Robin stared as his cat purred. At the girl. Seriously?!

"How the hell did you do that?!" he demanded, looking at Jeane. She looked startled, but didn't move. "Oh gods, you're going to terrorize me with my own cat now aren't you? Damned females. Taking over my apartment behind my back, even after I try to help you."

Jeane looked briefly amused at his outburst and hesitantly started petting Salome. The undead cat purred, flexing very sharp claws.

Cal snorted. "Have fun giving up your room, Nik," he said. Because no one else wanted to stay in his room. Ever. Nik had trouble going in his room sometmes. He was very secure in the knowledge that his space was safe.

The living room, on the other hand, was not.

Niko rolled his eyes and resisted the urge to smack his brother on the back of the head.

"While I would never inflict that cesspool you call a bedroom on another sentient being, you are still going to help clean up the apartment," he said. "As I recall, I asked you more than once to throw away the Chinese in the fridge, and contrary to what you may believe, it won't take care of itself."

Khalid watched the exchange between them after she glowered at Goodfellow for startling Jeane. Jeane was still skittish with nonhumans, and he wasn't helping. She wiggled a couple of fingers at him as a warning not to do it again, because she would make good on her earlier threat and not feel the slightest bit of remorse for it.

Robin paled slightly at the implied threat and sat back, clearly rethinking things. Maybe he shouldn't try to heave them off on the Leandros brothers. He might not have much of a city left after that...

Cal shrugged. "It's still edible," he protested. He was pretty sure it was, after being nuked for a couple minutes. it wasn't like things were growing on it last he'd checked a week ago...

Niko just gave him a flat look.

"I doubt it was ever truly edible to begin with," he said. "You have no idea what those preservatives are doing to you, nor, I suspect, do you care." Which was probably very accurate. He shook his head with a small sigh and turned to the two women.

Khalid was watching them carefully.

"If the puck says that the safest place around is with you, then I'm inclined to believe him," she said reluctantly. It grated on her to have to admit that they needed the help. "I would be just fine on my own, but Jeane needs a place to stay." And that was the crux, wasn't it? Khalid had always been just fine on her own, but she wasn't on her own at the moment.

Jeane glanced at her friend before looking determinedly back down at Salome. Not only was everything likely her fault, but they'd had to leave because of her too. Because Khalid couldn't protect them both.

Cal glanced over at Jeane and blinked at her nonresponsiveness. Not that he really cared, but he did not want weepy women in the apartment. Things were bad enough already.

"Fine," he grumbled, getting to his feet. "Let's get going already so I can go sleep."

Niko nodded in agreement, although this time he did give his brother a bit of a whap.

"Then perhaps it's best if we go," he said. He glanced at Robin, who had gone uncharacteristically quiet. "I'm sure Robin would like to go back to sleep."

"I'm sure there's a lot of thinks he would like to do," Khalid retorted. Regardless, she went over and held out a hand to help Jeane to her feet. It was late, and she hadn't been kidding when she said Jeane would need a place to stay. The human didn't look tired quite yet, but Khalid was sure it was only a matter of time. It had been a very stressful few days, after all, and humans could only push themselves so far.

"Come on," she said softly. "I think we'll be alright for the time being."

Robin rolled his eyes and waved them out the door. "Don't bother me unless Mercury is pounding on your door." He grinned and waggled his eyebrows at Khalid. "Unless you change your mind, of course."

Jeane took Khalid's hand and got to her feet, petting Salome one last time. She wasn't comfortable with this, but she didn't have much of a choice either. Covering a yawn with one hand, she headed for the door, glancing over at the brothers.

Cal rubbed the back of his head, leading the way out of the apartment and down the stairs outside. Too freaking cold out here. Although it would probably be warmer in the apartment now with four people radiating heat instead of the normal two. That wouldn't be a bad change.

"I doubt you could handle it if I did," Khalid replied. She snapped her fingers once and then turned to follow the brothers. She had warned him, after all, though she didn't make her impotence curse very bad. A few days, at best. She couldn't work anything bigger without permission. She pulled her leather jacket tighter around herself as she got outside, trying in vain to keep the cold out. No matter how long she spent in such climates, she would never get used to this kind of cold. Give her a desert any day.

