SAFE Finals (Field Tests)

Roy's grades in the SAFE semi-finals were at best average, at worst failing, just enough to keep him in his sports clubs, at the time he had not really invested time and energy in his power. But after the fight with the football team and the fight with the school to stay enrolled and not be completely expelled Roy had taken to his power. Even naming it Quicksilver his applications of the power quickly becoming many and varied, while he'd never thought about using the powers to enhance himself during his football time, now such personal modifications were second nature. Such modifications automatically disqualified him from the high school league. Now needing to double down Roy did quite a bit of back studying just to make sure he had things covered, specifically for this final.

Hearing the call to stop, the white haired teen looked up from the CPR dummy, having just finished his fourth rotation of the standard fifteen chest compressions and two breaths. He waited patiently in front of his raven-haired teacher for her next set of instructions or next task, after all he'd had to drag the two hundred pound CPR dummy nearly two hundred yards just before trying to resuscitate the amalgamation of metal and plastic. This was quite the test, not that the written portion took itself less seriously, Roy felt he'd done a good job on that, having known most of the answers if not had a good feeling about what he was writing.

Coale frowned as she looked at the clipboard, she hadn’t really been planning to administer any sort of test, but Houston had been on Call for hero work that day, or at least he had used that as an excuse. Idiot, sticking her with the work while he went out to go slack off. Especially with finals for some students scheduled for that day, specifically some individualized testing. Luckily she was certified to actually give this testing, as it was one of the things required to work within the SAFE program.

The student himself though still had the hardest part of the exam yet to come, including the combat exam, still she had quite some left to go, Coale frowned wondering how the next portion would go. There was an obstacle course in the next area, though only the start was visible prior to actually starting, as there were barriers meant to block the participants view. This was meant to test the participants ability to think on their feet. At the end was an area the instructor was meant to wait at, and Coale knew she’d have to go there to wait for the student upon starting the exam. An area which gave her a clear view of the course to continue grading.

“Alright, you can start right…” The short girl clicked a stopwatch before calling. “Now!” With that Coale would walk over to the instructor’s area. A glowing flame in her hand. She’d begin her transformation just as she reached the viewing area, knowing the test after this would require her powers.

At the sound of Coale's whistle Roy would take off at a dead sprint towards the obstacle course entrance. This was the part he'd done the best on last time because of his football skills. Getting by things that wanted to smash or simply stop him was something a running back had to deal with, and Roy had been an excellent running back. He was quick to clear the first few obstacles without his powers, sliding under a low bar right in the opening, before rolling to his feet and bounding over a hip height ledge and zig-zagging through columns.

Roy would force his way through punching bags, swinging softly, trying to keep him form completing the maze, but it wasn't too hard. With his enhanced strength he could bull rush the bags pushing them out of the way as he ran through them. The final test was an eight foot high wall which Roy bounded over in a single jump, having finally gotten used to his new mobility thanks to his strength, and landing without skipping a step before running through the hanging curtains, and stopping in front of his teacher who was finishing her Transformation, in awe of the flashy change.

Coale felt her body warm as the flames washed over her, glowing brighter by the minute as she would seem to float slightly over the ground as her hair and eyes flashed brightly, changing from their normal colors into a bright red, her outfit changing from it’s normal look into the familiar schoolgirl outfit complete with a cape. Coale hadn’t really paid much attention to the theatrics of her transformation, having long since gotten used to the flashy display, and still needing to do her own job. At the very least she was able to notice the boy finish the course on time just as the transformation was coming to it’s end.

The short teacher looked over the Roy, somewhat surprised by how quickly the boy had made it through the course. The next part of the course was the most work on her end. “I guess you’re not too terrible?” She allowed, looking away from the student after checking the time on the stopwatch. She wasn’t about to admit that the time was somewhat impressive, and while not the best she’d ever heard of, it was certainly impressive in its own way given the records of his last test. “Alright, well next up is the combat segment, try not to screw up too badly.” The instructor stated. Walking towards a circular area set out to represent a ring.

One would think her confident, though Coale wasn’t too sure, she’d never been much of a short range fighter, something the arena area setup would cause problems for her. As far as range went though, her more medium range combat abilities could still serve her. Heck she had heard some people were working on a fully digitized arena for the combat tests to allow for a better scenario of an area a hero might actually have to fight in, but as it stood the arena area was wide enough to allow at least midrange fighters, with some barriers in place and crates so as to simulate. The “arena” was also much larger than a typical fighting stage might. Perhaps 30 or 40 feet in diameter rather than a smaller ring one might see for hand to hand training. She’dwait impatiently for Roy to be in position before calling out.

