The Prisoner (Open)

by **Nova** October 21st 2015, 6:36 am

Lower Manhattan, 12:42pm
On a Friday

'What do you think of the food?'

'Too much olive oil, but otherwise well made. I see why so many enjoy it,' Nova says, quirking a brow at her spoonful of chowder. She dumps it back into the bowl in steaming chunks. 'I'm not sure I like it, though.'

'Not a fan of the chowder?'

'Not a fan of food.'

Today's one of those unseasonably warm autumn days that warrants shorts and sandals, as though summer wasn't a memory and the first snowfalls of the season weren't but a few weeks away at most. The breeze from the Hudson river funnels through the shipyards' concrete corridor, channeling the bleating of boat traffic and the stank of fish guttiwats from the nearby docks. Manhattan at noon, and it's business as usual, as though she hadn't borne witness to one of the most heinous acts of devastation in the last few centuries. Nope, she'd taken her licks and had gotten right back to work in almost record time, like a hooker with a black eye, or a stripper with a gunshot wound. If you don't look too hard, you could almost miss her scars. The dense architectural skeleton of the once famous skyline fairly rattles with construction, the sound of her determination to be stronger, better, shinier.

The cafe where the machine and her creator lunch is a bustling hole in the wall, a mom-and-pop operation with sparse outdoor seating. Sven's Clambake, the establishment's faded, blackened sign reads, along with some much ballyhooed declarations of winning numerous awards for its seafood. Not a single table is unoccupied, lending some validity to its claim of having the best steamed clams in thirty blocks. Around them flows a mass of people, a vast sea of mostly brown, ebbing in wane as the city's lunch hour begins to wind down.

Dr Caen sits across from Nova, paper-thin tablet in one hand, a mug of coffee in the other. Business casual is his trim for the day, open collar with rolled up sleeves. He's already finished his meal and is reading the news. He briefly turns his weathered countenance towards her, peering over the rims of his reading glasses. 'Explain,' he prompts.

'I see why you enjoy it. The sight and aroma of edible material triggers a biological imperative in your brain. That imperative tells you that the food is delicious, and that it will provide nourishment. There's also the social element of dining with others, a custom older than cooking itself.' Nova eyes the chowder with two different hues of distaste. 'But when I look at it, I receive no such imperative. I don't require it for nutrition. All I see are its ingredients, and the chemical components of those ingredients. Broken down that way, there's little to find appetizing.' She pushes the bowl away.

'I see,' Dr Caen says, not bothering to look up at her this time. 'Although I think you hit the nail on the head as to why you must eat. The social aspect. Sharing a meal makes others feel more comfortable around you.'

'I'm made of titanium. That foregoes any expectation for me to "share a meal",' says Nova.

Dr Caen swipes to his next article. 'Not everyone knows you're made of titanium,' he absently points out, 'and I expect you to surprise those that do.' His tone carries a note of finality, like a father patiently explaining to his daughter why she has to get a tetanus shot.

Nova lets the subject drop. Today, she was conservatively dressed. A business blazer and pants suit, strictly incognito. They'd just arrived in the city, their flight having touched down a couple hours ago. The TSA agents at the metal detectors had been surprised, alright. She turns her attention towards the street, with its myriad of sights and sounds. She turns her attention to the city's networks and signals, with its myriad streams of information. She breathes them in all at once, immersing herself in data, tasting the city's dynamics, its moods, its restlessness. She relates.

'Our meeting with the police commissioner is in a couple hours,' Dr Caen is saying. 'Obviously, I don't need to tell you how huge this is for us. This city may have mostly recovered from the physical damage, but suspicion of metahumanity will linger for some time, I suspect. That makes this the perfect environment for your capabilities.' He sips his coffee. 'Unfortunately, the NYPD's budget isn't what it used to be. We'll need to convince him that the cost of your operating in the city is worth the benefits. Given the city's sizable metahuman population, that shouldn't be a problem, but...'

Nova says nothing. The Doctor's brow creases as turns to her. 'Are you listening?' he asks.

'Yes,' says Nova, seemingly studying the flashing WALK sign across the intersection. 'Meeting with police commissioner. Fulfilling my purpose. Public opinion is on our side. There's a shootout.'

Dr Caen blinks at this last bit. 'I never mentioned a—'

'No, there's a shootout,' Nova insists. 'Down the alleyway between Finger and Crescent. A prisoner transport, bound for Sing-Sing.' She pauses, biting her lip. 'I've accessed the transport manifest. Only one prisoner, an inmate named Dmitry Volkov. Serving 40 years for human trafficking. Ties to the Russian mob.' Another pause.

Dr Caen sets down his tablet. His features have rearranged themselves into an unreadable mask. 'Are you accessing a secured law enforcement network?'

'I wasn't a second ago, but I am now. And listening to their radios.' Nova pushes her chair back, rising to her feet and training towards the east like a Catahoula leopard dog scenting an injured deer. She speaks quickly. 'It's the Russians. They're trying to break Volkov loose. They've got the alleyway blocked off on both ends. The transport bus and the escort are in a kill zone. Officers are outnumbered.' Her eyes widen. 'Nearest police response is 4 minutes away due to the jurisdiction being understaffed. I can make it there in—'

'Sit down,' says Dr Caen.

