Avenger Assembled
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"Warrior Woman." Dimitri's red eyes appeared in the corridor behind Klara as she was about to step into the kitchen to grab their waitress. There, he thought with satisfaction, can hardly tell how fast I had to fly to get into this place! He looked her up and down, an easy enough task given just how massive the woman was compared to him. "Do not worry about serving staff. Have paid them well already." And so greedy! I had to promise an introduction to Gabriel to half of them. "Your wife will have her meal." He pointed to the nearby banquet room, left temporarily open by yet another exorbitant bribe to the restaurant staff. "Shall we talk?" he asked challengingly, practically daring her to refuse.
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"She's a 'gineer in both places, yeah." He frowned, looking at Jimmy. "How do you not know what your mom and dad do?" Jimmy's answer seemed to thoroughly baffle him. "What do they talk about at home?" He couldn't imagine not knowing about his mother's career, not having grown up in the same rooms as her, in the same space, year after year. "I mean, uh...sorry. I know things are different here." He shrugged a little, and looked away. "Out of doors is nice. I spend a lot of time there. You ever make it out to the state forest?" he asked, looking over at Jimmy. "I hear it's real pretty there, especially in the fall. Supposed to get a hunting license this year." He shrugged.
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"Sorry." Riley reached over and actually put his arm around her shoulders, hugging her firmly. He wasn't as strong as she was - but he was no weakling, despite his short stature. He'd wondered if they'd ever caught who did it - but figured she probably would have told him if they had. Thinking back, murder in his own community was rare - much less robbery. "People are damn animals sometimes. Especially here." He took the picture carefully. "I wish I had a picture," he admitted quietly. "Hey, I ever tell you I spenta whole week in the Fens?" he asked Robin. "Earlier in da summer. When I took off from Peyton's house, I went for the Fens - 'squiet where I'm from, the ground's all caved in 'n even the Ferals don't go there much. 'Course yours is different."
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Aquaria made a rapid, booming noise in the back of her massive throat that sounded like "Mo'o lele lu'elu'e!" to the listening humans. Turning to the other heroes, she gasped, eyes goggling, "We have to help them!" Clapping her big hands to the side of her head, she realized to her horror that she knew absolutely nothing about Surfacer anatomy or how to help these people. "Somebody call 911!" she declared loudly. "You, Phantasmo!" she declared, pointing at him while hopping around agitatedly. "Use your spells to carry them to a hospital! We can't let anyone stay here if the roof caves in!" She leaped from the store, out to Black Knight, and frantically prodded him. "Black Knight! Are you okay!?"
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A Picture of Sophisticated Grace (IC)
Avenger Assembled replied to Avenger Assembled's topic in Port Regal
With her body exposed to the elements, Wraith could make out the magnificent tattoos that ran all across Aquaria's back and upper limbs; figures of warriors and beasts cast in blue ink that reminded her of the cave paintings she'd seen in Terran history books. Sitting on all fours in the middle of the rain, Aquaria suddenly croaked, "I was born in rain." She hopped around till she was facing Indira indirectly, evidently unable to turn her head that far. "Surfacers run and hide when there's a storm - and Atlanteans dive deep into their cities. But my tribe, we would cling to the rocks as the hurricane raged around us, and we would know that Dagon and Hydra were blessing us with their might!" She ducked her head. "Do you have any gods, Indira? You are far from home too." -
"No murders," agreed Frost sociably. "Not with so many witnesses!" He laughed at the old joke. "Now go be sociable," he went on with a wink. Taking out the binoculars again, he watched as Talya carefully made her way towards the restaurant, ready to go into action himself as soon as the coast was clear. Even a little tipsy himself, he could fly down there and practically be in the front door in the space of just a moment or two. Ah, such a day this has been. How did I find myself on a rooftop spying on my friend-turned-enemy, in any event? He thought back, then nodded his head in satisfaction. Through the power of true friendship. Hmm. Perhaps next time I should bring Ghost Girl. She owes me a favor - and she would make an excellent snoop.
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"Spent long day with cranky vampire who became cranky father when he caught Set in flagrante delicto. And here Set had been trying to be good lady and call for aid! But Set can share gory details. And I do mean gory, heh-heh-heh." His heart didn't seem to be in the joke, though. Instead, he shook his head and tossed back a shot of the ice-cold vodka. "You know, Set," admitted Dimitri reluctantly, "I feel I owe you apology. You have been good fellow, and lady, since reincarnation but I have been nothing but foul-mouthed about you. Was just so delighted to see enemy of old days, it seemed a shame to have friend instead." He shrugged.
