Rowan mouthed the word 'zed' to himself. Now that was new and unique knowledge and he'd love to show that off in front of his teachers.

"Tch." Jude muttered in his coffee. "She's in a meeting with a publicist." Not to mention the boyfriend part of what had triggered all that silliness. Jude was well aware that it would look like he was being a teen about it, but the woman should have better sense than to deal with any of that.

Even better that Ghost's pal Zinnia got excited about her dream project. He smiled in a blandly interested kind of way. It was actually interesting. But it also probably existed already under lock and key and copyright. Or security clearance.

"Aren't you afraid of 'wrong hands' and all that?"

As for what Jude thought mutants suffered from? "Delusions of grandeur?"

But really. Mutants were always the edges of a bell curve. Super nice or hella not. Super hot or hella not. Super tall or... him. "Have you ever noticed how tall mutants are? I mean, there's exceptions and stuff, but everybody around here's like basketball team material." Which was irritating considering how much he'd practiced for that.

Rowan became busy trying to use his tongue to retrieve a marshmallow that was stuck to the inner wall of his coffee cup. It was juuuuust out of reach enough that he'd probably never get it. But he did manage to dump the rest of his up's contents down his shirt. This did not bother him at all, nor did he feel the need to interrupt the big kids to tell them about his soaked shirt front.

There was nothing wrong with meeting a publicist as far as Zinnia could tell, mutants had enough bad press, there was no harm in the Xmen getting a bit of coaching on how to present as well as possible. Jude’s derision of the idea was perhaps based on having to baby-sit a chocolate covered puppy-brother. The fact that it may have been partly due to dating a celebrity who had swarms of (occasionally violent) fangirls never crossed her mind.

"Aren't you afraid of 'wrong hands' and all that?"

She was, but the neglect of standard healthcare procedures for mutants put both them and the healthcare professionals at risk. True there was risk for the mutants who would dare participate in a study, echos of registration still lingered in many people’s minds, especially those with an active Xgene. The announcement of the METAbots had reopened old wounds, even if they were supposed to be entirely different to the robots that used to drag people off into the night.

“Yes and no, I would hope that the sort of data I would be collecting would be more like ‘in general those with an active Xgene should supplement their intake of calcium as 89% of the studied cases were lacking’, stuff like that, it can’t be weaponised, but it could really help out mutants.”

His comment about delusions made her dip her head and smile, she had been a little carried away there, it was something she thought about often, which made it easy to get sidetracked into it. He was right though, so many mutants gave up on a ‘normal’ life to follow their destiny. Even here they were surrounded by the young and impressionable, aiming to be Xmen. She wondered how many of the students who filled the mansion’s many rooms wanted to grow up and be postmen, or office workers or stay-at-home-moms. A life of normalcy was so often denied to those with the X, and a life of shortness.

“There does tend to be a skew that direction, but humans have been getting historically taller and taller, it makes sense that the next evolutional step would be taller again.”

She knew a lot of the height discrepancies between historical figures and current humans was nutritionally based, but there was nothing to say it wasn’t also evolution working away quietly behind the scenes. Again, more research needed ^TM.

The dregs of the chocolate beverage joined the ever growing puddle which spread across, counter, puppy and floor. Were all the mansion’s residents so messy? They would have to have some sort of permanent clean up crew on standby. Or a sentient Roomba or something.

“I’ve never played basketball, but one of my brothers does. Do you play any sports?”

Swimming was kind of a sport, although not really in the way she used it. Other than that she was distinctly sportless.

If she thought a lack or surplus of calcium couldn't be weaponized, Zinnia had never been properly briefed on the dangers of a certain Bone Bikini Babe. Jude leaned back on his stool and considered inviting Zinnia up to his room to see, but... yeah. As it turned out no girls liked to be shown big posters of Isabel Duskmoore in a bikini made entirely of bone. It was rad and kick butt mutation, but everybody seemed to get hung up on the cleavage. And the murder.

He sighed. Whatever. He liked his poster. But Zin had started talking sports and that was a waaaay safer topic.

"I like basketball. I'm not good at it, but I like it. Swimming's cool too. What's your power do in a pool?"

He was trying reeeeal hard to just let Rowan do his thing, but when he next glanced at Zin and saw past her to the chocolate ring his little brother had imprinted on his own face, he couldn't stand it any more. Jude pinched the bridge of his nose.

"You need a bath." Magical words to a not-quite-4 year old. Rowan dropped his mug like it was hot. "Thanks for the coffee." that the Mansion bought and paid for. "I'm glad you're not a creep." Jude smirked and offered his hand for the shaking and the goodbye making. That was her cue to split. Little kid getting naked who wasn't her relative? Yeah. Only a creep would stick around for that.

"Ack! Help! My head's stuck!" Oh. The ears again. Jude went to herd Rowan up to the boy's hall as he dislodged the shirt collar from his little brother's ears. Someday he'd learn.

"I like basketball. I'm not good at it, but I like it. Swimming's cool too. What's your power do in a pool?"

Her power was always activated, even when she was breathing like a ‘normal’ person, she hadn’t noticed any particular difference when she was swimming, except that she didn’t get the initial shock many people complained about from walking into a chlorinated environment.

“No real difference, except I guess I’m better at holding my breath than other people.” Little did she know that her body was storing up the chlorine, just in case. How could she know?

At mentions of bathtime she moved for the dishcloth to mop up the worst of the chocolate water feature, they didn’t need her help for the bathtime activities. Aside from the protests regarding his ears Rown seemed more kid than dog, she would have expected him to scamper away and hind under the bed if she’d had to make a guess. She shook Jude’s offered hand.

“Nice to meet you guys.” She dug a business card out of her pocket- you never knew who you might meet, and it was always better to be prepared with contact details than not. “Always handy to have an adult contact that’s not related.” For embarrassing moments or awkward questions. She offered the card to Jude before turning her attention to the sticky. She could find her own way out, she was sure.

Fin.