7872/Summers Session

Summers Session
Date of Scene:	14 June 2019
Location:	Danger Room - X-Men Base
Synopsis:	Summary needed
Cast of Characters:	Marvel Girl, X-Man

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Marvel Girl has posed:
Rachel left the school for a few weeks, and then she came back. And now that she's returned, she seems to have steeled her nerves for going to war. Or as much going to war as the X-Men do, at least. She's kept her space, kept to herself. And now she's set up a routine in the danger room.

If there was any doubt about how serious she is, it can be resolved by the fact that she's //not// engaging in a no holds barred combat fest. Smashing, after all, is easy.

Instead, there are humanoid figures across the room from her, while small robot-like creatures buzz around them. And Rachel is trying to hit the robots with //small// fireballs.

Judging by the char marks on the figures, she hasn't been entirely successful.

X-Man has posed:
    The door slides open behind Rachel, to allow for the entrance of another scion of the Grey line of psionic powerhouses. Nate Grey. The genetically forged union of the DNA of Grey and Summers, from a dark otherworld. Currently, the often shirtless young man is surprisingly shirt-clad. Sort of. A dark blue leather jumpsuit clings to his athletic and ripped form, emblazoned with a large white X across the chest, with stripes that spill down his shoulders along the outside of each arm. The front of the jumpsuit is left unzipped down his chest, however, with the upturned collar dangling loosely at either side of his throat.

    "Yo."

    He calls out, giving an upnod to Rachel as he strides inside. He takes one look around, and sees what is going on. She needs to increase her focus. Get her aim down.

    "What have we here?"

Marvel Girl has posed:
When the door opens, a fireball narrowly misses the head on one of the figures, jerking back away at the last second. Only once it's hit its actual target does Rachel look back over her shoulder, tipping her chin up in greeting. "Hey," she says, turning back to the array. "You know. Trying to find out if I'm capable of limiting collateral damage."

Another fireball explodes into being at the side of one of the figures, just in time for the little robot to flit into it. "Looks like the answer is a solid 'sometimes.'"

X-Man has posed:
    "Gotcha," Nate replies, as he casually strides closer, approaching with not a single whiff of caution in the wind. Let the lightning strike where it will, as the old saying goes. His left eye begins to burn. A smoldering, golden ember, at first, but that golden power begins to smoke and then flare out of the eye vibrantly.

    "I might be able to help. Give you some pointers," he offers, as he watches that fireball explode right before the miniscule robot. His head cants to one side, and he folds his arms across his mostly exposed chest. He does give a solid three seconds of a pregnant pause before he asks, "So... are you okay? I know you went away. We all need... I guess... I'm not really good at this kind of thing. I just... I want to know you're okay."

Marvel Girl has posed:
"Nate, I wouldn't know okay if it bit me on the ass," Rachel points out, arching a brow. "I'm not injured. I'm just...focused." A larger fireball blossoms a few feet away from him, shrinking as she directs it to one of the robots. Experimenting.

"All this Sentinel stuff has me on edge. I just don't want to watch it happen again, you know? So whatever I have to do to make sure that doesn't happen, I'm going to make sure I'm there for it."

X-Man has posed:
    "I know you're not injured," Nate replies quickly. He lifts a hand, as if to ward off that notion altogether. His boyish features look more mature when his brow sets to brooding, and his soft, pliant lips draw tight at the edges with a frown. "That's not what I mean."

    The fireball that erupts in the air near him creates a warm breeze that blows through his silvery and chestnut locks, shifting them to one side, but he, himself doesn't flinch. He trusts Rachel not to try to bring him harm. He trusts her skill enough to know she won't do so by accident, either.

    "That," He says when she mentions the sentinels, pointing a finger at her. He nods his head, looking her in the eyes with his own blue and gold stare sympathetic. "That's what I was asking about. Are you... okay. Is there anything that I can do? I mean... I'm here for you."

Marvel Girl has posed:
Rachel gives the fireballs a break for a moment, reaching up to shake a hand through her hair as she lets out a huff of breath. "It's fine. I'm fine." The lie detector determined: that is a lie.

"It's not like you can just snap your fingers and make it not be happening, Nate," she points out, a smirk flickering across her features. "We may be a big deal, but we're not that good. So I'm training. Making sure I'm as good as I need to be. And I told Kitty I'd talk to the Avengers, which is..." She grimaces, setting off a three-foot fireball between two of the figures that incinerates three of the smaller robots.

