Skydancer couldn't decide if she liked the Mansion or not. She definately knew that she liked the warm food and the dry shelter it provided but she couldn't quite shake the feeling that by staying there she was making some kind of choice of sides to take in a war she didn't fully understand. She didn't want to take any sides because she didn't want to be a part of this stupid war, whatever the details of that war might be. It involved mutants, that much was obvious and, from what she could gather from the argument Aura and the masked hero had when she met the two of them only a couple of nights ago, it seemed to involve what they thought about humans. The thing was, though, that Skydancer didn't think much of anything about humans. They were what the were, some of them good, some of them bad and most of them afraid of her. All she wanted was to be left alone to live her life in peace.

Skydancer walked down a long hallway into the foyer before opening the door and stepping outside to think. She was starting to feel a little clausterphic in there and not just because she had been living outside for months. There were people, mutant people she guessed, around everywhere and it was almost more than she could bear just then. Most of them appeared to be living their lives, just as happy as could be with their human masks and amazing powers. If only she could be one of them, blending in with the humans around there but with a secret little gift that no one needed to know about except those she told. Now that would have been her perfect life, the life her sister and her aunt were surely able to live. But no, she was more than just a mutant, she was one of the freaks.

Skydancer took a deep breath as the door shut behind her. The air was still cool, even as spring approached, though it was sunny and beautiful out. It was a shame, really, that she was in no mood to properly enjoy the sunshine. There were tall trees around, the type she had always liked and the type with good sturdy branches for swinging on. They were no proper uneven bars, but in some ways they were all the more fun for that fact.

For once since her transformation not caring if anyone happened to be around, Skydancer winced as a tube shot out of both of her wrists and wrapped around two of the branches on the trees. There were no leaves to get in the way, given the season. After raising herself about 10 feet off the ground and hanging from the long tubes, Skydancer began swinging to gain momentum. Once gained, she swung to the top of the branch and let go with her tubes, letting the momentum of the spin shoot her several feet into the air above the branches, before catching the branch again on the way down with the tubes. It was moments like these that really struck home just how bitter sweet her mutation really was.

Koga kneeled against a tree, his feet holding him up as his knees bent to allow his back to press against the tree comfortably where no branches under him, a small stereo hanging from a branch above him. His Violin crooked on his shoulder. He let the heat packs that rested on his hips seep their heat into him. he was feeling good tonight just soaking in the afternoon. He was waiting until he was ready to start playing he often came out side to try his music as those that were studying could hardly complain of noise if they were outside. His eyes sprung open as something of a whip sound lashed its self around a branch below and to the left of him. His eyes followed the mutant on the other end of the purple wire swing back and forth until she flung herself to a branch parallel with him. if not for his clothes she might have thought the tree sprung a face, his skin and hair blended in with the wood behind it flawlessly brown on darker brown.

She leaned with grace that was practiced, he could appreciate natural grace and then the refined grace of someone who had practiced movement and perfected it. His hair turned the purple of her wires, and his skin took on clear silicon like aspect, much like hers might look without the wires underneath.

“Hello.” He spoke quietly calmly not to startle the young woman from her new perch. “Might I play something for you?” A smirk said that he wasn’t going to wait for an answer. His bow swatted a button on the small stereo which started to play some accompaniment he plopped his chin down on his violin. And he began to Play.

HE rose from his Spiderman like crouch on the tree and stepped over to her branch. “I am Ryuichi Koga, A pleasure to make your acquaintance.” He subtly let his hair change to blue and his skin take on a white. He realized that he ought not to have mimicked her lest she think he was mocking her, He offered his hand in greeting. His solid black eyes studied her features carefully, one might not notice her high cheek bones or delicate nose shape, if one didn’t look closely, she was quite pretty, if one looked closely enough, though he had to admit that she was beautiful in a mutant way, the same way, he had hoped to be good looking, she didn’t however have the luxury of changing skin tones on a whim. Still, she was pretty.

