Kid Dynamo Chapter One: Jeopardy
by Connie Hirsch

     I've always found the concept of "starting at the
beginning" to be a difficult, slippery thought, because
except for the Big Bang, something always has happened before
something else, and a "beginning" is merely an arbitrary
designation.  So I would say that events seventeen years
before my birth determined a lot of what I'll be relating
here... but then, events twenty or more years before _that_
helped to form those events, and -- well, you've got the
picture by now.

     So I'll chuck this nebulous beginning stuff and start
with something concrete, something that I did... or didn't...
do.

     It was an early October evening, and when I got off my
shift at the restaurant I decided not to spend money on the
bus but to hike the distance to the homeless shelter.  I was
_this close_ to having a downpayment for a room of my own,
not bad when you're seventeen, a runaway with a fake ID and
living by your wits.  Another shift or two of tips and I
would reach my first goal for the new life I was starting.

     I remember walking along, forcing myself to be cheerful. 
My feet hurt, and I couldn't help but wish I could fly the
rest of the distance.  Such thoughts were not helpful, or
productive, so I concentrated on noticing how the leaves were
turning, their colors fading as the twilight deepened.

     It was an urban neighborhood I was walking in, full of
families on stoops and teenagers gathered on corners trying
to look sinister.  That didn't much scare me; I blended right
in with my jeans and t-shirt -- my only waitress uniform,
which I'd bought with the last of the money I'd taken when
I'd run away, hung back in my locker.  Besides which, I knew
I could take care of myself, if it came to that.

     It must have taken several blocks for it to dawn on me
that I was being followed.  There were some horns beeping in
back of me, I turned and saw a pickup truck loudly pulling
out to pass a slow moving black car with tinted windshields,
cruising slowly down the street at walking speed.

     My mother didn't raise no fool, as they say, and unlike
most mothers, she specifically warned me about black cars
like this.  I speeded my pace a little, looking for alleys
and cross streets: and I noticed that the black car increased
its pace to match.

     I'd already passed the one alley on this long block;
doubling back was not an option.  I'd have to turn at the
corner.  I spent far too few moments trying to review what I
knew about local geography, but I had been in Pittsburgh, and
this neighborhood, for barely two weeks: I was going to have
to wing it as I went.

     I turned the corner with apparent nonchalance, giving
myself three regular steps before I broke into a run.  I
never got to take them: pulled up to the curb was another
black car, men in suits and dark glasses lounging against it
like they expected me.

     And right in my path one guy was standing.  I didn't get
to even open my mouth in surprise: he pulled out a badge and
said, "Jessica Pierce, we're here to take you into custody."

     I stared at him, horrified, my mind and heart racing. 
Flee now, and my legal condition went from simple runaway to
something a little more nebulous and _dangerous_.  Project:
Pegasus must really want to examine me... but badly enough to
set up a dragnet operation?  Something was not right here.

     While I hesitated, another guy came up behind me,
putting his hands on my upper arms.  "Everything's going to
be fine, Miss," he said politely but with a dreadful lack of
sincerity.   I didn't struggle but I stood still, resisting
his pressure.

     "I know my rights," I said.

     The first guy nodded.  He had an earclip receiver, the
cord running down to his inner jacket pocket.  "We'll read
you your rights in the car," he said.  "If you'll just get in
without a fuss, we can make this much more pleasant."

     I didn't want to get in that car; everything I knew said
this was _dangerous_.  But if I refused, I'd be in much more
trouble... I let them move me in and down.

     "What is this, the FBI?" I said as I slid across the
seat, a little off balance.  There was a cold stinging on my
upper arm and  a sharp hiss, I looked back to see the guy
next to me pull away a hypogun.  "Hey, that isn't standard
procedure..." I remember saying, and then the world grayed
out as I slumped over, all my nerves gone dead and my mind
following.

     "It is for us, mutie bitch," said a voice that I
sickeningly realized might be the last I'd ever hear.

     

     % % %

     

     But I did wake to a vague and threatening reality: there
was a helmet on me that made my head buzz unbearably: some
kind of power suppressor.  I had no idea how long I had been
out, nor eventually how long I had been hanging in chains:
I'd started blacking out from exhaustion and dehydration. 
The men who'd kidnaped me had strung me up with my arms over
my head and left me on display in a big hall where other men
in strange uniforms worriedly consulted each other over
sinister machines.  I cried, I screamed, I pleaded, and all
it got me was a beating that broke my nose and blackened my
eyes when someone finally noticed me.  To this day I don't
know what they planned to do with me, or why they put me in
chains and left me there.

