"Target is crossing the street, on the corner of-" She rattled off the streets and numbers. Her grab bag team was listening in on the other end, through a mic pinned to the inside of her collar in her gray winter coat. A flesh colored earwig was buried in her left ear. If they relayed important information, like their van's path being blocked or everything suddenly being on fire, she would know. And when she got her target, so would they. They could swoop on in and scoop her up.

Her black purse bounced against her black skirt as Lenna stalked through the night. Her quarry was moving, out and about in the seedier parts of New York. At night. Lenna was wearing a lot of black and a gray winter jacket, on account of that. Wanting to blend in with the drab part of the city. She'd almost wanted to wear white, which would have stood out. Kind of because of that fact, actually. Sort of a predation hunter sort of deal. But she'd thought better.

She hadn't really read anything about this woman, save the important bits that directly involved the mission. Something about spiders, spider silk. SPIDERS. The last time she'd read too deeply into a profile, it had bit her in the butt. Crazy Aura and her oddly-identifiable motives. Lenna had not wanted to overdo it, this time. But from where she was walking, and when she was doing it, Lenna was getting a feel for exactly the kind of person this woman was. And it was the kind of woman who strolled through crime-ridden areas at night, without fear. She kind of liked the balls. Stupid identifying with targets, stupid emotions.


Back on task, SUPER was interested in utilizing the woman's mutation for discovering new ways to make lightweight combat wear. High quality combat threads, if you will. And they wanted her for it. The entire her. She thought she'd read the woman might have been selling her wares to the highest bidder, but-- you don't question orders from up top. Maybe they wanted to run some experiments? Lenna thought their PR people had played down that, though... whatever.

Orders are orders.

Had the woman glanced back when she'd turned that corner? Lenna couldn't tell. She moderated her walking pace, and tried to blend in with the night.

She was being followed.

Huh.

Megan wasn't quite sure what to do with this new bit of information. The small arachnid eyes situated on the back of her bare neck weren't lying to her though. A woman had been following along behind her for a while now, seemingly talking to herself a few times. Why was she being followed? Who the hell knew. She could tick off dozens of names on all her fingers and toes of people who hated her or wanted her dead for various reasons. Picking just one would be hard.

She chalked it up to someone being sent after her for cutting ties to a few companies for her wares, and left it at that. It didn't really matter a whole lot who it was, or why they were dogging her. She also didn't really feel like getting in a scuffle at the moment if she could avoid it.

Flexing her fingers in the warm pockets of her coat, she slipped on the pair of metal knuckles she had tucked away there. How long had it been now since she had been in a scuffle last? Probably too long. She was for sure rusty.

Stalking down the sidewalk, she keep a forward eye on where she was going while regularly checking in on what was going behind her with her rear facing ocelli. She paused at a corner, considering where to go, before heading left, past a passed out drunk on the sidewalk, and turning into a little dive bar on the corner.

Would her stalker follow? Who knew. But she worked best if she had a proper environment around to work with.

All this thinking was making her thirsty.

”So a Spider walks into a bar...” Lenna said dryly, into her mic.

There was a person in layers of rags stretched out across the sidewalk in front of her, near the stoop of a rundown apartment building. They clutched a bottle of red wine in one fist. As she walked past, giving them a wide berth, the drunk stirred with a groan.

She had expected derision, or scathing comments at her tongue-in-cheek update. Something smart ass, maybe. Time and a place. SUPER ops rarely had senses of humor. When you’re in the body-snatching biz, it seemed that was par for the course. What she hasn’t expected was sudden darkness and a blast of static.

Her hand shot to one ear as she clawed the earwig free and lobbed it at the ground.

Another groan.

The area around her was dark. Some street lights had popped, burst their filaments or something. It wasn’t entirely clear from a single glance. The lights down and up the street still glowed, however, which said “localized phenomenon” to Lenna. Or “localized problem.” The burst of static in her ear piece was another piece of evidence pointing towards what may have happened... the person on the sidewalk slightly behind her... the one who let out an occasional pop and spark of light... was another.

—

The woman had given it to him. He’d seen her do it earlier, not an hour before, and he’d begged her afterwards. Pleaded. And she’d consented. She had given. It. To him.

