The Unicorns and The Wasp

It had been a couple of weeks since the grand unveiling of the faux element 'Omicillium' and Vexus' proposal to restore New York and eventually the world with this excellent discovery. The funds for the project had begun to flow in for the restoration of New York, however not much interest had been shown in purchasing this element for construction in other projects. She assumed it was because most companies needed to see how things would go with the reconstruction of New York and then they would buy in if it were successful. Elena did not have time for this. It would take a very long time to properly rebuild the City and of course repopulate. There was a whole economy that needed to be completely restored, which could take years, decades even. Far too long of a time. This new body she now inhabited was more than capable of aging, and so far it had not realized the true age of Ms.Vexus and has remained young for the time being. There was no definite way to tell how much time she had left to live, meaning she needed to get things done. Now.

Jessica Magic had been out of the limelight for short amount of time now, mostly due to returning to work and producing as much of her new element as possible with the new funding she had received. The media understood the amount of work and preparation that needed to be done in order to reconstruct an entire city, so they have left her alone. Whilst everyone was preparing, Ms.Magic went away on a quick business trip, or needed to pick up an order, or had a meeting to attend. Whatever the reason, she was gone. In truth, Vexus had dematerialized herself into her Techomatter and traveled hundreds of miles in an extremely short amount of time. Her destination? Chicago, Illinois.
Re-materializing on the outskirts of the city, a breeze blew by an whipped her hair around into her face. Moving it off and out of her mouth she cursed at the new human tendencies that she was experiencing. And she did not like it one bit. Being on the outside of the city she could really see the separation of classes. It wasn't bad out here, however inside the city it was much more profitable with high end store, successful businesses and all sorts of money floating around. A little bit of chaos in said city might spark the interest of not only the higher ups, but the civilians as well causing them to lean a little more towards purchasing Vexus' product to reconstruct and enhance the safety of their beloved city.

Activating her Exo-Suit, which covered her entire body in a matter of seconds, she took aim at a couple of areas. Residential area, bridge, and a few plazas. The casualty rate was nearly zero, with most damage being done just to the property, if anything many people would be injured but not killed. She was aiming for outside of the city because it would cause more of a panic inside of the city. Installing the thought "What if we're next?" in civilians minds creating a gradual panic. She'll continue with attacking the outside of other cities creating a pattern eventually forcing these organizations to purchase and protect their cities since it would cost much less or simply reinforce their building rather than to just rebuild them after being destroyed. Not to mention all of the lives that they would be able to save in the future. Seems like things were coming into play. Elena gave a smirk and launched all 10 of her Miniature M-Tech Missiles. The Mx3's destructive capabilities were extremely high, however the batch she brewed this time around were much more mild in order to reduce the injury and casualty rate. It would only take a few seconds, half a minute at max, for the attack to reach their targets and in the same time the missing mechanical digits will have been re-created by the Technomatter. Vexus will have full control over the fingers immediately, however the explosive properties of the missiles would not return for some time now.

This whole ducking and dodging the Hale family wasn’t working well…at all. Every turn he made he ran into Arianna, or Aaron, and when he wasn’t running into them he was with Brandon. The bottom line was that either Niall sucked at hiding, or Arianna put a damn tracking device on him. The woman popped up EVERYWHERE! While Niall rather enjoyed the Hale family, he was staying away from them for the sheer point of not letting them get close enough to come to hate him. This resulted in the whole I like you so I push you away…which made no sense. Then again, this was Niall.
 
     Niall stumbled into the ally, removing the mask that hid his identity as Ethereal. The full moon in the sky, as his bloody self stumbled around.  His breathing labored as sweat beads rolled down his face. He began to walk, clutching at his left arm as if it were about to fall off of his body. He was in an intense pain, one that was unlike anything he’d ever experienced, as a machine or as a human. It was a pulsating burning, a burning that radiated through his arm, but deadened at the collarbone. He was whining, wincing and roaring, as his arm suddenly began to have yet another pain added to this mess. It was something that he could describe, but not appropriately for an arm. The pain felt like…hunger pains. His arm vibrated and it felt exactly as if his stomach were in his arm, only for him to stagger forward. His vision was getting blurry and he began to fall, only to lean into a dirty alleyway wall. The energy inside him pulsed, burning his arm more and more. He slid down the wall and brought his knees up, resting his forehead on them.
     
