"Go to Beata," they said, "It'll be fun," they said. [Open]

Michael stood in front of the gates to Beata Academy, staring at the looming school beyond with wide eyes. It actually felt like he hadn't been there at all. When he'd received the invitation, he really couldn't believe it had happened. He was going to a school for the gifted. The word sat bitterly in his mouth; he liked being gifted, and having powers he couldn't even control, but he didn't want to be special. He wanted to be home, with his best friends Jason and Todd and his old school and his family. He didn't want to make new friends or have someone teach him what he could learn at home.

When his father put a hand on his shoulder, he started and turned his head. His father was smiling at him warmly, his dark hair tousled and lying in neatly messy curls in front of his face. He was wearing a dark suit, and he looked overly business for dropping his son off at school. Michael scowled when he reminded himself this wasn't the eighth grade anymore.

"Make me proud, son," was all he said. Then he rounded to the back of his spotless white Hellcat, opening the truck and lifting out a clean black-and-grey suitcase. There was a bag with overflow luggage packed in it tied to the handle. Michael was hesitant to take his items from him, because that meant he was really stuck here at this Academy and that he would be here until they went home and they would be here again for the next few years, every single school year.

Unless he got himself suspended or expelled, which he wasn't even sure if they did at a school like this, but he wasn't stupid enough to find out.

His dad gave him a fond squeeze of his shoulder, wished him good luck and goodbye, and then parted and disappeared around to the driver's side of his car. Michael looked through the darkened passenger window at his mother, who turned her head to give him the tiniest hint of a smile. The Cat started purring, and then it slipped off away from the school.

And then he was alone at Beata Academy. He knew nothing, he knew nobody.. he turned to face the school, looking at the gates with a knot of nausea rising in his stomach. He curled his fingers around the handle of his suitcase, his knuckles turning stark white, and he fought the urge not to start crying right there. He started forward, swallowing hard and determined to make his first day a good one.

It had been an accident. Really. Promise. But somehow, Poppy got the inkling the Headmaster wouldn't see it that way. She turned the chunk of marble over in her hand, chewing on the inside of her lip, wondering if she'd be best off just dumping it back into the fountain and walking away. Okay. So her gift could get a little out of control, from, err, time to time. Shit happened, y'know? That was no reason to blame her.

The fountain's middle spout, so elegantly carved, had been busted wide open at the lip. That was to say that it was spraying water out sideways like a fire hose across the school's front lawn, out across the bricks and into the grass and trees and a park bench where a few unlucky bystanders may or may not have been caught up just a little bit in the crossfire. It'd happened too fast. An accident. Really.

She backed away from the fountain, turning on her heel, and whistled as best and innocently as she could (she could barely whistle). Dang, what to do, what to do... Poppy glanced left, right, over her shoulder, everywhere but forward as she took quick, long strides away from the scene of the crime, right into the short ginger kid. "Oof! Agh!" She stumbled back, half-juggling the chunk of stone as it almost went bouncing straight out of her hands. "Sh-shoot..."