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Sounds about right."

She was smirking at him and Max had the sneaking suspicion this was not the first time she'd had this conversation. He smiled back and decided to move on given he didn't much want to bore her with repeated details.

"Sounds good. If I am support, den you call the shots

He nodded and reached into his bag. He produced two small pistols. Each was made of a tough plastic and had a metal cylinder attached to the back. He offered one to the woman.

"They're set to respond to the paintballs as real rounds," He explained and nodded behind Sveta.

A dozen pairs of feet shuffled along the floor. Max grinned as the soldiers they would be going against entered the room. They were simply robotic skeletons with hard light projections over them. But to the naked eye they looked like stormtroopers. The white armor flashed in the light as the troopers entered the maze. There was a disturbance in the air and a map appeared beside them. It had the floor plane of the maze along with notations of where cameras where.

"In a real mission we would have Intel. So this is what we have to go on." He said.

He took a minute to memorize the map. He ran through the maze and tried to force a few different routes into his mind. It didn't have the location of the stormtroopers on it, that would be a variable. After he felt confident he could navigate he stepped towards the door.

"Your ready to go?" He smiled, bringing his gun up.

Quin had not been lying when she proclaimed that she knew defensive driving. She swerved away from the gunfire and Max instinctively shut his eyes for a second as she collided with the car beside them. He open his eyes just in time to see the car pass beside them the driver jerking the wheel fiercely. He was lucky that the passenger couldn't get a good line of sight to fire off a shot at Max.

They barreled through the cones and Max looked ahead of them. Construction equipment and various building materials lay on the sides of the two lane bridge. About halfway across Max saw the wooden barricade set up with flashing lights on it. Beyond that there was only a large and empty gap probably the length of half a football field. On the other side of that was a matching half of bridge under construction. Max's stomach rolled. He look in the rear view mirror and saw the car barreling along behind them. He had no choice.

His hands still placed firmly on the dash Max focused his will and began to breath slow steady breaths. Normally he could use his power instantly, throw out a field of augmented gravity around himself or other things. He'd even been fast enough to throw power over someone in the time of contact during a punch.

However, the SUV was massive. At the time of renting it he had thought the bulk would be nice. Now however he let out a small swear at his past self.

He tensed his muscles and pushed out with his power. He felt it spread over the vehicle. An invisible film of gravity spread from the front of the hood around the tank of an automobile. He pushed harder and it spread over the front. It was as the field reached the middle of the storage compartment that Max felt his power strain and pressure build. He felt like his whole body was a rubber band being pulled to its limit.

"Pour on the speed. I need all the momentum I can get." He said with a struggled breath.

They were barreling towards the barricade at a speed that would be lethal to impact, but for what he wanted to do he needed more speed. He could lift the car, but if they didn't have the forward push they'd never make it to the other side.

First however he needed to get his power over the car. He let out a cry of pain and found himself shouting with effort. Every muscle tensed in his body and slowly the field of power snapped around the last part of the SUV. He nullified gravity as they reached the barricade and the tires floated off the road. The front bumper of the car smashed through the top light on the barricade and they flew out over the void beyond.

He held his breath, fighting to keep his power over the car. He could feel force building up against him, like the gravity he was defying was bleeding through and trying to smash him. The SUV apparently had the force required because after a moment that felt like an eternity he saw the barricade of the opposite side fly underneath them.

Something popped inside Max's gut and he released his power. More accurately his power seemed to snap apart and he felt an unproportinal force blast through his body. Stars formed in his vision and he almost passed out. The SUV fell three feet and the tires smacked onto the road with a loud thump. Max's head snapped back from the impact and his forehead smacked the dash, adding yet another pain to the mix.

Yeah this mission was going so smoothly.

She took his hand and he felt a surge of something akin to electricity shoot through his limb. He was nervous, the physical contact somehow bringing back the insecurities he had felt earlier in the night as he had been waiting for her. He threw those nerves aside and started walking, leading her beside him at a pleasant pace.

For a moment he wasn't a mutant, he wasn't a secret warrior from Haven, he wasn't a freak. He walked beside Janelle and they could have been any couple out for a date. As he made his way through the crowd he saw a number of couples walking and holding hands as well. They were just two people out and about.

"So Haven has investments in a lot of things. Mostly stuff that has applications to bettering society." He said.

The place he was heading was only a few blocks away. He didn't want to think about the price of real estate this close to the heart of the city.

