[IC] X-Men: The Divided

[MistressCyanide]

The winds of change are approaching; the X-Men will soon face one of the most difficult challenges of their lives. Will they be able to overcome it or will it destroy them slowly bringing everything Professor X had worked for? Friends become enemies, groups will form and the trust for others will break for those outside there group. Then there are those who stand in the middle but can being neutral last? While the older generation of X-Men will have to deal with this upcoming problem the new class will have to take charge and show there worth out in the field.

October 3rd, 2011. Somewhere over Africa the newbies have one of the hardest fights in their young careers as an X-Man. The Shadow King has taken Storm again and has been doing so over the last few months, slowly beating the weather witch down to the point where he could take control of her. Many could sense something was up but none of them could get anything out of her. The newbies had managed to find Storm in Wakanda, one of the most prominent African nations which is surrounded by several other countries known as Azania, Canaan and Narobia. The team needed to be careful as they were fighting Storm; they were briefed on what they needed to do.

They needed to keep the Shadow King busy so Xavier could use his powers to seal him away again, maybe this time forever. Wolverine leads the students on this mission but stays back to let the students deal with this; stepping in when needed, X-23 was also present. Logan was other than Storm the only experienced member there. The black bird was not too far away, the jet that allowed any and all X-Men to travel to any part of the world. The Shadow King did the see the young mutants as a threat as only astral energies and psionic attacks could bring him down. For the most part the young ones were being blown about by the strong winds Storm was using on them with lightning strikes to keep them away from each other; this was a sort of game to the Shadow King.

Plasma was not having fun as she liked Storm and she did not want to hurt her though at this point how could she when her powers did not work half of the time. The force of the wind being used against her sends her flying back and forth like a piece of paper caught in the wind. Cannonball and Magma find themselves colliding into each other a lot while Multi-man and Boom-Boom find themselves dodging lightning strikes. The students not being harassed by the wind had to keep on their feet as lightning could hit them at any time. They each had to call out to Storm as well during this in an attempt to bring her back though this was also to aid Professor X in bringing Storm back.

The winds keeping her back soon died down as the Shadow King focused on others for the time being. Plasma felt a little motion sick as she slowly got up from the dusty ground; she then began to dust herself off making her say “I just got this cleaned.” Half of her outfit now had brown spots, some spots heavier than others. She hoped the others were doing better as she gave the battle field a look over, it was pretty hectic as she watched two mutants collide into each other; it looked like it hurt as well. There were two teams though she was looking mainly out for the team she was on and so she looked out for Darkshadow and the others on her team.

[Assallya]

She was a beautiful woman, with long golden blond hair and she was completely out of her element. She was thankful that the Shadowking had summoned clouds at least, to better enable Ororo's power of lightning. Her own costume, composed of shadowstuff had been more transparent than usual in the blazing light of the savannah sun. She gazed at the floating figure of Ororo, her blue eyes searching for some weakness. She hated lightning, concentrated light, burned through her powers.

Darkshadow ducked low, keeping herself behind a cluster of rocks. She preferred stealth to direct confrontation, preferred to hide in shadow and darkness and project walls of shadow to escape when confronted. How did one sneak up on a telepath? Worse still, she was unable to hurl daggers, shuriken or anything else at the possessed Ororo Munroe. Hurling a baseball sized sphere of darkness Sarah watched as it was grasped by invisible winds, thrown aside and ripped into shreds. Worse still, this was bloody Africa! She could scarcely imagine a more powerful sun overhead to diminish her powers.

This time, when one of the others attacked, she'd blind the bastard with some summoned darkness mere moments before the strike. Then, with luck, he'd not switch to his telepathy in time to see it and avoid it. If Ororo was knocked unconscious all the astral possession in the world wouldn't help him control her!

[Zagan]

As like the others, John had been briefed on the mission he and the other students were about to undertake, and they had landed in Africa a while ago and it had not taken long to find their target. before Storm had been taken;John was not overly familiar with the weather witch or what the extent of what she could do - but on the flight over here the latter at least, had changed.

Unlike most of the others the harsh winds were not as effective on the earth mover due in part to his increased mass (although he didnt look it, he was quite heavy) but mostly due to him moving the earth around his feet to stop him from being blown about - but this plan to combat the winds although good for that, didnt help with much else as it was more difficult to dodge the bolts of lighting she threw. It seemed at the time her lightning bolts were being targeted else where; he saw in the corner of his vision a ball of darkness just get tossed away and destroyed as if it were nothing.

