Info: The Second City. The Windy City. Chicago, one of the most famous (if not infamous) cities in the United States of America. It is a town brimming with culture, a town famous for its nightlife, and a town famously riddled with crime and corruption. The coming of the Gifted thirteen years ago did not completely warp the city's culture (as it did New York's); however, there is much talk of Gifted Chicago natives being drafted into either the police force or the city's gangs. And though the town has not been the scene of many super battles as of yet, some fear that is going to be the next "hot spot" in the struggle between the Namidian Wave and society's defenders.

In addition, for the past three years, many of the city's criminals have tangled with "The Ghost of Chicago," a mysterious Gifted woman who spends her days and nights protecting the innocent. No one has yet managed to pin the Ghost's identity down, but a handful of people do not believe the widespread rumors that she is a violent spirit of vengeance. Instead, they feel she is a Gifted who can be turned to "their side." Can she? As of yet, no one but the Ghost herself knows!
This message was lightly edited by the GM at 22:20, Tue 19 May 2015.

Anyone in the know, knew that Megadyne was a subsidiary of a shell company of a corporation owned by the Yakuza and that the Yakuza were one of the last holing out against a new, rising power in Chicago. What everyone did know was that "dark eyes were watching." Any criminals apprehended these days said the same thing and seemed more terrified than usual of the organized groups. Fewer freelancers operated in town, the gangs stuck to their turfs, and even the big organizations were moving in response to something bigger. In a world of predators, the signs of a super-predator being present were obvious.

The territory this group controlled was hard to nail down, you had to look for certain inactivities. Where did buildings suddenly experience a sharp drop in crime? A sharp drop followed by an increase back to normal levels but, if you looked closely, nothing important or valuable was being lost? The puzzle was complex but there. You also had to look for the innocuous crimes where nothing seemed to have gone missing and the victims often did not report. These were the signs of a war being fought by the titans of the shadows for control of the shadows.

Deep in the dead of night, an office building was being burglarized. Four men in black outfits and wearing strange, black, buglike headsets with large, black lenses and headphones covering their ears were moving through the warren of cubicles towards the offices of the President and CEO of Megadyne Industries. They never spoke but used hand signals and subvocal microphones for communication and moved with the precision and speed of ex-military.

Inside the office, Nobu Yukinori and three of his bodyguards were holed up. They had pistols and tantos at the ready. two men took up covered firing positions while a third guarded the rear and the fourth flanked the door and slapped a charge against the lock. He rolled away and prepped his weapon. No need to cover his ears when the door blew as his earphones canceled out the sound. The two with a bead on the door each fired their M302 and sent a canister of tear gas into the room. Each did a silent twenty count and then one-two men entered the room. Their goggles immediately detected the smoke and switched to infrared, low-light, UV and a few other spectrums before settling in infrared. Ratta-tat-tat Ratta-tat-tat and two of the guards went down. Nobu had just fit a mask over his own face and drew a bead on the squad leader as he entered the room. Nobu smiled even as the third bodyguard shifted and pointed his pistol at the back of his former boss's head and pulled the trigger. Nobu fell ignominiously.

The squad leader approached the JApanese gentleman, "Mr. Takiyama, Schwartze Augen has upheld our deal. You are now the boss of the Chicago Yakuza. We expect 13% each quarter and absolute loyalty or you will be the next one replaced. As you requested in the deal with Mr. Sievold, two squads of Shwartze Augen Guard are at your disposal. We are Squad Lemmings and they are Squad Annie Lennox." He set a pair of cellphones on the table. One was a SatPhone with a single button on the console.

The cold night in the heart of the country was like any other to Alex.  Crime had died down a little over the past month.  To her, it seemed criminals knew she was out there and feared what would happen if they tempted fate.  She knew her home would never be clean of all crime so Alex still went out every night to keep up her new job.  Most of her night was uneventful, citizen kept walking, keeping their hands to themselves.

When the moon was highest in the sky, something unexpected did come to Alex's attention.  Not to far from her current location there had been a disturbance at a local office.  When arriving at the location it appeared to have been broken into.  Just as she came up to the door shots rang out from somewhere inside.  This night is proving to be more than normal thought Alex as she let herself pass through the front door as if it wasn't there.  Upon entering she soon found the source of the break in.  The room was filled with smoke that was slowly dissipating and the smell of blood was in the air.  Four men in strange looking gear, gear that seemed to advanced for a normal burglary, stood in-front of one man.  Alex couldn't quite here what they were saying but distinctly heard the word "Yakuza".  The Japanese mafia?, Alex thought, what is going on here?

In her ghostly way, she floated over to the strange men, what ever was going on here had to stop.  Hovering next to one the armored men she grabbed his gun and ripped it from his hands.  Alex lifted her hand and shot the man with a blast of energy, sending him reeling across the room.  She dropped the gun and glided over to next closest one and sent him to the ground with an energy blast to his legs.  "Drop your weapons and cease this violent disturbance." Ghost said in her eerily calm voice. "I will give you a chance to turn yourselves in for you crimes today."
Alex faced herself towards the civilian, "I would contact the police now."

Not combat yet, I don't think. Talk first, yeah?

The Japanese gentleman standing behind the desk holding the proverbial smoking gun and a tanto looked down at his former boss, whom he had just shot, then smirks at the voice.

---

Behind the scenes, Laura frowned as the life signs of two of Team Lemmings spiked and she immediately reviewed their Ghould feeds through multiple spectrums but came up with relatively little except a few abnormalities. She triggered a band of the comms system and said calmly, "We have an unidentified Gifted at Location 23 X-ray/Lima. Engaging in exploratory combat." She then flipped a switch which caused a module in the two men's suits to inject a dose of adrenaline into their thighs.

---

One of the Ghouls swiveled and the barrel of his weapon scanned the room as his partner did the same. The second man hit in the legs used a wall to leverage himself up with a grunt then trained his rifle as well. The first man, rifle-less, stood and drew his pistol. Each man's visor was scanning through a variety of methods to "see" and finally settled on a triangulating echolocation system that used the small amounts of materialization Ghost would need to do to maintain her position and stability. After all, no material meant no friction and no friction meant immobile.

The pistol wielder stepped forward, "Unknown Gifted assailant, I am sure that you are used to beating up gang bangers and pickpockets with relative impunity, but if you continue to engage in this activity, we will be forced to put you down with extreme prejudice. We are NOT cutpurses and thugs." As he finished speaking, all three rifles shifted and pointed directly at her. Through a combination of echolocation, audible tracking, ambient heat signatures, and even some pheromone detection, they had a precise location on her and even an idea of how to hurt her. After all, to affect the tangible world requires one to be tangible if even for a second.

---

Far below, in a non-descript white van sat a woman who frowned at the video feed Laura was sending him on her own Ghoul Helmet. Vivianne Sommers had been a Ghoul for five years before her own abilities awakened and she was promoted to lieutenant just last year, and she did not appreciate this brat hording in on her first mission after officer's training. Her armor was bright red and her codename was Lady Crimson. All Schwartze Augen Lieutenants had color codenames. She flexed her shoulders and felt her augmented physical power and prowess as glanced down at her uncovered hands which were covered in a laticeork of chemical burns.

Ghost snorted audibly and very theatrically at the man's offer, "No, I think you are much worse and in need of a lesson, Mister." She shifted her sight to the erstwhile citizen she had come to the rescue of to see an obvious Yakuza thug with his own weapons staring at her like she was a dragon straight out of legends, "Baka?" The armed men surrounding Ghost were still holding still awaiting orders or an aggressive move from the Gifted girl. The tableau was like something straight out of a manga.

And it was broken by the most obviously stereotypical of event. A floor below, the cleaning crew had just arrived and a man had switched on a vacuum which had not been emptied properly at the last job and was clogged badly. The man stared at the machine as it whined higher and higher and finally fumbled for the switch just as the machine's bag suddenly exploded with a loud bang. The sound would not have normally traveled through the floor up into the former CEO's office, except that windows were open to allow breezes in. The loud pop caused Yukinori to jump, which caused him to squeeze the trigger, which fired a round off at the squad leader.

Yukinori had only a second to posses a look that was complete shock transforming into fear when a three round burst center torso sent him out of the window through which the unfortunate noise had sealed his doom. Ghost's combat training was all self-taught so her reactions were a second behind the others as she hurled a blast of energy at the Ghoul firing the rifle which sent him clattering against the wall again. <aqua>"You shouldn't have done that."</b> The team only responded by entering exploratory combat.

Two of the men standing fired: one send a pair of 9m pistol rounds into what should have been her center mass while the rifle send a three round burst into what should have been her right shoulder in an attempt to disable her attack parameters. Each man registered the rounds impacting the wall behind Ghost and grunted. Laura and Lady Crimson also registered the information. Laura reacted first, as was her duty, "Unknown Gifted appears to be invisible across all spectrum but registers on audio and olfactory sensors. Visual data from first engagement: suspected immateriality. Suggestion, gas."

The men in the room had been moving of course. The small room was a bad idea and they had all made a break for the warren of cubicles outside the office and disappeared into the maze. The downed man once again stood but appeared to be wobbly and moved into Ghost to make a swing at her torso. She was a bit unused to people being able to detect her but she had noticed the odd helmets the men wore and suspected some kind of advanced technology. She knew that she registered as invisible only visually. She watched the man close and finally reacted to the trained soldiers by letting the man's strike pass through her then forming a shield around her fist and striking him in the chest. The man staggered back and went clink-clink. Wait, men didn't go "clink." She looked down just in time to see a small oblong object before it detonated. Ghost did not have time to get a shield under her and fell through the resulting hole even though all the kinetic force of the blast passed through her.

So far, the men she was fighting were proving their word; they were faster, stronger, and better trained than the low rent criminals she had been rounding up on the streets. In the office below, she looked up at a very shocked looking janitor and a vacuum now laying under a pile of rubble. He couldn't see her of course but was staring up at the hole wide-eyed. The man who had dropped the grenade looked down; he snapped a shot with his rifle and the janitor fell bleeding.

Far away, Laura grunted as the man's sensor sweeps registered the unknown Gifted, "Witness terminated. Assailant still active. 67% probability of immateriality. Force of blow to chest plate exceeded normal human capacity, combat augmentation present." The helmet disappeared even as Ghost sent a blast of energy up at it. She mentally chided herself for that. It had been a desperate move and she knew that she paid for each blast with her own physical energy. She'd exhaust herself firing in a panic like that. She stood and looked in anger and sadness at the slain civilian and moved to the office door and looked out through the smoked glass. She wasn't going to be able to depend on the skills she had developed so far and these men had obviously tangled with Gifteds before. Still, a plan formed in her mind and she moved through the door and into a different but identical warren of cubicles.

The four men descended the stairs and approached the cubicle farm slowly and in formation. They split naturally into two and moved along the edges of the warren slowly with their rifles leading, the disarmed one had recovered his weapon. Laura, behind the scenes, moved through all four camera feeds and various spectrums trying to locate the assailant as she mentally chided herself. Losing track of the Gifted had been a mistake; her pay would be docked for that. As the left hand pair came abreast of a door, one flanked it and the other covered him from a cubicle across from it just like Ghost had seen in all the movies! As the one opened the door, she stepped out from behind a filing cabinet and sent a blast into the one covering him. The door opener spun and trained his rifle at her but she let the triple tap pass through her then sent a blast into him. It had worked! The two men lay unconscious and she moved to one and checked the helmet quickly, materializing briefly to do so, and found it secured in place. She felt the panic rising in her guts about being caught like this but calmed her self and drew the man's knife to cut away the strap and remove the helmet. The soldier was just a boy! She quickly dematerialized again and made a run for it.

She'd made it two steps when the floor beneath her again disappeared, but this time it seemed to melt away like plastic. She landed in a puddle of something which by the smell would have been quite unpleasant if she hadn't been insubstantial. Standing over her was a woman in a bright red suit like the soldiers' outfits: an officer of some type? Ghost looked around at the floor as it continued to dissolve and guessed the woman was gifted, too. She shrieked and hugged the helmet to her belly as the floor disappeared again and she fell another flight. This was not how she had planned to get downstairs. The red soldier jumped down after her and landed lightly like a cat. Ghost noticed that the woman had gotten a bit of the stuff on her hand moving through the hole and watched it burn the skin there. There were lots of scars, "The Ghost of Chicago, I presume? Congratulations, Squad Lemmings is one of my own personally trained units. They are quite skilled. Still, they are not likely a match for someone with your particular Gifts."

She scrambled to her feet and backed away. The woman moved faster than anything Ghost had ever seen and sent a rain of blows through her insubstantial form and even made a grab or two at the shape of the insubstantial helmet. Ghost threw a panicked blast of energy from her mouth alongside a shout of rage but the woman ducked lightning fast and closed again. Ghost threw a couple of punches and blocked a few blows with shields trying to fend the attack off, then suddenly recovered her head and just walked through the woman like her namesake and ran a few short steps before another spray of the viscous chemical hit the ground around her and she went plummeting through another floor. It had to be some kind of record. THe woman in red landed next to her again and sent a kick through her skull, unnerving even if she was undamaged and Ghost flinched. The woman chuckled, "I'll figure you out yet, sweetie." Suddenly, the woman cocked her head to the side like she was listening...

"Ma'am, Yukinori-san's untimely end has alerted the officials. CPD inbound; ETA 2 minutes."

The woman in red looked down at Ghost again and made an annoyed 'tsk'ing sound, "Cops, sweetie. I gotta jet, but you enjoy the bath, kay? If you want to talk some more, meet me at Burnham Harbors tomorrow evening, kay? Ta~!" So saying, the woman thrust her hands palms out at Ghost and more of the olive green liquid burst from her skin much as Ghost's own energy blasts did and bathed the area she sat in, sending her down yet another story. The woman did not appear again. Getting out of the pool without materializing was a bit of a trick though as to walk, you need friction and friction required things to rub against. Still, as the next floor dissolved she formed a shield over her and used it like a shelf to pull herself up onto as her energy seemed to be able to interact with her even when insubstantial. She then floated it over to some "dry' ground and made her way slowly down passed the CPD cops in riot gear ascending the stairs.

The combat had been a harsh lesson for Ghost in her own inexperience. What a protracted fight would mean was beyond her, but the cops had saved her this time. Her encounter with real criminals had rattled her burgeoning confidence badly. It could not stop her grinning like a madwoman though as the adrenaline surged like waves and the experience settled into her brain like a warm blanket. She had been on the back foot the almost the entire time. All in all, she had not fared badly at all. He abilities were quite powerful and strongly defensive. Her offense was a bit of a problem, though. She still clutched her prize against her, protected by the insubstantiality she had spread over it, too. What it could tell her, only time would tell. Whether she would be at the docks tomorrow, that was a matter for further thought.

This message was deleted by the player at 01:26, Sun 24 May 2015.

As the men fixed their guns on Ghost, Alex's mind raced.  It looked like she was getting more questions than answers.  Out of the corner of her eye Alex noticed blood pooled on the floor from the men who were forgotten.  Alex frowned, "You may not be the run of the mill criminals but you are still murderers," Looking back up at the suits.  Her voice grew, "I would be no better than you if I let you walk."

At that Ghost let her body become intangible, she then lifted herself up into the ceiling.  The armored men released a good some of bullets into the spot Ghost was heard last.  This is going to be tricky if they knew where I was, Ghost pondered, Gonna have to try something better.  When she came down she was behind one of the men still with a rifle, with hands up in-front of her chest.  In a quick seconds she came back to the physical plane and grabbed the mans shoulders, in attempts to drag him into a wall.  Much to Ghost surprise the man reacted lightning fast and grabbed her arm tightly.  Before she could react she was hurled over the man and thrown to the ground.  Alex let out a grown as all the air left her chest and her arm began to be twisted by the now blatant combat trained man. "Unknown gifted has ability to materialize. Data now informs that gifted can switch in and out of the physical plane." Recited the man placing a foot on Alex's arm.  Her head raced and her breathing quickened, Alex was flustered.  They could fight her, they knew where she was, they were better than her, if they even nik me i'm dead, they had all the odds in their favor.

Just as Alex started to lose her cool something happened that startled them all.  A floor below a janitor was going through his normal routine, not even noticing the fight happening a floor above.  However when he turned on his old bag vacuum it started to make strange noises, like it was choking.  "What the heck?" Questioned the man.  He knelt down to the running machine to inspect what was going wrong, as he did the vacuum exploded in ball of dust and debris.

Back up on the floor where the real action took place, when the bang went off the man holding her arm loosened his grip.  Ghost took her chance to fade out, she held her arm as she picked herself up off the ground.  Just as quickly as Ghost, the armed men focused back on the fight and began to move.  The two injured men moved backwards, towards the floors stairs and the two able men lifted their guns at Ghost and let out covering fire, shifting slowly backwards.  The man with them, who had been watching til now, barely dove out of the way of bullets; however he yelled in pain as one off the bullets lodged itself into his shoulder.  Alex let the bullets fly through her as she calmed herself down, You need to focus or they will get the better of you.  She looked down and took a deep breath, exhaling slowly.  When she opened her eyes she saw a round metal ball at her feet, she cocked her head to the side and sighed.  The ball exploded and the ground beneath her feet vanished.

Ghost fell through the hole, catching herself on the way down; she floated onto the floor not covered by ceiling.  Alex looked up at the hole as one of the men gazed back at her muttering something into his helmet.  Her eyes followed the new hole down to were she could have landed when she saw the feet of a man.  The unknowing janitor had been crushed by the sudden collapse of the ceiling, with no time to escape.  Alex simmered with anger and frustration alike, now innocent civilians were getting killed, these men were going to pay.    Ghost ran into the array of cubicals that made up this floor as the four man descended the stairs onto the level she was now on.  With their guns up the scanned to room moving in two groups.  They split taking two rows of tiny offices; one man would walk and keep his eyes on the hallway as the other turned and scanned each cubical they passed.  She would have to take them out at the same time for the other group not to notice.  Alex drifted over to one the offices not yet checked and focused her energy into her hands.  When the man turned the tight corner Ghost let out a huge blast that knocked the rifle wielding assailant into the desk of the cubical across the way.  His head hit the desk with a loud thud as his body crumpled to the ground with silent moan.  His teammate stepped back and fired his pistol into the room at a safe distance.  All the shots landed in the wall of were Ghost had been, before she moved behind a filing cabinet.  The armored man with the pistol stepped though into the room she was in and scanned for her or were she went.  To his surprise Ghost floated through the flimsy walls and came around behind him.  Ghost let out many bursts of energy to the mans back, this sent him further in the cubical and hunched over an office chair.  She kept firing at him until he stopped trying to get back up and he surrendered to the ground.  Alex smiled to herself, two down, two to go.

Looking behind her she spotted the other tag team and made her way for them.  Before she could even take a step he foot sank through the floor.  To her amaze the floor below her had began to melt and for the second time that day she fell through to the floor below.  She hit the ground hard, being caught of guard again she had materialized.  This was not how she planned going downstairs.  "Hello sweetie," Said a voice next to her.  Alex look over and her eyes met that of a woman's.  She wore a suit similar to that of the assailants on the floor above, however hers was blood red.  The women walked over to where she had caught Ghost, "The Ghost of Chicago, I presume? Congratulations, Squad Lemmings is one of my own personally trained units. He is one of my most skilled men. Still, my men are not likely a match for someone with your particular Gifts."

Alex scrambled to her feet and fadded again as the woman approached her.  She shot two blasts of energy at the red lady but to her dismay the woman dodged them easily, almost as if it was a joke.  And with a chuckle the women shot forward throwing punches at the air Ghost occupied.  The two women moved back and forth, dodging, shooting, punching, flinching.  Alex could feel the her own energy growing thinner and thinner as the brawl continued.  This was going to be bad if the fight lasted much longer.  Out of a fit of exhaustion Ghost materialized to let off a blast of energy and the red lady.  The lady in red spun around it and kicked Ghost in the side, the kick connected and Alex was thrown to the side.  The women smiled, "That's interesting. Don't worry, I'll figure you out soon enough."  Alex grabbed her side and watch as the smiling woman bolted forward again.  Ghost let herself fade once more, as the last of her energy depleted.  The women leg stopped not two inches from her face, as the women made a face and placed her hand on her ear.  With the tsk of her tongue she lowered her leg and stood firmly on the ground.  Alex took this chance to stand, still holding her side were she let her guard down, she asked "Finally going to stop and talk thing out?"

The crimson lady laughed and replied "Cops, sweetie. If you want to talk some more, meet me at Burnham Harbors tomorrow evening, kay? But I gotta jet, you enjoy the bath, kay?"  At that the woman thrust her hands out and an olive green substance shot out of her hands and onto the floor beneath Ghost.  Prepared this time she managed to hover above the ground where the floor began eat itself away.  The red women ran for the window that led to the back of the building and leapt out.  Alex had no intention in following her.  She floated out of the building and down to the ground.  Police were now there, she couldn't help but to think if they showed up sooner things wouldn't have gone down like they did.

As Alex walked away with aches in her side and arm she pondered what happened.  For the first time since she started she got her ass handed to her.  These men she faced were above anything she was prepared for and the women was in a whole nother league.  "This was not how I expected my day to go," Alex muttered to herself as she made for home to recuperate and think over the crimson woman's proposal.
This message was last edited by the player at 07:04, Sun 24 May 2015.

"You are not run of the mill criminals, you are much worse and in need of a lesson, Mister. You are murderers, I would be no better than you if I let you walk."

At that Ghost let her body become intangible, she then lifted herself up into the ceiling.  The armored men released a good some of bullets into the spot Ghost was heard last.  This is going to be tricky if they knew where I was, Ghost pondered, Gonna have to try something better.  When she came down she was behind one of the men still with a rifle, with hands up in-front of her chest.  In a quick second she came back to the physical plane and grabbed the mans shoulders, in attempts to drag him into a wall.  Much to Ghost surprise the man reacted lightning fast and grabbed her arm tightly.  Before she could react she was hurled over the man and thrown to the ground.  Alex let out a grown as all the air left her chest and her arm began to be twisted by the now blatant combat trained man. "Unknown gifted  Unknown Gifted appears to be invisible across all spectrum but registers on audio and olfactory sensors. Visual data from first engagement informs that gifted can switch in and out of the physical plane.  Suggestion, gas." Recited the man placing a foot on Alex's arm. She was a bit unused to people being able to detect her but she had noticed the odd helmets the men wore and suspected some kind of advanced technology. Her head raced and her breathing quickened, Alex was flustered. They could fight her, they knew where she was, they were better than her.

'If they even knick me I'm dead...' They had all the odds in their favor.

Just as Alex started to lose her cool something happened that startled them all.  A floor below a janitor was going through his normal routine, not even noticing the fight happening a floor above.  However when he turned on his old bag vacuum it started to make strange noises, like it was choking. "What the heck?" Questioned the man.  He knelt down to the running machine to inspect what was going wrong, as he did the vacuum exploded in ball of dust and debris. The sound would not have normally traveled through the floor up into the former CEO's office, except that windows were open to allow breezes in. The loud pop caused Yukinori to jump, which caused him to squeeze the trigger, which fired a round off at the squad leader.

Yukinori had only a second to posses a look that was complete shock transforming into fear when a three round burst center torso sent him out of the window through which the unfortunate noise had sealed his doom. When the bang went off the man holding her arm loosened his grip; Ghost took her chance to fade out, she held her arm as she picked herself up off the ground. "You shouldn't have done that." Ghost's combat training was all self-taught so her reactions were a second behind the others as she hurled a blast of energy at the Ghoul firing the rifle which sent him clattering against the wall as he dropped his weapon. The rest of the team only responded by entering exploratory combat.

Two of the men standing fired: one send a pair of 9m pistol rounds into what should have been her center mass while the rifle send a three round burst into what should have been her right shoulder in an attempt to disable her attack parameters. Each man registered the rounds impacting the wall behind Ghost and grunted. Laura and Lady Crimson also registered the information. Alex let the bullets fly through her as she calmed herself down, 'You need to focus or they will get the better of you.'  She looked down and took a deep breath, exhaling slowly.  When she opened her eyes she saw a round metal ball at her feet, she cocked her head to the side and sighed; the ball exploded and the ground beneath her feet vanished.

Ghost fell through the hole, catching herself on the way down; she floated onto the floor not covered by ceiling.  Alex looked up at the hole as one of the men gazed back at her muttering something into his helmet.  Her eyes followed the new hole down to were she could have landed when she saw the feet of a man.  The unknowing janitor had been crushed by the sudden collapse of the ceiling, with no time to escape. The helmet disappeared even as Ghost sent a blast of energy up at it. She mentally chided herself for that. It had been a foolish move and she knew that she paid for each blast with her own physical energy. She'd exhaust herself firing in a rage like that. She stood and looked with sadness at the slain civilian as she  simmered with anger and frustration alike; now innocents were getting killed, these men were going to pay. So far, the men she was fighting were proving their word; they were faster, stronger, and better trained than the low rent criminals she had been rounding up on the streets. She wasn't going to be able to depend on the skills she had developed so far and these men had obviously tangled with Gifteds before. Still, a plan formed in her mind as she moved into a warren of cubicles.

The four men descended the stairs and approached the cubicle farm slowly and in formation. They split naturally into two and moved along the edges of the warren slowly with their rifles leading, the disarmed one had recovered his weapon. Laura, behind the scenes, moved through all four camera feeds and various spectrums trying to locate the assailant as she mentally chided herself. Losing track of the Gifted had been a mistake; her pay would be docked for that. As the left hand pair came abreast of a door, one flanked it and the other covered him from a cubicle across from it just like Ghost had seen in all the movies! As the one opened the door, she stepped out from behind a filing cabinet and sent a blast into the one covering him. The door opener spun and trained his rifle at her but she let the triple tap pass through her then sent a blast into him. It had worked! Looking around her, she spotted the other tag team and made her way for them. Alex drifted over to one of the offices not yet checked and focused her energy into her hands.  When the point man turned the tight corner Ghost let out a huge blast that knocked the rifle wielding assailant into the desk of the cubical across the way.  His head hit the desk with a loud thud as his body crumpled to the ground with silent moan.  His teammate stepped up for a clear line of sight and fired his pistol into the room at a safe distance.  All the shots landed in the wall of were Ghost had been, before she moved behind a filing cabinet.  The armored man with the pistol stepped through into the room she was in and scanned for her or were she went.  To his surprise Ghost floated through the flimsy walls and came around behind him. She let out another big burst of energy to the mans back, this sent him further in the cubical and hunched over an office chair.

Ghost moved forward to see if he was out like his partner; She'd made it two steps when the floor beneath her again disappeared, but this time it seemed to melt away like plastic. She landed in a puddle of something which by the smell would have been quite unpleasant if she hadn't been insubstantial. Standing over her was a woman in a bright red suit like the soldiers' outfits: an officer of some type? Ghost looked around at the floor as it continued to dissolve and guessed the woman was gifted, too. Ghost did not have time to get a shield under her and shrieked as the floor disappeared again and she fell another flight. This was not how she had planned to get downstairs. The red soldier jumped down after her and landed lightly like a cat. Ghost noticed that the woman had gotten a bit of the stuff on her hand moving through the hole and watched it burn the skin there. There were lots of scars, "The Ghost of Chicago, I presume? Congratulations, Squad Lemmings is one of my own personally trained units. They are quite skilled. Still, they are not likely a match for someone with your particular Gifts."

Alex scrambled to her feet and faded again as the woman approached her.  She shot two blasts of energy at the red lady but to her dismay the woman dodged them easily, almost as if it was a joke.  And with a chuckle the women shot forward throwing punches at the air Ghost occupied.  The two women moved back and forth, dodging, shooting, punching, flinching.  Alex could feel the her own energy growing thinner and thinner as the brawl continued.  This was going to be bad if the fight lasted much longer.  Out of a fit of exhaustion Ghost materialized to let off a blast of energy and the red lady.  The lady in red spun around it and kicked Ghost in the side; the blow connected and Alex was thrown by the force of the impact. The women smiled, "That's interesting. Don't worry, I'll figure you out soon enough."  Alex grabbed her injured side, and watched as the smiling woman bolted forward again.  Ghost let herself fade once more, as the last of her energy depleted.  The women leg stopped not two inches from her face, as the women made a face and placed her hand on her ear;

"Ma'am, Yukinori-san's untimely end has alerted the officials. CPD inbound; ETA 2 minutes."

With the tsk of her tongue she lowered her leg and stood firmly on the ground.  Alex took this chance to stand, still holding her side were she let her guard down, she asked "Finally going to stop and talk thing out?"

The woman in red looked down at Ghost again and made an annoyed sound, "Cops, sweetie. I gotta jet, but you enjoy the bath, kay? If you want to talk some more, meet me at Burnham Harbors tomorrow evening, kay? Ta~!"

At that the woman thrust her hands out and an olive green substance shot out of her hands and onto the floor beneath Ghost.  Prepared this time she managed to hover above the ground where the floor began eat itself away. The red women ran for the window that led to the back of the building and leapt out.  Alex had no intention in following her. She floated out of the building and down to the ground. Police were now there, they had saved her this time yet she couldn't help but think if they showed up sooner things wouldn't have gone down like they did.

As Alex walked away with aches in her side and arm she pondered what happened; for the first time since she started she got her ass handed to her. She used to believe her abilities were quite powerful, but these men she faced were above anything she was prepared for and the woman was in a league all her own. Her encounter with real criminals had rattled her burgeoning confidence badly, and the combat had been a harsh lesson for Ghost in her own inexperience.

"This was not how I expected my day to go," Alex muttered to herself as she made for home to recuperate and think over the crimson woman's proposal.

Thirty minutes latter and the members of Team Lemmings were sitting in the back of a police van looking at one another grimly. They were trying to decide if they were deadmen or worse. They had each been taken out by a girl and it stung their pride as professionals. They had also been stripped down to their briefs, which wasn't as bad.

So, considering their thoughts, none of them were surprised when a riotous sound was heard then the van they were in shook like the end times were upon them. Each rolled with it as the van tipped and the sounds of gunfire were heard. There was a brief silence then the doors of the van lurched, buckled, and then tore from their hinges. Lady Crimson stood looking at them with the door held over her head. Everyone paused then she tilted her head, "Your gear is in the van over there... the one on fire. Get equipped. You have one minute thirty."

The men scrambled and their boss looked over at the wrecked vehicles and scattered bodies as she wrapped up the situation. She was thinking about the Hero they had encountered earlier and the mess it had made of Schwartze Augen operations in Chicago. The Yakuza were furious and mobilizing; their contact had been lost. She would need to make a call alter and get instructions. She was the type to carry out orders not think up the plan.

She blinked and looked back down as her men climbed into a pair of SUVs and tore off for the base their organization had in the area. They would need to change tactics and she had a date tomorrow.

Alex walked up the steps to her alcove and took a deep breath before opening her backdoor.  In the whole world there was one person who hated what she did most, Alex's mother.  Understandable, but when a person is trying to stop a armed robbery, it doesn't help when someone is trying to get you to wear protective gear.  Alex loved her mother.  But she felt like her mother worried to much about a person who could become intangible.

Alex locked the door behind her as she gave a sigh of relief.  "Alex?  Is that you?" asked a concerned voice from the other room.

"Yes it's me mom," replied Alex as she walked into the room the other voice came from.

Her mother sat on the couch with a pillow gripped tightly between her arms and a remote in hand.  Her brown eyes meet with Alex's and she could see worry drain from their irises.  "Thank God you're okay," smiled her mother.  Her face then panned back over to the TV screen as the local news continued to report about the recent events at an office building. Her mothers eyes grew concerned again, "Was that you?" she said in a more stern voice.

Alex answered, "Yah, so what?  I was just doing what I do every night." she lied.  Alex turned around and crossed her arms, "I was just stopping a robbery."

The room fell silent.  The gig was already up.  Alex turned around and saw her mother with a scowl on her face.  Alex huffed "Come'on Mom.  I made it back okay..."

Her mother continued to stare.

Alex frowned "...Don't look at me like that..."

Her mother lightened up her stare and said "I don't like when you lie to me.  You may be invisible to everyone else, but I can still read you like an open book."  Her voice gain a caring tone as she continued, "I am so glad you're okay, but could just be straight with me.  It already stressful enough knowing you're out there fighting.  The least you can do for me is to be honest."  Her mother paused looking at the report on TV again, "They said there were shooting and explosions.  Your not hurt, are you?"  Her mother then got up from her seat and approached her daughter.

Alex walked away from her mother, "I'm fine, nothing I can't sleep off."  She fixed her eyes at the ground and opened up to her mother, "But, other people got hurt.  Killed."  Alex went silent before continuing, "I could have saved them."

Her mother found Alex's arm and rubbed it.  "I'm sure you did your best." she said in her loving tone.   Her mother sighed "Now, why don't you go take a shower.  I'll go warm up your dinner."

At that her mother left her side and walked into the kitchen.  Alex let a small smile wipe her face as she made her way for her bedroom.  It was nice knowing, even if her mother didn't like what she did, she still had faith in her ability to do her best.  But Alex's night was not so relaxing as she kept reminding herself of tomorrow.  She would have to go meet the Crimson Lady, and she was not looking forward to it.

Lady Scarlett sat in her big, comfy office chair and logged into a website to check a message board her cellphone had prompted her to. She found a message indicating a go order and checked the time reference then typed a group text message into her phone Update, Order 101: Green Light. 01600053120329999-23.

The message lit up cellphone screens all across Chicago and all hell broke loose in the city.

---

Deckard looked down at his wrist and saw the text message scroll across the screen then held up two fingers and moved his hand in a circle then pointed to the door. As one, the four Ghouls of Team Annie Lennox burst from a van parked in front Wintrust Bank and moved on the financial institution. The lead pair burst through the glass doors and shot the pair of rent-a-cop security guards with a smart pair of bursts then moved toward the counter, the second pair moved in and took positions clear of cameras, line of sight from the street, and with good points of view over the bank floor. The last through locked the door behind him as the first pair moved on the tellers. One moved straight to the door and pointed her gun at the teller, "Hands off the button ma'am." The other moved toward the offices. Within a minute, they had the bank tied up tightly and began to liberate of its various liquid resources.

Deckard kept an eye on the timer on his wrist. They had two more banks to hit today and each one was planned to a T, in and out in under four minutes thirty-two. He used his subvocal mic to send an okay message to the sniper on the opposite rooftop.

---

Across town, Squad Lemmings, still recovering, burst from a similar van and moved with the same anatomical precision into The Chicago Diamond and Jewelry Exchange to make an equally ruthless and violent robbery of that location. They were not subtle and used explosives and advanced weaponry to move through security designed to stop almost anything: almost. Another sniper operated in distant support of them as well.

---

There were three more targets on the list of places to hit: Tribune Tower, Holy Name Cathedral, and Advocate Lutheran General Hospital. Of these, Lady Crimson had chosen as her target for the afternoon Advocate General. The reason was to cause chaos and panic, nothing more. She had her rendezvous that night though so she had to make this quick. Even as she was approaching the ER doors, her phone rang and she paused to answer, "Sir? Yes, Sir, the package is secure at Burnham Harbors as discussed previously. Yes, sir, the plan is in action. Yes, sir, 12 hour protocol is in place. Agreed. Squad Lemmings and Squad Annie Lennox are at their assignment. Squad Link is operating in support capacity. Roger. I won't let you d..." But the call had ended before she could utter the useless assurance. Dieter knew that she would do what she was told and knew the consequences if she did not.

Cimmeria  entered the Holy Name Cathedral, it was empty save for the the choir of nuns rehearsing their chosen hymnals for the upcoming service. The women's voices were angelic, filling the impossibly high arched ceilings of the church with music that brought strong emotion into all that heard it. All except Cimmeria, her face remained locked in its emotionless mask, her violet eyes seemed vacant of a soul.

The singing women paid Cimmeria no mind, as she lifted AT4 she carried had been carry at her side. She ignored the soreness she felt knitted in her side and fired. The hot explosion of back blast caught fire to the pews behind her, making her a dark silhouette against the burning flames. The shell Skipped past the nuns, causing them to rush for the exits, their heavenly music silenced and replaced by hysteria. Cimmeria dropped the launcher and continued proceeding towards the front of the cathedral. The shell exploded in a giant cloud of fire and debris, pieces of wood, ceramic, and plaster arcing through the air before rain down among the pews. She was not 100% percent yet, but she felt well enough to take part in drawing out ITSDA. Cimmeria was outfitted with a pair of M9 pistols holstered on her person, a tanto knife sheathed in each boot and the determination to bring the building to the ground if need be.
This message was last edited by the player at 18:46, Sun 31 May 2015.

It was impossible to tell at first, but it became clear that someone was walking through the hole Cimmeria had applied to one of the church walls. As they took step after step, the curtains of thick smoke that obscured them fell away one by one reveling a growing number of details; they were humanoid and tall by human standards, with broad shoulders that were connected to thick arms which matched the legs below. It would be easy to guess this figure was wearing ITSDA battle armor, but then the truth was revealed; the man's form was made of only his own flesh and bone covered by clothing. Not even a vest clung to his chest, and although he has armed with two hand guns in holsters plus a vintage K-Bar in a sheath on his belt, his hands currently held a hotdog that he was actively taking a bite out of as he entered. The stranger swallowed, belched, and smiled at the villain as though the pair were in a bar and not a partly demolished place of worship.

"Whoa, somebody's got some issues. What is it, did daddy not hug you enough as a kid? Or maybe too much? If you're one of those chicks outta tha' Bible, I remember two tha' Army preacher used ta' talk about and since you don't seem ta be no virgin ta' me, you must be lost cause Babalon ain't around these parts. Or, is it just your time of tha month?"

There were no sirens, no flashing lights, no sound of helicopter blades overhead; this stranger had walked into a hostile situation through a massive smoking hole without backup or armor, and instead of protecting himself he seemed more interested in finishing lunch. It looked as though he had known she would attack this place, and was simply awaiting an invitation;

But looks can be deceiving. Frank had been sent to Chicago to find some ghostly Gifted for the ITSDA, but he had been taking his sweet time about it and had been in town for a time enjoying himself while charging his expense account. He had decided to have a Chicago dog, not in some fancy tourist trap but from a cart with a vendor who had been doing it for years. Said cart happened to be on a street corner close to the church, so his involvement here was blind luck.

When morning rolled around, Alex was still in bed sleeping off the bad day.  It wasn't until her mother had shook her awake, did she finally get up.  "Alex you need to get up!  Somethings happening." said her mother in a quivering tone.

Alex jolted upright and looked at her mother.  "Wh-What?" asked Alex as she swung her feet off the bed and stood up.  As she did so the pain in her side returned, the blow from the crimson lady had formed a good bruise.

"Come look," replied her mother.  She led Alex into the living room were the news was playing on the TV.

"Reports of multiple break-in's and robbers flooded in only moments ago.  Three criminal events occurred within moments of each other.  As of now, the CPD is asking people in the area to evacuate, as the police move in to try and contain these events.  We now go to Dave Rowe who is live at..."

Alex watched in horror as she saw a jewelry store being robbed with accuracy of trained men.  Maybe what happened last night was leading up to all this.  Perhaps those men from the night before were involved.  Whatever was going on, she need to help.  Alex rushed over to the door and pulled it open, she needed to do something now before people got hurt again.

"Alex!"

She turned around to see her mothers concerned face. "Please be careful," said her mother.

Alex smiled "I will."  With that she flew out the door and headed towards the nearest disturbance, which just so happened to be the Holy Name Cathedral.

Eric was currently enjoying a day strolling down the street when a buzz in his head alerted him to something of interest. He concentrated on a phone call being held a few feet away and overheard the individuals talking about all these break ins going on. He quickly tapped into the local network and found the news story. He kept looking for anything interesting and there it was. A single individual striding into a hole made in the side of a church. A few moments later he had the name of the church and began to make his way there. At the same time he was tapping into camera feeds from news cameras and people who just had their cellphones out. ahh thank god for modern technology he thought to himself. He noticed the local authorities headed towards the scene and quickly tapped into their radio feed. Proceed with caution possible Gifted incursion. Suggest recon to comfirm. Eric smiled to himself. He needed to get there. Especially if there was gifted. If the AGF showed up he could easily deal with them.

Eric continued on his way when he received an email. Only a very select few knew how to contact him. HE opened it and read it carefully before smiling again. He concentrated as he walked and soon the police lines were filled with the reports of freak car accidents, people losing control of their vehicles on the street he was walking on. He made sure to act like the regular public and seemed shocked. He continued to tap into the road light systems and turned every single light to green. Which caused even more chaos and panic as more traffic accidents happened.

He made fire alarms go off at the local school systems and hospitals while causing emergency alarms to go off on many local businesses. He made sure no cameras were looking at him as he made his way through the crowds towards the church. Today was finally getting interesting.
This message was last edited by the player at 07:14, Mon 01 June 2015.

Moments after his cell phone lit up, an Irish, 20-something man with an ugly mullet and a full leather ensemble strode into the lobby of the Tribune Building. He never looked up from his phone as he entered the building, but the messenger bag slung over his shoulder caught the eye of security.

The man was known as Ash, and it would soon be clear why. He stopped in his tracks, snapped and pointed at a mohawked man in a suit standing in front of a security officer's desk, then pulled a handful of pollen from his bag. Two security officers stood up.

"Excuse me, sir!" said the closer officer as he walked toward Ash. As soon as the officer passed Zenith, the man with the mohawk, he spit at the officer's feet. Upon hitting him, Zenith's spit instantly transformed into a green nerve gas that sent the officer into coughing spasms.

"Ladies and gentlemen, have I got news for you!" said Ash with a smile before he blew the pollen out of his hand. Zenith dashed over to him, the second officer took aim, but it was too late. The pollen exploded into flames! People retreated deeper into the tower, stopped and rolled, and called for backup, but the flames just kept spreading from dust particle to dust particle.

After less than a minute, the flames had engulfed two thirds of the tower's floors. Satisfied, the Gifted duo calmly stepped out the door.

"Ashes to ashes, dust to dust," said Ash. A childish little giggle left his lips.

"You have no patience, lad." responded Zenith. "Were it not for your hastiness, I could've transformed the attack into a hostage situation..."

"I hate those, boss," said Ash as he pulled out a cigarette and lit it with one of the ashes flying off of the building behind them. A fire alarm rung out; the authorities would be here soon. "Too much standing around, waiting to get shot."

"We are Gifted, my boy. We need not fear death; who can touch us?"

"Namidias," responded Ash, coldly.

"True, but why would he want to...?"

The pair heard a fire engine approach them as they spoke. In response to the noise, Zenith cut open his hand with his one long fingernail, ran to a nearby street, and slapped his hand on the ground. It left a huge, brown, bloody print in the center of the road.

"A liquid chemical with properties similar to napalm. My own invention, I might add," the eloquent criminal stopped speaking for a bit and turned to his partner. "They'll never know what hit 'em."

Never being a woman of conversation, Cimmerian granted the old man with her trademark greeting. In one fluid motion she drew one of her M9 pistols and fired. The man's hotdog exploded in his hand, pieces of bread, meat, and condiments splattering a crossed his shirt and completely covering his hand.

"Why is it that you men insist of running your mouths? You look to be picking the pretty girl. If you wanted my number all you had to do was ask?"

Much of the cathedral was bathed in flames now, only the first few rows of pews had been sparred by the  all consuming fire.  The past three days Cimmeria had trained with Team Bannanas, showing them what she showed few. They knew how her portals worked almost as well as she. The team waited for her now within one of her secret rooms, ignorant to the happenings outside the white walls that contained them.
This message was last edited by the player at 23:55, Mon 01 June 2015.

Frank calmly wiped the gunk off his hand, pulled out a pack of cigarettes along with a battered lighter marked with the symbol for the US Army, lit a smoke and put the items away again; he seemed fully unaware that there was a gun trained on him. After he took a draw and exhaled, he smiled at the killer.

"You're dressed in black and blowing up a church, I just figured your number was six six six. By the way, not to be a pain about it but could you give me ten bucks for the dog? Pricy I know, but it was one of those thick all beef ones loaded with topping on good bread and not some summer picnic family reunion cheap crap. I'm not in a rush or anything if you don't have it on you, I could just swing by when you get off work. What time you leave the street corner?""

Something was wrong with this picture; many people either taught themselves or were taught by someone to hide their emotions so that they appeared to be calm when in truth they weren't. However, from the look in his eye, that wasn't what this old geezer was doing; he was standing in a room full of flame, in front of a very skilled and armed enemy, splattered with the remains of his lunch that was shot out of his hand, and there wasn't a whisper of fear or worry swirling around in the gray that looked up Cimmeria.

As Alex arrived at the Holy Name Church she stopped in her tracks when she saw the whole cathedral ablaze.  The windows shattered and thick black smoke rolled into the cloudless sky.  Sirens could be heard all over the city, from the south loop to the north.  This day was going to shit, all chaos broke loose.  With all the disasters around the city no units had been spared here.  She had to stop the fire.

Alex rushed over the the nearest fire hydrant shoot a blast of energy at it.  The hydrant exploded and water shot out of it like a geyser. Next, she created a field of energy and placed it above the water at an angle.  The water bounced of the energy and spewed over the burning church.  It wasn't as good as a hose but it was the best she could do with what she had.  She kept this up until the burning died down.

