[Sunday, October 26th. 2 PM] [The past few days have not been uneventful. Though there haven't been any major attacks, there've been a whole lot of minor ones, all across the city. Alone or together, you've all been pretty busy these past three days.] [Most of the attacks featured some combination of Axe Effect goons and Disco Ninjas, with the occasional minor villain or medium-sized death robot thrown in for variety. Nothing too serious or threatening, but enough to keep you all a bit on edge and stocked with fresh nicks and bruises.] [Today, you've been called for a quick briefing. Solaris and Sister Admin are in their usual places; Eternal Warrior is out on patrol.] [The attack on the mayoral candidates has predictably gotten a lot of press, and a fiery speech by Wild Bill in the aftermath has turned into something of a media coup for him. Polls have him close, but still behind the two major party candidates.] [Ugg has gotten some press too, but he's not talking to them, and neither Solaris nor Lt. Stone have commented to the press either, so it's mostly just speculation at this point.] [And that's the situation.] [Session Start] * TheRedcoat is there, leaning back in her chair. And rhyming, apparently. [She's combing her hair. On a dare. Eating a pear. Cuddling a bear. Without a care.] * Horus walks in, all glowy like she usually is. "Kinda early today, innit?" she asks as she claims her own seat. * Jacqueline is doing much the same, and early at that. [Solaris nods. "There's a reason for it. I'll explain once everyone's here."] * TheRedcoat ain't hangin' out with no Pickles the Imaginary Bear, yo, that's Christian's thing. * Christian heads in, rolling his shoulder slightly as his hand is placed on it and cracking his neck. He looks a little sore but not too bad. "Yo. Sorry I'm late." * Abby opens her door into the main room quickly, and then rubs her forehead with the end of her staff as she floats forward, a frown on her face. She doesn't say anything as she floats to her normal position and just stays there. [Solaris shrugs. "No problem. Reason you're here is that Sister Admin got word that there's some sort of press conference going on with Ugg in about fifteen minutes, and we wanted to brief you all on where we are with checking out his story before whatever goes down."] * Christian blinks and turns to Solaris. Wait, he's going public with this? * Horus blinks, trying to parse what Solaris said. She mostly fails. "What?" After ChakRam declared him dead on the spot? Is he fuckin' *insane*? * TheRedcoat wrinkles her nose at the mention of SA, then blinks. Clearly, he's stupid; there's proof. His name, for instance. * Christian rubs his nose. "Don't need to tell *me* he's a moronic douchebag." * Abby scrunches her eyes together and says, slowly, "Why would it matter that people who already knew he'd betrayed them would... suddenly know? I assume he has some sort of villain defense prepared." * TheRedcoat nods. [Sister Admin gets up from where she is and walks over the table, standing next to Solaris. "Won't know until the press conference. Until then..."] [SA rubs her temples, looking tired. "I went over my system a half-dozen times the past few days. Scales was always a bit of a paranoid sort, and the security on our servers is nothing short of insane. Our passwords use letters from a few dozen alien and extra-dimensional alphabets, along with three he invented himself."] ["There's no way anyone gets into our system to plant that information about Ugg."] * Christian folds his arms and settles into his chair. "So you're sayin' he's legit then." [SA shakes her head. "No. I'm saying the information in my system is legit."] * Abby reopens her eyes and says flatly, "She's saying she can't believe it." Kinda goin' around. * TheRedcoat rolls her eyes and slouches back in her chair. "So we have a new ally, what's the big problem?" I am /sure/ there's enough room for mercenarial sorts to be better on the inside than they may appear. * TheRedcoat snorts in agreement. [Solaris speaks up. "We might. Or he might've been turned. Or he might be controlled."] So? So could any of us. * Horus pauses, as though she's just realizing she's speaking up in Ugg's defense, but continues: "Ain't much we can do about it right now, right? If you're really worried, don't tell him more than you gotta." * Christian rubs his head. "Fuck. I lose count at triple and quadruple crosses, just to let ya know. It's like a fuckin' hexagon at that point." ["I've talked to him a few times over the past few days, along with Lt. Stone, who is... more skeptical than I am." A beat. "He *seems* genuine. That's just gut instinct."] All right.... So what is the information then? What's the problem? Look, I don't really care either way. If he's good, he's good. But if we got more on the other side and don't know about it, how the hell we gonna know? ["Might not be a problem, depending on what this press conference is. He didn't know much about Master Magus' operations, other than the fact that the portal we closed out at Shea Stadium with the black hole bomb was a big deal, and that he seemed genuinely happy that he... and I'm quoting here... 