(no subject)
Sooraya prayed at dawn, at noon, and at sunset, as always. There were a lot of times in her past when that routine had been the only certain thing she had in her life.
Now? She was asking for guidance, as she had done before, when she had the luxury to do so.
She never thought of herself as "righteous" or particularly deserving of help, or Allah's counsel. Signs and wonders were for others; prophets, holy women, perhaps. She was an 18-year-old ex-slave, current fighter with more blood on her hands than some soldiers saw in a tour of duty, and she knew what lay ahead for her wasn't a quiet life.
She simply prayed, and listened, and hoped to be helped to see the right path.
What did He want from her?
She found herself remembering the Three-in-One, Blindfold, Emma Frost...
Rachel.
The ability was an asset, yes, an aid to survival. Yet she also recalled the weariness in Rachel's voice, the sense of a restless power that never quite gave the other woman surcease.
Did she fear it? Not Rachel. Sooraya's initial reaction, two nights ago, had been that of suddenly having a potentially lethal weapon thrust into her hands, armed, and not knowing what she should/could safely do with it.
Others had learned to control the power, harness it. Was that what she was meant to do?
Somehow, that didn't feel right. Why? Or why not?
She knew the distance that separated mutants, or those other-than-human, from those that were "ordinary". Here, what she'd seen was that that distance wasn't considered a good thing. People cared, reached out, listened, regardless of what one was. They trusted.
Was someone like Muldoon, or Guppy Sandhu, or Mrs. Wells, less capable than she was? No. Of course not. They didn't need 'metahuman'power, of any kind, to make a crucial difference, to be good.
Did she?
No, again.
Why hadn't this ability surfaced sooner, when her power to shift form did? She was more than a little suspicious as to the timing. But leave that for now. Lacking a geneticist or doctor who specialized in mutant physiology, she
couldn't ask. What mattered, was what she did now.
To take up yet more power, in pursuit of being stronger, or better...was to say that that was she chose to be. A woman who wanted such power kept in her hands, rather than trusting in the One she prayed to, or in those around her.
She didn't need it, as such. What she had was enough. She wouldn't want to reverse the last three years, but this...wasn't the road she wanted to take.
Yet, if she went home now, as things were, that wouldn't be a choice she had.
As much as she loved the others; Laura, Julian, Nori; she knew they wouldn't understand what she was contemplating doing. She shuddered, imagining presenting this 'request' to Emma Frost, the headmistress' reaction.
Perhaps that was why again the decision was given to her to make here.
Was this Allah's will for her? If so, who was she to reject the chance? How dare she even think it?
Yet, she remembered(vaguely) dreams, during the operation. A sense of /presence\, old and deep running strength, bright, enfolding her. She couldn't remember words, but there had been a certainty of acceptance, love, being cherished and welcomed, no "strings attached." A presence that knew her,saw her clearly, both the gentler and bloodier, dark sides of her nature, all she'd done, and the ugliness of her past no worse against that than a single coal fallen away into the ocean.
She couldn't recall specifics, but that had remained, if dimly in her memories.
She sat up, comforted. The knot in her stomach melted away.
The choices people made, defined who they were, if not what.
She nodded slowly, hands on her knees, eyes abstracted as she quietly recited a prayer of gratitude.
At last, she stood, stiffly, and began to walk downstairs.
She'd come to a decision, of sorts. Now, she and Rachel needed to talk.