Verdigris hoisted her bag back onto her shoulder and consulted the piece of paper she had scribbled the room number given to her onto. Asking politely to be placed in a specific room, technically with a specific roommate, could work wonders.

She walked up the stairs and down the middle hallway, apparently when you were older than 18 you could sleep in the ‘adults’ corridor. She felt a little awkward, like she had snuck into an ‘R’ rated film underage. Giving herself a tiny shake she continued down the hall. There was nothing here that should be worrisome to her. Nothing to be afraid of. Except that maybe Andrea would not remember her offer to share a room. In which case she would just walk right back down the stairs and ask for a different room number and hope that it was either empty or occupied by someone who was as easy to get along with as the girl with green skin had been.

She stopped in front of a closed door and double checked the number on her page and the door. This was it, the moment of truth. She made a fist around the already crumpled page and knocked solidly once, twice, three times.

"Hello? Anyone home?"

Spercifically 'any green-skinned-first-mate-hopefully-soon-to-be-roomie-home?' but that was far too long winded for the dark haired captain. Also a little awkward for anyone walking by.

She barely heard the sound of someone knocking on her door over her music blaring from her laptop. Sure, it was classical, but it was still loud. With an eyebrow arched, she clamped her teeth down on her toothbrush, her hand reaching across her bed to claim her glasses once again. Slithering to the edge of the bed, she slipped her legs over and stood, adjusting pink fleece pants before making her way towards the door. Her fingers silenced the music as she walked passed the end of her bed, before they shoved her glasses on over curious orange eyes.

A voice floated through the wood and her other eyebrow arched to join it dark twin near her hairline. It was... Distinctly female. Did she know any females at the school?...

Not that she could remember. She adjusted the toothbrush in her mouth and wiped her hands on her the bottom of her tank top before wrapping her palm firmly around the metal door handle and cracking it open. Her mouth gaped in sheer surprise when the face that greeted her was that of her Central park Acquaintance. She paid no heed to her own appearance, hair wriggling about- free from it's constricting braids, toothbrush hanging limply from her cheek, tired and wrinkled looking in her sleepwear. She flung the door open and stepped back to let the girl in.

"Verdigris! Wha- How-?" A grin slowly spread across her face before she stepped further into the room to give her friend more space. "You beat me to it didn't you, getting the forms I mean?"

Her mind raced back to where the forms she had were, sitting folded neatly in her coat pocket.

She wasn’t quite sure what she was expecting from the other side of the door, but the reception she received far exceeded it. The stammered words followed by a toothpastey grin prompted a smile of her own to raise her cheeks in an excited expression. She had not had a real proper home for nearly three years, but already this was looking like it was going to be lots of fun and entertainment. She almost wished she had worn her paper hat which was carefully tucked in one of the pockets of her seemingly bottomless bag, her black bandanna was tied around her head though, to ward off the imminent bad-hair-day she had felt coming for a week, so she touched a finger to that and bowed slightly. Full sweeps with hats were reserved for days when there were hats. Or at least not full backpacks resting against one’s spine.

“Andrea, good to see you again.” A lopsided smile crept its way up one cheek at the question. “Didn’t jump the gun by too much did I? I was here a while back, for a wedding, so I grabbed some forms while I was around. Also, ‘Good Morning’, and ‘Surprise’”

She moved into the space vacated in the doorway and observed the room. It was a lot larger than she had expected, imagining in her spare moments a cleaner version of a room at one of the homeless hostels, with a double bunk bed. Nothing like the floor space and simple elegance of this room. Add to that it was pretty clean, with just the bed betraying the fact that someone lived here. Her eyes felt visibly wider and she blinked a few times and told herself not to stare. Not only was it rude it also showed how little you knew.

“So how have you been?” She paused and considered how best to enquire about room sharing without being rude. “Do you have a roommate?”

She hoisted her backpack a little higher on her shoulders and regarded the girl before her. It was very difficult to judge reactions through the dark sunglasses so she shoved her hands into her pockets and fiddled gently with the marbles in her left pocket, they were small and glass. As they always were. And as always she was surprised just how fast they calmed her down.

