ic Final Exam (IC)

[alderwitch]

"Good work," Robin told Raina and Merlin, her voice still tight and tense as the simulation crumbled. She didn't answer the question as she was indeed, not alright, but not of the sort that was going to slow them down. She gave Fred's shoulder a light squeeze of mute approval once she joined the knot of teenagers. Robin well knew that reining in the Alkahest was no easy task for the alchemist, but she'd had faith in Fred to pull it off regardless. Her tension was palpable as she took a step in front of the rest of her team, blocking the line from the window to her more fragile teammates with her body. 

 

"Cracked the window, Riley, if you hit it with your grapple-line, bet we can yank it out." Robin squinted up at her handiwork, "Let's see what's up there and then... we'll go from there." 

[Gizmo]

Leaning heavily on her cane, Winifred looked like she'd gone a few days without sleeping between the beginning of the simulation and that moment. Her expression was carefully schooled as she rejoined the group, only letting out a shaking breath when Robin squeezed her shoulder reassuringly. "I am," she replied to Raina's question, the emphasis making the extra layer of meaning clear. "I was not expecting the images of your parents to be used in that way. The shock-- tt." She made a short sound between thin lips pressed tightly together. "I will try to steel myself against that level of offence going forward."

[Avenger Assembled]

Secure on Sparkler's back, Merlin told Raina that his SOS had gotten a reply - an emergency response team was on their way, once they could get through the Doom Room defenses. That meant other students - and an instructor who was their supervisor.

 

Woodsman took a knee and fired an arrow at the cracked glass above, the bolt easily cracking through the already-weakened protective glass. Above, Mr. Archer never wavered, the reflection in his glasses still the primary source of illumination from the perspective of the students on the floor. Riley could see where the lights inside the control room had shifted to red, a sign that Merlin's distress signal had been heard even in there. "Care to do the honors?" he asked, unsnapping the line from his bow and handing it to Robin. 

 

[alderwitch]

The smile that Robin gave Fred held appreciation if no real joy. "I know," Robin said simply, "Thanks." The word was short, clipped but heartfelt. It mattered that Fred and Riley cared about the misuse of Robin and Raina's parents. There weren't a large number of people in the world who did, or would even recognize them, so to have real friends care... well, it mattered. Still, there wasn't much time to waste in dealing with whatever threat Archer presented. He made a malevolent figure, not moving or even really blinking from what little Robin could make out. 

 

Robin took the line with a nod of thanks, wrapping it around her fists and bracing one foot against the furrow of metal that she'd already yanked up. With her full strength, Robin braced and gave a hard yank on the line. The glass creaked once, bowing before shattering outward under the pressure of the teenager's full strength applied on the line. 

[Avenger Assembled]

The next problem was how to get into the control room - it was quite a trip from ground-level to the now-open window of the observation booth. A few minutes of consultation had them make their way up there together - Sparkler flying in on her broom with Reagent on the back, with Nighthawk and Woodsman sharing his grapple line. Inside the room, they found Mr. Archer sitting in front of the flashing computer screens, staring straight ahead, a line of drool down one side of his mouth, his hand holding a pen over a yellow legal pad (like the ones he usually used for writing evaluations) covered in erratic, black-inked writing completely unlike his own usual neat script. While Merlin killed the interior alarms so they could see, and think, Riley peered over Archer's shoulder at the words on the pad. 

 

^CUT_IT^OUT 

^CUT_IT^OUT 

^CUT_IT^OUT 

^CUT_IT^OUT 

^CUT_IT^OUT 

 

Woodsman took a hard look at Archer and suddenly grabbed the man's collar, pulling it down from the back and exposing something protruding unwholesomely from the back of Archer's neck, a short silvery tube with a blinking red light on the back. The area where the metal met Archer's flesh was swollen and inflamed, looking infected or close to it, the red light almost matching the color of his skin. 

Without a word, Riley reached into his pocket and came out with a folding knife that he snapped open, staring with intent at the thing protruding from his instructor's neck. 

[Electra]

"Whoa, hold on there, Stabby," Raina said hastily, stepping forward before Riley could jam the knife anywhere important. "That doesn't look like something we wanna use field medicine on." She sighed with relief as the alarms cut out, even though the strobey lights continued. "Hey Merlin, can you tell anything about what this here might be?" 

 

Merlin was very absorbed with his study of the computer screens, but he turned around long enough to advise Raina that it was pretty gross. At her huff of annoyance, he took a closer look and opined that it was some sort of transceiver, sending and receiving signals from a remote station. They typically did not belong in necks. 