Once atop the tree, Skydancer allowed a pair of shorter tubes come out of her upper legs and wrap themselves securely around the branch she now found herself perched upon. With her power, there was little risk of her actually falling unless the branch itself should, for some reason, break off of the tree which was fortunate because falling from such a height was more dangerous for her than it was for most. So she had learned, early on, how to ensure that she didn't. Even in a violent wind storm she was fairly certain she couldn't be dislodged once her tubes had gotten a firm grip.

“Hello.”

Despite the soft tone of voice, Skydancer jumped at the word and might very well have fallen had her tubes not so securely anchored her to the tree. "Oh my god, you scared me!" Even being right in front of her, it was easy to see how he could have missed him. He blended in with the tree and then suddenly his hair was purple, her colour of purple and she didn't know what to make of that but when he offered to play something she nodded and listened. It was, she thought, very beautiful.

“I am Ryuichi Koga, A pleasure to make your acquaintance.”

When the reptile mutant rose to come to her branch and shake her hand, Skydancer rose as well, elongating her anchored tubes to account for the extra height needed. "I'm Skydancer. Pleased to make yours as well." This was the second lizard mutant she had now met which struck her as more than a little odd, unless there were a whole bunch of them in the city. "You seem very confident in these treetops." She offered a smile that hinted at a shared secret. After all, they were having a conversation at the top of a tree and how many people could say that?

“Ssorry.” He apologized softly before he started. After he completed his song he apologized a bit more sincerely and thoroughly explaining his conundrum.

“My Apologiess for ssuprissing you. It wass either that or wait and ssee if you noticed me eventually in which I would have caught you off guard probably.” He nodded to her assessment “ I do it in a little bit of a different way, but the Idea iss essentially the ssame hold on, and don’t let go.” He grinned. “ Sso, how do you like then manssion sso far?”

He lowered himself to a crouch and then switched to sitting on his rump one hand held the branch as to not give the wind a chance to dare him to see how well his reflexes were working today. He could probably grab another branch before he hit the ground, that wouldn’t make it fun though and his violin would surely suffer. The small stereo continued to play a mix of techno back beats.

“My Apologiess for ssuprissing you. It wass either that or wait and ssee if you noticed me eventually in which I would have caught you off guard probably. I do it in a little bit of a different way, but the Idea iss essentially the ssame hold on, and don’t let go. Sso, how do you like then manssion sso far?”

Skydancer nodded her understanding. Before coming to New York, the only encounters she had previously had with mutants had been the kind to blend in perfectly with human socieity and she had assumed that must be the majority of them. Since coming to the city, however, two of the four mutants she had spoken to were the type to stand out, freaks just like her and she was beginning to expect they were more common than she had first believed. Then again, both of them had also been reptile mutants so perhaps it was just reptile mutants that were common rather than freaks in general.

"The Mansion is fine," Skydancer answered, though doubt about the whole situation could be heard in her voice. In its way, The Mansion was actually pretty amazing. They provided her with food, clothing, shelter and others of her kind. She felt very little animosity about her strange appearance there and suspected, if she would only drop her walls, that she might even find acceptance. The problem was that she didn't trust any of it. There was an ideological war going on in the city, between those at The Mansion and those at Sanctuary and she felt an unstated pressure to choose a side in a war she didn't entirely understand. One day, and she didn't know when that day would be, she was certain that the war she wanted no part of would come to her and she would be forced to choose. By the time that day came, she hoped to have a better understanding of both sides of the conflict. She wasn't about to be anyone's unwitting pawn.

Skydancer returned to a more comfortable crowched position so she wasn't looming over Koga. "Have you been at The Mansion long?"

Koga cocked a bright blue eyebrow that said he didn't buy it, It was pretty observant and heard the reluctance in Sky's voice.He wanted to interrogate her if someone made her feel anything less than welcomed, but he held his forked tongue, she looked like she might get her hang ups off her chest in her own time so he figured he would lend an open ear and keep an open mind. so instead of questions he smiled slightly and gave it his endorsement. " I love it here."

