Sci-Fi Zone (Green)

[Josh Dalton Worthington]

The Sci-Fi Zone is entirely modeled off the Star Wars universe. There are a variety of different homages to the series (Hank, you nerd!). Right off the Neutral Zone is a recreation of the Battle of Hoth. It would be advisable to avoid being flattened by the walkers. Rebel troopers and Stormtroopers are having a furious gunfight right outside the entrance to the Rebel base.

Once inside the Rebel base, the scenario abruptly changes to the interior of the Death Star. In this area, one must download the Death Star plans onto a data disk in the computer room. Once downloaded, the secret plans are the Sci-Fi Zone's flag. If a player is eliminated, the data disk is available for pickup at the site of their KO.

[Bobby Drake]

Bobby allows himself to be distracted for a few seconds by playing “spot-the-reference” on Hank’s holographic spaceship command deck. It’s mostly a recreation of the Death Star’s control room, with Imperial troops running around frantically, but there are dozens of little bits from different movies, TV shows, etc... including about a dozen stations arranged around the room’s perimeter, each occupied by a small cluster of what are presumably specialists of various sorts, and security guards everywhere.

It feels a little strange to realize they’ve been cast as the Empire… not that it really matters, but Bobby’s always thought of himself as one of the Jedi. Presumably that goes double for Josh and Sheppard, what with the telepathy and everything.

He dismisses that with a shrug and grins at Josh. "Man, Hank outdid himself on this one, huh? Remind me not to tease him about his OCD for at least a week. Anyway, " he adds, dragging his attention back to the exercise, "to work. What’s your plan, fearless leader?" Bobby has a few ideas of his own, but he’s curious about what Josh has in mind.

[Josh Dalton Worthington]

Josh looks around, slightly in awe. Man, I think I'd have asked Hank to teach me how to program if I knew you could do something like this with the Danger Room. He turns in a half circle. The scene was definitely the Death Star from Star Wars. Josh peers through a clear viewport down into a hangar bay. Wow - there's even a Millennium Falcon parked down there!

> "to work. What’s your plan, fearless leader?"

A huge grin appears on Josh's face. "I had no idea Hank was such a little fanboy!" He starts laughing, but soon becomes serious. "Er... plan, right."

"Well, I think our biggest concern is someone nabbing our flag while we're gone. I was thinking we could go to the Blue Zone first, because the other two flags are moving... what do you guys think? Before that, though, I have an idea." Josh runs over to the command area across the room, scanning the figures gathered. Come on, Hank... please...

Score! Josh drops to one knee in front of the dark figure. "Lord Vader! We've detected saboteurs inside the Death Star! We believe they are here to obtain a technical readout of the battlestation." Heh heh heh...

The cloaked figure whirls. His lightsaber is in his hand, deactivatd. "If that is their goal, they will be sorely mistaken, my young apprentice. Go and destroy them!" He turns to another officer. "Red alert, Admiral." Young apprentice? I always though of myself as one of the good guys...

"Of course, Lord Vader!" Josh backs away and returns to Bobby and Jake, but sets off in a run for the exit. Alarms begin wailing. "Hopefully that's going to put a crimp in the others' plans..."

"I was thinking about strategy. It might not be a bad idea to hit hard and fast, rather than draw out a fight, so we can move on. For us, that would be knocking people off their feet, freezing people to the floor and wall, that kind of thing. What do you think, Bobby?"

[Bobby Drake]

> "…my young apprentice. Go and destroy them!"

Bobby chuckles at that. "So, do we call you Darth Impulse now? You always did have that Skywalker vibe to you, what with the smashing people around the room with hand gestures and all…" He laughs harder as he thinks it through, and adds to Jake "But, hey, if he’s the Dark Padawan, and you’re giving him psychic lessons, doesn’t that make you the local Sith Lord? Better be careful, or little Annie over there’ll get jealous."

> " knocking people off their feet, freezing people to the floor and wall, that kind of thing. What do you think, Bobby? "

Bobby nods as the three of them head down the corridors to the shuttle airlock. "Sounds reasonable, as long as we’re not in the Neutral Zone. Slippery floors and the occasional blinding snowstorm ought to slow them down, too." The Stormtroopers guarding the airlock seem to recognize them, saluting as they pass; Bobby stops for a moment and takes one of their rifles. "Go get a new one from Supply."

