2/15 Instance: Stark Reality

[Slarti]

Timelined June 1, a few days after Hope and Grace

<Bobby> Bobby was bored, not that this was an unusual state for Bobby. He swung the shopping bag round and round his wrist, watching it spin and calculating how slowly he could swing it before Hope's very expensive shit started to fall out. Oops. Too slow.

<Hope> She shot him a look as she paused in her walk. "Really, Bobby?"

<Bobby> He did manage to catch the bra before it hit the sidewalk, so he gave her a triumphant grin. Then, he realized he was holding her bra. It went back into the bag very quickly. "Argh!"

<Hope> That earned him some laughter as she held her stomach slightly. "Classy there, Popscicle."

<Bobby> "Hey, I'm all class." He reshuffled the pink bag into the mass of other bags he was carrying for her, in his very dignified job of bodyguard and personal valet.

<Hope> She snickered at him and glanced around at their choices for lunch. "Hmmmm I'm hungry... what do you feel like?" She paused in her walk beside a fountain, digging for a coin in her purse.

<Bobby> "Like putting all this shit in the car before I try to fight your mountain of Stark credit card abuse through another door?" He grinned again and propped up a foot on the edge of the fountain, taking a look around. Old and brick and old. Yep, that was Boston. A sign caught his eye. "Osborn Chemical.... huh. I wonder if that's Osborn Osborn."

<Hope> "Osborn?" Hope glanced up with a raised eyebrow. "We should be careful. His crappy technology might leak radiation at us!" She teased, heading to the car.

<Bobby> Bobby sized up the building one more time and shrugged, dislodging a bag that then almost fell into the fountain. "Motherfucker!"

<Hope> "Hey! That's the panties! You'll have to explain to Chris if you lose then," Hope taunted him a little, pausing as she heard something odd.

<Bobby> He gave a fast look around and iced the surface of the fountain to stop the bag from taking a dip, diving after it.

<Hope> Hope had no choice but to stop and watch what he was doing. He was so odd! She laughed again and grinned. "Nice skills!"

<Bobby> "Hey, I saved your sexy, sexy..." he stopped and looked in the bag. "Well, well, are those crotchless?!"

<Hope> Hope just grinned. "Maybe. We can go pick you up a pair for Paige if you want. Yowza!"

<Bobby> That made him cough at the sudden mental image that was way too tempting, then choke slightly and turn bright red.

<Hope> She smirked at him and tossed some red hair over her shoulder. As something caught her eye, she glanced in that direction and blinked. Must have been nothing.

<Bobby> Dammit. Bobby straightened up and tried to shift the bags around into a more comfortable position as he recovered.

<Hope> Shrugging off the thoughts, she snickered at Bobby again. "So we should go back to the store?"

<Bobby> "Can you imagine the shade of red she'd turn if I did that? And then she'd probably hit me!" He laughed and shook his head, turning to head back to the car.

<Hope> "Or ask why there was a hole there," Hope smirked at him.

<Bobby> He cocked his head and considered this. "Yeaaaaah, very possibly," he admitted, bumping into her with his shoulder.

<Hope> Hope laughed and nudged him back as he bumped her. "Quite possibly." A flash of light brightened her vision before slamming into her, sending her to the ground.

<Bobby> "Fucking A!" Packages flew everywhere as Bobby tried to simultaneously cover Hope, look for the danger, and check for other casualties. Shifting to ice in these situations was second nature to Bobby, but the shift just didn't happen. "No... nononono..."

<Hope> Hope tried to push herself up, just in time for her green eyes to lock onto what had attacked them. "Bobby..." The sentinel raised it's arm at them again.

<Bobby> "Fuck, Hope..." He tried go grab her, to scramble behind the limited cover of the fountain. "Can you walk?" This blast shattered the fountain, sending concrete and water spraying high into the air. Bobby tried to cover them both, but felt the bruising impacts against his back and swore.