     There's a word that gets thrown about a lot in regard to
pain: "excruciating."  It refers specifically to the pain of
crucifixion.  As I said, I'd been hanging in chains for two
days; my shoulders were dislocating from the weight of my
body, my wrists were ulcerated from the cuffs and I was
dehydrated -- no one had so much as looked at me in more than
a day even though I hung in full view of 40 or more men.

     I think the only thing that kept me alive by that point
was my will and my anger.  The pain was unbearable; I truly
understood what my mother had gone through in the last year
of her death.  I drifted through periods of hallucination and
relived the day of her death several times.  If I'd given up
I would have drifted off into a coma, I think.

     I thought it was another hallucination when the door of
the room blew in and a flying figure burst into the hall. 
The men commenced firing and there was lots of smoke and
noise.  I closed my eyes and wished one of the bullets would
find me and put me out of my agony.  It struck me this was my
punishment for not having the courage to end my mother's
suffering with a morphine overdose.

     I remember the noise going away and voices coming near. 
"What the tarnation is that?"  said a male voice with a
Southern accent.

     "She's hung up in chains,"  answered a female Scottish
voice, a youthful one, younger than me.  Another, older
sounding female voice answered her,  "And is she alive?"

     _Good question_,  I said to myself, and tried to open my
swollen eyes, but I could barely crack them open.  "Help me,"
I tried to say, but my throat was so dry it just sounded like
wheezes.

     "Amara, can you burn the chains?" said the male voice,
and yet another female answered,  "I think I can."  I kind of
drifted off at this point, only to come aware when suddenly
-- excruciatingly -- I was hanging by one arm instead of two. 
I screamed, which I hadn't believed was possible.  "Get her,
hold her up,"  said the first male voice and someone held me
so the weight was off my arm until the other chain was gone.

     I whimpered as they lay me on the floor.  I wanted to
roll into a ball, but I couldn't move my left arm -- they
both felt dead, and my left shoulder was now fully
dislocated.  "Water, "  I whispered.

     "Anybody seen anything to drink?"  said the
authoritative female voice.

     "I think there's some coffee over in the corner here," 
said the Scottish female.  I could hear the scrabble of
claws: cracked my eyes to see Lon Chaney's daughter holding a
bottle of soda pop to my lips.  Since I was half-convinced
that it all might just be a hallucination anyway, I just
accepted her appearance.

     The soda pop was real enough -- warm and flat and
blessedly wet.  "Don't give her too much at first --" said
the authoritative voice.  The young woman who belonged to it
looked like an Amerind, about seventeen.  I caught glimpses
of my other rescuers -- two blond haired boys, two blond
haired girls and a little redhead, all teenagers.  The
werewolfette had disappeared, or maybe I'd just imagined that
part.  I wasn't in the mood to be curious -- all I wanted to
do was fill my mouth with flat soda and swallow.

     "In all this complex, I can not detect Warlock,"  said a
new man's voice.  He was older than my rescuers, with a very
faint German accent, and he'd probably learned his English in
Britain.

     "We didn't come up entirely empty, sir,"  said the tall
blond male rescuer.  "The Right _did_ have a prisoner, but it
wasn't Warlock."

     "Indeed?" said "Sir."  I opened my eyes just as he must
have bent over to look at me.  He was a powerfully built man,
tall with a good-looking aquiline face and short white hair. 
I knew him at once.

     "_Gott im Himmel!_" said Magneto and stared down at me.

     At the time I didn't appreciate how infrequently Magneto
is at a loss for something pompous to say.  I could only
stare with hatred at the man responsible for my mother's
death.  As much as I loathed him, I had never looked to the
day when I might meet him, and certainly never in the manner
that I did.

     "Since Warlock is not here, there seems to be no reason
to remain in this outpost,"  said the Master of Magnetism,
ex-leader of the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants, and obviously
the commander of this band of youths.  "Illyana, would you
teleport us to a location where I may destroy this
installation?"

     "Sure, Boss,"  said one of the blondes.  There was a
flash of light, a twisting sensation, and we were outside
under the stars.  I whimpered -- I couldn't help myself --
and tried to curl in a ball again.

     "Make it quick, Magneto,"  muttered the Indian girl,
bending over me.  "Don't worry, we'll take care of you,"  she
added to me.

     I closed my eyes.  In the distance I could hear things
imploding, collapsing. There was another flash that reached
through my eyelids and we were indoors, somewhere else --
don't ask me how I knew, but I did.

     "Samuel, get a gurney, we must take her to the
infirmary,"  said Magneto.  "Danielle, wake Sharon if she is
not already awake, tell her we have a patient."

