xp_logs | A Touch of Brimstone Log 7

Lorna's team sees the counterattack by the Brotherhood, forcing them to flee

"What?" Matt asked, confused. he could hear fighting on the monitors, but he had no idea what was actually happening. This was the part that sucked about his powers. They did not compensate for quite everything. "What's going on?"

"Bad things Ping." Lorna moved to another camera, "Looks like a portal with a load of baddies inside. Okay Team. Looks like some of our peeps don't know that portals are opening. Get on the comms. Now."

"Ping, by me," Jennie said. She felt protective of the younger trainee, she wanted him by her just in case. "Correction, portals are opening." The monitors showed a few more flashes, including one in the hallway they had just passed.

"Someone get the door! We've got incoming!"

"On it," Sam said, springing into action. Using a short, controlled burst of his powers he darted across the distance between himself and the door, slamming it shut and locking it for whatever good that might do. It was more than just your run-of-the-mill lock but depending on who - or what - came through those portals it might not make much of a difference, if any.

"Any IDs on the incoming? Do we know who they are?" Given the mention of multiple portals it had to be more than one person, though he was afraid to ask exactly how many.

"-members of the MLF and Dark Riders appearing in all locations," Marius was finishing into his communicator, handily answering Sam's question. He whipped back to his teammate. "It's the attack of our greatest hits out there, even saw the pratt who left me with bat wings for two weeks. Anyone seeing who's outside our--"
The door flew off its hinges as if hit by an invisible battering ram, taking Sam along with it on its journey across the room.

"Oof!" The force of the blow sent Sam flying across the room, causing him to activate his powers once again for a brief period in an attempt to slow him down. He stumbled and ended up slamming hard against the opposing wall, grunting at the contact but finally coming to a stop. Bending down into a crouch and getting ready to counterattack, he waited to better see their assailants and how his teammates reacted.

What Matt couldn't see on the video monitors, he could now sense with his powers. "I've got five," he stated, then paused, "No. Six. Two have very similar heartbeats," he wasn't sure what that meant exactly, but there were definitely six when he listened closely. It was difficult to focus on that specifically with everything else happening.

He didn't have time for anything else though as the room was breached. For all that Roulette wanted to be protective of him, there was no time as a feral was practically on him, but Matt fell back easily with the force, rolling so he ended up on top of her as they grappled. Her claws unable to get through his leathers, but his billy club not enough to quite hurt her.

It was a trap. All of this, Muir, everything. It bore all the hallmarks of a trap. And the X-Men were screwed.

Jennie froze for an instant, watching their opponents bear down on them in seemingly slow-motion.

What do I do? What do I do?

And then, that ever-damnable voice that still spoke to her after all this time:

You fight, and if there's no way of winnin', you make them remember you

Jennie snapped to attention, her face twisting with rage. She reached down and grabbed the Feral by the scruff of the neck, hauling her bodily off of Matt like a bad dog. Jennie slammed the Feral's head against the wall, with her hands glowing red. The combination of wall and bad luck detached Shalimar's retinas, leaving her for the moment... blind. Shalimar twisted in Jennie grasp, howling in pain, as Jennie went to slam her head against the wall again.

Having regained his senses, Sam watched as Kilmartin charged into the room after Shalimar. Once Jennie had slammed her out of the way he blasted himself at Kilmartin, who he recalled was able to alter his density. Sam aimed for his legs, trying to knock the target over no matter his density by attacking below his center of gravity, and the two of them smashed backwards against the opposite wall.

Lorna was busy telling the other teams about the portals when her team was engaging in the fight. When she turned she immediately closed the door and sealed it shut with the metal that was around with a glow of her hand. That would buy them sometime with the enemies a ready in the room. No sooner had she re closed the door she felt the pounding on it with a lot of force. "Shit..."

The doorframe buckled, creating a gap through which a monstrous fist could be seen. Clearly the barricade was not being well-received.

"Out of the way!" snapped someone on the other side of the door, and the fist quickly disappeared. The makeshift barrier cracked and puckered as an opposing force fought against Lorna's handiwork.
Before the electromagnetic could reinforce the door again a fire erupted from the console beside her. The air was suddenly flooded with eye-watering black smoke and the stench of burning electrical wire.

