Us Mutants Prefer the Term "Special"

x42x

A/N as of 09/05: I just went back and edited this entire story so if you read the sequel "Nothing Less than Extraordinary" and something doesn't seem to line up based off your recollection of the story prior to today, something probably changed. I'm not saying to re-read it (which you could do in one sitting with the right conviction), because you can just shoot me a comment or message about it and I'll clear up the issue. Thanks again for reading and I hope you read what's available so far for the sequel!

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I stood there, staring at him. I couldn't blink. I couldn't move. I couldn't think. I couldn't even breathe.

"You were in my room," he said. I still stood there. I still couldn't move. Or think. Or breathe. But my response was to blink. "Am I correct?"

In his presence, it appeared that I was the one absent from the reality set in front of me. And if I thought my brain was deceiving me, it was all confirmed when he reached out to touch me and the cells in my arm survived a half second before telling me to step back.

That motion offended him and his gorgeous eyes narrowed slightly before returning to normal and caring more for the fact of what I did and maybe why I did it, than feeling rejected.

"Pen—"

I immediately spun around and he appeared in front of me and when I attempted to reach out and touch me, I didn't act like some fragile girl. I grabbed his wrist and put him in his place on the ground with the wind knocked right out of him. But when I would place my foot upon his sternum and threaten him, he was—with a blur of speed—flipping the position and now I was the one looking up at him as he kneeled over me and locked my wrists together with his hands.

"Help! Hel—" he covered my mouth.

"I don't know whether to be offended at you to think I'd actually hurt you, or cautious because I don't know how much you can actually do," he ranted at me as if scolding me, but then he scowled once before easing up and extending a hand for assistance. I only glared up at him and the sorry excuse of five letters in a row on his shirt. He gave me a persistent look and jabbed his hand at me once more, but I got up on my own and kept a great distance between us.

The lingering voice of Maxwell played in my mind, hinting at forgiveness, but as soon as I was trying to actually look into the eyes of the man in front of me, he was being thrown into the nearest wall by Cheshire. He held him by the throat.

"Be lucky I let you live on that rooftop, but now you're not so lucky," Cheshire hissed at him.

"Cheshire," I addressed in a mumble that didn't surpass his sights of blood.

"Jase got what he deserved and there is nothing more that you can offer to the world, so it's time you take the same fate—"

"Cheshire!" I addressed once more as he continued to ignore me.

"I'm here to help—"

"Help hurt us more?" Cheshire hissed at him and then I grabbed his arm.

"He didn't hurt me," I told him.

"Yet," Cheshire added and then suddenly he was thrown off his guard and his personal prisoner escaped his grasp and flipped the position as he had with me, earlier. However, now he looked threatening.

"I would never in a million years hurt her!" he yelled. Cheshire's blue eyes found mine in question and then he was released. "And I came here to help you."

"What more can you possibly—" I held a hand up to Cheshire and wondered what was being implied. Now I was being addressed.

"I know that I caused a lot of havoc and death and betrayal, but I promise it wasn't me!" he started. "I want to fix all of this and—"

"'Chevy ordered this', 'Chevy ordered that'," Cheshire mimicked. "It sounds like you were in charge to me."

"And for a while I thought I was, but that's what they had a telepath make me think so it would make sense as a cover," he reasoned. Cheshire exchanged a glance. He sighed. "Please. I just want this to be over and for things to be normal and I'll help you find the others—"

"Others?" I asked. Other people in charge?

"Sentara said that she and some of the other students got out and they teleported somewhere, but she couldn't tell me where because she thought someone was here and could ruin that," Cheshire informed. "I guess she was right."

"Sentara Johnson?" he asked and was responded with a nod. He pushed for a pathetic laugh. "She's alive in all of this while Jase died. Nice—"

"What isn't nice is the dozens of students killed, injured, or in hiding because of you," Cheshire said sternly, crossing his arms and looking menacing.

"I don't know where they are hiding, but I know where the ones captured are," he informed. Cheshire and I exchanged a look and I bit my lip. I didn't even feel like I was here right now.

"And why should we trust you, Chevy, the person with the least to lose out of all this?" Cheshire asked and then a pair of hazel-green eyes met my glazed brown ones.

"Because I'm not this malicious 'Chevy' anymore than you're this delinquent 'Cheshire'," he simply said. "I'm a mutant, just like you both. I'm just...Tyler Lane."

Cheshire looked over at me as if he knew about mine and Tyler's past, but I knew he didn't. It made me gulp. But I had to be stronger than that. Even as he took a step near me.

"I know you lost me once, but I had no control over it. Now I do," he whispered, inches from my face. I stared up at his beautiful eyes.

"Considering you're the reason why so many of the people I refuse to lose are in this hospital right now, you've lost your privilege," I hissed at him. "The privilege you have now is to right your wrongs and help us find the others."

I looked over to Cheshire, pulling him along because I'd go on this journey if it meant saving the others like us. But before we made it to the elevator with Tyler in tow, I looked back to him.

"And we're not mutants," I added, feeling as offended as the man who dared and won to take the place of Tyler...that was the same offended man sitting in a hospital bed down the hall. And I'd try more than anything in the world to undue that and carry on his life and views of the world and anyone who's been lucky enough to interact with him. "We're special."