Star Dust (A Paladin Adventure)

Outcomes

To my surprise, the Commissioner was with the two officers and the woman from Child Protective Services. They joined us where they could observe the kids but not freak them out. "They're looking better," Commissioner Gordon observed.

"Being rescued did a lot of good for them," Steve agreed. "But some of the kids still aren't speaking much, or at all if they don't have to answer a question. They need help."

Gordon scrubbed his face with his hand. It didn't look like he'd had a lot sleep either. "We're having a hard enough time finding some place for them to live," he said. "Foster families are afraid. Some of the children were kidnapped and we've tracked down their families, who are concerned about what was done to them. A couple of them don't want 'muties' in their families. A couple of kids were in the foster care system, but there are five that we can't account for."

Professor X spoke up. "I run a school upstate for children with mutations. I would like to offer places there for the children with nowhere else to go; we can address their trauma as well. It may be also that the children with families who want them back may be overwhelmed; in those cases, I'd like to offer to provide the children with training to help control their new abilities. While it's always possible that these induced abilities may fade over time, it's my experience that once a change is made that it will persist. There just aren't that many places where children who are different can go, and although it has been my practice to open our doors only to mutants, I do not feel that in good conscience that we can ignore these children."

"What's the difference between mutants and these kids?" one of the police officers asked.

"We believe that mutants are those with genetic changes that developed in utero. Mutates are those like Ms. Harrington and Captain Rogers, who acquired their gifts as a result of exposure to outside stimuli or energies. These children would be classified as mutates."

Commissioner Gordon nodded. "It's a very generous offer," he said. "We will be taking you up on it; we're just not sure how many children will be coming to you." After some discussion, it was decided that the Commissioner would talk to each child in the presence of Beast for psychological comfort and Professor X. The rest of us watched in concern. The children who were going home were both thrilled and worried, but overall they wanted their parents. The foster children were the most receptive to the offer to attend Professor X's institute. Additional questioning of the children with no known origin didn't help matters. They didn't want to talk about their past and accepted the offer to go to the institute as well.  The hardest interviews were those children whose parents didn't want them anymore, and I cursed the parents viciously in my head. The children's grief affected the adults in the interviews as well. Dr McCoy looked  curiously deflated, his fur looking limp and sad, the Commissioner had tears in his eyes, and Professor X was so grim he looked carved from stone although his manner was still compassionate.

It was agreed that the children would go back to the Institute together for sophisticated testing to determine the effect of the Skrull's treatment on each one. After that was done, the parents would  visit their kids and hear the results of the testing. It was unsaid but understood that if the parents rejected their children that they would stay at the institute. The police officers helped get the kids ready for transportation and would accompany them to the institute with the CPS representative. We accompanied everybody down to the parking garage, waving as they left.

"The kids in the storage room were mostly teenagers, street kids, runaways," Gordon said. "We have some families to notify, but mostly not. The younger kids there we can't identify and the M.E. thinks that even DNA identification might not be possible." He shook his head. "There are days when I hate my job."