“You can start anytime you’re ready.”

Stopping to catch his breath Roy watched and listened to the junior teacher as she finished transforming into a redhead, some powers were far more flashy than his quicksilver, but it would seem that his powers were a lot more utilitarian as he walked towards the combat ring following her, a sense of deja vu spread over him as he stood across from Coale and looked her over. Loosening up his shoulders with a little roll, Roy took his fighting stance, hands up palms out.

"Alright." He called back psyching himself up. "Here I come!" He announced, speeding towards the red-headed loli creating a short club out of the quicksilver ready to give her a good thumping as he charged in, unaware of what his teachers powers were, really setting up a good target as he failed to bob or weave with his first, most direct attack!

Coale gave a look of overt confidence as she stared down the student, it seemed obvious why the school had allowed her to administer the test as he seemed to try running her down without any thought to evasive maneuvers at all. It told her he was either cocky, or wasn’t used to fighting ranged opponents like herself.The approach overall was something of a disappointment, and Coale would only wait until It was too late for him to correct that mistake before forming a glowing energy blast in the shape of a heart in her hand.

“Sloppy.” She commented, as she thrust the glowing heart forward, sending it flying at the student with surprising speed. The heart would only expand as it moved forward until it finally struck the boy. She controlled the power enough to decrease the potential for lethality, but the force behind the energy projectile still remained, and at the very least it would certainly not be pleasant for the boy to get hit by. The shot would move fast enough to make it difficult to dodge, especially given Roy’s forward momentum.

She put her hands on her hips as she considered the student. “If you don’t take this seriously, you aren’t going to pass you know.” She pointed out. She’d follow the comment up with two more heart shaped projectiles.

The shot caught Roy right on the chest, putting him directly on his butt and sending him skidding backwards, his eyes still focused on the redhead that just blasted him. Rolling backwards to his feet, Roy shook off the hit, a heart burned into the center of his shirt. A quick hand tried to dust off the carbon scoring on his chest, that didn't even smear when he did. "Hmm..." He wondered looking down then back up to his teacher.

"You're right." He said quickly turning the metal bar into a shield, and charging again! Moving headlong he was quick to change directions, nearly ninety degrees and start a long slow circle to her position, keeping the shield between him and her. "Obstacle courses have nothing on this." Roy called back, letting Coale know that he now had a better grasp of the testing environment.

Coale smirked as her student was knocked off his feet, though her expression turned to worry briefly as she wondered if perhaps, she’d put too much power in the blast. Her powers had strengthened rather quickly recently, making control of the power much more difficult than it had previously been. Previously, Though she wouldn’t ever have admitted to any problems with her control. Nope, it was fine, obviously and the student standing back up a moment later verified that to the teacher, the worry replaced by an annoyed look as though being kept waiting.

She did smirk at the change in strategy, sending a couple blasts out to test the defense. She expected them to not get through, though they could always trip the student up. Coale would then send a much large blast ahead of the student, lighting the path ahead of him on fire with the energy blast leaving a trail, continuing slowly towards the edge of the ring. There was a possibility of the student stumbling into the fire, though either way at least it’d possibly give her a moment to get a clear shot off, or stop him from getting the full lay of the land for the moment.

Her attacks were quite awesome, but their substance was something a little more intangible to Roy as he was a bread and butter kind of guy. He liked getting close and clobbering his enemy, even if it meant taking a shot or two in the process. The fire attack was something else as Roy bounded through the flames, only getting lightly singed by the fire keeping his eyes his teacher and quickly starting to move faster as more shots came in, throwing his body around acrobatically, in what might at first seem a random pattern of motion, but each dodge was quite deliberate, and focused as he jumped, rolled, dove and somersaulted around the incoming ranged attacks.

All the while he was moving closer, and closer with each attack she lobbed at him, a clear, clean shot never presenting as he closed to half the distance of the mats, just inside the range to throw weapons at her. He would hold off, as unlike her seemingly endless supply of energy his Quicksilver was limited and he wasn't going to waste it on thrown weapons just to make her stop her attacks.

Coale kept the surprise off her face as she watched the student seemingly dodging her attacks with ease. It was somewhat annoying to see, and Coale frowned realizing the closing distance between herself and the student. A hand to hand fight would in no way be to Coale’s advantage, and while she had something incase it came to that, she hardly wanted to reveal all her tricks just yet. It didn’t matter if she knocked him unconscious or not, she merely had to run down the time limit for the match really, and even then, the student’s actual combat abilities seemed alright enough to get decent scores.

