Pam placed the potted plant on the rickety looking table and glanced at her mother, hoping for some kind of reaction. When her mother's gaze remained unfocused and cloudy, Pam sat in the visitors chair with a defeated sigh. She hated visiting her mother in this place, in this home that isn't really a home and never could be. Not with the corners of the table sanded down so her mother wouldn't hurt herself, not with the bland white walls.

“You having a good day Mom?” Pam asked. On a good day her mother recognized her. On a bad day it was like trying to have a conversation with a four year old.

“Oh fine, Pam, I'm going to play tennis with Mrs. Miller across the street this afternoon. You be good and take care of your algebra homework before you watch TV, alright?”

Pam didn't bother correcting her mother, its wasn't worth it. “Sure, Mom, I will.”

She lets her mother talk for a while, nodding and throwing in a word of agreement every once and a while. It was easier to just let her babble and, Pam thought, perhaps a bit foolishly, that it made her mother feel better too.

“I have to go Mom,” she finally announced after thirty minutes were up. “I have work.”

“Oh Pam, wait, before you go...” Her mother's hands clasped hers and there was a desperate look on her mother's face. “Can you make the room go away? Like before?”

Pam nervously glanced towards the door where a guard was pacing rather lazily, Pam doubted he paid much attention to their conversation. “Mom, did you tell anyone I can make the room go away?”

“Oh no dear, I did promise after all.”

It was sad and sweet that her mother had forgotten so much about her own life, but still remembered when to keep a promise. Pam's resolve shattered and she shifted in her seat, focusing.

“Okay, close your eyes.” Her mother did so. “Can you see what you want the room to be?”

“Oh let's do the lake house this time, Pam.”

Pam smiled as she closed her own eyes. “Okay. The lake house.”

In her mind's eyes Pam pictured the living room of their lake house down to the smallest detail possible. She reached out to her mother's mind and filled in the gaps in her own image. When she was satisfied, Pam opened her eyes.

“You can open your eyes now, Mom.”

The white walls, the rounded off and rickety table were both gone. Replaced by a rustic cabin with a fire place and soft plaid sofa. Pam's mother was beaming with joy and Pam allowed herself a smile when she saw happy she was.

“Thank you, Pam,” she said, fascinated by the fragile and intricate dollies on the coffee table.

“You're welcome Mom.” Pam picked up her bag and stood. “Now, I don't know how long it'll last this time, but maybe I'll do it again when I visit next week.”

Her mother just nodded and Pam headed for the door, knowing it was time to leave her mother alone with what was left of her sanity. Pam knocked on the door and the guard opened it from the outside. He glanced at Pam's mother, who appeared to him to be intrigued by thin air.

“I think she's having a hallucination,” Pam explained and the guard just nodded. He let Pam past and she didn't let herself breath until she made it outside of the hospital and into her own car.


She did it for the first time when she was sixteen. When everyone else around her was discovering their own bodies, or someone else's, Pam was discovering the strength of her own mind. She developed a photographic memory and an interest in art. It was a normal hobby at first, she'd sketch and paint and her parents would ooh and aah in all the right places.

The first time she had an inkling it might be something more powerful was when her social studies teacher was giving a lecture on the river Ganges in India. He had traveled there many times, and was describing everything for the class in the most vivid of details. Pam was only half listening and allowed her mind to wander. Her professors words blended in to the background and soon Pam found she could see images before her as her professor spoke. She saw what her teacher was describing, only clearer, crisper, more real. When her teacher incorrectly recalled a pattern on a basket he saw a guru weaving, Pam corrected him.

She couldn't understand why the class laughed or why her teacher looked so horrified and confused. It wasn't until later, when the teacher admitted Pam was right, that she started to think that maybe she'd accidentally read his mind. Afterwards she tested the theory. She found if she concentrated she could see images of what people were thinking, never words, always images. Pam was a little anxious about her discovery, but figured as long as she kept her mind out of everyone else's, it would be okay.

Then at the homecoming dance, she'd gotten so carried away in dancing with Roy to one song, she started to imagine a different setting for their beautiful dance. Soon the dance floor was surrounded not by balloons, but by darkened woods and above were real stars instead of cheap string lights. The dance ended and when Pam realized she'd somehow made every other student see the same thing she did, she ran from the ball room.

Luckily enough someone started the rumor the punch had been spiked with something stronger then alcohol and everyone managed to laugh it off as an accidental adventure with ecstasy. And Pam added the ability to create mass hallucinations to her list of strange abilities.

Pam thought about telling her parents and more then once she thought maybe she was just going insane. Years past and her 'gifts' refused to go away. It wasn't until she was in college and suddenly the whole world was talking about evolution and mutants that Pam began to think maybe she was part of something bigger then herself. When the news first broke, regular humans now with special powers, Pam thought about telling someone. Roy, her parents, a professor, a psychiatrist, a doctor, anyone. She actually went as far as to schedule a doctor's appointment, but then the tide of intrigue turned to hate and mutant was suddenly a dirty word that meant different and dangerous.

