[Wednesday, October 15th. 1 PM] [Your normal afternoon routines have been interrupted as you've each received an emergency call from Sister Admin. She didn't provide many details, except that there's been an attack up in the West Bronx, the responding heroes are in trouble, and Eternal Warrior is otherwise occupied.] [You've all be instructed to rally outside the nearest train station, call in for further details, and then assist the heroes ASAP.] [The station is at the edge of a rather run-down industrial area, not too far from the shore.] [Session Start!] * Mizuki is there, then, looking normal as normal! She floats there, mming slightly as she looks slightly off into the distance, eyes unfocused. * Jacqueline is there, looking normal as normal. Except for not really being visible thanks to being concealed in the stomach-seated cockpit of a ten meter tall, vaguely humanoid robot with turrets for arms and lots of soft, artistic curvature. * TheRedcoat is there, smoking a cigarette and eyeing Jacqueline a bit. * Mizuki glances to Jacqueline and murmurs, "Time for the... heavy weaponry?" * Jacqueline 's voice comes out through speakers throughout the thing's chassis, and is about as giddy as is appropriate to the situation: "Yes. Apparently, /someone/ has finally decided to display a modicum of sense." * Christian comes to a halt quickly outside the station, the air settling behind him as he comes to a more normal speed. He glances around briefly, gives a brief nod, then resumes his slightly neutral, unhappy look. "Yo." It sounds somewhat halfhearted. Any news? * TheRedcoat raises an eyebrow. "Your level of weaponry was restricted?" My access to things that cost the city thousands of dollars in damages is restricted. * Mizuki looks over at Christian and shakes her head. "No... but do we know if Horus is coming?" [All of your comm cards start beeping!] Ah. Well, the-- * TheRedcoat takes hers out and performs the appropriate action! * Christian shakes his head slightly. "No clue. We ain't got time to wait though." He scowls at the beep and picks up the card, pressing it. "Yeah?" * Jacqueline manages to find the opportunity to answer hers! [A small 3D image of the large 3D image of Sister Admin pops out of each of the cards as you answer them. "Horus is stuck on a train stopped between stations; she'll get there if she can. The rest of you need to move out now. Ten blocks west, towards the water, one of the city's major water treatment plants is under attack."] * Mizuki answers hers as well! Hooray holograms. She asks, "By who?" Well fuck that. Not on my fuckin' watch. ["A group of heroes known as the S-Team responded, but last I heard they were in over their heads and needed help. Set, who was the major sparring partner of the old Horus, and pretty well kicked the crap out of our Horus a few months back, is the one attacking."] * Mizuki frowns and says, "She'll be sorry she was late." ["He's on par with the original Horus power-wise, so be damn careful out there."] * TheRedcoat 's brow furrows a bit and turns to Jacqueline. "How fast does your mechanism go?" * Jacqueline begins taking big, loping steps that for the most part miss doing any undue damage as she says via communicator, "Call it sixty kilos per." ["Stay safe, folks." And the image disappears.] Can you take me? I'll slow the team down, otherwise. * Christian lets out a breath. "Damned straight. But can't be helped. This guy's on *my* turf now." * Jacqueline stops, sighs loudly, and comms, "I would suggest taking a ride on Christian. What with my stunning lack of /hands/." * Mizuki flinches, then says, "I suggest moving quickly, either way." She starts to fly off immediately, adding, "They have little time!" * TheRedcoat shrugs. "I had planned on using my sash to latch on, but very well." She turns to Christian. "Would that be all right?" * Christian shrugs slightly. "So long as you're light enough, shouldn't be a problem." He glances at Jackie for a moment. "She's bigger to ride on but like hell I'm gonna argue now." Time is kind of the essence, yes. * TheRedcoat hesitatingly clambers on, if allowed. Her badass powers do not permit awkwardness to intrude. [You all get moving! At the speeds you're going, it only takes a minute or two to get there, but on the way you can see signs of what's going on: dark clouds hovering over what you assume to be the water treatment plant, which is periodically being struck by bolts of lightning. High winds, filled with sand, get stronger as you get closer, and the temperature increases dramatically.] * TheRedcoat frowns. Dramatically. * Jacqueline stifles a giggle, dramatically. * Christian slows down to a more reasonable speed so Redcoat can get off then checks out the distance, frowning as well. Like hell he's being dramatic. * TheRedcoat flips off gracefully, her red coat swirling in the winds. [The heat is stifling and the sand in the wind is just short of intolerable as you turn a corner. Standing in front of the building being hit by lighting is a tall, lean man with bronzed skin, wearing a dark jackal mask and holding a wooden jackal-headed staff. He's wearing traditional Egyptian garb with a single thick strap across his chest connected to a loincloth/skirt; sparks of electricity flicker around him as he stands calm in the maelstrom of winds. This, rather obviously, is