just hanging that's all(Swordsmaster, invite only)

John Capore was just simply sitting around.That day it was 69 degrees farenheit, sunny with a slight chance of rain and some degree of low lying fog.That was what the weather was like that day in the city of Wilkes Barre, Pennsylvania, population around 42'000, part of the Wyoming valley.He had been reading up on the history of this place here and there over the course of the last few days.None of the information he had found out were things he had ever heard anywhere else beforehand.

Nonetheless what he had read was causing him to deeply desire to journey around this city just to experience all of it.Or at least as much as possibly could.Experiencing all of it may just be to great of a goal to try and attain after all.So upon thinking that John decided to know exactly what to try for first off and go from there.The knox mine which was the location of a famous disaster seemed like a possible place but it was just so far away though.Maybe some of the locations where the Pennamite-Yankee war took place would be ideal."Yeah that'll do for now."he thought to himself.He though he might've said it out loud too.Wasn't really sure to be honest.

And so it began.He started travelling about this city.It was quite relaxing to be honest.Nothing out of the ordinary.That was until he heard some noise and for a second there thought he saw someone he knew."It couldn't be."He thought."Here?Of all places?"After a second to think he edged closer to see if it was indeed who he thought it was.

Running, faster and faster, sprinting away from the cops as fast as he could flipping and diving through and around obstacles. He was just a petty thief back home in Australia, worked alongside his ‘family’ or gang as the cops called them. They were all just a bunch of orphaned teenagers or kids who ran away from home trying to make a living in the land down under, him most of all because of Lauren. Yet then it all came crashing down as the dream turned into a nightmare, his ‘family’ was blooded and broken, the bodies lay scattered across the building they lived in. Lauren most of all could be seen laying in a corner beaten and broken, as if every inch of her body had been violated. At the image Darren lost it and freaked out in his dream which woke him up.

He woke up jumping up and out forwards only to land on the ground in front of some feet. Which he thought was odd, because when he had gone to sleep there were no feet and no one around him. Yawning the shirtless Australian ruffled his bed head hair and looked up at the occupant of the shoes only to see someone he thought he wouldn’t. “John?” He asked with a chuckle not believing his eyes, this was the guy who he had met in Florida the day he came to America, was the one who got him to join the Talons and now here he was in Pennslyivania or whatever the place was called. “Dude, I thought I’d like never see you again. You know unless of course the you know who did some epic stuff and what not.”

He sat down and leaned against his backpack looking up at him with one eye open because the sun was getting into the other one. “So, what exactly are you doing around here?” He asked interested because if he remembered right didn’t this guy live in New York, or Washington, something like that at least. So, seeing him all the way out here was odd but then again Darren traveled a lot so that could mean other people did too. Especially when the other person had super human speed just like he did, hell Johny boy was probably just as fast as he was if not maybe even a little bit faster. But when it came to reflexes John didn’t stand a chance nope, poor guy can’t even dodge bullets like Darren can. He grinned at that fact and put his hands behind his head leaning up against the wall.

Now John could not just believe who he had managed to run into.This was simply astounding to him.He wasn't sure how it was though.What with all that he had experienced over the last few years that something like this he found find such a big surprise just seemed out of the ordinary to him for some reason.Whatever reason that was he did not know at all.Still it wasn't all that bad seeing Darren again.He was rather enjoyable after all.This was a rather pleasant surprise to be honest.

Darren had noticed him and was incredibly surprised to see him.Indeed it was obvious.The guy seemed to be on the verge of a meltdown due to his complete shock.He also wondered why he was meeting John here.So he told him"I'm just here."he paused before continuing."That's all.Just like you are it seems."He sighed before continuing onwardsUnless you happen to be here for some other reason.It does not really matter to me really."

The weird grin that Darren currently had on his face was making him want to burst out laughing.It kind of reminded him of the one that the cheshire cat wore in fact."So anyways why are you in Wilkes-Barre exactly?"

Darren nodded his head listening to John explain why he was there as well, and it seemed they were both here for apparently no reason at all. But Darren had come to believe that things don’t happen randomly, that everything you do happens for a reason even if that reason is something completely random that you would never in the world think about. Even then though it turns out to be something important, everything happens because it was supposed to happen you just have to let it happen. At least that’s how he sees things, but that doesn’t mean you can’t try your hardest to stop it. Like with his buddies back home, he trained as hard as he could after getting struck by that lightning and discovering his awesome abilities and amazing sword fighting skills. Too bad he didn’t get the power to manipulate lighting, but hey now lighting would never be able to touch him anyway.

