2013.08.06 - Campus Assault

Vance Astrovik laygs on his back on the lawn outside one of the university buildings. Some of the kids are having fun in the quad, tossing frisbees or strumming guitars in desperate attempts to hook up with girls who like soulful ballads sung by boys with dreadlocks. Vance is trying to concentrate on his calculus homework, but he's having a hard time focusing. He's got a new girlfriend, a burgeoning superhero career and, at last estimate, no less than nine part time jobs. On top of that, a full classload, guilt inducing phone calls from his mother and, oh yes, that Legion tryout. Which is the very last thing on his mind at the moment as he wrestles with doing a complex calculation...

Frisbees, guitars, girls, it's all the way it goes on a university campus. There's plenty of things to distract, or to build the background tapestry, depending on your perspective of things. For the past half hour, the call of 'HEADS' has been a pretty common one, as the frisbee goes spinning off towards a guitar player or some kind of studious studier. Such as, for instance, Vance! A frisbee twirls towards him and the call comes, quite predictably, "HEADS!". The disc's lost a lot of its speed and thunks against his side, bouncing once. That shouldn't really be anything of note, except that something appears and grows from the top of the disk. A woman, dressed in a dark violet and green bodysuit with white holsters on her hips. She leaps on Vance, aiming at him and her eyes glinting with murderous intent.

Vance Astrovik recognizes the well armed woman from a brief encounter with her at LSH headquarters. While that might have set some people at ease, Vance remembers all too well how eager she was to potentially should Axiom, who claimed to be a known and valued ally of the team. Salu, apparently, had not received that week's "known and valued ally" memo. Maybe it went straight to her spam folder.

At any rate, he responds in the most natural way he can when weapons are aimed in his direction: a soft nimbus of blue energy wraps around him, his telekinetic field popping into place to protect him from harm, "Hello...Salu, wasn't it? Is there something wrong?" he asks simply enough, holding up his hands in a placating gesture.

"Hello, Vance," she says with a smirk, cocking her head to make the jagged hair on her head toss and move. "You thought you'd get away with it all," she says. She shifts upwards and takes shots with both pistols. "We see you for what you are!" she adds, as the shots sizzle into the ground on either side of Vance's head.

Vance Astrovik moves up to a fully standing posture, his TK carrying him easily to his feet. He looks down at the singe marks left by the weapons on the ground and turns back towards the more general area of the quad, "Maybe time to take the hackey sack down to the Student Union guys! Just for a while!" he yells. He expands his field slightly, making sure to shield anyone behind him, sort of creating a TK wall in his general region, keeping himself between innocent bystanders and Salu's guns. What's gotten into the Legionairre's head. "Look, Salu, I'm not sure what you're talking about," he says, using her name, wanting to emphasize who she is, in case she's been, like, brainwashed or something. "But we can talk it out. No need for the shooting demonstration."

Salu takes a few quick steps back, as bystanders jolt and start to move run. "Call the X-Men!" one shouts. "Call the Avengers!" another suggests. "Call the Legion!" a guy says, and promptly gets smacked by her girlfriend for such as illy suggestion. "No, we can't. You think I don't know a spy when I see one?" she asks, taking a shot at Vance's nice, bit Captain America styled target on his chest. It's amped up to full stun, which could take down a Hyperhippo in one blow, so Vance...might be in a bit of trouble.

Vance Astrovik apparently doesn't think so, or, at least, isn't about to make a fuss about it. He wants to keep the well-armed and potentially loony alien lady focused on him and not on the idiotic and scattershot suggestions of the hoi polloi. Although, really, he wouldn't, like, say no to the Avengers right now. "A spy? For who? Cabrini's Donut Hut? Hardcastle's Wedding Caterers and Buffet? The Wiley Fisherman? 'cause those are the main people who, like, pay me money," he says a little incredulously, drawing his TK back in to fully shield his body now that the students are mostly running for it. "Like I said, whatever's going on, no need for guns. Let's just talk."

"CIA? KGB? SVG? OMG?" Salu suggests, ratting off the acronyms like they're taunts, "So many ways you humans have to spy on each other. I'd like that, if /I/ weren't a target," she says. The blast sizzles off the shield and Salu makes a face, adjusting her other pistol and taking a stronger shot.

Vance Astrovik winces a bit at the impact to his shield. THey're not close to penetrating, not yet, but he can at least feel the impact, which shows they're much more than just conventional firearms. He's confident enough he can hold out, but that doesn't make it fun to do so. "Seriously, Salu, if I'm a spy, I'm pretty much the worst spy ever. I've barely even been in the headquarters and, when I did, it was on the public tour, with Garth supervising. I haven't even gotten my try out yet. And...will you stop shooting at me already?" he says, making a frustrated gesture as another blast hits his shield.

