Rupert’s skin was crawling off of his muscles and sending cold, revolted chills through his blood stream where her fur touched his flesh. He was the idiot who’d offered his arm, though, so he wasn’t about to make himself look like more of an idiot by recoiling. That subdued smile of hers didn’t help matters. It hid her teeth, and gave her face the chance to look more human. No big surprise: it took that chance, spit on it, and rubbed it into the dirt with a clawed foot. This thing that he’d offered his arm to? This thing that he was letting touch him? This thing was a mutant. Raina was one of these, on the inside.

Rupert shook her arm off. It was either that, bend over and vomit on her shoes. “The Stalker bots—oh yeah, they’re just the life of the party.” He swallowed down bile, and dodged her eyes by looking at the struggling James. “Here’s something that will make your day: more police officers have died because of those things than mutants, and that’s counting the camps.” He met her gaze briefly, but couldn’t keep it up. That bagel he’d had wanted out. Rupert swallowed again. He wanted out; out of his conversation. Out of holding a conversation with a biped lioness. He couldn’t think of an out that left his ego intact, though. His pride was more important to him that not puking: his therapist was just going to love that one. She’d call this little revelation ‘progress’. He’d rather call it ‘indigestion’.

(Sorry for the sappy beginning.)

Sara counted the seconds off in her head. Felt odd having contact with a human. In her pat the non violent contact had come from her theft. Her pick pocketing career. Not all of those were all that friendly. People don’t get friendly when you steal from them and they find out. The guards at the, this, camp had always only used contact for abuse. Beatings Sara had no physical marks to show other then the scar around her arm that had formed thanks to her cuff, when ever she healed. There was only one other scar on her body and that was left to her from a similar circumstance. A circumstance that lasted from before Sara could, or would, remember, to when she was a teenager. Then there was a brief thought of her parents. Where she had come from. Sara didn’t know if her parents were mutants as well, or humans. She didn’t know weather to hate them for what they had let happen to her, or mourn for them because the just might of gone through the same thing.

She managed to keep the more close lipped smile through this. Studying her escort’s face as he chose to look away. Tension in his arm rose till he pulled away from her, and she let his arm go. Apart had always felt more natural anyways.

“The Stalker bots—oh yeah, they’re just the life of the party.”

Sara nodded though not really catching the tone in his voice at first. “Worth their weight in gold, I imagine.” The words slipped out between her lips. More like it was worth their weight in gold to get rid of them.

“Here’s something that will make your day: more police officers have died because of those things than mutants, and that’s counting the camps.”

Was she really happy? She wanted to be. Part of her wanted to jump into the air and point an laugh. Serves them right. The other part? She wasn’t sure. “I’m sorry to hear that you humans employ technology that has caused you such loss.” While being truly sincere she wasn’t going to let him forget that this was the doing of his side.

“I’m sorry to hear that you humans employ technology that has caused you such loss.”

Rupert stopped cold, letting James go on without them. Suddenly he didn’t have any trouble turning around and staring straight into the freaks eyes. “Oh, shove a ******* sock in it, mutie. No one asked me if using those things was a good idea, just like no one asked you. The only ones who had a say in this are in the government, and last I checked, there was no restrictions on mutants voting. So tell me, Sara, did you help vote in the Senators that are doing this to your kind and mine? Personally,” he gave a flippant shrug, “I voted for the other guy.” Rupert was beginning to see red, in the literal sense. It was on his hands, his side. It was all over his partner. It wasn’t on the ground yet—that was the last place it ever hit. He closed his eyes, took in a deep breath, and let it out again. Getting worked up over mutants wasn’t a good idea. Really. He hadn’t been seeing a therapist since last year just for kicks. When he opened his eyes, he gave the lioness a brief, tight smile, and a little shake of his head. “This... is not worthy it. Goodbye.” He turned, made sure he had his balance, then started walking away.

((ooc: Feel free to yell after him and/or catch his arm and/or anything else you’d like. Just ‘cause he’s trying to run from having a conversation with you doesn’t mean he’ll succeed. ))

(Alrighty, because you know Sara’s out to bug Ruppy more. )

She let him vent out some more. Even James was suddenly lifting his chin to take in what was being said. Rupert went on about how mutants could still vote. Sara stopped herself from exploding right back at him. Instead she felt her stress build up at the pit of her stomach.

“This... is not worthy it. Goodbye.”

