[IC] Champions of Engine City

[Omega Man]

Firing out her sword, the cresent slash seems to fire out a wall directly in the path of the human hot-wheel. Her momentum continues to slash again trying to split the wall she just made, along with Fastlane's head.

"What in the hell is...?" Fastlane thought before running into a wall of ice and barely moving fast enough to evade the sword slash of the female ice manipulator afterwards.

"I don't know who you are, ma'am, but there are survivors in the quarantine zone that need outside help. They don't have much longer and the authorities aren't lifting a finger to help them. Are you working with them to keep people from coming in?" Fastlane asked getting back up to his feet.

His construct road dissipated into the air and Fastlane and the unknown attacker fell to the streets below where a dozen or so melted ones stopped whatever it was they were doing and began herding towards the two costumed individuals.

Zero tilted her head, his objective didn't clash with hers...Aside from him not allowed to be here. He knew nothing. But she saw fit to answer his question about her purpose.

Her sword had found itself back in its sheath, only for her to draw it once more? Tied to technique most likely. As it was drawn it fired small ice shards in the direction of Fastlane and everything behind him. Collateral damage was hardly on her mind. "Leave."Not one for small talk her gesture and tone should make it clear enough.

"Who does she think she is?" Mal thought dodging the attack easily enough, "I know there are superhuman criminals out there but I'm just trying to save some people on the inside of this quarantine zone." he continued thinking before taking a stand and speaking up out loud.

"I can't do that, ma'am. If you're working for the same people who seem to have bought the police in this city then your time will come soon enough. I can run circles around your ass, so put the pig-sticker back in it's sheath before you get hurt." Fastlane ordered as the dozen or so melted ones drew closer to their location between two larger buildings in an alley.

What was the word to describe young men like this one? Zero looked him over as he rambled on about something, his posture and tone made it clear he didn't plan to leave. What was the word for it? Ah yes she remembered just as he finished his statement.

"Arrogant."

The woman had heard enough to make her next move. She began by slinging mist from her blade as if to remove the condensation, but in actuality it was flash freezing the ground. No sooner had it spread close enough to the young hero had Zero skated inwards. Already preparing to draw the frozen blade, hopefully through his pride. Fastlane could see the move coming a mile away and dodged the frozen weapon four or five times before whipping a leg around and knocking her over into a nearby trashcan. Suddenly a shriek was heard for at least a couple hundred yards nearby. Five survivors were making a run to closer ground to the barricades. Having lost a sixth person to a pack of melted civilians who tore the woman to pieces, they were literally running for their lives.

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!" cried the woman being torn from limb to limb.



"I'm saving those people. If you have a problem with that we can finish this later...." Fastlane stated before running off.

~KL~ / Venom

[Blackwolf]

Adrain kept walking along the fence when he saw something that was simply a little weird, namely what looked like some kind of light track out of a video game or something. Shaking his head he simply figured it was another "hero" rushing head long to his death. So Adrain turned to walk away from the fence as it seemed the longer he was near it the more likely he was going to get dragged into something he really couldn't be bothered with. Turning down the next street he looked around, there were a bunch of shops, most of them closed as normal people didn't want to wander to close to the radiation zone. Only those few who fancied them selves heroes did.

Suddenly Adrian stopped, It was feint a distant sound of a woman. She screamed in primal fear and agony as the large man looked down clenching his fist before finally punching the wall and looked back at the fence before his eyes drifted to a store front. He turned down an ally coming up to the stores back door, placing his hand on the dead bolt he closed his eyes, it was easy enough as he touched something to get it's resonate frequency and then match it. Soon that lock was literally shaking apart as the metal cracked and started to fall a part. So he simply opened up the door walking in. Running in he found a jacket, a black peacoat with a hood and looked at the price tag. Pulling out his wallet he tossed a hundred dollars on the counter as he swung the coat on zipped and buttoned it up then threw the hood up as it covered his face some what.

Now he was back at the fence hood up as he walked closer to it as a pair of guard walked up to him. "Hey you can---oooff" he was cut off by Adrian's fist pounding into his stomach as he quickly shifted and altered aiming for the bottom side of the guards jaw uppercutting as the strike raddled his skull and he lifted off the ground a few inches before falling back unconscious. The first guard was groaning a bit as Adrian turned and kicked him in the head as he rolled some also no unconscious. With that done he ran towards the make shift fence, jumping up and kicking off of a support beam he was able to grab onto the top and pull himself up kicking his legs over it landing on the other side.

