Intertwined Genes (Griselda Banks + Akira.S)

[Akira.S]

((That's alright I understand))

A lot had changed in two weeks and a lot was the same. Sure, Anna was still an outcast but at least she had Oliver to talk to some of the time. She'd help him catch up sometime, sit in the large drawing room with him and play piano for a few hours while he practiced. It was a good arrangement for the both of them, and they could even go hours without saying a word to each other and still be content. It was a sad relationship but it worked for them. Anna was just glad to know he was getting used to his powers, and even though Jill and some of the other students were starting to close in on him he wasn't becoming too pig headed.

"There's no such thing as normal anymore Oliver..." Anna played with the ends of her top while looking down a while, "everyone has a bit of mutant in them, it's just the genes in us developed and spread a lot faster. Everyone has their defects...it's just people without physical mutations can't see their own faults and just like to find faults in others...." it was almost as if Anna was talking from experience since her voice was very solemn and quiet. "B-But I'm just being metaphorical! don't listen to me." she exclaimed and laughed a little nervously looking up and down the aisle in the bus at the other students.

Over hearing their conversation, Valon decided to have a say since they were in the same group as Anna and Oliver, "I 'ave a suggestion 'hen, why don't we show the bloak the mall." as smart as Valon was he was still an austrailian surfer at heart. Sure, it wasn't surf season and there weren't any waves around since they were in a big city but he still didn't mind shopping for shorts, tanks, flip flops and just general stuff. "Wha' you 'ave to say 'bout that Luke?" he nudged the black boy sitting beside him.  

[Akira.S]

((I had to figure out which post was your most recent one LOL))

When the school bus stopped in the middle of the city’s busiest streets, all the students and few teacher supervisors got off and walked over to a suitable area to be briefed before they let them enjoy their day of freedom. They went over the same rules as they always did, even though students knew most of them by heart, the most important rule being that they weren’t allowed to use their powers unless in a life or death situation. Sometimes it was hard to restrain themselves but for the good of the city and it’s civilians they had to.

So the groups broke off, Anna and Oliver walking behind Valon and Luke towards the City’s megamall. It was a mall, an amusement park, movie theatre, it had a swimming pool, and more than 8 floors to shop on that took up at least three blocks. It was like a maze to those who’d never been before so it was a good idea for them to stick together. Even though the three of the four had been there countless times, it was almost impossible to remember everything without checking a map. Once inside, they looked up and around the large mall entrance seeing hundreds of people walking around with their shopping bags, talking on their cell phones, and listening to their MP3 players.

“You want to sync watches or sumthin’? Best not stay in the mall all day.” Valon pointed out, looking at his black waterproof watch on his left hand.

“I doubt I’ll be spending much time in the mall. Just need to pick up a few summer outfits and shoes.” Anna shrugged while taking out her cell phone from her purse, readying to sync the time with them. It was only about 1:30 in the afternoon so they had plenty of time. They didn’t have to stay together but at least in the same vicinity was good enough. “Luke do you have anything you want to pick up? And were you just going to tag along one side one of us Oliver? Might as well go with Valon since you’re both boys.” Anna turned her deep brown contacted eyes towards the dark skinned boy and asked curiously then looked over to Oliver. She didn’t mind going along and knew how boys and shopping mixed...it’s not like she was an obsessive shopper herself but she still liked to browse a little bit.

((remind again what our plan was....something to do with Magneto’s mutant students causing an accident and then Anna and Oliver or whoever inviting them to see the Xavier school and then something after that? Was it a fight...and then during that fight Anna and Oliver started losing their powers?))  

[Griselda Banks]

((Gah, I'm so sorry it's taking me so long to post all the time. I think I'm trying to do too much at once. I'm going to try rearranging my schedule, and hopefully it'll go better that way.

