KaijuBaragon

《 H. E. R. O. 》

Tom continued to brush ash and smoke off his face and out of his hair as he walked over to stand next to the others as Sam hoisted Blake over him for the rest of the journey. Tom was finally glad they seemed to be making some actual headway, even if they hadn't found the key or whatever that they needed to get into the building and save the others. It was time to head up to the basilica anyway, going after Patricia who was frantically running in that direction. Maybe the keycard was over there, and then they could finally get out of his mess and bring some hell down on the Wings of Law, those absolute bastards. Tom was pretty sure they couldn't escape what would undoubtedly be a media storm once him and the rest of the Gang got out of there.

When they finally reached the basilica, Tom was happy to see Brie and Will turn up - he didn't say anything, instead deciding to greet the pair with just a small smile. But that small smile became a grin as Brie revealed what they had brought along - it was the keycard! This mess was finally over! Just after they beat Nero up, that was. And considering Nero was outnumbered and outclassed by a significant degree, Tom didn't have any worry of the group being defeated by Nero at all. He would definitely go down fighting as all villains did, but it wouldn't be a problem. As Rumi was passed the card, Tom waited with baited breath for the doors to be opened. He thought he heard a distant thud from behind the doors, but it was probably just machinery. Tom prepared some moves in his head.

Of course, it turned out that those moves would not be needed at all, because when the doors opened they were greeted with the scene of Nero lying on the floor unconscious, and Grace sitting there with a smug look on her face. Tom blinked as he processed what the hell just happened - he was immediately disappointed that he couldn't be part of an epic fight, but that was quickly washed over with relief that half an hour or so had been shaved off their escape. Tom saw Grace, heard her speak (something about a blue bomb? He wasn't really listening) before rushing over. "Grace, are you okay? Let me just..."

Tom looked around frantically, eventually finding a boxcutter, which he proceeded to use to cut the zipties which were restraining Grace. When she was free, he immediately gave her a big hug, surprising even himself, and covering the girl with smoke and ash at the same time. He pulled away and grinned at her. "What did you do? How did you kick his ass while in your restraints? I bet it was so cool!"

@Hitman @Danvers @Scarifar

The Sisters of the Dying Branch

As the situation beside the wellspring finally began to clear up, with Summer waking up, Calypso stopping her excessive vomiting and Maggie calming down from her apparent panic attack (Charlie felt some guilt for not going over and seeing if she was okay, but he didn't know how to deal with a panic attack, and Sister Lark seemed trained and ready for that anyway), Charlie found himself looking at the scar that now adorned his wrist. It was still throbbing a bit, but much less than it had been, and it was still pretty red. Charlie wondered if he'd have it forever now, even if faint. A physical reminder of the ritual he had taken and the bond he now shared with this magical body of water in the forest. It was strange to think about.

The walk back was thankfully far more uneventful than the bonding ritual itself, Charlie finding himself glancing back a couple of times at Calypso who was carrying her vomit soaked robe over her shoulder. At least it hadn't soaked through onto the rest of her clothes, that would have been really unfortunate. He rubbed off a bit of blood that had dried on his arm as he walked, mind swimming with thoughts both about himself and about his fellow new witches. However, all his thoughts were quickly shifted asdide when the group walked out of the woods towards the house and were blasted with a wave of deafening applause from the members of the coven. Despite the stress, Charlie couldn't help but crack a smile. That was until he saw a flurry of red hair and was forced into a crushing hug by his mother.

He couldn't hear much of what his mother was saying due to the buzz of noise that was coming in from all angles, but he definitely heard words like "proud" and "achievement", so he knew that he was getting a positive message from her. But something was playing on his mind and he needed to make sure that his worry wasn't justified. So, he pulled his mother to the side and posted a question - "Mum... I know I wasn't really supposed to be in this coven. Do you think my Dad would be rather upset I'm not joining his coven?" The ginger looked uncharacteristically nervous, and his mother could tell, so she put a hand on his face and smiled at him. "I only knew your Dad for a few days. But just from those days I know that he wouldn't have cared what coven you were at. Just what kind of man you turned out to be. And he'd be proud of the man you are now." Charlie smiled and gave his mother a hug before the pair went back to the group, and Charlie went to go and grab some more food.

