Time was something that had little hold on Tses' life. Growing up on the streets, months blurred together, and seasons were the only real guiding point to the year at times. It was snowing, must be Winter. It was raining, must be Spring. Months didn't matter, just like birthdays didn't or holidays. She ran off her own calendar, and there were few things that mattered on it.

The blazing days of summer were still clinging to the air, and Tses sat on one of her favorite rooftop perches, enjoying the humid night in blissful ignorance of the world. The riots were over, the city had calmed. But she was still a will-o'-the-wisp, a ghost light flickering through the city guiding whoever she could off the straight and narrow.

She had pick-pocketed a little tonight, stole some candy from the convenience store and had a mouth full of gummy worms as she swung her booted legs over the edge of the building. Occasionally, she'd condense the moonlight stored in her into an energy orb, and drop it onto the unsuspecting pedestrians bellow. Coffee cups were her favorite targets, but at this time of night landing the orb in a hoodie or someones hair was equally satisfying. So with a swing of the soda sitting next to her, she picked her next target and let the orb fall, waiting and watching to see how they'd react.

The night air was nice, holding a small breeze to it but still a little hot for his liking. Normally he wouldn't have been out this late but the cycle of trying to sleep and doing nothing for hours on end had lost its appeal, so he had decided to try and see some of the city at night. and so far it had been working he managed to keep moving and not run into much trouble. 

It seemed to him that finally he might be able to get some sleep. I think I've finally cal- His trail of though was lost as he was knocked backwards by a sudden force on his head. For crying out loud! was one night to much to ask!? He thought angrily. 

The feelings of calm had been replaced by the anger he was more accustomed to, he should have known that something would happen. With it being the city that never sleeps someone was bound to try and start something with him, by their choice or his. He decided to look up after all if the force came from his head then it would most likely be dropped on him. Looking up he couldn't see anyone but he did see what looked like a pair of legs swinging down over the edge. He smiled slightly it looked like he had found his culprit. 

"HEY, YOU WHAT DO YOU THINK YOUR DOING!?" He yelled to the pair of legs on the roof, not caring how weird or absurd he looked and sounded.

Tses was used to people yelling up at her when she dropped explosives on their heads, but she was always amused by the volume some of them could get. Leaning over on her knees so she could see the figure below her, she gave a catty smirk and chuckled slightly at the lone figure. "Is that a rhetorical question? Because I think we both know it's pretty obvious what I'm doing." She rolled her eyes, and chuckled, not caring whether or not he could hear her.

"But if you want me to CLARIFY..." Forming another explosive, she set the fuse so it would explode just short of his face and let it fall. The faint 'pop' resounded up to her perch and she chuckled as she put another gummy worm into her mouth. Then swinging her legs back up, she casually laid back and lounged on the ledge of the roof. Like a cat sunning itself, she shut her eyes and ignored the teen below her. It was clear she didn't care what he did, and she didn't regard him as a threat. But the subtle green bands of light around her arms were only a small part of what made her a fighter. These rooftops were her territory. If he was going to come up here and do something, he would be in her world.

OK that's it He thought as he pulled himself off of the sidewalk. In retrospect he should have seen the second one coming but that didn't stop it from knocking him down, onto the dirty sidewalk. Some people and things he could let slide but this one had just made it personal. After all she, at least it sounded like a she, had mocked him and knocked him down with what could only be her mutation. 

Looking at the building that she was on top of he noticed a fire escape on the side, he immediately made his way over to the fire escape in the ally. Putting a cigarette in his mouth and lighting it as he walked, the way things looked he didn't doubt that he may need it soon. Once he reached the bottom of the fire escape he was thankful to find the ladder down and ready to use, looking at the building he would guess that it wouldn't take long to climb.

He was right reaching the top took at the max a few minutes but he wasn't the quietest person ever, tripping over multiple trash cans and other unsavory items on his ascent. Having successfully reached the top of the building he looked to where he would guess the girl would be, seeing what he could only guess was her he felt a new wave of anger flow over him. 

"And what the heck what the second one for!?" he said not feeling the need to shout, but not hiding the anger in his voice.

Stealth obviously was not her angry victim's forte, and she could clearly hear him climbing up the fire escape, as well as smell the cigarette smoke as he wandered up. Bored and otherwise disinterested, she continued to relax on her perch, continuing to absorb the light from the full moon above her. At this point in her life, danger didn't bother her, fights didn't phase her, and there was little to live for and even less to loose. Heck, she got stabbed in the leg a few weeks prior, and it was nothing more than an annoying sting in her past at this point.

The angry voice that greeted her was like a fly buzzing in her ear at this point.

>>"...what the heck what the second one for!?"

"Laughs." The blond haired female answered with a smirk. She opened one eye and gave him a bored expression, then shut them again and put her hands behind her head. "For being the city that never sleeps, this place is pretty lame. Gotta entertain myself somehow." She drawled, and crossed one booted leg over the other.

