The Good, The Bad and The Spandex II

Eldtrich was still busy scouting out the watch shop. Yes, this was all very interesting....he would have to cast a divination spell to figure out more about this. Someone had been very busy down here, constructing a base of operations. And they hadn't been back in ages. How.... interesting. There were several questions Eldtrich was asking himself now; why had this place been built, who had built it, what had they built it for, where were they, and why had it activated now?

As he considered this, he continued to hear the sounds of battle, and decided to go back to his body and intervene, finish up what's left of those machines.

Of course, once he returned and regained consciousness, he was stunned to see the sight of the police firing upon his familiars, some of them retreating back to their own world, well, he just couldn't stand by, especially with an innocent wolf man being shot at.

"Fr'ider'ck!" He cried.

"Yes, master Conan?" asked the brutish butler.

"Restrain those officers. I shall deal with these machines."

"Of course, master Conan," Fr'ider'ck bowed, and then turned, sprouting more arms and racing forward, curling himself into a ball and rolling across the ground towards them, several tentacles appearing out of his flesh and spreading out to the sides, twisting together into stalks. These tentacles began catching several officers, dragging them away from the carnage.

Meanwhile, Eldtrich turned to the robots. So, electronic attacks worked on these, eh?

He had something else in mind for them....

"Boy," he said to the kind in the magicians outfit, "you create distractions? Create one for me. Direct the robots attention to me, specifically. I want to make sure this is just right." As he said this, he was tracing several glowing runes in the air, the wall of flesh which was his shield curving behind him into a new shape, that of a large cube. "I will tell you when I am ready."

He turned to the girl who had the filth goddess inside her, and asked her question. "May I have your name madam?"

Presto had been waiting for a response, but was suddenly distracted by the giant monster butler that appeared out of a giant portal in the middle of the mall, apparently named Fredrick. He probably shouldn't have been surprised by new creatures anymore, considering the eldritch monsters already present at the battle, but for some reason the combination of the proper butler motif and the scary monster motif made the creature more disconcerting. Note to self, add Monster Butler to the top of my wishlist. And try to ask this wizard guy where all these creatures come from after the battle.

Presto was beginning to marvel at Fredrick when the big oaf started moving towards the officers and manhandling them (or perhaps monsterhandling, would be the more appropriate term.

"Hey, you, make sure you're not too tough with those guys. They're just trying to do their job." He then turned back to the wizard after realizing he had been saying something. "What? Oh, yeah, I can do that. Whenever you give the signal, I'll be ready."

Presto quickly summoned a small army of mirror images of himself, and sent them to the different areas of the fight to get the attention of the robots. A few started throwing small plastic cups, cans and little trinkets from the different mall carts at the robots, while some started taunting the robots yelling phrases like "Is that all you've got" and "Wow, looks like this is gonna be easier than I thought", and had the other copies tell the other heroes to redirect the robots toward the wizard.

The next move was a simple one, just gotta get them all together, and for someone to finish it, so he decided to go for the simple route to stop them. With a bite, he ripped the arms of one of them before taking a piece of debris to take another out. After that's done, he decided to wrap it up, throwing all of those he could get his hands on into a pile, cutting off as many limbs as he could.

"Anyone up for the big finish?" Kyle asked.

After the wolf guy finished, Ember Maiden readied another fireball. The flame was almost blue with intensity, and about the size of a kickball. Ember Maiden just hoped it would be effective this time.

“Let’s give it all we got! Everyone, on the count of three!”

Easton Mall

Alex nodded in agreement to the plan to finish them all at once, releasing the latch in his chest and allowing Kaylee to not-so-graciously tumble out.

"OK, ow. Less of that next time, please."

Oh crap, she's implying a next time, justignoreitjustignoreit, he nervously thought, before suddenly running to stand alongside the other heroes, Kaylee barely managing to follow behind.

"Alright, I'm in!" he yelled, thrusting his hands up into the sky, which caused a bright glow to form in the clouds with a loud crackle.

Electricity started to discharge from his suit as he struggled to keep his arms up from the energy.

Once the glow had reached its peak, he shifted his helm over to Ember Maiden.

"Right, whenever you say!" he grunted.

Next to him, Kaylee strained as she slowly materialized a massive, spinning gear, around a good metre in width.

"OK, let's finish these twits off," she muttered.

edited 18th Nov '17 12:53:55 PM by Enirboreh

Easton Mall

Was this really the time to be making introductions? Well, he’d asked, so it would be impolite not to answer, and it wasn’t like she was making much progress on these mannequins anyway.

“You can call me Pollutrix.”

“And I’m Lhdwnr, but Becky calls me Elly. ‘Cuz I’m smelly.”

She sounded oddly proud of that fact.

