Evelyn chewed on her lip as she ran through the different objects they may find in the room. A first-aid kit didn't stand out in her mind, but there was plenty of shirts and cloth around at least. "There may be some toy mummy bandages, and plenty of shirts and stuff. Could work for now. Toy bow and arrow too, if you want one of those." She flashed a quick smile, then thought more seriously. "There is packaging tape, and other supplies up on the right-hand shelf if you need anything like that. Fire extinguisher too, but that's more useful as defense than first aid."

She rubbed her forehead, and her fingers ran the length of the scrapes on her cheek. "The echoes are getting a little on the fuzzy side. Just need to keep the blood I have left inside me..." She muttered. Her day had been nothing but running, and as tough as she tried to be, she was drained. "At least nothing is super deep. Just giant cat scratches."

Somewhere, she thought she could hear the muttering of yelling voices, but they weren't close enough for concern. Someone was definitely pissed though. She didn't want to be on the receiving end of that. "How much distance can you have between mirrors when you go between them?" She asked, trying to calculate a path out.

>>"There may be some toy mummy bandages, and plenty of shirts and stuff. Could work for now. Toy bow and arrow too, if you want one of those. There is packaging tape, and other supplies up on the right-hand shelf if you need anything like that. Fire extinguisher too, but that's more useful as defense than first aid."

"All right, let's see what we've got." Gawain pushed himself back to his feet, leaving the archery gear on the floor as he went to rummage around in the storage room. There were t-shirts in great numbers, even a few scarves, and some boxes of mummy bandage, although it did not look very clean.

>>"The echoes are getting a little on the fuzzy side. Just need to keep the blood I have left inside me... At least nothing is super deep. Just giant cat scratches."

"Bingo." Gawain returned from his exploration with a pile of white t-shirts and two bottles of water that was probably stored there to restock a vending machine. He sat back down with his legs crossed in front of Eve, handing her a bottle.

"Drink."

>>"How much distance can you have between mirrors when you go between them?"

"A lot" he said as he started working on tearing some of the shirts to stripes. "Problem is, I can't skip one, I have to go through all the mirrors in-between. And if I slip, I can also end up trapped in a TV until someone turns it off. Not fun."

Gawain was big on orders. Drink, stay, run. She wondered if that was just part of his battle training, or if he was just bossy. Taking a gulp of the water she realized how thirsty she really was, and avoided arguing yet again. As she let her arm come back to rest, she noticed the slight tremble to her hand. The adrenaline was wearing off and some of the shock was settling in.

"I didn't realize you could travel into TVs too. If I ended up in the middle of a movie I'm not sure if I'd feel delighted or terrified... maybe a mixture of both." She pushed her hair from her face, and it was clumped in a few places with the blood tried to it. She would kill for a bath right now. She looked like crap.

"Didn't watch much T.V. The echoes have a habit of ruining things; pointing out the inaccuracies." She realized she was starting to trail off, and went back to the problem at hand. "We can try traveling through store fronts? I know the path towards my apartment pretty well, there are lots of prissy high end clothing places that'd have mirrors in the dressing rooms and show rooms."

There was a loud crash in the distance. She flinched and started to move, then bit her lip. Suddenly, all the noise didn't seem to be accidental. [Security guards know you will do what it takes to protect your paintings. They're baiting you.]

Darn right they were. And it was starting to work.

>>"I didn't realize you could travel into TVs too. If I ended up in the middle of a movie I'm not sure if I'd feel delighted or terrified... maybe a mixture of both."

"Depends on the movie" Gawain smirked. He had had some weird experiences. Including dying on screen...

>>"Didn't watch much T.V. The echoes have a habit of ruining things; pointing out the inaccuracies."

"No kidding." he had watched movies with people like that. No wonder Eve was socially awkward.

>>"We can try traveling through store fronts? I know the path towards my apartment pretty well, there are lots of prissy high end clothing places that'd have mirrors in the dressing rooms and show rooms."

"That could work" he nodded again "Although if they are hunting you you might not wanna go back home. I can take you to the Mansion. We locked it down since the riots started. It's safe."