Coale knew that Houston would never let her hear the end of it if she did let a student get the upperhand on her, and she continued sending out shots before sending one out that would grow far larger suddenly. It’d grow much large just as it neared the student, likely being much harder to dodge as the energy heart grew to roughly the size of a bus, obscuring her from view at the same time, and Coale wouldn’t stay idle as it grew, waiting until it obscured her from view before moving to another spot to the left of her student, sending a second heart blast to try to intersect with the first and catch him from the side instead, using the objects left scattered around the arena and her small stature to maneuver around the fighting area with some relative stealth.

Coale's attacks were starting to become predictable to Roy who settled on his laurels for a moment, and planned out his next move, shifting his allotted amount of Quicksilver to his legs deciding to make a dash for it, before realizing her next attack was growing in size to that of a whale. It was a big blast and Roy felt like he didn't want to get caught in it...

Skidding to a stop, the dust on the floor getting kicked up by the sudden deceleration. Roy grasped his hand out to form a shield, but there was something about the speed of the attack made him guess it was a sort of combo set up, so the best thing to do would be to dodge before the next blow landed! When the attacks struck home and, the smoke cleared, there was a tall kite shield damaged and deformed by the attacks, standing stuck into the ground, it's odd warped shape making the appearance that Coale's attacks had hit home.

Mister Mercury had in fact taken to the skies, bringing the combat into a three dimensional arena, his head turning upwards to look down from his inverted form as he scanned the area of their mutual combat and seeing his instructor crouched behind a piece of debris, and kicking his legs out he would come down right in front of the debris, dropping down at point blank between the girl and his leftover shield. "Gotcha!" Roy shouted throwing a wild high kick at the assistant instructor!

The shield in the ground told her that she’d hit with the two attacks, but Coale wasn’t completely sure. Where was the student? It wasn’t like she could have vaporized him. As an instructor, she’d been fixed with a power limiter meant to ensure that possibility didn’t need to be worried about such things, as the actual power of her attacks were supposed to be automatically filtered down to acceptable levels.

There was no way he would just hide behind the shield, Coale thought, nobody would be that stupid and it was only just as she realized what was happening, looking up just in time to see the student land. She just managed to avoid the high kick, jumping back to allow her former cover to take the hit instead. A hands moving to just over her heart and a bright light beginning to glow. Then she opened her hands and unleash her power.

It’d be a wave of pure force and heat that the girl unleashed into the student, and at this close range, along with the power’s wide range it would be unlikely to miss. Roy would feel himself struck by a wall of fire and force, and would likely get knocked back along with her the debris she’d previous been hiding behind, as the attack’s force hit home.

There was a fairly massive dent in the cover where Coale had been hiding, a dent that showed off that Roy had found a way to enhance his strength. The teacher's attack however was far more effective as Roy was sent ass over teakettle backwards from his teacher, ending up right by his shield, and reaching or it re-absorbed the heavy quicksilver construct back into himself and kipped up to his feet, and dusted off his clothing, and started walking around Coale, ready to dodge at this distance he'd be more effective, but thanks to the ring he didn't have as much cover that would be effective against her blasts, she was at the advantage here. However he wasn't going to give up yet, he just needed a new plan. So he would begin formulating one as he kept his eyes on the student-teacher his opponent. She'd had quite a strong power as it covered quite an area and she even wore a limiter.

"Hmm..." Roy formed a sword in his hands, leaving the impression that he was still very much on the offensive, or at least considering it.

Coale’s eye glanced over to the dent left buy je student, obviously showing some ability to enhance physical abilities, She’d known he’d already have a physical advantage over her, as she didn’t receive any sort of physical boost from her own powers, and her size and body type hardly lent themselves to being a heavily physical fighter. It just meant to her that she’d have to ensure the distance was kept to the maximum, though they had already taken quite a bit of the allotted time for this section of the testing. The biggest issue for Roy would be trying to close the distance without getting blasted back, and of course doing so before running out of time.

All she really had to do was make sure she kept her distance for the next several minutes. Coale’s advantage e wasn’t lost on her, and while she’d already used a substantial amount of attacks, she was still nowhere near her limit as far as she could tell. She’d send more attacks Roy’s way in the form of a bombardment of the energy hearts, meant more to keep him moving and distract his focus rather than to really hit the student. “We both know you aren’t going to win staying over there,” She stated, her tone indicating a measured boredom, meant just as much to get under her opponent’s skin and throw him off as it was to motivate him. She hoped he wasn’t stupid enough to try a blind rush, as any such careless attempt would undoubtedly end in a repeat of the last, with her blasting

Roy started to change his plans, his eyes were still locked onto the young teacher as he started move his way around the young woman, barely older than himself. The plan he'd wanted to enact now that he had a good sense of her powers was nothing short of wearing her physical body down as she ran from him. This would take time and intensity, and not getting blasted himself, he'd have to put out twice the effort of the defender, give or take if he wanted to at least pass this thing.