     

       * * *

     

     Sharon turned out to be another Amerind, older than the
one called Danielle, around thirty I'd guess.  She said she
was a nurse, but she doctored well enough for me.  I didn't
spend much time complaining about her qualifications.  The
first order of business was my dislocated shoulder.  While
she had examined me I'd started drifting off again, the first
honest rest I'd had in two days.  When she told me they were
going to fix my shoulder, putting the humerus back in the
socket and they wouldn't be able to use anesthetics, I almost
ignored it.  It still _hurt_, though not the agony I'd been
enduring, enough to bear.

     So Danielle held me around the torso, and Sharon took my
left arm in both her hands.  Abruptly she tugged on my arm,
pulling it towards her.  It was sharp agony, and brought me
fully alert, crying out at the pain.

     "Okay, half way there,"  said Sharon. "This time we'll
get it in."

     "No, no,"  I pleaded, all dignity long gone.  "It hurts
too much."

     Magneto spoke up from the end of the bed.  "Jessica, you
must put up with the pain just a little longer."  When I was
free to reflect on it later I was amazed he knew my name, and
it made me jump to all kinds of wrong conclusions; however,
my purse had been thrown on the floor where I had been held.

     I just continued pleading desperately that they wait
before hurting me again.  "Honey, we have to do this without
painkillers or we won't know if we got it right," Sharon
explained, her hands still on my arm.  When she started
pulling again I reached out with my power preparatory to
tearing the room apart -- when another power clamped down on
me and held me like a fly in amber.  That and the pain were
too much; mercifully I fainted.

     The next thing I remember is the cold feeling of a
needle in my arm.  Strangely, it felt like paradise.  "Only
the minimum dose of morphine,"  I heard Sharon say in answer
to a question.  "It'll be quick relief, Percodan would be too
slow."

     I opened my eyes.  They'd placed me in a hospital bed
with pillows on either side of me.  Sharon eased a sling
around each of my arms.  The drug made me feel floaty and
disconnected.  "You shouldn't move your arms at all just now. 
The muscles and tendons around the joints are strained and
torn -- they need time to heal."

     I smiled dreamily.  I wasn't in pain anymore; _this must
be heaven_, I thought.  

     "I'll be just around the corner.  If you need me, call,
or push this button."  She tucked a little box in my right
hand.

     She turned to Magneto.  "Magnus, we should leave her to
sleep now."

     "Indeed, Sharon,"  he said.  "We will talk tomorrow,
Jessica, or whenever you are well enough."  They left the
room, shutting off the light.  _Talk all you want, dude_,  I
thought dreamily to myself, _I'm out of here as soon as my
feet can carry me._  It was a comforting thought, and I was
asleep almost instantly.

     

     *  *  *

     

     So that was how the New Mutants entered my life,
although I didn't know they were called that at the time, or
that they were the junior team of the X-Men.  I was too damn
glad for the rescue, though never in my wildest dreams had I
thought Magneto would be leading it.  Out of the frying pan,
and into the fire, though that's a rather inappropriate
metaphor for me.

     As bad as things seemed, they were only fated to get
worse, and "fate" may not be the best description of the
process by which they got worse; I was deliberately making
choices that seemed at the time to be correct ones.  You may
have noticed that my mental state at this time was not the
best, so take that into account when you consider the
decisions I made and acted on in the following days.  I have
an awful lot to regret.

     I must have slept eighteen hours or so.  I vaguely
remember wakening slightly to be fed water or juice; it seems
to me that Magneto was on bedside duty at least once, but I
may have dreamed that part.  It wasn't until well into the
next day that I really woke up.

     I stared at the ceiling for a couple of minutes.  Save
for an ache in my shoulders and assorted pains, mostly from
my bruised face, I was almost comfortable enough to be
convinced the preceding days must surely have been a dream --
until I tried to sit up and discovered my arms were strapped
into a double sling arrangement.  Furthermore, it hurt when I
tried to move them.

     "You're awake,"  said the blonde girl who'd been reading
in a chair at the foot of the bed.  She was medium sized,
skinny, pretty, with very straight blonde hair worn long with
bangs, just the kind of hair I've always coveted.  She smiled
at my discomfort, she was the kind of person who finds humor
in other people's pain.  I decided I didn't like her very
much.

     "Yeah, I'm awake,"  I said.  "The question is, _where_
am I awake?"

     "Salem Center, New York,"  she said.  I raised an
eyebrow at her.  "Professor Xavier's School for Gifted
Youngsters,"  she explained, giving each syllable a posh
emphasis.

     "The Brotherhood of Evil Mutants has taken over the
X-Men?"  I said, my voice rising.

     She sneered at me.  "Keep your pants on.  No, it's
really more like the other way around.  Professor Xavier gave
the school to Magneto when he thought he was dying last year. 
Magneto's _reformed_,"  she added.

