Sometimes there are people that normal heroes can't reach. Either because they are protected by the law, or because they are deep in supervillain territory where only the most powerful of heroes (who are too busy saving the world) wouldn't be overrun.

Enter the vigilante. The anti-hero. Heroes who have forsaken the law in order to get justice when it would otherwise fall between the cracks.

A week ago, anonymous letters were sent to some powerful vigilantes to work together on a specific task. There is a wealthy man in Paragon City by the name of Wrashk. A powerful man who generally makes his twisted personality obvious, but obeys the law and never even skirts the line. The Paragon City Police have often suspected the man in connection to a number of crimes... but nothing ever stuck.

The anonymous letter had outlined a place for the vigilantes to meet.

The location: A warehouse in Liberty Quay (which is in the middle of Independence Port)

Once the vigilantes arrive at the port, there is a glowing, white young man with a rather large beam rifle on his lap and he has his hands on the rifle. His eyes are glowing a light aqua like most of his other glowing parts and he has a smile on his face. This can be none other than the vigilante known as "Light", who is known for his use of a powerful beam rifle and his ability to sometimes warp time itself.

Also sitting there is a large, bulky robot with its hands on the table.

Light turns to look at anyone entering the room with a smile.

The table appears to have the names of the vigilantes at specific seats. Probably so there would be no arguing over who gets to sit where.

Raven crushes the letter in his hand and drops it toward the ground, but as it reaches the ground the bottom of his coat swirls out and almost looks as if it devours the paper. As he comes up onto the meeting place he tilts his hat down and walks into the side of the wall of the warehouse and vanishes into the shadows only to reappear walking out of the shadows cast the light bulb man in the middle of the room. Standing a good 6'2" with black shoes, jeans, shirt, trench coat and fedora hat Raven was as intimidating as it got. He is most famous for being one of the most relentless of all the vigilantes and has never not got his target no matter who he had to go through. Raven makes his way to a dark corner of the room and leans against the wall waiting to see who starts the party and sizing up who to take down first should he need to act fast, the glowing toothpick looks like the most trouble.

Don't believe what you hear about Raymond, because it's probably all true.  Did he really come from the Rogue Isles, famous home of the world's most notorious super Villains?  Has he been spotted working alongside the greatest heroes?

Well one thing your eyes will tell you right away is he doesn't look human and he wields a huge lightning rod.  He takes his assigned seat, looking none too happy.

  Megaton Crushing Machine: Crushington ™ uses his limited supply of subtlety to simply walk into the room.  8 foot tall and short for most killbot standards, he'd probably be taller if he had a traditional 'head'.  He picks up the sign with his name on in it between two bulky fingers, and looks at the tiny chair.

  "I shall stand."

Crushington's chair transforms into a larger chair.

The other large bot asks, "Did you think I would sit in a large chair and not provide one for you?"

The bot then says, "Wrashk is slated to meet with his top officers: George Catchingteeth, Blabbering Bouncyhead, and Ajeeto. These are powerful villains all. But this meeting of Wrashk and his officers must not happen. My intel has the locations of the individual officers. Take them out and then find Wrashk and take him out."

The bot places a holoprojector on the table and it projects 4 locations, complete with visuals of the buildings and the names of the villains who will be in a given building. "Your pay will be your standard seek and destroy rates with a bonus 50,000 to each of you upon completion of the entire task. Any questions?"

Light is still smiling and says, "I have a question. How much wood could a wood chuck chuck if a wood chuck could chuck wood?"

The bot answers in a serious tone, "As much wood as a wood chuck could chuck of a wood chuck could chuck wood. Any other questions?"
This message was last edited by the GM at 05:01, Sat 22 Aug 2015.

Ravens voice comes from the shadows "Do you have a hollow copy of my targets description? Leveling an entire city block is always an option, but I prefer to work in the shadows and leave no trace of my pray of that he has been taken care of. Will we need proof of success on our part of mission?"

Raven has no intention of skipping out on the job with the money but should complications arise from no proof, he would hate for the employer to lose a fer limbs or have a few less unbroken bones. "I lose more clients that way."

Raymond stays silent, his arms folded and eyes narrowed.  On the one hand, Wrask and his group are clearly evil.  On the other, he's never been terribly comfortable with simply killing a known villain under any circumstance for a number of reasons.  Not the least of which is the very real chance of being arrested for murder.

"Suppose Wrashk and the others survive and meet anyway.  What happens?  World comes to an end?"

  Inflation these days at the auction was crazy, but work was work.  Particularly when it was getting paid for something you may have just done incidentally.

  "Thank you."  He puts the chair to use.  "Even the isles would be upset if you removed a large part of it's infrastructure.  I may lack subtly, but I'm not <i>that</u> sloppy."

The robot waves a hand and the holoprojector displays images of the villains. Wrask and George are human (at least, they appear to be). Wrashk has black slicked-back hair and an annoying grin. George Catchingteeth seems to be your standard middle-aged sleezy man with hair pulled back into a ponytail. Blabbering Bouncyhead looks more like some kind of... human-looking dummy thing? With the top of his head completely separate from the bottom of his head. And Ajeeto is some plant monster covered in thorns.

Wrashk:
http://img08.deviantart.net/b7...y_lnearmellomatt.jpg

George Catchingteeth:
http://fieldservicenews.com/wp...eazy-salesman-WO.jpg

Blabbering Bouncyhead:
http://www.quizlaw.com/blog/im...th-park-canadian.jpg

Ajeeto:
http://i.ytimg.com/vi/T0CaZ1kc3NA/hqdefault.jpg

To answer Raymond, the robot says, "If the meeting happens, Wrashk will have the power to remove super powers from his enemies."

Light, still smiling (and even chuckling a little), says, "Oh my. Guess we better not let that happen."

Raven rises his hand and the shadows on the table begin to spin and take the same shape as the hollow, when the shadows stand still again they are in the form of Wrashk and then floats over to the palm of his hand. "Then this shall be my target."

After burning the image into his mind raven dispels the shadows and looks to the robot waiting for any further details.
This message was last edited by the player at 05:51, Sat 22 Aug 2015.

"Uh huh..." Raymond says in the most "I don't believe you" tone, his face just as skeptical.

"And what makes you think that?"

  "Always such a vague topic, 'power' removal.  Also often some of the most annoying even when not a target yourself,"

  He turns towards Raven, "My only misgiving about going directly to the top.  Would we be asked to deal with the rest if simply cutting straight to the end was practical."

The robot says, "I warn you all; Any one of these villains is more than any one of you can handle alone. Which is why I summoned you all to meet up with each other."

The robot then answers Raymond with, "I am not at liberty to discuss the nature of how their meeting will cause this ability. You have your mission and your payment has been put on the table. If you want out of the mission, now is the time to express your desire to leave." (Note: GM actually knows how, but realized the client does not trust this group of questionable types with that kind of information. Only trusts them with getting the job done.)

Raven simply nods "If that is how you want to play it then as long as you pay me ill handle them in any order you want."

"If you think me an assassin, the least you can do is offer a payment more suitable," Raymond's thinking, "Add a few more zeroes and you'll be in the neighborhood of what I made way back when I was knocking off banks in the Isles."

But that's not Raymond anymore.  Money is hardly a motivation.  A burning hatred for slimeballs like Wrashk and the others is what drives him now.  But there's a reason he hasn't dribbled his head like a basketball on his own yet.  Even a crusading vigilante needs more evidence than a jerkface personality and some random money-waving person's say-so to condemn a man to death.  More than likely these guys were hired by Wrashk to lure his enemies into a trap.