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"Your government should do more about the problems of poverty," agreed Nina, sipping her wine. "The problem with American politics is that so many of your leaders avoid hard choices because they don't want to be seen as dictators." She gestured forcefully as she spoke. "But if you took all the poor people in this country, gave them work, gave them an education, then you could have an army. Of liberation, of liberation," she added after Mark raised an eyebrow at her. "I don't really listen to a lot of modern music," Mark commented, "but Asli's stuff is pretty great. Joe's got a foot in the music world too," he added with a wink his friend's way. "And sometimes his whole head."
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"I've heard rumors of such things, Lord, but one has never been taken intact." Shadowy tentacles ran across Steve's bare chest - did the shadow-witch intend for him to shrivel in disgust? But bound and chained or not, he had had far worse than this - in the black pits of Nihilor, and beyond. In places that these people, inhabitants of a time far removed from Earth-Prime's own, must never know. Instead he locked his eyes on the conversation as the woman in gossamer wings of black, in what would have looked like a dark angel's costume to these people's eyes, spoke to her bearded master. "We could learn much about the land beyond shadow from its remains." "Now now, my shadow queen, you are too cruel! Look, this is a man, a man with the marks of slavery on his body. We are not like those cotton-picking savages back East" Her master, effortlessly at ease, took a seat in a plush chair and sipped the wine a servant had poured them. The red silk and brown wood of the chair stood out as a sharp contrast to the rest of the cool silver lining of the room. "He has but to answer me the simple secret of his origins, and we can undo those troublesome bonds and show him our plans. Surely that is a small favor, my friend Steven?" - Across town, the trio in the cliffs suddenly heard an exclamation. "You! You!" Turning around, they spotted two men in brown leather and blue denim, hands raised as they approached. "You, parlay over there!" The taller of the two, a blond with strikingly handsome features and a short mustache, seemed to be the leader of the bunch. Despite the Old West setting, he had a distinct French accent. "You're not one of those spaceman's goons! How did you get past the flying machines?"
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Nick and Equinox, the only ones left on the hill besides Tarva, heard the shadow-priestess give a startled exclamation at the sight of first Kimber's transformation, then the way she casually embraced her fellow young heroes! With her hand over her heart and another over her mouth, it was hard to read the specifics of Tarva's reaction - eyes wide and body whipcord-tight as she stared down at the scene below. Then the view of the scene below was cut off as a giant robot flew down out of the sky and embraced everybody in one big, hard hug - the sheer bulky size of his robotic body letting him take in the entire team in one big go. It was hard to tell with the robotic features, but Citizen sure did seem to be smiling. "We did it! Your mojo beat their mojo-" he still wasn't going to call it magic, obviously, "and you look great! Young Freedom saves the day!"
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"Oh, marvelous, she is there with aged wife!" said Frost from the rooftop across the street, peering at Klara and Tracy through the restaurant window with the help of Talya's borrowed binoculars, both he and Bombshell in the shelter of an high ornamental railing on the nearby rooftop. With his infrared vision, he could see their particular heat patterns easily even in the relative warmth of the establishment. "What am I supposed to say now?" he asked Bombshell, looking thoroughly disgruntled that their fun bit of afternoon surveillance had gone amiss. "You betrayed everything you fought for and left us holding the bag, and oh hello there Mrs. Warrior Woman, how are things with family?" he asked, annoyance in his voice.
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"Hello, Lady Talya!" said Dimitri cheerfully. "Set and I have had day of troubles, so I thought we might darken your door with liquor. I have brought my own!" he said, pulling the vodka flask from his pocket. First came a brotherly embrace for Talya, the same he might give any other comrade of war, then he headed straight for her wet bar. "Set, do not know if you ever tangled with Bombshell 'back in day', as Americans say," he said, making actual air quotes with his fingers as he ducked down to study the contents of Talya's guest liquor cabinet, "but she is fine lady! Killed many fascists, bedeviled many American heroes - my kind of woman." He winked at her while he poured his vodka. "Lady Talya, this is Set! Smaller than she was in ancient past, but then, aren't we all in these flashy 21st century days?" He shrugged as he poured another round of shots for Set and Talya both.
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"Ugh. In Typhoon's name, then, be-" Just as the guard was waving them on back the way they came, the other door opened up - this one from below, down in the prison levels. Another guard was escorting a young woman in traditional Socotran dress, her long sleeves pulled back by heavy restraining energy cuffs on both hands that reminded Trevor of the kinds of anti-power restraints used in Blackstone. "Guess who's causing trouble again?" said her escort, a hard sneer in his voice. "Think she needs another-" Nina screamed out loud and raised her hand - and suddenly the air rippled beneath the effects of the al-Darsah family's diamagnetic hydrokinesis. The prisoner just had time to throw herself to the floor as Nina levitated the guards and smashed them together like iron filings being pulled towards a magnet, then against the wall, then against each other again, and then she dropped them, groaning to the floor. Trusting in Trevor to deal with the alarms, or with any lingering guards, she tore off her mask and embraced the prisoner tightly. "Iyar! It's me!" "Nina?" Her eyes narrowed at the sight of her rescuer. "Nina, what are you doing here? Lord Typhoon will-" "He will do no such thing," replied Nina firmly. "He thought to use you and the others as weapons, but he will find that you will explode in _his_ face."