He shrugs at the rifle in his hands as the shuttle takes off towards Hoth. "Beats me if the damned thing will work outside the Green Zone, but I figure there’s no rule against using it in the Neutral Zone, right? And all those hours I spent practicing with a rifle ought to be good for something."

The shuttle trip seems to take no time at all, like a cut-scene in a movie or video game, and leaves them standing in an arctic field where Rebel fighters are harassing – and mostly being swatted by – Imperial Walkers. Which, for all of his teasing of Josh and Jake earlier, doesn’t quite sit right with Bobby either… since when are they the bad guys?

He shrugs it off and turns back to Josh with a new thought. "Hey, so I was thinking about what you said, about other teams nabbing our flags. What happens if we play a purely defensive game? We plant ourselves here with a battalion of Stormtroopers and Walkers as backup and take down any team that comes through the entrance. Nobody else can win as long as we hold the Zone, and they’ll all tire themselves out running around and fighting each other. Once they’re all exhausted or taken out of play, we head out, mop up, and retrieve the other three flags from wherever they ended up." He ducks his head, slightly embarrassed. "I know, it’s not… dramatic, or anything. But… well, anyway, just a thought."

He returns his attention to the Zone entrance, rather pleased to have the decision be up to someone else for once.

[Jake Sheppard]

He’s on the Death Star.

Which is… all manner of odd, really. Maybe someone blew up the Institute for real this time, and where they were before was some sort of waiting room in purgatory and now he’s died properly and gone to heaven… Okay, that’s stupid, but still… Death Star!

How…? Okay, that doesn’t matter because… DEATH STAR! It’s the same blend of insane excitement which swallowed him when he found out that the Institute had a private jet which came up out of the basketball court, only better, and it keeps him from noticing the bits that aren’t Star Wars related for a while. And when he does he gets caught up in that, and in wandering around spotting all the canon inconsistencies and bits nicked from other series and… wow, this is so many levels of awesome. It’s a shame it’s all holographic (it is holographic, right? He thought he’d understood that much about the place, beyond that it just didn’t seem to make sense and threatened to blow his mind if he thought about it too much) or else he’d be collecting souvenirs (though it’s tempting to see if he can grab some sort of uniform as cammie-combats and stupid t-shirt don’t sit all that well here). If he’d known the Danger Room was capable of this, then he’d not have left it this long to get down here. Maybe once this exercise is done he can convince Hank to let him…

… ah. Exercise. Right. Back on task, then…

… is that…?

Wow. It takes a lot to keep from actually squeeing out loud once Josh starts talking to Vader, though the weird ‘no… hands off. Mine’ tug which comes with his calling Josh his apprentice helps, as does the whirring of cogs trying to reconcile their previous Yoda banter, and being quote-unquote superheroes, with their being cast as The Evil Empire (c&TM) now.

< … doesn’t that make you the local Sith Lord?
… yeah, that doesn’t initially help much. Though the image of him as a Sith Lord is more than a little amusing, and he stifles a giggle – thanks, Bobby - and tries to look suitably menacing (semi-glare, stereotypical super-villainous planning fingers (c&tm a hundred cheesy cartoons) and so forth) before they’re… running… somewhere.

< knocking people off their feet, freezing people to the wall and floor, that kind of thing…
< Slippery floors and the occasional blinding snow storm ought to slow them down too
… right. Jake’s not really the master of anything here, is he? He can’t cast lightning at people, or throw them into walls, or force choke them… yep, fairly useless, and it’s notable that there’s no real place for him in the masterplan. Which of course suits him just fine – no stranger, Jake, to not being able to do anything useful – but… well, sort of sucks for their team. Yay, dead weight! But whatever. Josh is in charge and all (something about learners, masters and complete circles springs to mind, as it inevitably would here…). And hey, if he gets to stand by and watch, and wherever they’re headed is as complete as this? Win-win situation. So he nods his assent as they reach the shuttle, ponders whether to copy Bobby and take a rifle (… best not, he’d only shoot his foot off), and isn’t disappointed when they arrive stunningly quickly in the middle of a battle between the Rebel Alliance and Imperial Walkers which… wow.

He almost misses Bobby’s suggestion, caught up in the ‘wow’. But… well, it sounds like a plan. In the ‘sounds like something I can get behind’ sense as well as the ‘sounds like he at least sounds like he knows what he’s doing’ (and it’s all sorts of encouraging to hear that from Drake, given how shaken he’s been recently… not that Jake’s claiming any credit for his return to form but… well, alright then, if you insist; it had been him who suggested therapy, after all. Minor point but there you have it…). Maybe they – okay, Josh and Bobby more so than him, but… - can win this thing after all.

