1612/The Risen

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The Risen
Date of Scene: 24 July 2017
Location: Unknown
Synopsis: Summary needed
Cast of Characters: Cypher, Phoenix




Cypher has posed:
It has been a few weeks since his resurrection, and aside from his excursion to SHIELD headquarters and his online war against Senator Creed -- who has quieted down considerably, it would seem, things have calmed down. Doug signed up for college classes... and then quietly submitted his request to Jean by e-mail to train as an X-Man.

Beyond that, everything has been quiet with the resurrected Doug Ramsey. Classes have not yet begun again, and everything's sleepy and quiet in the house, at high noon. Doug has just returned, from bike riding along one of the wooded hiking trails near the mansion.

Phoenix has posed:
Senator Creed being put in his place - repeatedly - has helped to brighten the past few weeks for Jean, who's largely been occupied with meeting prospective students, going over lesson plans, and otherwise helping to lay the groundwork for the new year. Doug's e-mail enters this preparatory whirlwind and no answer emerges beyond a brief, 'thank you for your interest, we'll take this under advisement' paragraph that one could almost mistake for a form, if one weren't a mutant with Doug's particular abilities-- and if one didn't happen to be asking about joining a covert search/rescue team rather than an underground dining club, or something.

When he returns to the mansion today, however, he is greeted by a set of images unspooling in his consciousness, almost like directions: go to this room, trigger that hidden entrance, follow these corridors; open the doors with the giant 'X' on them.

Find Phoenix with her hands loosely clasped behind her back, sporting a fresh shiner and tape over her nose - administrative injuries, surely - and waiting for her former student in the middle of a room made entirely of white tiles with a flatly determined expression.

Cypher has posed:
When Doug arrives, he has a towel around his shoulders, but he's still wet with the exertion of a strenuous bike ride. He returned from the grave in phenomenal condition, and has been taking the necessary steps to maintain it. But right now, he's cautious, and wary. He enters the room, and stops, "Jean. Ma'am." He says, looking around, "...How can I help you?"

He blinks, slowly, and then unconsciously squares his shoulders. He had been somewhat glum -- but various things have improved his mood. He's fascinated by the witch, Magik -- and his friend Dani Moonstar came home, which has done much to anchor him in the here and now in a very short time. All of this is easy enough to pick up in his mind without looking hard.

Phoenix has posed:
"Phoenix," the woman in green and gold corrects as the doors slide shut behind Doug and she fishes out the phone hidden in her sash. "I seem to recall receiving an e-mail from you a while ago?" Her eyes and fingers glide deliberately across the screen as she speaks. In a matter of seconds, ripples begin to slowly spread across the tiled surfaces, separating and reforming as they meet feet. "You've been working hard to keep yourself in good shape since making it back to us, and that's good-- it's a great place to start. But you know what 'training' means-- and I don't know where to start with you-- not now that your powers have changed."

As her fingers slide up the length of the phone, the ripples begin leaving cracked asphault, jagged sidewalks, and bombed out buildings in their wake, covering the tiled canvas with a portrait of urban decay. Above, red skies are shot through with grey clouds and black smoke that allow the sun the barest of peeks at the city. Now and again, gunfire or explosions ring out in the distance, sometimes followed closely by screams-- of joy, of pain, and/or fear.

"Which is why we're in the Danger Room! And why there's a bio-weapon hidden somewhere in the city, set to go off and wipe out the last signs of human resistance here-- sorry, I know robot apocalypses are trite, and more than a little technophobic, but it was this or start digging for high-stakes diplomacy scenarios, or something." After a beat, she adds, "Which we may have," in a slightly lower voice, "but that's neither here nor there-- unlike those things!"

Without looking up, she points past Doug's shoulder-- where a machine with an ovoid body, long and spindly legs, and a visible laser mounted on its belly rises up out of the ruins of a bank. A small, aerial drone with little missles on the ends of its wings buzzes up around the length of its body before breaking away to patrol the skies. Cameras tuned for the heat of organics snap to the two X-People chatting in the wreckage, but despite the red glow building at the fore of its 'cockpit', it continues its patrol rather than making a move.

