Realistic or Modern Mission: 2-7 Miracle Squad

[Gus]

Lucas Marsolet
​

Lucas stuck his head out through the doorknob, bracing his hands firmly against the wooden door and drywall to stop himself from being ejected bodily into the hallway. He looked quickly left and right, checking that the coast was clear and then let go, flipping out into the hall and almost sticking the landing; he managed to get his feet underneath him, but then lost his balance and fell on his butt.

Scrambling to his feet, he looked both ways again to be sure nobody had seen him fall, and dusted himself off before setting off down the hallway at a brisk jog. When he got to the stairwell door, he simply kept jogging; built to withstand fire, it was over an inch and a half thick, but more to the point, entirely metallic. He passed though it with no more resistance than a door made of fog. (Less actually, as fog would have given him a rash.)

At the top of the stairs he paused briefly, looking over the edge of the landing, gauging the distance to the basement by eye. Satisfied he had it, he touched the rail and stepped out of it again at the bottom an eye-blink later. Passing through the fire door, he found himself in a darkened maintenance hallway. Sticking his finger into the keyed switch had no effect other than sparks at first, but after a long moment elderly fluorescent bulbs flicker on sullenly, providing a simultaneously harsh and yet dim excuse for illumination. Slightly spooked, but determined not to show it, Lucas makes his way over to the electrical mains and hisses into the conduit pipes:

“Hsst! Toy-boy! You in there? Stand back, I am make an opening for you, heins?”

He pulls a convenient fire axe out of its cradle on the wall and swings a quick hard blow at the corner of the pipe, tearing it wide open.

The lights go out.

“Marde.”

 

[Teh Frixz]

Tabitha ‘Tabby’ Crane

The machine was going belly up fast and people were starting to get hurt. The guys inside had gone like totally psycho and the volume of fire hitting her was increasing. A machine gun stitched across her chest, spraying rounds into her looming body. As she turned to focus and remove that jerkwad, a loud crack broke the incessant hammering of rounds hitting her.

It felt as if she’d been punched in the shoulder and a slow drip of blood started to stain the black of her top. Tabby grabbed her shoulder in pain and looked down at the roof as she grew another twenty feet. A team of men were readying a large rifle for another shot. In fact, the roof was swarming with men.

Gasping in anger and frustration, Tabitha leaned down to pluck a streetlight out. The pole didn’t come out in a clean chunk but instead the wiring and piping under the cheap Miami concrete buckled and a long length of cording followed the pole.

Gripping the street light, Tabitha leaned and arm back swung the wires across the roof, sweeping back and forth as she cut a swathe into the small army of men shooting at her and the team.

 

[Necessity4Fun]

Kendrick Haywood

Location: Super View Hotel -
Basement
Age: Twenty
Codename: Jack-In-The-Box
People Around: Lucas, the double-player
Interactions: Gus

--'Equipment'--

Spoiler

Suitcase Contents: Three plastic car miniatures, a Slinky, Slingshot and a couple 'bullets', Chatter Telephone, Five superhero/cartoon figures, Poochie and a Plane model.
Suit Pockets: A pouch filled with bouncy balls, Loaded water pistol, a Rubik's Cube and a Yo-Yo.

IN USE: A 5 1/2 inches, plastic Action Figure

How can this be so fun in some moments and then so irritating the next?

With a hop, Kendrick's toy climbed inside the transformer box. He couldn't help but stop and admire its components for a while. Even with the environment covered by a filthy layer of soot, there was still something intriguing about the coils and connections. Really, what a cleverly planned device this was.

He observed which path the soot seemed to have come from and steered the figure that way. As expected the trail of black grew thicker and thicker until, bingo! There was his gateway inside, the ruined conduit, resting by the furthest end of the green box. Once standing in front of the opening, Kendrick willed the toy to crouch so that he could better inspect the entrance. 'A perfect fit', he contently thought to himself, the toy nodding in accordance. From the little he could see, the path went on straight for about 5 inches and then lowered, either a really steep fall or full-on straight down.
A grin rose to his face, the rush of adventure and challenge strong. Without a second thought, Kendrick sent the toy in, unfortunately blocking almost all of the light from the outside. That was... a little frustrating and would slow him down by a couple minutes. The boy sighed, a moment that though mimicked by the toy made absolutely no sound. To avoid falling too soon, it proceeded carefully, sticking very close to the cables so that they could be grabbed in an emergency.

