*****
<Inside the casino>
*****

The Explosion has some kick back and shrapnel flies in limited directions thanks to DS’s new shield. Unicorn and Silvermane block the shrapnel coming for them they were far enough away that there wasn’t too much Unicorn gave a couple of quick blasts hitting some of the “bigger” debris and Silvermane body resisted the smaller pieced . But Silvermane looked displeased.
The robotic form with an old man head looked at the 2 villains on the ground, He shook his head stepping out of the entrance and kicking over a table, a seemingly odd agility and strength comes from the robot which just looks very odd with the old man’s head on it.
Hammerhead should never be allowed to run anything.

He said more to himself then to Unicorn.

Unicorn Looked over at the shouting hero, and as Darkstar spoke to Lois Unicorn did not hesitate to open fire. His protruding tip from his helmet lit up sending a blast towards Darkstar barely missing him.

With Cyclone and Hydroman down this left TaskMistress to be able to manoeuver where she needed however the entrance was now partially blocked by this large robot guy and Unicorn.



****
Outside
****

Lois stayed low and made her way to the front of the casino which was almost empty now of people seeing the chaos seeing Eel standing in the street as Spiderman and Aurora are saving the civilians on the sidewalk. There were a few of the Maggia henchman laying flat on their backs on the street 2 of them slowly getting up. Most of the crowd was now dispersed with the exception of a few that Spiderman and Aurora were dealing with.

Lois looks out to the street and can see Bloodrager flailing his sword and moving in towards the opposite side of the street on the sidewalk where a woman and her daughter are  Crouched not far from him looking in his direction in sheer terror as Bloodrager advances on them.

********
Downstairs
********

Dee Dee now in Monkey form looks around the room there is a large metal table similar to something seen in the Frankenstein movies of which the large Robot Silvermane just got up from, Wires and various cables are attached to the table and the wires run to a large switchbox in a rack with various machines in them, to her left is a filing cabinet in front of her is a desk with a laptop,it’s opened but in sleep mode a file lays under it.

Being outmatched and having herself freed temporarily from the Water Wizard she went to gather the Intel. Since the two were blocking the entrance she decided to go further into the building instead. Her plan was to retrieve the files and report back to Naslund.

The civilians were gone and his team mates were gone, as far as he could tell.  Even the various bad guys were mostly non-moving except for Robo-senior and Hornhead.  Despite that, Kevin hesitated slightly before doing it.

All his abilities had kinks, weaknesses and potential drawbacks.  His force field couldn't deal with lasers and if he got stuck "on" he could suffocate.  His energy blasts were effective but also at least as lethal as actual bullets and quite a bit more powerful.  His Darkvision made him sensitive to bright lights.  His wings were, well, wings so could couldn't use them in cramped  areas.  His constructs tended to melt in bright lights and he could only do one of them at a time.  The teleporting was pretty cool but learning it had been a bitch since it tended to leave him seasick on crack at first.  But the Darkness was the one power he really disliked using.

He could feel something like a door open within him and the Darkness poured out, flooding and filling the room with its near-suffocating blackness.  In his travels, Kevin had been in urban and rural environments.  He knew the difference between "city-dark" an "country dark."  This was nothing like that.  The Darkness wasn't a simple absence of light that "Night vision goggles" or even normal flashlights could ease.  It was a Presence all its own.  Some relic of the primordial Night that still thrived in whatever place it was from which he drew his power.

And it was comfortable.  Inviting.  Homey, even.  Every time Kevin let it come he seemed to feel a bit more reluctant to send it away.  It was like some part of him liked it.  Loved it.  Wanted to fill the whole damn world with it.  And that scared him more and on a deeper level than even Belial had.

The intense utter Darkness filled the room now and Kevin began carefully and as quietly as possible moving through it, watching his two enemies to see if they could detect him well enough to target him and otherwise getting into position to take them apart if they couldn't.  Kevin was fully in his element.  And they were in his element too, the poor bastards.
This message was last edited by the player at 17:39, Thu 07 Mar 2019.