>> “Didn’t jump the gun by too much did I? I was here a while back, for a wedding, so I grabbed some forms while I was around. Also, ‘Good Morning’, and ‘Surprise’”

Andrea closed the door behind the dark haired girl and plopped back onto her bed, plucking her gloves up from the covers and slipping them on... to be safe. After ruining a few of her dads good jackets when she was small, she had gotten used to the synthetic gloves acting like a second skin.

"No no! of course not! This is a wonderful surprise! To tell the truth I was actually worried I wouldn't find you again to get the papers to you! Its a good thing you happened by like you did."

>>“So how have you been? Do you have a roommate?”

Her eyes glanced behind verdy, eyeballing the empty shell of a bed that had occupied her room for a few days. honestly, it was unclaimed- as Andrea had hoped. A small grin over took her face as she pulled her toothbrush from her teeth and wiped her mouth with a tissue.

"It was reserved for someone..." she paused for a moment to pick up the glass of water she had stowed away on her dresser, taking a small sip to wash out any left over mintyness. part of her wanted to drag the whole thing out, make Verdy believe that it was taken before spilling that she had been hoping to save it for her.... but she could never be so devious.

"but the someone seems to have surprised me before I could get everything ready... It's yours if you want it, friend." Her grin softened into a true smile and she set her toothbrush down with her glass, folding her legs under her before she leaned forward on her bed and clasped her chin in her hands with support under-elbow from her mattress.

Verdigris watched as the green-skinned girl pulled gloves over her hands, but decided not to say anything. She smiled as Andrea dithered her pleasure at her visitor. In answer to her question Andrea’s eyes flicked away from her and Verdigris felt her happiness fall right through the floorboards and she stared at her toes.

~~~“It was reserved for someone”

Verdy nodded quietly, she could still live down the hall and be friends. It might even be better not to strain the friendship. Especially with her know habit of snoring when she was sleeping peacefully. The more nervous or excited, the less she snore. Needless to say, the last few nights were even quieter than usual. The voice of Andrea continued and Verdigris forced her attention back to the green-skinned girl.

~~~“It’s yours if you want it friend.”

Verdigris, in general, had very good control of her body functions. At this moment however, she completely lost all vestiges of ‘cool and collected’. Her mouth got stuck somewhere between hanging wide open and a face-splitting grin. The result was a stunned expression that has yet to be named.

“I’d love to share it with you… I do snore though.”

She something-ed happily at the green-skinned girl and carefully plopped her bag onto the floor. There was her life for the last three years all bundled up into one bulging backpack. Strained with odds and ends collected or stolen, saved for a day they might be needed. She stretched her neck and shoulders and forced her expression back to a relatively normal smile. With a smirk she kicked her bag under the bed.

“There, all moved in.”

>>“I’d love to share it with you… I do snore though.”

What should have been a laugh, came out as a soft snort- which she tried to play off as a sneeze unsuccessfully. With an embarrassed grin, she scratched at the back of her head and shifted on her bed, leaning back and against the wall.

"I don't mind. I talk in my sleep...er... well I'm told I do anyway." She watched curiously as Verdi settled in...in a sense.

>>“There, all moved in.”

Though the action was hidden behind her glasses, her eyes had widened considerably. She had nearly forgotten her friends...er... lack of a home. She stared at verdi's bag, stuffed seemingly to the point of exploding, before her eyes slid to her dresser... sitting half full and hungry by her bed.

An idea was forming.

Pursing her lips, she leaned over and planted both her hands against the side of the wooden dresser, before shoving it across the expanse of empty wall that separated the two beds. When she felt it was even between them, she stood and shuffled through the drawers with her things in them, condensing her own meager belongings into the top two drawers. Then, after dropping to her knees, she stooped and crawled halfway under her bed, her toes wiggling as she fished around for the item she sought.

"Ah!"

Withdrawing from under her bed, she pulled out a long, slim plastic container, an extra she had been saving from a pack of three she had been forced to by by an overly pushy sales woman. She turned and wriggled back onto her feet before holding it out to her shiny new roommate.

"here, you can put your things in this. i find it works well for holding toothbrushes and bathroom items." She scrunched her nose as she voice thickened with her accent, and cleared her throat before continuing.

