Hey, here's chapter 27! Enjoy!
Laurien awoke abruptly to the sound of scratching on the solid oak door to her bedroom. She raised her heavy head up off the desk covered in nursing course papers, upon which she'd fallen asleep, only to frown when she noticed that something was stuck to her cheek. She carefully removed the page from her skin, wincing as it felt like ripping off a bandage. She set it down before her on the desk, smiling sleepily as she recognized the bright faces of the Fleischers in the glossy photo, now a happy little family of three.
Adela and Franz held their daughter between them where they sat snuggled up in their bed. Saskia was absolutely gorgeous, her big brown eyes nearly dwarfing the rest of her beaming face as her tiny hand, no bigger than a daisy, held onto Franz's fingers.
The photo had accompanied a letter that Laurien had only received yesterday, consisting of Adela apologizing for how long it had taken for her to write and send the photo, seeing as Saskia had been born in early March and the late fall winds were currently sweeping through the fields surrounding the Xavier mansion.
"The new tenants of your house are a right menace." Adela wrote in loopy letters, making Laurien smirk as if she could actually hear her friend's voice exaggerating every syllable. "They have barely even said hello, and they play their music without ceasing the entire night, to the point that I sometimes wonder how many record player needles they go through in a week."
The letter would continue for at least five pages, front and back, before it ended on a sad note, with Adela revealing that her mother had died of a heart attack back in June. "I know I gave her a lot of flack, but I really do miss her. And I miss you too, Laur. Please come visit soon, Saskia needs to meet her godmother some time before she turns thirty."
This last part had taken Laurien by surprise. "Godmother." She murmured as she reread the sentence, wondering if she'd read it wrong the first time, but there it was, clearly written in the blue inked looped letters of Adela's hand.
She was flattered, of course, but even the thought of taking on a role that even included the word 'mother' in its title, completely terrified her. Besides, she wasn't even quite sure how the godmother thing even worked, or if it even applied to them, seeing as neither Laurien, nor the Fleishers were Christian.
Laurien placed the photo carefully in the corner of a picture frame that held the picture of Dan sitting asleep in his uniform, one of the items that she'd brought back with her from Belgium.
The nightmares had lessened considerably since returning from Ypres, but still made themselves known on an unpredictable basis. She'd be lying if she said that the memories of her past didn't still bother her in her waking hours as well, seeing as she'd almost accidentally dislocated Sean's arm last month. He had made the mistake of sneaking up behind her, wearing a Halloween mask that he'd bought when they'd gone out with the students to get costumes. She'd scared the hell out of Sean and the five kids when she'd pinned Sean up against the wall of the store with his arm yanked up behind his back, nearly pulling it out of the socket.
Laurien shook her head to rid herself of the memory, and got out of her chair to investigate the scratching sound at the door. She had just turned the handle when it suddenly flew wide open as Shasta threw her weight at the door, bounding into Laurien's room happily with her tongue lolling out of her mouth.
Shasta had almost grown to Laurien's mid thigh, big enough to push her over if she wanted immediate snuggles. Laurien was always forced to comply, seeing as Shasta would sit on her and refuse to get up until she did so. The pup had also become quite a hit with the students, constantly convincing them to abandon everything they were doing to either pat her or play outside with her, which would sometimes become a problem if they were supposed to be studying or eating.
"Hi, Shazzie." Laurien cooed as the red furred dog jumped up onto her bed, only to leap into Laurien's arms unexpectedly and lick her face repeatedly until her cheeks were shining with drool. "Oh, God, you need a mint." She muttered, wiping her face on her shirt sleeve.
Laurien proceeded to carry Shasta out into the hallway as the pup rested her head on her shoulder. Laurien had caught on to the fact that Shasta did this whenever she felt a storm coming, while on some other occasions, she would jump onto Charles' lap and let the soft electric buzz of his wheelchair lull her to sleep. Charles didn't seem to mind, in fact he would let some of the younger students have rides on his wheelchair. The most recent of these instances took place the day before in the kitchen when Laurien and Alex were making breakfast. It usually ended in something rather large and expensive looking getting toppled over and a fit of laughter breaking out.
