Cassidy also caught the fleeting expression. "Is something wrong?"

"It's nothing, really." Emma said, clearly annoyed. "They're planning something. I can tell." She propped her arm against the desk and scowled. "And I rather think it's on me."

"You mean the kids?" He winced sympathetically. "Hopefully it'll be easier to clean up than the last time Jubilee pulled something."

"If it was just Jubilee planning something I wouldn't be too worried. This is Karen and Arcania plotting. I doubt it will be too messy, although you never know with 'Cania, but it will definitely be more creative. And they seem to have gotten everyone but Paige in on it." She pouted a bit. "I almost wish they'd just get it over with."

"I wonder why Paige isn't in on it..." Sean mused.

Emma rolled her eyes. "We'd all know everything within ten minutes. It's one thing when it's something important, but I wish she would figure out we're not her parents to tattle to..."

Moira had to stop herself from asking why she didn't just read their minds. It would be completely tactless, after all. Besides this was a rather trivial matter. Although she remembered more than one occasion when Charles had scanned Bobby for that very reason...

"Well, good luck then."

"Thank you so very much, Irish." Emma wrinkled her nose at him. "I'll have a word about this with Jono in a bit."

"Are you guys sure this is a good idea?" Ev said hesitantly. "I'm sure she'd like the thought and all, but... I don't know."

"Shh! Paige is coming." Karen did her best not to glare at the other girl. She could take undisguised cruelty, no problem; being patronized, on the other hand, just pissed the hell out of her.

"Why do we not want her in on this again?" Jubilee asked, puzzled. Sure, Husk wasn't her best buddy these days and Kare, Keith and 'Cania hadn't known her B.T. (Before Tristan), but this still seemed a little odd. They weren't planning anything Ms. Frost would object to-- They were just jazzing it up a bit.

"Because we'd lose the element of surprise." Crane intoned firmly.

As much as Jubes hated to admit it, she was right.

"So, are we ready to get started then, Wellington?" Arcania drawled.

"Very cute, Constantine." The young woman from Illinois made a face at her roommate.

"Oh, you'd prefer to be Major Sharpe, then?"

"Damned straight. I'm a huge fan of Bernard Cornwell."

"And of course the fact that Sean Bean is rather easy on the eyes has nothing to do with that." (1)

"Of course not." The two of them made a habit of dropping obscure references that no one else could quite catch. Put them together for any amount of time and it was ten times worse, with everyone else ending up thoroughly confused.

"Right..." Angelo stood and stretched. "I guess we'll get started on getting things ready and you guys can round up our, ahem, victim..."

"You took the words out of my mouth. C'mon."

A knock came at the door, with ever so slight hesitance. It then opened without further niceties. The female student body, minus Husk, trooped in, all except Arcania in various states of nervousness. Somehow Illusion of all people had been elected spokesperson. "You know how you said it was okay if we did the movie marathon thing..."

"Yes. If you want to change the films I'll have to approve those as well." They had been, with few exceptions, quite violent, but most of them were still acceptable. The only reject that had been protested too much was an obscure horror movie with Rupert Everett of all people in it (along with a few peeks at an Italian model's bare cleavage. They could find worse without any problem, but that didn't mean she would condone it.). (2)

"Not that... But there is a change in plans." Karen twisted the end of her ponytail in her hand. "You know how... I mean... Well..." She was absolutely brilliant with words-- as long as they were written. TALKING was another story in most cases. "You said that you had never done anything like this when you were our age and Jubilee and 'Cania said it wasn't because it wasn't your thing or something, that you... Anyway we all think that sucks so we kinda decided that you're-going-to-hang-out-with-us-this-weekend." (3)

That had not been what she was expecting, especially from the at times eloquent but usually painfully shy Karen. That was the main thing that kept her from acting right away. She stared at them, and then blinked. Monet and Arcania took her by either arm and walked her out of the room.

