EOD WAR ROOM

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What used to be mission control is now called the War Room, and it remains much like it was in Xavier's day, with the only exception that the hardware in it now feels slightly out of date. The room is exceedingly large, the walls and floor in keeping with the overall style of the danger room. By the entrance, to the left and right are two different seating areas, square tables with booth style seats flanking them. An old coffee pot and stale donuts sit harmlessly on one of the tables. These are areas to rest and to process information. Without Danger, the fancy holographic displays that used to serve as the life blood of Mission Control are now gone, instead replaced by LCD screens. In the middle of the room is a square raised platform with large chairs around a central table. The middle table emerges straight out of the metal floor and it has a metal pillar in the middle, on which the screens have been hot-wired. Each of the four chairs around the mission control table has its own keyboard and mouse, hooked up to the LCD displays, a new addition to make up for the lack of holograms. One the far side of the room, opposite the entrance, is a massive map of New York, stretching from side to side. Using transparent film paper, many annotations have been stuck on the map to track the movements of the MLA, gangs, raiders and rogue mutants. Two even larger LCD screen on the very top of the pillar, facing down, show updated information and missions from the government and the company. Commander Glint, mutant liaison between the X-Men and the Company can usually be found here during the day and at the barracks at night.

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X-men Resources

None

EoD X-Men Mission Postings

Information Displayed on the Screens of the X-men War Room

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X-Men EoD Time

Wednesday, August 13th

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"Glint," Vlad greeted unenthusiastically, his head ever forward as he entered the massive chrome room and made his way to the center of the room, eyes locked onto the screen that faced the LCD computer hookup that he assumed every morning. Accustomed to this routine, Vlad sat down and leaned forward to squint at the large screen, his near-sightedness causing the words to blur just for a moment before they focused and he was able to relax his squint. He rested his hand on top of the mouse, scrolling down the day's list of missions, reading each line and weighing the pros and cons in his mind. MLA intel would lead to money, refugee and mutant detainment would lead to a vehicle, something that caught Vlad's eye, and delivering the generator would give them better quality supplies and would increase their reputation amongst the humans of Salem. Down one person as they were, Vlad leaned his chin into his hand and went over the screens again.

"Morning Shostakovich." replied simply Armano Glint, the liaison between the Company and the X-men, picked personally by the head of the Mutants Affairs Office, as he made the cup of coffee he was holding Irish. "You look as taciturn as ever." he added. The man was in his early 50s or late 40s, with a bit more salt than pepper on his hair and frazzled look to him, as if he was always lacking in sleep or permanently hung over. His short hair and half an inch beard were always messy and irregular and he wore a custom made Colossus Grade Combat armor provided by the Company, which, oddly enough, was entirely sleeveless. His outfit was complete with a pair of dark army pants made for urban camouflage and heavy, steel toed boots. His eyes were dark but had a certain menacing wit about them, almost as if they saw everything before them in relation to how tempting a prey it was, something that made anyone wary of leaving Glint alone with women or children, both of which present in the mansion. "Looking through the posting, I see." he added, his voice sounding like the man's throat was made of sandpaper. "Might I suggest you get us some supplies that can top this shit coffee?" he added, swallowing some of his while he pointed at the monitors. On his right hand, glint was missing his middle and index fingers from an unfortunate encounter with Rook a few years back, they'd been replaced by carbon nano tube laced polymer mechanical fingers, one of the few good offshoots from the sentinel program. Many of the materials used by the company were made of some organically built metal-like carbon compound, including the Colossus Combat Armor, how they had discovered it, no one knew, but it was probably devised to counteract mutants such as Magneto or Light.

"And you smell like whiskey. Life is as it should be," remarked Vlad passively, keeping conversation on auto-pilot as he scrolled once more through the missions, declining the invitation to speak as Glint griped about the coffee. He tapped his finger against his black-haired chin and then sat back in his chair and stared at the screen for a moment longer. Untrustworthy as Glint had always portended to be, when it came down to information regarding the missions, Vlad found the older man to be well informed and no longer had any reservations about picking the man's brain for whatever scraps The Company decided Vlad could have. "We are still a person short for missions," he said after wiping his palm over his mouth in a thinking gesture, speaking aloud to the screen, but Glint was probably familiar enough with the process to know that Vlad was opening up opportunity for a dialogue for the two of them. "And we are dangerously low on supplies." Vlad folded his hands in front of his lips, elbows resting on the arms of the chair as his cloudy grey eyes scoured the expiration dates to the missions. "Let me guess, The Company wants us to focus on numbers 1 and 2?" he asked, seeing that the mission came directly from the Mutant Affairs Office, which was ever hungry for new mutants to bag and tag.

"Rules say 3." replied Glint with a sardonic smile as he leaned back on the booth and gave Vlad a sardonic smile. "I can send one of MY people to babysit your people. Make sure they don't get any boo-boos and the sort." he continued, standing up and walking towards Vlad, then standing next to him to peer at the monitors. "Well, the bleeding hearts of the office are in charge of solvin' the 'mutant problem'. Of course they see that as simply, getting rid of the MLA and keep things quiet for everyone. If it was me running the show I'd say just paint that fuckin' bridge for an airstrike, not get intel." he added with an exasperated sigh before taking another sip of his coffee. "Company is more interested in keeping all of us spooks in here." he added with a shrug before finally concluding, "and the mayor of Salem is just a fat fuck."

