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| Keep Your Eye on the Birdie; Open | |
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| Topic Started: Oct 13 2014, 07:41 PM (291 Views) | |
| Shepherd | Oct 13 2014, 07:41 PM Post #1 |
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October 1 10:30am Shepherd's body tensed and he flexed his fingers. The reinforced leather of his training suit creaked under the strain. The suit had become more flexible in the time that he had been training. It had a familiar feel, broken in and worn to a comfortable shape. Shepherd thought of it like a favorite pair of jeans or a jacket he had for years. The fit was perfect and reassuring. His favorite jacket was for those times of relaxation whereas his training suit represented the times when his body was linked into the electric surge of adrenaline. Shepherd enjoyed the comforts of home, those warm and fond memories of a bygone life but his salve was any activity that kept him from dwelling on his painful past. From his crouched position in the exercise ground his active mutant power felt the mutant signatures of those around him in the training group. Shepherd could passively track every mutant around him but if he focused directly on that he knew he would be a liability to his teammates. Shepherd strained his ears to hear and scanned his eyes through the forest and undergrowth. The mutant's aura tracking would not detect his opposition so he had to rely on his own baseline human senses. Daniel likened it to deer hunting. He had to look and listen and be ready to react. There was sudden movement in his periphery and Shepherd rolled to the side. When he righted himself and found his bearings again he extended his hand let a flurry of psionic shrapnel fly down the course. A mechanical turret had sprung up from the underbrush and launched three clay pigeons at the group. Shepherd's blue shards reduced the harmless projectiles into harmless dust. The turret retreated into the growth and then would reappear somewhere else. Over time the number of turrets would increase and the exercise would become more difficult. Raja, the tiger-like student, snorted, "Nice dance moves, Teach." A turret reappeared on the opposite side of the course and launched three more clay pigeons. Raja leaped into the air and with a spin-kick and two well placed clawed punches snuffed out the projectiles. Raja landed nimbly and received a high-five from his friend that had sparks of electricity arcing across his torso. "Finesse, Teach. That's what that looks like. I give lessons after claaaaAASSS!" Raja was taken aback when he got slammed in the side of the face with a clay. Bright yellow dust covered his body. "Situation awareness, Raja. I give lessons after class," Shepherd said with a smirk. "Time to hit the sidelines. Everyone else, eyes open. Those things are harmless but they smart." |
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| Lucy Saint | Oct 15 2014, 09:58 AM Post #2 |
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Lucy smiled as Raja was hit with a clay pigeon and was covered in yellow dust, “Raja, use your senses. You are able to hear them from miles away through the wind. Never let down on your senses, they are there to protect you.” She said and smiled at the others. She was new at training with the students, she usually took care of the super strong and durable children with Piotr. This was absolutely new to her to actually be teaching in other stuff than breaking, jumping and landing. A flying pigeon headed her way while she was focused on Raja and the others and lifted her hand for it to hit before it got her in the face as well. Now she was covered in yellow dust herself and smiled brightly, “Now listen to Shepherd. I wouldn’t want to have to take care of you in the infirmary after this. I usually use that time to drink coffee and watch youtube videos.” She winked and took a fighting stand ready for anything that could be sent towards her. She was very happy when Shepherd had asked her to join him in this, ever since the Illuminati she had been feeling much more confident in herself, her powers and what she was capable of doing. Being a nurse with destructive powers no longer seemed to conflict her. Things had changed and she had changed with them. She was no longer just a smiling and warm face to make the pain go away, now she also had a determined look in her eyes and a will to do whatever it took to fight for what she believed in. True, she still believed that it was better to solve any disagreement by talking about it, she wasn’t about using her powers anymore. She heard a noise from inside of the woods and looked through the corner of her eyes, what was this training session going to send towards them this time? She remembered a session where Piotr had made sure a giant metal ball would roll out and try to crush them all and she felt her muscles tighten beneath her gym shorts and top. Unlike the others, she didn’t have a direct suit she’d slip on. The only times she had used one, was when she was asked to help fight against something or someone threatening the world or the school. So she made good with simple clothes you’d see on any female at a normal gym. She kept watching in anticipation, knowing something was coming towards them from the woods, while the clay pigeons were still shooting against them. Oh she really hoped that these kids listened to them when they told them to focus. She wouldn’t want them to get hurt and more importantly; she didn’t particularly feel like getting squished trying to protect them. Not today at least. |
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| Preview | Oct 16 2014, 11:37 PM Post #3 |
