Disclaimer: Odds are I don't own it, just using it to make a fun story. That being said, count how many things I don't own in this chapter.

:}

The explosion sent everyone scattering across the war torn landscape. Tori and Trina could easily avoid the blasts, while Cat, Jade and Beck were able to take it. But Andre neither was fast or tough enough to just ignore the warnings until the world exploded around him. He needed to rely on skill and a good guess at where the next blast was going to hit to keep going. "Remember, our goal is to take the flag." The young agent called out.

"Not gonna be easy." Sikowit's voice cut in. "They have a lot of firepower on this battlefield. And while you have speed, they've managed to block Trina's ability to teleport." The view of the torn up land, mostly open with old battle damage, reminiscent of some alien world, had not initially given the teens much concern as to how hard this would be.

"Radio frequency blockers." Robbie clarified. He was hidden in the rear of the fighting, in a make shift bunker. "I'm having trouble cutting through the static, and we have no real eyes above. All that has reduced Trina to short hops. But she's still the most mobile person we have."

"Ground troops, coming in fast." Tori warned. "I'll try to cut them off."

"Careful." Andre called out. "Thy adapt fast. Jade, you and Beck, cut us a path through them. Cat, stay in reserve. I may need you to take out a fast mover if they try that, again. Tori, stay alert. They can move as fast as you can."

"Only if they don't try to do anything else." Tori replied. "I can take a couple out. Let me."

"Don't get cocky." Jade warned as she found a couple of the enemy. Large metal men with some kind of energy weapon built into one arm. These guys didn't walk, they stomped. And the metal soldiers had rockets built in for when they needed to fly. They were both intimidating and oddly familiar. Plus they could adapt.

Jade ripped the first of them apart, only to see the metal man start to pull himself back together. "It's rebuilding itself." Jade warned. Even as she spoke, three others opened fire on her, knocking her backwards and off her feet.

"JADE!" Cat and Tori echoed.

"Code names." Andre tried to scold his people. But both girls were already on their way to see if the goth was hurt. Tori raced towards her, and was cut off by two metal men who somehow could match her speed.

She slid under the first, and regained her footing in time to see the second stop itself for the second it took to reorientates. A series of thrown pebbles managed to place dozens of dents in the metal head of the robotic man. "Their not as maneuverable as I am." Tori cheered.

The ground exploded as the enemy sacrificed both soldiers to detonate a shell next to Tori. Jade was there, just in time, with a powerful force shield. "I got you." The goth assured her lover. "It's okay."

"Princess, you can't maintain that for long. Blitz, if you really are faster, make your way to the flag, and get it. Princess, cover her. Golden Girl, guard our position. Their coming." Andre instructed them.

"Blitz, your not faster as much as more maneuverable. Use that. Make then chase you." Robbie said.

"Anyone seen Beck?" Andre asked. "He disappeared in one of the explosions. Cheshire, see if you can find Guardian."

"On it." Trina called out.

"Trina," Jade called over their radio link, "These robot dudes, their connected, right?"

"Yea?" The older girl asked. "No sign of Guardian. Not even scraps. Not sure what to make of that."

"Use their own com system to pop over to the flag. They have guards, so you use their system to get close, and grab the flag, then use the same system to pop back over here to our side of the battlefield." Jade explained.

"Great idea." Robbie said. "Except for the fact that their probably monitoring our communications. They'll be expecting it."

The ground at the far side of the field, the area where the robot men had set up their headquarters, exploded outwards as Guardian burst from the ground. His magnetic beams sliced a couple of the robotic men in half as he closed on their flags position. Moments later, the Canadian had the flag and was flying back at full speed.

"Princess, Golden Girl, cover Guardian's retreat." Andre called out. He was using all his powers to push back the incursion of he robotic men. 'Can't let them get our flag.'

Jade and Cat flew to intercept the small army of robotic foes that were massing to shoot Beck down. Both girls placed most of their power on defenses, and allowed themselves to be used as shields. Beck, meanwhile, dropped down to closer to the ground. Not wanting him to escape under ground, the robotic foes fired like mad at him. They clipped him, causing his defective fields to buckle. He went down.

