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Zorro.

”Cool name.” He said.

It was a cool dog. But he had work to do. He rose back to his full height, focusing on what had brought them together that day.

He followed the woman inside the building. Warmer was better.

She took off her cloak, but he chose to keep his. Mouthed a thank you, and moved on. He had a tendency to get cold. Especially talking the talk they were talking. Shivers. Etc. Speaking of—

Kemp went right to it, huh? His mind went to a crude joke about disappointed partners, but he quashed it. This was no time for fooling around!

He watched Sundance’s face as she took n the information. His own face tried to be neutral, but distaste worked its way in there somewhere. Distaste over the subject at hand.

When kemp looked at him, Ashton added ”Several of the victims were notoriously anti-mutant. Perhaps that set him, or her,” he pointedly did not glance kemp’s way at the comment. ”Off.”

Girls can be violent murderers too. It wouldn’t do to go into any investigation with a specific type of person in mind. Gotta keep them eyes open.


Personally, Ashton thought the assessment might have been a little off. Mainly the youthful aspect. He wasn’t going to tell Kemp how to run his show, but it just seemed that many of the victims had been all over town, not just around the mansion. Someone needed means. Transport. Young people had the bus, sure, and they could look into that. But he just got this feeling... this feeling that didn’t want it to be some kid. Probably bias on his part. Mansion people had been good to him so far. He kept it to himself.

Ashton felt the start or a sneeze coming on. He quickly rubbed at his nose to stifle it before it could actually happen.

”Don’t, uh. Spread that around. Might not be something the general public needs to know. For obvious reasons.” He added, embarrassed. Had he messed up? Talk of serial killers tended to go over... poorly. Especially when kemp asked if the person he’d profiled sounded like a student. Oh gee.

He mouthed sorry to kemp. Then, he suggested that maybe they ought to take this some place more private, like Sundance’s office, if they wanted to talk about the case in detail. A hint of the Irish flavored his words, even though he’d been trying to kill that. Ah Irish cop who sounded Irish? How mundane could you be?

The guy was silent, and to use a blatant cliche, too quiet. Ashton shot a quick glance at what the guy was doing, but not long enough to really see anything he’d looked at. Case files obviously had Kemp consumed. With what he was aware of, it was probably fine and dandy he hadn’t stared at anything grisly while driving.

In his unbiased opinion, the murders had been awful. As all murders are. In his biased opinion, they couldn’t have happened to many nicer guys. That was awful, and he knew it. The law protects all. But these had been some flagrantly anti-mutant individuals. At least, the vast majority of them had been... not all of them. He felt a little bad about lumping them all together like that, but what can you do?

One of the victims had died near a school full of mutants. If they’d been a bigot, that would have had to make their blood boil. A question mark hovered around that last one for him. Connected? Maybe it had been lumped with the rest by sheer coincidence. It could have been self-defense.

Kemp asked him what he knew of the mansion. So Ashton told him.

”Not much. I helped a homeless kid get settled in about a month ago, when his mutation first activated. So I know my way around the place A LITTLE. What I do you, you could probably Google.” He rolled his eyes and turned a corner.

”It was rebuilt in 2005 by some headmaster named Tricity. A sister school to some other school. She isn’t the headmaster now, though. It’s some guy named Rudyard Kipling or something. Kipperling. Yeah, that’s it. A place mutants can go to school and learn to use their powers. X men are associated. And—“

He pulled to a stop in front of the mansion gates. ”Thats pretty much all I know about that. Oh. They’ve got a jet. Want me to buzz us in?” He asked.

Once they were approved to enter, he pulled the car up the drive and parked it by the mansion. And there they were.

Bastard was dancing with the hostage. Pain.

Didn’t like it. Didn’t like the guy talking about him, either. And he also... did not like the sudden tickle in his sinuses. What was that about?

He really ought to scratch his nose. A little scratch would relieve the stress. But it would also put him at risk, by making him drop his guard.

