To Catch a Chronoz (Argil Prodigy Recruitment Redux)

A package found its way to Argil. Enclosed was a file containing pertinent information on a villainous criminal reported to be in Cheyenne, Wyoming. The villain was self styled Tyrant of Time, Chronoz, who came from San Francisco. He had been wanted for burglary of several clockmakers and stores selling old analog clocks. Prodigy was short on members to take care of it, and apprehending Chronoz would be a show of intent for the new recruit.

Argil wouldn't be alone though. The package also contained information on a friendly hero in the area, Sagittarii, apparently a blonde girl who was a good shot with a bow... and selfies. She had a profile on the incredibly lame HeroNet, and seemed quite fond of taking pictures of herself posing with a bow and with people than actually doing any crime fighting. She usually hung out on the roof of a Louis Vitton building, where she would meet Argil as she "kept an eye out for crime. And sales." Together they would be responsible for taking down Chronoz.

Paul Alban Dibra, otherwise known as Argil, was currently asleep on a bus nearing the city of Cheyenne. The teenager was dressed in civilian clothing... actually the heavy brown pants and top that made up the backing of his superhero outfit. Resting on his lap was a heavy backpack just full of ceramic, and he'd been forced to explain more than once that the fairly suspicious backpack was just clay; thankfully, it'd calmed down and he was able to sleep his way through about the last half of the five-hour bus ride. Infused with clay, Argil was a very minor superhero already; aside from normal, low-key crimes his only real claim to fame was involvement in helping deal with a mine fire. Yet, he'd managed to apply for the young superhero group "Prodigy",  and if there were ever a perfect opportunity to perhaps be a little more important on the superhero stage, this was it.

That's why he found himself arriving at the capital of Wyoming, five hours away from his home city and his actual job; he was assigned to deal with some "Chronoz" criminal out burgling things. If he could pull this off, Paul figured he might be able to really make something of himself in Prodigy. As the bus arrived, Paul slowly and blearily woke up, and he grunted as he slung the heavy backpack over his shoulders, and walked out into Cheyenne. A quick hiding spot and change later, the teenager was decked out in his ceramic plates (yet, no helmet!) and walking on his way over to the Louis Vitton building he was supposed to meet this "Sagittarrii" girl at. And so, ignoring stares, the dour hero approached the building before walking up a set of external stairs... wincing at the creaking whenever his heavy, armored form stepped on the metal grate of the steps.

He made it up to the roof, trying (and failing) not to thump against the roof and startle the poor people inside. He saw the girl he was supposed to meet... a blonde archer girl, as was described to him. He piped up: "Hey, I'm Argil. I'm assuming you're Sagittarrii? ...oh, and can we maybe not be on the roof? I'm not light, or mobile."

Despite her picture online, the hero girl wore a sensible, dark blue and gray combat suit with only her chest symbol being pink and yellow. She wore a helmet with pink glass goggles, making her look like a military power ranger or something. She also had a high tech composite bow... in pink. And she spoke like how someone from the valley would. She raised her hand and did a girly wave at Argil.

"Like, hello there! Yeah I am totes Sagittarii, but you can call me Sage, cuz, you know, like, Sagittarii is a totes long name to say. Oh yeah sure, we can get down, Like, we shouldn't be too conspicuous, you know?"

Sage had a line and she used it to power zipline down back to the ground. It was night time now and the presence of costumed heroes caused people to either take pictures or get clear. Sage ignores them. "So like, I tracked this lame-o Chronoz guy here to Cheyenne, all the way from the Bay Area. Ugh... He's such a nut job, stealing from like, watchmakers and clock makers. I don't get it." She headed to her bike and picked up a radio-like device, a police scanner from the police reports being made from it. So far there was no mention of crazed costumed villains robbing watch stores.

"So like, what's your powers, Argil?" She asked with a cheery smile.

Argil paused briefly when Sagittarii started talking. From her description, he has expected something like this, but... he hadn't expected this much valley girl. It was a little overwhelming, really, and so it took Argil a moment once Sagittarii (Sage!) finished talking to blink and begin moving down from the roof. It took another several moments to get down the stairs, and he made rather a ruckus doing so... Argil certainly hadn't been lying about not being the world's lightest of people. However, once he HAD finally made it down from the roof, he walked over to Sage. Neutrally looking at a few of the gawkers nearby, Argil turned to Sage, looking at her police scanner and listening to her question.