     ”Wh-what’s…happen..ning?”
 
     Blackout. A total black out for Niall. The pain had gotten to him, his body just shut down. His mind was still working, but just enough to sustain him. Who knew what was going to happen to him? Was he going...back…back there?! Niall would have been kicking and thrashing had he known and been awake enough to know he was going back to the Abyss. He couldn’t do it again, he WOULDN’T do it again. The being a ghost, the whole resurrection bit, he just couldn’t do it. He was barely adjusting well enough to being a human, let alone having to jump back and do it all over again. He had to wake up, he needed to live, he could not and would not die again. Not now, not after everything he had been through. His blackout eventually would transition into a dream, it wasn’t a good one…or a bad one. It was just a normal, pointless dream with no meaning…aside form the part where a large pray-mantis popped up and ate lunch with him and a crocodile. Niall giggled even through his sleep. Please a crocodile in a suit? Yeah right.
 
     ”He-llo?” A voice called. Niall opened his eyes and looked up to see a person poking him with a stick. He shook his head and groaned. The guy just had to stand directly in line with the sun, didn’t he? Niall started to stand up and he began to wobble. The other person, the one with the stick grabbed onto his arm to help keep him up. ”Woah man, you alright?” The guy asked.

    ”Yeah, just a little dizzy.” Niall said. Suddenly he heard the other guy break out into laughter. He looked at him to find him almost doubled over in a fit. ”What?” He asked.
 
   ”That accent is just so fitting.” He decided to reluctantly say as he seemed to defensively back away a little. Niall looked around to find that the alleyway he passed out in was actually the backside of a bar. Niall looked at him and shook his head looking down trying to hide his face a little.
 
     ”Yeah…Well I can only sleep at places that remind me of home so…” Niall started to fall again, what the heck was going on with him? That pain must have thrown off his equilibrium some. The guy grabbed his arm and picked him right back to his upright position.
 
     ”Woah, you’re REALLY light.” He said. Niall suddenly realized that this guy was probably even less beefy than he was. He was a bit of a string-bean so much so that one of Niall’s shirts would have been big on him. He was this five foot six or so guy with the skin color that looked like an Indian and a Mexican had a kid, and his hair was jet black. Niall was surprised that even with his super-light weight that this guy managed to catch him without breaking in half.
 
     ”And you’re really thin? Ever heard of a hamburger?” Niall asked him. The kid laughed and fixed his glasses.
 
     ”Yes…yes I have.” He said with a smile and an energetic nodding. Niall was about to get a run for his money energy wise. ”Josh’s the name.” The guy said with that awkward face where his lips curled up and inside his mouth. He held out a hand for Niall to shake. Niall went to shake his hand when there was a loud explosion that came out of nowhere. Niall instinctively pulled the Josh guy down with him, hoping that no real debris or whatever was going to come down on him. It sounded too distant, but then again what did Niall know?
 
     ”Right,I'm Niall,  Nice to meet you now get the hell out of here!” Niall said with a little laugh as he stood up and tried to walk towards the source of the noise. While he was on his way there he saw yet another little missile thingy coming towards him. He just had to pick to be at the plaza today didn’t he? With that in mind, he knew that these things were going to hurt, and while there wasn’t too many people at the plaza right now, there was a family with their kid. Niall cursed his luck, knowing that of course there HAD to be a baby there. He sighed as he did what he did best…
 
     …get hurt severely and/or get himself killed.
 