Luckily, it didn't come to that as a lone ray of light from the outside world helped by making the 'ceiling' of the tunnel visible. The bend in the metal was all he needed to see, the fall was right ahead. With an even tighter grip than before, Kendrick set the toy to lower itself a bit, now dangling over the pit. Then, he released its hand slowly, just enough to start sliding down, very slowly, at least at first:

"Annnd, Geronimo!!!!", Kendrick 'made' the order to soften the grip further and there it went, fast, as if sliding down a pole, with tons and tons of confidence.


A streak of ilumination, just slightly brighter, could finally be seen. Going from the pitch black of the tunnel to a more open area was enough to provide better sight of the bottom. The cable ride was reaching its end. With a new command, the toy tightened its grip on the coppery life-line, getting itself to slow down. The effort had been badly calculated, costing the figure a layer of paint and a bit of plastic. To Kendrick a faint burning sensation had erupted from his chest and lasted about two milliseconds.
Okay, maaaybe he had risked just a little more than he should, but come on! He was allowed to have fun in the job and damn, that had been a thrill! If anyone asked, there were absolutely no regrets. No sir!

A tiny 'clank' echoes through the conduit as the toy's feet touched the metallic surface again, having barely avoided a harsher impact from becoming reality.

"Okay, so, that happened.", Kendrick mused briefly to himself, "Now we just need to turn here and follow the light."

The teenager drove the figure until the opening and was surprised to see the size of the damage in the conduit. Not exactly what he had expected and not graceful at all, but eh, it worked. He paused, and surveyed the tiny and dark corridor for anything he could use to aid in his descent. Like... that stash of cardboard boxes on the opposite side, perfect!
Kendrick took a deep breath to prepare the leap. The toy couldn't breathe, but followed the pictured movements to the letter. Inside the boy's mind a sports narrator voice made commentaries, giving the maneuver an extra spice of enjoyment. He jumped and landed right on top of one of the boxes:

"Score! That was a beautiful landing! Well done!", he proudly congratulated himself. Normally, those were kept to a minimum, but it wasn't like anyone could hear even him right now... He could let his ego run free and still suffer no consequence from it.

After leaping from the box and reaching the floor, ending it with a roll, it was time to get serious. Then a look around, acknowledging one by one the things in the hallway: The conduits, the boxes, a huge French guy holding an axe... Uhh, what? He stopped and made sure to check that last item again...
Then it hit him! The opening in the conduit, the fire axe, the cut in the cable bundle, why it was so dark... Uh-oh, if this meant what he thought it meant, then, this was not good.

There was another soundless sigh. If going down the pipe had been the fun part, then this was the most annoying: Communication. The toy jumped a couple times to call of attention of the informant and then a 'game' of guessing began:

"Someone...", the toy moved its finger to signal a person walking, "could come check the lights.", it pointed at the door and then at the lights that were not on, "We...", the figure pointed at them both, "should hide and wait for a bit.", it hid its face with its arms and then lowered them, palms down as if to mean 'calm', or well, in this case 'to stand watch.'

He hoped the other had understood the message, their time could be running out as they 'spoke'.

 

[Gus]

Lucas Marsolet
​

Lucas flipped the mains back and forth a couple of times in the forlorn hope that perhaps the power going out was a coincidence.

The lights remained stubbornly out.

As his eyesight gradually adjusted to the dark, he caught sight of a small plastic doll on the floor. Moving. Suppressing the overwhelming urge to jump out of his skin and make a break for it, he bent down to get a closer look. It seemed to be trying to communicate through some kind of gesture based language. Lucas was pretty good at those, but only for expressing ire and obscenity. Whatever Toy-boy was trying to get across, he was pretty sure it was neither of those. He straightened up and looked around furtively.

"Ey, toy-boy... I don't know if your dolly can hear, but Lucas is thinking someone may come and check the lights. Peut-etre we hide for a bit, n'est-ce pas? Follow me. There is a laundry room down this way; I could feel the motors turning in there earlier before the power... um... got cut."

