Van rocked on his heels for a moment, pondering what to say after he was thanked for his compliment on the tail. Luckily his thoughts were interrupted by the girls walking back to their little group. Etta had returned from her tete`-a-tete with Blondie,er, her best friend in the whole world Twyla and she hadn’t dumped him on the spot or thrown something at him or anything like that. This was a good sign. A surreptitious glance was thrown about in the room in order to make sure that there were no french fries present. He found none in any of the obvious places but he kept his guard up, just in case. He wouldn’t put it past ‘security’ to have a few deep fried spuds at the ready, just in case Van’s track record with his brunette date proved to be a trend.

And in all likelihood it was--Van Sanders-Adamson was particularly good at being an a$$hole.

Introductions were given again as the blond spoke with her boyfriend on the fringes of their conversation--Van could about guess what or more probable who they were talking about. Oh well. Pish-posh. Cue inner eye roll before he got back into his current conversation. Ruby was apparently into science...Van was not...he was bad at science...and math, and physical education--physical education being his worst when it came to grades (he always made a point to skip gym, no matter what other classes he was pretending to attend). “I think robots are more useful when it comes to world domination purposes.” He said the first thing that came to his mind, trying to sound like he was cool and engaged in the conversation (he was, his mind was just in a million places at once due to the energy drinks).

Blondie and Security Man traipsed away to dance and in his head Van wondered if that’s what his girlfriend wanted to do as well--it made sense seeing she’d told him that they were going to the dance. He blinked for a few moments, studying the slow movements of the people around them. That didn’t look like fun--maybe if he didn’t mention it she’d forget the whole thing? Public displays of crazy were much different than public humiliation--his fate if he tried to...slow dance. Van whistled, to hide his thoughts from both Etta and Ruby because girls always seemed to have some mild form of telepathy and he needed to keep his dangerous thoughts on the down low.

Kealey’s cheeks got even hotter as Sam pointed out the obvious and Kealey nodded her head. ”Every last bit.” he wasn’t judging her for the feelings, but there was something…impish in his emotions. Then he winked at Shin…who was feeling all sorts of interesting things. He was curious, he was happy still, he was…something else Kealey couldn’t exactly place but was warm and fuzzy.

Kealey smiled at him and went back to feeling mildly awkward at all the things rolling around inside her chead.

At least she wasn’t the only one with sudden climate problems. Kealey smiled gratefully at Fade when she echoed the sentiment about the recent temperature rise in the room. Sam chose that moment to go wish a student a happy birthday and as he walked away, Kealey felt things in Fade that made her wonder if the heat increase had really been an idea of her own. The blond turned to look at Sam as he walked off, then the red-head in front of her….interesting.

Fade turned Kealey’s question back around on her and the blond thought for a moment, wondering if this was the best time to explain.

”The costumes are just something I do for fun…and hopefully my eventual career.”

Here it came.

” Besides that….I feel emotions.” she said, eyes scanning the crowd, picking out each different pocket of emotion. ”All of them. All the time. Kind of like that gas station…with all the frozen sodas…only with emotions.”

Kealey inched closer to Shin…she wasn’t quite overwhelmed, but there was a lot going on in her head.

Henrietta smiled a ‘thanks’ to her best friend and watched as both Twyla and Gawain went off to dance. The brunette turned to Van and raised an eyebrow. She wondered what he did to tick Mirror off. He was pretty nice and accepting, but not so much of her boyfriend. Henri stared at her boyfriend for a moment, thinking of all the reasons they could not be getting along. A small sigh escaped her lips as she noticed his humming. After a moment though, she smiled. “Hey. Van--?” She looked at him, waiting for a sign that he was listening.

