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[center][h3][b][Part 2][/b][/h3][h1][i]Herald the Strangers[/i][/h1][/center]

[b]Location: Lost Haven University, Lost Haven
Time: Present Day - Morning[/b]

On the east side of campus, Pantheon faced the last eight of his assailants. It was a blitzkrieg, his body a blur as shrieks and gurgles fizzled into a grotesque cacophony. Within less than a minute, he had disposed of all eight: bones stuck out of arms and legs, ankles twisted in ways unthinkable by occupational trainers, one had both kneecaps completely shattered. He had done his work here, he left them to suffer. But alas, Pantheon was still one person no matter how fast he moved--for every Hound Pantheon disposed of, they were still murdering two and three students. He could hear the crushing rattle of the assault rifles as they tore human flesh to mince.

He would take the fight to the heart of the attack. Pantheon blazed to the interior of the east wing of the building where bodies had been stacked up against one another. There appeared to be no Hounds in sight, however. In the eery silence, he glared at the mesh of lifeless flesh before him. There were at least fifteen scattered against the walls and slumped against lockers. One girl, a blonde with blue highlights running to the ends of her hair appeared to make it to the emergency exit before she was cut down. All of the blood hadn’t even coagulated yet, the Hounds must have just rampaged through here. 

Littered alongside him were the bodies of lost souls; they found a way to accuse him even in death. He could hear their pleas from beyond, he could hear the whimpers and the spite spilling from those whose lives had been cut too short. The dead may not speak, but they see and they judge with eternally damning eyes. The aftermath of murder was unlike any other settling feeling; with death, the moments [i]posteriori[/i] affirmed the permanency of death’s unnatural hold on mortal beings. These people were innocent, they committed no crime simply because they were born different--and if these Hounds saw it right to treat their fellow human beings as dogs, Pantheon would treat them the same; and he would put them all down without mercy.

Reaching the end of a hallway, he saw the map which detailed the layout of the Eastern wing where he saw the Dean’s office two floors above him. He would let it be known that any hounds who found themselves before him would meet a swift end. He shot up through the ceiling until he did reach the Dean’s office, to which he found some straggling Hounds rummaging around the desk of the now deceased Dean: the method of execution was a slit throat. Just as before, the Hounds immediately opened fire. Wading bullets, Pantheon approached both soldiers and after crushing the muzzles of their guns, he seized both by their throats and raised them above his head.

[color=yellow]”What are your names?”[/color] Pantheon resounded,
“CAHK-Chuh! I’ll never tell you, scum!” Pantheon squeezed tighter around his measly throat.
[color=yellow]”A shame. So stubborn as to choose death.”[/color] Pantheon assured the nameless Hound enjoyed his fall from the sixth story window. The splat of his body against the concrete even made Pantheon flinch. He turned to the other, still held firm in his grasp.
[color=yellow]”And you?”[/color] This one was smart, he obeyed.
“M-Michael!” from what Pantheon gathered, he sounded young--perhaps no more than 25. Michael’s headgear covered his face, but Pantheon could feel him trembling, wary of how close he was between life and death. He would show this one mercy. Releasing Michael from his grasp, he spoke once more,

[color=yellow]”Retire. Lead a better life, Michael.”[/color] Michael caught his breath, and with his hand wrapped around his throbbing throat, he scurried off, no longer the resilient paramilitary dog he had so fervently tried to portray but a few minutes before. He pushed the dead Dean out of his chair and assumed his place. Grasping the intercom which relayed messages to the entirety of the East Wing, Pantheon spoke.

[color=yellow]”Attention, Hounds of Humanity! My name is Pantheon. You have committed an unforgivable atrocity here today, and you will pay for your crime. You have thirty minutes to evacuate this institution or I will kill you all. There will be no mercy shown to any who do not abide by these commands after these thirty minutes have passed. Have a fine day.”[/color]

And now, he would wait.

Lawrence replied promptly to Pantheon’s kind warnings, his tone hardly changing from his previous announcement. “Hey, congrats on defeating my men. I was hoping there’d be some tough sonuvabitch we could fight with today. Well, it really is your lucky day, you get to be our guinea pig.”

Meanwhile, as the main forces of the HoH made their way through the university, gunning down anyone they couldn’t readily contain, several other squads were making their way around the campus entirely. These separate squads split off to place several beacons, just a few feet big, around their targeted area of the university. Another squad followed directly after their first waves, to set up a larger tower device in the center of the main campus building.

