Young Bloods(IC, Reboot Open)

[Scotatrova]

Diego Belcourt

Diego ran for his life. This felt familiar, it was, he realized with some despair, that its something he had to do way too often. Diego was lean and fit, but he was not a good runner. Eluding hot pursuit had never been on his list of things to enjoy before he got old. Nevertheless, he ran. He paused only once, to turn back in wonder at the men and women on motorized machines who came tearing out of nowhere. The motor sounds faded a bit, and Diego felt a splinter of relief that those newcomers were not chasing him. The others, though...Mary, and Ruben. They could be anywhere out here, and Mary had already demonstrated that she was capable of moving like a ghost. Diego dropped into a low squat and listened. He was a very good listener, with sharp senses that he’d honed for months. The motor sounds were far away, and the sounds of the city had already begun dying down. The sounds of the motors were long gone, and there was nothing...until, there was something. He held his position. The sounds were louder now. Whoever was sneaking around was coming his way. A man suddenly emerged twenty feet in front of Diego. But he was facing the other way. Diego froze and stared at the stranger. And strange he was. The man was short and broad-shouldered, with huge biceps like soccer balls, a freakishly overdeveloped chest, and almost no neck at all. He wore the same black clothes as the people on the motorbikes. The man started to turn, and Diego slipped soundlessly behind a car, certain that he hadn’t been spotted. A pair of angel wings had been carefully embroidered on the man’s shirt, and around his neck was a chunky steel chain. The big man stood listening to the night, much as Diego had done. His face was harsh and grim, but then a small smile formed on his thin-lipped mouth. “No sense hiding,” said the angel as he brought a scythe up and made a slow, deliberate cut through the night air. “Hiding will only make it hurt more.”

The angel cut the air with the scythe again and again. With each pass he called out in a gravelly voice. “Hiding only makes it worse. The darkness wants to take you. Give in to it and there is only beauty. A touch is all, and then you are free. Free!” Diego held his breath. The angel listened to the silence and shook his head. “Struggle against it and you beg for pain.” It was clear that the angel did not know exactly where he was; he kept turning, shouting to different parts of the surrounding block. It was a trick, and not a very good one, Diego mused. No one would be crazy enough to fall for it. Then a second man stepped out on the far side of the street. It was Ruben. His clothes were torn and splashed with blood, and his hair and eyes were wild. He looks like he’s just been through hell, Diego thought. And he wondered where that girl Mary was. When the angel saw Ruben, he nodded approval. “Smart choice, brother. This angel honors you and offers the gift of darkness to end your suffering and—”

“Skip the sales pitch, ‘Brother’ Andrew.” Ruben pointed his shotgun at the angel’s chest. “I’m not interested in anything you have to say. I’m going to give you one chance, because you used to be my friend. Drop the cutter and walk away. Leave me and mine in peace.”

“Peace?” The angel, Brother Andrew, shook his head, and Diego thought there was real regret in his face. “There is no peace left on earth, Ruben. You of all people should know that. How many have you lost to mundanes? Your first wife? Your son? Your sister? How many more do you have to see executed before you understand that earth no longer belongs to mankind and their so called protectors?”

“I don’t want to hear it.”

“We’ve been called home, brother,” insisted Andrew. “Mother Lilith has shown us the way.”

“She's a murderer, and she's brainwashed the whole bunch of you into believing in some crazy made-up god and a bunch of lunatic ranting. She's blinded you with this darkness nonsense.”

“No,” said Andrew, “she's opened our eyes and our hearts to the truth.”

“What truth? All you do is kill.”

“No!” said Andrew, looking hurt and surprised. “We don’t ‘kill.’ Why can’t you get it through your head that its the will of our god. He has reached out his hand to erase the mistake of ‘life.’”

“‘Mistake’? Life is the only thing that matters.”

Andrew shook his head. “No. God—the true god—meant for mankind to leave the physical form and transition into the formlessness of the darkness. That was his will, his plan for the redemption of everyone.”

Ruben shook his head. “Horse crap.”

“There are maggots crawling on the festering corpse of this world,” countered Andrew. “Everyone who draws breath does so in defiance of the will of God.”

“You still seem to be sucking air, Andrew.”

The angel placed one hand over the wings on his chest. “The angels are the holy priests of our god. We have been asked to remain here and usher the last of the lost—the last of those like you who refuse to believe—into the darkness.”

“Sure. By murder. Very compassionate of you.”

“But it is compassion, Ruben. The true god has revealed himself and is calling us home, Ruben, he’s offering us freedom from bondage.”

“Through murder?” demanded Ruben.

“It’s not murder—it’s euthanasia, and it’s sanctioned by God.”

“You’re insane. All of you.” Sadness darkened Brother Andrew’s face. He let out a long, weary sigh. “I tried, Ruben,” he said sadly. “Because we have history, because we’ve been like brothers, I tried.” Ruben pointed the shotgun at Andrew’s face. “Sure, and because we were friends I’ll give you a chance, Andrew. Drop the cutter and get your ass into the wind and we’ll call it quits here.” The angel gave a sad shake of his head. “I’ll bet you don’t have any shells left. Otherwise you’d have given me the gift of darkness.” Ruben snugged the stock of the shotgun into his shoulder. “Want to find out?”

“Yes,” replied the angel earnestly. “I want to die. How can you still not get that? So either pull the trigger or put the gun down and join us.”

“I’m taking Mary away from here. You won’t have to worry about us ever again.”

“Well, let me tell you something—Sister Mary is nuts. I mean really out of her mind.” Andrew shook his head.

“You don’t even know what you’re talking about.”

“The offer stands,” said Andrew, “but the clock’s ticking on my patience.”

Ruben studied him, and Diego could see doubt in the man’s face, but there was anger, too. Much more of that.

“Go to hell,” said Ruben.

Brother Andrew sighed. “So be it,” he said. “Such is the mercy of Cernunnos that even with blasphemy on your lips the darkness welcomes you.”

There was a sudden flash of silver, and Ruben cried out and staggered forward. His finger jerked the trigger of the shotgun, and the hollow click told the story the angel had already guessed. The weapon fell from Ruben’s hands as he thumped down hard on his knees. That was when Diego saw what had struck the man. An arrow. It had flown out of behind where Diego crouched and buried itself between Ruben’s shoulders. “No...,” Ruben gasped. But the answer was a dreadful “yes” as a second arrow punched into Ruben’s back not a finger’s breadth from the first. The last word Ruben managed to say was, “Mary.” Then he fell forward. Despite everything he had learned, Diego cried, “No!” The angel with the scythe turned his head sharply toward the spot where Diego crouched. And smiled.

[Charmera]

July 24

Wyatt's eyes widened a bit as Cass transformed into a much larger and more armored version of herself, complete with giant arm cannon. Why she was using her much more powerful mode for a casual sparring match rather than the much more intense one they had a few days ago was beyond him. This time she opened up with a much more powerful blast than the ones she used earlier. He was quickly starting to get sick of having to fight machines. He closed his eyes and braces for the plasma. It stung. Like hundreds of wasps had decided to sting along his arms and bits of his chest. "Ah!" He hissed, staggering a bit and giving a death glare when he opened his eyes. Gotta get rid of that gun.

Gritting his teeth, Wyatt charged at her with inhuman speed. Aiming to tackle the android and wrestle the cannon away. Cass wasn't lying. She really did intend to win this time...

Did she just hold a grudge?

As she regained her bearings, she noticed Wyatt had done the same. CASSANDRA's shots were now just annoying, unable to really do much against his armored skin. Despite his size, he charged with remarkable momentum and within seconds was about to close the gap between the two. "No we don't..." she said under her breath. She wasn't sure how effective her fire attacks would be against him, but she had to try. Mere feet in front of Cass, Shi spewed forth a large wall of bright blue fire to protect her teammate. She, at the very least, hoped that it would throw him off.

Calculations were problematic. Her current data suggested that despite her sudden change in power, her strength would not be enough to overpower Wyatt in a pure fist fight. This was a concerning development, but that did not mean she did not have means. Her battle form was quite likely to be tough enough to allow her to take some of the hits Wyatt is able to dish out, in fact, she more than likely had the edge in sheer endurance, while she could use strategic opportunities to blast Wyatt with increasing levels of power.

Shi's intervention gave Cass a prime opportunity to put her strategy into action. The fire was going to slow Wyatt, no matter what, though whether it was by a microsecond or something more substantial was the question. Cass decided to take another risk and pointed her cannon at the ground between the flame wall Wyatt would soon cross and herself. Her current form allowed her a lot more flexibility with her projectiles, so she decided to dump as much energy as possible into a concussive beam, rather than a plasma blast. It would more than likely push her back too, but that was a negligible drawback. If all went to plan, it would send the draconic hero flying.

[Charmera]

Casimir Herman
After a few minutes, Casimir's breath began stabilizing into a smooth rhythm as he straightened his back. Like a wet dog he shook his wet face to get rid of the dribbling liquid but instead of water it was a bright red curtain of blood. Checking himself out he wasn't that injured sans some spots on his chest that were the definition of sore and bruised. Once his eyesight was cleared Casimir began to the tower's infirmary. He wasn't particularly worried about his wounds as his regeneration could easily take care of them but he'd vastly preferred not being injured so seeing Jacob would have to take priority. His wounds were also covered with concrete dust and he'd prefer someone who knew what they were doing to clean them then his meager first aid skills.

As he neared the infirmary, his thought wondered to his recent defeats. First was that alternate spider version of him, next was the juggernaut, and now recently....Scott. This wouldn't do. This humiliation will not be set aside thought Casimir as a fierce scowl covered his face. He had to become stronger! Much stronger....but the facilities at the Tower wouldn't do as they were designed for normal strength people. He had his makeshift set of weight made of trees he fell but they were quite crude and he needed something more sophisticated. Something more challenging. Maybe he could talk to Naja to see if her connections could add something to the training room. That could be one route he could take Entering the infirmary, he peeked his bloody head and spotted Jane organizing the infirmary's cabinets filled with supplies.

"Hello, Jane right?," asked Casimir with a calmer expression overtaking his face, "Mind having me as your first patient of the day?" He gave a lighthearted grin at her hoping the large gash on his forehead, light covering of concrete dust over his clothes, and several bruises weren't too much of a shock.

"Yes?" Jane replied as she turned around, then noticed the gash on his head and she sighed with a concerned frown. "How the hell did you get that?" She asked, gently grabbing his head and inspecting the gash. "It doesn't look too bad. Just needs a clean and a bandage. I'll have to see if you have any other wounds though." She commented, leading the young man to a bed while she got some mild soap and water for a rag for cleaning the wound. She also prepared a sterile cloth to staunch the bleeding. She was also going to need some ice.

She didn't know much about Casimir, and ever since she got to this position she had been meaning to learn more about the team. Hopefully now she would get a little bit more of a sense about him.

"Let me know if you get dizzy or anything." She spoke as she cleaned his wound. Shen the put the sterile cloth to his head and ordered him to keep pressure applied to it while she looked him over. It seemed he had bruises and some minor burns.

"How'd you get these wounds, if you don't mind me asking?"

[The Republic of Atria]

Cass

Sina

July 23, Raid

Jason jumped forward, just above the power suited thug, landing on the machine with both feet and kicking. The force staggered the juggernaut but sent back back far quicker. He recovered quicker by landing on his hands and flipping backwards. "Okay, those things are built pretty solid. But let's see if you can even touch me!" Jason taunted. The juggernaut aimed the palm at his hand and fired the blast, but Jason was already out of the way, having flung himself across the room, swing around a support beam and sticking to another wall. Well punching this stupid hunk of metal and lasers isn't gonna work. Come on Wyatt. Shake off the concussion...

Wyatt blinked a few times. There was a dull ache in his back and a visible dent in the metal and he hit it. He started to push himself back up with his left arm, still a bit dizzy when Sina came over and... told him how awesome he was? Definitely a bit out of place at the moment. She was carrying some sort of energy weapon, though obviously unsure of how to use it. "Uh... Thanks. Really. We can talk later. Please just make sure you hit the giant metal target and not one of us. Augh, dammit. Juggernaut is a good name. See if you can hit the back. I don't know what it is, but it looks glowy and important. Might be the battery. Jason and I will try to hold it still as best we can. And uh... Hell will be given."

"Who taught you to aim? Your husband?" Jason taunted as he jumped out of the way of another blast.

"Shut the hell up!"

"I'll stop talking when you hit me! Which, to be frank, you're pretty shit at. You're also bad at situational awareness."

Wyatt grabbed the juggernaut from behind, lifting it off it's feet, his arms wrapped around the suit's arms and chest. He squeezed with all of his might, the metal creaking and bending just a bit under the dragon's massive strength.