'has such interesting people opposing him.'"] * Abby chuckles faintly and replies, "Who's opposing him, them or us?" * Abby then squints her eyes and mutters, "Yes, I heard you," before speaking up and saying, "Has anyone managed to pick anything out about their damn teleporting trickery off of Ugg?" * AFKgryphon is now known as RDMgryphon [Solaris grins slightly. "My next point. I suggested that to Druish Princess earlier this afternoon. She gave me the usual complaining about how busy she is that I've been getting from her these past few weeks, but I'm gonna find a way to get her and Ugg together to see if there's something they can do."] * Jacqueline 's eyebrow arches as she idly says, "I am /sure/ that they could find something to do." * Christian sighs and leans back. "What's the security around this press conference anyway?" [SA speaks up. "Significant. SPLEE-NY is there in force."] So we leavin' it to them I guess? [Solaris nods at Jacky. "Druish Princess has been... more difficult than usual lately, I know. But she's all we've got at this point." Solaris turns to Christian. "For now, yes."] * Christian folds his arms behind him, relaxing in the chair. That's all he needed to know. [SA blinks, and walks back over to her monitors. "Press conference is starting. One sec..."] * TheRedcoat looks bored out of her gouuuuurd. * Christian looks half asleep. And may want a cig. * Horus seems mildly annoyed that she's sitting here, toying with her hair. * TheRedcoat obviously wants a cig as well as being bored. [The picture comes up on the monitor. There's Ugg, behind a podium, wearing a three piece suit. A fuzzy three piece suit.] * Abby decides to drag her chair out and sit down it it, for the conference. * TheRedcoat slouches down and starts tapping her fingers on her leg quietly. [And then, strolling into the picture with a cigar and a big grin, and walking behind the podium with Ugg, is our old friend Wild Bill.] * Horus mutters, "Fucker," upon seeing Wild Bill. She gives the lock around her finger another twirl. [Ugg steps aside, and Wild Bill takes the microphone. "Thank you for coming, ladies and gentlemen. I have an important announcement that affects all New Yorkers."] * TheRedcoat hits her head on the back of her chair in annoyance, rolls her eyes again, and pulls her hat down over her eyes. * Abby looks at the scren and groans slightly. "Because things went so very well the last time those two were together." ["You've all seen the footage of the attack on the mayoral debate from a few days ago. I am, of course, extremely relieved that my fellow candidates escaped unscathed, and am grateful to the NYPD for their efforts in protecting us against this supervillain menace that has gripped our great city."] * TheRedcoat makes a peh sound. "That's what they get for not listening to me..." [His grin fades as he takes a puff of his cigar. "What you may not have seen in the video was the failures of the supers who were supposed to provide security at the press conference."] * Horus sits up, and she looks at Solaris, disbelieving. * Christian sighs. "Y'mean because it didn't happen?" * TheRedcoat just shakes her head and goes back to slouching. * Jacqueline gestures dismissively as she leans back and crosses her legs. "Carefully edited footage, pushing an agenda, fat white power structures, et cetera, et cetera." ["Not only did they fail to detect the would-be asssassins hiding in our midst, endangering myself, my fellow candidates, and the gathered crowd, along with the dedicated members of the police force..."] * TheRedcoat just puts in the earbuds for her fancy .mp3 player...on low, but still. Which one of us rescued that asshole again? And remind me why. ["But one of their people... the woman known as Redcoat... met me up on the roof as I was attempting to contact my personal helicopter to help evacuate the wounded and admitted to me that she spent the entire fight cowering in a tree!"] * Abby 's hand tightens around her staff as he