The day had started off in a relatively ordinary, unexciting manner. People hurrying here and there, clad in suits and dresses with briefcases, backpacks, and purses in hand. Nothing extraordinary had really happened, until outside a small courthouse all hell broke loose. A convicted criminal, who happened to hold a mutant title, was being taken from the building in handcuffs after a verdict had been reached. He had been found guilty for three home invasions, and five counts of assault with a deadly weapon. The crowd outside cheered as he was led down the building's steps, until a voice boomed out from a loud speaker and a mob of people raised large signs high into the air.

"Mutants will be our downfall!" One man boomed, his head and shoulders high above the crowd as he stepped up onto a wooden crate. "This man is one of them! They cause us nothing but pain and suffering!" The crowd cheered as he launched into a tirade against mutation capable people, and the signs bounced about angrily as the criminal was secured within a squad car, and taken swiftly away from the scene... The crowd didn't break up, instead, they followed their megaphone wielding leader as he marched down the street, into more populated parts of the city.

Andrea heard them before she saw them. With her hair pulled back, snakes and all, into a low ponytail, she looked up from the book she had been reading to try and locate the source of the loud, angry voice booming across the street. Someone was growling anti mutant gibberish... political issues, religious issues... She felt the hair on the hair on the back of her neck stand up. Being a bright green beacon of mutant heritage, she knew for a fact she would attract attention. The Greek glanced around her as people stopped what they were doing to pay attention to the booming voice, and growing crowd. The urge to leave became incessant. Standing swiftly, she shrugged her raincoat back on, slipping her hood up just as the group of Anti Mutant supporters came into full view.

"They have infiltrated every nook and cranny of our society! The girl who serves you coffee at your favorite coffee shop could be a Muti! The men and women you work with could as well! Even the children in our schools are subjected to these heathen creatures!"

Her feet had been leading her away... off into an alley where the shadows offered her safety... but the words the man spoke stopped her. Heathen?... He assumed that those like she were monsters? Her nose wrinkled, and she felt anger boil to life in her chest. Andrea had her own views on mutations and the like... but she was person, if a afflicted one. Her friends were mutant, but not monsters. The man babbled on, his little mob of supporters cheering at the end of every hate filled rant, and Andrea could only watch and listen. A man in passing bumped into her shoulder, knocking the hood from her head, and shuffled off with a mumbled apology. The twenty three year old wasn't able to pull her hood up fast enough, and the mod turn its many eyes on her.

"THERE! You see! This woman thinks to blend in with the covering of her face! She seeks to slither her way into our hearts, and take down our morals and our- ...our very FOUNDATION!"

The anger she had felt was quickly replaced by fear, as some of the people in the group turned to face her, and advanced a few steps. The alley was just behind her... she had a clear escape route... but, they wouldn't just attack her, would they? One child at his mothers side, stooped and picked up a little chunk of concrete that had come off of the curb. Her hopes that they were still peaceful, if loud mouthed, people were dashes when the little girl cursed at her and lobbed the concrete her way. One strike to the forehead later, Andrea took flight into the alley like the hounds of hell were at her heels. She didn't know if they would follow, but up ahead she spotted a peculiar sight- and open man hole in the middle of the alley. Hiding was better than running, in some situations, and without much thought she slipped herself into the hole and climbed down into the sewers below. It was dark... and wet... and smelled more than a little putrid. She could heard the echo of the crowd above cheering, as well as the sound of the man with the megaphone as he ranted about her swift departure being a sure sign of cowardice and guilt.

"Such violent people..." Which had left a little bleeding wound, that stung, she noticed. Tucking her book up under her arm, she removed a glove and dabbed at her forehead with her fingers. The red of blood on green skin reminded her of Christmas in a morbid way... She let her feet carry her down a little cement pathway, hopefully toward an exit. While she walked, she couldn't help but keep an eye on the flowing water at her side... she had heard stories of Gators in the sewers... and she didn't much want to find out if they were true.

In this part of the sewers, there were no discarded pets. There were no mutant fish, or giant turtles. There weren't even any rats, and there certainly wasn't any alligators. There was something close though... Something living that had been flushed by society and left to slink about the shadows, growing into an awful monster. Like a predator might, this thing had picked up a tiny scent, in a similar way to how a shark picks up the smell of wounded prey. It smelled like red.

The thing had been resting down in the sewers when Andrea had approached. The term 'resting' is used instead of sleeping, as the mutant was no longer capable of real sleep. For seven years, his devolution into a fungal monstrosity had removed the need to recharge as humans did. Instead of lying prone for a third of a day, he simply attached himself to a nearby surface and remained there, hanging like a dead fly on a vertical glue strip. Only when something interesting happened, or when he felt it was time to move again, did he detach himself. This smell, and this oddly-shaped girl, were more than interesting enough. He lurched outward from the side and into Andrea's path, like a zombie being shoved out of an elevator. He looked over at the woman, and said “Who are you?”

