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Tales of The Legendary: Snippets of The Legendary
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Figured I'd try something a little different. Behold, the collection thread wherein you post one-offs, shorts, and snippets. Discussion in individual
threads, however. "No can brain today. Want cheezeburger." From NGE: Nobody Dies, by Gregg Landsman http://www.fanfiction.net/s/5579457/1/NGE_Nobody_Dies
I fought through the fear coursing through my brain long enough to trigger the Energy Absorption function. The effect spun out, shaking the massive Rikti pod,
and power flooded back into the cells of my suit armor. I took advantage of the interruption to deliver a one-two combo, knocking the Rider known as Famine back and out of skew. The pod rattled as my taser dart slammed into it, just below the pod, but didn't cease it's inexorable rotation to face me, and the fear clenched me again. Even through the fear I felt a spike of terror as another Rider became visible in my peripheral vision. I felt my heartrate spiking, then dropping back to normal, and my mind cleared. I started flipping armor functions back online, drawing strength from Inspirations I'd acquired earlier, and glanced down after a resumed one-two combo. A sigh of relief escaped me as I saw the black pool of mobile shadow around my feet, and the normally-irritating sensation of being tickled by a velvet octopus through my armor didn't even faze me. Hexane was back and on the job! The renewed clarity of mind provided by Hex's Shadow Fall allowed me to spare some attention for the additional Rider I had noticed mere moments before, and I grinned like a shark as it cruised in to attack Famine. We'd been hit hard on the initial opener of this fight, but now with Amberlee back in action as well, we were at 100% - or better, given that she'd somehow managed to confuse one of the Riders! I triggered Frost and blasted Famine with a cone of intense cold, slowing his attacks and scaling his armor with a blast of superhard ice crystals. I threw back my head and laughed in Famine's face as two familiar forms came into view behind him, Gen stooping in like a hawk, blades out and screaming, Terrence abandoning all subtlety to come in fists first at head level, slamming into the confused Rider with a thunderous crash. A pair of firey wings exploding from his huddled form announced the return of Frenetic, and he came out of the Rise of the Phoenix with his fists clenched and fire already collecting around them. Seconds later, it was over, and the Rikti Riders had fallen. Victorious, we boisterously cleared out of the rough caves, hot on the trail of some captured psychics. Just another day on the job. "No can brain today. Want cheezeburger." From NGE: Nobody Dies, by Gregg Landsman http://www.fanfiction.net/s/5579457/1/NGE_Nobody_Dies 
Wiregeek: I like this plan! I'm excited to be part of it. Let's do it!
Valles: forgive me if I misremembered something or mischaracterized a bit. My chatlog wasn't on that day, so I'm working from memory here. Right, so, there we are, both of us taking it in the face as we head out to lay the smack down on villainy. The doc -- Kentucky Smith to most, but I think of him as the doc -- the doc's better at takin' it than I am, though I think I got the edge on him in damage output. Well, it helps that I'm on fire, right? That's how I got my nickname, y'know. I wreck things, I burn... I wanted Cannonball, but the old gang said Flaming Wreckage was better. Chap named Iridium Horizon's along with us, laying his own version of smack. Me an' the Doc, we get up close and personal, beat on 'em, real direct-like, y'know? This Iridium guy -- never did get a look at his face, but he's big and tough-looking -- wasn't like that. He hung back, waved his hands a bit, and conjured up ... stuff. Lots of stuff. Which he chucked at our targets. Was pretty cool, if I say so myself. And I'll never forget seeing a forklift slam a thug through a wall. Wish I could do that. We're in th'Hollows, which is a nice enough part of town if you ask me. Some great views there. We hop from one place to 'nother, cleaning out old offices and whatnot, and in general havin' a great time. For a brainy type, the doc's pretty cool, and ruthless with those fists. Almost makes me wanna go back to school. Well, not really, but 's a nice thought. One of our little jobs is to recover some stolen magic thingies. I don't do magic. I can appreciate it an' all, but it's just not my thing. So when the doc tells me to keep an eye out for magic artifacts, I just nod and smile. Right. So we plow through the office like weasels on crack. These guys, they're wimps. With Iridium gluing them to the floor, an' the doc and I pounding on 'em like they was our own personal speedbags, it's not long at all before the last one is