Yes, the plan was that two Magneto Mutants (lol) would cause some kind of big dangerous accident, and Anna and Oliver would try to use their powers but would find they don't work (or only work very weakly) so they can't protect themselves/other people in danger, so then two other Magneto Mutants come in and save them with their powers. They get to talking, and when they find out that these mutants don't go to Xavier's school, they take them there. I think we were each going to have one mutant doing the damage and one doing the saving, so do you have an idea about what kind of accident they'd do? I was thinking maybe something along the lines of smashing the ceiling or a pillar or something?))

Oliver felt alive as soon as the students dispersed and wandered their own ways throughout the city. As his own group mingled with ordinary townsfolk walking along the streets, Oliver surprised himself at how normal he felt again. It was like he wasn't a mutant at all. Without strange-looking mutants like Gerald all over the place, and without normal-looking mutants goofing off with their powers left and right, he could imagine that nothing had changed except his circle of friends.

He'd never been much of a fan of "hanging out at the mall", but at the moment he didn't really care where he was when surrounded by so many normal people. He looked around himself with surprise when they entered the mall, never having been in a mall that was so huge.

Luke pulled out a cellphone as well, saying, "I was just going to look at a sale on the top floor. So whaddya say we meet back here in an hour?" Then he glanced up at Anna and said with a good-natured smirk, "Or do you need longer than that? Two hours?"

Oliver just nodded at the suggestion that he go with Valon. He enjoyed Anna's company, but he remembered girls like Stephenie back home who insisted on dragging him all over the place when they went shopping, spending hours looking at the same stuff over and over again. He decided he'd rather not find out if Anna was the same.

((So I suppose we'll have to wait until Anna and Oliver get back in the same area before we can do the attack.))  

[Akira.S]

((I honestly thought it was two mutants do the saving and another two on the side working with them are the ones who cause the accident but it doesn’t matter to me.
A pillar or ceiling falling is always classic, I was thinking about blowing up a fountain and having one of them control water or something I dunno lol depends where they are but other than that yeah we’ll just wait until Oliver and Anna are in the same area, that’ll probably take like what 1 post lol))

Luke didn’t have much shopping to do, and since boys never do it wouldn’t take them long to find what they needed. Anna on the other hand still wanted to browse and see what would look nice on her, especially since she had such poor fashion sense as a girl. Thankfully, he suggested giving her two hours, enough to let her browse a floor or two and enough to let them to do something in the amusement park or one of the arcades.

Smiling over at Luke politely she answered.
“Two hours is fine, we’ll meet at the carousel.” Anna turned and motioned towards a large carousel that played annoying childish music.

Putting an alarm on her phone she waved off and walked into the flow of the crowd, slowly getting lost within the shuffle of people.

