Penance, Haller - Saturday evening

[x-penance.livejournal.com]

Once the newcomer is settled, Haller goes to speak with her.




The girl looked a little anxious after Miss Paige had left, but reassured herself that the older girl would be just outside in the hallway. And the man she'd brought in... well, he was very tall and had very odd hair, but he didn't seem to be a threat. Something about his expression, perhaps? So she watched him with those glowing blue eyes, waiting for him to make the first move.

"Hello," Jim said with a warm smile, touching his mismatched eyes only briefly on hers as he settled down into one of the chairs, slow and calm. He didn't extend a hand to her, nor take the chair closer to the bedside. The door to the hallway was quietly, but conspicuously, left open.

"Paige tells me you've had dinner a little while ago," the telepath said, resting his hands lightly on his knees. "Before we start talking, is there anything else you need? Something to drink, maybe?"

She shook her head, noting that he'd left the door open. That was good. "I am... fine," she said, her voice a little rough still from the long silence and her English heavily accented. "Please, you are teacher here?"

"Yes. I work at the school." Jim kept his words slow and carefully pronounced. According to Charles, the girl had previous previous experience with English, which allowed the professor to make certain provisions he could not have with Sooraya. Even now Jim was vaguely uncomfortable with that kind of intercession, but that could be worried about later. All that really mattered at the moment was that the language would come easier for her, in time. For now, though, he needed to go slow -- for more reasons than mere language.

"My name is David Haller," he said, and once again touched her bright blue eyes with his. "May I ask -- what is yours?"

There was a long pause, and then she said, in a voice so small as to be barely audible: "Yvette. My name is Yvette." She looked around the infirmary room again, hunching a little into the bed, the blankets already torn and fraying from contact with her skin. "I do not mean to be rude... but this is a very strange school."

"Yvette. Okay. Hello, Yvette." Jim's answering smile was at more than the assertion. The question had been unnecessary -- Charles had found that too, of course. The asking had not been for Jim's benefit. Sometimes unnecessary was not the same as unneeded.

Okay. Now the hard part was beginning. Reorientation. Jim settled back a little in his chair and gestured around them. "You're not being rude at all. It is an incredibly strange school, and things have been happening very fast, so I'm here to answer your questions. Any of them, even things that might seem silly to ask. All right?"

She nodded, hesitating only a little before speaking again. The fact he'd asked her name, introduced himself politely, like she was a person... it helped. "Please..." she began, not sure where to start. So many questions. "Where is here?"

"This place is called Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters. Xavier's, for short. We're in New York, in the United States of America. Some of our teachers found you, and brought you here so the professor could help you wake up." The words weren't quite appropriate, he knew, but for now it was the only way he could think of to explain it. Jim nodded to her. "Where is the last place you can remember being?"

"America?" Those glowing blue eyes grew wide, even if the rest of her face was unresponsive. "But that is being wrong, it cannot be..." She shook her head, the spikes of her hair rattling slightly. "Kosovo. I am being from Kosovo. There was a place, not my home. They are taking me to there." Her head drooped. "It is being hard to remember."

"Sometimes when the situation is frightening or dangerous people go to a place inside themselves where the danger can't touch them, where they can't feel or remember how bad things are. It's a way of protecting yourself -- what we call a defense mechanism. Everyone uses it. You just had to protect yourself for longer than normal. I did too, a long time ago." Jim touched a hand to his temple. "You may not be able to remember, but the memories are still there. When you're ready, and your mind feels like it's safe again, they'll come back."

There were some difficult words there, but Yvette nodded, understanding the gist if not the whole meaning. "How long?" she asked, then. "How long was I being hiding? Please, what is being the date?" Her voice grew a little panicked - she remembered spring, clearly, but the woods outside had been edging into autumn.

Charles hadn't been able to discern the exact date, because the break from reality had not been immediate, and the last few accessible memories had been blurred at best, but there had been enough that Jim had some idea of what he was about to tell her, and hated that it had to be said. But right now, about this, a gentle lie or served no one. Least of all Yvette.

"You had to hide for a very long time," Jim said quietly. "Today is September 30th, 2006."

A soft gasp broke from her and she shook her head vehemently. "~No, this can't be right, not so long!~" she exclaimed, breaking into Albanian in her distress. "~Six months?~"

"It's okay, Yvette. Slow down. Breathe. We're going to work this through, okay?" His voice was calm, reassuring, but belied his thoughts. Jim hardly needed his telepathy to deliver the meaning of her words. He knew this moment all too well.

"When we're in danger we fight back however we can," the telepath explained, turning his palms up over his knees but making no physical move to comfort her. "You couldn't get away then, but you found a way anyway. Like that, and like this, too." Jim raised one hand to touch his other to indicate the talons that had replaced the girl's hands. "It wasn't just your mind. Your body was protecting you, too."

He hadn't touched her - he understood the sharpness of her skin. The same as Paige had. "I am not..." She struggled with the words, searching for the right one and failing. "~Monster?~" she asked, looking down at herself, the talons, the dark red skin, the new hospital gown already tearing along one shoulder.

Jim shook his head. "No, you're not. You are what Americans call a mutant. Have you ever heard of that word?"

