Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters, settings, or worlds within this work, outside of a few OC's. Any recognizable characters are not mine; I'm just playing with them. Harry Potter and its associated works belongs to J.K. Rowling. X-men and Marvel belongs to... er... Disney, I suppose? I am not making any money off of this fan work, nor do I wish to.

Chapter 9

Reflections

The Great Hall was particularly noisy this morning. The revelations of the day were ripe with potential for gossip and speculation- who was a mutant, who couldn't possibly be a mutant, what exactly made someone a mutant, and so on. There was a bit of a fuss at the Ravenclaw table, with some of the students clustered around one of the girls, and the rest of them cloistered pointedly away from her, but Draco didn't notice. At the moment, he was a bit preoccupied with his own problems.

Draco was trying to focus on his breakfast, but it was a bit difficult when it felt like everyone was staring at him. While this was probably an exaggeration, it didn't really seem like one when every time he turned, or looked up, or shifted a bit in his seat, he noticed someone quickly shifting their gaze away from him.

Even the Slytherins, though they hid it better.

The scrutiny unnerved him, made him feel uncomfortable in his own skin, though he did his best to avoid showing it. He only hoped he didn't have another accident- not yet, so soon after yesterday...

He was startled out of his thoughts when out of the corner of his eye, he noticed movement in the doorway of the Great Hall. He glanced up on reflex just in time to see Potter, Weasley, and Longbottom enter and make a beeline for the Gryffindor table. Potter caught Draco watching, and met his eyes for a moment on his way to the table. Draco made sure to give him his best sneer, and Potter rolled his eyes, turning back to his Lion friends.

Funnily enough, this was the most normal interaction he had during breakfast. Oh, his friends tried, he'd give them credit for that, but the fact of the matter was that Draco was one thing yesterday morning, and another thing this morning. Regardless of whether or not they cared about his... mutation, it was still a bit of a shift in your view of a person when they started shooting things out of their arms.

His fingers shifted a bit, out of the blue, and he tensed up momentarily, staring at the shimmering-silver hand holding his fork. After a few seconds, the skin shifted back to its normal color and texture, and he relaxed. He looked around to see if anyone had noticed, and- yep, that was all the younger Slytherins gawking at his hand, while his year-mates tried to pretend disinterest.

Oh, he was so done with this. He wolfed down his breakfast as quickly as he could without resorting to barbaric table manners, grabbed his school things, and left early for his first class.

While I've got the time, I should try to figure out what I'm going to say to Father. It's about time I wrote him about this situation. He can help. He always helps...

Maybe he'll have some advice on how I ought to approach something like... this.

Though, now that he thought about it, Draco rather doubted that his father had ever had to deal with suddenly manifesting a strange, confusing power in front of half his year during the middle of class and throwing the entire school into chaos...

Perhaps I should wait a bit on that letter to Father. Just until I have a better grasp on things.

It wouldn't do to present myself as incapable of handling my own magic, after all... even if Severus says it's not really magic.

Harry decided not to tell Hermione at breakfast, despite Ron's nudging. He didn't want to talk about it right there at the Gryffindor table and risk everyone else overhearing him. So he figured he'd do the next best thing, and talk with her in-between classes.

Harry and Neville had developed a plan during a whispered conversation right before their 9 o'clock lesson. It was even a good plan, they thought.

Neville wanted Hermione to know about his mutation, since she knew the most about the subject out of everyone in Gryffindor, and had helped him out the other day, and didn't have any grudges against mutants. He figured it would be good if another person knew about him in case anything went wrong. But he didn't want to explain it to her himself and have to deal with the inevitable slough of questions she was bound to fling at him, at least not until later. He wanted time to mentally prepare himself for the maelstrom that was Hermione on an intellectual mission.

Harry, on the other hand, wanted to tell Professor McGonagall about his own mutant status, because he would prefer that she find out now through official matters rather than later on when Harry inevitably accidentally outed himself someday- knowing his luck, it was pretty likely to happen. The problem was, he knew going to see McGonagall right after all the Houses had been given The Mutant Talk would certainly make the Hogwarts Gossip Mill more likely to natter on about him, rather than less. Suddenly choosing to write a letter when Harry had never had anyone to write to would be just as noticeable. And until he inevitably gave himself away, he wanted to avoid any unwanted attention of the gossipy sort. He'd had enough of that last year what with the "Heir of Slytherin" business.

So, the two of them had agreed that Neville would stay after Herbology and talk to Professor Sprout, which was hardly unusual for him, and explain about Harry at the same time he explained about himself, while Harry did the same with Hermione. That way, Professor Sprout could tell McGonagall about the two of them without everyone and their mother knowing about it, and they wouldn't both have to talk about it multiple times in one day.