He’d hit up a liquor store for a bottle of liquid courage afterwards. Told her he was going to do it. He knew he could, knew he would, but he’d been scared all the same.

She had given it, to him. It hadn’t been part of her usual MO.

Humanity was the past. Withering away. Turning to dust. Mutantkind, the future. Thriving, but struggling. Inevitable. Mutants live hard lives, and it ages them. Harder than your vanilla being. And it just isn’t fair.

He hadn’t been her first. He wouldn’t be the last. Some mutants just need a second chance at youth and happiness. As her eyes fell on a woman with dark hair, she asked herself if the woman had a slightly harried look? Hunted, maybe? Then and there, the nondescript Lady decided he wouldn’t even be her last That Night.

The night was young. Or rather, it was old and getting older. But that didn’t mean she couldn’t make it much, much younger with a little initiative.

The Lady smiled. She would talk to the dark-haired woman with the supposedly tired face. And if she were a mutant, She would give her a second chance.

—

A localized EMP, probably. Her phone was fried. Mic? Fried. Earbud. Utterly useless. And here was hoping it had been the right kind that didn’t demagnetize her credit cards, or else she’d be using caveman’s cash. Next, she’d be bartering with shiny beads. And it wasn’t even Mardis gras.

Lenna toed the vagrant over. A few sparks fluttered off him, revealing features. Fevered brow, freckled face. Rusty hair. Youthful, underneath the oversized brown coat and rags. Another flash, another detail. The wine bottle, she had seen in her cursory glance when first she’d passed the kid in the streets. The needle that tumbled from his other hand as another spark leapt free... she had not.

Poor kid.

The hand twitched, flexed.

Hopefully, he’d get picked up later and get off the streets. Maybe she’d report him, herself. For someone that young to be caught up in all of that... well, maybe he’d get the help he needed. Not from SUPER, though. They’d just try and weapon use his ass. Little did she know the 65 year old teen with the fresh liver had gotten all the help he’d need that day. Well. Maybe not all the help. Casually, she dug in her purse and found a business card for The Mansion. She flicked the card onto his drunk face.

Lenna hadn’t had much interaction with the Mansion. SUPER guidelines normally said to avoid them and the X-men, to let them go about their business. That said, she still carried their cards around and gave them to young mutants who might need a helping hand. Ones she avoided alerting SUPER to the presence of.

The organization had little leeway for mutants that fell south of the law. She didn’t care either way... but her alternate self might have. For Kaitlyn. The daughter she’d never actually had. Her alternative self had died for the thought of saving a young mutant. The least she could do was toss out cards.

Stepping out of the darkness and into the next pool of streetlight, Lenna ambled onwards, towards the bar. The White Ring, huh? Was that a picture of a lacy garter belt on the sign? Some people...

One arachnid is sent to take up station by the entrance to the bar. She checks back in with it briefly before turning her focus back forward. The place seemed a little higher tier than she was used to these days... she tended to favor places where people wouldn't even spare her a glance, and the bartenders had conveniently bad memories.

This place was... well, in her younger days she might have traipsed around a place like this. There were tables and booths, as well as a few stages scattered around with dancers on them. It brought up memories she wasn't terribly fond of or prepared for, as well as a handful of ones she cherished. Megan headed for the bar while idly wondering if her previous face was still infamous around places like this. She's bet money that people thought twice before trying to pay for danced with coins in this city still to this day.

On her way over, her icy eyes landed on a woman who seemed to be heading her way. You know, in that direct kinda way someone moves when they lock onto a target. Quirking a brow, she didn't do anything to avoid her, or stop her. It wasn't super uncommon considering that Megan wasn't exactly unattractive, but surprising seeing as the expression on her face usually kept flirts at bay. Well, for the most part at least. What was even more surprising though was that as soon as she was within an arms distance of Megan the woman's eyes lit up like she had just seen a f#$@in Christmas tree. Everything screeched to a freaking stop when this woman, this complete stranger Megan had never met nor seen before, stopped directly in front of her and grabbed her cheeks like she was an adorable puppy.

.... what.

Megan, who had been on edge only moments ago and preparing for some sort of inevitable confrontation, was completely flabbergasted.

"Beautiful."

What?

Her face was turned this way and that, but the woman wasn't looking at anything but her eyes. "Almost like fire."

