Eileanea hesitated before the gates, then shied away. Or rather, one of her did. Her main self was hidden somewhere safe. However, while she usually was fine sending her clones into danger in her place, she wasn't entirely convinced that she was any safer from this particular danger than she was usually. After all, the clones could die in her place, and she would hurt but she would survive; but they all looked like her. If she humiliated herself, it wouldn't matter if it was a clone or if she had done it in person. She didn't know if someone could literally die of humiliation, but if they could, she doubted even the distance granted by a clone could save her. Well, she supposed if it was too bad... her friends and family all thought she was attending Hofstra university, and one of her clones was there, more or less on autopilot. She supposed if she had to hop a cab or whatever to go back there, she could always attend there, and go back to being a mutant in secret... But here... here being a mutant wouldn't be a thing she had to hide, right? That would be part of what would help her find a group of friends. And even more than doing good, more than anything else, that was what she wanted most. To be part of a group, on the inside. She didn't want to be the queen of the school, or anything. She had no ambitions to be popular, or universally loved. She just wanted to be... liked. To not be teased or bullied, to have a small group of friends that were hers, to have a comfortable place that was her own inside a tight-knit group. But... She had lucked into it when she had moved as a child. Could she really luck into it again? She touched her hair, which was finally growing long again, and allowed herself one greedy wish... to have a group of friends... who never thought cutting their hair was an awesome idea. She didn't want to ever cut it again... but... she would for a group of friends, to have and keep them. It was why she had done it the first time, and since she wound up having to do it anyway, she had learned a lesson. Just do what the group wanted, when they wanted. Her hair would have started growing back that much sooner. She shook her head, still hesitating, still wandering the clone around just outside the gates, not yet braving that first step. She would cut her hair again to fit in... but then... she would also cut her own throat for the same. Not someone else's, but her own. Odd how someone with so many "selves" never learned to be herself, nor did she want to at this point. She looked up at the school, fervently hoping that it would feel like a home... that it could BE a home. A home with friends, a place where she fit. She would be whoever she had to, for that. Swallowing hard, she headed for the gates, and again hesitated...