tagged and bagged and we're sorting through the debris for those missing whatever-they-are's. The doc's gushing over some gaudy bauble he pulled out of a shattered display case. I spot another one on the balcony and jump up there to grab it. It's a bracelet of some sort, covered with that funky writing and all. Gotta be what he's lookin' for, so I grab it and come back downstairs just in time to catch Iridium trying to stay awake while the doc babbles on about Atlantis, or something, I dunno. "Hey, doc, this what you're lookin' for?" I say to break the stream of babble, juggling the bracelet from hand to hand. What can I say, I fidget a lot. He looks at me, then turns to stone. Not literally, but if he could've, he would've. "Put. That. Down," he commands. I glance down, puzzled. It's just a bracelet, dunno what the -- oh. I'm still on fire. And the bracelet is starting to look a little crispy 'round the edges. "Right!" I say, and drop it into his outstretched hand. "Sorry 'bout that." Heh. Oops. A bit later, there we are, cleaning Frostfire's house, and after I lay a particularly nice right on the guy I was fighting, sending him to dreamland, and the doc lays what sounds like a whole series of blows on his target, sending him through a decorative planter, we're left standing there in a frost-covered room staring at this... altar-thingy. It's glowing and humming and doing whatever it is magic things usually do, I guess. The doc's all excited 'bout it, rambling about Sumerian deconstructionism or some such stuff -- I really have no idea. "So doc," I ask, "what are we supposed to DO with it?" "What you always do with magical wards," he replies calmly. "Break them." "I can -do- that," I reply with a grin, and I lay into it. It's a tough altar-thingy; I'm there beating on it for a while, and Iridium's bouncing crud off it, and it's at least a minute or so before I realize the doc is hanging back. "Hey, doc," I begin, and that's about all I get out before the altar-thingy gives up the fight and lets all the boom out. There's a lot of boom, too much for my fire to block. I decide that's as good a time as any to take a little nap. After a couple minutes of scraping myself back together, I stagger to my feet and give the doc my best glare. "Didja know it was gonna do that?" I ask him. He nods. Figures. "I suspected it would, yes." He looks at me innocently. "You didn't know?" Ah, the doc. What a character. I add 'altar-thingies' to my list of Stuff To Avoid in the future. Hanging out with the doc has made that list grow pretty fast... if I was the suspicious sort, I'd say he's doin' this stuff on purpose. But the doc's a nice guy, and I define the word 'unlucky' anyway, so I know it's just a coincidence. And hey, it's better than the alternative. With him along, least I know nothing I get dropped on me 's gonna be permanent, right? 'e's a doctor after all, ain't he? --sofaspud --"Listening to your kid is the audio equivalent of a Salvador Dali painting, Spud." --OpMegs 
The black armored Scimitar recognized that these memories were abnormal. Her schematics distinctly forbid her to possess so much extraneous data beyond that
necessary to impersonate a living being in concordance with her mission. But Singularity knew these memories were important. They told her who she really was. Not a pawn in this scheme, though she could certainly play along. Eliminating the Sabres would be a bonus. But Crey thought it owned her. It thought wrong. And all she needed to prove to herself that this wasn't all some circuit board delusion was right in the building ahead of her. *** The lights, not unlike a seperate Crey facility miles away, were all dark at Portal Corps as a door wrenched itself into a sphere the size of a baseball and plonked to the floor with a heavy thud. Singularity Scimitar stepped through, double checking the bypasses Crey had given her early on. The armored figure softly walked through the hallways until she found the appropriate portal, inserting a dataprobe and booting it up. She then opened a radio line, getting a small "Sound Only" acknowledgement. "....whoever is calling me at this time of night, it better be important," said a deep, gravelly voice. Singularity nodded, even though the man she was speaking to couldn't see it. "Sorry about the interruption, sir, but I believe I've found something that we really should take an interest in." "Oh, really? Moreso than our current operations and cleanup?" "If I'm right, sir, this will pay that all back a hundredfold." "Well Madigan, you've intrigued me. Tell me about this discovery." "Of course, Chairman Rosencroitz." --- "Oh, silver blade, forged in the depths of the beyond. Heed my summons and purge those who stand in my way. Lay waste."
I blame everyone who was teaming with Nano the other day when she got Tenebrous Tentacles, and their reactions to it.