Maire watched forlornly as months of careful work, of the most delicate teasing of threads in the pattern to loosen the knots in this city, was being destroyed. Slowly, but steadily. Burglaries, murders, rapes, fires. There didn't need to be very many to tear apart this tapestry, and there was more than enough. She'd already removed several burglars from the pattern, but their influence on it was minimal, and made little difference to the damage being wrought. There were others, here, in this city, disrupting things to a degree that she'd only ever seen Gifted do. Gifted, as she'd noticed in her long years, seemed to affect the pattern far more heavily than any Normal ever could. They should be working to preserve it, not destroying it.

She stepped slowly out of a small alley, her shoes leaving prints of blood on the ground. There was a barely visible puddle of blood, spreading slowly in the darkness of that alley, and a hand was visible behind a pair of trashcans. She wiped her hands off on her coat, thin streaks of the red stuff seemingly repelled by the cloth as it fell directly to the ground. She glanced down the sidewalk and saw a man staring at her, his eyes confused and fear ridden, before he turned and ran away. She ignored him. He was nothing but a bystander, and her work had terrified him. His pattern was veritably shaking itself to death. A fire-engine passed by, screaming loudly, and turned around a corner. She looked up, glancing over the building as much as she could and seeing the Tribune Building burning, smoke pouring off of it into the sky. Her head quirked to the side, and she began walking towards it slowly.

As she turned the corner, far down the road, the firetruck exploded. There was a pressure wave headed right for her, but she ignored it. It passed right over her as she picked up her pace, barely even ruffling her hair. She was approaching cautiously, if still quickly, and her gaze was carefully combing the street. Even so, she barely noticed the two men standing a small distance from the burning fire-truck in time to slip into another alley. She crouched, hummed a few small notes, and stepped back out, keeping her tune up. It sounded almost sepulchrous, in its low melancholy notes, and where she stepped the ground appeared to freeze over for an instant before thawing out. This was a song she liked to call, "The Milky Eye." She sucked the energy out of many of the patterns around her, usually resulting in a cooling, and redirected it into a thin field that surrounded her and deflected attention. It was easy to see her, but if nobody was looking for her, their attention shifted to something around her, like the shattered window or the burning tree, or the dying firemen.

She shifted herself to be directly parallel to the men and ducked behind a well placed vehicle, keeping her eye carefully on them. Engaging in combat with men she didn't know the combat style of was dangerous, and would likely be disastrous and, at the very best, result in her death. So she began examining them, keeping her tune up. She wasn't subvocalising, since that took too much effort, but even if the men did here her music over the roaring flames and screams, she was scattering it off various things around her on purpose. Even a man with fantastic hearing would think the sound was coming from several different locations along the street. Gifted, though, especially ones with enhanced senses, could possibly determine her general location. That still gave her plenty of room to maneuver out of the way in the case of violent actions.

LAdy Crimson put her phone away and shifted the two satchels that hung to her waist as she moved through the sliding doors and into the Er entryway. She scanned the room casually for a second as people began to register the woman in the fiery red armor and armed to the teeth.

She tilted her head at the people and heaved a sigh, people just don't panic like they used to... She drew the pair of Glock 19s she kept at her hips and leveled them at the duty nurse as she stood to get a better look at the new weirdo in her ER and released a pair of 3-round bursts which knocked her back. Obligingly, the people began to panic and Crimson smiled as she put the pistols back and walked past the reception desk into the treatment area and toward the ER rooms. She walked along a hallway and opened doors long enough to toss grenades into each. Each detonated like a powderkeg and sowed yet more confusion. She finally arrived at a bank of elevators and turned to survey the chaos even as she pushed the call button.

She pulled her 19s again and took a few potshots until the doors dinged and opened. She hit the B3 floor and ejected the clips to be replaced with extended mags as she hummed and checked in on her teams. Hello, Ma'am. Squad Annie Lennox has finished at the first location and is en route to target two. Squad Lemmings is one minute out from finish." Crimson considered it and then responded, When Lemmings is finished, redirect them to Soldier Field and make sure they have A LOT of explosives. The command was accepted even as the doors dinged again and she stepped out into the basement area and was surrounded by the hum of machines. She grinned and holstered the pistols to pull one of the satchels off her torso and open the flap. She turned the dial to fifteen minutes then did the same with its twin and tossed the pair of satchel bombs in under the hospital generators before steppeing back into the elevators and hitting floor 9.

The elevator was playing "The Girl from Ipanema" and Crimson hummed along as it rose out of the ground to the administrative floors, CPD is in chaos from the hack on the city networks, but they are prioritizing the hospital. ETa 5 minutes. Crimson nodded and walked out into the admin floor and followed a series of directions she had memorized until she arrived at a door labeled "servors." She shot the lock and then tossed a pair of grenades in and then moved toward the stairs. That elevator music was still stuck in her had though and she found herself humming and bouncing a bit as she walked. Her head tilted from side to side in time to the music even as she quickdrew the .45 revolver she kept in the small of her back and shot a doctor in the back, "Tall and tan and something something, the girl from ipanema s-uh-omething..." Each something accompanied a shot and dead staff as she strolled until she kicked open the stairwell door just in time to hear a similar noise floor below and the sound of combat boots. She grinned.

She stepped to the railing and saw CPD SWAT coming up so she dropped a pair of grenades over the side then ducked back as they blew. She hear shouting and felt her blood stir as she approached then hopped the railing and dropped like a stone amongst the cops. She didn't even grunt as the impact, her super-strong frame taking it in stride as she grabbed a cop by his vest and threw him against a wall, then drew her revolver and put a shot into his buddy before punching through the visor of the third and sending shards of his nose into his cranium. She stepped back and leveled the pistol at four and five and put them down with quick shots to the head before cracking the gun open and reloading it even as the men breathed their last. One of their comms buzzed and she reached down to pull the bud from his ear and listen for a second as someone demanded the man check in, "Sorry, Sergeant... Oliver was it? He won't be answering anyone ever again."

She tossed the bud away as someone on the other end began cursing her and made for the door the men had just come through and ended up near the main entrance to the hospital. She peeked around a corner at the heaps of cops out there and grinned. Chicago was a villains playground today, that was for damned sure. She clicked her comms over to network wide broadcast, "This is Lady Crimson, hospital shut down. Who is turning off the power?"

Gates was continuing to make his was towards the church when in his mind a call was coming through. He answered after first making sure no cameras were on him and then ducking down an alleyway and coming out a block near the Church. "Hello....Substation? Understood. Do we have any assets near Holy Name Cathedral? He asked as he saw water being bent in midair to cover some fire. After a confirmation he spoke again. "Understood will adress substation then proceed to Cathedral for support." With that he hung up the phone and started making his way down the street away from the cathedral. A few blocks away he found the substation and a few cars that were trying to escape the chaos from earlier. He concentrated on two large trucks and after gaining control of the computers inside them sent them careening into the substation. A few moments later power had gone out throughout the city and since all the substations had been hit no backups would bring it back. Bombs..such wonderful little inventions. He nodded as he made his way back to the church making sure to keep his emotions in check. He began to study the wonderful little waterspout as it seemed to move this way and that seemingly on its own...
This message was last edited by the player at 10:29, Wed 03 June 2015.

At Commander's headquarters operations were in full swing, and the Villain himself was sat at his usual station;  at the very heart of his compound, surrounded by toiling minons and information covered screens.
One of his technicians looked up from an alert on his console and called out a report to the room in general. "'Green light' keyword has pinged... confirmed. Operation #101 is GO!"
The room suddenly took on a tense air, They'd been forewarned of the order for some time and although not everyone in The Commanders employment knew the full implications of 'Order 101' it was generally believed that it'd mark a vital stage in Namidias's endgame... whatever that was.
"Who do we have in the area? Put a list on the main screen." Commander replied automatically. He tapped a button on his armrest and the bank of monitors reset to show several channels of live news footage along one of it's halves and a scrolling list of personnel superimposed over a map of central Chicago on the other. Brett drummed his fingers impatiently as he waited for either display to give him the tactical inspiration he'd need to commit himself to a plan.

One of the news channels caught his attention and he enlarged the window to take priority, as it filled to eclipse it's neighbouring channels it's volume raised proportionally and the reporters voice echoed throughout the room with appropriate ominosity.
-"Reports of multiple break-in's and robbers flooded in only moments ago.  Three criminal events occurred within moments of each other.  As of now, the CPD is asking people in the area to evacuate, as the police move in to try and contain these events.  We now go to Dave Rowe who is live at"-
As the reporter spoke the screen flitted between three static images of Tribune Tower; which was gushing torrents of fire, Advocate Lutheran General Hospital; which was surrounded by an astounding number of police cars, and The Holy Name Cathedral; which had plenty of either.
Commanders vision pulled away from the impressive destruction on display and scanned eyes over his list of available operatives; he had two units of five agents within immediate range, a helicopter squad of ten soldiers that could be moved into position within three minutes, and a number of getaway drivers. A large bulk of his force had been moved to surround Chicago in preparation for a raid on the Federal Reserve building hidden within the cites skyline, but a brief glance at the news banks told him that he'd lost initiative and that someone else had already started reliving the Windy City of it's wealth.

"Move squads IL-1-0C, IL-3-RR and IL-6-NB into the city limits. No orders yet, but I need them ready to act." he said cautiously as he considered the news footage for a while longer, still looking for his golden opportunity.
Without warning every news channel operating out of Illinois crashed and the half the monitors illuminating the room plunged into darkness. Commander's technicians scrambled and began yelling rushed reports to each other as they attempted to understand the situation. A smile crept it's way into Commanders features as he mentally digested the new development.
"Chicago's been cut off the powergrid, somehow. Switch to our backup HF communication system and get a drone in the air- we won't be able to rely on our usual systems for this mission."
Commander had found the edge he'd been looking for. Although the electronic disturbance and mass attacks on the city all served to make his own job difficult he couldn't help but appreciate how efficiently the Namidians had acted in carrying out order #101. Even anticipating the attack Commander was still rushed to put his forces into play, and for the citizens or defenders of Chicago the attack must have seemed nothing short of apocalyptic.

"I've made up my mind; contact the away teams and have them converge on the James R. Thompson Center." He leaned back in his chair and his predatory expression relaxed into a mere smirk as he began to think and rethink his options. "With the power down it'll be difficult for anyone to communicate at all, and the CPD and Military will already be stretched thin. With confusion on our side we may as well help ourselves to a few hostages- what's the black market price for a Governor, these days?"

---

Minutes later Squad IL-1-0C, also known as 'The ZeroComets', finally re-established communication to their Headquarters- they'd been given the order to suit up and get airborne before the unexpected loss of their Chigao transmitter had knocked out most of their advanced systems.

The ZeroComets were The Commanders favoured heavy-response team; and were notorious for their hardhitting heavy weaponry and blisteringly fast airdrop assaults. The unstable men and women that made up the unit were currently armed with an even mixture of automatic shotguns, airburst grenade launchers, and brutal taser-batons. They were lead by a skinheaded adrenalin junkie who only went by the name 'Smokes' who'd look more at home picking a fight in an unlicensed dive bar rather than within any kind of military unit, the ten irregulars that he lead were each almost as bad. They rode in a battlescarred 'AVX JMR-MPS' that'd earned favour with the unit not just for it's nimble speed, but also because it could effortlessly unleash enough firepower to chew a bus in half and spit out the pips.

Their pilot had struggled to tune the helicopters delicate HF modulator to a setting that'd let them resume communications whilst avoiding the worst of the low-tech interference that'd flooded the airwaves since Gates had blacked out the city. The outmoded radio suddenly squawked into life with static feedback and a clear voice could be heard chanting a cryptic number combination over the other side, Smokes snatched the radio handset out of his pilots hand, spat a return confirmation code onto the same frequency and waited for the operators reply -moments later he pushed the communicator back and stood to deliver his mission briefing:
" 'S order One-oh-ONE, lads an' lassies! " he said, practically vibrating with feverous excitement and speaking in a slurred 'Low British' accent, " As ye' know, everythin' electronic's just up an' knackered. Th' C'mmand'r want's us t' use th' distract'n t' take some heads. 'e says t' take anyon' who looks import'nt as a hostage. "
Smokes strode over to the side panel of his 'chopper and wrenched the access door open. Thin air immediately poured into the helicopters belly and Smokes laughed fearlessly as the pressure difference almost pushed him outside, he reached out a hand to steady himself by attaching the belt of his armour to one of the 'copters three mechanised pulleys.
He raised his voice to be heard over the violent winds now gushing into the cabin " AFT'R THA', WE'RE T' CIRCLE TH' CITY AN' FIND MORE TARGETS. IT'S GONNA' BE A MESS DOWN THER', AN HE'S GIVN' TH' ALL CLEAR T' GO NUTS. " The Comets cheered at that.
The hard-edged shock troopers of the ZeroComets were chosen from the most undisciplined and unstable of Commander's men, and since most didn't share The Commander's compulsion to keep bystanders out of their line of fire they were generally only called into action for particularly chaotic and unpredictable missions- such as the present moment.

---

The helicopter blazed it's way under the city's skyline and carelessly veered between the inner-city skyscrapers, it banked sharply on it's side as the pilot shot the aircraft around Washington Street corner and brought it into view of the circular steel-and-glass building that served as the centre of Illinosis's political power. The 'chopper levelled itself out and it's dual rotor buzzed into a frantic whine as it began climbing to a higher altitude and came to a halt at the squat buildings 16th floor, from the open door of his ride Smokes could see into the semi-mirrored windows of the building; the interior was packed to the walls with frightened looking well-to-do's who'd retreated inside to escape from the chaos that'd spilled into streets, a few of them pressed against the window and squinted at him- perhaps they were wondering if the military had flown in to evacuate them.
Smokes levelled his grenade launcher at the window and immediately ended any such misconceptions. The first shot he fired impacted against the reinforced glass of the building and blew it inwards with an almighty burst of displaced air and shrapnel glass, His second shot bounced through the ruined window and stunned everyone inside with an explosive flash of magnesium. The helicopter pivoted midair to expose it's rear ramp to the blown-in window and shunted backwards into the damaged building; the moment the distanced had been closed The ZeroComets leapt from their cargo ramp, over 200ft of empty air, and landed with a heavy crunch as their tactical boots ground the remains of the glass window into office carpet.

The squad immediately fanned out and began subduing their prey. One of the ZeroComets, a rough woman sporting a cut lip and a full-face tattoo, roughly grabbed the suit nearest to her and pinned him to the ground- she jammed the barrel of her pistol deeply into his temple.
"WHO THE HELL ARE YOU?!" she screamed into his ear. The terrified victim took a moment too long to answer as he stuttered over a sentence, she shot the ground by his ear to reinforce her demand. *BLAMN!*
"AH! I'm George Sawman- Chairman of-" *BLAMN!* She fired her gun at the floor again, this time to shut him up.
"Get in the 'chopper! NOW!" She hauled him back to his feet and shoved him towards the breach, where he was caught by another one of the invaders and would promptly be tied down and dragged into the transport. The trigger happy Tattoo'd Lady rounded her pistol on the next person closest to her and repeated her system.
"WHO THE HELL ARE YOU?!" the smart yet brightly dressed young woman she'd levelled her weapon at replied immediately as she ran her mouth in obvious fear, "M-miss Brown- I-i'm the assistant of-" *BLAMN!* Her pistol fired again, this time discharging a lethal round into the assistants neck. She didn't have time to waste shepherding low value targets such as the late 'Miss Brown' and she immediatly faced the next richest looking person in the room and brought him to the ground with a snapkick to the stomach.
"WHO THE HELL ARE YOU?!"

As all this was going on the Helicopter pilot kept careful control over his flightstick with one hand, and used the other to transmit a message across a broad bandwidth that he knew the other Namidian's within Chicago would be able to receive:
"Asset Zero C reporting in on behalf of 'The Commander'. Operating within Washington Street. Searching for potential resistance- Over."
With the simple confirmation message sent the pilot cut hsi broadcast, although The Commander had shoehorned his own agenda into the mix 'Order #101' was primarily a command simply to sow chaos and disharmony- it would be a shame to finish their mission and leave without at least firing the JMR-MPS's stock of missiles at someone.
This message was last edited by the player at 00:20, Thu 04 June 2015.

The Tribune Building's smoke turned a sickly pale, yellowish color as the inferno consumed the newspaper printers inside the building. Ash fidgeted with antsy delight.

"The 21st Century's hit the papers pretty hard, eh?"

Suddenly, the lights of Chicago went down all at once. Divorced of its millions of artificial lights, the city looked almost, but not quite, tranquil. There was peace in this, Zenith knew. It's unfortunate, then, that the modern world never let this sort of peace run wild. Perhaps Namidias would let it run wild in the world to come...

"Excellent," said Zenith. A thin, wistful smile slowly took hold of his face. Ash stared at his boss in exaggerated confusion and frustration.

"You expected this?! No way man, lights off, bedtime? I would've liked to know!" Ash turned his back on his boss and threw his hands up into the air.

"I had no plan for this," said Zenith. "I just think it's excellent."

"Whatever, boss. You're just wasted.."

"Not yet," said Zenith. He then titled his head, licked the roof of his mouth, and transformed a small portion of his blood to a low-level Amphetamine. His head darted from side and side as everything besides the sounds around him faded away.

"Ash, there's a helicopter not far from here. We may need to prepare ourselves for a more serious endeavor." Zenith's ears perked up at a new sound he heard; it was some sort of low, tuneful humming. But it wasn't normal, Zenith wasn't even sure it was human! Could it be a hallucination? No, it was too coherent, too sensible, and too direct. It was coming from that alley!

He threw his closed fist up and backward into an L shape, then flung his pointer finger toward the alley. Ash nodded, smirked, and transformed the thin layer of smoke infiltrating the alley into a cloud of fire. In seconds, the cloud congealed into a massive, floating blaze and flowed down the alley as if it were a wave.

"Nothing, boss. You really are high," said Ash.

"No, no. I heard someone or something. It's here, it's here. It has to be. Just give me time, and prepare yourself."

Ash shook his head, then psychically transformed part of the smoke flowing through the top of a neighboring skyscraper into fire. That perfectly-formed blaze sliced through the edge of the skyscraper, hurling it to the ground with incredible force.

CRRRASH! 

The debris, and the crater it formed, blocked off one of the roads leading toward the Tribune Building.Ash repeated the action twice more. Now, with three directions of attack blocked off, the duo would not get surrounded. Instead, they would be able to funnel their enemies down a long, long tunnel of death. Ash chuckled at his own thoughts; "The Tunnel of Death" sounded like the name of a great roller coaster.

Zenith, meanwhile, hadn't found the source of his frustration. Each time he focused on an area, it turned out that he was just hearing an echo bouncing off something in his field of view. He realized, however, that there were only so many things the sound could echo off of. One by one, he would eliminate the wrong answers until he found the right one.

Zenith's communicator turned on. His focus broken, the businessman flushed the amphetamines out of his blood before they could have any side effects on him. The caller, whose voice was partially drowned out by the roaring of a helicopter's engine, asked about any potential resistance.

"That's what I was trying to find out, before you decided to intrude on my thoughts!" Zenith frowned for a bit, slowly ran his hand through his mohawk, then picked up the communicator again.

"I apologize for that. There is someone here, I think, or something... obviously, I cannot, as of yet, confirm whether or not it is a threat. I will keep you updated."
This message was last edited by the GM at 02:48, Thu 04 June 2015.

Bard smiled widely, and changed her tune. This was fun, and these men were enjoyable. One of them didn't, quite, conflict with the pattern in truth, but he was off just enough to warrant, at the very least, intervention on her part. The other was unstable and destructive, and he so obviously disrupted the patterns around him that even without her sight, she doubted this man would ever come across as natural. Her new tune was louder, and she focused briefly before cinching a pattern around the air surrounding her that amplified it a hundred-fold, and began to loop it. She gathered her song into a thin orb in her hand, glowing faint gold and green, and tossed it high into the air where it exploded in a brilliant shower of sparks. Everywhere the sparks touched began vibrating, and soon it sounded as if the very street were singing along with her. The song took on more malevolent tones quickly, and the very air seemed to darken. The fires dimmed, even though they burned just as high, and windowpanes up and down the street shattered, sending glass sprinkling onto the hard pavement below. Even the tinkling seemed to have a place in the song though.

The temperature dropped quickly, and such a rapid change caused thin tendrils of mist to creep around various objects. The firetruck began sputtering before it went out, and the only illumination was the dimmed light from the burning tribune building, which appeared to be unaffected by any of the going-ons in the street. Her song heightened volatile emotions, rapidly. Since neither of these men appeared to be in complete control of their emotions anyways, she felt that it might make things more interesting. Maybe even... strain their relationship. She spun a note of discord into her song, and one of paranoia. Even the roaring of the flames in the tribune building seemed to be joining in in the chorus, their deep rumbling and various cracks and pops taking on an undertone to the higher notes.

She gracefully slid down the street, adding more notes into the song until some of the complexities of the music even gave her pause. Discord and paranoia, fear and anger. Confusion and distraction. Everything had its place in this melody, and she joined her own, singing the highest notes and leaving the lower ones to the patterns she'd established already. It was a danger, participating in the music herself. Now there would be a more discernible focus, unless she remained cautious. One of the men had appeared to be focusing on the various places she'd been bouncing her music off of, and she was running out of space to do that to a well enough degree. So she raised the volume slightly, threw off minor dynamics in her surrounding space, and... voila her voice came out nearly 30 feet away. It sounded wrong, so she modulated for a few moments before she approached a more appreciable sound. It was far from the best she could manage, but safety was paramount. She took caution and wove a thin pattern that, if she had to stop singing suddenly, would sustain the music for at least 15 seconds without her direct participation. After that, the song would start faltering before fading altogether. 15 seconds should be more than enough time to withdraw, however, in the case of her being discovered.

Ghost did her best to put out the fire.  She managed to put out any large raging areas but left a couple of smaller smolders.  After all she could only do so much with what she had.  While she was finishing up she noticed a slim man next to her.  The white haired man seemed to be examining her improvising.  Alex knew he couldn't see her but that didn't stop it from being weird.

When she finally got the last large patch of fire under control, she let her energy go.  The water that was being funneled at the church now shot straight up into the air.  Alex frowned, it wasn't her intention to add to the problems but there was no way she could fix the broken hydrant.  She could feel the cold water hit her on its way back down.  She was done here.  Alex nodded to herself, moving onto the next are where someone was needed.

Alex moved her way into the city, following Michigan Street.  As she made her way for the chaos in the loop, she saw swarms of people out on the streets.  Each one in their own world, trying to escape the hell Chicago had become.  From blocks away she could see the ruins of the  Tribune Tower.  Flames licked the Tower and the neighboring building were toppled over on the ground, covering the street.  This day was getting worse and worse.

"You're fucking with me, man. There ain't shit there," said Ash. He made a strangling motion with his hands and then dismissively waved his hand at Zenith.

"Hold your tongue, Ash! I need focus," said Zenith, placing special emphasis on the word "need." The noise, the noise! It was getting so chaotic, so scattered, and yet so focused. It was like a coordinated, many-pronged attack on his psyche! But where was his attacker?

Zenith gasped as glass windows exploded all around him. This wasn't happening! Ash, on the other hand, glared at the Tribune Building, didn't even hear the glass. The building, the fire, and the screaming people inside were all laughing at him. They knew he was this big, crazy badass, but they didn't care. They laughter poured out of the building and directly into his ears; they wanted him to hear them!

"You think you know me? You think I'm a joke?! Well here's a joke for ya'" shouted Ash at the top of his lungs. He then held out his hand and rapidly transformed the smoke surrounding the building into a huge sheet of thick, yet contained flames. Strangely enough, this fire drew all the oxygen out of the Tribune Building. When it cleared, the charred and decimated skyscraper was no longer on fire.

"You can't fight fire with fire," said Ash in a mocking, infantile tone.

"Calm down, now!" screamed Zenith. His eyes were wide with rage. He cupped his ear with his hand again, trying to focus his hearing.

Ash picked his head up slowly at the sound of his boss's voice. His eyes were partially closed and his mouth was rapidly twisting itself into a different shapes as he marched toward a distracted Zenith. Every time it became a flashing of his teeth, it would warp into a sadistic grin. Then the grin would morph into a frown, the frown would change to a gasp, and the whole process would start over.

"You're always ruining my fun, Zen! What's wrong with you?"

"Nothing's wrong with me," shouted Zenith as he jumped back. "I'm just trying to put myself to good use, make a respectable living! I've got my Gift, I'll use it! 'Fun' doesn't matter, child. Your life does; so start living it!"

Ash scoffed and lit his boss' hair on fire, turning the older man's mohawk into a jet of flame. In response, Zenith flooded his body with adrenaline and rammed his protege. Before he even knew what hit him, Ash was lying on the pavement while dozens of fists were hammering into him.

Seeing a trail of blood run down his associate's nose, Zenith hopped off of Ash. He stood beside his new enemy and took up a boxing stance.

"I'm nothing if not a good sport, Ash. Let's do this like gentlemen."

"No," retorted Ash. With one hand, he flung his messenger back at Zenith's face. When it hit him, Ash burned a hole through the front of the bag. Thousands of pollen particles flew out from the hole as the bag drifted toward the ground. And the moment they flew through the hole, they were lit on fire.

Zenith reeled back and yelped as hundreds of miniature fireballs flew past him, each one effortlessly peeling off a layer of his skin. He regained focus just long enough to roll out of the way as a fire literally erupted beneath his backside.

"Die, die, die, die!"

"We cannot do this," said Zenith. "We'll ruin everything."

"Who cares?" said Ash. A single tear slid reluctantly down his cheek as he chuckled. The air surrounding him caught fire. "There's nothing to ruin!"

"What?"

"There's no point to this! Don't you see? He wants us to die for him!"

"I've told you before, Ash. We need not fear death! And this oper--"

"Well, you do," said Ash with a smirk as he stared at something behind Zenith. Zenith spun around to face the trap, only to find nothing but a strange hum coming from behind him.

As Zenith spun around, Ash hurled some loose gravel up into the air. He ignited it just in time for his boss to turn back around.

"Ahhhh!"

Gripping his face in agony, Zenith carelessly tossed himself to the ground. Ash pumped his fist at his victory, only to become distracted by the song too.

"Oh crap, boss," said the younger man, as if nothing had transpired between them. "I think you're right..."

Ash lit up all the areas from which he heard the song originate.

"Come out, come out. We've got a special for ya.' Two pricks for the price of one!"
This message was last edited by the GM at 03:53, Fri 05 June 2015.

In reply to Scripts (msg # 27):

(Non-canon Battle Post)

The music faded into the background, only the occasional note finding its way into a high enough volume to be heard across the street. A womans voice spoke, its tone lilting and lyrical, from the thin air over Zeniths collapsed form. "But look at this poor spectacle, a fight between friends." It cooed, and then it spoke from Ash's other side. "You should relax, and subsume to your guilt." It whispered directly into his ear. By Zenith, the voice was whispering quietly as well, too quietly for Ash to hear but enough for Zenith. "You're in so much pain. I'm so sorry." It whispered. "If you just relax and let the pain wash over you..."

Bard was nursing a burnt leg. One of Ash's explosions had been dangerously close, and she'd barely gotten out of the way of losing half her side. Even with enhancing her regeneration, the burn was bad enough to necessitate at least an hour of recovery, so she was focusing on eliminating the two men. She ignored her pain, and cupped her hand, whispering quietly into it. She focused her power into several words, intoning them at just the right frequencies to react with the mens patterns.

In the street, Ash screamed and threw a blaze of fire away from Zenith, his voice completely incoherent. Something at least remotely similar to screaming bloody murder was coming out. The voice in his ear gasped. "That hurt!" it whispered in an appalled tone, as soon as Ash's fire touched the dead Firetruck. He grinned madly and began laughing, throwing more fire at the truck. There was a faint screaming, almost imperceptable, that faded from Ash's perception quickly and he laughed some more. "I got you!" He shouted. He turned around and- he was sitting on the sidewalk of the street, in front of the now dead Tribune building, with Zenith lying next to him. He looked around in confusion, not remembering even moving here.

Bard smiled grimly. His emotions were so awry that manipulation was almost too easy for her.  She stood up carefully, placing as little weight as she could manage on her burnt leg, and stepping from behind the car. Her shoes squelched as she stepped onto the street, the sound echoing off of the buildings, but she hummed a loud note, and Ash's gaze turned to her but his eyes were unfocused and he was grinning like a mad-man. She reached into her pocket and pulled out a thin knife, flicking it open. Ash continued to just stare at her, even as she held it out in preparation to slit his throat.

Zenith surged upwards, the adrenaline in his system masking the pain. His hand reached out and grabbed their foes, a woman's, arm. Her eyes flicked to him immediately and the knife in her hand came around quickly, far too quickly, but Zenith lifted his hand. The blade was shoved through his palm, and he noted quickly that if he hadn't put his hand there, that blade would have hit his heart. The woman did something, her arm slipping out of his grasp like a wet bar of soap, and stepped back, her mouth opening. He couldn't hear anything, the pumping of his blood in his ears masking the sound too well, but he could feel a vibrating in his bones. Her gaze flicked to Ash, and he cast a quick glance there as well. He seemed to be coming out of it, and when he looked back at the woman she had backed up another few steps. He noted the limp in her right leg, and the burned section of that spread down almost  the entire thing. He pulled the knife out of his hand, and altered some of his blood into a substance chemically similar to sulphuric acid, throwing it at the woman. She avoided most of it, but splatter of the stuff landed on her arm and her singing abruptly stopped as she gasped in pain and tried wiping the stuff off.

Bard restrained the urge to scream. The mans blood burned hotter than any fire she'd ever experienced, and wiping it off only spread it to her other hand, which was now burning as well. She watched in dawning, muted, horror as her flesh reddened and split, blood seeping out and mixing with whatever it was this man had changed his blood into. If this got into her bloodstream... she prioritized her tactical needs and focused on the pattern of the man's blood, releasing a short, quick note of dissonance. It evaporated off almost immediately, but its damage had been done and the pain was clouding her focus. Her lapse of attention on the both of them ended when Zenith stepped directly up to her and shoved her own knife directly into the spot on her arm that had been hit with his blood. Having a keen sense of what should and shouldn't be in her own body, the toxin flooding her system was noticed immediately, and she subvocalised anotehr note of dissonance as her hand on the opposite arm flew out and struck the man in the sternum. There was a flash of pain which she shoved deep into her unconscious, but the man stumbled back, his breath lost. She gathered a pattern in her hand, and tossed it behind the man, a small explosion of sparks and then a debilitating scream escaping it.

Ash, who had just been regaining focus, stiffened and fell backwards, spasming as his eyes rolled into the back of his head, and small trickles of blood slid out of his ears and nose, but Zenith was too far away to be affected quite as much. He was using dangerous amounts of adrenaline at this point, and that pain that that scream seemed to be rousing even all the way to his bones was hard to ignore, but he stepped forwards once more and attempted to hit the woman directly with more of his altered blood. She deftly slid underneath him and lifted him completely off his feet. He heard a small moan, but right before Bard's leg collapsed from the strain she threw Zenith into the epicenter of the scream. The pain over-rode his adrenaline, and he collapsed, but whatever blood he was leaking was lost in what he already had spilling out of his torn apart skin.

Bard fell to the ground, her leg completely useless now. The burned tissue had ripped, the stress she'd put on it too great for the unhealed tissue, and she was no bleeding far too profusely. At this rate, she would be dead within the hour. She pulled the knife out of her harm and looked at it, closing her eyes and gathering her courage. She sang, a high, cutting note, and the blade began vibrating almost imperceptibly. THe silver metal began steaming before it turned just slightly red, and Maire turned her gaze and placed it on her leg, a scream actually erupting from her throat this time. The debilitation would only last a few more seconds. She needed to hurry. The blade made its way down the broken skin, sealing it back up with black and bubbling tissue, and Maire stood, her scream dying out in time with the one that was keeping Ash and Zenith out of consciousness. She hummed a deep note, and ran down the street, disappearing from view moments before Ash woke.

Bard snickered a little at the manchild's pitiful excuse for a joke; her snicker echoed between the buildings and created an odd break in her endless song. Ash gritted his teeth and thrust his hand toward whenever he heard that monster's echoing, taunting laughter! If anyone was watching, he would have looked to all the world like a lunatic desperately trying to catch a bug in his palm. Each time he thrust his hand out, the air around his target erupted into a thin, quickly dissipating sheet of flame.

"Where are you," demanded the burning man. The song started up again. It was a harmonious, yet dangerous thing; not at all aggressive, but very ominous. It pressed down upon Ash, filling him with dread and making him feel trapped. Death was coming, death was coming; the pain he caused had finally caught up with him!

"Yaaaaaaahhhh!" screamed Ash as he swung his hands back and forth like recoiling machine guns, filling all the air around him with white-hot fireballs. His hundreds of flames came and went like fireflies on a summer night, and still the song carried on. The low, peaceful hum he heard soon became a crowd of millions humming in serene unity. Worse, the wind flowing about "played" the ruins of Chicago like massive flutes.

Ash cried out in frustration and agony. The dead were speaking, they were singing. It's not over, they sang in his mind. Our songs still play. Ash built a wall of fire around himself and held his breath to keep from choking on his own smoke.

Though we be gone, we're heard to-day. Tears gave way to inelegant sobbing from the murderous, cackling supervillain.

"I'm sorry!" said Ash. "I had no choice! I'm sorry!"

Ash had never felt guilty about killing people; nobody suffered after they died, and most people would be forgotten in a flash. But, for far too long, a parasitic fear had been growing in his psyche: that fear was, of course, that he was wrong. He feared that most people were good enough to be remembered, that the people he killed mattered, and that he didn't deserve to be forgiven. And somehow the songstress knew this and played a song that  ripped his brain apart.

Clenching his fist hard enough for his fingernails to draw blood, Ash howled up at the sky. His outburst itself seemed to erupt into an enormous mushroom cloud that cut entire skyscrapers in half and sent cars flying miles down the road. As soon as she had heard the scream, Bard ducked behind a dumpster. There she held a loud, defiant note that let her skin suffer no more than singe despite being bathed in flame. She stood up in the burnt rags that were once her clothes. Her eyes fluttered with delight and she smiled widely.

"I have won," sung Maire, loud enough for Ash to hear. "The harmony has come." 

Ash flung his arms out in all directions as Bard danced toward him. While smiling and singing as though she had never known fear or sadness, she bounced out of the way of each of his attacks moments before he even knew he was going to throw them.

The criminal fell back on his oldest defense mechanism, joking around.

"Okay, Miss Cleo, predict this!" Ash built a cage of flame around his enemy, but she simply rolled through the bars before they could collapse around her.

"No no no no no!" said Ash under his breath. Bard tilted her head in mock curiosity and stared directly into the disruptive boy's eyes.

"Why do you resist?" she asked. "You know it's useless."

Ash fell to the ground and pathetically backed away from his assailant on hands and knees.

"You lived a long, wrong life," said the Bard. "Full of agony and strife. Let it end, let it end, and all the hearts your burnt will mend."

And just like that, the once mighty Ash curled up into a ball and began to fantasize about living just one more day...

Bard took the time to increase her song's tension. When she hit that one final note, she would end her song with an abrupt stab to the dragon boy's heart. Suddenly, she sensed a horrible degradation of the patterns behind her. When she turned to face these patterns, she noticed all the familiar shapes, motions, and patterns melting into a chaotic, incoherent mess. The lines that formed the Earth's web curled themselves into loop-de-loops and tangled, hairlike messes. The whirling clouds that were her song's sounds turned to concrete and crumbled before she even heard them. The heartbeats of all those left alive became dying rodent squeaks. And finally, the flames of Chicago flashed a million different colors before disappearing and leaving massive holes in her vision. For the first time ever, she was truly being blinded. For the first time in years, she was truly afraid.

A green pyramid, roughly the size of a human head, emerged in front of her. She scrambled back in fright, but a handful of mercury-colored liquid blades burst from the pyramid's nearest tip. Before she could react, the blades poured themselves through the pores of her skin and turned her face to metal.

Back in reality, a badly scarred Zenith (whose mohawk had been burnt off) finished blowing a thin line of multicolored smoke into a frozen Bard's face. He then carelessly pushed the young woman to the ground.

"I sincerely hope you prepared for your trip, love."

The criminal mastermind stepped over his victim and leaned down in front of his treacherous young ward. He spoke to him softly.

"Everything's alright, Ash," said Zenith. "We've won the day."

"You're lying! Liar, liar, pants on--"

Zenith instinctively brushed the seat of his pants.

"Did you really think--" asked Ash. "Motherfucker, I'm better than that!" A sad laugh that entirely failed to conceal his whimpering escaped his lips.

"Indeed you are, son," said Zenith. "And that's why we trust you... That's why he trusts you."

Ash wiped the pathetic tears off of his own cheeks. Yeah, yeah, that's right. Namidias knew they would win, he was crazy to ever let that woman get to him! She didn't stand a chance, no one did! And no one ever would again! They were Ash and Zenith, Chicago's Foulest; you were afraid of them, they weren't afraid of you.

Zenith held out his hand and Ash grabbed it. The two stood up and Zenith radioed the Namidian Wave for backup.

"Phase One complete. Where are we needed?"
This message was last edited by the GM at 03:24, Wed 10 June 2015.

Cimmeria decided to make this old geezer pay for his mouth, and with a slight adjustment to her wrist sent a bullet into his left shoulder. There was barely any movement from the impact with his flesh, the stranger didn't even grunt from the pain; instead he gave her a smile with the right corner of his upper lip curled like some dime a dozen Elvis impersonator and took a step toward the assassin. She fired again, this round sinking deep into his left leg, but the biker simply took another step closer. The killer kept her outward cold and detached appearance, yet inside she was growing ever more worried. She abandoned her first idea of torturing her pray, and shot him in his right lung; still he came, not hurried but a casual pace that was unnerving his would be murderer. Deftly, she emptied the last twelve rounds in her gun, placing a bullet in his forehead, one eye each, heart, and the rest she attempted to out and out shred him with; he finally fell in a heap to the ground as water from somewhere began surging through a window frame and turning some of the flames she had created to steam.

Cimmeria thought the old man a fool for walking toward her as he had, some misplaced attempt to play a mind game and make her doubt herself probably. She turned from the corpse, looking for something else to trash in here in hopes of getting the ITSDA's attention. It was then she heard something, what sounded to her like some smallish piece of metal dropping to the hard floor of the church. There it was again, and a third time, until it sounded like some odd version of rain. The killer thought it came possibly from behind her, and turned to see the dead body pull itself up from the ground; as she watched, the holes she had made pulled themselves closed within seconds until not even a slight scar remained. When the eyes reformed, the stranger said,

"Peekaboo, I see you."

The woman reached for her other gun, but the big man closed in fast this time. He left his own weapons resting on his belt and instead favored throwing a fist at Cimmeria's head; she blocked it out of reflex by throwing up an arm, but staggered backward from the blow; this a-hole wasn't just punching, he was throwing haymakers with all his strength and weight behind each blow. She barely had time to recover before he landed a second into her block, she had to use both arms to stand against the attack he rained down upon her and even then she was being forced back toward a spot where the water from nowhere hadn't touched and fire awaited her. At the risk of falling over backwards, the killer tried for a snap kick to the other's side; it was like hitting a brick wall and seemed to have about as much effect. She was highly trained at her craft, and as such was loath to do her next action, but as she saw no other choice launched another kick this time right between his legs; the smiling foe simply blocked it his left leg.

"Really? You're going to go with that old chestnut? Allow me let you in on a couple of things; the first is that by the age of three every girl knows that cheap shot, and by four every boy can block it..."

Again he threw a punch into her double block, but this one was far weaker. Before Cimmeria had time to wonder why, he followed up with a sharp jab to her left breast; the pain forced some of the breath from her lungs as he resumed talking,

"...and second, a girl has two sweet spots to a man's one."

Two more jabs came in fast, both of which were blocked but the surprise kick to the woman's solar plexus was missed; the assassin felt her breath rush out of her lungs and her muscles lock up for several seconds before they would be able to once more draw air. Her current tactic wasn't working, she was going to have to try something else. Cimmeria ran backward as close to the flames as she was willing to go, then rolled to the left behind some pews that were burnt but still mostly intact thanks to the deluge from minutes before. She crawled on her hands and knees, opening portals as she went. From each, a member of the squad she had for backup popped up with weapon at the ready; at the sight of the first, the Greaser drew for the first time one of his own guns and fired. There was a sound much like if someone had put an old M-80 firecracker into a melon, then a thud. These noises were repeated each time a new fighter sprang up, and when Cimmeria had worked her way across and down the group of pews she was using for cover she lifted herself up quickly to see the state of things before ducking down again; all of her men were dead, each and everyone was missing their head. Damn it! This a-hole must be using exploding rounds, and instead of a surprise attack turning the tables, her table got smaller.

The Wave member was by no means foolish nor stupid, and though she had pride she could squelch it to enact a retreat if she needed to; however, she wasn't willing to do that just yet. Yes this man was good, with some talents to his name, but then again she fit the same bill. He kept her off balance the first time by changing up what he was doing each time so she couldn't predict and prepare for it, she'd return the favor. There was something she could do that she felt strongly he couldn't, and it wasn't a tactic she fell to commonly so it wasn't well known about her just in case the reason this guy had bested her so far was because he had some sort of insight on her. This was a big place, the kind where sound echoed and the assassin used that to her advantage when she spoke,

"So big man, what's your name? I need to know so I can carve it on your tombstone."

"Frank Jackson, Cimmeria. Pleased to finally meet you in person."

"So you know who I am, huh? That and the fact you're a Gifted, I'm going to guess you're ITSDA."

"When I feel like it, I am."

"You're good, I'll give you that. What are you, a Senior Agent or combat instructor for them?"

"Hah! Hardly. Well, I guess you could say at my age, you could say I'm a senior anything. But to that group, I'm only one of them when it suits the powers that be."

<deepblue>"Nobody's born being able to fight like you, so what is it? Grow up on some mean streets? Military? Some kind of special police unit? Or are you just a quick study, and picked up stuff fast from the ITSDA?"</deepblue>

"All of the above, except that last one."

Cimmeria had kept the man talking so she could work her way closer, and finally she was in a position to execute her plan; she leapt up from a crouch and sprinted toward Frank, pulling back a fist like she was going to swing at him; he turned and saw her, left arm coming up in a reflex to block. That was what she'd been waiting for, and opened her hand to wrap it around black leather. She saw the confusion in his eyes, then shock and extreme pain and she forced open a small portal under her palm. There was a smack of something hitting the ground, and she allowed herself a very slight and brief smile of satisfaction as she looked upon the stump that had seconds before been whole. That same hand grabbed his throat and pulled him closer while her left latched onto his remaining wrist.

"You should never mess with people you don't fully understand, Mr. Jackson. Overconfidence kills many people, and your name will soon grace that list. You can heal bullet holes, but what about your arm? Don't worry about it, for in a moment your neck will follow suit and you'll share the fate of John the Baptist. Fitting, given where we are I think. If this were a hit, I'd just have you dead on the floor right now. But you've caused me pain, came close to threatening my reputation, took out all of my men in less time than it takes someone to buy a newspaper. So, I want you to look me in the eye, Mr. Jackson. I want you to see it coming, know you are powerless to stop it. I'm not as strong as you, but if you try to force your gun hand even an inch toward me I will treat it just like your arm. I know you can fight, but I can block with my legs same as you some your power house kicks will do you no good. I want you to know you have failed, know Death will take you, I want to see it etched upon your face."

Frank did meet her eyes, but in his there was a look of defiance and his smile never faltered. He didn't try to pull his gun down toward his would be killer, but instead pulled the trigger in rapid secession until the pin clicked in an empty sound. Cimmeria looked confused, then bits of stone fell to bounce off one shoulder. She thought to look up, and noticed the pair had been standing under a large and ornate light fixture. Chucks of the ceiling were cracked, and more lines were spreading. Realization struck her at the same time as a loud noise sounded and she let go of her prey to jump free and save herself just in time. As soon as her iron grip was gone, Frank shoved himself backward. There was an impressive crash, and the killer looked to see the old fighter crawling toward the fixture as best he could. Before she could figure out what he was doing and stand, he had his arm out of the wreckage. Then, he held the end to the stub. As she watched, the fingers began to twitch and she knew his body was making itself whole once more. However, it had to take longer to reattach a limb than recover from a bullet hole, And he probably had to hold it in place for even seconds before the bond would be strong enough to allow it to keep it on its own. That meant both arms were out of service in that window of opportunity, and she knew for sure she could rip him apart. She could still win this fight, but she had to act fast. To that end, she ran toward the wreck in the floor, leapt over it, and bull rushed him with both hands out to grab and separate anything they could touch.

Frank saw her coming, and let loose a flying crescent kick. His legs were longer than her reach, and she went crashing into the remains of some pews. She knew her injured side had felt the impact, but mental training and adrenalin kept the pain from her mind as she got back to her feet; Frank had closed in, and caught her under her chin that sent her back again. Once more she quickly moved into a standing position, and this time managed to block the incoming kick although as with his punches the sheer strength and force pushed her back. She tried to grab a leg, but every time she snatched at one her opponent pulled short on his kick. Every time one foot touched to ground, immediately the other came flying in. By this means, the two worked their way onto the dais to the right side of the alter. The old man let go of his arm, placed both hands onto said alter, and delivered a double kick to Cimmeria that slammed her into the baptismal fount and crumpled her to the floor.