As he was about to reply to John as to the reason he was in whatever-whatever town this was he was cut off by the sound of a siren flying by and could only smirk at the noise. A grind wider than that of the Cheshire cat spread across his face at the sound as he looked down at his backpack then at John. Quickly he threw on his ‘costume’ and put is sword in its sheath, flipping the hood up over his face. “Come on, let’s go check it out. For ‘old times’ sake.” He said then nodded his head in the direction and took off. When they came up upon the scene about five minutes later he let out a low whistle realizing this was a hostage situation of some sort. That much was easy to tell from all the police surrounding the building and none of them running inside. “Damn, looks like some real shit is going down.”

So John was still having a problem of believing that he had somehow managed to run into this kid again.It felt like he back in Tampa or something with this occurence.Yet all Darren could seem to do was grin at him like someone who was amused by just about everything that he witnessed for no apparent reason at all."Well at least he can enjoy life to its fullest I suppose."He thought.This thought seemed like it was a true statement too.Indeed it sure did.Then again with this kid he didn't know what to make of him.The guy was so completely random it was like he was a computer programmed to be so just to screw with people's heads simply because it could or something like that.Though that didn't seem likely.Darren didn't seem like the kind of guy to do such a thing.Not on purpose really.Maybe he was just someone screwed up in a good way.

John simply could not let this awkward silence continue on forever.This guy had somewhat developed into a friend of his after all.He sure did enjoy hanging out with him.That was for sure.It just didn't seem right at all."Well it's nice running into you here I guess.Yeah it is."He said in an abashed voice.Just then a siren rang off.John looked in the diretion of the sirens to see what was going on.It seems something bad was happening in this city at this very moment in time.Darren had already donned his costume and was heading off in the direction of the situation at hand.John made a quick look around to make sure nobody was around before donning his and following him.Upon arriving he could see a hostage situation occuring.What a major event for a rather small city to take place."Any ideas on how we're going to get in there besides using the front door?"He asked Darren."Personally I'd prefer a window if there's no rooftop entrance.We'd have to make sure to get there without being noticed though."

The building was a classic factory, six floors about ten windows on each floor and one big room on each floor, with an office on the top floor for the factory boss. He could see movement on the top floor of a man with a big build, or that's what he figured, and a rifle in his hand. With that he figured the hostage was also on that floor but far enough back that one couldn't see them from the window. What bugged him was that the fact that the situation must be worse than what it appears to be because of all the cops and two s.w.a.t. teams. So, obviously this guy was either a super hero, he had back up, or both; least that’s what it looked like to Darren.

A fire escape running up the side of the building and to the top floor was their best bet in Swordmaster’s mind and he figured he’d say so. “Hey, Force let’s try the fire escape use it to get to the top floor and go in through there.” He said just suggesting the idea and then taking off at full speed over to the fire escape, dodging cops and trying to remain hidden from any out looking people on the inside. So, basically he went back outside the Cop’s line and ran around to the side to where the fire escape was then back in and up it to the top of the building. When they hit the roof Darren looked for the door that leads down into the stairwell of the factory. When he spotted it he moved towards it as silently as he could and tried to open it only to find it locked. “Of course its locked…” he muttered letting the spring loaded hidden daggers pop out of his wrists and used them to pick the lock. “After you,” he motioned holding the door open.

So here he was in the city of Wilkes-Barre Pennsylvania.Yep even here.Even here John Capore found himself in a situation such as this.Right after surprisingly running into Darren again they had made their way into the site of a serious situation.At a factory in the middle of town a hostage situation of major proportions was occuring.Considering that the entire city's police force seemed to be here and were heavily armed it must be serious.Even with all that though it seemed like it may not be enough to handle whatever was causing all this chaos.

So Forcewave and Swordsmaster were heading in to handle this situation.They had to sneak around to avoid being detected at all.When Darren suggested using the fire escape, John agreed figuring it a good way to do so."Alright let's go quickly.But keep quiet.We don't need to be noticed." So they quietly climbed up the fire escape and up to the roof.From there they opened the door to the stairwell and headed inside.They moved through the building looking for the people behind all this and the hostages as well all while trying to avoid being seen.Walking down a hallway John heard noise just ahead.It seemed to be coming from the room only a couple doors down on the left.Forcewave looked back at Swordsmaster so as to acknowledge if he was ready.

