xp_logs | The Perfect Nanny

Once the trainees, Bobby and Jubilee arrive, they very quickly engage Peter. It's obvious he's not all there, in the head, and Shiro, Terry and Paige take him down as gently as anyone can take down a super-strong emotionally-damaged teenager.

Shiro was almost surprised that the house wasn't made out of candy. Or a giant shoe. With all the children reported to be in there, he'd expected something of a fairy tale to keep them all inside. But it was just a normal house. Small, isolated, but otherwise nondescript. Almost disappointing in a way.

The team had been split in three: one to distract the crazy old coot with the stinky gas, one to rescue the hostages, and then Paige, Terry, and Shiro to distract the big guy who probably required prosthetic testicles after Clarice got to him. Keep the nuts busy while the kids could be saved. Good plan.

"He wears armor," Shiro reminded his teammates as they crept around the house to find a good entrance point, "but he is soft underneath. Avoid getting hit and aim for the flesh, ne?"

"Like a bug," Terry said, trying hard to sound cool and grown up and not at all like the youngest one on the mission. The ball of nerves in the pit of her stomach were making her just a bit queasy. She controlled her breathing carefully to combat it. "Just got to crack the shell first. Do we have a plan over and above hit fast, hit often, don't get hit?"

The moment that Mother had detected people breaking onto their yard, she'd sent Peter outside in his armor to go deal with them. She hadn't expected there to be nine of them. Neither had Peter, but he was feeling just a little irate at his mother after the scolding she'd given him about wearing all of his protective gear.

He was wearing it this time, despite being cranky about it. It still itched, it still didn't fit right, and it still made him feel -funny-. But better that then the pain that had made him cry.

He lurked, believing himself to be well hidden, behind the van, and waited. One of them was the man with the fire powers from the park, and Peter knew that he had to be dealt with first. Fire was bad, you weren't supposed to play with it at all. He still had scars from when he'd tried to light the grill himself the once.

"No, that is more or less it," Shiro said to Terry at Paige's nod. He heard some crinkling noises from his left and looked around. "Terry?" She was the one with super-hearing, after all.

"Just one, behind the van. Walking." She considered the distances and the size of the auto. "I can knock the van back into him, probably." She looked at Paige who was the most Scott-like and therefore as far as Terry was concerned in charge. "Then you two can go in after him?"

Peter stayed ducked down behind the van. Why were they just -talking-? Mother had said they would come in and try to beat him up and then try to come hurt her and the babies, and they weren't doing that at all. He was confused, and just a little upset. He shook his head, frowning. Maybe he could make them mad..

Throwing the van wasn't allowed. But he could throw rocks. There really weren't any big enough to do anything with though - although, Peter thought, there were the cinderblocks. And those were easy to throw. So he did, flinging two of the set of four next to the van over it's roof.

Shiro bit his lip. "You can focus enough to affect only one area and no . . . Duck!" Blasting the cinderblocks out of their air, Shiro growled and eneveloped his fists in golden fire, a sign that he was jonesing to hurt something. "Do it." No more time to plan. Time to act.

Without wasting the breath to respond, Terry turned to the van and screamed. For Paige and Shiro it was merely loud, just as any teenage girl screaming would have been. But the side of the van dented like it had been hit with a freight train and it flew backward, catching the big child-man lurking behind it and flinging him with the same force.

That had -hurt-. Peter tried to stand up, grabbing at the ground and pushing the van off him with his back. Not only were they bad, but they -screamed-. That wasn't allowed. And they broke the van. Mother was going to be furious. The van cost a lot of money, and now they were going to have to get another one and fix it so Mother could drive it.

"You are SO BAD!" He yelled, pushing the van awkwardly off him and crawling out from under it. Oh, and they'd broken his helmet too. Angry, he pulled the helmet off and threw it at the red-haired screamer. "Breaking people's stuff is not good!"

"Because kidnapping children and crippling their parents is," Shiro replied as he, Paige, and Terry took a few steps forward, eyeing him cautiously and maintaining defensive postures. "Listen, kid, we have no interest in harming you." Much. "Let us return the children to their families and no one gets hurt." Much.