Lois fumbled between her various radios, making sure she sent one to Bloodrager and not the bad guys.  She had to stop her (out of control?) teammate from a friendly fire incident.

“Blooodrager, stop swinging!  You going to hit civilians.  Head inside the casino if you want to keep fighting.”

The red man paused, stopping in his tracks. His blind eyes tried to see through the glare but failed, and he half-turned in the direction that the voice coming over the 'magic amulet' was in, lunging at where he thought Lois might be from the sound. Swordpoint first.

Might have been a good thing if someone, during training, had said 'Hey, don't try and talk to Bloodrager!  He's *way* too out of it during combat to take sensible advice, or understand basic English!'   

She flew swiftly, and tried to move Lois gently aside, saying "I think that's how he heals people?  What he does confuses the hell out of me.     Maybe best not to find out right now?"   

With all the commotion going on upstairs, Deedee decided that it was probably safer to do the quick grab. So a hop up to the table, grab the laptop and file, then it's a shift into mongoose and bolt for it.

With the way up still open and her small size, Deedee hoped that the smaller rodent form wouldn't be noticed.

Worst case scenario, if she got spotted she could go insect and make her way out that way. It would just take a heck of a lot longer...

"Yeah, but his way of healing is going to definitely give some people here nightmares tonight,"Spider-Man commented as he proceeded to fire his webs at the pair of Maggia men in an attempt to keep them stuck to the ground.

*****
Inside
*****

Taskmistress: Although the initial path to downstairs was blocked heading the other way lead her to an area with several offices, With the commotion it seemed that no one had time to lock the doors. Taskmistress checked several doors and found the largest of 3 offices, inside it was quite the flashback to the early era of gangster’s with pictures of Capone, Lucky Luciano and Carlo Gambino and not to be outdone and adding to his ego behind the desk there was a large self portrait of Hammerhead himself.
There were also  Various old crime movie posters. In the back center of the room there was the  a large mahogany Desk with a beautiful finish there were various papers and files on the desk and off to the wall in the back was a large filing cabinet.


Darkstar:
The darkness filled the room. If anyone were to be watching the camera’s in that area there would be nothing to show but a black feed. The energy surrounded Kevin like a blanket seeping throughout the room. Unicorn and Silvermane where left blinded. Kevin easily seeing their white outlined silhouette along with the silhouette of all the objects in the room. Unicorn started to panic.
<green> What the hell?<green> He shouted out no longer aware of his surrounding and started firing random blasts, But with his vision impaired there was no real target. Kevin was able to maneuver easily around to get close to both Silvermane and Unicorn without much effort.
Who turned out the damn lights? Silvermane shouts out to no one in particular.


*****
Outside
*****

Mortis / Bloodrager:
The message sounded out to Bloodrager, he turned and pointed his sword toward the entrance his eye slowly starting to focus now as most of the exterior lights no longer were a factor.


Aurora / Spiderman

Aurora lands next to Mortis looking around as Spiderman Webs up a couple of the Maggia thugs who had been close to Bloodrager and fell down having slipped due to Big Red’s spell.
The Duo suddenly realized that besides a few of the Maggia thug, the others were gone… Slipped out during the confusion, there were no signs of Speed Demon, Hammerhead or the Eel.

*****
Downstairs
*****

Dee Dee

DeeDee grabbed what she could and bolted upstairs half way up the stairs she had to stop, through the open door she had come in she could now see pure darkness, Her animal eyes couldn’t seem to adjust to see this wasn’t just a lights out sort of darkness… This was a solid black wall,


*****
Back At HQ
*****

Jocasta finally came on the comms,
Apologies on the delay the systems of the casino had been diverted and the security encryption were a lot more complex than they should have been. And I have been trying to get Clockwork but his system is too foreign.
We’ll need someone to gather Clockwork. Naslund added. Accessed a few of the camera’s and see this didn’t quite go as smoothly as we had hoped.

Kevin didn't reply to either of the Supers' comments.  No sense making noise to give them a possible target.  There were some "super villains" (he still thought that term was silly as hell) who might decide to play cat and mouse games.  Martin Devereaux had pretty thoroughly kicked (and sneered and viciously sarcasted) those tendencies out of Kevin in favor of instilling a kind of ruthless, efficient professionalism when it came to pounding the fuck out of others.