“What did I just say!? And it’s Rebecca; don’t call me Becky.”

This last part was directed at both Elly and the wizard. Then the fire girl called for a group attack, which Rebecca joined in, readying cyclones of garbage to throw at the mannequins.

edited 18th Nov '17 1:23:36 PM by PossiblyQuiteInsane

"Charmed," Eldtrich answered. "You may refer to me as Eldtrich, or Conan Warren. I look forward to having conversations with you both once this is over."

Eldtrich took a deep breath as the remaining machines were herded into his line of vision. The runes were pulsing and beating as one organism now. As they did so, the sound of multiple voices, all chanting as one, could be heard now. They were soft whispers, speaking in a hundred different tongues and different dialects, impossible to truly make out.

Soon enough spectral hands made of some oozing green light manifested from the runes, outstretched towards the machines.

Fr'idr'ck was being as gentle as possible with the cops, subduing with as much force as was needed from him. This resulted in several groaning officers. "I am aware of what I am doing, thank you, young sir." He grew another arm and used it to trip up a police officer. "I would advise you be ready for when master Conan unleashes that spell. Going to be quiet the display!"

The hands were getting longer now, stretching out seemingly with a life of their own while the familiars were shoving the machines into the firing range. Eldtrich was counting down now....waiting for the right moment...

“One.”

Ember Maiden aimed at the remaining robots.

“Two.”

She held her arms out.

“Three!”

She didn’t have to throw the fireball. It was just a matter of pushing it with her mind, of making it go where she wanted.

She just hoped that all of them together would be enough to end this.

A tall man in a red jacket walked out of the Suncoast, carrying a bag full of anime figurines. He was completely unaware of the robots that were attacking the mall due to the headphones he was wearing. As he walked through the mall, he quietly sung along to the lyrics.

"Fighting evil by moonlight,

winning love by-Whoops, sorry, miss." Kessler said, running into one of the robots. The machine clicked. It clicked again. Kessler was very lucky, because the robot was out of ammo. Kessler examined the machine, puzzled. He was very stoned, but hallucinations were not an effect of marijuana. It was a mannequin. Maybe it was some kind of marketing thing? Sure, he'd go with that. He pushed it over, onto the ground. 'Cause fuck the man.

Kessler was in general very lucky the robots had attacked today. He had walked into the mall with a pair of katanas on his back, and in fact, the clerk at Suncoast had attempted to call security several times. But once Kessler made it clear that he was willing to pay for the anime merchandise he was blowing all of his money on, the clerk sold it to him in the hopes of making him leave.

What was that popping noise? He kept hearing it, and first, Kessler thought it was his headphones. But then he took them off. Gunshots! He wanted to be where there were gunshots! And there were several people fighting the police. Just his kind of crowd!

"Holy crackers you guys are supervillains!" A voice called out to the heroes. A man with Vegeta hair and sunglasses reached into his jacket, and pulled out a pistol, quickly pushing a clip into it. When Ember said three, he started firing at the robots. Or trying to. He had forgotten to turn off the safety. In frustration, he threw the gun at the robots, and then started throwing the anime girl figurines he had just bought at them.

edited 19th Nov '17 12:12:56 AM by HeroicSociopath

Easton City Mall

At Ember's signal, Alex thrust his hands down, watching the glow in the sky build up, before finally bursting.

Into a lightning bolt.

It crashed into the pile of robots, stray bolts jumping between them and creating even more damage.

However, the bolt didn't last, dissipating a few seconds after.

Panting heavily inside his now steaming suit, Alex undid the latch that locked the chest compartment, and tumbled out onto the ground, too tired to bother to move out of the line of fire.

Seeing her partner was in danger, Kaylee swiftly threw her massive, sharpened gear in the general direction of the pile, not even caring if it did anything or even hit, and ran over to him, flinging smaller gears at other robots that got in her way.

She finally reached him, and upon a quick look over, he appeared to be alright apart from the steaming.

And the immense fatigue.

"C'mon, Blue. Get up, bud. Don't want you to die out here." she said softly, voice filled with concern. She began dragging him away from the suit over near one of the shops filled with civilians.

"I-I can walk, Kaylee. Just... give me a minute."

He leaned against the shop, breathing heavily, looking past his friend to see the action.

"We uh... *heh*...got quite the colourful cast members today, eh?"

She chuckled at that, flopping down beside him, not noticing him flinch in embarrassment at her close proximity.

"Yeah... let's just watch for now... You're really rough in that suit, ya know..."

"Oh, please don't say it like that..."

edited 19th Nov '17 9:22:32 AM by Enirboreh

Eldtrich smirked, noting the position of his allies attacks. "Perfect...."

With that, he snapped his thumb and fingers together, causing the sickly green hands to lash outwards and grab onto the machines, wrapping around them and constricting them, crushing and tearing them apart.