But by then Tori could be seen racing from next to where he'd landed towards the home camp. "I got it." Tori called out. "I got it."

One of the robotic men got as close as it could, and detonated. Tori rolled head over heals, and found herself stunned by the impact. The others were closing in. Jade was burred by enemy firepower, holding her own but unable to get to her lover. Cat was in similar peril. The metal men were above Tori now, with her too stunned to reacts. But instead of firing, the robotic men shut down.

"And that was a thing." Trina called from home base, sitting next to Robbie.

"So what was the purpose of this game of capture the flag?" Jade asked. "Other then to show us how weird Sikowitz's imagination is?"

"The training equipment here is amazing." The quirky teacher said. "Three dimensional holograms, with force fields and who knows what else giving everything the illusion of being real. I've always wanted my own Star Trek Holodeck."

"So you had us play capture the flag to test it?" Tori asked. Normally she wasn't a critic of his teaching methods. But she knew, just like everyone else, that sometimes his goals weren't anyone else's.

"Nonsense." Sikowitz argued. "For your first foray into this dark new world, I wanted to set victory conditions that would challenge you, and make you work together."

"Rapidly self repairing robot men?" Beck asked.

"Cybermen." The teacher said. "Out of Doctor Who. They've been seen to fly, run fast, regenerate, and all kinds of other nifty stuff. I just gave them all those abilities. The reason Tori was more agile was the computer here just couldn't adjust their moves fast enough. But given the odds, you winning was amazing. I'm impressed. So, my students, I've decided not to test you on your lack of robot knowledge. There's a huge difference between Cyberman and robots."

"Like robots can be broken." Jade griped. "Really? You sent us against regenerating death machines?"

"Jade, we have no idea how likely or unlikely the odds that you will face enemies with nanotechnology allowing for rapidly regenerating cybernetic killing machines." The teacher scolded her.

"So?" Mal's voice cut in over the intercom. "How did the training system work? Can we use it? Can we copy it?"

"No." Sinjin's voice joined in. "That is, no copying this system. Someone used nanites to make most of the power conduits and circuit boards, with incredible levels of minute details. Taking it apart would ruin it. Our best choice of action is to study what we can, and hopefully we can some day make copies of the best if this things capabilities. But yes, We can use it. We'll be able to do a lot more training then what we'd been doing in the junkyard above."

"Then I'll let S.H.I.E.L.D. know that this is yet again another piece of alien technology thats beyond our ability to replicate. Lets hope it never falls into enemy hands." The level five agent said. Everyone suspected he'd wanted to hand this tech to his superiors on a silver platter.

"Yea, cause they might lure the kids into it, override the safety systems, convince the computer that they're supposed to be running that programs, and then use it to hurt us?" Sikowitz's voice was laced with sarcasm. "Talk about cartoony."

"And… He… I..." Tori tried to wrap her mind around the Cybermen they'd fought, and their teachers opinion of the dangers inherent in the training facility they were using.

"Tori, let it go." Jade told her girlfriend. "You always do that. You assume that he's gonna make sense, or Cat is going to follow some kind of logic trail, and when they don't, you're always left so surprised. Their not that kind of people. They have their own logic, and we don't get to know what goes on in their heads."

"Jade, as much as I enjoyed that nice speech, I'd like you all to come to the briefing room to go over what I saw today." The coconut lover said. "We have some interesting results to discuss."

Robbie walked to the briefing room, not sure what to make of the exercise. 'Sikowitz expected me to be on the field. I'm control, yet he sent me in there. I had to use my powers to modify the battle field just to have cover. And that doesn't make sense, cause there shouldn't have been rock or stone, and I can only make small stone guys. But whatever, I survived, uninjured, and no one's the wiser.'

"Okay, for starters, we should address the elephant in the room." Sikowitz said. "I sent Robbie in there both because he's part of the team, and to give you another obstacle. You passed, initially, having Cat stay back to protect him. But once Cat moved forward, no one was watching Robbie. Yes, it was a game of capture the flag, but your teammate was there, in danger, and if we're honest, the real test was if you could have accomplished your goals while protecting the civilians. We just got lucky the landscape had a small stone outcropping shaped enough to act as a bunker, or one of the explosions might have done some damage."

