Avenger Assembled

The blast hit hard, knocking al-Darsah into the water with a splash so loud Cerulean could hear its faint echoes from nearly a mile away. Had she really hit her that hard, or was the water controller simply playing possum, trying to lure her into her element? Either way it didn't matter - she wasn't going to fall for that! And the scream of aerojets behind her told her that the locals weren't falling for it either. A flight of a half-dozen triangular craft wooshed past her on either side, close enough for her to catch the razor-quick image of a black-headed eagle against a yellow background emblazoned on their hulls, and then the hi-tech planes were bombarding the icy waters of the bay where al-Darsah had fallen. They were using lasers too, fast, rapid-fire attacks like machine guns, and they spent minutes strafing the bay like so many angry bees. The local authorities had arrived a little late; but it was clear they were on the right side. After several minutes, the flight maneuvered again, faster and more nimble than any planes Cerulean had ever seen on Earth-Prime - they rotated around their central axes so fast and easy they looked almost like bad special effects. This time they were flying around her, taking up position on either side and beneath; not hostile, but clearly trying to direct her towards part of the domed Icelandic city below, where a gap was beginning to open in the transparent covering that enclosed the city.

"He'll be fine," said Mark with steady warmth and perfect confidence, seemingly appearing out of nowhere as he pulled up a seat next to the group already at the bar. "I came back from Geneva as soon as I heard, good buddy," he told Mike, reaching over to squeeze his friend's massive bicep. He hadn't seen much of Mike since the former had chosen civil service at home and Mark had chosen civil service abroad, but in some ways, despite their differences, they'd made some very similar choices in the years after high school. "You know," he said confidentially, his voice dropping so the rest of the bar couldn't hear. "It's not too late to spin this thing in your favor. We could tell people it was a hoax, or a shapeshifter disguised as you, or another one of the Curator's robots..." He was ticking off points on his fingers as he spoke, his crewcut blonde hair practically gleaming in the overhead light, his teeth perfect and white.

"Ah, this old thing," said Frost with a ready smile, studying the knife with great and familiar interest. "I remember it well. Once stabbed old Donar straight in meat and potatoes with its twin in fields of Valhalla, right in front of Lady Sif and her poison grain. Such eyes he made!" The light from the killing blade seemed to reflect something from the draugr's eyes, giving it a distinct reddish glint of its own. "I have knowledge of ritual you suggest," he said, tossing the knife from hand to hand. "We can make happen what needs to happen. You are in good hands." He did a little salute with the blade, then walked off to take his position for the ritual. - Tarva studied the idol carefully, looking at the marks of profanement with a practiced eye. "And you're not worried the deity herself might be summoned by the spell or the magical energy flowing around it?" The tone was surprisingly practical for the shadow-witch, her gaze that of a professional as she looked at Kimber and the others. Her display earlier had faded now that it was time for business; or at least another type of business. "Wild realms are close together along the Cosmic Coil and the walls between them thin. She might blame us for what happened in the interim and want revenge. Predator gods can be very protective of what's theirs." She didn't so much as glance at Wraith; it was hard to tell if she saw her at all.

What they found, just a few miles away, was something completely unexpected. They had to pass through a bank of clouds to get there, thick and heavy grey fog that clung to the sea like foam, which was the only reason they hadn't seen it from the deck of the ship. It being a gigantic chariot, looming as large as the vessel they had left behind, riding over the surface of the water and being pulled by a mighty steed that seemed to be made of the water of the Caribbean Sea itself. Riding in the back of the chariot stood a giant large enough to pick up the ship if he was so inclined; a multistory figure wielding a massive trident and with a long, curling black beard that cascaded down onto a muscular chest that made him look like a veritable Greek god! Though on closer inspection, the toga he wore belonged rather more to the Roman era. The figure, looking like Neptune or Poseidon brought to life in gigantic form, was obviously heading quickly for the stranded Mictlan - and would surely reach the boat shortly. He didn't seem to notice the two flying heroines; instead he snapped his whip and called to his steed, his baritone voice booming over the waves with great force. "Ho! Ho!" He went on; but neither of the two women spoke ancient Greek or Latin, so his words might well have been a mystery to them.

