Milk Run

Note from Nute: So I was thinking, this "all-new, all-different" trainee class of X-Men is EVENTUALLY going to have to get into the Danger Room and work as a unit. So here's an idea of how it could go...

Originally posted April 26, 2005.

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The pagers all went off simultaneously with the same text message. TRAINEES TO READY ROOM, followed by a countdown that began at 3:00 and started clicking down. Cain blinked, pausing to set down the sofa he'd been vacuuming under and make haste for the stairs to the sub-basement. Narrowly avoiding Doug and Marie-Ange, who seemed to be turning the summons into a giggling game of tag, he flattened himself against the wall of the stairwell, letting Jubilee and Paige rush past him with a stereo "Excuse us, Mr. Marko!". Stepping into the ready room as the timer hit the one-minute mark, Cain frowned as he saw all the other trainees already leaning casually against the back wall, facing Cyclops, who stood across from them in full team leathers and combat visor.

"Well ahead of schedule, excellent," Cyclops announced as Cain shut the door behind him. "You've all been training in some capacity for a good while now. I have to say that when it comes to the paperwork and testing, I have no doubts that you've all put forth your best effort. Now we step it up a notch. Today," he proclaimed with a smile, "is your first session as a team in the Danger Room."

Muttered exclamations of surprise, pride, and excitement filled the room, cut off by a lifted hand from the X-Men's team leader. "But," Cyclops continued, "we're adding a few wrinkles to the program. This isn't just powers testing, but it's not a full simulation either."

"What are the parameters then, sir?" Shiro asked politely from the seiza stance he had assumed, kneeling on the floor of the ready room. Behind him, Paige nodded, the same question on her lips. To reply, Cyclops only pointed to the door behind them.

"Suit up," he ordered. "You have four minutes to get in uniform and into the staging area. Go."

The trainees practically stumbled over each other as they rushed through the door, pausing as they suddenly realized that all their lockers had been moved into one room. A few seconds of awkward silence reigned until Paige confidently strode across the floor, identified her locker, and snapped it open. Only a moment of confusion passed before she frowned, unfolding a pair of pants that she could have fit into one leg of. "These," she declared, "are not mine. Nor is the jacket, or…"

"Merde," Marie-Ange chimed in, opening her locker. "Our uniforms appear to have been mixed up. Who wears a men's medium jacket?" Shiro raised his hand and caught the grey clothing as it was flung across the room. Shouts of "Girls' extra-small?" and "These aren't my boots!" rang out as articles of clothing began to be tossed into the center of the room.

Jubilee shrugged and reached for her locker, finding herself shoulder-to-waist with Marko. "Um, dude? A little room?" Cain arched an eyebrow down at her. She screwed up her face and tugged at the hem of her t-shirt. "And a little privacy, dude? Turn around, maybe?"

Cain scowled right back. "Right. YOU turn around. I gotta change." Cain turned around, meeting Marie-Ange's eyes as she tried to struggle into a pair of trainee pants. Blushing, Cain threw his hands up and marched across the floor. "I'm changing in the bathroom!" he exclaimed.

"Occupied!" Shiro yelled back, bracing his feet against the small restroom door as he found the uniform pants he had grabbed unable to fit past his knees. Checking the waistband, he stuck his head out. "Paige!" he called, holding out the pants as she walked by, calmly exchanging trousers as she rummaged through the pile of boots.

"Thirty seconds!" came Cyclops' voice from the staging area, prompting the trainees to simply grab the nearest uniform parts and shrug into them, stumbling for the door. Scott paced back and forth, listening to the muffled cries from the locker room.

"Sports bra?"

"Too small for me, Douglas. Leave it in the pile."

"Yo, that's mine!"

"You barely have any breasts as it is, Jubilation. Leave it be and hurry up."

Rushing into the staging area as Cyclops began to count down from ten, the trainees stood at an approximation of attention against the back wall, Jubilee hopping awkwardly while attempting to put one boot on and line up at the same time. With a barely-suppressed grin, Scott walked up and down the line, glancing at the trainees. He raised an eyebrow, observing how Marie-Ange's uniform pants somehow seemed to only make it to mid-calf and were tight enough to almost be painted on. Jubilee's, on the other hand, were bunched up around the tops of her boots.

Stopping in front of Cain, Cyclops just shook his head. "Hydrant?" he asked. "Where is your shirt?

Bare-chested, Cain stared straight ahead at the wall over Cyclops' head, trying not to laugh. "Vision's locker, sir."

"And why is it in Vision's locker, Hydrant?"

