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"We got trouble, it's time to go!"
Perhaps this was something prepared for, first the small pep talk in the danger room and now this. Jean was already locked and loaded in the Blackbird's pilot seat, uniform tugged on and snug, red hair down her back which was slightly unkempt and wily. Buttons were flipped on, headset grabbed and tugged over her fiery red hair, the underground entrance which sits upon the unused basketball court soon opening to give birth to the sky.
The people who boarded the Blackbird were of the most exceptionable, and one of the unknown. We will see how his worth fits with this crew of merry little assholes.
Thanks to the capabilities of the Blackbird, they touched down outside of Kinshasa. The space was nearly clear enough for the blackbird herself to land, and with a little help from the bird in the sky (read.. crazy cosmic Phoenix), a tree was uprooted and misplaced somewhere far enough for the metal of the sky to land. And it was glorious.
For once.
Upon the opening of the doors, the first smell would be the salts of the land due to the nearby river, and the far away drums that haunt the skies from the Inland Madimba. It was clear that there was life there, but what wasn't clear.. was the sound of the drums. Was it happiness? Was it a tribal celebration? Or were the drums themselves a call to the dogs of war?
Jean unbuckles herself after shutting down the Blackbird, turning within her seat. "I'm staying here." It was clear that she wasn't going anywhere. "I need to protect the Blackbird, it's our only way home. Don't lead anyone to this spot. Cover your tracks. Don't blink…" She pauses, scrunching her face, then waves her hand in a nevermind fashion.
"And don't die."
For little do they know? Jean's going fishing. If this co-op is successful? There will be a few extra mouths to feed and she refuses to be caught lacking.
"Good luck."
"When we're ready to go," Illyana puts in. "Find me. If all else fails, head north. I'll pick you up there and bring you back to the plane." She could bring them all the way home. Maybe. If not for the possibility of getting lost in space and time. "For the moment, I'm heading in to scout. I'll report back." A disk opens beneath her, and she disappears into Limbo to find a good spot from which she can see the activity around their target.
Daire is dressed in a pair of loose jeans, boots, and a plain white t-shirt with a small pouch with some odds and ends in it. He has a hat positioned over his horns so that they aren't obvious, at least for now. He can do nothing to hide the intense unnatural green of his eyes, or those fangs, unless he keeps his mouth shut. "Alright, so, should we start out while she gets ahead of us to scout and meet up with her?" He glances to the others and begins to head out, at least to stretch his legs and take a survey of their surroundings.
Kaleb arched an eyebrow and looked at Kwabena with an eyebrow. He was not subtle. He noted to the team, "I can keep us quiet, but can't do anyhting about keeping us unseen. Might want to get Illyana's intel before we move in so we have some idea of what we're walking int- I'm gonna poke my head out and have a listen." Kwabena got a nod, "Good to see you again." He didn't follow that up with 'please don't burn down teh jungle while we were still in it' but he felt it was implied.
|ROLL| Rogue +rolls 1d24 for: 22
I swear to God, if some asshole wipes my mind when I'm done with all of this, there will be hell to pay.
Let's not bother with just how, exactly, Kwabena Odame got involved on all this. The point is, he'd been convinced to come, because someone or someones knew that he was born in this land. He'd be the best to know the culture, the language, the little nuances mostly unknown to the Western World. Curse his luck.
The African, born to parents of the Ashanti Empire (now Ghana), isn't dressed in any kind of uniform. like the others. A black tank top, brown khaki shorts, black boots. He's kept mostly to himself, quiet for the ride, safe for a few glances toward the two familiar faces that are Kaleb and Illyana.
However, the moment they step off the airplane, his guarded demeanor changes. Unnaturally silver eyes begin to glow a bit brighter, and his lips part in a quiet gasp. The others might move ahead, but he stays back, crouching down to spread his dark-skinned fingers into the earth.
"Nyumba nzuri," he murmurs in a tone that is not the typical, angsty, vulgar cab driver most people know him as. This is the Congo. It may not be his home, but it's the closest he's come for eleven years. "….nimekukosa."
Rising to his feet, he rejoins the others following Illyana's departure. Kaleb gets a short nod, but there's an honest to goodness smile on his face. "Africa," he says quietly to himself, before nodding his head in the general direction of where the drumming is coming from. The smile becomes a smirk. "Do you heah de drums?" he says in his heavily accented English. "It is celebration, but… not celebration like birthday, or Christmas. It is de celebration of conquest. Blood. Victahry ovah de adversary. And it is nevah lasting in Africa."