"i don't really own much myself, so my dresser has a few spare drawers if you need a place to store your clothes. The two drawers on the bottom right there..." Pausing, she shifted on her feet and glanced at her dresser. "Sorry it's kind of crooked... I had to assemble it myself and the directions proved themselves pretty confusing.."

Verdigris watched curiously as her roommate heaved the dresser next to her bed to the middle of the space between the beds. She was fairly sure that if she was occupied with snoring and Andrea was occupied with sleep talking they wouldn’t disturb each other, but if her roommate felt the need to shield her ears, well that was ok too. A scurry, a flurry and an exclamation later and she had space to put her bits and pieces. A grateful smile flittered across her face as she accepted the plastic-box-present-of-acceptance-and-love.

“Thanks, that means a lot to me.”

She inspected the crooked dresser and grinned, she had tried to assemble a desk once. ‘Crazy simple’ the splash of colour had declared. Crazy mistranslations had been more of what the instructions were and when she got to ‘insert part a.i, shown in figure 17c part one (viewed on side) into groove jx, shown in figure 24g part six, as shown in the diagram ‘g’ on page 15’ she gave up and called James to come and assemble it. He finished it in one hour, no sweat. Nothing quite like a handy-man.

“Directions I think are designed to confuse the innocent and baffle them into hiring a professional to install them. They’re in cahoots.” She smirked “It’s a pretty good job though, it works, and that’s the main part.”

It didn’t really matter that anything rounded would roll off the edge. They would just have to be careful. She yanked her bag from under the bed and sat on it carefully. Unzipping the middle pocket she dragged her spare pair of jeans and tracksuit pants from the tangle of discovered items and shook them out before folding them carefully and placing them in the bottom draw. Disentangling a long sleeve shirt she tugged the semi-folded stack of t-shirts from under more junk and gave them one large shake. A stack of keys which had been rolled up in the top shirt fell out and bounced. Tinkling and clattering to the floor. All the keys she had ‘found’ during her stay at NYC, there was upwards of fifty, but she was unsure of the exact number. Some had plastic tags, describing what they opened. Most were simple and brass. As indistinguishable as each other. She glanced guiltily at her roommate.

“Oops.”

She agreed entirely with her dark haired friend when on the subject of directions and assembly. While she hadn't really had to put many things together in her measly 22 years, she had always considered herself quite handy. With the dresser, which had boasted being easy enough to assemble that a child could do it, she found this was not the case. In fact, if it were not for her inability to give up on puzzles and such, she might have thrown her hands in the air and went running for either shin or someone with better problem solving skills to help her fix the mess of lopsided ply wood and screws. so, having her fully functional, yet leaning tower of pizza reminiscent handiwork complimented in such a way forced a goofy smile to her face. She could see that she was really going to love having some company for the first in her life.

"Yeah, I suppose one could look at in such a way. I'm just glad that the drawers fit in it right." She neglected and refused to mention that there was a small baggy sitting in her top drawer with all of the screws, nuts, bolts and various small pieces of wood that she hadn't found places for.

While Verdi settled in once again, this time with a few places to stow away her belongings, Andrea bent over and picked up her laptop from the floor by her bed. She gave the old computer a loving pat with her hand before lifting the screen and typing her password quickly into the . While she dragged out one of the many things she had been working on in the last week, her new roommate dropped something, and the resounding jingling of many metallic things reached her ears. Her eyes rose above the top of her computer screen and she blinked at verdi before glancing down to see what had fallen. Without really thinking, she dropped a foot to the floor and bent down and over, picking up the large clump of keys on the floor before her.

>>“Oops.”

Her lips formed an silent 'O' and she turned the keys over in her hand before turning curiosity filled eyes back to her roommate. She had, in all honesty, never seen quite so many keys in all of her life. Perhaps her friend was a collector of sorts? Maybe she had a lot of locked boxes with super secret possessions in them? She shrugged inwardly and held her hand out, palm upwards with they keys cradled within for the dark haired girl to take.

"That is quite a collection... must weight at least a pound?" She dipped her hand a little, as if trying to gauge their weight, and poked her tongue out of the corner of her mouth. "It must have taken you a while to acquire so many, How did you come across all of them?"

(( Let me know if you want me to change anything. :3))

The facial expression of Andrea was priceless, and definantley worth dropping her stash of keys on the floor. She intended to return as many as possible, starting with the labled ones, she just hadn't got around to it just yet.

