Tori felt like she had been warped into an episode of the Fresh Prince. She got into a fight, her mom got scared, and she was sent to a new city to live in a mansion. Was she going to go on to fight aliens? Did aliens even exist? Hopefully not. Anyway, the cab she had paid for pulled up in front of the school she was being transferred to and she climbed out of the cab and waved towards the driver before he took off.

Tori's emerald green eyes scanned the mansion in question. It was large and looked pretty tight. Bigger than anywhere she has ever lived. Considering she has lived in an old red duplex her entire life this was a step up. But still, Tori was nervous. She hasn't met another mutant before and she didn't even know if she would fit in among her own kind. She was away from friends and family and didn't know what to expect. But she figured if she wanted to be a crime fighter some day she had to take risks, so she stepped up on the front porch of the mansion and ranged the doorbell.

'Easy, Tori. No need to be nervous. We're all mutants here. If anyone can relate to your plight it's the people here.' thought Tori as she waited in front of the mansion's entrance for an answer.

The driver waved back. Fuzzy dice swung from the mirror as they pulled away. If anything, you could say that this cab was rare. But ah yeah, forget it. The cabbie was not headed home, to Bel Air. Wrong coast.

~*~

Inside the mansion, the doorbell rang. It announced someone at the entrance to an Asian man in his mid thirties, all the way in his office in the middle of the mansion. He had dark hair, cut short, and hazel eyes with triangular pupils. He wore a white button up shirt and dark slacks. Hr looked up from his math assignments, which he had been grading. Was someone going to get that bell?

No?

He set down the papers, and rose from his dark wood desk. No rest for the wicked. And even less for the just.

~*~

A minute passed before the man arrived to open the front door. He smiled politely at the person there. An unfamiliar face. A new person.

“Hello, my name is Professor Shinbo. Can I help you?” The Asian asked.

Alas an answer came in the form of a young Asian man. Well, not younger than she of course. Tori had a hard time placing a number to someone's physical appearance. Some people looked older than they were, and others looked younger than they were. But he announced himself as "professor" which told her he had to be an adult of course. There were no children professors after all. At least not to her knowledge as cool as that would be.

"Yes, hello. My name is Tori. My um... my parents sent me here to be a student."

Tori took out her red backpack, which also had her Gaia outfit stored in it but he didn't need to know that just yet. She reached out for some papers that her parents filled for her in order to transfer here as she put the backpack back upon her back and handed them over to the teacher.

"My papers are right here."

Tori hoped this would go smoothly. She really didn't want to talk about the reason she was here. What happened back in her hometown. That was a sore issue for her and not something she was going to open up about on a first day.

The girl was a teenager, or at least, that was his immediate take. His eyes, which could calculate the exact measurements of objects in his direct line of sight could tell him the person’s height, the height of the gate beyond her, at the front of the mansion, and all sorts of other fun information, and he could run equations to get further information. But that did not tell him ages, only that she was taller than a toddler.

They introduced themselves as Tori. A prospective student. Their parents had sent them to the mansion. Clearly, that meant there had been paperwork. Yes. Papers clearly had been worked. He nodded. They could check that out, but surely the headmaster already had these things all sorted.

Oh wait. There were the fabled papers now. He was being handed them. Super.

He took them: “I will get these filed and sorted, thank you.” He said.

Now he had some new work to do. Hurray! He was not really annoyed, it was, after all, his job. He turned and gestured for Tori to follow him.

“My office is this way. We can get this done quick fast.”

~*~

At his office, he sat down at his desk. Pulled up his laptop. Entered data. Offered a seat.

“Only take a minute,” Shin said. “So, long way from home, I see. You’re not in Kansas City any more. I apologize profusely for the state of our barbecue,” he joked wryly, “but at least our pizza is memorable… if not good.”

The man was motioning for her to follow him, so she did so. Her eyes scanned the interior room of the mansion as they walked towards his office. It was big. Almost bigger on the inside. If a Blue Police Box appeared at some point she was going to run right to it. They entered his office and Tori took a seat across from him as she waited for him to drill through the information on the papers. Tori at least hoped her parents thought of everything.

It seemed like this Shinbo was a little bit of a joker, which in truth? Took a little bit of the edge and awkwardness off as Tori liked to joke too. If her friend Nex was here he'd be making all kinds of jokes right about now. Some of the things her friend said didn't always make sense, but it did make her laugh.

