• This section is for roleplays only.
    ALL interest checks/recruiting threads must go in the Recruit Here section.

    Please remember to credit artists when using works not your own.

Futuristic Heroes of Tomorrow

B R E A K
But if you really want to live, why not try and make yourself?

can't... stop... now!
the incubus
Will I ever get to where I'm going?
escape route
paramore
mood: smacked around
location: downtown, star city
interactions: Jade
scroll
'Get up, damnit...Breathe!'

Trevor sat up, taking in deep inhales of the sweet air as it finally came into a steady rythym. He glanced before himself, at Colt as he blasted beams of heat vision into the swarm of robots. They melted down but more of them replaced their ranks. Trevor coughed and stood up, still dizzy from the effects of whatever caused his vertigo. He made an executive decision to let the big guns deal with the current situation. He felt a little better, able to stand on his own. But, clearly, his telekinesis was out of order for the time being, unless he wanted to blow up everything and everyone around him. Turning tail, he made his way to some of his other teammates.

He saw Mikey on the field tending to Daimion, which confirmed what Trevor already knew in his gut: They were royally getting their asses handed back to them. On the first day of work, to be exact. Trevor huffed, getting his footing back. He made a conscious effort to avoid the robots, opting to throw them out of the way and keep them at bay for someone who could end them at that moment. Trevor watched as a cluster of robots began to swarm at Kai. He was about to get completely demolished by them and Trevor would not allow that to happen on his watch.

He ran at full force toward him, reaching his hand through a pile of metal to reach his comrade. He would never hear the end of it if he let the guy die on their first day.
© reveriee
 
Last edited:
Sybil was calling out civilian locations and warning her teammates of incoming robots, but frankly there was so much going on, it was hard for even her to keep up. Suddenly she rushed to the mic controls, muting Damion's mic for the open channel about halfway through his scream. She kept it active for her to hear though, and his pleas echoed through the room before he fell silent.

"Good luck," she told Mikey as he left, but she barely looked away from what she was doing.

She winced as she watched Freddie spiral out of control and careen to the ground, unable to do anything but watch, and opened up a private channel with the winged girl.

"Freddie? It's Sybil," she said, trying to keep her voice as calm and steady as possible. "You conscious? Try to stay that way, okay- Mikey's on his way."

Apparently so were half a dozen robots, Sybil saw. They were headed towards Freddie with intent, and Sybil was powerless to stop them-

"Wait, I'm an idiot," Sybil said aloud, and her fingers began flying with renewed purpose. Sybil was pretty powerless against a lot of things- But a robot? That was just a computer with legs.

"Let me see if I can't take care of these walking circuit boards for you," she told Freddie, one of her drones moving into position above the robots. These things weren't all doing the same thing or going to the same place, which meant they were either communicating with each other or with some central source, and if she could disrupt that communication... Nothing happened the first few attempts.

But then- She found the right frequency and the robots just.... Stopped.

Sybil nearly cheered. She could do the same thing on a larger scale, using the drones as pinpoints to create a network, and began to move the drones from their auto-determined routes to where she wanted them.

"Nat, Mikey- I'm sending a drone with a green stripe your way, it has a lock on Freddie," she explained, pressing down the mic buttons to talk to just the two of them. Or it would have a lock on her, once Sybil got around to doing that- She was juggling quite a bit at the moment. "There's a big white button on the top- Press it once you are ready to move on, and it will lead you to her, okay?"

The other drones were in position now, spread out as far as their signal radius would allow to take out as many of the robots as possible. She was about the enter the commands to jam the frequency the robots were using- When two of the drones fell from the sky and crashed to the ground, incinerated by Colt's show of force. Or tantrum, as Sybil saw it.

"Dammit, Colt," she muttered, re-spacing the drones as quickly as she could and hitting 'enter' on the command chain.

Nothing happened.

She tried again, tweaking it slightly- Still nothing. She swore a bit more fiercely, but cut herself off once she remembered she was still on the line with Freddie.

Either the robots' defense systems were self-learning, or she had a counterpart somewhere, who had seen what she did to the robots approaching Freddie and taken measures to make sure she couldn't do the same to the others.

Now that she thought about- Jamming the signal frequency to disrupt the robot's communication was... Almost too obvious, for robotics advanced as these. They should have had stronger defenses from the get-go. It was almost as if someone had left those defenses open, to see if anyone would try to get past them.

And she'd gone and revealed herself for what? Six robots? Shit. The ones she'd taken out still seemed to be offline at least, but based on how fast the the things had come up with a defense for her jamming, she wasn't confident that would last.

"Freddie, you still with me?," she asked loudly, having never closed that channel. "Keep, you know, breathing and shit, okay? Deep calming breaths," she advised, having no clue how to console a teammate in pain. She imagined Oracle did this shit all the time- She worked with the Bats, and without much for superpowers, Sybil figured they were getting injured left, right and center. Oracle probably had this comforting reassurance shit down to a tee.

"You might want to move away from those bots I took down, I'm not sure they'll stay that way." So much for comforting reassurance.

"I'm gonna stay on the line with you until Mikey gets to you, okay," she promised, typing in the commands that would make the green-striped drone lead Mikey and Nat to the winged hero. "But I'm also gonna keep trying to take out these hunks of metal remotely, so if you hear me swearing- That's what it's about," she explained. "That or one of our teammates did something boneheaded again," she added, reflexively searching her monitors to see where Colt had gotten to.

He was on the sidewalk and not currently generating an inferno or anything, so that was an improvement. Hopefully no civilians had gotten caught up in his fury.

Interacting with: Mikey birth of venus birth of venus , Freddie KingofAesir KingofAesir , Nat PRETTY HATE MACHINE. PRETTY HATE MACHINE.
Mentions: Colt fin fin
 
Alias: Blink
Eli Ronan

Eli was late, like so late. It wasn't his fault though. It was basically lunchtime when the call had been broadcasting over the speakers. So he hadn’t been ready to leave on a dime like everyone else had seemed to be able to. I mean who just lived their life ready to go fight robots.?He needed a second to put on his costume, to get in character.

Okay so usually it was just a second that he needed. But Eli had to finish his lunch and his disguise was all the way back in his room and he couldn’t find his other knife.

He let out a few loud curses as he heard the zeta tubes start going off. There wasn’t even going to be anyone to fight by the time he got there. Everyone else was going to get the fun combat and he was going to be left with clean-up duty or whatever else heroes did once the camera crews turned their lenses to politicians.

He pulled the pillows up from the couch, hissing when something sharp nicked his finger. “Finally.” He pulled the knife from where it had fallen between the cushions. “You can’t leave me like that” A faint smile tugged at Eli’s lips.

A few more Zeta tubes went off and the training facility seemed to fall quiet. He was so fucked. This was supposed to be his first real day as a hero and he was already messing up.

With a deep breath, Eli pulled light around him. He didn’t want to deal with Dick right now and the only way through the Zeta tubes without setting his mentor off was while invisible. He’d probably have to sit through a lecture about responsibility or some other stupid hero shit later but right now he just wanted to join the fight against… whatever they were fighting against. He figured it would be easy enough to tell who the bad guys were once he was on the battlefield.

He slinked into the debrief room, hugging the wall to keep as far away from Dick and Troia as he could manage before slipping through the zeta tube, still invisible.

He was met by immediate chaos; the kind that made his fingers twitch for action. A knife brandished in each hand, he leaped into motion. Eli tackled the first robot he found from behind, taking it by surprise. The thing stumbled forward, trying to catch its balance as Eli’s invisible arms yanked it backward. The moment he felt it start to fall, he twisted to land on top of it and drove a knee down into what looked to be relatively fragile hip joints.

In the same motion, he drove his knife into a bundle of wires near what seemed to be the machine’s chest. It flailed, trying to grab the unseen assailant on top of it but Eli just plunged the knife back into the mangled wires. Probably not the most effective way to kill whatever this was, but it worked. Even if it took five or six deep plunges of the silver knife to cut through enough wiring, it worked. The bot twitched and stuttered before going slack.

Before he had even a moment to celebrate, something hit him square in his back. Hard. He was knocked to the ground, coughing and hacking to try and catch his breath. He stumbled to his feet, turning to face the new assailant. It was a tall and blocky robot with no eyes.

Fuck, Eli thought. It could see him, he knew it. It was tracking his movements with its head as he shifted his weight. Eli wasn’t used to being caught. He hated the feeling of being seen when he was so sure he shouldn’t be. His heart dropped when billowing smoke began to waft from vents on the robot’s side. Seconds and it was all around him. Light was harder to come by in smoke, it felt like threads unraveling from the blanket he’d pulled around himself. He wasn’t invisible anymore. He could feel it. There wasn’t enough light to pull around himself to hide his body. On top of that, he was blind, surrounded by a cloud of thick smoke.

His head snapped left when he heard the crunch of something heavy stepping on loose gravel. He threw himself backward, narrowly missing a fight that sent air moving past his cheek. The next blow came quickly: something sharp slashed across his shoulder, dragging a reluctant yell from Eli. “Fight me fair!” He pushed back, kicking up dirt and dust “You couldn’t land a hit in a fair fight” It was an odd statement to come from a man whose power was invisibility, but at that moment the irony was lost on Eli. He was so used to having the upper hand in every encounter that when someone else had it, something felt innately wrong. Like something he was owed had been taken from him. He wanted it back.

He was as ready as he could be for the next hit. Something hard and blunt hit him in the stomach. Eli curled around the thing that had hit him, clutching the arm with every bit of strength he had. There was no way that he could fight this thing without knowing where it was so he would just have to keep a grip on it. He grit his teeth, pushing the thought of the blood staining his chest and the bruises blossoming on his stomach and back out of his mind.

Fuck this machine, Eli. Kill it.

Mentions/interactions: None! Open for interaction
coded by reveriee.
 
scroll !
mood
regret

location
middle of the street

outfit
Ching Shih suit

interactions
butterbee butterbee

mentions
no
Zheng
“Ooooh, somebody’s late…Eli’s going to get a whooping from Donna…” Zheng spoke to Rheba, as quietly as she could, smiling, grinning. She had already been in her Ching Shih suit, which seemed to be way too light to be protective, but in her training proved to be quite useful and better than her old pirate suit. She liked the color scheme but had an almost melancholy blanket floating over her every time she put it on. She waited for the blanket to fall over her, but it still hadn’t.

Of course, a man is late. Typical man behavior. When a male is late in my dimension, we strangle him to death and then feast on his body!

“Rheba…I was joking.” Zheng sighed in defeat, noticing that there was a line formed around the zeta tubes. She contemplated waiting for Eli but decided against it. This was his mess, and she didn’t doubt his ability to get out of it without a scratch on him. In fact, she predicted that helping would only hinder his mentioned ability. Of course, this was after only a few weeks of knowing him, but when you’re 200+ years old, you get the gist of archetypes.

You joke too much. When a female jokes too much in my dimension, we strangle her to death and then feast on her body!

“Well, this is my dimension, and I hope you’re ready for a show. You and me…we’re gonna kick some ass.” Zheng hyped herself and Rheba up, trying to whisper her words and not attract too much of that pesky little thing called attention. “Rheba, can I count on you? You know, to shift when I ask you to?” The woman asked, hoping that the answer would be a positive one. Zheng was the only one whose training required her to talk to a therapist and get Rheba to cooperate on dangerous and real missions like this. But therapy can only do so much in such a short period of time.

I promise nothing!

“Rheba, I’m not joking—” Zheng got into a zeta tube as she spoke and didn’t expect it to start moving so quickly, basically stopping her in her wording. “Rheba, I really am not joking.”

But the chaos that ensued once the zeta tube opened, letting Zheng out into the city…it was horrible. There were robots everywhere, and things were burning. In fact, there were so many things being thrown that the ground itself was vibrating somewhat, and it didn’t take long for Zheng to jump into action. With her new sword and her old sword handle, she was ready to take on anything that was headed for her. Oh, and one shouldn’t have ever forgotten that she had a degree in robotics, so she knew pretty much where to strike. Surprise, it was not the head.

“Okay….Okay…Ching Shih, you got this. Identify the power source and shut them down. Okay, that’s two steps. Good. Two steps are easy.” She spoke, this time to herself because Rheba appeared to be offline. It didn’t take long for her to start following her own pep talk words; smart words and start slicing the robot’s left and right. Their body parts flew everywhere and sparks from their wires followed.

This went on for some time, and it emerged to Zheng that after every robot she’d cut down about two more would appear, and by that logic, well…you didn’t need a math degree to know you’d pretty much die after two or maybe three rounds.

(Zheng did also have a math degree for those wondering).

However it was, Zheng knew that she was getting tired. She was sweaty and her palms already were hurting from her grip on the sword. If only she could’ve had about 8 arms and be 10 times bigger. Oh, wait, she could—she could be exactly that.

“Okay, Rheba, now!” She yelled out, ducking as two robots over her crashed into each other, basically destroying themselves in the process, but instead of there being a giant purple squid where Zheng once used to be, it was just Zheng lying on the ground, underneath the rubble of two robots. “Rheba, I swear to whatever entity you call God; I will find a way to make you suffer if you do not help me right now.”

No.

“You b—” Zheng stopped herself. Swearing and getting angry was not the way, even though she desperately wanted to punch the octopus. “You know what, your hissy fit is the least of my problems right now.” She climbed out of the robot rubble and checked around her to see if there were any more robots. For some reason, the answer was no, and all of them decided to run to a street nearby, so, naturally, Zheng followed.

That was when she saw the funniest thing which laughing at would probably send one straight to hell. Well, it was funny until she saw there was blood dripping everywhere. “Oh, God! El— Blink!” She corrected herself as she was already sprinting towards the large robot that was practically killing Eli right in front of her. In this state of her mind, she could not locate a power source because this robot seemed to be different, and at the same time, she just stabbed him the exact way she did others.

It didn’t work, and with a single turn of the enemy, Zheng was thrown 30 feet away, landing straight on her ass. When she looked at her sword she realized:

She just stabbed Eli.
coded by reveriee
 
Freddie MacNeil

Fred was only half conscious really, her mind drifting in some strange space between the waking world and the embrace of the unconscious. Somewhere in the fogged over mess of her mind she knew that she needed to stay awake. The force with which she had hit the sidewalk paired with a particularly nasty hit from a bot did not bode well. The sounds of the battle still waging around her were muffled and felt a world away, but she could feel where the concrete crumbled under her, and she dug her fingers into the pulverized bits to ground herself. The ringing in her head was steadily getting worse and Fred wondered if it was the glorified tin cans making the noise or if she was losing her hearing. A sharp pain lanced through her back and down her left wing as she tried to force herself up off the sidewalk. It was laying limp across her side and Fred forced her eyes open to try and gently move it off her. There were feathers strewn about everywhere and she was certain she could feel blood trickling down her back where her suit slit open.

