Baby steps

[Warren Worthington III]

The man trailing him tries to go unnoticed at first, becoming more obvious as Warren approaches his target. He finds that funny... the furtive sidling from alley to alley had been far more noticable (to his senses, anyway) than the supposedly more blatant casual stride that followed it. The man's friends waiting in the alleyway are also pretty obvious, and for a moment Warren isn't sure who he's supposed to notice and who is supposed to be hidden.

His follower clears up that confusion by calling out as Warren approaches the alley mouth. "Yo, mutie! Wingman! Wanna talk t'you!" The voice is belligerent, contemptuous, difficult to ignore. Fortunately Warren has no intention of ignoring it... he's been wandering this area making a target of himself for an hour in the hopes of hearing one like it.

He turns and pastes his most pleasant, vacuous smile on his face as he recognizes the snake tattoo from Colleen's description. This is the guy, then. "Yes? Can I help you?"

"Damn right y'help me. Y'start by handin' over yo' wallet, man... figger a rich mutie like you carries plenty of green." Tattoo-guy shows a knife and what is no doubt supposed to be an intimidating smile, and Warren does his best to look intimidated as he takes a step towards his would-be assailant and the other four approach him, ostensibly sneakily, from behind.

It's a remarkable thing, really. If he walked around with two extra arms, six feet long and muscled like a body builder's, nobody would mess with him... never mind that the sheer amount of force it takes to push his body through the air is more than any bodybuilder could ever dream of. But because they're wings, with feathers on them, nobody ever thinks of them as weapons. It's like they think they're in a comic book, or something.

Not that he's complaining... it makes his task easier. One relatively gentle sweep is all it takes to render the four thugs behind him unconscious. He stops his wings short an inch from Tattoo-guy's head, though, letting the clap of air daze him as he grabs the back of his collar and launches them both into the air. He needs the man conscious.

By the time his would-be attacker recovers they are a quarter-mile in the air and rising fast. "All right, scary scary man... now it's time for you to help me. Specifically, by telling me everything you remember about Colleen Mackey." At the confused look on his face, Warren adds "Well, I guess her name wouldn't mean much to you, but you'd remember her. Mutant. Red skin. Tail. Hooves. No powers... nothing to speak of, anyway. Not enough to fight off you and your friends. Not enough to keep you from assaulting her. Raping her. Leaving her for dead. Sound familiar now?"

Warren isn't sure what he'd expected. Certainly he isn't naive enough to expect guilt, is he? After everything he's been through that would be too much, to still expect human feelings from scum like this. But he is surprised when tattoo-guy laughs and spits. "Oh... yeah, little red girl. Yeah, I remember her, she was tiiiiiiiiii...!" The last of whatever he was going to say is lost when Warren drops him, and he doesn't care... all he'd wanted was the confirmation.

Well, no. He wanted the look on tattoo-guy's face as he plummets towards the concrete half a mile below. As he faints in mid-air. As he wakes up in a jail cell. He wants to see Colleen's face as she gets to accuse him in court... though he's afraid of her face if he walks. Which, he has to admit to himself, he might.

The truth is, he wants to see Tattoo-Guy hit the ground. But he's not going to do that. Not today, anyway. That's not what X-Men do.

Instead, he contents himself, when he returns to his room, with writing back to Colleen's mother. He doesn't admit to anything specific, but he tells her enough. Maybe it'll make her feel better. Probably not, though.

He's not sure why they write to him... the victims, their families, their friends. He's not sure what they expect from him. He does what he can, which is never very much. Pay some bills here, arrange for some professional assistance there... it doesn't amount to much. Finding Colleen's rapist was more than he's managed to do in a long time.

He's not sure why he did it, either. It's not part of being an X-Man, that much he knows... he suspects they wouldn't approve, if they found out. They're already uncomfortable with his public profile, he doesn't want to think about their reaction to his becoming a mutant vigilante. That sounds more like the Brotherhood's gig... and that's not a thought he's ready to entertain for more than a moment.

Then he sits on the roof of the boathouse, with a bottle of gin and a glass of ice and a void bigger than the sky that no amount of gin, no amount of superheroics, no amount of anything is ever going to fill, and waits for the sun to rise, and tries not to think about how pointless it all was.

Baby steps, he tells himself.

