Sept 2 - Mutant Town becomes Copper Town

[Juma Ngomo]

He nods to Merle's plan, not quite buying the lack of hostility from the police but not about to argue in the heat of the moment. Besides, the plan still makes sense, to avoid any kind of 'first strike' from the mutants. That being said, he is very cautious as he prowls around, sniffing the air and occasionally standing completely still to listen.

[Marcus Kingston]

He caught wind of the plan but honestly, if they did something too crazy they'd be on the bad side of Mutant Town. Also, seeing how close the town was the the university didn't seem like a great idea. He looked to the girl in the trance, wondering just what she was doing.

[Rick Ferguson]

"Great situation we're in now," he said ironically. Still, Rick could be effective at breaking up fights if he had to be.

[Harold Marks]

"We'll deal." Harold said, continuing to keep watch, waiting for someone to make a move.

[Narrator]

The place looks tense, but the only standoff that isn't between police and mutants is in Genova Memorial Park, between some human toughs and some obvious mutants. Ryan can pick that out pretty quickly, the bobbies all look pretty much the same from above after all.

He hears a voice in his mind as he passes over the park.
Took you long enough to get here boy. I hope you're not planning anything rash. The voice is pretty strong and commanding, though there is no actual command. Nothing on the level of Professor X, but still, a strong and subtle mind.

[Narrator]

Meanwhile, the students on the ground suddenly find a group of mutants wandering up to them. Toughs, the sort that have been making trouble with the police, unlike the regular mutant folk just going about their business as best they can.

One of them steps forward, a young man with tusks jutting out of his lower jaw.

"Hey, you guys with us, right?"

[Merle McClintock]

Merle nods.

"We're from the college. And we know that someone's trying to set us all up. If we attack now, they're gonna bring out the army, the battlesuits, and whatever, and knock us out of town. We know that the cops don't play fair, but we gotta be better than them."

He smiles and flexes at one of the guys knowingly. "Because we are better than them, right?"

[Juma Ngomo]

Juma closes the gap back to his fellow students as the mutant toughs arrive. He's surprised at how well Merle responds so does not add his own opinions, instead showing a sense of solidarity with the others.

[Marcus Kingston]

Marcus stepped up beside Merle. "Yeah. You guys need to be careful about this.

He sighed. "Believe me. America had some messed up times. The government did all sorts of fucked up things to mutants as soon as they saw them as enough of a threat. If you guys do anything crazy, we're all gonna have hell to pay for it. They even raided our damn school in the night."

[Narrator]

The guy with the tusks shakes his head. "No man, this is a load of bollox. These coppers push us around, and we're just supposed to take it? And then what about the next time they do this? It'll be worse."

[Rachel O'Brien]

Rachel still deep in her trance, started looking for the most agitated minds. She found the young man with the tusks, and concentrated on calming him as best she could.

[Ryan Gabriel]

I never plan anything rash, Ryan thought back, before reflecting that the thought might not have been for him. he glided toward the memorial park, looking to see what he could do there, if anything.

[Narrator]

Rachel discovers that the young man has already been calmed by someone, he'd be really freaking out if it wasn't for the effect already on him. She just has to give him the lightest touch to bring him down to a really calm state.

[Merle McClintock]

Merle nods. "You're right. You've probably been shit on since you were a kid. People thought you were a freak, a danger, a weapon."

He makes eye contact.
"But they're wrong. Every day of our lives, we have to prove them wrong. We have to be the people they don't expect us to be, until maybe our kids get a fair break. Same as blacks in America, same as us Irish."
He sees that the group is actually interested in him speaking, and that keeps him going. This is actually one of his better speeches.
"They want us to be animals. They want to cage us, contain us, and when we're not funny or cute anymore, they're going to put us to pasture. Not all of them want that, but there are a few, very powerful people who want it."

"Can I get your cell number? You're a pretty smart guy."

"My point is, that when you give them a reason, they'll take it. They'll take it out on the storekeepers here, they'll take it out on the mutants in Surrey, in Sussex, in Knightsbridge or Mayfair. The poor orphan kids in Versailles, the German watchmaker's son in the wrong neighborhood at the wrong time.
Whoever's causing all this bullshit wants us to show we don't belong. Let's calm down, grab a pint maybe, and give them what they least want.
A bunch of muties worth respecting."

[Narrator]

Ryan feels that touch on his mind again.

"Of course not dear. I can tell you don't plan your rash acts."

"Don't bother those boys too much. I'm keeping a pretty tight leash on them."

