Xaviers!

With the Point closed over the holidays Nailah's options for getting prepped are limited. Fortunately she's been doing this on her own for a while now, so she has most of her stuff hidden away in her dorm-room. On her way there she absentmindedly opens up the other packages that had her name on it, which are much better surprises. Especially the belt and leather-jacket will come in handy and provide more protection than her usual costume. She pulls them on with a certain grim determination, wings spreading behind her as she makes sure she has all the freedom of movement she needs. She catches herself in the mirror and can't help but grin a little. It feels much more appropriate to her mood than the bright white costume.

She pulls a bag out from underneath her bed where it sat all the way against the wall. She opens it up and pulls out a whole bunch of stuff that she starts putting into the belt-pouches and jacket pockets. A small medical kit, pepper-spray, a butterfly knife and brass-knuckles that she 'liberated' from some thugs, rope, zip-ties. Two flash-bangs she swiped from the armory at some point and one anti-mutant foam grenade and finally two nightsticks that she slides into loops on each side of the belt. This time she's going to be prepared for the lunatic. She picks up the stack of books she's hidden among all the stuff as well, regretting she hasn't had much chance to really look through them, much less translate anything. Whatever is in there, it'll have to wait. It's time to bring down Hazard, even if she has to do it without any powers to rely on. With how little she trusts her Paths right now maybe that's not even a bad thing.

She quickly zips up her new jacket, running her fingers over the X patch on it for a moment before going to open the window. With a swift leap she slips out, tail trailing after her for a moment before she lands in a three-point crouch on the ground outside.

Haley, walking up to the building with a travel cup of some multisyllabic coffee concoction, let out a yelp of surprise as her occasional crime-fighting partner landed just feet from her, looking badass.

“Holy shit, Nai, you look fucking amazing!”

"Haley!" Nailah says in surprise. She didn't really expect to bump into anybody, with the school being mostly empty still. "Uh. Thanks. Christmas present."

She looked over the outfit and accessories in wonder again before the slightest hint of a frown crossed her face. “Are you going out alone?”

"I got some... loose ends to take care of." she says. Haley's telepathy might not be great, but it'd be hard to miss the cloud hanging over Nailah along with a determination that is more grim and much less... firm than usual.

“I wouldn’t match how awesome you look, but...I could totally go with you, if you want back up...” Haley offered, certainly sensing that cloud.

Nailah has a rare look of indecisiveness on her face.

"Hazard doesn't screw around. I don't want you to get hurt..."

Haley’s frown deepened, “and I don’t want *you* to get hurt. Are...you sure you don’t want backup?”

"It doesn't matter if I get myself hurt."

“The hell it doesn’t!” Haley scowled. “You’re one of my best friends, and if I let you go out alone and you get hurt I’ll never forgive myself.”

Nailah doesn't say anything for a while and finally settles on "I can't tell you what to do."

“I’m shitty at telepathy, and I don’t like peeking anyway...does that mean you’re going to wait while i get my shit on and come with you to help and make sure you don’t get yourself hurt, or does it mean that I’m going to have to break into the Point and possibly melt my brain trying to use Cerebra to track you down and help you without your consent.”

Nailah sighs.

"Alright, alright. But hurry." she relents.

Haley nodded curtly, dropped to one knee while she chugged the remainder of her coffee with impressive speed, and blasted into the air with her TK, flying towards her window. She reappeared through the same window about five minutes later, dressed in her prowling outfit which was significantly less fancy than Nailah’s new one.

“Okay,” she exhaled, somewhat out of breath. She picked up the empty coffee cup she’d left on the ground and crushed it into a tiny cube with a squint of her eyes, and flung it into a nearby trash can. “Where to?”

"A restaurant in London. Just follow me." she says as she takes to the air.

On the way she tersely fills Haley in on Hazards 'gift' but she avoids bringing up anything that happened over Christmas or where she was. Finally she dives down into the city and lands in front of the Clos Maggiore restaurant.

The street is mostly deserted, as most of those out for New Year's are already where they plan to be. The few outside stop to gawk at the dramatic entrance but quickly resume their nocturnal meanderings. There is absolutely nothing abnormal.

That is, of course, with the exception of the figure in the lion mascot costume and French flag t-shirt that emerges from an alley at exactly fifteen minutes to midnight. In one hand is a very large kitchen knife stained with what one hopes is rust. They regard the pair with lifeless eyes and wave in a jaunty "well come on then, I don't have all day" gesture.

"See if you can loop around back to the back of the alley. He's not getting away this time." Nailah says with grim determination before making her way towards the alley.

The mascot points at Nailah and backsteps into the alley with a high pitched giggle. If the occupant of the suit heard her, they are willingly allowing themselves to be boxed in.

Nailah doesn't wait for for Haley's response or to see if she does what she asked her to. She just sprints after the ridiculous mascot and pulls out the two batons from her belt.

