Beneath the Skin (open, anybody)

His fists hit the punching bag with a satisfying thwump, each blow striking harder and faster than the last until his muscles burned and his breath came perceptibly heavier. Alex felt unaccountably angry. Irrevocably angry.

Each passing minute made him want to destroy something, kill something. Detach himself from this school and everyone in it. He picked up a twenty-pound weight that was sitting next to a bench nearby and hurled it in a random direction. It collided with a rack of similar weights and they collapsed. His adrenaline was pumping; he felt powerful and unstoppable. Nobody at this pathetic place would be able to stop him.

He returned his attention to the punching bag, wondering if he could destroy it with only his fists and knees.

Alex had been here for a while, if the sweat clinging to his frame was any indication. His white tank top and loose black shorts showed off the muscles he had been working on, rippling with each move he made. His punches steadily grew measured, more patient and his scowl eased somewhat.

---

Damon glanced up when his twin finally came back. He whispered, "You took too long. This guy is dangerous. He destroyed a rack of weights. He will kill us."

Angelo plopped down next to his twin, sitting on a beam high up in the gym. "He'll never get to us up here. From what I've seen, he can't fly. Remember, we share a common area."

Damon shook his head. "Light, air, and water, right? How do you know he can't do something to get us down?!?"

Angelo waved a hand at his dark brother. "You worry too much. I got the supplies." He shook a bag gently in his brother's direction. "We have to wait until his attention is elsewhere, then BAM," he lowered his voice when his twin made a face at the outburst, "we set up the pranks."

Damon still wasn't sure this was right, but he figured he could stealthily remove the pranks after his twin was done setting them up. That would be easier if he saw where Angelo placed them.

Angelo watched the older boy working out below them and mused, "I bet I could distract him... or you could. You'd do a better job than I would, I think."

Miller walks to the gym door to start a day of working out, due to his paranoia he looked around the hallway before he opens the door. Before he completely opens the door he takes a peek in by cracking the door open a little. He sees Alex pounding the punching bag, he pulls his head back and puts a baseball cap on because now that he knows that someone else is in there he can't turn the lights off the way his eyes prefers.

Miller opens the door slowly, then enters the room very nervously still wearing his green T-shirt and black jeans (he isn't aware of things such as work out clothes). He steps over to the broken rack of weights while at the watching Alex, which as he can see is clearly not in a good mood. Miller is a bit scared and shaking a bit while walking, he doesn't notice the two boys sitting above them, his attention is diverted to Alex.

He tries not to look at Alex once he picks up a weight in his only hand, sits down on the bench beside the pile of wood and weights. His arm blade was resting on his lap as he started to arm pumping with his smaller less muscular arm.

Alex was set to ignore the newcomer. In fact, he would have pretended that he was completely alone if not for the interruption to his boxing. He was startled and entirely annoyed to find a pre-teen standing in front of the bag. The boy had curling black horns, wings, and a tail, and Alex found him to be intolerable.

The kid seemed nervous to be there, weak. If there was anything he hated, it was weakness. He stopped punching the bag and looked at the kid, silently informing him that he was not welcome. In response, the kid hesitated, then made a rude gesture at him and chucked a monkey wrench at his head (he moved so that it glanced off, of course.) Alex's mouth opened in both surprise and anger as the boy blatantly taunted him, then ran away.

A moment passed and Alex said, "That was a mistake." He didn't even move until the boy had gotten quite a ways away from him. Then he sprang forward. The sound of something groaning, then bursting in the walls heralded the arrival of water.

It burst through the drywall and slammed into the boy (who had been darting past Miller.) It was also headed in Miller's direction.

Miller tries to not pay any attention to what's happening around him, he was just staring at his right arm as it pumped up then back down. He then starts speaking to himself under his breath so that the others don't hear what he says, not that it has anything to do with them.

"We must keep our only arm nice and strong" he said to himself "I think I must work on my legs, so if those scientists do find me here, at least I'll be able to escape""fine thats what we'll do" he responded to himself.

Miller put the weight on the part of the bench beside him and jumped up, on his feet. Then a little devil boy zoomed past him and he stepped back keeping his blade arm behind his back so it won't collide with the small boy.

Miller looks into the direction that the devil kid ran and saw the massive amount of water coming to straight for him. Miller's large black eyes widen even more and the look of fear appeared on his face. He finally does the only thing he knows to do, he raises his blade arm quickly and jabs it into the ground just as quickly. Then his skin hardens to protect him as the colossal blast of water slams into him straight on, but does not even make him budge.

Alex watched with half-lidded eyes as the devil-kid hit a rowing machine and fell to the ground. His interest was piqued when the other guy who had come into the gym withstood the force of the water blast. As the demon-kid gingerly picked himself up off the floor, Alex pulled the water to him. It hung in the air in a myriad of different shaped globes.