As the towers came online the nearest squad to each surrounded their beacon to protect them, except for the central tower. Several more Hounds gathered around it, along with other squads coming back to this area as well with injured or unconscious civilians, all of whom they had identified at an earlier date as metahumans, and placed one or two of said civilians around the tower. One of the Hounds flipped a switch, and a high pitch shrill pierced the entire campus. The Hounds appeared to just get stiff, as if bracing themselves for something painful, the nearby civilians that had been brought in began to writhe and scream in pain.

But the metahumans who were near the central tower began to shake, scream, and all manner of struggle, until they vanished. It could have been described as an explosion, but it was too quiet, too clean, their bodies changed to an odd dust as soon as the shrill stopped.

“Their powers work differently, let’s continue testing.” A specially marked Hound said, while pointing at their next subjects.

“I haven’t heard back from the other squads yet sir.” A nearby Hound said, his hand still clutched around the radio on his chest.

“Break open some of our prototype ordinance and send out another squad. No more prisoners, let’s not risk it.”

Charlie watched on from the window in a lecturing hall, standing on the folding chairs. She peered at the back entrance of the west building, they wheeled in a tower of some sort. Looking like a heavily experimental piece of equipment. Wires, access boxes and instruments were strapped to it. They ran power cords to generators, squashing Charlie’s immediate hope of cutting the power to them. What she saw next however had changed her goal of escape. The tower powered up, the hostage they kneeled in front of it screeched his pain, activating his own set of powers trying to fight. The hostage fainted in their attempts, slumping forward. He was dragged away and another sat in front of it, visibly panicking. 

The alchemist knew she could sabotage the tower, but as she was; horrifically unprepared and outgunned she moved away from the window. The best move would be to get through the campus, look for weak links in their perimeter then slip by. Wait until bigger superheroes came crashing the party, where the real chaos would unfold. She wanted to be as far away as she could possibly get from that insanity. 

It seemed an impossible task, with who knew how many armed gunmen between her and the exit.  She forced her feet to move, she moved out of the deserted lecture hall, going straight for the maintenance room, it controlled all the electronics for the halls. She bit her lip then loaded up on some tools like screwdrivers, cable cutters, and excess blue telephone cables. From below a ladder led up to the roof of the hall, probably to where the re-circulating air fans were. Charlie made her way up, rapidly oxidizing the lock on the hatch to a rusted heap. She busted through to the roof, the bright sunshine making her squint. Overhead she heard the LHPD’s helicopters arrive along with the blaring sound of sirens. 

From his vantage, Pantheon could see the line of helpless humans/metas being dragged in front of the large tower contraptions across campus. His stomach writhed at the shrill that followed. He couldn’t quite see the aftermath itself, though. There was not anything he could do to save the deceased, and he had an entirely new set of problems rushing up the stairs behind him. Whatever Lawrence had presumed to make Pantheon a guinea pig of, he had no intentions of finding out. Doubly, below the east building, the Hounds had set up another of these small beacon contraptions where LHPD rescue vehicles and cop cars had begun to make their arrival.

For each car which entered the active beacon’s radius, its drivers met a terrible end. One veered right into a tree as its driver’s body seized up--both servicemen of 15 years lost their lives. Another spun out uncontrollably until it flipped over and rolled into the forest greenery beside the road. Meanwhile, the Hounds had invaded the entirety of the East wing from the bottom floor to the top. It was no use to try and repel an entire wave of them when there would undoubtedly be another wave in ten minutes or less. Above, he heard the whir of helicopter blades. If LHPD were here, it means they too would soon be arriving in greater force. LHU was about to be a war zone.

There was no use in trying to clear out the East wing, so Pantheon burst through the window and decided he would try to take out one of those beacons. Except in his divebomb, his entire body froze up and he plummeted into the concrete, a hole was left. The Hounds trained their weapons on him and fired, but just as before, nothing happened--the longer he stayed by these beacons, the weaker he felt himself becoming. He shot upward toward the western wing of the building through a window at the top floor. Perhaps there was something of interest here. 

Outside, more Hounds and police squads arrived on the scene in triple time. The LHPD had called in their big guns, there were armored trucks and officers draped in thick body armor from head to toe. The Hounds were unphased, for each truck the LHPD had at its disposal, there were three vans with six or seven armed men a piece inside. A firefight soon broke out on the streets below, with members of both sides swiftly cutting one another down. Any innocents and presumed metas who had attempted to make their escape were unceremoniously caught in the crossfire. Warm blood hugged the streets and swam to the feet of the opposition from both sides. Carnage won the day.

