Laurie, Kyle and Jean: Powers training.

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Jean and Kyle help Laurie with some powers training.



Laurie was almost vibrating with excitement and she had to remind herself that being this excited was not going to help her when it came to training, what she needed most was control. She'd been changed into her grays for at least the last half hour and had spent her time pacing back and forth in front of the entrance to the Dangerroom, awaiting the appearance of Kyle and Dr Grey-Summers.

"Hello, Laurie," Jean called out as she stepped into the hall and spotted the girl waiting. That Laurie was early was completely unsurprising, and Jean couldn't help but smile. "Hope you've not been waiting long." She keyed the door code to unlock the main room, and then moved over to open the control room.

Kyle was only a minute behind Jean, and by comparison, hadn't bothered with his greys. If this worked like it was supposed to, he'd be okay, and if it didn't, well, the risk of barf was too high. He'd rather not have his uniform smell like anything other then him. He'd put on a pair of school-issued sweatpants and a plain white T-shirt. "I get donuts for this, right?" He said, grinning. "Or Pizza. That was always the deal Forge and I had. If I'm an experimental subject, I get fed." Despite the joking, he fidgeted nervously. Laurie needed someone to work with, and he was the best choice, but it didn't make it any easier to -be- an experimental subject, even if he was volunteering this time.

"I’ll even let you suggest weird toppings," Laurie replied with an answering grin, her own nerves no less heightened. She just hoped she could rein them in before the training session began or she was never going to be able to get a specific reaction like they'd discussed. She still wasn't sure she could do it without some sort of 'need', always before it had been a matter of do it or get eaten, or the equivalent.

Jean heard the two of them out in the hall, but she finished setting up the danger room then stepped out to join them. "Heya Kyle," she said with a smile. "The room's ready if you two are." She'd turned the room's medical sensors on, but transferred them to a display screen inside so she could keep a closer eye on things.

Laurie stepped forward, watching the door slide inwards as she did so. She would never admit it to Forge, lest he get a big head, but the level of technology down below was one of the cooler things about being a trainee.

"What are we actually doing today, Doctor?" she asked, peering in at the expanse beyond the door, which seemed to contain only one chair.

"Dude, there's ready, and well, there's ready." Kyle said, shaking his head. "I'm just sayin', if we can pick, I'd like to go with calm for today's whatever, because, uh, this is not totally inside my... “He frowned, scratching his head in thought. "Comfort zone thing. Whatever Doc Samson called it. I know I volunteered and all, but can we please go with 'calm'? I like calm."

"How about hunger?" Laurie asked, giving Kyle a concerned look. She didn't want him feeling like he had to do this, and the idea of her friend being afraid of her in any way was painful. Especially after what had happened at the end of their date. She hated this, even though she knew she had to train in order to learn. "That's a pretty benevolent emotion"

Opening the door to the danger room proper, Jean revealed that she'd set the secondary walls to encompass a space about the size of the rec room. "Before we even get to that," she said, "I want to get a reading on your range, and how fast it takes your powers to reach out to fill a space."

Laurie looked around curiously as she entered the room, noticing the circular space lined out directly in the centre of the room. She assumed that this was the place she was meant to stand for the first part of this training session and walked toward it quickly.

"Should I just start doing something then?" she asked, glancing back at Dr Grey-Summers.

"Yes, please," Jean said, moving to where she had a better view of the monitors. "Something you know well."

She nodded and then closed her eyes, trying to find her centre. Outside of an emergency it still took concentration and focus for her to use her power deliberately. She hadn't yet figured out why it was different in an emergency, except that maybe the urgency of the situation gave her added focus. She'd try and put Kyle to sleep, that was something she'd used often enough that it should work well.

Kyle had taken up a spot against one of the walls, sitting with his knees pulled up to his chest. Therapy and being "okay' with this or not, he was pretty nervous. He rested his arms on his knees and looked around, watching Laurie for a few seconds, then Jean, and then staring at his own bare feet. "This is weird." He said, mostly to himself. "I don't feel any different.." After a minute or so, his curiosity got the better of him, and he sniffed at the air, trying to figure out if Laurie was doing anything specific. "I don't smell..." he started to say, and then yawned, jerking his hands up to cover his mouth."