And then she was free. And still more of less shocked into a mute, confused silence.

"I wonder what the rest of your mutation is? What could go along with such beautiful eyes?"

Megan shook herself. "Lady, I don't know what kinda next level flirting guru you took lessons from but- HEY."

The mildly attractive creep was poking at her, lifting the edges of her coat and prodding like she was looking for something. Megan swatted the intrusive hands away as the woman circled her like a shark, spotting the little beady eyes on the back of her neck and poking at them inquisitively. "Ow!KNOCK IT OFF! The spider mutant turned to snarl at the woman, but it got caught in her throat half way when she found her staring up at her with wide, unnerving eyes.

"Have you ever wanted to start again, hmm? Revisit your younger days and do it all over?"

Leery, Megan leaned a little ways away. She'd met a lot of creeps in her life, but never anyone like this nutcase. "....Hasn't everyone? What kinda question is th-" The woman reached out and gripped one of her arms. Megan's hands curled into fists.

"What if it wasn't just a pipe-dream anymore? What if you could have your youth again?"

Her spider by the door alerted her to approach of the one who had been stalking her, and the weird and whimsical mood lifted. She ignored the woman for a moment, turning to eyeball the door and prepare herself for a fight if it was coming. "Yeah, yeah....Anyone with half a brain would want a fresh start. It's not a hard question... can you leave me alone now?"

With her back turned, so focused on the perceived threat that had been dogging her, she didn't notice the woman pull a little syringe from her purse and uncap it. She didn't see the brilliant, happy smile of someone who felt she was doing a wonderful thing as she raised the needle in the air and prepared to jab it down straight into Megan's shoulder.

”Leave her alone, you bitch.” Lenna shouted, mildly. Almost as if she were talking about the weather. Or shouting about it. Calmly, over the storm. Inside her mind, however, it was a hurricane.

The woman she’d been following hadn’t seen the needle, but she had. A needle. Like the one on the kid. And one thing Lenna has been raised to understand was, you don’t mess with kids. Cortez was always kind of an old maid about that.

The Lady turned, and paused for a moment. Her eyes fell on the blonde shouting at her from across the room, considering. It certainly was messy. There was no question about that.

This Lady might not have been the dealer to mess up the kid. But she was there and the needle was there and the kid was not very far away and it all screamed “not a coincidence.” So the fact she did what she did in the heat of the moment shouldn’t have been a surprise to anyone except the people who paid her bills. She sent the Lady flying across the room with a psychic shove.

The Lady smashed into a jukebox. The machine skipped a beat on whatever track was playing, and then a new song blared. Toxic, by Britney Spears.

The Lady shook herself as Lenna stalked forward.

Very messy, The Lady decided. Her right hand dropped into her purse, and calmly extracted a rounded device. Without pause or comment, she hurled it at the woman who had thrown her!

Have some temporary youth, you witch!

The throw didn’t go quite as she had planned. Before the object had reached her, the blonde bimbo raised an arm and her projectile was batted away by some unseen force.

Lenna really hadn’t meant for the grenade to bounce off the ceiling and come tumbling down towards the bar. She had not meant to potentially explode the woman she’d been trying to save (if only by taking out the lady who would have done her harm). She’d simply reacted quickly to a perceived threat with deadly force. To quote the Tao of Spears, “oops.”

The people from the outskirts of the bar had shifted, stepping towards the scuffle now. Some were angry, some looming. One helped the Lady to her feet.

Smoke was billowing furiously from where the grenade had come down near Spider-Chick. Those near the smoke were also angry. Looming. Clear as day, a high-pitched voice drifted out of the cloud.

“-Uck.”

The voice had sounded like that of a teenager. Come to think of it, most of the silhouettes in the cloud of smoke were teenager-sized. But Lenna never had time to think about the shadows in the cloud, or the electric spark from one person. The continued swearing. A lighter-sized flicker of flame. The Lady had Pushed away the 400 lb bison who’d helped her to her feet, and she had charged. At her. She was charging at her. Lenna caught the slight glint of the tip of something metal jutting from a fist.

A stool broke against the bar. The bar stool had been metal. The bar, wood. It, had been loud. It tore Lenna’s concentration away from her oncoming attacker at the absolute worst time.