When she thought he was, she gave him a sympathetic smile. “I’m sorry. I’m sure this is really weird and awkward for you.” She glanced at her dancing friends for a moment. Turning back to Van, she sighed. “They’re nice people, I promise. They’re just a little protective and worried about me. Gawain is a good guy. He drinks, so you have that in common.” She elbowed him lightly with a smirk on her face. “I guess I would just appreciate if you tried to like them. I know they started the mean, but Twyla and I talked. She’s going to talk to Gawain for me. I could practically feel the tension when I came back out here.” Another eyebrow raise. “What happened anyway?”

Listening to the slow song that was playing, she grabbed Van’s arm. “Hey, you should tell me what happened while we dance.” Henri grinned at her boyfriend, slightly tugging on him. “It’ll be fun. I’ll even let you lead.” She laughed and swayed her hips back and forth. “And if slow dancing isn’t your thing, I’ll even let you do that mosh-pit thing a little.” Her bottom lip jutted out playfully as she batted her eyelashes. “Please? For me?” The girl glanced at Ruby, remembering that they had been talking. “Hey, Ruby. Would you mind if I dance with Van for a few minutes? We’ll be back pretty quick.”

Out of the corner of her eye, she caught Shin tilting his head a little, like a curious kitten, but she shrugged it off. She did not know why he did it so why make a big deal about it? Turning her attention back to Kealey, it seemed like everyone knew something that she did not. Kealey spoke about how she enjoyed costume designing, but it was not her power. Then it all made sense. It hit Fade like a giant sack of ceramic tiles, the blunt force at first came as a shock, but then the fragile material broke and pierced her thoughts with brilliant speed.

Without her knowledge, her eyes widened a little, followed by a smile that seemed to slither from behind her teeth. Wow, an empath. Though a telepath would be a bit scarier, she knew her emotions were running a little wild at the moment and she could not imagine just how many emotions were in the room. The comfort of her emotions being a needle in a haystack while at the dance, the smile widened and her eyes returned to their normal porportion. "Wow! Tonight must be a real work out for you!" she laughed it off.

Hopefully, she did not come across rude with her initial reaction, it was sort of surprising though, simply because Fade was trying so hard to cover any emotion on her face at the time being. Well, she was out in the open, so there was no need to hide it now, right? Casting a quick yet playful glance at Sam, she turned her attention back to the two in front of her. "So what's that like?" she asked, genuinely curious. She had nothing to hide, it would be discovered anyways through the blushing, but she hoped it was not too terribly obvious.

The blushing? Yeah. It made things obvious. Not there was anything wrong with blushing, or emotions connected to blushing... or even the tiny touch of a smirk on his face as Kealey inched closer, and Fade cast out a look for Sam. His hand snuck out, searching for Kealey's as Fade asked how that was like.

"So, you and Sam?" He changed the subject. "How's that like? When did this happen?"

Shin could be really good at being nosy if he tried.

The shock and surprise in Fade’s face and emotions were something that Kealey was used to and took with a grain of salt. It was a little shocking to most people to find out that someone who was probably a perfect stranger knew all your emotional baggage. Most people were curious, some people were fascinated, a few people were angry…Kealey was used to it all. Fade’s simply surprise and curiosity made the blond smile, especially when the redhead pointed out what a workout tonight probably was.

The blond shrugged with a return laugh, ”It’s actually not too bad. Like I said…teenagers feel things really strongly, but mostly they’re simple emotions. The beginning of the night was kind of difficult with all the anticipation, but now…” she trailed off. Explaining all this would not only be boring, it would be embarrassing.

The small group was silent for a few moments, and when Shin reached for her hand she entwined her fingers with his and smiled. ”Everyone’s pretty happy now.” she finished instead.

Fade asked another question, and Kealey was about to try and put it in words again, when Shin stepped in and turned the question back on the asker. Kealey was relieved she was off the hook as far as talking about her powers was concerned and she gave Shin’s hand a grateful little squeeze.

The question hadn’t even occurred to Kealey. Given the emotions she’d felt from Fade a few moments before, there had been no need to ask. She was impressed by Shin’s perception, though, and waited patiently for an answer to the question.