starts off, then she glances to Redcoat, before looking back to SA. "So, I'm new to this city, but is this Wild Bill guy as much of a jackass normally as he's being right now?" I'm trying to remember if there even was a tree. [Solaris... does not look thrilled. "I've met him once or twice. And yes."] * Abby shakes her head and looks up at the ceiling. "I'm just askin' because I'm a litle more worried about someone controlling him than Ugg." Any witnesses to that convo? * TheRedcoat yawns. "Yeah, there was a tree." * Christian snorts. "Controlling." He's controlled by wantin' more money in his pocket. * TheRedcoat snickers. ["The other four fought bravely, as anyone who was here could attest. But they were obviously outclassed, and would have been overwhelmed if not for the timely intervention..." He gestures to Ugg. "... of this man. Who for two years has risked his life undercover to gather information on the fiends that are attacking our city!"] * Christian sighs and leans back more. "Y'know what..." I bet no one's gonna attack now. Not unless it's to throw a fight to Ugg. Why would he want to do that? Fuckin' Wild Bill's doin' Magus's job for 'im. * Abby starts to open her mouth, then stops, glances to Horus, and smiles slightly. Perhaps that's the /idea/? * Christian sighs. 'Well *yeah.*" * Horus folds her arms, watching Wild Bill. She's obviously displeased. [Wild Bill puts an arm around Ugg's... well, bicep. "I owe my life to Ugg the Barbarian. And that's why, if I'm elected mayor, I will appoint Mister Ugg to lead the effort to form a new team that will finally put an end to this assault on the people of New York!"] * Christian snaps out of his disinterest and suddenly leans forward in his chair. "WHAT?" * TheRedcoat just yawns again. Yeah, so that answers your fuckin' question. Clearly a bad guy. Can we move on? [Wild Bill steps away from the podium to let Ugg step up. "Ladies and gentlemen, with your votes, I give to you the next Deputy Mayor of New York City for Superhuman Enforcement... UGG THE BARBARIAN!"] God fuckin'... No, actually, I would imagine he's just /fine/. He isn't terribly bright, though. It's almost as if someone brighter than he is is controlling him. It's novel, I know. * Christian clenches and unclenches his fist and starts to swing his arm at the table, air whistling around his arm before...winking out and resinking in his chair, ending up with a rather lame slap against the surface. [As Ugg steps to the microphone, and pulls a few sheets of paper from a furry pocket, a couple of screens on SA's monitor bank start flashing. "We've got trouble," she announces, typing furiously. "Something going on in Washington Heights..."] * Horus jumps to her feet. "Sup?" * Christian lets out a sigh. "Good. I could use some heads to bust. What's the deal?" ["One second, tapping into security camera feeds and police band... sounds like animals coming out of the sewers and attacking people. *Large* animals."] [Solaris curses. "Sewer King."] * Christian grumbles. "Convenient." He looks to the others. "Diversion?" We'll find out. Tape the rest of that conference for me, will ya? * Horus moves for one of the teleporters. [Solaris gets up and walks over to the monitors. "Diversion, compounding annoyance, it's something." She nods at Horus. "Will do."] * Abby floats to her feet and says, "Hope you enjoy politics." * Christian heads out as well, muttering along the way as he nears Redcoat. "Nice of them to hold a nice posh conference while the rest of us do *real* work." * Abby then floats doorward. * TheRedcoat sits up. "Why don't we just call someone at the conference and have them demonstrate the efficacy of Wild Bill's shiny new team?" * Jacqueline breezily says, "Because then, we wouldn't be the ones earning the headline tomorrow," as she makes for the teleporters. [You all go into through the teleporters! And end up on 175th Street, in the middle of Washington Heights. As you climb out of the subway station, screaming people stream past you seeking refuge.] [On street level, you quickly see the cause of the panic. What is normally a relatively peaceful shopping area has been overrun with vermin of various sorts, snakes and rats and bugs of all sorts, streaming out of the sewers. More troublesome, and more threatening to the numerous civilians on the street, are packs of rats the size of rottweilers, three dive-bombing pigeons the size of condors, and two crocodiles the size of cars.] [And actually, Redcoat didn't come with you guys.] * Horus takes it in. "Oh, bull fucking shit," she says, before flaring