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Summary: Xorn has Cloud help Mason with his first Danger Room Session before he joins the team practices. After it's over, Mason learns that Cloud isn't exactly his biggest fan.
Date: Sunday, November 28, 2010. 9:00pm
Log Title: Spider-Man is Mean
Rating: PG-13
Xavier Mansion - Danger Room
A product of Shi'ar technology, the room generates apparently solid, realistic imagery by manipulation high-resolution force fields and holograms. The walls and floor appear as a steel room until a program is turned on. Overhanging the room in the center is a control Room managing the room's mechanisms to oversee the exercise while ensuring the subject's safety.
Xorn stands in the empty Danger Room, awaiting to the students scheduled for a Danger Room session. Hovering in the air a few feet off the ground, sitting Indian style, he is dressed in white Buddhist robes with a red cloak and his signature metal mask containing his awesome powers. Xorn holds a file in his hands as he reads the file on the new student, Mason Steele. He nods his head as he reads and purposely paired him with Cloud Rosen, a mutant he met briefly in Mutant Town. "This should be interesting," a disembodied voice rings out from the Chinese mutant. He looks to the door sensing that they will be arriving shortly and attempting to get an empathic read on them as soon as they enter.
It isn't hard to read Mason's expression as he comes into the Danger Room. He's already found out about customizing his uniform from Robin, his guide for the first couple of weeks, and he has done so. The green and black uniform has been trimmed into a jacket with no shirt. Of course he would have to show off his chest. His legs are green around the codpiece area, and it bleeds into the dark charcoal colors as it ends just below the knees. A pair of boots start where they end, dark green in color to complete the ensemble.
"~Hit me with your best shot! Fire awaaaaay!" he sings aloud as he comes through the door of the Danger Room. He looks around at the room of legends. He is pumped, and it's clear. "Hi, I'm Mason!" he says. The show hasn't even begun, and he already looks like a kid in a candy store.
Cloud has already been working out all day and just as he's about to study like he's supposed to, he gets a call to go to the danger room, it's not even his squads day for practice, he's dressed in his squad uniform, black boots, black jean-like pants and a black t-shirt white the compusery green X on the chest, as he's been told to go to the DR without any energy in his system so he uses up the last of his electricity by superspeeding into the room.
Speaking directly into the minds of the two mutants, Xorn speaks, "Welcome to the Danger Room, Mason. I am Xorn, one of the X-Men. This room will be used to run scenarios where you can train directly in your power usage. You'll be training with your Alpha Squad mate, Rush. For the purposes of training, you will be referred to by your codename, Geo. Any questions before we begin." For those telepathically resistant, it will just appears like Xorn is still hovering there doing nothing.
"I'm Mason," the teen pop star repeats, holding out his hand as if he had no response. He's smile remains pasted on, though behind his eyes he starts to wonder about the masked figure. "Does he not talk or something?" he asks Cloud. "Or, oh, is this part of the scenario? We have to find out how to make him talk?" He pats Cloud on the shoulder without giving an opportunity for response. "Oh, this always works, watch this." The musician holds an invisible microphone, and with great flare begins, ~You've lost, that looovin' feeling. Oooh that looovin' feeling.-" He holds out the invisible mic to Xorn, waiting for him to finish the song. Yes, clearly a master of strategic thinking right here.
Cloud shakes his head, "He's telepathic, that why you can't hear him, cos of the resistance thing," they've been here less then a minute and Mason starts to annoy him, this guy probably has a massive ego, "Xorn, Geo here can't hear you, can you communicate some other way?"
If the mask could show facial expression, Xorn would blink, frown, and then quirk his eyebrow, "I see you have a telepathic resistance." A disembodied voice rings out across the hollow room and echoes back. A sigh can be heard and he repeats, ""Welcome to the Danger Room, Mason. I am Xorn, one of the X-Men. This room will be used to run scenarios where you can train directly in your power usage. You'll be training with your Alpha Squad mate, Rush. For the purposes of training, you will be referred to by your codename, Geo. Any questions before we begin?" He nods a thanks to Rush.
Mason looks around the room, and back to Xorn. "Oh," he answers Cloud. He turns a little red. "Well, don't I feel stupid. Sorry man," he responds to Xorn. "Didn't mean to be ignoring you. I don't really even know what to ask. Can we beat up bad guys now?" To him, this is an advanced videogame. He has no understanding of the purpose of what is going on. "Cloud, you ready to rock their socks off? You're probably way better than me at this, so tell me if there's something I'm doing wrong."