The evening went on, and the crowd eventually began to thin. Charlie's mother eventually left too, giving her son another hug and an embarrassing kiss on the cheek before departing with some of the other middle aged coven women, probably to go and drink some wine and talk about candles or something. Charlie gulped down some more fried okra before walking over towards the other initiates, his large bag slung over his shoulder. He was pretty excited to be spending the summer here with the others, and hoped that they were all equally as excited to be doing the same thing. If he was excited before, when Sister Lark mentioned they were going to be spending the night camping, Charlie's face positively lit up. He loved camping and doing outdoorsy stuff, and he knew lots of those outdoors camping hacks to start fires and clean water and stuff.

Charlie was a little disappointed as he arrived and found out that he wasn't going to be able to impress everyone by putting up a tent really efficiently and quickly, but sleeping under the stars was also really cool. As he saw others were vanishing into the trees to go and get changed, he went off to do the same thing, finding a secluded spot to change. He took off his hoodie, then changed from his Watford F.C kit to some Watford F.C pyjamas, a blindingly yellow t-shirt with a small logo in the corner and some black shorts. While slipping on the shirt he fell over and cursed quietly, but soon righted himself and returned to the campsite around the same time as Calypso. He chuckled good naturedly at her pig onesie before sitting down and warming his hands in the fire. He glanced over at Calypso with a smile on his face a few times before Dakota appeared.

"Oooh, ghost stories, that sounds rather fun." He heard fragments of Dakota's conversation with Calypso, and he frowned slightly. "I also know how to rig up a small fishing line, so we could perhaps go down to the creek and catch a fish to eat! While not being high, of course." He said the last part loudly.

@canaryrose @sassy1085 @Hitman

《 H. E. R. O. 》

Tom's casual float over the rubble where the dead ogres now lay didn't last very long. Partly because of the stench that was radiating off the pile of debris like a heat, and partly because he realised as he looked over that the situation was becoming a lot more urgent by the second. There were a lot more ogres than he had previously thought, and Blake was having a tougher time with that particularly aggressive vermile than someone who had superpowers really should be having. Tom thought that, if it was him, that annoying little bitey thing would probably be flying through the air right now. But he was definitely glad that it wasn't him, because from all reports he had encountered, vermite bites hurt like a motherfucker.

Tom landed next to the others as the remaining ogres began to close in. He was mentally preparing a strategy involving making one ogre tip over, then having that ogre fall onto the others like some kind of dominoes. He was trying to remember high school physics to try and work out whether this plan would actually work, when Blake suddenly decided to take things upon himself. There suddenly in the air was a spectacular looking flame phoenix. It seemed like ogres were afraid of kites as well as phoenixes, because the crowd of leftovers then went running in the other direction. But they were not fast enough, because Blake then proceeded to absolutely massacre the ogres with his phoenix. Tom put his hands on his hips, impressed.

At least he was impressed until he stepped forward to get a better look then got a face full of ash and smoke as Blake retired the phoenix. Tom coughed and spluttered, rubbing his face trying to get as much off as possible. "Son of a bitch!" He exclaimed, glancing up at his hair, which was no longer impeccably faux-messy, but which was now actually messy. But that wasn't really a concern. He heard a thud and looked down at his best friend, who had just unexpectedly collapsed to the ground. Tom looked concerned, but he wasn't nearly as concerned as Jamie, who was beginning to get quite upset.

Tom knelt down next to Blake, and put his finger on his neck. Not that he didn't trust Rumi to check, but he just wanted to personally be sure. He looked back up at Jamie. "Don't worry, , Rumi is right, he's not dead... Unless I've totally fucked up that pulse reading... Nah, he's not. But we should probably get moving. Rumi, you can grab his legs."