Aquaria steered Jessie towards the spice aisle, where for lack of a better idea she had Jessie pick up a small 'starter' spice rack that came with the standard Surfacer spices all packed in together. From there came the seafood section, where she nearly lost her disguise when she pressed her face against the glass to stare at the incredible bounty laid out before them. "Oh, Jessie, there's so much of it!" she said, her voice full of rapturous awe. Pictures of grocery stores, even tours, hadn't prepared her for this. She stepped close to Jessie, turning her head from the seafood section so she wouldn't give herself away from excitement "We should get the white fish, and the greyscale, and the shrimp..." She turned to her friend and said, "Can we please get a lobster? I haven't had one in forever! I promise I'll eat it outside." The big lobsters in the tank looked like they'd take a while to eat, and sometimes Jessie thought the way she ate was gross. This close to the fish, Aquaria didn't seem at all concerned about who or what might be following them.

Frost takes 10 for a 20

I would like a picture of Cyberknife and Harrier together (in civvies) in the high-tech lab in her basement - maybe with canoodling?

"Hmm." Frost disappeared into a cloud of white mist at the young man's words, vanishing around the hill like a bank of self-propelled rolling fog. He found the demon, now a shabby parody of his hipster persona, drawing patterns of magic in the sand with a stick. With wings pushing through the torn remnants of its clothes, it looked shabby and worn, like a demonic hipster hobo passing the time on a deserted stretch of beach. Where did I learn those words, anyway? Frost thought. He waited at the top of the hill for the demon to notice him and the fight to begin anew, but the demon didn't seem interested. Instead it drew more and more signs, muttering to itself in Enochian, occasionally doing an angry, hopping dance from clawed foot to clawed foot. Whatever the demon was trying, it didn't seem to be working. Such a shame! thought Frost with little pity as he rolled down the hill towards his target.

"You can be our friend and show us where things are," croaked Aquaria. Feeling more confident about the crowd with her best friend at her side, and strangely enough with Indira at her back, Aquaria led the way back into the fray, doing her best to keep the crowd from overwhelming Jessie as they went. Her long, limber body was gawky on the surface, but she was still fast enough to steer herself and Jessie through the crowd without bumping into anybody in a way that would unseat her disguise - or scare Jessie. "Come on, Jessie, let's look at the list!" she suggested, peering over her friend's shoulder. "Jessie's very good at making lists and planning!" she offered back to Indira, turning her body at the waist rather than turning her head. "What do you do?" she asked Indira before turning back to their shopping expedition. She let Jessie pull a cart free as they headed inside the grocery store. "Let's get the fish last," she suggested. "So it will be fresh."

Tarva hugged Kimber, her arms warm and strong as she pressed Kimber's head against her chest. When she was done, she released the spectre and smiled shakily. "You are my boon companion, Kimber." She met her eyes, black film standing out in her own, before she wiped a hand across her face and took a deep breath. "Come along. Let's give you your flesh." Reaching down, she held Kimber's hand all the way up the hill. - "Smoooth, eh?" said Frost with a broad wink at Nick. He watched the interplay between Kimber and Tarva below like the old vulture he was, red eyes narrowing. "I am sure we can deal with situation as it grows." He thought of Nick besides him, and Equinox on the other, and was struck by a sudden feeling of age. Am I so hard? So brutal, and these young people so soft? He decided to keep his own counsel when it came to Tarva's situation, and was all smiles to greet Kimber and Tarva when they arrived at the top of the hill. "So, tell us ritual, Kimber!"

I like this concept a lot, Zaranoth! Hope to see more of it.

That hits! http://orokos.com/roll/317965 = 24 She takes another Bruise, and retreats underwater. Inclined to wrap combat here - any issue with that, or do you wanna go further?

It was, like much else today, grim news - but it was grim news they could at least build upon. And begin bringing this to an end before more nightmares can begin in this free city. "We have our next target." Caradoc realized quickly there was one important obstacle keeping him from this destination - he had no idea where it was. He turned his armored head towards Omar, the only clue to where his attention was focused. "Where is that?" As soon as he knew the answer, he turned to Oracle. "I am capable of flight and Cannonade of mighty leaps. How quickly can you travel?" he asked her seriously, his amplified voice metallic and tinny behind what certainly appeared to be a genuine suit of armor. Once fast travel was arranged for them all, he was off with a roar of flame, erupting up against the blue Freedom City sky.

