Aurora

Part 6

The warm water cascaded over her, washing away all of the sweat from exercising. It had felt good to use a sword again, the metal had felt natural in her hand as she swiped and slashed at the air. She did miss having a partner to battle but it was still nice to be able to go through the motions again. 

It was the end of the school day for all of the students, so she'd decided to go inside to shower to avoid drawing too much attention. Wrapping a warm towel around herself, she dried off and pulled on some fresh clothes, listening to the noise of the people playing outside in the warm sun and enjoying their free time. She gathered her things and left the bathroom, toweling her hair dry as she padded back to her room, thinking over the day's events.

Logan seemed to be nice; he was stern and slightly scary, sure, but underneath it all he was a genuine person. Just because he seemed intimidating people tended to stay away from him. He'd been surprised at her skills with a fencing foil and they'd spoken about the different weapons that she could use. The conversation had ended where he'd told her that she had permission to use them without his supervision whenever the gym was open, provided that she used them properly.

She looked over at the clock as she blow-dried her hair with a hairdryer that she'd found in one of the drawers, dinner would be ready soon. Giving her hair one last blast to make sure that it was dry, she combed it out and tidied her things away, leaving the room to make her way down to the dining hall.

***

Dinner had not been eventful, Xavier had given her the time and details of her trial which would be for tomorrow's breakfast. She had to turn up half an hour earlier than usual so that Ororo could assess her properly. Aurora didn't mind, as long as she was earning something. The thought of second-hand underwear crossed her mind again and she shuddered.

She followed the hallway down to the art classroom that she'd found earlier and looked through the window to see if anyone was inside. There didn't seem to be anyone, so she pushed open the door, looking around. Back at home she used to paint and draw; it was mainly fantasy scenes, with a dynamic hero, or a plotting villain. She loved superheroes, and she'd never admit that being a mutant sort of made her feel like one from the small comic book collection that she had stashed away at home.

Her reminiscing was broken by the door opening and a tall, muscly boy entered the room. She blushed and smiled at him, 'he has muscles on muscles..' her internal voice commented. He looked over at her and nodded, his greeting voiced in a deep tone with a thick Russian accent. He went over to some shelves with slots where artwork seemed to be stored and pulled out a canvass, bringing it over to an easel before collecting his paints and things. 

'Stop staring.' She dragged her gaze from him and continued to search through the different papers and supplies. She settled on some sturdy bristol board and inks, a medium of comic book artists. Finding some pencils and rubbers she sat on one of the tables and began sketching a scene of a virtuous hero battling a gruesome monster.

"My name ees Piotr." Aurora looked up from the drawing to see him painting. She struggled to find the words.

"Oh, um, my name is Aurora." He nodded and smiled.

"Da, you are new right?"

"Yeah. This is my second full day out of the med lab." A look of realization seemed to dawn on his face and she was confused, did he know her? 

"AH! You are girl vith swords?!" She blushed a deep shade of red. 'Oh my god. He saw me practicing?! I was only playing around, it was nothing that I wanted people to see...'