[OP: "Prove me Wrong"-- Tyler Joseph.]

Colossus took the news about as well as you'd expect.

"Someone is wanting to hurt my sister? Colossus will talk to them," he said angrily. "With fist. I peace loving man, but no one threaten my family!"

"Calm down, buddy," Wally said. "We're trying to stop that, okay? Is it okay if we bring her here?"

"Da, Colossus guard her in person," Colossus said.

"Or we play right into their hands." Emma had fallen into a pretty morbid frame of mind. "We do all the work for them, and they come and collect."

"Don't read us your game plan," Mystique said to her nastily.

Emma didn't even have a snippy come back, she just gave her a murderous glare.

"I think you should stop saying things like that to her," Scott told Mystique sternly. "It's not good teamwork."

"Oh? Really?" Mystique said, in a fake honeyed voice. "Excuse me, didn't realize we were on the same team."

"Aren't we all trying to save the world?" This Scott apparently didn't get sarcasm any better than the other one.

He was so dense, in fact, that Mystique just looked at him and walked away.

"That was my reaction also," Emma muttered.

"What did I say?" Scott asked.

"Just ignore her." Emma put a hand to the bridge of her nose. 

Shine and Wally decided that not everyone should go to get Illyeanna, but more than one person should.

Morph volunteered... He needed something to do.

Colossus would go, of course.

Shine and Wally were going to go themselves, but the others represented to them that if things got dangerous, they might need them here.

Gathering the people was a risky move, and one that was a long shot, most of them thought. And they still thought someone might attack the house.

"Morph can handle it," Xavier said. "He knows what to look for. It seems you all have experience."

Emma wanted to go, and so did Scott, but they were told, no, they needed to stay where they could be guarded.

"But I feel so useless," Scott said.

"That's okay," Morph said. "We all feel useless..."

"Worth isn't based on use anyway." Shine shrugged. "I'm not going to let it bother me that I can't do much. But there is one thing Wally and I can do. We can put a barrier around the house."

"A what?" Emma said.

"Like we did at the camp with Magneto," Shine said.

"You mean Genosha?" Scott said.

"No...he doesn't own Genosha here," Shine said.

"Wow..." Scott said.

"He didn't own it once in our dimension either," Emma reminded him. "Not in the 80s. Not that I remember much about that time."

"Yeah, you can't be that old, right?" Morph said. "Time passing is kind of lost on me now... How old are you now, Scott?"

"I.... At this point, it doesn't matter," Scott said.

"If you're younger than 30, it's cool still," Wally said.

"What's wrong with being 30?" Shine asked him.

"Nothing," Wally said. "As long as it doesn't slow me down."

"Well, I'll find out in 5 years or so..." Shine said.

"So you're younger than him?" Scott said to her.

"By a bit, yes," Shine said. "Not that much, really... Why?"

"Oh...nothing... You act older," Scott said.

Shine burst out laughing...which she hadn't done all day. "It's like clockwork, I swear."

"Everyone always says that," Wally said. "People still think I'm 22."

"They say I look it, but he acts it," Shine said.

She did look young.

"By how you act, you could be anywhere from 10 to 100, depending on the time of day," Emma commented dryly.

"Ah, thanks, Emma, that's sweet," Shine said.

"We should leave," Colossus said. "It take hours to get to my home."

"Can I come?" Kitty joined them. "I'm going crazy doing nothing, and the other kids won't stop talking long enough for me to read."

"She's...not really in any more danger if she goes..." Xavier mused. "If you want, Miss Pryde. I suppose it won't hurt."

"Is good, Illy will like another girl around," Colossus said. "But what we tell my parents?"

"Well, wasn't she thinking of coming here anyway?" Wally recalled.

"Da...but they want her to wait till after birthday," Colossus said. "Think 13 is too young."

"Oh...she's my age?" Kitty said. "I mean...almost..."

"Yes, about," Colossus said.

"Well, let's go get her," Kitty said. "I can tell her how insane it is here."

"You speak Russian?" Colossus asked. "Her English is not so good."