@canaryrose @Hitman @Scarifar

《 H. E. R. O. 》

Tom couldn't exactly say he had thought much about his strategy, it was definitely a spur of the moment thing - brick up, brick onto the ogres head, then pick up another brick, definitely a simple plan. However, it seemed that this crude plan of attack wasn't actually doing anything close to knocking the ogres unconscious and putting them out of the picture for a while, which Tom had hoped would have been the outcome. Instead, they just looked - pissed off. As pissed off as a big dumb creature that probably wasn't at all sentient could look, anyway. And then the arrival of Jamie, blasting away with her powers, only served to piss them off even more. Tom floated in the air, looking nervous as he heard Jamie and Blake plan and shout to each other below.

Then the ogres changed course suddenly, moving towards a building a little bit away as Blake began to herd them away with his fire kite. It took Tom a couple of moments to work out what the plan was, but when he realised what the pair intended to do, he let out a loud "Ooooooh!" and began to float behind the pack of fleeing ogres, pelting their heads with bricks occasionally. Luckily, this time, it seemed that the ogres weren't getting pissed off with his pelting. It seemed that they were more afraid of Blake and his fire than they were pissed off at Tom and his brick projectiles. Eventually the plan was successful and the select group of ogres were herded into the definitely shaky looking building. When they were in there, Tom floated down nearby Jamie, crossed his arms and watched.

Jamie made short work of the derelict Roman-esque building, which soon collapsed into a pile of rubble, the horrible smell of the ogres wafting up from the wreckage, which made Tom gag a little. "Bleh. Those things are fucking gross... I hope that got them." He said, bouncing a rock up and down in his hand as he watched the rubble from afar. It didn't seem to have any movement to it... But Tom thought that he ought to have a look before they were sure. He was just about to when Blake got bitten by a Vermite. "Ow, dude. You should probably go and put something on that... If we can find anything. Anyway, back in a sec." Tom glanced back at the alive ogres before floating up above the rubble, looking carefully for any signs of life.

@Hitman @canaryrose

The Sisters of the Dying Branch

Charlie shivered with excitement as the trio finally finished their walk over to the house. This was followed shortly after by the appearence of Sister Lark from within the old abode, which only made Charlie more excited. Up until now, this whole thing had almost felt as if it wasn't real. The days leading up to today had possessed a strange feeling in the air that only anticipation and excitement for a large event like this could bring. He said nothing as Sister Lark broke out the cool-looking witch robes they were going to be wearing for the ceremony, and simply walked over and grabbed one. He had a small internal debate over whether he should take off his hoodie to put it on, but decided against it, still holding onto the idea that the elders wouldn't like seeing him wearing a football shirt. So, he simply slipped it on, looking over himself to admire how it looked.

Charlie then calmly took his phone out of his pocket and put it in the designated area, double checking all his pockets again to make sure that nothing was in there, before taking off his watch and putting it there too. He nodded at Brother Lucien and Sister Claudia before joining the mass of witchlings for the first part of the walk down to the Wellspring. He was buzzing with excitement inside, but on the outside he did his best to maintain a serious, stern and determined visage. The walk down to the wellspring itself was very pretty, and he looked around admiring the setting before he felt a strange tingling wash over him - he knew with a jolt that they must be getting very very close to the Wellspring now. It was magic rushing through his body.

And then, they were at the wellspring. It was a gorgeous blue lake... well, it was more of a pond, Charlie noted internally, but still, it was indeed very gorgeous. He took his spot quickly, kneeling on one of the red pillows that were strewn about by the side of the wellspring. His eyes immediately glanced down to the dagger. Huh... That was odd.. He hoped they weren't having to prepare a potion or anything for this, that could cause some trouble. And then Sister Deborah went and revealed the nature of the ritual - they were going to have to cut themselves, and spill some blood into the cup, then into the wellspring. And then drink the potion, and then it was done.

Charlie inhaled and exhaled deeply as he pondered the task. He didn't want to cut himself or anything, but that was the task at hand. He carefully filled up the vial, shaking it a little, before inhaling and exhaling again. Then he brought the knife across his wrist, immediately feeling weary, but with steely determination, let it drip into the wellspring for a moment before holding it over the vial, glancing at the changed mixture before quickly moving his hand away, bringing the cup to his lips and drinking deep.

