8465/The Wounded Warrior

The Wounded Warrior
Date of Scene:	23 July 2019
Location:	Xavier's School for the Gifted
Synopsis:	Hank calls an assembly to calm the students excited/anxious about recent violence. School staff support each other while discussing long-term solutions.
Cast of Characters:	Beast, Elixir, Nightcrawler, Jubilee

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Beast has posed:
Henry McCoy had a busy day yesterday. Most of the older students saw half of it first hand, with videos and photos going around of Hank having ripped the head clean off of the woman who knocked over their bus! Some say it was a robot, some say it was a human(!),and the rumors are flying. It gets worse when he shows up to class with no jacket, and a big bulge on one shoulder for a bandage wrap he has on.

Science class is buzzing all morning, and at the end he finally sighs. "Alright, I can tell you all have a question, so I'm going to hold an assembly at 10:30 so we can talk about this. But before we break now, ask your question."

"Were... were you shot? Could... we have been shot?"

"Er... yes. Yes I was shot. But... not at the field trip. You were not in danger of being shot. Dismissed."

When the class gets up to clear out, and start walking to the assembly, they're buzzing even MORE now!

Elixir has posed:
Josh heard the buzz after morning training and rounds in Medical. He decided to check in with Hank and walked in to lean against the back wall of the classroom shortly before the group was dismissed. He avoids the looks sent his way, some the usual unkind, others different after the bus incident.

When the students get up to go he talks to a few who come up to him to say thanks once more for the day before. He smiles and assures them it was nothing.

"So... You know you can call me when things happen, right?" Josh says with a bit of a grin as he comes up to Hank. "The heck happened to you?"

Nightcrawler has posed:
    With a small puff of smoke and the lingering reek of egg-fart, one of the Bamfs appears, casually opening a window as Kurt crawls down along the wall, slipping in and onto the ceiling like a gecko as the kids begin filing out. He's all khakis and button downs right now, per his usual appearance to the students, but with the recent excitement he's curious to see what is happening... especially since he was there for the most recent injury.

Jubilee has posed:
Jubilee was waiting till she saw the class file out before going to see Hank. But then Josh stepped in before she could. Usurper.

So, as Josh is talking to Hank, Jubilee slips in behind him, wearing some variation of a school uniform. "Yeah, are you okay? Didn't even tell me you were hurt," laments Jubes, looking concerned.

And along comes a Kurt. "Seems like everyone's a little curious..."

Beast has posed:
Henry McCoy makes sure the students are out of the way before he talks to the teachers. His uninjured arm moves to hold Jubilee's shoulder. "I'm alright." He then grins to Josh. "No really, I'm fine. I just need to walk it off." Old football player and all that. Then a smile to Kurt. "You know, my identity isn't secret these days. I felt so bad for you, looking obviously guilty after you nearly called me Hank out there. I'm open, don't forget that. I've told the world who I am, so I can be a better activist."

Elixir has posed:
Josh looks dubious but shrugs, shoots Jubilee a smile and nods to Kurt. He stands with his hands in the pockets of his jeans while the others talk.

"Don't know how you deal with it," Josh comments. "All the attention."

Nightcrawler has posed:
    Blinking and looking a little sheepish now, Kurt frowns and looks to Hank,
    "It's not always easy, to use names." the Bavarian shrugs, potentially embarrassed by his still using a callsign? "Und you vere shot as well, Hank! Unless its Logan, or Piotr - I really have trouble getting over that." 'crouching' on the ceiling, tail coiling about his ankles.

Jubilee has posed:
"Who shot ya?" Jubilee asks nonchalantly. Clearly she is not making a revenge list or anything like that. Probably just curious, or like...asking for a friend. "I didn't even realize ya were out, then I heard you were shot, and I was just sick worryin' about ya."

Beast has posed:
Henry McCoy glances over to a group of students still staring at him, and shoos them toward the assembly. They move in a HURRY once noticed. Then then looks over the group. "Jub, Rahne led a small group to visit the gang who attacked Doug. She explained very clearly to them that they should not engage in further drug related activities, but not before I took a bullet. I do regenerate, don't forget. I'm no Logan, but I can take a hit. I'll be fiiiiine."

