Briefings and Battles
Disclaimer: Same as before. Sorry I won't have computer access until May 24, this is my last update until then.
~ ~ ~ ~
After lunch the X-men and the Misfits were assembled, at Hawk's request on opposite sides of the room, in a classroom by Shipwreck's house. "Today we're going to learn about the basics of sniping." Bilby replied.
"Is that where you shoot people from 500 yards away?" Jamie Madrox asked.
"Further than that. In the US Army sniper manual sniping operations begin at ranges exceeding 600 meters. In World War II a German sniper named Matthias Hetzenauer claimed an off handed hit against a man standing in the open at 1100 meters." Bilby replied.
"Cool." Multiple replied.
"Teacher's pet." Berserker whispered.
"Now, the basic components of a sniper rifle are the stock, the receiver, the scope, and the barrel." Bilby replied, laying out his own L1A1 SLR on a large table. The students all moved in closer for a look. The weapon's stock and components were spray painted desert tan for the terrain he had been operating in.
"Now there's more to a telescopic sight than looking down range, lining up your crosshairs and pulling the trigger." Bilby replied. "The single reason most riflemen fail to hit their targets in the first shot is that they squeeze and do not apply a steady and constant force to the trigger. You should be surprised when this thing goes off. Now...."
He could see Bobby Drake sleeping. "All of you drop and give me twenty, right now!" Bilby shouted.
"But we didn't do anything." Scott Summers protested.
"All of you on your faces. You're all a team so you will be rewarded and punished as such." Bilby replied. Several of the kids started cranking them out.
"Stop." Bilby said, "None of those count. We'll do these when I count them out. I'll say down you say the number."
"Down!" Bilby shouted.
"One!" came the chorus. "Down!"
"Two!"
"Down!"
"Three!"
At around eight, Jean Grey's arms gave out. "Jean, we're gonna have to work on your upper body strength. That's mystifying considering you are a varsity athlete."
Jean looked visibly upset and muttered something, "I don't need to be in good shape when I can telekinetically lift you across the room."
"Oh really, I'd love to see what happens when the Heartless develop some countermeasure against your telepathy/telekinetics. Do you honestly think I fear you?" Bilby replied, "I've faced down a foe more ruthless than the Sentinels of your dimension, an evil manipulative intelligence that rivals both COBRA and Magneto in terms of evil. They do not feel pity, remorse, or fear, and they will not stop until the very heart of your dimension is consumed and all of you will cease to exist because such a great cataclysm will implode your universe."
Bilby spoke with such conviction and hatred for the Heartless that it kept some of the more smart mouth type students quiet. Scott noticed that the Misfits weren't even fazed by the twenty pushups that Bilby made them do where all of the Institute kids were sweating, and feeling the burn in their arms.
"That's nothing compared to what happens whenever Beach Head, Sergeant Slaughter or Roadblock does if he catches us sleeping in class." Lance said.
Bilby knew there was at least some hope for this dimension. At least the Misfits didn't have their noses in the air, unlike the X-men who seemed to consider things like working with their former enemies beneath them. There were a few who had potential, one was Kitty Pryde, her friendship with Lance showed how open minded she was. By contrast Jean Gray and Scott Summers were classic power trips by his way of thinking, the leaders with puffed up egos and in the case of Jean, she was as bad as those popular crowd that gave the former Brotherhood members a hard time at Bayville High School.
He ordered them to their feet by saying, "Recover."
They all stood up and sat back down. "Hopefully that keeps you awake." Bilby replied, arms folded across his chest.
The lesson went smoothly until Bobby Drake decided to go egg Lance on about Kitty while Peter made his move. The classroom started to shake. Calmly Bilby put his laser pointer into his pocket and said, "Save your energy for the obstacle course, and I mean it." Bilby replied, "I know from experience Sergeant Rumpler isn't taking it easy on any of you and you know Sergeant Slaughter is especially merciless."
Bilby's words proved to be entirely prophetic as he walked out with the class to the obstacle course. "Bilby, Cover Girl, show them how to go through the course." Sergeant Slaughter ordered, "The only stipulation, boys and girls, is use none of your fancy mutant powers to get through this."
"Bilby, you're up." Sergeant Slaughter said.
Bilby sprang forward, running through the tires and vaulting several logs that were four feet off the ground. He ran up to a wall with a rope hanging from it and scrambled up the rope and jumped down. He swung across from one parallel beam to another, missing the second beam and falling down. It didn't seem to faze him and he just kept on running and when he hit the finish line after going through more tires, past several simulated mines, and over more walls until he finally finished, crawling under the barbed wire.