“Freddie? It—” Fred winced at the sound of Sybil’s voice bouncing around in her head and only managed to catch a few words, “Mikey’s on – way.” What? No, she didn’t need him. Fred forced herself up into a sitting position with some sudden force of energy surging through her.

“No, Syb, wait. He can’t—fuck, I don’t know how healing a wing will affect him I’ll be fine if I can just—” Fred didn’t have much time to do anything as the sounds of metal slamming against pavement entered her ears and at least a few dozen bots came into view, on a direct beeline for Fred. Thoughts of Mikey abandoned her, and she grasped around blindly for the hilt of her sword, gripping it tightly as soon as her fingers found purchase. There was no way she could stave off that many of them in her current state. She felt suddenly like that that little boy cowering under a bench, helpless, alone. She barely registered the sound of Sybil’s voice but the robots suddenly jerked to a stop in front of her eyes and Fred decided that she’d have to thank her teammate for that later. A bright flash blasted across the sky. Fred blinked, Colt, that was a rather large display of force which probably meant that—Kat, Freddie forced herself up onto a knee so that she could see more than two feet in front of her. She had lost the two of them previously and if Colt was going haywire like that then Freddie wasn’t the only one overwhelmed. She ignored the screaming of her head as she tried to catch even a glimpse of Kat, or Lex, or anyone really. She saw Trevor barreling Jade out of the way of a collapsing building but the others she couldn’t see. Sybil was speaking again.

“Keep, you know, breathing and shit, okay? Deep calming breaths.” Fred almost scoffed, deep calming breaths was the last thing she wanted to be doing right now, but she forced herself not to say anything to Sybil about it.

“You might want to move away from those bots I took down, I'm not sure they'll stay that way.” Freddie did not need to be told twice. She gathered up as much strength as she could to clamber up onto wavering feet and scramble away from the currently frozen clunk buckets. Her head was still pounding, and she felt a little out of sorts, but she managed to find a wall that wasn’t crumbling away to lean up against and hope that nothing else came after her. Still, this felt like cowardice. The rest of her team was still fighting and here she was leaning up against the wall of a building like she was out on a smoke break.

“Can you see Kat? I can barely fucking—talk clearly…we got,” Freddie sucked in a breathe between her teeth, “We got sep—she was with Colt.” She wasn’t much use at the moment, but she wanted to make sure they hadn’t gone off a died while she was curled up on the ground like a baby.

Mentions: Kat a z u l a a z u l a , Colt fin fin , Mikey birth of venus birth of venus , Lex hery hery , Trevor sublimed sublimed , Jade aikoscurse aikoscurse Interactions: Sybil jones573 jones573



coded by: @s e v e n

 
mime.
beaten up
star city, fox news van
lex hery hery atti mogy mogy
honey, where's my supersuit? w/ white balaclava and mime design

“Hmm..?” Alonzo thought aloud, brown orbs narrowing down at where Lex said the source of these robots was located. Truth be told, he hadn’t been listening much to Sybil - or the team comms at all. He dug into his ear but all that his digits could find was ear wax.

“Must’ve lost my earpiece in the wreck, I guess.” Zo muttered as he joined Lex in leaning over the front seats. He then nodded his head in agreement. The civilians in the van were a pleasant party to have with them but it would soon be time to send everybody home - get them somewhere safe. He wasn’t sure what he’d do if any of them were injured on their watch now and there was a sickly feeling in his gut when he thought of how he’d packed them all together like sardines. If he were a robot, he’d be salivating at this ten-birds-in-one-stone combo.

But that was when another comrade came into view, Atticus, who was small for his size but held his own ground well. Zo could tell that there was an extra layer of panic in how Lex frantically raised attention to their teammate and wasted no time in corralling the passengers. Alonzo joined in.

“Ladies and gentlemen, let's try and go three for three, shall we?” He joked in hopes of relieving the tension of yet another dastardly mission. They were asking an awful lot from those they were supposed to be saving. The civilians made it easy in their willingness to help but what else were they supposed to say? They’d abandon them and find their way through the robots alone? Zo shook away the thought and with a flick of his chin, ordered Lex to the back of the van where they’d pick up their ally. From where he stood in the front, Alonzo tightened his hands against the worn fabric of the seat and let his eyes slip shut, focusing his powers again. A field of energy invisible to the eye enveloped the hull of the van as they rammed through the robots. The front-end of their ride was well-maintained, while the visible BB dots in the back doors told another story.

Alas, Alonzo grinned at the mess of two tumbled comrades sprayed across the back of the van. The doors slammed shut behind them.

“I do the jobs asked of me. I don’t get people killed,” whatever hidden connotation inhabited those words, they were lost to Alonzo who simply nodded to Atticus and helped him off the floor when Lex’s outstretched hand had lingered for an awkwardly long time without grasp. He could sense the tension, and patted Atticus weirdly before sticking a thumb towards the van’s front windows.

“Now where were we? The source,” Zo continued in an attempt to draw focus back to the mission. As the van continued, the roads were filled with more pot-holes and wreckage but the area was quieter. Civilians had either fled or died. Only the hum of machinery sounded like a noise in the back of their heads, only, it grew as Felix drove deeper.

“H-Hey, what’s that thing those medieval castles always have? Big-ass lakes that guard the castle…” Zo mentioned in a voice that was almost a whisper, as if he were thinking to himself… or hiding from something. Hiding from the truth. If they were truly nearing the source then there had to be something to protect it, right? There had to be a moat.

“Stop the van, Felix!”
He shouted in his sudden realisation.

But when the van jerked violently to the right, Alonzo knew he’d been too late. There was no time to react as the van crashed into a nearby building in the district. In the moment, his eyes had widened, taking in the images of bodies hanging in the air for a second that felt all too long before being flung onto the walls of the flipping van. Now, most of the civilians were groaning and in pain. Some were knocked out. All were still.

Knocked against the floor, for some poetic reason as if the universe were laughing in his face, Alonzo could see through his only eye not swollen shut, the mess that he had brought upon them. It was the handiwork of a genius, a massive work of metal that glowed a menacing hue of red from its illuminating orifices. It had to be at least 9 feet tall, nearing the van with steps that caused the earth to shake. That had been what knocked them off course.

Alonzo felt it; how easy it would be to give up now and bite the dust. But the voice of Midnighter echoed through his splintering headache ear like nails scratching a blackboard. “If you’re still breathin’ at the end ‘a the day, you ain’t done your job right, I'm uncultured.”

It burned to move but Alonzo managed to do so. With the robot nearing the van, it needed a distraction. A reason not to kill all of these innocent people… So Alonzo gave it one after limping outside of its back doors.

Standing across the street, over a fire hydrant that helped take the weight off of his wounded leg, Alonzo’s fingers twisted into the shape of the firearm. He'd peeled the nape of his balaclava up over his nose to inhale air and sport Midnighter's crazed grin. His fingers took the shape kids made when they played cops and robbers in the playground. Only this time, smoke blared from their tips every time he flicked up his digits.

“Pew, pew, pew,” Zo whispered. BANG! BANG! BANG! Were sounds of the invisible bullets ringing off of the robot’s shell. It didn't do much besides adding a couple of scratches to the bot's perfect paint-job. The robot stopped after Alonzo’s attacks had only scratched it. Gears visibly recalibrated themselves as the hulking piece of crap turned slowly to set its sights on Alonzo. Then it started to move.
coded by natasha.
 








"So 'stonished."
Mika had asked one too many questions. Questions that went to the back of his mind. She even thought it was rubber, which almost drew a chuckle. The symbiote had mimicked the threads of most clothing but its pseudo-Vantablack appearance made it appear to be made of another material. Half the reason he ran along with the fact Itsy suggested it. The bots might have been programmed to attack targets but a fast-moving target was better than a slow one.

Before entering the fray, Mika–Veil–mentioned this would be an easy mission. Safe. Daniel did not quite have the heart to say otherwise. This was not a game. Was any mission truly safe? Pessimistic thoughts aside.

Here and now, his focus steadied on what was real. On what was right in front of him, of them all.



“Sounds like a plan, Veil. Race ya’,”
Daniel–Spider-Boy–flashed a thumbs up with his little quip, dry yet keeping that witty charm as he smirked under the mask. Speaking deadpan made him sound like a jerk. Even the lenses transferred the emotions of his eyes, one grew smaller and thinner while the other slightly larger and wider.

Then he took off, throwing his arm forwards to point towards a small group of death-dealing decepticons.

“I got these pieces of software!”


Running forward like a quarterback with the robot arm slung over one shoulder, Daniel simply leapt into the air and brought the arm down on one robot’s head, simply splitting the skull into two almost before the mechanical limb just seemed to sink into the head the rest of the way. Pulling the bot to the side through the stuck mechanical limb inside its circuitry-infested skull, Daniel delivered a swift kick to its backside. The destroyed bot flew into his functioning companions while Daniel simply disappeared from his spot, leaping and somersaulting over the carnage below before firing a wide netting of silk onto the drones. Landing and bending his knees while simultaneously crouching and pulling his arms forward over his head and towards the ground, Daniel sent the mass of robots towards the larger ground forces.

“I came in like a wrecking ba-AAAAGH!


A stray laser sliced at his suit and shoulder. A small cut, almost nothing but an inch or less but the suddenness and sting behind it certainly left an impression to not be desired for. Sucking air in and out of his mouth, the symbiote Itsy eased the pain aside as Daniel focused once more as he flipped to the side and landed on a nearby wall. Where did it come from? Where was the shooter? From above. Flying drones and certainly not the ones Sybil had flying around. All different shapes and sizes for a number of them. Others were more uniform in design. Similar to the ground forces.

“I’ll take them. Veil, focus on the ones on the ground.”


Firing off two strands–one from each arm–the superior human-spider’s body flew through the air with a mighty tug on the lines. Crouching mid-air and sailing his arms back, striking a rather aerodynamic pose, the acrobat landed on the back of one of these drones before smirking. Raising a fist up and shifting his shoulders, a downward punch tore and pierced through the steel casing. Ripping his hand free from the casing, inside the closed gloved palm held wiring and circuit boards.

“Hm,”
Daniel mumbled before storing the parts away. Nothing substantial and probably ruined beyond repair but better than nothing in terms of evidence. He doubted anything would be left of these bots.

Hopscotching from one aerial drone to another, Daniel focused his energy on tearing apart the aerial forces. Arms and legs worked in concert, claws at the read as he sliced and diced his way through. If his friends were pinned down by their heavy fire and unable to reach them, it would spell certain tactical disadvantage. He leaped once more before a certain beeping noise reached his earpiece.

Wait, that meant-.

Dismantling the last bot with his bare hands and his claws, Daniel backflipped away from the crashing drone and landed next to Mika. He gave a small wave before ducking into a nearby alley, keeping low and staying low. Pulling from the suit a communication device–complete with a screen and a field-tested replacement for his phone–Daniel’s eyes began scanning the screen. He began tapping into communications. Complete chaos. The team was a mess. Leaving his cover and leaping towards the nearest streetlamp to perch, his panicked gaze shook from side to side. Teammates were pinned or falling down injured. It was not just a fact of numbers or firepower. They were too spread out, too prone to injury or being cut off. Alone.

They were a team and were falling apart right at the seams and more.

Shit.


The most prominent was not those who were injured or already seeking aid. Jude’s vital signs had dropped significantly in the last few minutes. Colt’s seemed to have spiked but no serious signs. Yet. It would take too long for Mikey to reach Freddie at this pace, and Eli’s vitals were spiking and falling every second. No one would arrive in time to help them. A new plan was needed. This would require teamwork and coordination from people who probably barely knew each other’s names, even in the two weeks together.

Leaping off the streetlamp before swinging away on a line further down the street, Daniel let go of it before slamming into a drone. His feet crumpled the metal underneath before grabbing hold and throwing the formerly-flying bot like a discus while mid-air, sending the impromtu weapon towards its brothers and sisters in scrap.

“I can score on ya’ chumps all day!”


His feet and hands hit the ground, crouching like a predator upon landing. The lenses of his mask fell upon Mika. He tapped on the comms over his ears. Sybil and Mika needed to hear this. They needed to focus up with him.

“Veil. Pythia. We have to work together and coordinate the teams and make sure the zeta-tubes are ready. Focus on having everyone regroup and evacuate out of here. I think we have too many injured to keep going like this. I have a plan to draw as many bots away so everyone can escape. But I need to go right now. Stay here.”


Veil could protest all she wanted. He could not wait. They had too many people down. Now or never, something needed to be done. No hesitation hindered his movements before he took off. Daniel leapt into the air once more, firing a line almost haphazardly behind his body before his entire body flew into the air at speed. The wind rippled across his suit as he trailed behind a drone like a flying water (or air) skier. Daniel began crawling along the silk line like his namesake.

“Seriously, guys, Star City has laws against drones.”


Tugging on his speedline, Daniel yanked himself forward to close the distance and landed on top of the drone, sitting atop it before leaning forward and peering down towards its camera. It would see the hero's upside down head as he smirked under the mask.

“Hello! Welcome to my livestream. Today we’ll be dismantling an army of robots the next few blocks over.”


Flipping into a one-hand stand atop the robot, Daniel delivered a swift punch with the other towards its cameras before leaping off his arm and away from the careening bot as it exploded against the asphalt. Another silk line fired from his wrist as he swung towards the source of these robots, at least how Sybil had predicted it. But he needed more noise to draw the bots. He needed to think of something and think fast! Spinning mid-air before falling backwards, Spider-Boy began firing globules of webbing towards several different vehicles.

And setting every single car alarm off he could. Swinging and gunning webs all the way as he kept moving. No time to fight now. He needed everything following him. Create the largest ruckus to cover the others. Daniel tapped a finger to the comms as he made his getaway.

“Atria! Can you hear me? Are you okay? Can you grab Firebrand? You’re the fastest, and she’s been down the longest. I’ll get whoever I can. We can meet up at the cross section. And everyone clear the streets!”


He barely got the words out before a strady laser cut the line while another sunk into his back. Smoke smoldered off the wound as he fell atop a car on his back. Good news, it set off another car alarm. Bad news? Too many of those drones on his tail. Rolling off the car before flipping onto his feet, Daniel smiled. He got this. He got this. He began lifting it up, twisting and spinning his body, before throwing the vehicle like an oversized dodgeball. It flew into the heaps of bots as their lasers cut through it. One such shot hit the gas.

Daniel did not stick around for the explosion.

Too many. So many. Keep going!


