Disillusionments and Expectations

The school seemed smaller than he remembered. He had missed so much in his sequestered life, and he had seen how big the world was on the last mission to make first contact and while most of the heavy action was done by Jamie Braddock; Ethan had learned how to pretend to be an ordinary kid for a short period. He didn't have many memories that could be considered simply or ordinary by even the most generous of expectations. He adjusted his training suit and closed the locker in the area before the danger room. He was still in training and his suit was a mixture of sensors and bio-registry gear designed by the egg heads of the school for his unique powers.

The doors opened much like the CG doors on Star Trek with a "swoosh' the panels disappeared, and a landscape filled the room with solid light constructs and practical effects and the occasional mechanical device thrown in for realism. The control room was typically in view above him but this exercise it was hidden from normal sight, but Ethan saw the room differently as he adjusted his eyes to various electromagnetic frequencies.

The room stripped bare of artifices was a network of advanced energy and matter reconstruction technology far more advanced than Ethan's junior high-level mind could comprehend. He was 15 going on 16 on an arbitrarily constructed birthday since he had no idea when he was born or even where he was born. He turned off his special sight so he could adjust to what he was supposed to see as three generic androids loomed in the distance and screams of people running away from them could drown out any thoughts that Ethan had that this was going to be easy.

"Really? Three androids...." Ethan said sarcastically as this was supposed to be hard but three of them was a bit too much in his opinion. The machines began to echo "mutant detected!" as if a rallying cry to all its brethren machines.

Beams of intense light fired from one of the androids. It was an intense infrared heat beams which Ethan bent and curved the blast to hit the 2nd android in midflight taking out it's foot propulsion unit.

"Mutant is an energy manipulator switching to physical attacks!" The Android broadcast like some idiot military commentator. The androids used in these training sessions were designed to adapt and counter tactics making them excellent ways to train someone. Ethan had to adjust quickly or they would adapt to his attacks. Ethan took this as a declaration that he had to take the offensive position and he generated an intense full spectrum light burst overwhelming the robot’s visual machinery. The school had taught him that all mechanical devices had thresholds that can be reached if he blanketed the area with too much light. Cameras are blinded, computers are rendered unable to process the flood of colors and the bonus was that human sight was so limited that any human seeing the display was just a little noxious.

"Primary visuals nullified...switching to Sonar” Ethan heard this because he was tapping into their communications by observing the frequency of the chatter between each robot, he was able to adjust his radio to eavesdrop on their updates. They were now about relatively 500 feet from his location and sonar as good as it was had to contend to walls, and you could hide behind a large object or vehicle. He was trained by the school to not k=just rely on his powers but his street smarts.

A car side view mirror showed one Android looking for a target and he shot a high intensity laser beam and bounced it off the mirror and it hit the Android square in the chest melting a hole through it and it went out the other side. The problem with lasers were that they were too clean a hit and not enough damage. The Android attacked the location of the blast and ripped the car to shreds luckily Ethan was next to a different car. The advantage of using mirrors was that he could redirect his light beams from any reflective surface even the very shiny surfaces of the Android's themselves.

One of the robots landed near him, and a series of machine guns popped from its arms and laid down suppression fire which meant Ethan had to duck behind another location as the stream of bullets ripped a long path and caused two cars to explode as their gas tanks ignited under the hot rounds. He needed to hit one of the Androids in such a way as to and then he got pegged.

"End Session"

"What happened?" Ethan couldn't tell what he had done wrong, but the session was terminated so he had to have fucked up something. He called up and he heard mumbling and then he heard a disapproving reproach.

"So, you think you can handle three androids on your own?" The voice sounded very angry, and Ethan realized this test wasn't about fighting but his arrogance and self-confidence.

"While you were dealing with the first two the third snuck up behind you!" Ethan heard the all too familiar rant of not forgetting to keep the whole battle in your mind. He looked behind him and saw the 3rd robot just standing behind him with a viscous looking blade ready to strike. He was glad that the room had safety measures or he would have had a nasty draft in his back.