Laurien carried Shasta all the way down to her classroom, where she was almost run into by three of her students who'd sprinted around the corner.
"Oh, sorry, Miss Van Tiel." The purple haired boy apologized.
"That's all right, Silas." She said kindly as she struggled to keep Shasta from wriggling out of her arms, before eventually lowering her to the ground so she could receive her pats from the students. "Where are you three going so quickly?"
"We were actually looking for you." Peggy replied, the eldest of the three. "We got our Frisbee stuck on the roof."
Laurien couldn't help but smile. "Again?"
They nodded bashfully and led her outside to where they had lost the Frisbee. Laurien could just see the edge of the yellow disk peaking out from the roof, and it took her all of two seconds to grab onto it with her powers and lower it into Silas' hands as Connie, the youngest of the three siblings, clapped her hands excitedly. Laurien knew that it wouldn't be long before she was called out there again, seeing as Connie's super strength, and admittedly terrible aim, meant that a lot of things would be displaced upon the roof in the near future.
Once they'd gotten Cerebro back online, the Williams siblings had been first on the list, seeing as they lived less than an hour away in Hackensack, New Jersey, and therefore became the first they'd paid a visit to on their quest for students. They had been the only mutant siblings that Laurien had ever heard of, though they quickly learned of more as they continued down the list.
They had around twelve students so far, without including Laurien and the others, and of varying ages. The youngest, Connie, was only six, and the eldest, Gordon, was due to have his sixteenth birthday in a month. Even though Laurien had initially thought that Charles would've been disappointed with their small numbers, she was pleased to feel the strong waves of hope and pride emitting from him at the fact that their school was in business, making Laurien feel giddy in turn as the second hand excitement mixed with her own.
"I'll admit, I'm rather frightened as well." He'd stated gently, squeezing her hand in an effort to quell her anxiety the day prior to the students' arrivals. "Every time I think about it, I keep imagining the entire mansion just bursting into a catastrophe of flames, burning down to nothing cinders and ash." He chuckled, but then spotted the look on her face and moved on from his statement as quickly as he could. "But then again, it could go absolutely wonderfully. Think of all the students that could walk these halls, everything that they could learn from us, and what we could learn from them. All of it going towards a brighter future for both human and mutant kind."
Laurien gave him a small smile, feeling the majority of her worries melt away for the time being, an effect that he always seemed to give her when they were together.
Despite feeling quite content with her life at Westchester since returning from Ypres, something still bothered her. One of the first things that Laurien talked to Charles about once they were alone was the photo. She'd pulled the piece of frayed paper from her pocket and given it to him, watching his face carefully as his blue eyes searched the photo.
To her utter disappointment, he didn't react. "I'm sorry, I don't recognize her." He'd said, holding the photo delicately.
She had frowned and opened up her mouth to explain what she'd seen in the vision when he'd touched her on the beach, but suddenly found that she couldn't remember what she was going to say. Severely annoyed and feeling rather out of sorts, she had instead decided to go unpack her things, heading down the hallway and in the meanwhile, involuntarily forgetting about the photo.
After helping the kids get their Frisbee, Laurien walked back to her classroom with Shasta following right on her heels, wanting to prepare herself for her upcoming English and French classes that afternoon. While she had recently recommenced the process of completing her degree at the local nursing college, she'd also agreed to teach a few classes at the mansion. At the beginning, it had been quite a lot of responsibilities on her plate, but as the semester went on, she found them progressively easier to juggle.
In fact, Laurien quite enjoyed teaching. She loved interacting with the students, devising fun and informative activities for them to try out, and especially the sensation of joy and triumph that warmed Laurien's heart when a student successfully grasped a difficult concept. The realization of her affinity for teaching had then sent Laurien into a spiral of doubt regarding what her true passion in life would be, and made her wonder if she was actually wasting her time at nursing school.