Rpeating the mantra over and over in his head as he pushed forward. Completing one more swing before landing once more and rolling to break up the downward momentum and force --instead sending him forward along the ground--Daniel came to the location of one resting Colt. One with no injuries. But completely unmoving. What the hell happened to him? Besides a small spike, nothing should be wrong with the man who was basically invincible.

“Liberty. What the hell did they do to you?”


Daniel flipped the man over, checking for any wounds quickly before shaking his head real quickly. Alive and breathing but little to tell beyond that. Daniel simply lifted the man up and over his shoulder. One down. He would have to pass Colt off to Kat. Especially since Daniel’s whole pan involved being a distraction. He could do this. The weight wouldn’t slow him down.

“Blink! Ching! I’m headed your way! Angelface, find a zeta-tube. Nahuelito or someone check in on Azrael.”


What the hell was he spouting? Teamwork makes the dream work, though. They needed to work together. His lenses widened along with his eyes before narrowing as he curled himself up in mid-air, dropping fast and accelerating towards the ground. A spare web-line fired near the last moments changed his trajectory and slowed his landing.

Smoke. And danger. His sixth sense was warning him. Even Itsy was on edge, scanning around for any hostels. Something was moving in there. And there were two heartbeats.

“What the hell is this? Liberty, are you still with me? X-ray vision might be nice right about now!”


He could sense it moving. A large bot but there was too much smoke. But whether it made its way to attack him or not would be up to his sixth-sense to detect the danger before it happened. Daniel looked around the other streets before hitting comms and leaping towards the side of the street closest to the fog. If the bots overran his position, taking cover in the smoke for refuge would not be a bad idea. Well, other than running into the fog and praying they would lose him, at least for a moment so he can get away.

A shield formed from and out of his suit sprouted from his arm, raising it as the hellfire of weapons' fire began to rain down on Daniel from across the other end of the street. He needed backup. Anything. Anyone. If Liberty could not be of use to the situation, maybe he should start asking for a few other options.

“Atria, I could use a bit of backup here! They’re sending in some new shit, and I can’t mess around while I’m lugging our golden-boy here.”


He switched channels. His breathing got faster, fighting it down as he gritted his teeth.

“Ching? Blink? Can you guys hear me? What the hell is happening?”


There was too much. And there would be more drones to pile on and compound the problem. They were going to get killed. Daniel steadied his legs, waiting a few moments for any response. But moments are all he would have. Because, sooner or later, Daniel would be running into the smoke. No matter what.







the venomous



spider-boy













♡coded by uxie♡
 
Alias: Blink
Eli Ronan
Eli had never gotten used to being in pain. Some of the thugs he’d worked with on the streets had tried to make a point of toughening him up a few times, but Eli had learned to slip through their fingers and aim for their ego. Getting put on their back by a ‘kid’ half their size would usually shut the strongman-types up pretty quick. He wasn't tough but he was scrappy; just strong enough to drive one of his signature daggers down into soft flesh but fast enough to get out of a bad situation when he needed to.

He would never be the guy that took a punch like a champ. He would never be able to set his own broken nose or pop a dislocated shoulder back into place without letting loose a few creative phrases

But the pain he felt now was mostly manageable. A few bruises and a shallow cut across his chest. Every once in a while, he would screw up his face as a swing of his arm would pull at the split skin. “You fucking hunk of dense metal-headed piece-of damn metallic ass fu-”

Pain. White hot pain. Eli spasmed at the feeling of a blade driving itself through his shoulder. For a moment, he went limp. He couldn’t think, he couldn’t move, he couldn't see. Arms that had been wrapped around the robot combatant lost their grip. It was almost like he had been pulled from his own body, so shocked by what had happened that he couldn't quite grasp what he was feeling. Any control that Eli had kept on his invisibility slipped through his fingers. He hit the ground in a fog of confusion.

What just happened?

Another wave of pain brought him back into the present as the blade was pulled out of him. Something between a scream, a curse, and a grunt escaped his lips and pressed against his ears. Eyes blinked hard, shifting wildly as he tried to understand what had hit him. Had there been another robot? He couldn’t think of anything close. Maybe the thing he’d been fighting had been able to twist and get him… but he’d been keeping an eye out. He’d been careful. What had…

There was a metallic creak behind him and the sound of something large swinging through the air. Just in time, Eli pulled himself from his own scattered thoughts and rolled. It hurt. The pain at his chest was radiating out from the wound. Everything hurt. The ground where he’d been moments before made a sickening, cracking noise at the impact of the robot’s blunt arm.

But something even worse loomed above him; Zheng clutching a bloody sword.

Eli groaned. Robots don't bleed. So where could his dear, sweet roommate have found the blood that was smeared across her blade? What lucky-fucking-bastard had found his unfortunate way across her path? Hm? Any guesses?

“What the-” He pressed his face into the asphalt, retching as pain blurred his vision and twisted his thoughts. “I sleep ten steps from your bed, Zheng.” He didn’t have the presence of mind to use the codename she’d drilled into his mind the night before. The hero coughed and spit before forcing a laugh from his own lungs “If you wanted me dead, there were easier ways.”

He could feel blood staining the blue fabric of his hero suit. This was not good. He didn’t think she’d nicked anything too important, but he needed help. Quickly.

Eli’s mind reeled, trying to find a way out of this. Trying to map his escape. There was always a way out of a bad situation, there had to be. The fighting around him hadn’t stopped. Maybe it had begun to slow, but everything sounded so loud in his head that he couldn't tell. Or maybe he was just hearing his own, deafening heartbeat in his ears.

He shifted, propping himself up. His free hand went instinctually to the wound. Pressing gently at the place where Zheng’s blade had gone through him. The area was already slick enough to cover his fingers with blood. “Damn it,” He hissed.

Finish it fast Eli, he thought, or you won’t finish it at all.

He glanced back at Zheng, his features beginning to pale. No matter how hard he tried to send a forgiving and encouraging look in her direction, he knew his mess of an appearance probably wasn't doing him any favors. “Take an opening when you see it.”

He pushed away the pain. Just for a moment. Just until they could get out of here. Just until Zheng could save his ass. He pretended he was fine, trying to convince his own mind to ignore the way his nerves screamed. He willed his body to move the way it did when he was fine. And it did… mostly.

In one motion, he pushed himself off the ground and dove for the robot’s legs. He could give Zheng one good opening. She had one chance. The robot wobbled, trying to account for the impact, but Eli had wrapped himself around both legs. It wouldn’t let it correct its balance. He wouldn’t let it stay up. He wouldn’t let it get away.

It tipped forward, flailing to try and keep upright. But it went down.

Blood smeared against metal, metal pressed into mangled skin. Pain flooded back into his mind, but he’d done what he needed to. Eli had given Zheng a way out, hopefully with him in tow.
Mentions/interactions: Zheng ( mogy mogy )
coded by reveriee.
 
Last edited:
mood: angsty + overwhelmed
nokuda kai

As Kai tried to fight robots off while helping civilians escape, he began to think about the jail cell he could’ve been spending his time in instead of this bullshit. No one to bother him in solitary confinement but his own thoughts. Maybe if he stabbed one of his teammates they would still send him.

The assassin had faced many enemies before, but robots were a new one. They were smarter than humans, and much harder to dissect. Kai was a master at reading body language and predicting his opponent’s next move, but with these hunks of metal it was much more difficult to tell.

His twin blades worked in an endless stream of slashes, cutting down robots as they dared to come anywhere near him. Helping civilians became less of a thought as the robots kept advancing on him, focusing on saving his own skin instead of the remaining civilians still stuck in the middle of the battle field.

For the first time since joining the Heroes of Tomorrow, Kai was jealous of his teammates. Being the only member without a power was something he had bragged about, because he was the only person who didn’t need to rely on a power to get him in. He was better than his teammates even without a superpower, and it had made him cocky.

Now that he was neck deep in a pile of robots, he was beginning to wish he had some sort of fancy trick to get him out of this mess. His slashes became sloppier as his arms grew heavy with each swing, and still the robots kept coming. The screaming in his ear piece only distracted him and hurt his precision, so he yanked it out and chucked it at one of the robots as he continued fighting.

Nothing seemed to help as he was now surrounded by a mix of normal sized and smaller robots. There were too many for his blades to reach at once, a flurry of steel on steel as his blades rapidly swung at anything they could reach. All those years of excruciating training and Kai couldn’t even defeat some measly robots when it really mattered.

He was completely overwhelmed now, unable to see past the silver glint of robots blinding his vision. A human hand reached out through the metal towards Kai, belonging to a voice that sounded like Trevor telling him to take his hand.

In his current state of panic and self-loathing, Kai scoffed at the outreached hand and continued trying to slash robots despite the lack of room for movement. The robots were now landing hits on the back of his head and his midsection as he desperately tries to dodge, only to run into another robot just as he’d gotten away from one.

Narrowly escaping the grasp of one robot, he tripped over a smaller robot in his haste to escape, at the same time a taller robot nailed a solid punch against his head and sent him propelling to the ground rapidly. In his disorientation his grip on his katana loosened, and before Kai hit the ground he hit something sharp on the way down.

Years of holding the same weapon meant that Kai knew every inch of his blade and it’s sharp edges. As Kai’s vision started to blur with each hit the robots continued to land on him, he gripped the weapon in his hand and stared at the blood pooling on the ground beside him, the piercing pain through his stomach could only mean one thing. Kai had impaled himself on his own sword.



coded by reveriee.
 
Last edited:
Kataly'a.
distraught — outfit — colt, daniel, jude — fin fin birth of venus birth of venus Fill Fill


The rising and falling of Colt’s chest began to even out and signify that whatever had happened back on the ground was beginning to lose its hold on him. Kataly’a continued to watch with concern as Colt slowly began to recover, the tension not leaving her shoulders even as he seemed to come back to reality, because their current reality was not a good one. The fight had only gotten worse as she had waited for Colt to recover, and as much as she wanted to fly back into the fight, she needed to make sure that her comrade was okay.

The look of panic on his face that had stricken her so much was suddenly replaced by one of anger, and the alien could only stand still as Colt suddenly rushed forward, all flame and fury as he began lashing out at her.

As much as she tried not to, the princess flinched as the harshness of both Colt’s words and gaze scorched her. It reminded her of the condescending way her mother spoke to her, a reminder that she was not yet good enough to be ruler of Almerac.

The Kryptonian’s hand on her face made her heart skip, not used to such forward contact from any of her teammates, let alone Colt of all people. She couldn’t look away, even as her palms began heating up with anger at both herself and the clone. The insulting way he spoke to her made her insides boil, if she was any less forgiving she would’ve smacked him into the ground by now.

As much as she hated him and what he had to say, he was right. And she hated him even more for being right. Kataly’a had always been emotionally weak. The princess was always rushing in headfirst and letting her emotions get the best of her. It had gotten her into plenty of trouble on Almerac, and now it was getting her into trouble here.

Still, it cut like a well-aimed blow to the chest as Colt stated that if their positions were reversed, he would not have saved her. And Kataly’a whole-heartedly believed him.

Without another word, Colt took off towards the battle below them, leaving the Almeracian standing alone on the roof top. There was no time to sit and sulk, her team needed her and the built up fury within her needed a release of energy.

With all the fire of an exploding sun, Kataly’a took off into the sky just behind Colt, ready to unleash her sudden emotional turmoil on the invading robots. Before Kat had even reached the ground, Daniel’s voice suddenly crackled into her earpiece.

“Yes, I will go grab Firebrand! Do not the worry Spider-boy!” Kat responded, blasting robots from the sky with a renewed vengeance as she scooted for Jude among the rubble.

It wasn’t easy to find the cherufe amidst the wailing of the injured, explosions of metal, and a suspiciously large amount of car alarms going off. Once the alien finally laid eyes on her injured comrade, Kat swooped down through the army of robots towards her teammate, emitting explosive blasts of energy as she went.

While Jude was quite heavy, Kat lifted her without much difficulty and took back off into the sky. Though she was much more knowledgeable of destruction than healing, she could tell that something was seriously wrong with Jude as she carried the usually scorching hot woman towards her designated meeting place with Daniel.

“Everything will be the oh-kay!” Kat tried to reassure her teammate as she carried her above the ruins of Star City. Even in the sky the robots were closing in on them with Kat slowed down by the weight of Jude and the amount of energy she had already expended.

A robot landed a blast on Kat’s leg as Daniel’s voice called through the communications device again, distracting her as she tried to shoot back at it with beams of silver energy while still holding onto the cherufe.

“I am on the way! Everything is under control!” Kat tried to assure Daniel through the comms, though things were certainly not under control as a robot grabbed hold of Kat’s leg and started clawing it’s way up. The alien’s grip on Jude loosened as she violently shook her leg, trying to get the robot off of her and sending her flight off kilter.

A well aimed blast finally sent the robot plummeting to the ground as the Almeracian reached the meeting spot with Spiderboy. There was a hoard of robots following after him, and Kat allowed herself a brief moment of gloating which quickly turned to concern as she spotted Colt’s limp body in Daniel’s arms.

“Goose!” The warrior princess called out for Daniel to duck as she charged towards him with Jude in tow. With more energy than she could afford, Kat released a blast of energy ten times the size of her normal ones aimed just behind Daniel’s head. It would be enough to take out a good amount of the robots behind him, but it still left them vulnerable.

If Kat was going to destroy this large of a force, she was going to have to use up every last ounce of her energy. With the right timing, Kat could release the blast and still have enough energy to get herself and Jude to the zeta tube.

In a flash of silver, a wealth of solar energy released from Kat’s body in the direction of the oncoming robot army. The moment she released it, Kat could feel the energy drained from her body. As she slowly started making her descent to the ground, a robot flew out of seemingly nowhere and straight for the Almeracian.

With little energy left, Kat could not dodge in time, but she could strike with her fist. Except this robot did not crumple under the immense pressure of her punch, instead barreling the alien over and sending her into a forceful downward spiral. No metal could affect Almeracian’s like that besides aluminum, but the others had not been made of that?

With no energy and little time, Kat desperately called out for Daniel as she tried to throw Jude in his general direction. Unable to stop her momentum, Kataly’a smashed through the exterior of a nearby building with the force of a freight train, barreling through steel and concrete until she was propelled out the other side of the building. With a sickening thud, Kat’s body cracked against the side of the next door building, falling to the pavement between both structures in a heap of mangled limbs.

Still conscious but considerably damaged, Kat clawed her way off of the ground, weak sparks of silver light seeping from her hands as she tried to get back up and continue the fight. She had to get up, to keep fighting, to prove Colt wrong and show that she was a worthy warrior-

The building groaned as it fell, and the Almeracian was only able to drag herself halfway to the sidewalk before it crushed her, ruble pinning her to the concrete from the waist down as she flailed her arms desperately trying to get out.