-----\ "All I'm saying is, they creep me out and I wish you wouldn't use them." Nano Sabre sighed behind her facebowl and scowled through the holographic interface at the back of her fellow Sabre, Swift, as they entered the Riot Force 6.1 base. "You're saying I shouldn't use one of the most effective weapons in my arsenal because, and I quote, 'it creeps you out'?" "They're -tentacles-, and they -moan-. Yes. It creeps me out. It creeps EVERYONE out. And they, er, tickle." "They're NOT tentacles. They're a nanite-based extruded semi-autonomous psuedopod, and the moaning is a side-effect of the shaping field that keeps them in place. It's all very clearly spelled out in the design notes, there's nothing spooky about it." Swift spun in place and put one gauntleted hand on her hip, her body language evincing irritation. "It's -creepy-. They moan and twist and touch you all over and it's just NOT RIGHT, okay?" She spun around again and resumed walking. "Fine." Nano sighed. Privately, she thought the writhing mass of tentacles was a bit creepy too, but it wasn't her fault -- whatever sick pervert had designed her nanocloud projectors was to blame. And she needed the firepower. As she spent more time awake -- a part of her mind prodded her to correct that to 'on-line', and she ignored it, as usual -- she was discovering more and more abilities packed into the bulky gauntlets that comprised the arms of her hardsuit. The radiation projector and the nanocloud projector had tons of possibilities built into them, she could tell, but it was a long process of trial and error figuring out how to activate each particular effect. As luck would have it, the activation sequence for the individual abilities was not included in the documentation her (and she shuddered at this thought) databanks had stored. And Swift wanted her to abandon the most recent one because it was a little... unnerving. She sighed again. Hm. Maybe she could get Nene to explore her hardsuit, see if she could redesign the effect a bit. --sofaspud --"Listening to your kid is the audio equivalent of a Salvador Dali painting, Spud." --OpMegs 
"Meg, I'd love to help you out with your Lost problem, you know that," Street Sabre said as she stood on a corner in Steel Canyon, looking like
she was talking to herself. "But Positron asked the Legendary and Riot Force for a Task Force, and... no, I volunteered. Being on the Surviving Eights good side is a plus." She paused, then turned to the other heroes. "She laughed like a madwoman and hung up." *** Positron looked up from his book at the sound of an insistent cough, finding four people standing in front of him. "Task Force Los Alamos!" he smiled. "You did it-" "Four days," Street Sabre growled. "We haven't slept in FOUR DAYS. We've been crawling through sewers and Vazilok guts." "I can't even move my wings," Kara added. "And God only knows how many times we got sent to the hospital. I recommended we call in backup, didn't I?" "Many times," Sell-Sword agreed. Digi growled softly, flowers digging through the pavement under her feet and reaching in Positrons direction. "But no, you INSISTED on security," Street said, stepping forward. "We checked, you know. You didn't call the Freedom Phalanx at all! You were too busy fucking with us!" Valkyrie looked over at them, then stepped away. Positron looked at her, then back to the other four heroes. "Now, calm down..." "Sure," Kara smiled, anger vanishing. "We'll calm down." Then, all four of them pulled baseball bats out from behind their backs. "In a few minutes." "... oh crap." 
I strode through the base, absently returning greetings from other Legendary. One of the younger members stopped me and commented on my new 'costume'.
My forced smile grew brittle at this, and I excused myself quickly. The armor-like, full-body sensor suite that adorned me was no little bit uncomfortable, but I had been told that if I wore it to differing dimensions, the readings would be able to 'match up' the dimensional constants that were present in my body, and the worlds I went to. This would hopefully give me a ballpark guess as to where my home dimension is. The mathematics involved are nothing to sneeze at, though, and I had heard one of the scientists mumbling about 'Seven dimensional spiral search' or some such as they fitted the suit to me. Since I couldn't have any 'contamination' from local sources, they even had to make a new eyepatch for me, out of the same material. These thoughts raced through my mind as I reached the Admin office. Swiftly checking that no one was there (and initiating a minor search along the strings of gravity to make sure), I took a small, battered book from my collecting satchel, and laid it on the table. To anyone else on this world, there was a strange and indecipherable symbol on the cover. The book itself would be filled with pages and pages of the same. I reached up without looking, slipped another book out from the shelves, and placed it beside the other. Save only the age and wear of the first, the two were identical. The name, in Syndan, on the cover was my own: Impossible". I collapsed into the chair and stared at the two diaries. Both penned in a language known only to me in this world, both beginning with the same words, both detailing the battle which had thrown me here. But there lies the first difference: instead of battling the forces of the Omniscient, as I had, that Impossible had fought *for* them. I shuddered as I thought of the terrible power described in her book, a power that she had taken grasp of with all her might. The terrible, awful power that I felt, every time I Sang my magic. Although the book did not say it I surmised that she had been one of the few to survive, but fail, the Test of Faith. She had hidden it well, too, up until the point where she joined the Omniscient, I guessed. They had approached me, as well, with their offers, but I had been too headstrong, too full of myself, to even consider it. I had killed the messengers, and them sent them back as my own message. Although, now that I think on it, that made them all the more willing to come for me. I had already read through her diary. I knew that every page would be burned in my memory. I shook my head, stood, and hid my own in the bookcase again. The other's diary would be taken to Tina Macintyre, and if I am lucky, would be destroyed. Just as her life had been, by her own hand. 
Speed defines my life.