"That generator is going to catch a lot of attention," Vlad mused as Glint came over to look at the screens. Again, his voice was distant, speaking aloud as he weighed the options carefully. Despite his calm demeanor, Vlad never found it easy to throw his teammates into harm's way but knew implicitly that someone had to make the hard decisions, and his shoulders were large enough to carry the responsibility. "Air strike?" Vlad asked, blinking at the screen and then glancing to the grizzled mutant standing next to him, getting a whiff of his Irish coffee. The idea was interesting at best but Vlad always weighed Glint's suggestions against what remained of his moral fiber since he knew the Italian to be a ruthless cutthroat. Still, the man was far more experienced than Vlad was at the finer art of war and staying alive in the middle of it, so the Russian waited to see if there was anything else forthcoming from the cad to help him make a decision, waiting with one of his bushy brows generously lifted.

"It is." replied Glint as he downed the last of his coffee, treating the drink more as if it was a cold beer than a piping hot cup of Irish coffee, like the heat didn't get to him. "I betcha those MLA are already moving their pieces to get that thing." he added before heading back to his booth. "And there's a mighty good chance they're gonna get it, those company escorts are crap on a cracker." added glint with a laugh. Sitting back down on the booth, Glint raised an eyebrow and an evil grin drew on his face as Vlad seemed to show some interest on the air strike possibility. "Oh? Interested? Didn't think it'd be up your alley, little john." replied the Italian man, "Unfortunately the MAO seems to be against airstrikes right now, of course, they could reconsider that if they got some really disturbing intel."

"I would get a mutant," Vlad replied as Glint insulted the Company escorts, which, over the years, Vlad had come to regard with decreasing trust. While Glint gulped his hot coffee like a shot in Tijuana Vlad was thinking of teams. "Nathan, Lire and I can handle the generator," he said, wishing that what pitiful remains of the X-Men boasted a few more mutants with long range powers to help against the veritable circus of assorted powers the MLA was proud to house. Elizabeth could handle the refugees with Catherine and a mutant from the MAO. Looking over to catch Glint's sinister smirk at Vlad's crumbling morals, the giant held the stare coldly then sighed and looked back to the screen. "Neither did I," he sincerely admitted, a brief glimmer of his former self shining through the tough outer shell. "But they won't play fair and I don't want to sit around with my thumb up my ass while they plot my family's murder."

"Well if yer ever a man short, it can be arranged, just ask me about it." added the man with a sardonic grin. "Well, about the airstrike, we can find a way to get it done, but you have to keep in mind there's ten times a many little mutant tykes down there in th' sprawl as here in the mansion... or anywhere else, for that matter. Hell, there's probably more little mutant tykes down there than there are MLA militants proper. What can I say, our kind has some libido, we fuck n' breed even in the face of apocalypse." laughed glint heartily as he lit a cigarette with a small bang, blowing up the tip of his finger and almost immediately regenerating it, even as his finger smoked like a gun. "I don't give a flyin' fuck, obviously, but I don't want you limp dick types getting soft halfway through and leaving me to foot the bill, so to speak. That's one line in the sand you can't draw again, just saying." continued the man, his voice as raspy as they get. "Now go out there and kill some of our feller muties and when you've tested your determination, we can talk about them airstrikes."

"I am not a man short but we are severely lacking in a ranged attacks, as well as experience," Vlad replied somewhat irritably as he stood up from the large chair in front of the monitor and started towards the map of NY. He listened as Glint reminded him of all the children that would die in an air strike and Vlad felt his resolve plummet. This whole thing was fucked. His black brows dipped over his grey eyes as he looked at the Quarantine Wall, following the path to the bunker with his eyes and imagining a hundred life-or-death scenarios along the way. "Humans do the same," he commented passively to Glint's summation of mutant progeny, grabbing a marker and putting the cap on the end so that he could indicate the path on the film paper. Despite Glint's deplorable attitude, Vlad listened to his less-than-eloquent reply and found much truth in it. Right there, standing in front of the board, Vlad already questioned the action. "Understandable," was his only reply, though he was clearly given much to think about. With the MLA all against them, he would have to break a lot of eggs in order to save his family, eggs with faces he used to call 'friend.' Squeezing the marker, he capped it and put it down, stepping away from the map to look at it with his hands on his hips, eyeing all the places where they had last encountered MLA raiders and rogues, which absolutely peppered the trail they would take the generator on. "So what do you suggest about this generator? Without a vehicle, someone is going to have to carry it, and we need that APC," he said, folding his arms and speaking with the clear indication that the someone who would have to carry it and protect it would be him.