Kealey spoke about the teenage hormonal emotions, which seemed completely understandable. It would make more sense that most people had the same emotions out on the dancefloor, that would be a bit easier to handle if everyone was happy. Now being stuck in an angry mob or sitting in church and feeling all of those silent emotions, that may be a bit different. She smiled and laughed a little "that makes sense, when I was a teenager, I was always more concerned about what was directly in front of me instead of whatever else was going on," she said, remembering KP and how she fought with Calley and literally had to be dragged away to do her part for the mission. Bad memory.

Shock. Complete shock overwhelmed her as Shin redirected all of the questions to her before Kealey had a chance to answer them. It was almost as if he rescued her, which caused Fade to wonder if she had insulted Kealey some how. While it was not her intention, the current question had her frozen. The slight emotional pulls began to tug a bit at her mutation, though she could not feel it. How did Shin know? Did anyone else know? She knew Kealey had to but she did not want everyone to know. Her past confidence quickly slipped away.

What happened next was minor but a bit obvious. Her body slowly began to turn invisible, it was happening extremely slow, but at the moment, she was slightly transparent. Though you could not see that much through her, any time a light flashed across the dancefloor, it shined straight through her. "I would tell you about it if there was really a word or even a way to describe it," she said, slowing down her invisibility by breathing, though she was unaware that she was turning invisible. "I think he's cute and strong and pretty much macho manish, for lack of a better word," she sort of laughed at that last remark, "but I mean, I'm not quite sure if it's just flirting or what at this point, I dunno if Sam even knows what it is. But I'm fine with how it is now," she said, this time not turning to find Sam, it would make it even more obvious...as if a transparent redhead at the punch bowl was not obvious enough.

Kealey took his hand. Shin felt a small grin form on his face. If there was one there beforehand, it only got bigger.

Score!

Everyone was pretty happy, himself included.

Fade seemed a bit SHOCKED, though.

Well, hey. If her blushing hadn't made it obvious she was embarrassed before, her reaction to his question about her and Sam had made the mask on her emotions transparent.

He could see right through her act. She liked Sam. By her description, she liked him a lot. Shin squeezed Kealey's hand, and smirked.

"There's one way we could find out if he feels the same way," Shin said knowingly. He paused, and looked to Kealey with a slight tilt of his head. "Though, that just might be cheating. Maybe you should ask him yourself?"

Nudge nudge. Matchmaker Shin was a Matchmaker. He knew the best way to get people together was to help them gain the confidence to pursue their love interest themselves. Give a man a fish? He eats for a day. Teach a man to fish... he can find plenty of fish in the sea. That was matchmaker Shin's hook. That was his line.

Kealey nodded to Fade's summation of teenage emotions. They were very focused on there here and the now. The simplicity made things easier, the intensity made it harder. Kealey was still warm, but it had faded a bit since Sam took his walk across the room to wish a student happy birthday. The blond figured there was nothing like a teacher walking through the crowd to cool any overzealous intentions.

While Kealey was grateful for Shin’s intervention in the line of questioning about her powers, at the same time she shared a bit of Fade’s horror at the direction that things had gone.

Shin was intent on listening to what the other woman said, and the gears in his head were turning. There was something…sly in his emotions. No, sly wasn’t a good word for it. He felt crafty though, and he was suggesting to Fade that there was a way to find out if Sam felt the same way?

Kealey looked back at Shin, her head tilt mirror in him as the math added up to what exactly he was thinking she should do. Kealey shook her head right as he explained that it might be cheating if they did it that way.

”I only suspected with you because everything happened sequentially. I’d had to make a guess on something like this and be wrong.” she said, raising an eyebrow at Shin.

”Besides, don’t you think it’s better to let people figure these things out on their own? People have to be ready for those kinds of revelations.”

Kealey turned to look again for Sam and found him still speaking with the students, ”Besides…Sam is kind of hard for me to read, and stubborn as a mule if you try to confront him about feelings.” This probably wasn’t helping, Kealey realized, and she grinned at the redhead.