"Let me go you lizard fuck!" The pilot shouted. Come on you piece of shit. Gimme something I can use... Thrusters on the bottom of the suit roared to life, sending both of them into a wall, knocking Wyatt off. "It flies too?! Holy shit this thing is fucking awesome! Come here slime boy!" He shouted, launching towards Jason, only for Wyatt to grab a hold of his left leg, pulling him back down. "You AGAIN!? That's it!" He increased the power to the thrusters, burning Wyatt's bface, and freeing him, but the extra power made him loose control and flop to the ground. "Alright. Where're you at-"

Jason had a few seconds to look for something he could use. Spying a forklift that looked to be gathering dust, he smiled as the Juggernaut looked for him. Shooting his strands at the forklift and swinging it with all of his might. "CHOO CHOO! ALL ABOARD THE PAIN TRAIN!" Jason shouted , sending the forklift careening at the juggernaut, smashing it into the suit and against the wall. "Get absolutely FUCKED on you stupid piece of shit." He huffed.

The moment of celebration was short lived as the Juggernaut grabbed the forklift and tossed it away like it was a paper ball. "Huh. This thing is tough."

Jason spotted Sina with a glowing weapon and started connecting the dots. The arms. We gotta grab the arms.

Wyatt stood back up, a small singe between his eyes from the thruster, but still kicking. The juggernaut spotted him getting back up, and fired blast blasters at Wyatt who braced for impact. He was still standing, his talons digging into the ground as he was slowly pushed back by the immense force of the beams.

Jason moved quickly, shooting two more strands of his goo at one of the arms and yanking as hard as he could. Enough to pull it off balance and stop the blasters. The Juggernaut tried to grab a hold of the strands Jason was pulling on, only to have Wyatt grab hold of his free arm and pull it away. "SINA!"

July 24, Sparring

Jason was somewhat impressed at how skilled Shi actually was. Using her powers in a way that wasn't just spraying and praying. Instead, launching a blast of super heated air from her legs that incinerated his strands and forced him to jump away and reposition. Whatever doubt he had that she was trained well before joining the Young Bloods was burned away. The expert back flip solidified that much without a doubt. Okay, so she's actually pretty good at this. Too good. Alright. Time to get a little rough. Just hold on another second Wyatt. Ya boy has a plan. His draconic partner seemed to wind up a bullet sponge quite often. Jason sprung into action to help his friend.

Wyatt was caught off guard when Shi got in front of Cass ad started spraying him with fire. The fire was hot enough that he backed off, still braced, not expecting a blast of force the knocked him on his back. God dammit! He groaned internally. All he seemed to be able to do was get smacked around while everyone else did all the work. Not only did it hurt, it felt degrading. Made him feel useless. No, not useless.

Angry. He grit his teeth, eyes giving the most intense thousand yard stare. He slammed his hand on the ground of the gym, cracking it in the process and thrusting himself back to his feet. Completely without a plan of action until he saw Jason creeping behind Cass.

Jason shot two strands at the back of Cass's body and used her sturdy frame to vault over Cass and use Shi as a landing pad.

Wyatt began his charge once again, however this time, he jumped above, clasped his hands together like one would hold a sledgehammer, and dropped, intending to bring both of his hands down on Cass's head.

[Confederation of the Equator]

[minecraft villager sound]

[North America Inc]

-snip-

Shi was actually taken aback by how effective her attack was at holding ff Wyatt. She didn't expect him to just back off like that, while, the successive shot by Cass landed him on his back. Shi quickly glanced at her fists, silently admiring the unintended synergy. I was expecting more... She remarked in her head, having pictured him as an unstoppable tank rather than...this. Well I guess no one can live up to my standards. Wait a minute... As Cassandra stood there firing into Wyatt, where was Jason? She had lost track of him after hanging her upside down. She scanned the immediate horizon, not seeing him or his goo anywhere on the floor or the roof.

"Two Minutes, Thirty Second." the Clock's Automated voice boomed from the carefully guarded speakers. It was half time.

"Cassandra, do you see where Jason is?" Shi shouted to her partner before hearing a loud...THUNK sound from across the gym. Despite the congestion of smoke and dust in the air, Shihong could clearly see the anger and desperation in Wyatt's eyes. He was more than ticked off, he was pissed. Gone was the calm facade and collected demeanor of someone who was above all this, instead we had a man, or reptile, literally slamming the ground in frustration. Wyatt launched in the air, probably to land straight on Cass; Shi aimed her fist to cut him off.

Just before she could launch her following attack, she was slammed by the entire weight of Jason from behind her. She flung forward, and it gave Wyatt a perfect opportunity to rip into Cass. Sliding against the rough floor, she felt her skin painfully scrape against it; not to mention the numerous bruises fromJason landing right on top of her. That hurt. The lacerations stung and her body felt sore, so much for going easy during a sparring match. As she lifted her head up, she heard the sound of Wyatt landing on the ground, but she wasn't sure if he landed on Cass. They were out of her field of view, what wasn't, was Jason slinging away from her. He may have landed a critical hit on her, but he had brought himself dangerously close. Lifting herself partially up, she raised her right arm as she targeted him. Struggling to get in form, she murmured under her breath, "Inhale...Exhale...Inhale." Reaching her feet, she nearly stammered but recovered; she moved her right arm downwards at a and did the reverse with her left in a crude attempt to get set up. "Exhale." She opened her left palm and unleashed a sizable blast at Jason's unsuspecting back. It hit.

[Finland SSR]

July 23, Raid

The Mad Lass, Sina As'tari!

---

Wyatt's answer was brief and hard-headed, as if he was really hammering down the point that it wasn't the time to be cheering each other up and that taking care of the rampaging Juggernaut in front of them was the main priority. Right, that was a bit of a dumb decision to make, especially since the Dra'Quinni didn't seem like he needed much help in standing up. Now's the time to focus.

Wyatt pointed out a glowing piece of the Juggernaut's armor on the back - which, as he guessed, must be the machine's battery, and offered to use the cannon to hit it.

"Righty-ho." Sina muttered in response, then, as the Dra'Quinni and his human buddy took on the Juggernaut, ran across the floor of the warehouse with the cannon in her arms still charging up and made her way to the other side of the wide building, behind the battle going on, before flying up to reach the ceiling and latching onto one of the bright hanging lights with her free arm, using the vantage point to watch the battle and await an opening. Perhaps it should be surprising that the chain keeping the light suspended was strong enough to not pop when a humanoid dragon with a massive plasma weapon was yanking onto it, but it was the last thing on the vigilante's mind at the moment.

Her two allies seemed to be holding their own, but their attacks weren't doing any noticeable damage. At best, they'd only leave dents. Soon enough, however, Wyatt latched onto one of the Juggernaut's arms and Jason pulled onto the other with a some sort of goo, the latter even calling out to Sina by name, and both of their efforts leaving the machine's glowing back undefended. Better time than ever.

Letting go of the light, Sina let herself fall towards the ground, building up freefall momentum, before extending her wings at the last moment and speeding off straight at the juggernaut, and combining it with an aerial bullet-like spin to further increase her speed. The plasma cannon in her hands was ready to fire, a large blast was gathered in its tip and ripe for release. This is where the Dra'Quinni saw herself faced with a problem.

How do I... fire this thing?..

Shaking the cannon to let the blast fall off didn't work, the cannon wasn't responding to any motion commands or being shaken, and none of the buttons on the side seemed to work. Meanwhile, it was a question of milliseconds before she was about to become a splat on the Juggernaut's back.

Yeah, whatever.

Sina spread her wings vertically as a makeshift drogue parachute, her speed coming to a halt, all while she tossed the whole cannon straight at the Juggernaut's back, the weapon slamming into the chassis at near the speed of sound from the inertia. The plasma and reagents within the cannon, combined with chemicals within the battery, almost immediately erupted into an explosion, taking out the whole battery in one fell swoop. Meanwhile, the Dra'Quinni safely landed on her two feet, heavily breathing from the rush of adrenaline and the exertion she went through at the sudden flight and just as sudden stop, but grinning regardless.

Now that's what I call a high...

"I'm here, Jason, what were you asking?" Sina exclaimed, jokingly referring to him calling out at her earlier.

[New Finnish Republic]

Brianna Erickson

---

Brianna groaned as she rolled over onto her back, a painful series of coughs erupting from her as her bruised neck struggled to let air pass. Her eyes widened at the sight of her opponent throwing her spear back towards her, the inhuman speed too fast for her to even have a chance to raise her shield. However, with an equally inhuman speed, a scaled hand suddenly reached out to grab it mid-air, the tip of the spear staring at her through the slits in her helmet merely inches away. þakka Týr, she thought as she forced her body into motion, using one of the stationary chairs to shakily prop herself back onto her feet.


She was forced to momentarily shield her eyes as Sina let loose a torrent of flames down on her opponent, the sheer intesity of the flames nearly blinding her. After needing to blink her eyes a few times, Brianna was prepared to see the scorched remains of their opponent. It apperaed Sina did as well, as a confident smug had appeared on her face for a brief moment. However, it was soon replaced with a look of complete surprise as the robotic man, now without a left hand, slammed its forehead into the Dra'Qunni. The impact sent her flying into the nearby table, smashing the metal object with a sickening crunch.

"Ér daufi murtr!" Brianna screamed at the robotic man, who's gaping holes and melted pieces made it look more of a monster than a man at this point. Her strange words seemed to confuse it for a split second, before eventually it reached up with the spear it had grabbed out of Sina's hand and prepared to make another throw at her with it. Brianna prepared herself for it, but before it could let go a series gunshots erupted from behind, striking all over the head and torso of the robotic man. An annoyed snarl erupted on its face as it threw the spear towards the stranger from before, the young man only barely avoiding the oncoming projectile by a matter of millimeters as it impaled into the side of the wall with a loud thud.

Before the andoid had time to scold itself for its mistake, its sensors suddenly picked up on an oncoming object. Snapping its head, it suddenly felt something strike at its right elbow. Glancing down, it saw that its arm had been completely severed into to, the lower portion crushed in between the wall and the shield which had embedded into the metal material.

Realizing what had happened, the android looked up, only to see an arm reaching around its head. Alarms rang out inside the android's processing unit as it struggled to get out of the grip, but without any use of either of its arms plus the iron grip that held around its neck, it was unable to escape. Meanwhile, Brianna wrapped her legs around the androids legs, doing all she could to bring the machine down. Her efforts were futile, however, as instead of falling down it merely began to back up and slam her into the wall in an attempt to get her off its back.

She felt the air force itself out of her lungs as her back slammed into the metal surface, but still managed to maintain her grip around the robotic man's neck, pulling backwards with all of her strength as she did. The two struggled for several moments, the android's attempts becoming more and more frantic as slowly its internal structures started to bend in a manner in which it was not designed to do. The sound of the metal being bent and stretched was frigtingly audible, combining with the loud grunts that Brianna gave as every muscle fiber in her being focused on her task.

Finally, after one final roar, the internal structures that made up the android were no longer able to withstand the force, and in a loud crack that reverberted across the entire ship, the head of the android snapped free from its place. A metalic spinal colum scattered with crackling wires trailed from the head of the robotic man, which let out a series of broken and distorted cries. Its body below, now separated from the control center, immediately slumped over into a heap, sending Brianna crashing down onto the floor with it.

At first, all remained quiet within the bridge with the exception of the android's severed head, which continued letting out a series of distorted curses. However, after a few moments, Brianna managed to prop herself up from her prone position with her fist, raising her body so that she could look up to see the battered Sina. The valkyrie looked down at the talking robotic head in her hand, the thing still continuing its furious ranting at her, before she lazily tossed it towards her.

"He's no Mímir, but I think Nick will appreciate our little gift here."

[Absolon-7]

Jane

Casimir Herman July 24th
Casimir's head was a whirlpool of thoughts as Jane lead him to one of the infirmary's beds. While she went to get supplies, Casimir looked downwards with his face contorting to a furious scowl once again. His thoughts went from his complete lack of prowess with his fight against Scott at how easily he let himself get sapped of most of his strength to the completely ridiculous request from Renata about keeping it a secret. How dare she ask him such a pitiful demand. His mind then swayed to another side as he remembered the great show of regret that was on Scott's face. This remorse of his was intriguing to say the least but Casimir couldn't quell his anger at his utter humiliating third defeat in a week. He was the almighty Kabuto and yet...and yet he lost.

Casimir momentarily shoved the thoughts away as Jane came back with supplies and began cleaning his forehead wound. His wounds being treated was an actually quite soothing experience now that he thought about it. That is until she asked how he got these injuries. Now would be a good time for a quicksave but that wasn't going to happen now was it. He still felt guilty about what happened with Renata and this ordeal with Scott seemed more complicated then the surface looked. Probably best to keep it to himself until he had more information.