Things were pretty much chaos, to be quite honest. In the back, a man shouted something that sounded terribly like “everyone attack.” And it turned into a bar room blitz.

Too high.
Can’t come down.
It’s in the air and It’s all around.

Smoke spread and people shrank. And the band played Britney Spears’ Toxic.

She was watching as the blonde woman who had been following her shouted, but took it the wrong way at first. Leave her alone? Leave the touchy feely woman who was still waaay to far into her comfort zone alone? What? Her expression said just as much. Then, because nothing ever went how she planned at all, comfort zone lady was... gone. Just gone.

Half turning with a very surprised look on her face, she caught the tail end of her crashing into the music maker.

What?

Absently, as her feminine stalker stalked across the floor toward the touchy feely creep, Megan wondered if it was too late to just leave again and let all this drama play out without her.

Fate was quick to decide 'Nah' for her and Mrs. Creep pulled what looked like an honest to goodness grenade from her purse and trie to hurl it at the angry blond.

Whelp.

She jumped into action at first trying to get to the grenade as quickly as possible before it could explode in the middle of the bar, but, again, since nothing ever went smoothly for her it instead seemingly bounced mid-air up toward the ceiling and the spider making mutant had to skid to a halt and re-direct herself back toward it.

She knew that doc was always going on about caring for herself and whatnot, but to be honest she still hadn't fully kicked the habit of attempting to throw her life away. So, when presented with the opportunity to possibly use herself as a meat shield to prevent other unnecessary deaths, she was already reaching to grab the supposed bomb before her brain had fully grasped the idea that she was seriously about to die.

"Everybody RU-" Instead of exploding like she had expected, it erupted into streams of white gas. One stream was nice enough to hit her directly in the face. Megan dropped the thing and started hacking up a lung. What was it, poison? She could handle poison.

Things started tilting funny and her vision was getting blurry. A nerve agent? She... didn't know if she could handle that.

Darkness started creeping in while she stumbled around blindly, only mildly panicking all things considered.

And then, nothing.

When she opened her eyed next it was due to someone literally walking all over her. The sounds of an ongoing fight and panic raged all around, but first she focused on the shoe embedded in her stomach. "O-off! Get off!" She was able to dislodge the offending foot from her person, and scrambled to her feet to avoid being stepped on again.

Things were muddy, and she was still coming too, but immediately two things were obvious to her.

1. None of her clothes fit, as evident when she tripped over her own pants trying to fall down. And...

2. She was in the grossest, nastiest bar she had ever seen. Were those peanut shells on the ground?!\

And then someone punched her directly in the face and the confused teenager landed smack back on the ground from where she had come.

Welcome to New York, Megan.

It wasn’t all about punching Megan, though. Some people punched some other people, too!

When the nerve agent had gone off, it had hit everyone in the general vicinity of the bar with a potent whammy of the de-Aging cocktail little miss Lady loved so much. People had turned back their personal clocks, and baby if I could turn back time and make you see, you’d see some people just weren’t so comfortable in their younger selves skins.

It was crazy. Some people had no control over their mutant powers. Some people didn’t have any powers at all. The 400 lb bison man, who had actually been a bison man, and not a figure of speech? Yeah. He was a 96 lb bean sprout of a boy with blonde hair and acne. And that confident firestarter? He suddenly couldn’t help himself from making the world burn just a little brighter around him. People were mad about the sudden changes, about the sudden feelings (or lack of feelings) of loss. And most of them took it out on each other. Megan, unfortunately, had gotten slugged. But at least she hadn’t gotten hit with the taser fist. As for Lenna... she was having her own problems.

The Lady had stabbed her with a needle, and it was taking effect.

Let’s set the way back machine for 2008! Lenna had been 16. Property prices in the US were falling. President Bush and House leaders had just agreed to a giant stimulus package. Writers were on strike against Hollywood, and Britney Spears had just released her new album, Circus! Lenna had been sent on her first contract killing mission on her own!

Things had been going great, up until a bunch of thugs had gotten the jump on her. There had been guns, and knives, and fists and Kung fu. It had all been pretty hairy for the 16 year old girl. But then. Her mutation had activated for the very first time. It had been a coming of age, of sorts.