He paused, and really thought about it. But then, he saw an opening. The dancer guy, he was getting ready to, what, dance? With ice person? He’d heard enough chatter to know the name Cold steel. And cold steel was getting in position, sacrificing himself. The hostage was free. And—

He raised his gun and aimed. But clearly, Hunter was ready for that and had not ever dropped his guard, even through all of that.

”Hold that thought!” Private Dancer smiled at Sammy boy, and held up a finger. Cold Steel stalled. Private Dancer turned, and brought his gun to bear at Ashton.

Oh crap oh crap oh crap. Could he roll to the side? Get out of the way?! Or— the thing hit him like a Mac truck. One second, he was standing there, ready to fire or run, eyes locked on the bad guy’s gun, the next, he was doubled over. Coughing. And. Sneezing.

Private Dancer arched an eyebrow. Well, if the cop was just going to bend over and give up then killing him would be easy. He narrowed his focus as he aimed.

Ashton’s hand closed around something. His eyes snapped up. Focused on the gun. Another sneeze, and— oh god it hurt. His head— piercing pain. Pounding throb.

”Huh?” private dancer blinked. He’d had a gun a moment before but now his gun... ”A rock?”

A piece of concrete. Fist sized. In his hand. Where the gun had been. But how?

Ashton grimaced, and closer his hand right around what was in it. Why had he picked up— where had he gotten? The realization hit him as he looked at what was in his hand.

”A gun...?” He muttered.

First he’d had one gun. Now, two? Who had— how had? He slid the safety on for the stranger gun, and put it in his holster. Stood back up and wiped at his nose.

Had the gun and the rock traded places? That was stupid. But here they were.

”Hey Hunter,” Ashton said. He held up his gun again. ”Drop the rock and freeze. You have one second to comply.”

The hostage was crawling away. Hunter dropped the rock. And then— he raised his hand towards him, and Ashton felt something grip his arms. Try and aim him. And—

He sneezed again. And traded places with the rock. Again, entirely by accident.

Ashton appeared inches from private dancer, completely confused. PD was confused too. The thread he’d tried controlling the cop with broke, as the guy stumbled forwards, right into him. And

”Whoa whoa whoa!” They both tumbled into each other and fell.

What a mess, what a mess. Broken store window, glass and debris everywhere. And he Liked that deli.

And the people... so many hostages.

Ashton exchanged a look with his partner. This was going to be a tough one. That thought about both living and hating MRC? It skewed closer to hate just that moment.

“I’ll keep crowds clear and coordinate with backup and emergency services, as they arrive.” His partner said.

‘Of course you will...’ Ashton thought.

Joe did not have a mutant power. Ashton did. Or at least, it was on his records that he did. People believed that he did. The fact that he still had not gotten a grip on his power went entirely unremarked. Things just sort of... happened. When they happened. Mostly, he just fought hard to be smarter and better than any problems he faced. Wits didn’t stop the non-MRC cops from glancing at him warily when they thought he was not looking. Or maybe it wasn’t wariness? Anger? Fear.

Cops can be kind of dicks. He knew. He was one. At least for the moment.

He was close enough to see the ice man and the jerk with the gun and the colorful hair. Not close enough yet to hear everything they said, though. Wasn’t like Hunter was whispering sweet nothings into Cold Steel’s ear or anything. But Ashton couldn’t hear every word of the exchange, even as he crept closer to the situation.

An older Ashton who had his stuff together might have swapped places with the guy or his gun, smashed him in the face (or gotten his partner to cuff him), and assumed control of the situation. But Ashton himself did not know this, and he had to go about things in his own particular fashion.

The less broken fashion.

He heard the gunshot and gritted his teeth. Nobody shot yet, but... made a mental count of the ammunition most likely left.

A gust of wind seemed to knock ice man on to his knees and Ashton caught a glimpse something not quite there, but man-shaped. His partner.

Yeah. That was definitely interesting. Would make his gun that much more useless.

