You have really strange ideas about what is fun, Nova thought as she snuggled in Danielle's arms.

"I like flying with you too," Nova said, silently appending "when you're not being weird." "Let's give that throwing thing a shot, then I really think we ought to catch up with everyone and see what's going on."

"Okay. Uh, here we go..."

Danielle holds Flicker out at arm's length, then throws her straight up about two hundred feet.

Nova hadn't known what to expect, but the sheer force required to hurl her so high nearly knocked the wind from her. She recovered as she reached the apex of her arc, and for a lazy second she hung weightless before plunging towards the ground, head-first.

"Woooooooooowoooooowooooooooo!" she shouted, feeling her stomach drop out as if she'd crested the greatest roller coaster ever. Nova quickly scanned the air for Danielle, and found her target. Faster and faster she fell towards the airborne nova.

"Oh, this is gonna hurt," she realized.

Danielle quickly flies backwards, a bit slower than Nova as she falls.

Please don't let me screw up. Please let me do this one thing right. She can teleport but still...

As Nova falls, Danielle flies beside her, carefully matching speed, and scooping her up, pulling her to her chest... and then she pulls up in a long arc, like a yo-yo on string, flying back up in a u-shaped turn.

"You okay? You all right?"

Alexis flew back to the park slowly, enjoying the flight. On the way back, her flight-suit shaped itself into the rough approximation of the shirt and jeans she had on earlier, allowing her to look more like herself and less like a contestant in a super heroes contest.

Back at the park, she flew up to Ryusei and asked, "So who was second? Since they actually won as they weren't getting propelled over the finish line."

There were, Alexis had been told over and over by her parents, some things more important than winning. Sometimes, it was more important to have people be happy than to be first.

"Whoop!" Nova whooped, relieved that she'd been caught without any broken bones or dislocated joints. "Nice catch!"

In the next instant they were standing on the ground in the park at the shore, and no longer airborne.

"Surprise!" Nova giggled.

Ryusei Nods and lets go of Vixen as she resumes her Nova form. He looks to Alexis. "Well Knockout and Flicker came in after you so I'm gonna say second place was a tie."

Flicker. Why'd it have to be her? None of Alexis' thoughts were on her face as she turned to look at the woman who'd berated her for being wealthy. Granted, there hadn't been much ill will since then, but Alexis was still leery of the other woman.

Floating over, she put on her best smile. "Congrats on actually winning the race rather than getting pitched across the finish line," she said, unaware that they'd almost followed suit. She extended her hand. "I don't think we had a chance to formally meet - I'm Alexis."

Still arm-in-arm with Danielle, Nova cocked her head to follow Alexis' approach. She shrugged gently out of the embrace to free her hand to return the proffered handshake. Nova could not help but notice that despite the fact that the race was over, Alexis continued to hover a small distance from the ground. Oh rub it in, why don't you? she thought.

"There's no rules," Nova suggested with a neutral tone. "So you're the winner in any case. I'm Flicker, but I imagine you'd probably guessed that." Nova took Alexis' hand as if she had imagined it might suddenly turn into a poisonous viper, and resisted the urge to wipe her hand on her jeans afterward.





(Despite her mega-appearance, Alexis has a whopping one dot in charisma. I've taken that into consideration.)

"Wow, that was awesome! Just *bwoof* and *kefump* and here we are! I - hi."

Danielle watches the interplay between Nova and Alexis, watching Alexis more than Nova. Good lord. Sweet Jesus. She looks so... guuuuh. Why's Nova so grumpy?

"Uh, hi, yeah. Yeah, I thought about doing that but I didn't want to smoosh Flicker 'cause that would be bad for her and whoever she landed on also. Teleporting is really neat! How far out can you go?"

"Officially?" Nova replied with a curious smile. "As far as Mars."

"I guess it was a better idea than I'd thought," Alexis admitted, laughing lightly as she decided she liked the pretty blonde in front of her. The knowledge that the gender of that pretty blonde was in question only made her more interesting.

