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Post by ParamountKeymaster on Mar 15, 2016 19:36:59 GMT -5
Night had befallen Void City. The sky had gone dark and the lights had gone up. Nonetheless, as the day winded to a close, the bustling metropolis seemed as lively as ever. From the hum of cars on the highways making the trek home, to the streetlights and windows that lit up the steel and concrete jungle like stars, to the blissful citizens finishing up their business in the Plaza... It looked like another average day had come and gone peacefully.
And then...
Fire.
One by one, the buildings lining the Plaza's sidewalks were set ablaze, as if the flames of hell itself had erupted from the shadows. Great orange tongues burned forth to touch the blackened sky, raining embers down upon the streets. As fire spread throughout the city, consuming all in its path, the gentle hum of the city was overpowered by a horrific choir of screams. People fled in terror, crowding the streets as they scrambled to escape the growing blaze. Many found themselves trapped by walls of flame. Everywhere you looked, there was nothing but fire, smoke and devastation.
Just when it seemed like everything had come crashing down all at once, silhouettes appeared amongst the chaos. From out of the shadows and flames came a horde of red-eyed Præt'nos, swarming the fleeing crowd like enormous black insects. The hapless citizens would soon find themselves either trapped against the fire or ambushed by the demons, any chance of escape looking to be long gone.
And as death and destruction ran rampant through the streets, General Choleric observed his army from the far end of the street. With one hand, he maintained a wall of shadows, sealing the city exit. With the other, he continued to light the fires that filled the Plaza and spread to the surrounding buildings. So many souls ripe for the picking. His orders had been simple, and his demons were carrying them out according to plan.
Kill them all.
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Miles away, as he and Chrys wandered the cemetery, placing defensive spells and light traps wherever they saw fit, Toby looked up to see the red and orange glow illuminating the city. Even from this distance, he could feel the heat. Hear the screams of the innocent as they were trapped within this ring of fire.
And almost instantly, Toby knew what was going on.
"C-Choleric..."
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Post by Pink Moon Wolf on Mar 15, 2016 20:08:23 GMT -5
The members of the Summer Snow apartment knew this would come, though none of them knew where.
As such, they had broken off into groups and spent the day traversing the most populous places the island had to offer. While the others had ventured to the north, east and south, Andromeda and Aether had explored every street and every corner of Void City in the hopes of finding any telltale signs of an impending Præt'nos attack. Truth be told, they would've considered themselves lucky to have found anything. Those demons were tricky and often appeared without warning. Even though the foreknowledge provided by Enlightenment had alerted them to this fight, the alien girls were by no means ready for it.
Fortunately, they had been a few blocks away when the Plaza spontaneously caught fire. After simultaneously jumping and staring at the phenomena in shock and horror, the duo quickly realized that this was what they had been waiting for.
"Goodness...!" Aether choked, doing her best to shake herself off and get moving. "This has to be Choleric's work."
As the little blue star jumper bolted down the street, she called over her shoulder, "Tell the others! Let them know we found them!"
Andromeda nodded and quickly pulled out her phone, hastily sending the pre-written text message to her teammates. Once the word was sent, she dashed after Aether, circling around the fiery Plaza in search of a break in the flames. They had to get these people out of there!
In her run, starlight swirled around Aether's form, building and building as she channeled the surrounding elemental forces into her aura. Soon a mist started to pour out of her body, condensing into a black raincloud. At her command, the cloud rose into the air, rainwater pouring from it and onto one of the burning buildings below. It was a slow process, but the flames directly beneath the cloud were quenched, and Aether continued around the block, creating more clouds and repeating the process.
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Post by gantzgun74 on Mar 15, 2016 21:03:49 GMT -5
It was a horrible awful mess, with seemingly no end in sight. And worse yet, it looked like these monsters would get away with numerous victims... Several demons were chasing people about the town one of them preparing to catch up to three people-
"POWER FIST!!!!!!!"
A powerful ray of light in the shape of a fist plowed several demons backwards at highspeeds, causing them to crash into one of the buildings.
.... When the demons and people looked, they would've found three figures standing at the end of the parkway...
"WOW!!! Those look like... Mega ULTRA baddies!!" KO was POSITIVELY ELATED to see all of this. Though the smile melted when he saw all of the people in danger. "Hey-!! Hey Mom! All of those people are in trouble!!" Carol's frown was prominent as well, the gap in her teeth now showing in prominent TEETH GRITTING. "... Mom?"