Cloud sighs, man this is going to be trying, why'd Xorn pick him anyway theres plenty of others who could help and who have more paitence than him, he's gonna be so tempted to hit this guy.
"Bad guys? Not quite." The room goes completely black and then the three mutants find themselves standing in what appears to be a construction site, A truck is thrown across towards Mason and Cloud. Xorn opens his mask and the truck suddenly warps around and is crushed by unseen gravimetric forces until it is the size of a lego and absorbed into Xorn. If the two mutants look, they see blackness under the mask as it is closed.
In the background, Spider-Man and Sandman appears to be doing battle. Suddenly the two enemies stop fighting and look at Cloud and Mason. "What are you doing here?" Sandman asks. Spider-Man looks to Mason, "Trying to take my fame away, you lame N-Sync wannabe?" The two stop fighting and rush towards the a giant sand fist coming down on Cloud and web blasts fired at Mason.
The truck is hurtling toward him, and the pop star flinches, expecting to be crushed in moments. But then, Mason's baby blues go wide as Xorn crushes the large vehicle. "Wow," he says, not even paying attention to Spidey and Sandman at first. "That was one of the coolest things I've ever seen." As he turns his gaze toward Spider-man, he gets a little starstruck. But only for a moment.
"N-Sync wannabe?" Mason repeats. "You did not just say that." That's it, Spider-man is a villain for sure. His response to the web, however, is by answering Cloud's attack. He reaches up to where the sand fist is coming down, and makes contact with it, hands outstretched. The fist isn't completely dissolved, but he flings a good portion of it at the incoming web. It doesn't maintain constitution, spreading out as if he had thrown a bucket of sand. The result? He's covered in a sandy, and sticky, web. Wasn't quite the effect he was going for, but it does keep him from being completely immobilized by the webslinger's attack. "Yuck, you snotted on me!" he exclaims, taking the time to try to pull the nastiness off of him.
As the truck is coming towards them, Cloud plans to evade and get Mason out of the way if he doesn't move, but no worries as the truck is destroied, "Huh, spiderman," he can't help but laugh at the 'N-sync' comment, man he should've thought of that, when the sand is coming towards him, he prepares to absorb from the diamond he keeps in his pocket, but Mason stops it, "Stick to your on villan," taking a chance he runs over to the nearest power outlet and begins absorbing his eyes glowing yellow.
"Pay Attention!" a voice rings out from Xorn's area. Spider-Man follows through attempting to pounce on Mason and punch and kick the teen pop sensation, "Pop sucks! Now gimme Black Sabbath or Metalica anyday now!" A masked man with wearing a leather jacket and jeans comes running from the site, "What they hell are you guys doing here!" An enraged Rage starts running towards the trio of mutants fists pumped and ready to pound on whoever is closest to him, which is Xorn who makes no move to counter.
Sandman pauses a moment as his fist dissolves. He stares where his hand was and reforms a new hand. "Metal rules!" He dissolves into the ground and suddenly sand hands reach up from where Cloud is standing and grabs his feet.
"Whatever!" Mason retorts. As Spider-man comes flying toward him, he answers by…standing still. He puts one foot back to absorb the impact, and then swings a powerful arm to return the attack. Mason is very solid, and it appears that moving him from where he's standing isn't as easily done as said. "Michael Jackson, baby!" His fist is gauged to meet Spider-man's chest, but while he has a punch that might give Spider-man cause to flinch, Mason finds that he's not nearly as solid as he believed in his head. He goes sliding back along the concrete. He looks around at what he has at his disposal. He coughs, as he gets back to his feet. To take a blow from Spider-man and get back up says something for his resiliance. Still, that really hurt.
He picks up a slab of concrete to try his powers out. To his surprise, he can actually lift it. A sly smile creeps across Geo's face, and he spins once, and then flings it like a frisbee. The square piece of stone flies forward toward Spidey, and he continues the banter. "On second thought, just give me that old time Rock'n'Roll! Augh! I used a pun! Spider-man is contagious!" He hasn't noticed Rage's entrance yet. He's pretty focused on Spider-man.
Cloud grins as he feels the buzz from the electricity surging though his body, as he feels something grabbing his feet he superspeeds away towards where Mason is dealing with Spiderman and Rage, spiderman and sandman are dangerous enough, the third guy is gonna push things too far, he speeds infront of Rage and reaches out to touch the man's face.
