everywhere, shadow also means to follow, but it also means to imitate. Someone said to me recently that the appearance that is on the outside of me is just a defense, a shield against the world. So that made me wonder, was it just imitating what everyone else looked like and making something to look like some combination of what I look like, and what the world wants me to look like? So I figured, maybe I can separate the two." She sighed and stood up straight, "It only lasts four seconds though, its rather unfortunate."

Her head hurt. She didn't know how much longer she could even stay on her feet, even with Rune trying to help. The door opened, Curse, Rael and Hart came out. "You know, you shouldn't of said anything about us being freaks, this is a school full of them, and I've made lots of friends."

His jaw was set, he walked up toward her again. "I hope you enjoyed making a sick girl think she's a freak, you'll be hearing from my lawyers I'll have restraining orders against every single one of you."

"Actually, Brett," Beast came walking out followed by Storm who's attention immediately went to Naomi, she looked about to collapse, the longer she stood the less shimmering her skin was doing. "You'll be hearing from her lawyer first."

"What the hell are you talking about, her lawyer?" Brett demanded.

Naomi took to sitting on the steps. Rune picked her up. "Good job," he said softly. "you delayed him just enough."

She smiled, "Oh good, can I go downstairs now, I think I over did it by a lot."

Beast was speaking all kinds of legal jargon while handing her father a court signed document, a custody hearing. Until the date Naomi would be remaining at the school, then she'd be in state custody until the judge made a decision. She smiled and closed her eyes as she was carried back into the school.

Yeah! You've all been so patience with my lack of updates, and you're lucky that I knew how this one was going to go so you get a second update! Yay for legal jargon!