     "In a pig's eye, he's reformed,"  I said, and she
smiled.  Maybe she was a little more likable than I first
thought.

     "He isn't all that bad a guy, actually,"  she said, and
I snorted.  "I'm Illyana Rasputin.  Magneto told me your name
was Jessica, but he didn't say much else."

     I thanked Heaven for small favors.  "I'm Jessica Pierce,
late of the Ohio State foster care system,"  I said.  "I'd
offer you a hand to shake, but I'm kind of tied up at the
moment."

     "Do you want some juice or something?  Sharon left some
stuff for you."

     "Yes, I think I would,"  I said, realizing suddenly that
I hadn't eaten in three or so days.

     "Baby mush, but you probably won't complain,"  said
Illyana.  "I'm going to have to spoon feed you,"  she added
with a little moue.

     While she fed me Gerber's Baby Oatmeal ("It's what
Sharon says you should try first,"  she had said, "If it goes
down okay, I'll sneak up to the kitchen and get some real
food for you."), I got her to tell me about the school and
what Magneto was doing being headmaster there.

     "It took us all by surprise -- I think Magneto the
most,"  she said at the end of her tale.  "It was like a
deathbed request or something.  So before we knew what was
happening, there he was, and here we are."

     "[Are you Russian?]"  I said, before she could pop
another spoonful in.  Her accent was so faint it had taken me
a while to place it.  Of course, her name had been a big
clue.

     "[Yes I am, where are you from?]"  she replied in
Russian.

     "[I was brought up all over Europe,]"  I said.  "[My
mother is Polish, so I was raised bilingual.]"  In English,
German, Polish, French and Spanish.  Russian I picked up in
high school -- it's not too different from Polish.

     "Cool,"  she said.  "I mostly think in English now."

     She told me about how her brother Peter had been in the
X-Men and how she'd been kidnaped by a guy named Arcade.  And
while she'd been staying with the X-Men, she'd been kidnaped
yet again by a nasty dude named Belasco.  I got kind of lost
in her explanation, because this Belasco had taken her to a
"demon realm" called Limbo, where she'd lived for seven years
while no time passed in the real world.  I took it all with a
grain of salt.

     "Listen,"  she said when the bowl was empty.  "I'm
supposed to call Sharon when you wake up, but I can go to the
kitchen if you'd rather..."

     "No,"  I said,  "Really, this _is_ all my poor stomach
can take right now."  To tell the truth it was a little
upset.  I'd been around hospitals and sick people enough to
know when not to push it.

     Illyana rang for Sharon, and when the nurse came she
excused herself with a wink to me to let me know she'd be
back later.   Sharon was kind, but all business, and her
business was a physical exam.  "I'm afraid your nose is well
and truly broken,"  she said.  "We'll keep it stuffed with
cotton for now."  No wonder my face felt so funny.

     "Missing any teeth?"  she continued.

     I ran my tongue around my mouth.  "Might have a couple
loose ones,"  I said.  I could remember them hitting my face
again and again.

     She changed the dressing on the wounds on my wrists,
where the cuffs had rubbed me raw.  They were doing well, I'm
generally a good healer.  "Time to take a medical history," 
she said, getting out a clipboard.  "You didn't seem coherent
enough yesterday."

     We ran through the usual questions: childhood diseases,
accidents, allergies, vaccinations.  Not many of any except
the last -- all that traveling when I was little.  She got to
the bottom of the form and put her pen down.  "Jessica,"  she
said delicately,  "From talking to Magnus, I've gathered the
impression that you're a mutant.  I don't mean to pry, but if
there's anything that would affect your medical
treatment...."

       I started to speak and stopped, my face growing hot --
I was blushing.  I'd never told anyone I was a mutant or what
it was I could do; Mother had always known, and it had been
impossible to keep it secret from the doctors and nurses
who'd been treating her.

     "I'm fireproof,"  I said.  It sounded so stupid.  "I
mean I can't be burned -- it was very useful around my
mother."  Oh God, I was starting to babble.  Sharon didn't
look like she understood, but she didn't look like she
disbelieved me either.  "Excess heat just sort of goes away
when it hits me.  X-rays too, so I can't be x-rayed
successfully."

     "I hope you don't break anything while you're here!" 
Sharon said.  "I suppose we could use ultrasound if we had
to...."

     "But radiation therapy's right out, if I ever needed it
-- though we've never established if I had an upper limit. 
It's not the sort of thing I really wanted to test --
sticking my hand in a blast furnace or walking on lava.  They
don't even _have_ lava in Ohio."  Definitely Babble City
here, folks.

     Sharon smiled.  "Anything else?"  she said.

     "No,"  I lied.

