Today...was not a good day. Paige stormed her way down the sidewalk, her red shirt and khaki pants stained with coffee. "Stupid job...stupid freaking city..." she grumbled, occasionally stomping a puddle from where it had rained earlier. "Stupid ugly uniform..." she continued grumbling.

The girl couldn't count how many jerks tried to flirt with her, and she was so close to throwing scalding coffee on a few of them. In the end, she got a scolding from her boss. He'd told her something about not showing favoritism and having to be fair and blah blah blah...

Sometime after that she'd dropped and spilled a cup of coffee on her own clothes. In the end, she wanted to cry, but she managed to keep her cool. Finally, four o'clock rolled around and she'd managed to get out of there. Soon she would be home--if one would call it that. But then, today would be over.

Suddenly, however, a car whizzed past her, sending the water from a puddle splashing directly onto her. Paige let out a frustrated yell, overrun by emotions. And in the blink of an eye, she was gone, a spork lying on the ground in her place.

"Perfect...." she grumbled, lying on the sidewalk, unable to move.

Kiva had her hands shoved in pockets as she walked down the street, wings folded and 'hidden' under a dark jacket that was open, showing the skull design on her black T-shirt. Work was over, and it was time to head home and feed Clover. She looked forward to the usual enthusiastic greeting of her black cat; ever since she'd seen those bright green eyes staring up at her from that dark face two years ago, she'd known she'd just found her new best friend.

Her boots thudded against the wet sidewalk, occasionally making a faint splashing noise when they hit a shallow puddle. Kiva sort of liked the scent in the air after it rained. It was soothing.

Then...she noticed something lying on the sidewalk ahead. Blinking in confusion as she approached, she realized there was a spork just sitting there on the concrete. Struck by curiosity, and perhaps a hint of some mild hoarding instinct, the dragon-like woman knelt down next to the spork and carefully picked it up, gently curling her fingers around the handle so that the object was only exposed to the soft scales of her palm and not her claws.

"Huh," she said as she looked at it. "Poor little spork. Someone could step on you out here." She realized a moment later that she was talking to a utensil, but this was someone who had gotten in a one-sided argument her toaster--she swore she should have gotten the warranty on that stupid thing--when she tried to make breakfast this morning. So at least she was consistently crazy.

Paige would have tensed up, if sports could do that sort of thing. She could tell that the stranger was obviously a fellow mutant, but the girl wanted so bad to raise an eyebrow. It was bad enough that she was being picked up, much less talked to in this form!

"Hey! What the--" the shifter exclaimed, though her 'voice' that resonated from her body sounded distant and muffled. She tried her best to shift back, but she was nowhere near calm enough to do so. So, until her emotions reached a more peaceful state...she was stuck. Crap crap crap... She was so close to being home free, and her day had taken yet another turn.

This was just great...Her mind raced, though the only things she could think of were 'crap' and how much she hated this godforsaken city. Even if she did just get here like yesterday.

The little exclamation suddenly made the dragon-woman tense up, and she just quietly stared at the spork in her hand for a couple of seconds. It had been muffled, but she could have sworn that came from the utensil she was holding. "Um...Okay, either I've officially lost it, which is certainly not out of the realm of the possible..."

She stood up, slowly. "Or you really did just talk, and given that I'm a freaking dragon I'm not ruling that one out either." She tilted her head, offering a little, apologetic smile. "In which case...I'm sorry. Do you want me to put you back down? Maybe put you somewhere you won't get stepped on?"

Why, yes, she was going out of her way to be polite and helpful to a talking spork. The talking spork had yet to give her a reason to not be nice, after all. And maybe her childhood love of Beauty and the Beast was influencing her just a tad to be more sympathetic toward what seemed to a living inanimate object.

"I don't know if you lost it or not, but yeah the spork is talking back," Paige said, maybe a little more snappy than intended. "Actually...maybe give me a few minutes....or at least take me to an alley that isn't crowded or...something. Once I relax I should be back to normal."

She let out a sigh. "Today freaking sucks..." she muttered. There wasn't much she could do since she was a kitchen utensil and all.

Kiva frowned at the snappy reply, but didn't snap back. If she were in such a form, she wouldn't be too happy, either, and the spork's mumble afterward just reinforced the sympathy. "Yeah, sure. No problem." She started walking again, still very carefully holding the utensil in her scaly hand.