Flicker's reply was interesting, but Alexis had other things to do at the moment. "Flicker, I just wanted to say thank you for a lovely time," she said, still smiling. "I need to be going," before Praxis gets back, "but I didn't want to leave without saying good-bye."

[OOC: Heh, Nova, that's fine about Flicker's terse attitude. You're right - Alexis is not very charismatic. It's cool that you're playing that up.]

Coming in second to last, but plenty far ahead of Praxis, Daniel zoomed over the finish and headed straight for where Alexis was waiting. "That was fun, but I think I still need a bit of practice flying before I can really compete. I only learned to fly a couple weeks ago." He was grinning as he congratulated the others and shook hands. When he heard that Alexis was ready to leave he nodded understanding, and said good by to everyone quickly and explained, "I'm catching a ride to New York with Alexis. Can't pass up flying first class for free ya know." It didn't occur to Daniel until too late that putting it that way could be taken another way, and when he did he barely avoided turning bright red by talking to Ryu.

"Hey, it was really good to meet you. I'm looking forward to my visit to Japan. I hope we can arrange that soon, but it will probably have to be over the summer. I think I'm going to be very busy through the end of May." Seeing that he was about to be left behind by the retreating Alexis he bowed to Ryu. "Until then Ryusei-san."

Nova couldn't help but chuckle at Daniel's verbal bobble, and she smiled, perhaps to the surprise of Alexis and Danielle.

"My, people come and go so quickly," she joked, wondering if anyone would catch the reference. "Thank you both for coming, Alexis, Daniel; it was good to meet at last."

Alexis nodded to Flicker, perhaps a bit briskly. "And you," she replied politely before gathering up her materials and heading toward the plane, all without landing. She almost left Daniel behind when he paused to say goodbye to Ryusei. For a moment, she considered stopping long enough to say goodbye to Praxis. No, it will just encourage him.

When Daniel caught up with her, she guided him across the narrow stretch of lake between the park and the small airport, and led him to the waiting plane.

"To MARS? Seriously? You can go, like, whenever you want? That's cool. I suppose I could fly there, but it'd take years..."

"Can you survive in hostile environments?" Flicker asked, sparing one glance to the departing couple. She turned to face Danielle, and she became more serious. "We can go right now if you'd like."

"Right now? Oh awesome! Yeah, I don't think I need to breathe..." She looks skywards. "I flew up far enough to see the curve of the earth and I was okay. Could you blip us right back if there was a problem?"

Nova considered that for a moment, thinking about her science classes, and movies like Total Recall and Outland.

"I suppose I could do that," she said thoughtfully, trying not to imagine how Danielle would look with her eyes bugging out of her face and hanging by the optic nerves. She nodded, the decision made. "Yeah, I could definitely do that if you're willing to try it."

"Yeah, sure! Now'd be great. Uh, everyone, I'm going to Mars!" Danielle raises her voice to be heard by the others. "Flicker and I, Flicker is coming as well. She's the designated teleporter. There, everyone knows. I'd hate it if something happened and no one knew where I was. Ready when you are."

"You're so dramatic," Nova chuckled, smiling. She turned to those who remained. "Back in a minute!" Nova took Danielle's hands and considered the Red Planet. In the next instant, they were there.

Red soil, cold as fuck, windy, the sun's really tiny; yep, this is Mars, Nova thought. Her lungs ached, as the sudden reduction in outside air pressure caused them to swell with a force that would rupture the lungs of an ordinary human.

"So, how are you doing?" Nova asked, using her one lungful of earth atmosphere to speak at a casual level. Her next inhalation of thin Martian air--air only a few percent as dense as that on Earth--would hardly move her vocal cords, and any further conversation would have to be shouted just to create a whisper. Danielle appeared to be holding up okay, she decided, but the look on her face was priceless.

Danielle looks around, agog, at the red soil stretching to the horizon and back, and up at the pale pink sky. "!" she exclaims.

