Chapter 4: Acclimatizing goes both ways part 1

Harry woke up early the next morning at sunrise, and smiled happily at the rays of sunlight coming through the window. He got up, stretched for a moment then felt for his link with his familiar. One eyebrow rose in surprise as he felt Hedwig close by. Following the link he exited his room and went down three doors to the entrance to the large arboretum he had seen as they rode up to the front door.

Inside he found a multitude of plants and trees, all of them growing together in a wild profusion rather than separated into different classes and types. Walking through it he soon found Hedwig perched on a tree. Her eye had been closed but as he walked up to her Hedwig's golden eyes popped open. "Preck."

"Hey Hedwig, just wanted to make certain you were okay after such a long flight, if you want to get some more sleep I'll prepare a rasher of bacon for lunch rather than brekkers."

Hedwig shook her head. "Preck. Preck, guah."

Harry's emerald eyes narrowed. "Really, two of them?"

Hedwig nodded her head. "Preck."

"And one of them really did wear the form of a bird at first? Then changed into a woman?"

"Preck."

"Huh, well I don't know about that one, but the other one I knew about before. I wonder if she was there to watch me or to watch the FF?" Hedwig shrugged eloquently not caring which it was.

Ororo's voice came from behind him. "Good morning Harry, it isn't often that I see anyone else up this early. Is there a problem?"

Harry turned and gasped, all his blood rushing to his cheeks and further down. Ororo was standing there wearing nothing but a small, strangely challenging smile. Her large D cup breasts stood out proudly topped with nipples the color of dark chocolate; her skin was the color of coffee with a hint of cream added; her waist was thin, her legs long, her body without blemish or mark.

Ororo had spent much of her life living alone on the plains of Africa after a young girlhood as a poor thief in Cairo after her parents had died in an earthquake. As such, she had never developed the nudity taboos that Americans took for granted. She had noticed Harry entering her sanctuary and wondered what he was doing. She thought that this would be an interesting test of his personality as well.

Harry gaped for a second then with an effort of will concentrated on just Ororo's face, allowing a smirk to appear on his own. "Um . . . wow. I didn't know this room was clothing optional."

Ororo shrugged. "You may join me if you wish, but what were you discussing with Hedwig? Incidentally," she turned to the snowy owl, "I would appreciate it if you hunted on the grounds outside rather than in here. I doubt there are many animals in here, but I don't want to find any . . . leavings . . . shall we say?" Hedwig bobbed her head in assent, liking how the female human had already gotten used to her intelligence. It normally took the silly two-foots much longer to realize that she was probably as smart as they were if not more so.

Ororo turned and was amused to see Harry already had his shirt and pants off, though he kept his boxers on. His eyes, however, after that first gaping, full-body stare remained on Ororo's face, and he made no move to close the distance between them. "Hedwig says we were being watched by two people when we left the Baxter Building. One of them I knew about. She's been watching . . . well I thought she was bloody watching Johnny Storm and just generally keeping an eye on the Fantastic Four. The other though, she's apparently the local equivalent of an animagus. She was in the form of a crow at first then transformed into a blue-skinned woman when Hedwig knocked her out of the sky."

Ororo frowned then looked over at Hedwig approvingly. "Give her a few extra bacon slices for me Harry. That sounds like Mystique. She's the leader of the local opposition as it were, the Brotherhood of Mutants. Did the others tell you about them?"

Harry nodded. "I understood the Brotherhood is a group of teens like the kids downstairs, but the groups based more about using their powers for personal gain than essentially evil or anything like that. Is Mystique the same way?"

Ororo found her own eyes glued to Harry's pecs and the odd assortment of scars he had. To many they might be a turn off, but to her they spoke of experience and his ability to survive anything the world could throw at him. And it had been a long time for her, and her last (and only second of two) relationship with a man had been disappointing. Going to college had been necessary, but the majority of people she had met were so juvenile and shallow, and the man she had dated and eventually slept with had been no exception, merely better than most at hiding it.

Harry was anything but juvenile, despite his lack of a verbal brake system, and was actually quite a deep thinker as well. And eyes I could drown in, and is handsome and . . . Her eyes tried to trail downward, but she resolutely raised them back to his face. Thankfully Harry was busy stroking Hedwig and hadn't noticed her lack of attention, though she could swear the snowy owl had.

"I would say she is more amoral then truly evil, but she is extremely devoted to the cause of mutant supremacy. Whoever her leader is, she believes him or her the best chance to fulfill that dream and to protect mutant-kind from prosecution."