The only thing going through Adrian's mind was what the fuck was he doing, these people were dead soon anyways. Adjusting his hood he grunted running down the street towards that scream and as he did he was encountering more of those shambling freaks. He had no desire to get any where near them so he simply ignored the ones that weren't to close, the ones that were he would hit with large sound waves, the concussive force knocking them back and sending them flying through the air out of his way as it wasn't long before he made it two the group for people running. He charged right into them and came out behind them as he jumped into the air and came down slamming both his hands into the ground. The air rippled as light was being contorted, like looking in the distance on a hot summer day everything seemed to shiver as well as there being a low groaning sound like that alternated in pitch softly. Soon all of the shambles behind the were sent flying back, unlike the ones before that were simply tossed, this one was an explosive force. The ones closest were being blown away in pieces as there bodies were ripped apart by powerful shock-waves. The damage got less the further it went but it still sent them flying into walls like insects on a windshield splattering and painting the walls with gore. He stood up and turned fallowing the group and resuming as he did before, using concussive waves to knock the shambles back into the air away from the people, nothing as devastating as the other one but it kept them at bay..

[Atomyk]

Ziogen said
Miss Alice Revya Rose

Dirk watched Alice questioningly as she looted the thugs' unconscious bodies. When she was finished, she looked ridiculous in her new clothing. Dirk doubted the woman was trying to make him feel better, but he found himself grinning nonetheless. "Nice," he said, his eyes flashing with amusement. "The plan sounds good to me, but les' decide on the details when we see how things look."

Keeping ahead of the others, Dirk led the group toward the quarantine. There was little discussion between them for most of the way, but Phoenix eventually spoke up about his reservations with the plan. To Dirk's relief, the other hero decided he didn't want anything to do with this. Dirk told Phoenix that they "might meet again one day" as they split up. It was still a lie. Without the healer, Dirk and Alice continued to the blockade.

Skulking in an alley, Dirk spied on the guards. There were four that he could immediately see standing before concrete blockade walls. The walls were high, higher than Dirk believed he could climb. There was a metal scaffolding behind the wall, where two more guards stood watching the street. A sudden fear that the guards on the scaffolding would see him overtook Dirk and he retreated back into the safety of the alleyway. He detected that even more guards stood directly behind the wall. He related all of this to Alice, a grim look on his face. "With my powers, I can tell you if more guards are comin' as backup, but thas' about all I can do."

[Yog Sothoth]

Tom overlooked the perimeter and repelled some of the corpses heading for the edge of the quarantine zone with a wave of spiritual energy. he looked out for more of the melted monsters that were once people, more would probably soon come and had to keep them off the police's back so they could focus on keeping the living people safe. he then looked behind himself and saw that several of the heroes were heading for the quarantine zone. he was wondering when they would show up, he flew down towards them and landed in front of them.

"The area within the quarantine zone has toxins that are deadly, you might not want to go into the area" he told them, and he wondered if they would listen to him.

[Ziogen]

Miss Alice Revya Rose
A cocky stance with her arms crossed and sunglasses half-lit through light. Her teeth were in full view, half-scowl and half-smile. It seems she wasn't only going to dress the part, but play it as well. "I'm Cheese Wiz and I dun pay no respect to fools who dun respect. Introduction, solution, resolution. Dat's how things go down. Ya warnin' the fire is hot, but we coo'. Conduu here knows whats up down there, I'm jus' here to knock down the brick walls." This was definitely different from the girl from earlier. Alice's thoughts were something along the line of 'why just dress the part?' A good disguise needed a good act. She didn't know who this guy was, so it'd be best to be careful. Was he hired to help guard the barricade? Or was he just concerned? She hadn't considered the Quarantine too dangerous, since her body was a lot more sturdy inside and out than a human's. But maybe it was? That would mean that something interesting was going down though...