He focused his sights on Storm once more as he moved forwards her as if he were on a conveyor belt, cupping his hands around his mouth he tried to yell over the harsh winds:

"Miss Storm - please try to fight this, you are stronger then this you have to fight back, realize who you are Miss Storm!"

trying to think ahead John had an idea, if he couldn't reach her as she floated in the air letting off her powers, he might be able to do something if he tried to lift himself up to her in a column of earth and knocked her out - great plan he thought - just one slight problem; he didnt quite know if he was able to maintain something like that, after all he was a new student to the school and not much control over his powers - but he could prepare himself for it and did one of the few things he knew he could do, he burrowed his way underground and began to move under where storm was.

[Solemn]

Laura growled inaudibly against the whipping wind, her right foot and hand claws planted firmly in the side of a rock for stability. They didn't really have the tools necessary to take down the Shadow King, but if they didn't render Storm unconscious soon they could very well be casualties of the weather witch's insurmountable power. She retracted her claws and made a quick dash towards her teammates, individually they had about as much of a chance of "winning" as they did of winning the lottery. John was attempting to reason with the sort-of possessed Storm, to which Laura issued a grunt of disapproval. Among the varies plans of attack, Talon realized that he was definitely going to need a codename if they made it through this. Maybe Tectonic? She pushed the thought down, as if the pressing matters made that difficult.

With some difficulty she tried to bark orders into her comm, "We must incapacitate Storm. As a team." Not that her impatience would shine through the wind and rain assaulting everybody, but she still took a fraction of a second to regret the tone. She knew that, for all their drilling, everyone else would come to that realization too...but they needed to pull together on this one. Following one bad plan was better than three or four decent ones that contradicted each other.

"John, I know it is Storm, but we have got to attack. Try and keep her busy and, maybe help me get to her. Plasma, can you fire pot-shots at her? Shadow King does not know how to use her powers like she does, she is feral. We need to take her down. Now."

A bolt of lightning punctuated her sentence for her, she barely acknowledged her own reactions to the strike. It landed a few feet off, forcing her out of cover and into the open against the wind and slanted rain. The pelts felt like rocks and the wind made it hard to move much of anywhere. Instinctively, Laura threw her hands up to protect her eyes from the weather's onslaught before another bolt of lightning blasted straight through her. She felt the air sizzling around her, smelled her cooked flesh before her nerves even had a chance to react. Her heart had stopped and the metal in her hands and feet singed and cooked right onto the blades. The mic, of course, fried and sent feedback through the other comm links; her body simply rolled across the uncharacteristically muddy ground.

It took a few moments for her to move again, for her heart to return to normal. She extended her claws, tearing the cauterized flesh so it would heal properly. Her muscles ached and continued to spasm as she pulled her self up, groggy at first before breaking into a sprint for new cover. Apparently Shadow King disliked coordination, perhaps it wasn't all wild strikes.

[Zagan]

A faint message managed to get over the comm and John could just about hear it as the stern voice of Laura growled at him

We must incapacitate Storm. As a team then another slightly more faint due to the howling of the wind and the noise of the rain hitting what ever it landed on John, I know it is Storm, but we have got to attack. Try and keep her busy and, maybe help me get to her. Plasma, can you fire pot-shots at her? Shadow King does not know how to use her powers like she does, she is feral. We need to take her down. Now.

At least, John thought - someone was taking charge - starting to formulate a plan of attack, and best of all it wasn't him. The last transmission that had come over the comm before they had all shorted for what ever reason had requested that John try and distract Storm, and one thing had come to him, maybe he could play on her fears?

Not being able to tell Laura what his plan was he closed his eyes and focused his power, making it look like he was sinking in to the ground (the effect was more like a life going down the actually sinking) and stared to burrow under the ground, as he was not that deep underground anyone standing above where he was burrowing would feel slight tremors under foot as John began to move, eventually popping up out the ground like a Mole behind where Storm was floating and shooting off her powers.

Johns plan in his minds eye was to shoot up and grab a hold of storm and encase her in an earthen tomb hoping that her fear would break who ever had a hold on Storm.

Burrowing back down John shot out of the earth and hoped against hope that his plan would work or at least do something...