Her teammates needed her. The civilians needed her. They were depending on her to help them and she could not even help herself. As silver blood slipped from her side, Colt’s words repeated themselves through her mind.






 
Last edited:



jude rivera-carvajal.





































  • mood



    we're soarin', flyin'!
















The sounds of chaos and battles roared above her head as Jude laid buried in concrete and rubble, phasing in and out of consciousness as the penetrating cold reached down to her bones. Not only that, but the impact into the ground had left her head banging like a kickdrum with no rhythm or beat, no respite to the pain. The cherufe was far from a stranger to it, if anything she welcomed hurt as any other truth in life, but this was entirely new. Vaguely, if Jude was able to open her eyes in a moment of wakefulness, blood bloomed in the vision of one of her eyes. Ever the firecracker, Jude was fizzling out fast, and left bitterly angry at the fact that she could be defeated so damn easily. How could she let herself be so useless? She could have done more, helped more people, fought alongside her team, but instead her one weakness had been pinpointed and exploited.

There was no measure for her to realize how much time had passed before she truly regained consciousness, but fully formed thoughts finally caught up to the dizzying ache in her body when horrible rumbles like an earthquake and a flash of heat flew above her from Colt's outburst. The ice had melted even before that, but the frigid cold left her incapacitated. Now, Jude could open her eyes and begin to move, the only sound in her ear a high pitched ringing. Beyond the veil she could hear yells and cries, car alarms, and destruction. It took her a moment to realize she couldn't hear her teammates' voices. The girl slowly raised a hand and felt around her head before finding the earpiece and shoving it back into place, wincing at the onslaught of screams and commands. She had barely caught the exchange between Daniel and Kat, and knew that soon the alien girl would arrive to help her. And stubbornly enough, Jude didn't want help, but had to accept it as another bitter truth of her massive failure.

The cherufe sat up slowly and cupped her trembling hands around her mouth, attempting to self regulate any ounce of warmth left in her. Instead, a choke and a cough of white smoke left her mouth and nose, a warning sign of her dangerously low temperature. The melted ice and frost left her soaking wet like a drowned cat, hair flat and lifeless, pale as a ghost. Trying to reignite herself left her head spinning, a pang of black in her vision. Fucking useless.

She wasn't left in her one person pity party for long. Kat's arrival was swift and without greeting, but Jude gasped and held on tight as the two flew into the air without a second's notice except for the alien's attempt at reassurances. It would have made her laugh if Jude wasn't absolutely terrified at that moment - she was born of the earth, typically too heavy to ever be held, let alone flown around without a grunt of effort from Kataly'a, and holy shit did flying absolutely terrify her. Completely out of control and being jettisoned along like a package, Jude looked down and her mouth popped open into a little round 'oh' as she witnessed the full extent of destruction that had hit Star City.

"Fuck! Please don't drop me!"
Jude squeaked as robots attacked them midair and they went spinning off in a different direction. When they readjusted as Daniel came into view with his own horde of robots following closely behind, Jude's heart dropped. This was a battle they were not winning.

The enormous display of Kat's power was both incredible and terrifying to behold, even moreso as she had been held in her arms as Kat released power like never before and wiped out more than half of Daniel's pursuers, but the impact midair from a stray robot came entirely out of left field. Jude felt herself be gracelessly thrown to the side and met the open air with a terrified scream. Midair, she witnessed Kat fly into the building but had no time to react except to shut her eyes and brace for impact.

Daniel caught her before the girl plummeted to the ground for a second time, and Jude yelped in fear and found herself clinging to someone again and thanking whatever gods she could think of.
"Jesus Christ, thanks."
Her voice trembled dangerously as the full realization hit her - Kat had been flung through two buildings and they were crumbling and falling over her. Jude basically wiggled out of Daniel's hold once they were on solid footing, but upon the realization that she could barely stand, she grabbed his arm for leverage as she watched the buildings fall. Terror gripped her throat and Jude trembled from cold and fear, close to tears.
"Kataly'a! Oh fuck, please god no-"
Jude shuddered and coughed more white smoke,
"We have to get her out!"



































magnet



bikini kill










♡coded by uxie♡
 
Lex Delgado

The roar of a building crumbling resounded throughout the block, sending ripples in growing magnitude down the street. The van rocked violently, nearly sending Lex tumbling into a trio of huddled passengers. He caught himself with a hand on the metal side of the vehicle, sending an apologetic smile down at the family. The civilians were holding it together, but just barely. Everyone was scared shitless.

A heavy sigh of relief exited the quivering man, whose heart clutched his chest as though a heart attack was imminent. Surprised, grateful laughter filled the van as Atti gathered his bearings, and it brought a smile to Lex's face. He was sure the guy would shout and push him right out the van in an act of misplaced vengeance, but this was a welcome change.

But as all good fortune has its ugly counterparts, Atti's smile dropped and the light in his eyes was extinguished. "Oh," he said flatly, meeting Lex's eyes once the gears in his head had begun to turn, "I'm fine." Lex pursed his lips, crestfallen but not shocked. With no attempt at politeness, Atti swept his hand away and stood up somewhat with Alonzo's help, even if it was obvious that he was in pain.

"Well, good," Lex replied, a newfound note of bitterness finding its way into his voice. And as he explained their situation, it became startlingly apparent that Atti didn't want to listen and that Zo had yet to be debriefed on information readily available at the very start. Yet somehow, the glorified mime had been the glue holding this end of the operation together. His natural charisma, even under extreme pressure, was something to be envied. Another layer of stress stacked itself atop Lex's frazzled psyche.

“Yeah. I was listening. Couldn’t exactly move much being jumped by seven-or-so robots. But I was listening," Atticus started. Good for him, then. His tone was getting very old very fast, but there was a time and place. “You know…whatever, Lex—” He hesitated, and in that very moment, Lex lifted a curious brow. It must have been so exhausting holding in all that he was. He sent Alonzo an exasperated glance, even if he wasn't capable of understanding the context of their blondes' shared contempt.

“Whatever, dude. I’m not petty," Atti concluded in the pettiest voice imaginable, “I do the jobs asked of me. I don’t get people killed.” Lex's jaw dropped, his brows now knitted with clear consternation. Sparks surged around his right fist. He had half a mind to ream the other man right then and there, but Alonzo had already seized the figurative talking stick.

“Now where were we? The source." Right, the mission... Lex gave Atti one last glower before moving on, finally picking up the eerie silence surrounding the van. The screams and cries of both heroes and civilians had begun to wane as they entered the long-evacuated portion of the street. Zo's voice fell to a murmur. “H-Hey, what’s that thing those medieval castles always have? Big-ass lakes that guard the castle..."

Lex moved up to the front window, turning his back on his ex once and for all. "You mean, a moa—"

The van jerked just as Alonzo's voice cut through, “Stop the van, Felix!”

There wasn't even time to form a thought before inertia took hold, catapulting Lex forward and into the front windshield, which shattered into pieces upon impact. Just as the vehicle's passengers were suspended midair for a fraction of a second, so were thousands of glittering glass shards. It was like an explosion of stars scattered every which way. He shut his eyes as he flew out the window, across the front of the news van, and finally onto the splintered asphalt.

Words escaped Lex as he let out a sharp cry of pain. His body tumbled like a barrel on the ground, his ragdoll arms flailing in the wind until, eventually, he landed a mere ten meters from the moving force that had begun its assault on the van. He groaned lifting himself up, dusting off the glass pieces that had burrowed into his semi-metallic supersuit.

His body ached, but adrenaline was quick to kick in. Lex stumbled shakily onto his feet, assuming a battle-ready stance while craning his neck up at the gigantic thing in their way. He looked slowly, uncertainly, taking in the behemoth with wide, fearful eyes. Its red glow trickled onto his comparatively tiny body as it drew closer, each heavy step cracking the surface below. Smoke was pouring out of the destruction that surrounded them in every direction.

Behind Lex, he could barely make out the forms of his teammates being slammed into buildings, dropped from the sky, and overwhelmed by endless masses of robots. They were fighting, yes, but losing. Alonzo, Lex, and Atti were as close as they could get to the supposed source of the swarm, but they were still so far away. It simply wasn't enough.

"Guys..." he spoke into his earpiece, faltering on the precipice of his statement. How was he supposed to explain to the team that... maybe it wasn't enough? As he peered back at the van filled to the brim with exhausted, injured civilians and at his two limping teammates, a pang of guilt struck his heart. He wasn't ready for this. He knew he wasn't, and yet...

But there wasn't the time, and just as Lex snapped away from his thoughts, he caught Alonzo trudging out of the van with every ounce the energy that was left. There was a determined look on his face and, while it was inspiring, the metallic giant in front of him left Lex standing like a deer in the headlights. A deer with a really, really bad backache.

Frozen, dumbstruck, the blonde watched as he limped to a fire hydrant on the other side of the street. Before he could begin to ask what he was doing, Lex realized that he was pointing finger guns at the robot. And he was waving them around, pretending to shoot, which meant...

He looked back at the giant to find it staggering backward, the sharp bang of invisible gunfire resounding throughout the scene before him. The robot's stagger was a mere illusion, as it sustained no real damage besides a slightly scuffed paint job. It turned away from the van, which Lex was lamely guarding with outstretched arms. He gave it a look back, noting that most of the passengers has passed out. It was amazing what hero combat training could do to keep a person conscious.

This distraction wouldn't go to a waste, not now. The moment the situation became clear to Lex, he charged forward, grappling onto the robot's legs with glowing, orange hands. The air around him was overwhelmingly hot as he latched on harder, his gritted teeth and formerly aghast face twisting into extreme, pained focus. But the robot lugged itself onward like nothing, kicking its leg carelessly like Lex was a mere mosquito. He was immediately sent hurtling backwards but this time, his hands and feet caught his body. The heavy friction burned his gloves, and he winced.

It was useless. Frantic, Lex searched for a signal from Alonzo to find that he was looking up at the robot's head. He was shooting toward it, but the thing was so small compared to its body that hitting it was near-impossible. "Really? The head?" he exclaimed, nodding to Zo, who nodded back, then moved his arms like he was throwing or stretching, or... what was he doing? Lex never liked clowns, but mimes were even worse.

With a flick of the head from his teammate, Lex was alerted to look behind the robot. Just barely, dust caked atop invisible platforms that were immediately recognizable as the work of the ever-resourceful Mime, Alonzo Rodrigues.

"I hope you know I hate heights!" he shouted, making deft movements hopping from platform to platform. Electricity pulsed in his palm, ready to grapple onto the robot's head and give it the thrashing it deserved. But fate was cruel, and just as Lex was level with the robot, a miniature turret crawled out of one of its metallic crevices, taking aim and firing at the hapless hero. His feet moved side to side dodging the gunfire and, from afar, it almost looked like he was tap dancing.

It was impossible to get close like this, not unless Lex wanted a facial reconstruction. "It's shooting at me!" he cried, his entire body covered in a nervous sweat. His voice rose an octave, a wild panic seeping into his tone. "There's guns... on its shoulder!" Even so, he was getting closer, learning the pattern at which the turrets moved. One wrong step and the entire endeavor would be moot.

It didn't look like it, but he was almost there. "Hang on!" Yes, yes! Just... a few more seconds...

And that was when, out of nowhere, a hand intertwined with his. Surprised, Lex toppled forward, narrowly grazing a bullet on his ear. Sparks shot in every direction, but that wasn't the end of it. Lex was scrambling to stand up on the dissipating platform, and that was when his eyes latched onto Atti. He understood what the man was trying to do, but...

"Wait, stop! Let go! You're going to—!"

Interactions: fin fin (Alonzo) mogy mogy (Atti)



coded by: @s e v e n

 
B R E A K
But if you really want to live, why not try and make yourself?

can't... stop... now!
the incubus
Will I ever get to where I'm going?
state of the art
incubus
mood: done
location: downtown, star city
interactions: Kai, Mikey
scroll
He felt it from within, something like a blaze within his being that flickered to life. When he saw Kai fly so awkwardly through the air and then land on his own blade that feeling pressed forward, outward. He felt a haze fall over his eyes. Was it visible...the way the air seemed to bend around his body with the conviction that fell on his mind, body, and soul? The vertigo from earlier seemed to melt away from him in this state. As he walked forward, cars and trucks seemed to be pushed out of his path.

"Fuck this bullshit," he sneered, blood dripping from his nose as he flexed harder than he ever had before. This was raw...he felt as if his head was on fire. It had gone on long enough. His pupils were in a state of chaos, expanding and retracting at a steady pace. A line of robots stood between him and Kai, who needed serious attention. The blood from his body pooled from the place where his body was skewered. More robots surrounded the man as he withered in pain from his injuries. Trevor could feel Mikey, the medic, still a distance away from them. If Trev didn't do something soon, death was evinant. He felt the words as he said them, like an echo in his mind. Something has broken down in his mind, a crack in what used to be a wall.

"M...m...Mike....Mikey...," He stammered, his pupils now fully dilated to the point where his irises were but slight rings around them, "Get.....Kai....," he said, somehow knowing that the man would get the message. The robots made their way to him. There was no way they could have calculated around Trevor's brute force, reaching out with his left hand and swiping at the air. They stood for a few seconds before the effect of his move displayed itself. Their bodies fell one way, their heads the other. He proceeded forward, stepping over them as a child would step over broken toys.

There were people watching as he moved, some of them being huddled together by the robots. And, there was Kai, who seemed to be hanging on to life by a single red thread. Trevor walked out amidst all of it and stopped at the center. He then slowly raised his arms, in the shape of a "v". He stood, single and solitary at that moment before the robots started to rise off the ground. Not one, not five, but all of the ones that were near his area of at least 700 meters slowly levitated. As they did, the imprisoned civilians ran away while Trevor yelled "Go!" loudly. The word echoed into their minds and they took off in gratitude and fear of what was about to happen next. Trevor flexed and as he did his head felt like there was a white-hot iron stabbed into it. The robots, however, were violently quartered at the same time. Their limbs hovered around their bodies like mettaloid phantoms in the wind. Trevor flexed again, the pain intensifying tenfold. The metal collided together, creating a huge mass that damn near melded together. He then threw the entire thing down, slamming it down so hard that rock and metal flew in all directions.

