Well, crud.
"Grace! Hi, uh, no, I have no cupcakes for them," He says. "I mean, I don't know them that well, just-" He started to say as Oh, no, he's got his tattoos out Caio came over. Shin was quick to pull him aside.
"Act like we're just classmates and say nothing about the team!" He tells him, before laughing and clearing his throat. "Sure, I can help you with that project! You don't need a key, just show up when you need to use the study space," He tells him, looking back at Grace. Sweat is starting to bead along his forehead.
"So, uh, about, you know, shopping later tonight. I'll do what I can to clear my schedule for that, just that, you know, scholarship assignments - I'm trying to get them done," He says to her.
Budderball: No. You are not a human. A cactus shoved into an a+!&$$+ has more humanity
Connie: A true testament to ingenuity, perseverance, and the love of sticking impractical things up your butt conquering all. I can't think of anything more human than that.
***
Deedee: Ring broke. Need help ASAP!
Crap.
Wait, why I am I worried. True Llllikely Significant Feelings will win out over demon sex musk, right?
***
"Hey Double Dee. Got your text and wow!"
Crap.
Connie blushed just looking at Deedee, and Praetoria, and Femms, and TV's Tiv Krueger. I think? I've definitely seen his ass at a newsstand. In some snug jeans. Metaphorical ass.
Also, what is this, the hotness convention? HotCon? Wow that's a bad joke
"Wow, what is this? HotCon? That's the uh, hotness convention..."
"Double Dees please help."
Fem says to both, “I am! And actually I really wanted to show Connie and DD my new outfit. Wanna head to the girls’ room see how I look in it?”
She holds up the small bundle in her hands that, from it’s size, can’t possibly be clothes, unless it’s a pair of socks.
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Holy s*+@! What the hell kind of skimpy negligee is she planning on showing me **and** Deedee?! We said exclusive, right? Does that not mean threesomes to her? I feel like it should at least include threesomes that we haven't talked about.
Unless this is her asking? We haven't even done more than kiss yet and she's already planning on passing me around to Max?!
"Femms, uh, wow I'm not sure if I'm really comfortable yet being sh-"
"-own that outfit even a second later than possible!!"
Tiv gives Femtite a brief double-take, but then renews his focus on Max. Without looking at her, he shrugs. "I don't mind. Max and I can stay here, and you and DeeDee and Connie can go."
On the other side of the hallway, Grace arches an eyebrow while Shin divides his attention between Caio and her. "Really? I wasn’t quite sure you still wanted to go…” she says chidingly while shooting Max and Kayla a look.
"Oh! Uh, I should... That is to say..."
Max stammers and sputters, overwhelmed by all the attention focused on her...
As Shin mentions "them", Caio cranes his neck to see Max, Femtite, a dude he doesn't know and Praetoria. He isn't too keen on following news about superheroes, but he certainly knows her, remembering Max had a huge crush or her.
Caio notices Shin's embarrassment, but also the tension between the two. He smiles. "Thanks for helping Shin. I'll need your laptop borrowed then... so you won't be able to work on your scholarship assignments today." Looking at Grace and then at Shin, he adds. "You'll have the whole day free to do whatever else." He pats him in the back before walking to join Max.
---
As Caio comes closer to Max and the others around her, he is hit again by her perfume, for a moment losing his ground before realizing it was bad news. He tries to disguise his anxiety as he walks closer, looking around to see how many others could be affected, while noticing that Max is being able to control it somewhat.
After gesturing a "hello" to the others and hearing Fems' excuse to try to get Max away, Caio rests a hand on Max's shoulder. "Hey Max, is this a new perfume?"
“Great! C’mon, Connie, DD, a.k.a. Max, and…”
Caio shows up.
Femtite sighs.
Her excuse having failed, she edges closer to Connie, “I really do have an outfit. Super cute, too!”
Chaos seemed to just follow them all, as Shin laughed and gave Caio a hard clap on the back of his shoulder with a strained grin. "Yep, don't wait for me and just get to it!" He encourages before returning his full attention to Grace. "Sorry, he's one of the students I help to tutor - that is, we're in the same tutoring program. Peer tutoring. Anyways," He clears his throat as he walks away from the pure cluster of chaos brewing over. "Can I walk you to your next class? Or maybe you have a free period?" He asks.
