Ty nodded as he watched Tses turn and walk away. He wanted to follow, but he was in one of those 'damned if you do, damned if you don't' typed of situations."Yeah. That's my girlfriend. She recently figured out she could turn into light. Honestly I'd much prefer that way to what she usually does. Being punched in the face really isn't as bad as exploding energy." He gave a laugh, then sighed.

"She...she kinda has this protective, jealous thing. And it really doesn't help matters that pretty much all my friends are women." Sighing again, he turned around. "Tses! Please don't go, not like this..." As an afterthought, he mumbled, "I got presents and everything..."

Rude

Oh, Tses could be ruder. She turned around, half tempted to show Noel, when Ty started talking. Her arms were still crossed, and the light temporarily faded, lingering only around her arms. There was an almost instantaneous rush of pain from her leg and shoulder, and a noticeable lack of energy from the rest of her body. If she wasn't so angry she might have leaned against the wall slightly for support. Apparently, the whole light trick took a lot more effort than she thought...

"Fine, staying. And you'd have a better case if you could at least list a guy friend." Tses said, still standing where she was. Mostly because she wasn't sure if she'd be able to walk straight if she moved. She couldn't remember if they were in the moons gaze this morning or not. 12.5. hours of the frickin day. Why couldn't she have just absorbed sunlight. It had to be less temperamental than this?

Noel put her hands up in a placating gesture.

> "...pretty much all my friends are women."

"Ooookay. You two seem like you have your issues-" she couldn't help the meaningful look she gave to Ty. Poor guy. "-so I'mma let you work that out yourselves since it sounds like you don't need me." She wasn't a man and apparently that was the kind of friend Ty needed right now. Noel rolled her eyes and stuffed her hands into her pockets.

Punching people? Yeah. She could do that. "Placating attention crazy chicks is so not my thing." She mouthed the word 'sorry' to Ty and turned to go, raising one hand in farewell.

"Yeah, I probably would, but I don't seem to like too many guys. Not my fault girls understand better." He shrugged, eyes meeting Noel in an understanding sort of way.

He sighed, not really wanting to see her go, but knew if he asked her to stay, he risked poking the bear as far as Tses was concerned. He gave a small nod at her apology, biting his lip. Maybe he did need some guy friends. Girls were weird sometimes.

>>"You two seem like you have your issues so I'mma let you work that out yourselves since it sounds like you don't need me."

Tses glared at the woman. Yeah, whatever. Like she had any idea what they were even arguing about. Go away, get lost. Darn friend of Ty's whoever she was. grumpgrumpgrump.

Tses was about to turn around and leave, then the next comment clicked into place.

>>"Placating attention crazy chicks is so not my thing."

Shoot. Bang. Tses was mostly on her good behavior the past few weeks, but being locked up in an apartment and a hotel prior to that after getting shot did make her stir crazy. And...maybe attention crazy was a valid point. But some stranger had no right to stay that. Not after she just spent all morning dragging a darn tree halfway across New York, splitting open the scab on her shoulder again and hadn't taken her pain medicine yet.

The explosive left her hand before she could stop it. Really. It was only a small one anyway. Nothing major. Just, you know, a little surprise 'TWAP!' on the back of the girls head for good measure.

Noel stopped in her tracks when something thwapped her in the back of the head hard enough to make her jaw clack shut.

"You like the low blows, eh?" She should have just let the crazy off as her Christmas present to Ty. Should, being the optimal word there.

Noel turned, eyes glued to Tses as she marched straight over to Ty. The memorymancer wasn't sure she could touch the hologram girl. She wasn't sure she wanted to either since it really looked like she wasn't all that steady. Instead she took Ty by the shoulders, kicked her heel back behind the red-head's knees forcing Ty into the most romantic of dips, and laid a big fat smooch on her old roommie's lips.

It was a nice double whammy. Not only was it a big one fingered salute to kiss a girl's boyfriend right in front of her, but Noel used her talent and tongue to dig up everything Ty knew about Tses.

Everything.

Ty facepalmed when Tses threw the explosive, but luckily it was a small one, right? Nope...Noel turned right around and--what the she wasn't heading towards Tses...what the fu--before the redhead could get that thought out he found himself dipped and Noel's lips were locked on his.

He tried pushing her off, but in his current position, he had zero leverage, making his efforts futile. So there he was, flailing like a fish and trying his best to break free. Then...it dawned on him. She had a deeper motive. As bad as kissing a guy in front of his girlfriend was, he remembered her tongue was the vehicle to a certain part of mutation. And there was nothing he could do to prevent it.

Merry Christmas indeed....Humbug.

The explosive hit, and Tses felt a momentary sense of victory. Then everything seemed to go cascading into a pile of crap. Noel turned and---

"Get your slutty mitts off of him!" Tses yelled, and the light around her flared like it's own little moonlight powered inferno. Angry at Ty or not, Tses was still jealous, and Ty was still hers. Launching forward she made a grab at the girl's dark hair and aimed her first right for her dumb little face as soon as she pushed Ty away.

Hindsight, punching someone with a busted shoulder hurtlikehell.

Tses' yank on Noel's braid pulled her face away from Ty's with a smacking pop that was sure to rankle even the most liberal of swingers. The memorymancer missed the slutty mitts comment altogether. In fact, it wasn't until after Tses had punched her in the face that Noel's eyes focused on the here and now.