"Got them while I was sparring on the roof with someone," said Casimir with a halfhearted grin, "Things got a bit heated so we stopped. The guy didn't really want to come with me to the infirmary. That's his problem though. What kind fighter doesn't take care of themselves afterwards, right?"

[New Neros]

The Battle of San Francisco
Chinatown

Rather than immediately teleport away from the battlefield where he had claimed victory, Mustafa Gaul was keen to prove himself untouchable even in such a vibrant city with a strong heroic culture. It didn't take long, either, for the B-Listers to make their move against him, following the reports of Gaul and Punk's battle with Goliath and part of the Rising Suns, and continued reports of sighting the villain throughout the immediate area. Ducking through a side-street, Gaul was met by an impromptu market place, full of odds and ends that most likely weren't made to standards set by regulations, but his eyes also caught a flavorfully dressed vigilante just a few yards away. Narrowing his eyes and re-entering his tunnel vision, Gaul moved forward as bystanders and pedestrians moved out of the way of the shirtless, bleeding villain who looked to be nothing but trouble.

Dressed in all colors, adorned with a cape and a red visor, the burly vigilante seemed to be nodding along as a civilian gave him their testimony in regards to recent events. The man he was talking to, however, paused mid-sentence and stared beyond the hero, locking his eyes on the villain he had seen take down Goliath and live to walk away. Slack-jawed and wordless, the vigilante grew a look of confusion, looking all around the man for signs of a seizure, but whipped his body around in dramatic fashion, nearly toppling the man over with his thick cape and knocking several items off of a vendors table near them, to some annoyance. "You there!" He declared with grandiose vigor, "State your name and stay where you are!"

Gaul replied with a half-cocked smirk and an outright refusal to heed the colorful man's order, and continued advancing without missing a beat in his step. The sheer determination present in the half-bloodied and visibly injured villain sent a shiver down the vigilante's spine, recalling in a single moment all the stories and headlines featuring the man who was in his sights, one of the most dangerous villains whose rapid rise to fame featured a strong resume of victorious battles against big-name heroes. Grabbing a metal wok from a table as he walked, Gaul swung hard and vicious against the hero as he declared, "I am the Peacock of Chinatown, and I order you to -" The hero was cut off by a loud clang, Gaul having slammed the wok as hard as he could into the Peacock's face, leaving his facial impression on the metal and a spray of blood to join the hero on the walkway.

The marketplace was in a frenzy at that point, everyone hoping to get out of the way of whatever else was to come, be it allies of the Peacock or Gaul's villainous associates, but the first to react were large bodyguards of some Chinese mobsters who had a stake in keeping the off-grid marketplace open. One attacked directly, tackling Gaul from the front and putting him through a stand, spilling the off-brand electronics on the ground and breaking most of them on impact. Gaul locked onto his attacker with arms and legs, effortlessly picking the man up once Gaul got his foot stance planted firmly and throwing him hard into the cement ground, catching a bamboo pole to the temple unexpectedly.

A blow that would knock any grown man out cold only earned a stern look from the villain, splintering the weapon apart and giving Gaul's face a few decent gashes, and a look of both surprise and terror from the second bodyguard. Gaul raised his hands next to his face and slowly approached the adversary, swatting away the bamboo staff with one hand and leaning deep into a punch with the other, senselessly dislocating the man's jaw on impact, and cracking it back into place when the side of his face landed on the warm ground. Standing tall and straightening his back, Gaul looked on to see an empty and abandoned marketplace, wiping away some of the blood that had started to drip down his cheek.

Yet another ambush awaited him, though, this time from above, and that was in the form of a rocket-powered armored vigilante allying himself with Peacock. Firing two missiles unexpectedly, Gaul leapt to the side to dodge, the munitions exploding abruptly and knocking over several abandoned tables. Gaul trained his eyes on his armored foe, watching as he floated seamlessly above the side-street, re-orienting himself to launch more rockets at the villain. "Apollo," He stated directly, "Or the man who's going to bring you down." He fired a volley of small missiles then, forcing Gaul to work his feet and hands to dodge or disable the rockets, which he accomplished by throwing a table at a large cluster, prematurely exploding several at once and generating a large smoke cloud.

Using the cover wisely, Gaul leapt high onto one of the buildings bordering the side street and sunk his ankles deep onto it, firmly watching Apollo as he fired blind in an attempt to find Gaul once more, not knowing he was nearly level with the technologically enhanced hero. Gaul jumped directly at Apollo, the armored vigilante seeing at the very last second, far too late to have made any difference, watching helplessly as Gaul's body collided with his own, Gaul using his speed and momentum to pin Apollo's armor into the building opposite of where Gaul jumped from. Apollo's helmet and chest plate cracked under the pressure, exposing his brownish hair, blue eyes, and fair skin, not to mention a face filled with horror and pain as it must have taken a car-crash worth of force to break his armor. Gaul leapt gracefully down to the street level once more, Apollo falling from the five story distance and crashing harshly into the ground behind Gaul.

Turning to walk away from the side street, Gaul laid his eyes on three distinct figures blocking his exit, earning half a smile and a look of determination from the villain.

[Zarkenis Ultima]

San Diego, Night of July 23rd

---

“Isn’t this the place…?” Icarus wondered out loud as he walked through the abandoned buildings of the former industrial complex, somewhat puzzled. It would’ve probably helped if Renata had been more specific when picking the location, but it was a bit late to complain about that, so he could only hope she had enough foresight to account for that somehow. Stopping in his tracks for a moment and looking around to see if he could spot any sign of the pink-haired girl anywhere, but his efforts yielded no results and he soon continued walking aimlessly through the complex.

“I’m here!” He called out after hesitating for a moment; he didn’t know whether she would show up as Stella or as Renata, and he didn’t want to screw up something by calling her the wrong thing in case there was another soul around, listening and watching, so in the end he decided on simply not using her name; however, he dearly hoped it would be the latter option. He himself was here as Icarus, not as Blackout, wearing his long hair loose and his favorite jacket over simple civilian clothes, no masks covering his face; if his girlfriend showed up as Stella and some saw, that would undoubtedly raise some eyebrows and cause a headache for the two of them.

She’s not showing up… If she had cancelled though, she would’ve sent me a message, so she’s probably here. The blond boy mused, before sighing and pulling out his phone. Might as well try texting her.

Renata, meanwhile, was sitting on the edge of the roof of one of the abandoned, weary factories, leaning back and waiting, assuming that the vigilante was going to scout her out from above much like he did before their first... date. Nothing seemed to be coming up, however, the only things which reached the heroine’s ears were the howling wind, a few distant sirens from the crime scene at Wonder Foundation a few blocks away, and maybe a granny passing through the street below every once in a while.

Perhaps I made a mistake. Who would ever be able to discern the location of a meeting if all they receive is the name of the street?

Renata let out a sigh. Oh well, you can’t change what already happened. Best to just wait and hope for the best, then, maybe he’s just lost. It’s not like I’m being hidden.

Eventually, that plan yielded fruit… but not the way Renata anticipated. While passing time by dangling her feet off the edge of the rooftop, the heroine suddenly overheard someone shouting from the ground floor of the factory, saying ‘I’m here’, with a voice which immediately set off all alarms in the heroine’s mind. She swiftly stood up and looked around.

Huh? That was him, right?

Indeed, and a confirmation soon arrived in the form of her phone suddenly ringing up, having just received a message. Right before pulling it out, Renata assumed that this was Aleta pranking her one way or another, or a message from the Young Bloods informing her about whatever, but both of those assumptions got dispelled immediately - nope, nope, it was Icarus. He’s definitely down there.

Renata threw herself forward to leap off the roof… then stopped herself at the last second, comically waving her arms around before safely pulling back. Right, right. Both of the leg suppressors are busted, I’d just be breaking my bones if I tried something this stupid. Having arrived to this street right after the Wonders Foundation mission, the heroine was still in her new Stella costume - which meant that three of the four devices were now either completely off or visibly busted, while the rest of the suit didn’t look much better, either. Taking a sigh of relief, Renata turned around and instead took a ladder leading from the roof of the factory to its lower floors, sliding down like a firewoman, ignoring the heat generated by the friction between her hands and the steel poles making up the ladders - all of it simply ended up absorbed, after all - and touched down on the moist brick floor of the complex.

“I’m here, too!” the heroine exclaimed, running forward and frantically looking around almost with every step. Finding the aimlessly wandering Icarus didn’t turn out to be too difficult, all it took for Renata was to stroll through a few rooms decked out with welding machines and steel mills never touched since the Great Recession until the vigilante’s golden mane appeared in the distance.

He’s here as Icarus, though, not Blackout. And she was still Stella.

Oh, that’s not very good.

Let’s… hope there’s nobody else in this whole complex right now.

“Icarus!” Renata exclaimed, running up to the vigilante and immediately pulling him in for a tight hug. “A-are you okay? Is everything alright?”

“I’m here, too!”

The sudden call made Icarus stop in his tracks once again and look around frantically, immediately recognizing the voice. It was her, she was here! But where? The boy couldn’t seem to find her no matter how much he looked around, until finally he heard her voice once again, coming directly from behind him and calling his name. Turning on his heels, he saw a familiar pink-haired heroine running towards him.

Oh, she’s… Yeah, that might be troubles-

The blond boy didn’t have time to finish his thoughts before Renata reached his side and pulled him into her embrace, before worriedly asking him if he was alright. I’ve got to admit, this is… quite the contrast with the last time we met up. He thought, quickly remembering the devastating way it began and all the high-running emotions that were into play that night. In comparison, the present moment was surprisingly… calm. Renata was clearly more concerned for his safety than she was interested in berating or questioning him, her tone almost fearful. Seeing how much she cared for him, he smiled, placing an arm around the girl’s waist and pulling her closer to him, tenderly stroking her hair. She was cold as always, but it still felt very nice to hold her close.

“Yeah, everything’s fine, Ren- er, Stella.” He replied to her question. “I… Warwolf took away my powers and nearly captured me at the end, but someone bailed me out and I managed to make my way here like this.” He continued, in a far quieter voice this time, just in the remote case there was someone nearby eavesdropping on them, doubtful as it was. “You don’t have to worry about that, though. It wasn’t someone from your team, so Warwolf can’t blame you for it.”

Seeing Icarus pull her closer after their hug and stroke her hair, their faces, at most, a foot apart, Renata blushed, her body heating up for a second before cooling down back to somewhat more normal levels. Thank goodness, at least he didn’t seem to hold a some sort of grudge for the way she opened up their meeting last time. The last thing she wanted was a repeat of that - the moment how she went as far as to pull her finger gun on someone who trusted her this much was keeping her up awake at night. So this was a nice change of pace - and thus, when Icarus placed his arm on her waist, Renata responded in kind, wrapping her arms around his neck.

What was not as welcome was Icarus’s explanation of what had happened to him since that brief exchange of words in Wonder Foundation. Apparently, the worst possible outcome was very close to becoming reality - Warwolf depowered him and nearly captured him, if it weren’t for the intervention of someone. Who? Icarus didn’t state, and the only clue Renata received was that they weren’t a Young Blood - which prompted the heroine to take a sigh of relief. As far as she recalled, the only participant of the battle who wasn’t a Young Blood, Warwolf or one of the Cabal was Pitch, who fought alongside Renata against Beast. That would make her a good candidate for this mysterious savior, but not the only possibility. I didn’t get to see the second half of the fight on the surface, after all. It could have been Mickey Mouse as far as I know.

So the heroine opted to leave that question aside for now.

“So not everything’s fine, then,” Renata replied, referring to Icarus’s initial statement. After all, he was now depowered for God knows how long and Warwolf might not be completely fooled by his change of clothes and hair style. “It’s… it’s good to hear that everything went well, though. I was worried about you ever since you showed up in that battle...” The heroine’s voice turned somber by the end of the sentence, recalling all of the fear which had been bottling up in her mind during the mission and especially when she returned to the surface alongside the rest of the team.

“Do you need any help with something? I’m still not sure if there’s much I can do… but I wasn’t lying when I said that I’ll do whatever it takes to help you get out of this rut.”

Icarus frowned when Renata pointed out that not everything was well. Much as he preferred not to admit it, she was right: while he had escaped relatively unscathed this time, the fact was that Warwolf had devised a method for taking him down and proven that it was effective not just once, but twice now, meaning that heading out onto the streets would be much more dangerous from here out; Warwolf wasn’t going to relent, and now that they knew how they could deal with him without tools that used electricity, he was sure every patrol would have a dart gun with them. In addition, he was also not any closer to proving his innocence than he was the previous time he met with Renata, not having the first clue of how to gather proof of Warwolf’s guilt; there were some people out there who believed him rather than the PMC, sure, but they were a minority, and he did not know how much he could rely on those people to help.

Absorbed in somber thoughts, the blond boy had stopped caressing Renata without noticing, his hand resting idle. It wasn’t until she offered her help once more that he realized he had zoned out for a bit, and with a little reluctance, he pulled away from her, shoving his hands into his jacket’s pockets as he briefly mulled over his answer.

