"Eleven years, I lived on the streets... I had a lot of people tell me that same thing. @#$# em. They don't know what we're made of. You're gonna beat em all, Elke. You ain't... you know... plannin on goin too far off for college, are you?" "

That was a long time... Eleven years. She'd been around eleven when she'd first met him. "God, you're old as #$%&." She allowed him to steal the fries seeing as she wasn't hungry any more. 

"Nah, i'm aiming for NYU with one of my besties from school. We're going to room together since we'd be studying similar things." Grinning, she threw an elbow at his side. "Who'd keep you out of trouble if I left, huh? I don't think the art chick's got it in her."

It wasn't like she hadn't considered other schools, though. She'd looked a few of them and frankly they all confused the hell out of her. Tuition, room and board, whatever those scholarships were she kept hearing a bunch of stuff about. Waaay over her head. She figured staying close by with people she knew was probably for the best, since she could bounce questions off of them whenever she needed.

"Besides, how am I gonna get all that training you promised if I run off to Cali or something?"

"God, you're old as #$%&."

Damn, not even one second into the burial and she picked up her own shovel. You go girl, dig that hole.

"And here I almost forgot about grounding you. Thanks for the reminder."

"Nah, i'm aiming for NYU with one of my besties from school. We're going to room together since we'd be studying similar things. Who'd keep you out of trouble if I left, huh? I don't think the art chick's got it in her."

Saph shrugged. "I ain't complaining. You may not think it, but I like having you around. I think you underestimate Shelby, though. She's tough. With the stuff she's been through, I'm surprised she's still talking to people."

He spared Elke the details. They'd just eaten, after all.

"Who's this friend of yours, anyway?... A boy?"

"Besides, how am I gonna get all that training you promised if I run off to Cali or something?"

Saph nodded. "Uh, yeah. I don't know about you being the most educated X-Man, though. What's your plan, then? Long term."

She shrugged both the grounding and the Shelby comment off, not really all that interested.

"Nope. Her names Dizzy. I had her over for a study group once, remember? The blonde loudmouth who wouldn't shut up about how much you look like that singer from a band?" God, that girl could talk, but Elke didn't mind. It was better than silence, and Dizzy made her laugh.

"Uh, yeah. I don't know about you being the most educated X-Man, though. What's your plan, then? Long term."

She shrugged again, moving the french fries over in his direction. "I dunno... I still got a ways to go before I have to really look into it. Just kinda figured i'd get a job somewhere some of the time, spend some of it studying, and whatever's left over i'd spend with you guys."

Not the most concrete plan, but given how just a few years ago she hadn't even been in school it was still a marked improvement. "I'll just make it all work like i've always done. Like you did."

"What ever happened to making it work like you've always done, eh?"

It was a different time and place. The soft light of the danger room permeated the air with a sort of artificial thickness as he sent her flying after another failed attack. It was day six of her trying to land a solid blow on him without her clones to help. They'd long since discovered that the more skilled and physically fit she got, the stronger her clones were. He'd forbidden her from using them for a month.

"You gonna give up again? I've fought zombies with better coordination."

He poked at his wrist communicator, and increased the resistance weight on her to ten pounds per limb. She was going to be a force to be reckoned with. She'd already been getting pretty used to 7.5.

The older mutant pulled out some flashcards, and rattled out a geography question, waiting for her answer, and her next attack. He had to admit, she was getting harder to block. She was hard headed, but damn could she be creative when she wanted to be. He might have to get out the crowbar soon.

"What ever happened to making it work like you've always done, eh?"

From her spot on the ground, arms and legs splayed out while she panted, she grumbled at him. "...Smarta#$." 

She was exhausted beyond belief, both mentally and physically, but she was also too damn stubborn to give up. Oh, she'd hit him... somehow... at some point.