Harry nodded. Maybe I should talk to this Mystique woman. I definitely want to hear both sides of this argument before I really choose a side, after all there might be more reasons to fear a normal human backlash than Charles knows or is prepared to admit. "I see. Well, enough about that for now, when do the others wake up? And do you want me to cook breakfast for everyone? Any preferences or dietary needs?"

Ororo chuckled, going back to using her powers to water her plants. Harry stared, his control fraying as he saw her laugh a little under the rain she had summoned, the water glistening on her dark skin. "No, no dietary needs, though the girls, especially Jean, seem to think they need to diet. I have tried to convince them otherwise, but if you wish to try you are more than welcome. They won't awake for at least another two hours though, so we have time. Tell me more of your adventures? Where did you get the one odd scar on your arm—it looks as if it's from a giant tooth. And you mentioned creating a . . . 'ward' I believe you called it, to cut me off from local weather patterns?"

Harry grinned, pushing aside his desire for now to just enjoy the aesthetics of watching Ororo move about her arboretum uncaring of her nudity. If she isn't going to make a big deal out of it, I'll try not to as well. "Well, I did yes, and I can try to come up with something later today once the kids have gone to school. I may have to use trial and error at first, of course, as your ability isn't based off magic, but I'm certain I can come up with something. As for my scar, since we've already played 'you show me yours and I'll show you mine', how about I tell you mine and you tell me yours, a story for a story?"

Ororo laughed aloud, spinning in place and setting the clouds she had summoned to twisting and twirling in a slight eddy. "Of course, if you go first."

Harry nodded and sat down, leaning back against a tree. "Well in that case, that particular scar came from a monstrous snake called a basilisk. I don't know if you've heard of them but…."

OOOOOOO

A very pleasant hour later, Harry excused himself reluctantly from the 'goddess's presence' to go shower and then head down to cook breakfast for the horde. He had found Ororo pleasant, very intelligent company, with a very solid knowledge of current events and an ear for languages that he had never seen the equal of. She could speak in twelve languages like a native, and read and write in all with equal proficiency. And here I thought that speaking French, Italian, and Latin was impressive. Her story about her parent's death and how she had lived on the street reminded him over much of how the Durlseys had mistreated him. While he had been abused because of who he was, she had been beaten whenever she failed to steal something.

She was incredibly lucky even so, he thought grimly, remembering coming in after a particularly nasty Death Eater raid where the two young daughters of the house had been left, their minds broken and bodies mauled after the Death Eaters had used them for their pleasure. Yes, very lucky indeed. And so was the rest of the world. He shuddered, wondering what could have happened if Ororo's powers had woken up early from such trauma, wild and uncontrolled. Hurricanes, tornadoes and massive storms would have done untold damage. With an effort he put aside such dark thoughts and concentrated on making breakfast.

The others got up in their own order and were surprised to find the new teacher already up, save for Kurt who cursed at missing an opportunity to pay the new guy back for smacking them around the previous evening. Most of them sat down talking amongst themselves. The guys were loud, but moving gingerly, Scott most of all due to that final paint claymore, while Kitty was quiet, chewing on a pen and contemplating a letter she was evidently writing. Rogue, too, sat quietly, listening to some music on her headphones and tapping along to the beat, trying to ignore the injuries she had sustained. Jean, however, after stopping off to get some more burn cream and still nursing her burned chest walked into the kitchen. "Do you need any help Mr. Potter?"

"Gah, outside of lessons call me Harry. I'm not really interested in formality for formality's sake, especially from someone only a few years younger than me. And no, I don't need any help thanks, though if you could get everyone some drinks that would be fine if they're too lazy to get up and get their own." Jean giggled a little at that, but his next words, spoken loud enough for the others in the dining room to hear, wiped the smile off her face. "And Ororo told me that you girls seem to want to diet. That ends now. You lot are active and in training; you need all the energy you can get. You'll have a full plate and like it."

Jean glared at him, but he glared right back emerald against green. Jean sighed and nodded, giving up in the face of the inevitable, after all it wasn't like he could force her to eat, could he? "Alright fine. But can you tell me why I couldn't get a read on you in yesterday's match? I can't even find your mind for goodness sake!"

Harry smirked, waving a finger at her to come closer. Jean sighed but did so and Harry whispered. "Have you ever heard of indivisibility cloaks?" Jean shrugged, but the name seemed self-explanatory to her. "I imagine one then cover my mind with it, so that no one else can see it."