”Sure” he nods. ”All we have to do is stop anyone getting to the shuttle… like you said, as long as we keep our flag no one else can win. We time it right, wait for whoever takes the lead to eliminate the other teams and get all the flags in one zone, and then swipe them all in one.” Who said all those sessions in Warsong Gulch when he should have been doing something useful were a waste of time? Though that suggestion’s about as far as ‘Jake the strategist’ goes; he doubts they’d appreciate it if he started talking about Tanking and Pulls and all that sort of stuff (geek…). ”Good suggestion, Bobby.” Jake grins, and gives a characteristically goofish hopefully encouraging thumbs-up, before turning his attention back to Josh with a slight smirk, snapping to something nearer attention. ”Though of course it’s up to you, ‘Darth Impulse’… What are your orders?”

[Bobby Drake]

> " Good suggestion, Bobby. Though of course it’s up to you, ‘Darth Impulse’… What are your orders? "

Bobby is briefly startled as a wave of rebels charge a cluster of Stormtroopers, before he realizes it’s just part of the simulation. It’s hard to tell the two groups apart at first, since the rebels are wearing white uniforms to camouflage against the snow, but it’s clear after a moment from the way they move… the Stormtroopers are armored, a little slower, and a lot less motivated. All of which makes perfect sense until Bobby remembers that it had to be explicitly programmed in. Wow. Hank, you take OCD to a whole new level of brilliance sometimes.

It still feels a little weird being cast as Imperials when Bobby’s sympathies lie with the rebels. He resists the temptation to start taking out Walkers and Stormtroopers while waiting for Josh to make a call – after all, they are presumably part of this Zone’s defense – but he can’t quite bring himself to target the rebels, either. What the hell… it’s just a game, either way. Though he wouldn’t mind giving Luke a serious case of frostbite, if it came to that.

[Josh Dalton Worthington]

Josh blinks and gazes out the window throughout their entire ‘cutscene’. It seems to only take a few seconds, much shorter than an orbit-to-land flight should be. After landing on Hoth, the three of them go jogging off across the snow field. It’s actually much smaller than he’d imagined it would be. I suppose the Death Star area counts as part of the total zone.

> What happens if we play a purely defensive game?

> ”All we have to do is stop anyone getting to the shuttle…

> ”Though of course it’s up to you, ‘Darth Impulse’… What are your orders?”

Alright. Time to make some decisions. Josh chews his lip absently as the three of them make their way to the Neutral Zone gate. If it had been his choice, someone with actual leadership skills, like Bobby or Warren, would be leading the group. When Ororo had announced his name he’d had bad flashbacks to her knockout at the riot. It’s just a game, though! This sets him somewhat at ease, and he contemplates their best strategy.

Bobby’s plan, then... It definitely made the most sense. Between the two of them - and Jake - they’d be able to hold the gate for a long while, especially with Bobby being able to throw up physical roadblocks. I could probably keep John far enough away from his creations, too… Yet there was a bit of nagging doubt. There was just something dissatisfying about playing defense until the end and picking up the pieces. He could envision a scenario where they’d still lose - like if another team had the same idea and charged their gate.

Let’s work with it for now. “Okay, guys. Let’s go with the defensive stance at first. If the situation changes, we can always go on the offense. Bobby, maybe you can throw up some fortifications for us? I’d hate to get in the way of some of the students with projectile powers…” Josh nods at Bobby. “Jake, within rules, any clue on what you can finagle with telepathy? If Nikk or Danny try to teep any of us, our combined strength should knock them on their ass.” He looks up ahead. The gate is set into the side of cliff.

Suddenly, a scream of pain echoes through his mind, and Josh trips in the snow, landing on his knees. The shriek of pain ripples outward from his mind, and travels through his entire body. He gasps, letting out a loud breath. What’s happening to me?

Almost as soon as the question forms in his mind, the mental contact resolves itself into a feeling that’s he’s come to associate with Warren. Josh feels sick to his stomach and moves a hand to the small of his back, as if clutching for something. Warren… There are tears rolling down his face.

Through the tears in his eyes, he stares up at Bobby and Jake. “Something horrible is happening to Warren…” Josh stumbles to his feet and is off like a shot for the area gate. Desperately, he tries to compose his mind for combat.