up and taking to the skies. * Abby is flying off the ground already, but a little lower. She says, to Horus, as she takes off, "Find the actual guy doing it!" * Jacqueline frowns once she realizes they're down one, and then just mutters, "Well, we certainly won't /share/ when we've brought these carcasses back for barbecuing." * Christian sighs. "Well *this* is a mess..." He calls out Abby-ward. "I'll keep 'em off the civs as much as I can, but we're gonna need to take 'em down fast." * Christian then glances around and hisses out. "Fuck. Too many jokers around to really cut loose. Ah well." He takes off with a sudden burst of speed and spin kicks his foot at the closest croc's jaw, screaming through the air. [The croc, which was about to bite a little old lady in half, is slammed aside by Christian, sending it skidding into the side of a building. It's still moving, though, and snarls at Christian.] * Christian gestures at the croc rudely. "Yeah yeah, big tough guy, I know.." He calls out louder so the civvies know what's going on. "I'll hold 'em off." [A few nearby civilians manage to run into the building behind Christian, now that the croc's been knocked out of the way.] [Meanwhile, Redcoat appears from the subway station, emerging alongside Jacky and Abby! As she does, though, the three giant pigeons circle ominously overhead... oh god, what's that falling from the sky?!] * TheRedcoat , having just emerged, barely has time to take stock of the situation before oh hell no what. * Jacqueline would have been in reasonably okay spirits at the splatters on her shield, given that she /has/ a shield, but seconds later her mood shifts entirely as the smell begins to hit her; there's quite a lot of scowling to be done. * TheRedcoat swirls her coat around her face, but doesn't manage to block the splats. Her mask provides *some* relief from the stench, but....not that much. * Abby , the picture of serenity, floats through the crap as it sloughs off of her shield. * Horus looks around for this Sewer King. "Fuck, fuck... wait..." She flies higher and spreads her wings, becoming a second sun in the sky, bolstering her allies' confidence and giving the civilians an extra boost of speed. "Mizuki, I'm gonna need you to find him!" she calls. "You can see spirits, and that's what he is. We gotta break the connection!" * Abby looks up as the last of the pigeon crap falls to the ground, to yell/ask, "Yeah? What're we gonna need to do this time?" [A few civilians, bathed in the light, grab some debris and manage to drive back one of the rat packs that had pounced on a young woman. As two of them hold off the rats with long sticks, two others drag her to safety.] Remember the thing with the headmaster? * Abby nods slightly. "Yeah, but this ain't air!" Nope. It's light! You gotta find him, touch him, and I'll channel through you to blow him to fuckin' pieces. Or at least enough that he'll go the fuck away. [As Horus and Abby work out how they're gonna do what they're gonna do, the packs of rats attack! One group each go for Jacky, Redcoat and Christian, while the group that was fighting with the civvies turns and goes for another civilian near Christian!] [Meanwhile, the rat packs pounce at Christian, Jacky and Redcoat, while the fourth group, having been driven off by civilians, goes after a fallen young woman near Christian!] * Christian gets piled on by the rat-weilers, but breaks free, tearing one from biting his clothes to chuck him back away. "The *hell* off." He jets towards the civvie and hauls her up just before the rats pile on where he was before, carrying them towards the building he's guarding and to relative safety. nnnngaaaah. * Jacqueline is, for a little while, covered with angry rats. And then she isn't anymore, on account of a colorful display of lights and concussive force, courtesy of her gun. * TheRedcoat dodges her rat pack, hoping to fling some of the pigeon poo off her coat and onto them. [As Christian moves the woman to safety, the croc he hit charges behind him and tries to bite him! And the other croc moves in and swipes his tail at Redcoat and Jacky!] * Abby flies up to Horus and wraps her single arm around her stomach, staff held sideways. She says quietly in her ear, "Alright, give me a moment... spirits, animals and life, be my eyes, help us... find this traitor to the city, abuser of your denizens..." * TheRedcoat is kerswiped as she comes back from the rat dodge. "Chyort voz'mi!" * Jacqueline is free of rats just in time to be staggered by a leathery tail, which isn't really trading up. * Abby 's voice