Excuse Me, Excuse You

[Penelope Adams]

She was stuck up. She knew that she was stuck up, so Penelope saw little reason to apologize for it. Especially not when people didn't apologize for their own poor behavior and clear lack of manners.

Sure, it might not have helped that the few people who had bothered to find out who she was, usually saw her as nothing more than that annoying school paper chick who rarely sugar coated anything. And here she was, standing in line in front of some of the school's jocks, who seemed to enjoy wasting everyone's time rather than getting whatever they came here for and leaving.

"Excuse me," the brunette said, her tone even, yet it held a condescending tone to it. The boys turned and gave her a once over. The biggest, clearly the leader offered her an almost sly looking grin and leaned against the counter. "You're excused babe." Penelope rolled her eyes and pursed her lips. "Please, even I wouldn't go that low - I mean, I do have standars."

Long story short; the encounter Penelope had with the boys quickly ended up with her tray being knocked over and her drink spilled across the floor along with her books and papers. Sitting on her knees, the dream walker huffed to herself as she started picking up her stuff, casting annoyed glances at the laughing jocks a few tables away.

[Morrigan LaFayette]

Morrigan frequented the cafeteria a fair bit. Food, and nobody liked touching her or being around her because of her reputation. It was all perfectly fine for her. She saw the whole altercation though and walked over, looking down at the girl at her feet.

"Looks like they wanted to make you go that low. Now I could offer to show them where to shove it. I've been told it's a talent of mine. However, I don't see the need." She looked at the laughing jocks and they stopped laughing. That tended to happen when she looked at people.

"They're a bunch of chickens. Kill a measly human and suddenly bullies are afraid to piss you off. Go figure." She was going through 're-education' for what they called murder, but in the meantime her reputation could come in handy on occasion. She walked to the counter, asked for a roll of paper towel and walked back with it in hand.

"Here. No sense making the floor all sticky. Unless you're planning to lure the morons into a trap of their own making. I have to say that would be almost as sweet as the juice the cafeteria serves when they run out of concentrate." She smirked slightly.  She wasn't admitting it, but she liked the girl's spunk.

"Morrigan by the way."

[Penelope Adams]

Penelope looked up at the woman standing above her with furrowed brows. She couldn't really remember ever seeing the girl around before, but that hardly meant a thing. After all, it wasn't as if Penelope was particularly known herself. She usually just made herself known to the people that would somehow benefit it - which usually had something to do with the school news paper. "Hm," she replied as she followed the brunette's gaze towards the jocks.

"I'm not sure that's something you should run around bragging about," Penelope said dryly. It wasn't exactly common to kill people, after all. And the girl didn't seem even a tad guilty about it. Now, getting people hurt was a whole different story. It kind of came with being a teenager jacked up with superpowers.

Nodding towards the piece of paper, Penelope grabbed it. "Thanks," she said as she once again focused on the mess on the floor. "No," she said, her head shaking. "They're hardly worth the energy." She cast a glance towards the jocks once more. They seemed to busy themselves with something entirely different now, which suited Penelope just fine.

"I'm Penelope," she said once she finished cleaning up and rose to her feet to get rid of the trash.

[Morrigan LaFayette]

"I'm not bragging I'm just stating facts. Otherwise you might wonder why numb nuts over there shut his trap the moment I stared at him." She shrugged. It was just a fact of life she'd killed someone. Why should she avoid mentioning it just because stupid human raised mutants thought it was taboo? She couldn't understand it. She watched as the girl finished cleaning. Morrigan wasn't really inclined to help.

"So other your tray taking a spill how's your day going Penelope?" Hey Morrigan could be friendly. It wasn't like she was incapable she just didn't do it too often.

[Penelope Adams]

The girl was odd, but in a way, Penelope found it... Refreshing. She was open and frank, unlike most people at this school. Everyone was so busy keeping their secrets tight to their chest. "Fair point," she agreed with a nod. She had to give it to the girl; she had some serious balls.

Brushing her hands together, Penelope shrugged. "I guess I can't complain," she offered with a light smile. She offered the girl her full attention now; she was pretty, in a very untraditional kind of way. She had that mean look, without actually looking intimidating. Penelope decided immediately that she liked this girl. "What about your own?"

[Morrigan LaFayette]

"Pretty good. The food doesn't look too bad, which is always a plus. Could be sunnier though. Without the sun, there's not as many shadows. Kind of makes my power wane some. So today's a more normal kind of day I suppose I could say." She shrugged.

"Don't suppose you'd want to sit with me in the corner? Nobody ever really bothers 'cause it's near the tree, and I always sit there." Morri smiled even though she'd basically just said she had no friends to sit with. It wasn't something that really affected her all that much in the scheme of things.

[Penelope Adams]

Nodding at the words, the brunette realized that she envied people with a simpler power. As much as she understood that every power had its drawbacks, entering people's dreams wasn't exactly... Well. The kind of power you'd want. "We're drawing towards brigther times," she noted. Spring was around the corner now.