Koga's black eyes picked a spot in the distance and he started to spin his tale."Yeah, I came here when I was thirteen, it's actually odd how I came to find the place. one day I'm just a Asian kid going to bed, the next morning my father is above me pointing at my face, screaming in Japanese to a police officer that has no idea what he is saying. Peekskill, New York is a nice little bigoted town to the north. so the cop saw my skin change color and was pulling out his tazer. I'm just waking up at this point and the first thing I notice is my mom crying in the background but doing nothing to defend me. He sneered out the side of his mouth. The cop goes to taze me and I climb the wall and drop on him from above. and lock my arms around him and squeeze until he stops struggling." A small sigh left his lips. " I'm pretty sure I didn't kill him but my dad is still there screaming at the top of his lungs. I grab a back pack that has my essentials in it and i throw open my window and run...." He smirked at her. " so I'm far away from my house and walking down the road and get mugged for my mp3 player and thrown into a trunk the thugs stop half way between Peekskill and NYC and let me ride in the cab after that, turns out that one of the guys little sisters came to Xavier's but they couldn't risk being seen as sympathizers. they dropped me off here and I have to say I haven't looked back much since."

He then paused to let his tragic mutant tale simmer for a moment. Most of them had one. He didn't think he really had to hard, just the whole betrayal of the parents thing. their loss. "I can tell somethings on your mind.

The 'I love it here' sure did sound authentic to Skydancer's ears. Of course, she had no way to know just how good a lier a lizard boy who could change to blend into the background might be. A stealhty power alluded to a potentially stealthy individual but then, maybe that was being unfair. Was it discrimination to judge a person's personality based upon their powers? Probably.

Skydancer listened to Koga's story intentently, feeling worse as he went along. How could she feel so sorry for herself when, apparently, there were others out there that had it so much worse than she did? At least her family was supportive of her and she was hardly the first mutant to crop up in her family tree. That made it easier, in some ways, although it also made it so much worse when her idealistic youthful ideas of what it meant to be a mutant were so brutally shattered. Because she was one of the freaks. Because it wasn't anything like how her aunt made it out to be. Because her brother died and it was her fault for being a freak.

"I can tell somethings on your mind."

Skydancer nodded, deciding to return honesty with honesty. Because, colour shifter or not, Koga seemed to be the honest sort and she couldn't, in good conscience, reply with anything less. As she spoke, her eyes wondered to a rather fascinating patch of ground below her. "Do you know, my greatest dream growing up was to become a mutant? I had an aunt and she could make the amazing little oregami creatures with her power. They were colourful and entertaining and I thought it was so amazing and I wanted to be just like her when I grew up. I guess you could say she was my idol. Except that when my own powers developted, it wasn't at all like I thought it would be. I didn't have a little parlour trick to amuse my friends, I turned into some kind of distrubing freak, the monster everyone was afraid of and it was aweful. Then, when the gang came and attacked my family and killed my brother, well, that was it. An innocent died because of me, because I was a monster and so I fled for the protection of my family. And I ended up here, in this surprsingly welcoming place except I know there's more going on here than simply welcoming wayward mutants. I know there's some kind of conflict and that, sooner or later, I'm going to be expected to pick a side and I don't want to be involved in anyone's war and I don't even know what the sides stand for."

Skydancer lifted her eyes to meet those of Koga. She hadn't meant to say quite so much, but what was said could hardly be unsaid.

Koga listened to her carefully. Analyzing what she was saying against the feeling behind it. He could relate to her feelings on being a monster and a freak, He wasn’t done changing, at least if the dream was accurate, if his grand father spoke true..

“Firsst thingss firsst. You are no monsster. Your brother didn’t die because of you, He died becausse ssome ******* bigot. Thosse people that came and attacked you and your family were monsterss. My father wass a monsster. You and I, are not. I’m not ssaying we are normal humans either. But we aren’t monsterss. Freaks, sure if you mean freaking awessome. I’m ssorry you didn’t get your dream, You aunt’s ability might be neat, If you’d like I can teach you how to do some origami. Its not the same, but it could be fun.” He took a breath as he didn’t want to come off as scolding her.