No.  Even sleezier would be to simply trick a wealthy zealot into believing he'd better hire some vigilantes to try and knock him off right away or the sky will fall.

"You don't even know, do you?  Sounds like you've been duped.  I'll go, but you can keep your money.  Whoever is paying to have Wrashk taken out is likely to double-cross the lot of you with it.  I'm in this to wipe that smug look off Wrashk's face with the pavement.  Worth the risk for that alone."

  Crushington's player is basically trying to ignore the 'In the actual MMO' economic situation.  Though 'standard seek and destroy rates plus 50k' means ICly, they can consider the 50,000 basically adding dollars to the tip jar.

  "Is there anything else you can divulge at this time?"  We're going to be honest, Crushington is already way more well spoken than we were initially planning.

  The robot is getting a bad feeling about Raymond though. "Refusing the money but then doing the job anyways?  A lot of you in it for the blood sorts do seem to think payment devalues your pleasure hunts."  Crushington actually thinks Raymond is more a moody mc moodysons hero than a Vigilante at this rate, but saying so out loud may have them run crying to Longbow.

  Crushington wishes it was an exaggeration to say he's seen that happen before.

The robot says, "Believe what you wish. You have the information you need for the task at hand. Half of your payment is in your seat's name slate. The other half, along with me, will be here once you have completed your task. Good luck."

The robot then retrieves the holoprojector and stands up before walking away. Once outside, the robot simply rockets off into the sky.

Light looks at the others and smiles. He walks over to Raymond's seat and reaches for Raymond's name slate. With a pleasant tone to his voice, he says, "If you don't want your money, Raymond, I will be happy to take it. Seems our benefactor is insisting on giving it away."

He hasn't touched the name slate yet, but he most certainly will if Raymond doesn't stop him.

Raven waves his hand and shadows surround the name slate with Raymond's money and the slate disappears into the shadows reappearing into Ravens hand. Raven then walks over to Raymond and holds the plate out to him. "Take it. Do what you will with it when the mission is over. I could care less for your morals, but now that a plan and payment have been deviated it will not change. I don't like it when someone changes the plan,.." Raven looks at Light with a smooth black emotionless masked face "... if anyone disproves I will remove you myself." Looking back to Raymond waiting for him to take the plate
This message was last edited by the player at 05:31, Tue 25 Aug 2015.

Raymond looked surprised when they mentioned the payment was up front.  Not used to that.  He takes the plate from Raven, looking annoyed with the teases of Light.

He answers Crushington with a headshake, "I already gave my reasons.  But that was before I knew the payment was up front.  The scenario I was expecting was, 'Go to the corner of Itsa and Trap for your bomb-erm-I mean, for your payment.'"

He turns his gaze back to Raven with a skeptical look.  "Brace yourself for a life of dislike, then, dark one.  Plans rarely go as expected."

He then scrutinizes the payment for tracers or any other double-cross type catch.

  Crushington sees your emotionless face and raises you no face whatsoever.  Nevermind how he uses "eyelasers"

  "Raymond, every job has that risk.  Even when you are working for Longbow." Especially if you are working for Longbow.

  Still, he sometimes wishes he had something akin to facial features, so that he may roll them.  "If you want to waste your time fighting your co-workers instead of your target like Arachnos, be sure to let me know."

  So far Light has seemed the most reasonable.  Which of course means they make sweaters out of puppies or something.

What? The puppies were already dead... they weren't going to feel anything...

Light chuckles and says happily, "But if you remove me, you'll be the one changing the plan as I am a part of it. But I suppose I should be used to working with your mentality. Hypocrisy is part of the job, after all. Speaking of the plan..."

He looks at the holo projection. "Looks like George Catchingteeth is the closest.. right over in King's Row. Should we head for him first?"

"No I would be removing an obstacle, and I do not consider obstacles part of the plan any longer." Raven simply walks out the door heading toward the designated target as advertised by Light. As he walks through the wall his Name plate left on the table sinks into the shadows.

Looks like Raymond isn't going to be taking point.  That suits him just fine.  He'll head out with the others.  He eyes each one as they exchange words but doesn't have a comment to add this time.

  "Closest is as good a deciding factor as any right now."  Crushington has unflattering expectations of how well Raven would take his order having a mistake at the local City Of Gyros.  You have given me the wrong toppings, *devours shop with black hole, doesn't leave tip*
This message was last edited by the GM at 06:12, Tue 25 Aug 2015.

Light looks at the others and chuckles again, shrugging his shoulders. "As Ben Franklin once said; 'wonderful thing about being a reasoning creature - you can make a reason for anything.' Poor Raven is probably as deluded as the rest of us. Oh wait... that's normal." he then becomes a streak of light as he speeds off towards the destination (Super speed).

When the supers make it to the location in King's, they are just outside an office building. Inside are some people going about their business while wearing standard office-worker garb. They seem to be paying the group no mind at the moment and just go about whatever they are doing. It's almost like the vigilantes aren't even there as far as the workers are concerned.

Raven is standing out to the side of the team "I can scout ahead by hiding myself in the shadows, when im in my realm I cant be seen, heard, or smelt. If there is anything to worry about I will bring word." Raven begins to sink into the shadows but stops and looks at those beside him. He turns to them "If any of you have another plan in mind speak now."

Raymond took a detour to his SG base to drop off the payment in the safe, leave a request for the others to look into this whole mess for him while he keeps an eye on it, and grab himself a simple yet surprisingly effective disguise:  http://blog.seattlepi.com/cani...-bandana-cropped.jpg

He shrugs and offers Raven a thumbs-up.

  "Stay away from any gun turrets or ladies with red goggles."  Raven probably has already learned the hard way which things laugh at concealment methods, but he'd have to pick up the workload if Raven got stabbed in his squishy brain out of ignorance.

  "If you do locate the target without interruption, do you have any assistive teleportation?  Stealth and recall are rather popular for those without the time or inclination to work their way through someplace the old fashioned way."

  At the bandanna wearing stranger, he asks "...So, who is this guy?  Eh, at least they're not as ugly as the other organic. Welcome aboard."

Light shrugs at Raven. "You scouting ahead suits my needs just fine."

When Raven scouts ahead, he discovers George Catchingteeth talking to one of his own officers. "Having Nemesis help us out sure worked out for us. So far, none of the heroes are knocking on our door."

Meanwhile, back at the others, Light looks at Raymond. Then looks at Crushington. "Ugly? Now Crushington, don't be judgmental. Just because Raven hides his face doesn't mean he's ugly."

Raymond gets a txt from Emerald asking, "Where are you? I can come."

After Identifying the target Raven begins to make his return to the party when he notices a two soldiers head into what looks like a control room. After investigating further he realizes that it is the control room for the warehouses defenses. Only two guards are in the room, I can port that glowing toothpick in here and maybe he can do something about the automated defense system.

Raven travels back out to the team and reaches out of the shadows of a wall beside them grabbing Light by the arm pulling him into the shadows with him. "I need to borrow you." After pulling him into the shadows Light looks around to see that there are paths made of what looks like black smooth stone leading out into an never-ending void of countless doors and holes of light. "Stay close if you get lost in here you may never get out. Also don't fall down, the inhabitants of this world aren't as nice as those of your world." Raven points down and below creatures of all shapes and size reside below all with horrific looks about them. "Bloodthirsty beasts they are, so like i said keep close."

