17802/Alaskan Airdrop

Alaskan Airdrop
Date of Scene:	28 April 2024
Location:	A remote part of Alaska.
Synopsis:	A job to investigate an underground facility turns unexpectedly awful, pushing the team into action.
Cast of Characters:	Neena Thurman, Clarice Ferguson, Laura Kinney, Rachel Summers

Neena Thurman has posed:
Calls out of the blue from a known mercenary and trouble-magnet, what could possibly go wrong? Each of the three mutants present had been reached by Domino individually through whatever connections were available. The promise of money may have been involved. Perhaps it was a favor or an offer to get out and get the blood flowing, theirs or something else's. Secret military this, illegal experiments that, it's a tired old story but one destined to forever be repeated. Whatever might entice them to join her and a growing group of misfits on a ride...to Alaska.

Providing transportation with the old chopper are identical mutant twins going by Greg and Gerg. They're a little on the short side with rounded faces, short but bushy mustaches, and olive green skin. Their form of in flight entertainment involves corny jokes, bad puns, and an exchange of "I want to be Greg today" followed by "You were Greg yesterday!"

They're harmless, really.

As they fly up to the ass end of a very cold state the notice for their upcoming drop is given, the internal lights going red as the cargo ramp starts to lower. The frigid blast of wind immediately fills the chopper, flying high enough to clear the heavy snow-filled clouds closer to the ground.

Domino, wearing so much white as to look like a comic panel which hadn't yet reached the colorist's desk, shifts goggles from forehead to eyes and moves to look out the back of the helo where absolutely nothing can be made out of the landscape below. Turning to Blink, she presses "You HAVE done this before..?"

There's always the parachute option (or maybe Rachel?) but if a teleporter can get the job done, you may as well take the teleporter.

"Alright, on my mark" she says then turns back to look outside to the gloomy morning day. What exactly they're all waiting for seems known only to the organizer of this raiding party who is visibly concentrating...

Her hand drops onto Clarice's shoulder. "Now, go!"

Clarice Ferguson has posed:
Some people would have to think twice when notorious trouble-magnet Neena Thurman calls up out of the blue to offer a job. Clarice might even be one of those some people most days. But she did nearly bowl over the dynamic Domino recently when Deadpool was... doing whatever the hell all that craziness was. So she figures she owes the albino merc a freebie.

Plus they're friends! Or at least as friendly as Clarice really gets with anyone. She's not exactly a social butterfly, and when you live on an orbiting asteroid, even with teleporting abilities, a quick jaunt for coffee seems to always be just a /bit/ too much trouble to suggest.

But hey, this isn't coffee. Clarice didn't even think to bring a Thermos of the asteroid's totally rockin' hazelnut caramel blend. Mainly because she spent a lot of time rummaging around for something a little more suited to traipsing about the tundra of Alaska than a green dress with dramatic hip-high slits up the sides and an almost backless top.

Frostbite is the real enemy, kids.

Blink's not going to dwell on the fact that she's signed on to ride in a chopper that's older than she is, piloted by a pair of twins that are giving her some real big Bob's Burgers flashbacks.

"Burgers! We should go for burgers after this. Good ones."

Green eyes flick to Domino and she grins wide, "What? Portal'd a striketeam out of a helicopter? ...I mean, not really. Portal'd a strike team? Sure. Portal'd some military troops out of a helicopter? Hell yeah."

She clears her throat, "I mean, the strike team was fine. The... guys in the helicopter situation...?" She shrugs lightly. There's not really a polite way to explain away how they were hostiles. Or how she portal'd them to 'directly above the rotors'. But hey, she /seems/ confident in this. "Oh! We're just going to want to like... have the portal a little below us and to the side. You're all gonna want to jump into it. And it's roller coaster rules. Keep your hands INSIDE the ride!"

Blink's focused, lips pressed into a thin line until Neena gives the go order, and a whirling pink-edged portal blossoms into life just feet outside the helicopter's door, angled down and away from the helicopter.

The fact that the ring of energy shows a view that's clearly a couple of feet off the ground and level with the terrain below is probably only /moderately/ disorienting for anyone who isn't Clarice. For her part, the pink 'porter just steps out and sort of falls forward so she's 'stepping' through the portal and the added momentum of that brief 'fall' has her jogging forward, head already on a swivel.

Laura Kinney has posed:
Laura's a hard woman to get in contact with but for those in the know there are ways and means. Dead drop message sites in hollowed out library books. Cryptic classified adverts in newspapers. Sometimes even a radio broadcast with a series of numbers ala a cold war era numbers station. She might be paranoid but there really are people out to get her. So it's justified!

Also Rachel knows her telephone number. But that's far less fun.

Secret illegal military experiments are enough to get her interest though. There's always a chance there could be links to the people she's hunting. And revenge motivates in a way money never could.

X-23 doesn't go in for superhero suits. Instead she's got military artic cameo gear. Picked to be suitable for the region. Pouches with ammo, explosives, rations and weapons. Silenced handguns, throwing knives, and a drum fed automatic shotgun.

Given the missions mysterious nature the former assassin remains largely silent for the ride. Studying maps of the region and committing as much detail as possible to memory. It doesn't hurt to plan the route you'll need to hike home for if the teleporter takes a hit. Except maybe for Blink. But shhh what she doesn't know won't hurt her.

If she found the portal process disturbing there's little sign of it when she appears on the ground. Weapon raising even as she sniffs the air. Her other enhanced senses listening out for anything too. The hum of power lines outside typical hearing ranges. Broken branches that might indicate a regularly used trail. Even subtle things like a slight depression in the snow caused by a buried heat source.

"Anything in particular we're looking for?" she wonders. It might be the first words she's said since the helicopter ride began. "Other than burgers that is."

Rachel Summers has posed:
Rachel Summers, being from a dystopian future where the universal currency was 'the ability to not sleep in a potchmarked shithole for a single day,' doesn't really have the greatest concept - or care - of how money works. It's all pretty exhausting and arbitrary to her. Favors are nice and more easily grasped but she has enough on her hands dealing with aiding Genoshan reconstruction that it's not the hard sell.

The tired old story of crushing secret military this, illegal experiments that, though?

That's her jam.

The spiky psychic - dressed in what looks like a snow white and red version of her be-spiked trenchcoat attire, for thematic unity - has spent most of the chopper ride to her distant fatherland of Alaska mostly engaged in a very flat-toned, very -involved- conversation with Greg and Gerg on the mechanics and rules of how the mutant twins decide who gets the vaunted title of Greg and who must suffer the fate of Gerg on any given day.

Her perfect mastery of the art of deadpan presentation makes it very difficult to tell if this is a serious conversation on her part or if she's just playing the role of a living shitpost, but, well: if nothing else, considering how long the conversation's been going, she commits to the bit. So maybe the answer is just 'both.'

She's about to offer suggestions on which to make their process both more efficient AND fair when their arrival to the mission destination cuts her off with perfect (superhumanly lucky...?) timing. Green eyes blink, looking back over her shoulder towards Domino, Laura and Blink. A second passes.

And then they'll all feel a little crackle like the comfortable, relaxing warmth of a hearth buffeting at the backs of their minds as she speaks her next thoughts directly into their brains:

< We're all linked up. You're good to go, Spot. >

Rachel stands up. Rolls one shoulder, then the next. Upnods to Greg and Gerg.

"You two are alright," she off-hands to them. "Later Greg. Later Gerg." And somehow gets it -perfectly right- the way it's -supposed to be today-.

Psychics, man.

