ic Keep Their Heads Ringing

[angrydurf]

Content Warning:  Police violence.

The Fens

82nd and Baltimore

Friday April 10th, 9:30 PM

 

There wasn't much cause for celebration for the residents of the Fens most days, The rayguns making it in as even an underdog to the championships would just about do it.  After the surprise upset even in the fens the residents took to the streets to celebrate.  The FCPD worried the celebration might turn violent had withdrawn prepared to cordon off the whole district if it tipped into rioting.  Barricades had been placed just off the street at the few throughways from the Fens into the theatre district or parkside.

 

The residents of the Evers Manor complex had spilled out into the streets in the shadow of the Wallace Expressway.  The mood was light and easy music pumping from the sound system of a local enthusiasts amp van laid a thumping beat for the crowd to groove too as they milled about cheering on the home team.  If they were aware of the barricades being prepared a couple blocks over where Baltimore crossed the expressway into Greenbank they weren't bothered.  It looked for the moment in this corner of hte Fens at least the celebration might pass without more than public intoxication and some noise violations, the kind of thing easily ignored by the police in light of the alternatives.

[Kaede Kimura]

Alice watched the party, her suit pristine. She would have liked to have been among them as her civilian self, but she was still a hero and had a responsibility to be there as Shooting Star in case something went wrong. Still she was there and near enough to be a part of the party. She had always put herself among the people as a hero they could turn to. She was off to the side watching the party, leaning against a wall, a gentle smile on her lips. She waved as someone she knew passed, greeting them kindly.

Edited April 9, 2020 by Kaede Kimura

[Tiffany Korta]

Ms Bright

Sitting on a nearby roof Agnes was wandering just why she was here. For the longest time she’d had some reluctance to cross the river that separated to two halves of Freedom City. But with such an event some of the homeless she knew had decided to join in the celebration she’d decided to keep an eye on them. Celebrating crowds could be generous but it only took a few drinks for trouble to starts, that's why she was sat on the rooftop to act as there protector.

 

With so many people around she wasn’t short for energy, and she wasn’t hiding away as a broody presence her protective aura glowing softly around her.

[Azuth65]

Gauss had been out for a late evening flight, needing the time in the air to clear her head after finishing up some of her physics class work.  After an hour or so on the aerial equivalent of a run she was ready to settle back in with a cold drink and work on her creative writing class work.  Passing the impromptu party however, she made the snap decision to land on a nearby rooftop and make sure things stay under control.

 

After a few minutes of standing on the roof and letting her cape billow in the breeze, she debated floating down and grabbing a soda from the guy who, showing a heck of an entrepreneurial spirit, had grabbed a couple coolers, bags of ice, and cans of drinks to sell.  She was surprised a random taco truck had not pulled up by now.

[angrydurf]

The mood was light as more residents spilled out of the surrounding buildings and joined the festivities.  Even the presence of obvious heroes seemed to have no real effect on the crowd earning little more than a few gasps form the youngest revelers or shifty retreat from the imbibers of less than legal substances.  Most traffic avoided the crowd turning off before reaching hte impromptu block party though a few drifted through the crowds honking support or for people to just get out of the way.

 

A dark van crept up the street at a crawl not honking just slowly making it's way through the throngs, unremarkable to the untrained eye those more in tune with the streets might make out the subtle clues that the lowered van had the hallmarks of the Eighty Eights, a car theft ring out of out of Greenbank.  Not out of the question for them to operate in the Fens but certainly not locals. 

[Kaede Kimura]

Alice missed the Eighty Eights van as she made her way through the crowd, planning on reaching the girl who had just flown in. She knew quite a few of the people here as both Alice and Shooting Star, so she took her time talking with them, letting them know that she wasn't here to bust people for drinking their Uncle Michael's moonshine, just here to make sure noting violent happened. It was slow going making her way through the crowd like this, but she didn't want to scare anyone by flying at the other super, least of all that super. They had probably seen her approaching, her costume was rather visible being white and blue with the bronze chestplate, but that was the idea. After a few minutes of slow going she did reach the bottom of the building, turning down a soda, before slowly floating up.