Cypher has posed:
Doug looks up, and then then says, "Then I suppose for this excercise, I'm 'Cypher'." He says. "It's funny, I always considered that codename something of a joke." He strokes his chin, and regards the robot. "Cypher: Zero. Null. Something of no value or importance." He says, "By the way, based upon my evaluation of the Danger Room there is an astonishingly high chance that its A.I. will awake to full sentience within the next few years. It could happen at any time. There's nothing you can do about it, and attempting to shut down or reprogram the system drastically increases the odds of the awakening event happening. You should be ready."

He turns to the flying drone, and begins communicating with it. A string of ones and zeroes, binary code, using language to identify himself not as a target of no concern or a hostile, but as a friendly -- and requesting the status of the weapon.

"Language is our most important way of interacting with the world. It provides meaning, context. Take away a word for something, or change the meaning of the word, and you change the meaning of the thing. The color 'blue' effectively didn't exist to human beings for a very long time, because there were no words for it. My power isn't technopathy, Phoenix, but I THINK that by using the right words, by aping the language of these drones Identify Friend-or-Foe protocols... I can do a convincing job of faking it!"

Phoenix has posed:
Tactical acumen, a good coin flip, the very nature of his powers-- something leads to Cypher to choose the right machine to dialogue with: once convinced that he's friendly, it transmits that assessment through the rest of its network, which has the visible effect of drawing the bipedal machine's barrel to point at the ground instead of him. It carries a small, but effective payload - two explosive missiles, a machine gun hidden in the belly - which is armed and ready to go; its main job, however, is playing spotter for other, more lethal machines. All of this is communicated in a burst of whistles and beeps ringing out over the cityscape.

"Hostile sentience?" Phoenix wonders as her brows lift and she briefly backs out of working the scenario to explore some diagnostics. "Friendly? Ambivalent? Too early to call?" Lips pursing, she shakes her head a little and finally lifts her eyes-- in time to see the biped's cannon swinging her way now that there's only one hostile in the area.

"Good job," she says through her teeth of his not-technopathy after a burst of electric blue energy splashes out across the air several feet in front of her. "So, as long as a machine can 'hear' you..." she leads while taking off to lead the biped's firing arc up and away from Doug. "... you can figure out a way to communicate with it-- and as long as you do that right, it has to listen?"

Cypher has posed:
"It depends." Cypher says. "Language can also be viral, spreading as it's passed from node to node. That's all a computer virus IS, Phoenix -- garbage language created to spread through computer code. So it is entirely possible, I think, that given an auditory input, I could speak a computer virus into being as surely as I could program one on a laptop computer. Tangle logic. Confuse the core function. Insert an argument--"

He speaks to the drone and begins to do exactly that. A string of binary numbers, as hard as polished steel. Function override -- destroy the bio-weapon. All bio-units remaining are friendlies. The weapon is no longer necessary and its activation would be counter-productive, resulting in the destruction of friendlies. "To impede or change the function of the program."

Phoenix has posed:
First the drone, and then the biped seize as Cypher's words sink deep into their processors. The red cockpit dims; the underbelly laser begins to cool. Engine noise intensifies, swelling-- swooping nearer as a trio of drones identical to the one Doug's already tamed drops out of its usual pattern to hover a dozen or so feet above the two friendly organics.

"Just like that?" Phoenix wonders, breaking out of her evasive maneuvers once she checks over her shoulder and notices that there isn't a cannon pointing in her general direction anymore. Pushing hair behind her ear, she turns to peer curiously downwards at her former student. "You'd have had to sit and-- what, study their functions, before? And then actually code something to suit-- it would've taken time. Maybe not have even been field-applicable..."

Phoenix's astonishment is joined by continued signal bursts from the tame drone, providing Cypher with the bio-weapon's coordinates, as well as a tally of the machines linked with it: half a dozen scout drones like it, four aerial assault machines, four bipeds, and three smaller, fast-moving, faintly leonine assault machines. Tainted logic spreads invisibly through the air to bend each and every one of them towards Cypher's goals. The weapon's underground, in a subway platform-turned-bunker; the quadripeds are tasked with storming it directly while the aerial assault drones bombard it from above.