With that, she makes her way towards the back of the rickety helicopter, her psychic presence in the others' mind an unobtrusive kindle as she gets ready. Feeling the vibrations thrum all throughout her from the soles of her feet to the tips of her fingers as the door hatch opens, a telekinetic field protects her from the burst of frigid air, little astral flames licking around her body and billowing around her hair as the winds rush all around her without actually touching her.

Again: psychics, man. Just unfair.

She waits until Blink has made her little list of caveats and conjured the portal before she positions a very slow, sidelong look Neena's way.

"Gosh," she begins, in NO way sarcastically, "that sounds promising."

Despite that, there's a grin on her lips and a fire in green eyes as the portal opens. She doesn't so much leap at the portal as she does -float- at it, offering telekinetic tweaks to the others to make sure they get in and get out the other side with all their limbs intact on the ride down.

< Burgers on Spot's tab? Sounds great to me. >

Psychics, etc etc.

< Scanning for signs of mental activity. Let's see what we've got here... >

Neena Thurman has posed:
Blink will of course get a flat look from the goggled albino, not having to say the words 'Not. Helping.' for the message to get across nice and clear. So! Try not to think about the chopper. Try not to think about the twins flying the chopper. Try not to think of the mutant abilities portaling them OUT of the chopper. And they haven't even gotten started yet!

It's going to be a good day. With burgers. Good burgers.

Rachel is given a look before they're 'out the door' as well. "Oh shut up, you'll be fine."

As the portal opens and its creator shows them how it's done Dom gives a subtle one-shoulder shrug and follows suit, out of the air and directly into the snow. As far as landings go it's pretty darn soft thanks to all of the ground covering. A quick radio to the pilots they've safely touched down and those with superhuman hearing will hear their ride departing the scene for now.

< Keep your mental hands off my tab, Red > comes the deadpanned return shot, though there's a touch of amusement to be found in her thoughts. Banter, every mission also needs good banter.

What are they looking for? "A back entrance" she replies, as if it couldn't possibly be any more cryptic. To anyone keeping score it looks like they just bailed out in the middle of the freaking wilderness, quite possibly a week's hike to the nearest cabin if not longer. There's rocky overhangs buried under the drifts which help to shield some of the wind but would prove to make overlanding all the more difficult.

But Laura's a sharp cookie, in more ways than one. A faint vibration through the rocky ground underfoot. A whiff of something metallic, not anything carried by the present team. It's close.

Close enough that when the albino grabs a rock and flings it at a snowy part of a natural rock wall there's a hollow *Gunk!* with the impact, knocking a bunch of snow away to reveal a reinforced steel door.

Dom looks to Laura and dips her head toward it in an 'after you' motion. "Claws and healing factors get point" she says with a smile.

Clarice Ferguson has posed:
Blink's gone for tactical chic, or... possibly, she raided Mystique's wardrobe up on the asteroid, because black turtleneck and leggings with narrow profile boots aren't exactly the kind of flash she usually goes for. But when all of your training is based on your powers, or on nimble, athletic motion, a parka and snowpants just won't work.

Also, if she ruins them, she'll just give Mystique the ol' wide-eyed apologetic stare and hope it works.

Really, with Laura's loadout, and Neena's arsenal, she's kind of thinking she needs to start bringing along throwing knives. Maybe ask Logan or Betsy Braddock or some other sword-wielding badass to give her some lessons. Sure, her javelins can literally teleport someone's heart out of their chest. But like... swords are /cool/.

She glances over her shoulder at Laura with a wry little grin, "Diesel fuel? I mean, they probably have a generator, of course out here there's probably a bunch of survivalist nuts too, so..." She frowns thoughtfully, "Big Sentinel painted in winter camo? ...Why /are/ they always purple?"

The last is under her breath, and only /mostly/ a genuine question that she's never considered before.

Rachel earns a longer little glance as that crackling sensation runs down Clarice's spine, and, she worries, partly through her soul. Telepathy. She's not totally ignorant of it.

But she's really more of like, a distant friend of a friend of the family to the X-People, and the Brotherhood hasn't got a lot of telepathic horsepower, so she's not used to being able to just 'think' her radio communications.



And then Neena's just... throwing a rock and hitting the jackpot.

"Or that." Whoops! Did she say that or think that?

She's not going to ask.



She's /sure/ she thought that.

Laura Kinney has posed:
"Probably there was a committee filled with hired consultants who did consumer focus testing," Laura muses. Responding to Blinks whispered question because with her ears it might as well have been spoken aloud! "Big military projects have so many pointless consultants there to siphon money away however they can." A beats pause. "Or the purple paint was cheapest."

She shrugs when Domino volunteers her for point woman. She prefers to roam ahead anyway. "Are we going in loud or trying to keep things quiet as long as possible?" One hands claws popping with that distinctive SNIKT noise. "I can probably disable any security on the door or I could just..."

The petite mutant mimes a slicing motion. Her claws will open a steel door like it's not even there.

The mind link makes team communication much easier than subvocal microphones and hand signals. Thankfully she's had enough practise she can mostly tune out the various musing on how best to eliminate her team mates.

Less thankfully is everyone gets to share in her delight at the smell which builds as she closes. Something rancid leaking through the seals around the door. Spoilt meat. <You're going to want to order a veggie burger after this.> It's the sort of smell which answers her question for her. Speed over stealth. People don't tend to care about the alarms when their facility smells like it's gone off.

A sweep of those blades simply opens a person sized hole up. A kick and the cut out section falls inward with a dull thud. Revealing an inside that's neglected. Flickering lights. Stairs heading deeper beneath the ground to areas barely lit by red emergency lighting.

<Still better than Gotham sewers.>

Rachel Summers has posed:
Keep your mental hands off my tab, Red.

Rachel's rebut is the flash of heat in Domino's mind imparting the psychic equivalent of a wink before they disappear through a pretty pink portal.

< But it's such a nice tab. >

Flame tongues paths of psychic heat off Rachel's shoulders as she emerges from that portal and just kind of... stops, an inch or two off the snow, because who would voluntarily trudge through entire inches of snow if they had the ability to bypass it entirely? Short red hair floats within Rachel's own TK field as she keeps scanning, serving as scout and spotter for the team to make sure they're not ambushed -- or, well, ambushed by anything with a living, mental impression.

"The first ones were red and blue," she remarks in a physical if distant way to Blink and Laura's musings on the coloration of the Sentinels. "The idea was to make them stand out. It wasn't an efficiency thing: they wanted bright, contrasting colors. Colors you'll remember.

"They wanted us to know they were coming and we couldn't do anything about it."

Rachel knows a lot about Sentinels; speaks from personal experience. Personal experience that she works very, very hard to keep out of the tone of her voice.

With Domino being helpfully vague, Rachel just artfully rolls her eyes and focuses on her scouting. Laura scents out the way out; Domino just kind of stumbles into the entrance they need. Rachel smirks and begins to queue up a teasing jab of, "Your powers are such bullshit--"

-- which is when she catches something. She blinks. Dark red brows furrow as the mental impressions of Laura's senses trickle into her brain's neural pathways. And as Laura takes point, as a foul and familiar scent races its rancid route through her senses to fill her neurons with the olfactory sensation of rotting meat, Rachel's thoughts reverberate guardedly through their minds:

< I've got something. But there's something... weird about these mental signatures. Be careful; I'm not really sure what I'm seeing here... >

Rachel's dark red lips twist as her telekinetic field bolsters around her in cautious preparation.

(She seems to psychically agree about Gotham sewers, at least.)

Neena Thurman has posed:
It's a rare event to catch Domino completely off guard but one thought comment from Rach and the telepath scores the first point. It's accompanied with a bit of the albino mentally tripping over herself in search of a response which never quite materializes.

