Mr_Grey

Psycho13 grinned and suddenly bolted from his position on the ground. Kip arched an eyebrow at Twilight.

"From what I saw, the body was still in the ma-"

"Got it!" Psycho13 grinned and laid the body down, "I was kind of worried, too. I was thinking I'd lost one of my blades, but after you knocked that [thing] out of the sky, I was able to get it back lickety split... Oh yeah, here's the body, too..."

The pilot wasn't quite dead yet. Gurgling on the pavement, he stared, wide-eyed in horror, at the skinny man who'd ended his life (and tenure with the forces of Mayhem).

"What about the others in that thing?" Kip asked suddenly.

"What part of super speed do you not understand?" Psycho13 replied glibly, "I had more than enough time to... finish the job."

"You've become a lot more bloodthirsty as of late, old friend."

"These bastards killed friends of mine. They have laid waste to this wonderful city. They subjugate the citizenry to fuel their mad ambitions. They hold the world at the end of a sword. I'm fairly certain I am the lesser of the evils in this case... The Devil you can deal with, if you will. Aren't you much the same? Warden?"

"It's been a long time since I've been called that," Kip barked, "And you shouldn't even know anything about it!"

"You'd be amazed what you learn when you're a Committee prisoner, tortured into helping them cobble together 'meta-projects.' You'd be sickened at what kinds of conclusions you reach under such duress."

Kipland nodded and rubbed his eyepatch.

"Do you really need that?" Psycho13 asked suddenly.

"Yes."

They looked back down to Twilight.

"You gonna be okay, siphoning the last of the life out of that [man]?" Psycho13 asked calmly.

--Jade Moon--

Getting tossed around like a ragdoll was really starting to bother Randall. It wasn't so much that his heavyweight armor was being ignored (indeed, if the enemy was strong enough to accomplish it, so be it), it was that he was starting to realize he was out of his element.

"Time to kick it up a notch," he growled as he pushed himself off the floor.

On his feet, he altered his armor, switching to a blend of energy deflecting crystals, rock, and magma armor as well as his rooting. He would have stuck to the Granite, but he wasn't trying to outlast anymore.

It was time to outhurt.

The Celts called it Battle Frenzy. The Romans called it the Berserker Rage. Randy didn't call it anything, he just saw red while his irises turned white.

In this red, the one thing he saw with perfect clarity was the Dark Watcher Impostor.

There was no way to adequately describe the sound that issued from Randall Grey's mouth. It was a roar, to be sure, but unlike anything on Earth, maybe even the cosmos. Hearing it sent chills through people's spines.

With a few quick strides, Randall closed the distance between himself and the Impostor. His fist slammed into the machine's chest, and he was quick to throw another fist for the face. This was followed with an uppercut.

Ducking low, he swatted the Impostor's knee with a back-fist and planted his shoulder into the android's belly. Standing, he hoisted it up and tried to slam him back into the ground with a power-slam that was the envy of American professional football players.

He knew it was by no means over. In fact, the Impostor definitely was able to weather such assaults easily. Nemesis put much more effort into the automatons than his standard corps.

But it was a start, and Randall had plenty more fight left in him.

----------

--Inside the Portal Control: Before the Wall--

Ryat66/The Fool pondered his situation.

A dark black car? Expensive looking. Money... Massive amounts of money. It pointed to a number of individuals, Crey and Nemesis top on that list.

Obviously, it had something to do with this problem.

"First thing's first, though," the Fool muttered and approached the security guard.

The automated security actually aimed at him. He whistled a chipper tune. This did little to abate the defenses, but it did help his nerves.

"Me, an A.I., with nerves!" he chuckled as he reached the security guard, "Hello, sir!"

"Hello." was the crisp reply.

No emotion. At least, none that the Fool could tell.

"Fine day, today, am I right?"

"A great day."

The Fool blinked. Normally, banter provided one with answers, but this program was not reacting very well at all. It was all cold and sterile, so devoid of emotion, of a soul...

Of course, it was a program to fulfill a very mundane purpose.

On, Off, Go Here, Go There. Of course it would be prim and proper, cold steel, professional.

It was time to try the basic steps.

"Sir," the Fool gestured and his hero identification marking him as Ryat66, android blaster in the employ of Portal Corporation, flickered into existence in mid-air and floated over to the guard, "Mutual friends of ours are trying desperately to gain access to the facility. There's something wrong with it and it needs to be repaired, but every time they try to log in, they get turned away by the current working crew. Now, our higher-ups mean no disrespect to the employees here, but they feel that time is of the utmost importance, and the stall they keep running into with the current engineers is threatening lives."

The identification winked out of existence as soon as the guard was done examining it. He wouldn't need to look at it again. He was a program, just like the Fool. He had better than an idytic memory, he had a computer memory.

"I was hoping that with your support, we could get another crew in there to get a more hands-on examination, and possibly correct problems as we find them. Maybe relieve some of the stress the current crew is under as they undertake this important endeavor all by themselves. As you can see, my identification checks out that we work for the same company. Surely, you can understand the importance of this request."

Licking his lips, the Fool waited for the Guard's reaction. It actually seemed to be considering the request.

--------

--Portal Corp Courtyard: Next to the Rikti Portal--

Sheldon Wallace was mad. Very mad. Portal Corp technicians could clearly hear him yelling at Matt from the communicator lying in the grass. Unfortunately, Matt was nowhere nearby. He had to leave Sheldon to talk to the Portal Corp techs so they could patch into Ryat66 and figure out what was going on.

"Matt! MAAAAAAAAAHT!" Sheldon shouted, "You get the [expletive] back here and answer me!"

"Sorry, Shel," Matt revved up his motorcycle's engine, his eyes wide with shock, his face set in something akin to panic, yet off slightly, "I got work to do!"

With his motorcycle making a hideous, thunderous roar, he sped off toward the south.

----------

--Peregrine Island, Bay Area--

Cory was mildly surprised. Not necessarily shocked, but he was hoping things weren't quite this bad.

The Malta Group.

The air around him shuddered and some of the bullets fired deviated from their course. A few others impacted into his ice armor. But it still hurt. A lot.

Before the grenades reached him, Cory dropped, filling his lungs with air. As the ledge of the roof came to his chest, he let loose a gout of fiery breath, flooding the rooftop with flames.