Another short, well-directed scream sent the helmet flying. "Aye and yeh threw things at us first. Didn't anyone tell yeh that yeh shouldn't throw rocks?" Terry added, nerves making her accent slip and power vibrating through every word. She ranged off to the side. She was too small to engage the boy directly but enough of her voice hitting him and he'd start to feel off balance. The inner ear was so fragile.

"Mother says you're all -bad-" Peter yelled, holding his ears. They hurt so much and he kind of wanted to throw up. He tucked his chin, like the football players he'd seen on TV a few times and ran towards the group. He didn't care which one he ran into. If he could hit one, maybe they'd make the girl stop screaming.

Shiro took to the air as the girls dodged to the sides. "Your mother is an idiot," said Shiro, tired of even pretending to play nice. He launched a fireball at the kid, grimacing as the explosion seemed to have no effect on him. He (or his damn armor) was tougher than he looked.

Peter stopped still, staring for a moment. He could -fly-. The fireball throwing one could fly. He couldn't fly. He was strong, and fast and tough, but he couldn't fly. His attention was brought back to the fight by the fireball in his face making him cough and his eyes water. "And you shouldn't play with -fire- either!" He scolded loudly. How was he supposed to deal with someone who could fly? Mother was going to be so disappointed.

"You really are not in the position to tell anyone what they can and cannot do," Shiro retorted, strengthening his shield and coming in fast. This guy was big and strong but dumb. Real dumb. He would likely react violently to a human torch zooming in on him, but Shiro would pull out, distracting him to give Paige and Terry time to lay it on.

Terry paused to catch her breath as Paige followed up on Shiro's attack. They weren't really having any effect with the blunt force but as close as he was to Paige, Terry couldn't really scream anymore without catching her teammate as well. "Your mother hurts children!" she shouted instead, hoping to distract him.

"She has done nothing but harm," Shiro followed, dodging a wild punch and countering with a flaming roundhouse. "Split up families, frighten children . . . She is no good."

Peter flailed wildly at Shiro, throwing his arms around and shoving Shiro in chest trying to push him away. They were calling his mother names. That wasn't right. And playing with fire, and yelling too loud. All the windows were going to be broken in the house if he didn't make them stop.

Shiro swore as he was violently thrown away, though he managed to cach himself only a few feet away. He flew up again, tossed another couple of fireballs, and then with a knowing nod to Paige, shouted at Terry: "Get him!"

Terry caught a signal from Paige and drew a breath, refocusing. At the moment, Shiro was too close for her to attack the boy directly. So, with a quick thought for how unhappy Mr. Marko would be if she tried this at home, Terry angled her next scream with perfect precision at the ground just behind the combatants, vibrations shaking the soil and, thanks to the wet spring, liquefying it.

Peter charged, trying to get towards the screaming girl, or the one made of metal. But the muddy ground was slippery, and sucked at his heavy boots. He windmilled his arms wildly, trying to regain his balance but it did no good. His feet came out from under him and he sprawled, landing messily and heavily face-first into the wet mud.

Shiro landed in front of Peter and kneeled. The kid wasn't out yet, but he obviously wasn't competent enough to stand much more. "I apologize," he said sincerely, grabbing Peter's head by the hair with one hand and punching him with as much force as he could with the other. He winced as the blow connected. He wasn't expecting the kid to be so hard.

But he was out, so mission complete.

Jubilee and Bobby take on Francine. You'd think an old woman would be easy to deal with, but she has a tank. And a flamethrower? Where'd she get a flamethrower? Wal-Mart. It used to be a gas-powered weed-wacker.

How many of these perverted leather-clad teenagers were there? Francine frantically motored her chair around the corner of the house. If she could get to the shed, she could get to the flamethrower.

Not that it would do any good against the fireball throwing asian one. He was a menace. And sullen-looking to boot. The boy obviously hadn't been raised with a firm hand on his bottom.

She turned the corner, almost unbalancing the chair in her speed, only to see two more of the teens. More leather, more sullen looks. Who had -raised- these monsters?