 

"Thank you, Dr. Doolittle," Raina muttered. "What the hell do we do with him?" 

[Gizmo]

Winifred hissed softly as she stepped off of Raina's broom and got a better look at the device lodged in their instructor. Her first thought some sort of macabre acupuncture but at Merlin's brief observations she stood up straighter. "Ah, I may have something for this!" she spoke up, showing a little more energy even if her complexion was still pallid. From the bottom end of her bandolier she produced a glass vial filled not with a liquid but what looked like a fine, silvery powder. "Everything is always some sort of signal here, wireless radio and such, so I've been experimenting. Magnetic filings, you see. A cloud of it ought to block any outside induction. While, ah, being rather opaque to the naked eye as well. Shall I?"

[Avenger Assembled]

"All right, yeah," said Woodsman, hesitating just a moment at Sparkler's words before putting his knife away. "No point in acting like we're in this alone, right? Everybody together." He nodded at Reagent, still studying the device implanted into Archer's neck. "Yeah, better cut the signal if y'can. Merlin c'n send signals out on the mainframe," and sure enough, the monkey was doing just that, "no reason to keep the signal going any louder than it is."

 

After Fred did her work, scattering the dust and blocking radio signals in the air, Fred was just about to keep talking when Archer made a sound, small, almost inaudible - making the team fall silent over his whisper of "Help..." Evidently cutting the signal had done some good - Riley was just about to comment to that effect when fate intervened. 

 

An instant later, there was a pop of air behind them as the rescue squad teleported in. Advanced students, in their uniforms, volunteering to be on watch late at night. Merlin's distress call had summoned them, though evidently not their faculty adviser. 

 

They were Madison Tyler, magical energy crackling around her fingers, Sofia Torrez, batons in her hand, Celeste le Faye with her bow already in hand, and the unmistakeable figure of Jay Vikas, his wings folded behind him in the relatively narrow space of the observation room. Jay took one look at the scene before him and demanded, "What in God's name did you freaks do with Mr. Archer?!" 

 

"Help..." Archer croaked again, "...help." 

 

"I can't reach Ms. Summers," Sofia was saying, her hand to her earpiece, "there's something in the air!" 

 

"Get away from him!" demanded Jay, only to have Riley's bow snap up into his hands, not actually aimed at 'Garuda' but obviously at the ready. 

 

"No, that's goddamn ridiculous," Woodsman hissed. "Why would _you_ be here? Why would _they_ be here?" he demanded of the three girls. "Lemme see your neck and we can talk." 

[alderwitch]

"Just calm down," Robin said as she took another step forward, her hands coming up into fists and her posture protective as she interposed her body between Fred and the new comers. "Just keep working at it," she told Fred over her shoulder, before directing her attention forward to the other students, "Something's wrong with Mr. Archer an' we need some actual adults. One of you go get more help."

 

It was a more politic statement but, like Riley, she didn't want these students closing with Mr. Archer until things could be verified. "Much as I wanna hit something tonight, fighting's not going to help with whatever's going on. Hopefully its just Archer, but...." Then why couldn't they reach anyone else? Her gaze narrowed suspiciously at the other students but she didn't repeat Riley's demands to turn around. 

[Electra]

"Whatever's f- screwing up the Doom Room has blocked communications in and out too," Raina interjected, one wary eye on both factions. "Merlin got an SOS call out and summoned an emergency response team from the school. Looks like they're scraping the bottom of the barrel tonight, but it makes sense that students are responding. I thought there was supposed to be an actual teacher supervising them, though." She glanced at Merlin, who nodded once and and dug back into his computer, looking for confirmation on who was sent out and why. "We need to get Archer to a hospital, and then maybe to a mental hospital. He cooked the simulation and then keeled over, so who the hell knows what's going on with him. You guys going to get on board and do the job?" she demanded of Madison and her cronies. 

[Gizmo]

At first, as the 'emergency response team' arrived, Winifred maintained her focus on the device protruding from Archer's neck, took a deep breath and tried to reason out their next step. This, however, was utterly beyond her expertise. She could recognize that it was some sort of electronics but as to its purpose she had only increasingly horrifying guesses. There was no way to know how deep into the man it went and she wasn't about to go digging into the base of his skull with improvised tools. Her nerves already frayed, looking at the infected flesh around the metal made her stomach churn and the hand putting weight down on her cane shook, the clattering of the hardwood audible against the hardwood floor.

