Logs:For the weapons of our warfare are not merely human, but they have divine power to destroy strongholds.

For the weapons of our warfare are not merely human, but they have divine power to destroy strongholds.
Dramatis Personae Jax, Kitty, Leo, Sarabeth Holland, Steve
In Absentia Erik, Fury, Shane	2023-06-16 "I thought the sword was for morale."
Location <NYC> Rooftop - SHIELD HQ - Times Square
There's an unexpected oasis at the top of this gleaming high-rise, the whole of it carpeted in thick, soft, layered ground cover of sedums, grass, and moss. A small, carefully manicured grove serves as the centerpiece, with benches, tables and chairs scattered around in the shade. Beside it a professionally landscaped garden boasts a pond and quite a few planters that either used to hold plants or still hold dying ones. The greenhouse is somewhat sparsely and eclectically populated with tropical plants, flanked by garden beds even more sparsely planted. An open lawn on the side overlooking Times Square makes a great spot for a picnic. The otherwise unsightly structure housing the roof access, a single stall bathroom, and tool shed has been covered on three sides with turf and shaped into a little promontory offering a breathtaking view of the city. The rooftop has transformed itself today into what looks like a Renaissance Faire tourney ring, wildly and, likely, very intentionally anachronistic in its attempts at old-timey flair. There's a little pavilion erected over the picnic area that is currently serving as Spectator Seating, a pair of banners displaying shields where they flutter from it -- one vivid yellow, a black paintbrush positioned like a horizontal bar across the top third and a blazing sun shining below; the other is blue, a silver X drawn across with stars dotting the bars of the X. In between, a scoreboard -- in bright rainbow LED lights -- currently displaying the purported score: KITTY: 7 JAX: 0 The 7 is flashing, shifting: KITTY ∞. Nearby in the ring, Jax does not seem particularly dressed for swordfighting -- black short-alls with rainbow trim, a tight vivid yellow tank under a looser rainbow mesh crop top, slightly shimmery purple Doc Martens laced up in silver. He does have a shield strapped over his right arm, and though it almost certainly is not real it manages to be Solid Enough when it takes blows. In his left hand, gleaming bright, is Sunbeam, wicked and sharp for all the danger this poses to his opponent. It has, probably, been posing even less danger than usual given that Jax has consistently failed to properly attack. "-- OK I know," he's currently lamenting, only a little sheepish as yet again his illusory-shield loses its very solidly real coating of iridescent forcefield, "I'm just real used to the shields being what matters." Leo has been watching this fight-instruction with rapt attention since his sudden appearance on the roof (in a telltale crackle-pop of ozone smell that did not linger) not long before. He is perched -- in the stands? On the edge of a picnic table bench, actually, in a plaid button-down in a handful of cheery pastels, medium wash cigarette cut blue jeans and camel suede loafers, leaning forward with elbows propped on his knees and his fingers laced loosely together. "If you just swing in the direction of your opponent and then -- laser them. Illusion the blood. Who will know." Sarabeth Holland has been bustling in and out of SHIELD for a couple days, now -- mostly out, sorry Jackson but there's a whole city full of Stray Prometheans she's also had to bustle at. She was here at the beginning of this lesson but is only now returning with a tray -- large pitcher of fresh lavender lemonade, a plate of fried okra with a small ramekin of spicy remoulade, glasses, small plates. She's taken this opportunity to leave her sturdy farm jeans ensembles behind, bright today in a square-neck smocked blue sundress with vibrant floral pattern. "Boy's got a good point, do you really want to go stabbing people, Jackson, that's a far bridge even considering --" She isn't bothering to ask but is pouring some of the lemonade for Leo, serving up some of the okra onto a plate and nudging it towards him too. "-- that sword's got a good point, too," comes with the disapproving fret turned up just a notch, "where did you even get a weapon like that, you ain't even need it. I liked the shields just fine. Keep everyone safe." Did Kitty get the RenFaire memo? She's dressed for a different genre of swordfight entirely, it seems. Kitty was probably wearing something else when she ~~rolled~~ mutanted up into SHIELD headquarters today, but that outfit has disappeared into her huge blue duffel bag on the outside of the ring in favor of a black uwagi jacket and matching hakama pants, barefoot, curls tied in a loose low ponytail. Probably someone at security had something to say about the wooden katana-like sword she is currently wielding (or one of the many others in the abandoned bag, along with a currently irrelevant set of armor) but it made it up here by some combination of will- or mutant-power. She's just withdrawing from her last attack when Sarabeth returns -- her eyes light up when she waves (with her sword-holding sword hand, so perhaps a bit more aggressive than intended) at the older woman. "I'll know," Kitty calls to Leo, mock offended, "and that fully defeats the point of having a real sword. You might as well just illusion it in if you're going to do lasers anyway." The wooden sword in her hand spins lazily, looking far less dangerous than some minutes prior when it hit Jax's shield over and over and over again. "I feel like you might have better luck with, like, aiming? Swinging? If you used two hands instead of just one. You got so much room on the hilt there --" Kitty taps on the empty space