Once Eve was done drinking he reached for her arm. Undoing the soaked bandages he looked at the wounds, half closed and half re-opened, with a frown. Trickling some water onto a piece of the t-shirt he started dabbing the dry blood away to clean the arm as much as he could before bandaging it up with the clean strips of cloth.

The thought that someone would go to her home was difficult to swallow. All of her art supplies, her desk, her drawings... everything was still in her flat, and if someone damaged that, she would never forgive them. Suddenly, she wanted to lead them away from her apartment if nothing else. She skimmed her mind for another route, heading towards the mansion.

"There are more residential areas in that direction, but still might work. Or....we could just take Avery's car...If he's going to trash my museum I'm not sure I'm entirely opposed to borrowing his precious sports car." She remarked. She knew where he stored his keys when he was at work, and the staff parking wouldn't be too far from there. She contemplated it as Mirror cleaned the cut on her arm, managing to only flinch a little.

"So up to you. I'm not sure the moral code of your mutant club." She said with a smirk. She nodded to his shoulder once he was done wrapping her arm. "Need a hand?"

>>"There are more residential areas in that direction, but still might work. Or....we could just take Avery's car...If he's going to trash my museum I'm not sure I'm entirely opposed to borrowing his precious sports car."

Gawain smiled a little at the mention of 'her museum'. Evelyn was obviously passionate about the place. He liked that. The idea of taking the car was not a bad one, although he was not sure how the traffic would look in the city at this part of the chaos. It might have been faster to risk the mirrors.

>>"So up to you. I'm not sure the moral code of your mutant club... Need a hand?"

Mutant club. Cute. Did she not see him shoot the guy in the leg?

"Yeah, please." he nodded, turning his right side to her "I'm right-handed."

He did his nest to slip the jacket off his right arm without dislodging most of the glass shards still stuck in his skin. He frowned.

"Ya might need to pick those out..."

Evelyn gave a small smile, and looked unconcerned by the glass. "Nice thing about being an artist is you learn to have steady hands. I promise I won't make it any worse." She remarked, and tucked her legs to the side so it was easier to work.

Taking a good look at his shoulder, Evelyn got a clean piece of cloth, wet it a bit, and gently laid it across his skin. Lifting it gently, a few of the smaller pieces came up with it, and she folded the fabric and set it aside. Gently, she removed the larger pieces of glass by hand, her echoes carefully noting and identifying each piece for her. It took a few moments but he wouldn't have felt much until she poured a bit of water on the cuts, cleaned it, then wrapped it up. "There. Now you are an official museum mummy. Congratulations."

She paused suddenly, the echoes trying to alert her to something through their murky haze. Then she heard noises from the direction of the gift shop. "They probably went to the back rooms. Keep searching. I swear, when I get my hands on those little twits...."

>>"Nice thing about being an artist is you learn to have steady hands. I promise I won't make it any worse."

Gawain smiled a bit and let her do her thing. He was sure the voices in her head were helping. He was used to cuts and bruises, and DocProf grumbling over the more serious injuries... but he had not been tended to like this for a while.

>>"There. Now you are an official museum mummy. Congratulations."

"Career dreams come true." he chuckled, moving his arm a bit to see if the bandages would hold. They did. "What do ya know, you're actually good at this. Full of surprises, huh..."

There were sounds outside, and Gawain tilted his head to listen. Damn, they found them fast. The security guards knew the building all too well.

Pulling his jacket on, he looked around in the storage room.

"So... now what?"

Evelyn distantly heart Gawain's question, but she was distracted by the conversation in the hall. Her face was pulled into a tight frown at the words she was hearing. "If they want to play games, let's play games. The two of you head up to the European Exhibit. Grab that Renoir piece with the two girls in the meadow from room 824. And some matches. Sometimes, the best way to catch a fox is to smoke them out."

Evelyn was on her feet before Gawain could stop her, snatching the baton off the ground where she'd set it and starting for the barricade like a mother bear about to defend her cub. She was already mapping out the best places to ambush them, and she didn't care what Mirror had to say.

This was war now.

Dammit.

