Kid Heroes Unite!

Danielle found herself in an unknown bedroom. The walls had been painted black, and there was a small dresser to one side. Apart from that, nothing. What the heck's going on? Was I kidnapped or something? She checked her hand to see if her magic ring was still there. Yep. At least whoever did this to her was going to get a nasty surprise.

The dresser was fully stocked, thankfully, and none of the clothes were hideous. Always a plus for a teenage girl. As she got dressed, a voice came over a hidden loudspeaker. "This is Headmistress Havoc. I hope you're all ready for your first day at Blackriver Academy of Evil. I just know this is going to be a fabulous year of multiversal conquest. Classes begin in one hour, so don't be late!"

Blackriver Academy of... Uh-oh.

Violet woke, exiting sleep and passing right by drowsiness with the practice of a girl who'd had far too many midnight monster fights. She listened carefully to try and figure out if she was alone, then decided to chance it and opened her eyes.

Hm. Unfamiliar room. That was a bad sign. She glanced down - all limbs still attached, still in the same clothes she'd had before, and most importantly her bracelet was still on her wrist. She pushed herself up, and found her bag sitting by her feet. She picked it up, wincing slightly at the weight, and checked quickly inside. And there was a sleeping Geode, too. So whoever had kidnapped her either hadn't looked inside or had assumed that a teenage girl must have had a good reason for hauling around a big rock.

Violet began to examine the room. No obvious cameras or security measures, no ominously magical symbols anywhere... the dresser had clothes all in her size, which was slightly creepy and moreover meant that whoever this was had either been planning this or had very fast seamstresses.

She glanced up in thought. What had she done last? Ugh, there was that fight at the big castle, then she'd won, then the cute Witch-Princess had given her a magic mirror to keep in touch (though that's still be back on her desk at home, wouldn't it) and... ah. So these were the new villains.

On cue, a loudspeaker came on. School for evil? That was a new one for her, though at least it wasn't another evil clown theme. After three distinct evil circuses, festivals, and carnivals that theme was getting old.

Well, she wouldn't find anything more in here. She picked up her bag and settled it over her shoulder, then went to try the door.

Cale Bluefield had gone to sleep early the previous night after one last bit of exercise with some barbells in his room. He had only expected to wake up the next morning to his alarm and maybe his dad drinking some coffee and prepping for work with Stark that day. Maybe some complaints about Cale's noise before bed, considering how close their rooms were.

This new room, decidedly not his, was not what he was expecting. Clambering out of bed only in his boxers, he examined the clothes in the closest, considering what all this meant.

They know my sense of fashion, and they also know how I like my bed. This was premeditated, planned, and someone's probably got some long running plan for this.

He got dressed in a tight black t-shirt, a letterman jacket, jeans and then slipping on his socks and shoes, carefully looking through the clothes themselves prior to putting them on. He needed to make sure there were not bugs or spy mechanisms on them.

The blond man looked at the door after he finished dressing, and then heard something go on the loudspeaker about this being some sort of school for evil and conquest. Well. That narrowed down the list of suspects.

Kade Kilgore maybe - I wouldn't discount that mouthbreathing Heckfire Clubhouse ringleader something like this if he had the right help.

Maybe Sebastian Shaw...probably not Shinobi Shaw, or the announcement would be about hookers and booze.

Taskmaster could run something like this, but I doubt he could grab me and possibly others without major league help.

Moving to test the door, Cale pondered what he'd find outside.

"Aw hell. Noth, you there?"

Sup? How are you? You don't normally sleep this long, and let me tell you, with the effort it takes to even perceive your human constructions of temporal passage I am 100% certain that that is the case.

Elvyra wasn't even sure why she spoke aloud, but it was maybe because of there being absolute silence in her room for literally the first time ever. She'd grown used to the hum of the space age. And thrumming trip-hop in a neighboring block, that was basically constant. She'd been taken in her sleep to an unfamiliar place without her consent, just like millions of kids every day.

