Jaager Worldwide had a respectable skyscraper downtown. Jiri craned his neck back and back, and watched the reflection of clouds going past its windows. Very modern, very stylish. A little intimidating. Was he dressed okay? He was wearing black slacks and a white shirt, he'd even borrowed a tie from one of the older kids, but it felt like he was playing dress up more than anything. The closest he'd come to stepping foot in a corporate office was going into a bank. This was on a whole different scale.

He was totally getting class credit for this.

He'd peppered every mutant-run business in town with emails, in the hopes that someone had a soft spot for li'l mutie high schoolers doing a school project. Little fish, big fish, he'd hit them all--Java Jimmy's, Insomniacs Anonymous, Faust Pharmaceuticals...

And one of the biggest fish by far, Jaager Worldwide.

He'd dropped a hook baited with corn off a dock, and reeled in a lake monster. Mr. Jaager's PR department had been thrilled to hear from him, had informed them of their continuing campaign to connect with local schools and charities and put a human face on their business, and would Tuesday at 9:30 work for him, because Mr. Jaager had a cancellation and Madeline could slot him in--

It had happened really, really fast. With corporate efficiency. He took a moment to finger comb his hair in his reflection off the lobby windows, then pushed through the spinning doors. Cool air greeted him inside, and polished tiles, and air-quality-friendly potted plants tucked between casually artistic arrangements of chairs. He would not be surprised to find a koi pond somewhere in here. It looked like that kind of place.

He straightened his tie, hiked his backpack further up his shoulder, and approached the front desk.

"Umm, they said to ask for Madeline? Mr. Jaager's secretary? I'm Jiri. O'Leary. His nine-thirty?"

The receptionist gave him an off course smile, and called upstairs. He barely had time to sit in the offered chair before the elevator doors dinged open and a tiger walked out.

A white tiger in a black business suit. The employee badge clipped at her waist marked her as Madeline. She walked like a jungle in stiletto heels, and shook his head with immaculately groomed fur and just a hint of claws against his wrist.

"A pleasure to meet you, Mr. O'Leary. We've got you set up in the Midgard conference room."

" 'Set up'?" He trailed her back into the elevator.

Her smile was a flash of perfectly straight, perfectly inhuman teeth. "PR prefers if you use their camera. Better resolution than the one you've been using. Do you need make up?"

"Umm no, I usually stay behind the--"

"Good," a single claw click punctuated the word, as she pressed the button for their floor. "I abhor men who hide behind makeup, don't you?"

"Umm." Ummmmm. The doors dinged open again.

"Right this way, Mr. O'Leary." 

He followed her stripped tail down the hall, to where a team of techies had already set up a laptop and camera for him. Yeah. Yeah, they did look a lot better than his. He tucked his bag down at his feet as he sat in one of the leather chairs, and slid it out of sight under the table. 

"Water? Coffee?"

"Tea?" Jiri asked. 

"Tea." Her teeth flashed again. "Mr. Jaager will be right with you."

"Okay." Okay. The tiger woman sashayed out, and techies unconsciously scrambled to give her a respectful space as they finished the hook up. 

If that was the secretary, what was Jaager? A force of nature?

"Mr. Jaager?" Ambrose glanced up from where he sat at his mahogany desk, typing away at his laptop. His secretary stood framed in the doorway, looking at him with the same distasteful look she reserved for all interactions with her boss.

"Ah, Ms. Brass," he said. "My nine-thirty is here, I presume?" She nodded, and as Ambrose got up and walked over to her, shoved a folder in the most polite and respectful way possible at him.

"Jiri O'Leary," she told him, fangs flashing as she smiled and he skimmed through the folder's contents. "We checked him out - he seems to be a mutant as well, and a body-snatcher at that, from what we could find. The only criminal activity on his record was when he stabbed somebody in his school with a plastic knife, but apparently that was related to the manifestation of his mutation, which he was unaware of at the time. So, from what we gather, he's safe. And he has no harmful intentions toward you that I could gather." Ah, the joys of having a white tiger empath in your employment. Ambrose knew PR cut no corners when arranging press meetings or interviews of this sort, but Madeline was merely his fallback plan should PR fall through.