"Lady, you seriously picked the wrong kids to try and kidnap." Jubilee drawled, a brief set of sparks arcing across her fingertips as she held them loose at her sides. "Now, are we gonna do this the easy way, or the hard way?"

"I got your back, Jubes," Bobby murmured softly, taking a deep breath. "You do the honors." A soft crackling noise came from his hands as he flexed his fingers, drifts of frost and slivers of ice sifting off of them.

"Your parents should be ashamed of you both." Francine said, voice haughty. "My son would never be seen in those.. .. outfits." She screwed up her face in disgust and hit the control stick of her chair hard, turning at a sharp angle and chewing up the lawn, flinging clumps of grassy sod back at Bobby and Jubilee.

"Dude, is this woman for real?" Jubilee asked Bobby, as she ducked out of the way of the sod. "I'll see if I can blind Ms Bizarro world Mary Poppins here, see if you can slow down her wheelchair. I figure we just need to keep her occupied till the others get here and then we can take her into custody."

Suiting words to actions, Jubilee moved closer, she'd need to get in front of Nanny in order to get a good shot. She only wanted to blind the old bat, not hurt her.

"Watch your step, it's gonna get slick," Bobby warned Jubilee as she moved in for a better position. He concentrated on the ground directly in front of the strange contraption, forming a smooth ice patch. "Let's see if those treads are all-terrain," he muttered under his breath.

They weren't, not at first, and Francine's chair went skidding dangerously fast towards the thick overgrown bushes surrounding the yard. It took her too long, she felt, to remember how to key in the code to get the treads to slow down and retract, so that the textured underside was exposed. But now she was closer to the shed. The brats had done her a -favor-.

Damn, that had not worked out the way Jubilee had expected it would. Looks like the old bat had a few tricks up her sleeve afterall, and this would be so much easier if Jubilee didn't have to worry about hurting the woman.

Jubilee wouldn't be able to get into position to blind her before the old woman reached the shed, and whatever it was that she was looking for in there. In view of that, Jubilee decided a little demonstration was in order. Scaring her into stopping was a good a tactic as any other.

Forming large balls of plasma in her hands, Jubilee sent a stream of sparks toward the shed.

"Shit," Bobby cursed under his breath, clouds of frozen vapor swirling around his hands as he cautiously followed, trying to get close enough that he could try to freeze the treads themselves--without encasing the whole damn thing in a block of ice, that is.

They were going to blow up her -shed-! She couldn't have that. Francine smacked a button on the control of her chair and accelerated forward faster than it appeared she could have, with the accompanying rumble and stink of a gas-powered engine.

A remote control on the arm of her chair opened the shed door automatically, and she drove towards it, careening around the flying plasmoids.

Jubilee cut off her sparks when she saw the old girl make it to the shed, blinking at the rate of speed she'd suddenly put on. She retreated till she was standing beside Bobby, so she could talk without being overheard. "Bobby, wait till she's in and then freeze the doors shut. If she wants in that shed so badly, she can stay in there."

"Yeah," Bobby replied tersely, taking a few steps closer to the building. The moment the motorized contraption disappeared through the door, he raised his hands and started forming a wall of ice in front of it, sealing the crazy bitch inside.

He turned to Jubilee and grinned. "That should hold her for a while," he commented smugly. "Unless she's got explosives or something in there."

Francine smirked, despite the violent shivers from the cold shaking her back and arms. They'd sealed her in the shed, but that was right where she'd wanted to be. And here she'd almost thought that building the flamethrower was excessive and a luxury and a waste of time. It wasn't big, it wouldn't spit fire for long, but she didn't need that much time.

She hooked the hose to the spare tank for her chair and rested the thrower on the arm of her wheelchair. "Born and bred in the briar patch. I was born and bred in the briar patch!" She sang out, as she flamed the thick ice covering the open door.

"Well, fuck a duck." Jubilee growled, noting the melting happening with the ice. "Bobster, dude. Now would be a great time for a brilliant idea. What the hell are we gonna do without hurting the old bat?"

The flamethrower was harder to control then she thought. But it did what she wanted. Melted the ice, and gave her clear passage out of the shed. She would just have Peter rebuild the shed later. It needed tidying anyway. She pushed forward, knocking the last of the melting ice out of the way and turned, aiming the flamethrower towards Jubilee. "You have a foul mouth, miss missy."