I'm far from the only one who could say that, of course. Race Car drivers make their living by going faster than their competitors. Fighter Pilots live or die by the choices they make in how fast they go and when they accelerate or decelerate. My issues with speed, I daresay, are slightly more personal. Unlike a normal person, I can actually move fast enough to dodge a bullet fired directly at me. And yes, that happens to me on an almost daily, even hourly basis. I'm in a unique line of work, you see. My birth name is Peter Brady, and I'm a registered Hero in Paragon City, but the populace at large and even most of my teammates in the Legendary know me better as Cyberman 8. Most people, even very quick heroes, think of themselves as "dodging a bullet" when they are avoiding gunfire. Not so, at least most of the time. You're just moving faster than the man shooting at you can change his aim to compensate. You're not actually dodging the bullet itself. It's a pretty rare ability, even among the hero community, to dodge the bullet after it's been fired. In this case, the man in question is a member of the Skulls street gang, and the bullet in question is a .357 Caliber pistol round. It says so right there on the bullet casing tumbling away. My skin sensors pick up the specific heat of the air as the bullet passes by the left side of my face. In combat, all my sensors log these sort of details that I normally ignore. The buffer erases it after 5 minutes. But if it becomes important later, I can call the information back. I can see the beginnings of the expression of surprise, mingled with dawning recognition of who I am, in both of the two young punks body language. To them, the bullet seemed to pass right through me. Even though in reality, I simply moved my head the exact distance I needed to safely evade the shot, and no more, before moving right back into the exact position I was in before. To them, the movement was as invisible as the bullet. The partner of the Skull with the gun is already starting to back away, the woman they'd been trying to drag back into the alleyway is on the ground with her hands coming up to instinctively protect herself. "Put the gun down, son. No one needs to get hurt." I say the words, even though I have little hope they'll have the desired effect. Always give them the choice. You have to at least do that much. It even works sometimes. Not often. But sometimes. Some enemies I don't give the opportunity. Malta Sappers, for example. I can't afford to give them the consideration. But then, I know they already made their choice. But Skulls? Some of them are still just street punks looking for acceptance and protection. Some of them are salvageable. I have to give them a choice. He hesitates, then aims the gun at me again, taking a two-legged stance. He must have convinced himself that I got lucky, or that he fired too soon. He may already know, but not admit to himself, that it's already too late, and that he's going to jail. But figures he has nothing to lose by hoping for a lucky shot to take down a hero. It's happened on occasion. There are memorials all over the city to dead Heroes after all. This time, he can see when I move, though there's not a thing he can do about it. I jump above the line of fire as the gun goes off and toward him, doing a backflip and then extend my leg forward to tag him across the jaw. I only use enough force to knock him out, not enough to break his jaw, though it's probably a near thing. I slap an Arrest Beacon on him as he starts to fall, then reach out to lay a stunning blow to a pressure point on the base of his friends skull (his own skull, not his mask) as he turns to run away. I follow up with a relatively light tap to the side of his head with my foot and a second arrest beacon. Total elapsed time: 4.43 seconds. "You'll be alright, ma'am. It's over." I give the girl a hand up. "Thank you so much! I thought I was done for!" I make sure she'll be alright. She lives just around the corner and promises me she'll go straight there and call the PPD to file a report. Smart girl, and tough. But then, they tend to be like that in Kings Row. Then I'm off (at 92.5 MPH, the limit of what my Hero License authorizes me for within city limits). My team is running an investigation into weapons smuggling that turns out to have been a shipment for Nemesis - a new prototype Nemesis soldier bot. This may be a piece of info that leads us to the real Nemesis. If we could take him down, we could save a lot of lives. Sometimes my friends in the Legendary tease me (in a friendly way) if a team member shows up before I do to the scene of the crime. I don't worry about that. The path to justice sometimes takes the (high speed) scenic route.
A Skull crunched against the metal wall of the warehouse, before being briefly transfixed with a spray of laser fire that left the smell of char, blood, and
burning meat. The perpetrator, a heavy combat robot striding forward with a twin of itself and liberally spraying down the gang hideout with firepower halted as all that was left was the now sweating profusely gang leader, Thanatos. "I have to admit, I would've left your kind alone, but you had the gall to call me out. I cannot ignore such an insult, you see," the sharp dressed man in a business suit noted. "Really, you have no one to blame but yourself." "Y-you killed them! All of them!" He seemed to consider that. "You were planning to do the same to me. I can't say I sympathize." The robots backed off as he stepped forward. Thanatos stared at him in a mixture of fear and hate, dark power surging to his hands, before he halted as the man called Largo laughed. "Please. Even with such power, my servants could gun you down before you got close. I think we really need to discuss how you may, possibly, get out of this ali-" He paused as a random Death's Head that he'd missed during the opening attack opened fire from a balcony above. Armstrong leapt up and crushed him in short order, but the bullets tore through Largo's suit and presumably the man himself. Thanatos was about to laugh and begin dismantling the robots, lasers or no lasers, when Largo simply straightened back up, making the Skull leader's eyes bug out. "A poor display. I guess you'll have to suffer for it though," he said, before he blurred into motion and Thanatos felt the back of his head slam against the metal wall, his feet dangling as the man attacking him held him up against the wall with one hand clamped around his head. He also noticed the slight orange liquid drops on the floor behind his attacker. He'd seen blood before. Caused it. Been coated in it. This wasn't blood. "Yo-you're not human!" Largo smirked at him. "Congratulations. You get an A for rudimentary perception for the day." A hum and the tingling feel in his skin made Thanatos instantly aware of the fact that he wouldn't have been able to waltz in here with just two robots if he didn't have powers himself. "Oh...oh God!" Largo continued smirking at him as a bluish-green energy built around the hand holding Thanatos's head. "I'm sorry. You started praying to me a little too late to help." *** The story barely made the front page in the Rogue Islands Protector the following day, but for those on the lookout for the right things, it certainly sent a message. "Skulls Gang Found Slaughtered In Warehouse. Boss Thanatos Among The Dead." --- "Oh, silver blade, forged in the depths of the beyond. Heed my summons and purge those who stand in my way. Lay waste."