     "Well, that's it for now,"  she said and got up.  "We'll
start reducing your medication with the next round.  Do let
me know if you're in more pain than you should be."

     "I know, you heal faster that way,"  I said.

     "You do know a lot about medicine,"  she said.

     "I should, I want to be a doctor,"  I said.

     She nodded.  "There's TV, magazines, and I'm sure one of
the students would be happy to bring you books or whatever. 
Everyone wants to visit you, of course, but I said one at a
time.  If you get tired, just give me a buzz and I'll chase
them away."

     "I think I'd like to rest now, actually,"  I said. 
_Actually_, I was having an attack of the shys.  Strange as
it sounds, I'd never been much in the company of other
mutants, not for years anyway.  It was kind of a new idea for
me and it would take some getting used to.

     I turned on the TV and dozed while game shows played.  I
was awakened by a tapping on the door.  "_Entre'_,"  I
called.  It's what my  mother always said.

     Sharon stuck her head in.  "Magnus wants to speak with
you,"  she said apologetically.  She opened the door further,
I could see him standing beside her.  "Fifteen minutes,"  she
said to him.  "No more, and if she's tired it's your fault."

     I stared at him as he entered.  He was dressed in a dark
business suit,  looking so much younger than I thought he'd
be, a vital -- and dare I say it? -- incredibly handsome man. 
Looking at him I began to understand why my mother had so
blindly followed him.  She was a complete fool sometimes, I
wouldn't make the same mistake.

     As for the self-appointed Master of Magnetism, he pulled
a chair over to the side of the bed using his so-called
magnetic powers and sat in it, regarding me silently.  At
length he said,  "You seem to have found yourself in
considerable trouble, Jessica."

     "Yes, I suppose you could say that, Magneto,"  I
replied.

     He digested that for a moment, deciding to ignore the
hostility in my voice.  "How did you come to be the prisoner
of that organization?" he asked.

     _He wants to play it cool, okay_,  I thought.  "I was on
my way to work on Tuesday,"  I said.  "A big black sedan
pulled up on the street and guys in business suits got out,
told me they were FBI and I was supposed to come with them."

     He raised an eyebrow.  "I doubt they were FBI,"  he
said.

     "So do I,"  I said.  "They had identification, but it
was probably faked.  However, one doesn't keep a reputation
as a law-abiding citizen by running away when the federal
government wants you for questioning.  So I got in the car,
and they drugged me.  That's when I figured out -- too late
-- that they probably weren't really the FBI."

     "You know no more than we about your kidnapers then," he
said.  "They made no mention of what they worked for, who
with?"

     I stared at him for a long moment.  I didn't owe him
anything -- the other way around, more likely -- and he'd
certainly personally set the cause of mutants everywhere back
several decades.  But I couldn't find any ready reason to
withhold information about an organization dedicated to
exterminating mutants, either.

     "I gathered they called themselves 'The Right.'  They
made a lot of anti-mutant comments when they were beating
me,"  I said at last.  "Race purity, stuff like that.  There
was a lot of activity in that hall.  I kind of got the
impression they were international in scope - they seemed to
be communicating with a lot of places, but I wasn't close
enough to any screens to get a firm idea on where, exactly. 
Several times they had some kind of bossman up on the big
screen.  Skinny dude with glasses -- I remember his face very
well.  I could probably draw it for you if I could use my
hands..."

     "Sharon says you shall be able to use your arms by the
end of the week, perhaps sooner,"  Magneto said.  He'd
listened intently, his eyes never leaving my face.  "When you
can, draw it for me."

     "I'll be gone by then."

     "Ah, yes,"  he said. "Are you sure this is a wise course
of action?"

     That brought me up sharp.  "I haven't had time to
consider all my options....  But I'm sure I don't want to be
involved in any 'Baby Brotherhood.'"

     He arched an eyebrow again.  "Is that what you call it?" 
he said.  "I have been laboring under the delusion it is
called Professor Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters."

     "Yeah, Illyana told me,"  I said.  "Still, if it quacks
like a duck...."

     "I fail to see what fowl have to do with the subject," 
he said.  _You wouldn't_, I thought.  "At any rate, Jessica,
you are underage and considered to be a runaway by the Ohio
Department of Youth Services."

     "Project: Pegasus wanted to examine me, and the D.Y.S.
was going to hand me over to them, so I lit out,"  I said
defensively.  "I only have four months to go before I'm legal
age anyway, and then they'd have no claim on me."

     "So you suggest we should allow you to go back to the
street to fend for yourself."

     "Yeah,"  I said.  "I wasn't doing all that badly on my
own."

     "Despite the fact that this 'Right' were able to find
and capture you with apparently little fuss."  