    He opted to jump up and use his ethereal energy to warp up into the air, and swat the missile with one of the six ethereal tendrils on his back. It swatted the missile away, but not far enough away for him to avoid the blast. Niall was knocked to the ground. He sat there for a second…not moving. Not because he was injured, but because he was afraid to look and see what the damage was. He finally grew a pair and decided to look, and he barely had a scratch. Well, that was an exaggeration. He felt it, and there were a few scuffs and grazes, but nothing worth mentioning. He stood up and brushed himself off as best as he could. He thought he saw the area the missiles were coming form, but he couldn’t be sure. He began his long trek towards the source of the missiles, passing the news stand to drop two bucks and take a bag of skittles for safe measure.

The creature crouched, its barbed tail leaking venom while piercing eyes kept its eyes o the mortal standing in front of it. A forked tongue flicked out, tasting the air for various scents. It was one would expect of a demon really, scaled skin with grotesquely contorted limbs that made standing upright impossible. Brandon however had no reason to fear it, his skin being far too touch for its little stronger to hope to penetrate, which made the poison useless as well, though it was also useless within its own right. ”Ya done? I don't have all day to deal with demons playing around in Chicago.” Brandon said irritably cracking his knuckles loudly, which only agitated the being even more. It lashed out with his tail, which drug harmlessly across his cheek, though left a trail of poison in its wake. Disgusting green liquid forming a line along his face, 'Okay, that was disgusting.” He said wiping it away with the back of his hand, and looking disgusted at it.

”Sssstop mocking me huuuman.”It said with its raspy hissing tone, though the only indication it was speaking was a slight parting of the great toothed jaws. The long tail would return to its side, yet still hovered about warily as if it would lashed out again if Brandon move, and he would do just that.

”That was nasty you know. I mean i'm used to having stuff on my face, but that just takes the cake....wait that was the wrong phrase I think.” Brandon rubbed his chin for a moment. ”Nevermind, not like it's going to matter to you.” He took a step forward and one again the tail lashed out, though his hand lashed out as well and gripped the barb at the end. His grip was merciless, and the thing let out a bestial screech It would have drawn such attention but not now, when they were near the outskirts of the city itself. ”No..” He felt the carapace break and the soft flesh under squish as its dark green blood flowed between his fingers. ”Bad.” With a pull half of the tail came off and was now in the hand of the Hale.

It roared, thrashing about on the ground as more of its blood spilt out. It hissed upon contact with the ground, but did nothing again his skin. Sure acidic blood was useful, but against skin tougher than diamond, it meant nothing. ”Now the next time you go around threatening members of my family, or any of the others within this city, it will be your head that gets ripped off.” He threw what remained of its barb and tail at the thrashing mess. The demon leapt to its feet, glaring hatefully at the blonde male.

”I will not forget thissssss Hale child.” In an instant all of it left in a puff of smoke and Brandon wiped the acidic blood against the nearby wall, which then began to suffer the degradation of the acid. His clothes were untouched mostly. A simple plaid over shirt with a white t-shirt under it and simple tan colored cargo shorts, which were accompanied by leather sandals. So he had dealt with the demon problem for now, and that meant time to go home.

”Nice work Brandon, you're as strong as ever.” A female voice said in a mocking sort of way as Misha Caster seemed to appear out of nowhere. 'So how's you and lover boy? Does he know about your daughter?” The blonde stepped from the shadows, her dark blue eyes boring into his. ”Does he satisfy you?”

”Well aren't you a nosy bitch today.”

"He cannot be trusted Brandon. The Caster's have sensed it, even from Las Angeles. He uses Ethereal energy, that will only bring pain to him and those he holds dearest. If that means anything,it will be you as well who suffers, maybe even more so than him. Come with me.”

”You had your chance Misha, long ago. I loved you once, but you screwed that up long ago, so just shut the fuck up about that.” She had gotten too close for comfort, but with a simple push she was now a good meter away. The female did not seem surprised by that however, as if she were expecting that one. 'Now go back to Nolan and be the perfect Caster bitch that you were meant to be.” He said rather coldly, perhaps more so than even he had intended. She only laughed at that, a peal of laughter that turned his blood cold.