Mystique walked in. "I'm coming," she said.

"Uh...you are?" Morph said.

He got a stone cold glare.

"Do you speak Russian?" Mystique said in the coldest voice imaginable.

"No..." Morph couldn't believe he wanted to tack a "ma'am" onto the end of that.

"You do?" Colossus said.

Mystique said something in Russian to him. 

He responded.

"What was that?" Wally asked Shine.

"I think she just said she could speak it well," Shine said. "And he said that was good and where did she learn... I don't know, Hon, my Russian is not a whole lot."

"Okay...so is everyone around here bilingual except me?" Morph said.

"You know, it pays to be bilingual if you travel worlds," Shine said. "Hablo muchas idiomas, pero apprendo mas todo el tiempo." [My best effort at translating: "I speak a lot of languages, but I'm learning more all the time."]

"Claro tu haces," Mystique said, rolling her eyes. ["Of course you do."]

"Cuantos idiomas hablas?" Shine said to her. ["How many languages do you know?"]

"No recuerdo," Mystique said. ["I don't remember."]

She seemed ready to dismiss it.

"My Spanish is not good," Wally said. "So I didn't get most of that. But it sounded like you were showing off."

Shine pretended to swat him.

"But why do you need to go if Colossus is?" Kitty asked Mystique.

"Because I don't trust him to explain this situation well," Mystique said. "That's why. And I was there, and he wasn't. Why?" She frowned at Kitty.

"Nothing." Kitty shrugged. "I just didn't think you'd get involved...but, hey, it's fine... It'll be fun."

No one else looked like they thought it'd be fun.

Warren said he'd go also. He needed something to do.

Hank went to drive the plane, and they all left.

"Not that it's important," Wally said, "but how long is Mystique going to stay mad at us for?"

"I read her mind," Emma said. "You're lucky she doesn't have a gun right now."

"I think she has one," Shine said. "And stop doing that. I don't need you to tell me she's angry."

"I don't see why," Scott said. "What did anyone do to her?"

"It's complicated, Scott." Shine stood up. "Suffice it to say, there has been a huge misunderstanding that is not easy to explain. She now thinks that we were using her this whole time. I couldn't talk her out of it. But that's all I can say about it. It was Morph's friend in the time zone that did it. He said something."

"Yes...well, wasn't it true?" Emma said.

"I don't know, Emma." Shine suddenly frowned at her. "What do you think is true about time and responsibility?"

Emma blinked at her and looked down.

"So...she caused a problem?" Scott guessed. "Or maybe she just thinks she did?"

"You're not shabby, huh?" Shine said. "This is tripping me out. I'm not used to someone who looks like Scott being so perceptive."

"I...don't think I'm that perceptive," Scott said. "But given the whole time thing, I just assumed there was only one reason she could have been upset about it. It seems to be going around...unless she found out she died or something."

"We all die," Shine said, "just about, so that wouldn't be news would it? But you all don't need to worry about our fight, uncomfortable as it is. It's none of your business. Just don't say anything to her about it. That's all I was explaining it for."

"But shouldn't she know by now if you'd use her?" Scott said. "Hasn't she been here for some time, I gather?"

"Well, in her defense, you don't always know people so well," Shine said. "I almost can't blame her... I mean, if I thought about our powers too hard, it would scare me to think of someone using them for ill... Anyone can be scary, can't they? I wish Mimic had kept his mouth shut. I knew she was not ready to hear all this..."

"Well, it's her own fault," Emma said. "She chose to go there. I don't see why you should feel guilty."

"It's called caring about someone's feelings, Emma." Shine was terse.

Emma frowned at her. "I never said that was wrong."

"She's doing you a favor as much as anyone." Shine leaned on the counter to look at Emma pointedly. "And she's actually not complained a whole lot about it. Because Raven understands one thing: survival. And right now, we all need to cooperate. So I think whatever happened to her was unfortunate and should be treated as such, don't you agree?"

Emma was not ready for that level of aggression from Shine.

"Of course..." she said, subdued...though she didn't look happy about it.