     Ooh, I hated the bastard.  "I'll be on guard,"  I said.

     "You would be safer here," he said softly. 
"Furthermore, it may be possible that Xavier's could assume
responsibility for you.  That would normalize your legal
status, and give you a clean record to present to colleges."

     I didn't know what to say.  I felt like Christ being
taken to the mountaintop and offered the world by the devil. 
Xavier's would have been the answer to my prayer -- if it
weren't for the headmaster and a few other facts.

     My indecision must have showed on my face.  "Jessica, I
can understand your hesitation, based on my reputation, and
your mother's experience.  But I give you my word that I run
this school on the principles laid down by my friend Charles
Xavier.  If you will, it is a form of penance for the wrongs
I've committed.  You have nothing to fear here, and
everything to fear from life on your own."

     "Bottom line, Magneto,"  I said.  "I don't trust you
further than I can throw you."  (Further than he knew....)

     "I accept that,"  he said.  "Few people do.  But I have
lately gained the trust of the X-Men and the New Mutants, and
I believe it has been fairly earned."

     "Good for you,"  I said.

     He paid my comment no mind; Magneto generally treats
sarcasm as beneath notice.  "Stay with us a month, at least," 
he said.  "Give Xavier's school a fair try.  If at the end
you decide to stay, we can go ahead with your guardianship."

     It was my turn to stare away pensively.  The Master of
Magnetism (You have to meet the guy to realize that a pompous
title like that actually fits him without it being an
exaggeration) waited patiently.

     I remembered the guys from the Right bundling me in the
car, telling me they were from the FBI.  Running away would
have made me an automatic fugitive from justice -- I was
already a runaway, but that's a different degree of
seriousness, juvenile records get expunged when you're of
age.  With the Right waiting for me, I couldn't trust anyone
who said they were from this or that.  By now the Right could
have even infiltrated the Ohio D.Y.S..

     I thought about that kids at the school I'd met so far,
and Sharon.  Maybe it was the kind way Sharon had treated me
that tipped the balance.  And the fact that I'd get about
three steps before keeling over if I tried to leave now.

     "Okay, I'll stay -- for a month,"  I said,  "If you'll
pledge to me you will not physically or mentally try to
restrain me if I decide to leave at the end of the period."

     "I will pledge this,"  he said, looking intently at me
with eyes of cold blue gray.  "If in turn you will promise
two things.  First, you must promise to keep secret the
information you learn about this school and its inhabitants.
Lives could hang in the balance if enemies learned details of
this community."

     "That's only fair," I said.  "I may not agree with my
mother's politics, but I'd never rat on the people who
sheltered us when we were on the run.  I can certainly
promise this."

     "Excellent," he said.  "Secondly, you will pledge to
give the school -- and the headmaster -- a fair evaluation,
not biased by events of the past."

     "I could try,"  I said.  I really didn't expect I'd want
to stay, and it was only for a month anyway.  "Okay, you have
my word."

     "And you have my word,"  he said. "One of the hardest
lessons I have learned is the fallacy of protecting people
who do not desire protection."

     I couldn't let that go by.  "Oh, just like the way you
protected my mother?"  I said, my voice rising.

     He looked solemn and I was this far from throwing
something at him.  "I understand Noemi passed away two years
ago,"  he started to say.

     "She _burned_ to death,"  I snapped, and then I lied,
one of the worst lies I've ever told, because it was intended
to hurt.  "She cursed your name before she died."

     He squeezed his eyes shut in pain.  Bingo, I'd made a
direct hit; and for a moment I almost regretted it.  But the
feeling quickly passed.  "Jessica, I am sorry, "  he said,
and I cut him off again.

     "Sorry will never make up for it,"  I hissed and stared
at him, working on something else hurtful to say, but Sharon
opened the door.  "Magnus, I asked you not to upset Jessica," 
she said, all nurse.

     "We are not done,"  he said, standing up.  He seemed to
tower over her.  He isn't terrifically big -- 6' 2" isn't
incredibly tall -- but he has this presence.

     Sharon was unfazed.  Maybe she was used to him or it was
just her professional attitude in operation.  I once saw a
skinny little doctor face down three knife-wielding thugs in
an emergency room, armed only with an authoritative tone of
voice.  Just like the one Sharon used when she said,  "You
promised not to upset the _patient_."

     "Very well, Sharon,"  said Magneto.  "Jessica will be
staying with us for the next month, so she will need a
bedroom, and clothing."

     "Out,"  Sharon waved a hand at the door, and Magneto
strolled out with dignity.  He must practice acting majestic
in a mirror when nobody's looking.