Jean gaped. "B-but that can't work! Your mind can't be that organized! Our thoughts fly all over the place, I've been meditating ever since the professor told me about my power, but I've never heard of anyone being able to organize his mind like that."

Harry looked at her thoughtfully as his hands worked without conscious thought on finishing the food. "How much free time do you have on a day to day basis?"

Jean frowned at the odd question. "Not much really, I get home around 7; I'm part of the cheerleading squad and the soccer team right now. Then I'm part of the basketball team when in season, the floor hockey team when in season, and of course I've got homework for school and daily workouts with Logan and the others."

Harry's eyebrows rose in amusement. "That much, huh? Well aren't you a busy little bee." Jean frowned at the slightly mocking tone, but Harry went on. "See, the problem is I could loan you some books on occlumency, the magical method of organizing and protecting your mind, but I don't know how far you could get with that little time a day to devote to it, nor am I certain that a mundane—sorry, non-magical—could use it in the first place. When I was learning, I had to devote at least four hours a day to meditating and organizing my mind."

Jean kept frowning. "I'm not certain I could take that much time off. I mean I've got obligations and I want to keep my A+ average."

"Good grief, you're like an athletic Hermione!" Harry shook his head, a slightly sad smile on his face. "Well, I'll give you the books in any case. I'll also give Xavier a set, see what he thinks of them. Honestly though it's not the first thing I was going to teach you."

Kurt popped in to help set the table, wincing a little as his aching ribs twanged. "Oh, you already thought of what you vanted to teach us Harry?"

"Yep, different things for each of you actually, and a lot of team exercises. For you Kurt I'm thinking of a lot of martial arts, like Krav Maga—we'll see what Logan thinks about that—and maybe some medical knowledge to know where to aim your blows." Kurt blanched a little at the serious nature of Harry's suggested lessons. "And for you Red," Jean growled, making stabbing motions with a handful of forks she had grabbed for the table, but Harry ignored her. "I want to see how many ways you can use your powers. I haven't much of a handle on them, but I think they could be damn powerful."

"Well maybe if you hadn't taken me out so fast each time, you'd know what all I was capable of," Jean said snippily, irritated by his continued use of that hated nickname.

"I had to, your powers were the most unknown therefore the most dangerous. I was able to tell what the limitations of everyone else's were, but not yours. If you think about it, given what you and Charles said about telekinesis last night, you could probably have countered most of what I did by yourself if you had known what to expect."

Harry brought out the food and everyone piled in as Jean thought about that. It was actually kind of professionally flattering in a way, that Harry thought she was the most dangerous of the team, even if she knew it wasn't true.

Ororo and the other adults were at one end of the table, and Harry sat down next to Ororo, who smiled in welcome. She'd had a lovely morning with him earlier, and he had passed her little test this morning with flying colors. Other than that first initial glance and another when she started watering her plants—and even she had to admit that she looked quite enticing when doing that—he had ignored her nakedness and been able to carry on a perfectly normal conversation. And it wasn't like she hadn't enjoyed the view of his pecs and hard muscles. There was a surprising amount of power in his lithe frame.

The stories they had shared also showed her they had a lot in common; both of their childhoods had been hard, marked with hardship, lack of food and horrible home life (in her case because of the thieves that had taken her in after her parents died, and in his case because of the Dursleys).

Evan saw the smile on his aunt's face and scowled, wondering what the hell was happening between her and this new guy.

Scott looked around at the others. He was so sore from the other day's fights that he didn't even want to think about moving, but he had to. "Professor, will we have any time in the Danger Room after school? I've been thinking about yesterday's battles and I've thought of what we did wrong."

Harry answered him. "Good, in that case your AAR will be easy to write, and I'll work with you one on one this afternoon after school." Scott frowned wanting to correct the team problems first, but Harry went on inexorably. "First you work on the individual issues. Learn your own strengths and weaknesses, then see how you can put them all together to be stronger as a team." Charles smiled at the sentiment, and the others all nodded.

Scott did too, after a moment, though he didn't think he had done anything physically wrong. He had made a lot of wrong decisions, but that was all. If he had known Harry was a wizard, he would have been able to come up with an appropriate plan. Harry smirked at him as if he could read his mind and shook his head.