 

She had to turn away which only brought her to another distressing scenario. Smith was right; they were hardly the most popular collection of student on campus but here was a group with specific vendettas against each of them. The altercation between the survivalist and his original roommate was common knowledge and Epiphany had made it abundantly clear that she considered Raina a villain by blood. Raptor was the most civil in public but she never ignored an opportunity to put one over on Robin. Did Prestige hate her, then? Winifred wasn't sure, it was impossible to tell what Celeste was thinking past the layers of false cheer and backhanded comments. She must hate her, though, that was the only way to complete the pattern. Hated her and her friends and they'd never let them explain!

 

"Th-they knew. They must have," she spoke up, voice cracking and cane dropping to the floor. She grimaced and gripped the side of her head, blood pounding in her ears, making it impossible to concentrate. "A set up. They'll lock us a-aw-aah--!" The alchemist fumbled desperately at her collar, gulping for air as her skin took on a distinctly grey pallor and her left leg began to spasm violently.

[Avenger Assembled]

"It's all right, Reagent," said Celeste, circling around to flank Fred on the right. She really was warm and reassuring, no wonder she was the social butterfly of their class! "I know you're in there, and we're going to make sure nothing happens to you-" She was also blindingly fast - whipping her fae bow out of nowhere and firing a glowing green arrow at Alkahest's midsection. They'd all seen those bolts in training; the "elfshot" arrowheads could go right through an iron door if aimed properly. 

 

For his part, Woodsman worked without thinking - jerking his bolt and firing downwards, an eruption of foul-smelling smoke boiling from the weapon outward to fill the small space of the control room, blinding almost everyone. But with his team by the still open-window, they had more options than their counterparts, backed up against a still-locked security door, who had arrived by the teleportation that was still their only way out. As the smoke filled the room, he ducked down to pick up Mr. Archer over his shoulders, staying low to avoid further shots. Getting out the window carrying Archer was going to be hard - but he had friends. 

[alderwitch]

"Everyone, scatter," Nighthawk shouted, only slightly broken by a cough in the face of Woodsman's stinky arrows. "Out, out!" She wished that she wasn't wearing her costume as at least then she'd have been able to pull her t-shirt up over her nose and mouth. Still, she'd make do. At least she was used to those arrows by now. 

 

Shifting her weight on the balls of her feet, she put herself in the middle, between the other students and her group of friends. Silently, she prayed the Alkahest would flee the stench towards the clearer air beyond the window but Nighthawk was braced for the inevitable wrestling re-match if it came to that. "I'll cover you."

[Avenger Assembled]

Jay coughed, declaring, "You crazy freak! You still collecting your piss?" Garuda took to the air and flew directly over everyone's head, executing a daring acrobatic maneuver that would have been impressive under other circumstances. Riley couldn't see his winged rival through the smoke, but he could hear Jay yelling "I'm on their rear, Next-Gen. We're not gonna let these crazies get away!" He could imagine the other young man out there, flaming sword in his hands, violent intent in his eyes. 

[Electra]

Raina groaned when Riley released his piss-cloud, reliable as a startled skunk. They were really going to need to have another talk about appropriate ways to start a combat in close quarters. She put a hand out and touched the console Merlin was sitting on, finding his furry leg a moment later. That was something, anyway. She quickly hummed her invisibility song, rendering them even more unnoticeable amidst the smoke and the stink. "This fight's going to get out into the Doom Room," she murmured to her familiar. "I need you to get control of the systems as fast as you can. And if you get a chance, tell whoever sent the help that they're a bunch of assholes." Merlin chirped agreement to both ideas and bent over the console, his flat nose almost touching the screen as he strained to see through the edges of the fog. 

[Gizmo]

Just enough light penetrated the cloud to make out the vaguely humanoid silhouette of something massive moving with startling speed before the entire control room shook as though it was about to come loose from its subterranean walls and slide into the Doom Room below. Metal groaned in protest and weaker materials burst into flying fragments as the Alkahest slammed lumpen fists into the space where Prestige had been moments before. Naturally the duplicitous archer had immediately slipped away after striking and as the monster felt only the residence of whistling air where it desired meat and bone it began to trash in all directions, taking loud snorts of the foul smoke and ignoring the stench as it tried to find and squash the threat.

[Avenger Assembled]

Merlin gave Raina the little out-loud clicking that told her he was listening but he was very busy right now, his hands and whole body in motion as he scampered from keyboard to keyboard, shutting down the manual override on the Doom Room system's - and hopefully giving them back control! Of the door, and who knew what else. 