Heavy vegetation chokes the lower reaches of the Congo. Thick jungle puts the leaf cover in Central Park to shame, where it hasn't been hacked away to create the odd field. Scored reddish soils hiding some of the greatest mineral wealth on earth give rutted paths that, even by day, are treacherous to travel.
By night they're positively deadly, the wet season leaving sucking mud and deep ruts large enough to swallow up a cheap dirtbike now and then. Nothing like fences attempt to remotely tame the path that widens sometimes for two vehicles to pass by one another, or reduces to a skinny pitted line across a rickety, makeshift bridge.
Madimba isn't a place anyone deliberately comes. You show up here with a purpose. It's not like Leopoldsville, a benighted capital named for a hated foreign despot who instituted the removal of hands and feet for rebellious thoughts and deeds. Here barbed wire strung between the trees and a heavy, pointed pallisade around the metal shacks and shanties outlines a kingdom ruled by another kind of despot. The kind who rules with AK-47s and keeps barrels of grenades or copper, gold, and diamonds for trade.
Westerners of any kind stick out among the largely youthful men guarding a perimeter. They're armed and walk in pairs, vanishing behind impassably thick greenery and re-emerging. Others stand on the metallic structures thrust up like oil derricks and jungle gyms all over the place, using the apparati to see deep and far. When they speak, it's an ugly patois hard to really fathom even for the peoples from around this area. Inside are larger structures, tin-roofed, flimsy compared to New York and absolutely not in any way. Not with the senior staff biding their beers and cigarettes, listening to a radio.
Kaleb looked around with a squint. His eyes closed to get a better picture of what was around them. Plants. A lot, and lot of plants. At the question of the drums Kaleb extended five fingers out into the air and made a gesture like he was gripping the air and pulling it back, amplifying the ound of the drums and looking for bits of conversation he could draw back, not for his benefit but Kwabana's to see if he recognized any of the dialects used. As they passed Kaleb was at least able to keep the sound of passage and footfall from extending out and giving away their position.
Illyana returns after a few minutes, immediately grabs a pen and paper from somewhere and starts to sketch. "Here it is," she says. It's a basic map of the camp: a pentagon, patrols are regular, the lay out of the buildings more or less accurate. "Jean, you have any idea where this kid is we're trying to find?"
She is, for the record, not wearing a uniform herself. She's dressed all in black, loose-fitting clothes for ease of movement, and a black kerchief to hide her golden blonde hair.
Daire takes a look at the drawing that Illyana makes and listens to the amplified sound of the drums that Kaleb conjures, but the drums mean nothing to him in particular. The drawing, however, holds some interest. "Okay, so do we know if he's just part of the village or is he hiding? Or are they holding him? How much do we know about this kid aside from that he's here somewhere?" He glances around to the others curiously.
Radios light up. There's no television here to speak of but there is radio of all kinds throughout the roughly pentagonal camp behind its barbed wire and walled confines. They all blare in unison, drowning out the drums, a sextuple beeping burst in head-splitting volume. Anyone with unnaturally sensitive hearing or simply too close to a radio is going to be nursing a migraine and earache for a while.
Even the Blackbird radiates with the same signal.
When Kaleb amplifies those drums, Kwabena's back straightens. He eyes the familiar man cleverly for a moment, but there's nothing on the amplified sound that really draws his attention. Instead, he turns back toward Illyana when she reappears, allowing the others to crowd around the map before he gets a peek. This was their show, after all.
To Daire, he shoots a look. A dubious one. "You kidding? Is Africa, dey ah holding -"
While he doesn't have sensitive hearing, those sound waves are being amplified. He grimaces and recoils from it, uttering a curse under his breath. "…ffffffucking shit."
|ROLL| Rogue +rolls 1d6 for: 6
|ROLL| Jean Grey +rolls 1d20 for: 11
There was a fishing rod and a bucket immediately within her grasp after a few moments of teetering around the blackbird. Already the effects were starting to take, mostly just a test on the minds within the vicinity of how the blackbird herself slowly begins to fade out of sight, and back into sight a moment later. If they missed the trick of the light, it was a little too bad. There was some life still in the old bird; radios were on-line to catch broadcasts of enemies that may or may not be in the vicinity, those things needed to be watched in order to gather the crew to fly away, or to stay and fight.