This, as Ambrose's public appearances usually were, was also one of PR's ideas - he'd been drilled for hours on what to and what not to say. He knew what topics were taboo and to stray away from, because people would definitely ask, but he was ready. So he followed Madeline into the elevator and down to the Midgard conference room - and he smiled a bit to himself, aware of the irony of the name and the amusement he'd felt when Madeline had wryly suggested it to him - where he found a rather nervous-looking teenager sitting at the conference table, surrounded by technicians setting up the camera and computers.

"Mr. O'Leary!" Ambrose said upon catching sight of his interviewer, smiling and nearing him, extending a hand to shake. "Ambrose Jaager. Though I suppose you knew that already." He was wearing his usual suit, but his usual color-changing contacts were out - he had clear ones in instead, making his yellow irises very visible, and his wings were held out in such a way that they could be seen, but were not obviously present. The spikes studded along his back now had openings of their own, added when he'd briefly complained about how the fabric was too tight. Madeline had told him to stop whining, but his tailor had immediately made the adjustments because he had been a nicer person.

Ambrose settled himself into a chair, folding his hands in his lap and looking at Jiri. "We can start when you're ready, I suppose - you have been briefed on what topics we'd prefer you to stray away from, correct?"

Jiri hurried to stand as Mr. Jaager entered, tripping a little over his chair.

"It's a pleasure to meet you, Sir." He accepted the offered hand. Was he shaking too hard? Too soft? Mr. Jaager seemed so nice, so natural, that it made the teenager even more aware of how weird it was to be greeting an international business tycoon. 

A few weeks ago--even a few days ago--he might have spent too long staring at the man. Jiri had looked up pictures online, of course, but the man was just... more in person. His wings seemed bigger than they did in corporate photos, his eyes were a wolfish yellow Jiri didn't remember noticing at all before. In person, it was really obvious.

He'd seen worse since he'd come to the Mansion, though, like eight foot tall girls who'd step on a sleeping guy and kids who oozed glue. Heck, it was just a few days ago he'd met Victor. Giant one-eyed four-armed tangerine-colored monster, anyone? There had even been a black dragon on the Mansion grounds that one day. When Jiri still thought he was human, if he'd seen someone like Ambrose Jaager walking down the street, he'd have ever-so-casually crossed to the other side. He felt like he'd built up some kind of tolerance, during his brief time at the Mansion. He could look at a guy with predator eyes and wings that didn't exactly belong to an angel, shake his hand, and think to himself you're not so scary.

Besides, it was hard to be intimidated by Mr. Jaager--he was just so civilized. Plus, Jiri totally had an inch or two on him. 

To be fair, the CEO of Jaager Worldwide had a couple hundred dollars on Jiri, when it came to the wardrobe department. So. They could just call that one a wash, then.

He sat when the older man sat. That seemed like the thing to do. The techies were clearing out now, and somehow, sometime, Madeline had slipped a cup of black tea at his elbow without him noticing.

"Yeah," he said. "Basically, keep things light and fluffy, no giving away company secrets or getting into heavy politics, right?"

He waited for the man's response, then got himself logged in, and adjusted the camera a little.

"All right. You ready to go? Remember, the internet can be stupid, so if you want to avoid a question, just facepalm. They'll get it." This brief tutorial on internet etiquette complete, Jiri grinned and took them live.

"Hi again, Internet. InvasionOfTheBS back again. We interrupt our regularly scheduled Xavier interviews to bring you Ambrose Jaager, titan of Jaager International. I see there's kind of a lot of questions piled on already, so remember to upvote things, okay? And don't forget to 'like' Jaager Worldwide on Facebook, and yes the PR people asked me to say that." He grinned a cheeky grin, even though the folks online couldn't see it. The camera was pointed at Mr. Jaager alone, and it was going to stay that way.

"So, Mr. Jaager, first question. 'How did you become a CEO so young?' "

"What's it like being a mutant CEO? Do you get the same respect as humans in your position?"

"mmmmmmmmmm n sorry my cat was typing but that reminds me could you take off your shirt? So we can see your mutation better." Jiri very carefully enunciated that one, to give the full effect of The Internet.

The boy was adorable. He seemed rather intimidated, once faced with Ambrose's presence - Madeline told him once that he had that effect on people. Apparently, he was so nice that he freaked people out.

He wasn't really sure what she meant by that, but like how she treated most of what he said, he ignored her.

"Yeah," Jiri said. "Basically, keep things light and fluffy, no giving away company secrets or getting into heavy politics, right?"

"That's one significantly more concise way to put it," he responded, and watched as Jiri got himself settled in in preparation.