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Normally Jessica didn't think yellow and blue were at all flattering when outfitted together but she guessed the training uniform she'd earned as a student of the Institute was pretty alright. It was made out of a decent material that was durable, comfortable. Still... she was eager to get out of it, to graduate to something a bit more stylish and more personalized for her uses. Of course the uniform wasn't the sole reason she hoped to move on, just a perk. She thought she deserved to move on at this point, imagined herself as being better than a student. Jessica had been a student for over five years, had participated in these training sessions since she'd first arrived, she'd matured mentally and morally under the X-men, she was competent in training sessions, she was confident in her own abilities. Despite this everyone kept telling her that she was unproven and so she walked around like the girl with something to prove. Though the training session she was faced with seemed simple enough, she was determined to join and excel so that maybe everyone else could see what she felt—that she was ready to be an X-man. Or X-something... X-anything, really. Jessica just wanted to drop her current title. That training title had to go; she was long off training wheels and her training bras were years behind her so it was about time for her to pass on that loathsome suffix from her identity. She didn't want to associate with that which put her in the likeness of twelve year olds and teenage nightmares who... also walked around as if they had something to prove. Her current yellow and blue spandex didn't have a decent place for her to stow her Escrima sticks; she instead held them awkwardly or uncomfortably when not in use. Somewhere buried in her room was a very expensive custom holster that was ill-made; clashing horribly with her uniform and spilling over when she moved too much in the field. At the moment her weapons were clutched ready in her hand. Jessica didn't have any world-shaking powers, she was at a bit of a disadvantage when it came to taking offense against the threats that endangered mutants. She was vulnerable to attacks of all forms and lacked any means of manipulating energy or her environment like Storm or Cyclops or Emma Frost. She couldn't fly either so swooping in quickly to catch an enemy off guard had long abandoned her as an option in a superpowered environment. Her escrima leveled the field, as did the various other martial arts weapons she'd been training with. She might not have had claws or the ability to blow shit up with her mind, but getting smacked across the face with a flurry of blows from fiberglass sticks of ass-kicking could incapacitate most opponents mutant or not. She didn't allow her peers to forget that either. The smirk on Jessica's face wasn't well hidden. She'd told Raja that would happen and he decided to showboat anyway; she was the only one who was going to showboat today. She stood up from her crouching position and sidestepped her instructors in time to crack one of her sticks against a clay projectile as it sprung up toward them. She began to swing them to a six-count beat of a standard pattern, knocking two more from the air. A final birdie ejected from behind them, but her powers of precognition were good in helping her not get beamed or embarrassed by disks of clay. She smacked it dismissively then put her hands on her hips with a little too much bravado, cocky grin on her face. "No worries, I've got this," she declared before spinning an escrima in each hand to show off further. Her sense had yet to catch the danger that Valkyrie had referred to. It was easy for Jess to become dependent on her powers instead of her actual awareness. Then she got that feeling, an itch up her spine that alerted her of danger. She crossed the escrima over each other to form a defensive X as she cast a glance around. "Something new coming our way. Anyone have this? I mean it'd be my pleasure if you all aren't up for it." |
[align=center]![]() I can just hear them now --"How could you let us down?" But they don't know what I found; or see it from this way around [/align] | |
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| Shepherd | Oct 23 2014, 02:23 AM Post #4 |
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Shepherd gave a cautious glance to the side as Lucy, codenamed Valkyrie, chastised Raja for not paying attention. Some of the students didn't take their training all that seriously. They saw it as a time to show off. There were a few that realized that the X-Men and their ilk were thrown into Life and Death situations on a nearly weekly basis but there were a handful, like Raja, that preferred trying to be flashy. His mutant ability allowed him raw talent but without the proper training the tiger feral would not reach his true potential. Hard work beats talent when talent doesn't work hard. Lucy for example. She was a nurse on the faculty but not on the X-Men field team, much like Daniel. She was out there training. She, just like Daniel, needed to be prepared and keep her senses honed. She had intense strength and durability but had wanted to join them to work on her reflexes. Shepherd grinned at her wink and her joke. "Listen to Nurse Valkyrie. The point is not to have to go to the infirmary," Shepherd added as he turned his eyes back to the treeline but still felt her presence as the snap of buckles fastening. Lucy had sprang into action. Her action was actually rather calm. She lifted her hand and smashed the clay pigeon. Daniel admired her smoothness. Being so strong and durable she must have been very careful at all times to control her strength or else she would harm those around her. Shepherd almost laughed at her bright smile as she was covered in the colored dust from the clay pigeon. So the training went. The turrets would appear and the students