Raymond snorts a chuckle at Crushington's tease.

He texts Emerald back, "Shadow us.  Already fallen into a Nemesis trap."

And gives coordinates.  He readies his weapon and courses with defensive electricity, ready for the inevitable bullet spam from the "office workers."

  This sort of thing is why Crushington is still set to 'permission required' for teleports.  Also, uh... Yes, he totally knew that was actually Raymond and was talking about Raven, really.

  "I hope you won't balk at fighting automotons, but robots never do rate high on the moral line drawn scale in this city, do they."

"Woah!" Light exclaims as he is yoinked.

Light would comment on robot morality, but he is no longer present.

Meanwhile, in the darkness realm, Light looks around, whistles low and then smiles. "This place... is beauuuuutiful... But! I guess like anything else, you get used to it, eh?" He follows Raven's advice, though, and sticks with Raven. And doesn't fall.

Once they get to the control room, Light's eyes water. "You left a couple targets for me? You really do care..." and with that, he charges up his Beam Rifle and FWAZAAAAP! One of the workers is shot. And exposed to be a robot underneath! It responds in "Critical Error; Rebooting social protocals.... Happy Birthday!" and proceeds to attack Light and Raven!

After a brief fight, Light then goes to play with the controls and says, "There we are... silent alarms shut down. And any other alarms that might inform the other Wrashk officers are shut down. We are free to do as we please without alerting our prey..."

Meanwhile, the nemesis bots do attack Crushington and Raymond. Raymond soon gets a text that reads, "I'm here. If you need anything, say the word."

As they step into the room out of the shadows and Light shoots one of the men showing it to be a robot Raven flicks his wrist and the robots own shadows wraps around him and shadow spikes shoot throughout the robots body sending it crashing to the ground.

After light disarms the defenses Raven slams his hands onto the ground opening a portal made of warping shadows directly to the rest of the teem and yells "Hurry I cant hold a point to point connection of this size for very long." Lashing out with What little power he can spare tentacles of darkness spring from the shadows of enemies attacking the rest of them slowing, binding and crushing them. Raven looks back at Light "Get over here and help cover them till they can pass through, we need to hurry less the target manages to escape."

"I know you won't need this teleport," Raymond coms to Emmy, "So see you there."

He does a quick knockdown to briefly keep the robots from pursuing and hops into the portal as requested.

  Crushington steps through the melodramatic portal, and bzzzrrts an error sound "deep sigh.midi not found"

  He hulk claps the haphazardly knocked down automatons into a cubicle.  "Nemesis suffers rust on his steam pipes", said as he unleashes a power sink and a stomp that knocks enemies back on their robutts, but not any teammates (How does that work?  Why do you think it takes so long to unlock!).

Light does as told, no problem. The group is now in the office room where George Catchingteeth is. He pulls out shiny metallic discs and begins throwing them like ninja stars at the group! "You won't take me so easily, sellswords!"

The robots in the room are shooting at the team with brass rifles with tuba-like barrels. Others are walking over to the vigilantes and just punching at them!

Light, of course, mostly shoots beams of light from his rifle, but occasionally, when he spots one of his allies wounded, he waves a hand and with a reverse-sound, the wounds seem to close as if being wounded in reverse.

Raven finally recovering from creating the portal manipulates the shadows around him to block the shots fired at him while simultaneously shooting dark spikes out at the enemy and using there own shadows to bind and slow as many as he can to make easier targets for the group. " I prefer the silent approach, but if its war you want its war you will get." Raven notices the target heading for secret door. "Hey someone take out that back exit fast, and watch yourself a cornered beast is the most dangerous."

Raymond makes a beeline for the boss, off-handedly tossing a massive ball of lightning at the escaping enemy.  He courses with electricity that zaps all the nearby enemy as he swings his massive weapon at the boss!

"Your days of evil are OVER, villain!"

    All heals are appreciated, hardcapped bullet resistance isn't 100%, after all. (And it saves him a cooldown usage).

    "You started breaking things before I even got in here, Raven.  Just because I'm louder now doesn't change that."

  While less flashy, Crushington hurls the wonders of 'homing boulder' after George.  No we don't know how that doesn't leave a big hole in the floor when there should be.  Crushington fully expects NPC -fly and knockdown immunity, but throwing a boulder upside someone's head is always satisfying even then.

George sees through Raymond's clever disguise, but thinks better of the surrender angle for now. He continues to fight and says, "So you think you can win this? Do you all even know how powerful Wrashk is? By the time you even get up to him, each one of you will have had something happen to them; the kind of something you will remember to the end of your days and regret ever crossing Wrashk. And since there are four of you, I suppose that means I have to make at least one of you suffer to reduce the workload of the other officers..."

He presses a button and says, "You have five seconds before this building blows up."

Judging by this guy's endurance, five seconds is simply not enough time to kill him.

Light smiles and says, "Don'tchya just hate spoiled sports?" and continues shooting George. But again... 5 seconds? Not enough time.

Raven without hesitation dashes forward and grabs George by the face and forces him into a new portal Raven had just opened yelling behind him "Follow me now! Light don't let them fall..."And disappears into the shadows leaving the portal behind him.
This message was last edited by the player at 07:59, Thu 27 Aug 2015.

"Emmy!  Bomb!  5 seconds!"

Raymond hops into the portal after the baddie.

  Well, it seemed that everyone but Light had some readily accessible way of surviving an exploding building just at a glance.  So the bigger issue would be ensuring George didn't get out themselves-oh portal that works too.

  The robot floats on through, primarily to not to split the party.  He refrains from commenting on Raymon's obvious intel leak, because he doesn't feel like dealing with the results right now.

 "Five bucks says we crush his head and it turns out to be an automoton.
This message was last edited by the GM at 03:55, Fri 28 Aug 2015.

Light follows the others. "Those shadow portals sure are handy. Watch your step, everyone. Do not fall. And stay close to Raven."

Once the group is through the portal, George's smile becomes a sad smile as he realizes his spite move was thwarted. "...I surrender!" he says, looking directly at Raymond. "Don't let these thugs kill me!"

Raven waves his hand dark tentacles spin and climb there way around George binding him to the stone path. "Now my employer has paid me to deal with you how I see fit, so how about we have a little chat. Now a nice stand-up guy like you isn't gonna turn on his friends that easy so how about we get this part over with first." Raven grabs the shadows around George and drags him to the side of one of the paths and shows him the pit below. "You know George they're not the ones to be afraid of." Raven the pushes George over the side.

As he falls down the pit the creatures at the bottom stop and look up screeching and screaming waiting for the meal to reach them. Right as George reaches the first set of teeth the shadows open and he falls through returning to the stone path crashing down on his back. Raven walks over and stands him up, claps him on the back and asks "So now then you wouldn't be thinking of lying to me would you?"
This message was last edited by the GM at 04:11, Fri 28 Aug 2015.

Raymond folds his arms and frowns.

"This kind of interrogation is never reliable.  But whatever.  You'll learn eventually."

He hovers off the ground to show that falling isn't an issue for him.  Doesn't expect it to be an issue for anyone else either.

  Light is somehow one of the most reasonable people again. Oh dear.