Helpfully, there's Sentinel talk. "Maybe one of the designers thought purple would seem less threatening to everyone they /aren't/ trying to capture or kill" Dom considers in a sour note. "Ah, there it is. Cost-cutting measure. But hey, ask 'em if you ever get the chance. It might come up on trivia night, you never know."

Then Rachel comes in like a damn historian, causing a white on white hand to flip upward in a 'there you go' motion. "Damn psychic know-it-alls" she mutters.

With the psi-link established and Blink already testing the waters a fleeting thought passes through the palest one's mind. Did she just assemble a team full of people who hate having someone speaking directly into their minds? Really, like what are THOSE odds looking like? Hah. Not a chance.

A sheepish smile slips across blacked out lips, there and gone in a hurry as Clarice's next comment effectively clears the slate. With the teleporter's thought comes an amused *snrk*. < Crowds as big as six! >

But thinking of bigoted crowds... A dark cloud settles over Dom's mind. Quite recent memories. Not good memories. The kind of stuff she tries to shut herself out from.

There's a few more timely distractions, the first being a call from Red about bullshit powers which /just/ about has Dom smiling like a damn Cheshire Cat when Laura gets the door open, curiously without any alarms going off, but with an ugly truth hitting everyone present. The air /reeks./ Like someone opened up a long dead freezer filled with nothing but meat.

< God...DAMN I never get used to that smell > Dom gripes with a wrinkling of nose, already filling gloved hands with a suppressed MP5. < Did someone already clear this place out? The deets were fresh, no question... Go for it, X. We've got your six. >

When the team has a murder-happy bulletsponge it seems to work out in everyone's favor to let them go ahead.

Rachel is given a lingering look here. If there's that much death which hadn't been cleaned up in a while, what are the chances of something still being /alive/ down there? Pretty high as it turns out with Red picking up 'something.' Multiple somethings.

As with most top secret installations they never build anything close to the ground which means delving deeper into the dark stinky unknown. Something's still providing heat to the facility so they aren't freezing while breathing in the rank air.

By the time they reach the bottom-most landing there's more to be concerned about, the clear marks of bloodied handprints having tried to grab onto the railing before being pulled back down the stairs and deeper into the hall. This short story comes to its end in the form of decaying meat and gnawed upon bones. Human remains, complete with bloodied and tattered clothes. What used to be a white labcoat stands out most of all.

< Not gonna say the bastard didn't get what's coming to him but this raises a few more questions. Stay sharp, team. >

Clarice Ferguson has posed:
Blink heaves out a sigh, "Probably. I mean, as someone who, in the right light, is purple-adjacent? Not really a big fan of the design on an aesthetic level." She clicks her tongue and trails off, rather than vocalize her opinion on the whole 'Killer robots designed to genocide her people' thing. It literally goes without saying.

There's a brief little rankle in Blink's brain as not only is whoever's behind this torturing people and generally being the kind of asshole who needs immediate, arguably brutal killing... but guh. The /smell/.

Her thoughts across the psychic link aren't even verbal, just a recoiling absolute repulsion. Maybe she's been pampered by asteroid air recyclers and the garden up in orbit. Flowers are so much better.

And then Laura's got the door open and... that's not making the smell any better. Gas mask. Next time Clarice agrees to jaunt along with Neena to the, apparently literal, ass end of Alaska? She's bringing a gas mask and a flamethrower retrofitted to spray flammable Febreze.

On the plus side, Rachel's tagging along and the psychic brain powers? Means they can communicate without her having to open her mouth.

"Goddamn!" ...Yeah, she couldn't hold back to just think that. Despite her previous life as a child soldier-slash-assassin, you don't actually run into piles of bloody used-to-be-human that often as a Mutant Freedom Fighter.

Still, with the dark and dank of the stairwell, Blink thinks to add a little illumination.

Or at least, the twin darts of glowing pink energy that materialize in her fists /also/ give off suitable light for investigation and navigation.

< Well, looks like whatever they've been up to went a little sideways. Anyone else get the feeling it's less 'righteous angry' sideways and more... murder monster? >

But for all the banter, and for all the confidence being in the midst of her fellow badass mutants gives her, Clarice is beginning to withdraw from banter and playfulness to the Bad Old Days... well, not that bad, she figures. After all, she survived them, even if a lot of people she was sent up against didn't.

And she's got a feeling whatever did this, whoever they used to be, they're not going to be the 'Talk it out and express their feelings' sorts now.

Laura Kinney has posed:
<If I had to guess. Something went very wrong with whatever experiment they were doing.> Laura thinks over the link as she ranges ahead of the group. Retracting her claws in favour of the shotgun. <And someone locked the doors sealing anyone who was still alive in with whatever they made. What's less clear is if it started eating people before or after.> She's such an optimist at heart. Almost as an afterthought she glances back at Blink. <You've got ear protection right? This could get very loud.>

Automatic shotgun. Enclosed spaces... She'll be fine. Probably Domino carries enough guns to be prepared. And Rachel can probably just cheat with TK to fix herself. Leaving Clarice as the one suffering.

Reluctantly she allows the extra info from her nose to be shared over the link. Unwashed bodies. Human waste. Probably the plumbing has backed up somewhere if the lighting is anything to go by. Maybe it was too soon to trash talk how Gotham smells...

<Questions like 'what are we looking for down here?' and 'Should we leave a few explosives to bring the whole place down once we're done?>

Rachel Summers has posed:
I'll never get used to that smell, Dom gripes.

< ... Yeah. >

It's a distant thought of agreement, on Rachel's part. There and gone. A lie's harder to cover when it's delivered through emotional impressions and psychic imprints.

It's easier, though, when you wish it were true.

Booted heels hit ground with a soft squelch of melting ice beneath them as Rachel descends to duck into the facility. Green eyes are narrowed and sharpened to finely focused, alert points; there's a subtle, ready tension lining her entire frame that's been trained, beaten and scarred into her since as long as she can remember. The dead and rotting clogs her sense of smell with its rancidity, but the way Rachel tracked was never really by scent.

Instead, her mind expands outward, catching and chasing psychic afterthoughts of the world around her as artificial heat buffets at her skin. There's not enough... material... here for her to focus on and trace back past events with, the further they descend. The most overwhelming impression she gets, however, is the obvious one:

Death. She -feels- it even more poignantly than she physically experiences it, every smear of blood streaking the walls coming with a visceral impression of meat, and panic, and... and...

As a very specific sentiment starts to etch away at the corners of her psychic net, pink light ignites the darkness, chasing it away to bring that bloodied, gnawed stump of meat that was once a person into sharper focus. that green gaze slides Blink's way. She knows what the teleporter must be feeling even without the psychic link to broadcast the sentiment; it's writ large across her features. There's a brief desire on Rachel's part to try to help soothe those nerves, but she suppresses it. She can tell; most, if not all of them, don't like people being in their heads to begin with, without someone taking liberties with their brain chemistry, for good or for ill.

She can't say she doesn't understand, after all. She does; far too well.

< This... is more of the 'dies screaming' kind of dead, > is Rachel's answer to Blink that, while illuminating, might not exactly help her nerves. Rachel pauses. And then she looks Dom's way, pointedly.

< ... Laura is right. I think this is the time we get some answers, Spot. Do you know what they were trying to do here? I... >

Rachel's thought trails as the sentiments she has been keeping an open, astral eye for intensify. Her brows twist into a consternated knot so deep it wrinkles at the bridge of her nose. She turns her head sharply to the right, eyes focused on some far off place as a frown twists her lips.