"I can already picture the pity."

X-Man has posed:
    "I don't think you're fine," Nate says, calling her on that lie without hesitation. His voice, though, isn't stern, nor reproaching. It's gentle. Soothing. But it certainly isn't pity. It's understanding. There are certain things for people like them, that just... trigger deeply rooted fears and concerns. Things that they've seen that will never shake free, no matter how utopian this time and world might seem on the surface.

    "I... I mean... In a way, maybe I could..." He admits, though he seems hesitant. Nate could do a lot of things. He could fly around the world, dissolving each Sentinel from the face of the planet. Or, at the very least, he believes he could. "If you don't want to talk to them... Then don't. We're the X-Men. We don't... we don't answer to the Avengers. I know they're trying to foster some sort of goodwill or something, but... This is our fight. Not theirs. This is what we're made for."

    He looks out where she created that last fireball, and gives a faint upnod. "Offer's still on the table, though. I could help you."

Marvel Girl has posed:
"No, it's not that I don't want to talk to them." Rachel shakes her hands, pacing in a small circle, restless. "I mean, not really. Them. It's not them. It's..." The frustration comes off of her in waves, all too obvious between a pair of psychics.

"You know, in my world, when everything happened, when the Sentinels and everyone else showed up here to put us down, no one else stood up for us. No one stood with us. And we all fell. Again, and again, and again. So if talking to them means that if it happens here, they show up too? Then I can go and be a sad face." She huffs out a sigh, squaring her shoulders and looking to the targets.

"What've you got on the target help front?"

X-Man has posed:
    Nate listens. It's not just listening, nor is it just waiting for his turn to talk. He's an empath as well as a telepath. He can literally feel what she is feeling, even if it weren't so obvious. He can taste it in the back of his throat, like acid on the tongue. He doesn't speak, he just listens and feels.

    "It's funny. You and I... We come from such opposite places... But..." He shrugs his shoulders, the leather creaking as it stretches over his muscular form. He can empathize. It's apparent. "We've got entirely too much in common."

    When she asks about what he has to help her, he taps his temple, and asks, "Is it okay if I come in?"

Marvel Girl has posed:
"Right?" Rachel laughs, though there isn't much humor in it. "Enough to make you think maybe it's for the best if Mom and Dad don't figure things out." At his question, she takes a deep breath, tilting her head from one side to the other and weaving her fingers together to crack her knuckles. It's like tidying things up before the neighbors come over.

He can feel the frustration subside somewhat, pushed back into a corner as she works on focusing instead. "All right, come on in," she nods then, carefully lowering her shields. He's likely to feel some resistance still - no matter how much she may be intellectually willing to share head space, there's always going to be a part of her that pushes back on general principle.

X-Man has posed:
    As soon as she gives the word go, she'll feel him easing inside of her mind. He's not using any guile. His presence is felt as a soothing warmth, like a summer breeze in the shade of a large tree on a sunny day. He doesn't burrow and dig. He simply sort of envelops, letting his being almost seem to merge with hers.

    "I... don't call them that. Mom and Dad. It's... weird. Plus, it's not like they had me. I wasn't born. They're just... genetic donors."

    There is a flux in his psionic presence at that. A momentary shudder, and impulse to recoil. A sense of cold, mournful emptiness. He had no parents. He wasn't a person, really. He's a genecrafted weapon.

    Regardless, though, he steps in behind her, his chest to her back, and he reaches down to take her hand. She'll feel that hollow sorrow fade away, replaced by a focus. He's guiding her.

    "You can feel it... Out there. Telekinesis isn't just about moving or strength... Reach out with it. You can feel it. You can feel them out there, moving around."

    Reaching down, he takes Rachel's hand and lifts it, outstretched towards the target figures, and the swirling robots.

    "The matter is there for you to command. You can shape it. Rearrange it. Control it. But you just have to feel it, first. So touch it. Touch it with your mind."

Marvel Girl has posed:
Rachel's mind - even tidied up - is a battlefield. At night. Through a ruined city. There are walls everywhere, and the darkness is lit by simmering flames that could just as easily be destructive as warming. It's where those flames are coming from. Despite their similarities, that much is hers.