"First things first. We need to get you into some normal clothes. I said we should go shopping, but I got outvoted." Jubilee said, making a face at the others.

"An' it's still a daft idea, Lee. If she doesn't a pair of jeans and a T-shirt she can borrow them off of one of us." Arcania rolled her eyes.

"Besides, it's just... against the whole principle of the thing. You're just supposed to wear comfy clothes-- grubby comfy clothes-- not high fashion." Illusion spoke with utter conviction.

Monet raised an eyebrow. "Karen, it's a slumber party. Slumber parties and principles have little to do with each other." The Algerian girl shook her head.

"No, it isn't, M."

"I beg pardon?"

"It isn't a slumber party. Those are a bunch of girls giggling about boys and absolutely nothing until the wee hours. This is an all night wallow in geek-dom. A ho dog party. Much more fun." The others gave her odd looks, but didn't say anything.

Half an hour later the White Queen, whose fashion sense in her various incarnations had been described as either elegant or kinky, was dressed in a torn and faded pair of cargo pants and a paint speckled Cure T-shirt, courtesy of Karen and Arcania respectively.

She was still just slightly shell shocked. "Relax, would ya, Ems? You'd think we were takin' you t' the gallows you're so uptight." Arcania smirked a bit.

"If you insist. This really isn't my thing, though. And I still find it odd that an empath enjoys making others squirm quite so much."

She was ushered into the rec. room, which had been modified a bit. Nearly everything had been pushed against the wall. The couch, a love-seat, a low long coffee table piled high with junk food and the big screen TV were all that remained. The boys were sprawled over all the good spots, as was Paige. Her expression went from slightly annoyed to completely shocked in two seconds flat.

"I take it Paige wasn't in on this little plot of yours."

Paige's indignant "Of course not!" was simultaneous with Karen's "Nope." Crane 'ported away and came running back through the door a minute or so later carrying an awkward shaped bundle. (4) Ignoring the odd looks she then proceeded to distribute water pistols to Jono and all the girls besides Arcania and Paige.

"What, may I ask, are these for?" Monet asked with an arched brow.

"This." Karen spritzed Keith until he gave up his seat. Arcania just sat on Jono.

~Why do I get one instead of 'Cania?~

"She doesn't need one-- She has you whipped."

~You've been a bad influence on our Karen, luv. Keep up the good work.~

"Just helping her get it all out, nothing that wasn't already there." Constantine chuckled, then crossed her eyes at both of them.

Synch shook his head. "It might stick like that, you know." He sighed in the tones of someone surrounded by lunatics. "Shall I do the honors?"

"Get on with it already!" At least three cushions and one stream of water came flying at him.

He dodged them all and put a tape in the VCR. It was standard B-movie fare: young couple goes to cabin, find an artifact (well recording of a spell), get attacked by zombies and it was a sequel to boot. It was awful, horrible... And despite all that Emma was enjoying herself immensely.

Monet, her brow slightly furrowed, spoke up. "Jubilee? Didn't we watch this a couple weeks ago?"

"No, this is Two. That was One."

"What's the difference?" None of the puzzlement had left her voice.

This time it was Keith that spoke. "This one is funny on purpose."

"Oh." She munched on some popcorn. On the screen the hero strapped a chain-saw to where his hand had been. "Groovy." (5)

A bit later. Another film. Jubilee, Monet, Ev, Keith and Paige were either giggling madly or staring blankly as they saw it for the first time. Arcania, Jono and Karen were reciting lines along with it... As was Emma.

"We're the People's Judian Front."

"No, we're the People's Front Of Judia."

"Splinter!!" (6)

"How do you know this, Ems?"

"I like Monty Python. A friend used to make me watch it after..." Remembering who she was talking to she silenced herself. "I like Monty Python..." She mumbled and shrugged.

No one said anything, but Arcania was visibly trying not to follow that train of thought.