"Well if it's a mutant you want, you can go talk to Leon, he's usually in the shooting range, he works for me so I'll let you borrow him." he grinned mockingly with a shrug, showing exactly how much he cared for his subordinate. "If you want range, though, there's that hot piece of ass Sarah, she works for the good commander tho, you'd have to go to the barracks and ask him if you can take her with you." he continued, yawning noticeable as Vlad continued to speak. "APC? Why the fuck do you need an APC for an escort mission? They're lookin' for an escort block'ead, not a transport. That means you go with them in their cars and watch their asses in case someone tries something. If you want an APC that bad you know what you can do tho."

"Hmph, shows what I know," Vlad replied as Glint pointed out his error, sounding unfazed but looking a bit sheepish. He needed to get his head in the game and stop dwelling on things or else he would wind up six feet under in a REAL hurry. "My mistake," he amended, taking a quick glance at Glint and his pungent cigarette and then looking back to the large LCD, where he eyed missions 1 & 3. Those were his preferences, and they were the most direct. At least the mutants they might have to kill would be MLA affiliated instead of strangers just trying to make it. With a sense of urgency now fueling him in an entirely new way, Vlad pushed the circular logo on his suit's shoulder and leaned his head towards it to say "Team, meet me in the war room in an hour. Be suited up and ready to go."He mulled over Glint's suggestions with a hand on his chin. With a barely perceptible look, Vlad thought about what kind of men the unquestionably amoral Italian would have serve him but pulled his lips to the side and considered what kind of hell he might catch for using Sara... Deciding to investigate Leon before ruling him out, Vlad scooted the large chair in and said "thanks for your help" to Glint.

"My pleasure" replied simply Glint at he lifted his nearly empty cup of Irish coffee in the other man's direction, almost as if in a toast, and then downed it before going back to his paper.

Lire slipped through the door; she knew she was early but really she had nothing else to do considering she'd gotten ready this morning in the hopes of going out on a mission. She nodded to Vlad, "You called." she said as she leaned against the wall. She crossed her arms and waited for him to elaborate on details.

As Lire came in, Vlad was in the middle of leaving, so the two of them very nearly collided. The enormous Russian stopped short, making sure that he didn't steamroll right over the more diminutive Honduras native, his grey eyes showing more white than usual as he narrowly avoided flattening his fellow mutant. "Hey, a little eager to get started, huh?" he asked, glancing up towards the clock to see that she had come almost immediately instead of waiting an hour. "I've got to check on some things, but the missions are up if you wanna check them out. It's gonna be you, me, and Nathan on number three," he said as he pulled open the doors. Before he left, he made sure to catch Lire's attention and then led her eyes towards Glint before giving her a warning look to watch herself around him. Then, once he was sure she'd gotten the message, Vlad disappeared into EoD Complex Hall.

Lire ducked out of the way as Vlad passed her in the entrance. She nodded her understanding; both acknowledging the mission and his warning about Glint. She stepped forward to study the mission information.

Glint followed Vlad with his own eyes as the massive man stepped out onto the complex and then they darted back to his newspaper once the mutant was out the door. A second or two later, Glint folded the newspaper and set it down on his lap, putting his feet up on the seat next to the one he was using and resting an elbow on the table. "That guy, uh? Won't even trust his own comrades." he simply said, trying to get Lire's attention in his usual coarse voice, feigning a bit of painted indignation as he grinned.

"In this day and age...can't say I blame him." Lire answered with a shrug. "Seems like everyone is a little crazy now." She skimmed over the mission information and grinned; the mission sounded like something that would entertain her; as long as someone was stupid enough to attack.

"So guarded..." said simply Glint, huffing a bit as he leaned forward on the booth and poured himself another cup of coffee, he didn't make it Irish this time, however. Taking a sip, Glint continued, with a kind of cigar-and-brandy type of smoothness. "Its in these... troubled times, when one has to look towards the small pleasures in life and enjoy them the most. "Friendship, companionship and a good cup of joe." he added, lifting the pot of coffee towards Lire as a friendly invitation and pointing it towards a couple of clean cups stacked on the other end of the table. "Well...a hot cup of joe at least." he added with a laugh.

Lire shrugged as she took a cup and poured it about a third full of coffee. "Those things are only good for so long." She answered as she took a sip of the black coffee. She wasn't particularly close to anyone on the team and so distrusting that any affection she held towards a person was kept closely guarded. She had become far to used to losing those she became attached to.

Glint once more lifted an eyebrow quizzically while Lire seemed to bemoan the human condition. "The whole ice princess act doesn't suit you, my dear." he laughed heartily. Sitting forward and putting his feet down, the man leaned forth and rested both elbows on the table, suddenly appearing much more menacing. At the moment, Lire had become a viper facing a bear, but Glint meant her no harm, at least not right now, so he simply added "You're not unlike me, I can see it on your eyes." with a big, confident grin.

Lire raised an eyebrow not fazed in the least; even a bear would fall to a viper's bite. "Glint..." She began slowly, "If you were looking in my eyes you wouldn't be able to move." She paused, and her sharpened nails tapped against the hilt of her knife, "And I'm sure you know what happens after that." She said with a small shrug.