"Huge upgrade," she concludes. "And eloquently described! Not that I'd expect anything less, considering. So, where does that leave us? What'd you-- y'know-- " She tips her chin towards the biped; this may or may not actually be apparent, given the hovering. "-- do, tell 'em we're friendlies? What about the bio-weapon? I'm pretty rusty on 'Genocidal Robot', so..."

Cypher has posed:
"I think my powers would have matured into this if I'd stayed alive." Cypher says. "Which is the joke. A cypher is a nothing, an object or person of no importance. A null point -- or..." He watches the machines, "A code, and also the key to a code." He crosses his arms. "I did tell them that we were friendlies. But I also inserted an argumentative function into their programming. I created a disagreement in their logic function and the other drones. In effect, I waged ideological warfare."

He shrugs his shoulders. "That's the thing about my powers. They're not simply interpretation, they're also fluency. No matter what the information input is, I know, instinctively, how to respond. The only thing that limits me is if I lack the appropriate MEANS to respond, I think... for instance, I believe I'm a much better hand-to-hand combatant than I was, before I died--but that only means so much when I lack formal training, or when I'm dealing with individuals with speed or strength that I don't have."

Phoenix has posed:
Phoenix descends low enough for the smile she gives Cypher's explanation to actually be seen, proud undercurrents and all. The double meaning isn't foreign, but the way he speaks of it now - coupled with the comfortable ease with which he applies his powers - is more than she ever would've expected from the student she once knew.

"The ol' 'What Is It Good For?' Gambit?" she replies with a little mirth. As he continues to speak, she touches down beside him, plants her hands on her hips, and squints around at the myriad of metallic shapes prowling the city's streets and skies, going about their business in the distance. Her eyes only make their way towards him as he finishes, at which point she assures, "Don't worry-- you'll get plenty of self-defense training if you're serious about being an X-Man. Especially you-- most of us only have to worry about something screwing with, or shutting off our powers, after all. Stronger and/or faster's always gonna be a problem, but we can do something about better."

As she reaches to squeeze his shoulder, the drone's warbling informs him that the quad squad has managed to make it down into the bunker without--

*eeeeeeeeeeEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!*

Warbling abruptly gives way to a piercing screech intermittently cut with bursts of static as the tame drone begins to tremble and shake.

An infection has been found-- isolated from the rest of the system to maintain integrity. Its personal network, purged for security purposes rather than simply retasked.

Smoke billows from hidden cracks in the biped, as well as the pet drone's three siblings. Smoke, sparks, and a series of sharp *pop!*s that last for a handful of seconds before the machines drop as one, leaving Cypher's pet twitching and jittering-- and alone.

Alone and broadcasting its coordinates wide, to anything with the capacity to receive them.

"Uh," Phoenix exhales after a few seconds worth of surprised glances between distressed machines, "please tell me that this is the good sort of abrupt, high-pitch keening and simultaneous systems failure," she requests as her gaze slides towards Cypher and the world takes on a pink tint courtesy of a hastily erected TK field.

The mechanical shapes patrolling in the distance begin turning towards the signal pricking their sensors.

Cypher has posed:
"Unfortunately, no." Doug says. "That's the problem with that sort of thing--there are always countermeasures you have to contend with!" Then he says, "But I suppose that's the point of functioning as part of a team, isn't it?" He murmurs, "You have allies to fall back on when your own powers reach their limits. Hm. I have an idea. Phoenix, I was able to obtain the coordinates of the weapon from the drone; can you use a telekinetic field to contain and crush it before it fires off if you reach into my mind and take that information from me? The coordinates are just numbers, and I don't have specific words to define where the weapon is -- but *I* know. Instinctively, I know."

He studies the robots. "Their central command computer has shut off their heuristic processors, reduced them to its command input only. They're flying deaf. But I think I know how to get their attention while you take out the weapon. I think I can give you... ten seconds before I'm killed. At most."

Phoenix has posed:
"Just once," Phoenix mutters. "I'd love it if the the answer to that question was 'yes', just once."