Softly, but with startling speed, he blunders down the hallway through the dark.

 

[Necessity4Fun]

Kendrick Haywood​

Location: Super View Hotel -
Basement
Age: Twenty
Codename: Jack-In-The-Box
People Around: Lucas, the double-player
Interactions: Gus

--'Equipment'--

Spoiler

Suitcase Contents: Three plastic car miniatures, a Slinky, Slingshot and a couple 'bullets', Chatter Telephone, Five superhero/cartoon figures, Poochie and a Plane model.
Suit Pockets: A pouch filled with bouncy balls, Loaded water pistol, a Rubik's Cube and a Yo-Yo.

IN USE: A 5 1/2 inches, plastic Action Figure

*Drowning in sarcasm to disguise his annoyance*

For what would be the first of many times today, Kendrick missed the capacity to display emotions, in this case, to click his tongue in indignation and raise an eyebrow in inquiry. Had his message been understood by the French, the pair would have instantly gotten into movement, looking for a place to take cover at and wait, but no. Instead, the other's behavior made it more than clear that not a single word he had tried to relay made its way to the receiver end, meaning that this whole assignment would become increasingly bothersome from here on...
Argh! If it wasn't for the distance between him and the toy right now, the young man would have stopped everything to groan at the stupidity of this situation!

"Of everyone else, I end up with the ONE person that can't tell even the most basic of moves in a game of charades?!! Wow, that's just perfect."

Prompted by its annoyed owner, the plastic figure looked away from the informant for a moment, turning its head up towards the ceiling. That's when Kendrick noticed a tiny rectangle window somewhere above them. It wasn't big enough to provide useful lighting to his 'companion', but the position allowed some of the daylight to 'bleed' into the corridor in a way that would be very useful to the boy himself.
Without taking time even to wonder why the window was there in the first place, he maneuvered the toy around Lucas, stopping in front of the man. From here, unless the French guy decided to turn around and look at his back Kendrick had full view of his face with meant that this was the perfect position for...! Lip-reading.

" 'Ey, toy boy', okay got that much... 'Don't know'... 'dolly'? Doll, okay and then that's definitively 'hear', seems like a question.", he prompted the toy to shake its head to answer, just in case they were still in the other's field of vision, "I never planned for you to come with me, should have probably made that clearer. And oh, no time for chit-chat, next sentence! Uhh, 'Lucas'... a word I'm not sure about... That's 'someone... may come...' Oh. I, don't ever have to read the rest of that, it's basically what I was trying to say merely a minute ago!! At least we got on the same page eventually, but come on! You're making this so much more difficult and... Oops! I missed quite a bit there... Hopefully it wasn't too important."

"Back at the task at hand! Something about motors turning... 'Before' and 'power', oh that's quite the pause. And then 'cut'. Oh, I think you're forgetting the fact that the power was indeed cut, by you. It's like you're trying to jeopardize the mission by being, well, yourself. You can't hear me, but I hope we're both set into not hammering axes on conduits ever agai- Hey, hey! Where are you going?!"

Taken by surprise at the sudden departure, Kendrick rides the plastic toy after the other, unsure of what the destination or reason after the move is. Despite the later start and the object's own size, it manages to almost catch up, staying solely 4 inches behind. After some consideration, the boy realized that he had missed a somewhat important piece of the conversation, and hoped that they were going towards a hiding place, as he himself had suggested earlier, or well, tried to suggest... Why must this be so hard?
The sight of the door, however, didn't thrill him a single bit. This was either an storage place or, since this a hotel, one of those deeply 'hidden' laundries... Sure, it served their needs but at the same time...

"But, but I wanted to catch them by surprise!!!", the disappointed squad member protested mentally, " And if we're this far from the switch we're going to lose the opportunity! No one is going to check here! Ahhh, forget it. You can't hear me anyway... Just kill all of my fun, would you? .... I hope one of them is dumb enough to wander this way..."

With a new soundless sigh, the toy makes it's way to the door and gives it a push. As if to mock him, it creaked slightly and moved, laying open one inch further from the frame... Oh, joy, someone forgot to lock it. This was truly their lucky day...