Spidey easily dodges the punch and stone slab and as it passes webs it up and returns it back to Mason, "How about just a rock?" Spidey jumps to follow up should Mason dispose of the slab, Spidey is ready to kick the pop star in the face. Rage runs into Cloud directly into Cloud's open hand. Sandman's hand dissolve and then Xorn appears above him and he opens his mask as a sand is sucked into the blackhole that makes up Xorn's head.
Rage runs into Cloud directly into Cloud's open hand. Sandman's had dissolve and then Xorn appears above him and he opens his mask as a sand is sucked into the blackhole that makes up Xorn's head.
Sandman's had dissolve and then Xorn appears above him and he opens his mask as a sand is sucked into the blackhole that makes up Xorn's head.
Mason doesn't have time to think. He doesn't really understand his powers yet, so he's trying to improvise as he goes. He ducks beneath Parker's kick, and stomps the ground as he lands. His hope was that the ground would leap up and clobber the incoming Spider-man. But what does happen is…nothing. He looks at the ground, trying to get a moment to think. "Okay, earth is my tool. Um…I used the slab, I used the sand, why didn't that work?" He backpedals, and sees some rubble. He scoops up a handful of the pebble sized rocks, and flings them forward in a spread.
The small rocks hurtle toward Spiderman. Not necessarily so fast they couldn't be dodged, but there's enough of them over a wide spread, he hopes that it'll make it a bit more challenging. Still, they are only pebbles, and while they may smart, they aren't likely to stop a superhero of Spider-man's caliber.
Cloud generaly isn't a fan of this aspect of his powers, but Geo is very new to this, there are three bad guys, plus Cloud is already pretty tried for working out all day, so his aim is to get Rage out of the fight, when Rage makes contact with his hand he starts absorbing.
Spider-Man leaps over and dodges as many of the pebbles, but some do connect and cause some discomfort. Spider-Man stops his attack and looks at the pebbles, "Pebbles? Really? What's next bam bam?" He lets loose and wide netting of his webbing and launches it towards Mason
Rage lets out a loud yell as he feels himself literally being drained of his strength by Cloud. He howls out and drops to his knee. Sandman is all but gone as like the truck he is disappeared into the void that is Xorn.
Geo doesn't have much defense, nor the reflexes needed to get out of the way of the web, and takes the web straight on. He finds himself plastered against the ground, with very little answer that he can give. Or…can he? As the boy's hands are flat against the ground. Mason grits his teeth, and balls them into fists. He feels the ground beneath him respond, and he's holding two rocks that fit perfectly into his grip. "Wow, that's pretty cool," he says. He forces them back into the concrete, and start to try to formulate some solutions with his newfound options.
As Cloud gets a sudden wave of Rage's personality, he starts feeling VERY pissed off, and Rage is still conscious?, well he can fix that, reaching into his pocket he absorbs from the diamond in his pocket, his body, clothes and hair take on a diamond-like quality, he then proceeds to start punching Rage with the aim of knocking him unconscious.
The Rage that rage feels is gone as is his being conscious. Blow after blow, Rage finally falls over and succumbs to the attack by Cloud. Xorn having finished off Sandman hovers over to Cloud, "I sense the boy's emotions in you. I suggest a moment to gather your thoughts." Looking over at Mason, "Geo will be fine. Let him finish this fight."
Spider-Man stands over Mason, "Cute trick, but face it, like your music, you suck!" Spider-Man turns to face Cloud and Xorn launching more web netting towards them.
There's a certain boil behind Mason's eyes. He doesn't like being bashed. His hands fan out, and the concrete separates, tearing the webs away from them, since they were anchored to the ground. He pulls across the ground with his hands, not getting up yet. The ground beneath Spidey's feet suddenly slips beneath him, as if somebody had pulled a rug out under his feet. It's at that point that Mason clambers back to his feet.
The new traits are fresh in Cloud's mind so they're pretty overwelming especialy the rage, so while Rage may be done, Cloud isn't, instead he continues punching the man at full force.
As Spider-Man makes his way towards Xorn and Cloud, he is suddenly tripped up by Mason's trick, "What the?" He turns and leaps up onto some scaffolding and then launches himself towards Mason
As Cloud continues to pound away on Rage, Xorn moves to Cloud and touches his shoulder a sudden shift in gravity and Cloud will feel weightless and may sense a strong sudden overwhelming sickness.
Just as Cloud's just starting to enjoy himself he feels a wave of sickness along with a conplete lack of gravity, "What are doi…" he gives up as the sickness really starts to effect him.
