She frowned, and sighed, and pushed her hair form her face feeling awkward and unhelpful. She hadn't meant to offend him, but something about his body language suggested she had. His tone had a sharp edge to it, and she fiddled with the edge of her sketchbook, smudging a little of her drawing as she did. She shouldn't talk to people this late anyway. She seemed to have less control over her echoes when she was tired, and the information in her head desperately needed sleep to sort through. She didn't want to sleep though. Unlike this kid, she wasn't hoping for sleep to come, rather, for it to stay away.

"Sorry. I didn't mean to... My powers aren't exactly socially friendly. I have, I guess you could call, hyper-awareness. It points out things about pretty much everything, and it is especially keen on body language and behavioral patterns." She found herself explaining, flipping her sketchbook closed and rubbing her forehead. She felt exhausted suddenly, and drained at just the action of talking about her powers. She wondered if she'd finally get some sleep after this. A flicker of memories went through her mind, and she felt the fear in her gut that made her doubt that possibility. 

"I know I'm not exactly helping anything by being here right now. Maybe the art room is open though, I can go hang out there." She offered, trying to give him a way out.

The echoes were distracted by the television. She was going to have a recipe for cheesecake stuck in her head now everytime she remembered this conversation.

Aiden cringed in apology. Even without her words even he could tell that he hadn't handled that nicely at all. He shifted awkwardly as she tried to explain... her mutation? Well... this was a place for them. But a mutation that, er, pointed things out? How did that even work? Was there some mini personality in her head that talked about what she saw to her? Because Aiden was pretty sure that was diagnosable and not related to being a mutant.

Still, he really owed her for snapping at her, so he tried to sort out what she had said. Hyper awareness. So, whatever the particular mechanism (which was probably the only interesting thing about mutations), she noticed everything. Well, he was probably screwed. He was self-aware enough to know he wasn't that good at hiding things. He was really only passable enough for adults so worn out with their horrible jobs that they really didn't notice anything at all anymore.

He scrubbed a hand across his face. "Sounds like you should interview people for the cops," he said with a reasonable amount of levity, making a last-ditch effort to improve the situation. "Figure you're better than one of those fancy old-looking lie detector things?" Cop stories always used lie detectors, but they really didn't look like much. Ai figured they had a proper name too, but he couldn't remember it. 'Lie detector' worked well enough, didn't it?

"I'm... sorry," he said awkwardly. "Like I said... I don't do well with people. I always mess things up, and being here and tired and everything... doesn't help." He pulled the remote back to himself and tried to see the buttons through his sunglasses. "You can stay here. I don't think the T.V. was helping anyway. Just making noise."

Her companions remark made her smile a little, and ease the tension that had set in a bit. She gave a little shrug and chuckled slightly. "Lie detection is a tricky thing. The echoes are decent at it, but nothing is 100 percent accurate all the time. Reading people involves a lot of deduction. You piece together clues and then build the most logical conclusion from what you know. That's why polygraph have to be reconducted---I'm rambling again."

She stopped herself, and gave a firm shake of her head to clear her thoughts. The television transitioned to an infomercial about a new computer, and the echoes noted the specs that were displayed. The graphics were decent, but the audio could be better... She tuned it out again, focusing on the teen.

"Well, I guess we have something in common. I don't always do well with people either, and being tired seems to make it awkward for both of us." She put her sketchbook on her knees, and glanced at the television. "Maybe the school has a movie or something we could put in? If you can't sleep, may as well stop yourself from being too bored?" She suggested.

Aiden found himself almost smiling - no more than a half-paralyzed tightening of the under-used muscles around his mouth - at the woman's rambling. "It's all right," he said with less hesitation when she cut herself off. "It's... it's interesting hearing and thinking about how things work." He looked back at the television sharply, uncomfortably aware of himself and how much he had just said.

