[hr][h1][i]The Hands of Science, & The Changeling Unit.[/i][/h1][hr]



"... And if we participate in this project?" Nathaniel said, putting his fingertips together. 

"We could very possibly eliminate NEST, and have free reign to do whatever we please." Dr. Cross grinned. "Look, we barely have options left. We relied far too much on our anonymity, and look what happened when we lose it? We literally were pushed to our last leg. It won't be long until NEST knocks what's left of us."

"It seems that way..." Eliza groaned, sounding strained. She started feeling odd. Like, really good. Pleasure was creeping it's way onto her body, and her vision was distorting. "Has the air been contaminated?" She asks.

Dr. Cross could smell it, too. She looked down, and realized that the scientists that were taking seats below started passing out, and weren't looking good for wear either.

The first thing she did was put on a mask that she (and most other members of the Hands) held on hands at all times. The REAPER Generals did the same in a few moments after her. "Damn it, which one of you amateurs caused...." Dr. Cross hissed, and ultimately trailed off as she realized that something wasn't right here.

"Dr. Cross," Stephanie started off, turning towards her wheelchair bound assistant. "Communications are down. Security systems are down. Someone is actively hacking us, and pulling information out of our systems!"

"What?!" Dr. Cross said, surprised. "That means... [i]RAVEN...[/i]" She groaned.

A bright flash of red light, followed by a pop, heralded Revenant appearing on the balcony. "Dr. Cross, Task Force RAVEN has breached the base." The Revenant nodded her head as she explained. "And we can't properly mount a defense; they put a drug in the air system, and half the damn staff is unconscious."

"God damn it!" Dr. Cross shouted.

"This is your stronghold, and you can barely keep it defended, Cross." Eliza rolled her eyes from her balcony. "I guess this meeting is over."

"Eliza, now is not the time." Dr. Cross hissed at her fellow woman of science, looking over her shoulder at her. "Chairmen," Dr. Cross turned back around towards them. "Take the emergency exits at once." 

They wasted no time in running out behind their balconies.

"Same goes for you, Stephanie." Dr. Cross nodded at Stephanie.

"But, Dr-" Stephanie tried to plead.

The Dr put her hand on Stephanie's shoulder, before cooly explaining, "This base is now becoming a warzone, and I hate to lose you in all this madness."

Stephanie nodded. "What about you?"

"I'm going to stay behind, and lead an offensive." 

Stephanie, once again, nodded, and started rolling off. "Stay safe, Dr. Cross."

With the Chairmen heading out, it was time for the REAPERS to mount an offensive. The four of them stood before her, with attentiveness. "Revenant, I need you to go through the base, and alert everyone that's still standing of the breach, and tell every scientist to preserve as much research as they can, then tell them to start breaking computers, the memory wipe might not work, so we have to go for the next best thing. After that help mobilize a counter-offense against RAVEN."

Revenant nodded her head, before she disappeared in a flash of light.

Dr. Cross turned to her Generals... The Witch, The Demon, and the Killer... Some of the most powerful REAPERS - being natural Metahumans. "You three have to buy some time for the other Scientists." Dr. Cross said, "All three of you are powerful enough to put up a major fight. Kill as many NEST Agents as possible." 

"Hehehehe..." Ignatius laughed as he put his hands up, creating twelve knives - six in each hand - out of a dark-red energy that was similar to hard-light. It was seemingly surrounded with a roots that were of a lighter shade of red. "It's time, boys! It's time that we remove those assholes at RAVEN from the equation!" Ignatius was just itching to fight Maximilian.

The Wendigo slammed his two gauntlets together, creating a loud boom on impact. He loudly growled like a lion as he stood tall. "No mercy." He growled.

Snowblind created a large, snowflake-shaped, ice construct in between her fingers, and grinned. "Understood, Cross."

"... Could we be of assistance?" Heartbreaker said, cockily, as she hopped from one balcony to another - landing on Dr. Cross' balcony with flawless grace. She sat down on the railing, and pulled out one of her revolvers. Twirling it around her fingers. "You know, ya'll save our ass back there - how about us Changelings return the favor?" Heartbreaker laughed.

There was a solid, dark-green, pane that Fig and the Witch Mother walked down to get on Dr. Cross' balcony. The Mannequin fell down from the ceiling, landing flat on the ground. He pulled himself up almost as if he was being pulled upwards by strings. He stood straight up, and faced Dr. Cross.

"Gang's all here, and we'll be proud to lend a hand!" Heartbreaker said, with a wry grin.

"Of course." Dr. Cross said. "Do all you can to assist my REAPERS."

With an impressive squad here to battle REAPER, Dr. Cross nodded her head. "Move out, we don't have a lot of time."


[hr][i][h1][color=springgreen]Cindy Gabrielle Keagan[/color], & [color=cornflowerblue]Shizuka Takashiro[/color].[/h1]
[sub](Written in collaboration with [@tsukune])[/sub][/i]
[hr][hider=Silversun Pickups - Better Nature (Cradle)][youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dAyLWdRqKoYp[/youtube][/hider][hr]


First problem that Cindy always had in a fight was location and preparation. At least at the beach Cindy had a large amount of glass to create. Here, at best, she has a few windows. She'll have to grow some glass. When the freak charged her, Cindy gathered all the glass, and created a pane, putting her arms against it. When it's tentacles impacted the shield, it pushed Cindy back a little bit, causing large cracks within the shield. It still held steady.