< Wait. Watch out. They're still here. They're... >

This is probably not a reassuring sentiment to hear, or feel. What she says next, probably even less so:

< ... They're hungry. They're so hungry... >

Neena Thurman has posed:
The addition of two pinkish sources of light earns Blink a curious look. < Nice trick. > Learning something new about her teammates all the time! The further they go it seems all the more like she picked the right people for the job.

What are they looking for? < Wish I knew. > Should they leave a few explosives? < Abso-fucking-lutely. Whatever came through here was nooooot happy. Not that I could blame them. I've been there. Putting money on 'murder monster' all the same. Grab a gun if you need one, Blink. >

Laura shifts to the shotgun. Domino simply offers a subtle nod. They're officially within 'go big or go home' territory.

To Rachel's questions Dom looks grim while slowly shaking her head. Answers she does not have and it's clear she's none too pleased about this. < You know how it goes. These outings always come with a thousand unanswered details. Blacksite confidentiality is a real bitch. >

With the blood at the stairs leading in one clear direction it seems like the direction they should continue along. The back exit seems to have been situated closer to general storage rooms which lead toward living quarters if the printing on the wall is to be believed.

Really though, what ARE they up against? Something 'hungry.' < Explains the teeth marks > she thinks with disgust. A frown crosses colorless features as Dom pushes the goggles back onto her forehead. < Everyone look sharp, I'm gonna ring the dinner bell. > The first exposed pipe she sees gets rapped by her submachine gun's stock three times, meaningfully spaced out. Down here the notes carry far into the steel and concrete labyrinth.

It's quiet at first but Rachel would pick up the first stirring of alarm. Something's taking the bait and it's slowly shuffling its way toward them.

When it's close enough to be heard the sounds aren't any more comforting, something almost like the sloshing of a Jell-O cake against the floor. Slap-scrape. Slap-scrape. Dom instinctively fans out as far as the limited space will allow, ducking low and readying her gun. < Sucker bet this is a 'shoot first ask questions later' kind of encounter. >

It's...a stinking, hairy, flesh colored...'blob.' Not a scrap of clothing to be seen covering its immensely saggy folds of fat. Stubby feet and arms. A drooping pear-shaped head. It's probably only around five feet tall but it may as well weigh five hundred pounds. Large, solid black eyes cast an empty stare at the four women, the humanoid creature taking a moment to make sense of what it's seeing.

Everything goes sideways in a flash, the creature raising both arms forward with a demonic howl as it stumbles toward them all as quickly as it can run, far faster than what would seem possible but still slower than any of the four visitors.

Rachel won't mistake the thoughts coming from it now. /FOOD./ It's found FOOD. SO HUNGRY!

"Drop it!" Domino calls with clear urgency.

Clarice Ferguson has posed:
Blink frowns thoughtfully and harbors secret... or maybe not-so-secret doubts about whether or not the four of them can pack enough explosives to bring this hellhole down. Except, of course, they've got her own javelins to remove support struts, Rachel's badass telekinetics, and... okay, she's willing to admit it's /totally/ possible Neena and Laura have more explosives than she thinks possible. They've both got that 'prepared for anything' vibe after all.

It's really only once Blink takes a moment to let her own eyes adjust to the illumination of her javelins that she wishes she hadn't brought two of them into existence. Well, part of her wishes she hadn't.

The part of her that just reacts in time to not step in /something/ not meant for stepping in is actually pretty thankful.

< My money's on 'Create another mutant killing machine' and I'm sure they appreciated the irony of their success before... yeah. >

She practices thinking in a sarcastic tone at the end. Because hey, when else is she going to get to practice being telepathically linked?

And then it's right back into the pros-and-cons of telepathic links. On one hand? Tactically advantageous. On the other hand, 'They're hungry' is so much more off-putting than someone just yelling 'Contact!' or opening fire with an automatic weapon.

And then it's all happening so fast. Neena's making noise, and then there's... oh god, how's the sound worse than the smell?

Blink's been through some trials and tribulations, but she's never quite been in a situation where she wanted to shower a sound off before.

Ah, the life of a mutant freedom fighter. Always new experiences to endure.

< Oh. Goody. ...You said 'they' right? >

Instantly, one of those javelins it being launched out and down towards the creature. Not to hit /it/, but to hit the floor it's about to step onto and disintegrate a couple cubic feet of concrete and ice.

Where's it go? Blink's not telling. But she's hoping it'll throw the thing off balance and trip it up enough for someone to shoot the shit outta it.

That's the tactical term.

Laura Kinney has posed:
<Find someone on the need to know list. Then dangle them over the side of a building until they talk.> Laura recommends. There's an impression getting black site information out of people is a regular thing for her. She might be a loose cannon but she gets results. Or something like that.

Speaking of cannons.. Automatic shotguns aren't really an assassins weapon of choice. But The Facility were /very/ thorough when it came to Laura's weapons training. Because in a world with magic, aliens and super science you never know what tools your genetically engineered killer for hire might need.

Case in point. Whatever this nightmare shambling towards them at an unwelcomingly eager pace.

<Don't think we'll be asking this any questions.> X-23 doesn't bother to bring the shotgun up to her shoulder. Healing factor enhanced muscles give her enough strength to fire from the hip. It's not like she needs to worry about accuracy with a target that large. Trigger pulled the weapon booms out a constant stream of military grade pellet rounds. A storm of lead sweeping across the creature. If there was any chance they'd avoid alerting the entire base it's definitely gone now.

It's probably for the best they have telepathic comms because in the close confines the noise is deafening.

Rachel Summers has posed:
There is a moment where Rachel considers what remains of that body and how well she could use it as a focal point to see the psychic imprints of what happened here -- if any still linger. It's a grotesque thought; one that she hates comes easily to her.

But that hunger overrides _anything_ she might be thinking of doing before she can even begin to act on it. Starving hunger, the hunger that _hurts_ you deep down inside like you might gnaw away at yourself just to make it stop -- it's a familiar sensation, yet one that's flavored with a dangerous undercurrent that is difficult for her to grasp on.

Familiar, but alien. Like the thoughts of a monster reflecting traces of recognizable sentiment.

< I'm... nnh. I'm ready. Do it. >

The CLANG! CLANG! CLANG! of metal carries through the wonderful acoustics of this steel-and-concrete trap. Rachel's jaw sets. Something reacts, echoing its alarm in the back of her mind. Psychic flames spark at the tips of her fingers.

< Get ready. It's coming. >

The first thing is the feeling. The hunger. The second is the sound. The viscous gooey slurp and suction of something slopping its way across concrete. Rachel's feet leave the ground as her mind expands outward, less towards whatever thing is coming, and more towards the material around her. Pipes. Steel. Loose concrete. She can use these things.

The pipe that Neena struck begins to tremble by the time that mass of mutated, masticating flesh and hair all but spills into their line of sight, like a tumor given life. Rachel winds back from her floating position, eyes widening as they stare into huge, black, glistening counterparts.

And she feels... not disgust. Horror. Horror, but in a different way.

Whatever this is, however it came to be the way it is -- Rachel feels so sorry for its painful, misbegotten existence. That hunger--

< Move! Now! I'll try to hold it down! >

There's no time for pity. Its stumbling, quivering sprint comes with a sentiment behind it that turns this into a clear and present life and death situation. And Rachel Summers -- Rachel Summers is a survivor.

Blink teleports its footing out from beneath it. And as Laura's barrel is brought to bear --

Broken piping RIPS from the walls to wrap around those stubby little feet and BIND like a hogtie, to hopefully hold it in place long enough for Domino and Laura's opening salvos to go off.