Gawain was on his feet the same time Eve was, his mind occupied with trying to find a place on her to grab that was not hurt or would not result in a punch. He settled for her shoulder.

He knew what their plan was. The museum meant everything to Eve, and they knew it. Bastards. Gawain could not even imagine what kind of a national treasure they were prepared to destroy just to get their hands on one young mutant girl.

"Hey. That's what they want. They want us to come out. We put up a fight before, but I can't tell if they've got more weapons this time around. There absolutely no way in hell you're going out there. Forget it."

Evelyn flinched as Gawain touched her shoulder, and turned a cold gaze to him. Her face was set in a determined glare, and she growled slightly as he tried to stop her. "This is my museum, and I'm not just going to let them ruin an irreplaceable masterpiece. You can come help, or you can stay here. But hell if I'm gonna let you stand in my way." She still had the pepper spray and she looked like she wouldn't object to using it. After a pause, she waited for the mirror-walker to stand down, ignoring any protests. Then she moved to the left and started scrambling up the metal shelves like it was a jungle gym, fishing through a box at the top.

Her echoes momentarily reminded her she was still wearing a skirt. She ignored them and finally found what she was looking for, tossing a bundle of replica arrows down to Mirror. She landed with a quiet jump beside him. In the hallway, the voices were moving away, so it was now or never.

"If you want to keep me safe, then help me out. Those aren't particularly sharp, but they'll hurt something awful if you use them still. Remember that trick you played on the cookie monster in the park? Your own little mirror fun house? There is a exhibit just before the paintings that is full of statues in display cases. At this time of day, they should be reflective enough for you to use. I know this museum better than any of them, let me lead them there and you can have some target practice and help get a few of them off our case."

She fished through another box and grabbed a book bag with some type of knight on the front of it. She would have found it ironic if she wasn't too busy loading it with supplies. A few bags of marbles from the toys section, a collapsible umbrella, a toy weavers loom... Her mind was in overdrive and it took her a few moments before she could speak again, drowning in the sound of her echoes piecing together a plan. Finally, she felt ready, and straightened up.

She held up a couple decks of cards and gave an evil grin. "Ever seen cards on freshly polished floors? Couple kids dropped some a few weeks back, took one our our security guards down like gravity was out for revenge. Be creative." She put it in his hand and moved to the door to listen, tucking the second deck into the bag.

>>"This is my museum, and I'm not just going to let them ruin an irreplaceable masterpiece. You can come help, or you can stay here. But hell if I'm gonna let you stand in my way."

Gawain opened his mouth to protest, but she was already climbing the storage cabinets. Oh joy. He watched her in disbelief as she clambered around, completely willing to risk her own personal safety (not to mention Mirror's) in order to save the artifacts in the museum.
Girl was not quite right in the head. Gawain smirked.

>>"If you want to keep me safe, then help me out. Those aren't particularly sharp, but they'll hurt something awful if you use them still. Remember that trick you played on the cookie monster in the park? Your own little mirror fun house? There is a exhibit just before the paintings that is full of statues in display cases. At this time of day, they should be reflective enough for you to use. I know this museum better than any of them, let me lead them there and you can have some target practice and help get a few of them off our case."

Gawain caught the arrows but put them aside. He still had an almost full set, and he was not one of those archers to go into battle with five arrows poking out of the quiver.
Still, apparently she had no qualms about encouraging him to shoot people, if the paintings could be saved.

>>"Ever seen cards on freshly polished floors? Couple kids dropped some a few weeks back, took one our our security guards down like gravity was out for revenge. Be creative."

"You..." he said, staring at her as she packed a bag, out for revenge of the darkest kind, and realized that his mouth was hanging open "... are scary sometimes, ya know that right?"

He shook his head and sighed.

"Fine, we'll go save the paintings. But then we get outta here, no questions asked. Deal?"

"You...are scary sometimes, ya know that right?"

Evelyn turned, tilting her head slightly to the side and giving what could only be described as a disturbingly dark look. Her eyes were a dull grey as she let her echoes run wild, and she gave the cabinet a firm shove away from the door. "'The distance between insanity and genius is measured only by success.'" she recited, and pushed the box out of the way. She paused, and then looked back one more time. "One more thing... don't miss. If you hit one of those paintings..." Then she yanked open the door and took off down the hallway.