"Name's Drake," she said, figuring she may as well introduce herself. "Or at least that's what people tend to call me," she added with a faint shrug. It didn't take long for her to find an alley to slip into, and she took a glance around to make sure it wasn't occupied before she gingerly placed the spork on the ground in front of her and took a step back.

Kiva lingered for a moment, shifting her weight from foot to foot. She supposed she could just take off, but unless she was specifically asked to go, she'd rather stick around at least to make sure the shapeshifter got back to her normal form all right.

"Paige. Or Thingamajig. Or Thing," she said quietly, bringing up the affectionate nickname her friends had given her years ago. As she was set down, thoughts of her old memories made her feel better. As a result, she became more peaceful and relaxed.

The spork on the ground began to shift and grow, looking much like living, silver, silly putty at first, then gaining more of a peachy color, then mixed in with the red and khaki and black of her work uniform. Within just several seconds, a five foot five, nineteen year old blond stood where the spork was.

"Uhm...thanks," she murmured. "Nice to meet you, I guess. I owe you like...a handshake or...something?" she asked, awkwardly extending her hand to the dragon-mutant.

Kiva watched the transformation curiously. It looked a lot less...painful than what she'd gone through all those years ago, but then again she'd never met a mutant where changing shape was the actual mutation. She supposed it'd have to be relatively painless.

When Paige awkwardly held out her hand, a rumbling chuckle escaped the dragon. "You don't owe me anything, hun." She still reached out and briefly shook the blonde's hand, however, careful to never touch the younger woman's skin with her dark claws, even though they'd been filed. "But it is nice to meet you, Paige. And I'm happy to help."

She noted the uniform Paige was wearing, but didn't comment on it. Instead, she sighed a little and looked at the hand she'd just shook with. "Mutations kinda suck sometimes, don't they?" she commented. She wasn't sure if twenty-four seven ugliness was as bad as sudden spork shapeshifting, but that didn't mean it was pleasant or that she didn't sometimes still wish she weren't a mutant.

She wasn't sure why she was trying to make conversation, or if that was what she was even doing, but she couldn't take it back now.

Paige gave an awkward smile. "Thanks.Yeah, they sometimes can suck," she murmured, looking away. "Though I think my new job sucks more. I mean, I can shift into other stuff, but when like...emotional and stuff...I turn into a spork." She shrugged a little, looking at the ground.

"So....what's it like? You know, being...visible. I mean....if I can keep calm, I can like, keep it a secret pretty well. But it's gotta be hard, especially with stuff getting tense with humans and stuff, right?" she asked. "I mean...I don't want to be rude or anything...I kinda admire more visible mutants, even if I don't think I could handle it myself."

Kiva shoved her hands in her pockets when Paige questioned her, though she looked a little surprised when she said she admired visible mutants, and couldn't help but smile a little at that.

"Honestly? I'm pretty lucky, all things considered. I didn't come to America until all that Registration BS came and went." Then, realizing that 'Manitoba accent' was synonymous with 'no accent whatsoever' to the American ear, she added, "I'm Canadian. I can't speak for the whole country, but the city I grew up in is a little less..." She twirled a claw next to her temple and chuckled, faintly.

"But, yeah, being visible means I don't really have the option of a good first impression. I've seen a guy's face lose all colour in about a third of a second and his eyes bug out like a frog when he saw me. My boss happens to be the most mutant-tolerant guy in New York, so that helps a lot."

She shrugged a little. "To be honest, though, I'm more likely to be spitting fire and brimstone over the fact that I shed scales all over the place sometimes." After a second, she realized what she'd said and laughed. "Metaphorically. I can't actually breathe fire or anything..."

Paige giggled a little. "Damn, because breathing fire actually sounds sorta badass," she commented. "Yeah, I know what you mean. I'm not from here either, actually just blew in yesterday. Though I don't think my boss is tolerant of anyone."

She let out a low sigh. "I'm from California, and I've been both admired and picked on for what I am. So much so that I had to leave to keep my parents safe. Dad had a friend here who hooked me up with a job, if you would term it that."

She shrugged, stretching her arms as her shirt didn't move to expose her pierced stomach. The uniforms were baggy for just that reason. "I think you look kinda cool, actually."

