Heroes: The Road of Good Intentions

[Hotfoot]

Hotfoot didn't waste time. As soon as Blackheart gave the order, his shield snapped into place. Without his communicator, trying to get orders was going to much harder, but it was pretty clear, the people with guns shooting at civilians were bad.

The bullets themselves became a trail of breadcrumbs, drawing his attention to the shooters on the ground. He ran towards the shooters, diving through the shattered window, keeping his path random and changing. The shots were slow enough that he could easily keep out of the way of the individual groups of bullets. As he came up on the cars, he jumped through the interior of the car, passing cleanly through where Gravitas...Black Hole tore off the doors, his feet set up to land right in the gut of one of the shooters.

Assuming that went off as planned, the cars would become small gymnastics sets, allowing him to quickly change direction and come back around at the shooters. The flurry of blows would focus on disabling the shooters and knocking out their guns, several blows would be simply to get in close to touch the plasma shield to the barrels in an effort to melt them.


.....Meanwhile.....


Blast cursed as the pizza parlor became a kill zone. "You've got to be kidding me! At this rate we'll be at the end of the world by dinner!" He looked around for the nearest power source. If Collin had only stuck around, or maybe left him one of those boxes....a headache tomorrow would suck, but it was better than a bullet in the brain now. He crawled on the ground, doing his best to avoid shards of glass as he made it to the nearest power outlet. It was a standard power outlet, but it was at least something. If he could make it to the kitchen, something bigger might be available, but as it stood, beggars couldn't be choosers.

[Cynical Cat]

Bullets smacked into Blackheart as he exited the pizzeria in full view of the attackers. Lei's purchases got a lot of holes real fast as a hail of automatic weapons' fire hit him and did shredded clothing. The meta didn't even break stride. He glared at one of the shooters and the blue-white beams of his flash vision shot out.

[LadyTevar]

The patrons and waitstaff evacuated, Argent returned to the pizza parlor, and was very glad she paused in a shadow to peek around first.

There were a lot of bullets flying around, more than she felt she could handle even in dragonform. She slid from shadow to shadow to get a better view of the battleground, and found a gernade bouncing down in front of her. Shadows snatched and swallowed it, the concussive blast no more than a muffled *whoomp* as it went off inside.

Gernades she could handle from the shadows, and it would keep the others from having to deal with them.

[Bloody Good]

The bandaged man came hurtling back over the counter. "You're who they're after? That changes things!"

He stayed under his shield as he moved forward. Closer now, the team could see his gear, and it was, in a word, archaic. The shield was a curved dome at least a yard wide, and probably an inch and a half thick in most places. Wedge-shaped symbols had been hammered into every inch, though more than a few of them had been obliterated by dents and scars. His sword was curved, and decidedly sinister. The spear, on the other hand, was nothing special. It looked like someone had heated the end of a signpost and twisted it into a point. A few bullets made it through the gravitational maze thrown up by Black Hole. Of those, the ones that made it to him embedded themselves in the massive slab-like shield, or simply ricocheted off.

He gestured. Reality shattered. The area surrounding the cars seemed to fall apart. It was as though the world were painted on a Fun House mirror, which had broken and been laid atop an illustation of a Lovecraft novel. Euclidean geometry became a vague guideline at best.

As the lunatic ran, he planted the end of his spear in the broken pavement, and pole-vaulted over the cars. He dropped the spear and drew his sword as he flew, seeming to be in three and a half places at once in the broken air.

Laughing maniacally, he landed with a clatter of metal in the midst of the shooters and began slashing with a hateful zeal.

[SirNitram]

"Oh, I hate this part..." Black Hole grunted as sense and mortal logic ceased to function in the area around the strange man. With the kind of effort that he usually reserved for feats outside of inhabitated space, the Nova collected the space around the man mentally.

"Fuckfuckfuckity fuck..." The white fire roared into being around the left hand of Black Hole, responding to the Ring and the power needed to try and mend the damage to the local spacetime. What was left of the car's engines belched out flames sympathetically, merging with the white fire as it began trying to stitch the world's wound back up.

[Haizu]

The black haired man leaped over the counter completely hidden by his gigantic shield. The four foot wide steel disc was just as worn and scarred as his companions but was adorned with an upturned V instead of the hammered symbols. Still hidden behind his shield, he charged for the doors, shouting as he went "Maintain the madness Tasat!" Bursting out into the street, he made a beeline for the cars, hurling a monstrous spear through one of the car windows as he went. Before the spear had even cleared his shield, he was already drawing his sword and making a leap over the cars in one fluid motion letting loose a bloodcurdling roar as he went.

