Here she was again, standing outside the doors to the training area. The 17-year-old sported a red tank top, black shorts that came half way down her thighs, and red and white Nike tennis shoes. Her long, brown hair was up in a ponytail and her blue eyes shone in the light coming from the florescent lights that hung from the ceiling.

After taking a deep breath, Henrietta Braun opened the door to the training room and stepped inside. She squinted a moment as she took in her surroundings. The room was empty. Much more empty than she had ever seen. All that was inside was Mr. Stein, sitting on a red couch. It wasn’t a very pretty couch; in fact it looked old and dirty. The girl glanced around a little before turning her attention officially to her teacher. She was surprised to notice that there were no intimidating looking people. Well, no intimidating people besides Mr. Stein.

Henri’s shoes made a slight squeaking noise as she approached her instructor. It was very quiet and the brunette found herself cringe a little every time the sneakers made a noise. Once she was right in front of the couch, the girl smiled slightly and then perched next to him on the filthy piece of furniture. “Hello, Mr. Stein. It’s nice to see you again. You look like you’re doing pretty well.” Henrietta glanced out of the corner of her eye at the man. “So, what’s on the agenda today? Something exciting, I’m guessing.” She smirked.

“A very good day to you Ms. Braun.” He voiced into the void space, couch creaking slightly under the new arrival. The echo was nonexistent, lost itself in all the emptiness a was the intention. Sound traveled, traversed the space, just to never find back again. Every word that was spoken here sounded empty. Some important part was missing, a mirror without image. Distance. He spoke, his head unturned, eyes looking somewhere into the distance, by happenstance an empty wall of gray, surface textured only slightly by the machines that had built it some time ago. The hands.

Eyes focused on something beyond the ordinary, as nearly always they were extraordinary, that focus now wavering, wandering, never straying, just staying. Content. “I think you may want to present your results now. Physical exercise will come later.” It was an invitation, nothing more or less. As if he did not quite care.

The cake is a lie.

Untruths as always. Neatly packaged, portioned just for her in cardboard boxes. He cared as he always did. Just that little bit too much. On the other side there was eternity, was there not? There were hints everywhere. If one only looked for them. An empty room. Lots of space. Free. Fly. Bird. Nest. Just those things.

And then there were words.

This is a lie. I tell lies. Lies I tell.

Trust me?

The girl glanced at the man that sat next to her. He explained to her what they’d be doing and she felt herself let out a breath she must’ve been holding. She hadn’t even realized that she had been doing so, but she guessed that she was nervous about what he intended on having her do this time. Their first encounter had left the girl bruised and battered. She had been glad that no one seemed to notice all the injuries, considering it wasn’t actually a big deal. She had okayed the idea of training and she had wanted to learn. There were prices to pay for knowledge sometimes.

He wanted to know the results of her results. Henrietta turned and faced Mr. Stein so it was easier to talk to him. She cleared her throat and then smiled nervously. “Well, that word you told me, Weltshmerz, can mean a couple things, I found out. It was originally from a German author named Jean Paul, and he used it as a term to explain the feeling someone has when they realize reality won’t ever meet the demands of the mind.” The brunette tapped the side of her hear lightly for effect.

After a brief pause, the girl started up again. “The other way it’s used is as a meaning for world pain.” Henri looked her teacher in the eyes. “You said that it was supposed to tell me something about you. Is it that you think the world is in pain, or do you feel like reality isn’t good enough?” She was honestly curious, though they would both be sad for someone to feel, she thought. “I guess I could see how one could think the world is in pain or is pain. It can be hard sometimes.”

She folded her hands in her lap and rubbed one sneaked on top of the other, but not hard enough to make any noise. “You also said you had a quest for me, though you didn’t tell me what it was I was supposed to do.” Her blue eyes squinted slightly in thought. “But I think that I did learn some things about you. I think that sending me on a quest, shows that you actually want to make me a better person and that you do care to an extent what becomes of all this. As for Weltshmerz, I think you’ve had a difficult life and a lot of things you’ve had to overcome that have made you believe whatever you do and makes you seem so stiff and, forgive me, a bit cold.” A smile appeared on the freckled girl’s face. “And I believe that when you aren’t my teacher, we should try to have a conversation, as friends.”