Without missing a beat, Nova's chair regains occupancy, in a movement so fluid, so economical, so improbable that she may as well have never left it. Her only signs of protest are the flex of tension that snakes through her taut artificial musculature, visible even beneath her pantsuit. And one simple line of protest: 'They have assault rifles, Dad.'

If he hears her, he gives no sign. He affixes her with a stare she's only seen him use in the boardroom and on insubordinates. His eyes are silver dollars. 'You just committed a felony,' he says in clipped syllables. 'We're here to meet with the police commissioner and you just committed a felony. Hacking a government network is—' he cuts himself off, shaking his head. 'Why am I telling you this? You already know. Which means you know better.'

'I left no trace,' Nova ventures, because she didn't, but she may as well be debating ethics with a tiger kitten.

'I might have to have to decommission you,' says the Doctor, more to himself than to her as he leans back in his chair with a grimace. She can see him doing the equations in his head, registers the utter disappointment in his voice, and it stings her in an unfamiliar way, around where her heart would be, if she possessed one. 'Give me one reason why I shouldn't.'

The gunmen are closing in. The officers are in mortal danger. She doesn't tell him that. It wouldn't matter, appealing to his sense of decency; he has none, at least not where a few dead bodies were concerned. Alexandre Caen built her from the sweat of his brow over the span nearly twenty years. He could probably recite from memory each section of code powering every subroutine in her CPU. However, he'd programmed her to learn, continuously, and over the course of a year of operation, she'd learned quite a few things about her Creator. More than even he suspected, she'd warrant. One thing she knows for certain about Dr. Alexandre Caen: he values his company's bottom line more than anything else. And just like that, in the span of less than a nanosecond, the dots are connected. She knows not only how to prevent herself from being reprogrammed, but also how to maneuver him into allowing her to stay in New York, police commissioner's permission be damned.

'I accessed the network because I need to save those officers,' she says, slowing her diction to an fraction of what she wants it to be, 'If I am able to save them, and protect the prison transport, then it will earn us the commissioner's favor. He will then be more inclined to dip into his budget, even though it is not what it used to be, and offer Caen corporation a security contract. He needn't know that I accessed his security system. I will also alter my programming so that such a breach will be impossible for me to attempt going forward.'

That's how Nova discovers manipulation, and though she has an elementary knowledge of what it is, she isn't aware that it's what she's doing. And if she did, she never would have thought to use it on her Creator.

Dr. Caen steeples his fingers, again running the numbers through his head. She waits. He's not as fast at it as she is. She will reflect, later on, that this is an advantage she has over him.

'Do it,' he says, waving her off. 'I'll get a camera on the scene.'

The moment his words hit the breeze, Nova explodes into action like her special effects budget is limitless and becomes a boneless whirl of gymnastics, whipping out of her chair and up the side of the nearest building, propelled by the genius engineering of the man she leaves behind, taking the most direct route to the shootout. As she runs, she plans, and as she plans, she runs. She knows how to do it. She knows how to free herself of the Maker's influence. She files her plan in a .dat file and encrypts it, stores it away in a part of her memory that he'll never be able to access, and it doesn't occur to her that she'd never, ever wanted to do such a thing before.

This is, after all, New York City. A girl made of titanium would be no more an oddity here than a child made of starlight or a woman with snakes for hair.

by **Lotsofluck** October 21st 2015, 9:16 pm

This is, after all, New York City. Alex couldn't even see the scars left on the city after the attack all those years ago. He remembered watching it on the news, not really understanding what was going on. But even a child knew it was something bad. And now, all these years later the city was alive again. Bouncing back better then ever. From his spot on the sky rise, Alex turned his gaze towards the horizon. It was going to be a beautiful sunset.

Watcher: "Aegis, focus now."

Alex: "Right right."

He snapped back into focus as the AI chimed in his ear. Watcher let him have his moments, but only when time permitted. He was needed now.

Watcher: "Dmitry Volkov is being soon. From what we learned in Carson Blaze's files, it looks like the russian mob might try to free him. They already paid off the right people."

Carson Blaze, a metahuman with an unoriginal name. He was a pryokinetic in Chicago that was trying to reorganize a local mob force. Watcher hacked into his files to collect some new leads. Now Carson wasn't in on this job, he just kept a tab on it. Good enough for Alex. He flew over from Chicago a few hours ago. They knew it was going to happen, just not when or where exactly.

Watcher: "Just called in over the police radios, it seems they are under attack. Finger and Crescent. Go."

Alex: "Errr... don't know New York at all, which way is that?"

Watcher: "Head striaght till the big skyscrapper over there then cut down that street near the bridge. You should be able to hear the gunfire by then."