Aquaria bent her knees, forward, and inclined her upper body. "I am Aquaria. This is my friend Jessie." Tentatively, she took her hand out of her front pocket and gave Indira a little wave - one look at that gloved hand, with its three thick fingers, immediately told Indira why she was keeping it in her pocket. She put her hand back and said, "Can you help us hunt for food and supplies at the grocery store?" She suspected that Indira was probably a Grue, as those were the shapeshifters they'd talked about the most at Project Freedom. But she wasn't about to bring that up, not with so many Surfacers around. Angry, violent Surfacers, who...She shot a look around, then stepped closer to Jessie. "We just moved into the DuTemps Building," she said, carefully pronouncing the last word - and the next sentence. "We are new arrivals in your community."

For his part, Steve vaulted the counter with a boom and headed straight for the cooler, glad that there were no real patrons inside the store. "I will meet you outside." He pulled the door half-closed and changed, and after a time of flashing light and the sound of clanking metal, the armored figure of the knight Caradoc strode forth! There had been some chuffing about his other secret identity from his fellow Interceptors, but in the end they all understood his motivations. Outside, the vortex was growing in both size and power, with lightning bolts dancing along its interior as it grew large enough to swallow a car. By now a wind had kicked up, nothing even the unpowered humans were threatened by, but scrap paper and empty cans were beginning to fly through the air, bouncing off slower targets, and hurling themselves into the vortex to disappear entirely. Outside, Caradoc hung back and let the more social of his teammates handle introductions with the other heroes on the scene; the gleaming tech-knight briefly turning his featureless head to Wildcat and Echo before turning back to the vortex. This explains the missing items. "It is not a dimensional gateway," he said aloud after a moment, his voice tinny and mechanical. "It is something...with which I am unfamiliar." Suddenly, a crack of lightning shot down from the vortex and hit the ground, scarring the asphalt and putting the scent of burning tar in the air.

Aquaria blinked herself - then made her decision, shooting a nervous look over at Jessie and rocking anxiously from her heels to her long toes, an uncomfortable feeling in her big shoes. "N-no, we'll do thiss...diplomatically. Follow me." She was tempted to tell Jessie to punch the woman if she gave them any trouble; but that would just get them both in a whole lot worse trouble. And maybe take off that dark-skinned woman's head if she wasn't a tough super-person instead of just one with crazy eyes. She slowly walked over to Indira, her big shoes awkwardly thumping along, her every footstep hollow and loud in her ears as she approached the other woman. She sniffed the air again; definitely not a human being. The woman approaching Indira, who definitely did smell like fish, was keeping her head down and her hands in her front pocket, barely making eye contact from behind her big sunglasses. "Excuse me," she said in a clear, calm voice, just as she'd learned in therapy. "Are you a person?"

Equinox's question left Dimitri with a dilemma between his word and his good sense. "It is...imprudent of Kimber," he finally conceded. "But what might any of us do for the chance to know another's touch, if we were denied such things?" Silently, the thermovore stared down at Kimber and Tarva and took a deep puff on his cigarette, eyes flaring red. "Good blend, good tobacco!" He finally exclaimed before turning to Nick and declaring, "Come now, you must smoke with us! Is death, to be sure, but you know death well." Looking back at the couple, he kept speaking in a quiet murmur as he handed the lit cigarette to the necromancer. "Presence of Annihilist in Jotunheim has caused some...irregularities with Lady Hel. I have solved them for now with certain oaths but it is well we do not tarry. Beings outside of our plane are not interested in stories of repentance. Only destruction." - For once, Tarva was geniunely at a loss for words - her cheeks flushing black, she put her hand to her mouth for a moment. But she didn't back away from Kimber, either, and didn't seem as eager to pull away as she had been before. "You..." She paused, noting the change in her voice, then said, "T-thank you, Kimber, that...You took my wound upon yourself? Why?" She didn't sound angry, just thoroughly baffled. She licked her lips.

