Scott & Tabitha| Danger Ball

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Energy projectors for the win... or something.



Scott bounced the ball on the floor of the danger room once before he
caught it and gave it a guilty look, since when had he turned into a
gym teacher. It's not like he didn't already have enough to do at the
mansion, "Ok, I figure we can try something new today, and I could use
a break from the normal blowing things up kinda training", he admitted
to Tabitha as an aside before tossing the football at her. "So we're
going to play soccer today," he revealed gesturing at the Danger Room
while thumbing the panel on the wall and letting a pair of goal posts
and platforms rise up out of the floor before he tossed the ball at
Tabitha.

"There's only one catch," he told her with a smile, "you're not
actually allowed to step onto the field".

She raised a confused eyebrow at him. "So, I have to use my bombs?"
she asked. That .... would require significant concentration and
effort.

"That is the general idea," Scott agreed with a nod, "Blowing stuff up
is easy, but being able to control how much power and the direction of
the blast." Now the X-man was grinning broadly, "I thought you might
enjoy the challenge of it."

She gave him a dubious look as she centered herself on the field, ball
in hand. She rolled the ball out to -approximately- where she figured
the starting point should be. Tiny bombs formed at the tips of her
fingers, well, they were more like burps than actual bombs. She
flicked one toward the ball and let it go off.

The ball rolled three centimeters.

"That's it," Scott encouraged Tabitha, "you've got the idea behind
moving it. you just need a little more power." As he spoke Scott
walked around the field till he was standing behind the goal opposite

Tabitha. "Give it another shot."

She saved her dirty glower for the soccer ball as she made a more
powerful bomb. That one sent the ball a few feet in the wrong
direction. Tabs adjusted her position on the side of the field and
added more power to the next bomb.

The ball exploded too.

"Almost," Scott commiserated, "Too much power too close to the ball.
Try placing the bombs a little further away from the ball." He
suggested as he gathered up another ball and threw it towards Tabitha,
bouncing a force beam off the ball to bring it to a slow halt in front
of the young woman.

She took more care as she made a new bomb, more conscious of the
content and power. This time, it bounced along quite nicely, but in
the wrong direction. "Precision work, eh boss?" She asked, face set in
concentration.

"Precisely," the X-man nodded, "you never know when it'll come in
useful out in the field to be able to throw around bomb blasts with
pin point precision. Besides," he continued with his trademark evil
glint, "You've got a wide open field and a pretty big goal here, this
is hardly the most challenging I could get." Scott leaned back against
a goal post, "So how's the rebuild of the library going?"

"Well, it's no longer snowing in the reference section," she said as
she continued to bomb the ball down the field. A misplaced explosion
sent the ball in the wrong direction. "I'm going to run out of dirty
looks to throw at you."

"That is the essence of my cunning plan" Scott told Tabitha with a
smile, "If you keep getting frustrated with it then when you finally
get it you'll feel soo happy you'll forget about turning in your newly
honed explosion directing skills against me. Or at least forget until
next time." The X-man gave a laugh, "Was there much damage to the
books in the library or did we get lucky?"

Nope, she found another dirty look. She gnawed on her lip as she
concentrated on moving the ball in the correct direction. "We
got lucky. Kyle smashed the last of the goop squad as soon as we got
outside. As soon as he healed enough, we got a tarp up and the
undamaged books away from the hole in the wall."

Scott smiled unrepentantly at Tabitha, "The goop squad? I don't think
I've ever heard them called that before," he told the young woman, "So
then I shouldn't expect a heart-attack inducing budget for library
renovations and replacements to pop up in the middle of the paperwork
then?" Scott asked grinning at Tabitha.

Tabitha looked up from her task long enough to smile innocently. "Not
a major one, anyhow." She didn't sneak that many things
in. "Replacing wood shelves isn't cheap. And I refuse to use particle
board.

"Well," Scott mused, "wooden shelves do add a certain something to the
environment it's true, But given the number of times parts of the
mansion are attacked or blown up maybe we should look into something
with a little more permanency." Scott grinned, "I heard that Ikea was
having a great sale on metal shelving units, you wouldn't have any of
those pesky shelves breaking issues then." he teased.

A sharp explosion sent the ball into the goal, slamming into the net.
"You think you're funny," she said, with a look that couldn't quite
disguise her self-satisfaction.

"I have my moments," Scott replied with a smirk as he pulled the ball
out of the net and threw it back to Tabitha, "Think you could do that
again with some opposition?"

"Bring it, old man," she taunted, knowing she was about to get her ass
handed to her. "Best two out of three?"

"Glutton for punishment eh?" Scott asked with a grin setting himself up across from Tabitha mentally measuring the distances involved, "3...2...1...go"