He wishes it were raining... if it were, he could tell himself the moisture on his cheeks was just the rain. He could pretend that he really is the confident Golden Boy everyone thinks he is. He could tell himself it was all going to be OK, and he might even believe it.

Baby steps.

[rileyfletcher]

Riley was in bed sleeping, but then she woke up. She didn't know why, but once she looked at her clock and noticed what time it was, she wished that she was still alseep. She rolled over and tried to fall back to sleep but couldn't. So she soon got herself out of bed and walked around her room a bit. She went over to her window and looked outside, noticing it was still dark. Why on earth am I awake?

Riley decided to go outside for a walk. So she got dressed into her ripped jeans and white tank top. Once she was dressed, she quietly walked through the mansion, so she wouldn't wake anyone up. Soon she got to the door to get outside and opened it quietly, and quickly slipped outside. Riley quickly walked far away from the mansion. As soon as she was quite far from it, she slowed down her pace.

Riley looked around to see if anyone else was up and decieded where to head too. She didn't see anyone, so she began to walk towards the lake. Once she was at the lake, she looked out across it. After standing there for a bit, she decided to walk towards the boathouse. As soon as she turned to head for it, she noticed someone sitting on top of it. I wonder what he is up too? Riley continued on heading for the boat house.

As soon as Riley was getting near to it, she noticed that he was crying and was holding a bottle of gin. She waited until she was right by the boat house before sayding anything. "Are you alright?" she asked him. She looked up at him, waitting for a response.

[Warren Worthington III]

> "Are you alright?"

Warren startles at the voice and almost drops the bottle, catching and righting it on the roof with a wingtip.

He wasn't expecting company out here this late at night... though, now that he thinks about it, he has no idea why. Nobody at the Institute seems to keep any saner hours than he does.

He thinks about the question far longer than Riley probably intended him to, considering different possible answers.

For example: No, and neither are any of the rest of us, but we sure do fake it well, huh?
Or: Yeah, I'm considering taking up getting shitfaced and sentimental as a hobby. Beats knitting.
Or: No, but damn you should see the other guy!

But they all sound pretty stupid, even to him.

Finally it occurs to him that trying to have an internal private monologue while talking to a telepath isn't the cleverest thing he's ever done, and he rolls up a little shakily to his feet. (Warren made a point of reading the Institute's available files about all the students and faculty, much as he always had at his father's offices. It always helps to know who you're dealing with.)

"I'm fine... or anyway, I will be. It's Riley, right? I'm Warren. Sorry we haven't had a chance for a real introduction yet... it's nice to actually meet you. " He gives her his best charm-school smile and raises the glass in his hand in a kind of greeting, noting that it has noticably less ice in it than it did when he first got here.

"Care for a drink? I know you probably think it's too early, but you're wrong... it's actually way past late enough."

[rileyfletcher]

Riley noticed that she startled him as soon as she spoke to him. She wasn't sure if she should go and leave him alone, since it was so late at night and thought that he wanted to be alone, but thought it would be quite rude to just leave after asking him a question. So she stayed and waited for him to respond.

It took awhile for him to respond, but he finally did. She was a bit surprised that he knew her name. She began to wonder how he knew and why he hadn't started saying that Riley is a weird name for a girl and wasn't it for a boy, but he didn't. She looked at him for a second. "Yeah my name is Riley. Nice to meet you Warren." she told him with a smile.

He then offered her a drink and she thought about it for a second. "Sure, it wouldn't hurt. I haven't had a drink for awhile." she told him. She thought that she might as well join him ontop of the boat house. So her pure white wings came out of her back, and with out any effort, she fly up ontop of the roof of the boat house beside Warren. Once she had landed, she had her wings return into her back. "So how did you know my name? Are you teleapathic or something?" Riley ask him, a bit curious.

[Warren Worthington III]

Warren shrugs and grins. "Couldn't you tell, if I was?"

His eyes widen a bit at Riley's wings. "I like that... retractable. That would be... convenient." He sits back down on the roof as she lands, propping himself up in a relaxed slouch with his wings against the tiles.

"Anyway... no, I'm not a telepath. I'm just probably the only guy around here who actually reads those "Welcome the new students" memos the management send around. There aren't that many of us, after all."

He grins again, pouring some gin into his glass and handing it to her. "Besides, it's hard to forget the most attractive girl in school, even if there were thousands of students. And right now there's only the two of us, right? So... what brings you out to the lake at this time of night, Riley?"

