Cafas rubbed his stubble, scrutinising his reflection in the Mansion window. He could swear his facial hair hadn't been blonde before, but having never let it grow it was hard to know. He sighed, and his breath fogged the glass fogged, passing in a short moment as the heat of the morning sunlight chased it away.

He'd been at the Mansion since before dawn programming and testing the trial he'd set up. It seemed to be running fine, though he hadn't had time to fully test the last few changes. The code checked out, that was all he could actually say about them. The Danger Room was, luckily, fairly user friendly in terms of programming. You didn't need to actually use code, but Cafas saw no reason not to, seeing as he'd had to learn in order to turn all the safety parameters off for himself.

Who even programmed that thing in the first place? They'd have to be beyond a genius. I mean, I could barely scratch the surface of its programming...

He'd called Juliette a week before. Not that he'd ever had to worry about it, but getting time off work seemed like it'd require a decent bit of notice. Hopefully he'd given her enough notice that she wasn't going to be in any kind of trouble. It was an odd consideration, that he'd never really had a job. Acting didn't really count. It was just such a weird industry.

The X-man stretched wide and tried to blink away the dry, tired felling in his eyes as he walked over to, and out of, the Mansion front door. Meeting Juliette on the drive seemed more logical than expecting her to navigate her way to the Danger Room alone. "Okay, you can do this. I mean, you knew it'd probably happen one day, right? Just hopefully haven't miscalculated any of the safety parameters. Should I have organised a partner? Well, she'll have to do solo work too. What about testing team work? She's a nurse, right? Surely she can work in a team just fine." He really shouldn't have been nervous. He wasn't the one being tested.

She had been both waiting for the call and doing her best not to think about it when her phone finally rang. It had been later than she was expecting, but she allowed herself to chalk it up to the X-man's busy schedule and the hectic nature of having the team situated at a boarding school for mutant children. She could understand why it might have taken him longer than usual to call her.

When she did get the call, though, it was a little bit nerve-racking. The realization of what she had actually signed herself up for came like a crashing wave that suffocated her thoughts. There was actually a trail that she had to perform. And fight things. In front of the herculean X-man.

So, Juliette booked the day off of work and rented a car, unsure of how many time she would need to make the trip down to the school. She had been offered room and board, but she doubted that the deal came with a car, so she also noted the fact that she might be forced to use what little savings she had to purchase one herself. Joining a mutant team of superheroes was not exactly easy on the wallet.

Juliette had gotten up that morning and done her best to prepare herself for whatever might happen. She was far from sure as to what to expect, and she had no idea what she would be expected to do there. She didn't even know what to wear. Business casual seemed like a horrible idea, especially if she was to be fighting robots or something, and most things in her closet seemed to fall into that category. It was so much easier at work when she knew to wear the same scrubs each day. After a few minutes of blank staring, she finally settled on leggings and a dry-fit shirt, which she usually wore to go running.

Despite her reservations, she was still excited by the prospects of what was to come. Plus, she was definitely interested in seeing the school that she had heard so much about. Her heart pounded loudly as she drove up the never-ending driveway and spotted Cafas standing out front.

He seemed to be saying something, but there was no one else around, save for her driving up. Maybe he had a bluetooth or a communicator in his ear or something. They always seemed to have the latest tech.

She parked the car in front of a little flower bed in the middle of the enormous driveway and stepped out, hearing the echoing noise of the remote controlled lock she had just pressed. "Am I late?" She asked Cafas as she approached, slightly worried that the intense talking she was witnessing was on her account.

Cafas' vision refocused at the sound of an engine and tyres on gravel. He watched an unfamiliar car roll in. The driver could certainly have been Juliette, though he'd only seen her once, and the windows were slightly tinted. He didn't have to wait long for confirmation. The woman that stepped out, all tight fitting active wear, was definitely the woman from the rally.

>>"Am I late?"