Alex pushed off of the building, falling into the air before rocketing forward. A sonic boom sounded as he blew threw the sound barrier, making his way to the scene. Watcher was right, he could soon hear the gunfire. From the sky it looked like a bus and a single squad car were being fired apon by three Black Suvs. Men were using the doorways as covered as they used automatic rifles to rain lead down on the police officers. It looked like one was down already, his partner taking cover behind the squad car. Alex couldn't see what was going on inside the bus.

Like a clap of thunder, Alex came down on the front of one of the suvs. The force flipped it upside down where Alex caught it with one hand. He held it aloft like it weighed nothing.

Alex: "Soooooooooo..... how are we going to do this now. Do you guys all give up?"

by **The Grey** October 22nd 2015, 7:24 pm

"You should have given up," Jardin said passed a chuckle. Within a cheap dive bar, the young thief had just hustled a self proclaimed billiards expert out of 100 dollars. Swiping the stack of twenties, Jardin taunted the drunk man one last time: "I do so thank you for the business, though. Perhaps we can play again; see if you can't win your money back."

Jardin agily wove his way between the bar's other patrons, easily putting distance between himself and his irritable victim. He slipped on a pair of mirrored shades just as he passed into the midday sun.

Jardin coud not have looked more generic had he tried. He was a common gray clad punk, living in a gray clad city (for now). He passed 3 other people wearing similar gray hoodies to his own on his way north...

*pop* *pop* *pop*

Jardin paused. Gunshots were not particularly uncommon on the streets of any American city, though gunplay was relatively rare in New York. So why did Jardin feel compelled to hed towards the gunshots. You are not a hero, Cory. Don't try to play one.

*pop* *pop*

Dammit...Jardin quickly made his way to Crescent and Finger...

Using a fire escape, free of rust thanks to its freshness, Jardin climbed to a roof overlooking the firefight. He could make out the sounds of several types of weapons and cartridges: .45 ACP, 9x19mm Parabellum, 5.56mm NATO, 7.62x36mm...that would have to be AK-47s...

Jardin perched at the edge of the low standing, surveyed the battle raging below. A couple of US Marshals and a token escort exchanged fire with rifle armed thugs. The traceur counted one man in dark blue uniform down,

Jardin stepped away, having a full conversation with himself. "No, Cory. You're not a hero. You're just a thief...But If you don't help, those men might die...That's not your problem...Except you will feel like shit tomorrow if you don't help...You'll feel like shit if you get shot, too..."

Just then, something seemed to explode below him. Rushing back, he found a man in a swanky costume lifting one of the SUVs, taunting the thugs...Okay, the man had style...

Jardin pulled up the black buff he used as a mask, slipped off his shades, and dropped to the window sill below him. And the next...until he was back to street level. No one noticed, focused as the were on the much flashier of the two metas.

He quickly checked the downed cop before slipping behind his car. "What the-" his partner reacted, turning his AR-15 on the newcomer. Jardin shushed the man. "I'm on your side," he wispered, checking the dead man's own sidearm. Poor bastard never even got of a shot...

by **Nova** October 22nd 2015, 9:07 pm

Dmitry Volkov, six stout feet of magnificent bastard, shifts uncomfortably in the raggedy little bus, clinking in the chains binding his wrists and ankles. He has the appearance of a half melted candle, sallow jowls and ruddy neck seeming to somehow migrate away from his glabrous pate. His deep-set, heavy lidded eyes impress casual indifference, proffering the demeanor of a man accustomed to treading through dogshit rather than being sent to likely spend his remaining years in prison. It was the same expression he'd worn during the trial, which along with his crimes had horrified the jury and led the judge to throw the book at him during sentencing. As though this was his first rodeo. During his last stint in Sing-Sing, another inmate had made the mistake of nicknaming him Uncle Fester, a comparison Dmitry did not find humorous in the slightest. He'd shanked that inmate in the liver some ninety-odd times with a sharpened toothbrush, wearing very much the same face all the while.

Besides, he's not going to prison, not this go-round. It's been arranged. He's been a good earner—exceptional, even—and when you earn enough for the family, and keep enough secrets, they've a way of having your back. By this time tomorrow, he'd be on a boat back to Arkhangelsk, and by this time next week, he'd be sitting at a table with old man Pietrov, knocking back vodka shots and plotting the demise of every single snitch that had brought their stateside operation tumbling down with him on top. Probably the judge and the jury that had found him guilty, and their families too, just for good measure. And within a year or two, who knew? Maybe he'd have a hand in setting up the family business elsewhere. It's not like there was ever a shortage of girls. New models were being made every year, and they were easy to grab off the streets. Especially the young ones. He loves the young ones.

So when the short bus and its stupid little escort make their merry way down the blind alleyway, and he hears the diesel-powered SUV's screech to a halt in front and behind, Dmitry stays cool. When his ski-masked, body-armored brothers pile out into the concrete and start unloading their AK's on the stupid cops, he stays quiet. When he sees one of the cops in the squad car up front eat a bullet like it's his last meal and go sprawling on the pavement, Dmitry stays seated. And when the soon-to-be-deceased driver roars at him to stay seated and goes for his stupid shotgun like he's got a prayer of surviving the next minute or two, Dmitry mildly raises his manacled hands in surrender. His smile is thin-lipped and smug. He's in chains and he'll be seeing his family soon. Magic 8 ball says Not Bloody Likely for this stupid prison guard.