One of these, he shot at an angelic-looking kid who was laughing at them all from the rafters. The kid dropped from the rafter to avoid the shot and used his wings to slow his descent. However, Alex's second watery projectile did not miss. He warned them both, "Scram."

The demon kid ran over to his friend and exclaimed, "Angelo! You okay?" He stared at Alex with wide eyes. "You didn't have to do that!"

Angelo shoved the demon boy's hands away and got up. "You bastard," he shot at Alex, who wasn't impressed. "That was a cheap shot."

Alex folded his arms over his chest and shook his head. "Get out of here, kid."

Angelo was going to protest, closed his mouth, thought for a moment, then grinned. "Yeah, it's easy to pick on kids, but I bet you'd have a harder time beating that guy up." He pointed at Miller.

Alex took another speculative look at the new guy. From first glance, it was clear that they were pretty evenly matched in height and physical shape. The other guy had more apparent advantages (namely, the sword-arm,) but Alex's mastery over water could be hinted at by the orbs floating around his person.

He didn't notice that the angel kid had shoved the demon kid closer to him. He did feel a bit more combative. "Hey, you," he called over to the other guy. "You think you can take me? We'll have to settle this." Without warning, he froze all of the ice around him and hurled it at the other guy's head.

Miller soften his skin and he curiously looked around the room to find out where the water went to. Then he turns and finds it hurling towards him in the form of ice. Miller once again went wide eyed and jumped to his left and landed on the ground front down. He pushes himself up a bit and has his face towards the ground.

"Can we take him?" he asked himself, he looks back up shaking a bit "are you insane you saw what he did" he responded "do we have a choice?".
"No I guess you have a point" he replied.

He got himself up completely and quickly, then he threw his blade arm to his left side, his hat has fell off by now. Miller runs straight at Alex as fast as he could with his blade far back behind him gliding through the air.

Alex frowned at the boy, who was talking to himself. Huh. Maybe this was a horrible idea. Maybe this guy was mentally handicapped. Alex might have no qualms about teaching a couple younger kids a lesson, but even he had to draw the line somewhere.

He was on the verge of stepping back when the angel-kid said, "What the F*** are you doing just standing there? You a coward?"

Between shooting the kid a dark look and turning back to his opponent, the dude with black hair had made up his mind. Alex grinned and pulled the water together to form a sword made of ice and ran at Miller. As he reached the other guy, he brought the sword down in a slashing motion.

||Sorry it's so short. My posts can get that way during action sequences. It's either make them short or risk powerplaying and I'd rather choose the lesser of two evils.||

When Miller gets much closer to Alex he notices the ice sword and he tries to think of an idea that will save himself from being killed as he is running full speed towards the guy. Once Alex got close enough to Miller, he grabbed onto the arm opposite to his right on Alex, completely stops dead in his tracks ,and hardens his skin so that Alex couldn't harm him nor could he escape. Miller's plan was to hold onto him until he calmed down, which may or may not work.

Miller kept hoping in his thoughts that this works because he has no battle plan and has no battle experience with an other living being. He starts putting a back up plan into his thoughts.

When he was grabbed by the other guy, Alex's first instinct was to hit him in the arm with the sword. The sword shattered and the shards floated in the air around them as Alex immediately went to his second recourse. A couple punches told him all he needed to know.

His third recourse was to send water directly up the other guy's nose. This was something he usually didn't have to do. The last time had been for a fight with Erin's brother. While that particular fight had not ended well (he'd been trapped under a bike while his perceptions had been altered by a cowardly trick by Jared,) the trick had been pretty effective. If water itself didn't work, he would be forced to replicate the move exactly (this version was gentler.)

When Miller got water up his nose he immediately let go of Alex and softens his skin so he can move. He quickly backs away clenching his nose with one hand and his arm blade blocking his face from anything the other guy might do. Miller now kneeling tried clearing his nose and finally got the water out.

He started thinking of what to do again, but all that came to his mind was blunt force. "We have no choice we must fight" he complained to himself "give me a couple more seconds to think" he replied still in his defensive stance.

Alex felt that could have dealt some damage while the other guy was distracted, but decided that he really didn't want to get expelled just yet. He glanced over at the kid who had instigated the fight and folded his arms over his chest. The kid got the point and glared at him. "Whatever, he was clearly holding back. He didn't use that sword-arm of his. Besides, the fight's not over- he can still beat you."

Alex sent water up the boy's nose and froze it. As the kid squeaked in pain, he walked over to him and growled in a voice only the kid could hear, "You're an idiot. Why don't you leave before you actually get hurt? The fight's over because I say it's over, got that?" The boy, his nose now bleeding, gave Alex a begrudging nod and waved to the demon-kid.

They both left. Alex glanced around at the gym.

