Gabe walked into his apartment building, beginning his climb to the 5th floor. He didn't bother with the elevator here, because of two reasons. One, the music in elevators is terrible. Two, because the last time he used the elevator, it had broke down between the second and third floor, leaving him stranded in the thing for about 2 hours before somebody got him out.

"I hate this place. It's cold in the winter, and will probably be hot in the summer."

He crossed the third floor landing, nodding to the nice old lady who lived there. She smiled, and headed back inside. As he got to the fifth floor, he knew something was wrong. It was way to quiet for a floor that had two families with at least three children apiece. As he turned the corner, he stopped dead in his tracks. The door to his apartment had been busted in. He stepped inside, only to see that anything that wasn't bolted to the ground was ground. His television, DVD player, everything was gone.

"Great. Just f***ing great. I've been here a few weeks, and my stuff is gone. What am I supposed to do now?"

Gabe shook his head. He turned around to leave when his landlord walked in.

"Ah, Mr. Fenix. So, instead of paying your rent, you were just going to leave, huh?"

"No, sir. I was robbed. I just got home! You can ask any of the other people in the building. I haven't been home for quite awhile. When I left, it was all here, and when I got home, it was all gone!"

"Well, I don't believe you. If you have anything left in here, get it out. Robbed or not, I'm evicting you!"

Gabe stood there in utter awe.

"What? Your kicking me onto the street? Seriously? I heard New York City was bad, but you've got to be the worst person I've ever met in my life!"

Gabe walked into his bedroom after the landlord left. He looked in the closet. His suit was gone, most of his clothes were gone. Even his bed sheets were gone.

"What am I gonna do now?"

Gabe packed what was left into his backpack, and headed back to the shop, hoping either Tarin or Lee was there.

Business was really starting to pick up, and not just people wanting Tarin to do a reading for them. They weer finally starting to sell through some of the inventory they had started to stock in the shop, and Lee had had a few people asking for different things that they didn't yet have in the last few days.

Maybe it was because both she and Tarin were happier, much happier, since coming back from Texas, maybe it was because of the new hire, or maybe because word was finally starting to spread about the shop actually selling things. Whatever the reason, the shop was doing better than Lee had ever seen it, and a good chunk of that had nothing to do with what Tarin told customers in the back room.

Gabe had already left quite a while earlier, which had left Tarin and Lee to finish closing up the shop. Not that that had really taken too long, but Lee had decided that she should get around to going over some ordering and other paperwork she had been putting off lately.

Which actually worked out perfectly. Tarin had said that he was actually going to cook dinner that night, rather than them ordering out, something that hadn't happened in a long time. To an outsider, it would sound strange for that to be the perfect time for Lee to stay at the shop later, but the truth of the matter was that she could not cook, and after a couple attempts at helping him, it had been discovered that it was actually easier for Tarin to cook without her help.

About 45 minutes after they had closed up the shop, Lee wasn't really too worried about the time; since they didn't cook often, she knew that he had to do some shopping first. So Lee was still sitting on the stool behind the counter when she heard a knock at the door to the shop.

Lee was confused. The shop was clearly closed, turning off the neon light and turning the other sign to say closed was the first thing she and Tarin did when they were done for the day. And, Lee thought, Tarin couldn't have possibly gotten the shopping done and finished cooking dinner already, could he? But if he had, wouldn't he have called rather than spend the time walking back to the shop?

Getting up off her stool, Lee walked to the door and glanced through the closed blinds, her confusion growing, before opening the door for Gabe. "Hey," Lee said slowly as she held the door open. "What's up?"

Gabe gave a verbal sigh of relief when Lee opened the door. He wasn't sure if anybody would be there after he'd left earlier that afternoon, and he sure needed someone to talk to. He stepped inside, and leaned against the wall, sliding to the floor. He hung his head between his knees as he spoke.

"I got robbed last night. All of my stuff is gone. I've got like, 3 different shirts and 2 pairs of pants to my name. Undergarments are down to what I'm wearing. Who seriously steals underwear? They even stole the suit I wore to my mom's funeral! Bastards!"

Gabe punched the floor, then exhaled sharply. He had a tendency to hit things when he got angry, usually leaving his had sore and the surface he hit unscathed.

"So after I get there, my landlord shows up, and I think he's gonna ask me what happened. What does he do instead? Evicts me! Kicks me out 'cause he thought I was just trying to skip out without paying him his rent! What kind of slime ball..."

