The engine of Drake's large black motorcycle, the Manticore, roared in her ears. She was racing far, far above the speed limit, but there were greater concerns right now. The bronze-scaled woman had barely been able to jam on her helmet fast enough, her poor leather jacket and sketchbook left behind as her wings flared out behind her, making her dragon nature obvious to all onlookers who managed to catch a good enough glimpse at the mass of black and bronze roaring down the street.

The attack on Gina? That was no accident.

The words of the mutant reporter echoed in her ears. She couldn't shut it out, even with the wind whipping pass her and the Manticore's roars. Her clawed hands had the handlebars in a death grip that would have turned her knuckles white if she'd had human skin.

Do you know what they said? That they didn't need help from a freak like me. That if I told anyone what they'd done, they'd kill me. They said they were untouchable.

She had never enrolled in Xavier's Sister School for Gifted Youngsters. She'd gone to public school in Manitoba, had attended a 'proper' art school here in New York. She'd never taken charity for what she was, had never sought a safe haven before. She was determined to live on her own, to never let her mutant skin define her entire life.

Right at this moment, she was determined to throw all of that bulls*** out of the window. For the first time in a long time, Kiva Angelique Lynette Augillard was terrified out of her mind.

That time with the five thugs and the knives, that had been unpleasant, but expected. There were always a few judgmental, violent, angry idiots. This...this was something altogether different. Things had rapidly spiraled out of control and she was terrified of getting caught in the crossfire...of leading all this back to her human friends...to her aunt...She needed to hide.

I think humanity just tipped things to burn this city down.

Kiva screeched to a stop at the gates, leaving behind a prominent mark as she skidded to a halt. She dismounted and nearly threw her helmet off, then stood there as the adrenaline surged through her system and she breathed heavily, as if she'd just run a marathon. They'd take her in, right? They had to. They just...they had to...

Serena had spent the day exercising. Swimming, running, generally trying to increase her fitness. Not only was it healthy, it also gave her something to do when not studying, although she did have an ulterior motive for wanting to increase her fitness...

She thought, if her power drained her of energy, maybe, just maybe, if she increased her fitness, it wouldn't leave her so tired after using it, or... It could actually make it a little easier to control.

It wasn't much, but she would take anything she could get.

After exercising, she was rather... unclean. So she decided to pop back into her dorm, to have a shower and get a change of clothing. As she jogged through the living room, she saw a bunch of kids gathered around a T.V, which was showing more Riot coverage... Oh dear.

She carried on moving and reached her room. She threw down her top and trousers and then undid her bra and tossed aside her underwear, as it landed in the washing basket, she jumped into the shower and began to run some hot water.

It felt glorious on her body, the heat washing over her. She finished cleaning up and then went and put on some fresh clothing. A T-shirt and a pair of shorts to go with the beautiful afternoon sun.

She wandered out of her room and decided to go for a walk along the mansion perimeter. She'd see if she could spot anyone she knew outside.

As the blonde walked nearer to the gate, she heard the distinct roar of a motorcycle, she saw a helmet wearing figure skid to a halt, just in front of the gate to the mansion, and remove a helmet hastily.

It appeared to be a mutant, with bronze, scaley skin. She looked almost frantic. Serena did a mental Eye roll. Stupid news reporter, instead of finding a peaceful way to deal with it, or doing it quietly, she started a full on city wide riot, now mutants and humans alike were terrified of the other side.

Serena approached the gate with a smile on her face. "Hi there, can I help you?"

The friendly voice snapped Kiva out of her frantic thoughts, and she looked at the girl who had approached. Kid couldn't be much older than Sorcha, she noted. There was an instant, instinctive warmth at that fact, and were it not for the fact that she was still riding on the wave of fear and adrenaline that had brought her to the gate, she may have smiled back. As it was, she suddenly found herself acutely aware of what she'd come racing here to do.

She'd come racing here to beg for protection from a bunch of teachers and students. A bit of disgust with herself rose in her throat, and she looked down at the helmet in her claws silently as she tried to come up with an answer that didn't make her sound like a complete and utter coward.

Kiva was a wall of scales and muscle, a good half-foot taller than the girl as the mid-day sun made her skin gleam bronze. She stretched her wings slightly and tucked her helmet under one arm as she ran her clawed fingers through her black hair, only now noticing what a mess it was. "I..." She trailed off, her stomach tying itself into an awkward knot at the silence that followed the aborted attempt at an answer.

Oh, for God's sake. She should just spit it out. "My name is Kiva," she said, not even bothering with her nickname right now since it really didn't matter. "I've...It's getting crazy out here and I narrowly avoided some people pitching whatever they could get their hands on at mutants while getting here and I just...I..."