Max reels from having the object of her pre-transformation crush in front of her, a super hot guy gazing soulfully into her eyes, and Femtite talking about showing off super-cute outfits. Then Caio appears and it's -- as Connie said -- a Convention of Hotness and she's the headlining guest of honor.
Grace gives him an even stare before finally finally breaking into a wry grin. "Unless you’d rather walk with one of the super-girls,” Grace teases/chides. She follows him away from the scene.
The sudden crowd of people are chattering around Max threatens to give her a panic attack. She closes her eyes and takes a few deep breaths to master her emotions.
”Yes, it is a new perfume,” she says to Caio. ”I’m glad everybody seems to like it. Tiv, lovely to meet you. I wish I could stay and chat, but I shouldn’t keep my friends waiting. Femtite, Connie, lets go take a look at that outfit, shall we?”
Inside is a storm of hormones and confused feelings, but on the surface, nobody can tell! Hopefully...
Kayla gestures to her wrist, which has a fairly sizable but nice looking wristband on it. ”I keep my wardrobe and super suits all on here. It’s a special little device that lets me swap to and from super suits quickly, as well as my normal clothes. None of this is actually fabric, even though it feels like it. It’s actually some nanotech.”
She emphasizes her point by tapping a button on the wristband and her tank top and skirt quickly shift on her body until she is in her current super suit.
“Whaaaaaaat?” Femtite is excited to hear about nanotech from a human. “Oh, you should see my Love Bug, The! You cannot because it is being repaired, but it is the second-most advanced nanotechnical wonder of my world!
“And I’m wearing a real school uniform now, but I make my own clothing by altering the energy that radiates from my body into an amethyst-toned solid. OOH—and my mother has been having her guardswomen wear uniforms like yours!
“I wonder if it’s you who inspired the design.”
Femtite is vaguely aware DD mentioned the girls’ room.
“Speaking of clothes…”
"Yes mommy- Sorry!" She clapped her hand to her mouth.
"I mean mom-" Her second attempt also ended in a stifling palm.
"Mhmm." She agreed through tightly closed lips.
***
"Okay gimme that ring!
"And hey, maybe next time go outside?! Instead of packing more and more potential love slaves into close, sweaty, confines and- Just give me the damn ring!" Connie reached over to take the ring off Max's finger with a lot more diffidence then her words suggested.
”It’s not my fault! I was just talking to Kayla and it broke, and then suddenly the whole school showed up!” Max protests. She takes off the ring and gives it to Conflux.
Femtite holds up a Barbie-sized poodle skirt and a little jacket and points out the socks and shoes, and the pink headscarf and black purse.
“Ummm…… so this was an excuse to get you away from Tiv the Boy, but I really did get a new outfit.”
She makes a mental note to herself not to let DD hold the outfit. If she can break a ring…
"Femms, that's super adorable. Deedee? I didn't make this ring so that it breaks when the wearer is too thirsty for the person she's talking to so something else happened. I designed it for me, so let's face it that would have been a serious design flaw..."
She turned away from Max, saying over her shoulder. "Okay, you got this stuff under control before, remember? At least a little bit? I'm gonna focus on this thankfully fresh lysol, you focus on getting things back under control.
"You're hot, you're confident, and that's just you. That's part of who you are. You don't have to bottle that up till it explodes everywhere. Focus on yourself. See yourself in your mind's eye as you are, and delight in where that gives you joy. People will look, and love you and like you whether or not your pheromones are everywhere. They're just a part of you. They're under your control. You're in control."
She turned around. "Okay, ring's fixed. But you've got this either way. It'll be a fine backup though."
Femtite takes her Barbie outfit into the handicap-accessible stall. And as she strips, she takes in those words. I’m hot, I’m confident, it’s part of who I am. I am fire. I don’t have to explode everywhere…
Her heart flutters at the sound of Connie’s voice.
…give me joy. Like me, whether or not my pheromones are… Femtite is holds up the tiny poodle skirt. Knee-length, but perhaps I should magical-girl a pair of bloomers underneath.
She shrinks to don the Barbie outfit. —sans bloomers!
I am in control!
”Right. Yes. I’ve got this,” Max says as she puts the repaired ring back on her finger. ”So what if Praetoria gave me her phone number? So what if her super hot boyfriend is into me?”