“I… well, to be honest, I don’t know, Renata. I still want to clear my name, but I don’t have a clue about where I should start, and with Warwolf paranoid about getting their asses handed to them… the streets are going to be even more dangerous than before.” He stated, letting out a sigh and looking off to the side. “I guess the safest thing for me to do is just lie low for a while longer, I don’t want to keep worrying you either. The only problem is… well, I’m not going to accomplish anything by sitting idle, and Warwolf is just going to keep doing what they want if we don’t do something to stop them.”

Icarus ran a hand through his hair, concern and frustration evident in his face. If being unable to stop the murder of three people and getting blamed for those same murders wasn’t enough, finding himself powerless to get back at the people who framed him or reverse the situation was certainly doing no favors to his peace of mind. Suddenly, however, he cracked a smile. “I guess by now it’s evident that all that I said about giving them a taste of their own medicine was bullshit. They’re everywhere and anything I do against them doesn’t seem to stop them.” He said with a chuckle, recalling the passionate speech he had given Renata the last time they met, after she finally listened to his side of the story.

“It just feels like I’m in a dark tunnel with no way out…”

Seeing Icarus react to her statement and questions in such a somber fashion, even relieving her of his embrace and stepping back with a frown, brought down Renata’s mood as well. Indeed, this was a very touchy topic without an obvious solution behind it, it made sense why the vigilante would react in such a manner. Especially since it seemed like not much has changed since last time - the decision to take the fight to Warwolf wasn’t working out, Icarus himself confirmed it, and the PMC, as always, held the advantage both in publicity and in raw strength.

When the vigilante referred to the passionate speech he made last time about taking the fight to Warwolf and now declared that idea to be a load of bullshit, however, Renata snickered. That speech had struck her as fairly out of character for him back then, and if she weren’t worried about Icarus throwing himself into the face of danger, she probably would have denounced him as a dork who watched too many superhero movies. Coming up to the vigilante and wrapping her arms around his neck yet again, she replied:

“Of course it’s not going to work, pendejo,” Though the words she were saying weren’t exactly sweet, Renata conveyed them more like a playful poke in the chest rather than actually berating her boyfriend. “It’s… quite a predicament, you’re right. But I’m sure that you’ll be able to find a way out, I trust that you can. And I’ll try to be your light in this tunnel.”

Renata followed it up with a peck on Icarus’s cheek - just some additional motivation.

Which, unfortunately, doesn’t answer the real question here - how are they going to solve this problem? Icarus has already proven that simply sticking to your guns and continuing to fight Warwolf despite their numerical superiority is not going to work - the PMC appears to be here to stay, any resolution would have to come from proving his innocence.

One idea Renata toyed around with in her mind while mulling this over back in Wonder Tower was recruiting her father’s help. Ecuador’s intelligence operations in the United States have a long history, starting in recognizable scale soon after the establishment of the Condor regime and the empowerment of the country’s secret services. Through them, the nation has worked diligently to sway public and leader opinion in favor of superhuman rights - lobbying for pro-super politicians in Congress, organizing internet campaigns through bots and paid commentators, so on and so forth… Surely, if she put enough effort into it, she could try to convince her father to order Ecuador’s operations to target San Diego and attack Warwolf’s integrity. Spread some fake news, acquit the vigilantes they have either arrested, assaulted or are gunning after, sway the opinion against them and thus possibly have them leave the city under public pressure. If Russia could do it on a national scale, there’s nothing which says Ecuador couldn’t pull the same on a localized scale!

Except… there were problems with that idea. For one, her father was unfortunately very... controlling. Back in Ecuador, he even went as far as to keep track of which of her classmates Renata interacted the most with in their school, for reasons which the heroine still had no clue of. If she comes up to him and asks him to do this or that, he’s going to start investigating why. And her relationship with Blackout was something Renata hoped to keep secret for as long as humanly possible - or at least until she could realistically sell it to her father without getting reprimanded. The second thing was, however, that this wouldn’t be a plan without risk. If news break out that Ecuador’s secret services have been spreading anti-Warwolf propaganda and trying to acquit serial killers, then that’s going to make the situation a lot worse, maybe even result in Renata being forcefully sent home.

No, there’s got to be an alternate option, this might be too risky. How did we get the Mask out of jail, again?

Well, if my memory serves right, after defeating Marionette, we spread the information about who actually committed those murders, this being her. That resolved the situation for the time being.

Getting information about who actually committed the murders to the public...

“I’ve… had a few ideas on how we could get you acquitted, but it depends on whether you are bothered about the legality of what we’re doing,” Renata muttered after a long pause. “Though, there is something I need to know - do you know if there were there any cameras nearby during that… incident with Warwolf and the teenagers?”

To someone such as Icarus, who was no stranger to sullenness--though he also did not spend every waking moment resentful or depressed--it was amazing how easily Renata was able to reverse his sour mood with but a gesture or a few words. Simply feeling her body press closer to him as she threw her arms around his neck was enough to put a smile on him after a moment of surprise, and it only grew wider as she heard her words of encouragement, especially when she assured him she would be there to light up the dark tunnel he was in. I really need to figure out what that word she keeps saying means, though.

What came afterwards was the cherry on top of the cake, figuratively speaking. As Renata pecked him on the cheek, the blond boy could feel his whole face heating up; far from embarrassed, however, he was happy, something not unknown, but relatively uncommon in him. However, the energetic heroine suddenly fell deep in thought, remaining silent for several moments. Not one to disturb her as she mulled over the matter for his sake, he simply continued to gently hold her close, enjoying her proximity despite the slight coldness of her skin.

Soon enough, she spoke up once again, and, hearing her, the vigilante thought back to that fateful night, not without some effort. It was difficult to think of the moment that his life took such a complete turn for the worst, but he remembered everything clearly-- what he had seen, that is. The truth was that, while he had been there, by the time he descended to the streets he had little more in mind than avenging the three victims, and wasn’t keeping an eye out for anything he could use in the current scenario to prove his innocence. With that in mind, he shook his head at Renata.

“I don’t know. I don’t recall seeing any cameras while I was there, but I can’t say for sure there weren’t any. I… didn’t have the coolest of heads on my shoulders back then.” He admitted, looking off to the side. “I don’t think it would be any use even if some camera had caught what happened… Warwolf may be stupid at times, but I doubt they’re careless enough that they’d simply pass that up, especially with such a delicate situation in their hands. If there was a camera, the footage is probably very well protected, assuming they didn’t just destroy it.” He stated, shaking his head. Trying to recover something like that was just plain risky, and he did not want Renata to go through that, even if the evidence of his innocence was on the line.

After a short pause, he pulled his girlfriend closer still, wrapping his arms around her back. “As long as you’re not killing or torturing anyone, I’m not concerned about you doing something illegal. Just make sure you’re not caught, and…” He trailed off for a moment, letting out a sigh. “Stay safe. Yes, I know that’s rich coming from me, and you have every right to berate me if you want, but… stay safe.” The boy repeated as he pulled back slightly, grabbing Renata by the shoulders.

“Today, I felt what I assume you felt every time I went off and did something dangerous. I was worried sick about you when I saw you arrive at the scene; that’s one of the reasons I went somewhere that was crawling with Warwolf soldiers.” He looked down for a moment. “I… I’ll try to keep my head down for a bit, stop picking fights with Warwolf and putting myself on the line. I don’t want to keep worrying you like that, it feels awful. But this time I want you to promise me something: that you’ll be careful as well. If something happened to you…” The vigilante trailed off, leaving the implications unsaid. Renata ending up hurt due to his fault was not something he wanted to think about, much less what he’d do in that case.

“You could never forgive yourself.” the heroine completed his sentence, her eyes remaining locked towards his. So now that Icarus had made his choice to stay low, stop putting himself in danger and wait until the situation calms down, it was her turn to be the one making a promise. And he wanted the same thing from her as she wanted from him nine days ago - to promise that she would keep herself safe, to be careful and not try to pull off anything stupid. Renata took a deep breath as an attempt to calm herself down a little bit, then continued:

“I promise. I’ll be careful. You’re right, I know how it feels to worry about someone’s safety… and I’ll try to make sure you wouldn’t get to experience it again.”

Which was far from a promise she could easily keep. After all, how do you manage to compromise that with the need to acquit Icarus of all the crimes he has supposedly committed? All of the ideas which Renata had on that had plenty of risk behind them. And, hell, the vigilante offered a correct observation - even if there was any footage of the incident with the three teenagers, Warwolf is far too competent to have missed it, so it’s likely either destroyed or kept in a file somewhere in the headquarters of their mission in San Diego. Infiltrating their facilities to see for herself is out of the question, so if Renata ever wanted to take that path towards acquitting Icarus, she would have to recruit the help of either Wendy or Ecuador to hack into Warwolf’s systems and pull out the necessary files. Both of which would have risks of their own, if either one even agrees to helping her out, and then…

Okay, fine, we get it, this is a tricky situation. Take an optimistic look to the situation instead, perhaps? After all, you won’t have to worry about Icarus putting himself in harm’s way anymore! He’s finally decided to take the hint and lay low! In other terms, take a vacation…

A vacation, hm...

“O-oh, and, um, if that’s what your plan is going to be from now, Icarus, then I’ve got something for you.” Renata suddenly spoke up, letting go of the vigilante and taking a step back, unzipping her purse and scouring through it with her fingers. I left the leftover tickets in there, right? Not back in Wonder Tower? The sight of a few flashy, colorful tickets hiding behind her credit card made Renata let out a sigh of relief, and the heroine pulled one out, once again walking up to Icarus and placing it in his hand.

“We’ll be going on a plane trip to Ecuador and it’d be great if you could join up with us,” the heroine began to explain, her face almost glittering with excitement as she stared into Icarus’s eyes. “Don’t lie to me, you need to go on vacation, at least for a few days, especially since it’s summer, and this would be the perfect opportunity, don’t you think? We wouldn’t be alone on this trip, of course… but I think none of the Young Bloods know your secret identity, so it’ll be fine!”

Icarus nodded as the first of the heroine’s words reached him. Actually, I was going to say that I’d probably just lose it, but that works too. He thought, cracking a half-hearted smile at his unsaid joke. As she agreed to his request and promised that she would be very cautious in the future, a more solemn expression took over, the boy nodding yet again while internally letting out a sigh of relief.

After that, the heroine suddenly spoke up, pulling back and looking for something. A gift? I came here expecting a good scolding, not this… The vigilante reflected, before accepting the object Renata had procured from his purse and looking at it. His eyes went wide in shock as he realized that it was a plane ticket to Ecuador, her homeland. The girl’s words only confirmed what the ticket indicated, and he stared at her in surprise for a moment before looking back down. Isn’t… isn’t this thing really expensive? I know she’s rich but… wow… and we? Does she mean the Young Bloods? How many of these did she buy?

All those questions and more popped into the blond boy’s head, but, taken aback as he was, he still continued to listen to her. While he wasn’t keen on just going somewhere else and letting his guard down while things were such a mess back home, the idea was certainly alluring, and beyond that, she was right: he needed a few days to rest, not just to recover from his fatigue, but from the stress of his situation as well. He needed to forget about all the things haunting him at least a bit, and he doubted he’d manage to do something like that if he simply continued to stay home.

Renata’s last few words confirmed what he suspected: that the rest of the Young Bloods had been invited and would go on the trip with them. Casimir’s company wasn’t something he minded, but he didn’t know how to feel about the rest of the lot; however, that was hardly on his mind at the moment.

“Er… yeah, about that…” Icarus spoke, a bit awkwardly, the memory of his meeting with Casimir a couple days ago immediately coming to the front of his mind after hearing Renata express her assumption that none of the Young Bloods could connect his secret identity to his vigilante persona. “I, err, might have told someone about it already…” He confessed sheepishly.

Icarus’s last sentence instantly shifted Renata’s expression from an excited smile to a confused frown. The heroine raised her eyebrow, struggling to even form a response at his revelation, but eventually managing to mutter out:

“...what.”

That… didn’t sound like Icarus at all. He always struck Renata as the type of person to put a lot of care into protecting his secret identity - at least, that’s the impression she gathered from their meeting in the San Diego Docks, where he not only shied away from even considering to reveal his identity, but even berated Renata for openly calling Mars and Roy by their real names rather than aliases. He couldn’t just blurt such a secret out to a stranger, and especially not to, presumably, a Young Blood, whom Icarus didn’t seem to trust at all.

“W-why? To who?!” Renata exclaimed, still shocked and baffled. “And… please, don’t tell me you revealed about us, too...”