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Aquaria made a standing leap impossible for a human, crashing down into the water with a grace that belied her gawky amphibious body. She'd caught sight of the Surfacer drowning in the water beneath and frankly trusted Jessie to handle herself, at least for a few moments, against the sharkman above. She reached down into the cage and pulled it open from the bottom, dragging Dr. Ellis completely underwater with her for a few moments. Ellis struggled, of course, but she was basically helpless in Aquaria's grasp - as any normal Surfacer would be. Dismissing memories from her childhood with an effort, Aquaria all but threw Ellis up onto the other side of the watery chasm, then leaped up there with her, trying to keep the gap in the floor from the helpless civilian. "RUN!" she bellowed frantically, gesturing towards the open door.
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Riley reached over and put his hand on Robin's, then leaned over until his head was resting against her shoulder. "Sometimes I think I made it up. No one's ever heard of a world like mine - and nobody's even been able to find it. But then I close my eyes at night, or I see something like I did today, and I'm back there in the Forest, and this place, and you, are just a dream..." He squeezed her hand tight, and she heard him take a single, hitching breath and let it out, then silent breathing for a long time. "I'm sorry about your parents. Do you want to talk about it?" She'd already heard about the early death of his father - though he was sure the story of the otherwise-preventable thyroid cancer that had taken his life had now taken on a whole new meaning.
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Miss Americana flew down right through the roof of the museum, catching her counterpart off-guard. Looking up from what had been obviously meaningless 'work' on the dummied-out missile hanging in the museum, the other Miss Americana started, then rose to her feet, dusting herself off. The smile on her face looked nothing like the one Gina saw every day when she was testing Miss Americana's smile architecture. "Well! I had a feeling you'd come find me first. Do you like what I've done with the place?" she asked Miss Americana cheerfully, spreading her arms wide to embrace the museum, the fort, and all around them. "We haven't seen much of each other lately, my beauty, and I wanted to make sure I gave you something worthy of your talents." - The area was full of strange IR readings; no surprise, given all the secret bunkers and compounds at this heavily-protected site so close to NSA headquarters. But Miracle Girl soon made the baffling discovery that their counterparts had no IR signature at all - whatever they were, their heat signatures were nothing human. Maybe artificial? VIgilant showed no sign of recognizing his daughter; instead sizing up Cannonade before drawing back for a punch. "All right, you hippie peacenik. We're going to give you a beating all-American style!"
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"People have tried. But all the superheroes are dead, Robin. All the ones who didn't get turned died saving us from the rest. We don't know anything about magic, or super-science. All we can do is forage in the city, and try and keep our power plant running. You know how hard it is to keep a power plant running for fifteen years with no more fuel?" His thin smile died quickly. "People have tried to take in young Ferals and the like, but even newborn babies...whatever happened has already happened to them. They're already gone. They show us that in training." His voice was so quiet now as to be inaudible. "Killing one that's trying to kill you, almost anybody can do that. You have to show you can give one peace even if it's small." He swallowed hard, then said, "I know, okay?! I just...I just forgot." He rubbed his eyes. "I didn't shoot him because I thought it would be funny, dammit. I shot him because I thought he was going to die, because people were dying right then in that...that horrible place. I thought I was saving them."
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Riley was silent again, listening to the birds and the wind. "Growing up, the older people in town told me about the old world. About the superheroes who used to guard us, about the city we used to live in, about how it was before the Forest. But it's all I've ever known." He looked over at Robin. "Fifteen years ago, the Forest came. It swept over the world in a single night, destroying everything it touched. Millions of people died when buildings collapsed, when roads buckled, when they were impaled..." He swallowed. "Animals came with the Forest too, big ones, smart ones. I've seen bears that could take human clothes and wear it for a disguise, and I've heard about foxes that could write in English, and wolves that hunt humans more than any other meat. But of course we hunt them too." He smiled thinly. "My first trips out of the compound were for hunting; that's when I made my first bow." He looked away, then said quietly, "But that's not the worst part of it. I...my mom told me that when the Forest came, the superheroes told everyone that things would be okay. They headed into the thickest parts of the woods, some of them with super-scientists or magic people, looking for what happened. Regular people went into the woods too; cops, firefighters, rescue people. They went into the woods, and when they came back...when they came back-" He looked back at Robin, pain and remembered fear in his voice. "We call them Ferals, the ones who heard the call of the Maddening Wild. It still happens to people who stay out in the woods too long. Especially people with superpowers. First they get crazy with going out into the woods as deep as possible, running or climbing or flying, fighting off the people that stop them. Sometimes then you can still save them. But if they make it out to the Forest, if they spend a night there, they turn. Their eyes turn yellow, their voices change, their nails grow out like claws. They can't really talk anymore, just growl and curse, but some of them can use tools. And they...they eat people. They'll hunt or forage if they can't see people, but they see people, they'll drop whatever they're doing and they'll die trying to kill and eat a human being. I've seen....I've seen that happen," he admitted. "There's maybe fifteen thousand of us, but there's at least a hundred thousand of them left, all through what used to be Freedom City. That's why Woodsmen learn to be fast, and quiet, and go through the forest so smoothly even the Ferals can't find us. And why we start young. I just turned fourteen when I started."