  "That was more a broad general 'as you see fit' rather than you specifically, Raven.  Killing him then questioning the rest would be the most practical method. But I expect you'd spend too much time fighting me while he escapes even from here if I act on that, Raven"

  He comments to Raymond, "It's highly effective when circumstances favor it."  GM doesn't want it to work? Your immoral methods fail.  Expect that courtesy for your PC?  Welcome to Japanese hentai land (If Byron's Podcast is anything to go by).
This message was last edited by the GM at 04:18, Fri 28 Aug 2015.

It's pathetic. George is crying and blubbering about how he'll say whatever Raven wants.

Light glances at Raymond. "Oh... I know what you mean, Raymond." he smiles brightly. "After a certain point, they just say whatever you want them to say, even if it is a lie. But in this case, Raven is specifically asking the man not to lie to him."

He leans his elbow on one hand and his head in his other hand, then taps his cheek with a finger. "You know.. it's ironic. Off the top of my head, I know one hero and one villain who would be perfect for telling if he was lying. But I'm sure neither of them would help us."

Emerald coms Raymond. "I know this place. I'm still watching you, but don't let your guard down. Also, no matter what, do not endanger yourself to rescue George while you are in this place."

"Now lets play a little game, I'm going to ask you a few simple questions.." Raven grabs the shadows around the back of Georges neck and stretches them up until they bind to more shadows reaching for who knows were, stringing him up and over the edge of the bridge. "... and then we are going to go and verify them. If you do not lie and you tell me everything without fuss, when we have verified that you told the truth I will release you back into the crater of what used to be that warehouse. If you lie you will die." Raven leans in close "I'm sure this venture has taught you to be a good citizen from now on correct?" Raven steps back a little. "Now tell me what you know of Wrashk's plan and locations of him and the remaining lieutenants and any defenses we should need to look out for."  Raven crosses his arm waiting for an answer. He realizes he has not answers any questions from the team but he must stay focused until the end of his interrogation, he would deal with any aggression from his own teem when the need arises.
This message was last edited by the GM at 04:53, Fri 28 Aug 2015.

"You needn't worry about that," Raymond answers Emmy.

He glances from robot to Light then thumbs at Light to indicate he made his point already.

  Crushington glances around for bouncy vents because while he is perfectly capable of flying, those are more fun.  Alas, this particular shadow dimension seems to be lacking them.

George answers the locations correctly. "Wrashk won't let the rest of us know his plan. He just told us to make sure we brought the numbers we discovered with us to the meeting. As for defenses... well all of us outsourced to Nemesis. But I understand Agito got help from the Circle of Thorns* and Blabbering Bouncyhead has  the Carnies** guarding him. Wrashk, of course, has convinced Longbow*** to guard him."

---

For Nina's information since he never played the game. But Raven would totally know the following:

*Circle of Thorns:
Formed back in 1898, this cult has pacts with demons and researches deep mystical secrets of magic through the ancient ruins of the prehistoric city Oranbega.

**Carnival of Shadows:
The Carnival of Shadows is a circus whose performances are well known among the wealthy and influential people of Paragon City, who are often part of their audience. But none of them suspects the true price they will pay to the Carnival for their arts: The bright and cheerful appearance of the Carnival betrays its fearsome powers and the dark past of their leaders.

***Longbow:
The "super police" of sorts, Longbow stands as a powerful, stalwart protector of Paragon City. They uphold the law and use super powers, mech suits, and high-end weaponry and gear to combat the forces of evil.

"What numbers?" Raven is a little concerned about the Circle of thorns, they make packs with the  same daemons that lie bellow now. "If you answer that then if the others have no questions I have all I need. Ask if you want to know something the rest of you I think hes about taped out."

Raymond eyebrow perks at the mention of "numbers," but it looks like DarkFace has already asked that question.  Any more questions?  Uh...

Raymond shrugs.

  Crushington has to put in more effort than other robots at making a mockery of the Carnies, but then he also takes them out faster than said other robots too.

  "Oh Longbow, even the 'Hero' heroes fight them more than criminals these days.
This message was last edited by the GM at 05:34, Fri 28 Aug 2015.

George answers Raven's question, "The numbers we found. He had us each decipher some ancient texts. Turns out they were clues that led to... well... numbers. My numbers are 20, 39."

Light shrugs. "Pertinent to the mission, I can't think of anything to ask him that you have not already asked."

"Well then you had best hope you don't see me again and simply wake up nice and safe in the ruble ." Raven waves his hand and Georges head and rest of his body are enveloped and then he shoots off into the blackness.

Raven looks back at the team. "So whose next."

"See that, Emmy?  Appreciate a pick-up of the perp," Raymond coms.

He looks to the others then Light.

  "Likely Bouncy, if only to get their particular brand of help out of the way sooner."

When the group makes it to Bouncy's building, it is, in fact, filled with the carnies ALONG with Nemesis bots. The Carnies prove... annoying. They slow the vigilantes down substantially even with Raven teleporting them past most of the enemy.

But Bouncy proves to be a weird boss fight. The top of his head is a projectile he uses while the rest of him seems to act like some cardboard puppet. His primary power seems to be the ability to summon big, powerful musclemen who are able to take hits really well.

But ultimately... the 4 vigilantes win.

Emmy coms Raymond with, "The man never showed up in the rubble. Where are you guys?"

"Seems our friend was telling the truth after all." Raven snaps his fingers. "There we go he should be realizing hes gonna live and stop wetting himself now. The rest of you seem against my methods so I'm going to round up the rest of the clowns and bind them all together for whoever comes to deal with them." Raven walks of warping the shadows hauling the bodies of the clowns into one pile.

"Seems DarkFace has only just now released George," Raymond coms Emerald.

He also forwards his current location.

"What are your numbers?" he asks the latest boss.

  "Relying on alternate dimensions when you do not have to has a habit of going poorly."  Just take a look at the front lawn of portal Corp half the time.

  Carnies are some of the least likely to be interrogated successful there are, but that varies wildly with the writer.  Where one minute their soul is eaten by their mask for failing at purse snatching, and the next they spend years in prison then leave while wearing the thing.

The latest boss is indecipherable when he speaks. "Hom-milom-minnermin! Blerbalalderadum!" the top of his head bounces off the bottom of his head whenever he speaks. He seems happy, regardless of the situation.

Light chuckles and says, "I never objected to your methods... they are proving sufficient, and fun besides. So far as you and I go, it has only been you who objected to my methods, Raven. But your attempt at concession is still appreciated."

Emerald comms, "George has been taken into protective custody. I don't have a crime to detain him for, but I can at least ensure he is locked away for a time."

"Heh, well I  say seems you and I might just get along after all.  We sociopaths need to stick together don't you agree." Raven has finished subduing the enemy and walked back over to the team. "Well then all that's left is the weed."

  Quite the philosophical conundrum.  If you were never built with empathy for others in the first place, was that sociopathy?  Not that it quite applied here, as Crushington had a functioning Givadamner.

  "In hindsight, one of us should probably have caught his head when he threw it.  I'd watch out Raven, the plant likely has more tentacles than you"

Raymond simply forwards the nonsense to Emmy for her to decipher then coms, "He blew up a building.  That's illegal even in the Rogue Isles.  Unless that was a bluff."

He looks at his weapon and smirks. "I brought my weed whacker."

Emmy coms, "There is no proof he blew up the building. I was recording audio and all he said was a warning, which he will argue was him trying to save the lives of the people who were trying to hurt him. As for the nonsense... you don't want to know what he said, but it's enough for me to wanna go strangle him myself."