[knighthawk]

Well this was an odd stalemate; Storms wind could not blow him away with his connection to the shadows, now could her bolts of lightning match his superhuman reflexes. Sadly, as long as she was airborne, he couldn't hit her. He watched the black ball get whipped away on the wind and knew any grenade of his would meet the same fate.

We must incapacitate Storm. As a team John, I know it is Storm, but we have got to attack. Try and keep her busy and, maybe help me get to her. Plasma, can you fire pot-shots at her? Shadow King does not know how to use her powers like she does, she is feral. We need to take her down. Now.

"We need zero visibility, he cant do his psych thing and her storm stuff at the same time, force him to use his powers will loosen up on her. Kick it up, dust, dirt, sand, put her wind against her. "
There was a bolt of lightning and then a squeal on the ear piece as something bad must have happened like the blackbird getting a shock and knocking out communications. He pulled out the piece to give that ear a rest as he switched ears and frequencies.

"Anyone still on, go to beta. Obscure, choke-" He looked up at the earth elemental trying to tombstone the weather witch, well that might work.

[CrimsonWarrior55]

Ayame was deadlocked behind a boulder, having dodged ANOTHER damn bolt of electricity. Despite her own powers over electricity, she didn't know if she could handle getting hit with something as raw and powerful as lightning, and three times now, she had almost gotten zapped. Every time she tried to blast Storm, the Shadow King had her blast Aya with enough wind to throw her aim off, and follow it with a bolt. If this kept up, then they were fucked. If they could get Storm onto the ground, then Aya could tase her. She didn't even bother wondering if they could get Aya herself, airborne, considering the winds and all that.

Just then Talon's voice came over the radio (Oh, and what a lovely voice it is... even with the mild irritation), as she relayed instructions. Until the radio suddenly cut out with a high-pitched squeal. Ripping the earpiece out, Aya cradled her poor ear "Son of a... FUCK! That hurt" she vented, punching the boulder "Now, I'm fucking pissed". Almost tempted to run at the witch and start blasting away, Laura's last set of instructions made her think. 'Keep her busy, eh... I can do that' she thought, peeking around the corner of the boulder. She witnessed one her teammates (Jake? No... Jack... wait... Oh, yeah! John... I think? Fuck it, I don't know) sink into the ground, almost as if he was preparing to launch himself upwards toward Storm's back.

'What the... oh. Clever little bastard. But, if he's spotted, he's dead...' Aya thought, a rather creepy grin sneaking onto her face. "Why should he have all of the fun" she said, as her forearms burst with electricity. Suddenly, she ran out to her left, launching a few bolts toward Storm (well, technically they're off to her side, don't wanna fry the kid when he gets airborne, funny as that would be), then switching directions and firing more, doing her best to keep Storm's attention squared solely on her. Sensing a bolt lining up with her current position, Aya quickly arced herself (it's what I call my "teleporting" technique... Arcing... sound's cool, right?) out of the way... but, moving that fast over such a short distance makes it difficult to stop, and Aya stumbled off-balance for half a second... which was all Storm needed to catch her with a massive gust of wind 'Oh, Fuck me' was the last thing Aya thought before she struck a rock... really fucking hard...

[MistressCyanide]

Plasma was being bounced around like a pinball machine once again by the Shadow King where she was the metal ball and the wind acted as the bumpers. As she was being knocked about she heard X-23 give some orders off though that was short lived as she heard a loud sound which was quite deafening. She heard the words pot shots; she did not want to hit Storm as she did not have the ability to take such a thing. She thought about giving a warning shot off but she then noticed Ayame and John had a plan. Plasma soon grabbed the nearest object that was stuck to the ground so she would not be blown about like a plastic bag.

The Shadow King had his eyes on nearly all of the mutants, the only ones he was missing was Wolverine, John and X-23. Darkshadow tried to blind the Shadow King and she succeeded when Ayame went in for some attacks. This just made the possessed Storm fire blindly causing damage to all nearby. “Foolish mutants, you are only delaying you’re demise.”