Carol snaps out of her trance and turns to KO, smiling. "Don't ya worry, My lil' Dumbbell~. We ain't gonna let these creepos hurt em." She turns to the third person. "Ya ready for a brawl?"
Prishe, a new normal attendee at the gym, grinned and cracked her knuckles. "ALWAYS."
The three charge in, shouting battle cries all the while. "FOR THE PLAZA!!!!!" KO shouted as he jumped up high in the air, drop-kicking one demon before rapidly punching another one HARD in the gut. Give Carol's boy this, he was a real dynamo as he finished up by grabbing the beast and SUPLEXING IT CLEAN INTO THE CEMENT. "YAAAAH~!!!!!!" KO followed up by jumping up high in the air-....
BAAAAAAM!!!!!!!!!!!! And the ensuing shockwave knocked a number of Praet'nos soldiers off guard-
"WIDE OPEN~!!!"
Prishe's follow up was the good old fashioned ‘Nullification Kick’, a powerful flying drill kick attack coursing with magic which slammed through several soldiers all at once before she followed up with, “ONE INCH PUNCH!!!” The magical blow seemed to follow through… BEFORE the single punch magically blasted enemies in several places around the body sending them flying back. Several soldiers tried to sneak up behind her only for another Power Fist from KO to send them flying once more. More opponents followed prompting Prishe to sweep her leg at them- The energy blast from the attack sent them sliding backward-
They were flattened by a massive slab of SOLID CONCRETE.
Carol looked to the people that were past them, the fighters having pushed back the pursuers. “GET OUTTA HERE!!! GRAB AS MANY PEOPLE AS YOU CAN AND RUN!!!!” The citizens didn’t need to be told twice and quickly took off running.
With Carol however, as she PICKED UP THE SLAB ON CONCRETE THAT SHE HAD JUST USED AS A CLUB, looked around the numbers KO and Prishe were fighting…. “Hmmm… Nah… None of them look like leader material.” The soldiers from before tried to get up-
ONLY FOR CAROL TO FLATTEN THEM BACK DOWN WITH ANOTHER SOLID HIT FROM THE CONCRETE SLAB. Carol, after that, quickly jumped up to a street-light, taking a look around. Both for more people and for anything resembling a big man in charge. “Come on… Invasions like this don’t work without the boss… Where’s the boss??” ZEEOOO!!!!! KO Managed another ‘Power Fist’ beam slamming several Praetnos sliding backward. “HAhahahahaha~!!! THAT’S MY BOY KO!!! DEFEND THIS CITY TO THE EXTREME!!!!”
“MY SOUL BURNS FOR JUSTICE!!!” KO shouted back proudly as he grabbed another Praet’nos and practically LOBBED him at the others.
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Post by DMis on Mar 15, 2016 22:41:51 GMT -5
Chrys' attention quickly snapped to the raging fire. "Well time to be heroes," she commented with a smirk. "You up for this?"
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It had been a quiet day off for Beth and her red headed charge. She was currently glaring at the flames now surrounding them both. A cloth covered the lower half of her face.
"Ready for this one Partner?" Beth asked as she launched a few flashes of dark blue to combat the flames.
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Post by ryocker on Mar 15, 2016 22:54:50 GMT -5
Nora looked around at all the sudden fire, grinning hugely as she pulled her Rocket Launcher to her front. "I always knew I'd be fighting aliens some day," she smirked, the gun becoming a hammer as she swung it at one of the Praetnos flying toward them, making it go sky high. "FOUR!!!"
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Post by ParamountKeymaster on Mar 15, 2016 23:10:44 GMT -5
Toby took a deep breath and nodded, staring ahead with grim determination. "I can get there faster through the shadows... but I can only do that alone. Go together or meet me there?"
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Choleric snarled as he watched the battle unfold, taking note of his army's opposition. Half of them were focusing on tearing down the crowd, while the other half was subduing these new challengers to no immediate avail. It infuriated him to see his demons, the toughest and strongest that the Præt'nos had to offer, being knocked down so easily, particularly by the child and his mother. He thought he had made it clear that there was no easy way out. That there was bound to be someone who would try to put up a fight. These fools should've been easy picking!
At the very least, his demons were only getting pushed around, and they were doing a good job at discretely protecting their weak spots.
Still, the general had to roar in anger as storm clouds started to gather just above the buildings, releasing a cascade of rain to quell his flames. Now this was all too familiar to him. He had seen this tactic used against him before.
The Keymaster's companions were here.
In one quick motion, Choleric threw a massive wave of fire at KO, Carol, Prishe, Beth and Nora. Then he sunk into the shadows, slithering along the ground in search of the little blue rainmaker.