”I suppose i'll see you again, once he causes you such pain that you couldn't even stand to look at him.”In an instant she faded away into a black mist and became one with the shadows, gone now. Brandon would have broken down, but there was something that caught his attention, and it was the sound of explosions, something was attacking the city? With that he was moving, his legs forcing him onward at speeds faster than anyone on the street was used to seeing since the speedy heroes were mostly inactive within Chicago  these days or too smart to allow anyone to see them. What he saw was only partially expected. It was a building on fire, and a few more doing the same, as in the distance he swore he saw something in red armor. His fists clenched tightly.

”Looks like more work.” He muttered running towards the said person at full speed.

Reports came back of all of the missiles hitting their target, except for one. She could assume that it had been intercepted, more than likely by a meta human. Not that all of them needed to make contact, the other nine would have done plenty of damage. Whoever altered the course of the one missed target might even get blamed for the explosion, that would be ideal. Although it did not appear as if Ms.Vexus was going to have much luck with that as she could already see an individual inbound to her location. He was moving relative quickly. No doubt he was planning on attacking her for attacking the city, or at least the small bit of it that was damaged.

She turned towards him as he was in the last leg of distance between the two. Elena dialed up the strength setting on her suit to the maximum (+4STR) and prepared for a fight. When he was within a few yards of her, he jumped upwards and came crashing down his fists aiming to pummel Vexus into the ground. She casually raised her right hand and caught the blond boy's punch. The force form the impact caused her to sink into the ground creating a small crater. In this short instant, from behind her mask Vexus recognized this boy. She had seen him not too long ago, at her debut. He had accompanied the Hale family member. Could he as well be part of the Hale family?
.While he was still in the air, Elena moved her hand up and grabbed the boys wrist followed by pulling down sharply over her throwing him hard into the ground, creating another indent in the terrain. Without skipping a beat one of Vexus' guns popped out of her side thigh compartment and into her right hand. The setting on the gun had been turned up to a larger width beam, and Elena did not give a second thought about pulling the trigger. She had it aimed right at his abdomen which would easily scorch through his body and destroy most of his vital organs. However, revisiting the fact that he could be a Hale, there was a very strong possibility that her attacks might not do much if anything to this man. She continued to fire until he was either dead, or she was forced to switch to a new tactic.

From the small port on her back, a tiny swarm of her Micro M-Tech Drones flew out and dispersed around the area. This was for surveillance purposes to assess the damage she had caused, and to check to see if there were any more individuals inbound to her location. Just judging by this man's punch he was going to be more than just your average human. Elena would need to refrain from using her Celestial Eye, with it being a magical artifact there was possibility that he could sense it. She knew a little of the Hale's lineage, but what she did know she would utilize.

Brandon felt power course through his muscles, primarily his legs as he charged forward like a wild bull. His attention was only on the woman floating in the sky, his fists clenched tightly, so tightly that the knuckles were blanched white. If that thing had been responsible for the destruction of any part of Chicago, he felt responsible for bringing her to justice, and his fists were what would do that. He put a large amount of strength into his legs, feeling the very ground break beneath his feet as he propelled himself through the air. It was in this moment that his mind was racing, making sure that his trajectory was going to bring him right for the woman. Well, if she was a woman anyway, seeing as how the figure was only vaguely woman shaped, and could just be some kind of drone or something.

The blonde careened through the air as his hair whipped past his face and mussed up his hair, and the fist came down like a hammer, but what he did not expect happened. The thing reached out casually and caught his punch, something that had never happened to Brandon before and he was frankly shocked beyond all belief. The force from their clashing was monumental, as what sounded like a boom resonated from the point of impact outwards with enough force that it would likely hurt the ears a little, Brandon's did anyway. The woman was forced onto the ground, and a crater was formed from the clash itself. So she had strength that would match the Hales?