The Shadow King had his focus broken due to being blinded making him say “Foolish mutants, you cannot defeat the Shadow King with such tactics.” A big grin appeared on Storm’s face though the Shadow King did not see John’s surprise attack as they were insects to him. He enjoyed toying with the newbies, He had Plasma all over the place, and he also swept Ayame off her feet when she stumbled giving him enough time to throw a wind attack in her direction. Before the Shadow King knew it John had launched an attack which would encase Storm and he managed to get his target, the Shadow Kings cockiness was his down fall but would the plan work.

Once Storm was encased, the darkness that blinded her vanished, her fear started to kick in making the Shadow Kings hold on her weaken but at the same time making Storm feel very uncomfortable. “Walls closing in, nowhere to go I…… I…….” Her words stopped as the Shadow King fought with her to stay in control, this gave Professor X his chance to battle the Shadow King in his plain of existence which was all in Storm’s head. The Shadow King now had to fight Storm who was resisting him at this point and the Professor who was trying to remove him. With each moment that passed Storm got closer and closer to losing it which soon forced her to make a big boom of lightning strike what was encasing her to break her free.

The Shadow King losing his grip as the Professor and he did battle to see who would win, would the Shadow King regain control or would the professor put him away again and maybe this time for good. Once Storm was free of her prison, an experienced X-man was too strong to contain, all they needed to do know was calm her down while the professor gave the Shadow King the boot. If they could calm her down they would get Storm back sooner then they planned. The winds soon picked up and so they needed to hurry up, the thought of knocking her out occurred to some of the newbies, namely Cannonball and Boom-Boom.

The professor was way too strong for the Shadow King and his defeat was that much closer, but as long as he held on to Storm as much as he could he would not defeated completely. If the newbies could bring her around the professor could finish the Shadow King off and the mission would be completed. He needed the Shadow Kings hold complete removed or the Shadow King would return.

[Assallya]

The blast of electricity tearing the earthen encasement caused Darkshadow to cower, shielding her eyes. Her black filled eyes emptied of shadow and became azure blue once more. It stung. Most of her vision was one giant field of neon colours, rapidly shifting from one shade of green, becoming red, then yellow and finally blue before returning to green. Her retinas were burned but it was fading quickly. Her costume, for the briefest moment, almost faded from existence before snapping back to becoming near opaque.

"Move fast!" Sarah called out, not knowing what the Professor needed and only that Storm was a threat that needed to be neutralized, "someone hit her with the tranq gun before she gets back to blasting us!"

Not having a tranquilizer gun herself, Sarah opted to do otherwise. Aiming carefully, Sarah hefted a blunt ended javelin she had created completely out of shadow with little more than a thought. Gazing down its length she threw her arm forward and loosed the javelin, hoping to strike the African weather goddess in the jaw.

[Zagan]

John shot up out of the earth and had managed to get high enough to grab Storm from behind, encasing her in an earthen tomb and as he thought Strom's fear had loosened the Shadow Kings grip over her, but this had the danger of aggravating Strom, who had summoned a very large bolt of lightning to destroy her prison sending the newbie earth mutant flying backwards away from her and towards the ground crashing into it and making baby sized creator. damn that hurt John thought, giving himself a couple of moments to rest before getting up.

From Johns eyes it looked like the Professor had started to take part in the recapture of the Shadow King - but it was a harder task then first thought due to Storms current state and so the mission objective was to calm her down or just simply knock her out. As he stood he could see Darkshadow lining up to take a shot at Storm, seeing something that resembled a javelin, The Earth Elemental decided to wait and see what would happen of Darkshadow's attempt before going in for another shot himself.

Thinking to himself John realized that in her state, Storm would not notice if he did a repeat of his last attack but instead of encasing her he could just smack her one to knock her out. through the blustering gales and the odd bolt of lightning, John slowly made his way over to the other mutants: " We need to regroup!" he tried to shout over the roaring of the wind and hoping to see who was still at least somewhat up and about.

[CrimsonWarrior55]

Aya was dizzy, but still conscious. Gritting her teeth against the pain, she pulled herself to her feet, looking up to see if her efforts had born fruit, and was relived to see John encase Storm in a bubble of earth. Unfortunately, the relief was very short-lived as a massive bolt decimated the earthen prison and sent the rock-mover flying to the ground. "Jesus, that's one hell of a panic attack. Remind me never to lock HER in the closet" Aya chuckled to herself, but quickly grimaced "Ow, ow, ow... hurts to laugh".