 

"Enough of this! I'm tired of these stupid games!" Epiphany took too deep a breath - and coughed. "Is that-" She said a word that Raina recognized as an extremely foul one in most magical dialects and then shouted another few. "Conputruit et abiit!" As she cast, the cloud of foul-smelling smoke vanished like someone turning up a filter, instantly making everyone and everything in the room visible. Except Sparkler and her familiar, anyway. "Next-Gen, take them down! We can't deal with them and the Alkahest at the same time!" 

 

Raptor went for Woodsman, perhaps recognizing him as a softer target than the others with their powers. From the set of her hands, she was going for a grab, not a blow - but when Nighthawk intervened to keep her all-too-human boyfriend out of the reach of the oncoming Raptor, the other girl hissed and threw a quick rising kick that caught Robin under the chin. "Stay down, Nighthawk! This isn't time for you to fly by the seat of your pants!" 

 

Woodsman shot Robin a horrified look - but dropped down anyway, already committed to the fast descent down the line he'd dropped, his armored gauntlet absorbing the friction of the descent even as he kept a firm grip on the unconscious Mr. Archer with his other hand. He landed, sweating and straining, his muscles pushed to the breaking point - long after Prestige had already executed a perfect backflip through the opened window. "All right, Epiphany," she called with a laugh in her perfectly modulated voice, "I'll take them down, but I won't buy them dinner!" She squeezed off another shot from her perfectly formed magical bow, a shimmering green bolt that struck Alkahest in its armored torso, and was about to quip again - when Woodsman tackled her from behind. 

 

Riley didn't speak, and hadn't had time to go for his bow. Instead he hit her at a full run, knocking the tall girl off her feet and wrapping his legs around hers, wrapping his hands over her mouth, letting brass and leather block fae speech. They struggled and wrestled together, but for all Celeste's power, she'd never learned how to fight hand-to-hand - not when it really counted. When he was sure she couldn't get away, he forced himself to talk as he pinned her against the wall, hissing, "Stop fighting! Just stop fighting!"

[Avenger Assembled]

Garuda's sword, the flaming blade of the Vahana, plunged past Woodsman's head and into the Doom Room's holographic plating, deep enough that Jayaman had to work to pull it free. Riley had felt the shock of pain as the blade went past his head and knew with sick horror that he'd dropped his weapon and was surrounded and was about to be - no no no, the scent of blood in the air was only his own. Still struggling with Epiphany, who he couldn't release without having two enemies to face, Riley looked up to see Garuda gloating down at him, Jayaman's arrogance radiating even behind the eagle's face. 

 

"I always knew it was going to end this way, Woodsman," taunted Garuda, raising the giant sword for another strike, his giant bird wings rising into the air behind him. "Surrounded by heroes, without your little toys, about to get your freak ass kicked." He laughed. "Maybe they'll put you and your girlfriend in the same cellblock in juvie!" 

[Electra]

Raina kept a nervous eye on Alkahest as the monster rampaged, keeping herself in the air and well away from the destruction, despite being invisible. She sincerely hoped that something would catch Alkahest's attention before too much of the control room was destroyed for Merlin to reroute around. Outside the control room, she could see the crowd ganging up on Riley and Robin like schoolyard bullies, and hear Garuda's taunts. She frowned. She didn't like Riley, and she was going to be smelling like urine for the rest of the afternoon thanks to his goddamn cloud, but he didn't deserve a hit like whatever that sword would do to him. Besides, she admitted to herself, jackass had practically painted a bullseye on his own chest by raising both arms above his head and stretching his whole body out like he was begging somebody to shoot him. She flicked her lighter and sang under her breath, "Pop goes the weasel!" then flicked her fingers through the flame. Instantly a fireball roared away from her hands, plowing into Garuda, dead center of the chest. Raina instantly took flight again, hiding in a corner of the ceiling to watch the show. 

[Gizmo]

The Alkahest's head came up as the foul smelling cloud vanished, clumps of stringy hair tossed about as it swivelled from side to side trying to spot Prestige or in lieu of its original target some other immediate threat. The sound of Raptor's foot connecting with Nighthawk's chin caused the monster to whirl around, nostrils flaring. Without battlecry or preamble it crossed the distance in two stride, surprisingly quick for its size. Sofia sensed the attack coming a moment too late, nearly slipping out of the way before in one brutal movement the Alkahest delivered a full-body backhand with a limb large enough to catch her from her should halfway down to her waist.

