Fear it's self (Open)

[nathan]

Nathaniel Crane missed his daughter. It had been a few weeks since he had last seen her and he really needed to swing by soon to see her. Maybe bring her a doll or something yeah a little scarecrow doll if he could find one. Something to remind her of her family. Nathaniel smiled softly as he continued to think about his little girl. She was his life. Screams echoed throughout the warehouse that he was experimenting in, his newest victim trembled in fear as he experienced the terror that the fear toxin brings. Deimos took careful notes about the reaction that the toxin caused. Oh dear, he was going for his eyes now. Deimos frowned and kicked the man, when that didn't help he sighed and bent down and tied the man's hands to together.

He continued to watch and make notes about the man being restrained. It was sad really, that people are so trapped by their fear. Deimos smiled when the man stopped screaming, and settled on whimpering. There, all over now, Deimos patted the man on the head softly.“It's all over now,” He cooed, when the man whined. Deimos had gotten his fill for the night he untied the man and left him there crying because of the after-effects of the fear toxin. “Time to go see my baby.” Nathaniel said cheerfully, left a small syringe of the fear toxin antidote next to the man. If he could ever pull himself out of the pitiful delusions that his mind created he could have the antidote. Deimos packed away his note book and tidied up his space, he bid the man farewell and left the warehouse humming.

Nathaniel's eyes lit up when he heard the man scream again and mad a mental note. The toxin had a second phase. This gave him a reason to try the same toxin twice! Nathaniel smiled again. This was turning out to be a every good day.

[knockout]

Jen was not in a good mood at all. She had gone into New York in the hopes of running into one of her parents, not that she had wanted to argue with them or anything. More to simply see them. It had been a long time since she had seen them even if it had been self imposed that she didn't see her family. However she hadn’t ran into anyone, instead she had nearly gotten a ticket for her car, if she hadn’t flashed the officer a peak down her shirt she most certainly wouldn’t have done, now she was just looking around New York looking for something to do.

She had her ipod on and was listening to her music not really paying attention to anyone around her, after all if they rudely brushed into her and her powers killed them then it was their damn fault. After all she hadn’t asked for her powers, she had been ‘gifted’ with them and therefore she didn't get a choice in it. Not that it seemingly mattered what she wanted and her life had seemingly been mapped out for her, whether she had wanted it or not. She had been walking down the road with her ipod messing up on her when she had to swerve a guy at the last possible second otherwise she would have walked straight into him.

“Sorry,” she said looking up at him. “I wasn’t paying attention, my mind was anywhere else.”

[nathan]

Nathaniel blinked in surprise, he was almost run over a very attractive woman. He shook his head at her apology, “It was my fault, my mind was elsewhere, as well.” He chuckled softly. He straightened himself up and brushed back some of his hair that had fallen, during his 'experiment'. Nathaniel paused, he hadn't tried this new fear toxin on a woman before...should be he try it? Yes, he thought she would be his first female victim of the day. “Since we were both a little scatter brained, maybe some coffee would help clear our minds?” He offered hopefully. He made sure to look as weak and submissive as possible, hopefully the woman would agree.

For a brief moment his thoughts turned to his daughter, he really needed to go see her...but surely she could wait another day? Nathaniel pushed back his feelings of guilt and smile at the woman softly. “Well, what do you say?” Nathaniel let his real hopefulness into the sentence. He was eager to try out the fear toxin. He looked at her, carefully, he wondered what she feared. He was almost giddy with excitement, but first he had to get her to agree to coffee.

[knockout]

Jen could tell that there was something creepy about this guy, she didn't know what but he wasn't completely normal, not that anyone was in this world, but at the same time she could tell that there was something different about him. However she could not prove it after all he had basically only said that he also was scatter brained. Not that instantly made him weird but she just couldn’t shake the feeling that there was something up with this guy. She smiled when he offered the idea of coffee, it hadn’t been what she had been looking for today in the form of a nice guy offering coffee but it wasn’t something that she was going to turn down. However again there was the feeling in the back of her mind that there was something different about this guy.

However it wasn’t like she couldn’t defend herself, her powers would make it easy for her to fight off this guy if she had to, also the fact that one little touch would be able to put him into a coma or even kill him if she had been wanting to, however the fact that she was thinking about these things already showed to her that she wasn’t normal at all because of the fact that she was wanting to kill a guy that she didn't even know that well that was offering her coffee after she had nearly knocked him on his ass.