Their current situation was not looking good at all. Shizuka had thought of dragging the monster down and getting it stuck halfway into the ground but he didn't have the confidence that it would work on this thing (too much work to make sure all those tentacles were rendered immobile). He threw himself against the glass, lending his strength to Cindy; he knew the pane wouldn't hold out for long. Too bad his power wasn't as cool as this girl's - he was prepared to grab her hand and phase out of this goddamn place when the need arises. "So, offense is out of the question?" There's nothing on him at the moment that could put him on the offense - his ability was more for [i]defense[/i].

"Long as it's attacking like this, yeah!" Cindy shouted over the sounds of the creature barraging her shield. Both of them were being forced to take steps back. She was holding onto the shield like this so that she could create glass, and put it inside the shield to repair and reinforce it. If she got enough time, she could make this very tough to break. "Hey, run out there for a second and do a dance - [i]anything[/i] - just distract it!" 

A distraction? Shizuka couldn't help grinning. "Yes, ma'am - and how long do you need?"

Why is he asking these damn questions? This thing is about to break through her shield any second now! This is a "do it or you die" situation. "... [i]Long as you can![/i]" Cindy shouted over the creature's glass assault.

Shizuka sighed. He hated to do the extra work, but now wasn't really a time he could complain about that. He walked through the glass pane and faced the beast. "Yoohoo! Right here, buddy!" It worked - the creature turned its attention to him, and that was exactly what he needed. The beast began to redirect its assault on him, but the tentacles passed harmlessly through his incorporeal body.

[i]How the helll...?[/i] Cindy noted as the boy just walked right through the glass. She knew he was a Metahuman after that last incident - but this just further convinces her. Whatever, there were more pressing matters. Like stopping this damn thing from killing them! When it turned away, Cindy expertly changed her shield into a lance - but subliming the glass into a liquid state, and cooling it down until it was solid again - and sending it at the creature at high speeds, spinning through the air.

Out of the corner of his eye, Shizuka saw that Cindy was done with her preparations. However, he knew he wouldn't be able to dodge the glass spear no matter how good his reflexes were - he had to go into phased state again and let the glass pass through his body, where it continued to sail towards the beast.

While the creature was distracted, it didn't even notice the lance until it already pierced it's body, and started digging deeper and deeper. The creature stumbled over, using it's tentacles to brace itself. Before it turned it's head right towards Cindy.

It's eye narrowed.

Cindy took this moment she needed to continue her barrage. She can't let it get back up. She generated her green glass from her hands, and pointed both palms at it. Shooting off shards of arrow-head shaped pieces of glass at it. Shooting it out like a barrage. Each of the shards hit the beast, and dug their way in deeply. She stopped for a moment, and created a large chunk of glass - large as her head - with a very pointy tip. Cindy shot the shard through the air, and it pierced the beast again.

Knocking it right on over. Cindy wasn't sure that it was dead. But she was feeling a little tired. She noticed that bits and pieces of her skin were turned into glass. Christ, she needed to tend to that soon as possible. Her whole shoulder was glass! She put her hand over her shoulder, and converted it back into flesh. She let out another sigh as she turned the rest of her body back into skin before it could break.

The creature was already dissolving. Which meant that Cindy's barrage killed it.

Shizuka wasted no time and rushed back to Cindy's side. "Let's go!" He held out a hand. He wasn't sure if there would be reinforcements coming after them - they would need to get as far away from here as possible.

Yeah, Cindy thinks that getting out of here would be the smart thing to do in this city. The girl ran outside with her friend in tow. She was immediately assaulted by the rain. She had no idea what the [i]hell[/i] that thing was - and she didn't want to find out. It was dissolving, which meant that it was dead. Though, she had little idea of whether or not there were more - or if it would get back up.

Cindy pulled out her cellphone, and shined it on the area in front of her. They needed to get the hell out of here fast as possible. Cindy thought about something... which might not be that bad of an idea - but she needed to be quick. Cindy gathered glass from the surrounding area - including some from the building they were just in - and gathered it together. It reverted to it's near-liquid state (Which was a bit harder to do with all of this rain cooling it down prematurely), and Cindy created a multilayer pane of glass.

The girl stepped on it, and it started floating with her on top of it. "Get on!" Cindy said. 

Shizuka jumped onto the floating glass. "This is really cool. Where are we going now?" He shrugged off another bad feeling deep down inside him - he was probably being overly sensitive.

"Anywhere but here!" Cindy said, as the glass flew above the building line. "Just hold still, and whatever you do don't jump. I never tried this with more than myself before!" First time for anything. Cindy was going to head back to her apartment fast as possible, and wait out the night. Because this shit crazy.

"Well I'm honored!" He sat down on the glass, enjoying the view. "Verthaven has a great nightscape like any other cities I've been to."

"Boy, we were just attacked by a fuckin' jellyfish monster, and you are talking about the view?" Cindy turned her head halfway towards him, and raised an eyebrow. "You truly are kooky as hell." She rolled her eyes.

However...

... There were a few glowing lights on the buildings behind them.