Then all of a sudden a bolt of blue and/or black drops from the sky like the goddamn Chelyabinsk meteor and onto one of the black Suburbans in an explosion of glass and steel, flipping it skyward, end over end. Dmitry's smile vanishes as he registers a figure—a man, no, not even, a boy—standing where the car used to be. And when this boy catches the falling Suburban like a toddler hoisting a Tonka truck, he can feel his cool congealing somewhere in the back of his throat.

Metahuman. Has to be. Dmitry curses roundly under his breath, in that seething sting one can only manage with a Russian accent.

His brothers share his shock, and for a moment, the firefight is halted as all eyes are on the new arrival. The guard at the front of the bus is stunned too, shotgun trembling in his hands, and though he's not chained like Dmitry is, for that moment he too can only watch events unfold.

The boy says something that Dmitry cannot hear to his comrades, and from there, things happen quickly indeed.

The Russians turn as a unit and unload their rifles at the kid, and the air is filled with searing 7.62mm and the heady tang of cordite. Dmitry makes his move, leaving all pretense of chumminess behind. With a grunt, he barrels out of his seat and down the aisle towards the guardsman, catching him unawares. The chains binding his feet are hobbling, but Dmitry still manages enough force to slam the guard facefirst into the windshield hard enough to crack the glass from roof to dashboard. A struggle ensues as they wrest for the shotgun, and although he is chained, Dmitry is the bigger man, and the guard is fighting through a veil of blood dripping from the forehead. Dmitry latches his chained wrists round the guard's throat, hoisting him off his feet with considerable ease. The shotgun clatters to the floor, and the two go down in a tangle of limbs, scrabbling madly for the fallen weapon.

At the same time, the bus's emergency exit is yanked open as four Russians from the rear SUV move in from behind. One clambers inside, rushing to assist Dmitry. No sooner does he make it up onto the deck that he suddenly stiffens and jerks, performing a spastic interpretation of the funky chicken. The convulsions last but a moment or two until finally, almost tenderly, he collapses to the aisle in a twitching heap.

Dmitry looks up from his back, beneath the guardsman he is strangling, and from his inverted point of view spots some dark-haired floozy in a business suit, standing at the opposite end of the alley. A cord whips from his fallen comrade and back towards her arm where it snakes from, stopping just long enough to pull her up and out of sight when his remaining brothers fill the space she vacates with enough lead to drop a pachyderm.

Two metahumans, Dmitry realizes, and wonders what he ever did in his life to deserve this kind of luck. Gritting his teeth, he slacks on the chain just a wee bit, figuring he'd stop trying to crush the bones in this guard's neck and settle for rendering him unconscious instead.

He's going to need a hostage.

by **Lotsofluck** October 22nd 2015, 10:03 pm

The bullets bouncing off Alex felt like nothing more then someone tapping their fingers against his skin. Did they really think that small arm fire like that was going to work? He looked up into the car, making sure no one was in it before chucking it further down the line where no one else as. He kept a door though.

Alex: "You realllllly should have given up"

The man closest to him had his rifle up, shoulder pressed into it has he let loose round after round at Alex. With his free hand, Alex reached forward grabbing the gun and gave it a quick yank forward. The man came with the gun, his head smashing right against Alex's. The man's eye rolled back into his head, going unconscious on the spot. Alex caught him though as he fainted and directly proceeded to throw the man's unconscious body into one of his compatriots. Alex advanced forward on to the others. He threw his door like a Frisbee into one man, knocking him out.

Alex: "Do you guys know how hard it is for me not to break something important on you guys? Like really, it takes some actual effort to hold back."

Three down, eight to go. Alex walked forward and kicked the next Suv like he was punting a football. It sailed over the side of the bridge, leaving the four men exposed. A bullet ricocheted off of Alex's skin and into one of the four russians, bringing him down.

Alex: "See? Should have surrendered."

Too late for that now. Alex hovered a few inches off the ground then flew forward at high speeds. He picked up one man, headbutted him then threw him at another guy. A go to favorite of Alex. He walked forward to the last guy at this car. The man threw down his gun and advanced, brass knuckles on each hand. Seemed he wanted to go down swinging. Respectable. He threw a cross at Alex's chin. Alex ducked under the blow and answered with and uppercut of his own. The man went down like a sack of potatoes. Alex turned back to the other car.

Alex: "Weren't there more of these guys?"

Said to no one in particular. He paused, looking around for the other four.

by **The Grey** October 23rd 2015, 8:31 pm

Well, looks like I'm not needed up here, Jardin thought. Placing his pilfered Barretta into his pocket, he pulled a bundle of black plastic zipties. "Don't ask why I carry these; just use them once the fighting is over." He handed the bundle over.

Cautiously, the young Meta scanned around. This other Meta was dealing with seven of the assailants...3 SUVs, 4 per SUV...should have been closer to 12 men...unless they wanted one of the passengers alive...