Oh good, he wasn't the only nervous one. Cafas smiled and offered his hand. "Not at all. Nice to see you again Juliette. How've you been?" The mansion was starting to wake up more thoroughly behind him. The chatter of kids coming back from breakfast filtered through the large wooden doors. Probably meant they shouldn't dawdle. Mansion tours would have to wait. Even though the Danger room was booked, there was always a good chance someone would ignore the reservation. More so since they'd lifted the X-man only restriction. Their training facility had become more of an entertainment facility after that.

At least I don't have to kick them out every day any more. Took them long enough to learn.

The X-man gave the hopeful another once over, noting that, at the very least, she dressed prepared. He was in half his uniform, even though he wouldn't be needing it. It just felt right. The armour and gloves though, had been left in his locker, along with the face mask he barely wore since they'd gone legit. The hat he had no idea where it even was. Hopefully someone had burned it. What had he even been thinking?

At least it didn't have corks...

"Good to see you're dressed for this. I kinda forgot to tell you anything about this didn't I? Sorry, this is my first time running someone through a trial." The X-man gestured for Juliette to follow and turned to hold the door open for her. "We're going to be using our danger room facility to run a simulated mission for you. I'll watch how you do from the control room, and once you're done, I'll make an assessment of your performance, and therefore your suitability as an X-man." He tried to smile reassuringly, given how formal and kind of scary that sounded. "Don't worry, the Danger room is actually quite safe, and you're being judged for entry, your performance isn't expected to be up to the full grade of an X-man."

Actually, all he was really testing was her fitness, her instincts, and her temperament under stress. She could fail the mission, within a reasonable margin, so long as she conducted herself as he'd expect an X-man trainee to in the field.

Juliette took a deep breath in and then quickly released it, somewhat please that Cafas seemed not at all angry with her, and that he seemed about as nervous as she felt. It was a comfort to know that she wasn't entirely alone in the feeling.

"I've been well enough," she replied through a somewhat strained voice. It was taking most of her energy to seem like she had everything under control. "And yourself?" She didn't mention the fact that she had seen him in the tabloids recently with someone she could only assume was his Ex. It would also be rather uncomfortable to admit that she had seen a tabloid and not put it down immediately.

>>"Good to see you're dressed for this. I kinda forgot to tell you anything about this didn't I? Sorry, this is my first time running someone through a trial."

Good, she hadn't been completely off the mark with the exercise clothes. It seemed that she was somewhat right in thinking that the trial would be some kind of physical test. "That's alright," Juliette said with a more nonchalant tone than how she felt. "Who usually runs these, if that's alright to ask?" It wasn't exactly comforting to know that the person running your physical fighting test was a complete newbie at it, but she pushed the image of the trial malfunctioning to the back of her mind.

>>"We're going to be using our danger room facility to run a simulated mission for you. I'll watch how you do from the control room, and once you're done, I'll make an assessment of your performance, and therefore your suitability as an X-man. Don't worry, the Danger room is actually quite safe, and you're being judged for entry, your performance isn't expected to be up to the full grade of an X-man."

She had been in the Danger room once before with Sam. Only here, she assumed that it would be used for some kind of fight simulation. She nodded at the idea of what was going on. It was better to know that she didn't need to be some kind of extreme warrior, or have a ton of fighting experience, but she also knew that there was no way that her fighting would be the only thing that Cafas would measure. He would probably look into her body language and reactions as well. At least she had gotten a good amount of sleep the night before.

"Should we get started, then?" Juliette suggested, not particularly wanting to put off the trial for too long.

"Oh you know, keeping busy. Been working overtime with riot squad, SWAT, normal patrols, it's been a pretty shaky month or so." His nonchalance about the whole affair was a total lie. It had been more than a little taxing. He was still trying to process the bridge and tunnel bombings.

The X-man, still coming to grips with being a team leader, led Juliette downstairs to the high tech looking corridors under the Mansion. He didn't remember exactly which rebuild had done away with the more classy look found throughout the rest of the school, but he didn't approve. "And it's fine to ask. It's always one team leader or other. Tetsuya Shinbo and Kealey Shinbo, though she was Quinn at that point, ran mine." He stopped in front the door to his home away from home, all imposing steel. The security pad next to it blinked green. Cafas pressed his palm onto it.

