The Great Escapist [IC]

[GranspearZX]

"Why? They're just bull-... oh. Right."

Arc cleared his throat. For a moment, the Beast Rune's arrogance had overtaken him, forcing him to wrest control of himself again. It wasn't an encouraging sign. "No way for us to keep in contact, at least not that I know of. I could work something up if I had the time, but time is definitely on limited supply... we've got an hour before that jerk Harper sends agents in after us. I don't know how good an idea that is..."

Arcturus took a few steps forward. "Splitting up in a dark forest... hm. Then again, we don't know how big this place is. At least two of us should scout ahead... Warp? Errant? How about you two?"

[Ari]

"I don't look like a bad guy, and I can get hit pretty hard." the resplendent boy offered, rising up into the air and moving in the direction of the gunshots. "I've got super-hearing too, I could be pretty far off and still hear you guys. I'll go first and see what's going on!" he turned to Arcturus, the paragon drawing the Banner from its sheathe and slinging it over his shoulder "Errant can detect people real good, he can search for others."

So saying, he shot off like a red blue and gold bullet through the trees, straight for the source of the nerve-wracking mystery!

[TheAbsurdist]

And he stopped, opening his eyes, and half turning to face where they were going. "This way. Just follow me. No time to explain." And with that he started to move then, talking off into a dead run. He wasn't going to sit and discuss these things with them, it wouldn't help. And frankly he wasn't too concerned as to whether they followed him, this was a risk from the start and this was not a matter of his ego, it was a matter of having to adjust things on the fly, and he couldn't communicate what he was seeing effectively without there being a gap of time.

Not that no one else here would, but there was an immediately threat, so resolving that quickly was his first goal.

[Scuffles]

Glow was mid-way through opening her mouth to suggest that she join Heraldo out in front when Errant interrupted and took off at a dead run. She paused and blinked in surprise, then shrugged at Arcturus and dashed off in pursuit. A quick telekinetic hop let her catch up to the telepath, and she matched stride to run alongside.

"What's going on?" she asked as she glanced his way. "Obviously you can sense something we can't, is there trouble up ahead?"

[GranspearZX]

See what happens when you think too much?

Whatever.

Arcturus growled as he took off running after Heraldo and Errant, the red in his eyes glowing eerily in the artificial moonlight as the Beast Rune gloated. Still, he couldn't deny that Errant had a point, and they didn't really have the luxury of time to figure everything out. Just the fact that his transformed state was working meant that magic was more or less unimpeded by this weird-looking place, and that would have to be good enough.

[Curious Key]

Warp stared after Heraldo, chewing on the inside of her lip. Guns couldn't hurt him. He would be fine.

And then Errant jumped like a kid who'd realized he was almost late for class and took off. Warp stared after him for a moment, started running and closed the gap with a flash of red light, peering back over her shoulder and trying to remember enough of what she saw to make the leap back if they needed out of trouble in a hurry. "You can at least explain on the way," Warp said, picking up the questions where Glow left off, trying not to trip over some obstacle hidden in the darkness.

[Ari]

'This is what happens when you think too little! Oh for the love of-Elias! TALK WHILE YOU GO, quit with the 'Ooh, I'm so mysterious and handsome and of inscrutable motives' thing, s'gettin' old! Oh really? Hush, you'

"Alright, I bet Errant has that covered" Heraldo said aloud to himself as he soared through the primitively-rendered trees. He knew from experience that Elias was wholly competent, and wouldn't have done that without good reason. The fact that the reserved psychic hadn't seen fit until that very instant to say something still grated on him though, and he made up his mind to have a serious talk about it with him later. He glanced behind himself momentarily, rolling his eyes as he realized that he was only one going this direction.

"Of course I was wrong. Ah well, I can always, you know, get back to them." setting his sights on the digital forestry ahead, he kept his super-sensitive hearing focused to the utmost, trying to detect the least clue of what lay ahead for the patriotic paragon.

[GranspearZX]

GM

Heraldo could hear a sinister sort of giggling from further up ahead--almost about the same time, Arcturus could smell something burning. Before he could say anything, though, they'd rushed forward into a group of three red-skinned gargoyle creatures hovering around a tree and chucking fireballs into a figure trying to hide in the leaves; they seemed to be toying with him until Heraldo burst through the trees, his costume making him instantly noticeable. All three of them turned in his direction and immediately started to converge on the group. hurling fireballs at Heraldo.

[GranspearZX]

Arcturus picked up speed as they stumbled into the clearing. It wasn't exactly an intentional thing but now that they had been detected, there really was no getting around it. With a feral snarl, the huge bear leaped forward, a violet runic symbol appearing against the back of both his clawed hands. The sound of a faint but punctuated clap of thunder preceded him as he took a vicious swing at the first gargoyle, knocking it right out of the air and down onto the ground.

[Curious Key]

"'Guys, come quick, there's gargoyles shooting fire at people!'" Warp mimed as the lot of them threw incendiaries uselessly at Heraldo, still breathing a little hard, she raised a hand toward one of the gargoyles as it ducked and dove through the air. "See? Is that so hard?"

