Another day of HARD training

So I spent little over an hour trying to fly with Storm using the wind to try and stop me, I got thrown around quite a bit until a particular worrying fall. Storm had stopped everything after seeing me lose control of my flight, slamming head first into the ground, I suddenly felt like I knew what a lawn dart felt like... My head was hurting and there was a little blood as I struggled to get up, using my Red Disc to heal myself. We were barely out of the room when I received a new quest that made my eyes widen.

Quest Available! Create a connection and share your mental defenses with another person! Bonus objective: Connect with as many people as possible before the end of the night. Rewards: 1000 EXP +1000 for each additional connection, possibly other rewards. New unlocks, quests and training become available. There were other quests that rewarded me with items or cash instead of experience, the objectives mostly being to try and make friends, a couple involved getting a kiss or a hug from some of the ladies. Anyways my next stop was clear, so I went to the office and knocked on the door. "Come in Zane!" Jean called out from the other side.

I entered the room and tried to think of how I could explain this... "S-so I got a new quest... Um it involves my Mental Defenses. Apparently I can connect it to other people's minds to defend them from mental attacks as well. At least that's what seems to be the case with my powers." I tried to explain, she smiled a bit at me before asking questions, I tried to answer as best I could. "I see, would this harm the other persons mind?" I shook my head quick. "To my knowledge it shouldn't even feel like it's there honestly, it might strain my mind a bit but it would help right?" I asked as she turned thoughtful for a moment. "Well it might, but don't go out of your way trying things that could be dangerous, even if you intend to help with it there could be problems or strains on your mind that your not aware of yet." I suddenly found myself getting lifted off the ground by a grinning female Canadian woman. "Hey there kid. Didn't you have training with me after Storm? You weren't trying to escape were you~?" Her grin turned a bit wicked as I shook my head real fast. An explanation later and Logan shrugged her shoulders. "Well try it on me then..." Jean practically jumped up from her seat. "That's NOT a good idea Logan! He hasn't even had his powers for a MONTH yet! There's no telling what could happen to or if there's any side effects." Logan turned to her with a sigh. "Look Jean, I get it. But this is faster than waiting and hoping for the best outcome, besides he won't get better with it if he doesn't try to use or control his power."

Jean didn't look happy, but sighed as she wished Logan good luck, the Canadian woman leading me back to the Danger Room for more training. We got there and she told me to... "Well go for it kid, might as well give it a shot right?" I gulped as I tried to very carefully manipulate my defenses at first, that felt like the wrong way to do this... Taking a deep breathe I closed my eyes and tried to focus on stretching my mental defense out to Logan, a minute later I was shaking before letting out a gasp of breath. "O-okay... It's... like it's too far away? It's a weird feeling..." I wasn't expecting Logan to get closer, pulling my hands up to her head. "Try it like this, maybe it'll be easier." I closed my eyes and concentrated, it felt much easier now. I felt like... a bridge slowly connecting me to her? When I had finished I felt like there was a stable connections to her, pulling back a bit we were both pulled out of what was happening when Betsy came into the room. "Hey Zane, Logan. Jean asked me to check up on you two, said something about that mental defense being able to connect and protect others?"

Logan called her over closer, explaining what had happened on her end, me explaining my end. Betsy tried to see what her sense's could pick up. "Huh... it's barely there, like a thin string or strand of hair but it's a pretty strong connection... Alright I'm gonna try going into your mind first Logan, see if those defenses can really be shared with others." With that Betsy went in, I don't know how long she was in Logan's head, but she came back in less than a minute. "HOLY SHIT!" She suddenly jumped back, a blade of energy in her hand as she looked between Logan and me. "Whoa! Betsy what happened? What'd you see?" Logan asked, looking a bit worried. It took her a minute, but Elizabeth calmed down before speaking again. "It worked, those Parademon things that were in his mind? Their in yours now too, they seem to seek and destroy anyone trying to gain access to your mind. Jean's definitely gonna need to hear about this..." I gulped, suddenly feeling a lot more concerned. I calmed down a bit though when Logan told Betsy to go ahead and let Jean know, saying that it was long past time to start training. Logan asked what kind of training I had to do. "Oh well... My clones have gotten stronger, so I got a quest to basically send them at you non stop for an hour!" I explained, Logan letting out a giggle as she shook her head.