Before he could think, Brandon was flipped over her back and thrown into the ground with a dizzying strength. While he was unharmed, it still hurt like hell. Dust was thrown up, and the ground below him splintered under the excessive force created by such contact. He let out a cough, his back feeling sore but otherwise he was unharmed. Sure the bitch had strength, but it would take more than that to harm his nigh invulnerable body, way more indeed. He heard the sound of a motorcycle coming close, and that caused his eyes to turn towards the source, and ignore what he should have been worried about.

A powerful burst of energy collided with his stomach, and with it a searing heat that kinda burned him, and damned did it sting. Brandon quickly rolled out of the way, though his arm took some of the damage as well. An explosion filled the air as whoever was riding the bike joined in the frey, and It was none other than...Niall. He popped a few skittles into his mouth before saying something to Brandon. He smirked reflexively, perhaps pleased to see the Irish male there and at the same time worried as to how this would work out considering the strength of his foe. What could they do? He had only seen one of the weapons she had and it already made him wonder.

”Would like to ask you the same question.”Part of his shirt fell away to reveal the irritated skin below, turning a slight red though he was sure it wouldn't be that way for long. Now he had a huge hold in one of  his favorite shirts, and that meant that if this kept going, he wouldn't have much in terms of clothing.”I was going to pummel miss mecha into the ground, but she was stronger than I thought, ruined one of my favorite shirts too.” He seemed to pout lightly.

As expected. Her high powered gun did little to nothing to the Hale boy. He tried to roll out of her onslaught, but something caught the attention of her pretrial sensors. What caught Vexus' attention personally was a energy barrier that appeared around her target. She did not have time to properly analyze it as another individual was yelling something as he launched himself from a bike, shooting a similar looking blast of energy at the motor vehicle. Elena quickly moved herself outside of the blast radius and looked at the two, tumbling and rolling back up to her feet. Whoever the other boy was it was almost obvious that they knew each other, just judging on their small conversations with each other.
Be though as it may, she felt as if she were dealing with children by the way they were acting and speaking. The candy and nonchalant disappointment that his apparent favorite shirt had been ruined. On second though, she thought it almost insulting. As if they had no interest in what she was doing. It was obvious what kind of threat that she posed, and it did not seem like that even noticed she was there. Annoying. Not to mention, Vexus had not immediately recognized the form of energy used. Granted it was a very short time witnessing yet and she could not process things as fast as she could previously, but curiosity is the mother of Science and she would try to make this newcomer reactivate whatever powers he possessed.

A Second gun spring up to Vexus' hand from one of her thigh compartments, she changed the dial on both of them to release a steady stream of beam instead of short individual ones. Elena aimed one at each of them and fired away. While she was trying to hit them, she recalibrate her suit to more so even out the distribution of power. She removed the increase to her strength and instead increased her speed and overall durability (+2SPD +2DUR). Hopefully with this more constant stream of power it cause more of a struggle as far as defenses. However, in terms of durability this member of the Hale family had already proved his worth. She was going to have to step up her attacks if she wanted to significantly damage him. As for the other one, this beam would and should be a sufficient enough test to see what he was capable of.

Despite Brandon's apparent disregard for his opponents strength, he wasn't underestimating her in the least, seeing as how she had a pistol that hurt that much. What other things did it have in that armor of wonders and would they be even more powerful than that little weapon? Brandon reflexively felt over his abdomen, the skin relatively warm and still a little irritated. His dark brown eyes were focused on the woman...robot thing as if preparing for whatever it could throw at them, but his attitude was less than serious. What could he say? He was Brandon Hale after all, and almost everything was a game to him, or so everyone that knew him liked to believe. He recognized that this would not be an easy battle, but with Niall he had a chance, they always did better together.

