EternalPhoenix Posted July 4, 2014 Posted July 4, 2014 Terrifica slid her staff out of its case and shook it open just as the Psycho Collective called for aid. She smiled fiercely. Now everything made perfect sense. Theory number three is the winner.. "Now, now. That's not how you discipline wayward children. For shame. Centipedes do better, and they're centipedes. Are you more inept than a centipede? Because I must say, from what I know you've never succeeded at anything other than being an annoyance. Yes, oh great Collective. That is your reputation. You are a revolting joke that no one ever found funny." The Collective twitched oddly, the words striking home.
Avenger Assembled Posted July 5, 2014 Author Posted July 5, 2014 For his part, Caradoc didn't speak - he wasn't much of a talker in fights, and anyway it sounded like Terrifica was covering the most important details. Instead he charged up his shining blade and drove it deep into the heart of the Collective. His own experience with sentient insect swarms was primarily limited to flesh-eating creatures of the Terminus, but these creatures were hardly bloodswarms. Sure enough, the creature's retaliation, launched against the being that had attacked it, was largely ineffective. While the great tendril of pulsating, biting, hissing insects was certainly menacing-looking, and the way it wrapped around his waist and smashed him against the subway station wall with great force would have probably killed a lesser man, Caradoc had been threatened and battered before but never been kept down by it long. Snapping his blade open again as he pulled himself back to his feet, he silently walked back into the fray.
horngeek Posted July 18, 2014 Posted July 18, 2014 Stronghold frowned as she considred what to do next. She wasn't sure her constructs would be effective- or rather, she wasn't sure she could tone them down. Might need to look into that. That said... she thought for a moment. Could she bind the Collective somehow? Conventional wisdom might say that binding a swarm would be next to impossible, but... The Orange Ring blazed with a brilliant glow, as she brought up her hand, focusing on what she wanted. Something that could bind each member of the swarm, or at least the vast majority of them... while still allowing attacks to pass through. In the end, the construct she made looked something like orange-tinted plastic wrap, settling down over the bulk of the Collective and pinning it down. Haukea's forehead was glistening with sweat as she opened her eyes, the young heroine breathing out. "Okay... let's see if that works."
Avenger Assembled Posted July 25, 2014 Author Posted July 25, 2014 With the Collective contained behind Stronghold's barriers, the Psycho-Collective attempted to make a break for it - at least until Caradoc's gleaming blade came down in a flash of energy that penetrated the concrete between the psychic cockroach swarm and their means of escape. Steve knew he had to act fast, having dealt with swarms before - and he felt a strange kinship with these things, bizarre though they were. I too have been shunned by what I was once; and fled from it as I would Death itself at my heels. Before the group could completely split, Caradoc declared in a voice drained of nearly all medieval pretense, "Stop! If you flee into the sewers again, you will never find your freedom. Darkness and fear are no escape from the world. They are only cages. Come with us and be free." "Shut up, fool!" declared the Collective. "Your disguise may fool them, but I know the taste of your energy! Don't listen to their lies!"
EternalPhoenix Posted July 31, 2014 Posted July 31, 2014 Terrifica lowered her staff. "It is as he says. Running is only another cage, one of your own making. I cannot promise it will be easy. I cannot promise that you will not be feared and hated. However, I can promise you that if you run now, you will be running for the rest of your life, and you will turn out just like your parent. You choose who you are. You are beholden to no one's idea of who and what you should be but your own. You have a mind of your own. Use it. Decide what you want. A life lived alone in darkness, forever running. Or one lived in the light, with people who understand what it means to be different. I can help you. This man can help you. That young woman up there can help you. We're heroes. That's what we do. So tell me. Are you going to run, or are you going to ask for help?"
horngeek Posted August 3, 2014 Posted August 3, 2014 Haukea nodded. "Yeah... it's your choice what to do with your life. I mean, I know what it's like to be... um. Maybe not as different as you are, but still different. Told you don't fit in, maybe your brain doesn't 'work right'-" Stronghold raised her hands, making a finger-quote gesture. "I have it lucky as far as that goes, but I know what being told stuff like that can be like. If that makes sense?" She set down on the floor, looking at the Psycho-Collective. "I've tried drawing away once. I am so, so lucky that I've got a family who didn't let me." Haukea held out a hand. "I'd say that the people who accept you for what you are outweigh the idiots in the world. But you need to make the first step."
Avenger Assembled Posted August 10, 2014 Author Posted August 10, 2014 Slowly a cockroach crawled towards Haukea, then another, then another, and then a swarm poured over the glowing-orange heroine. "Yes! Yes, we will go to the surface! And learn your ways, all of your ways!" Over the swarm's head as it crawled over Stronghold shone shining bright images of the various heroes who had helped rescue it, the ones with visible mouths, anyway. "Yes! A great day has dawned for the Psycho-Collective. Let us go forth and feel the sun on our numerous faces and the wind in our antennae!" Haukea could feel the swarm all over her force-field covered skin, some merrily wandering their way right over her face. "Yes," said Caradoc, pleased that the maddened swarm had reformed itself. "Come, let us take ye out of this bondage, into the bright world of heroes beyond."
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