They say you're not supposed to think during a fight. Just react. Instinct and all that shit.
Maybe that's true. For norms. Me? I ain't never been normal. She's moving, now. Up above. The ceiling's high in here. Enough space for that damn trick to come into play. Fliers always do that. Why do fliers always do that? She doesn't say anything. She doesn't need to. The taunt's obvious, her body language screaming it in blazing neon lights. My lips curl back into a smile. It's feral. I move. Muscles tense, coil, release. All faster than the eye can see. Than HER eye can see. I know just how fast her reflexes are. They're fast, damn fast. But not fast enough. Not fast like me. Less than a second. That's all it takes for me to go from here to there. From crouched on the mats to up above. Knuckles blurring straight for that grin on her pretty little... No. Shit. Pain. Like a jackhammer straight through my ribs. Something breaks, and I can feel it. Never a pleasant sensation. I crash into the wall, sprawling. I draw a ragged breath. That hurts like hell too. She smirks. Bitch! She sold it, I bought it. Like a goddamn idiot. But the bone's already shifting. Fragments twisting back into position. I can feel the torn muscle knitting back together. Skin and blood crawling faster, faster, faster until it all kicks into gear and the rush hits and this is what I live for A heartbeat. I'm on my feet. The floor shatters beneath my heel, chips of wood flying as I blast off the ground. I can just see Lora'lai staring at me with that disappointed look, oh Syndesis, you broke the dojo again. But damnit, I just don't care. She's trying to move. Trying to get away. For me it's like she ain't moving at all. Keanu Reeves, eat your emo heart out. You want speed? This is speed. Flesh and bone against space and time. Her grav field holds. Barely. It ain't enough to stop the impact. She's heading for the ground. Out of control. In a second she'll recover. But she ain't gonna get the chance. It's all about the pressure. I'm heading for her again. Following her down. Lining up another blow. Wait. Damn! By the time I land, hands and feet skidding against the ground, she's already regained her balance. Hovering overhead, she winks at me. "Time," Brightsky says. I snort. I start to pull off the practice gear, undoing the straps of the padded gloves. She interrupts. "Hey, Syn?" I turn. "Best two out of three?" I grin. With thanks to Valles for letting me borrow Brightsky. She and Syndesis have a strange relationship. -- Acyl
I've been sitting on these for a while, but I hit 50 the other day and was -finally- able to roll the last two up. So, here they are. These are a
group of characters, some of which don't exist yet save in concept, that I've got an elaborate backstory and story arcs and everything else all planned, and can't seem to write it. >_< Enjoy! **** Primal chaos, bestial rage. The fury of one who is chained by those weaker than him. Anger, hatred, fury... these are all mine to hold. To control, to channel... with which to wreak my vengeance upon those deserving of it. I am the Flamebinder. **** Logic and reason, madness and insanity, coupled in an unholy embrace. The wintry chill of death, and freedom from the inexorable march of decay. Preservation and punishment... these are mine to hold and control. Mine to adapt. I am the Coldbinder. **** Stability and power, rough and unyielding. The weight of immensity, the determination that comes with incalculable eons of age, and the strength to move mountains. These are mine to hold, with which I guard those weaker than myself, as is my duty. I am the Earthbinder. **** Flexibility and freedom, denied he who owns them. The rage of storms and the playfulness of a spring breeze. Healing rains and lightning-filled skies. All of these and more are mine to play with, mine to enjoy, and will never be his again. I am the Windbinder. **** Depths of shadow and the inky blackness between the stars. I am nothing without my twin, as she is nothing without me. Fear and uncertainty and dreams and hope; these are all mine, and more. Aided by another, I prevent the dark one from escaping, and am bound to his prison myself for all time. I am the Nightbinder. **** Points of brightness amidst the black. The white-hot blaze that can be a soothing caress on the cheek or a terrible swift sword striking down those that oppose me. I am nothing without my twin, and he would engulf all if it weren't for me. Serenity and peace and chaos and war; these are mine to hold, though only with the help of a friend. I hold back the demon, and forever will I bear his mark. I am the Lightbinder. --sofaspud --"Listening to your kid is the audio equivalent of a Salvador Dali painting, Spud." --OpMegs
There is, I think, a certain magic to this.
