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The professor nodded and I looked in his direction as well, while I called my ability a system I didn't know if that was just wishful thinking. "Personally I call the ability Conduit, and its abilities are both simple and complicated. The simple explanation is in the name, Conduit, in other words a channel and if my ability was a beta or alpha level ability we most likely wouldn't be having this problem."
I could hardly keep my excitement under control, that meant I was an Omega level Mutant, I literally had endless potential. "In fact it probably would have been better if it was, but unfortunately we were 'lucky' enough to reach the Omega classification. But like all Omega level abilities you can't just access all that power immediately, so a limiter was put in place. My dumber and much less handsome twin called that his system."
My smile couldn't be wiped off my face when he confirmed my suspicions, even with his dire tone and blatant ribbing. "Unfortunately he was short sighted and complained about the minimalist options he started with. How it was practically useless compared to the others he had read about in his favorite stories. And thanks to the exposure to your telepathy he gained access to Astral energy, or in other words, the energy of the mind."
Xavier looked down at this but before he could say anything the ass jumped right back in, "But don't feel too bad professor, it was a good thing to get access to that energy, in fact it saved his life. It was the desire for more than we could handle that got us into this mess, you see, while he now had access to that energy he couldn't consciously control it. So when he bitched and complained about his lack of immediate power his subconscious cross referenced what he was thinking about, and it snowballed into what you see now."
Then he gestured with his arms and we both looked at the chaos surrounding us. "If he hadn't done that I wouldn't be here and he probably wouldn't have chosen to come to your school at all." The professor chuckled at that, "Yes, he is not very subtle with those trust issues is he?" My doppelganger just laughed while my head fell into my hands as I groaned in embarrassment. When was the snark going to end!? "Right up until you stop being so emotionally constipated, life is meant to be lived. Not spent worrying about what might not happen."
I looked up from my hands and nodded, while I understood what he was trying to say I didn't really appreciate how he was going about saying it. "Not that I want to interrupt this teachable moment but shall we get down to business. I am not really sure why you need my help, from what I can tell you are doing a remarkable job on your own. While I can certainly speed up the process, delving into another person's mind to such a deep level leaves a residue."
The professor folded his hands as he raised his concerns, "Any advice I give you would only be surface level, when it comes to psychics we all reach a point where we have to walk our own path and interference from others will only hamper our potential." He shook his head in disagreement, "The basics are exactly what we need schooling on, what you see around us is a sort of automatic defense. Something that has kept our mind from completely collapsing, anything more will require training from someone that actually knows what they are doing."
Here he paused for a moment, "Although I should tell you that I asked Alex to ask you to perform this meeting of minds for another reason. You see now that our mind and powers are in chaos we need a catalyst to latch onto, and for this that is your own mind melding with ours on a deeper level. You're like a magnet and with a little help from you I should be able to reel in a big fish."
With that said he stood up and stretched out an arm, flexing his hand his entire body trembled as he pulled back, as if he was trying to move a large weight. The storm outside started to pick up and a vortex of pure chaos formed on the opposite side of the dome. The professor and I just watched in curiosity, so far he hadn't put us in any danger and had actually saved us a few times during the journey to the safe zone, so we would give him the benefit of the doubt for now.
After a few seconds a ball of purple light slowly emerged from the vortex like it was struggling against some great force. When it reached the halfway point it suddenly popped out like a cork and shot into his hand. Once he caught the ball of light he tossed it up in the air a few times, smirking as the ball spun in the air. "This should help speed things along." Then without warning he threw the ball at me, I wasn't expecting it so naturally when I flailed and failed to catch it the ball hit me right in my chest, shattering into a burst of glitter before fading away.
I patted my chest in confusion before looking back up but he just smirked, "Now that we finished that up I think it's better if you both leave." He waved a hand at both of us and I felt a harsh tug before my eyes shot open and I gasped for air. When I looked around I found myself back in Xavier's office with the man himself sitting in front of me rubbing his forehead. "Well that was fairly rude."
"Yeah well, our little meeting was starting to attract some attention and while the barrier would have held I would rather not test its limits." I froze and my neck creaked as my head slowly turned towards the impossible voice, and low and behold there was a purple ghost floating above my left shoulder. It looked like a stereotypical sheet ghost with a more expressive face, hollow looking eyes and mouth, but with two eyebrows and a slight bump for a nose as well.