Some time ago. Steve spread the graph paper flat with his fingers, then took a sharpened #2 pencil to hand. "This is your universe." He made a dot at the center. "The dimension that you call Earth-Prime." He drew a line from the dot to one end of the paper vertically, then back the other way. At each place where horizontal lines crossed vertical, he made another dot. "This is its associated universes. You know some of them; the morally-inverted universe, the National Socialist universe, the gender-inverted universe..." He marked several others as he went. "There are an infinite number of universes along that line. Some are more important to the line than others," he said, pointing to the junctures, "and each has its close neighbors." He thought for a moment, looking down at the page, then picked one of the dots. "Here, the gender-inverted universe." He drew another line, this one horizontal, across the page, with the gender-inverted universe as its center. "And here are _its_ associated universes - the gender-inverted National Socialist universe, the gender-inverted morally-inverted universe, and the like. There are an infinite number of universes along this line as well - each with its close neighbors, some more important than the others, and so on." He drew more lines, back and forth, slowly and methodically, until he had covered the entire page. "Now, we come to the question of traveling." He put the pencil to paper again, directly over the now-overdrawn dot of Earth-Prime. "A traveler can go only a few steps away, to a closely associated universe, easily enough..." He began drawing the line. "Or he or she may go further, all the way to another point." He reached the morally-inverted universe. "This universe is among the closest to you, so it is one of the easiest to find. Hence Johnny Rocket's discovery some years ago." He lifted his pencil from the page, and plunked it down at a seemingly random point. "Large trips, one that leave a world-line behind completely, can take the traveler to a radically divergent world - but these require far more energy, and the return is far more difficult." He raised the pencil in the air, directly over one of the dots "The Zero Zone, as you call it, is the space outside of worlds - easy enough to visit from each world, and a potential gateway from one to the other for knowledgeable enough to use it. I believe Wander's Raptor Empire uses the Zero Zone to maintain its holdings. A wise policy. Most multiversal empires destroy themselves, because it is far easier to do this -" He pressed down with the pencil, hard, and tore a hole in the page near its top, showing the desktop beneath. "and open a hole that leads to what lies beneath the multiverse. The Terminus - the entropic sewer of creation." He set down the pencil and took up an X-Acto Knife, setting the blade down in the hole he had made. "An invasion is done in this fashion. Once a universe has been destroyed, it is used as base for further conquest." He drew the knife across the page, following one of the lines, back and forth. "Until that universe and all its associated universes are gone. From there, the attack begins on all the universes associated with _those_ universes..." He cut off the top section of the page, then cut that section in half. "Until at last all things related to that world are gone; save the fragments left in the Terminus." He scattered the paper pieces across the desk. "Omega hungers for Earth-Prime, and other key universes, so that he may divide up the multiverse - and devour it at his leisure."

Shaking off his grim mood, Frost beamed at Kimber. "Naturally!" He gathered up Nick and Equinox the way he would any other young people, by clapping his hands and calling, "Nicholas! Equinox! Come come," he declared, pointing towards the summit before flying over there himself in a puff of white mist. Waiting for them there, he smiled broadly, "So! We create abomination of life and death today." He didn't sound bothered by the idea - in fact he sounded positively delighted. "Ah, is just like I am become new father, eh? And you all are godparents!" He clapped the two younger practitioners on the back, beaming. "Such a day!" Without comment, at this juncture he took a loose cigarette from his pocket and lit it with a battered old metal lighter. "I would offer you smoke, but I know how young people are!" - "I'm up for it," said Tarva with a smile, her voice sounding scratchy and dry like she'd caught a cold - something Kimber had never actually known her to do. "Don't worry about me," she went on before coughing. "Everything I'll be doing is based on body movements - and talking like this will help with the summoning." Bold words or not, she coughed again, clutching her hands tight against her sides to avoid grabbing onto Eve or Kimber and pulling them down.

Go ahead and post! =D

That earned Cerulean a blast to the center of her body mass - and prompted a return strike from the light-wielding heroine. Both of their aims were true. A searing blast of light hit al-Darsah in the face, making her gasp and curse in obvious surprise. It wasn't hard to guess that pain wasn't something the genetically-enhanced would-be conqueror had much experience with, from the look of anger on her now sun-burned looking face, it wasn't something she enjoyed either. Still, a blast of water struck Cerulean in the midsection, Nina's 'ripping' gesture with the free hand she used for the strike making it appear she was going to rip out something vital from the younger woman. The problem was, despite al-Darsah's excellent aim, evidently she had no way of telling the many Ceruleans apart. That earned another curse.

Ooh, you are catching me in all sorts of naughtiness. http://orokos.com/roll/317291 = 7 Okay, I'll get an IC post up.