And so, it was Harry's job to corner Hermione. Except, it was proving surprisingly difficult to locate her.

It took him the better part of an hour, and there were a few times he almost decided to just give up and drag her into a corner after dinner. But he managed to find her eventually.

She was in the library surrounded by textbooks. He should have known. Even if she hadn't taken on more classes than a college double major, she liked to hang out in the library in her off time. Harry knew this. It really should have been the first place he looked.

Oh well. He's here now, isn't he?

He shifted his gaze around the room as he headed towards her table, making sure no one was nearby. She didn't notice his approach, nose buried in her Arithmancy book. "Hello, Hermione. Haven't seen you all day outside of class."

She jumped. "Harry! Hello. I've got a lot of homework, so I came here to get started on it, and- did you need something, Harry?"

"Er, well..." Harry hadn't expected to get an opening so quickly; now he had to figure out what to say. "Um. Yes, actually. I... There's something..." He lowered his voice. "You know how the teachers told everyone about mutants this morning?"

Hermione raised an eyebrow. "Of course I know, Harry, we were all there. What of it?"

"Well... I would've said something at breakfast, but, er. Too many people. Didn't want to risk someone hearing me talk about it-"

Hermione froze, connections seeming to form in her mind, and she suddenly put her book down and turned to face him directly. "Yes?"

He braced himself, "Ron and Neville already know this, because I told them right after the meeting... but you weren't there so I couldn't tell you at the time, you know? So-"

She leaned forward expectantly. "Yes?"

He cleared his throat. "I'm a mutant."

Even though she'd obviously been expecting it, her eyes widened with excitement. "Really?"

"Really."

"You're seriously a mutant."

Harry nodded.

"Show me," she said.

Harry blinked at her, then coughed. "Eh... Hermione, I don't... I shouldn't use my powers in here if I can help it. They aren't exactly... indoor friendly, you know? I took enough of a risk this morning with Ron and Neville-"

"You showed Ron and Neville your pow-?!"

Harry clapped a hand over her mouth. "Scream my mutant status a little louder, why don't you," he hissed, "I don't think they could quite hear you in the dungeons."

Hermione had the grace to look abashed. "Sorry," she whispered.

Harry sat back. "To answer your question... Yes, I showed Ron and Neville. Neville had just told us about his being a mutant himself-"

Hermione gasped and placed a hand over her own mouth to prevent another outburst.

Harry smirked. "Yes, he's a mutant, too. It's got something to do with plants- He asked me to tell you for him."

Hermione nodded. "Of course. I was beginning to suspect something yesterday... but I was so caught up with Malfoy being confirmed as a mutant, and then my classes... Well, you know."

Harry snickered. "I know. I should probably let you get back to work, then, huh? Since you're taking so many classes and all."

Hermione looked to her pile of books. She sighed, and nodded. "That would probably be a good idea..." She turned back to him sharply. "But you're showing me later." Her tone brooked no argument.

Harry gave her a nod. "Yeah. I'll show you later."

As the third-year Gryffindor/Hufflepuff Herbology class ended and students filed out of the greenhouse, Neville stayed behind, pretending to have tripped (it wasn't hard) and taking his time picking up his spilled things. Finally, everyone had left except for Neville, and Professor Sprout, who was checking over a few of the plants that hadn't quite gotten the correct treatment.

He was so nervous. Even though this is what the teachers had told him to do, he still worried a bit about how this meeting was going to go. How would the professor take it? Would she still want him in her greenhouses, knowing he could mess with any plant he wanted? Knowing he might accidentally mess the whole thing up? The prospect was daunting. Herbology was his favorite subject- he didn't want to have to stop taking it just because of his mutation... though he'd understand if they did decide to take him out of it. Hard to properly teach a class if the subject of the lesson plan accidentally gets messed up, after all...

Come on, Neville, you'll just work yourself up like this- and then where will you be? You'll be making your own fears come true if your powers act up when you could have prevented it by staying calm...

He took a deep breath, let it out, took in another... I can do this...

He swallowed hard and walked up to where the Professor was studying the underside of a leaf. "Professor Sprout?"

She looked up. "Why hello, Mr. Longbottom. Need help with something? You understand your homework alright?"

He nodded, paused, frowned, shook his head, paused again- "Uh.."

Professor Sprout waited patiently for him to make up his mind. Neville fidgeted in place, but managed to get out- "Can I show you something, Professor? Er. Outside, I mean?"

"You want to show me something?"

He nodded slowly at first, then more firmly a second time as he confirmed his resolve. "Yes, ma'am. Outside."

"Well alright, then." She followed Neville over the grounds until they reached a point where he felt they were far enough away to avoid any affect he might have on the greenhouse plants. They stopped. Professor Sprout looked around. "So, what was it you wanted me to see?"

