Grinning right back at him, Jaxon had every intention of seeing if he really could behave. So after a few minutes of relaxed silence, she glanced over. Only to stifle a laugh. What was it about big guys that made them look like little angelic infants when they were sleep? Shaking her head, she settled down, careful not to wake him, as she got comfortable. Within moments the sound of breathing and a strong heartbeat began lulling her to sleep.

After a while, the other man in the room began performing his little ritual, and Jaxon didn’t even feel the transport. But the loud shout that he let out instantly woke her. Her limbs were uncoordinated from sleep, she tended to be extremely clumsy right after she woke up and had to concentrate to get her limbs to move properly, and in her surprised waking she ended up slapping herself in the neck. Not hard, but enough to make her stop moving her arms and to actually look around instead of floundering in the chair.

Staring at the man, watching him do his little celebration, Jax stopped herself from asking him what the hell he thought he was doing… Instead she nodded at his introduction, somewhat surprised that they were here. "Thank you Step..." If she didn’t know better she would say they were in the exact same room they had been in. As she thought about this trip a phrase came to her, and it made her laugh. "A journey of a thousand miles, starts with a single step..." She laughed again, and suddenly couldn't wait to see this place.

She looked over at Pluto, wondering if he had managed to sleep through that.

Step grinned at her even as a groggy Pluto rubbed at his eyes.

**“You are most welcome m’lady, and you are one of a few to know where my name originated. Let me just go get one of the docs and he can check us out to make sure we are haywire free.” Step walked over to the door and tapped three times. “House keeping!’

Pluto smirked at Jaxon who never seemed to have any trouble getting along with any one she wanted to, though step was another of those people.

“I can show you my place and your room, if you want the guest bedroom at my place. Otherwise we have a dorm like set up for new residents until we can get something built for them. This place is a utopia, there is such an impressive array of mutations here that we don’t really lack for anything we need.” He then paused. “After they check us out of course. Luckily again we have the latest in medical bloodlines.” He smirked the girl wonder was something else. There would be people here that were either pleased with him for his efforts or disgusted at his betrayal of their ways. Violence was meant only to keep this community safe. But he insisted that since it was family out there doing the terrorizing and giving them a bad name. That he had to go and challenge his brethren.

Pluto pulled his hand out from under her thigh. “ I was asleep, so I can’t be held accountable.” And then stuck his tongue out at her. “ You didn’t take advantage of me did you?’

A darker skinned fourteen year old came in the room and looked at them all. Merely glancing at step and the couple in the chairs at the other end of the room. There wasn’t anything in particular that set her as mutant other than possibly a look in her eyes that came off as wiser beyond her years and possibly all of their years combined. It was a look that wasn’t judging but almost all knowing.

“ You are all, good to go.” Step raised his eyebrows at him prompting him to say something. “clean.” She then tsked at Pluto and Jaxon. “clean, but wounded. May I assist you with these abrasions?” Her eyes fell onto what was left of Pluto tail. “ I can fix that at a later date, it will take a lot of time and energy, as for the rest I can probably handle it now.”

“Tien Sovel, Miss, nice to meet your acquaintance.” She reached out to shake Jaxon’s wounded hand.[/color]

Grinning at the man, surprised and proud that she had actually managed to guess his name’s origin without trying, she turned the smile on Pluto who was still waking up. “I would like to stay with you, at least for a while, if you don’t mind…” Jaxon was almost ashamed to ask, but she had never been on her own as bad as that sounded.

She had gone from her parents’ house to her husband’s house with no time in between when she learned how to be by herself, and the prospect of trying it for the first time in this brand new place was scary. Maybe in a few weeks, once she got the swing of things, she would be able to go to the dorms, but right now Pluto felt safe and familiar. It comforted her, even if everything else was new, to know she had someone to point her in the right direction.