When Laurien had brought this up in the hallway between classes a few weeks ago, Hank and Charles quickly assuaged her fears by assuring her that this was quite a normal phenomenon for an individual in their early twenties to experience.
"I can recall a particularly dark period at Oxford where I almost completely scrapped my entire graduate thesis and considered switching over into bioengineering. I mean… can you believe that? Of all things, bioengineering?" Charles chuckled, shaking his head, before then tossing an apologetic glance behind him to Hank who was pushing his wheelchair. "No offense, old chap. I know you enjoy that sort."
Hank's nose simply twitched in response, eliciting a small smirk from Laurien.
"The point I'm trying to convey, Laurien, is that what you are feeling is normal. Everyone has doubted their path at one point or another, and in your case, it's okay if you finish the nursing program and then discover that you'd actually like to try something else. There's no such thing as wasting your time while pursuing any kind of education." Charles declared, his words admittedly making Laurien feel significantly better.
Charles had just opened his mouth to speak again, when suddenly the sound of a muffled boom emerged from down the hall, prompting him to sigh. "And while the students explore and learn to control their mutations, it doesn't hurt to have someone with medical knowledge around."
Laurien had finished preparing her lessons and was currently only half way through correcting the students' quizzes when Charles rolled through the door to the classroom, holding two cups of tea in his hands.
"Here we are." He said, smiling as he handed her one of the cups. "English Breakfast, milk, two sugar, just as you like it."
"Oh, thank you, Charles." She murmured gratefully as the heat from the cup warmed her aching hands. "This is just what I needed."
"I know." Charles grinned slyly as he took a sip from his cup.
Laurien scoffed playfully, narrowing her eyes at him as she unconsciously studied the way that a small curl of hair fell effortlessly onto his forehead.
"How many more of those have you got?" He asked, nodding his head toward the quizzes.
She sighed before setting her cup down on her desk and running a hand tiredly through her long wavy hair. "Maybe seven, but it shouldn't take too much longer."
"What's on today's schedule?"
"I was hoping to get started on To Kill A Mockingbird with the older children, and then read some poetry with the younger ones."
"Perfect, which poet will you read to them? E.E. Cummings? Edgar Allan Poe?"
She blushed. "Doctor Seuss."
Charles stared at her for a moment before nodding. "That's a good choice, I can see the great benefits in his work." He stated kindly, but she wasn't having any of it.
"Oh, please shut up, you're such a terrible liar." She chided, laughing as she smacked his arm. "What I don't understand is why you have me teaching English when it isn't even my first language."
"But you're so good at it!" He exclaimed, his blue eyes widening. "Besides, how many languages is it now? Four? Five?"
It was actually six, now that she'd properly brushed up on her German to the point of fluency, but she didn't mention it. She took a long sip of her tea as she pondered her options. "I don't think that Connie and Ivan would exactly appreciate Poe at their age. I don't want to add more nightmares to the ones that The Wizard of Oz has already given them."
Charles nodded absentmindedly, but then frowned. "What's wrong with The Wizard of Oz?"
She raised a questioning eyebrow at him. "What do you mean what's wrong with it? Didn't you ever watch it when you were a boy?"
"No."
"Then you will never understand how terrifying those flying monkeys are through the eyes of a child." She suddenly shivered, despite the warmth that resided in her stomach. "I didn't sleep for over a week after watching it, and the only way that I could ever get a wink was if I cuddled with the wooden bunny figure that my Opa had carved."
Charles opened his mouth, but then wisely closed it before moving on to something else. "What have you got going on this evening?" He asked, catching Laurien off guard with a sudden wave of anxiety that flowed off of him.
"Nothing really." She said truthfully, knowing that it would usually just be her either rereading Lord of the Flies to see if it would be suitable for the older students next semester, or studying for an upcoming nursing exam. "Why? What's up?"
Charles rubbed the back of his neck anxiously, letting Laurien know that whatever was weighing on his mind was heavy. "I was just wondering if, you know, you'd like to–"
He was suddenly cut off by the arrival of Alex and Hank at the door to the classroom. "Prof, Laur, you've got to see this."