Glint laughed once more, even louder than before, as he leaned back on his chair and considered teaching the girl a lesson. Nevertheless, Vlad was already one man short and he didn't think he'd take him mangling one of his X-men right now very well. Seeing the similarities between Viper's gaze and his own, he'd forgotten how young and inexperienced the girl was. Leaning forward once more, Glint smiled and looked at Lire squarely in the eye, grinning wildly. "You're a killer. Like me. You don't really enjoy the 'simple things'. Sure, sex feels good. Sure, a good glass of brandy has a nice burn to it..." he began to say, his eyes staying on pray and his face twisted in the same confident grin. "But they're just... imitations. Cheap thrills to stave off the hunger for the real thing." he continued, slowly he moved his hand towards Lire, his index finger pointing out towards her neck, even touching the side of it if she'd let him. "The real thing is driving your blade into someone's neck." he added, his voice getting lower and lower, so that one would be forced to lean closer to hear him. "Feeling his life gush out, sticky and warm, and their eyes look at you as they realize you're the last thing they're ever going to see. The power of life and death in your own hands. The total control over that person's future, or at least, the few seconds of it that remain." he finally concluded in a husky whisper. "But you're young and dumb." he added, trying to move his finger upwards now and trace the shape of hew lower jaw should she not try to freeze him. "*I* know what comes next. But *you* don't. You're a snake who grew up hunting mice, but now come to a land where everyone else has fangs to and you announce your intentions without so much as knowing whose fangs are bigger."

It was easy for Lire to recognize someone stronger than her and even though it angered her that he dared to touch her; she swallowed her outrage. She allowed him to touch her; refusing to flinch back or show any weakness as she kept her gaze a little off from his. Her pride grated at his words but even she recognized some of the truth in his words and she felt like biting through her tongue as she quietly uttered her answer, "Then teach me. I know the feeling of my prey's blood on my hands; I love the game of hunting each person down. You are my elder... show me how to play your game."

Glint was amused at Lire's stalwart determination, as she looked at him with pride and defiance in her eyes. She had surely piqued his interest with her reaction, even if she seemed angered by his touch, she might yet learn to enjoy in, in due time. "Really now?" he said with a grin, "Appealing to my better nature? I can teach you what I know, I think." he continued, letting his index finger run along Lire's collarbone, extremely slowly, to the point where one could wonder at times if it was moving at all, before finally pulling away. "You have to know your boss won't like it, you'll have to keep it quiet, or at least dress up the truth a bit." he added, crossing his arms as he leaned back on the booth, Vlad certainly wouldn't be too happy about one of his dogs getting too close to the wolves. "I think we can arrange a little test, first, one i'm sure you will enjoy." said the man, his eyes were those of a predator, much like Lire's own, but grizzled and experienced, his smile dashing but clearly belonging to a wolf in sheep's clothing. "Come back to me after you've finished your test..." he said, ripping one of the articles from the newspaper he'd been reading, folding it over and sliding it over to the girl, "..and i'll be sure to teach you many other things you will enjoy." he concluded with a perverse grin.

Lire nodded, "There's a lot of things Vlad doesn't quite know." She answered softly as she took the paper. She held it in her hand for a few moments; she didn't like how close this felt to betraying the X-Men; to betraying Xavier. Still.... the idea of more games, of learning more and becoming stronger toned down her anger at being touched. Making up her mind; she unfolded the paper and glanced through it. "Shriek?" She said with a small smile as her eyes seemed to light up with anticipation. "How soon do you want him gone?"

"Get to it when you can get to it." replied Glint with a small wave of his hand, as he shuffled a bit in his seat to get more comfortable and took another sip of his coffee. "Wouldn't want to rush it and let things become too transparent. There's a reward, too, so you can probably convince your fellow X-men to help you out." added Glint with a sidelong glance at Lire, as usual, meeting her gaze directly and fearlessly with his own. "As always, sooner is better than later."

Lire nodded. "I'll get it done." She answered; her mind already starting to work out a plan. She absently shredded the piece of paper he'd given her until it was basically impossible to put together again. She shrugged at Glint's suggestion to have someone help her; it wasn't something she was really used to but something she would consider. She met his gaze; staring directly into his eyes and her eyes changed colors to a clear silver as she activated her powers.

"Good then." said Glint with a confident smirk. "You can kill him however, but if you deliver the killing blow yourself, I'll make sure to rewards you accordingly." he added before going back to his paper. Lire COULD prove a promising asset if she played her cards right, and she wasn't bad to look at, so maybe she'd prove a fun ride too. Crazy chicks were wild, after all. When Lire activated her powers, Glint seemed to just stare straight at her and apparently froze as expected, for a second anyways. Suddenly, there was a blinding flash and the smell of burnt meat. Lire felt as if someone had pricked her eyeballs with needles for a bit, forcing them closed. When she opened them again, she could see Glint nonchalantly looking at his newspaper, some burn marks on the table, like liquid fire had been sprayed on it adnd then put out. Small wisps of smoke coming out of Glint's slightly reddened eyes.