Set.] [Nearby, you can see the heroes you were supposed to come to the aid of, and damn if they don't need it. Three of them are out already: a North African man in a turban and flowing robes lays slumped against a wall, several thin pieces of metal that look like skewers stuck into various points in his body.] [Two women, one surrounded by smoke and dressed kind of like a female version of Christian, and one dressed in a pink and light-purple bodysuit, are similarly unconcious and burned, with evidence of a lightning strike between them.] * Mizuki glances over them and then heads straight for them, saying, "I will support them!" * Christian nods to Mizuki. "Need me to pull 'em out of the line of fire?" [The last, a strikingly beautiful blonde in an eye-catching outfit, is still standing, but barely, flinging small star-shaped burst of energy ineffectually at Set, where they impact against some sort of force field.] * Mizuki nods and replies, "If you can easily, it would help!" [As you arrive, Set lazily turns his head to you. He pauses for a moment, seemingly confused, then looks up and around. "Where is the fake Horus? The little bitch is supposed to be here with you! Where is she?!"] * Christian looks for a second at a likely spot to draw them out of the line of fire and then runs full speed towards the nearest one, possibly slowed a bit by the wind but pressing against it with a wind of his own. Starting with the ones further away from Set. [Set ignores the lot of you for the moment, searching the sky for Horus. "Coward! You dare hide from me?!"] * TheRedcoat starts creeping around outside the circle of winds, heading for the building, or at least out of Set's immediate field of vision. * Christian draws them out of the likely range and sets them down out of the area, then turns towards Set and starts stepping towards him away from the bunch so they're less likely to be targetted. "Tough shit, Sherlock. You got us to deal with." Not much for stealth, that one. * Jacqueline points both of the robot's gun arms in Seth's direction. And then its smooth, featureless 'face' opens up to reveal a far more textured landscape made up of multiple glowing gun barrels. "Believe me, I'm nearly as disappointed as you." * Mizuki moves in once Christian's got them free to lay down some incredible phat heals, murmuring, "Heroes, rise, your strength is not truly gone." ( EDIT Set, not Seth. ) [The heroes get healed, and look better, but remain unconcious.] [In the meantime, Set finally seems to notice the lot of you again. "... fools. You're barely worth my notice, but if you wish to test yourself against the power of a god..." A few more of the glowing energy stars impact against his shield, and almost contemptuously he waves his staff, a huge gust of wind sending Captain Starlet crumpling into a lamppost.] * TheRedcoat reaches the plant and starts climbing the wall stealthily. * TheRedcoat reaches the second floor, and swings up to kick in a window and disappear into it in one fluid motion. * Christian steps quicker and quicker still, becoming a blur of motion as he chases down Set and aims a quick haymaker for him. He doesn't wait for it to hit or not before he's out of the way and past him, clear for the next volley of shots. [Set deftly sidesteps as Christian rushes by, looking unruffled. "Feel the heat of Set's wrath!" And suddently the temperature rises dramatically, going far past stifling. Mizuki, Redcoat and Jacky are staggered somewhat by the heat, but are mostly unfazed, but Christian begins to feel his energy sapping away.] * TheRedcoat steps away from the window, flips her coat, fanning herself with it a bit, and covers herself with the reverse side, becoming invisible before peeking out again. * Christian starts to sweat a little at the heat and tsks a little as he pulls off his jacket and lets it loose in the wind. He doesn't seem inclined to slow down though, despite the heat. Yet. Taking off the jacket reveals a small edge of a tattoo on peeking out underneath his shortsleeve shirt, but not enough to show it entirely. * Jacqueline would probably be a bit more bothered than she actually is if she weren't experiencing the extreme heat from within the cockpit of her GIANT ROBOT. * Mizuki floats her ground at the sandstorm, then looks at Set before she lowers her hands to the ground and intones lowly, "Rise up to shield your protectors, kami, in service for what they have done to you...." * Mizuki 's kami rises from the concrete, smoother than the last rubble-kami, its broad body standing in front of her and the other downed heroes. * TheRedcoat mutters into her card. "I'm in the plant. You won't be able to see me. Waiting for his field to go down. Can't hit him otherwise." * Jacqueline 's robot's 'face' glows brightly for several seconds, and then it fires a beam of coherent microwave radiation that arcs all the way down towards Seth in order to return the temperature raising favour. [The beam impacts on Set's shield, not appearing to do much damage but causing the shield to waver momentarily. "You seek to burn the Lord of the Sands? FOOL!"] * Mizuki fumbles for her card and says back into it to Redcoat, "When it's down... the crystal at the center of his head is where he is weak... his sacred stone." * TheRedcoat nods before remembering nobody can see