His look hitting the waiter was more then hard. It was cold yet so completely unconcerned, that he may even have discussed this matter -or any other for that fact- over tea, which in fact they were. The waiter might have asked himself what was driving this man to do as he did, but something in this eyes was not quite right. They seemed much older then the rest now. No boy would look at another this way. It was more like the icy look of a mother or a father saying very clearly “leave now kid.”.

Now she was angry. Argh this stupid head made him want to slap her in the face. But that would not be really smart, would it. Better slap himself for his slip. Those things had not happened since he was a lot younger. And that was what scared him. What hurt him. Hadn't he changed at all?

Somehow he must have, as a dry smile found its way on his lips at her response. So she had noticed, but not noticed the scraps he had given her as well as the one he had not given voluntarily. And that even without body language. She was observant after all. Observant and wary.

Also her response told him, that she was fond of this waiter boy. More then she would let on right now. He made a mental note of it. And of the fact where she placed herself. Bits and pieces. Not nice, yet nice to those she knew. Somehow the smile turned lighter at hearing that. He was leaving the first points to her. Note: Leaving as in giving. Sometimes he was charitable after all.

“Its sad to hear, that you do not even expect humans to carry out conversation with you.”

The distant look found its way into the voice somehow. Humans did not really matter to him, aside from the fact, that they were the dominant power at the moment, no matter, what some mutants might claim in their bold addresses. And of course they were interesting to learn from and of, but so were mutants.

“And not spoken technically?”

His question lingered on in the room.

Sara’s head tilted the other way about what he said. While it wasn’t entirely true, she let it stay there. Johnny wasn’t a mutant, but he was an acception. One of a few human’s Sara had interacted and held conversations with. As a whole, Humans did not tend to hold conversations with Sara. At least not right off the bat with out having met her or been introduced before.

“It’s just their loss.” Sara said simple. She liked company but she only liked company of those who didn’t freak for stupid reasons like bipedal talking cats. “Tell me. When you walked in here, did you expect me to be able to talk, when you saw me?” Sara asked. Curious to see not only what his response was but how he responded.

His low chuckle was an answer to her first sentence. My this cat-woman had her share of humor. But his amusement did not last long, was blown away like a could by the winds.

“I am quite sure of that.”

A great loss it was indeed. So small minded they were sometimes. So strangely open at others. And always afraid of something it seemed. Like insects under study they crawled along with their lives and never were aware of many dangers, but to compensate inflated those they could see. If not afraid of him, then of time or death. Did he have to be afraid?
Her next question was well phrased, for it required him not only to give factual information, but a great deal of information in himself. On his views of the world. He scratched his head, while a near silence unfolded, that reminded him of a little while earlier, when he came in. When he finally spoke his voice carries some odd tone. It seemed like approval?

“I assumed you were capable of communication.”

Well he did answer Sara’s question but not with the degree of accuracy that Sara was hoping for. Capable of communication, could mean anything from understanding highly intellectual conversations to just pointing and grunting. Hell A Hamster can communicate even. They sink their little teeth in your hand and they let you know that they don’t like you or don’t like something you’re doing. Sara wasn’t necessarily a highly social creature. She liked her alone time a lot, but she liked to think that her communication abilities were able to be gauged higher than a hamster’s.

“Well the minute you walked in I assumed you were capable of communication as well.” Sara joked back. Her tone had definitely relaxed from a minute ago when she had given this man her single warning. At least he was still talking to her and he answered the question.

"You said it was bad, where you were from as well. Between mutant and humans. May I ask how bad it is? Say on a scale from 1 to 10. By the way. My name's Sara."

So she understood his little game. In a way he had not anticipated it. Yes she was a mutant, but he was one of the better examples himself, of how those little gifts could affect the workings of the mind. Alas a cat would be able to hear the undertones of his voice easily- or the overtones for that matter. And this one had not shown all her claws with the warning earlier. Not in any way he could think of at least. So he gave her a small smile. Was it a reward for him, or for her? Just these little ambiguities made them so much fun.

