Speaker A
You open your eyes for the very first time, and here we are. You don't know it yet, but you've just been born a mutant. You look normal now, but boy, just you wait. At first, everything seems fine. You grow up in a regular neighborhood with regular parents, living a regular life. Sure, sometimes there's a Galactus attack or half the population turns to dust, but there are people to deal with that kind of stuff. But once you hit puberty, you start to notice some changes, and not the ones you're thinking of. You wake up with a fever, and your parents brush it off as a cold and let you stay home from school. But over the course of a couple days, it only gets hotter and hotter until one night you wake up at 3:00 a.m. with your bed sheets on fire. You jump out of bed quickly and stomp on the sheets to put out the flames. That was close. Crisis averted. You look down at your hands and see what looks like tiny flames shrinking and disappearing. Weird. But then, uh-oh, the walls blackened, the smoke detector blazes, and your parents rush in to find you standing there in the middle of it all. Welcome to mutant puberty. At first, your parents try to convince themselves it's all just some freak accident. Maybe the wiring in your room was faulty. Maybe they left a candle burning somewhere. But then it happens again and again until finally they have to face the truth: their child isn't normal. Unfortunately, in this world, that comes with a lot of prejudice and fear. So from that point on, your parents start treating you differently. Their hugs become a little more hesitant, and they start to sit further away from you at the breakfast table. You overhear quiet conversations at night with your mother crying and your father talking about what to do, like you're some sort of problem to be solved. For them, it's only a matter of time before the neighbors find out. And they do. Your family stops getting invited to barbecues. The neighborhood kids don't come over to play anymore. And the next thing you know, your dad's lost his job because somehow the whole town found out he has a mutant in his house. You see, this world is full of superpowered people, but for some reason, everybody hates mutants. Mutants are humans who are born with what's known as the X gene. The same way certain genes will determine your height or hair color, the X gene causes you to have superpowers completely naturally, meaning unlike Spider-Man or Captain America, you don't need any kind of serum or genetic modification to get your powers. You're just born with them. Don't ask me why it's different, but the people here love Superman, and they hate mutants. They see it as wrong and unnatural. The power you develop is different from person to person and depends on the rest of your genetics. It typically shows itself around puberty or can be activated through immense stress and trauma. Some mutants are latent and may never develop powers throughout their entire lifetime, but that's definitely not you. You're now part of the most hated minority on Earth. Your parents still love you, but they're scared both for you and of you. One day, the wrong person finds out about you, and an angry mob shows up in the middle of the night. They shout words like monster and abomination as they surround your house. They throw things through the window and try to break in through the front door. But just as they manage to get it open, they completely freeze. A bold man in a well-pressed suit wheels his way through the crowd. That's Professor Charles Xavier, or Professor X. You've seen him on TV before talking about mutant rights. He puts his hand on your shoulder and says, "Come with me. There's a place for you." Your parents didn't take much convincing, and just like that, you leave everything behind. Xavier tells you that you're special and takes you to a school for kids like you. When you arrive, it's a massive sprawling mansion in the middle of nowhere, with half of it under construction. It turns out that because of all the supervillain attacks, these facilities are almost constantly being rebuilt. Apart from that, it looks like something out of a fairy tale. But as you walk through those front gates, you realize something: this place isn't a school, it's a fortress. They've got security technology that doesn't even exist yet, like literally it's from the future. Thanks, Cable. Kids your age wander the halls. Some look just like you, and others look a little less like you. A girl phases through a wall, completely ignoring doors. A boy with blue skin and fangs swings across the rafters. A set of twins sit in the corner conversing without speaking a single word out loud. This place is full of all the freaks and outcasts. Every other human seems to be scared of you. You sign the room and meet your new roommates: a guy with gills on his neck and another one who's completely invisible. Awesome. You've made it to Xavier's School of Gifted Youngsters. Congratulations, you're officially a part of the most dysfunctional boarding school in existence. Sure, it's got state-of-the-art facilities, but they tend to get blown up every other week. And don't even think about complaining about your living conditions because unlike a normal school, here you'll be expected to help with the constant rebuilding. It doesn't matter that your mutation is fire-based. Grab a hammer. Not every kid has laser eyes or telekinesis, so if you can't fly or fix things with your mind, well, better start learning how to mix cement. At most schools, gym class means running a few laps or playing dodgeball, but here you get thrown into a high-tech combat simulator built by aliens. The Danger Room is where you'll learn to control your powers, which really means you'll be fighting holograms of killer robots, Sentinels, or if you're really lucky, a simulated version of Apocalypse himself. And there's no sitting this one out, even if your power is something useless like can slightly glow in the dark. You're going in. Your instructors are legendary battle-hardened X-Men: Wolverine, Cyclops, and if you're really unlucky, Emma Frost, who will personally roast you if you mess up. And she will know when you mess up. She's literally reading your thoughts. But hey, at least you're learning valuable skills like how to throw a punch or how to avoid getting folded in half by an 8-foot Red Hulk. You're not training for some after-school club. You're training for survival because at Xavier, you're not just a student, you're a soldier. Technically, Xavier is a school, but good luck focusing on algebra when the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants is attacking the front lawn. You'll get the usual subjects: math, English, science, but there's a catch. Every class is centered around mutant survival biology. Hope you like learning about mutant genetics instead of frog dissections. History is 90% lessons about mutant history. And forget about skipping self-defense training because that's not an elective. You will learn how to fight because one day you need it. Oh, and let's not forget about the med lab internship. Every student is required to put in 72 hours working in the school's medical bay because, let's face it, injuries here are inevitable. Whether it's a training accident or an actual supervillain attack, you'll be patching up classmates like a paramedic before you even graduate. And you think human roommates are bad? Try sharing a room with someone who sleepwalks through the walls or a guy who has to sleep in a water tank. If your mutation involves anything dangerous, expect to be put in a room with reinforced walls. And seeing you have fire powers, that's definitely you, buddy. Some mutants get along, but others not so much. There are kids here who can read minds, some shapeshift, some turn invisible, you name it. And some of them are way too comfortable using these powers for pranks. Ever had your mattress phased through the floor in the middle of the night? You will. There's no reassignments either. Xavier believes in learning to get along, which means if your roommate steals your stuff while invisible, that's something you have to work out. Good luck. Let's get o—
