Jim's avatar followed Raina as she raced through his illusory forest invisible to all of the constructs that he had set to patrolling. While his student's – and how weird was that thought – invisibility was a pretty straightforward illusion – Jim had never even heard of someone who actually let light go through his body – it had taken the two of them some time to figure out what Raina was doing to make her psi usage undetectable. Eventually, they had figured out that it was a separate Kine/Psy emission, using some form of combination wave to negate all emissions from the invisibility illusion.

Once Raina had realized that point, she had immediately begun to experiment with making other abilities and programs undetectable. Case in point, she had just placed several Kine 'bombs' at some key locations on the patrol routes, as well as on some carefully selected trees, boulders, and a bunch on a cliff face that she had found. Jim suspected that she was planning on destroying the cliff simply because she could, and not for any tactical reason.

The 'bombs' weren't much, just a condensed ball of Kine power that Raina could make explode at will. Which she did immediately after getting into a good position to make a dash for her target, a massive white flag that waved in a wind that didn't seem to affect the rest of the simulation. Jim grinned at the chaos that Raina created with her bombs. Only a few of the explosions actually injured anyone directly, but the exploding trees and rocks made for impressive shrapnel bombs. Raina flickered out of her invisibility, switching to full Enhance, making for the flag. Jim frowned, she had tried a similar tactic in one of her previous runs and had gotten cut in half for her troubles. Raina hadn't made the same mistake twice yet, Jim was interested in what she had come up with for this opponent. Raina's body erupted with Kine power that condensed into an aura as she ran. Jim nodded, Raina was using the fighting style that they had worked out for the op.

The aura was a general-purpose technique that offered protection and some physical reinforcement. It was a decent fighting style, and common enough that it wouldn't attract much attention. The problem with Raina using that style to get past the ambush that Jim had placed near the flag, was that despite having had over a year's worth of training, subjective time, she simply wasn't skilled enough to take on the ambush in a straight fight, let alone finish her off before the patrol units got their footing back and caught up to Raina. Well, let's see what she has planned.

Raina charged at the flag, her aura flickering around her, picking up traces of the ambush that Jim had set for her. The first time she had tried this mission, she tried to simply sneak up to the flag. While it had taken her some time to figure out how to get past the patrols – being invisible did not mean that you didn't leave any trace behind you – it wasn't really that difficult. A few lessons on how to hide your tracks in the forest, some real-life practice, and she was pretty much able to walk around the map all day if she wanted to without getting detected.

Then she had gotten killed while reaching for the flag. Jim had dealt with her accusations of unfair play by pointing out that she still couldn't fly, and she had obviously bent the grass when she stepped on it, alerting the psionist who had been waiting with powers deactivated to avoid detection. Her next tactic was to first locate the enemy and take her out before grabbing the flag. She had lasted about ten seconds before a patrol unit had arrived and killed her from behind.

After complaining to Jim about unfair tests and failing to convince him to use models of actual people for the patrols, not faceless goons in suits, she demanded a fair fight with the model that Jim had used for the ambush. Jim told her not to count on fair fights, adding some images of what he somehow managed to label – how do you label a telepathic image – of ' Idiots who Aimed for A Fair Fight' and set her against the woman in a colosseum match, not unlike how Raina figured Leila would be fighting in soon enough. The result had been gory, turned out that when the model had been waiting to ambush, she hadn't been using any psi, a feat that told Raina quite a lot about how fast Jim wanted her to be able to activate her Enhance if it ever became necessary. When her powers weren't at a low from having just been activated, Raina couldn't even last the ten seconds that she had managed in the forest map.

Raina located her opponent hiding behind a bush, and flew at her, creating points on her palms where her aura gathered to increase the power of her strikes. The model, a girl probably not much older than Jim was, went forward to meet her, drawing a katana that immediately began to glow as her Kine psi Reinforced the blade. Raina boosted her reflexes in anticipation of the attacks that she knew would be coming. She wasn't disappointed. The sword came rushing at her in a one-handed slash, glowing gold. Get inside her range. Raina went low, turning, striking at the girls back with her left palm. The girl turned, matched Raina with a punch of her own, fist glowing with the same light that had shone on her katana. Release. Raina forced all the power gathered in her palm out in a single burst.

The collision sent the two stumbling back, Raina forcing herself to ignore the pain shooting up her left arm. She consulted her mental clock.

1.7s from detonation.

She had bought herself some time with her bombs earlier, but that shouldn't delay the patrol models for more than another five seconds at most. She had fifteen seconds total, or howsoever long it took for the girl to raise her powers enough to kill her. Move. She attacked, moving fast, building up energy in her palms for more Release strikes, Hardening the aura on the back of her hands to deflect the sword.

5s.

She wasn't going to be able to defeat the model in time.

Plan B. Time to see if I can pull this one off.

Raina went in close, trying to force her way past the sword. She blocked the glowing weapon with both hands, resisting, trying to push it to the side, and it seemed for a moment that she had succeeded. Then the katana exploded. Raina flew back, rolled to her feet and dove to the right, avoiding the follow-up attack. The woman advanced, Raina frantically backpedaling.

Now.

She shifted her balance and lunged, closing the distance, allowing the sword to finally hit her, Reinforcing to keep herself from being getting injured too badly. Raina screamed as the blade pierced her shoulder, forcing the white-hot pain away, another burst of pain from the sword. Trying to tear me apart from the inside. Dampen. Her aura condensed, shot down into her shoulder and swirled around the blade, fighting the sword's power.

That won't work for long.

Good thing she didn't need it to. Raina grabbed the girl's sword arm with her functional hand. Release. The impact blew the arm off at the forearm. Screaming, the girl's power broke, giving Raina the chance to stop focusing on her aura and prepare her final attack. Don't stop 'till it's over. Jim's voice echoed, and it takes a lot to make any Enhancer believe it's over.

Release.

The cliff face, hundreds of feet away exploded. Reaction Enhance. Raina felt almost detached from her body as she sensed the rotating points of power that she had planted what felt minutes and years ago. Release/Partial. Angles noted. Release/Partial. The screams cut off abruptly, the girl's remaining hand starting to glow.

8.3s

Release.

The screams began again, from the patrol units this time, as the boulders rained down like meteors. The girl's eyes blazed as the glowing palm approached Raina, unstoppable.

Release.

This rock was the size of a melon, only a drop slower than a bullet – and on the side of the girl that Raina had already injured. She didn't have a chance. With her Enhanced reaction speed, it felt like an eternity as Raina watched the girl tumble aside, red drops vivid against the flags white and the forest's green. The world returned to its normal speed and the body hit the ground, rolling. Raina walked forward, her shoulder burning white, and placed her hand on the flagpole. The world around her faded, and Raina O'Hara fell out of the mental plane.