Alex was walking through the streets of New York with his hands in the pockets of his leather jacket, his cyan eyes aimed towards the ground, and a frown on his face. It had only been two days since he had a deity for a customer in his pottery shop asking for an idol and he basically bit her head off, and a few days before that he had a duel with an aura manipulating mutant in the alleyway behind his shop and got his shoulder dislocated during that duel. Needless to say, he was a bit sore in the shoulder and unhappy with his own attitude. Sure that wannabe deity needed to be taken down a notch because she had insulted him... but he might have over did it. And that mutant he fought with in that back alley needed to be taught a lesson, but he was still feeling the effects of it, despite the fact that his arm was already back in place.

With a grumble the malachite manipulator turned down a block and walked down that road, pushing passed the crowds of people that were moving around at noon on a Saturday... and most of them were looking like they were recovering from a hangover from drinking too much during happy hour on Friday. Alex squeezed his way through the growing crowd as he kept on walking, not sure of what he was going to do today since he always closed his pottery shop on Saturdays, but the places that he normally hung out at were closed do to mutant activity... go figure. Reality was that Alex was looking for something that would require physical activity that would test his limits since something like that always made him feel better.

However where ever Alex looked, the only thing he found thus far was a park where he could run... and that wasn't a challenge at all. "Forget this... I'm just gonna build a dueling dummy in my basement and slash it to pieces..." Alex grumbled as he turned around and started to head back... and stopped when he noticed a public boxing gym. It had been a while since he practiced his boxing... eight months to be exact... and it was physically demanding... and he might even learn a new trick or two here. With a nod, Alex walked into the gym, paid the walk in fee in cash, and was handed a key to a locker for him to store his stuff. It didn't take long to find his locker, and with his leather jacket no longer weighting him down, Alex walked over to one of the larger punching bags and gave it a left cross, resulting in a satisfying thud.

As he worked on the punching bag some more, Alex glanced around a little and noticed that there was a boxing ring off to the side of the gym, and there were people lining up to box. Was there a competition going on? That would be interesting to watch... or even participate in. With that in mind, Alex went back to focusing on the punching bag, a bit oblivious that some people were staring at him since he was still wearing his malachite bracers.

Donovan had gone through a fairly uneventful morning, even by the student's usual standards it had been both dull and in need of some shaking up. And when things were boring and dull for Donovan he went to the local gym and did some sparring. Now he promptly waited in line for king of the hill, as the name alluded, one boxer kept sparring until he got beat or grew too tired, then would pass it on to the winner or next fighter.

Soon enough Donovan's turn came up and he climbed into said ring. He wore his favorite pair of black boxing gloves, each adorned with a shamrock on the striking surface for good luck. The man went in without a padding helmet, though his opponent wore one for safety sake.

As the bell rang Donovan moved into the center of the ring, keeping his feet fairly solidly planted to the ground, as apposed to his opponent who was maintaining a light-footed stance. Initially Donovan intentionally took a few blows experimentally, getting a feel for the tired man's jabs. After realizing that his opponent was already tired the boxer smirked and went in for a high-force uppercut, knocking the exhausted man over with little effort.

McCalaghan held a disappointed expression on his face, but he did have the next boxer to look forward to.

Alex had seen the 'king of the hill' thing advertised on the window outside the gym when he first entered the shop, but he hadn't entered the gym to beat several people up with his fists before he got tired out and then thrown out of the ring... he had come to get a work out and see about changing his attitude. Pounding the tar out of a large sand punching bag would do the trick for him. As the malachite manipulator pounded the daylights out of the punching bag, he was alternating between quick jabs, a few right and left cross punches, and then one really strong center punch before he went back to jabbing. Alex was so focused on the punching bag that he didn't even notice a new guy step into the boxing ring and knock someone out with a single uppercut.

Suddenly a loud SNAP echoed throughout the gym, which was quickly followed by the punching bag that Alex was pounding falling to the floor. He had punched the thing hard enough that the hook had given way. "Whoops..." Alex exclaimed with surprise before he knelt down to look at the hook. The darn thing was made out of cheap aluminum and was very hallow. There was almost nothing holding up that punching bag. No wonder it failed. The referee for the 'king of the hill' match had heard the sound of the hook breaking and had stopped to stare in Alex's direction, clearly not knowing that the broken hook was a bad one, dumbfounded.

The owner of the gym wasn't happy. "Hey! What gives you the right to break my equipment?!" the man yelled as he stormed over to Alex. "Hey, sorry about that. It was an accident. I'll gladly replace it for you if you want." Alex offered as he removed the rented boxing gloves. Hearing that Alex was willing to pay for the damages right away, the gym owner calmed down a little. "You do that son, but I don't want you in this gym much longer. You want to keep throwing punches, do it in the ring till someone knocks you out." the man said in a booming voice before grabbing Alex by the shirt and started to pull Alex towards the boxing ring.

"Whoa, hey! I didn't sign up for that! All I wanted to do was blow off some steam, that's all!" Alex stated before the gym owner shoved Alex into the front of the line. "You've been volunteered. Get in there!" The owner yelled, and Alex was starting to get annoyed. "I said only came here to blow off some steam. Doing that against another person is a bad idea." Alex protested, but the referee walked over to Alex and offered a padded helmet. "You might as well step into the ring pal. He only gets like this when he sees someone that might make it as a pro, and he wants to get them to box for him before they go for anyone else. He's basically testing you." the ref stated. "Fine." Alex stated and climbed into the ring, ignoring the padded helmet that was offered to him as he put the rented gloves back onto his hands.

Turning to face his opponent, Alex offered a gloved hand for him to shake. "Hey, I'm Alex, also known as Mr. I can't control my own strength. What's yours?"