She feels bad. She knows that hunger. But pity only gets you so far.

Neena Thurman has posed:
*Slosh-scrape-slosh-schLORF!*

The aggressively approaching critter drops partway into the hole in the floor made by Clarice, so much of its loose skin fully sealing it off with a whole new manner of disgusting sound. An inhuman shriek and mad scramble results, it's clearly not very coordinated but more than enough determined. Before any headway can be made Rachel makes with the pipe and pins those stubby flabby limbs together, turning the world's angriest most overweight lawn gnome into a disgustingly obese grub. For an opening salvo it doesn't get much better!

And yet... Actually /shooting/ it gets less than desirable results. The projectiles from both Laura and Domino's guns act a bit more like they're being shot into mud, the bullets audibly slapping against its jiggly gelatinous hide with about half of them seemingly getting swallowed up by the fat while the rest get bounced right back into the hall.

"Problem!" Just in case it needs saying!

What else do they have? A handgun with 'Desert Eagle' etched on one side and '.44' on the other. There's so much fire and noise happening in here but that damn hideous creature still remains, enraged but seemingly unhurt as its hide shrugs off the projectiles.

< Can't get through its skin! X, go for the throat! > Surely it can't hold up against the swipe of an adamantium claw..?

Clarice Ferguson has posed:
Clarice is, once more, ever so thankful those pointed elfin ears don't give her the stereotypical fantasy elf level of enhanced hearing. It's always so helpful to /not/ be deafened by the snarling monsters and booming firearms of her lifestyle.

And while she's sure that frequent exposure to loud ballistic weapons /and/ her occasional jaunts out to loud, dark clubs will be an issue to reckon with years from now, she'll take a future of hearing loss in exchange for the creepy crawly getting blasted apart.

Clarice was braced for the disgusting disintegration of the monster, but was not /quite/ so prepared for it to take a burst of shotgun rounds and keep on ticking, no matter how metaphorical the ticking might be with it being pinned by those pipes twisting around it.

And already her eyes are darting around, looking for... something. Anything. She can't bring down the tunnel on it... at least not in any way that won't bring it down on them, and trying to time removing enough concrete for the structure above to collapse /and/ open a portal for them to escape?

Blink's good. She knows she's good. But she's not actually /crazy/.

Well, not that crazy.

And so she throws javelins towards the bound monster, trusting that unique teleportation effect of hers to scramble its atoms up, aiming to strike it around the neck and chest.

Because hey, if it /can/ stand up to adamantium, maybe it can't stand up to adamantium /and/ its molecules being scrambled.

"God, why on Earth would anyone want to make this?!"

Laura Kinney has posed:
X-23 advances. Calm measured steps. Trigger still held down. The muzzle flare lighting her way until it runs dry with a CLICK. She's dropping it before the final shot has stopped ringing down the corridors of the underground black site. Hopefully they'll have chance to fetch it later. Not that the thought even crosses her mind in the moment.

Her claws popping again with that SNIKT. A burst of speed. Kicking off the wall, foot claws digging into the wall for purchase, as she launches herself forward. Twisting and whirling through the air. She's never met anything which can withstand adamantium, not without cheating anyway, but this certainly seems like a high force situation.

You might think having just the one claw per foot would be less dangerous than her two more traditional claws. But you'd be wrong. The extra reach and power of a kick honed into the single razer cutting edge. It's more like a high speed blender than a spinning kick.

Even as she connects her thoughts are calm. Measured. <I'm billing you for dry cleaning.>

Rachel Summers has posed:
The thing is just too blubbery.

It's almost like whale blubber, so thick that all that shivery, quivery fat becomes a hideous defense system all its own. Rachel's expression twists in muted surprise, and then frustration, as she watches -shotgun- shells just... sink harmlessly into gelatinous flesh.

< Big fucking problem! > is Rachel Summers' emphatic agreement.

Why would anyone make this? It's a good question that Clarice throws out in her panic, just as pointed as the shimmer javelin of spacetime she hurls into the creature's flabby hide. Was this the intention?, Rachel wonders to herself. She can't help the afterthought that comes in the wake of it:

Or was it just the horrific mistake of something much worse?

Loose concrete created from the chaotic battle is ripped out of the ground with the flex of Rachel's mind. Oranges and yellows swaddle it in a cocoon of astral flame as she dissolves away excess matter, psychically whittling it down into the sharpened point of a stake not -too- dissimilar from Blink's javelins.

And it hovers there as Laura sprints towards that poor abomination, floating on standby as Rachel briefly diverts her psychic efforts...

... towards the creature itself.

Its mind is so strange. So bizarre. She's not _unused_ to alien brains, at least, but this... this is different.

But it doesn't stop her from trying to see the shape of it, to at least get a clear enough picture of its psychic layout to provide it one service, as Laura's blade finds its mark:

To reach out, and take that horrific, deep-seated pang of perpetual hunger that chews so desperately at it...

... and shut it down.

"... I'm sorry."

The words linger on her lips, lost to the chaos of the battlefield as Rachel offers the creature one small reprieve before -hurling- that concrete stake at the opening wound that Laura creates to try to help her seal the deal.

It's not a permanent solution. It can't be, not for a mind this strange to her.

... She just doesn't want it to die hungry.

Neena Thurman has posed:
One detail Domino hadn't considered is Blink weaponizing her portals. Navigating a battlefield, sure, but using them offensively as a weapon? Where her javelins hit fist-sized wads of saggy flesh are pulled right out of the vile specimen, bringing about a whole new level of shrieking. The upshot: It works! The thing /can/ be hurt.

Despite suffering such bad injuries it also has a new target, that being the wads of tissue which had been snipped away from itself. Seemingly oblivious to the fact those chunks used to be a part of it, at the moment they're looking like mighty tasty morsels which are both closer and putting up less of a fight. The sorry thing is so desperate as to eat pieces of /itself./

With these new injuries come new opportunities to expand upon them. Laura's walking fire continues to send pellets all over the place with some coming straight back at her as she gets nearer. This time a bunch of them land true, disappearing into gods know where but ripping things apart from within as they go.

Then comes the blade, quick and vicious. Even with adamantium it isn't the same as a hot knife through butter, the creature's tissue pulls at it like trying to cut through a ton of chewing gum, but the honed edge does its job and cuts /deep/ after Blink helped clear out a piece of its throat.

Being absolutely certain, Rachel eases its one pain while briefly bringing another. The concrete stake punches through one of those teleport-related wounds and drives into its heart, finishing a wicked one-two strike which quickly bleeds the beast out.

What's left of the disgusting mass flops to the ground, loose skin spreading out with pockets of trapped air escaping from its rolls. At last, blessed silence returns...briefly.

"What the HELL was that?!" asks a wide-eyed albino.

Dom may not know, but other forces down here apparently do. Rachel's mind will light up as several more similar feeling minds come to, stirred by either the noise, the smells, or the promise of fresh meat. The famished howls can be heard from deeper within the facility. There's more of these things, and now they're on the hunt.

"We need answers" Domino quickly thinks. "Answers and results. Find the main lab, grab some intel, override the reactor, glass this whole fucking place. Blink, Prestige, gonna need you both to help us leapfrog past these things as they come."

Clarice Ferguson has posed:
Really, despite her reputation for badass ass kicking, Blink usually holds back. Teleporting up behind someone to knock them out? Totally fine. Throwing knife through an unexpected portal into some Humanity First goon's back? Fair game.

But she can also destabilize and even remove parts of people with her javelins. It was, in fact, what made her such an efficient assassin when she was a mutate before she gained her freedom.