"I'm...I don't think she meant it that way," Scott said. "Maybe not be so...harsh?"

"Oh, Scott," Shine said, "if you knew what I have been dealing with for the past several weeks, you would appreciate how self controlled I am being today. And I know, that sounds real immature, but right now, I don't care. I think I'll go continue to try to hold it together upstairs."

"It's late already," Wally said. "We should just go to bed... We didn't do that much today, but somehow I'm exhausted."

The kids had already gone to bed, except for the older ones, who were probably up, talking.

"Yeah," Shine sighed.

Ruthie wandered into the kitchen right then.

"Hey, kiddo." Wally smiled. "Did you need something?"

Ruthie nodded somberly. "I'm scared," she said. "Are the bad people coming back?"

"No," Wally said. "They left, remember?"

"Cindy is scared," Ruthie said, after a moment. "She wants someone to come..."

She tugged Shine's arm.

Shine nodded. "Okay," she said. "Come on." She picked her up. "This house is kind of spooky at night anyway. Sometimes I even jump. Right, Hon?"

"Yeah, well, all old houses are spooky, right?" Wally said.

"But I can sing the song that scares away the bad things," Shine said. "Come on...knowing Cindy, she's going to want water too. Hon, can you bring us that?"

"Yeah, got it," Wally said.

Emma and Scott watched this in silence, and once they had gone out, Scott said:

"Well, I guess they're okay. They're just stressed. Maybe I was too hard on her."

"She is just sparing me." Emma got up and went to pour herself some more tea.

"Why?" Scott said. "I think she was a little mean about it."

"Oh, no, I deserved worse than that," Emma said. "And she knew it. But I can't seem to help it anymore... It just maddens me how calm Mystique is about this. She ought to be just as stressed as everyone else. All that working with those lunatics, I suppose."

"Isn't it good if someone isn't stressed?" Scott was puzzled. "I don't even know where to start with this situation..."

Emma just thought it wasn't fair. She was going to pieces, almost literally, and Mystique was somehow not. Just to spite her, she thought.

But it seemed kind of pathetic to complain about that. [Yeah...]

"If it wasn't for the circumstances, this doesn't seem like such a bad place to live," Scott remarked. "I feel like it's more...lively than home...from what I'm remembering...more kids, too."

"Well, there was the plan for more at the other mansion," Emma said dryly. "But the MRD was making that extremely difficult. Just like they did for me. This world doesn't have one, and that would be reason enough to like it here, if it wasn't for the circumstances... I can go out and not worry about being arrested. Not that I have ever had quite the problem with that that other people did...but still. They all go out in broad daylight, even the ones who are so clearly mutants."

"Sounds great," Scott said. "I guess...it's because it's in the past...sort of."

"Or things are just different," Emma mused. "One could spend years trying to figure out why, but they don't know how fortunate they are."

"Can I ask?" Scott said, after a pause. "How long did we know each other? All the things I remember, I can't fit them into one timeline at all...could be over years...or days..."

Emma sighed. "Just a few months," she said. "I...I knew of the X-men before that, but not personally. And I can't say Wolverine liked me very much at first. Something about competition, I suppose."

Not that that was the only reason.

"This might be a weird question, but were we friends?" Scott asked.

"If you remember me, don't you know the answer to that?" Emma didn't feel like she should answer that kind of question.

"I'm having a hard time placing what I remember..." Scott said.

Emma made the mistake of reading his mind at that moment, and she turned red and had to hide it by turning around and pretending to add more sugar to her tea.

She told herself to get a grip... Of course it was all confusing right now.

Better just explain.

"Well--" She hoped her voice was more steady than she thought it was. "--friends...that's a complicated question, on a team... I guess you could say so. I was so new...and not on it for very long before...so it's hard to say who was and wasn't a friend."

Not to mention none of them trusted her, she thought to herself.

She was glad he wasn't a telepath. This conversation would have been unbearable.

"I see," Scott said. "I guess that makes sense... Just...I keep thinking I remember something more than that..."