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Okay, Aquaria is going to jump in the water, see Dr. Ellis, get her out of the cage, and get her onto land. Can I do all that, HGM?
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Riley was sitting on the roof in the spot where they'd first met, staring blankly at the horizon. He'd known Robin was coming, of course, she'd never been able to sneak up on him before and he certainly was hyper-aware now, eyes darting towards her the moment her head appeared. "Over here." He looked away still, out at Bayview beyond, as Robin joined him on the roof. He'd removed both his bow and hatchet, setting them both against the chimney they usually used as cover for their nocturnal activities. "Maybe I shouldn't be here," he suddenly said, his voice tight with repressed emotion. "Learning how to be a superhero isn't going to help me when I get home."
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"Forget that, I don't want you hanging around with that Set character until we know exactly what that blood did to you," said Jack, looking unrepentant for his name-calling. After all, he'd already apologized! "That means no visits, no phonecalls, no emails, without our permission." He folded his arms, reaching down to put one hand on top of Taylor's. "I think you have schoolwork you need to be doing." he said, shooting a pointed glance in the direction of Huang's room. "You'll be in enough trouble when you get back there tomorrow. There's no point n making it worse."
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"No, I had those after I arrived. I'm not from Earth-Prime. This dimension," Riley clarified, not knowing what Jimmy knew about dimensional travel. "This is a good place to work out. They've got a nice gym here, probably the best I've ever seen. And I should know - I have to spend a minimum of 2 hours a day getting physical training, since I don't have any powers except muscle and bone." He scratched the back of his short hair before going on, "I get testosterone shots," he told the other boy frankly. "For my voice, and so maybe I can grow myself a 'stache in a couple of years." He grinned. "What do yer folks do?"
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"All right. Okay." Riley stared up at his instructor, his face ashen, then turned to see the horror on his friends' faces. His hands, at his sides, were balled into fists as he turned to Robin and whispered harshly, too low for the others to hear, "Those people were being eaten. Dr. Metropolis was going to be eaten. You think I haven't seen that happen?" Defiant or not, the words seemed to take something out of him - Robin could see him start to crumple before he pushed himself enough to keep going. He couldn't break down now, not in front of the others. "...roof," he murmured again, this time looking Robin straight in the eye. He turned and stalked out of the room, shame and anger tugging at his fine-boned features, and all but ran not for the elevator but for the marked emergency stairs he'd seen nearby. Pushing open the metal fire door, he bolted up the concrete steps, taking them two at a time as he ran back to the surface.
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Riley looked around for a moment, reminding himself that the scenario was over, before he fixed his gaze on Robin again. "Yeah. Yeah, I'm okay," he said, his voice tight and drawn out with emotion. He didn't sound okay - not distressed, really, but the tension in every line of his body showed the energy vibrating in the young man's form like the plucked string of a guitar. His eyes were bottomless as he looked at Robin, and she could see the pain there when he made eye contact. Then he raised his head and looked up at Dauntless. "Was that not right?" he demanded of the stainless steel instructor. "I avoided the Ferals, I made my way through the city, I even figured out who did it. I was about to drop a chlorate bomb and get out under the smoke cloud. I...I know what I'm doing. I'm not stupid," he insisted, his hands tight at his sides. "You wanted to see if I can do what I have to do, and I did it. Was I just supposed to let the Green Man eat Dr. Metropolis?!"
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"Oh, man, sorry," said Riley, looking stricken at the other boy's words. "My...uh, my dad died of thyroid cancer when I was five," he admitted, something he realized he hadn't even told Robin. "A lot of people get it where I'm from. But you're really okay?" he asked, looking Jimmy over, obviously impressed at the extent of his evident recovery. "You look great," he told the other boy sincerely. "So did they use radiation on you or something?" he asked. "My mom's a nuclear 'gineer over at Raymond," he said, pointing in the direction of Freedom City's nuclear power plant. "so I've been around that stuff my whole life. And I'm just getting a shot," he added.