He then let go. The citizens in that area were okay. They would get to Kai. They could win this fight. Trevor smiled as he took a step in Kai's direction before falling over on his face, completely unconcious.
© reveriee
 
Last edited:








'So Stonished.
Struggling against laserfire, Daniel’s comm piece flickered to life. Kat was alright. She was okay. She was coming and had Firebrand with her. Daniel smiled under the mask, gritting his teeth as Itsy and him strained against the heavy fire. They would need to move soon. Just a little longer. Keep Colt safe. Keep Zheng and Eli safe. Keep the whole team safe. Work together. Get through this. Retreat and regroup. Strike back when the opportunity was best. They can still win this and make it out alive. They just needed to work together. Hopefully, Mika and Sybil were working to organize and help the team get out of here. If Kat could get here, the two of them could grab the injured and get out of here.

They could grab Fred too. His communication device told him she was not far from here. Everyone was going to make it. He had to trust his team, and they had to trust him. As impossible as that might have sounded, Daniel held onto that hope. Suddenly, his alien partner alerted him. There! Kat was arriving! Wait, what was his spider-sense going off?

What the hell was Goo- Oh no!

“WHOA!”


Daniel instantly ducked down, crouching and almost parallel to the floor with one hand touching the ground for balance. The blast ripped through the center of the bots, cleaving the forces into two groups and leaving many who had not been directly hit singed and burned. Missing limbs or melting and malfunctioning. The others were simply vaporized. Kat had certainly meant business.

“Whoa,”
Daniel muttered. Eyes wide.

That was only the start of the lightshow. As the warrior princess took charge, she began to glow. Daniel did not dare to look at her, instead opting to find any sort of cover. Behind him, light erupted, rendering the army to be no more. Exploding cores and parts flew, vaporizing in mid-air as the force and heat simply washed over their enemies. Daniel gazed at the destruction simply by peeking over his shoulder.

Kat . . . she was amazing. The two of them could get past the rest of the forces together and get the team out of here. Daniel beamed up at her, delivering a thumbs up.

“Kat, that was-. WATCH OUT! KAT!”


Too late. The scene played out in slow motion. That was the problem with super-reflexes. Sure, you could react to things in day-to-day life normally. But as soon as the pressure was on, as soon as the adrenaline began to hit or fight-or-flight response started telling your brain to get off the bench, it was like someone hit the TV remote and began to slow the footage. Kat’s body flew to the side, nearly out of his peripheral vision. He watched as she pierced the first building, then saw part of her collapse into the second. He tried to follow her trajectory but his head instantly snapped and looked up at the other flying body. Jude. She was heading straight for him and screaming.

Every fiber of Daniel’s body kicked into overdrive. Nothing on God’s green earth could stop the locomotion of his body as he simply traveled as a blur. His legs pumped and forced him forward before the athlete took a mighty leap, soaring through the air and past several stories before firing a web-line. He shifted Colt over his shoulder as a spider-like appendage formed from his suit before wrapping itself around and holding Colt. Another one of Itsy’s tricks while Daniel soared into the air towards Jude’s flailing mass of limbs. If he timed this just right and grabbed her just now . . .

“Gotcha, fireworks! Nice of you to drop in!”


Extending the line and rappelling down, Daniel skidded the pair of them to a stop as he held his teammate in his arms. Not even a moment afterwards, she began to squirm from him. Daniel slowly let go as confusion crossed his face. She felt cold. What happened to her? As she stumbled and reached out for him, Daniel immediately reached out and grabbed her arm as well. She could barely stand. Whatever was done to her put her through the ringer, same as Colt. His eyes narrowed, piercing into her without her realizing.

Would he have to carry her as well? Most likely. Then she began yelling. Tears ready. That’s right. Kat. His own eyes widened, watching his own teammate panic. On the verge of tears. Not because of her own injuries. Not because of the situation. Not over the deaths of anyone else. All more than enough reason for anyone to break down, trained or not.

But, no, it was because of a friend. Kat got hurt while trying to keep Jude safe. And now Jude wanted to rush in and help her. And Daniel . . .

He couldn’t let her, but he couldn’t just tell her that. Not to her face. Not now. Immediately, Daniel forced Itsy to drop the modulation on his voice. Nothing but his own, true voice would speak to Jude. She needed to listen to him. Not Spider-Boy. Him.

“Hey, hey, hey! She’ll be okay! She’s almost as tough as Superman, remember? She’ll be okay!”


Nice lie, Daniel. Aren’t you the honest team player. You have a clone of the big man hung over your shoulder.


His tone kept firm. There was no time to argue, no time for Jude to question him. She needed to do what he said or none of them were making it out of here. Tendrils from his suit began to form as well as an additional three spider-like legs. Itsy’s tendrils began to form a blanket of insulated pseudo silk to keep her warm and for her to hold onto and keep herself centered. To keep the shock from overwhelming her. He needed her to focus on him, on his words.

“Listen. I’ll help get her out of here, I promise, but I need to get you and Liberty out of here! Same goes for Ching and Blink!”


Jude would hate him. He would see it in her eyes, wouldn’t he? The hate, the indignation, everything. The fact he stuck to codenames, even in the face of all this. How could he stay calm? How can he still play hero? How can he hold onto the idea of hope? Didn’t he care? Why would he leave Kat behind? Wasn’t he supposed to be a real hero? Maybe any one of the questions would rattle through Jude’s mind. All Daniel knew was that there was no time to argue. Sometimes, the only choices you had were bad ones.

But you still had to choose.

But no matter what, he would never, ever break his word. He would save Kat. He was getting her out of this. He promised Jude that. But he had to get the people who were still alive in front of him out of here before risking their lives for one that might not be. As hard as a pillow as that might be to swallow.

It was one he would have to deal with.

He would grab ahold of the cherufe, whether she liked it or not, and Colt with the aid of his new spider-legs. At least his arms and hands would be free for him to use. Daniel began swinging away, towards Zhing and Eli. If the two had concluded their battle, they would find themselves the aid of one particular Spider-Boy.

Ready to swing them home. Hopefully, Mikey would have Fred and the others covered, at least until Daniel could get back and grab any of the rest that had been scattered and injured. Maybe he could swing by Fred and help her, if the bots kept off of them and if Mikey was preoccupied or taking too much time. He would make the call depending on how the situation fell. So he kept his ears to the comms.

And he kept going. He had work to do.

––––––––––

“Hey, Veil! You miss me?”


Mika would see a black and white blur simply falling from above before slowling to a stop and landing with the aid of two synchronized silk lines fired from the wrists and slowing him at the last second as Daniel tugged on them. He smiled as his attention fell on her.

“Gotta drop off my teammates here. Get them through the zeta-tubes. They need medical attention and we don’t have time for Mikey to get to them.”


Dropping them down onto web-made gurneys, Mika could tug on the silk-rope handle and tug her friends through the zeta-tube and to the otherside with ease gathering than carrying or dragging each one by the arms.

The agile gymnast turned around back to Mika as he gazed at her over his shoulder. He smiled.

“I’ll catch you on the flipside! I got a few more to grab!”


He’d take off once more again. If Mika or Sybil said anything to try and stop, he was not hearing it. He made a promise. And he would make good on it.

Because he had no clue what he would do if he didn’t.

––––––––––

Daniel peeked around a corner of a nearby building, several stories up and clinging to the wall with ease. Too many bots. They were surrounding the structure. Searching for a body. The son of his father–the police detective–knew this might be the case. It was the reason he couldn’t leave Jude and Colt in a nearby building and run off to save Kat. If any bots arrived, they would search and find the two of them. This group was larger, nearly twice the size of the army Kat vaporized. How were there this many? Were they self-producing? Self-repairing? Multiplying through mitosis?

Something had to give. Something was wrong about this whole situation. His eyes scanned before falling upon the bot that hurt Kat. Daniel’s teeth began to crack against one another as he scowled. No one hurt his friends like that.

His fists closed as his eyes closed. His entire body shook as he took several deep breaths before his eyes shot open, glaring through the mask. His spider-arms at the ready and tendrils began to grow from the suit, ready to wreak havoc. Itsy growled inside Danie’s mindspace. It wanted a fight. And more importantly, like Daniel, it wanted payback. As little as these teammates mattered to it, they were allies nonetheless and important to Daniel.

Nothing would deliver it the disrespect of hurting the things that mattered most to its host.

Daniel leapt into the air, firing a singular web-line. Time to go to work. At the middle of the pendulum of his swing, his legs bent and pulled themselves close to his chest before exploding outwards towards the skull of the automaton that dared to strike down Kat. A giant dent found itself in its exterior before Danile landed atop its back.

“Yoo-hoo! I’m right here! Tight spider-ass here for the taking!”


The bots began firing. Daniel began crawling around the exterior of his new metal shield as it took the brunt of the attacks. It seems these bots, for all their coordination and intelligence, lacked the simple necessary attribute of friendly fire. Perhaps the calculated the loss of one automation to be inconsequential if it meant his death. Daniel smirked before casting a quick glance at the side of the damaged robot he clung to. He reached out and tore off a piece of ripped up metal from its exterior before reaching inside and ripping out the wiring and motherboards from the inside. Itsy simply absorbed these materials into the suit, storing them for later use. A machine that could deliver a blow like that to Kat was not to be messed with.

In more ways than one as Daniel ran and hopscotched along the exterior of the machine, dodging laser fire. More and more stray shots began to hit him. He shrugged it off, realizing they were closing in from all sides. These weren’t stray shots anymore. These were overwhelming odds, too many projectiles to dodge. His suit and skin began to burn. Time for Plan B before they circled him completely. He leapt to the top of the suit and began to flip over its head. In mid-flip, Daniel’s hands reached out and grabbed the machine’s cranium before completing his flip and wielding the giant automation as a weapon, slamming like a hammer to the ground. Before Daniel picked it up and began using it like a battering ram. Shot echoed off from behind as he ran forward. He pushed through. One seared through his leg. He nearly stumbled before yelling and pushing forward. Two more tore through his arm and shoulders. Nothing. He could handle this.

Tearing through the forces, Daniel opted for a different strategy, attaching two web-lines before swinging the behemoth of a bot around like an elastic chained mace. The radius of his swing got larger and larger as machines flew left and right into mangled shells of their former selves. On his last swing, Daniel let go and sent the construct straight towards the enemies firing at his back.

Crushing them.

But there were many more. They were crawling over the rubble, flying over between the buildings that were still intact. Here to stop him. To kill him. Too bad. Whoever made them should have sent more.

Because he was not dying here.

“COME ON, YOU SONS OF BITCHES! I CAN DO THIS ALL FUCKING DAY!”


The next moments were a blur. Daniel began tearing into them. Claws. Razor-sharp spider-arms. A kick sent to the torso of one both while he spun in mid-air and removed the head of another with his bare hands. Where bullets failed, blades buzzed forth to tear him apart. Make him bleed. Make him slow due to the loss of the ichorous lifeblood that helped him move. Spiders had a neat way of altering their blood pressure to spring forth. Jumping spiders used this to leap across distances. Daniel used it for everything. His super strength as he sent bots flying towards his comrades, knocking them over before he could leap, fire a web-line, and accelerate his descent with a pull as his legs remained taut and straight, crushing their heads. His super-speed, moving fast enough between machines as they began shooting each other. They were too close. Friendly fire would always be an issue.

Melee weapons helped even the playing field. Of course, Daniel could use them against each other. A sword pieced his leg as a buzzsaw made its way towards his skull. Daniel stopped the automaton attack on his cranium with one hand before sending the spinning blade towards the one that had stuck its blade into his leg. Daniel tore it out before launching it at another bot. His breathing ragged. How long had he been fighting?

Time had become a soup as Daniel staggered over to the rubble. He had to save Kat. Nothing mattered except getting her and everyone else out of here. He began tossing rubble. His sixth sense was buzzing. It was always buzzing.

Something struck his stabbed leg, sending him into a crouch. A new pain erupted from the other leg. Something had struck the kneecap of his other leg. Ligaments shifted and broke. Useless. Another strike. It shattered the bone this time. Daniel could not stand on it. He swore, yelling as he lashed out. His fist took the machine’s head clean off, the very one that had snuck up on him. Idiot. He was an idiot. Too much danger. It had clouded his senses, his spider sense. Itsy was too busy keeping his alive from his injuries to focus on watching his back.

And here was another to add onto the pile. He stood up, forcing bone and muscle to simply bear the weight, for him to bear the pain. It was nothing. It had to be. No matter how broken. This was not a game. This was real. Trainee or not, there was no choice but pushing forward, whether he liked it or not. He limped, tearing off more rubble. Keep digging. Keep searching. The next injury came from a drone. It fired electrical wires, searing into his left arm. Two lasers fired, tearing through the muscle. Daniel brought it down to his level using those same wires, working through the pain, and crushed it before tossing it towards the reinforcements. He kept tearing at the broken building. Where was Kat? Every movement carried out frantically. There was not much time. His breathing became a series of shallow breaths interspersed with huge gulps of air, tearing into the rubble nearly as much as the pain was tearing into him.

More and more injuries added to the pile. His left arm and shoulder burnt. His left leg was torn to bits by blades. His ribs bruised. Some cracked. Others broken. He couldn't tell. It was one big mess of his insides, a patchwork of pain he could never unravel. It just drummed on and on inside of him. A constant reminder that he should give up. One stab wound nicked just almost between the ribs. A large slash across that side of his torso. Scratches and bruises lined his chest and lower parts of his arms. Defensive wounds. His knuckles were bleeding and covered in dried blood and soot as the protective gloves had simply torn apart under the force of his punches against the onslaught. Holding back would be useless here. Three of his spider-arms were torn. The last simply nearly in two pieces as one end hung to the other and swung back and forth in the wind, held by a few strands.

Back to work. Keep digging.

The final series of injuries came from a new breed of bot. This one decked out with several arms and an orb-like body. Like an octopus or a spider. Dozens of huge limbs accompany its central body. One such limb struck out and simply broke his arm in several places as it sent him flying before another rapid limb struck out towards his shoulder. A blade sprung from the tendril and stabbed his shoulder partially before his arm shot out and grabbed ahold of the arm. His one lone working arm struggled and strained as it held the blade back from fully skewering through him. The clamps around the tendril snapped open and shut, wanting to impale him and hold onto him at the same time. The machine settled for lifting him into the air.

Before another tendril wrapped around his throat. Choking. Squeezing. Everything going black. He wouldn’t choke to death from a lack of air. The machine would snap the bones in the neck long before that. Daniel only had one choice. He let go of the arm and its blade, letting it slide through his shoulder. Before he lifted his arm up and began striking at the arm that choked him.

He snapped it off of him, finally able to breathe before the clamped blade around his shoulder threw him violently to the ground. And then the real pain came. The machine had been trying to be merciful. Instead, its dozens of other arms began to strike at him in rapid fashion.

One after the other.