She breathed in, focused, squinted gray eyes at her target as she drew power out of the core of her. Darkness that made the deep shadows around them look like midmorning morning crawled over her arm, hissing. Warp pointed at the creature, bit her lip and led the target a little more before she let loose, a bolt of screaming darkness striking the gargoyle, engulfing. It froze in the air and twitched, like a program run into a glitch, and entropy devoured it from the outside in, not leaving a pixel behind.

Edited March 20, 2013 by Freely Seek

[TheAbsurdist]

"Take me to task later!  Save people now!"  Yelling as he ducked low to make less of a target of himself as he made himself, diving low towards the STAR agent, and throwing himself over the man.  Twisting about and facing the gargoyles, he held up his hand, readying himself in case he needed to pull up his powers to fend off any attacks towards the man.  Though he couldn't avoid to bring down his farsight powers.

[Scuffles]

Glow brought herself to a hover near Warp and allowed herself a tight smile at the running argument between Warp and Errant. "Now isn't the time!" she told Warp as the tiny teleporter blasted one of the gargoyles into even tinier pixels. "But hey, nice shot!"

 

Power swelled and swirled around her as she took aim at yet another of the video-game-like monsters, then lashed out with a ferocious telekinetic punch. Unfortunately the gargoyle dipped aside at the last moment and the blow swept on past, then dissipated into nothing well short of the trees as Glow cursed softly. "Well at least I got it's attention I think!"

[GranspearZX]

GM

 

The STAR officer had the good grace to look confused, despite being obviously injured. Empty gun still in hand, his left arm had burn marks from the fireballs. "Who... who are you kids?" Despite the questioning, he seemed grateful to see someone that was real and not trying to incapacitate him,

 

The gargoyles seemed genuinely surprised by the sudden turning of the tides--or rather, the one that was still moving freely did, Arcturus still towering over the one he'd swatted out of the air.

[Ari]

Staring in bafflement at the monsters harrying the STAR police officer, Heraldo didn't even flinch as the fireballs slammed into him and simply fell apart as they struck his resplendent costume. With a whoop of "Great going, guys!" as Warp blasted her target into oblivion, and Arcturus smashed his combatant into the ground, the young paragon turned to the man they were rescuing and called out "Greetings citizen! I'm El Heraldo, the guy in the hoodie is the pursuant psychic called Errant, he found you! The one in black is the magnificent mutant Warp, the guy looking like a bear is the ursine adept Arcturus and green telekinetic girl is Glow! Nice to meet you!" he added cheerfully as he rocketed off through the pixelated sky,  a streak of gold that slammed into the other hovering gargoyle with national might behind his fist!

 

He was aiming for precision, not power in this case, and so went just slow enough to aim right.

Edited March 23, 2013 by Arichamus

[Curious Key]

"Hey," Warp said, grinning sly and turning her hand toward the last gargoyle. "I'm a multitasker; I can do both." She wrought her focus and drew power out of her core, whet the appitite of the awful power with thoughts of anger and violence and a wish to break. The void of the end of the world out of her heart to coil around her arm and, shot itself in a jagged line toward the gargoyle. It pierced straight through, withering the construct until it fell apart, its pieces scattering into fading pixels. "How about you?"

Edited March 20, 2013 by Freely Seek

[GranspearZX]

GM

 

With all the fighting going on around him, the STAR agent finally sat up, taking stock of the entire situation. He didn't know who these kids were, but they were saving his life--he was hardly one to complain. He still wasn't sure what to say, being covered by two--one in a particularly colorful costume--while the other three went after the digital demons.

 

As Elias mentally scanned the area, he caught a glimpse of what he'd seen before--several more gargoyles and a much larger red-skinned brute carrying a massive club in one hand and dragging a STAR agent by the ankle in another. They had gotten relatively far, and were a stone's throw away from a massive, looming castle that seemed to be located at the edge of the woods.

[TheAbsurdist]

He straightened then, and lifted himself up a bit and he looked around.  It was giving him a headache to do this.  But his options were more than limited.  If that was possible.  "Two o'clock, more gargoyles, and a big one carrying off another agent to a castle.  We need to head that way, now!"  And he reached a hand down to the STAR agent he was standing over.  "You have to come with us.  Splitting now isn't sound."  And with that he moved from them a few steps, and then he stopped, lurching with a bit of the momentum, before he looked back at them.  "Come on, I don't know how much time we have, and I don't know how much longer I can keep up looking ahead like this..."

[Ari]

"Good shot Warp!" Heraldo exclaimed happily, the brightly-clothed paragon swooping over to Errant and the STAR officer. "Hey, Glow, your telekinesis can shield people, right? I'll carry Errant, how about you take this gentleman?" he put a powerful arm around Errant's waist, lifting them both into the air and glanced over at the others, adding "I think we should take them with us! At least until we've managed to rescue all of the STAR police. No offense to your capabilities, sir," Heraldo added with an apologetic glance at the man they had just saved from the rampaging gargoyles "but we're pretty good at fighting these kinds of things! It would be unthinkable to leave you in danger."

 

He set off in the direction that Elias had begun to move, a trail of blazing golden smoke following the young paragon "Lead the way Errant!" he called, weaving elegantly through the trees.