fandomhigh | Library, Sunday 07/01

"Family," Evan echoed, and the anxiety that had been soothed away was replaced with a different sort of pang. He missed his parents... hadn't so much as heard from them in months. "It almost sounds too good to be true."

Which was something he would have been loathe to think, even a few months ago.

"I know," Raven said, her own bitter-sweet memories of arriving on the island coming to mind. "I came here with no family. But one of my teachers has become as a father to me, and the friends I have made -- the bonds I have with them are deeper than any true sibling. I hope that your experience here will be much the same."

She gave him a gentle smile. "I know that is a lot to take in, so soon after coming here. It may take time to adjust and to trust. But if you have any questions or anything I may help you with, I am happy to do so."

Evan tried a tiny smile on for size.

"It already sounds like a better school for me than my last one," he admitted softly. "I don't know if my Uncle Cluster would want me to stay here for too long, but if it's really as good as you say it is... maybe he'd let me. If I asked him, I mean."

"If you truly wish to stay, some of the teachers can be quite persuasive," Raven said, pleased with the smile, even a small one. "But that is not a concern for now. You have only just arrived, after all. And if your uncle visits at Parents Weekend, hopefully he will see how happy you are here."

Then, out of curiosity, she had to ask, "What was your school before this one? Was it for mutants such as yourself?" Knowing what most worlds such as Jono's were like, she knew his appearance unfortunately wouldn't let him fit in well at other schools.

"It was," Evan replied, nodding a little bit. "The Jean Grey School for Higher Learning. It was all... classes by mutants, for mutants. And before that, I was going to school in Kansas. Just another little school. I was on the baseball team and everything, though."

It was weird, for all that he'd learned about the way baseline humans felt about mutants, he'd always been accepted far more easily back home in Kansas than he had been at the Jean Grey School.

Funny, that.

"Jean Grey School?" Raven said. "I have met her, briefly, both as a student here and as a member of the X-Men in Jono's world. Has she taken over the Xavier Institute? Or started her own school now?"

Evan was chewing on his lip for a minute while he tried to muddle out just how he'd answer that.

"It's... technically the Jean Grey Memorial School," he said, carefully. "Headmaster Logan started the school up again, I guess... It used to just be a bunch of ruins, but he decided that fighting all the time wasn't any sort of life for a bunch of kids, and he opened up the school again."

This had all been before Evan's time, barely. The school had only been open for a couple of weeks before he and Angel had become students.

Headmaster Logan? Headmaster?

"I see," she said slowly. "I am sorry to hear that, but glad that he reopened the school." Ruins?

"I have met Headmaster Logan as well, though he was not headmaster then," she said. "It does not entirely surprise me that it was he who opened the school again." Of all the X-Men he was the one she didn't still harbor some bitterness toward for abandoning Jono. At least he'd tried to find him. He'd cared.

Evan nodded a little.

"He's... a pretty good guy, I guess. I mean, he doesn't think that a bunch of kids should grow up to be soldiers."

But heroes... why not heroes? That's what Evan had been raised to be, after all.

[Bedtime! Sp?]

"I would agree with him in that," Raven said softly. "Not everyone is suited to that kind of life, and especially not children, no matter what their gifts might be."

She was feeling a strange sense of protectiveness toward Evan. Maybe because he looked like Jono, or because he looked like a little girl who drew on her face with blue lipstick. She knew he must have some connection to Apocalypse, but she wasn't sensing anything evil or dangerous from him.

[SP, yay! \o/ I should be in bed, too.]

"I was eleven when I found out I had powers," Evan murmured. "And almost fifteen when I was in my first real fight. They told me I had to save the world."

After watching his family fade away before his eyes, that was a hefty amount of responsibility to put on the shoulders of a kid of fourteen. But the world was still there, and Uncle Cluster had told him that he'd done well, and he hadn't seen his parents since.

"That is indeed a heavy burden to bear at so young an age," Raven said. But so was being told you were going to destroy the world that young.