That had her in a sweat. If she wasn't gonna be conscripted into a drug-running cell she'd be sold into slavery, she'd have to kill her way out—and then the PA sounded and Elvyra's inner thoughts ground to a halt. Nevermind, Blackriver Academy of Evil was a religion if ever she heard of one and the comments about multiversal conquest just had her thinking about semi-ironically discussing the overthrowing of capitalism. It was an oddly harmless kidnapping, all things considered.

"Alright, Noth, I'm just gonna..." Elvyra held still in bed as eldritch hell-mouths the size of dinner-plates opened in the air above her bed, their gazes sweeping through the room to give her a view of the room across all spectrums of light. No traps. She sat up—ah, fuck, she was still undressed. Elvyra groaned in frustration again. There was a dresser there, possibly dangerous. She levered herself out of bed and strode over to it... full of clothes she'd be fine with. Blouses and denim. Another once-over proved they were safe, which meant Elvyra was decently dressed in a pink blouse, jeans, and boots before finally trying her luck at this place. If she was gonna escape, she'd have to test the danger she was in. She didn't open the door, she lashed out with one booted foot and forced it open.

edited 17th Jun '16 9:23:41 PM by Taco

Cale opened the door and walked out just in time to see someone down the hall kick the door down, a blatant sign of anger and perhaps some lingering surprise at this situation. Most likely, thus, that person was either from the Sabretooth school of villainy in which case there was some danger to this, or they were another person brought here against their will.

I should group up with and align with as many of the people here unwillingly as possible. There is safety in numbers even with my power, and at present due to just waking up I am at low charge.

Cale started to walk over, calming himself and not showing any sign of hostility - he needed to approach this girl in a succinct way. His steps toward her were measured and he showed a completely neutral look on his face.

"Going by your display," the blond young man said to Elvyra, taking in her appearance and mannerisms as he spoke, "I am guessing you were brought here against your will and heard that little announcement about what kind of place this is. You're not alone in that - and I suspect we may not be the only people kidnapped and brought here."

Eighties and nineties sensibilities, well dressed for such a period - most likely indicative of either a personal sense of fashion or, in the more outlandish thought, of another "universe" where such sensibilities are the norm.

We need to exchange notes and see if anything bizarre happened last night. I don't remember anything strange but something might have escaped my notice.

As soon as Dingo opened his eyes, he knew he was not in his room. First of all, he was not greeted by his own face. Dingo had a poster of himself taped the the ceiling above his bed, so that it was the first thing he saw every morning.

The room was all black, and his first worry was that someone had taken his kidneys. He was naked, but that was how he slept normally. As he pulled himself from the bed, he didn't feel any pain, and a cursory examination revealed no scars or other blemishes.

Then the announcement filled the room. Was he being recruited into some evil organization? Man. Dingo may have liked to fight, but he didn't think he was evil. He opened the wardrobe, and found clothes that fit his usual taste. He had worn his shades to bed, so he still had them too. He pulled on a pair of jeans, then threw open the door to his room. He saw a boy and a girl talking a bit farther down the wall, the boy with his back to him. First order of business was to get information. He ran up behind Cale, then launched a flying kick at his spine. It wasn't strong enough to break anything, but if it landed, it'd prolly knock him down.

"Information. Now." Dingo said, striking a pose. He flexed his arms, showing off his tanned, toned body. He looked at Elvyra. His tone changed instantly. "Hey baby. I'll give you my autograph if you tell me what's going on." He looked back at Cale, his cocky grin replaced with a snarl of rage.

"Talk, or you're going out the first window I see."

Danielle opened the door to her room, and heard an argument going on, the details of which confirmed two things. One, that this school apparently had coed dorms. Two, that she wasn't the only hero sorely out of place here. Then, she had an idea: what if they could turn this problem into an opportunity?

"I'm Danielle, and it sounds like I'm not the only one whose morality isn't exactly in line with this school's goals. I'm not sure how or why we ended up here, but there's a chance to strike a blow against evil here. We can sabotage their plans of domination from the inside, though we'll have to pick and choose our moments to strike wisely. We can't afford to get caught.

So, whaddaya say?"