Part of him leans back, watching himself flirt. It's practically second nature at this point, the best way he knows to put new people at ease and see what they're actually made of. But it's also a little bit scary, each time, never quite knowing what reaction he's going to get from each new person.

[rileyfletcher]

Riley tilted her head a bit to his question. She thought for a second about it. "Well no, not really." she told him truthfully.

Riley looked at Warren and noticed that his eyes widen a bit at the site of her wings. She smiles at him as he siad that he liked the retractable wings. "Yeah, they do come in handy, but of course there is a down fall to them. Having wings going in and out of your back isn't the most painless thing." she told him. It was very true, and everytime she brought out her wings or put them back in, there was always a lot of pain with it, but never showed it. She watched him as he got himself comfortable sitting there on the roof and she looked over at his wings and smiled to herself. Riley was quite glad that she wasn't the only one around here that had wings.

Riley smiled, knowing that he wasn't a telepath, incase he could hear some of her thoughts, that she prefered only her to know. She also nodded her head in agreement that there really isn't many of them around here. "Really? I never knew that there were memos being handed out about new students. I guess they missed me or something, but I have been around here for awhile. The Professor was the one who brought me here, but it's really sad that he isn't around any more." she said, and at the end she looked down at the tiles of the roof. Memories were flooding back, but she had to quickly clear them, incase her powers started acting up and she didn't wasnt Warren to get hurt.

Riley soon looked back up at Warren and took the glass of gin that he handed her. She then took a sip from it and smiled at him. She then listened to him, and raised an eye brow, when he was saying it was hard to forget the most attractive girl in school, and she laughed slightly. "Well aren't you the chramer." she told him with a smile. "Well, I heard that you were going to be out here, and I had to come and see what all the girls were talking about was true. and they were right, you are the hottest guy around here." she told him with a smile. Of course it wasn't true, but she wanted to see his reaction to it.

Riley deiceded to lean back a bit, and was resting on her elbows. She looked over at Warren and smiled. She could tell that he was in a good and flirty mood, so she decided to go along with it, to keep him in that mood and have fun with it.

[Warren Worthington III]

Warren nods sympathetically at the comment about pain. "Yeah, I can imagine." He does wonder how it compares to keeping wings squashed up in a harness for six years, but he doesn't ask... playing I'm-more-angst-ridden-than-you seems like a popular passtime around the Institute but Warren stays out of it, usually. Not much point to it anyway.

Besides, it's clear she's angsty enough over Xavier's death. As is everybody else around here. No surprise, really... he was a kind of father-figure to all of them, and from what he's picked up from records and conversations he was obviously a pretty impressive guy.

He goes through the ritual dance... the drink, the exchange of compliments, the little laughs and suggestive smiles... on autopilot, almost, as she recovers from her grief. Or at least suppresses it. And he wonders if that's such a great thing. He knows a little something about suppressing strong emotions, and what happens when you try, and it occurs to him that they're probably both pretending to be in better spirits than they actually are, and how dumb that is.

So he lets the compliment go by with nothing but an amused grin, lets the flirtiness drop and the silence grow a little, nods seriously. "Yeah... from everything I hear, he was quite a guy. I'm sorry I never got to know him, or Scott, or Jean." That last part, he has to admit, was a lie... he saw her in action at Alcatraz and he's not ashamed to admit she scared him silly. He's sorry she's dead, of course, but he's just as glad never to have met her.

"I bet you really miss them, huh?"

[rileyfletcher]

Riley took another sip of gin and looked down at the tiles of the roof. She didn't want the memories to start flashing through her mind. She had enough of them and always getting her into some sort of trouble with her powers. SHe never knew why, but everytime she thought about the past, and a bunch of emotions go through her, her powers act up.

After a couple of minutes she lookd up at him. "Yeah, I do miss them. They were like family to me, since I never did have a family. The Professor always believed in you, even when you didn't believe in yourself. He also helped me alot with my powers, so I could control them and use them whenever I pleased. Scott was a very good leader, and you could always count on him to know what to do, if your in trouble. And Jean, she was the most caring person I had ever met. If you needed someone to talk to about a problem, you could always go to her and she would help you through it. They were all really good teachers and I looked up to all of them." she told Warren.