"Wasn't about to argue about clothes with a Frenchwoman, sir."

Scott couldn't hide his grin at that response. "Ten points to Gryffindor," he joked. "This was just the first part of the test, seeing how you deal with a familiar situation becoming unfamiliar under pressure. Why is Husk the only one in a complete uniform, can anyone tell me?"

"Hers is the only uniform that is labeled, and made of a different material," Shiro answered, frowning down at his bare feet. "It is easier to discern from the rest of ours."

"Not at all because she stayed calm and professional?" Cyclops asked, prompting a grin from Paige and looks of mild consternation from the others. "But you have a point. Husk is more gear-dependent than the rest of you, due to the nature of her powers. The same way I am, or Jetstream is. Knowing where your gear is at all times will become a survival skill. Take the next few minutes to get yourselves arranged properly and go draw your communicators from the supply chest, you'll need them."

As the trainees filed out, Cyclops turned to face the wall. As the door to the locker room shut, he cleared his throat loudly. The wall's surface shimmered, becoming transparent and revealing Alison and Ororo seated behind it at the controls to the Danger Room's scenario editor.

"That went far better than expected," he announced. "I recall someone on their first try just decided to forego a uniform altogether."

"I was nineteen," Ororo shot back with a smile, "and had been training for I believe a week before we were thrown into this exercise. Do not make me retell the story of the day you ran through an entire scenario wearing Jean's shirt. Inside out, I may add."

"Oh, do tell," Alison chirped, swiveling in her chair. "They've got the communicators. Time for us to make scarce." She keyed a command into the console, and the wall became opaque again as the trainees, properly arranged and dressed this time, filed back into the staging area.

Cyclops looked over the trainees, then produced a slim envelope from his pocket. "Which one of you drew the blue communicator?" Doug slowly raised his hand, which garnered a barely perceptible doubletake from Scott, who stepped forward and handed him the envelope nonetheless. "There's your parameters, Lexicon. You have twenty minutes from the time the door opens. Good training." With that, he stepped briskly into the locker room, but not before slapping the red panel on the wall. A countdown timer began from twenty seconds and approached zero as Doug opened the envelope.

"What's it say?" Jubilee asked. Doug scanned the single line once, then smiled as he saw the staging area doors open.

"The enemy's gate is down."

Scott took the command console seat between Alison and Ororo, fuming quietly. "That wasn't as planned. Lexicon wasn't supposed to draw the command communicator. I had Short Fuse scheduled for it."

Ororo raised an eyebrow expressively. "You slated Jubilee for the command role their first time out? Not Cain or Shiro?"

"Hydrant has more experience, but it'd be too easy for him to just start barking orders without knowing his team's capabilities. And Kamikaze, well… not quite yet." Cyclops watched the gate open and slowly pushed the activation sliders for the Danger Room up to full. "Start scenario," he spoke into the microphone. He crossed his arms over his chest, not bothering to hide his frown. "I honestly have no idea how Doug's going to do in command." Behind his back, he couldn't see the devilish smirk cross Alison's face as she nonchalantly cued up the session recorder.

"What does it mean, 'the enemy's gate is down'?" Shiro crouched in the staging area, priming himself to blast off on a trail of fire once his teammates moved. Doug smiled, reading the notation at the bottom of the parameters.

"It's from a book, Ender's Game. The object is to activate the gate across the way… there." He pointed out across the stark grey expanse of the Danger Room, broken only by slowly-moving low walls and swinging beams. "Takes four people to activate it, one person to walk through and win. The enemy's gate is 'down', because in the book, the exercise was done in null-gravity, and the students had to pretend they were falling towards the gate."

"Five to win," Marko nodded. "Six of us. We can't be lollygaggin' around here. We're gonna need a plan."

"And that seems to be my responsibility," Doug answered. "I'm on command, so let's try and beat the clock, team. Spread out along the wall, keep your eyes open. Floor, ceiling too. Kamikaze, I want you straight up from the door, ten-meter altitude. Watch for anything moving from above. Hydrant, Husk, take the flanks. Anything incoming, you're best set to intercept it. Short Fuse, Vision, you're with me."

Everyone paused, not used to hearing such a confident, commanding tone coming from Doug Ramsey. Cain was first to move, hunching down and creeping left along the wall. Peeling away the outer layer of her uniform and skin as she walked, Husk adopted a dull grey steel appearance, the better to absorb impacts. She slid along the wall, absently forming the molecular structure for Teflon in her head, should an entanglement present itself.

