Laurence Takes Manhattan (Coraline/HS/Rosa)

They really didn't expect the trucker to go for a full 24 hour stop. They'd tried to stay in the south, their comfort zone-- while they backpacked, consistently changing locations so that they weren't so easy to pin down by real powerhouses. But this time-- it seems they'd made a grave error when choosing where to secretly hitch a ride from. And now, here they are-- in a cold, cut-throat city with officers just about on every corner.

Needless to say, the stowaway wild cards were severely unsettled. Sitting outside the gas station, they huddled together for warmth-- most notably, they seemed to curl around one shivering, bald, red scaled teenage girl, who'd been given the sweater jacket of the pale boy. "I think-- we need to get her, uh-- some warmer clothes." The jacketless boy says, concern clear on his face. "I'm, uh-- Laurence, since, since you can't really help with body heat, could, uh-- would you mind checking to see where the closest, uhm... Mode of transportation is?" He offers, looking up to the other masked individual who seemed to wreak of death. He gives no verbal response, and then stands-- gently pressing his burnt, ugly, cold hand against the demon girl, who looked up with a shiver and sneeze. He then walked off, ignoring the leering and the keen eyes on him from NYC officers.

With the tallest boy gone, the demon girl tries to stand, being stopped by the blond teen. "Listen-- Allocer. We can wait. He'll be fine. You need to take care of yourself." Her voice is soft, and gentle. "B-But--" Allocer sneezes, ending her sentence early.

"Well, uh, hey, Allocer, look at it, uhm, like this? Soon we'll be able to be in a train or something that's probably way too warm, and, uh. It'll be like home. A-And then we can rob somewhere to get money for a flight home and, uh, for you to get some warmer clothes." He murmurs the second part, with the three's body's pressed together for warmth. The blonde girl seems a little surprised at that, blinking once or twice. "You know, that's actually-- a really good idea. We'd first need to find you a cemetery, right, Alex?" She blinks, pulling away from the warmth cuddles for a moment to think this through. Alex fervently shakes his head, keeping close to the shivering demon. "No, no-- we don't have time for that, I don't think, Sharon." To which, the blonde girl furrows her brow. "We'd need the manpower, though. I dont think the ones you made for the whole Taco Truck fiasco will be very useful." Sharon huffs, as the demon girl quickly shakes her head.

"Guys, it's-- whatever. I can-- I can take it. This temperature is n-nothing for, ahm, a-- a daughter of, of Satan." She mumbles, leaning her head against Alex as the two other teens look to eachother in concern. "We need to get her out of the outside, first, before anything else." Sharon quickly stands, holding a hand out to Allocer, who, after a moment of hesitation, places her clawed hand into Sharon's softer ones. With a sharp yank she pulls the demon girl up, wrapping her arm around her as she begins to lead her into the convenience store. "Hey, Alex-- wait for Laurence." Sharon turns to look at him, as Alex only gives a simple, sharp nod in reply.

Soon enough, Laurence would return, and with his help, the entirety of Horror Squad would sneak and cheat their way all the way up to SoHo, Lower Manhattan. Clothing stores seem to line the streets here in this part area of SoHo, as well as bars for those old enough to attend. However, the kids were clearly focused on one thing and one thing only: getting them, and their little death party into a store to utterly decimate it. They received many reactions by their very obvious meta presence, from comments, to subtle rough-housing, to downright creeps following. They were, without a doubt, ready to cause this city some harm, even if only minor. Finally, their eyes rested on a nice big chain store, with people flooding in and out of the H&M. Almost in sync, the four plus four undead make their way towards, with Sharon heading in first, with the four (albeit poorly) costumed undead given the orders to follow her and not harm her until the next orders come in.  Sharon gets as far away from the entrance as possible, pretending to look between different things of coats as she begins to stew on making this place as messed up as humanly possible.