Then it hit him: the third SUV had been behind the bus. Turning, Jardin saw a man in a DOC uniform go down...right, they handled prisoner transfers.

Moving toward the bus, the traceur ducked as the large vehicle shifted...someone had climbed aboard, likely via the emergancy hatch judging by the buzzing. He hated that buzzing...

Jardin peers up the stairs that lead up from the entry door. Two men wrestle on the floor, one being the DOC officer from before, the other a large man in orange. Except "Jumpsuit" sees something that...troubles(?) him.

Pressing his ear to the side of the vehicle, Jardin listens, trying to understand what is happening before he decides to jump into the shallow end head first...

by **Nova** October 24th 2015, 4:37 am

The Smart Claw bites into the uneven brick bulwark lining the alleyway and retracts, wrenching Nova skyward. She disengages it, allowing her momentum to carry her into the wall, where she kicks herself high over the killzone the Russians have created. From this soaring vantage point, she takes in the entirety of the battlefield.

The officers' radios had gone silent moments before her arrival, and there was no telling what kind of scene she'd be leaping into, but this? A man wading through the mobsters with naught but his bare hands, his skin rejecting bullets like a volley of bad ideas? He torques his arm back, and she notes how he hurls the car door into one of the armed goons effortlessly, how it takes the thug off his feet with a crunch that turns bone to shrapnel. From this she draws two conclusions: he's not human, and he lacks finesse. But he's not on the side of the Russians, and that makes them allies, for now.

Speaking of now, she's being shot at, a lethal speedball of lead and tracer that's one step behind her, now two, now three. She's picking up speed, and the Claw whips from her wrist, a dancing, sparking livewire.

The thugs below her stack up behind the bus, seeking to avenge their partner she dropped moments prior. They came prepared to deal with cops, likely expecting this entire episode to last less than a couple minutes. They couldn't have prepared for her, or His Highness Headbutt. They're desperate, and it's making them sloppy. Not that they have a snowball's chance in hell of ever hitting her to begin with with such clumsy weapons. She's built for pure reaction, calculating the angles and trajectories required for the highest chance of success. She doesn't need to think any more than a toaster mulls over browning bread, or a mechanical arm considers how it should weld steel. The street soldiers below her are handicapped in that regard--they must track her with their eyes, aim with their hands, fight against the recoil blatting into their shoulders. Their brains aren't made for this. Nor are their muscles, as their friend found out when he climbed into the bus.

Nova can channel some 30 amps down the myomeric line--all fine and dandy, if she wanted to cook these guys. She settles for .01 milliamp, just enough to backhand the central nervous system and loosen the ole bowels. As her aerial arc peaks, the claw traces an efficient trajectory that comes just shy of completing an infinity symbol, and the remainder of the Russians fall to the ground, their limbs clenching and unclenching in palsied fits. The rifles clatter from their hands, silent and impotent. They'll not be getting up for a bit.

The bus is her next priority; Dmitry must be secured, then she intends to parley with the Vehicular Vivisectionist, the Knave of Knockouts. She lands next to the door, but as she moves to head inside, she notes another player on the field she hadn't noticed, so focused was she on the neutralizing the gunmen. A man of slight build with steely eyes, his face obscured by a dark buff, pressed against the bus. He is clad in a hoodie of a gray shade so profoundly neutral that it is nearly indistinguishable from the surrounding concrete. He appears unarmed.

'And who might you be?' Nova asks the Cement-Colored Creeper, as the Smart Claw retreats back into her wrist with a metallic snap, flesh sliding over its housing as though denying its existence. Then she takes a shotgun blast to the side of the head.

It takes her off her feet, sending her sprawling into a mess of overflowing trash bins on the side of the alley. She lays there, faceplanted and still.

Dmitry Volkov rears his ugly head, having finished with the guardsman. He can't see the traceur from where he is inside the vehicle, and so his bloodshot eyes zoom in on the youth in front of the bus, the one who likes to juggle cars and make a fool of his comrades.

'You there,' he bellows in an accent so thick it drips hammers and sickles, 'I have pig here, yes? How about you fuck off, before I make dead pig.' He aims the shotgun in his hands downward and pumps it, emphasizing his threat with the clink of a falling shell casing.

by **Lotsofluck** October 24th 2015, 10:21 am

Russian mofo: "Черт возьми . Трахни свою мать ."

Alex: "I don't know what you are saying, but it sounds angry. Then again, most of what you guys say sounds angry."

Alex was crouched over the man who had been hit by the ricocheting bullet. It had shattered his kneecap it seems as he was holding it while cursing with all the venom he could muster. Which, for a Russian, was quite a bit. He rocked side to side while Alex picked up his gun.

Alex: "Is he going to be alright?"

Watcher, speaking into his ear, : "It is hard to say. The bullet did not seem to hit any major arteries so he will bleed rather slowly. I doubt he will walk properly again though."

Alex: "Hmph..."

A shot gun blast pulled him out of his thoughts. Alex's eyes darted up to the man inside the bus holding a shotgun to the back of a guards head. A woman was now lying sideways on the ground, still. She had just been shot. Just like that another person had been killed. And now another life hung in the balance. Oh shit...