Shaking off the pain, she moved closer to the battle, when she noticed Darkshadow outta the corner of her eye, recovering from the bright flash of electricity. 'Huh, nice bod' Aya thought with smile, not failing to notice the effect bright lights had on the shadow mutants unique costume 'I'll file that image away for later access' she smiled, watching her throw a javelin at Storm. But her attention was quickly drawn away by John, who had recovered and made his way over to the rest of them. Barely hearing his request to regroup over the damn winds, Aya began loosening her arms for action "About time! You got a plan there, Earth-Shaker?!?" she asked, having to shout over all the noise "'Cause I'm rip-roarin' PISSED-THE-FUCK-OFF!!!" she finished, her arms blasting to life and a psycho smile creeping on her face.

[Zagan]

Cupping his hands around his mouth like a make-shift loudspeaker John shouted to the others who had seen him approach, and one or two with a slightly startled that someone could almost just get up from being thrown back like that, it made John smile and thankful for the physical aspect of his mutation - he didn't yet fully understand it but he knew from what medical exams he had undergone at the mansion that part of his skeleton had become stone and that at the moment his skin had mutated into a condensed/hardened earth which allowed him to take a bit more of a beating then most of the others.

"Might be best to try and knock her out as she seems in no state to be calmed down - question is how do we do it? I dont think I could pull off the same sneak attack again - you guys got any ideas?"

The Earth elemental wasnt sure how much of his message was getting to the others over the howling winds and the sharp bolts of lightning, but something had to be done and quick or else this was going to turn into a level 10 disaster zone.

[Solemn]

Talon moved as fast as her feet would carry her. In serpentine patterns she leaped and dodged away from any potential dangers; even if there didn't appear to be, she didn't much feel like getting another taste of lightning. A plan struck her like an aforementioned bolt and her pace quickened towards her nearest team member. Darkshadow's exploits had gone relatively unseen in the chaos, but she hoped the promiscuous woman could muster up enough strength for what she had in mind. Despite her new plan her instincts still craved blood, it would have been the easiest solution if she could actually get close to Storm. Of course, the parts of her brain that had been trained out of this knee-jerk reaction quelled the calling for culling easily, but it was always a dull spoon digging into her consciousness like hunger pangs on the losing end of starvation.

Laura made it to Bamf with, thankfully, no real danger. "My communications are down, I need you to relay a plan. It is only theory, but it is something. Have John create an overhang with the earth, enough to cast darkness on Storm," she figured at this point the rest would already come to him, but out of habit she continued on without so much as a formal greeting for her teammate, "and get Darkshadow close enough to bind her with shadows and constrict. If possible, get Discharge close enough to shock her unconscious while Darkshadow holds her. I will do my best to draw her attention and to reach Plasma." Feeling that if she could trust anyone to carry out such a plan, it would be their resident teleporting ninja, she took off in another serpentine sprint, but this time towards the center of the action.

Lightning bolts crashed around her, which she avoided by the most uncomfortably thin of margins, and hail pelted her, but she continued on through the largest gusts of wind. With a burst of either creativity, bravery or stupidity (or some malicious concoction of the three) she climbed John's stairs, crouched at the apex and pushed off with all the unnatural strength in her legs in a leaping maneuver that her adoptive father would be proud of. With any luck, she'd manage to wrap her limbs around storm and drag her down. With far too much luck, she might actually lock in a choke hold, but that was doubtful. All she needed to buy was some of Shadow King's concentration and a few more seconds for her team.

Mostly she expected to kiss another bolt of lightning and, with nowhere to go, spend most of the night getting used to whatever limb it decided to burst out of.

[knighthawk]

Bamf slid more than ran to keep pace with the howling wind which was now lifting him and the earth he clung to in chunks which made his shadows less useful, but each piece torn free added to the debris to limit vision, if even just dust in her eyes. For a moment the wind died down as the earth trapped her, but that was short lived as Thor sought fit to split the rock asunder. He used the lull to make distance to regroup but got intercepted by "wolverette" who had a plan.
"My communications are down, I need you to relay a plan. It is only theory, but it is something. Have John create an overhang with the earth, enough to cast darkness on Storm and get Darkshadow close enough to bind her with shadows and constrict. If possible, get Discharge close enough to shock her unconscious while Darkshadow holds her. I will do my best to draw her attention and to reach Plasma."