Emma could see where that notion would come in...she just didn't like it.

"Well...to be honest," she said, finally turning around to make it less obvious she was uncomfortable, "there was a lot of...mental breakdown going on at the time...so...it's possible whatever you're remembering is part of that, and not reality, as it was at the time."

And I wish what I remembered was that and not what I know was real, she thought to herself.

"Oh, that makes more sense," Scott said. "I think it wasn't adding up... But...you're a telepath--maybe you could help."

"I don't think that's a good idea," Emma said.

"Why not?" Scott asked. "You're the only one who knows what I'm supposed to remember. Morph hasn't been there for years, so...also what he told me just didn't cover it. I need more specific help... I don't want to wait for days and days, when things are like this."

"But perhaps letting it happen naturally would be best," Emma said. "Suppose I just confuse you more?"

"It's...just too much time," Scott said. "Could you try, with anything? I'd take it."

Emma hesitated.

"Well...all right." She knew she was going to regret this immediately. "Maybe if I just try something small.... There was the time when Storm nearly destroyed Africa."

"Small?" Scott said.

"I suppose by comparison," Emma said.

To what happened later, she added mentally.

"Well...fine," Scott said. "That sounds vaguely familiar..."

Emma put a hand to her head.

It was a recent memory so it was easy for her to find herself and try to connect.

For a moment, it seemed to work.

Scott's memory of it wasn't gone, it was just hazy.

But then for the third time Emma got that horrid feeling like her head was trying to split.

She fell over so fast she knocked her tea onto the floor.

"Emma!" Scott got up and rushed over.

Emma tried to stop the feeling this time.

Shine and Wally had tried to strengthen her earlier, while they were waiting for Morph...and it seemed to help a little...

Shine had also advised her that if it happened again, she should try to think of something calming as soon as possible.

But this feeling just wrecked her concentration too much.

Emma's mind ran from the feeling, and for a second it blanked out again.

She blinked...not sure where she was...

By now, though, the not knowing was starting to become a memory all on its own, and she felt dimly that she was supposed to know...she just didn't.

Then it passed.

Scott was holding her by one hand and trying to get her to sit up with the other.

"Can you hear me?" he asked.

"Yes..." Emma put her free hand to her head. "What...what just happened?"

"I think it happened again," Scott said. "I'm sorry, I shouldn't have asked. That must have been what set it off... Are you all right?"

"I..." Emma realized what was happening right then and stood up in a hurry, brushing herself off. "I think I'm all right...other than I think I just ruined this outfit." 

She had tea all over her now... At least it wasn't that hot...

"I guess it's no use," Scott said. "I don't understand... Why did that make it happen?"

"I don't know..." Emma was scared again. "Perhaps...the truth is, your memory is blocked by the dimensional shock, and what is happening to me is also caused by the shift in dimension...so if I try to access it...it acts up. I hope that is all. That is the simplest explanation..."

And that would make it something she could avoid, if she was careful.

"Maybe that's it," Scott said. "Sorry."

"It's not like you knew it would happen." Emma walked to the door. "I'm sorry also...that I couldn't help."

She walked out without another word.

Didn't she feel useless now?

* * *

The plane ride was awkward as heck.

Colossus was worried about his sister and not his usual cheerful self.

Kitty attempted to cheer him up, with some success, but not as much as she'd have liked.

Hank was just focused on flying and not much help.

Warren was sullenly silent mostly.

Morph?

He tried to use the chance to talk to Mystique about what happened.

"Look, about Mimic," he said, "I really think if you'd just let me finish explaining, you'd see it's not like that."

No answer.

"He just didn't know any better," Morph said. "And all that stuff about you? It's really not the reason. Come on, you can't really buy that, right?"

Stony look.

"So much for trust," Morph said.

Finally that got an answer.

"Why should I trust anything you say?" Mystique said. "I should have known it as soon as I found out about all this. But somehow, I still imagined it was different than it looked."

"I don't even know what looks so bad," Morph said. "You know, this is why I don't tell people this stuff. They get weird about it."

