(OOC: Continued from Long Island Botanic Gardens)

After her 'adventure' with Detective Rupert and the swans, Iris decided to take a further step to remain hidden, mainly from the Registration. She couldn't trust her mutations not to activate on their own. While she could choose not to use them once they activated, and the personality changes would only get her branded as 'crazy' by general society', the changes to her hair and eyes would give her away in a second. Fortunately there was an easy way around both.

Well.... relatively easy.....

Iris eyed the hair dyes dumbly. She had never dyed her hair, nor even considered the idea, and thus had no clue how to even begin. Her perplexed expression caught the attention of one of the stockgirls stocking the top shelves.

"Never dyed before?"

Iris blinked dumbly, mistaking what she meant at first. "Um.... no.... I don't think so...." Also her attention was more focused on the six-inch, orange-and-black dyed mohawk that posed as the girl's hairstyle.

"What, you're not sure?" She chuckled, and climbed down from the stepping stool. She leaned in for a closer look, and Iris reflexively leaned back.

"Um, no..... I'm sure I haven't....."

"So what color're ya lookin' for?"

"Uh... I hadn't given it much thought-"

"Ya oughta try black. You'd make a mega sexy goth. Or maybe red. Redheads get all the hot guys. I mean we're talkin' fiiiine men. Just as long as you don't go Lindsay Lohan red. I'm talking more Jennifer Korbin or Kate Walsh red. Of course you can also go really spectrum! They just got this new one in that turns your hair this rave shade of purple that turns neon under the lights, and-"

"Black's good!" Iris interrupted before the girls could continue. "Black works great."

The girl grinned, and began another string of inquiries that left Iris's head spinning.

It was an hour later before she made her way out of the store with all of the necessary equipment, and some she was sure wasn't necessary, and headed back to the inn. It was within walking distance, so she had left the van back at the inn. As she walked in the growing dusk, however, she began to regret her decision. She hadn't planned on being out this late, and she was still jumpy from past experiences. Actually, her fast pace and nervous glances around her pegged her as a likely target for any mischief-makers hanging around, than if she had acted like she owned the streets. But she couldn't help flinching at every passing shadow. Eventually her heart rate had worked up to a near panic attack, for no reason, and Iris could feel her back beginning to burn, her mutation threatening to take over on its own. With the Registration Act in force, that would be highly unacceptable.

Iris paused, and leaned up against a nearby alley wall. Her breathing was coming in gasps from adrenaline, and her heart was pounding. She forced herself to breath deeply, willing her back to cool, and gems to settle.

<"This is ridiculous!"> she scolded herself. <"You work with wild animals all of the time. What is so scary about a few dark alleys? You're not a kid, worried about a boogey man jumping out of the alley to grab you. And you look human, as long as you stay calm. You'll be fine....">

It took nearly five full minutes to convince her body of that fact. Finally her breathing had slowed enough, and only a dull throb pulsed in her back. Satisfied that that was as good as it was going to get, she pushed off from the wall, and turned to leave.

And suddenly the alley in front of her exploded in fire and smoke. Iris was knocked to her feet by the shockwave, and her hair products were flung away. She sat on the ground, stunned, not at first aware of the fire-throwing mutant that ran out into the street. However, as the smoke cleared, a huge metal creature appeared, like a mechanic alien, in front of her.

She froze. All of the faux calmness she had fooled her body into believing it felt vanished, like a drop of water in a hot skillet. She didn't need a mirror to know that her mutation had kicked in, full throttle. Her hair and eyes turned the color of molten silver, as cold as the fear she felt in the core of her soul.

Iris felt like she was watching a New York version of Predator. The robot moved more like a beast than something mechanical, and way faster. From where she was, she couldn't tell if it had killed or simply ko'ed the mutant it was chasing.

"Surrender mutant." It turned to her, and suddenly she didn't want to find out.

However, her legs didn't seem to want to move her. Looking down, she realized she was frozen to the ground. Literally. Ice covered her feet and butt, locking her down to the cement.