”I’d let him know though…” she said, ”He might not even realize you feel that way. Sometimes people can be thickheaded about these things.”

Shin suggested using Kealey to help her figure it out, but also mentioned that it would be cheating. Yeah, that sounded a bit like cheating. Though it was a tempting idea, she'd had to pry into his emotions like that, even if it wasn't her doing the prying. She would have hated it if Sam had sent out a scout to find out her intentions...or is that what he did? She knew Sam and Shin talked quite a bit, maybe that was the reason for the sudden change in direction of the conversation. Trying to keep her composure, she shook her head. "No no no, I wouldn't ask that of you, first off, plus sometimes it's a lot more fun to be confused on your own," she sort of smirked.

They say the chase is more fun than the catch, though she could still have her fun with the catch, right now, it was time to enjoy the chase. "I probably won't let him know any more than he already guessed at, which I'd say is enough for the moment. And yes, he's quite the stubborn one, but I'd be a little weirded out if he was completely set on what he wanted, no one ever is," she shrugged. Her body was beginning to turn back to normal, it was still ever so slightly transparents, but she was looking the initial shock and embarassment.

She took the opportunity to scan the crowd again and find him right where she last saw him. At least she was handling the conversation a bit better, she wasn't as blushy anymore, weren't the guys supposed to confess first though? They usually ran if a girl confessed first, so her lips were sealed and hopefully she could shut her body language up, it was talking way too loud. She pulled the punch up to her lips and took a seat before noticing the slight tint on her hand from her minor transparancy. Slightly embarassed, she focused on making herself fully visible and solid, covering it with a little guilty smile, "oops..."

"Mhm, you're both right," Shin nodded, still smiling. "It'd hardly be fair for Sam if we pried. Nudged and hinted? Maybe more fair. But..." He looked seriously to Fade. "If you don't want me nudging him, I won't. I'll leave the nudging to you."

These were the sorts of things the people directly involved had to handle themselves. Shin knew firsthand that in situations like this, it was better not to involve third parties. He hadn't confessed to Kealey with any help, nor had Kasumi confessed to him.

Sam's stubbornness would make it hard, though. Shin suddenly remembered something from before. Sam had hit on Kealey. That hadn't been love. At least, he didn't think it was... at least, not the right kind.

He glanced to Kealey, giving her hand a light squeeze as he smiled. "These things have to happen naturally. It's up to you, Fade." His focus returned to the girl who'd just realized she was going partially-invisible. "Keep up a bold face."

((OOC- Will edit to add response to Katrina))

The addition of a new voice to their conversation drew Locke's gaze down to his lap faster then a paperclip to an earth magnet. It wasn't as if he felt the same level of social intimidation from an adult as he did his peers. With the exceptions of Kendra and therapists that he had to go to for awhile, Locke had no issue speaking with adults. Maybe it was because he'd gotten a good grasp of that responsibilities of an adult thing, or it might be because there was less pressure from them to act a certain way. Most of what drove the Californian to act shy at the moment was that Katrina was the one who was being addressed and not him. Locke hated when he got caught on the orbit of a conversation planet like some useless satellite.

He looked up though when he was spoken to, fixing his hair back more over his eye. Nobody was going to make him feel comfortable with his dead eye, not even if they had an eye patch. “Uh… Locke,” It didn’t surprise him that the guy didn’t know who he was. Locke kept to his room, and after the Cthulu thing, when he trained he went outside, weather permitting.

"Take a bow?" he echoed his roommate, extremely confused and slightly dazed from the fall and crash. He stumbled to his feet, trying to apologize again to Amber, but she met him with an apology of her own and then darted off after the retreating Liz.

And now he was standing, no one within earshot to apologize to, but many onlookers interested in learning what had happened. He shrugged, trying to pretend that the warmth in his cheeks was from the heat of the room packed with moving bodies. Then he joined Carrick in bowing. Some in the crowd laughed, some snorted, a couple broke into half-hearted applause.