Whenever her body started to work with her commands again. "Like hell!" She forced herself to sit up, huffing and red in the face. He'd added more weight on... again. This was the third time in four hours? Either he was trying to kill her in a very slow, passive aggressive manner, or she was doing better than he thought she could. She was going to go with the second option.

"The Baja California Peninsula and the Yucatan Peninsula!" 

Yeaaah, so he'd found out about her scuffle with the geography teacher she didn't like. Grounded for the rest of her life, no math club or after school activities and he was coaching her personally on the test that she still had to take, albeit with a different teacher. She was apparently lucky that the old teacher hadn't wanted to press charges for her threat. As she pushed herself to her feet and tested out how the added weight felt on her limbs, she tried to come up with some kind of plan. So far she'd gone with simply attacking him head on, and trying to be sneaky about it. He was really hard to read, though. His stupid mutation meant he knew where she was while she was moving so it seemed virtually impossible for her to get in and land a hit on him without her clones there to run as distractions.

"Hey," A sudden voice sprang to life over the intercom system, "Don't work her too hard, Saph... she's still got a few essays to write tonight."

 Elke would have turned red in the face, but she was busy eyeballing Saph. She was wondering if she could rush in while his attention was elsewhere and tag him, but kept in mind that stupid auto twist thing he did sometimes when things were coming at him. If she did rush in, she'd need to aim for one side, wait for that switch, and then immediately juke to the opposite side or it would all be for moot. 

"It's lunch time so I brought some drinks and food for you two. Black coffee, a soda, and sandwiches. Don't let it get cold!" Shelby was up in the observation room setting down a platter with a bunch of stuff on it for the two of them as she eyed the monitor.

Elke weighed her options, before deciding to go for it. It wasn't like she was going to get anyway standing around doing nothing! She darted forward, adjusting to the new weight on her as best she could as she laid her plan into action and sped toward him from his vulnerable side.

Saph had to admit. Some of this was for him. He didn't often get to fight people who knew about his abilities, and what exactly made him tick. Elke knew it all. That made her rapid fire blows at his left side pretty demanding to deal with. She was getting fast, too. Really fast. He had a feeling she could easily take on a trained fighter with about... a fifty percent win rate. In a real fight, at least. In a ring she would still get pummeled.

He noticeably perked up when he heard Shelby through the mic. She'd been helping out a lot, and maybe, possibly, Elke was warming up to her as well as Elke warmed up to anyone.

Elke was at it again. He knew she was at it again. She knew he knew she was at it again. So on, so forth, rinse, repea-AHH!

She purposely triggered his spin reflex, and he did so, twisting to react to her really deep fake, and-

Thump!

It hit his right hand, wrapped around his back to deflect her blow.

He'd made it just in time... He refused to admit that without the recently added weight, she might have landed it. A palm lashed out, aiming to send her rolling off to the side.

"Alright, alright. Lunch time, Moose. Time out."

She cursed colorfully as he blocked the strike, and was too tired at that point to really do much more than dodge the open palm in favor of flopping back on her butt and huffing loudly. She'd almost had him! She'd been so freakin' close it physically hurt. Still.. even that achievement felt good. She cracked a grin, not bothering to wipe away any of the sweat rolling off of her.

"Bout damn time! I've been starving for ages!" She got back to her feet slowly and headed for the door, flexing her hands as the weights vanished and her arms suddenly felt like noodles. She wasn't sure exactly what Shelby had brought food wise, but she at least knew what kinda soda it was. Rootbeer. At some point the woman had caught on that Elke liked it, and there was always a surplus of it around now.

When she got out into the observation room Shelby was there, sitting in one of the chairs sipping on cup of coffee herself while she swiveled back and forth slowly. The Native squinted at her, snatching up the can of soda that acted like a peace offering between the two of them as she moved to sit against the far wall. 

Shelby simply smiled, and stood to hand her a brown paper back with her lunch in it. Sandwiches and chips. Elke nodded slightly, but didn't drop the suspicious squint until she'd taken a bite of the sandwich. It passed her inspection, because she muttered a low "Thanks." and set about quietly eating.