Lire flinched back; her arm instinctively coming up to cover her eyes as a pained gasp escaped her. When the pain faded she opened them hesitantly, they were back to the darker color and watery. She took in the burn marks and wiped her eyes with her sleeve before looking back at Glint with a newfound respect. She'd met people who hadn't been effected by her gaze but never had she met someone who could so completely wipe it out. The realization terrified her but at the same time any doubts she'd had about associating with him were erased. She didn't say anything as she went to her seat and sat down. Her eyes were still stinging and she blinked rapidly as she stared straight ahead; waiting for the rest of the X-Men and wondering what the hell she'd gotten herself into.

Endelyn came into the room and looked slowly around the room. Seeing that Lire and Glint were in the middle of a conversation, she didn't bother to intrude. However, she did notice not only the tension, but the smoke as well coming from his eyes. "Hnnn... hello you two."

Catherine appeared behind Endelyn, and as she walked in, it was as if she'd ran face-first into a wall of tension. Somehow, she'd forgotten about Glint before her jog here. Her smile had vanished, replaced by a straight-faced look, akin to a worker drone. "So, what're the jobs?" She folded her arms, not wanting to stay too long in the same room as the man.

Glint simply stared down at his newspaper, as if nothing had just happened with him and Lire. "Mornin'" he muttered with a distinct lack of interest when the two other girls came in. He'd done his research before, one was a dyke and the other one was bland and engaged. Maybe when he had a bit more wiggle room he could try something, but for now he wasn't going to waste time in them.

Lire glanced up and nodded a greeting at Catherine and Endelyn. "Jobs are up there." She gestured towards the screens. She turned to face them; her eyes were still a little red but for the most part were back to normal.

Entering hastily, Vlad looked around to take a head count. "Where's Nathan?" he asked, looking confused as he sniffed the air at the strange smell, but dismissing it as he walked towards the huddle of them.

"Who knows where he went to. I think he said something about going to his room." Endelyn said as she looked at the board. She was trying to figure out which mission she would be best suited for.

Catherine didn't know what mission she should go for, she just wanted someone to tell her what to do, but preferably not Glint. "Not a clue where he is." She'd gone of wandering, and he was gone when she went back to the mess hall. "So..." She looked right at Vlad, desperately trying to ignore the other man's presence. "What's the plan of action?"

"Nathan, report to the war room, we're all waiting," Vlad demanded shortly into the pin on his uniform after a deft push of his finger to tune it into the right frequency. As the girls seemed clueless, Vlad sighed and hoped everything would go all right with the outside help he had just gone to set up. He then tuned it again, this time to 102.5 and said, "this is Invalesco to Snapshot, please join us in the war room," and then clicked it to 101 and said "This is agent Invalesco to Commander Nemecek, I have it covered today, thank you sir." He dropped his arm and started towards the postings. "All right," he said, walking over to the large LCD screen with his hands on his hips, adjusting the mouse so that everyone could see all the missions neatly on one screen. "We are taking on numbers one and three. Quartz, Entropy and myself will take number three and Lire, Blade, and Snapshot, a mutant from the Mutant Affairs Office, will handle number one."

Nathan entered the hall shortly after Vlad's briefing, stepping aside the door so as to allow for traffic. He gave a quick nod to the large Russian, so as to indicate his preparedness, regardless of what was up for the day. His nap had far from done him wonders. He was still a bit frazzled over his thoughts about Endelyn, and still had his ever-constant worry for his sister lingering in the back of his head. He closed his eyes for a brief moment and shook his head, trying to clear it of these disturbances before having to go out for the mission.

Lire watched Vlad and quickly reread through the mission even though she already knew what it was. She glanced at Blade to see her reaction to the idea of working with the M.A.O mutant. She knew who Snapshot was although she'd never worked with him she had talked to him on a few occasions. She fidgeted with the hilt of her combat knife as she waited for more.

Endelyn didn't show any outwardly emotion as she read the mission she'd been assigned. She didn't like the idea of working with someone she didn't know, but it was a mission at least. She barely noticed Nathan coming in as she read, but happened to look around anyways. She noted he did look exhausted, and figured he looked more worn than usual. She started to regret being cold to him earlier, but only slightly. She walked over and nudged him slightly. "You need to watch your smoking habits, it's not doing any good for your complexion." She said in a teasing manner. One thing she would always have trouble with was making jokes that made sense, no matter how much she got used to this modern world.

Quickly entering the room, Elizabeth offered no apologizes for her lateness, only giving a quick nod to Vlad before taking up a stance with the rest of the team, carefully holding her hands behind her back to keep her nails out of anyone's way.

Vlad looked to the door as it opened, and gave Liz a small grin, very grateful to see her there. "All right, once again now that we're all here," he said, "will be Mayhem, Blade, and Lire will tackle mission number one while Entropy, Quartz and myself do number three. I want you to read through everything carefully and then ask any questions you may have," he said, folding his arms and standing back so that the others could read, shooting a look to how distracted Nathan and Endelyn seemed to be with each other, one of many reasons he had separated them. He wished that he could take Liz with him but he needed her leadership skills with the other team and so he gave her a small sad look as if to say 'I know, I'm a douche.' "Obviously we are both going to come under a lot of fire while we are out there so I need everyone to keep their heads and keep the missions firmly in mind."

