Broken Wings: Main Thread

[Red]

They say life is unfair..... I don't believe that. Lucius drove down a two lane mountain road. His sleek vehicle's lights lit up only a small space in front of him, but he turned every corner perfectly at triple digit speeds. All was silent but raindrops hitting the hard pavement, and the roar of the supercar. All was peaceful, the calm before the storm.

No, unfair is an understatement. The world is evil, destructive. It tests it's people's limits, ruins their lives for the fun of it. Lucius slid across the road, his tires cut lose as if he weren't in control, but he was. He drifted around the next steep curve with precise and beautiful skill. Outside, faint signs of an impending dawn were beginning to appear.

Indeed, the world is cruel. It takes good men and beats them down, slowly bringing them to their breaking point. The half a million dollar car spat as he arrived at his destination. A cabin in the middle of Canada. The reason this place was chosen was because of it's secluded nature. It actually had a magnetic field that prohibited quantum tunneling naturally, hence the driving. Of course, once you were in the area you could teleport within its bounds, but going in or out was impossible.

I was a good man. Kind, honest, loving. Then this evil world took something from me, and left nothing but a monster. Yet i still try to help the place that wronged me. Why? I don't even know the answer to that question. Lucius opened the door to his muscle car, a soft click like what you would hear from a new model responded in turn. The brisk air blew his hooded robes about, cooling his armor plating in seconds. A small shiver went down his spine. It was so unfamiliar, humanity.

I'm a monster, yes. But do you ever ask why the one under your bed does what he does? The one in the closet? No, you don't, because you're told monsters are evil...... No, no they aren't. They're just another victim of a cruel world.... The sticks and leaves crunched under Lucius' mostly metal boots with each step toward the wooden structure. His scanning system surveyed the place, no one was here yet. The dawn lit the sky faintly now, and birds sounded off to signal the coming of a new day. He opened the wooden door, flicked the light on, and found a broken down interior with nothing but a long table inside. He sat, awaiting the others. This was the day, the day they put one of their bigger obstacles to rest. One way or another, The Talons would fall.

Everything was set, the explosives, the cameras, and the traps. But in the end that would only serve as a slight distractive advantage. This was a cage match, and only one side would come out whole. The Rise members were quite likely to arrive first, and when they did they would have a good ten minutes by Lucius' estimation to stage their ambush. The coordinates he had lead the Talons to were just over the hill,  in a field that gave Rise a distinctive advantage.

[Chellizard]

'Arm goes in. Pull the gloves on. Zip the back. Make sure you don't forget your mask...'

Thinking to herself was an early twenty year old girl. She stood at roughly five feet and six inches tall. Despite her average size, and petite frame, she was a force to be reckoned with. She was standing in a small cubicle, dressing into her battle regalia. The one piece spandex style suit with microfiber laced into it clothed her. The outfit itself was new. It was no longer a black base with gold swirls. No.

She was now truly an Eclipse.

The singular piece of deep charcoal clothing covered her arms, her shoulders, and even part of her neck. It was a full body suit. There was a slender moon shape cut into the chest. A golden sun was being eclipsed by the cutout in her uniform. Her hands were dressed in a pair of sensor pressurized gloves to help regulate her own strength. If she didn't have them, she wouldn't be able to control how hard she punched people.

She may be super strong, but she's not the brightest crayon in the box.

That much was apparent.

Sitting down, she relaxed for just a few moments.

'Your band is in shambles. Your life is just barely dangling by a thread. You're a Talon, though. People are depending on you. Get your head in the game, Tyuki.' Scolding herself, her eyes flashed a bright green as she caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror.

Her mass of ebony hair fell around of her face and shoulders, bangs just barely brushing passed her furrowed brows. She relaxed her expression and slipped her feet into her boots. The gold trimmed carbon fiber steel toed boots would protect her from any tremendous damage. Not that she needed the protection.

Finally, she did a wing check. A burst of golden light flashed throughout the small room and once it dimmed down, a pair of beautiful white feathered wings were attached to her back.

They stretched, folded, and ruffled up. The feathers were so white, they looked to be glowing. Smiling for once this whole day, she mustered up the courage and walked out of the room to meet the rest of her team.

"I know I'm not the leader, but let's rally and get a move on." She said, clapping her hands. Being lead singer of a band for so long gave her the motivation to push other people in the right direction.

--

Arriving just a mile outside of the clearing, Tyuki stepped out of the old helicopter that the Talons used to use back in the day. It still got them from point A to point B fairly easily, so there was no need in using something else.

The reason they were a mile away was to attempt and get any upper hand that they could. However, the pride Tyuki had for the honor of hero code, or whatever you wanted to call it, she made sure to fly out and ahead to land in the center of the field.

She didn't let anyone, even Phoenix or Apex, give her a chance to change her mind.

Her wings brought her up into the air and she landed gracefully, barely disturbing the meadow she was standing in. Rain was drizzling now, the clouds angrily barking at one another as flashes of lightning threatened to make even more rain pour on them.

But not yet.

This was the calm.