Shit. The both of them were acting really damn suspicious. She couldn't trust either of them, they were too conventionally attractive. The violence she could deal with, boys just, like, acted that way, right? People like them were incredibly easy to fake. If this was an accident involving the energies she used to project Noth-Gholei across space and time she couldn't let on anything out of the ordinary. On the other hand, the transparent embrace of "evil" as a principal to her spoke to a profound emotional honesty.

Fuck it. She could kill her way out if it got too nasty.

"Yeah." Elvyra leaned against her creaking doorframe and crossed her arms. "Yeah, I woke up like this too. Now back the fuck up, the both of you. Five feet, minimum. We don't talk about this shit in public starting now. Introductions aren't exactly in order so you'll call me Ingress. We wanna keep this on the DL, see."

edited 18th Jun '16 9:19:55 PM by Taco

Violet slid out her door, just in time to hear a loud slamming sound. This was followed by some guy (tall, athlete, probably used to getting his way with everything) promptly talking very oddly at the slam-er. Then he was kicked in the spine by someone who looked right out of the animes.

...OK. Well. Villain school. The athlete guy was probably some sort of mastermind type, right? And someone who thought a kick that could leave someone a quadripalegic wasn't hard to sort either. And there was something off - no, not off, vaguely familiar? - about the other girl, though she'd be damned if she could put her finger on it.

Violet put her hand over her eyes at the 12-year-old coming out. Oh, so this school apparently kidnapped kids too. Of course. Violet was aware in some part of her brain that she was technically considered a minor too, but frankly considering that she'd died at least once and had driven off more soul-eating whatevers than she could easily remember she thought she was entitled to adulthood. At least the older girl had some idea of what to do. "Agreed." She wasn't exactly sure which of her names to use here, so she settled for nodding. She'd have to keep an eye on the two guys - maybe the kid was psychic or something, but it never hurt to be wary.

edited 18th Jun '16 7:09:57 PM by KarrinBlue

"You, ten feet back, now!" Elvyra said entirely out of nowhere. Her face flushed and she covered her mouth in shock.

Noth, what the fuck?!

That's a, a, look, she's done some terrible shit to me, alright? I got summoned once, before you were bound to me as we are now, and motherfucker guillotined my bits off by closing the portal.

Ouch. Alright, chill.

Elvyra, externally, was just frozen with her hands over her face for a moment. "But yeah, back up, never talk to me like this again, play it cool for awhile." She looked around and down the hallway at other doors opening and shot them a smile. "And not talk about any plans we may or may not have. We got no real directions right now though so we oughta grab some breakfast first."

edited 18th Jun '16 7:16:29 PM by Taco

Violet startled, backing up. "...Sure, OK. Are you alright?" She winced, hearing her own stomach grumble on the mention of food. "Oh, breakfast. I agree with the breakfast plan."

As the horde of beautiful women flocked to him, Dingo came to a horrid realization: He'd completely fucked up!

"Uh. Sorry, bro. Let me, um..." He said, kinda not-touching Cale and then settling for trying to maybe dust off his shoulders with his hand? "Thought you were a bad guy. You okay?" He asked. He figured that was the best he could do, all things considered, so he turned to the others.

"Hell yeah. Let's get some breakfast. I'm always down for waffles." Dingo said, giving the thumbs up. "My name's Dingo⍟Burnem. I'm about chewing ass and kicking bubble gum."

edited 18th Jun '16 11:35:47 PM by HeroicSociopath

Cale immediately detected some force incoming, and was actually quite glad for this guy's aggression - it certainly gave him access to a lot of kinetic energy. Cale barely moved forward as the kick hit him, a slight glow showing as he absorbed the kinetic force behind the kick, minimalizing the damage.

Great, the first guy I see here and he's another ridiculous jock. Much as I'd love to turn his own aggression against him, I have to simmer down and remain the objective, sane person here. So he thought, but he gave no outward show that he was even bothered by that kick.

"Listen, I don't know much about what's going on here, only that I was rudely kidnapped as well - and the sooner we put differences aside, the sooner we can decipher what happened."

Cale backed up in tune with Elvyra's words, deciding he needed to make sure people didn't start throwing punches or getting too involved in aggressive displays.