Nightcrawler has posed:
    Glancing to Josh, Kurt tilts his head to the side, "I'd think it easier to understand. He may be blue and furry but his callsign reminds of romantic French literature, and his standing in the scientific community makes it easier access to activism with less open judgement, ja?" Kurt remains seated, brow knitting. "His being a football star doesn't hurt either."

Elixir has posed:
Josh shakes his head and smirks when Hank admits he was shot. Walk it off indeed.

"It's a lot of pressure," he replies to Kurt with a shrug and frown. "And people are ugly."

"So you guys went out and got into fight with those guys?" he asks Hank. "Wow. Is that why Evolution was attacked last night? I heard one of the bouncers is dead and someone tried to torch the place with people inside."

Jubilee has posed:
Jubilee flinches. "Evolution?? How am I this out of the loop? I hadn't heard anything about that, either! And somebody's dead....God, this stuff HAS TO END! It's gonna turn onto all out civil war."

Beast has posed:
Henry McCoy shakes his head, and starts to fold his arms, but then the shoulder says no, so his hand returns to Jub's shoulder. "I hadn't heard that. It may have been related, but maybe not. We roughed them up good, and Rahne was forceful, wasn't she Kurt?" He snorts, and shakes his head with a smirk. "It's a drug war, not a civil war, and someone's behind it. We haven't found who yet. That's who we need to take out, not these street level punks." He then pauses, and looks to Josh. "You're right. And that's why I do it. I can take the heat. I get out in front so that others don't have to. That's how I put up with it. I'm able to. I have the awards. I have the fame. I can handle it. So I take the bad with the good."

Elixir has posed:
"Yeah, it was in the news," Josh replies to Jubilee."

"That's... really cool," Josh says to Hank and chews on the inside of his cheek. "We'd better get moving, or that assembly's gonna start."

Josh starts to walk in that direction with his friends and teammates.

Nightcrawler has posed:
    Kurt is fumbling with his outsized phone, tail being used to tap at it where his fingers are too clumsy. "Verdammt" he frowns, "Ja... something made her angry, and this will make it worse..."
    Wagner sighs, looking pained as he scans around the room. "This is only going to get worse unless we have someone fast, or able to stop bullets by the club... Or we're going to have to track them all down and round them up before this happens again"

Jubilee has posed:
Jubilee shakes her head at Hank. "I feel like it is all related, though. I think mutants are being targeted by whoever is pushing Hook. I feel like they were being targeted last nihht, too. It all seems to tie ends together to create one big push to eliminate mutants, one way or another."

Beast has posed:
Henry McCoy starts walking with the group into the gym for the assembly. Bringing the teachers up to the front. He answers them quietly "It is going to get worse. More kids getting addicted, shot, or both. Someone built that drug with a great deal of skill. This isn't some small time FoH gang. This is a major, funded effort."

He then steps up to the podium. "Students, staff, thank you for coming. As i'm sure we've all seen and heard, our junior and senior class field trip was attacked yesterday. There were some students hurt, but Josh Foley led efforts to give emergency care, and we came out fine. Just down one bus." Those who saw him tearing the bus up know what he means, and why he smiles at that.

"I want to make clear that they were robots attacking us. Not strong sentinels, but similar in spirit. And none of them had guns. I was not shot at the field trip. You have nothing to worry about that. I was in Mutant Town last night, and you may have heard there were incidents there. I Was caught up in that, and I will be fine."

Hank then steps aside in case any other staff want to speak.

Elixir has posed:
Josh hangs back while Hank speaks. He watches the kids as he does. A lot has happened in the last 24 hours. 48 hours. A week. But he has no idea what he would say to these kids, not much younger than he is. He shakes his head if any of the others look at him, having no intention of going up to the podium, particularly given the sentinment he arouses in so many of them.