"I AM ECLIPSE. AND WE ARE THE TALONS! YOU CAN STOP COWERING IN FEAR NOW!" She shouted, her voice carrying with a booming echo. It bounced off the mountains and trees, making her sound way more ferocious than she really was.

The Eclipse had begun.

[Arcana]

When it came to being a CEO that doubled as some manner of super villain, one had to make sure they had a strict schedule. Between the whole improving humanity thing with Rise and keeping up a clean public image, well his life was usually planned out weeks in advance with only the tiniest room for error within it. Luckily Lucius' little plan fell within the time he had for the supervillain portion of things, though playing around with superheroes was not exactly how he enjoyed spending his free time. Electronic music flowed through earbuds implanted within his ears, keeping him otherwise occupied as the vehicle itself was driven towards their destination. A small, unimportant looking cabin in the middle of nowhere. Questions quickly flowed through his mind and yet he did not bother worrying about it. Only three of his little siblings had actually come along, them being Zeta, Delta and Eta who had insisted on coming.

It may have been that they were not included in their activities very often, something that annoyed them more than they would have likely admitted. The black car drove into a small worn driveway, parking as he stepping out, removing his earbuds and silencing the music. The three would follow suit behind him as Alpha stepped first through the door, taking in everything with a cursory glance. The place was well worn, holding a table that they were likely to be sitting around. Obviously Lucius was there first, but then again he wasn't surprised by that in the least. With a twitch of a finger, one of the chairs would scoot backwards and he sat down, letting the others stand. Delta chose to sit cross legged on the floor, Zeta stand against the wall and Eta levitating via aerokinesis.

"Well, here I am." He noted with a sigh, crossing his arms and letting the chair lean back slightly, held from falling by his mind alone.

--

Apparently there were a few problems were anti-metahuman terrorists, in Canada of all places and that just sounded really annoying. This was a threat that he planned to deal with alongside his hero group, one Sean hadn't worked with for a while now. Honestly, he was just happy to be with old friends even if the days they were friends weren't exactly known for being good. He was a younger, and far less restrained person then. The teams that had come along were splitting up and stragely enough, he was working with Zell of all people. Not that he minded it, considering that an excuse to do heroics with Zell was something that he had actually really enjoyed. That may have explained why Sean had that cheery look on his face, or maybe he was just that confident. Afterall, he knew Zell's work in the xenogens was near flawless, so not like any metahuman could hope to beat him.

Rolling his neck, Sean heard the joints give out a loud pop. "So, you guys ready for this? I'm so ready to punch some terrorists in the face. " Sean then said, pumping his fist as he could see the shine of Tyuki's wings in the distance, flying through the air despite how far away they were. He wouldn't try to stop her, just back the metahuman up when things went badly. Not long in any manner of helicopter due to sort of jumping from it, landing on the ground with a thump. "Question now is where these terrorists are."

[Elena Vexus]

"And I think they said that this goes just liiiike, that..?"
Next to her vanity, her laptop was playing a youtube video. It was a makeup tutorial. It was a small little thing she had deiced to try recently. Turned out she was pretty good at it. Elena was trying to integrate her a little more into regular human activities. Helped her feel calm, and subconsciously it helped her feel normal. Elena had gone on for so much of her life being quite literally a war machine. When she began to settle into her body of flesh and bone she developed what could be considered a post traumatic stress disorder.
Humming along to a song, she picked up a shadow brush and began to blend out her eyes.

Her PTSD doesn't act up often, and a lot of it came to light due to her encounter with an individual who went by the name 'Humanity'. She keeps a very level head in nearly all situations and tries not to over exert herself anymore. Not because she is underestimating people, but because she doesn't want to lose herself to a crazy outburst.
She closed each eye one at a time looking at her work, she gave a little smirk and closed down her laptop and finished getting ready. One would think she was readying herself for an award show. Heels, tiny black dress, hair and makeup all done up. She was attending a mission for the organization Rise that she holds a position in.
They were meeting at an obscure location in the middle of Canada. Vexus had a little outpost in Quebec that she was getting ready at. It would be quite the drive, but she had the proper driver's car to make it there comfortably.

As she placed her finger on the switch to turn off the light in front of her mirror she took a long look at her skin. She was aging. All she could do was let out a sigh. It would be a project for another day. Elena was free from all damage and disease, but it seemed that her body would still age. Granted, it was at a remarkably slower rate than a typical human, but the fact still stood that her body was deteriorating.
The light flicked off, and the door locked behind her as her General smoothly opened the driver side door for her.
"Thank you, dear. I'll see you soon."
"Of course, mistress." he replied as the door closed on it own. And with all twelve roaring cylinders of her Rolls Royce, Vexus was on her way to the meeting point.

