Angel and Garrison || Danger Room Session

[x-firestar.livejournal.com]

Angel and Garrison decide to do a Danger Room run. Scott's name is cursed a few times in the process.



Angel stood on the edge of the Danger Room, stretching. She'd be lying if she said the Danger Room was her favorite place in the world, but that didn't mean she didn't want to do well. "Eugh.'" She made a noise as her back muscles cracked audibly. "That's gotta be one of the worse sounds in the world. Besides nails on a chalkboard."

"It doesn't sound a little like you're crushing a bag of popcorn with your bare hands." Kane appeared behind her, He was dressed in the grey exercise suit that they used instead of leathers while training. With a swipe in the air, he brought up the holographic interface and typed in a few orders. "Did you have a scenario in mind?"

"Mmm, popcorn." Angel sighed. Now she was hungry. No, focus. "Um...nothing specific coming to mind, but something with a lot of movement. Obstacles and stuff." She jogged in place to make a show of the energy she had. She was rather wound up today.

"Have you been back into the Red Bull again?" Garrison took a minute to pull up the program that they'd jokingly called the 'Cuisinart'; a moving set of ground and mid-air obstacles on a multi-level track. It was dangerous to navigate and constantly moving and changing, requiring strategy as much as agility to get through.

"It was on sale," Angel said without shame. "I picked up a pack of cranberry by accident, didn't think I'd like that but it's actually really good. Ahem. Anyways." She jogged in a place a bit more, grinning when she saw the program Garrison had brought up. "Yeah, that one's good. Let's do that one."

"OK. Last time, you put up just under eight minutes. Let's up things a bit and see if we can do it in seven." He continued to input information. "Reminder, we're running it together, so some of the obstacles in my way you need to clear and vice versa."

"Sounds good to me." Angel nodded, putting on a serious face. Time to get with it. "It's not a race, we clear it together. Got it." She rubbed her hands together.

"Alright. Timer is set. The program will be active in three, two... one... now!"

Angel stood straight, at the ready, going as soon as Kane called. Right off a large wall sprang out of the ground, cutting her off before she'd gone too far. If she'd been moving a little bit faster she would have hit it.

Kane louped along behind her, moving quickly along the ground. The first traps were easy; hurdles coming up out of no where, which he cleared. There were so many moving parts it was easy to get distracted, so Garrison focused on his route, leaping on to a platform emerging from the ground.

Angel took to the air, swooping dodging around the hurdles that popped out of the ground, but keeping an eye forward as well. Watch everything, know what's going on right in front of you and what's going on ahead.

She had half a second to react when a hurdle dropped down from the ceiling, and she dodged nimbly.

As he pulled forward, the platform accelerated, and Kane had to throw himself forward to avoid being flung from the course. He rolled as he landed and was up running. Ahead, a massive net drew across the aerial space, screening off Angel. From below, Kane spotted the activators and turned up the speed, getting ahead of her just in time to hammer at them and cause the net to retract.

Angel had already been turning up the heat to burn through the net (though she wasn't sure if she'd actually be able to) when it retracted. She gave Kane a quick salute in thanks before lowering herself back to the ground, dodging the projectiles that flew out of the small panels that had opened up in the walls. She came down to hover just above the floor as she moved alongside Kane, putting up a shield of flame to protect them both.

Ahead of them, the route split again and they found themselves moving through a complicated warren of grates and tunnels. Finding the right path required split second decisions, as the rate the track was moving sped up as well.

The redhead swung around a grate as it shot at them, touching down to the ground to run along this time. Flying was clearly way too dangerous, at least right then, with everything flying at them. And being in the air was less thing to worry about with all the chaos.

Kane took the lower path, using his agility to dodge through the closing portals as they swallowed up the path. The ones in the higher path would take Angel's flight ability to skip through, but the lower one requires his physical abilities to slip past. The area finally open up again and they passed the halfway mark.

She took the higher path, as was expected of her, flying through and dodging along, pulling off a very complicated twist at one point to get through two obstacles closing in on one another. She couldn't help but make a noise of triumph when she hit the halfway mark. She wasn't sure how long they'd been at it, but she was pretty sure they were doing well.

"Now for the tough stuff." Kane said as they both headed down the route towards a forest of metal spires. They would be hard to navigate both on the ground or in the air, bunched together and heading the twists and turns of the path through.