Unfortunately, grenades don't work on contact. They work on meticulously timed fuses. The web grenades exploded overhead, and Cortland felt the weight upon him. This was fine. He had a plan in mind already. It largely involved hitting the ground, first.

Once there, he muttered a cancelling enchantment and cut out his attempts at flight. He let the webbing hold him for the moment. There was no need to fight it, he wasn't going to be going anywhere anyway, and he'd need the energy. However...

Placing his palm on the ground, Cory muttered another spell. The concrete instantly frosted, then a patch of ice sprouted from it. It was slick, slippery, and just what the doctor ordered for dealing with overwhelming odds.

Psycho13 stabbed his way up to the pilot. When he made it to the cockpit, the pilot pulled a pistol from next to his chair and went to point it at the scrapper.

Baker stabbed the blade into the pilot's wrist with a raspy cry. Before he had a chance to recover, he slashed the hooked blade across the pilot's throat, causing a spurt of blood to splash over him. The vehicle started spinning out of control, with the gunner and the engineer scrambling to regain it.

Psycho13 was flung from the machine. Though he could have survived the fall, it would have hurt and Kip didn't have the time to wait for him to regenerate.

Catching him in mid-air, he landed on the other side of the street and looked back to see how Twilight was doing.

"My hero," Psycho13 chortled and started trying to kiss Durj.

Kipland dropped him like a sack of rocks. Then kicked him for good measure.

Baker chortled out a pained laugh as he reached for his friend in mock affection, shouting "Don't ignore your feelings!"

"And yet more evidence that you're the real deal," the other scrapper muttered to himself as he analyzed the current situation and planned for his next move.

Ryat66 "blinked" when he saw the diagnostic program denying his service. And yet, it didn't seem to be making any progress, nor was it inhibiting the system from running.

"I have a bad feeling about what I have to do," he muttered, "Matt, if Sheldon calls looking for me, tell him it's your fault!"

"Got it," the scrapper barked back.

Ryat66's head suddenly buzzed and the body slumped into a meditative pose. Inside the android's mind, and the firmware of the terminal, was another story.

----------

--3-D representation of the Internal Workings of the Portal Command and Control Console--

The Fool. He looked himself over. His clothes were haphazard, asymmetric, and ill-fitting. His body, however, was fit. He didn't necessarily need to check, but he did, anyway. His hair was disheveled and unkempt.

Definitely the Fool.

Before the Fool was a digital interpretation of the programs running within the Portal's Command and Control software. Also, there were the obstacles that stood in his way, and the way of everybody who had attempted to muscle through the diagnostic program's stubborn errors.

"Muscling won't work," the Fool muttered to himself in the high-toned voice of Ryat66 (minus the tinny echo), "That's why I need to work through it here... Where I can be clever, and work a different kind of technical wizardry..."

He searched his pockets...

"A dagger... A small spade... Matches... A hatchet... A length of rope, nearly twenty feet... And a bar of chocolate. Not nearly as much as if I were just Source Code. Source Code operates without boundaries, in fact defines its environment..."

He looked up at his...

"My environment defined itself. I only defined me... And I have very few tools for this, but I have to try. If I can even chip the armor of this beast holding the IT guys at bay, it may provide them the thread they need to unravel this wool..."

Gathering his equipment, the Fool set off for the representation of the Diagnostic Program.

----------

--Jade Moon--

Randall, his granite armor deflecting the stray laser blasts of Toy Dispenser and crew's laser fire, caught the Dark Watcher Impostor by the shoulders.

"Knock knock!" he growled as he tapped the android on the head.

The taps were not, by any stretch of the imagination, soft.

The loud, metallic clang confirmed that the hissed words of the Vanguard soldier he'd heard earlier were something of the truth.

"Damnation," he muttered as the head turned toward him, "You're gonna be a tough fight, then."

----------

--Peregrine Island, Bay Area--

"You can stop kissing my [butt], now," Cory narrowed his eyes at the sniper, "I don't take well to being deceived..."

With a flick of his left wrist, a fireball was launched from his hand into the center of the building. The intent wasn't so much to injure what had moved there, but to reveal it.

Muttering to himself, he cast the Endowment of the Eagle's Eye, a moderate perception enhancing enchantment. He so disliked having to waste the energy, but it was necessary at times like this...

In case the sniper wound up getting some nasty, "itchy" reactions, Cory had a rather potent, short range fire attack spell at the ready, balled up as it was, in his right hand.

"I dislike being forced to intimidate, but if you will not be forthcoming with information, I will be forced to cease my pleasantries."

A pair of horns sprouted from his forehead.

"I don't believe you wish to see just how unpleasant I can be!"

((The storyline prior to this was detailed in the thread called WAR! (Praetorians Attack!). It was a pseudo RP that was supposed to be compiled stories about various characters fighting their Praetorian counterparts. As of the writing of this, the conflict is over, but life continues unabated in the City of Heroes...

----------

It took a couple weeks to actually stop the fighting, for even after Tyrant had been batted around by the Brutal Warriors' dropship, he was able to pick himself up on his way to the Zig and take a few Freedom Corps helicopters down before Statesman started chasing him across the city. Numerous times, various heroes found themselves face-to-face with the major Praetorian generals when not in conflict with their own inner demons. The Zig even now had a large, scorched hole where Infernal escaped repeatedly after being felled numerous times by varying groups of heroes. Most of the other escaping Praetorians (and not a few other, unaffiliated rogues) used the same large hole...

But that issue was over now. The Praetorian portals had been smashed, their forces rounded up, and the dimensional tears sealed. Through counter strikes engaged from Portal Corp and some assistance from resistance groups on Praetorian Earth, the facilities for the Praetorians to maintain their raids and reiterate their assaults were severely crippled, barely leaving enough power and utilities for their average citizens to go about their lives as normal. Whether or not Tyrant leaves his citizenry to live in peace was another matter, but Statesman had delivered a rather grim message as to what would happen if he learned of his opposite abusing his people again.

Life went back to normal in Paragon City. Roving gangs of thugs continued their crime sprees, heroes fought with and arrested them. Arachnos cells popped up and were often splintered apart by even more heroes.