"All right. You ready to go? Remember, the internet can be stupid, so if you want to avoid a question, just facepalm. They'll get it." Well, he wasn't that old. He knew how the Internet worked, but he certainly wasn't going to facepalm. That was so... plebeian. And would likely become a GIF that would haunt him for the rest of his life. So no, no facepalming. But he understood the gist of what Jiri was trying to get across.

As Jiri started to introduce himself behind the camera, and who his guest was today, Ambrose glanced at the screen on the camera where he could see himself sitting in the chair, the gorgeous view of New York City's skyline stretching out behind him. Somewhere out there were the idiots who were likely going to ask him rather stupid questions, and he couldn't help but feel a faint homicidal urge nudging the back of his mind, but Jiri asked the first round of questions before he could consider it more.

"So, Mr. Jaager, first question. 'How did you become a CEO so young?'" Well, that one was easy. He'd been asked the very same thing on tons of interviews.

"Hard work," he said, shrugging slightly. "I know many people accuse me of having inherited everything from my father and my grandfather before him, and that is partially true. Without them, I wouldn't be where I am now - I probably wouldn't even be living in America. But I wouldn't be able to continue their legacy without working so hard on my own. I was not handed this position on a silver platter - I worked my way up to it. Some of you may know that my father, the last CEO, died before his time, and I was one of many candidates to be finally picked for the job." He'd gone to uni to get a series of degrees and everything. And making many of the other candidates "disappear" had taken plenty of effort, too.

"What's it like being a mutant CEO? Do you get the same respect as humans in your position?"

"Depends on who you ask," he responded. "Some will claim that I'm a monster taking a role only humans should have; others say that I'm a force for good in the mutant community and lead by example. There will always be people who dislike who I am and what I do - for example, female CEOs often struggle due to criticisms of their gender. I receive very similar criticism due to my species, but I don't let it affect me. Sure, as a mutant, I may have more critics than human minorities, but I don't let it affect me. After all, if they could do better than me simply by being human, than I wouldn't be the one running JW today."

"mmmmmmmmmm n sorry my cat was typing but that reminds me could you take off your shirt? So we can see your mutation better." Ambrose frowned slightly in surprise and glanced over at Jiri, who seemed to be enjoying himself far too much as he enunciated every word with great accuracy. So these were the lows the Internet could steep to - asking respected business tycoons to strip on camera for their own amusement.

Sighing, Ambrose stood up and shrugged off his suit jacket, hanging it on the back of his chair.

It wasn't like it was embarrassing or anything, Ambrose reflected as he carefully undid his tie, folding it and laying it on the table. He wasn't unfit - his nightly misadventures saw to that, because his monster form being physically fit meant that his human form was too - and he had been told repeatedly, often by random people on the street or on the Internet, that he was attractive. And he knew about fangirls, he considered as he started to unbutton his shirt. He'd been told to appeal to them. He supposed this was what that meant.

He blatantly ignored the horrified look on Madeline's face as she watched, from behind the camera, through one of the glass walls of the conference room.

He neatly folded the shirt and placed the tie on top of it, sitting back down just as properly as he had before. But now he leaned back and crossed his legs, propping the ankle of one leg onto the knee of the other, and extended his wings in a way that they wrapped around him and were even more visible than they had been. The green veins extending from the wings and spines were faintly visible, the edges just wrapping around his torso.

"Happy?" he asked, almost bored, and tried oh-so-hard to keep from laughing as Madeline held up something with "ONCE IT'S ON THE INTERNET IT NEVER GOES AWAY YOU DUMBASS" scrawled on it. And he was well aware of that, anyway.

It just didn't mean he cared.

It was nice to work with someone who understood basic technology, for once. Alex hadn't even grasped the concept that a live chat could be recorded, and Ghost hadn't been able to identify a webcam when it was literally right in front of her. Mr. Jaager had sort of a patient you don't need to be explaining this, but I'm too polite to interrupt air that was really, really refreshing. Finally, he was among a digital peer.

His answer to the 'young CEO' question was so by the book that Jiri couldn't help but give a lop-sided grin over the camera. The sort of knowing grin that said between you and me, how much of that was scripted by PR? It was even framed like a speech: the 'hard work' thesis came first, accompanied by its supporting bullet points of humility, legacy, and tragedy. And let's not forget the subtle 'Murica! worked in, there. A true thing of beauty. Jiri leaned back, hands crossed over his stomach, admiring the work of an expert orator. It was a little worrying, actually. If Mr. Jaager kept up the perfect business man poise, it would be a good PR segment, but it wouldn't get passed around much outside the people currently present at the chat. PC soundbites didn't make videos go viral--

Was he

He was actually

Jiri held his breath, along with the rest of The Internet.