"The...baby. The baby!" Still on her hands and knees and fumbling around for her lost glasses, Honey was looking up at Hologram, and talking - but at the same time she wasn't, at least, not alone. There were two minds in the woman before Paige - one was human, angry and afraid all at once in the way she would have been if the situation had been reversed and her children and grandchildren had been threatened. The other was something else; a sharp, hungry echo of the brush she'd had with the mind of Honey's granddaughter Emma. If that younger mind had been feral and fierce, a young predator growing its teeth ready to take on the world, this was something older, more settled, but no less dangerous for that. The image of a fierce old hyena matriach, like those she'd seen on location shoots in Africa, came to her mind - but the thing at the back of this woman's soul was nothing so clean and normal as an animal. Upstairs, Paige could hear Jean yelling, "Emma! Emma! Where are you?" Honey actually growled as her hands came down on her glasses - then squeezed so hard the frame snapped. "Get away, that bastard woke her up again," she said, voice turning low and feral. "Get _away_..." - Outside, Harry looked like he wanted to wring the neck of the man who had broken in on his family's fragile peace. "What the hell is this?" Practically ripping apart the man's body armor, he pulled out crosses, garlic, and various holy items that made it look like he'd robbed a religious supply store. "Some kind of crummy demon hunter crap? I don't even know who this is!" he exclaimed to Wail, a moment of raw unfairness amid all the horror. "Demons," the semi-conscious witchhunter was muttering, "demons inna house..." Looking back at the house, Wail could see something small crawling up from a bedroom window and up onto the roof - crawling like a bat scuttling up the side of a cave. As Wail watched, it leaped right off the roof, heading straight for the lawn. It looked like a small child turned feral and predatory, bulging white eyes, fanged maw wide, and fingers extending into long, curved claws. Bad Emma!

"The best thing for me to do will be to take all the sick people off the boat," said Edge decisively. "I can get all of them to Freedom City; right into the League's hospital. The only reason I haven't taken the whole boat is that might start an epidemic." Monsoon, who knew Edge the best, didn't so much as blink at the news that he could evidently teleport an entire passenger liner across a continent's worth of ocean. "Plus, we might hit a ship in the harbor," he admitted. "I can get it done and be right back." Monsoon was able to get ahold of Starlight's security tapes, revealing that the collapse down below had occurred almost simultaneously with Festus' collapse above. The silent footage showed a grim scene - Rediker, a look of urgent concern on his face, had come into the engine room and hit the security lock behind him before having a quick, sharp conversation with his second, pointing at the engines - and then both men had collapsed, bleeding and vomiting, almost simultaneous with the captain above ground. Coming back from seeing Edge off, Monsoon studied the security film alongside the others; the ship's interior architecture new enough that it played on a shipboard 'cloud' that was still functioning despite the transition shipboard transition. "I was talking to the ship's doctor in there," she said, wiping a cloth over her mouth as she spoke, "and he said the Captain has spent a great deal of time down among the engines." She made it sound accusatory, but she did that for many things. "I wonder if they were all exposed to some-" Suddenly there came the sound of sirens in their conference room - and Chief Forrest's voice on the intercom. "Attention superheroes...you'd better get up here!" - Upstairs, the bridge was full of white-faced sailors and officers - this was not the working cruise they'd all signed on for. At the sight of the capes, the security chief, still in overall command with so many illnesses, took over. Forrest pointed the problem out to the heroes in a moment after taking them aside to a navigation station; what looked like a massive, slow-moving blip on their radar, coming towards them from the nearest landmass; the US Virgin Islands. "It's too slow even for a freak wave, but it's too damn big for another ship. Can...some of your people get out there?" he asked the heroes. "

When the trouble began, it started small enough, with a crackle of electricity in the air that pinged Erik's energy-sensing abilities, then with a faint pop outside that produced what looked like blue ball lightning to Ellie and Wildcat, hovering over the strip mall's parking lot at the height of one of the light poles in the lot - its glow no brighter than one of the faded yellow bulbs that still lit up the parking lot. A series of pops produced three more blue-white balls, which after a short time began spinning around each other, first slowly, then faster. The circle expanded too, gradually taking up space just If not for the growing feeling of power that was definitely pressing on Erik's senses - and making Ellie and Wildcat's hair stand on end, the nearly silent circle of spinning light could have been a holographic display or just some piece of stagecraft. By the time Steve was looking outside too, things were already changing - electricity was jumping from one ball to the other, first little sparks like a plasma lamp, then continuous streams of blue-white light that turned the spinning shape into a vortex, the sky 'behind' it fading away into one steady energetic glow that cast strange shadows on the asphalt below. Meanwhile, the artificial lights outside were beginning to flicker, the growing illumination from the man-sized vortex the only source of light outside the building.