     "I brought dinner,"  said the nurse when he'd closed the
door.  "I'm sorry if I interrupted, but it's not in your best
interest to go shouting just now."

     "I guess I _was_ shouting,"  I said, chagrined, as
Sharon uncovered the dinner dishes.  It was a non-meat meal. 
"Hey, how did you know I'm a vegetarian?"

     "They found your pocketbook right next to you --
somebody had just dropped it on the floor -- with all your
ID, so Doug was able to sneak an on-line peek at the Ohio
D.Y.S. records."

     "Oh, okay,"  I said, around a mouthful of tuna
casserole.  "What'd it say about me?"

     "Nothing to be embarrassed about.  I only had a short
glimpse of the printout -- but what an academic record you
have, even with all your moving about."

     "Mother was a terrific teacher,"  I said, and got a lump
in my throat.  She'd always stressed how important a good
education was, making yourself the best you could be.

     "The dossier said she died from her powers?"  Sharon
asked.

     I sighed.  "She was a pyrokinetic -- she could throw
flames and heat, kind of like the Human Torch.  Her real name
was Noemi Majewski, and her _nom de guerre_ was Firefall. 
She was in the first Brotherhood of Mutants with Magneto,
before they came to America.  Something went wrong when
Magneto tried to boost her powers -- they boosted all right,
but she progressively lost control of them.  So she left to
go into retirement."

     "But I guess revolution was in her blood or something. 
She was the daughter of Polish refugees that had settled in
England, she had degrees from Oxford in political science and
economics.  Her politics were strange -- she was an
anarchist.  Hated capitalism, considered communism as beneath
contempt.  She figured most of the world's problems would go
away if you could just eliminate money."

     Sharon was trying to keep a straight face.  "It's okay
to laugh," I said.  "I know she was eccentric as all hell. 
Unlike most eccentrics, she could do something toward
achieving her aims." 

     "Anyway, after she had me, she drifted back into
international terrorism.  I think she must have touched base
with nearly every revolutionary group in Europe except for
the Italian Red Brigades.  She wasn't into killing innocent
people.  I know she personally killed two of Baader-Meinhof
gang, and I think she tipped the police on the rest of them."

     Sharon blinked.  "None of this was in your background
check,"  she said.  I wondered how long it had been since
someone knew the whole story -- not since Mother had died,
anyway.

     "It was all secret, of course,"  I said.  "I suppose I
must have had the most appalling childhood.  We were on the
run constantly, from one hideout to the next, with Interpol
or SHIELD a few jumps behind."

     "So we lived all over Europe, even in Spain with the
Basques.  Noemi's specialty was bank robbery.  She thought it
hurt the government and corporations more than people.  She
just burned the money, keeping just enough for us to live
on."

     "Anyway, by the time I was eleven, her powers were
beginning to be pretty wonky, and SHIELD was getting to be
only one step behind us, so we came to America for a while. 
Only, once we were here, she had an episode where she burned
herself -- seriously.  She'd always been immune to her own
fire before."

     I shrugged.  "After that, it was one hospital stay after
another.  Sometimes she'd be out for as long as six months. 
We took American identities -- I'm not really American, I was
born in England and my name isn't really Jessica Pierce, but
that's what I'll be happy to go by for the rest of my life. 
Everything was forged of course, but it was forged well, and
I'm sure that Interpol and SHIELD would just love to question
me at length, even if I was only a child when all this went
down."

     "Anyway, her health gradually deteriorated.  First she
was in a wheelchair, and then she went blind.  The last year
we mostly lived at the hospital."

     "All the doctors knew I was a mutant, 'cause I never got
burned by her.  I guess  inflammability is a pretty
non-threatening mutation.  They were grateful I was fireproof
because she started uncontrollably burning random things, and
she could go through an asbestos suit amazingly quickly.  The
best the doctors and nurses could do was run for cover, and
even so some of them were burned.  I could go in and take
care of her when it got bad."

     "She was so brave during all this, up to the bitter end
when she lost her hearing.  She was in constant pain, and she
kept burning her bandages off so her wounds weren't healing."

     "I guess it all got too much to bear.  She must have
waited til she knew I'd be away, and sent herself off in a
blaze of glory."

     Sharon touched my face with a hankie, and I realized
that I was crying.  "So, you see her death was really all
_his_ fault.  If Magneto hadn't tried to muck around with her
powers, she'd probably still be alive."

     "I'm so sorry, Jessica,"  Sharon said.  "I don't suppose
Magneto _intended_ what happened."

     "No, but he's responsible, just the same.  And I won't
forget it."

     She nodded.  "So after your mother died...."

     "The Ohio D.Y.S. came and put me in foster care.  I went
through two foster homes pretty quick -- one foster mother
caught me drinking boiling coffee from the pot."