Daniel’s arm fell limp to the side, only able to fend off a few times. His suit and mask began to tear to pieces. Daniel’s eyes lulled into the back of his skull almost. Waves of mental anguish as well as physical rolled over him as Itsy screamed in pain. Parts of his suit flickered, trying to camouflage with the surroundings. Sparks of bio-electricity began to pitter and patter off of him. Host and symbiote reacting only with the most basic instincts.

Hide. Fight. Run.

None of that is possible. Daniel’s body felt on fire. No more. He couldn’t take it anymore. The pain had to stop. A flash of purple light erupted before his eyes. Those far away might see it. A large surge, an electrical storm, exploding outwards as every ounce of bio-electrical potential left his body. It was a small trick he could do, like a taser.

And now it simply rendered his opponent to be as effective as a piece of scrap metal. Parts of its outer shell sizzling from the heat. Daniel rolled to the side gazing out to the mess. Cybernetic piles of bodies surrounding this site he had been tearing apart by hand, brick by brick. Now, here it was where it came to a close, right? His eyes flickered open and shut. He could rest a little. He could just lay here. He fought to the end. He did everything he could. No one could ask anymore of him. No more, please.

Please, God. No more.


Then, he saw it. A lock of hair. Silver blood. A face. Between the rubble. Under the largest piece of debris yet.

No.

He had a promise to keep. Kat sacrificed herself to get Jude out. No way in hell would he not do everything he can to give back for that. Even if it took everything. He had to save her.

Come . . . on. Come on. Just a little more.


“GRAAAAAAAGHRAHH!”


He crawled towards Kat. With one arm and one leg. A blood trail pooled and followed behind him, marking the direction of his travel. Pain seared through his wounds. The cuts felt cold, the bruises seared up in pain, and everything that felt on fire became cold and vice versa. Opening new wounds that just healed with every movement.

“Just . . a little more.”


Twisting his body, he sat against and under the rubble. He made it. Now what?

Now he pushed. One leg strained to lift him up as his back struck the ceiling that was the huge slab of metal and concrete. His arm steadying, sticking to the debris before pushing against it as well.

He made it move a whole few inches before the weight became simply too much. His back echoed with pain and vertebrae unwilling to move anymore. He needed his other arm. His other leg. He needed Itsy to force his limbs to work, to move them, to push them. His muscles will do the rest, no matter what he might tear with the fragmented bone unwilling to work with him.

Both hands settled on the slab while both feet struck the ground. His arms and legs will work. They will do as they were told. And they would lift to help save his friend!

“COME ON!”


It began to shift. Slowly. Daniel’s vision swam with stars. Blackening. But if he gave up now, if he allowed himself to rest.

He would never wake up again.

More. It began to shift more. Tears welled and spilled out his eyes. Tears he thought ran dry long ago in the fight. Molars nearly snapped under the strain of gritted teeth. Flashes of pain and states of falling in and out consciousness permeated his head, his entire body feeling simultaneously asleep and ablaze with varying temperatures and msucles working and not working, no matter how hard he pushed. His eyes could barely see the ground right in front of him--a swirl of grey mass before his eyes--as his back and arms pressed and lifted upwards. He almost got the full weight of it off. This was the apex, the tipping point. The most difficult part! Every muscle screamed to quit. To give up. The slab began to lower back down to its original position as other pieces of rubble that had been balancing on the slab fell around and atop Daniel.

Dust settled around the site.

––––––––––

As evacuations were underway, radio silence was all that would be heard from Daniel’s channel. Mika and the Nest would glance at the screens to track his position. The radar came up empty. Gone.

Nothing.

Only a single dot. Kat’s tracker. Moving, steadily. Slowly. Straight for the zeta-tubes.

The first thing anyone would notice would be Kat, cradled in his arms. Next, there would see the blood. Silver and red mixed to form splotches and patterns across his suit. Brown hair poked out in small spots through holes in his torn mask, and a tuft of hair blew with the wind over his forehead, exposed to the world. One brown eye peered at them through a torn mask, a lens removed from it. Alive. Hopeful. Happy. The bottom half of his mask, ripped away, revealing a smile. Bloody and, while intact, broken in a way.

His limbs, twisted and broken, kept walking and holding Kat. His voice held a steady timbre as he spoke. The same smile never left his face. But this was Daniel's own voice. No modulation. Not like Itsy was capable right now of any other functions.

“It’s okay. I got Kat. She needs med-bay.”


His arms offered her to the nearest person he could find before he kept walking, beginning to turn around. To head back into the fight.

“Tell Jude I kept my promise. I got-. I got to save-. The, uhm, others.”


A stumble to the left as his balance faltered slightly. One arm hanging loosely did not help in helping him remain upright.

“. . . w-who else is there?”
he swallowed a lump of blood,
“Syb, Mika. Someone. I need to find-.”


He swayed to the left before swaying almost backwards. He tapped a hand to the side of his ear. No communicator. His mind barely perceived that information.

“Oh.”


The smile disappeared as his last phrase became tired, finally catching up with the rest of him. His body tilted forward before slamming into the cold concrete. His breathing stopped. His heart slowed. It would soon follow his lungs.







the venomous



spider-boy













♡coded by uxie♡
 
Last edited:
Freddie MacNeil


Everything felt like it was spinning. Fred had felt feelings like this before, this dizzying, trembling sensation like her legs might fall out from under her at any second. It was difficult to tell if the way she felt like running and throwing up at the same time was from the way her head was ringing or if it was something else entirely. Sybil hadn’t answered her about Kat and Fred was beginning to feel anxious. There was so much screaming going on she felt like she was drowning in the noise that surrounded her, pressing on her eardrums like it was trying to crawl its way into her brain and make a home there. Fred shivered even though it was not cold. She pressed herself as close as she could up against the wall she was still leaning on, favoring her right side to avoid pressure on her injured wing. Perhaps, she thought if she remained still enough, she might camouflage against the dark foundations. That was untrue, she knew, but the thought made her feel better.

Fred tilted her eyes to the sky and blinked against its dulled color. The sun was setting. Strange, Fred could have sworn it had been bright afternoon when they had stepped through the zeta tube. How long ago had that been? Fred blinked again; a heavy kind of exhausted blink that made her eyelids feel heavy. When had it gotten this late? A blur flashed across her vision and her eyes snapped open again, finding the strength through cloudy thoughts to track the flying…people. That sudden sluggish tiredness that had overtaken her just a moment before vanished like evaporating water. That was Kat, carrying a very worse for wear Jude, but Kat, nonetheless. She was okay. Fred sagged as much as her body would allow against the wall. She wished she could fly, wished she could see Lex in the crowd if only to give her peace of mind for a moment. But there was Kat and that was good enough for now.

“Never mind, I see her. It’s—” Freddie’s however brief moment of relief was interrupted by a startlingly bright blast of energy. She turned away from it, shielding her eyes away from the entirely too bright flash, head screaming. When she turned back Kat was being flung through the air like a ragdoll, Jude quickly plummeting to the earth below in reaction to that. That heart racing kind of panic took her over again and she felt her good wing flapping uselessly on instinct and she cursed at the pain it caused the other. She hadn’t even heard herself scream.

“Fucking useless—” Freddie grunted as she pushed herself off the wall against her head protests not to. Then the building was falling, and her steps were suddenly much quicker. There were bots blocking her path, but she pushed forward anyway, eyes glassed and wide. She felt kind of like a feral animal in that moment, head wiping around on a painful swivel, panic and raw adrenaline spurring her movements. The tip of her sword was dragging against the pavement and there was something wet running down the back of her neck, Freddie couldn’t tell if it was sweat or blood. She wished time would speed up, wished she could force herself to move quicker. She tried to shake off the brief flashes of doubled vision and the blurriness of her peripheral, but it wasn’t doing much good. The bots that Sybil had frozen were moving again now, though they seemed unaware of her. Everything felt like it was moving at a snail’s pace, slow motion like those dramatic scenes in movies she hated. She hated this. Hated the way her breathing was far too quick like she was gasping for air, hyperventilating. Fred stopped suddenly halfway from the wall, her good wing drawing tight against her back, muscles clenched. Frozen to that spot like the movie had been paused.

A panic attack, Fred’s chest constricted tightly, she was having a panic attack.

“Shit, fuck this. Fuck” She saw Daniel somehow, making his way toward the direction Kat had crashed, he was going to help her. Fred breathed once deep; she couldn’t get through all of these bots in the state she was currently in, not without making it worse or dying in the process. But she found that that didn’t bother her as much as it had a second ago, she shook her head at the revelation, she trusted Danny as strange as trust felt to her. So, she turned her direction, finally able to force herself to move and started shambling toward the zeta tube.

Fred made it before Daniel and Kat did, barely. She had turned back to the battle with drawn brows, praying to a god that she didn’t believe in that he would come that mass of metal alive. Her heart was still hammering against her ribcage and her breaths still felt shallow and quick, but it was better than it had been. Better then when she saw Dan come shambling toward them. He was covered in blood, her blood, his blood, but God the soaring feeling in her chest would be something she would never speak about out loud after this. They were moving too slow, Fred decided, stepping forward to meet them in time to take Kat from a very wearied Daniel. Her muscles were sore, but she cradled Kat as tightly as she could against her, frowning down at the silver she was bathed in. She didn’t notice the way her working wing came to circle around protectively.

“God, please stay alive.” She had only whispered that, head snapping back up to Dan as he said something about going to get the others, “Wait, no, Dan, you’re hurt you can’t—woah, woah.” Fred stepped forward again as he started swaying before remembering she had Kat in arms. He fell.

“Shit.” Fred spun around and placed Kat as gently as she could down on a gurney, smiling at Mika with a wavering mouth, “Hold on a second.” She turned back around and made her way back to Danny, turning him onto her back and sliding her arms up under him so that she could lift him up off the ground.

“Come on, bug boy, it’s time to give the hero thing a break.” She gave laid him down on a gurney just as gently, thought she would refute any talk about it later.

“It’s Azrael, uh—” Fred spoke into the comms to update their compound bound teammate and any others, “I made it to the zeta tube, so did Spider—” The codenames felt cold, so she changed her mind.

“So did Dan and Kat, he got Jude and Colt too.” Fred felt dizzy again, the adrenaline that had been her power source fading, “I think I’ve got a concussion, but—fuck I don’t want to leave without the others. What do, someone tell me what to do, please.” The last word dropped an octave and the end and graveled, she felt like she might cry out of exhaustion, but instead she just kind of wavered a little and cast a glazed glance back at Mika.




coded by: @s e v e n

 



mikey robinson.





































  • mood



    panic.
















Mikey could feel his heartbeat pound in his ears as multiple things happened at once.

Colt rained hellfire above their heads, pieces of smoldering metal and bot parts littering the rubble around where he had Damion tucked away. With another sickening snap, his shin repaired itself and sat ramrod straight as ripped skin sewed itself together in what were mere seconds - though it felt like hours of pain to the medic. He could hear the yells of his teammates in the distance, but he stayed focused with the task at hand, turning Damion's leg gingerly in his hands before concluding that the process was complete. He couldn't heal exhaustion though, or at least, do very much about it.

Multiple voices continued to buzz in his earpiece as he patted his friend's leg and got up to find the next. A drone flew low near them and he listened to Sybil's instructions intently, but upon hearing Fred's disagreement he stood looking back and forth across the battlefield, conflicted. If Fred could talk and move, he could fix her up later. Who knew how his body would handle healing her wing, but he had to try. He could not go, could not act without knowing that he had done all that he possibly could. The timing now, though, was crucial. If he chose to help one teammate over another, what if the other bled out, succumbing to their wounds?

Another voice made him pause before descending into a full blown spiral of anxiety. Get Kai. With a second of thought, Mikey realized that the voice belonged to Trevor - if Kai couldn't even call for help, that didn't bode well.
"I'm on it! Let's move, Kai is down and he's at least a block away."
The man explained, eyes flicking back and forth between the screen and Mikey.
"I can fix wounds but I can't fix battle fatigue. We're gonna have to start rounding folks up to the zeta-tubes, we're getting swamped out here!"
The boy yelled aloud, half talking to Natalio and half to himself in an effort to keep his head focused.

It was during the mad dash to get to Kai that Mikey stood in the middle of the street with Nat, watching his teammates soar through the air. The flash of brilliant solar light made him flinch and shield his eyes, and by the time he opened them he watched the exact moment that Kataly'a was launched through two buildings. Jude had been caught, but they couldn't watch any more as more robots began to swarm from the commotion. Soon, Kai's head of black hair was in sight, and Mikey's heart dropped to his stomach.

Laid around the man was a pool of blood, dotted with robot carnage, and in it was Kai with a katana through his midsection.

First things first, the sword.

It was a good thing Mikey had a stomach of steel - with no hesitation except for a preparatory wad of gauze in hand, the medic grabbed the hilt tight and pulled as swiftly as possible. With a nauseating, sharp and slick fwip the blade was extracted, and the bloody sword was tossed to the side as Mikey immediately put pressure on the wound. He could heal the wound, but he couldn't let Kai lose any more blood.

He only paused for a second, unsettled at what had to be done. But the moment of nausea was shaken away with a quick huff of breath. Mikey steeled himself and pushed away whatever clothes Kai had covering his stomach. His bare hands laid over the wound, squelching through the flow of blood, and began to heal him. His power was innate - he did not have to will it, hope for it, or force it - the moment he laid his hands on skin it flowed through his body, broke him apart, and began him anew once more.

Like the slow blink of an eye, the wound began to close on Kai's skin and bloom open in Mikey's torso. The sensation was met with a word vomit ramble of oh gods, please wake up, and Jesus Christs. The entire process took over a minute but once the pain began to fade Mikey simply wanted to let himself lay in the dirt, cry, and scream. Alas, he did none of that. With Natalio's help, they began to move towards the nearest zeta-tubes, the destruction of the city and the collapse of buildings a background rumble to their action. Throughout the entire time, Mikey had been half-listening to Daniel's evacuation plans.

Mikey arrived soon after the other arrivals at the zeta tube entrance, eyes wide behind ash-smudged glasses as he took in the state of his teammates. Fred with her broken wing, Jude shivering like a wet leaf, and worst of all Daniel and Kat. Laid out on gurneys like makeshift soldier's graves.
"Oh my god Daniel, please tell me you're freaking alive."
Mikey breathed out, rushing over and standing over him. He didn't even know where to start, taking in the fact that Colt was knocked out there as well, and Freddie was barely able to stand and paging Mt. Justice for help.
"I know we don't want to leave anyone behind, but we can't stay out here like this either. You guys need help, you can't just wait in line while I heal individually!"


































bodys



csh










♡coded by uxie♡
 
Damion Greywolf
Damion's eyelids fluttered open slowly. His vision was blurry but he could tell there were two figures in front of him. He lifted one arm to his face slowly and rubbed his eyes with one hand. His vision cleared and he saw the two men in front of him. Mikey was crouched in front of him with Damion's pant leg up, healing his leg and cuts and wounds. Damion watched as Mikey checked his leg one last time and then he patted Damion's leg and stood up. He was relieved to have been found by Mikey and was overall very grateful for him.