And yet, as she breathes in the second gust of air that captures her senses, her eyes flare red almost immediately, her shoulders nearly hunkering as if a large gorilla climbed upon her back to hug and hold. And yet, there was that feeling, that sinking feeling of wanting to burst out of her skin..
..for the fire that slowly surrounds her eyes were met with a bucket drop, one hand placed over her eye as she tries to combat the darkness due to the language spoken. The exposed skin not covered by the black glove only appears to crack and peel. This time? -She- wants to be seen. For there was even a half peel of her lips backward to reveal her pearly whites, her hand dropping to cast both of the glow of her eyes towards the sky as she listens. Listens and thinks. It was a dangerous thing, the woman on fire was a beacon upon the forest, the fishing rod dropped as if it were disgusting, her hand shaken out as she speaks, which carries the tune of close to ten voices, ten versions of Jean mingled into one.
Nevermind the creepy child who carries the soprano in her voice.
"Dead center." They all finally say, casting her eyes upon the group. "The area itself is fortified."
"Jean did not want me to tell you.."
'I can't tell them this..'
"But you all are going to die tonight."
'Please make it back alive..'
"Some of you, anyways.."
'Is the mutant watching the drumming? What is going on? What is that language?'
"Good luck."
The ignited burst of chatter inside the compound might actually be interrupted by a splatter of gunfire from an AK-47 held by a boy in fatigues, thin and probably not past fourteen. His eyes are cold and wide, whites showing, so old for someone so young. The bullets tear through a woven mat on a makeshift wall, bisecting the table and blowing the radio right off it. Everyone nearby, a collection of 10 people, start shouting. Loudly.
How many speak English? Well, that's bound to be questionable, really, especially after the first point that causes them to shake their heads. Lingala, Kituba, Tshiluba: they speak that. Some know French and others Dutch, a few Portyguese, but clearly they're not making any sense of it. English earns a very loud shout. Someone in a position of authority shouts: «Get the boy. Ngakande, Mangso! They know it!»
Broadcast.
- Report from Sol three, quadrant 7 omega 12.
- XORRAR broadcast band engaging to Toliman.
- No response. No response.
- Repeating broadcast. Report from Sol three.
- Relay online: IRAM.
- Emergency broadcast to Hala.
The drumming has largely stopped. It doesn't take long for them to fall back onto a war footing. They are guerrillas, after all, in a country tearing apart itself at the seams.
The kid they're looking for kneels in the middle and he jerks his head up when the flames go up. Others shout about the broadcast, but he's suddenly on his feet and bolting, gun slapping against his back.
Kaleb seemed to be focusing on whatever is in the air while they talked until he finally put up a wall of silence between he and the group so there were fewer sounds to pick through. Finally he did have report for them broadcast back as he could pick it apart. "There's… tunnels under the compound. Four… adults playing drums are in teh compound. They-" He winced sharply, "They're on radios. I can't do much about broadcasts. There's rooms underground. Equipment… they buried a good body of the compound so if we're looking for someone we're going to be headed down likely. I'll try to get a better… shape… maybe of the area. See what we can map." He looked to Daire, "Sorry I don't have better to share for you."
Illyana stops, staring at Jean. Glances at the others, back at Jean. At the others. "What the fuck was that?!" she demands. Her sword appears in her hand, her armor materializing around her. Red, ram-like horns burst out of her forehead. Whatever Jean just did, it scared her. And Illyana does not scare easily.
"We need to get in there, get this kid, and get out. Fast. Hell, if I knew which one he was I'd just drop a disk under him and call it good."
Rogue dropped Broadcast Sign.
|ROLL| Kwabena +rolls 1d20 for: 18
At the sound of Jean's creepy voice, Kwabena spins around and looks her way. "What de fuck?" he asks, almost in unison with Illyana. Almost at once, his body begins to transform, but it is not the kind of transformation he is looking for. Apparently, the young mutant still doesn't have much of a grasp on his abilities, for his body begins to turn, well… liquid-like. "Fbbrrubck," he gurgles again, and clamps his eyes shut, baring his teeth. His skin stops dripping loosely, and snaps back into place, where it belongs.
It's embarassing.
The muted sound of gunfire prompts him to turn back around, this time in a much less shocked manner. He shakes his head rapidly once, then steps forward. "Is dat de plan?" he asks, his voice a bit harshened, likely out of humiliation at his little matter phase slip. "I'll go first and draw dere fire. Nobody freak out, is just bullets."