Spoiler:

After quite sometime, she finally was on the final stretch of road that would lead her to her destination. She gently pulled up next to what she could have assumed was Lucius'. A muscle car, no surprise there. One of the few things these two disagreed on was probably their taste in cars. The instant her engine shut off, her General materialized right next to the driver side door. She had taken note of the inability to teleport to this location, so Elena deconstructed her bodyguard into Technomatter and had him follow high above in the clouds. The cloaked, seven foot, cyborg being opened the door for her creator. Vexus stepped out with a black, floor length trench coat on. She lightly grabbed her hood as the breeze blew by her, flaring her coat out behind her.
"Goodness, and they call this summer..?"
The two of them continued up to the house, which was a little run down to Elena's standard. Her General opened the door and allowed Vexus through first, he followed in behind having to duck his head down. He then offered to take her coat, but she waved her hand as she would keep it on for the time being.
"Alpha, I see I was not the only one to bring a friend." Elena said taking note of the three individuals around him, hoping they would eventually be introduced. She  then turned her attention to Lucius, the group's leader.
"Nice wheels you've got out there. Maybe we can go a couple laps once this.. Pest control assignment is done." she said with a casual smile. The two of them had worked together briefly in the past, but a little bit of friendly competition between coworkers she figured would be healthy.

The Bodyguard remained in the corner of the house while Vexus walked slowly over to the table. Her heels clicking against the wood flooring with each step. She lightly pulled out a chair on the other side of the long table and took a seat. The red soles of her shoes flashed briefly as she crossed her legs.
"I know a pretty good interior design guy if you ever, ya know, feel like sprucing up the place." She said with a chuckle and slight sarcastic tone as she gazed around the room at the lack of basically anything. As she spoke, her guard walked over and handed her a tea cup with a saucer from underneath his cloak. He had brought a whole satchel of things to make Elena's stay a little more comfortable. She sipped her tea casually, the warm liquid was very calming. Elena closed her eyes and let out a sigh of contentment and sipped her tea again.

She knew this meeting was to eliminate the Talons threat. She knew that both Sean and Phoenix would more than likely attending this fiasco as well. Their last encounter was very eye opening for her, but she made sure to share all of her intel with the team. Anything to help out the cause. Calm confidence is Elena Vexus' signature attitude, and that would be how this entire assignment would be conducted. Calmly and with the upmost confidence of a victorious outcome.

(outfit)

Spoiler:

[Andrew]

"Alright team here's the deal." Andrew pointed to a ping upon a projection of the world map.
"I've gotten a distress signal from Canada about those anti-metahuman terrorists. Many of their ranks will be at the location from what it seems like. Its a big opportunity to shut down, or at least but a big dent in their operation. Sean, and Tyuki. You'll be coming with me. The rest of you, I need back here at HQ. A.I. ready the old chopper and set it's auto pilot to those coordinates on the screen."

Andrew nodded to Tyuki as she was ready to go.
Already in costume he didn't have much to suit up into.
His tall, muscular stature was hugging his perfectly fit suit.
He felt ready to take on any threat that could possibly come their way. Of course, he didn't know how many of their ranks would honestly be there. It could be 100, it could be 1000. However their low tech, mixed with their low amounts of training made The Talons leader confident they could bring any amount of them to justice.

Right before entering the old chopper Andrew turned to A.I.
"Keep a constant ping on our location. If things go sour. We'll need back up. I trust you can run things here, so you're in charge while we're gone." He put his hand on his android friend's shoulder. "Talons Engage, right?" he spoke with a smile.

The blades of The Bird where spinning hard and wind was gusting. "See ya soon." he sat in the back of the chopper.  Prepared to pep talk the team. God this brought back memories.
It was like they hadn't missed a step, yet all of them were much stronger.

"Alright guys, We're more than likely walking into a trap, but we've dealt with these circumstances before. We are The Defenders of Earth. I know Canada is out of our element, but they have innocent civilians too. I know if we work hard together, there isn't a single threat we can't take down."
If only the hero knew what he trap he was walking into.

They arrived close to the scene and once they touched down Tyuki took off like a bat out of hell.
"Dammit Tyuki. No. Wai-"
She was far ahead.
Turning back to Sean he gave him a fist bump.
"I'm gunna go catch up with her. You know what to do. Let's clean this mess up and get back home quick."

In a flash, Andrew was hot on Tyuki's trail. He came to the clearing and saw his love standing alone in the field.
"What?" he questioned.
Touching his dog tags, he called in to A.I.

"Are we in the right place?"
"Yes, the coordinates match the ones provided here. Is something wrong?"
"I'll get back to you on that. Remember keep a track on our position. Phoenix out."

Walking up to Tyuki, he gave her a look of worry.
He had a strange feeling. One that you get before walking into a surprise party or a stray thunder clap dances across the sky.
"Ty, I think we mighta been duped."
The hero looked around, and then powered up to prepare for any event.
Coating his body completely in fire, the white and gold danced off his skin. He created 30 clones that looked identical as his flesh looked like it was made of fire himself.
The sky opened up and rain was falling hard. His flames weren't even the least bit effective. Small bits of smoke trailed off a few of the clones he had put less heat into.
"Be on your toes. I don't like this."