"I knew them just enough to miss them when they died," she murmurs, the flames in her mind intensifying at the memory. As if in answer, there's a flicker of flame between her fingertips before she clamps down on it.

A deep breath, as she follows along his mind, letting everything seep in. "I can feel it. That's never a problem. It's just the..." Her eye twitches. "//Focus//." Like pushing a forest fire through a fine gauge needle.

X-Man has posed:
    "I only knew them by tales," Nate says. Or rather, thinks. While that flame might be hers, the rest of her mind seems comfortingly at home for him. As if they might be able to have their unique psyscapes overlap and find them a near perfect match. "Sometimes I wonder what it might have been like... If Jean had found me. Or if Scott had known what Sinister was up to in his labs. If they maybe had both found out and had come for me..."

    That's a dark and lonely place that he doesn't need to go.

    "You're trying to push," Nate says, his voice growing softer and less obtrusive. "You're using force when you do not need to. Instead of pushing the fire out, simply let it flow. The fire goes where it needs. All you need to do is let it go."

    Nate takes his turn with one of the robots, keeping his mental link locked into place, allowing her to feel everything that he feels, see everything that he sees. Full sensory union. She'll feel the way that his mind reaches out, using his telekinesis much like a nose, following a scent for the matter that he wants. One of those flickeringly fast drones. She'll taste the metallic taste of that on her tongue, smooth and dull. She'll feel the power flowing, like a wave of electrical fire that shoots from the center of his mind, down the length of his arm that stands flush against her own, and down from his fingertips and out. She'll feel the pulsing wave even as it races through the air, arcing to follow the scent that his mind had joined to it. Even as the robot zips around one of the figures, his psionic bolt curves around to meet it, and turn it into nothing but slivers of glittering dust.

Marvel Girl has posed:
"They would have. Come for you." Rachel doesn't even hesitate at that. "If they knew." Her world fell apart when she lost them, more than once, but that much she knows for certain.

For as much as she looks like their mother, though, it certainly feels like she managed to inherit a few of her father's control issues. Their minds fit together easily, but there's still a feeling like she's keeping careful borders, like plastic wrap stretched tight over her psyche. Guarded.

Her brows furrow as she follows his mind, follows the path of his bolt to the robot. "Okay..." she says slowly, head tilting as an idea forms. She finds another of the bots, letting her mind sink into it. He can feel, though, the way that the smaller things slip away, like trying to grasp a single grain of sand with oversized fingers. But rather than guide the fire //at// the bot, she seems to link her consciousness right with those molecules, exploding the fire into them. And around them, for about a foot, but it's still an improvement.

X-Man has posed:
    "I know."

    The words are simple, but the certainty with which they're spoken is absolute. He does know. He doesn't doubt that. He knows just enough of the Jean Grey, a rebel fighter for freedom and a better world, and Emplate Summers, who rebelled against his own master, to know that they would have come for him. Had they known. But they didn't. They didn't know, and they were both too involved with their own things to have ever found out.

    He follows along with her thoughts and feelings as she forms them, a slow, easy smile coming to his lips, splitting them apart to reveal the white teeth hidden behind them. He opens his eyes when she releases that power, and he feels the way that it simply sparks within, rather than being pushed at.

    "That is so much better!" He exclaims, releasing her hand from his own grasp, and stepping away from her back to her side. Placing his hands on his hips, he looks at where the fire claimed its victim, and says, "That's it, exactly. Affect the matter itself, and don't worry about aiming. You might even be able to, with some practice, change the matter rather than simply destroy it."

    She'll feel Nate, again, reaching out, feeling rather than seeing, another of those robots. All of the particles that make it up. Each of its moving parts. All of that solid metal, and he just... wills it. He doesn't change the composition of the molecules themselves, so much as he shifts their state. The robot's flying course comes to an abrupt end as a cold puddle of metal splashes the floor.

Marvel Girl has posed:
Rachel twists a faint smirk at his approval, guarding the fact that it actually makes her feel good. He can feel that little blossom of warmth though, no matter how much she tries to hide it. "Progress." She watches his he changes the state of the robot, that faint smirk deepening.

"You wanna know the stupid part?" She takes a step back, and with a thought, the jogger and tank top she's wearing effortlessly shift into reinforced leather combat gear, tennis shoes turning to sturdy boots. "I hardly even have to think about that."