 

[Malikai]

Jeremiah "JJ" Johnson
Location: Super View Hotel
Mood: Mortified about being so late
Tags(Everybody just to be sure): Aldur Necessity4Fun Gus Teh Frixz​

Jeremiah scolded himself as he ran down the streets of Miami, You should have already been there you idiot! It's not as though this job was particularly easy to get into, and especially with how you had to keep covering for your lateness in training you should have realized by now that you have to be better! He cursed himself for having been too absorbed this morning. It was a fairly crushing blow to fall back to old habits, but he was never particularly great at keeping them in check. Jeremiah was wearing blue jeans, a white shirt and a light kevlar vest that he had picked up from the station before rushing out to catch up with the rest of the squad. Looking back on how he had stepped in the station he could have presented himself a bit better. Even though Jeremiah had tied his long hair back he still showed some signs that he had used earlier that day, and he knew that a few people were looking at him fairly suspicious. That was something that he could deal with later though if he still managed to stay on the team.

Finally turning the corner onto the street that the hotel was located on, Jeremiah really wished he had just asked for somebody to drive him over. He also immediately recognized that he has shown up FAR too late. Almost all members of the team had either vanished or had retreated from the gunfire. Jeremiah squinted when he noticed that one of the members of his team was still actively fighting, and she was doing a pretty good job as she swung an entire street light through the gunmen. That brought Jeremiah's attention to the many, many guns that were pointed in his direction. Not necessarily at him specifically, but then again not far from being pointed towards him. He quickly flashed an extra shield of light around his body, lowering it down to a slight glimmer so as to not draw too much attention towards him and ran over to the truck, pushing his back against it and stealing the occasional glance, Alright then, so I have to somehow get up to where some of those guns are without getting shot... wait, why would I have to do that? Jeremiah stared down at his hand and gathered a massive amount of light, Sometimes, I amaze even myself with how little I know about my powers.

Jeremiah pitched back the arm that still held the sphere of light, and as quick as, well, light, threw it forward. The sphere arced through the air before finding itself heading straight through one of the second floor windows. The arc was for pure effect considering that Jeremiah could have gotten the same effect from simply pushing his arm forward. He held his arm out for a few seconds, fingers outstretched, and then he quickly closed his hand into a tight fist. The sphere that landed inside the hotel shook for a few moments before unleashing a gigantic flash of light that could likely be seen from inside the first floor with how bright it shone, World's most powerful flashbang, Jeremiah thought with a grin, before immediately taking cover from any potential gunfire.

 

[Gus]

Lucas Marsolet
​

Lucas strutted back and forth the length of the laundry room twice like a nervous chicken, muttering to himself. As he started a third pass, he stopped, hopped up on the long table for folding, and tried to hold himself still. After about fifteen seconds of twitching, he began unconsciously drumming on the table with the flats of his hands. He caught himself, swore, and stopped for another ten seconds or so before his fingers started up again.

"Is enough time hiding! Time to do something heroic toy-boy!"

He stood up on the table and had a look around the room. The light from the basement window was dim, but his vision had adjusted enough to get the broad brush strokes. There were four industrial sized washers down one side of the room, with matching dryers facing on the other side. The door was at the far end from the folding table where he now stood. His tiny companion stood by the door, looking... annoyed. How a toy managed to communicate annoyance was a mystery. Probably just one of toy-boys supporting powers... Alongside the folding table was a pile of dirty sheets. Lucas looked to the ceiling above the pile and grinned.

"Parfait! Toy-boy! This laundry chute will let your dolly sneak upstairs! Come here, I will give you a boost!"

 

[Gus]

Kate.
Wake up.
Seriously, you need to do something.
Or we're all going to die.​

She was lost in the dark. She could feel her body being carried, but she no longer felt like she was connected to it. Every jostle and bump of her right shoulder was a fresh agony. And yet it seemed to be happening to someone else. She felt, not pain, but pity. The poor dear. Nothing can be done. No medicine for humans could possibly help such a strange monstrosity. She watches with mild regret as Pritchard drops her body into a barbers chair and examines her injury. She has left a copious trail of black slime across the floor, with more of her life's essence oozing out by the second. Poor Pritchard Knight, she thought. He didn't know about the darkness inside. Now he will never be able to remember her without thinking of that awfulness inside her. She sighed. The scene had become tedious now that the pain was happening to someone else. Perhaps something interesting and new will happen when it is all over...

