Persi was not, generally, fond of the outdoors. This held true for the Mansion's grounds, as well; Persi had no particular desire to play football or basketball, and no one to play them with anyway. He didn't like swimming much either, even if he wasn't currently lacking clothes that he could (or at least, would be willing to) wear to swim. Regular shorts might be an option, technically, but hated the way wet clothes clung, and anyway, he didn't know what chlorine did to clothes, and didn't want to accidentally ruin any of the clothes that Andrea had bought for him. He still didn't know how he was going to pay her back... aside from that bit of guilt, though, he didn't know when he'd be able to get more clothes either, and Andrea was just about the only person in the Mansion that Persi liked, so he didn't want to damage them. They weren't going anywhere near the pool.

There was one exception to Persi's dislike of the outdoors, though. He not only tolerated, but distinctly liked trees, and was quite happy to climb them for nearly any reason. Or for no reason at all; it might have been easier for him to have stayed on the ground to sketch, but it was more fun to sit in the tree.

It wasn't any particular tree; just one of the large, fairly old trees scattered around the grounds. This specific one was a maple of some kind; the branches were very nicely spaced for climbing around in, and large enough to support Persi easily. (Unless, of course, he was spectacularly stupid and tried walking out to the end of a branch, but that was true of every tree in existence.) It wasn't so good for sketching, so Persi was sitting against the trunk, one leg on either side of the branch he was on, with the sketchbook somewhat precariously held on the branch. He couldn't focus on drawing quite as much as he normally did, since a lot of that attention was going to balance instead, but it didn't bother him. Persi was in a tree, and drawing; for the moment, he was quite content with the world.

There were fewer and fewer places that Sara felt that she could go in the city, and still feel safe. So with a quick stop at her apartment, she’d picked up her dog, Roxy, and together, they had traveled to the mansion. The two of them had only been on mansion grounds for a short amount of time now and Sara couldn’t help but notice how things had changed since she had last visited.

For instance someone had put up a new green house. Then there were also new students, new powers, new smells. Sara and Roxy had circled the perimeter once and were working on circling the perimeter a second time, when Roxy found some of her favorite mansion residents to visit. A group of children had come up and greeted Sara but Roxy had received the warmer welcome. Before the German Shepard was Sara’s she belonged to Sam. She still had friends here and her presence seemed to take away some of the stress of the riots out of the younger teens. So Sara let them take Roxy for a walk and she continued her own exploration.

She wondered off sill she found a particularly inviting tree, and a person sitting in it. He was definitely yet another new person, because Sara didn’t recognize his smell. Normally she would have continued on, but her curiosity was getting the better of her. So carefully she hopped up on the thick branches of the tree, just on the other side of the mane trunk. Her weight rocked the tree only slightly but one could mistake it for a sudden gust of wind. She then raised herself just behind this other mutant and slightly higher, leaning over the side of a branch to see what they were drawing better. “Cool.”

With the riots still ongoing Mariusz was still out and about providing extra security, only now he was at the Mansion instead of at the mutant sanctuary in the city proper that was run by Mahadevi. Quietly he soared above the grounds, bow slung over his shoulder and his repaired quiver hanging at his right hip. All in all it was a rather nice day for flying and there was nothing much to see or do... until he spotted her.

The cat woman.

The feral beast.

Reacting quickly he drew and arrow from his quiver and nocked it, drawing the bowstring back by his cheek. As he was pulling the arrow back in preparation for firing it he watched as the cat woman scaled a tree and came up behind one of the students. No doubt she was preparing to strike and then eat the poor boy. It would definitely be a good idea to let her know that he knew right where she was.

Raising his aim just slightly Mariusz released the bowstring and fired the arrow. It whizzed through the air and thunked into the tree trunk just above WereCat's head, the razor sharp arrow burying itself deep into the wood of the tree.

"I see you fuzzbucket," Mariusz shouted down at her. "Make one wrong move and the next will pin your heart to your spine, I do not have any aim distractions today!"