Kurt tried to reach over to a plate of bacon that Harry had placed between him and Ororo. They both stopped him however, saying together, "I wouldn't do that if I were you" then smirking at one another.

Kurt looked at the two adults in surprise but his answer came swooping in on silent wings. Hedwig landed before her just reward, and immediately began to gobble the bacon down. All of the girls oohed at the beautiful bird, and Harry regaled them with the story of how he and Hedwig had been introduced by Hagrid, his half-giant acquaintance, and what being a familiar entailed both for him and for Hedwig.

Kitty broke in at this point, having put her letter down to stare at the bird. "Like, is there any magic you could teach us?"

Harry frowned in thought. "Well, I don't know, I want to introduce Red here," Jean growled again at the name causing Kurt and Scott to look at her in surprise. Who knew she had an issue with being called such a simple nickname? "To occlumency, the mental discipline of us wizards; I suppose I could see if you could get a reaction out of runes or wards. Agatha says people in this dimension can use magical items, so we'll see. I know in my home dimension, mundanes couldn't; Hermione tried to teach her parents how to use some magical items, especially a magic communication mirror so they could talk during the school year, and they couldn't."

"Who's Hermione?" Kitty asked.

Harry paused, his emerald eyes dimming for a moment. "She was my best friend my own age, and my first girlfriend. She and her family were also the first to die when Voldermort, the evil wizard I mentioned last night, came back to life and power, because an old man who was supposed to be leading the so-called 'light side' thought I would come to rely on his advice if I didn't have her by my side, and so didn't bother protecting her when he should have." Everyone looked at him in horror, but he shrugged. "It was the start of a very bad time, but it was at least five and a half years or so ago, so I've had time to get over it."

That wasn't true of course, he'd had time, but getting over it, no. Harry looked over at Kitty's sad face and smirked a little. "You and little miss honors student," he waved over at Jean, "remind me a bit of her honestly. So sure, let's find out what you all can use, huh?"

Kitty nodded happily, wanting desperately to add some more offensive punch to her repertoire. As it was, she was pretty much dependent on her mutant power for all her offense and defense. As Harry had proved last night, that wasn't going to be enough all the time, and becoming dependent on it might get her killed.

The rest of the breakfast passed quickly and the kids swiftly left for school, leaving Harry and the adults to their own devices.

Logan turned to Harry, an almost challenging look on his face. "If you ain't up to anything this morning, do you want to have a spar in the danger room?"

Harry looked at him eyebrow raised then nodded. He had a good idea of Ororo's skill, but getting an idea of how dangerous other more experienced mutants could be was a good idea.

OOOOOOO

About an hour later, Logan and Harry were facing off against one another in the Danger Room. Harry smirked, stretching his arms above his head and cracking his neck. "I don't suppose you'd be such a good sport as to tell me your powers before we begin, would you?"

Logan grinned wickedly. "Trust me kid, you'll see it soon enough."

Harry shook his head resignedly then, without warning, shot off a Stupefy, starting with the least dangerous of his spells.

This didn't startle his opponent at all, and Logan was able to easily dodge the beam of red light. He then charged in and suddenly claws, metal claws, popped out from behind his knuckles, three of them to a hand, about six inches long and wickedly pointed. Harry jumped back, putting up a Protego between them, the weakest of his shield spells. "Ah," he said blandly. "I do see your point now."

Logan barked a laugh and struck out, shattering the magic shield with a squeal as it broke, then tried to close in again.

Harry fired off a Difindo and then a Bombarda, but Logan took the first one without blinking, and dodged the second. To Harry's surprise, the cutting spell didn't do much damage; even underpowered, it should have cut a small slash into Logan from shoulder to hip, but it had barely cut into his shoulder and as Harry watched, that too closed.

"Huh" he said intelligently, then had to duck a slash and twist away from a follow up uppercut topped with claw points. He punched out, his fist glowing with a second Bombarda spell that smashed into Logan's face, blowing the older man off his feet and away. Yet even that wasn't able to keep him down for long. Logan jumped up, the blast on his face already healing in front of Harry's surprised eyes. "It's like you've got an intravenous tube feeding you healing droughts!" He was again forced to dodge, diving to the ground to avoid a roundhouse blow tipped with gleaming points. A half–powered Rifela, a penetrating attack spell, caught Logan on the kneecap, punched into the skin, but then bounced off the bone. "What the bloody fuck!"