'Mission 3' thought Catherine as she read through the screen once more. Retrieving a generator. If it was Vlad, Nathan and herself, then that meant Vlad grabbing it and loading onto something, right? "For the generator, are we having any help transporting it, like a vehicle?" She assumed at best that she'd be on a lookout, firing on any MLA, and at worst, she'd encase the bloody thing for protection. Nathan again would be a lookout she assumed, like a turret of green flame. She wondered if that would be enough.

"Yes," Vlad replied immediately. "We are only supposed to escort it so we will accompany them on the ride and offer our support under any means necessary."

A smile curled on Nathan's face when Endelyn joked with him about his smoking habit, "You know that I try. The stress of missions like this don't help much," he spoke to her with a light tone in his voice. He turned back to Vlad, and swallowed hard, "I'll be fine. Still waking up from my nap a bit is all. I'm ready for this." He turned his attention to the board, gazing quickly over the third mission, knowing what he was set out to do.

As the group walked in, the door suddenly opened and snapshot walked in, seemingly outfit for battle. The mutant was wearing a company combat suit similar to the X-men uniforms but in a grey color and with urban camouflage patterns on them, as well as a SWAT style Kevlar vest. Around his waist he had a black leather pistol holster with that seemed to be a 9mm pistol handing off it and some ammunition strapped to his vest. "Am I late?" he asked with a grin. Giving Glint a small salute, the man walked towards a nearby chair and paid attention to Vlad's briefing, assuming they would come up with a plan or designate team leaders or something like that.

Elizabeth shrugged off Vlad's expression, not too concerned about how she was placed apart from his team. True, there was no better person to have at her back than he, she knew how he fought, could count on him to deal out damage, and take it, and trusted him completely. However, being on separate teams increased the chance of one of them at least coming back. She did however raise a brow as she read through the finer points of the mission, casting an eye over those assigned to her. "Where exactly are we gaining this intell from? General observation, or something more? We're not the most subtle figures to be moving among the MLA undetected." It wasn't like the could blend in easily. Their uniforms were a dead give away for being 'the enemy', and no doubt at least a handful of MLA would recognize them as X-Men. As for the actual skill of her team, Vlad had chosen well for her, confident in both Blade and Viper's abilities.

Lire listened to the conversation thoughtfully. She was unknowingly sharing Mayhem's thoughts; there was no way they could blend into the MLA if they were wearing X-Men uniforms. Mayhem had even less so... she turned her attention to study Elizabeth; instinctively trying to figure out the best way to hide her.

Vlad stepped forward and clicked on mission one so that more information would pop up about how exactly they were to execute this mission. To Snapshot, whom he realized he might no longer need, Vlad simply replied, "No, right on time."

As soon as Vlad clicked on the mission, a map splayed out larger on all screens. The map detailed a route from the mansion down to the north end of the Plank. The route would take about an an hour to traverse in a vehicle and about 3 or 4 to do by foot. Ever since the war, the lack of roads made traveling by car slower than it had been before. A note at the north end of the bridge read "Gang & Mutant Raider activity detected." The line then moved further south until it reached the middle of the The Plant, a marker read "New Mutant Brotherhood Checkpoint." and finally to the south end of The Plank, where the marker read "New Mutant Brotherhood Base", next to it, there were several objective notes; "Objective - Obtain Names of New Brotherhood Leaders.", "Objective - Obtain Approximate Numbers of New Brotherhood" and "Secondary Objective - Do Not Reveal X-men Status during Mission."

Reading the last line of the mission objectives had been the biggest reservation Vlad had about tackling Mission #1. The X-Men were easily recognizable, Elizabeth and himself especially, which is why he had originally arranged for someone else to accompany Viper and Blade, someone who the MLA wouldn't automatically recognize. However, he also wanted someone he could implicitly trust, and though Snapshot had yet to prove untrustworthy, he didn't like to use free agents. Sighing, he looked over to Glint, someone he was begrudging to trust but would never ignore battle advice from. "Commander Bruciano, do you have any suggestions?" he asked, speaking over his team towards the grizzled warrior in his booth with his newspaper and the strange warm splatter.

Endelyn managed a slight smile at Nathan before Snapshot came in. Her attention snapped to him, soaking in as much information she could get just by looking at him. She pretty much figured that he was good enough, and looked towards the screen when the information came up. She listened intently, soaking in the image in front of her eyes.

Glint was simply looking down at his newspaper, taking eventual sips of his second cup of coffee for a day as he listened to the discussion. The lack of initiative among the X-men was mind numbing. When Vlad suddenly asked him a question, he didn't even look up. The mutant simply put down his mug and changed the page of the newspaper as he declared; "Use fake names." and then added, "And don't wear yer uniforms." as he grabbed the cup of coffee once more.

Lire suddenly coughed, "That won't work for the whole team. Some of us..." She indicated Mayhem, "Aren't quite able to blend in as well." She turned to study Elizabeth once more. "If we need stealth than our best bet is either for Mayhem to hang back where she can provide support or for a disguise that would hide her whole body." She fell back into silence; she had the third option of bringing Snapshot in Mayhem's place but it was one she intentionally did not mention. She for one would not feel comfortable with a teammate she didn't know; not in something needing delicacy like this mission seemed to need.