her. "Thanks." * Christian tears down on Set before launching his arm at the back of his head in Set's blindspot. His arm hits some resistance and seems to get tattered up a bit, but it doesn't seem to stop Christian as he keeps slamming it through. He then follows through by passing towards the other side of Set. * Mizuki adds, "I ain't sure you could break it, but take it? Maybe." [Christian's blow makes it through Set's shield and knocks him aside a bit, but he keeps his footing.] * Christian holds up his arm cockily at Set in a bit of a flippant manner. "Fool's the one who takes his eye off the battlefield, pal." [Set turns his head slowly towards Christian. "Boy, I've the power of thousands of years of history behind me. I need not see the battlefield to know the outcome! And the outcome of this battle is that you lot shall be wiped clean from it!"] [And then the sand in the wind gets thicker, nearly choking, as the winds increase in speed, to the point where you're struggling to stay on your feet!] * Jacqueline is, for some reason, more concerned about the sand clogging the joints of her machine than the warehouse that's no longer there thanks to the whole robot having been lifted and dropped atop it. She's murmuring something softly to herself that's half clicks as she tries to make the thing clean itself up somewhat. * Christian gets smashed into the side of the plant building, dislodging some of the brickwork and then stands back up. Despite all the pain it looks like he should be in, he's grinning as he watches Set. * Mizuki and her Kami end up slamming into the dumpster, Mizuki crying out in pain. The Kami rights itself and leaps towards Set to slam a stony fist into him. [Set seems a bit surprised by the speed at which the Kami advances on him, and just barely gets out of the way as the Kami's fist slams into the ground, leaving a fair-sized crater.] * Mizuki rights herself and grips her staff in both hands, looking at him carefully, gauging Set and his winds for a strike. * Jacqueline blows a stray strand of hair out from before her face, and then she narrows her eyes on the moving targetting reticles on her HUD as she waits for a shot. * TheRedcoat narrows her eyes as she peers out at Set, running her fingers speculatively over her Glock. * Christian darts in after the kami fist slam. As the Kami goes low, he goes high, screeching his foot with a roundhouse kick at Set's face from the other end. [Set is either really lucky or really, really good, because as he slides out of the way of the Kami's fist, he twists his body around just enough so that Christian's kick goes whizzing by his head.] [He stumbles a moment, then regains himself. "Are you to be humanity's saviors, now that the American Dream has fallen? Do you think you can stand before the thunder of a god's fury?!" As he says that, he pounds his staff into the ground, and lightning bolts shoot out at everyone on the ground, while more bolts hit the plant!] * TheRedcoat is rocked by the impact of the bolts on the building, but manages to steer clear of falling debris as she jumps from her crumbling catwalk section to an adjacent, hopefully more stable one and pops a viewpoint out of her new window. * Jacqueline clenches her controls tightly for a few seconds as electricity courses through her body, and then once she's caught her breath she manages to reply, "As if you're the /first/ so-called god any of us have ever met." through her speakers. * Christian rolls to the side just before the bolt hits, crouching down low. He gives Set a steady look through his glasses. He seems to be standing pretty well to the fury, yes. "Savior? Fuckin' hell if I know. We're just the clean-up crew who sweeps up assholes like you." * Mizuki takes her hit in the air, gritting her teeth, then says, "Onward, city!" as she raises her staff into the air and white light suffuses the area. The Kami moves forward and smashes its fist towards Set again, but this time, with a crushing connect! [The kami rears back, and plows right through Set's shield, swatting him aside and sending him flying several yards to the ground.] [He gets up reasonably quickly, though it damn well looks like he felt that one.] * Jacqueline demonstrates another point for not allowing access to this particular piece of weaponry by spraying the area immediately around Seth with hundreds of bullets, perforating the ground around him and sending casings falling all around her like a brassy waterfall. [Set's shield stops many of the bullets, but more get through and nick at him. Plus the shield's not looking as fierce as it did at the beginning of the fight.] * TheRedcoat aims very carefully, sighting a line to a hopefully non-essential part of Jackie's mecha. She mutters "I'm sorry, Jackie," into the comm card, then shoves it into her pocket. She takes a deep breath, pauses, lets half of it out, and fires, trying to ricochet her bullet from Jackie's robot into Set's crystal! [The bullet bounces off the bottom of one of the turrets on Jacky's bot and slams into Set's forehead. His shield slows it enough so that it doesn't kill him, but it catches a bit of his gem, and suddenly his force field goes down!] * Jacqueline growls, "Oh, no, it's perfectly fine, it isn't as if this is a finely tuned monument to science or anything of the sort." * TheRedcoat lets out