It's true - he can feel the way she just pictures it and lets it go. There's no real artistry in it, no thought at all.

X-Man has posed:
    "Right?" He agrees with a bright grin, as he steps back, holds up his arms, and does the opposite. His leather costume shifts, crackling with golden light and sparks of psionic flame to fade away, becoming nothing more than a pair of comfy, dark grey pajama pants made from that Jersey cotton, and a black silk kimono style robe left open and untied across his strong, pronounced chest and rippling abdominals. There was absolutely no thought in that at all. It was something that was as rote as curling a finger might be. Just another muscle to be flexed.

    "But, you can do that with anything. It just... it sort of just takes the recognition of it, to be honest. It takes more effort to outright change things from one to another, of course. Or to make them from nothing... But just shifting the state of matter?"

    He waves a hand dismissively, and smiles. "You can do that. You just have to think of it. Train yourself to do so."

    He pauses, going silent and tilting his head as he looks at Rachel, his blue eye alight, while the other's golden fire seems more peaceful and calm, like a pulsing star. "I should get going, but... This was good. We should do this more often. I think I can really help you, and..."

    He shrugs his shoulders, letting his gaze drift to one side. "It's nice. Having someone who can get it. Just... Get it. Not need to ask what it was like. Not need to think that I have to be treated like some PTSD case. Just... get it."

Marvel Girl has posed:
"Okay, seriously, what do you have against shirts?" Rachel sets her hands on her hips, quirking a brow as her outfit shifts back to the more comfortable training clothes. It's all in good spirits, though, her expression softening just a bit at his later words.

"Yeah," she agrees quietly, nodding. "Yeah. I mean, shitty stuff happens, and it leaves marks, but...Yeah." She reaches a hand for his shoulder, keeping it there as she slowly pulls her mind free all the way.

"Hey, I've gotta track down this guy who mistakenly tried to take a hit on me, help him get out of that game. Maybe you can help out." Because that's what passes for Summers/Grey family time.

X-Man has posed:
    "They're uncomfortable. Like... collars feel like they're choking me. They're constrictive," Nate says freely, shrugging his broad shoulders, and giving a disaffected look. "Besides, when you have a body that looks like mine, it's kind of a civic duty to share it with the world. It's a heavy responsibility, but... that's the price I pay for having these abs."

    He flexes them for emphasis, turning what already looks like a washboard into these chiseled, deeply grooved blocks of muscle buried under bronzed flesh. He looks like a walking photoshop job. And not at all unlike a younger, smiling Scott Summers. Not that Scott ever smiles.

    "What? Is he being forced to do that, or is he just like... a hitman? And why you?" Because Nate's clearly game for this, but he definitely needs to hear more deets.

Marvel Girl has posed:
"You're ridiculous," Rachel rolls her eyes, shaking her head and failing to hide a smirk as she shakes a hand through her hair. "He wasn't super talkative. And apparently his power is taking out other powers, so I couldn't get the info the other way. He said he mistook me for his mark, he said something about they were gonna kill him if he didn't finish the hit." She looks up, raising her voice. "End program."

The robots and the human figures fade away as she heads for the door. "It sounded like the mob or someone was putting pressure on him to use his skills to take out other mutants. I'm kind of against that sort of thing." For obvious reasons. "So. He ran off, but I can find him."

X-Man has posed:
    "I'm ridiculously awesome, you mean," Nate says, flashing a brilliant smile, and having that left eye flare for a moment in a dramatic light. As she turns to head towards the door, Nate takes up a stride beside her, listening to her relate to him the tale of this dude who can shut down powers. That's an interesting thing to note. Nate immediately wonders if he could shut down those power nullifying powers. But that's not the focus.

    "Alright. Let's find him, then. We can bring him in here. Protect him. Mob guys?" Nate gives her a sidelong look as they step out of the danger room. "Gimme a break. That's like an afternoon lunch for us. But... let me know when you want to track him down. I'd... rather go with you. Just in case."

Marvel Girl has posed:
"Yeah, sure," Rachel nods. "I figured I'd bring along a couple people who can handle themselves without powers. I mean, I still kicked his ass, so I'm not //too// worried, but." She looks over with a faint smile, shoving her hands in her pockets rather than give in to the urge for physical contact. "Let's go get something to eat. I'm pretty sure the kitchen is my favorite thing about this world."