Charlie watched the descent of the flying costumed meta crash through into a classroom, his attempt to attack one of the towers the Hound’s setup failed miserably. Clearly he was disorientated, more so was that she saw a possible ally and escape plan. She took off at a run across the roof, using the length of cable she tied her staff to her back then used the excess, creating an cement anchor. Winding some of it around her fist then slowly around her waist. She peered over the side where the broken window was, the Hounds were preoccupied with the arrival of the LHPD their eyes trained on the ground and not above them. Slowly she backed up against the ledge, balancing on the edge with her heels. “[color=honeydew]Good thing I’m not afraid of heights.[/color]”

A quick inhale she jumped off the ledge, the cable pinching her waist taking the weight as she swung forward directly into the classroom. Careening with a desk she slid off the surface then clattered to the floor with a groan. Using a chair she pulled herself up, adjusting her goggles as she did noticing the downed meta and a few stray bodies. She paced over to him, having made a mess of desks upon his landing. She used the butt of her staff to poke his side.

“[color=honeydew]Hey, you alright?[/color]”

Pantheon rose from atop the crushed metal desks from which his body rested.  He gleaned her up and down, from her sweater to her staff. She was small and breakable in many ways. For a moment, he envisioned the varying ways he could do as such. Although, she didn’t seem like she had any intentions of doing him any harm which, above all else, is all he cared about. It was always fun to test a person’s resolve, though.

He grabbed one of the spare metal legs of the desk and promptly threw it at her head. There was a small smile on his face.

She ducked catching the desk leg, shaking the sting away in her hand. Glaring she snapped, “[color=honeydew]The fuck, man! What the hell are you smiling about, asshole.[/color]” 

Her irritation turning the steel in the leg to liquid as it puddled to the ground. “[color=honeydew]Who’re you anyway?[/color]” When he was at his full height he towered over her. Rightly noting the large thunderbolt across his chest, the cape. Classic costumed hero look about him, she supposed if this grinning idiot was her ticket out there’d be no room for complaints.

He watched her turn metal into water. Though he would never admit it, such a feat caused him to squirm inside. Someone who could transform solid objects into liquid was not to be trifled with; Pantheon would not, of course, let her know this.

[color=yellow]”What a strange creature you are.”[/color] He paced to the broken window, the spinning helicopter blades had gotten closer. It sounded like they were about to land on the roof.

[color=yellow]”Well, human, you know these mortal institutions better than myself. How do you propose we get out?”[/color]

[color=honeydew][i]Great, another one these jokers. Mortal this, human that.[/i][/color] She thought.

“[color=honeydew]Okay cool, nice to meet you too. Name’s not creature, it’s Alchemyst.[/color]” She replied, then dryly added. “[color=honeydew]It’s customary in my culture to say who you are too. Unless you [i]like[/i] being called an asshole, I don’t mind.[/color]” 

“[color=yellow][i]Memhmemhmemhnemhe![/i][/color]” Pantheon mimicked her drawl, [color=yellow]“Sassy this, sassy that. Look at me, I’m ‘the Alchemyst. I’m better than you because there aren’t as many of me as there are of you.”[/color]

No matter how serious he appeared, he was still one part kid, one part magical bulldozer. He curled a grin across his face as she grew more flustered. Hassan, ever more the antagonist, still lived inside the far more serious hero who made up his exterior. 

[color=yellow]”If you’re done complaining about how hard your life is, can we figure out how we’re gonna get out of here?”[/color]

She threw up her hand and flipped him off before stalking over to the door, “[color=honeydew]What are you, fuckin’ twelve? I swear to christ, you-[/color]”

[color=yellow]”Technically, I’m 17, thanks very much.”[/color]

She huffed heading in the opposite direction going to the door and peeking through it. Lifting the blinds up tentatively with the crystal on her staff. It was like talking to her little sister, Harry had a penchant for acting like a brat when the mood struck her. “[color=honeydew]They’ve got the campus surrounded, exits are covered by those tower things they’ve set up. I can sabotage them but I had no hope of getting close. Seriously though, what do I call you?[/color]”

Near as quick as Hassan’s juvenile demeanor emerged, it suppressed itself when he spoke up again.