So Pam learned not to talk about it, to ignore it. For the most part, she was successful. She and Roy were engaged and she was content, if not happy, with her job at Dunder Mifflin as receptionist. Working hard, loving Roy, it made her forget.

That is until she found out about Jim.

She hadn't meant to spy. Jim had gotten up from his seat and gone to the kitchen for more coffee and her eyes naturally followed him. They had been joking that morning about what would happen if they replaced the water in the coffee machine with soda and she wondered if Jim had finally decided to go ahead and try. Despite the fact that he and Pam had agreed the result would be super caffeinated but probably taste like dirt.

Pam watched Jim carefully pour coffee into his mug and then shift the pot back into the machine. Something must have slipped or maybe the pot was heavier then Jim thought, because somewhere along the way he lost his grip. The coffee pot tiped off the counter and was flying towards the floor.

Pam barely got out a gasp before the pot froze where it was, in mid air. It righted itself and quickly zipped back into place in the coffee machine. Jim brought his hand back to his side and looked around nervously. Pam forced herself to stare at her desk, her heart beating a mile a minute.

It had looked like Jim stopped the pot, as if somehow he had made it freeze in the middle of its stumble and return from where it came. Was that possible? It was then that Pam reminded herself that if she could see imagines in people's minds and create hallucinations that it was altogether possible for Jim to be able to move objects with his mind.

Ever since that day, Pam had been watching Jim closely, purely to try and gather more proof. She daydreamed sometimes about telling him about what she could do, imagining that afterward he would confide in her and she'd finally have someone who understood what it meant to be on the outside, looking in.


That night she was surprised when Roy turned on the news as they sat down to dinner. She'd long ago accepted that TV was a must for Roy when he was eating, but it was usually the Simpson's, not CNN.

“Why the news?” she asked, trying not to sound too shocked.

“Guys in the warehouse were talking about this bill that might get passed tomorrow. Supposed to be a special on it tonight.”

Pam was shocked. Roy never had an interest in politics. “What is--”

“Ssh, its on.” Roy leaned attentively towards the TV, ignoring Pam.

Pam stared down at her plate, rearranging her vegetables in alphabetical order. She was trying to block out the sound of the TV and the images in Roy's head, he was almost always thinking of something inappropriate, when the voice-over on the news program hit a low, critical tone and for some reason it knocked Pam out of her daydreaming.

“...tomorrow the bill goes to the floor of the Senate. If the Senate approves the bill then it's on to the President for his signature. The Mutant Registration Act has been in committee for years now, but its only just gained the congressional support it needed to get pushed through...”

She knocked over her glass of soda and scrambled to pick up the shards of broken glass from the table and carpet below. Roy didn't even twitch. Pam knelt down and stared at the growing stain on the carpet. Mutant Registration Act? The name was self explanatory, Pam would have to go somewhere, to some government building and let herself be poked and prodded at. In the end they'd give her a number and a file and she'd be black listed for the rest of her life.

“I can't...this can't be happening...”

“You okay babe?”

She nearly hit her head on the table on the way up, but she did her best to appear nonchalant for Roy. “Oh yeah. Fine.”

“If the bill passes, mutant members of the population will have until the twelfth of December to report to a to be determined government facility for processing.”

“Processing,” Pam can't help but fume. “Like...they're computers or something instead of people.”

Roy just snorted. “Guess so.”

“Do you think...” she faltered, not really wanting to know his answer. “Do you think they deserve that? The mutants?”

Roy shrugged and looked thoughtful. “I'm not sure. I mean, its just paper work Pam. They'r e just going to get a different...state ID or something. And some of those mutants are dangerous. They need to be checked up on.”

Pam picked up her dinner plate, suddenly not so hungry anymore. “Yeah, I...I guess you're right.”


The next day at work Pam was practically twitching with a desire to talk to Jim about the Mutant Registration. She nearly brought it up at lunch, but the subject wasn't very appetizing and Jim had just finished spending five minutes talking about how much he was looking forward to the turkey sandwich he packed.

“You're this excited about a sandwich?” Pam asked, laughing.

“I find joy in the little things, Beesley,” Jim admitted, not at all ashamed. “Its what makes life worth living.”

“Turkey sandwiches.”

“Exactly.”

So she waited. Specifically she waited until it was almost two, when Jim always takes his break. She got up from her desk at 1:59 on the dot and started towards Jim's desk. Her path was blocked when an overly excited Michael burst into the bullpen.

“Conference Room! Everyone! Now!”

“Why?” came an exasperated voice Pam recognized as Stanley's.

“That Mutant whatever-y bill vote is going on. Democracy in action people! Conference Room!”