Damion's lips formed into a weak, faint smile and he spoke in a low, raspy tone. "Thank...you Mikey...", he licked his dry lips and rubbed his eyes again. Damion watched as Mikey and Natalio took off to find the next teammate to help. He looked around at his surroundings. Buildings lay crumbled into pieces, bodies scattered everywhere, people screaming and crying for help. It truly was a horrific scene and nightmare. Damion tried to stand up but immediately fell back down to the ground. He coughed as some dust rose from the ground and filled his nostrils and lungs. Fuck. This shit burns Damion continued coughing and he covered his mouth to try and stop his coughing fit.

Damion lay on the ground in a ball, closed his eyes, and imagined himself in a cocoon of red energy. He knew his energy was almost drained completely and he needed to act fast. He muttered a spell in Latin. "Audite me, Hecate, responsum meum vocans. Afferte mihi lux, amor, et praesidio. Mihi opus est industria et fortitudine, adducite eam ad me, et ego laudabit te mane, dies, et nox." ("Listen to me, Hecate, answer my calling. Bring me light, love, and protection. I need energy and strength, bring it to me, and I shall praise you morning, day, and night.") Damion slowly opened his eyes and he saw that he was now in a ball of red energy. He could feel the energy flowing into him and he sighed with delight. He knew it would look selfish of him to stay and lay but he needed to get his energy back if he was going to be doing anything.

Mentions: Mikey - birth of venus birth of venus Natalio - PRETTY HATE MACHINE. PRETTY HATE MACHINE. Interactions: Mikey - birth of venus birth of venus



coded by: @s e v e n

 
"Zeta tubes are open and ready," Sybil confirmed Daniel's request. It wasn't really her call to make, but 'retreat' was sounding like a pretty good option for the team.

She shifted her focus to her teammates in the van to see if they were any closer to finding and stopping the source of the neverending bots and-

"What the hell is that," Sybil swore, redirecting one of her drones to get a better look at the enormous robot. Wait- It looked... Familiar? Like she'd seen the specs for this model at some conference once...

"Yes, aim for the head," she agreed with their plan of action. If she was right about being familiar with this model, she's was pretty sure it's major computing hardware was in it's head- Which was an obvious design flaw in her opinion, since heads were a bit of a weak point when it came to bodies, whether robotic or organic.

"I'll try to draw it's fire," she told Lex, moving her drone closer. But instead of the guns targeting Lex swiveling towards her drone, a different set of guns popped out of the far shoulder.

Damn.

Well- She was already replacing half of her drones anyways, what was one more? She redirected a second drone towards the shoulder where Lex was, and the guns that had been targeting Lex finally began shooting at something else. These guns seemed a touch slower than the ones that had shot down her first drones, so hopefully the automatic avoidance technology would keep this drone up longer. She glanced longingly at one of the dismantled drone prototypes sitting in her nest- She'd been messing around with adding EMP technology, that would sure be useful right about now- A beeping alarm started to her right.

It was accompanied by a flashing purple light which meant- Sybil reviewed all the alarms she'd set- it was a medical alert, and she swiveled to another screen to bring up the team's med status. 'Excessive blood loss' flashed next to Eli's name. She pressed a button to acknowledge the alert and it silenced for a moment- Then started again. 'Excessive blood loss' for Kai.

Shit, what were they doing out there? Stabbing each other? Falling on their damn swords or something? She can't believe she'd let herself get distracted- She hadn't even seen them get injured, much less been able to give them any warning. Dammit dammit dammit.

"If you can get yourself to the zeta tube without Mikey, do it," she told Freddie, agreeing with the other woman's assessment. "He's gonna have his hands full."

At least Kat was back in action and holding her own- Until suddenly she wasn't.

The robot being made of aluminum confirmed something that Sybil had been suspecting for awhile now.

"This is a trap," she snapped at Nightwing and Troia. "You gave us a shitty briefing and sent us in half blind and unprepared," she said angrily, because she had not appreciated how little information they'd been given before being thrown into this. "And it turns out it was a trap!" She watched through Kat's eyes as the world went dark, the falling building blocking out the sun. "So get off your asses and go help them!"

Later, she might regret speaking to the team mentors so brashly. But for now, she only turned back to her monitors to do what little she could. And it was, unfortunately, quite little- Mostly just telling her teammates which were the clearest routes back to the zeta tubes.

'Excessive blood loss' - Daniel. Sybil angrily slammed the button to acknowledge the alert and opened a channel to their resident Spider-Boy. "Daniel, turn around," she told him. "Kat is alive despite a literal building falling on her, she will stay that way regardless of your actions," she promised. He didn't turn around.

"Listen, you idiot," she said peevishly, "I don't care what you promised, you still have other teammates that could use your help as well," she tried, an appeal to his sense of duty. Trevor was unconscious, and Atticus, Alonzo and Lex were nowhere near the zeta tubes. "Kat is alive for now, and safe from the robots and we can come back for her with a crane, okay? It'll be much faster than your hands."

Either he'd broken or lost his comms piece, or he was running on so much adrenaline - and panic- that he couldn't even hear her.
 








'So Stonished.
If not for the carnage and chaos continuing onwards and pushing this team to its brink, Daniel's lone revealed yet closed eye and peaceful expression might have been a blessing in disguise. If not for the fact there was no rise and fall to his chest. The growing bruises under his eye and along his face, darkening in color as blood capillaries snapped and burst. Swelling began to run its course, inside and out of his body. Concussions were a best case scenario for his condition. Brain hemorrhages andr edema would be worst cases, bleeding in his brain would only quicken his death.

It mattered little if his external wounds were fixed. Despite his blood remaining on the inside, internal bleeding was a subtle killer in of itself. Well, not subtle to one experiencing it. Throes of pain washed over his body and yet Daniel would experience none of it. His lack of oxygen and sudden unconsciousness did him a favor before collapsing. His senses operated on an unconscious level, on barely feeling and knowing what was happening surrounding him. Itsy no better than him, barely conscious and frantically working to stitch Daniel together long enough for the healing process to do its job.

But, despite all his metahuman power of the arachnid and alien-kind, Daniel was still just a man. One who did not benefit from the invulnerabilities or greater powers that others held. No healing factor that could fix him in seconds. A man who could fantastic things had simply become fantastic no more. Lying in a pool of his own blood before Fred lifted him up, slicking her hands with dried and wet blood alike, that of Kat's and mainly his own. His body simply laid on the gurney. Unmoving.

Not a single breathe traveled through his chest. No contraction of muscles. Not a flicker of the yes under the eyelids. His heart began to slow, the one of the lone driving forces behind his body fighting to survive. And it was failing.

His body was shutting down.

And, yet, the fingers on his left hand twictched before traveling up his lower arm. Then his upper arm. Then a small movement. His hand slowly slid to the side before grasping onto something. Fred's hand. Maybe she would notice it nor perhaps not in her panic. But she would notice his hands squeeze, firm and strong. Not any other part of his body betrayed any signs of life. No words of comfort, no words needed to be spoken. Just a simple action. His grip held firm against all else, no matter how much she may tug. Sticky fingers tended to make for a strong grip. And her hand was his last tether.

It will be okay, Fred.

Stay strong, Fred.

Stay here.

You are the last lifeline he has got right now.







the venomous



spider-boy








  • filler tab!





♡coded by uxie♡
 



mikey & jude.





































  • mood



    don't think, just act.
















The deep, bitter taste of failure sat in her chest, laced with soot and blood. Jude knew that she was useless at the moment - a burnt out match with no way to strike a spark, left only to be a burden to her teammates and herself. In the moment that she watched Kat be buried and Daniel try to reassure her, there was little left for her to do except nod. The anger had faded from her, melting away into the sputter of white smoke that came every so often from her throat, the acknowledgement that this was out of her hands.

The realization that he was taking them to the zeta-tubes was only met with a
"God damn you,"
but no other pushback - she couldn't fight like this. She couldn't even keep herself warm. The only thing that was sure was the spider-boy's reassurances, and that was the only thing Jude had any faith in at the moment.

She didn't stay laid out on the gurney, though the makeshift blanket he had given her gave her at least the slightest bit of feeling back into her extremities. Her hair was beginning to dry from all the flying and webbing around. It was a shock to see so many of her other teammates laid out so easily. As much of a pain as he was, Colt seemed like an indominable foe, and over the comm lines she quickly knew that others like Kai and Damion were down as well. She dimly realized that many of the others were still unaccounted for - Alonzo, Lex, Atticus - Jude could have sworn she had heard them over the comms too, but she couldn't see them from the point of view before their escape route.

Mika had been guarding the entrance to the zeta tube all the while, and Jude stood next to her for a moment, taking in the sight of the destroyed city.
"I think we really fucked this one up,"
She spoke in a low tone, nearly all grumble. Their unpreparedness was a cold slap in the face of their confidence. Jude knew she couldn't allow herself to be so useless ever again.

-

More and more of her teammates began to appear as well, but the sight of Daniel carrying in Kat, blood and dust painting them in a violent visage was like a shot of adrenaline, a god damn heart attack walking in on two feet. She wasn't so shaky in the time it took for them to return, and soon swooped in Fred, and Mikey as well. He fucking did it, she realized in numb shock. Kat was unconscious, soon handed off to Fred and laid out on a gurney with the others.

It was so unsettling to watch them, unmoving and bloodied. No words were exchanged as she stood over both gurneys, on guard over her friends, and Mikey handed her a gauze to help as much as possible. Jude gave Fred a look of concern, but otherwise began to gently mop at the layer of silver and grit on Kat's face. In all honesty, Kat was the first out of everyone who had approached her with kindness and a sunshine smile that she couldn't bear to be angry at.

In the meanwhile, Mikey waited for any indication that they were to retreat, but any communications from Mt. Justice were silent aside from Sybil's help. He truly had no idea what would happen if he tried to heal Kat, if he even could do anything to the alien girl, but Daniel was a walking car accident and Fred's wing was limp and painful at her side. The man was exceedingly gentle as he rubbed a moist gauze over the exposed area of Daniel's face, and quickly opened his exposed eye to flash a light in it. The slow response of their spider-boy's pupil was a damning sign, blood pooling in the whites of his eyes. With a huff, Mikey ripped off his medical gloves. He was not going to die waiting for help.

"Screw this."


The medic walked around his gurney and over to Fred's side, and Mikey laid both of his hands own atop theirs clasped together. If they weren't leaving yet, he had to make sure that at least something would be done.

He could live through this. Pain was temporary - he could bear it all and more, if it meant his friends would be safe.

Mikey was no stranger to the breaking of bones and pain in his lungs. If anything, they were another part of life, like growing pains and the sky being blue. When one hand made contact with Fred's, his shoulderblade shattered along with a vertebrae in his spine. Cuts, scrapes, burst veins and open wounds opened over him, and soon he could feel every last thing that had happened to Daniel in the past hour as it ripped apart his body. He nearly fell to the ground if Jude hadn't been quick to move, grabbing the boy from behind and holding him up with an arm around his torso.

"You're fucking suicidal, kid."
"Just- just let me finish."


It would take ten agonizing minutes before his body slowly began to fix itself, and in those few minutes, the team would hear the voices of Donna Troy and Dick Grayson reporting for backup.

































bodys



csh










♡coded by uxie♡
 
Freddie MacNeil

Maybe at one point in her life Fred would have called herself a recluse, a loner, a singular unit functioning on its own with no need for assistance outside of her own head. That had not been an easy way to live, truth be told. Before that letter had appeared one night in her dingy hotel room somewhere off the coast of Florida, Fred had not known anything outside of loneliness. Years of her life had been spent calming herself down, riding through the bad ones trying desperately to catch her breath. Her father had called them fits in a tone that always sounded dismissive and uncaring. They didn’t happen as often as they used to when she was young, a cold, closed-off demeanor had kept most people at arm’s length, and she had learned she supposed to deal with the way her heart raced, and her muscles tensed. Fred remembered laughing when she read the letter the first time; she was not laughing now.

That quick burst of relief she had felt had waned into nothing along with the adrenaline pumping through her system. All that was left now was a heavy, pressing sort of exhaustion that made her bones feel like they were made of lead. Still, her heart was racing a mile a minute and every time she looked down at her hands, covered in a strange grey-pink mix of her friend’s blood, she wanted to vomit. Blood, she could handle, sure, but there was something different about this blood and this point in time because Kat and Dan were both laid out unconscious and her hands were covered in their blood. A hazy film had overtaken her mind, blocking out everything else around her like TV static in the background. There was a quake in her hands as she steadied herself against Dan’s gurney. This had gone so terribly wrong. A brief flash of anger crossed her features, jaw hardening and twitch as she ground her teeth together. This was their fucking babysitters’ fault. God, she wanted to rip them apart. They were the reason Kat was half-dead and Dan had almost killed himself trying to make sure she didn’t actually die. They were the reason this was happening. They were the reason her hands were covered in blood.

Fred had almost made up her mind to march through the zeta-tube and do whatever the hell she felt like when she felt his hand. Honey brown eyes tracked down her arm to where Dan’s hand had moved it’s way on top of hers. The furrow in her brow evened out as he squeezed and she let out a short, rueful laugh. Her eyes flicked over Kat, Jude standing at her side, and she sighed a little.

“I thought I told you to give the hero thing a break.” A toothless grin, “You really aren’t very good at following instructions.” Fred knew he probably couldn’t hear her, but hearing her voice, hearing that she was still here, still real, made her feel a little better. Fred, against every fiber of her body that disdained unwanted physical contact, squeezed back. Mikey was there suddenly, pressing his hands over top of theirs. Fred’s eyes widened and she tried to yank her hand back to herself but the way she felt the bones in her wing slotting themselves back together indicated that it was a useless act.

“You’re a goddamn masochist, Mikey, Christ.” Fred would admit that being able to fully extend both of her wings again was a welcome sensation, but she wished he hadn’t done all that on top of Dan’s shitty state. She let her wings extend and wrap as far as they could around those of them present at the zeta-tube, a shield of feather.

