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

[marvel_boy]

Topher was outside, behind the mansion, running training exercises. It was, he realized, something very much like what his Uncle Scott had probably done back when it had been the original five X-Men.

But please, let me not grow up into being the tight-ass he is, Topher considered. Although, let me keep my tight ass.

It was a simple enough exercise, today. Holograms of human-sized, human-disguised sentinels fighting the X-Men, while the X-Men had to keep civilians - and themselves - safe.

Mostly, it's just combat training and teamwork training, going over things they've already learned at the hands of their teachers.

[wild_child]

"We gettin' this show on th' road or what, Summers?" Rose growled, but clearly teasing.

[seismic_shockwave]

Kayla on the other hand looked about as gleeful as she was on the inside. Beating up things in the Danger Room was awesome, like the best sort of video game. And the idea that she was learning the vital skills of a superhero? Even better. That being said, there was a serious element to it all and she didn't take it too lightly.

Kayla worked hard, she played hard. Hell, she even slept hard.

"I second that sentiment, Chief." Which is what she was calling him, because he was running this particular simulation.

[marvel_boy]

"Yeah, sorry," Topher said, furrowing his brow. "I just..." He looked up towards the mansion. "I keep on getting these little hits of negativity emanating from the school. It's, for once, not Brooke." He shook his head. "Never mind. Let's do some energy expending." He hadn't even finished his sentence before the program started.

[wild_child]

Rose dove into action. "Move it, folks! Before the Tin Woodsmen get the idea to start choppin'!"

[seismic_shockwave]

Kayla was a natural at the whole combat thing, actually. Beating things up with her superpowers came very easily to her. It was the teamwork stuff that was a little harder for her, not because she was antisocial but simply because it required putting limits on one's urge to simply smash shit. In real life, she'd probably be more circumspect, but this was a training exercise.

For now, though, she focused on trying to tell the Sentinels apart from the confused civilians. Using her powers to try and help people rather than just laying hurt on the bad guys. She was trying to learn how to moderate her shockwave powers, sending a shockwave strong enough to get someone out of the way of a falling lightpole without seriously harming them.

So far, so good.

[kinetic_assault]

Brianna remained silent as the exercise commenced, evaluating their enemies. Topher had explained everything ahead of time and now she was ready to start.

While Kayla worked on helping others, Brianna moved in tandem with Rose to form a defense in front of the civilians. She didn't have Kayla's super-strength or Rose's claws, but she did have something of her own to bring to the table.

Her eyes took on a fierce violet glow and she conjured her katana from the kinetic energy stored within her body.

She readied herself to deal with the first of the attackers to come at her.

[marvel_boy]

It was a funny sort of role reversal, Topher thought as he watched the girls spring into action. The original X-Men had numbered more in men than it had in women. The opposite was true for the current generation, but unlike then, there was no way that these girls could be underestimated.

These girls were strong, capable, efficient. There were kinks to work out, sure - Topher could tell that Kayla needed a little help on the teamwork end - but things could have been a whole lot worse.

He half-smiled to himself as he started to seperate the civilians from the Sentinels. It was a good hologram, he mused. He could feel pings of fear from the civilians, while the Sentinels had no real emotions to read.

Still, they had both Brianna and Rose as defenders. Topher moved to help Kayla.

[seismic_shockwave]

And then some goddamn Sentinel decided to get right into Kayla's business, like it was programmed to or some ridiculous thing. Her eyes narrowed at it slightly.

"Want a piece of this, robo-bitches? COME AND GET IT." She roared, or at least as much as her rather petite frame allowed her to do. She ripped off a manhole and hurled it at the Sentinel. As she expected, the robot batted it away fairly easily, but it gave her time to get up close.

Though her powers allowed to her to attack from range, her shockwaves tended to rapidly lose power. Delivered up close, though, any target didn't only have to worry about the damage from her fist itself but from the concussive blastwave that rippled out through the entire robot's mechanical body, wreaking havoc with sensitive systems. The Sentinel fell like rocks.

And then she was promptly blasted by another Sentinel and felt herself hurtling into a brick wall, hard enough to actually register as feeling unpleasant.

Right. Failed my perception check again. She thought as she peeled herself out of the wreckage of the wall and stood up. Somehow she doubted the next Sentinel would allow her to get up close so easily.

"Hey Chief." Kayla managed a wry smirk. "Wassat awesome trick where you throw someone at an enemy?"

[wild_child]

Rose dodged out of the way of the Sentinel, retreating back to where the team was gathering. Her claws were sharp, but nothing against steel hide like that.

"Fastball special," she said. "'s a good one."

[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.