Even now he could almost hear that cold acerbic voice.  "The object in a battle is to win and to win as quickly and with the least amount of cost and effort possible, dear boy.  If your battle somehow has rules or proscriptions against cheating or some silly buggering notions of honor or fair play, that is not a battle.  It is a game and an unrealistic one at that."

A goodly part of that efficiency involved creating and then pitilessly exploiting every possible advantage.  The Darkness was a huge advantage and Kevin duly exploited it.

He created a tight solid box around Unicorn's face and head, making sure to leave the horn uncovered so it couldn't potentially destroy the box.  Most humans could hold their breath for maybe two minutes if they'd prepared.  Unicorn likely hadn't.  The heavy, solid box would make it impossible to breathe and the dude was already panicking.  Figure unconsciousness in three minutes or less.

Silvermane would be even easier.  Kevin had plenty of time to position himself and aim carefully.  He unleashed the Voidfire blasts at Silvermane's limbs with the idea of destroying them, one by one while leaving his head and torso untouched.  It hopefully wouldn't be long before the cyborg was a limbless body rolling on the floor.

In the midst of this, assuming he saw a small animal at the edge of the Darkness, Kevin would teleport over to her and quietly tell her, "Don't go in there yet.  I'll be done with them in a second and then we can leave."
This message was last edited by the player at 03:21, Sat 10 Oct 2020.

Taskmistress began eyeing the files giving her head a smack hoping to get Anni back online. Anni was fine wherever she was it was just tge transceiver that was damaged. She sped read the the files gathering the ones necessary for the the mission and useful in general. Exploring the room carefully to ensure she could get everything back.

Blinking, the red-skinned man looked warily left and right as his vision began to return as the aftereffects of Aurora's brilliant flash faded. If he didn't see anyone obviously wounded and in need of healing, he headed into the 'casino' dungeon mouth to check for others. And perhaps treasure or even a bite to eat (depending on the monsters - even for him, green slime a.k.a. lime Jell-O was still scary and needed fire).

If there were obvious, clear wounds outside, though, he went for the wounded with a gusto, sword swinging vigorously to heal them.
This message was last edited by the player at 22:25, Wed 13 Mar 2019.

Lois nodded her thanks to Aurora for whisking her out of 'harms (heals?) way'.  In the meantime, things looked to have settled down... and the villains had retreated.  Lois listened into the Maggia radio channel just to see what they were saying (if anything).  The only concern she had was Dee Dee.  Presumably Darkstar was going 'Batman' on the two other villains inside the casino.

"Um... are the police going to show up anytime soon, William?  And has anyone got eyes on Darwin?"

"Hammerhead must've took off while we weren't looking," Spider-Man says as he noticed how quiet it was outside. "I wonder how a guy as big as him managed to get past all of us."

"Dunno.  Powers? Technology?   Photoshop-?" She shrugged. "What I'd like to know is where and why.  Hopefully not because they plan to blow the place up."      It was a terrible thought, hopefully only that;   it would destroy a lot of evidence, if they were sufficiently desperate to do so.

Alison sped back inside the casino; looking for Darwin, loose ends to tie up, or teammates who needed aid.

Re: CH 4 Did it have to be Jersey?

*****
Inside
*****

Taskmistress: Most of the files were written in short form with minimal details, However some that stood out as she read and filled in the blanks with the help of Anni were that Dr. Strauss was actually Dr. Phineas Strauss he was listed on some of the files as The Tinkerer. He was partially working on a project called the Sovereign Six. Which would be lead by Silvermane,
Silvermane is a 70 year old head of the Maggia who had temporarily handed down control of the Maggia to Hammerhead while Dr. Strauss Worked on a suit for him that would allow his frail body to be incorporated into a cyborg body.
Seems that along with casino fronts Maggia has their hands in Various fronts, One being a section of the Docks in the harbor and another is funeral homes.
Darkstar:
Darkstar manages to get the dark matter box over Unicorns head. He watches as he starts thrashing about sending his unibeam in various directions causing more damage to the casino walls, fixtures and equipment. A Couple of blasts come close to Darkstar and one also passes the wall into the stairwell where Dee Dee was standing sending some light debris in the air around her.

