It had been two weeks since Logan had paid a visit to my cabin in the mountains. Two weeks of considering my options even though I'd known immediately there was only one. He told me he'd been sent by a professor named Xavier, a man who'd studied people like me for years and could help me control my "gift". It wasn't a gift though. You could return a gift. Most gifts didn't put every single thing you looked at in danger of being vaporized, either. I'd almost lost it when he called it that. Almost blasted him into atoms on the spot. I'd turned away though, cut a ravine in the side of the mountain half a mile long before I closed my eyes and gained control again. "Can your professor fix THAT?" I'd asked, struggling to regain control so I could open my eyes again. Logan had just stood there for a while, watching the fires in the new ravine burn themselves out. 

"He's the best chance you've got, kid." 

Then he'd left a letter and walked off into the woods, leaving me alone with my thoughts. I knew before he'd even left that I'd be making the trip to New York, knew I had no choice in the matter. I suspect that he knew it too, after the display I put on for him. How could I not go? If I wanted any semblance of a normal life, this was my last shot at getting it. Sure, I could control it for almost eight hours now, but the headaches started after four and only got worse the longer I held it in. So here I was, in the middle of the most populated city in the world, looking for a bar that allegedly held all the answers to my problems. If only life were that easy.

"So then the lawyer says to the jockey, 'it's not a horse you idiot, it's a cab.'" It was an old joke, one my dad had told me years ago, but the pretty brunette who'd decided to tag along from the airport seemed to think it was the funniest thing in the world. She had a pretty laugh, that was for sure, and it made me smile to see someone so happy again. It had been a long time since I'd been able to genuinely smile. The young woman looped her arm through mine and almost ran into a girl a couple years younger than myself as she payed too much attention to me and too little to where she was going. I managed to pull her up short though and we avoided a head on collision, though she'd been fairly consistently absentminded ever since we'd met. Clearly not the brightest bulb on the street, but even so I didn't want her tagging along to Xavier's bar with me. Then my salvation came in the form of a question from the new girl with auburn hair.

"There you are, Emma!" It was the first name that popped into my head, so I ran with it. Besides, she kind of looked like an Emma. "I think I found Xavier's place. It's just back this way." I pointed back the way the young woman had come, acting all the while like I'd known her for years. The half-brained brunette latched onto my arm was clearly only interested in one thing, and I needed a way to get rid of her before actually finding Xavier's place. I pulled my arm free of the brunette's and stepped closer to "Emma", sliding an arm halfway around her waist, praying she'd just play along. Though if the brunette hadn't spotted the holes in my story already it would take a pretty big reaction to make her suspicious. "Emma, this is Vivienne. Vivienne, this is my girlfriend, Emma Frost." I guess if you spend enough time in the frozen mountains of Alaska, some words tend to stick in your mind more than others. At the mention of girlfriend, Vivienne's expression took on a half-startled look and she visibly had to compose herself. 

"Oh... Well, I... uh. It was good to meet you." Then she turned on her heel and walked back down the street. I watched her until she turned a corner, then sighed audibly as she disappeared. Hopefully she'd just assume I had come from the airport to meet "Emma" at this Xavier's place, and we'd both just happened to be running late on the same street. Now that Vivienne had been taken care of, I slipped my arm off the new stranger's waist and took a step back.

"Sorry about all that. There's only so much brainless chitter a guy can take, you know?" I gave her an apologetic smile then held a hand out in greeting. "I'm Scott. Thanks for playing along. I actually haven't found Xavier's place yet, but it's gotta be close. It's a bit too much of a coincidence that we'd end up on the same street looking for the same guy otherwise. Shall we look together?"