[Marcao]

He wasn't exactly sure as to what was going on now, the two men that had been driven into the pizzeria originally got into the action and he was uncertain as to how to proceed. There was a blur of motion near the cars, that was probably hotfoot but the other two men were clearly doing something. A part of him wanted to join the fray openly, to lash out and help in ending the conflict one way or another. However, with the situation he saw before him action was difficult.

He frowned, shaking his head for a moment. "Shit." He glanced towards the older man that he had saved as he began to steadily put distance between himself and the area of conflict. His eyes flickered to the buildings about them, aware that people were standing by the windows attracted by the disturbance. As if their homes offered any sort of refuge from what could go on in there. All it would take was a stray bullet to end a life in that situation. He imagined that calls had already been placed for emergency services, but normal police could only do so much.

In the end, he settled on utilizing his ability to move as many people in direct danger out of the way as possible. He blinked, appearing to a young woman and touched her shoulder before depositing her several blocks away and repeated the cycle. It was not something that he could maintain indefinately, but he could save some lives this way.

[B4UTRUST]

Lenox watched helplessly as one of his teammates was reduced to so much ash. This wasn't how it was suppose to go. But no plan survived contact with the enemy. And in this case he had made some preperations for contingencies. Time to stop fucking around. No survivors.

He plucked out a pair of WP grenades and cooked off a few precious seconds from them. When he threw them, assisted by teke, they flew through the air with speeds that would make most major league pitchers jealous. One went right into the restraunt, the other right at Blackheart.

Behind them came another pair of frags. Each of the thrown orbs glowed a violent bright red, Lenox's infernal energies magnifying the blast and damage capbilities of them.

Then the speedster intervened, going after his team, trying to knock them out. That was simply uncalled for. In a way it was amusing however. He would probably regret it later.

A few automatic rounds into the cars ensured that the burning phosphorus would find its way to the gas tanks, creating two very nice big booms. He ejected the clip, letting it fall to the rooftop without a glance as he slammed home another clip loaded with AP rounds. He started firing at the metas running around, this time going for three round bursts.

Down below the rest of the team was still firing into the restraunt and into the outpouring metas. The lead one seemed to shrug off rounds like they were only minor irritants. And for all they knew they very well just might be.

Wolf was the unfortunate target of Blackheart's flash vision. It vaporized her in an instant down to ash. Too fast for even her ammo to detonate. Her teammates would make up for the loss, however. Baden dropped the guns and went for his boom boom. Blocks of plastic explosive fell to the ground, hitting with a dull smack like wet clay. The detonator was in his hand.

When Hotfoot started bouncing around attacking people he managed to knock out Webb first, sending her down to the ground in unconciousness. Her body didn't get burnt by the heat shield but the force of the attack did the damage just the same.

When he came at Baden he recieved a small surprise. While the heat shield burned him it wasn't that bad. However the kinetic energy of the speedster was rendered impotent. He struck Baden and Baden stood there, smiling at him. The swords likewise had little effect on him, being like minor irritants. His simple reply was the backhand to the face of the sword wielder, returning the kinetic force of his attackers into one punch capable of easily breaking bones.

The madness seemed to affect Jobe however. His response was to flee, running straight at the restraunt. His hand went to a cord on his vest, yanking it free. The clatter of grenade pins hitting the ground was silent in the rest of the battle.

[Charon]

Legacies looked up to see the man on the roof, throwin grenades down on them. "Argent! Grenades! I'm going to go to hit the rooftop!" Legacies shifted from view, his suit camouflauging him as he jumped out of a shattered window at his top, dagger assisted speed. Slamming into the wall of the building opposite them Legacies quickly scrambled up the vertical wall as the explosives flew by him. The symbiotic creature came up to the edge of the tower and came to a dead stop, tendrils lashing out to strike at anything near the edge, the sharpened edges cutting through the concrete, not letting it be an impediment.

[Bloody Good]

Tasat's nose crumpled. Blood flowed profusely. "Bastard. Scream like a harem girl!" With a quick motion, his slammed his sword into a sheath affixed to the back of his shield. Empty handed, he reached out and tapped Baden. Only four people present had any real idea what was happening: the shield-carriers, Li Na, and Baden. Li Na could feel a nova of pain form, and pass from the bandaged man to the gunman. The shield-carriers were very familiar with this, and Baden felt the effects.