Well, even if the last few time the two fought something they ended up needing the help of his family. Even fully grown, he still needed his mom to bail him out, but not now of all times. The robot thing produced another gun, perhaps one to allow it to fight two instead of one, though he was unsure on that really. With both guns aimed she fired at both Brandon and Niall, perhaps aiming to either test them or truly believing that this would kill them. Brandon would have an easy enough time with his attack, which came in a steady beam of the energy. Brandon held his arm up and the attack collided with his flesh, and damn did it sting. It hurt just as much as before, but he wouldn't let the pain show, just keep it buried behind a conceited grin. Still, would Niall be able to resist such an attack, even with his magic?

With no real choice Brandon moved, as quick as possible though the best he could do was move in front of the blast as it collided with his back, and perhaps only ruined his shirt even more. He could smell the fabric burn, and his skin felt even more irritated, but he would have to shrug it off for now. ”Ouch.” He said with a certain sarcasm crossing slim muscled arms over his chest. Now the only thing standing between Vexus and Niall was a certain Hale and the tendrils of Ethereal energy. He let out a deep sign and removed the over shirt, which fell to the ground mostly burnt to a crisp, and his under shirt was no better. Damn this was going to be no good if all she did was shoot those rays at them, seeing as how his clothes were nowhere as durable as him.

'Well if you're done, I think its my turn.” He would then turn around, and attempt to power through the continued beams of energy, which were only hurting the closer he got. If he managed to get close enough, Brandon would slam a fist across her face, and hopefully break the robot thing into pieces.

Vexus got her wish and the strange energy manifested yet again, this time in  defensive tendrils to protect the boy. She couldn't get any reading off the energy, but was however able to save the signature that it gave off which would allow her to detect other beings who might have traces of it on their bodies. This discovery of a new power was fascinating to Elena, however there were more pressing matters at hand. The Hale child avoid his blast, and moved in front of the boy producing the odd energy taking the full force of the blast. As previously witnessed, the beam did little to nothing to his body. She combined the two beams to focus on the Hale family member, and to her surprise he began to push back on the energy beams. Elena was forced to cease fire as if they had been pushed back too far, the guns could overload and backfire causing heavy damage to Elena herself.

After the beams stopped, she knew that he would pick up speed and close in quickly on her. Vexus moved the increase to her defenses to her reaction time and close range combat abilities (-2DUR +2FS). She retracted the blasts and the Hale boy came rushing in at her and took a powerful swing to her head. Elena dropped down into a crouching position and the pushed herself off to the left keeping herself airborne over the ground as she took aim at the boy manipulating the strange energy. The guns settings had been now altered from a consistent beam to short powerful blasts. Parallel to the ground, Vexus began firing multiple shots at her other opponent hoping to land a hit. Her overall goal was to capture the boy and run some experiments in order to find out more about this new form of energy that he could manipulate. The biggest problem in reaching this goal was the Hale boy. His impressive strength and durability was what needed to be properly addressed.
She was able to put a significant amount of distance between her and the Hale, roughly a couple hundred feet, and being almost equally as far from the other boy. She held a gun up aimed at both of them as she rapidly plotted her next move. If she had not been able to land a hit on the individual controlling the tendrils of energy, she moved the aim of both her guns towards him and began to open fire yet again. As for the Hale, the yellow extension off the back of Vexus' helmet rapidly extended out and towards him hoping to wrap around his neck and constrict him, however any contact with his body would do. It was quite possible that he would catch the rope like object, but the moment that it touched him Elena would channel an insane amount of electricity through it in hopes of stunning or just causing more damage to him.

All the while Vexus did not take her eyes off of her target before her, continuing her laser onslaught towards the poor victim. Also, the insect like drones she had released earlier were making their way back to the battlefield in order to aid her. They were positioning themselves in strategic places around Vexus in order to prevent any blind spots. Mostly hiding in or on the grass, in trees, bushes and other foliage. In being scattered about, there were not enough of them for one to think that there was an abnormal amount of insects in the area, but still enough to provide substantial help to Elena in this conflict.

