This was stupid. Really stupid. As the ground whipped by below Shin's silver triangular barrier platform, he noted for the umpteenth time just how stupid this whole thing was. They were tailing a naked gold man over the streets of New York. This was the SAME gold man, mind you, he'd fought a whole lifetime ago in the Thunder Dome, before he'd ever joined the X-men. The same Gold Man he'd had to suffocate to defeat. The same Gold Man... and the police were after him.

The police were after him. Shin still didn't know how someone the police wanted suddenly became their duty. Sam had insisted. He'd insisted Shin cover Shawn's shift and help him tail this naked gold man, but as they rushed after him, so close on this guy's tail Shin could see brick buildings reflected off his gold back, Shin suddenly doubted that anything good could come of this.

The gold man shot past a stoplight as it turned red. A silver streak sped after it. The gold man looked over his shoulder, then blasted through a window on his left. The platform strafed right as Shin evaded the glass, hands in front of his face. He looked back to Sam. "He went into that building through the window!" He announced. "You cut him off at the window on the other side of the building. I'll corner him on this side." The silver platform changed its course, bursting through the window after the naked gold man. Shin idly wondered when Invincible Fighter Golden had added flight to his skill repertoire. It didn't matter.

His shard platform vanished as he touched down on gray carpet, stalking through the hallway. He jerked open a few doors. He found wardrobes, mirrored dressing rooms, and a few makeup artists, but didn't find IFG. That could only mean one thing.

Shin's eyes locked seriously on the door at the end of the hallway. They had him cornered, obviously. Obviously, there was no where else to run. Shin took a few quiet steps towards the last door at the end of the hall. His hand found the door knob, and turned it, prepared to find the gold man. He tore the door open, ready as could possibly be.

"Okay, IFG! This is the end of the line for you!!" He took a bold step into the room, brought his finger up to point at one gold man... then, two... three... four? Shin's eyes fell on a scantily-clad woman.

He immediately went blind. "Er. Stop, evil... do... er, what is this?" Shin took another stumbling step towards the line up of golden men he'd seen when he could see, and the girly girl. He covered his eyes, more out of modesty than anything else. "There some sort of Adaptoid-thing... in this... room?"

"EXCUUUUUSE ME!" A snooty voice interrupted Shin. If voices could get more nasally, Shin would have been amazed.

"Today just can't get any better, can it?" He jinxed them. Obviously, it could.

Work was work, but sometimes it was just so damn amusing that one had to wonder why they even got paid. Riley mused as the makeup artist put the finishing touches on her hair and eyes, she probably wouldn’t go so far as to wonder why she got paid…this was definitely a job, but she’d seen the male models she was going to be working with. Three of them. Painted gold. She had to laugh out loud again, just a little bit. The concept was so out of this world…literally.

Apparently the idea was that they were some sort of androids and she was their creator, or ruler, or something out of this world. The men were literally gold. She, on the other hand, was dressed in silver. The outfit was really only mildly skimpy as far as some of the things these places put her in were concerned. In fact, it looked like an aluminum foil, one-piecek sailor’s suit. It was short as all get out, of course, and the slightly gaping top probably would have better fit someone half Riley’s size in that area, but all her bits and pieces were covered, and if she didn‘t button the top past the third button, she could breathe. The thigh-high boots in the same shiny material as the rest were kind of fun too, and gave her just enough added height to make the male models a little uncomfortable. All in all this was such a strange concept…at least the men had speedo-type costumes….gold to match the body paint. The less awkward, the better.

The make-up artist finished with the voluminous curls that laid on her shoulders, and Riley studied the effect in the mirror. She really did look like something out of a 50’s magazine. She made her way to the area set up for the shoot, and got to work. The photographer was a snooty type, and after he’d bossed her around for the first few takes Riley was tempted to remind him that he wasn’t shooting for Vogue…not matter what his ego said.

The door opened and another model sprinted into the room. Riley rose an eyebrow, the guy was seriously late. The photographer ripped the guy a new one, while he had the audacity to look shocked, then thrilled by the situation. Then he joined the group and everything picked up where it took off.