---------

With the city in as good hands it was ever going to be in, Randall decided it was time to have a barbecue for his family, friends, and anybody who happened to want in on it. Unfortunately, due to the interference from the dimensional ruptures as well as the measures taken to seal them, the base portals located throughout the city were acting a tad wonky.

Randall had to tell his super group where the base was.

"That's lazy, Dad," Cedric remarked, "Real lazy."

"I should've known," Kip muttered.

"Makes sense to me," Zeke chuckled.

They were staring at a large metal door in the basement of the building Randy lived in and supervised. Grey had excavated a disused section of the city sewers and had taken great pains to connect the complex to his apartment building. Since it was a small complex, the city didn't seem to mind, especially since Randall had done some pretty decent things for them.

"I had to promise to reshingle a bunch of roofs over the summer," he grunted, "Cedric, Zeke... Don't make plans."

"But I..." Cedric gestured to his axe, "I do this, now! What if I get hung up!"

"Then I'm gonna be disappointed," Randy glowered at his son, "And you know how I deal with disappointment."

"I'll be there!"

----------

"Nester," Fire-Shield got the young defender's attention as the party was just getting underway, "Can we talk?"

"Sure," he replied, "What's up?"

"Well," she sighed as she tried to compose herself, "This is a tad embarrassing... I... I wanted to talk about when we were fighting your opposite..."

She had been the one to connect the final blow against Jrud Retsen. Her Detention Field had prevented the walking timebomb from irradiating a small section of Independence Port, but in order to do that, she had to place herself in a somewhat compromising position as she grabbed a hold of Nester to detain the floating villain.

"What about it?"

"Well, as you know, I'm a little new to the whole... teleporting thing..."

"Right..."

"I just wanted you to know, the way I caught a hold of you... I didn't mean to seem so..."

"I see..." Nester chuckled a little and set his glass down, "'Unprofessional?' Don't worry about it. I know why you did it..."

"Well, it's just that throwing up that Detention Field is a little intensive, and I couldn't just leave it to random chance that I might miss..."

She seemed frustrated and a little embarrassed.

"I understand," Nester reassured her, "Let me guess, the rest of those knuckleheads kept giving you a hard time of it?"

"All except Eisenheartz. But he's all cold and mission oriented..."

"Well, that's Germans for you," Nester chuckled.

A big hand clamped on his shoulder.

"What was that?" the large man asked.

It was odd hearing Eisenheartz's voice without the metallic echo of his armor.

"Huh-hey!" Nester waved uneasily to the smiling man, "Good to see you! With a beer in hand?"

Nester was a little surprised to see the guy had red hair.

"Indeed," Eisenheartz wasn't even in any form of armor, just his civvies, "I like to cut loose like anybody else. I just take my hero work seriously. I must if I am to negate this horrible image people have about we Germans... This one movie I saw, about a beer drinking contest..."

He sighed, leaving much of his thought unfinished.

Mindy Jakobsen ran up and nearly tackled Nester with a glomp.

"I have great news!" she shouted, "Misty just told me she's pregnant!"

Misty had gone to Praetorian Earth to keep being with her boyfriend, the Praetorian of his brother, Kipland , Kip "Aaron, Cobalt Black 3-8-9" Durj. During their short time there, they'd gotten married.

Shortly after securing the Portal Corp. courtyard, the Maltese Resistance, under the leadership of an alternate Crimson (it was later determined that Red Renegade was actually an alternate from another alternate dimension, not Praetorian Earth, where their Crimson, called yet another shade of red, worked as Tyrant's "counter-terrorism" expert; the same went for Black Purple, as she'd come from the same dimension as Red) had their families and other "non-combatants" transported over. Now, the Maltese Resistance soldiers worked for Crimson (pending the review of their conduct while on probation).

Misty had been among the non-combatants, along with a Freedom Corps Agent sent with her and Cobalt Black named Agent Keller. Keller was a little freaked out after running into her opposite (oddly enough, a psychic in the thrall of Mother Mayhem), but she was composed enough to help negotiate the terms of the Maltese Resistance's amnesty.

Now, a couple weeks alter, Misty was letting her friends know the good news. She and the alternate Kip (called "Aaron" as it is his and Prime Kip's middle name, and Prime Kip was here first) were expecting a wonderful bundle of joy.

"That's great!" Nester swung his roommate around and set her on her feet, "So... I guess that means you're not moving back in with her..."

"Of course I wasn't moving back in with her, silly!" Mindy smiled with the tip of her tongue licking her lower lip as it flicked under her teeth, "I'm staying with you!"

Fire-Shield smiled lightly at Nester and waved goodbye as she and Eisenheartz walked over to the table where Roland and Cedric were setting food. Nester looked to ehr for a moment, but she didn't seem to have the posture of somebody who felt dejected...

"You're not her type," Mindy explained as she looked at the confusion written on his face, "Her type's probably more like that big guy, Cedric... Maybe even Kip..."

"Oh..."

---------

"So, what are you guys going to do?" Sheldon asked.

"We gotta wait until we have a new flyer," Daren Simms ("Solo Stryker"), "And Psych's been going nuts about giving it a name."

"We could try to transport people on the Runtime Exception," Dale Simms ("the Kingdale Referee") offered, "Maybe convert it into some kind of hover car..."

"No," Levi Baker ("Psycho13") muttered, "We don't have an engine with enough power. Man, we got lucky there, didn't we? Statesman himself standing right there!"

Statesman had noticed how Daren and James had been acting and later determined their status as "villains" within Paragon City's limited parameters.

However, in a surprising show of moral flexibility, he let them go. After all, they had just sacrificed a major component of their endeavors and risked their own lives in defense of the city. Apparently, he figured their efforts at least warranted a head start...

"That head start is now four weeks, five days, twenty-one hours and counting," Dale looked at his watch and smirked, "Y'know, he's a lot cooler than he's portrayed most of the time."

"Has dad talked to you guys about what he intends to do with your next flyer?" Sheldon continued.

"He said something about using miniguns and a chaingun main turret," Daren shrugged, "Frankly, all I'm hearing is 'Hey! Money! Bye-bye! Wave bye-bye!'"

"That sucks, man..."

"Eh, we do what we can..."

----------

"Congratulations, man," Kip sighed as he handed a beer to his new brother.

"Thanks," Aaron replied, "Things are finally looking up for me. Maybe they'll pick up for you, too."