And while she's sure she might have some nightmares about doing it again... they'll have to compete with the nightmares from this dank hellhole anyhow. Worth it.

Blink's breath is fast, ragged, almost animal herself, those bright green eyes are wide, darting, hyper alert for threats and dangers, "Whatever it is... was... it /shouldn't be/... we should... this place needs to..."

She frowns, closer to a grimace and hisses out softly.

But then Domino's laying out a plan. Or at least a goal. Get around the poor bastards down here get some data, blow the place apart.

"Hell yes. I can't like... port us into the control room or anything without risking us... well, without risking some real bad shit. But I can open portals past whatever comes at us and... yeah, exactly. Leapfrog."

And then she's focusing, getting her breathing under control. She's got this. Just... portals. Leapfrogging. One at a time. Child's play.

Just gotta ignore the horror and godawful oppressive atmosphere.

Easy peasy.

Laura Kinney has posed:
"Dead," Laura notes astutely. Tone so even it's impossible to tell if that's her idea of a joke even with the telepathy.

It's hard for people to appreciate just how enhanced superhuman senses can be (without cheating that is). It's not just that she can hear regular sounds from further away, although after all the gunfire hearing anything normally would be tough, Laura hears things outside the range of traditional Human senses. The vibration of wires as power runs down them. Each subtly different based on the thickness and flow of power. Training and experience letting her tell them apart.

"Lets just hope this place runs on diesel generators, rather than nuclear power." Not that it'll stop them blowing the place up. It'll just be more of a major ecological disaster than blowing up a regular black ops site. Aka somebody else's problem. "Either way I've got demolitions training. And am at the least risk operating solo."

<Well okay Rachel is probably at the least personal risk.> But that tactical assessment is accompanied with the mental image of Rachel cutting loose and the whole facility burying them all alive as she TK destroys everything with her psionic might.

"Based off the direction of the wires I should be able to get pretty close using the ventilation ducts," she asserts. Retrieving the shotgun and slinging it over her back. "Not sure how your teleportation works, but maybe these'll come in handy."

She slings a bandoleer filled with assorted knives and a few grenades. Shedding some excess weight and bulk for easier vent travel. "If I don't make it to the rendezvous point on time you know what to do right?" A beats pause. Just long enough for thoughts of noble sacrifices to begin. "You fucking well better wait for me." Tone still deadpan there's a flash of a smile. Okay that /definitely/ was an purpose joke. Maybe some day she'll even quip.

She doesn't wait for any agreements or permission. Off she goes into the vents. Probably they'll be as delightful as everything else in this place!

Rachel Summers has posed:
Orange ripples along otherwise bright green eyes like tongues of transient flame as Rachel watches the traumatic slop of flesh messily, noisily breathe its last bloody breath.

Only then do those eyes shut. She exhales--

And then that gaze snaps wide open as she feels starving minds awaken like a field of horrific flowers in bloom on her psychic radar.

"Shit. Fuck," is her eloquent summation. "I don't know what the hell that was, but--"

Her words transition from the physical to the mental, the sound of howls helpfully underscoring them:

< It wasn't alone. >

There's a lot of them. More than they can realistically deal with all at once, considering the effort it took just to take out -one-. Domino's plan is a solid one. And Laura's suggestion is probably the best recourse. After all...

A soft snort flares past Rachel's nostrils, despite the danger of the situation, at the picture Laura paints in her thoughts of a world of concrete crushing down all around them.

< Yeah. I'm of the opinion a controlled demolition might be slightly more preferable. >

Laura takes off. And Rachel offers her a lopsided sort of smile that only a veteran of horrible, god-awful situations can muster in the thick of a horrible, god-awful situation.

"Don't worry," she promises. "I won't let Spot skimp on fronting your burger bill."

She manages to slip in that last bit of banter, despite the situation, despite how she feels -so many- of those creatures hungrily hunting for them. But... there was something about it, when they woke up. All those mental signatures were coming from the same location -- they were all clustered together. Their home. Their nest. Where they were born?

If so --



Rachel reaches out. The link between her and Blink grows stronger like an accelerator added to a flame trail.

< I'm feeding you directions, Blink. You feel those hunger pangs? Those are the creatures. Just follow the information I'm sending you. And try not to port us into any hungry monster mouths. >

She tries to make that last one light as she psychically-uploads a constantly-updating stream of directional information to the instinctive parts of Blink's brain so she can just -do- without worrying about overthinking, like some sort of psychic GPS. She tries to keep it light, but, also.

'Not getting eaten' is a very real, very pressing concern.

Neena Thurman has posed:
'Dead.'

"About fucking time" Dom says with a quick exhale.

There's some mutual freaking out going on but Blink seems to be taking it harder than Domino which conveniently gives the latter some welcomed perspective. "Hey" she tells the teleporter. "Hey. We got this. Just breathe...maybe not too deeply..." because that might induce involuntary vomiting, "...and stay focused. These things aren't subtle and we've got the mobility advantage. If it comes to it teleport some chunks off of them and let 'em fight over the scraps, should buy us a couple seconds." A white hand drops down onto Clarice's shoulder. "You're doing great."

As their designated exit route and a primary defensive measure, having the teleporter freak out is bad for everyone involved!

With their current objectives set Laura's quick to dig into tactics and lay out a course of action and the albino is wholly inclined to agree. All of the scrapper's points are considered then given a nod of approval. "Bitchin.' Get this candle lit, we'll rendez outside. Good hunting."

Her parting comment about waiting the fuck up for her gets a mock look of shock from Neena. Hand to her chest and everything. "And destroy a perfectly good shotgun? I would never."

A rolling of eyes quickly follows with Rachel's remark about bill skimpage. Both hands are brought forward, one an open palm and the other still holding the comically large magnum. "Alright. Alright. Get us out of here and I'll cover lunch."

As the strike team loses one Dom takes the opportunity to get everything reloaded while Prestige does ...whatever it is that crazy powerful brain does. Right now it's to find them all a route straight to the heart of the facility, complete with uplinking everything into Blink's head. What a trick! Dom swirls both of her hands about in the air as if mimicking the swirling of debris and crushing of subterranean structures. < Because I'm all for it if you can. >

Just before they make their run Dom eyes up those removed chunks of tissue and slowly works the building knot of bile down toward her stomach. Weapons are stowed. Then she goes and picks up those excised chunks, one after the other. As small as they are they're still difficult to hold onto, the tissue wanting to roll and slop about no matter how she tries to carry them. "Egh... Urrrrgh... Happy thoughts. Butter. Wads of churned butter. Nothing to it. Like picking up after Deadpool. He just loves going to pieces. We're just bringing him back to himself."

Just in case the other two give her weirded out looks, she'll explain "You saw how he tried going after these. A free meal can, on occasion, be more effective than any gren -- oh my GOD this is so fucking GROSS. Let's go, emphasis on /go./"

Clarice Ferguson has posed:
Blink licks her lips briefly, a momentary nervous reaction as she feels Rachel's mind deepening its connection. As she tries to draw slower, even deeper breaths despite the miasma in the air. Her eyes close, and the telekinetic redhead probably picks up on the stream of consciousness mantra filling the teleporter's head, reassuring herself she's got this.

And she does. Oh, it's... been awhile since Blink has been in a real crisis situation. But the benefits of the mountain of past trauma she's got from her childhood training is that really, despite her anxiety, part of her knows this is nothing compared to that.

Also, there's a benefit to Rachel guiding her mind out to aim her next portal.

Namely, the fact that the edges of those portals destabilize atomic bonds. They can cut through concrete, steel, hell, for all she knows adamantium (It's not something she's tried. For obvious reasons.)

