Amanda, Logan - Wednesday afternoon
Nov. 22nd, 2006 06:13 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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xp_logsTraining - As arranged, Logan puts Amanda through her paces. It's educational, to say the least.
Logan tried to stay out of the brownstone that the Snow Valley folks called home - normally, he had no business traipsing through their collective living rooms. Still, this is where the Gym was, but today wasn't one of the fun sessions with Sarah. Nope. Today, he was evaluating a different member of the staff. He couldn't remember if their Gym had cameras or not, but he was prepared anyway - he'd brought a cheap video camera and enough tape to keep it happy for a few hours.
Amanda was already in the gym, taking the chance to get warmed up - with Logan putting her through her paces today, she'd need it. Normally she trained with Wanda, but she knew the value of switching training partners. And Logan had forgotten more about self defence than Amanda could ever hope to learn. As he entered the room, she nodded, smiling a little. "Afternoon, teach."
Logan nodded to Amanda by way of a reply and set up the camera to tape the center ring of the gym. Once the camera was ready, he turned to face the slender Brit. "OK, kid, here's the deal. I want you to show me what you've got. Don't hold back. Whatever you've got, I can take." he said with a very slight smile. "Once I get a feel for what you've got in your toolchest we can start working on maximizing your strengths while minimizing your weaknesses."
"Powers too?" Amanda asked, just to make sure. Not that she could really do much to Logan with George the Happy Glo-Ball, but you never knew.
"I did say whatever you had." he said. He disliked repeating himself. "You won't see the claws - I doubt I'll need them." he said with another slight smile as he slowly rotated his head around, producing a truly horrendous series of metallic crackling noises as his tendons snapped across his metal bones.
Amanda wrinkled her nose at the noise and nodded, swallowing a little nervously. She'd prefer no claws, personally - magic and metal didn't mix and she doubted she could shield against them. "All right then," she said, and without warning launched herself at him, knowing she'd only get the one chance and hoping she'd get the chance to use her shielding spell at least once.
Logan sidestepped but didn't counterattack - she'd left herself open for it, but he wanted to get a feel for what she had, not how quickly he could beat her down. He circled her, lightly balanced on the balls of his feet, watching her warily. Just because she was a ninety-pound scrap of nothing didn't mean she might not have a few nasty little tricks up her sleeve.
Wanda would have taken the shot, and Amanda chided herself for leaving herself open. Guard up, she turned as he circled, trying to think of a way through his guard. She feinted, then launched a heavy Doc Marten boot in a direction nice girls didn't aim at.
Logan grinned, twisted his leg so that her Doc Marten hit him on the thigh, and then countered with his own booted foot going where gentlemen never struck - but he pulled it so that she'd get the idea, not so that he'd punt her uterus up around her ears. This was still information-gathering. To top it all off, he just grinned at her. "Good."
Thankfully the work she'd done with Wanda on dodging had helped - she avoided the return kick with a yelp, Logan's foot grazing her thigh and knocking her off-balance. She quickly got it back with some quick footwork, and decided to bring out the unexpected - clicking her fingers, she sent the werelight zooming around Logan's head, close enough to his eyes to blind him temporarially. She couldn't hurt him with her fists, but she could make a point if she got an opening.
Logan took the expedient route - he closed his eyes until his healing factor could undazzle his eyes and concentrated on his other senses. Mostly, in this case, his ears. He launched an attack at her - half-speed, nothing too serious. The classic right cross to the jaw, just to let her know he was still in the game.
The girl snapped her head back, Logan's heavy fist grazing her jaw slightly. "Shite," she muttered, rubbing at the place with the back of her hand before going for another kick, this time at his knee.
She was a chatty Kathy, which was working out to his benefit. He barely heard the kick coming in time to stop-hit it by stomping her attacking leg, but it was a close thing and _not_ how he would have liked to have handled things. Plus, that goddamned spotlight was still circling his head and driving his eyes nuts.
Ow, that one hurt. Hopping back a bit to give herself time to shake it off, Amanda winced and considered her next move. George was buying her some time, but Logan's enhanced hearing was compensating. All right then, time to stop messing about - clapping her hands smartly, she brought up her shield. The magic made a slight crackle but she felt safer already. Now to see if she could hit through it...
Logan grinned faintly as he heard her shielding spell go live. He was wondering when she was going to get around to popping it. He was curious about her field, and there was no time like the present to test it. He stood still for a moment, grinned in what he hoped was her direction, and waggled his hand in a "gimme" gesture straight out of the Matrix. Clearly Marie had been after him again to expand his pop culture repetoire.