No, not yet, and she's not supposed to damage him. Not permenantly, at least. "Never said you were good, Human," she snorts. On the mention of Garth Salu just rolls her eyes and snorts with derision. Salu amps up the power on her other pistol and takes two shots at once. "And you won't get out of this alive," she adds.

Vance Astrovik winces a bit at the doubled impact on his shield. Still not enough to punch through, but it's taking more effort and concentration to maintain, partially because he's focused entirely on being defensive. Might be time to change that. He concentrates carefully, getting a sense of her location as she stands and fires at him, "I'm not sure where you're getting -your- information, Salu, but it's not very good. As in, totally wrong." he says, and then he tries to snatch, his mind wrapping energy around the pistols and trying to yank them directly from her grasp.

Salu can tell that, the increased effort on the shield that make Vance wince. She takes note of it, another thing to make note of for Vance's file. "Of cours eyou'd say that," she says. Obviously. She feels the tug on her pistols, the hard yank a sign of Vance's powers at work. One of them loosens and goes flying towards Vance. Salu takes a step back and aims sidelong at him, "Hope you know how to use that," she warns.

Vance Astrovik looks closely at the pistol, head cocked. "Wouldn't even if I did. But I hope you're not too fond of it," he says, and his power crumples in one direction and yanks in the other, denting and ripping at the pistol until it's unusable, tearing off the trigger, punching in the barrel until he hears circuits crunch. "Or, honestly, I kind of hope you are. You're starting to piss me off," he says.

It's futuristic all right, sleek white with some notches and grooves, an apparently rubberized grip, and a little control pad with a range on it, that seem to be touch sensitive. Except not anymore, as Vance crinkles and crunches it. "Weak, if that's how you treat your enemies." Salu shoots at Vance once more, but this time she follows it up, rushing towards him and swinging out as she leaps into the air and swings her leg. Thanks to her flight ring she can go fairly high, and her foot's streaking towards his neck.

Vance Astrovik doesn't dodge and doesn't flinch, just concentrates and, yeah, he can feel it when she hits, feel it impact and strike and he has to work to hold it, but he does and, thankfully, since it's just a strike and not a constant barrage, not a constant pressure, he can recover and hold. "I admit, Salu, I don't really have enemies. I fight people sometimes, yes, in the name of justice, in the name of right and, sure, even in the name of the good old U.S. of A., because not everyone's from Pan Zania Super Universal Galactic Town. I'm just a kid from Brooklyn. And, enemy or not, I don't shoot people. I don't try to kill people. Good, bad or indifferent. Just not my thing. Call it weak if you want. I'm still standing," he says, and he is, defiance shining beneath the shimmering blue of his eyes.

That shield is just as advertised. Incredibly tough, despite all the plasma and kinetic energy Salu's dumped into it. "Mutants don't have enemies?" she asks. Yup, somebody's done her research. "'Don't shoot people,'" she repeats, mocking. "And that's why you'll loose. You're not willing to go the whole way, to do what's necessary. What would happen to your precious Ayla then?" she adds. Salu lands back on the ground and takes a punch towards Vance's gut with her free hand.

The shield seems to give then...but only for a second, only enough to take in the flat of Salu's fingers and knuckles and then...he's gripping. The impact of the blow blunted, he holds her hand in his shield, binding it there. He's not crushing her fingers, although he could, no doubt, he just demonstrated that with the gun. "If I become a murderer, I've already lost. And yes, some people want to hurt mutants. Some of those people are mutants themselves. But I'm not just a mutant, any more than I'm just a Jew or just a New Yorker or just really, really good at Angry Birds, like, seriously, I'm so effing good at that game, but...to me, an enemy is someone with something against me, personally, Vance Astrovik. Marvel Boy, if you wanna get all superhero-y about it."

He adds some pressure on the hand, letting her feel it.

"Do you want me to get superhero-y about it?"

Salu makes a face as her hand gets trapped in the shield. Her fingers stretch and she tries to make a fist, she yanks back hard, dropping down and truing to roll and fling Vance over her. "Absolutely," she answers him with relish.

Vance Astrovik actually does move, her leverage and skill actually letting her move him...except that, halfway up in the flip he stops in mid-air, his mind taking away the momentum and leaving him just hanging over her...and then the shield that extends around him forms a dish at the front, shooting out and around until he's now laying on top of a telekinetic dome over Salu, trapping her inside against the ground as he lays on the top of it, looking in.