The feeling came immediately, washing over him like a churning ocean wave. He could see bright lights flashing in his vision, which only made the feeling stronger. He felt himself lean back against the soil, and for a moment, it felt as if the rocks and the soil were moving around him. Then the feeling changed. It was painful, so painful, and he was writhing, fleeing from some unknown magical enemy as the deep strange pain ran over him in excruciating waves.

After around 20 seconds, it suddenly went away. Charlie sat up suddenly, realising he was holding and brandishing a stick, and that his arm was still bleeding profusely. He quickly put his hand over it and did some quick healing magic. The wound closed up, but it was still red and hurt like hell - he wasn't great at healing magic. He then became acutely aware of the sound of someone throwing up. He glanced to see Calypso throwing up everywhere, feeling a deep swell of pity for the girl.

He then heard the familiar derisive laughter of Sumner, and some mocking comments from her. He was about to give her a tutting and a stern when she fell over and fainted. Well, serves her right for mocking Calypso in this hour, Charlie supposed. He then looked down in alarm as he saw a girl lying face down in the water, but breathed a sigh of relief as he saw the person suddenly move, coughing, revealing themselves to be Rebecca. He nodded and agreed with her statement.

”Yes, that was certainly… An experience.” He looked down at his still painful and red arm, his face looking even paler than usual. ”I do wonder how much blood I lost… and why is Calypso regurgitating everywhere?”

@blackdragon @canaryrose @Danvers

《 H. E. R. O. 》

Tom was only vaguely listening as Will seemed to take charge of the planning aspect of things, dividing everyone up into groups. He did roll his eyes out of view when he heard Will place himself in a group with Brie... Of course he did that. Tom looked over, nodding. Himself, Blake and Sam. That was a pretty solid group... They were totally going to kick ogre ass with that group. Tom still couldn't believe that he was going to have to fight fucking ogres... But this was a world with giant birds and walking plants, so he probably should have expected ogres to come up at some point. Italian ogres, no less... Tom wondered for a moment if they could be lured with pizza, but then he remembered they did not have access to any pizza, or even meatballs. He looked over as some other people also woke themselves up and came over. Patty, Jamie, Angie.

And then, suddenly, Will decided to change the layout of the groups. Tom wasn't sure why he was just letting Will dictate who should go where, it was just Will after all, not like they were trapped here with Powers or Christina. But he was too tired to argue. Now he was with Will, who put himself with Brie again (of course), and Tom tagging along as a third wheel of sorts. "Yeah, sure, whatever, sounds good." He said, running his hands through his messy brown hair. He heard Blake's voice doing something to the TV, then turned his head suddenly as he heard the now familiar voice of Nero pop back up on the screen.

Tom went deathly pale, as he watched a jolt of electricity run through Grace's tied up body and wake her up with, well, a jolt. That was of course before she went on a loud and uninterrupted explanation about how the reason they were stuck in this sticky situation was the fucking Wings of Law. Tom cursed. "Seraph is dead. He's so dead, I'm gonna beat the shit out of him when we get out of here... I knew he was a fucking crook, but I didn't think he'd stoop to kidnapping and hiring villains who run electric shocks through innocent people!" And speaking of which, Nero then decided to run an even larger jolt through Grace, and another through the tiny Eliza. Tom yelled something indecipherable before whipping his head around to the others.

At this point, the notion of Will's plan had completely left his mind. He looked at Will and simply said "No time for a plan, we just have to rush them!" before following Brie out of the room, intending on going and helping Blake. He arrived just in time to see that Blake was apparently making the ogres go on the retreat. He looked around, grabbing a couple large pieces of marble off the ground before floating up and closer to the lumbering ogres - being careful to avoid Blake's fire kite - before sending the pieces down towards the heads of the ogres with as much force and use of his powers as he could muster. "Take that, and that! You ugly bastards! Take that!"