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Post by Pink Moon Wolf on Mar 15, 2016 23:23:14 GMT -5
Andromeda was nervous. Terrified, really. If there was one thing she was demonstrably not, it was a fighter. She was by no means fit to charge into this battle, and it was quite frankly the last thing she wanted to do. It might've been different if they were up against the air or water general. But the fire general? No thank you!
Of course, she couldn't just stand by while people were potentially dying. She had to help somehow.
Fortunately, Aether's rain seemed to be doing the trick at putting out the fire, creating plenty more openings for people to escape through. As they navigated through the charred buildings in a desperate bid for freedom, Andromeda gathered up as much of the light power within her as she could, then threw it at the shadows, ensuring that they couldn't hurt anyone trying to stray away from the Præt'nos' reach. She did this quite a few times despite the exhaustive strain, pausing every now and then to check and see if anyone was injured.
Okay... things were progressing well... she hoped.
All the while, Aether continued to run laps around the Plaza, creating cloud after cloud to unleash a torrential downpour on the fire. This too was an exhausting process, as it was taking almost everything within her power to ensure that the streams of water were powerful enough to put out and not fan the flames. At least it seemed to be working, and fighters had arrived to combat the Præt'nos. She hoped this would be enough to deter them.
"YIPE-!" She screeched to a halt just in time to see a dark figure writhing her way, leaping back and hastily throwing a lightning-charged cloud at the shadow.
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Post by gantzgun74 on Mar 15, 2016 23:57:43 GMT -5
The fight was going well it SEEMED, unfortunately however, it didn't look like punching these things down was doing any good whatsoever. Whenever they were knocked down, the creatures would just get back up and continue their assault. Even worse? The fighters present didn't even account for the second half of the attack team, still going around killing whatever people they could find. Things weren't going worse, but they were still going pretty horrifically bad.
Thankfully, Beth and Nora shooting in seemed to help even the odds somewhat allowing for Prishe and KO to fight at leisure while Carol herself continued looking around-
The object of her search quickly became apparent thanks in large part to the screaming-AND THE FLAME THROWING.
"YEAAAAAAAAH~!!!!" KO continued punching about and suplexing other demons down- THEN HE SAW THE WAVE OF FLAMES." WHOOO-UH-OH..." KO quickly went on the defensive- Until his mother jumped in front of him-
THERE WAS A MASSIVE STOMP AND SUDDENLY THE ROAD FLIPPED UP LIKE A HIDDEN WALL BLOCKING A GREAT DEAL OF THE FLAMES.
............
KO was starry eyed, Prishe was in disbelief...
Carol however SAW what had become of the apparent leader as he shrunk down into his shadow while screaming in frustration... The shadow then slinked into the shadows, taking off into the darkness. ".... Hmmmmm So THAT'S what I'm lookin' for~. Okay, good!"
With this discovery out of the way, Carol turned to her son. "Now listen up my Little Dumbbell~." A monster tried to sneak up behind her, only to get hay-makered and knocked clean across the street for it's trouble. "I want you to stay here and keep beating up the bad guys alright? With Prishe and these other two, mysterious arrivals~." She winks at Beth. "You're momma's gotta go and kick some SERIOUS behind~."
That was the last thing she said before vanishing into the alleyway, after the mysterious shadow.
...... Well it was no skin off KO's nose. His mother could survive anything, What was one more disaster like this one? "YEAH!!! GET EM MOMMY~!!!"
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Post by DMis on Mar 16, 2016 0:08:10 GMT -5
"I'll see you in the bash," Chrys offered as she readied the blue token. "Meet you there."
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"He's safe with us," Beth assured Carol before watching the woman go. Myrtenaster was drawn and the chambers were loaded with several vials. "Hey Striker. Think you can get me airborne?" Beth was looking at Nora as she said this.
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Post by ryocker on Mar 16, 2016 0:31:30 GMT -5
Nora smiled with Glee. "Straight up or at an angle?" she asked, readying her hammer. She waited for Beth to Jump, then gave the hammer a swing at her feet, sending the woman skyward.
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Post by ParamountKeymaster on Mar 16, 2016 9:35:01 GMT -5
Toby nodded and quickly retreated into the shadows, merging with them, travelling through the darkness itself and towards the fray...
This was going to suck.
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Choleric was quick to lunge at Aether, only to be stopped by a lightning bolt from her cloud. The electricity did little to deter him, but the flash of light briefly disrupted his body, destabilizing his hand before it could grab her.