Bobby stepped forward almost lazily, a 'bitch, please' expression on his face. "Get real, lady. I've dealt with bigger flamers than you, he drawled, ice forming on the flamethrower already, as well as on the hose connecting it to the tank.

This was more like it, Jubilee thought as she stepped forward as well, powers at the ready in case the old bint tried anything sneaky. "She's really not very bright, is she? You'd think she'd have realised a flame thrower wasn't going to do much except annoy the crap out of us. Now, how about you just give yourself up, Grandma and we can cut this short, hmm?"

Francine pulled the level-like trigger on the flamethrower, and smiled in what she considered a kindly manner. "I'm sorry dear, you're just going to have to be punished." The flamethrower kicked back, and spat out a jet of flame.

For all of half a second before it spluttered out and produced exactly nothing.

"HA," Bobby couldn't resist saying, his eyes scanning the area for a way to stop her now that she was disarmed. He looked at the ground around her chair-thing, grinning as he noticed the puddle of mud the melted ice had created--mud which the tank treads had settled in quite nicely. "Freeze," he drawled, flash-freezing the water in the mud, cementing the treads quite thoroughly in place.

Jubilee snickered, and then looked at their surroundings. Now that the woman bat was effectively contained, she should check that there weren't any other goons lying in wait about the place. "Bobby, can you stay here and look after her? I'm goin' to go do a little scouting."

"Yeah, sure. She's not goin' anywhere," Bobby answered, showing off now by making little curls of ice rise up around the treads, like frozen waves of water splashing up around them.

Jubilee was gone for a long while, making a thorough search of the surrounds. She wanted to make sure that there was no one that could come along and release Nanny after they'd gone back to the others. Finally, she walked back to where Bobby was standing.

"Well, no one in the immediate vacinity, so I think we're safe to leave her here for a bit. We should go back and see if the others need any help." Jubilee said.

The remaining four sneak into Francine's house, and find the children. A little nerves, a little electronic B&E, a little sneaking, some fat sheep and Skittles.

Marie-Ange pulled at the collar of her leathers and tried to develop Kitty's powers and merge into the wall. They were pressed up against the outer wall of the big house, waiting for the signals from Bobby and Paige that both of the possible hostiles were being dealt with, so that they could have uninteruppted access to the house and the children that were likely there.

Her comm had chirped once, and waiting for that second chirp was nerve-wracking.

The second chirp sounded a bare moment after the first, but it felt like they'd been waiting for hours; Jamie let out a soft breath he hadn't quite realized he was holding, and nodded to Doug. "Looks like we're on."

Doug looked up from where he'd been fidgeting in his leathers, leathers he'd honestly never thought he'd be wearing in the field. "Hm?" he asked, before realizing what the signals were. "One order of electronic B&E, coming up," he quipped, trying to cover his nervousness and desire to get everything right. He moved to the electronic lock and began coaxing it to divulge its secrets and open obediently.

Marie-Ange just kept trying not to fidget, or play with the ends of her braids, or the decks of cards in the pouch on her belt. This was nerve-wracking. But God only knew what this woman had -inside- the house, besides children. She'd built that tank herself, she could have any number of mechanical defences.

But waiting for Doug to disable the alarms felt like it was taking years. And it didn't help to watch him peer at the insides of the keypad and poke at it with a small ... device. She wasn't even sure what that thing -was-.

Doug's tongue stuck out of the side of his mouth in concentration as he prodded at the lock. It was definitely well put together. Complex in the extreme. The outer layer of wires was a decoy. The trick was to...ah. With a pleased-sounding 'beep', the locked clicked and the door cracked open. "Ta-da!" Doug exclaimed quietly, bowing. "I'll be here all week, tip your hackers well."

Clarice was having to physically remind herself to stop fidgeting. There could be motion detectors (although it was unlikely since Doug was doing his voodoo and Marie Ange was fidgeting too) or any number of bad things waiting to catch her off guard, but she was wearing leathers. Real, honest-to-goodness X-Men (trainee) leathers. That they were Jubilee's old training uniform didn't really dampen Clarice's excitement. This was a dream come true early and she was going to bask in every hot, nervous, scary moment of it.