She giggleld aloud. Her eyes widened and she slapped a hand over her mouth.

<"Oooo..... this isn't going to be pretty.....">

"Stay where you are and prepare to be registered."

Iris giggled again, slightly hysterical. "Yeah, right...."

It hissed and reached for her. In an abrubt mood change, she shrieked, terrified. The ice let her loose, and instead shot forward at the creature. It wrapped around its front limbs, and froze them too the ground. Iris stumbled to her feet and backstepped several feet.

'Combat robots'. That's what Rupert had called them, given by the government to aid registration. Combat robots..... Some how that just didn't do justice to what she was now facing. A part of her mind was fascinated with the hissing..... thing.... that was standing in front of her. The other part was scared witless.

The ice cracked, like a boom of thunder. The smart part of her brain took over, and she turned on her heels to run.

Iris skidded on a patch of loose gravel, nearly loosing her balance, but used the momentum to change direction. She wasn't keen to be seen using her powers in public, but she also wasn't keen to be cornered in a dark alleyway by that thing either.

Speaking of which, when she turned, she realized it had vanished.

Then the less rational side of her took control, and she stopped her flight to turn and look around blankly. Whether continuing her flight would have been smarter or dumber would remain to be seen. As it was, she paused wondering where it had disappeared to, and what it was going to do next.

The hair rose on the back of Iris's neck, and goosebumps spread down her arms. She knew she was being watched, a feeling she'd come to have an extreme aversion to. And she could 'feel' the creature moving around; slight vibrations of its movements were reaching her ears, but she had no way of pinpointing it. She rubbed her arms, as if she was cold.

"I know you're here!" Why she yelled that, she had no clue. "Show yourself!"

<"Smart Iris. Tell the thing trying to half-kill you to come out so you can see it before you black out... Real smart....">

HIIISSSSSSSS!!!!!

Iris practically jumped out of her skin. She shrieked, unconsciously channeling her sound power into the scream. The noise pierced the air like nails on a chalkboard, and many times louder. Up above two streetlamps shattered, sending shards and sparking wires toward the ground. Two blades of ice formed and sliced through the base of the lamps, sending both to the ground in a flurry of sparks and glass.

She threw herself backwards to avoid the falling lamps. When she sat up, a giggle fit overtook her, to the point that she began crying from laughing too hard.

Iris covered her mouth in hopes of stopping her insane laughter. Out of all of her emotions, why did it have to be the clear gem that reacted to stress?

A final flickering of electricity from the destroyed lamps brought her out of the giggling. She blinked several times, attempting to activate her sight in the dark. This was only the second time she had used this new gem, and she wasn't used to the multiple-mutation use.

Suddenly the robot seemed to appear out of nowhere, directly in front of her, and roared like a lion. She stared blankly at it, as if trying to figure out a reason behind the noise.

A flash of of movement from the right caused her to roll left. She felt the rush of air as the blade passed by, much too close for comfort. As she continued to roll, a layer of ice formed on the ground below the robot. It flowed up and around it, as if it were water, not ice, freezing solid around the bot as it moved upward.

Iris scuttled backwards, out of reach of the blades. She tilted her head to the side curiously.

"What are you?" she asked aloud. "Are you alive?"

<"Does it really matter??">

"We are the enforcers of the law against mutants. We are the hunters of mankinds prey."

The words were disturbing enough, but the voice they were spoken in..... Iris shivered, and not from the chill of the ice.

She flinched visibly as a new set of blades emerged and began cracking through the ice, but she didn’t move. Part of her was still fascinated by the monster, at least for the present moment. In the moment that it broke free and charged her, she had an abrupt change of heart. Unfortunately, by that time it was too late to run. She dodged the blade coming in on her right, throwing up a thick ice shield to block the knee-blade thrust. The blade impacted the shield and the force of the blow threw her backwards across the pavement. She curled up and surrounded herself in ice as she fell, so that she tumbled away like a soccer ball. She came to rest up against a building. The ice absorbed the shock, but a sharp pain burned her side. She placed a hand over her side, and felt something wet. Unconsciously she manipulated the blood to keep it within her body. She didn’t have time to check to see how deep it was, but hopefully it wasn’t deep and would clot quickly. The pain she could ignore for the time being.