[Gemini]

A shrill, digital screech filled the incredibly modern quarters that had been given to Solitaire ever since he joined up with Rise. The card slinging cowboy's eyes opened, and he slowly peeled his red hat from the front of his eyes. The clear, white orbs remained completely still for a few seconds, ignoring the attention seeking cries of his alarm clock. It flared repeatedly, flashing a bright red '12:58PM' over and over and over and over. With an exhausted grunt, Solitaire reached over and pressed the big button at the top, in order to shut the damn thing up. His feet moved from his red and black silk sheets to the shiny black floor, kicking an empty Whiskey bottle over. There was some general debris over his room - cigarette buds, glasses, spare playing cards. He stood up and rubbed his eyes. Another restless, dreamless sleep. Seemed no matter how much he drank, fucked or partied, nothing could give him back his sweet dreams. But he sure as hell wasn't going to stop trying.

He was already late, so after yet another sigh he moved over to the large bathroom's walk in shower and began getting ready. He purified his body and mind of the debauchery of the night before with scalding hot water.

He moved to the centre of the room and stood, completely naked with the exception of his red hat. He slowly rolled his neck before slamming his hands together in a loud clap. When he pulled them apart, a card rested inbetween his fingers. He flicked an arm into the air and his white eyes flashed green. A swirl of green power and playing cards originated from the ground and engulfed his body before disapating from the bottom upwards. When the light was gone, a gust of wind scowered the spare cards around the room and Solitaire retained the pose. His once naked body now clad in a red and white tail coat, red trousers, black boots with red aces for stirrups. HIs usual gimmicky outfit had been upgraded for the occasion, it now had some minor armor and thicker material to try and give him some protection.

He swirled his finger and the cards which were thrown around the room were dragged back, and span around in order to create a form of ritual circle, created with playing cards, arranged highest to lowest and patterned Ace, Heart, Club, Diamond. Moving to the centre of the circle, Solitaire span on the spot and threw his arm back into the air. A similar green energy seemed to erupt from his chest and encase his body in a vivid green oval. He drew on the power of the cards in order to amplify his teleportation, allowing him to travel all the way to Canada.

Now, Lucius had warned Solitaire that the place he was going 'had a magnetic field around it which made it greatly resistant, if not, immune to quantum tunneling, I.E teleportation so he'd have to teleport himself into the general vacinity rather than the address itself'. Solitaire had replied with 'I'm a Wizard.'

However, when he tried to teleport directly to the Cabin's location, he found his spell re-aiming itself to a location very close to it. It would appear it could even distort magic. An oval of bright green power manifested infront of Vexus and Lucius' cars. Some playing cards flew from it and began circling the oval, before it frittered away in a flash. The cards froze in the air for a second before they were sent flying away on the wind. Solitaire brushed down his lapels and checked his digital watch. '06:16AM'. He always liked teleporting to different timezones. It felt like time travel. He pushed his hat harder onto his head in order to shield as much of himself from the wet spittle that was falling from the sky. The clouds were barkin'. There was a storm approaching, and in more ways than one.

He spotted the Cabin and moved towards it. He opened the door to find the party nearly started without him. He wasn't late was he? He couldn't have been, he woke up 7 hours in the future. He looked to the people in the room and tipped his hat to the congregation. "Howdy." His voice was thick with a foreign drawl. It was thicker than usual because despite the hot shower he could feel he was still hanging. He'd blame it on jetlag if anyone asked. Solitaire dandered over to the table and took a seat. 'You wanted these?' He reached into his coat's pocket and slid a small metal box, containing a deck of regular playing cards to Lucius. He removed an unboxed deck of his own and slowly began building a house of cards.

He hadn't seen all of the people present before, but reputation exceeded most of them.
Although he might have to give the doll some fashion advice.

[Thorgron]

Dressler's heart fluttered as he soared high above the clouds over Canada on pterosaur wings. He was exstatic. His deatinatation was a small cabin, one that Lucius had provided the coordinates to. This however was not the source of his excitement. No, it was instead the purpose of the meeting that he was on his way to attend. Rise, the organization to which he so proudly called himself a member, were converging at the obscure location. Has of yet, Dressler had met only two of its members. Travis, the head of his own branch of Rise, was a man Dressler had provided a "daughter" for. That was a relationship he intended to further nuture. The other member he had become acquainted with was their leader, Lucius. The man was impressive even to the good doctor, a man with such vision that he had elevated himself beyond his own human limitations. But that was not the only reason that Dressler was find of the man.

No in fact his current perception of him may have been hightened to a certain degree. You see, Lucius, upon informing the shapeshifter about their ambush has made an offer to Dressler. That offer, that he would be the one to take down the head of the Talons. The mere thought sent an excited shock through his spine. His wings seemed to vibrate on the wind currents he was so enthralled with the idea. Clearlt my superiority is well accepted he mentally strikes his own ego. He would be put against their leader. He could not shake himself from the importance of that idea.

But as the small cabin came in to focus his mind shifted, if only somewhat. Becoming human once more he would instantly begin to drop from the sky. Quickly reaching terminal velocity he would shift once more, becoming a large flying squirrel. Landing on the roof of the cabin he would squeeze his small rub age like a rat and slip through a crack in the boards of the roof. To all inside a squirrel would appear, dropping from the ceiling before landing perfectly on his feet as the one and only Dr. Dressler. Hello everyone he would bow slightly, showing courtesy to his fellow colleagues. Looking around the room, it seemed they were quite the well suited bunch...except for one. The man in the corner, dressed as some sort of Valentine's Day cowboy. No matter how Dressler searched through his genetic blueprints he could not find the source of his powers, or if he even had any. Turning to Lucius, he would question about they man.We bring a human to take on human sympathizers? disgust rang in his voice. Now turning to the human in the cowboy hat he looked intently. Obviously I'm missing something he'd throw the words at the man with an air of superiority. I'm Dr. Dressler, I hope that you won't be a liability. then once more turning away his eyes came to rest on Lucius. It appeared that the gang was all here, the time to crush the opposition would soon be upon them.