It was over, she knew that; this fight went to Jackson. Yet every fight she lost she learned from, and by this practice not many did she fail at anymore. There would be another time, another place, she would see to that. She would think on this man, his fighting style, his tactics. She would not be caught wanting again, and his remains would be dumped in a hole like so many before him by her hand. For now though, she needed to rest and heal, and plan. She looked at her foe with her trademark stone face, and touched the floor to open a portal beneath to safety. As she sank from view, she saw the big man run toward and jump over her. She thought he had meant to attack her again, but abandoned the thought when she started to disappear and he didn't want to get sucked into where he didn't know. She doubted her reasoning though when she heard him grunt as though straining his muscles, and seconds after the entered one of her rooms to fall to rest on the floor, the marble font came through the portal after her. She tried to move out of the way, but sheering pain in both her legs told her she was too late...

Smokes stood over the edge of the shattered entrance he'd created and peered down into the street surrounding the James R. Thompson Centre, from here he could see an ominous black APC shunt its way through the civilian vehicles that'd been left abandoned on the chaotic streets.
"TIME T' HUSTLE! Y' KNOW TH' PLAN, SO G'T GONE!" he shopped his hand to indicate the street and his soldered rushed to follow their orders.
The squad had planned their manoeuvres in advance, and even with their communication difficulties preventing The Commander from glaring over their shoulder they all knew what was expected of them; Smokes and three of his soldiers used the mechanised winches onboard their transport to load their six chosen hostages, this would fill the helicopter to it's limit and so the remaining six troopers would have to fight their way to the ground floor and rendezvous with Unit IL-3-RR.
Unit IL-3-RR was one of Commander mechanised divisions, and although the 'Rough Riders's conventional and professional tactics meshed poorly with the ZeroComets aggressive and adrenalin fuelled style they had agreed to cooperate in this one case. While the remaining Comets fought their way down the building they would collect additional hostages to load into the RoughRider APC and both vehicles would then complete a circuit of the city to assist any other Namidian forces before beating a retreat to offload their cargo. With both the 'Comets helicopter and the 'Riders custom VBCI-pattern APC loaded to the seams with hostages neither unit felt that they'd be at any risk of retaliation.

Both units moved out to commence the median phase of their operation.

---

Eight thousand feet above the ground the clouds hovering over the dark shell of Chicago bulged outwards and burst to reveal the featureless dapple-grey hull of an unmanned "Predator D" drone, it's 30 meter wingspan swooped down to level out at a lower altitude and reduced it's speed to a sedate 250 miles per hour. A streamlined hatch along it's belly pulled back to reveal a bulbous bank of rounded cameras and rack of assorted missiles...

"Cloud cover cleared. 'Megalodon' is now in surveillance mode." A technician reported, back at Commanders Headquarters. "On screen."- Commander commanded.
With the systems feeding his virtual tactical map rendered unreliable Commander had decided to deploy one of his new toys. From the sky his drone would be able to give a birds eye view of the city, and Commander could manually fill out the gaps in his knowledge.
"Status of my ground forces?" he enquired, and the technicians manning the desks infront of him rapidly checked their systems and made the relevant calls:

The satellite view of the drone jerkily shifted to look down upon a Chicago street and the camera refocused to examine a black APC that thundered down Randolph Street, as he watched an armoured police van collided with the vehicle in an attempt to stop it and was promptly pushed over. The APC disgorged a handful of men who moved to pick through the wreckage and even as The Commander watched one of the injured peacekeepers was dragged from the husk of his van, sprayed in the face with Capsin, and piled screaming into the back of the APC before it reloaded and returned to it's destructive route. "IL-3-RR is in phase two. On schedule. Zero casualties." the technician reported dryly.

"Good." -Commander keyed out a few alterations to his map- "What about IL-6-NB? The 'Numbered Brethren'?"
"Still getting into position, sir."
"Right... And the ZeroComets?"

The camera pulled back like the eye of god and the drone yawed slightly to re-align with a different street, a second later the camera's PoV plunged down to gaze at a trail of Carnage making it's way down Wacker Drive. The drone could clearly see futuristic multi-rotor of the ZeroComets shot it's way down the riverside street with the doorside machine-guns on either side firing carelessly at whatever target's they could. The glass of the skyscrapers by it's sides exploded outwards like a wake of razors as the rounds found their mark.
Commander stared at the display with an unreadable expression- his technician broke the silence;
"ZeroComets are in Phase Two, and are responding to a potential situation. On schedule."
"Casualties?"
"Uh... estimates are still being tallied."
The helicopter pivoted into the air to face the sky, threatened to roll over, then twisted into a suicide turn that brought it  a few feet above the roads surface where shot down the corner bridge of Michigan Avenue at fifty miles per hour.
"Jesus Christ." Commander swore.

---

The interior of the multi-role helicopter was a mix of emotions, Hostages screamed bloody murder, Soldiers hooted in unbridled delight and the pilot's uninterested lack of expression served as a contrast between the two. Smokes slapped the back of his chair.
"AH' TOLD Y'H WE COULD MAKE THA' CORN'R!" Smokes returned to his machine gun and held the trigger for a moment to rake bullets across the beautiful stonework of a Gothic building that'd somehow offended him. He came to a sudden realization that he'd been shooting at his destination, the Tribune Tower, and slapped his pilot again upside the head.
"PUT 'S DOWN! WE'RE HERE!"

The helicopters rear rotors pivoted forwards and slowed the aircraft to an almost instant stop with a roar of air, it yawed along the corner of the building and it's occupants were given a long view of the destruction that Ashes flames had caused. Smokes could see two distinctive figures standing by a totalled fire-engine and he decided that they must be the Namidian's who'd radioed in a few moments ago. Strictly speaking the duo had only claimed the possibility of a threat, and it looked as though they might have arrived a moment too late- but that hardly mattered to the Soldiers. The ZeroComets didn't get invited to violence, they actively sought it out, and where convenient; created it.

Hovering a dozen feet off the ground the helicopter eased towards Ash and Zenith, and with it's guns quiet and it's rotor maintaining an idle altitude the vehicle quietened to only a moderately deafening background noise. The side door was thrown open and Smokes winched down from to face the two men firsthand.
"THIS YH'R WORK?!" he said, jerking a thumb to the firetruck. "FUC'IN' FINE JOB!- 'AH LIKE HOW Y'H BURN'T IT, S' IRON'C."
He cast his eyes around. There was obvious violence and destruction all around, but when he'd flown in the street looked deserted, burned out, empty. Not a combat situation. He lowered his voice to a threatening hiss.
"So uh', lads. We gotta' call." he shifted his eyes around, suspiciously. "Where's th' fire?"

Bard snickered a little at the manchild's pitiful excuse for a joke; her snicker echoed between the buildings and created an odd break in her endless song. Ash gritted his teeth and thrust his hand toward whenever he heard that monster's echoing, taunting laughter! If anyone was watching, he would have looked to the entire world like a lunatic desperately trying to catch a bug in his palm. Each time he thrust his hand out, the air around his target erupted into a thin, quickly dissipating sheet of flame.

"Where are you," demanded the burning man. The song started up again. It was a harmonious, yet dangerous thing; not at all aggressive, but very ominous. It pressed down upon Ash, filling him with dread and making him feel trapped. Death was coming, death was coming; the pain he caused had finally caught up with him!

"Yaaaaaaahhhh!" screamed Ash as he swung his hands back and forth like recoiling machine guns, filling all the air around him with white-hot fireballs. His hundreds of flames came and went like fireflies on a summer night, and still the song carried on. The low, peaceful hum he heard soon became a crowd of millions humming in serene unity. Worse, the wind flowing about "played" the ruins of Chicago like massive flutes.

Ash cried out in frustration and agony. The dead were speaking, they were singing. It's not over, they sang in his mind. Our songs still play. Ash built a wall of fire around himself and held his breath to keep from choking on his own smoke.

Though we be gone, we're heard to-day. Tears gave way to inelegant sobbing from the murderous, cackling supervillain.

"I'm sorry!" said Ash. "I had no choice! I'm sorry!"
Ash had never felt guilty about killing people; nobody suffered after they died, and most people would be forgotten in a flash. But, for far too long, a parasitic fear had been growing in his psyche: that fear was, of course, that he was wrong. He feared that most people were good enough to be remembered, that the people he killed mattered, and that he didn't deserve to be forgiven. And somehow the songstress knew this and played a song that ripped his brain apart.

Clenching his fist hard enough for his fingernails to draw blood, Ash howled up at the sky. His outburst itself seemed to erupt into an enormous mushroom cloud that cut entire skyscrapers in half and sent cars flying miles down the road. As soon as she had heard the scream, Bard ducked behind a dumpster. There she held a loud, defiant note that let her skin suffer no more than singe despite being bathed in flame. She stood up in the burnt rags that were once her clothes. Her eyes fluttered with delight and she smiled widely.

"I have won," sung Maire, loud enough for Ash to hear. "The harmony has come." 

Ash flung his arms out in all directions as Bard danced toward him. While smiling and singing as though she had never known fear or sadness, she bounced out of the way of each of his attacks moments before he even knew he was going to throw them.
The criminal fell back on his oldest defense mechanism, joking around.

"Okay, Miss Cleo, predict this!" Ash built a cage of flame around his enemy, but she simply rolled through the bars before they could collapse around her.

"No no no no no!" said Ash under his breath. Bard tilted her head in mock curiosity and stared directly into the disruptive boy's eyes.

"Why do you resist?" she asked. "You know it's useless."

Ash fell to the ground and pathetically backed away from his assailant on hands and knees.

"You lived a long, wrong life," said the Bard. "Full of agony and strife. Let it end, let it end, and all the hearts your burnt will mend."

And just like that, the once mighty Ash curled up into a ball and began to fantasize about living just one more day...

Bard took the time to increase her song's tension. When she hit that one final note, she would end her song with an abrupt stab to the dragon boy's heart. Suddenly, she sensed a horrible degradation of the patterns behind her. When she turned to face these patterns, she noticed all the familiar shapes, motions, and patterns melting into a chaotic, incoherent mess. The lines that formed the Earth's web curled themselves into loop-de-loops and tangled, hairlike messes. The whirling clouds that were her song's sounds turned to concrete and crumbled before she even heard them. The heartbeats of all those left alive became dying rodent squeaks. And finally, the flames of Chicago flashed a million different colors before disappearing and leaving massive holes in her vision. For the first time ever, she was truly being blinded. For the first time in years, she was truly afraid.

A green pyramid, roughly the size of a human head, emerged in front of her. She scrambled back in fright, but a handful of mercury-colored liquid blades burst from the pyramid's nearest tip. Before she could react, the blades poured themselves through the pores of her skin and turned her face to metal. Maire’s world burst open like the rotting corpse of a pre-teen girl’s princess themed birthday party. Pinks and acid greens and warlock purples exploded like fireworks and rippled in the blankness of her blindness. Someone in the know might have compared it to a screen saver, swirling colors of light and patterns. Her senses were desperately trying to make sense of the world and being overwhelmed with pure, raw sensory data. She did the only thing she could as a reflex.

Back in reality, a badly scarred Zenith (whose mohawk had been burnt off) finished blowing a thin line of multicolored smoke into a frozen Bard's face. He then carelessly pushed the young woman to the ground. HE noted even as she fell with a beatific smile on her face, that she was humming something.

"I sincerely hope you prepared for your trip, love."

The criminal mastermind stepped over his victim and leaned down in front of his treacherous young ward. He spoke to him softly.

"Everything's alright, Ash," said Zenith. "We've won the day."

"You're lying! Liar, liar, pants on--"

Zenith instinctively brushed the seat of his pants.

"Did you really think--" asked Ash. "Motherfucker, I'm better than that!" A sad laugh that entirely failed to conceal his whimpering escaped his lips.

"Indeed you are, son," said Zenith. "And that's why we trust you... That's why he trusts you."

Ash wiped the pathetic tears off of his own cheeks. Yeah, yeah, that's right. Namidias knew they would win, he was crazy to ever let that woman get to him! She didn't stand a chance, no one did! And no one ever would again! They were Ash and Zenith, Chicago's Foulest; you were afraid of them, they weren't afraid of you.
Zenith held out his hand and Ash grabbed for it only to miss as his vision swam. Zenith frowned as his own world blurred and swam as well and then snapped his vision back to the blithely humming woman.

In her reflex to protect herself, Bard had started a hum which synched with the effects of Zenith’s drug and then broadcast them. Purely as a defense against danger, Bard was suffusing an entire area with the aural version of Zenith’s powder. Ash and Zenith’s vision danced and then exploded even as Zenith mouthed something that was supposed to sound like, Phase One Complete… but came out as ”face un compeesh.” He felt an overwhelming sense of friendship and fondness for Ash suddenly and collapsed on the ground to throw a hug around his protégé. For his part, Ash was weeping uncontrollably as something latched onto the patterns of their heightened emotions and amplified them beyond reason. Even hoped up on drugs and blind, Bard’s instinctive defensive attacks were having nearly as bad an effect on the two villains as her directed attacks had.

Just then, the ZeroComets chipper hoved into view and the team’s on-board FOF system registered the presence of two Namidians as well as an unknown third party. The side door was thrown open and Smokes winched down from to face the two men firsthand. "THIS YH'R WORK?!" he said, jerking a thumb to the firetruck. "FUK'IN' FINE JOB!- 'AH LIKE HOW Y'H BURN'T IT, S'IRON'C."

He cast his eyes around. There was obvious violence and destruction all around, but when he'd flown in the street looked deserted, burned out, empty. Not a combat situation. He lowered his voice to a threatening hiss as he scanned the trio. One was laying on the ground frozen while the two Namidians were stumbling drunk and spouting love for one another.

"So uh', lads. We gotta' call…" he shifted his eyes around, suspiciously. "Th’ Fuk’s this scrum?” He eyed the situation and then grunted and opened up with his weapon at the woman. Bard screamed as a bullet tore through her leg but gave her a moment of barest chance as reality snapped to attention for a second. She gathered a pattern in her hand, and tossed it behind the man, a small explosion of sparks and then a debilitating scream escaping it.

Ash, who had just been regaining focus, stiffened and fell backwards, spasming as his eyes rolled into the back of his head, and small trickles of blood slid out of his ears and nose, but Zenith was too coordinated away to be affected quite as much.  He had registered what was happening and had been altering some skin cells to act as an antidote for his own state even as the scream erupted. The trick took a few seconds though.

Bard convulsed on the ground, her leg sending near crippling pain into her mind which she shunted into her subconscious. The bullet had torn a deep furrow through it and she was now bleeding far too profusely. At this rate, she would be dead within the hour. She pulled a knife out and looked at it, closing her eyes and gathering her courage. She sang, a high, cutting note, and the blade began vibrating almost imperceptibly. The silver metal began steaming before it turned just slightly red, and Maire turned her gaze and placed it on her leg, a scream actually erupting from her throat this time. The debilitation would only last a few more seconds. She needed to hurry. The blade made its way down the broken skin, sealing it back up with black and bubbling tissue, and Maire stood, her scream dying out in time with the one that was keeping the foes off their games. She hummed a deep note, and ran down the street, disappearing from view moments before Zenith regained control. Ash was still smiling blissfully on the ground and muttering something.

Reflexively, he altered the blood flowing in his ears. It was imperfect at the moment, but the sound effects were greatly diminished even as he eyed the chopper hovering nearby. The men inside were covering their ears and screaming in pain. He suddenly looked around the area in panic and saw no signs of his recently defeated foe.

Air rushed past Daniel in a defending storm as he hurtled through the sky like a crimson cannonball, a long scarf trailed behind him and his bright red and white clothing made him conspicuous against the blue Illinois sky. His mask overlayed a horizon guide onto his vision and the heavy protective plates of his armour extended and contracted subtly as he corrected his course with a clench of a gloved fist. The shifting panels brought air under him and as he felt his speed reduce toward terminal velocity he kicked a blastwave out from his feet and returned to full speed as the displaced air pushed past him. The thickly tree'd and grid-set buildings of Chicago's semi-suburban Des Plaines district lurched past him alarmingly fast, and Daniel kept his eyes locked on the streets below as he kept distant pace with a white-and-blue-striped CPD patrol vehicle.

Flight was dangerous, but not a new trick for him, and he felt his thoughts drift back to the series of events that'd brought him here; Less than an hour ago Chicago had reported a colossal surge in superhuman instigated crime, and the ITSDA were naturally notified. Phoenix Crimson was airborne and hurtling across the Illinois state border when the media had managed to setup shop and broadcast their early reports, he'd brought the channels up on his visor but something'd knocked his news reports offline before he'd had a chance to decide where he was most needed.
Without a running source of information he'd decided to tail the first police vehicle he could find, and as the squad car pulled up outside the entrance to Advocate Lutheran General Hospital Daniel knew he'd made the right decision. The entire drop-off strip was locked up with police vehicles and panicked civilians were fleeing from any exit to the Hospital that wasn't the front door, clearly he'd found the trouble he'd been looking for.

He pulled up from his horizontal flying position and extended all the panels of his armour, the sudden air resistance sent his velocity plummeting and he felt the drag of gravity begin to pull him back down to earth. With a thought power crackled around his body as he prepared to make his dramatic entrance.

---

The peacekeepers that were entrenched behind their semicircle of police vehicles surrounding the entrance to Advocate Lutheran General Hospital was in a state of repressed panic; scant moments ago they had received word that a psychopath had entered the building and opened fire on doctors, nurses and patients alike. Explosions had rumbled across the open air surrounding the building and the responding SWAT and Police forces were forced to conclude that Lady Crimson had detonated devices inside several of the hospital's Emergency Rooms.

Chicago was far from undefended, but the simultaneous attacks from the Namidian's forces had stretched them well past their tolerance. With helpless and handicapped civilians at stake the forces of justice had quickly moved as many of the forces that they could spare into position around the Hospital, the electronic blackout had come at the worst possible time and had crippled their ability to take action: Without leadership the police forces had no choice but to hastily strategize among themselves, and opinion was split on whether rushing the building was the best course of action, or whether it would endanger the lives of the invalids still trapped inside.
Most galling of all was that the fact that the first wave of policemen to enter the building had been completely wiped out by a single adversary, and she'd used the last moments before the electronic blackout to mock the men still waiting outside.
With no time to spare, no means to organise, and no concrete knowledge of the threat they were up against the dozens of highly trained law enforcers were rendered practically inert- and every moment that they wasted was more time that the rest of the chaos that'd hit their city could spread unchecked.

Two heavy-set men dressed in the classic blue and grey of the CPD crouched behind the hood of their Police Interceptor, they were both clutching their special issue Springfield pistols in white-knuckled fists. The older of the two men wore the three silver chevrons denoted him as a Police Sergeant, whereas the younger of the two was unranked and held a handset that was attached to their cars PA megaphone by a coiled cord.
"Backup won't get here in time, Sarge. There's only one of her and twenty of us, we should end this now." - The younger officers impatience wasn't a sign of inexperience, but rather he knew that other incidents exactly like this one were happening all throughout his home city and was loath to sit back and do nothing.
"That's what she wants." The older man said, with a disapproving shake of his head. "She took out Ollie's unit in seconds, and she'll slice through us just the same. At least this way she won't be able to escape as easily." The Sergeants face hardened as he committed to his decision. "We're staying here. We're waiting for her for make a mistake -and we're waiting for more men."
He wasn't happy about the decision he'd had to make, but the harsh reality of the situation was that the CPD couldn't be everywhere they needed to be, and that he had to do what little he could with what little he had left. Throwing his men's lives away on idiot heroism wouldn't achieve a damn thing.

The tense stalemate was broken by a screaming whistle of air and a cacophonous explosion behind the police line, the blast sent a wall of air buffeting past the peacekeepers and the men who weren't completely focused on the hospitals entrance snapped their vision around to the impact as they wondered whether or not they'd somehow come under mortar fire.
Their eyes found a brightly-clad white and crimson figure standing in a foot wide crater that'd been knocked out of the roads asphalt as he landed. Before any of the stunned policemen could react to say or do anything the masked man thumbed a switch on his armours chestplate, brushed a long streaming red scarf off his shoulder to billow out impressively behind him, and gave the Police Sergeant a quick salute and a reassuring smile as he strode over to him in a few quick steps.
"Phoenix Crimson. I'd like to be of service."

The officer by the Sergeants side levelled his gun to the interlopers head and very deliberately set the guns cock with a loud click. "Hands where I can see them! Get on the ground!"
The figure looked down the barrel of the gun, his mask hid his eyes but the officer could see the man's blonde eyebrows knit together in indignation. "Don't you know who I am?!"
The Officer was about to respond that he didn't particularly care before he was interrupted-
"Phoenix Crimson. Glad you could make it." The Sergeant gently pushed the barrel of the younger officers gun away from Phoenix's face. "Keep your eye's pointed forward, Officer. This one's on our side." The younger officer wasn't cleared to know this, but the Sergeant had been half informed and half warned that the increasing threat of superhuman 'incidents' might bring the CPD into conflict with a classified branch of government sanctioned superhumans. Details of this organisation were disturbingly vague and tied behind miles of red tape, but given his lack of options the Sergeant was willing to take a risk on the stranger.
Phoenix's smile widened, and he knelt behind the cover of the squad vehicle to meet his eye level. "Thank you... Now, what kind of mess are we all in?"

---

A moment later Lady Crimson would be able to see her similarly-coloured Phoenix counterpart step into plain view atop the bonnet of the Police Interceptor, he raised a handset to his mouth and his voice blared out from the vehicles PA system to address her directly.
"VILLAIN!" he began. "YOU'VE CAUSED MUCH SUFFERING THIS DAY! YOU HAVE ONE CHANCE TO SURRENDER WILLINGLY TO THE CHICAGO POLICE DEPARTMENT. TAKE IT! OR I'LL HAVE NO CHOICE BUT TO ADMINISTER JUSTICE MYSELF!"
He struck a pose, this time standing noble and upright with his finger pointed directly at Lady Crimsons cover.
"EVEN IF THE LAW CAN FORGIVE YOUR PETTY CRIMES, I -PHOENIX CRIMSON- CANNOT! SURRENDER NOW AND RENOUNCE YOUR EVIL WAYS!"
He clenched his fist and pulled it to his chest. At the same moment a tower of fire shot from the ground behind him to cast his silhouette over Lady Crimsons position.

Several of the police officers exchanged sceptical glances.
This message was last edited by the player at 23:49, Thu 18 June 2015.

Vivianne, for that was how she still thought of herself, let her eyes widen a bit at the brazen pronouncement; she was slowly coming to think of herself more and more as Lady Crimson now that she was in the field again though. She took a moment to scan the reports coming in of Namidian progress across town. Radio silence at the church but news agencies were reporting it of shortwave radios, the Tribune building was burning, the hospital was out of action for now, and her two teams had robber several million dollars in cash and jewels to be funneled into the Wave's infrastructure. Dieter had to be pretty happy about it and this was just Phase One.

"Laura, activate Phase Three and assign resources as necessary. Reroute Squads Lemmings and Annie Lennox to the hospital though and get me a dossier on that costumed buffoon out there, kay?"

A quick affirmative was her only answer followed shortly by her two ghoul teams checking in. She shifted slightly and did a count of her arsenal. Two White Phosphorus grenades, three more He grenades, and an infrared smoke grenade. She also had to flashbang packs. 22 more rounds for the revolver and 3 more clips each for the TMPs. She clucked her tongue, "Squad Lemmings and Annie Lennox, deploy destroyer protocol." Lemmings would be bringing a M249 LMG while Annie Lennox would deploy a M72 LAW with three rockets to one soldier in each squad. She grinned as she thought of what type of battleground she would make of the hospital. She pulled up the blueprints on his visor even as her comms fired as Laura made a cross channel announcement, All parties, Phase One satisfied; Phase Three is go. Firebug and Tastetester are to divert to Soldier Field; IL-1-0C, a juicy bit of information for you; the mayor is held up at Chicago City Hall and a prime target, heavy police resistance. Cimmeria, check in and reroute to the East Foreman Drive police building to neutralize. GITS, we need eyes on the church."

Even as she listened, Lady Crimson watched as the small file that Schwartze Augen had on Phoenix Crimson played and her lips smirked. Rating 5 personal combat with a Rating 4 mobility score? Average in other categories. Notes about ego and showboating. She flexed her muscles and activated her own external comm systems, ""Much suffering" and "evil ways" don't even begin to tell the story. The city will burn, hero, now come and get me." She bolted back into the hostipal to use its corridors and rooms to play her favorite game even as Laura readied herself behind the scenes and her soldiers moved toward her location.

Gates brought out the satellite phone he had been give and quickly got the camera pointed at the Church. He started sending the stream, which of course was completely encoded, to his boss. "Eyes are up."

Phonix Crimson released a theatrically exaggerated sigh of exasperation. "That never works. They always want to put up a fight." He handed the microphone back to the officer he'd taken it from.
"...Shame, really." he said, without disappointment. "Sergeant, please wait outside. This should only take a few minutes." He put on his cockiest grin and slowly strode towards the hospital's entrance, as he walked he shook the tension out of his arms and casually stretched his shoulders with circular shrugs.

He passed through the hospitals automatic glass entrance and came to a stop in the reception area. There was no sign of Vivianne, which meant that she was preparing a trap that Phoenix'd have no choice but to walk into. This suited Daniel just fine; his line of work didn't usually give him the luxury of fighting at an advantage, and at the very least it'd give him a moment to consider his enemy:
Viviane had taken out an entire unit of Swat troopers by herself, so it could be deduced that she was gifted- although Phoenix wasn't sure in which way, yet.
The reception area was a thinly furnished and open-planned affair, with only a few sterile desks, support columns, and utilitarian couches to break up the room. Doors and corridors along the ground floor lead into the further wings of the facility and into waiting rooms, shops and an efficiently placed canteen. With the power out the only light illuminating the room came from the mirrored floor-to-ceiling windows that plated the buildings ground floor. The room was completely silent.
As Daniel stepped further into the building he could see the still corpse of a SWAT Officer slumped over a stairwell banister, he had been shot squarely between the eyes with a single bullet. Whoever his foe was she was skilled, very skilled; the guard looked as though he hadn't even had time to fire off a shot before he'd been efficiently put down. He lifted the mans head to examine the entry wound, it was an ugly fat wound that looked like the kind of mark that high-calibre low-velocity bullet could leave. A revolver, Daniel guessed.
He replaced the man and continued onwards. Without Police Officers to showoff to, and nothing but the eerily dead hospital surrounding him, the bright enthusiasm that he'd entered the building with with was gradually sapped and replaced with a bitter sense of purpose. He told himself that he'd feel better after he'd had the chance to throw Vivianne through a few walls.

---

His path took him down one of the hospitals many hallways. The sterile furnishings, uniformly placed drinking fountains, fire extinguishers, and two-tone laminated floor made it seem indistinguishable from the rest of the facility but the overhead signs set at each junction claimed that he was walking past the first floor Emergency Rooms. Here the building was fully enclosed and windowless, only the pulsing orange-white light of his armours heatsinks and the glowing charge he kept maintained in his right fist kept Daniel from stumbling over the particularly thick trail of corpses that'd lead him here.
After a long minute of fruitless searching he stopped to call out a challenge: "This is your plan? Hide and seek?! I guess that you're not as great in a fair fight as you are at slaughtering the helpless." His challenge came out angrier than he'd meant, seeing the senseless destruction paired with the dismal surroundings had pricked his temper and caused him to think rashly... which of course was why Vivianne had lured him down here: Angry heroes made mistakes- such as giving away their position with loud outbursts.

"Whatever you say, boy."
Daniels head snapped up to the ceiling as Vivianne broke her silence, his reactions fired a bolt of lightning down his spine as his dim vision adjusted to spot olive green beads of corrosive solution bubble the ceiling above him. A warning droplet splashed onto the ground by his feet and chewed a hissing pit into the floor, instantly and without warning the ceiling along the entire length of corridor bulged outward and acid gushed in torrents down onto the ground where he'd just been standing, great chunks of rubble slammed into the ground and sunk away as the pool of acid washed outwards before receding again as it dug it's way through another floor and drained into the basement.
From her perch on the floor above Vivianne admired her handiwork with a sly grin. She'd used her Ghoul helmet's suite of echo-locators to plan her strike but now that the air had filled with caustic vapour and shifting rubble she switched to low-light vision, she leaned over the precipice she'd made as she waited to confirm her kill. If the air, acid or rubble hadn't killed him her drawn TMP certainly would. Dropping a floors worth of chemically-drenched rubble onto her target had been excessive and impersonal by her standards but she wasn't in the mood to draw this fight out for long, her Units would soon be in position and she intended to begin Phase Three of her mission immediately.
As the mist parted her highly contrasted vision picked out the glowing white lines of Phoenix's armour, a moment later it cleared enough to show that he'd narrowly been able to leap back from her initial attack and had used his ridiculous scarf to filter his lungs from the congested air.
"I'm almost impressed!" she laughed, honestly. "You're light on your feet, for such a loudmouthed idiot!" Her finger traced playful circles around the pin of one of her White Phosphorus grenades.
"Thanks. I like your uniform..." Phoenix returned. He threw his crimson scarf from his mouth and struck a pose, this time raising his striking arm in a karate-like pose. "...but one of us is going to have to change!"
Lady Crimson snorted derisively, her quarry was back to throwing out inane soundbites. "You shouldn't have gotten involved. Goodbye forever." With a casual flick of her wrist she plucked the Grenade from her holster, popped the pin, and tossed it in an underhanded spin to bounce past Phoenixes feet before spilling it's deadly chemical payload in a great surge of gaseous powder.

Daniel had to act quickly, whether it was from warcrime-grade phosphorous or acid rain the crimson psychopath seemed intent on killing him the the most painful way possible. His survival would be decided in a mere moment, and time seemed to slow to a crawl as the two Gifted committed their full skill and focus against each other.
As the armed cylinder hit the ground and bounced once past his boot Phoenix kicked himself off the ground with a concentrated detonation under his heel, he hurtled into the air and used a second crack of energy to kick off from the corridor wall just as the grenade bounced a second time and blossomed into a swell of pale smog. With a third wallkick Daniel cleared what was once the ground floor ceiling and hurtled toward Vivianne with a furious battlecry on his lips, his fist pulled back and the glow of it's stored power redoubled whereas Vivianne's own hand inched up to lead Daniels path and tightened it's finger around her TMP's trigger.
The distance between the two closed in less than a second; Phoenix slashed his gauntleted fist around in a powerful but telegraphed strike which Viviane countered by simply taking a step back and letting the attack sail through the air where her head had just been, she dug the stubby barrel of her gun into the young man's unarmoured gut and flashed a cruel smile that seemed to say 'I win. Tough luck.'
"PHOENIX! -PUNCH!" At the final moment Phoenix finished the last syllable of his battlecry.
Energy crackled along Phoenix's entire body and collected to a pinprick just above his knuckle, too fast for either party to perceive the point shrunk down to a singularity and burst into a volatile'KRAC-CK!' of energy, even the indirect hit sent a blast through the room that threatened to boil the fluid in Vivianne's inner ear, and the blastwave pressed her down to brace a knee against the floor even as it blew open every door throughout the second floors corridor. Phoenix Crimson laughed in triumph as he succeeded in landing the first-hit.
"Hah -HA!"

Vivianne's perception floundered against the unexpected sensory assault as her Ghoul helmet desperately triggered it's flashbang and counter-noise compensators, her highly-drilled combat instincts screamed at her not to reflexively seize her finger against her trigger or to flinch into a guard, and instead she fell back upon the simple mantra that'd served her through her years of service as a ranker Ghoul and continued to serve her as a Lieutenant: "When in doubt, lash out."
From her pained crouching position she snapped her palm upward and felt it connect with the pliable flesh of Daniels throat, which shut the little bastard up for a moment at least. Her octuple vision refocused whilst her blacked-out visor made what little light shone from the thrown open-second storey windows almost tolerable against her hyper-dilated pupils. With her restored vision she could see that Daniel had landed behind her but her strike had prevented him from following up with a second punch, currently he stood almost doubled over and clutching at his throat and Vivianne's ringing ears distantly registered that he was trying to croak out another speech. Vivianne didn't care to hear it, her wrist-stab hadn't been direct enough to crush Daniel's Laryinx but she wouldn't let that happen again, from now on she intended make every action a killing one.
The blood pounding in her ears subsidised enough to let her regain her balance and her helmet was obliging enough to reduce the rooms noise to a comparative whisper while she recovered, an electronic notification sprung up on the corner of her vision and she knew it's meaning without having to examine it: Squads Lemmings and Annie Lennox had arrived at the Hospital and this morons interference had put her behind schedule. She ground her teeth together furiously and a scarlet flush of rage ran it's way up her neck as a thought crossed her mind: 'Dieter won't tolerate this.'

She locked eye's with Phoenix Crimson to the extent that their opaque masks would allow as they sized each other up and planned their next moves.
Vivianne reacted before Phoenix and fired her TMP from the hip to scatter lead at his retreating figure, the Hero turned, sprinted and dived inside one of the wards recovery rooms before any of the rounds managed to find a solid hit- but as Daniel dived to cover Lady Crimson saw a round ricochet off his right shoulder plate, another whip between his pounding legs and several more pluck holes through his trailing scarf.
Pheonix Crimson twisted from his dive and franticly rolled into the relative safety one of the floors Recovery Rooms. His heavy breathing indicated the closest thing to fear that he ever allowed himself to feel in combat, the airy and well-windowed recovery room was deceptively calming compared to the hell that the rest of the building had become, but Phoenix resisted the urge to ease his guard- he could afford complacency in some of his fights, but this wasn't one of them.
Bullets were his biggest, and most unfortunately common, weakness; he could outmanuver the arm that fired them, but the rounds themselves travelled faster than his feet, his blasts, and even faster than thought- and it only took a single direct hit to take him out of action. From Daniels perspective Vivianne's compact little submachinegun was easily more dangerous than any of her grenades, acids, or shockingly strong combat manoeuvres.
His reactions and agility had narrowly saved him this time, but blind luck had definitely played it's part.

He could hear Vivianne's footsteps stamping closer in a heavy sprint, he guessed that she intended to press her advantage and corner him in the room and so he heaved himself to his feet to meet her challenge head on.
Vivianne barged into the recovery room only moments after Daniel, and it's designed tranquillity exploded into anarchy as she waved her weapon over everything inside in an extended barrage that smashed windows, shredded hospital charts midair, and reduced a roomful of medical hardware to plastic shards. Her vision spun around as she tried to find her target, and as her weapon snapped around to clear the near-corners of the room Phoenix lunged from his hiding place behind the door to grab Vivianne by the wrist and twist her gun-arm to harmlessly face the ceiling.
Phoenix Crimson followed up his counterattack with a series of jabbed punches into Vivianne's side, each time he hit he did so with a gunshot spark that buckled her armour and would have ended the fight against a normal opponent, but only seemed to drive the wind from her. She was made of stronger stuff than even her militaristic and intimidating frame would suggest, and as she contracted her muscles to force the barrel of her weapon back toward Daniel it quickly became apparent that she was the physically stronger of the two. Without time to charge his attacks Daniel's punches had lost most of their power.
The two wrestled in silence for a long second, both their hands were grappled around the submachine gun's handle and Phoenix began to feel his muscles give way as the woman's enhanced strength brought her line of fire to within inches of Daniels face with slow inevitability. Phoenix tried to jam the trigger down to spend the rest of her bullets but she stopped him by hooking a finger behind the triggers frame.
"You look pissed. Did something come up, or are you always like this?" Phoenix taunted glibly, although his clenched teeth and groans of exertion told Vivianne that he was struggling not to give way. "You shouldn't get so worked up. It's not a hot look."
"You little shit!" She wanted to to put a bullet through his skull as much as she wanted to punch him in the throat again, but neither so much as she wanted to get the fight over with and rejoin the broader battlefield. Images of Dieter's quiet scowl, and the subtle threat that implied, etched themselves onto her thoughts and triggered a very real and personal fear within her. As they struggled her masks messenger system updated it's earlier notification to an orange alert. She was falling behind schedule. "Just die already!"
She decided to employ a dirty trick; with a single economic movement she released the grip of her off-hand from her weapon and gathered a thin layer of thin acid against her burnt and scarred palm before attempting to slap the hand against Phoenix's mask. Her own acids were just as damaging to herself as they were to her opponents, but she'd find it easier to deal with another layer of calloused skin across her palm than Phoenix would with two eye sockets full of the stuff. She loathed using the trick but it came in useful now and then, it was always painful, and it was always messy.

Phoenix Crimson felt the crushing pressure of Vivianne's strength suddenly release and could see her hand swing at his vision. It wasn't until he'd dodged under the arm with a drunken step that he saw the skin on her palm was blistering and bubbling away. Vivianne shifted her feet into a reversal posture and chopped her palm back to Phoenix's head with a lightening-quick fencers lunge. Realizing that attempting to block the attack would coat his arms in the same substance that was eating away at his opponent Daniel twisted his dodge around to dart past Vivianne's side and out of the doorway back into the corridor that he'd fled from.
His retreat took him one, two, and almost a third step out of the recovery room before the scarf trailing behind him was snatched in a vicelike grip and yanked sharply into his damaged neck, he turned on his heel to face back towards the room before a second savage tug pulled him to the ground. He unconciously released a strained 'Glark!' from his constricted windpipe as his legs kicked out uslessly, one of his hands scrabbled to undo the taut knot that'd suddenly imprisoned him whilst the other dragged it's fingers along the corridor wall in a desperate attempt to find purchase to resist the force that'd started to pull him back into Vivianne's line of sight...

Vivianne twisted the red cloth of Daniels scarf around her fist a third time before heaving her arm backward with irresistible force, she heard a painful choke and a slight give of resistance as the fabric yielded another foot. Her off-hand was still wet with mild acid and she ignored the burn of her raw skin on fabric as she wound her fist and tugged again, her main hand clutched her machine-pistol and she knew the weapon only had a quarter-clip remaining. Vivianne's dense muscles contracted and snapped back on her preys leash with another mighty pull, the cloth hit heavy resistance before coming away with a sudden flutter that forced her to take a step back to keep her balance. She tossed the crimson rag aside and brandished her weapon at the vacant doorway just as the wall beside it crushed inward with explosive force. She ignored the masonry shrapnel that pelted at her armour and started firing careful single shots into the gap in the hopes of clipping Phoenix without squandering what little remained of her clip. Flying grit and debris obscured her sight but she heard the bullet punch through something metal, the debris filling her vision was pierced by a shrill hiss and she saw a jet of angled white gas sweep under her vision before arcing up to crash into her chin with enough force to crack the lenses of Vivianne's helmet and wrench her neck upward at a terrible angle.

Phoenix Crimson's uppercut the fire-extinguisher into the hitwoman's neck with all his might, the red cylinder had taken a bullet for him and he felt it welt into her chinstrap with enough force to crumple the metal and vent what remained of it's pressurised contents into a freezing gaseous powder that blinded the pair and forced it's way into their lungs.
Vivianne's vision blacked out for a moment as her helmet took the blow, she could taste blood pooling in her mouth and the strike had turned her around to face an unknown direction- she started firing into the all-enveloping mist in an attempt to keep Phoenix at bay, and as her vision returned she heard the hollow deadman's click of her gun running dry. Her eyes widened as she saw a sudden glow expand from the fog and dive toward her.
"PHOENIX!-"
She forced her battered body to respond, and attempted to quickdraw her sidearm-
"-KICK!"
Both Phoenix Crimsons boots blew into her side, and with a deafening crash she felt herself lifted bodily from the ground and hurtled through a pane of glass. Her spiralling vision suddenly filled with sunlight and air rushed past her as she shot from the buildings second storey window like a cannonball... there was a brief moment of gutwrenching weightlessness whilst Vivianne's combat and base survival instincts screamed conflicting demands in confusion.
The moment came to a pass as she hit the ground. Her bare hands dragged across the rough floor and she felt her damaged helmet split open with the force of impact, her armour and momentum sent her grinding over the concrete carpark that she'd landed on before she came to a stop. A moment later the glass from the window she'd shattered on her way out caught up to her and coated her in a light razor crust. Her brain screamed at her legs to stand but her body had simply stopped responding.
With an agonised groan she rolled herself over and tried to tend to the worst of her injuries. Her eyes were weeping themselves raw after her cracked helmet had spattered them with freezing extinguisher-powder, but what remained of her vision warned her against rubbing it out as both of her hands had been scraped raw by her landing and were glazed with an unhappy combination of extinguisher, gravel, acid and glass shards. Instead she reached out a hand to grab the largest intact section of her helmet that was still within reach, she pressed a button on its side and spoke in a slow and deliberate tone that tried to mask the agony she was suffering.
"Annie Lennox... Lemmings... Laura... West carpark..." She released the microphone key as she felt a fresh stab of pain lance it's way down her neck, her jaw had been broken. "...Awaiting extraction." she spoke finally, before flattening into the ground with conscious but unmoving exhaustion. She managed to flex her limbs, so she knew that she hadn't been crippled, but when she tried to inventory her broken bones the pain forced her to stop at 'twelve'.

---

Back in the hospital Phoenix's armour glowed a solid white that gave the gas settling at his feet an almost ethereal quality. He waited until he head the slap of Vivianne's meat hitting the ground before he released a breath that he hadn't realize'd he'd been holding. This had been a close fight, one of his closest ever- in fact. The woman was clearly no simple thug and although her abilities were no match for his own the way that she'd used them had been exceptionally skilful, even as he'd harried her with continuous attacks she had given as good as she'd got, and Phoenix had lost count of the many near-deaths he'd avoided.
His muscles ached all over, and his limbs shook with involuntary adrenalin spasms as he unsteadily teetered over to the window to look down upon his victim.
He could see Vivianne lying still amid a sea of glass and crimson shards of her ruined armour. After he'd seen the destruction she'd caused Phoenix sincerely hoped that she was dead. His mind lifted from such dark thoughts as he saw a group of armoured men with drawn rifles hustle out of cover and take up positions around Lady Crimsons prone form.

He beamed a shining grin, run a hand through his hair, and called out to what he assumed to be a squad of riot control officers.
"PASS THE SERGEANT MY APOLOGIES!" His voice was hoarse from the abuse it'd suffered over the last few minutes, but he injected it with a double dose of heroism and bluster to makeup the difference. "- IT TOOK A WHILE LONGER THAN I'D HOPED, BUT HE CAN REST EASY IN THE KNOWLEDGE THAT I! -PHOENIX CRIMSON!- HAVE ONCE AGAI-"
*KA-BLAMNN!*
The Shwartze Augen soldier lowered his M72 LAW antitank weapon from his shoulder and quickly chambered another rocket, he was a specialist of Squad Annie Lennox.
Six minutes ago Laura had parsed Lieutenant Sommers broad orders into individual commands, and with her overwatching eye had guaranteed that the two squads met no resistance in occupying the area. The thin line of police officers that'd been waiting outside the hospitals main entrance, and the smaller squads around the rest of the building, had been easily dispatched and the Hospital was now entirely under Namidian control. The only fault in the plan had been with the Lieutenant herself, who'd failed to rendezvous with her units on time... and the Gifted she'd been fighting, who was still drawing breath.
"Annie Lennox, maintain position and train weapons on the hospital- second floor, fifth right section- above the ER dropoff. Terminate anything loud and red with maximum prejudice." Laura's voice chimed out an efficient set of instructions. Half of the squads weapons focused on the window with laser precision whilst the remaining Ghouls fanned out into a 360 degree defensive circle that left them without any blind spots.
"Lemmings, move in to assist Annie Lennox with the extraction of Lieutenant Sommers. Annie Lennox, data indicates that 'Phoenix Crimson' would have a 91.5% survival chance against that blast. Fire again."
*KA-BLAMNN!*
"Both units. Resume Phase Three operations immediately, we are cutting into our time buffer. Vehicular extraction for Lieutenant Sommers is en route."

Phoenix Crimson lay prone on the floor as he groaned in pain. In the life of a hero some days were better than others and the two rockets had definitively put his day in the 'pretty shitty' category. Fortunately the loud, slow, combustible, nature of missiles made them easy enough to counter and he'd survived with only a few pockmarks and slashes over his armour.
He had no idea who the soldiers who'd surrounded Lady Crimsons body were, but they clearly weren't fans. On reflection the style of their armour had been similar in form, if not colour, to the kind Vivianne had worn- given that she was well armed and trained it wouldn't be presumptuous to think she was part of a larger organisation. Daniel knew of several Namidian para-military sub-organisations, and he felt that he recognised the uniform of one particular group... something German... that he couldn't quite dislodge from the mire of his memory. Not whilst encumbered by his pounding head and combat exhaustion, at any rate.
"Persetan!" he swore in Malay as his bruises began to make themselves known.
He sat himself upright with a groan and tested the flaps of his armour, after a quick diagnostic he confirmed that after he'd gotten his second wind he'd be able to resume his patrol. He raised a finger to his temple and activated his masks communicator by habit.
"Phoenix Crimson checking in. Gifted Terrorist has been defeated at Advocate Lutharian Hospital, enemies possibly still in the area. Resuming sortie."
No one responded, of course. Communications were still down, and he suspected that they wouldn't be restored until Justice was finally restored to Chicago.
He stooped down and plucked the dissolved, burnt and bulletridden remains of his crimson scarf off the ground and tied it around his neck once more, he tossed it over his shoulder with a dramatic flick of his hand.
"Better get going."
This message was last edited by the player at 00:02, Fri 19 June 2015.

