ADVANCEMENT OF THE SPECIES
Part 1: Movie and Milkshake Night
by perletwo
Graymalkin Lane, Westchester, N.Y.
"AAaaaahhhh, come ON!"
The popcorn flying at the TV screen froze in midair. "Sam Guthrie!" scolded his teacher and chaperone-for-the-night at Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters.
"Oh, okaaay. Sorry, Dr. Grey." Sam rose and slouched his way toward the TV, trying as always to hide his lanky height, and plucked the popcorn from Jean Grey's telekinetic grasp. "Just, ah mean, this movie's just DUMB!"
"NOT back in the bowl, Kentucky!" his classmate Danielle Moonstar growled, and Jean floated a wastepaper basket over to the couch. "C'mon. I kinda like the cheesy old Hammer stuff."
"What's wrong with the movie, Sam?" Jean asked, arching a perfectly formed brow. Beside Dani, Jean's fellow redhead Rahne Sinclair shrank a little deeper into the corner of the couch. How Dr. Grey could manage to look regal in a lime-green terry cloth warm-up suit was beyond her. *Way* beyond her, she thought bitterly.
"It's just silly. Ole men in satin capes runnin' around makin' bug-eyes at the pretty girls," Sam explained.
"They've misused the Scriptures somethin' wicked," Rahne volunteered timidly, Presbyterian soul offended by the pseudoreligion of the Dracula legend.
"Hey! That's Bela Lugosi you're dissin' there, pal!" Dani aimed an affectionate swat at Sam's bicep. "He's, like, the god of the Dracula movies!"
"Dani!" Rahne gasped.
"Sorry, Rahne. But really, he's just the *best* Dracula."
"Ask me, the whole dang idea's just goofy. Ah mean, *vampires?*" Sam popped a handful of popcorn into his mouth.
"As goofy as a boy who can blast into the air with concussive force? Or a telekinetic?" Jean asked pointedly.
"Or a werewolf, Sam?" Rahne added, referring to her own mutant power to become a wolf.
"Aw, Rahne, ah didn't mean it like that. Ah think it's just all the mystical mumbo-jumbo in this thing that's gettin' on my nerves." Sam's long arm stretched behind Dani to ruffle Rahne's bristly cap of short red hair, and the girl scowled a bit at his taking such liberties. "Ah think if there really were such things as vampires, they'd prob'ly be more like us, 'stead'a stuck in the good ole days like this dude."
"Sam's right," came a soft voice from the back of the room.
All heads turned to look at the girl with the white-streaked dark hair and satin opera gloves. As always, she sat up straight and watchful, a "do-not-approach" vibe emanating from her in waves. A faint tremor of discord went through the room as each of the other occupants realized they'd forgotten she was there.
"The movie's silly," Rogue pronounced. "Vampires wouldn't really be like that if they were around in this day and age."
Rahne shivered at the sorrow haunting the girl's voice, and cringed slightly when she saw Dani and Sam's subtle, reflexive flinch away from the freak-amongst-freaks. Her eyes met Dr. Grey's, silently expressing her wish to see Rogue's loneliness ease, and Jean nodded acknowledgement.
"Yeah. Uh, right. Thanks, ah, Rogue," Sam stammered with evident awkwardness.
"If that's all *quite* settled, can I have my creature feature back now?" Dani asked, and they settled back into the movie, Rahne and Jean keeping quiet tabs on Rogue.
After the movie, teacher and students migrated in silent accord to the kitchen to raid the 'fridge. Jean used her seniority to call dibs on the mochacchino ice cream, and offered to share with Rahne as Sam and Dani bickered affectionately over the Hershey's chocolate syrup for milkshakes.
"Rogue, will'ye join us? There's more here than I can handle," Rahne called, seeing the older girl staring into the depths of the refrigerator.
Rogue startled back to reality at the call, smiled gratefully at her schoolmate and grabbed a spoon.
By the time Rogue settled in at the table opposite the two redheads, Sam and Dani had completed their milkshake masterpieces and were racing each other with the drinks to the gameroom.
"GUYS! Bring those glasses back up here when you're done!" Jean shouted after them, shaking her head and waggling her eyebrows at the futility of the order. Rahne and Rogue giggled, and the three ate in silence for a few minutes, broken only by "mmmm"s around spoonsful of ice cream.
"So, Rogue," Jean mumbled, then slid the spoon from her mouth, "you didn't like the movie either?"
"It was okay," she replied, digging at the side of the carton with her spoon.
"Y'sounded quayte definite when y'spoke up for Sam," Rahne said softly. "I'd'a almost thought tha', well..."
Rogue set her spoon down on the table with a clatter. "Yeah? Thought what?" Her eyes shifted from Rahne to Jean; the corners of the psychic's mouth and her eyebrows lifted simultaneously, and Rogue sighed. "You *know,* don't you?"
"That there's a story there? Yes." The young Scot's eyes bounced back and forth between the two older women, whose own eyes were locked on each other - Rogue's accusing, Jean's cool and assured. "The details? Certainly not."
"...y'needn't tell us anythin' if y'wish, Rogue...I mean, if there's confidences ye're keepin'..."
Rahne's shy voice cut the tension, and Rogue dropped her eyes. "Ahhh, naw, Rahne, it's not that there's anythin' secret about it," she said. "Ah just figured nobody'd ever believe it if ah tol' the story, is all."
She glanced up to find Jean and Rahne staring at her expectantly, and she sighed.
"Okay. You guys know ah spent a long time on the road by m'self before ah hooked up with Logan, right?...."
The redheads nodded, and settled back in their chairs for a story.