In the next moment, Kwabena is running. He knows this kind of terrain quite well, and with every footfall, he trusts the earth to guide him away from the pitfalls and mudtraps he remembers from his childhood. He's running fast, leaping and ducking and dashing where instinct tells him to, and he's running right for that compound. Let the others be sneaky; if there's one thing he's good with, it's guns. Primarily, attracting them and their bullets.
At the breach of the compound, he spots the barbed wire just in the nick of time. With a grunt, he leaps into the air, grabs hold of a protruding tree branch, and vaults himself over the barbed wire in a display of athletic prowess. He lands in a half somersault, and picks the pace up where he left it as soon as he's back on his feet; only then, he's cranked his maw open to let loose a horrific battle cry.
"RAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHGGGGGGHHHH!!!!"
He's charging straight for the first rifle-wielding bastard he can find.
|ROLL| Kaleb +rolls 1d20 for: 5
The little group closes in on the wall through the stygian jungle nightfall without anyone really noticing. There are lights to see by behind the walls and the metal structures overhead are awash in the glow from diesel generators. Oddly no one seems to notice thanks to Kaleb. They're alarmed more by the direction of the huge freaking plane that wasn't obvious before. And, then, well, Kwabena jumping over a wall out of apparent nowhere roaring at them. Outside the zone of silence he's really quite noisy.
So, of course, they fire. And Mr. Fancy-Cabby takes a spray around without much accuracy. There might be a shout worth hearing: "«The bastards are attacking us!»"
The camp seems to be sprung into chaos based on whatever is broadcast in English over the radios. Yes, those are English words but they might not make a whole lot of sense.
A generation of young men raised to fight against their Belgian and French oppressors are quick to run to pre-arranged stations throughout the rather large camp. A few indeed seem to disappear into the night, thanks to camo and a number of hidden entrances into the underlying web of tunnels. Some drop down into a tunnel while their gabbling superiors try to make sense of what the hell a 'ronel' is, and someone keeps shouting "SIEVERT" very loudly indeed.
Who here knows what a sievert is?
Kaleb sighed as Kwabena charged. He sighed, "And there goes Kwabena alerting them to where the rest of us are. Team, they have people underground coming up." As for Echo? He got the hell out of the way. "I'll see if we can pick up if the kid moved. 'Yana, can you see anything from… however you do that thing from the other side to help us look?" With that he fanned out to the side and noted to teh rest, "I'll focus on the exfiltration, but I think we gottabe quick."
"Jean told us where he was," Illyana says to Kaleb and Daire. "And while Kwabena may get himself killed, at least he's distracting the soldiers. I can take us close to where the boy was, and hopefully we can find him there while Kwabena makes so much noise." A stepping disk opens beneath her. "All aboard who's coming aboard," she adds drily, and then mutters something to herself in Russian before affixing a fake smile on her face.
In all the sudden chaos, Daire notices that there is a path opened up that could allow the use of the buildings for cover and gestures, "If we go that way we can use the buildings as cover to get toward the middle of the complex." He isn't sure how the stepping disk works, but he offers up that information to Illyana before he hustles over and hops on the disk. He's never traveled by disk before and eyes it dubiously, but it seems he's game for sticking together on this one.
The gunfire may not be accurate, but there are more than a few bullets that strike pay dirt, considering how many of those guerilla soldiers are shooting at him. In a manner of speaking, of course. Those bullets that strike Kwabena's clothing do, in fact, rip through from one end to the other, but when they touch flesh, that flesh is ripped into tufts of black smoke that almost immediately knit back together into flesh and bone. Those bullets eventually strike dirt, indeed, as if passing through the mutant did as little to slow their momentum as they did damage to his body.
"RRAAAAAHHH!"
He only stops when his body collides with a young boy, knocking him flat on his ass. Kwabena scoops the assault rifle out of the teenager's hands, and he spins it around to level it at the next group of guerrilla he can see. "KUFA!" he cries with a sort of maddened rage that is entirely, but convincingly, put on. "TIMA KUFUNA KIMA!"
It's a bastardization of Swahili with his native Dangme, but many of the words will be easily translated, including 'die' and 'cockroach'.