And then came a question, that he had not posed himself very often. How bad was it really? If you have nothing to judge it by, bad doesn't look so bleak any more. His statement was quite business like. Friendly, noncommittal. Did he really commit himself to anything lately?

“Oh you put too much weight on my opinion with that question.” Well no one seems to see it, but it is there. Was there?

He was crouching in the shadows of an alley in his beloved haven. Lately there had been rumors, that warned of them, for here mutants were building their territory, one fighting the other, gangs forming alliances and breaking them again. Out of sight enough not to be noticed on first glance, secluded in the very heart of the city there was war. And today a pair of gray stones had come to investigate. All he saw though were few stains of blood on walls, the lingering metallic smell. His hands and eyes were searching for the source, but it could not be found any more. This battle was over. But the winner was unknown.

“I will give you facts: Blood and tears are running in the streets like rivers, yet no one is inclined to notice them. Do you really want me to count those in numbers?”

If she wanted he would. It was not his blood. Not his tears. Those had been shed long ago. The small clacking of glass was rebounding throughout the room. It came from the glass in his hand, in which a storm seemed to have whipped up waves in the water, since its container was shaken by an earthquake.

The sound of the glass shaking caught Sara’s attention, and her right ear twitched. She was trying not to be annoyed by the sound but being that the high pitch of the glass and ice was close, it was hard to control emotions on that level. On the other hand, Sara found herself concerned about why the glass was shaking. Did the man she was talking to have a physical disability that her nose couldn’t smell? Was it the memory of what she asked? Or was it something else? Mutation related?

Slowly, Sara reached out, following the sound of the clacking and clicking glass to try to calmly steady it. That is if he let Sara put her paw like hand, gently over his fingers, and his glass. Her head tilted curiously the other way. “It’s alright. What you just said, Says enough. It’s been a war zone here too.” Maybe that’s how this other mutant dealt with the painful facts. Being vague.

So Sara decided not to push him further, but she thought she would tell him a little bit more about what went on here. “There has been a lot of things going on here too. I’ve told you about the different groups. A year ago the humans tried to issue out a mutant registration law. They had us locked up in concentration camps.” As Sara spoke she began to remove a thick leather band from her arm to show a circular scar that wrapped around her wrist from her wrist band she once was required to wear. “A lot of us died back then, and since then, things here have tried to improve but a lot of the hurt is still there.”

The warmth of her fingers was seeping slowly through the leather to his fingers. He didn't even care that she touched him. It would in all possibility feel sleek and cold to her. A warrior was she? A fighter? Maybe. His voice sounded calm and steady. Unlike he felt really, and his fingers clearly gave those feelings away.

“Thank you.”

The gratefulness in his voice was just a little too much, as if he wanted to make her forget the lapse with the glass, but then her next words came through to him and the glass fell on the ground in a clang that told of its breaking. His words were those of complete disbelief.

“They did... WHAT?”

Now he was on his feet. The sound of his voice complete disbelief, quickly turned to an icy cold. The implications of such a foolish and dangerous act were obvious.
“How terribly stupid of them.”

Here more blood had been split, then at home. Here they had done the unthinkable.

“At home they never would do such things. There it was quiet. Some simply vanished and it were not many. Someone did not want to look suspicious.”

He shook his head as the old memories washed over him a second time and threatened to overwhelm him, yet he continued.

“How did the people let it happen? How could they?”

Never again. Never!

Part of being a predatory cat was recognizing inconsistencies. Things that broke the normal rules of the way an object, or animal should act, or what broke the pattern set by other individuals. In the wild, it’s how predators survived. Recognizing the weak, or the old. A zebra in a herd, looked like the entire herd, till it moved differently. Then the mass and jumble of stripes were able to be singled out for a meal.

Sara used the same tactics in her every day life. Though she didn’t hunt to make a kill so much as she hunted for money that happened to come from people’s pockets. She picked people out of a crowd, to thieve from, by the way they were paying attention to their surroundings, in comparison to the others around them. The same fundamentals hit her here, between listening to Martin’s voice, and the way he felt with she touched his had. And it wasn’t just the feeling. She could feel her own emotions shift and she pulled away from his hand more hastily than she planned. What just happened with the shift of emotion wasn’t exactly something that she could explain, and she ended up leaning back in her seat. She didn’t even move to stop him from getting to his feet, and let the glass clatter to the floor as she tried to figure things out. Mean while he was on his and Sara’s ears were following him, even though her head staid in the same position.