Kiva's mouth twitched like she was holding back a very brief urge to laugh when Paige said 'California.' Not because of any amusement over the location in and of itself, but simply due to the lyrics of a country song that flickered through her mind.

I ain't never had a problem with California
There's a lot of good women from Sacramento to Carona
But them Hollywood types after a while wear on ya
Struttin' around in their size zeros
Skinny little girls no meat on their bones
Never even heard of George Jones.

She sobered pretty quickly as Paige continued, however, and it was like the faint twitch had never happened. She wasn't one of those types of girls, anyway, Kiva could tell. Well, she didn't know if she'd heard of George Jones, but still. Paige was all right as far as she cared.

Kiva couldn't help but smile at the compliment on her appearance. "Thanks. Kinda nice to hear that from someone other than my little sister." Of course, Sorcha had only been five or six when it all first happened, so it wasn't like she really remembered her big sister being anything but a dragon. In fact, Paige didn't look all that much older than Sorcha, now that she thought about it.

She glanced over her shoulder and chuckled before she slipped her dark jacket off her shoulders. She stretched the small, scaly wings that now showed through the open back of her shirt. "These make shopping for clothes a pain, though." She flapped them, once, in an attempt to fight back the feeling in her muscles that told her they were going to cramp up.

Kiva shrugged a little and sighed quietly. "But with my family, it was mostly just 'That's your daughter? Oh, I'm so sorry.' Not sure how people are treating them now that I'm down here..."

"But, California, huh? This place is probably a bit of a shock to the system, even without Bosszilla." She managed a faint chuckle at her own joke. Bosszilla. Not the most original thing she'd ever come up with, but hey.

"Hey, I'm mutant myself, though I can't say I support either race as a whole. Sure, I'm more for mutants because I am one, but...well I believe that every farm has jackasses." She shrugged lightly, having used a phrase one of her friends in high school had used. He was from...Texas or somewhere, and the phrase just sort of stuck with her.

"Whoa, that's cool. But yeah. I mean I know a lot of girls who have to buy a size or two up because of their chest, but...that's not quite the same thing. My family tried to protect me. But when things started to get bad, I volunteered to move away to protect them. My Dad had a friend in New York, and he's my new boss...first day at work and I already wanna tell him where he can shove this job..."

Kiva gave a little snort of laughter at the odd turn of phrase, making a mental note to remember it. The comment that her wings were cool made her give them another flap, and she couldn't help a small laugh at the talk of shirts. "Yeah, cup size is kinda the least of my concerns..." she half-mumbled. She was built less like a woman and more like a scaly tank and knew it.

However, the talk of her job made Kiva, without thinking, reach out toward Paige's shoulder, but she caught herself and retracted the hand before contact was made. She didn't think she had to worry about the girl shying away from contact, since she'd initiated a handshake and all, but they had just met, and, assurances that she didn't scare her aside, Kiva was still big and scaly and had claws.

Though the attempted comforting gesture had been aborted, she still gave a sympathetic smile. "Well, nothing says you can't go looking around for a better job if you want. And, well, I'm not exactly a tour guide..." She idly rubbed the back of her neck, not really noticing the couple of loose scales that flaked off at the action. "...But there are a lot of places around here to take your mind off a bad day. Art galleries, museums, libraries, theaters, restaurants, green spaces, lots of shopping..."

She shrugged. "And, I didn't have any plans today beyond making sure my cat was fed..." she added. She wasn't sure exactly what she was doing, and she wasn't going to be upset if Paige turned her down if for no other reason then, again, they'd just met. Still, she'd very rapidly endeared herself to Kiva, for whatever reason, so she was going to offer.

Paige giggled a little, though she noticed the motion for contact that was averted, and figured not to worry about it. It was weird because of all the people she'd had contact with today, the dragon was the nicest one.

"Yeah, that's kinda what's stopping me. I don't know my way around much yet. I just know...home and work." She shrugged lightly, brushing her hair out of her face, listening to her new acquaintance talk.

"So I hear. Sounds like fun, but the only problem is those things cost money, and money is something I'm sort of shy on," she murmured, shrugging a little. Her face turned pink, and she looked down, those were words she never said before. Before now, she was part of a wealthy family, who could literally get anything she wanted. Now, she was just some spoiled rich brat without any money and far from home...