“She’ll be alrigh’, s’not like she’s not been in this mall before. Alrigh’ fellas! Two hours, plenty of mall and not to mention the amount of cute gals walking around.” Valon nudged Oliver while happily heading off in the direction of the escalator motioning the two to follow. Hopefully they’d all get along, he and Oliver would of course but Luke wasn’t someone he normally hung out with.

~~~

“I’ve got a visual on the girl...and she’s alone. Not much of a looker, she’s so average. Probably wearing contacts to hide the fact she looks like a total alien without them.” A female spoke into a long-range walkie talkie, while holding some binoculars to her eyes and looking down a couple of levels in the mall towards Anna. The mall was so big it wasn’t a surprise it could practically house like spies or terrorist. But they compensated for that by having extra security, police and a lot of segways.

Putting down the binoculars she pulled out a clipboard from the bag she was carrying and flipped through a personal profile on Anna. “How about you, anything on the boy? Maybe he’s got flowers growing where ever he steps.” She laughed into the walkie talkie while still watching Anna from a distance, making sure she didn’t lose sight of her.  

[Griselda Banks]

(( sweatdrop Sorry, we had a guest over the weekend so I haven't been able to get on for several days. What I meant was that there would be two mutants saving and two causing the accident. I'm just saying that I think it's a good idea if we each have one of each - like, you have one character saving and one causing the accident, and the same for me. Does that make sense?

Ooh, and blowing up a fountain sounds good razz If you don't mind, I'd like to have the water-controlling character, unless you already had somebody in mind, of course.))

Oliver watched Anna disappear into the crowd, then followed the other guys to the escalator. He squinted up, trying to count the floors, and for a moment he thought he saw someone peering through binoculars - at him. He blinked, did a double-take, and scanned the railing a couple floors up, but he decided he must have imagined it, because whoever it was could no longer be seen. Sheesh, he chided himself. Don't let your imagination get away with you like that, or you'll make those potted plants shoot everywhere. He narrowed his eyes at the tree in a large pot that sat next to the top of the escalator, wondering if it was real or just plastic. He hoped for the latter, personally.

But here he was again, worrying over his powers. Today was a day to be normal, like all the other normal teenagers thronging through the mall. Luke broke away from the others to go on up to the top floor, shaking off their offers to come along. "I'm just looking at ultraviolet lamps," he said, giving no explanation for what he planned to do with them, and set off whistling a cheerful tune.

Oliver raised his eyebrows at Valon as they walked past several shops with mannequins wearing odd clothes that were supposed to be fashionable. "Does he ever explain what he means?"

----------

"Would you get serious already?" Another girl asked with a roll of her eyes, switching her own walkie-talkie to her other hand and putting her binoculars to her eyes again, scanning the crowds below. She lowered her voice and snapped, "We're about to pull off a dangerous, illegal mission; I don't appreciate your jokes right now."

She locked onto the boys again. Three of them, but she was mainly interested in the new one. Gullible, by the looks of it. Man, he looked like a wimp. Even more of a wimp with a power like growing flowers. This would be pretty easy; he looked like such a pushover. Suddenly the boy looked up and peered in her direction. With a gasp, she drew back next to the pillar.

"Oh, crap, I think he saw me." Well, thankfully she wasn't the one going out in the open. She just had to start the chaos, and the others would do the rest.  

[Akira.S]

((No yeah that’s fine you could be the water-controlling character, I’ll think of another sort of power for the other bad person. And yeah 2 people doing the damage and 2 people saving, sounds good to me, I just got confused with your choice of words sorry))

Valon continued walking off with the two boys, heading up the sets of escalators until Luke decided he wanted to hang out somewhere else and check out some ultraviolet lights or something like that. He didn’t think too much of it, everyone was entitled to do something different with their spare time. And as long as they were in the same area and got on the bus at the same time there was nothing wrong with it.

So, waving him off he continued off with Oliver as he asked if Luke ever really explained what he was talking about. Shaking his head the Australian teen walked into a surfer kind of store and began browsing. “Don’t worry ‘bout him, e’s just got different interests is all. Relax, ‘alk around the floor if you like, I’ll be ‘ere for quite some time, no worries mate.”

It was so odd that someone like Valon had the power of photographic memory, looking the way he did. You’d think he’d be some sort of like pro surfer or something like that, but the power didn’t necessarily have to reflect the person as in Oliver’s case.

~~~

Sitting down on the ground, still holding her walkie talkie the girl sigh to herself, “You’re so like serious about this mission while Mickey and I are the ones who have to go in there. If anyone finds out anything we’re screwed.”

“Hey Tanya, here.” A taller and rather good looking male with lightly tanned skin, dark black hair, black work out shirt, jacket, jeans and biker gloves, held out a coffee drink for the girl sitting down on the ground.

Putting the walkie talkie on her lap, Tanya, the blonde, pale skinned, blue eyed, fashionable girl with a white toque, accepted the drink and sipped it slightly. “You’re damn lucky I can reheat this in my hands Mickey...that took you like 15 minutes or something.”