Bard hadn't been quite this... angry, in a long time. In a very long time. She had gotten far too confident there, and the pattern had payed for it with several years worth of damage in moments. It would take her weeks to repair that damage, and those were weeks she could be spending tracking down more men like those. She stood up, her pants re-knit and any limp gone from her leg. It still hurt; it likely would for hours to come, but it had full function back. That said, a helicopter had dropped into the street she'd dashed from earlier. She figured they'd picked up their agents, and it had departed quite a while ago. She considered tracking it, but with everything going on in the city, finding its pattern in the chaos this place was turning into would be almost impossible.  She poked her head out of the alley, casting quick glances up and down the street before dashing out and running towards the next largest knot she could find. At the very least, she could make up for her mistakes.

With enhanced speed, she made it through the city, mostly avoiding direct contact with any civilians, quickly. She lost a few minutes detouring around a brigade of policemen, but made it to City Hall in record time. She was abusing her powers at this point, but she felt it worth it. Too much shifting of her own pattern would eventually shatter it. Living patterns weren't supposed to do such radical shifts as hers, and the only thing keeping hers even remotely stable was her power itself. She examined the building quickly, trying to find the focal point for the knot, but it was large and spread out through much of it already. She whistled, the sound carrying an unnatural distance, and tested the chaos that was that building with a bit of order. Heavy resistance, but the knot yielded and unraveled just a small amount. She wasn't getting lucky today. She would need to find the focal point to completely unravel the knot.

She took a moment to orient herself. Slipping in unnoticed wouldn't be too difficult, at this point, but there was too much she would miss out here inside that building. She scouted out the streets, noting the placement of police troops. There weren't many, it appeared that most of them were inside the building, but the ones out here were setting themselves up for failure. These men would be her alert to any intruders. She slid through their ranks, twisting their patterns almost into incoherency before slipping them back into their, almost, natural states. Their was a thin pattern strand, comprised of just a small amount of all of their patterns, strung between all of them, and then tied into the surrounding part in the Grand Pattern. It was sloppy work, and if any of them survived whatever was going to happen here, if she didn't find them and undo it, their patterns would bleed out all of their energy within the year.

After that, she strolled up the building as if this was any other day. Every officer out here, when they died, would immediately dump all their remaining energy into the rest of the chain. None of them would ever amount up to the sheer power of even a weak Gifted, even with every other officers power in them, but the link was more for the effort of keeping them coordinated and in touch with their environment. For the rest of their lives, if she never repaired that link, they'd work so well together that it was almost as if they thought the same things.

The exterior of this building gave very little credit to the inside. Despite being blocky, and honestly, quite boring outside, the interior of this building was lavish. Marble floors, curvy staircases. Officers everywhere. Whatever they were protecting, it was extremely important that she find. The strands of that knot were twisty here, but with some effort she was able to follow it to a single floor, which she noted. After finding it, she quickly traveled to the roof. Their was a garden up here. That was... surprising. And the patterns up here were actually quite stable. Harder to work with stable patterns, but she would make do. She sat down, and began humming a series of complex note, weaving herself into the pattern of the building. She brushed her hand along her collar, another note popping into existence and beginning to weave confusion around her. She was prepared for whatever came her way this time. She'd set the battleground up in her favor before anybody else had shown up, and she was well prepared to take full advantage of it.

Vivianne clucked her tongue as the man seemed to converse with the police sergeant and then retreated into the hospital. Laura had already highlighted several strategically sound strong point int he hospital silently on her heads up so she headed for the nearest one. She might mock the hero, but he had an ITSDA jacket and that meant he was no chump. He clucked her tongue in a nervous habit even as she came out into a long, empty hall. A few beds and other things were scattered around room the rapid evacuation, so it would make a good attack point. She grinned as she grabbed a couple of half used air tanks off a wheel chair and headed for the stairs.

---

Daniel was making his way into the building and being so loud that his uniform could not compete, "Come out, Come out where ever you are... Come on, ti won't be THAT bad, I'll make it quick." He was moving down a corridor near the main entrance slowly, ready for the attack, when his nose caught the smell of something caustic. He frowned and looked right, left, up... "Come on.... I know you are here! MARCO!" His foot suddenly shifted, sank, and his eyes flared wide as he looked down just in time to see the floor beneath him dissolves like sugar in water. He made a choking sound as a powerful caustic smell rose through the floor and he fired a blast just under his feet as well as behind him which sent him careening down the hallway. He used a series of small, controlled blasts in a practiced order to have him suddenly land upright and facing the hole. His eyes flicked rapidly as his hands quickly threw his scarf over his shoulder. Suddenly, from the stairwell behind him he heard an ominous sound, "POLO!"

He reflexively fired another set of explosions to send him rocketing back down the hall as a hail of bullets followed him. He flipped and landed just and something went clank! at his feet. He looked down at what appeared to be a small, cigarette sized box. His world suddenly turned white and he cursed even as his well-trained instincts took over.  A man capable of flying via controlled explosions had a lot of training. He followed his nose and flew blind threw the hole. He felt whatever had eaten the hole smear along his left arm and eat away at his armor a bit as he passed, but no more bullets tinking along his armor.

Upstairs, Vivianne took a moment to take stock as she smoothly replaced the clip in her TMP. "Ma'am, he appears to use small kinetic explosions to augment his maneuverability. If he used the same explosions to augment his attack parameters, that would explain his ratings" She noted the information but took it with a grain of salt. Underestimating your opponent was bad form and she had once again lost visual track of an opponent. She ran back into the stairwell and went up three flights to the NICU. Time for the next test.

Phoenix ducked behind something solid feeling and waited the several long moments for his vision to return. Whoever he was facing, he had yet to make solid visual contact and she was using guerrilla tactics. He might call them "dirty" aloud, but his training was good enough for him to think highly of the training of his opponent as well. This was not some duel of honor or noble match, she was trying to win... and kill him. If he didn't have respect for that, then he would lose... and die. He stood and flipped his scarf over his shoulder again then headed for the stairs. If you were fighitng this type of fight, where would you go? High Ground he climbed the stairs slowly with reluctance. He knew that time for her was another trap for him, but better that than trip said trap. His heart sank as he came to the fourth floor and found a message scrawled in red marker in the NICU door, POLO. It wasn't a bluff, she was in there; but, what was the battlefield like?

He grit his teeth pulled up his resolve and stepped through the door. Something hit the top of his head. His training was good enough that he looked down instead of up. Looking up would have cost his life, that was where the attack had been, the ground was where it was now: a grenade. He dived back even as the High Explosive grenade exploded and his senses tracked the slow moving kinetic energies and used his own abilities to blow the door closed behind him and deflect what energy made it through the door. He rolled to look through the door even as a voice echoed from up the stairs, "Just like the heroes to think villains would kill babies..." He rolled as a round from Vivianne's revolver cratered the cement where his head had just been.

As shards of cement pelted his face, Phoenix kicked himself off the ground with a concentrated detonation under his heel, he hurtled into the air and used a second crack of energy to kick off from the stairwell wall just as second round dented the wall and sent more cement chips into the air. With a third wallkick Daniel shot up the stairs vertically and hurtled toward Vivianne with a furious battlecry on his lips, his fist pulled back and the glow of it's stored power redoubled whereas Vivianne's own hand inched up to lead Daniels path and tightened it's finger around her twin triggers as she leveled the TMp and Revolver at Daniel. She waited for the perfect shot.

The distance between the two closed in less than a second; Phoenix slashed his gauntleted fist around in a powerful but telegraphed strike which Viviane countered by simply taking a step back and letting the attack sail through the air where her head had just been, she dug the barrel of her guns into the young man's unarmoured gut and flashed a cruel smile that seemed to say 'I win. Tough luck, kid.'

"PHOENIX! -PUNCH!" At the final moment Phoenix finished the last syllable of his battlecry.

Energy crackled along Phoenix's entire body and collected to a pinprick just above his knuckle, too fast for either party to perceive the point shrunk down to a singularity and burst into a volatile'KRAC-CK!' of energy, even the indirect hit sent a blast through the room that threatened to boil the fluid in Vivianne's inner ear, and the blastwave pressed her down to brace a knee against the floor even as it blew open every door throughout the second floors corridor. Phoenix Crimson laughed in triumph as he succeeded in landing the first-hit.

"Hah -HA!"

Crimson screamed and almost dropped her pistols to cover her ears, but her training kept the weapons even as her helmet's sensors damped the effects of the attack and her suits biomonitor recorded the damage to her frame. Ma'am, close quarters combat with the target is inadvisable." Vivianne grit her teeth, Really, ya think so? Fuck. She shook her head and fired a pulse from her TMP toward where her helmet was telling her he had landed, her eyes not having recovered yet. Ma'am, your targets are here and here. Be advised, Lemmings and Annie Lennox are on scene and neutralizing the CPD forces. Vivianne registered his position with the two targets and snapped fired her revolver twice at the air tanks she had borrowed. They exploded feet from Phoenix even as Vivianne vaulted over the stair railing blindly and landed a floor below.

Phoenix was rocked and shaken by the explosions, but his senses had damped most of the force. Still, his armor was showing the wear and his scarf was a singed tatter around his neck now. He stood slowly and shakily and realized he was going to have to track her down again, walk into yet another trap, and hope this one went better. Still, that last pass had to have hurt her as well.

---

Vivianne crouched down and took several long breaths. Running with cracked ribs was a lot less fun than it sounded. She grunted and looked over the counter of the ward she was in now. Higher floor still; she had circled to another stairwell and went up again. She mindlessly reloaded her revolver and checked her TMP, last half a clip. She thought out another trap and grunted. Her sensors noted his approach again and she chuckled as the idea hit her and she sent several orders.

She was sitting on the counter, legs crossed, as he entered and she tilted her head to the side. If she wasn't wearing the all covering helmet, he'd have sworn she was grinning, "You're fun, kid, but I am behind schedule and my boss is a real... well, ballbuster, for lack of a better word."

Phoenix got his first real good look at her now and the armor and mention of a boss gave him the clues he needed, "Schwartze Augen, huh? Dieter Sievold. Yeah, I'll bet, ITSDA has him listed as confirmed assassinated three times. Wanna explain? Oh, Nice outfit by the way, but the two of us are a bit gaudy together, yeah?"

She laughed and shook her helmeted head, "How the fuck you think I would know... his secrets? Might as well ask me about Namidias. What can I say, I like red. The blood doesn't show as badly. Nice job here today, kid, you almost won..." Daniel was about to respond in the banter that was building when she rolled back suddenly and fell behind the counter even as the wall to his left disappeared in a hail of gunfire as Squad Lemmings' M249 chewed the wall to bits then set a hail of lead toward Phoenix who barely avoided it with a blast at his back that sent him out a window. On the roof above the ward stood three men with machine guns trained on him who opened fire. He twisted in the air and fired a burst that sent him up and close to 300m/s. He still felt something rattle along his side and tear into his right thigh.

Crimson limped to the hole in the wall and followed the target up even as she put a hand to her cracked ribs and ordered a Banshee mobilized. She grinned as her suits sensors tracked him. She gave the kid a lot of credit for taking her on when she got to pick the battlefield and coming back for more time and again. He'd even been kind of good looking, in that heroically blonde sort of way. Confirmations from various sources around the city filtered into her ear and she clucked her tongue as she gave the order for her two squads to evac and head for the Church. One thing Dieter would not be happy about was Cimmeria being taken out. "GITS, sit rep on the Church? Laura, update Phoenix Crimson's files."
This message was last edited by the player at 10:43, Fri 19 June 2015.

Gates studied the church. "There was some yelling and a loud crash earlier but other than that it has been quiet."

Phonix Crimson released a theatrically exaggerated sigh of exasperation. "That never works. They always want to put up a fight." He handed the microphone back to the officer he'd taken it from.
"...Shame, really." he said, without disappointment. "Sergeant, please wait outside. This should only take a few minutes." He put on his cockiest grin and slowly strode towards the hospital's entrance, as he walked he shook the tension out of his arms and casually stretched his shoulders with circular shrugs.

He passed through the hospitals automatic glass entrance and came to a stop in the reception area. There was no sign of Vivianne, which meant that she was preparing a trap that Phoenix'd have no choice but to walk into. This suited Daniel just fine; his line of work didn't usually give him the luxury of fighting at an advantage, and at the very least it'd give him a moment to consider his enemy:
Viviane had taken out an entire unit of Swat troopers by herself, so it could be deduced that she was gifted- although Phoenix wasn't sure in which way, yet.
The reception area was a thinly furnished and open-planned affair, with only a few sterile desks, support columns, and utilitarian couches to break up the room. Doors and corridors along the ground floor lead into the further wings of the facility and into waiting rooms, shops and an efficiently placed canteen. With the power out the only light illuminating the room came from the mirrored floor-to-ceiling windows that plated the buildings ground floor. The room was completely silent.
As Daniel stepped further into the building he could see the still corpse of a SWAT Officer slumped over a stairwell banister, he had been shot squarely between the eyes with a single bullet. Whoever his foe was she was skilled, very skilled; the guard looked as though he hadn't even had time to fire off a shot before he'd been efficiently put down. He lifted the mans head to examine the entry wound, it was an ugly fat wound that looked like the kind of mark that high-calibre low-velocity bullet could leave. A revolver, Daniel guessed. He replaced the man and continued onwards. Without Police Officers to showoff to, and nothing but the eerily dead hospital surrounding him, the bright enthusiasm that he'd entered the building with with was gradually sapped and replaced with a bitter sense of purpose. He told himself that he'd feel better after he'd had the chance to throw Vivianne through a few walls.

---

His path took him down one of the hospitals many hallways. The sterile furnishings, uniformly placed drinking fountains, fire extinguishers, and two-tone laminated floor made it seem indistinguishable from the rest of the facility but the overhead signs set at each junction claimed that he was walking past the first floor Emergency Rooms. Here the building was fully enclosed and windowless, only the pulsing orange-white light of his armours heatsinks and the glowing charge he kept maintained in his right fist kept Daniel from stumbling over the particularly thick trail of corpses that'd lead him here. After a long minute of fruitless searching he stopped to call out a challenge: "This is your plan? Hide and seek?! I guess that you're not as great in a fair fight as you are at slaughtering the helpless." His challenge came out angrier than he'd meant, seeing the senseless destruction paired with the dismal surroundings had pricked his temper and caused him to think rashly... which of course was why Vivianne had lured him down here: Angry heroes made mistakes- such as giving away their position with loud outbursts.

"Whatever you say, boy."
Daniels head snapped up to the ceiling as Vivianne broke her silence, his reactions fired a bolt of lightning down his spine as his dim vision adjusted to spot olive green beads of corrosive solution bubble the ceiling above him. A warning droplet splashed onto the ground by his feet and chewed a hissing pit into the floor, instantly and without warning the ceiling along the entire length of corridor bulged outward and acid gushed in torrents down onto the ground where he'd just been standing, great chunks of rubble slammed into the ground and sunk away as the pool of acid washed outwards before receding again as it dug it's way through another floor and drained into the basement. From her perch on the floor above Vivianne admired her handiwork with a sly grin. She'd used her Ghoul helmet's suite of echo-locators to plan her strike but now that the air had filled with caustic vapour and shifting rubble she switched to low-light vision, she leaned over the precipice she'd made as she waited to confirm her kill. If the air, acid or rubble hadn't killed him her drawn TMP certainly would. Dropping a floors worth of chemically-drenched rubble onto her target had been excessive and impersonal by her standards but she wasn't in the mood to draw this fight out for long, her Units would soon be in position and she intended to begin Phase Three of her mission immediately. As the mist parted her highly contrasted vision picked out the glowing white lines of Phoenix's armour, a moment later it cleared enough to show that he'd narrowly been able to leap back from her initial attack and had used his ridiculous scarf to filter his lungs from the congested air.

"I'm almost impressed!" she laughed, honestly. "You're light on your feet, for such a loudmouthed idiot!" Her finger traced playful circles around the pin of one of her White Phosphorus grenades. "Thanks. I like your uniform..." Phoenix returned. He threw his crimson scarf from his mouth and struck a pose, this time raising his striking arm in a karate-like pose. "...but one of us is going to have to change!"
Lady Crimson snorted derisively, her quarry was back to throwing out inane soundbites. <#Red>"You shouldn't have gotten involved. Goodbye forever."</Red> With a casual flick of her wrist she plucked the Grenade from her holster, popped the pin, and tossed it in an underhanded spin to bounce past Phoenixes feet before spilling it's deadly chemical payload in a great surge of gaseous powder.

Daniel had to act quickly, whether it was from warcrime-grade phosphorous or acid rain the crimson psychopath seemed intent on killing him the the most painful way possible. His survival would be decided in a mere moment, and time seemed to slow to a crawl as the two Gifted committed their full skill and focus against each other. As the armed cylinder hit the ground and bounced once past his boot Phoenix kicked himself off the ground with a concentrated detonation under his heel, he hurtled into the air and used a second crack of energy to kick off from the corridor wall just as the grenade bounced a second time and blossomed into a swell of pale smog. With a third wallkick Daniel cleared what was once the ground floor ceiling and hurtled toward Vivianne with a furious battlecry on his lips, his fist pulled back and the glow of it's stored power redoubled whereas Vivianne's own hand inched up to lead Daniels path and tightened it's finger around her TMP's trigger.
The distance between the two closed in less than a second; Phoenix slashed his gauntleted fist around in a powerful but telegraphed strike which Viviane countered by simply taking a step back and letting the attack sail through the air where her head had just been, she dug the stubby barrel of her gun into the young man's unarmoured gut and flashed a cruel smile that seemed to say 'I win. Tough luck.'
"PHOENIX! -PUNCH!" At the final moment Phoenix finished the last syllable of his battlecry.
Energy crackled along Phoenix's entire body and collected to a pinprick just above his knuckle, too fast for either party to perceive the point shrunk down to a singularity and burst into a volatile'KRAC-CK!' of energy, even the indirect hit sent a blast through the room that threatened to boil the fluid in Vivianne's inner ear, and the blastwave pressed her down to brace a knee against the floor even as it blew open every door throughout the second floors corridor. Phoenix Crimson laughed in triumph as he succeeded in landing the first-hit.
"Hah -HA!"

Vivianne's perception floundered against the unexpected sensory assault as her Ghoul helmet desperately triggered it's flashbang and counter-noise compensators, her highly-drilled combat instincts screamed at her not to reflexively seize her finger against her trigger or to flinch into a guard, and instead she fell back upon the simple mantra that'd served her through her years of service as a ranker Ghoul and continued to serve her as a Lieutenant: "When in doubt, lash out."
From her pained crouching position she snapped her palm upward and felt it connect with the pliable flesh of Daniels throat, which shut the little bastard up for a moment at least. Her octuple vision refocused whilst her blacked-out visor made what little light shone from the thrown open-second storey windows almost tolerable against her hyper-dilated pupils. With her restored vision she could see that Daniel had landed behind her but her strike had prevented him from following up with a second punch, currently he stood almost doubled over and clutching at his throat and Vivianne's ringing ears distantly registered that he was trying to croak out another speech. Vivianne didn't care to hear it, her wrist-stab hadn't been direct enough to crush Daniel's Laryinx but she wouldn't let that happen again, from now on she intended make every action a killing one.
The blood pounding in her ears subsidised enough to let her regain her balance and her helmet was obliging enough to reduce the rooms noise to a comparative whisper while she recovered, an electronic notification sprung up on the corner of her vision and she knew it's meaning without having to examine it: Squads Lemmings and Annie Lennox had arrived at the Hospital and this morons interference had put her behind schedule. She ground her teeth together furiously and a scarlet flush of rage ran it's way up her neck as a thought crossed her mind: 'Dieter won't tolerate this.'

She locked eye's with Phoenix Crimson to the extent that their opaque masks would allow as they sized each other up and planned their next moves.
Vivianne reacted before Phoenix and fired her TMP from the hip to scatter lead at his retreating figure, the Hero turned, sprinted and dived inside one of the wards recovery rooms before any of the rounds managed to find a solid hit- but as Daniel dived to cover Lady Crimson saw a round ricochet off his right shoulder plate, another whip between his pounding legs and several more pluck holes through his trailing scarf. Phoenix Crimson twisted from his dive and franticly rolled into the relative safety one of the floors Recovery Rooms. His heavy breathing indicated the closest thing to fear that he ever allowed himself to feel in combat, the airy and well-windowed recovery room was deceptively calming compared to the hell that the rest of the building had become, but Phoenix resisted the urge to ease his guard- he could afford complacency in some of his fights, but this wasn't one of them.
Bullets were his biggest, and most unfortunately common, weakness; he could outmanuver the arm that fired them, but the rounds themselves travelled faster than his feet, his blasts, and even faster than thought- and it only took a single direct hit to take him out of action. From Daniels perspective Vivianne's compact little submachinegun was easily more dangerous than any of her grenades, acids, or shockingly strong combat maneuvers. His reactions and agility had narrowly saved him this time, but blind luck had definitely played it's part.

He could hear Vivianne's footsteps stamping closer in a heavy sprint, he guessed that she intended to press her advantage and corner him in the room and so he heaved himself to his feet to meet her challenge head on. Vivianne barged into the recovery room only moments after Daniel, and it's designed tranquility exploded into anarchy as she waved her weapon over everything inside in an extended barrage that smashed windows, shredded hospital charts midair, and reduced a roomful of medical hardware to plastic shards. Her vision spun around as she tried to find her target, and as her weapon snapped around to clear the near-corners of the room Phoenix lunged from his hiding place behind the door to grab Vivianne by the wrist and twist her gun-arm to harmlessly face the ceiling. Phoenix Crimson followed up his counterattack with a series of jabbed punches into Vivianne's side, each time he hit he did so with a gunshot spark that buckled her armour and would have ended the fight against a normal opponent, but only seemed to drive the wind from her. She was made of stronger stuff than even her militaristic and intimidating frame would suggest, and as she contracted her muscles to force the barrel of her weapon back toward Daniel it quickly became apparent that she was the physically stronger of the two. Without time to charge his attacks Daniel's punches had lost most of their power.

The two wrestled in silence for a long second, both their hands were grappled around the submachine gun's handle and Phoenix began to feel his muscles give way as the woman's enhanced strength brought her line of fire to within inches of Daniels face with slow inevitability. Phoenix tried to jam the trigger down to spend the rest of her bullets but she stopped him by hooking a finger behind the triggers frame.
"You look pissed. Did something come up, or are you always like this?" Phoenix taunted glibly, although his clenched teeth and groans of exertion told Vivianne that he was struggling not to give way. "You shouldn't get so worked up. It's not a hot look."
"You little shit!" She wanted to to put a bullet through his skull as much as she wanted to punch him in the throat again, but neither so much as she wanted to get the fight over with and rejoin the broader battlefield. Images of Dieter's quiet scowl, and the subtle threat that implied, etched themselves onto her thoughts and triggered a very real and personal fear within her. As they struggled her masks messenger system updated it's earlier notification to an orange alert. She was falling behind schedule. "Just die already!"
She decided to employ a dirty trick; with a single economic movement she released the grip of her off-hand from her weapon and gathered a thin layer of thin acid against her burnt and scarred palm before attempting to slap the hand against Phoenix's mask. Her own acids were just as damaging to herself as they were to her opponents, but she'd find it easier to deal with another layer of calloused skin across her palm than Phoenix would with two eye sockets full of the stuff. She loathed using the trick but it came in useful now and then, it was always painful, and it was always messy.

Phoenix Crimson felt the crushing pressure of Vivianne's strength suddenly release and could see her hand swing at his vision. It wasn't until he'd dodged under the arm with a drunken step that he saw the skin on her palm was blistering and bubbling away. Vivianne shifted her feet into a reversal posture and chopped her palm back to Phoenix's head with a lightening-quick fencers lunge. Realizing that attempting to block the attack would coat his arms in the same substance that was eating away at his opponent Daniel twisted his dodge around to dart past Vivianne's side and out of the doorway back into the corridor that he'd fled from.
His retreat took him one, two, and almost a third step out of the recovery room before the scarf trailing behind him was snatched in a vicelike grip and yanked sharply into his damaged neck, he turned on his heel to face back towards the room before a second savage tug pulled him to the ground. He unconciously released a strained 'Glark!' from his constricted windpipe as his legs kicked out uslessly, one of his hands scrabbled to undo the taut knot that'd suddenly imprisoned him whilst the other dragged it's fingers along the corridor wall in a desperate attempt to find purchase to resist the force that'd started to pull him back into Vivianne's line of sight...

Vivianne twisted the red cloth of Daniels scarf around her fist a third time before heaving her arm backward with irresistible force, she heard a painful choke and a slight give of resistance as the fabric yielded another foot. Her off-hand was still wet with mild acid and she ignored the burn of her raw skin on fabric as she wound her fist and tugged again, her main hand clutched her machine-pistol and she knew the weapon only had a quarter-clip remaining. Vivianne's dense muscles contracted and snapped back on her preys leash with another mighty pull, the cloth hit heavy resistance before coming away with a sudden flutter that forced her to take a step back to keep her balance. She tossed the crimson rag aside and brandished her weapon at the vacant doorway just as the wall beside it crushed inward with explosive force. She ignored the masonry shrapnel that pelted at her armour and started firing careful single shots into the gap in the hopes of clipping Phoenix without squandering what little remained of her clip. Flying grit and debris obscured her sight but she heard the bullet punch through something metal, the debris filling her vision was pierced by a shrill hiss and she saw a jet of angled white gas sweep under her vision before arcing up to crash into her chin with enough force to crack the lenses of Vivianne's helmet and wrench her neck upward at a terrible angle.

Phoenix Crimson's uppercut the fire-extinguisher into the hitwoman's neck with all his might, the red cylinder had taken a bullet for him and he felt it welt into her chinstrap with enough force to crumple the metal and vent what remained of it's pressurised contents into a freezing gaseous powder that blinded the pair and forced it's way into their lungs. Vivianne's vision blacked out for a moment as her helmet took the blow, she could taste blood pooling in her mouth and the strike had turned her around to face an unknown direction- she started firing into the all-enveloping mist in an attempt to keep Phoenix at bay, and as her vision returned she heard the hollow deadman's click of her gun running dry. Her eyes widened as she saw a sudden glow expand from the fog and dive toward her.
"PHOENIX!-"
She forced her battered body to respond, and attempted to quickdraw her sidearm-
"-KICK!"
Both Phoenix Crimsons boots blew into her side, and with a deafening crash she felt herself lifted bodily from the ground and hurtled through a pane of glass. Her spiralling vision suddenly filled with sunlight and air rushed past her as she shot from the buildings second storey window like a cannonball... there was a brief moment of gutwrenching weightlessness whilst Vivianne's combat and base survival instincts screamed conflicting demands in confusion. The moment came to a pass as she hit the ground. Her bare hands dragged across the rough floor and she felt her damaged helmet split open with the force of impact, her armour and momentum sent her grinding over the concrete carpark that she'd landed on before she came to a stop. A moment later the glass from the window she'd shattered on her way out caught up to her and coated her in a light razor crust. Her brain screamed at her legs to stand but her body had simply stopped responding.

With an agonised groan she rolled herself over and tried to tend to the worst of her injuries. Her eyes were weeping themselves raw after her cracked helmet had spattered them with freezing extinguisher-powder, but what remained of her vision warned her against rubbing it out as both of her hands had been scraped raw by her landing and were glazed with an unhappy combination of extinguisher, gravel, acid and glass shards. Instead she reached out a hand to grab the largest intact section of her helmet that was still within reach, she pressed a button on its side and spoke in a slow and deliberate tone that tried to mask the agony she was suffering.
 "Annie Lennox... Lemmings... Laura... West carpark..." She released the microphone key as she felt a fresh stab of pain lance it's way down her neck, her jaw had been broken. <#Red>"...Awaiting extraction."<#/Red> she spoke finally, before flattening into the ground with conscious but unmoving exhaustion. She managed to flex her limbs, so she knew that she hadn't been crippled, but when she tried to inventory her broken bones the pain forced her to stop at 'twelve'.

<#hr>

Back in the hospital Phoenix's armour glowed a solid white that gave the gas settling at his feet an almost ethereal quality. He waited until he head the slap of Vivianne's meat hitting the ground before he released a breath that he hadn't realize'd he'd been holding. This had been a close fight, one of his closest ever- in fact. The woman was clearly no simple thug and although her abilities were no match for his own the way that she'd used them had been exceptionally skilful, even as he'd harried her with continuous attacks she had given as good as she'd got, and Phoenix had lost count of the many near-deaths he'd avoided. His muscles ached all over, and his limbs shook with involuntary adrenalin spasms as he unsteadily teetered over to the window to look down upon his victim. He could see Vivianne lying still amid a sea of glass and crimson shards of her ruined armour. After he'd seen the destruction she'd caused Phoenix sincerely hoped that she was dead. His mind lifted from such dark thoughts as he saw a group of armoured men with drawn rifles hustle out of cover and take up positions around Lady Crimsons prone form.

He beamed a shining grin, run a hand through his hair, and called out to what he assumed to be a squad of riot control officers. "PASS THE SERGEANT MY APOLOGIES!" His voice was hoarse from the abuse it'd suffered over the last few minutes, but he injected it with a double dose of heroism and bluster to makeup the difference. "- IT TOOK A WHILE LONGER THAN I'D HOPED, BUT HE CAN REST EASY IN THE KNOWLEDGE THAT I! -PHOENIX CRIMSON!- HAVE ONCE AGAI-"
*KA-BLAMNN!*
The Shwartze Augen soldier lowered his M72 LAW antitank weapon from his shoulder and quickly chambered another rocket, he was a specialist of Squad Annie Lennox.
Six minutes ago Laura had parsed Lieutenant Sommers broad orders into individual commands, and with her overwatching eye had guaranteed that the two squads met no resistance in occupying the area. The thin line of police officers that'd been waiting outside the hospitals main entrance, and the smaller squads around the rest of the building, had been easily dispatched and the Hospital was now entirely under Namidian control. The only fault in the plan had been with the Lieutenant herself, who'd failed to rendezvous with her units on time... and the Gifted she'd been fighting, who was still drawing breath.
"Annie Lennox, maintain position and train weapons on the hospital- second floor, fifth right section- above the ER dropoff. Terminate anything loud and red with maximum prejudice." Laura's voice chimed out an efficient set of instructions. Half of the squads weapons focused on the window with laser precision whilst the remaining Ghouls fanned out into a 360 degree defensive circle that left them without any blind spots.
"Lemmings, move in to assist Annie Lennox with the extraction of Lieutenant Sommers. Annie Lennox, data indicates that 'Phoenix Crimson' would have a 91.5% survival chance against that blast. Fire again."
*KA-BLAMNN!*
"Both units. Resume Phase Three operations immediately, we are cutting into our time buffer. Vehicular extraction for Lieutenant Sommers is en route."

Phoenix Crimson lay prone on the floor as he groaned in pain. In the life of a hero some days were better than others and the two rockets had definitively put his day in the 'pretty shitty' category. Fortunately the loud, slow, combustible, nature of missiles made them easy enough to counter and he'd survived with only a few pockmarks and slashes over his armour. He had no idea who the soldiers who'd surrounded Lady Crimsons body were, but they clearly weren't fans. On reflection the style of their armour had been similar in form, if not colour, to the kind Vivianne had worn- given that she was well armed and trained it wouldn't be presumptuous to think she was part of a larger organisation. Daniel knew of several Namidian para-military sub-organisations, and he felt that he recognised the uniform of one particular group... something German... that he couldn't quite dislodge from the mire of his memory. Not whilst encumbered by his pounding head and combat exhaustion, at any rate.

"Persetan!" he swore in Malay as his bruises began to make themselves known.He sat himself upright with a groan and tested the flaps of his armour, after a quick diagnostic he confirmed that after he'd gotten his second wind he'd be able to resume his patrol. He raised a finger to his temple and activated his masks communicator by habit. "Phoenix Crimson checking in. Gifted Terrorist has been defeated at Advocate Lutharian Hospital, enemies possibly still in the area. Resuming sortie." No one responded, of course. Communications were still down, and he suspected that they wouldn't be restored until Justice was finally restored to Chicago. He stooped down and plucked the dissolved, burnt and bulletridden remains of his crimson scarf off the ground and tied it around his neck once more, he tossed it over his shoulder with a dramatic flick of his hand.

"Better get going."
This message was last edited by the GM at 00:38, Sat 20 June 2015.

Frank grunted to himself in satisfaction as he heard the font hit something, then reached into a pocket and pulled out a pack of smokes from which he extracted a cancer stick with his lips. He turned and walked away from the alter, stepping over the dead squad bodies without pause until he came to a pew with a tongue of fire still licking at it; the old man bend forward, lit his cigarette, stood back up, and with one bare palm extinguished the flame. Then, he moved about the bodies, collecting all the ammo, weapons, and gear that he could which looked useful. Frank honestly had no idea why the Wave wanted this place, but they did, and that alone was reason enough for him not to let them have it. He didn't think any of the squad he'd killed had had time to radio in, but it wouldn't be all that long before they missed a check and others came looking. He was going to need help, but a test of his cell phone told him he was SOL in relying on it.

The war hero looked around, and an idea came to him; he moved about the church and collected up all the prayer candles he found still intact and holy water basins. He emptied the latter, arranged them in a circle under the hole he'd blown in the roof, placed the candles inside, then lit them all. The large amount of light was amplified by the metal, then Jackson returned to the alter and removed the cloth and returned to his invention. He took the fabric in both hands, held it over the light, then pulled back only to replace the cover. He did this again and again, some times faster sometimes slower.

The fighter figured someone somewhere on his side had ordered a satilite view of Chicago, and with a bit of luck his little light show would be picked up. Now, if there was another old fart whose still remembered Morse Code, Frank would be in business...
This message was last updated by the player at 00:23, Sat 20 June 2015.

In the Church, several pieces of the gear from the soldiers smoked and fizzled as the internal circuitry fried itself. Much of it was useless now, as was often the case with Schwatrze Augen recovered technology.

---

The bright red M113 sped along the street away from the Hospital car park flanked in front and in back by black twins. Within the red APC, a Redcap medic worked furiously on Vivianne's form under the burden of being allowed local anesthetic only. She might be out of the fight physically, but she still needed to be able to give orders. As soon as the feed from the Church was up and the report in, she pursed her lips tightly and shook her head.

"Ma'am, biomonitor feedback from Squad Bananas is flat. 100% casualties. We have this image of the assailant. Suicide protocols enacted on all gear." Vivianne stared at the image of some old man drawing and eradicating one of her elite squads with casual ease and grit her teeth, that bastard would pay. "Reports from the fight indicate a rapid healing factor, near instantaneous." Vivianne only grinned, "Noted. Refresh Destroyer protocols. Have Squad Link's Banshees get into position once we roll in. Redcap to ho..." Vivianne hissed as the Redcap applied another fast cast to her left leg. She'd be laid up for months once she got back to base, but not until after the operation was over.

"Redcap to hold back with me. APCs take that fucking building out and I want it fucking filmed. GITS, act in support of our efforts as you see fit. I want video of all targets from Phase One at maximum destruction on the net now. This is a god damned terror campaign, so lets terrorize some folks, yeah?" She grit her teeth again as the APC rocked. The trio of vehicles pulled up in front of the Church and a trio of M47 Dragons and .50 Caliber Machine Guns opened up on the church, beginning the process of chewing it to bits.

---

Far, far away, Dieter grimaced as reports rolled in. He had expected ITSDA mobilization and losses, but this was a bit too much. True, it was within projections and acceptable, but he would have liked things to work a bit better. He pursed his lips as Namidian forces maneuvered to engage in Phase 3 and Crimson gave their tech specialist orders to implement Phase Two, the terror campaign. He smiled as he considered the true objectives of the Chicago Campaign and flicked through a few reports of hero movements around town, looking for the exact right spot for Phase Four. Still, he wondered if he had not assigned enough manpower to the assault. With Cimmeria incommunicado, his resources might be stretched a bit. He dialed a number and asked to see a list of Namidian resources and contacts in the vicinity.

Gates smiled and reached into his jacket and brought out four small devices with cameras and propellers on them. He manipulated a few small buttons on them and they took to the sky. He pulled out a control device and one moved towards the church and all the others moved to the other various locations that had been targeted. With the press of a button the feed want live to the net on every website available. "The feed is live. We are golden."

Megalodon's cameras swivelled in their mountings as the technicians manning them searched for new targets, one of the cameras swept over the Cathedral and it's lens twisted into focus as it's operator found something worth reporting.

"Sir! Flashes of light from Cimmeria's last known location. It looks like someone on the ground has found a creative solution to the blackout." The technician turned from his display console to look to his Commander, only to find the supervillan with his eyes locked on the screen and tapping a message into the armrest keyboard of his chair.
"It's Morse." Commander confirmed. "Keep the camera locked, I want to read this."
"Cimmeria... Namidias... Jackson..." Commander had already begun translating the screens feed, and had begun transcribing it onto the main screen as a subtitle while the message spelt itself out letter by letter. It resolved into a short statement that the hitwoman 'Cimmeria' had been defeated, and that armed backup was urgently requested. Tanks, specifically. What followed was a string of Names, Numbers and Locations that identified the location and rank of a man named Frank Jackson as well as a military service code.

Commander stood up from his chair, strode over to within feet of his main screen, and gave what he'd written one of his especially stern scowls.
"It can't be that Frank Jackson, surely! -You! Run the numbers on that serial!"
The technician that'd spoken earlier entered the eight-digit number into his terminal and a nanosecond later the vast computers that filled the majority of Commanders control centre returned the information that they held on record. The technician had expected the query to return a military-issue service record; but instead the computers sent a list of new articles, police records, honours and other scrap information that sent text scrolling down his screen. The technician took a moment to boggle at the overload of information before he found a suitably concise summary of the man's achievements:
"Franklin Jackson. Born... 1950. Served in the NYCPD. Served in Vietnam as part of a court deal and was awarded a Medal of Honour in-" -Commander interrupted- "-1975, for his exploit in freeing himself and seventeen comrades from a Vietnamese death camp in an event that would become known as 'Hell's March'."
Commanders voice had lost it's usually stern edge as he talked, and took on an almost awed tone and his eyes widened as he felt an uncommon sense of Nostalgia.
"...when I was a boy I must have read the novelization of 'Hell March' three or four times. I saw the films too..."
Commander realised that his men were trying very hard not to stare at him, and he reset his face to it's normal severe look as he recloseted his inner Military-History fanboy.
"'Action Jackson' should be an antique, though. Why the hell is he in Chicago, and how the HELL did he manage to defeat Cimmeria?!"

"This complicates things." He turned back to his command throne and took long purposeful strides back up the room. "You!- Inform the rest of the 'Wave about Jacksons message, tell them it's unconfirmed. You!- Reroute 'Numbered Breathern' and 'Zero Comets' to City Hall. You!- Get me a Coffee! Black!"

---

Smoke's radio headset buzzed in his ear and he cupped a hand over it to make out what it was trying to tell him, and he had to ask for the message to be repeated before his pounding head finally caught up to the message. After he'd put a bullet into whoever the pair of Namidans had been fighting she'd countered by throwing a sonic blast that seemed to disorient him with bone-deep reverberations, and he could still hear his soldiers and hostages in the 'chopper above him suffering it's effects. Smokes had always been fast to recover, though, and after he sent a return message through his radio he offered Ash and Zenith an apologetic but insincere shrug.
"Sorreh' for intrudin' on y'hr... whateve' this is." he said, still remembering the two villains compromising introduction with an amused smirk. "-but ah' gotta' jet. Work, y'ken? Ye' have new orders tae."
He thumbed a key on his winch, and the rope connecting him to his transport snapped tight as it respooled and pulled him back into the air, his helicopter started to pull away but dust before his ride had taken him completely out of earshot he yelled out a final thing.
"Y'HR ADORABL' T'GETH'R, BY TH' WAY! BAH-HAHAHA-HA!"

Still chuckling to himself, Smokes climbed back into the passengerside door of his helicopter and closed it behind him, the noise assaulting his ears changed from the rush of air outside to the wailing groans of the passengers inside. Although his soldiers had all recovered their wits the hostages that he'd taken were still clutching their ears and complaining loudly. Smokes shut up the closest and whiniest of his prisoners with a kick before addressing his troops:
"DIG THA' SHIT OUTTA' Y'R EARS AN' LIST'N UP! WE'RE T' DIVERT T' CITY HALL, WE HAVE AH' NEW ITEM F'R OUR SHOPPIN' LIST!"
He took his rifle and exchanged the clip it held for a fresh one. He'd only fired a handful bullets since he'd disembarked but he took the precaution anyway, you could get a lot of mileage out of a single gunshot.
"THA' MAYORS NO' EVACUA'ED YET, BUT 'ES WELL GUARDED. OUGHTA BE FUN!"

The ZeroComet's transport returned along a similar route that it'd come, and a few blocks away from the freshly pillaged Thompson Centre it changed it's course to face the whitewashed building that served as the office to Chicago's local government. Two speakers built into the nose of the helicopter blasted out a message to the building's occupants as the pilot read the script he'd been passed.
"Occupants of City Hall, on behalf of the Namidan Wave and The Commander, we now claim dominion over this building and yourselves. Follow our demands and you will be spared, resist and your survival cannot be guaranteed."
A missile detached itself from the rack bolted onto to helicopters side and crashed against the front doors to city hall with a sudden blast that reduced the buildings main entrance to an impassible mound of fire and rubble.
"Demand one: No one enters, no one leaves."
The helicopter climbed in altitude and passed it's shadow along each floor of the squat buildings face.
"Demand two: Turn over the mayor. You have five minutes to comply, or punative action shall be taken."
Like this, the helicopter circled the building. Any visible policemen outside would be pinned down with machinegun fire and any extra exits would be demolished- it would only be then that the helicopter would climb to the top level and attempt to disgorge it's cargo of unstable psychopaths onto the buildings rooftop garden to begin their operation.

---

On the tenth floor of City Hall a window smashed inwards as a tethered harpoon shot through it and buried itself in the far wall of the empty and darkened office it'd landed in. Five quick figures ziplined their way inside and cut the rope with a well practised action, they fanned out to fill the corners of the room and each readied their weapons.
Their leaders, a male and female pair, checked in:
"Unit 'Numbered Brethren' is in position. Commencing capture of target." said the female of the pair, Brethren One, on a broadwave transmission that'd reach their companions on the roof above.
"Scan the building, 'Brethren Three'. The mayor will likely be with the largest concentration of armed men." said, Brethren Two, the male leader.

The 'Numbered Brethren' were Commanders Elite espionage unit, and zealous believers in his ultimate goal. The unit lacked the diversity of appearance and personality that many of The Commanders other units boasted, and each member of the Brethren was a consummate professional who was solely dedicated to their mission. They did not take new names after each mission, they did not work for a mere paycheck, and they did. not. make. mistakes.

Each member was dressed in the same uniform. A blacked out one-way helmet that left their face as a featureless oval, and a set of battlearmour that incorporated photo-reactive panels that could be set to the same shade as their surroundings; although the technology wasn't advanced enough to make them invisible, they would be as equally difficult to spot in a darkened room as a fully lit one. They each wore a glove that could either deliver electric shocks to a target, or to interface electronics with Commanders own computer systems to instantly hack almost any device. Besides that they carried almost nothing, if their mission went according to plan they would be able to capture the Mayor and extract him before event he guards by his side noticed he was missing- if they were forced into direct conflict they would have already failed in their objective.

With a single objective, and the city already in chaos, the unit considered this to be a simple mission. With the ZeroComets doing their best to act as a distraction and to panic the civilians trapped inside their mission ought to be even simpler.
"Move out."
And the room was empty.

The first missile had just launched from its tube when there was a heavy explosion, and the APC the dragon had launched from was reduced to no more than flaming scrap. No one inside survived, as evidenced by panicked screams and cries of pain followed by sudden silence. The gunner aboard the second carrier pushed the ordered attack, but his 50 cal. ammunition exploded and sent him flying; he was thrown prone to the ground on his back, still alive thanks to his armor but out of this fight.

"Enemy has explosive rounds! Execute evasive maneuvers and move to flank!"

The two remaining APC units split to the left and right of the church, moving out of direct sight of the front. Vehicle 2 fired a dragon into one bottom corner of their side, followed immediately by another hit to the opposite corner. One more strike to the lower center, and the entire walls came crashing down bringing a good chunk of the roof with it. To give them the chance to do this, vehicle 3 had opened up with its 50 cal. the second it had turned the corner and hadn't let up for even a second.

Inside the building, Frank decided he wasn't having the best of days as one wall came smashing down to cover him with a choking cloud and various Saints were reduced to plaster bits. What glass was left in the remains of the still existing windows tickled down, and the old man knew why; the enemy had taken out a load bearing wall, and the weight of the whole structure was shifting because of it.

The old man knew at any second these guys could take out another wall, and the whole building would collapse on top of him. He knew of course he would survive it, but having every bone in his body crushed and internal organs made into paste and being stuck that way didn't really appeal to him. Frank looked to where he had stockpiled the dead squad's grenades, took aim, and fired an explosive round into them; there was a deafening roar, smoke and fire climbed high toward the roof, and a hole was opened in the floor. Jackson ran for it in a hunched over sprint, and dove inside just as vehicle 3 opened up with its dragons. Seconds after the war hero entered the basement, the entire structure collapsed above him.
The remaining troops looked over their handy work, and scanned the wreckage on all levels available.

"Area sterilized, no sign of enemy presence. Mission objective achieved."

Immediately after this communication was sent, a blast obliterated vehicle three; a tank was rolling down the street toward where the church used to be, and it was not alone. The Illinois National Guard Armored Division had arrived, and the fight was on...

