"Left hallway is for boys, right hallway is for girls, and middle... is for older adults, like me..."

After peering down a few empty hallways, Andrea took to looking at shin, one eyebrow quirked as she made a guess at his age. He couldn't be that old... Not much older than her anyway. She returned to eyeballing her surroundings, jotting down a quick mental map of her surroundings, as well as a few notes from what he was saying.

She would hate to burst in on the boys dormitory at night and scar the poor things beyond recover. Andrea took a nervous sip of her tea, glancing quickly at the last few gulps left within her cup. She would be the first to admit that when she was woken up at night for various reasons, and her wild hair was free from its restrictive braids- she would look an awful lot like a boogie woman- or Medusa herself- wandering around in the dark hallways.

"There's a curfew, of course. After the curfew, kiddos have to stay in their own rooms, or those on their side of the hall."

Blinking, she turned her attention back onto shin, away from her own paranoid thoughts, and tilted her head a bit in curiosity. "What exactly is the age group that this curfew is intended for?"

>>"What exactly is the age group that this curfew is intended for?"

"All ages," Shin replied, point blank. "Older students need to do their part to set good examples for the younger ones. We can't have them crawling into each others' rooms at night. That'd be pandemonium." Though if the older students managed to sneak friends into their rooms without the younger students noticing, like certain ice elementals had recently... well, that was harder to monitor. Shin neglected to mention that for obvious reasons.

A thought struck him. "The older student dorms are for people 18 and older... I never did catch your age." An honest, yet awkward realization that was. Here, he'd been assuming she was younger than him. What if...

"The older student dorms are for people 18 and older... I never did catch your age."

She blinked for a moment, odd memories of girl time with her mother floating back as her mothers voice chimed faintly, "A self respecting woman never reveals her true age!" With another blink, she shook the memory away and tinkered with her cup.

"I'm 22. What about you?"

She glanced at him from the corners of her eyes, assuming that because he was taller than her, that he was older as well. She really did have a problem with assuming things. It never led her to the correct answer, nor did it help to kindle the very frail relationship with strangers that she had.

To Assume makes an ass out of U and me, sadly- for Andrea that saying had turned out true more than once or twice. She really needed to remember that more often.

22. Shin blinked. Oh, so she was older. Okay. "I'm 21, actually." He replied lightly. "So, anyways." Tip-toe soundly around the issue, Shin. She's got a year on you and can freeze you in your tracks. You just called her immature. Shin slid a grin onto his face that was far too big. "Liiiibrary~?"

Shin took a big step forward, and led the way. Past the endless hallways of dormitories, past the potted plant of solitude, around the sheer corner that had claimed countless lives. Shin veered twice around the yellow blur, the mansion's very own speedster that always seemed to 'appear' whenever Shin had somewhere to be in a hurry. He always had Shin beat when it came to 'hurrying'. He turned quickly to tell Andrea 'watch out!', then rounded the final bend. They were in the home stretch now, walking leisurely up to the library's doors. Shin flung them open, gesticulated like a bandit, and announced 'The library!'

The library was spacious, with a mezzanine railing in front of them that overlooked the first floor, and an elevator nearby to reach the third. Books were everywhere. The must of pages was omnipresent. It was great, really. Shin took a step inside, then turned around to grin at her. "Go ahead. Faint if you must."

It was just that overpowering.

21? well, at least she wasn't too far off... She Zoned out for the most part, which would turn out bad for her in the end, when she was stumbling around at night with no clue as to where she was. This thought, led her to further zoning out. What would she find if she were to wander the halls? did they have a gym? An art room maybe? The possibilities seemed endless- compared to all of the things she had seen so far. While she pondered, she missed most of what was going on around her- which led her to almost walking into the walls a few times, as well as most of what had been said to her- save for one thing, which snapped her out of her thoughts immediately.

"The library!"

It was then, that the full picture of the library hit her. She regained enough composure to keep her mouth from hanging open, but not enough to keep the tea cup in her hands from pitching forward as her fingers went slack. A short cry of surprise slipped past her lips, as her hands regained their grip on the cup. She fought with it for a few embarrassing moments, trying desperately to keep the tea within its ceramic home. As she regained balance and ended the show- which she was sure looked like a juggling act gone horribly wrong- she shook her wrist a bit to free a few drops that had escaped to land on her rain coat sleeve.

She was actually very surprised that she had not spilled anything more than a few drops, and thus gave herself a pat on the back.

