Demon in the city of stars

"She's pretty, in an exotic kind of way, ya'know?" Entei answered after he was shown the comic cover. He had indeed heard Uzma's earlier comment, but, he had gotten rather skilled at determining what he should have been able to hear, and what he shouldn't have, so he ignored it. As he looked through the pages upon pages of comics in front of him as he listened to Uzma talk, he began to realize exactly how passionate this girl was. It was a passion he lacked, or at least, had never experienced, and it brought a small smile to his lips, which he did his best to hide by turning away. A small blush came to his face as he slowly began to realize something. He was starting to like this girl. Coughing into his hand to try and quickly cover up the blush, he turned to Uzma, giving her his attention, instead of flipping through the comics.

"Hmm. My favorite comic book character you say?" In that moment, Entei realized something he hadn't known. He knew next to nothing about comic books. He couldn't remember the name of a fake hero, from the rather extensive list of real heroes he had run into since his short time adopting his hero moniker. So, there was only one thing to do in this situation. Lie. He didn't want her to think he was weird for not knowing about comic book characters, after all. "Ah, there was this really old hero my adoptive dad use to have the comics for. His name was Entei, and he was a pyrokinetic. He was an orphan like me, which is why I think I connected with him so well." After a short pause, Entei smiled to try and break the awkwardness of what he had just revealed. "But, enough about me. What are your parents likes?"

Entei smirked at the playful nod, slightly showing off his enlarged, fang like canines as he did so. Turning to follow the girl, he shrugged at her suggestion to change. "I think you look fine, and all I can smell is caramel." The last part of what he said was a half truth. While Caramel was indeed the strongest, most recent scent on her, he could certainly see what she meant when she said ice cream and little kids. He figured agreeing with her on that, though, would be rather rude. Holding the door for her after she had finally opened it with her backside, Entei was rather unsurprised to see the crowd from earlier had all but vanished into nothingness. Save for a few stragglers who waited to see what they presumed to be a professional cosplayer exit from the comic book shop. "Are you inviting me to your home, though?" He asked, cockiness beaming on his face. "You sure you trust me already? You just met me, after all." It was then, that one of the few times Entei ever cursed his powers came into play.

"Come on, you don't wanna do this, I'm a single mother!" The voice echoed in Entei's ears, and he let out an involuntary sigh. From the same direction, he heard the wailing of a small child, and the sound of metal dragging along concrete. He felt like he could literally smell the fear coming off of this lady, and his eyes drifted towards the scents and sounds. It would be very obvious that Michael was distracted, somewhat like a dog that heard a car pulling into the driveway. His ears even seemed to 'perk up', and his mouth went agape with what seemed like a zoned out form of concentration. For a millisecond he completely forgot that he was with Uzma, and the muscles in his legs had begun to coil and contract, preparing to sprint off. But, he quickly snapped back to reality, and looked to Uzma with what was his best imitation at a sincere smile he could muster in this situation. Though, it should have been painfully obvious that his eyes hid a hint of concern in them.

"Well, we should get going in that case!" Entei had said in response to whatever Uzma had answered about going to her home. He had been do preoccupied with the voice of the woman, that he had forgotten to listen to it. Grabbing her hand, he gently, but forcefully, pulled the girl with him as he began to walk towards the noise. It was probably bad etiquette to bring a girl you liked to a mugging, but, he hadn't got her number yet, and tracking her down in a city the size of L.A. would be incredibly difficult, not to mention a bit stalkerish. "Come one, I know a shortcut." He said, picking up his pace a bit with a lighthearted laugh. Completely ignoring the fact that he would have to explain all this later. At this moment, he was concerned with helping this woman, as well as keeping from losing contact with Uzma.

"Yea I know, crazy right?" Entei said, barely paying attention to what Uzma had been saying. His mind was racing at a million miles an hour, just trying to think of ways to fight without drawing his sword. Somehow, he didn't think 'Oh yea, by the way, I'm a demon whose real father killed his adoptive father just for fun,' was good first date protocol. As he ran, he grit his teeth in what appeared to be grueling agony. He was focusing so hard on the noise, that as it got louder, it was beginning to cause him physical pain. Finally, as he rounded a corner, he unfocused his hearing, and instead focused on the sight in front of him. Down the alleyway, was the woman he had heard earlier, a small stroller was placed protectively behind her, and Entei could hear a small child's cooing from inside of it. Surrounding her were three men, one of which wielded a large machete. In their eyes, Entei could see all the typical signs of a mugging, and possibly worse. Their dead, beady eyes held a primal lust in them, the same one Entei saw when he was slaying demons. "HEY!" he elled at the man, anger burning up in his very chest. With the hand that still held Uzma's, he pulled her behind him, before letting go, and slowly stalking towards the men. If they had been intelligent men, they would have run, they would have been able to see the murderous intent hidden behind the boy's usually calm, peaceful eyes. But, these were not smart men. They were deranged criminals, criminals who had just made a grave mistake.