Being tired making dealing with people more awkward? To be honest... he really couldn't tell. It was always awkward dealing with new people, and he had even less experience dealing with strangers while he was tired. He shrugged noncommittally at her proposal but found himself agreeing when she continued. "They should have some," he said, and pushed himself to his feet to examine the storage around the TV. He found a shelf that seemed to have the texture of a collection of DVDs but didn't have anywhere near enough light to read the titles. "Anything in particular interest you?" he asked, trying to sound casual as he squinted his hardest at the cases, pulling out one at a time to try to decipher the dark-on-dark that was the labelling on pretty much all of them. "I don't usually spend much time on movies... can't say I recognize all of these." Well, he couldn't recognize any of them because he couldn't see them well enough. That wasn't the point, though.

Evelyn couldn't help feeling a little more relaxed when the caught the subtle movement around Aiden's mouth that could almost be classified as a smile. It was a step in the right direction, if nothing else. The general effort behind the action was there, and even if the follow through was lacking, she could accept it. Heck, he frowned so much, she wasn't sure his mouth knew which direction was up at this point, so benefit of the doubt. She smiled back. "Well, I end up doing a lot of thinking thanks to my powers. Not all of it's useful, but I certainly have a lot of stored information to sift through if I want. A lot of it deals with the stuff at the MET though. If you ever need to write a report on art history, I'm the encyclopedia you need."

She was pleasantly surprised that he agreed to her suggestion, and quickly moved forward to look at the movies to try and pick a title. She scanned the list, then rubbed the back of her neck somewhat sheepishly.

"To be honest, I don't watch much movies, so I actually am not really a good person to ask. The echoes sort of...ruin them. One minute you're watching a really good action shot and the next the echoes are picking out the physic errors in the size of the explosion. Maybe you can just grab one and we'll see how it goes?" It didn't seem like that bad of an idea. Most of the titles seemed familiar, but that was a common feeling when you had a perfect memory. Everything started feeling familiar after awhile.

Yeugh. Thinking. Aiden was officially very, very glad he wasn't this girl. It was hard enough keeping from thinking too much as it was, and as far as he knew his mutation had nothing to do with his head, beyond being the cause of the white and silver that hung around there so stubbornly.

"Can't say I'm expecting to have to write anything on art history any time soon," he said drily, trying to edge the conversation forwards so he could stop thinking about thinking before it degraded into just thinking. He wasn't expecting her to not know movies, though, so hearing that worked very well to distract him. He blinked at her. He was supposed to be the weird recluse who didn't know any normal media.

"That... makes sense," he allowed. "Maybe we should watch something bad enough that even I can pull out the mistakes, so all the issues just make it funny?" Of course, him actually being able to figure out which of the cases before him contained such a film wasn't going to happen. Maybe if this girl could do anything other than notice everything he'd dare peer around his sunglasses long enough to read some of the titles, but he sure wasn't going to do that knowing how much she noticed. "Just grabbing one is probably easiest," he admitted, though - mentally replacing probably with absolutely - before just plucking a case from the shelf at random and popping it open.

Oh great. Where was the DVD player? Setting the case beside him, he crouched in front of the TV and peered at the shadows around it, trying to perceive some shape or tiny LED light that would lead him to the DVD player. "Um... I don't suppose you can see where the DVD player is?" he asked apologetically and just as sheepishly as she had admitted to not knowing movies, continuing to look.

Ok, so he wasn’t a fan of history. Or art. Or both. She could understand that and would resist driving the conversation towards her favorite art eras or the historical significance of difference pieces. Or maybe she could try it. That might help put him to sleep.

As Aiden scanned the DVDs, Evelyn tried not to hover too close behind him. She really wasn’t sure what would constitute as a ‘bad’ movie, but a cartoon would at least be silly enough the logic would obviously be wrong and she could tune that out. ”Maybe something animated. Those never really make sense so if nothing else I can shut the echoes up.” She glanced down at the row with animated films, and realized most of them would probably be children’s movies. ”Or, maybe something more towards the top shelf… I don’t think we want to end up watching some educational children’s show. Anything that would ask you to repeat after them may drive me to throw something at the screen.”