Good lord she was annoying, he had hoped that once he reached her she would start to be a bit more serious but there she was just being calm and collected. And that was just making him angrier and angrier. even the comment about entertainment that normally he would have agreed, but it just flew into his head and churned him up. noting that she liked to use her mutation to annoy or hurt people and classed this as fun. she definitely was not on the right side of the law. 

He was past caring now, in the past he would have tried all of the ways to calm down like counting to ten. thinking of lavender, even meditating. But this time he would just skip straight to the remove the annoyance stage. Feeling the tingling heat in his lungs that always came with his mutation he smiled, If she wants fun I'm going to give her fun. He thought as he felt the ash rise into his mouth, Letting it be exhaled out with his breath to surround him. When no more came out he knew it was time, judging by how much he had let out he had roughly enough to cover half his body, and lightly at that. Reaching into his pocket he brought out four more cigarettes, he really didn't want to do it as he would be running low but he had to little ash.

"So you think fights are fun?" He asked as he made the ash start to swirl around his legs, masking some of the light from his legs as they set alight. In his hand he could feel the cigarettes catch fire and burn down. Once he could no longer hold them comfortably he dropped them to get caught in the ash clouds and be assimilated into them. 

The smell of cigarettes was strong as Tses allowed herself to glance back at her companion. What looked like ash was rising from the guys mouth, surrounding him and starting to cover his body. Growing up on the streets, Tses developed a certain tolerance for bad air quality, but that didn't mean it would be pleasant to deal with a bunch of smoke. In his hand he held more cigarettes and lit them, and she studied the effects of his powers, mentally calculating what he was doing. While she wasn't book smart, she was street smart, and in a scuffle she relied on instincts more than anything else. Learning what you could about an opponents strengths and weaknesses kept you alive. Although, sometimes like today, you picked a fight a little prematurely and just waited to see what happened.

The blond haired mutant watched, keeping her expression calm, but letting the green energy flicker on her arms. She smirked slightly and finally sat up, swinging her legs over to the ground and grinning at him. She had a Cheshire cat grin and mischievous demeanor, comparable to Loki or another wayward trouble maker. Not directly malicious, but not entirely kind either.

"Fun? As a matter of fact, I do think they're fun. A good fight makes life less boring." She let the energy crawl lazily across her arms and it flickered like green flames as she stared at it with a calm expression. "Why, you're not having fun yet?" She remarked and tilted her head at him.

That's much better He thought as she stood up and started to turn on her mutation, which if he was right about what he thought it was could be a huge problem. As the strength of his clouds has never really been tested but he was fairly confident that they couldn't withstand an explosion, but the only way to be sure was to try and hope.

"Well personally I like a good fight, helps to blow off some steam." He said letting a slight smile, not the friendly smile but a creepy smirk,which he found works quite well when lit on fire. That being said the smile that she was giving him was quite creepy in itself, with her arms mimicking green flames. he wasn't confident that it was real fire as the previous blasts hadn't burnt him in anyway, but it still looked rather weird.

"Well it looks like we are in agreement, so shall we?" He said as the burn end of his cigarette fell and became part of the swirling clouds below him, from the feel of the clouds they where now up to his mid torso. Which was better than just his legs, and in his opinion more than he needed to deal with this annoying girl. From his past experiences he noted that normally someone broke the stalemate and they normally had the advantage.

So without wasting another moment he made the clouds spin over his shoulder and fly towards the girl, some of the ash he noted glowed slightly where it had spent to much time next to his flames, or it was warmed by the five cigarettes freshly burnt into the clouds. The clouds tore towards the girl covering the distance between them in moments fanning out before her, hoping to bring down an crashing blow. 

Tses fought differently compared to many mutants she'd encountered. While most people relied on their powers to control the outcome of the fight, she tended to lean more towards her natural fighting skills. Long range attacks were the one exception though. Her bo staff was something she reserved for hand to hand fights, and her knife was for emergencies only. Here on the roofs, the advantage was left in the environment, she she utilized what was around her.

When she ash rolled her direction, she did a backflip and landed on one of the air conditioning units, watching to see if the fan would have any effect on the density of the clouds. At the same time, a small portion of the light around her arms condense, and she threw it at her attacker. It would feel about as tough as a good kick, but if he had a good stance it shouldn't knock him over.

"Let's see if you can think fast." She called out from her perch, sending three more explosives his direction. The first was a smaller one directed at his left foot, the second towards his right shoulder and the last right in front of his eyes. They were small stinger style explosives, intended to drive him backwards towards the edge of the roof.

Damn she was faster than he had originally thought, neatly dodging his initial attack and launching her own, unfortunately he was to focused on her and only noted her attack at the last second, attempting to move out the way only served to hit him in the shoulder, it knocked him into a sideways spin landing him clean on the roof, This brought his attention back to the fact that this would not be a one sided fight.

Jumping back to his feet he saw the small glowing orbs much better than the first, jumping to the side at the last minute with one missing his head by inches, he could feel his mind fighting to keep the fan from breaking down the cloud, so far it seemed like he could keep it together but loosely. Opting to change tactics would be the best course of action he thought feeling a slight throbbing in his shoulder.