"I was working on some budget paperwork the other day and came across something interesting. I thought it be right up your ally." He said vaguely.

It only took a short trip to bring them to the building Max wanted. It was a tall building, older and made of brick. You could see that there had been work done to update the place. A sign above the large twin doors read "Demeter Research Labs." He punched a code into keypad beside the doors and pulled one open.

"After you my lady." He said brightly.

Being shot at is not as fun as it looked in the movies. There was no satisfying popping noise as the gun fire. There was only a flash of light and the sudden destruction of the passengers side mirror. He knew he should be focused on survival but his initial thought was more along the lines of "Well there goes my deposit."

His adrenaline pulsed through him like fire as he swerved a bit to avoid another spray of fire. Quin shouted for him to trade seats and given the circumstances he couldn't argue with the logic. He hammered the pedal to accelerate and clicked on the cruise control to maintain speed. His hand still full of hamburger flew down under the seat and he dropped the food as he punched the lever and the seat shifted back as far as it would go. It would be crowded enough and he didn't want to cramp Quin.

He pulled his legs up to mirror Quin and slid across the middle console to the passengers seat. The SUV gave an unhealthy little bump without someone behind the wheel and he slid off the console and into the passengers seat. His head smacked into the window.

He had just enough time to notice a flashing LED. It had words flashing in bright red.

"Bridge construction ahead. Use detour."

A flash of insanity ran through Max's mind as he came up with an idea.

"I need you to get ahead of them! Pour in as much speed as you can! Head for the bridge construction, skip the detour!" He called.

He looked back to see Noel in the floor of the car. Smart move. He looked ahead and saw something looming on the horizon. The bridge. Max placed his palms on the dashboard and started taking calming deep breaths to focus. This was going to suck, hard.

She gave him a look that told Max she found the idea of him being a lawyer as downright rediculous as he did and then she spoke.

"School wasn't so bad though. There are lots of private schools where I grew up and it was basically the same as regular school."

Max gave a little nod of agreement as he took another bite.

"It wasn't all bad. I mean I got a great education. It was just one of those places where everyone was important or a loser because of who their mom or dad was. I like to judge people for who they are." He said.

She continued with a description of her parents and a smirk crossed Max's face. They sounded nice, supportive. It was a bit of a foreign concept.

"Well of course. They just want what's best for you. My parents do too in their own way. Your folks sound like they get it though, they want you to be happy. That's nice. My parents had my life planned for me before I even got there " He said simply.

"With suits and big poofy, fancy dresses?"

He let out a small chuckle.

"Only the poofiest and fanciest. It was all table manners, proper greetings, and pompous clapping" He said demonstrating with a delicate formal clap as he set his empty plate and can down, " The dancing was nice though. Got me started to be honest. More ballroom than anything else but it worked."

They've go a lot of personality for a large herbivore.

Max looked at her and shrugged, "I'm always down to learn new things. Just don't expect me to wear one of those fancy jokey costumes." He teased.

She seemed to ponder life for a moment and Max rose.

"I think I'm pretty happy with where I am. Especially right now." He said offering his hand, "come on I have a surprise for you."

Quin gave him a murderous glare. Which when given by a woman with sufficient firearm training was not something to be ignored. She asked him a serious of questions and he looked back over at her from behind the wheel.

"Good questions Quin." He said.

He added a small emphasis on the proper use of her name. It was a small gesture of passivity. Sure irritating a friend was all fun, but Max wasn't an idiot.

"We should be good on law enforcement u less we meet some of the higher ups. Dad is a lawyer, but he didn't mess with beat cops. Richmond is big enough we shouldn't be noticed coming into town and they have enough going in to keep them busy without us." He replied.

The girls exchanged quick explanations of their abilities and Noel offered the support with the law and his family. The familiarity with his parents didn't go unnoticed but Max was way past being uncomfortable about Noel having his memories. At first it had felt like he was being spied on, now instead he tried to look at it like he had simply grown up with an invisible sibling. She had his experiences and knowledge and could relate to how things were at home.

"Having my memories can help you get them to talk. You know them well enough to get them talking and can feel them out-" He agreed before being cut off.

They had left the city and were on the highway as the car blew past them. Normally it would simply be what Max considered bad drivers. This car however flew past with a feverish intensity. The car didn't just pass however it got in front of the SUV and began swerving back and forth in the lane ahead of them. Max felt a surge of tension race through him as a man leaned out of the cars back window wearing a ski mask and began shouting back at them.

"What the hell is this?" Max asked.