Then some more women showed up and Cale did not lie, he found the newcomers quite attractive. He did however divorce himself from these attractions and thought about what he was hearing.

Then the jock decided to apologize, including dusting off Cale's shoulder. Breathing, Cale put on the mask so to speak, "Its all good, dude. Just don't go kickin' me like that again. As for the plan, I'm game."

"Shut the fuck up, lite brite!" Elvyra snarled at Cale. She looked down the hall at another rando and waved at them. "Hey, someone put it out on Twitter that these fucks are socialists!"

She whipped her head back around and lowered her voice. "There, got some cover for your dumb asses. Seems I'm the only one here with any tact. We're in a fucking public hallway with folks about to get up and start walking around, and I swear by the highly namable abomination gods of deep space that I'll start choking motherfuckers out if you keep talking about this here. Last. Warning. Ugh. Hangry."

She started down the hall, in an entirely arbitrary direction. "Let's go find food."

Violet frowned slightly at the two guys - yeah, she'd have to keep an eye on them. She followed after Ingress, trying to keep a reasonable distance away, though she couldn't think of what she'd done to the other girl. She wondered where the best place to have any kind of tactical discussion would be - empty bathrooms? Unused bedrooms? Outside, if this place had an outside? She'd figure it out.

Darn it, I should have been more discrete. If I'm not, I'm going to get myself killed.

"That's true," Danielle whispered. "Personally, I'd suggest using our dorm rooms. I'd think they're private enough for us to have our little chats."

She spoke up a little bit now. This was purely small talk, in her mind. No reason for anyone to think otherwise. "So, what all can you do? I'm a magic wielder, myself." The young girl willed a tiny flame to life in her hand. It was so difficult for her to use magic untransformed that the tiny, sputtering glow was about all she could manage, but at least she could do something.

Huh. One of them listened. It might actually pay off not to let on about her own powers yet. And also to plot their deaths in case one of the fucks turned out to be one of those moral authoritarian types. Mage girl had fire, probably much stronger than the flame she demonstrated with.

Elvyra rattled off a practiced response. She'd done this shit before, information games were nothing new.

"I can create and see through these really powerful eyes here. Microscope, telescope, infrared, ultraviolet, all in one." Elvyra held up a hand and conjured another dread portal to Noth Gholei, holding an eye out for them to see. "What I can tell right now is you're all flesh and blood, at least. Gimme a sec and I'll find the kitchen." She swung the eye around the hallway, sweeping for the telltale heat blooms of ovens and griddles.

edited 21st Jun '16 3:03:42 PM by Taco

Cale quieted down a bit, but then considered what everyone here knew and then thought on the circumstances. Whoever or whatever brought them here selected them specifically, got their taste in clothes and how they liked their beds right, and also seemed to put them close to one another.

While discretion might be the better course of action, they also had to entertain the notion they were not as hidden as was assumed.

He also found himself wondering what the students at this little location would be like.

Following along beside Danielle and the others on their way, he heard the girl talking about what exactly they "did". He decided he could afford to share, "Well, Danielle, I absorb energy. I can then do quite a few things with it."

He demonstrated by making a bright red sphere of kinetic energy in the open palm of his hand - basically the force of Dingo's kick earlier - and then clenched his hand and dismissed it.

Of course there was little reason to disclose the exact limitations.

"Extra eyes? Creepy, but I kinda like it." Inwardly, though, Danielle was freaking out. Sure, this girl was probably on her side, but she couldn't help remembering all the monsters with abnormal body parts she'd fought already. Danielle nodded as one of the boys demonstrated some sort of energy ability. "Not bad. Certainly very useful."

Looking around the hallway, Danielle noted a small door marked "Kitchen." "Kitchen's over here, guys. Let's see what we've got." She opened the door and found that the room was well-stocked, with a stove, oven and microwave. Still, she opted for a big bowl of sugary cereal. "You have to admit, they know how to treat a bunch of teenagers around here."