[Marcus Kingston]

Marcus blinked at Merle. He, uh, pretty much summed it up. He looked around though for others that may of needed to be spoken to in hopes of calming them down.

[Rachel O'Brien]

Rachel noted that another telepath had gotten there first and kept going, calming everyone as much as she could, bolstering the efforts of the other teep.

[Merle McClintock]

Merle grinned inwardly. The speech had worked a lot better than he thought...maybe he should join debate club.

[Ryan Gabriel]

"All right, I'll bite... who am I talking to, here?"

"And if you're trying to keep things calm here, I'm open to broad suggestions as to where to go to help keep things defused."

[Narrator]

The tusked boy sighs, seeming to calm down. "Look man, I don't have a cell. But my name is Steve. Everyone knows who I am 'round here."

[Rick Ferguson]

Rick almost whinced a bit when he heard Merle say 'muties', but from what little he heard, it did saound like he was doing the best he could for the situation. "Agreed. They probably are only trying to get us mad."

[Juma Ngomo]

Juma nods, "Good to meet you Steve, I'm Juma. Hopefully it won't be this tense the next time."

[Merle McClintock]

Merle scribbles down his digits and hands them to Steve. "Any good bars in this part of town? I'm from Surrey, so I'm kind of new to the city..."

Merle tries to defuse the mob and bring them to the nearest public house. He'll buy Steve a pint of his choice, too.

[Marcus Kingston]

"Nice to meet you too Steve. Name's Marcus. Could you get the others to relax some? I know you wanna smack the hell out of them but we can't fall into their plan."

[Rick Ferguson]

"And I'm Rick. Good to meet you," he said, offering a hand for a shake.

[Narrator]

Ryan hears - "You can call me Mrs. Chesterton. I keep an eye on folks here. You need to get those boys from the North end out of here before I get tired and fall over."

[Ryan Gabriel]

"On it, ma'am," he answered, swinging around and coming in for a landing, interposing himself between the two groups.

"All right... No one here really wants any trouble, do they?" he started, his hands held out from his side with his palms spread at the ground, held in the most nonthreatening way he could manage. His glow vanished the instant he touched ground.

[Narrator]

Steve shakes Rick's hand. "I don't know about the other guys. We can't take too much more of this, you know?"

[Marcus Kingston]

"I hear ya Steve. We wanted to smack them when they were protesting outside our college."

[Narrator]

Steve shrugs. "I don't know man. I just feel... tired right now I guess. Can't stand these cops."

[Merle McClintock]

Merle will continue trying to separate the mutant-toughs from the police, then tell the team what he learned. He makes sure the people know they can contact him and the university when times get tough. He also reports the "can't take much more of this" attitude to Dominic at the university; he'd know how to handle it.

[Juma Ngomo]

"The cops are just standing around right now. There are other things they can be doing, I don't think any of them want to be here either. I'm sure there are enough other things to keep them busy that they'll leave as soon as they see things are quiet."

[Narrator]

Steve - "What, you don't think the cops want to be here? I thought they liked busting heads."

[Marcus Kingston]

He chuckled. "Man. They're probably scared shitless."

[Narrator]

The thugs eye Ryan suspiciously. "Who the hell are you then? Piss off, pidgeon."

Mrs Chesterton's mind touches Ryan - "Careful now lad. Spook them and it all blows up. This one here is afraid that you know he's being paid to be here. But you can't be blunt about it. Come at it sideways, and he'll bugger off.

[Narrator]

Steve shakes his head at Marcus. "Weird man, I don't know if I ever thought of it that way. But they've got an unfair advantage, don't they?"

[Niles Radcliff]

Still not sure what exactly he is going to be doing, Niles decides to head over to Mutant Town and find out when he gets there.
So far all he knows is a bunch of police are there and tensions are high, unfortunately thats not much to go on.

He finally arrives and starts looking around for others from the school.

[Marcus Kingston]

"Unfair? How's that?"

[Ryan Gabriel]

Ryan didn't make any threatening gestures at the thugs, though he did glance back to give a reassuring look to the mutants they'd been staring down. "Look, no one wants any trouble here, right?" he said, thinking quickly, holding up his hands in a 'whoa, calm down,' motion. "Everyone's on the edge, and it's just going to take one little spark to make everything blow up. Then everyone gets hurt, and for what?" He shook his head. "No one wants that to happen."

He paused, then seemed to repeat himself. "No one here wants that, right?" He put a little emphasis on the 'here' part, which probably wouldn't be noticed unless someone was already paranoid on the subject.

[Narrator]

Steve - "What dya mean how? They've got all the power, haven't they? They can mistreat us, and there's bugger all we can do about it."