Non Canon Battle Post

The trio opened up with a salvo of three rockets. Two shot strait at the building, one through the main entrance like a very rude parishioner and another through a window. The third exploded a few feet from the Lemmings' APC and rocked the transport violently. The two rockets that detonated inside sent Frank flying back through a set of pews and landed him in a pile of rubble and wooden shards. He grunted as he noted a piece of wood impaling his thigh and jerked it out of the flesh that almost instantly knitted itself.

Outside, Crimson grit her teeth as two of the APCs entered battle maneuvers while the third radio'd about technical difficulties. "Squad Lemmings, disembark and co..." And just as she spoke, Commander's dossier came over the wire and she grit her teeth. Military history had been part of Schwartze Augen officer training and Frank Jackson was known to her. This would be no easy fight with the resources at her disposal. She pulled up the cameras that Gates had put up and grunted as she cycled through spectrums until she had a location on the target and transferred it to her underlings' helmets. The Redcap tending her was not amused by her antics so she ordered him to shut it and wait. "Target is Threat Value Nova. Extreme caution."

The members of Squad Lemmings approached the church door via cover even as the other two APCs circled the building. The second black vehicle unleashed a pair of rockets into the side of the building that sent chunks of concrete, glass, and wood flying through the church like something out of Dorothy's worst nightmare. The wall began a slow motion collapse even as the members of Lemmings burst in. Two went left; two went right; Frank opened up and the two on the right went down. One have a bullet through his right thigh, the other had a hole in his head. "Ma'am, Lemmings has made contact, 25% casualties, one member reduce capacity. Orders?" Crimson smiled as she pulled up the tactical map of the church, updating in real time thanks to Gates and looked it over. The target was a consummate soldier, but a poor tactician. She gave a set of orders; the remaining Lemmings would need to buy 1 minute's time.

Inside the church, the two who had broken left took cover behind statues and swept the church with eco-locators, noting the presence of the target behind the altar. The injured Ghould was down behind the last row of intact pews about half way up the church floor. He was also the one with the LMG. A series of subvocal orders went off and the man grit his teeth as he stood and opened up on the Altar with the weapon in short, controlled bursts. Even as he did, the other two made a break for the next piece of good cover.

Frank was pretty safe behind the solid altar piece but that wouldn't stay that way for long. His long combat experience made him acutely aware that his opponents were also experienced soldiers as well as that they had a plan. What, he could not know, but he needed to ruin it for them. As it was, the church was looking more and more like swiss cheese due to the fights. Another rocket opened up another hole in the one remaining intact wall. He swung up between bursts and drew down on the LMG wielding trooper. Even as he squeezed the trigger, two rounds of ammo ripped through his left shoulder; in return for his shoulder's sacrifice, the trooper sprouted a sudden case of exploded chest cavity. Frank looked over at his destroyed shoulder: not severed, already regenerating. He was winning the war of attrition so far. He ducked back down as smart M4 fire ricocheted off the altar. Two more targets in the church, and, judging by the numbers, 8 more targets outside. There was nothing for it but to grin and bear it.

Frank stood and made a slow walk to where he knew the two men were hidden; they responded by opening fire. They were good shots, but Frank healed almost as fast as they fired and he closed the distance at an angle that reduced their cover. He pulled the trigger and an explosive round detonated in the wooden facade one was hiding in sending splinters into his helmet. Trigger: the second target's left arm went limp. Both men recovered: one let his rifle drop and pulled a sidearm that Frank recognized from his own long military service as a Colt 1911. The two continued to fire and move to keep cover between them and the nigh-invicible opponent. Credit due: the did not break but remained icy calm as they stepped around the corpses of their fallen Bananas brethren. Frank grinned and sent a round into the pile of looted munitions and watched it explode, sending the two Ghouls flying. They each landed in a heap. Shattered shoulder groaned but the other lay still.

"Ma'am, Lemmings at 75% casualties. Suicide protocols active. We do have a confirmed healing rate on Mr. Jackson. Last member critical, but target is in sight." Vivianne pursed her lips and nodded then hissed at another jarring pain in her leg. "Go."

Frank walked over and looked down at the soldier as the man tried to reach for his sidearm in vain. He drew a bead on the kid and sighed, "Sorry kid, ya picked the wrong side to soldier for. Nothing meant by this." Suddenly, his vision disappeared; the world went black. He reflexively pulled the trigger twice and heard meaty sounds in response as his free hand went to the ruins of his face. His body shook violently as two more rounds from the pair of M24 Sniper Systems rocket him again. He swung around as a fifth rough shattered his wrist and he dropped the pistol. A sixth round impacted his chest. His eyes were just starting to reform as he made out another team of four soldiers entering the church. His body convulsed in nigh epileptic seizures as they opened up on him with their M4s. The damage quickly outpaced even his healing factors and then something burned as a white fog surrounded his frame. Frank finally succumbed and slumped, immobile for now, to the floor as his body shut down to let his healing factor go into full bore. Except the Ghouls never operated in half measure. Squad Annie Lennox's specialist trained his LAW on the temporary-corpse and detonated it with extreme prejudice. The leader of the squad quickly advanced, grabbed the shattered remains of a few key bits, then bumped them in a bag.

"Ma'am, Squad Lemmings at 100% cas..." She was down one APC and four soldiers, but she had neutralized a threat. They needed to move and move now. "Ma'am, inbound National Guard forces. Recommen..." Again, Vivianne cut the woman off, "Recover assets and a few bits of Mr. Jackson, update the Namidian files on him, and lets roll." The Ghouls troppers evac'd hastily, the two Banshees descended and mounted the crimsonAPC, and they abandoned the immobilized APC. It was trapped of course and the first squad of guardsmen within fifty feet of it caused it to detonate. Suicide Protocols were absolute.

NON-CANNON BATTLE POST

Maire waited atop the rooftop patiently as she heard the helicopters blades echo from all around her, explosions had rocked the building just as she'd reached the roof and even without following the noise of the pilots blaring list of demands she knew exactly where they were. The vehicle left a vile black stain on the pattern of whatever it touched, and the mindlessly destructive minds of the ZeroComets paired with the traumatised thoughts of their hostages made Bard and her altered senses wince with disgust. Years worth of damage had been caused today, and Bard didn't relish the work she'd have to put in to return Chicago's pattern to even a semblance of normality, but the men and women inside the vehicle threatened her work with their mere existence and she resolved to end them swiftly.

The helicopter touched down of the rooftop garden with a heavy nudge of it's landing gear. It's rear ramp was flung open and the loud man who'd put a bullet into Bard's leg disembarked with two other men, a fourth soldier and the pilot stayed aboard the helicopter to keep their prisoners in line. She reached out with her ability to test her prey: They were excitable, violent and conflicted- between their malleability and their destructive influence she could hardly imagine an easier set of targets.

"Th' plans simpl', lads." Smokes said, to the two men following shortly behind him. He walked with forceful aggressive steps that made it obvious he was getting pumped with excitement.
"One floor at'a time. Shoot anythin' with ah' gun, a'fore it shoots us!" The men behind him cheered their approval of Smokes 'plan', one punched Smokes in the back of the shoulder in an amicable shove. From her hiding spot Bard hummed a light note of discord, by the standards of what she could do the note was barley a nudge, but she was sure it'd be enough. She wouldn't have to disturb the grand pattern much more than she already had to win this battle.
Smokes turned around furiously, as the note of discord made him take the friendly gesture in the worst possible way.
"TH' SHIT WAS THA' F'R?!"
The squadmate he rounded on recoiled, before his own heightened aggression made him literally butt-heads with his leader and shout him down. "WHAT?! GOT A PROBLEM 'BOSS'?!"
"GUYS!" The third member of the squad cut in. "Guys. Save it for the enemy, yeah?" Bards subtle push hadn't had an immediate effect on the third member of the party, but that quickly became irrelevant when Smokes turned around to deck him to the ground with a savage and unprovoked hook punch.

If Maire had had a normal capacity for humour she might have laughed as the three men stopped in their tracks and began to infight, but she didn't. As she hummed she touched her time bracelet and interwove the slight resonations that it pulsed with into her song, her perception of time stretched forward by a few seconds and she could see that the men would keep escalating their fight- and with her continued intervention a gun would be drawn, and the argument brought to a sudden climax. Once the men were dead she'd easily be able to kill any survivors, and to amplify the fear infesting their parked transport to turn the Hostages against their far outnumbered captors.
Something subtle shifted in the pattern of the building below her, then shifted again. She diverted some of her attention away from the spectacle the ZeroComets were making of themselves and tried to pick out what had changed. The pattern shifted again, and she realized what was happening: Links in the chain she'd setup between the buildings security force were being taken out, their share energy was being dissipated and surgically cut out as a group of intruders that barley registered on her senses cut a path through the chaotic building and directly to the room where she knew the mayor was being held. She truly didn't give a damn about protecting the politician, but the Namidians attempts to capture him was the source of the disruption that'd drawn her here- and that was reason enough for her to act.
She let her voice raise above it's subvocal level to leave the rooftop Villan's a parting gift, before she'd dash from her hiding place and push her way through the rooftop exit to make her way downstairs. With a shrill whistle that went unnoticed among the wrestling trio she quadrupled their aggression and inspired the frightened hostages inside their transport to fight for their freedom.
Just as the rooftop door clicked shut behind her she heard the results of her actions:
"Fuck YOU! You incomprehensible prick!"
"I'LL FU'KEN DECK Y'H, MATE!"
"TRY IT! JUST MAKE A MOVE!!"
*BLAMN!*
*BLAMN!*
*BLAMN!*

---

As Bard rushed to the Mayors office she could see the trail of destruction that the unaccounted for intruders had caused, if 'destruction' could be considered the right word. Every guard she'd come across so far had been rendered unconscious before they'd even known what'd hit them, and had what appeared to be burn scars on their faces and necks. The links of her chain were still being extinguished and their path told her they were only moments away from the Mayors office. Even whilst looking for her targets using her empowered senses she had difficulty discerning the intruders patterns against the background chaos that the building had been plunged into: it was almost as though they were sharks, moving unseen under the surface of the pattern before surfacing violently to take action, only to calm and sink under the surface once more without leaving so much as a ripple in their wake.

Without anyone conscious to stop her she pushed her way easily into the Mayors office, the men by the door were slumped over where they'd stood but on pushing her way inside the only person in sight was the Mayor himself who'd taken cover behind his secretary's desk, and was radiating palpable fear that pulsed throughout the entire room and further masked her senses. The desk that he was hiding behind had another sedated guard slumped over it.
She strode up and grabbed the politician by his collar, she wasn't prone to bursts of emotion but it'd been a long day, so she decided to speak frankly:
"Who did this, and where are they?!"
The terrified Mayor only raised his shaking hand in response and pointed behind her, as she turned she saw what she'd missed on her way in: A woman had been standing by the door, her armour was the same beige hue as the rest of the room and she'd stood statue still as Bard made her entrance which made her easy to overlook, but as she charged at Bard with a raised fist the simple camouflage was broken and she became easily visible.
The infiltrator dived out in a quick lunge and attempted to grasp Bard with an outstretched hand, electric sparks fizzed from her gloved fingertips and Maire heard them crackle as she blocked the attack with a forearm Hwa-Rang-Do block, which she followed up with a twist that opened her opponents guard and sent a well practised punch into the modern ninjas featureless helmet that marked its surface with a fractured split.
Bard began humming, she was no slouch in hand-to-hand combat but neither was her opponent, and neither participant was of a mind to engage in a a fair fight. Her powers reached out but didn't find much purchase to use on the person, a tiny smear of pride, some anger perhaps, but nothing as easily workable as the soldiers upstairs had displayed.

A second Infiltrator detached itself from a spot on the walls, and a third burst through the ceiling tiles above her- again, the singularly flavourless aura they exuded almost nullified them against her pattern sense, as she felt the pressure of attacks begin to press at what her normal martial gifts could cope with she fell back again on the use of her 'Time Bracelet', and Maire integrated it's melody into the song coming from her throat and fists she began to regain control over the fight- from three directions fists and feet tried to subdue her but her form and gifted advantages allowed her to keep them at bay, as she began to relax into the rhythm of the fight she began to integrate notes from her Confusion Collar into her song and immediately she felt herself regaining the advantage. Their own attacks slowed and her fist shattered the visor of another foe, with two of her opponents visually impaired she began to gain ground on them as her fists drove each of them back and her senses continued to search out a finger hold for her music to affect them.
"Mission accomplished. Return." another figure called from the door, before it darted out of sight.
Her three opponents suddenly backed off, they each threw her a final attack that stumbled her offensive long enough for them to make their escape. One darted out the door behind her companion, another handsprang off the Mayors desk and into the dark obscurity of the ceiling tiles where he'd burst from and the final Infiltrator dived into a side room where Bard found nothing but a thrown-open window to show their escape route. Feeling a sense of irritation and confusion of her own she returned to the room to face down the Mayor, what had the last one meant by 'Mission accomplished'?

Something was missing... The fear! and the Mayor it belonged to! Whilst she'd had her whole attention diverted by the fistfight another Infiltrator must have stole her objective out from under her! She stamped down hard on her own sense of frustration and cast her senses out again. She could feel the beacon of the Mayors fear carve a line through the Grand Pattern as he was shepherded through the rooftop gardens and back to the blindingly distorted chaos of the ZeroComet gunship, and she felt that if she moved now she might just be able to intercept them before their escape!

---

As Maire pushed her way back through the rooftop door she could see the wheels of the Helicopter nudge off the buildings rooftop. She'd run past the corpse of the Zero comet leader 'Smokes' as well as his two underlings, who'd shot each other with heatedly drawn pistols. Four civilian corpses were also hastily piled up at the mouth of the Gunships boarding ramp, Bards attempt to incite rebellion had taken effect but had fallen just short of actual success.
Bard could feel the helicopters influence on the grand pattern like a cigarette burn on fabric. So much fear, anger, psychopathy and even the cold-emotionless imprints left by the five Infiltrators piled inside such a small area left her with an absolute certainty that she'd have to kill the entire group to maintain her twisted version of order- and she was about to begin singing a chorus that'd reduce her enemy to scrap iron and flaming debris... but the voice that shouted out from the Helicopters speakers stopped her short.

"If you attempt to destroy this vehicle I will destroy the building you stand on." -Commanders Voice rung out from the Helicopters PA system as it hovered there, almost in challenge.

"I can deliver a bunker-buster to your position in less than a moment. Weigh the lives of the civilians trapped in the building against the ones you have in your sight, Hero, and you'll see that you have no choice but to back down."

Bard wasn't amused by that. She didn't consider herself a hero, and neither would any of the victims she'd murdered over the years for even the smallest infraction. Whoever was talking over the system obviously had no idea who she was, or the lengths that she'd go to maintain her own particular brand of order.
-But-
She had to admit the voice had a point. She wanted the Namidians hovering infront of her wiped out of the equation dearly, more than she'd wanted to murder anything in a good while, in fact, and that was saying something. However the damage that the destruction of the entire building would have on the Pattern of Chicago would be irreversible, whereas the damage that'd been inflicted so far was merely crippling. To her, it really was no choice.

She clenched her fists, grit her teeth, and pointed threateningly to the helicopter. "If I see any of you again, you are dead. That is a fact. Begone." Determined to get the last word in she spun on her heel and strode away back into the building.
The Helicopter spun on it's own axis and sped away, with it's precious but dearly-bought cargo.

---

Commander ran a hand along his face to clear it of perspiration and shakily released his grip from Megalodon's firing controls. He really, really, hadn't wanted Bard to call his bluff- but after the death of one of his lieutenants he wouldn't have had any choice. He would have destroyed the building if it'd come to it, and he would have suffered for the action.
He stopped his hand from shaking with a force of will and jabbed it onto the Broadwave transmitter that sent out a message across the Namidian wavelengths.

***"Mayor is in custody. ZeroComet's are falling back to stow our assets, Numbered Brethren Injured but active. Rough Riders still active. I have satisfied my role in this engagement, if any final objectives have yet to be achieved make them known."***
This message was last edited by the player at 10:42, Fri 26 June 2015.

Non-Cannon Battle Post

Maire's song was breaching discord at this point, several layers in conflict with each other as she spread her control thinly across the entire rooftop, grasping at every nook and cranny in the pattern that she could hold onto. Her attention fractured, and her frenzied song suffered a brief cacophany that would have destroyed the hearing of any normal standing too close to her, but she succesfully re-attained control of it. She stood safely within the shadows just inside the rooftop access, staring balefully at the approaching ZeroComets. Anger and happiness were becoming dangerously close to rebelling out of her control, and she was reminded why she never dealt with opposing emotions very often, on so many people at once. One emotion over an entire crowd was easy, maintaining several among different pockets in the crowd? The hostages inside the Copter were being infused with hope, and those approaching the door being infused with paranoia. Those left in the copter infused with anger at being left behind, and a great deal of... contentment. At least they'd been left with the easy job, watching over a bunch of terrified hostages. All they had to do was look at 'em and they'd curl up into a ball.

Smokes had some of the others in those he'd taken with him walk through the door, just to make sure they weren't gunned down immediately, but still stopped and stood still for a moment at the doorway, listening for anything. There were hints of something, far down the stairwell, but he wasn't concerned at this moment. He stepped in, and after the last one stepped in and started down the steps, his gun raised and a nervous grin on his face, the door slammed shut with a bang that was echoed with a gunshot from the startled men at the front of the chain. Smokes yelled loudly. "Fingers off th' damned triggers, you idiots!" There was faint mumbling, but they went on their way quickly, hitting the first floor down and barging through to... emptiness. And silence.

Maire hid just around the corner, her song becoming more hectic yet. Now there were those still on this floor to control, and the patterns she'd tied over the windows on this floor to block out sound. It was getting past even her fine control, and she was starting to revert to more brutal methods of control. Her foot tapped, her fingers were snapping, and her hands were clapping, and even her pace as she slipped farther down the hallway was measured, from the click when her heel hit the floor to the squeak as her sneaker slid along the tiles.

Smokes grunted. "Start checking all th' rooms!" He shouted, and banged into one himself, a few others following after him and a few others heading into others along the hallway. All of them were empty, and after they reconvened and searched several more, even travelling to the next floor, their disturbance and desire for something to shoot at to relieve that incessant pressure began increasing exponentially. They started snapping at each other, even Smokes, and a fight broke out that was finished quickly with a loud gunshot. Smokes and two others stood over one of their comrades grinning maniacally, and they all whooped. That death had felt so good to them. Better than the most delicious chocolate they'd ever eaten. But the pressure mounted quickly again and their hunger rose. Just as the second gunshot went off, Maire felt a pressure on the weaves she'd left farther down in the building. One of the guards outside the mayors office had just died. She hadn't even noticed anything. Her head jerked to the side and she whistled, loud and shrill. It bounced down through the patterns in the building, hitting civilians and guards alike until it dimly bounced off of someone that hadn't been in the building before. Her whistle shouldn't have bounced dimly at all. If it hadn't been for just the slightest twinge of a pattern in response to it, she wouldn't have ever even detected it.

Another shrill whistle, punctuated by two more gunshots and a dull thud that sounded like a muted explosion, and Maire was slipping down the stairs faster than any normal. Whoever was down here was clean. The guards she'd enhanced were enhanced, but sloppy. Too sloppy, and someone had slid right through them and were likely already in the Mayors office. Or more than one? Her whistles weren't effective enough. She sent out a few more as she approached the office, more dull reflections coming back at her, but they were confusing. Too erratic. She couldn't tell if it was one or ten, even as she stepped right up to the doorway. With a quick subvocal hum, her time sense filed in, and she stepped into the room. It was empty of everyone, including the mayor, but someone was still here. No, there, behind that door. She stepped over and threw it open, and stared in confusion at the empty broom closet before a faint pressure from her time-sense hit her in her neck, and she flipped, her arm reaching out and gripping the arm of a man. It took her the barest flex to break it, but his silence was disturbing. Her other arm came around and slammed into his visor, knocking his head back and cracking it. The hand on his broken arm dropped something thin and silvery, a needle, and she let go of his arm and grabbed it, spinning it and shoving it into what she felt was a weaker thread at the elbow crease.

A woman fell out of the ceiling and Maire barely shoved the man away and pulled herself out of the way in time to avoid it, but she dropped the needle in the process. Brethren One was skilled enough that even with enhanced powers, Maire actually had to employ tricks she hadn't used in years. Another man appeared, this one wearing a fancy suit and a bandanna wrapped around his face and goggles over his eyes. He didn't join the fight, but grabbed the man lying on the floor and dragged him unceremoniously away. Maire frowned, but caught on quickly. The man hadn't even tried to fight back, he'd just tried to stab her with the needle. They'd hidden the mayor in one of their own suits. And she'd just broken his arm. Likely with pearmenant damage inflicted. This was not turning out how she wanted.

The woman only fought for a few more moments before pulling back. Maire pursued, but yet another man stood at the door, with another uniform similar to the others, and holding a silenced pistol. He shot, and Maire dove behind the desk. The woman retreated, and the door slammed shut, a lock clicking into place. She frowned and stood, standing in a ready position and humming a sonorous note before dashing at the door, slamming through the wood like a block of concrete through a thin window. The hall was empty, but she whistled, catching the faint reflection of the now unconscious mayor, and a few of the others. But they were spreading out, and she could feel them two floors below her and two floors above. The Mayor was with the group above, so she headed for the stairwell and clambered up the flights quickly, interspersing whistles into the climb.

When she finally burst out of the rooftop access, the helicopter was already lifted off and hovering there, facing towards her door. She saw a rocket detach itself, and her eyes widened. She stepped back inside and flipped over the railing, falling a flight of stairs and bouncing to her feet, jumping again and landing badly, but uninjured. She covered her head, and... nothing happened. She stood, and cautiously moved up the stairs, opening the rooftop door and glancing out. The Helicopter was gone, and the missile lay on the rooftop, unexploded. But she wasn't an idiot, and instead of investigating, accepted the loss and turned, slipping back down and out of the building and disappearing into the streets.

The Numbered Brethren reported in ahead of schedule. "We've got the mayor." Was all they said.

Canon Battle Post

The trio opened up with a salvo of three rockets. Two shot straight at the building, one through the main entrance like a very rude parishioner and another through a window. The third exploded a few feet from the Lemmings' APC and rocked the transport violently. The two rockets that detonated inside sent Frank flying back through a set of pews and landed him in a pile of rubble and wooden shards. He grunted as he noted a piece of wood impaling his thigh and jerked it out of the flesh that almost instantly knitted itself.

Outside, Crimson grit her teeth as two of the APCs entered battle maneuvers while the third radioed about technical difficulties.

"Squad Lemmings, disembark and co..." And just as Lady Crimson spoke, Commander's dossier came over the wire and she grit her teeth. Military history had been part of Schwartze Augen officer training and Frank Jackson was known to her. This would be no easy fight with the resources at her disposal. She pulled up the cameras that Gates had put up and grunted as she cycled through spectrums until she had a location on the target and transferred it to her underlings' helmets. The Redcap tending her was not amused by her antics so she ordered him to shut it and wait. "Target is Threat Value Nova. Extreme caution."

The members of Squad Lemmings approached the church door via cover even as the other two APCs circled the building. The second black vehicle unleashed a pair of rockets into the side of the building that sent chunks of concrete, glass, and wood flying through the church like something out of Dorothy's worst nightmare. The wall began a slow motion collapse even as the members of Lemmings burst in. Two went left; two went right. Frank opened fire and the two on the right went down. One got a bullet through his right thigh, the other got a hole in his head.

"Ma'am, Lemmings has made contact, 25% casualties, one member reduce capacity. Orders?" Crimson smiled as she pulled up the tactical map of the church, which was updating in real time thanks to Gates, and scanned it with brutal efficiency. The target was a consummate soldier, but a poor tactician. She gave a set of orders; the remaining Lemmings would need to buy one minute's time.

Inside the church, the two who had broken left took cover behind statues and swept the church with eco-locators, noting the presence of the target behind the altar. The injured Ghoul was down behind the last row of intact pews about half way up the church floor. He was also the one with the LMG. A series of subvocal orders went off and the man gritted his teeth, stood up, and sprayed the altar with the weapon in short, controlled bursts. Even as he did, the other two made a break for the next piece of good cover.

Frank was pretty safe behind the solid altar piece but wouldn't stay that way for long. His impossibly vast combat experience made him acutely aware that his opponents were also experienced soldiers as well. They moved like soldiers, they aimed like experts, and they didn't crack when the first skull did. What they were planning, he could not know, but he needed to ruin it for them. As it was, the church was looking more and more like Swiss cheese due to the fights. Another rocket opened up another hole in the last intact wall. He swung up between bursts and drew a bead on the LMG wielding trooper. Even as he squeezed the trigger, two rounds of ammo ripped through his left shoulder; in return for his shoulder's sacrifice, the trooper suffered a sudden case of exploded chest cavity. Frank looked over at his destroyed shoulder: not severed, already regenerating. He was winning the war of attrition so far. He ducked back down as smart M4 fire ricocheted off the altar. Two more targets in the church, and, judging by the numbers, 8 more targets outside. There was nothing to do but grin and bear it.

Frank stood and made a slow walk to where he knew the two men were hidden; they responded by splitting his chest and shoulders open. They were good shots, but Frank healed almost as fast as they fired and he closed the distance at an angle that reduced their cover. He pulled the trigger and an explosive round detonated in the wooden facade one was hiding in, sending splinters into his helmet. Second pull of the trigger: the second target's left arm went limp. Both men recovered, one let his rifle drop and pulled a sidearm that Frank recognized from his own long military service as a Colt 1911. The two continued to fire and move to keep cover between them and the nigh-invicible opponent. Credit due: they remained icy calm as they stepped around the corpses of their fallen Bananas brethren. Frank grinned as he spotted an opportunity and sent a round into the pile of looted munitions. He watched it explode, sending the two Ghouls flying. They each landed in a heap. The one with the shattered arm groaned, but the other lay still.

"Ma'am, Lemmings at 75% casualties. Suicide protocols active. We do have a confirmed healing rate on Mr. Jackson. Last member critical, but target is in sight." Vivianne pursed her lips and nodded, then hissed at another jarring pain in her leg.

"Go."

Frank walked over and looked down at the soldier as the man tried to reach for his sidearm in vain. He took aim at the kid and sighed, "Sorry kid, ya picked the wrong side to soldier for. Nothing meant by this."

Suddenly, his vision disappeared; the world went black. He reflexively pulled the trigger twice and heard meaty sounds in response as his free hand went to the ruins of his face. His body shook violently as two more rounds from the pair of M24 Sniper Systems rocked him again. He swung around as a fifth rough shattered his wrist and he dropped the pistol. A sixth round impacted his chest. His eyes were just starting to reform as he made out another team of four soldiers entering the church. His body convulsed in nigh epileptic seizures as they opened up on him with their M4s. The damage quickly outpaced even his healing factors and then something burned as a white fog surrounded his frame.

Frank almost succumbed to the pressure, but his warrior instincts took over as pieces of his brain burst and reformed over and over again. He dashed through one of the soldiers, swung his arm around the man's throat, and wielded him like a shield. He screamed in agony as the flesh on his choking arm was shredded apart by gunfire, but he would not let go. He used his human shield to block whichever direction the greatest pain was coming from, and emptied his clip into the newly arrived troopers' helmets. One by one by one, three of the four fell to the ground. Pools of blood leaked from the dead's helmets, and the whole scene desecrated the peace and serenity of the Cathedral.


"Ma'am, Squad Lemmings at 100% casualties, Squad Annie Lennox at 75%..." She was down one APC and six soldiers, and the tough bastard was still standing, mocking her. But he was still a grunt, while she was an officer.

"Keep moving, trooper. Dodge between cover and do not take aim at him. He'll expose himself. They always do."

As snipers tore chunks out of Frank Jackson briefly exposed shoulders and head, the ITSDA badass' stream of bullets trailed behind the one remaining Ghoul. The Ghoul dashed from the pews, to behind the columns, to under the very altar he hid behind, and never even attempted to fight. He was either a coward, or (more likely), a distraction. He laid down some covering fire to keep his target in place and his rifle clicked. Cunningly, he pulled out his shield's sidearm. That was a big mistake. The sidearm exploded with the force of a rocket, sending shrapnel flowing through his organs and pulling his body apart.

It was then that he dropped his shield, and then that the snipers put hole after hole in his head. He got up three times, each time a little slower. After the third time, he stayed down and began to crawl backward out the door. A fresh ear piercing wracked his body with pain and kept him still for two seconds. That was all the time the Lennox APC's miniguns needed to cleave him into pieces like a giant knife. Eviscerated and in literal pieces, the one remaining soldier opened a bag and began to pile the undying soldier's major bits into it.

Lady Crimson hated this man for putting a dent in her army, but her hatred meant nothing. Unlike the others, she could put her personal feelings aside. She finally neutralized the threat, and they needed to move and move now.

b>"Ma'am, inbound National Guard forces. Recommen..."</b> Vivianne cut the woman off.

"Recover assets and all you can of Mr. Jackson, update the files on him, and lets roll." The Ghoul trooper evacuated hastily, the two Banshees descended and mounted the crimson APC, and they abandoned the others. It was trapped of course and the first squad of guardsmen within fifty feet of it caused it to detonate. Suicide Protocols were absolute.

Inside the crimson APC, a Banshee noticed an unusual lump in the bag full of Jackson's remains. He couldn't tell whether or not it was there before, but he wasn't about to take the risk.

"Lady Crimson, possible signs of life. What are your orders?"

Maire's song was breaching discord at this point, several layers in conflict with each other as she spread her control thinly across the entire rooftop, grasping at every nook and cranny in the pattern that she could hold onto. Her attention fractured, and her frenzied song suffered a brief cacophony that would have destroyed the hearing of any normal standing too close to her, but she successfully reattained control of it. She stood safely within the shadows just inside the rooftop access, staring balefully at the approaching ZeroComets. Their anger and happiness were becoming dangerously close to rebelling out of her control, and she was reminded why she never dealt with opposing emotions very often, on so many people at once. One emotion over an entire crowd was easy, maintaining several among different pockets in the crowd? The hostages inside the Copter were being infused with a miniscule amount of hope and holding on to it for dear life, those approaching the door were injected with paranoia. Those left in the copter were filled with anger at being left behind, and a great deal of... contentment. At least they'd been left with the easy job, watching over a bunch of terrified hostages. All they had to do was look at 'em and they'd curl up into a ball.


"Th' plans simpl', lads." Smokes said from where just within Bard's hearing range. He and the two men following behind him walked with forceful, aggressive steps that made it obvious they were pumped up."One floor at'a time. Shoot anythin' with ah' gun, a'fore it shoots us!"

The men behind him cheered their approval of Smoke's "plan," one punched Smokes in the back of the shoulder in an amicable, nonverbal "yeah!" From her hiding spot, Bard hummed a light note of discord; by the standards of what she could do the note was barely a nudge, but she was sure it'd be enough. She wouldn't have to disturb the grand pattern much more than she already had to win this battle.

Smokes turned around furiously, as the note of discord made him take the friendly gesture in the worst possible way.

"TH' SHIT WAS THA' F'R?!" The squadmate he turned on recoiled, before his own heightened aggression made him literally butt-heads with his leader and shout him down.

"WHAT?! GOT A PROBLEM "BOSS"?!"

"GUYS!" The third member of the squad cut in. "Guys. Save it for the enemy, yeah?" Bard's subtle push hadn't had an immediate effect on the third member of the party, but that quickly became irrelevant when Smokes turned around to deck him to the ground with a savage and unprovoked hook punch.

If Maire had had a normal capacity for humor, she might have laughed as the three "professionals" stopped in their tracks and began to struggle amongst themselves, but she didn't. As she hummed, she touched her time bracelet and interwove the slight resonations that it pulsed with into her song; her perception of time stretched forward by a few seconds and she could see that the men would keep escalating their fight. Even better, with her continued intervention a gun would be drawn, and the argument brought to a sudden climax. Once the men were dead, she'd easily be able to kill any survivors and amplify the fear infesting the Comets' parked transport to turn the hostages against their cowering, outnumbered captors.

Something subtle shifted in the pattern of the building below her, then shifted again. She diverted some of her attention away from the spectacle the ZeroComets were making of themselves and tried to pick out what had changed. The pattern shifted again, and she realized what was happening: the links in the rhythmic chain she'd setup between the buildings security force were being taken out. The heartbeats and breaths that made up the chain's beats were being surgically eliminated one by one as a group of intruders that barely registered on her senses cut a path through the chaotic building and directly to the room where she knew the mayor was being held. She truly didn't give a damn about protecting the politician, but the Namidians' attempts to capture him was the source of the disruption that had drawn her here. That was reason enough for her to act.

She let her voice raise above it's subvocal level to leave the rooftop villains a parting gift before she dashed downstairs. With a shrill whistle that went unnoticed by the wrestling trio, she quadrupled their aggression and inspired the frightened, but hopeful hostages inside their transport to fight for their freedom.

Just as the rooftop door clicked shut behind her, she heard the results of her actions:

"Fuck YOU! You incomprehensible prick!"

"I'LL FU'KEN DECK Y'H, MATE!"

"TRY IT! JUST MAKE A MOVE!!"

*BLAMN!*

*BLAMN!*

*BLAMN!*

Maire sang a note of curiosity and frustration as she slipped down the stairs faster than any normal. It's sound, it's presence in the pattern, was being twisted and routed around something as it got closer and closer to the mayor's office. Whoever was down here was clean. Her note wasn't effective enough. She sang a higher, nervier tune as she approached the office, but only got dull reverberations for her troubles. She couldn't tell if the soldiers numbered one or ten, even as she stepped right up to the doorway.

With a quick hum, her time braclet was again incorporated into her song, and she stepped into the room. It was empty of seemingly everyone, including the mayor, but she knew someone was still here. No, there, behind that door! She stepped over and threw it open, and stared in confusion at the empty broom closet before a faint pressure from her time-sensed nearly collapsed her windpipe. She flipped backward, reached her arm out and gripped the arm of a nigh-invisible man. It took her the barest flex to break it, but his silence was disturbing. Her other arm swung around and slammed into his visor, knocking his head back and cracking it. The hand on his broken arm dropped something thin and silvery, a needle. She let go of his arm and snatched it out of the air. In one fluid, dance-like motion, she spun and shoved it into what she felt was a weak spot at the crease of his uniform's elbow.

Suddenly, a woman wearing the same outfit dived out in a quick lunge and attempted to grasp Bard with an outstretched hand. Electric sparks fizzed from her gloved fingertips and Maire heard them crackle as she blocked the attack with her forearm. Bard followed up with a twist that opened her opponents guard and then sent a well practiced punch into the modern ninja's featureless helmet. The punch was hard enough to split the helmet's along the middle, but not hard enough to take her down.

Bard began humming, she was no slouch in hand-to-hand combat but neither was her opponent, and neither participant was of a mind to engage in a a fair fight. Her powers reached out but didn't find much purchase to use on the person, a tiny smear of pride, some anger perhaps, but nothing as easily workable as the soldiers upstairs had displayed.

A third infiltrator detached himself from a spot on the walls, and a fourth burst through the ceiling tiles above her. Again, the singularly flavorless aura they exuded made them almost impossible to sense! How many more were there? She felt the pressure of attacks begin to press at what her martial gifts could cope with she and she fell back again on the use of her "Time Bracelet." The rapid beat-beat-beat of the Time Braclet's tune grew louder and even more rapid, and Maire's fists and kicks flew everywhere. From three directions fists and feet tried to subdue her, but her form and apparently inhuman reflexes allowed her to keep them at bay. As she began to relax into the rhythm of the fight, she integrated notes from her Confusion Collar into her already complex song and immediately gained the advantage. The ghostly soldiers' attacks missed her constantly as they struggled to keep their eyes locked on to her. Her fist shattered the visor of another foe, and that soldier stumbled out of her reach and toward the downed man.

The last unharmed soldier dashed toward her. A perfectly executed flying knee threw him halfway across the room, but he caught himself with a handspring before he hit the ground. Maire anticipated the roundhouse kick he attempted, grabbed his leg, and swept his left leg out from underneath him. The trooper immediately rolled out of the way, jumped up, and elbowed her before she could dodge it. Maire staggered back and prepared to parry his next blow, but something in her peripheral vision caught her suspicion. One of the infiltrators was carrying his or her unconscious comrade away. Maire frowned, but caught on quickly. They wouldn't focus on the wounded! They'd hidden the mayor in one of their own suits. And she'd just broken his arm. Likely with permanent damage inflicted. This was not turning out how she wanted.

"Mission accomplished, return immediately!" said the female infiltrator, who stood just past the door. She drew her pistol and fired, forcing Bard to dive behind a desk. With that, the remaining pair beat a hasty retreat and locked the door behind them. The very moment the lock clicked shut, Bard belted out powerful, righteous rage and rammed her way through the door.

As Maire pushed her way back through the rooftop door, she could see the wheels of the Helicopter nudge off the building's rooftop. She'd run past the corpse of the ZeroComet leader "Smokes" as well as his two underlings, who'd shot each other with heatedly drawn pistols. Four civilian corpses were also hastily piled up at the mouth of the Gunships boarding ramp; her attempt to incite rebellion had taken effect, but it had fallen just short of actual success.

Bard could feel the helicopters influence on the grand pattern like a cigarette burn on fabric. So much fear, anger, psychopathy and even the cold, emotionless imprints left by the five infiltrators piled inside such a small area left her with an absolute certainty that she'd have to kill the entire group to maintain her twisted version of order. She was about to begin singing a chorus that'd reduce her enemy to scrap iron and flaming debris... but the voice that shouted out from the helicopters speakers stopped her short.

"If you attempt to destroy this vehicle I will destroy the building you stand on." The Commander's voice rung out from the helicopter's PA system as it hovered there, almost in challenge.

"I can deliver a bunker-buster to your position in less than a moment. Weigh the lives of the civilians trapped in the building against the ones you have in your sight, hero, and you'll see that you have no choice but to back down."

Bard wasn't amused by that. She didn't consider herself a hero, and neither would any of the victims she'd murdered over the years for even the smallest infraction. Whoever was talking over the system obviously had no idea who she was, or the lengths that she'd go to maintain her own particular brand of order.

-But-

She had to admit the voice had a point. She wanted the Namidians hovering in front of her wiped out of the equation dearly, more than she'd wanted to murder anything in a good while, in fact. And that was saying something! However, the damage that the destruction of the entire building would have on the Pattern of Chicago would be irreversible, whereas the damage that'd been inflicted so far was merely crippling. To her, there really was no choice.

She clenched her fists, grit her teeth, and pointed threateningly to the helicopter.

"If I see any of you again, you are dead. That is a fact. Begone." Determined to get the last word in, she spun on her heel and strode away back into the building.

The helicopter spun on it's own axis and sped away, with it's precious but dearly bought cargo. The Commander considered King Pyrrhus of Epirus as his troops sped away; had this battle's victory perhaps cost him his ultimate victory? No, no. The ZeroComets were replaceable, this battle was not. Still, the primitive, unnecessary fear lingered in the man's mind as he formulated his army's next move.

Her tapestry was fraying. Threads snapping, chunks burned out. Lost into an oblivion of emptiness that made Maire both enraged and desperate. She was failing, and there was nothing she could do about it. She was up against too much. Too many enemies in too many places, with more resources and more vision than she had. She had her reasons for not joining the ITSDA, but right now their help was looking ever more necessary to salvage even a remnant of what this place had once been. She could see, so clearly, that they would never help her to reach her ultimate goal, and with her actions against them, she knew that any attempt at interaction with them would be met with outright hostility.

Or, perhaps, they may have been just as intent on rescuing this city as she was... She'd been a fool to turn down their help in the first place. She should have abused their assistance as much as she could, and gotten as much as she could manage done before they split ties, but she'd been blinded by the glory of the Pattern. Of order on a magnitude that made her mind quiver in a mixture of both terror and absolute joy.

Snap. Maire's gaze twisted, her eyes focusing on something strange. That thread... Threads never came back after being destroyed. She distincitly remembered that specific thread being wrenched from the world right before her eyes mere moments ago, as she'd been admiring the beauty of it. It was old, and constant. And while it certainly did damage to the surrounding patterns, it was so ingrained in them that... oh, now it made sense. A gifted? Yes, another gifted. The gifted all influenced the patterns in their own way, always indirectly, but this one seemed to... suck energy out of other patterns back into itself. The mechanics in its weaves, the little tedious twists and knots that made it possible boggled her, but that was definitely something worth looking at...

She swept out of City Hall quickly and quietly, severing the remaining ties she'd created between policemen on her way out. Many of them collapsed, and would likely be unconscious for a few minutes. The ones that didn't fell to their knees and retched all over the floor, but there uncomfortable situations didn't even register now that her focus was on that thread. That unbreakable thread.

Travel through cities was normally more difficult, but without the intervening crowds and with a clear line of sight and no thought as to the implications, Maire took full advantage of her gifts. She whipped through the streets at a pace that far outstripped a normal human, and made it to her location in record time. She didn't normally take advantage so much, since her influences on her own and surrounding patterns did its own kind of damage, but she was desperate.

A church came into view. Wrecked almost beyond recognition, but not gone. It took her a few moments to scan through the vehicles and wreckage to find what she was looking for, but when she did, she was surprised. That pattern was far too complicated for her to mimic. Or even to influence. She doubted anything but the barest of her abilities would even graze the thing. Whatever it was, it was inside an APC, and there were others in there.

She whistled, long and high, and crouched down low. A ripple slid along the weaves around her, slipping into the van through impossible nooks and crannies, and reverberated. Nothing happened, but the whistle had only been to get her a better feeling for what was in the van, not influence. Whoever the unbreakable thread was, the others in that APC were uncomfortable around it, and she took that as a sign. Another whistle, and the weave around and in the van loosened considerable. She trilled, and started shoveling energy into the unbreakable thread like coal into a fire.

Crimson was just starting to relax just a little when the Banshee noted that whatever was in the sack was doing its best to be a bit more than just meat. She grit her teeth and looked at it, but the calculated healing factor gave her a few minutes, yeah? Then why was the sack rippling like mad then?

Back at Schwartze Augen HQ somewhere in Ohio, Laura was monitoring the various sensor and data feeds from many different sources around the team she was assisting and it took a her a second to identify an anomalous auudio factor. She frowned, isolated, and analyzed the sound. It was music, but it was resonating at an odd frequency amongst other factors, "Ma'am, we have an anomalous sonic wave impacting the APC. Analyzing now, possible gifted."

In the tank, Crimson grunted and eyed the sack then jerked her thumb to one of the ghouls, "Up, lift the seat cushion." Without words, the team moved, comfortable in the presence of orders, "That hollow is lined with glass, dump the head in now... heart and spine as well. Quickly." Anyone else might ahve been grossed out by digging through a mound of generating living tissue, but Ghouls were beyond that and soon the three requested bits were dumped into the box. Vivianne then moved her hand over it and concentrated for a second before a stream of vitriolic acid poured into the confines. It was not a permanent solution to Frank Jackson, but it could buy them some time. "Dump the rest out the hatch."

A door was opened in the bottom of the APC and the rest of the bag's contents kicked out even as the APC tore away heading towards the docks.

The bag thudded unceremoniously to the ground, wriggling and swelling as the APC moved out of sight. By destroying the biggest surviving parts of him, Crimson rejuvenated the now surviving largest piece still shrouded in black plastic. Bard's infusion of power into the dead man's pattern enhanced his healing factor, reducing the time of days to minutes. Bone reformed, to be covered by muscle, tendons, and other expected parts; a skull grew out of the mass of tissue and calcium, white being coated by red then flesh. Eyes that had seen the events of decades swelled into once empty sockets, lips covered teeth stained by years of tobacco use as the right upper corner curled up as part of a cocky smile. Hair white as snow sprouted, eyebrows and a mass on his head that twisted and turned itself into a pompadour.

The zipper of the bag was torn asunder by strong hands, and a big man stood naked but alive on the street. Frank looked about to get his bearings as he stretched, wondering how long he'd been dead this time.

Bard sent one last note after the departing APC, the note latching onto it and sinking into its patterns like oil into a dry cloth, and turned her attention to the man standing in the street. She had never encountered, heard of, or seen him before, so she would need to be careful. Gifted were not known for their stability when encountering the unknown. She whistled, very loudly, to announce her presence and stood from behind her cover. The whistle trailed off into a series of other notes before fading from audible hearing range. She looked the man up and down before speaking, just loudly enough for her voice to carry the intervening distance. "My name is Bard," she said, "and whether or not you know me or what I've done, I need your help." Her gaze slid down the street momentarily before she began walking very slowly towards Frank. "I'm fighting too many foes alone to do my job. I've already let Ash and Zenith escape, and the Mayor get captured, and my defeats are stacking up against me."

She stopped just out of what she best assumed his lunging reach would be. "If you don't wish to help, I'll find others, but I can see where help is needed the most. And believe me," she said, going on a hunch, "there is going to be a great deal of combat wherever we end up, and it's going to be hard. And with me around..." she looked pointedly at his form, "you're abominably slow pace of regeneration is multiplied a hundredfold. You'd be unstoppable." She winced internally at that. Anytime she bolstered his regeneration, she would have to suck energy out of the rest of the pattern, and that made her uncomfortable.

She raised her eyebrows and waited for Frank, but kept herself in a defensive stance. Caution was not something she would give up anytime soon.