It might have been cool if her telekinesis had taken the form of a crashing wave of force that swept across the room sending all the henchmen flying into walls. Or if she’d gone Vader on them and started choking them to death. Or if she’d pulled out a bunch of knives and gone Blade Storm on the criminals in an incredibly messy way. It HAD been messy, just not quite like THAT. Lenna, it seemed, hadn’t fully grasped she even was a mutant. Or had a mutation. Or what said mutation was when it happened. Things just got... orange. All the things. And from there, things got confusing.

It seemed her power was targeting every single thing in the room at once. When it would settle on something, the orange would recede. When it stopped settling, hey what do you know? Everything was orange again. In adult life, she would have gotten that under control. The orange highlight when she targeted a thing for telekinesis would only happen when she wanted it to happen. And only she would see it. But teen Lenna wasn’t there yet. Nor did she have any control at all.

The guy who wanted to shoot her missed because she noticed his gun and the orange receded to a single point, nudging off the aim. Orange flooded back as someone across the room fell over, dead from friendly fire. A man swung his knife down at her, and as she turned to avoid the attack and swept out with her arms to shift it aside, she had shifted him aside too. Right into the path of another man’s attacks. In the close confines of the room, numbers did not mean success. The rest of the entire ordeal had continued like that.

Whenever Lenna’s life was in danger, she had just so happened to center her focus on the one thing that could help her out, if it were only to have been shifted by the slightest amount. The orange had zoomed in to surround whatever that something was, and then snapped back out like a flood light coming on. At the end of it all, she had not thought she had tactical telekinesis. She thought it was luck.

She was so lucky. She was a star. But she cried, cried, cried with the pain and orange orangeness. Why was the orange everywhere?! She had been angry. She had been scared. And that, friends and neighbors was the exact moment the de-Aging plot device had thrust her back to. Amid the pain and fear of a sudden life change, on the edge of death. She was a teenage girl with a problem, and she. Was. PISSED!

The blonde hair had shrunk to a shoulder-length brown, tied neatly in two little pigtails that bobbed on either shoulder. Her bone structure had changed, reverting from an already-altered state, back to her adult self’s height and weight, and then down again, to a lesser weight. A lesser level of muscle tone and strength. A similar height... which had been less than the blonde alternate identity’s height. It hurt, in addition to every other emotion she was feeling. And her clothes didn’t quite fit.

Lenna screamed. Everything was orange. She glanced down at the needle in her arm, then up to the Lady holding the thing. She punched her in the face.

The Lady reeled. During the whole event, the gas had started to fade away. Be dispersed by the AC, the ceiling fan, whatever. So she didn’t tumble back into her own cloud of de-aging gas. But she did stumble into a melee. This was going poorly.

“Messy,” the Lady said. “Messier than that restaurant with the pedophile.”

”What the hell.” Lenna said.

What the hell. What the hell was with the orange. What the hell had happened to the thugs, the building, her target. Everything else. Why had that hurt and where was she and why had the woman been stabbing her with a needle and what the hell?!

The Lady took her chance to waltz underneath the arm of a bar patron whose arm had suddenly become long like spaghetti. She beat a retreat.

Some of the angrier de-aged bar patrons took Lenna’s screaming personally, and turned on her. Which was just what she needed. New targets for a disoriented psychic with personal control problems.

Ow.

Her @$#%#in nose hurt. Past the dark tinge on the edge of her vision and the sparkling little stars of light she was seeing, she could feet pain and and around her face. And PEOPLE KEPT STEPPING ON HER.

Someone tripped, landing sprawled half across her as their aggressor jump down after them. Megan curled up to avoid an elbow to the face, before throwing out one of her own and landing a hit in someones ribs.

The pain started to recede and she kicked and slapped her way to her feet. There was a war going on around her... but as the flashing lights from a possible brain injury started to fade... she found that she was hearing things. Not crazy angry bar patron things either... little things chattering between her ears. In her head.

In her head!

And then her eyes started acting funny and she was suddenly blind for a moment. Then she was seeing absolute chaos from a different angle.

And then another.

Orange. Someone screaming amid a bunch of other people screaming. Was that fire?! She was suddenly very very sick and promptly lost her lunch right one someone's shoes.

She was save from being punched again because someone else barreled into the guy she had puked on.