[RumikoOhara]

Once Elli had committed the patrol officers and security of the quarantine to her observational skills it was child's play to walk through it without being detected or seen.
Quickly she began her penetration of the area as she sought the point of origin. She touched walls and vehicles as she went deeply into the zone allowing herself brief glimpses into the past so that she might better chose her course and avoid any deep patrols.
Her agile mind began managing the data she was collecting into a living mosaic that continued to expand in volume an depth. Elli had been called in her youth one of the most intelligent members of her field when in fact she was likely one of the top ten intellects in the world. Her IQ was beyond measuring and her memory the envy of any computer.
She didn't think of such things often as it was an unneeded distraction but so far the data she had gathered was as expected in such a disaster area.
She came upon a deceased police officer and touched his corpse drifting back in time as she followed him through his day till point of death.
Satisfied at last she'd found a small part of the puzzle she took the officer's radio and continued her entry and data gathering.
She began scanning the radio channels searching for any current data and soon found an encoded signal that to others would sound like random noise but to Elli soon began to become as intelligible as her native tongue.

[Aura]

The sounds of fights had been present to Lucina's sensitive ears for a while now but they hadn't really bothered her. There were always people fighting somewhere if you looked hard enough and a place like this there definitely were going to be a few. What made her ears take notice was the terrified scream of a woman followed by the sudden silencing of it. She couldn't help as her heard turned towards the sound and then again she heard more screaming, there were others. Others that could be silenced just like that lady had been.

Looking back at the odd man before her she frowned slightly, she couldn't help be worried about him. Maybe it was the fact that he had mentioned men in coats and maybe that reminded of her trying to protect June and failing and maybe just maybe that made her care about him. "Get out of here," She said as more as an order then a question.Then without for any reaction from him, she quickly turned into a cheetah and dashed away.

Going as fast as she could, she sprinted to where the sound had come from. Soon she could see the running group and WHAT THE FUCK WAS THAT?! There were shambling creatures going flying past her and this giant wave pushing her into a sudden stop. She looked around to see what the hell could have caused that and there she saw a man with his hands on the ground.

Well I guess all the interesting people came out to play today. Lucina thought before starting to sprint again and running towards where the group was. Without giving them time to even think holy shit there's a cheetah next to me, she sprinted in front of them and then started to jump at one of those getting less sympathetic by the moment melted creatures. Half way through the jump she transformed into a tiger and landed on the creature, making it keel over with the full weight of a 120kg tiger landing on it. She then leaped off the creature to then land on another and another, creating a pathway for the panicking people behind her.

[Omega Man]

"I can take it from here." said Fastlane running to the group of survivors around Shockwave and the apparently friendly tiger.

He created a construct piece of road that would lead them out of the quarantine zone and into the arms of some EMS crews that Fastlane had called via BlueTooth in his suit. There were the five remaining survivors from earlier and a couple more that had made their way to the group. However more and more of the melted ones began coming to the area with the most commotion and Mal had to dissipate the tracks behind the group as they headed out. There were more survivors in there, but for Mal he was already getting sick and got a taste of the pure oxygen the EMS crew had in tanks for the survivors.

The guy with the hood and the tiger had followed along with the survivors and along with Mal the three of them were kinda off to themselves away from the medical crews.

"So is the tiger like your pet or something? And doesn't anybody wear costumes to at least look like a superhero anymore? You even have a code-name Scruff McGruff?" Fastlane asked jokingly taking into account the quiet guy's 5 o' clock shadow.

The tiger kinda made Mal nervous, but in the back of his mind he knew if he was faster than anything on foot it was a big cat. Something else was on his mind however. The ice manipulator from earlier. She was some sort of hired muscle to keep the heroes out along with the police at the barricade line. There were at least two close calls in the brief meeting where she could have dealt a killing blow to the speedster's throat, and he knew it. He couldn't shake the chill, even in a suit that absorbed solar energy on a daily basis. He drifted off into his own thoughts for a few moments, pondering how a continued fight with the woman may have went. Like the intern from that Scrubs show he played out comedic scenes that could never happen in the real world. He snapped back into it after the tiger began moving around a bit. Was it a shape-shifter or something? And why wasn't the hooded guy saying anything?