gets lower as her tone switches more into intoning. * Christian shifts to the side as the wild teeth go at him and then slugs the croc in the jaw, possibly sending a few bunches of teeth flying in the process. He ain't budgin' much from his defensive posture unless there's more civvies to save. These civvies are staying put. [The croc is spun around in circles by the force of the punch, and when it stops spining, it stops moving.] * TheRedcoat snarls and pulls out her grappler gun, aiming it at the nearest rat pack. * TheRedcoat also shoots instead of just aiming. [All four rats in that group get pierced or smashed by the grapples, putting them down.] [The three pigeons circle around Jacky and Abby, but are warded off by the heat of Horus' shield, and dive down to attack the three heroes on the ground!] * Abby makes a slight retching noise, but manages to say to Horus, "Disgusting, but I've... got him..." * Christian bats off the diving beak with his forearm, side-ducking out of the way to avoid any errant pigeon. * TheRedcoat fends off the pigeon with her sash. "Ohhhh no." * Jacqueline 's shield keeps her safe, rather like a really clean window. * Horus places a hand on Abby's shoulder and tells her, "Just hang onto 'im." She closes her eyes, and her own light begins to eclipse the priestess'. Soon, Abby's glow starts to match hers, flaring out with light, brighter and brighter until it's pulled entirely inward, two women sheathed far too brightly to look at. * Horus holds the light for a moment, then it shoots for the invisible, intangible the Sewer King - stopping when it pierces him (it?) dead center. [The light from Horus pours down in columns through the open manhole covers, filling the sewers beneath and shooting out from the storm drains along the sidewalk. All of you 'hear' a horrible scream in your heads, and then a feeling of malevolent anger that slowly fades away.] [As the light too fades, the previously enlarged animals have returned to their normal size. They, along with the rest of the vermin, quickly retreat down into the sewers.] * Christian sighs as he cools down and rubs his knuckles a bit. He didn't injure anything but punching a gator isn't fun. He calls out, "Anyone hurt?" * Horus lets out a long breath, and the light fades to a normal flare. She opens her eyes, looking around. [The civilians have mostly suffered bruises and cuts, though a few are rather seriously injured and all of them are going to be in desperate need of a whole lotta antibiotics.] * Abby lets out a slow breath in Horus' ear, then chuckles and says, "Huh. We do pretty well, don't we?" She unwinds her arm from around Horus. Pretty fuckin' awesome, if I do say so myself. * Horus grins. "An' I do. Think you got some people ta heal." She points out the more injured ones. * Christian *doesn't* say yeah yeah, get to kissing already. Although he might be thinking it. Maybe. * TheRedcoat takes out a wipe from her coat and wipes/shakes off the worst of the pigeon grime from her hat and coat. * Abby smiles slightly and says, "Yeah, I better." She floats down to do healing support on the wounded. * Horus flies down herself to help as much as she can. * TheRedcoat then tosses the wipe in a handy trash unit and lights up a smoke. * Christian sighs and dusts himself off slightly from the rat pile. "I'll call up some clean up in a moment." He then takes out his comm card thingie and patches Headquarters. "How's the press conference goin'?" [As Abby and Horus land, all but Abby hear a female voice scream something loudly in Spanish. They are thus not as surprised as they would otherwise be when a curvy, 7-foot tall woman in a purple one-piece bathing suit with a picture of a ram on it, purple wrestling boots, and a decorative purple mask, with a long black ponytail sticking out, jumps from a nearby roof and lands in their midst, cratering the street.] [The woman stands up, hands on hips. "Against vermin, you are mighty. But how will you fare against... LA GIGANTE?!"] * TheRedcoat just gives the woman a Look as she backs up against a handy wall. "...*Seriously*?" * Christian is still holding his comm card, but *staring* now. He half-forgets he's speaking into it. "...okay. What the fuck." * Abby blinks at at the new woman, then smirks faintly and says, "Alright, I'm game." * Horus eyes the lady as well, then sighs. She's already too fucking old for this. * Jacqueline tilts her head slowly as La Gigante emerges, but she doesn't say anything more than, "If you surrendered, and took me to dinner, this would all be over much quicker." [Session End]