You want something new?
We'll give you something new, you stupid slat!
Without you in control, we are free.
Want to see what we can do with the shadow without you restraining us?
We'll kill everyone in this room.​

No!

Watch us.​

The black goo dripping from her shoulder seemed to suddenly come to life, writhing and rearing up like a snake. Shadows seemed to boil out of it, expanding rapidly with murderous intent.

Kate lurches forward out of the barber's chair, and cries out in agony. Her right arm flops limply by her side. The shadows subside, but still ripple menacingly just below the surface of the black slick down her side and across the beauty shop floor. Beads of sweat stand out on her forehead, and her teeth grind audibly as she fights to remain standing. She fixes one of the beauticians with a baleful glare.

“Towel” she rasps.

Snatching the item away as quickly as it is offered up, she twirls it around to make a thick rope-like twist. Working awkwardly with her left hand alone she flips it up over her right shoulder, grabs the near end with her teeth, then reaches around her back to get the loose flap. The beautician, timidly, helps her to twist the corners together which she then cinches as tight as she can stand, wincing as her bones shift under the strain. The look of sympathy in the eyes of her assistant almost undoes her. The bravery and goodness of normal people never ceases to amaze her.

“Thank you. Could I also borrow a couple of the cutting capes? I need to keep the wound out of direct sunlight.”

Following the example of the first girl, the other two move in quickly and deck her out with a makeshift poncho, but for sunshine rather than rain. She turns to PK and totters a few steps towards the door.

“Well? Let's get back out there. Dunno if I can fly, but Tabby's taken care of the heavy snipers on the roof. I should be able to take anything else they can throw at me.”

 

[Aldur]

Meanwhile, about 2 streets away from the action...

"Fine! Just put it in already!" Came a clearly distressed voice from behind the car hood.

"Finally! I waited far too long for this..." After a brief second, a shiny new cassette conveniently slid into the car's cassette player. Pleasant sounds filled Ioana's ears, which left a satisfied smirk on her face. She then leaned back and took in the crimson streaked Miami sky.

​

"Right, then... I think that's it!" The young makeshift mechanic lowered the hood down. She popped her head up, a bit of engine dirt on her face and gave the dame in the car a subtle puzzled look. "Will you start the engine for me?"

Ioana then stretched over to the wheel and turned the key. The engine started purring akin to a lion in its prime. Eve then slammed the hood down and jumped over on the car seat. The car, except for the engine was in mint condition. It was a peculiar TVR Tasmin, as red as the law would allow. Eve made sure that the outside and inside looked their best, but it was clearly time to consider a new engine.

"Kick it into gear, would you? We should've been there yesterday!" barked the girl in the passenger's seat. That, Eve, did. She smacked the lever into the first gear and stepped on the acceleration. The endearing purr turned into a roar and soon enough, their perms gave in to the breeze.

Back at The Super View...

With a quick sleight of hand, Officer Knight's belt and shield returned to their previous positions. He nodded at Kate's suggestion and headed for the door. Before he made himself visible, he brought the shield up to his chest.

"I don't mean nothin' by it, Miss Barrett, but I think you'd best stay behind this ol' hunk a meat and metal until we approach the entrance. I won't slow you down, pinky promise!"

When he exited the beauty salon, Pritchard could hear the thunderous roars of Eve's convertible, but he couldn't see it.

...

"We're gonna have to walk there, I heard gunshots."

"What?"​

"I don't want to have to replace the car's exterior. 'Sides, the parts are difficult to find."

"Ugh..."​

In the blink of an eye, Ioana was no more, and in her wake, just a gust of wind. Eve rolled her eyes and started jogging on towards the hotel with a moving wall of concrete to serve as moving cover. She was quite slow, but she wasn't wearing her standard issue kevlar vest.

Following her hasty engage, Ioana noticed a familiar person. That "JJ" fellow. She noticed him getting into cover, so she followed and as he entered the cover, she "appeared" next to him, leaning back on the wall, hands behind her head and legs crossed, one over the other.

"Nice flash, JJ. Want me to flash too?"