Nathan crossed his arms over his chest and began drumming his fingers on his bicep. This new guy really seemed a little too arrogant for Nathan's liking. Then again, he was one of the military's hand-fed puppy dogs, so he couldn't expect much out of Snapshot. Nathan waited in the back, not wanting to intrude on this section of the mission planning.

"Excellent," Vlad replied in a droll voice as he maintained eye contact with the screen as Glint answered with his usual complacency. Words of advice were appreciated nevertheless, and Vlad showed zero sign of annoyance with the Italian Company Man, though Elizabeth might have been able to detect the way his eyes twitched at the corners. Without Sarah's cloak there was no way of hiding Mayhem, but hopefully with the right duster and maybe an accent she could pass. He had an inkling that she would at least ask the right questions, though he also hoped that Viper would be at the ready with a poison knife if they ran into trouble. As Viper spoke up he nodded, turning from the screen to face the teams. "That's why I asked Snapshot to come down here in case we need him. I leave that choice up to Mayhem."

"I'll sort something out." Was all Elizabeth offered as a reply, sharing Vlad's concerns about the last part of the mission. Sure there were some weird looking mutants out there, hell, even one or two who may also be fully red in colour, but with their ex-class mates out there, it would always be a risk of her being recognized. But that was something to worry about at the time. "If there isn't anything else you want to add," She addressed Vlad before turning to her team. "Get into some more appropriate clothing." When they had some privacy, Elizabeth would go over her other thoughts with her team. Moving towards the doorway, she paused once behind everyone's back to turn back and blow a kiss to Vlad, then exited into EoD Complex Hall.

Catherine empathised with Elizabeth. There were ways and means around how someone looked. It shouldn't stop someone from trying to help. Still, she found herself lucky she didn't have to be too stealthy, she hated her hair dark, and blonde looked worse. "So, with this generator, has it been spoken about much?" She struggled, then found the right words. "I mean, how likely is it that we'll actually have MLA on our heels?"

Lire nodded at Elizabeth before slipping out the door into the EoD Complex Hall

Endelyn nodded to Elizabeth as well and kissed Nathan lightly on the cheek before she followed Lire out into EoD Complex Hall.

Nathan smiled as Endelyn came up and gave him a kiss on the cheek, "You be safe out there, Love." He spoke softly to her as she turned to leave.

Now, more than ever, Vlad wished for one of Doctor McCoy's famous holowatches. It wasn't a perfect fix but it was better to hide a book in a library, which had the massive man with his hand on his chin as he rethought the teams. However, his wife's seeming nonchalance took him off guard and by the time he got some sort of assembly to his thoughts she had already disappeared out the door. He blinked, quite forgiving of Nathan and Endelyn's small display of affection, and turned away in order to both give them a second and to face Catherine. He double clicked on Mission #3 in order to get more details, but said with assurance "nowadays it's best to assume they have eyes and ears everywhere. For all we know they're waiting for us at the pick up site."

No sooner had Vlad clicked the third mission, the information that had been displayed on the LCD screens prior shifted away and a new map came up. This map displayed a dotted line going from the entrance of the quarantine area, a massive fortified gate on the quarantine wall where a full detachment of the national guard kept watch 24/7, to the town of Salem, about a 4 hour drive southwards. Up top, a truck carrying a power generator about the size of a small car was displayed and two APCs as well, probably the hardware they would be given to run that mission. There was a small headcount next to each vehicle, apparently one APC had only a driver, another one had a driver plus 3 national guardsmen, and the truck had a driver as well. The route was definitely the quickest way between the two points, and rather well chosen. It granted the convoy a clear view of everything around them and level ground for most of the ride, which would make it very hard for anyone to ambush them. There were concerns, though, two obvious choke points which could not be avoided without massive detours. One was the remains of a massive, collapsed overpass. Some of it had been cleared to allow traffic but the columns and a literal beehive of steel and concrete still remained around it. Another one was a destroyed bridge that would force them to load the vehicles one by one onto a 5 minute ferry ride. Their forces would be divided for a few minutes and the banks of the river provided good hiding spots for terrorists.

"We can expect the trouble anywhere along this route," Vlad said as he looked up at the two dangerous pitfalls that was waiting for them along the way. "I wouldn't put it past them to ambush us with a small group to slow us down or distract so that more people can arrive at the ferry," Vlad said seriously, though there was no longer any sense of fear in his voice. With his great arms turned over his chest, he looked as if he had resigned himself to death some time ago, and was now merely counting the days until he met his inevitable doom. "My plan was to have Quartz encase the generator in a layer of diamond," here his grey eyes cut to the short-haired mutant. "Do you think that will be a problem given the size?" he asked, wanting to know for sure what all Quartz could do before making any dangerous assumptions. "Nathan," he said, lifting his head to look at the green eyed man. "You are the only person on the team with any ranged attack. How has your aim been lately?"