@Hitman @Infinite Cosmos @Danvers

The Sisters of the Dying Branch

Charlie smiled as Maggie accepted the offer of walking up to the Coven house with him and Summer, quickly standing up and joining the two after taking one last sip from his water glass that was sitting on the table. He arrived just in time to see Summer, hopefully genuinely, complimenting Maggie's dress. Charlie smiled warmly and nodded, definitely making sure to hammer home the point that his compliment was 100% genuine. "Oh, yes, it definitely suits you, Maggie... Certainly apt for this, I mean, it is probably the biggest day of our lives so far... Rather frightening to think about, isn't it?" He mused, joining the girls in his walk. He knew it was a bit of a risk bringing Summer and Maggie together for this brief, in regards to their conflicting personalities, but so far, it seemed to be going well. Summer hadn't been snippy to Maggie, which was good.

Charlie enjoyed spending time with Summer, but it wasn't as if he was completely naive to what she could be like. While originally they had bonded loosely over the fact that they were both ginger in a region that generally had very few of them, it seemed Charlie was one of the few that actively put up with Summer whenever they were brought together for coven purposes. Perhaps it was the fact that she'd never actually been rude to him... at least not when he was around. But Charlie was also a believer in the idea that people are generally nice at heart, and he hoped that Summer was no different. But even then, he did have the slight worry that by being one of the few people that would willingly spend time with her, he might be associated with her and the comments that she made, and he didn't want that. Especially when she did things like insult the clothes of people nearby.

Charlie winced subtlety, and he looked down at Maggie for a second, before back at Summer. In a loose attempt to stop Summer talking about people that way, he responded - "Well Summer, I do suppose it doesn't really matter what people are wearing no? I mean, it's not as if the elders are going to be judging us on our attire... And if they did, that would be rather inappropriate of them, too." He said, trying to put things as gently as possible. Things went silent for a moment, before he became aware of Maggie talking to him. He looked down at her, catching her eyes taking glances at his fiery hair, to which he glanced back at the golden sun for a moment.

"That's a good question... The landscape of this region doesn't lend well to large lakes, so it's probably smaller, tucked away somewhere... Like, a pond, or something like that." Charlie's face changed, which meant that he was about to ramble on about some vaguely related fact. "I've heard there's a wellspring in Tibet that is right on the top of a mountain, so all the witchlings have to learn how to fly a bit, you know, like Dakota can... And then there's apparently a very interesting one in Ethiopa that you can only get to after travelling through a deep dark cave for several hours... But I doubt our one is anything as extreme as those..."

@Danvers @Melissa

《 H. E. R. O. 》

The following events had come to fruition over the course of a few months of planning.

The first and the most easy had been to find a location for the event to take place. It had to be somewhere that was large, but also tucked away enough that people wouldn't come looking once the alarm was raised. It also needed to be fairly close to Club 27. After a week of covert searching after his kidnapping of the ICOSA, Caustic had located an abandoned recording studio in Kingsdale. It was slated for redevelopment in September, but that didn't matter - it was going to be done before that date anyway, some time during the Summer was best for an idea like this. Lot's of parties and events for the villain to pick and choose from, there was plenty of variety. And then, the next simple decision was choosing what exact date to use. Fourth of July came pretty naturally - so many people would be launching fireworks, so if gunshots did occur, the sound of them would be masked by the vast swathes of idiots gleefully celebrating their holiday.

The second task had been tracking the security detail of Caustic's quarry. Like the first task, it had been surprisingly easy. They were just normal people, buff people with guns and combat training granted, but normal unpowered people. And what's more, Caustic was going to take them completely by surprise. After that, he spent a little bit of time staking out Club 27, the locations of outside security cameras and things like that. If he was seen on the night and the alarm was raised then the whole plan might collapse. The next task was the one that was actually somewhat difficult - Caustic had to find himself some broadcasting equipment, and then work out how to use said equipment to hijack broadcasts elsewhere. After scoping out a few locations, he settled on some shitty Castleburg news station that was pretty much bankrupt. He didn't even have to rob it - he simply paid some grunt from Brookside some money to go and purchase the equipment off them for an offer they couldn't refuse. The 2 months or so after that was spent with Caustic figuring out exactly the broadcast was going to function. He cracked it a week before the Fourth of July.