(( okay so here's the 'boss' stats
Int:2
Str:5
Spd:3
Dur:5
Ep:0
Fs:3 normal mercs are int:2 str:3 spd:2 dur:2 ep:0 fs:3 and usually carry a gun of some sort or bat/blunt force weapon))

“Quiet got it.” Swords whispered as he slowly followed force inside of the building going into unknown territory. Oh, how awesome would it have been if either of them had the ability to see through walls or heat vision? I mean with that power sure everywhere else they’d be useless but when it came to seeing what they were up against it would be freakishly useful because they wouldn’t be going in blind. Not too far into the building noise could be heard coming from one of the doors just down the hallway, when Force looked to him to see if he heard he put his hand on his friend’s shoulder. “Let me go first.” He mouthed sliding around in front of the other boy hero and peeking into the room quickly. He only got a quick look but it was just enough because of his photographic memory.

“Okay so, ten hostages, ten guards five with machine guns and five with like bats or pipes; all carrying pistols.” He said quietly trying to remember everything “Oh yea and one big guy in the middle, no weapons no anything, but he is biiiigg…and wearing black glasses?” He said relaying everything he got from the room with a nod. Jumping up he grabbed hold of the ventalation shaft above them grinning. "Saw it in a movie, come on." He whispered pulling off the vent and settin it down the ground he crawled inside. It was about ten feet from their current spot so he figured it wouldn't have been much of a crawl, right?

When they had gotten about ten feet or so he could feel the vent start to give away underneath him. "Oh crap..." he muttered falling through the vent and onto the ground and right in front of the hostages. "This isn't what it looks like..." he said standing up with his hands in the air with a grin. They had surprised the guards apparently and he wasn't quiet sure if that was a good thing or a bad thing. He jumped to the side and unsheathed his sword jabbing it into one of the man's legs than flipping away and over the guy's head and slashing out at another's ribs. "Nice party you got here, next time invite me and we won't have to crash it." He said with a grin upon his hooded face.

As Forcewave slowly walked towards the door while being as quiet as somebody could possibly be, the very room that the people behind this whole situation may be located in.He looked around the hallway and back the way that they had come from just to make sure nobody knew about them.He had even been checking for any cameras in the hallways but had seen none.Whether or not that was a good thing was hard to tell.Just as he was approaching it Swordsmaster went instead to peek inside quickly then returned to him to notify him of exactly what was inside.After a quick look inside, Darren walked back to him and told him exactly what was inside.Both the assailants and their hostages were in that room.One of them seemed to bother him quite alot for some reason.Whatever that reason was John was sure they would find out eventually.

Forcewave was now thinking of a way to take down the assailants without hurting the hostages at all.As he was doing so Swordsmaster jumped up and opened up a ventilation shaft that led into the room itself.Forcewave was not too sure about this idea at all for various reasons.For one if they got discovered while up there then they would be sitting ducks to all the gunfire that would be sure to come.Also there was the chance that they might get trapped in there somehow.Also the tight space that it was guaranteed to be would be quite unsettling.Still it was far too late to stop Darren from doing so.He was already in the vent and heading towards the room itself.

And so he waited in the hallway itself standing against the wall just out of the view of the doorway for Swordsmaster to do whatever it was that he was planning.He didn't have long to wait it seems.Mere seconds later he heard a loud banging noise followed by some shocked commotion.He peered into the room to see him standing there amongst the assailants.Of course he would do something like that.One of the assailants aimed his gun right at Darren which forced John to act as well.He blasted the gun out of the guy's hands and proceeded to join this fracus quickly taking down one of the gunmen and then disarming a few more.

When Force jumped in the fiasco and took out the guy who was about to shoot a gun at him he frowned having wanted to dodge the bullet but it was still nice of him. His ‘buddy’ also quickly disarmed three more of the gun men leaving only one gun man left and three unarmed men, plus the big guy but he seemed to be watching as of now. Shrugging Darren laughed spinning in a circle, sword in hand as he motioned for all three of the bat wielding men to come at him. They thinking themselves superior in strength to the sword wielding hero smirked and ran at him as fast as their wittle wegs would carry them. Darren jumped into the air and spun to the side quickly evading the hits from the bats. The fools had run in at him in such a way that they ended up hitting each other in the head.