The Commander glared at his bank of monitors with narrowed eyes, he finished his Black Coffee in a single gulp and it's bitter taste complimented his bitter thoughts. The information portion of his screen was filled with information about his active soldiers as an active and constantly updating list, as he watched the icons representing three of the ZeroComets changed to simple red X's and their status changed from 'Active' to 'Deceased'. Four of his hostages were also flagged as 'Deceased' and two of his invaluable Numbered Brethren and his VIP hostage were classified as 'Injured'. His raid on city hall had been a success, but had yielded unsatisfying results.

Commander respected and valued every man under his command, but he'd never really liked the ZeroComets; their violent and unrestrained style meshed poorly with his own tactics, and the unit had disobeyed his direct orders on more than one occasion. The unit had been his high-attrition dumping ground for his most volatile and uncontrollable men, and although the casualties they'd suffered were unfortunate they weren't necessarily unexpected.
"Start querying information brokers. I want a profile compiled on that Gifted."
Just because Commander and Smokes had never seen eye-to-eye it didn't mean that he'd forgive Bards interference.
"Superhumans have been causing me too many near-misses, recently. Next time I'm not going to settle for half a victory."

He turned back to examine his tactical map. His list of objectives had grown short, and the majority of his remaining units were now falling back from their 'Phase Two' operations to deliver their hostages to Commanders reserve of getaway drivers. Megalodon altered it's course to follow them and re-aligned it's cameras to lead their escape, with it's many eyes and unspent firepower watching over his men Commander felt confident that he wouldn't need to add any new names onto his short list of casualties.

"Commander, reporting in. The Mayor is being filtered out of the Combat Arena with the rest of the hostages. What is the status of Operation #101?"
This message was last edited by the player at 15:26, Sat 27 June 2015.

Frank turned to look in the woman's direction as she whistled to announce herself, hands hanging at his hips as though out of habit. He took no action, remaining where he stood as she drew ever closer. He let her have her say, and only then did he respond.

"Glad to know you, Bard. Name's Frank, Frank Jackson. Fighting is one of my favorite pastimes, and from the looks things I haven't missed much and the battle for Chicago is still on. But, I'm a little under equipped at the moment. I don't even have clothes on my back, let alone my guns. Though, they may still be in what's left of the church."
This message was lightly edited by the player at 00:01, Mon 29 June 2015.

Phoenix Crimson shot through the air like a Crimson Comet, the explosions that propelled him along trailed him as a fiery wake. After his spar at the hospital he'd resumed his search by gliding above the city streets and attempting to find the source of the cities Chaos- however, he quickly realised that this wasn't a winning strategy.
By responding to the largest threats he'd spend far more time searching for Namidian's than actually fighting them. It also meant that he could only perform damage control, and wouldn't be able to drive them out of Chicago.

He changed course. Instead of following the major roadways he started to follow Chicago's powerlines. Even since before he'd arrived the loss of the city's electronic infrastructure had virtually crippled him, and he imagined that the city's military and law enforcement were suffering it's effects far worse. If he could restore Chicago's power he'd be able to inform Headquarters about the full extent of the attack, and perhaps give the forces of Justice inside the city a fighting chance at victory.

---

Chicago was famous for it's architecture... and if you were into that sort of thing, it was also famous for it's substations.
Within the city limits Chicago had a policy of disguising it's infrastructural buildings in elaborate façades. An observant Chicago citizen might note that several buildings within their city had doors which never seemed to open, or was clad in cunningly disguised ventilation grates instead of windows, but most people in the city walked past such buildings completely oblivious to their true purpose.
This one had no such illusion. The flaming truck smashed into it's side and the fizzing crackle of mismanaged electricity made sure of that.

The damaged substation was surrounded by a gaggle of powerless firefighters and electrical technicians, and Phoenix Crimson landed among them in his usual bomb-like manner. The men recoiled back from the explosion and were temporarily rendered dumbstruck by the hero's sudden and dramatic appearance. Phoenix Crimson grabbed the closest electrician by his collar and hoisted him into the air with one arm.
"Your city's getting slaughtered! Why's the power down?!" Phoenix Crimson clenched his fist as though he were threatening the poor public servant. In truth he didn't bear him any ill-will, but a long history of social manipulation told him that he was going to have to ask the technicians and firefighters to put themselves into a dangerous situation, and that the only way to achieve that was through intimidation. "Chicago doesn't have any radio. Your police are scattered and confused even as they're getting killed piecemeal, is that what you want?!"

The unfortunate technician he'd started to bully raised his hands defensively. "No- of course not!", the technician tilted his head towards the burning truck that was still crushed within the building. "We can't make repairs while the buildings on fire, and the firefighters cant do a damn thing while the lines are still on!"
Phoenix Crimson looked to the firefighters, and then to the damage. What the technician said wasn't just an excuse; any attempt to douse the flames had a very real chance of electrocution- and since Phoenix's objective was to restore power to the city disabling the HV powerlines feeding into the building wasn't a valid option.
He dropped the electrician and stamped over to the fireman nearest to him and snatched the hose from his hand, he held it high in the air as he addressed them with one of his signature speeches:
"I'VE ALWAYS BEEN TOLD THAT PUBLIC SERVANTS ARE THE 'REAL' HEROES. POLICE OFFICERS, FIREFIGHTERS, PARAMEDICS... WELL, TODAY YOU EARN THAT RESPECT."
Phoenix Crimson levelled the nozzle of his stolen fire-hose into the building and jammed it's release level forwards- his arms fought it's recoil and the air was immediately filled with the mist of vaporised water, complaining flames and the fizzing crackle of high voltage electricity forcefully grounding itself.
Even as an arc of electricity arced up his stream and grounded itself a few feet from his position Phoenix kept up his speech:
"YOU MIGHT WORRY ABOUT THE DANGER, BUT KNOW THIS! SO LONG AS YOU FIGHT FOR JUSTICE YOU CAN NEVER BE DEFEATED!"
"NOW GET MOVING! EVERY MOMENT WE WASTE IS ANOTHER INNOCENT CORPSE!"

Phoenix's idealistic speech had the desired effect, and five minutes later the building had been extinguished enough for the electricians to do their part. Four firefighters had been struck by high-voltage bursts of electricity and were currently receiving CPR, whether they'd recover or not was uncertain but in either case they'd have earned Phoenix's respect- it'd hadn't been fair to thrust his own reckless heroism onto the unempowered workers, but the situation called for it and at the end of the day Daniel wouldn't regret the choice he'd made.
After they'd had the chance able to inspect the damage the electricians reported back with dire news: Only a handful of the capacitors were still in a position to be repaired, and in their water-drenched, overheated and jury-rigged state it was doubtful that they could be relied upon. Furthermore news had filtered in that several other substations had been demolished in a similar way. In short, there was no way that the substation could restore power to the entire city.
They worked with what they had; and the electricians enabled and disabled each of the city's powerines until they found a combination that'd re-enable the city's police and military antenna towers.

The dark streetlights and buildings of Chicago were suddenly kicked from their dormancy, entire sections of city would startle awake with fluctuating and renewed electricity before falling dark again. After some time the electrical anomaly stopped and power was restored to the block surrounding the CPD Headquarters and nowhere else- moments later the silent Police wavelengths were reactivated with a squawk of static and a familiar voice:
"Thanks to the HEROIC efforts of the citizens of Chicago radio communication is restored! If backup is required let it be known, for I -PHOENIX CRIMSON- am standing by."
Phoenix had his finger pressed to the side of his mask, which allowed him to communicate over the newly restored channel. Under the mask his eyes narrowed.
"-and if any Namidians are listening in: I'm coming for you next."

In reply to Frank Jackson (msg # 56):

Bard shrugged. "Clothes are unnecessary with your gift, but I'll help you search for your weapons." She said, brushing past him and heading right for the crumbled church. "Do you have any idea where you may have left them? I'm afraid my gifts are better used to find people, not... guns, but I can try." She whistled, and the pattern rippled around her, but she had no idea what his weapons looked like. There was something vaguely gunshaped over there, but when she picked it up it was... a bent piece of metal. "Yes, see." She said, gesturing with the metal and tossing it into a pile of debris.

Janice rode into town on a semi loaded with emergency supplies. For days she has considered how best to attract a gifted without giving herself away.  She needed to get one in range to taste and if suitable to seduce into being her protector from Dieter.

The truck made it’s way to the University of Chicago Medical Center, epicenter for the wounded from the latest gifted battle at city hall. Hundreds wounded with lacerations from shattered glass, from stray bullets, from falling while running for their lives, on top of those shot intentionally.  So much physical pain, so much despair and grief;  the strength of it threatening to overwhelm her.  Janice gasped and started to briefly drown in the agony of it all till she forced up her mental walls and started to float above the wretchedness.

As she walked the halls of the Hospital Janice reached out from her mental fortress, tentatively licking at those in greatest pain, just barely touching the tip of her mental tongue to their agony.  Briefly she thought about sending their pain and despair on to Dieter as he alone would appreciate it as a gift. But instead she started to spread emotions of calm, peace and acceptance. Moans of pain begin to subside, tears of grief dry and the negative emotions of a hospital in crisis being to mellow. Then she reaches out to strong bio fields, the hospital visitors, the police, the nurses and doctors and starts to draw from them and redirect their energy into the weakest bio fields, those on the edge of death.  While the hospital staff and visitors begin to tire and weaken miracles of healing occur among the patients.  Inoperable wounds start to spontaneously heal, people with spinal injuries that would render them paraplegic or worse start to walk, massive burn victims begin to heal. The media take notice.  But through it all Janice draws no specific attention to herself.  Hopefully someone will come to investigate, some gifted or some agency to whom she can make contact.


[OOC] Let me know if this screws up time lines too much. I am thinking Janice can arrive at the hospital just as it is taking in victims from the last Gifted fight which should be close to where bard, jackson and the commander are timeline wise.. [/OOC]

Frank walked through the wreckage of the church, shoving the stuff he could out of his way and climbing over what he couldn't. In his search, he found one of the dead bodies of the fallen enemy. He checked the corpse, and was rewarded with a pack of smokes and a lighter. He lit one as he continued to dig around, finding one of his guns then poking through rubble in a widening circle until he found the other. They were made to last, as still functioned. He counted his available rounds, then looked to Bard.

"Ready when you are, Chick."

In reply to Frank Jackson (msg # 60):

Bard's attention slipped from Frank and back to the Grand Pattern, her vision being subsumed temporarily. There, a little north, was a small knot. Likely murder, facilitated by some normals. Farther north was a larger knot, likely a hospital. Places of unnatural death often tended to tense up to a pretty high degree, so Bard's attention slid past it. At the last moment however, she caught something. The knot, although old, had just loosened a little bit. And then again, and again. The entire thing wasn't coming undone, and whoever was doing it obviously didn't have Bard's vision. Random strands were coming unknotted, and it was causing a great deal more chaos than order. Too many that should have ended were living, and a few that shouldn't have were living as well. Naivette? Perhaps someone else with a gift like hers? But she sensed no violence in those threads, and she'd promised Frank combat. Her brief analysis of him had revealed little, but she had no doubt that if she didn't offer him anything worthwhile, he wouldn't stick around for long. It wasn't worth assaulting that APC until it had stopped moving, and the Hospital was on the way though. She shook her head and snapped out of it, gesturing in the right direction. "We're going to hole up in a hospital that way, until the APC I marked stops moving. Then we can go and get revenge on the people who tore you to shreds." She paused. "And there's likely another gifted there. I don't know about intention, but perhaps she's aggressive. I'm sure you would enjoy tearing... her, him, whatever they are, apart if they do happen to be."

Frank walked out of the remains of the church, to the twisted and mutilated remains of a hot dog cart with tattered strips of yellow cloth hanging from a pole that proudly exclaimed;

..the.... .....go D..s

He shoved the thing aside, his natural muscles handling the task without any needed assistance from help of any kind. Underneath, on its side, was a 1953 Indian Chief motorcycle. Jackson placed his guns down, pulled the machine up back onto its stand, then reached into a saddle bag and removed a mixed tape case that proudly proclaimed, 'GREATEST HITS OF THE 50's!'. He opened this, and a key fell out into his hand. He smiled at Bard.

"Great, ain't it? Been using this here little trick for years, nobody yet has figured it out. Idiots don't even realize my girl here don't even got a tape player."

Frank stored his weapons, placed and lit a new cancer stick, then shoved the key home and gave a twist along with the few other needed actions. Without hesitation at its master's command, the beast roared back to life. Apparently, the cart had gotten between the classic ride and sure destruction. It had taken a few dings and scratches, but the boys who rebuilt her had known their business, and she was once more made to last.

The old man looked over to the woman, giving her a lip-curled smile and a wink.

"Hope on, Cutie. The Retro Rocket is ready to cut this scene. You just tell me where to turn, I'll get us to this hospital you want. Oh, make sure to hold on tight, and if your hands wander I won't complain..."

In reply to Frank Jackson (msg # 62):

Bard's head cocked. "Ineffective vehicle, but better than nothing." Her eyes flicked over the surroundings one more time before she sat on the bike behind Frank gingerly. Her arms snaked their way as far around his large form as they could and gripped tightly. Almost uncomfortably so, and a lot harder than it looked like a woman of her size could grasp something. She whistled, and even though it was loud and basically right next to Frank's ear, it didn't even make him cringe. The bikes rumbling did something strange, falling into a temporary pattern before fading back into it's previous sound, and Bard gestured. "We'll be harder to notice now. The hospital is that way." She pointed in the appropriate direction, and returned to staring at the Grand Pattern, keeping her attention as spread out as she could manage, but keeping a careful eye on that APC.

As Bard and Frank approached the hospital they saw the news trucks pulling up. Everyone looked tired but joyous, patients on the brink of death were healing miraculously. All around more and more hopeless cases were being brought by ambulance from other hospitals.  On the lawn in front of the hospital prayer vigils belonging to several denominations of the Christian faith had started, Catholics,  Lutherans, Evangelicals. Of course people understood that a gifted must be some how responsible, but was it too much to believe that maybe a benevolent god might have something to do with this gifted, who ever it was?

Janice could not help but notice two distinctly odd souls approaching.

[OOC] Please describe what Syndie feels about Frank and Bard. [/OOC]
This message was last edited by the player at 16:09, Sun 05 July 2015.

Outside of Chicago city limits the RoughRiders armoured troop transport slowed to a halt, and it's cargo of hostages were pushed and prodded out into the open at gunpoint. Moments later several nondescript civilian vans pulled up, divided the hostages among themselves, and drove off to blend seamlessly among the rush of panicked traffic leaving the city. The vans and the APC all moved off in opposite directions as the all-seeing eye of the Commanders drone darted around to ensure that they weren't being followed. Finally satisfied it retracted it's camera and pulled back into a higher altitude where it'd be able to glide in standby above the cities cloud-cover.

---

"Key objectives accomplished. Very good work, everyone." Commander said aloud to his command room, even as his attention was clearly elsewhere. He typed a program command into the keyboard built into his chair and the bank of monitors dominating the room shifted to make room for a new window. The public records of each of his hostages were displayed onscreen as their potential value was added to a running total, even after deducting the days operational costs, the cost of replacing his lost troops and reimbursing the families of the four hostages that'd died during the mayors capture it was predicted that he'd be able to end the week almost a billion dollars richer than he'd started.
"Have the Drivers move our guests back to base. They're to stay here until negotiations are concluded- and not to be mistreated in any way."

"Sir!" A technician interrupted.
"The cities power grid has been partially reactivated. Police radio is back online..." the technician held a finger to his ear as he listened to his interception, "...someone called 'Phoenix Crimson' is apparently responsible."
"Phoenix Crimson?" Commander thought aloud. "Isn't he that 'public' Gifted that's always jumping infront of news crews? No matter, it's too little too late, the CPD are hardly a threat any more. Leave it be."

"Something else, Sir!" A technician interrupted, again.
"News stations are coming back on the air. One of the top stories is that a Chicago hospital is claiming to be host to a number of 'miraculous recoveries'. Normally fatal wounds are being healed. A Gifted is probably involved."
Commander looked at though he'd been struck across the face, and the underling withered under The Commander's scowl before he finally spoke. "So what? Why should I care?"
The technician rallied himself as he defended himself. "A number of the recovered patients are victims from our own attacks. The civilian casualties you've inflicted might not be as bad as we initially thought. I thought that you might appreciate the good news."
Commander winced at 'casualties you've inflicted'. The technician had a point, though- if this unexpected intervention could keep a little blood from staining his hands it'd go a long way towards preserving both The Commanders public image and own peace of mind.
"It is good news, at least. Keep an eye on the newsfeed, it might develop into something interesting."

By the time the crimson APC rolled up in front of the warehouse, Vivianne was seated and breathing easier. True, Schwartze Augen and the wave in general had access to some of the best medicine the world over, but her ease had more to do with painkillers and a job near done. Chicago was in chaos; several key figures were dead or abducted; and their files on the Gifted were expanded. Even with ITSDA active now, Chicago was in a place to be easily tipped toward another California if the Wave applied more pressure.

She grimaced as she thought of how far this day should have gone though. CPD should be extinct not just crippled, Chicago's skyline should be unrecognizable not scarred; and she should have 7 more aoldiers. She grunted but sighed as she considered the day's goals and successes. She had requested an updated tiem table from her operational HQ due to casualties and it had been granted. Schwartze Augen was in full withdrawal. It could not be helped.

As she entered the warehouse supported by the last ghoul of Team Annie Lennox, she eyed the offide above with the light on and blaring against the darkness, "Prep our supplies and pack the APC. I was this forward base stripped down and mobile in thirty. Inform our guest that we are moving out."

The Ghouk sat her down on a crate even as the Banshees and he began stripping the eauipment down. The medic went upstairs.

The white armored soldier opened the door into a room and a man with wildly green hair and another in an all encompassing trenchcoat stood up. Between them sat the president of Brazil grinning like an idiot. "Sir, the situation has changed. We are changing sites. Please, move to the chopper on the roof. We are arranging an escort."

Minutes later the battle-scarred hull of Commanders JMR MPS hovered into view, it pivoted on it's nose midair and dropped it's boarding ramp and rocked the suspension of it's landing gear as it settled on the roof above Schwartze Augen's covert office. It's engine dropped a few rev's and the updraft from it's thundering rotors died down to a tolerable level.

The tactical situation was changing fast, and given the situation Commander had taken drastic but logical steps to ensure the Presidents security. The Numbered Brethren who'd taken refuge inside the helicopter had been moved back into Chicago to continue their objectives, whilst the remaining ZeroComets and Hostages had been extracted by van. Besides it's pilot, the Helicopter had been restocked with five infantrymen from his RoughRiders regiment. In theory, the combat-fresh soldiers and the superior vehicle would give the most reliable odds of success.

A figure stepped off the helicopters boarding ramp and greeted Schwartze Augen with a quick but professional salute.
"Lieutenant Tudor, reporting in on behalf of The Commander."
Tudor was an older white-haired man who carried himself with the bluff air of a proud gentleman soldier. He wore the same equipment as the four troops standing behind him: Navy blue bodyarmor of conventional design, a spraygun of capsin, and scoped needlerifles of the same design used by the AGF.
"Climb aboard, we're ready to move as soon as you are."
Tudor fished a device out of one of his armours ammo-holsters and flicked it open with a snap of his wrist before offering it to The President, it was a combination earpiece/headset/eyeglass.
"You will also need to wear this, it'll connect to the rest of my units display- should something unexpected happen."

As Bard and Frank approached the hospital they saw the news trucks pulling up. Everyone looked tired but joyous, patients on the brink of death were healing miraculously. All around more and more hopeless cases were being brought by ambulance from other hospitals.  On the lawn in front of the hospital prayer vigils belonging to several denominations of the Christian faith had started, Catholics,  Lutherans, Evangelicals. Of course people understood that a gifted must be some how responsible, but was it too much to believe that maybe a benevolent god might have something to do with this gifted, who ever it was?

Janice could not help but notice two distinctly odd souls approaching.

One tasted like Paranoia, Loneliness, Sadness, Loss, Pride, Happiness, and Confidence. The other a steel ball of emptiness, a sociopath...


But where these gifteds? Janice needed a test.


She reached out and found the angriest person in the hospital. A man who had just lost his wife. His anger compounded minute by minute as people all around him were coming back form the brink of death. The celebrations of the families feeling like mockery of his pain. Janice focused on his anger, and started to inflate it like a balloon. As she did so she focused the bio energy she had been giving into healing to him, boosting his strength, speed and endurance 100 fold.

Suddenly the man stood up form his dead wife's side and punched  the cinder block outter wall of the hospital room thrusting his fist right through it.

"Fuck fuck fuck, YOU ALL!!!"

In a blind rage the man grabbed a nearby hospital bed and flung it out the second story window where it landed right in front of Bard and Frank.

When the bed crashed down directly in his path, Frank not only failed to slow down or swerve but opened the throttle more and bore straight on as he popped a wheelie. As soon as the Chief's front tire was over the top of the wreckage, Jackson lowered it down allowing metal to rest on metal. The back end came up off the ground, but the momentum built up plus the Greaser leaning forward caused the bike to slide down and allowed rubber to once more make contact with the parking lot. A couple of seconds after the treads on one end touched Terra Firma, those on the other touched on the obstruction and propelled the duo clear.

Syndie wasn't pleased with this result as she watched from a window; she had wanted to know if either of the pair was a Gifted, and so far all she had learned was that one of them could do some fancy driving. Clearly, she was going to have to devise something not so easily shrugged off. To this end, when the man she was manipulating happened to glance out of the hole he'd made at the two unknowns the former stripper turned the blue hot rage inside her pawn to white. As she had planned, the widower thought this increase was due to the fact that those he was looking at had somehow been responsible for the death of his wife. With a screaming cry, he flung himself from the gap at the mercy of gravity. The two story plunge would have at the very least broken bones, but as that wouldn't serve her purpose Janice pulled life out of one she had recently snatched from Death and infused it into the once normal human causing his injuries to knit quickly

Her puppet stood up and snarled at those he wrongly perceived to be responsible for his pain, wanting nothing more to shred their bodies until they begged him for release. His intent etched plainly upon his brow, the bedeviled figure charged the bare knight seated upon his chrome steed. At the sight of this, Frank stopped his beast and dismounted while indicating his companion do the same.

"Looks like coming here was a good call, Chick. Get yourself clear, I can handle one raving lunatic."

Marie did as was suggested, not so as to be safe or stay out of the formerly dead man's way, but so she could concentrate on a battle all her own of which the old fighter was simply a tool. She knew this person who had survived such a fall without injury wasn't a Gifted himself because she could see his core pattern, but over it lay manipulations that were just another testament to the blasphemy this hospital represented to her. Now she was sure someone was twisting things to suit them, treating the Pattern as something that existed only for their sole benefit and nothing else, perverting it at their whim without care. Doiteain knew she had to fix it, the abominations cried out to her to be mended; she had to set all to right, but also prove to this Heretic the fruitlessness of their endeavor by sending a minion to do battle.

Frank pulled a gun out of one of his saddle bags as the lunatic closed in on him; honed skills aimed the barrel at the attacker's left knee and fired a plain fifty-caliber shot. The hunk of metal punched through flesh, pulverized bone, shredded tendons; yet the injury healed as though it happened to Jackson himself. The war hero blasted again, this time into the guy's chest but to no better result. He had time for one more shot; this bullet invaded the man's skull right between the eyes, giving him a forced lobotomy. The patsy went down, fluids collecting under him in a statement that he would not again rise.

Sydnie clenched her hands so tight the nails bite into her palms, but she didn't notice anything other than she still held no answers. She wanted proof one way or another if these newcomers were Gifted, but this naked man had bested both with mundane means; as she had expected him and his partner to either use powers to beat her challenges or fail, Rohas saw his actions as cheating. She focused on him for a moment, in an attempt to increase his guilt for having just taken a life, but a feeling of justification raised to a higher level within the nude man. The emotional manipulator dug for a grain of doubt about his abilities as his clearly advanced age she could exploit, but all uncovered was self confidence stronger than steel. Janice managed to find a deep sadness and yanked hard, but instead of tears and despair over the loss of his family there was only a resolution that burned within a broad chest to make sure that fate never befell another father and husband.

'You are going to show me your secrets, old man...'

Sydnie fished through the emotions of a group of spectators until she found those who most regretted a loss of human life, and amped this up along with their rage until they rushed past the security personnel attempting to hold a perimeter and charged the gunman in the birthday suit. Frank didn't bother with a warning of either word or shot since these challengers seemed to him of the same caliber as the single man from before; he did try to aim for non-lethal areas, but this did as well as before so he resorted to head shots; once more, bodies toppled and remained still. Janice hadn't planned for those she sent to win, nor the next batch nor the one after that; she was only interested in forcing the shooter to use up his ammunition. Men were dim animals she could do with what she pleased, at least it had been so until Dieter. That had been a one in a trillion happenstance, an universal irregularity. A man besting her shouldn't have happened once, couldn't happen again; WOULD NOT happen again. The fact that her determination to force any Gift the stranger might possess out into the open was causing Rohas to pull the life force out of those she had just saved to empower her growing army didn't occur to her, but even if she had been made aware of it nothing would have changed for her; it was a price she was willing to pay...

Syndie might be fully willing to pay the cost, however Maire wasn't. She had come here because something or one was damaging the pattern, allowing life to continue when it should have ended. That issue was being dealt with now, but the balance swung the other way as far too many died who were meant to live. Another having a like Gift but not her Vision, she could understand it even if it made more work for her. Being ignorant of the importance of the Pattern, well that applied to the mass majority of people she had met since her Awakening. However, to twist and pervert it with such wanton disregard? That was beyond shortsightedness and ignorance, into the realm of dangerously stupid and not by just a little bit. The more corruption one single thread forced into the Pattern, the easier it was for Doiteain to detect. Humming softly to herself, she increased her speed and took off toward the hospital leaving Frank to handle things for the moment on his end alone.

Janice was so focused in on the man, she didn't even realize the woman was gone until she heard a voice behind her. With a start, Syndie turned at the sound and met the gaze of one who's eyes held unbridled anger. When the other female spoke, it was in a tight snarl of a voice;

"YOU! Do you have any idea what you've done!? The giant mess you've made for me to clean up!? No, of course you don't, because you're just a slacked jaw mouth breather like the rest of them. Just because you can mess with something, you think that gives you carte blanche to do whatever you want to it. Because of you, too many people were left alive. Now, too many people are dead. Have you even seen the mess this city is in, do you even care that it will take years for this part of the Universal Pattern to be repaired? Of course not, you're just a spoiled little brat out for yourself who can't be bothered with a little thing like consequences."

Syndie held her ground through the verbal onslaught, the only outward reaction being a smirk upon her lips.

"Are you done? I hope so, because your babbling is making me wish I was born deaf. I've meet people like you before, you know. Oh yes, I know the type well; someone who has something, and for that fact alone they believe they're rightfully the only person who either should use it or have absolute say in how it's applied. All of them have been egotistical windbags, and you don't seem any different to me. I'll admit I'm not exactly sure what it is you can do, but since you act like I'm invading your turf I'll guess it's like my own Gift. As for this Universal Pattern you're on about, I'm  not sure you're aware but it's 2036. You're ninety years off, so how about you pack up your tambourine and get back to the 1960s when people actually cared about stupid made up garbage like that? Or, would you rather I tell your buddy down there that he's hooked up with a sociopath who's only using him?"

Syndie gave a confident smile, but her opponent just gave a short bark of a laugh.

"Go ahead, tell him if you think it'll make one bit of difference. It's not though, because he already knows I'm using him just like I know the reverse is true too. Humans use each other all the time; we use our parents to be born, we use teachers for education, we use envy of other drivers to get pride over the fancy car we bought, we use farmers to eat, restaurants so we don't have to cook, the homeless so for the investment of less than a cup of coffee we can fell generous. Heck, what do you think romance is? Romeo and Juliet? No, it's two people using each other so they won't feel lonely. Even having a child is just a way to make sure you'll be remembered, after you're gone. Go ahead and waste your breath, I'll wait."

Syndie was quickly realizing that things were even worse than she had first thought; she knew this woman was a sociopath, but as they care solely about themselves Janice had intended her threat of telling the dangerous figure with the guns to startle or scare the other female. It really didn't matter what emotion her bait produced or even how little; one tiny crack in that smooth armor is all she would have needed. However, her skill with her tongue had faired no better than her Gift, and that scared her. There were still people on the second floor, since the puppet from before had jumped out and no one knew Rohas held the power behind him; they were also too busy rubbernecking the fight below to notice how fast Maire had joined them. The teenager was playing to a hand showing aces, but she tried for a wild card; the stripper yelled at the top of her lungs,

"HELP!"

A few heads turned, and that was all Janice needed; as one man looked at the pair of women a tiny flutter of lust surfaced toward Bard, and Syndie amplified it many fold until the poor victim couldn't hold back but ran as fast as he could toward his 'true love'. Rohas then increased the jealousy within him when he thought about the possibility of other men looking at his own desire until it was an overpowering emotion, and turned it to rage against Maire by simply enforcing her wanting one of them over him. He roared as he charged, to which the only response Bard gave was to turn and hum a soft tune. As he was about to wrap his hands about her neck, his intended victim simply slammed her first one single it into the center of his chest. The unintentional hit-man let out a 'irk', and fell to the floor. As though she had just swatted a fly, Doiteain turned back to the younger woman with a cold indifference.

"You're powerful and resourceful, things that I could have put to use in fixing and maintaining the Pattern. However, you have clearly proven yourself my enemy and too dangerous to be left alive. You should feel proud, you're about to get a personal performance..."

Before Janice could figure out what that last comment meant, Bard started to sing a Note of Dissonance. Syndie felt lightheaded the instant she heard the sound, but it grew to dizziness and disorientation while a discomfort grew and intensified throughout her body until it felt like every cell was trying to rip itself free from her at once. In mad desperation, Rohas began sucking in all of the life force she could access as fast as possible. The people closest to the pair dropped dead first, then the whole group of gawkers who had been watching the battle royal in the parking lot, then everyone on the second floor followed by more and more of those above and below. Without any other course of action open to her, the teenager ran. With her muddled senses however, she took the stairs up instead of down.

Frank meanwhile had finally run out of bullets for both guns and had been slugging it out when suddenly, the onslaught of newcomers stopped and his attackers stood still blinking and looking confused. He turned to speak to the woman he had arrived with, only to find her gone. Without any other lead, he took off at a run toward the hospital and made his way to the second floor since that's the place the first crazy who came after him had come from. He got to the area with the hole in it just in time to see people start to fall dead; he felt a tiny tug himself, but it was easily ignored. He spotted the chick who had directed him to this place, and another girl nearby her who seemed to be in a great deal of pain. Before the old cop could make anything out of this information, the two women took off running and he followed.

Syndie burst out onto the roof, realizing it only because of the bright light of the sun. Bard followed close behind, the effort of hold the Note beginning to show on her. Last out was Jackson, not sure of what exactly he was witnessing but rather of a mind that it wasn't good. Janice knew there was no place left to go, so she turned to face what might very well be her final battle. She lifted her hands out to her sides, lifted her head toward the sky, and concentrated on ingesting any and all life force. She thought she had been at the limit of how much she could draw before, but the limit was pushed beyond what even she thought she was capable of. She took her hate, fear, pain, doubt, wound it up into a swirling mass within herself, and blasted it like a weapon at the cold, smooth shell that was Maire. The other woman held against the force assaulting her, and increased her volume; the louder Bard became, the more energy Syndie drew into herself and the harder she attacked Bard, who became louder, on and on.

As Jackson watched this weird fight, he noticed things happening around him; the light over the door back into the building popped, then cracks began to form in the concrete of the access area, followed by the thick steel door falling off its hinges. Shortly after this, the surface beneath his bare feet shook with such force he heard windows from the floor below shattering. A chuck of the half wall that surrounded the roof for safety reason was torn loose and plunged toward who knew how many innocents below. Frank had been a police officer in a major city for forty years of his life, and he knew that at the first sign of real trouble an evacuation was started; but with a building the size of this hospital, that was going to take a while as he strongly doubted at the rate this structure was doing the shake, rattle and roll that even half the patients inside could be saved.

"HEY YOU TWO! WHATEVER YOU'RE DOING KNOCK IT OFF! YOU'RE BRINGING THE WHOLE PLACE DOWN!"

With the noise level produced by Bard and the concentration Syndie was using his words went unheard, not that they would have been heeded anyway. Frank didn't know what he could do, but he was pretty sure as the hospital gave another sickening lurch that he didn't have much time to figure it out. He ran around the edge of the roof looking anywhere and everywhere for something he could use, and finally he found it. The immortal soldier moved back around to the other side of the two power houses, backed up as for as he could, and holding both arms out from his sides he bull rushed the ladies. They were so focused on the other they never even realized he was on the roof let alone coming at them, and he grabbed them both without issue and he continued forward. Before they could switch out of battle mode in their minds to figure out what was going on let alone how to react to it, all three of them had reached the waist-high safety wall; Frank pushed his upper body and those of the two other Gifted over the top of the wall as muscle bound legs shoved against gravity, winning the contest for a brief moment before plunging down story after story toward the intended target below. With as powerful as these two seemed to be, Jackson couldn't be sure a simple fall would eliminate them as threats. So, he carried them with him to do a full gainer into the fenced in area that contained the heavy duty mini-tower power transforms hospitals tend to have to keep them fully operational.

Even with the sun bright overhead, the glow could be seen as connections were interrupted and an electrical crackling drowned out even the reporters yelling to be heard on camera over a rushed and harried hospital staff and panicked patients. The building went dark for a few minutes, then the emergency generator kicked on and power was restored. The area was marked off, but a youthful reporter hungry for an anchor position snuck past the boundary with his camera man; they both died as their life force was drained away. Sydnie had fueled herself with so much extra of the precious energy that as devastating as the impact was she had held to life, if not by overly much. These little morsels allowed her to get up, still hideous and deformed from not only smashing into steel and concrete but burned badly by the current they had interrupted. As she crawled her way out of the wreckage, she knew that was a trivial thing; she could draw in all she needed to repair herself, but she thought it wise to leave the place of her intended demise in the event the other woman had somehow survived as well. Better not to take chances, and besides people were plentiful so she need not heal herself fully here; she could wait a little while.

Several minutes after she had managed to slip away, a security guard spotted the bodies of her latest victims and called over some other private uniforms; this wasn't what they normally did, but with the police department crippled like the rest of the city if the rent-a-cops wanted law and order they knew they were going to have to do their best to establish and keep it. It really didn't matter if their badges were plated tin or not in the end, since their patterns could be sacrificed just as well as that of any member of the CPD to repair Bard's. She looked around and realized what must have happened, could sense both that the other female Gifted was gone and that the unbreakable thread was still intact. The former wasn't pleasing, the latter not so bad as the man had proven useful as a distraction and had even stopped a battle he himself had no clear weapon against. He could be of use in the future, possibly. For now though, the Pattern of the city was still in tatters and needed her help. Since those in the immediate area were now dead, there was no one to stop her as she slipped away to some as of yet undetermined destination.

Eventually the bodies left by the women inside the fence were taken out, along with one more they found that appeared to be an unidentified nude male. Normally the police would have been called in, the remains taken away by a coroner, but with things the way they were there was no way to know when that process might even get started. So, John Doe was hauled by a couple of orderlies into the hospital morgue. They dumped him like raw meat onto a tray, slid him into a slot, and clicked the drawer door shut after him. That, as far as they knew, was that...

Marty was the third shift attendant in the morgue area, although he kept calling it the graveyard shift despite the fact that no one in the two years he had held the position thought it was funny. He was at the main desk studying a premed textbook for an upcoming exam, when he thought he heard a noise like one of the metal body trays rattling. When he had first taken the job he'd been jumpy sure, imagining he heard this or saw that. He had gotten that out of his system in the first couple of months though, and after he took a look behind him to see all was well he put it down to nerves and his upcoming test. A short while later he could have sworn he heard a muffled bang of something hitting metal hard, but again a quick glance proved nothing to be out of order and he thought perhaps he shouldn't have had that last reenergizing cup of coffee. He barely had time to get his mind back on the Latin names of body parts before there was again a sound just like the last if not louder.

The twenty year old was rattled enough at this point that he decided he was going to go to the drawers, just to double check everything was in order so he could get back on track with his studying. He walked up to the bank of shiny doors, and right then one in the middle center flew open. A naked man rolled out on a body tray, and hopped down. Marty promptly fainted, and would upon recovering quit his job, collect all of his medical textbooks and throw them away and change his major to business. In the interim, Frank made use of the desk phone to call HQ and let them know he was ready for a pick up. He also let them know he needed a double bacon hamburger, two cases of beer, his bike accounted for along with his guns, and one of his backup sets of thrift store vintage biker gear.

Non-Canon Battle Post


When the bed crashed down directly in his path, Frank not only failed to slow down or swerve but opened the throttle more and bore straight on as he popped a wheelie. As soon as the Chief's front tire was over the top of the wreckage, Jackson lowered it down allowing metal to rest on metal. The back end came up off the ground, but the momentum built up plus the Greaser leaning forward caused the bike to slide down and allowed rubber to once more make contact with the parking lot. A couple of seconds after the treads on one end touched Terra Firma, those on the other touched on the obstruction and propelled the duo clear.

Syndie wasn't pleased with this result as she watched from a window; she had wanted to know if either of the pair was a Gifted, and so far all she had learned was that one of them could do some fancy driving. Clearly, she was going to have to devise something not so easily shrugged off. To this end, when the man she was manipulating happened to glance out of the hole he'd made at the two unknowns the former stripper turned the blue hot rage inside her pawn to white. As she had planned, the widower thought this increase was due to the fact that those he was looking at had somehow been responsible for the death of his wife. With a screaming cry, he flung himself from the gap at the mercy of gravity. The two story plunge would have at the very least broken bones, but as that wouldn't serve her purpose Janice pulled life out of one she had recently snatched from Death and infused it into the once normal human causing his injuries to knit quickly

Her puppet stood up and snarled at those he wrongly perceived to be responsible for his pain, wanting nothing more to shred their bodies until they begged him for release. His intent etched plainly upon his brow, the bedeviled figure charged the bare knight seated upon his chrome steed. At the sight of this, Frank stopped his beast and dismounted while indicating his companion do the same.

"Looks like coming here was a good call, Chick. Get yourself clear, I can handle one raving lunatic."

Marie did as was suggested, not so as to be safe or stay out of the formerly dead man's way, but so she could concentrate on a battle all her own of which the old fighter was simply a tool. She knew this person who had survived such a fall without injury wasn't a Gifted himself because she could see his core pattern, but over it lay manipulations that were just another testament to the blasphemy this hospital represented to her. Now she was sure someone was twisting things to suit them, treating the Pattern as something that existed only for their sole benefit and nothing else, perverting it at their whim without care. Doiteain knew she had to fix it, the abominations cried out to her to be mended; she had to set all to right, but also prove to this Heretic the fruitlessness of their endeavor by sending a minion to do battle.

Frank pulled a gun out of one of his saddle bags as the lunatic closed in on him; honed skills aimed the barrel at the attacker's left knee and fired a plain fifty-caliber shot. The hunk of metal punched through flesh, pulverized bone, shredded tendons; yet the injury healed as though it happened to Jackson himself. The war hero blasted again, this time into the guy's chest but to no better result. He had time for one more shot; this bullet invaded the man's skull right between the eyes, giving him a forced lobotomy. The patsy went down, fluids collecting under him in a statement that he would not again rise.

Janice stood in stunned silence. She had never intended for anyone to die! All she wanted was a test. To find out if these were gifted and what their powers might be.

Janice was so focused in on the man, she didn't even realize the woman was gone until she heard a voice behind her. With a start, Syndie turned at the sound and met the gaze of one who's eyes held unbridled anger. When the other female spoke, it was in a tight snarl of a voice;

"YOU! Do you have any idea what you've done!? The giant mess you've made for me to clean up!? No, of course you don't, because you're just a slacked jaw mouth breather like the rest of them. Just because you can mess with something, you think that gives you carte blanche to do whatever you want to it. Because of you, too many people were left alive. Have you even seen the mess this city is in, do you even care that it will take years for this part of the Universal Pattern to be repaired? Of course not, you're just a spoiled little brat out for yourself who can't be bothered with a little thing like consequences."

Janice startled, as she awoke  from her stunned state by Bard’s words.  “Who the hell are you and what are you talking about? I saved hundreds of lives just now!”
Janice pointed towards the fallen man.
“I’m… sorry about that. I didn’t mean for anyone to get hurt! I didn’t think you would kill him!
You… you’re with Dieter aren’t you?”
Suddenly Janice put two and two together. A sociopath and a casual killer.. These were Dieter’s people, they had to be. Panic swelled in Janice’s chest as she reflexively started to draw life force form the crowd around her, including Bard and Frank.
“Are you here to take me to him or to kill me?” The anxiousness in her voice made it hard to determine which alternative she feared or craved the most.
“I won’t let you! Tell him I won’t go back!”
Meanwhile… The hospital had many police officers doing crowd control, visiting wounded brothers, taking witness statements. Clearly the police had learned to fear the gifted but Frank has only displayed normal human abilities. All around Frank police where responding to the gun shots, some were pulling weapons. “Sir, drop your weapon and put your hands in the air!”
Janice felt the rise of paranoia in Frank. Surrounded, in danger of capture. She feared that if she did not do something Frank might start killing cops any second.
“This was a mistake! I’m sorry!”
Janice started to drain Frank and Bard of emotion, all emotion, all affect and motivation. Suddenly the two heroes found it hard to care about the police or her or anything at all.
Using the strength of a hundred people and a dancers grace, Janice leapt through the hospital window and started to run using 100 foot leaping strides to escape.


This message was last edited by the player at 21:16, Sat 18 July 2015.

Non-Canon Battle Post

Maire was too focused on unraveling the tangle of threads in the hospital, hoping to find the source, too see the bed. Frank was on top of things, however, and deftly swerved. Maire's arms clutched tighter instinctively as she almost slipped off the bike, but after Frank slid to a stop at the front entrance of the hospital, she slid off of it quickly. "Whoever's in there has done enough damage to make it nearly impossible to find them." She said quietly.

Syndie watched cautiously as the two she'd hoped would be gifted merely avoided the bed and disappeared from her direct view as they stopped at the front doors. They were here for a reason. Neither of them were obviously injured and the news had only been reporting the hospital being hosted by a Gifted for a few minutes. She gripped the minds of the others in the building and filled them with an insatiable curiosity, directed at the two that had just appeared. Those that could flocked down the stairs and crushed themselves against the front doors, staring at Maire and Frank.

"Are they violent...?" Frank asked Maire, and she shook her head. "Somebodies twisting their patterns. They're just interested in us. She looked up at the second floor window that had been blown out by the bed and sighed. "I do apologize." She said before stepping up to Frank and whistling loudly. The whistle devolved into a series of complicated patterns, which she kept up for several seconds before stopping and gripping Frank. Her knees bent and she jumped, Barely making it up to the second floor.

Frank hadn't expected the small woman to pick him up, let alone jump an entire story, so when they landed and she set him down, he frowned at her. She ignored his look and gestured. "They're somewhere on this floor. When they sent all of those people downstairs, they exerted a great deal of influence on the pattern. I just followed the ripples." She gestured at a table by the door, with some clothing sitting on it haphazardly. "Maybe those will fit you."

She left the room while Frank gawked at her, and followed the trail until she stood at a door. Syndie was sitting inside, staring at the door. The woman was out there. Her cold steel emotional bubble was obvious, and the man was approaching the room as well. The woman was obviously gifted, at least. A 1 story jump carrying a man 3 times her size was proof enough. Super strength was a little cliche though.

Maire knocked the door open. "The damage you've caused is insufferable." She said before Syndie could even open her mouth. "Twisting the Grand Pattern like it's some toy." She shook her head. "You're going to break it. And unfortunately, I can't let you do that." Maire whistled, and Syndie blinked. Maire was gone from the doorway. But her emotional bubble was... all over the room. What?

Then Maire felt a sharp prick against her neck, and a dragging sensation of pain. She gasped as Maire appeared next to her, holding a scalpel. Syndie put her hand to her neck and gasped. The woman had just slit her throat! She paniced and pulled at the closest emotional energy, that of the woman, and healed herself. A sensation of cold filled her veins though, and she gasped again. The woman's feelings hit like a truck. Satisfaction, dissapointment, joy, anger, self-deprication, self-destructiveness, fear, anger, love, terror. The cold steel hid a lot more than she'd thought possible.

She swung out her leg, trying to knock Maire over, but Maire deftly avoided the leg and slashed out with the scalpel again, this time cutting a thin slice into Syndies upper right arm, which she again healed. She stood up and continued pulling on Maire's energy. It took almost 10 seconds of the two staring at each other for Maire to show any physical signs of being drained. It took seconds, of that, when used on other people.

The space under Maire's eyes darkened dramatically, like she hadn't slept for a long time, and she growled at Syndie. A quick whistle shattered Syndies concentration and before she could gather it again, she found herself falling. Frank entered the room just in time to see Maire heft Syndie out the window, and he frowned again.

Maire didn't resort to brute violence very often, but the pattern here was fragile as it was. If she made the effort to try and twist it to help her, she might end up breaking it herself. Syndie only fell one story though, and a quick sapping of strength from those gathered at the doors had her back on her feet. It had been a bad idea to try and draw Gifted in. She shook her head and turned away from the hospital, bounding away at a quick pace.