“Hold it!”And he was avoiding the hard part again. No that wasn’t happening. Sara wasn’t just letting him turn around and walk away. She didn’t care if she got shocked for this. One hand reached out to grab him by the shoulder as her feet swiftly stepped around his, so that she now stood in the way of his retreat.

“You’re right. I didn’t vote in the last election. You think things are that easy, don’t you. Last I checked someone, even a mutant, still needed s social security number and a picture ID. Just to participate in their democratic rights.” She managed to keep her voice down but the frustration was still there. Sara doubted she’d get through to Rupert at all, but arguing felt good.

Rupert stared down at the arm on his shoulder. Furry. It was very... furry. There were claws, but there weren’t any bone spikes. That was... strangely comforting. It shouldn’t be, but it was. He left the hand there, and looked into her face. “Miss Nobes,” he asked simply, “have you ever considered Nair?” He was not talking about this. He didn’t care that he’d started it: he was not talking about this. He couldn’t exactly take another breather and count to twenty in the middle of the camps with a freak and a subordinate watching him, so he’d do the next best thing: he’d not talk about this. He wasn’t going to start shouting, he wasn’t going to even approach a rant: he just wasn’t going to talk about this. Any of this. Inane topics might be... inane, but they sure as Hell kept him from getting caught up in something that would leave him wheezing, having a full-blown flashback, and/or saying things that he’d rather not let James over there hear.

Speaking of which: he turned a cold-blooded smile on the guard. “Those clothes aren’t going to deliver themselves, Jimmy.”

(*Has a sudden RP flash back at the word Nair*)

“Miss Nobes, have you ever considered Nair?”

“Yeah it worked better then the razor and shave cream. I don’t suggest the hot wax treatment either, But the period where the hair grows back just isn’t worth any of those.” She recalled the weeks of feeling like she was being pricked all over the place as her hair grew back and made her clothing bunch in all the wrong places even more.

He found another way to avoid her argument. Too bad because she really wanted a better reason to yell.

“Those clothes aren’t going to deliver themselves, Jimmy.”

Sara turned just enough to see James over her shoulder as he suddenly tripped over the bag. He shuffled as fast as he could around the corner.

Rupert couldn’t help but smirk at the fumbling, tripping, hurried guard. “Karma, huh?” He said, mostly to himself, as James went out of sight. Thankfully, the lioness had allowed his bad attempt at a topic change to work. Though the image of her totally furless... He gave a little shudder at that mental picture. “What, did you try to make yourself a little more human?” He impulsively asked, giving himself a shift mental kick once it was out: that had probably opened a whole other can of worms. At least James was moving his G-stringed toush on. With any luck, Rupert could get back to his office without proving to the lioness that he knew how to use his remote.

“What, did you try to make yourself a little more human?”

“Nope, I lost a bet.” He wasn’t giving her satisfaction anymore with a good argument. He was starting to get boring. She shifted her weight so that Rupert could walk through. Silently daring him just to lift a finger in the direction of his remote. Like he’d never shocked Sara before. Then again like Sara had never been shocked before.

Out side James had dumped the bags of cloths while he waited for Sara. The feline was going to pay for his indignity. He lit a cigarette as he waited.

A bet. Right. That answer was disquieting for a moment. It took him a moment to put his finger on why: it was a normal answer, implying that this... lioness had been living her own life, and that life wasn’t much different than any human’s. A small shudder ran up his spine. He was ready to get these freaks out of this camp. Letting them have that sort of normality, though... he’d rather not think about it. He’d rather not think about any of this.

“That’s great,” he said, giving her the most insincere smile he could muster in return for that dare in her eyes, “you have a nice day now. Bye.” He walked past her, back to the guards’ barracks. There was a radio in there, right? He only had an hour left on this shift. It would have to do.

Sara watched Rupert walk by her. Taking her time to watch him begin to leave, before making her way outside. Hadn’t he said she could have the rest of the day off if she had helped him with punching James? Ok so she didn’t help him punch James but because of her, he did manage to get a good kick in. No doubt Sara taking the day off, wasn’t going to happen.

She thought, for a moment about heading the other way, glancing back behind her. The opposite direction James had taken. Problem was once she was found, even if it was the other day, she’d be punished harder. She needed to be the quiet one. The cooperative one. For now.

Accepting her short term fate, Sara made her way out the door. As soon as she walked out James hit the button on his remote and sent her down to the ground with the electricity. He raised his foot preparing to aim for her ribs. Beginning her punishment for making a fool of him.