~~"That is quite a collection... must weight at least a pound? It must have taken you a while to acquire so many, How did you come across all of them?"

Verdigris smiled, show and tell time, and in the safety of their room she would be able to show without worrying about being attacked or thought less of for being a mutant. She yanked her bag out from under the bed and placed it against the far wall, it would not do to break something in her new room and the bag was tough.

"My mutation allows me to... find things I guess you could say, but they have to be small enough to fit in my hand."

She rattled around in her pocket for a moment until she found a quarter, squeezing it tightly in her left hand she held her right out and pointed it towards the bag. Less than a second later the quarter was shot from her palm and hit the bag with a 'thunk' before tinkling onto the floor and rolling on one edge for a moment before tipping over. Verdy glanced at it.

"Heads, I win." She grinned "But because I don't always have something in my hand it just... pulls stuff from nearby. Keys are one of the better things to find, sweets wrappers are not really much use."

She smiled awkwardly, other than James she hadn't really demonstraited what she could do for anyone, and James had recieved the watered down 'oh my gosh I'm a mutant I don't know what to do' version. She liked this version so much better. Stooping she picked up the coin and pocketed it.

((The only thing I would say would be that you said you put your password in the ' . ', other than that, all good )

>>"But because I don't always have something in my hand it just... pulls stuff from nearby. Keys are one of the better things to find, sweets wrappers are not really much use."

Managing to hider her Awe, just barely, she deposited the mass of keys on their shared dresser. It was indeed a unique and interesting power... and Andrea had never witnessed such a thing before. She shot a rueful glance at her own hands in disdain. All they did was kill things... deprive things of beauty. Her powers served no real purpose other than to make other suffer... well, at least to her they did. She gave momentary thought to sharing her own powers with the girl, dropped the idea swiftly, then picked it back up again after a moments pause.

Perhaps it was better to be honest for a while... rather than trying to hide something that was sure to come up sooner or later down the road. All she had to think about was how absolutely mortified she would be if she were to slip and anything bad were to happen to Verdi... The mere though was enough to drain a little color from her face.

"Rather handy, I'd say." She forced a grin to put herself in better spirits again and tapped the side of her sunglasses. "Much more useful than what I am stuck with. I have the ability to...erm..." She fumbled for a moment, her gaze shifting from behind her dark glasses, " freeze people...and things, if you will." Holding her hands up at her sides, in a very 'i surrender' type of fashion, she continued on. "And with these I-" Suck the life out of things... Not a very pleasant way of putting it. Andrea found herself at a loss for words. It had been easy enough to tell Shin...well, Show Shin what her other power was. Should it not be equally easy to tell her new roommate? "...I turn things to stone...kind of." She tried to pull of a sheepish grin as she picked up her glass of water again and sipped at it quietly.

There. It was out again. The dark haired girl was the second person to know, it almost felt a little... relieving.

~"Rather handy, I'd say."

Verdy blinked, more and more Andrea was reminding her of James, the toothy grin flashed her way wasn't quite the same, but it gave her the same snort-chuckle feeling in her chest. She smiled encouraginly at her green-skinned friend as she hesitated. Not a whole lot could be lost between them, and she doubted that anything Andrea could say could change her feelings about the budding friendship. Unless it was like, the ability to drain innocent souls or something.

Ooh, stone-making, much cooler. She grinned at the girl, not quite enough to match the tusks of her roommate, but a grin all the same. She would have to practise this smiling, all these friendly relationships she was intending to start at the Mansion would need her to be proficient at it.

"That's why you're always wearing sunnies and gloves huh?"

She nodded in sympathy, her mutation only meant she had to be careful who she got surprised by. It must have been really hard to deal with a physically obvious mutation. Although, some might think that the tips of her hair being green was a side effect of her mutation. In a round about kind of way it was, with the history behind it. Dying it green the day she ran away, away from the brother mourning his friend killed by a mutant. Away from her life, away from everything. She gave herself a little shake.

"Sorry, got a little distracted there."

>> "That's why you're always wearing sunnies and gloves huh?"

