ArchivedLogs:Doing Science!

Doing Science!
Dramatis Personae Peter, Hank
In Absentia	2013-06-12 '
Location <XS> Danger Room - B2
The subbasement corridor looks different from those above it. It looks like a freaking spaceship, is what it looks like. Like you have stepped into The Future and also Space at the same time. It is not often that students visit the deeper levels of Xavier's school. Usually, it is a sign of status, an indication that the students are prepared to face the far more mature aspects of the school. Today, however, two of the students that have been given access to the lowest level of the school are not there fully by choice, if indeed at all. Peter is running out of web-material! Ivan only could produce so much in a day, and had -- other things to do beside SIT AROUND MAKING WEBS FOR PETER. And now that Ivan is leaving, well -- that leaves Peter with only the webbing that he left over. It's a bit, but not a /tremendous/ amount; enough to run experiments on. And possibly, /maybe/ make a suit out of. If they are /very/ careful. The 'finished' product -- or, prototype, really -- ends up just being a square foot of substance; a honey-comb pattern of interwoven kevlar / webbing disks forming a sort of scalish pattern contained beneath a length of dark red fabric. Wrapped, rather firmly, around a dummy; a dummy that's currently standing in front of a large fiber-glass shield (with more shields arranged on either side of them!), as if it were in front of a firing squad. Why? Well, that's probably because of the INDUSTRIAL STRENGTH SLINGSHOT Peter currently has nocked, pointed -- tongue stucking out, eye squinting -- at that patch of red. A glass marble loaded up; safety glasses on his face. The slingshot itself is -- made of cast /iron/, with a /very/ strong band of rubber used to hold the marble. Pulling waaaaaay back. Hank watches through his own safety goggles and Peter readies the shot. He glances down at his tablet, double-checking the Danger Room settings he chose for this test run, and nods to himself. The numbers add up! "Alright Peter, now remember, the glass ammunition is to establish a control set of data. It will probably be stopped, but you must fire it as /hard/ as you can. Really pull!" Hank makes one more swipe on his xTab to start recording and says, "Fire at Will!" They had named the dummy Will, because, well. It's funny. Streeeeeeeeeetch. RELEASE. Poor Will. The marble ZOOMS across the air, CRACKING with a loud ka-THUNK; the immediate result of impact is -- a sort of wobble, a /ripple/ that travels through the material, rolling up toward its far corners. The marble itself bounces off with a delicate 'ping', before clattering loudly on the ground. Instantly, Peter's goggles are off, and -- he is hop, hop, /hopping/ toward the dummy, to peeeeer at the patch of red. "Diditworkdiditwork," Peter asks, all at once. FEEDBACK, DR. MCCOY. Peter /requires/ it. "Excellent Peter! Will is telling me that was nearly half the force of a pistol shot." Hank scrolls through some more relevant data, nodding to himself, 'hmming', and grunting as he goes. "Interesting! And the chest piece appears to have absorbed and dissipated the energy with nearly zero through-put. You'd barely have a bruise." Hank looks up, smiling past the sensor data. "Would you like to try the steel ball, next? I'd like one more test before we try the firearms." "Ohman," Peter says, /poking/ the armor -- poke, poke, poke. "It actually /works/ that's awes--yes." Snap. Straighten. Swiveling to /peer/ at Hank. Peter is clad appropriately, of course; the safety goggles have gone up -- he's wearing a blue collar shirt (buttons!), dress slacks, and -- A LAB COAT. A smaller one. For science-ing. Because, you need a lab coat when you do science, right? He's immediately darting back up besides Hank, reaching for the steel ball bearing that's deposited in a bucket on the table besides them. LOADING IT UP into the cast-iron slingshot. Taking aim. STREEEEEEEEEEEEEEeeeetch... "Ohman if you coated this with a conductive film? Could be /taserproof/ too." Peter's very interested in /taserproofing/ things. Hank looks on with careful evaluation of every piece of data. He is dressed appropriately too, of course. Khaki shorts, barefoot like always, and lab coat. But under his coat is an obnoxiously colored hawaiian shirt. Red, green, yellow - it's got everyColor. He also has on his special safety goggles, which actually fit, strapped to his head, in case he happens to be upside down for some reason. "Yes, Peter, I imagine if we added an appropriate coating, it should be able to absorb fairly well. The webbing is already not very conductive. So it should be able to act as an insulating layer." Hank flips and zips some things on his tablet and nods, "When you're ready..." P-TOooooooo--*CLANG!