Gabe stopped, his head still hanging between his knees. He didn't know Lee well enough to let her see the silent tears of frustration running down his face, dripping to the floor.

Pretty much the moment that Lee had opened the door, Gabe was sliding through the opening, then leaning against the wall and sliding down to the floor.

This was not normal behaviour for Gabe. Not that Lee knew the younger man all that well, but she had never seen him looking this down before.

But then Gabe started speaking, and Lee understood all of a sudden. He had been robbed and evicted in the same day. At least that was one thing Lee could say she had never had to deal with. Evictions, quite often, but she'd never been robbed. Not that she had really ever had anything worth stealing other than her coffee maker before she'd gotten together with Tarin...

"Probably the same kind of slime ball who's evicted me more times than I can count," Lee said softly, leaning down and grabbing Gabe's arm that he had used to hit the floor, though she gave him a slight smile. "And no hurting my shop, ok? It hasn't done anything to you.

"And let's go find some proper seats," Lee suggested, starting to help Gabe back to his feet using her grip on his arm. "I don't know about you, but I don't really feel like sitting on the floor beside the door in a skirt."

Gabe looked at her hand on his arm, and smiled at the comment about hurting the shop. He stood up as she pulled him up, and let her see the small smile on his face.

"Sorry about that. I tend to do that when I get frustrated."

Gabe knelt back down, and patted the floor.

"I'm sorry floor. It won't happen again."

"I wouldn't want you sitting on the floor either. Especially when I just walked in and the floor is probably wet."

He took his coat off, and hung it over his arm, following Lee into the shop.

"I really hate to bother you and Tarin with this, but you two are the only people I know in this city. I thought about calling my dad, but after he found out about my abilities..."

Gabe stopped short. Had he ever told Lee about his mutant powers? He knew he'd told Tarin, but no, he hadn't said anything to his new wife. As far as Gabe knew, Lee thought he was just some random human with a high tolerance for the strange. Oh well, truth has to come out sooner or later.

The floor of the shop had never really been an option for Lee to sit on, whether it was wet or not. It only happened when it happened, and that was only in bad instances. Like when she was pulled to the floor because she was siphoning and refused to let go, or when she had been thrown to the floor.

Gabe was apologizing to the floor now, and Lee couldn't help but smile at that. She had been half kidding with her comment not to hurt the shop, but as she watched Gabe pat the floor as if to make it feel better, Lee couldn't help but wonder if just maybe the shop deserved something along those lines. It had been beaten and trashed far more fully than it could possibly have deserved over the last year and a half, after all.

Almost a whole year and a half already...

Lee pushed that thought out of her mind for the moment, even though it was kind of shocking that she had been with Tarin for that long, and at the same time that short of a time. But there were far more urgent things going on than to have Lee standing there thinking about that. Like Gabe being evicted, which Lee knew from personal experience sucked.

Gabe stood up, with the help of her hand on his arm, and walked further into the shop with her. Leading him over to the green armchair in the corner, Lee indicated that Gabe should sit before cleaning off a corner of a nearby table that displayed some of their merchandise and sat on the edge herself.

Gabe was talking again, apologizing for bringing this problem to her and Tarin, and Lee waved him off as she crossed her right leg over her left. Lee did not fail to notice how Gabe's voice cut off suddenly as he said said something about his father after discovering his abilities.

"So you're dad's not that supportive either?" Lee asked, a slightly bitter, one sided smile on her face. "But, if you don't mind me asking, what is it you can do?"

Gabe sat in the armchair Lee led him to, and watched as she cleared off a corner of a table to sit on. He watched as Lee waved off him apologizing about dropping his problem in their lap. He also noticed the smirk on her face as she said something about bad parenting. And then she asked about Gabe's abilities.

"Well, I guess now that the cat is out of the bag, that would mean that Tarin hasn't said anything to you about it. Well, he is one hell of a guy, isn't he? Your lucky. It's obvious he's head over heels for you."

He took a deep breath, as all the bad memories of his abilities flooded back into focus. He cringed momentarily at the thought of his mother.

"Well Lee, I'm a pre-cog. I can 'see' into the future. I've had a few visions, some of them good, some not so good. Like seeing my friend get accepted to Princeton, which he completely blew off. And my mom..."

Gabe wiped a stray tear off his face, and inhaled sharply, before beginning again.

