The Universe's Mixer

The City was cold and quiet at 2 AM. Laura Kinney was wandering alone through town, an uncharacteristic habit she had picked up as of late. Now that she had the ability to go where ever she chose whenever she wanted to, Laura found it increasingly difficult to stay in one place for long. Especially if Billy was busy plotting or attending ELE meetings.

The cold didn't bother Laura much, and neither did the complete lack of streetlight (there was something to be said about her mutant DNA). Night time was her favorite time to go out, as most of the strange inhabitants of this strange City were off the streets, giving her the opportunity to roam without unnecessary interaction.

Laura could not define what happened as she turned the corner. The dark figure in the corner meant she was no longer alone, but the tell-tale signs of a human presence were entirely missing. She had never encountered anyone or thing like whatever was in that street with her in her sixteen years, a fact which made her only slightly nervous.

She had been created as a weapon; built to adapt herself to any situation. Stepping carefully forward, Laura called out to the dark shape. "What are you?" It was straight to the chase with this one.

Dr. Banner stepped outside, heading home for the day. He was greeted by a variety of interesting sounds. There was some laughter and quiet talk among the few students walking around on campus, some scattered screaming in the distance, and a very faint moaning coming from a few different directions. Another interesting detail was that everyone he saw was paired off. This was odd, but the Valentines' Day weekend could account for it. He sighed, thinking of Betty.

Walking further off campus he noticed he was a bit closer to the screaming. As he rounded the corner he saw a winged figure hovering in the air, raining little pink arrows on the crowd. The screaming was slowly diminishing, and people were pairing off.

Great.

If this cupid thing was another of the City's experiments, it would be even more disastrous than the zombie invasion should Hulk get involved. Certainly more upsetting, anyway. Best to keep him well away from those arrows.

Banner ducked back around the corner and made for the glow of a neon sign advertising beer. There was a little dive bar below street level, in the bottom of a brownstone building. He'd hole up in here until things blew over.

"Hi. You got any Heineken?"

Love was in the air, and Fred hated it. Not hated it, but it just felt all sorts of wrong. Of course, she was alone, and she didn't have anyone. Her heart was full of possibilities, but her mind just kept telling her to forget about it. So, she put her mind into working out the City; there had to be some equation, some formula, some way to put the City into a working model. That had been her plan, to try and ignore the love-fest by solving the world around her.

She'd picked a nice cafe to curl up with a muffin and her clipboard, her pencil moving quickly over the paper, taking notes, writing figures, just keeping busy. While she was trying to factor in the idea of nonlinear time, which was something to say the least, she noticed a certain older man. He didn't look like what she remembered, if she had ever really seen him in the flesh before, but she knew who he was. He was that mean editor who had a stick up his butt about Spiderman. She'd have to be careful not to say Peter Parker, but she could keep the webslinger's identity hidden, she could. She had a few alter-egos hidden away in her head, and she wasn't going to give this man the power over them; but, she was going to have a word. Seriously, when was she ever going to get to do this again?

After tossing the empty muffin wrapper, she gathered up her clipboard, tucking the pencil away, and headed rather determinedly over. She wasn't going to let him frighten her; she'd faced demons, vampires, and Cordelia on a bad hair day - she could face him.

"Excuse me, Mr. Jameson. I'd like to have a word with you." Yes, she could definitely do this.