This went on for some time. Harry was fast and had insane reflexes and hand/eye coordination, and was well—if eclectically—trained in hand to hand. Logan, however, was simply a monster in close combat; he had a healing speed that was insane, reflexes almost as good as Harry's, his claws, and more training. More, he was smart enough to not give Harry any time or distance, keeping the pressure on and the battle in close. So while Harry could land about two blows for every nick he took, neither fighter could land a knockout punch. Even Harry's lightning spells didn't do more than slow Logan down. He had a powerful sense of smell, and could tell when Harry tried to use illusions or conjure beasts to draw Logan's attention and always matched them easily if they tried to attack him.

After about an hour of this, Harry was bleeding from several places and wishing he had changed into his crisis suit. All right, his bones are metal and he's got a healing ability that is just crazy. In that case, let's see what happens if I attack his brain box. Harry stopped using his spells, building up a spell-chain in both hands as he dodged around one slash or stab after another. He built the chain from a series of simple spells and one advanced spell he had created in the Negative Zone called 'shatter-shaker'. A moment later, he saw his chance and first used a tickling charm, which caught Logan mid-leap.

Logan began to convulse in laughter, but he still swung his claws around, trying automatically to force Harry to keep his distance. Harry, however, was more than happy to oblige. He jumped back and fired off a glue-making spell, pinning Logan in one place then fired a series of shatter-shakers. This spell was designed to hit something and then cause a vibration to shake it apart. It had been created to take out defensive positions by shaking the walls apart. Now these spells were underpowered and targeted specifically, but even so, the jolts and continued shaking of Logan's brain inside his skull were eventually able to put him down and out.

As soon as Logan hit the floor, Harry cancelled the spells, and used a Leviosa to pick Logan up and head out of the Danger Room. This fight had proven one thing above and beyond anything else, the X-kids had a lot of learning to do before they were anywhere near as good as an adult mutant at using their powers, and Harry now knew that he wasn't going to be powering through any mutant he met—a good thing to learn now, before he faced an actual enemy.

Logan woke up as Harry was levitating him toward the medical center. After growling angrily at having lost, he made Harry put him down. "You're good kid, real good. I thought I was winning there for a few minutes." Moreover, he could tell the kid wasn't putting as much into the fight as he could have, there were several times he could tell the kid switched from a more dangerous spell to the one he used.

Harry nodded. "Yep; you were, but then I changed tactics. On another topic, you look like you might know how to do this: how do I go about converting gold into cash?"

OOOOOOO

Harry spent the rest of the morning and into the afternoon learning about the wonderful world of the criminal element, how computers could be used, laundering money, and offshore accounts. Harry was a little leery about using this information though, as he would not get nearly as good a return on his gold as he would if he went to legitimate businesses. So instead, Logan told him about pawnshops, and agreed to go with him into New York and Philadelphia, which between them had hundreds of stores which would buy gold, few questions asked and no questions answered. However, that would be a full day trip, and thus would have to wait for a bit, as Harry wanted to get the kids started own their individual exercises/lessons before pursuing his own interests.

Charles spent his time in the medical wing, trying to glean any clues about Harry's mutant power he could, but was stymied at every turn. There were no readings from the Danger Room sessions that indicated a mutant power—his speed and reflexes, while incredible, were still within the bounds of what a normal human could achieve. And he certainly didn't have any extra durability, given the number of injuries he took from his spar with Logan. Everything that had happened around Harry could be 'easily' explained away with his ability to use magic, and it was frustrating the professor no end.

Ororo spent her time as she always did, preparing the kid's language lessons, which occurred every other day, practicing with her own powers in the Danger room, and as Harry had asked, cataloguing what things and how quickly she could do said things with the local weather, both consciously and unconsciously, which would help him create the ward he was thinking about creating for her. The thought occurred to her to mention he might want to create one for Rogue if he could, but she was also wary of doing so; getting the girl's hopes up like that might backfire badly if it turned out he couldn't. She had become used to controlling her emotions, so while the ward for her would be an excellent thing to have, it wouldn't be as earth shattering to not have as it would for Rogue.

Harry was coming back from jogging in the woods that made up part of the mansion's property when the kids came back. Scott, being the only one with a license and thus a car, brought Kitty and Rogue home with him, while Evan and Kurt skateboarded home, and thus would be arriving a bit later than the first trio. Jean would arrive even later, busy with all her after school activities.