Oh no! She's the girl in the bubble! Or in a Stephen King-inspired miniseries. Either way, not a good place for her, but there's no look of panic or concern on her face. Vance sees a distortion and it seems like Salu's shrinking. Wait, no, she /is/ shrinking. In a few moment's she'd disappeared.

Vance Astrovik frowns as he watc hes her shrinking, but he, too, doesn't look too concerned. He keeps the dome in place, presuming that she didn't shrink into nothingness or teleport away, trying to keep as tight a seal as he can. In the meantime, he pulls out his cellphone, hitting speed dial. "C'mon, Ayla, pick up, pick up...' he mutters, hoping his girlfriend might know why her teammate has gone plum loco.

Salu Digby bides her time, shrinking down to the microscopic, then flying up towards the shield, testing it carefully to see how porus this thing is, in reality. And if he calls in Ayla? Well, won't /that/ make things interesting.

Vance Astrovik starts to shrink the dome, slowly, downward and downward, with the dome shrivelling underneath him, focusing his concetnration to try to keep Salu trapped inside, waiting for his girlfriend to answer her phone, "C'mon...c'mon..." he mutters...

The dome appears to be solid, to the point of not letting anything or anybody through. Certainly not an Imskian. Salu goes with another plan, whipping down and sinking into the ground, trying to find a way out underground.

In the resident quarters back at Legion HQ, a song starts playing. A song that has Ayla diving for her phone, a sappy love song she heard and assigned to Vance's number. She has to fumble through the pockets of yesterday's denim shorts, thumbing the button and chirping, "Vance!"

Vance Astrovik says, "Ay! Um, hey, babe, got you on speaker...um, so...your friend Salu, the chick with the guns? Yeah, she's tryin' to kill me...I'm trying to trap her but, y'know, she's probably about to escape and climb on my back and strangle me any second now. Do you have...I dunno, any idea what this might be about?" he asks, his words coming out in a slightly breathless rush as he tries to focus his eyes. Was that a flicker of dirt?"

"Wait, she's what?" Ayla asks, although she heard it clearly. Her voice raises slightly in pitch as she goes one, "Strangle you? Did you do something? She's a little... high strung..."

You paged Vance Astrovik with 'So does the shield go through the dirt? Hoping not! :-)'

Vance Astrovik says, "High strung? She tried to shoot me in the face with an energy gun, babe! That's not kosher, not even with pickles! I dunno, she showed up at school, said I'm a spy and a weakling and is trying to blow me away. By the way, she can totally hear you. Speaker phone.""

There's worry and concern in Ayla's voice as it comes over the speaker, "Are you alright? Do you want me to come down there? I can't imagine why she would say those things."

That's certainly accurate, more than Ayla might realize. As the two have talked Salu's burried through the dirt, thanks to the force shield of her flight ring, and with luck, she's free. The trick is now to find the best way to take advantage of it. The tiny Imsikian whips around and re-emerges a few feet clear of the dome, enough to still have Vance in her sights. There's a heavy thump as Salu comes crashing down on Vance's back, pistol to the back of his head. "Now you're dead," she tells him. She leans in and reaches for the phone, picking it up. "Your boyfriend's passed his test," she tells Ayla.

Vance Astrovik grits his teeth as Salu lands on his back, feeling the gun against his head. She didn't pull the trigger, though, and now he's angry. Because it was a test. And, while he expected to be tested, he isn't particularly fond of the method, a lack of fondness he shows as he blasts telekinetic energy out of his back, essentially trying to sock Salu in the gut and probably throw her ten or twenty feet in the air in the process.

The next sound from the phone is a thump as Ayla flops down onto her bed, relieved at the sound of Salu's voice. "Well that explains it. Sprock, don't do that." Still, there's good humor in her voice. "We'll celebrate tomorrow if you can still make it over..... Vance?" Was that some noise from their end?

The blast kicks salu up into the air, into a fairly nice parabolic arc that would plant her across the street, if she didn't have a flight ring to level her off and put herself in a safe hover. She still has Vance's phone, and says, "He's pretty angry. Didn't think he had it in him," she says, as she flies back towards Vance. She lands a few arm's distance from him and tosses him his phone back.

Vance Astrovik watches the phone, his shield still up, hoving a few inches off the ground. He considers continuing the fight, feeling the urge to act out a bit, but contains it, holding it up to his ear. "I'm fine, babe. Not pleased, by a long shot. I think I might have an issue or two to discuss with whoever came up with this particular test." He's laying about ninety percent odds that it's Ayla's brother, but he's not about to tell her that. Passive aggressivity apparently isn't a merely human trait. "Thanks for the workout. We'll try it again...sometime." he says and, with that, he takes off into the sky on his own.