Haley took back to the skies, trying to use her telepathy to obscure herself a bit while she flew over and around some of the buildings to try to get to the other side and keep the weirdo from getting away.

The mascot backs further into the alley, past mounds of garbage bags, pantomiming terror before slashing out at the oncoming sphinx. She thought she saw another pair of lifeless cartoon eyes watching from the trash.

At the other end of the alley, Haley discovers a black MINI Cooper parked by the opening. For some reason, there is a length of rope on the ground running from next to the car into the alley.

If she was being less reckless then spotting the other pair of eyes might have been good, alerting her to a possible ambush. As it is, catching a glimpse of them only distracts her as her eyes are drawn to them mid-charge.

The hell... she thought, surveying the rope and seeing if it was attached to the car before following it into the alley.

Nailah's power suddenly speaks up. Pivot counter-clockwise on the right foot. Strike down on the knife. Jump back. Go for the head.

The rope doesn't attach to anything. It merely meanders through random junk strewn in the alley. In fact, there is a strange excess of junk in the alley; much of it is rather pointy or otherwise hazardous.

"Heads up, Sphinx, lots of pointy shit in here. Coming your way to make a mascot sandwich on blonde." Haley announced, dropping to the ground but erecting a force bubble around her as she bolted down the alley and towards what she thought sounded like a scuffle down the alley.

"....That sounded way less fucking stupid before I said it."

As much as she's told herself she wasn't going to trust her power, to not rely on it anymore, when it suddenly pops into her mind again she's too used to it. It's too easy to give into the certainty and the unspoken promise of bringing down Hazard. She vaguely hears Haley in her head shouting a warning of some kind to her, but all that's on her mind in this moment is the Path. One foot plants solidly on the ground, claws snap out to provide traction as she twists her body and with her tail trailing behind her she turns counter-clockwise in perfect precision. The baton snaps out and strikes the knife as she turns and her other foot comes down, pushing her off the ground and backwards as the other baton swings around...

The first strike sends the knife clattering to the ground. The second knocks the mascot's head clean off in an impressive spin, only to reveal an empty shell. Yet there is a creepy, echoing feminine giggle from where the head would be. The Path tells her to have Haley crush it and to follow what comes out. She is also told to avoid the boneless and impossibly agile roundhouse kick it unleashes.

This does give Nailah pause. She opens her mouth but doesn't follow through. Consequently the rest of the steps disappear and she's caught by the kick and send flying backwards into the wall, only just about managing to stay on her feet.

Haley, receiving no direction otherwise, sprinted down the alley in time to see her partner kicked into the wall. She flung her arm upwards, trying to direct the mascot several feet into the air with her TK before dropping it roughly.

The suit rises and flails around helplessly. "Hey! No fair! That's cheating!" cries a woman's disembodied voice with an adorable squeaky southern US accent. The suit then crashes to the ground hard and flattens. A black mist billows out and makes a bee-line for a nearby garbage pile.

"What the heck..." Nailah throws one of her batons at the black mist. She's not really expecting it to do anything, but it frees up her hand, which pulls the pepper-spray from her belt which she proceeds to spray into the mist.

Haley looks confused for a moment then squints her eyes and tries to trap the mist (and pepper spray!) in a bubble of telekinetic force.

Haley's idea is sound, but forming a telekinetic bubble around a gaseous entity is hard. The mist squirts into the pile just before the barrier solidifies.

"Ooh! So close!" the voice gloats. "He said I couldn't kill you but let's have some fun anyway!" she cackles before an engine revs up and what looks like a modified lawnmower rotor with extra long blades on a motorized cart rockets out with a burst of black plastic confetti, hungry for some leg of Sphinx. The mad contraption bearing down on them sports the filthy head of a white rabbit costume.

"Heeere's Puppet!"

"Great, he made a psychotic friend..." Nailah mutters and pulls the knife from a pouch. She flicks it open as she backs away and throws it at the spinning blades, hoping it'll mess the machine up when it'll inevitably get stuck in the rotation.

Fate, being the harsh mistress that it is, graciously allows the knife to jam the blades and even cause the motor driving them to spark and die. The contraption halts. "Well banana shenanigans... he said you were a lucky little kitty! That wins you ooone question!"

"Where is he." Nailah demands.

"Really? I already told you that ya silly billy," the cartoonish voice responds, "... though I suppooose it isn't pronounced that way."

“Quit playing games, you fucking weirdo,” Haley snarled, probing her telepathy towards the strange creature, trying to pick up thoughts and secrets.

Though hazy, there is indeed a human mind in there.

God these kids are dense. It's L... Y... for fuck sake Alice, the sidekick is a telepath!

A human mind whose thoughts don't sound like a demented cartoon.

"I didn't make the rules buckaroo. Go to the lion of France. The fat viking lady has a message for you."

“Sphinx, isn’t there some place in France called like Lyon or something?” Haley asked aloud, trying to push a bit deeper mentally to see who the other voice was, probably without much success.