The top shelf had a few animated films, a few recent movies and some box set DVDs. Box sets were trial and error here at the school. She was used to hearing kids wine about getting halfway through the series and one of the disks was scratched. When Aiden finally suggested just grabbing one, she nodded in agreement. ”May be easier and then at least we won’t have to feel bad if we pick a dumb movie because it’s all change. And I think the DVD is right there on top of the television…” She moved over and pushed the button to open the tray so he wouldn’t have to fish for it.

Why was she behiiiiiiind hiiiiim? He successfully resisted the urge to feel around the edges of his sunglasses to see if there was any possibility that someone standing anywhere behind him could possible see any part of his messed-up eye at all, and strapped all of his attention to finding something to watch despite the potentially useless sunglasses making it nearly impossible for him to see much of anything.

"If it's educational, it comes straight back out," Aiden said resolutely. He was not watching something like that. Or, well, listening to and maybe kind of seeing, if the screen were bright enough with the movie. Some movies weren't very bright, right? Heh, like horror movies. He could be immune to the visual effects of horror movies! But it might be worse just listening to the idiots and never knowing when something was creeping right up around the corner and then BAM!

But he didn't think there would be very many horror movies sitting on the shelf in a school. Kids, you know. At any rate, chance was good and could be blamed very easily. Chance, in this case at least, was safe. Following her instructions, Aiden managed to catch the edge of the DVD tray with a finger and deftly slipped the disc itself in, giving the tray a little nudge to close it rather than fish around awkwardly for the button. As the machine whirred to life, he retreated to the couch to settled himself at one edge. It would be rude to take up the whole couch and make her sit somewhere else if they were watching a movie, after all, even if he didn't want to sit too close.

If nervous energy was something palpable, Evelyn could have made a smoothie off it. The echoes were practically swimming in the stuff coming off Aiden, from his twitches, to shuffling, to shifts in movement towards his glasses then away that made her wonder if this was a bad idea to try engaging with him further. Plus, it was clear he couldn't see any of the titles he was trying to look at, and trying to move any closer to help just increased the nervous energy.

There was no winning. Even as they put the DVD in and she finished setting up the T.V., he scooted to make room on the couch but his body language advised his lack of comfort with actually sitting next to her. Hesitating for a short second, she finally moved forward and perched quietly on the other end of the couch.

They looked like two x's being forced to sit together. This was so many levels of awkward. She should have gone to paint.

Then the movie started, and the title screen for an animated film called Howl's Moving Castle came onto the screen. Information flickered into her head about what she knew about Japanese animation, and this particular film's release date, and she pushed play before they got too technical. "Good news is, not educational... Anime."[/b] She remarked, then did her own moment of fidgetting until the film started.

Everything was in place. The movie was in and would be running soon, he had his end of the couch, the girl had hers. Reassured that she was content to keep to the other side, he tucked his feet up beneath him. They might not be cold, but he wasn't too warm to manage it for a while. It was more comfortable a position, after all.

The screen flared to brightness again, and he blinked. Howl's Moving... Howl's Moving Castle? This place kept anime on the shelf? How had he not known that?

Other than, you know, not being able to see well enough or spending enough time in here to ever find out.

"I've always heard about this one but never seen it," he said curiously. He hadn't been expecting that he would have the opportunity to see it here, in a giant ancient school for freaks with some random white-haired omniscient girl in the middle of the night. "It's supposed to be good." He relaxed a bit as the production credits rolled through the screen. Okay, this wasn't so bad. He hadn't been irreparably rude, she wasn't being too weird despite the whole apparent hypersensitivity thing - which he felt rather more comfortable knowing less about than more - and he finally got to watch a theoretically good movie in a format that actually interested him.

Aiden might have been relaxing, but Evelyn was still feeling very nervous with this situation. That was the problem when you could read other people's body language. While he was less skittish than before, he clearly didn't want her anywhere near him, and the whole social bit wasn't a strength for either of them. But it was a movie, they could survive. As the animated characters started wandering across the screen, she nodded at his remark.

"A couple of the guys at the museum are big on anime and they talk about it a lot. It will be nice to have something to contribute to the conversation..." She trailed off as she tried to follow the story's plot. The echoes were doing fairly well at it, although she may have momentarily had to get their assistance figuring out where the hat shop and the strangely femininely drawn man fit in the story arc. It had one of those introductions that didn't necessarily make sense at first, but gradually started to sort itself out as you went along.