Light smiles at Raven. Then to Raymond. "Oh look! He can smile!" he points at Raymond in astonished amazement. Why not point out Raven can smile? Because Raven has BEEN smiling. Sure, it's an evil smile of "I'm going to enjoy your screams", but it still counts.

He then looks at Crushington. "At least it will be interesting."

"Then I suggest we move fast, after the commotion we caused aand no word from the others the rest of our targets will be on high alert." Raven says.

  "I'm expecting far to many jokes about the circle of thorns working with a giant plant."

Raymond returns Light's comment with a "Gimme a break" look, Crushington's with a shrug, and Raven's with a nod.

"Let's go."

He moves on with the others.

Light smiles at Crushington, "No such thing as 'too many jokes' Crushington."

Emerald sends another com, "....but I can still call it in and hope the police can keep him locked up. Sorry for the negativity, I just have come to expect Wrashk and his cronies to get off every single time."

Meanwhile, the group easily makes their way to Agito's location. Which is an underground facility. It was once a nuclear shelter, but has been officially converted into Agito's "office". Inside, the CoT await alongside Nemesis bots. The circle waste no time summoning demons and casting spells on the vigilantes the moment they open the front door.

As they bust in Raven realizes the familiar feeling of demonic presence and quickly shrouds the himself and the team in a dome made of shadows to block the brunt of the attack, but its not strong enough to handle the onslaught and it shatters slowing some of the magic to pierce his leg. "Damn it all, be careful they have demonic magic at there fingertips. Do not allow them to hit you least they attack you with necrotic magic." Raven thrusts his hand forward piercing a daemon that jumped at him with a long jet black sword he had formed out of shadows. The shadows rush to him and fill the wound on his leg and covers his entire body in a dark aura giving of a fearsome pressure. Raven dashes forward with new found strength and begins to carve apart daemons as fast as he can reach them heading straight for the summoners. "If you want to kill the snake, cut off its head." He brings his sword down slicing the man in half down the middle and the few daemons he had summoned begin to fade.'
This message was last edited by the player at 04:46, Tue 01 Sept 2015.

  "Unless they bring something extra to the table, the most difficult part of dealing with the Circle is how hard ghosts are to hit."  Still, that alone would make things harder for Raven.  While the hellfire hurling demons still burned well enough, the powers of darkness against ghosts was another story.

  Of course, that's why Raven wasn't all on their own here.

  "Right, remember to back away from the skinnier demons in your melee every so often Raven."  Well, Skinny compared to the ones as wide as a tractor, compared to the ones as large as a professional wrestler.

  That said, he solves this issues somewhat by siphoning out enough stamina to crash the enemy toggles momentarily.

OOC: frivolous references to game mechanics you have no way of knowing.  Some demons had a stacking defense buff based on how long, and how many enemies were close to them.  They reset if nothing was close enough.  Players had access to similar.
This message was last edited by the GM at 04:51, Tue 01 Sept 2015.

With the badguys thusly enfeebled, Raymonds massive swings with his huge weapon completely obliterates the trash.  He then points threateningly at the boss and charges with a roar!

The boss summoner goes down easily. After all, the summoners are weaker than their summoned demons.

Light, of course, is happily shooting things with his beam cannon. But seeing what happened to Raven, he waves a hand and Raven's wound un-wounds as if he had never been harmed...

The group is challenged pretty decently by all the CoT and with the robots in the mix, the battles become chaotic.

However, after a long fight, they make it to Agito... a mass of thorny vines and a gaping maw, he looks like something from a nightmare.

Light shoots Agito with his beam canon! But Agito seems unharmed and it only seems to make Agito laugh.

At this point Raven is breathing hard and the shadows are cracking and layers of it falling from his body. He looks to light and nods in thanks for the healing. "Thanks but it seems I have been using to much of my power, it starting to drain my life force now. We need to finish this fast." Raven knowing he has very little time left focuses his strength and the shadows stop crumbling and move to his arms and his sword starts emitting more power. He changes his grip and prepares to make his final assault on the boss, his shadows not covering him his true form finally revealed. "Hold him off for just five minutes and ill finish this just buy me some time." The shadows in the room start to spin and flow into the sword charging it.


https://lh6.googleusercontent....BImage%2BPicture.jpg
This message was last edited by the player at 05:50, Tue 01 Sept 2015.

  "Right, I'm sure that sounds better in your head Raven.  But perhaps you and Light look for any notable root systems to destroy.  Damage immunity is still damage immunity after Bzzt-"  Piccolo singing 'chargin my attack' soundclip ensues.

  Still, either way him and Raymond would be tanking.  So that much Raven had right.

Maybe invulnerable to damage, but so is Raymond's lightning rod.  He jabs it into the monster's maw and yanks to lever the mouth wiiide open for his allies.

"Also, might be softer on the inside.  Do your things!"

Agito laughs at Raymond, but his mouth is opened. Light blasts some energy beams into Agito's mouth and says, "Don't forget we have Wrashk to deal with!" before using a concentrated blast to give Agito's mouth the biggest shot he can! After that, he rushes off to search the room for anything that might make Agito vulnerable.

Raven cringes as pain shoots up his body from harnessing this much power while weakened but he stands firm. <Lavender>"Just a little more and i'll make that bastard eat those chuckles."</Lavender> The shadows continue to gather into the sword while the pressure rises. This will weaken me considerably, but if I return to my realm my recovery time is multiplied exponentially. I will just have to trust that they can handle making there way to the final boss without me, by then I should have regained enough power to lend some support.
This message was last edited by the player at 06:43, Tue 01 Sept 2015.

  Crushingtin roams the room between chucking boulders and firing eyebeams (torso beams?) at Agito mostly out of spite.

  There is a purpose to his wanderings, because looking for buried weakspots goes a lot faster when you have electricity arcing out to anything nearby of note.

Raymond is coursing with lightnings and growling every time the big nasty rakes him with it's spikey tendrils.

"Any day now, slowpoke!  I can't hold this thing forever!

"And I could sure use one of those rewinds, Light!"

Light points at Raymond and says, "Rewind!" and Raymond's wounds reverse into health.

Crushington finds a mysterious crystal ball that is focusing a beam of light at some kind of Agito voodoo doll.

Light fires another beam of energy that seems to do nothing. In fact, it is clear nobody has done anything to Agito yet.

When Crushington removes the doll from the beam of light, Agito suddenly interrupts his laughter with "...eh?"

At this point shadows are leaking from Ravens eyes look a black mist and he look up at the plant with a wide sinister smile on his face. "Your mine you overgrown salad." Raven kicks of the ground and instantly vanishes reappearing in the air right above the boss the ground were he kicked off warping and breaking apart. "Raymond dodge now"


Raymond releases his hold on the beast jumping behind Raven out of the way.

Raven swings his sword in a arc at Agito and the shadows around his sword dance like a black fire releasing themselves from its containment in a large wide path. "Now release!! Maōnokage no hi!!" (shadow fire of the demon lord) The shadowfire envelops the plan and burns him to near nothingness.

http://i.ytimg.com/vi/0hF4Sks0q5Y/hqdefault.jpg

Raven looks to the rest of the teem "Sorry, I tried to hold back. Try looking through any paperwork for details on the numbers." Cough Rave moves his hand to his mouth caughing up blood. "Ill catch up when I can, need to return and recover." Raven sinks into the ground back into the shadow world. As he descends he calls out, "I will be watching through the shadows to keep track of you, but it will take some time for me to heal enough to help in battle." With that Raven is gone.
This message was last edited by the player at 07:20, Tue 01 Sept 2015.