“How terribly stupid of them.”

“I assume you mean the Humans by saying them.” Sara said as her head tilted. “As a whole, yes how terrible, but there are some who are trust worthy.” Just like there were some mutants who were untrust worthy, even to their own kind, as Sara remembered a few mutants who had become guards in order to torture their own kind. She chose to leave that information away from him seeing as he was already upset.

“At home they never would do such things. There it was quiet. Some simply vanished and it were not many. Someone did not want to look suspicious.”

Sara listened to him quietly wondering if that was why he was here in the US. Fear of being one of those people who’s blood ran in the streets. To be forgotten because people were choosing to ignore what was truly going on. Or if he had other more personal reasons why he was here. Sara knew very well about running. She’d done as much running from city to city out of fear of being found or fear of being sent away before moving on was her choice. For years the only contact she had kept was a draconic mutant with scarlet scales, named Ayesac. Someone who understood her perfectly. If Martin was looking for a better place to run, Sara didn’t know of one.

“How did the people let it happen? How could they?”

Sara shrugged and shook her head as Johnny scurried out of the kitchen with a towel, and a broom and dust pan, to clean up the broken glass. “I don’t know. It’s hard to tell. Probably fear, for different reasons. Of us, or of their selves that and what some think.”

Past was shifting to present and he did not like it very much. Daemons long thought dead arose yet again to haunt the living. Never again had been the promise that was broken by the ones making it in the first place. Falling into a brisk stride back and forth he tried to calm down roaring seas with actions of his own. He did not care, that was was walking right across the glass on the floor, creating rasping noises. His head was forgotten. The young human was forgotten. There was just Sarah's voice. That and roaring seas of emotion. Sadly it is the tendency of oceans to resist human interference. Those were bad news. Really bad news.

“Assume I mean those in charge. ”

They had apparently not listened in their history classes, nor had they learned a single thing since the beginning and had gotten a reminder of how dangerous it is to not only pick fights that are either against humanity or supreme powers, but both. Between them they had been crushed. Had to have been. No he did not this mutants deserved the title of homo superior, but some of them factually were strong enough to wipe out small armies on their own and he recognized that strength. Not as strength maybe, but as power to be reckoned with. A thing like concentration camps for mutants would have them stand up for themselves. A good thing this was. Would he have stood with them back then? Would he have taken action? Would he have gone so far as to use... He would. And if that was an indication of how things had been here they had been bad.

“I don't care much for simple categories. As I said there is more then black and white.”

Always narrowing things down to comprehensible bits and parts was one thing, but when putting a dissected thing into order great care had to be taken not to make things wrong. Wrong simply. Simply wrong, right? The order that was there was already a great organization, so why bother with simple categories as mutants or humans? Just few genes anyways. They were more closely related then anything else, yet every single mutant could be considered a species of its own. Weren't they just the same? Not really. Their differences were their only common grounds. And on those trust could start to build, but not more then that. As could it be build on the 99.9% of genome they shared with humans. Could he build trust on her this way? He still was unsure.

“Fear. Fear. Fear. Its always the same excuse. When people do something bad its always fear. Cant they use their heads for something sensible once?”

The fact that his own rationale was just eluding him the way that it had them was not occurring to him just now. A pained noise from the ground made him stop in his walk. He had just stepped on the hand of young Johnny. His face made him calm down somewhat. Stepping down from his hand carefully he admitted.

“I am sorry. It seemed as though I got agitated.”

He even though he stepped away from the glass he kept on standing, while Jhonny cleaned up the rest of the mess he had made, now kneeling a few feet away and again Martin fallen into deep thought, making the sound of the broom the only noise in the room. Or rather: The most prominent one.

"Especially for a mutant like me they never seem to grow up nor do they learn from the past."