She of course laughed to the comment. Not really knowing a thing about New York City's barbecue. Though she smiled at the pizza comment. She would have to remember to try their pizza.

"I'll have to try the pizza sometime. So um... what all do people do around here?"

Tori was curious. If everyone here was a mutant then where did they go to use their powers? It made her wonder if there was a training facility of some kind somewhere in the mansion, but where were they going to fit that in the budget? What was the budget anyway?

What do people do at the mansion, Tori asked.

The honest answer would have been “rebuild the mansion.” There was no sense in going there, though. Scare the child, Shard. Rebuilding only happened after cataclysmic wizards did things. It was not a common event— it only felt like it happened whenever things got dull. To spice up the site a bit.

“School work is fun, right?” Shin smiled, knowing full damn well the answer was generally “not.”

“We train our mutant powers. We practice. We do school stuffs. There’s sports, and so on. I think the living room has some sort of video game system. It may only be a few years out of date. Dunno. Last I checked, we had an Xbox.”

That had been, what, two decades ago? One? You lose track of time.

He entered more data.

“So, is it okay if I ask about mutation?” Some people are particular. Good to get consent.

Tori listened as the professor explained things. Tori held back on commenting on the "school work is fun" comment. As with most teens Tori could've done without school work, but it was a part of life so she usually just dealt with it. Her friend June would've said it was fun though. June was a genius and teacher pet. Of course the practice of mutant powers didn't come as a surprise, but Tori's face lit up at the Xbox statement.

"You have a Xbox? I love Xbox! I have a Xbox Series X at home. Are we talking original Xbox or Three-Sixty?"

She was genuinely curious how old they were talking about. Though Xbox One could be considered old now for all intent and purposes. Either way she was going to make use of that fairly quick. Tori loved video games and she was a big mark for Xbox. Her mood immediately changed though when he asked about mutation. Tori knew it was inevitable though. Can't have a school with mutants without knowing their mutation.

"Sure. So, I can manipulate the earth around me. Geokinetics I think is the technical term. From what I can tell I can only manipulate the earth up to five meters and about a single metric ton at a time. I've been able to mold objects like dirt, rock, and sand like clay and even made a platform for flying. It's pretty cool when it doesn't scare the crap out of me."

She was being honest. There were some perks to having superpowers. Like how she could help regular citizens. Ordinary people. That was what she wanted to do with her powers in the long term. Help people as Gaia, but her parents weren't having any of that. At least not until she learned how to control it. Tori didn't want another earthquake to happen. She could barely live with the first one. Let alone a second.

“Probably the original, but who knows?” Shin said mysteriously. “Someone may have brought a new once in since 2010. The world works in mysterious ways. And I don’t have time to check. I’m sure that you can find out.”

—

The mutant talked about their mutation.

“Neat,”’Shin said. “Flying is fun. Don’t see that with most earth benders. Does that mean a little magnetic flair, or maybe limited telekinesis… ooh, guess we will have to figure it out. Got a code name, yet? You’re Tori, earth is terra, so maybe blend the two and make tora? But that’s just Japanese for tiger, or some old book, hmmm.”
He trailed off, after having thoroughly nerded out.

“Lots of people don’t know all the facets of their powers at first. That’s one thing we help people with. Teach them about themselves. For instance, I didn’t start out being able to fly. My power grew over time. And with a little creativity, I came up with new applications. You would not expect razor blades to be useful for clothing purposes, but—“

Tori only smiled at the teacher's mysterious hand wave to what kind of Xbox they had. If anyone could eye what Xbox they had it would be Tori. She knew what all the Xboxes looked like and even the differences between Xbox S and Xbox X which confused her parents she had to admit. But they grew up with very different systems her parents. Xbox was the way to be, but now she had to focus on more important things like her powers.

He made a good point about either magnetic flair or a little telekinesis. Since Geokinesis was a play on that word when it came to earth bending. Tori was kind of proud of herself to have thought about flight when most earth users probably stuck to the ground because of their powers. Tori did know that earth magnetism existed, but she had no idea what that meant and even if she could tap into it. Guess she would find out here.

"That's pretty cool, but I actually went Greek with it. I chose Gaia as a name. You know, because Gaia was the Greek personification of the Earth. So that's what I went with."