"Saying that with such a sweet smile on your face? You seem a bit more confident today..." She trailed off as she prepared herself, when a group of 5 clones appeared all at once? I felt like she was just a bit surprised, there was a smile that spread across her lips when another 3 groups of 5 clones appeared one after the other. All 20 charging at her at once while I sent a text asking if it would be okay for me to share my mental defense with anyone else around the school. Betsy was nice enough to ask about it as I began sending clones in to replace the ones getting destroyed. The first ten minutes passed without any trouble and I could see that my quest was making progress so I couldn't stop now, though Jean approached about that time. "Are you SURE it's safe?" Betsy sighed at the question. "YES Jean, it's safe. Logan's mind isn't being invaded or anything. From what I saw they were just standing there, ready to attack intruders at a moments notice, easily over a hundred of them were there." I was sitting by the door, continuing to send clones as I studied with a book. "Then perhaps we should LET him share such a defense with others. It could serve as an early warning of an attack if nothing else." Emma spoke as she approached from the other end of the hall, Jean glaring at Emma for a moment before sighing. "Fine! Go ahead and give it a shot Emma, since your so eager to try it..."

Emma rolled her eyes and came over to me, looking down at me before speaking up. "Well Zane? If you can share those mental defense's why not make that connection with me?" I gently pressed a finger to her head, it took a minute or so to create the bridge and another few minutes for it to stabilize. When it did she went into her mind to find the defense's I'd shared with her, standing at the ready and prepared to defend Emma's mind. It didn't take much convincing for Betsy to form a connection, her and Emma both had prior experience with being controlled, now they felt safer from such threats. Once Jean had looked into their minds for herself she begrudgingly agreed to accept the connection... Only after Betsy explained to Scott what was going on and Scott had volunteered to go before her. A few minutes later and Jean was allowing me to form a connection to her just after Scott had finished with her bridge being formed.

By the time the hour long training with Logan was over Rogue, Jubilee, Boom Boom, Kurt and Beast had all come by to hear more about the connection. I was starting to feel a little strain but Kurt went first, when she was done I had to take a bit of a break, my head starting to hurt from strain. I stepped into a locker room for a minute, now that the training was over Logan had gone to get cleaned up as well, it took me about 10 minutes for the straining feeling to go away. When I got back out there were more people gathering to form a connection, those that already had formed one explaining how the connection only shared my natural defense with them, they couldn't read my thoughts or emotions nor could I read theirs, there didn't seem to be ANY downside to the connection process. I was able to make a connection with Jubilee, Boom Boom and Rogue before I felt the strain suddenly pull hard. It didn't break or pop, but it did finally start to recede and vanish. While it did I got a new pop up.
Congratulations! You've improved your Mental defenses and can now connect with more people! Mental Defenses can now defend from more powerful forms of manipulation. I was so happy to read that message that I went right to connecting with the others as best I could, the process going faster now. Kurt left to gather up the others that hadn't formed a connection yet, Gambit begrudgingly allowed it, Colossus and Magik agreed to it as well, Beast and Storm setting up connections as well, with me heading for the Professor since Cessily, Laura and the few remaining others were out and about busy with things. The whole process, including setting up the connection with the Professor had taken nearly two hours after Logan's training had finished. My clones sent out to train as much as they could, studying numerous different subjects, I even had a team of 5 working together to learn how to cook! Ended up with a new Cooking skill, which I hadn't been expecting but it apparently made things I or my clones cooked taste better so I wasn't gonna complain.

When Cessily, Laura, Kitty, Bobbi, Magma and Angel returned I was able to set up connections with each of them as well. It was a lot easier than it had been earlier! I went back to my room to relax before dinner and check my stats... My mental Defense power was glowing? What the hell?
Please choose an evolution upgrade for Mental Defense: Unending Defense, Mental Citadel or Omega Fortress.
Holy hell... all three of those sounded really strong! Could it be possible I could get all three with enough training even? Wait, I had a crisis now!