The artist chuckled and tossed a small towel at the girl as well, then lifted her cup to take another sip of her drink. It was coffee with plain cream. No sugar, yet... but it was another step closer to normal and her stomach hadn't complained at all! A small victory in her opinion. 

As they exited the danger room, Saph was sure to give Shelby a nice, long kiss. Partly because he knew it bothered Elke a bit, and that was funny, but mostly because he wanted to. He took a seat and dug into his sandwich, taking note of the coffee addict's graduation to bland creamer. It was a step forward.

"You got close this time, Moose. Maybe you'll get me in, say, a week or so, and we can move to the next stage of your training finally. You been doing your nightly workouts?"

She'd been tasked with doing 100 push ups in five sets, 50 pull ups in five sets, and 30 minutes of intense aerobics at least between their fighting sessions.

She really was grounded, too. Aside from the few times she'd snuck out, he'd given her so much to do that it was all she could do to keep her head above water at this point. Saph didn't believe in making someone mope about in their room all day.

"Hey, uh... Noticed you got a new contact in your phone. Bailey, I think? Who's she?"

Shelby could feel the teens eyes burning holes into her, and pointedly kept her gaze off of the girl. Dealing with teenagers was like dealing with animals, right? Just don't look em' in the eye and your okay. She drummed her fingers on the control panel and Saph spoke and did just that.

"You got close this time, Moose. Maybe you'll get me in, say, a week or so, and we can move to the next stage of your training finally. You been doing your nightly workouts?"

"Yup. I've double it, though. Got bored with the numbers you gave me."

Holy %#$&, that was a lot of push ups. Shelby couldn't even struggle through one! The artists eyes widened and she risked a glance at the teen, who was still glaring at her in retaliation from Saph's kiss. She hastily moved her eyes away again. My! What interesting coffee!

"Hey, uh... Noticed you got a new contact in your phone. Bailey, I think? Who's she?"

It was Elke's turn to pointedly focus on something other than Saph. She chose to focus on her food as she continued to glare at Shelby. She'd forgotten about putting that number in her phone! Crap!

"...Eh, she's new to my study group. We still meet up online over Skrype so we can go over notes and junk. Really nerdy... Talks a lot, too." She finished off her sandwich and moved onto the chips non-nonchalantly.

Shelby stayed out of it, innocently smirking at the wall as she stole a chip from Saph and nibbled on it. 

"Yup. I've double it, though. Got bored with the numbers you gave me."

Saph almost choked on his sandwich, coughing it down, and then taking a gulp of his drink to clear his throat. Jesus, that was more than his training regime! He would have to step it up.

"Oh, yeah, that's great, Elke. We'll have to make sure your form is good, though. Can't waste energy doin it wrong, you know?"

Maybe she wasn't following the 90 degree rule?

"...Eh, she's new to my study group. We still meet up online over Skrype so we can go over notes and junk. Really nerdy... Talks a lot, too." Aww, she took his eh! D'aww.

"Oh, good. Y'know, I met a guy named Bailey the other day. Thought it was only a name for girls. Talked a lot too... eh, Maybe it's a Bailey thing. I was thinking, though... Soon you might be ready to try out, if you wanted... You're about as far along as Aiden was when he became a trainee."

How she managed not to start sweating when he mentioned meeting another male Bailey was beyond her. It couldn't possibly be the same guy, right? New York was far to big for that. She scoffed in response, "A dude named Bailey? Weird."

Shelby chose that moment to chime in, "Actually, Bailey is a really popular boys name this day and age. It's unisex, like Avery, Andy, Dakota... Morgan. Etcetera." 

Elke wrinkled her nose at the woman, ".... Know-it-all." She finished her chips and soda off quickly, then stood and started to stretch. "I dunno... I don't feel all that prepared. Like... there are people here who can set s#$% on fire with their minds and turn you into a block of ice. Me knowing how to punch you in the kidneys around your stupid cheat code thing isn't going to help with that."