“ I can’t sspeak for the ssanctuary, though from what I can tell, it’s the ssame over there asss well, If you want to, you can ssimply live life. You can just go to sschool here, live here, learn here. Pick up the sslack if you ssee any in the choress. Make ssure you know how to control your powerss responssibly If not practice and learn how to. That’ss the mosst anyone will assk of you here. If you want and I mean want to do more, thiss iss where the x-men are bassed. They sstand for a world that encouragess peace and undersstanding between humanss and mutantss alike, the Order is bassed out of the ssanctuary, they are mutant ssupremacisstss for the mosst part, They don’t care who they hurt or how bad to get their way. I told you all that sso you would know what any fighting wass over. That ssaid, you don’t have to be a part of that sstruggle. at all, ever. Not if you don’t want to.” He let that sink in for a moment and then continued. As he did he came to a stand.

“You sshould however, be a part of our family. It can be rough asss one of the freakss out there, and around here, we aren’t even freakss. Just a couple more friends around the housse going to the craziesst sschool there ever wass.” He looked at her and smiled lightly. “ And you might not need thiss like I did when I firsst got here but..” Koga took the couple of steps closer to Skydancer and hugged her in her a friendly but tight embrace.

“Firsst thingss firsst. You are no monsster. Your brother didn’t die because of you, He died becausse ssome ******* bigot. Thosse people that came and attacked you and your family were monsterss. My father wass a monsster. You and I, are not. I’m not ssaying we are normal humans either. But we aren’t monsterss. Freaks, sure if you mean freaking awessome. I’m ssorry you didn’t get your dream, You aunt’s ability might be neat, If you’d like I can teach you how to do some origami. Its not the same, but it could be fun.”

Skydancer agreed with the first part at least. Even if things had been partially her fault, that certainly didn't eliminate the guilt of the bigoted gang that had come and attacked her family. Justice was something she dearly wanted done to them, although she wasn't sure it was ever going to happen. "How can you be ok with looking like you do?" she asked, passion in her voice. "I don't mean to insult you or suggest that you're ugly or anything like that, but its the stares! Everywhere you go you're stared at and you can see their mouths move and you know they're snickering and mocking you just out of range of hearing. How do you deal with it, being an outcast like that?" That was what it came down to, in the end. How did one deal with being an outcast for the rest of their life? Maybe for some it was easier than others, but Skydancer had always craved human companionship and that seemed impossible now.

“ I can’t sspeak for the ssanctuary, though from what I can tell, it’s the ssame over there asss well, If you want to, you can ssimply live life. You can just go to sschool here, live here, learn here. Pick up the sslack if you ssee any in the choress. Make ssure you know how to control your powerss responssibly If not practice and learn how to. That’ss the mosst anyone will assk of you here. If you want and I mean want to do more, thiss iss where the x-men are bassed. They sstand for a world that encouragess peace and undersstanding between humanss and mutantss alike, the Order is bassed out of the ssanctuary, they are mutant ssupremacisstss for the mosst part, They don’t care who they hurt or how bad to get their way. I told you all that sso you would know what any fighting wass over. That ssaid, you don’t have to be a part of that sstruggle. at all, ever. Not if you don’t want to.”

That certainly didn't sound so bad. Not that Skydancer entirely believed it yet, but at least Koga came across as honest and heartfelt, unlike the man who had taken her from the streets. He had worn a mask and that was deceptive in a way changing one's skin colour never could be. If it was true, however, the question was why anyone would help while gaining nothing in return? She frowned, considering what possible motivations whoever owned and operated The Mansion might have.

"I know how to use my powers." In demonstration, another tube shot out of the top of Skydancer's neck and wrapped around a branch above her, hoisting her up onto the higher branch. She then lowered herself back down to her previous position, making sure her anchoring tubes were still in place. "I guess I have it better than some. My power isn't one that ever really spiraled out of control, although sometimes I don't know my own strength. As for the rest of it, it sounds good. Too, good, in fact, to be true. Maybe I've grown paranoid, but I find it hard to trust it." She shrugged, her agitation showing despite the casual nature of the gesture.