, and a few more poses were gone through and snapped, the little group completely oblivious to the commotion going on outside. At least until some Asian kid burst through the door.

Riley didn’t scream, what the hell would the point of that been? No, she plopped her hands on her hips and glared at the boy as he clapped his hands over his eyes and started stumbling around like he was blind.

The photographer threw a fit, of course, and the kid started babbling about evil doers and adaptoids or some such nonsense. ”What the hell is an IFG, and what the hell are you doing in the middle of my photoshoot? Is this about the guy who was late?”

Screw the photographer. They all knew who was really running the show here.

”Why is he naked!?!?” Sam asked whoever could answer as he traveled behind Shin, who clearly had a faster mode of transportation than he did. His legs shifted left then right as he sped along on his ice slide falling slightly behind both Shin (who shouldn’t even be there) and the Naked Golden Guy… a Midas touch joke came to mind but he decided to save it for later when he had time to gauge Shin’s reaction.

Nodding his head as Shin followed the golden guy into the building Sam cut around on his slide and sped up to the other side of the building. However when he got there he could see in the window and as if on cue before he could touch the window his powers shorted out as ice started to crack from under his feet. ”Shi!” he didn’t get to finish verbalizing his thoughts for he started to fall, fast!

He started rotating in a circle as he started to fall his blind eye fixed on the ground, which was quickly approaching. Trying to get a fix on his ice with little luck he punched his fist’s tighter hoping that it would jumpstart his mutation, luckily it did. What was even more lucky he spotted a fire escape off to the side, not making an attempt to grab it Sam through a few layers of ice around his lower half of his body then formed a slide hoping that it would be enough to cushion his fall.

It was and it turned out it was a smart move on his part he iced the lower half of his body for when he hit the slide it cracked and gave way threatening to throw him right into a nearby dumpster, instead of landing on the edge of the dumpster where he would have most likely done the splits over the edge he only managed t slide out tearing his shirt sleeve in the process.

”So much for going out after…” Sam said as the ice around his legs shattered and then vanished just as the ice slide did. Standing up and looking up at the fire escape Sam wondered why his powers shorted out again, the last time they happened was around Jacen the member of the S.W.A.T. team, but it couldn’t have been him Sam hadn’t heard from him in forever, besides the police would have notified him if other officers were in pursuit.

After a minute or so and a creation and destruction of an ice ladder Sam started running up the fire escape to window where he had been ‘shut down’ not even bothering to activate his powers to try and get into the window Sam leaned back and kicked in the window that was covered on the inside from a large dark curtain.

Pushing the curtain aside Sam walked in stepping on broken glass then walking into the room. He blinked once with his one eye and looked around. There he spotted a eve covering Shin, a girl in silver and four nearly naked golden men in speedos. ”What the hell?” Sam asked as he tried to figure out what he stumbled into. ”Shin, who is who?”

Who was yelling at him? Was it someone in charge? Was it one of the gold men? The nearly-naked lady? Ugh... He didn't need any of the nudity in this room, especially not those gold men. Scarring? He'd have it. After this, he needed to call Kealey and Aurum up for drinks...

"Guy who was late...? What?"[/color] Ugh. Shin took a blind step back, nearly tripping over something. He tried opening his eyes. It didn't help. "Listen, if everyone could just go to the other side of the room... nice and easy. Near that window I think I saw. One of these guys is an impostor, I think. We were chasing him, and..."

"EXCUUUUUSE ME?" Ugh. There was that snooty voice again. "This is a private shoot. I'm asking you to leave."

"I'm asking you to go over towards the window," Shin shot back. "I'm asking everyone nicely. This isn't for you. It's for me. Someone here's an Adaptoid... adaptwhatever... and they shut down mutant powers..." Though, if that were the case, wouldn't the golden man have been less golden by now!? Maybe he was standing far enough away from whoever the adaptoid was that they weren't affecting his power... that meant pooling everyone near the window had the added bonus of revealing the imposter. Yay for logic.