Riley then looked out across the lake, feeling her emotions mixing again, but tried not to show it and let it take over her. She then looked back down at the tiles on the roof. "Once they passed away, I felt my world crashing. That's when I really started to cause quite a bit of trouble with out meaning to. When the Professor died, I lost control of my powers. So now the only thing I do have control over is my healing and my wings. My other powers, I dare not to use, incase I hurt someone." she told him. Riley had no idea why she was telling him this, but it just seemed to come out. She had never told anyone about this before, and couldn't stop herself now. A tear rolled down her face remembering them, but she quickly wiped it away.

Riley looked up and out across the lake, for a few moments, then looked over at Warren. "I'm sorry you never got a chance to really know them. You would have really loved them." she said to him with a slight smile.

[Warren Worthington III]

Warren listens carefully, nodding sympathetically.

So, OK, yes, it's an angstfest... but it beats spending an hour on the roof telling each other pretty lies and hoping to score. He gets enough of that on the outside, he really doesn't need it in here.

"Yeah. I guess I would have." He reserves judgement about Jean, though... Riley's description just doesn't match the woman he saw on Alcatraz, the woman Logan killed. Maybe she just wasn't herself that day. Or maybe telepaths stick together. Either way he doesn't need to bring it up right now.

"Anyway, thanks for telling me that." He shrugs slightly, not really intending to, wondering if he should offer his life story in exchange. He decides not to... she hasn't asked, and in any case it isn't very interesting. Besides, there's something he's been curious about for a while, that maybe Riley can tell him.

"So... you've been around for a while, maybe you can tell me. What was the plan, before Xavier and the others died? I mean, it's great that you guys all have someplace safe... or, well, kinda safe... and God knows I needed this place when I came here... but there had to be more to it than just hiding out and training, didn't there? I mean, don't you... don't we have some kind of plan to do something?"

[rileyfletcher]

Riley listened to Warren as he asked her a question. She guessed that he had been thinking about it for a while, and finally decided to ask someone about it. She looked out across the lake to think about it. She remembered asking the Professor a smiliar question.

"Well, from what I can remember, we were trying to get mutants together, to learn about their powers and able to control them, so they stay and live amungst the humans. Also the Professor and Jean were working together to get the government to help out the mutants and make a law to get humans and mutants to live together in peace in harmony, but it hasn't worked just yet." she told Warren. She remembered hearing about it and seen it a couple of times, but it was always rejected.

Riley then looked back at Warren. "Also we have been mostly trying to keep the Brotherhood in line and not allow them to hurt or kill the humans. That has mostly taken up most of our time and attention." she told him. She remembered the fights they had with the Brotherhood, but the biggest fight they had with them was at Alcatraz. That was the year that the Professor, Scott, and Jean (but at the time her darker side took over her and called herself Phonix) had died.

[Warren Worthington III]

It's a good answer, actually. Training, working the legislative angle, keeping the terrorists from doing anything too awful... that all sounds pretty good. But he still feels disappointed, like he was expecting something more, and he doesn't really know what he was expecting.

After all, what has he been doing? Going on talk shows, beating up streetpunks, throwing money around... sure, it's something, but he's not in any position to give the Institute flak for being ineffectual.

Maybe he just liked the look on that punk's face when the sidewalk came rushing up at him a little more than he really wants to admit.

"Sure. That makes sense, I guess. And yeah, I saw the Brotherhood in action at Alcatraz. That stunt with the bridge was impressive. Weird, but impressive." He shakes his head. "Fighting that crowd doesn't seem like it'd be any fun at all."

And suddenly he has no idea why he's sitting on a dark rooftop with a pretty girl talking about mutant firefights and political activism, so he looks her over more carefully, smiling appreciatively. "So, the Institute is all the family you have, then? That must be..." a relief, he thinks to himself, remembering the chat with Dear Old Dad he still needs to have some day, but says "...hard for you. Have you made any..." he grins "...special friends here?"

[rileyfletcher]

Riley listened to Warren as he told her that he was there at Alcatraz and saw what had happened. He also said that he was quite impressed with had Magneto had done with the bridge and fighting the crowd of mutants wouldn't have been fun. Riley shook her head. "No it definatly wouldn't have been fun." she said to him.

At the corner of her eye, she noticed that was looking her over very carefully and she turned her head to look at him. She then heard him saiding that is must be hard for her, cause of the way the Institute was going. "It can be hard some times, but mostly everything is alright." she told him. She then smiled at him and he asked her if she made any special friends. Right away Riley knew what he was meaning by it. "Well I have friends here, but their nothing more then that." she told him with a smile.