Or at least he would have. While he was resting, the small pocket of air that comprised his 'lungs' and vocal cords had filled with fluid, like it always did. When he spoke, the words were replaced with a sickening, viscous goo that jumped merrily out of his mouth. A person could replicate the effect by biting down on a rotten tomato. These factors considered, his question was less of a “Who are you”, and more of a “Wharrgarblr.”

He did not realize he was naked... Though technically, the rules of nudity didn't apply. If arms, legs and a head made a human, then Maks was human. If a brain, genitalia, organs, and a dermis made a human, then Maks was not. To make it simple, let's simply say that he was not wearing clothes. He was bare, all purple, squirming flesh that seemed to coil and twist like a thousand tiny cyclones of rotten muck. He did realize, though, that his words had not come out quite right, so he tries again.

”Who... are you?”

Something stepped out in front of her suddenly as she was walking along. Something that looked oddly human shaped, but was purple, wiggly, and gurgling at her while a gross looking slime substance oozed from its mouth. She shrieked and hopped back a few steps, before slapping a gloved hand over her mouth. Her scream bounced off the solid walls around them, and she stared at the creature for a few tense moments. She was unsure of what to do in such a situation... this wasn't an alligator... nor a... person? It was a squirming mass of... something.

...and it had just asked her a question. Instantly, she felt herself relax- just a little. It was a mutant, not a monster.... or at least she hoped it was. There were too many old horror movies locked away in her memory for her to feel even remotely safe until it was made painfully obvious that it was not the creature from the black lagoon, nor the blob. Sloth hissed at the... he?... while her other snakes squirmed around behind her, trying to wiggle out of the ribbon that held them in place on her back.

"...Who am I?" She repeated, dropping her hand away from her lips. "... I am Andrea. Who... are you?" More precisely, what was it? Through the darkness of her sunglasses, she could see a patch of what looked like a face that stood out against the wriggling purple stuff... but that was as much as she could really make out. A very... unique... mutation... if she had ever seen one...

She felt inclined to ask why it was lurking around down in the sewers... but part of her already knew the answer. Probably for the same reason she hid her face and took to the alleys to get around up on the surface. Considering its... sudden appearance and... startling if informal introduction, she couldn't imagine spotting anything like it waltzing around the city sidewalks. She heard the voice up on the street crackle back to like over the loud speaker, and another though struck her. Maybe it had been driven into the shadows like she had?

"...did... you come to hide down here as well?"

Looking at the woman's sunglasses reminded Trenchfoot of the rules of 'propriety'. He looks up at the ceiling of the low tunnel, toward a small patch of adheisive goo which was currently coiling itself around an old backpack. Following some silent command, the fungal strands release, sending the bag to drop into the mutant's hand. He responds to the girl as he draws a thick canvas coat out of the back, proceeding to wrap himself in it. From his motions, it appeared as though he didn't know how to put it on, but he manages, sliding his noisome limbs and torso into it. Within moments, most of his exterior was, thankfully, hidden from view.

"I am... Trenchfoot. Your hair is... alive."

The thing nods as he makes that last statement. He sounded approving of her appearance.

"Hrmm... A colubris? And... viperidae? It has been... years since I have studied. They... are beautiful."

It took the creature a long moment to recognize what she was referring to when she asked if she was hiding. The sounds of the riot above were coming closer to the manhole... Which Andrea had left open! Audible, even down in the sewers, was a single voice on a megaphone.

"She went down in there! The monsters know they're not wanted! They hide from our eyes so they can strike at our heels when we least expect it!"

Still half-dressed, Maks looks over Andrea's shoulder, covered as it was in still-startled snakes, he looks down to the dim light streaming through the open manhole in the distance. He answers her last question as he does so, still looking meaningfully at the ladder leading up.

"Down here... to hide. Yessss. But... About to be uncovered... Perhaps."

Trench...foot?... That was an odd name. Very odd, actually. "...Yes... my hair is... alive, I suppose." Though, her actual hair had appeared to hold life, even before the snakes. While newly named 'Trench' commented on her hair... with words she had never heard before, she patted the while serpent around her neck. Sloth seemed uneasy, and was kind of starting to crush her shoulders because of it. "It is nice to meet you, Trench foot." ...That name sounded odd on her tongue, and didn't bring pretty images to mind. She would certainly have to question him (she was going to assume it was male, based on the voice and what she could see if his facial features in the dark) later on if that was his actual name, or just some kind of code name.

