xp_logs | Sound & Fury

x-dazzler.livejournal.com posting in

A rescuing we go!
Toad // Miles, Kurt ~ It takes a swashbuckler to pull a rescue off with style.

It was odd to hear the booming of thunder when you knew that the one who tended to generate those was actually far more busy keeping the air currents around the bird stable enough so that Jetstream could pilot the plane without being batted away like a cat's toy by the storm outside. Light poured inside the bird though the view ports and the only discernable sign of life actually consisted of a faint dimmer spot in the roiling mass below. For a brief moment the tide receded, giving Kurt a clear view - Magneto, arms held out straight before him as he apparently shielded those behind him from the light storm, metal bleeding from his surroundings and forming a thick wall that glowed a molten orange-red under the onslaught. The wall held, impossibly, even in the teeth of the light storm, but the strain was already visible in his face.

And nearby Kurt saw a small struggling boy, trying to get free of his captor.

It was hard to maneuver when some brat kid was repeatedly kicking you under the chin in an attempt to squirm free, all the while screaming non-stop. Never mind how some woman had just gone berserk and was trying to vaporize them all while the boss held her off. I'm going to have a headache. Stupid kid. Shut up already. Still, he gamely kept trying until he got sick of it all and even though he knew Magneto had told him that the kid was worth his own life ten times over, Toad neatly clipped Miles on the chin, knocking him out instantly.

"Gonna put you on a leash when we get back, you annoying little bug," Toad muttered as he turned to spring away.

"There he is", Kurt said grimly, staring down at the scene below him from within the jet. "I will be back as soon as I can."

*Bamf!*

Toad blinked at the odd sound and looked up. Hands full of no longer squirming kid, he really didn't have much time to do much more than mutter "Uh oh!".

Kurt advanced on him without hesitation, knowing time was of the essence, and didn't waste time aiming a punch intended to knock Toad off his feet. The other mutant was hampered by holding Miles, which would hopefully either make him easier to defeat, or make him put the boy down.

At least the little bug wasn't squirming anymore. That made things easier. A powerful spring sent Toad arcing over Kurt's punch, and over Kurt himself, and he aimed a kick at the back of the X-Man's head as he came down.

Kurt was already turning when Toad landed, and was therefore able to dodge the kick, spinning out of the way. In the next moment, he was lunging, hand outstretched, for Toad's neck. He has to let go of Miles.

Shit, the guy was fast. Toad bounded backward, feeling Kurt's nails scratch at his throat, landing in a three-point crouch and spitting slime.

The slime never hit, because by the time it got to where Kurt had been, he was behind Toad, kicking out at the back of one bent knee.

Fuck all teleporters, Toad thought as the kick caught him squarely, toppling him sideways. He was able to turn it into a fast handspring, but had to drop the kid to do it--goddammit--and he leaped back as soon as he recovered, both hands extended, reaching his tongue out, the boss was going to kill him if he lost the little brat--

But by the time he had recovered enough to renew the attack, there was no longer anybody there. Kurt hadn't wasted any time bamfing to where Miles lay, grabbing him, and 'porting back to the jet and safety.

Toad slammed a fist into the ground, hissing in frustration. Cuisses de fucking grenouilles.

The second Miles disappeared from sight, the thunder faded. One last muted rumble careened through the devastated area. The radiance dimmed to tolerable levels for a moment, curling back into the woman standing on a fragile looking spire of rock in the middle of a smoking crater. Living light curled from her body, falling to the ground in sizzling streamers of destruction.

Magneto looked up, still holding up the shield just in case but no longer focusing on that now that the worst of it seemed to have abated, and glanced at the jet now glittering at the edge of his awareness. And raised his hand, smiling grimly. So much for him to work with.

Any remaining sound was snuffed out entirely at that gesture, and Magneto paused for a heartbeat. The silence was deafening in contrast to the previous maelstrom of thunder. No sound. None. It was only Mystique's frantic gesture back towards the crater which drew his attention in time to see a wall of light boiling violently towards them, tendrils of light slicing through the ground and racing ahead for them greedily.

~*~

No one stays behind…
Alison, Nathan ~ Once the storm abates, someone needs to pick up the pieces.

The brightness had faded to tolerable levels, Magneto and the others nowhere to be seen. Streamers of light still lashed out from the center of the crater however, the faint crumbling of stone and steel from the destroyed mall echoing with each strike. As the haze cleared for a moment, Alison's prone form, still glowing with painful intensity, could be seen atop the slowly crumbling spire she had been standing upon earlier, lasers still weaving from her lazily, destroying anything in their path.

Nathan stumbled through the haze to the edge of the crater, desperately shielding against the stray lasers. "Alison!" he called desperately, willing her to answer him. #ALISON!# Nothing.

