What Does it Take To Be a Hero? (Open)

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(Sure Yanks. Will do that now.)

A couple of hours went by, allowing Cerise a chance to finish her classes while Talia was coming from the infirmary, mainly concerning the child she carried at the moment. But, since she had arrived there Talia was still deep down worried and stressed, hiding it well from her alternate family so not to worry them. She knew they had other stresses of life and this was one she preferred keeping to herself or among a select few. Truth be told, her body was having a nasty reaction to it all, making her sometimes sick, depressed, or lacking much motivation to get anything done or participate in things. And her suspicions had been confirmed when she went to the infirmary this time, that the stress was also affecting her unborn child, saddened by the prospects she was given for its survival.

But, she was for now doing her best to push this aside as she sat out on the front steps of the mansion, admiring the slowly lowering sun to take her mind off things. Her tail slowly swished back and forth behind her, letting out a soft sigh as she pushed her troubled thoughts aside, not wanting Cerise to pick up on these negative emotions and dampening their time together. Shaking her had, she focused her thoughts outward, barely touching the minds of those close in proximity, sensing for her sister to see if she was approaching.

[Cerise Wagner]

Cerise wasn't exactly a fan of math class but she did her best. She took notes and did as much as she could to try and learn. Maybe later she would be able to ask dad or her mother about some questions that she didn't know of or couldn't find the answers too. Finally they were able to be let free, a bit earlier than she would've liked. But she knew that it would be time to see Talia again. "How about I try teleporting again?" She asked herself as she began to concentrate. There was a familiar Bampf noise and a smell of brimstone to add to it. She disappeared in a flash again.

This time she found herself out side in the backyard where a lot of people were playing or waiting for their next class to work. "I can't believe it! I got the teleporting to work again." She said sounding a bit confident with herself. She looked around trying to find her sister wondering where she went. "Talia? Where are you?" She asked having her backpack on her shoulders that had her homework in it. She'd do it before it was time to go to bed, or before the next time math class came. "Is everything aright?" She asked managing to find Cerise as she was watching the older Neyaphem from her perched spot. "If not we, don't have to spend the evening together." She added.

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Sensing her sister's arrival, Talia stood from where she had been sitting and followed the trace thoughts of the younger Wagner. She smiled as she met her sister, but quickly tried to keep up her usual front, "No its fine Cerise, I could use a bit of a distraction." She said with a soft smile, showing she was genuinely excited to be joining her sister, knowing there was a lot of times she couldn't bring herself to spend time with their family. This was one of her few chances to bond with her family that lied in this dimension, and she knew at any time the Exiles might actually come back for her, so she was going to try to use what moments she could to spend with them.

"What did you want to do? Training perhaps?" Talia inquired, already decked out in her own attire, just in case it was something Cerise was interested in doing as well.

[Cerise Wagner]

"Ok as long as you're sure about it." Cerise said still showing a bit of worry for her older half sister. She did care a lot about her family even if they didn't admit it. She sat in a crouched position as her pointed tail flicked a few times. She listened to Talia as she asked what they wanted to do and nodded as she heard Talia mention training. "Sure I'd like to do some training. What do you have in mind?" She asked as she was familiar with some of the X-Mansion training simulations in the War Room.

"Well." She said a bit hesitant on it, she had realized that she hadn't told Talia about this power, in fact she wasn't sure where it came from. "Besides teleportation, I do have another power that is called darkness manipulation. I've only used it a handful of times in the war room and I'm kinda...well not sure about that power." She admitted as she found herself feeling a bit nervous of the powers. Sure it was darkness manipulation, and it worked best at night while the moon was out. With the sun overhead, it appeared that her powers might not work as well as she wanted. Perhaps she associated the power in being a bit bad, but who could say that powers were good and bad?

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Talia could see her worry, but she kept her smile, being as reassuring as she could be when it came to her depression as of late. It was something she felt Cerise was not ready to hear or that it was best that the fewer people who were aware of what was wrong the better. If something did happen it would make things a lot easier and less difficult to explain to others. Such decisions were difficult but it was her own little way of protecting her family from entirely realizing the full extent of her problems right now. "Training it is then." Talia said brightly, but her smile turned to a frown at hearing her sister's hesitation.