  Raven is going to be oh so excited if they ever start down the Incarnate™ path.

  "Nuke crash huh? Yeah we see a lot of that."  City Of Heroes was cancled before the patch that removed that got implemented on live, alas.

  That explosion out of the way, he crushes the voodoo doll out of spite and double checks for any regenerating root systems plotting to return and enact their planty revenge.

Now Raymond is worried for Mittens.  She's been dabbling in shadow magic of late and is reckless enough to sac her life force to kill an invulnerable boss.  That said, he has some newfound respect for Raven.  That he's willing to risk his life that way to take out a villain hints that there's more to the man than a simple money-grubbing merc.

"Hmm.  Seems I was wrong."

He spots Crushington crushing the doll and ohs.  "So that was the secret.  Good job.  Seems we work decent as a team after all.  Thanks for the heals."

He begins searching the place for clues.

Light says, "You know... at this point, we have kept the meeting from happening. However, we are being payed to take all of them out, including Wrashk. So the job is not done..."

Emerald coms Raymond, "Wrashk is a serious problem. And if he doesn't already know about you bunch, he will soon. I could get you there fast, but if I do, you won't have Raven's help. To make sure he doesn't get away this time... I'll keep an eye on him while you all make your way there. Unless you have a better idea?"

Meanwhile, Light says, "So... race you all to the next spot?"

Raven appears into his shadow realm and the shadows circle him gathering into his body and layering onto him forming a solid black sphere. "Must gather my strength fast, they will need me in the final fight. If I focus enough on my sword to keep it maintained and use the rest to heal my life force then I can at least help with keeping any smaller enemy at bay. Though ina fight with Wrashk I will only have about 30% of my full power. Dammit, you guys had better be as good as you claim, It gonna take time to heal, and I don't know if the short time frame I have will be enough." With his hand Raven opens a small window into the other world in which he can watch the others progress.

  Well, we finally killed one of them.  So unless Agito was completely superfluous to Wrashk's success-oh who am I kidding, they always are if you actually manage to squash them ahead of time."

  He shrugs in regards to Light "May as well.  I'm expecting Raven to be patched up just in time to be useful. With some kind of comment about exponential recovery in the shadow realm which also freshens their breath."  Silly organics, proper breath is maintained at optimal levels easily when you are a robot!... with no mouth. Shut up it totally makes sense.

"Teleporting there would be fastest," Raymond offers, keeping his com mic open so Emmy can hear, "I've got a friend offering.  Crushington is probably right about Raven showing up on his own."

Emerald walks up to the trio in a casual fashion. The little fox says, "Hi. I'm Raymond's friend Emerald. If you want a short cut there, well... teleportation is one of my specialties."

She mouths some words and points a finger, tracing something in the air before letting out a beautiful singing voice, singing a single note. "Aaaaah..."

A portal opens, seemingly leading straight to the front door of Wrashk's office building.

Light says, "....oh. Well so much for for racing."

...and yes, Raven was able to see this all happen.
This message was last edited by the player at 03:50, Sat 05 Sept 2015.

Raven starts taking mental checks of his condition. He seems to have only two broken bones his arm and shoulder from the force of his attack. "Internal organs are fully restored, all that's left is to heal the arm and allow my body to absorb as much energy as possible before making my return." He notices Emerald in the mirror to the other world. "A new player, more change, I hate when people change the plan. It never ends well, I hope they know what their doing."
This message was last edited by the player at 05:08, Sat 05 Sept 2015.

  "Of course there is still racing" Crushington says as he steps through the portal,  "The finish line just got closer.  If you hurry you might still beat Raymond"

Raymond sweatdrops and steps through. "Thank you, Emerald."

He's ready for anything on the other side.

The group arrives at Wrashk's. Light seems to still be happy, despite losing the race. He honestly doesn't care. But would have enjoyed racing for its own sake.

Emerald says, "The teleport is all the help you'll get from me for now. If your lives are in danger, I will step in. Otherwise... well... this is your job, not mine."

She steps backward through a portal and vanishes. Then coms Raymond with "I'm only a call away, Raymond." Thanks to being a known member of the Redemption SG, Emerald can not afford to be implicated in an attack on Wrashk... and Raymond knows this. However, she will not let that get in the way of rescuing people.

Wrashk's office building seems eerily empty. Nobody appears to fight the vigilantes. Light's smile becomes a nervous smile. "...anyone else's nerves get wracked by silence?"

Rave can only watch and wait as he continues to recover.

  "You start to find quiet preferable after the nth Goldbricker.  Now, let's get on with this so we can get exposited at about how all our prior efforts were useless"   If he's wrong, it shall be a pleasant surprise.

"Yes...  quiet is creepier than violence, but can be better than noise," Raymond agrees.

To Emmy he coms, "Thanks for the help.  Looks like my instincts that this whole thing was a setup may prove right.  May need way more backup than just yourself when things fall apart."

He proceeds with caution, ready for an ambush.
This message was last edited by the player at 03:52, Fri 11 Sept 2015.

Crushington's comment cheers up Light and he smiles. "I look forward to him saying that... so I can blast him in the face mid-sentence. No villain likes being interrupted mid-monologue."

Emerald coms back, "Roger that. I will drop a hint to Redemption if that happens. Mittens will be there so fast, we'll wonder if she was there before you were. And she'll likely be dragging two or three others with her."

The group is soon able to make it to the top floor of the building where there is simply one very large room and a single chair in the center, Wrashk sitting in it. He does the slow clap for the vigilantes. "I've been expecting you." Wrashk comments. "Welcome to my tower."

Raven moves his body checking that all his bones have reset themselves correctly and the shadows reform his mask and outfit from the groups first meeting. No more time to recover, gotta get their fast. Raven tears a hole in the shadows and forces himself through it his entire body stiff and in pain. "Looks like I made it just in time to watch the show." He stands up ashowing the sword in his right hand to be much shorter, not much longer than a dagger. "All I could muster outa what I got left. O well least I can be a distraction." He looks to Wrashk. "Couldn't let you guys have all the fun."

  Looks like Crushington was wrong about Raven. "I was expecting you two minutes ago"

  As for Wrashk, he responds by firing his eye torso beams at their chair.  Suitably petty, less risk of 'lol no damage', and also destroys any lair furniture mounted shark tank buttons.

Looks like he still needs some help, Light," Raymond mutters.

To Raven he says, "Welcome back brave one."

Raymond sweatdrops at the laser to the chair attack.  "I expected you to aim for Wrashk...."

He looks at the villain.  "Your evil plan was thwarted when we took down your first lieutenant, Villain."

The chair is demolished. Along with Wrashk. That is to say, he completely vanished... so either Crushington vaporized him, or there is something else going on.

Light proceeds to open fire all across the room with a beam cutter blast.

Raven closes his eyes and reaches out to the shadows covering the room using the to search for any movement or presence outside the group. "Now were did you get off to?"

_{(OOC leave it up to narrator if i find anything.)}

  "If I had to make a guess, hologram projector in chair."  Whoo, those were expensive.  Petty spite justified!

  "Could just be a standard 'haha I now control time and am right behind you with a fuel tanker' too."  Yes Crushington, that is incredibly standard.