Nathan smirked, "Spot on. And if I miss, I can just blast 'em if I need to." He looked over the board, surveying the route that they were taking, and the additional support that they had been given. His smile faded slightly as he looked over the information. This definitely wasn't going to be an easy mission. Way too many critical failure points, and that ferry was going to be the worst of them. He pointed up to the bridge on the holo-map, "We're going to need a lot of support here. I can't clear that gap with a blast. My suggestion is to leave me with the generator at all times during the crossing so that we know that we have the best coverage of it. I'm not about to trust some national guardsmen alone with a piece of machinery this important."

"It should work, but I'll need to focus on it." Catherine's powers had grown over the years, but there were still definite limitations. "Don't want it to glass" She'd coined the phrase 'glass' for her powers to show the deterioration of the diamond substance. "I mean, I have a gun, so I could help, but it'd be better to keep focused on the diamond than to pew-pew really." If she thought that she herself would be in danger, she could even attach herself to the generator, covering herself and it. Better that than a stray hit knock her out, or worse, and then the generator would be defenseless. "Sounds like this'll be...'fun'." She was dripping with sarcasm, but at the same time, it felt good to be doing something that helped.

Vlad's eyes drilled into Entropy, silver spheres scrutinizing his response as if to test for the proper mettle. He didn't know why it came as such a surprise to the both of them that they were risking their lives to do all of this: that was their job, however ignoble it may have become over the years. "Good," he said, turning to look at the map again, eyeing the ferry crossing. "I was leaning towards Entropy and I in the APCs and Quartz in the truck with the generator," he countered, though he looked over to Entropy with as open an expression as he could muster, indicating that he hadn't made a final decision yet and was open to discussion. "You won't be able to create a shield around yourself if you're encasing the generator, will you?" he asked, shifting his eyes to Quartz briefly before looking back at the boat. He eyed the water, grateful that he'd learned how to jump or else he might fear that more than the likely welcome they were to receive, and then continued to look at the map.

"If I need to, I can." Catherine would rather not, the stuff became claustrophobic at times, and getting out was hard. "I'll just make an air hole. You just make sure they don't steal me with the generator." Truth be told, that would be highly unlikely, as she could stop them by creating spikes on the surface. "Unless you want me to go hedgehog, that is." Her mind was buzzing with ideas she'd love to try with her powers. They would all work of course, in theory.

"You can just call me Nathan," the man said, turning to Vlad. In truth, he only had the codename in case of emergencies, and generally hated its use, even in times like this. It served as a reminder of what he was, even more than the powers. He was going to have the powers for some time, but his name was something that he had since birth, and that wasn't going to change, even if his powers came or went. He shifted his gaze back to the map, scanning it over once more, "I think that that is going to be our best bet," He nodded in response to Vlad's suggestion of separating the three of them between the vehicles.

"Trust me, we will all be making sure that nothing happens to that generator, whether you're fused with it or not," Vlad replied as Quartz gave her answer, and then went on to add "and I want you to focus your energy on keeping the crystals as thick and durable as possible without much fancy stuff in between unless it's starting to look really bad. Is it better for you to fuse with it or would it be better to have you encase it and then get you a weapon of some kind?" he asked, truly concerned about the limitations of her powers since he was relying heavily on them to keep the generator safe. To Entropy, Vlad ignored his name request and listened instead to the fact that he had nothing else to add. "All right then, if there is nothing else..."

"Understood." Catherine stood up straight, an arm-twitch away from saluting, but she stopped herself in time. "In all honesty, I'd rather keep my concentration on it, and not attacking." It felt bad turning herself into a human shield without a sword, but she'd rather that than a weak shield. "But it's up to you." Her eyes kept staring at the door as Vlad's sentence seemed to trail off. "Shall we...?"

With a slight scowl on his face, Nathan nodded, "Let's get going." He pushed himself off of the wall, straightening out his uniform really quick, waiting on Vlad to take point.

A small cough had crept up on Vlad while his team readied themselves, his steely grey eyes volleying from one to the other placidly as he raised his fist to his mouth to cover the cough. However, it lasted a touch longer than he had anticipated and he eventually turned away, raising his elbow to contain any airborne pathogens from freely flying into the shared air. He licked his lips after he was done, and then wiped his fist on his mouth and started towards the door. "Armory first," he said, and then tapped the insignia on his Colossus Grade Armor to ask the other tean, but mostly Mayhem, "Hey, you guys hit the armory yet? We don't want to clean out the place before you get a look," he said on his way out the door, nodding to Glint as he exited into EoD Complex Hall.

Due to his position close to the door, Nathan managed to file in quickly behind Vlad, not saying a word as he exited the war room and headed into the EoD Complex Hall. In reality, he did really want to get away from Glint, and to move on with this mission.

'Wonder what I should grab...' thought Catherine, as she shuffled quickly after the two once they had left. She came close to treading on the back of Nathan's feet a few times, but avoided it as much as she could while she followed the two to the EoD Complex Hall.

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ACCESSIBLE AREAS
EoD Complex Hall

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X-Men: End of Days * X-Men EoD Characters

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