An Administrator Came to Westchester

[ngm_miscellaneous]

Mrs. Mary MacNeilly had made the hour trip out to a private school in Westchester county. She was the person assigned from the State Education Department's Office of Nonpublic School Services to perform a surprise inspection of the Xavier Institute for Higher Learning. It had been some time since an in-person inspection of this learning facility had been conducted. It had fallen to Mrs. MacNeilly to go and assess how the school fit the understaffed Office of Accountability's educational parameters.

She drove her midsized sedan up to the gates. She announced herself on the intercomm as "Mary MacNeilly from the New York State Education Department for a compliance inspection."

She drummed her fingers on the steering wheel as she waited for some administrator to allow her on the grounds.

Comments

[kinetic_assault]

Brianna also cartwheeled her way back to the group, moving so that she was back-to-back with Rose to keep anyone from flanking either of them. She was breathing heavily but she wasn't tired.

In fact, she was having a lot of fun.

"I've never seen the Fastball Special. It sounds like fun." Brianna said, holding her katana at the ready.

[marvel_boy]

Topher laughed gleefully. The Fastball Special was the classic X-Men maneuver. "Why, Kayla? Did you want to try it out?" He'd used his strength to bash the head in of one of the Sentinels, and the head flattened easily. He clearly had a lot of energy to expend.

[ngm_miscellaneous]

Mrs. MacNeilly had requested copies of the curriculum so she could peruse it somewhere that did not make her slightly jumpy. After nearly being run over by a student with small wings sliding on indoor ice, she decided to take the curriculum to go. All she had to do was make it through the tour of the facilities.

And she was completely unaware of the training exercise happening in what she thought was the relative safe outdoors.

[talk_to_you]

With a million possible things that could go wrong, Doug was equally unaware of the training exercise going on. At least the curriculum was rigorous. That was one of the promises of the school, after all.

"And, as you can see, we also offer numerous physical education opportunities, and spacious grounds for various athletic functions..."

[demonbearslayer]

"There's a lake, stables, an Olympic certified archery range... and team sports, too. We have bi-weekly intramural baseball games when the weather is nice."

Yes, let's get the inspector outside, and far away from any random power manifestations roaming the halls. The gorgeous grounds can only help her report...

[seismic_shockwave]

"Yes. Yes, I want to be thrown at a Sentinel right now. See ... my shockwaves are best at close range and they know that. So I gotta bring me to them." She grinned at Topher. "Up for practicing your tossing arm, Chief?"

If it helped, she was fairly small as far as people went, though she doubted it would've been any difficulty for him had he been larger. She just wanted to see some Sentinels smashed.

[wild_child]

Rose dodged a blast of Sentinel fire.

"If yer gonna do it, quit yer jawin' an' do it!"

[kinetic_assault]

Brianna saw a civilian that was about to be in the line of fire and moved to get said person out of the way while the others handled the Sentinel.

[marvel_boy]

Topher grinned. Hell, that was permission from the daughter of one of the guys who had invented the move. If she was fine with it...

Topher easily took ahold of Kayla - she was small enough, and he was strong enough - counted to three, and then threw her at a Sentinel, entirely oblivious to any adults who may or may not have been around.

[seismic_shockwave]

Kayla flew towards the Sentinels in as tight a ball as she could manage, trying not to wreck the timing. Strange as it was, though, hurtling towards them, time actually seemed to slow down. Just before contact, she initiated a shockwave, the most powerful one she could manage to destroy the Sentinels.

And that was how almost everything within a hundred feet or so ended up looking vaguely like Hiroshima as a massive concussive shockwave rippled out, ripping chunks out of Sentinels and earth alike and sending it hurtling in all directions, far further than the hundred-foot or so radius of the primary shockwave.

For her part, Kayla fell to the ground, feeling exhausted but exhilerated, until she actually looked around.

"Oh shit ..."

[wild_child]

In the aftermath of the explosion, it actually took a moment for Rose to come to her senses. The ringing in her ears from the damage done by her super-hearing was slowly subsiding, but there was a rather large amount of pain from several other areas...

Oh.

Including the rather large piece of shrapnel in her stomach, along with some of her guts seeping out.

"This is... gonna... hurt."

[ngm_miscellaneous]

Mrs. MacNeilly was taking in the grounds. They seemed pleasant enough... until she saw some students fighting giant robots? She was not sure what she was seeing. She stopped and stared.