"Why are we shooting up an empty room?" Raymond asks.

"Looks like he still needs some help, Light."

Raymond hovers over to a window.

Light says, "He's fine, Raymond. He is just a bit spent. I can't give someone their expended endurance back. And why shooting up an entire room? Because we're here to shoot up Wrashk and he's in this room... what kind of fights have you been in where destroying the area wasn't involved?"

But it is clear his weapon didn't do anything to the room, really.

He then shrugs off Raymond's comment about controlling time and fuel tankers being standard because for all he knows, Crushington is an ALIEN robot manufactured on a planet where that is standard... this IS City of Heroes, after all. It might be unusual to see a space squid transform into a moogle in order to blast you in the face, but it isn't unheard of.

Besides... he already knows someone else with time control that kind of scares him and wouldn't surprise him if she appeared behind everyone with a fuel tanker.

Wrashk's voice comes from all around the room and says, "Congratulations. You all fell for my trap. I worked hard on making anti teleportation runes and anti gateway runes. I did my homework on any and all methods of escape. Shoot up the room to your heart's content, nothing will help you esca...acse uoy plehlliwgniht-"

Wrashk's voice goes backwards. Crushington's blast goes backwards. All the team goes backwards before finally being outside the building. Light is panting heavily. "Well... looks like it was my turn to spend everything I had. But now that we've escaped by never entering in the first place... how are we going to trump his traps?"

Raven walks out of a shadow close to light, "Damnit Light, warn me next time I barely had time to warp myself into my own reality. He may be able to stop teleportation, but my warps are more tears in the fabric of space than simple teleportation cant stop that. Besides having all my body re-broken and mangled from the rewind would have hurt like hell. Sigh.. Well not that I have the energy to transport more than myself anyway good call none the less.""

  "Raven, instead of taking advantage of the rewind to heal longer while not needed... you still came out early just to complain?  Sounds about right."  Clearly the bigger tragedy is expensive chairs remain unbroken.

    "Thanks, Light.  I doubt he put so much monologing effort into this if we could just portal our way out like a cheap council cell." He figurs all of them had done that trick at least once by now, not just Raven.

  "Wrashk may not even be here, which is the first thing to confirm or not." Preferably through property damage, but he'll take an easy answer too (and then maybe some property damage anyways).
This message was last edited by the GM at 03:43, Fri 18 Sept 2015.

While the vast majority of the violent fights Raymond finds himself in do not end in property damage, he doesn't consider the point worth arguing.

"So it was a setup after all."

He looks over at Light.  "Thanks for the save."

To Crushington he comments, "Extra points that he caused you to complain about his complaint."

To Raven he says, "I've met a great number of people who use the power of darkness like you do.  It stands to reason that with the resources at Wrashk's disposal, he would be able to hire several of them to make it so that should you have entered your dark world from inside that room you would be trapped forever.  Or if I tried to teleport I would be forever caught in the space between spaces.  I think Crushington's right about how prepared Wrashk was."

He looks at the building.  "I doubt I'd recognize a clue here if it hit me in the face.  But I know people..."

He coms his SG to see who's available to do the Sherlock thing.

Light simply nods and says, "Technically, how we perform our job is completely up to us.  We still get paid whether we recruit help or not."

He looks over to Raven and says, "Sorry about the suddenness.  But if I warned you, I'd be warning Wrashk too."

Emerald responds to Raymond's com, "We don't have much in the way of detectives in our supergroup, but we do have people who can undo his trap.  I'll get on sending who you will need.  Make sure you prepare your 'friends' for working with heroes.  And possibly a villain or two."
This message was last edited by the GM at 01:07, Sun 20 Sept 2015.

Raven crosses his arms and looks to Light, "I am grateful and did not mean to sound anything other, simply irritated at the situation is all."
This message was last edited by the player at 22:14, Wed 23 Sept 2015.

  "Something that elaborate would be difficult to hide the traces of, even if it wasn't always on. Magic or otherwise.  Seeking out the most notable energy sources or trails that are not inside the trap itself is a start."

"If there were a lot of electric power here, I'll be able to sense it, but I doubt that's what the trap was powered by."

Raymond checks anyway.

"My teleporting friend says she'll be bringing a team of experts.  Be forewarned that some of them may have a villainous rep."

Light says, "So we wait?"

Emerald coms Raymond with, "Not for very long. According to what I've found, Wrashk has warding magics against every type teleportation; be it arcane, natural, or otherwise. He has a ward against hyper movement, so you can't vibrate your way out. And with Raven's power being exhausted, only Raven would be able to escape since he would be unable to tear an opening long enough for the rest of you. I will be able to undo his arcane and physics wards. With those undone, I will be ready to provide an escape for the group as a whole. Basically, they will be forced to trust you as you trust me, but it will get the job done."

Assuming Raymond passes this info along, Light nods and waits. Soon, Emerald lets Raymond know that the wards are removed.

Rave has leaned against a wall neat Light that has heavy shadows with his head slanted down, holding his right arm and breathing heavy. "Damn it... high hugh hugh... can't keep this up. We need ta move soon or fall back and regroup. With most of his plan sabotaged it will take time to fix and  as much as I hate changing the plan purely out of principle, I hate being dead more."

  "We already regrouped, so I assume traditional problem solving will commence shortly unless we feel like abandoning the job."

  Traditional problem solving is violence, duh.

Raymond looks concerned for Raven.  "That attack looks to have done a real number on you.  You should have yourself checked out."

He relays to the others what Emmy said. "I'd rather not quit if it can be helped.  But a delay for Raven returning to peak condition might be in order."

Light says, "If the guy succeeds at what he was up to, then we all die. Right? Or just we all lose our powers? Or we work for him..... Ug. I have standards. I refuse to work for him and I don't want my powers taken. So let's try to bring him down. Worst case scenario, we are forced to run. Don't forget; Raymond's mystery friend claims to have the barriers brought down. And Wrashk likely doesn't know since he has yet to monologue to us."

We all agreed then? If so Lets move out and if we make it through this Im buying the drinks later.

  Crushington appreciates the sentiment at least, considering unlike certain depictions not many robots drink beer (or at all).

  "I will see what I can do to ensure you will not need a straw to participate."  Hard to tank for self inflicted injury though.

Raymond is wearing a grim expression.  People willing to push themselves to the brink aren't something unique to Paragon City.  There were plenty of them in the Rogue Isles.  Too proud to admit when they're not up for a job.  And of course something always goes wrong.  Then they wind up dead.  And the rest of the crew scatters.  And Raymond gets stuck with carrying the body out and finding someone willing to revive her.

He hands Raven a few inspirations, nods to the others, and starts heading in.  "Let him monolog this time.  He might let something important slip."

OOC: Inspirations were the City of Heroes equivalent of healing potions, ethers, status effect removal, and so forth.
This message was last edited by the player at 02:44, Tue 27 Oct 2015.

(Time Skip)

Wrashk gives his monologue again (Up to Crushington if he interrupts with blasting the chair this time or not).

Light looks really trigger-anxious, but holds back for now.

If permitted to finish his monologue, Wrashk brags that the mercs have not succeeded in stopping him or his plans.

Raven accepts the potions and uses them immediately, as they listen to the speech he reaches out with the shadows searching the room looking for anything they would have missed in the excitement of the last go round. (Up to DM if I find anything.)