“You sshould however, be a part of our family. It can be rough asss one of the freakss out there, and around here, we aren’t even freakss. Just a couple more friends around the housse going to the craziesst sschool there ever wass. And you might not need thiss like I did when I firsst got here but..”

Such a simple gesture but to Skydancer it meant more than mere words and she actually had to fight off tears as she returned the hug. "You...you're a family? And you want me to be a part of it?" That was one thing she never thought she'd ever have again.

He shrugged. “No inssult taken. I can do thiss if I want to blend in.” He shifted his hair to black and his skin to a pale with slightest bit of Olive that was once his natural color. “But you can still ssee my sscaless if you look closse. My sspikess sstick out of my hair." he brushed his hair carefully to reveal horns. " My tonguess sstill forked, my eyses are forever black. To be honesst, I don’t mind the sstaress. I typically wear ssomething more like thiss.” He changed his hair to a bright red and his skin to a neon orange with light purple stripes."Out casst or not. I can climb wallss, I can change colorss, they can sstare in awe or disgusst or whatever they like.” He shrugged.” But they won’t ever sstand on top of the empire sstate building, they won’t look over the bay from atop Lady libertiess head. They wont climb a tree at the flick of a wrisst. They can’t defend themselvess effortlessly with Purple coilss of greatnesss. “ He smirked. “ Sso I guesss I’m not bothered by becausse itss one of the few places I let my ego run free. I imagine for a moment if I would trade what I am for what I ussed to be. You might feel like that iss a trade you would make, but you are just know getting a tasste of what iss like to be accepted, apprecited even for who you are. I wouldn't change a thing about you.”

“That’ss good about your powerss but a lot of time the initial mutation issn’t the only mutation. You learn to walk before you run. But once you run you can get placess fasster. Its kind of like that. even if you are good, you can alwayss get better and it might help you ssome day. Ass far ass having it better off than ssome, you are right. If you have control than you are way ahead of ssome. There’ss a kid around here that can float, and ussed to not be able to control it sso he had to carry around an anchor incasse his powerss got the better of him. Now he knowss how to fly on a whim.

He listened to her as she spoke about not trusting it. “I’ve alwayss sspeculated that this Xavier guy or whoever founded the place iss either a mutant or ssomeone that loved a mutant enough to ssee how difficult it wass for them, for uss. on top of that he had the money to make this place posssible. We get donations from other placess too. I’m guessing more rich people that are mutantss or have mutant kidss. If you think about it, it makes ssensse that there are mutants out there with sskillss that enhance our economic potential. I clean windowss for a lot of the local houssess around here, I don’t need ladderss and Can get to any sspot without much worry. Their gutterss are cleaned in minutess compared to the hourss it might take ssomeone with a ladder.” He wasn’t quite done hugging her yet, she seemed like she needed it just as much as he did when he got here, sso he would let go when sshe did. He did lean back however and smile. “Of coursse, it’ss good to have family. A lot of uss don’t have many optionss outside, but in here, you might not even have met someone and they’re likely to help you ssolve any problem you have asss besst they can.”

He thought for a moment and wondered at something…was there anyone that could change someone else’s skin color around here. That would be something worth looking into. He might be able to help her feel a little bit more ~Normal~ if that’s what she really wanted.

The ability to change skin colour really was quite a fantastic one and an ability the the other reptile mutant Skydancer had met had been able to do as well. Not that she had seen all that many different mutant powers during her life, but she had to admit that it was secretly one of her favourite ones. As someone with former Olympic ambitions, the ability to draw attention to herself had historically been a posative goal of hers. Of course, the unfortunate part of being a mutant freak was that most of the attention she seemed to draw now was of the negative sort.