"Bilby. Ten minutes and fifteen seconds." Sergeant Slaughter said, "Not bad soldier."
"Cover Girl, you're up."
Cover Girl ran through the obstacle course with a gymnast's deceptive grace and skill. She managed to land smoothly on the rope swing, and didn't have as many falls and mild trips that Bilby had gone through. Where Bilby relied primarily on his inherent toughness to get through the course, Cover Girl used a combination of skill and grace.
"Cover Girl. Nine minutes and thirty seconds. Your best time yet." Sergeant Slaughter said.
One of the X-men and one of the Misfits would go through the course at a time. The minimum passing time for a recruit was twelve minutes with ten minutes and thirty seconds being the average time for most Joes. First up were Jean Gray and Althea Delgato.
Althea went through the course with twice as much agility as either Bilby or Cover Girl had shown. She easily scaled the wall, finding her footing easily and climbing swiftly. Jean was still struggling past the logs and made it to the wall. Sergeant Slaughter watched as Jean tried yet another futile attempt to scale the wall, her face flush with frustration. "I can tell you right now you're not gonna make it over that wall." Sergeant Slaughter said.
"I'll make it over that wall!" Jean shouted. Again she failed; she didn't have the upper body strength to get over the wall. Jean bit her upper lip, tears streaming from her face.
"Delgato, Nine minutes and fifteen seconds." Sergeant Rumpler said.
"That is exactly what will beat you in combat, Miss Gray, that defeatist attitude you've got going there. You've been on top of everything all your life, but you're now at the very bottom and you can't take it. That will beat you quicker than anything COBRA's got."
Meanwhile Lance and Scott were going through, constantly jockeying each other. When Scott slipped when trying to scale the wall because it shook he immediately blamed Lance even though he wasn't responsible for that shake.
"Alvers, there's no way you can do that without using your powers!" Scott said, blasting a hole in the wall.
"Summers, if that's how you wanna play...." Lance said, shaking several holes through the obstacle course and hitting Scott with a mini tidal wave of earth while Scott blasted him. The two boys began to instantly fight.
"Vampire!"
"Witch!"
"Garlic breath!"
Came the shouts of Wanda and Rogue, who were immersed in their own verbal argument. An energy bomb appeared out of nowhere and blew several tires airborne. Amara started to throw fire blasts around that consumed the rope climb and rope swing.
Several obstacles were either on fire or blown up before the fight ended and Sergeant Slaughter piled on the punishment.
Misfit and X-man alike were face down on the ground doing forty arm straining pushups. Jean Gray watched Althea do them with ease while she was struggling just to do ten. Every one of the Misfits, even Toad, was now in better physical condition that she was in and she couldn't stand it. Here she was, former captain of the Bayville High School Girl's Soccer team, MVP, and she was being bested by the former Brotherhood.
"If you're wondering why the Misfits have been beating you at every evolution it's because they've been training to do this. Their training is hard and practical. You X-men should be in better shape, you've got the money to pay for a lot of equipment and training that we can only dream of." Sergeant Rumpler replied, "The Joes may not have as much money as you, but they know how to make the best of things, and that's what we're teaching you."
"We're here to help you fight against the Heartless, but you have to do your part of the bargain. We need you to work harder than you have ever done in your lives. It is the only chance you stand against them. They're not gonna give you a second chance, they'll shoot you dead where you lie." Bilby added.
'Just like they did to Akima.' Bilby thought, 'And hundreds of other worlds.'
Exhausted, the X-men swarmed Professor Xavier, "How much more of this?"
"Two weeks." Xavier replied.
"Two weeks! It's only been one day with these maniacs and we're getting our butts kicked!" Jean complained.
"Jean, Scott, it's only for two weeks...." Professor Xavier began.
To this Jean replied, "I keep getting humiliated out there, so are the rest of us! Why are we even in need of them to fight the Heartless? Our defenses at the Institute drove off their last attacks."
"The Heartless don't just threaten the Institute, Jean, they threaten the entire world." Xavier replied, "Do you think I wanted to be in close proximity to Shipwreck and his crazy family or Hawk and his insane soldiers for that long?"
"YES!" Jean and Scott shouted. Obviously the golden boy and golden girl were upset that they weren't getting the royal treatment they had been accustomed to.
"Charles." Logan said, as the pair stormed out of the Blackbird, "It's gonna be a long, hard two weeks."
~ ~ ~ ~
I'm up for some more suggestions at this point. I'm gonna use my week off to think up more ideas.