Max strips out of her sweatshirt and pants. She stands in the bathroom in her half-tank top and boy shorts and forces herself to stare at her reflection in the mirror. ”I am not controlled by my powers. I control them. I am not defined by what others think of me. I define myself. I am Max Lopez. I am Devil Diva. I am both my mind and my body. The human and the monster. And I am gonna be a motherf@%$ing hero.”
"So I'm just the only person who didn't come in here to strip? 'Cause uh, hell yeah, 'motherf~~~ing hero,' all that goodness, but uh...
"Hey can you do me a favor? Can you tell me that you do like, just an embarrassing, life-eating amount of pilates?"
Max turns and smirks at Connie. ”Sorry, Connie. This is just the body I was given. My blessing and my curse.”
"Yeah. Sorry about your 'curse.'"
Her smirk stays the same, but her eyes get a little softer. After a quick mental double check that there was no one here who shouldn't hear the offer, she casually mentioned, "You really do seem a lot more, well, comfortable. We should do like, a spa day or go thrifting or even just a gals' night in sometime. Us three. And maybe Skyden? Skyler? Skylark? Whats-her-name with the bad powers and the good hair?"
“Skyler!” Femtite calls from the handicap-accessible stall. “What’s a spa da—yes! Let’s!”
Femtite walks under the stall door in the Barbie outfit.
“Connie? DD? Could you help me put my uniform in my locker? I want Conway to see me in this at lunch.”
She gives her poodle skirt a twirl!
The school day continues. The lunch period finally arrives and thankfully without the drama of the previous day -- though it was touch-and-go there for a moment or two.
At first the lunch period starts out in typical fashion; students converge on the cafeteria or get in their private vehicles to eat at one of the nearby restaurants. Everyone finds their usual lunchtime groups or pair off.
Conway is sitting alone when Femtite shows up to model the doll clothes. He blinks in astonishment when she appears on the table at doll-height.
The lunch routine is thrown off, however, by a series of subsonic rumblings and faint tremors. Long-time residents and natives of Halcyon City roll their eyes and start stuffing any foods they have that are packaged into their bags or pockets while scarfing down what they've got on their trays. Moments later, the PA comes on ordering students to take shelter immediately.
Kayla Taylor is seen shifting her clothing into her Praetoria outfit. She gives a quick kiss to Tiv and then flies out the door!
Shin gets a buzz on his comm. Whippoorwill's slightly out-of-breath voice comes through. "Rally your team -- this is a city-wide event. The Death Cap's back. It's some kind of outer-space mushroom. Alliance and Heralds are taking care of the body; I need your team to deal with its spores. Hurry!"
Looking outside the windows towards the Tower District, you see a huge circular shape enshrouding everything in shadow! Smaller shapes detach from its underside and float around the skies of Halcyon City -- several heading directly toward the campus of Halcyon Prep!
=======================
What do you do??
Femtite looks up at Conway. “This gift means a lot to me, Conway. Truly… would you hold onto it for now? I will come back for it… I just know this outfit will be safest with you.”
Femtite shrinks until she fits inside the Barbie sock. She flies out as a barely-perceptible flesh creature, and when she grows to human size she armored like Praetoria, but pinkish-purplish, and winged like Whippoorwill, but golden-fiery.
She soars out the window and glares at the sky.
“I eat space mushrooms for breakfast.” To whatever teammates are near, she notes, “Not that particular kind.”
But fire consumes them.
“Do you need me on defense, Horizon? Heliokinesis can form a barrier…”
…so when he says Air Support, she will obey and bring the fire to the enemy!
Shin had managed to sit down with the regular crowd, trying to sneakily hold onto Grace's hand underneath the table, when the tremors started and he looked concerned. "Oh...I should go check on something," He said before swiftly getting up and heading to the bathroom. He expected the call from Whippoorwill, as he got out his quick change in uniform, adding the faceplate and looking out into the shadowed city.
"Emergency call up! Drop what you're doing and meet on the rooftop," He says over comms, flying up to the outside while continuing to explain. "We've got a giant space mushroom spewing spores, and we're the last line of defense between the people here and getting covered in fungus! Femtite and Steel Guardian, we're air support and we're going to fly out and burn up whatever we can get before it hits the ground. We've got several spores already incoming, so if they get past us, the rest of the team needs to take them out before they reach any civilians," He says, figuring this plan of action would be good to start off.