“Sure,” she said with a smirk and a wink as well as running a hand through her hair “maybe I can help you unscatter your brain?”

[nathan]

Scatterbrained was right, Nathaniel wasn't focused like he should have been. His instincts were shouting at him to leave the girl alone and to go visit Alice, but his inner psychologist was demanding for the sake of knowledge that he test the fear toxin. Deimos demanded it so Nathaniel had no choice but to agree. He smiled happily at her and chuckled when she offered to help nu-scatter his brain. She had no idea just what that would take...Nathaniel though played along. “I think I need all the help I can get.” He told her with a small grin. Nathaniel motioned for her to follow him. “There's a Starbucks, a block over.” He told her adjusting his jacket, Nathaniel frown there was what looked like, blood, he swore mentally. The stupid man had managed to get blood on him. What to do? he wondered. Nathaniel just ignored it, if she said anything he would say he had a nose bleed or something.

“My name is Nathaniel Squires,” He introduced himself, he used his mother's name so she wouldn't recognize him for who he was...Nathaniel never made much of an effort to hide who he was when he was researching. “If I may ask your name?” Names weren't all that important in his research but it was the normal thing to do so he really had no choice but to get to know her. But that brought up the question as to how he was going to get her alone...Nathaniel shrugged mentally he had time. The side walks were not nearly as crowded as they could be. It was 10 am almost everyone was at the office so the two had plenty of room and it also meant that Starbucks wouldn't be full. As they passed an alleyway, Deimos demanded that he just do it there but Nathaniel managed to ignore it. She was a lady and deserved better, he would at least take her back to the warehouse. He was excited, it was almost time.

[knockout]

As this guy was seemingly still hesitating that made Jen even more nervous of him, after all it wasn’t normal for someone to be as distant as this guy was seemingly being. Not that she thought he was meant to be locked up or anything, he was just a little weird, there was nothing wrong with that, however it was at the same time something that she was becoming more wary of because of the fact that it wasn’t exactly normal for him to be doing it, like she knew what normal was. She could tell that there was something up with him and she tightened her right hand into a ball just in case she had to punch him as she was known to have a hell of a right hook according to some of the guys that had gotten on the wrong side of her over the years. “Starbucks is fine,” she said following him.

As she thought back on it, she knew better to prejudge someone as just because this guy was slightly weird that didn't mean that she had to be weary of him, but at the same time that didn't mean that she wouldn’t trust him either. After all there was very little in terms of people that she did trust anymore, not even her own parents where in the list of people that she felt that she could trust them anymore. “Nice to meet you Nathaniel” she said with a smile even though she doubted that it was his real name, she had no way of checking this however. “I am Jennifer D’Ancanto.” She wasn’t exactly lying it was true, but she had used her mom’s surname not her dads. “Now how about we get that coffee?”

[nathan]

Nathaniel nodded while his thoughts drifted elsewhere. He came back to himself when they reached the door and he pulled it open. He was a gentleman, his grandmother demanded it. The coffee shop was fairly empty like he had thought it would be, Nathaniel smiled at the young man behind the counter, and ordered something, he wasn't really paying attention to what. He just needed an excuse to talk to this woman, so eventually he could use her for a test subject. This was not a real, coffee date thing. Nathaniel ignored the fact that he really wanted to just say screw the fear toxin and get to know this nice woman. Alice needed a mother, he mentally bashed himself in the head with a chair, fear toxin, he chanted in his head. FEAR TOXIN!

He waited until she ordered they both got their coffee before walking back outside, and took a seat at one of the small tables provided. He sat his drink on the table, he needed small talk. He was a psychologist(Almost) darn it, he could handle small talk. “So, are you from New York?” It would be easier if she wasn't, it would make her harder to track when the police eventually found her.

[knockout]

Jen could tell that Nathaniel was being somewhat distant but at the same time she wasn’t going to pressure him into telling her his life story, as simply it wasn’t her place to ask, also the fact that if he asked her about her own life story she would most probably make something up, she wasn’t one for spilling her guts and life story to a complete stranger, one because it was a sore subject for her and two the fact that they normally didn't have a damn right to know anything about her, let alone her personal life. Entering the starbucks she let Nathaniel get his coffee first before getting her own, hers was simply a black coffee as she much preferred it to be a strong as it could be, she didn't believe in weakening it with milk and sugar.