Mall

"Bop-bop-bop-bodabodabop~" A happy if distorted voice sang wordlessly, going along with a purple blur that kept popping in and out among the screaming throng and making them disappear in ones, twos and threes.

Outside Mall

"Bop-bop-bop-bodabodabop~" A happy if distorted voice sang wordlessly, going along with a purple blur that kept popping in and out, depositing frazzled civilians away from the fracas and into police care in ones, twos and threes.

kaaaa- FOOOOSH!!!!

The pile of androids EXPLODED under the combined assault of physical, superhuman and magical attacks, showering everyone with debris and pieces of burning plastic. In its place was left a pyre of greenish fire and foul-smelling smoke. Of course this triggered the mall fire alarms, followed by the sprinkler system, which quickly put out the flames but also drenched everyone present.

The explosion also had the effect of snapping the policemen out of their shock (and trance.) For a moment they just stared confused, but then the captain shouted, "Well, what are you waiting for!? Go help any people who were hurt!" to his men, who quickly scrambled to do so.

"And you!" he snapped again, this time pointing at the group of assembled heroes, "One of you better explain what the hell is going on here, now!"

edited 19th Nov '17 3:19:14 PM by Sijo

Mall

A cowboy stripper appeared!

"Hi."

The police were yelling at him about what the Hell all the superheroes were doing. Sounded like trouble.

"Bye."

A cowboy stripper disappeared.

The possibility of running away was tempting, but still a bad idea. Ember Maiden considered not saying anything. Then a purple cowboy stripper appeared and disappeared. On the bright side, everyone seemed as surprised and confused as she was.

“Well,” she said. “The robots were attacking. And we...took care of them. Is there anything we can do to help with cleanup? Or finding out where the robots came from?”

Easton City Mall

"Well, that lasted long," Kaylee grumbled, gently pulling Alex up with her. She let him rest most of his weight on her as they walked, and her concern for him meant she nearly knocked over a short redhead.

"Woah, sorry. Didn't see you there. You OK?"

The redheaded man turned, and the first thing she noted was the sheen over his grey eyes. He was wearing contact lenses.

The second thing she noticed was the wide, almost blank stare he was giving them both, only blinking once during the entire exchange.

He also tilted his head like a bird, which sent off massive warning signals.

"I am uninjured. No need for concern. The police need to speak with you, I believe..." he trailed off, before suddenly turning and walking off towards the exit of the mall.

She shared a confused glance with Alex, which he returned, before continuing over to the officers.

"We picked up a reading on our scanners earlier, next thing we know after we arrived was that these guys were shooting crap up. That's all we really got out of it before they were turned to scrap. By the way, that giant robo-suit belongs to Alex here. Don't haul it away or anything, we need that."

She again looked over at Alex who was giving her a pleading look. She sighed, before nodding.

"Go fetch your tech, Lex."

And with a broad, adorably happy grin, he was by his suit, already inspecting it for damage.

Giving a fond smile, she turned back to the officers.

"What can I say, he likes his toys, and so do I. Anything else, officers?" she asked, semi-politely.

edited 19th Nov '17 4:00:51 PM by Enirboreh

Crescent came close again after somewhat backing off from the big bang. He sighed.

"It'll be really hard to pick out a scent between the nightmares, the fires, the trash girl" A dirty look was sent her way "And the sprinklers might have washed away something, but I'll try" The boy turned to get to work.

"By the way, some of your officers had a weird smell on them, and it's not from the monstrosity that got too friendly with them" Kyle chuckled at that "Just for that, I won't hold the shots against them"

"Speaking of which" He started to shake his body like a dog, making both the water and several bullets that ended up tangled on his fur and suit fall to the floor.

edited 19th Nov '17 5:15:29 PM by Blueace

Easton Mall

Rebecca threw her garbage cyclones in time with everyone else’s attacks as was rewarded with the sight of the mannequins finally going down in a spectacular fashion.

Oooh, pretty!

Not necessarily how she would have put it, but the explosion was quite attention grabbing. Then an alarm started blaring and it started raining indoors, via the spinklers. Anybody who was paying close enough attention would notice that any water that touched Pollutrix’s skin instantly became a foul-smelling brownish liquid.

She was about to say something to the cops when she caught the werewolf giving her a dirty look.

“Oh, like you’re much better, Muttman. Wet dog isn’t exactly an attractive scent.”

I like it!

“Exactly.”

Turning to the police, she simply stated:

“All we did was take care of an infestation. Now they won’t need to call an exterminator.”

edited 19th Nov '17 5:35:47 PM by PossiblyQuiteInsane

Eldtrich bid his familiars leave now, including Fr'ider'ck, before turning to address the police officer. He had conjured up a shield to protect him from the debris, and quickly went to grab his bag of goodies and keep it out of the water, not wanting it to be ruined. Once that was done, he spoke up, his tone polite and courteous.