An approving beep preceded the pneumatic hiss of the heavy doors opening. Cafas gave a toothy grin and gave a bow, hand sweeping across the doorway. "Ms. Lawson, the Danger Room. Our very own hard light virtual reality chamber. If you've seen Star Trek, think holodeck, but less mishaps." Aside from the steel panelling on every surface, the danger room was rather unremarkable. A big, empty, steel clad room. In the small foyer that served as an airlock when the simulation was running, an equally unremarkable door was set into the wall. Behind it were the stairs, and once you climbed those, the god room.

"I'd give you a tour, but as you said, we should get started. If you could go stand roughly in the middle of the room. I'll be going through that door," He pointed, "Up to the control room. I can stop this any time if you need. So, for now we part ways." Cafas once more indicated into the room further.

The god room door ran palm and retinal scanners. Cafas was so used to it he stood in position for the retinal lasers automatically. The lock clicked open and Cafas quickly ran up into the room he'd spent most of the morning in. He leaned over the control panel and activated the intercom. "This will be a little disorienting the first time, believe me. If at any stage it gets too much, let me know. You ready?"

It was rather difficult to not be distracted by the enormous school that the pair was walking through. She had been there once before, but she had been focused on other things. Juliette's eyes shifted across the architecture as Cafas listed some names that rang no bells in the young woman's mind. There seemed to be a lot of history with the team that she would have to catch up on. Cafas was team leader, now, so it seemed, which made her wonder who all the other members were. Sam had told her that he was part of the team, but they had never really discussed it. Thinking on it, she realized that she likely should have let him know that she was applying, or even asked him to give her the trial if he had that power, but it seemed that he would have to find out the old fashioned way.

She took in a deep breath as the door to the danger room opened. There wasn't much inside, other than a set of stairs leading to the control panel, but it was obvious that there was a lot that could be done with the place. It was likely that it rarely ever went without use.

Juliette bit her lip and glanced around the huge room as she stepped into the centre and glanced back at Cafas, who was making his way to the control panel. Well, this was what she had come for, and it was about to start. It felt odd to stand in the middle of an open room with such a clear view of everything that she was doing. It was a little bit unnerving. 

She took one more moment to compose herself before giving Cafas a thumbs up and waiting for whatever he had planned to begin.

If Cafas knew more about Juliette's powers, he might have wondered how a hard light simulation would interact with someone that absorbed light. Actually, he wasn't entirely sure how hard light worked anyway, who was to say it was even comparable? Either way, it was something he didn't have the information to start questioning, so He opened the comms one more time.

"Good. Your goal is to evacuate the ship, and escape yourself. Begin." Cafas hit a green button on the control panel. The sleek, futuristic steel walls of the Danger room were gone in an unfocused instant.

Juliette would find herself in a dimly lit, claustrophobic, grimy steel room. It was modelled (a little imperfectly) on a ship's lowest chambers. Around her was machinery working noisily. In front of her was a door, open, through which could be seen rising water, already lapping into the room where Juliette stood. Behind her was a narrow staircase leading up through an open hatch. Hidden in shadows behind the staircase, between two pieces of machinery, was another door mirroring the one the water was coming through. It was closed.

Up the stairs, a corridor running the length of the ship, five doors either side, some open, some closed. Mostly sleeping cabins, though the front most were rec rooms. It had three stairways up, one in the middle of the ship, one either end of the corridor, and further aft, midway between the two ladders up, another hatch down. Gunshots could be heard, and screaming.

The fake ship was rocking on the waves, its stern rising as water flooded the bow. Cafas watched from above. His view came without a ceiling. Now to see how she reacted.

"Ship?" Juliette asked a little nervously as the room around her shifted. It seemed that she wasn't going to get any further clarification, though, as her view of the control room was blocked by unfamiliar metal walls.