“So you’ve found her right? What about the guy?” he said taking the clip board from her lap and looking over Anna’s file.

~~~

After about one and a half hours, Anna had finished her shopping in that part of the mall, having luckily found most of what she needed in a few larger stores than having to browse individual stores through the entire level she was looking out. She’d come out with a couple of large bags but nothing too overwhelming. Realizing she was a tad bit early she decided to sit by the fountain near the water park in the mall. There was no way the guys were early and were probably in the food court eating or something that guys did.

Looking around the area a bit, Anna caught sight of a food stall and decided to at least get a bottle of water to drink while waiting that last half hour. She wasn’t starving herself but she at least wanted to wait until she grouped up with the others to eat. It’s not every day they got real world food...now she was hoping that they hadn’t been eating.  

[Griselda Banks]

(( sweatdrop Yeah, sometimes I forget that people can't read my mind! Sorry for the confusion. So are you doing both of the characters who do the saving?))

"Right, I'll just check out the floor for a bit," Oliver said, leaving Valon to his surfboards and brightly-printed shorts. The stereotypical Australian surfer, that was Valon. Sticking his hands into his pockets, Oliver strolled around the floor, taking his time looking into various windows to see what kind of shops they had here.

From time to time, Oliver looked around at the crowds of people passing him. The mall was busy, since it was the weekend, filled with mothers pushing strollers, little kids begging their parents to buy something or let them go on the carousel three floors below them, teenagers walking in packs and talking loudly. Normal. It was all so wonderfully normal.

He'd almost made it all the way around the floor - he could see the flashing sign of the surfing shop - when he heard his name being called and turned to see Luke striding up to him, two large and rather heavy-looking bags in tow. "Where's Valon?" he asked when he came alongside Oliver.

"I left him in that shop over there." Oliver pointed.

"Then let's see if we can pull him away from his surfboards," Luke said with a grin, and they set off.

Oliver surreptitiously glanced over at his companion, feeling rather short and skinny (and very white) when compared to such an imposing figure. "So...did you get your lamps?" he asked tentatively, hoping to make small talk.

"Yup. Bargain basement price." Then they passed a video store and Luke paused to laugh at a large poster for the next Spider-Man movie. "Those crack me up," he chuckled as they moved on. "Totally unrealistic."

Oliver grinned. The more time he spent around Luke, the more comfortable he felt. "So why'd you get those ultraviolet lamps? Wanting to get a tan?"

"Not with skin like this, brother!" Luke nudged him with a dark elbow. "Nah, I'm gonna set them up in my room and turn them on when I sleep." And without explaining why anyone would want to shine bright light on themselves when they were trying to go to sleep, he stepped into the shop and stood on tiptoe to see if he could find Valon.

----------

"Which is why you should be more serious," Aria snarled through gritted teeth in response to Tanya's remark. She made her quick way along the railing, keeping an eye on the boy while making sure to stay out of his line of sight. "He's meeting up with that black guy," she announced to the others. "Now they're going into the shop...."

She nearly ran into the broad-shouldered girl standing in front of her, then brought herself up just in time. "Garnet," she said in surprise, "what are you doing here? I thought you were in position."

Garnet's only response was to shrug her muscular shoulders and stare stolidly back at Aria. Her face was like granite, her square jaw unmoving, her small dark eyes like glittering black stones, her close-cropped brown hair almost seeming to stick out in spikes around her head.

Aria rolled her eyes. "Well, come on, then. Help me keep an eye on Flower Boy."  

[Akira.S]

((I thought we agreed to play one each, but reading my post I can see why you thought that! SORRY! That was an accident; I didn’t mean to say that! SORRY SORRY! Mickey is supposed to go in and Tanya is spying! I meant to say Mickey and your other character or whoever was supposed to go in and she’s supposed to watch and cause mayhem that was totally my fault! I apologize))

While in the surfer shop, Valon was already paying for a couple of things, but not too man. A couple of shorts, flip flops and tops nothing too special. There weren’t any real places to surf back in the city so he had to make do with the pool and simulation. He seemed to be spending a lot of time talking with some of the sales representatives in the stores about Australia and what not, before he noticed Luke and Oliver waiting for him. Waving off and carrying his bags he walked off to meet the other two, noticing Oliver didn’t get anything yet.

“What’s the matter Oliver? Didn’t find anythin’ you like?” that would be a major surprise since this mall had everything for everyone.

They had a good amount of time left before they had to meet Anna and they had to think about what to do if they weren’t going to continue shopping. “Still early...we should go do somethin’, I doubt Anna’s goin’ to be there, and you should tell us where to go Oliver. You been so quie’ this entire mornin’.”