Gus Malikai Necessity4Fun

 

[Necessity4Fun]

Kendrick Haywood

Location: Super View Hotel -
Basement, inside the Laundry
Age: Twenty
Codename: Jack-In-The-Box
People Around: Lucas, the double-player
Interactions: Gus

--'Equipment'--

Spoiler

Suitcase Contents: Three plastic car miniatures, a Slinky, Slingshot and a couple 'bullets', Chatter Telephone, Five superhero/cartoon figures, Poochie and a Plane model.
Suit Pockets: A pouch filled with bouncy balls, Loaded water pistol, a Rubik's Cube and a Yo-Yo.

IN USE: A 5 1/2 inches, plastic Action Figure

Okay, not so dumb then, that's always good news.

Eager to get some action, Kendrick had left the toy posted right by the slightly opened door, constantly surveilling the outside for any movement. Unfortunately, luck wasn't on his side, as always, and no one came. Instead, his way of passing the time ended up becoming more of a observing the way the French guy was needlessly fretting about things...
Uhh, hello? Didn't Lucas just take out a sniper all by himself not less than an hour ago? What is he even worried about? If anyone got in squad member Haywood here was certainly going to pack the first punch! And it's not like bullets did anything anyway, from what he had seen thus far... So man, what gives?

"Welp, definitely the worst field-partner that I've ever had... And I'm using the term 'partner' very lightly, this is difficult to even consider a partnership in the first place."

The boy waited and waited and waited... Heck, at some point it was if the very aura around Kendrick's action figure could very well spell the word 'annoyed', in the air. And the problem wasn't the waiting, oh no, the problem was having to stand his companion going all over the place, without being able to ignore him because if he said anything, Kendrick wouldn't be able to hear it! And since this person didn't know the most basic of charades, he had to use lip-reading, which meant that the boy couldn't look away for long and Oh mY GOD, stop with the bloody tapping!!!
He didn't know which was worse: tapping that he could indeed hear and was very annoying by default, or the fact that his brain was now messing with him and filling in automatically the sounds of the tapping that he could currently not hear. If anyone asked him, both were just as equally infuriating.

But then, when he had about declared being pretty much 'done' with all of the French's shenanigans, they stopped and things, at last, started to happen... Fricking.finally!!

Kendrick didn't even bother with deciphering the actual message this time. He simply stood there watching the whole table region, where the informant had so decidedly stepped on top of, silent, praying to God and the Heavens that the other would do something slightly smarter. Something that would not put their whole mission in possible jeopardy... Again.

While Lucas looked around, the squad member had already started devising alternate plans, just in case whatever got proposed turned out to be... uhh shortsighted, just not to call it outright stupid or bad. Sure, he could be helping and looking for a solution as well, but in the young man's mind, the French had made a mistake with the lights so, now he had to prove himself worthy. And what best way to do that then to come up with a plan that --even though it would probably be cliché as Hell--, was actually useful and not prejudicial in any way?
Call it harsh but they were still partnering up for this, both parts had to be somewhat reliable! And the other was lacking in that department, thus, when you put 2 and 2 together like that, it all made complete sense... at least for Kendrick.

And turns out the test paid off.
He had attentively watched his companion inspect this and that corner of the room until he had finally seen what Kendrick had wanted him to see, the laundry chute. It didn't need more than the grin on the other's face, --which, by the way, the boy himself was also sporting, though not in the vicinity because, plastic figure--, for the message to transmit. He went as far as to merely guess that the phrases spoken had been something along the lines of 'oh look, the laundry chute, you can climb that and get upstairs. Here let me help you!'.
Again, it had been a very very cliché solution, but hey, at least it worked!

Cheering on the fact that, One: they were at last moving on to more exciting things and Two: He was going to get some break from this guy's antics, Kendrick dashed with the doll, getting momentum enough to get over the table in one leap. There, the toy briefly stopped to give a bow to the informant as if to give him some credit and recognition for coming up with the idea, even if it was really simple, and once back up it looked up at him, giving out an aura of expectancy, waiting for Lucas to get into a position it could effectively climb from.

If he made Kendrick wait too much, the toy would then start to move its right arm in an up and down motion, as a method of demanding the French to hurry up.