The rifle is cocked, and with a mad cackle, he begins spraying the air with bullets. Of course, his aim is by design terrible. He didn't come here to murder his fellow countrymen. The bullets pelt into the ground in a wild pattern, but his silver eyes are wide with mania and his shouting rips at vocal chords, sending spittle and saliva spraying from his mouth and down his cheek.
X-Men? Meet Strategy: Diversion.
Yes. What the fuck. Part of Jean was not Jean and it was clearly visible by the cindered-ella that resides upon half of her face. And even while the bullets begin to sing, warcries sung, chaos and the dryness of Illyana coalesque into something magical, the bird. The woman who could possibly be in the middle of the war (not!), begins to dance.
"Hurry children!"
'This is too much.'
"Run to your doom!"
'Help them, goddamn it!'
"Run home to your Gods!"
'We can't take much more of this.'
And all the while, she dances. Dances the song of the fire ballerina, all around the Blackbird.. (because she's not much help at all!)
Indeed, there's a nice, open path towards the central command hub where the drummers completely refused stopped their work. The broadcasts continue in regular bursts of English that ends up repeated, by the time the cycle is done, next in Russian and after that, Latin.
A number of the guerrilla fighters fixate on the fellow plowing into them. When he doesn't drop immediately to the gunfire, the determination to use all their ammo falls into place. Swahili isn't all that common around here. It's spoken by the westerners in the country; the enemies. The sympathizers. Those willing to brave fists and snarling teeth close in on Kwabena to hit the only way they can. A few drop. Maybe one can steal a rifle!
The mutant teen is pounding his way for one of the metal structures, in the opposite direction of fire lady and the central compound. He cuts two quick gestures with his hands, and then the shadows erupt into strong cables and webs that hoist him above the ground. Strands wrap around the top of a building, an antenna bending. He springs airborne to hit a rooftop of a barrack. If it makes anyone happy, at least he's nice and visible to Illyana and company when they step out.
Kaleb stuck near the outside as the others hopped on the disk and insted took off downt eh side path to get closer and then… focused so hard at reaching out with a hand and diving into the waves of sound to find the low waves of the drums that were thrumming around to cancel the waves and silence them. All that was left was a quiet flat *tink tink tink* as they were thumped on. He was not at maximum efficiency and was really glad he had the helmet on to protect his head from teh gunfire. So, unbelievably, grateful. At least he could focus on the task at hand.
Illyana looks around when the disk lands them right where she intended (of course — they didn't have to travel very far, so her accuracy is spot on). And it only takes a moment for her to spot the kid they came to find. "I'm going to guess that fellow on the roof over there, the one with shadows coming out of his hands, is the one we're looking for." she glances at Daire, then down at herself, and she sighs. "This might have gone better if one of us had gone mad and decided to take on an army by ourselves," she concludes, before teleporting them on (assuming Daire chooses to come along) to the rooftop where the scared mutant kid is visible to everybody.
|ROLL| Rogue +rolls 1d20 for: 19
|ROLL| Rogue +rolls 1d100 for: 39
"I'm guessing that's him, yeah. Let's get up there and see if we can talk him down before this gets any messier than it already is," Daire says to Illyana, and he remains on the disk for her to pop them up there, because it seems the most efficient way to do it. "I'm with you," he says to her. There's a glance around to try to track the others, catching sight of the fight going on with Kwabena and noticing Kaleb's movements, he just tries to keep track of where everyone is for a moment.
More bullets! It's a few too years early for the Jim Kirk reference, but in the span of a few seconds, Kwabena's clothing begins to resemble cottage cheese with more accuracy than actual clothing. There are so many rounds piercing him that it actually slows his movements. With each strike, a little cone of swirling black smoke follows the shell before being sucked back into the African's body.
His cackling falters when some of those shells pass through lung and throat, the little chemical transformations making him sound as if he's choking.
When they get too close, he does allow himself a little shake of brutality. The spraying of his stolen rifle is lifted just a little, to allow for the possibility of some foot and leg shots. Wounds that wouldn't kill. Remember, if anyone in the Congo has access to medical treatment, it's these chuckleheads. With war comes conquest, and with conquest, access to medicine.
The shooting does, eventually, die down. For one thing, Kwabena's gun runs empty with a series of fast clicks, and soon after, the goons are bum rushing him. "Hai'na maaynu," he grunts, and swings the rifle around behind his head for momentum's sake, before flinging it toward one of them.