and staff would either intercept the flying disks or get tagged by one and have to be removed from the game. Preview, Jessica Vale, was doing very well. Her mutant ability of precognition allowed her to advance quickly. She was also taking an approach that Shepherd really liked. Her mutant powers were not offensive by any means but she took training with her escrima clubs. She was defending herself in a way that didn't relate to her powers. The mutant tracker truly thought it was amazing how versatile his kind could be. Shepherd heard Preview's voice, her mutant signature registered as the sound of a record skipping, calling out that something new was coming. She sounded like she was more than able to handle it. "On your toes! Heads up people!" Shepherd called out. Suddenly, a trio of turrets appeared to form a triangle around them. Each turret launched three clay disks at them. The training field had been programmed to increase difficulty as time passed. Shepherd dodged his hips and pulled in his stomach as he turned sideways, narrowly escaping the disqualifying blow. She focused his gaze and launched his own shrapnel to destroy the clay before it hit the ground. "Valkyrie! Watch it!" he called out. |
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| Lucy Saint | Oct 23 2014, 11:51 AM Post #5 |
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Listening arund her Lucy was still focused on what was going on and what was coming her way. The kids seemed to be cocky and taking this as a competition which was good. However, she knew better than ever that it took teamwork to succeed. “Very good Jessica. That was really quite a show. But remember, you rely as much on your teammates as they rely on you.” She said and threw a stone at a clay birdie was about to hit one of the students and smashed it. “No battle has been won without the trust of the ones you fight with.” She looked as Shepherd warned her and quickly grabbed a big tree pulling it out with all of its roots, placing it in front of herself and two of the students, making sure they weren’t hit by what was coming their way. She bent down behind the trunk with the children and raised her eyebrow, “Well? You have shelter now. Work as a team to figure out how to eliminate the threat instead of hiding. She grabbed a few stones and threw it after the disks smashing three of them fast. She had the strength, she had the durability. She could easily be shielding them and taking every hit, but she also knew that these kids had to learn how to survive together. She looked over at Shepherd with a grin “Avoiding them isn’t going to stop them in the long run.” She teased playfully. She looked over at Jessica and nodded towards her for the kids to look. “Your teammate is out there. What do you do?” she asked and watched as two of them ran out there to stand by her side ready to fight what was coming their way. “Work as a team.” She smiled and looked at the rest who was still hiding with her. “You guys have three minutes, before I remove this tree.” She warned. |
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| Preview | Oct 29 2014, 01:03 AM Post #6 |
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During her freshman year in college, Jessica had taken an ethics class to fulfill her humanities requirement. She had no idea what she was getting herself into but it sounded smart and interesting and so she eagerly signed up to have it as her first ever college course and sat in the front of the classroom. It was terrible; they took a book's worth of notes on a daily basis and had to submit a ten page paper on the various theories and fallacies they'd discuss every two weeks. She got an A in it, of course, but it wasn't an easy A. Good grades were never easy for Jessica, really, but she absolutely slaved to keep her head above water that term and the result was plenty of long, sleepless, nights and an A in a class that had nothing to do with her dance major. Beyond that, a question that stuck with her as they discussed the various theories of philosophy more than any other concept: that all human beings were selfish. That no matter how kind, charitable, or altruistic one's actions might be, they were still only acting in their own best interest. Jessica wanted others to trust her; to know that she was an adept fighter in hopes that it would be the type of attention she needed to make a difference. Though she often overlooked the fact when she wasn’t being reminded, even in her adolescence Jessica understood that it took more than being a weapon to be of use to mutantkind. It wasn’t just skill that the X-Men looked for on the battlefield, it was the ability to operate as one member in a unit. Even Wolverine, the one man army extraordinaire, had to allow himself to be a part of a greater force in order for the X-men to save the world. The leaders of the Institute had those same expectations for her but she wasn’t a team player, not at heart. Jessica would always be just a little bit selfish. She couldn't be sure about human nature in general, but it was certainly within her own. "Of course Ms. Saint," Jessica replied just a three new turrets sprang free of the earth and began to volley off more discs at all sides. Jessica hadn't forseen the increase in turrets but with their training regime it was to be expected anyway. She just reacted, crouching low by instinct before dodging or smashing the disks that came her way. Dodging was the easy part but making sure one that she'd dodge didn't go and clock a nearby teammate in the face was much more difficult. Thankfully, Valkyrie came to their rescue placing an entire tree down as cover for them to take cover behind. Jessica was out from behind the tree and alone; she tried to take the brief pause and reflect on their exercise objectives, to think