"Hard to say if a power is bad Cerise. You may control darkness but that does not make you a bad person. A lot of people who control that sort of energy are good people." She assured her, resting a hand on Cerise's shoulder. "But, I suppose it does fall in my reluctance to use my body possession ability I have. I just think yours might be a little easier to control and understand, or at the very least demonstrate." Talia pointed out, wondering if someone working with the young girl might help her relax for her power. If Talia could help someone feel comfortable with their power compared to herself then that was a win in her book.

[Cerise Wagner]

Cerise nodded as she listened to Talia. She felt bad for her sister, she tried to be there when she could for her, and even TJ was able to be around her too when he could. But it was probably not the same for Talia since it wasn't her real family or even her real time for that matter. She sat there in a crouched position out of habit as she put her backpack down by a couple of rocks, figuring it was probably safer there. "I understand." Cerise said with a soft nod as she saw that Talia put a hand on her shoulder.

"Well I can give you an example of it. I'm still not very good at it but I'd say I've improved with the teleportation powers more." Cerise admitted. Putting out her hands with only three fingers on each end, it sure was a bid odd to look at first but it was all she had. Once she focused hard, some dark colors started to appear from her hands, her midnight powers were weak in the afternoon and day time so there wasn't much she could do about that, but after sending a blast of the midnight powers forward it created a small hole in the grass nearby them as she closed her eyes hearing a soft bang noise, it would've been a lot louder and it made her flinch too. "I hope they aren't going to get me for destroying the lawn a bit." She said feeling a bit guilty for it as her powers reverted back and the dark area around her hands disappeared.

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Talia allowed her sister to demonstrate before she said anything, watching curiously as she saw the darkness form around her hands. It certainly was energy alright, making Talia think that maybe she could somewhat help her sister since Talia herself could use a type of energy to some extent for some different purposes. Still, to be sure, the older Neyaphem watched, but unlike Cerise did not flinch from the sound. Quite frankly, she was use to such sounds when expecting it, so it did not faze her nearly as much-specially not what she had gone through these days.

"I doubt they'll be mad Cerise. You have a bunch of mutant teenagers with unpredictable powers, this lawn probably gets messed up every day." 'Or blown up every other day.' She thought the last part to herself, recalling often how the mansion in her time had been attacked. Or even Avengers Tower as well. Those had been some rough times but Talia's last memory of it being attacked had forced her to rally the students to help the X-Men, the one time her and Nightcrawler had been able to reconcile their strained relationship. But there was still strain there. "But that was a pretty good start actually. Some people have a hard time even manifesting the energy when they're still novices, trust me I've been there." Talia assured her, smiling a little.

Turning for a moment, Talia saw one of the mansion trees, which seemed to be slowly dying, as a suitable target. She concentrated towards her hands as a bluish-purple colored energy formed and began to billow from her hands like clouds, giving off the familiar brimstone smell when Cerise teleported. She concentrated a fair bit of energy before firing two basketball sized hex-bolts, blowing the middle of the tree to splinters. But as the tree fell she heard a startled "HEY!" before someone came rolling out of the way, watching as someone who resembled Wolverine-just with blonde hair-stood, shooting her an angered glare before storming off somewhere else. "Sorry!" She called, but looked back at Cerise, "That's what I can do with my "hex-bolts", though its just volatile energy really."

[Cerise Wagner]

"I guess you're right they'd be mad at us for dismanteling robots and such in the training room about a hundred times a day." Cerise added glad to see that they weren't going to be mad at her for that. Heck other mutants had their own powers and would've done a lot worse than what she did besides making a small hole in the ground. Cerise was surprised that Talia was actually impressed with her midnight powers, perhaps they were better off trying this in the middle of the night instead of the day. "You really think that was good?" Cerise asked having thought she heard Talia say something else. "I think for me it's a lot of concentrating that might be a bit hard in challenging or difficult situations." She added.