He was

He sighed first like he understood exactly how stupid this was and then he did it anyway, that sigh made everything so much better.

Ambrose Jaager, twenty-five, CEO of a globe-spanning corporation, took of his shirt. One little button at a time. And his suit, and his tie. He folded them neatly where the camera could see and sat back down, his wings doing nothing to hide dem abs. The chat's words, not Jiri's. Just to be clear.

What a smug, confident bastard.

Jiri wanted to be him when he grew up. 

"Mr. Jaager," the teenager said, not even caring when his voice cracked a little in the middle. "On behalf of the internet, let me proclaim our viewers very happy."

There was a surge of questions and comments. Jiri tried, very hard, to keep the laughter out of his voice as he cherry picked a few.

"Now that you're comfortable again, Mr. Jaager, we have some new questions. Ahem:"

"Does your PR department recommend tattoo artists that can do your wings, I want some."

"What music do you want on the video of that suit coming off, I'm editing the clip right now."

"Cherry blossom petals or anime sparkles in the background, I'm editing it too."

"Do you have a license to hunt fan girls or was that poaching?"

Madeleine was behind were Jiri sat, so he didn't see her sign. It was just as well--there was very little keeping him from dissolving into laughter right now, and he didn't know if he'd be able to stop once he'd started.

Madeline was flipping him off now. Ambrose himself was trying oh so hard not to smirk.

"Mr. Jaager, on behalf of the Internet, let me proclaim our viewers very happy."

"I aim to please," Ambrose said, almost modestly. "It was getting a little hot in here, after all." He could see Madeline visibly cringing as she typed away on a tablet she'd somehow conjured, and now she held it up to show some social media site. She'd searched the tag "ambrose jaager," apparently, and already the page was filled with GIFs of him stripping. Well, that had been quick. The next thing she held up was another note, this one reading "ALL OF THE BUILDING IS WATCHING. ALL THE STRAIGHT WOMEN AND HALF THE STRAIGHT MEN ARE ESSENTIALLY HAVING HEART ATTACKS RIGHT NOW." Ambrose smiled, the corner of his mouth twitching up, at that. Madeline looked horrified, as being an empath, she was privy firsthand to the emotions that they felt about him and she would very much wish to avoid.

"Now that you're comfortable again, Mr. Jaager, we have some new questions. Ahem. Does your PR department recommend tattoo artists that can do your wings, I want some."

"Not that I know of," Ambrose answered apologetically. "I'd suggest getting a tattoo of something else, though. I doubt that whatever you could get would be quite as... inspiring, as the real thing."

"What music do you want on the video of that suit coming off, I'm editing the clip right now."

"Uptown Funk," Ambrose helpfully supplied. "I think the chorus is quite accurate."

"Cherry blossom petals or anime sparkles in the background, I'm editing it too."

"Both. Why choose one or the other?"

And finally. "Do you have a license to hunt fan girls or was that poaching?"

"No license, I'm afraid," he said not-at-all-apologetically yet still managing to sound sincere. "I have plenty of experience, though, so I hope that counts for something."

There was a tap on the glass wall of the conference room. Madeline with another sign, staring Ambrose down - "YOU DISGUST ME." Ambrose outright smiled at her, and she huffed, rolling her eyes and moving over to where Ambrose now realized that all the techies and Madeline were crowded around a computer, watching the entire thing as it happened. So she hadn't been joking when she told him the entire building was watching. Not many CEOs could say that their entire company had seen them strip on camera for the Internet - that was an achievement. Probably. He had rather low standards when it came to good things he'd done on camera.

This man was amazing. Inspiring. Unbelievable. Maybe it was just the last word that Jiri was reaching for--maybe it was all three, simultaneously. His sincerity, his deadpan, the magnificence with which he 

Jiri finally caught on to what was happening behind him, the interplay between the man and his secretary. He shoved a hand over his mouth, and shook with wordless mirth. There was a notepad on the table near him--one of those big legal ledger ones. Jiri dragged it over, and scrawled a note to her in pen before holding it up: "Don't worry, the Internet will be gentle."