"Hey, you aren't here to start anything yeah? Folks here don't get lots of chances to celebrate, so can you let the minor things slide for tonight?"

Edited April 11, 2020 by Kaede Kimura

[Tiffany Korta]

Ms Bright

Having dealt with gangs like the 88’s, if not them themselves she never really stop to check such things, Agnes wasn’t ready to pussy foot around with them. Standing up she took the air quickly calculating the right time to take them out without endangering anyone around them.

 

Then when she had the perfect moment she teleported above the van dropping down rapidly through the air. At the last moment she brace driving her elbow through the engine block. Bracing with her shoulder to take the force of the suddenly stopping vehicle.

[angrydurf]

The van's hood crumpled under the heavy impact the cracked engine block slamming into the asphalt as the back of the vehicle reared up under the force of the blow before slamming back to the surface of the road once more.  The van disgorged a handful of rough looking 88's weapons already drawn in advance of their planned driveby.  They were clearly shaken by the sudden attack, but that really only made them more dangerous, particularly with the crowd around them to be concerned with and the rival gang nearby.  This could turn into a very mess shootout in a matter of seconds with the crowd caught in the middle.  Already teh initial cries of surprise at the sudden impact were turning to terror as ripples of panic spread through the revelers.  Taking up station at each side of the van and peeking around the back the gang members screamed expletives at both the Royals and the Royals unlikely protector.

[Azuth65]

Even as the toughs formed into position around their ruined hulk of a van, Gauss was focusing her senses on the metal in their hands.  Guns mostly, though she was unable to tell exact make and models from this distance, and one or two blades.  She reached out with her right hand, as well as her power, and clenching her fist ripped the weapons right from their owners' hands.

 

"Man, you pendajos really picked a bad night to pull this kind of stunt.  Now, I'm going to have to insist we keep these under the supervision of cooler heads," she called out, purple light emanating from her left eye as she moved the floating pile of guns up onto the rooftop by her feet.  "I don't care why you're here or who did what, the second you saw a crowd you should have rescheduled.  Waaaaaay too many collaterals for you to damage right now."

[angrydurf]

The 88's let out a chorus of curses as their guns were torn from their grip by the magnetic prowess of Gauss' attack.  As the weapons flew away they froze for a fraction of a second before diving into the crowd and behind whatever cover they could find.  One turned with a snarl back to the Van leaning in through the door out of sight of heroes before rolling from the back to take a knee and balance the single shot anti-tank rocket on his shoulder, "I'll show you collateral damage!"  he bellowed madly and with a scorching fwoosh the rocket streaked toward Gauss!

 

The white trial of spent propellant was visible for a mere moment before the flash of the explosion lit up the evening sky overhead the shockwave of the fiery blast shattering windows up and down the street and obscuring visibility on the rooftop for several long seconds.  When the smoke cleared Shooting Star hovered unharmed where she'd intercepted the rocket at the last moment leaving Gauss in the clear if perhaps a bit shocked at hte turn of events.

[Kaede Kimura]

Alice was very glad that she'd intercepted that. Her poor breastplate now had a large scar on it from the impact. "You okay?" She threw the question back to the girl behind her, but didn't wait for an answer, speeding across the crowd faster than the rocket did, landing heavily in front of the thug with the rocket. She swung wildly, anger at the man overtaking reason, and realised that she had misjudged as her fist sailed through the air, missing the thug by a country mile, passing over a foot to the left of his head. She quickly tried to play it off as intentional as she took most of her weight off of the abused sidewalk, and glared at the man, hoping the display of power would stop him from doing anything stupid. "That was your last warning. Surrender, before I take you on a jaunt into the sky."

[Tiffany Korta]

Ms Bright

As soon as the van was fully stopped, she half flew half jumped up onto the roof of the van to better get a look at those that had left the now destroyed vehicle. Sensible people would have probably given up at this point, but these weren’t the smartest of people in the city.