[Proarden (Gravity Man)]

Zell:

****************************************
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    Gravitas wasn't there yet. He was always on time, however. He wasn't worried as the last time he had been late he was quick to make an example of the person responsible. He was already too forgiving when the same thing happened with Lucius the first time. If he let it go now, they'd begin to assume it was acceptiple. It was not. The generals of his gang were not all joining him today. Though the two amongst his ranks with him were Ink and Xerox. Thei car was the smae as it always was, the one that utilized the subdimensional slip in order to make the car larger on the inside.  The car ride itself was silent. No one dared say a thing, in fact no one dared to even think anything in fear that Gravitas may have somehow developed telepathy in the past few days.

  The events surrounding what happened in Detroit had finally leaked out. City wide destruction for several reasons, though ultimately the fate and status of the entire city had been something he neglected, nor cared for at the moment. Though the transpiring events left quite the mark upon Gravitas.  He arrived at the shack and his lietenants stepped out, he took his sweet old time, knowing full well he wouldn't be late.  His attire was a bit different than the last itme Lucius had seen him...many of these people would have never seen him before.

  His attire was his conventional garb, though over it was a cloak with a deep maroon-purple fuzzy padding around the neck and gold-laced trimm in a rather extravagant pattern. Bneath his traditional armor was a seemingly new type of mesh padding underneath, resemblant of an athletic wick material, though the scale-like hexagons seemed to glisten. Armor to finally cover his arms it would seem. Grey stayed outside as instructed, and Ink stepped in, holding the door for her boss.

   He stood there and said nothing, though he was just in time to hear Dr.Dressler start to take a snarky tone with the magi they had brought into the group not all that long ago. Gravitas said nothing, but simply continued to exist in the shadows. Ink stepped between him and the rest of the group, seeming to try and be a shield of sorts.

   "On topic!" Gravitas snapped viciously as his voice boomed. He leaned against the wall, arms folded and Ink still in front of him. His tone and voice made it quite clear he wasn't amused with the "superiority" complex, or with the fact Lucius allowed the group to become so distracted as to talk about interior decoration and condemnation of ones contributions.

[Chellizard]

Days before now, but hours after Las Vegas, an anonymous phone call rang in Lucius' pocket.

The voice on the other end was distorted, masculine, and almost Russian.

"I have information you want... Meet me in exactly six hours or you'll be missing out on an opportunity."

The line went dead.

--

Exactly six hours later, on a deserted highway in the middle of the desert outside of Las Vegas stood a small figure cloaked from head to toe in black. The sun was setting, and the orange sands of the desert were cast in an even more red hue.

"You came. Alone. Odd that you would trust such an anonymous voice. Knowing you, however, you've likely got something up your sleeve..." trailing off, the small figure giggled.

The voice was definitely feminine.

Pulling back her hood, her cloak dissipated in a breeze of plum colored energy. It resembled more like dust.

As soon as the cloak was gone, a very petite girl came into view. She was practically flat chested, but had thick thighs. She had stark white hair, and creamy brown skin. She was a very light mocha. Signs of freckles dotted her exposed left shoulder, her right was covered by a half cape that draped down her back. She was standing at first, but she floated up and toward Lucius.

"Lucius Gavril Alba... Mmn. You are on powerful man." She moved a hand up and adjusted her wide golden visor. It hid her eyes, and the majority of her face from view. All that was really visible was the tip of her nose and down from the apples of her cheeks.

She produced a couple chairs from thin air, and sat herself down, waving that he should sit, too.

"I have information for you. As I said.... Eclipse, a member of the Talons. Her number one weakness is grapes. As stupid as that sounds, she's deathly allergic, and not even her own innate power can stop it's horrific effects. It's funny that the girl that can cure cancer with a single touch has a grape allergic. I feel bad for her sometimes. Ah well." Rolling her eyes unbeknownst to Lucius, she made his chair disappear just as he went to sit in it. If he fell on his rump, well that would be funny.

If he managed to recover and stand back up, she would applaud him. Either way, she let out a hearty laugh and offered him a transparent card with a single word on it.

'Dreameater.'

"Give me a call sometime, Lucy," she lowered her visor, passed him a wink, and then vanished in a cloud of plum colored energy.

If Naomi couldn't take Tyuki down, Lucius Alba would have to do it for her.

[Red]

Lucius watched as one by one each member of Rise, and a few of their lackies emerged. Lucius himself was keeping it small, out of pride/honour if anything else. He wanted to win on equal footing, or at least without bringing an army. He sat calmly, saying nothing but making sure to nod to each member as they came in. He seemed to be working on a few of his micro bombs, as he tinkered with them with a little tool and held his face close to the table. He had a bottle of black liquid next to him, and started coating various gadgets with it including his sword before dumping the rest into a simple smoke grenade. After that, he packed up and looked to the people in the room.