Just in time for a girl to get thrown at a giant robot and explode. It made the administrator stagger back and her ears ring. She shook her head and looked back at the group of students...

... to see one impaled and bleeding. Mrs. MacNeilly stared in shock. Then she started to shuck her jacket as she dropped the papers in her hands.She headed straight toward the girl. Maybe she could do some first aid despite her ears ringing. Was there a hospital near here?

[talk_to_you]

"...Merde." Doug managed, after realization had finally sunk in.

[demonbearslayer]

Her powers had turned on her. The woman from the State Education Department was an evil mutant with power-warping abilities, and Dani was seeing her own worst nightmare come to life.

It was the only explanation.

[kinetic_assault]

Brianna expected the explosion and some debris, but the sheer force of the explosion was a bigger shock than anything. She cut away one piece of shrapnel and another, but she was soon thrown off her feet and against the trunk of a tree, slamming into it with sufficient force.

Unlike the others, she wasn't indestructible nor did she have a healing factor. She thought she heard a loud, wet crack as she slammed into the tree but she didn't have time to question it.

She slid to the ground unconscious and didn't move again, her katana fading out of existence.

[marvel_boy]

Of all the things that Topher had expected, this was the least of them.

He was knocked out, and he wasn't as badly damaged as the rest of them.

But zounds the negativity that was emanating from everyone.

Topher closed his eyes and buckled, falling to his knees, using the powers from the negativity to quickly heal whatever wounds he had, trying to expend as much energy as he could.

This was...this was not good.

[seismic_shockwave]

Kayla was completely physically unharmed, but now she could see what she'd done and all strength disappeared from her legs and she sank to the ground, unable to do anything except half-sit, half-lie there.

As physically tough as she was, she was in psychological shock. Her thoughts weren't at all coherent, just a mess of horror, guilt and self-hatred. One that would be positively toxic for anyone in the area with telepathic or empathic traits.

[wild_child]

"This is... gonna suck..." Rose said, wincing in pain as she forced herself to her feet. Kidneys and liver were probably shot. Small intestine threatening to fall out of her. Bleeding from numerous minor cuts. Huge piece of shrapnel in her gut.

"Everybody... everybody... check... in."

[ngm_miscellaneous]

"WHAT THE HELL IS SHE STANDING FOR? SHE'LL MAKE HER WOUNDS WORSE!" Mrs. MacNeilly was shouting due to a combination of panic and temporary deafness. Her ears were still ringing from that explosion. She tried to do an assessment, but the impaled girl had gotten to her feet, two of them looked awake, and the one by the tree wasn't moving.

[talk_to_you]

Okay, now? Now Doug was running towards the field, cursing in various languages as he did so.

[demonbearslayer]

Dani sprinted past Mrs MacNeilly muttering "She has a healing factor..." under her breath. She stopped, and knelt in front of Brianna. There was no death aura around the girl - always a good sign! But, from the position she was lying in it was impossible to tell if anything was broken.

[marvel_boy]

The whites of Topher's eyes took on an eerie bruised purple-blue glow. He looked up at Doug as sweat beaded on his forehead. The emotions, the negativity, it was all way too much. Below him, the ground started to crumble just a little bit as he tried to expel brute force. "Need...Rachel..." he managed to say, his voice echoing strangely.

[kinetic_assault]

Brianna is breathing but still unmoving. Even if she were awake, she'd be in a great deal of pain.

[seismic_shockwave]

When Kayla finally got up, she remained rooted to the spot, arms and legs shaky as she couldn't help but see the carnage around her.

She took a shallow breath that did nothing to relieve the tension, the horror of what she'd done. Kayla's skin was completely pale, it would have been clammy to the touch.

She started to walk, shakily, like a traumatized veteran, eyes fixing into a thousand yard stare as she half-walked, half-stumbled towards the Mansion.

[wild_child]

"Lady, ya mind not screamin'?" Rose growled. She looked own at the shrapnel in her stomach. Great. Sharp around the edges too, and her without her gloves. This was gonna suck too.

She grabbed it, slicing her palms open in the process and yanked it from her belly with a grunt and more than a little blood, probably cutting her intestines in the process.

Her eyes instantly fell on Brianna. "Cajun...?" she said. "She okay...?"