"What the hell!?" My eyes bulged out of my head and I flinched so badly that I had to grab both armrests to keep from falling out of my chair. The professor gave a little chuckle while the small ghost was now bent in half, doing somersaults in the air while gasping for breath as it died of laughter. My eyebrow twitched as I realized I had been subjected to a prank, but when I had that realization it only made the little ghost laugh harder.
Since I hadn't voiced that thought I was pretty sure I knew what was going on, but I wouldn't admit I was a little impressed. "So, I'm guessing that little ball of light gave you the ability to do this?" He nodded and wiped an imaginary tear from his eye, "Yeah, thanks to the professor linking our minds like that I was able to use him like a hook and caught myself some Astral Energy Manipulation."
I got a little excited at that, Astral energy meant everything from telekinesis, telepathy, and even green lantern like constructs. But my new companion didn't let my mood rise too much before slapping it back down, "Don't get too excited, I'm a being made of pure thought, it is much easier for me to use than it will be for you. Get ready for the grind, because you have a lot of work to do if you want to reach my level."
That was when the Professor injected himself into the conversation, "Since you will be taking a more… active role, is there a name you would prefer to be called? I have gathered that while you have similarities, you are still very different people." I nodded in agreement, I had just been referring to him as the annoying voice in my head but him having a name would make things easier. I paused when a thought struck me but once again it was struck down before it could get too far.
"Even though I can manifest like this I'm afraid you're still stuck with me. The core of what I am is still stuck inside your head so the further I get from you the shorter amount of time I can spend out here. And I want to make use of as much time as I can out here in the real world!" I slumped when my hopes were ruthlessly crushed like that. While I pouted he turned back towards the professor, "As for names, all I have come up with so far is O'Hara. Not sure if it's gonna be my first or last name but it'll do for now."
When I heard the name he chose, my head once again snapped towards the ghost with an incredulous look on my face. "I gather from the look on Mr. Callwell's face that this name has significant meaning to both of you?" The menace answered before I could get a word out, "You could say that, it comes from an old story we read. A group of people that fought to preserve knowledge no matter the cost. And it ended up costing them almost everything in the end, but their knowledge and culture endured until it could be spread to those that would use it for the betterment of all."
The professor's face softened as he smiled, "That is a wonderful name, though I implore you to do their legacy justice. Anything less would be a travesty." While I thought it was still kind of awkward to use a name from an anime it wasn't the worst one he could use. At least it wasn't something like Naruto, Luffy, or Goku, that would be even worse and I'm not sure I could stand calling him that without cringing.
"Yeah that would be a little much even for me." I couldn't help but roll my eyes and give the little ghost a dirty look, "Are you going to keep doing that?" He nodded, "Yes, at least sometimes. I'm in your head remember so I know that the best way to get you out of your shell is to annoy you until you can't help but respond." The professor gave a chuckle at my responding sigh of exasperation, just because I knew he was right doesn't mean I have to like it.
There was a sudden knock on the door and the professor's gaze rose to greet whoever entered. When I turned around to see who it was I didn't recognize them so the professor handled the introductions. "Mr.Callwell this is Jean-Paul Beaubier, he can guide you to where you will be staying, unfortunately due to the amount of students we have staying here you will have a roommate. And while I do hope you get along, you may go to any teacher and request a change of your accommodations if you feel the need to."
I nodded and stood from my chair waving goodbye to the professor before following Mr. Beaubier out the door. He did give a second look at my companion but shrugged it off rather quickly, I guess living here he had seen a lot of strange things. As we made our way through campus Mr. Baubier decided that since he was guiding me he would play tour guide as well. He was rather good at it too, I learned that most of the teachers couldn't be found at their offices most of the time but each one had somewhere they could be found most of the time instead.
If it wasn't an emergency then it was preferred a note be left in the basket hanging on each door. But if you absolutely needed to talk to someone Ms. Monroe could almost always be found in the greenhouse or in the foreign language club room. She was always willing to lend an ear should I feel the need to talk. Logan, because it was never Mr. Howlett, unless you felt like getting extra drills assigned during gym, could be found in one of the wooded parks when not teaching a class.