"There is a laboratory underneath that watch shop over there, which I believe the robots came from. Better investigate, officer. And this was a team effort, really. There were many different robots here. Be thankful not many people didn't die."

edited 19th Nov '17 5:34:18 PM by Vampireandthen

"Graah, will SOMEONE turn off those sprinklers?" the by-now-drenched police captain -whose name, according to his badge, was Sanderson- growled. "And turn off those infernal alarms while you are at it!" Someone must have heard because both tasks were soon accomplished.

By this point, the few people still in the mall were crawling out of their hiding places; the cops quickly went to help them.

"A lab, you say?" Sanderson asked Eldritch. "Take me to it!"

It had been a long, grueling day at school for Jackie. The kind of day that made her want to psychically fling her pencil clean through her teacher’s skull, but that would have given her away.

<I still think you should have done it.>

[Shut up, Zith. The less we’re on the supers’ radar, the better.]

<But what’s the point of being a supervillainess if you don’t actually do anything evil?>

Jackie looked up from her phone, spotting a huge cloud of smoke rising from the vicinity of the mall. [Looks like fun!]

<Indeed.>

Racing towards the mall as fast as her legs could carry her, Jackie found she was too late to partake in the chaos. [Aw, shucks. We missed it!] Still, it wasn’t all bad news. Maybe the troublemaker escaped, and she could find herself an ally. “So, what exactly happened here?”

"The watch shop that's been closed for years?" Crescent asked. "I wondered why no one else ever used it" Kyle decided to go ahead and give it a look. But he noticed that most people looked at him with fear and sighed. It's one of the big downsides of being a huge wolf man. So the boy turned wolf decided to do a small change. His eyes were closed, but his body began to change. Beginning to shrink, the hair started disappearing and his face slowly became more human. At the end of it, the wolf was gone, and now, there was a big, wild looking man with a long mane of black hair and stubble. His hands and feet still had visible claws and his fangs still looked sharper than normal.

Calmly, he put on some sandals he kept on him, and slipped some clawed gauntlets. Just now, he truly paid attention to the girl who just got there. Something just made him wary of her, just an instinct, but he was fast on guard. He dismissed it for now, maybe later he'd consider it. The crackhead with guns was already on his list. Now, there is a probable mad scientist to catch.

Easton City Mall

Deciding to check on her partner, Kaylee made her way over to Alex, who had already produced a set of welding goggles and was fixing the steaming problem.

She rolled her eyes, leaning onto the suit and causing it to shift slightly under her weight, making him jump.

"Should you really be doing that here, Alex? And... now, for that matter?"

After he composed himself, he gave a blank look at her, to which she immediately groaned. He was in full-on techie mode.

"The suit overloaded from the strain of amplifying that much electricity. It requires repair before I can use it in the field again, and maybe potential upgrades when we get back to the sh-"

"You're rambling, Alex," she interrupted. "Just do what you have to do and no more, alright? This is why you don't get sleep, y'know?" she said softly, putting a comforting hand on his shoulder.

"Well... aware, Kaylee," he grunted absently, now having disappeared under the massive bulk of the mechsuit.

Of course, he was too invested in his work to notice.

Or, alternatively, he was burying himself in his work so he could pretend not to notice.

One of the two. It was becoming difficult to tell lately.

She sighed, shifting her attention to the watch shop that was the apparent source of the attack.

"I'm... gonna go check this place out. You alright fiddling with that thing while I'm gone?"

"Er... yeah, I'll be fine. J-just, don't be too long, OK? I know how much you like clockwork..." he trailed off, nervously trying to hide his anxiety beneath a joke.

It didn't work.

Kaylee just nodded, feeling half guilty for leaving him, and turned to join the others.

"I'll come with in your little Sherlock investigation," she said as she finally caught up. "Let's try not to be too caught up for Blue's sake, the sweetheart doesn't like to be abandoned."

edited 21st Nov '17 4:45:57 PM by Enirboreh

Eldtrich shrugged as he dismissed his familiars. "Come this way. If you will follow me, sirs..."

As he turned around, he made sure his shopping bag was tucked on his arm, and sent a small comment to Pollutrix. "I would like to speak with you later." He didn't wait for an answer as he lead the police to the watch shop.

Mall

Ember Maiden hung back as everyone else traipsed underneath the watch shop.

She didn’t feel entirely comfortable being around so many cops. Plus, if something happened up here, she could help out. Stand guard, and all that.

Soon it was just her, and the robot remains, and the one guy repairing his robot suit.

“So,” she said to the robot guy conversationally. “How does it work?”