A Japanese cartoon with an amazingly cool mostly jazz soundtrack followed. There was a rather loud argument over dubbed versus subbed. They only watched the first episode and its name was too weird to remember, at least at that time of night. Or morning. (7)

Throughout the next film everyone was poking Jono and 'Cania in the side for translations; the actor's accents were so thick. At one point there were even subtitles. "You're carrying a wasted girl and a bag of fertilizer. You don't look like your average horti-fucking-culturist." Everyone liked the random drinking scenes. (8)

"The director's name is kind of familiar..."

"He's married to Madonna. I think."

After that was over they played video games for a while until, one by one, they dropped off into sleep. Emma got the couch because they had the sense not to try to move her. She was still the teacher, after all.

Meggan and Brian Braddock followed Sean into the school. "You're both being silly. Everything feels fine and besides, you didn't try the emergency number. There's plenty of reasons why she didn't answer the phone that aren't horrible. There's absolutely no reason to go in all mob handed." The two men paid her no mind and stealthily entered the kitchen. "Fine, ignore me, make fools out of yourselves. What do I care?" The fey let out an exaggerated sigh. Then her elemental senses detected the temperature going down slightly and she turned to see a very wide awake, but obviously very recently fast asleep girl.

She blinked, looked at them all carefully and blinked again. "Hi, person I don't think I know. Why are Mr. Cassidy and the other person I don't know going all commando?"

Banshee turned quickly. "Karen, lass, is everything all right. I couldn't get in touch with Emma--"

The young woman yawned and began to rummage through the cupboards. "Everything's fine." She gave him an odd look and turned back to her search. "We kidnapped her." She pulled out several boxes of Pop-Tarts and squeaked happily when she found pink cans of cream soda. (9)

"Beg pardon." The three adults raised eyebrows.

"Emma. We kidnapped her."

Sean looked at her, utterly confused. "I think I missed something."

"She was with us."

"It was horrible. They made me watch movies and eat junk food." Emma's voice wryly through the door. Brian was staring at her. She glanced down at her self. "And borrow some quite comfortable clothing." She stopped trying to hide her smile.

"You're welcome." Illusion offered a can to the White Queen.

"No, thank you... You're having that for breakfast?" The girl didn't answer, just shrugged and left. "I don't understand how any of them survive on that stuff." The former White Queen shook her head. "Thank you for coming over, Meggan. I talked to Jono and he seems quite hopeful, and Arcania is all too happy to see if you can show her how the therapy works."

"Arcania?" Brian asked.

"One of our newer students. I believe you're worked with her father while Excaliber was still up and running. She's a mutant empath in addition to being a mage."

From a room or two away there was a faint yell. "Magus!"

A faint, fond smile crossed her lips and refused to leave. "Shall we begin?"

Notes

1-This conversation is a reference to Bernard Cornwell's Sharpe's Rifles series of Napoleonic historical military novels. It was also made into a PBS mini-series.

2-The movie in question is Cemetery Man, it's awful and horrible and absolutely rocks.

3-Karen is very shy and quite possibly has Social Anxiety Disorder. I'm not going any further into that because I don't know anything more. She's my self-insertion in this piece and I was quite awkward in high school and still am quite honestly. (I occasionally think I might have SAD myself). I think how lonely it can be when you feel as though you can't talk to people isn't known. She also is an aspiring write r and communicates much better that way.

4-Karen's teleportation is based on that of the dragons in Anne McCaffery's Pern novels. For a second or so there's nothingness and extreme cold. (It's very possible that it works this way because she's read them all at least twice.) It probably wouldn't freeze the water since it doesn't the moisture in other people's bodies, but she assumes it would.

5-Evil Dead 2:Dead By Dawn

6-Monty Python's Life Of Brian (This is quite possibly misquoted.)

7-Cowboy Bebop. The coolest cartoon ever.

8-Lock, Stock, And Two Smoking Barrels

9-Pop-Tarts and pink cream soda, breakfast of champions. Or at least teenagers.