Wandering. (Open)

[Deleted]

(after enrollment)

Betsy stepped outside and shivered against the cold afternoon wind. Pulling her striped scarf over her face, she stuffed her gloved hands into her coat pockets and started to walk.

The area around the mansion was gorgeous, especially under its fresh blanket of snow. Betsy could still manage to make out the outlines of a path, and she followed it, the snow quickly soaking through her converse trainers. Note to self: Buy boots. She thought, smiling.

[Mystique]

Mystique had stepped outside to see the snow. They had gotten a few more inches last night, and the world looked undisturbed and peaceful, just as long as the snow lay untouched. Then she noticed someone in a striped scarf around the side of the mansion. The person looked unfamiliar, and she decided to make an approach. She hugged her brown coat tighter, thankful that Charles had bought such a good coat for her.

[Deleted]

Lost in thought, Betsy tromped her soggy feet further along the snow covered path. She still wasn't quite sure what had inspired her to come here to Xavier's school. Her life had finally seemed to smooth itself out, things were finally making sense, and out of nowhere, she knew she needed to be here. She had never been more certain of anything. Now that she was here, she wasn't sure what she was supposed to do next.

Closing her eyes briefly, she took a deep breath. Whatever the reason, she knew she had made the right choice.

[Mystique]

She walked closer to her, noting that the person a few feet from her was a woman, and wearing poor footwear for the snow. Apparently she wasn't aware of her presence. "I'm guessing those shoes aren't so good in the snow," she pointed out, still a few feet behind her.

[Deleted]

Betsy jumped in surprise and spun around. Blushing, she realized that because she had been so lost in thought, she hadn't been paying attention to her surroundings, and this woman had been able to approach her without notice. I have to be more observant.

She looked down at her shoes, which were completely soaked at this point. Shrugging, she answered, "Probably not the best choice, I'll admit." Glancing toward the mansion, she asked, "You live here?"

[Mystique]

She gave her a wry smile, hugging her brown coat closer to her; it was cold today. "Yes, I do." She moved closer, extending a blue, scaled hand to shake. "My name is Mystique. Are you a new student here?"

[Deleted]

Betsy pulled her right hand from her coat pocket and shook Mystique's hand. "I'm not exactly sure what I'm doing here, to be perfectly honest." She looked down at her feet, which were so cold now they were starting to hurt. "My name is Elisabeth, but nobody calls me that. You can call me Betsy." She pushed a strand of her purple hair behind her ear before shoving her hand back into her pocket.

[Mystique]

"It's nice to meet you, Betsy," she said, shaking her hand. Thankfully Betsy was unaware of her previous activities in the Brotherhood, otherwise this encounter might have been much more awkward. "I like the tattoo," she said, nodding to the scarlet tattoo on her eye.

[Deleted]

Betsy reached up to her eye without thinking. "Thanks. It's not really a tattoo, though." She blinked hard, not wanting to revisit the memory of the day she became marked. Forcing a smile, she said, "You certainly have an interesting look." Immediately, she realized that she may have crossed some sort of boundary and blushed. Sometimes she wanted to kick herself for saying whatever came to mind.

[Mystique]

She smiled gently. "Yes, I do." So it seemed they both were marked in some way by their powers. Just because she loved to show off, she transformed into Betsy, though still wearing her brown coat. "I'm a metamorph," she told her, mimicking her voice.

[Deleted]

Betsy grinned, thoroughly impressed. "That's fantastic! Can you look like anyone?" Her fascination only briefly distracted her from her feet, which were past painful and now going numb. Instinctively, she levitated herself a few inches from the ground and created a telekinetic barrier around her feet. Laughing, she pointed down and said, "Telekinetic snow boots!"

[Mystique]

"Nice," she said, nodding to the 'telekinetic snow boots'. At her question, she nodded again, this time looking like the President of the United States, then shifting to look like her human form, then the blond haired 'Grace', a persona she'd created for her own uses. "I can be anyone, right down to their fingerprint and retina pattern."

[Deleted]

"That's incredible!" Betsy gushed, still hovering a few inches from the snowy ground. She looked around at the empty grounds, then back at Mystique. "So, what do you do here?" Maybe getting an idea of what life was like at the mansion would give her a better idea of why she had come there, or what she would do now. She pulled her legs up, crossing them so it looked like she was sitting indian style in mid-air.

[Mystique]

Seeing Betsy pull her legs up and get comfortable, she guessed that she was interested in learning what people did here at the mansion. She shifted back to normal, scales and all. "Well, right now I'm taking it easy, but I've been thinking of asking the Professor about becoming a physical trainer of some sort." That was certainly true; she had thought about it, but had yet to broach the subject with Charles.

[Deleted]

"A physical trainer." Betsy seemed to repeat to herself, turning it over in her mind. "What kind of training? What I mean is, would you have some sort of specialty?" Resting her elbows on her knees, Betsy folded her hands under her chin, genuinely interested.