"Well. There's a lot of clay involved, for one. My bones are made of very very very hard ceramic, and in general I'm... almost, kinda made out of clay? I've got extra ceramic plates and clay-like flesh, when things are dangerous. It means I'm really tough, basically. It'd take a lot to hurt me. Plus, I can control clay, harden it, soften it, move it, that kind of thing." Argil finished talking, but then snapped as he remembered to mention one more thing. "Oh, and I can heal myself. Give me a few hours of rest, and broken bones will stop being a problem."

"So, that's me, what about you? You're an archer, obviously, but what do you have? ...oh, and exactly how dangerous is this Chronoz guy? Does he have superpowers? Fancy equipment, any of that?"

"Yeah! Check these out, like, I totes had some inventor friends put together these like, trick arrows. Some of them explode, some of them like, make everything all gooey and sticky, and some are like, make a totally bright light. They are the bomb diggity." Sage let out a distinct, nasal giggle when she spoke about her gear, turning around to show him the quiver of assorted, color coded arrows.

"Well, Like, Chronoz calls himself 'The Tyrant of Time'. Likes to tell everybody he's got qoute, "mad temporal skeelz" unquote, but I haven't seen him do more than smash jewelry shops. Haven't fought him yet, so like, gotta be careful anyway."  Sage's tone was a bit more serious when talking about the criminal on hand. Even though he sounded more like a nutjob than an actual villain, one couldn't be too careful.

The police scanner piped up about Chronoz, and Sage turned up the volume. "...All units be advised, robbery in progress at the Liberty Mall. Suspects are armed and dangerous, witnesses call out costumed criminal 'Chronoz' is on the scene."

"Like, that's our cue." Sage hopped onto her incredibly pink bike with a side car. Some bike though, as it was an ultra-rare modified Kawasaki Ninja. She hands Argil a helmet. "Well, hop in. And like, don't worry,I've had, like, bigger people ride in the side car." She then fired up the bike. Once Argil was comfortably seated with his helmet on, they'd be off.

Argil listened with the same serious expression he'd had on the whole time, apparently patient enough not even to be annoyed by Sage's mannerisms.  He looked briefly at her arrows, before making a "Hmm," sound. "Alright, I can see that being useful." He then smiled a little. "As for being careful... well, of course. Don't know what he might be packing, though the fact that you haven't actually seen him use any powers is pretty good! ...Plus, I'm good at not being hurt, at the least."

His attention shifted to the helmet she was offering him... the hot pink helmet she was offering him. His little confident smile transformed into one of confusion. ...and then he looked at the hot pink sidecar bike (albeit a good bike). ...well, then. He cleared his throat and spoke up. "Well. The helmet is probably useless, considering I think my skull is actually stronger than it. But. . ." Argil sighed quietly to himself and sat in the sidecar of the ridiculously pink vehicle... anyone watching closely as the two rode would notice a very distinctly disapproving expression on Argil's face as his usual drab clay brown was just utterly drowned out by all the pink.

However, something occurred to Argil along the way. "Oh! That thing mentioned suspects, armed. Who does Chronoz usually work with? Are these just normal gunmen, should I maybe be a bit more worried about them. Do you know?" As Argil spoke, he somewhat casually molded an extra ceramic plate from the outside of his arm to his hand, where he hardened it and attached it something like a buckler. "I mean... I'm ready to take him down either way, but it's useful to know. Make sure I don't get blindsided by something surprisingly awful."

"Yeah, like, they're just dudes with guns. Pretty boring, but still dangerous." They arrived at the mall and Sage had no more to say, bringing to bear her high tech bow. They made it in time just as Chronoz and his goons were in the parking lot and about to make a getaway. His mooks wore jackets, fatigue pants and ski masks, while he wore an all white get up, something that looked like a baseball uniform and a plain white bed sheet as a cape.

"Hurry! Our time is running out!" He said with an unsual enthusiasm. Sage had gotten very close, undetected, walking crouched, then climbing up the tree with the grace of a hunting cat.

Sage announced her presence by and shooting one of the assault rifles, the particularly sharp arrow cutting into the weapon's mechanisms, rendering it useless. The others look at the arrow dumbfounded, then towards Sage who already had an arrow nocked.

