Lerman sat at the back of the bus. He hated the Museum of Natural History, he had been there every year of high school so far. It got boring. Fast. Granted there was always the Africa sections, and those never got tiring. He also loved to see the occasional new exhibits.
As he sat there, his neck began growing, like it did, and the bus hit a bump. *WHAP* His head hit the roof of the bus. He heard the laughter of the other kids as they turned around and watched him try to reach his head and rub where it hurt. He wasn't too successful. Luckily they had just arrived at the museum, and Lerman was prepared to be super bored.
Lerman hopped out of the bus, neck still long (he thought about how hard it really is to go through doors with the neck of a giraffe), and stepped out in front of the big old museum. Great. Well this is fun. Long neck in public. At least it's not too long. He thought as he prepared himself for the museum.

Museums were always great resources for Allison when she was feeling uncreative. She might get some weird looks for carrying a dozen bottles of ink in with her, but nothing bad, and there was just about infinite inspiration. Twenty minutes of wandering through gift shops and some sort of space-oriented display, and Allison disappeared into a bathroom to cover herself with thin black lines, slightly too thin and smooth to be zebra, and extremely thin, weblike blue lines; meant to be lightning but not quite random enough, and three black-blue-black rings around her eyes. Well, close enough. She surveyed herself in the mirror, twisting to see as much as she could, before nodding and wandering out the door. And now, to find something to do. Glancing around showed African mammals to the right, and Asian mammals straight ahead; if she remembered right, they connected through a few other rooms. Circles then. Circles are good.

Allison regretted being as small as she was as she dodged around people to get to the Asian Mammals entrance. People just seemed determined not to bother with anyone lower than their own eye level, which left quite a few either running into Allison, or just pushing her out of the way, making the ink bottles in her bag bump into each other, much louder than she'd really like them to. Once they did notice her, though, nearly everyone quickly backed off. I may have to do more dramatic patterns more often.

This summer was getting busy. It was almost as if people thought that having no official summer classes meant she had all kinds of free time on her hands.

Her mom, for one. Cold Steel, for two. And Letitia on behalf of Eros, for three.

“Keep up on your studies, you don't want to fall behind over the summer,”

“There's been a prankster running loose in the Museum of Natural History, take the X-kids to investigate and report back to me. Do not try to face him on your own,”

and “Keep an eye out for mutants who would be willing join the cause. We'll need all the reinforcements we can get,” respectively. Bunch of bossy summer wasting bossypantses. Luckily she could multitask. All three of those missions could theoretically be done at one time.

At the front door of the museum, Katrina handed out maps to the other two X-kids who had been assigned to the mission. An owl shifter and a mud melter. They were splitting up in order to cover the most ground.

“Okay, we'll meet back here in two hours. Ready?” The two younger students nodded solemnly and they all headed for the entrance.

The school group moved along through the museum as quietly as a summer school field trip can. That is to say they weren't very quiet at all as they tromped through the museum. It didn't help that Lerman's head refused to come down. People all around stared at the kid with the neck nearly as long as they were tall (if not a bit shorter). He had to walk very carefully through the grand halls of the museum to avoid falling over. That was the worst. As he walked he noticed other kids ducking though the crowd. They seemed to be looking for something, and by the way they looked at him it seemed like they had found it. He decided to ignore them. Besides, they had just entered the Big Bang exhibit. Knowing what was coming next Lerman filled with excitement. His favorite exhibit was immediately after this!
Lerman didn't pay attention to any of the big bang exhibit. It passed quickly and uneventfully. As they left the exhibit he felt his tail begin to show. Confused he stuffed it into his pants. He was never SO excited about the African mammals exhibit. Exploring his thoughts, he discovered that he he felt a bit anxious about entering the next hall. He decided that he was being paranoid, and wrote it off to the kids he saw earlier.
As he entered the next room his thoughts were put at ease. Then he looked down. Standing next to him was a girl. She seemed to be in her 20's. Upon closer inspection he noticed lines and patterns drawn all over her skin. He decided that it was not polite to stare (even though all eyes were turned on him) and snapped his head back up.
Falling when you have a 4 ft. neck is not fun. Take it from Lerman.