"There's civilians outside the walls - we need to get them into shelter and off the street," He adds, looking down at the protestors. "Anyone not on air support, decide if you're up for that task. Bastion, let's rumble!"
Once Horizon's done with directions, he'll fly out ready to fight - and when he sees the first of the spores approaching, he uses this opportunity to vent and blasts them with stored energy to vaporize the alien particles!
Okay, we've been entrusted with dealing with multiple spores. They're not all gonna land here, but hey, we lucked out and we're near a big concentration. That means we need our fast movers spread far and wide.
Theoretical: Mycelial networks suggest a possible linked weakness, but not one that's likely to be trivially accessible from our location.
Practical: Stalling tactics likely to be effective against unthinking foes, and allow us time to gather information on alien ones.
Conflux reached into an inner pocket and pulled out a pink wand carved and holed by no human hands until it was fit for only one purpose.
Dipping it in the nearest liquid that was at least a bit bubbly (a not yet flat soda, natch) she blew a bubble that physics probably would have disagreed with.
And that was before it expanded to the size of the quad.
"This one's gonna be permeable to human size things if they try hard enough, but if the spores we can see are shedding ones we can't, this should be enough to stop those theoretical baby shrooms cold. The big ones will make it through, but it'll slow them down. And make them sticky!"
Turning her back on her gigantic soda bubble ward, she briefly muted her comms and started yelling to her classmates.
And Dear Old Dad said this was the most useless wand he could conceive of...
"Hey Horizon, you ever heard of the Bystander Effect?" She said back into the open comms. "Specifically assigned tasks in complicated, high stress situations are more likely to actually happen. As an example, Deedee, you wanna come with me and show the turds outside the wall that you're a Big Damn Hero?"
|
Percy has once again managed to avoid pretty much all drama that accompanied the group all day. Aside from the occasional flare up of heat for Max but never anything that actually resulted in anything. So he had settled into a pretty good flow of everyday stuff.
When the ground started to tremble Percy was lucky he was in the bathroom, he ducked into one of the stalls and waited for the call only for Shin to burst in and changing suddenly. Start yapping about what was going down. Indarius stepped out in his glamoured clothing and looked to him, "Little loud boss and a good idea to check that there isn't anyone in here already. I'll get to the roof gonna need a good vantage point and to draw alot of aether but I'm going to try something stupid."
Once outside Indarius pulled his staff from his pack and clicked it onto the ground causing another floating disk to whisk him to the top of the school almost too quickly. He landed and tripped a little having not meant to be in quite the hurry.
Heading towards the center of the building Indarius started to draw a ley-line circle. Falling into a crouch with his book on the ground.
This was going to be difficult, not only did he have to cover the school but also the protestors that were for his friend. His teammate, Indarius put his hand on the rough graveled rooftop and grunted pulling visible wisps of aether into a ball in his palm. He planted his feet wide, slamming the staff into the gravel and working the spell with both hands.
S̶̘͇̅̀p̷͕̪̜̈̅̇͘͝ã̸̳̜͇̒̈̋̚a̶̫͑͝͝ṋ̸̞̀͊ ̴̙̜̅̆̌͝D̶̡̮͌̎̄i̸̤̳̠͆́́̽̒i̶̧̼̪͈̐ ̸̡͎͑͐͆G̵̫͇͎̓r̵̹̋̂͆̇ã̷̠̪̤̼̹̈͛̓͠h̸̺̭͒̎̌͌̚-̸̬͇̍̈́̄̚Ż̶̢͚͓̮́̂́e̸̬̦̳̰̮̽͆͑́̾y̴̎̐͑ ͖̹̻m̶̖̤̘̜̖̾̓͌ä̷͇́̾̈h̶̢͐͗ͅz̴̩͛̏̕͠ỉ̷̧̢̹̻̮n̸̠̰͛ ̸̙̼̅͆͠͠S̸̜̯͐͐͌̾p̸͚̲̳̜̾a̶̱͊̓à̷͔̇͌n̷̛̟͕̺̬̋͌͠ ̵̱̫̜͝Ẅ̸̛̘́̇͘a̶̳͛h̴̼̮̺͂̌͑̉͘l̵̡̧̪̺͙͐ ̴̰͚͙̞̂̓̚͠F̶̩̲̂̀͜͜į̴̼̺̣̮͂̎̽̽n̶͕͐̾̋ ̶̦͚̮̱͋Ǐ̴̢̞͖̫̪̿̉̐ļ̷̼̲̝̲̈́͌z̶̘͐̂ ̷̝̩̏K̵͎̙͙̈́̎͑͜͠ͅư̸̧͓̙͈͔̋̇̚n̸͈͔̠̒̌
He sweeps his hand from the horizon across the air over his head all the way to the other horizon. His voice straining at the effort of channeling such a large spell. The air around him glowed bright and crackled with energy. Near the ground a shimmer started to form almost like ice stretching up in a domed shape, the outside was ridged as if made of bumpy scales. Slowly the barrier started to enshroud the entire campus, there were spots open and the barrier would likely break from a heavy assault, but it offered some cover while the mage simmered from the effort of keeping it aloft.