with the blunt tip of her bokken, "-- and that would give you more control over the blade." Her brows scrunch together. "...Any control, really." "Ain't kept everyone safe though, has it?" Jax is, experimentally, illusing a sword-wound in his own abdomen; it warps through several incarnations of mild-to-terrible before it settles into a distressingly realistic amount of unpleasantness. "I thought the sword was for morale. But it'd probably be better morale if I knowed how to use it right." With that concession his shield vanishes, and he switches his grip (a little reluctantly) to a two-handed one. "Magneto made it for me," he adds, oddly offhand about this. "An' Lord let me tell you how Fury had himself a conniption when it got delivered. By Shane!" This addition is quick. "I ain't been having no house-calls from the Master of Magnetism." Leo flushes as Jax's mom delivers him food, dipping his head deep in a nod of thanks. He takes the plate but doesn't eat any, turning the fork over and over in restless fidget that only grows at the bloody illusion Jax sprouts. "Delivered?" His eyes widen. "Did -- Magneto come --" This question is truncated even as Jax answers it. Now his fidgeting is just a little self-conscious. "-- do they. Make a lot of trouble for you. When your visitors are -- trouble... some." "Whose morale gon be raised by you running someone through?" Sarabeth is pouring further glasses, serving up further snacks -- she sets servings aside for Kitty and Jax before taking a seat on the bench herself. Her eyes widen when Leo's does, and she's sitting further upright in her seat. "Magneto? Lord, Jackson, and here I been telling everyone all those things 'bout you and those -- that Brotherhood of Evil Mutants stuff weren't true." If the sword had eyes, the reproachful look she is giving it would quail it, though the edge is taken off somewhat by her very next statement being: "...you didn't ever tell me you and he were friends like that I might have sent him -- what do you send someone when they get broke out of jail?" Her brows pinch together in a brief consideration of this. She is distracted in short order by patting Leo reassuringly on the arm. "Oh I guarantee you are not the most troublesome of visitors he's had," she says cheerfully, "and they sure can't be objecting to Kitty, can they? You two go so far back and make such a --" She breaks off, perhaps, now, considering the very large bag of swords Kitty has with her. "... well, you've always been a real polite guest," she amends. Steve makes his leisurely way around the side of the roof access hillock in a blue and white striped seersucker shirt, well-fitted blue jeans, and black lace-up boots. Over one muscular shoulder he carries his iconic shield, painted up as usual this month in pink, purple, and blue; over the other, a Chimaera Art Space tote. He breaks into a smile at the sight of Jax and Kitty in the ring, glancing from Sunbeam to the bokken and back, eyebrows raising. "Don't tell me you're trying to go easy on him. Oh! How'd it go with your --" And right about now he clears the earthworks far enough to see the spectator stand, his smile going wider, surprised. "-- Leo! They haven't given you any trouble, have they?" He's ducked under the illusory fence into the tourney ring to curl an arm around Jax -- from the right side, not wary of the sword but certainly aware of it. "Hey," this is softer, fonder, as he presses a kiss to Jax's feverishly warm cheek. "Was passing through Union Square and they had fresh berries for days, so I --" The flush that rises to his cheek is very faint, and his sidelong glance at Jax very brief, but his smile doesn't really falter, though it smooths out to something a lot more polite an a little more sheepish. "Mrs. Holland?" Kitty's eyes widen when Jax says Magneto, her gaze tracking to the blade -- the hilt, the dragonfly on the pommel -- to study it a touch more critically even as she wanders over to take a lemonade from Mrs. Holland. "Well," she says, not quite as off-hand as her friend was for his reveal, her tone a careful sort of casual, "you must have impressed him -- he didn't send me a sword after we met." Her return to the ring is stalled by a glance at Sarabeth, just as Steve comments on her relationship, as he kisses Jax. "I am going easy on him, and yet! Don't look at that wound, it's all him." She raises her glass towards the scoreboard with a grin, points her sword towards Jax's illusion injury. "You ever used a sword before, Steve? Maybe a demo would help Jax figure out how to actually swing his Magneto-blade. I'd ask my boyfriend," she says with a sweep of her eyes over to Sarabeth and then up to Leo, the faint flush over her cheeks not stopping her from blowing him a kiss, "but he just got some of Miss Sarabeth's okra and that stuff is delicious." "I think that's real heavy dependent on who I run through. -- An' I don't know him like that. I'on even know if I impressed him none on meeting, just, he heard 'bout Spence and -- oh!" Jax is lowering the sword as Steve arrives, his expression brightening. To the touch he's considerably more than feverishly warm; though his fierce ambient heat is less noticeable in the hot June sun he's actively uncomfortable to touch. Perhaps self-conscious of this or perhaps of his mother watching nearby, in answer to the kiss he just bumps his forehead light against Steve's shoulder and rocks a half-step back. The bloody wound vanishes. "Sorry, I woulda told you my ma was in town only it was a bit sudden -- I think the headmaster out down the school been feeling guilty he ain't visited so 'stead of, you know, visiting, he flew my folks up. Ma, Steve Rogers -- Steve, s'my ma, Sarabeth Holland." After this he's blushing deep -- the dragonfly pommel on Sunbeam shifts, briefly replaced