Skinned alive with blades made from ice chips. Devoured by demon-hounds. Boiled in a vat of urine. Eyes ripped from their sockets. Rose-vine catheter. Broken on the rack. Flayed with a barbed whip. Roasted over open coals.

And not a drop of blood.

[LadyTevar]

Argent had seen the grenades flying and acted quickly. From her hidden position, her shadows lashed out like frog's tongues pulling the grenades out of the air despite strong resistance, as if someone was trying to guide the grenades to their targets.

Even Blackheart's own shadow lashed upwards, snatching the grenade heading his way, swallowing it as the shadow faded back to flatness ... before the flash of the WillyPete went off.

The explosion of each WP grenade temporarily obliterated the shadow that had swallowed it, releasing the chemical fire -- but only within the area that shadow had occupied instead of flung in a deadly arc. For Blackheart, however, that heat was burning inside the shadow at his own feet.

The two Infernally-Enhanced grenades were harder to contain. The shadows that snatched and swallowed them down merely grounded the blasts. Though Argent's shadows managed to contain the fire and fragmentation from the Infernal bomblets, the concussive blasts leapt outward and skyward from the shadows on the ground with full effects, shattering the windows above.

Argent's shadowself gasped in pain as the Infernal magic backtracked through her shadows to her. She locked down her Empathy to prevent her pain from affecting the team, bottling the pain for later.

[Cynical Cat]

Blazing phospherus from his shadow splatteredBlackheart's feet and calves. His clothing began to burn. The pain was excruciating, but not enough to stop him.

Jobe ran towards him, pulling the pins on the grenades of his vest. Blackheart didn't hesitate. He turned the man to ash with a full power blast of his flash vision.

[SirNitram]

"Me-damned kids!" Gravitas grunted with effort, flames from the WP grenades sucked into the streaming fire he was making. "Making portals, windows... Don't they know other things can come across?"

His attention fully occupied by trying to repair reality, reinforcing and stabilizing the zone of insanity back towards what accounted for 'normalcy', Gravitas depended on the team and his own weak 'shield' to handle the attacks. He just needed a bit longer.

[Marcao]

The situation was quickly spiraling out of control. It was no longer an assassination attempt gone wrong or something along those lines; it was simply havoc and destruction for its own sake. Grenades of some kind or another seemed to be literally raining from the sky, and for a moment he wondered if he had taken the right decision by taking the time to shepherd civilians out of harms way. Every second that passed, these adversaries sunk deeper and deeper into their callous disregard for life of any kind. It was with those thoughts in mind that the rounds found the gas tanks and two explosions resonated through the street.

He felt his blood turn to ice. He was not going to let these mother fuckers live any longer. He felt nothing as he caught sight of Blackheart’s attack on one of their enemies, his eyes narrowing as he sought out a threat he could deal with. His eyes settled on Baden as he dropped his weapon and for a moment he hesitated, was he surrendering? A fraction of a second later his eyes narrowed as blocks of something fell to the ground and something was caught in the man’s hand. He could not be that crazy! Oh yes he could a part of him whispered. Everything about this conflict seemed crazy to him.

Hotfoot came at his target but nothing seemed to come of it. A plan danced in his mind. It was risky, but when had that ever stopped him before? He concentrated on his force screen for a moment, reinforcing it in case what he planned went wrong before he took a deep breath and focused on where he wanted to go.

<Blink>

He flickered out of existence and reappeared next to Baden. His left hand was balled into a fist and from the top of his fingers as if projecting from his knuckles a foot long triangle shape was forged of pure indigo. It was reminiscent of a katar, a triangular claw forged of pure energy the very power that flowed from within him. His ability with energy projection was far more versatile than merely crafting blasts or beams of energy. He could manipulate his energy in anyway he saw fit and projected it from any part of his body. He moved, his left arm sliding through the air aligning itself so that it would sever the man’s hand at the wrist; the same hand that held the detonator.

Inwardly, he was keenly aware of the passage of time. If he concentrated on it, he could hear each distinct beat of his heart, the world seemed to move at a slower speed as if somehow everyone else was snared in mud. This was the secondary effect of his blinking, a sharpening of senses and an acute perception of the passage of time. It was necessary the only way that he could truly utilize his gift effectively. His attack continued towards its target even as Tasat acted. He had no idea what the man had done, but Baden seemed to slow beneath it, tensing, slowing. His energy projected instrument sought to make contact with its target, piercing through flesh and bone. Assuming it worked, he would attempt to catch the falling hand while simultaneously attempting to touch Baden.