Brandon had a feeling that Niall was annoyed by his continued heroics, ones that had indeed gotten the Hale harmed multiple times, and even almost got him killed. Still, when he had a nearly indestructible body, there was room for him to be stupid and jump in front of the proverbial trains. If it meant that Niall would be okay, he would indeed risk his own safety to make sure that it was so. Hell, even while this energy burned against his skin, Brandon would have to keep moving forward until he was close enough to knock this bitch out and end the little fight. He was not amused, especially when his punch missed, granted that he was nowhere fast enough to really catch the woman off guard with such an awkward blow as he threw at her, and he was now wide open in mid swing.

Brandon stumbled forward a few inches, before managing to get his bearings and glaring at the woman that had created a good bit of distance between them in such a short time. The Hale grumbled under his breath, the flesh around his chest issuing small amounts of steam where the laser had hit, though perhaps that was more of a visual effect than actually any sign of damage. Another round of attacking would come and he would have to be ready to defend himself, though his heroic tendencies seemed to also have keeping Niall safe in mind as well, though if that was a viable strategy was another matter entirely.

The woman lashed out with a strange whip of yellow energy, while shooting more shots at Niall, though Brandon was forced to keep his attention on the more pressing matter; the whip that was wrapping around his neck. He would have removed it at one, but a surge of energy through it sent his body rigid, and at first his arms did not respond. It took a few seconds before they did, and with much pain, he hooked his fingers between the whip and his flesh, before prying it off. With the whip off of him, Brandon let if fall to the ground, still as deadly to anyone that touched it. ”Dammit, that hurt.” He muttered under his breath with a slight groan.

Whoever this bitch was, she had some powerful weapons, and perhaps even better ones. For a moment he considered that maybe him and Niall were out of their league with this woman. The blonde Irish boy was running towards him, blocking bullets with tendrils that were being picked apart. Niall was not as resilient as The Hale male and that meant that he was likely to be hurt worst than Brandon, he would have to be kept safe, even if that meant Niall would be pissed at him. Niall got close soon enough, and place his hand on Brandon’s shoulder, on a section where the cloth of his shirt did not get burned away. He muttered something about forgetting a spell, and that did not inspire confidence within him. He felt around his neck, perhaps to feel for tenderness, but there was none, only a slight warmness of his throat, though he was actually worried then.

Strength seemed to well within him, and that seemed to run throughout his entire body, though mostly pooled around his beck, close to his shoulders. There was a burning sensation, as if he felt something would burst through his skin, a sensation that Brandon had never felt before, and it hurt like hell. His teeth grinded together as there was the sound of flesh seeming to rip and feather fluttering for a moment, as the Ethereal energy seemed to be taking a toll upon the blonde Hale. In an instant wings as black as midnight had seemed to spring from his back, a few drops of blood staining them, but not noticeable against the jet black feather. Brandon was awestruck at what happened, and that impeded his overall performance when it came to helping, but he was busy staring awed at his new wings.

'What...the...hell.”

They were an efficient tag team. More than likely they had worked together before and it was by mere coincidence that they ended up in the same situation again. The Hale child appeared to be the shield while the other one performed more long distance attacks. Their tactic may work on other opponents, but they were basically transparent to the likes of Vexus.
Her Electro-Whip did its job and was retracted back into her helmet, as for her onslaught on the boy who could manipulate the strange energy it was somewhat successful. He had defended against her attacks with the tendrils, though her shots damaged them causing the extensions to fall off and dissipate before even touching the ground. Still fascinating to Vexus. She would have to get her hands on this boy and take him apart piece by piece. Elena would one day get to the bottom of this power and the source it haled from.

