[b] Rainmaker's Team [/b] 

Twister felt the massive strain that Blast Girl put on his tentacle and he stopped cold as she dropped to the floor. When she yanked her arms back he stumbled towards her but just barely kept out of punching range. But he still couldn't move while carrying her. With his other tentacle he threw Shade far down the hall, where the other villain crashed with a yell, and he grasped Blast Girl with both tentacles. 

He gritted his teeth, "You are far too much trouble, girlie. I would snap your neck now if it wouldn't make all your friends run us down into the ground. You got lucky." With that he put all the strength that he could into his tentacles and swung Blast Girl through a nearby store front that was within his henchmen's killzone. With the force of the throw and Blast Girl's high gravity, she broke clean through the window, and crashed into a rack of clothing knocking it over. Then he used his tentacles to run away, hoping that that would delay his pursuers. 

Rainmaker cursed when they hit the ambush. She saw the wrecked store and could barely make out Blast Girl in a pile of clothes, "Someone check Blast Girl!" She fired several tendrils of lightning that forced the henchmen into cover and she created a obscuring mist for cover. Nimbus saw that Arachnid was hit and he created a strong wind that carried Arachnid to his position, Rainmaker's thick mist covering her from fire. He gently set her down and Evergreen began tending to the wound. This time she created an anomalous green gel in her hands and gently spread it in the cut, "To prevent infection and help the pain," she explained. Then she wrapped another bandage around the wound even tighter than before. She looked into Arachnid's eyes, "We should get you out of here." 

[b] Olympia's Team [/b] 

If Bouncer hadn't been as fast and agile as she was, Wenchang's plan would have worked. As it was she saw the aerosol can and when her kick rebounded on Wenchang's arm, she nimbly dodged her head and upper body to the right side and narrowly avoided taking the cloud to her face. However she still took a knuckle duster to the face, and grunted in pain. Then she was ready and dodged Wenchang's strikes in rapid succession. When he aimed his aerosol can again she flipped over the hero and landed behind him. She wrapped one strong arm around his neck and began trying to choke him. With her other arm she grabbed Wenchang's hand and savagely twisted and squeezed it, attempting to force him to drop the can. She blankly said, "Stop resisting and I'll snap your neck. You'll die quickly and without any more pain." 

Sarin had been pursuing her quarry with a sadistic glee, savoring the sight of the hero fleeing from her slow and deadly advance. She anticipated the kill with a growing animal thirst to see the life drain out of another person's eyes. She had killed before, when she first manifested her power and killed a group of gangbangers that had attempted to rape her in the chaos of the Awakening. 

The act got the attention of an overzealous band of newly created heroes and they had run her down, and in the midst of a fight where they assaulted her house, in her attempts to resist she had unintentionally killed her children. Her mind had broken and now she sought to find pleasure in using a power that had brought her grief. Now she had the chance to take revenge on the costumed heroes that she thought had ruined her life, by killing one of their own. She would be a legend among villains like her for taking out a costumed hero. She would have her vengeance. And then Sonja took out the industrial vacuum cleaner.

 If the sorcerer had been looking closely she might have caught what looked like surprise or confusion on the ghost of Sarin's face before she was sucked into the vacuum and bulged the device's bag to the brim. Olympia, Sonata, and Graviton had been fighting another wave of henchmen and even they took a brief moment to look flabbergasted before continuing. Olympia grinned madly and shouted out, "It's official Sonja. You have now topped that time when I took down that vampire with a UV lamp." 

Shank was panicked. Volt would have won if Shank hadn't then gotten desperate. Shank in a wild frenzy kicked at Volt's leg with manic strength. As he did a hidden knife slid out of his boot and buried itself in Volt's thigh. It was enough for the hero to lessen his grip and Shank seized the opportunity to flash away. He appeared at Volt's side and slashed at the hero and did the same thing from the other side. He kept appearing in all different directions, each time only manifesting long enough to lash out wildly with a knife. He made no attempt to aim carefully or put a lot of strength into the blows. He was trying to give Volt a death of a thousand cuts as it were. And if Volt didn't do something soon, he might just succeed. 

[b] Pariah's Victims [/b] 

One by one heroes slowly gotten taken down by the immobilizing bullets. A couple of heroes had already been ensnared and the team had barely made any headway into the exercise. At this rate they would all get taken down before they even got anywhere close to the bus. Pariah even said, "You're all going to have to do much better than that if you wish to succeed." 

Changeling and Strix's efforts to disable the drones and terrorists contributed massively to the team's overall efforts, several terrorists and drones were taken out by various means whether by energy attacks, super-strength, gadgets, or any number of things. Slowly the heroes advanced but Eclipse's shield continued to wane, any longer and it would fail entirely. Nuetro's charge forced the terrorists to give up some ground and allowed heavier hitters like Apogee to leap into the fray. The young heroine flew around and used super-strength to fling terrorists about and heat vision to melt their rifles. Changeling's arrow was true and disabled the grenadier who was trying to shoot at Nuetro. At this point most of the drones had been disabled but several still flew around firing away. 

Near Changeling was a major sniper's nest with a half-a-dozen sharpshooters firing at the heroes on the street. A few others carried grenade launchers and aimed at Neutro and Apogee. And as they watched, several other terrorists emerged on these roofs and began setting up mortars with concussive rounds and loading rocket launchers. The situation was the same on a rooftop near Strix. If the heroes managed to neutralize these nests, the enemy's overwatch capability would be reduced massively. If they did not then the main force would be overwhelmed by the men on the rooftops and the men firing away on the ground. 

And for the heroes on the ground they needed to break through a barricade of cars that had been strung across the street and provided cover for numerous terrorists. If they could break through then they would get much closer to reaching the bus. But their opposition became even more intense. More and more men fired away with assault rifles and grenade launchers, with the grenadiers focusing on Neutro. Occasionally a man would throw a grenade that exploded in the same manner as the initial barrage that had nearly immobilized the team earlier. 

The barricade stopped Rolling Girl from advancing, and up until this point she had dodged all of the assault fire. She could breeze through the barricade but that would leave her cut off from her team. But perhaps the speedster could assist the heavy-hitters in breaking the fortifications. And If the heroes waited any longer then the opposition would get even more intense and their chances of success would shrink. They needed to keep pushing fast and hard, and they still had a long way to go.