She was cute before she was cool (Maxine)

The bird was white, and too far away. That wouldn't stop Maxine.

It sat on the fence. A wooden fence that rose up until her fingertips couldn't stretch, couldn't touch, the very top—it hopped up there, from board to board, looking down at her. The girl stared up at it, her pigtails brushing down her back. The bird tilted its head, and let out a single musical note.

She went into the house, and came back with a footstool. There. Now she could—

The bird flew up, just out of reach, to a tree in the yard. Footstool and girl together couldn't touch the bough on which it sat. It preened under one wing and, plucking out a feather, dropped it from its beak. The downy feather caught in her tousled red hair.

Maxine went into the garage, and wrestled out a ladder. Step by step, she dragged it back. There. If she could just keep her balance, she could—

The bird flew up, into the sun. She squinted into the blinding light. Its musical voice called down to her, note by note, daring the little girl higher.

Maxine went into her mother's room, and came back with a candle snuffer. She climbed the tree, hand over hand, somehow holding the sooty brass antique as well. When she reached the top, when the branches reached out into the sky, she stretched it out towards the sun—

And the world went dark. And the world went cold. And someone called her name from the distance, but she wasn't going towards them or the bird, she was going down further and her arms wouldn't move and there were metal chains wrapping around—

>> "Maxine?... Am I interrupting something?"

The twelve year old woke up in a bed much bigger than hers, in clothes much bigger than hers, with metal tentacles slowly binding her arms to her chest.

Her scream pierced the heavens.

Screaming made the chains get tighter. The redheaded girl, sitting bolt upright in bed, tried going very very still instead. There was a man in the room. He wasn't old-old, but he was a lot older than her, and a lot taller.

"I'm Maxine Ralls," the girl said, her chin raising defiantly. "And you're stupid. Because my mom is a mutant too, and so is my big brother, and they are both going to cream you if you don't call off your—your Rex. And take me home. Now."

Little Maxine was not amused. Or scared. He was almost as thin as she was. She could take him, if he would just fight fair. Probably. Especially if she didn't.

He was acting like he didn't do anything wrong. That's how boys always acted: it didn't fool her for one second.

Neither did his face: so what if he had cute bangs, and a trust-me, no-really uptilt at the corners of his mouth? So did Jacob Turner. And Jacob Turner was an immature jerk who still thought monkey bars where the coolest thing since trading cards.

No, the twelve year old was wise to the ways of men. But there was something about him, something... Something in his voice.

It was the way he said her name: 'Maxine.'

Not 'Maxine,' like her teachers when she was the only one to raise her hand—there was no welcome approval in the word. Not 'Maxine,' like when her mother called her down to breakfast—like she was being summoned down to a whole new day. Just 'Maxine.' Just 'oh, Maxine. again,' with a hint of 'why am I not surprised.' He said her name like he knew her. In fact, he said her name exactly like her older brother did.

...Maybe she could trust him. It didn't mean she had to like him, or his bangs, or his mouth. Stupid Jacob Turner.

>> "So... how did you end up here, hm? Where are your parents?"

"I—," not I don't know. That would be stupid. The redhead drew herself up a little straighter, tentacles and all. "I haven't figured that out yet. But I will." She would.

"...How do I call him off?" She asked, after a few tentative squiggles of elbows and wrists had only succeeded in tangling her up even more. And now the thing was moving into her hair.

The paperclips reacted to the shoe like... well, like they were alive, and they could actually tell that something was there. This was her power? Two chain tentacles reached out, trying to drag in both shoe and man: she could sort of... feel it doing that, like a dull touch at the back of her mind. There wasn't any texture to the sensation, really—just a sense of things giving, or not giving, when they were touched. It was like the time she'd had to get a splinter taken out of her hand, and the doctor had given her some kind of a shot: there was no pain or hot or cold, only the weirdly disjoint pressure of the knife on her palm. The rest of the mesh stayed wrapped around her shoulders in a cold hug, but she could move her arms again.

"I was watching the news with my dad," she answered. Her dad wasn't a real mutant; more of an honorary mutant. Maybe a mutant by association. "Mom was making Clark—Clark is my brother—she was making him clean up the mess his pen-wasps made on the porch when they tried to fly through a window. Then I went to bed. In my room. In my house." Not to be confused with here, with him. The redhead narrowed bright green eyes at him.

"Is this your room? Why am I here?"

"Maxine Annabelle Ralls. It's Saturday, June 19, 2002, and I don't have a concussion." This was accompanied by a flick of her head that sent her red bangs tumbling off to the sides and out of her face. For approximately five seconds. The only time people asked questions like that was when someone had hit their head. She hadn't.

At least, she didn't remember doing that.

...She was so, so glad she hadn't said that out loud. Especially not in front of a boy. An older boy.

"I don't have a concussion, do I?" The girl asked, somewhat less confidently. "...How do you know me?"

The octoclip sent out a third tentacle, boxing in the swinging shoe from right, left, and bottom. The mesh net tightened around its dangling prey.

When the man dropped the shoe, the clip mesh followed, in a surge of silver. The shoe bounced lightly on the sheets as the creature balled itself up and disappeared inside, leaving only a few stray paperclips waving warningly out off the entrance. Maxine refrained—with great dignity—from using her hands to scrub at the lingering crawly feeling on her skin. She couldn't help a small shudder though, and a very subtle edging away from the thing. That was her power? She was not convinced. All thematic family resemblance in powers aside.

Her eyes narrowed again, subtly, as the man kept talking.

What she wanted to say was this: If you're my friend, why didn't you know my middle name? Because of course a friend should know something like that, even if it was the name of some relative that had been dead before she'd been born, and sounded like something from Gone With the Wind. Still. A real friend would know it, right? And not snerk about it like a total jerk?

What she did say was this: "I don't freak out." She didn't. Except for very good reasons, like waking up covered in tentacles. Any gentleman who pointed such discrepancies out was... was asking for a tentacle-shoe to get shoved down the back of his shirt.

"Tell me," the thirteen year old commanded, with chin held high.

Green eyes narrowed. Splotches of dark freckles seemed to stand out with the force of her concentration. He didn't look like a liar. But there was only one sure test.

"What am I? When I grow up." The levity with which the redhead asked gave the question its true and proper weight.

Because there was only one answer to that question. It was as clear to her now at twelve as it was when she was five and shoving her brother into the sandbox for telling her it was stupid. Clark was going to be a superhero when he grew up. Talk about stupid. Might as well be a reporter by day while he was at it.

No, there was only one job for Maxine: always had been, and always would be. After all, there was only one career where a girl could play with Tyrannosaurus Rexes for a living.

The Maxine he knew was a paleontologist, or he didn't know her at all.