She almost couldn't help but grin in response. It was exactly why. "Yeah... though, some day I hope to be able to go without. Have enough control over my powers to look at people and not worry, You know?" She sipped her water again and studied her friend, wondering if the semi distant look in her eyes was one of thought, or of memories. Then she wondered if she looked like that while thinking. People on the outside probably couldn't tell due to her glasses, so the question wasn't really worth diving any deeper into. Shifting her attention back to her roommate, just as she seemed to snap out of whatever she had been thinking about, Andrea set her cup down and smiled.

"Have you gotten a tour of the place yet? There are a lot a different rooms that might interest you..." She though back to her own tour just a few days ago and her smile faded a bit. It would be better this time, that was for sure. She had her glasses, she was a lot calmer, and she would make sure to stay away from tea cups and Saphirus. "... I'm not a tour guide or anything, but I could show you around."

~"Have you gotten a tour of the place yet? There are a lot a different rooms that might interest you... I'm not a tour guide or anything, but I could show you around."

She smiled at her friend, nothing quite like exploring. She glanced at the pyjamas her new roommate was sporting but decided not to say anything, this was like a great big house… kinda… She rolled her shoulders in anticipation, she could easily make them another pair of hats, but it was closer now to christmas than talk like a pirate day, so she decided not to adorn the head of her friend with anything on top of that scary hair.

“Sure, I’d love to. I’ve been to the, um, danger room? But, other than that, I’ve got no clue where anything is.”

She was always up for a bit of adventure though, and what better time than the present. It would also be a bonus to know where everything was in case she needed anything. She was pretty sure that the hair was a little extra on top of the explained gifts, but she was not going to push the limits of the friendship. At least not until she knew the girl better.

>>“Sure, I’d love to. I’ve been to the, um, danger room? But, other than that, I’ve got no clue where anything is.”

The green skinned girl stood from her bed swiftly and swept herself into the joined bathroom with a purpose. After depositing her toothbrush safely back into her drawer, she raked her brush through her writhing hair and swept it up into a loose bun, sparing only a soft frown at her still free bangs before she moved back out into the main room.

"Alright, lets be off then!" She was tempted to call the girl captain, but withheld the comment for later. With a glance at her coat, she opened the door and waited for Verdi to join her before moving out into the hall. "How does the library sound as a start off point? There's a music room and a few others even i have yet to fully see..." She shut and locked the door behind them, slipping the room key into her pocket as she raised hidden eyes to her new, shiny roommate. She would have to request a second key for the girl, least one of them get locked out due to contrasting schedules.

She set off down the hall way at a casual pace, her hands tucked into her pockets while she waited to hear Verdi's wishes. it felt odd, in her opinion, to walk around in what could be considered public without her coat on... but she was comfortable with her body enough not to pick at herself while her dark haired friend was around. Of course, if their path happened to take a turn for outside the mansion, she would be forced to return to her room and claim the safety of her pea coat.

~"Alright, lets be off then! How does the library sound as a start off point? There's a music room and a few others even I have yet to fully see..."

She waited until the girl emerged from the side-room and slipped out into the hallway. As of yet she hadn’t seen anyone beyond the front desk. Something about a curfew rung a bell in her mind, but she figured seeing as she was allowed to stay in the ‘grownup’ rooms in the middle hallway she was allowed to get a tour at who knows what hour of the night. She grinned at her green skinned friend as she shut the door.

“Sounds great, I haven’t done a lot of reading since my glasses broke I’m afraid, but before then it was something I enjoyed.”

She followed her friend quietly for a few moments, eyes darting everywhere. So much to see, still a lot to learn. But she was a fast leaner, there would not be long before she knew everything there was to know. Or at least as much as she could cram into her head in as many sittings.

“This place is huge.” She cleared her throat and started again in a smaller voice “How big is this place? Really I mean, I know the grounds are massive, it took me ages to walk from the edge to the gate and that was just one side, do you know how big the whole place is?”

She glanced at her friend’s bare shoulders and shoved her hands into her pockets, she could walk all night, or at least as long as her friend was willing to show her around. She was not yet confident enough to wander the halls alone. Besides, she didn’t want to be locked out of the room. Spending nights behind dumpsters and under park benches was all well and good, but her pack was half unpacked and she had nothing but what she was wearing. Not a brilliant way to spend the night on all accounts.