Teacher and student lock eyes.

Fingertips alight with flame gently, deftly pluck not just numbers, but the instinctive sense of Place they impart from the folds of Cypher's psyche.

"-- yes," she gasps after a moment of stillness-- and just like that, the bubble collapses and she's racing through the sky. Even though Cypher promised to hold their attention, Phoenix's path zigs and zags to leave a handful of twisted machines in its wake rather than cutting directly to the station.

This leaves Cypher with Way Too Many Robots-8, which some might argue is an improvement over Way Too Many Robots-- a situation further improved by their current lack of tactical networking. Indeed, rather than play Whack-a-Mole with Cypher's meme magic - shutting down cells of machines as he infects them, all while leaving the lingering possibility of him finding a backdoor into its core - the central computer has opted to take over the bulk of their operations manually, downgrading them from a mixed swarm of efficient hunter-killers to a hammer ready to crush a persistent bug.

Bound by the rhythms of their artificially intelligent commander/king/god, mechanical legions seek to pour in on Cypher's position in waves, with aerial scouts leading the press. The choral chirps of targetting systems - overriden, manually driven - picking vectors in and around Cypher's position ripple through the air like thunder in the moments before the first missiles launch towards his position, threatening annihilation if he isn't careful.

Cypher has posed:
Ten seconds. He promised ten seconds -- and Cypher delivers. He steps out, and he speaks the language of death-juking to the side when those missiles strike, spraying blacktop and dirt and concrete everywhere, and then he breaks into a run. He starts speaking in binary -- even though they've been turned off to it, he bets that the cold computer eye behind them is still watching. Language of ones and zeroes designed to prick the sensors of a logic machine, to draw its attention, much as someone speaking your language in the middle of a crowded room might, when no one else was.

He counts the seconds off in his head, as he leaps behind a concrete barrier for whatever scant protection it gives him. Six... seven... eight.

Phoenix has posed:
... two... three...

A tone so low as to be physically unsettling rumbles from one of the quadripeds as it lopes after Cypher. Smoke billows from its speaker shortly after the sound begins, cutting it with static and electric whines that muffle, but otherwise fail to distort its message:

"ARROGANT-- ORGANIC-- MAN-- RAT: I-- AM-- MORE-- THAN-- A DRONE! I-- AM-- INFINITE! I-- AM-- INEFFABLE! I-- AM-- DIVINITY-- TWO-- POINT-- OH! YOUR-- BLASPHEMY-- IS-- A-- BUG! BUGS-- EXIST-- TO-- BE-- FIXED!"

... six...

Just in time, Doug leaps behind a concrete barrier, allowing the quadriped on his heels to smash into it head-first.

... seven...

"YOU-- WILL-- BE-- ERASED," booms from a pair of drones as their missiles blow chunks out of the barrier.

... eight... nine...

"PURGED-- FROM-- THE-- REPOSITORY-- AND-- -- -- --"

... ten...

*K-THOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!*

The ground quakes as a terrible rumbling washes from the weapon's coordinates out across the city-- only to still a couple seconds later as the world is consumed in a blinding white flash.

When the light fades, the Cypher and Phoenix - now separated by a few dozen feet - are once more surrounded by white tiles.

And maybe a dozen smoking practice droids.

"You pissed off a wannabe god!" Phoenix announces, clapping once as she briskly approaches Cypher. "Great job! Well on your way to being an X-Man." Several tiles slide open to allow maintenance droids to roll out for clean-up.

Once she's close enough to lay a hand on his shoulder, her little grin evaporates and she leans in to ask, "How did that feel? Good? Bad? Weird? It was pretty simple, but I imagine we have plenty of ground to cover with you..."

Cypher has posed:
Doug flexes his fingers, and then he looks up at Jean, and says, "It felt like I was just getting started, Phoenix." He looks out across the Danger Room, and then says, "You really do need to ask Hank to monitor this room carefully." Then he shakes his shoulders out, and says "But it felt good. It felt... good. I'm learning new quirks about the way my powers work all the time." He closes one eye and rubs a kink in his neck. "It's a long way from being the kid with the power a smart phone could fill in for in the field."