When she felt something move under her leg, his hand it turned out, she lifted an eyebrow. “See, I knew you couldn’t behave, not even in your sleep!” Then with a somewhat sly grin, she could feel the energy from her youth slowly coming back, and it gave her the courage to add, “But, I couldn’t either, I just had to jump you. And I was so sneaky you didn’t even wake up…” She grinned. It wasn’t one of Jaxon’s better come-backs, but she was feeling fresh, so it didn’t matter.

The girl entered and Jaxon watched her as she looked around and then spoke. She turned to Pluto, offering to heal him, then to Jaxon. When she offered her hand though, Jxon pulled away with a light wince, and got to her feet. “Sorry, that one is a little…” Trailing off and leaving the sentence unfinished, she shook the girl’s hand awkwardly with the other hand. Jaxon first repeated her name, testing the pronunciation to make sure she had it right, before offering her own. “Tien…? Jaxon Kane. Nice to meet you too.”

~` “I would like to stay with you, at least for a while, if you don’t mind…”

“Nonsense, stay as long as you like and then as long as I can talk you into staying after that.”

~~“See, I knew you couldn’t behave, not even in your sleep!”

“I!....cant defend myself.”

~~“But, I couldn’t either, I just had to jump you. And I was so sneaky you didn’t even wake up…”

A lopsided smile came to his face. “huh, I guess I’ll have to ask step about it then.”

He might just have to fall asleep in the living room at some point to give her the chance to do that more often.

~~“Sorry, that one is a little…”

She nodded. “ that is the one I wanted.” As she shook Her perfectly healthy hand.

~`“Tien…? Jaxon Kane. Nice to meet you too.”

Another nod “nice to meet you Miss Kane and welcome to our community, if you are here to keep this one out of trouble then you are more than welcome.”

“I wouldn’t bet on that.” Pluto manged to interject into the polite conversation. “If anything she is here to help me get in more trouble.” He stuck his purple toungue out at the teen healer.

She then laid her hand on Pluto’s chest through his shirt the tiny cuts and scraps began to glow and then fade. The bruises on his arms briefly lit up and then disappeared.

Pluto Shook his head. “ Don’t call me the trouble maker, just cause you are good at getting away with stuff doesn’t mean you can fool us all. Tien, I will come to you about my tail sometime but for now I am going to show Jaxon our Casa. Thanks for the heal by the way.”

She nodded as He hopped up and walked across the room gathering up all of her things and his bag of groceries. It mostly consisted of cereals that no one bothered to stock here.

“So, I was thinking that we could do Pizza tonight and stay in?” He announced his plan to Jax.

The fact that Pluto wanted to talk her into staying longer was more reassuring than if he had simply said it was fine, and Jaxon felt better about imposing herself on him. Imagining Step telling on her, when there was nothing to tell, gave her a little inward tingle of laughter, and she just shrugged trying to pretend that there was actually something to tell.

Realizing that the healer had wanted to work on her hand, Jaxon slowly gave Tien the wounded limb. As the girl worked, she talked, making Jaxon laugh. “So he still gets in trouble? He had me fooled…” Looking over her shoulder at Pluto, she winked before turning back to the girl. “I would try, but I have a feeling it would be in vain…”

After the girl finished with her hand, nodding in agreement over Pluto, Jaxon glanced down. She had only used a healer once before, but it seemed to feel the same, some odd energy moving in her wound. “Thank you Tien, it feels much better.”

“Not a problem Miss Kane. That was a nasty thing though; ready to get infected. I hope whatever caused it won’t be doing it again.” The teen then moved to Pluto, healing him as well, while getting Pluto to agree to see her at a different time to heal his tail.

Me too Tien..Me too. Watching the girl, and Pluto, Jaxon couldn’t help but look at him with an odd mix of regret and sorrow in her eyes again. His tail was just a reminder to her of the story he had told, and she was sure there were more memories attached to it for him. It had to feel much like having a finger missing; when they had been young, all the brothers had used their tails, though perhaps not with the dexterity of a hand or finger, and the tails had been so much a part of them. In all her memories of them, she couldn’t imagine them without their tails.