The voice came from above again, once again pointed at her. Her nose wrinkled, and she tilted her chin up to glare in the general direction of the man and his angry mob. "...We are not monsters, silly man..." Her mumble was barely audible against the sound sewer water rushing along, and the ranting from above... but it helped to make her feel just a little bit better.

What Trench said next though, made her drop her gaze back to him. "...About to be uncovered?... what does tha-" The sound of feet scuffling by the open manhole reached her ears, and she turned to stare with Trenchfoot. She could hear murmuring voices, and shadows were dancing through the light the manhole let in. She shifted on her feet nervously.

"...Perhaps, this isn't the best place to hold a conversation...?" Someone up above mentioned something about chasing the monster back where she had come from, and she spotted a pair of feet as someone slowly lowered himself into the sewer. That... was not good. She had figured that the appeal of the sewer would keep them away.... Apparently she had been wrong. Andrea stepped back, toward the now semi dressed Trench, and held Sloth to her as he reacted to her uneasiness and hissed at the small group of humans climbing down into the sewer. "There she is!...wait... who's that guy with her?" One man squinted, while his two companions descended the ladder. "...Looks like another freak of nature, guess we get to chase two of them off today!"

Finally fitting one twisting arm into the last sleeve, Maks echoes the words of the invader. "They will... 'Chase us off?' Hrmmm..." Around his right hand, the fungal mess that composed Maks' body begins to collect. His hand takes on swirls of yellow, the colors shifting lazily like a swarm of bees in slow motion. Casually, he hurls the wad down the sewers, the ball striking the ladder upward solidly. In the dim light of the distance, the living muck coagulates around the bars, seeping down and... dripping upwards. In moments, the living carpet would cover the whole ladder!

The three men had interpreted the throw as a miss and, taking heart in that, hasten their approach. The one with a North Carolinian accent took the lead. "Whooee boys, lookawhat we got here!" A steel glint appears in his hand, a jagged deer-gutting knife. "Come on freako, gonna carve you good!"

Maks looked to Andrea once more. Under his clothing, his whole body had taken on that yellowish color; the same pigment of the stuff that had held up his backpack. "Ready to get... teeth wet?" he asks, just as the east-coast hick thrusts the skinning knife into the creature's gut. The human grins wickedly as Maks turns around, but that grin turns into a grimace as, with a jerk, he realizes his knife would not come loose! The man looks down, seeing a horrifying yellow substance snaking its way across the knife blade, and up onto his hand! The edges of the living mess seemed to form tiny feelers, like a hundred miniature slugs questing for holes and gaps, and the man screams.

Three men.. against two mutants. Andrea shifted nervously again, staking a few more steps closer to Trench. She hadn't noticed his creating the ball of...whatever it was, but she sure did notice when he threw it- and the effect it had on the ladder. He had closed off the exit! ...that meant the men couldn't be scared back up the ladder. '...oh jeez...' Sloth shifted around her shoulders until he was able to clearly spot the advancing men.

She stepped out of the way, expecting her trench coat clad sewer companion to do the same when a knife was produced... but he didn't. She sucked in a breath so fast it sounded like a soft scream. He had been stabbed! The other two men, who were more than confident in their companions shanking skill, rounded on her. One took hold of her arm, while the other turned to see what the knife wielding man was screaming about and Sloth jumped into action.

The white snake uncoiled like a bolt of lightning, latching onto the throat of the man holding her. he uttered a little gurgle as his airway was shut off, while Andrea shook her arm loose from the mans grasp and darted forward. The rushing sewer water lay right behind him- so it only took a little push to shove him off balance and into the water. Sloth didn't want to release his newly acquired prey, but the jerking of Andreas shove tore his many teeth from the man's throat- which took some of the flesh with them. The man was quickly swept away with the water, flailing and grunting all the way.

The other had turned to help his screaming partner wrench the knife from Trenches gut. Both men were panicked, and the sight of the yellow, crawling thing quickly overtaking the man's arm was not helping matters. Andrea could only stand, and watch... too frightened to budge from her current stop.
The men screamed again, and the voices up top suddenly quieted. "...Someone help! The mutant is eating Fred!" She squeezed her eyes shut, her hands slapping over her ears. If he kept screaming more people would come!... If this didn't stop soon... they would get in trouble.. so much trouble.. Fear swelled in her chest, and everything seemed to be moving too quickly. Her fingers brushed her glasses... and she realized how she could shut the men up... if they didn't stop screaming soon...

Maks watched approvingly as the snake-haired woman struck out at one of the humans. She let the water do most of the work after the albino serpent made its attack; it was efficient, far more than simply bludgeoning someone until they stopped struggling. Slowly, the creature brought his arm around the man who had stabbed him, grabbing him in a powerful hug and bringing him close. His own body reached out, enveloping the screaming man further until he was hopelessly stuck to Maks! His face becomes buried somewhere in Maks' armpit, his hand still trying to pull the knife free.