"I am sorry, Cloud. I know this is only a simulation, but you are filled with his rage. Not a good place to be." Xorn speaks directly into Cloud's mind. Meanwhile Spider-Man easily flips and avoids the concrete in an impressive acrobatic display and lands with legs bent and shoots two webs each towards Mason's legs.
Mason's legs are already on the ground, since he hasn't gotten up from the last time he got webbed. But he hasn't found them to be all that useful to him anyway. "Geez, how do you do that?" he asks. The terrakinetic sits up, and then slaps the ground with his hands. It makes a spiderweb crack along the ground, and he gets to his feet, web and rubble hanging from his legs. "This is a lot messier than I thought it'd be." He eyes the masked hero, trying to figure out how he can attack someone who moves with such a level of agility.
The shock sort of brings Cloud back to his senses, "Ok, right i get it, i gotta stay calm, now let me go and help Mason." He's still full of electricity, that could distract spiderman long enough to give Mason a chance to hit him.
"Very Well. This will feel uncomfortable." Xorn speaks directly into Cloud's mind. A sudden rush of gravity returns to Cloud. It like walking into a wall. Turning to see the battle, Xorn watches as Spider-Man. "Enough of this!" The arachnid hero and leaps forward again ready to smash through anything to get to Mason.
Mason decides that waiting for the attack seems to lend itself better, since when Spidey is in the air, it's harder to change trajectory. This time, he responds by pulling some of the webbing with rock chunks from his legs, and meeting the leap with a makeshift cat of nine tails. It swings forward with great power to meet the incoming Spider-man.
As soon as Cloud recovers from the wall hitting sensation he sees Mason's attack, he fires a blast of electricity to the side of Spiderman, aiming to make it harder to avoid Mason's attack.
Xorn watches the tactic to the Alpha Squadron male mutant take and nods his head at the teamwork. Spider-Man sensing both attacks decides to take the shot from Mason so he aptly dodges the electricity but his head is smashed by the swinging make-shift cat of nine tails. Spider-Man falls to the ground in front of Mason holding his head.
Mason doesn't waste any time, but follows his first attack with a second. His foot comes up and is brought down with a heavy pound toward the chest of the webslinger. "And for your information," he growls. "I get my inspiration from George Gershwin, the greatest American musician ever born!" This music insult thing seems to have him rather put off, even though it's just a simulation.
"It's a simulation blondie, it doesn't care who George Gershwin is." Cloud fires another couple of blasts either side of Spiderman so that if he does recover before Mason hits him, he has limited escape options.
"Kick a man while he is down, interesting tactic," A voice rings out from Xorn. Spider-Man lets out a loud howl as he is stomped out and then he turns over to be struck by the electric blast and suddenly falls limp.
The lights suddenly go black and the three mutants appears on the original empty hollow Danger Room, "You won." Xorn's voice says simply.
Mason feels the webbing and rocks disappear from his grasp and from clinging to his legs. "Wow," he says, examining himself as the lights come back up. "None of the dirt stayed or anything," he comments. He looks at where Spider-Man had been. "I guess. I felt kind of like a bully though," he says. "I mean, he was down, and we just kept hitting him." It bothers the musician to think that he had that in him. In fact, it looks like it drifts his mind elsewhere.
Cloud relaxes as the scene reverts back to normal, "We completed the objective, you gave no condition about being honorable about it, Spiderman is much more expirienced than we are, our way he wasn't able to retaliate," either way it was a simulation, they can be as violent as they want, theres no real world consequences.
"Well not necessarily, Cloud. Mason is right to note how he felt. You are right about this simply being a simulation, but the emotions he is feeling are real to him. And he should contemplate his actions." Xorn offers the two. "I must go myself and contemplate the actions that have occurred. However, Mason, Cloud is right. You won and survived your first Danger Room scenario. Congrats." Xorn then exits the Danger Room.
Mason raises his brow, and wipes some sweat from his forehead. "Sure, thanks," he says to the strange X-man. The pop star's gaze follows Xorn as he opens the door to the Danger room and passes through it. After he leaves, Mason looks back at Cloud. "Is it just me, or that guy creepy as hell?" he asks.
Cloud shrugs, "I don't really notice creepy things anymore, after a cirtain point here they become the norm", plus Cloud could be seen as creepy himself with the whole life sucking thing, "You should learn more about your powers, next time it may not be a simulation, trust me I know."