Jolted slightly when Pluto jumped up, she shook off her sad thoughts and she smiled at the younger girl as she moved to join Step. The two seemed to exchange glances at her and Pluto, before descending into conversation together. Having a strange idea as to what they were talking about, Pluto and herself of course, she followed after Pluto, waving back at the two.

“Can I get… Never mind, I forgot.” She grinned when he hefted everything with an absurd ease, her offer to help dying on her lips. She had forgotten how strong he was, and surely he was stronger now than he had been before. “Pizza… That sounds like a great idea Pluto.” The idea of hanging out, eating pizza, and doing nothing but reconnecting with him was heavenly. “But I’m going to cook for you sometime...” Her teasing had a grain of truth in it, she fully planned to cook for him, hopefully frequently. She didn’t know how else she could do anything for him in return for all this...

~~“Can I get… Never mind, I forgot.”

He rolled his eyes as he shifted everything to one hand holding multiple bags hooked on a single finger.

~~“Pizza… That sounds like a great idea Pluto.”

“ I do deepdish so, if you want so itsy bitsy thin crust, tell me now so I can, actually commit the atrocity when it comes time.”

~~“But I’m going to cook for you sometime...”

“ It has been forever since I have had any one cooking for me for me.”

They went though the door and then into a building that was fitted to appear like any other building, but the windows across the hall were the first look at a kingdom of Ice. The majority of the structures were Ice; even the ones that weren’t completely Ice were partially ice. It looked like a painting that mixed all sorts of architecture into one very eclectic marvel. From spiraling towers to chic modern buildings to fanciful and faye homes.

He pointed to a few buildings naming the useful necessities. The general store, the observation tower. The lack of a police building. He smiled at her and bragged. “There is zero crime in this town. It is small but the simply fact is there is no need for crime here. If you need it you only have to ask and a way to get it will be found. And considering some of the cutthroats that have come down here, that is impressive.”

He pointed out a bubble down toward a main lane. “Château Pluto.” It looked like a snow globe with a large log cabin inside it. a pair of large Snowmen guarded the arch way that let you enter into the globe and one of them had a male box sticking out of an appropriately comedic area.

“we have established a higher level of conveniences then we initially had, it was at first a simple place almost Spartan, but now it is getting a bit more utopian in that we have less work an more play. And you can’t beat the community here. If I thought the world would leave u to our selves then I wouldn’t leave.”

“Do you have a parka in here or am I going to have to smuggle you into mine?”

Ignoring the fact that he was just showing off now, Jaxon had to raise her eyebrows at his choice of pizza. “Hey, I’m from New York, if I eat pizza any other way, I’m pretty sure they would revoke my citizenship. Pizza should always need a fork.” She laughed, knowing full well that officially New York was a thin crust town just because of street vendors, but the cult following of thicker style had spread so much that it was regularly served in restaurants; unless you were eating on the run, most New Yorkers ate deep dish.

With a smile and a pat on his arm she looked up at him. “Anytime you want big guy, just name it and I’ll make it.” She nodded to punctuate the sentence, her eyes catching the first glimpse of the new world as they moved out. Staring out the window she nearly forgot Pluto was there. It was amazing… So much so, that Jaxon was speechless and could barely find breath.

The sparkling of light off the buildings, ice that looked like glass, mixed styles of buildings, different heights and shapes, all coming together to make a sort of fairy-tale. She could have literally sat and stared out the window for days. He spoke, and she heard him, but most of her thoughts were on the amazing scene in front of her. She had to blink away the moisture that came to her eyes. “Pluto, this is….”

She turned, staring at him. “Amazing! I can hardly believe it!” She felt like a child for the first time seeing snow, or Disneyland, or… or the most amazing thing ever… It was like a dream. “You have done an amazing job…”

As much as she hoped that he never had to leave again, the only reason she had found him and been brought to this place was because he had left, so she was grateful. His question brought her back to the reality and out of the dreamland. She had brought a jacket, a few of them, but she wasn’t sure if they would be thick enough. “I don’t know… Smuggling might be fun anyway!”