"What are your powers, if you do not mind me asking?" she said curiously. "Do any other in your family possess them? My own gifts come from my bloodline." No, she wasn't fishing for an Uncle Poccy or anything, why do you ask?

Evan shifted his weight, looking slightly uncomfortable as he tried to figure out if she was hedging around the same thing that his old classmates had just out and accused him of, straight to his face.

"My Uncle Cluster knew about my powers, but he doesn't have anything like them," he attempted, working on not getting too obviously fidgety. "Ma and Pa don't, either. And I..."

... Would be there all day if he started listing things off, and honestly, he wasn't entirely certain that he ought to. So he just... settled on one. The one that probably seemed the most harmless at a glance. He nodded over to a bookshelf across the room, and then he made a reach for it, feet staying firmly planted where they were, and easily plucked a book from the shelf with one rather fantastically stretched arm.

He glanced at the cover of the book once his arm had snapped back into its usual shape, and then looked up at Raven and shrugged.

Edited 2012-07-02 14:05 (UTC)

"That is very impressive!" Raven said, giving him an encouraging smile, though the demonstration reminded her of Angelo. Jono had never found him that he'd told her, so she hoped he was safe, wherever he was.

"I am a healer and an empath myself," she said. "And I can see I have made you uncomfortable with my questioning. I apologize for that -- it was truly not my intent."

"No, it's okay," Evan replied, turning the book over in his hands for a moment, not quite looking up from it before making another stretch in order to put it back. "I remind you of someone else, and you're curious. That makes sense."

"You must be questioned a great deal about your appearance," Raven said softly, feeling guilty and radiating another pulse of comfort. Looking like Apocalypse wasn't easy for Jono, and it couldn't be easy for Evan, either. Yet if the X-Men had accepted him into their school....

"I wish I could promise you that will not be the case here. For the most part, I think so. But there are people here from worlds that are similar to yours that may be surprised." To put it lightly. "Most others may think you are simply related to Jono due to the similarity in your appearances."

It was actually Jono's reaction she was most concerned about.

The X-Men, of course, weren't the problem. But other children could be cruel, especially when they sensed an easy target. And Evan didn't know enough about Apocalypse, or even about why he was here exactly, to be able to do much but quietly take the abuse.

"I don't even know anyone that goes by that who looks like I do," he murmured, finding the bookshelves pretty darn interesting, over there. "I've only ever seen one person that looks kind of like me, and in pictures."

Raven hesitated, but since he'd mentioned it....

"Apocalypse?" she asked quietly. "I know of him as well."

"They call me Kid Apocalypse at my old school, when they think I can't hear them."

They called him far worse, too, but that was the one that he had the heart to repeat. And only barely.

So help her Raven wanted to hug Evan that very moment, but she managed to refrain. "I am so sorry for that," she said instead. "That is not fair of them."

There was no way she couldn't be sympathetic. Devil's daughter and Trigon's spawn had followed her, even in Azarath.

"Well," Evan murmured. "They're wrong. They have to be. I'm who my parents raised me to be. I'm who I want to be."

He was a hero.

"You will be," Raven said. "Fandom will give you many opportunities to demonstrate that."

She leaned back against the front desk, clasping her hands in front of her. "We have much in common, Evan. Where I am from, it was thought I would follow in the footsteps of my father, who was a being of great evil. It was a difficult struggle, but I proved them wrong. And I think you will do the same to any who doubt you."

She was tempted to invite him to the showcase that evening, but no, she had to talk to Jono about him first.

"I guess all I really need is the chance to do it."

Evan watched his toes for a few moments more, and then turned a little smile up towards Raven.

"But if even half the people around here are as willing to give me a chance as you, maybe it won't be so hard to do?"

"You will have that chance," Raven promised, giving him a warm smile in return. "And I hope you will come and visit me often to tell me of your experiences on the island. I am here every Sunday, and I enjoy having visitors."

"Then I'll have to stop by when I can," Evan decided, rocking up on his toes and feeling pretty pleased that he'd decided to stop by the library. "I'll tell you all about how I'm settling in, and... maybe you can tell me about how you settled in when you were new, too?"

Library, Sunday 07/01

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