Not Magic magic, like what gives so many of my teammates their powers. And certainly not Sr. Clarke's magic, which gives so many other teammates their powers. But magic nonetheless. Alchemy would be the better word, perhaps. A combination in the proper proportions, brought together at the right time and in the right order, prepared in a tradition older than memory. Some have a gift for it; mi abuelita was such, and many called her bruja when they saw the results. I do not have that gift; my skills come from long, hard practice, at her side and with others. But by gift or by practice, these things take instinct. Instincts that tell you when things are perfect. Instincts that tell you when to wait, and when to rush in without hesitation. Instincts that can keep you from total disaster, or worse. My instincts are finely honed. I have spent many years making sure of this. And this time, I am pleased to say, that they do not fail me. I remove my preparation and look it over. It is fine and beautiful, made with care and love. Just like mi abuelita taught me. And it smells like home. "Dinner is ready," I say, placing the enchiladas on the table, with the cheese and chili con carne still bubbling. My teammates are weary from a long day of protecting the City, but I see their eyes light up and they smile when I make the announcement. Good food is un milagro de Dios, making one forget his woes, at least until after dessert. Almost, I think, like magic. Ebony the Black Dragon http://ebony14.livejournal.com "Good night, and may the Good Lord take a Viking to you."
"--I specifically warned you there might be a Kronos Titan ambush!" Crimson shouted, loud enough to make Badb wince and hold her phone away from her
ear. "So? I get ambushed by robots while waiting in line for coffee." She peered around the corner of a building and frowned. "You didn't tell me this one is the size of Godzilla." "The Kronos specs were in your briefing." "You know I never read the mission briefings," Badb said. No sign of the Titan. She ran down the street. "..." "Oh... hey, I'm sorry, I didn't mean it that way." Badb bit her lip. "They're good briefings--" "How would you know?" "--but I don't need so much backstory and dire consequences of failure stuff." She reached the next corner and looked left and right quickly. "Just tell me where to go to fight the bad guys, and I'm good." "Just tell you where to go," Crimson repeated. There followed a long pause. "So... do you know where it went?" Badb asked, checking a third street. "You wouldn't think something that big could hide so fast..." "You went back? What about stopping Project: Wildflower?" "Are you kidding? Giant Freaking Robot! This is so cool!" "The same robot that just set you on fire and stomped you flat," Crimson said. "I'm fine! The medical teleport beacons are way too sensitive," Badb said, "besides, I've got a call out to The Legendary and in Founders' Falls. We'll make it sorry. If humongous mecha can be sorry. Anyway, this will be fun! If I can just find it." "If those nanites are released--" Badb sighed. "Give me five minutes, Crimson. The world's not going to end in five minutes, is it?" "..." "Please?" "Fine." "Thanks, Crim! You're the best." Badb snapped her phone shut and kept hunting. Here, robot, robot, robot... Quote: "Thanks, Crim! You're the best." Badb snapped her phone shut and kept hunting. Here, robot, robot, robot... *SNARF* Damn you, Render! Now I gotta go wipe down the monitor again! Mountain Dew spewage gets sticky if I leave it there too long! (^_^)
"So lemme get this straight" I repeated into the comm, one hand clenching the neck of an Immunes Surgeon, the other just smashing into his face.
"Don't bother with the Endurance Reduction line of enhancements, just let bonusses and buffs take care of it, and worry about Regen?" The Immunes collapsed into an unconscious slump, and I flipped him over the edge, watching the arrest beacon I had clamped to his neck kick in midway. Terrence landed behind me, and as I turned to unleash a Frost blast, he landed a Foot Stomp. Half-frozen Cimeroran Traitors went flying, quite a few off the parapet, as he keyed his comm. "Exactly. You can't beat, pound for pound, money put into regen or defense. Endurance isn't a problem for you, since you have that draining aura, you lucky dog." Terrence punctuated his statement with an uppercut, sending an Immunes Engineer over the edge to follow his Surgeon brother. "Don't be jealous, Terrence, it'll give you lines." I punctuated with a one-two combo to the belly of a Praefectus Castrotum, who staggered drunkenly. "Lines? What?" Terrence's confusion didn't impair his fighting ability, and his Jab made a convincing argument on the Praefectus, who crumpled to the ground, defeated. "Exactly!" I chimed reassuringly, and launched a superjump out to the next parapet, Terrence moments behind me. The sun beat down upon the ancient land of Cimerora. "No can brain today. Want cheezeburger." From NGE: Nobody Dies, by Gregg Landsman http://www.fanfiction.net/s/5579457/1/NGE_Nobody_Dies
"So, let me get this straight," Sylia said, sitting back in her armor next to Sell-Sword. "While base teleportation technology is open source