~KL~

[Blackwolf]

As Adrian ran he looked over seeing a cheetah, that then turned into a tiger, which was something you didn't see every day, but he didn't have time to dwell as he brought his arms up he another blast of sound knocked a shamble to the side. That was when the costumed guy showed up and made the light bridge for every one. Well that answered that question from before, though in all honesty it was a question he didn't really care was answered or not but none the less it was answered. He did like the bridge though it was better then blowing a hole in the fence or everybody climbing up one by one. So he ran up and over coming to a stop at the end. His breath was a bit heavy but being some one in very good physical fitness it wasn't to bad, though he did take the oxygen that was offered to him. Inhaling deeply he could feel it clearing out his lungs as he turned back looking over to the fence then to the group of people. So far nobody got a good look at his face as he pulled his hood up and was getting ready to leave.

And of course the "hero" had to come talk to him. Turning his head he looked at the man, he looked to the tiger as it was mentioned then looked back over to Fastlane. He was less then amused by the "scruff gruff" reference as it was plainly written on his face, well his constant angry scowl was a bit more of an angry annoyed scowl now. Finally as if to reply he simply lifted his shoulders, turned and started walking again looking down at his watch. At this rate his errands were done for, but he might at least still get to work one time. Also he wanted to be gone before any news crews showed up seeing as he wanted even less to do with them then he did any of this.

[Atomyk]

"Uh, wha' she said," Dirk said, giving Alice a sidelong look. It was one of many that he anticipated the girl would receive from him. It was becoming quite clear she was a little odd, or at least had an interesting sense of humor. "I think."

Looking back toward the newcomer, Dirk found himself a little self-conscious. The hero had blazing red hair and was built like an ox. Compared to him, Dirk was like a tub of vanilla pudding. Clearing his throat, he said, "Anyway, I'm Conduit, an' this is... Cheese Wiz." A sudden worry came upon Dirk that the man before them was acting as a guard for the quarantine. It would make sense that some heroes would be hired to help guard the blockades and this guy looked tough enough to be one of those kinds of heroes. Even if he hadn't seemed aggressive when he had approached them, Dirk couldn't take any chances. With grim determination, his eyes locked on the redhead. "There's a friend of mine trapped in there an' I am goin' to get into this quarantine no matter what."

[Yog Sothoth]

Tom looked at Conduit with a calm expression on his face, it was understandable that the hero would want to save someone close to him and if Tom was in the same situation then he too might just throw caution to the wind. he was wondering why the girl had chosen Cheeze-Wiz as a name for her superhero identity, it sounded so childish and silly. in today's world, heroism is very dangerous and deadly. but regardless of the oddness of names, he introduced himself, "You may call me Phantom, and if you are going to rescue a friend then I shall accompany you and assist in finding the person you're looking for. where inside the quarantine zone is your friend?"

he wasn't sure if this was the right course of action, but he was a hero and true heroes made sacrifices for the good of others. he was confident that his energy reserves were high enough to keep his powers going while he went through this dangerous task, and in order to conserve energy, Tom would limit his intangibility to only doing it when it was necessary.

[Ziogen]

CHEESE WIZ
Alice didn't really pay too much attention to what they were determining. She had her job to do, so she may as well get it over with. They could do their talking inside. "You gonna do what you decide, Cheese Wiz here's gonna blow the door wide open." She leaned forward and soon was off at full velocity, carelessly cracking the earth beneath her feet. She took the first guard by surprise, smashing her hand through his hold on his gun and grabbing his face. The woman was already at the concrete blockade before they noticed something was up. Borrowing 'a bit' of the grasped guard's energy, she punched her free hand into the concrete wall and vigourously released a blast of black lightning, detonating the walls into the scaffolding and barraging the two guards. Dusty debris spread out behind her as she tossed the now-unconcious guard at one of the ones she had left behind. In the same motion and faster than they could aim for her dusty shadow, she picked up large chunks of debris and hurled them at the remaining two of the guards. Killing them wouldn't do, so she released black lightning to explode them into smaller bits of rubble half-way.

Miss Rose double-checked the guards that had been on the scaffolding, and threw two well-aimed chunks of concrete to put them to sleep. By now, she was more than familiar with what was needed to drive a man to lose conciousness. She started walking back torwards Conduit and Phantom, saluting them in the process. She made a quick stop by the guard who was bowled over by his own ally, kicking the gun out of his hand and letting loose another one against his temple to shut up him. Alice walked up to the two, feeling she had successfully hid her more private powers. All they should know for now was that she could crush concrete with her bare hands and was fast enough to put it to use. Rather than saying something about the event, she simply opened the pizza box in Conduit's hands and took another slice of pizza. "Done and done, know more guards that need to be cheesed?"