[Bobby Drake]

> " Let’s go with the defensive stance at first."

Bobby is oddly disappointed by the decision… it’s the right move, strategically, but it’s really not any fun, and he’d been somewhat hoping Josh would decide otherwise. Oh well. That’s what I get for having a smart leader, he thinks, as the rebels blow the Stormtroopers to bits and a new group of Stormtroopers spawns to replace them.

> "Bobby, maybe you can throw up some fortifications for us?"

"We live to serve, Lord Impulse," he responds with a grin. For a second he considers just sealing over the gate, but that might come back and haunt them later if they do have to get out. So he closes his eyes and envisions a series of ice-rings surrounding them, about ten feet tall, with staggered gaps allowing exit and entrance but no clear shot. "This will take a little while…" he adds as he starts leeching heat out of the proper regions of space, creating a single pole of ice that slowly starts to spread in the right direction. "I’ll dome over the inner wall last thing, to keep your boyfriend from dropping rocks on us."

It occurs to him that this is the first time he’s ice-shaped for something other than test-runs and power-exercises since last year, and he’s pleased with the results. He has to pay a lot more attention than he used to in order to keep control of the process, but he gets better at it every week… and this new ice-form of his seems far better suited to channeling cold (or, as Hank would insist, channeling heat). In the old days, he’d have passed out before he was half-way done with this project.

He’s vaguely aware of something happening to Josh, but with his eyes closed and his heat-sense mostly focused on the rings, he doesn’t really notice details. But Josh’s voice catches his attention, and he stops in mid-construction to look around.

> " Something horrible is happening to Warren…"

Um… isn’t Warren on the other team? Bobby discards the thought almost as soon as it occurs to him; from the tone in Josh’s voice this is more than just “game”-horrible. Is something attacking them? Has the Danger Room gone rogue or something? Don’t be silly, Drake, that’s just a Star Trek thing.

He shrugs to Jake. "So much for ‘defensive.’ Oh well… this way’s more fun, anyway." He starts speed-skating after Josh, wondering what’s going on, trying to pay attention to everything in all directions. In retrospect, it occurs to him he should have offered Jake a ride… on the other hand, it’s not all that far to the gate, and telepaths don’t really worry about distance much anyway, right?

[Jake Sheppard]

Jake’s relief at the decision to go defensive rather than attack is in a fairly perfect counterpoint to Bob’s disappointment, though he has nagging doubts of his own – if they’re cast as the Empire, then… doesn’t the script say they lose this battle? In the Capture the Flag scenario it doesn’t really matter, provided they get the rest of the flags, but if Hank’s been this devoted thusfar, sooner or later the Rebel’s’ll get the upper hand, and then… He pushes the doubt to the back of his mind – of course the defenses’ll hold, it’s a damn good plan – and concentrates on Josh’s question as to what he can ‘finagle’.

… hmm. ”Danny and Nikk won’t be a problem – we’ll know before they can do anything much” – false confidence, maybe. But maybe not – so far as Josh is concerned anyway, given the leaps and bounds Josh’s taken under his tutelage, and (moreso, perhaps, because he can’t claim too much credit) the phenomenal natural talent that was there to begin with. Jake turns his mind from outsmarting them in particular to more general teep applications. ”Direct control’s out, right? So it’ll have to be more subtle than that… turn ‘em about a bit – voices an’ flashes an’ stuff, maybe get Bob to shake things up on the non-astral front – flood ‘em with whatever we can throw, get ‘em disoriented enough they’ll be easy pickings for the troops?” Uch, maybe the Dark Side’s the right choice after all, because it’s all a bit brutal, putting colleagues and friends and Ororo, who’s both and neither, but he’s not thinking about that in a place where, to cross verses, they can *die easy*… but such is the nature of the game, right? And they want to win, so… ”Distract, disorient, disrupt. Easy enough… Given time, maybe I could throw up a decent decoy shuttle, but it’s a risk, probably won’t be anywhere near as complete as the rest of the world…”

He’s distracted enough by the planning and scheming, babbling away, that he doesn’t pay much attention to the first ripples of discontent emanating from his *apprentice*, pushing them to the back of his mind, putting them down as just worries about leadership or whatever, nothing that need concern him… Though like Bob he can’t ignore the shout, or the sense that this is more than just the other team getting an ass-kicking wrong. So much for staying put and not getting involved in the skirmishes…

< … this way’s more fun anyway
”Fun’s one word” is about all he can get out before Josh and Bob have outpaced him in their mad dash for the gate, prompting a half-sighed ”Bollocks…” and a blink into slow-time, much to his chagrin. Jake’s secondary power isn’t something he admits to much, nor really enjoys exercising, but such are the demands of the situation. To the others it would seem he’d borrowed Tobias’ gift, appearing next to them just short of the gate and the *no powers* boundary out of breath and mildly dizzy, having sped his relative progression through time enough to catch up with them.