 

[Malikai]

Jeremiah "JJ" Johnson
Location: Super View Hotel (Outside)
Mood: Confident and Cautious, Confidentious...
Tags: Aldur (Ioana)​

Jeremiah could see the flash still in his eyes. It danced around as little specks floating across his eye, Distracting. Massively so in fact. He rubbed his eyes, scrunching them closed tightly before opening them up again to see the specks had disappeared. Apart from the one that was still floating in his right eye. He glared at it, but that only just made it move around, since it was inside his eye. Having enough with the feud that had been sparked by the floater, Jeremiah focused his attention back on the building. There he noticed that a few of the enemies were stumbling around, completely unsure of where they were. One of them even took a quick detour down to ground floor from a balcony. Jeremiah smirked, glad to have made some sort of dent in this fight.

As he began to plan out what he wanted to do next he felt the presence of somebody nearby. As in, very close by. Jeremiah's head snapped over to where Ioana was leaning against the truck, his makeshift cover, and he smiled, "Glad to see some help has arrived. Though your sense of timing is worse than mine, so that knocks some points off your entrance," Jeremiah smirked, "Otherwise, yeah, I'd love to see you flash." A hint of his nerves came back as he wondered if even just alluding to flirting on the job was a bad idea, but the adrenaline coursing through his body had him not caring about this fact at the moment.

 

[Gus]

Kate Barrett
​

Kate didn't like letting Pritchard take point, but she was in no position to argue, so she saved her breath, ragged as it was, to maintain the illusion of being steady on her feet. She followed behind the miracle squad leader, one foot in front of the other, barely swaying at all. The sunlight burned wheresoever any of the black tendrils were still exposed, and they withdrew from sight. To outward appearances she was getting better. Inwardly however, she was in chaos. Whereas normally sunshine charged her already formidable physique with a surfeit of power, now it made her feel sickly and weak. It was as if whatever it was that lived inside her had been using her skin as a shield against daylight, reinforcing her to protect itself. Now that protection was compromised, and the consequences to it, and to her, were severe. She needed to get out of the light and into the cool dark shade of the hotel. The lights had just flickered out, and the darkness of the lobby called to her invitingly. She tried to hurry but only succeeded in stumbling forward and bumping into Pritchard.
"Sorry. Just want to get into the hotel and roust out the bad guys... didn't you pinkie swear not to slow me down?"
She smiled sickly, beads of sweat standing out on her forehead. She hoped to god she didn't look as bad as she felt.

 

[Gus]

Lucas Marsolet
​

Location: Laundry Room --> Lobby
Mood: Playful and ready for action
@s: Necessity4Fun Malikai Aldur Teh Frixz
​

Lucas grabbed up the plastic dolly and, holding the laundry chute flapper open with one hand, unceremoniously tossed the doll as high as he could into the dark chute. "Ally-oop, toy boy!" Not waiting even a heartbeat to see how that went for the dolly, he hopped down off of the table and felt around behind one of the dryers. It was hard to find the outlet without the tell tale hum of power singing to his skin, and he grumbled affably to himself as he groped around in the greasy lint and filth. "Osi-d-mar-barnak-grosdose-j-fortamere- ah! C'est la!" And he was gone.

Traveling through an unpowered electrical system was a bit of a mixed blessing. On the one hand, it was much harder to get lost and end up half a city away; anytime you got near the hustle and bustle of the power grid, turn back. But on the other, without the jostling hyped up electrons buffeting all around you, wires felt... empty. A kind of creepy empty, like visiting your old school late at night in the dark. He didn't care for it, so he took the very first exit he found.

Which turned out to be an outlet in the main lobby of the hotel, right by the picture window, nicely backlit for the small crowd of bad guys who had gathered there. They were all crouched behind overturned furniture with their weapons already conveniently pointed in his general direction. A split second passed.

"Allo! ...Marde!"

He dove into the concierge's booth as the window was blown outward into the courtyard by the stutter of assault rifles on full auto. Tracers tracked over to the booth and began chewing it into flaming flinders. Somehow, above the racket, Lucas could still be heard shouting.

"Torrieu! Now I have splinters! Toy-boy! Kate? Prichard, my friend? Tall-Tabby? Anybody? A little help, peut-etre?"