"What's this? Sagittarii? And another hero? No matter. You're running far too late! It's only a matter of time before I complete my time machine! Minions! Attack!" He ordered his goons to open fire, but they all only looked at each other and laughed.

"Yeah, we already got the jewels. Sorry Chronoz but we're bailing now." The bad guys were quick to abandon their fall guy, some nutjob in a cloth cape. They ran away towards the other end of the parking lot. Sage would have none of that and sent a foam-crete arrow their way, encase the group in instantly hardening foam-crete. "Like, you should have used your guns when you had the chance."

"Traitors! No matter... You may be an expert archer, Sage, but behold the hands of time!" Chronoz opened the door of his van to reveal several large clocks... whose hands launched themselves at Sage and Argil like arrows. Sage displayed serious skills leaping out of the tree and avoiding each one, even catching one in hand. Argil though would be peppered by the mundane projectiles.

Whilst Sage had been stealthily and skillfully approaching the gunmen, Argil had simply been jogging up; he was behind Sage mainly because he wanted her to get off the first shot or two. ...and get off the first two shots she did! She had managed not only to ruin a gun with a very well-placed arrow, but to encase the gunmen in some sort of super hard foam. No matter how valley girl she may act, it was plenty apparent she knew what she was doing, and she was good at it.

Argil spotted Chronoz himself as he got closer, and... well, he was less than impressed. It looked like he was wearing a bedsheet and a baseball uniform, no lie. It looked even sillier when compared to the jackets and fatigues of the (immobilized) gunmen. "...really?" Argil almost couldn't believe the man was actually a supervillain, considering how... well... dumb he looked. Apparently, he was working on a time machine, too. ...well, then.

Of course, it did turn out that Chronoz had something up his sleeve... or rather, something in his van. After a short monologue about the "hands of time!", Chronoz suddenly threw open the door of his van, revealing his supervillain-y weapon: CLOCKS! Specifically, clocks that shot clock-hand-arrows at you. Sage had it well in hand,with an agile dodge that not only led to not a single arrow striking her, but an arrow actually caught out of the air. Without any comparable agility and still jogging towards Chronoz, Argil seemed doomed to be peppered with arrows.

And peppered with arrows he was. Almost every single one of the arrows hit him dead on, with a couple missing and one grazing. But it simply didn't matter: the majority of them bounced off of his ceramic plate armor harmlessly, and even those that didn't stuck in the fabric and maybe got their point into Argil before either falling off on their own or being lightly pulled off by Argil himself. One arrow made it to hit him directly in the forehead; but it just bounced off his skull as well.

Argil just kept jogging, perhaps even reaching a higher speed than before he'd been pelted. The buckler on his hand morphed around it into a sort of a fist... though softened, so he didn't just kill the robber on contact. His plan was real simple: Keep jogging at Chronoz despite his attacks, and then punch him.

As the clay giant approached, he would see that Chronoz's cape was tied together with a clock, and he had a large assortment of pocket watches hanging at his side. The Tyrant of Time produced a clock shield- a round shield that had the numbers and the hands on the outside. He didn't just block, but deflected Argil's attack with it, and with yet another sombering line.

"Hahaha! No mere metahuman can harm Chronoz, when he is protected by chrono energies!" He seemed pretty ridiculous but he did demonstrate some decent fighting skill. At that point three arrows dug into his shield, but it didn't faze him. Sage went all valley girl at how he blocked the arrows. Once Argil was in melee range, he dug into his pockets... and tossed fine grade pocket sand into Argil's eyes.

"The sands of time will be your downfall, interloper!" He said, then spun past Argil to go after Sage. He blocks two more arrows that tried to skewer him, one of them beeping, forcing Chronoz to discard his shield as it exploded.

"Like, what the heck?! This guy's nuts!" Sage said, as she ducked, weaved and generally avoided a baseball bat covered in watches. "I'm not out of this fight yet, Archer Girl! taste my Chrono Cudgel!"

Argil discovered that he had (possibly) underestimated Chronoz after the minor villain pulled a... clock shield out of nowhere and bounced his punch directly off of its surface. He watched Chronoz then prove himself to be able to block Sage's shots as well (admittedly impressive), while simultaneously putting his hand into his pocket... and drawing out sand! Argil was taken by some measure of surprise as Chronoz threw a handful of fine sand directly into the teen's eyes, drawing out a curse.