"Thank you Solitaire. You have no idea how hard pressed i was to find a pack in this wasteland of a country." Lucius said, placing the cards in a belt compartment before looking slightly disapprovingly at Dressler.

"I assure you Doctor, you have. Everyone here has their role to play and they are all equally important to the success of this mission." Lucius said plainly, not caring to get into detail about anyones supposed superiority. Such conversations could be had while not in such a crucial situation.

"Yes Vexus, i will have to take you up on that after this. For now i will have you at the core of our secondary strike team. Let the others work around you, overwhelm while they use more intricate tactics. Do not fail me." Lucius said, seeing Gravity Man enter. He hadn't seen the man in quite some time now, and with what happened in Detroit...... He knew he had to be gentle. He stood and approched his fellow Rise head, and friend, holding out his hand for a shake.

"It's good to see you." Lucius said simply, turning to Alpha and his underlings. So many were here. Why so many? He thought he had made it clear he didn't want so many lesser members. Oh well, perhaps Travis felt safer that way.

"Keep your siblings from doing anything cute."  Lucius said, then got a beep from his sensors outside. Two groups were outside, one of two and one of about 31, though on the first group another lingered in the trees above. They had arrived.

"They're here. Get to work. Dressler, it's time. The rest of you, fall in line with Travis and Gravitas." Lucius said, walking out the door and getting into his car. He figured Dressler had his own means of moving a few hundred meters. Suddenly, and with a pop, Daniel appeared in the car.

"You're late." Lucius said, not turning his head as the engine sparked to life. Daniel just shrugged.

"Hey, i haven't driven in years. Cut me some slack." The teleporter said, and with that Lucius ordered Hector to set the first trap, explosives in both groups with a copious amount of military issue stun dust, meant for use against metahumans. This would clog The Talons senses for a short while, giving Rise a slight jump.

From there, he kicked it into high gear, his car going semi intangible and moving up to mach two in speed. In fractions of seconds Lucius would close the distance with Tyuki and Phoenix, coming out of the forest in spectacular fashion as he jumped the hill. The car had a red energy plow at the front, and Lucius was headed right for the likely stunned Tyuki. This was going to hurt, badly.

"Eclipse, meet Amara."  Lucius said, referencing his new vehicle by it's name. Yes he names his cars, and yes you can shut up.

(Due to the discussions, the new order is: Me, Thor, Chelle, Andrew.

The rest of you will have a thread up shortly.)

[Thorgron]

As Lucius gave the order Dressler was practically drooling with excitement. In fact his body was drooling to a certain extent. A thick clear film formed over his arms as his cells primed for action. And as Lucius ran to his car, Dressler was already working on his own form of transportation. Morphing his legs, they would take on the appearance of that of a small flea. The chitinous materiel would stretch over his lower appendages as his legs crack and bent into a reverse biped like structure. Stretching and bounding on his new legs he would exit the cabin.

Observing the direction that Lucius was going, Dressler would coil back on his spring like legs. Before his ascent, his eyes would change taking on an appearance of swirling color. They were now the eyes of a mantis shrimp with the neural pathways of a copepod. What this meant for the poor poor fools on the other end of the hill was that Dressler could now see in 16 spectrums of light (as opposed to the seven that humans can see) and react to stimuli in less time than it takes a single human neuron to fire. Then with his legs coiled, he would unleash the stored energy and rocket towards his intended destination at speeds exceeding 4,000 miles per hour.

Almost instantly Dressler's target was in sight. Phoenix, the leader of The Talons stood among a group of fiery constructs. But Dressler saw directly through the ruse. Only one Phoenix had genetic information, only one was made of flesh and blood and Dressler's mind was reading that information like a book. From information provided by Vexus to Rise he had a fairly good idea of what he was going to be up against, but now the doors were thrown wide open as to his capabilities. Hurtling towards Phoenix at over mach 6 speeds Dressler's form would once more change. His skin would form in layers, the bottom being a four inch thick layer of rhinoceros hide, this was both for insulation from heat and cushioning against blunt trauma. Layer number two was five inches strong of iron clad beetle carapace molded in tight scales, the ironclad beetle, even with a shell only fractions of an inch thick requiring a mounted power drill to pierce. And the final layer meshing over the beetle carapace was a thin layer of outward facing and sharp limpet teeth, the hardest known natural animal structure. But that was not the only change, for now Dressler would grow to the size of an african bull elephant weighin in excess of 15,000 pounds, a sizable canonball, moving at the speed he was towards Phoenix, but it was not enough. The muscles inside him would detatch from his skeleton, its very structure disappearing. Instead he was now, exoskeletal with the proportional muscle structure of a dung beetle giving him the capability to now lift in excess of 17 million pounds with no ill side effects. Admittedly it was not as much as his opponent, but now was no the time to blow that particular secret. As a final benefit to himself, Dressler would infuse his cells with an enhanced version of the heat resistance of a thermophile. Their extreme resisitance to heat, made better by the enhancing abilities of his protege Bella and the non-flammable stone like limpet teeth, Dressler was confident that fire would be the last of his worries. Ensuring that his body was coated in the wonderful tissue softening Highform mutagen, he curled in to a ball and awaited the crunch of his opponent's bones beneath his own body.