Neville shuffled his feet, studying his shoes for a moment, then pulled out a clover leaf he'd slipped into his pocket earlier. He was going to take a page out of Harry's book and put on a bit of a show. "Watch." He nudged the leaf, and it began to grow, first growing a stem and several new leaves before suddenly speeding up even further and bursting into a full-size plant. He managed to slow it down before it grew too big for him to hold, but by the time he was done, the plant was sporting a plethora of large, plump clover flowers.

Oops, didn't mean to make quite so many, he thought. Oh well- it'll certainly explain what I'm trying to say, that's for sure. He turned from the clump of clover in his hand back to the Professor. She had a hand over her mouth in surprise.

Then her sense of professionalism caught up with her, and she stood up straight. "Are you showing me this because you think you might be a mutant?"

He smiled slightly. "I know I'm a mutant, Professor."

Professor Sprout blinked. "You know you're a mutant? What makes you so sure?"

"Oh, well... You see, it's- well, it's a bit hard to explain, but... it just... it doesn't feel like magic, see, doing-" he waved his clover- "this. It might not make much sense to someone who's not a mutant, but... it's just... different. You can just tell. When we had that meeting with Professor McGonagall this morning? A lot of things suddenly clicked into place. I knew I'd finally found the answers I've been looking for, ever since I discovered I could do this."

Professor Sprout nodded. "I see. Alright. I will inform the other Heads of House, and we will hold a meeting some time next week with you and any other students who come forward with mutant abilities. Thank you for coming to me with this- I know it can't have been the easiest thing."

"Thank you, Professor. There's just one more thing."

"What's that, young man?"

"It's Harry, ma'am. He's a mutant, too."

"Harry- you mean- Harry Potter?"

Neville nodded. "Yeah. He wanted to tell the teachers, but he didn't want to look suspicious talking to Professor McGonagall, so he asked me to explain for him."

"Oh." She blinked. Good heavens. Of all the people. "Well. Now you've told me, I suppose. I'll make sure I tell Professor McGonagall, don't worry."

Cedric stared down at his parchment during free time after his first afternoon class, idly shifting it around with his mind, while pretending to do so with his fingers. He had found, over the summer, that if he concentrated on making one or two specific things float on purpose, he'd have less trouble with making it happen accidentally. Of course, he was trying to write on this parchment, not play with it, but he wasn't sure how to start this letter just yet, so idle fiddling with the parchment it was.

He was trying to decide what to say to Professor Sprout.

It wasn't as if he was afraid, or ashamed or anything- he was perfectly fine with the professors being aware that he was a mutant (and what a weird thought that still was). In fact, it was rather nice to finally have a name to put to this odd thing he could do. And he was going to tell Professor Sprout, he really was... it's just... it's just...

Well, this whole thing was kind of embarrassing. He's not been oblivious to the confusion in his house towards all his little accidents- he sees their annoyed expressions, he hears them groaning as yet another small item is not where they had just put it. But at least, up until now, he's been able to hide behind his anonymity. But after that meeting this morning, everyone in Hufflepuff knew they had a mutant in the House. They just didn't know who it was. And now, it was up to him to decide to tell someone about it.

He sighed, and twirled his parchment again.

Suddenly, something occurred to him. It would be embarrassing writing a letter to Professor Sprout, sure... but it wouldn't be quite as embarrassing if he wrote the letter to one of the other House Heads...

Severus Snape walked into the staff room to the sight of Minerva McGonagall sitting before a pile of letters with her head in her hands.

"Am I to assume by your reaction that your students' performance in class is singularly deplorable, or is this somehow related to the mutant situation?" he asked, pausing to glance down at one letter that had particularly poor handwriting.

She raised her head and stared off into the distance. "The latter, I'm afraid."

"Surely there aren't this many mutants walking the halls- we certainly would have noticed something much sooner if that were the case."

"No, Severus, these letters aren't from students claiming that they're mutants."

He raised an eyebrow. "Who are they from, then?"

"They're letters from students who are making claims that other students must be mutants. Some of them show sound reasoning, despite the apparent invasion of privacy. Others, well..." She plucked a letter from the pile and handed it over to him. "See for yourself."

With some degree of wariness, he opened the letter and read. It was a second-year Gryffindor girl from a pureblood family who claimed that her best friend must be a mutant because "whenever we go out shopping, she always picks out things that are in red. And she's always wearing something with red, when she can get away with it. I think she must have some sort of mutation that gives her a connection with the color red, or maybe the color red makes her stronger, or something!"

Severus snorted. "Has this girl ever thought to ask her friend what her favorite color happens to be?"