[Warren Worthington III]

(picking up from Neutral Zone)
As he clears Matthew’s back and lands behind him, Warren’s actually surprised that his impromptu bluff worked, and makes a mental note never to try that again with him… next time, Matthew will no doubt refuse to fall for any kind of feint along those lines. Still, it’s gotten him past the immediate obstacle, and he sprints towards the gate.

He’s aware of Rasputin on the other side of Matthew as Storm disengages from Blackburn… Damn, we got separated. He considers doubling back, engaging with Matthew to distract him, but it seems more useful to start the gate cycling; it will take several seconds to open anyway, and the sooner they’re out of the Neutral Zone the better.

He gets two surprises in as many seconds, though – first Blackburn disappears in a corridor of displaced air reminiscent of Smith’s power, and then the gate opens in front of him before he’s even quite reached it. What the…? He’s not sure what just happened, or why, but he doesn’t have to understand it to realize it’s to his advantage. "Follow me!" he shouts to his team before diving through the opening gate.

He’s not entirely sure that’s the best move, since it still leaves Storm and Rasputin in the Neutral Zone with Warhead, who’s pretty formidable. But he’s fairly sure that they can get past him, even if he’s not sure how, and he’ll likely do his team more good by distracting the Green Zone’s defenses so they can come in relatively safely. Micromanaging every move only trains a team to be useless; it’s better to give them the job and trust them to do it. He still feels guilty about leaving them behind, though.

“Intruders!” Warren lets strategic concerns go for a moment and concentrates on evading blaster-fire and, after a second, sprays of quick-hardening ice; he loops high and then drops behind one of the Imperial Walkers to block line of sight momentarily. I sure hope they do it soon, though… I can dodge gunfire all day, but telepaths are a whole different story…

[Bobby Drake]

Bobby nearly skids out in surprise as Jake simply appears out of nowhere as he approaches the gate. "Jesus! Since when can you teleport?!?"

At first he thinks it’s some kind of weird Danger Room trick, but Josh doesn’t seem at all surprised by it. Admittedly, Josh has been pretty single-minded since whatever freaked him out a minute ago, so it’s possible he’s surprised but indifferent…but it’s more likely that Josh knew about this power of Jake’s, it just hasn’t been general knowledge. Man, there should be memos about this stuff!

Well, he knows now, anyway, and it’s better to have the surprise powers on his team rather than the enemy’s… Bobby’s sure he’ll think of ways to use it. Or, rather, that Josh will; Bobby reminds himself a little forcefully that he isn’t in charge of this team.

Not that Josh would object to his making suggestions, of course… quite the contrary, really; if anything, his ex-roommate seems a little reluctant to run the show. Which, Bobby realizes, is actually a problem if Josh’s going to be out in the field: the willingness to follow orders is important, but so is the willingness to take charge, especially for someone like Josh, whose powers make him a natural communications hub.

Listen to you, Drake, he thinks to himself, half-amused… You’re not even on the team yourself anymore, and here you are working out everyone else’s limitations. He blushes a little at the thought, but only a little… he sees what he sees, and it does nobody any good for him to pretend otherwise, even when that includes faults and limitations. And, come to that, it’s not like he spares himself the same evaluation; he understands perfectly well why Ororo took him off the active roster; he’d have done the same thing in her place, and much as he wants to be an X-Man again he knows he’s still got a lot of training to do before he’s ready for it again.

He’s been thinking about that a lot lately, since his initial mutation resurfaced. Ever since the Second Invasion, the connection between the X-Men and the Institute has been something of an open secret among the student body; the resulting hallway and dinner-table conversations about membership have been instructive. At one extreme, there are students who seem outright frightened they might be shanghaied into the team; at the other extreme there are students who seem to consider it some kind of award granted for academic excellence, like a scholarship or some kind of extracurricular program that can go on a college application or something. Bobby can understand the former, sorta; the latter utterly bewilders him. I guess some people can make anything be all about them.