So, on the Fourth of July, Caustic was currently sitting in an apartment opposite Club 27, looking across with some binoculars. The loud booming music coming from the club and the steady stream of worthless celebrities and heroes he could see going inside only made the villain more irritated and more determined. He knew he was going to be sitting here for a while, perhaps until the early hours of the morning, until his quarry left the party, likely inebriated, high, or both. Perhaps he would be with some young woman picked up at the party. But that didn't matter - like the security detail of his target, this theoretical individual would be expendable. The hours ticked by and by, and Caustic didn't move from his spot by the window until 1am. It was then that he spotted his target walking out of the club to a car parked nearby. Three men in dark suits also got into the car a couple seconds later. It was time to move.

He knew the route the car would take - it was a simple matter of intercepting it. Luckily, he had long figured out the shortcut to a place where he could intercept the car easily. After reaching the spot, and after about a minute, he heard the noisy car making its way down the road. As soon as he saw it turn the nearest bend. He stepped out suddenly in the road. The car, reacting to this sudden pedestrian, swerved suddenly, but the driver was clearly not ready for this, and instead the car slammed into Caustic sideways. Or at least, it would have, had the villain not turned on his powers just before the impact. Caustic stood unbothered in the road as the car went right through him, which left a massive hole in the car, and one of the security men in the car completely corroded. It veered again, crashing into a wall. Caustic stepped up to the car. The driver was dead. One security man was left, who quickly leapt out of the car and reached for his gun. Caustic quickly put him down with a single touch to the face. Then he peered into the car at the terrified, rainbow haired man sitting there.

"Hello, Rainbow Dancer. Enjoy your party?" He sneered, before, pulling the struggling Wings of Law member from the car.

---

It was now 9:30am the next day. Rainbow Dancer had been taken cared for well enough, considering. Caustic had given him some water and locked him in a room, pocketing his phone. No doubt the news of the crash of his car and the disappearence of the well known hero was all over the news right now, a situation which was perfect for Caustic. Rainbow Dancer had tried to use his powers to escape from the room on multiple occasions, but they were far too weak for that, and besides, he was too old. He had also tried yelling, and at one point threatened to sue Caustic. He laughed to himself, putting the finishing touches on the equipment. As the clocked passed the aforementioned time, Caustic got up and opened the door. "Come with me. Now." Rainbow Dancer made a dash to escape, but Caustic calmly grabbed his arm and delivered a painful burn. Not enough to cause any lasting injury, just a reminder of the fact that he should probably be obedient.

Caustic marched Rainbow Dancer into the studio's lobby, where the natural morning light was filtering in through the windows. "Kneel down over there. In front of the camera." Rainbow Dancer spat. "For the last fucking time, let me go. You can have all the money you want. You can even have publicity, I could get you exclusive membership of our club, and all the girls you w-" Caustic laughed loudly and sneered. "I don't want any of that. Right now, I just want you to kneel. I'm not going to ask again." At that, Rainbow Dancer kneeled, still looking annoyed, but still quite confident, as if he thought this would just be some minor inconvenience he would have to deal with today. Caustic then marched to the camera, then another device, and flicked a couple of switches.

All around Castleburg, many TVs began to glitch and flicker, changing from whatever programmes they were broadcasting to the view of the pissed looking Rainbow Dancer kneeling in a dusty lobby. "Are you recording this? What the fuck are you-" Caustic shushed him off camera, before stepping into view himself, donned in his usual gas mask. "Some of you might know who I am already. Those who do, please inform those who don't. Today, I join you with a symbol of corruption." He gestured downwards. "Rainbow Dancer. I imagine many of you probably idolise this man. Those with powers and those without - because he is a hero." He said the last word with almost unheard of contempt.

Rainbow Dancer called out. "Damn right I'm a hero, and you're a fucking psycho, I'll kick your ass!" Caustic gave him a swift punch to the back of the head, and ignored him. "But the truth of the matter is - there is nothing moral about hero work. All it does is protect the lazy and the weak from those who have been given gifts. And we live in a world where those gifts have been watered down and regulated by organisations like H.E.R.O. And ICOSA. But I could ramble on and on about what I think about H.E.R.O. This particular meeting is a demonstration about how those you hold up as standards of heroism and morality are more corrupt than anyone. I am honest. I do not hide my intentions. Unlike Rainbow Dancer here. How can you call yourself a hero after what happened to Riptide Boy?"