The initial plan was to get her to shoot at something else as he closed in on her position, juking back and forth through her initial fury of blasts the onslaught enough to keep him well and on his toes, he would nearly miss one of the blasts cutting back on his own course, spinning and swinging his hand wide unleashing a wave of small needle like flachettes, meant to make her either use her power or abandon her position as he closed in on her again.

Coale was a bit frustrated at the boy’s constant dodging around, it wasn’t like her energy blasts had a finite number to them, she could throw them around all day and he had to be aware he didn’t have an infinite amount of time. It would almost be disappointing if he didn’t find some way to try to turn around the fight. He had maybe minutes before the fight ended, as this test wasn’t really meant to represent a prolonged combat, just long enough to give the instructor a good idea of the practical aspect of the student’s abilities and tactics, as well as combat skills. The sudden projectile attack caused Coale to smirk slightly, recognizing he’d at least realized the danger of approaching without some kind of way of keep his opponent from simply blasting him. Rolling out of the way and behind a box. She’d see what he was planning soon enough, if he even had enough time. Regardless he’d at least exceeded her expectations by actually learning over the course of the fight, unlike some students she’d seen testing before. The short redhead did her best to try to keep her focus on the opponent she was facing, keeping an eye out for more projectile attacks.

Her ducking under cover would have likely given Roy more than enough time to close most of the distance between them, and while Coale would attempt to send a few blasts at him, she knew she’d likely have to give ground to keep from entering close combat.

...

Roy would charge in indeed, using his darts to keep her head down and when she gave up ground he would charge in again. He would try to increase the tempo of their charge and fall back battle to get her more tired out in the time, a constant sprint away from him might not be attainable but her consistent and fast rushes from cover to cover would be tiring enough.

Then there would be a sudden switch as Roy let off the next time that Coale would take cover, there would be a glint in the sun as a rain of darts would come down right at her. Roy would sprint in and slide towards the cover she was in kicking up the dust and the rocks as he pulled the last of his pool of quicksilver into his hands forming a dagger to point directly at the red head teacher, as she took cover from the rain of shards, an impromptu pincer attack!

Coale wasnt blind to the fact she was being kept on the move intentionally, using her own energy blasts to try to keep the teen from advancing to quickly, but she knew that space between them was slowly growing smaller as she was forced to give ground. She understood what he was doing, in a fight of attrition she normally could hold out better, so long as she could keep her opponents back but his ability to dodge her attacks meant she herself had to keep on the move.


Her physical capabilities were not near the levels of her reserves in regards to the energy blasts. Still she was forced to move from cover to cover to avoid all the projectiles. The rain of darts very nearly caught her flatfooted, and had Coale been less focused on Roy the attempt to dodge would have put her exactly where he'd want her. As Coale once again released a blast of fire and force to intercept the darts.The dagger came in close just after she finished the attack, and Coale didn't hesitate to catch the teen by the wrist, using his momentum to and her own training to help her throw the boy in a textbook judo move which would likely leave him on his back before the timer finally went off.  

"Time." Coale called out, breathing hard from the exertion. The fight had taken more out of her than expected. She looked down at the student. "Not bad, i guess." She admitted trying to keep a neutral expression. She didn't want to admit it, but there was a good chance he could have beaten her.

Roy's slide into knife range went about as expected as someone employed by the S.A.F.E. program would be well rounded, but her judo move was sloppy it was obvious she wasn't practiced as the young white haired boy was quick to recover to his feet, and spun just as the timer went off, having something of a sporting background, Roy very much respected the timer as he was just a half heartbeat away from connecting with the fiery little redhead, but practically freezing on the spot right there in arms reach. He'd made it to fourth and goal on the one yard line and came up a half second short.

Gritting his teeth in open frustration Roy, stomped a foot. "Damn." He scowled as the quicksilver dagger was reabsorbed back into his hand. Taking a deep breath, Roy would slowly overcome the sting of defeat as he stood up strait, leaving his lowered combat posture. "So... will I find out now? Or will I come home to angry folks?" He asked hoping that she would give him the grade then and there as opposed to mailing it home for his folks to see first.