One, two, three, four... She counted off in her head, giving herself enough distance before turning and yelling back behind her. Her voice made it difficult to register what the guard was yelling, but it was certainly not complimentary. "Hey Avery, you want to play games? Let's play games. Marco? Polo!"

She ducked out of the employees hallway into the Egyptian art wing. There would be a few more exhibits, some stairs, and then a run through the second story before finally reaching the Ancient Near Eastern art, Greek and Roman Art, then the Islamic Art. Either exhibit 454 or 406 would do; both had enough display cases for Mirror to utilize. But there would be a small amount of running until then.

She ripped the bag of marbles open with her teeth and sprinkled them next to the mummy as she passed by. A few moments later, there was the sound of a cry and a thud, followed by some rude cursing.

Five, six, seven... That would have to do. She was already yanking yarn out from the weaving loom she'd grabbed, and hastily strung a piece between the Statue of the Goddess Sakhmet and the railing on the other side. The echoes listened to the approaching runners, and the yellow yarn seemed to stand out quite a bit even in ancient Egypt. It would have to do though, it was more of an inconvenience than an actual attack anyway.

Through the door, starting up the stairs.

"Radio ahead! She's trying to save her paintings!" Called the guard behind her.

>>"'The distance between insanity and genius is measured only by success... One more thing... don't miss. If you hit one of those paintings..."

"Whatever ya say, Home Alone..." Gawain smirked as he got ready to head out. There was no way of stopping Evelyn, so if he did not want his ass handed to him by Sam for letting her do this alone... all he could to is stick with the plan.
Whatever the plan was.

>>"Hey Avery, you want to play games? Let's play games. Marco? Polo!"

While Evelyn ran down the hallway Gawain slipped into the mirror and followed her. She was bait, whether she liked it or not. She could only do so much to slow them down. Gawain saw one of the men slip on the marbles and fall, straight out of a comedy movie. Stepping out of the mirror he kicked the man in the head (no time for politeness) and wrapped a plastic strip around his wrists (courtesy of the storage room).

One down.

Jumping back into the reflection, he moved on to the next room and then upstairs,just in time to see the next guy trip over the thread. This one, however, did not go down. Gawain moved past, hearing glass shatter behind him, trying to find a good vantage point fartner along in the Ancient Middle East.

String wasn't a very good tripwire, but there were still plenty of other tricks she could try. A deck of cards littering the stairwell was her next parting gift, and then she was upstairs in the middle of the Asian exhibit. The first room didn't have much to offer--a few tall sculptures--and the next had a long wall of pottery pieces in display cases. Mirror could at least utilize those, wherever he happened to be.

Ducking into the closed bar on the museum balcony, Evelyn's legs were burning and her lungs were on fire. Ducking into the room, she ducked under one of the tables and quietly pulled out the collapsible umbrella. Careful to point it away from herself, she lightly coated the top in pepper spray, then settled back to wait. Footsteps were coming from two directions now: drawn away from the European paintings, and making their way up to the second floor from another set of staircases.

There was a distant thud, and she hoped that was at least one of the remaining goons enjoying some playing cards. [Four attackers remaining.]

"Hey, she go that way?" Called one of the intruders.

A second voice responded, the rather winded sounding Avery. "No, we were right behind her. She must be hiding again. Check the restaurant." Evelyn tried to still her breathing, guessing where Gawain would be next. A set of footsteps came closer, and there was the sound of tables being overturned. Her heart started to race and as a hand clutched the edge of her hiding place she rolled out, expanded the umbrella and drove it into the mans face. There was a cry of pain as metal hit bone on his forehead, and further cursing as the pepper spray mingled with his tears. Stumbling backwards, the figure tripped over one of the tables and crashed into the ground.

[Three attackers remaining.]

Evelyn was already running. The pepper spray was out and there was only the baton left now.

C'mon Katniss... get your ass up here. She thought, turning into Gallery 400 with footsteps closing in behind her.