"Maybe I'm just still getting used to this," Skydancer replied, her voice sad. "Its not that I don't appreciate my power because I do. I can do fantastic things that would never have been possible before. But sometimes I hate it too, just a little bit. Because I'm a mutant everything that I worked for while I was still human was for nothing. I was this close to making it to the Olympic trials for gymnastics, but of course there are no freakish purple gymnasts competing on that level. You have no idea how many countless hours I spent in practice and then to have it come crashing down around me..." Her voice petered off into silence. Maybe she was just feeling sorry for herself, just like she had been for what seemed like ages.

Skydancer giggled at the thought of the floating mutant boy having to be tied down and then felt immediately bad for doing so. "Oh no, I must be a horrible person for finding that funny." The mortification she felt could be clearly heard in her voice.

"You mean, I could end up with more mutations," Skydancer asked. That wasn't something she had ever realized was even a possibility before and she had mixed feelings on it. Of course having powers were fun and it meant she could do amazing things, but she could no longer honestly desire more than she had. Once she might have thought about the possibility with eager anticipation, but that was before her greatest desire had become reality and that reality had been forever tainted. Her gift was also a curse and the thought of it changing brought with it the possibility of further curses and that was just about the last thing she wanted to have happen.

"I guess its good that someone cares about mutants and our plights," Skydancer answered after Koga had finished his speech. She gently disentangled herself from his embrace and sat on her branch. "I like my power, I really do. My tubes are stronger than any human and with them I can climb, well, not exactly effortlessly but a with a lot less effort than any regular human. I don't even mind my skin, so much, when I'm alone. I just wish there was some way I might be able to hide it when I want to. You know, I just don't always wanted to be known as that purple freak. Sometimes I just want to pretend to be normal again, just for a little bit." Boy did she ever sound pathetic. One little bit of kindness from a walking lizard and suddenly she was poring her heart out.

“I undersstand, well itss not the Olympicss, but I have a 4.0 gpa and it’ss like, am I going to be able to put that to usse to get into whatever sschool I want? Free sscholarsshipss? Doubt it.” He stopped himself, this probably wasn’t the kind of support she needed, though empathizing wasn’t a bad thing. It just wasn’t going to help either.

“What were you going to compete in? or were you going for multiple gymnasstic competitionss?” It was interesting having a conversation while tangled up like this, in a tree no less. he found the tone of voice and closeness made the conversation more intimate and meaningful, at least to him, as if they could confide more in one another. He hadn’t thought of that initially just that she looked like she could use a hug.

He smirked, “ Nah, he thinkss itss funny now. I think while it wass happening he wass freaked out pretty bad about jusst floating away. Really though you never know what’ss going to hurt who’ss feelingss. Ssometimess the mosst innocent thingss can get taken wrong. Me turning purple earlier could have backfired. I like that shade, it looks good on you, but you could have jusst as eassily thought I was mocking you. Point being, sometimes it pays to tread lightly. but a lot of people of a sense of humor about it.”

“Yeah, Mine iss progresssively making me more reptilian, I got sspikess, sscaless and extra eyelidss lasst time, but for a lot of people it iss more ssignificant. Lesss, yeah I got sspikess on my head.” Koga didn’t resist her, letting loose of the hug, it was one for her comfort after all, so if she had enough he wasn’t going to argue.

“Again, being purple doessn’t dissqualify you from being normal around here, but. I bet, its feassible. It might take ssome effort on your part, but I am ssure it could be worked out if we put our mindss to it. Hmmm, I’ll have to look into it but I think I might know ssomebody who knowss ssomeone that could offer a more permant ssolution.” He looked thoughtful for a moment. “ Try not to get too excited, it will take ssome tracking people down, but I’ll ssee what I can do.”

There was just something satisfying about having a conversation in a tree. Skydancer had spent so much time lamenting her lost dreams that she hadn't properly realized just how much she had gained in exchange. Maybe some doors had closed on her life, but she was just starting to realize that maybe, just maybe, more doors had opened for her than had closed. The price was far too great, with the loss of her brother, but maybe it was time taht she move on and actually do something with the gifts she had been given.

