Issue 1 Downtime

Well I'll be damned. This place is pretty nice. Anika says as she looks around. Alright how did they say this worked? Name input or some shit... "Computer, do that...baseline test thing: Anika Sloan."

The moment after, the room shifted into an outside area with targets and dummies. To the right were the archery targets and to the left were the melee dummies. She sighed. "Seriously? Come on, this isn't even a challenge." Nevertheless, she began creating a bow, her hand meticulously drawing out the shape before it forms. Once the bow itself is complete, she pulls back on the string, concentrating as an arrow manifests, ready to be released. Thunk. Close to a bulls-eye, but not quite. She was a bit rusty. "Good god, is this how people train here?"


((Open))

"Not really," Ryan said. "It's how the newbies train."

She doesn't turn, keeping her focus on the target. Thunk. Closer.

"Does it actually get more challenging? Because I have to say, this is pretty sad." She sighs and turns towards the melee dummies, waving a hand over the bow and shifting it into a flaming scimitar. She takes an offensive stance, hilt of the weapon in both hands.

"Oh, it does. As soon as it's sure that it isn't going to kill you with whatever it's trying to do."

She steps forward, then shifts her weight slightly to do a mock-dodge before sweeping the blade in an upwards diagonal motion. The dummy catches fire before the program quickly extinguishes it.

"Well that's good to know. So it kind of learns your movements and all that?"

She takes another offensive stance.

"Oh, it can be outright mean after a while. Start throwing things at you that aren't flammable, make you fight them underwater... sky's the limit, so to speak." He just sort of stood leaning against the wall of the observation room, not wanting to walk in and let his own settings affect her difficulty level.

"You're right. Underwater *is* just plain mean." She twists into a spin-dodge and strikes the dummy horizontally across it's mid. "Would be nice if these things actually fought back. How long does it take before it takes your baseline crap?"

Ryan shrugged, even though she couldn't see it. "Computer, activate in-room display, show simulation objectives," he said. In the room, a big hard-to-miss display showing her completion objectives should appear somewhere behind the dummies.

She looks at the objectives.

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Baseline Simulation Test Objectives: Anika Sloan

- Hand-Eye Coordination (Archery Target Protocol) COMPLETE
- Combat Stances (Stationary Target Protocol) COMPLETE
- Ability Threshold (Recording...)
- Reaction Timing (Projectile Protocol) INITIATE

"Projectile Protocol? What's-" And that's when it began, tennis balls being pelted at her. Whatever this computer program had with tennis balls, who knew. Maybe they were just a good tool for reactionary measures.

Her eyes catch the balls coming her way and she immediately throws the sword. As it flies through the air, she claps her hands and separates her fingers, which causes the sword then to separate into a number of tiny flaming daggers, piercing the poor helpless balls. They drop to the ground in little poofs of ash.

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Reaction Timing (Projectile Protocol) COMPLETE

"Well. I suppose it makes sense the baseline test would be easy to start. Just to kind of get a jist of how you do things, yeah?"

"Yeah, just be careful when you get to the point where you can drop the safeties down. When people say it can almost kill you, they aren't exagerating."

She gives a nod. "Well, I don't have any plans on dying anytime soon, much less to a computer program. So I'll probably take your advice to be careful. I heard it was possible to spar in here, right?"

"Well, you need a partner, but yeah, you can. It'll separate you if things get too intense."

"Do you spar?"

"I... have," Ryan hedged.

"Sooooo do you want to spar? Jeez this is like pulling teeth."

"Well, I suppose it couldn't hurt," Ryan reasoned. Going to have to take it easy...

A minute later, he was walking into the Danger Room, wingless and in his training suit. "So. How do you want to do this?"

"Up to you. I'm used to both ways, with powers and without." She thinks for a moment. "Heh. Both ways." She laughs. "Anyway, I'm up for anything. Ring, cage, powers, no powers...it's been too long since I had a good spar...assuming you're any good at it."

Ryan smirked. "Just pick the style, and you'll find out," he said, stretching his arms out.