"Not likely," the scrapper replied, "Mine isn't a fate for good luck. I need to stay enraged, a victim of the system of life, in order to be effective against the criminality of the world..."

"Do you really believe that?"

"No, but it sounded cool."

Kip sighed and took a swig of his beer. He didn't really like the taste of the stuff, but it helped to dull the edge of his days.

"Good thing I've got my alternate ego," Aaron chuckled, "I actually have something to protect."

"Pft, Misty can take care of herself. She was a Carnie, after all."

"You didn't see her in action back home..." Cobalt Black smiled, "I have no doubts about her ability to defend herself. Still, she shouldn't have to."

"If you ever need help, bro..."

"Goes without saying."

---------

"Party's doing pretty well, Randy," Zeke muttered, "Any clue as to what's on the horizon?"

"No clue... Hopefully, it's nothing world-breaking or crazy like we've been dealing with..."

"Aw," Androm'Geizzer's voice suddenly issued from Zeke's nostrils, "It's not so bad, is it?"

"Don't do that, Androm," Zeke muttered, "Ask to use my mouth, like always."

"Sorry... I'm just a little new to being this drunk... On victory, on alcohol... On life! I never knew anybody could be so happy living so simply..."

"Welcome to Earth," Zeke muttered, "And now, to drown you in more alcohol."

----------

On the roof, Cory Simmons helped Roland and Charlene Cook.

"It isn't necessarily the most proper use for magic," he chuckled as he kept the barbecue hot, "But I don't think anybody will mind."

"You're doing a great job, man," Round gave him a thumbs-up as he flipped a steak, "Ma? What do you think?"

"Fantastic," she chirped, "Just great..."

"Well, I'm glad to be of service."

A couple Clockwork robots appeared nearby. Rather than attack, they just seemed to sit back and watch. Cory smiled to them. They'd been a lot more... well... friendly... since the quick war. Though everybody knew the peace wouldn't last, and that the Clockwork King would soon go back to his ravenous scavenging ways, nobody here intended to disturb things.

"Why didn't your little girlfriend come by, Roland?" his mother suddenly asked.

Roland looked at her with a simple frown.

"She wasn't who she seemed to be. Let's just leave it at that."

"Bad?"

"No..." he grinned, "Nothing bad. Just... She's not really in the best position in life to be my friend."

Charlene arched an inquiring eye, but Roland's stoic demeanor as he went back to work at the grill ended the conversation. Cedric showing up to snag more food for the party didn't help matters.

"Yo! Stay frosty, people! Our guests are hungry!"

"Of course they're hungry. This is damn good food!"

Charlene handed a plate of steaks to her eldest son, who proceeded to balance it on his head. She hen handed him a plate of burgers and another of chicken.

"You better not crash that stuff!"

"Yeah, Dad'll kill me!"

----------

"So," Randall grunted to his daughter, "When's the wedding, again?"


We're aiming for October," Sarah replied as she hugged herself closer to her fiance, Joe, "Multi-colored leaves, outdoor setting..."

"Sounds pretty," Joe patted Sarah's hand and smiled.

"You having the wedding out here?" Randy's voice rumbled.

"No... No. Back home," Sarah chirped, "In Kingdale. That meadow out behind the old house, you know?"

"Is it being taken care of?"

"Roland said he hired a guy to take care of it," Joe shrugged, "Mike Flechette... I think you've met him."

"He said it's part of his wedding gift," Sarah bubbled, "He was hinting at deciding on what cake to get for us, too."

"Isn't that supposed to be your decision?"

"Wouldn't you trust Round's judgment on this?"

"Touche..."

----------

And so the night continued, with each of the heroes engaging in various inconsequential conversations and patching up old faux pas and controversies that may have occurred in their past. Good friends showed up, and even Freedom Corps's Agent Wild arrived to check in on their festivities.

"You guys all seem to be doing well for yourselves," he observed, "Almost makes me feel bad to bring you this news..."

Everybody stopped partying almsot instantly and glared at the guy.

"Nah, I'm kidding. Have fun, folks. Nothing major's on the docket as far as I'm concerned."

"I'm gonna wind up killing that guy," Randall muttered, "Seriously... Fricking dead."

((Mkay, I'm done here. I'll be moving back to doing Grey's Army and Brutal Warriors Order. Much of the rest of the Praetorian War (Invasion) will be covered as commentary in the aftermath.

I kinda wish more people tossed their stories into here. I guess I just threw it up at the wrong time.

Oh well, there's always next time.))

[ QUOTE ]
Let's litter it with bodies!

[/ QUOTE ]

Recluse probably WOULD say that one.

Lord Recluse: *looking through this thread* "Ooh! I like that one!"

Ghost Widow: "It's not another one of you lecherously coming on to me, is it?"

Lord Recluse: "Of course not!"

Ghost Widow: "Oh... Okay... I guess..."

Breathing a sigh of relief, Randall turned to the rest of the crew.

"Alright, back to where we started! Let's move!"

He started bolting past them, his feet hissing as he crossed the heated floor, heading for the explosions that sounded from the battle between Lady Grey and whatever her assailants were. Rounding the corner, he grunted.

"Sonova... Dark Watcher! What the Hell are you doing?"

"It's an impostor..." one of the injured Vanguard troops hissed at him.

"Oh... Well then," Randall started marching toward the automaton's back, "I guess I can get back to doing what I'm good at, then."

He reached forward to grab the Dark Watcher impostor by the shoulders and lift him into the air. From there, the intent was to loft it into the ceiling and hammer into it with a knockout blow, but one thing at a time...

Roaring, Randall stripped himself of his rooting and charged forward. Placing his massive bulk between Ineffable and the War Horse was unlikely, but he had to try...

And Lord knew what was about to happen to him, but he'd already taken care of most of his affairs...

I'm sorry Charlene... But I had to try...

Kip's club smashed through the canopy glass with a cascading crash, and the pilot looked up barely in time to notice Kip doing a one-handed handstand over him and dropping both feet down into his collar bone.

Unfortunately, Mayhem pilots wore a pretty tough crash harness, and Kip wound up bouncing off the enemy and rolling over the nose of the vehicle. As the pilot aimed it down at him, Psycho13 was there, his hooked blades at the ready. He stabbed into the nose and started crawling his way up the machine to the suddenly very frightened pilot.