"I saw the car accident that killed my mom a week before it happened, and didn't think anything of it. You know how people are when the think they are day dreaming. And then I got called into the principles office a week later, and sure enough, my mom was dead."

He sat for a moment, letting it all sink in. Then he continued.

"As for my other power, I've only used it a few times."

Gabe indicated the scar on his face.

"When I was in high school, I was on my way home from school, and someone tried to mug me. So, my other power manifested. I pointed at him, screamed, and the next thing I knew, he was on the ground screaming in pain. Apparently, I can send psychic suggestion that you are in enough pain that it will drop you to the floor. The thing is, it doesn't actually cause any damage. Not physically, not mentally. I just make you believe your in pain, and it works."

Gabe looked at her again. Tarin had taken all of this in stride, but he wasn't sure how Lee would take in the fact that he could drop a full grown man to his knees in an instant, screaming as if he were a child again.

Lee shrugged slightly when Gabe asked about Tarin not telling her about his powers before then. Honestly, Lee didn't see a reason for Tarin to have told her; Gabe apparently hadn't before this point. He had turned out to be a great help around the shop so far, though, that's what was important, right?

"It wasn't his place to say anything," Lee said simply with another small shrug, further explaining why she thought Tarin hadn't told her anything about Gabe's powers, which he apparently knew about. But then Gabe went on to comment about Tarin, and how he was 'obviously' head over heels for her, and how he was a great guy.

Lee couldn't help but blush slightly, even though she knew that Tarin was a great guy knew how incredible he was. Of course Lee knew that, she'd known that for a very long time now. If Tarin hadn't been such a great guy, there was no way she would have fallen for him so quickly, and so it wouldn't have been worth the risk to stay with him.

Gabe was a pre-cog? Lee listened intently as the younger man spoke. It was an interesting idea, that whole pre-cog thing, until Lee heard about how Gabe had seen his mother's death a week before it had actually happened.

Apparently, that wasn't the end of it, though. Lee blinked as Gabe described how he was able to send a mental suggestion of pain, enough to almost instantly drop a person. That was even more shocking than the whole pre-cognition thing, especially since he could do it without actually leaving any injury or damage behind.

"Wow," Lee breathed after a moment. "That's quite some talent you've got there." Her mind was already racing, though, thinking, planning. Cocking her head to the side, Lee looked straight at Gabe. "No damage?" She asked for clarification again. "No injury at all, but they feel like they're in that much pain?"

Yes, Lee was thinking, planning, plotting. She was sure that Tarin wouldn't like what she was currently thinking, if for no other reason than she was planning another way to stay nearby and help in a merge rather than get to safety, but it definitely had great potential. "How far away from someone can you be and it still work?"

Gabe sat through everything she said, smiling as she blushed about the comment on Tarin's behalf. He then saw Lee's eyes moving back and forth, a look on her face that could only be explained as excitement at the thought of his pain suggestion ability. He sat for a moment, thinking when she asked what the range of his ability was.

"Well Lee, I think as long as I've got a clear line of sight, I could hit them from across the room."

He pointed to the opposite corner of the shop.

"Yeah, I could definitely hit them that far away. But the sight lines have to be clear, or I run the chance of hitting somebody else by accident."

Gabe thought for another moment, than looked straight into Lee's eyes.

"Why do you ask?"

A clear line of sight, Lee thought, a small crease forming between her brows as she thought. The same crease that Tarin had a tendency to try and rub out every time that he saw it there on her forehead. A clear line of sight was most likely doable in most cases.

Then Lee saw Gabe pointing to the opposite corner of the shop, and Lee glanced over as well. The crease turned into a bit more of a frown at that. A clear line of sight within, what would that be, about 30 feet? Well, Lee thought as she stared across the shop, it could always be worse, it could have possibly been half that distance. And with the exception of that last time, the merges had all been, or at least dealt with, in either the shop or the apartment. In that case, the line of sight would probably be more of an issue than distance, since the front room of the shop was by far the larges room she and Tarin had.

Turning her head again, Lee was just in time to see Gabe staring straight at her as he asked why. Why oh why did he have to ask that? Just because she was willing to prepare for the eventuality, didn't mean that Lee was wanting to talk about Tarin's merges. Plus, it wasn't her place to tell Gabe, just as it hadn't been Tarin's place to tell her about their assistant's powers.

"We've...had some nasty characters come in before," Lee said slowly. Well, it was true, even if most of the nasty characters Lee was referring to were no longer living. "It's always useful to know what you have to work with in those situations."