Kevin got into position letting off a few blasts, although his vision wasn’t impaired Silvermane’s was a little quicker then he anticipated. When he aimed for the legs he was only able to get the left one , As Silvermane buckled His arm move to the side as a mini missile was launched from his wrist Over Darkstar’s head, It zig zagged and hit the wall causing a large hole to open into the wall. A large crack could see being formed, and it looked like the west side of the casino might be coming down as some drywall started to buckle.



*****
Stairwell
*****

Dee Dee
She heard Darkstar on the comm “"Don't go in there yet.  I'll be done with them in a second and then we can leave." Then a large hole was blasted through the wall
Dee Dee looked around and somewhat shielded her eyes with her little paws from the dust that had been sent flying by the hole in the wall from it was strange to see a piece of wall half in the darkness and half out. For a brief second she still tried to adjust her animalistic dark vision But it was clear there was no seeing in there. She re-adjusted the laptop and file.


*****
Outside
*****

Bloodrager:
Bloodrager did pass a couple on his way towards the entrance seeing the man was hurt, He swung the red sword and struck the man, The Woman screamed in utter fear of seeing her husband sliced in half and the man also ended up pissing himself in fear as the blade went through him…. The couple looked at each other as the man’s hands felt his body realizing he wasn’t made into a shishkabob… He did however notice the large open wound on his leg was no longer there. The man was unsure on whether to smile or fear but in either case his Wife lifted him off the ground and hurriedly got them away from the big red sword wielding behemoth

Mortis / Aurora / Spiderman
Spidey looked around webbing up  one of the dragon tongs gang members who had regain consciousness and was poorly attempting to flee..

As they looked around there was nothing of note, It is true it was impressive they could get away so Quickly…. Of course, Speed Demon probably had something to do with it.

Mortis listened in on the comms of the Maggia. There was a lot of interference but she was able to make out Speed Demon, Have Hammer … heading …  B119….


Aurora Sped in and didn’t make it far when she encountered a solid wall of black!
It was quite the sight to see. There was darkness, but this, this was almost chilling. Catching Darkstar’s message to Dee Dee, Aurora hung back for a second. Then heard the explosion. From her angle she could see that the west division wall was starting to collapse. With still a few people inside.

Few onlookers

There were only a handful of people left outside some had their mobile phones up taking video’s of the scene, as Spiderman looked around he could see a news van arrive as the crew was starting to get out and start filming.

*****
Back At HQ
*****

Jocasta finally came on the comms,
Taskmistress is in a north office, Dee Dee is to the stairwell on the east side of the building.  We held off the police but dispatch is no longer waiting for our ok. Police should be arriving shortly the quinjet has retrieved Clockwork and is landing on the roof across the casino.

This should of been a simple info gather mission, Not sure what went awry but get yourselves out and to the quinjet ASAP. Came William’s reply.

Alison was relatively sure the darkness would have to be Kevin's power. The fact that it was actually chilling surprised her.  She'd thought Darkstar's power was just a black force field of some sort.  Attempting to illuminate or dispel it with her own light was almost surely a bad idea;  she'd learned from her gaff with Bloodrager.     There was a bigger priority now, anyway:

Utilizing her speed, she went into action, attempting to rescue anyone in danger of being crushed or otherwise injured by that falling debris...

Sword was watching the (formerly) injured man elope with the woman, unsure whether to go after them to stab some more, bless the union in the name of the Stillborn Unwanted Child, or seek out more blood elsewhere. But he heard Miss Jocasta over the magic amulet, with William's orders following. Reluctantly, the hulking red man turned away from the casino and started jogging away from it hoping that he was heading for the right building, the right roof.

His sword thrust out to one side, and he commanded it. "Coagulate," Woundhealer faded from steel and stone to a sword-shaped and sized mass of scab. "Dissolve." And the scab sword liquified, melting back into fresh blood making a mess as it dripped off his hand and puddled on the ground.