"How'd the system know to pull back on those of us who couldn't take it?" Andre asked. "Or did you just set it, and hope?"

"Oh, it has a dozen or more safety systems." Sinjin explained. He'd been in the room to help out if the technology got too out of hand for the older man to deal with.

"Yes, took me hours to shut them all off." Sikowitz added.

"You shut off the safety systems?" Andre exclaimed. He couldn't believe his teacher would take such risks.

"I needed to see how you protected one another." The quirky teacher said. "Plus, it wouldn't let me run my Cybermen the way I wanted unless I turned off the safety. Look on the bright side. No one got hurt, and Jade was most likely going to live, even if they atomized her."

"So, anything else?" Tori asked.

"Yes, the elements seemed to act like elements while the system is on. You get wet, with real water. Beck tunneled through the earth, without leaving a hole in the floor…." The trainer said.

"She meant about us?" Jade cut him off.

"Oh, yes." Sikowitz said. "I now know that all of you have the ability to improve. Tori can get faster, but also learn tricks to use her speed. Trina is going to learn tricks, as well as how to use various beacons and other things to get around the frequency blockers I used to keep her from popping over, grabbing the flag, and popping back."

"And Cat can get stronger, and I can get stronger, and Beck has all kinds of tricks he can learn." Jade added. "Talk to us one on one, so we're not here all day."

"Not yet." The balding teacher said. "Your teamwork was a vast improvement over most of what I'd seen up until now. You react well to Andre's instructions, but you also are getting better at figuring out what to do in any given situation. Jade, I'm expecting you to further develop your mystic whatswho and help coordinate the team."

"Huh?" The goth princess asked.

"Your mystic communication ability. I understand it's a mental connection, or can be used as a mental connection. I think, with practice, you can set up something like a psychic radio, make communicating on the noisy battlefield easier. And with luck, when you slip up and use each others real name, no one will be able to hear."

Jade looked thoughtful for a moment. "Okay, I know we agreed to my codename, but I have a problem."

"Babe, whats wrong?" Tori asked, wrapping her arm around the dark haired beauty.

"Everyone's calling me princess out there." Jade groused. "That hasn't exactly been a compliment in my life."

"Too bad." Mal said. "Jade, we use the code names cause their not you. You're Power Princess now, and Princess is easier then Power girl. Just let it go."

"Okay, as requested, I'll make a full report on what I've learned about each of you to Andre, and then send you all copies. But for now, I feel I owe Robbie a personal apology." Sikowitz said. "So why don't I take Rob here to my office, and the rest of you stay close, cause I want to have you near if we need to discus something that Robbie observed."

"I knew it." Cat said. "You were there to spy on us. Admit it."

"Cat, I was scared out of my mind." The nerdy boy said. "I could have wound up seriously dead. Trust me, whatever I observed, it was through a haze of panic."

"And yet he did his job." Andre added. "We're all proud of you for that."

The others made their way out, but Robbie wasn't sure if he wanted the apology. Sikowitz had specifically placed him in danger. 'He probably wanted to see if I could handle the stresses of combat.' the young mystic thought. 'So he put me in danger. However, if I did impress him, Sinjin's more likely to be willing to build me a power suit. I just need to be magnanimous..'

"Rob, where's Rex?" Sikowitz asked.

"My room." The boy replied. 'Why so interested in Rex?'

"I noticed, for a while, you were growing apart from your, um, other half." The teacher said. "But since things got weird, you two have actually gotten closer. You're more dependent on him. It worries me."

"How so?" Rob asked. "Wait, are you gonna apologize for placing me in danger, or was that a trick to figure out if I'm too dependent on Rex?"