The two had met up with each other, and Vexus stood by watching. The one of them seemed to be frantically stumbling over his own words. Placing one of his hands on the back of the Hale boy it appeared as if some sort of transfer of energy had occurred. Quickly following, the boy muttered some words Vexus did not have enough time to translate and instantly six discs manifested around Elena's person. Without any hesitation, she activated her personal defense system. The M.Tech Defense Discs came to life generating a field in between Vexus and this odd attack that had been summoned by the Hale's companion. Elena raised and arm and pointed it at the two, with this movement she noticed the discs around her body begin to shrink. Moving a few feet forward, these discs continued to shrink in size until they came into contact with her barrier. Try as they may though they did not have the force to break her defense. She sheathed the gun she held in her left hand back into the thigh compartment and aimed her hand back up at the two. The explosive capabilities had returned to her miniature missiles, and she did not plan on reducing their destructive power as she had done previously. Her targeting system was locking on to the two when there was a large spike in energy levels inside of the Hale's body. His partner must have transferred his energy into him, and his body was having an adverse reaction to it. To Vexus surprise, it was almost the exact opposite.
Black wings had sprouted from the back of the Hale family member. Her systems were telling her to fire, as they had a lock but there it seemed all of them were taken aback by the events that had just transpired. She shook off the new information knowing that she'll analyze it later and fired off five of her miniature missiles at the two of them. Three for the newly gifted Hale, and two for the other kid hoping that they would still be too surprised at the growth of wings to notice the devastating inbound missiles.

Vexus was unsure of what to make of the wings herself honestly. There was no explanation that validated what had happened to his body. And when science failed to explain, it only left the possibility of magic. At this time Elena cursed under her breath for not being able to pacify Elena Marie when she had the chance. Now she was stuck in a useless flesh body, and who knows what kind of time would be spent dissecting this new form of energy. Humans unfortunately had limited amounts of time, which greatly restricted Elena's capabilities. Regardless, Marie was no longer around so such a discovery would prove extremely useful to her in the reconstruction of New York and of course, her conquest of the world.
As a precaution towards any other new found gifts or abilities that may have been given to the Hale child, Vexus connected her right arm cannon to the piece on her shoulder. This was a measure taken so that she could more quickly launch and utilize a Technomatter-Fusion creation. Things were starting to get a little more interesting to Elena, the intelligence of man-kind may not be progressing, but the meta human gene was most definitely evolving at an alarming rate. This new energy was proof of that,.

Brandon felt them, heavy and dense against his back as they moved through pained mental commands. Clumsy limbs hugging his back as they seemed to shake off small drops of blood, which fell against the ground soundlessly, though hew knew that his back was fine. Dark brown orbs would scan over what he could of the wings, and his mouth hung open in stupefied awe. The first person to speak about this was Niall, and Brandon could hear incredulity within his voice, and did he hear an edge of fear? His words froze within his throat, and Brandon had nothing he could say except for a few awkward words. 'I......I....guess I am.” The wings moved awkwardly once again, bringing up some dust with their movement. Why had he grown wings now of all times? Before when Niall did the spell, he had gotten like a boost to something, but now this was happening of all things, and he felt as if Niall did not trust him now.

He wanted to rip them off of his back, but the thoughts of the pain deterred him well enough. He tried to move the wings, and they responded, though perhaps with only a weak flap, a single movement that showed they were his, not some cruel joke; not an illusion. Would Aaron know anything about this, or maybe his mom? At this moment, Brandon felt like a child worrying about their first pimple, or even their voice cracking. No, he was scared, perhaps wondering what had happened to his body and why it was happening. He could feel a wave of weakness run through his body, especially his back and then pass. His thoughts snapped back into focus, Niall letting out a light chuckle before charging the missiles, and then there was an explosion, and he was gone. Well, that was not all of the missles, the other three slammed hard into his body and sent the Hale flying through the air with all of the grace of an epileptic chicken.

His wings flapped uselessly, and in an instant he slammed hard into the ground, and damn did his chest hurt like hell. Brandon felt over it, and....there was blood. It was a minute, almost unnoticeable amount but he could feel the thick moisture on his palm. 'Great...I have wings and I can't even fucking use them.” The Hale grumbled to himself pulling himself from the ground and letting out a disappointed sigh.