TIME WARP: New Student

Sean didn’t spend a great deal of time in the library, since he didn’t have free periods in the traditional sense; his work day consisted of meetings, appointments, disciplinary sessions (he still wasn’t quite certain how those had been added to his job description after the fact), and paperwork. Still, Hammel kept a better library than the local Pilot Ridge public library, and so when he was in the mood for a new book, he usually paid a visit.

However, he was distracted from the stacks by angry thoughts and frustrated shouting. Still holding the copy of Virtually Normal he’d been perusing, he walked toward the person who was in so much misery. Arriving, his eyes settled on the young blonde girl, looking quite familiar in terms of posture and sentiment, just as she finished her diatribe. Pens, paper, other supplies and a couple of books were floating around her, and while telekinesis was a first thought, that was too much control and power for someone struggling that much. Aerokinesis perhaps? Unless they were just illusions but he was shielding and so that would be impossible. Besides, he detected no hallucinations from her. He’d go with aerokinesis until proven otherwise.

He stepped over to her and spoke kindly. “You know, I used to think the same thing.”

The telepath wouldn’t patronize her by offering her a handkerchief before she began to cry, only afterward. And since she was blinking back tears, stubbornly not allowing herself to cry, he didn’t reach for the handkerchief in his back pocket. Instead he remained patient, still speaking in a calm tone even though she yelled. “Actually, I won’t tell you any of that because it isn’t all right just because you have something comparatively better to some other people. It’s difficult, and anyone who says it isn’t is lying.”

Now that she had stood, there was no point in him sitting down, and thus he remained standing. He didn’t interrupt her during her outburst, instead he let her get it out of her system before he spoke again. “I’m not going to kick you out of the library, although the librarian might come over later; if he does, I’ll talk to him for you.” They all needed to let off some steam sometimes, and the first few months at Hammel were usually a difficult period of adjustment.

They had been for him, once upon a time. Everything that she listed: being in a new place in a different part of the country – although she had come farther than he had – being separated from family, not being able to control powers, having no friends yet. It was all familiar and her frustration was understandable.

Not everyone would turn those feelings inward as he had.

His expression was kind and he nodded in understanding. “I know what you mean. And I’m sorry it’s so disappointing right now. Being meta isn’t as easy as the media would have us believe; it’s not like comics at all.”

The library, young Michael's newest safe haven. It was nice and quiet which made his constant headaches seem less severe, and they were a lot less students in there than most other places in the school, which meant a lot less ridicule, bullying, and fighting due to the lack of control over his powers. Mike usually wasn't one to run or hide from a fight, but sometimes, especially when his head hurt the most, enough was enough, and he'd seek out a nice place to attempt to relax. The young manipulator of memory, had absolutely no control of his so called power, and hadn't been able to use it sine he had arrived at Hammel.

Michael's safe haven unfortunately wasn't as safe as he had hoped considering he had just had a book thrown at him. Michael was furious. The enraged thirteen year old snatched up the book, and stomped over towards the area the book had come from. His head was still in plenty of pain, but his anger easily overpowered his pain, and he was ready to dent his assailant's head in with their book.

Michael was pretty disappointed when the only person in the area the book had soared from was a girl who looked to be about his age. He couldn't hit a girl, and even if he was the kinda guy that could hit a female he still couldn't, she was currently in a heated discussion with a... teacher, or some other kind of Hammel employee.

A lot more nosy than his future self, and a lot less callous, Michael hid behind a bookshelf and listened to what the two were talking about. The angry child planned on waiting until the man that could get him into trouble to leave. Michael always put people into two categories, can and get get him into trouble. Once he left Mikey would at least give the girl an earful for chucking books at him. Of course he didn't mind ease dropping until he could do that.

Michael couldn't believe what he had heard and could no longer keep his comments to himself. Their conversation had calmed down but Michael was about to turn it right back up. He popped up from behind the bookshelf, a look of disbelief and annoyance on his face. "What's wrong with you?! I can't believe you were over here crying about having a power, I can't even get my stupid power to work and for some reason everyone here hates me for it! Oh and here's your stupid book back! Next time you throw something at me It'd be nice if you didn't hit me in the freakin head!" Michael's rant was pretty loud, and he wondered if the teacher would show him the same leniency he showed the girl and not kick him him out of the library. He also wondered what he'd say about the way he just spoke to another student.