"Ay ay ay ay!" he shouts, and throws his hands up into the air, straight up. The universal sign for surrender. "D'nayu! Kujitoa! Surrendah!" Multiple languages, eyes wide, forced terror, as if he'd just gotten in way over his head.
…. as if.
|ROLL| Jean Grey +rolls 1d20 for: 8
|ROLL| Daire +rolls 1d20 for: 4
This is possibly the reason as to why Jean stays home and refuses to go on missions. The blood thirsty Queen within was having the time of her life, and yet, due to the constant emotional connection she feels for this rag-tag group of the X-Men (and one removed), there was a bit of a roll of one green eye and one red. They have the boy. This is what they came here for, right?
But.. where in the hell did she..
How in the hell did she get inside of the wall and -that- fast?
Her leather clad hand lifts towards the bum rushing crowd, her fingers curled into a fist as she let out a whip of a whistle and a shake of her head. Along with a.. shake of a naughty finger?
"One.. by.. one.. you.. all.. go.. down.." A finger extends, ticking off person by person.. as their legs collapse beneath them and they crumple to the ground as if the wind had been knocked out. And yet, for the keenest of ears, they'd hear the soft sounds of snoozing. A sleep of an endless sleep.. save for one. One that was still running.
"Except for you, this is going to be funnnnnnyyyy!" With a clap of her hands with child-like glee, that was the extent of her help this night. Off to the river she skips, Jean wanted fish. Might as well do what the host says, right?
Hakuna matata, ay ay, what a wonderful phrase!
It means hard punches
and a roundhouse at your squishy head,
It's a solution-free philosophy!
Hakuna matata!
Kwabena's guard may be the last one standing, a kid of 17 who does not stop despite the whisper in the back of his skull. No telling how he proves so slippery to Jean. But when the rifle is suddenly out of the air and Kwabena is surrendering, he screams in a torrent of enraged words that amount to broken Swahili. "«You boot eater! You broke our radio and you waste our guns! Ho! Who is you! You Frenchie?»"
The mutant guerrilla soldier isn't talking. That might be more disturbing than anything.
The boy weaving shadows is doing it even faster, pulling out threads that cocoon his lower half within a circus tent suspension. If only it were that simple. The shadow isn't exactly inanimate, no. It moves in response to proximity, and several wild tendrils come lashing up in cobra coils to front Kaleb and Illyana. That's quite close enough, apparently. Ooo, look how they sway!
And oh, the shame!
He was ashamed.
Thought of changin' the game,
Oh what's in some blame?
Kaleb found no point in a-being shot or b- being shot. It was a thought he put much effort into. That said he called up, bouncing his voice off a few surfaces and amplifying it as he needed to so that his presence on the roof withthe kid and Diare and Illyana was… disembodied French?! «Hey kid, These weird people onteh roof are actually here to help. You. Go with them. You will eb brought to safety» He was going to keep trying to talk in teh kid's ear from far away but holy SHIT there was a tentacle out of nowhere in front of him and he was backing the hell off of that. "Wooooah woah woah woah! WHo does this belong to? This is not okay! I'm pretty certain this ain't sanitary either! can we GO yet??"
Illyana, unfortunately, does not speak French, or she'd confirm whatever was said to the kid. She recognizes Kaleb's voice, at any rate, as she appears on the roof, stepping from a bright white disk and holding up her hands toward the boy, trying to pacify him. She has forced her horns to retract — she's pretty sure the demon aspect wouldn't look good. The Congolese are mostly Christian, she's fairly sure.
She tries English and Russian, tries to use the few words she knows in French to get the kid to understand she's trying to help. THEY are trying to help. The message is simple: come with us and we will take you somewhere safe. Whether or not it comes across, she doesn't know — and she certainly turns to Daire for backup, hoping he speaks something she doesn't.
Daire, unfortunately, only speaks English, but he attempts to very gently indicate through a series of charades and body language combined with Illyana's words and some gentle ones of his own that they want to help get the kid out of the place. Unfortunately, this takes some time, and he's never had to try and encourage someone to flee quite such a chaotic scene who didn't speak English. His own horns are kept beneath the cap on his head, and he's fairly careful to keep the fangs fom showing too much. There's nothing he can do about the unnatural color of his eyes, but at least he seems mostly normal otherwise.