 

One moment the martial artist was standing over Robin and in the next there was nothing but empty air as she was knocked clean off of her feet and through the hole in the control room wall. She spun like a rag doll, already unconscious from the force of the impact, before crashing into the floor and skidding to a halt. Up above the Alkahest looked down at Nighthawk warily, eyes narrowed and torso heaving with laboured breathing but not yet moving to attack.

[Avenger Assembled]

"Sofia! No!" Epiphany disappeared from where she stood, then reappeared next to Raptor's fallen body. She snarled, eldritch energy crackling around her eyes and hands, a sudden font of magical energy that Raina could feel all the way up in the air. Epiphany really was the most powerful magus of her generation, and a potent threat indeed - but one thing she'd never learned to do was cast the sort of magic that could see through invisibility. 

 

"Monsters, that's all you are! Ferro , ligabis inimicus!" she waved her hands and the floor of the Doom Room itself began rising up as if to swallow Robin, a binding that Nighthawk herself just managed to wriggle free from. "Prestige, stop Alkahest! 

[Avenger Assembled]

Prestige pushed herself away from the wall, staring for a moment at Woodsman, then at the hole Garuda's sword had left behind, then at the man himself. Garuda'd been hit bad by Raina's fireball; his scream of pain at flames licked at the feathers on his chest and back all-too-human. He was on his knees, still pulling himself back up despite the scorch mark over his heart - which left it to Celeste to fight the Alkahest. Focusing her attention on Alkahest, she said in a honeyed tone that seemed to come from the very back of her throat. "Good, good, my paragon of destruction, let that voice speak - be the one that destroys it all. Alkahest, strike Nighthawk!" 

 

As he saw his worst enemy at the school stagger and fall, it occurred to Riley, with a sudden, terrible knowledge, that he could hurt Garuda very badly right now if he wanted to. Jay was hurt and not thinking about anything other than his own pain - and Riley was still as armed as when the long, terrible night had begun. But that was wrong...right? Woodsman turned and ran for his bow, kicking it up and into his hands without a passing thought, and rolled for cover. There was none on the flat floor of the Doom Room normally, but the shelter of the overturned fragment ripped up and thrown by Robin earlier let him not so much vanish as simply move so no one else was focused on him. Who could pay attention to one teenager with a crossbow in the middle of a vicious super-battle?

[alderwitch]

Robin had been staggered for a moment from the blow she'd intercepted. By the time she'd caught her breath and pivoted into the fray, the chaos had only multiplied. With a grimace, she realized that her options were minimal. While she could most likely out run Alkahest with the effort put into it, it would leave both her teammates and friends vulnerable, and it would risk Alkahest turning on someone less able to take the damage. Fred wasn't going to be any happier, really, if she pulped Robin into the wall but it would take significantly longer than it would with just about anyone else in the room. 

 

"You assholes!" Robin shouted at them even as she threw herself at Alkahests neck in an effort to tangle up the raging form of her roommate. "She's not a weapon to be used!" Robin would have sworn more; after all, if she'd had the breath to draw. If someone could command the Alkahest, they could calm her down rather than ratcheting up the damage factor. Robin's breath whooshed out as one long, muscled arm grabbed her torso tight enough to hurt. "Idiots," Robin hissed through her teeth.

[Avenger Assembled]

Still gamely in the fight, Garuda staggered towards Nighthawk, flaming sword in his hand. It was becoming increasingly clear that he was groundbound, Sparkler's searing blast having burned his heavy pectorals and scorched many of his once pretty feathers - but injuries aside, he wasn't down yet. "She's a monster, just like all of you!" he said in a voice that was in all honesty a screech - somewhere between a human's shout and an angry eagle's cry. "None of you even belong here!" He pointed at Woodsman, who looked ready for a fight. "And you're the worst of them! I know what you are - I can see inside! This is all your fault!" 

[Electra]

Merlin chirruped in sudden excitement, and Raina leaned over his shoulder automatically to look, though his computer screens rarely made any sense to her at all. He informed her that he was in, that he had taken full control over the Doom Room and temporarily disabled whatever it was that had been controlling it before. He could, at Raina's discretion, begin isolating the combatants with the Doom Room's many built-in nonlethal safety containment features. 

 

"Go for it," Raina instructed, "and use that blankety thing they throw on the Room when they want us magic users to do real jumping jacks and stuff. The dampening field." Merlin agreed, tapping away busily on his keyboard while Raina flew over to the control room window. She readied a fireball, just in case, and wondered whether it would even work when thrown into a dampening field. Only one way to find out!