"Hi, honey!" he shouted, "I'm home!"

--Portal Corp--

Ryat66 looked to Matt as he plugged his brain into the computer the tech guys were providing him.

"Sorry, Hoss," he chirped, "I'm needed elsewhere."

Matt shook his head at Archlich.

"If it turns out the interference is terrestrial, I'm gonna be the guy who goes and takes care of it. If not, well, there's enough guys who should know what they're doin' on the other end. Plus, being stuck in Grand Rikti Central isn't what comes to mind as a good idea."

----------

--Jade Moon--

Randall stared at the War Horse as it's body suddenly glowed green and his hands came away from the expanding orb with an electric jolt.

"Augh!"

He shook the pain out and turned to the rest of the crew.

"Next time somebody's going to go and do that, do you mind giving me a warning?"

Seeing Toy Dispenser's proffered finger, he gritted his teeth and shook his head. Suddenly, a massive growth of gray stone wrapped around him.

"You guys get to helping that other tank. Something bad's going on over there. Me... I'll stick around here and see if I can take the last whuppins... Lord knows, I stood up to a couple Kronos Titans in my time, I should be able to handle this..."

He turned to the green orb and waited for it to fade. Considering their luck, it was probably going to be much sooner than Toy Dispenser had said.

----------

--Peregrine Island: Across the bay from the Bayside Docks--

The Sniper's scope suddenly went dark. Looking up, he saw a dark-skinned man with red-dyed hair, glowing eyes, and some rather peculiar looking robes floating next to him with his palm on the other end of the scope. When he stood up, the wizard floated away slightly and raised his hands in a gesture of peace.

"Hello there," the strange man intoned to the sniper, "I see you're aiming in the vicinity of a vehicle that a friend of mine informed me of. Do you mind telling me what makes it so important?"

When the sniper aimed his rifle at the blaster, Cory wagged his finger at him, then pointed at the muzzle. It had a solid block of ice jammed inside it. It was as if it had just grown there...

"I also have a spell woven around me, Wind Armor... Not to mention my natural maneuverability while hovering here. Combined with the ice armor I usually conjure up, like so..." he snapped his fingers and ice started wrapping around himself, "it makes your actually harming me a slim chance. Please... I am not here to hurt or arrest you, I just require information. I had myself a long flight, I was flying over here to have a word with my friend, and I noticed you on my way. Strange coincidence, huh?"

--Peregrine Island--

Matt was halfway through a shrug when his eyes suddenly widened.

"Oh! Wait!'"

He plucked his communicator from his hip and dialed furiously.

"Hello? Who the Hell is this? Volde- GET A FRICKIN' IMAGINATION!"

Cursing to himself, he redialed, this time slower.

"SHELDON!"

There was a loud scream of "WHAT!?" on the other end, causing Matt to wince.

"Sorry," he muttered, "I'm a little agitated. Look, man, I need your hacker skills over here in Portal Corp. pronto!"

...

"What do you mean, no?"

Sheldon Wallace, Randall Grey's tech man and the inventor of his super group, was busy at his own computer, trying to figure out a complex algorithm that only got weirder and weirder as he wormed through it.

"Because I have no 'madd skillz,'" he replied as he tried unsuccessfully to hold the phone on his shoulder, "I'm not a hacker, Matt. I'm barely even a programmer, truth be told. It was an exceptional stroke of luck that enabled me to design the Ryat Source Code... A stroke of luck that seems to have become a double-edged sword as of late..."

"Dude!" Matt was suddenly enthusiastic again, "We could get the Ryats over here! Which of them would be better at tweaking around inside a computer? Sixty-Six, Ninety-Nine? Maybe one of the other hundred or so?"

...

"What the Hell man!? Why not!?"

"Because, Matt," he barked back as he typed furiously with his free hand, "I recently found out something bad about the Ryat code that needs to be dealt with promptly. I simply do NOT want them to be touching sensitive equipment at the moment..."

"Oh come on!"

"No, I will not acquiesce. It is simply too dangerous."

Muttering grim obscenities to himself, Matt hung up his communicator. Looking darkly to Unai, he shrugged.

"Sorry, man," he finally grunted, "I got nuth-"

Ryat66 trotted up next to Matt. He looked a little odd, not that his standard outer shell had changed, but he looked like he was drinking something...

"Hi Matt," he warbled, "What's going on over here?"

Matt rounded on the android, his eyes wide. Ryat66's posture changed to reflect surprise and distress.

"Matt... Don't look at me like that. Humans always have the most horrible ideas when they look like that..."

"Well, Sixty-Six, the only thing horrible here is that I'll be asking you to disobey an order from Sheldon..."

"You mean the one he's broadcasting to all the Ryats to not listen to you?"

"Hai."

"Hm..." the android rubbed it's chin (it was still drinking the oil as it conversed), "While the prospect of further aggravating him is intriguing, for now I must decline."

"Come on, man! You do this for me, you might just save the..."

He leaned over to Unai Kemen.

"Am I right in assuming the universe is at stake?"

Kemen nodded.

"YEAH! You might just save the universe here!"

Ryat66 rubbed his chin again, and finally gave a thumbs up.

"Alright!" Matt shouted, "Where's your USB hookup?"

The android pulled a small cord from a panel in his head and handed the connector to Matt.

"Where do we plug this bad boy in?" Matt asked the Security Chief.

He had that crazy look in his eyes that had oh so worried Ryat66...

----------

--Jade Moon--

((Diov... I apologize. It was rude of me to vent here. ))

Randall pushed himself off the ground and gave a (strangely) victorious whoop as he closed with and smashed his fist into the remains of the War Horse's head, leaving a nasty dent. From there, he gripped its neck again and smashed its upper body against the floor.

"I tell you, this is the life!" he shouted, "Nigh invulnerable, breaking stuff... Causing massive amounts of money to be wasted by a guy who didn't even deserve it anyway..."

He heard the explosions in the background. Arching his eyebrow as he held the machine's head down, he craned his neck to look back. A HVAS robot's head crashed just outside the door Ineffable had previously disintegrated and Randall had a bad feeling rumbling around in his gut.

Things were very wrong here.