Niko resisted the urge to roll his eyes at Robin's comment. That sounded more normal. He followed his brother outside, though he kept an eye on the two women.

"It seems my brother and I have been remiss in our manners," he said. "My name is Niko Leandros, and this is my brother Cal." He looked at the two, waiting for their names in return.

Robin's irate yell followed them outside, and Jeane couldn't help but snicker, even as she stuck close to Khalid. She shifted her bag across her chest so it was more comfortable, smothering another yawn.

"Jeane," she said quietly, watching the two. Niko and Cal, huh? Odd names, but oh well. She was kind of used to odd names.

Cal looked at the two for a few moments before he snorted and started walking. Not very fast, since Niko seemed to be trying to play nice, but he wanted to get home and get warm, dammit.

Khalid couldn't help but indulge in an inner smirk when she heard the shout from inside. Puck wouldn't be so smug for a few days.... She looked at the other two, still hunched inside her jacket in an attempt to keep warm, and then said, "Khalid." She didn't offer any more than that at the moment. Oddly, she found herself speeding up a little, keeping pace with the pale one. If it got her somewhere warmer faster, she was all for it.

Niko just watched silently for a moment. From what he'd observed, one was shy and the other just didn't like people. Nothing he wasn't familiar with, then.

"It is too damned cold," Khalid grumbled as they walked. "Give me a walk through the desert sands any day over this... Just how far is it from here?"

"Mile and a half," Cal grumped, sounding just about as pissed as Khalid. He pulled his jacket higher around his neck, trying to shove his fingers farther into the gloves he'd borrowed from Niko.

Jeane didn't say anything, just smiled and walked a little bit behind Khalid, her trench coat unbuttoned. She didn't think it was that cold, especially since they were walking. But then again, she was the one who usually slept with the window open, or in next to nothing.

Niko unlocked the door when they got back to the apartment and went in first, slightly tense. It wouldn't be the first time that they came home to find something unpleasant waiting for them, and it never hurt to be on guard for such a thing. Once he determined that everything was as it should be, he relaxed a little.

Khalid went in after him, looking around as she did. Typical male-only apartment... It was tidy enough, but there were clearly signs that one of the occupants was less than neat in just about everything he did. She wrinkled her nose slightly when she saw a sock and a pair of pants draped across the couch, but she still motioned to let Jeane know that the apartment was safe and that she could come inside.

Hopefully, there would be a place for Jeane to put her bag where nobody would look through it at all.

Jeane entered the apartment last, looking around. At least the place didn't smell funky or anything, for which she was very thankful. But it was definitely a male residence. She picked up a pair of boxers by the waistband using only her nails, dropping them off to the side.

Cal rolled his eyes at her skittishness and grabbed his clothes before Niko could whack him, balling them up and throwing them somewhere in his room. He'd find them later when he needed laundry.

"Lovely," Khalid said flatly. She glanced at Jeane, as if asking 'should I do something about it?' She wasn't completely serious, since she knew it was a bad idea to piss off their hosts when there was an angry god looking for them, but still. She took one more glance around the main area of the apartment, making note of both the windows and the potential 'sleeping spaces.' She'd let Jeane have the couch, that wasn't a problem. Khalid would figure something else out for herself, even if she had to resort to her bottle.

Niko gave his brother a pointed look when he saw the clothes lying around. He'd told Cal to pick those up last week, and of course was ignored.

"Make yourselves comfortable," he said to the women. "Then we can discuss your situation in a little more detail."

'A little more detail' sounded rather ominous to Jeane, so she sat and pulled her bag into her lap. No way she was letting go of it now. Especially not with these two potential-psychos.

Because everyone was potentially a psycho. To her anyway.

Cal even got rid of the few other articles of clothing he found around, throwing them back into his room before making himself comfortable on the couch. His (and Niko's) apartment, so he may as well get comfy, even if they weren't.

Khalid sat down on the arm of the chair that Jeane was sitting on. That way, she could stay close to Jeane, just in case, and she didn't have to push Cal off the couch. She was still wary of being in the same room with him.

"So what, exactly, are you asking about?" she asked, watching the two of them.

"If I may ask, first," Niko started, "you aren't human, are you?"

Khalid hesitated for a moment. She didn't like being called on it quite so fast. She'd learned how to blend in damn well over the centuries, and she wasn't used to being identified so quickly.