The vigilante immediately raised his hands defensively, as if trying to calm down the exalted heroine. “No, just wait a second. I didn’t tell him everything.” He said, letting out a sigh. “Look, I’ve no idea if you knew this, but Casimir’s my best friend. You know, the dork with the hair antenna? I knew he was with you since that day you took me to the infirmary, but I hadn’t had a chance to talk with him all.” The blond boy explained, unable to shake the feeling of awkwardness that came with talking about mundane social things after they had just discussed the matter of his framing.

“A couple days ago, he gave me a call and asked to meet up. We ended up talking about a lot of things and eventually… I ended up telling him that I’m Blackout.” He said, averting his gaze for a moment. “I just felt very frustrated and… lonely, and I needed to vent, so that’s why I told him. I trust him and even though he’s a dumbass at times he’s seldom let me down, I’m sure he won’t tell the other Young Bloods about it.” He assured as he looked back at Renata. “I also didn’t tell him about… well, about us, though I have the feeling he’ll find out sooner or later.”

“Oh, well...” was all Renata initially muttered.

Right, she had seen Icarus and Casimir sit next to each other during lunch break and overall act friendly towards each other back in Thomsen High, it wouldn’t have been a stretch to imagine that the two were good friends, and since they were also both in the superheroing business, maybe it would have been logical to assume that he was the person Icarus revealed his secret to. It’s just that Renata didn’t connect the two events until the vigilante pointed it out. It’s okay, I can’t claim to be an expert in Icarus’s life regardless.

“Well, at least you’re right on the part where you call Casimir a dumbass, Carito,” the heroine continued and snickered, then tapped on Icarus’s shoulder. “It’s okay, it’s okay. I was just a little worried that you revealed that secret to Nightshade or something.”

Hold on. Go back to what I just said. “And, um, you don’t mind that I just called you Carito, do you? I just… thought that Icarus is a little bit too formal at this point, isn’t it?”

Icarus chuckled as he heard the nickname and Renata’s reasoning for it, simply shaking his head in response. “No, it’s fine, Renata. I don’t mind at all.” He assured her with a smile. Truth be told, he didn’t know how to feel about being called Carito, but the fact that she started using a term of endearment for him was certainly a plus. It made him think that, despite all the roadblocks, their relationship was progressing.

“Though, I haven’t come up with a nickname for you… I guess Renata’s a bit too formal as well, now that we’ve come this far. Hm…” The blond boy spoke, appearing to fall deep into thought for a moment. “Well, I know how to make up for it.” He said with a grin. Placing a hand on her face and an arm around her waist, he pulled her closer and leaned in to kiss her, only pulling away after several seconds.

“I didn’t have the chance to tell you earlier, but you look gorgeous in that outfit.”

Having been watching Icarus intently and awaiting what cutesy little nickname the blond boy would make up for her, Renata was left quite surprised and unprepared when he instead pulled her in for a kiss, so much so that her eyes initially widened in shock and a visible blush appeared on her face - however, she quickly embraced the moment, closing her eyes and wrapping her arms around the vigilante’s neck. Soon enough, Icarus pulled out.

And offered a compliment, too.

“Oh, um… thanks, I was actually wondering whether you’d like it... ” Renata muttered in response, stuttering as she went. “You know, we’ve been standing here in what’s basically a horror movie locale for a good… ten minutes now. Maybe you want to move this somewhere else, perhaps?”

Somewhat surprised by the girl’s statement, Icarus looked around, remembering that, indeed, the area where their affectionate rendezvous had taken place was an abandoned industrial building. Blinking, the blond boy continued staring at the large, empty walls and the moonlight that streamed in from the tall windows. “You’re right. I kind of stopped paying attention, but this is a pretty gloomy place…” He mumbled, before looking back at Renata and smiling. “I guess you really did light up my world.” He said with a chuckle.

Geez, that was super cheesy.

“I guess we can go elsewhere.” The vigilante added afterwards, reaching down to grab Renata’s hand and beginning to lead her out of the empty factory. “But… I’m not sure this meeting should go on any longer if you want to go elsewhere. If we’re seen together, you and me… Well, it’s going to raise some eyebrows isn’t it? A famous heroine and a simple student like me.”

“Famous...” Renata muttered, repeating Icarus’s words and looking down. I wish. The rest which the vigilante pointed out made sense, however. She was still in her new Stella suit, after all, while Icarus was merely Icarus. Besides, it was getting awfully late, too, and Renata wasn’t much of a fan of going out at night, it didn’t fit her sleep schedule. So, after the vigilante offered to depart their ways, the heroine turned to him, offered a smile and spoke:

“You’re right, Carito, I don’t think it’d be too good of an idea,” As she spoke, her hand clutched onto Icarus’s more tightly, before releasing it and stepping back, ready to depart. “So, I’ll… see you around, then.”

[Finland SSR]

Caudillo Sergio Martinez, the heroic Silver!

---

A new report from the National Intelligence Secretariat's mission to the United States, huh. Finally, something new from them which isn't about hunting down the constantly popping up dissent against the Condor regime. That seems to be growing more and more common recently. With that on his mind, Sergio descended down the Carondelet Palace, the official place of residence of the Andean Condors and the puppet civilian government, to the underground floors. That's where the team established their... let's say, secret negotiations room. Where, through video conferences or secret meetings, either Silver alone or the whole team would make decisions which would best be... kept away from the general public. Removal of specific public figures who are barking too loudly. Operations against the guerrillas in the Amazon. Major decisions on national security and espionage. So on and so forth. This time, Silver was descending down to receive a report all by himself.

Sometimes, especially if he wasn't in the best mood - and today was one of those days - Sergio would mentally stop and consider where he and his nation are now. A lot has changed during the twenty five years since when the Andean Condors decided to draw the line for their tolerance of the military junta of the past and decided to take the reins of the country themselves. Many of those changes weren't even predicted by the five heroes themselves.

What would Renata think of the state Ecuador is in today? She was very fearful of the team repeating the same mistakes and crimes as the dictator they removed from power - handing over complete, unchecked power to a small group of individuals was just a recipe of disaster to her. She wanted them to be merely a transitionary period before a real democracy is established and they can return to being heroes first and foremost. Would she recognize the lengths Sergio and their teammates had to go to ensure a society that is free of suffering and pain? Or would she see them as traitors?

No, not his daughter... the other Renata.

Stepping into the negotiations room and closing the steel door behind him shut, Sergio was greeted with a video call from San Diego - the person on the other side was a blonde woman with two recognizable cat-like ears sticking out from her hair, clearly somewhat exhausted and still moving across the dark streets of the city with the camera in her hands before finally stopping inside an abandoned building.

"Miss Marina, why are you dressed like a restaurant waiter?" Sergio immediately raised the question, noting the spy's... questionable attire, to which Marina responded to with:

"Yeah... I had to infiltrate one a few hours earlier, Caudillo, please excuse me for the bother. I'm sending you something important, however."

Last year, when Renata first brought up the idea of changing schools, dropping the prestigious Quito one she had been enrolled in up to that point and instead applying for Thomsen High in the United States, Sergio was far from excited for the prospect - and not just because he might have considered the education opportunities there to be lesser or the United States far from the safest country to reside in, but also because it would have meant a loss of control over his daughter. She was, after all, the only child Sergio had, and as he was unwilling to marry again, this loneliness was here to say. This meant that in the possible event of his retirement, or, God forbid, death, she'd have to be there to ensure a smooth transition of power from one head to the next. Or, if worst comes to worst, at least take up his place in the Condors. As such, making sure that Renata's life does not turn to unwanted directions was paramount.

Of course, the girl eventually won over him, showcasing an ability to make threats, ultimatums and sway her fellow Condor members which caught Sergio by surprise, but the hero didn't give up, and right after her plane took off for San Diego, he contacted Marina, a human-bakeneko hybrid spy previously dispatched to the United States, to keep tabs of his daughter from now on. The small bakeneko and bakeneko hybrid population of Ecuador, much like the nation's supers and other supranatural humans and non-humans, were fully emancipated by the Condor regime and Marina, much like the rest of her people, repaid this favor through loyalty. As such, the news of being requested such an important task by the dictators himsef was a badge of honor she wore with pride.

With a few button presses on her device, Marina sent several pictures to the headquarters in Ecuador, swiftly and automatically printed out and landing onto the oval table in the center of the room - each one fairly blurry. Which made sense, as the spy has to take them from an another building, cloaked in shadows, upside down and through a window, but the figures in all of them were fairly easily perceptible. The shorter one, with bright pink hair, was obviously his daughter, and she seemed to be embracing a tall blond with long hair.

"Your suspicions were correct, my Caudillo, your daughter has acquired herself a soulmate." Marina continued, her ears twitching slightly, while Silver continued to watch the hybrid explain the situation with his arms folded. "I didn't pick up a recording of their conversation, unfortunately, but to summarize it, they were discussing him being on the run from Warwolf and getting him acquitted. Oh, and she calls him Icarus."

Sergio took a deep, weary sigh. Oh, Renata, Renata... What do you keep getting yourself into?.. First joining a controversial team of young heroes out of nowhere and now this...

"At least I cannot fault your daughter for her aesthetic eye, it's quite a handsome devil..." Marina continued muttering to herself, her eyes trailing off the screen and glancing to the skies, only for her to suddenly notice that the dictator on the other side of the call was no longer paying attention. "Oh, and my Caudillo, you might be interested in the fact that this 'Icarus' will be going on that trip you offered your daughter to get acquainted with her team..."

Sergio's head suddenly perked up. "Really now?"

"Well, that's what I got from their conversation, yes."

Not all is lost, then.

"If you wish, I could go and eliminate this 'Icarus' right now," Marina continued, making an offer. "Apparently, he is depowered and weakened after a recent battle, and I would be able to pick up his scent to track him, it would only take a few-"

"No, no, that would be unnecessary, miss Marina." Sergio replied. The spy nodded accordingly. "For now, all I need from you is to is to build a dossier on him and avoid any interference. I will consider my options from there."

Transmission end.

[The Republic of Atria]

EXPLOSION

Come on Sina, pull the stupid trigger on the gun... Jason bemoaned as he watched Sina fiddle with the weapon for a few seconds before ultimately deciding to just throw the damaged weapon at the Juggernaut's back. He was already a safe distance away, but Wyatt was right next to it. He shot two strands, grabbing his friend from the back and pulling free from the bright explosion of plasma and whatever chemicals that were in the Juggernaut's power supply.

Wyatt tumbled across the ground, not realizing Jason pulled him free until he pulled the weird bits off of his back. "Did-did we win?" He stuttered a bit as he stood up, wincing at the sight of the bright, but fading light of the explosion. The Juggernaut was face down, though expletives could be faintly heard from it. "Holy crap, we won." He smiled a bit. A little sore, but it was far from the worst thing to happen to him. It felt... Nice. Maybe there was a reason to keep doing this after all.

"Damn straight. Hell yeahs all around. For real this time. Uh, Wyatt. I don't know if those things are air tight, so do you mind pulling the helmet part off? Would rather our foe not suffocate." Jason said, motioning over to the face down, unpowered suit. "Plus, we gotta throw post battle banter and he needs to be able to hear us." He said as Wyatt flipped the suit over, placing his foot on the chest of the suit and carefully removing the helmet, seeing a trapped human's head sticking out. Fairly unremarkable as humans went. Brown hair, green eyes, slightly tanned skin, though it was difficult to see in the poor lighting. "Sup loser." Jason mused.

"Fuck you! Get me out of this useless piece of shit so I can kick your asses myself!" The thug spat.

"I gotta say, that's some balls you've got on you." Jason spat back. "Cops and paramedics'll probably be here in a few minutes to wrap this little venture up. Any words you like to say before we head off into the night and celebrate with large amounts of junk food?" He asked, crouching over the man's head.

The thug spat in Jason's face. "...Alright. Well, I can't let that go unpunished." He said, darkly. The head portion of his suit covering it once again. Jason taking his finger, which looked quite sharp, lowering it slowly towards the thug's eye. "You know. I like the eyes. They taste like salty grapes! Mind if I have yours?" Jason lowered his finger closer and closer to the stuck man.

"GET THIS FREAK OFFA ME! HE'S FUCKING CRAZY!"

"Jason!" Wyatt shouted about ready to pull him off.

"Oh come on. I'm kidding. What, did you really think I'm gonna gouge this dumb bastard's eyes out?" He asked standing back up, wiping his face. "You shoulda seen the look on your face." Jason taunted to his stuck foe. "I'm gonna go look around for anything we can... Requisition to further the fight against crime. I'll leave you two lovebirds to it. Make sure none of these dipshits try to make a run for it."

[Finland SSR]

Wyatt and Jason

The Mad Lass, Sina As'tari!

---

Immediately after Jason stepped off the pilot of the downed Juggernaut and got a good laugh at both Wyatt and the thug falling for his joke, Sina stepped in as well, aiming to follow it up, and spoke:

"Hey, if you're not taking the eyes, might if I take a bite instead?"