"Oh, I'm going to apologize. I just needed to set the stage. A good apology is specific, so there's no confusion over what the individual was sorry about." Sikowitz looked serious, sincere. "I needed you to know I'm sorry for placing you in the line of fire. I'd long noticed the similarity between your aura and the unidentifiable one Jade has. I knew you were some kind of mystic. But I also noticed, as Jade continues to practice and grow stronger, her aura changes and grows. I came to the conclusion that either you were deliberately avoiding telling us about your abilities, or you didn't know. By placing you in danger, I'd hoped to activate whatever powers you had that may have lain dormant. But now I understand. Geokinesis seems like an awesome power, but with your apparent limits, I wouldn't rush to the battlefield either. I saw the flow of your power as the rock men stood up, formed the barrier, then fused themselves back together. Intriguing ability, and small potatos compared to the likes of Jade or Cat. Hell, Beck was practically tailor made to rip your little men apart. I'm content to continue using you in your current role."

"Oh." Rob was stunned. 'I can't do anything to Sikowits, the others would ask questions. And the last thing Rex wants to do is piss off Jade. No, we need to figure out how to use Tori to turn Jade, then Jade to turn Tori and Trina. With just them, we can take the world.'

"So I'm sorry I placed you in that kind of danger. It won't happen again." The teacher said.

"No problem." Rob replied. "Just, don't tell anyone. I don't want them to look down on me any more then they do."

"How could having powers make them look down on you more?" Sikowitz said.

"Right now, I'm the normal who's pushing aside my fears to help out. But if they knew I had powers, just lame ones, then I'd be the cowered who avoided front line fighting to be support." The mystic explained. "I'd rather be seen as brave then useless."

"I doubt the others would think that of you." The coconut lover said. "But I do see how, after all this time, telling them would lead to problems. So I'll keep your secret."

"Thanks." Robbie said as he got up to leave. "One more thing. Whats up with wanting to know where Rex was?'

"I noticed a lot of your power focused in him. I was assuming he was more alive now. But the big thing was, I didn't need his influence cause I was sure he'd make fun of you for having powers and not using them." Sikowitz explained.

"No need to worry." Rob said. "I use him as a focus for the rituals that help me call the earth to obey. He's the focus of the rituals. But since we're keeping this between us, let not bring up Rex either."

"As you wish." The teacher said.

Robbie returned to his room, finding Rex on the phone again. "No, mister Ward, I'm not happy about this. I'd prefer to go through my usual go between. But you said you wanted to talk to the boss, and thats me. Now when will I get my cyborgs. I have people to kill, and with luck, a world to take over."

Robbie imagined that Grant Ward wasn't the kind of person who liked having that tone taken with him. But Rex was getting impatient. Hydra's cyborgs had been promised a while ago. But instead of showing up, or even being routed towards L.A., they'd remained off wherever. And more frustrating for Rex was that all they'd heard were excuses.

"Good, we'll be watching for them." The anger puppet said, then slammed the phone. Robbie'd gotten him an old fashion phone, cheaply, just so Rex would have the physical pleasure of slamming the phone when agitated. "So, what'd Sychowitz want?"

"To apologize." Rob informed his partner. "He'd put me in the simulation to foster teamwork. He'd expected the others to make more of an effort to keep me safe. He was sorry for putting me in danger for nothing."

"Rob, when are you gonna learn." Rex sighed as he spoke. "They're not really your friends. Sikowitz may say he did it for teamwork, but he really just wanted to watch you squirm. They all do. Remember, I'm your only friend, and there are times I can't stand you. How could anyone else be there for a loser like you. No, you keep acting as my man inside, and when it's all over, I'll let you have choice of my rejects. That is, assuming there's no one cooler I'm trying to win over. Grant just got kicked down a place or two on my like list. He's a winner, and sometimes those guys don't know how to work and play well with others."

"So were finally getting the Deathlocks?' The nerdy boy wondered aloud.

"Yea, and I don't buy for an instant there was technical problems." Rex opened up as he paced. "Grant knows how valuable those guys could be for him. Why give us choice soldiers, people he knows we're probably going to get mulched, when he has other uses for them."

"Except they're not easy to control." The puppeteer corrected his so called friend. "I believe it, that the delays were him using them for what they were worth. But in the end, he can't let them get too powerful. He has to use them against a solid foe, and thats our team."