It certainly was a good plan and he did his best to try and distribute the information on his com while closing in on the group. One part he didn't care for grouping together as too big a target. "John, we need pillars or an overhang to give 'Dark' some real shadows to work with and something I can climb. Dark try to wrap her up with your shadows if even for a wrist or ankle, neck would be best to choke her and really freak her out and her whole body if you can. Discharge with me to try and get you close enough to zap her, high amp low volt. She cant take what she dishes out. Plasma and Talon will try to do their thing, Plasma try to get behind any of the rocks when you shoot to give better shadows for the rest of us to use." When he closed in on everyone he repeated himself again for those who hadn't heard him on the com the first time.

[Zagan]

So the plan was set. In theory the plan was the only logical way forward but John worried - not for the others as he had slowly learned at the school; but for what control the earth mutant had over his power.Something which showed as the others talked and confirmed the plan, seemingly with out checking to see if this was something that was possible for the earth mutant - they all knew that sometimes his power controlled him rather then him in control of his power; which had quite disastrous affects, which worried John that something might go wrong and he might end up wounding Storm or anyone planning to climb up this earthen structure that was to be created.

"Guys" John roared over the howling winds "I'm not sure if I could do such a thing, are there any backup plans at all?" as the last word left his lips, his face fell and he stared at the floor and the feet of himself and his team, but after mulling things over - it would not be worthy of his place as an x-man if he sand bagged and so after several deep breaths he spoke up once more.

"Right, I will try but I will need your help guys - there is a chance that something may go wrong and a rogue element might occur so I will need you to deal with them, specially if something looks like it will hurt Storm or one of the others." As he spoke his mind relived some of the more disastrous attempts at trying to train and control his powers - causing large earthquakes which affected a good portion of the city, the danger room being out of commission as John had tried to create an earthen element during a session and instead managed to rip open a wall and near enough buried the danger room.

Shaking his head to rid himself of the negative images he took a few steps away and slowly sank to the ground sitting cross legged, hands palm down on the ground with his eyes half open as he concentrated on the task at hand. Eventrually a series of earthen buds sprouted in a line behind storm which slowly began to bloom and intertwine slowly became a sturdy looking wall which grew until it became a large overhand looming over the weather witch, meanwhile John began to sweat as he concentrated on keeping the wall as is and half hoping nothing would go wrong.

[MistressCyanide]

The weather witch was unaware of the incoming javelin like object coming towards her thrown by Darkshadow. The confusion in her head gave members of the X-Men a chance to strike and so when the javelin grew close it did indeed hit her. The javelin did strike Storm where Darkshadow decided to target her. In a matter of seconds the javelin connected with Ororo’s jaw. The witch suddenly felt it as she turned in the direction of the force caused by the object thrown at her. The pain caused by it threw Storm off.

Inside her mind the professor and the Shadow King were at it as they both sent a blast at each other in order to regain more control of Storm. Professor X eventually said “It is only a matter of time, my X-Men and I will defeat you.” The Shadow King was unaffected by his words and soon gave him a laugh which had a lot of confidence in it. His laugh followed up with some words “I will defeat you Xavier and after I do I will kill every X-man here and when I have finished that I will KILL THE OTHERs UNTIL NO X-MAN IS LEFT ALIVE, YOU HEAR ME.” The professor only replied with “We will see about that.” The battle was turning as the Xavier was slowly beating him down.

Storm showed she had felted the attack dealt by Darkshadow making her shoot a bolt of lightning her way once more though the power was much weaker, was it a sign of her getting weaker, did the blow do more than it let on. Ororo soon turned her attention round to see both John and Aya and she was about to strike them though something caught her attention though was it a little too late. Storm tried to get rid of what was over her and as she tried to do something a ball of what looked like green acid passed her stopping her in her tracks. It was from Plasma, it was all clear from her point of view as Storm was no longer targeting her but was targeting the others.

Plasma was surprised she got something off and she was happy she did not hit the weather witch either or things would get nasty. The witch gave Plasma no time as she sent winds to send Plasma off her feet and sent her flying into the sky. The group now had an opening to knock her out and she hoped they would take it. She gave the few on the ground a look as she soon saw a bolt fly at her, she was not going to dodge it as the wind threw her towards it. As the bolt struck her Plasma tried to hide the pain in by gritting her teeth. She was however soon knocked unconscious and had gained many burns as well. She was soon sent free falling; the X-Men had to strike now before she turned her attention on them once more.