Motioning for him to give her one of the bags, she dug through it, pulling out the thickest one she had. Holding it up for his inspection, she checked it herself. It was puffy and thick, filled with down, and it had a faux-fur lined hood, the best she had been able to find this time of year. “How’s this?” She was halfway hoping he would say it wasn’t thick enough, the idea of being tucked in his jacket was a nice warm bonus, but the free ride would let her look around like a swivel head.

~~ “Hey, I’m from New York, if I eat pizza any other way, I’m pretty sure they would revoke my citizenship. Pizza should always need a fork.”

“at a girl, I swear sometimes I am offended when those crust slingers try to get me to buy their nonsense. It’d be like selling spaghetti with out the noodles!”

~~“Anytime you want big guy, just name it and I’ll make it.”

“ I could blurt out several different things, but I will put some thought into and see what we can do about supplies.”

~~ “Pluto, this is….”

~~“Amazing! I can hardly believe it!”

He nodded and simply watched her look at the city, it was hard not to stare himself it was a view you didn’t get used to.

~~“You have done an amazing job…”

“If I took credit for all of that I would be a scoundrel.” Slight pause for comedic effect. “ Thanks, I do what I can.”

“no really though, there isn’t a part of this town that hasn’t been built by its members, this easily the most tight nit community around. In fact, don’t be too surprised if Tein and step have everybody knowing your name and that you are staying with me before we step out the door.” He said the last loud enough for the pair to hear before the exited. They simply smiled and waved; having news from outside was a prize and everyone would know regardless anyhow, might as well let them have their fun.


~~“I don’t know… Smuggling might be fun anyway!”

~~“How’s this?”

“That is good, but not nearly good enough, I would have told you to look for the thickest thing you could find, but the truth is we would have ended up getting you something from down here any how and you would have wasted time trying to find something that new York doesn’t have at least readily available. GO ahead and throw it on and let me go grab my coat. He went around a corned to a coat room and grabbed a gigantic black fur coat that went down to his shins and made him appear even bigger than he already was. He pulled up the hood and then opening the coat scooped up Jaxon and made a seat of his left hand for her firm little tush. And lifted to about chest height where head could stick out if she wanted to look around as much as she surely would. His Right hand scooped up all the luggage and then pinched the edge of his coats opening and wrapped it around her and back to his chest so she was now in a snuggly cocoon of black fur and clone.

“I guess you are going to have to grab the door once we get to it.” he would normally have opened it with his tail but that wasn’t happening till he went and talked to Tein.

“Oh see those holes over there? That is one of the most entertaining things we have, they are ice tunnels and slides, they are crazy fun.”

Raising an eyebrow she grinned. “Pluto, you are a scoundrel…” She smiled broadly, unable to resist the window, and she kept looking out of it. Hearing him talk about the community, and the small town grapevine, she looked over her shoulder in time to see the two he was talking about. Though she was used to people knowing who she was, she did wonder what the people here would think of her.

Waving along with him she gave them a smile while talking to him. “I hope I won’t be getting you in trouble by staying with you.” She had forgotten that he might have a significant other by now. Though, any woman who would let him out of her sight, especially when he was injured, was either supremely confident or stupid. Jaxon certainly wouldn’t let him go anywhere without her if he was hurt. And who knows what sort of people might be dropping by to see the newcomer.

Nodding at his decision on her coat, she agreed. Jaxon had thought as much, but it had been better than anything she had owned or could find. Pulling it on as he went to get his own, she shrugged the sleeves up and zipped it, flipping the hood over her head as he came around the corner looking like some Russian mobster. Surprised when he scooped her up, his hand on her rump, she blushed.

Clearing her throat, she joked, “I knew it, all you wanted to do was cop a feel…” Not that I’m complaining. Blushing even harder at the thought, she smiled, hoping he wouldn’t notice her red face, and nodded at his direction to open the door. The slides looked interesting, and she would be trying them sometime, that was for sure. “You will have to tell me more about that later.”