"A djinn," she admitted after a moment. She stayed close to Jeane, not moving away from her at all. Niko raised an eyebrow, intrigued.

"A djinn?" he repeated. "The same djinn that inspired the tales of genies?"

"Damn posers," Khalid grumbled.

"To an extent," Jeane answered cautiously, glancing at Khalim. Which was true; the myths were only partially accurate. Besides which, genies didn't exist. She'd asked. Djinn did.

"So, what, you fly around, live in a gold lamp and wear gold shackles?" Cal's eyebrows shot up.

Khalid's eyes narrowed slightly and she turned to look at Cal, pulling up one of her sleeves.

"Do you see any gold shackles on my wrists?" she demanded. "Hm? What about my ankles? You're a moron." And she had no problems saying that. Ask a stupid question and all that. She let of of her sleeve again. "They started that gold-lamp bullshit because clearly they wanted something to be useful in more than one way."

Interestingly, she didn't say anything about the flight. If she tried, she could do it, but she didn't like to.

Cal shrugged. Hey, he was allowed to ask. "Oh yes, because I make it a point to look at a woman's wrists and ankles."

Okay, so maybe he did when he was doing a threat assessment. But shackles wouldn't show up anyway.

Jeane sighed and shook her head, holding her bag closer. She'd already labeled him as a moron anyway, but he might have some hidden value or some redeeming quality to him that she didn't know about. She preferred his brother, anyway. Niko seemed much calmer and somewhat nicer.

Oh yes, Khalid was going to be at odds with this one, she could tell already.

"Cal, behave," Niko said, giving his brother a look. It was a look that clearly added the 'or else' onto the end of the sentence. It was clear that Khalid didn't like talking about herself much, and he could respect that. He turned to Khalid. "You said that you were having trouble with Mercury. You mean the old Roman god Mercury, correct?" The question was mostly just for confirmation, since he had heard both what Khalid had told Robin, and Robin's reaction.

"Right," Khalid replied, still a bit short.

"What happened?"

Khalid hesitated, glancing at Jeane. She didn't want to sound like she was blaming her friend, but it would be difficult to explain without sounding that way.

Jeane sighed. "It was my fault. I'm a historian, and I was looking around at things and I started messing with things I shouldn't have. I didn't know those things actually worked still. I'm new to the whole nonhuman thing, so." She shrugged and looked down at her lap, fiddling with her bag. Speaking so much made her feel self-conscious.

Cal snorted. "So you screwed up."

"Hey, don't you pin this on her," Khalid jumped back in. She didn't care that it really was mostly Jeane's fault. "It could have been anyone so don't point fingers at her or I'll make what I did to Goodfellow seem like a favor when I'm done with you." Not that she could without Jeane's explicit consent, but she could still threaten it.

Niko raised an eyebrow at her but nodded, he knew a few historians and knew exactly how easy it was for them to get tangled in the wrong kind of things.

"So you touched something and it annoyed Mercury?" he pressed. "What was it that you stumbled across, do you remember?"

Jeane met his gaze for the briefest of moments before looking down at her lap again. She actually pulled her knees up to hide behind them.

"I found the cadeuceus. And I examined it. In detail."

Cal stopped and looked at her for a long moment. Even he knew what that was. "Well, shit."

Niko blinked. The caduceus?

"You were examining the caduceus," he repeated. Yes, that would probably be enough to annoy whoever it belonged to. "And I'm assuming, to make a long story short, Mercury got angry and came after you."

"That's about the size of it," Khalid said, nodding. "And it's really damn hard to throw him off our trail, and he's probably found it again by now."

Cal snorted. Wow. They had worse luck than him and Niko. In a way, anyway. They'd dealt with one 'god' before, and he had no wish to repeat the experience.

Niko, though... Nik would be fascinated. He'd probably ask all sorts of questions about the caduceus, and what all they knew about, and things like that. In his own sneaky ninja way. Without seeming too obvious.

Yeah, he figured those two would be staying there for a while. Damn.

Jeane looked at her knees again. She still felt terrible about the whole thing, and she could practically see Cal blaming her. Not that she blamed him for that. It was her fault, after all. But she was blaming herself quite enough, thank you. Not that she was going to say anything. That was too close to actual confrontation.