Sina pulled up the thug by his face and shoulders, to which he immediately responded to by flailing his arms and shouting:

"Hey, what the hell are you doing?!"

"Nah, I bet they would actually taste disgusting. I tasted a bear's eye once and it almost made me vomit, not going to try that again." the vigilante added upon closer inspection, then tossed the pilot back into where she dragged him out from, instead turning towards Wyatt, whom Jason left with her while he took on requisitioning the gang members' belongings. They have a few minutes before the human law enforcement arrives, right? They've got a bit of free time, then. Not that I'll have much of a chance to stick around once the police shows up, anyway.

"You said you wanted to talk about something, right Wyatt?" Sina raised the question. "If it's something you don't want the scaleless to year, we can take it outside."

[Segral]

Carter Graystone

Wait, whaaaaat?!

Scott was leaving?! Just like that! Granted, a few others had already come and gone, but none had been so...abrupt about it. One day, Scott's fine, eating, sleeping, hanging around the Tower, and the next day, he's saying that he doesn't deserve to be on the team and that he wants to do cartooning! Well, he had been a little upset since the mission yesterday, but to be fair, so was practically 90% of the team. He just couldn't understand. Why? Why would he want to leave?

He just stared blankly for a few seconds at the spot where Scott's face used to be, trying to comprehend what just happened. As soon as it hit, he suddenly whirled around, almost tipping off his skateboard. Scott was already clambering into the UBER but seemed to be idling a bit, as if waiting for Carter to say something in return. What could he say? He could try to convince him to stay, but it was clear Scott wanted to leave, and who was he to force him to stay here? But was it right to convince him to leave either? Too many questions, not enough answers. Why did things always have to be this complicated? All he had wanted to do was join the team, do something besides failing at school, and now he was stuck here, moping as he watched one of his teammates walk away.

"Scott, wait!" Carter suddenly barked, his mind made up as he wheeled his way over to the UBER, his jaw pulled tight. "...Look, if you ever out of luck for a job while you're finishing your GED, you can visit my dad's mechanic garage. It's in the residential section of Diego, at 28 Mendez Road. I'm sure he can hook you up with something," he said quickly, butchering the pronunciation of "GED" to "Gead".

"And...can I just say one thing? I used to live in New Orleans with a foster mother, a black spinster lady with no kids. One of those no-nonsense working-class adults preoccupied with 'your future'. And she always had the weirdest sayings and metaphors for everything in life. One day, I played hooky from school for the third time that week, and the school called in to ask why I wasn't there."

"She was maaad, let me tell you, and she said something to me I'll never forget. 'Son, being a fast runner will always help you in life, but when you can run and run and never get tired, you know you've lost the race.' I still haven't forgotten that...and neither should you." he finished, a resigned look on his face.

Great, now he was getting all worked up. How pathetic was he? Spent half of his day moping around the Tower oblivious to his teammates' perils, and then as soon as they leave, he acts like it's such a loss and that it's so sad. Sooky baby, crying again. Where was his mental toughness, his resilience? No, no more of this. Act like a regular person, behave. Lana's voice was echoing in his head, telling him to be confident, assertive. He could do that. It wasn't just a matter of trying, he could fully commit to it.

Stepping back with a grim expression, Carter lifted a hand in a mock salute, trying to make some light out of the situation, crack a joke. "Goodbye, Scott, hope things go well for ya. Do visit though, I'm going to miss your light shows," he said with a wry, thin smile, planting a foot back on the skateboard. "Let's have a contest, see if I can outrace your fancy car with a board on wheels, huh?" he said, pushing off and flying away on his wind-enhanced skateboard without waiting for an answer. He didn't need one, he wouldn't be keeping score this time.

---

Sir Edward Whilton of York
Chapter 9: A Duel for the Ages

"Pfft, pathetic!" Edward spat, gingerly shifting his weight to balance on both feet so that he wouldn't have to hobble and limp so badly. "Spoken like a true piece of filth. When I was still a knight, not in this god-forsaken realm with places and names that I do not recognize, I traveled over the oceans to fight for my religion in the Crusades. Worthless fools like you fell one after another underneath my blade, their lives vanquished for my holy cause, my gift to Jesus. The day I swore to be a knight, I promised to be chivalrous, brave, defeat the injustice in this world. Which tasks me to defeat a liar like you!"

His words gave him confidence, the knowledge that what he was doing was right. Clearly, he was saving poor sailors from murder, these accusations must be false. All he knew about drugs were those odd "vape" things the children were using, and slavery wasn't performed on Christian sailors, that was ridiculous! And many ships carried weapons, all of these things were commonplace! Even if the sailors were performing injustices, he could always deal with them after. This man was insolent enough to warrant a fight, and a fight was what he was going to receive.

With a deep breath, he threw his head back, and screeched aloud his powerful war cry:

"DEUUUUUS VUUUUULT!"

As soon as he finished, he gave a very loud whistle with his lips and tongue, attempting to signal for Harold, who could be heard crashing his way through boxes. Until Harold arrived, his best chances were to stall the steeled stranger long enough to wear him down, bring the horse to him. With a crying screech, he removed the sword from its scabbard and charged forward, shield arm up to protect him from any wild blows. He was a quick runner, and at a full sprint, he was nearly impossible to redirect. With a mighty yell, he swung his sword out in a wide arc, flying straight towards the man's grey, hard skin.

[The Republic of Atria]

Sina

Wyatt was rubbing a few of his bruises he'd gotten fighting the juggernaut while Jason and Sina threatened to eat a man's eyeballs. All things considered it actually went pretty well. Probably the first thing in his life that actually went off without a hitch. Hopefully there'd be a few more like that. Sina approached him, asking if he wanted to talk. <"We can just speak our native tongue. They're not gonna understand what we're saying. And... I suppose I owe you an apology. My real name isn't Wyatt. It's Bael. Well. I guess if I'm being honest, I've got no idea which one is the real name."> He spoke and sat down on a crate.

He finally got a decent look at Sina. One where he wasn't in the middle of trying to keep his attention on not crashing into a building or not getting shot by some kind of force gun. Were it not for her disdain of humans, he'd consider asking her out. <"Not too many of us around. Feels kinda lonely. I don't even know if Jason's doing this because he legitimately cares and wants to be friends, or just doesn't want to feel like the biggest weirdo in the room. Or maybe he's got some weird plan that involves me for some reason."> He admitted and sighed. "<But I guess that's enough moping from me. You said you hang out with the Outriders? Jason's heard of them, but I don't know much about them. What're they like?>"

That being said, he had half an idea. Sina seemed unusually bloodthirsty, the only other person that came to mind was Kaban, and even he was willing to not murder people because Onu asked him not to. So the people she hung out with were probably like him. There was no doubt she had blood on her hands, and probably a lot of it. Even though he found her attractive, it was difficult to see him and her getting along for any length of time.

Jason

Gotcha-Oh fuck. He realized. Once again, Shi proved that she was not the amateur she was masquerading as. Jason spotted her controlled breathing and near laser focus in her eyes, even has he smashed her into the ground. The woman had very good training, good enough that instead of panicking, she shot a controlled fire blast at point blank range that hit Jason square in the chest, staggering the black coated hero back, gripping his chest and swearing. The fire had burned a decent portion of the black ooze away. Revealing some of Jason's body with some burns along his chest.

"Jason, this hurts us! The fire hurts us!"

"Yeah! It hurts me too! Come on buddy, we're in this together. We can do it. We're both fighting the pain. We both need to get used to it. Heal it up, I'm gonna try to play keep away from now on." He spoke under his breath to reassure his partner before calling out to Shi. "You know, you're good for sounding all meek and quiet. Practiced even. Where'd you get all that practice from?" He spoke, backing away, looking for something, anything he could use to hit her. The only thing he spotted was a ball lying off the side of the arena. He'd seen one of those before, it was a medicine ball. He'd have to use a little sleight of hand, but he could pull it off. Attacking from two directions was always a good strategy.

Jason shot a strand towards the ceiling, however, midway, he shot another at the medicine ball, swinging it from behind, aiming it at the center of her back.

[Solisian Union]

Catarina!

---

The Cargo Hold.

Catarina wiped the blood off of her bony claws as she finished off almost every gangster that was protecting the cargo. She even had fun slaughtering any one who came down. She giggled as she brought her hands up to her face to lick the claws clean. She was standing in the middle with several corpses and limbs around her feet. Her lower garments were quite bloody as much as her shirt was and she didn't even mind that. She just wanted her claws clean. It tasted well to her too. All as Night Raven was with her. Catarina did not mind whatever her companion did but... Oh, some meat! Nice~

Soon enough though, she was interrupted by the footsteps approaching from above and from the voice of a woman. The Colombian sighed as she faced the approaching woman who was dressed in cargo pants, military boots and a cotton T shirt that had red letters written on the front that basically said EYES ONLY.

Fortunately for Catarina, this woman might be the fight that she was looking for after feeding and slaughtering the more mortal gangsters in the hold. The woman's eyes glowed with a strong red color while her hands holding knives that were crackling with magical energy. The cannibal hissed at her as she stood her ground while the Russian approached until she was only a few meters away from the cannibal.

The stand off went for a while until the Russian made the first move, slashing at Catarina when she suddenly pulled back. She was able to retreat a bit before finally standing her ground again and used her own magic to pull the bones of some of the bodies towards her. With the bones in her hands, she used these to fight the Russian woman in close quarters, the Russian enjoying the quality of her summoned weapons while Catarina rejoiced with the use of several natural weapons as well as the fact that with her magic, she was using the fresh blood around her to distract or to mark the Russian.

With her own abilities, Catarina was able to push the woman out of the cargo hold, bringing herself and the woman into the upper deck. There, they truly began their fight, with the cannibal magically bringing blood and bones with her out of the hold. With these, she was able to hold her own. Even though her tribal style was nothing like the professional Spetnaz style of fighting the Russian was using.

The Russian kicked at Catarinas side. She dodged by stepping out of the way and attempted to stab the Russian with a long bone. The Russian jumped back and tossed a summoned knife at her foes' face. The knife misses but slashes Catarinas left cheek. She let that bleed as the blood from that wound would prove useful in the fight. With more space around them, the cannibal unleashed a wave of blood against her opponent, pushing her off of her feet and slamming her against the wall of the ship. She chased this chance by lunging at the Russian, howling as she pinned her down and stopped her from summoning any more weapons. As they struggled and wrestled, Catarina was able to keep her opponents hands down and closed, unable to summon as the cannibal drew closer to her and ultimately started to end her life.

This was done first by the sound of a tearing throat and a dying scream.

[North America Inc]

- Jason -

Let's end this. Shi thought to herself as she rubbed her head, different feelings circulated all around her, from a numbing confusion to a searing sting. She walked slightly dazed for the first few steps, before straightening her posture and regaining a modicum of balance. Shi had caught a glimpse of how much one shot had done to Jason, just one blast was enough to knock him out of the air and expose his entire upper torso; she could press the attack, however, successive blasts might be potentially fatal. Despite the idea of incinerating Jason being particularly enticing, it probably wasn't the best idea to kill a fellow Young Blood on the first day of actively joining. That would not be great for her image after all. As she approached the wounded Jason, who was shouting various curses in a fit of anger, she took in the damage with hidden pride. The charred remains of the slime's tendrils covered the ground, his skin was noticeably pink, and the faint smell of burnt hair littered the air. Walking with her hands behind her back, so as to not appear threatening, Shi motioned to him and recommended, "That looks pretty bad. I don't think you can take much more than this. Why don't you just surrender?"

He apparently didn't hear her or was speaking to someone else, as he didn't respond to her idea. Instead he asked, "You know, you're good for sounding all meek and quiet. Practiced even. Where'd you get all that practice from?" He stood himself up, and suspiciously began to back away from her. He had something up up his sleeve.

"1 minute, 30 seconds..." the automated voice declared. Time was almost up, but it wasn't like Shi and Jason, or even Wyatt and CASSANDRA were keeping an eye out for it. Both parties were oddly dedicated to winning a supposedly casual fight.

Keeping a close eyes on his hands, Shi playfully pulled her arms up to do a triceps stretch. "Well you see. I've kind of done this thing in my home country. Britain. If my accent wasn't enough of a give away..." She said with a teasing tone. After doing her right arm's triceps, she switched to her left. "Anyways to keep a long story short, I have done some 'criminal justice' work for the past few years. On the side, I have other obligations too."

She watched his hands closely as she got closer to him. Jason was going to pull something He launched himself in the air with his right and then a few moments later, with his left shot another strand to something out of her sight. She contemplated just shooting him down, but that would do a little too much damage to a 'colleague'; not to mention his speed. He might be able to dodge her shot. So let's target something stationary. Without even turning her head to focus on either or, she outstretched both her arms, and targeted his web strands. Severing both with ease, he fell to the ground.