     "That would be ...startling if you didn't know about
it,"  Sharon said.

     "Yes, but she knew, and she still got so hysterical. 
The other place was fine until I burned my sleeve off in
public.  The new place was okay for the past year, but my
foster parents couldn't find any objection in handing me over
to Project: Pegasus for an 'evaluation.'  So I lit out, and
the rest is history."

     What I told Sharon was mostly factual except for certain
critical omissions.  I was really on the verge of telling her
the rest when there was a knock on the door.  "Here, dry up a
bit," she said, handing me another hankie.  "I think I know
who that is."

     She waited until I had blown my nose before she opened
the door.  "Sharon, is it okay if we come in and say hello to
Jessica -- we promise not to wear her out,"  said a tall boy
with a voice I recognized from the day before.  He was a tall
lanky blond with an Appalachian drawl.

     "Well, I'll ask Jessica,"  said Sharon.  "Would a couple
of visitors be okay with you?"

     _As long as they're not Magneto_, I thought.  "Sure,"  I
said.  I couldn't come up with any reason to refuse.

     She opened the door wider and four kids came trooping
in.  Sam Guthrie was the Kentuckian, and Dani Moonstar was
the Amerind girl who'd braced me while my shoulder was
manipulated, and they were both actually older than I was --
Dani was nearly 19 and Sam had just had his 19th.  The other
two were Amara Aquilla, 17, from someplace in Brazil though
her accent wasn't Portuguese, and Rahne Sinclair, the little
fierce Scots girl.  She was 15.

     Sam used up a few minutes going over introductions. 
There was so much to learn about them -- they were all
mutants, and it seemed they all had exotic backgrounds or
histories.

     "Doug is at a family gathering tonight, otherwise he
would  be welcoming you with us.  His parents are back in
Salem Center for a visit,"  said Amara.

     "I asked Illyana if she wanted to come, and all she said
was 'We already met and she knows she's welcome,'" said Dani.

     "Tell her about the stuff we brought,"  said Rahne from
behind Sam.  She was the oddest combination of shy and
assertive.  Her name was pronounced "rain" and for several
days I thought her parents had been Scottish hippies.

     "We thought, maybe you could use, you know, toiletries
and such,"  said Sam.  I swear he almost blushed on the
t-word.  "So we saw what we had extra, and asked Stevie to
buy the rest -- we're grounded right now."

     With no little ceremony they produced a little zippered
bag.  It was packed with essentials like a brush and a comb
and nail clippers and a toothbrush, as well as an assortment
of magazines and candies.  "Why, thank you very much,"  I
said, really touched.  "Why are you grounded?"

     Sam hung his head while Dani answered with a smile. 
"Magneto was searching for our teammates Warlock and Roberto,
and got a signal, similar but not close to Roberto's.  He
wouldn't go and check it out, so we took off to check it out
ourselves -- only it turned out to be you -- and Magneto
followed us.  Boy, was he pissed!"

     "Dani!" said Rahne, offended.

     "Sorry, furtop,"  she said.  "Anyway, we're all grounded
again."

     "Seems pretty strict,"  I said.

     "Oh, it's not that bad,"  said Sam.  "We earned it fair
and square.  Magneto had good reasons for not going haring
off after a random signal, not with the Marauders still at
large."

     "Just as well we did,"  said Amara.  "What could have
happened to Jessica if we hadn't?"

     "_And_ you were outvoted,"  Dani said to Sam.  "The New
Mutants take care of their own."

     "So what about these guys Roberto and Warlock?"  I said. 
More guys were certainly needed around here.  This led to
another long involved explanation about Brazil and
techno-organic beings from outer space who'd landed in the
mansion's lake, but it was cut short by Sharon calling time.  

     "You'll have a chance to finish tomorrow,"  she said. 
"Jessica will move upstairs, and if she's up to it, start
classes.  So you'll have plenty of opportunity to wow her."

     "Anyway, you'll have to meet Warlock to really
appreciate him,"  Sam said in parting.

     "Are you sure 'appreciate' is the right term?"  said
Dani.  "Good night, Jessica, and welcome to the school."

     They all chorused good night and left.  "I hope they
didn't wear you out," said Sharon, fluffing up a pillow and
cleaning up the bedside table.

          "Oh no -- it was fun, but I'm not sorry to see them
go,"  I replied.  "I am getting sleepy."  She helped me get
washed up and when my head hit the pillow I only had time for
a few thoughts about the month ahead.  With classmates like
these, it couldn't be too awful, could it?


	TO BE CONTINUED...
	KID DYNAMO, CHAPTER TWO: "WHAT'S MY LINE?"
.