"They feel weird about knowing they're a target on some cosmic scoreboard?" Mystique said. "I wonder why." [Mojo would do that to a person.]

"You know, you're not the only one who's been in that boat," Morph said, more warmly. "Even I have. But I don't treat everyone like they're a bad guy over it."

"Your decision," Mystique said. "A stupid one, probably, but not one I have to imitate. But who is being treated like a criminal? Just because you put a different name on it doesn't change it."

"Didn't Shine talk to you at all?" Morph said.

"Yes...her excuse was pathetic," Mystique said. "I'm supposed to believe anyone would know about this and not use that information to plan? I wouldn't do that."

"Yeah, maybe that's why you're not a DJ or a RT," Morph said. "We just don't think that way... It looks like you're determined not to believe it no matter what we say, though. Well, fine." He sat back and scowled. "Figures. Mystique has to be the victim, right?"

"Don't talk to me," Mystique said.

"Fine," Morph said.

Kitty glanced back at them, and then she hissed at Colossus,

"Does that fight seem kind of childish to you?"

"Colossus try not to eavesdrop on other people's arguments," Colossus said. "Americans, so strange and nosy."

Kitty looked embarrassed. 

"Well, they are behind us..." she muttered.

Mystique had been going over what happened for so long, she'd almost lost track of why she was angry.

Why should she have been? In their position, she'd have tricked herself also. Probably more heartlessly than whatever they did.

But that was her. She just...didn't think they were the type.

But shouldn't she have known? Shine was tricky. Morph had all those secrets...Wally was just along for the ride, maybe, but...it was so obvious in hindsight.

 A little voice said to her, "But you know them too well for that. Are you willing to believe they really were lying all that time? All the times they saved you? Is that what they earned?"

But the voice saying that it was exactly how one would expect was far louder, and right now, she was giving it her full attention.

She barely had a thought of anything else, other than the world was in danger... At the moment she was treating that more like a distraction than anything else, much like all the other projects she'd ever worked on in her life.

https://youtu.be/Hz0K7VoAIts

[Hustle-- P!NK]

* * *

Finally, they arrived in Russia and over the cities to the rural area Colossus was from...which was hard to find on a map. He and Hank had to work for some time at it.

"I hope we aren't too late," Kitty remarked.

"I'm sure the farm boy would have gotten word if she wasn't here," Warren said sullenly.

They landed the plane in a field some distance from the houses of the village.

Colossus hurried to his house at a speed the others couldn't match easily, though Hank could bound over the hills pretty fast. Kitty started just phasing through the grass and crops.

Then she almost hyperventilated from holding her breath that much and fell into the dirt.

"Careful, Shadowcat," Colossus called.

"Stop calling me that," Kitty grumbled.

"Here." Morph helped her up. "It's funny you hate that name so much. That's the name the Kitty Pryde I knew uses."

"You're...kidding?" Kitty said.

"Nope. I thought it was neat," Morph said.

"Shadowcat?" Kitty said.

"Yeah, you know, mysterious? Like a cat," Morph said.

"Cats are creepy," Kitty said.

"Cats are necessary," Colossus commented. "Keep mice from eating grain in bin."

"There, you see?" Morph said. "Stop being so negative about the name. Maybe it's destiny."

Kitty frowned.

"Beats little mouse," Mystique muttered, walking by and stepping over the dirt haughtily.

"Maybe it's not so bad..." Kitty said. "But knowing someone else like me is using it makes me feel like a copycat, not a shadowcat."

"Oh, clever," Morph said nervously.

"Pryde," Mystique called, "look professional."

"Why are you picking on me?" Kitty said. "What did I do to you?"

"I have little hope of anyone else in this squad pulling it off," Mystique said.

"Oh." Kitty straightened and brushed herself off. "Right."

She shook her head at Morph. "What did you do to her?"

"Nothing," Morph said. "She's just determined to think I did."

"You know, when my mom gets mad at my dad, my dad usually just leaves her alone until she cools off," Kitty said. "And if I try to talk to her about it, she bites my head off...so...maybe you should just leave her alone?"