  Showing great restraint, Crushington refrains from destroying their expensive (holographic) chair.

  "It does seem the importance of your associates was vastly overstated, yes."

  OOC: My own joke about Inspirations is that they are like childrens chewable vitamins.  Inventory UI wise, there was a tray they'd slide down racks from like an upside down pez dispenser.  Though there really wasn't any "official" statement on if they were literal items or an abstraction.
This message was last edited by the GM at 07:49, Sun 01 Nov 2015.

Raymond frowns and narrows his eyes at holographic Wrashk.  "You won't get away with this!  Even if you survive this round, sooner or later someone will stop you!"

He takes a swing at the hologram, fully expecting to be mocked for being tricked by the decoy.

Raven finds nothing of interest. It's just a standard villain room with a shark pit below it.

Wrashk laughs. "Why would anyone hinge their plans on the efforts of others? Oh sure, allies are useful, but let's face it; people just aren't reliable."

He watches Raymond punch through his holographic self. "Oh. That might have hurt if I was actually there. But since you bunch are going to die soon anyway and even if you escape, you won't make it to me in time, how about I brag to you about my evil plans?" he laughs as he stands up, puts hands in his pockets and lets the floor begin to open to reveal the shark pit. (Note; it only began to open. There will be time for everyone to react) "You see; I had my underlings gather coordinates. But while they were each busy gathering those coordinates, I was spying on them. So the moment they had the coordinates, so did I. Those coordinates lead to artifacts, each of which controls one kind of power origin. For example, this one..."

He admires some ancient-looking spherical relic in his hand. "This one controls technology. Yes... the gods of ancient past foreknew the capabilities of today's technology. So I could, for example, control any robot with this. Including robots with minds of their own like Crushington there. But where's the fun in that when I can watch you all suffer and struggle to no avail? Although I could turn off Light's beam cannon for kicks." he finally can't hold in the maniacal laughter and lets it out.

Light is annoyed.

Raven crosses his arms and taps his foot in irritation, "If the shark tank is your big plan the your going bore us to death log before with your annoying laugh and speech." Though as he Jokes if those who pay close enough mind to the shadows, every time he taps the darkness under and around him gets thicker while his shadow armor shrinks making a floor of shadows so that they wont if the floor suddenly well doesn't want to floor anymore.

  "I always was annoyed by that particular branch of metahistory."  Going to the Gym and working out literally falls under such things, when you get down to it with Wrashk's overall plan.

  He considers the shark pit, and shrugs.  "I could deal with this for everyone, but that wouldn't be as fun to watch. Right, Wrashk?"  He just floats harmlessly in the meantime.

OOC: Joke plot twist.  Frostfire saves the day because Wrashk forgot to get the Mutation Origin artifact.  Because 0.3% of the player base ever used it, and basically only one lower level enemy group counted for it.

Frustrated that he can't smash Wrashk right then and there, Raymond resorts to giving him a rude hand gesture right in his holographic face.

"I'm going to find you!  Then I'm going to break you!"

He turns his titanic weapon on the nearby wall.  "Rrraaah!"

Crash!

Wrashk laughs at the group and even widens his eyes as his laughter gets louder and heartier. "I love watching your reactions! Raven's boredom amuses me so! Raymond making wild claims to a hologram! And Crushington thinking he is being witty when he is only covering for his laziness! Too bad television isn't this good! You all go ahead and keep making excuses for your failure and that you can't even touch me. I'm enjoying every second of it!"

Light says, "We should at least figure out where his cameras are so we can "blind" him and thus, reduce his entertainment. It's the least we can do."

The sharks jet out of the pit. Yes, jet. They have rocket packs and are now flying sharks... with spines growing out of their hides. There is about 3 sharks per mercenary and they all begin breathing fire.

Light, thankfully, has super speed and is able to dodge.

Even while they group is all being attacked, Raymond is contacted by Emerald, "How are things going? I've almost pinpointed Wrashk's location. If you guys can keep him distracted, I'll be sure to record his villainy as evidence for court."

"Flying Fire Breathing sharks it had ta be Flying Fire Breathing sharks.... I need a nap and a bath." Raven sighs ad swipes his hand forward pulling the shadows around him to guard against the fire. (Any who wish there is room to hide with me.) He then looks to the rest of the team. "Ill provide support I'm low on juice," He gathers what energy he has left, "So long as I'm here Ill make sure they cant even touch us."

  "Well, firebreathing sharks is some dedication."  You know, what with them spending most of their time under water.

  Incarnate nukes would be overkill, as well as ruin Wrashk's show early.  So Crushington opens up with power sink to showcase his own display of 'I can make technology stop working right haha'.

Raymond is infuriated by Wrashk's taunting laughter.  Raven's dark powers, while extremely helpful in this case, are calling to mind some extremely frustrating times with the Circle of Thorns, and that's not improving his mood any.  And to top it off, Emmy wants him to let Wrask continue his evil gloating!

"Shut. Up!" he screams, charging the sharks with massive swings and lightning!

Between his shouts of rage he manages to point out to light, "Cameras in shark jetpacks!"

Plausible.  Probable even.  But hopefully now whatever camera Wrask was watching through before won't be picked off till the sharks are dealt with first, buying Emmy that much more time.

Light nods to Raymond and zooms all over the place to rip up wires and tear out anything that looks like a camera. He tries his gun again and finds it is working. "...good thing I'm crazy." Light comments quietly to himself as the others see Light open up with all kinds of laser fire!

The ceiling begins to lower. "Sorry I couldn't come be there with you all in person. But you know... my life is just so busy! Ahahahah"

Between Crushington's EMP and Light's lasers, the sharks begin dropping into the water, but with the ceiling lowering and the floor almost gone, that will soon hardly matter. But thankfully, Raven is able to keep the others from harm in the meantime.

Emerald coms Raymond, "Alright, Raymond! I've got the recording I need! Step through the portal! It will lead to Wrashk!"

A portal opens up. Wrashk's hologram looks at the portal. "...what? That shouldn't be happening..."

As the portal opens and the ceiling begins to fall raven slams his hands onto the ground and giant pillars of darkness form to try and slow the decent and give everyone time to get to the portal. "Forget the Damn sharks, we have bigger fish to fry."

  "What, Mako is here?" it's a legitimate question.

  Still, he heads through the portal because that is the sensible thing to do at the moment.

  Well okay, the 'practical for others' thing would be to let the ceiling (eventually) crush him so he can't simply be handwaved to attack the others.  But he wouldn't be a Vigilante if he had that much moronic selflessness going for him now would he?

Raymond punches the shark gnawing on his arm in its face and it drops into the water.

"So much for your supposed control over tech!  I know you were full of hot air!"

Seeing that Soul has slowing the celing's descent covered, Raymond zips through the portal after Crushington.

He coms, "Thanks, Emerald.  Perfect timing."

Once the group makes it through the portal, they see Wrashk on the other side. ".... oh look. It's the mercs. Fun."

There is a three-foot tall fox standing there wearing a blue top, blue skirt, blue vest, and a pair of sunglasses perched on the top of her head. She is leaning against a wall, arms folded and gives a smile and a wave to the others as they arrive. "All yours. But keep him alive for trial, please."

Light says, "You're not our boss, but... you did say the magic word. And death should be a release..." he gets an evil smile on his face as he turns to look at Wrashk. In the blink of an eye, Light is behind Wrashk and holding him still for the others.

Raven and Crushington's turns.  :)