His voice carried some hint of the sadness he felt while watching life pass him by. It was not much, but that especially made it... creepy. That control, that seemed unnatural almost.

“Assume I mean those in charge. ”

“Mostly.” Sara said lightly. Most of the people in power were able to control the thoughts of others through fear, but there were those like herself who might as well be on their own teams.

“I don't care much for simple categories. As I said there is more then black and white.”

“True.” Sara didn’t consider herelf really in any category.

“Fear. Fear. Fear. Its always the same excuse. When people do something bad its always fear. Cant they use their heads for something sensible once?”

“It would be nice.” Ok this didn’t happen 100% of the time. But from the majority it was annoying. Sara agreed with most of what Martin was saying. Though Sara’s attention was instantly purked and put on edge when she heard Johnny’s yelp. Sure she had heard the the grunching of glass, but that was Martin’s feet. He had shoes on.

“I am sorry. It seemed as though I got agitated.”

Sara remained in her seat, though her ears flattened against the back of her head. “Perhaps you should find a seat while Johnny finishes cleaning.” Said Sara politely but with an edge to the word you that implied Martin didn’t really have a choice. Sure Sara knew she could be thick headed at leaning, but she did her bet at not letting the same mistakes happen twice. Speaking of witch.

"Especially for a mutant like me they never seem to grow up nor do they learn from the past."

“Well. You just have to learn think a bit more. So sit.” Sara motioned to the closest chair to him. She had long since memorized the layout of the restaurant.

"If you don't mind me asking, what is your mutation?" Sara asked. "With me, I'm obvious. What you see is what you get. It's a little unfair, and puts me at a disadvantage."

The cat was agreeing with him. Reactions that he had used so long they became automated processed her response, analyzed it. It seemed they were not much different from each other in certain opinions. Not much different at all. Though the information was just another tidbit, another small drop of water it was enough. It was the final one. He would make the first step in a longer time toward something called trust. Ignoring the cleaning boy completely now he sat down -the chair protested against the addition of weight- at her request and fell into silence.

How should he word this? How to explain everything was the question to which an answer was yet to be given. But apparently she was not finished. Spirited cat she was, strong willed as all of them. What might happen if he started scratching her fur? Would she purr? Stray thoughts that were distracting him from the real problem, to which the solution was simple. He would simply start and then see, what came of it. It was the first step.

“I am sure it is difficult for you.” In certain places she would probably not have survived, no matter how strong she might be physically or mentally. The strongest poison is the one you never taste. “My mutation relates to time. It is difficult to explain, but you could say that I am exactly the same now as I was when I alked in through that door, while you chaged.” He hoped she would grasp the implications of that. The troubles it presented to be seeing her mouth open to produce the words she spoke as if some super glue was holding her jaws together. The difficulty of staying the same. Ever and always the same on the outside. And on the inside there were ever growing numbers of memories wildly tossed around. They were big piles of photographs lying around unsorted. “And it sometimes so happens that through touch I extend that gift to others in a very literal sense. You could say I can freeze people in time. My power... is...stability.” The cleaning was finished. He did not feel different. He wanted to scream. He wanted to break something new. It would make no difference at all. He was the same as the one who had just walked into the door. He was the same who had gotten into the plane. Would he change after this at all?

His question was to be left unanswered for Martins eyes were set upon her musing face and so caught twich of irritation as, her ears went rigid and pointed in the direction of the door. Her senses really were incredible. He had not heared a single thing yet, and as he turned around to the door, there were no people to be seen there either, until the sound of chimes announced the right moment to see not one, but a whole froup of people enter the room. He tensed as old reflexes woke up from a shallow sleep, almost catapulting him to his feet. Normals they had to be. And he was sitting with a half cat. THEY could not see the two of them together. If that happened then both of them were dead. Foolish thoughts. Reflexes of an old soldier, who had forgotten that the war was long over. Only that there was no war, there had never been a war. It was NOW.

Jhonny was already fussing around the newcomers with bows and greetings, while Martin disappeared from view, out through the door. He just had to get away. The only sign of his presence he left was a 10$ note and a lingering smell, that was almost too obscure for even a cats nose.