Allison was close to the end of the African Mammals exhibit, absently looking at a few last displays while wondering where to go next, when a group of teens and a few adults swarmed into the room. Huh. School trip in summer. Glad I never went on those. She ducked to the edge of the flow of people, trying to avoid being run over by the many teens, either focused solely on their conversations or, in a few cases, the displays, and not at all looking out for her.

A sudden change in the noise made Allison’s attention snap back to what was happening, as a boy near her fell, and people swore, laughed, got out of the way, and generally acted obnoxious. Allison jumped back a bit herself automatically, turning to face the boy who’d been to her side, before moving back over to him and blinking. That.... I do not think I’ve ever seen someone with legs that long, much less a neck. She blinked for a second before shaking her head and leaning down. “Are you alright?” She pushed her ink bag back behind her to keep it from falling and hitting the boy, or breaking the ink bottles on the floor.

Katrina couldn't help but roll her eyes as her two young cohorts ducked and weaved their way into the building with their fingers pointed into guns as if they were super secret spies. At least they were having fun and keeping busy, which Katrina was beginning to suspect was the real reason the X-kids had been sent here. Nevertheless, she was going to take this job seriously.

Somewhere in the museum, a prankster lay in wait. Each day some minor or major catastrophe had occurred. Each time it had been blamed on an accident. She wasn't so sure. It was too much of a coincidence that it kept happening. Over and over. At the same museum.

On Monday, all of the monkeys on display in the primate hall had been inexplicably moved to the middle of the planetarium where they seemed to enjoy the show on the origins of the universe quite a bit for a group of taxidermed mammals.

On Tuesday, someone had left both doors to the butterfly conservatory open, letting thousands of butterflies loose all over the museum.

On Wednesday, the triceratops went missing. It was found later on the roof.

Today was Thursday. Hopefully she could prevent any other mishaps. And convince her mom that seeing the exhibit on the evolution of the human species would help prepare her for her classes next fall.

Outside the Akeley Hall of African Mammals a large crowd was forming. Katrina wriggled her way to the front to find that a boy not much older than herself with patchy hair and a very long neck was sprawled on the floor. A girl with inky tattoo designs all over her skin looked alarmed.

Was this a victim of a prankster tripster? Or was this guy causing a scene and making trouble? Either way, Katrina decided to keep an eye on both of them, to see what would happen next.

Lerman checked to see if he had fallen on any one before he turned his thoughts toward his neck. It hurt a bit, but the pain wasn't any worse than he had felt before. He looked around to see what was going on. A crowd of people had gathered and were watching the action intensely. Lerman didn't really feel comfortable with all these people staring at him. He looked around some more an noticed the tattoo girl bending over him. She was pretty, but the tattoos drew his attention away from this fact. She was saying things to him, but there was too much noise for him to hear her properly. He also noticed a younger girl, perhaps closer to his age. She too was looking at him. Embarrassment spread through Lerman.

Getting up is hard, but Lerman tried to anyway. He decided that his best course of action would be to curl up and shut out the out side world until he went back to normal. Fortunately it happened quickly. He lied there for a minute more, to see if he would change again. Luckily he didn't.

He struggled to his feet and turned to address the girl with the tattoos "Hey uhh... thanks for making sure I was ok. No one ever does." he mumbled to the ground and quickly turned with the intention of rejoining his group.

Allison hovered without any real idea what to do as the boy curled up, and a bit later his neck shrunk down to a normal size. Allison blinked, not entirely sure what had happened, for a moment before he stood up.

"Hey uhh... thanks for making sure I was ok. No one ever does."

“Ah... it was no problem.” Allison shifted a bit, brushing her hair back as she tried to think of something to say. No one ever checks to see if you're okay. How do I respond to that? She blinked as he started to turn away, dropping her hand and taking a small step so she wasn’t completely behind him. “You, ah, are okay, right? It took you a bit to get up....”