Whether Ambrose Jaager would be gentle with the Internet was another matter entirely. 

"Are you single?"

"Do you find it hard to date with your mutation?"

"Do you find people attracted to your mutation and not to you?"

"Are you going to leave some girls for the rest of us or are you staking claim on your internet harem here and now?"

It seemed Jiri had caught on to the little exchange that he and Madeline were having, as he was shaking with laughter before writing a note himself to show her. She looked rather disgruntled, scrawling something else - "YOU'RE RADIATING SMUGNESS; DON'T EVEN NEED TO BE AN EMPATH TO SEE THAT" - before returning for good to crowd around the laptop streaming Ambrose's AMA. He could see her typing away, and that worried him just a bit. Jiri asked the next question before he could so much as consider what she might be doing.

"Are you single?"

"Single and pansexual. Ladies, you may have some more competition now." That was a relatively well-known fact - his sexuality was usually glossed over in favor of talking about his near-prodigal rise to the head of his father's company as well as his mutation - but it was definitely out there.

"Do you find it hard to date with your mutation?"

"Some people are interested in it, some people dislike it, some people don't care," he said offhandedly. "I don't really date that often - too busy for that - but it hasn't been a problem."

"Do you find people attracted to your mutation and not to you?"

"All I will say," Ambrose said, choosing his words very carefully, "is that there is a forum for this sort of thing, and I have a thread with over two thousand posts." He was just going to leave it at that.

"Are you going to leave some girls for the rest of us or are you staking claim on your internet harem here and now?"

"Like I said, my preferences are not limited to girls. My internet harem cannot be solely female - but that is all I will say, in addition to the fact that I have no control over what you do as individuals. Or as a group, if you wish to do so."

God, why was he encouraging the Internet? It was a terrible idea to encourage the Internet. He was too far gone now, though. Eh, he'd just wait it out and hope the backlash wasn't too terrible.

Jiri could see why Mr. Jaager kept his secretary around. The tiger was an excellent straight man to... to whatever this was. Could they make this into a reality show? Like, just have cameras follow Ambrose and Madeline through a normal workday? It would have sounded boring to him an hour ago. Now, it was sounding like something he'd pay good money to see. Also, the woman was an empath? So... she could actually feel that amusement that was written all over her boss' face? That had to be like rubbing salt in the wound. Hilarious, hilarious salt.

This interview was not going where he'd expected. Or where the internet had expected. Where the internet had hoped, maybe, but not where anyone reasonable could have expected.

Jiri didn't even know what pansexual meant, but the volume of comments in the chat had just about doubled between the shirt stripping and that comment, and it was a whole new crowd. A crowd that near-instantly dug up that unnamed forum and its thread, and shared the link with each other. He had no doubt this would help the "over 2,000 comments" count.

>> "Or as a group, if you wish to do so."

It took Jiri's mind a moment to even process that one. Good God. So that's what his naivety being torn away felt like. He shoved his palm over his mouth again, desperately trying not to laugh. Finally, barely, he got himself under control enough to gasp out the next set of questions. There was a certain theme to them.

"You wake up in bed next to a hideous slug mutant who is smoking a cigarette. What do you say to him/her/it?"

"You meet Bruce Wayne at a bar. What pick up line do you use?"

"Would you agree to a charity pinup calendar photoshoot? To support orphans. And puppies."

Maybe he needed to back off a little bit in the "break the internet" department. Just a little.

"You wake up in bed next to a hideous slug mutant who is smoking a cigarette. What do you say to him/her/it?"

He frowned slightly, pondering his answer. Maybe he was taking that one a bit too seriously, but he was a businessman. He was supposed to take everything seriously. "Breakfast?" he responded cautiously. It wouldn't hurt to be polite. The looks of whoever it was didn't matter - one never did anything as atrocious as abandon somebody who you had clearly slept with the next morning.

"You meet Bruce Wayne at a bar. What pick up line do you use?" Bruce Wayne - Batman? Oh, he knew this. He knew all the superhero-related pick-up lines. It never hurt to know some, after all.

"Are you Batman, because you're Robin my heart," he said smugly, and tried to resist the urge to let a smirk show.

"Would you agree to a charity pinup calendar photoshoot? To support orphans. And puppies."

"For orphans and puppies?" Ambrose asked, raising an eyebrow slightly. "Of course. What kind of man do you take me for? But I don't think I could beat - who was it - Bone Bikini girl, though, in the moat-sold mutant pinup calendars department."