"You!" he shouted at Binro, "Take point and take everybody who can move to check out what that was! If it's nasty, kill it."

He turned his attention to the struggling War Horse. Ineffable... He hoped that guy (if he was still "alive") was doing something crazy enough to finish this thing quickly, if not, he'd probably still be stuck here for a while.

"I'll take care of this little monstrosity."

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Lord Recluse: "Ghost Widow... I..."
*Ghost Widow pulls a towel up over her body, glaring evilly at Recluse.
Lord Recluse: "Wow! Nice shoes..."

[/ QUOTE ]
You know, there's got to be Lord Recluse/Statesman and Ms. Liberty/Ghost Widow slash fiction out there in the wild somewhere. heh.

[/ QUOTE ]

ARGH! MY BRAIN!

[/ QUOTE ]

You found it? Where?!

[/ QUOTE ]

Don't answer Grey! For the love of all that is holy, don't answer!

[/ QUOTE ]

But I must...

I found it in my cranium.

woot.

I dislike the idea behind "slashfics."

Let things be as they are. Cloud doesn't need to...

You know what, I'm going to stop right now. So long as I don't cast this thought into the Ether, it can't happen.

I hope.

But that hope keeps being beaten down...

That makes my brain bleed.

So, without further ado, we put this thread back on track...

----------

Lord Recluse: "Slashfics!? Bring me the head of Ang_Rui_Shen!"

Captain Mako: "What the Hell did he do?"

Lord Recluse: [growling] "He started it..."

Weaving behind a corner, Psycho13 pressed his severed left arm against the stump. There was a strange slithering sound and the limb stitched itself back together.

Funny thing was, it didn't leave a scar. There was a line of slightly lighter flesh, yes, but it was nothing like the nasty scar that circled halfway around his arm just below the elbow.

"That's what tells me I'm here," he muttered as a light started shining on him.

The flyer had sought him out. The pilot must be bored. Psycho13 flipped him the bird and bolted under the vessel's belly.

Kip was busy carving a neat line through one of the guns. As he was about done, he took a hold of the barrel, wincing as he came in contact with the hot metal (fortunately, a wreath of black-purple smoke wrapped around his hand, mitigating some of the pain). Wrenching it free, he made for the cockpit.

"Evening, [boy]!" he shouted as he hefted the impromptu club, "I hope this hurts!"

He swung the barrel down to smash into the canopy. The glass spiderwebbed, and he lifted the weapon up for another swing.

After Danica made her attack, Randall, gripping the neck of the War Horse, growled. The brass under his hands crinkled and he (again) rooted his feet to the ground.

This caused all forward momentum to stop.

"Now I'm [ticked]," he growled, "Let's try this again... the hard way."

Placing one hand on the "snout" of the machine and the other on its shoulder, he started to push the head back. His fingers continued to press into the brass armor, where it crinkled slowly with a low whine. The head bent back slower, largely because it was riveted together.

"This would be easier without the jets," he grumbled.

So, he took a hold of its neck again and smacked the shiny machine against a nearby wall. Since that wasn't nearly enough, he did it again. And again. And again...

The metal walls seemed to do a lot more damage than his bare hands.

It was still such slow going, though.

"Yo, armored guy..." he shouted at Binro, "Argh... I forgot your name... Still! Let's put this damn thing between a rock and a hard place!"

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Lord Recluse: "Ghost Widow... I..."
*Ghost Widow pulls a towel up over her body, glaring evilly at Recluse.
Lord Recluse: "Wow! Nice shoes..."

[/ QUOTE ]
You know, there's got to be Lord Recluse/Statesman and Ms. Liberty/Ghost Widow slash fiction out there in the wild somewhere. heh.

[/ QUOTE ]

ARGH! MY BRAIN!

The flames parted from the horse's "vision" and there stood the terrifying image of Randall Grey, his body seemingly unharmed by the assaults directed at it. The energy bolts were deflected or absorbed by the crystals, the fire absorbed by the magma growing out of his skin. The rockets seemed to impact on his body and he emerged from the cloud on a direct path for the offending machine. What force bolts did hit Randall did little to slow him down, as his rooted legs refused to let him fall away.

The piece of Warhulk he had went flying through the air at this point, aimed for the War Horse's head. Randall followed it, his face screwed up into a mask of rage, his hands balled up into fists bigger than most faces, and just as solid as granite.

Before he smashed into the machine with an uppercut, he let out his warcry...

"HAAAAAAAAAAAAUGH!"

Lord Recluse: "Ghost Widow... I..."

*Ghost Widow pulls a towel up over her body, glaring evilly at Recluse.

Lord Recluse: "Wow! Nice shoes..."

--Jade Moon--

Randall flicked the switches on his belt and started plodding down the corridor. Nanites started flowing from the devices they connected to, and Randall had to take a deep breath to calm himself as the Aggressors got into his bloodstream.

Regaining his sense of what he was doing, he looked back to the others.

"Let me take point... I have certain... advantages... Even here, in this 'alien world.'"

As he reached the War Hulk half, he wrenched a piece free. One never knew when they'd need a good piece of debris to hurl at the enemy. Taking a deep breath, he took a hold of the blast door and started to pull on it...

"With enough-grr-pressure... Anything is-hurgh!-possible..."

----------
--Portal Corp.--

Mad Matt arched an eyebrow at Archlich. Sighing, he let the ice covered blade fall to the ground. There, he simply shook the weapon and pulled it free of its icy prison.

"If you'd like to disarm me, you're going to have to do better than that, Numbskull."

Smiling like an [jerk] at Archlich's back, he sheathed his weapon and followed in time to hear the bad news.

"So... Unai, right? What the Hell are we going to do about this?"

Kip snarled at the flyer, but crouched into the shadows. If it dropped a bomb, he'd still have a few moments to leap up and over it, land on top, worm his way inside to...

Psycho13 came running around the corner.

"I found a bunch of Resistance soldiers holed up in... in..."

He looked up at the flyer and his jaw dropped slightly. As it's guns locked on the super-speeding scrapper, Kip cursed and leaped impossibly high into the air.

Kicking off the nearby wall, the small scrapper vaulted himself onto the back of the offending machine.

"Psych! I was doing fine without you around, buddy! Now you had to go and make me care..."