Light flared right in front of him, a laser dancing crazily alongside the shield before moving on to shear off a slab of wall next to him. The spire at the center of the crater finished its slow collapse, the eerily bright form that had been atop it slowed down from its fall only by a stray ribbon of light momentarily holding it in place, before stabbing into the wrecked ground below.

Nathan winced, flinching both mentally and physically from the impact on his shield, but his eyes widened as he saw Alison fall. No! Instinctively, he reached out to catch her...

...and it was the mental equivalent of picking up a hot poker. A noise that was half-groan, half-cry escaped him, but he held on. Couldn't let her fall...

The Askani were shouting at him. Shield. Shield? He hadn't let his shield fall, had he...

#SHIELD HER!#

Shield her. How else were they supposed to get her home?

The crumbling of the spire had only intensified the lasers however, which led to a return of the same effect which had generated the lightstorm. Walls crumbled upon impact, debris falling to the ground, the radiance bleeding from Alison's body once more affecting the surrounding air, low rumbles steadily building within the echoes of the crater.

And it was entirely possible that none of them were going to make it out of here in the first place, if he didn't shield her. Nathan took as deep a breath as he could manage, and started to build. One shield, a single layer as strong as he could make it, and he tottered on his feet, nearly falling into the crater as the light slammed against the psi-construct and he felt the impact like a crushing blow.

The brilliance now contained by the shield was nearly blinding, lasers coiling in on themselves, raking across Alison - with seemingly no effect. But the shield held and after a moment the strain upon it seemed to lessen every so slightly, along with the intensity of the light within.

Nathan stumbled back, found himself being supported by someone. Who, he didn't know. He had to keep his attention fixed on Alison, or he'd lose the shield. The pressure was ebbing, just a little, but it was still almost unbearable.

"The jet--" he gasped out. "Lead me to the jet--I can't let go of her--"

It was Kurt who had come out to get him, and was supporting his weight now. With a nod he knew Nathan probably couldn't see, he fixed his attention on the jet rather than on Alison, and gently urged the larger man in the right direction, steering him around any loose rocks big enough to be a hazard.

Heat. Heat and pressure, and he shifted the shield, changing it. Denser. Had to be denser. Nathan squeezed his eyes closed and concentrated desperately, listening to the urgent whispering of the Askani as they fed him images of patterns, structures. Instructions.

They were drawing very close to the jet and Kurt paused, trying to work out the best way to get the "blind" Nathan up the steps and inside without him either falling or losing his telekinetic grip on Alison.

"Open the cargo hold doors," Nathan gasped out. Only place big on the plane to give him enough space, in case he slipped.

Haroun, listening in on the tactical net, flipped a toggle from the cockpit. The cargo bay doors opened with a subdued hiss of heavy-strength hydraulics in action. "Bay door is open." he said over the comms. "What's going on?"

Since Nathan probably didn't have the energy or attention to spare for an explanation, Kurt took over. "Alison's powers are... in overload. Nathan has her in a TK bubble, and we are bringing her back in."

A brief pause, then Haroun came back onto the net. "Once she's secured, ETA to the barn is no more than ten minutes." he said, prepping the jet's seldom-used afterburners. They were hideously wasteful of fuel, but they gave a very tasty bump of speed, and if Alison was down, they'd need every second. He spent a quick second offering a prayer to Allah for her safety and health.

~*~

Fly me home
Ororo, Haroun, Kurt, Nathan ~ Even seconds can feel like years when you're in a hurry...

Ororo was seated in the co-pilot's seat, eyes dead white as she pulled the winds around them, driving the Black Bird along at speeds the plane had never managed before.

Haroun, in the pilot's chair, had the metaphorical Pedal to the Metal. He was running the 'Bird flat-out, using Storm's wind-boost to achieve even greater speeds. "Arrival in five." he said, walking through the pre-landing checklist early. His feelings were being brutally suppressed, only expressed by the unnecessary force applied to various toggles and switches.

The tunnel of wind Ororo had wrapped around them translated into an eerie howl surrounding the jet, underscored by the scream of the engines as they raced towards the mansion, every nuance in sound echoing itself in the maelstrom of light that Nathan was trying to contain in the cargo hold.

He didn't know how he was doing this. The circuit-breaker was there in his mind still, he could feel it, and his vision was normal - or as normal as it could be with the blinding light filling the cargo hold - but somehow, he was managing to hold the waves of light emanating from Alison back. Barely. He was on his hands and knees on the deck, with her floating above him on a telekinetic cushion, the shield flaring gold around her.

She was slipping in and out, her thoughts present if only by the sudden shifts of her mind that seemed to be filled entirely with brilliance edged with pain. And nothing else. The Black Bird accelerated, the sudden crack of power from the engines resulting in a laser which struck at the shield madly and managed to break through briefly, whipping through the cargo hold and scoring the metal in a wild pattern.