Again she took to her heels in flight. This time as she went she began emitting a sonic pulse, like echolocation, to hopefully know where her attacker was. That didn’t help when it came to fighting back. Not that she really wanted to fight back. She just wanted to get away!

And the thing disappeared off of her 'radar'. Great.....

This wasn't working. The robot was too fast and obviously made for stealth. She couldn't hope to get away until it couldn't follow her anymore. But how to get it off her tail?

Iris gulped, realizing she had to go on the offensive, at least for a brief time. There really was no other choice. She shivered reflexively, remembering the last time she'd been forced to fight back against a pair of red eyes.....

She blinked away the image and focused on her surroundings. Her flight had landed her almost back where this chase had begun; she passed the motionless body of the pyronetic from earlier. And that meant.....

She swept her hand outward, feeling for the hair dye. Moments later two bottles zipped through the air. She slid to a halt, grateful that the stockgirl had insisted she buy two bottles, and not one. It wasn't much liquid, but enough to fight with. She opened the containers, allowing the black goo to float free in a blog. She looked around, this time with a one-sided smile painted on her face.

"Here botty, botty, botty, botty," she called out in a sing-song voice. "Where are you you ugly mug? I though you wanted to play with the mutant."

Inwardly she cringed, realizing just how randomly her attitude kept shifting. And there were still twenty minutes worth of crazyness left.....

<"It moves like a reptile, with its tail."> Her mind registered the thought even as the machine attacked. When the bot landed behind her, she was already in the process of raising another ice shield, thicker than the last. She dropped to her knees, and scuttled away on all fours as one blade slashed through a block of ice where her head had just been. The ice seemed to liquify, and froze around the blade adding to its bulk and weight. While she doubted the extra burden would slow it down, she had other plans. A half-crazed giggle escaped her when it was pushed away.

"Missed me!" she taunted, while willing herself, unsuccessfully, to shut up.

She was back on two feet now. The second arm blade sliced through her icy protection, and was encased int the frozen liquid, and more grew to replace the hole. That was what she was waiting for. As the blade was raised, poised for another slash, Iris 'pushed the ice backwards, and away from her. Since the ice wasn't attached to anything, there was no way to crack the ice off, short of slamming it against the ground or something else solid. She kept 'pushing' to keep that from happening, but not hard enough to knock the machine over.

The floating black blob shivered. Suddenly it shot forward, smashing into the creature's eyes, shattering the protective coverings. In the same moment Iris shoved the ice blade back and around, then dropped them to the ground with as much force as she could muster. As she heard and felt the ice shatter, she hoped that those blades had also cut through the monster's tail.

She didn't stick around to see however, as once more an overwhelming panic seized her, forcing her feet to flight once more, this time toward a dark alley. Hopefully it wasn't a dead end.....

As she ran, Iris tried to come up with a half-decent escape plan. She sent out another echolocation call, but it came back empty of the robot. Maybe she was being paranoid, but she just knew that thing hadn't given up. Come on, she was a cream puff when it came to fighting, and her mutations didn't take up that much slack, at least in her opinion. There was no way simply knocking out its optics had slowed the machine down. It wasn't logical.

Her mood shifted again. She continued her flight, but the fear vanished completely, replaced by cold calculations. She sent out a continuous echolocation, analyzing her surroundings carefully, as well as going through what she knew of her pursuer.

It was a machine, AI in worst-case-scenario, considering the manner in which it had answered her earlier. If it was a mutant hunter it must have other tracking capabilities other than sight, for illusionists and invisibles. Would heat tracking work without optics? Possibly....

Sound, most definitely. Yet another reason to think it was still tracking her; her heavy breathing was audible. Nothing to be done about that at the moment..... Plus, echolocation works both ways. And picking up her moving vibrations would be possible as well, no doubt.

