Welcome to Gaia! ::

She lifted her head just enough to give him a searingly bright grin. "Eighteen." She whispered, a fierce pride behind the word. "So yes. They do." As had her fake IDs before Deus, as well - though they did usually give men a harder time about those kinds of things, at clubs. Something about wanting all the pretty, available ladies on the dance floor.

She could have gotten in with nothing but that smile.

It felt like everything had closed in around them. Amidst all of the noise and bustle, that one moment made her feel like they were alone, two people sharing a secret that was naughty and they were going to get in trouble and oooh, what if mom and dad found out. She bumped her head against his chest and laughed, without explaining what the sudden, intense bubble of joy her laughter expressed was really about. They were children, stealing from the cookie jar.

She wanted the moment to last. She didn't know she was about to ruin it.

"Sounds like a hard life to leave." She couldn't imagine what had given him the urge to make the choice. "Why did you?"

Some of us don't have a choice.

Maebe's eyes were glimmering with dangerous curiosity. Her entire expression looked like she wanted to crawl into his brain and find out what he meant by that. She wanted to know exactly how Deus had forced him to leave a loving, caring family and join a bunch of barely human superheroes in a fight that cut their life expectancy to a third. She wanted to know, and he didn't want to tell her.

She felt it in his dimming smile.

"Deus is hardly a better option." She mumbled, her lower lip sticking out in a sullen pout. "I thought it was, when I joined. I'm definitely regretting that decision." All the power in the world wouldn't have made Maebe choose Deus again. Even if it meant she'd have never been in love, she wouldn't come back.

It was easy to convince herself of that, when the option wasn't available.

The line moved abruptly, as they opened the club to a vast majority. She turned her attention to it and smiled, tying her hands up messily with both of his. "They're going to let us in soon. Are you ready for this?"

"You would have met nicer, if you had stayed home." She offered, turning back to look at him with a well practiced smirk on her lips. "Trust me. Having met people like me is not worth the trouble."

She was ready, however. When they got to the bouncer, her expression transformed. Her hands had abandoned Dawson's, but she was still pressed against him, just enough to promise the bouncer that she wasn't going in without her man - but her eyes, lidded and interested, promised him that there was no guarantee she'd be leaving with him. That was enough to make the giant, imposing figure sneer with yellowed teeth that spoke of cigarettes and beer. He unclicked the red velvet rope, and ushered her in by placing his hand gently on the curve of her thigh, where it shouldn't have been.

He gave Dawson no such service, but at least he wasn't fussing with entry either. Neither of them were carded, if only because the bouncer didn't want to know whether she was legal or not. It was always easier to fool a polygraph that way.

Maebe snatched up Dawson's hands the moment they were inside, and attached them like a seatbelt to her waist - because if he didn't hold on, he would have lost her. The room was far more crowded than she'd expected, but the view was still to die for.

She heard nothing coming from him over the loud thrumming music and the feel of base against her chest. So instead, when they continued to slog through the slow moving crowd, she began to shift and pop to the wordless music. Her hands let go of him, in the hopes he would know better than to let go of her as well. Instead they slid up, against her neck and over her hair until they were perched exotically in the air, twitching with the beat. In her mind, it was obvious. What was next was to dance.

Her eyes closed for a moment, just to drown in the beat, before she resurfaced and opened them facing up at the ceiling. Her hands stopped moving to wrap around Dawson's head, and tilt it up as far as she could. If he couldn't hear her, at least he would know what she was looking at.

"Look, there's a person in the ball!" A clearly trained professional dancer was twirling and arching and crawling and weaving in and out of a giant metal cage surrounding an almost equally giant disco ball. How she'd gotten up there was anyone's guess, but it was clearly her job; as dangerous as it might be.

Maebe screamed with delight, and turned around to face Dawson, while still watching the dancer move above them. Her own body was never at rest, and her lips always had a laugh on the edge, just waiting to escape.

It was increasingly obvious how Dawson planned on dancing the night away, which was a gentle rhythm that held him close to himself, like a tight little ball of nervousness. And she wasn't actually surprised, though she was relieved that he wasn't trying to show off. She should have at least given him some pointers before they'd entered the club, though. This one was on her, without a doubt.

She slowed to try and move at his pace, and only found herself wanting to snicker. It felt like they were prom dancing, and it was so awkward, so incredibly out of place, that it became the most endearing thing she'd ever experienced. She let it dictate her movements for a few minutes more, until she watched completely familiar behavior suddenly become unacceptable. A woman was riding up on Dawson from behind, and she had the gall to run those ridiculously clawed hands anywhere near his body while Maebe was dancing with him. The look mustered in her ice blue eyes was downright murderous.

Then she realized poor Dawson was in a room full of Maebe's, and felt like a complete a*****e for ever thinking this was a good idea.

She got up on her toes, trying to get close enough for him to hear her. "I'm sorry," She all but screamed out, her brow furrowed with contrition. "We can leave anytime you want. I don't want you to be uncomfortable."

She also did not want to have to cut a b***h.

He spoke her language. She nodded fervently in agreement, and grabbed both of his hands. "This way." She screamed up at him, tugging him towards where she knew the bar was. It was completely unviewable from where they were, but she remembered.

A few seconds later, she hit paydirt. The brown wood of the bar pressed against her stomach, and she waved her fingers until the bartender caught sight of her, and leaned in to catch her order.

"Two tequila shots, and a sex on the beach." She yelled at him, belatedly turning back to get Dawson's order. "What would you like? It's on me."

Someone was already calling the bartender over to them, gesturing wildly to try and give him money to pay for Maebe's drink. He shook his head, well versed in the situation. "She's with someone," He told the oily looking dancer, who immediately put his money away.

"A whiskey, a mint julep, and a rusty nail." Dawson needn't worry about the night being on Maebe's dime. While she wasn't used to paying for drinks, she was used to saving up way too much money for her own good. This meant she was virtually swimming in money that she was itching to spend on something other than clothes for once. Dawson was the perfect excuse to pull the hundred out of her bra.

"Hold this for a tab." She yelled at the bartender, who took the money with a nod. Her drinks were already set on the counter, but he'd only just begun Dawson's.

She knew he only meant one. Yes, she knew.

Her hand reached back to tip first one, then the other shot back down her throat. Each glass was slammed down on the counter, and promptly taken away. She picked up her sex on the beach, plucked out the little umbrella, and sucked the pointy end of it for a moment as she thought about his question. The tiny, colorful little decoration was pulled through her closed lips, and then promptly placed behind his left ear.

"You're not boring, Dawson." She yelled out, having come closer in order to put the umbrella in. "Not to me."

His whiskey came up first, and she leaned back to let him take it, while sipping coyly on her own. "I'd take you on a million dates, if you'd let me."

Maebe held two fingers up behind her, without looking. A few seconds later, two more shots were waiting at her back. She remained facing him, sipping on her straw with perfectly puckered lips. "Actually, I'm a one trick pony. The only good places I really know are night clubs and strip joints. Seeing as I'm not going to take you to the latter, and I've already subjected you to the former today, you may already be done with me." She grinned impishly, as if to tell him that being done with her wasn't really allowed. "But New York is just full of places to be discovered. It wouldn't be hard. We could find them together."

She was making plans, which was the exact minute she realized how doomed it all was. Her smile transformed into something more careful, and she found herself craving the sting of alcohol down her throat once more. Thankful for her foresight, she turned her head and downed each of her new shots, one after the other, without a breath in between.

Returning to look at him, she held her fruity drink up in cheers. "Here's to burning through shields." She muttered, an amused bitterness in her voice.