“Ms. Braun, I expected no less of you.” His voice stated cordially, breaking the silence only on a regretful note. As to whether he might have expected something more, he remained quiet, unrelenting in that silence, that always posed the singular question. Was there something more? In that sense he was nothing more than a blank slate, a surface to project the others own insecurities, their fears about their own inadequacies. Always there was room for interpretation. For discovery.

This was an end. Death of innocence. If one looked around at the surroundings, they might seem arbitrary at first, some randomly chosen program he had not designed himself, but rather taken for his own usage at this particular second. One could not guess farther from the truth. This very moment, this second he had orchestrated with utmost care and scrutiny. Inviting the emptiness was nothing he did unprepared. That tangy bitterness, the flavor of destruction he might not remember it in order, but this picture, it would be preserved in his memory. This very moment and the ones that follow.

He turns his head to look at her. A spring creaks. They do that sometimes if they get older, rusty.

The fly on the wall, does it wait for its swatting? The end of its existence? Only to leave that black mark on the white wallpaper as ultimate testament, confirmation of its own existence? It all comes down to memories.

The spotlight overhead warms them slightly. Their hair, their heads, getting warmer with every passing minute. The legs are slightly cold, down where the concrete is. The voice again. His voice. “I was born on...” He needs a moment to do the math himself, marking with his pause a small end to the common words. It becomes necessary to ask yourself these questions sometimes. How old am I? How far behind? “the 12th of January, 1980.” just ordinary words, like the rest of them. Everything the same – but different. How will she react? He watches.

This fly... it never dies. No matter the times you swat at it. It eats the paper of the walls to your heart. It lays bare everything you are. This fly is... What am I again? Buzzing from overhead. A final moment.

Mr. Stein seemed to be complimenting the young woman and Henrietta felt her face get a tad red as she smiled at her teacher. “Well, thank you. I did some researching and it helps that I’m German, so I kind of have some background in the language. My grandfather likes to use German sometimes.” She glanced at his face and tried to read what he was thinking. The brunette wasn’t sure if he would be upset that she found out about him, but of course if he didn’t want her to know, he wouldn’t have given her the opportunity. At the same time, maybe he was kind of hoping that her knowing something about him would make it so they could talk. She wasn’t really sure.

As a reward, her defense teacher told her something. He told her when he was born. At first she thought nothing of it, but then thought about the year more. She was born in 1993 and he didn’t look much older than her. The year 1993 and the year 1980 were 13 years apart. 13 years?! He only looked around 20, not 30. Her mouth dropped open at the realization. “You—you look so young. How can you be born in 1980!?” She blinked and tried sorting out how it could be possible. “Do you age slower or…?” She didn’t know how to finish that question. What other options could there be besides that? Her blue eyes looked at her teacher expectantly, waiting for an answer.

His voice seemed to have become stuck, like a dysfunctional elevator, somewhere between a amusement and hoarseness. “You are panicking.” A statement that was, despite its tone quite curt. How should she not. He was nothing that fit into her realm of experience or expertise, her comprehension. He simply was beyond her understanding in ways of what she had been brought up with, what she had been taught. Humanity is finite. Is defined even by its inability to escape the end, shaped by its defiant attempts to escape that dogma. Setting yourself a monument was what they did, like the fly on the wall in trying to make themselves remembered. He did not need to do this. It was if fact a senseless act to him. He was. And sat, right before her on a smelly couch, as the inherent possibility of transcending what was mortal, moral, normal. The antithesis to humanity in a very profound sense. He was. And would be. “Which is exactly what you should not be doing in this situation or any fight you should ever come in.” Learn to fall... in more than one sense of the word. He was teaching her still, was he not?