and thus legal for heroing purposes, we can't use the portal in the Cavern of Transcendence because it infringes on your company's patent on portal technology?" "That's correct," the Portal Corps representative said with a nod. "If you attempt to use such without paying the proper fees to Portal Corps and signing appropriate paperwork, we'll be forced to take legal action." Sylia sat back, raising an eyebrow behind her faceplate. "So....you're claiming patent rights to a magical portal..." "Yes." "That you didn't know existed..." "Correct." "And which would've been in the hands of the Circle of Thorns if we hadn't stopped it..." "Indeed." "Despite the fact that Portal Corps had no knowledge or intent to stop them...." "Also correct." "And if we use it ourselves without going through you, you'll sue us." "Precisely." Sylia looked at him with a tilted head. "Portal Corps has no concept of the term "gratitude" if they're not making money, do they?" "We're a former division of Crey Industries, ma'am. Gratitude isn't in our vocabulary." Sword looked up, leaning forward. "So you'll...sue us if we use the portal." "That's correct, Mr..." "Sell-sword's what you get." "Very well." Sword leaned back, putting his arms behind his head. "Now, if I understand patent law correctly, you own the patents on technological portals. The Cavern of Transcendence is magical. If you were to take us to court, your win would not be exactly steel-clad assured, would it? In fact, depending on the ruling, you could get competition by someone using magical dimensional portals. No monopoly would mean you'd lose significant profits." The man looked vaguely uncomfortable. "Are you threatening us, Mr. Sword?" "Not at all. I'm just saying.... I think we could come to an understanding that the Cavern of Transcendence, which is keyed to those of us that were present when it was unlocked and won't obey anyone else, be off limits to heroes. We really have no reason to use it, given your fine customer service. However, organizations like Riot Force and the Legendary do have a lot of overhead...the upkeep of the Legendary base alone....perhaps Portal Corps could see that there be a sizable....charitable donation....." The representative eyed the armored figure oddly, as Sylia refused to let herself chuckle at how quickly he'd turned this around. "Are you suggesting we pay you off, Mr. Sword?" Sword chuckled in return. "You're a former branch of Crey Industries. Gratitude isn't in your vocabulary. But bribery is." **** "Sweet mother of microwaved dinner rolls and all her crazy nephews!" Ifrit said as she looked at a check that'd come in the mail from Portal Corps. "We don't even do business with them yet....how the hell did they know who we were?" "Maybe the Legendary referred them," Sword shrugged from his spot on the couch. "Not that it matters. I'm sure this is out of the goodness of their heart..." --- "Oh, silver blade, forged in the depths of the beyond. Heed my summons and purge those who stand in my way. Lay waste." 
'Scuse me whilst I pick myself up from the floor after my laughing fit.
-- Bob --------- Then the horns kicked in... ...and my shoes began to squeak.
*chuckles* More Wire, YOu must write more snippets, Your bang on bout Terr's obsession with Regen and Defence, thoes two in his opinion are vastly more
important than End Reduction, espeicaly if Like Mag's you can Drain other people's End. OpMegs..Again your Fic's amuse me to no end, I loove How Sell-Sword easly changes the situation to their favor and gets a...donation..from portal Corp *grin*
Op, Sell-Sword is a mercenary to the core, and we likes it, we do. The last scene was perfect in my mind, Sword just laying back, basking in a job well done,
while his boss freaks out. On a side note, though, it reminds me that one of my characters got around Portal's monopoly through her backstory and a few legal... hijinks.. 
"Make it stop!" whined Net Sabre as the Legendary Lounge echoed with a sound like a waterfall. "It's just not RIGHT!" She pouted at the progress bar on the laptop in front of her and in her own internal HUD and turned a baleful eye at the mountainous form of Wide Receiver.
The veteran hero was figuring sports statistics with an abacus and pencil and paper! He'd given her the same raw data and challenged her to see who would be finished first. By the smoke rising from Wide's left hand and the racket produced by beads being shuttled around at super speed, Wide was almost done, and her own heavily modified systems were chugging along on a particularly meaty segment of rushing yards per game. With a thunderous crack of massive joints, Wide stretched and set his pencil down. He stood up and came to loom over her shoulder. "Hmm," he rumbled. "Seventy-nine percent done. These systems ARE getting faster. How are you on your internals?" Nene blushed behind her helmet. "Eighty-two percent." The football player gave a low whistle. "And you still ain't got all your Crey bloatware excised yet, either. That's pretty good, Kiddo. Anyway, I'll take your forfeit next Friday. There's a new opera being put on in Talos, and I need someone to watch the twins while I take Min to go see it. And... just to show I'm a good sport..." A rush of air filled the room as he dashed off and returned seconds later. "Here's a dinner from City of Gyros, with extra 'Chili Fries Crisps.'" She smiled weakly as she took the proffered meal and began planning her next set of self-upgrades. That Crey Media Player was just devilishly hard to uninstall without wrecking her file associations.... ''We don't just borrow words; on occasion, English has pursued other languages down alleyways to beat them unconscious and rifle their pockets for new vocabulary.'' -- James Nicoll
Rhea burst into the apartment in a blur, dashing past the couch where Terrence and Lisa were attempting to watch a movie and rushing straight into the bedroom.