 

Spotting one close to her she growled to get his attention before throwing herself off of the van to slam her elbow into his face, with just enough force to take him out and leave a bruise for quite some time. She twisted as she hit to land at a crouch just as he fell off of his feet, glaring at the others and daring them to try and attack her.

[angrydurf]

As Ms. Bright came off the van her target was clear.  The thug with the rocket launcher dropped the now useless tube dodging back from Shooting stars attack.  Lining him up perfectly for a vicious elbow to the face from Ms. Bright.  His nose crunched with a wet meaty sound and his knees went out his eye rolling back in his head and he collapsed in a heap.

 

The crowd was abuzz with uncertainty bordering on panic at the explosion shattering windows up and down the street and the falling chips of masonry from the blast.  The Royals were less timid and seized on the chaos erupting to hit back at the almost drive-by.  They didn't bother to seek cover as their foes were neatly disarmed and pulled free their own weapons opening fire  in mass at the cowering 88's.  The fusilade was enthusiastic as were their whoops of victory, their aim did not match their enthusiasm however and not even half the shots found their marks and two of the 88's collapsed in bleeding heaps on the ground.

 

The civilians were no longer undecided, the pull of a hero fight was not enough to keep them in the middle of a gun fight and enmass they scattered the bulk surging down baltimore toward Grenville in mad rush any not able to keep up with the crush risking being trampled by the others as they made their mad dash to safety.  

[Azuth65]

Blinking the spots in front of her eyes, Gauss barely had time to see Shooting Star and Ms. Bright take out the 88 who had fire upon her.  Mere seconds after, as the assembled Royals drew and began firing into the crowd, aiming, if not every efficiently, for the 88s that had yet to be knocked out by the assembled heroines.  Gritting her teeth in annoyance at the second gang's instance on continuing to make trouble her eye flared with purple light as she raised her hand, yet more purple light rippling outwards towards the guns and switchblades in the Royals' hands.

 

"Okay, assclowns one and all!" she called out, pulling the second pile of weapon up to the roof, "You had the chance to walk away.  We've now moved to the part where I offer you the chance to be taken to the police voluntarily.  Next person who draws a weapon or hits a civilian, I'm breaking both your thumbs."

[angrydurf]

The Royals weapons fly from their hands toward Gauss clattering to the roof deck behind her.  Luckily none misfire on impact though one does go off while being jerked from the hands of one particularly stubborn gangster.

 

The two 88's still standing make a dash for the crowd once their foes are disarmed.  Quickly trying to loose themselves in the panicking mass of humanity.  

[Kaede Kimura]

Alice flew into the air, surveying the crowd for the bastards escaping. No one tried to shoot up her neighbourhood on her watch. With a quiet snarl she dove on the 88 she spotted, grabbing him by the shoulder with a vice-like hand. "You bastards just had to try this tonight of all nights didn't you?" She lifted off the ground, the struggling gangster in hand. "I hope any of your buddies who hear about what happened learn that if they want to mess with my neighbourhood, they're going to have to go through me. And they'll have to bring bigger guns." She wasn't being entirely honest, that rocket launcher could've hurt her pretty badly, but right now she was a bit too annoyed to think clearly about what telling the gangster to try bigger weapons could mean for her in the long run.

She floated near the rooftop Gauss was on, so her head was visible above the ledge. "Hey, I just wanted to say thanks. This would've been messy if you hadn't been here."

Edited June 19, 2020 by Kaede Kimura

[Tiffany Korta]

Ms Bright

Looking around Agnes picked out the closest of the baddies, not caring which baddies she punched, and half left half flew towards the foe, right now she just wanted to take all these guy down.

 

Again no fancy moves just a fist to the stomach, though as angry as she was she held back the blow so not to overly hurt the scumbag, however tempting as it was right now.

 

“Stay down or things will be much worse for you!” it wasn’t an idle threat either, her glare proved just that point.

[angrydurf]

Disclaimer:  I've added a content warning to this thread in light of recent events.  Please check the OOC for details.