Maire was too focused on unraveling the tangle of threads in the hospital, hoping to find the source, to see the bed. Frank was on top of things, however, and deftly swerved. Maire's arms clutched tighter instinctively as she almost slipped off the bike, but after Frank slid to a stop at the front entrance of the hospital, she slid off of it quickly.

"Whoever's in there has done enough damage to make it nearly impossible to find them," she said quietly.

Syndie watched cautiously as the two she'd hoped would be Gifted merely avoided the bed and disappeared from her direct view as they stopped at the front doors. They were here for a reason. Neither of them were obviously injured and the news had only been reporting the hospital being visited by a Gifted for a few minutes. She gripped the minds of the others in the building and filled them with an insatiable curiosity, directed at the two that had just arrived. Those that could walk flocked down the stairs and crushed themselves against the front doors, staring at Maire and Frank.

"They violent?" Frank asked Maire, and she shook her head.

"Somebody's twisting their patterns. They're just watching us our target's behalf."

Syndie wasn't pleased; she had wanted to know if either of the pair was a Gifted, and so far all she had learned was that one of them could do some fancy driving. Clearly, she was going to have to devise something not so easily shrugged off. To this end, when the man she was manipulating happened to glance out of the hole he'd made, she turned the blue hot rage inside his heart to white. As she had planned, the widower thought this increase was due to the fact that those he was looking at had somehow been responsible for the death of his wife. With a screaming war cry, he flung himself from the gap at the mercy of gravity. The two story plunge would have at the very least broken bones. However, as that wouldn't serve her purpose, Janice pulled life out of one she had recently snatched from Death and infused it into the once normal human causing his injuries to knit quickly. The man stood up, growled, and sprinted toward Frank and Maire. He wanted nothing more than to shred them to pieces with his bare hands and to hear them beg for the mercy that his wife never received. He stood, growled as his whole body filled with rage and adrenaline, and charged at the monsters.

"Just watching, huh?!" shouted Frank as he suddenly drew his weapon, expertly aimed it, and planted a bullet in the man's leg.

Syndie hissed as the sharp, jagged fear of a wounded animal tore through her thoughts. This mortal fright was familiar, but it always took its toll on her.


"Get yourself clear, I can handle one raving lunatic."

Marie did as he suggested, not so as to be safe or stay out of the formerly dead man's way, but so she could concentrate on a battle all her own of which the old fighter was simply a tool. She knew this person who had survived such a fall without injury wasn't a Gifted himself because she could see his core pattern, but over it lay manipulations that were just another testament to the blasphemy this hospital represented to her. Now she was sure someone was twisting things to suit them, treating the Pattern as something that existed only for their sole benefit and could be perverted and twisted on a whim. Doiteain knew she had to fix it, the abominations cried out to be mended; she had to set all to right, but also prove to this heretic the fruitlessness of their endeavor.

The war hero blasted again, this time into the guy's chest (to no better result). The man's leg was thrown back by the bullet's impact, but his wounds healed even more quickly than Frank's usually did. He wasn't even thrown off of his feet! Frank had time for one more shot; this bullet invaded the man's skull right between the eyes, giving him a forced lobotomy. The patsy went down, fluids collecting under him in a statement that he would not again rise.

Janice stood in stunned silence. She had never intended for anyone to die! All she wanted was a test. She needed to find out if those two were Gifted and what their powers were. And now, because of her, an innocent man was dead. However wounded he was, he should have lived. For the good of the world, for the good of their child.

Syndie was so focused in on the man, she didn't even realize the woman was gone until she heard a voice behind her. With a start, she turned at the sound and met the gaze of one whose eyes barely held back a tsunami of unmatched anger. When the other female spoke, it was in a tight snarl of a voice.

"YOU! Do you have any idea what you've done?! The pieces of the pattern you've torn and scattered to the winds?! No, of course you don't, because you're just a slacked jaw mouth breather like the rest of them. Just because you can touch the very fabric of our realm, you think that gives you the right to do whatever you want to it. Because of you, too many people were left alive. Now, too many people are dead. Have you even seen the mess this city is in, do you even care that it will take years for this part of the Universal Pattern to be repaired? Of course not, you're just a spoiled little brat who can't be bothered with consequences."

Syndie held her ground through the verbal onslaught. And although she was quaking with guilt and anger, she sported a horrible, hateful smile as she responded.

"Are you done? Crap, your babbling is making me wish I was born deaf. I've met people like you before, ma'am. People who want to grab, push, mark, and enslave anything... or anyone, they can get their hands on. I can see into people's hearts. I've seen their pain, and I can see yours. And I'm no murderer; but I know your pretty face ain't worth saving. So why don't you get on out of here? Or should I tell your little buddy down there he's hooked up with a psycho?"


Syndie gave a confident smile, but her opponent just gave a short bark of a laugh.

"Go ahead, tell him if you think it'll make one bit of difference. It won't though, because he already knows I'm using him and vice versa. Humans use each other; it is simply our pattern. And though you can disrupt the pattern, you cannot break it. It won't let you, and neither... will... I."

Syndie was quickly realizing that things were even worse than she had first thought. She knew this woman was a sociopath, but as they care solely about themselves Janice had intended the threat of the dangerous, heavily armed maniac to startle or scare the other female. It really didn't matter what emotion her bait produced or even how little, one tiny crack in that smooth armor is all she would have needed. However, her skill with her tongue had fared no better than her Gift, and that scared her. There were still people on the second floor, since her victim from before had jumped out and no one knew she controlled him. Plus, they were too busy rubbernecking the fight below to notice that Maire had joined them yet. The teenager was playing to a hand showing aces, but she tried for a wild card by yelling at the top of her lungs.

"HELP!"


A few heads turned, and that was all Janice needed; as one man looked at the pair of women a tiny flutter of lust surfaced toward Bard. Syndie amplified it many fold until the poor victim couldn't hold back and ran as fast as he could toward his "true love." She then increased the jealousy within him when he thought about the possibility of other men looking at his own love until it was an overpowering emotion. Finally, she twisted the jealousy into rage against Maire by building it up and up and up until her loving someone else was his only thought. Much like the man that attacked Frank earlier, this man roared and dashed toward Maire. However, Syndie quickly realized her mistake and froze in fear. No one else had to die here!

That moment of doubt, that instant wherein the man slowed down gave Bard all the time she needed. She turned to him and hummed a soft tune. Just as he was about to wrap his hands about her pretty little neck, his intended victim simply slammed her fist into the center of his chest. The unintentional hit-man let out a gurgle and fell to the floor. As though she had just swatted a fly, Bard turned back to the younger woman. Her eyes were calm and utterly remorseless.

"You're powerful. but far too predictable. In time, you could have been useful. You can have helped me save us all. However, you're just too dangerous. You should feel proud, you're about to get a personal performance..."

Before Janice could figure out what that last comment meant, Bard started to sing a Note of Dissonance. Syndie felt lightheaded the instant she heard the sound, but it grew to dizziness and disorientation while a burning, no, tearing sensation spread throughout her body until it felt like every cell was trying to rip itself free from her at once.

In mad desperation, Syndie began sucking in the life force of all those around her. The people closest to the pair dropped to the ground first, then the whole group of gawkers who had been watching the battle royal from the hole the bed made, then everyone on the second floor followed by more and more of those above and below. Without any other course of action open to her, the teenage empath ran. With her muddled senses however, she took the stairs up instead of down.

Meanwhile, Frank was checking on the dead man's body and yelping orders at the civilians and cameramen that neared the crime scene. His ear perked up as soon as he heard his companion screaming bloody murder; he finally had some real work to do.

"Official ITSDA business. Clear out, now!" said the war hero as he flashed his badge. His command wouldn't convince everyone, but he needed some way to avoid collateral damage before he engaged.

BLAM! BLAM! BLAM!

When commands wouldn't cut it, his trusty pea shooter would. With everyone screaming and running for cover, his path up the stairs was clear. He dashed to the second floor within seconds, rolled behind the door of the battle's location, and took aim. Finding nothing but unconscious (yet still breathing) bodies, he immediately made his way up the hospital's staircase. Something was wrong. Unless he stopped them, these women could kill everyone here.

Syndie burst onto the roof, realizing it only because of the bright light of the sun. Bard followed close behind, the effort of holding the note beginning to cause face to turn red and her breath to run short. Last out was Jackson, who wasn't sure of what he was witnessing, but knew it wasn't good. Janice knew there was no place left to go, so she turned to face what might very well be her final battle. She lifted her hands out to her sides, lifted her head toward the sky, and concentrated on ingesting all the life force she could snatch from the people around her. She thought she had been at the limit of how much she could draw before, but the limit was pushed beyond what even she thought she was capable of. People all around the block fell to the ground, but there was no longer any doubt within her. She would drain, or she would die. It was as simple as that.

Moments later, as her enemy made her final approach, Janice gathered all the hate, fear, pain, and despair she could from the city, wound it up into a swirling mass within her own mind, and blasted it like a weapon at the cold, smooth shell that was Maire. The other woman held against the force assaulting her, and increased her volume. The louder Bard became, the more emotion Syndie drew into herself and the harder she attacked Bard, who became louder. The escalation kept climbing and climbing until both women's bodies and minds became little more than cables through which pain flowed.

As Jackson watched this weird fight, he noticed the world coming apart around him. The light over the door back into the building popped, then cracks began to form in the concrete of the access area, followed by the thick steel door falling off its hinges. Shortly after this, the surface beneath his bare feet shook with such force he heard windows from the floor below shattering. A chuck of the half wall that surrounded the roof for safety reasons was torn loose and plunged toward who knew how many innocents below. Frank had been a police officer in a major city for forty years of his life, so he knew that at the first sign of real trouble an evacuation was started. But with a building the size of this hospital, evacuation was going to take longer than the time it had left to shake, rattle, and roll before it collapsed entirely.

"HEY YOU TWO, KNOCK IT OFF! YOU'RE BRINGING THE WHOLE PLACE DOWN!"

With the noise level produced by Bard and the concentration Syndie was using, his words went unheard (not that they would have been heeded anyway). Frank didn't know what he could do, but he was pretty sure as the hospital gave another sickening lurch that he didn't have much time to figure it out. His experienced instincts kicked in, he ran around the edge of the roof looking for anything he could use, and finally spotted something just off the ledge.

The immortal soldier dodged several short waves of concrete debris as he moved around to the other side of the two power houses. He then backed up as far as he could, and, holding both arms out from his sides, rushed at the ladies. They were so focused on each other that they never even realized he was on the roof let alone coming at them. He grabbed them both without issue and continued to drag them forward like a bull goring a matador. Before they could figure out what was going on, all three of them were pushed down to the safety wall. Frank continued barreling toward the two other Gifted and managed to hurl them, along with himself over the wall. Soon, all three were plunging story after story. With as powerful as these two seemed to be, Jackson couldn't be sure a simple fall would eliminate them as threats. So, he carried them with him as he somersaulted into the fenced in area that contained the hospital's heavy duty mini-tower transformers.

Even with the sun shining bright overhead, the glow could be seen as connections were interrupted and ear-popping electrical crackling drowned out even the reporters yelling to be heard on camera over a rushed and harried hospital staff and panicked patients. The building went dark for a few minutes, then the emergency generator kicked in and power was restored. The area was marked off, but a youthful reporter hungry for an anchor position snuck past the boundary with his cameraman; he collapsed as soon as they entered. Sydnie had fueled herself with so much extra of the precious energy that as devastating as the impact was, she still survived. The little morsels she stole from those last two men allowed her to get up. She was still hideous and deformed from smashing into steel and concrete and being charred by the current she had interrupted. As she crawled her way out of the wreckage, she knew that her lost beauty was a trivial thing; she could draw in all she needed to repair herself, and besides, she couldn't feel her enemy any longer.

With her second kill of the day complete, she no longer wished to fight. She wanted to leave and repair herself slowly. That way, no one else would die. That way, she wouldn't have to feel the pain and shock from those who loved the men and women she drained. She had certainly felt enough of those emotions for one, or even a dozen, lifetimes. She wondered, briefly, if her survival instinct was selfish. No, she assured herself. She saved so many people in the hospital; she deserved this. She had the right to live. And Dieter, and all men like him, needed to be taken down.

Soon after Syndie left the scene, a strange, percussive coughing was heard by the armed orderlies who arrived on the scene. Bard, who had managed to worm her way into a bush, struggled to hold herself together as her attempted to let out a song of tranquility. As she recovered, the tranquil lullaby gave way to a low, triumphant tune that rapidly strung her bones back together.

"What in blazes?" asked an orderly who arrived on the scene with her male partner. She and her partner stopped and looked around for the song's source. Observing this, Bard threw her voice behind them.

"It's one of them! Get down!" said the orderly man. The man and woman flinched in fright and threw their bodies to the ground while covering their heads. When the song finally dispersed, the pair emerged from hiding, quickly placed the two living bodies within the fenced area onto gurneys, and took off like cannonballs.

Eventually, a third orderly braved the "haunted" area and took away the corpse of an unidentified nude male. Normally, he would have the remains taken away by a coroner, but with things the way they were there was no way to know when that process might even get started. So, John Doe was hauled away and unceremoniously dumped into the hospital morgue. They dumped him like raw meat onto a tray, slid him into a slot, and clicked the drawer door shut after him. That, as far as they knew, was that...

Marty was the third shift attendant in the morgue area, although he kept calling it the graveyard shift despite the fact that no one in the two years he had held the position thought it was funny. He was at the main desk studying a premed textbook for an upcoming exam, when he thought he heard a noise like one of the metal body trays rattling. When he had first taken the job he'd been jumpy, imagining he heard this or saw that. He had gotten that out of his system in the first couple of months, though. He carefully eyed the area behind him to see all was well and put what he heard down to nerves and his upcoming test. A short while later, he could have sworn he heard a muffled bang of something hitting metal hard. But again, a quick glance proved nothing to be out of order and he thought he shouldn't have had that last cup of coffee. He barely had time to get his mind back on the Latin names of body parts before there was again a sound just like the last, but louder.

The twenty year old was rattled enough at this point that he decided he was going to go to the drawers, just to double check that everything was in order so he could get back to studying. He walked up to the bank of shiny doors, and right then one in the center flew open. A naked man rolled out on a body tray and hopped down. Marty promptly fainted, and would upon recovering quit his job, collect all of his medical textbooks, throw them away, and change his major to business.

After the boy fainted, Frank made use of the desk phone to call HQ and let them know he was ready for a pick up. He also let them know he needed a double bacon hamburger, two cases of beer, his bike accounted for along with his guns, and one of his backup sets of thrift store vintage biker gear.

"Understood, Agent Jackson. Backup and supplies are inbound," the voice was crystal clear and familiar. But, Jackson wondered, who was his backup?
This message was last edited by the GM at 05:45, Thu 23 July 2015.

As the chaotic SubStation was brought back under control Phoenix Crimson watched his surroundings cautiously. Whoever was responsible for the attack was apparently content to leave it at that, and Phoenix felt confident that he'd be able to move on without leaving the building open to another attack. The Electricians and FireFighters who'd risked injury were recovering, and the repairs they'd made finally allowed Phoenix's mask to re-establish a link with the ITSDA's communication server.

The news channels that he'd been monitoring earlier reactivated; there seemed to be a fight at another Chicago hospital but a few seconds of viewing told him that Frank Jackson was already at the scene... bollock naked, for some reason, but even so it looked as though he had the situation under control.
His visor alerted him that his main objective was still unfulfilled: although trying to keep the chaos that'd spilt onto the streets was an obvious priority the ITSDA's primary targets were still Ash, Zenith and President Roman Galvez.

The three targets pictures flashed one after another and Phoenix quirked an eyebrow to himself as Romans own mugshot flashed; The President looked more than a little out of place paired against the two Namidians. The ITSDA had photographic evidence of the man conspiring with the other two men on his target-list and all three were suspected Namidian underlings, furthermore parts of a plan detailing an attack on Chicago were clearly visible in the photo's background- and given the current state of the city the evidence against all three suspects was pretty damning.
It hadn't taken long to match the photos origin to a location within the city, and with his systems restored Phoenix was able to access his latest mission information and return to his manhunt.

Daniel jabbed a thumb into his chest to trigger his suits 'flight mode' and with a careful detonation under his feet he fired himself into the air and above the buildings skyline, another series of blasts stabilised him and fired him like a bullet towards the warehouse that the ITSDA intelligence department had flagged on his map.

---

Phoenix Crimson crashed through the warehouses roof with all the grace and subtlety of a torpedo, and to a similar effect. The first explosion blasted a hole in the buildings roof and a second slowed him down enough to survive his landing.
He'd expected to find the warehouse packed with Namidian soldiers, or at least some of the Presidents own bodyguards, but the main floor of the building seemed deserted. Without anyone to take by surprise his dynamic entry had gone to waste, and after a quick glance around to confirm that the main room was deserted Phoenix lowered his guard.
"...huh. Weird."

As he strode to the warehouses office block he took in the details from his surroundings: the dust that'd accumulated inside the building was disturbed by recent footprints and scrapes, someone HAD occupied the building recently, but it seemed that they'd cleared out just before Phoenix had arrived. Phoenix felt a stab of impatience as he realized that his target might already have escaped- he'd finish searching the building before calling Headquarters for new instructions.

He finally came to the door to the warehouse's office and kicked it off it's hinges with an explosive stomp of his heel. This time he was rewarded with a sharp cry of fear and Phoenix immediately returned to a state of combat-readiness, there was one man in a red suit who'd stumbled back from the explosive kick and into the corner of the small room, Phoenix closed the distance between them with a lightening-quick lunge, grabbed the man by the throat, and crushed his face into the offices brick wall.
"Before we begin let me just say it's an honour to meet you, Mister President." Daniel smiled sweetly before drawing the mans head back and slamming it into the wall.
"Where are Ash and Zenith?!" he demanded, before slamming the Presidents head into the wall a second time. "Where is Namidias?! Why did you attack Chicago?!"
"How-" The president groaned painfully as Phoenix's interrogation addled his senses, he eventually managed to arrange and spit out a reply.
"How the hell should I know?! I don't know what you're talking about!"

Daniel stared at the man for a long moment, he was fantastic at reading people and the president didn't seem to be lying, furthermore the lack of resistance he'd encountered in the building was suspicious. He felt his stomach twist in a rare sense of self-doubt as he wondered whether he had the right target after all... visually the man was a perfect match for the one in the photo, but he didn't seem to have any other villainous traits. Hell, he hadn't even put up a fight.
Daniel tapped a button on the side of his mask while he held the President down with the other, and sent a direct audio message to ITSDA HQ: "Phoenix Crimson, reporting in. I have one of the targets in my custody... but..."
His voice broke a little as he was hit with another shot of doubt.
"...you're sure this is our guy, right? For a Namidian he's kinda' pathetic. Please respond ASAP."
He ended his communication and looked down to his prisoner. Nothing about the man identified him as a threat to Phoenix and he felt his growing sense of doubt turn to regret at handling him so roughly- something clearly didn't add up here, but until he got a response from Thunderclap or another of his superiors he'd have to keep his faith in his current orders and keep the man pinned down.

Ash, who had been grappling with a mountain of hallucinations and struck by alternative waves of ecstasy and rage, finally sat up aboard one of The Commander's transports. He looked around, flinched in pain at the white hot LED lights above him, then spotted Zenith frowning at his own image in the vehicle's reflective wall. In the span of a second, Zenith spotted his partner out of the corner of his eye and slowly turned to face him. A slightly disdainful, yet somehow still jovial smile swept across Zenith's face. Ash let out a fatigued, guttural groan.

"Get in a fight, wake up in some shithole hours later; them's the rules. Fuck, man... where are we?

"For once, I'm grateful to hear you vocalize the rusty, scatter-brained thoughts you mistake for wit."

"Fuck you say, old man?"

At that, Zenith tossed a smartphone in his pocket up into the air and threw it at Ash. Instinctively, the young thug caught it. On screen, a highly detailed map drawn from The Commander's GPS files showed their path toward the warehouse where the President was being held.

"Nothing of substance. But to answer your prior question, we are, as always, headed toward our next mission."

Ash angrily shook the smartphone in front of his face as he stared at it, without blinking, for a full minute. As he examined the expensive piece of commercial hardware, the dust he shook free ignited all around him. A nearby hostage flinched away in fright as the burning dust swirled closer and closer to his head. Tears of joy streamed down his face as soon as the dust dissipated. Of course, none of this caught the eye or even the notice of either criminal.

"You ever tried to clean this thing?" muttered the impulsive, fiery brat. Finally finishing his examination, Ash spoke again. "It's already time for Operation JFK?"

"You've been indisposed for a long while... and I've already indicated that that is not the name of our plan."

"Whatever. What's the ETA?"

"Five minutes."

"Make it ten," retorted Ash. He turned his head to the side and lowered it again.

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

Later, in the warehouse, Thunderclap's voice suddenly invaded Phoenix Crimson's head.

"We've confirmed and reconfirmed his identity several times. President Galvez is our target, and a Namidian associate. He might not be an agent, though. We have no data on the training he's received or the full details of his affiliation. Just bring him in quickly; Namidias springs his trap right when things start to get quiet."

A quaking, hyperventilating President Galvez let out a war cry and harmlessly elbowed Phoenix Crimson in the stomach. Driving his elbow straight into armor must've snapped his arm in half and he cried out in tremendous pain. Even as Crimson held the man in place, he could see the President's wounded arm twitching.

As he was comprehending all of this, ear-splitting alarms from inside the warehouse started blaring. Crimson spun around to face the door. A fire, no, an inferno had appeared out of nowhere; it was engulfing the entire warehouse! And as soon as he turned to look, a punk cockily danced through the door Phoenix had just barged through. He was trailed by a sharp-looking bald man wearing sunglasses.

"Hey, it's da ITSDA! I knew we'd find you here!" said the hoodlum. The President gasped as a trail of fire appeared on his shoelaces and started crawling up his pant leg.

"Now hear this, friend, before you attack us..." said the older, mafioso-looking man. "We both have a similar goal in mind here."

"You want him out of the picture, we want him dead."

"So just relinquish him and we'll make sure he never meddles in your affairs, or betrays our trust, ever again."

"What are you talking about?! I didn't do anything!" Ash chuckled. He loved it when the squealed.

The older man held out his hand to accept President Galvez. All the while, he war running his tongue along the inside of his mouth and cooking up a sedative that could bring down an elephant. And his partner was eying the dust on the brick wall behind everyone.
This message was last edited by the GM at 05:56, Tue 28 July 2015.

Miles away, the remnants of the Schwartze Augen force that had invaded the city was making good its retreat. Ash and Zenith would be more than enough to complete the errand Namidias had assigned his underlings in Chicago. Plan 101 had just been the plan to make it all happen. What better distraction for a very subtle plan involving the president of a major nation than to set an entire city ablaze and loot it for all it was worth?

Lady Crimson reclined in a seat, strapped painfully into it actually, and eyed the pile of loot they had liberated at the expense of 11 well-trained soldiers. The loss was felt keenly and would be hard to recuperate. Achwartze Augen's fighting strength was not so vast it could afford this kind of loses.

Lady Crimson was sure she would hear about it once they returned to base. She looked at the handful of personnel, Schwartze Augen and Rough Riders, in the craft and grinned darkly. Everything according to plan. "Mr. Green, Mr. Black, we will landing shortly in Ohio, from where you can get back to Boura readily. I have to move south after that. The Regional director has called for me and I expect I will be recuperating for a while while training replacement for the assets lost today. By the bye, have you a line on any good candidates? Commander, I assume you can hear me, funds are being transferred from Schwartze Augen to your accounts in payment for the taxi service. Let us off at the Gaultown facility, please. Oh, also, Dieter would like to talk to you about a certain prisoner he has. Hmm, he would like to contract interrogation services from you... personally."

The green haired man looked to his entrenched counterpart and shrugged, "Thugs and mercenaries, sure, but men fit for recruitment... I'll have to check my files. I should ahve something to Dieter by the end of the week."

---

Even as the various Namidian allies made their moves, retreats, and more, a non-descript grey sedan came into town on the Highway 55. Inside the car, Vincent Lee glanced sideways at the file folder on his passenger seat where a hasty image of Janice had been taken with Dieter's security cameras. There was a brief dossier on her abilities and personality. Vincent also had a long range rifle modified to fire tranq darts with an assortment of dart with various chemical cocktails within. He also had a machete. He had a simple mission, track down, capture, and return Dieter's... lover?

From afar, Janice could feel Dieter's razor, towering will focused on her like a high powered spotlight. He sought her, he would always seek her; he loved her. There was not hatred, now anger, no violence in his attention; just a sadness and loneliness and resolve. A towering resolve as she had never, ever felt before in anyone.
This message was last edited by the player at 14:54, Tue 28 July 2015.

Lieutenant Tudor placed a finger against his ear as his headset buzzed him a message. He sat listening for a brief moment and occasionally nodded his head, he responded with a curt "Aye, Sir." before releasing his finger and addressing Lady Crimson directly.
"The Commander thanks you for your business, and is pleased to inform us that our escape has gone unchallenged."
"He has also informed me that he intends to consider your contract. Mister Sievold can expect a reply through the usual darknet channels."

The sleek fuselage of Commanders gunship sped over the Illinois/Indiana border, and at their current speed it'd take less than two hours before the craft would touch down on Ohio soil and disembark its passengers into their separate discrete getaway vehicles: Dieters Lieutenants had their own transport arranged, the hostages were herded into the backs of several nondescript windowless vans of the same make that The Commander seemed to favour for his extractions, and the RoughRiders took back to the skies.

Phoenix Crimson winced as the president struck him, not in pain but in pity: The poor bastard didn't even know how to throw a punch without breaking his arm, and now he was apparently on his co-conspirators hitlist. Despite himself Daniel felt his suicidal sense of duty to 'help the helpless' barge past his other motivations, motivations such as 'self preservation' and 'rationality'.
Pheonix hoisted Mr Galvez to his feet by his unbroken arm.
"That's a very reasonable suggestion. It's a win-win- and hey, it's not as though I owe this sonofabitch anything; The opposite in fact!"
He twisted the Presidents arm hard enough to elicit a whine of pain before moving to stand protectively between the man and the Namidian agents.
"It's not going to end that way, though. I'm bringing him in. You as well." He shrugged carelessly. "Sorry, not sorry."

"Don't be. We're not sorry either." Both Ash and Zenith revealed wickedly malicious grins.
The room exploded into instant action as the thin veneer of civility between the two parties was stripped faster than a Porsche parked in Boura. The dust caking the crevices between the offices old brickwork burst and ignited the rooms back wall into a sheet of flame and as Ash released the attack he'd been holding the dusty floor between them ignited and leapt up to trap Phoenix and Galvez in a set of searing jaws- Phoenix tightened his grip on the traitorous^(?) politician and fired both of them out of the room and through the office window overlooking the warehouse floor with a stomp of his foot and a blast of force.
Phoenix Crimson's escape took them through a doublethick pane of soundproof glass, down a floor from the elevated office and hard onto the concrete below. Normally able to soften his landing with a second explosion and nimbly transfer his momentum into an escape roll, Daniel instead crushed against the ground with a jarring smack- carrying the heavy-set President with him made any kind of fine control impossible and Daniels conciousness fluttered as the shock of his crash landing washed over him.

As his senses pulsed in and out of darkness Phoenix tried to pull a battleplan together:
The President had a broken arm and was howling in pain from several fresh injuries- deafened ears, a dislocated shoulder and burns down one side of his body. Daniel was immune to his own explosions, but other people flying 'Air Phoenix' tended not to enjoy the experience. Despite just having his life saved President Galvez probably wouldn't be very cooperative, and keeping him safe from Ash and Zenith would be difficult.
The warehouse itself was ablaze, the previously dark and empty space was now brightly lit as Ash's flames spread themselves over the walls and crowded the scorching air with plumes of thick black smoke. The floor was as dusty as it'd been when he'd first seen it; favourable terrain for Ash.
As his body convulsed with another wave of pain his vision lolled upwards to see the bald head of Zenith glaring down at him through the shattered office window. With a disgusting hawk he spat his chemical concoction onto the ground between the dazed Phoenix Crimson and the severely injured President. Phoenix managed to force his numbed muscles to roll away with a supreme force of will but as Zeniths attack splashed onto the ground it vaporised into a cloud of gas that knocked the President out cold, just as Phoenix completed his evasion he could hear a pair of feet battering their way down the offices stairwell.
He dug deep and forced himself onto his feet. Assuming that Ash and Zenith would try to rush him together he'd only have a few moments to think up a plan before they'd be back ontop of him....

---

"Ahh... shit, man! I think we lost him!" Ash complained, sarcastically.
The two men stood around the patch of glass that marked where their prey had landed. A streak of blood trailed from a particularly crushed patch and dragged a noticeable path through the dusty warehouse floor and into cover behind one of the warehouse's forklifts.
"Indeed. Clearly we shouldn't underestimate this master of subtlety." Zenith replied, his voice dripping with an equal amount of mockery.
"We especially shouldn't underestimate someone who has the GENIUS-" Ash's voice turned from a sarcastic mock to an aggressive shout in a heartbeat as his head snapped from the forklift to face the roof "-TO TRY TO SNEAK UP ON US WITH GLOWING ARMOUR!" Ashes eyes flashed onto the lattice of support beams gridding the ceiling, and met the glowing white pinpricks of Phoenix's mask which were only partially concealed by the thick mask of smoke that hovered between them.
With a dramatic clench of his hand the minute particles of dust, dirt and ash hovering around Phoenix ignited and forced him to dive to the ground, he softened his landing with a microdetonation under his palm but before his fatigued muscles could make a follow-up attack Zenith lunged at him, with a single smooth action the sharpsuited mafioso drew his one long fingernail across his palm and tried to slap the bloodied hand into Phoenix's chest. As the attack approached Phoenix's defensive instinct kicked in, and the energy that he'd been gathering to leap at Ash was instead spent in a burst of energy that wrenched Zeniths wrist away to spatter his palmful of blood harmlessly against the floor where it bubbled into hissing pits that reminded Phoenix of his earlier fight. Phoenix once again gathered energy, this time in his foot for an explosive roundhouse kick, but a sudden wall of flame sprung up between himself and Zenith and he was forced to retreat backwards to the cover of the Forklift.

"A simple trick like that might work on the 'mundane variety' supervillains you're used to fighting, friend..." Zenith called out in an unfriendly tone.
"-But we're Ash and Zenith! Best of the worst! You ITSDA just don't compare!" the younger of the duo cut in excitedly.
Phoenix gave the pair reluctant credit- individually he'd faced worse, but they knew how to cover each others blind spots and were more dangerous than the sum of their parts. Even in close combat, his speciality, he would have trouble attacking one without leaving himself open to the other.
Zenith allowed himself a fond smirk of his younger teammates enthusiasm before his expression sobered. "Enough. They're both in one place, please finish them off before the building burns down around us."
"Only 'cuz you asked nicely, Boss." With another dramatic flourish Ash sent another wave of flame down the warehouse floor, it was tall and long enough that Phoenix could neither jump above it nor dodge around it without abandoning the President, and through the burning wall Phoenix could see Ash and Zenith grinning in satisfaction as they thought they had him trapped.
"PHOENIX...-"
Phoenix Crimson unleashed his battlecry as he charged another attack. Telegraphing his strikes was one of his major weaknesses, but in a situation like this he couldn't miss.
"-BEAM!"
Energy coursed along Pheonix Crimsons arm at the same instant that Ash's chest exploded into a destructive fireball, in a fraction of a second the Namidian was thrown from his feet and hard into the ground while the explosions fiery after effects surged out and staggered Zenith back with a blast of pressure. Without Ash's control the wall of fire bearing down on Phoenix returned to it's usual behaviour and exhausted into nothing more than scalding air as it washed past Phoenix's position.
Zenith's pharmaceutically skilled mind raced as he loaded himself with a cocktail of stimulants; Adrenalin and Analgesic compounds to help him shrug off the attack, and Benzodiazepine in his tearducts to restore his vision. As the drugs took hold his first instinct was to search for Ash- Zenith himself had no fear of death but he'd grown protectively attached to his young protege, and the thought of something happening to the boy somehow filled him with a dread that he never felt for his own wellbeing.
With great relief he saw that Ash was only knocked-down unconscious and not mortally injured, he turned his head back to face Phoenix Crimson just in time to see the ITSDA agent take to the air with an explosive hop and drive his knuckles into Zeniths jaw with a savage right-cross.
"PHOENIX! -PUNCH!"

---

Phoenix Crimson sat outside the warehouse, and it's burning husk cast his shadow far across the street as he made an urgent call to his ITSDA handlers. He'd dragged the still-unconscious Roman Galvez out of the building with him.
"Crimson, reporting in." Daniel rubbed a grit of ash from his eyes, now that his adrenalin had settled he realized that his fights had taken more out of him than he'd expected. Perhaps exhaustion was his body's way of telling him to take a few hours break between life-risking heroics.
"I have the primary target in custody, request prisoner transport. Secondary targets also encountered. Defeated."
"Good work, Phoenix. Ash and Zenith will require specialized prisoner transport- do you require a second police carrier?"
Phoenix looked back to the burning warehouse. Ash and Zenith were still lying unconscious inside, and even as Phoenix watched a section of roof caved in and scatted flaming debris throughout the building. He could leave them to burn; it's not as though they'd have shown him any mercy if the situation had been reversed- and the thought of running into a burning building to save his would-be killers really didn't appeal to him. Hell, in the long run it even made logical sense- how much suffering could the pair inflict if they ever escaped ITSDA custody? How much suffering had they already caused? What were the odds Phoenix would just get himself killed in the attempt?
On the other hand, the sense of duty that'd been drilled into him ever since he'd become Gifted flared up again. 'No one else is going to save them. It's up to you.'
"Send the second wagon... yeah. Maybe send a medic as well, everyone's taken a beating."
"Understood. Hold position, transport will be with you in ten minutes."
Daniels mask clicked quiet as the line disconnected. He stood and started walking back to the burning building as he committed himself to yet another act of selfless, stupid, valour.

ITSDA vans rolled onto the street exactly ten minutes later; as the paramedics, police officers and military personnel accompanying them secured the area they found the unconscious bodies of Ash, Zenith and President Galvez piled by the roadside being watched over by a singed and very-much the worse for wear Phoenix Crimson.
This message was last edited by the player at 16:02, Sun 02 Aug 2015.

Glitz was good at his job...ex special forces, on duty with some of the first police squads to handle Gifted incursions...and then he'd been turned into a Chicken by the Barn Raiser....he'd been a chicken for a full year, wandering back and forth in front of pen in animal control until Limrick McFabisham had finally found him, never did say how, and had another Gifted turn him human again.

And for five years, Glitz had done some really weird but generally rewarding things for his new boss.  The police had considered him unfit due to insanity, but McFabisham and his benefactor hadn't batted an eye.  He'd saved lives, and often had intel he would have killed for as a cop.

He'd taken down drug lords, wall street kingpins and weapons dealers.  While he had taken um-bridge at doing illegal things at first, it became clear his employer could see the thin veneer of legality that the people who really ran the world maintained in their corruption.

It became easy...especially when he'd saved his first thousand people. When they stopped total economic collapse in Burma he knew two things; McFabisham's boss was a Gifted, and a very powerful one, and that he was a good, if not slightly paranoid guy.

So Glitz just could NOT understand how he'd been asked to sit there and watch servers in a basement not one block from where the hell had gone on in downtown Chicago.  How could he know the things he knew and have this not happen? He was armed to the teeth and he knew that the other three members of his cell were too.

Worse...worse still, there had been a very specific body count...a contingency plan was in place to drop guard duty and help snipe for the good guys from the shadows...but not now.

What fucking accountant thought like that? But worse, worse still was that now that he'd had to put up with all that, he was being asked to WAIT on site now that the Namidians had gone.  Why? What the hell did it all mean?

IN any disaster, whether man made or natural, there is a fortune to be made. IN such an event as the Chicago attacks, the stock markets around the world reacted instantly to the news of a Namidian attack. Futures markets rioted, companies went bankrupt, companies boomed, and chaos ensued. IN such chaos, the cunning and adept individual stood to make a fortune. The disreputable stood to make even more if they were willing to risk it all.

Still, there was one person who stood to gain the most. That was the man who knew the disaster was coming. Dieter had been planning the attacks for months and he had also been planning how to reap the benefits. Schwartze Augen had its fingers in pies all over the world. It owned several companies directly, was a principal investor in several, and have influence on many more indirectly.

One of the more direct reapings was in the casinos of Las Vegas. As soon as the first televised coverage of the events occurred, the morbidly obsessed world wanted to bet on Chicago's fate. It just so happened that some establishments got the minutest of drops on the competition offering odds on the best fights, which buildings would be targeted, etc. The house made a killing.

But the indirect money was the real windfall as investments made days and months before hand began to return at remarkable rates as the events unfolded. Companies went bust, companies made fortunes, and some companies just did what they did best. Dieter made billions once all the trails and all the traps had been triggered. Oh, a few gambles lost here and there, but the vast majority of chickens came home to roost and the bankroll capacity of Schwartze Augen was increased several-fold.

Dieter was paranoid though and had covered his tracks; even if he was certain those tracks were not capable of being followed. Dummies companies, impenetrable firewalls, multiple routing, various shell and dummy corporations. In fact, a vast majority of the money stayed put and was just reinvested but a small percentage was filtered through the black net into the most secret of accounts around the world. Even then, much of it was invested into real estate, jewels, commodities. But a small trail of it led back to accounts no one would ever be able to find unless they were the Economy itself and looking. No one would be even capable of noting the tiniest of crumbs he had left as he cleaned the financial house around the Chicago incident.

Gates had been calmly observing all the destruction and chaos with satisfaction as he made his way through the city. Suddenly his phone went off again. He reached into his pocket and fished out the small device. "Gates....Yes Sir." this time there was a bit of a pause as though he was computing what he had just heard. "I understand. I will proceed to my nearest upload point. Time is approximately 13 minutes and 42 seconds. I will have the information as soon as possible." He hung up and immediately made his way to a very specific abandoned building in Chicago. He walked towards the door which automatically opened for him and quickly made his way to the basement. He found the chair he was looking for and after strapping himself in plugged a large cord directly into the base of his neck. A few moments later and he had uploaded himself to his true home...the net

"He may deserve it, but I cannot allow his death. By order of the ITSDA, and for the millions of men and women you buried, I'm bringing you in! All of you," said the Crimson Champion as his eyes drifted from the shivering President, to the twitchy, giggling Ash, and the laser-focused Zenith.

"That's quite alright. I had no expectation that a simple predator such as yourself would surrender his prey," Zenith said. Phoenix Crimson scoffed at the common crook calling him a simple predator, then noticed that the man was tilting his head toward his partner. Phoenix tapped the flight mode button on his chest, jumped, and caused two small explosions that launched himself and the president straight up into the air.

Phoenix shielded President Galvez and stared down at his targets as his head crashed through the warehouse's concrete roof. Just as he thought, the wall he was standing in front of morphed into a massive wildfire. The dossier on Ash was right; the man was nothing if not predictable and insanely aggressive. As Galvez let out anguished cries of fear and pleaded to be let go, Phoenix Crimson circled the roof like a helicopter monitoring a battlefield. As he stared through the massive hole in the roof, he saw the wildfire swallow up the entire room. Shit! Where did they go? He waited. One second, two, three. They had found a place to hide by now. But if he baited them...

Phoenix landed, planting President Galvez down right in the middle of the warehouse roof. The struggling, kicking, weeping man was now right where he'd be most visible. Phoenix Crimson hid himself in the tower of smoke nearby, waiting to deliver the knockout blow on anyone who came to attack the corrupt politician. He stepped out of the thickest parts of the smoke and took careful, deep breaths whenever he could and laid in wait. When about two minutes had passed, the disgraced representative snapped out of his stupor and raced across the roof, gasping all the while as he ran for dear life. Effortlessly, Phoenix Crimson jumped in front of the man and kicked the air in front of him with irresistible force, knocking the President back until his head slid back into the roof's wall.

"What right do you have to call yourself President of one of South America's greatest nations?" said the young agent. The smoke particles whirling around Phoenix Crimson suddenly rose up into the air. Phoenix leaped back, fired flames out of his feet, and shattered the bones in Ash's back with a single, rocket-powered somersault kick!

"AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!" a blood-curdling, howl-like scream pierced the night. Ash's head hit the concrete and bounced. Blood poured out of his back at an incredible rate, never even slowing down enough to form a pool.

"Murderer! By what right do you call yourself a hero?" shouted Zenith. The career criminal raced toward his partner, dripping the sweat from his hands into his crying protege's gaping maw. Liquid painkiller, most likely. Or perhaps a sedative that would keep him from squirming...

"His internal organs weren't critically damaged. He'll survive... if he gets attention."

"So that's your game, is it? Surrender, or lose my associate?"

In truth, Phoenix hadn't planned for that. His kick was just designed to take Ash out of the fight without killing him. However, the man had an interesting idea. No! He was a hero, he wouldn't succumb to such horrible tactics!

"No. Scum like you would never put a comrade's life ahead of his own success."

"You know nothing!" Zenith cried. With one quick motion, the drug warrior's one long fingernail sliced open his arm as he charged his opponent. As he neared Phoenix Crimson, he splashed the ITSDA warrior, who blocked it with perfect efficiency. Zenith smiled, slid down between Phoenix's legs like a baseball player nearing a base, and hocked a ball of spit at the bottom of the agent's helmet. Phoenix jumped back and hurled his fist at the ne'er-do-well beneath him, but Zenith rolled out of the way at the last second. Phoenix felt his pulse quicken; now the combat high was beginning! The hero spread his palm wide to unload a stream of fire, but one of the thug's knives sliced through the air in front of it. Using little more than a wave of his hands, Phoenix caught the dagger out of the air and slammed it down in front of the prone criminal's body. Even Zenith's eyes widened in shock.

"I know enough about you," said the gloryhound with a note of cockiness in his voice. Between desperate gasps, Zenith counted upwards.

"15, 16," said the prone drug lord under his breath. Phoenix stared blankly at the man as he counted. Was he poisoned? In desperation, Daniel Hunt tore his helmet off, ridding his exterior of the last of Zenith's spit. "18, 19."

Nevertheless, blood came rushing into Phoenix Crimson's ears. As soon as he stopped to take a breath, Zenith charged at him once more. Phoenix stepped aside and threw the man to the ground with a thunderous tackle!

"24, 25" whispered Zenith.

The once-mighty Prince of Flame staggered around like a drunk as he tried to hold himself up. His palms began to drown in sweat, a strange tightness gripped his limbs, and his heart very nearly exploded out of his chest! As the world blackened around him, Phoenix realized what Zenith had done; a powerful stimulant was coursing through his veins. He needed to calm down; he needed to end this, now, without exerting himself!

And just like that, the ITSDA's great martial artist, the legendary hero who'd been fighting for most of his young life, dropped himself to the ground and played possum. He squeezed his palm together, readying his suit for one final flamethrower attack. Like the sinister wolf he was, the wounded Zenith slowly approached the downed president, keeping his eye on Phoenix Crimson the whole time. But Phoenix stayed smart and didn't move a muscle when Zenith picked up President Galvez and started toward the hole in the roof. The moment after the drug lord eyeballed him for the final time before entering the hole, however, Phoenix let loose. He simply lifted his arm, unfurled his palm, and fired away. With flame consuming his back, Zenith had no choice. He stopped, dropped, and rolled, giving Phoenix enough time to stand up and stomp on his stomach.

Phoenix took several short, shallow breaths as a desperate, but defeated Zenith tried to worm his way out from underneath his conqueror. He then knocked the old drug lord unconscious with the hard side of his metal boot. Finally, he opened a communications channel with ITSDA HQ.

"HQ... I need... immediate pickup for our three, main, targets.

"Transport on its way," said an authoritative, yet somehow casual male voice.

"And bring--" Phoenix Crimson wheezed loudly as his lungs suffered a spasm. "--Medics."

"You got it,"

As he desperately awaited the ITSDA's planes, Phoenix never bothered to look down at the faint smile that decorated the half-dead Zenith's face...

In reply to Scripts (msg # 72):

(As the ITSDA)

ITSDA headquarters, having already sent out the vast majority of its backup in the Americas region to Chicago, only had to make a simple call to redirect a small squad to Frank's position. It took them around ten minutes to collect the supplies they were told to, and then make their way to the Morgue. The squad Captain, Juniper Hall, had had previous experience with Frank and didn't even bat an eye at him being in a morgue. She set up the other two agents at the doors and walked in, staring at Frank. "Why do you even bother wearing clothes?" She asked, tossing him a bag of carefully folded clothing. "You obviously make a better impression with them off." She sat in a chair that had obviously not been there before, and put her feet up on a stool that also seemed to come from nowhere. "Looks like you had fun. I'll definitely be asking for a copy of your report." She was silent for a moment before she stood, the chair and stool disappearing. "Headquarters has us rendezvousing with Phoenix. We're part of the guard duty that's been placed on Sherry. You're welcome to join us. Or you can run off and do some more of... whatever it is you do."
This message was last edited by the player at 18:31, Wed 12 Aug 2015.