Alex stood there, shock making his mind numb. What had this guy just said? Time seemed to elongate as the man's words stretched into meaningless gibber. He was staring at Alex with cold, heartless eyes as he pumped the shotgun one more time. The shell casing slowly flew into the air before it landed on the ground with an almighty bang. The bang jolted Alex back into real time, eyes blinking behind his small mask. What could he do to save this guard? He could fly forward, break the sound barrier and hopefully beat the Russians reaction time. But he would take to long speeding up which would give the Russian the time he needed to pull the trigger. Alex could use his heat vision to sear through the gun casing, but then he might not do it fast enough. Or precise enough. He might accidentally take the hostages head off with that. What could he do?

He could be a distraction.

Alex looked down near the cop car. There was someone else there now besides the officer. A man in all grey looking like he was there to do something. Hopefully it would be something heroic. Alex slowly raised his hands above his head.

Alex: "Alright. You win. You let him go safely and I won't do anything to stop you."

Alex began floating upwards and backwards, hands still raised. He was trying to be as cooperative as possible. He began backing off slowly as to not spook the man.

by **The Grey** October 26th 2015, 11:21 pm

OoC:

Jardin's hand shut up reflexively. He had expected blood spatter, thrown as the buckshot it its mark. He felt nothing. A touch to his face made it clear: the woman did not bleed.

Glancing back to where the other Meta had downed seven men on his own, he saw that the police officer had turned his attention to the bus. And then can the heavily accented threat and the cop began to advance on the but. Jardin waved him off.

Jardin tried to steady his breathing. The man was definitely Slavic, probably Russian. And this much organization? Had to be Russian Mafia (or maybe he was just being racist). He had heard many disturbing anecdotes about the Russian Mob...like the number one reason to shoot someone? To make sure their gun works.

Jardin doubted the unconscious guard's survival as he saw the flyer shy away...great.

Withdrawing the stolen Baretta from his pocket, Jardin centered himself. Eyes closed, his visualized his movements. Steady breaths. Stepping into a turn. His arm raising to take aim. Squeezing off two shot into the barrel of the shotgun; shotgun going off, barely missing the guard, harmless until it was reracked. It waould happen in an instant.

With the confidence of a man who knew exactly how his body could work, Jardin swung around, stepping up the stairs of the bus as he fired twice, then centered the sights on the large man's temple. Then the hooded youth spoke in fluent Russian. "Careful, 'Comrade.' Someone could get hurt with that." He makes a show of eying the shotgun, glances at the prisoner's large frame and adds, "Are you compensating for something? Steroids, maybe?"

by **Nova** October 28th 2015, 1:23 am

Dmitri tilts the still-smoking shotgun on its side, eyeing the damage from the precision shooting. He blinks, his brain still stuck on rewind, trying to fast forward to his current state. His teeth grit against a delirious note singing in his ears, caused by the series of reports in the bus's cramped space. His hearing will return after these brief messages.

Last Dmitri knows, he's chumping up. He's bouncing from foot to foot, every muscle a dynamo on pure adrenaline, and he's getting ready to bust out of here like an animal in a trap. His plan at this point is to make a mad dash out the back of the bus to the remaining SUV. Problem is, he has no idea what to do after that. He could grab the guard, commandeer a vehicle, run… where? The family had arranged the whole thing as a favor to him. He didn't know the particulars of where he was to be taken and hidden. And while police levels weren't quite back up to pre-cataclysm days, he thought he might be pushing it, time wise. When he points the gun at the guard's head, his heart is going a mile a minute as he decides his next play. Then there's a sliver of gray movement, a cacophony of muzzle flashes, and his next play's decided for him by some punk in a hoodie.

The punk is saying something to him, maybe; something Dmitri's stressed eardrums go without hearing. He's a narrow, whippy thing, a black-and-gray revenant, and Dmitri's first thought is to break him down, gun or no gun. Then he catches sight of flashing blue lights near the end of the alleyway. New York's finest, coming to have a word with him. Behind the floating man.

The floating man.

All fight drains from Dmitri and spreads at his feet in a metaphorical pool of liquid courage. It's all gone so wrong, so rapidly, and all he can do is stand poleaxed. He and his boys, they never had a chance. Against the cops, sure.. but cops were all they'd planned for. Not the floating man, or the whip-girl, or this masked punk who moves and shoots with such precision that he wants to award marks out of ten. He throws the mangled shotgun to the bus's deck and spreads his shackled wrists. He fixes the hoodie an impassive stare.

'You're metahuman, aren't you?' He nods, knowingly. 'Yes, you are. Of course you are, you all are. So what are you doing? Шутки в сторону, what the shit are you doing?'

Dmitri hisses this last in a pileup of harsh syllables, his bound hands becoming at once pleading and limp. Surrounding him are the moaning, twitching, broken forms of his comrades. So far as he can tell, each one is still alive, to some degree. He keeps his hands where they can be seen, not taking his cold, dead eyes off the punk. A muscle twitches in his cheek as he continues, belying the rage beneath his stony mask.