It only took two steps when she felt her feet leave the ground violently, and the world spun as she slammed forcefully into the ceiling. Crying out, she tried to point to the source of the attack, but could neither see one nor move her arm from where it was plastered to a flat black disc set into the ceiling. "Electromagnet," she hissed into her communicator, but received only static in response.

Jubilee was the first to notice Paige's predicament and threw a hand up to her earpiece. "Short Fuse to Husk? Dubba yew tee eff, dude? Husk?" Tapping her communicator, she turned to Doug for advice. "Lexicon, we got a trainee down. Or up. Want I should try and pop some fireworks to try and knock her down?"

Doug assessed the situation and motioned Shiro down to him. "Kamikaze, get up to Husk and tell her to adapt to an elastic configuration. Assist her if she needs it. Go." With a short head-bow of assent, Shiro was off like a rocket. Tapping his earpiece, Doug sent out an all-hands message.

"Hydrant, you're our blocker and recon. Stage yourself by that stationary wall. Short Fuse is going to your location. You're Red team. Kamikaze, when you recover Husk, flank their position and leapfrog forward. You're Blue team. Vision, advice?"

Marie-Ange calmly drew out a tarot deck from one of her uniform's many pockets. Shuffling one-handed, she expertly flipped the top card over. "The Wheel of Fortune. Misdirection, trickery, the unexpected." She palmed the deck, sliding it into a convenient sleeve pocket. "Not precisely useful, non?"

Doug shook his head. "It's exactly what we needed. Break left with Hydrant and Short Fuse. Get ready to move on my signal. I have a plan."

No sooner had Doug spoken than a panel in the left wall opened and a fifteen-foot tall iron monstrosity stomped out. Almost twice Cain's height, and easily twice as broad, it spread four arms and let loose a peal of electronically synthesized laughter.

"Plan A goes right into the toilet. Red Team, engage." Going off the communicator, Doug turned to Angie, who was no longer beside him. Instead, she was obediently following the last order given and making her way past the moving walls to Cain and Jubilee. Doug rain a hand through his hair in exasperation. "Right," he muttered. "Command."

Up in the control room, Scott was smirking to himself. "Remember when you and Hank had to take on Four-Arms there?" he asked Ororo playfully. "How many times did you shock Beast before you realized steel is a conductor?" Ororo stuck her tongue out at Cyclops, returning her attention to the Danger Room's readouts.

"Hydrant has engaged OP-4 and is… wow. He's actually behaving himself and sticking to the restrictions we set. He could rip it limb from limb, but I think he learned the last time." She gave a half-frown, remembering Cain's less-than-pleased reaction to the simulated nuclear contamination that had resulted when he had destroyed the last robot opponent, and failed his session on account of causing more widescale devastation than he would have prevented. Storm once more gave silent thanks that the X-Men could train on a simulated scale.

"Would you look at that…" Alison said, pointing up to the ceiling. Shiro had reached Paige, and was whispering in her ear. Gripping her shoulder, he tore downwards, revealing an expanse of dark black rubber instead of skin. Wriggling out of her discarded metallic husk, Paige dropped to the floor, bouncing once and landing harmlessly in a crouch. Taking two steps forward, she heard a click under her feet and swore, bracing herself for another impact. Suddenly she heard a voice over her communicator.

"Lexicon to Husk. What did you just do?"

"What?" she called back, "I got back into play like ordered. There's a pressure plate here, don't know if anything will happen if I step off."

"Step backwards, then forwards again." The order was confusing, but Paige just turned to Shiro, shrugged once, and did as she was told, hearing the more obvious click as she stepped back, then forwards.

Doug watched the change in motion, then smiled. If this was a pattern, then the next obvious step would be… "Kamikaze. Move fifteen meters right, ten meters forward of Husk's position and land." As Shiro did so, Doug watched the Danger Room react, swinging walls and padded barriers into place down the field. Five more moves in the right order would get Blue Team to the gate without any incident.

"Lexicon, Kamikaze. Red team appears to need assistance. Shall I engage?" Shiro's voice was plaintive. Doug shook his head, keying the mic.

"Negative, stay with the plan. Husk, advance past Kamikaze's position. Stop when you notice a change in the obstacles. Leapfrog each other and make it to the gate. Red team?"

"Red team is busy!" Marko's voice bellowed across the Danger Room. He was spending less time trying to push and punch the giant robot as he was trying to draw its attention away from Jubilee and Marie-Ange. "I ain't doin' more than denting this thing," he called. "No telling if I crack it open if it'll blow up or turn all of us into nuclear glowsticks or something."

"Hydrant, go for the head." Jubilee's voice was suddenly flat and serious from behind him. "If you can get it to drop its head, I can get us past it."