Shelby laughed at that. "Heh! Cheat code!" 

Elke sniffed at her, frowning and crossed her arms. "I think after I finally land a hit on you I may need to look into beating the tar out of a few of the other mutants around here. Get a feel for how to deal with other powers and junk." He'd actually mentioned that, but she was going to ignore it and play it like she'd come up with it on her own. 

Huh. Must have been a 90's parent thing. Making their daughters Tim and sons Victoria. It was a weird time.

Saph dropped that subject there for lack of interesting, and smiled at Elke as she talked about her unprepared-ness. "Yeah, sure, you can't do all that stuff, but you can control a battlefield if you do it right. You got the advantage of perspective and the ability to approach a situation from multiple angles at once. Here, c'mon, lemme show you something."

He wrapped up the remainder of his sandwich, and gave Shelby a kiss, standing to head into the danger room again. "That is... if you ain't too tired." He looked back to the young native woman, no longer the little whippersnapper she was just a few years ago, and grinned.

He walked into the bright room, leaving it in it's default setting. "Make your clones, arm them with blunted arrow bows, and attack me."

"Yeah, sure, you can't do all that stuff, but you can control a battlefield if you do it right. You got the advantage of perspective and the ability to approach a situation from multiple angles at once. Here, c'mon, lemme show you something."

Elke scoffed and stood, dusting her pants off. "As if!" She replied to his comment about her being too tired. She dropped her wrapped off near Shelby as she followed him in, not even sparing the pink haired woman a glance.

Shelby took that as her cue to skedaddle, and set about gathering up the remnants of their lunch. She left Saph's half eaten sandwich, figuring he might want it later. The he and Elke vanished back into the danger room she slipped out.

Inside, Elke did as instructed. Soon there were four of her standing there, each with their own bow and blunted arrows. She eyed him for a moment before turning and nodding her chin at two of the clones. They broke off to the left as she and the last clone took off to the right. They rounded on him from all angles, bows lifted and cords drawn taunt as they each aimed one of the arrows at him. Elke waited until the three others loosed their arrows at him, before she let her own fly. She wanted to see which ones he would go for first and choose a spot to tag him accordingly.

"As if!"

"What is this, the nineties?"

Saph replied snarkily as the young woman spoke, shaking his head at the outdated term. Seriously, was she even alive when people said that last?

She would likely get even before too long. She made a wise move by separating her clones, placing them all at different angles. This would be difficult. The first three let loose, and he reacted immediately, turning his body toward two of them, and reaching to stop the other with an outstretched arm. Now that he was in a strange position, though, he was sure Elke herself would attack.

As the arrow almost made contact, his sense reached out and smothered it, draining it of energy as it got within 18 inches of his body. That was round one. She was going to keep at it, and it was only a matter of time. He could only pull that neat parlor trick a few times a day. "C'mon, Moose, you got more than that in you, I know it." He commanded, taking a moment to cross his arms on his chest and shoot a solid look at his daughter.

He was glad she'd used the others to make an opening... That was exactly the thought pattern he was looking for, and it would have worked on most opponents.

"C'mon, Moose, you got more than that in you, I know it."

Frowning, she pursed her lips and let out a low whistle. It was one of the main ways she communicated with her clones, and they understood the majority of the tones rather well. As soon as the nonverbal command left her lips the three clones bolted for him at once.

The three copied teens converged on him, each aiming to tackle and immobilize. Considering the fact that they each weighted roughly around 130 pounds, and that they had been subjected to Saph's insane work out program, a decent force was being slung at him.

Elke watched from behind, casually setting up another simulation arrow as she waited. The clones, though rather simple minded on their own, took orders pretty well. She waited as they tried to disable him with various joint locks. Then, with very precise aim, she let an arrow fly at him when she thought she had the perfect opportunity.