Cerise couldn't help but giggle a bit as she saw the guy yell out in surprise from being struck by one of the hex bolts that Talia had made. Sure she felt bad, but the guy who looked like wolverine seemed alright for the most part. "The hex bolts are really cool if you ask me. I noticed it smelled like brimstone, whenever I teleport people say they smell that too." Cerise pointed out. "It looks like a really strong power if you ask me." Cerise pointed out still surprised that Talia was related to the maximoffs and Wanda too..

"I also wondered if my midnight powers are better at night, this time around they seemed so weak I couldn't do so much with it." Cerise remarked wondering if that theory could be put to the test some how and some way. Well it was going to be dark in a couple of hours, they were going to find out sooner or later if they had time to hang around and practice their powers.

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"If you were in danger I think it would have been more than enough to stun someone Cerise, which come to think of it I can teach you power concentration." Talia offered towards her, confident that despite their energy powers being different there was still very much a similar concept regardless. Energy was energy, no matter where it came from there was always some similar principle or basics to be applied, something she had learned from the X-men and for those who could control the energy fluctuations, unlike say Cyclops himself.

But she smiled, "I can tap into the Brimstone dimension which is why they smell like that. I can't change any probabilities or anything, only mentally draw on the energies of our grandfather's dimension and use it for attacking purposes." She explained, knowing the concept was rather similar to the teleportation. She could mentally tap into the dimension's energy, using it to do all sorts of explosive things. But seeming as there was some time before dark would fall it seemed they had plenty of time to spare before Cerise could demonstrate her powers better. This, however, did give Talia a chance to display her rarely used ability.

"By the way, I can use telepathy sis. It is minor, but I can at least read and exchange thoughts with others, like I am right now." Talia spoke towards her younger half-sister through her thoughts, smiling and glad that some of her powers weren't quite that destructive.

[Cerise Wagner]

"That's good to know I can use it to some degree in the day time. But like anything it takes practice, and lots of it." Cerise said with a soft nod back towards Talia as she listened to her speak. There was nothing to be afraid about it, right? Nothing to worry about, at least she hoped so.

"Oh that's why they smell like brimstone, I know my own teleportation ability has left that smell behind too." Cerise said starting to figure it out. It appeared that had been the case for TJ and their father Kurt. Each time they teleported they left a trail of brimstone smell behind them just as Talia explained it here. Cerise knew that darkness wouldn't fall until much later, some kids were still in class and would probably be like that for another few hours before they got out and would head to dinner next.

"Uh?" Cerise was caught off guard a little bit as Talia talked to her through her mind. It was something she wasn't used to. The Professor had done it once or twice through demonstration to her and other students but it seemed the older man mostly kept to himself and only used it for emergencies. But people were different to how they used their powers, right? "Oh I get it, you're using your thoughts to talk to me. I guess I'm not that used to it." She admitted as she felt a bit bad that it surprised her so badly like that. Maybe Cerise just wasn't used to it and was jumpier than some people, that had to be the reason for it.

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"Trust me, I rarely use my telepathy at all. Only times I ever really use it is when we all need to coordinate or I want to keep something between a person and myself. Aside from that, I sometimes forget I even have it." Talia explained. Perhaps that sounded rather sad to forget one of your abilities, one of which she seemed to have inherited from their grandfather, Azazel, who she had heard had that ability himself but neither of her own parents did. But with her mother's powerful abilities alone anything seemed rather possible.

Glancing up at the sky, seeing there was still plenty of time before dark would fall Talia wondered if she could spare the time to run some errands of her own. Her and Cerise had talked about much that day and she knew the younger Wagner was to really display her abilities. With a soft smile, Talia turned her attention back to her half-sister, "Cerise how about this; let me go run some errands of my own in the next hour or two. When I get back, we can do some work on your energy powers and go from there. It'll give you some time to work on your homework stuff and I'll be back before you know it." Talia suggested to her.