Yes. Movie. Good. He tried to glance over at Evelyn without moving more than his eyes. She didn't think this was too weird, did she? She could probably still leave without getting too hung up over manners at this point. She wasn't moving, though, so it must not be too bad. It was probably just him. He wouldn't be surprised if all the awkward he ever noticed was entirely him. Other people were supposed to like dealing with other people.

"Lot of room for art in anime," Ai mused aloud. Graphics, storylines, characters, music... There were a lot of things that could bump a series or movie up from 'okay' to 'wow' without the producing studio just flinging money at the project like people commenting on online geek store products always seemed to try. They were silly. The only way for those sites to take your money was if you gave them all the required information and legal permission, so screeching in caps lock about it wasn't going to do much of anything.

"If you start talking about one thing, chances are they're going to rope you into watching a ton of other stuff," Aiden said, idly and offhand as his attention gradually settled more firmly on the movie. Anime characters tended to have such interesting backgrounds, whether they were raised by another species' remnants or expertly cultivated into the perfect citizen before being cast adrift. "Maybe you should ask them to suggest some series. I suppose they know you reasonably well?"

Evelyn still was not used to dealing with people. Watching a movie shouldn't have been such a grand adventure, but it was still making her a little nervous. The hardest thing was to just try to watch the movie without over analyzing it. The echoes were caught up on the fact they couldn't find a logical way Howl's jacket was staying on.

The fact he was walking through the middle of the air didn't seem to bother them though.

Evelyn turned her attention back to what Aiden was saying, and nodded slightly. He was probably right. Then she chuckled slightly at the end. "No, not really. Most people I work with try their best to know me as little as possible..." She trailed off. She looked back at the movie. It was always sort of a sore spot for her. She loved the art work, and she was good at what she did, but most of her coworker were annoyed with her because either a) her parents, b) her lack of social skills or c) rumors. Some of them thought she was some freaky mind reader still and if they kept their distance she wouldn't be able to snoop.

Yeah, like that would work. Telepathy was completely based upon sight, after all.[/sarcasm]

Ah, anime: the most irrational, logically impossible reality imaginable where you could still find people laughing with scorn at the suggestion that the merely logically improbable could be included. Watching such occurrences was fairly amusing. Being involved in one probably wouldn't be, either as one of the sides arguing the legitimacy of such a point or as the inhabitant of such a world, but the peanut gallery had a pretty good view.

Aiden glanced over at Evelyn, surprised. "What? Why would they try to do that?" he asked. "You don't seem weird enough to avoid to me, especially as a coworker." Maybe it was the hyperawareness thing? That could set off some people, he supposed, but there were worse things out there, and probably plenty of completely normal who could ferret out at least some of the same information she theoretically could. She might not be a grand talker, but she was certainly more social than he was, and even he wasn't having too hard a time getting along with her, all things considered. "Sounds like they're being kind of rude and silly," he mused, looking back at the TV.

Evelyn blinked back at Aiden, somewhat surprised by his...well...surprise. She was used to people keeping their distance from her that she assumed whatever made her disagreeable must have been something everyone would notice. Her companion didn't think she was quite that odd though. She fidgeted slightly, feeling off her game by his reaction. She watched the screen for a moment and fiddled with the ends of her hair.

"I guess it's always been a mixture of things. My family has always sort of been anti-mutant, and...well, they have me. When I got the job at the museum they sort of pushed their weight around to make sure I stayed there. I'm not really great with customers. I mean, you over-analyze someone once and most jobs will try to keep you in the backroom. I guess some of my coworkers just felt like I was getting special treatment... I like where I work though. I know a lot about art and I can remember all the useless facts no one wants to remember....Maybe it's a little rude, but I feel like part of it might be my fault still..." She trailed off. She was rambling again. She focused on the movie, trying to sort out where the plot was at.

She had no idea what the hat shop had to do with people walking in the air still....