A great deal of it was damp. He could easily remedy that, of course, by a quick use of his power. He called the water to himself and it floated in several basketball-sized globes around his person. The real issues were the broken pipe and the broken weight rack. Not that he cared about the trouble they would cause the school. He was just annoyed that he'd allowed himself to get riled up by a kid.

His cold eyes surveyed the other guy. After a moment, he commented (in a surprising display of loquaciousness,) "If you didn't mince about and play so close to the belt, you'd be a decent opponent. Next time, use the weapons you have. I will not hold back." He went back over to the punching bag, seemingly ignoring the water around his person. He had lived with his power and worked with it to the extent that doing this required very little effort.

Miller risen from his defensive stance right after the devil kid's comment and watched as Alex shoved icicles up the kid's nose, he felt thankful that that didn't happen to him. He looked around the damp room and at all the damage that they did, he didn't think too much about it because he has no clear knowledge about laws or rules. He walks closer to Alex after the two boys left the gym and listens to what he says.

Miller has no idea what Alex means by 'playing close to the belt' so in confusion to his slang words he just replies with "uh, yes... we'll not do that the next time". He walks back a bit and turns his head to the side asking himself while only having the non-visible side of his mouth moving "do you know what that means?" he responded with "I have no idea keep pretending you know what he's saying until I figure it out".

He very quietly walks over to Alex while he's using the punching bag and whispers to himself under his breath "maybe he can train us?" to which he replied with "I don't know you want to try asking?".

Then he completely stops and whispers back "can you do it we're scared". Then his tone of voice becomes a bit more louder right after the "eh-hm" then he followed it up with an "excuse me, I was wondering something?" he directed that into the water bender's direction.

"Good." Alex was pretty sure that the other guy was insane. Or something that looked like insanity. In any case, he was wary when the guy came closer. Did he want to continue the fight? Alex, personally, didn't feel compelled to fight anymore- he felt that unless the other guy stopped trying not to hurt him, things would be sort of pointless. Alex had ferreted out a weak spot (he suspected that the eyes and ears might also be places that he could attack) and he was bored with the idea of sparring with this guy.

He gave the punching bag a few blows, noticing that he'd bruised his knuckles when he'd punched the other guy earlier. At least he'd gotten a chance to work on strategy, which was something he didn't often have to do. Normally, brute force got him through things... though his fights with Erin usually had several wild card factors to them. He sort of missed those fights, but not necessarily for the reasons anybody would expect. Also, they were out of the question since he'd come very very close to actually causing some damage to Erin out at the lake.

Alex had his suspicions about his abilities. The human body contains about 50-something to 70-something percent water, right? Well, if that aspect of the human physiology could be tapped into... He shook his head, launching an elbow at the punching bag. It would be a coward's way of winning a fight to use an aspect of an opponent's body against them like that. Still, he stored away that realization just in case he was ever cornered.

He paused in his workout when Miller asked him something. Irritated at another interruption, he turned to glare at the guy. Between his teeth, he growled, "What?" Given the other guy's appearance, he figured it wasn't about his too-pale skin and white hair. If the guy was about ask why he had gone around beating up other people, he was going to make him regret even coming to the gym.

Rosemary waltzed into the room, having exercised Swan she felt it was time to get her gymnastics back up to shape as she walked over to the mat. Once there she stretched her muscles, allowing her hair to fall softly against her shoulders and chest, standing out against her white and grey leotard which barely crinkled as she stretched the various muscles.

Rose didn't really spot the two males that were within the vicinity but her mind was focused so didn't really pay attention to anything else as she started to do some basic handstands to get her rhythm going and to check that she would be alright to do a routine or if she needed to build back up her skill.

At her last school, her teachers often praised her and suggested that she should compete however she declined, she was comfortable with teaching others who would compete but she was quite shy about herself and didn't want to be seen in public so practised in seclusion, peace and tranquillity; more often than not with Swan as her only companion as she stopped her train of thought to complete a flip and upon landing launch back up into a back flip and finishing in a split, uneasily and with a couple of wobbles. "I really am rusty...... Take it back Rosa, take it nice and easy..." She stated to herself mostly as she swung her back leg towards the front and starting a shoulder stand to balance.

Miller hadn't noticed the woman walk in, as he was occupied with the current situation he was in. A drop of sweat slid from his temple down to his cheek, he hasn't felt this nervous all his life and he broke out of a lab. He thought through every word he was about to say because he knows the smallest of things could set him off again.

He opened his mouth and shot out "well, I was thinking. Maybe you could train me to be better at fighting, so I can protect myself from, umm... Unwanted people" then he also shot out shaking scared "with a man of your stature, you would be the best suited".

He readied himself for whatever Alex might do by starting to harden his skin and his eyes were halfway closed. He was ready to pull his sword upwards to protect his head, he was going all out on protection this time.