Persi did think his drawing was cool. It was dragons, how could it not be? Tiny dragons, sure, smaller than the leaves some of them were peeking out from behind, but still. How could a tree full of dragons not be cool? That did not, however, mean that Persi expected the tree to comment on it.

He jumped, turned too quickly, and had to twist more to get his balance back. He wasn't that close to falling, but he still definitely had to catch himself.

...Oh. It wasn't the tree that had commented. It was... a cat girl. Well, cat woman. A bit more cat than most seemed to be. Either way.

Persi wasn't sure which would have been weirder, really; the tree talking or the cat girl existing. He probably shouldn't be surprised by either anymore; he'd already been kidnapped by a bush and met a winged boy, so why not? That didn't stop him from staring at the woman's ears until he caught himself and made himself look back at her face. "Um, thanks. I--"

An arrow landed in the tree. It was quite recognizable, even if Persi didn't see the actual arrow part of it. He jumped again, a bit more since he was already in a more awkward position than normal, and had to grab a branch to catch himself. Staring at the woman's ears was no longer a problem. "...Arrow?"

There weren’t a lot of people that openly showed a lot of artist talent. Sara could, but normally it was only a single sketch here and there. This kid had a hole illustration going on.

"Um, thanks. I--"

Sara let the corners of her eyes wrinkle slightly. She could let the surprise of seeing herself go for a little. Roxy had that sort of relaxing effect on Sara. Then that arrow hit the tree branch directly above Sara’s head. Her ears pinned in response. She was really starting to hate pigeon boy. Her thoughts were distracted for a moment. He was making a speech or some sort of warning, and Sara was really only half hearing the warning when she saw the other mutant artist start to fall. Her right hand shot out to grab a hold of his wrist, tight. Her claws were only slightly out, enough to irritate the skin, and she squeezed tight to keep the other mutant from falling further. It might have been alarming to see Sara’s arm move that fast but it was meant to help. “You ok?”

“Robin Hood. It’s not that I don’t appreciate you’re presence again, but buzz off.” Sara glared over her shoulder at Talon and that stupid bow and arrow of his. She made sure that the other mutant was steadied in the tree, when she snapped a dead branch off of the tree limb that she was perched on, and flung it at Talon like a knife. “… Or you could always get a little closer.”

"I live here, flea bag," Mariusz snapped back, drawing another arrow and firing it at the branch that the cat woman had flung at him. The force of the arrow striking branch split it in two and the second arrow buried itself in the tree trunk, though this time it was nowhere near the cat woman and the student. "What are you doing here," he demanded, drawing a third arrow and fitting it to the bow string but not drawing it for the time being. True, the feline had grabbed the boy, but Mariusz's enhanced vision told him that it had looked like the boy was about to fall. Maybe the cat woman was behaving herself, maybe she was just making sure she had a meat shield, too early to tell at this point.

"And I have no intention of coming any closer you flea bitten miscreant," Mariusz said. If the cat woman thought she could come here and cause trouble, for Evelyn or anyone else, she was badly mistaken. "If you want to take a flying leap into space though you are welcome to test it. I remember that worked out quite well for you the last time."

That was helpful. Slightly painful where the nails dug into Persi's wrist, but helpful. Especially if any more surprises decided to appear.

...Unless those surprises were in the form of more arrows, anyway. Hopefully they wouldn't be; Persi couldn't dodge anywhere close to fast enough. He didn't attempt to free his hand until after he'd carefully turned so he was sitting sideways on the branch, facing toward the source of the arrow and sort of toward the cat girl, and closed the sketchbook so he could hold it. "Yeah, thanks." His eyes kept darting up to the arrow.

"...You know... him?" Cat girl didn't seem to be fond of arrow boy, which made some sense if he made a habit of shooting arrows at her. How she would have gotten to know him--relatively well, apparently, from the way they argued--was less clear. Persi was pretty sure that people didn't normally get to know their enemies well enough to banter like that, at least when the enemy was of the attempting-to-kill-you level.