Soon enough, the H&M is in chaos, and it's Laurence and the non-sentient undeads time to amplify that chaos, with Laurence taking well timed swings and the undead blindly chasing after anything that isn't their little group. Next comes in Allocer and Alex, idly walking past the screaming and running crowds. "We should stop the cashiers from calling the police. Feel up to it?" Alex asks Allocer, who seems to be warming up with the inside heat. She nods, unlatching herself from the awkward boy as he moves to go focus on watching his undead and being more strategic with them. Allocer, teleporting up to the second floor, sneers at the rushing crowds and the distraught employees. "Evacuate, or be damned to hell!" She hisses, hoping they ignore the slight shiver in her voice. She makes her way straight up to the employees, hoping up on the counter, leaning forward. "If you even think of calling anyone, we'll kill you." She says with as much gravity as she can muster-- she's not really the killing type, but she certainly knows she looks it. "Get out with the rest of the mortals, and you'll be spared, okay?" She leers down, before pausing and grabbing ones shoulder. "You. Open the register. I'm giving you to 10 before I do something about your insolence."

Needless to say, it was quickly devolving into chaos on the streets of SoHo and more particularly in the H&M. People were starting all out brawls, having full on panic attacks-- every little feeling seemed to be heightened, and with the undead around causing chaos and bloodshed, most emotions were not good.

Coraline was in the changing room when all the commotion started. Honestly, it probably should have concerned her more than it actually did. She had just assumed some celebrity had walked in and everyone was freaking the fuck out because… New York??? It was dumb in hindsight, but in her defense, she was in a bit of a hurry since her office hours were in less than 50 minutes.

Not that any of that mattered at this point. Considering there were zombies running around... What the fuck.

She simply stood there for a moment, too flabbergasted to really do anything until an unfortunate shopper that had been hiding nearby screamed as a zombie approached. The zombie lunging at the unlucky soul was what finally prompted her into action. Coraline leaped between the woman and the monster, using an arm to push it back. The zombie immediately bit down, giving her extra leverage to push it back. Seeing her chance to escape, the woman ran off, hopefully to safety.

With that out of the way, Coraline directed her attention back at the zombie, who was gnawing on her arm with a strangely troubled expression on its face. You know. For a mindless dead thing. That’s when she noticed that it was chewing through the coat she had been planning to buy. The fact that this was what caused her to really snap didn’t say any good things about her, but she had been saving up for weeks, managing to nab the last one in her size. All for nothing now. Fuck this.

The ichor dripping from her arm abruptly formed into a blade like shape, piercing through the zombie’s head. Kicking the undead away, she dissolved the weapon back into a liquid, coating her injured arm in the dark substance and forming it into long, sharp claws.

“Hey you freaks! Over here!!” She yelled out as she pulled her face mask on, hoping that it’d grab the attentions of the rest of the undead and give any straggling civilians time to run out.
Word Count: 342

ACROSS THE STREET

From a rather drab looking diner emerged a young woman in black and yellow active wear, a look of frustration on her face. She seemed to be searching for something, but to no avail. Her thoughts though, did not hold her long, as a commotion from the nearby store broke up the monotony of her day. Shouts of "zombies" and "demons" meant she would quickly retrieve her gauntlets from her bag, while her axe was slung on her back. She quickly made her way to the front door.

THE H&M STORE

“Hey you freaks! Over here!!” Axe Knight came in time to see that the commotion had already drawn out another metahuman- an Umbrakinetic, from the look of it. Using her edgy shadow powers to dispatch a zombie. Effective, but a bit too flashy, Rosa gave her that.

"That's not how you get their attention..." Rosa murmured, quickly donning her psi-gauntlets. The psionic warrior began to glow with her power.

Rosa approached the nearest zombie, her hands now covered by gauntlets. A swift jab-straight-uppercut combo breaks its jaw and sends the undead thing reeling, allowing the Templar to lift up the zombie by its leg, then send it smashing into a couple more nearby. The force proves too much for the undead, and Rosa is left with a rotten leg, which she discarded.

"THIS IS HOW YOU GET THEIR ATTENTION!" Rosa the Axe knight proclaimed loudly, proving her superior loudening skills compared to Coraline. Her attention then turned to the four main misfits who brought the trouble to this store. "You there! Who do you think you are?!"