"Oh, we cook it ourselves, sick." Elvyra skittered in past Danielle to get her spacing back and once again swiveled an eye around the room. "We only got so much time before the other kids get here—"

She flipped open an eye again to check the heatforms through the door. "About sixty seconds. Get while the getting's good." Elvyra immediately marked out the stove as valuable real estate and lit it up. She dug the smell of an old gas-burning stove, it reminded her of home. With a burner going she started scrambling around the room through cabinets until she found a good cast-iron skillet to throw on the stove. As she waited for it to heat up she started raiding the fridge and came out with a bottle of oil and a carton of eggs. She doused the pan in oil, then waited with the eggs. "Bee tee dubs, cast iron skillets are primo improvised weapons. Not just in the cartoons."

"Yeah, being kidnapped and having someone measure me while I'm asleep is totally worth this," Violet said. "Hm. We should try and find the outside of this place, if there is one, or whatever they used to get us here. Could be magic, could be sufficiently advanced science..." She thought out loud. She walked over and smiled slightly. "Frying pans make good blunt instruments, but for my money knives are always good." She picked up a sharp-looking kitchen knife.

edited 21st Jun '16 3:56:52 PM by KarrinBlue

"Extra eyes...certainly not anything alarming. Give us eyes...give us eyes..." Cale said wryly in response to the revelation, accentuating the chant of "give us eyes" to imitate a figure from a certain game.

As he said this he was preparing some chicken and beef from the fridge, which was already put on a plate before, and promptly put it in the microwave oven for about a minute and a half.

"We also, however, have to keep in mind how given this is a school for villains, they may have poisoned the food so as to teach the disciples a lesson about taking such things for granted and the "value of deception"." Cale pondered this aloud, even as he and his team mates prepared the food.

edited 23rd Jun '16 5:52:42 PM by NickTheSwing

"I think maybe finding the outside of this place would be a priority, but let's multitask so we can secure food." Elvyra pointed finger-guns at Violet and was about to speak aloud about something else, before she stopped herself and swerved. They were the only two girls of this age group present; they had to look out for each other, even if this girl had also sort of fucked up her buddy. "Hey. You. No-name. Can you find where they keep the silverware and the dish soap? I got an idea how we can get outta here." She cracked a couple eggs into the skillet. "I'll make breakfast for the both of us to compensate you."

"Sure," Violet said, opening drawers. "Not sure we'll find anything other than plastic, but if this place wants to try and be classy or whatever there could be real silver." She pulled open another. "Here we go. Any preference on forks vs spoons?" She asked. "Or knives, of course."

Yayoi slowly woke up, taking a while to realize just where she was in. With black walls and unfamiliar furniture, this was definitely her bedroom. Someone had obviously kidnapped while she was asleep. But was it? Was this the work of the Bad End Kingdom? Somehow, it didn't seem like it.

Now that she was more alert due to the panic caused by the situation, she quickly got up and went to check a few things. First, she noticed her bag laying by the bed's side and picked it up. She looked through it's content and thankfully found her Smile Pact still there. So she would at least be able to defend herself from whoever did this to her.

Then she went over to the wardrobe. She was surprised to find clothes in her size in there. She was somewhat small for her age, so this couldn't a random room for just any junior high student. Someone had been watching her and possibly had even measured her before bringing her over, which was more than a bit creepy ...

Leaving to worry about that for, she then quickly dressed herself. Just as she had finished, she heard the announcement.

"O-Oh no, school for evil!? W-What am I gonna do!?" She said to herself, panicking. She was never going to fit in. She and her friends were superheroes after all. If this place was filled with supervillians like the Bad End Kingdom, then ...

Wait, she couldn't be the only one, right? If this sort of thing were to take place in one of her shows, she was sure that several heroes would have been brought together for some mysterious and nefarious reason. So it was safe to assume that there others like around here. Why do it just to her, after all?

With that in mind, she picked her bag again and walked out of the room. The announcement had said that classes began in one hour, but she had no idea of where to go. She didn't want just ask a random student either. She was pretty sure she would just blow up what little of a cover she had.

So she started to wander through the halls. She was pretty nervous at the moment and it was probably easy to tell. She just hoped her potential allies found her first ...