Life was good. That was the one thing that Juka was rather certain about. What wasn't to love about life, really, when your name was Juka Miami? People worshiped him, he didn't have to work at all in order to afford his life, he had quite possibly the best most cool mutant power every and he was, simply put, absolutely fabulous. And then there were his new kitties, Ninetales and Jolteon and they were everything he had wanted in a pair of kitties and more besides, being quite possibly the most furriest cutiest most adorable and lovable kitties ever. There was, of course, the minor annoyance that he wasn't able to flaunt his mutant power as he would like to be able to (and why shouldn't he be able to show the world that he was even more amazing than they all ready knew him to be?) but he wasn't about to let that get him down, especially not on a beautiful night like tonight. And by beautiful night he did, of course, mean that it was poring out rain, there was thunder to be heard and many bright and impressive flashes of lightening and the wind was blowing atrociously. Anyone else might consider it a horrible night to be out but for Juka he knew that it was the perfect opportunity to go for a float around the city.

After making sure that his precious kittens were fed and watered Juka spent a little time on his hair and makeup, somewhat less time than usual since he was reasonably certain that he wasn't about to meet anyone in this kind of weather and then opened the balcony door, bubbled himself and floated out onto his balcony. With a secondary bubble he picked up a piece of metal and used that to mostly close the window, keeping it open a crack. Then he floated over to the edge of the balcony and before he knew it he was floating over a large expanse of empty air, the storm raging around him.

As much as Juka enjoyed floating in calm weather, there was nothing quite like the experience of floating in the midst of a storm. He allowed the winds to have relatively free reign over his bubble, allowing them to push and pull him where they would. He had, of course, no real destination or purpose except to thoroughly enjoy himself and before he knew it he was laughing in absolute glee, much like a child on a roller coaster. Turbulent skies raged around and rain battered the barriers of his bubble but within he was as warm, dry and cozy as anyone could ever want to be. It was a wild ride, more thrilling than any roller coaster could ever be and for once Juka completely ignored the possibility of anyone seeing him in all his mutant glory. Not that there were many people out on the streets anyway, but instead of remaining safely dozens of feet above the tallest building, he instead allowed the winds to carry him right to the ground, almost colliding with it, before allowing them to carry him back up again. Spinning daringly around buildings and street lamps, Juka retained just enough control of his bubble to ensure that he didn't actually collide with anything and remained completely obvious to the world outside of his bubble.

He was a rain god. It was the only possible conclusion. It seemed like each and every time he ventured out into this city, he managed to find himself caught out too far from the mansion and directly in the path of a massive squall rolling across the city. Fortunately, Jake managed to find shelter more easily then most. His alien senses gave him a great ability to sense contours, and that meant it was easy to learn the location of all of the best weather hide-aways. What made it so simple was the army of homeless that poured through the city, essentially mapping every nook and cranny long before he ever arrived.

Jake shuddered and looked up at the thick plate of corrugated steel that rang with the heavy pounding of the storm's power. The spot he had managed to find was the roof access to a mid-sized office building. It was protected on three sides by concrete walls and had its own roof, but was miserably breezy. Jake, doused as he was already, was getting steadily colder with each passing minute. He had to find something better, but it had been bugger hard getting up here as it was. Gritting his teeth, he stood, steeled himself, and stepped out into the onslaught.

Rain savaged down all around him as he walked over to the edge. A normal person's eyes would have been all but useless in the torrent of rain and the darkness that prevailed on the roof, but he moved with confidence, but slowly, ever fearful of loosing his grip. Four stories was a long way to the ground. As he reached the concrete rim of the building, he looked down into the twisting river of meaning that made up the city around him. New York was a miracle compared to Seattle. Everything here was exaggerated. Everything here was brighter. It was beautiful, really, but Jake didn't waste any time reveling in that fact. Instead, he began touching the sea of connections, looking for that fateful link that would carry him someplace warm and dry until morning.

He didn't find what he had expected. What he found was wonder and shock and hatred. He had seen this selfsame pattern many times now, and knew instinctively what it meant. An impossibility was taking place and that meant a mutant was at work. Jake studied the flow of connections further, and could feel them flowing along the course of the city street. Whatever or whoever it was, they were coming towards him. He knelt and waited, and sure enough he saw the strange knot of impossibility move out around the corner of the street below him and sail upwards towards the edge of his building. There weren't many people on the street, but there was enough to illuminate...whoever this was.