Disclaimer: Same as before. Sorry I won't have computer access until May 24, this is my last update until then.
~ ~ ~ ~
After lunch the X-men and the Misfits were assembled, at Hawk's request on opposite sides of the room, in a classroom by Shipwreck's house. "Today we're going to learn about the basics of sniping." Bilby replied.
"Is that where you shoot people from 500 yards away?" Jamie Madrox asked.
"Further than that. In the US Army sniper manual sniping operations begin at ranges exceeding 600 meters. In World War II a German sniper named Matthias Hetzenauer claimed an off handed hit against a man standing in the open at 1100 meters." Bilby replied.
"Cool." Multiple replied.
"Teacher's pet." Berserker whispered.
"Now, the basic components of a sniper rifle are the stock, the receiver, the scope, and the barrel." Bilby replied, laying out his own L1A1 SLR on a large table. The students all moved in closer for a look. The weapon's stock and components were spray painted desert tan for the terrain he had been operating in.
"Now there's more to a telescopic sight than looking down range, lining up your crosshairs and pulling the trigger." Bilby replied. "The single reason most riflemen fail to hit their targets in the first shot is that they squeeze and do not apply a steady and constant force to the trigger. You should be surprised when this thing goes off. Now...."
He could see Bobby Drake sleeping. "All of you drop and give me twenty, right now!" Bilby shouted.
"But we didn't do anything." Scott Summers protested.
"All of you on your faces. You're all a team so you will be rewarded and punished as such." Bilby replied. Several of the kids started cranking them out.
"Stop." Bilby said, "None of those count. We'll do these when I count them out. I'll say down you say the number."
"Down!" Bilby shouted.
"One!" came the chorus. "Down!"
"Two!"
"Down!"
"Three!"
At around eight, Jean Grey's arms gave out. "Jean, we're gonna have to work on your upper body strength. That's mystifying considering you are a varsity athlete."
Jean looked visibly upset and muttered something, "I don't need to be in good shape when I can telekinetically lift you across the room."
"Oh really, I'd love to see what happens when the Heartless develop some countermeasure against your telepathy/telekinetics. Do you honestly think I fear you?" Bilby replied, "I've faced down a foe more ruthless than the Sentinels of your dimension, an evil manipulative intelligence that rivals both COBRA and Magneto in terms of evil. They do not feel pity, remorse, or fear, and they will not stop until the very heart of your dimension is consumed and all of you will cease to exist because such a great cataclysm will implode your universe."
Bilby spoke with such conviction and hatred for the Heartless that it kept some of the more smart mouth type students quiet. Scott noticed that the Misfits weren't even fazed by the twenty pushups that Bilby made them do where all of the Institute kids were sweating, and feeling the burn in their arms.
"That's nothing compared to what happens whenever Beach Head, Sergeant Slaughter or Roadblock does if he catches us sleeping in class." Lance said.
Bilby knew there was at least some hope for this dimension. At least the Misfits didn't have their noses in the air, unlike the X-men who seemed to consider things like working with their former enemies beneath them. There were a few who had potential, one was Kitty Pryde, her friendship with Lance showed how open minded she was. By contrast Jean Gray and Scott Summers were classic power trips by his way of thinking, the leaders with puffed up egos and in the case of Jean, she was as bad as those popular crowd that gave the former Brotherhood members a hard time at Bayville High School.
He ordered them to their feet by saying, "Recover."
They all stood up and sat back down. "Hopefully that keeps you awake." Bilby replied, arms folded across his chest.
The lesson went smoothly until Bobby Drake decided to go egg Lance on about Kitty while Peter made his move. The classroom started to shake. Calmly Bilby put his laser pointer into his pocket and said, "Save your energy for the obstacle course, and I mean it." Bilby replied, "I know from experience Sergeant Rumpler isn't taking it easy on any of you and you know Sergeant Slaughter is especially merciless."
Bilby's words proved to be entirely prophetic as he walked out with the class to the obstacle course. "Bilby, Cover Girl, show them how to go through the course." Sergeant Slaughter ordered, "The only stipulation, boys and girls, is use none of your fancy mutant powers to get through this."
"Bilby, you're up." Sergeant Slaughter said.
Bilby sprang forward, running through the tires and vaulting several logs that were four feet off the ground. He ran up to a wall with a rope hanging from it and scrambled up the rope and jumped down. He swung across from one parallel beam to another, missing the second beam and falling down. It didn't seem to faze him and he just kept on running and when he hit the finish line after going through more tires, past several simulated mines, and over more walls until he finally finished, crawling under the barbed wire.