“How can this be, I am losing my grasp on my Ororo, I WON’T GO BACK.” The fight was coming to an end making him think of leaving Storm and taking someone else but he had to be quick. The professor however was not going to make it easy for him to do so and so needed the X-Men to knock Storm out so he could finish this.

[Zagan]

The wall that John was growing was getting taller and thicker as well as curving over the weather witch, not another tomb like before, but more like an wave over Storm trying to create some shadow for the plan that was supposed to be happening, but the earth mover felt that the pre made plan wouldnt of done anything. The Wall stopped growing as John was trying to think of his feet as one thing struck his mind: KNOCK HER OUT! It was almost as if his power was acting on its own rather then being under John's control a large fist of earth soon loomed out of the wall striking Storm with just enough force to knock her out.

The wind died down, the bolts of lightning ceased and things calmed down as Storm fell with a thud on the ground, it was over, the large wall shrunk and crumbled away to nothingness as John moved over to Storm, checking to see if she was okay, that she was still alive and breathing before moving onto plasma as he had noticed she was lying on the ground covered in injuries. John motioned for the other team members to come over and help him in recovering their injured and make ready to move out.

[Assallya]

Sarah's ebony lips opened wide as she stared in slack jawed shock. They'd done it. More importantly she'd done it. She couldn't believe she hit Ororo and right where she aimed. While she'd been practicing at being a ninja and using her powers to hurl all sorts of things she still was a horrible, horrible shot. This was an unprecedented success. Then John brought her low with a thrust column of earth.

"Boo-Yah!" Sarah Covenry exclaimed as Ororo went down and pumped her fists in the air, "Did you see that? Did you! I brought that bitch down! I am the fucking bomb!"

Darkshadow couldn't resist, hopping up and down and performing a victory dance. Normally she was the one that screwed everything up. She'd barely passed her entrance examination that got her onto the rookie team, scraped by and probably left some paint on the examination room door.. This time, however, she was the bang on. Sure it was John that delivered the final blow but it was her, when nobody else could get an attack through Storm's defenses that managed to score a hit, despite the gale force winds and the striking lightning, she'd managed to strike a target the size of her palm.

Hopping as much as she was walking, her bosom bouncing with each victory leap Darkshadow made her way to Ororo. Ignoring Mantle's presence she stepped forward and planted her foot on Storm's chest, directly between Storm's breasts, crafted a small shield out of shadow and a gladius sword straight out of ancient Rome's gladiatorial arenas.

""Yeah beeeeyatches!" she added, lifting her sword to the heavens, azure eyes searching our her companions in what she saw was her moment of triumph, "I so fucking rock!"

[CrimsonWarrior55]

Aya was about to turn to Bamf and tell him to get her right next to Storm so she could taze her, when she noticed Shadowtits actually manage to connect with a shadow javelin... and then Rockhead managed to successfully deliver a blow that knocked Storm out and dropped her ass to the ground. "Wait... what? Oh, come on, what the hell!? I missed everything!!" she whined, discharging the electricity she had built up in preparation. If she was gonna be honest, Aya was a little miffed she couldn't have been the one to knock Storm out after what she had done to her earlier.

And as if to add salt to the wound (which Aya knew full well she wasn't doing on purpose), Shadowtits was gloating... over a K.O. she didn't even get. Well, Aya still wanted to hit something, and now she had a target. So, with a very annoyed look on her face, Aya stomped over to Storm's unconcious body, where her target was gloating like some kinda idiot gladiator... and konked her hard over the head. "I hate to pop your bubble, Trixie, but Rocko got the kill" she grinned down at Sarah, jutting her thumb over to her shoulders at John, who was still standing there.

[Assallya]

Sarah's shoulders hunched up as the heel of Aya's clenched fist bopped her crown. It stung.

"Ow!" Sarah exclaimed, rubbing the top of her head, "what the fucking..."

That was when Aya pointed out John had struck the final blow.

"Come on! You saw that cast," she declared, straightening and turning to face the diminutive Japanese girl, "throwing into a hurricane, that was sheer dope! I put her on the ropes."

Admittedly, there was probably as much luck as there was skill to that thow but there was no way she would admit that without a great deal of reluctance and especially not to the small Asian girl who was the same size as she was.