She stumbled back, being tussled around from every angle until she hit the bar with her back.

Confused, slightly frightened, and very dizzy Megan hauled ass over that bar as fast as possible.

There was a toddler swaddled in a too-big apron and clothes wailing on the other side with a teenage looking girl in a waitress uniform trying to comfort him.

Her eyes landed on a wall mounted fire extinguisher and she staggered back to her feet.

If it didn't calm down the massive fight, at the very least it would put out the damned fires!

BEEP BEEP BEEP....[/b]BEEP BEEP BEEP[/b]

A shrill alarm started beeping away and lights at the exits started flashing.

Megan let loose a cannon of extinguisher fog just as the sprinklers overhear kicked on and drenched everyone beneath them.

Targets. So many targets. She ducked under a punch, and deflected it so the person went sailing on into a couple more people. Threw a kick at him and the back of his dumb knee, as he went. And then, things got violent. Too violent to describe. There was fire. There was water. There was electricity springing from fingertips, and that didn't work out well for anyone who was wet and within earshot. Every time someone came near Lenna, something unfortunate happened by inches. Her mind brought the painted orange world down to a single point... and then the orange only she could see sprang back out when the deed was done. And she felt nothing about it. It hadn't been her. Just some bad luck.

An alarm was going on. Lenna wasn't so lost in the fog of battle that she hadn't noticed it going off for a few seconds. She had just been... busy. Knocking out thugs. Around her, men and women were either unconscious or wishing they were unconscious. But she was starting to get the feeling that maybe this wasn't the place she'd been in before. For one thing, she wasn't in the same room. Or the same building. And this was a bar. Weird.

Things were on fire, although the fire was getting doused by water. And someone had the bright idea to use a fire extinguisher.

Common sense dictated that she leave the scene. She had not killed anyone. Whether or not unfortunate happenings had occurred that had cost them their lives, it was hardly her business. She'd merely been acting out of self-defense. And killing people you aren't paid to kill is bad business.

She wasn't in the place her target had last been seen. There was nothing to keep her in a flaming building. Lenna decided to leave. The only problem was-- What was the way to the exit, and where was all the fire. Because everyone and everything looked like it was on fire to her. And it was still pissing her off.

Lenna made her way towards the bar. Because at least she knew the person with the fire extinguisher was actively engaged in extinguishing fires. It should be relatively safe. Safer there than with Sparky McHandsSparking, at the very least. She stepped around him and his self-tazing ways. He twitched.

"You with the fire extinguisher." Lenna said, urgency in her voice. "Lets get the hell out of here and let God sort out these idiots."

Person-with-fire-extinguisher had brain. Person-with-fire-extinguisher was thus cool, in Lenna's book. Person-with-fire-extinguisher was coming with her. People with common sense don't deserve to die in fiery infernos. Not if she could help it.

Someone was talking at her, which was a helluva lot better than throwing fists at her.

Around that same time the tank ran out of fire smothering fog to spray.

Leave? Hell yes! She had never appreciates those words all strung together so much before. "Don't have to tell me twice!"

Someone sprang up from behind to engage her. She jerk-reaction swung the empty tank into his head. "Out the back!" She shouted back, equally as urgent.

Two swinging doors that led into the kitchen burst open as Megan hurried inside. No one was in the kitchen at first glance, but she could see the green glow of an exit sign through the water and slight fog. Figuring that the other girl would be right on her heels, she made a beeline for it.

The heavy metal back exit door burst open from her swinging it with force, and she was finally out in the cold air.

Megan took a few steps away and leaned over to prop herself up with her hands on her knees. She coughed and snorted, and a gooey, long bob of coagulated blood oozed from he nose.

"@#$%..." Reaching up, she could feel that the skin on the left side of her nose was cut, and everything around it was throbbing and sore. She spit out another blob of blood before standing back up and starting to peel of the soaked coat from her shoulders.

"What the hell am I wearing..." Maybe she had a concussion. She didn't remember owning an outfit like this at all.

The metal knuckles fell from he pocket as she shook the coat out and she stared at them.

"..What are-? H-hey you! What was going on in there? I... I don't-"

The words lodged themselves in her throat as she turned to look at the girl, trying to make sense of the mess she had found herself in. "Rrgh!" A hand flew up to press a bloody palm into her eye. She was struck with sudden flashes of things.

