ic The Mars Connection

[Cubismo]

"Know your type? You don't know me at all! And MarsTech is totally..." She stopped and shook her head despairingly. They weren't going to listen anymore than the last group of Ultio-Suits did. She was beginning to wonder if MarsTech went out of its way to hire only the most twitchy and intolerant jerks it could find.

 

Her sensors spotted at least eight of them around, most which were still on the ground staring daggers at her. The only one that wasn't was a Ultio-Suit in red that looked to be holding back to the side. Maybe she was more reasonable than the others? Or maybe she was just waiting for an opportunity to strike while she was distracted. Courtney really hoped it was the former than the latter, but either way she got ready for a fight. 

 

"I didn't want to do this last time and I still don't know, but if your not going to be smart and back off than," her optics suddenly shifted from bright blue to scorching red, "I guess I'm just going to have to do this worse way."

 

 

[RocketLord]

GM

 

The woman in the red Ultio Suit stayed back, crossing her arms, while the others rushed in.

 

"Remember the plan!" one of the men in grey shouted.

 

Three Ultios quickly moved in close, surrounding Ultra Girl while two flew up above. The last two and the two fliers struck towards Ultra Girl, forcing her closer to the others. The first three all punched and kicked at her, having no qualms about teaming up against a single enemy.

[Cubismo]

Ultra Girl grimaced as she saw the Ultios come at her. The seemed far more prepared this time, apparently having gotten it in their heads that they wouldn't be able to take her down with sloppy tactics and foolhardiness. Unfortunately, that also meant that they were also way effective this time around.

 

Despite herself, a small painful grunt escaped her lips as the suits managed to block and flank her in way that made it all the easier for them to get a few good shot on her. Not for the first time, Courtney wondered why the heck her mother saw fit to allow her to feel plan.

 

The damage was relatively light but it still wasn't a fun stress test for chassis. It was definitely something she had no desire to see repeated. With that in my mind, the android unleashed a torrent of nanites within her internal systems that boosted the strength of her carbon muscles and promptly started to go to work, first taking a mighty swing at the first suit that was in reach. 

[RocketLord]

Justice

 

With a roar from the Law Rider, Justice came riding around the corner, screeching along the ground, driving at full speed towards the group. She was in her red, grey and pink uniform, her domino mask hidden behind her bike helmet in the same color scheme. She should be well enough known around EC to be recognized by now.

 

Alright, these Ultio jerks were absolutely ganging up on Ultra Girl, kicking and punching at her. No way Robin would let that happen!

 

"HENSHIN!" 

 

Steering with her left hand, she reached down with her right to click the button on her belt, the amulet swirling to life with pink energies swirling around. All around her, small rainbow colored portals opened up, bits and pieces of armor flying out and connecting all over her body, the helmet being the final part. She was heavily armored by now, quickly throwing her hand out to reach into a portal and pulling out a somewhat oversized gun, the Justice Buster.

 

Quickly taking aim, she fired at one of the fliers, just a low powered warning blast, condensed air. It bounced off the armor, but at least it got their attention.

 

"Leave her alone!"

[RocketLord]

GM

 

"That's Justice, boss!" one of the fliers shouted to the red Ultio.

 

Ultio Red grimaced, pointing at Justice. "Jimmy, May, Tanya! Stop that knock off! The rest of you keep going at the target! I'm gonna get those points!"

 

Moving in close, she raised her right hand, releasing a powerful blast, only to move her hand away at the last second when the armored Ultio up close moved in the way. "Get out of the way Bill!"

 

Jimmy and May, the two fliers, flew at Justice, while Tanya started blasting with lasers. First the laser connected, then the two fliers swooping in punched, only to see their hits deflected by Justice's armor.

 

Up close with Ultra Girl, Bill, the heavily armed Ultio, remained in melee, punching at Ultra Girl's cuts, while the last standing Ultio on the scene fired a smoke bomb around Ultra Girl, Ultio Red and Bill, covering them in heavy smoke.

[Cubismo]

Ultra Girl had just finished landing another finishing blow on one of the suits and was winding herself to deliver a third when shouting from down blow caught her attention. The noise might have thrown her next punch off, but it didn't stop her smiling at the new arrival, especially once she saw one of her lasers blast a suit.