He kept jogging, seeking their transport to leave as ordered.

Lois assumed that B119 was an escape vehicle of some sort.  But there wasn't enough radio chatter to accurately assist the team into apprehending the villains.  Besides, William had called for a withdrawal.

"Withdrawing to the jet.  Be careful everyone, there is media starting to gather outside."

Mortis calmly walked away from the scene, avoiding phone cameras and the media van... wherever she could.  Lois entered the back of the building where the Quinjet was waiting.  If necessary, a bit if judicious disintegration helped to gain her access... a melted lock, handle, or even a hole in the wall.

Kevin moved quietly to scoop up the small mongoose that was Darwin.  He put her into one of the larger pockets of his overcoat patting her through it in what he hoped was a reassuring manner.  Then he turned back to the room.

Unicorn was still struggling with the the Darkforce box that was suffocating him.  Given some of the destruction in the room, he was probably stronger and tougher than a normal, but he still didn't have the strength, leverage or remaining oxygen to free himself.  Meanwhile, as a one-legged man, Silvermane was on track to lose this particular butt-kicking contest.

Naslund was giving the "Vamoose" signal, but Kevin couldn't quite refrain from giving this particular pot of shit a couple of extra stirs.  "Thanks boys," he told them.  "This info should come in handy.  And it's not like you goombas would realize its true potential.  Best you stay content with what you have, take your friends and run away.  Revenge is a dish best served in dreamland.  Buh-Bye and Hail, Hydra!  Bitches."

With that, Kevin moved quickly but quietly to exit the casino, heading for the jet.  Hopefully the others would get there soonish.  He maintained the Darkness and the box around Unicorn.  Simple distance would cause both to fade, but there was no sense making it too easy on the two.

Taskmistress made her way to extraction with the files in hand. Carefully avoiding another confrontation she wasn't in the mood to drown again. She didn't speak to anyone evacuating still trying to get her connection back online.

Taskmistress slipped past the remaining Duo of Unicorn who looked slumped on the ground with the metallic cyborg Silvermane next to him, She spotted Dee Dee able making a b line for the exit, As the two passed Silvermane and Unicorn they both caught a glimpse of the old man trying to smash the darkforce field from Unicorn’s head. As the final blow came the darkforce cube vanished just in time to have Silvermane punch Unicorn in the face , It was a good thing Unicorn was already unconscious cause that hit seemed like it would of hurt a lot as it connected with Unicorn right in the mouth where his helmet didn’t cover his face. Dee Dee finally made it past without being noticed due to the distraction of Silvermane.


Aurora gathered one last man that was pinned under a roulette table that had tipped, he had no serious injury but his leg would be bruised for some time.

Bloodrager just caught a glimpse of the quinjet up above as he headed into the building to make his way to the roof, It took him a tad longer as he had discovered some boxes on the stairwell of the building on his way up and hesitated to see if these were possible “treasure chests” which might contain treasure.

Spiderman gave a quick look around and noticed the emergency services pulling in. Seeing the others head out he followed suite and headed for the Quinjet.
Once everyone was gathered into the Quinjet the door automatically shut behind them, Clockwork Knight was already inside but was offline, Guess Doc would have some more work to do trying to figure out what happened.
It wasn’t long before the Jet cloaked and was off again heading towards the base Jocasta was in control of the auto pilot.

Several opened and disordered boxes left behind on the stairwell, Bloodrager sat quietly in his seat on the Quinjet firmly strapped in place. He mentally brought up one of the musical instances in his matrix to internally listen to while in-flight, something depressively calming.

"Okay, nobody we give a shit about died and the bad guys got a Taskforcey bitch-slapping.  Though next time Doc Squid tries out a robot, maybe we need to make sure the warranty didn't expire in the Bronze Age.  So far, so good," Kevin said before turning eagerly toward Taskmistress and a hopefully human Darwin.  "So, what did you gals get?"
This message was last edited by the player at 02:24, Fri 24 July 2020.

Closing Ch 4 will post in Hangar and then you'll be ok to continue in the base threads,

END!
--->  To Hangar