[Chellizard]

Tyuki stood alone for a good ten seconds before she felt Phoenix's warmth creep up behind of her. The temperature rose around of her significantly as many fire copies of Andrew popped up around of her.

The meadow, damp, still began to burn around each clones feet. The smell of smoke filled Tyuki's senses, completely overriding them.

She glanced to Andrew out of the corner of her eye and gave him an affirmative nod. It was as if to say, 'we got this, okay?'

Then, to add insult to injury, a stun bomb went off completely clouding Tyuki's sense of sound. She couldn't hear anything. Her vision was blurry, and she was certain her heart was about to jump through her throat. She clenched her fists, anger rising. She was not happy at this point in time.

She was actually fairly pissed off.

Why, though?

Was it her emotions just getting out of hand again? Or was it something simpler?

Shrugging it off, she slowly recovered from the stun, her sense of hearing coming back in short bursts. It was like someone had their hand on the volume dial and kept cranking it to ten, but immediately turned it back down to one.

Her ears were in pain, but after a few more seconds of volume control torture, everything came back to normal. She felt her body return to homeostasis. It felt great.

The sudden burst of adrenaline gave her an edge she would not waste. Her wings stretched and she moved a few more steps forward, moving passed one of Andrew's clones so she was out front. Andrew may not like it, but Tyuki was capable of handling her own. And she was going to do it.

Right now.

She heard her moniker come over an intercom - almost alike to a police transmission. Amara? Who was Amara?

Finally seeing the source of the sound, the roar if a beastly engine was coming directly at her. Her wings flexed and she moved forward. She was going to stop the car, or go with it. Her wings pumped, sending her forward faster than her feet could carry her. She moved as quick as she could, but not matching the vehicles maximum velocity. Because of this, the impact was devastating -- for the car.

Tyuki's leg muscles flexed as she held her ground, now a good twenty-five feet ahead of Andrew. And she was glad. She had also veered off to the side, and this would force Lucius to sling his car into a lower gear to make a sudden turn and bee-line it toward Tyuki.

Her wings spread out and she prepared herself for impact.

As soon as the car made contact with the butt of her palms, a loud horrendous thundering crash exploded. The sound was terrifying. It was almost akin to a sonic boom. Tyuki's sheer force penetrated the hood of the car, placing two large hand print dents into the metal. But at a price.

She was sent scooting back, her feet tearing up the beautiful meadow as the winged heroine held onto the metal horse.

"It's gonna take a lot more than a heap of metal to stop me..." she finally said, debris clearing now that Tyuki had control of the car.

The two entities had moved almost three hundred feet from their original position, putting them far away from Phoenix. This distance went unknown to Tyuki - she was focused on one thing.

Lucius.

Well, maybe two.

Cause her second goal was to kick his ass.

A few feathers slowly drifted to land on the hood of his car, and the grassy meadow below. She actually let out a soft pant, but smirked immediately after.

Tyuki took one short moment to glance toward Andrew, noticing a horrific beast coming for him.

"What the hell is that?" She said aloud, her hands still pressed into the dents she made on Lucius' car.

[Andrew]

Andrew nodded back to Tyuki, although he was still concerned with the unknown. He wasn't exactly fond of the idea they could be sitting in a trap. Boy were they ever. Bombs went off, creating a temporarily deafening sound. Andrew didn't move from his position, nor did his clones. He simply grit his teeth.
"Dammit." Whatever and whoever had them right in their grasp.
They had played right into the hand of Rise.

Ironically for a man who enjoyed cards so much, Lucius had a full house and was not going to walk out of this battleground with simply his chips. Andrew thought about who this could be and only one name came to mind. "Lucius." he spoke softly.
The buzzing of a speeding car filled his ear drums as the echoes of explosions began to work their way out. "Ty-"

Something Andrew didn't want to see mixed with something he had for quite some time. He saw a car with Red's signature energy in front of it. However he also saw Tyuki standing her ground.

Of course he was worried. Yet a sigh of relief shot from his mouth when he saw her fly head first into danger. What he was feeling wasn't love though he did feel that for her, no what he was feeling was pride.

That feeling was short lived. Directly ahead of him was a speeding creature of the likes he had never seen before. He felt something different happening inside of him though. As the creature seemed to be making a direct shot towards the real Andrew and none of the clones, it was apparent he had been snuffed out.

Andrew quickly rolled to his left, every fire clone rolling in unison.
"What the hell is that thing?"

15 of the 30 clones launched themselves at the beast with the flick of Andrew's wrist. They became a smoldering 8,000 degrees. As they approached the creature, they would explode and create a magnificent display of flames surround the creature entirely.

"I'm not sure if that is human." he questioned.
Closing his hand to a fist he let the explosion around the creature close in more, and created even more blaze around it. Cranking the heat up a bit, he let his staff form in his left hand.
"Burn."