Phoenix Crimson winced as the president struck him, not in pain but in pity: The poor bastard didn't even know how to throw a punch without breaking his arm, and now he was apparently on his co-conspirators hitlist. Despite himself Daniel felt his suicidal sense of duty to 'help the helpless' barge past his other motivations, motivations such as 'self preservation' and 'rationality'.
Pheonix hoisted Mr Galvez to his feet by his unbroken arm.
"That's a very reasonable suggestion. It's a win-win- and hey, it's not as though I owe this sonofabitch anything; The opposite in fact!"
He twisted the Presidents arm hard enough to elicit a whine of pain before moving to stand protectively between the man and the Namidian agents.
"It's not going to end that way, though. I'm bringing him in and you as well, for the millions of men and women you buried."

The Crimson Champion's eyes drifted from the shivering President, to the twitchy, giggling Ash, and the laser-focused Zenith; both known Wave members revealed wickedly malicious grins. "That's quite alright. I had no expectation that a simple predator such as yourself would surrender his prey," Zenith said. Phoenix Crimson scoffed at the common crook calling him a simple predator, then noticed that the man was tilting his head toward his partner. Phoenix tapped the flight mode button on his chest, jumped, and caused two small explosions that launched himself and the president straight up into the air.

Phoenix shielded President Galvez and stared down at his targets as his head crashed through the warehouse's concrete roof. Just as he thought, the wall he was standing in front of morphed into a massive wildfire. The dossier on Ash was right; the man was nothing if not predictable and insanely aggressive. Phoenix Crimson circled the roof like a helicopter monitoring a battlefield. As he stared through the massive hole in the roof, he saw the wildfire swallow up the entire room. Shit! Where did they go? He waited. One second, two, three. They had found a place to hide by now. But if he baited them...

Phoenix landed, planting Galvez down right in the middle of the warehouse roof. The President had a broken arm and was howling in pain from several fresh injuries- deafened ears, a dislocated shoulder and burns down one side of his body. Daniel was immune to his own explosions, but other people flying 'Air Phoenix' tended not to enjoy the experience. The struggling, kicking, weeping man was now right where he'd be most visible. The warehouse itself was ablaze, the previously dark and empty space was now brightly lit as Ash's flames spread themselves over the walls and crowded the scorching air with plumes of thick black smoke. Phoenix Crimson hid himself in one of these nearby, waiting to deliver the knockout blow on anyone who came to attack the corrupt politician. He stepped out of the thickest parts of the smoke to take careful, deep breaths whenever he could and laid in wait.

The smoke particles whirling around Phoenix Crimson suddenly rose up into the air. Phoenix leaped back, fired flames out of his feet, and shattered the bones in Ash's back with a single, rocket-powered somersault kick!

"AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!" a blood-curdling, howl-like scream pierced the night. Ash's head hit the concrete and bounced. Blood poured out of his back at an incredible rate, never even slowing down enough to form a pool.

"Murderer! By what right do you call yourself a hero?" shouted Zenith. The career criminal raced toward his partner, dripping the sweat from his hands into his crying protégé's gaping maw. Liquid painkiller, most likely. Or perhaps a sedative that would keep him from squirming...

"His internal organs weren't critically damaged. He'll survive... if he gets attention."

"So that's your game, is it? Surrender, or lose my associate?"

In truth, Phoenix hadn't planned for that. His kick was just designed to take Ash out of the fight without killing him. However, the man had an interesting idea. No! He was a hero, he wouldn't succumb to such horrible tactics!

"No. Scum like you would never put a comrade's life ahead of his own success."

"That might hold true for the 'mundane variety' supervillains you're used to fighting, friend, but about me you know nothing!" In truth, Zenith had grown protectively attached to his young protégé, and the thought of something happening to the boy somehow filled him with a dread that he never felt for his own wellbeing.

With one quick motion, the drug warrior's one long fingernail sliced open his arm as he charged his opponent. As he neared Phoenix Crimson, he splashed the ITSDA warrior, who blocked it with perfect efficiency. Zenith smiled, slid down between Phoenix's legs like a baseball player nearing a base, and hocked a ball of spit at the bottom of the agent's helmet. Phoenix jumped back and hurled his fist at the ne'er-do-well beneath him, but Zenith rolled out of the way at the last second. Phoenix felt his pulse quicken; now the combat high was beginning! The hero spread his palm wide to unload a stream of fire, but one of the thug's knives sliced through the air in front of it. Using little more than a wave of his hands, Phoenix caught the dagger out of the air and slammed it down in front of the prone criminal's body. Even Zenith's eyes widened in shock.

"I know enough about you," said the gloryhound with a note of cockiness in his voice. Between desperate gasps, Zenith counted upwards.

"15, 16," said the prone drug lord under his breath. Phoenix stared blankly at the man as he counted. Was he poisoned? In desperation, Daniel Hunt tore his helmet off, ridding his exterior of the last of Zenith's spit. "18, 19."

Nevertheless, blood came rushing into Phoenix Crimson's ears. As soon as he stopped to take a breath, Zenith charged at him once more. The ITSDA agent took to the air with an explosive hop and drove his knuckles into Zenith's jaw with a savage right-cross.

"PHOENIX! -PUNCH!"

"24, 2..." whispered Zenith as the harsh blow interrupted his count. He dropped and rolled from the force of the impact, giving Phoenix enough time to follow up and stomp on his stomach. Phoenix looked down as a defeated Zenith twitched underneath his conqueror; he then made sure the old drug lord was unconscious with the hard side of his metal boot, better safe than sorry after all.

It was in that moment that the once-mighty Prince of Flame staggered around like a drunk as he tried to hold himself up. His palms began to drown in sweat, a strange tightness gripped his limbs, and his heart very nearly exploded out of his chest! As the world blackened around him, Phoenix realized what Zenith had done; a powerful stimulant was coursing through his veins. He had to admit it was a really good idea, only a few ticks short of succeeding.

---

Phoenix Crimson sat outside the warehouse, it's burning husk cast his shadow far across the street as he took several short, shallow breaths. He had managed to get all three men safely off the roof even in his hindered condition, yet it was nowhere near easy and honestly he was not sure if he could even explain to himself how he had managed it. Finally, when he had calmed down from the dosing well enough to clearly speak slowly enough to be understood, he opened a communications channel with ITSDA HQ.


"HQ... I need... immediate pickup for our three, main, targets.

"Transport on its way," said an authoritative, yet somehow casual male voice.

"And bring--" Phoenix Crimson wheezed loudly as his lungs suffered a spasm. "--Medics."

"You got it,"

As he desperately awaited the ITSDA's planes, Phoenix never bothered to look down at the faint smile that decorated the half-dead Zenith's face...

"What I do, June, is save lives and protect people. It's what I was doing well before you were born, what I did when governments said super heroes were just villains in disguise, and what I'll still be doing when I have this conversation again with your great great grand daughter instead of you."

The man was quick to eat and dress, a testament to his time as both a soldier and police officer as one in either profession never knew when they'd be called upon to act, or when they're next meal would be.

"As for my cloths, I'd rather not have to stop to give myself a ticket for indecent exposure or constantly explain to people why outside of a nudist colony I find it necessary to run around in the buff. Also, you ever gone eighty miles an hour on the back of a bike in winter? Not fun, trust me. As to tagging along with you, sure why not? Nothing more I can do here, and most likely all I could do on my own about now is mop up some non-Wave lootings and such. Better chance for some action if I stick with you, though I have a question of my own; why use your powers when there's a perfectly good chair right there at the desk?

Jackson gave the woman time to answer, while he checked out his guns and made sure they were fully loaded and in perfect working order before sliding them back into their holsters.

June shrugged, walking to the door and pulling it open. "I like to show off." She said, completely serious, before walking out of the room. She pulled the other two team-members off guard duty and went to wait outside, where Frank's bike was sitting. It was in contrast with the newer modeled bikes that the agents were riding. As soon as Frank joined them, June passed him one of the ITSDA's headsets. Extremely comfortable and almost completely invisible, this model was usually used for undercover ops, but ITSDA had been handing out the sets to several of the squads doing clean-up duty in Chicago like candy. "Phoenix called for medics, and he's getting the best we've got." June said, hopping on her bike and glancing at Frank. "We haven't broadcast a single thing about it being Sherry that's coming in, and we hope that even if we did, the Wave has minimal information on her and her powers." She pulled on a helmet quickly. "We're taking no risks though. Do try to keep up." She and her team-mates sped down the road almost completely silently. Their bikes were state of the art, after all, and that much noise would just draw attention.

It only took a few minutes for them to rendezvous with Sherry's transportation and fall in behind. Though it was hard to tell, there were barely visible blurs travelling alongside the van. The only visible riders were those that had just joined, and of those only Juniper and Frank stayed visible. "Captain Harding is inside with Sherry." She said, as if that were explanation enough.

When they finally arrived at the burned out husk of a warehouse, there was a semi-truck trailer just sitting on the ground where it had had space cleared for it. There was no sign of the actual truck, just its trailer, and there were several people flitting around outside of it. Ash, Zenith, and the President had been heavily sedated, and placed into the truck. Zenith was still being watched very carefully, however. There was no reason to take any risks. Phoenix had been directed to a cleared spot where a few combat medics were watching over him. His system was strained, but they believed he'd be fine. Though the milling mass looked uncoordianted from a distance, everyone there was doing exactly what they were supposed to be.

A male voice came on over the headset, giving directions to everyone. "Phoenix, once Sherry has fixed you you'll protect the transport for the prisoners until it reaches its destination. You'll return to our operating base in Chicago for debriefing afterwards. We'll want you to stay close for some time to make sure nothing else goes terribly wrong. Sherry, you're only here to make sure none of the prisoners die, then you'll be shipped back to headquarters. June's squad, we want you in New York. Looks like the local police agency has had a run in with Cheshire." Frank's headset spoke to him privately. "As of now, we have an undercover squad heading into Gaultown. Captain Jill has also rerouted to that location. You can go after Cheshire with June's squad, or you can rendezvous with the Gaultown team. Or you can stay here in Chicago and patrol. Right now, we could use you in any one of those places."

Sherry got out of her van and walked over to Phoenix quickly, leaning down and placing her hand against his shoulder. "Minor damage. Easy fix." She said, smiling at him grimly. "Minor damage that it is, if you hadn't been lucky this might've ended up being far worse. Be more careful next time." After fixing him up, she and two guards hopped into the trailer and disappeared from sight.

Phoenix Crimson's battles had not left him in a great condition, and when the responding ITSDA medics had found him he was on the verge of cardiac arrest. It wasn't until Sherry's gift had purged Zeniths drugs from his system and restored his lost fatigue that he'd been able to respond to his new orders:
"That plan suits me. I was hoping to stay in Chicago for a while longer, anyway."



As Sherry turned to enter the van and tend to the much-abused Ash, Zenith and Roman he called out his reply.
"C'mon Sherry, you know that I can't promise that. My careless attitude is, like... my fourth best feature."
Crimson pulled himself to his feet with exaggerated care, like all other gifted Sherry's healing abilities gave Daniel temporary side effects: His powers seemed to flow more freely and easily whilst his personal immunity faded by a small amount, not enough to put him in any danger but just enough to dissuade him from trying any fire tricks for a few short minutes. Furthermore, the sensation of restored strength and stamina after having just been on the verge of passing out was a uniquely strange feeling; he knew that he'd suffer a crash in less than a few hours, but for the moment at least he could appreciate his second wind.
"-Also! You might want to keep the President and the other two separated. I don't really know the details, but they don't seem to be on the same team any more!"

With still a few moments to go before he had to head out Daniel paced the waiting vehicles restlessly, and greeted Juniper.
"Captain! Flying's not the most subtle way to travel, for me. Any chance that you brought a spare bike?"
He turned his grin to Agent Jackson, and greeted him with a similar attitude.
"Old man Jackson! I saw you on the news, it looks as though we've interrupted your Ghost hunt. Sorry about that."

The old fighter shrugged.

"Eh, no big deal. With as much destruction as has happened here and them not showing up on our radar, either it was a rumor and no such Gifted existed here, or they were in the wrong place yada yada and really are a ghost now. Getting paid to drive around in Chicago was fun I'll admit, but I never did get to finish my hotdog; some loon in a church shot it out of my hand. I can see you've been busy too. You do know it's the bad guys' job to destroy the city, and ours to save it, right? Or is everything backwards with you Oriental types, like those funky Japanese comic books that go right to left?"

Frank winked to make his fellow agent aware he was joking good naturedly, then held up a hand and turned his back so as to respond to his communique.

"I'll take Gaultown, I've seen enough of Chicago to last me a while, and I could use a break from a major city. I'll leave for the airport, get me a fast plane cleared and make sure it can stow my bike too. Also, I'll need any and all info you have on the place. Copy?"

"Hold position, Frank. We don't have time for you to catch a plane, so we're sending in an Agent to get you there. Sherry, we'll need you out here to help out some." It was a moment before Sherry jumped back out of the truck, looking upset. "Are you kidding me?" She asked, looking extremely frustrated as she walked up next to Frank. "You realize I've already Juiced him twice today, right?" Her comm unit replied to her privately, and she just shook her head and took on a resigned expression.

"Phoenix, there's a bike already assigned to you. It's on its way as we speak. These bikes are keyed to their riders, so only you can move it, but their armor is negligible versus your Gift. Do not use your powers on or near the things. They will explode, and the explosion will be big. And they're expensive." The comm unit buzzed off and Juniper jumped in, clapping Phoenix on the back. "I've never seen you do anything subtly." Juniper said, glancing pointedly at the destroyed building. "Why would you bother starting now?" She winked at him.

There was a loud crack somewhere behind and over them, as if somebody had just left their airspace at supersonic speeds, and then the sound of someone falling onto the ground and scrambling to their feet. Jump stood there, shaking enough to be more than visible. His glasses were askew, and he seemed to be shuffling from foot to foot madly. "Sherry it feels like my heart is going to explode." He said, his voice shaking. Sherry blinked and scrambled over to him as quickly as she could manage, brushing against his skin. Some of the shaking abided, and he stopped shuffling, but he still looked uncomfortable. "What did they give you?!" She asked, surprise and anger dripping from her voice.

"Pure glucose packet with some steroids mixed in I think." He said. His voice wasn't shaking anymore, at least. "Here to pick up Frank and his bike." He said. "Special delivery to Gaultown. You get to hang with Response Team One, you lucky dog. You'll be arriving ahead of them by a couple of minutes, but hey. And pardon if my targeting is a bit off. It's rather difficult to focus." He shrugged. "But we'll end up in the right place, that's for sure. Let's go. I'm gonna port somewhere where they can't shove a heart-attack in a bag into me after."

"Ehh?! Now just hold on!-"
Phoenix Crimson Objected as both Juniper and Frank made reference to the burning warehouse illuminating them. He recognized that the pair were only joking, but just this once something had been reduced to a heap of flaming rubble and he wasn't to blame, and his pride ruffled at their accusations.
"Unbelievably, someone else set this building on fire first. I'm not taking responsibility if you put this on my expenses."

As Jump materialized with a sharp 'krakk' of displaced air Daniels posture stiffened as he turned to face the intrusion. The initial grin that he'd flashed when he recognised the new agent fell when he picked out the details. 'Of course' he thought 'Jump's been working support, poor guys probably been pushing past his limits all day'.
"Jump, you look like shit." he pointed an unempathic but concerned finger judgingly at him. "If you push yourself too hard and die playing 'Mister Taxi' after we've already won, I won't forgive you."
This message was last edited by the player at 08:05, Mon 24 Aug 2015.

Jump shrugged. "I was sleeping, actually." He said. "But the world doesn't sleep with me. I appreciate the concern, but I was being serious when I said I'd find somewhere to go and crash where they wouldn't stick me with heart-attack in a bag again. To be entirely honest, I've actually enjoyed myself. I've never ported this much in one day before, and I've figured a few neat tricks out." He grinned and winked. "Maybe I'll talk about it later, once I've figured out how to actually put the concepts into words."

Frank stood by quietly as the younger man chatted, ready to go when he was.

Pheonix Crimsons grin returned.
"I'll look forward to it. In the meantime you'd better get going- once the terrible trio are locked away Chicago's going to be filled with spare agents, and if you don't make tracks you'll probably get roped into jumping them all back to NewYork to deal with this 'Cheshire' thing."

He looked down the streets roads as he waited for his own transportation to arrive.
He'd asked the ITDSA's armourer for a motorbike once before; but had been firmly rebuked on the basis that he'd already spent an absurd amount of his expense budget on his flight suit, and that they'd completely refused to build him one with a bright crimson colour scheme. Life was cruel sometimes.

Jump nodded and grabbed Frank's arm. "Alright, I don't normally cut corners but since you're not as fragile as my normal passengers are, this might sting a little." He cracked his neck and glanced at the Frank's bike as well. "I call it bungy jumping. Lots faster, and way cheaper on the calories scale. A lot bumpier too though, so..." He shrugged, and there was a loud crack as Frank, Jump, and Frank's bike disappeared. Everyone depth perception was thrown wildly off for a moment before returning to normal.

Jumped to Gaultown

As soon as Jump left and Sherry had reoriented herself, she stalked back to the truck and hopped back in, slamming the sliding door shut behind her. A motorbike rolled up without a driver and stopped, shutting itself off silently. "Your bike's here, Crimson." His comm said briefly before clicking back to something else.

'My bike can drive itself, that is SO freakin' awesome.' Phoenix thought.

He strode through the spot that Frank and Jump had occupied only a brief moment before, swung a leg over his vehicle and saddled himself. With a twist of the handles throttle he felt the vehicle hum back into life with restrained, stealthy, yet potent, strength.
As Daniel habitually flicked the charred remains of his scarf over his shoulder he began to appreciate the sense of excitement building within him; Even before he'd become Gifted he'd been a big fan of the 'funky Japanese comic books' that Jackson had mentioned, and his situation reminded him of one particular hero and a simpler time. It was little moments like this that Daniel lived for.

He took a moment to pair his masks systems with his bikes, and idled it into position beside Sherry's truck.
"Crimson Rider, ready to move out."
He checked his formation against the other riders. Even though he had almost accomplished his mission he couldn't afford to lower his guard; there was every chance that Namidians were still watching from the shadows, waiting for a chance to jailbreak their two comrades.

The scattered personnel, bikes, and truck melted out of sight. There was a faint humming sound to anyone within 200 feet of the semi-truck, and if they looked out their vision seemed to be slightly clouded beyond a certain point. Not enough to be a risk, but enough that it was obvious that someone was using some sort of gift. Most of the other people seemed to be used to it and kept on about their business, finishing up the last of their preparations to depart. "Crimson, we're placing you with Captain Hall's squad in front of the truck. We depart in 5 minutes. There's going to be a gifted taking care of moving the semi-truck for us so we won't have to deal with the cab, and the truck is reinforced. We have a perception filter set up already, but it's not perfect. The truck can't take that much punishment, so keep an eye out."

June turned to Crimson, hopping on her bike and flicking it on. "You'll be shifted back into Chicago on the outskirts of the city. We've got replacements set up there to take our place when we split up. Until then, you're considered a member of my squad and I'd appreciate if you did your damndest to listen to me. You've already been linked into my comm-channel." She cracked her neck and moved quickly into position, waiting for the orders to move out.

Exactly when the comm had said, the truck behind Crimson and June's group made a strange groaning noise before moving forwards slowly. June waved her hand and kept her distance ahead of the truck even as it began to speed up quickly and began its route for the outskirts of town.

"Whatever you say, bossman."

As the cabless truck drove its way through Chicago Phoenix Crimson shadowed it's every move. Between Captain Harding's visual distortions and the muted engines of the convoy the journey was almost eerily silent and Daniel fought to keep his senses focused for the slightest disturbance that could warn against an imminent attack.

The damaged city provided plenty of it's own background noise; the distant bass roar of fire, a scattered police siren, someone shattering glass, but nothing that indicated any directed threat.
It seemed as though the Namidians had accomplished their goal, and any Villains remaining in the windy city were too scattered or disinterested to spare the ITDSA's armoured convoy any thought.

Suzanne Greens sat behind her large, expensive desk which had been a gift from the investors after her record first quarter earnings her second year of operating the small defense contractor and rubbed the bridge of her nose. Last night, the company had been hacked and the company employee and investor records had been taken by what appeared to be a leftist collective anti-war group. The data taken was not so important but the breach was bad. Their stock prices would plummet if it got out. She tapped a few keys on her computed and checked her personal e-mail accounts, but did nothing official as she waited for Jerry from IT.

---

Jerry liked his job; he misliked his employers. He and a small group of like-minded nerds he had all but cherry-picked and groomed ran the IT department for a small but well-ff company. All he had to do was keep the computers from frying under the careless use of the regular employees and he made considerable bank. Normally, that was; last night was one of the rare cases where he had to work overtime and overly hard. A midnight call from the overnight watch had been the first alert;it had been followed by a long night of "cyber warfare." It wasn't like that shit in movies though. It was hard, complicated work. At last, early in the morning they had gotten what looked like the last of the system secured and offline. Internal memos were out to not use computers for any personal of business purposes until IT had personally cleared your terminal and issued new clearances, passcodes, and security keys.

He nodded to Maryanne as he approached CEO Greens' office and was waved on in. The woman sighed at him and made an annoyed motion at her computer. He noted a personal e-mail site open and sighed himself. He took internal pleasure as she displaced from her seat to the large, plush sofa and he usurped her seat.He noted that she had oddly placed herself at the far end of the sofa instead of nearer the desk but shrugged. He opened up his case and set it aside after taking out several discs. He began the process of scrubbing and recovering her system. At some point,Greens moved to the closer side of the sofa but he hadn't noticed.

"Okay, Miss Greens, I did a complete wipe and restore on your system. Your personal content will be missing now. To restore sensitive files, wait until tomorrow when access to the secure internal servers is reopened. We need to make sure there is no more dangers left in the system. I have here your new passcodes and passwords. Ah here... uh... I must have left your new passkey in the office. It's been a crazy day. I'll have a lackey bring it up in a minute. Any questions?"

---

Suzanne stared at  the IT flunky in cool disdain until he gulped then got out of her chair. The affect to her personal data was minimal. She kept no personal work here, what little she had, and what she might have lost she wouldn't miss. Lacking access to certain work files was going to be irksome, but she would have to bear it. Rushing to work would be counterproductive if any left-over cyber invaders were still lurking. She watched from behind her desk as he left before breaking the seal on her new security profile and leafing through it. She set it aside for a bit and tapped at her computer a bit.

---

He casually leafed through the papers he had just jerked from her hands and took a picture of each page with his cell phone. She had looked confused and irritated for a split second then her mind had been shoved away from thinking about the papers by his gift. He had no way of knowing how she was..not perceiving it, but he cared little. A second latter and he set the papers down. She casually took them up and started scanning again. Nemo strolled casually over to the sofa where he had been sitting all morning since following Suzanne into the company's building and sipped the coffee he had similarly liberated from her during the car ride in. He set his phone on his knee, not on the arm of the sofa, and took the tablet out of his messenger bag. He ran a few apps and programs and used her brand new security profile to log in. Sure enough, she had far more sweeping powers in the system than she was probably aware but was mandated by company policy. The CEO obviously got Administrative access even if she had no clue how to use it. He chuckled as he carefully constructed a back window into the system. Why hack a system when you could make a door? Using her security profile continuously would be risky, but using it to construct his own secret profile was not. He chuckled as he worked.

Minutes later, he used his access to security cameras to scrub his presence in the building clean. He also studied the security layout, accessed several other security profiles, and carefully planned. He would be scouting this company for the next two weeks. Paying that hacker collective to create the security emergency was a trick he had used a few times. It usually worked.

He finished the coffee,threw it in her bin, then strolled out of the office.A few people looked confused at his passing as their willpower was strong enough to notice the anomalous path he wove but most never even looked up no matter what he did. he took a sick joy from it even as it ate at his insides. He was a ghost, the invisible man, Nemo. Inside a couple weeks, he would have total access to this company's research projects an files and he would sell it to whomever the highest bidder was. He might even sell it back to the company if their bid was high enough. He would be sure they knew once it was on the market. He chuckled even as he made a few unnoticed, mischievous stops on his way out of the building.

Once outside, he stopped to access the tablet again and scrub the security system of his presence again. Now that he had the tablet, he needn't come back but he should make sure that once his gift was absent no one would know it was him. They might, weeks from now after his auction was live, go back and notice the anomalies in the security once they knew to look for something, but they would probably never figure out who he was.

He crossed the street to the fast food burger place and walked in. He strolled past all the people, noting how they unconsciously swerved around him. he could have lifted the counter but he slid over instead. Things like lifting the counter lowered the threshold of his gift, so he didn't like to push it too much. he strolled to the hopper and mused for a bit.

---

Jimmy stared at a point hovering in space somewhere a foot in front of the cheeseburgers and tried to remember what he was doing.

"Jimmy! Two cheeseburgers, one fry, two large colas. Come on son!"

Jimmy shook his head and moved to the hopper and stared in confusion. "Mr. Cooper, there's nothing here yet!"

"What?" I just made the burgers, kid! Lemme see.. Well, shit.. Must be the rats." Jimmy saw the look he got and resented it. Just because he was a hungry teen boy didn't mean he had stolen the food.. this time. He swung his sight out to the crowded eating are and stared suspiciously.

---

At the only empty table in the crowded restaurant, Nemo sat by himself eating a burger with the other tucked under his hand.Unattended objects lost the benefit of his gift. As long as he was covering it with his hand like this, people would ignore it too. He sighed as a pair of teen boys slid into the booth ignoring him and began to ogle and talk lewdly about the women in the place. He sighed and finished his burger before throwing the second one at the first boy. The kid jumped up and started shouting accusingly at people nearby as Nemo slipped out of the booth, exited, and walked away.

To Be Continued...

Erin had stopped thinking of himself as Jump after Chicago. Now he was a nobody, a ghost in the system. After the incidents in Chicago, Erin had disappeared. It hurt him, to avoid his friends and watch what happened to them from a distance. He wanted to be there for them, but after blame had been leveled for everything that had happened, he had decided that it was best for him to give it up. The hero spiel, that was. This by no means meant that he had gone villain. He had done a couple of bad things to survive, yes, but he tried to avoid hurting people that couldn't afford it. Unlike this asshole.

"I don't suppose you've learned your lesson?" Erin asked, turning around and quirking his head in the direction of the small man struggling against invisible bonds. He was middle aged, probably, and while Erin could only discern shapes, considering the man's excessive compliment of weapons and what he had been attempting to do before Erin had taken him, he was fairly confident that he was in one of the many gangs that ran around the city of Chicago and terrorized an already terrified population. None of the weapons were still on him, of course. Those were at the bottom of Chicago River. At no response from the man other than grunting noises, Erin stretched his hand out and snapped.

It apparently did the trick, as the man began screaming quite loudly. Floating thousands of feet in the air did that to normal people. "Alright, so, I'm currently holding you up, but really, I have no desire in keeping you around if you're going to try robbing people that can barely feed themselves. So here's what's going to happen." Erin smiled faintly, quite proud of how well he was hiding the strain of generating a portal large enough to fit him and the man and displacing the strong winds generated at this altitude.

"I'm going to put you back on the ground, and you're not going to rob people. Starving or not, turning on each other is really only going to get everyone killed. Trust me on that. Any questions?" He asked politely.

The man squeaked and nodded his head emphatically. Erin shook his head and turned around, both he and the man suddenly back in the alleyway they had started in. Before he reached the sidewalk, he pulled his cane out of his jacket and extended it, walking on as if nothing odd had happened at all. He grinned slyly as the man scrambled out of the alleyway and ran in the opposite direction.

***

 The oscillating fan over his head was barely displacing the air at all, and the heat was getting to him. He stared at the small living room of the small house he had claimed for his temporary stay in Chicago and sighed. With a small twist of his hand, Erin cracked space over his head and an extremely cold wind blew through, quickly cooling the heated room. Erin relaxed back into the couch,and dozed off.

The sound of footsteps in the hallway woke him. He started and stood, staring worriedly at the door as a man pulled out a key and slowly inserted it into the lock. As soon as it had turned 90 degrees, Erin turned and looked out over the city line, atop Sears Tower. He hated the squatting and the running. But he liked the anonymity. He liked the freedom. It was better than what the ITSDA would have had to do to him. An Oversight committee. The horror that would have caused him.

He sighed, and looked down at his stomach as it grumbled loudly. He supposed that it was about time he ate again. He hated that too. Leaving the ITSDA meant he had no job. No job meant no money. No money meant he had to steal to live. It had grated on him more at the beginning of his forced isolation, but it had become easier now. He turned around again and walked out of an alleyway a block down from his favorite burger joint, grabbing his cane and flicking it out.

There was a quiet meaty thud that surprised Erin, and he immediately quirked his head slightly towards the man that he had not noticed. "I am terribly sorry sir, I didn't see you there. Please forgive me." He then turned his head and continued on, stepping energetically towards the burger joint before he recalled that he was blind. He took a quick guilty look around, but noticed no one close enough to have seen him, and then proceeded to click-clack his way towards the building.

Nemo was out the door before it registered; someone had talked to him. They hadn't talked about him or at him, but about him. Two things sank into his mind at the same time: he had let his guard down and this was his first interaction with a living person in months. It was terrifying on many different and earthquake like levels.

He was back through the door and moving along the restaurant service area like a stalking panther instantly. He paid little attention to the people around him as they stepped out of his way without realizing it. Other people didn't even register them stepping out of his way as that would be an acknowledgement of his existence as well. Oh, they saw, heard, smelt, and interacted with him but not at a conscious level. It was how his "Gift" manifested. People interacted with him as normal mostly but simply could not register it, acknowledge it, or create memories of the interaction. IF people just couldn't see him, maybe his life wouldn't be the absolute mess it was. No: he was undetectable because he could not be acknowledged in proximity to him.

Some donut eating slob at Burger Shack corporate HQ going through the video of this branch might not him and think him a bit odd for just charging through the room. He had developed navigation habits in response to how the world operated around him after all. As long as he moved so that any normal person might notice him, these people would move according to if he was charging right at them if he did but have no clue why they suddenly jumped back or swerved a different direction. They'd did it, remember that they did, but he would not be part of the memory as its cause. More, others might not even ask them why they had. His gift was strong.

As he stalked the man, he noted the cane and the blank gaze and that made sense. Sometimes, people with sensory disabilities had a better chance of piercing his gift. They tended to be more focused and attentive to their other senses and more aware of the world. They often navigated differently. Still, most of them did not register him either. No, it took extreme willpower to note him. This man was unique; Nemo had long since learned that the majority of those who noted him were worth noting in return either as enemies or marks. Thus, he took care to stay out of this man's sensory ranges as best he could. It was hard to mark a blind man's hearing range. He was cautious; he observed.

The trip up the counter was swifter than anticipated, and Erin pulled a few dollars out of his jacket to pay for the service before taking the burgers and heading for a table. Something was bothering him though. A nagging at the back of his neck, as if someone were watching him. And something didn't feel right in the area. He just couldn't place what was causing the feeling though. He sat down at an empty table for 2 and ate his burger slowly, attempting to concentrate on his surroundings as much as possible. Everything seemed normal, but he couldn't shake that feeling of being watched.

He went over every single person around him, judging the direction of their head in relation to where he was sitting in order to figure out if they were looking at him. A couple glanced in his direction, which wasn't unusual. He was a blind man, and people seemed to take that as right to stare. It was with a start that he noticed something odd. Another person that he had gone over before. He vaguely remembered going over that person a couple of other times too, but it was odd, as if he were looking at the memories through a thick fog. Only after focusing explicitly on that location was Erin able to grasp the fact that he knew the man. Wasn't he the one that Erin had apologized to on the street? He wasn't great at recognizing people based solely on their physique, since his spatial awareness didn't offer a great deal of perception in relation to detailed features, but he was almost positive that this was the man from outside.

What should he do? The man was clearly a Gifted of some sort or another, with the way he seemed to be able to avoid detection. It was extremely difficult even for Erin to focus on him. Every time his perception shifted even a tiny bit, he lost track of the man, and finding him again was as hard as catching a fish with his bare hands. Why was the man following him? Chance coincidence? Or darker intentions? Was he with the ITSDA? Namidian Wave? Erin gulped down the last of his burger and stood up, heading slowly for the door. He was dedicating so much of his attention to trying to keep track of this man that he didn't have to pretend to be blind to the rest of the world.

Getting outside was a slow trek. Erin had had his Gift for so long that not being without it was, well, like suddenly losing his eyes. Walking blind was a far more complicated process than he had anticipated. He chose an alleyway at random and wandered down it, temporarily losing track of the slippery man before locating him again at the entrance. Erin turned his head and made a waving gesture, hoping that the man had actually followed him, than pointed behind a dumpster and walked behind it. He tapped the wall and walked through it into an empty park, sitting on a bench and waiting patiently to see if the man would decide to follow. As soon as he'd walked through the portal, he lost track of the man, but whatever Gift the man held seemed to lose its grasp over him. His memories were far from clear, but the effort he'd had to put into keeping track of the man's existence was vastly decreased.

He  briefly thought over who this man might be, but nothing occurred to him. It may have best to have simply run. He shook his head. Running was still an option, and he might learn something valuable by attempting to speak with the man, so he sat still and stared at the portal. He'd give it 5 minutes, and if nobody showed up, he'd assume the worst and jump somewhere else.
This message was last edited by the player at 16:55, Tue 13 June 2017.

NEmo prided himself on his ability, even if he rarely had to push himself any more.he supposed a more talented man might have taken his new Gift for granted or a less talented man would not have seen the loopholes in the Gift. Nemo had never had many illusions as to his capability. In high school he had managed a consistent A honor roll, sure, but he had done so through diligence and care. Always he had been careful, a planner, caluculating. No, he was not one to posses more than an average intellect or physique and that he knew it had always been his weapon. Nemo did not entertain false pride, vanity, or underestimation. He did not think any more or any less of himself or others than was merited if at all possible.

This practicality had made him a good spy and an excellent thief. Now, he applied it again. It wasn't hard to tell when the man was focused on him again. It was hard to track Nemo under any circumstance; to do anything less than focus completely was begging to fail. So, each time the man seemed to be tracking him again, Nemo just used a little knowledge of pursuit to make it just a bit harder and the man seemed to lose him again.

However, his razor analysis told him that every time the man locked onto him again, Nemo got pulled further into the pursuit himself. he was becoming obsessed. When the man ducked behind a dumpster, these thoughts fled and Nemo focused wholly on moving slowly to get a view behind it without compromising his position. As he stared at the blank spot where the man should have been and the errant apparition on the wall, he calmly focused on this obsession.

The man was either better at espionage than Nemo first suspected and had given him the slip or he was Gifted; too,the man could just have the aid of a gifted individual. None of the three options were exceptionally appealing to his paranoid sense of safety. All three scenarios seemed to suggest a certain amount of danger to his way of life,mission, and health. Still,he couldn't deny that he was still quite obsessed with the man. Was he obsessed with human contact or the threat to himself; neither was a pleasant possibility. One seemed to suggest he cut ties and leave; the other begged investigation. Investigating would be good and it didn't harm his ulterior motive, so he decided to make the next move. He observed the image through what he suspected was a portal and noted the park. It wasn't far from here but if the man thought he was going through a spacial anomaly that he controlled...

Instead, Nemo moved quickly and a dead run along the sidewalks and streets toward the park.he left a wake of chaos and accidents behind him, but as long as he avoided collisions then he was unmolested and unnoticed. He made it to the park in a few minutes and spotted the man quickly. He stopped and stod a few meters from the man to catch his breath.

Jump had encountered a lot in his 11 years of working for the ITSDA, but no information or experience with this man (or whatever gift this man held) occurred to him. He had heard no news, seen no reports, seen nothing odd. Which was in itself slightly odd. Jump was, after all, renowned for his senses, and to have someone so easily counter them was slightly aggravating. Thus he very carefully noted that distance seemed to not only relieve some of the pressure this man exuded on Erin's mind, but seemed to remove it completely. It was quite simple to track the man's trek through the city, though the portal skewed his perception slightly, so after the man ran off to get to him on his own, he closed it quickly.

Though at least that told him a little bit about him. Curiosity, but tempered with caution. Not using a strange Gifted's portal was intelligent. Something to be marked, at the very least. How was he supposed to record information on this man though? He could hardly use a computer or cellphone. Writing was out of the question. Erin could write, surprisingly. He was able to track the displaced space of lead and ink on a piece of paper, as long as he payed close enough attention. He just didn't have a notebook to write on. In either case, he dedicated the next stretch of time to tracking the man and noting exactly when his Gift started to affect Erin.

Thus when Nemo arrived on the scene, he saw Erin sitting very sedately on the park bench exactly where he had been before. His eyes were closed, but his head was inclined in the general direction of him. He stood and approached a couple of feet, careful to try and keep as much distance as possible, just in case the man was jumpy. He offered a bow, figuring a handshake would get the man closer than he wanted to be, and spoke.

"I'm Erin, previously known as Jump. Ex-Agent of ITSDA. I can't really use either name now, since they're both being tracked. Call me whatever you want. Who are you? And why were you following me?" Erin stood from the bow and backed up a single step. He was very relaxed in general demeanor, but an attentive individual would notice he was on a hair-trigger, ready to jump away (figuratively and literally) at the slightest provocation.
This message was last edited by the player at 05:10, Mon 26 June 2017.

Nemo grit his teeth as the man tracked him. Something curdled beneath his skin as the man approached. On one hand, Nemo was relieved that there were still those who could "see" him, but it also irked and disturbed him. Not the least was because he was working. After a long, silent pause, Nemo responded, "I am no one. You saw; I followed."

The words fell from his lips rustily. It was hard for him to form English any more; It was hard to interact at any level at all. Most of his contact with other humans was via the interwebs and not direct. It was uncomfortable. He wondered if he was jeopardizing his work with this fiat yet again. The fact that the man was ITSDA, even formerly, set his hair on end. This was not going well.

Importantly for this encounter, Nemo forgot that he might need to say anything more.

"Why did you follow?" Jump asked offhandedly. "Your gift was working on me. If you hadn't gone to such lengths to track me, I never would've even realized you existed."

He gestured at a bench sitting across from him. "If we're going to talk, you may as well sit. Unless you want to go, or try to kill me. Either way, this might be a long conversation and there's no need to be standing for the whole thing. Whatever you choose, I've got no desire to kill you and the chances that you'll be able to get from there," Erin pointed at the ground where Nemo was standing, and then pointed underneath his feet," to here before I make the decision to move to the Bahamas is slim. Unless you've got superspeed too. Which would just be unfair."
This message was last edited by the player at 15:10, Mon 17 July 2017.

The man appeared relaxed; Nemo had no such appearance.  He was not uncomfortable, but he was at a more elevated than normal state of paranoia and anxiety. He was quite used to paranoia and anxiety. They were his constant companions and allies. He moved slowly to the other bench and sat down on its edge. He was ready to move at any moment.

Nemo didn't like confronting the Gifted. Put him up against most other humans and he could hold his own, his training made sure of it, but Gifted were not humans and he often had issues overcoming them. His Gift often helped in this; it was hard to defend against something you had troubles or could not track.

This man posed all sorts of troubling issues for his current world view and set of practices in doing his work. But his well trained mind worried at the problem like a terrier with a rat. He was not a man who could thunderbolt a solution out of thin air, but with time and patience he had solved many problems the so-called elite could not. Nemo had a plodding, careful sort of intellect: powerful but slow. Much of that slowness came from him worrying at every possible angle of attack and possibility for variation.

He applied this intellect to a small fraction of the present problem while he acknowledged that there was much of the iceberg below the surface yet. "I followed you because piercing my Gift is a rare aptitude and it posses problems for my line of work."

He tasted the rhetoric of the sentence and found it was well crafted to suit his purposes with plenty of room to audible if needed. Now, to add a question which ought to put the active role of this conversation back in the other man's hands, "Former ITSDA? What are you doing now?"

Jump examined the man as he sat, trying to understand what was going through his head. He wasn't as paranoid as him, but the time he'd been on the run had taught him a little paranoia, and he sacrificed some of his focus on the man to stretch out for a connection with... Toronto. Who would expect him to show up in Toronto? He immediately felt the effects of the man's gift affect him more though, as it took him a couple of moments of thought processing to even remember what had been said to him.

"Running." He said, glancing at the man. "Life got too... too wrong for me. If you're worried about me turning you in, they're just as likely to grab me as you. I'm sure they've thought of something to keep me from jumping at this point. Spending valuable resources on trying to catch a harmless man instead of actually doing what they're supposed to do." He sighed, reigning his temper in. Too much spite had filtered into his comments. "That wasn't the question, sorry. I kind of just... exist right now. I don't really do anything. I scare burglars and steal money to buy food like a hypocrite. Jump to a new city every few days. Just came from Seoul, actually. Hard when I don't speak Korean, but eh, it was nice anyways."

"What about you? What do you do?"
This message was last edited by the player at 13:30, Wed 26 July 2017.

The man's answers were not quite what he was hoping for; however, Nemo was a man that kept his expectations low. His expectations of humanity and what life would hand him. Life was handing him lemon today, rotten lemons. He frowned.

"Me? I am an independent contractor."

Still, he had developed an idea for this encounter and saw a narrow, fraught path that lead toward that objective still. He stroked his chin and sat back a bit on his bench. It had been a long time since he got to play this particular game and he was recalling how much he enjoyed it. He did note the man's struggle to keep Nemo in his perception with a smile. It would appear that moderate levels of deliberate evasion on his part would allow him to slip away from this individual. Nemo noted that carefully.

"So, on the run but still scaring the local criminals as you do? How's that working out for you?"

In reply to Nemo (msg # 107):

"Surprisingly well. It's struck me that they might not even be tracking me down, but my pride simply couldn't suffer such a wound as that, so I've dismissed the idea." Jump said, leaning back on the bench and gesturing openly. "However, I'm afraid that it's really losing its appeal. There always seems to be more, and I've even met a couple of the same people. I'm really not that scary a person. My gifts have little to no combat applicability, seeing as I refuse to teleport people into solid objects, or vice versa. It's quite gory when I do that. Very hard to clean up."

He looked at the man across from him, really looked, very briefly, and then looked away. Jump wasn't capable of seeing through solid objects, per se. He couldn't see through a solid brick wall very much better than a normal person. But thinner things, cloth, glass, etcetera... there was a trick to trying to look through those things that took a bit of practice for him to grasp well, but it had proved invaluable. Hidden weapons, things past closed windows.

He shook his head. "Do you want my business card?" Jump asked the man.

<On a random street>

Steel-gray eyes beheld the sky, and then the world around him as people walked past hypnotized by little devices and cars crawled past in rush hour sludge. The figure took out a cigarette case, scratched a match against the bottom of his shoe, and lit up as he took it all in;

It was different, no doubt about it, yet he could tell it was Chicago; not his Chicago of course, yet it would be...

The removed his wallet from an inside coat pocket, took out a dated one hundred dollar bill, and waved down a taxi. It was driven by a woman from clearly another country, yet the man simply chalked that up to the strange surroundings he currently found himself in. He climbed into the back, and handed the money to the lady upfront. She looked at it skeptically, nd frowned.

"This no real, you get out!"

The gentleman leaned back in his seat, and steepled his fingers.

"I assure you, my good woman, it is indeed most real. In fact I'm so sure of it, how about you and I make a little wager, hmm? I can't remember when I last ate, so you drop me off at a restaurant close to a bank; go in, and ask them if it's real. If it isn't, you know where I'll be and can call the coppers on me easy. But, if it is, then you become my driver until midnight. All you have to lose is a little time, and you stand to gain one hundred dollars. So, feel like a gamble?"

The driver considered it, then nodded.

"Many cabs on road, sometimes not make much money. If this real, I drive you all day. If not, I call police on bad man."

The figure gave a nod.

"Yes, those are the terms as I laid them out, of our bet. Shall we be off then?"

The woman put the taxi into gear, wedged herself into the slow traffic, and they were off at a crawl to a bank.

True to his word, when the cab parked the gentleman got out and went into a restaurant just a couple doors down from the bank and left the driver to check the suspicious bill. He looked around the inside of the eatery, then made his way to the counter and made himself at home on a stool. An old man with white hair and a wrinkled face walked up to him, pulling and order pad out of a pocket as he did so.

"What'll ya have, son?"

The fellow produced another bill almost exactly like the first, only the serial number had increased by one.

"Before I order, would you have any problem with me paying with this?"

The man took the money, held it up to the light, flipped it over, then looked back at his new customer with a grin.

"Wow, you really go all out, don't ya? I mean sure I get gangster buffs in here sometimes, a few of 'em even dress up in outfits like yours. But, outside of you, I've had maybe two guys total actually pay with period money. They spent a good part of their paycheck to get a handful of bills, and even then the stuff was ratty and ripped in places. Yours, now yours looks like it came right out a museum. I can't imagine how much it set you back, and I don't think I want to since even now I can hear my own bank account crying. Are you sure you want to pay with this? I mean yeah my food's good, but I could no doubt sell this to a collector for several times face value at least."

The stranger's smirk grew bigger.

"Of course I'm sure, what's the point of having money after all if not to spend it? And thank you for the compliment, I do try to be as realistic as possible and I'm glad it impresses you. As for my meal, just bring me the specialty of the house and a coffee. Ah, coffee, I haven't had any since, well since..."

The younger man shook his head.

"Strange, can't seem to remember. I guess that just means I need it all the more."

The owner laughed at the joke, and walked off to get a burger and fries going. As requested, he brought back a mug of coffee, and sat it down in front of the fellow while pointing out where the cream and sugar were; the new arrival looked at these things questioningly, then proceeded not to touch them and opted to drink the brew black instead while he awaited his food.
This message was last edited by the player at 09:31, Wed 30 Aug 2017.