Хорошо, конечно, когда мне нравится то, что по всем признакам должно было мне понравится. Ну ещё бы, кто же любит разочаровываться? Но лучше всего, когда мне нравится то, что по всем признакам мне понравится не должно было бы. Такие вещи, такие случаи и таких персонажей я запоминаю лучше всего. Например, читаю ау-фик по XMFC, где Чарльз - человек, выступающий за права мутантов (и он одинаково не мил ни радикальным мутантам, ни радикально настроенным людям) и больше всего мне нравятся вовсе не будни школы мутантов, героические спасения детей и перманентно удивлённый Эрик, случайно оказавшийся втянутым во всё это, а фрагменты социальной пропаганды Профессора, которые автор прописывает в качестве эпиграфов к каждой части.

Например:
"There are mutants in this room. Shocking, isn't it? Mutants sitting amongst us with no sign of their presence, able to pass as human, with their enormous powers doing—absolutely nothing but listening to a boring old sod in a sweater. My, my, how very treacherous of them, don't you think? Mutants going to class, eating terrible food and day old pizza, getting drunk, getting fucked—ah, right, yes, that is to say having sex, my apologies to the very horrified gentleman in the third row, you may stop that disturbing twitch anytime now, thank you very much.

Yes, right, where was I? Ah, yes, yes, those low-down, no account, upstart mutants who dare to do the same thing you, all the while not announcing their status to the world.

How every shocking.

I've news for you.

читать дальшеThere are homosexuals in this room as well. There are atheists, Catholics, people of faiths and believes you've never heard of, there are illegal immigrants, feminists, Republicans, Democrats, cat people, dog people, gerbil and rat people—why there might even be a snake owner or two.

A few of which probably live in your dorms with you—have fun sleeping tonight on that one—and not a single one of them is obligated to say a damn thing about themselves.

We have a right to our privacy. We have the right of our bodies. Moreover, we have the responsibility to ourselves and our existence to treat that right with the respect it deserves. I am no more obligated to share my secrets with you than any of you are me.

But, you're thinking, mutants are different, Professor. They can harm us. They can walk through our thoughts at will, know our secrets, kill us with a gesture or a thought, why they might sit there and be blue. Good heavens, think of the children, why don't we?

Well, I am. You're still breathing. Your secrets are your own. I've known telepaths. Had conversations with more than a few, felt them walk through my thoughts, laugh at the bad jokes I can never bring myself to inflict upon the world—yes, they do get worse than you've heard thus far—and yet here I sit in my chair, hale and hearty, and I haven't quacked like a duck once.

Mutants have superhuman abilities, but those abilities come with a cost. It takes effort to impress your will upon another, even more to change their minds on a fundamental level, and it takes skill to do so unnoticed. The human mind is a tricky bastard at the best of times, when it is being tampered with it is a mindfield of potential disaster.

Every mutant I have known has made that quite clear; they have limits. They need to eat, sleep, fuck—oh, terribly sorry, sir, there I go again, really must put a warning on the door, I tend toward vulgar when I'm rambling, it's a horrible failing of mine—I know someone who can heal injury, even bring someone back from the point of death, but must risk trading places when them to do so.

Yes, there are mutants sitting amongst us at this moment and that is all they are doing. They are not prowling our thoughts, slipping beneath our chairs, roaming about as a roaring lion seeking to devour their prey—they are sitting. They are listening.

Perhaps we might try shutting up and doing the same.

If only so that gentleman in the third row will stop twitching. Really, I did apologize twice.

Professor Charles F. Xavier
Columbia University, March 2, 1960 ©

Жалко, что мне сейчас идти на работу он не дописан пока.