He wasn't one for talking about your feelings, but if you felt the need to get some energy or frustration out he can either point you in the right direction or give some personal guidance. Thanks to that he usually either had a few of the rambunctious kids hanging around or some of the kids that had troubled home lives. Both types seemed to gravitate towards him at some point, and apparently everyone thought it was hilarious that the roughest person on campus was the best one with kids.
I couldn't get the image of a bunch of little kids using Logan as a jungle gym as he just sat there like a statue. When I had to stop to try and get my laughter under control Mr. Beaubier asked what I was laughing about. When I told him he chuckled, "That actually has happened before and it ends up being more cute than funny, I'm sure some of the more motherly staff have photos of the event hidden away."
By that point we had made it outside the building and so he went from introducing a couple of the teachers to pointing out what the different buildings were used for. Apparently I was very astute when I compared this to a college campus, each building had a speciality but that didn't mean the drama club wouldn't be held in one of the engineering labs. It was all about who had the space and where there had been a bit of damage that week. Even though the weekly attacks weren't a thing this was still a super power school and some of the powers could be destructive when not completely under control.
The lab example was actually happening right now because they met at different times. Plus the theater room was being renovated after one of the members became a little too enthusiastic and almost burned the place down. Luckily because of the wide array of powers and people we rarely needed to go outside to find help for something. These days people rarely leave and usually when they did it was only to go on recruitment missions. That felt a little cult-like to me but I could kind of understand it when there was just so much hate out there for mutants.
Who would want to dive into that mess when you had another option? After walking past the construction area I got to see some of what he was talking about, there was a guy that was using Cementos' ability. Though he was lucky enough to not look like a slab of concrete himself, and when I took a closer look I found that he wasn't actually producing cement, he was just moving it like water. But it still looked pretty cool.
After that we walked past an open field that looked like a game of extreme sports was taking place. I think it was supposed to be soccer but it looked more like they were playing football with how hard they were slamming into each other. But the ball was a soccer ball so maybe it was just a full contact version, I flinched at a particularly brutal clash and felt a hand land on my shoulder.
"Don't worry, those are the Bruisers. They all have some sort of durability mutation and love to show everyone how hard they can knock their skulls together. It would take a tank to even give them a scratch. You'll find life here can be kind of strange, but most of the time you can see some really cool things. When you get the chance you should totally check out one of the shows the theater club puts on, it's a lot more interesting with powers. It's like having special effects in real life."
I nodded and made sure to keep that in mind, although it seemed like my companion had a question of his own to ask. "I get that you all are all about being open, but just how open are you?" The question was blatant enough that I didn't think the moving eyebrows he projected were necessary but while I facepalmed in embarrassment Mr. Beaubier just laughed. "While you won't find any sort of hate filled rhetoric here, the professor has a zero tolerance policy, there are still things that should only happen behind closed doors."
"That's good, while I would mind seeing some more skin of some of the more aesthetically pleasing among you, I'm not sure if anyone would recover from seeing this guy's hairy ass." That got another laugh out of the man while I flicked O'Hara and made him flip head over heels before stabilizing himself and floating back over to my shoulder with a pout. By the time he reached my shoulder we had stopped in front of a large brick building, "This is the dorm for high school students, would you like me to come inside or just drop you off?"
My answer was very typical for a teenager but really I was an adult in mind and didn't really need a guide to find my dorm once I knew the number assigned to me. "I think I'll be fine, what's the room number?" He rattled off the digits and then headed off with one last goodbye and a reminder to ask anyone if I ever needed any help. Once I assured him I would, I turned back to the dorm and walked up the steps and onto the next phase of my new life.
The current advanced chapters are:
Master of Magic Ch2-3
Seal Smith Ch2
Flip the Script Ch1-2
The Game Ch1-3
Millennium Ch1-2
Haven Ch1
Who is a Zoo? Ch1
God of Games Ch6
Breathe Ch1
Another Wayne Ch1
Salvation Ch1
Guide Ch1
Growth Ch1
Ark Ch5-7
Further Ch2
Puzzle Maker Ch3
A Thousand Words Ch1-2
Free Range Ch1
Not All Heroes Wear Capes Ch3