Chapter Text
Giggles. Laughter and bright lights, their playroom is full of life, off stumbling feet, toys blaring their songs and block towers being knocked over. Kids. Apart from the teachers the room is full of kids, no older than four.
The glass doors are open, leading to an outside area with gravel and artificial grass. There's trays of rice and boxes of sand and a climbing frame out here alongside more kids running around, playing.
A blonde boy has got a car, he's wheeling it around on the ground, tongue stuck out in concentration, back and forth, head pressed to the cool ground, contrasting the warm sun beating down on him. There's a bit of wind, making his blue shirt flap around.
A woman walks over, hair pinned in a bun and she crouches down, "Hey Jimmy, don't you want to play with the other?" she asks him, gesturing to the other kids playing in the sandpit.
"No," Jimmy says back, eyes not trailing away from the red car in his grasp.
"Come on Jimmy, it's fresh sand, you can bring the car with you," she suggests.
"No," Jimmy repeats now more grumpily. The woman stands back up sighing.
"Alright Jimmy, if you say so," she tells him and she walks over to where the majority of kids were.
Jimmy enjoys his time with the car, making noises, beeps and engine noises until a shadow is cast over him once again, interrupting his joy.
He looks up to see a boy, brown hair and green eyes, he's got a smile on his face but his hand is outstretched, "Car," he says.
Jimmy stands up, clutching the toy to his chest. "No," Jimmy responds.
A frown appears on the other boy's face. "I want car," he tells him.
"No mine," Jimmy says back.
The boy opposite him gets mad, eyebrows furrowing and he shoves the blonde. Jimmy falls back onto the floor but doesn't let go of the car.
He feels the ground scrape his cheek and he stands back up, angry. The boy pushes him again, rougher this time, causing the small blonde to scrape his knee on the fall but once again he gets back up.
He's angry, furious. He feels his fingers tingle weirdly and then he looks at the boy who is about to push him again and the anger takes over.
Jimmy drops the car and strikes, slashing first into the boy's face and then anywhere and anywhere he hits and slashes as he sees both red in his mind and in front of him. He's grown claws he was not aware he had but it doesn't matter to him. The boy is crying, screaming but Jimmy can't hear it. He wanted his car, he hurt him, he's bad.
Someones pulled him away after a few moments whilst he can see another of the playroom leaders is with the boy. She's got her phone out, calling an ambulance as she tries to stop the bleeding with her cardigan.
Jimmy watches a white cardigan turn red and he's feeling confused. As the anger leaves him he's left with only one thing in mind. Bad. He's been bad. He knows it hurts when he cuts his knee, he cries and cries till someone puts a plaster on it and now the boy is cut all over. He needs a plaster.
"Hurt," he mumbles as he watches the boy cry more and more. There's red pooling beneath him and when Jimmy looks at his hands he sees the stained with the same colour alongside black claws.
The person holding him by the shoulder, pulls him away, grasping his arm. When he looks up she looks scared. She keeps looking from Jimmy and then around as they walk into her office. She's in charge here.
She lifts him into the chair in there and grabs a tissue, beginning to wipe his hands, "That- that wasn't good Jimmy," she tells him but all Jimmy can do is look at his hands. They're red and there are claws. Claws.
"I'm going to call your parents, they'll pick you up," she tells him and the blonde nods. Confused but he knows he's in trouble.
She pulls her phone from her pocket and rings a number till someone answers, "Hello is this Jimmy's mum," she asks and after a response she carries on. "Your son, Jim's a mutant, you need to get here now, he attacked a boy, you need to get him now," she says and then the call ends.
Jimmy's crying, this is all confusing and scary and black claws are still in the way of his fingers. One is chipped, but all are slightly stained red.
The head caretaker comes over, crouching down beside him. "It'll be okay Jim, it'll be okay," she tells him but he doesn't believe her.
"I'm in trouble," he tells her. He knows it's true, his mum's going to tell him off. He's been really bad.
She shakes her head, "Jim you're just a little different alright and because of that something bad happened, it'll be okay," she tells him.
"Is he ok?" Jimmy asks.
"I don't know, but there will be people helping," the woman tells him.
His mum arrives not long after, she looks panicked, blonde hair a mess and she scoops Jimmy into her arms, grabbing his clawed hand and concealing them in one of her own hands.
"We didn't know," she says to the caretaker.
"I thought so, look I don't know what's going to happen to the other boy, but you should go, you know the government will take him as soon as they get wind of this, get out of town," she says to the blonde boy's mother.
"Thank you," his mother responds and then she's out, bringing her three year old son who's crying his eyes out into the car.
"I'm sorry," he cried as she buckled him in. Her son. A mutant. Possibly a killer.
"It'll be okay Jim, it'll be okay," she soothes and then she's getting in the front seat and calling her husband.
"We need to get out of town, Jimmy's a mutant," she tells him as soon as he answers.
...
At age five the memories of what Jimmy did never left him. His life had changed drastically that day, they had left town, He was homeschooled now and told not to ever show his powers.
Powers, his mother had screeched after he had been looking out the window at a bird and then turned into one himself and zipped around the room. She told him he looked like a canary bird.
It was one night, when a nightmare took hold of him and he had woken up crying, he had seen what he had done. Understood now how really bad he had hurt that kid. His mother comes into the room, dressing gown wrapped around her to fight the winter chill and she comes and sits next to her son on the side of his bed.
"Mum, what happened to that boy, the one I hurt?" he cries.
She doesn't respond at first, is quiet before finally speaking, "You killed that boy Jimmy, he's not here anymore and that's why you've got to be careful with your powers, always," she tells him.
Jimmy lives with that in mind for the years to come, up to the age of fourteen he used his powers with care. They were dangerous. But as he watched the news and read articles he learnt how much he was hated, how much people wanted to see people like him gone and a want to strike always held a place within him.
Then he got a best friend in high school, for years he kept things to himself. Tell no one was always the number one rule but then his friend showed him that he wasn't alone. He wasn't the only mutant, Grian was too.