"I don't think that's going to work," Morph said. "And, uh...no offense, but you don't really know what's going on, so..."

"No one tells me anything," Kitty said.

"Not to be that guy, but you're 14," Morph said. "You don't really want to try to solve grown-up problems, do you? Ruins the fun of still being a kid."

"Technically, I'm Jewish, and I'm already an adult," Kitty said. "Had the Bat Mitsvah and everything...back when I was normal." She sighed. "My parents took me seriously at least."

Morph was starting to see why she gravitated toward Mystique, if that was the case.

Colossus was knocking on his cottage door now.

"Mama, Papa? Illy? Someone?" he called.

"Pietro?" a man's voice said.

But it came from around the house where there was some farm stuff lying around, and a guy about as big as Colossus but much older came and gave him a big bear hug.

"Why you no let us know you're coming?" he said. "Who are your friends?"

Then he started speaking in Russian.

"Ugh, I know Hebrew and Latin, not Russian," Kitty complained. 

"You're not missing much," Mystique said. "Just the usual stupid, sentimental crap that people say."

"That's not very sensitive, Madame. They have not seen their son in months," Hank said.

The door opened, and an older woman who must have been Colossus' mother came out and also spoke in Russian and then looked at them.

"Why didn't you put on a disguise?" Kitty asked Mystique.

"I figured for this, making the point that we're mutants will be more effective," Mystique said.

"I guess that makes sense," Kitty said. "Are they talking about us?"

"Yes, one of them just asked why there was a kid and a painted woman here," Mystique said.

"And you're the painted one, right?" Kitty said. "Wait, so they don't realize you're a mutant?"

"I'd have to guess they've never seen one other than their own kids," Mystique said.

"Crazy," Kitty said. "Colossus probably never got any crap for it, then."

"Would explain a few things," Hank mused.

Colossus began trying to explain about Illyeanna, who must have been somewhere on the property out of eye-view of them.

But his parents weren't having it.

"What do you mean she's not safe here? She is perfectly safe. No one has been troubling us," they said. "And America is too dangerous for her. She is too young still. We hear how the young people over there behave."

Mystique repeated this to Kitty, to her amusement. 

"I thought Russians were the crazy ones. What do they mean we behave badly?" she said.

"I'm sure they just think everyone has a gun," Mystique said. "You wouldn't believe the conceptions people have of America."

"But we don't fight bears," Kitty said.

"I did once," Mystique said.

Morph thought she was purposely ignoring him and talking to Kitty just to rub it in.

How petty could she be?

A mature person would have just talked it out, but that was just expecting too much from Mystique, he supposed.

Past trauma or not, why would you not even give someone a chance to explain themselves? Who did that?

Colossus turned to the others, and in English he said, "We have problem.... I can't seem to make parents understand that bad people could be coming here looking for Illyeanna because of her powers.... Her powers are not very strong yet. Not even sure what they are.... She only just started to have them, after she was kidnapped...but she all right now. No more bad people...so...Colossus not sure how to convince them."

"So tell them something they'll take seriously," Mystique said.

"I try, but they think I have been in America too long. I get paranoid," Colossus said.

"Oh, for the love of... This isn't that hard," Mystique said.

She walked up to them and said something in Russian that made Colossus almost choke.

"What'd she say?" Kitty asked Morph. 

"How should I know?" Morph said.

"Oh...my..." Hank said. "I...wouldn't have gone that extreme with it."

"How bad was it?" Kitty said.

"Oh...well...it's not something I like to say to children," Hank said.

Kitty frowned.

"Glad Warren stayed to watch the plane..." Morph muttered.

Colossus' parents looked at Colossus and said something that sounded much more concerned now.

Mystique answered it instead, crossing her arms.

Colossus finally spoke. It seemed he was sort of weakly agreeing with her.

His parents look somber and shook their heads. Then they said something more subdued.

Colossus turned to the others. "Good news, they say she can go."

"What did you tell them?" Kitty asked her.

"Just that--" Mystique began.