"I've never had the time to really dedicate myself to school," Skydancer answered. It wasn't that she was a bad student, but her energy was always firmly upon her competitions and school took a backseat to that. "I always figured at some time I'd go to college or something, but I don't really know anymore." She shrugged. It was one thing to realize she had options available to her and quite another to know which options were worth pursuing. Her life had been laid out for her before, now it was wide open and that was more than a little scary.

"As many gymnastics competitions as I could," Skydancer agreed. "And I was good, really good. If not for this," she gestured towards her purple skin and tubes, "I'm sure I would have made it to the Olympics. It would have been this year, you know. I was so close I could taste it, just a matter of getting through the trials and actually arriving. But I guess that's changed now." She tried not to let her disappointment show in her voice. "It's hard when something you've worked for your entire life is taken away from you."

"How do you feel about becoming more reptillian?" Skydancer asked, genuinely curious. Hearing the stories of other mutants, especially those who stood out like her, made her feel better about her own situation which wasn't so bad as she first thought. "I think I can find something to blend in, at least for sometimes. I don't want to be ashamed of what I am, but...sometimes I just don't want that kind of attention." It wasn't quite about being normal, she was almost an Olympic athlete and normal isn't something she ever wanted to be. But sometimes illusions were nice.

“Itss more a purssuit of knowledge than gradess for me, school is fine, but issn’t really suited to the task of fulfilling a true scholar. You should go to the one you want to, if you want to.” He nodded to himself and to her, it was something he needed to decide for himself as well.

“That’ss pretty awesome, I’m kind of the oppossite, I’ve alwayss been interessted in the way gymnasticss complimentss martial artss. But, Why does it have to change? I mean if you appeared to be x gene deficient, could you still try out? or do they have a must be homosapien to be Olympic clause?” He had practiced Gymnastics for years for the application it had in real world situations, being a hero, the way he wanted to be a hero required nothing less than being great at gymnastics, martial arts, negotiating and so many more skills.


“dependss on how far it goess. I’d like to be able to have a wife and kidss ssomeday, I mean not anytime ssoon, but atleasst the possibility. Eventually you have to wonder if your own genes are so far changed from the norm, if you are still compadiable, I would think that if I was a female it would be harder as I am coldblooded. That couldn’t be good for a baby. Other than that though, I think itss kind of awessome. I think about all the wild thingss reptiless have naturally evolved to and have to think the possibilitiess are kind of epic.” He wiggled around on the branch getting comfortable until he seemed satisfied with his postion once more.

“You don’t have to explain to a chameleon the benefitss of blending in. We’ll definitely figure something out.” He nodded confidently to her and smiled at her and then let his statisfied determination settle out towards the other trees. A slight breeze caught just then and he couldn’t have been happier with his life.

"I'm pretty smart but I never really got into the pursuit of knowledge much. I didn't have the time, really, because of my training." There were many things she had never had the time for growing up, because of her training. In a way, she had lost her childhood to her hours upon hours spent in the gym practicing. Those were the sacrifices one had to make in order to become the best, however, so she had never really regretted them. Until, that is, she had come to a place in her life in which all her training was for nothing because she could no longer ever hope to become an Olympic athlete. "But I think its an admirable thing to pursue."

At the phrase martial arts, Skydancer's ears perked up. Now that wasn't something she had thought about before, but given the more dangerous turn her life had recently taken, perhaps it was something she should think about. "I can't compete in the Olympics because of unfair advantages an all that." She shrugged as if it didn't bother her, although that fact still stung. "How would they be able to test what, exactly a mutant could do to determine if competing was fair or not? They don't really have a way aside from taking their word for it so, instead, they just ban us from competing. Its pretty unfair." It was downright discriminatory but there wasn't much she could do about it. "I probably wouldn't mind learning some martial arts though. You know, just in case. Because the life of a mutant can sometimes be dangerous." As she was coming to learn first hand.

"I haven't even though about the future," Skydance replied. She adjusted her grip, pulling up to a more comfortable branch. "There hasn't really been the time; I was mainly just concerned with survival." She stared out into space as she spoke. "I guess a family might be possible though, right? I mean, if I were to find the right person, of course." It was a pleasant thought that gave her a strange sort of hope.