Smell.... Was a robot capable of smell? It seemed highly unlikely, but.... Speaking of smell, what was that faint odor in the air? Sort of.... tangy, and sick....

She shook her thought back on track.

Taste..... That fell in the same category of smell..... Besides, how would tasting help track her at this moment.... She dismissed both smell and taste as negligable methods.

So sound it was. That was easy enough to mask, but even easier if she were to stop. Was stopping really a good idea? Okay, so good ideas and necessity were two different things at the moment....

Changing direction she paused for a second in front of an opening in the alley. It was boarded up, but an ice blade quickly brought the barrier down. She found herself inside an immense warehouse, and the strange smell finally registered: Sea water and old fish. The place must have been a cannery at one point. In the dark her eyes picked out the conveyor belts and machinery. Her senses picked up various reserves of liquid scattered around, though she couldn't tell if it was water or gasoline, or something else.

"Great, its a Batman cliche'....." she muttered flatly. Calling on her gymnastics training, which was hindered by her wounded side, she dodged in, over and around the various bits of leftover debris, and secured herself inside what had probably once been a foreman's office. It took a bit of concentration to mask her breathing, since she hadn't consciously used the technique for a while. At the same time she encased herself in ice, just in case the robot could use heat vision after all.

Iris pressed a hand against her side. The constant movement of running hadn't allowed the wound to close. Blood had seeped through and stained her shirt, and her side was burning painfully. She turned her focus into keeping it within; she was already in trouble enough, she didn't need to be weak from blood loss as well. Slowly but surely, it began to clot and close.

Focused as she was, she didn't notice yet another mood change. Her breathing calmed, then slowed. Her lids began to droop, and her head nodded. Within minutes she had dozed off. While with her other mutations, falling asleep would have 'turned them off', this gem had to run its course.

For once, that was a good thing. A soft noise penetrated her daze, a noise she probably wouldn't have noticed if she'd been fully awake. Metal sliding against metal....

Metal against metal? The cannery was abandoned. Why was the machinery still moving?

<"Wait.... moving machinery? What the-">

Her eyes flew open. She saw nothing in front of her. But she did feel the impact of something slamming into her ice shield and piercing it all the way through, stopping only an inch or two to the side of her ear.

It was pure reaction after that. The ice pushed back against the invisible menace, crashing it through several walls. Meanwhile she bolted through the door and back out into the factory. How under the sun was she supposed to fight something she couldn't see?? For one brief, infinitely short, yet irritatingly too long of a moment, she regretted not staying with Hunter long enough to learn how to fight.

<"You did not just think that, Iris. You just didn't.... Deny it 'till you die.....">

She moved toward what looked like another boarded up exit on the other side of the warehouse, where the sea water smell was strongest, and where she could feel a large amount of liquid present. Maybe, if she could find something to smear the robotic menace with, like mud or tar or oil, and a way to do it, she could see it long enough to fight.

Or run again..... not that running was working.... then again, neither was fighting......

"Gaaaiiyaa!!" Iris clapped both hands over her ears as the the screech pulsed through her head. It took several moments for her mutation to kick in and send the sound back, out of phase. The sound vanished, but it left behind a massive headache and an upside down-feeling gut.

She stumbled backward, fighting the nausea and watery vision. A band of ice formed at the base of her skull to help dull the pain. Unconsciously another band formed around her middrift as well, thin enough to not hamper her movements too much, yet enough to keep her wound 'under wraps'.

She sent out another wave of echolocation, and found the machine bearing down on her. She threw up a frozen wall in front of her, and blasted out the wall behind her.

Outside once more, she found herself near a boat dock, overlooking a rather disgusting-looking waterway. It looked large enough for a cabin cruiser or two to pass each other by, but not much larger. It also smelled disgusting, not as badly as a sewer, but pretty close. Her stomach protested, threatening violence if she stayed too much longer.

But....

<"Oh gosh..... WhatdoIdowhatdoIdowhatdoIdo???!!">