As the remaining clones all stood together in front of Andrew, they became a spectacular wall of flame. The white and gold flared with unique fashion. The Phoenix leaped backwards, and began spinning his staff clockwise, creating a wind tunnel he blew the wall in the direction of the creature.

The construct was no less than 100 feet tall, and 50 feet wide, but it wasn't a flat wall shape. It curved, and would follow the creature upon Andrew's command as he was sure that wasn't the last of the beast he had seen. He was on the other hand sure it had taken some damage.

Looking back quickly at Tyuki he noticed her holding a car up with her hands. It was Lucius's car. "Where's your stupid card jokes now? That's got to cost a fortune. Not that money means anything to a slime bag like you."

Andrew turned his focus back to the direction of where the beast was headed. Staff in one arm, the other prepared for any purpose he needed. His eyes shifted from brown in the iris to a white almost silver color, and his head buzzed. "What the hell?"
A bit of blood dropped from his nose.
Little did he know a new power was manifesting.

[Red]

The car had the intended effect on the target, it seperated her from Phoenix. Excellent. Sure Lucius now had an angry chick capable of ripping the car to shreds in front of him, but that wouldn't be an issue for long. As soon as the car stopped, the energy pulse generator activated at full capacity, sending the corrosive substance outward. It was capable of incinerating just about all earth material to nothing in seconds, so it would likely hurt. Seeing it made Lucius a bit upset, as he no longer could manipulate it. But now wasn't the time to think about the power he once had.

After the pulse likely at least stunned or knocked back Tyuki, Lucius would toss Daniel the smoke grenade he had put together and the young teleporter would port out, right next to the woman as he activated the grenade and it sent out a thick black smoke in vast amounts. The effects would be felt very, very soon. Right after the initial spout of coughing. You see, tha black stuff was a highly concentrated extract, made with a base of grapes, the woman's allergy.

Lucius would then step out, smirking under his armor with sword drawn. He side stepped the smoke cloud, stepping away from his vehicle just as Daniel left the area to be used later on. This was it, the fight of Eclipse's life. Lucius pulled out a card, a Queen, and charged it with potential energy from his gauntlet, then tossed it at Tyuki just as he converted the potential energy to kinetic energy. When the card got to her, it would explode violently with electricity.

"Breathe, breathe it in....... Where's your king now?" Lucius said softly, amusement in his voice. He was just getting started.

[Thorgron]

Watching his intended target, Dressler's mind was hard at work. The man, Phoenix stood unaware of his impending collision. But a turn of his head lead to him catching site of the hurtling monstrosity. A duck and a roll brought half of the fiery men rolling in sync with him. Cute, he was a one man dance team. The other 15 or so came flying up at Dressler. The copepod neural structure went hard at work, allowing him to adequately process the incoming threat.

Tucking himself together tightly, the layer of limpet teeth covering his body would conjoin into a thick solid orb. Just in time as eh felt the first wave of explosions rock against the durable structure. The inflammable limpet teeth along with the enhanced thermophile physiology in all of his cells served him well on the onslaught. Though the outer layer may have been blazing hot, inside he was resting comfortable at a thousand degrees thanks to his insulation.

By the time the last clone crashed against him, Dressler's body landed with a loud thud into the relatively soft earth. The ground beneath him scorchied on impact from his still very hot exterior. Separating the limpet teeth back to their original configuration but keeping the added thickness Dressler rose on two monstrous legs to find his opponent.

Standing no more than a few feet away was his prey. Dressler licked around the area where his lips would normally be with a sickeningly long tongue. The excitement built in him, this prey did not want to go down easily. Struggle against me Phoenix! the voice emitting from his mouth was horse and hollow, like angry bees buzzing in their hive. Watching Phoenix's clones merge into a towering inferno, made Dressler's heart jump with excitement. The hunt makes the kill all the more satisfying.

Once more recoiling back on his legs, his feet would dig hard into the ground. Rapidly a mycelium structure would form beneath him, snaking its way through the soil and embedding itself in the root structures of nearby plants. By the time the wall was upon him, Dressler had a100 foot diameter mycelium substrate beneath the soil of their battlefield.

As the inferno pushed onward towards him, Dressler's body receded into the mycelium beneath, spreading its reaches even further. Incorporating the tremor sensitivity of a star nosed mole across his now hidden fungal body, he got a clear sense of the world above the substrate. Words from Phoenix rang out, giving away his location on the surface above.

Moving his center of mass beneath the feet of his opponent, Dressler would form a more human appearance once more beneath the soil. For a head he took on the trap-jaw ant, with jaws open at 90 degree angles from all four corners of the head. For the body, he took the same as earlier, armor and flea legs and all.

And with the trap set, so to speak, he sprung. The massive elephant proportioned ant jaws crashing through the soil and most probably around Phoenix 2,300 times faster than the human eyes can blink. The acceleration of their closing was so fast in fact that it pushed force downwards on Dressler's body like a rocket suddenly turning on. But with his flea legs he would simultaneously spring upwards beneath Phoenix, detaching himself from the mycelium and attempting to not only crush him in his massive jaws but to carry him up in to the air with him.

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