Nathan realized suddenly that the cool surface beneath the side of his face was the deck, and that wasn't good. Someone was pulling at his shoulders, shaking him. He jerked in pain, feeling another laser stab through the shield. Another hole, and he could feel the whole structure of it starting to crumple as he lost his grip on the patterns the Askani had given him...

Kurt, being the only one with no other duties to carry out, had stayed with Nathan in the cargo hold, watching over both him and Alison. He sprang to Nathan's side as soon as he saw the other man's consciousness slip, taking his telekinetic grip with it.

"Nathan! Rebuild your shield. You can do this."

"Stop--shaking me," Nathan wheezed, not knowing who he was talking to, who was calling his name. "Back off!" The hands let go of him and he pushed himself back up to his hands and knees, straining to create a second layer of shielding around the first. The first was irretrievable. The patterns flowed into each other in his mind, and he squeezed his eyes shut again, ignoring the last few stray lasers, even as they bit into the walls of the cargo hold. The bubble was almost
complete again. Almost there...

~*~

What it all comes down to...
Lorna, Nathan ~ There's only so much Nathan can manage on his own, and Lorna's arrival is very timely indeed...

Lorna skidded into the hangar just as the jet touched down and kept running as the cargo doors opened. She'd heard the reports and knew that they needed more shields. No one had said anything to her. Theoretically Polaris had no need to be down in the hanger any more than she'd been needed on the initial rescue mission. Her power was mostly offensive after all and what they needed was more shielding. But light and sound were just vibrations and they could be affected by shifts in the EM field. Or so she was betting.

Spillover. He was getting serious spillover here, Nathan realized dizzily. Impossible to keep his TK focused properly when he was using this much. He could feel Kurt trying to get closer to him, to direct him down the ramp, but be pushed away by the ambient telekinetic energy coming off him in waves.

But his 'sonar' field was kicking in, sort of, and he could make do without the direction. Had to. Alison was still bleeding lasers that were trying to slice through his shield, and he had to focus on her. Getting her to the medlab. He could hear Charles' voice in his mind, telling him what he had to do.

He stumbled backwards down the ramp, landing on his ass on the hangar floor. The blazing incandescent TK bubble encasing Alison dipped in the air, but only a bit.

The sight stopped Lorna cold for a moment. Somewhere in the middle of all that light was her best friend. It was more instinct that conscious thought that had her throwing up her hands and grabbing the EM fields outside of Nathan's shield. She twisted them, winding them tighter, upping their rate of vibration trying to find the right speed to bend the laser light into harmless rays. With her hands still gripping the shields, she ran towards Nathan. "Are you shielding her from sound?" she demanded.

Someone else was shouting at him. New voice. Nathan blinked dazedly in that direction, not able to focus on anything except the light. Light blinding him, light burning in his mind...

"Nathan!" she shouted, "Nathan, answer me! Sound, she converts sound!" Lorna repeated herself until she saw it start to get through, "Are you blocking sound?"

"Can't--" He hauled himself back to his feet, swaying, focusing on the TK bubble. "Can't--the circuit-breaker, I don't know how I'm doing this--" He reached towards the TK bubble, levitating it down out of the cargo hold as delicately as he could.

And quiet was one thing the hangar was not. Lorna swore. "I'll do it. She'll be easier to block when she's not getting any new power."

Nathan didn't question it. Didn't ask her how she was planning to do it - didn't have the available concentration to do so and listen to the answer. Still backing away as he lowered the bubble down, he became aware that the hangar was quieting down. He could hardly hear his own breathing.

Lorna threw another shield around all three of them, releasing her first one. She began again to find the right speed, trying this time to block sound rather than light. Not as fast…sound waves were longer…easier to disrupt… Lorna continued fiddling until the racket outside of the shield dropped to a low buzz. It wasn't perfect but it shouldn't be enough to keep powering Alison. She hoped, anyway. The theory seemed to be borne out by the fact that the flares against
Nate's TK shield had slowed. Carefully, she drew the shield more tightly around Alison, making sure it stayed at the same speed. The noise of the hanger returned suddenly for her but inside the shield it was quiet as a church. She left Nate inside. No reason not to and less distracting for him in the quiet.

A little easier. It was a little easier suddenly, the pressure slacking off - not all the way, not nearly all the way, but enough that he could straighten, could walk towards the hangar doors a little more quickly, following Charles' low, calm directions. He was peripherally aware of Ororo and Haroun and Kurt exiting the Blackbird as well, but they weren't important right now. Just Alison. Just getting her to the medlab and keeping her contained every step of the way.

Lorna gave the others a short nod then followed Nathan, keeping things as quiet as she could. Her head ached by the time they reached the medlab, her powers unused to being used this way. But that was all right. She had no intention of going anywhere until she knew Alison would be okay.

~ Fin ~