"Madame, please," Hank said. "Don't repeat that in English."

"She tell them bad people come look for Illyeanna," Colossus said.

"But that's what you told them," Kitty said.

"Not same kind of bad people..." Colossus said. "Also say something else... Miss, you are kind of scary."

He was saying that?

"Whatever, it got the job done, didn't it?" Mystique dropped her arms. "We'd just better have been in time."

Morph hated that the whole thing was kind of impressive.

She was driving him crazy, he thought to himself.

"You were a soviet spy?" Colossus asked Mystique.

"It was an in-between job," Mystique said. "Good way to keep track of how they were using mutants."

"Did you ever...kill someone?" Kitty asked. Her eyes were huge.

"No," Mystique said. "Not doing that..."

Kitty blinked at her.

"Besides, killing people is sloppy. It's better never to get caught at all." Mystique shrugged.

"Perhaps you had better stop sharing," Hank said.

"She has to learn sooner or later what the world expects of us," Mystique said. 

"What the world expects of us and what we expect of ourselves are two different things," Hank said.

"What, you think I want to be a spy?" Kitty scoffed. "It's just interesting to hear about it. Gosh, Hank, I'm not stupid. I know it's illegal and stuff. But you guys spy, don't you?"

"As a last resort," Hank said.

"If it was your first resort, you'd get less problems from the humans," Mystique said.

"And be like the trouble-makers?" Hank said. "How is that helping us?"

"Ah, there she is," Colossus interrupted them.

A girl much smaller than him, though pretty tall for her age, came sprinting around the yard and tackled him.

"Pietro!" she cried, then began talking in Russian super fast.

"I didn't quite follow that," Hank said. "My Russian is a little rusty,. I should re-read Dostoevsky."

"Illyeanna, meet friends from America." Colossus patted her shoulder finally. "Dr. Hank and Morph, and Mystique, and Kitty."

"She is Kitty?" Illyeanna looked at Kitty. "One from letter?"

"Letter?" Kitty said.

"Colossus mention all new friends in letter," Colossus said.

Kitty smiled slightly. "I'm Kitty Pryde," she said. "Though I guess I'm also called Shadowcat."

"Why are you called little cat?" Illyeanna asked bluntly.

Kitty frowned.

Morph laughed.

"Does it just run in the family?" Kitty said.

"Or it could be that in Russian to English, Kitty and little cat translate to about the same thing," Mystique said randomly. "But that's just a wild guess."

"I get it, but it's just a nickname..." Kitty said.

"You don't look like cat," Illyanna said.

"Well, you don't look like magic," Kitty said. "But I'm not judging you."

"Huh?" Illyanna looked confused.

"Uh...maybe don't say things like that," Morph said.

"Illyanna, listen, you must move to America early," Colossus said. "There is trouble. Bad men, looking for us. Must keep you safe."

Illyanna said something else in Russian.

"I'm with her," Mystique said. "It would be easier to explain this if it wasn't in English. And if it wasn't so out there to begin with."

"Maybe just tell her about the school?" Kitty said. "Worked on me. No one told me how crazy it was."

"I think some explanation is in order..." Hank said.

Colossus attempted to give on.

Illyana was a little less dense about it than their parents were, she at least understood the very real threat of being kidnapped.

"I come with you," she agreed. "Leave now?"

"Da," Colossus said.

"I not have papers..." Illyana said.

"We'll have to work on that later," Hank said. "I'm afraid we don't have weeks to wait for it."

"I go illegally?" Illyana said.

"Just for now..." Colossus said.

Illyana frowned. "Well...all right.... I pack. Take me five minutes. Not have much."

"I'll help," Kitty offered. "Just...there's some stuff you might not want to bring...so..."

"Help?" Illyana said. "Oh...sure. Friend help, no? Come." They moved towards the house.

"That's the nicest I've seen Kitty be to someone she just met," Morph said.

"Well, Illyana is sort of in the same boat as Kitty herself was," Hank said. "Perhaps she empathizes."

"At least someone is enjoying this..." Morph muttered.