What had started as a stressful day had turned around as Max decided to come to try to come to terms with both her body and her mind. So of course, a giant space mushroom would choose that moment to attack the city!
She sheds her sweats again, but she keeps her costume on this time as she rushes up to the roof to meet with Horizon and the rest of the team. She looks out at the Death Cap and its many spores, then down to the crowd of protesters standing outside the walls of the campus. She sighs.
"Hey Horizon, you ever heard of the Bystander Effect?" She said back into the open comms. "Specifically assigned tasks in complicated, high stress situations are more likely to actually happen. As an example, Deedee, you wanna come with me and show the turds outside the wall that you're a Big Damn Hero?"
"Guess it's time to meet my adoring public," she says resignedly. Devil Diva leaps down from the roof, landing in a crouch beside the protesters. "Alright, people, let's move it! Everybody inside the school! Come with me if you want to live!"
The demoness moves to interpose herself between the crowd and any incoming spores!
Listening to Horizon, Caio gets to his feet and looks around, seeing students in varied states of panic. He reaches for his comms. "It is a mess down here. I'm staying here with the students until I know they are safe, then I'll meet you. I can't fight flying monsters anyway and if I shift now people will be afraid of me."
He doesn't hear that Max is trying to get the protesters to safety, so he focuses on the students getting to safety. He notices a group that are not moving fast enough, perhaps used to such situations and imagining some hero will always save their asses. "Hey guys! Come one! We are in danger here! Move on!"
Seeing Tiv, and imagining he is used to these situations since he is Praetoria's boyfriend, he comes closer to him, hoping he'll help him on guiding the students. "Care to help me guide the students?"
Several students race to the windows to catch a glimpse before the reinforced shutters slam down. Rampant speculation begins.
"What do you think it is this time?"
"Doomshroud, looks like."
"Naah, it's more oval. Doomshroud is like a cloud."
"Anything like that reality warpers this summer? My parents became gargoyles for a few hours."
"No way! Look at it! It's probably the Death Cap again."
Or an alien mothership. Like Behind the Mask, season two finale."
Grace doesn't say anything to Shin, just starts moving with the rest of the students towards the shelters, herded by Caio's directions. Tiv seems bewildered at first by the alert, but quickly gets with the program and steps up next to Caio. He helps a couple struggling students including one in a wheelchair. He gives Caio a respectful nod as the class gets to safety.
The floating spores range in size from dump trucks to steamer chests. Tendrils hang from the base, groping and grasping at anything that gets within their reach. Praetoria zooms across the sky, blasting through the spores as she aims for the massive Death Cap body.
In the far distance, the Alliance heroes are engaging the behemoth, tiny specks against the immense bulk of the alien fungus.
Much closer, the spores are descending upon the campus and the nearby vicinity. Conflux's bubble barrier protects a large swath of the campus, and Indarius's magical shield protects the rest.
The fliers engage in the air above the shields. Horizon skillfully zips among the spores, staying out of the grasp of the tendrils, and blasting them with his radiation. Wet chunks of fungus splat against the barriers below Horizon.