Kilmartin, still grappling with Sam, managed to gasp out "Idiot, we're in here too!"

The momentary distraction was enough; the barricade broke a second time, and an enormous humanoid with energy crackling around his hands hurled what remained aside. Two others stood behind him: a blonde, and a woman still haloed in flame.

Marius bolted forward as the amalgam that was the Kleinstock brothers raised its fist, narrowly intercepting their attempt to hit Lorna while she was still distracted by the smoke and flame. He managed to absorb the energy from the blast, but couldn't fully process the heat; he fell back cursing, shirt blackened and skin red.

The two heartbeats were one now and Matt launched himself at them, it - whatever the pronoun was - using his agility to wrap his billy club around that massive wrist and using his entire body to wrench the arm backwards painfully. He couldn't take the energy blasts like Marius, but he could topple the behemoth. This might be a trap, but they weren't going to go down easy.

Lorna coughed as the door was busted down and it took her a second to get her bearings. Right away, Lorna lifted her hands as a chair was flung in her direction, but she stopped it in midair with the metal legs. She looked around and saw the concentration from a nearby woman. Raising her other hand as tiny metal balls were unleashed towards her. "Push them out!" She already had an escape route but she needed them off her to do it.

Sam aimed a powers-enhanced punch at Kilmartin, who had seriously upped his mass in order to charge into the room, but as he'd feared the other mutant had gone incorporeal now to avoid his punch. His fist smashed into the wall and knocked out a chunk of it before he disengaged, shifting to one side and darting away before Kilmartin could change yet again and counter.

He turned his attention to the Kleinstocks, who Matt had lassoed with his billy club, and attempted to blast them hard with both fists outstretched, whizzing by Jennie as he did so.

Jesse Killmartin couldn't breathe in his incorporeal form, so he switched bad, coughing and gagging as smoke filled the tiny room. He turned his sighs to his former target and got ready to aim again, when a burst of red energy exploded upside his head. Momentarily dizzied, he staggered just as Jennie burst forth from the smoke, slamming him against a console. Before he could react to switched his body mass Jennie threw a vicious elbow, shattering his nose. More blows followed, always just before he could switch forms.

Meanwhile his teammate Shalimar lay groaning on the floor behind them, her world gone black and choking with smoke.

Jennie's onslaught was cold, calculated, and merciless. With one more well-timed blow her opponent slid to the floor, completely unconscious.

Between Sam's blast and his billy club, the Kleinstock brothers separated with a yowl which made them a much more manageable size to deal with. They had muscle, Matt had agility. Using his billy club, he used one for leverage as his boot met the other, sending him flailing into the wall with a sickening crack.

Taking advantage of Matt's disentangling the twins, Sam quickly tripped the remaining brother. Once he was down Sam used another quick burst of his powers, driving his shoulder hard into the prone Kleinstock and taking him down for the count.

He got back up and quickly reassessed the situation, seeing where he could potentially help out next. Jennie had taken out both Shalimar and now Kilmartin, so he sought out Lorna and Marius to see how they were faring.

Lorna was able to keep Rowan from causing more damage as most of the things in the room where made from metal. She flicked her hand to send a cabinet towards the female to knock her out - it was still better than the alternative. With the bigger threat out of the way, Lorna looked up, if they couldn't go out back through the door then they would have to go up. "Cover me!"

There was a shriek from beyond the doorway as a blast of energy identical to the Kleinstock's attack burned through the air. An orange glow that had been building in the hallway winked out.

"Already on it," Marius said, though he was feeling ill-equipped to follow up on the promise. Unless one of the energy projectors decided to have another go at him he had nothing left. He was certain he'd only winged the pyrokinetic. He couldn't be sure of Rowan; had the cabinet knocked her out, or only stunned her? He turned to Jennie. "Roulette, need a favour if you-"

The beating Jennie had inflicted would have incapacitated most people; some might never have woken at all. Shalimar Fox, though, was a feral. She was resilient, tenacious, and now, furious. Like Matt, a lack of sight was not necessarily an obstacle. Marius turned just in time to see her crouch, nostrils flaring at a scent caught through smoke, and leap.

Jennie only had a momentary warning before a hundred pounds of angry feral slammed into her. Shalimar was sightless, but she could smell the bitch who had blinded her, citrus and adrenaline. She clawed at her, fingers raking through leather and armor.