The colour seemed to flush from Rainbow Dancer's face. "Why don't you tell the good people of Castleburg what really happened with Riptide Boy?" When Rainbow Dancer still remained silent, Caustic pressed a finger to the back of his neck and delivered a searing burn that made the hero scream. Tell them. Tell them now, or I can promise you far more pain than he endured." Of course, Caustic didn't give a fuck about Riptide Boy, or that whole incident. But why not use that situation to further his goals. After 20 or so seconds of searing heat, Rainbow Dancer relented, and screamed - "Fuck, fuck, alright! I beat him, okay! I beat him, I beat him half to death, broke half the bones in his face, then left him by the side of the road to d-die!"

Caustic released the finger on Rainbow Dancer's neck, grinning under his mask. "Thank you for your confession. And now, your reward." Caustic pulled something out of his pocket - a small Wings of Law logo pin. Caustic held it in his bare hand for a moment, squeezing it. When it was shown to the camera next, it seemed to be glowing a sickly shade of green. Rainbow Dancer looking up at it nervously. "A... A pin? What are you gonna do with-" Before he could finish, Caustic dropped the pin.

As soon as it hit the top of Rainbow Dancer's head, a sick sizzling sound could be heard. He didn't even have time to scream before the life slipped from his eyes, and a few seconds later, the pin dropped from the bottom of his jaw. "Heroism with class, hm? I advise all heroes, especially those with exceptional public reputations, to be careful. This will not be the last broadcast." Caustic stepped out of view after saying that, footsteps approaching the camera, which was still looking at Rainbow Dancer's body.

A few seconds later, the broadcast fizzled out, and returned the people of Castleburg to their normal broadcasting schedules.

《 H. E. R. O. 》

Tom was still feeling annoyed as he stomped inside the house, planning on get another beer from one of the various coolers that had been strewed around the house... Or maybe he would get something from Soda Boy, something stronger. If he was an idiot for downing a couple beers, he may as well drink a lot more, because he couldn't become more of an idiot, right? "Stupid Grace... Idiot..." Tom muttered to nobody in particular. On his way to Soda Boy he spotted Sam waving at him, and Tom put on a smile and waved back happily. After what seemed like ages he could not locate the soda based hero, so Tom simply sighed and made his way over to a cooler to grab another beer, before getting into a conversation with some other random hero he didn't know the name of.

Soon enough it was time for fireworks, and Tom made sure to stand far away from Grace as he watched them, cheering and whooping and saying vaguely patriotic things as he watched the fireworks explode in the sky, getting very into the whole mood of the celebration. He had already downed his beer by the time that Blake's personal fireworks display was over, so as soon as it was he went in and grabbed another, waning the hours away drinking and talking to random people, some of which he didn't even really like at all. He was also trying to avoid Grace, the booze only making him more and more annoyed at her as time went on. But he tried to put that to the back of his mind and enjoy the night.

At least, he was enjoying the night. That was until the orange mist began to spread through the room. Tom frowned and looked around. "Oh, what... What is this? It's all orange!" Tom exclaimed before he joined the fellow patrons of Blake's party and passed out, falling backwards onto the carpet.

---

Tom awoke suddenly, lying on his side. He opened his eyes slowly, noticing that he was lying next to someone with long blonde hair. He felt sick to his stomach. Wait, no, god, no, he hadn't had he?! He sat up quickly, realising that he was not in his bed, or any bed, he was lying in a cold stone room. Firstly, he was relieved that he hadn't done what he feared he might have just done. But that was immediately washed over with the fear of where the fuck was he, and what the fuck was going on? He heard a voice and glanced over, seeing Blake with his fiery red hair all sticking up, muttering. "Dude, what the fuck is going on, where are-"