"What is it?" Laurien asked, a spark of fear igniting within her at their grave expressions.
"Just come on." Alex urged, prompting Laurien and Charles to follow them to the common room where all the other students were crowded around the television set. A large CBS news bulletin had appeared on the screen, something that didn't usually show up unless something terrible had happened.
"How long has this been like this?" Charles asked.
"Only for a few seconds." Alex explained hurriedly. "We were in the middle of watching As The World Turns, naturally,"
"Naturally." Sean piped in from where he sat uncharacteristically upright in one of the armchairs.
"And then the screen just went black, and this showed up a few seconds later."
"Shush, everyone, they're starting to talk." Sean urged, leaning towards the television set.
A man's voice cut through the tense air of the common room. "Here is a news bulletin from CBS news, in Dallas, Texas, three shots were fired at President Kennedy's motorcade in downtown Dallas, and the first reports say that President Kennedy has been seriously wounded by the shooting."
There was a loud collective gasp from the room, and the students began to murmur in shock until Sean shushed them all again, allowing the authoritative voice of the newscaster to echo in their ears.
"–perhaps could be fatal. Repeating. A bulletin from CBS News, President Kennedy has been shot by a would-be assassin in Dallas, Texas. Stay tuned to CBS news for further details."
The screen then switched to a commercial where a pendulum swings back and forth until a cup of coffee suddenly comes into frame, leaving the entire room in a state of utter disbelief.
"Jesus Christ." Laurien murmured from behind her hand that she held to her mouth.
"Do they know if he was shot in the head or something?" A student asked.
"Dallas isn't all too far from here, is it?" Another commented, but before anyone else could say anything, Charles' voice rang out calmly throughout the room.
"I know you are all concerned, but I do not believe that there is anything to be afraid of, though I think that it would be best if everyone stayed inside until further notice, just as a precautionary measure."
"Can we keep watching the incoming news on the television?"
Charles paused for a moment before shaking his head. "No, but you can all listen to the news on the radio in the kitchen," In response to some disgruntled groans from the students, Charles then added, "I'm only concerned that they may share some footage from the incident, and there's no need for you all to see that. Now run along."
The students rose from their seats on the ground and the armchairs before they rushed out of the common room, leaving the adults alone to talk.
"What are we going to do?" Sean asked.
"There's nothing we can do." Laurien stated plainly, still mulling over the information in her head. "What's done is done."
"It can't be." He protested, his nose crinkling in frustration. "We're the X-Men, we save the world and stuff. That includes presidents as well."
"X-Men?" Alex repeated, unimpressed. "When did that get voted on, because I sure wasn't there."
"Look, can we focus on what's important right now?" Hank urged, running a clawed hand through his blue fur. "We need to deal with the students right now, a lot of them are probably scared and we need–"
He was cut off again by the steady voice of the newscaster suddenly speaking through the speakers of the television set, putting them all on edge. "Here is a bulletin from CBS News. We now have new information regarding the assassination attempt of President Kennedy. The Secret Service have apprehended a suspect by the name of Erik Lensherr, and–"
The sound in the room faded away the moment Laurien heard his name being uttered. She stared unseeingly at the television screen, knowing that the others were doing the same, as Erik's face appeared, with what seemed to be his passport photo. She could barely breathe. It was almost as if an elephant was sitting on her chest and wouldn't let up. Not knowing what to do, she tore her gaze from the screen and instead saw Charles' head tilt back against the headrest of his chair, looking up despairingly at the ceiling. His blue eyes then slowly rested on hers, a quiet message passing between the two of them.
Her vision flashed a sickly green as a small voice arose from the back of her head, its tone hushed and reserved, but it still spoke volumes.
"You're not surprised, are you?"
And the truth was, she wasn't.
Hope you enjoyed, we'll be soon jumping into the Days of Future Past storyline. Thanks for reading, please review!