When they reached the door, Jaxon leaned forward, keeping a hold of the jacket with one hand, the other opening the door. Leaning back re-tucking the coat around both of them as the cold air hit, she shivered, immediately grateful for Pluto’s body heat and his large jacket. As he moved out among the community, Jaxon couldn’t help but stare at everything. Even the small things that would have seemed boring and common anywhere else.

~~ “I hope I won’t be getting you in trouble by staying with you.”

“Nah even with the talk I am sure more would side with Tein about you keeping me out of trouble or busy. Heh. “ not that kind of Busy, but you know, the will talk.” He shrugged.

~~ “I knew it, all you wanted to do was cop a feel…”

“well, I figured you’d want to look around otherwise you are going all the way in the coat and crooked like a bebe. But If you don’t mind” He rapped his fingers on one of her cheeks and laughed. It really wasn’t coping a feel because he wasn’t grabbing, just supporting…there was a difference.

~~“You will have to tell me more about that later.”

“I will do more than tell you, we are going tomorrow, if they don’t find work for us before then, But even if they do. I bet they give us at least a day to settle.”

“oh! You see that building? That is the power generator. It has been designed to take energy and convert it into stuff we can use for the day to day stuff. There is a Gear system that they let me work out on if we are running particularly low. Converting all the kinetic power and friction again into stuff we use at home.”

The building resemble a big Drum.

He pointed to a squat square building that had horns coming out of it and what looked like sharp teeth coming out of the windows and door frames. “That is the school, some of the kids decided it needed to show outwardly what it did inwardly. Sooo the Ice movers made a deal with them, if everybody passed their classes then they got to design what the school would look like. They made it ferocious.”

Pluto continued onward. Until they were nearing a snowglobe. “and here is home, I asked them to give me the dome because I thought it was fitting, they told me to go polarbear club if I really wanted it. so I showed up at the beach and they told me I didn’t have to, they would just o it, but I jumped in any way, and spent the next week shivering. But it is great installation, they have started building a dome over the whole thing except for the observation tower, they are just going slowly for structure’s sake.

Looking at the things he pointed out, and the things he didn’t, was keeping her occupied so she couldn’t do much more than give him a smirk before she went back to looking around. The thought of ‘keeping him busy’ in the other way was interesting to think about, and she actually had to stop thinking about it if she wanted to be his friend and stay with him. Having a crush on him right now was not a great idea; trying to get a divorce, having a kid that she needed to get custody of, and living with the man wouldn’t be a good situation to try that sort of thing.

“of course you work out in the generator… where else!” Her tone was teasing and the question rhetorical, but she could easily see him doing just hat. Laughing at the design the kids had made for the school, she shook her head. “That’s one way to motivate them… Though if my school had looked like that I’m not sure I would have wanted to go.”

The story of how he got them to build the dome, an amazing and interesting thing that she planned to check out later, make her laugh and say ‘awwww’ at the same time. It was odd how Pluto could still be himself, with his antics and jokes(the snowmen and mailbox proof of that), but still be grown up at the same time. “It must have been a good idea if they are making a bigger one for the whole colony…”

She couldn't wait to get inside and see what else there was to see.

~~“That’s one way to motivate them… Though if my school had looked like that I’m not sure I would have wanted to go.”

“ I think if they weren’t behind it they would agree with you. Hopefully they will let them redesign every year or two. I think the thing is ugly.”

~~“It must have been a good idea if they are making a bigger one for the whole colony…”

“well, for me it was just that this place is that magical place in the snow globe, and then Bam! it shuts out that cold cutting wind. It is one thing to be cold but to have even a breeze messing with you too, it can be rough.”

Inside the dome, it warmed a little and then more so that dread wind was kept out. Inside it was simple and Cozy. The first floor was like a new york flat, the living room and kitchen met in the middle, a bathroom door and a bedroom door were connected to the living room. A staircase went up to a balcony that connected to the living room’s vaulted ceiling. There was also a large window set in the roof that looked out a bubble in the roof of the globe that magnified the night sky. There were rugs and furnishings that made it seem comfy. Any nick-knacks that were around looked hand crafted. It wasn’t lavish, it was Cozy.