* The steel ball /slams/ into that armor, right on target; Peter's a dead shot with that thing. Instantly, the armor ripples -- a bit more quivering, maybe! Like jello, except -- more scaley -- as it absorbs the impact as best as it can, the armored ball /drilling/ into it. Maybe actually managing to dent something this time? Maybe not! The ball immediately pings against the floor, rolling off to the left; at once, Peter is /charging/, safety goggles up yet again, inspecting. "Fascinating, yes. Slightly more force, but not quite up to standard sidearm energies. But regardless, I believe we're ready for firearms testing. Please return behind the line." Hank gestures with his pad again, and a cylinder which looks suspiciously like an homage to R2D2 rises from under a plate in the Danger Room's floor. It is not on wheels however, and is really just a Thing Sticking Up. It has a little green light on top, indicating the safety is still on, but Hank gets the thing oriented only once Peter is out of the way. "You brought your ear-protection, of course?" Hank deploys the built-in earplugs from his goggles and carefully inserts them into his sensitive ears. "Uh. Oh. Right. Hm." Peter pauses a moment, thinking. And then -- steps back. /Waaaay/ back. And proceeds to CLAP his hands down on top of his ears, hunkering his head down to minimize the sound. "EARS PROTECTED!" he shouts, to Dr. McCoy. Because, this will /totally/ be sufficient. "Fire away!" Hank opens his mouth to protest Peter's method, and finally adjusts his DR controls to project a sound dampening cone around Peter's position. With another couple of flicks, the green light turns red (safety OFF), and Hank takes a step back from Not-R2D2 as well. One more click, and a loud bang echoes around the empty Danger Room. He holds up a hand to Peter, just in case the boy is over-eager, and completes a few more adjustments on his pad. R2's light turns green again, and lowers halfway into the floor. Then Hank reverse his hand and beckons Peter forward. "Check the physical evidence please, Mr. Parker, while I collate this sensor data..." Hank is already lost in the numbers. "OhGod," Peter responds, to the sound of a gunshot; it isn't /loud/ because, DAMPENING, but -- still. He's /immediately/ charging forward, though -- as soon as Hank's hand has dropped down! -- rushing forward with his goggles now dangling around his throat, like a puppy dog after a ball. THRUSTING his head toward the armor to inspect where the bullet made impact. "Oh/man/ ohman /oh/man..." Seriously, Peter's almost hyperventilating over this. "Dude I mean /DOCTOR/ I don't think it got through--" "The data would seem to agree with you peter. Very exciting indeed!" Hank fiddles with the tablet some more, and finally walks over to where Peter is inspecting things manually. "If I may?" Hank winks when Peter scoots over a little, and then uses the tips of his claws to dig around in the indentation. It was purposely aimed to a slightly different part of the pad, away from the previous slingshots, for maximum data accuracy. After a moment, Hank emerges victorious, the flattened bullet between forefinger and thumb claws. He holds it out and drops it into Peter's palm. "However I should note, the forces here could easily break a man's rib, and cause substantial internal bruising. However, both options are preferable to being shot. Well done Peter. You took a theory and followed it through to completion, with the most favorable result possible. You should be proud of yourself." Hank smiles broadly and claps the boy on the shoulder. Peter watches with /rapt/ fascination as Hank's clawtip digs into the armor, searching -- search, search, SCRAPE -- and when he finally produces that flattened bullet -- Peter just about /squees/. Clasping it. Inspecting it. Then, proceeding to SHOVE his own finger into the indentation, just to. FEEL around. Feel, feel, probe, poke. "It /wooooooooorks/," Peter exclaims, a little slowly, but then -- with more force -- peering up at Hank as that hand descends atop of his shoulder. "It /works/. Ohman oh /man/. This will be -- so /cool/." Hank smiles and laughs with Peter's enthusiasm. "You deserve accolades for this, Peter. Hopefully with some more testing, it might be something we could issue to students in the future, for safety both on and off campus. Lord knows powers go awry sometimes, even here. And with the current political climate-" Hank suddenly remembers he's talking to a student, and not a full-fledged colleague. "Well, you've done a great thing here, Peter. Congratulations. Now we just need to get Ivan's spiders spinning on their own!" he grins, and sends the command to fully stow the gun-bot, and slips the tablet into his lab coat pocket. "Ooh, yeah," Peter comments, almost offhandedly -- blushing, violet. "Man it would be cool to have these for -- students, maybe, yeah. I mean you wouldn't want them to get shot at /anyway/ but, I mean. It could, I dunno, maybe when you guys do dangerous stuff too you could use it for--" At the mention of Ivan, Peter quickly nods, before adding: "He'll be gone for about two months, but... when he gets back, he can -- make more. Experiment." Peter leaves out the fact that Ivan's left him a not-insignificant supply of web-fabric to experiment with. Not enough to build a bunch of armor, but. Maybe enough for /one/. If he's careful.