Gabe breathed a sigh of relief. She must have wanted to know for security purposes or something.

"I mentioned it to Tarin, as well. He said it was a good thing I had it, just in case something should happen."

He leaned back in the chair, and then looked at Lee again.

"I've got a question for you, Lee. Where am I supposed to sleep tonight?"

Gabe gave a half-hearted laugh, but had asked a completely serious question. Like he'd said before, he didn't want to drop this on them, but he didn't know who else to come to.

Lee was glad that Gabe seemed to accept her reasons for asking more about his powers, for asking how his pain inducing worked, and at what distance. She hadn't really wanted to have to even try explaining about merging, it was hard enough to explain and understand even after having seen it, but Lee didn't want to have had to wait until a merge or some other problem to ask the questions. Better to know ahead of time so plans could be formed as best as possible.

And Tarin had said something similar, that it was a good thing just in case? Lee couldn't help but wonder if Tarin was thinking about using in case of a merge as well, but she was not about to ask him. That wasn't something they talked about if at all possible.

But back to the issue that had brought Gabe back to the shop in the first place. He'd been robbed and evicted, had very little other than the clothing on his back, and had no where to sleep that night.

Lee wasn't exactly sure what to suggest. There was no longer a futon in the shop; that had been moved to the apartment once Tarin had finally gotten out of the shop as both a place of business and a residence. And it was now rotting somewhere after Lee had gotten rid of the mattress while she was cleaning the horrid mess Rupert had called her in to take care of.

And while Lee did have her single bed back at the apartment in her bedroom, and there was the fact that when she'd been sleeping since getting back from Texas, half the time had been in Tarin's bed. The other half of the time...well, even though there was that mostly spare bed, they were newlyweds.

Plus, there was the fact that Tarin was currently at home, actually cooking dinner for her right that very moment. "I'd offer you my bed back at the apartment," Lee said slowly, a slight frown on her face. "But me and Tarin were kind of planning a whole date night thing tonight..."

Then Lee had another idea, and her face lit up. Her back straightening, Lee looked straight at Gabe, the smile growing on her face. "I have a friend who might actually be able to help. Well, they might have an extra bed, at any rate. Did you want me to call him?"

He listened as she said her and Tarin were doing something together that night, so either one of their places was off limits tonight. He saw her sit up and smile at him and ask if he wanted her to call one of her friends.

"Yeah, that'd be great. I really appreciate it Lee."

Gabe smiled back at her, but it was only for her feelings. Gabe didn't like hanging out with strangers, and had even been wary of Tarin and Lee on his first couple of days in the shop. He had warmed up to them, though, and he considered the two of them his only friends in the city.

"I really appreciate it Lee."

((OOC: lol Sorry, just have to comment on this quickly, though, I can see where you came up with it based on what I said. Tarin and Lee live together, and have for just over a year with the exception of the time Lee was in the camps and then when they were broken up. They do, however, still have their own separate bedrooms even though they are married, all thanks to Lee's powers.))


Lee had suggested she could call Sam, see if there was a bed free in that huge mansion he was staying at, the place he had apparently just gotten a couple of jobs. The same place Garrett had been staying. It was worth a shot, would keep Gabe off her couch and off the street that night. He seemed to realize that same thing and said that he'd really appreciate her making that call.

With a nod, Lee hopped off the table she was sitting on and walked back to the counter, pulling her cell phone out of her purse. Sam's was still the only number actually programmed in it, so it really didn't take long to find. Just a couple rings, then Lee heard him pick up on the other end. "Hey Sam, it's Lee," she started, then went onto briefly explain the situation and ask about the Mansion.

The call really didn't take all that long, and just a couple minutes later, Lee was walking back around the counter toward Gabe once more, a smile on her face. "Yup, it's all good," She told him. "Apparently there's lots of room there, so there's no problem with it. I only know the address, though, since I've only gone by cab. No clue how to get there by bus or subway."

"Sure Lee, sounds great."

Gabe smiled, although it was pretty much just for show. He was still in a pretty crappy mood, but having some place to sleep tonight might make it better. Besides, who could Lee know that would just up and give him some place to sleep?

"Well, I guess I'll need that address, and then I'll have to call a cab. Luckily I've still got most of the money you and Tarin gave me for that Christmas bonus. Unless the location is a secret?"

Gabe gave a genuine smile at that. He was pretty sure nobody was gonna blind fold him, but what did he know about where he was going?