Everything was apparently sorted, or at least Leila felt it was all turning out all right. She wasn't looking forward to increased headaches or anything and she wasn't sure she believed everything this guy was saying, but at least she felt a little bit better. Dubious, but better.

That is, until another kid came in and started screaming at her. Immediately the wind picked up again and all the books went flying out of her hands again. Desperately she tried to pull them back and keep all the papers from flying around, but it was hopeless. She was too upset to properly control the wind, and she could feel a headache growing again. "No, no, no, no," she said, starting in a whisper and growing into a shout as she finally stood still and just put her hands over her eyes.

But she wasn't about to let this guy accuse her of things and then feel like he had the upper hand. She may be new to Hammel, but that didn't mean she had to lay down and just take things. "Shut up, just...just shut up, okay? You don't even know...it's like I can't switch it off! I didn't want to hit you in the head, it just happened. Maybe if I hit you now it would be on purpose, but then I'd actually have to be trying, so I guess you're probably safe, huh? Because I don't know what I'm doing, and I'm just going to mess everything up. You think you could do better? I can't even go outside sometimes because I'm worried that I'll end up doing something and people will get hurt. And then when I stay inside everything just turns into a mess."

Then she turned back to the teacher. "Look, you've been really nice and everything, but I don't need a...a powwow. Just because I'm having a hard time doesn't mean I need to sit around in a happy little circle and try to talk about feelings and crap like that. I can handle this. And isn't it, like, bad to talk about feelings and stuff? I think it would be better if I just trained myself not to feel anything, then nothing would ever get out of control and I just would be, you know. Okay."

She forced herself to take another deep breath and calm down. The pressure building up in her head, though, made that difficult. "Ow," she moaned. "Ow, my head. Stupid, stupid power!"

Frowning, she plopped back down on the floor and drew her knees back up to her chest, the papers settling to the floor around her as she managed to control herself again. The wind picked up in tiny bursts again, though, when she developed the hiccups. She was too tired and worn out to want to clean up again anymore.

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Late addition picture of pre-teen Leila. She is dubious of everything.

Leila was entirely dubious about what this man was saying. She knew that teachers were supposed to have all the answers and were there to help you, but she also had a sneaking suspicion that most adults were faking it anyway and no one had any idea what was actually going on. So instead of trusting Sean's opinion about feelings, she merely looked up at him and raised her eyebrows. Before she could say anything further though, she squeezed her eyes shut against the headache.

When he offered her the pills, she raised her head again. "What are *hic* are those?" she asked, glancing at them. But she wasn't too afraid that they would be anything bad, since this was a teacher and all. Holding out her hand, she hiccuped again quietly.

After dry-swallowing the pills, she frowned and held her breath to try to get the hiccups to go away. "So, *hic*" she said, after completing this fruitless exercise, "I guess you think the powers are all natural and stuff, huh? This is just a part of who we are and we should accept it?"

She'd heard similar speeches from some of the other teachers, as well as plenty of people throughout her life saying that having a metahuman ability was unnatural. She'd started to develop an idea about the whole thing, though, and she was wondering if this person could answer her questions.

"So if this is natural and everything, and we should be able to deal with this and not scare everyone, why does everyone have to come to this special school? Shouldn't we be able to deal with it at home? Naturally?" In her defense, she is not trying to be argumentative, but really just wants an honest response.

Leila scrunched up her face at Sean's verification of her thoughts. Training. That was his big suggestion. Why couldn't this whole thing be easier? It was never this hard in any of the books or the movies. If you were born with a special gift, you were supposed to be born with the ability to use that gift. Or so she'd always thought. "I bet you never had problems with that sort of thing. Were you one of those good students who learned really fast?" Leila used to be one of them. Before she was thrown a curve ball.

Leila's hiccups had gone away of their own volition without her really noticing. She was too busy trying to understand the teacher's comments. The pregnancy imagery was not something she was altogether comfortable with. It was also not a really familiar idea. As an only child, she'd never seen or really dealt with pregnancy, and so she wasn't exactly sure how it happened. She knew you were supposed to be born in a hospital, but she'd also heard of people being born in the woods. "But we don't make all the pregnant ladies go live at the hospital," Leila said, cocking her head to one side. "They just go there every once in a while, right? For check-ups and stuff. You don't make people go live on their own without their families."

Frowning and rocking back and forth on her heels, Leila thought about this last comment. "Well, I guess it makes sense. I don't know. Isn't it hard to make sure you find everyone to come here? I bet that takes a lot of people. How do you know you didn't miss anyone?"