~~~

Tanya was sipping her drink while watching Anna just sit on her own and stare into space. It would be the perfect opportunity to strike now, except Mickey was there and apparently, through the walkie talkies, she figured out that Garnet was now with Aria instead of in position. “I suggest the two of you head down or something and maybe attack Anna on your own. She’s so vulnerable right now so hopefully...Oliver will come on over and help or something. This is taking way too long...” Tanya rolled her eyes and looked over at Mickey who was just staring down the railway at Anna.

He seemed to be interested in her – at least as a target and not as a potential girlfriend. Tanya would kill him if he liked anyone else. Either way, it’s not like he had eyes for anyone else other than her, this was just another mission to him and the sooner he got it over and done with the better. “The others will come if we attack her alone. We have to make sure the two of them are alone or they could cause interference.”  

[Griselda Banks]

(( sweatdrop Wow, this is turning out way more confusing than it's worth. Okay, so Tanya and Garnet are attacking, and Mickey and Aria are going to save them? Have I got that right now?))

Oliver shrugged. "I'm always quiet," he mumbled, then looked around for an idea about where they could go. "We could check out the arcade down there, if you guys have any quarters." He pointed to the flashing lights that indicated the arcade on the ground floor, where they could hear the boisterous teenagers even from up here.

Luke shrugged. "I'm game - pun intended."

-----

"Garnet, just get into position, okay?" Aria hissed irritably, hurrying along the railing as she lost sight of Flower Boy for a minute, then found him again with the other guys, heading down an escalator. She quickly held the walkie-talkie to her mouth and said, "Okay, I think they're going all the way down. Maybe they'll meet up now and we can actually do it."

The girls hurried down a set of stairs, moving faster than the escalator since most people crowded on the escalator instead. As they hurried on down, Garnet finally spoke. "We should make a diversion first," she said in her bland, flat voice. "Draw the other guys away while we go for our targets."

"Yeah, good idea," Aria said shortly, finally stepping off the stairs and easily blending into the crowds of people. "Mickey, you better get your butt down here if you want a piece of the action."  

[Akira.S]

Tanya had to drag Mickey down a couple of levels while talking on the walkie talkies with the other two. The four boys seemed to be heading down to the main level, but whether or not they were going to regroup with Anna was what they weren’t sure of.

When she heard that they needed a diversion to split some of them up Tanya thought it was best she step in. It’d be a lot easier than Garnet breaking things....or people. “Let me handle the distraction, Mickey’ll meet you guys near the amusement park okay.” The blonde looked at her partner/boyfriend and punched him in the arm before heading off towards some empty hall which were usually only for washrooms and employees.

Making sure no one was around she made it to a maintenance room sort of place and just by touching the padlock, melted the circuits so she could go into the unauthorized room. Making sure no one was in there as well, she made to some sort of large floor electrical cage where a lot of wires ran. Not necessarily the main one but anyone would do. “A little distraction coming right up...” cracking her knuckles slightly she held as many of the cables as possible with her bare hands while sending heat through her body and into them. It took a couple of minutes but their circuits and wirings began to fry and once they were all melted a couple of sections in the malls power went out.

Signs, computer systems, banks, lights, a lot of things just went kaput. The mall was very large but it was still a big deal that a very large portion just suddenly shut down.