Psycho13 had his own problems, however, as he was busy darting back and forth across the street to avoid incoming ammunition.

"Hey! I-WOAH!-don't know-HAI!-what to tell you.-YIKES!-I'm sorr-AAAAAAOW! THAT WAS MY ARM! YOU [something mean]!-I'm sorry..."

Kip caught a hold of one of the guns and started using his laser eye on it.

"That's okay, man. All's forgiven."

The Brutal Warriors Order found themselves face-to-face with the leader of the Praetorians. Well, most of them, anyway. Psycho13 tried to keep up with them, but he wound up getting sidetracked in Talos Island when the trail ran across the fight going on between Bobcat and the Freaks.

The rest of the group couldn't keep track of their wayward friend and his misadventures, however. Solo was more than a little busy trying to keep the rest of the crew from getting slaughtered by Tyrant.

"I don't have time for this insolence!" shouted the monster, "I will tear your vessel apart, piece by piece if I have to!"

"Then let's give you a piece!" Solo Stryker shouted through the loudspeaker, "Draven! Rage, show this [wussy] what happens when he [messes] with the B.W.O.!"

Tyrant shouldn't have arched an eyebrow. For that wasted moment, he found himself being pelted with a nearly never-ending stream of machine gun ammunition from three different sources.

Floating above the statue of Talos, the ships three turrets were delivering a pounding on the Praetorian's Anti-Statesman. Tyrant ducked and dived away from them, Draven and Rage having trouble keeping up, but Solo's computer-guided turret kept a solid bead on the target. Suddenly, however, they lsot him.

"What?" Solo shouted, "Where the Hell is he?"

He was answered with a scream from Draven. Tyrant had flown under the ship and pushed through the Repulsor Shield. Solo's brother, the Referee, had attempted to compensate, but it was just too late.

Tyrant had ripped out Draven's turret with the B.W.O. leader still inside it. Tearing the weapon apart as he was pushed away from the vessel, he didn't notice when Erickson leaped out and started flying away. Tyrant turned just in time to catch a broadsword to the face.

"You must be joking," he chuckled to the red-coated scrapper, "Do you have any idea how truly outclassed you are?"

"I-" Draven began, but he was backhanded away before Tyrant could even begin to care.

"I don't intend to waste time with an imbecile."

He chased back after the dropship. Solo Stryker swung the vehicle around so his turret and Ragin' James's could each line up to fire on him. Weaving through the streams of glowing hot bullets, Tyrant made for the port turret.

The weapon stopped firing a moment before he reached it. Yanking it out and doing much the same to it as he did the starboard weapon, Tyrant failed to notice Ragin' James wasn't inside. When he turned back to the machine, James was busy pointing a minigun his friends and him had acquired in their travels into Tyrant's face.

"I bet this tickles," he shouted as he pulled the trigger with his right hand, his left being busy holding him, dangling, from the opening in the dropship.

Tyrant fell back, pain evident in his posture, but he recovered quickly. As he rushed to assault the Brute on the ship's exposed flank, Ragin' James leaped out at him, tossing the minigun aside (into the wild blue yonder, it wasn't helping him anymore anyway).

His body wreathed in red electricity, James connected with Tyrant only a scant few yards from the ship as it sped off over the cityscape of Talos Island. Heroes and citizens watched in awe from below as some lunatic seemed to be going toe-to-toe with a slightly skewed Statesman.

Rage caught Tyrant with a right cross, Tyrant responding with a hammerfist smash. The brute fell away, but recovered in mid-air, actually flying to meet Tyrant in the middle of his dive.

"Bet you didn't see this coming, [jerk] face!"

Rage caught the Praetorian dictator with an uppercut to the face. Unfortunately, it only seemed to deviate the villain a little from his flightpath, and Rage could have sworn he just broke his wrist. Rubbing his injured limb, he looked down to see that Tyrant had disappeared.

"Where'd he go?"

In the distance, the B.W.O. dropship was fighting Tyrant yet again. He'd rocketed through the valley of buildings and snuck up on the heroes and rogues. As he made a final approach, however, Dirty Ice leaped off the top of the vehicle, screaming and swinging his stone mallet.

Tyrant caught him in mid-air and casually threw him to the roof of a nearby building. Coughing, Ice pushed his burning body back up, but found himself hit in the back with a large piece of concrete.

Chuckling, Tyrant turned back to the dropship to find Draven Erickson in his face again. Draven raked his blade across Tyrant's forearms (as the anti-tank was quite adept at deflecting Draven's assaults), and wound up barreling over him when the villain tried to tackle him in mid-air.

"Ow," he muttered as he hit the roof of the magic shop, "I think he bruised my hip..."

When Tyrant, breathing haggardly, turned back to the dropship, he was railed across his body with several clusters of missiles.

"That's right," Solo muttered as Tyrant emerged from the dust cloud, screaming in anger, "Keep showing me your hubris..."

Solo started firing the last turret's guns at the villain. Tyrant didn't even try to deviate. The bullets pinged and panged, scattering in various directions. Solo held down the trigger until the guns went hot. He was pulling the vehicle away when the Praetorian leader reached him and took a hold of the turret.

"And now, I take the last of your claws," he laughed as the turret came out easily in his hands.

Too easily, in fact.

Solo had a minor dislike when it came to the dropship's main turret. The side ones could be reloaded from within the main chamber of the ship. Psycho, Dale, Slater... Whoever was available at the time just had to pop a hatch and toss in another crate of bullets. The feeder clawed up the new belt and fed it into the tube leading to the turret.

However, the main turret had a finite loadout of ammunition. Dale (the Referee) and the Wallaces (Sheldon and his father, Hector) hadn't been able to work out an adequate reloading system for the weapon. Daren, however, asked for a different nasty surprise.

Tyrant glared at the retreating vehicle. The ease with which he'd yanked out the weapon and the fact that the pilot was laughing about it over that infernal loudspeaker was a little...

Too late, he noticed the peculiar digital noise warbling out of the small thermal bomb that was superheating the last of the ammunition and turning the derelict weapon into an impromptu claymore mine.

One explosion equivalent to a Fire Blast Inferno combined with a couple shotgun blasts, and Tyrant was spinning in the air. When he circled came around, he noticed the last nasty surprise Solo Stryker had ins tore for him.