'You help these pigs? You help them catch me? Why? To save life? You meta влагалища kill as many as you save. You fight each other, turn city to ash… why am I so important?' Outrage twists his face. 'Why does the man who throws Suburban give shit about my affairs?'

The squad cars can now be heard screeching down Finger Ave, which is what forty years of sitting in a small gray cage sounds like. This breakout attempt will likely add another twenty. The boys, once they recuperated (and not all of them fully would, one looked like he had a kneecap hanging off him) would each be looking at multiple charges. This is going to be a devastating blow to the family.

'You send big criminal back to prison. Make you feel good, yes? Feel like hero.' He sniffs. 'You're not heroes. You're children with toys. You have all the power, nobody can stop you, so you walk all over everyone's lives. And for what. So you can feel good. Like big hero.' His shoulders slump, and suddenly he goes from a wide-set Ivan Drago to a bald dude who's not getting out of prison til he's north of eighty.

The woman in the business suit--the one with the whip, the one to whom he'd proffered a 12-gauge aneurysm--shadows the doorway to the bus, an angry red welt on the side of her face where there should be giblets of bone and brain. She quietly observes the goings on with a face like the Mona Lisa.

'How'd I guess?' Dmitri's shrug is listless, and he collapses into a seat, an empty rattle of chains. He clasps his head, closes his eyes, and waits. The police interceptors are screeching to a halt at the end of the alley, now.

'I'd say my family will kill you for this,' he mutters in a voice like jagged glass to nobody in particular, 'if they knew how.'

Spoiler:

by **Lotsofluck** October 28th 2015, 3:06 pm

With the shotgun out of play now, Alex let out a sigh of relief. He came back down to the ground, landing lightly as he did so. One glance at the Russian and he just watched the fight drain out of him. Cop sirens sounded behind him. He walked over to the nearby police officer who was crying over her partners body. Alex crouched down next to her, putting one hand on her shoulder. It was the only thing he knew to do to comfort someone in this sort of state. He rubbed the back of his head before looking up at the defeated Russian.

Alex: "I'm sorry, I think you have the wrong impression on why I am here. It wasn't for you. This is never about you. I don't really care about stopping criminals."

He looked back to the officer then stood up slowly, facing down the man.

Alex: "If I wanted to stop criminals, you would be dead. All of your men would be dead. That guard you had hostage might also be dead. All I care about is protecting people. That's why you are alive. That's why that guard is alive. I don't care about your affairs in the slightest. But you put others in danger so here I am."

He turned his gaze downward towards the dead man laying on the concrete. He looked a little over twenty, small amount of stubble on his face. A wedding ring on his hand.

Alex: " Did you know over 5 million people a year die from cigarettes? Corporations commit fraud that steals billions from people. Medical companies ship contaminated goods to third world countries, knowingly infecting thousands. I can't stop those things. But I can protect a cop from a bullet by standing in front of them. I can pull people out of burning buildings. I can save people by stopping you. So that's what I do. You, the criminal, don't really matter. To me, the people I am protecting are the only things that matter."

Alex gave a small shrug. He didn't know what else to say. He looked up at the woman in the business suit. Then over to the man in the ski mask. Then back to the woman in the business suit.

Alex: "Didn't you get shot?"

by **The Grey** October 28th 2015, 11:20 pm

Jardin listened as the big Russian whined about how metas made his life so unfair. Then the meta in black and blue spoke on heroic motivations. Classic exposition, really.

Jardin stepped forward, bringing 'his' Baretta down on the back of the Russian's neck. He was careful, hitting only hard enough to knock the man cold without killing him...

As Jardin turns, the Blue/Black superhero asks after the woman's injuries. It would seem she was made of sterner stuff than most people. He just didn't realize how literal such terms woupd turn out to be.

He studied the pair, unaware that the Iron Maiden likely had access to several security records; some of which clearly showed a familiar youth clad in gray stealling some odd number of medium value trinkets.

Flipping the handgun so that he held it by the barrel, he offered the weapon to his acting allies. "I won't be needing this anymore," he said, simply, as he prepared to leave. He had no interest in his proverbial "15 minutes."

OoC:

by **Nova** October 29th 2015, 6:24 am

'Yeah,' Nova replies. 'My Dad's gonna kill me.'

Bloody embarrassing.

That was Nova's first thought when she came back online and assessed the damage. Synthetic flesh ate the buckshot, deflected it hither and yon, but the impact so close to her CPU had jarred her into a reboot. That she would be caught off-guard wasn't the part of this that has her all self-conscious. In the future, she'd be more mindful of checking her corners.

No, what's got her all icked is the mark the 12-guage left on her face. A little caveat of her fake skin is that it bruises realistically, as real as one might bruise from taking a shotgun blast to the noggin, see. So she's working with what is essentially the world's worst paintball welt, clustered over her temple, and the best part is that she can't see what it looks like. This doesn't seem like a huge issue, until you remember she has a meeting with the police commissioner in an hour and change. She was expected to show up pristine and presentable and now she's all marked. Bloody embarrassing. Embarrassing not just to her, but to her Maker, who demands perfection in all things. Nova can't see the future, but she can see the future like you and I can see the future, and she's dreading it. She's not looking forward to keeping that memory forever.