Right. They weren't done yet, not even close. Angel steeled herself as they dove head first into the spires, staying in the air this time. She twisted and turned through the maze-like structures, sliding in through small spaces that made her grateful for her lithe form.

Kane plunged in, weaving back and forth to eke his way through. They were making good time, but the margin of error was getting thinner and thinner, forcing them to slow down in order to avoid getting trapped.

A near miss involving a spire and her right arm had Angel pulling back, eyes quickly following a different path and going into that one instead. She wasn't going to slow them up with getting hurt.

Zigging through the thick forest of spines was difficult, enough that Kane had to slow to a trot, moving carefully. There was something about it that didn't seem right. "Angel, I think we're getting funnelled into a maze. Can you get a bird's eye view, see if there's a clearer path we can't see from here?"

"On it." Angel zoomed up high enough to see the spires clearly, nodding to herself. "Alright, hang a left at the next turn, go straight about five feet, then go right, and follow that path down, that'll get you out a lot faster."

"Perfect." Kane followed her instructions, moving quickly through the spines. The path opened up significantly, confirming his suspicions. As the path opened, several small explosions took place around him, sending some kind of device into the air. "Angel, something coming your way. Be careful."

"I see it," Angel called back as she dodged out of the path of the incoming device, putting enough distance between her and it that when it went off, she wasn't caught up in the shockwave. The explosion wouldn't have been enough to necessarily hurt, but it would have knocked her out of the air and probably put her out of commission. She turned in the air, her eyes refocusing on the path Garrison was running just in time to see the floor shift, creating bumps. "Heads up, the floor's trying to trip you up."

Kane leapt just as the ground spasmed and fell away. He caught the edge of a strange tree like configuration, pulled himself into the branch and then jumped for the next one. The foliage grew thicker overhead, threatening to cut Angel off.

Angel scowled at the foliage, turning up the heat around her and carefully burning it away - just enough to make a path. She kept it under control, not letting it go beyond her own radius and making sure it didn't get anywhere near where Kane was jumping along.

The foliage abruptly stopped, and they were left staring out over a chasm with no physical route across. Kane held up, leaning on a branch and looking out. "End of my road."

"Wanna lift?" Angel called down as she came to a stop, hovering above Kane's head and looking out. If she had to guess, she'd say it was about twenty feet across to the next part of the platform.

"I don't see a lot of choice." Kane agreed, holding up a hand for her.

"Going up." And with that she swooped in, grabbing Kane's outstretched hand with both of her own and hauling him into the air, swinging him out over the abyss and carrying him across to the other side.


Kane landed nimbly and took a look at the final platform. It was a gnarled metal structure, extending up into the sky. The problem was that at various points, energy rippled out from it, making it inaccessible for flyers. He silently cursed Summers for having an inventive moment designing it.

"I think we're going to be climbing, Angel."

Angel sighed as she landed. "They really did cover everything in this one." She twisted quickly, cracking her back. "Up up and away."

Silently they started up the metal. The gnarled surface offered plenty of handholds, but some were slick to the touch and required slow navigation in order to bypass. Kane let Angel take the lead, being smaller and able to take to the air for any last minute surprises.

Surprises came in the form of metal disks releasing from the wall, flying down at them. "No ya don't!" Her flame shield bubbled out from her body, slamming into the disks and throwing them off course, sending flittering off aimlessly.

"Wow, remind me to kick Summers in the junk once this is over." Kane continued up and after two more showers of metal disks, they found themselves on the top platform. The button to complete the course sat in front of them, and he waved for her to take it.

"Gladly," Angel huffed as she hauled herself over the edge. She had the utmost respect for Scott Summers, but this course sucked. "Only if I get to watch though." At Kane's indication she darted forward, hitting the button, and a buzzing sound ran through the room as the course was officially completed.

Kane brought up the interface to check their results. "Well, we didn't beat seven minutes, but we did shave forty seconds off your best time." He swiveled the holographic screen for her to look.

Angel sighed as she leaned in to check it. "Oh well," she said as she examined the results, stretching her arms over her head. "Forty seconds is almost a minute, that's still pretty good. Imma chalk this one up to a win and get some ice cream." Because what better way to follow up a grueling Danger Room session than with a sugary treat.