The teens that were calm amongst the chaos, weren't all together. Two were making their way around the ground floor, and thereby visible, and the one's attention they got was another undead-- but there was something different. It paused, as the two spoke, and it's neck slowly craned to the side, almost as if it could... Think? Furthermore, in it's hand, was a machete. The blade was obviously old, with how the handle seemed to wear, and instead of blindly running towards, it first used a clothing rack to strike against and sharpen the weapon about two times, still keeping its face, covered by mask, facing the two heroes. With that, the other visible on the ground floor-- a blonde girl, Sharon, kept her eyes on the group from a distance, her brows furrowing in displeasure. The masked boy, Laurence doesn't reply, and the blonde girl purses her lips in distrust. Amongst them, and between the two obvious baddies and the two obvious good guys was a sea of people with a flurried mix of emotions-- rage, inciting brawls within the store-- fear, leaving them crumpled and unable to move as their loud wails followed throughout the chaotic store. Finally, with only a flicker of hesitation, the blonde teenager spoke. Her voice was slightly hesitant, youthful, but full of uncontrollable snark reminiscent of her age. "I think you're being awfully rude to my friend here. Why are you assuming we have anything to do with this, at all?" She squints, her lip curling up in distaste. She keeps her voice clear, and loud-- as if she's spoken over rioting crowds like this before. "Why, you two have been more violent than any of us still here. We just walked in." She notably keeps her distance, letting her visage come in and out of view as people run through and past, utter chaos still ensuing. "We haven't stabbed anything through it's skull, or broken a jaw and torn off a leg."

Meanwhile, away from the intense chaos-- a teenage boy sat, curled up in the boys dressing room. He sure hoped Allocer was doing fine-- 1 of his 4 zombies were dispatched very quickly, with 2 others being sent back quite a bit and poor Pete losing a leg. With him getting a mental front seat, first person viewing. That was always very unnerving to see and experience. But he had to stay logical. He could see, through the last undead-- Laurence was taking a forefront against the two, and Sharon was hiding out in the back. But they both saw them, and recognized the situation. So, then, the best move, would to be push this undead into the conflict so it's not just Laurence physically fighting against these two. He should have found a place to himself sooner, really, so that he could have avoided the quick loss of some of their advantage. While Sharon spoke, an undead, much less intelligible than the one in the mask, it seems, shambled up behind the two heroes, but stopped just short of a physical hitting distance, as if suddenly jolted still by a command. The two sent away, but not officially killed, slowly seemed to get themselves up as well, their movement less fluid and shambly than before. The one with a broken jaw shambles in a circular motion, getting lost within the crowd and slowly appearing next to the masked undead, and the legless one forcefully pulling the leg off of a female mannequin to almost use as a crutch. It definitely didn't seem smart enough to make that opinion on it's own a few minutes ago.

Upstairs, where the rest of the store is, along with the most notable cashier stand, Allocer still crouched on the counter, as the poor cashier forced to stay opened the register, handing the clawed teen the cash. "Thank you, very much! Maybe, when I rule the world, I'll let you go." She snickers as the cashier takes his chance to run away, and-- she hears the yelling downstairs. Heroes? Allocer, quickly, pulls a clearance rack sweater off of the rack, throwing it on and teleporting downstairs, inbetween Laurence and the heroes. Her demon-esque visage is contrasted by the obvious gymnastics leotard and the big fluffy  pink sweater she just threw on. "Look! A pair of goody two shoes thinks they can combat us? It's too late! We've already got the accursed item we've been searching for!" The bald demon girl laughs proudly, striking some melodramatic pose.

The blonde girl seems to respond irrately, a heavy sigh falling from her lips. "Okay, what-- what the fuck, Allocer. No. You need fucking pants. Your leotard does not count as pants. And a coat. You need a goddamned coat. You were going to fucking die like five seconds ago, shut up." She hisses, before looking to the adult heroes with even more irratibility. "Listen. You can continue jerking off your 'I'm a good guy' streak by fighting a bunch of teenagers in like. Twenty minutes okay? Why don't you try actually rescuing and saving the people who've been negatively affected by my abilities, rather than hitting on a bunch of dead people and insulting ugly teenagers." She snaps. "If you're so hellbent on it, I'm sure Laurence doesn't mind sparring or whatever." She huffs, making her way past the chaotic crowds-- and one particularly violent fight between two women over a skirt, and grabs the demon girl by the sweater. "C'mon, you fucking idiot. Oh my god, I can't believe I know you? I can't believe I know you." She murmurs as she tries to drag the demon girl off, who responds with screeches and miscellanious threats to the heroes, as she's dragged off into the clothing aisles.