“Perfect.” Running out of the electrical cage, Tanya left the room before anyone had come to notice, pretending she was drinking some water from the fountain by the girl’s washroom so she wouldn’t seem suspicious.

~~~

“What the ‘ell...” Just before the guys reached the arcade they noticed all the machines in the arcade suddenly shut down. But it wasn’t just the arcade, that entire area in the mall just went dark if not for the sunlight pouring in from outside. “Okay that’s just weird, why’d all the lights just go out?” Valon asked himself while the other people around them started to question what was going on. “Maybe we should go check it out or somethin’?”  

[Griselda Banks]

((This didn't come out exactly the way I'd planned, but I think it works.))

The boys came to an abrupt halt when the entire mall powered down. Only the lights by the emergency exits, which ran on their own backup electrical system, seemed to be working. Several screams echoed throughout the mall, but Oliver thought they sounded more like surprised screams than ones of pain, which was a relief. It wasn't that dark in the middle part, because of the skylights, but the individual shops were pretty dark. He could hear the sounds of cursing and squabbling coming from the teenagers in the arcade as they tried to make their way out and kept on running into each other.

Luke stood frozen, though his face was too shadowed for Oliver to make out what expression was on his face. But he almost thought Luke looked as though he was weighing the options. Finally the tall boy raised his head and looked at Valon. "Yeah, we should see if we can find a security guard or something. Maybe they'll get things up and running soon and-"

"Anna?" Oliver had been looking around at the confused bustle of people trying to find each other, many of them heading for the exits with varying speeds and levels of fear. He thought he saw Anna near the fountain, which had shut off, and he raised his arm to wave, but then realized she wouldn't be able to distinguish him in all the confusion. "Hey," he said to his friends, "I'm going to go get Anna, okay?"

"Right!" Luke raised a hand in acknowledgment as he set off in the direction of an information desk. Oliver hurried in the other direction, keeping his eyes pinned on the form he thought was Anna. The last thing he needed was to lose her in the dim confusion.

But because he was looking only at her, he didn't notice the large pillar cracking loose and falling in his direction....

-----

The darkness and confusion provided the perfect cover for what Aria and Garnet had planned back home before they'd set out on this mission. Hurrying behind a pillar aligned with where the girl stood, Aria quickly snapped her wrist in the special gesture she used to get her powers working. High-pressure water shot from her fingertips at the floor and bounced upward; Garnet put one foot on top of it and Aria quickly intensified the amount of water pouring out. This shot Garnet upwards to the top of the pillar, where the large girl punched the concrete. With a satisfying crack, the top of the pillar broke away from the ceiling and the tall pillar began to fall.

There were enough pillars that the second floor didn't collapse immediately, though if people kept thundering over it, that might not be the case for long. People screamed as the pillar toppled over, and Aria quickly let Garnet down again with a splash onto the wet stones. Then Aria darted out from the shadows to do her part.  

[Akira.S]

((I'm not feeling very well so it'll take me a bit to post. I'll PM you when it's up >3<))  

[Griselda Banks]

((No prob! Hope you feel better soon!))  

[Akira.S]

((It's not very good but I tried, my brain is still scattered))

While standing the crowd of people by the carousel, the children were helped off by their parents and security for safety measures and told to stay calm. Of course that wasn’t an issue since Anna was trained for situations like this, but a large part of the mall going out at once...really? It was probably a mutant or something. This was one of those times she wished she didn’t split up with the others, but either way it’s not like they were allowed to use their powers unless for DYING emergencies.

Looking around while there was still light from outside coming into the mall to help them see, but while looking out to see if she could find the others, Anna noticed some pillars on the second floor breaking and coming down. There was one pillar in particular that was coming down on a figure in the distance that looked like Oliver. Panicking slightly Anna ran over as fast as she could to try and push him out of the way.

“OLIVER! LOOK OUT!” she cried, not sure if he could hear her through all the screaming.

Before Anna could get there to save Oliver from that certain pillar, another man dashed out passed her towards Oliver and the others in the crowds and pulled Oliver’s head down while holding his hand up above him. As the pillar came tumbling down it slowly started to disappear, as if an invisible shield above his head sucked it in like a vacuum.

Running over to catch up with Oliver, Anna embraced him, thankful that nothing happened (in a friend like manner of course). She turned to the mysterious other boy who saved him and thanked him, definite that he was a mutant. “Where are the others, I thought they’d be with you?” she asked after releasing her friend from a FRIENDLY embrace.