Something shattered. "Wait, what was that?" A window shattering? Was his whole 'pool near the window' plan out the window now? Or was the gold man scared, and fleeing? Who could possibly have--

>>”What the hell?”

Sam!? Ugh. He'd ruined everything. Shin had the situation under control! So ridiculous!

>>”Shin, who is who?”

"Group them all together. We'll find out. Might not be able to think with numbers, but that much is obvious. Geez..." Stinking adaptoids, making him blind, razzafrazza.... his mind fell into mental cursing, losing so much coherency. He blamed the adaptoid for that, too.

Pissed off didn’t even start to cover the way Riley felt as the Asian kid continued to stumble around the shoot. He decided it was a great time to start barking orders too, and shockingly…nobody listened. The kid was still rambling, and Riley was just about to help him out the door when he said something that made her blood turn instantly to ice water in her veins.

It was one of those weird moments, where time kind of stands still and a voice echoes around eerily in the space between your ears. Cancels out mutant powers….cancels out mutant powers….CANCELS OUT MUTANT POWERS. Riley admitted nothing, did nothing, and decided that blending into the wall was suddenly the best idea she’d ever had. Then the window shattered.

Again, Riley didn’t scream. The photographer had that covered, and as the photoshoot fell to hell and Riley watched her paycheck swirling down the proverbial toilet she didn’t even care. This was too many times for coincidence. Too many times. What had the kid called her? An adaptoid? It was ironic how well that worked out with her strange futuristic clothing.

The guy who’d walked in through the broken window was the muscle head type. Obviously this was a Turner and Hooch operation…Riley would have put money on who was Hooch.

Now they were coordinating…they still wanted everyone to gather by the window. Was this an awful attempt at a hostage situation? Riley didn’t care, more than anything she wanted them to leave…leave before anyone else noticed that there was a special kind of freak in the room.

She backed towards the window, heels crunching in glass as she got close, and rolled her eyes, ”Hey, Sightless Wonder….your pal Hooch over here just broke the window. There’s glass all over the floor and you want the barefoot guys to walk in it…any other brilliant ideas?”

She turned an icy glare on Hooch and backed up, just a little further, completely unaware that one of the golden men was starting to get a little nervous. His eyes darted this way and that, looking for a means to escape…he’d never heard of an adapted before, so there was no way he could know what would happen if he got too close to Riley. He looked at the open and broken window…if only the big one would move….

greeing with Shin on some level Sam looked to Riley who was not only insulting himself but his friend as well something Sam wasn’t a big fan of. Though with the way Shin was acting he was tempted to laugh and would have done so in another situation but it was completely different when Sam laughed at Shin as opposed to a total stranger, not to mention a stuck up model that probably missed her lone cracker lunch.

Letting out a quick whistle (after not really understanding the hooch reference all to well) Sam directed the whistle to the golden men but was looking at Riley so it could have been easily mistaken that he was whistling at her, ”Yeah! I got an idea, how about you all chill and hands behind your head.” the chill comment would have been better if he had control over his ability but for the time being he was less of himself. Sam’s shoes crunched on the glass as he locked one eye on the female then each individual golden man.

”We are actually looking for a golden guy who just ran in here not to long ago. He broke the law and seeing as we are working with the NYPD we have permission to place him under arrest.” eye traveling around the set Sam spotted a camera a few people in the background and then the four golden men.

It was a shoot of some kind what ever the product was he didn’t want any part of unless it was for a condom ad that was the only way he could picture there being a reason as to why three almost naked men in gold were huddled around a woman hardly dressed in silver.

Looking at the golden men Sam pointed at them, ”Down on the ground where you are and hands behind your head, NOW!” reaching into his pocket Sam picked up the com-link that was patched into the police radio notifying them that they had fond their target however they would need back up. ”Shin, get it together!” Sam remained by the window till all the golden men would comply if they would.

Several-thousand-dollars-worth of property damage, even more money the city would lose if the photographer and everyone else in the room decided to sue, the money it would cost the mansion to bail them out of jail… all these things… combined with the comment she’d spouted: Priceless.