Riley took a few more sips of the gin that she had in her hand. "How about you? Do you have any special friends?" she asked him. She began to study him a bit and waited for a reply to her question that she had asked him. She looked at his wings for a bit, finding them amazing, and his wings looked almost exactly like her's. She then looked back into Warren's eyes.

[Warren Worthington III]

> "How about you? Do you have any special friends?"

He grins at the question, then grins a little broader as he catches her checking out his wings. Great minds think alike, I guess, he thinks, and he ruffles his feathers a little to show he noticed.

"No... not really. Nobody really special."

Not that he's been sleeping alone much since he went public, granted, but if she hasn't been reading the tabloids he's not going to be the one to bring it up. It's hard to believe it's only been a few months since Alcatraz, it feels like he's lived his whole life since then.

She catches his eyes then, and he stares back into hers, and wonders how far he really wants to take this.

She's certainly attractive, and apparently unattached, and seems nice enough, and she probably isn't after him for his money or because of some mutant fetish, which puts her head and shoulders (and wings!) above the "Angel Fan Club".

And she's a fellow student... or, well, she hangs out around the Institute, anyway. Actually, he's not sure what her status is, now that he thinks about it more carefully. She just seems to be around. Still, she's not an outsider, and that's increasingly important to him these days. Not that he's prejudiced against humans or anything, but it's just easier to relax around other mutants.

And there's the wings. He's never met anyone else with wings. He wonders if hers are as sensitive along the inner membranes as his. That'd be... interesting. Well, OK, actually, that'd be totally hot.

And it'd be nice to have a steady girl. The hookups at raves and clubs and the one-night stands are great... OK, to be honest, they're amazing... but it'd be nice to wake up with someone he's likely to see again some time.

Geez, he thinks. What the hell is wrong with me? At this rate I'll be picking out china patterns and naming our first kid before the sun rises. Must be the gin talking... I'm getting maudlin.

He shakes his head, as if to clear it, and adds a bit too quickly "Truth is, I'm not really looking for a 'special friend' right now. Just looking to have some fun, you know?" He lets his smile go a little wicked, then looks over at the lake. "Fancy a swim?"

[rileyfletcher]

When Warren ruffles his feathers, Riley smiled at him, and blushed a bit. She knew right away that he had noticed her looking at his wings. She noticed that he didn't mind her looking at his wings at all.

She nodded her head as she listened to Warren, while he told her that he didn't have anyone special either. After he told her about that, there was a long pause, with no one speaking. She continued to look into Warren's eyes, and could tell that he was thinking a lot about something, but she had no idea what. Riley would usually use telepathy to find out, but since she had no control of it, she just kept herself wondering.

After what had seemed like a long time, even though it was only a couple of minutes, Warren shook his head and began to talk to her again. Riley then seen his smiled changed a bit and he looked out over the lake, then asked her if she wanted to swim. She looked out at the lake for a moment and then back at him. "Sure, I wouldn't mind going for a swim." she said to him with a smile.

She didn't have her bikini on, but that was alright. It wasn't her first time to do something like this. "You don't mind if I just go in my under garments do you?" she asked him, with a bit of a mischevious smile. Riley knew right away he wouldn't mind, but she thought that she should ask just in case and before she began to take off her clothes.

[Warren Worthington III]

> "You don't mind if I just go in my under garments do you?"
> she asked him, with a bit of a mischevious smile.

Warren's smile goes impish in response, and he kicks his sandals off as he gets up again.

"You can, if you want..." A twist of his shoulders and the proper flex of his wings pops open the snaps across the shoulder blades and down the back of his custom-made shirt, and it slides to the rooftop as he shrugs his way out of it. He'd worked the design out when he was fifteen, but could never convince his dad to have any made... and what was the point, when he was wearing the damned harness all the time anyway? Once he'd moved out, though, he'd had a few dozen made by a custom tailor, and never regretted it... you couldn't go shirtless all the time.

His smile goes from impish to outright challenging as he undoes his belt and adds "...if you don't mind them getting wet." Pants and boxers drop to his ankles a moment before he runs to the edge of the roof, diving into the air with a few strong wingbeats before pinning them against his sides and sliding through the lake's surface with a barely audible splash.