Restless

By Gladys Hammonds

	This story features Professor X, Magneto and
Storm, who are trademarks of  Marvel. This is an
unauthorized work and no profit is being made on this work.  
This work and all other non-Marvel characters is
copyright of Gladys Hammonds.  
____________________________________________
	I am a mutant.  I do not sleep. I have no 
other distinction. I am as human as the ones who are genetically 
benign. I am as different as the ones who are favored with the 
powers. I am not one to stand out.   No human fears me, 
no mutant demands my aid. I simply do not close my eyes and
succumb to that  state of consciousness that rests
and revives the bodies of  others. I  am fully conscious
twenty four hours a day. 
	My trivial gift of sleeplessness came to light slowly,
as a young teenager, as all the powers do.  At first, I only stayed
up late, transfixed by the music videos, that had just come into
favor. I told no one. I wasn't afraid. My homework suffered.
What urgency does algebra and book reports have to a 
procrastinating student who always has an extra hour, another
last minute to finish?
       Others do not know. I  pretend I am normal. I can be 
as nondescript as needed. But I live through the hours of
darkness and of light, alone.  By choice, by habit, by
compulsion, by foolishness.  I could use the sleeplessness to my
advantage if I were truly ambitious.  The reporter, doctor,
police officer, even student always alert, never tired,
never stopping.  I have this gift, and I can live three lives in
the same time you live only one. But I have no dreams of my own,
either of daytime greatness or visons of the night like those of 
you who sleep do. 
	I don't sleep, but I see them, the exceptional and the 
ordinary.  I can neither help nor hinder, endanger or rescue,
threaten or defend. So, I record. I am the recording secretary 
of the lives of the special ones, chronicler of their encounters 
with beings both bizarre and mundane. I am the sleepless, 
harmless documentarian.
	What can I offer Professor Charles Xavier, so-called 
mutant protector, mutant humanitarian? The alledged peace lover
whose first assignment for any acolyte he recruits is to convert
civilians into soldiers in the Danger Room. As a fighter, I am 
unskilled and unwilling.
	The lives of the mutant terrorist heroes are troubled,
complex. They lurch from one disaster to the next, one madmen
seeking past and future domination to the next threat to all
reality as we know it. Always unappreciated, always feared.
Never do they take the time to understand the trap their powers
and their heroism places them. 
	There is Xavier. And there is Magneto. The definitive
villain, dead or alive, mind-wiped or age-regressed, young or
old.  More so than the goody-goody Xavier and his earnest
students, the stuff of legends.
	I have met that mad genius.  He summoned me and I 
could not refuse.  We met in his domain; he was surrounded by
acolytes and attendents, as usual.  He did all the talking,
demanding my allegience to him, my unswerving loyalty
as he plotted his latest scheme for mutant
domination.  With Magneto, you can only be his acolyte or
his foe.
	He was startled when I said no.
	I pointed out I could be neither threat nor 
asset to him. My power being only the power of alertness,
and a non-mutant talent for documentation.
	"Mutant powers are not  what they once were, then,"
he laughed and turned away.
	A sarcastic comment, but I do not disagree. I am
a mutant, but not one who cares to wage war for good cause
or bad. I offer only the power of observation.
	What have I observed of these titans?
	Xavier and his puppets will be studied by mutant
children in  solemn textbooks, comparable to presidents
and war heroes, the dates, roster lists, multiple choice 
questions the bane of future procrastinating students.  But
Magneto, undisputed and unrepentent murderer, cruel
manipulator, arrogant philosopher, domineering leader,
thoughtless father and Xavier's intermittent ally will be 
remembered as a towering legend, whether truthful or 
embellished, but always a figure of awe.
	There is one other leader.  Ororo Munroe,the 
wind goddess herself.  A woman touched  with the 
beauty of nature and command of all its fury.
Without coyness, without seeming effort, men 
desire her love.  A leader by love, not
arrogance and domination. If only her spirit could lead
the mutants.  She does not judge the evil ones that
toss up on  Xavier's doorstep. She befriends them,
understands them.

	I feel the mind touch.  Gently, delicately, like the 
petal of a flower against my heart, not my head.  I am
surprised. The supercilious genius, Charles Xavier has
taken notice of me, his chronicler.
	"Young mutant, you are needed."
	"Ridiculous," I speak aloud.
	"We need you, your powers, as we need the 
powers of all mutants." 
	Xavier, the self-righteous professor, assumes
once again that all are required to follow him.  
	"I will not follow you. Neither you nor Magneto."  
	" I refuse to be an aggressor.  I have recorded the  
aggressions of humans against mutants, mutants against 
mutants, aliens, beings of unimaginable complexity. I have
recorded them all, and I see only that aggressors never win 
their constant battles; they postpone them, continue them, 
set them down temporarily only to resume again with
another foe with another name".
	" I do not sleep," I tell Xavier,  "and I do not fight. I
have nothing to offer the X-Men. I have nothing to interest 
the terrorist legend Magneto. Both require soldiers and
powers. I have neither."
	"Mutant," again the soft petal brush. "You are needed
because you are right."
	"I have trained X-Men for three decades in a dimension
where times stands still.  I have sent them warring against evil
mutants, evil humans, evil aliens, evil robots. But I have not
ended the fight or secured the peace."
	"Your single power, to live day and night seeking the 
answer to the aggressions so that we can all one day live in
peace, is needed."
	"I have not supplied that answer, even though I have 
devoted my lifetime and the lives of my students to that end. I am
crippled now.  It is not through my own power that I speak to
you. My friend and daughter Jean Summers allows me to send
you my thoughts.  My powers and my so-called genius have
failed me.
	"I need you. No,  you are right, I am arrogant, as arrogant 
as Magneto.  You are needed, not for me, but for us all. Human
mutant, alien, we all fight, triumph, only to fight again. You live 
only to record, to understand. Perhaps together, we can win."
	"Please, you are alone."
	This time, it is another voice. Unlike her to speak through
the thought links of others. She commands thunder and plays with
lightning, but her thoughts are are as light as soft daylight, as 
soft as wind on skin.
	"You have not shared your gifts with others. You have 
not shared your self with others. But you long to do so.  You do
not wish to always be alone. You yearn for family, children, wife,
friends, understanding. You are not happy as you are. Join us.
	I  know she is right. I have longings. But my gift, my 'power' is
negligible, no matter what Xavier says.
	"Even you do not know all of your powers. Do any of us
until we are tested. Do you know your true limits, sleepless one?
Perhaps we all can be relieved of sleep. Perhaps you can send 
us all to sleep permanently.  One who doesn't sleep is one whose
energy never needs to be replenished.  Perhaps your powers are 
no more than you say. Perhaps not."
	I am intriqued. I am tempted.Chroniclers, observers,
lurkers wish to be actors, but we  believe we have no
talent, no potential. We play it safe.
	But if there are possibilities. If there is more. I life that I
could live, as well as observe? I am thrilled. I am weak. I am
terrified.
	"Yes."  My answer is as soft as a rose petal, too.
	"Welcome," say the leaders of the X-Men.