If he was to look up news on the Kansas City Star he would even find an article that was dedicated to her small works in the Kansas City area with that name, but Tori thought he didn't need to know all of that just yet. She had already said too much with the name, but if this place also created heroes as well as responsible mutant citizens then surely they would support her efforts to fight crime wouldn't they? Tori wasn't sure one way or another.

"Razor blades?" she repeated curiously. Now wondering just what kind of power the teacher had.

Gaia, huh? Cool cool.

“That’s definitely a good one,” he agreed.

People could go back and forth on code names all day, but it all came down to taste and what was important to the person with the powers. Which is why they always got to choose. Unless their code name was profanity. Then it got a veto. Gaia was not the f-worder. He still remembered the intervention with that student vividly. They had been like a pokemon that day, saying their name often, and loudly. By comparison, Gaia was the best name ever!

Teachers did not make a habit of googling new students, home town, and powers to see if they had something dangerous on their hands. Usually if it was important, it got shared. Eventually. So Shin did not google Kansas City earthquake. He finished entering the data, instead. Just in time to answer a question.

Easy enough to show.

Shin, aka shard, summoned a shard. A forest green equilateral triangle, about two inches tall and wide. It hovered in the air above the extended index finger of his right hand.

“I make psychic barriers. They’re shaped like triangles. They’re diamond-hard, razor sharp, and I can make them all sizes and colors. Through the dynamic power of maths, I have figured out how to stack them in such a way it does not cut me. So I can use my razor sharp shards to make armor. I mainly use it to make cosplay. But I can also summon a flying tortilla chip, and use it like a hover board. Or make really big swords. Like a diamond, the power is multi-faceted………. I’m really sorry for that joke. Really. Sorry.”

He made an apologetic face.

Tori's eyes went crazy wide almost like an anime character when she saw the professor's power. The shard of energy colored her favorite color, green. As he explained the power she found it so cool. Of course a lot of the mutants' abilities she had read about online seemed cool. A lot more responsibility to actually wield and use them, but just reading about them on websites were pretty cool and now she was seeing someone else's power who wasn't her own in person. All around cool.

"That is so cool!"

Tori didn't even care about the bad joke. The coolness of his power well outweighed that. It made her think about what all she could do with her own power. There had to be more applications she could build upon instead of creating walls, digging tunnels, and sensing vibrations. As well as flying on platforms. Maybe she could learn all of that here.

"I'd show you my power, but I don't want to ruin the furniture."

Something she was really self-conscious about as you can imagine Earth Manipulation can have a lot of collateral damage.

The kid was impressed with the power, just from description alone. They’d probably die if he turned into a Power Ranger. Although he generally did golden lion knight GARO, as a rule. Way less iconic.

She said she would show off her power, but it would ruin the furniture. Part of him wanted to jokingly say “forget the furniture.” But it actually was nice furniture, so—

Teachers have to get their own furniture, if they want nice things. And he didn’t want to replace it. He nodded at the comment. “Yeah. Outside is better. Or in the social super secret underground room we use for training, but shhh. Anyways, we’re done here. I’ll put this paperwork away. It is all entered. Do you want a tour?”

"Social super secret what?" asked Tori confused.

He said they were all done here. That was indeed fast. Good. Tori hated paperwork and was glad she didn't have to answer many questions. The question about mutation was really the only question he posed so she was grateful for that. At some schools you basically had to give out your whole life's story. She was glad that wasn't the case here. He had offered to give her a tour. Tori was more than willing to take advantage of that offer.

"If you don't mind I would like that. I never been in a building this large before so I would hate to get lost."

Tori smiled friendly at the man. He seemed nice and would likely make a good professor. And he could probably teach her so much about Japanese anime if she was to press him enough.

“Did I say social?”

He thought about it for a second. Damn.

“I meant super. Super special secret. Oops.”

—

The professor took her on the tour of the mansion. Some parts may have looked brand new, in fact all of it was new, repairs were most likely done by now. He showed her the kitchen/dining room area, the living room (they actually had modern systems, yay!), the outside (regrowing hedge maze, basketball hoops, etc), teachers offices, classrooms, not necessarily these things all in that order, and finally they assigned a room. Usually people had roommates, but not always. He had not even asked about luggage.

“Anyways, this is you. If you need help bringing in luggage, we can get someone. Someone will be along to tell you about classes, help you choose stuff, probably the headmaster. Welcome to the mansion! Be sure to make friends!”