“[color=yellow]I am Pantheon. I am not a ‘you’ per se, I am only real in the sense that this body has been manifested over the course of several centuries. I do not care for the name myself.  It is, as I have learned over several existences, an homage to your various human religions. I am an amalgamation of spells, tomes, runes.[/color]”

His eyes never once strayed from her frame as he spoke. His iris’ were a mixture of different colors, and he didn’t appear to belong to a single ethnic group though his skin in this recent iteration was brown. [i]This Alchemyst seemed so worried about such a minor matter.[/i] 

[color=yellow]”I am not so sure you want to ‘get close’-- whatever these things are, they caused me great pain. I dare not imagine what they might do to you.”[/color]

She saw no one in the hallway, turning back to him, “[color=honeydew]Pantheon, weird magic, got it. I’ve got my share of family history behind me too, alchemy is as weird as it gets though.[/color]” She commented. “[color=honeydew]The tower on the westside here wasn’t that bad. It knocked their victims out, didn’t look like it killed them. The center one could be the strongest one. I won’t have any real ideas until I can get my hands on it.[/color]”

She paced over to the main desk, pulling open the drawers fishing out office supplies mostly erasers, scotch tape and paper clips stuffing them into her backpack. “[color=honeydew]If I get rid of the tower then we can make a break for it yeah?[/color]”

He set his eyes on the continuing firefight below. Neither side appeared to be giving ground.

The whirring of the LHPD helicopters were simply background noise, through the raining gunfire the launch of a rocket was drowned away until it hit its target. The helicopter exploded in bright fire, the sound deafening. The aircraft came spinning directly toward their classroom window, Charlie had time to duck underneath the desk while it gave Pantheon no real time to react.

All he could do was watch as the helicopter whipped into him. No matter how durable one was, getting hit still [i]hurt[/i]; it didn’t help that one of the rotary blades had detached and lodged itself into his cape, effectively choking him while what was left of the helicopter from the explosion lay sprawled atop his body. Capes were indeed a bad idea. His arms were free, but he had begun to re-think this hero’ing business in general. Some groans escaped from his mouth in between the choking and coughing.

A blast of cool foam of the fire extinguisher hit the wreckage, from where he was Pantheon would see Charlie having broken up from the desk, debris pinned the furniture to the back wall with her beneath it. When enough of the fire was gone, she slammed both hands over the blade pinning him, it disappeared in a similar fashion of the desk leg, but this time reforming as a pole pushing the wreckage up a few feet removing the weight. Without a word she grasped under his armpit then with all her strength she pulled him free. He was heavy as it was, but she quickly had him free after dragging him a few feet away. 

Letting go she picked up the fire extinguisher again, blasting more foam on the flames. “[color=honeydew]We need to move![/color]”

He rose, one hand rubbed his throat. The heat itself didn’t bother him, he knew this was not the case for the Alchemyst.

“[color=yellow]I hope you are not averse to flying. I doubt either of our acrobatic skills are sufficient for safe departure. You know where these towers are? What is the quickest route?”[/color] He did not care for safety at all.

She snapped, “[color=honeydew]Hell no, we are not flying. I am not making a target for another goddamn rocket.[/color]” She put the canister down, pulling her staff back into her hands. “[color=honeydew]We’re taking the stairs.[/color]”

“[color=yellow]Very well.”[/color] He swooped her up in his arms in a streak of speed and encased her with an arm, both were airborne in a matter of seconds. “[color=yellow]I am insulted that you believe I am as slow as your man made inventions. Also, they were coming up the stairs.[/color]” They weren’t, but he deigned he could pull off the lie well enough.

She shrieked at the sudden, blurring movement. Nearly motion sick at the rapid departure of the classroom, she clutched her staff then squeezed her eyes shut her ears popped painfully at the sudden ascent. Barely having heard what he had just said. Working her jaw. When her mind caught up she looked down at the campus, rhyming off where she left off on the periodic table panic nearly overtaking her once again. 

[color=yellow]”Now, where to?”[/color]

“[color=honeydew]T-tungsten.[/color]” She said quietly then turned her worst glare onto Pantheon she pulled down the mask to yell at him. “[color=honeydew][i]You absolute shit![/i] Fucking supes and their bullshit flying. Fuck you and your stupid ass cape! Fuck that thunderbolt! This-![/color]” She ranted pointing at him, “[color=honeydew]Is all shit![/color]”

When she finished she pointed, “[color=honeydew]Over there.[/color]”

“[color=yellow]Hahahahahahhahaahaahhaaahahahahahahahahahaahhahahahaha! If you want, I could just drop you right now. Just--[/color]” he released her from his grasp as they flew over the campus grounds while they were several hundred feet in the air.

