Quinton knew better than to start diving into family matters with someone he didn't know. He took her explanation to be that Tanya Dawson didn't necessarily have the happiest of childhoods in that particular regard.

The young man only shook his head in response. His family were none the wiser as to just what had driven him away. A need to spread his wings and see the world, gaining some independence along the way was what he assumed they presumed had driven him to leave the way that he did. Perhaps, if his character was different then they might have had some suspected something fishy but given his easy nature, they'd believed his explanations. 

Quinton smiled thoughtfully at the other Meta's words. "Yeesh. Can't imagine what it would have been like for you. Just thinking about my brothers and sisters with powers-" He gave an exaggerated shudder for effect. "Nightmare." He became a little bit more serious as he reflected upon some of the implications. "Still, must be nice to have someone you can talk about it with." 

"Figured it would be safer..." His voice trailed off momentarily before something occurred to him. "For them." He was quick to clarify. "Least they know about all this, the better." Not everyone in the world they lived in was good.

Mia was friendly and had never really been hurt by a human being. Her tail wagged excitedly right up until she was grabbed. She let out a slight yelp. The dog struggled. Her natural placidness mixed with panic meant that her first instinct was to get away before she tried to bite. She was quite close to do doing so when she was finally released. It didn't take anything else for the crossbreed to charge back to her owner, abandoning her stick as she did so.

The young man didn't quite see what happened. His night vision wasn't half as good as his pet and he couldn't quite make out just what had happened. So he guessed. He hadn't seen the woman sleeping, otherwise he most certainly wouldn't have thrown the stick in that direction. As soon as he saw that the woman was awake, he was quick to clip Mia back onto a leash. He gave her a few reassuring pats, taking note of his companion's tail tucked between her legs as she faced towards the stranger. He assumed that his dog must have been startled. Much like him, she was more accustomed to a rural and quiet lifestyle. Strangers especially in a large numbers of which there were plenty in the city, weren't something that she was used to coming across routinely.

Quinton was what could best be described as optimistically naive. 

In his hometown, there weren't half the dangers and uncertainties that the big city came to offer. Sure, he was aware that there were troublemakers and individuals whose intentions were anything but noble but he didn't quite know how to identify any of them. The young man saw the stranger, sized her up momentarily and deemed that she wasn't much of a risk. Unless she were to pull out a cleaver and begin chasing him through the park, he was confident that she could overpower her quite easily.

It didn't even cross his mind that the woman could have been a meta. 

"Sorry, didn't see you there!" He called out to her, in the hopes that he might be able to apologize. Mia was good-natured but decidedly excitable and the poor thing spent far too long cooped up. In the hopes of lightening the mood, he smiled. "She didn't get any drool on you, did she?" 

Quinton was shattered. Whilst his body certainly regenerated and he might not feel the strain as acutely as some, he still required some rest. Mia however wasn't quite so picky. With her owner out of the house more often than he was in, she was keen to take advantage of every second that she had with him, especially when it meant that she was allowed a walk in the park.

Truth be told, her owner didn't much mind it either. It was better than being cooped up inside of the tiny four walls of his dingy damp little apartment. These parks were as close as he was going to get to the big wide open spaces he was accustomed to. At least, the man took some comfort in the fact that it didn't ever seem to get terribly chilly around this part of the country. One hand in his pocket and the other holding onto his leash, he walked behind the dog, relatively relaxed. Unlike some, he didn't particularly need to worry about getting mugged, not in the long run at any rate.

"Come here girl..." With the park relatively empty, he deemed that it was safe enough for him to allow her off of her leash. The retriever/shepherd mix wagged her tail but stayed nearby for a few moments, eyeing him expectantly. The young man smiled, retrieving an old tennis ball many times chewed from his pocket. "You want it?" He giggled the item around in front of her face for a few moments. The canine barked once excitedly, her tail wagging as she readied herself. Pulling his arm back, Quinton tossed the ball as far as he could watching as his dog charged after it. "Fetch!"

The instruction wasn't entirely required. The dog knew nothing else other than to chase after a ball and rush back with it so that it might be thrown once more. Her owner didn't know exactly how long he would be able to toss the ball for before she finally grew tired of it, if she ever would. Quinton walked along the path, pausing only when Mia brought the ball back to him so as to throw it once more. The stranger sleeping in the corner was something which he noticed but didn't pay a good deal of attention to. True, it had been a bit of a shock for a small town boy to come across but after a few months, he'd gradually grown somewhat accustomed to the unfortunate sight.

His mind was elsewhere, dreaming about the past, recent events and the future which seemed terribly uncertain to him. He was still alive and so far, was able to find enough work to ensure that both he and his dog stayed fed whilst also paying rent. How long that would last, he couldn't say for sure. He'd work it all out, that was what he told himself.

Tossing the ball once more without paying much attention, he didn't notice it roll underneath the bench where the unknown woman was sleeping whilst Mia inevitably gave chase.

It was with an amused smile that Quinton dismissed her concerns. He raised a hand to signal that everything was perfectly fine. She didn't have to worry. "It's fine. Honestly I was a little late myself..." It had taken a little bit longer than he'd expected to pick up Mia. No real reason other than he'd forgotten just how long it had taken him to make the walk. "Just glad I caught you."

He was acutely aware that he might not get another chance to speak with another metahuman who seemed to be so friendly and willing to discuss matters openly.

