You Can't Handle This (Open)

[Layla Harlow]

It was time for new clothes. She was sick of wearing the same stuff she had in her closet and though she was cutting into the money she saved up for an apartment, she just wanted to go out and impulsively buy something. Hell, maybe even people watch. After all it wasn't like she could go do anything 'reckless' without someone throwing a conniption fit. Going to the mall was innocent enough, it wasn't like she would get jumped or something.

Besides, Hot Topic was still selling some epic stuff that she wanted to get her hands on. She figured that as long as she put off going home, the happier she would be. The rents had pretty much freaked when they found out she was intending to go out. They were trying to keep her under supervision because whenever she went anywhere, she caused problems for them. And as soon as they said that she was out the door and on her way to the mall. She didn't care if she made their social lives oh-so terrible. They could get over it.

She shook her head as she entered her favorite store and started looking around. It was almost like deja vu, but she put that out of her mind seeing as how she was trying to ignore that day completely. It was bad enough her mind got distracted easily.

[Jack McCarthy]

For not the first since he arrived at Vermont jack was bored. In his opinion, this was Jack’s first real free day since he became apart of “The hammel institute for mutant or whatever the hell it was called. At first Jack was excited to go to the hammel institute. It was a school for kids with super powers! How could that not be awesome?! Jack just naturally assumed he would be learning bad ass kung-fu, or how to break blocks with his mind. Imagine his horror when he discovered the school was…exactly like school at home.

This revelation stunned Jack, he couldn’t even begin to comprehend why a kid that could read minds needed to go to home ec class. Where the hell was fighting evil 101? At the very least, the bald guy in the wheelchair had a god damn jet. Hammel just had a couple chemistry sets.

But ignoring all the negatives, at the very least it gave him something to do. On days like today, he had to face the fact that he was in an unfamiliar town and therefore had no concept of what was fun to do in this place. Still he guessed he might as well start somewhere…Why not the mail?

He had been meaning to get some new threads and hot topic seem like a pretty cool place. With that in mind Jack causally started to browse its contents.

He wondered if they had a top-hat? He always wanted a top-hat…

[Layla Harlow]

Layla made it part of a routine to go out as often as possible. More times than not she ended up at the mall, not because she was one of those girls that loved shopping, but rather to people watch. It was something that helped pass time and she also found it pretty entertaining. At times she often tried to point out the metas from the normal humans, but it was a lot more difficult than anyone might think. The only thing that gave a meta away was when they had a visible ability with wings protruding from their backs or some crazy thing like that. Still, she liked to think that there were more metas around than some of the normal people would like to believe.

She was leafing through some new shirts, not really finding anything she liked, then she wandered off to look at the dresses and corsets and still nothing sparked her interest. Sometimes she just couldn't place exactly what she wanted and she ended up leaving empty-handed. It was odd seeing as how she loved just about everything in the store, but even she got sick of shopping at the same place sometimes and Hot Topic was pretty much the only store that held her type of clothing.

Layla rounded the corner rather quickly to take a look at some of the cute beanies they had and ended up bumping into someone who had been looking at...top hats? At that she smirked. Who in the hell wore top-hats for the fun of it? Not that she was one to judge seeing as how she fit into the store just as well as anyone who shopped there, but it still seemed a little odd to her. But that passed her mind rather quickly and she apologized, "I'm sorry, I rounded that corner a little faster than I should have I guess."

[Jack McCarthy]

Why ask “Why buy a top hat?” when the more pressing question was “Why NOT buy a top hat?”

Ok, so it may be true that a top hat served no real practical purpose, but you call it an experiment of sorts. To see if Jack could really pull off a top hat, this is how Jack chooses to entertain himself whenever he’s bored. Instead of actually doing anything productive with his time, he does….well this. Just be thankful that he didn't discover a monical.

And hey who’s to say if a top-hat would be practical or not?

In his admittedly short time in the hammel institute he knows one thing to be true is to expect everything and anything. Who knows? Maybe tomorrow he’ll run into someone who has the power teleport him to an alternate dimension that made anyone with a top hat their king.