His thoughts are dragged back to the here and now when Josh keys the gate open, and Warren soars in scarcely a second later. What the – Bobby hesitates for a second, remembering Josh’s earlier anxiety about Warren, but the truth is their high-flying enemy seems perfectly fine… and has a well-earned reputation for being awfully sneaky when he neads to be… and does have Rasputin on their team, who Bobby has gathered is a pretty good illusionist. Maybe they’re pulling some kind of telepathic scam on Josh?

For a split-second he considers waiting for additional instructions, but discards the idea; he’s here to defend the zone, after all, and Warren’s fast enough to get past them if they don’t stop him now. So he concentrates for a second, using his arms to guide the flood of slush he fires in Warren’s direction. It’s an embarrassing habit, like needing training wheels on his bike, but he hasn’t re-trained himself out of it yet – and even with the visual/somatic aid, he doesn’t come anywhere near tagging Warren’s evasive maneuvers.

Right. OK, head in the game, Drake… let’s see what we can pull off here. Warren has ducked behind one of the Imperial Walkers, but that doesn’t conceal him from Bobby’s heat-sense; he concentrates on a large spherical area around Warren’s thermal outline, manifesting a sudden snow-flurry that should coat Warren’s wings into relative uselessness.

[Josh Dalton Worthington]

After having hit the door release, Josh positions himself in front of the blast doors, trying to ignore the sounds of battle behind him. None of the Imperial or Rebel troops would target him, so what was the point? Save getting flattened by an AT-AT. Better watch out for that.

He was much calmer at this point. Whoever had caused Warren’s horrific pain would regret stepping into the Danger Room, Josh tells himself with cold anger. He was no longer detecting any pain across their mental link. A second burst of agony had rolled across him a few moments after the first, though. I hope he’s all right…

As soon as the door is halfway open, Warren - wings and all - comes catapulting into the zone. Thank god. Josh breathes a sigh of relief, at least until the stormtroopers open fire. Wait! Is he… Josh opens his mind, transmitting to Warren.

Warren? Warren, are you okay? I felt something horrible… Josh jogs briefly after the other, but Warren’s airspeed quickly outstrips his best efforts. Behind him he senses a strong-willed mind moving closer. Visibility drops as snow begins to fall.

Oh, crap. We’re screwed. He’d nearly forgotten about having to go up against Storm. Josh’s hair begins to stir in the wind.

Change of plans, guys. Head to head with Storm is suicide. Regroup in the Neutral Zone.

[Ororo Munroe]

Making her way around Matthew isn’t particularly difficult. Storm slips by in partial shadow while the younger boy is distracted by the chaos of the rest of the Neutral Zone.

As son as she crosses the threshold into the Sci-Fi Zone, Ororo reaches out with her abilities and begins manipulating the air currents and cloud cover, high above. She was never quite sure how the Danger Room worked, exactly, but somehow it simulated real atmospheric conditions. She couldn’t quite put her finger on it, but a feeling of artificiality permeated it. Which, of course, is because everything is fake. Yet the Danger Room simulated almost everything perfectly, so it was somewhat jarring to detect its shortcomings.

The sky darkens under her control, and snow begins to fall as the wind picks up strongly. “Hey, you! Rebel scum!” A few haphazard blaster shots come in at her from across the field, and Ororo resists the urge to roll her eyes. Hank… you nerd. Storm jumps into the air, lifting herself into the sky with wind currents.

Warren swoops around a walker, and Storm spots Bobby firing slush shots up at him. Fortunately, Warren gets out of the exchange unscathed. Ororo turns her attention to the walker - at least until she detects the rapidly cooling bubble of icy air around Warren. Aha, where are you, my little Iceman…

Ororo spots Bobby more easily than she’d expected to. He stands out fairly well against the surrounding snow. The snow begins falling more heavily, and she directs a current of wind at Bobby, intending to knock him off his feet. Josh, clad in his X-Men gear, stands out completely against the white backdrop as he runs underneath her towards the door. I don't think so...

Storm opens up her powers more fully, catching both Josh and Bobby in an ice-cold gale blast. As they lose purchase on the ground, Ororo reflects that getting stuck in a snowbank, wherever they land, could simply be considered bonus points.