Jake stood and studied the strange mixture of connections climbing towards him. It was a man. Mostly. There were a lot of feminine base connections there that he couldn't quite make out. Definitely a man, but with heavy leanings. Interesting. And the man was...floating. Jake blinked twice. Mutant powers had a way of creating strange distortions in his perceptive world, and this one was no different. He was enjoying himself, Jake realized, reveling in the storm. Maybe this actually was his rain god?

Jake watched as the man sailed past, grinning manically, and grinned himself. This was a character. Taking hold of his own power, Jake allowed the Awe to slip over him for just a moment. Just enough to drag the man's senses to him and make him seem intriguing before he shoved that power back down into the depths of himself. Let's see who this man is...

As Juka bobbed and weaved through the rain and win he was suddenly distracted by something quite plainly shiny. Or rather, not actually physically shiny but it definitely had a shiny aspect to it. It really should have been shiny, he was quite certain of that fact, and why it was not, in actual reality shiny, he really couldn't figure out. His first pass around the shiny man he caught a glimpse only out of the corner of his eye so, taking more firm control of his bubble, he made for a second pass, this time pausing just above the shiny man to study him closely.

Studying the shiny man closer, Juka was just plain puzzled. He was plainly fabulous, he might almost say nearly as fabulous as himself, but there was no reason why he should be. The man positively glowed with an aura of amazing and yet looking down at the cold wet man, there was nothing exceptional about him. So, of course, the only natural thing to do when confronted with a shiny man who simply should not be shiny, was to poke him with a bubble tendril and that was exactly what Juka did.

Settling himself a couple of feet above the man, Juka sent out a reflective tendril, simply wanting to touch the man to make sure he was solid. Shiny wonderfully amazing men had to be confirmed to be reality before they could be trusted. It was only common sense. Then, discovering that he did, indeed, appear to be solid, Juka suddenly felt profound pity for him. Here he was, a sopping wet and cold shiny man who was almost as fabulous as Juka himself and he was stuck in this horrible raining, storming weather. It didn't seem right, somehow. People that fabulous should have bubbles to ride, or at least warm dry places to reside in during storms like this.

"Would you like to come with me to my apartment? Its dry there, and warm," Juka offered grandly, thinking neither of the potential dangers of allowing a stranger not only into his apartment but into his bubble as well, nor of the fact that the stranger might have a problem riding in a giant floating bubble. And then he realized, horror of horrors, that if the stranger did agree to his offer his precious clothes might get wet since the shiny man was dripping with water. He almost groaned audibly, barely managing to restrain himself and taking solace in the fact that he had more clean and dry clothes at home, thanks to the wonderful Ghosty who had taught him to do laundry.

Jake smiled softly and stepped forward as the man slowed to a stop some distance above him. Like all the mutants, the man's power carried within it a strange and impossible weight had set it apart from the normal everyday world. These bubbles, as the stranger seemed to think of them, spoke of regulation and structure, enforcing their own vision upon the small volume of space contained within them. As Jake watched, a singular tendril of this impossibility stretched out towards him, gently prodding him the shoulder. The man's intention was benign enough, and Jake made no move to resist.

“Would you like to come with me to my apartment? Its dry there, and warm.”

Jake grinned. It seemed his fortune was changing. Absently, Jake took a sense of the man's karmic weight, getting a feel for how other's felt about the man's actions from the vast network of connections that wove into the man's pattern. Like all people, this man possessed a complex mixture of dark and light, but overall the outlook was...favorable. For just a moment, Jake sensed a familiar connection within the mass. Ghost. A shared acquaintance it seemed.

There was a strange weight to man's thoughts in the moments following his offer. A faint sense of disgust connecting itself to Jake's clothing. His wet clothing, he realized. There was little he could do about that at this point. He would just have to play things by ear.

“I would appreciate that... I really didn't expect to get caught out here like this.” Jake plucked at his sodden shirt with frustrated air. Fashion sense was not something he usually indulged in, but he had long ago learned what did and did not touch people's senses of style. Somehow, he imagined this approach would play off more effectively with this man then any other.

“My name is Jake,” he said, offering his hand to the floating man.

Juka smirked at the not quite shiny man, picking up on the fact that he too seemed not entirely pleased with the state of his dripping wet clothes. Well, Juka would just have to rectify that situation when they got back to his apartment. By Juka's ever critical eye, Jake seemed to be a little shorter than him and a little broader of build but he was fairly sure that he must have something that would fit the poor man And poor man indeed, for it was quite apparent that he truly was in need of Juka's help, and not just to help him get out of the rain and wind.