The startled duo looked at each other, blinked, and craned their necks to see where Rhea had gone. A frustrated "Darnit, they're not here!" from the bedroom floated down the hall. Terrence cleared his throat. "Um, Rhea? We're out here...." Rhea appeared in the doorway as if teleported. "TERRENCE!" "... yes?" "You have GOT to see these! They're SO CUTE!" So saying, Rhea dropped a large -- and heavy -- shopping bag on Terrence's lap. Lisa leaned over to peer inside as Terrence grumbled. "... glad I'm invulnerable, that would've hurt otherwise..." Lisa blinked in surprise, then reached into the bag and pulled out a plain cardboard box, adorned with a sticker proclaiming the contents to be one "TERRENCE KNIGHT SUPER LOVE KIT, PROTOTYPE 3". A second box was labeled "TERRENCE KNIGHT SUPER-MAGNUMS", with a sidebar on the sticker proclaiming the contents to be hypoallergenic, radiation-proof, and all-natural. There were many other boxes, all along similar lines, from creams to oils to battery-operated toys. A particularly large box -- Lisa didn't open it -- said "Experience the LEGENDARY TERRENCE KNIGHT for yourself!" Rhea beamed at the two as they slowly turned their heads to stare at her. "See? The manager at Second Skin is sorta a friend of mine, and she was in the back room when we went there, and she saw YOU, Terrence -- she thinks you're really hot, by the way -- and she knows this guy who knows this guy who specializes in adult products, and --" "Rhea?" "Hmm?" "NO." Lisa cleared her throat. "These haven't gone on sale yet, have they?" "Well... no... these are just the prototypes, she's got lots of other ideas too, but she needs Terrence's approval. Oh! Terrence, you wouldn't mind appearing in an ad spot, would you?" "Rhea..." Terrence growled, blushing. "NO!" "Aww..." Rhea pouted. "But the surveys got a good response...." Terrence whimpered. Lisa patted his knee. "I think you'd better tell her no, Rhea." Rhea sighed. "Oh, alright." She picked up the fallen boxes and dropped them back in the bag. Then she brightened. "Well, if nothing else we get to keep the samples!" --sofaspud --"Listening to your kid is the audio equivalent of a Salvador Dali painting, Spud." --OpMegs 
oh god, that is too precious for words. Now I have my coworkers looking at me funny cause I'm laughing too hard.
-Terry ----- "so listen up boy, or pornography starring your mother will be the second worst thing to happen to you today" TF2: Spy
Killkitty was a normally a sanguine enough soul. One did not survive SpecFor training in the United Allied Forces, Sniper School, Long-Range Recon and Patrol,
and six years on the front, dealing havoc with the Enemy without being behind the Eight Ball* and NOT have a thick skin and a level head. But sometimes ... sometimes, you just had to lose your temper. Sometimes, you just had to shout. Sometimes, you just had to do things that all that ingrained training said you shouldn't. This was one of those sometimes. "Listen very carefully, null pointer," she snarled, jabbing a finger into the sternum of the civvie she'd backed against a wall, "because I'm only going to give this to you once, and if you hash it up, I will NOT be held responsible for the resulting pain. I am NOT a catgirl. I have never BEEN a catgirl. I am a mutant. Period. End of description." "But...," the civilian stuttered, gaze jumping to the Killkitty's ears, pinned back in displeasure, and her tail, lashing with surpressed anger. "Shut. Your. HOLE!" Killkitty roared in an impressive impersonation of her former DI. The civvie made a noise completely at odds with his overweight frame and shrunk back against the wall. "I don't give a nanocred what you call any of the others; that's their business. But I am not a catgirl. I am not 'kawaii.' And my name is 'Killkitty' or, if you're feeling formal, Captain D'Allesandro**, NOT 'Neko-Chan.'" She leaned close, her voice pitched low. "If you or your buddies forget this fact, civvie, then I can promise you that you won't like the consequences. To be frank, I won't either, but that's only because of the mess I'll have to clean up and the paperwork that I'll have to file. But those are burdens that I will force myself to deal with if you zipbrains call me that again. Understood?" The civilian nodded, eyes wide with fright. Killkitty looked him in the eye for a moment, then nodded and stepped back, shouldering her futuristic assault rifle. "Good," she said. "As you were." Without another glance, she leaped away, her jumpboots emitting a characteristic hum. On the roof of the nearby building, Killkitty sighed as she watched the civilian scurry away. She hated pulling the bad cop routine, but some of these civvies just got her tail in a knot. She was going to have to have words with the brainboys if she ever got back home. All of this cultural imagery that they failed to mention when they briefed her for the trip back to the 21st Century. Anime, artwork, posters, costumes, and all the other stuff. And here she was with mutations that put her smack in the middle of it all. Killkitty sighed. "Friggin' fanboys." Ebony the Black Dragon http://ebony14.livejournal.com "Good night, and may the Good Lord take a Viking to you." Quote: Foxboy wrote: ....oh man. I now have the image of Nene as a babysitter having *no idea* what she's getting into. Either that, or the next generation of hackers will begin far sooner than projected. --- "Oh, silver blade, forged in the depths of the beyond. Heed my summons and purge those who stand in my way. Lay waste."
*Shatters compleatly at Sofaspud's fic* Thats..21 flavours of wrong! it is..oh my god..Yes..Terrence would die of shame and embarassment if
thoes....products ever became...public..Not to mention the kind of teasing he'd get from his aquaintences..But..so incredibly funny tho Spud..I approve absolutly. |
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