Sprinklers.. Dim lights and smoke..

Blue and red and white. Pulsing.

"I.. I think the cops are here."

Right on cue, sirens pierced the air from the other side of the building, cutting through the shouting and screaming still ongoing over-there.

Out the back, they went. Lenna followed the orange girl. Through the orange doors, and past the orange glowing exit sign. Shouldn’t it have been green?

Finally, they were outside.

The girl was coughing up blood. Or oranges. But probably blood. Which wasn’t good, right? She was no doctor but she’d been injured enough to know that’s the stuff that should stay in, not out.

She didn’t ask if the girl was okay. Merely stepped closer, ready to lay down a helping hand if push came to shove. Without getting into the girls personal space, or any of that.

Wet. They were both wet, in addition to any injuries or problems thanks to smoke inhalation. Her gray winter jacket and black skirt were plastered to her body... as was her hair. Though with it up in little pigtails, the bulk wasn’t dragging sloppily on her back. No scrunchies held it. They’d been twisted and tied by their own force. And she’d managed to keep her black purse, through all of that. Despite not really remembering having had a purse for the mission she was on.

Memory loss must be a side effect from whatever mutant hit me with the whammy. Memory loss and teleportation. Ouch.

What was the girl wearing? What was she wearing.

”No idea.” She replied. Then quieter, and to herself Lenna added. ”Skirts are not conducive to fighting. Why the hell am I in one.”

It was a little loose, too. Like she had less hip to hop.

Clingclang clong. Brass knuckles bounced off the pavement. The other girl had been carrying a concealed weapon? Yet another reason she approved.

Lenna opened her mouth for a quick retort, but closed it as the girl cut herself off with a little scream. And a bold pronouncement.

Sirens wailed, in order to give truth to the statement.

”Shit.” Lenna said. And for the second time that night, she said ”Lets get the hell out of here.”

Policia were not something she wanted at present. Knowing herself, she was probably weighted down with concealed knives. And enough firepower to knock over a stronghold. Or at least pop a few heads.

Lenna shuffled towards where she figured would be the next best place to run. Away from the sound of sirens. If the bloody girl followed, good. If not... that was her own business.

A hand clamped down on her skirt to keep it in place as she ran. Keeping out of sight, she moved from shadow to orange shadow in the night. A trash can got in her way, and fell over just as she was about to barrel into it, rolling away. Lucky.

Had things been less orange there for a second?

”I do not know this city.” Lenna called back, in case the woman was following. ”Is there some place to stay safe and take stock?” Her words were clipped, and had a slight hint of something foreign, like English wasn’t her default language. Was that a tinge of Spanish lilt?

Other chick wanted to hoof it, and so would she. Even with the pain and confusion distracting her, she hand managed to hear that little comment from the other girl about why she was in a skirt.

There was a growing puddle of dread pooling in her stomach.

She followed after the other woman swiftly, wondering why her boots felt a little too big and adjusting the studded belt around her hips to keep them from drooping.

"I... I don't know. I don't know where I am right now." Trying to stave off growing internal panic, she reached back to what felt like a brick in her back pocket and withdrew whatever it was. A phone?

...It looked like no phone she had ever seen.

There was no flip function. No buttons. Just a black shiny surface and a nondescript rubber backing. She turned it in her hand and the screen suddenly lit up in a flash of color.

She damn near dropped it in surprise!

"What the hell!"

What kind of technology was this?!

Poking the screen experimentally earned her a prompt to enter a password or scan a finger print. "@#$%in' finger prints??"

She caught sight of a little weather widget floating in one corner of the screen and her eyes bugged a little as she stumbled to a stop.

"This thing says New York!" She tried to keep her voice level, but a little warble in her tone and the expression on her face was probably enough of a tell. She was freaking the @#$% out. The tall buildings surrounding them were enough of a give away to her.

Why the hell was she in New York city?!

Why did nobody know where they were in this city?! Was it something in the water? This was why she stuck to bottled water, and tequila. And beer. Much safer, when you know what you were drinking, and from where.

She had a bad feeling about this whole situation. Had she been kidnapped during her mission? Had they been kidnapped? Was this girl another assassin? Was the whole bar full of assassins? If so, they had been been pretty $#!++¥ assassins. She would have cancelled their contracts, post haste.