"This is Mia." He replied glancing down briefly at the animal. "Came with me from the farm, didn't you girl? It's alright, she's friendly."

Should Tanya try to get close or pat the dog, she would find that the only threat posed was that of a lashing tail which wagged rapidly as soon as there was even the faintest prospect of getting some fuss and attention. Her owner was similarly relaxed about anyone who wanted to approach her in order to give her a pat.

Something did confuse him however about the girl's statement, causing him to raise an eyebrow. "I didn't think I had to... Since you - you know-" He feared even saying it out loud in case someone overheard them. A knowing raise of the eyebrows was all he offered to clue her in to what he was referring to. "Figured you knew pretty much everything about me." 

The suggestion wasn't entirely what he'd been expecting and for a moment, the prospect struck him as being rather strange. So much so that it took him a little while to respond. "Yeah. That sounds nice..." He paused for a few moments before chuckling briefly. "I'm sorry. It's just it's been quite a long time since I did something... "normal" I guess." He couldn't remember the last time that he'd gone for a drink with someone, anyone be they a girl or a boy for whatever reason. Since embarking on his quest, such things had seemed ironically far fetched. 

Quinton sometimes wondered about education, specifically his own. He'd been quite keen to leave high school, go to agricultural college and then take over the farm. It was a good life for him. Outside and free. From what little he'd seen and heard around this campus, he wasn't sure that he possessed the patience or dedication to go through with such a length process as getting a degree, although he most certainly could respect those who did dedicate themselves to such studies. He wasn't a snob in that regard. "Well, you're braver than me." The young man noted with a certain amount of humor, not teasing but sympathetic. 

It sounded as if she wanted to spend a little while longer with him. That gave the man some hope. So far, throughout his somewhat aimless wandering, he was yet to get so good a lead as Tamya where metas were concerned. It was comforting to know that she wasn't part of some organisation.

"Sure. No problems." Quinton didn't say it but he didn't exactly have anything much better to do. In the strange city, he had no friends. He'd be going back to his car to take his dog for a walk over lunch. Even if she'd been finishing at seven, he would likely have made the effort to hang around for a while. This was his first contact with another meta and he most definitely wasn't about to squander the opportunity to get to know her a little bit more. 

He could only take her word for it. "Makes sense I guess. If anywhere was going to be more open..." He didn't quite feel like opening up about some of his doubts he had regarding even those from his hometown. His family would have been able to cope with the revelation but he was quite sure that his new status would have been met with some raised eyebrows and cautiousness regarding his powers. "I suppose mine are pretty harmless though." That being said, his concerns were more directed towards just what might happen if someone decided that they wanted a peace of his regenerative powers.

"Yeah... Well-" His voice trailed off momentarily as his gaze ran over the campus which seemed so very alien to him. "-I went to an agricultural school and they don't have much use for a guy who can tell em' how best to plant wheat around here. I've still got to eat." It wasn't just him of course, he happened to have a canine companion who also required nourishment, then there was gas, clothes... Life was expensive, shockingly so in the city. "I'll take whatever comes my way. I've just got to be careful." For the time being, he'd only ever received an occasional nick here or there or a couple of bruises, here or there. Nothing which anyone had noticed, much less cared about. 

"It suits them well enough if I don't get hurt, so it's not like they're going to look for anything." If anything, he was more comfortable working in such an environment where injuries, minor and severe were common as opposed to an office, where it would almost have been noticed and people would have made a bigger deal of it. That and he knew in his heart of hearts that he would have gone insane if he found himself confined to four boring walls and a computer screen.

Quinton raised his eyebrows, smiling at the mention of a famous name. He'd done a fair amount of research on all things metahuman before leaving his home and more since so. He was impressed that his new acquaintance had met such a famous individual. Her words intrigued him as he found himself imagining what it must have been like to have siblings with powers. "Is it genetic then?" He assumed, probably naively that Tanya would know far more about this than he did. He would have struggled to explain his rational other than the fact that he was desperate to discover whatever he could about what had happened to him and others like him. Nobody else in his family had been affected, at least as far as he was aware. They could have been keeping it secret from him, just as he had from them but the man doubted it. 

He listened to her explain some of her powers to him. Yeesh... At some point in the past, Quinton had found himself regretting his abilities - although granted healing from injuries was inevitably better than succumbing to them. It separated him from others, made parts of his life more challenging. If he got so much as a paper cut, he was forced to conceal the injury out of fear of someone noticing it healing up. Ironically, for a man who at this point in time believed that he couldn't be killed, he was rather paranoid about getting hurt. 

"Well... There's nothing up here I'm particularly embarrassed about." He responded pointing to his right temple. All the same, it was something of a relief to know that she couldn't read all of his thoughts. It must have been unpleasant for her to be able to pick up on everything from a mere touch. Presumably she'd found some sort of a way to cope with her affliction. "Didn't get too bored, did you?" He joked, doing his best to try and make light of the current situation so as to lighten the atmosphere even just a little bit. 

He grimaced a little at the thought, not entirely accustomed to such open declarations such as the one she had expressed about certain fantasies. Oh, he could imagine just what exactly he meant, it was the fact that she'd mentioned it to begin with which surprised Quinton. He smiled, unsure how else to respond. "Do you think you'll be able to train yourself?" If she could, then maybe he could. If he could stop himself from healing up then maybe he could go back to something of a regular life and pretend that none of this had ever happened.