"Are you insane?" Marie-Ange hissed from behind cover. "It's larger than Mr… than Hydrant. If he's not denting it, you won't…" As she spoke, she watched the red-haired groundskeeper double up his fists and deliver an axe-handle blow to the knee of the robot, caving the joint in. When the behemoth dropped lower, Jubilee gave a thumbs-up and sprinted out from behind the wall. Running across the field, she springboarded off of the Danger Room wall and landed on the expansive shoulders of Cain Marko. Pausing for a second to gather her balance, she grabbed one of the robot's arms, letting it fling her into the air. As she was thrown upside-down, she extended her arms, sending a spray of plasma 'fireworks' into the machine's faceplate.

As the robot reacted predictably, thrashing its arms about blindly, Cain stepped to the side, throwing his shoulder into the other knee joint and heaving with his legs. Metal creaked and gave, and the giant machine tumbled onto the ground. Smiling, Cain extended one arm out to the side, letting Jubilee land in a crouch across his forearm, almost like a trained hawk.

"We have SO got to find a name for that trick," she quipped, then pointed to the gate where Shiro and Paige were already arranged at the corners. "Lead on, dude."

In the control room, Cyclops smiled. "Storm," he announced, "bring on Wave Two." As Ororo flipped a bank of switches, Scott leaned over to the viewing port, waiting to see how the trainees would react to this.

Cain heard the telltale whine before the rubber bullets began flying and tucked Jubilee to his chest, letting the rounds bounce off his invulnerable skin. "Hydrant to Lexicon! Unsafe to proceed through red area. Am heading to goal area with Short Fuse. Confirm!"

"Confirm! Go go go!" Doug hollered back, ducking and rolling out of the path of fire. Reaching Marie-Ange, he looked at the doorway opening across the field. About twenty meters was all that stood between them and their first training victory. Twenty meters of machine gun fire that seemed to track any moving object.

"We go different ways," Marie-Ange whispered. "Only one of us needs to get to the door." Doug took her hand, shaking his head.

"There's no such thing as an acceptable casualty. Besides, haven't I told you how much those things hurt, love? Here's what we do…"

Cyclops, Dazzler, and Storm stepped up from the consoles to crowd the viewing port. This was always the crux point. Alison had argued against it, pointing out the similarities to the "unbeatable" scenario that she'd run Nathan through. Ororo had spoken out in favor of it, noting that may times the X-Men had run into "no win" situations, gingerly stepping around any mention of Jean's sacrifice. Scott, for his part, had said nothing, but approved the scenario as written.

Now all three team leaders watched as, hand still clasped, Vision and Lexicon bolted from behind the wall, darting around barriers. The stream of rubber bullets tracked, adjusted, and shifted, yet still they managed to creep forward. Finally, however, technology won out. One fell, then the other.

"Lexicon is down. Vision is down." Cyclops intoned into the recorder. "Time is fifteen minutes, twenty-four seconds." He turned to Ororo and Alison. "They'll complain about the bruises, but it'll give them a good opportunity to evaluate Doug's command performance. To be honest, I didn't expect him to take charge so quickly. I'm pleased that…"

• SCENARIO CONCLUDED. GOAL REACHED.*

"…the HELL?" Scott twirled to look through the viewport as Doug and Marie-Ange, still holding hands, walked calmly through the gate. "Computer!" he barked, "confirm elimination of Lexicon and Vision."

• NEGATIVE. TARGETS NOT ELIMINATED.*

"They walked into gunfire." Cyclops insisted, "We saw…" He looked at the beaming expressions of pride on Ororo and Alison's faces, then watched as Alison moved the camera to zoom in on the celebrating trainees, specifically the tarot card that Marie-Ange held high in victory.

The Lovers. Complete with a hand-drawn representation of Doug and Marie-Ange themselves.

"I'll be damned…" Scott breathed. "They beat it."

Alison tapped her fingers on the console, a grin plastered from ear to ear. "Remember what you said you'd give them if they won." She patted Scott on the shoulder as she stood up from the chair, grabbing her leather jacket. "I'll go have Jetstream prep her."

Cyclops breathed out slowly, then keyed his microphone. "Trainees," he announced. "Good job. We'll be having our after-action review…" he swallowed, then rekeyed the mic, "at thirty thousand feet. Get your butts to the hangar, you've earned a ride in the Blackbird."

As he grabbed his jacket and walked out of the control room, Ororo took one last look at the celebrating trainees, one hand pressed to the glass in a silent salute.

"Well done, X-Men," she whispered. "Well done."