Her shoulders slumped, her wings drooped, and she stared down at her thick leather boots. The androgynous growl usually in her voice dropped away as she admitted, softly and quietly, "I'm afraid." There it was, two words she loathed to say rolling off her tongue, in front of some teenage kid. The kind of person she normally would have tried to be strong for.

Kiva just stood there, looking ashamed.

Serena gave a warm smile to the scaley newcomer. She looked... Very muscular, and Serena also noted that she had claws on her hands. Small claws, but claws none the less.

The Haemokinetic's mind drifted to Sylar, it filled her with a warm feeling. She really liked Sylar, he was so cute in the way that he was socially awkward. Serena would teach him, at some point, how to be less easily embarassed by social situations.

Of course, last time they had seen eachother she had instinctively greeted him with a hug... That probably was not the best way to ease him out of his comfort zone. Oh well.

She noted the scaled female looking very awkward indeed. She was reminding Serena more and more of Sylar every minute. Shame, she looked a little shaken up, Serena wondered if something bad had happened to her.

As she spoke, Serena mentally scolded herself. Of course, the bloody riots. There must have been many mutants who were absolutely terrified. She felt really stupid for not thinking of that sooner. Why was she so thick?

The young blonde not thinking that this might be some sort of ploy for a monstrous mutant like that giant Roach... to get into the mansion and hurt others, opened the gate and walked forwards with a smile. "Hiya Kiva, I'm Serena. It's ok, I'd be scared too if I was out there."

She was channeling as much sweetness and warmth into her words as was possible. She really felt bad for the lizard-like mutant. She must've recieved so much unwarrented hate from people in her life. It was so sad that people could be so cruel.

"It's much less scary in here. Unless you count the amount of food some students are able to consume..." There, a little joke, to lighten the mood, that should help.

Gemma stopped on her way through the living room to look at the TV screen. Since the red haired reporter dropped the panic bomb on the city the TV was set non-stop on the news channel, and various groups of students gathered at various times during the day to keep up with what was happening outside. The Internet also got noticeably slower in the building with everyone who owned computers streaming, tweeping and searching.

Gemma sighed; the news did not look any better. She was doing her usual rounds to make sure no one was getting into any mischief, and, even more importantly, no one was getting out. She, together with the X-team, ordered a lockdown on the school. No strangers in, and definitely no students out.

Walking outside the building she noticed Serena talking to someone at the gate. Gemma frowned as she started towards them down the driveway to see what was going on. As people outside got crazier, and the hate against mutants was rising, even showing yourself within the gates could be dangerous.

Gemma knew in the back of her mind that she was not going to get any sleep until it was over.

Kiva hadn't expected the gate to open, and she looked up in surprise at the teenager as she introduced herself. While she had no idea what sort of precautions were being taken around here, Kiva had a distinct feeling that Serena may not have been supposed to do that, and so she stood where she was, making no move to attempt to enter. The warm, comforting words she'd been offered were doing little to improve her current emotional state, at least partly because they were coming from someone likely a good seven years her junior.

The little joke, however, did help. A smile came to her face and a chuckle, manifesting as a deep rumble in her chest, escaped her. "Oh, I'm sure I've seen worse," she commented. "My family's Irish." Well, half of it, at any rate. Her mother's side of her family were big on attitude, eccentricity, and appetite. Christmas every year, when she went home, was always great fun and resulted in enough food to feed a small army.

That seemed a world away from the here and now, however. Kiva touched the claw on her pointer finger to one of the small, blunt, black spikes on her lower jaw, tapping it lightly a couple of times in a nervous habit she'd developed not long after said spikes emerged. "It's...nice to meet you, Serena," she said, "It's nice to see a friendly face."

There was a vague desire to give the blonde girl a hug, one that Kiva suppressed. It wasn't a comfort-seeking impulse, but one brought on simply because Serena was being so nice to her and further reminding her of her little sister back across the border. The main reason she was holding herself back was because few reacted well to a sudden bear hug from a big, scaly monster like her.

Serena smiled at the scaly figure. Who was definitely much bigger, and more muscular than Serena was. Although mind you, Serena was rather pale, frail and had very little muscle mass.

Irish. Her mind drifted to a certain winged angel she knew for a moment. He had certainly given the impression of a trouble maker. Was that an Irish thing? Or was it just a coincidence?

It was a coincidence. Stereotypes were just that, stereotypes. And you shouldn't really need to pay any attention to them. You shouldn't pay any attention to them.