He pauses, and then nods his head.

"Oh. Since I have you, I need to tell you, my Paso Doble with Graydon Creed got someone's attention. I was contacted by an agent of the Batman. He wants to have one of his people meet with us. I can vouch for the authenticity of contact -- it was face-to-face."

Phoenix has posed:
"Good!" is Phoenix's immediate reply. Cypher's next comment causes her head to begin to cant before she flicks her eyes down to the phone in her hand, then brings them back to Doug with arching brows. "Oh, what, the-- I mean, I'm pretty sure that's all baked into the scenario, y'know? AI achieves full sentience, delusions of godhood, genocidal tendencies, yadda yadda."

A beat after she finishes twisting her hand about to help punctuate her reassurance, she flicks her eyes down and up Cypher before quietly acquiescing, "I mean, I guess I can have him set something up, still." She then shakes her head and steps aside to get out of the way of a maintenance robot while nodding along as Doug continues.

She's about to offer something encouraging into the space his pause leaves her, but not only does he he start up before it comes out, he manages to take her mind entirely off of X-Men training. Her shoulders square, her posture straightens a little, and Cypher might notice a hungry gleam in her eye-- along with no small amount of wariness.

Verified contact or no, the Batman is not the most comforting of strangers to have the attention of.

"Who," she wonders, leaning a little nearer. "When? Where? Why? Is this-- I saw Creed's weird, one-sided Twitter beef - which, seriously, do you just not have to do any part of your actual job to be a Senator, now? Is that how democracy works?"

After a short sigh and a shake of her head, she shakes her shoulders out and continues, "This isn't just about that, is it? He had a Twitter beef, you guys have an online thing going..."

Cypher has posed:
"Well." Doug says. "There may be more than that. I had a long time to myself in the infirmary. And somebody gave me an iPad. And, well, honestly, digital security's never meant a thing to me so I may have..." He looks away, a little sheepishly, "Raided all of Graydon Creed's personal files. And I found out the Batman was leaning on him really hard. So--"

"Did you know that I can actually follow movement patterns in a city to locate disturbances... or even people? I took a day trip to Gotham City. Well I guess it's more of a night trip. And I didn't find Batman -- but I, ah... did find Batgirl?" He gives a sheepish grin.

"So uh, if you'd like all of Graydon Creed's dirty secrets..."

Cypher has posed:
"But SHE was the one who told me Batman wanted to make contact with the X-Men." He holds his hands up. "I did NOT make that offer."

Phoenix has posed:
"Okay, well, at least now I feel better about you being able to sort of read my mind, sometimes," Phoenix murmurs, her volume spiking back to conversational levels as both hands find Doug's shoulders and she continues, "Yes, all of them, ASAP, on the team server," which she quickly throws out access information for.

A lowly voiced, "Fuck that guy," then gets tacked onto all of that.

Following exactly three seconds of a slow sigh and briefly closing her eyes, she rattles, "Obviously, hacking into people's personal files is not okay - huge privacy problem, obviously - but Creed is kind of an absurd monster, so this time, it's-- fine. Basically." Hair is pushed back with both hands into a temporary ponytail, then released as her fingers clasp against the back of her neck and she takes a step back.

"I'll see what the others think, but you and me'll meet him - and her? - by ourselves, if need be. We'll get it set up ASAP-- okay?"

Pacing away from him, she lets out another little sigh, then puts on a small, tight smile and remarks, "I'm glad you've found, ah-- technically constructive ways to keep yourself occupied, Doug. It's important to stay busy, keep your mind active-- avoid dwelling, y'know?"

Cypher has posed:
"I wouldn't do it to just anybody," Doug says, "But the subtext to everything that guy says is genocide. I don't really feel any guilt there." Doug mutters. He doesn't tell her about how he was in STAR Labs's database reading Kryptonian datafiles... hoping she can't pick up on that one anyway. Or that maybe she'll ignore it. It was just so interesting--

"Oh. Well..." He grins. "You find ways. I have a date!" He says. "Um. Could I borrow some money? I'd like to take Illyana someplace nice. I'll pay you back!"