“[color=yellow]Oops.[/color]” And now he waited. Four… three… two… it took no time for him to catch her as he ziplined down.

“[color=yellow]I believe there is a mortal saying that recounts something like, ‘if one has nothing nice to say, one should not say it at all lest they be felled by a force greater than themselves. Or something of that nature.[/color]” This Alchemyst had proverbial rough edges, ones Pantheon could appreciate. She was defiant even against odds she could not overcome alone; for him, one who could and would stand independent and defiant of all in her path was one who garnered his respect.

He flew them in the direction which she indicated, vague though it was.

The drop and subsequent catch earned him one more, “[color=honeydew][i]Fuck you.[/i][/color]” Charlie stayed icily silent as they descended. When they found themselves on the other side of the west department building’s exit around the corner from the tower she knelt gratefully into the grass. “[color=honeydew]A flying wizard with the temperament of a teenager, what fuckin’ luck do I have today.[/color]” She stood back up fixing her hood back on her head with her mask, she pulled out the smoke grenade she had picked up earlier from her pack. 

“[color=honeydew]Alright, I’m going to make a distraction to draw them away from the tower. You,[/color]” She gestured with the disabled grenade. “[color=honeydew]Get rid of the Hounds, while I tear the tower apart.[/color]”

They were in the midst of battle. Several more armored trucks had made their way onto the scene, and the Hounds who were hold up in the Eastern Wing had poured into the streets. 

Suddenly some of the vans in the rear began to stop, or lose traction, and dirt began to build up in odd ways underneath them. The formations quickly began to form into fingers, then hands that slowly lifted the vans into the air, more thickened ‘fingers’ began to sprout off, to block windows and doors. 

Clearly this was the fault of a metahuman, all of the Hounds that could began to scan their area, looking to stop whoever was at fault before all their reinforcements became trapped.

“Contact spotted, the roof!” A Hound shouted as he pointed, not a second later gunfire rained down around the figure on the room.

David raised his arms instinctively to block, it had taken a while for him to get used to the fact that he was bulletproof, since he spent most of his waking hours as a normal human, but at least he didn’t jump back. For this he needed to be at the front, everyone’s guns pointed at him, instead of someone else.

Terra Firma had spent his time so far saving people as he had become lost within the campus, drawing up earthen walls to shelter people, disarming and disabling Hound attackers, making them pay for their cowardly tactics. He began to wonder what they were really trying to accomplish right before he heard a loud explosion booming off in the distance, and then an obvious thought struck him, he brought his hand up and facepalmed himself. Get the high ground, find out what’s going on outside, because he was clearly missing something.

Several more of the vans from earlier began to arrive, with no one watching David took the opportunity to try to reach out to his earth powers, he wasn’t a master yet, in fact he wondered why he was able to control it so easily now. But he reached out and began to form those hands, imagined them reaching around, grasping the cars like simple toys. However, before he could get a handle on the rest he was spotted, and interrupted.

[color=red]“I [i]am[/i] pretty hard to ignore.”[/color] David mused to himself. The Hounds were clearly trying something with those towers, so he’d work his way up, take care of the men so they couldn’t stop him, then he’d deal with the towers. And with that plan in his head David jumped down, as he slammed into the ground, chunks of dirt and nearby cement flew into the air everywhere, the force of his landing sent several of the nearby Hounds flying back.

David grabbed the feet of a nearby Hound before he could fly off, and threw him ‘properly’ into some of his still standing friends. 

David held out his hands and brought up two stone ‘blades’ into his hands, it wasn’t that he needed help pushing around unpowered men, but it occurred to him that it might help with reach. The swords themselves were smoothed out, they looked almost real, but if one saw one up close or even felt one they could tell that they were actually dulled.

The new hero’s appearance grabbed both Pantheon and Charlie’s attention. She had nearly finished her own distraction, someone else was fighting and actually pushing back. The ground was shaking with each move Terra Firma made. He tore into the Hounds with vigor, when he approached one of the towers Charlie decided there was only one way to warn him and chase off the Hounds.

The repurposed smoke grenade in her hand had alchemical formulas scrawled over every inch of it, it took some picking about it’s insides, adding her own ingredients from her backpack. The smoke grenade had grown past it’s original size with a new trigger crudely shaped from within. She shouted at the top of her voice.

“[color=honeydew][i]MOVE![/i][/color]”