of how they could be champions of the activity, when two of the mutants joined her. When Jessica turned to her peers, the other mutants in training now faced to work together, she wasn't doing it because she wanted to be a team player. She was doing it because she didn't want to lose and she knew things would be getting more difficult. She did it because she didn't want to appear resistant to offer her aid. She was doing it because she'd rather contribute to a group effort than have the other mutants hinder her in any way as they put forth their best. She was doing it at Ms. Saint's friendly reminder to care for her allies. She contemplated the fair advice for only a moment, standing at the ready as the machines hummed, ready to start the next assault. But something felt bad, deep in her gut--it was the kind of feeling she had when her powers were picking up vaguely on events that she wouldn't much enjoy. was it a new challenge she wondered? Was this the point where she was going to get beamed by a clay pigeon? She couldn't exactly dodge those things all day. "Boys...." Jessica began quietly in warning to the two mutants beside her. She furrowed her brow. "I don't know what's going on but it isn't something we're Oh. " Jessica's voice trailed off as she scolded a boy beside her, electricity racing across his chest and arms. She turned to the staff members, hands on her hips with an exaggerated sigh. She was going to say something, a warning, an annoyed comment when she saw a flash of light from her peripheral vision and heard the electricity race out. So much for being a team player, though. Jessica was in such a hurry to get out of dodge that she said nothing at all to the mutants who'd so eagerly came to her aid. Her warning was more of an afterthought that she yelled as she vaulted over the tree trunk and pressed her back against the bark. "So much for winning." |
[align=center]![]() I can just hear them now --"How could you let us down?" But they don't know what I found; or see it from this way around [/align] | |
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| Shepherd | Nov 10 2014, 01:13 AM Post #7 |
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Shepherd dipped and dodged around the flying projectiles intended to teach the students several skills at once. They could use their agility, at a baseline level or heightened thanks to their mutation, to avoid the clay pigeons. As Lucy pointed out, though, some of their problems couldn't be solved by simple dodging. Shepherd then planted his feet, used his arms for balance, and sniped another clay projectile out of the air. He had never had time for sports growing up due to his responsibilities on the ranch but he had considered himself adequate enough if it came down to reflexes. After training more extensively at the school Dan felt he had improved by leaps and bounds. Valkyrie had taken a handful of stones and began to throw them in order to demolish the clay pigeons as they came but she was right. This wasn't going to work in the long run. The statuesque Dane wrapped her arms around a tree and ripped it from the ground, roots and all. She slammed the log into the ground to provide a shelter for the students to hide behind. "That was great thinking!" he called out. "You can help defend your teammates that can't defend themselves. Maybe even cause a diversion." Some of the students took cover behind the tree but Preview took the lead. She seemed to take charge while some of the others students were more comfortable simply destroying the clay pigeons. She seemed to want to forge ahead, being proactive, rather than just reactionary like some of her peers. Jessica's face had a sudden shift, Shepherd noticed as he came to rest after rolling across the hard packed earth. She was giving her attention to Kilowatt, the boy with electricity arcing over his body. He was one of Raja's friends. Preview then turned toward the staff members in exasperation and then dove for cover behind the tree. Kilowatt let out an curling lance of electricity. The charge struck one of the turrets and then fed downward and danced across the ground. Sparks fired from the other clay pigeon turrets and they all retracted into the ground. Raja sauntered over and gave Kilowatt a high five. "Point, set, and match K-Dub! This exercise is oh-ver!" Around the training pitch, new turrets sprang from the shrubs. This was not part of the training exercise that Shepherd programmed. "Okay, I think we should clear out," Shepherd called out. As if on cue, the turrets began to fire on the staff and students. Thwip! Thwip! Thwip! A bolo flew out and ensnared a student's legs. He tumbled to the ground like a dead log. Plumes of fire blazed forward and lasers pierced the air. Shepherd furrowed his brow and launched a volley of shrapnel at a turret that was releasing bolo snares. This way the students would be able to escape. He ran over and slid to a halt on his knees next to the ensnared boy. "Hold very still," Shepherd instructed. Daniel tried to shut everything else out at that moment. He needed to generate a narrow beam of fine shrapnel otherwise he might risk hurting the student. Dan took a deep breath and found that he was able to generate the shrapnel he needed. In the past he had tried to generate larger shards, always larger, but had never really tried to create smaller and more precise cuts. The cables around the boy's legs snapped in two and he sprang up. Daniel hurried up and urged the boy to head for safety. Shepherd looked around in time to see one of the training devices belch forth a wave of sticky slime to trap anyone caught in its path. "We need to get to the control panel! Shut the system down before anyone gets hurt!" Shepherd called out. |
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2:29 PM Jul 11