Wheeling the cloud back to him he split it so that two separate clouds flew past him, catching each with his hand hoping the flames would spark some more glow, although the contact with him lasted for only a second if that he had little or no time to check. Spinning the two clouds around he sent a double attack her way, one cloud going directly forwards and one circling around. At this density he knew they would not pick up someone but the small amount of heat left in them and the speed that they would hit could disorientate and restrict oxygen.

Her opponent recovered quickly, which was a treat, but it also gave her a challenging situation to deal with. She had already fished her bo staff out from her boot and expanded it, and was grateful when his attack changed. The ash split, one cloud moving towards her and the other starting behind her, and she responded by using her staff to pole vault over the nearest cloud, landing in a crouch then spinning her staff quickly at the attacker's legs. Her position left an opening for one of the clouds to knock into her if he could redirect them fast enough, but her experience in a fight kept her light on her feet and for the moment one swing ahead of the sword.

A breath of ash brought a cough to her lungs though and reminded her of how unpleasant that 'sword' would be on contact.

Tses withheld use of her powers at this close range for the moment, ready to use a a kick if the staff didn't work, and ready to jump backwards if he retaliated. It was hard to keep an eye on the clouds behind her, but fighting from a distance in this situation was both helpful and harmful. Running would have looked silly considering she instigated things, but if it came down to it she wouldn't be ashamed to try. Running was a natural part of living on the street. Knowing when you were beat and taking evasive maneuvers was just a way of buying time to fight back.

He hadn't thought that she had concealed weapons, although her use of the staff did make her surrounded and by the sounds of her coughing she just had the first taste of how unpleasant it would be to get hit. Although that staff would be a issue as it gave her more close range than he had, and as such made dodging the low attack difficult. The earlier attack however had left him more observant and he quickly jumped over the swinging staff, It wasn't a perfect jump though and he barely manged to clear the staff.

Upon the landing he went directly into a punch winding it back as he jumped so that it would gain some extra momentum, he could see the flames on his body curling around his fist as he fell so he guessed the fire would make up for what he lacked in brute strength. As he did this the clouds behind her met each other and merged back into one cloud, the slightly hot ashes at the center re sparking each other, as it throttled towards the back it shrunk in size slightly as the ash compacted together forcing the hot ashes closer to the center and the other ashes. This attack he knew would easily lift a person if they got hit and would most likely hurt quite a bit, although the smaller size and slower speed gave them more time to react.

He jumped the attack and sent a punch back, forcing Tses to quickly maneuver her staff into a protective block. She was hoping to at least deflect his hand, but if he hit it wrong, the blow would probably still hurt. Weapons like hers were half the reason she kept her knuckled wrapped and slightly protected. More than one busted knuckle taught you to be careful how you hit something, and the scars on her hands were just a few additions to one ones littering her figure.

The fist seemed like the least of her worries though. Being caught on fire would really put a damper on things. The combination of the flames on his hand and those in the clouds concerned her slightly, but she didn't let that take the cocky twinkle from her expression. Scurrying sideways, her focus had to turn to escaping the cloud, leaving an opening for a more direct attack again. A second bit of coughing reminded her just how close some of his attacks were getting.

"Having fun yet?" She couldn't resist quipping, raising an eyebrow at her companion.

She swept the staff up into a block, not bad and that showed that this was not her first fight. As his fist hit the staff it went sliding sideways slightly, this threw him slightly off balance and jarred him arm. Which was pretty painful he had to admit. She also appeared to have very good reactions having blocked his attack then dodged his cloud. 

"Its a good fight, so yes I am having fun." He replied to her with a smile. He noticed that she coughed again, so maybe she wasn't dodging as well as she seemed to be. the ranged tactic wasn't working fast but at some point they would connect. and that would be that. He made the cloud of ash split again, bringing one of the two clouds to him and spiting it again. so he had three clouds one medium size and two small.

With the small clouds he wrapped one around each hand to serve as cushioning for any blows and for some added kick to his attacks, and he sent the medium cloud racing around to bring up the rear, launching himself into another attack he swung his fist to try and catch the side of her head, with the combination of the flames and now smoldering ash he guessed it would hurt and burn quite a bit. At the same time he brought the cloud around close to the floor to try and disrupt her footing.

Tses wouldn’t have admitted that she was slightly flattered he considering this a ‘good’ fight. She would have felt better if she had already won, and the sentiment wouldn’t have been necessary. But at the same time, the challenge was part of the fun, and just winning outright wouldn’t have been as amusing. As long as she won, perhaps she could appreciate having a strong opponent.

The ash, however, was making the odds feel like they were tilting to his unfair advantage.

How could she fight something that, for an intensive purposes, wasn’t solid? He could hit her with it, but there wasn’t much she could do to deflect it. Or, maybe there was.

Taking his blow with her forearm, she felt the slight heat as the flames contacted the fabric wrappings. Then she realized a large explosive to detonate in the cloud. Her orbs were energy, condensed and then released. She hoped it would, if nothing else, disperse the ash a bit.

If not, she was about to take a quick tumble flat on her back.