Am I cruel? The question swam along the twisted paths of his frontal cortex... To damage her like that? Am I already breaking her? He was... in more that one sense... inhuman.

“Think, Ms. Braun, think about what I have given you, and the answers you are looking for...” Looking for now... how about in a month? In twenty years? “...you will find to be quite apparent.” Rationale. Dealing with the impossible, or merely the improbable. Those were the necessary skills to survive a battle. Panic helped no one. “The most dangerous weapon is not your fist Ms. Braun. And neither are your legs.” That was a truth... He was obsolete in so many ways. And yet memory always served a purpose. If he just had any... That would be fun sometimes. And sometimes when he looked into his book... he though not. Dual education was quite en vogue, was it not? A thing of preliminary interest to him. But nonetheless some preliminary things were noteworthy.

He did not look different from before. He did not sound different from before. So was he not different?

Mr. Stein told Henrietta she was panicking and her mouth instantly closed. She brunette blinked and looked down at her hands. For her, that wasn’t really panicking, but she didn’t want to argue. Her version of panicking was running around like a chicken with its head cut off. Either way, she knew he was right. If she couldn’t handle hearing about what must be his mutation, there was no way she’d be able to handle a serious situation. Then again, Henri had been through a few hard times and had to protect her friends from danger, so she could kind of keep a level head. Of course, that kind of depended on the situation.

She brought her head up to look at her teacher. The girl nodded as she listened to him. He was telling her that her fists and legs were not the most dangerous weapons. “I understand what you’re telling me and I also understand that panicking doesn’t help. I just….I’m just interested in how come you look so young. Not that 30 is old, but you don’t look quite that age. Though I’m guessing it’s your mutation.” The brunette smiled slightly. “I’m going to assume that that’s a safe guess.”

Henrietta’s tightened her fists that were lying on her lap. “There’s just so much I don’t know and being young doesn’t necessarily help with that. So many people don’t think I can handle information because I’m only 17, but obviously I was old enough to send away from home. So how come I’m not old enough to know more about the Kabal or anything about my father or..” She trailed off as she felt her eyes start to sting. Henri sensed tears were not far off.

Oh no..Not right now.The brunette went silent as she worked on getting her emotions under control. She was lucky enough to stop the tears from flowing in front of her emotionless teacher. Henrietta’s blue eyes met Mr. Stein’s blue eyes. “I think you’re telling me knowledge is the most dangerous weapon. I don’t feel like I have enough to be considered a threat, or whatever I’m supposed to be.” She sighed, frustrated that it felt so difficult to get her point across. “Am I making any sense whatsoever?” It was nice having Mr. Stein to talk to, in a way. He didn’t seem to judge her; he just took what she said in, and then gave her a reply. He attempted to answer her questions, or gave him a way to answer them herself.

Slower, a little slower than expected she was. And a little more touched by his revelation. Something odd was happening here. They were leaving the safe ground, sandy as it might have been, slippery to the feet, to be dragged down into the gaping hole that was. Quicksand under his feet. Young people were so unpredictable. He was prompted to sigh lightly, air escaping through his mouth. It was not an exasperated sigh, nor an exaggerated one that might have been cause for concern on her part. It was a sigh, the air of which was quite intent on covering her like a blanket. A fathers sigh maybe, a teachers sigh for sure. And then strange notes. Devoid of emotion, quite carefully kept so, though the grammar might have been called lighthearted, his body language was not. It was a dichotomy he presented her here with hi intonation being no indicator whatsoever which side he was on. “Ms. Braun, I haven't aged a day since I was twenty. And never will.” Maybe she would see the implications of that today. Maybe in a few years. Maybe on her deathbed. She might never see them. She was, for lack of a better word, mortal. He was not. Two circles of reality that very rarely overlapped. That might only allow glimpses of the others world to pass into your own. And it was a dangerous transition to make. Nothing made it over undistorted. It was the way minds worked. Aliens. Little gray men. And a gardener among them, and on the other side, on the very same blue planet, but not, was she. Her outburst, the emotional instability seemed almost tangible. The quicksands were moving. “As for the other parts for my mutation, and yes, there are other parts, you might see them one day. You will not like it.” He didn't like it. And he was much older than her. Would she understand his reasoning then? When he was next forced to dance, to kill someone? His voice was hinting at the possible discomfort, either hers or whomever would be affected. Those cool notes, like his icy eyes bits of winter falling short of its season, melting away in the background of friendly conversation. But they left wet sports in his memory. In hers also? He now fully turned around to her, towering over her in some ways freely. The air around him now holding quite openly that hint of ice that always accompanied him, that restriction, control spreading like ripples through his facial muscles, until it was quite openly a mask and nothing more. Unreadable, his voice continuing on the bland tones, those that left little room for care, for comfort.