Jean had kept her face carefully neutral as she watched the monitors - the sensors had picked up trace elements in the air a few moments before Kyle's reaction, but not significantly faster. Laurie's pheromones certainly had a kick to them. "No, there wouldn't be a smell, for the most part. This sort of thing is responded to on an unconscious level."

Laurie opened her eyes and grinned at the yawn from Kyle. She resisted the urge to make a 'huzzah' gesture, as this was meant to be serious, but she thought about it anyhow. Closing her eyes again, she pushed, trying to make it stronger.

"Aw, I don't wanna sleep." Kyle said, fighting another yawn. "I just had a nap.." He leaned against the wall and stretched his legs out on the floor. "Seriously, dude, I don't wanna nap." He stretched his arms out, and then scratched behind one ear, mouth closed tightly and eyes screwed shut to fight the yawns that kept coming and just would not stop.

"That's good," Jean said, smiling faintly at Laurie's grin. "You don't want to knock him out, and I want to get some readings on how long it takes it to disperse."

Laurie nodded; trying to concentrate on her own breathing, separating that sound from the sound of Kyle's breathing only a few meters from her. Turning her power off had always been more of a struggle then turning it on, or simply letting it do its thing. It was almost as if nature had intended that it always be on, an evolution that she hadn't yet found an explanation for. Was it communicative? Animals seemed to understand her moods quite readily.

As an evolution of her father's abilities it made some sense, a move beyond emotional control to something more fundamental. She preferred to think of it in other terms then control however, that way lay an uncomfortableness that she wasn't yet ready to deal with.

For all that Laurie tried to shut her power off, it's effect had pretty much taken a hold of Kyle, and he found himself thinking that leaning against the wall was a lot more comfortable then it had seemed a few minutes before. He yawned again, and jerked himself awake as he felt his head nod. "No. Sleeps..." He mumbled in a slightly cranky tone of voice.

Well, their volunteer passing out would put a crimp on the training session. Jean spoke up, "Kyle, your choice, sleep or Laurie can try for 'awake'." One of the things they'd discussed while planning this was that Kyle needed to have as much control over the process as he could.

Kyle tried to shake himself to alertness, struggling against the urge to just lie down and have the nap that he didn't really want or need. "If sleep is making me this tired, don't wanna know what awake is gonna do." He stuck on hand under his outstretched leg, claws up. "Should see if she can turn it off. Or how long that takes. It's useful 'n stuff."

Laurie nodded, focusing her will down to a pinpoint, concentrating only on turning her power off and trying to completely tune out the room, Kyle and Jean. 'Come on, you can do this.' she thought to herself.

Poking his claws into his leg kept him from nodding off. Every time he relaxed, his leg would drop onto his claws, and Kyle would startle himself back awake. Gradually, the time between nods grew longer and longer until he simply felt sluggish instead of having to fight an urge to curl up in a ball, put his arms over his face and snore away the afternoon. He sat up, shaking his head to try to clear some fog. "Don't feel like I'm gonna go right to sleep right here anymore...” He said, once the leaden feeling in his arms and legs had lessened.

Jean watched the sensor readings drop off as, once Laurie switched off her power, the room's air conditioner cleared the room. The saturation level dropped below the point where Kyle had first responded - it would take a little longer yet for his system to clear the remaining pheromones, although with his healing factor probably not as long as it would take most. "At some point I think we're going to have to try and find a way to do some tests outside - both to get some extra data, and for practice for you, Laurie. And I think, when we're entirely done, I want to do a test simulating a closed system. I'll shut off the scrubbers, and if you can saturate the room to about the same point when Kyle started to react, I'll have the sensors continue to monitor if and when the pheromones degrade." A very valuable piece of information if they ever, God forbid, had to deal with another space mission.