“It’s you, isn’t it. Gettin’ all defensive…” Shin muttered. He took another few steps in reverse, away from the sound of the voice, and uncovered his eyes. They swung open to a blurred haze. The triangular pupils shifted their focus from the blurred image of the woman, over to the golden men, past the photographer, and to a well-defined Sam. Shin took another step back for good measure.

NYPD… Inwardly, he sighed at Sam’s brashness. Sure. That would work well. And was Sam telling him to get it together? Sam was shouting at people to get on the ground, when the solution to the problem was obvious as the nose on his face.

Shin sighed, putting a hand to his forehead.

“Nobody’s going to listen to that. Just pool them together, and who ever is a mutant will become blindingly clear.” He shook his head. “Get it together, yourself. Use your head.”

This was a bad day. He had a headache. The X-men weren’t police officers, and honestly didn’t have the organization for it. More and more, it was becoming obvious. Out of all the people in this room right now, he was the only one using that thing between his ears.

He was grumpy. Grumpy-Shin was harsh... but at least, he was fair.

Hooch whistled…actually whistled at her and a frosty smile curled up the edges of Riley’s mouth. Let him look. That was the whole point of the outfit, allowing muscle heads who could only think with their hormones to get their jollies off of a girl surrounded by space men. She blinked slowly, deliberately. Let him think what he wanted, if he even could. Pig. The man stopped existing in Riley’s mind except for an irritating ball of hormonal annoyance somewhere to her right.

He decided to try his hand at barking orders while the blind kid was…blind, and again, nobody listened. It wasn’t like they had any jurisdiction here…whoever they were. Mutants, though, definitely mutants. The Asian kid muttered, and Riley just caught the words and her eyes flicked to him, then the photographer. The man holding the camera had stopped his squealing and was now staring at Riley as if all of this was her fault. Suddenly it looked like more than her paycheck for this shoot was going down the drain. Even if this guy was a pompous ass, he was legit. Riley didn’t respond to the kid, and jerked her head back to Hooch as he gave another set of barked orders and blind Turner made it obvious he disagreed.

”I’m sorry, all the testosterone must have clogged your ears.” Riley said, cold mega-watt smile firmly in place again. ”I just said that there’s glass all over the floor. At least your partner pretends to have a brain ” Riley turned to look at the male models, ”Don‘t get on the ground. I don’t see badges on either of these jokes…” the dark haired woman gave them both a meaningful look, even if the kid couldn’t see it. ”They can’t do anything anyway.” she said, the cold smile turning to a warm smirk.

Hooch reached for some sort of walkie he had in his pocket and one of the gold men decided it was the perfect time to make a break, which he did. Unfortunately, he managed to take three steps before he came within four feet of Riley. Without even knowing it, her field neutralized the man’s X-Gene and golden-hued skin suddenly flickered out of existence, leaving almost unnaturally pale skin behind. Riley gaped, she’d never seen her unrecognized ability function on someone with a visible mutation before. The man was on the ground now, curled in on himself and by the look on his face, he was in pain. Riley straightened, looking at the people in the room, each in turn. The other male models moved away from her, quietly but quickly….then there were the interlopers.

”I guess this is what you wanted.” she said, crossing her arms and giving Hooch a haughty look. "If so, take it and get the hell out. I've got work to finish here." Riley said, tossing her hair back and hoping she looked haughty as opposed to the absolute terror and despair that was coursing through her. What was she?

The one eyed mutant blinked then looked to the floor slightly irritated he was looking for the glass and found some but it was mostly where he was standing the curtains that were in front of the window made sure that most of the glass didn’t fall far from the it’s former location. He also noted that Shin wasn’t being Shin, but rather a crabbier version. Sam was about to say something but decided against it as he noticed the model was giving him a look.

He looked to her then looked away with a calm smile, she must have misunderstood his dog whistle (meant for getting everyone’s attention) with his wolf whistle (meant for getting her attention). It didn’t matter though it wasn’t like he was going to stick around after this was over. Especially sticking around with someone who seemed so pleasant. He was in a somewhat good mood today and before the chase with the golden naked dude ensued, his mood was certainly taking a nosedive.