“Please consider that you may not get the answers you are looking for not because we want to spite you.” And that we was quite obviously meant to reach beyond the walls of the Kabal headquarters, accompanied with a hand gesture underlining that meaning. “Part of being young, in my experience, and I have preciously little, is to think that every question has to have an answer.” Not exactly what some might have called comfortable truths. Not exactly what some might have expected from a mouth his apparent age. But now that she knew he did not have to restrict himself – even that little bit that he had before, freeing himself of a part of the burden, made his chest somehow go wider, more air fitting in his lungs. It was a belt much too tight loosened. That sigh it had been a relief, even though he was facing another crisis now.

“Ms. Braun, do not worry yourself. You are being very clear. There is very little you are supposed to be when you are with me but a student. Be glad that you are not faced with the questions that I have to decide. They will present to you sooner than you think and they will be as welcome as a foreign soldier at your Christmas table.” It was in a way a position that could only be occupied by him. Or anyone his age or older. Telling the youth that it was good what they were was a necessary part of some jobs. Unnecessary in others. But it most certainly came with age. The authority of doing so. And the neutral note. Strength and stability to cling to. If one wanted to. But he was not offering much to hold on to. Just words. They were a slippery thing. And maybe that was, why he banished emotion from their conversation.

The defense teacher sighed and Henrietta glanced at him out of the corner of her eye. It wasn’t the kind of sigh that would make her feel bad, it sounded like the sigh of someone you would be close to. Of one that came from someone who was looked to for answers. The brunette listened to him as he told her a little more. It wasn’t much more, but she hadn’t expected many answers. Mr. Stein seemed more like the type to make you look for your own answers. She wondered if he had had to figure out everything for himself. Maybe he had never had anyone to look up to. The thought of that made Henri a bit sad and figured that was why he was so quiet and seemed like he was afraid to express his emotions. Of course she wasn’t sure if he didn’t express his emotions, or if he just didn’t have emotions, but it seemed unlikely that he wouldn’t have feelings of some kind. To the girl, it was more like he just didn’t feel comfortable with that kind of stuff.

He said she wouldn’t like his mutation. She raised an eyebrow. She wasn’t sure how he could know that, but it must’ve been something dangerous if he could assume that and seem so confident. Henri couldn’t imagine having a mutation that could cause serious damage and not even on purpose. At least, she figured it wasn’t a type of pain or damage that he did purposely. Otherwise, he wouldn’t be so insistent that she would dislike his ability. It seemed like he didn’t like it either. She thought that was a bit upsetting, but wouldn’t push the subject if it was something touchy to him. She let it drop.