"Bilby. Ten minutes and fifteen seconds." Sergeant Slaughter said, "Not bad soldier."
"Cover Girl, you're up."
Cover Girl ran through the obstacle course with a gymnast's deceptive grace and skill. She managed to land smoothly on the rope swing, and didn't have as many falls and mild trips that Bilby had gone through. Where Bilby relied primarily on his inherent toughness to get through the course, Cover Girl used a combination of skill and grace.
"Cover Girl. Nine minutes and thirty seconds. Your best time yet." Sergeant Slaughter said.
One of the X-men and one of the Misfits would go through the course at a time. The minimum passing time for a recruit was twelve minutes with ten minutes and thirty seconds being the average time for most Joes. First up were Jean Gray and Althea Delgato.
Althea went through the course with twice as much agility as either Bilby or Cover Girl had shown. She easily scaled the wall, finding her footing easily and climbing swiftly. Jean was still struggling past the logs and made it to the wall. Sergeant Slaughter watched as Jean tried yet another futile attempt to scale the wall, her face flush with frustration. "I can tell you right now you're not gonna make it over that wall." Sergeant Slaughter said.
"I'll make it over that wall!" Jean shouted. Again she failed; she didn't have the upper body strength to get over the wall. Jean bit her upper lip, tears streaming from her face.
"Delgato, Nine minutes and fifteen seconds." Sergeant Rumpler said.
"That is exactly what will beat you in combat, Miss Gray, that defeatist attitude you've got going there. You've been on top of everything all your life, but you're now at the very bottom and you can't take it. That will beat you quicker than anything COBRA's got."
Meanwhile Lance and Scott were going through, constantly jockeying each other. When Scott slipped when trying to scale the wall because it shook he immediately blamed Lance even though he wasn't responsible for that shake.
"Alvers, there's no way you can do that without using your powers!" Scott said, blasting a hole in the wall.
"Summers, if that's how you wanna play...." Lance said, shaking several holes through the obstacle course and hitting Scott with a mini tidal wave of earth while Scott blasted him. The two boys began to instantly fight.
"Vampire!"
"Witch!"
"Garlic breath!"
Came the shouts of Wanda and Rogue, who were immersed in their own verbal argument. An energy bomb appeared out of nowhere and blew several tires airborne. Amara started to throw fire blasts around that consumed the rope climb and rope swing.
Several obstacles were either on fire or blown up before the fight ended and Sergeant Slaughter piled on the punishment.
Misfit and X-man alike were face down on the ground doing forty arm straining pushups. Jean Gray watched Althea do them with ease while she was struggling just to do ten. Every one of the Misfits, even Toad, was now in better physical condition that she was in and she couldn't stand it. Here she was, former captain of the Bayville High School Girl's Soccer team, MVP, and she was being bested by the former Brotherhood.
"If you're wondering why the Misfits have been beating you at every evolution it's because they've been training to do this. Their training is hard and practical. You X-men should be in better shape, you've got the money to pay for a lot of equipment and training that we can only dream of." Sergeant Rumpler replied, "The Joes may not have as much money as you, but they know how to make the best of things, and that's what we're teaching you."
"We're here to help you fight against the Heartless, but you have to do your part of the bargain. We need you to work harder than you have ever done in your lives. It is the only chance you stand against them. They're not gonna give you a second chance, they'll shoot you dead where you lie." Bilby added.
'Just like they did to Akima.' Bilby thought, 'And hundreds of other worlds.'
Exhausted, the X-men swarmed Professor Xavier, "How much more of this?"
"Two weeks." Xavier replied.
"Two weeks! It's only been one day with these maniacs and we're getting our butts kicked!" Jean complained.
"Jean, Scott, it's only for two weeks...." Professor Xavier began.
To this Jean replied, "I keep getting humiliated out there, so are the rest of us! Why are we even in need of them to fight the Heartless? Our defenses at the Institute drove off their last attacks."
"The Heartless don't just threaten the Institute, Jean, they threaten the entire world." Xavier replied, "Do you think I wanted to be in close proximity to Shipwreck and his crazy family or Hawk and his insane soldiers for that long?"
"YES!" Jean and Scott shouted. Obviously the golden boy and golden girl were upset that they weren't getting the royal treatment they had been accustomed to.
"Charles." Logan said, as the pair stormed out of the Blackbird, "It's gonna be a long, hard two weeks."
~ ~ ~ ~
I'm up for some more suggestions at this point. I'm gonna use my week off to think up more ideas.