"Yeah, that was the first time I've ever used them," Mason confesses. "I was always too afraid to try them out before. You never know when some camera is trained on you from a distance. A fan, or a reporter, or whatever." He looks around the Danger Room. It seems so much smaller without the scenario running. "I don't know if I could use my powers outside of here though," he states. "I mean, what if somebody saw?"
"Just before I came here I sucked the life out of a guy at a party, and when I go home I'm still real popular, but that's me, your crowd is much more superficial i'm guessing," Cloud is bending the truth slightly, it did happen, just no one figured out what happened, "You're a mutant now, you're old life is over."
Mason shoots a rather warning looking glare back at the other mutant. "I've been a mutant since I was born," he responds. "I manifested over a year ago." A long time to not experiment with his powers. "And thanks for calling everybody I know superficial, that was a nice touch," he adds with sarcasm. "It's not the people I know, it's the thousands of people I don't know, but know me. There's fans out there who know my blood type," he gives as an example. "It's showbiz, and you have to give up everything else to maintain your image. It's not as easy as it looks on TV. You wouldn't understand." It's a lot of pressure.
"Awww, is the poor little pop star's life that hard, man i know nothing about stress, i may have spent seventeen years trying to live up to the reputations of four older brothers and my dad, while having to deal with the issue that people find it very hard to take me seriously, yeah, i don't know stress", Cloud is really starting to dislike Mason.
Mason eyes Cloud. "What is it with you, man?" he asks, "What'd I do to you, anyway? You hardly know me." He paces back toward Cloud, closing the distance to an arm's reach. "I'm not tryin' to be your enemy. I'm just trying to figure out stuff like you. I didn't say you didn't know anything about stress. I said you wouldn't understand what it means to live under a microscope watched by half of America."
Why is Cloud mad at Mason, hmm maybe it's because Mason is complaining about living out his dream. Up until he found out he was a mutant he was on the way to living out his, he was a brillient quarterback and was looking at a scholorship and eventually the chance to play profesionally, but since the mutant thing, his life is over, or maybe it's cos the guy seems overly stuck up or maybe cos he started hitting on his sister in front of him, "Look if you can't figure it out, you're not worth dealing with".
Mason doesn't move. He stands between Cloud and the door, the pretty boy blue eyes staring back into Cloud's. "Well, I'm right here, and you are gonna have to deal with it. So why don't you spell it out for me?" He knows nothing of Cloud's history, only that he met him the other day, and he doesn't like him. Mason really can't handle people not liking him.
Cloud clenches his fists, "You don't wanna get in my way Blondie, you've only seen part of what i'm capable of." Cloud's not really gonna harm Mason, the amount of damage he did to Rage did actually freak him out a little, "Just get out of my way, I don't like you and I really don't feel like explaining it."
The comment from Cloud causes Mason to hesitate. He's not the greatest fighter, and he really wasn't paying much attention to what Cloud was doing during the fight, which puts him at an even greater disadvantage. He studies Cloud's eyes for a long moment. "I feel like having it explained," he answers finally, not moving. "If there's something I can do to fix whatever it is, I want to fix it, okay?" Mason's tone becomes a little softer. "I'm just getting to know you, and there's no point in starting out like this. Just…I just want a chance to make whatever it is right."
Cloud nods, "All right, you're arrogant, clearly in love with yourself, your complaining about living out you dream, plus you started hitting on my sister while I was there, want me to continue?" It probably would be simpiler to hit him, stupid morals.
Mason seems taken aback. "In love with myself?" he asks aloud. It seems that he doesn't view himself as in love with who he is. "I really come across that way?" If anything he feels the reverse. "I wasn't really hitting on her," he says. "I was just flirting a little, you know? I'm sorry. I don't want to disrespect her, or you. You're a good brother to stick up for her." Still, he's not sure how to handle the first half of the accusation.
"Yeah dude, you really do, and I say that after dating Cheerleaders." Cloud really can't be asked to explain this, surely someone must've said his to the boy before, though he was probably paying too much attention to his reflection at the time.
It appears to be news to Mason. "Well," he says, shrugging uncomfortably. "I'm sorry," he says. "I'll try to mellow out some." He has no idea what that will look like, but he finds it best to put forth the effort. "For the record, I am most definitely not in love with myself." He leaves the statement at that, giving no further context. The teen looks nervous, and clenches one fist to keep his hand from twitching. "I gotta go, I just…don't write me off, I'm not just some shallow pop star." He doesn't leave room for an answer, but instead rushes out of the room, refusing further eye contact.