...Apparently these two did know each other, however. There weren't many ways for that to happen, that Persi knew of. He looked between them a few times, came to an entirely logical conclusion, and turned toward arrow boy. "Is she your ex or something? I promise I'm way not old enough to hit on her!"

Flea bag. miscreant. They were names that Sara had heard before, but it didn't mean that Sara wasn't getting more and more ticked off by the second. Pigeon boy needed to come down so she could kung pow chicken his sorry tail feathers. "I used to live here. My apartment is in need of.... repair." Sara did her best to do just a one shoulder shrug but the fur there on her shoulders and neck were trying very hard to bristle.

Again, Sara's eyes focused on the end of the arrow that the bird mutant was aiming at her. She really needed to learn how to use a long distance weapon other than a gun. Because one day she really wanted to get this mutant even when he was out of her reach.

"If you want to take a flying leap into space though you are welcome to test it. I remember that worked out quite well for you the last time."

"And have a chance to make you talk funnier again?" Sara's hips might have shifted and her tail swayed much like a house cat ready to pounce at that thought. "It would be worth it again." Sara said with a grin. for a moment, she wondered if he'd flip her off as much as he did the first time if she dislocated his jaw.

Once the other mutant in the tree was secure, Sara let go of his wrist. However she still kept him in the corner of her eye in case he needed help again. She was just starting to decide exactly how much lower Talon would have to come to Sara for her to reach him, when the mutant on a lower branch asked something that nearly had her fall off of her perch.

"Is she your ex or something? I promise I'm way not old enough to hit on her!"

"Saw what now?" Sara's foot had slipped of of the branch and her arms shot out to grab two other branches, that bent and swayed under her weight. "I'm not old!" Sara said indignantly pulling herself back up to rest on the branch that she had been perched on, and letting her tail smack the back of the younger mutant's head. "And Hell no."

"Me date that uncultured, uncouth, and unintelligent flea bitten fuzz bucket," Mariusz called down from his safe perch high in the sky, "I hardly think so. Though if she took a real bath just once, instead of a bath by tongue, I might consider it just so she could get a good lesson on etiquette and culture."

"Even then... not if I were the last man on Earth and she were the last woman and we had to date purely for the continued existence of the species," the Czech man continued, his feathers all puffing out at the thought of such things with the feral and rabid cat thing.

"But yes, in answer to your question dear boy, we have met. Last time she was adventuring and attacking innocent people when I put an arrow in her knee... and another in her chest. I am still curious, though, to see if she would survive one in the head," he said thoughtfully.

Okay, apparently that was not the answer. Persi jumped and reached for the cat girl as she started to fall, but she caught herself before he could do much of anything (and it was unlikely that he'd have managed to do anything useful anyway), so he dropped his hand. And then ducked, immediately after her tail smacked his face. "Sorry! I didn't mean you're old, I meant I'm young. Er. I'm still a kid. Sorry!" And having some difficulty creating a coherent apology. It wasn't very easy to call someone older without calling them old.

And then the arrow boy answered, and Persi was blinking up at him instead. "...Do your insults always sound like you ate a dictionary? Because they're really not effective when everyone's busy laughing at you for sounding stuck up." Persi would know. There was a reason he no longer attempted such insults, after all.

Ok. Bird boy needed to land. Then he needed to die. He really needed to die.

Sara knew that she hadn't had the chance to give the best first impression to this guy, but he didn't need to spout all of that crap about her and the more she listened the more that she glared, them more that her ears pinned against the back of her head, and the more she just wanted to punch him. In fact if one was to look at her clawed hands, they were digging into the tree branches that she had grabbed onto for balance. Splinters cut into her fingers around her claws and she hardly noticed the biting feeling that they had. Most of the time, Sara let comments about her mutation roll go but it was still a sore spot. She'd put up with a great deal of abuse because of it, and she'd had enough.

"...Do your insults always sound like you ate a dictionary? Because they're really not effective when everyone's busy laughing at you for sounding stuck up."