THUMP. The sound of some projectile slamming against a wall could be heard intermittently in the chaos. Shi cautiously approached Jason, with her left arm retracted and the other extended. A faint glow engulfed her right arm as she aimed it directly towards Jason. "Surrender?"

[Finland SSR]

Wyatt

The Mad Lass, Sina As'tari!

---

Instead of taking the discussion outside, Wyatt instead offered to speak in their native language - a choice which made Sina cringe a little at how that didn't pop into her head immediately. Nobody else will be able to understand them that way, of course. I blame the fact that the last time I got to speak Dra'Quinni was, like, what, three weeks ago? Okay, that's not all that great of a justification, but I'm taking it.

<"Yeah, yeah, that works too. I don't know why I assumed that's not an option."> Sina replied in her native language while leaning on the edge of a crate nearby. When Wyatt explained that it wasn't his real name - which she had already suspected earlier, juydging from how unnatural that name was - Sina snickered. <"Bael? That's... an ironic name for someone like you - but it sounds a lot better than Wyatt.">

Bael was a bold and strong name. Wyatt sounds like the sound a demented frog makes. Not hard to make a choice on which is better.

After complaining a little about being alone and Jason having designs on them, the Dra'Quinni raised a question - so if she's an Outrider, then what is that team like? Bael had no knowledge of them, unlike Jason, which Sina had already suspected from the way the trio talked earlier, so she figured she could offer what she knows.

<"It's actually really fun. We spend our time taking care of the worst of society - criminals, thugs, rapists, the like - which nobody else tries to go after. There's a lot of risk involved and neither side's holding back, but it's part of the fun. Say, as an example, last night we got to storm a Russian mafia ship - I can't deny that there was a lot of danger involved, but it was worth it. And I learned what 'Russian' and 'mafia' mean, too."> Sina began to explain, snickering at the last sentence. <"Everyone out there is an outcast, one way or another - and, honestly, it makes the team oddly accepting, too. Nobody there ever shuns anyone for being different, you know - because that's what we all are.">

At least that's as much as Sina managed to extract from her few days of snooping around and being a member. The Dra'Quinni vigilante raised her eyes towards the ceiling and continued:

<"And if we're talking about being different - honestly, Bael... I'm just as alone as you, I'd say. You're actually the first Dra'Quinni I've met who isn't family.">

---

Brianna Erickson

---

The Mad Lass, Sina As'tari!

---

After Sina got tossed right back to where she came from, Brianna got back up on her feet and tossed herself straight into the fray, putting an end to the battle with a robotic wrestling match and an impressive show of strength, ripping off the android's head and showcasing it to the Dra'Quinni. Then chucking it straight at her. Sina caught the ripped off head with her clawed hands and took a closer look.

"You know... bzzt... you look like Smaug... bzzt... as imagined by the Internet." the head spoke to her.

"Sorry metal-rat, I don't know what either of those things mean." Sina spoke right back, then turned her eyes towards Brianna, and then to the mysterious human who had intervened in the fight to save both of them from the android's weapon barrage. It wasn't an Outrider, for sure - she didn't see him in the team meeting at least. "And who might you be?"

[Confederation of the Equator]

[minecraft villager sound]

[Tomia]

July 24th
Angelica didn't sleep much that night. It felt like there a heavy pit at the bottom of her stomach. Not only did the events at Wonder Foundation replay in her mind, but so did the conversation she had with Jacob. Was he right? Did she need talk to Alexis? The thought felt like a trial hanging over her head. What if Alexis rejected her? This was the first friend she had in her whole life, the first person she had opened up to. And if she fell out with Alexis, what would happen to her friendship with Yoshi and the team itself? The thought terrified Angelica and so she headed down to the gym to try to avoid it. When she arrived there she was alone thankfully, joined by nothing but the rising sun. She set up the punching bag and began slamming her fists into it, trying to focus on her footwork than the thoughts raging in her mind.

After about twenty minutes though she realized her efforts were fruitless, she couldn't go on like this. She walked in a huff to the wall and slammed her fists against the wall. Frostbite was breathing heavily, boarding on an anxiety attack. Her chest was seizing up and she had to actively think about breathing. "God damn it, what is happening to me?" She said allowed, willing her body to come down. After a few minutes she left the gym but didn't go to her room like she normally would have. Instead she made her way to Alexis' lab. She stood outside the door for almost five minutes, too petrified to knock. Eventually she gained up the courage and knocked, she was so worked up the knock ended up being a little more forceful than intended.

Inside the laboratory, loud whirring sounds could be heard as Alexis exhaustively tested Oberon’s mechanisms to make sure that everything that had been fixed so far worked properly before she continued with the repairs. Having worked tirelessly and without distractions for close to twelve hours, she had made leaps and bounds in terms of progress, but there was still much to do, a fact that would have irritated her had she retained the capacity for that at the moment. Regardless, the noise inside the laboratory nearly drowned out the sound of Angelica’s knocks on the metallic sliding door, but a small, near-invisible camera connected to it sent an automated alarm to alert Alexis to the presence of a visitor.

The blonde girl immediately stopped her current activities, shutting down the still wounded Oberon before turning to look at a nearby screen, noticing who the visitor was. Fortunately, or perhaps unfortunately, even though she was currently ‘disconnected’ so to speak, Alexis still took her wishes and emotions into account for deliberation--at least, the ones she was aware she would usually have. Thus, while the optimal thing to do would’ve been to ignore the knocking and continue working, she instead turned around and snapped her fingers, causing the door to slide into the wall.

As the door opened, the first sight that greeted Angelica was that of Makeshift in her usual superhero attire minus her visor, arms crossed in front of her chest as she stared at the taller girl with narrowed eyes. “What do you want, Angelica?” She asked, a bit of an edge in her voice.

Angelica had never fully gotten used to the complexity of Alexis’ workshop. In such a short time the tech girl had seemed to create something that almost felt alive. The other thing that threw her off was Alexis calling her by her real name. It’s not that she hadn’t done so before, but it had become fairly uncommon for Angelica since she doesn’t talk to many people outside of the team and only two of her teammates knew her team.

On top of all of that, Angelica found the sight of Alexis to be very distracting. It wasn’t that she was dressed in anything out of the ordinary, and she certainly looked like she’d been stuck in her lab for a few hours, but for Angelica the sight took her breath away a bit.

“Uh… well…” She stumbled, having trouble forming words in her mind let alone her throat. Come on, this is ridiculous. The ice hero chided herself mentally, but it didn’t seem to do anything to clear her mind.

Unfortunately for Angelica, Alexis wasn’t nearly as excited to see her as she was to see Alexis. The tech wizard was still in a foul mood after their failure the previous night and wasn’t very content with the frost heroine, so while she had decided to allow Frost Bite in and listen to the girl’s comments, her patience evaporated quite quickly when it became apparent that she wasn’t going to be very forthcoming with that.

With an irritated sigh, the genius girl placed her hands on her hips. “Look, Frost Girl, if you’re going to be like that then you should’ve sorted out your thoughts before knocking. In case you haven’t noticed, I’m a little busy here, doing some maintenance work so I can better pull my weight during missions.” She said with a slight scowl, the memory of their spat during her last mission still quite fresh in her mind. Her remarks were a lot more biting than she would’ve wanted them to be, admittedly, but it was too late to take them back now.

Angelica was taken aback a bit by her friend’s biting and impatient remarks. It made sense, considering their fight the night before. Still Alexis had never spoken to her friend that way and it made the hero known as Frost Bite even more self conscious than she already was. It was clear that Alexis wasn’t going to have a lot of patience for her, so she needed to find a way to just get to the point.

“Okay fine,” Angelica said, swallowing a bit before getting to the point. “I wanted to talk about last night. I know you’re mad at me for what happened, but there’s something you don’t understand…”

“What is it that I don’t understand, Angelica? That I’m too weak to hold my ground in a fight and that I should be a good girl and stay here?” Alexis interrupted, clearly angered by the implication that she didn’t know what was going on. “I’m obviously mad! I know better than anyone here that my track record on this team hasn’t been great, that the most I’ve managed to do is blow up a few things and punch Inferno’s jewels, but I don’t need people to remind me of that, you know? I didn’t join this team for that!” She shouted, clearly growing more agitated as she spoke.

“And you know what? I work really hard for this team! I spend hours upon hours in here just so I can help out, pull my weight and give everyone the tools they need to save people, so I’m not going to just stand here and listen to this!”

“Stop putting words in my mouth!” Angelica snapped back angrily. “That’s not what I was going to say, I’ve never doubted you work hard. It’s not fair for you to just project on me like that.” She told her friend, this wasn’t the reaction she had expected and it only seemed to confirm that telling Alexis about her feelings would only end badly.

“You know how hard it is for me to put myself in these conversations. I came here trying to open up to you and you jumped down my throat instead. You’re supposed to be my friend.” Angelica added, there was anger but also clear hurt in her voice.

Alexis opened her mouth to reply the exact same moment Angelica finished speaking, but instead of words coming out, she remained silent for several awkward seconds, being the one to struggle forming words this time. While she was definitely still very upset about everything that happened the previous night, the way Angelica called their friendship into question was enough to cause the genius girl to snap out of her anger for a moment and realize just how cruel she was being.

“I… s-sorry…” Was all she could say after that, unsure of how to make up for her behavior.

Angelica lowered her head and turned away, tears had started to form in her eyes and she didn’t want Alexis to see that. She had been stupid to think she’d confess her feelings and then sweep Alexis off her feet in a happy ever after. She was a mess emotionally and this could only end badly if she tried to pursue it, that was clear now.

“I’m gonna go, I made a mistake coming here. I should have just let you work in peace.” She said trying to keep her voice steady but only doing an average job at that. With that she ran off from the lab, leaving Alexis alone.

[Charmera]

Wyatt was caught off guard when Shi got in front of Cass ad started spraying him with fire. The fire was hot enough that he backed off, still braced, not expecting a blast of force the knocked him on his back. God dammit! He groaned internally. All he seemed to be able to do was get smacked around while everyone else did all the work. Not only did it hurt, it felt degrading. Made him feel useless. No, not useless.

Angry. He grit his teeth, eyes giving the most intense thousand yard stare. He slammed his hand on the ground of the gym, cracking it in the process and thrusting himself back to his feet. Completely without a plan of action until he saw Jason creeping behind Cass.

Jason shot two strands at the back of Cass's body and used her sturdy frame to vault over Cass and use Shi as a landing pad.

Wyatt began his charge once again, however this time, he jumped above, clasped his hands together like one would hold a sledgehammer, and dropped, intending to bring both of his hands down on Cass's head.

Cassandra was momentarily distracted by Shi asking her where Jason was. She was not able to answer that question before she saw Wyatt look to something behind her. Then she felt sticky strands of something. She braced herself, knowing how dangerous being unbalanced was. She noticed Jason soaring overhead, using her like a leapfrog. She returned her attention quickly to Wyatt, who was charging directly at her at great speed. But then the lizardlike hero jumped, using a fist like gesture that would bring the bulk of the force down upon her head.

My head. That was where her primary cognitive hardware was. She could lose every part of her body, but if her head was intact she could still survive and have a hope of being rebuilt. But if it were smashed, then that was it. She would be gone. She would cease to exist.

A spark of something strange rippled through Cass. Something which seemed to function faster than even her cognitive faculties would allow. It echoed the memory files of her fighting Floyd in that pivotal move, at a period between destruction and continued existence. It was a numb automation that took over, sudden and fierce. The android put her hand up in protection, said bulked arm would take the brunt of the slam.

That it did, metal buckling from the strike. It left a dent on her arm as her internal hardware was also suddenly shaken by the impact. Some of it was damaged. The armor itself had a small crack in that dent. With the force, the sudden strange feeling left her as she ascertained the impact. The damage had come to a well-protected area of her body, so it was altogether minimal. However, had it hit it's intended target...

Cass found herself strangely unable to calculate what the force would do to her head. As if she could not let herself think it.

Cass turned her mind to reprisals. She needed to stop Wyatt from getting the upper hand. Simply blowing him backward was not going to do it, she needed to disrupt him somehow. To this end she decided to leverage her greater fighting skills.

As soon as Cass could, she used their newfound closeness to suddenly slam down her foot onto Wyatt's. She would then follow this up with a devastating punch to the face, a powerful jab that aimed to stun her opponent. She then followed this up by aiming another blast of energy at her opponent.

Jane

Casimir Herman
Casimir's head was a whirlpool of thoughts as Jane lead him to one of the infirmary's beds. While she went to get supplies, Casimir looked downwards with his face contorting to a furious scowl once again. His thoughts went from his complete lack of prowess with his fight against Scott at how easily he let himself get sapped of most of his strength to the completely ridiculous request from Renata about keeping it a secret. How dare she ask him such a pitiful demand. His mind then swayed to another side as he remembered the great show of regret that was on Scott's face. This remorse of his was intriguing to say the least but Casimir couldn't quell his anger at his utter humiliating third defeat in a week. He was the almighty Kabuto and yet...and yet he lost.