Argil had already been wiping at his eyes with one hand and drawing off another plate from his armor when Sage fired off an explosive arrow directly into Chronoz's pesky shield, destroying it. This gave Argil quite a bit of opportunity, and Argil drew another pair of plates from his armor and morphed them into a few balls of relatively soft clay. From there, he squinted through the sand as Chronoz went after Sage with, get this, a baseball bat plastered with watches everywhere.

"Ugh, yes, nuts, I noticed!" Argil groaned as he proceeded to move at Chronoz, not likely to hit him from any sort of long distance thanks to that sand. When close to the clock-obsessed robber, Argil put his plan into motion: firing off the clay, Argil had it spread in the air to hit Chronoz, probably wrap around him, and then harden... an easy capture! This, of course, assumed that Chronoz didn't have any more strange tricks up his sleeve.

Chronoz's desperate fight against a pair of heroes was bringing out his true colors. Even as he was engaged with the girl in hand to hand, he was aware enough of Argil's attack. He pulled off an advanced maneuver just as the clay contacted him, spinning out and instead it simply caught his cloak. Then he caught Sage with a vicious thrust of his cudgel into her solar plexus. "HUuuurrkk~" She made an awful, awful sound as spittle escaped from her mouth. Sage didn't see that coming, and goes down as the air is knocked from her. Her eyes roll up into her head and she falls to the ground, limp.

"Persistent man of clay. But you won't be a pest when you're encased by my..." He launched his pocket watches at Argil. They were actually really going to wrap around him.  "Chrono Bolos!" He said with triumph, and the material on those Chrono Bolos was actually pretty tough.

Argil was forced to take Chronoz rather more seriously when the time-obsessed fighter continued to prove himself surprisingly skilled in combat. Argil had to wonder about the robber. He also had to deal with him. Alone, considering Sage had just been knocked right out. Argil couldn't help but wince a little as he saw and heard Sage get hit directly... he didn't intend to let Chronoz have it that easy with him.

So he had to deal with the bolas currently in the air. His plan was simple: take the clay he had been using as a buckler and a fist off of his hand and instead throw it out to intercept the bolas midair. Indeed, the bolas didn't find their mark and instead wrapped around the hard, thin disc of clay Argil proceeded to start  taking swipes at Chronoz with.

Finally, as he attacked Chronoz with the disc, he began to walk forward, hoping to force Chronoz to try and use his cudgel-- hopefully the image of Argil being unfazed would cause the clock man to lose effectiveness.

"What's the matter, man of clay? Silenced by the power of time itself?!" He really wouldn't give up with the quips, and was bracing himself to use the craven Chrono Cudgel to engage in combat with the clay man. He used the bat to parry and smash the clay discs, and this distraction was all that was necessary for Chronoz's downfall.

If he was aware of his opponent, he could defend himself. But, Sage had played possum and snuck up on Chronoz, the man confident he had put out the archer's lights. She then struck Chronoz in the side of the head with a large rock, sending him to the floor for real.

"Like, plot twist, jerk! Sage here can command the elemental powers of earth, by virtue of this rock in my hand!" She said with gratuitous gusto, deliver a righteous smack down on the man. The blow sent him reeling and unable to recover, his balance lost when his eardrum was ruptured from the violent attack.

"Betcha ya didn't know I was a druid too! I can command plants!" Sage said, picking up a good, thick branch.

"...Wait a sec... I remember you... didn't I put you in the-" WHACK. Chronoz was about to say something, but it was interrupted by a branch hitting him in the face, bloodying him and sending him out for the count.

"Jerk. Like, that really, really hurt. Good thing I was wearing combat armor." She said, discarding her secret powers over earth and plants and tying him up with zip cord cuffs.

"Good job teammate! Now we can wait for the cops to arrive and take him away! Up high!" She raised her hand to receive a high five, acting like she didn't just brutally maim a human being. Then again he had it coming, but the brain damage might make Chronoz even more unstable. She also took out her phone to take a selfie, then a groupie with Argil and Chronoz, and a picture of the beaten Chronoz.