Juliette spun in place, trying to get a handle on what she was looking at. Apparently, ship meant just that. A literal metal ship, all the way down to the way the floor creaked under her feet. She didn't know what she had been expecting, but it really wasn't that.

She glanced around the room for somewhere to go. There were stairs in front of her and a door behind them. She debated between the two. On the one hand, it was better to sweep the upper level first, so she wasn't suddenly cornered in the bottom with no exit, but if she was trying to escape, it made sense to go from bottom to top. Plus, she was expected to evacuate people as well as herself, and she didn't want to be dragging them up and down stairs for the entire simulation.

So, the door it was. She ran forwards and put her hand on the knob, feeling it for both heat and locks. To her immediate relief, the handle was neither hot nor locked. It slid to the side easily and allowed her to push the heavy metal thing aside.

Behind the door, there was a simulated civilian standing behind the wall, staring directly at the door with a hardened expression. He looked almost scared, but he was doing a good job of pretending he wasn't. He looked exactly how she would have pictured a seaman. God, those constructs were lifelike. 

"Follow me," Juliette nodded to the man. "I'm here to help, I promise," she added quickly, unsure of what kinds of programmed horrors would be floating around the man's programmed brain.

The man paused and stared at her for a good minute before nodding quickly. Juliette assumed that she probably didn't look like whatever was putting the ship in danger. 

She walked forwards in the in the four-way hall. To the left and right were two dead ends, but forwards was another identical door. She put her hand on the handle, praying that things would go her way twice in a row.

No such luck, apparently. It was locked.

So far, so good. Cafas was pleased to see Juliette get her bearings rather swiftly, and could appreciate the logic in her decision to stay on the lowest level. He'd always been a bit more brash, charging into the fight, then worrying about the rest. It appeared the nurse was more cautious.

Commanding, too. The X-man smiled. He'd sort of expected that one, but it was nice to see confirmation. Plus she'd picked up her first civilian for escort. He looked forward to seeing how she handled him tagging along tactically would be interesting. Cafas nodded as the woman moved for the next door. She would find it locked, but luckily, it was only meant to be locked from the other side.

"Here, I have the key. I locked it when I saw one them go into the engine room." The sailor reached into a simulated pocket and pulled out a simulated, but very solid, key. He held it out to Juliette.

Meanwhile water had started coming into the baggage hold with them. It was rising steadily, and wouldn't stop. He'd designed it to keep decision making time to a minimum. If she wasn't careful, she'd be struggling to keep ahead of it. If she went off instinct she'd always have a comfortable lead. That was the idea anyway.

In the engine room, a brick of putty with wires and a clock stuck to the front ticked down to its last two minutes of time. Juliette's water woes would be substantially worse if that were not dealt with. Cafas glanced over all the lights on the panel to check if all was in order. Satisfied, he clasped his hands behind his back and continued watching Juliette's progress.

Juliette raised her eyebrows at the sailor. She had been expecting to have to blast the door open, and she definitely hadn't expected it to be that easy. It almost seemed too good to be true.

"Thanks," Juliette replied warily and took the key from him. Weird. She stuck it in the door and listened to the clicking noise as it opened for her. Okay, maybe it really was going to be that easy. The door, just like the other one, was heavy and metal, and required a little more pushing in order to get it open. 

The sailor wasn't very much help, other than for the key. He mostly just stood idly behind her, looking around as if nothing was amiss. Juliette didn't really mind, though. She had other things to focus on than making small talk with a simulation.

 Behind the second door, there was a room nearly identical to the one she had started in. Complete with the unidentified machines, the stairs, and the door. Juliette put her foot on the first step, intending to go up, before she remembered her initial idea to sweep the entire level before going up. She stepped back, mirrored by the sailor, who was apparently just mimicking her movements, and walked towards the third door. 

To her relief, the next door was unlocked as well. She didn't want to waste anymore time than necessary, even if she did have the key. She pushed the door open and looked around. It looked to be the engine room, or something. She didn't spend too much time identifying the different rooms in ships.