Katrina couldn't help but feel bad for the boy. Rather than try to get up right away he simply curled into a ball and stayed there. The crowd, full of people looking kind of ashamed and embarrassed, dispersed quickly once they realized there was nothing to see; no fight, just a clumsy kid who fell on his backside.

The blonde teen scanned the faces, trying to see if anyone looked malicious or even a little pleased with themselves for causing mayhem, but she didn't see anything that looked even remotely suspicious. A janitor came by with his mop and his slippery floor signs, an old man sniffed with a disapproving wriggle of his mustache at the giraffe boy and the tattoo girl blocking his way into the African mammals exhibit, and a whole class of teens oohed and ahhed as they caught sight of the stuffed creatures up ahead.

A couple of them even called back to their classmate, “Hey clumsy, someone shot your relative!”

Katrina frowned. She didn't approve of taunting classmates. She stepped up in front of the bully, mouth open, about to say something.

But she didn't get the chance.

Behind him, the stuffed giraffe stirred. Someone applauded. Someone else whistled. Murmurs of 'crazy awesome animatronics' trickled through the crowd. Katrina just gasped. The bully was the first to realize something was wrong. The first to scream.

Probably because the stuffed giraffe was lifting him up by the back of his shirt.

“You, ah, are okay, right? It took you a bit to get up....” The girl with the tattoos had stepped in front of him. She seemed genuinely concerned about him. That was nice. "Yeah, I'm fine, thanks. I just... couldn't... get up." He began to explain to her that when his neck was long he couldn't lift himself from the ground. Unfortunately he didn't get the chance to before he heard his classmate yell at him "Hey clumsy, someone shot your relative!"
Harsh. But Lerman had heard it before. It wasn't unlike his classmates to make offhand comments like that.
But he stood there silent, because the comment did have the effect of shutting him up completely. But look!
As he watched the girl who had been watching him stormed up to the kid who had made the comment. No don't do that, it will only make things worse for the both of us. but everyone stopped in their tracks as the stuffed giraffe behind the bully picked him up.
Huh
Lerman was curious. Where would this giraffe take his classmate? So he followed it. The faker (stuffed giraffe) began walking toward the planetarium/big bang exhibit. They were on the second floor. Lerman realized that the stuffed giraffe was taking the kid to the balcony that overlooked the first floor of the planetarium's room. Danger.

Suddenly Lerman was a giraffe.

"Hey clumsy, someone shot your relative!"

“Mutants are not hybrids, oh smart one,” Allison answered before thinking that maybe the boy would be able to deal with his classmate better. Oops. Oh well. Can’t be too bad. The boy said nothing to contradict the thought... well, he said nothing at all, really, which tended to not be good, but Allison was just going to pretend there was a different reason for that.

The next few seconds were not entirely coherent to Allison. First, the stuffed giraffe behind the boy’s classmate started moving, leaning down and picking the boy up by his shirt, while the kid screamed, and carrying him off. Allison, the boy, and virtually everyone else, followed the--wasn’t that thing just dead?--giraffe through the museum, and then there was another giraffe, next to her, and people--Allison among them--swearing and scrambling out of the way of the suddenly appearing giant hooves and legs.

What is going on here!

This was getting ugly.

The bully, once so tough, quickly became not much more than a bundle of blubbering apologies as his he came nearer and nearer to being dropped off a balcony, “Just kidding. I love muties... I mean mutants. And I love giraffes, too. C'mon, just put me down. I'll be good. I promise I'll never make fun of anyone again. Please. No! Don't drop me. Lerman! Help! Make him put me down!”

The crowd, which was almost agitated enough to be considered a mob, had shuffled along behind them. It was impossible for Katrina to do anything other than shuffle along with them; there simply wasn't room to do anything else. At the front of the noisy herd, some of the bully's friends tried to reach up and grab onto his legs, trying to pull him back down again to no avail.

The whiskered older gentleman sniffed in disapproval at all this odd behavior. Didn't these children know how to behave in a museum?