A large chaingun had deployed from the opening left by the turret. It was already spinning, and the Praetorian leader's eyes widened in time to hear the sound of shotguns blasting across the city as the high-caliber weapon blasted round after round into his torso.

Tyrant was pushed back, but there weren't many rounds for the chaingun.

"What!?" Solo shouted as the weapon ran dry.

"Sorry, bro," the Referee replied, "We never got around to making enough shells for that thing..."

Hovering over Spanky's Boardwalk, the Tyrant and the B.W.O. dropship stared each other down.

"Missiles and rockets are reloading too damn slow," Solo shouted through the intercom, "Come on, Ref, tell me you've got something for me to use against this guy..."

Tyrant cracked his knuckles.

"I might ahve something..." Dale replied.

The two started rushing at each other, Tyrant rushing forward and picking up speed, the dropship blasting on the afterburners and rocketing forward. Just as they were about to connect, Tyrant pulled back for a hard punch into Solo's canopy. Solo, however, yanked the control sticks and wound up spinning the vehicle around like a baseball bat. The Ref hit the Repulsor Field button and Tyrant felt like he was flying through an undertow moments before getting blasted across the beach.

He bounced off a cliff and fell to the ground, laying still.

The dropship, despite the heroic blast, did not fare much better. Solo lost control of the vehicle and they started to crash. He screamed something about crash positions, and was surprised when there was a sudden slowing of the uncontrolled spin.

Ragin' James was outside the vehicle, and he'd caught a hold of it, using his super strength and flight to try to slow the momentum of the crash. Pushing against the rear ventral port-side corner, Rage realized his desperate gamble was not going to pan out. He saw the sand rushing to catch him, and closed his eyes.

He refused to let go. If his small sacrifice could help his friends survive, so be it...

The momentum of the ship suddenly dropped and Ragin' James looked to see the cause.

Statesman was back.

He'd been monitoring the battle personally, watching to see Tyrant's next move since the infrastructure of his world's "capital city" had been decimated and his reinforcements cut off. It seemed he had been distracted, however, and watching his "opposite" face off against this motley band of heroes and... others... had been quite amusing.

Setting the ship down, he looked to Rage.

"Are you alright?"

"Yes..." James edged toward the ship, hoping to avoid identifying himself.

Technically, he was considered a "Brute" by his power profile. A criminal.

"Check on your friends," the Paragon champion simply ordered, a hint of relief in his voice, "I'm going to check on our mutual friend..."

"Okay..." Rage muttered as he looked in to see the Kingdale Referee and King Slater picking themselves up off the floor.

"Man... Remind me never to let Daren drive again," Slater grunted, "Did Levi get that pilot's license, yet?"

"No," the Ref replied as he slumped back to the floor, gripping his head in his hands, "No he didn't."

((Leering?))

"I kind of figured," Randall glared back into Ineffable's eyes, "And?"

((Getting tired of waiting for Mutant Illusion. Sorry man, but Kip and Psych are heading out.))

Kipland was following Baker's lead. Kip would dart forward super fast, then dart back and let him (and possibly their latest companion) know what the forces and fighting looked like.

"Look, man," Kip finally got a hold of his old friend, "I only care if there's Resistance troops out there. They need help, and I've done what I could, but we can obviously see it's not enough. Maybe now... There's a wind of change in the air. You find Resistance, we're gonna hop in there and bust some Mayhem troops up! Capiche?"

"Capiche," Psycho13 replied before zipping around another corner.

Kip stared at the hunk of hair in his hand with a wide eye. Shaking his fingers, he let the hairs just fall away.

"That guy has GOT to learn to be more careful..."

((Matt's a (relatively) recent student of mystical arts, so he can't really tell one undead "overlord type" from another. The question mark is more of a reflection of his own uncertainty.))

Randall snorted.

"Ah yes... Hubris."

Already the team was divided, he could feel it. Behind him, he figured maybe half (maybe!) were following. If this was how it was all going to turn out for the rest of the mission, they were all gonna hurt (himself included).

"Regrettable for all of us," he muttered to Thelth (not that he really knew the guy), "The fewer people we have, the less chance we have of getting out of here alive, much less completing the mission. Now, if you'll excuse me..."

Randall peeked his head around the first corner.

--Jade Moon--

Randall grunted as Ineffable disappeared.

Stalker class, most likely. That "Chert" guy sounds [ticked]. Well, this is a wipe in the making...

"Now hang on everybody... Let me get a look at what's out there first. I know I'm the leader of Delta Squad, but since most of us are a little... squishy... I think it would be best if I took a look around first..."

His eyes rolled in consternation.

"And... Ineffable, right? If you're still around, your little stealth trick would come in REALLY handy if you would give us a heads-up as to what's out there. I'm not too keen on all of this 'Hi there, I'm gonna do something nasty, okay bye' [stuff]. We're a team, boy. Showboatin' is only gonna get us killed."

He gave a short glance to the rest of the meta types.

"That goes for all of you, got it? If one of you does something that has a high risk of getting the rest of us killed, I swear by anything and everything you could hold holy, I will do something very regrettable to you."

With that, he started edging along the wall to get a good look around the first corner. He moved surprisingly fast for a rooted stone tanker, too.

----------

--Portal Corp.--

Matt smirked at the skull-faced villain. He snicked the blade out of its scabbard, but didn't aim it threateningly at Blightlord. Instead, he whisked it this way and that as he spoke to illustrate his point (which means that it sometimes pointed at Blightlord, but not threateningly).

"Well, Numbskull, in case you haven't noticed, the portal's not exactly stable. I'm fairly certain that hopping in there is a one-way ticket to looking more like you, and less alive than I'd like to be. As for killing people to make the world a better place, well... I've done some of that already. Not too fun, but not too trying. I also find it has about the same effect as letting them live, minus the fun of incessantly sticking it to 'em. You know what I'm saying?"

He took a breath and rested the blade on his shoulder.

"Besides. I'm waiting for Kemen to tell me why the Hell I'm not working on some other things I wanted to do with my Steed and where my boss is."

He arched an eyebrow at the lich(?).

"So... Who the [something bad] are you supposed to be, and why aren't the authorities riddling your corpse with holes? Judging by your attitude, I'd be correct in assuming you're a rogue, right?"