Kitty hopped out of the car, excitedly running up to Harry. "Hey Harry! Like, are we going to start learning about runes and stuff now? Oh! I've had so many ideas on how to use 'em, like maybe we could embed spells in 'em and give me a bit more offensive oomph, or maybe defensive woven into our uniforms somehow, or . . ."

Harry laughed, pulling at her curly hair with a lazy hand. "Easy Curly, I've been thinking of those ideas too, but we'll still need to see if you can consciously use runes at all before anything else. That'll be part of your lessons, if you want to, we can start on that kind of thing tomorrow."

Kitty grinned at him, raising two fingers in a v sign. "All right, like I'll get my homework and stuff done for today and tomorrow and we can spend all evening on it. Like, this is going to be so exciting!"

Harry chuckled shaking her head and hoping she wouldn't be too disappointed if they didn't work for her, then turned to Scott. "You ready to go?"

Scott really wasn't, he was still sore from last evening, but he wasn't about to admit to that. "Sure, just let me go get changed."

Harry nodded. "Meet me back here, we'll warm up with a jog and then we'll play a game in the danger room."

Scott almost shuddered at that but nodded and went off to change. He came back and followed Harry on a three mile jog through the woods, finished with a sprint from the edge of the woods back to the house. Then some stretching exercises and the two adjourned to the Danger Room.

Harry entered first setting up the exercise he wanted to put the kid through, then called Cyclops in. "Alright mate, this is going to be a game to test your situational awareness, accuracy with your beams, and threat recognition."

Scott nodded and went to stand in the center of the field Harry indicated with a nod. Harry started the program and suddenly small spheres began to shoot out at Scott from all sides, then after a time which he spent firing off small beams and dodging wildly, more things appeared, arrows, robots, and others.

Harry stood to one side, stopping the program occasionally to give advice on the threat recognition, but otherwise let Scott take his lumps, which was the best way for anyone to learn. Scott got better as time went on in terms of control, being able to pare his beam down to deal with each of the different threats without overpowering them too much.

Yet he had a major problem with threat recognition, wanting to treat them all the same. When Harry began to mix in soft targets, i.e. noncombatants, the public and pedestrians, it became even worse. Scott seemed to oscillate wildly from being too quick to shoot and hitting bystanders to not shooting at all and taking shots in return. Still, that kind of reaction could be taught over time.

After an hour, Harry shut the program down and then spent the next hour going over the recording of the X-Men's fight against him the day before. Here Scott began to fall apart. Rather than admit to the main two problems—that he had tried to stick to a very specific plan and hadn't really taken anyone else's advice—he concentrated more on everyone else's reactions rather than his own. He also didn't seem to want to take advice from Harry, probably because of Harry being only a few years older than him.

The problem is, Harry reflected, he seems to be the leader, and he gives orders like one but he doesn't really have any leadership qualities. Daphne had explained it to him once, it had nothing to do with his power or his fighting ability. No, it had to do with charisma, with being able to bring out the best in others, with a certain amount of empathy, and the ability to think into the future near and far. Scott had no real empathy and all the charisma of a brick. It remained to be seen whether he could plan for the future and learn from his mistakes in truth.

Harry ended the session by saying blandly, "And you might want to remember not to talk about your plans out loud in enemy territory; you never know who might be listening."

Scott stared at him for a moment, not understanding then it dawned and he scowled angrily. "That's cheating!"

Harry shook his head wearily. "Mate, this isn't a bloody game, it's real life; there are no rules except 'he who survives wins'. You have a telepath on your team that could, theoretically anyway, handle all the communication you could bloody use." In fact Jean could probably do far more than that, but that alone was a major advantage.

Scott looked uncomfortable for a minute, but nodded, and Harry ended the session by assigning some reading about modern infantry weapons available on the market for both civilians and the military, to acclimatize Scott to the weapons he might face. Scott protested this though. "But our job isn't to fight normal humans, it's to fight other mutants who use their powers against them. If we fight normal humans we're no better than the Brotherhood."

"Hate and the need to feel superior over anyone different doesn't all go one way mate. I bet if you look for it, there're probably already hate groups springing up that target mutant-kind." Scott frowned but didn't argue the point; he just didn't want to thinking about it. The idea of using his powers on normal people made him think he was more of a bully than a hero, but he realized it might eventually be necessary.

Harry went back outside to get away from the noise of Evan and Kurt, who had arrived while he and his reluctant student were in the Danger Room, running around the main hall, skateboarding around on the smooth floor. They both stopped as he came by, but he just waved a hand at them and moved on, uncaring.