She smiled at Kiva. "Hey, do you wanna come inside and maybe we could try and find Ge-" Serena had turned slightly and noticed Gemma approaching out of the corner of her eye.

"Gemma! Hiya!" Serena exclaimed with a smile.

>>"Gemma! Hiya!"

"Hello Serena" Gemma smiled, but she was not her usual cheerful self. She eyed the person on the other side of the gates.

Well, she was a mutant, that much was obvious. She was still outside Gemma's nullifying aura, but she could not help but wonder what would happen to the scales if she came any closer.

"Hi there. My name is Gemma Taylor, I'm the school's guidance counselor. Can I help you?"

She was not going to let her in just yet.

The invitation to come in made one of Kiva's wings twitch. She, again, was pretty sure students weren't just supposed to invite random people in. Sure, she was very obviously a mutant, but there were mutants making their best attempt to burn the city down right now, so that shouldn't be the only consideration made regarding whether or not to just let her wander in. Something about Serena's trust here was both very heartwarming and a bit worrying.

Kiva's eyes moved to look behind Serena when she called to someone, and she felt her wings stretch and fold in a moment of nervous twitching as she caught sight of the other woman. Boy, was she tall. The amount of height Kiva had on Serena was not quite the same amount Gemma had on her, or at least it didn't seem to be, due to eyeballing at this distance, but all the same Kiva couldn't help but note when women were taller than her, since it didn't happen often.

Not to mention that there was something about this woman that seemed both oddly familiar and a wee bit intimidating, and while it took a moment to realize what it was, it seemed downright obvious once she did. This woman reminded Kiva of her mother. Sort of. Vaguely. There was just something in the look she was getting that made her think of her, for whatever reason. While Kiva was not afraid of her own mother, anyone who could even slightly be compared to the fiery Irish woman was probably someone you didn't particularly want to make upset with you.

"I..." And here she was, having the exact problem talking she'd been having before. Her eyes flicked from Serena, then back to Gemma, probably looking like she was hoping for some form of encouragement, like a shy or nervous child. The truth was that she felt all the more miserable with herself after having admitted her fear the first time that she felt like she may choke on her words if she tried to say it again.

"My name is Kiva. K-Kiva Aguillard." And now she was stuttering. Lovely. She pushed forward regardless, the words tumbling from her mouth before she could think too hard about what she was saying. "This...this was the only place I could think to go. I can't fight off mutant rioters on my own, and the humans just look at me and call me another monster. I-I...I'm not..."

Not strong enough. Not brave enough.

Not human enough.

She was trembling now. She realized she was doing it and let out a slow breath to steady herself. "I'm sorry, I just...I could try leaving town, but I don't have anywhere I'd be welcome without leaving the country, too. I'm not American and I..."

Her aunt here in New York would let her stay--heck, her aunt was currently looking after her cat, which was the reason Kiva hadn't roared through the city streets on her motorcycle with a cat carrier in tow--but her aunt occupied the category of mutant who was normal-looking and in control enough to hide it, just flashy enough to prove herself a mutant if cornered by other mutants, but not combat-capable. Being around an obvious mutant like Kiva would just lead non-mutants looking for an easy target right to her and wouldn't fix the overall problem of being in the middle of a civil war.

Kiva fell silent, idly running the tips of her claws over the bare bicep of the opposite arm. Thick muscles, tough scales. Not enough. She wasn't bulletproof, wasn't fireproof, and couldn't hide. In her mind, she was out of options.

>>"I... My name is Kiva. K-Kiva Aguillard. This...this was the only place I could think to go. I can't fight off mutant rioters on my own, and the humans just look at me and call me another monster. I-I...I'm not... I'm sorry, I just...I could try leaving town, but I don't have anywhere I'd be welcome without leaving the country, too. I'm not American and I..."

"It's okay." Gemma said calmly, without any hesitation, and with more kindness in her voice. "The Mansion is a safe place for mutants."

She glanced at Serena, then back at the girl outside the gates.

"I am going to let you in and you can stay as long as you want as long as you don't cause any trouble. But before I do I have to let you know that I am not a mutant. I am a human who adapted to living with mutants. I have an aura that cancels out most mutant powers. I need to know if that is going to be a problem with your abilities."

She did not think the scales would go away, but the girl could always have powers that did not show, and she might have been relying on them. It was a fair warning.

A safe place. Those words tumbled around in Kiva's skull, and soon collided with another group of them. As long as you want. She could say here as long as she wanted. They were letting her in. She was safe.