”Correction,” Sam said as he reached into his back pocket and pulled out a leather wallet specifically designed to house a badge. Flipping it open so all could see it he reached to his belt behind his back and pulled out a set of handcuffs, ”Good enough for you?” Sam asked not really worrying if she was okay with this or not. She seemed to have a ego that rivaled his own, different circumstances might have lead him to at least have a conversation with her but as it was now he just wanted to leave.

If he wanted to he could have used the cuffs on her but he decided not to, breaking the window was enough chaos for him, even if she was attempting to obstruct an officer. His attention jumped from the girl to the one of the men in gold running toward him and the window. Quickly tucking his walkie-talkie in his pocket Sam steeped forward ready to stop the golden man then watched in amazement as the gold flickered out leaving a pale and pasty looking corpse of a man shaking on the ground.

”Just like Jacen…” Sam said as he eyed the model with a little more interest, he was surprised that it was she to be the one that had an anti-mutant field about her. It certainly explained why his mutation didn’t work if it did Sam would have been in and out of this place by now.

”Say please!” Sam said as he smirked then nodded his head to her. ”You just became far more interesting, and thank you for you help, miss?” Sam didn’t have a name and wasn’t sure if he would get one, so he mentally decided to just stick with miss. Walking over to the former golden dude on the ground Sam pulled the cuffs out and cuffed the mans hands then started to read the man his rights, as he was taught how to do. ”Let’s see if we can get you some pants down at the station.” Sam said looking over to Shin expectantly.

The gold man met a far-from-golden end. It was about high time. Shin nodded towards the adaptoid, then swung his attention to Sam.

“I told you. All we had to do was use the tools already in play.” By tools, he of course meant the Adaptoid. Strange. He’d never really thought of people like tools before… especially when said tools had as sharp edges as the adaptoid seemed to have. For being blurry, she was one sharp women. Yup.

Shin shirked the thought. Now that the gold man was down, they could go. “I’m sorry for all of this,” He spoke to the room. “Police business, and all that. I guess the city will pay for the window. My apologies we couldn’t finish the arrest sooner. Let’s go, Sam.”

The Asian made his way away from the Adaptoid and her photo shoot, towards the door. As he hit the doorway, he turned back, and frowned at the photographer. “By the way. This is a horrible concept. You should see my friend about fashion tips… later.” Shin popped out the door.

Hooch had a badge, he flashed it around and Riley’s cold smile tightened into an irritated smirk. She didn’t give him the pleasure of a response to his rhetorical smart-ass question. That’s what he was going for. That’s what guys like that were always going for. The second they walked in a room and noticed that all the panties hadn’t dropped to the floor, they started flaunting around their symbols of power and manhood.

There was some commotion as the brain-screwed not-gold-guy writhed on the floor at Riley’s feet. The blind kid who apparently wasn’t blind anymore pointed out the obvious and Riley showed her teeth to Hooch when he asked her to say please, then the audacity to tell her she‘d just become more interesting. She shrugged her shoulders, ”I’d just as soon left him to finish the shoot. He showed promise, I guess I could just to stand in the hall and out of the way. You guys had the situation so wrapped in and in control before you waked in here, after all.”

The muscle head cuffed the guy and Riley watched impassively as she was thanked. Funny how polite the guy could be when he thought he had something useful in front of him. The Asian kid apologized, and Riley had to admit that at least he had the polite police thing down to a science. She shrugged her shoulders, ”You should teach your friend some manners, and I‘ll be happy just as soon as you get out.

The parting comment as they left was completely unnecessary, and for some reason, was more unnerving than anything else that had happened over the last few minutes. The gold guy she could handle, the photoshoot interruption she could handle, she could probably even handle the fact that she was a freak without an X-gene that could cancel out mutant powers. The fact that the outfit she thought was classy and interesting compared to what she’d worn in the past….was….not…shook her. Riley frowned at the three retreating backs and turned to face the male models and the photographer. None of them were looking at her. In fact, they were backing away….all except the photographer, who was glaring at Riley like all this was somehow her fault.

Great.