The Dark Phoenix - Log 8

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First team moves in, pushing against Dark Phoenix' TK shield.



The idea was simple; read the telekinetic shield that the Dark Phoenix was hiding behind and find a weakness. Use that weakness to break through, shut her down and go for pancakes. The last part might have been over-optimistic, but it was still the plan. Julian, Jean-Phillipe and Marie were ready to punch through at the spot indicated, waiting for Adrienne's sign.

Glad that the Dark Phoenix appeared to be ignoring them, Adrienne studied the telekinetic shield from behind the cover of some rubble, trying to figure out the best angle from which to approach it. She also took a moment to ponder whether she could actually Read the thing in the first place, what with it being made of energy or whatever instead of being a traditional object. But she tried to push the thought from her head. If she couldn't Read it, things might get very bad for them. And since it was too late for her to get the hell out of here and try to save herself, this had to work.

She crept towards the shield on her hands and knees, weapons holstered. There was no point in holding on to them. She couldn't fire at the shield anyway. The bubble encircling the Dark Phoenix was shimmering with energy, with the firebird's flames licking at it in places. Wincing in anticipation, she reached out a hand and touched the shield. Her brain registered pain. A familiar kind of pain. She'd felt it in Genosha when she'd burned her hands. Her hand was burning!

"Owowowow! Shit!" She pulled her hand away, staring at it in horror, anticipating the burns she'd be seeing. But there was nothing. Her hand looked the same as it always did. "What the fuck?"

There was no burn. It was in her head. The shield was making her think it could burn her. "Son of a bitch!" Angry at being duped by the shield, Adrienne stuck her hand back on it and scanned its history and composition, trying to ignore the sensation running through her head of searing pain in her hand. It was blissful relief when she could pull it back from the shield, holding it in her other hand to convince herself that it wasn't injured in any way as she scrambled back to the others.

"I saw it," she told them eagerly, out of breath with excitement. She was reminded of the dragon scene from the Hobbit movie, where one scale was missing. In this case, it was just a tiny point where the shield was weaker than the rest, but it might be enough to get through.

For a moment she considered relaying the spot's whereabouts via math equation, but decided against it, time being of the essence and all. "Right there. That's the spot," she indicated to the group, pointing.

"Good job," Rogue said idly, looking at the spot. She gave a testing punch and was pleased to see a rippling of the shield. Pulling back, she gave it all she had, punching through the shield, and allowing them access in.

Similar to Adrienne, she felt a sharp burning sensation but there were no physical burn marks.

Rogue would be happy when all this psychic mind crap would be done with.

Be careful", Angelo said warningly, hanging back a little from the shield while it was still up at all. "TK backlash can hit really, really hard at times like this."

The blow caused the shield to flare brightly and whips of telekinesis flung out. Angel and Dori were knocked from their feet as backlash slapped them down. Along the washes on energy in the shield, there was a sudden opening, as if the shield had partially melted, leaving the way clear to Dark Phoenix.

Rogue wasn't going to waste this opportunity. Stripping her gloves, she rushed in, hoping the breach of the shield would last long enough.

With both hands, Rogue touched the Dark Phoenix and wondered a few seconds too late why it all seemed to work on her favour.

Flashes of memories and thoughts burned through her mind. Other Jeans, other Rogues, other lives passed through her brain. Lifetimes were lived and lost and the accompanying emotions were overwhelming. There was no space in her brain for anything, and she could actually feel her permanent shadows also in pain from the invading shades.

With a scream, Rogue felt solid energy pulse out of her body in shockwaves, but she couldn't let go. Her hands felt like they were on fire and had fused to the body.

Everything happened all at once, energy seemed to blast outward from Rogue and the Dark Phoenix, his friend's scream vaguely registering in his mind before the lines of force around them seemed to buckle inward. Julian had only a moment to think, "Not again," before the force rapidly expanded in a massive explosion. Waves of energy emanated from the Dark Phoenix, sending Julian and his compatriots tumbling away from the flash-point, their attempt utterly unsuccessful.