She recognised the gesture from watching movies with Doug and grinned herself. 'All right, let's see what we can do...' George was wavering from the power drain of two spells at once, so she turned him off, aiming a fist right at Logan's nose as she did so as not to loose the advantage of his blindness. The shield flexed with her, enclosing her fist, and she raised her eyebrow. That was new.
Logan swayed away from the punch, but not fast enough to avoid taking most of her shot to his cheek. On the plus side, the glowy thing had disappeared and his eyes were beginning to clear. But now he knew exactly where she was, and as he moved he grabbed for her, looking to take this thing to ground.
Fuck! Buggery bollocks and fuck! came the panicked thought. Amanda sucked at any kind of grappling and she knew it - getting taken down to the ground was Very Bad. Squirming and wriggling and kicking, she tried to struggle free.
OK, it was becoming very obvious very fast that she knew _shit_ about groundfighting. Logan moved in for the submission, getting her arm into a simple triangle choke and waiting for her to tap out. Seems that her field moved the same way her body did, so applying tension in ways her body wasn't designed to go was going to work just fine on her. Good to know.
At the feel of the pressure on her throat, Amanda knew she was in deep trouble. Off, she had to get him off right now... The spell reacted without her consciously thinking about it, flexing outwards from her body and pushing Logan up and off. Using the leeway, Amanda scrambled backwards on her butt, trying to catch her breath and hoping she hadn't hurt him - she was still learning the limits of her magic.
Logan gracefully rolled to his feet and sketched her a miniature bow. "Very nice." he said with his small little grin. He appeared to be uninjured in any way whatsoever. "Let's see if you can do that again." And he took his own game up a notch, coming after Amanda more quickly, aiming still-half-power hooking kicks and stomps at her, trying to force her to get defensive, to do something to stop the onslaught of pain coming her way.
Fuck! Amanda knew what he was trying to do, but it still didn't stop the instinct to run screaming. Or the urge to duck - Wanda would have been proud, the way she ducked and dodged and dove away from Logan's strikes, some glancing off the shielding spell with a series of small zapping noises. The air started to smell slightly of ozone. Best defence is a half-brick in a sock, she reminded herself. No bricks or socks available, but she did have the spell - with a small grunt she shoved both hands out in front of her, focussing on pushing Logan away harder this time.
Logan ate the shove right in the gut, and his air hissed out from between his teeth as he rocked back on his heels, then went backwards. She had the same nasty habit that Jean and some of the others had - she was gesture-based. He'd have to run an experiment with her, see if she could still cast while handcuffed. Knowing Amanda, she'd get a kick out of it. He rolled to his feet, somewhat clumsily, and then grinned at her. "Interesting." he said. He switched up tactics on her - from the Rain of Pain down to the Crushing Sniper. He slid in with shuffling steps, took one hard shot at her, then backed immediately off to re-evaluate, move, and do it again.
She shielded against the first few strikes, but she was beginning to tire - there wasn't the brain-crushing pain and nosebleeds of her old overloads, most fatigue, a feeling of being worn down. A fist connected with her spell, bowing it inwards and she backed up, wishing she had some kind of weapon. Something long. Like the proverbial ten-foot pole. She blocked the next one, wincing again at the heavy feel of Logan's metal-laced bones - she wouldn't want to try that unshielded, she'd break her own arm.
He was starting to wear her down - her responses were slowing, and she looked and smelled tired. Time to bring this to a wrap. A couple more strikes, then he relaxed and backed up a few steps. "OK, that's enough for now." he said. "Take five."
Backing up just in case it was another test, Amanda dropped the shield and bent over, resting her hands on her legs. "Good session," she panted, looking up at him through wisps of hair that had escaped her ponytail. "So, how badly do I suck, to quote the kids?"
Logan just grinned at her. "You'll never be great, but I can probably show you enough to keep John Public from giving you a hard time." he said. "A lot depends on you."
"I want to learn," she said simply. "And you've got something to teach me. Whatever you think is best, I'll listen." She grinned then, wickedly. "Tho' I draw the line at that whole 'wax on, wax off' bollocks."
Logan barked out a laugh. "If you hear the word grasshopper and there's no insects in the room? Feel free to light the speaker on fire." he said with amusement. "And wanting to learn helps, but in order to be truly good at this you have to -want- to hurt people." he pointed out. "It's not a nice business."
Amanda thought back to the lab in Germany where they'd found Sarah, the meat computer in Russia, the heat of a burning warehouse on the docks and the cultists in Brazil. "It's not," she agreed, holding Logan's eyes steadily. "And while I don't want to hurt people, I know sometimes I have to, to do the job." And that was what it was about, doing the job. She squared her shoulders. "So, where do we start?"