There were no more people behind in this room, but there was a strange ticking noise. She knew from every single action movie ever that a ticking noise could mean nothing good. Her eyes swept the room and fell on an incredibly 1980's-MacGuyver-looking bomb. It could have been taken straight out of a video game. Then, she reminded herself, it very well might have been.

Juliette stepped in front of the bomb and stared at it. Shooting it was probably a terrible idea, and so was just letting the clock run out. Having no formal bomb training other than action movies, she did what everyone in popular culture yelled at their partner to do through a walkie-talkie.

She grabbed the sharpest part of the key she was still holding and cut the red wire, bracing herself for the results. 

Good girl.

She didn't trust the key. It was too easy. It was meant to be too easy. If she'd gone up and had to loop all the way back around, she'd have had a diving expedition on her hands to get to the sailor in the baggage store. The too easy key, and the hint about the engine room, were her rewards for making the right choice. After all, it was a video game.

He surprised when Juliette started up the stairs, but smiled when she hesitated. It had eaten into her time slightly, but she'd remembered. He watched her move into the engine room, sailor in tow. He saw her hear, and identify, the mysterious ticking noise. It was not a pipe bomb. It was a satchel charge. The hopeful approached it, which was a terrible reaction for anyone but an X-man. More hesitation, but not much. She reached out and cut the red wire with her key.

The ticking stopped. It would have stopped regardless of which wire she'd cut. The challenge wasn't about her skills at bomb defusing, because that would just be absurd. It was about her ability to act under pressure. See, while all the wires stopped the clock, the clock was ten seconds slow. Most people would um and ah until the last ten seconds. Those people would have been simulated dead. Cafas pressed the intercom button, leaning close to the microphone.

"Well done. Keep going." He stood back straight. She had neither failed by death, nor amplified her time constraints, though water was lapping at the bottom of the stairs in the previous room, and the listing was getting worse.

Juliette allowed herself a good twenty seconds to take a breath. Her stomach settled slightly at Cafas' words through the intercom, but she knew she might not have too much time to spare. Who knew what other time constraints were waiting for her on the ship?

She gave the engine room another good look. There didn't seem to be any doors at the back, and ships didn't usually go too much farther to either side. It seemed that the floor was finished. Just to be sure, though, she asked the sailor who seemed to be permanently attached to her side. "Does this level have any more rooms?"

"No, that's it," the sailor shook his head.

Perfect, then it was time to keep going. She retraced her steps back to the set of stairs she had almost gone up, and ran up them with a new confidence, sure that the sailor would follow. Once up the stairs, she gave the new level a look over.

She was in a long corridor with rooms on either side. Probably better to start at the back, she figured. The door on the left was locked, but easily unlocked with the key she held onto. A quick sweep told her that it was empty. The same went for the one on the right, only she didn't have to bother to unlock it.

Juliette moved to the next set of rooms, starting on the right. The door, again, was locked, but it didn't seem to be a problem for the key she had come to love. Behind the door, there were two armed men standing idly, like they were waiting for her. They probably were waiting for her, though, she realized. 

They immediately raised their guns at her, both of them wearing the same hardened expression. She felt her heart beat a little faster than before. She had been ready for guns, though. She had expected guns much more than she had expected maze ships.

Her body shifted to energy form and she waved the sailor to move back into the hallway. It was time to see if she was as tough and she believed herself to be.

Twenty seconds seemed like an eternity to be standing still on a mission, to Cafas. Then again, he'd never had to disarm a bomb by guessing the correct wire to cut. Still, the delay was noted, as water continued to bucket into the ship. She'd disarmed the bomb, she could afford the time.

Also noted was her instinct to use the resources at hand. It seemed obvious to him, and apparently her, that she should ask the sailor about the ship, but he knew people often didn't think of it. He made no further comment, but even if she failed in one of the fights ahead, it was probably a pass from Cafas.