Unbubbling with another grimace of distaste as the wind and rain hit him, Juka accepted Jake's hand and grinned. "I am Juka Miami," he announced grandly, despite the fact that he was now dripping water. He then stepped closer to Jake, possibly to close for personal comfort but Juka had little concept of personal space anyway, and rebubbled himself, this time including Jake in his bubble. "Make sure you hold on," Juka warned generously. "You wouldn't want to plummet to your doom would you?" The words were said far too cheerily given their context.

Warning properly stated, Juka commanded his bubble up and away, more than a little pleased with the fact that he was no longer getting rained on if not entirely pleased with the fact that Jake's sopping clothes weren't helping his goal of personal dryness. As Juka began heading back towards h is apartment he was careful to only allow the wind to buffet his bubble a little bit, knowing that those not used to traveling by bubble could find it more than a little disorienting. He did not, however, stop his fun entirely. He was doing a good deed, after all, and every good deed deserved a little fun as a reward.

OOC: Sorry about the wait. I was stuck on Buried Treasure and I needed to get that out. Buried Treasure is like a hobby. It's work, but it's fun. Hanging with Juka is like a vacation. It's all amusement.

“It's nice to-” Jake trailed off half way through his standard issue greeting as the grand impossibility of the bubble enclosed him. It was like being enfolded into a huge and comfortable blanket of incredible. Jake turned his attention back to the strange man before him. He was close now, very close, and the heady connections the man put out were now lacing themselves through Jake's own weave, making things a little hard to follow.

“Make sure you hold on. You wouldn't want to plummet to your doom would you?”

Jake grinned as the joke of those words rose out of the confusing mass of connections, and instinctively, he took hold of the man's fore arms. That was what he was supposed to do, right? As the bubble rose from the ground, Jake could feel the sweeping torrent of the storm slam into its surface, buffeting the pair of them around like a barely-controllable beach ball. For a moment, concern creased Jake's mind, but then he caught a hint of amusement coming from Juka. The man's control of the bubble appeared to be almost perfect. What buffeting the pair of them were feeling was what Juka wanted to happen. He wanted to have fun with his creation, but now it seemed he was limiting himself for Jake's wellbeing.

To hell with that[/color], Jake thought with a grin, I love roller-coasters. Maybe it was his own need to compare himself to others, or perhaps he had somehow tapped into Juka's overwhelming sense of enthusiasm, but Jake wanted to sample the rush he had sensed within Juka on his approach.

“This is incredible! I think you've got the coolest power I've ever seen!” Jake said flashing a smile. “You really looked like you were having a lot of fun coming up here earlier. Don't hold back because of me. I can take whatever you've got.” His words we as truthful as they were a challenge. Jake rarely, if ever, got disoriented by anything. He had been through one crashing bus, had fallen off a mountain, and performed hundreds of acrobatic stunts back in Seattle. Things that would have had a normal person coming apart at the seems. The Web of Fragments was always level, and Jake was curious what the man could do.

Juka, for all of his usual absent mindedness and lack of paying attention to anything going on around him could, when he felt like it, be rather observant. In this instance, Juka couldn't help but notice that Nexus appeared to be quite enthusiastic himself. In fact, if Juka was not mistaken he would enjoy the full experience of riding a bubble in a storm.

With a wide mischievous grin Juka let go of almost all of his careful control of his bubble, exerting only so much as to slowly, if not exactly directly, make his way back towards his apartment and not actually collide with any solid objects. Almost immediately the wind took hold of the bubble, compelling it this way and that, chaotically as if the bubble were a ship on a stormy sea. He allowed the wind to almost buffet the bubble into nearby buildings, building up the appropriate level of terror and dread, until commanding it, at the very last possible moment, to spin around the building, moving swiftly up or down or to the side as whim took him. Juka couldn't help but burst out into laughter, hoping that Nexus was enjoying the wild ride as much as he was. This was what being alive was all about, this was what being a mutant was all about. He pitied, just a little, those poor individuals who were forced to remain rooted upon the ground but he was enjoying himself far to much to really dwell upon such things.

“This is incredible! I think you've got the coolest power I've ever seen!”

"Why thank you," Juka said beaming. He hadn't even stopped to wonder if Nexus was a mutant himself or not, but then it really didn't matter to him anyway. All that mattered was that he was able to share his joy and his power with another person. All to soon, however, they made it back to his apartment and he landed on the balcony, perfectly gently. Unbubbling and opening the balcony door wide enough for them to enter, he beckoned Nexus inside.