Logan tried to stay out of the brownstone that the Snow Valley folks called home - normally, he had no business traipsing through their collective living rooms. Still, this is where the Gym was, but today wasn't one of the fun sessions with Sarah. Nope. Today, he was evaluating a different member of the staff. He couldn't remember if their Gym had cameras or not, but he was prepared anyway - he'd brought a cheap video camera and enough tape to keep it happy for a few hours.
Amanda was already in the gym, taking the chance to get warmed up - with Logan putting her through her paces today, she'd need it. Normally she trained with Wanda, but she knew the value of switching training partners. And Logan had forgotten more about self defence than Amanda could ever hope to learn. As he entered the room, she nodded, smiling a little. "Afternoon, teach."
Logan nodded to Amanda by way of a reply and set up the camera to tape the center ring of the gym. Once the camera was ready, he turned to face the slender Brit. "OK, kid, here's the deal. I want you to show me what you've got. Don't hold back. Whatever you've got, I can take." he said with a very slight smile. "Once I get a feel for what you've got in your toolchest we can start working on maximizing your strengths while minimizing your weaknesses."
"Powers too?" Amanda asked, just to make sure. Not that she could really do much to Logan with George the Happy Glo-Ball, but you never knew.
"I did say whatever you had." he said. He disliked repeating himself. "You won't see the claws - I doubt I'll need them." he said with another slight smile as he slowly rotated his head around, producing a truly horrendous series of metallic crackling noises as his tendons snapped across his metal bones.
Amanda wrinkled her nose at the noise and nodded, swallowing a little nervously. She'd prefer no claws, personally - magic and metal didn't mix and she doubted she could shield against them. "All right then," she said, and without warning launched herself at him, knowing she'd only get the one chance and hoping she'd get the chance to use her shielding spell at least once.
Logan sidestepped but didn't counterattack - she'd left herself open for it, but he wanted to get a feel for what she had, not how quickly he could beat her down. He circled her, lightly balanced on the balls of his feet, watching her warily. Just because she was a ninety-pound scrap of nothing didn't mean she might not have a few nasty little tricks up her sleeve.
Wanda would have taken the shot, and Amanda chided herself for leaving herself open. Guard up, she turned as he circled, trying to think of a way through his guard. She feinted, then launched a heavy Doc Marten boot in a direction nice girls didn't aim at.
Logan grinned, twisted his leg so that her Doc Marten hit him on the thigh, and then countered with his own booted foot going where gentlemen never struck - but he pulled it so that she'd get the idea, not so that he'd punt her uterus up around her ears. This was still information-gathering. To top it all off, he just grinned at her. "Good."
Thankfully the work she'd done with Wanda on dodging had helped - she avoided the return kick with a yelp, Logan's foot grazing her thigh and knocking her off-balance. She quickly got it back with some quick footwork, and decided to bring out the unexpected - clicking her fingers, she sent the werelight zooming around Logan's head, close enough to his eyes to blind him temporarially. She couldn't hurt him with her fists, but she could make a point if she got an opening.
Logan took the expedient route - he closed his eyes until his healing factor could undazzle his eyes and concentrated on his other senses. Mostly, in this case, his ears. He launched an attack at her - half-speed, nothing too serious. The classic right cross to the jaw, just to let her know he was still in the game.
The girl snapped her head back, Logan's heavy fist grazing her jaw slightly. "Shite," she muttered, rubbing at the place with the back of her hand before going for another kick, this time at his knee.
She was a chatty Kathy, which was working out to his benefit. He barely heard the kick coming in time to stop-hit it by stomping her attacking leg, but it was a close thing and _not_ how he would have liked to have handled things. Plus, that goddamned spotlight was still circling his head and driving his eyes nuts.
Ow, that one hurt. Hopping back a bit to give herself time to shake it off, Amanda winced and considered her next move. George was buying her some time, but Logan's enhanced hearing was compensating. All right then, time to stop messing about - clapping her hands smartly, she brought up her shield. The magic made a slight crackle but she felt safer already. Now to see if she could hit through it...
Logan grinned faintly as he heard her shielding spell go live. He was wondering when she was going to get around to popping it. He was curious about her field, and there was no time like the present to test it. He stood still for a moment, grinned in what he hoped was her direction, and waggled his hand in a "gimme" gesture straight out of the Matrix. Clearly Marie had been after him again to expand his pop culture repetoire.