"Think they'll at least take out Andre?" The puppet asked. It's cold eyes showed an almost demonic hatred of the musician.

"No." Robbie replied. "Besides, I thought you liked Andre?"

"He's cool, and I like cool, but he's got major weaknesses. Which brings up a point. Why haven't we found us a girl like Griffon to work her way into Andre's trust?" The question hung in the air, heavy but to one of them, almost comical.

"Maybe because Andre changes girl friends like I change my socks." Rob said.

"About once a month? Yea, that tracks." Rex smirked. Somehow, the cold puppet face smirked.

"Two, he's far more trained then any of us." Robbie absorbed the insult, and let it go. "Unlike Trina, who wouldn't see the guy coming, Andre would quickly get past the pretty face and figure out that someone is trying to play him. And three, in case that wasn't enough, any girl capable of staying close to him would have to be cleaver. Griffon we can handle, he's not that bright. Charming as anything, but we knew his weaknesses before we ever approached him. Without that kind of leverage, we risk making another enemy. Not gonna make another enemy."

"So we're looking into the spy girl then?" The puppet said, seeming to ignore everything his other half had said. "Just, make sure you're playing the others while looking for weaknesses. Sikowitz is clueless, and Sinjin's actually worth money. A scientist like him, and is sister, that big bucks."

"Don't worry." The nerdy boy said. "I have them all completely fooled."

A while later, Andre walked into an ally cautiously, looking around for a possible trap. "Okay, I'm alone." He called out to the darkness.

"No your not." Called back, in that Howdy Doody voice. "If you were the kind to take that kind of risk, then I wouldn't have a use for you.,"

"Okay, I have men hidden near by, and Cheshire on alert." The musician turned spy said. "Feeling better?"

"Much." The voice said. It was closer now. "Mister Harris, I'm only coming to you because there's a wolf at your back. You've embraced a viper to your very breast. The simple fact is, you, your friends, all of us, are in danger because this monster, this foe, has been allowed to fester and grow under our collective eyes. But I'm dedicated to stopping him, even if it means my very life."

"Very noble of you." Andre called, while quietly switching on his passive sonar. An image of the ally slowly formed in his mind from the analysis of the echoes of random noises. "Why don't you break cover so we can talk?"

"You're use of sound waves really is amazing." The voice was somehow behind him now. "I'll bet your forming a mental image of every nook and cranny in this ally. But I chose it, so I know the best places to hide. obviosly, I've been studying you. Not as hard as you might thing. I've been shadowing your viper wolf, and from it's scraps I've learned so much about all of your little group."

'Keep talking.' The Agent thought. 'I'm zeroing in on ya, getting the rebounded sound and filtering it. Gonna learn if your really there, or just a well hidden intercom.' Shifting, he deliberately knocked down a piece of trash, letting it's almost silent echo reverberate down the ally and back. 'Just a little longer…..'

Andre froze as the image started to form. Information gleamed included where this man was, if he was in body armor, that kind of chiz. 'No, can't be…?." Andre's mind struggled to make sense of the readings. Composition, size, everything. 'I-it's a…'

"Hello, Mister Harris, my name is Goonter." The puppet said as he stepped out of the shadows. "And I believe it's high time the two of us talked. Just a reminder, something I learned during my studies, while I was trying to decide the best course of action. Spooking your enemy before you know his plans can be bad. We don't know what this evil force is up to. But for your information, and this is important, Robbie's just the tool. I want him reformed, given chance to be a hero. He's been under the thumb for far too long. No, the enemy here is Rex powers, and we need to figure out how to stop him, without alerting him that we're onto him."

:}

Okay, now someone knows about Rex. But it's not the same as acting upon that information. Goonter knows Rex has had time to set things in motion, set up protections. Still, it was time for an ally, and Goonter chose the one man he felt could go back and pretend everything was normal. I guess we can say the sides are starting to form. But is it too late?

Reviews, comments, and unabashed hero worship is encouraged. Just use the review for the first two, and an alter set with rose petals and a picture is good for the last. Just, review.