She perked up in curiosity when Gemma said she wasn't a mutant, and she tilted her head very slightly as she went on to explain her abilities. Kiva never heard of anything like that before, and now that she wasn't quite so afraid she found herself a bit intrigued by the idea, wondering how she'd adapted like that. Questions could wait, however, since she had one of her own to answer.

Kiva glanced back at her wings and flapped them once, then looked back at Gemma. With the adrenaline fading, she was beginning to feel pain in the left one; had she had human skin, bruises would no doubt be forming. "Shouldn't be a problem," she said, "I'm...basically human on the inside. No weird body chemistry or anything...And if it messes up my wings, well, they're just there to look pretty, anyway..."

Pretty. She'd just called an aspect of her appearance pretty. She almost laughed at her own choice of words, but instead she smiled, just a little.

Then said smile faded once it really sunk in that they were letting her in, and she had none of her belongings with her. Not much, anyway. Kiva looked back at her motorcycle, the jet black beast of a machine, and the bag hung over the handlebars. An impulsive stuffing of a few essentials and she'd bolted down the street at nearly twice the speed limit.

She'd deal with it. She certainly wasn't to go out into the city again while things were like this if she could help it.

Serena smiled as Gemma was kind to Kiva. She was a nice person. Maybe, if Gemma was going to help Kiva, Serena could wander off, maybe read a book, or do something to take her mind off of the anger she felt towards that stupid, stupid reporter, who caused all of this to happen.

She had nearly not noticed that Gemma's field had enveloped her. And then she felt it. The sensation of almost weightlessness, although Serena knew exactly what it was, having experienced it last time she was near Gemma.

It was the weight that her mutation seemed to put on her, lifting as Gemma nullified it. She dreaded leaving the aura now, it was not a pleasant feeling when she left it... Like being crushed by a torrent of bricks and being suffocated, It wasn't fun.

Serena guessed as her power was telekinetic, it was probably the strain it put on her mind most of the time, and the horrible feeling was it returning, whereas she didn't notice it most of the time.

Putting those thoughts aside, the blonde smiled to the two, taller woman. "The city has gone a little crazy, hasn't it?" She turned to Gemma for a moment and smiled some more.

>>"Shouldn't be a problem. I'm...basically human on the inside. No weird body chemistry or anything...And if it messes up my wings, well, they're just there to look pretty, anyway..."

Gemma shared the smile as the girl flapped her wings. They were pretty, in their strange and unique way. She followed her glance to the motorcycle.

"All right, I am going to let you in" she said, opening the gates "I'll show you to the garage. Just make sure the bike is safe, last thing we need is one of the kids stealing it. Stranger things have happened around here."

Like, for example, someone stealing the X-jet. Yes.

>>"The city has gone a little crazy, hasn't it?"

"That's an understatement." Gemma nodded, and turned back to Kiva "The Mansion is under a lockdown, once you come in you have to stay until we tell you it is safe to go out. You will see the X-men in uniforms, they are the ones keeping the place safe. They are trained for it. Don't try to copy them."

Understatement of the year, kiddo, Kiva thought to herself at Serena's comment, but Gemma beat her to replying and she just gave one of her little smiles instead. She moved over to grab the handlebars of her Manticore and she walked the jet black motorcycle through the gates.

Gemma's aura indeed had an effect on her wings. The small, extra limbs went completely limp and numb, hanging lifelessly from where they attached to her shoulders. That was mildly unsettling, but the forewarning combined with the fact that they were completely useless even when she could move them meant that she didn't mind much. In fact, she was almost a little disappointed, part of her half-hoping her scaly skin would have morphed back to normal, but maybe that was beyond the capabilities of whatever Gemma was.

She glanced at the bag slung over her bike's handlebars. "Don't cause trouble, no going out until lockdown's over, and let the guys in uniform do their job. Got it. No problems there." Playing hero or being a troublemaker were both very much not on her priority list. She just wanted a place to feel safe for however long this lasted. "And I've got a chain that I tie the big guy here up with when I park 'im," she added, giving the bike an affectionate pat. A chain may not be too helpful if a kid with the right mutation was just that determined to steal it, but it should discourage most of them.

Maybe she'd leave her helmet in the garage, too, just so some joy-riding punk didn't have an excuse not to wear proper safety gear whilst doing said joy-riding.

Kiva glanced between Serena and Gemma. "Th...Thank you," she said quietly, aware that she had not said those important words yet and that she should. "I mean...You don't know me and you still...Thank you." She was aware of the trust she was being offered here, the risk they were taking in letting a complete stranger in here, and she wanted them to know she appreciated it.