Jennie barely had any time to react, her hands glowing red and a snarl that matched Shalimar's. The feral had raked across her chest, drawing blood. But they were surface wounds. They grappled before the feral got a hand around her throat.

Jennie didn't flinch, just rammed glowing red fists into her torso. The feral paused, unseeing eyes wide, but when nothing happened she bared her teeth on a triumphant smirk.

"Say goodbye to your pretty eyes," the feral sneered, her other clawed hand raised.

An olive brown hand caught Shalimar's wrist. A hand with a tiny mouth full of vicious pointed teeth in the center of the palm. It's twin grabbed the feral by the throat. With a heave Marius pulled Shalimar's off Jennie and tackled her to the ground.

Jennie stared stupidly at the snarling tangle, a shaking hand going to her chest, which bled sluggishly but was otherwise ok.

Oh. Maurice and Babette are back. Jennie thought from somewhere far away.

There was a crash and Jennie tore her gaze back to the door. There were still incoming. She hurled a red disk at the glowing figure in the doorway, causing her to collide with a Klienstock's fist.

As Ash reeled from the inadvertent backhand delivered by Matt's target, the cabinet Lorna had hurled and what little still remained of the door frame flew inward; Rowan was back on her feet and clearly losing her patience. Marius managed to deflect some debris through the simple expedience of inserting his body between himself and his teammate; he would be black and blue tomorrow, but whatever Lorna was doing was causing every hair on the back of his neck to stand on end and he suspected bruises were a better option than allowing her to be interrupted. Marius narrowed his yellow eyes and did some mental calculations. "Cover me" indeed.

As a telekinetic, Rowan benefited greatly from the ability to control whether or not an opponent had an opportunity to come within arms' length. It was therefor to her great surprise that she suddenly found the dark-haired X-Man suddenly charging at her with all the strength and speed of her teammate Shalimar Fox, and that the instinctive move to intercept him with her power resulted in . . . nothing.

The confusion lasted only an instant. A split-second before her attacker made contact the blonde yanked the sputtering fluorescent light fixtures from the ceiling. Marius hit the sudden barrier with a grunt, and Rowan pressed the advantage. With an unceremonious gesture the blonde shoved him into the wall, a look in her slitted eyes that said she was moments away from julienning his torso.

"Not today," Matt muttered, heart racing as he tugged the two ends of his billy club apart. No one was paying him any attention as he slid behind the blond, boots silent. Using his training, Matt grabbed the telekenetic and used his billy club to knock her out in one swift move. Disabling was so much more difficult in situations like this, but Matt was glad that X-Men didn't kill. He wasn't a killer and he didn't want to be. It was worth the extra work not to.

Suddenly the edges of the roof started to crumble as parts of the roof started to lift. Lorna raised off the floor as the roof moved with her allowing enough space for her teammates to move. "GO! NOW!"

"Come on, we've got to get moving!" Sam yelled over the roar of the roof's removal, He looked to grab whomever was nearby before blasting off upward, the only way they could possibly get away from their attackers. Matt was the nearest, and Jennie was just a short sideways thrust away, so he took hold of them both before blasting skyward, aiming for the space Lorna had rent open for them.

Jennie had almost no time to react as the ground lurched away from her and they blasted out into open sky. Jennie sucked in lungfulls of clear, cold air. Grateful to be out of the tinderbox that was the CINC. But where were Lorna and Marius? All she could see was black smoke billowing out of the hole, the pyrokinetic's last burst before unconsciousness took her.

Below, Marius gave the burning room one final case before he turned to Lorna. "They're out! Get clear and close it up!" he called, and then made his own escape. Rowan's telekinesis had in fact had an effect. One hard, sudden burst of telekinesis sent him up through the hole created by Lorna and so thoughtfully widened by Sam. He hadn't taken enough for a prolonged flight, but it was more than enough to get him clear to the roof. He landed hard, cushioned only slightly by adrenaline and the fresh infusion of feral.

Lorna was the last one out and she took to the opening and then using the piece she broke off she sealed again. Looking around to see where her team had gone off too. She flew down to Marius, "Everyone okay?" Seeing the trail of smoke that Sam had created.