Waoh. Sara's glare lost some of it's edge. The kid stood up for her? ok he just earned huge brownie points in her book. She still wanted to kill the bird mutant, but the kid? She'd definitely make sure that he wasn't hit by one of pigeon boy's arrows. "Don't you enjoy a good Hypocrite?"

Her eyes narrowed back on Talon's "If you shoot me in the head, I'll probably not survive that. But go a head and try." After all... Sara had narrowly survived being shot in the head once... Once.... Narrowly...

"Dear boy," Mariusz said shaking his head a bit, "I never insult. I speak only the truth, that the cat woman there is terribly violent and willing to attack everyone she meets for no good reason that I can discern." He still held the arrow loose at his side. For the moment she wasn't attacking, so there was no need to shoot her.

"I am, of course, willing to not shoot you in the head. Provided, of course, that you apologize for your wonton destructive acts and assaults upon mine and Evelyn's persons." He continued to hover in the air, ready to fir if needed. "Such action would show a sentience on your part, rather than simply being a mindless sort of woman beast."

"They can be pretty amusing, yeah. So many of them don't even seem to know what they're doing." Hypocrites were a group that Persi very distinctly disliked. The more important the subject, the more he disliked them. ...And apparently cat girl was not all that intelligent. "I don't think you're really supposed to dare them to kill you, though. That doesn't normally end well."

Okay, so hypocrite arrow boy was also condescending. Persi was officially on cat girl's side now. Persi considered, then turned to the cat girl and offered his sketchbook to her. "Could you hold this?"

Once she was, and he didn't have to figure out how to hold it and climb at once, he picked a path, and within a few steps reached a branch that put him more or less in between arrow boy and cat girl's head. It would probably still be possible for arrow boy to shoot her--certainly would, since he could always just move faster through the air than Persi could keep up--but at least this should make it more difficult to hit her without hitting Persi. Especially if he was aiming for her head. Persi settled onto the branch, and kept ahold of another in case one of them startled him again. "She hasn't attacked me yet. The only person here who's attacked anyone is you."

"Dear boy, I never insult. I speak only the truth"

That was more Bull than Sara had recently seen floating aimlessly above the city recently. Sara showered, she didn't lick herself because, Yuck Hairballs! And all of that other stuff. She really was getting sick of it. She really just wanted Talon to take a shot. Try to get her and fail. She was fairly certain she could catch an arrow of his if she saw it coming. Or better yet, dodge.

Then she was asked to hold Persi's sketch book and without fully thinking about it, she did. First only thinking that he might be climbing down. Instead, The younger mutant climbed up putting himself between the bird mutant, and herself. But bird boy kept going on and on anyways and figured the best thing to do was to remove herself from the situation with him. "You know what? You're right. While I'm here and in this glorious mood, I'm going to find her." Sara hopped down from the tree landing gracefully and low, then straightened herself, dusting herself off. She'd forgotten that she was still holding the sketch book so there it staid in her hand. Had she been thinking straight she would have at least laid it against the foot of the tree, or climbed back up and handed it to the younger mutant but this wasn't one of those times that she was thinking as her self. So instead so started marching her way up to the mansion. Her free hand made a single middle digit solute to the bird mutant as she left. "I'll go and apologize to Evelyn... Not to you." Though the way her voice sounded and the fact that her movements were sharp, fluid, yet fast, now might not be the best of times to fine Evelyn.

"Attack, no. Warn, yes. The cat woman on the other hand did attack me with a missile which, as you just witnessed, has been dealt with," he replied, indicating the second arrow he had fired into the tree trunk. Next thing he knew the guy had placed himself in the way. Like he had Stockholm Syndrome or something. There was just no helping some people.

And, just like that the cat woman was back on the ground and threatening to go find Evelyn. That simply wouldn't do. It wouldn't do at all. Mariusz drew the bow and fired an arrow in Sara's direction. It struck the ground well in front of her, by design, and buried itself deep in the earth.

"You are not going anywhere without me," he called out, drawing another arrow and then tucking his wings and diving to the ground while nocking the next shot, but not drawing the bow. Someone had to keep an eye on the nutty cat woman.