"Go ahead. Faint if you must."

"I just might."

Was her awe filled reply. After feigning a swoon, she took a few tentative steps forward, her eyes as wide as saucers behind her dark shades. Where was she to start? This library dwarfed her father's small study by far, and she had always thought had a fairly large collection of books! This place was so vastly big... with so many, many books... she had no clue where to start... or how long it would take her to finish once she started...

"Is it possible for me to live in here with the books?..." Though it was entirely a joke- her thick voice held a pinch of 'Please?'

>>"Is it possible for me to live in here with the books?..."

"I wish," Shin laughed. "Believe me, you wouldn't believe the hours I've spent holed up in here like a rabbit, gnawing away at a stack. Not good for the eyes, I suppose... now I see what's with all the carrots."

He turned towards the shelves and clasped his hands behind his back with a wistful sigh. As far as Shin was concerned, being curled up in a frumpy chair with a good book was the epitome of 'cool'. Sure, he'd been less knowledgeable about books when he'd first come to the mansion. His first real 'curl up' time in the library had been with a phone book, but after he'd gotten a job at Full Circle, his love of books had grown like a bonfire. Each page was fuel for the raging flames.

"Working at Full Circle, I only see a good eighth of this level of books. Maybe even a tenth... Full Circle. That's the book store I work at." Shin looked over his shoulder at her, elaborating. "It's a nice place. They take a neutral stance on mutants and humans, so we attract all sorts of crowds. We've even got a little cafe inside where they serve coffee and tea... speaking of, you got a little something on your raincoat..." Shin pointed.

...speaking of, you got a little something on your raincoat..."

The image she had put together in her mind, of the guy before her bouncing around a bookstore with a twinkle in his eye, poofed when he directed that last part her way. Indeed, upon further inspection she found that the tea had left a small wet dark spot on her coat. Half of her wised she had left it back in the kitchen right then. Shaking her arm again proved useless, as did rubbing the spot against her pants.

Andrea found this method to be ineffective as well. She glared at the spot for a moment, before she turned her glare on the hapless tea cup sitting innocently in her hand. Her thirst was plenty quenched by now, she needed it no longer. Her eyes lifted from the cup, to the room before her. It was a sacred place- one not meant to suffer the consequences of clumsy girls such as herself with dangerous cups of tea in their hands.

Catching sight of a small table out in the hall, Andrea muttered a quick 'be right back' to shin and moved towards the door. Only a few steps in found her catching a foot on herself, and the next thing she knew, she was pitched into the floor- the remains of her tea sent flying into the air.

To her surprise, light flooded her vision- her glasses were gone, and she wasn unable to find them as she gathered her wits.

It had been a pretty good day so far... All of the people he had met'd been fairly nice to him, and even though he had literally only been here a day, he had a good feeling about this place. Since he had shown up at an ungodly time at night, and hadn't been able to get to bed, he had decided that he might as well give himself a little tour of the grounds while his paperwork went through. He had started about an hour ago, and now... well.. now he was lost. Jesus, this place hadn't looked so big from the outside! He had been walking for a while, now, and he was still running into new things. They had everything here! Wonder aside, though, he wasn't really in the mood for a self-tour anymore... He really just wanted to go to the living room and relax, being very tired as he was. The only problem was that he had no friggin clue where the living room was anymore! He decided that it would be a good idea to ask the next person he saw for directions.

He turned around the next corner, and smiled at his good fortune.. there was not one, but two people he could bombard with questions! He headed toward the very green looking young woman, and opened his mouth to ask his first question as he approached, and immediately saw her trip over her own feet, sending a shower of tea his way... His still open mouth received a good bit of tea in it, and was followed by a cup, which cracked him in the nether regions, causing him to both cough in reaction to tea flying into his lungs, and bend down in reaction to being hit in the danger zone... The exaggerated motion caused him to smack his head on the very platform she had intended to put the little cup down on, and then fall flat on his arse right onto a pair of glasses that had slid below him. He stared at the wall for a second, trying to piece together exactly what had just happened, and why his marbles hurt... After that second, he realized that he probably had eyes on him, and that a girl had just fallen kinda hard on her face. He hopped up quickly, very much embarrassed by the whole thing, and turned to reach down and help the girl up "Hey, are you oka-" He made eye contact with the girl's strange orange irises ,and found that speaking was suddenly impossible... in fact... it was beginning to feel like he couldn't move at all... Past that, why even be awake? He was so very tired, wasn't he?