Fail to prepare prepare to fail was jack’s motto.

But alas there was no clear sign of a top hat, so unfortunately Jack was forced to bronze through an assortment of other merchandise.

Choices, choices… What should he choose, there didn't seem to anything to called out to him in any real sense and Jack was beginning to think he was wasting his time here…When a dark haired woman practically ran him over and apologized. Jack raised an amused eyebrow at her little joke while he was dusting himself off before he starts to speak in his usual strong Irish accent.

“Hey, still pretty right? So no harm, no foul.”

Jack gave the girl an apologetic Chester cat like smirk; as if to say Yeah, I know that line was lame and a feel dirty having said it.

“Oh, I’m Jack by the way. I just enrolled into the local school. You know the one I mean…”

As he was speaking Jack started to wave his hands in the air like a crappy magician about to pull a rabbit out of an invisible hat.

“The one with the whole: Professor X-freaky super power vibe to it? Yeah, that one.”

[Layla Harlow]

Layla caught onto the accent pretty quickly and even she had to admit it was kinda hot. Riley needed to go back to England to get that accent back because any accent was hot. Her mind drifted back in time to hear what he was saying and she laughed at his line. It was so lame. So painfully lame that she couldn't help laughing more than she should have. "I cannot believe you just said that, but yes you're still absolutely beautiful, sir." Hey might as well have some fun with it.

She cocked her head to the side as he introduced himself and tried to figure out the name of what school he went to. Clearly he wasn't from hers because, well she would have seen him around and also Pilot Ridge High was not difficult to remember seeing as how it was the name of the town. Then again, she'd grown up in this town and from the sounds of it he had just gotten to the US. She could have been wrong though too, who knows with that sort of thing really. Either way, she sort of expected him to be from one of the colleges or something.

And then he mentioned super power vibe and her eyes widened. Damn she was just running into metas left and right lately! Not that she minded, it was fascinating being around all the different people with their super awesome abilities. So far she was well-acquainted with two and that was only because of the twins and Riley. Both of which were way different from each other, but she couldn't deny that she was still jealous of each. "Ohmygosh that's awesome! What's your ability? I mean if you don't mind me asking, I'm kinda non-powered. But I lovvve the idea of meta-humans and sorta wish I was one." And now she was rambling.

[Jack McCarthy]

Despite the fact that his search for any reckonable clothes seemed to have hit a roadblock, it appears that this wasn’t exactly a waste of time either. He found himself warming up to the girl instantly. It was nice to see a friendly face, and the fact that the face in question happened to be a pretty one certainly was an added bonus.

I cannot believe you just said that, but yes you're still absolutely beautiful, sir.

At these words he breathed a mock sigh of relief

“Phew! Thank God for that.”

Jack was somewhat surprised at Layla’s reaction to discovering what school he goes to. Practically everyone he met was a meta-x-man-mutant freak or what ever they were called. He wasn’t be surprised if they were more meta guys then regular people here.

"Ohmygosh that's awesome! What's your ability? I mean if you don't mind me asking, I'm kinda non-powered. But I lovvve the idea of meta-humans and sorta wish I was one"

Non-powered? That must suck especially being right next the world foremost institute for meta-human’s. He could imagine how crazy it must drive a person to be walking for a bus in the pouring rain while other’s are flying wherever they please. Jack couldn’t even begin to think how sucky his life would be without his power.

“I don’t blame you. Being meta is awesome! But anyway, I’m kind of what you would call, a gifted child, I can do tons of things. Like hold my breath for ten minutes or burping the alphabet…backwards, but my real power is-no wait.”


Jack suddenly stopped mid-sentence, as an idea suddenly occurred to him. Why waste a perfectly good chance to show-off, when he could demonstrate his power?

“You know what? I’ll show you. Ok, think of a number between one and…infinity and before you ask, no. I’m not going to read your thoughts or hypnotized you or any of that voodoo jedi mind shit. Got it? Is it thirty-five? It’s totally thirty-five right?"