 

"Hey, thanks for the assist! These jerks just started attacking me and-" Ultra Girl stopped midsentence as her maneuver systems suddenly compelled her to move out of the way of an approaching energy source. She dodged the laser, but just barely. She wasn't so lucky when another suit managed to come around land a physical hit while she was distracted. 

 

Despite her friend being the won to actually hit her, Courtney sighed at Ultio Red.  "Guess you weren't the reasonable one after all."

 

She knew it was a long shot to think the Ultio in red was any smarter than her compatriots, but it still hurt to see her optimism had been misplaced. Didn't stop her from going after her and her heavily-armored friend. Switching to her other sensors to see through the sudden smokescreen, she threw out to the red Ultio.  

[RocketLord]

Justice

 

Moving in fast, but not that fast. But they were flying. Probably not something that Mars had stolen from Robin's old suit, but... yeah. Still, way too much of her tech in them.

 

The smoke started covering the entire area, but that was fine, Robin could deal with that. Activating her enhanced vision modes, she leaned to the side and out of the way of the first strike from the flier, then out of the next, and...

 

"Who's the knockoff?" Man, the one in red really knew what to go for. 

 

Full power to the engines! A quick punch sent the first of the fliers flying away, crashing further down the street, followed shortly after by the second one. She just had to get to Ultra Girl before she got hurt again...

[RocketLord]

GM

 

"Reasonable one? Reasonable one!?" 

 

Now that got Ultio Red going. Raising both hands, she released another blast directly at Ultra Girl's face.

 

"Don't you even know who I am!? Last time we met you punched me out while protecting a freakin' monster!"

 

The one with the blaster fired at Justice again, his blast bouncing off her armor with little effect again.

 

Up close, the one that had released the smoke moved in and feinted an attack at Ultra Girl, moving back and out of the way just in time for the one with the armor to come in and try to punch her in the face, before quickly backing off.

[Cubismo]

Ultra Girl blinked as Ultio Red went into her rant. It was a rare thing for her systems to misplace a memory, but it did happen every once in awhile. She gave the lead Ultio a wry shrug. "Sorry about that. Guess I completely forgot about you." She hated to admit, but that felt real good to say. It almost made up for being blasted in the face and pummeled only a couple seconds ago after. Almost.

 

Despite her chassis still not breaking it had taken such a beating that Courtney couldn't do much of anything as her systems tried to repair the damage.

Edited February 11, 2021 by Cubismo

[RocketLord]

Justice

 

Blaster guy wasn't doing much, but the hit just kept falling on Ultra Girl. She had to get in there, and now. Adjusting a dial on her belt, Justice leapt off her bike and directly into a rainbow portal, coming out right next to Ultra Girl, delivering a quick kick to the side of the armored Ultio's head, sending him face first into the ground.

 

"You got issues, you know that, right?"

[RocketLord]

GM

 

"SCREW YOU!" 

 

Circing around Justice to get closer to Ultra Girl, Ultio Red fired yet another two-handed blast.

 

"You're a freakin' menace, and I'm gonna take you down!"

 

The last two standing Ultios seemed a bit unsure of what to do at first. The one that had thrown the smoke bomb moved in and punched at Justice, connecting with her side. Justice's armor took care of that. The blaster continued to fire laser blasts despite his allies being in close, but to little luck.

[Cubismo]

Courtney was beginning to regret not taking the high road when it came to her choice to antagonizing the Ultio-in-Red. Her last blast felt like a warm breeze compared to the last few and her chassis had not taken it well at all. The repair systems she had activated and gone into overdrive trying to fix what was broken but they were having a tad bit of trouble on account of the Ultio's not exactly giving them time to really mend much.

 

All in all, this fight was not going her way. Fortunately, she wasn't alone in this.

 

Even though the servos in her neck weren't anymore good shape as the rest of her, Ultra Girl managed turned to Justice down below. "I think... I think I need a little help up here."

[RocketLord]

Justice

 

Crap! That blast seemed way more powerful than the last few that the red Ultio had thrown at Ultra Girl. She looked hurt. Like, really hurt. 