The zombie with the mask, Laurence, then gently lowers his weapon, seemingly waiting as he inconspicuously moves closer to a metal clothing rack. While he seems, still, generally eerie and scary, there's an aura of awkwardness radiating from him based off of that encounter. For those of high empathy, it's almost like... He's worried about them?

“This isn’t fucking competition.” Snapped Coraline, glaring at the newcomer with palpable irritation. “Just help me get the customers out Don Quixote.” With that, she turned to the… head zombie maybe? Who knows. It looked more intelligent than the rest though, if the posturing it was attempting meant anything. Which brought to her attention another issue… people weren’t leaving. Instead they were either brawling or pissing the ground in fear (hopefully not actually). Literally what the fuck was happening. She had just wanted new clothes!! Why was she always the one to get roped into these messes?

“You know what, how about you deal with the zombies and I’ll just... get everyone out of here. Have fun.” With that, Coraline started towards a nearby brawl, dissolving the inky claws she had created into the nothingness from whence they came. Right as she moved though, the voice of a teenage girl rang through the air, causing her to pause. Well. Looks like one of the culprits just outed themselves. Dead person number 2 and 4 were also back for another round (poor 3 just seemed lost. What a mood honestly.), this time a lot more formidable feeling, if only because number 2 was trying to sneak up on them.

From here, the ‘what the fuck train’ just sped up as a demon girl showed up out of nowhere, sporting a ridiculous get up that she seemed very proud of. Watching the banter between the two, kind of three, a slow, dawning realization came upon Coraline.

“… Did you guys just want clothes? Is that what this mess is about? Fucking clothing??? Are you fucking kidding me???? You know there are better ways to go about this right? Other than injuring and possibly killing a fuck ton of people over some cheaply made factory fashion. Holy fuck I hate teenagers.” She crouched down, clutching her head in disbelief as she repeated “This was all for some shitty clothes.” over and over again along with some "I want to die."s for flavor.
Word Count: 339
Total WC: 681

Rosa noted that the majority of people in the store were acting irrationally- instead of helping one at a time, she decided to nip the problem in the bud. She approached menacingly. That a demonic being materialized between Rosa and her target didn't faze her one bit.

"Your... abilities?" That the person who was responsible would so quickly admit that they caused this ruckus made things easier for Rosa. Now she knew who she needed to punch.

"You! You did this? You're going to stop this nonsense. Right NOW!" Rosa thought of how to follow up that command, reaching over to seize the blonde with one strong arm.

"Or... or I'll start punching YOU! In the FACE!" Clearly the Axe Knight was also a paragon of eloquent repartee.

Coraline, really, was a kindred spirit, or at the very least, someone who Sharon could appreciate the bitterness from. She wonders how exactly Alex would take the insult to his important plan (he isn't taking it very well), but that's not her problem. She can definitely understand the frustration, from the point of someone who hasn't had to deal with 'southern hospitality.' Or, she supposes, anti-meta sentiments aren't just for the south, judging on how they were treated on the way to this place. She doesn't give the woman a response, instead focused on making sure she could get Allocer some, well, god damned pants. However, her forward drive to take care of her friend was roughly stopped by a firm arm pulling her towards the other hero.

Yeah, that's what she about expected. Allocer, too, gets pulled along, who seems immediately react to the grappling of her friend with raising a clawed hand of her own. Sharon simply rolls her eyes at the melodramatics from the two, though she seems to be trying to ignore the strength being put against her entirely human body. "Yes, because that's how that entirely works. You're gonna have to wait. Now. Let go." She uses this moment to probe at the others brain, hopefully creating a slight enough slack for her to weasel out of and keep on her task, as Laurence decided that rough-housing between the two of them was enough, and he threw the clothing rack, clothes and all to even more notably give a distance between Axe Knight and his two friends. Clothes and hangers alike fly around from collateral damage.

Allocer, meanwhile, was digging her heels into the ground, both to offer a comeback to Coraline and to help her friend fight these two. "It was also for money, you fool!" She hisses, and after handing... something to Sharon, simply teleports much closer to the fray, her hands out and ready for fight. Sharon, meanwhile, simply sighs, pocketing the discrete knife she was given as the fight begins, surveying the crowd, occasionally bringing her eyes back to the group.