The unfortunate mutant froze in place bent over, and offering his hand to help her up... Maybe this wasn't such a good day for him... But hey, at least Saph Jr. didn't hurt anymore, right?

"Er, okay..."

She was making an awful big deal about a tiny spill. Then again, there was no reason to be drinking or eating among the books anyways. This was a very nice library. Too nice for mustard smudges and coffee spills. Shin glanced towards the window across the room as he waited for her return.

And waited.


and a few moments later, he was still waiting. A whole 5 seconds passed before he turned towards the hallway, thinking something was up.

"Andrea?" Shin queried. He took a few quick steps towards the hallway, and there he saw... "Andrea! Is everything-- everyone, okay?"

She was on the floor. And he was on the floor. Her glasses were off. He -wasn't moving-.

Uh

Oh.

Uh Oh was an understatement. From the moment her eyes locked with the man's, she knew she was in trouble. She spent a few frozen moments staring at him slack jawed, studying what he looked like, how he was posed, and the drips of her tea as the released themselves from his chin.

Great. It wasn't even her first day, and she had already screwed up royally.

"Andrea! Is everything-- everyone, okay?"

Andrea scrambled to her feet quickly, tripping on herself again as she snatched up her glasses and deposited them back safely on her face. Perhaps she would have to look into those Contacts Shin had been talking about earlier... for safety's sake.

She caught herself from her latest trip on the mans outstretched arm which proved itself highly unstable. After making sure she was fully stable on her trembling legs, Andrea turned and glanced over her shoulder at shin- guilt and fear plastered all over her face.

Panic set in then, and her hands found their way to her braids to tug at them nervously. What now...? Would they allow her to stay still? had she just ruined her only chance at help!? Question after question flooded her mind, only serving as fuel to the fire that was her fear. When she finally spoke, it came out small and quiet- barely above a whisper.

"I- I didn't... mean...too..."

"Didn't... mean to... ok. But what did you do?" Shin dropped to one knee at her side, reaching over the mutant's prone form. His hand struck out to a wrist, checking for a pulse... it was faint, but still there. Whatever kept this body paralyzed didn't kill. Shin's mind flew back to the apple. The one she'd turned to 'stone'.

"We got lucky." He frowned. "Whatever it was didn't hurt him... He's just stiff..."

Her worries about being denied a home didn't even drift through Shin's mind. Here, the important thing was rectifying the mistake, not placing blame. He bent down, and tried to level the man up against his shoulder. "Help me lift him... "

Andrea nodded dumbly at his request, reaching to help lift the man. She found it difficult at first, until she adjusted to his weight and height.

"I-... I'm so sorry...for this." Shame felt like a heavy fog within her chest... squashing everything but the quickened beating of her heart. "...if it helps... it doesn't usually last long, maybe a half an hour... at the most." Though her voice was quiet- her words were filled with enough emotion to stick out quite plainly in the quiet hall. Truthfully, she didn't know much about that particular power. Short from accidentally hitting her father with it, and a few cases in which she had forgotten to take mirrors out of her room- all she knew was that whatever it did to people, it lasted in varying lengths of time.

She remained silent for the rest of the trip, her eyes trained on the path ahead- locked away within her mind in thought. Unfamiliar hallways passed by, doors to rooms she had not been in yet, and stairs that led upwards- she noticed none of them. Simply following along as shin led her and the stiffened form of the man somewhere where he could be helped. She felt shin slow a bit- and took that as a sign that they were at their destination.

She helped to gently move the man into the room, her eyes scanning about as she took in what she could, before turning her attention back to the victim. His expression was the same as it had been before she locked eyes with him. That brought her attention to his eyes. She found herself wondering what color they were, maybe pine green? or maybe hazel like shins? All she could imagine was a rainbow of colors and what they would look like... maybe blue, deep blue? Like deep ocean water? Andrea reached up and carefully closed his eyelids, not wanting them to dry out while he waited to regain control over his own body.

Garrett had taken a break from running infinite laps in the Danger Room to come and soak up more ambience of the Infirmary. Honestly, he had spent more time lying in the beds here than doing any good, it was a shame and something he felt he should rectify as soon as possible. Not to mention the smoldering European nurse that he might find blowing deliciously on wet polished nails. Perched eyebrows walked in before he made it, anticipating the vixen. They soon plummeted as the only thing with a pulse was DocProf. "Looking for Alexandra? Not too many men come in here with that stupid little kid face over me, mind you. If you see her and can keep your mouth closed, get her in here for some paperwork. Or better yet..." The old man came over and dropped a load of files into Garrett's arms." Want to learn things? Paperwork is the beginning of your yellow brick road. I'm going to go get a sandwich."Mumble grumble and off he went.