She recognised the gesture from watching movies with Doug and grinned herself. 'All right, let's see what we can do...' George was wavering from the power drain of two spells at once, so she turned him off, aiming a fist right at Logan's nose as she did so as not to loose the advantage of his blindness. The shield flexed with her, enclosing her fist, and she raised her eyebrow. That was new.
Logan swayed away from the punch, but not fast enough to avoid taking most of her shot to his cheek. On the plus side, the glowy thing had disappeared and his eyes were beginning to clear. But now he knew exactly where she was, and as he moved he grabbed for her, looking to take this thing to ground.
Fuck! Buggery bollocks and fuck! came the panicked thought. Amanda sucked at any kind of grappling and she knew it - getting taken down to the ground was Very Bad. Squirming and wriggling and kicking, she tried to struggle free.
OK, it was becoming very obvious very fast that she knew _shit_ about groundfighting. Logan moved in for the submission, getting her arm into a simple triangle choke and waiting for her to tap out. Seems that her field moved the same way her body did, so applying tension in ways her body wasn't designed to go was going to work just fine on her. Good to know.
At the feel of the pressure on her throat, Amanda knew she was in deep trouble. Off, she had to get him off right now... The spell reacted without her consciously thinking about it, flexing outwards from her body and pushing Logan up and off. Using the leeway, Amanda scrambled backwards on her butt, trying to catch her breath and hoping she hadn't hurt him - she was still learning the limits of her magic.
Logan gracefully rolled to his feet and sketched her a miniature bow. "Very nice." he said with his small little grin. He appeared to be uninjured in any way whatsoever. "Let's see if you can do that again." And he took his own game up a notch, coming after Amanda more quickly, aiming still-half-power hooking kicks and stomps at her, trying to force her to get defensive, to do something to stop the onslaught of pain coming her way.
Fuck! Amanda knew what he was trying to do, but it still didn't stop the instinct to run screaming. Or the urge to duck - Wanda would have been proud, the way she ducked and dodged and dove away from Logan's strikes, some glancing off the shielding spell with a series of small zapping noises. The air started to smell slightly of ozone. Best defence is a half-brick in a sock, she reminded herself. No bricks or socks available, but she did have the spell - with a small grunt she shoved both hands out in front of her, focussing on pushing Logan away harder this time.
Logan ate the shove right in the gut, and his air hissed out from between his teeth as he rocked back on his heels, then went backwards. She had the same nasty habit that Jean and some of the others had - she was gesture-based. He'd have to run an experiment with her, see if she could still cast while handcuffed. Knowing Amanda, she'd get a kick out of it. He rolled to his feet, somewhat clumsily, and then grinned at her. "Interesting." he said. He switched up tactics on her - from the Rain of Pain down to the Crushing Sniper. He slid in with shuffling steps, took one hard shot at her, then backed immediately off to re-evaluate, move, and do it again.
She shielded against the first few strikes, but she was beginning to tire - there wasn't the brain-crushing pain and nosebleeds of her old overloads, most fatigue, a feeling of being worn down. A fist connected with her spell, bowing it inwards and she backed up, wishing she had some kind of weapon. Something long. Like the proverbial ten-foot pole. She blocked the next one, wincing again at the heavy feel of Logan's metal-laced bones - she wouldn't want to try that unshielded, she'd break her own arm.
He was starting to wear her down - her responses were slowing, and she looked and smelled tired. Time to bring this to a wrap. A couple more strikes, then he relaxed and backed up a few steps. "OK, that's enough for now." he said. "Take five."
Backing up just in case it was another test, Amanda dropped the shield and bent over, resting her hands on her legs. "Good session," she panted, looking up at him through wisps of hair that had escaped her ponytail. "So, how badly do I suck, to quote the kids?"
Logan just grinned at her. "You'll never be great, but I can probably show you enough to keep John Public from giving you a hard time." he said. "A lot depends on you."
"I want to learn," she said simply. "And you've got something to teach me. Whatever you think is best, I'll listen." She grinned then, wickedly. "Tho' I draw the line at that whole 'wax on, wax off' bollocks."
Logan barked out a laugh. "If you hear the word grasshopper and there's no insects in the room? Feel free to light the speaker on fire." he said with amusement. "And wanting to learn helps, but in order to be truly good at this you have to -want- to hurt people." he pointed out. "It's not a nice business."
Amanda thought back to the lab in Germany where they'd found Sarah, the meat computer in Russia, the heat of a burning warehouse on the docks and the cultists in Brazil. "It's not," she agreed, holding Logan's eyes steadily. "And while I don't want to hurt people, I know sometimes I have to, to do the job." And that was what it was about, doing the job. She squared her shoulders. "So, where do we start?"
