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"Oh, Kitty, I misspoke. I recognised him because I recognised his love."

God I make myself sick sometimes. What a pile of sanctimonious crap.

I recognised you, Charles, because your mind is like an atomic bomb on the psi-scape. Do you have any idea how furious I am at you right now? I have never been afraid like that before. You made me see what they see. You made me terrified of your - our - power; terrified of the harm we could do to these children. I'm one of the world's most powerful mutant minds, Charles, and you had me wretching with fear.

Well, no wonder the humans hate us. No wonder they look at us and see their own extinction - and worse, their children's extinction. Damn you for making me see reason in their hate.

You made a liar of me, Charles. I said they wouldn't be harmed again and they were harmed, God damn you.

This has been a long and terrible week, and I will say no more, because I know I speak in anger. But you made me hate who I am, Charles, and for that I doubt I can ever forgive you.

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I've been trying to deal with it all. But no one really knows, do they? His thoughts slicing through us like a hot knife cutting through butter. Keep busy, I say. Don't think, and it'll all work out. It's all I can say to remain sane.

Bullshit or not, these are the lives we lead.

But that day. I looked like a complete fool. I left myself bloody exposed, always trying to compensate for my lack of sight, and what Charles did felt as if he tore something out of me. And, I don't think I'm willing to risk it again. I've decided I'll suffer with a seeing-eye dog, over a mental screw anyday.

And the sad part is, that I haven't opened myself to anything since it happened. I can't. I've been walking around this school with a blind man's stick, because I'm afraid of Charles.

Keep moving, don't think, and everything will be alright. How I wish that was true.

Of course I know how furious you are, Emma -- I am particularly receptive to strong emotion right now. Particularly my own.

I wonder if I can ever forgive myself.

Good morning kids. Are we done with our melodrama now?

Of course you're fucking furious. I'm fucking furious. Apparently men in plaster aren't sexy, after all, and children are bright enough to stay out of hitting range. But y'know, you're a bright woman, Emma, and a telepath. I don't believe for a minute that you haven't known exactly how scary most non-telepaths find telepaths, and how scary *any* mutant power can be. I ain't saying that having you nose rubbed in it is going to be fun, but don't pretend you didn't know it all already.

I killed a dozen helpless men the other day, and I did it using my mutant gifts, because I didn't have time to find a gun, because I was trying not to die before the job was done. I was just lucky that they didn't kill me while I was helpless. I'm really fucking lucky all the terrorist fuckwits can't shoot straight, and all they hit was my leg.

I could curl up into a little ball of bitterness and self-loathing now. I just broke the one rule I set myself when I started having to kill people, that'd I'd never do it using my gifts and now the only little blanket of good conscience I had left, crappy, artifical and self-deceptive as it was has been ripped away from me because of the slaphead's brain, and bad circumstances. And yeah, you probably think that I'm a bastard who deserves to suffer, and that's fine, but at least I've got some perspective.

It's not Charlie's fault. For all the shit I disagree with him on, I trust him not to do that kind of shit willingly, and not to let anyone else do it while he's around.

But he's as human as I am, and he's going to fuck up as often as I do. (OK, maybe not that often.) Blaming him for the other day would be like me blaming my hot knives for the bodies on the deck. They did it, but I pulled the trigger. I don't for one second believe that Charlie had any choice in what was going on, that he didn't try to fight it every step of the way with everything he had. Someone else pulled the trigger on his brain there.

I'm not about to pour more shit on him just because he's not god, and does have a breaking point. And I'm certainly not going to blame him because someone else made him rub my nose in what I already knew about myself and the harsh and horrible world around me.

And y'know, the kids are resilient. They'll recover. And they won't hold it against anyone.

You all did you best to do a job you shouldn't have had to, that no-one could have got one hundred percent right. Beating yourself up, and beating each other up isn't going to help anyone right now. There's a job in front of us, and horrible shit behind us, and looking backward does no bastard any good.

Christ, Emma, you've got me in baldy's corner now. I ain't saying you ain't got a prefect right to feel violated, because god knows, I do. And if it bothers you that people might think of you in the same boat as someone who would do that to their brains, well, it's as fucking stupid as a the "all men are potential rapists" argument, and you know it. So we work to change that view, to educate, inform, teach, and build something better.

Ah fuck, I don't know what I'm talking about now. Do what you want. I'm going down the pub.

Are we done with the melodrama? Oh, heavens, no, Mr Wisdom, you only just got here. "Dear diary, I had to kill some more people today, poor me, feeling v v bad, ate whole cheesecake". The melodrama's not done until we've torn another page from Bridget Wisdom's Diary.

Don't lecture me, you insolent prick. I've heard your songsheet from front to back. "It's a hard knock life, luv, I just had to kill a guy but it Got The Job Done". Darling, your tedious moral equivocating bores me to crocodile tears.

I'm not afraid because mutants are dangerous. You're right, I always knew we were dangerous. I'm not angry at Charles because he's a ten-ton truck riding roughshod over our eggshell heads. I'm angry because we're eggshells. I'm afraid because we haven't done enough. I'm pissed, I'm furious, I'm indignant, because I almost lost my children a second time, and I should have made sure they were ready. I should have done a better job than this, because it's not enough to protect your children from creatures like us, you have to make them ready to fight. You have to arm your children to survive. If this day ever comes again, any one of us should be prepared to stick a bullet in Charles's head to keep the rest of the race safe.

So you can believe I'm not about to roll up into a ball of self-loathing. I'm rolling up into a ball of foot long sharpened quills, darling, and they're aiming for the heart.

Find these people, Peter. If any part of Stryker's little organisation survived, I want to know about it. If any of the people who helped or served him are still out there, I want them to pay.

Oh, and dearheart, all men are potential rapists. All women, too. So don't have any more pretty ideas, they just don't go with that ugly little scowl.

The melodrama's not done until we've torn another page from Bridget Wisdom's Diary.

Doesn't suit me any better than it does you, yeah, yeah. Point taken.

Find these people, Peter. If any part of Stryker's little organisation survived, I want to know about it. If any of the people who helped or served him are still out there, I want them to pay.

This bit, I can actually do. Give me a while...