“I typically stay up there, The tv gets ever channel around the globe…we have to intercept the signals to get anything at all so, if we are going to do it, we do it right.”

He had all the typical necessities. Though it was in better fashion then this particular bachelor would have the talent for putting together. He had to have had help from somewhere.

Jaxon was in agreement with him about the cold and the wind, and even though she expected a reduction in both, she was pleasantly surprised at how much nicer the dome made the atmosphere. Not warm or anything, but better. When they got inside, she looked around. She wasn’t sure what she had expected, but this wasn’t it.

It reminded her of homes she had seen in magazines and in the wallets of CEO’s for when they wanted to ‘rough it.’ This was far from roughing it, in fact it looked homey and lived in, and unlike those magazine homes, it looked realistic and touchable. The textures were an amazing mix that was very pleasing.

Looking up when he pointed out where he usually slept, and the tv reception, she grinned. “Meatball, when did you take a decorating class? This is well done, very… It suits you.”

Sliding down, letting go of him and opening the coat, she slipped out of his warm bubble. Though the air wasn’t as warm as inside his jacket, it was much more comfortable, and she walked around slowly, looking out the skylight, running her hand over things. Jaxon was impressed.

~~ “Meatball, when did you take a decorating class? This is well done, very… It suits you.”

"Meatball!" He said exasperatedly."Oh action, what did I ever do to deserve the name meatball? do I belong on spaghetti? is that it?"He said over dramatically and obviously not offended or wounded as he feigned. "Oh, yeah, I didn't,I had a lot of help actually, not that I really wanted it, but I happened to show a few friends what I intended to do with the place and they happened to have better taste I suppose. at least every one who comes in compliments it. It looks nothing like what I was going to do. But as I said they are friends, and they did a good job, and to be honest I don't have the heart to undo it."

"There is a couple of bedrooms over here and of course the bathroom." He would point out the hot tub a must in any arctic climate, but he thought he would save that for later or point out after the snow tunnels...or she would find it on her own.

"You can take your pick of either of the rooms and I will settle into the other one."

The bedrooms were pretty similar, a large bed, two wardrobes, a flat panel tv. the other usual bedroom junk.

"if you want some time to settle in, I will get the Pizza's going. Or whatever you wanna do.Mi casa....is your house too."
Pluto stretched and walked toward the kitchen tossing his giant coat toward a coat rack.

Smiling, her expression teasing, Jaxon returned to his side, giving him a fake punch to the arm. “You know very well how you got that nickname, so don’t pretend…” Of the brothers, Venus and Pluto had been the only ones she was comfortable calling by nicknames. After spending time with the boys, meathead and goofball had combined thanks to some of his jokes, and with all the brothers size they tended to eat a lot, so it ended up fitting Pluto after a few encounters.

“Well, I’m sorry you didn’t get it the way you wanted, but I can’t argue with the results.” And if he had any waterslides or trap-doors planned, she wasn’t surprised his friends had stopped him. After he pointed out the bedrooms, and she peeked in, she couldn’t help but shake her head.

Of course he wouldn’t take his own bedroom, and she couldn’t exactly go through the drawers to make sure he got his own room back. “I will take this one, if you have no preference.” She pointed to the one on the right without even looking in the second room. The first one seemed very nice, and she didn’t see any reason to look in the second one.

Following his example, she shrugged off her coat and hung it up, but instead of following him to the kitchen she opened one of her bags. Finding out a soft, loose, sweater that she pulled over her t-shirt, Jaxon untied her shoes and put them just inside the bedroom she had picked. “I’d rather help or watch. Make sure you don’t put anything vile on the poor pizza.” Following him to the kitchen she leaned on the counter, watching him.

After a moment she looked around. “What can I do?”