The front room of the house looked surprisingly normal, if cluttered. Empty playpens and high chairs were everywhere, but there was nothing that looked even remotely harmful. Sending in a image - very much not a Blinky, because Marie-Ange thought that was probably inappropiate - but a simple hand-drawn sheep was sensible - if there was something detecting motion, it would find the image first.

When nothing attacked, smushed, lasered, dissolved or otherwise harmed it, she nodded and released the image herself. "I think it is clear. At least to the front room.."

Beyond that, there were.... baby gates? Marie-Ange wrinkled her nose and tried not to laugh. This was absurd.

Jamie gave a low whistle as he looked around the room. "And I thought my parents got overzealous about impact-proofing the farmhouse after I manifested. This lady? Whole new meaning to 'two bananas short of a fruit basket.' Think we should check the . . . damn, those are baby gates . . . for booby traps, or just, y'know, step over them?"

"I vote neither," Clarice remarked, teleporting a section of baby gate to one side of the room and then walking through it. "This is....this cannot be serious. I mean, babygates? Do they think they'll trip us and we'll go away?"

"No, they're probably to keep the children safe," Jamie replied. "She's crazy, not stupid, remember? Don't get cocky, we aren't exactly oversupplied with trained backup here."

He looked around the room, then over to Marie-Ange and Doug. "What do you two think? I doubt she's got anything pressure-sensitive, between the wheelchair and the big guy, but I'm betting security cams at least, maybe some infrared tripwires where the kids aren't allowed to be. Lead with the sheep and try to find the bedrooms, or wherever else she's keeping them?"

Doug tried very hard to restrain himself from making 'sheep bomb' jokes. This was a mission, and missions were serious things. "Sounds like a plan to me," Doug replied, making shooing motions. "Run free, little sheep! Run free!"

Okay, maybe missions didn't have to be -completely- humorless.

Marie-Ange tried not to giggle, because that was just asking for trouble. But she couldn't help but smile and shake her head. Let it not be said that Doug didn't try to lessen the tension. A small group of sheep, not nearly a herd, appeared at her feet, and waddled forward to cross into the hallway and lead the way ahead of them.

The hallway was clear, and the two rooms after it were empty, save for cribs and scattered baby supplies. Diapers, tiny shoes and toys. "This woman is entirely too obsessed with children for her own good..." Marie-Ange said quietly.

The hallway ended in a pair of doors, both of which were blocked by the now annoyingly constant baby gates. With the gates removed, both doors were - unsurprisingly - locked from the side that the quartet was on. "I suppose she did not expect us to get this far?" Marie-Ange said.

After the doors were cautiously opened, they could hear squalling and fussing, and tiny voices urging that they 'Be QUIET or someone will hear.."

"Doesn't look like it," Jamie murmured back. "Let's see if we can get a little cooperation before we bust the door open on them. It's okay," he continued in a louder voice, calling through the door. "We're not here to hurt anyone--we just want to make sure you're all safe. Could you open the door, please?"

"We're not 'lowed!"

"Shut up, stupid!"

"She'll get MAD"

"I don't care!"

The children's voices got louder, until one of the doors rattled and shook and then made a click. "We can't get the other one! The babies are in the basement!" Piped a voice, right before the left door opened a crack.

"That's okay, you're doing great," Jamie said, smiling at the eyes barely visible through the doorway. "I'm Jamie, and my friends are Doug, Angie, and Clarice, and we're here to get you guys home to your moms and dads. Think maybe one of you could show us where the basement is? I bet the babies are getting a little scared all alone down there."

The door cracked open more, and three small children, none of them older than four poked their heads out. "We're goin' home? Nanny said our mommies and daddies were sick and bad..." They shuffled around, and then spilled out the door, pajama-clad feet slipping on the wooden floor.

"I wanna go HOME."

"I miss my mom..."

"I miss my -goldfish-"

"The basement's there..." The largest of the trio pointed at the second door. "The lock doesn't work. Peter -broke- it. Shhh. It's a secret."