the rest of that breath, the release in tension turning her limbs to jelly, and clicks back. "I'll help you fix it, we'll make a weekend of it." Then sighhhs in relief. * Christian smirks as he sees the shield go down and slows his speed down. He seems to be panting fairly heavily. He's poised to strike and rushes right at Set after the surprise gem attack and the forcefield going down, wrapping his arm around his chest and carrying him with him as he goes, slamming him into the side of the plant with a resounding thud. [Set is stunned enough from getting shot right in his gem that he doesn't see that coming, and gets slammed hard into the wall. He gets up, a bit labored, and starts to float into the air...] [Winds start to swirl around him, even more fiercely than with his sandstorm attack, and both his gem and staff glow so brightly they're hard to look at. "This entire endeavor has been a waste. Horus is not here, and she is barely worthy of my attentions. But you have laid your hands on the avatar of Almighty Set, and must face his wrath!"] [And as he rises higher and higher into the air, the clouds above him get darker and darker, and funnel clouds begin to descend, touching down all around the dock and on top of the plant and tearing up everything in sight!] * Christian manages to dart out of the way for a second and holds down his bandanna as the winds rip over him. He also makes sure that the unconscious supes are still okay. * Mizuki gets pulled out and thrown about in the air, beaten with debris! She stabilizes as she falls, though, looking a bit torn up. The Kami, not being so lucky, hits the ground with an incredibly loud and dull thud. * TheRedcoat , still kind of shaky, barely manages to swing out of the window in time, but gets buried by the debris as the window decides to join her and collapses over her, half-burying her. She's still mostly invisible, but a steady stream of faint Russian curses is kind of blowing her cover. * Jacqueline winds up floating to what's left of the ground by way of parachute, more or less unhurt but sans robot. She is as glowery as might be expected for the latter, but at least she can always pick up the pieces and make more. [The fallen S-Team heroes appear to have been unhurt, remarkably, as if Set felt them not worth killing. As the whirlwinds fade, you see devastation all around you. The plant, and all the buildings around you, have been reduced to rubble; the only thing left standing is a sign in front reading "New York Treatment".] [Set, who had risen and disappered into the dark clouds above, is nowhere to be seen as they fade away, allowing the afternoon sun to poke through. The winds have now died down, though you're all covered in sand and little pieces of debris.] * Mizuki sighs wearily as she looks down on the devestation. She floats down slowly and says, "It is hard to stand against the storm." * TheRedcoat spits out brick dust and asbestos and starts pulling herself from the rubble, making sure to keep track of the invisible coat so as not to lose it. * Christian dusts himself off. He seems to sway a bit as he gets himself up and wipe the last of the grimy sweat off now. "Least we got to piss him off. And get him to piss off too." He looks at the heroes, then takes out his comm card, activating it. "Yo. What do you want us to do with these fallen supes?" [Sister Admin's voice comes over the comm. "Who's fallen? What happened? Everyone okay?"] ["It looks like a fucking bomb went off out there."] * TheRedcoat digs out her card and flips her coat to be visible again once she's out. "We're down one treatment plant. And the rest of S--the S-team are unconscious. Not sure how wounded." Set threw a temper tantrum and flew off somewhere. Dr. Hyde was not to blame for the property damage. * Jacqueline brushes herself off daintily, in spite of her shaking hands, and then she adds, "Of course I'm not to blame for the property damage," in annoyed tones. * TheRedcoat puts the comm card out of range for a moment as she hacks up some more dust, then pulls out a cigarette and lights it while responding to Jackie. "I just wanted to accentuate that. Your gear is useful and you should have more access to it if we're going to make any damn difference." ["I can tell. Not her damage pattern." A pause. "Bring them in. We'll treat who we can here, and send anyone who needs more to one of the clinics. Are all of you okay?"] * TheRedcoat looks around. "...we're gonna need a bigger bot." * Mizuki replies, "Well... well enough." * Christian responds. "I'm fine. Bit worn out. And need one fuckin' helluva shower. But okay. And it wasn't mine either. ...well, maybe because I slammed Set into the fuckin' wall he got a little pissed, but other than that..." ["Set doesn't need any prompting. He's been after Horus since the original started his career. From what we've heard, he turned down overtures from Master Magus; he doesn't give a crap, he just wants to kill a Horus."] * Christian nods slightly. "Right. I'll get who I can. No sense in more supes gettin' wasted out here." He turns it off and walks over to pick up the supers and work on taking them back to base. "Anyone else who can help me out over here?" * TheRedcoat staggers over and hefts up the female Christian-costumed one, not really having hands or bulk for another. [Session End]