Femtite, however, has more difficulty. The monstrous spores are not like the microscopic kinds that are a nutritious snack for pixites. Her fiery blasts cook one of the bigger ones, but she suddenly feels a sharp jab in her neck where a smaller one has stabbed her with a tendril! She feels something being injected into her!
On the ground, Devil Diva leaps to the defense of the assembled protesters and media outside the walls. Her presence is not exactly favorably received, but the space spores are clearly the greater danger! They hustle through the gates into the safety of the shielded campus while the demoness holds off the spores.
She crushes several as they get too close, grabbing a handful of tendrils and then using the spores as a flail against its brethren. However, a massive spore catches Devil Diva up in a tangled nightmare of tendrils, hauling her up into the sky as the smaller ones move in to attack!
The rest of the spores in the area start slamming up against the barrier, or sliding stickily through the bubble, in an effort to get at the students underneath! It's holding for now, but for how long?
Max growls as the tendrils haul her up into the air. But she remains resolute, biting and clawing at the appendages until she breaks free! Her eyes flash yellow as she taps into her monstrous side, assaulting the spores that are surrounding her. She leaps from spore to spore, gouging out chunks from their bodies and stabbing them with her spiked tail. "I'll teach you to mess with me!" she snarls!
“Ahh… gross! Get outta my body!”
Femtite starts to heat up!
And when that fails, she heats up MORE!
She becomes fire. Red and wild. Burning the spores inside her, around her…
…as many as she can before they take her out!
She soars through the spore-clouds like a rocket’s red glare!
|
|
Indarius looks up and see's out of the corona of aether surrounding him noticing that some spores are breaching the barrier he redoubles his efforts, arms raised up like Atlas holding the world aloft. As the spores slam into the barrier there seems to be some sort of Arcane feedback with each resounding impact actually pushing down on him. He lets out another grunt of frustration and pushes back again, several of the holes in the barrier sealing back up, cutting a few spore bits in half as they do.
Comms: "These things are heavy... and numerous.. don't know how long I can hold em. How's the ground?"
"Once you've got the campus protected, expand the perimeter!" Horizon says on comms as he flies forward and starts to pick off spores heading in different directions. "It's not just the campus that needs our protection. Anyone have eyes on SG?" He asks, noting their absence as he continues his assault - the spores seem endless however, as he blasts one and three more take its place!
With the students apparently safe, Caio runs towards the front doors, removing his shirt and tossing it away as he shifts. Midway his shift, he turns a corner and unexpectedly finds himself surrounded by the religious people and media that just entered through the doors. "Puta merda... move, MOVE!" He yells as his voice becomes coarser and bark-like, his sigils pulsing to guide his shapeshift.
Caio bursts through the doors, taking a glance at the chaos outside, a bit disoriented. Seeing Max fighting the spores nearby, Caio joins her, fighting back to back.
A properly crafted wand was like a lever, but Connie's mind still had to provide the force to amplify. And it was also the place to stand. And had conceived of the lever. Messy metaphor if you tug on it too long, isn't it?
Keeping her semi-permeable bubble ward up while she was still dealing with the situation on the ground and in the air, and apparently up in space... was like trying to write with a song stuck in her head. Only the song had to be accurate, and she had to keep the words in her head right and separate from the words she was putting on the page.
And why am I bothering? Wonderboy put up a big-ass ward too. Why not just focus on doing something that he isn't doing, better?
Okay, it's not like, better-better. It's different. When his breaks, it's all gone. It's easier to get through mine, but each and every one of them has to do it.
And sooner or later, even his wards break...
The bubble stays.
Connie ran along with Max as she'd offered, but found herself clearly unneeded.
Okay, they're slowed here, but they're still coming. Either
a) They're mindless and don't like changing plans
b) They're drawn to something that was already at the school, which would explain the otherwise fortuitous concentration
c) They're drawn to resistance. Makes less sense given terrestrial fungal tactics, but what they did to Femms does suggest some attempts at a corruptive influence? Heroes=High Risk/High Reward?
More data needed, answers more likely at the central node anyways.
So focus on what's here. These spores aren't all the same, we should figure out what's different and why.
”Calm down, oh fearless leader,” Steel Guardian’s robotic voice comes over comms. ”Not everyone just gets to go to school at the All Mighty Halcyon Prep!” they say as they come flying in, their blasters firing off wildly into the air at the spores.