"Kujitoa!" Kwabena repeats, but the next word is cut off when the soldiers start dropping like flies. He maintains the battle-crazed expression upon his face, but there's a tell that it might be faked when his eyes dart around, searching for one of those people he came with. There's a glimpse of Jean skipping away, and some strange color coming from the roof. Must be Illyana.
With a smirk, he turns to look back at the 17 year old guerilla. Eyebrows rise. Hands come together, and with a grunt, he brings both fists down upon the poor kid's temple, aiming to deliver stars for his birthday.
Boy, it suddenly got quiet out here.
|ROLL| Rogue +rolls 1d20 for: 1
The kid up there coils a tighter spiral of those wavering black threads of pure shadow. What they lack for mouths or fangs, they have volition to keep things back. Russian doesn't get anywhere and English is a bit broken. Though he does know it and French does the rest. The Congo's masters were Belgian not that long ago. The curriculum in most schools still stumbles along in French. It's not as though they were receiving Frisian or Walloon as their particular education.
The Congolese youth bares his teeth slightly, more for the strain. Yeah, he's totally showing off his teeth at Daire, eyes bottomless pits to the Hadean zone of the ocean. The teetering darkness crests in a wave and dumps him down, standing, in front of the trio of mutants. The fourth one out there dancing on fire…
"She is mad. I see it, the mad spark there. Do not let her eat them." His French is better than his English, so he defaults to it. Mostly. Tentacles wriggle around in the vaporous shadow, acting as a barrier. Against Jean Grey, sweetness and charm, not Mr. Punchyfists Kwabena.
Kaleb stayed put and assured, sending French by circuitous route to the youth «You will be okay. My name's Kaleb. We're a lil different too. We're going to get you out of here to make sure you are safe. For you to choose what you want to do. We have to leave now though. It is scary, yes, but please come. Even good things need to be scary when evil things show up. It will be okay." It was very weird for Kaleb to play diplomat, but he just laid it out there for the kid and started to slowly work back towards the plane. He didn't want to pull the voice card but he did throwing at the roof "We need to leave now"
Illyana opens a stepping disk identical to the one they came through. Yes, it passes through Limbo, but Illyana has positioned the output of this disk immediately over the input of a disk that will take them directly to the Blackbird. She just hopes Jean's in shape to fly them home. Otherwise… that's a lot of trips through Limbo.
Daire continues to try to reassure the kid as best he can, but Kaleb seems to be speaking the kid's language, or at least one that the kid is responding to, and so he takes a step back figuratively, though not literally since he is staying on the disk to go with Illyana and the kid back to the plane post-haste. "Yeah, if we can go, let's get going.. then we need to figure out what is going on with Jean.. because.. I don't even know." He glances in the direction where Jean skipped off skeptically.
The teen may not be great at English, but he can get by. The shadows swirl and weave back to him, clinging together and hovering around him rather easily. He isn't aggressive with that display but the braided cord weaves around him in a living darkness. Ooh, look, a shiny disk that leads to a plane bigger than most buildings he's ever seen. Yay!
"Pahty is ovah," Kwabena quips. He shakes his head at the young soldier, before he's once again bolting for the airplane. When he finally comes upon the Blackbird, most of his clothing is falling off of him in tatters. However, for all of the bullet holes and tears in his clothing, he is otherwise unmarred. The others are already there when he comes trudging up the ramp, chest heaving. "See?" he tells them. "Diversion." He's the last to lay eyes upon the teenager they all came here to collect. "T'nura," he tells the young man, then bows his head in a manner of respect.
The blackbird was there. Still functional, not damaged by the fires of the Phoenix or her whimsy ranting or raving. Save for a few papers that fly once everyone teleports in. And yet, there was Jean in the pilots seat, strapped in and ready to go, already getting to flicking the buttons here and there, powering them up until she stops.. hesitates, then wrinkles her nose. "Did someone go fishing during the middle of the miss—.." Oh. Shut up Jean! Don't mention it and the others won't either!
It was a far cry of her just those few minutes ago, calm, cool and collected as she grabs the 'wheel' to pull back and lift the team out of the ground. Mission success? The fact that everyone was alive and on the ship was.. well. A blessing. Headset on, head tilted to nudge an ear right, and with a clearing of her throat she calls out..
"Alright folks, buckle up and get some rest. We got a five hour flight ahead of us. Let's consider this one a win, boys and girls.." Inward cringe.. inward cringe.. inward cringe..
"And uh.. does someone know how to debone a fish?"
Daire goes home.