"I'll take that." He muttered, his left hand catching the severed hand even as his right reached out to touch him.

The moment that he felt his groping hand make contact with Baden he tilted his head upwards and looked into the sky above the city. A small smile dancing on his lips before he took himself and Baden along for a ride.

<Blink>

A fraction of a second later, they appeared in the sky above Chicago and he found himself growling.

"Can you fly mother fucker?"

<Blink>

He did not take Baden along for the ride this time. Instead, he reappeared fifty or so feet to the side and settled to see if the man could indeed fly.

~~

(This post takes some liberties. It can be edited on command.)

[Hotfoot]

Hotfoot fell to the ground as he hit the second target, his eyes going wide with confusion. He rolled out of the way and came to his feet on the third roll, thinking about his options. The guy didn't flinch at the attack, so something was up. Meanwhile, civilians were still in the line of fire. He ran back to the cars with people inside and quickly removed their seatbelts and carried them around the block, one at a time, careful to watch for any incoming attacks. The heat from his shield was reduced enough so that it wouldn't burn, but it certainly wouldn't be comfortable. Still, intense discomfort versus intense death, the former would always win.

.....Meanwhile.....

Blast sucked down as much juice as he could, the heat from the white phosphorus grenades, the power from the outlet. It wasn't as much as he liked, but it would hopefully be enough to get into the action, especially with the juice he drained from the Bobs earlier. His shield flared to life and he looked around the battlefield that was once a normal city block, eyeing the targets. Jobe ran in just as he was looking around, and the grenades spilled all over the floor in front of him. "Fuck!" He let loose a quick blast at Jobe as he ran out of the resturaunt, through one of the frames that used to hold a window, diving through and rolling as he hit the ground. This was going to suck...

[Bloody Good]

When Baden disappeared, Tasat was left without a target. He could feel the Word trying to lash back at him like some vicious eel. He cut it off, and the disembodied sense of agony that Li Na could feel died. Similarly, the horrific visions seem to soak into him, leaving the air clear again, except for the copious amount of gunsmoke.

He dropped to a knee, whirling to face the remaining gunmen, and turtled under his shield. A bolt of flame appeared and dove for the nearest. Through it all, he kept laughing, though it lacked some of the menacing sound it had earlier. Laughing through a broken nose is harder than most people think.

[B4UTRUST]

Lenox could hear Legacies approach even though he couldn't see it. He had pulled back from the edge of the wall and flicked his gun to 3-rnd burst. He let loose a spray of bullets through the wall.

-----------------

Baden was wracked with pain. Every nerve in his body was nothing but agony. The cords in his neck stood out as every muscle in his body contracted at once. The detonator in his hand gave a silent click as the button was pressed by his spasming hand.

With every nerve singing a litany of anguish, his back arched, his neck strained, his arms were locked and it looked like he would fall but somehow kept his feet.

He didn't even feel when the hand was severed so great was the other pain coursing through his body. His own realization of it was when he was teleported into the air and the pain cleared.

Fire burned up and down his arm, blood pouring from the open wound. He screamed. And then he fell.

Unfortunately for him, one of his powers was not flight. Nor hovering, gliding or doing anything that might keep him aloft. His only natural ability that applied here was gravity utilization. He utilized gravity to his disadvantage and somehow decided that the ground might be more comfortable.

He fell.

He struck the ground hard enough to splatter most people. His body took the force of the landing in stride and absorbed it. He lay there for a few seconds before the dawning realization passed through his mind about what had just transpired. He then began to claw at the ground to scramble to his feet and sprint as far away as he possibly could. Not that it would probably help him.

There was no timer anywhere to be seen, so trying to figure out exactly how long was left before the approaching inferno was a best guess situation. The best guesses were low ones...

The delay clicked off the few remaining seconds.
4...
3...
2...
1...
0...

In the famous words of Leeloo from The Fifth Element - Big Bada Boom.

[SirNitram]

"...Oh shit." Gravitas said simply. He had no time to run, to fling the explosive away, or any of a thousand quick tricks. Re-stabilizing reality after the nightmare-window had been made had drained him enough. The godling was bathed in incandescent fire, as the white flames summoned by his need enclosed him and tried to hold back the blast.