OOOOOOO

As the sun was setting, Harry looked up from working on his laptop under a tree by the entrance to the mansion to see a sports car of some kind drive up. As it came to a stop Jean got out from the passenger side looking a little irritated. "Hey Red, guess you weren't kidding about how late you usually get home."

As Jean turned to give him a wan smile, a tall, strongly built blond teen got out, staring at him intently before turning to Jean. "Seriously Jean, just ask, they can't keep you in here all the time. Even if it is a school night, we could go out and catch a movie at least."

Jean shook her head. "Duncan, you know that won't work. Besides, we just got assigned a long term physics project and I want to get a leg up on it tonight. Oh, and this is Harry Potter, he's our new history instructor, and our cook too. Mr. Potter, this is Duncan."

Duncan smirked a little at that. "Oh a cook huh, does he come complete with an apron?"

Harry grinned unpleasantly. "Nah boyo, I just have an extra large barbecue to use on blokes that make fun of my cooking. And I told you not to call me Mr. Potter out of class, Red; it makes me feel old."

Jean rolled her eyes, but a smile did steal along her face at his initial joke. Duncan shrugged eloquently. "Well, if you're alright with doing something so girly as cooking I guess that's alright for some." His toned implied what kind of 'some' he meant and Jean's eyes narrowed but Harry merely shrugged. "Well, I'll see you tomorrow alright Jean?"

Jean nodded and he tried to lean in for a kiss but she moved away, never liking public displays of affection. Duncan scowled a little, but wiped it off his face quickly got in his car and gunned it moving away.

Harry cocked his head to one side as he looked at Jean. "So that's your boyfriend, huh? An interesting sense of humor he's got."

Jean rubbed her face wearily. "Sorry about that dig, he's usually nicer than that, but the football team had a really horrible practice today, half of their offensive line was out with a stomach bug, and Duncan got sacked several times, which always puts him in a bad mood."

Harry's eyebrows crinkled in query. "What's an offensive line got to do with football?"

Jean looked at him then laughed aloud. "Oh right, you're British. I forgot they don't have that over there, I guess you could call it a more advanced form of rugby then, what you call football, we call soccer here in the states." Harry nodded in understanding and she went on. "Listen, I wasn't actually assigned all that much homework tonight. Do you think you could give me those meditation books and walk me through some of them tonight?"

Harry nodded. "Sure, Red, though we might want to get Ororo involved. Sometimes when you start to organize your mind, you realize things you didn't think about or notice before, and it can get bloody emotional at times. A female shoulder might be needed."

Jean stopped and stared at him, growling a little. "Alright, what the hell is up with the nicknames? I hate being called Red! It makes me think I'm being stereotyped, like all redheaded people have tempers and other sh-stuff!"

"Ooh, nice correction there. Would you prefer 'luv' then? That's what I'd normally call female acquaintances, but I figure being yanks, you lot would take it the wrong way." It wasn't actually, but he'd be damned if anyone got out of having a nickname until they became more than an irritating bunch of kids to him.

Jean flushed slightly, but that was all. "I would prefer that to Red, but you're right; I think people would react badly to that if you used that to any of us girls."

Harry smirked, and led the way inside holding the door open for her. "Duly noted, Red." Jean scowled, but couldn't help the chuckle that escaped her.

The two found Ororo in the solarium, and when informed of what they were doing, she nodded agreement to join them, but asked "Have you run this idea by Professor Xavier?"

Harry shrugged. "I don't even know if it will work for non-magicals. This is more of an experiment than anything else from my point of view. I'm not certain why Jean wants to learn it so much."

Jean frowned but, at Ororo's insistent look, decided she had to elaborate. "You said that occlumency can keep other people from getting into your mind. I'm hoping to be able to do much the same. My powers . . . I . . . well sometimes even when I'm not actively using my telepathy, I pick up things from the minds around me that I rather I wouldn't. So I'm hoping occlumency helps me more than the professor's lessons on clearing my mind."

Harry nodded thoughtfully. "So in essence, you want to learn to keep your mind to yourself?" The words were whimsical, but his eyes showed his understanding of how uncomfortable it could be to have other people's thoughts in your head.

Ororo, too, was looking at her with understanding and concern. "And you say that Charles' lessons haven't helped?"

Jean nodded a little miserably. "He came into his powers after he had already developed mental discipline and control. Right now, I would liken it to trying to organize a defense against a massive flood while the flood is going on." And being a teenager and all that entails is not helping any, she thought angrily.