Minerva shook her head. "Even if she did, it's likely she would take the answer as proving her hypothesis, rather than the other way around."

Severus glanced at the pile. "Are they all like this?"

"All of the genuinely outlandish ones, yes."

"Hmm."

They stayed in silence for a moment contemplating the intricacies of youth's imagination. Eventually, Severus broke it.

"So, ridiculous claims about fellow classmates aside... Have any of the letters been genuine?"

"We've had two letters from students who say they have mutant abilities. The first was sent to Professor Flitwick, and is from a seventh-year Ravenclaw named Tony Kettleburn, who says he doesn't need any help with his mutation, but wished to inform us regardless."

"What are his reasons for saying he requires no assistance?"

"Apparently, all his mutation does is give him exceptionally good balance, a tail similar to that of a house-cat, and night-vision."

Severus raised an eyebrow. "Are we certain this isn't merely the result of a transfiguration or transformation potion gone wrong?"

"He brought up the same in his letter- he says the tail started growing in over the summer when he turned twelve, and he never once came into contact with any form of magic during that time period."

"Muggleborn?"

"Half-blood. His wizard-father died when he was young."

"Ah. Who else has come forward?"

"Cedric Diggory wrote to me- it was the one letter in my entire stack that didn't claim someone else was a mutant- and said he has some sort of ability to telekinetically move very specific types of objects. He admitted to being too embarrassed about it to talk-or apparently, write- to Professor Sprout directly, which is why he wrote to me."

Severus rolled his eyes. Minerva continued with her list.

"Luna Lovegood confessed to Professor Flitwick the moment the House Meeting was over that she is able to see magic in a way he's never heard of anyone doing before, and she can mentally communicate with magical creatures. Flitwick says she has been able to verify her claim, though he hasn't gone into the details. Neville Longbottom visited Professor Sprout today after his Herbology class was completed. It seems he is the one behind the mysteriously advanced plants.

And then there's also-" She paused, and gave Severus a calculating look.

Severus frowned at her. "There's also who?"

Minerva watched his face carefully. "When Neville came to see Pomona, he also stated that he had been asked by another student to inform us of their mutation, as the student did not wish to risk incurring gossip by either coming to see one of us, or by writing a letter to us so soon after the meeting."

Severus wondered why she didn't just state it outright, as she had with the others. There was really no reason for it, unless...

Unless she thought he would react badly.

The thought rose unbidden, as he suddenly recalled yet another important thing about mutants.

Mutations tend to be genetic. If a mutant and a normal human have a child, the likelihood of the child being a mutant is so astronomically high that it would be far more surprising if they weren't.

He grimaced. "You are referring to Potter."

She blinked in surprise. "You knew?"

"I surmised the answer based on your apparent unwillingness to say the name of the person you were talking about."

"Ah."

Severus sighed. "So. What new abilities should I be watching out for if I'm to protect the Potter boy from himself?"

"Mr. Longbottom says it's got something to do with wind."

"Of course it does," muttered Severus to himself. Because of course Potter would end up with some variation on his mother's mutation.

The boy seemed to live to torment him, after all.

Author's Note:

Draco is kind of amusing me at the moment because he doesn't realize there really are other mutants besides him, so he's feeling a bit singled out and having a pity-party of one.

I'm not 100% happy with this chapter. I mean, I don't hate it or anything- I like the individual scenes just fine- but I feel like there's something that needs to be added or changed that would make it better. Like when you're cooking and you feel like there's a spice missing or something. But I'm not going to worry about it too much. I might come back to this chapter and change something eventually, (if anyone has suggestions, let me know) but for now... onward! hehe

I didn't realize this until after I wrote it into the chapter, but I'm pretty sure the whole "red making a person stronger" idea subconsciously came from a movie I watched about a decade ago called... uh... I think it was "superfuzz" or something. *looks it up* yeah, it's called superfuzz.

It's about a guy who gets these superpowers from some sort of nuclear exposure (just like in all the comic books, right?) except his powers have one weakness. The color red. He has the ability to fly, super strength, x-ray vision, controlling people's movements, walking on water, running super fast, etc... but if he sees the color red, it's an instant power-off switch. What I was joking about in the second-year's letter is basically the reverse version of that, and I didn't even realize it at the time, haha.

Just to clarify, no, that girl is not a mutant who gets stronger from the color red. The letter was intended to be an example of a ridiculous idea, and therefore the person writing the letter has to be incorrect or else it doesn't work as such an example.

That would be pretty cool/fun, though... a person getting superpowers from a certain color... I'll have to keep that in mind if I ever write another X-men crossover...

By the way, does anyone have an explanation for why I have fewer views on chapter seven than I do on chapter 8? Because that's just confusing.