“Well, fuck.”





coded by: @s e v e n

 
Last edited:
scroll !
mood
fuck this shit

location
van and then platform

outfit
Canary suit

interactions
hery hery (Lex)

mentions
none
Atticus
Atticus was a known not-listener of other people and that sort of bad character trait was the thing that became apparent in heat-of-the-moment scenes like this one. Chaos in every direction; a canvas of orange and black as building burned, and a despondent orchestra of voices screaming for help as their voices faded to mere background noise, if even that. Just one look at a block of concrete tingled his brain in all the wrong places and brought him back to relive the worst moment of his life while his life was in danger.

It was a block of concrete. This guy was not in control of his powers and shit was flying everywhere. The closer Lex and Atticus’ dad got to the man, the more entropy took over, and, at one point, going back faded as an option. Atticus stood hidden behind a building not far away, not able to believe it was Lex who was helping his dad. His stupid, clumsy, irresponsible, boring Lex had been lying to him all this time.

Atticus was so angry, he wanted to punch both of them so bad, but like when most things got complicated in his life, he decided to walk away instead. Then, as he did exactly that, he could hear a shriek that only could have come from his sister and it had. He wanted to run over there, help heal his sister, do something, anything. Instead, the man, then boy, found himself unable to move as tears decided to flow from his eyes. And that was when he noticed Lex staring at him.

Now, Atticus was staring at Lex who was lying seemingly unconscious in front of the van, and the same tears as before thought it was a good time to come back, but Atticus intently stared for any type of movement from the other superhero as sign of life. It felt like hours, but it was probably seconds until Lex decided to get up, seemingly without any scratch on him, and Canary suit sensors could finally sense breathing again.

It was a moment or two that Atticus then took—balled up and holding on for his knees as for dear life. Fuck this shit. He was going home. This was stupid and dangerous, and it was pretty obvious that people were going to die. Atticus didn’t want to see anyone else die. Anyone that he knew, that is. But it appeared to be a bit too late for this as the first thing he noticed when looking outside was Lex jumping around some sort of platforms going on another death mission.

“The stupidity of that fucking guy. Fuck him.” He blatantly stated before getting out of the van and running as fast as he could to catch up to the other blonde superhero. Did Atticus do parkour when he was 16 because he thought it would make him look cool? Yes. Did that help him with this? Absolutely not. He almost fell to his death about 7 times, and had to squint to see the platforms that Lex could somehow see normally, but just in time, he jumped onto the platform Lex was on, immediately holding the other’s hand. Of course, Lex had an issue with that.

“Ugh, just let me do it, fucktard!” Atticus yelled, not letting go of Lex’s hand no matter how much the other did not like the idea of holding hands. They didn’t hold hands back when they were together, so this wasn’t something that brought back memories, but Atticus understood the other’s disdain and shared it. In his rush, however, the taller man had not thought about a crucial piece of information—his resentment towards the shorter man, and what it meant for their, now joint power.

“Oh, shit—" He exclaimed as he felt electricity of great proportions running through his body. He was the negative, and Lex was the positive, and now they were connected. For those of you who don’t know, when the negative part of a battery and a positive part of the battery connect without any resistance, a short circuit appears, and everything burns.

In matter of moments, the energy inside Atticus reached a melting point, and without knowing what else to do, Atticus decided to let the energy go.

An explosion, and electricity flying everywhere, causing every single wire, every single device with such, and even the main powerline to burn up in matter of seconds. Everything went dark, and the fires now better visible burned like candles—the city their wax. The small number of robots that remained around were killed by this explosion, as well as the monstrosity of a robot in front of the two blonde superheroes.

The people not in their immediate surrounding were not harmed by this explosion, but strong static could be felt in the air as almost everyone’s hair started rising up; gravity was a mere concept for hair, one not working.

From the height Atticus stood at, he could see the electricity he let out actually making its way through the town, as if a snake made of electricity, perhaps an eel. But at least the man did not feel like he was about to implode on himself, so that was a plus.
coded by reveriee
 
liberty and mime.
colt - terrified, zo - relieved
colt - mt. justice, infirmary, zo - star city ruins
colt - mika butterbee butterbee , dan Fill Fill , zo - atti mogy mogy , lex hery hery
colt - hospital gown, alonzo - supersuit minus mask

Colt felt every sensation in real-time. The mass death of his fortified Kryptonian cells, the shrivelling of his lungs as their capacity decreased a hundredfold, and the shifting of optic nerves stripping him of both his heat and laser-vision. Muscles that could once lift buildings were jellified as his Kryptonian DNA evaporated from his system, exhaustion-killed. That was the con of being a close - an unfinished one - all the more. It made his body rely on his Human DNA all the more, and revert to it when his energy was completely drained.

Weak fists buried themselves into a piece of cracked sidewalk. He wanted to punch the ground beneath it, to make the concrete pay for sins that he could not avenge now, but his fury fell on deaf ears. Colt’s wrist wobbled and shook before he could even pull his arm back for a punch. The shock of it all turned his body into a living corpse, a doll that lulled from left to right before collapsing in the dirt.

When he woke up, the wicked scene of dirt and death had disappeared.

It took a moment for his eyes to adjust to his surroundings. The bright orb of unfocused light dissipated into actual things. It was a white room illuminated with an even brighter shade of white. Colt’s legs had disappeared - no, they’d just been tucked under colourless sheets. He could feel the air against his back, thin, blue cloth against his skin.

Then he heard the rhythmic beep of the intravenous fluid being pumped from a machine at his side.

Colt was in the infirmary, he realised. It was difficult to tell how much time had passed but he was left with more questions than just how many minutes it’d been. Has the mission been completed? Was anyone injured? Civilian or comrades, had they sustained any casualties?

These were answers that any good leader would have stuck around to find out, but here Colt was, tucked away in this place. He ripped the probes away from his body and got out of the bed. His feet left the floor, but he did not fly.

There was a loud thud where his chin hit the ground. His powers had not yet returned. Instead, the Boy of Steel found himself in a growing pool of his own blood where he’d pulled out the IV. On the floor, his weak frame crawled to the door like an undying insect.

Colt needed to know what the hell was going on.

But Alonzo did not know what was going on.

As the robot trudged towards him, he found himself… regretting this decision. To be a hero and atone for his sins. He had wanted to die for Dante - to make up for his crimes in this line of duty, but when the risks of that job loomed over him, he quivered under the sound of gunshots. See, Zo did not want to die. He did not want the last time his mother saw him to have been thousands of miles away on a phone call. He wanted to have kids, grow old, and probably get browner on a sun-scorched island in Mexico. Those were dreams, but it suddenly hit him that in this life, you could have none. You couldn’t dream of a future because in any moment it could be taken away from you. It explained a lot about his distant mentor. He’d tried to prepare him for this - to severe his times with humanity to save them, but-

Messy blond hair escaped the fiery news van. Lex made an effort to down the robot, and for a moment Alonzo had hope but it was short-lived. Lex was sent flying away, but the image of the orange sparks at his finger reignited a fire inside of Alonzo. Or perhaps reminded him that he would not be in this thing alone.

Going for the head had been the most cliche of ideas. A trope from the movies, really, as most of Alonzo’s ideas were born. With the robot’s fortified frame and hulking capabilities, Zo could only hope that its weakermost point would be the head which sat as the smallest part of the contraption that was defended by protruding machine guns and probably some other foreign weapons. With his electricity, maybe Lex could short-circuit it. He just had to get up high enough.

The ringing in his ears made it difficult for Zo to hear himself, let alone shout out his idea. He had to rely on his namesake, and mime out the instructions for his plan.

“Really? The head?” Zo heard Lex’s voice, far softer than his comrade had shouted it. He nodded and stretched forth his right hand. Flat, rectangular platforms sliced through the air. As dust settled above them, his once invisible platforms gained a visual quality to them. Alonzo could feel each one of Lex’s steps as he ascended his stairs, and winced as a strange weight was added to them. Atticus. The presence of the platforms flickered but he was able to maintain them.

“Hey! What’s going on up there?!” Zo chouted, but they were well out of earshot as they scaled up to the robot’s dome. Alonzo could not make out the faces of his teammates above the robot, but he watched as electrical sparks gathered around them. The energy increased to an extent so great that they disappeared from his view. Instinctively, Zo’s eyes fell shut. After that, he went flying, instinctively rescinding his platform and throwing up a force field around himself.

A roar of electricity crackled out from where the head of the robot had once been. The second explosion Alonzo had dealt with on this day alone. His force field cracked against the pillar of a nearby building before he toppled to the floor. Electricity crackled across the dome around him. Zo’s eyes looked up at the light show above Star City as the energy rippled across the region; drones they didn’t even know had been there crackled and fell.

When the hulking beast toppled to the ground, Alonzo had ditched his torn mask, allowing sweat to drip over his forehead, and limped to the base of contraption to tend to Lex and Atticus. He waved away the dust and grime that hung in the air around them.

“Lex? Atticus? Yo, hermanos, are you okay?” Zo called out.

He didn’t even know when those in the van had begun to leave the protection of the van to check on the heroes that’d been with them that day. Some of them clapped while others chatted about the same thing.

“My phone’s off.”

“Yeah, I was calling my wife and it just flicked off.”

“Star City doesn’t get power outages.”

“You don’t think…”

And past the ringing of his ears, Alonzo realised that the mechanical whir of machines moving about the rubble had finally ceased. He chuckled a tired but excited laugh as he clasped the hands of his teammates and pulled them from the robot body.

“Guys, y-you did it. I can’t believe you did it!”
coded by natasha.
 

Attachments

  • ezgif.com-gif-maker (1).gif
    ezgif.com-gif-maker (1).gif
    2.8 MB · Views: 1




HEROES OF TOMORROW.
Interest Check | OOC | CS

While Donna tried her hardest not to be overbearing on her trainees, it was difficult to sit in the command center and not get involved. The Amazon had hated sitting on the sidelines as a sidekick, but sitting back and watching as a mentor was even harder. She now understood so many of the things Diana had told her years ago.

Watching the Heroes of Tomorrow mess up things that were second nature to her made her visibly cringe, though she tried her best to hide it. Even with the headpieces, it was too chaotic out there to really advise anyone. Things were happening too quickly, this threat was much worse than they had thought it to be.

What made Donna's hair stand on end was the way that some of these robots were programmed for the trainee's specific weaknesses. Kat's weakness to aluminum and Atticus' weakness to specific DNA. This threat was much more dangerous than they had realized, and there was only so much damage to the trainees, the city, and civilians they could allow before stepping in.

As their alien trainee crashed through a building and set several floors of it tumbling to the ground, the cries and screams of both trainees and civilians was too much for either mentor to bear.

"We've gotta get out there." Dick yelled, breaking composure as he finally stopped his frantic pacing behind Sybil's chair to rush towards the zeta tube. The Amazon was only a step behind him, heart racing as she took one last glimpse of the destruction on screen before they were whisked away to the scene of the chaos. Stepping out into the streets of Star City was utter disaster.

True devastation was something Donna was all too familiar with, but this was beyond the scope of a first mission. Something had gone majorly wrong here, but there was no time to analyze that now as two sets of powerful feet pounded the pavement.

"You go East, I'll go into the heart of the destruction. We've got to stop these robots before we grab the kids." Donna called, departing from Dick’s side to head straight into the most destroyed area of the city.

The Heroes of Tomorrow had wiped out more than half of the robots by now, though their means of doing so were questionable. The few remaining robots carried on despite the sharp drop in their numbers, and Donna was thankful that the trainee’s destructive habits had at least paid off in that sense.

Luckily, it didn't seem that the robots left had any particularly tricky abilities. In a matter of minutes, the two Justice League members had wiped out the remaining bots and begun damage control. There were so many people who needed help, but Dick had already called for backup from the rest of the League who would be arriving any minute now.

The kids were their first priority, so Donna began scooping up the Heroes of Tomorrow who were most injured and carrying them to zeta tube. Dick handled those who were still conscious and could make it to the tube with minimal assistance. It took them longer than Donna would have liked to retrieve them all, struggling to find them among the ruins but it went much faster with Sybil's assistance.

The Heroes of Tomorrow's first mission had been a complete and utter failure, and both mentor's exchanged a shared glance of concern as they dragged the last of their trainees to the Medical Bay. Someone had inside information on their team.

code by birth of venus.
 
9109976F-11B7-4E34-B82C-A5DDECEE58EB.gif



HEROES OF TOMORROW.
Interest Check | OOC | CS

A week had passed since the complete and utter destruction of Star City at both the hands of robots and the Heroes of Tomorrow. Yet the biggest failure of all, were the Heroes of Tomorrow's mentors. Donna was utterly distraught over the mission failure, ashamed to have sent her trainees to the gates of hell without enough training.

Dick had assured her that it wasn't entirely their fault, whoever had created the robots had known the trainee's weaknesses. Weaknesses that were only listed in the Justice League database. That was an entirely separate issue that the League was looking into with great concern.

What Donna could fix, was her team. They needed not only more training, but an overall change to the team dynamic. Not a single one of them could work together. It was beyond shameful, and Donna could only blame herself for not forcing them to bond more like a true team sooner.

So, the forced Team Bonding exercise had been created. Dick had suggested handcuffing them them together in pairs and throwing them out in the woods to survive for a few days. Donna had strongly declined that idea.

What she remembered as her fondest memories of being a Titan, were the mundane things like pizza parties and game night. They were doing plenty of hard-core training, but they hadn't truly become a team yet on a social level. So, Donna was going to approach today's training differently than usual.

"We are very disappointed in you all. Instead of even attempting to work as a team, you each tried to be heroes on your own, and failed." The words hurt even Donna as Dick said them, staring down the Heroes of Tomorrow as he paced at the front of the training room.

"You had the lives of civilians in your hands and you failed them. 21 casualties on your first mission. 21 lives that could have been saved if you had tried to be heroes instead of showoffs."

"Due to the failure of your last mission, it's evident that you cannot work as a team yet. You're going to have to prove to us that you can work together before we send you out on another mission." Nightwing lectured, with all the sternness of a disappointed parent.

"Today there will be no training. We will be pairing you up and sending you out to do some team bonding. This is mandatory and if you can't play nice by dinner, you won't be sent out on the next mission." Donna declared, crossing her arms as she stared down each trainee, some more distraught than others.

"Go stand next to your partner as I call your names. Zheng and Daniel, Kat and Colt, Mikey and Damion, Kai and Bashi, Sybil and Nat, Alonzo and Mika, Jude and Eli, Lex and Atti, and finally Freddie, Andre, and Trevor." Once the Heroes of Tomorrow had rearranged themselves, albeit begrudgingly, Dick continued. "Try your best to bond with your teammates. You can't survive out in the field together if you can't even live together in peace."

code by birth of venus.
 
Last edited:

Users who are viewing this thread

Back
Top