Ashton stepped out from around the corner of a building, about 20 feet from the group. He held his gun, trained on the guy with the gun and shouted at him to ‘drop his weapon and freeze! MRC!’

Then, a gust of wind came at him and pushed him back against the red brick wall. Yeah. He had kind of seen that coming. Hopefully, Frigidaire man would capitalize on his distraction.

The comment, she liked. Her reaction, he liked. The toddler cannon balling in on their moment of supposed privacy, he... did not.

Ashton’s hands slipped out and away, and he broke contact in surprise. Hips swiveled as he turned towards the disturbance. Regretfully, he took his focus off Ez.

Who was—

What was...

Why?

Water dripped down his nose. He did not care for it one bit. Ashton opened his mouth to begin to tell the child how he felt about things, and if someone would have been reading his emotions at that point in time they would have read a fine mix of surprise, annoyance, a little embarrassment, and two different kinds of frustration... but anger? Anger, he controlled and held back. Because this was a kid. And if he blew up at a kid over being a kid, what kind of crappy monster was he?

He’d been a kid once, himself. He knew how their minds sometimes failed to work. Another part of him registered that blowing up at a child in front of Ez would also be bad in that area, but... that was the lesser concern. The first one... just, yeah. You don’t treat kids like garbage because they do stupid stuff. Not unless you’re their parents. No right. Not right. Wrong.

So, Ashton dripped and Ashton grimaced and Ashton caught Ez’s little “I’m sorry” mouth. And Ashton mouthed back “It’s okay.”

Ashton chilled. Ashton took a moment to let Ez respond, and see how everything played out. While he cooled off. And did not sulk. No, he did not sulk. He just relaxed a little and shook his head wryly. Once he did that, he could take a little amusement at himself and the stupid look on his face. Just a little, mind. He was not psychotic.

Ez spoke. Ashton chimed in, and let the Irish accent flavor his words. ”Havoc IS fun. Somewhere else, though? Please? We’re not really into cannon balls or Marco Polo, or other pool games.” They were party poopers. They only really had one thing on their minds, and it was not pool games.

Ashton rested a light hand on Ez’s leg, underneath the water. Just to reassure him she was still there, and to let her know he supported her response to troublesome ninitas, one hundred percent. They were of the same mind.

His move had startled her, ever so slightly. Though had it been his move? In the moment, his brain conveniently glossed over any and all details about the unconscious usage of power. Not a mental block, per se. just weaponized stupidity. She loved winning, after all. And he wanted to see where things went. What better reason was there for playing dumb?

The moment of startled hopping, he did enjoy. Even if he glossed over the why. Mischief covered up any uncertainty she had about him and whatever.

And, she stole his shirt from where it lay. Covering up to some semblance of decency. Didn’t seem like it was fully on, just temporarily a bikini topper. One button. No more, no less.

Ashton laughed out loud. Now that THAT was out of the way, she’d said. A shame she’d covered up, but he could not blame her. He even respected the move. There was only so much room for that kind of blatant fun at a party, and turnabout was fair play. Plus, where she currently was made any wet shirt thoughts sort of drift away.

And she murmured something. He smiled. ”Sounds good to me,” He drawled. He brought his face up close to hers, and whispered into her ear. ”Is it stating the obvious to say you wore it better?”

Before she could answer, he went in for a sly kiss. The statement had been a rhetorical question anyways.

He liked character flaws.

And leaving, he liked leaving.

One could just order up a lift? He had no idea about modern cab order applications but calling up a company or flagging down a ride seemed to make sense.

Had he driven or walked here?

”A lift is a good idea.” Ashton agreed.

Even if he had, he probably shouldn’t drive them back. Plus, the whole amnesia thing made New York geography a work in progress for his brain.

While she did whatever she needed to do to dial up a lift, Ashton handled the lofty tab. Worth every penny. He was having fun. Plots to find bad guys who deaged people? What were those?

—

A short time later, he found himself getting in the cab with her. He gave the cab driver his address, then made to kiss her while they were transported away.