And so Clarice focuses that portal to open, sweep wide, and then close back down to big enough for the strike team to... well, strike through.

Does this mean that control room furniture and anyone around the direct border of the portal just got buzzsawed? Sure.

Clarice might need to sit down with Rachel after this to vent about being controlled and guided like a living weapon.

"Okay... let's just... yeah. Get in. Get the stuff. Blow the reactor and roll out... good news is, if you don't mind a little... ungainly landing, I"ll be able to port us right the fuck outta here."

And then Blink's groaning out softly, as she darts through her first portal, already pressing forward to open the next. They might pinball off a couple of walls depending on the hallway angles. But they're gonna make great time.

Rachel Summers has posed:
Can she really do it?

Rachel squints at Dom as she does her swirly-handy gesture as if she can't quite tell what the World's Most Monochrome Woman is trying to indicate.

< Evocative hand gestures there. >

She _can_ tell, of course. It's just that in times like these, it's more important than ever to fuck with people.



Still. Not bad to have a scorched earth option in their back pocket.

For now, Rachel focuses on creating that telepathic equivalent of a data-link between her and Blink. There's only the briefest blip in her concentration as she turns her head...

... and suddenly spies Neena flipping chunks of floppy flesh between her hands like she were playing with one of those slippy-slidy water snake toys.

Rachel takes a brief detour to stare, silently, at Neena. Her lips purse. Her head tilts. She observes with the morbid, intellectual curiosity of someone watching a trainwreck in action, if the train was made of the world's most flubbery flesh. Neena offers her explanation. It's sound. But she still made that logical leap and decided to put it into action, and so, what else can Rachel do but hike her brows up in response?

"You've got a sharp but big time weirdo mind, Spot," she observes. Like a -- compliment? Maybe?? If nothing else:



Rachel Summers believes in the importance of partitioning. It's all that got her out of her previous life with her sanity intact. And it's been an important part of keeping herself from drowning in her -own- trauma since then. Focus on missions. Shunt bad thoughts out to chew on later. Keep your head above water.

... But she -also- believes incredibly strongly in -not- making weapons out of others, for similar reasons. And so Rachel combines these two priorities as best she can as Clarice opens that first portal: part of her concentration is on that psychic link, feeding Clarice information, keeping her aware of the monstrosities around them, closing in. She constantly updates it with visual data as soon as any of them receive it, using their sensory information in triplicate to feed and inform Blink's portal making.

The other half of her concentration?

As they leap through the first portal, Rachel is automatically opening up a shield at Blink's front, psychokinetic force warding a fleshy gobbling monster off seconds before it can spring on Blink and Domino and -her-. She urges Blink to keep going, to open the next portal --

And she -hurls- the creature through it first before them, cannonballing it into another in a sickening SQUELCH of blubbery fat as they both impact an opposing wall.

Through the third, Rachel is panting, sweat dripping off her chin as she drags concrete slaps out of the ground to jam into the mouths of TWO of those hairy beasts.

"Keep -- GOING --"

The fourth has her leading from the front, thrusting one psychokinetic-clad arm into the maw of another beast before EXPANDING all that force inside-out before it can chomp down. Her TK field is wavering, but at least it keeps giblets out of their hair.

By the fifth, her nose is bleeding thick droplets of crimson as she stomps the ground, caving the floor out from beneath a beast to send it dropping down... somewhere.

She keeps trying to take all of -that- on herself rather than burdening the others as much as she humanly can, until by the last portal--

"GUH -- fhhuHH--"

She barely keeps her eyes from rolling to the back of her head as she stumbles out and into their destination, falling on hands and knees.

She knows. She can't help but -feel- it. Clarice doesn't like being used. Rachel doesn't want to use her, either. She'll accept any venting that comes her way.

But until then -- she needs keep that

Rachel Summers has posed:
But until then -- she needs keep that partition up.

Neena Thurman has posed:
'I like it.'

< It generally has more agreeable thoughts > Dom thinks back with an airy shrug while trying to keep her stomach under control.

(Hrk.)

The next portal Blink conjures up leaves Domino with flashbacks to the Terminator movies where she distinctly recalls those portals giving absolutely zero fucks about whatever was caught in their way. There's a note of awe in her whispered "Holy Hell..." while eyeing up the resulting damages.

Yep. Lady Luck /absolutely/ picked the right people for this job. Which now has her carrying around wadded up gobs of mutant fat instead of shooting things or setting off explosive devices. (You really planned this one out, Thurman.)

What comes next is one of the wildest rides through Hell which she can remember. Clarice makes with the rapid transportation and Rachel...deals with everything else. The two of them working in tandem is a thing of both beauty and terror, swift and effective despite taking a heavy toll upon them both.

The way forward may be clear in Blink's thoughts but the reality of passing through these corridors brings constant flashes of the twisted reality of how the place has fallen. Closer to the labs more remains can be found of what used to be the staff. Smells continue to get worse. Dried blood cakes more of the surroundings. The lighting becomes less reliable. Signs of failed emergency protocols and attempted last stands, anything from hypo guns to cattle prods strewn about. The bastard labcoats never stood a chance.

In record time they reach the lab, leaving two of the three in real rough shape and the third looking grossed out with her 'meat grenades' which turned out to be entirely unnecessary. The two wads of fat slough their ways out of her palms to *splat!* onto the floor. "So glad we worked this out" she mutters with a heavy sigh, holding her hands in a way one might if they had just dipped them into a vat of slime.

(Get it together.)

The door to the lab? Closed and barred. Wheeled stools? Shoved toward the other two women. The lab? Completely fucked up but frantically investigated. The computers are already in sad shape but where they're going they don't need working terminals.

Dom picks through cold storage and finds a tray full of samples, one of which she rushes over to hold up in front of Rachel. "Can you do anything with this?" She honestly has no clue, psychics are fucking weird and they always manage to pull some other trick out of their damn heads.

What can be determined up front is the writing on the labels of these samples.

'F. Dukes'

"Dukes... Dukes, where have I heard --"

Something meaty and flabby slams against the other side of the door, first snapping her attention over then looking down at the two chunks she had carried along.

"...Blob? Did they ... They seriously fucking tried to clone BLOB?"

Clarice Ferguson has posed:
Clarice isn't going to judge Domino's juggling of chunks of monster flesh. Like, she's not going to rank her technique, or worry that it's... like, a really gross tactic. Nope, you do what you gotta do when you're raiding a shadowy, presumably governmental hell lab.

Plus, that cold, precise logic is true. If the remaining monsters want to consume some flesh, better it be their fellow test subject than any of the ladies.

And as reluctant as Blink is to go back into her bad old Mutate days, every time Rachel brings a monster down, as a portal behind them flickers close, Clarice hurls a javelin at an incapacitated monster to teleport out a chunk of vital neural tissue.

Just to be safe. And those combat reflexes and her reflexes in general come in handy as Rachel sags as they reach their destination and the pink woman hooks an arm around the telepath, her own breath a little ragged, "Whoa, whoa, hang in there sparky. Here."

She dumps Rachel into a chair like a sack of potatoes.

But a really cherished and beloved sack of potatoes.

And then her head snaps around and her fists glow as two javelins materialize again.

"Well... that's... definitely a choice."

She sighs out and half-heartedly grumbles, "Also, Spot, next time we hang out? It's going to involve hard bass, hard drinks, and flashing lights. In a building that like... adheres to the bare minimums of the fire code or whatever."