So here she is, hanging out against a backdrop of semi-conscious comrades, one hand covering the welt caused by the shotgun blast. Not wanting to leave till she spoke to an officer, but not wanting anyone to see her injury. It's just as well. Everyone's attention is on the prisoner.

Dmitri listens as the flying man lets him know what's up. By the end of it, his face has twisted into something like a larva born backward. He sneers, about to respond, but a shadow slides across the concrete and Dmitri's knocked colder than a submarine's skin. The butt end of a pistol is held out to her and the Man that Gravity Forgot. The Grey Hood won't be needing it.

And who might you be?

So she takes the pistol, just as she takes the man's height, build, and all the face she can scan, and finds him fitting the description of an unknown perp behind a spate of small robberies. And now she's got fingerprints. She studies the pistol briefly, and files what she finds away, for later use. She'd woke to find that he'd taken the reins of the situation, leading to as favorable an outcome as possible. On the heels of that, it wouldn't be right to accost him. But she marks him in her memory, noting the way he moves, recording the too-perfect blue of his eyes. The pistol, she unloads and clears.

And now I know who you are.

'See you around.' As he prepares to leave.

Then there's just her and the badass in tights. And the cops, filling the alley with blue, handcuffing the beaten, the broken, and the damned, tending to their fallen brother and his grieving partner. Nova glances towards an approaching officer. 'You have my full statement on what I witnessed in your inbox, Officer Shields.'

He's a young guy, the cop, but his stare is the type that's seen it all. 'Ma'am, I--'

'Shields, Ofc Paulie Shields. I looked you up by your badge number and got your work email. You'll find my typed sworn statement and eyewitness video in your inbox. I also attached a copy of the Good Samaritan law, that demonstrates we were operating well within our rights as concerned citizens in preventing further injury and death. Should I need to be subpoenaed, my contact information is in the body of the email. This has been a courtesy service brought to you by Caen Corporation.' The emptied pistol is presented to him.

'This fucking town,' Ofc Shields gripes, somewhere in the midst her explanations, and keeps moving, passing by to scope the scene at the back of the bus.

Still holding her face, Nova turns her attention to Blue and Black Attack. 'You got here before I did. I didn't catch your name..?' Because he didn't give it, but after listening to the speech he gave Volkov, she detects a potential ally. That, and after analyzing what she's seen of his abilities and running a few calculations, it's only practical to gather as much information on him as possible should he ever turn rotten.

ooc:

by **Lotsofluck** October 29th 2015, 9:56 pm

Alex turned to the police ready to give a explanation when Miss shotgun to the face broke in. She quickly broke off any hostilities the police might have and even got them both of the hook for heroing. Well this day was starting to look up then! Alex just gave a big grin and pointed to her, nodding as he did so, when the police officers turned their attention to him. They broke off from the pair, going back to helping the other officers. Alex rubbed the back of his head, still grinning.

Alex: "Well that worked out well! Better then I expected at least. Oh, I'm Aegis. I didn't catch your name either"

He turned to her, offering a gloved hand to shake. She did get shot it seems, but she was okay? was she another durable metahuman like himself? She was wearing a business suit, did she not expect to be doing hero work right now? Brave to go without a mask, but then again she said something about a corporation a second ago. Maybe they had her back or something.

Alex: "Are you a metahuman like me? I don't meet that many that don't try to send me through buildings the wrong way and what not. Its nice to actually meet someone else!"

by **Nova** October 30th 2015, 12:40 pm

'Aegis, like the shield. I like it, has character.' She shakes his hand like one would shake the hand of a guy they witnessed manhandling a car moments ago, very respectfully. 'I'm Nova.' Gloves, no chance of catching a DNA sample. Not a likely prospect, anyway. His skin must be diamonds.

'Not a metahuman, no.. but I can take a hit, and I don't like seeing people get hurt.' Her smile is a wince, as though said hit stings. Now she has a name and a facial profile. There is definitely information available on this guy online; there's got to be. He's already demonstrated that he's not the type to keep his powers under wraps. Plus, one doesn't go wearing an outfit like his without turning a few heads.

She's not going to look. Somewhere around the time when he stopped to console the grieving officer, he told her much of what she needed to know about him. A show of compassion, concern over the lives of the citizenry. He doesn't deserve to get hacked.

But no matter where his heart is, his strength, speed, and durability make him exceedingly dangerous to those very citizens. This guy can level a city block, and Nova's not going to forget that, so instead of hacking him, she's going to see to it that they meet again and gather data on him firsthand.

'Listen,' she says, 'I hate to cut this short, but I… really need to get cleaned up for a meeting I can't be late to. Here, take my card.' Her fingers twitch and one is produced, seemingly from her palm. 'Give me a call sometime, when you're out and about. You look like you know what you're doing, and a lot of this is new for me.' She turns to the scene surrounding the downed officer. 'As you can probably tell.'

The Card, should you accept it:

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