Sure enough, the door caught, but swung open after a hard yank.

"Hi," Clarice knelt down so that she was eye-level with one of the kids, this one had pale white hair with almost a blue tinge to it, "I'm Clarice. You like skittles?" she pulled a bag from her pocket and shook a couple out onto her palm.

"Not spose'ta have candy," he muttered, eyes glued to her hand.

"This one is lemon flavored and that one is strawberry," Clarice pointed at the respective skittles, "So it's kinda fruity."

Hesitantly, he took one and shoved it in his mouth just in case she changed her mind.

Smiling, Clarice popped the other skittle in her mouth, "Wanna take me to the basement?" she asked, offering to hold his hand. The babies needed to get out faster than these older kids, she figured, but she still looked to the real trainees for reassurance. Just because she was wearing trainee leathers did not mean she was a trainee and she was determined to remember that.

Doug smiled reassuringly at the other children and offered his hand to one of them. "Want a piggyback ride?" he asked, his smile turning to a grin. After a hesitant nod, Doug hoisted the child onto his back. "Giddyup!" he said, humming the theme from Bonanza.

Marie-Ange nodded back at Clarice, and followed her down to the basement. "We should meet back here, to try to get as many children to the school via Clarice's teleportation?" She looked down the basement stairs and grimaced. Babies. Ick. "Can you teleport this many?"

Clarice paused to consider, "They're little. Shouldn't be too bad," like porting that damn medicine ball over and over again in practices.

"Then let's head to the basement!" Doug said cheerfully. Looking over his shoulder at the child riding piggyback, he grinned. "Lead on, little buddy!"

"Okay then," Jamie said. "The rest of you guys follow Angie and me, and we'll get you back home."

Francine would've almost gotten away, if not for those meddling kids! And their little expanding staff that was a gift from the Asgardian dwarves too. Okay, that was funnier in my head.

Once the horrible pervert children had left, Francine shook her head and laughed ruefully. Peter would stop them. Though, maybe not. He'd been rebellious lately, ignoring her about the protective gear and getting hurt. Her poor baby, he'd been so sore, and hadn't even let her get him ice for it.

She pushed the level control on her chair forward until the hybred engine underneath whined loudly, but under the whine, she could hear the clink-clink-clink of the treads breaking the ice. Sooner or later, she'd be free, and by her calculations, sooner -than- later. Get free, collect Peter and get away. She could deal with the pervert children later.

"I think I busted my knuckles," Shiro muttered as he rounded the side of the house to meet Jubilee and Bobby. He flexed his fingers, wincing at the almost emphatic cracking sounds. "Our target is neutralized. Yours?"

"Her assets were frozen by Bobby here." Jubilee replied, grinning. "She wasn't terribly happy about it but she's contained."

"I bet. And the children a . . ." Shiro's concern about the hostages was forgotten at the sound of ice cracking and a motor running. "Oh, no." Without hesitation, he ran around the side of the house to where Bobby and Jubilee had come from. And swore. Loudly.

Over by the driveway, Jamie looked up from a particularly stubborn five-year-old just as the wheelchair peeled around a corner and accelerated toward the road. He duped and sprinted after it, thanking Alison's fitness regimen every step as he gained ground, gained ground, and finally drew level . . .

"Hi," he said cheerfully. "Ma'am, I'm gonna have to ask you to pull over, I'm afraid this is a no-lunatics zone and you're clearly in violation." Even before the words were out of his mouth, he had his staff telescoped, and he jammed the dwarf-forged steel into the chair's tank tread as hard as he could.

Shiro was right behind him. He'd taken to the air the moment he saw the empty, melting pool of ice. He grinned viciously at the sight of Jamie intercepting her and pulled forward to land in front of her. "Bitch, please," he drawled derisively. Drawing in the sun's rays, he focused his solar flare to release a hot, concentrated beam that melted the other tread.

The chair's engine screamed and then died with a sick -crack- as it overheated, sending a plume of smoke out from it's underside. Francine shut her eyes, and let out a sigh. This was going to make -everything- so much harder. ~Meddling pervert teenagers...~ She thought to herself.