[Nikkolas Blagetovich]

It was a miracle, Warren's little maneuver with Matt was successful. While Matt was distracted with Warren jumping over him and all, Nikk made his get away to the Sci-Fi Zone. Warren had already started the door opening process, so he just ran inside, eager to be able to use his power again. As he was entering, he noticed a battle was going on. A bunch of white armored people were shooting at him and his team. There was also a large metal thing stalking slowly, blasting things. Nikk was confused, since when do they have metal dogs that shoot things? Nikk had no grasp on what Star Wars was or anything like it. All of the attention seemed to be on Warren and Ms. Munroe, that is until some dark cloaked figure with a red energy sword made his way over to the Russian who was trying to sneak around the battle. The figure slowly removed his hood, revealing red skin with black strips blotched on his face, as well as a pair of glowing yellow eyes. The figure sneered at Nikk, revealing a set of jagged yellow teeth. Nikk gave the man/thing a stupid smile, wondering for a second if it was friendly. He quickly came to the conclusion that it wasn't, just like anything else in this damn place. Before the figure could attack, Nikk telepathically melded with him. He could feel strong hate radiating from the being. He didn't like that feeling.

Nikk moved to a hiding place where he'd be safe while his little puppet went off hacking up white armored people with his energy sword. It was an empty trench in the ground. He kept an eye on his team mates as they did their thing. He figured it best if he contacted Warren though, his team leader. Warren, got any orders...As he was reaching out to Warren, he felt Josh's telepathic energy reaching out to Warren; he was trying to talk to him. Oh shit, isn't this the zone with Josh and Jake? He was alarmed, and quickly contacted Storm so that he would have less of a chance of being detected. Ms. Munroe, this is the room with Jake and Josh. I would contact Warren about this, but I think that would expose me. Think you could 'take care' of one of them? Nikk didn't want to 'run into' them on the mental battle field, but he would do what he must.

While waiting for a response from either of his team mates, a sharp mental pain hit him. His little puppet was just beheaded by another who had a green energy sword. His head throbbed in pain as his mental link was abruptly severed. He stayed hidden, taking the minds of some of the white armored people, but making sure that he was doing it very carefully and subtly so that he wouldn't be detected by either of the opposing psychics. Sneakiness was his thing.

[Warren Worthington III]

> Warren? Warren, are you okay? I felt something horrible…

For just a moment, Warren thinks he hears Rasputin’s mental voice before it’s overridden by Josh’s, but it’s gone so quickly he’s not sure he didn’t imagine it, The truth is they probably shouldn’t be communicating like this when they’re leading opposite teams, but Warren doesn’t really care about that.

I’m OK, love. Sucked, but temporary… I’ll tell you about it later, OK? I’ve got a competition to win right now… The laugh doesn’t reach his lips, but is unmistakable in his mind. Seriously, I’m all right... He trails off as the air grows suddenly colder; he becomes aware of Storm’s arrival and Josh’s anxiety all at once, and nods approvingly at the gust of air she sends in the enemy team’s direction.

Meanwhile, the way Darth Maul starts chopping up stormtroopers makes it pretty clear that his third teammate made it into the zone, even though he can’t immediately detect the guy with all the artificial wind blowing around… Excellent; he’s staying out of sight and distracting the enemy. I guess I should get around to doing some of that myself!

A batallion of stormtroopers has circled around to get a shot at him, while the Walker is turning to face its guns in his direction; he pauses about two seconds to get the timing right before divebombing the stormtroopers, pulling out of his dive less than a second before reaching them. Behind him, the Walker fires, and the cascade of energy-blasts passes harmlessly under his boots and not-so-harmlessly into the battalion. "YeeeeeeeHAH!" he shouts exultantly, his pain of a moment before forgotten in the sheer joy of evasive flight.

A moment’s scan of the battlefield makes his next move obvious enough… a brief stretch of level flight and a last-second dive lures an energy-bolt into a crane he’s willing to bet Hank programmed in with just this maneuver in mind; the destroyed crane drops a length of chain he snatches up and twines around the Walker’s legs, crushing the surviving troopers just as a new battalion appears from a previously empty bunker. Right, of course – they respawn, he thinks, annoyed at having allowed himself to become distracted.

"Keep them busy a little longer," he mutters into his communicator. (ordinarily he’d have Rasputin network the three of them, but in a zone with two telepaths the communicator actually seems more reliable), "while I clean out the shuttle, then meet me there!" With that he tears off across the frozen landscape, dodging blaster-fire and the occasional fighter-jet.