<Hope> "Mother F...." Hope shielded her head as the concrete sprayed. "Why don't you people let me carry a weapon!?" She wiggled her toes and nodded to the closest building, which had a half wall. "GO!" She grabbed him as she forced her body to make a run for it.

<Bobby> Bobby went all right - as soon as he saw Hope running for the building he charged straight for the sentinel. He'd finally spotted it, this one sans hoverboard, thankfully, on what had to be an observation deck halfway up the Osborn Chemical building. Screaming at the top of his lungs, he made sure it saw him, and then hoped some dodging would let him get to cover too.

<Hope> Alone. Hope was behind the wall alone. She gasped, and peeked out terrified to see Bobby's body. Where was he?!

<Bobby> He wasn't dead yet, but he'd felt better. Hope's remaining packages had taken the brunt of the last blast before he managed to make a flying leap into an alley. Panting hard, he poked his head out just enough to check the sentinel's position and then look for Hope. All around them, people were screaming and the area was rapidly clearing.

<Bobby> Lucky for them, the sentinel was only interested in mutants.

<Hope> Hope grabbed her cell phone from her pocket to try and call for backup. It made a hissing sound as it sputtered and turned off. "Fan-fucking-tastic!" She set it down and ran her fingers through her hair. The realization that Bobby didn't have powers hit her harder than the energy blast had. She didn't have powers either.

<Hope> Her hand shook. This changed everything. Bobby wasn't a meat shield as a human. He was a guard who could heal himself. Now he was just as vulnerable as she was. Her mind raced for a solution as she peeked out again to try and see where he and the sentinel were.

<Bobby> Well, he'd wanted to get the sentinel's attention, and he'd got it. Yay? The thing leaped from the balcony, dropping several storeys to impact the ground with a metallic clank. "Oh... fuck me..." He hadn't caught sight of Hope during his quick check, and he hoped she was a block from here by now, and soon he hoped to be a block the other way.

<Bobby> Not giving the sentinel time to take more than two steps toward him, Bobby bolted down the alley, checking his pocket for his phone.

<Hope> Not seeing Bobby or the sentinel, Hope got to her feet and ran down the closest ally, ducking down the first side street she could find. She didn't even see Bobby as she all but crashed into him.

<Bobby> He hadn't seen either, since for once the angels of heaven smiled upon him and his fucking phone worked! It survived! Yet before he could dial the emergency code, he took a redhead to the chest. "Fuck! Hope!"

<Hope> She managed to steady herself and not fall on her ass again. "Bobby! You're not dead yet!"

<Bobby> "Not yet - let's keep it that way, babe!" He grabbed her arm and kept moving, looking over his shoulder to see if the thing was following.

<Hope> Not needed second prompting, Hope ran with him. The adrenaline rushed through her body, and a grin spread across her face. "Maybe I should rejoin the X-men... if we survive this and all."

<Bobby> Bobby just shook his head, punching in the code with one hand as they ran. He was kind of surprised the thing hadn't caught up to them - so, of course, that's when he heard the whine of one of those gliders. "Ooooooh fuck, hit the deck!"

<Hope> She didn't ask questions. She dove for the wall of the closest building.

<Bobby> Since this was the fucking president's daughter, Bobby didn't dive - he tossed his phone to her and he ran faster than he'd ever run before. It wasn't long before the brick and asphalt behind him started to explode from blasts tracking his every move.

<Hope> "Who is this?...... GET DOWN HERE NOW!" Hope tried to convey just how vital the situation was to Darren on the phone. "And don't make me call my dad MYSELF! I'm being fucking SHOT AT! And I want a gun!" She listened to him long enough to hear their estimated time of arrival. Too long.

<Hope> Her face drained of color. It was too far out. Even local police couldn't make it in time. They'd both be dead before then. Unless... Hope pocketed the phone and took off after the sentinel.

<Bobby> "How the fuck..." Bobby shouted when something struck the back of his neck. "...is this thing blocking our powers?" Talking to himself was comforting, but it took air, and trying to shift to ice or move the water molecules in the air or anything while running took concentration.