The battle over Halcyon Prep rages.
Femtite burns off the invading fungal infestation at the cost of unleashing her inner inferno. She's a bright flare blazing through the incoming spores, roasting them as they stretch their tendrils at her. Soon, she's high enough to get a good vantage over much of this end of the city. She takes an instinctive glance towards her home, or at least the structure that houses the meteorite that contains her home. And she sees several large spores dropping down and around the museum!
Horizon as well flies amongst the fungal spores blasting away. With his initial successes, he spares a moment to further direct the battle. Then Steel Guardian shows up, and starts blasting away. Their attacks are initially not very effective until Horizon lends an assist.
Unfortunately, this divided attention costs Horizon as he feels a sharp barb strike him near a joint in his armor! He can hear his mentor's voice reminding him of "situational awareness" even as he knows something is injecting into him!
At the campus gates, Devil Diva and Caio unleash their vicious natures against an alien and unfeeling threat, and do so in terrifying fashion. Soon the duo are surrounded by chunks of fungal tissue. The smaller spores retreat, falling back as they flee from danger and difficulty.
Unfortunately, a massive spore nearly the size of a small house drops out of the sky shadowing the Transformed and the Bull. Rather than lashing out with its tendrils, it sprays a cloud of purplish vapor around the two!
Underneath the barrier, the wizards keep the defenses up.
Conflux reinforces her bubble barrier and starts to analyze the threat. Obviously, the mother shroom is probably the biggest threat, but that's out of the team's hands. Just then, you catch sight of a new kind of attack centered on Caio and DD -- they're likely in danger, potentially a big threat and if they manage to hold to themselves, the hallucinogenic spore is the biggest!
Femtite panics!
“CONNIE!! MY MOM—MY—MY WORLD!!!”
She soars toward the museum and attacks, throwing fire at the shrooms and caution to the wind!
Max coughs and swipes at the gas the cloud settles over her. The world seems to swirl and distort. She hears deep, guttural laughter and sees a dark, demonic shape looming up to claim her! Max yelps and is just about to lash out when the shape resolves itself and she sees it is Caio! She groans as she feels unsure of herself and the world around her, wondering if she truly has what it takes to deal with such a dangerous foe.
She sees Caio struggling, too, and she remembers his words of advice. Be the monster! Max fights against her insecurities as she brazenly stands tall before the massive spore, ignoring the swirling colors and impossible shapes of the rest of the world.
”You don’t scare me. You’re just a space fungus. I’m am Devil Diva!” she shouts defiantly. Dark energies gather around her as she lets out an inhuman shriek! Her yellow eyes burn with infernal malice as her tail whips back and forth. She looks for all the world like she has just emerged from Hell itself!
"These are soft targets, make sure you're using weapons that won't just pass through them," Horizon suggests to SG as they seem to have trouble with the spores. "Glad to have you here-"
A sharp pain makes him wince, looking to see a spore that had gotten close enough to jab underneath his shoulder, managing to puncture his uniform.
"Dammit!" He yells as his powers work and pull in enough radiation to goopify the spore, falling away in a splat on the ground. "Oh, these things are starting to really tick me off!"
He looks around to see what else needs a beating. Hearing Femtite cry for her world, he looks towards where he can spot the bright star flying towards the museum. "Wait, Fem, you're getting pincered-" He says, spotting how she was positioning herself to get assaulted from two sides by the large spores.
Grimacing, he flies out as fast as he can, pushing his powers for an extra boost of speed before slamming into one of the spores that would have gotten Femtite away from behind!
Caio was finishing some of the smaller spores when he was engulfed in the purplish vapors, not even realizing another enemy just arrived. He feels lost, thinking he might be losing control of the wolf. His vision clears a bit and he sees blood and gore in his hands and chest... not understanding, he turns around to see Max and Connie on the ground, their guts spread on the concrete. "NO! NOOOO!"
The vision then becomes hazy and he notices the two are just fine. He growls at the huge fungus and doesn't think twice before running on all fours towards it. Caio uses its claws to climb the side of Halcion Prep's building and then he jumps towards the huge fungus... disappearing inside the orifice that just blew them with she spores.
Steel Guardian notes the struggles Devil Diva and Caio are having with the gas. They adjust their flight path and fly in loops around them, starting close and working their way out to cause their thrusters to disperse the gas away!