And suddenly, with an explosion of snaps and a shower of half-clothes, there was another giraffe.

Wherever giraffe number two (who was distinguishable from giraffe number one by not having a bully hanging from his mouth and by having real eyes instead of glass ones) wanted to go, he could go. People, once densely packed, miraculously found space to skitter out of his path. It was almost as if they were afraid that they would be the next ones to be dangled off a balcony if they got in his way.

Through it all, the only calm person was the janitor. As if he was used to the strange happenings in the museum by now, he simply set up his wet floor signs in the now vacant African Mammals hall and started mopping away while whistling a merry little tune.

Lerman had an interesting choice. This was generally a side effect of being a full grown giraffe in a natural history museum. If another kids life weren't in danger he could pretend he was a stuffed giraffe, instead of trying to stop one from harming people. Right now, however, he had maybe three or four choices at the most. He could:
1. Whap the stuffed deviant with his head for distraction factor.
2. Snatch the child out of the other giraffe's mouth.
3. Kick the other giraffe, knocking it over (he figured it, being stuffed, wouldn't weigh a lot)
or 4. Watch.

Lerman considered his choices for a split second, not really even giving option four any real consideration. Acting fast he trotted up to the other giraffe and swiftly nabbed him by the side of the shirt, leaving him dangling sideways. Lerman did a 180 degree turn (ok 145, but who's going to pull a protractor out and check?) and gently set the little snot head down on solid ground. He watched with as close to an amused face as a giraffe can get as the babbling prick dashed back to the comfort of his pals.
There was a... well there was no noise, but as he turned back around Lerman could see the faker was getting angry. This was particularly funny to Lerman, because since when do inanimate objects/dead stuffed animals get angry? The freak started moving back to the crowd, and Lerman, seeing what it's intention was, stood firmly in it's way.

Oh no. he thought. You aren't harming anyone.

The giraffe from next to Allison trotted up to the formerly dead one, and grabbed the kid out of its mouth before turning and setting him on the floor. The kid disappeared back into the mass of other kids as quickly as he could possibly move, and the giraffe from beside Allison stood in the way as the formerly dead giraffe started toward the main group of people. Allison edged further toward the side, for once grateful for her size as she wove or pushed through people who were otherwise frozen in place or trapped by the people who were.

Allison finally made it to the edge of the crowd, sliding along the wall to put her back against it, the pair of giraffes in front of her, and the people to her right, and relaxed slightly. So she was still very far from safe, probably, but at least she could see people before they got to her this way, and move if she decided to. She tilted her head back, trying to look up at the giraffes, despite being unlikely to be able to read a giraffe’s expression like she could a human’s.

The stuffed giraffe's glass eyes did not show his feelings, if he had any at all, but judging from his actions, one could perhaps suppose that he was angry; he did, after all, rush in to attack.

Head swinging, the glass eyed giraffe charged forward, as if wanting to clear the hallway of intruders by literally sweeping them out of the way.

Behind the crowd, the janitor swished his broom in a circle and whistled a couple of notes.

Those closest to the back of the crowd, and consequently closest to the Africa exhibit, may have noticed (if they were keen of senses and paying attention) that something else besides the janitor was stirring in that hallway. A large gray form silently shook itself awake, then stepped out into the open.

Ancients, who didn't know what they were seeing, had first described this animal as a beast with two tails; one in the back, and another growing out from its face. Later, this animal would be hunted to near extinction for the sole purpose of turning its teeth into piano keys. Today, it was going to join it's brother giraffe in scaring intruders out of its hallway.

The janitor calmly stepped out of the big animal's way, wiping away where the big round foot prints left marks on the newly polished floors after the animal had passed.

Katrina turned around just in time to scuttle out of the way as someone yelled, “Elephant!”

Yes. Elephant. Thank you Einstein.

This was getting a little out of hand. Katrina grew a tiny mouse illusion in her hand, away from where anyone would see, then let it skitter down her arm and down to the ground.

This was a test; a test to see if dead animals with glass eyes could see illusions.

It may be a long shot, but it was worth a try.