" No hug?" A small chuckle and a sigh of disdain and Garrett sat down to pore over the stack of files. Most were insurance paperwork, easy fill-in-the-blank kind of stuff, so he proceeded to do so. After about thirty minutes of the humdrumness, Garrett was happily surprised by the sound of an arrival or even arrivals. He stood and blew into his hand, checking his breath before finding...patients. A shapely green girl and a young Asian boy came in carrying a rather stiff third. He vaguely recalled seeing the animated lad somewhere. Oh yes, he had been in a different Infirmary when he had found Maya in shock at the Sanctuary. A friend of a friend was a friend indeed.

No weathered and esteemed doctor or hot nurse to pawn off on them, it looked like learning was going to continue. Garrett walked into the main area of the Infirmary. The girl was wearing glasses and gloves. As it was neither bright nor cold in the room, he assumed there was a good reason for it. He watched her close the eyelids of the catatonic third. " Hi there. Garrett Wills. What's going on? Is your friend alright?" He checked the boy's pulse. Faint, but steady. Breathing was occurring, so it wasn't something to page the Doc over. He was probably hiding somewhere anyway, forcing the new guy to do something. Using a small penlight he had gleaned from the Doc's drawer, he opened the boy's eyes and moved the light. The pupil's dialated, but did not move with the light. Interesting. " So, what exactly happened here?"

>>"...if it helps... it doesn't usually last long, maybe a half an hour... at the most."

"It helps," Shin replied quietly, shifting the body along. Shifting the body along... The thought of using that thought in a sentence for a moment felt a bit morbid. ... Shiiiifting...? And they were shuffling like Igor. Moving a paralyzed body towards a lab where a mad DocProf was certain to be waiting. It all pointed towards shenanigans. Mary Shelley at its best.

Shin shook his head as they approached the infirmary. No no no. They weren't taking the corpse to be used in mad experiments! They were taking it to some intelligent old man who happened to be good at chugging root beer... and they'd leave him there and let the 30 minutes pass by.

And maybe some time during that, they'd have her describe the power in a bit more depth, so as to figure out how to prevent this sort of thing from happening again.

"Here we are," Shin slowed, pushing the door open. He worked to manage the added bulk of a body as they slipped through the door. Shin turned his head towards the infirmary staff with a cursory "Doc Prof?"

>>" Hi there. Garrett Wills. What's going on? Is your friend alright?"

Not Doc Prof, but familiar. And he was already checking the boy's pulse, so Shin took him as a new infirmary assistant, and let it slide. Shin met the man's eyes as he asked

>>" So, what exactly happened here?"

"Just an accident," He replied calmly, as if these sorts of things happened all the time. "Sort of a 'gorgon's eye' thing, right Andrea? Can you explain your powers to him for me?"

"Sort of a 'gorgon's eye' thing, right Andrea? Can you explain your powers to him for me?"

eyes.. all on her now. Andrea squirmed in her clothes, wishing her were a turtle at the moment- with the unique and useful ability to suck herself back into her shell at a moments notice.

"Uh..."

What a great explanation! While she applauded sarcastically for herself, she struggled to come up with an adequate explanation of her powers. What was there really left to say? She was much to afraid to try and experiment with her ability, least something horrible happen on accident.

"Well..." It was a start, a weak one, by a start none the less, "... This... is what happens when i look at people." She adjusted her glasses carefully while speaking, noticing for the first time a large crack in one of her lenses. "They get all ridged and stop responding for a while, but it usually only lasts for a short time! Then they just sort of...snap out of it. "

An explanation any toddler would be truly proud of. She was a sentence short of adopting a whimpering tone and stomping her foot on the ground in frustration. Her eyes scanned one face, them switched to the other- trying to read facial expression like a book to judge just how bad the situation really was- all the while trying to block grim images of being dissected by government agents so that they could harvest her power for their own! Much like the infamous gorgon Medusa and her severed head... She shuddered at the thought, before forcefully snapping herself out of horrid daydreams.

"It's a lot like a Coma, i suppose." She finished lamely.