"I'll go easy on you. No powers just yet. Just some bare-knuckle boxing. You alright with that?"

"Perfectly," he said. "Any restrictions you want to put on me? Styles, contact points?"

"Everything is fair game, but no hair pulling. No striking when the other is downed. Basic fair-play rules. I won't kick your junk in. Make sense?"

"Perfectly," he said, taking up a ready stance. "All right. Come at me."

She readies herself as well, hopping a bit on her feet. "So you got a name?" Her eyes look him over for openings, specifically set towards near his left shoulder.

"I'm Ryan," he said, keeping a loose defensive posture, seemingly stronger on his right side. "Ryan Gabriel."

"Anika." She says as she takes the beginnings of a mock swing towards his left shoulder with her left fist, waiting for the moment he defends it.

Ryan gave the blows all the defense they warranted, which was, to say, none. He turned away from the blow, letting it move past him and feinting at her side.

She couldn't tell much about his strength yet, but the guy was quick.

Moving towards a defensive stance as he is now at her side, she turns quickly to face him again, bouncing on her feet and trying not to give him a chance to take a swing at her from the side. "You one of the regulars here?" She keeps her fists and arms up tight to her body.

"Yeah, you could say that," he said, continuing to move around her and taking a shot at her midsection. "Been doing this since I was about fifteen."

She jumps back quickly on her toes to dodge the swing, constantly moving. Being quick as well was great, but it would only get her so far. Her training was from street fighting. Not professionals. "Pretty young. Where did you train?" She takes a quick swing towards his face. It doesn't have much power. Seems she's still just testing the waters.

"I've been at Xavier's as long as I can remember," he said. Conversation halted a moment as he gave a rather efficient block to the blow, then didn't follow up with one of his own. "Parents were mutants, wasn't really any doubt that I was, too, so I got put in early."

"Fair enough." She stops hopping for a few moments. "So are you actually going to spar or just block everything? If I wanted a punching bag, it wouldn't be hard to get one. Not trying to be mean, just pointing out." There's no attitude in her voice at all; she's just being point blank.

"Oh, I don't know, are you going to actually attack, or are you going to keep testing the waters forever?"

She smirks. "Fair enough." With that, she begins hopping again and takes a more forceful swing towards his gut with her right fist, keeping her left arm up so she doesn't leave *too* much of an opening. She's not using all of her strength still, but she's going more serious now. She's not going all-out for whatever reason.

"That's more like it," he said, smirking as he upped the stakes. He spun as he moved in, letting the hit graze his side as he slid a blow with his elbow to her chest. He moved back out without taking another shot, having let her get a better look at his style and skill, hoping she'd take the hint that she didn't have to hold back.

Her reaction time isn't too bad, and she uses her left arm to attempt to block the blow from her chest. She cringes a bit. Elbows hurt. However, there's still a smirk on her face. Apparently this is fun to her. She doesn't let there be much of a break between the hit and her next swing. Taking a quick step forward, she swings twice with her left fist now, one towards his face first, then towards his right shoulder.

Ryan guarded his face and took the hit on the shoulder, wincing at the hit. He looked like he was getting ready to throw a kick, then came in with his left arm with two rapid blows to her midsection as he gave his right shoulder a little experimental roll, then sent a right-handed blow at her face. "Not bad. Where'd you learn to fight?"

She was able to block a few of the blows, but the ones at her midsection she took with a cringe. It was clear as far as her face was concerned, she would be able to block that well.

"Mixture of on the streets and taking some lessons from one of my buds who was a professional boxer. The real training is on the streets though, obviously. Nothing better to learn from than actual scenarios."

Continuing to keep mobile, she throws out a few blows while they talk. She keeps focus pretty well.

Ryan nodded while he had the chance, then worked on shoving aside the punches as they came. "Yeah, there really isn't anything that'll teach you to survive like something that's trying to kill you," he agreed. Which, on reflection, wasn't exactly what she'd said, but hey, who was keeping track.

"Kill you *or* those you care about." She corrected.

"No no, that doesn't teach you how to survive," Ryan corrected her in turn. "That teaches you to kill."