Without missing a beat, he spun around, slashed the cloud to disperse it, then faced forward again and raised the shadows at Aether's feet, promptly entangling her in the dark tendrils. He was only a few inches away from raking his claws through her body when more shadows erupted from the ground and wrapped themselves around Choleric's arms.
He growled and looked into the darkness. Someone was controlling his shadows.
"RGH... Green Eyes...!"
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Post by Pink Moon Wolf on Mar 16, 2016 11:08:24 GMT -5
"AH-!" Aether writhed about in the tendrils' grip, anxiously charging up her starlight reserves to weaken the shadows. She looked up in time to see rogue shadows snag Choleric's arms just seconds before he could skewer her.
"T-Toby...!"
While the general was distracted, Aether charged up more lightning to disrupt the shadows. At the same time, a decent-size blast of light finished the darkness off, allowing Aether to run free and regroup with a very exhausted Andromeda.
"Goodness..." Aether worriedly looked her master over. "I-I don't know how much longer you and I can handle this...!"
Andromeda nodded, panting heavily.
"B-But... we have to keep helping these people! None of the Præt'nos have been killed yet! The least we can do is inform them what they're up against!"
With another nod, Andromeda gathered up what was possibly the last of her energy and fired one more light blast at the shadows, clearing the way for Aether to leap through and bound into the clearing at the center of the Plaza.
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Post by gantzgun74 on Mar 17, 2016 0:30:13 GMT -5
"Green eyes?"
............ The shadowy tendrils and the commander were a bit taken aback when a new figure entered the alleyway, taking in the odd little scene before her...
Carol just grinned and cracked her knuckles. "I always thought my eyes were more velvety if I had to be honest.. But hey~... I'll bet when you have a BLACK EYE, it'll be even harder to tell~!!"
That was all she said, all indication given to her intentions.
Because literally a split second later Carol was all Choleric could see.
and then a second later, that was replaced by the image of Carol's fist.
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WHAAAAAAAAAAM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Back in the plaza, KO looked even more punch happy then ever as he continued laying into enemies left and right. However the soldiers would always just quickly get back up. KO had plenty of energy however, and only welcomed the challenge as if it was a round of Shadow Boxing. "WAAAHOOO~!!!!" KO suplexed another soldier, then quickly saw another one trying to attack a citizen. "POWER FIST!!!" The beam fist blasted the soldier aside and allowed the citizen to quickly make a run for it. "BAM BAM POP!!!" An uppercut struck a monster's chin and sent the the thing flying high up into the air.
Prishe however had no such patience. "For the love of HOLY WHAT IS IT GOING TO FREAKING TAKE!?!?!?! FUSION!!!" A combination of blows struck the shadowy monsters-
The following flaming explosion looked like a molecular reaction as it blasted up to five of the creatures away.
"No matter how many times we knock them down, they just won't STAY Down!!!" Of course KO had no problems with it. That kid was a rushing dynamo full of energy and vigor. But Prishe? Prishe was pragmatic. She turned to Beth. "There must be SOMETHING we're missing here!! Nothing is unbeatable they must have SOME kind of weakness!" She quickly notices shadows fast approaching and dodges away from several blade attacks aimed at her-
The shoulder barge counter blasted them back and the following uppercut sent them flying upward hard and fast.
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Post by DMis on Mar 17, 2016 11:01:39 GMT -5
A blue blur flew over head as more water seemed to attempt to douse the flames. The blur landed next to Prishe to show a being clad in black and blue armor.
"Aim for the area where the shoulder meets the neck. It'll whittle them down a bit," the being offered as she proceeded to stab one with a trident.
"Straight up, Striker. And hello Dracorum. Seems she's fought these things before," Beth offered as she jumped up.
"Hi Mom. Thanks for the help!" Chrys chirped. And I didn't even ask. Damn she's good.
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Post by ryocker on Mar 17, 2016 11:32:11 GMT -5
"Between the shoulder and the neck, eh?" Nora smiled. One snuck up behind her, only to quickly realize how dumb an idea that was.
With a powerful twist, Nora circled around, hitting the massive shadow-man right where it hurt worst. It slammed into the pavement, gurgling and screaming as it turned into a shadowy puddle. "Oooooh, that makes this WAY more fun!" she excitedly cheered, running toward a group of the Praet'nos. One reared up, attempting to strike her from a distance-
Only for Nora's weapon to shift form, firing a big, heart emblazoned missile at the invading demons. The resulting-
KABOOOM~!!
Did little to faze the black beasts, but the subsequent hammers to the neck, that came right after proved her distraction tactic worked.
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