"Oh, what's this?" The man with the machete, and obviously the leader of the group, spoke out with a slurred voice. From his distance, Entei could easily smell the liquor on his breath, and quite a bit of it. That was fine with Entei though, it would make this even less of a challenge. "It appears we gots ourselves a lil' hero here boys. Let's show him what we do to heroes."

The first man charged, a larger man, who appeared to be a bit on the overweight side, and probably thought a normal sized kid like Entei would give him no problems. Boy was he wrong. If it it was from the pure Adrenaline pumping through his body, or his demonic blood, Entei would never know, but the entire scene seemed to be moving in slow motion. It was like Entei could see the man's movements before he had even made them, and he quickly reacted appropriately. The man threw a wild right hook, which Entei ducked under, spreading out his stance, and wrapping the heel of his foot around the fat man's heel, before quickly grabbing the man's out stretched wrist with his right hand, and placing his palm on the lower side of the man's bicep. With a quick pull down on the wrist, and thrust up on the arm, the snapped the man's elbow, causing him to let out a blood curdling scream of agony. Continuing to pull down on the wrist, Entei hooked his heel in, pulling out the man's foot, weakening his stance, and enabling Michael to easily hip toss the man to the ground, causing him to hit his head, hard. Through the concussion, and the broken elbow, that man would not be moving anytime soon. The speed at which Michael executed that combo would have put master martial artist to shame, and it was over before anyone, besides perhaps Uzma, had realized the man was on the ground.

Walking forward, Michael mustered up all the control of his demon powers he could, which was not a lot considering his blade was still sheathed, and sent a small spark of fire out. But, it was nowhere that anyone could see. No, instead, he sent a ember of fire, directly into the eyeballs of the man holding the Machete. The screams he released, as the fluids of his eyeballs began to boil and evaporate, would have given the most hardened of serial killers nightmares. Using the time, Entei rushed forward, stepping into the man's guard, and delivering a solid punch to the man's juggular, causing all air to cease making the trip from his lungs to his brain, rendering the man unconscious. It was rather kind of Michael, actually, letting him escape that horrifying pain. The third man, realizing he was outmatched, turned tail and ran, and Entei allowed it, instead holding his hands up to the woman he had just rescued.

"Ma'am, my name is Michael Krieger, I'm not going to hurt you." He said in a soft, gentle voice. "Uzma, call the police."

"As much as I would like to just leave, and go on our date..." Michael began trailing off slightly as he looked from Uzma back to the scared, crying woman, then back to Uzma. "...We should probably wait for the police, and the paramedics. If this was my sister, or mother, I would want someone to wait with her." Bending over, Michael looked inside the small stroller the woman had been pushing, and looked at the small child within. Somehow, the little bugger had managed to sleep through the whole ordeal. It made Michael laugh softly to himself, as he looked again to the mother, then down to the two men who laid unconscious on the concrete floor of the alleyway. One from pain, the other from lack of oxygen.

'Perhaps I went too hard on them...' He thought to himself. After all, they were just humans, and had absolutely no chance against his heightened sense and reflexes. Then again, they had broken Michael's one cardinal rule: Never hurt women or children. It was the one moral code he still abide by, unless absolutely necessary to break for survival. With a soft sigh he stood back to his full height, and looked to Uzma, a sheepish grin on his face.

"So..you're probably wondering how I did that huh?" He said nervously, his brain running through any possibly, believable lie it could. "Well, you see, I uh..I got into a lot of fights as a kid, and I had to learn to defend myself. I guess I got rather good at it." Yep. Totally believable. Or, it would be, if Entei wasn't such an awful, awful liar. Even the simplest person would have been able to note the stress in his voice, or the blush that quickly spread across his face, obvious signs of shame. But, maybe, just maybe, the young demon would luck out, and the girl would chalk it up to feelings of romance, or shame of having to cancel the date. Hey, even sons of satan got the occasional lucky break, after all. "Sorry we have to cancel the date, though. I've uh...I've been in situations like this before. We're probably going to have to deal with the cops for the remainder of the night. But, it is the right thing to do."