The hopeful started sweeping the next level, one room at a time. If she kept up the pace, and didn't have too much trouble with opponents, she'd have just enough time to do all of them before the water hit ankle depth on that level. Hopefully she found the second keycard she'd need to unlock the door with the injured sailor behind it before then. He probably wouldn't be able to stand very well on his broken leg.

Cafas' attention returned fully to the situation unfolding below as Juliette came to the door behind which she'd find her first fight. The door swung open, and combatants came face to face. Juliette dissolved into light, and waved the sailor back. Good, keep the civilians out of the line of fire.

And fire they did. Both shotgun blasts were deafening in the enclosed steel room. Cafas double checked the safety parameters on the danger room with a flick of his eyes. Hopefully, if the room sensed anything more than a superficial injury, it would shut down the simulation before it could happen.

The guns fired off simultaneously with loud bangs. Apparently, they weren't going to check if she was even against them before shooting. Then again, they likely wouldn't have hired a short woman with light powers.

Juliette was so entirely thankful that her light form was impervious to gunshot wounds as she instinctively raised her arms to cover her head. It didn't exactly feel great as the bullets hit her and went through the yellow-gold barrier, but it didn't feel like she was getting shot. That much was for sure.

Still with her arms raised, she walked forward to the men. The first one, she simply tried shooting a blast at. Her first try missed, but her second one hit him in the chest. At the close range, he crumpled to the floor in pain. The second man, was a little more difficult.

Once she was finished with the first, her energy form started to flicker on and off. She was running low on energy. She could easily just absorb some from the simulation, but she figured that might just hurt her chances a bit. Instead, she ducked behind one of the beds nearby and tried to figure out what to do.

He still had bullets left, so it wasn't a good idea to just stand up and hope for the best. No, that wasn't going to work. Instead, she raised her arm over top of the bed and shot a blast at him. It hit, but so did the bullet that the man shot at almost the same time. It grazed the top of her forearm and left a nice line of blood down the top.

Juliette stood up and winced at the pain in her arm, doing her best to ignore it. She hadn't brought anything to mend it with, so she just held it, grateful that it was just a flesh wound. Besides, she reminded herself, she didn't really have the time to sit down and fix it. Maybe after Cafas would let her see the Doc or something.

She ran out of the room, her eyes focused on her next task: the opposite door.

The light form was impressive. Bullets flew right through it, ricocheting off in the corridor, or blasting right through the opposite door. Cafas nodded and made note of that particular ability. The collection of light moved forward. The X-man watched his hopeful with keen interest. A sudden blast that brought a tiny ache to his stomach narrowly missed the first gunman, almost imperceptibly denting the ship wall. The second dented the gunman. Dented him right to the ground.

Damn, that's gotta hurt.

Juliette seemed to.. Flicker? Was it intentional? Seemed dangerous, but she knew her power better than Cafas. The way she dived for cover made him suspect that was a sign of her power reservoirs draining. That was also good to note. He watched silently as bullets continued to spray around her inaccurately. The men were hardly militarily precise. More pirates, if anything.

The nurse's arm poked out from cover and the remaining gunman did a pirouette as her blast clipped him in the face. He dropped onto his buddy, their guns clattering against each other. Cafas smiled, but his eyes were drawn to a flash of red on his console, and a line of red on Juliette. She'd been clipped by a bullet, it seemed. That... Wasn't meant to happen. Sure, it was a flesh wound, but it was a lot closer for comfort than Cafas had wanted. He opened comms, glancing at the still blinking light.

As he did so, Juliette was charging out of the room. Her sailor buddy was ducking into it. He picked up one of their rifles, and a spare magazine. Cafas knew it would happen. He wanted to see what Juliette did.

"That looked nasty. Remember, you can stop any time." The X-man shut off comms to focus on the stupid light. He frowned at it momentarily. Safety parameter error. That wasn't very descriptive. He tried to get more from the readout nearby, but it was no use. It would seem his custom safeties were buggy. He sighed and selected a default. There, hopefully there were no more bugs.