Argil had had his hands surprisingly full with the crazy clock man. Chronoz was capable of intercepting most all of Argil's attacks... but didn't really have the capability to much harm Argil; this was a recipe for quite a long battle. Argil figured he could up the ante, but it'd tax his concentration to his limits and he wasn't sure if Chronoz didn't still have the reflexes to deal with more discs... while still spouting his quips, no less.

Thankfully, Argil didn't end up having to redouble his efforts, thanks to the surprise rock-to-the-face from a very much conscious and very much angry Sage. And then the branch to the face for good measure. Argil looked rather surprised as Sage angrily savaged the guy. The surprise didn't last long, though, and as Sage tied up the robber, Argil returned all of the clay he'd expended to plate form and reattached it to his armor's backing, exiting his combat stance and then taking a moment to remove the rest of the sand from his eyes.

As he wiped the offending particles away, Argil noticed that Sage was already in the middle of celebrating, phone out and hand up almost in an instant. Argil was much more serious-minded than that, however, and basically left her hanging while he focused on getting those last bits of sand out of his eyes.

The clay-armored hero then continued to leaver her hanging and even not pose for her photos as he crouched over to check on their very literally beaten opponent. "Combat armor... you're all right, then? ...unlike him, at least, hmm. Well, I'll hold off on gloating; instead, I think I'll be doing some cleanup." Argil looked over Chronoz; exactly how hard had she hit him?

He then looked up and around: how much collateral damage, if any, had there been during the fight? Argil intended to fill it in with some clay, to at least serve as a temporary repair. Argil didn't want to leave the people of the area with a bunch of stuff to have to clean up... after all, metahumans like him had shaky public opinion because of collateral damage and destruction, right?

"Like, yeah! I would be so, like, not risking my neck if I wasn't wearing body armor going up against armed thugs. I'm just glad he didn't like, go after my face." It was fitting that Sage spoke with a metahuman with power of clay and ceramics, as she opened her body armor to reveal a smashed up ceramic armor plating that was crushed by Chronoz's powerful thrust.

Conversely, for hitting a teen girl in the gut, Chronoz paid for it with a ruptured eardrum and a concussion. He had a thick skull and a strong neck, so nothing broken there.

Aside from the explosive arrow Sage used, there wasn't much damage done that the thugs hadn't already. The broken windows and smashed glass doors would have to be covered by the mall. She picked up Chronoz's clock shield, seeing that it was still mostly intact from the explosion. "Huh. Like, This shield is made of seriously tough stuff... Think I'll call dibs on it as a trophy!" Sage said after putting her phone away. She picked up the Chrono Cudgel, aka, a baseball bat covered in watches, and offered it to Argil as a trophy.

"Think these watches are stolen?" She asked, looking at all the Rolexes and other branded, golden watches, just as the police arrived in a timely fashion.

"Police! hands the in air! Drop your weapons! We've got ourselves an armed, costumed vigilante here, and possible metahuman. They've apprehended suspect named Chronoz and his associates." Came the usual lines as beat cops took out hand guns and took aim at Sage and Argil. They were accompanied by a truck containing Metahuman response teams, heavily armed and armored specialists attached to the police department. How heavily armed? Two guys with rocket launchers apiece took aim at Argil and Sage. And they had officers with heavy shields in front of them.

"Um... I'm making a citizen's arrest!" Sage protested, raising her arms without protest. Her body armor protected her from some crazed costume criminal, but not from armor piercing missile launchers.

"Is that so? Well then, you and your friend won't object to coming with us to the precinct to make a statement?" A lady cop asked and approached Sage. Another, larger man approached Argil with metahuman grade cyber manacles.

"No... no, ma'am." Sage said, submitting to arrest. She looked at Argil, making a sad expression. "Don't... don't worry. We didn't do anything wrong. We made a citizens' arrest, after all."

"Be that as it may, you're in possession of some serious fire power. You look pretty young to be in the cape business, miss?" The lady officer said, leading Sage and the barely conscious Chronoz to a waiting police armored vehicle.

"It's Sagittarii, ma'am. I'm 17, ma'am. Like, I know I have a right to anonymity... and a lawyer."Sage said with a cooperative tone. The cop whistled. "A minor, but you know your rights. Well, ain't that good for you. I suppose your friend here's a minor too?" She looked at Argil, who would be led to a separate truck, escorted by heavily armored cops with metahuman grade weapons.