Hank's Lab, Covert CIA Base

[tobenormal]

Hank had been thinking about his lunch (turkey and swiss on rye, a coke and macaroni salad as always; though maybe he'd get a Twinky today) when he heard the facility's Director enter his lab. "...Capable of super sonic flight!" The Director was saying proudly, making Hank guess they had some more Washington brass to impress. He stood, straightened his lab coat and adopted his casual yet serious stance.

"You should see the real thing if you want to be impressed," he said when the group finally turned around a corner and into view. The group was odd as only one person was in a suit. Washington Brass always wore suits and there were two woman with them. Agent Mactaggert he recognized, though he didn't know her name, but the blonde....she took his breath away. He stood frozen in awe and swallowed.

Comments

[tobenormal]

Hank turns back to Raven with an awkward smile.

"I could explain from up here if you'd like," He says before realizing how silly it sounds. He clears his throat and grins awkwardly again. "Or if you could step back Ms. Darkholme, I could join you on the ground again." She is awful close and he'd hate to accidentally hit her.

[andproud]

"Oh. Of course," Raven murmurs, feeling rather sheepish as she moves to do just that.

She takes another step back, and then another, giving him a wide berth as the other voices disappear and fade into the background.

[tobenormal]

When she is only two steps away, he lets go and somersaults midair to land on his feet, his back to her. His smile of pride is hidden and vanishes as he turns. Yeah so he was showing off.

"So as you know Ms. Darkholme, this is the Blackbird. She is capable of passing Mach 1, that's just faster than the speed of sound in case you didn't know. Her thrust ratio is..." He says glowing at his baby and begins a long speech about the technical details of horizontal thrust, vertical thrust, how the plane can hover, it's maximum range and such. Unless Raven finds it interesting, she may want to stop his soon.

[andproud]

She's given him more than enough room to jump down, but the move still surprises her to an extent, eyes widening slightly as he rejoins her on the ground.

She will stop him, eventually, with a hand on his forearm.

"Dr. McCoy, please." Her smile is soft. "Call me Raven."

[tobenormal]

His voice stops as soon as she touches him and he melts a bit inside.

"Hank. Just Hank, I'm not a doctor yet, Ms...Raven." He likes the soun dof her name on his lips and he smiles again. "Did you have any questions?"

[andproud]

"Well, okay then, 'just Hank'," she replies, lightly teasing, and lets her arm fall back down to her side.

"So where's the real thing? The real Blackbird? I'm guessing it's bigger than that," she adds, gesturing to the model above their heads.

[tobenormal]

Hank gives a nervous laugh at her joke, at least he hopes it's a joke.

"Oh no, this model is 1/10th the scale of the original. The real Blackbird is at the hanger which is about...actually I'm not supposed to say because it's classified. We don't have a landing strip here."

[andproud]

"It's classified, huh?" she replies, leaning in slowly with a conspiratorial look as if she intends to convey a secret.

"But you know where it is."

[tobenormal]

"Well yeah," he says blinking and fighting the urge to pull back. "I have to go and make adjustments and I supervised its construction."

[andproud]

"Well, maybe I can see it sometime," she replies, idly clasping her hands behind her.

"What other kinds of work do you do here?"

[tobenormal]

"Lots of things," he says kind of fumbling with his hands before he finally decides to put them in the pockets of his lab coat. "There's this super computer I'm working on. I also have this jet backpack like in the comics but I can't seem to figure out how to get enough thrust for flight without injuring the flyer's legs."

As he talks he's looking around his lab for anything he can show her, anything that will impress, when his eyes light up. "I know, watch this." He says as he heads over to a wall with a heavy cable coming out of it to a very bulky looking harness and belt. He starts to put it on, looking up to her with a smile every now and then. Once he gets the front secured he turns around. "Can you fasten the clamps back there?"

[andproud]

"It might be important to figure out a way not to hurt someone," she agrees, smiling slowly. She follows him over to the wall, taking in everything with a faint smile on her lips. There's more technology in this room than she's ever seen, and some things she's pretty sure she didn't know even existed outside of science fiction.

Raven reaches out to help him as he turns around, fingers deftly working to fasten the clamps in the back of the harness, hands falling by her sides once she finishes. "What does this do?"