"I'll get the books, if that's all right with you. We can use this space, yes?"

Ororo nodded. "I'll go and talk to Charles; perhaps he will be able to help." It turned out that he did want to sit in, but was a little worried about how it was going to turn out; yet when Ororo told him the metaphor Jean used, he understood.

Harry brought back the books and walked Jean through the first chapter's meditation. This was a way of meditating through the use of picturing a fire and throwing stray thoughts and emotions into it until you were completely calm. Once you were able to do that, you could go onto the next stage, exploring your memories and organizing them in whatever way you were most comfortable with. Harry had his organized like a house, but he told Jean that one of his friends imagined them as a forest, with each tree having its own dryad protector, and another organized it like a computer complete with dozens of passwords. Luna and Hermione had been very different in their thought processes, but they had been very good at occlumency, in very different ways, but still.

After an hour, Jean was feeling much calmer and more focused than she had been, and determined to do this at least twice a day, once before school and once after. Charles was happy with her progress, though he urged her to find other metaphors other than fire, which he said was because fire was something destructive, and it might interfere with her getting rid of feelings of anger. Harry shrugged, not caring either way. The important things was to get rid of the emotions and stray thoughts, not how you did it.

They broke up and went down to have a late dinner. Everyone else had already eaten, wanting to hit the sack and get over their bruises that much faster.

OOOOOOO

The next morning found Harry and Ororo once again spending time together in the arboretum, sharing more stories and talking about current events and politics, getting into a really fascinating discussion comparing the government of Britain to America. Harry went back to his room once again in a good mood, only to halt outside his door as he heard sounds of movement inside.

Though nowhere near as much as Evan, who was still stiff and really sore from the pain (not helped by his decision to skate to school), Kurt had been a little bruised and battered around the edges yesterday morning, and had not been up to getting a little revenge on their torturer just then. Thus Kurt had gotten up a little earlier than normal and made his way upstairs to the teacher level to see if he could prank Potter.

Unfortunately he ran into problems immediately. First, Harry was already up and gone, leaving Kurt to figure out some way of booby-trapping something, which he wasn't so good at. His next problem occurred when he chose his target. He decided to try his hand at the huge trunk at the foot of the bed rather than the closet, but when he went to open it he found his hands suddenly frozen in place. He jerked and tired to break free of whatever was holding him, he even tried to bamf away, but the weight of the trunk must have been immense, as he couldn't take it with him and he was stuck there.

Harry opened his door to look inside and smirked at Kurt's predicament. It seemed as if the stasis ward was able to shut down Kurt's teleporting abilities somehow, something for him to research later, if only to find a way Kurt could combat it. "Well, well, what do we have here? Trying to find out more about me, or trying to set up a prank, blueboy?"

Kurt groaned, unable to even turn and face him. "Um, vhich one would make you less unhappy vith me, mine freund?"

"Oh pranking definitely. If you've got questions about me just ask them politely I'll probably answer them unless they're too personal. Now, what to do with you hmm? I know, I'll let you choose: painful or humiliating?"

Kurt actually thought about it. "Given I'm still a little sore from our matches the other day, I'm afraid I'll have to go for humiliating." Besides he knew he could get out of it when he went to school by using his image inducer.

"Humiliating it is." Harry stared at him, imagining the effect he wanted to achieve when he cast the color-changing spell. Then with a wave of his hand, Kurt's dark blue fur became a veritable riot of colors, lime, pink, red, orange and yellow in a strange rainbow pattern from the feet up. Another wave and the words 'I tried to prank a Marauder' appeared on Kurt's chest in green.

Kurt gaped down at his body and groaned, closing his eyes even as the stasis field released him when Harry touched the edge of the trunk. "Is it too late to change my mind?"

"Yep, but don't worry mate it'll go away in a few hours. Better luck next time, or you could ask me for some advice; I am quite the prank master myself, you know. In fact, I've been thinking of pranking the Hairy One and Baldy since I met them, and I've already got a few ideas."

Kurt gaped at him, he'd have never even thought of pranking those two. Why that would be the pranks of all pranks! With that thought, he knelt before Harry in homage. "Oh vise master, please take this penitent one and show him the ways of the prank!"

Harry grinned at him and raised a hand magnanimously in benediction. Elsewhere in the mansion, both the men he'd mentioned and several others felt a shiver of fear go down their spines.

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