Arriving

[lynx]

Alex laughed as he followed Bobby up the stairs. "I haven't played any video games since high school. Up where I come from fun is winning snowball fights. I'm from Alaska. Not a whole lot of people or things to do."

[Iceman]

Bobby's eyes widened, and he turned to look at Alex with an amazed grin as they reached the top of the stairs. "That's even better!!"

"I mean, I may be biased," he said as he started going again, leading the way down the boy's dorm hallways. He held out his hand then, and in it had formed a perfectly packed snowball. Bobby glanced down at it himself, a wicked smirk forming on his lips. If he'd known the guy any better, he would have launched it at him, no doubt.

[lynx]

Alex chuckled some more. "Well for you I guess it would be fun all the time, but some of us actually get cold after a while." He paused. Since he found out Scott had died this was the closest he'd come to having any real fun. It felt kind of good, like having a small weight lifted off his chest. The burden of mourning still lay heavily on him, but right now it was a bit lighter. "Besides, do anything too much and you get bored of it, you know?" In Alaska there wasn't a very long list of things to do outside except during summer, which was notoriously short. "How fast can you make those, anyway?"

[Iceman]

Bobby tossed the densely-packed snowball up and down a few times. "Something simple like this only takes a couple seconds. I can build you an igloo in about ten," he said with a grin that was largely joking but slightly proud as well. "I usually do ice. It tends to do more damage than snowballs."

They had reached the room Bobby had been leading him to, and Bobby opened the door and walked it, pushing it to ensure it stayed open while Alex came through. Bobby flipped on the lights. "We can get you a roommate if you want one, but there's enough open space for you to probably stay by yourself if you want to."

"Oh, I forgot!" he said then, turning back to Alex. "Forge is currently on vacation with Ororo - Miss Munroe, so you'll have to speak with Kurt...Mr. Wagner," Bobby said. It was so odd to use their formal names, he was so used to calling them 'Ro' and, well, 'Kurt' or some variant of 'Fuzz' or 'Elf'. "I can help you find him."

[lynx]

Alex inwardly winced. ~No snowball fights with the Iceman,~ he noted to himself. If he used plain ice it could be painful. Then again, Alex could easily melt it with one of his beams. ~Gonna need to burn some off soon anyway.~ He'd probably take a walk down the road and find an isolated spot to let it off.

He tossed his bag onto the bed and looked around the room. ~Nice.~ "Nah, no roommate for me." He'd had enough of that in college.

Alex smirked as Bobby kept correcting himself. That Forge was away concerned him slightly since he was the only guy Havok knew even a little bit. Well, him and Bobby now. "No rush." He could always unpack now and meet Kurt later if it was more convenient for Iceman. "You guys don't use your mutant names? I thought that was trendy or something. Do they have mutant names?"

[Iceman]

"Pretty much everyone does have a mutant name...though not all the students. They don't really need them, though, but for some people it's a form of identity. Brings them closer to their abilities. I don't know, they tried to teach us about it in some Psych class one year, but I didn't really get it." From the way he spoke, it was clear that he really hadn't been paying much attention.

"But we use them - the X-Men - for privacy reasons, also. Well, now just about everybody knows who some of us are, but we used to have to keep it pretty quiet. It's also for efficiency. 'Iceman' sounds more professional than 'Bobby', you know?" Bobby grinned at him. "And Scott used to use it on me when I got in trouble. Kind of like the parental 'Robert William Drake!'"

Oh. Scott = Alex's brother. Right. Whoops. Bobby glanced to Alex's face quickly to see if his comment had had any effect on the other young man. "Well, if you want to unpack now, you can do that, or we can get Kurt. Or if you want to unpack, we can always get him later."

[lynx]

~So they don't use their mutant names all the time. Got it,~ Alex thought, thinking they instead of we out of habit. He wasn't used to even thinking of himself as a mutant, he tried to hide it so much. Bobby's comment about Scott stung because it caught him by surprise, but it didn't show on his face. Like his brother he could wear a mask of non-emotion when he needed to. Scott seemed to catch him by surprise a lot lately. He could be doing even the most random things and somehow think of Scott. It made his chest feel hollow for a moment, but like always the feeling subsided after the initial plunging feeling. "Why don't we get Kurt?" The pain was generally worse when he was by himself, when he had nothing else to focus on so he could dwell on it.

(it just occured to me that using ~ for thoughts might not be how you guys do things. It's not a problem, is it? Or should I use another symbol?)

[Iceman]

(ooc: We usually use italics for thoughts, which uses the code {i} {/i} except instead of {} it's []. It's not like it's a big deal, but that way everyone does it the same. Thanks for asking!)

Bobby nodded. "Alright." He pressed the communicator button at his neck. "Nightcrawler," he specified, then sent his message. "Iceman to Mr. Acting Headmaster," he said with an air of joking. "We have a new arrival; Forge spoke with him about the X-Men. Want to meet with him?"

[lynx]

"Nightcrawler?" Alex mumbled to himself. Does he turn into a worm or something? That was intriguing.

[Nightcrawler]

Kurt stopped short as his communicator activated, spouting Bobby's message out to him. Tapping it appropriately to respond, he thumbed his collar, keeping the bud within reasonable distance of his mouth. "Ja, Bobby, it would be nice to meet with him. Where are you? I can be there soon as you please."

A new arrival? he thought, his brow furrowing. Not something I was expecting to have to deal with while Ororo was away, but I suppose sometimes things happen that are not expected.

[Iceman]

Bobby pushed his comm button again after hearing Kurt's response. "Nightcrawler. We'll meet you in the entryway." He let go of the button, lowering his hand to his side, and looked to Alex. "You ever seen a blue mutant?" he asked conversationally, a small smirk forming on his lips.

(ooc: Rob, do you want to start a thread in the Interior board for them to meet? Since we forgot to switch to the Interior board when we moved inside heheh.)

[lynx]

"Um, blue?" Alex's eyebrows furrowed. "What does that have to do with nightcrawlers? I thought you were supposed to pick a name based on your powers or something?" Dear God, what if he's a blue worm or something?? He wasn't even used to normal-looking mutants yet, he wasn't sure he was ready for a blue worm-looking guy.