Trouble, where trouble is due. (open)

Ethan was not one to look for trouble, no, he actually went out of his way to avoid it, problem is, trouble always found him one way or another.

"Five on one huh?" Ethan grunted out, spitting a frothy mix of blood and spit onto the ground as he looked at the five punks before him. Jump city wasn't as bad as steel city, but damn, was it starting to annoy him, "doesn't seem fair, at least you're doing it for selfish reasons and being truthful about it at least. I can respect that," he stood up straight finally, his fists raised into a traditional boxing stance as he spat once more. The blood was gone, the small cut in his lip having healed within a few moments before cracking his neck to the side.

Normally, a single person against five armed punk ass muggers was going to get curb stomped. But Ethan was not a normal person and while he preferred to avoid trouble and subsequently, fighting, he always made a habit of finishing what someone else started with him — painfully. So it stood to reason that Ethan, the defendant in this back alley brawl, was about to get his head handed to him. Well, if you didn't know him that's what you'd think anyways.

"Nah, it looks pretty fair to us," the head moke grunted, grinning from ear to ear as he tapped the gently with his free hand; the rest of his buddies chuckling as if on cue. Ethan didn't look at all impressed by this, or them for that matter. As if to further insinuate on this point, he started walking towards the group, pulling a fresh unlit cigarette from his coat and sticking it in his mouth.

"Oi. w- what do you think yer doing? You can't leave till after we take yer money ya punk!" The leader was a big guy, burly, at least two hundred and fifty pounds of solid muscle. From an outside point of view, that translated out as being goddamned terrifying. To Ethan, it was an annoyance that kept on buzzing. "Hmm? Oh, I'll send you a check for a hundred dollars then," mumbling absentmindedly, Ethan began to fish for a match, unaware of the mugger as he bought the crowbar across his face, like a solid steel bitch slap, coupled with a resounding crack.

Big mistake.

The cigarette he was chewing on, landed in a puddle and for a few brief seconds, there was silence as blood poured down his face. Unknown to the group of five, they had just done a rather, terrible thing. They ruined Ethan's last smoke. Ethan stumbled against a cluster of garbage cans, knocking two over and using the third for support. Slowly, he got his bearings back as he slowly looked up at the five men as he once again, spat out a wad of spit mixed with blood. He was not happy.

Slowly shuffling back towards the five men, Ethan picked up the thoroughly ruined cigarette and threw it in the man's face much to his chagrin, "Screw this, I'm gonna bash his little head in," like a bull that saw only red, the man charged Ethan, crowbar held up high, a look of seething rage plastered on his face. What came next was a bit of a surprise, perhaps a shock even, as Ethan not only caught the length of metal, but held it steadfast above himself like it had snagged against something.

Struggle all the man wanted, he couldn't dislodge his weapon from Ethan's grip and the rage soon became a look of frantic terror. He was dealing not with a normal person, as no normal human could weather a blow from a crowbar not once, but twice and then catch it mid swing and hold it there! The thugs were dealing with a meta.

Ethan's fist caught the man in the torso, lifting him a foot off the ground and causing his grip to loosen on the bar as he hit the ground, a stream of effluvium scented vomit splattering across the ground as he curled up in a ball. The rest of the man's thug buddies had gotten the bright idea of quantity over quality, bull rushing Ethan with lead pipes and chains.

He was a flurry of kicks, jabs and strikes, as each man fell under his well rounded hand to hand combat. After thoroughly picking their pockets clean, he took a seat on the leader who groaned under the added weight and sighed. He might not look for trouble, but trouble always found him one way or another.

Irritatedly, Ethan looked at the new arrival and sighed. Trouble, always and rightly so, trouble had a way of finding him and unfortunately, this trouble was going to be a right pain in the ass. That, Ethan was sure of. Not only had he flicked a rock at an immobilized target (Ethan was sitting on the guy), but he had no proper street smarts. "Yeah, whatever, short stack. I don't have the time to be dealing with this," Ethan grunted in irritation as he looked down at what used to be his cigarette and sighed. It was a big old pain in the ass, first these guys jump him, then he loses his last cigarette and finally some type of living blueberry bush was pestering him. This was just great, perfect even, just how else could Ethan's day get anymore annoying?