Kai smiled, glad that his roomie could get him out of a jam and wasn't going to kill him. He grab Carrick's hands and pretended to dance clumsily with him as well, making sure that the crowd knew they meant to create a spectacle. Then he dropped one hand and took another bow, this time to slightly more applause. Then people turned back to their own dancing and conversations.

"Great idea!" he complimented Carrick in a hushed tone.

It seemed that the ploy didn’t seem to be universal with the female kind, Elizabeth gave him the dirtiest look he had ever gotten from him then stormed off followed by Kai’s friend who added to the dirty look. His chest hurt for a moment till he was brought back to the present when Kai grabbed him by the hand and pretended to dance with him.

Carrick turned then entered another bow with Kai as his green thumbed roommate complimented him on his idea. ”Not as great as it could have been…” Carrick said as he watched Liz walk away. His initial reaction was to fly off in the opposite direction and look for some fun but for some reason his eyes lingered on her. ”I botched it bad didn’t I?” Carrick asked himself more than Kai, ”I gotta go explain, or I’m gonna get my butt kicked!” Carrick said trailing after the two girls not sure if Kai was going to follow him or not.

Sure he was worried about Elizabeth having a good time because of Haylee threatening him, but he was also you know worried about Elizabeth for Elizabeth’s sake. When he pushed his way around enough people he called out for her, ”Elizabeth!” he jumped and opened up his wings and flapped once lifting him into the air after knocking a few people aside. ”Sorry!” he called out then flapped again till he was near Elizabeth. He called out once more and dropped down next to her making sure he didn’t knock anyone over with his extra appendages or land on any one.

”Please let me explain!” Carrick pleaded as he lifted his hands up in the air trying to stall Liz long enough so he could explain.

Elizabeth was not good at hiding her emotions. She never had been. Therefore it was plainly evident that she was as mad as a plucked porcupine, as humiliated as a naked mole rat in a clothing store, and as crestfallen as a panda in a zoo. Over all, she felt like the turkey on Thanksgiving. Used for other people’s benefit, after she had been treated pretty nice and everything.

People quickly resumed dancing as Liz got further and further away from the scene. Students started to lightly part as the blonde walked by, not desiring to be trampled. In the back of her mind, she was aware that Amber had followed her, but Liz didn’t want to think about anything right then. Her only focus was to get to the wall and away from anybody who might’ve witnessed the embarrassing debacle. In the midst of her straight path through the crowd, a couple danced, not moving away like other students had. But then the guy caught a look at her face and with a flash of light, he and his date appeared several yards to her left. All the better for all three of them.

Water began building up in her eyes, even as she could hear her name being called out over the music. She ignored it, not wanting to deal with the winged-jerk. As she stepped around a guy with glowing hair and a girl with long pointed ears, her world was starting to turn read and the image of Carrick’s face seemed superimposed on everything. Reruns of what had just happened started playing through her mind in slow motion. A drop of salty water fell down her cheek and splashed on the gym’s floor.

An apology made its way to her ears. Again she ignored it. A blue-skinned kid somehow incorporated a back flip that enabled him to get out of Elizabeth’s way into his dance. A girl turned into a butterfly and flitted out of reach just a few more feet away. And then with a rush of air, she felt and heard an impact on the floor beside her. Even before the idiot opened his mouth, the empath knew who it was. “Just leave me alone!” she snapped, her tearing eyes pleading. She whirled away and walked through a student who turned immaterial just in time.

She finally made her way to the wall, away from the majority of people, and hopefully Carrick as well. She couldn’t believe all of it was happening! Hot tears flooded her face, causing her red face to glisten like a washed tomato. Why her? Why him? Why’d he do it? Nothing was making sense. From the corners of her eyes, she could see a couple people glance her way occasionally, but they didn’t let their gaze linger for long. Besides, they didn’t know what was going on; Elizabeth’s only measure of relief at the moment.