[Aura]

Seeing a sudden man run in front of her in a superhero's outfit Luciena just rolled her eyes. These guys running around in silly outfits just thought they were the best thing since sliced bread. Having abilities that most didn't have didn't suddenly make you a super hero. Yet all these people seemed to think as soon as they figured out they had super speed or whatever they had, they had to don on brightly coloured spandex and give themselves a code name.

The bridge he was constructing on the other hand, did look quite useful. Admitting that this was probably the best way out, Lucina ran over the bridge with the rest of the crowd. Reaching the bottom she could feel the affects of the contaminated area starting to get to her. She silently watched the crowd as she went over and sat next to a bush to sap some energy from it. The other 'heroes' seemed to stay with her though. That didn't really bother her till Mr.Dressed up decided to ask if she was someone's pet.

Growling annoyed at the man's joke, she instantly decided to let him know that she was in fact no ones pet or even friend here. Quickly transforming from a tiger into a her usual human form she glared at the man before her, "I'm no ones pet," She growled with still a tinge of a tigers growl left in her throat. She didn't care if she was naked or even looked unarmed, she knew if she really wanted to she could probably rip this guys throat out in a blink of an eye. In her anger she didn't seem to notice the other man turn around and start to leave.

[RumikoOhara]

At an intersection Elli found a scene straight out of a nightmare. Multiple people were being torn limb from limb as the screamed for help that never comes. She watches with a degree of detachment that even though now honed over the last several years of watching the crimes of serial killers requires she remind herself that this has now passed.
She continues to advance into the zone all the while exposed to sights that would leave others catatonic with fear. During her movement she finds and secures 15 survivors in positions she deems safe for them promising she will return.
Stopping inn an alley she listens to the conversation of one of the hazmat teams that passed this way 10 minutes ago.
So intent on gathering data her luck finally runs out as she encounters one of the sweeper teams and is ordered to halt.
Knowing that complying with their orders will end any chance of her learning how all this came about and exposing her true identity she decides to resist.
The soldiers reactions are violent an predictable as weapons rounds land all around her everyone failing to find a target due to her predictions of the fields of fire and choice of paths.
To the NBC team pressed into service Cypher's movements seem jerky and erratic as she escapes while 12 men heavily armed try to kill her.
Once out of sight Cypher takes a fox gambit type of flight that will leave even the best tracker following a false trail.

[Atomyk]

Dirk looked from the destroyed barricade to the pizza box still in his hands. Blinking, he closed the lid and tucked the box under his arm. Hey, maybe Richard would be hungry? Turning to Phantom, Dirk said, "Thanks, really, but if things get crazy in there, then don't worry abou' savin' your own skin before you go worryin' about mine."

He leaned out from the alleyway, his eyes searching for anyone still conscious. "That was awesome, Cheese Wiz, but I have to ask our new friend Phantom here..." Dirk could sense life forms rapidly approaching their position. That was some quick backup. "Can you fly me into the quarantine? My friend lives in an apartment building off of that big Tensen road. The building's called Clackson, or somethin'." Dirk paused to think, his eyes looking upward as he concentrated. "It's by the strip mall."

[DrewVonAwesome]

You remember how in those Dead Rising games, they make it seem like running around a giant horde of zombies would be fun? How you could just snag stuff from stores and use it almost to humiliate them or impede them?

Yeah… turns out its not NEARLY that fun.

Quietly Andrew Smith eyed the amp across from him in the basement, where he was when this mess started. Getting out would’ve been hard enough, so Andrew kept himself to making sure his place in the area would be safe for people. About 20 or so were in the rooms above him amongst all the battered and reboarded windows and doors. Thankfully while Andrew himself didn’t need to eat (probably something to do with his powers… at this point Andrew stopped asking questions about himself in that regard. The answers were too unnerving) but the food he had didn’t last amongst the survivors for very long. On the few times Andrew donned his costume and tried to raid any nearby stores for something edible. It didn’t go so well, sure he’d come back with bags full of stuff, but it was usually needing to run like hell.