Standing up off this Toni moke, Ethan spat on the ground before pushing past the kid with a sigh. Yeah, today was cloudy with a chance of annoying, as he put some distance from the alleyway and the kid. He was entirely not in the mood for this crap, not in the mood for this crap at all. And the sooner he got himself his cigarettes, the better. That kid better not be following me, cause I can't deal with this bullshit today.

Ethan stopped in his tracks, listening to the kids naive words. Didn't he understand when someone wanted to be left alone, wanted to be away from people for awhile. He reached for a cigarette out of habit, his fingers grabbing nothing as he let out an irate groan, "my issue, huh, that's a good one. Kid, my issue is that I wanna be left alone. That's my issue, got it blueberry?" Ethan stated in an otherwise bitter tone as he continued making his way down the road, his current destination being none other than a smoke shop that housed all sorts of tobacco based products, one of which he had an interest in; cigarettes.

The shop was closing up for the night, one person was locking up when Ethan gave the glass a hard knock, startling the women behind the counter. He was suddenly holding his wallet up. Looks like one more sale was going to transpire tonight before they closed up shop. With a soft click the door was unlocked and Ethan stepped through the threshold, the smell of tobacco filled his nostrils and he let out a relaxed sigh. "Two packs of peter Jackson's king size, menthol filters. And a couple match books if you got em," as he spoke softly, Ethan laid out twenty five bucks on the counter as the women laid down the cigarettes and the matches, took the twenty five dollars and Ethan quietly pocketed his disgusting little habit in his jacket. The women was about to bring up the streak of crimson down the side of his face, but Ethan had already left the shop.

It was relatively quick, five minutes in and he was outside unwrapping a package before putting one of the white tubes of paper packed with tobacco into his mouth, bit down on the filter and retrieved a match. The smell of sulfur and smoke filled his nostrils as he put flame to paper, the end of the stick smoldering bright orange as he inhaled deeply of the narcotic and blew out a puff of gray smoke, "secondly pipsqueak, a knife in the side isn't going to stop me anytime soon. So if you could kindly leave me alone now, I'd appreciate it," he stated roughly as he continued his walk down the sidewalk, that fresh patch of blood on the side of his face not bothering him all that much, he'd clean it off at a water fountain or something. No big deal.

"You're smarter than you look," Ethan stated as he continued to walk, taking a moment to stop every now and then to check his surroundings before moving on again. This kid wanted his pertinent information, his name and powers? Hell, he didn't even know what half his powers did, or were for that matter. Ethan would have to decline as he looked at the kid again, and blew a puff of smoke in his face. "Sorry kid, I'm going to have to decline on your offer," he spoke in his usual calm, listless tone as he continued to walk along, oblivious to anything else the kid would actually have to say.

Ethan was, and is without a doubt a complete asshole when he felt like it. This kid that was getting into his personal space didn't help matters much either. Picking up his pace, Ethan weaved his way around the few people that were still left on the streets with a sigh. Still, no one was trying to pick a fight with him at least, which was good, Ethan really didn't actually like fighting - it was too much trouble - too much of a hassle to deal with and Ethan didn't really deal with trouble that well.

"So kid if you could just piss off, I can go off and enjoy myself without having to worry about some blue haired smurf reject pestering me, okay?"

Ethan kept on walking, his ability to tune out the kid was in all honesty quite good. "Sure, whatever smurfette," chewing on the end of the cigarette, Ethan inhaled causing the tip to burn bright orange before looking at Toji again. He had nothing but contempt written all over his face.

Now, Ethan wasn't one to pick fights in fact, he was doing a damn good job avoiding it with the smurf. But as it stood, Ethan needed to get away from the freak cause frankly, he couldn't deal with the irritation of having some idiot who didn't know when he wasn't wanted around and pestering him, it was like the adoring fan in Oblivion all over again. Except, in oblivion, you could at least kill the little bastard and get away with it.

"Now, I can obviously tell you're about as dumb as a stump, so I'll use proper lingo. Me, want you, go away now." Irritation, that was something Ethan was good friends with, granted, he hated being friends with anything that bothered him but as it stood, it helped in dealing with people better then anger or rage could ever achieve. So as far as he was concerned, he could at least tolerate it's presence just for a little while. The irritation's, not the little smurf's presence.