by a miniature stylized version of Steve's shield. "You asking this guy? He'd try to make a shield out of nearbout anything he's gonna put me to shame if he takes to swording better'n me." Not that he sounds overly abashed. "I think maybe that depends --" Leo starts, but stops when Jax voices the same sentiment. He's quiet but emphatic on his correction: "It is just the Brotherhood of Mutants, no matter what MSNBC is saying." The blushing is evidently contagious, because it's spread to him at Kitty's blown kiss. "I have never picked up a sword. Perhaps I should start carrying one, just to see how the police react." He is not reaching for any swords, though. Just picking up a piece of the fried okra to offer it (with his fingers) to Kitty before eating a second (with his fork.) "It is very good, ma'am," he confirms. "Are you -- oh no. Is this the first Meeting The Parents?" Sarabeth is joining in the flushing, when Kitty blows Leo that kiss; she busies herself fully unnecessarily with rearranging the plates on the tray and very much is Not Looking at the kiss Steve gives Jackson. "Brotherhood of Mutants," she agrees, slightly distracted, "right, it's just what people -- he did try to bomb..." She's trailing off like perhaps her present company is full aware of What The Brotherhood Has Done, and when she looks up again it's wider-eyed, with a bright determined smile. "Steve. Rogers. -- Do I call you Captain, I don't -- yes," she confirms to Leo, "I've heard so much about Steve but we ain't met till... well, I ain't never met a person Jackson been seeing until now. James is in town too!" she tells Steve -- she may not have Jax's touch of illusion but somehow the aggressively chipper front here is strikingly identical. "I'm sure he'll want to -- oh." For just a second her face falls. She's looking at Kitty, now, rather than her son. "I guess we can't really invite you all out to a nice dinner or nothing." "I've fought with swords, but never properly," Steve tells Kitty earnestly. "Mostly a matter of happening upon one when I needed something to hurl at a Nazi and also needed the shield for actual...shield purposes. You are," he adds to Jax, "a sight better than I am with shields, too." He's evidently picked up the cue(s) fast, though, and keeps a gentlemanly distance from his boyfriend as he approaches Sarabeth. "It truly is an honor to meet you, Ma'am. Please call me Steve." His blush does not recede, but he is pushing gamely through it to offer his hand along with a sincere smile. "Jax has told me so much about you and your husband, but I reckon there's plenty more to learn from folks who raised such an amazing fella." He follows her glance toward Kitty and raises his brows very slightly at her. "Think at this point we could beguile, browbeat, or bamboozle the UN into letting Jax do just about anything he liked short of actually breaking..." He's flushing just a little deeper now. "...out." Kitty's expression falters at the Magneto comments, her grip tightening ever so slightly around (and briefly into) the sword in her hand. She doesn't sit down next to Leo but leans up against him, ducking her head down to bite the okra out of his hand, the gold Magen David pendant swinging free from her gi when she does so. "Oh noooo," she stage-whispers to her boyfriend, "Meeting the Parents. I don't think you need to deploy a stomach ache at this one." Kitty doesn't seem particularly worried about any of this -- at least, not till Sarabeth and then Steve look towards her. The blush is faded, replaced instead with a faint crumpled brow. "... I've been," she offers softly, "bringing the nice dinners in, lately. Won't be quite as nice as going out, but." She leans just a touch harder against Leo, brushes a crumb off her lips before pressing a kiss to the top of his head. "We can have a good sword lesson before and everyone will be too tired to notice. I got," and here her smile returns, earnestly serious, "lots of swords. Someone has got to learn something today, after I schlepped all this over." Is she waiting for an answer? Maybe not -- Kitty ducks down and retrieves three more bokken to lay out on a bench, for the others to at least look at if not wield. "I've never used one of these to dispatch a Nazi... yet." Jax glances to Kitty with a flush, his head bowing as her grip tightens. He ambles over to the spectator ring after the introductory handshake, setting Sunbeam back in her sheath and picking up two of the bokken."C'mon, ma. Kitty can teach us both, I'm sure. Maybe I'll be shamed into taking a proper swing once I'm out here paling beside how fierce my ma's gonna be. Maybe when my pa gets back from scourin' the Tessiers' place for things what need fixing we can all have a nice and hopefully Nazi-free dinner." He's flipping over one of the bokken, offering it hilt-out to his ma. "'course round here you never know, but at least we'll all be prepared." "If y'all break out into a case of Nazis again I'm gonna have some stern words with that Nicholas Fury, let's hope none of y'all have to -- oh!" Sarabeth's eyes go wider as Jax offers her the practice sword. She looks down at her sundress, looks back up at the sword. Only flushes a little bit as she steps off the bench and takes it -- she's turning a quick and lopsided smile to Leo and Steve. "Guess you two handsome gentleman will have to be our cheering squad, then. -- I'm a fair hand with a knife already so hopefully," she says to Kitty brightly, "this will go easier for you then when you tried to teach me how to do video chatting." Has she handled a sword before, it's anyone's guess, but she seems far more assured than Jackson has been as she moves out in front of Jax and settles into a fair approximation of Kitty's fighting stance, gripping her bokken confidently. "Come at us, then."