When he finally came to rest, Julian could tell he was somewhere in the forest, everything hurt- his arm was most certainly broken, as was his leg...but his chest and abdomen hurt more than the rest. Looking down, he could see why, as what looked to be a combination of wooden branches and metal shrapnel emerged from several places in his torso. Trying to take a breath he found himself unable, two branches were almost certainly through his lungs. The fact that the debris hadn't skewered his heart was a small, ironic mercy as he could feel his lungs filling with blood. This was it- the end of Julian Keller. Far away the sound of battle raged, but here, things seemed almost peaceful as night was falling quickly around him. He wondered, briefly, if he'd see Cassandra again as the darkness closed in.

Doreen and Monkey Joe were knocked back hard by the blast. For a moment Dori just laid where she was. Normally MJ came over to prod her up but there was nothing. She sniffed the air and turned her head towards where MJ's scent was coming from. Her eyes widened, MJ laid on some rubble his back at an odd angle, eerily still. It felt like her heart stopped. Dori didn't have many friends before the mansion and Monkey Joe had been the one constant that had kept her going. He couldn't be...

Doreen scrambled to her hands and knees and crawled over, picking up her friend with shaking hands. There was no mistaking the stillness of death.

"No! No no no! NOOO!" Dori screamed, her throat almost raw, "Wake up, come on, Monkey Joe, wake up! I'll give you anything, just wake up! All the nutella I can buy, anything, please, wake up. Please?!" she sobbed, holding the small squirrel to her chest, tears blurring her vision.

"Wake up. Please wake up."


Adrienne taken cover when she heard Angelo's warning. She had no ability to fight up close anyway, and with so many of her own comrades planning to get near the Dark Phoenix, she wasn't going to try shooting it, either. Her part in this assault was over, so she had taken cover when the explosive waves scattered the party, curling up into a ball to avoid flying debris and shrapnel that accompanied the rippling pulses of energy.

She tried to scream when she watched Julian blasted into the woods, but no sound came out of her mouth as, with wide eyes, she tracked his flight and the sickening way he landed. She thought of going to find him, to try and help him. Turning away so she could focus on a route out towards him, however, her gaze was next drawn to Rogue and the Dark Phoenix just in time to see Rogue collapse. The psychometrist blinked a few times, waiting for Rogue to get back up. When it didn't happen, she found herself, against her better judgment, crawling forward towards her friend. "Rogue? Rogue? You better not be dead or I'm gonna be really pissed off, Swan."

Peeking out from behind some rubble next to Rogue, Adrienne let out a happy squeal to see Rogue's chest rise and fall weakly. "She's alive!"

"Je suis vivant aussi," Jean-Phillipe groaned from a small distance away from Adrienne and Rogue. He had also been sent tumbling by the backlash from Rogue's interaction with the Dark Phoenix, and bludgeoned heavily by pieces of debris. He attempted to lever himself up onto his hands and knees, but everything seemed to tilt alarmingly in his vision as he was hit by a massive bout of vertigo, and slumped to the ground bonelessly, still breathing but clearly unconscious.

Angel had already been overbalanced as it was - the cast bound around her leg was making it hard to stay upright, and the blast threw her off completely. She hit the ground hard, the cast at least anchoring her so she didn't roll much, but she certainly wasn't moving any time soon. Her neck felt strangely warm, and if she'd been able to bend her head at odd angles she would have seen the red staining the heavy bandages wrapped around the wound. "Well shit," was all she managed to mutter before she passed out.

"Told you so", Angelo muttered, getting up gingerly with his left wrist bent in a way wrists weren't designed to bend from where he'd landed hard on it, but ignoring that to run to Jean-Philippe. After establishing he was still breathing, and putting him quickly into the recovery position, he looked around. "...where's Keller?"

"He... I saw him... he was blasted into the woods," Adrienne answered, frowning as she suddenly remembered her original plan to go check on Julian. She was copying Angelo's lead of putting Rogue in the recovery position, brushing the hair back from her friend's face with an uncharacteristically tender hand. "He landed in the trees, I think. I think that's where he landed. Should we go find him?" She didn't want to leave Rogue, but wanted to know whether Julian was still alive. Tandy would want to know.

"Yeah", Angelo said quietly. "No one gets left behind." If they're still alive.