 

The crowd parted scattering around the sudden arrival of one of the heroes in their midst snatching a fleeing gangster off his feet in a fierce takedown.  Those nearest didn't slow however continuing to surge west down Baltimore toward Grenville and the police barricades confining the recently celebratory crowds to the fens.  Already the leading edge of the panicked crowd was in sight of the police barricade and barked orders over loudspeakers could be faintly heard ordering the crowd to stand down and disperse.

 

Where Ms. Bright charged the Royals they started to scatter in the face of her onslaught.  One was too slow and caught her wicked jab to the shortribs collapsing in a wheezing heap on the ground.  The rest scattered in all directions some lost to the crowd others running full speed up the now largely empty north south run of 82'd street.  Three charged at the figure on the fringes making his way carefully deeper into the Fens grabbing at one one managing to strike the operator apparently recognizing him from some past conflict.  They seemed to blame him for either the injury or incarceration of one of their number some time back.

 

In response to the assault the better trained man shoved his assailants back and grimaced as he loomed over them, "You should have just let me leave you.... RrraRRARGGGHH!"  he cursed as his body went rigid and he threw his head back in apparent agony.  Short black bristly fur sprung up along his body as he grew nearly half a foot and contorted his shoulders and arms growing broader and longer, hands curled into cruel grasping claws.  His head elongated as he let out a guttural howl to the sky the transformation into some kind of bestial wolfman complete.  The blood curdling howl reverberated off the high walls of the surrounding appartements and sent his attackers into fits of gibbering terror at his feet as bloodshot eyes full of inhuman rage gazed down at them.

[Azuth65]

Dropping the second wave of confiscated weapons atop the first collection, Gauss watched as one man in the crowd began violently changing.  As he bent back and released a blood chilling howl, the magnetokinetic faltered for a brief second before gritting her teeth and taking to the air.  As she passed over the wolf-man she unleashed a steel ball bearing into the his shoulder.  "Okay Cujo, you've got an impressive set of pipes on ya," she called down at the transformed gang member, "Now that I've got your attention, let's keep it right here."

[angrydurf]

The high speed metal spheres found their mark pelting the bestial form with crushing force.  He staggered under th assault stunned by volly of projectiles and disoriented by the unusual angle of attack as well as his recent transformation.  Crouching favoring his uninjured shoulder as he faced off against the gangsters and heroes with mad fury in his inhuman eyes.  

 

The gangsters were already scrambling back from him but terrified as they were they were making little progress on escape.  Those still afoot did much better vanishing into the crowd or side streets as they fled the battle at a full run.  

[Kaede Kimura]

When the bestial creature roared, Alice's heart hammered in her chest, and she dropped the gangster in her hands as she watched the crowd panic. She took a moment, breathing deep to calm herself, cape fluttering as she turned to look at the new enemy. She snarled, getting ready to join Gauss as they attacked the monster when she stopped herself, remembering the police barricade. The crowd was charging headlong towards them. Swearing viciously, Alice shot off towards them, stopping ahead of the barricade with a rush of air. 

"There is a crowd incoming, please hold your fire! Two gangs started a shootout and a villain turned up, it's not a riot they are just afraid!" She was glad she sounded confident, hours of practice paying off.

"If someone could point me towards the officer in charge I can give them a briefing of the situation and we can coordinate assistance." Alice prayed silently that they would listen as she floated down gently in front of the barricade.

[Tiffany Korta]

Ms Bright

Agnes’s first instinct was to chase down the gangsters and give them such a beating that they’d would think again before doing it again. But then glancing up she caught the potential tragedy with a surging crowd towards the barricade, at heart she was still a hero and she wasn’t going to let people get hurt if she could help it.

 

Concentrating she pulled up all dregs of her powers, calling up memories that weren’t her own, past uses of her powers bubbling to the surface. For a second she felt like she knew who she was, and she was someone else. Then she opened her eyes a put out a hand pulling out all the power she had.

 

With a faint glittering in the air a massive teleport portal formed between the crowd and the police, that would if things went bad teleport them harmlessly several streets away.