He wished the fight would have been so easy but of course the idiots just had to keep getting up. Would bad guys ever learn they don’t get to win? He shrugged and motioned with his hands for the two that gun up to bring it, not worrying about forcey just yet because he figured the guy could handle himself against one gunman; right? The first bat swing came and it was so untrained and more of a brute force swing than anything that to Darren it seemed as if it time its self was moving as slow as a turtle. He waited until the last second before swinging his own sword up to meet the bat and cutting it in half. Following the strike up quickly he brought it down on the flat side against the man’s head knocking him out. “Stay down this time, would you?” He muttered turning his attention to the final guy.

The words had just barely left his mouth when the one through a more precise attack out at him with the bat looking to nail him in the ribs. It would have worked too if Darren’s sword hand hadn’t fallen to his side at just the right moment and that is what the bat hit. Blinking in surprise Darren remembered there was another man there and chuckled a bit, “Hey next time attack me two on one, gimmie somewhat of a challenge would you?” He asked before parrying the man’s next attack and slashing into the man’s left thigh and then hitting him with the flat end of the blade against the top of his head. “You stay down too, no point in getting up.” He muttered looking to see how force was doing and then hearing a clapping sound behind him. Oh, right the guy with the glasses.

As Darren turned around he was punched in the face by the man and sent flying into the wall from the sheer force of the blow. When he hit the wall he dented it and was sent sliding down to the ground. “Holy crap…nice punch, take a load of my buddie’s though.” He said with a chuckle and then a groan as he tried to stand up. Yet the ‘boss’ wasn’t interested in Darren anymore as he turned his attention to forcewave and sent a little shock wave of his own out at the kid by slamming his hands together as hard as he could. Now he knew it wasn’t as strong as most of the ‘brute’ meta-humans but hey that was the downside of the ‘serum’.

And here Fprcewave was again in another dangerous fight to try and protect complete strangers simply because of what path he had decided to take.It was annoying yes to some degree be completely honest, but then again he had gotten used to it.After about 2 years of such activity one should have at least started to get used to such an occurence especially since it had gotten quite routine.

As Swordsmaster was dealing with all the assailants except for the one that seemed to be the leader of bunch, Forcewave moved through and around whichever ones he had to in order to get to the hostages and protect them from these dangerous people.In the process of doing so he had managed to disarm a few through some well timed and accurate blasts.He figured that if they were disarmed they would be far less dangerous and there was the chance of them simply surrendering.Only a chance but a chance nonetheless.Something that would certainly makes things easier and therefore safer for the people that they had been holding hostage.

This didn't seem like it would take much longer.Through the combined efforts of the two heroes these guys were being defeated rather quickly.Yet even though this was happening and they were pretty much helpless against them they continued fighting as if they were winning or knew that they would win."Why though?" he wondered."Why are they fighting so hard?For what purpose do they have?"He was thinking.Or maybe they in fact highly believed that they would win regardless of how formidable their enemies were.

The very reason for such a thing became clear shortly afterwards.The big guy wearing the sunglasses who had been completely unarmed finally headed into action.Immediately he ran over and punched Darren right in the face.It looked painful indeed.He got slammed into the wall and fell to the floor.Though he was down he was certainly not out.Then the large man turned to John and by simply clapping together his hands let loose a shockwave that was heading right towards him.Forcewave countered the blast and nullified it completely by overpowering it with his own power sending what remained of it from the collision towards the main assailant himself.

The brute smirked as he watched his shockwave blocked back by the meta-human with ease and then a blast was sent out in his direction. He had faced meta-humans before and knew that they could usually back a punch in many different ways but they all had their weaknesses. That was what he was going to find and bash in the gut. Ducking and rolling to the side he took a blast in the side and grunted being sent backwards a little bit but he knew it was nothing much he couldn’t handle. Rushing forwards he sent a bone shattering punch out at the little guy, having forgotten about the other man, attempting to hit him in the gut. After that he rolled to the side and sent a punch to the side of his ribs attempting to break a couple of them. But as soon as the punch was delivered, or missed, he felt something going through his side between his ribs and then something hitting his head and then it all went to black.