Laurence, the undead boy, also makes his way closer, his own weapon at the ready. Despite defensive measures, though, they all don't seem too keen to actually start a real fight.

Her head snapped up at the outburst from Axe Knight. “Don’t escalate!” she screamed, jumping up as the other hero grabbed Idiot #4. Said escalation only… escalated as the slightly more intelligent looking zombie boy proceeded to throw a whole entire clothing rack at the group. This threw Coraline into action as she used the shadows cast by the rack to stop the thing from hitting anyone. Notably, the child crying on the ground that had been right in its path.

That was the last straw.

“Are you. Fucking. Kidding me.” She said through gritted teeth, clenching her fists in anger. As she did so, the shadows surrounding the clothing rack slowly began crushing it into a ball of twisted metal. It took Coraline a moment to notice the cacophony that signified a loss of control. Once she did though, she took a deep breath, forcing herself to relax slightly before setting the hazard safely on the ground. With that, she rounded on Laurence, stomping up to him and getting as much in his face as someone who was shorter than him by 7 inches could.

“That nearly hit a child.” She hissed, the shadows around her roiling. “And you.” She turned around then, pointing right at Sharon. “Get everyone the fuck out of here. Now. I’m done playing with you idiots. And yes. That includes you Don Quixote.” She looked at Axe Knight, glaring at the woman with equal venom as the ‘villains’. “Don’t fucking escalate unless necessary. You want to minimize damage and casualties, not cause it.”
Word Count: 259
Total WC: 940

The intelligent(?) zombie, doesn't seem to have a noticeable reaction, though the slightest shift to a hunch is present as the stench of death permeates off of him, thankfully made less grotesque by the lack of southern heat. The dried blood on his grotesque orange jumpsuit doesn't make it seem any better either, honestly.

"Let me make sure that one of them doesn't die from hypothermia, please." Sharon replies, the tensions causing the oldest girl to clench her jaw tightly along with a much more notable release of a southern accent. She then, with a bit of release, goes on to explain. "My abilities on them all will wear off in 6 minutes. They will come to, dazed, and will vaguely remember what happened. Give me those six minutes to make sure my friend doesn't die, okay? And, to be perfectly honest-- you can leave. The problem of zombies on the loose you were technically trying to solve from the beginning? Is dealt with, and you can't do anything about my ability. Alex has the undead under control, now, since he's stationary. We were going to use this chaos as a distraction to get clothes and leave-- which, is still my MO. Alex and Laurence can head out and wait, if you want-- proof, or whatever, but I'm not backing down on this. I could keep these people like this for months, if I really wanted. We could come back and raze this place with undead. But we're not going to. We're going to get a pair of shitty pants, cut a hole in them, and let my garbage friend live, and we're leaving this garbage city as soon as we can. Okay?"

Allocer, however, seems discontent with this, her lips curling up the slightest, though she says nothing. She doesn't seem to let her guard down, still, and is rather holding her little stolen weapon up in a defensive sort of way. "They have to leave first." She finally speaks, the lilt of play and dramaticism leaving her tone. "The heroes have to be out of our sight before I even think of leaving. Deals don't work with these people, Sharon. Laurence and Alex should escort them out of the store and watch them off." The teen seems to pause for a bit, looking towards one of the seemingly controlled zombies. "Hey-- Alex. Send this guy with them the entire way." This is the voice of a kid who's been travelling, who's been scavenging for quite some time-- jilted, and untrusting. Laurence, with Allocers final word, seems to straighten up, and immediately heads to get closer to 'Don Quixote,' providing Coraline didn't stop him.

Coraline was about to respond when the sound of approaching sirens, a lot of them, filtered through the air towards them. Seems someone had seen the commotion from the outside and called the police, thank god. She and the Horror Squad watched as they pulled up, along with… Jesus Christ the SWAT too. At that, they all scattered. The Horror Squad not wanting to deal with that level of opposition. Coraline because she didn’t need the attention or the inconvenience of being questioned and the like. And so the situation, deescalated, everyone kind of got what they wanted, The End.
Word Count: 100
Total WC: 1040