Somewhere on the internet, a hideous slug mutant swooned. Jiri grinned on his or her behalf. This guy was hilarious. Was this what corporate America was really like? At a certain pay scale, could you just relax, lean back in your chair, and say whatever you wanted? Because Jiri wanted in. Hopefully the Mansion had internship programs with Jaager Worldwide, because Ambrose was his new hero.

...He admired the man enough to forgive that godawful pun, even. And the fact that the CEO had clearly memorized it. For what? For just this occasion? In the hopes that someone would set up the joke for him, and he'd be ready to knock them down?

The internet was also hell bent on figuring out whether the man was serious about the calendar or just teasing. Like this entire interview was teasing. Jiri didn't even dare look back at the tiger secretary--seeing the look in her eyes was a terrifying prospect.

He read the next batch of questions, and almost kept a straight face doing so.

"Did you perfect being a troll before or after you became CEO? Please teach us your wisdom."

"How much of each workday do you spend playing farmville?"

"The world needs to know: chocolate or gummies?"

"Would you rather: A) have a psychic close to you reveal every embarrassing thing you've done in your adult life, or B) put on your damn shirt and take this seriously?"

He really, really didn't want to look back at Madeline just now.

He was doing great. This would get reblogged way more than any of his other interviews, that was for sure.

"Did you perfect being a troll before or after you became CEO? Please teach us your wisdom."

Ambrose crinkled his brow. "I'm sorry, what's a troll? Going to have to pass on that one." Even as he said that, he winked at the camera, but he was never one to divulge his secrets.

"How much of each workday do you spend playing farmville?"

"None," he said, almost shocked. "I'm an entirely responsible person. Anyway, who plays FarmVille when you have Angry Birds?" Somewhere in New York, all the board members resisted an urge to slam their heads onto their desks, because they had yet to see a meeting where Ambrose hadn't been playing on his phone in the corner. They'd even gotten together at some point to discuss his unhealthy addiction with that single game until he moved on to Fruit Ninja.

"The world needs to know: chocolate or gummies?"

"Ooh, that's a hard one," he said, seriously pondering the question. "Depends on my mood. I prefer gummies most of the time, though."

He had a bad feeling about the next question, judging by the slightly fearful look that passed over Jiri's face as he asked it. "Would you rather: A) have a psychic close to you reveal every embarrassing thing you've done in your adult life, or B) put on your damn shirt and take this seriously?"

"I am taking this seriously," he said petulantly. He even pouted a little bit, though he doubted Madeline would fall for it, considering the smugness she could likely sense coming off of him in waves. "They asked me to take my shirt off and I took my shirt off. Who am I to deny the whims of the Internet?" No doubt people were confused as to whoever he was addressing, but he'd leave them hanging for now.

This was going to be his most watched video ever. The Alex AMA had gone viral, but this was going to go super viral. Alex had just been a scruffy teen who'd killed someone. This was a billionaire pan-sexual playboy who'd been teasing the internet for the past half hour with his shirt off. Sorry, Alex. There was just no competition, here.

Which was the whole point of this whole AMA series, right? To give the internet something way better to reblog and retweet and rewatch? Thank you, Mr. Jaager, you incredible winky-eyed troll.

Even if the man was about to get them both murdered by his secretary. Or, more likely, she was going to get the IT guys to pull the plug.

Jiri moved them into some more serious questions, to unpoof her tail. (...That thought was racist, he really needed to stop being racist.) (But come on she had a big foofy tiger tail.)

"Earlier you mentioned you received 'similar criticism due to my species.' Do you consider humans and mutants separate species, and/or that you subscribe to the belief that mutants are the evolution of humanity?"

"What progress, if any, has been made on the mutant cure?"

"Assume that you develop a 100% effective mutant cure and get it passed by the FDA. How do you see it being used? What steps has Jaager Worldwide taken to initiate responsible use of such a cure, ie, avoiding forced 'curing' such as the forced imprisonment of mutants that occurred in the past?"

Alright, more serious questions. Usually, somebody had asked Ambrose similar things before, and he'd had time to ponder and regret what he'd said the first time around, so it was pretty much guaranteed his answers would be cookie-cutter flawless.

"Earlier you mentioned you received 'similar criticism due to my species.' Do you consider humans and mutants separate species, and/or that you subscribe to the belief that mutants are the evolution of humanity?"