Following Nathaniel she sat on the other side of the table to him and began to drink her coffee. She stopped slightly when he asked if she was from new York, she didn't know whether to tell him the truth or not as she was originally from new York but had left a while ago now, she wouldn’t exactly class herself as a new Yorker as a city of residence anymore. “I use to be,” she said “I travel around more now, I am actually living in New Jersey.” She inwardly groaned for telling him that but she figured it would do no harm.

[nathan]

Nathaniel felt a stab of unease...for the first time he began wondering just who he was talking too. Gotham was bad enough by itself but New Yorkers had a whole other fear. Mutants ever since that event happened you never really knew who you were talking too. Could she be a dangerous mutant? There was no doubt in his mind that it was possible, ever so slightly Nathaniel shifted in his seat. His scientific mind was wondering how a mutant would react to his fear toxin, but his normal self preservation oriented mind wondered how she could kill him if she wished. Nathaniel took a drink of his coffee purely for something to do, but he didn't taste the scalding hot beverage.

“I'm from Jersey myself.” Nathaniel offered, he purposely didn't say where in Jersey, Gotham wasn't a happy place. “I'm only in New York on business.” His mind flicked back to the man screaming in the warehouse. Nathaniel took another sip of his coffee, “It's not as bad as I thought it was, New York. I rarely venture out of my home city so I was a little weary of visiting New York.” He laughed slightly at his words and took another drink. Her turn now, he was, mentally, counting the minutes until he tested his fear toxin.

[knockout]

Jen nodded when he said that he was from Jersey, not that it meant anything, lots of people where from Jersey, it didn't actually mean anything at all, it just meant that they lived in the state, it wasn’t like they had said that they had both lived in Gotham, Jen couldn’t remember seeing the guy before hence why she didn't think that he was from Gotham, of course she could have been wrong. She had been in Gotham a little while but not really paid much attention to a lot of the people there, simply because of the fact that she didn't necessarily go out in the day, as she had once heard on TV the freaks only came out at night. Not that she was a freak but at the same time she wasn’t exactly normal so she fell into the topic group of different, plus she was out at night so she supposed she could be seen as a freak because of that.

“Yeah New York is ok I suppose,” she said noncommittally drinking her coffee, she didn't want to give too much about herself simply because she knew very little about this man, therefore she wasn’t going to give away more than she had to do so, not that it mattered too much to her as all she had to do for her to kill him was too touch him and therefore she was never exactly nervous that something could happen to her as she knew that she was more than capable of taking care of herself. “What kind of business.”

[nathan]

She asked about his business, part of him wanted to burst out about how he studied fear and babble on about that but he knew that would be a major red flag. Women didn't like obsessed men, especially when they were obsessed with work. He took another drink of his coffee and tried to keep his utter devotion for is work out of voice. “I am a psychologist. I mostly research how the human mind reacts to fear.” He knew that he was more then married to his work, he hoped his love for wasn't showing too much. Being married to he job sometimes put people off.

“I've been doing a study here in New York, it's almost complete,” He said sadly, it only needed one more test subject and then he could get back to Gotham and see his Alice. “I kind of glad to be honest, I miss home.” He laughed slightly and took another drink. “My little girl is probably missing me.” Crap... Nathaniel didn't mean to say that. Now he had to just use the fear toxin, no way she was even remotely interested now. Nathaniel sighed and looked down at the table sadly waiting for her to offer her excuses so he would have to go track her down and reluctantly dosing her with the toxin.

[knockout]

Jen was instantly weary of him when he had said that he was a psychologist, it automatically made her think of her own issues and that someone had planted her with a bug or something for him to be able to find her, not that it was possible or believable but at the same time she didn't want to be found and took to some hospital so that she could be rewired and given back to Bobby and Rogue, not that she would stay long, she would always run away, but at the same time she didn't want to be messed with, she liked her mind as it was thank you very much no matter how cute the man was.

“That is interesting.” she said truthfully as she presumed that he would enjoy his job and he didn't need her freaking out like some crazy person because of his profession, after all it would make her look more in need of a mental hospital if she did so. She smiled when he said that he had a daughter, it made her start to believe that he was less creepy than she thought,