[Cynical Cat]

The C-4 turned the cars in front of Blackheart into fragments of glass and metal. The shockwave rolled over him and would have thrown him around like rag doll if it wasn't for his powers. Shrapnel shredded his clothes and tore his flesh. The blast wave passed over him, leaving him marked by a hundred cuts and bruises, but unbowed. There was no mercy in his eyes as he searched for the surviving perpetrators.

[Agent Fisher]

While the others fought in a street far away, Ghost stood ramrod straight, as his friend was carried from the church down the steps to the waiting hearse, as hundreds of police, and Ultima agents saluted. Finally, after a twenty minute walk, they reached the cemetery. Words were spoken, rifles were fired. A single bagpipe sounded, the strains of Amazing Grace echoing through the silence.

****

He waited till the others had gone. Ghost walked to the grave marker and squatted down. "I'll get the assholes who did this, Frank." Standing, the forty year old spook looked down. He snapped a salute and turned, walking towards his car, eager to hunt down the people who had killed Cascade.

[Charon]

Legacies looked back as the explosion went off, shocked at the size of the explosion as the blast wave even caught him a little. A three round burst caught him in the leg, digging into his flesh, the symbiote winced for a second before shunting off the minor pain.

The silver figure leapt into the sky amongst an explosion of debree, tendrils catching large chunks and throwing them hard at the gunman, keeping him off balance if he had tough skin, likely crushing him if he didn't. Legacies landed on the rooftop, the dagger that lent him his new speed out in his hand. The dagger flashed in a complex motion and then pointed at Lenox.

"Fire."

Green bolts of energy flew from the dagger towards Lenox.

[B4UTRUST]

Lenox staggered slightly as the building he was on top of shook. The foundation cracked and shifted. The building didn't collapse or fall, yet. But it was unstable, moving slowly but steadily towards imminent fall.

When the debris flew at him he grabed it with his mind and threw it right back at Legacies. Each fragment was accelerated as it flew away from him.

The energy bolts slammed into Lenox, piercing his body. Blood flowed from the wounds. His eyes flashed as he gazed across the rooftop. His vision shifted from the normal to that of a vision of life. Life energies glow a brilliant blue, seperating from a background of grays. And Legacies stood out like a beacon.

He reached out and shoved Legacies with his mind.

[Cynical Cat]

Flashing energy bolts at the top of the building caught and drew Blackheart's attention. The meta flew up to to check it out. The meta was bloody and burned, but he could still fight.

He came up on Lennox's side and swung for his sternum.

[Charon]

Legacies didn't seem phased at all as the rocks came back at him, tendrils shot out and smashed the incoming rocks to powder as they came back at him.

Legacies took a chance at what was going to happen after that and lashed out with a tendril which dug deeply into the collapsing rooftop a moment before the TK blast hit Legacies. Instead of flying off through the air as Lenox had no doubt hoped Legacies would do, the symbiotic creature was caught by the tendril he'd used as an anchor and spun around at an immense speed, coming around directly at Lenox, a dozen sharpened tendrils digging into the ground just in front of lenox as others stabbed towards Lenox at near sound breaking speed. All this was a fore-front to the 200 pound spiked symbiote that had directed his speed towards the demon touched man.

As Blackheart flashed infront of him Legacies cursed and pulled on the tendrils he'd lashed into the ground, tugging himself away from slamming headfirst into his team leader. As Legacies flew by infront of Lenox's face, a tendril lashed out, intent on cutting off his arm.

[LadyTevar]

Argent had not seen the C4 fall. The battle behind the cars was secondary as she'd tried to contain the grenades thrown from above. Then she'd been stunned by the intensity of the Word of Pain, forced to try and shunt it away or box it up. Only when it faded on its own was she able to take stock of the situation.

If she had not been inside a shadow, the explosion would have nearly killed her. Even in dragonform the shredded metal would have sliced her, the concussion thrown her. Inside the shadow, her body was protected, but her senses were not. The noise of the blast hit her as strongly as if she'd been unprotected.

Vertigo hit her as the blast faded into dead silence. It was so strong she fell to her hands and knees on the damaged street, trying to make her head stop spinning and wondering why everything was so quiet. She raised up to see who was still standing, and one hand clutched the side of her head as vertigo hit again.

Wetness.
She pulled her hand down, staring at it dizzily.
*Blood?* She didn't know if she spoke aloud. She couldn't hear anything to know if was a whisper or a shout.

She felt the side of her head. Yes... her own blood. From inside her ear.

That explains the vertigo She thought to herself, her head swimming as she tried to rise to her feet. Have to find the team. Have to make sure they're ok.