"Can leave... if you like." he offers calmly, amid the chaos. The remaining free human thought the mutant was giving him a chance, and begins to take it before Trenchfoot's squirming hand reached out to grasp him by the throat. He had been giving the offer to Andrea!

With this man's terrified shrieks adding to the cacaphony, Trenchfoot finally realizes what Andrea already had. Unlike many creatures, the screams and squeals of a victim warned them away from the scene... But humans had a tendency to investigate! It was something that evolution had failed to breed out of them; something that Maks often took advantage of. If the humans wanted to swarm into his home, and see that only a creeping death awaited them, Maks wouldn't deny them that opportunity.

With two men struggling against his crawling grip, Maks speaks to Andrea once more. "Will need to... kill more until they... stop. Will run... for police. You should-" He had to pause then, as the third man had drawn a small pistol from a holster at his hip. The cracking, deafening sound fills the tiny space in the sewers as he fires two panicked shots into Maks. The fungal monster's grip only tightened around his neck, spreading to encircle the throat completely

"-leave. Others won't make... mistake of getting so-" another pause. The man's arm had risen shakily, and a shot blasts away into Maks' face! The human-like skin around his righty eye splits away, and his head jolts backward slightly. Freakishly, he finished his sentence calmly, his words muffled from the damage.

"-close."

With a sickening crunch, the gunman's airway is finally crushed. His body slumps, twitching spasmodically, and his life leaves him just as his knife-wielding companion suffocates. Maksimilian discards their corpses into the water, the knife handle still covered in squirming muck.

"Can leave... if you like."

Shaking her head, she glanced toward the way she had come in. Whatever the yellow stuff was, it had taken over the ladder- almost completely. Though he seemed to be offering her the chance to run, she wasn't willing to trust whatever it was he had thrown. Though she didn't think she could run, she couldn't take the screaming anymore. Her fingers curled around her glasses, but he spoke up again before she could come to a decision on whether or not to take them off..

"Will need to... kill more until they... stop. Will run... for police. You should-"

Kill?! She shook her head again, a small movement that she didn't know if he had seen. There wasn't a need to kill...instead, there was a very strong need to run. Things went from bad to worse though, before she could voice her opinion on the matter, when the second man Trench was holding pulled a gun. Shots were fired, and Andrea turned and hid her face. She didn't want to see blood... she didn't want to see death...

"-leave. Others won't make... mistake of getting so-"

Another shot rang out, bouncing off the walls that surrounded them. She whimpered, and refused to turn around. There was a moment of silence in which she could hear struggling and gasping.Then... she hear the other mutants voice. He sounded exactly the same... not injured at all.

The megaphone up top had quieted, but she could hear the scuffling of feet close to the open manhole. People had heard the screaming, and the gunshots- a small crowd of rioters had gathered around up in the alley.
Some kind of crackling and popping floated over the other distracting sounds in the sewer to her ears... She flinched visibly at the sounds- and then again when to large splashes signaled her to the mens departure...

"...I cannot go up this way... and.. we should not stay here..."

She hoped desperately that he had not killed the men... but that was as much as she was going to allow herself to think on the subject. She just needed to remind herself that they... they had attacked first... She was shaken, both from the unneeded hate from her fellow humans, and from the appearance of the new mutant. He didn't seem to worried, but she was. She didn't want to stay and find out if the people above were brave enough to venture down, nor did she want to stick around and see if the police would actually show up- but she didn't want to leave him on his own either. "... It is my fault they came down here.. I won't leave you to face them by yourself," ...which would only end in more violence...

"Will you come with me to find another exit?... I will watch our backs.. I-... I can stop them if they try to follow us..."

Maks craned his head oddly, a loose flap of skin hanging from his face. The pieces of himself he had thrown onto the ladder would slow down any approach, and reflexively, he had begun filling the area he was standing with a new substance. He motioned for her to back up down the tunnel as it grew, swarming over the stony, wet surface quickly. Whatever it was, it had the color and consistency of human bile, and was shortly covering the floor between the wall and the water. He steps off of it, toward Andrea, and points to the darkness ahead as he retrieves his backpack.

"They... see corpses. Will leave. Only the... brave ones will come. Guns. Knives. Calling police. Can kill, or let live, only to have to... kill later."

He begins to move down the tunnel. There was either a lack of urgency in his step, or a lack of the ability to move quickly. From the way his monstrous body was made, it was likely the latter. What he says next was a little jumbled; half an attempt to calm her, half to steel her to what they would need to do next.

"You know hate. They will always hate. You brought them down... And now they die. Hate is... circular."