Casimir momentarily shoved the thoughts away as Jane came back with supplies and began cleaning his forehead wound. His wounds being treated was an actually quite soothing experience now that he thought about it. That is until she asked how he got these injuries. Now would be a good time for a quicksave but that wasn't going to happen now was it. He still felt guilty about what happened with Renata and this ordeal with Scott seemed more complicated then the surface looked. Probably best to keep it to himself until he had more information.

"Got them while I was sparring on the roof with someone," said Casimir with a halfhearted grin, "Things got a bit heated so we stopped. The guy didn't really want to come with me to the infirmary. That's his problem though. What kind fighter doesn't take care of themselves afterwards, right?"

Jane raised an eyebrow as she checked on his other wounds. She was skeptical of that story, as any one of these injuries would be reason enough to stop a fight. It didn't sound like he was lying exactly, but he seemed to be downplaying the fight. She moved to the freezer as she thought, getting out some cream for the bruises and some cream for the burn. She applied the latter first, as it didn't require all that much from her patient. She would ask him to move a bit when she applied the bruise cream to his bruises.

"Keep holding that cloth to your head. Once that's stopped bleeding I'll get you a bag of ice for that wound." She explained. Treating Cas' wounds were hardly brain surgery, but she felt as if there was something else. It bothered her.

"Who did you spar with?" She asked.

[The Republic of Atria]

Sina

July 23

He sat back, listening to Sina mention that his name was ironic given how his personality was. He sniggered and nodded. "<The funny part is, you're not the first person to say that about me. I know. Not exactly the epitome of masculinity. Not that I really know what the means for our standards.>" He asked kicking his feet a bit. Sina like his "real" name more than his human one. It made sense, even if he wasn't sure. "<Call me whatever's easier for you.>" He replied.

Sina went on to explain the Outriders. A group of people who felt they were outcasts and took upon themselves to deal with the type of crimes no one really noticed or could deal with. Using methods that were far more... aggressive than what he was used to. Obviously he wasn't a fan of people being judge jury and executioner, but given how he did so the other day... It would be hypocritical to say anything against them. She somehow found it fun. "<Fun? I wouldn't call it fun personally. Exciting definitely, thrilling... Fun adjacent. I don't know. I like doing it, but I don't know if I actually like it or if it's the adrenaline talking.>" He shrugged. "<Feelings are hard and I don't really know what I'm doing.>"

It was nice to be able to talk to someone like him. Sina could relate to his problems, bemoaning that she didn't really have anyone outside her immediate family to speak to either. "<We should keep in touch.>" Hopefully he didn't sound too weird saying that. "<One of us finds something Dra'Qunni related, we can talk to each other away from the... Others. Or you know. We just want to talk.>" This was awkward, he knew it was awkward but dammit he wanted someone his own age and species he could talk to.

Jason smashed the metal door down he entered, with his foot, while carrying a large dufflebag. "A locked safe. No match for my secret lock picking technique." He said, carefully positioning himself so that his body obscured the fact that he just tore the door off, so long as you didn't look too closely. "Alright. Let's get the hell outta here. Sina, you said you ran with the Outriders? You mind asking them if we can crash for a bit? I gotta count out my and you guy's paychecks and I'd rather not do it in front of the cops."

July 24

How he wished that the setting was slightly more suited to him. There was so little he could do without getting right up on Shi's face, which was an extremely bad idea to begin with. "Another non-American came to join our wonderfully American team cause their country doesn't have a young team? Yeah. Figures. America is a melting pot after all!"

Then came Shi just burning all the strands he set up and sending from dropping to the ground, missing his shot completely. Jason hit the ground with a loud THUD and looked to see the British girl standing over him. "Alright alright. No point in continuing this. Odds are stacked against me something fierce. Your powers counter me. This stupid open area with limited things that I can throw at you that won't permanently maim you. I yield. Uncle. Submission, et cetera." He muttered climbing back to his feet.

He was not prepared for Cass to counter so quick. She managed to defend and counter by knocking him in the gut with a jab and blasting him away. He curled up, reducing the damage, but it still didn't feel good. Once again, he felt angry, but not the kind of angry were he wanted to dig in and fight, the despair kind where he only felt like his job was to get smack around. He slammed his knuckle on the ground of the area, cracking it before sitting up, with a frustrated glare.

Why can't I do anymore than hit things?! He hissed in his own mind. It wasn't that he was losing, though that certainly didn't help. I can only do one thing, and I'm not even good at it. Come on you stupid magic! Stop being so fucking useless! Help me! Do something! I don't care how! For what seemed like the billionth time, he recalled Kaban's words of advice: "Anger is power. Focus it. Use it."

Rather than continuing to fume, he stood back up, took a deep breath and closed his eyes. Focus... Come on magic. Do something. Jason's out... He opened them, his hands beginning to glow, the concrete cracking and breaking all over the arena. Wyatt immediately panicked, flicking and waving his arms, the glowing stopping after the arena had a crack down the middle. "Can... Can I just give up? That was... New? Not supposed to happen? I have no idea..."

[New Neros]

The Battle of San Francisco
Counter-Attack

Wasting no time in greeting the only three beings blocking his escape, Gaul launched directly at the foes who had decided to come to their allies’ aid. Despite his aggressive charge, though, they seemed ready for him, and Gaul landed his forearm against a muscle-clad woman of impressive height and build, fully stopping his charge and delivering a harsh counter-punch to his jawline. Dazed from the blow, Gaul staggered back a single step before becoming engulfed in roaring flames, singeing his clothes and hair, but at the same time, cauterizing his wounds. Regaining composure and jumping away from the heat source, Gaul reoriented his strategy, eyeing the larger woman and her scrawny, fire-producing ally as he skid to a stop some ways away, barely having enough time to consider where the third figure had went.

Without warning, a pick-up truck slammed hood first down onto Gaul from above, the villain barely having enough time to grab it’s grill guard and support himself against its weight and downward force. With a pained grunt, Gaul threw the pick-up to the side, cutting his eyes to try and see who had thrown it, but found himself rushed by the heroine and hero. Dodging a wide swing from the girl and pushing the smaller teen’s fist to the ground to redirect his flame burst, Gaul violently yanked the young boy’s hand into the large woman’s rib cage, forcibly snapping his wrist and splintering a rib from the woman in one fluid motion. Leaving no room for them to follow up, Gaul pressed his advantage and delivered a full-force side kick to the young teen’s head, forcing it to the side and knocking him out clean. Gaul jumped back to gain distance as the fire-producing heroes’ face ate pavement and laid there, but in that moment, he caught the heroines eyes, and saw her look change from horror to rage.

Tunneling his vision onto her, Gaul assumed his normal fighting stance and lowered his shoulders and hips, twisting them slightly to respond better and apply torque and momentum to any counter-attack he could manage against the coming onslaught. That proved to be a mistake, however, as the villain was suddenly smacked full-force with a large slab of concrete from the side, sending him flying into a nearby buildings’ brick wall. The heroine charged at Gaul as he hit, slamming her fist into his stomach, forcing spit to fly from his mouth and push his body the rest of the way through the building and into the interior. “You’re gonna pay for what you did to Agni, Peacock, and Apollo.” She spat with venom, bringing her other fist to crack against Gaul’s face inside the ruined department store. Staggering to his feet, Gaul wiped the blood from his mouth along with a tooth, looking directly at the woman and the hole he had been blown through. Smirking slightly, Gaul looked beyond his opponent to see the third combatant who had been well to hide the entire time and provide tactical support, watching a small girl float carefully in eye-shot of the larger woman.

“Found you.” He said quietly, the burly woman whipping her head around quickly, catching sight of her younger sister, who had been sticking to their plan without fail. That last glimpse cost her the fight, however, as Gaul swung as hard as he could, pulling through with fearsome power and momentum, slamming his knuckles against the side of the teenagers’ face and cratering her cheek bone, knocking her back into one of the side walls abruptly, knocking her fully unconscious and leaving her face steaming from the friction of the hit. “Let me guess, teenage heroes with god names related to their powers, except for Peacock, and she was Athena or something strong and feminine.” Turning his shoulders straight and gazing directly at Athena’s younger sister, a small girl, barely in double digits by the looks of it, she looked absolutely petrified. “And who might you be, little heroine?” He took careful steps toward her, emerging from the broken wall and stepping directly into the sunlight, bathing his six-foot-two heavy-muscled frame in warmth, showcasing his vast and extensive injuries, but also revealing his tenacity to still move forward in spite of them. The girl quivered slightly, floating away from Gaul but never looking away nor blinking. “I asked for your name, little girl. If it helps, I’m Mustafa Gaul, but you can call me Gladiator.”

“I…” She began, floating to the ground and landing some ways from Gaul, shaking slightly and clutching her elbows as she hugged herself close. “Iris.” She said softly, barely audible, enough to give Gaul a sly smirk and continue his slow walk towards her. The emotions that flooded her small body were numerous, but the prevailing one was fear, and every instinct told her to run and flee, but her body wouldn’t listen. She was frozen, even as Gaul towered over her and cast his enormous shadow over her. He squatted down slightly, becoming eye level with the school girl, causing her to breathe erratically and let a small squeak come from her voice box as he stared deep into her frigid blue eyes. “P-please…” She began, but was cut off by the villain, causing Iris to cover her mouth in fright.

“Iris.” Gaul said in a deep, authoritarian tone. “I need you to be honest with me, understand?” She nodded up and down quickly, willing to say whatever Gaul wanted to hear so that she could live another day, “When are the others coming?”

“O-others?” She stammered, giving Gaul a confused look, the villain nodding, realizing they probably didn’t give Iris much information other than her tasks and the basic game-plan. That was fine, she wouldn’t be much use anymore then, other than a talking mouth who would call for help the moment she ran. However, the girl was a powerful telekinetic, young, but full of talent and potential. The fact that she wasn’t trying to rip off his head spoke some volumes to her inexperience, no doubt, but Gaul was definitely above hitting children. She looked around to the sides expectantly, eyes welling with tears, “My sister…” She started, a waterfall pouring from her face at that point as she sobbed in the ugliest of ways. In the distance, a rumbling vibration shook the ground, Iris ignoring it in order to cry while Gaul looked to his surroundings, for an explanation.

“Iris,” He said once more, raising to his tallest as well, “I need you to listen to me, and I need you listen right now.” The girl sniffled and peered at Gaul through her red eyes and tears, choking back as she tried to calm down for a moment, “Are you listening? Will you do what I tell you to?!” He said a bit more forcibly, scaring Iris a bit, the young girl nodding up and down and stopping her tears for a moment. Gaul was quiet, listening as the silence permeated between the two. Softly, in a hushed whisper, the villain gave his order, “Run.”

With Gaul leaping forward unexpectedly, Iris did as she was told and floated and flew in the opposite direction, looking back for a moment and watching as the battlefield her, her sister, and her friends had just been beaten on explode into a lush forested landscape as well as shattered bits of debris from the cityscape, flying further and further away as Gaul prepared to fight a far tougher battle, the rest of the Rising Suns returning to the city in a display of force.

[Absolon-7]

Detective Jane!

Casimir Herman July 24th
Casimir nearly bit down on his tongue as Jane went to the infirmary's freezer in frustration but at least she seemed to buy the story about it being a sparring session. Well he did it. He let the words about revealing the half-truth of his wounds to Jane and now had to go along with it. Dammit, this was just nothing more then a strategic retreat! He knew too little about what was going on between Scott and Renata to jump to any conclusions. If he struck now it would be like a dragonfly swooping down to catch prey while on a river's surface while an incoming surge of rainwater was seconds away. He had to bide his time and observe. Although he was curious why Renata seemed so protective of Scott even after Scott tried to kill him.....Perhaps there was something going on between them? It made sense. They're both recruits from around the same time so they'd had something in common and they seemed friendly with each other back at Mar's and Wyatt's birthday party when he went to talk to them. Renata did show a lot of genuine emotion while she pleaded for Scott to spare him. Oh well, this was nothing more then speculation.

"Sure thing," affirmed Casimir as he complied with Jane's order of holding the cloth to his head before informing her, "My bleeding should stop pretty soon on my regen so you might as well get it now."

Internally Casimir tensed up when she asked who he sparred with but externally he remained the same composure, "I sparred with Renata. You know Lazer Girl and goes all pew-pew? I figured her range capabilities would be good for me to deal with. Although, I tried webslinging around the tower but I forgot that I barely know how to use the power and ended up sling-shotting myself into the roof. Quite hard mind you."