Henrietta turned her head completely toward her teacher to show she was listening. Her blue eyes opened and closed slowly, blinking in time with her every breath. When he said they weren’t trying to spite her, she looked down, embarrassed that she had hinted at something like that. She wanted to trust them. She wanted to feel like she belonged somewhere. There was the argument that she fit in at the Mansion, but it wasn’t quite the same thing. She loved it there and most of the mutants were really nice, but X-Men didn’t seem like something she could do. Here, at the Kabal, she was meant to do Humanitarian work. Hopefully, that would mean she wouldn’t have to be violent. It seemed like the X-Men used violence a lot. Even if it were for ‘the right’ reasons, Henri didn’t want to do that. She didn’t want her life to always be fighting. Fighting scared her and that was why she had never spoken at her old school. You couldn’t fight with anyone if you never talked.

The brunette shook her head slightly as she tried to understand Mr. Stein’s simile. Welcome as a foreign soldier at your dinner table? Her brows furrowed together in thought. She understood the gist of what he was saying, but it was worded so oddly. At least he had assured her that he knew what she was asking. That was nice of him, she thought. Henrietta quirked her lips to the side as she pondered what he said once more. “Do you mean you’re going to have questions for me? Questions I’m going to have to answer?” She sighed with disappointment. Quietly she added, “..but I’m the one with so many questions. I don’t know how I can answer someone else’s. Especially someone who has been around about twice as long as me

So they were sitting on their couch. She looking at his face, he looking slightly beyond again. Just those eyes, guarded ice, that half looked at her, half focused at something in the distance, off behind her. Something on a wall. A spider climbing higher maybe. Maybe something that was not really there. As always he was. Now he was. And it was as if he was, without even trying, seeing into past and future. “There will be no more questions today, Ms. Braun. I think we have spent enough time on them. I am here to help you.” And that nothing I do here is without purpose. Nothing I am. The silent part of the sentence was covered in a focused look thrown at her. He was back again. No more drifting. Apart. “As for your questions: I'm quite positive to be around when you find your answers. Like I said before I am much to far removed from anything you are to retain ability beyond acting as a mirror, a looking glass if you will.” Where paths lead he could not see. Where people led he would not see. But he knew some things. He could see them. Plainly. A bullet flying at your head. The single images that made up a movie on TV. He could see them. And guess.

Speaking the words he rose to his legs. Standing silently as the springs of the couch creaked their symphony again, walked a few steps, soundlessly as it was in here. He flowed to another spot, then stopped, turning to her, facing her. Silence. “The holograms will train with you today. Teach you the first throw. A nice week to you Ms Braun.” He whispered a word, another one. The darkness was absolute and sudden as the world winked out of existence.

The lights were out, went out. When they appeared again, the lone couch was standing on the usual training ground, mats and everything. And a white clothed man that looked slightly Asian, tilted eyes. He had not been impeded by the coming darkness, was gone, had gone. The shadows were his here. Shadows of heart. A grand exit?

Henrietta let out a small sigh when her teacher said there would be no more talking. She liked the talking, it meant she wasn’t going to get kicked all over the training room. No more talking meant that she was going to end up curling up in a ball in pain from being thrown around like a ragdoll. While the brunette sat there thinking about how she was going to need some ice packs in about 5 hours, the lights in the room went out. Henri automatically tensed up and strained to try to hear anything. “Mr. Stei-?”

As she started to call out to her teacher even though she thought he had left, the lights flipped back on. The area that had looked so blank moments before now appeared as the training ground from the last time she had been there. Another man clad in white was present, again, like the last time. He had slanted eyes and seemed to be of some sort of Asian descent. Even if he was a hologram, he looked like a real person and even appeared to come from some sort of background. He looked like a man who had parents and maybe even siblings. The girl stood, staring at her opponent. From their previous encounter, Henri knew he could fight and that being a hologram doesn’t mean that no damage can be inflicted.

The brunette narrowed her eyes at the man before leaping from the couch and landing on her feet. At the most, they were seven feet away from each other. Henrietta smirked before running towards the illusion. She put her arm up as if to punch so the man would move into a blocking position. As he moved to defend, she dropped low to the ground and swept out at his legs, as she had attempted to do with Mr. Stein in the past. Only, this time, she had tried a fake-out first.