<Bobby> The next blast took him off his feet.

<Hope> Unable to let the sentinel finish him off, Hope grabbed a nearby chuck of concrete and threw it at the back of the sentinel's head.

<Bobby> Groaning and stunned, Bobby rolled over, trying to figure out what the fuck Mack truck hit him.

<Hope> The thing turned on Hope, which wasn't part of her plan. Not that she had a plan. She dove behind a dumpster just in time to avoid a blast, but the dumpster pushed her up against the wall.

<Bobby> Oh... there was a wall... well, part of one. He blinked rapidly, realizing that his vision was bad because there was blood in his eyes.

<Hope> "Bobby?" Hope tried pushing herself out from behind the dumpster.

<Bobby> Hearing her voice made him jerk, the instant before another blast deafened him. Oh... God... there was a very good possibility they would die here. Actually die.

<Hope> With one final shove, she was free. She could get to him. She could. But then what? She tried to force her mind to think. What could she do!? She was staring right at it. She could put him behind the dumpster! She pushed off the asphalt and ran for him.

<Bobby> Debris rained down and he thought of Ripley, of Paige... was this what Lorna had felt before the end?

<Hope> Hope got Bobby and pulled him out of the way of the debris and toward her dumpster.

<Bobby> The movement was enough to make him snap back to reality. "H-h-hope? Fucking... no... get out of here!"

<Hope> "Shut up," she told him, almost softly as she shoved him behind the dumpster. She wiped her forehead and passed his phone into his hand. "They won't make it in time," she explained, glancing over her shoulder. "We'll be lucky if one of us goes home."

<Bobby> He closed his eyes, wincing, trying to listen for the thing's glider. "Yeah... the power thing... s'new." Shaking his head to clear it just made him want to hurl, but it worked enough to let him open his eyes and try to pull himself up to see out into the alley. "Wonder if... it could have gotten us by now..."

<Hope> "It's toying with us." She wiped her nose with the back of her hand. "Bobby... just... get out of here. If something happens to you, Rip is going into the system. They'll take her from Guthrie... and she'll wind up like me. Don't let her be me." She took his hand and squeezed it. "And do something else for me... will ya? Will you... tell Chris I love him."

<Bobby> Hope's speech took a moment to process and he shook his head. "Oh no, fuck no, no no no... you're not doing this - we can both make it." He didn't know how but... "It could have killed us by now, and Osborn said they were programmed to be non-lethal and defensive..."

<Hope> "He's a lying scum bag. And maybe, just maybe, my dad will do something." Hope let go of his hand.

<Bobby> "What the fuck is Tony gonna - Hope! Goddammit!" He shifted his phone to his right hand and grabbed for her, just in time to hear the whine of the glider overhead.

<Hope> Hope shoved him back down and took off after it. "Osborn you chicken shit!" She picked up an empty soda an and threw it at the sentinel before running.

<Bobby> He cursed again, looking at his phone. She was right - about Ripley, anyway. Probably about Osborn, too. But he couldn't just let her get herself killed! He went after her, at a slower pace, and stumbling over the debris he just couldn't seem to miss.

<Hope> Sirens! She could hear sirens! They had done it! They had made it. She turned around to tell Bobby, only to find herself face to face with the sentinel. It fired two blasts quickly at her. The first knocked her back into the brick wall. She second knocked her head harder into the wall.

<Hope> She slid down the wall vaguely aware that something hot and sticky was in her hair. She swore she saw her mom approaching them. Smiling, Hope closed her eyes. She had her mom!

<Bobby> Bobby heard the sirens too, the split second before the sentinel descended from the sky directly between them. It hovered there, just for a moment, then it raised a hand toward her, and that moment seemed to expand. There was one shot, then another, then Bobby didn't remember anything but screaming and diving for the fucking thing.

[steyn]

And so Hope died.
And Bobby was taken prisoner... again.

tsk tsk tsk, you'd think these kids would have learned by now. Lol, nice instance you two.