Rachel Summers has posed:
Cold sweat dampening her hair and drooling down her face in thick, chilly beads, Rachel's head feels like the whole world is ringing for a few, conscious-swimming seconds. She lurches, only to be caught by Blink; when that stool comes rolling her way, a trembling mind stops it and steadies it just in time for Clarice to dump her in it, slouching into the thing like a limp bag of bones until her shoulder-blades bump against the back of the ruined table behind her..

"gnfuh" is her first eloquent thought. Blood drips down to her outfit, bright scarlet sliding down the slick white surface of her paneled bodysuit as she catches her breath. Her right hand lifts, wiping away a smear of fresh blood from under her nostrils as she watches Dom rush off with a twitchy, half-lidded gaze.

"... Thanks," she finally remembers to say to Blink, when her words find her again.

A fingerless-gloved hand pushes through short, sweat-slicked hair as Neena gets to work. Rachel watches, lubricating her throat with a few gulps before she gestures. "There's a--" she begins, but Domino's already plucking up that tray and hurrying it towards her before she can finish her thought.

"... yeah. There's a those." Her hands are steadier things by the time Domino offers up that tray; fingers slide around it to grip tight. She needs to hold it -- it helps her focus.

"I can do... something. There's -- the astral plane. There's these psychic imprints in time," she tries to explain, "but without something to focus on specific moments it's like... trying to find a bead of sweat dropped into an ocean and... ugh. Fuck." She does -not- have the mental capacity for exposition right now.

"I can do something."

And here, she closes her eyes. She concentrates on the tray of samples, even as Neena realizes just -what- they are. Genetic samples.

"No wonder... those hairy little bastards... were so fucking durable..." Rachel mumbles as she focuses. The ends of her red hair flicker and dance like flames.

"Hard drinks and hard bass sound... really good right... huh."

A kaleidoscope of memories flood past Rachel. Phantom impressions of the Astral Plane layer onto her perception of the real world, showing thoughts and history play out in a spectacle. She observes the fragmenting comings and goings as best she can, as history layers over history over history; even with her little focus narrowing it down so she's not looking at memories before humans even so much as gazed upon this land, how many hands held this tray? How many people whisked back and forth through this facility?

their meaty memories are smeared all over the walls now and all she can see in this moment is one clearer than all the others--

"Giles," she spits out. Images project into Neena and Clarice's thoughts -- the clear impression of a man, the idea of what he looks like.

"A researcher here. Richard... Giles."

Neena Thurman has posed:
Hard bass, hard drinks, and flashing lights. "Yeah, I'm down with all that" Neena calls back, only sounding somewhat distracted. First because of Rachel who is clearly Not Okay. Clarice is still mobile and largely coherent, but Red's acting like she's having a synaptic meltdown.

Hey, if giving her a tray full of vials /helps/ her to focus then she can have all the trays in the damn place. "'Something' is good" she encourages. "I like 'something.'"

Soon she's got another whole tray of samples out of the fridge and set out on one of the counters, picking through each vial to check the name then fling it over her shoulder. "Dukes. Dukes. Dukes. These guys..." she shakes her head with a scowl. "Like someone managed to bottle just one of his farts then tried to duplicate it fifty ways to Sunday. It's like...the definition of insanity in government spending format. Were they TRYING to clone him? How do you fuck up a CLONE so badly?"

Her world comes to a screeching halt when Rachel provides a name, the next few vials in her hands all crashing to the floor at once as she stares across the flickering lab. "'Richie'" she says in return, a hard edge slipping into her voice. "Fucking /Richie/..."

The rest of that tray is picked up and thrown into the glass paneled fridge as hard as the albino can manage, shattering so much glass in dramatic fashion. "That little /piece of shit/-- This wasn't a job to HELP mutants. He wanted mutants to clean up his goddamn mess!"

In her search for something else to smash it's another wheeled lab stool which gets thrown into an already ruined monitor. Her thoughts never make it into words but having that psychic connection around, one or both (or all three) might happen to catch the pale woman's enraged plan.

< I'm gonna kill him. >

What does make into words is "I've seen enough. We need to go."

Clarice Ferguson has posed:
Clarice shivers and closes her eyes, steadying breath, brow furrows, and thoughts of loud music, delicious drinks, and the freedom and fun of a club are set aside. She's got a job to do, and it's one without any margin for error.

Clarice dips herself under Rachel's shoulder to support her on her way up, and with another hissing sound of reality tearing, there's a portal opened in the middle of the room, revealing... well, revealing the cold springtime tundra of Alaska.

She nods her head and growls out softly, "Okay, we're outta here then... That's about fifteen klicks to the south, we can port from there a little easier when we're not worrying about..."

She gestures vaguely and grins lopsidedly, though it's a little forced, strained really.

"But really, when you go to get payback for this shit? You call me again, Neena."

Yeah, Blink might not always like the jobs she does. But she's sure as shit not gonna put her comfort above helping out her friends.

But she's also showing just how good a friend she is... by not shoving the albino and the redhead through that portal unceremoniously. See? It's friendship!

Rachel Summers has posed:
Richard Giles.

It's like the name flips a switch in Domino.

'Fucking Richie.'

The astral weight of history gone by bleeds away from Rachel Summers until all that's left is the greasy, blood-stained smear of the present. Clarity pierces through the haze of her exhaustion from the sheer relief of all those memories rolling off her figurative shoulders...

... and comes into sharper focus in the breadth of Domino's violent reaction to that name.

Green eyes watch Domino with a certain calm as Rachel drags herself back onto her feet with Blink's help. She knows that kind of reaction. She's felt it before.

But she says nothing, nor tries to stop Domino. She lets her vent every inch of that anger without question or interruption as shattering glass and crunching plastics fill and spiteful words fill her ears.

Her arm slung around Blink's shoulders for support, Rachel just watches. Watches, and feels, that murderous sentiment bubble like molten rage at the back of Domino's mind.

It's only then that Neena will feel something -- a psychic touch, unobtrusive but there, suffused with wordless, thoughtless warmth like a crackling kindling of reassurance.

Like the emotional impression of a hand squeezing her shoulder.

"... Alright," Rachel breathes as Blink opens that portal. "Let's go, then."

She doesn't press for questions, but the wordless look she offers Domino says it all:

They're going to talk about this. Later.

Because she -does- have questions.

But for now...

"We've got a violent goth to pick up and burgers to chow down on."

This'll do.

Neena Thurman has posed:
When Clarice offers to help deal with Richard she gets a cold look from Domino. It isn't meant to be directed at Blink but emotions are a bit too far off the chart to avoid catching some of it by proxy. "Consider your name on the list. We'll talk more later." Because she's getting IDEAS, the sorts of which she's hoping are being kept to herself.

Whether or not those thoughts do remain her own there are still plenty of tells which Rachel picks up on. Neena only realizes this with that warm psychic touch, still enough to send the pale assassin reeling about with her shoulders knotting up in defense.

Nothing there. Just a very tired looking Rachel and two teammates anxious to leave this place far behind. But the look the redhead gives her, right in this moment...

It's met in turn. This is not over.

One last portal and the rush of cold /clean/ air is like a gift from divinity. Dom actually stops everything to close her eyes and breathe in deep, taking the opportunity to quite literally chill the hell out and clear her mind of rampaging malice. A far more polite "Thank you" is said to Blink but, as badly as she wants to leave this place right the heck now, she'll wait to make sure Rachel makes it out okay first. Dom and her power may be selfish but she does have the inkling of leadership.

A quick thought to and from Laura and the stage is set. < Burn it all. >

Of course this mission wasn't going to be easy or straight-forward. That's why she called in some of the very best help available. But right now? She'd give her last bullet for something simple.

Or she can just pay the lunch bill. That should be simple enough.

17802/Alaskan Airdrop

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