"Scientifically, yes, mutants and pure humans are different species," he said, shrugging. "Homo sapiens and homo superior are two different species of the human race as a whole. As for the second part of that question, yes - in a purely scientific sense, however. For example, people with green eyes are mutants. People who are taller than their parents are mutants. Mutation is not something limited specifically to people with powers others may consider dangerous or unusual - to monkeys, we are, in fact, mutants. The only way evolution can occur is through mutation, and sometimes, the evolution of one part of a population compared to that of another leads to a break in the population, resulting in two species. Humans today are evolved, mutated versions of their ancestors, and we mutants are evolved, mutated versions of our ancestors as well." He sighed, finished with his long yet highly simplified (he'd majored in biochem; he knew what he was talking about) spiel on genetics. "Really, did none of you pay attention during high school science? This is basic AP Biology."

"What progress, if any, has been made on the mutant cure?"

"I'm afraid I'm not at liberty to reveal that," Ambrose said, smiling tightly. "Certain companies may take advantage of that information in a way we'd prefer them not to." He was talking about Faust Pharmaceuticals, of course, which could pretty much be informed, but there was no way Faust could accuse him of defamation this way.

"Assume that you develop a 100% effective mutant cure and get it passed by the FDA. How do you see it being used? What steps has Jaager Worldwide taken to initiate responsible use of such a cure, ie, avoiding forced 'curing' such as the forced imprisonment of mutants that occurred in the past?"

He'd heard this one before. "Our cure, if or when it is developed, will not be a full cure. Nothing can permanently alter the genome of an individual past birth - it is beyond the technology we have available today. Thus, it will only be provided to mutants who need it - consider it a suppressant of sorts, instead of a cure." And wasn't that true - he was part of the research team as well, since he certainly had the credentials to do so, and he'd assisted significantly with the secretive work he'd been doing analyzing the suppressant he himself used. "Thus, it would be given out like any other prescription medication, in order to reduce harm to the individual and to others. However, in contrast to regular prescription medication, JW-accredited doctors will actually analyze the mutants themselves in order to ensure the least amount of bigoted bias."

Everything he was saying was the legitimate truth, of course, which any professional would understand. He just doubted - just a little bit - that the Internet would take what he was saying too seriously, considering he was saying it without wearing any sort of clothing at all on his upper torso. "Dem abs" would probably go more viral than "he's not actually searching for a cure; he legitimately just wants to help mutants like him" would be, to be honest. But if he had to strip to make sure his message reached some people who would be legitimately interested and support his opinion, then, well, so be it.

Jiri couldn't help shifting in his seat a little as the man answered the are we human or not question. It was a heated topic at the Mansion, one that Mirror had very definitively answered as no during her own AMA. But here Jaager sat, the head of a company on the leading edge of genetic research, giving a very reasoned yes.

He wasn't entirely certain how he felt about that, actually. But the way Jaager explained it didn't seem too bad--more like genetics were a grey area than a black-and-white. He also feel into the green eyed category, and that had never made him feel like a different species.

The answer about the drugs was reassuring, too. A suppressant. Not something that changed your genetics, just something that helped control things.

...Would it be weird to ask about joining the drug trails, after this AMA was done? He probably needed parental permission to sign up, anyway, and his mom had pretty much vetoed further drug tests after they'd found out he was a mutant, not a real narcoleptic. But this was a drug for mutants, so that might change her mind. Right?

Oh god he just wanted to sleep again.

The teen thought that now might be a good time to not be sitting down. He stood up, and read the next batch of questions. Hopefully that didn't weird Ambrose out. But seriously, it was better than possessing the CEO mid-AMA.

"With regards to certain companies, what do you have to say with regards to the Faust financial situation? Do you believe the Wolf exposé, or do you side with Faust's press statement that this was a juvenile hacking attempt, and all records were falsified?"

And a follow up question, from that same discussion thread: "Everyone knows Faust Pharm and JW are the two major players in the mutant cure business. Was this corporate espionage?"  

And that was probably enough serious questions for a bit. Here was a nice fluffy fringe conspiracy one:

"You have black wings remarkably similar to those of Jabberwocky aka Jörmungandr aka Death Dragon. Your company is working on a power suppressing drug. Admit it: 'Ambrose Jaager' is nothing but the pill-popping alter-ego of the wanted mutant terrorist."

He couldn't even keep a straight face, reading that.