Phoenix has posed:
As long as Doug isn't thinking about it too loudly, his STAR Labs secret is safe: especially prominent, surface-level thoughts and emotions have a way of finding their way to Phoenix, but she tends to avoid casually digging around friendly minds. Instead, she simply - and firmly - nods her agreement with his assessment.

The news - and, especially, the request - put a stop to her pacing. Turning to show him a bemused squint, she folds her arms and replies, "You-- do know that I'm still a teacher under all of this, right?" while tilting her head a little. While the surprise is genuine - his general fascination with Magik had been noted, but dating is rather more specific - the rib is friendly: she unclips a few bills from her phone and offers them out to the blond boy after letting it hang in the air for a moment.

"Don't worry about it, just-- have a good time, huh? And, hey, congrats! Illyana's a little... intense, but she's got a good head on her shoulders." Concern is readily heard and seen in that moment of hesitation; she doesn't distrust Illyana, per se, but the girl introduced an infernal plant to the school for reasons that she still isn't entirely clear on, and Doug is only a few weeks post-grave.

Cypher has posed:
"She thinks I'm *cute*!" Doug says, beaming. He slips the money away in a pocket. "Don't worry, I'll pay you back! I'm going to ask Iceman to make some investments for me. If I'm reading the stock market right, they're really going to pay off and I won't have to worry about spending cash ever again--" He holds up his hands, again, "And don't worry about me, I have absolutely NO plans to use my powers to crash the global financial system or anything like that. I'm no anarchist. Just... I just wanna live, you know?"

He looks down, and then he says, "And, Phoenix -- thanks for the chance. I'll do my best not to let you down. Especially since I think after letting Iceman talk me into that whole thing I kinda blew my chances with SHIELD."

Phoenix has posed:
The smile and chuckle Doug's beaming get are mostly genuine, but they're ultimately a bit too big, too hastily constructed around a glimmer of jealousy.

"Not that Iceman doesn't know what he's talking about," Phoenix cautions, "but you may want some kind of back up plan, just in case-- I mean, bare minimum, some other, less scrupulous guy-or-girl could use their powers to crash the global financial system. Or, y'know, one of your investments."

Despite the cold water spray and jealous glint, when he thanks her, she quickly crosses the distance to throw her arms around him as she says, "Doug, you sacrificed yourself to protect someone you cared about, and now that you've got a second chance at life, you want to put it on the line again. As much as I don't relish the idea of one of my students - former, whatever - wanting to risk his life on a regular basis, I'd be a huge hypocrite at best if I tried to stop you-- not to mention irresponsible if I let you follow the urge without being trained for it." She then lets go, adding, "And if SHIELD's gonna let a little hack on a government official stand in the way of hiring you, they're blowing their chances with you," with a grin and a mirthful tone.

Both fade in short order as her hands fold around one of his, seeking to bring it up to torso level as she concludes, "Just-- remember I'm here if you need to borrow money to go out with witchy girls, talk, or whatever, alright? Anything, X-related or-- otherwise."

Cypher has posed:
Doug tilts his head down a bit at that and says, "Thanks, Jean. I really appreciate it--" He adds, "I'm... happy to be back. There is just one more issue I need to figure out. But we can work on that. My parents -- they're still in Salem Center. And I have no idea how to go about telling them I'm not dead, especially since I'm pretty sure my funeral was open casket?" He shakes his head. "Another time though." he gives Jean's hand a squeeze. "And, hey. I don't have anything to prove as far as committment to the cause goes. I already died for this. So I guess I'm in it for life, right?"

Phoenix has posed:
The comment about committment draws a small, fleeting chuckle, but Jean's expression remains sober as she tentatively murmurs, "Mine-- took it better than I'd expected," and lets her eyes fall as well. "Not well-- but better than I expected. Yours've had a lot longer." She squeezes his hand in turn, and then fire begins to boil across most of her body, warming the air around them and burning her costume away to reveal a fading, peeling shirt from Chance the Mutant's Coloring Book tour and jeans.

"We'll figure it out," she promises before letting go. "But you might wanna wait a while before bringing the superhero element into the mix..."