[tobenormal]

"Yeah. Flight control is another problem," Hank adds as she works. The clamps are heavy and take a little effort. Once she's done he steps away and turns to face her. Flicking a switch and pushing a few buttons on the harness, he says, "You'll see in a minute, it takes a little bit to warm up."

A high pitched whine begins and the harness starts to glow a bit. "It's okay," he says remembering the agent who pulled his weapon on him when he demonstrated this device before. A few seconds later and Mr. Black flickers to life over lapping Hank. At first it's easy to see Hank through Mr. Black but soon enough Hank is nearly invisible beneath him except when the image of Mr. Black flickers.

Hank leaves the device on for only five seconds before turning it off. "It gets overheated quickly," he says with a hopeful smile.

[andproud]

The noise is a little disconcerting, but she's not going to step away - instead, she steps in closer, curious, until the image pops into view and then she starts visibly, surprised but not scared.

"You know, I just realized that I never showed you what I can do," she murmurs, the tech enough to resemble her own mutation in her mind.

Her eyes flash yellow, briefly, skin rippling and changing - and then it's a mirror image of Hank staring back at him, glasses and all.

[tobenormal]

"I was curious but didn't want to be rude," Hank starts to say but stops when he sees himself. His eyes widen but he doesn't jump or pull away. He's just fascinated. She doesn't have it, well him, quite right though as he doesn't look that attractive. He's not about to criticize though.

"That's amazing." Then because he realizes he's just mimicked her, "You're incredible. Can you change into anyone?"

[andproud]

She doesn't know him that well, otherwise her imitation would be a little closer to accurate, but from a distance, it could be convincing enough. The near-mirror copy of Hank blushes and smiles a little broader than he might before turning into Mr. Black, and then Charles.

She knows him the best. If one didn't know any better, she could almost be the real thing.

"Anyone," she replies, in Charles' voice, and then it's Raven staring back at him again.

[tobenormal]

Oh she likely had Hank down perfectly, he just doesn't see himself that way.

"Fascinating. I wonder if you produce extra mass to grow larger or if you just stretch your tissues," Hank muses without a thought to how that might sound.

[andproud]

She tilts her head, a questioning look springing onto her features as she tries to decide whether or not she should be offended.

"Tissues?" she echoes, slightly confused.

[tobenormal]

"Tissues. Your know, your skin, muscles..." Hank says before a look of dawning horror crosses his face. "I didn't mean anything by that. I was just wondering how you became taller for Mr. Black. You're beautiful, not mass..." He stops himself before saying finishing that last word. He did learn some things at college.

[andproud]

Her lips are already twitching to form a slow smile before he even finishes talking, making her amusement at his backpedaling more than obvious at this point.

"You think I'm beautiful?" she asks, voice soft.

[tobenormal]

"Well, yeah," He says a little confused. How can she not think she's beautiful? Then a thought occurs to him and he asks carefully, "Is this your natural form or your powers?"

He hopes he hasn't gone too far in asking. He really does like her and wants her to like him.

[andproud]

"No, this isn't - I normally don't go walking around unless I look like this," she admits, gesturing to herself. But he still hasn't seen the real her.

She takes a breath, and in a blink, yellow eyes stare back at him as she lets go, normal skin rippling away to her blue form.

"And now you know why," she adds, resisting the urge that pulls at her, the urge to change, to cover up her true self.

[tobenormal]

As she changes a look of wonder overcomes Hank. There's no fear or distaste evident, just fascination. His hand's twitch a bit at his sides as he wants to touch her, to see how she feels, but that would be too forward. Still she is so far out of the ordinary it's hard for him to find words. She is still beautiful in a way but it is so different from what he knows.

"Sorry," he says feeling a little guilty for asking her to reveal herself so fully. "I wish the world was better so you could be like this all the time. You're still beautiful though."

[andproud]

She glances down slowly, briefly, allowing herself a small smile before she finally looks back up, and as she does, red hair spills over into long blonde strands down her shoulders and her eyes return back to brown from yellow.

"Unfortunately, it's not," she says, briefly flat. Her own parents had disowned her when they'd found her looking like this after her mutation had manifested her. As far as they were concerned, she was an abomination, a demon. Charles is her only family now.

"But thank you," she quickly adds.

[tobenormal]

Hank fights the urge to promise to make the world that better place for her because what can he do? He's just one guy with hands for feet. Instead his growling stomach reminds him it's lunch time and so he says, "Are you hungry? I could show you the cafeteria and buy you lunch."