As he had cracked open the windows to his basement, much too small for any of those… things… to get in through. Andrew stood up from the cheap metal chair. Grabbing his black and lime green guitar and cranked up the amp. Quickly beginning to belt out the opening riff to Metallica’s “Search and Destroy”. He didn’t consider the weird irony of the song choice, and had done this in the past few days to show any survivors where a safe haven was. After all, those zombie things have shown they aren’t exactly adept at playing 80’s thrash metal.

[Venom]

Zero had taken a blow, a rare thing. But not surprising considering the speed of her opponent. The force and technique of his kick had both been lacking. She stood from her, less than comfortable make shift thinking chair. She too followed along the sound of screams, thinking to possibly eliminate as many as....Low Impact...Despite earlier deciding it a wasted endeavor she found it still a stipulation too consider. She watched on for a few, but more super powered problems began to arrive. "Problematic..."

Without a delayed thought, she opted to leave. Heading back to the key location, the Ground Zero had to be cleansed first and fore most. All other objectives should be ignored for now. Her feet slid on a thin sheet of ice that seemed to form before each of her skating steps, turning alleys and walls into her own personal half pipe. The only trail she left was a light layer of condensation and stirred melted monstrosities.

[Yog Sothoth]

Tom nodded in response and said, "I can, but I will have to use my spiritual energy to hold you up, and i must warn you, the energy will feel wield since it is not made of earthly elements."

he walked over to Dirk and grabbed him by the arm. he began to surround him with green spiritual energy, and then turned to look at Cheese Wiz, "Are you coming or not?"

He wasn't very happy at the super-heroine knocking out the guards who were helping keep the ghouls back from attacking the civilians outside of the quarantine zone, but they would need all the muscle they could get. he hoped that these heroes knew what they were getting themselves into because it would be a big waste if they found Dirk's friend dead or turned into one of those flesh eating monsters and then get a deadly dose of radiation.

[Ziogen]

Cheese Wiz
She decided she might as well check it out. The guards were already down, so it'd feel half-baked to just go away now. "I'll just keep up along the ground." And now that something more interesting was afoot, she decided to just drop the persona. It's not like she had to explain anything to anyone, so it didn't really matter that much. Alice, of course, still kept her 'costume' on. There was probably going to be a lot more going on. Maybe too much for her to care about hiding anymore. "Let's go." Her words cool and lacking her earlier... vigor, it was clear enough that something was up. She broke into a brisk run past the destroyed barricade.

[Omega Man]

9:13 pm, April 3rd

Fastlane stood in complete shock for a few moments outside of the quarantine zone where EMT's and survivors were gathered around. It was one of the more low key areas outside of the zone otherwise the paid off authorities may have objected. In truth the people not directly harmed by the Tox DNA that rained over Carter Hills could still be saved. But Westman Chemicals wanted the area taken off of the map to hide their secret underground lab just under the strip mall. There they operated and probed young superhumans to try and deduce the origin of their powers and attempted to replicate them to produce their own army of super powered individuals. The shock from that being discovered is a day or two away however, the look on Fastlane's face wasn't from anything to do with survivors or melted people... it was the naked shifter in front of him that still let out a hint of a tiger's growl.

"Get some clothes on or shift into something with some fur, there could be kids around!" he said in a quieter tone as to not draw attention to the girl's nakedness.

"I can't believe the guy in the hood just walked away like that without saying a word. There's got to be more to him than that..." Mal thought before noticing a familiar tune in the night air.

[musical chords playing in the distance]

"Somebody in the zone is playing Search and Destroy by Metallica... No way the melted people are smart enough to listen to the radio... there must be more survivors." he said beneath his breath and trying not to stare at the girl.

"Listen, I think there's a chance some other survivors are trying to call out in there. If you wanna tag along you're more than welcome cause I could use the help. But please, shift into something already or get one of those nano-tech Tron-looking suits that can work with superhuman traits. I think I saw on or two other types of shifters wearing them..." he said as he built a track that ramped up over the quarantine fences and barricades.

In a blink of an eye he darted off and back into the 'zone running about thirty feet over the ground on tracks made by his suit headed toward the Metallica tune.

~KL~