 

She was still conscious, at least.

 

"Got it."

 

Everything fired up right, suit to full effect, she punched straight at Ultio Red. Full power behind the blow, she seemed to surprise her with the force behind the blow. As the red Ultio stumbled backwards a few steps, Justice touched her belt quickly with her left hand, redirecting the power to her legs, then spun her right leg up, straight towards the red Ultio's chest, trailing a shimmering energy rainbow behind her leg, her foot colliding with the red Ultio's chest and sending her flying.

 

Justice quickly shifted position, moving in between Ultra Girl and the last two Ultios. 

 

"Anyone else?"

 

That sounded badass, right? She really hoped that sounded badass.

[RocketLord]

GM

 

Ultio Red was sent flying by the force of the blows, crashing into a wall and slowly sliding down, obviously completely knocked out.

 

The last two Ultios looked between each other.

 

"Err... now what?"

 

They really didn't seem too keen on continuing the fight now that they didn't have numbers on their side.

[Cubismo]

Courtney made a sigh of relief as she saw Justice take out Ultio Red. She didn’t have to on account of being an android, but all the same she felt relieved to see that vengeful jerk taken out of the fight. Though severely damaged her optic sensors were still functioning and showed that even with Red defeated their were still two other Ultio’s left to deal with. Even with only the two to deal with Ultra Girl didn’t feel especially confident in surviving clashing with them even with a new friend to back her up.

 

So she wanted to try diplomacy. Again. Hopefully the third time truly was the charm. She looked towards the remaining with determined eyes. “Your leader is down and out and so is most of the rest of your posse. How about we all take that as a sign and just end this disaster right now ok.”

[RocketLord]

GM

 

The last two Ultios looked between each other, then to Ultra Girl, back to Justice, and, finally, back to each other.

 

"Alright, I'm out," the first said, throwing up his arms and backing away.

 

"Yeah, same. I didn't even wanna do this in the first place!" He turned away, arms in the air. "Sorry, Jessie kinda made us do this, and really, nobody says no to Jessie for long! You should really do something about that, or she'll just keep coming!"

 

Helping a few of the other Ultios, but not the one in red that they had identified as Jessie, the Ultios began to make their way away.

[RocketLord]

Justice

 

Alright, two guys still standing, and Ultra Girl was in bad shape. Robin would have to move fast here, take them down quick before they managed to severely hurt her and...

 

Huh.

 

She relaxed her stance, looking after their Ultios as they started to leave. 

 

"Gotta admit, I didn't see that coming," she finally commented, just staring after them.

 

Breathing out heavily, Robin placed a hand on her belt buckle and pressed a button. With a *zhooun* sound, her armor powered down and disassembled, bits and pieces flying off into rainbow portals all around her, until she was left in the red undersuit and domino mask. 

 

"Are you alright? You took a couple of hits there. I got a safe place you can rest if you need to?"

 

Robin paused and slapped her forehead.

 

"Sorry, I completely forgot. I'm Justice. You're Ultra Girl, right? I've been looking for you."

[Cubismo]

Ultra Girl was able to give Justice a thin smile even as her systems were still only just barely chugging along. "Well, you found me, and at a great time too!" She tried to laugh, but one of her systems decided to fail right then and there leaving her coughing for a bit.

 

“Sorry. Not exactly at my best right now, but thanks for the save,” she says after mentally activating a subroutine to deal with the technical failure.

 

Courtney didn’t really know much about the other heroes in Emerald City outside of what most people knew. The same was true of Justice but given that the armored heroine just saved her life Courtney figured that she was the real deal when it came to heroism. Moreso than the Ultio suits at the very least.

 

“So, you were looking for me? Why? I’m kind of new at all of…” she waved a hand at the unconscious bodies of all the Ultio suits, “This. What could I help you with?”

[RocketLord]

Justice

 

"Doing better than I did," Robin said, looking around. Sure, she had taken down a lot of them, but Ultra Girl had held own. "Well, you are new, and I remember how that was. All new, not a whole lot of heroes around, and these jerks can't make that easier, so... yeah. I was looking for you. Wanted to see if you could use some help."