Darren grinned watching everything that was going on and sent out a small cough when the guy was hit by Force’s blast and kept charging at his buddy. Darren slowly but surely stood up walking around quietly with a bit of his own version of parkor thrown in making his way over to the backside of the brute. He saw how fixated the man with the glasses was on Forcewave that he knew this would work he rushed forward and unleashed his hidden dagger right between the man’s ribs. It wasn’t a killing blow he knew that especially with the man’s apparent durability so to finish it up he slammed his fist on the man’s head as hard as he could. He chuckled when the person was knocked out. “Let’s get these hostages out of here, yea?” He said coughing and picking up his sword as he looked at Forcewave. Little did they both know that on the next floor there were other’s waiting to challenge these two ‘Heroes’.

Just as it would seem that they would manage to defeat all these perpetrators of such heinous acts that they were commiting one of them, the leader of the group it seems, suddenly displayed abilities beyond that of a normal human.Indeed he was formidable to even the likes of superhumans.However he just wasn't able to stand up to these two on this day.After the shockwave that he created with his great strength was overpowered and a quick onslaught of attacks were dished out the guy had fallen to the ground completely unconscious.Now they could finally get these people to safety.

Forcewave was a bit disturbed by how much Swordsmaster seemed to be enjoying this whole ordeal.Surely he realized the situation for what it was and would be taking it seriously.Some people's lives were in extreme danger after all.Still he would have to worry about that later.Something far more important had to be taken care of first.They had to get the hostages to safety.He looked over at them and said to them all."Come on and follow us.We'll get you out of here." He then walked to the door and looked out into the hallway to see if anyone was present.It was empty.So he motioned everybody to follow him out.He was planning on leading them all to the staircases where they would go down them to the ground level floor and out the doors and into the streets where all the police were gathered.Hopefully this plan would go down without a hitch.Though he was worried it wouldn't.For some reason he didn't believe that those were the only ones that had been here.

Swords nodded at what Forcewave said and motioned for the now free hostages to follow them out as he waited for Force’s signal. When he finally saw it he nodded and waited for the people to go out first then he himself exited the room behind everyone else. ‘Get them out of here, right that’s a good thing to do, but just how are we going to do that?’ Darren thought to himself as he slowly but surely followed Forcewave out still behind the last hostage giving her a slight smile to keep her going. When Forcewave was just about to pass the door to get to the stairs it of course had to open, revealing a gun man who walked out eyes widening in surprise that the kids actually got this far. “Aww crap…” Darren muttered sliding past the people and elbowing the man in the face knocking him unconscious.

“Run down the stairs and get out of here!” He yelled at the ‘hostages’ as he stood in front of the door way, quickly closing the door though not really too sure what good that would do. The last hostage had just gotten out and onto the stairs when Swords started to feel the door get hotter and hotter. “Ouch…” He muttered backing up and just in time too as the door was melted and out of it came a man in more black glasses but this one looked just a bit more frightening. The reason behind that was because his arms were on fire and the fire didn’t seem to be hurting him, but not only that there were three armed gun men standing behind him. “Well… this isn’t good.” He muttered doing a back flip to just barely dodge the bullets that were shot out at him. "Got any bright ideas Force...heh get it, bright?" He asked with a grin on his face as he drew his sword.

((Fire guy has a full grid:
Int:2
Str:3
Spd:3
Dur:5
Ep:6
Fs:3 ))

Out the door and into the hallway they had went, leading all the people that had been taken hostage towards the staircase so they could take them downstairs and then outside where all the police were gathered.They collectively traveled towards the door that led to the staircase only for their path to be crossed by another gunman who had come through that very doorway as if he had been waiting there in case they had managed to escape the initial group."Darn there's more."He thought"I was kind of hoping that would be all back there."

Swords managed to take this guy out quickly enough for them to keep going.They entered through the door to the staircase and closed the door behind them as they hurried the hostages down the stairs.They needed to do so when one considers what came next.Another person came through the doorway.But not by barging through or anything like that.He simply burned the door away with intense heat.It seems this guy possessed fire manipulation abilities based on how he held it in his arms the way he did.Three gunmen stood alongside him and fired at them.Forcewave blocked the bullets with his own power by generating a barrier from the energy that was placed directly between himself and swords and the assailants to prevent them from advancing any further."You go ahead.Lead all those people out of here.I'll deal with these guys and catch up.I'll only be a couple minutes."He told Swordsmaster right before launching a powerful blast wave aimed at both the fire user and the gunmen.