As she walked, Lenna rooted around in her purse. Wallet, keys, mints. A gun. Nothing too unusual. She, too, found a brick. Hers had a black casing over it. There was a chili pepper in the very center of the case’s back. It looked red hot. She had no idea what the hell it was. Far too fancy to be a crappy flip phone. Not a brick from the 90s. Those had been popular in Cartagena. The woman behind her cursed.

>£>>ing fingerprints?

She glanced over her shoulder at the woman. ”Everyone has them.” she commented. ”Unless they get burned off.” Or they have no fingers. She left that last part unsaid.

Cortez loved security. Because of this, his girls were familiar with finger print scanners and other newer toys, like the ones that scan your eyes. Lenna had the basis of an idea. If this was some sort of super modern tech thing... like a smarter phone.

As Lenna pressed her thumb pad against the round button thing at the bottom... (because what else would be the print scanner? The chili pepper?), the girl said— New York.

”That is not where I was,” Lenna said emphatically. Her tone was surly. ”Someone is going to die.”

She HAD been kidnapped. And apparently so had this other girl. Who she really needed a name for because calling her girl was getting tiresome in her head.

Lenna wasn’t freaking out. Freaking pissed, but not freaking out. Except for the orange, but she was beginning to grow used to it. The other girl, however... Lenna stopped walking, turned in place and addressed her. Blocking her path.

”It is clear that something wrong is going on here. Either we have been kidnapped or else I got teleported by a mutant and so did you. And maybe everyone else at that bar. Do you have a name? It may be safest to work together while we figure this out.”

They both had phones. She supposed they could figure something out. Plus, she had that wallet. Where had she gotten that wallet? Speaking of phones... had her idea worked? She looked at the phone screen.

The screen was pitch black. Unbeknownst to her, the EMP mutants pulse from earlier had fracking fried the phone like a fricks ham. One cannot make things too simple, now can we?

Lenna slipped it away. ”This is useless.” She said.

Megan ignored the comment about death because, well, she said stuff like that all the time. She continued fiddling with the phone, pressing a finger on it and waiting. That finger didn't work, she tried another. The third finger in, because of course, and she was in. The whole screen lit up with a surprising amount of bright. Kinda stung her eyes for just a moment while they refocused.

What greeted her was a virtual rainbow of different icons. She assumed they were folders or links, same as she would see on her computer at home. Was this a very small compact computer? Sure seemed like it. She glanced up occasionally as the other woman fiddled with her phone, which looked pretty similar from where she stood.

Megan paused with the fiddling of her phone to listen as best she could over the voices in her head. "...Yeah, sounds pretty valid." She started, glancing back the way they had come. "My Name's Megan."

She scrolled across something labeled 'maps' and could hazard a guess at what it did. A search bar popped up as well as a bunchof other options she ignored. She started typing on 'Hotel' and blinked when the search bar filled out the rest of the text for her.

'Hotels near me'

... Well, okay. That was neat. She tapped a button offering directions.

She was not expecting the goddamn thing to start talking to her out of the blue.

Continue straight for... thirty feet... and then take a left in... thirty feet.

Megan blinked at it, then blinked at the other woman before shrugging. "Guess it found us a hotel to hide out in and make a plan." She started walking, holding the phone in front of her with one hand while she rubbed at her abused nose with the other.

Megan was Megan.

”Lenna,” she replied. Fake names were only useful when you were using an alias. Otherwise, it just got confusing. And right now, she needed no further confusion. Young Lenna was far more open and less cautious than old.

The voice out of nowhere surprised her, and Lenna glanced around the orange area for a sign of where it had come from. Oh obviously, it was the phone. What were they continuing to?

Oh. A hotel. Well that was as good as anything. ”Good.”

Lenna started following her. Now the shoe was on the other foot.

”When we get there I can bandage and clean you up, if you want.” She offered, out of the blue. She had noticed Megan and her injuries. ”My adopted dad...” she explained. ”Made sure we all knew basic first aid. Although we may need money for bandages and the hotel...”

She dug our the wallet in the purse, and checked it. The drivers license picture caused her to stop walking and utter a very audible “huh.”