 

"Yeah. Looks like you could need some rest." Justice placed a hand on her belt, next to the big pink stone in the middle, and clicked a button. A bright rainbow colored portal appeared in front of them, big enough for both to walk through.

 

Justice held out a hand towards Ultra Girl. "C'mon, the AnneX is a safe place."

 

If Ultra Girl accepted, Justice would help her through the portal, coming out into a garage that housed Justice's bike, her armor and several different armor pieces all over.

[Cubismo]

Ultra Girl's optics nearly lit up as she saw Justice form a portal seemingly out of thin air. "How did you do that!? Did you open some kind space-time tear or is just a fold in space that only appears like a tear to the eye? No wait! Is it a sidereal dimension? Are we really transitioning to another reality or just entering a different wave-length frequency on this one? Or maybe..."

 

She had nearly a dozen other questions pop in her mind as well but given where they were and just how bad she was hurting Courtney opted to save them for later. "Sorry again. I kind of get carried away on when I see new things. You can explain it all later. Or not! I know some people can be secrety about their tech, which is fine by me." Feeling rather awkward now after that whole anxious spiel, Courtney promptly went through into Justice's portal.
 

[RocketLord]

Justice

 

Robin stared and... wow. Ultra Girl was going on and on just... just like her. Oh this was great. She stopped herself from laughing at the absurdity of it, and then they were in the garage that housed most of her gear.

 

"Magic, actually." Robin grinned from ear to ear. "But there's a bit more to it than that. C'mon, I'll get you patched up and explain."

 

Leading the way and supporting Ultra Girl as she needed, Justice led her through a small common area with a table and a kitchen, further into her headquarters and towards a small infirmary, including a bed and some machines. Along the way, Ultra Girl would be able to look out a few windows, seeing a rainbow sky.

 

"This place is called Z-Space. From what I've figured out so far, it's basically the space between universes. So, a multiversal buffer zone of some kind. All kinds of stuff ends up here, like this place I found that I'm using as my HQ. I call it the AnneX, with a capital X." She paused, grinning sheepishly. "Y'know, Z-axis and X-axis and all that... yeah, I know, I know... anyway, anything broken? Just bruises? Need me to check for internal bleeding or anything? I'm not sure exactly how tough you are."

[Cubismo]

"Oh I'm pretty tough. Just there were a lot of those jerks. I-I just need some time to heal on my own." It was a lie. One that Courtney thought seemed pretty apparent given just how nervous she sounded even to her own ears. Not helping was the fact that she was blatantly covering her right arm from sight. It had taken a large amount of damage from the fight, so much so that part of endoskeleton was exposed, if only slightly. 

 

Bad liar or not, Courtney was pretty sure that Justice wouldn't leap to the conclusion that she was android in disguise. She could keep her secret. But did she want to? Justice had just saved and her invited into her super-cool headquarters. That required a level of trust that to Courtney seemed like a real good sign that the armored heroine would be understanding. Moreover... Courtney really did want someone who knew about her secret beyond her mother.

 

She made a decision. "Ok. Maybe I'm more than tough. I'm actually well..." She let go of her arm showing that past the torn flesh and the obvious metal and circuitry that laid under it. "I'm an android." Ultra Girl made a brittle smile. "Sorry to put that shocker out on our first teamup. I tend to overshare, I guess."

[RocketLord]

Justice

 

Robin opened her mouth, starting to assure Ultra Girl that she'd respect that, but she could take a look if she wanted to, just to be on the safe side, but... then she froze when Ultra Girl held up her arm. Circuitry and metal under fake skin, some of it had obviously taken damage .

 

Ultra Girl was an android. Not human.

 

"That is so cool," she finally said, moving closer, reaching out for Ultra Girl's arm, and then stopping herself. No, no touching others, even if they had cool tech. Not without asking. 

 

"Do you have self repair or something like that to take care of the damage? I can still take a look and try to patch up the worst of it, if you want me to." She motioned with her head towards the garage, with her suits, and, well... everything around them. "I kinda got experience with tech." She paused. "It's cool if not, of course!"