"I'd love to," she said as she nodded towards the cafeteria counters. "I just need to grab a new stack of food since the last was wasted." She was somewhat surprised the girl was sticking around; most people didn't. Without wasting more time thinking about it, the brunette started to move towards the line to get a new batch of food.

[Morrigan LaFayette]

Morrigan could admit to herself she was a little surprised the girl had taken her up on her offer. She grinned, waiting for the girl to get more food before she walked over to the table in the corner. She tried to keep a skip out of her step. She didn't know if she had succeeded, but what mattered was she tried. After all, a twenty four year old woman skipping over to a lunch table would be a little bit odd. Even she could appreciate that. She put her tray of food on the table and sat down, taking a bite and sipping from her juicebox before looking up.

"Spring and summer are always better than winter no question. Unless you're a water manipulator I guess. Then it would probably be pretty handy having solid water around. I think anyways. I haven't had the occasion to talk to a water manipulator yet."

[Penelope Adams]

She'd just reached the girl's table as she caught her words. She put her food on the table and took a site before answering - caring little if the words were meant for her or not. "I think powers have their ups and down regardless. To us, water manipulation might sound cool, but to a water manipulator it might be hell."

She didn't particularly enjoy her own ability. It was stressful and she always felt as if she was imposing on people's personal spaces whenever she involuntarily entered someone's dreams. It was always awkward. Always.

[Morrigan LaFayette]

"Well yeah if they were like afraid of drowning or something, but what kind of world would someone afraid of an element receive that element as a power? I mean, that would be pretty cruel, right?" Morrigan laughed.

"I think everyone has parts of their power they don't like though. Mine makes me a bit more at one with the shadows. Kind of influences by thinking towards that way too, which can make some things difficult."

[Penelope Adams]

Shrugging, Penelope took a bite of her apple. "I mean, I think it's less that and more wanting what others have, because people are good at making it seem like whatever cards they've been dealt is easier to handle, since you can't always read their inner most thoughts." She looked over the cafeteria for a moment before shrugging once more.

The girl caught her attention and she listened to what she had to say; so her power had something to do with shadows? Yikes. "Yeah, I think so too." She fell a little somber at the thought; she knew exactly what it felt like, not enjoying your ability to its full extent.

[Morrigan LaFayette]

"I think the important thing is that no matter where your power leads you, whatever you do are your own decisions ultimately. For example, I could blame my power for the blood on my hands but I'm not. I chose that path. And that's obviously a pretty extreme example, but I believe every mutant has that choice they must make for themselves." Even if their choice led to re-education like hers had.

"People make the best out of what they are given, and it is what we must all do. Put our best foot forward and all that. Or at least that's what I think." Even her dark side believed in putting her best foot forward. Of course, that meant violent thoughts more often but hey it was her best in her opinion.

[Penelope Adams]

"Hm," the brunette nodded. "I guess that's a little cut and dry," she added with a shrug. "We might not be able to blame it entirely on our abilities, but being hormonal teenagers, it doesn't exactly make things easier. I don't think everything is nearly that black and white though. Life, and our choices are filled with hues of gray." Then again, Penelope was lucky that way. She didn't have an ability that made her lose control in a sense where she could actually hurt someone.

"I guess." It wasn't always that easy, though. Life was hard enough just being a regular teenager - or even human. Having abilities you needed to learn how to control on top of that as well? Well, Penelope was hardly one to care about people's personal issues, but ah well.

[Morrigan LaFayette]

"Speak for yourself. I'm twenty four. Done with the whole hormonal teenager bit and moved on to hormonal twenties." She shrugged, taking a bite of her food and grinning.

"Besides, the stuff I just said? Sounds cool, is pretty true. We all have a choice, even the difficult ones are still choices. And the abilities...well I've been waiting to get my powers since I was born. The people who raised me...it was either get powers or get turfed out into the cold. 'Course Hannah Montana style I got the best of both worlds." She chuckled at herself.

"Our choices are shades of grey, but that shouldn't make them difficult in themselves. The whole world is shades of grey unless we live and turn them to colour. Nothing's black and white. You just said that yourself. But hell a piano's difficult to play. So who says shades of grey is so bad? Who made that a rule of the metaphor?"  She smiled.

"So I'm a shadow manipulator but what's your power?  I'm pretty curious considering your views."

[Penelope Adams]

That, actually, had Penelope smiling. "It never really does get any easier, do it?" Maybe the hormones calmed down, but she couldn't really see anyone in their mid-twenties having their life together. Not in that kind of way, anyways.

Penelope couldn't imagine being raised waiting for her powers to emerge. She had been more or less clueless about the fact until it had happened and boy, had it opened her eyes to the world around her. Maybe that was a good thing, though. She was part of a minority she could potentially, eventually, use for her own personal gain. "I guess," she said distantly and looked over the room, taking in the myriad of different faces.

Her attention snapped back to the other girl and she pursed her lips. She didn't really have a response to that. Maybe it was because her mind was elsewhere - or maybe she simply was in no position to really give a response.

"Dream Walking," she said with a simple shrug. "I essentially enter people's dreams without their permission and get to see their inner most thoughts and hopes."