But Tom was immediately cut off by the sudden pompous voice coming from the TV, and as the whole speech began, Tom came to the realisation that they were, to put it lightly, in deep shit. They had been kidnapped by a supervillain! A fucking supervillain had come to the party and somehow kidnapped them all! He seemed to forget the memory of the orange gas. Maybe Grace was right, maybe if he hadn't been drinking he wouldn't have been kidnapped. Maybe he was an idiot... Tom didn't really listen to much of Nero's speech as he looked around to see who was here with them. Looked like the whole gang was here: Jamie, Patty, Brie, Rumi, Will, Angie, that guy he vaguely knew who went by Alpha.... Minus Eliza and Grace. They must of got out. Of course they did, they weren't drinking.

Tom glanced at the screen again just in time to see the screen change to the view of Grace and Eliza chained up. Tom stood up immediately, angry. "What the FUCK? YOU BASTARD!" He yelled at the screen angrily, just in time before the screen turned to black. Tom's head was spinning. Just a few months after they had gotten away from the mob by the skin of their teeth, now they were all stuck in this bizarre... Wait, what was this place, some kind of weird Roman city? He hadn't been listening all that much during the meat of Nero's speech... And did Rumi just say OGRES?

"Fucking what now? Ogres? Ogres?! And they travel in fucking PACKS! PACKS?!" Tom exclaimed, putting his head in his hands for a moment, joining Rumi in looking at the map over Blake's shoulder. "Just how resistant are these ogres, can I just make them fly up and then fall down and then splat? They're just like big idiots right, can we like trick them or something?" Tom spouted out of a lot of ideas, before pointing towards the place Rumi had identified as the bath. "We could go there... If there is water then Will will be more powerful, and all of us need to be the most powerful we can be, if we're gonna be fighting fucking ogres.... Shit."

@DClassified @Hitman @Scarifar @Danvers

《 H. E. R. O. 》

The happy smile that was on Tom's face due to seeing Grace and walking over to her was wiped off his face in a split second as Grace immediately insulted him for being drunk. He took a step back, looking genuinely wounded at her comments, before he crossed her arms at the softening of her tone. It was too late for that, thought drunk Tom, as he looked at Grace with a slight frown, simply pretending that Rumi wasn't there even when Grace attempted to make some small talk with him. "It's a party, I'm allowed to drink at a party, and especially a party hosted by my best friend. That doesn't make me an... an idiot." He chewed on the last word, looking at Grace as severely as he could while tipsy.

And then he was suddenly interrupted by a fairly drunken Joseph, who seemed to take it upon himself to barge in and give him some, what, advice? On how to deal with the situation? There wasn't even a situation to deal with, Tom thought to himself indignantly as he looked at Joseph. "I don't know what you're talking about, Joe... Stuff being lost, room temperature, you're not making sense, I don't need you to tell me about... stuff. There isn't even any stuff. So juuuust..." Tom moved Joseph's hand off his shoulder as gently as he could for a drunk person. "Go back to drinking, I don't need any advice, I don't even have stuff to advise on! Especially not from you, alcoholic..."

Tom was then distracted by a familiar voice, and he saw Jamie suddenly running at full speed and entering herself into 6 cartwheels of a moderately decent quality. Tom laughed and cheered her as she cartwheeled along before dunking into the pool, Tom feeling some of the water fly out and splash him. But he didn't really care, it was just water after all. The smile from his face went again when he looked at Grace. "Whatever... If you don't wanna talk to me just because I drink, then fine. I'm allowed to have fun, but I guess being fun makes you an idiot!" He said coldly before turning on his heels and walking over to the pool, snickering as he looked down at Jamie.

"I don't know whyyy you did that, but it was awesome... Next time you should do seven... No, eight! Yeah, eight... High five, anyway!" Tom crouched down and gave her a hearty high five before standing up and walking back past Grace, Joseph and Rumi and back towards the house, seeking out another drink, and maybe someone else to talk to. Hopefully someone that wouldn't care if he'd had a couple of drinks... Yeah, someone more fun, that he didn't have to know all about quantum physics or whatever to be worthy of talking to.

@Hitman @Scarifar @Rabidporcupine @canaryrose