Nightcrawler has posed:
    There is something in the somewhat nonchalant way things are being handled. Brow knitting, he doesn't call out in the midst of the assembly though. There are people dead, and he was part of the source of the friction.
    Kurt looks to Hank again, trying to catch his eye and see if perhaps he might get a glimpse of how big blue is taking this himself? Or if the man's stage personae is too well plastered to let anything other than confidence through.

Jubilee has posed:
Jubilee steps forward, once she is certain none of the other staff is willing to speak.

"Good morning," she begins. "I just wanted to address the students this morning in regard to all the rumours and events that have been occurring lately. And I want to enourage you all to keep heart."

Jubilee takes a deep breath. Dressed in a slender-cut red sheath dress and matching heels, she looks more professional than usual. Her hair is swept up into a neat updo, to keep her hair off her neck.

"We Have all heard of the shootings. The drugs. The protests and the abuse. Gangs. Violence. And we wonder how it may end. I want to encourage you today and tell you that the 'end' may only come when we persist and do not allow ourselves to to cast aside. Those of us who have a message of peace, we need to be just as loud as those runours, and those guns. And we need to be as loud as the cries that call us names. That tell us to crawl back into the earth from whence we came. And if it can only end when we shout those voices down, so be it. We are evolution. Does it make us /better/? We are still human, and we need to remember that.

"We are all equals with those who came before us, X-Gene or no. Our legacy will someday be that we overcame evil and ignorance, and learned to coexist so that peace could prevail.

"I implore you all to keep hope alive, and strive to reach those better days that we have ahead. Because they're coming. We just have to choose here and now, whether we will be a step in that change or a barrier to it. Because those who choose to be a barrier will be the ones forgotten in the dust. I'll leave that decision to each of you."

Beast has posed:
Henry McCoy is being watched very carefully by the philosopher-poet Wagner, and Kurt can see it as Hank turns around to take a seat. Hank's been through a lot in this fight with Hook, and some of it came out yesterday. Tearing the head off of that robot was not his best look, nor was tearing apart the bus. He knows it, and he's playing it off as joke, the same way he's making light of Rahne's outburst last night. That could have been himself doing that. (Ed: Yes, Kurt can see all of that.)

Listening to Jubilee, he stands up again and claps once her statement ends, attempting to lead the students to follow, and fortunately they do. The place lights up with cheers.

Nightcrawler has posed:
    Jubilee draws a slight uptick of his mouth, something to inspire the kids - and he's not going to dampen that. The things Hank himself is hiding is mirrored in Kurt.
    The rage at these gangbangers, the urge to do more than he did to them. The urge to let Rahne do what she was prepared to do. Now there were innocents dead and all that the lot at the school do was keep spirits up as best they could. The kids, the ones who will be going out into the world one day.
    Kurt's brows knit and the gloom that forms around him naturally intensifies. He doesn't have a speech and his brooding results in a hump of darkness on the ceiling, visible from the stage for the two soft glows in the middle of the ball of blue-blackness. The X-Men don't deal with this kind of thing, it's too 'ground level' and it nettles at him. Kurt can do something though, and the resolve is building.

Elixir has posed:
Josh claps with a big half-grin. The fact Jubilee and so many others at the school /believe/ what she says has always struck him as... Noble. Something good like in movies. He nods to Jubilee with a smile.

Beast has posed:
Henry McCoy gets up from the rear and signals to the various teachers to open up the doors, and let the students out for lunch. He exhales heavily - more fodder for Kurt's analysis - but smiles. "Well done Jub. We'll ride this out. But the sooner we find the source of hook, the sooner we can put it behind us."

Elixir has posed:
"Well you've still got that guy in Security you and Scott grabbed," Josh points out. "I don't think anybody talked to him yet? You grabbed him in a drug house or something, right? Or did you let him go already?"

Jubilee has posed:
As Jubilee steps down, and the students are escaping to lunch, she smiles to the others. "Thanks guys. We gotta keep them hoping. For some of 'em, it's all they've got. It can change their world." She wraps an arm around Hank's waist and squeezes. "Who are we questioning?"