She looks puzzled, and tries again. "?" she attempts, to no luck. She inhales greatly, sucking in as much air as she can, and tries a third time, leaning close to Flicker as she shouts. "It's amazing! Can you hear me now?

"Wait, what?" Vixen's ears literally perk up. "You're off to - " She takes a half-step towards Flicker and Knockout, only to stop as they blip away.

"Uhm. Huh." She looks lost in thought for a moment, her tails drooping. "Back in a minute, huh? I hope so... it's a long flight back..."

Ryusei smiles. "I'll make sure you get home Doctor Richardson. Flicker isn't the only Teleporter in this bunch, she's just more proficient at it than I."

Danielle's shout was like a whisper in the thin and hostile atmosphere of Mars. Nova shouted as loudly as she could in reply:

"I can hear you just fine! What do you think so far?"

"I think it's awesome! It's really neat. The sun makes the sky all pink and it's pretty, and - " The rest of Danielle's words were indecipherable as her voice dropped.

She trails off, and looks down at her feet for a moment. Just say it. Nothing wrong with saying it.

" - it makes you look pretty too."

She thinks for a moment, then winces. "N-not that you're not pretty! You are pretty. All the time kind of pretty but Mars-pretty is a different kind of pretty and it's like another side and - " Her voice drops below hearing threshold again, and she blushes, feeling embarrassed.

It wasn't the thin atmosphere that rendered Nova speechless. For a long moment, she could only gaze into Danielle's expression and smile.

"Really?" she whispered, inaudibly. Stepping forward, as if in a dream, she slowly put her hands on Danielle's shoulders, and then pulled her close for a lingering kiss.

"Uhp."

Danielle blinks as Nova pulls her forward. She's gonna - oh don't blow it don't blow it don't blow it -

Danielle closes her eyes as their lips meet, her heart racing. She gently wraps her arms around Flicker's body and pulls her closer, her internal dialogue evaporating like spring rain.

Her feet lift off the ground slightly. Her footprints crumble at the touch of the wind.

Roxanne smiles at Ryu. "Aren't you a gentleman. Thank you. But I think she'll be back shortly. If not... thanks in advance."

Covered in red Martian dust, as if they'd been rolling around in it or something, Nova and Danielle reappeared hand-in-hand at the lakeside park in Cleveland.

"Hey," Nova croaked hoarsely but cheerfully, her vocal cords dry and rubbery from the lethally-thin Martian atmosphere. "We're back. Did anyone miss us?"

"Woog." Danielle brushes a hand through her long blonde hair, shaking bits of Mars out onto the street. "Uh. This stuff isn't radioactive, right? I mean, I'd hate to be sterilizing people by accident."

Vixen sniffs the air, and grins. "Ohhhhhhhhhhhh."

She rubs her nose, and dorms, reverting to a baseline form. "I'm no astronomer. But I think that it being further away from the sun helps. Get a geiger counter if you two are going into space. If you're sticking around, I think we're cleaning up now."

Nova stretched luxuriously and brushed most of the red Martian dirt from her clothing.

"Nah," she said slowly, making an elaborate display of casualness to disguise the way her mind raced. I kissed her! I kissed her on Mars! "It's not radioactive at all, don't be silly. Just don't wash it with anything else in the machine or it'll get all over everything."

Nova looked around, and could plainly see that the party was breaking up. She nodded once, satisfied.

"Doctor," she said to Vixen, "do you still need that ride home?"

"Yes I do." She runs a hand through her hair nervously. "Woo. Jitters. I wonder what he'll say when he sees me like this."

Ryusei smiles as he too could sense things winding down "This has been alot of fun. We should definitely do something like this again."

He nods to Flicker, Knockout,and Vixen. "Ladies it's been a real pleasure meeting you all. Hopefully next time we'll have even more novas come. Flicker thank you for putting this all together. I had a great time. I look forward to seeing you all again."