The brunette yanked her braid back from Tses' grip and touched her nose to check if it was bleeding. She wasn't. That didn't mean that the blow hadn't hurt. It definitely smarted. She didn't do that bad for a practical cripple. But Noel'd had much worse.

Poor Ty got dropped like a sack of flour somewhere in that span.

"Wow-e. I don't approve of domestic violence as a general rule, but Ty, you did a bang up job here of de-clawing your cat. That sorta tickled." Noel touched her nose again. It was probably starting to swell a bit by the feeling of heat that radiated off her schnoz, but she could at least act like it didn't hurt.

Noel wasn't usually this petty. She wasn't sure what had gotten into her, but she wanted to systematically dismantle this tramp. Feelings and friends be damned. She advanced a step toward Tses. "Don't you think these will add to the nice collection you started? The scars? Don't think I didn't notice."

She advanced again, crowding Tses' personal space and lowering her voice so that Ty shouldn't be able to hear. "I don't want your boyfriend. I just wanted his memories of you. I've got your number now so Merry Christmas. Touch me again and I'll throw you in the river." She quirked an eyebrow, daring Tses, just daring her to make another move.

Ty quickly found himself lying on the ground, head having smacked against the asphalt, feeling confused, used, betrayed, and somewhat violated. He heard everything that Noel and Tses had said, and it made him feel even worse inside. Somewhere on the ground were the plastic bags from his Christmas shopping, but that didn't even matter right now.

His head was spinning, and he was sure those were tears forming in his eyes. All he wanted was to let Noel know everything was okay...and this happened. He wasn't even sure what this was anymore...

Tses was mentally (and audibly) displaying her vocabulary of curse words as she released Noel and took a step backwards. Noel's words stung, each one baiting her more and more. She glanced at Ty, guilt momentarily flickering, but that just made her feel more protective as she stepped in front of him. Noel could play tough. She knew she at least got one good hit in.

Her shoulder knew it too...

Then, Noel hit territory that froze Tses in her tracks.

>>"The scars? Don't think I didn't notice."

She glanced down at her arms, the missing arm bands making her skin seem that much more damaged. Ty didn't seem to mind, but was he lying? She said memories.... Was he lying? Did she see that?

>>"Touch me again and I'll throw you in the river."

Tses felt her hand twitch slightly. It was cold, and winter. Maybe she just meant to give Tses a cold bath. Not that she knew Tses couldn't swim... right? "So you just kissed him for the memories? Some friend you are. I may have my issues, but you have a whole different set of them. You can pick on me all you want, but you stay away from him. Got it?"

Noel arched an eyebrow, but no further punches came.

Wow. So Noel was the bully now? She rolled her eyes. So what? She wasn't picking on him. She had notes that said that Ty didn't hide anything from her. He'd let her taste his memories before. What was the big deal now?

Of course, when she took a step back and thought about it she wasn't being a good friend now. It had started because she'd wanted to protect Ty from crazy pants McGee here. Now...?

God. She was going to have to grovel later, wasn't she?

"Ty, I owe you a steak for that eye." She watched Tses as she said the words. As much as this had started because of Ty, it was now really between the girls. In wanting to assert herself as the dominant and avoid further phsyical conflict, Noel had fallen into gray territory. Territory that made her squidgy and want to attend mass.

"I have..." She sighed, defeated. "Everybody has issues."

She was sullen and quiet but most of all tried to be discreet with the olive branch that she was about to offer Tses. "I know a couple tricks. If you want to learn to read." She'd recognized the signs through the memories. She'd done some of the same things in order to fake it. "I didn't learn that long ago myself." She shrugged. She knew she'd learned to read from someone else since her recollection of how she learned was a patchwork of other people's memories.

If Noel's offer earned her another punch, well, maybe she actually deserved it this time.

Ty's mind wandered as he lay there. Maybe he could just kill them both and start his life over; move to Mexico and change his name to Jesus Pescador...

No, he couldn't do that. No matter how upset either girl made him, he'd never have the heart or the fortitude to do that. But then he started to listen, first as Tses spoke. After Noel tried to make peace, it dawned on him.

Both women were just trying to protect him, looking out for his best interest. The problem was they were trying to protect him from each other, and he was just caught in the middle as the two fought over him. Ty crawled to his feet, head still spinning. But the dizzy spell would soon wear off. For now, he watched both of them carefully, hoping things didn't explode again.

Slowly, the dust seemed to settle. Noel slowly seemed to realize what she'd done, Tses was still ticked off about it, but she caught the slight apology somewhere in the rather backhanded olive branch. It was an odd way of trying to be helpful, pointing out that Tses couldn't read, but it was there. Tses was starting to feel to exhausted to argue. As much as she wanted to slap the woman, all the explosions and light changing drained her. She was pretty sure her shoulder was bleeding again too...

"I don't need to learn." Tses grumbled defiantly. As dumb as it made her feel sometimes, admitting she wanted to was a cut in her ego she wasn't going to take right then. She moved over to Ty and carefully gathered his bags. She didn't even peak as she held them out to him. Maybe she was a bit declawed lately.... she should still be swinging at this kissing bandit.

Swinging was easier when she didn't want to just crawl home and sleep though....

Ugh. And this was why it was so much easier to make friends with guys. A guy would have just punched her and gotten it over with. They may tussle, but when the chips were down no grudges were held.

"I'm guessing you would both rather fall over dead than let me carry your crap home?" Yes, that was an offer. She was the only one so far not wincing or crying. Jeez. Maybe it hadn't been Ty that made her uncomfortable enough to run off.