Pam followed everyone into the room, hoping she didn't look as sick as she felt.

In the end she could only stand to watch some of the voting until she had to get up and leave. She went to the kitchen and, hands shaking, tried to boil some water for tea. She wasn't sure how long she spent standing there, staring at the kettle, waiting for it to boil.

She heard the door open and glanced up to see Jim standing in the doorway, looking worried.

“You alright?”

She sniffled back her tears and nodded. “Yeah I'm...fine.” Pam sighed. “Is it over yet?”

“They're still voting, but the thing passed a majority two aye's ago.”

“It passed? Its...law?”

He nodded. She turned away as she felt the tears well up in her eyes again. “Hey Pam, its okay.”

“No, its not,” She laughed bitterly through a sob. “Jim I have to tell you something.”

He brought a hand up to rest on her shoulder, warm and supportive. Pam felt herself relax into him just a bit. “Okay. You can tell me.”

She laughed again and turned to face him. “I...I know. I'm just scared. This stupid bill has me scared.”

Jim suddenly pulled away and for a moment Pam panicked. She relaxed a little when she saw all he was doing was pulling the blinds shut and bringing a chair over to prop against the door knob, jamming it so no one could possibly come in.

He turned back around and something about his face was different, he look resigned but also, determined.

“I think I know what you're talking about, Pam.”

“You do? What--”

“Was it the time I threw Dwight's bobble head right into the trash can from across the bullpen? I thought I could just shake that off as talent but--”

“No, wait, Jim, what are you talking--”

“No, wait, I know. It was the time Dwight's chair wouldn't stay under him, right? You noticed me moving it?”

“Moving it?”

“With my mind.”

Pam's eyes went wide and Jim instantly knew the mistake he'd made.

“Shit. You didn't know.”

“Well I had an inkling...”

Jim paused and chewed on his lip as he searched his memory. “Ah. Coffee pot?”

“Coffee pot.”

“Of course. The one I didn't mention.”

They both dissolved into laughter for a moment, more out of pure relief then amusement.

“So if you didn't know about me...what were you talking about?”

“Oh, uh, I was talking about me.”

His excitement surprised her. He grasped one of her hands and leaned closer with interest. “You? You're a mutant?”

Pam had avoided the label for so long that her immediate reaction was to tense up. Jim must have noticed because one of his hands moved from atop hers to her shoulder, rubbing a little in the vain hope to calm her. “I...yes.”

'What can,” Jim glanced around once more to make sure they were still alone. “I mean, what can you...do?”

“Um, okay, I'll show you,” she said. Her voice was shaking a little from nerves. “Can you...okay picture a...place in your mind.”

“Alright. Got it.”

Pam smiled when she saw his picture. “The roof? Very original.” The surprised look on his face made her giggle. “Okay, close your eyes now.”

“Okay closing them.”

The break room slowly dissolved around them into the roof at night complete with fold out chairs and plates of grilled cheese.

“Alright, open.”

Jim's eyes flew open and got wider as he took in the sights around him. “Woah. Are we...on the roof?”

“No,” she laughed. “We're still in the break room. I can...create illusions and convince people they're real. I can do more outrageous stuff, I just usually stick to simple.”

“Outrageous huh?”

“I sense a challenge.”

Jim pondered this for a long moment before beaming at Pam. “Dragon.”

“What?”

“You said you could make an illusion of anything. I want a Dragon.”

Pam rolled her eyes. “This is some kind of child hood fantasy isn't it?”

“Damn right.”

“Okay. Dragon.” Pam closed her eyes and concentrated best she could on an image of a dragon. When she opened her eyes she found Jim doubled over, laughing.

The dragon she'd created was curled up on one of the folding chairs of her roof illusion. He was purple and green and...oddly familiar.

“You created Puff the Magic Dragon!”

Pam blushed. “It was the only Dragon I could think of!”

“No, don't get me wrong, its very nice,” Jim laughed. “Very cuddly.”

“Oh suck it, Halpert,” Pam spat and the illusion around them faded away, the break room coming back into view.

“Seriously, Pam,” Jim started, his laughter fading. “That's pretty...impressive.”

“Thanks.” She said with a smile. They lapsed into a comfortable silence and after a long moment, Pam took a step closer to Jim. “What's going to happen now, Jim?”

“With the registration act you mean?”

“Yeah.”

Jim sighed and ran a hand through his hair. “I don't know. Will you register?”

“Do we have a choice?”

“We should have a choice. We're supposed to have a choice.”

Pam's gaze drifted to her feet. “The whole thing...its freaking me out a little.”

“Hey,” Jim's voice was soft and this time he wrapped a whole arm around Pam's small shoulders. “Its okay. You're not alone in this. Not anymore.”

Pam smiled at Jim and felt the surge of relief she'd been waiting for since she was sixteen.

TBC...