"Mu-tant." She said the word softly, experimentally. "The other man, in the woods... He is saying he is like me. Is he being a... a mutant too? He was not bleeding and there were being claws, like a beast..." Yvette shivered a little bit, but then remembered light falling in diamonds in the small glade. "And... Miss Paige?"

"Yes, Paige is a mutant. So was Mr. Logan, the man. And me, too." Jim smiled. "A mutant is a person who is born different from most people. Sometimes they look different on the outside, and sometimes they don't. And sometimes they can do things that normal people can't." The telepath gestured to the open door. "There are many mutants here. This school was made to give us somewhere to go if we're in trouble, or if we just need a place to learn."

"Learn... not to be mutants?" she asked, although that didn't sound right. "Learn... not to hurt?" Yes, that was it - she suddenly remembered a scream and blood on faded linoleum. "I do not want to be hurting people," she whispered.

"You can't learn not to be a mutant, like you can't learn not to be tall, or not to have blue eyes." Jim met Yvette's with his own and said, "But you can learn how not to hurt."

"Is it being difficult?" She looked down at the floor, not afraid of this man, but realising there was... something about him. The same sort of resonance she'd felt in Paige in the clearing. "I am... how you say? Danger?" She spread her hands, fingers as long and sharp as knives. "I am making fright to people." Her voice was sad, thinking of the boy in the hallway. She hadn't meant to frighten him.

"Dangerous," Haller corrected with a nod, simply and without judgement. "Many mutants can be dangerous. Before they learn to control their powers, some are. This place was created to keep us safe, but also to help us be safe -- for ourselves, and for other people. It may be difficult, but there is a very good chance we can teach you how to make your body do what you want it to do. To not cut." It was not a lightly-made promise; judging from what had been seen of Marius' use of the power and Charles' assessment of her, Paige and Moira had concluded the manifestation of her power was very probably psychosomatically influenced -- and what had psychological roots could be controlled, in time.

She repeated the word softly to herself. "Dangerous." Then she looked up at Haller, the glow of her eyes brightening. "I am wanting to learn. To be safe. So I can be going home, to my mother..." A thought occurred to her. "My mother, she is not knowing where I am?"

Jim shook his head. "No, she doesn't. You were taken a long way from home." Six months and an ocean. "But now that you are awake we can get you back there, if that is what you want. What is your mother's name, and the last place that she lived?"

"Eva. Eva Petrovic," Yvette replied immediately, before giving Haller an address in the city of Kosovo, pronouncing the words carefully so he could write them down. A phone number as well. "I remember... there were being people, from the government. They are taking me away, for to be safe..." She shook her head, her voice almost scornful. "I am not being hurt. My mother is taking care of me, when I change. She is saying, people will not understand, so she is hiding me."

Jim considered this for a moment. He already knew he was going to have to talk to Nathan; Jim didn't know the international politics. He didn't know whether what Yvette was describing was a public policy or simple excuse. Given where the girl had ended up, he had to wonder.

"Do you remember what happened after the government people took you?" Jim asked her. "Were they the ones that made you need to protect yourself?"

She thought for a long moment, trying to piece together her memories. Her childhood, her family, her school... all those were perfectly clear. But the rest was more difficult. Dr. Voght had reminded her of the government people, being taken away, but after that... She suspected she'd already been withdrawing then. "There is being a place?" she said, sounding doubtful. "Cold. Many children. They are being frightened of me. My mother, she came, tried to bring me home, but they are saying this is better for me?" She shook her head again. "Is being wrong. Bad things happen, but I don't remember. Just.. little pieces." Holding up one hand, she held two long fingers an inch apart to punctuate her words. "Am I being able to remember later?"

"Later," he agreed with certainty, allowing the questioning on what had happened to her since being taken from her mother to rest for now. "Like I said, it feels blank now, but the memories are still there. When you are ready you will find them again." It would take time, and likely therapy, but Jim was confident of this. Yvette's mind would give her what she was ready to handle when she was ready to handle it. That, too, was all too familiar to him.

"It's scary, I know," the telepath continued. "You are in a strange place" he corrected himself with a lopsided smile "okay, a very strange place, and a lot has happened that you could not stop. The school will help you find your mother -- and learn about your powers, too, if that is what you decide you want. Any way we can, any way you need, we will help you. That is why this school exists." Jim nodded at her again, the most minute inclination of his head. "But I think maybe you will find you don't need as much help as it might seem right now."

"This is seeming like a very... good place, also," Yvette ventured shyly, reassured by his words. This Mr. Haller was very kind, and he also knew what to say, almost as if he had been through something like this himself. "I was very confusing, when I wake up," she admitted. "But, I am not so much now. Miss Paige and Mr. Professor and you... you are helping me. Thank you very much." And she looked up at him, eyes flaring brightly in the small infirmary room. "This I will not be forgetting."

"You're very welcome, Yvette." Jim smiled as he rose from his chair, his height taking him far above the small girl curled in the bed. "I am going to talk with the professor now so you can get some rest. Paige will come back to keep you company, so if you think of any more questions tonight you can ask her or the doctors, or you can ask for me. Tomorrow we will talk more about what you would like to do next. If you want you can meet some other people, too." He grinned a little, raising a scarred hand to touch his own sleeve. "And when you feel well enough, we may even be able to get you better clothes. Ones that do not tear so easily or need to be tied in the back. The doctors here are very good, but I never liked those shifts, either."