Once clear, they fly back near and hover while their cannons continue to blast at spores. ”You all good now?” they ask.
”Good. Bad. I’m the devil with the horns,” Devil Diva growls. She uses Steel Guardian’s cover to get even closer to the giant spore, as if daring it to flinch first.
Femtite sees Horizon slam into a shroom that nearly had her—and he’s about to get tentacled for his effort! Fem shows her gratitude by drilling her fiery body through Horizon’s assailant!
S*&&!
Connies eyes flickered back and forth at the sky as she thought through her options. Okay, every version of the wings I've made has ironically crashed almost immediately thanks for f&@!ing all of my symbolism ghost of Icarus... Portals need like Indarius-level heft, and a lot of finesse... Body-mods are a no-go...
She laughed, with more than a tinge of desperation flavoring her voice. "Well why the f!#* not...
She'd built the Lodestone to try to ground flyers, but it wasn't properly anchored yet, so it was just as likely to go flying straight at them if the power ratios were off.
Whipping out a pocket knife, she cut herself a strip of elastic and got to work, scanning the sky as she did for a spore that was flying in the right direction.
Bingo.
A small effort of will linked Lodestone to elastic, which of course was already linked to her.
Then the Lodestone caught its prey, a whopper of a spore, far too big a fish for Connie to reel in even if it had been ready.
So she was dragged into the sky.
With a quick slash, she cut the band tethering her to the spore so that she rocketed clear past it, frantically conjuring a stack of her softest, pillowiest wards to smash through before rolling to a halt in front of the museum.
"I told you I wouldn't let anything happen to 'em."
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"Yeah no that's okay, just ask me to hold up an entire alien onslaught. Connie what are you!-" He had already been struggling to keep things on lock but then she had left him alone on the roof. That combined with Horizon asking yet more of him and the team made his blood freeze. And so he opened the gates a bit more already aching from the efforts he was putting on himself.
"Everyone get under the barrier, Now!"
He starts sorting through his mind on the properties of transmutation and wove his hands in quick succession, creating an aetherical lattice network within the surface of the icy barrier priming it for change. He pointed towards Horizon altering the network slightly and giving him a burst of energy to fend off the spore tendrils trying to invade him.
Outside the school, the oversized spore's hallucinogenic attack fails against Caio and Devil Diva. Steel Guardian then blasts in with the powered suit's rockets that blows away the trippy vapors -- clearing the demoness's senses enough for her to keep the giant spore from a free shot on the armored hero!
Caio scales the ivy walls quickly to get to a point where he could leap up to the floating fungus. He clears the distance and jams his body in the orifice, blocking it from discharging more of the hallucinogenic toxins. Unfortunately, he takes a full blast of the mind-affecting vapors!
Devil Diva takes full advantage of her monstrous form and engages the spore in a battle of wills -- or mind-affecting reagents, to be technical. Her pheromones somehow manage to affect the rudimentary intellect of the spore, freezing it in abject terror. It drops from the sky and lands wetly on the ground before her. Her triumph is short-lived, however, when she sees that her terrifying visage was caught by the nearby bystanders she was trying to protect!
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Femtite recklessly races towards the museum to defend it. In her urgency, she fails to appreciate the danger that the floating spores pose to her as she approaches!
Horizon fights off the infestation with a little assistance from Indarius. That frees him to fly after Femtite and step in to defend her from the space-borne fungus. The pixite princess returns the favor, sparing Horizon from a nasty counter-attack!
Seeing the fight move several blocks away towards the Halcyon Museum of Natural History, Conflux tries a risky gambit that gets her across the distance in record time, landing her roughly on the steps leading into the museum!
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With the most threatening spores dealt with, Indarius switches from defense to offense! He adjusts his powers to blast away the remaining spores floating on or around the barriers protecting the school. In seconds, the air is filled with the unpleasant smell of charred shrooms and blackened lumps drop out of the sky!
The spore threats around Halcyon Preparatory Academy are mainly dealt with. The giant hallucinogenic spore is grounded and vulnerable to DD, though Caio may be suffering from its effects.
The museum still has a number of spores floating around it. Meanwhile, in the distance, the Alliance and Heralds seem to be driving the massive Death Cap away from the city!