Log:An End to Tyranny

2019/11/03 Breach Sentinel Paragon Porter Starlight Thunder Allison Antigon Portennant 1

The docking bay. The heroes have arrived, via shuttle, towed-sealed-box-pretending-to-be-a-shuttle, or under their own power, as appropriate and able. Nearly all of the landing craft (and those under their own power) bear varying levels of carbon-scoring or energy burns from the run through the gauntlet. Many of earth's heroes, mightiest or otherwise, meta or mundane, are present. From the comm chatter, others have also successfully arrived at the other bay amidships.

The bay is enormous, over 100 meters wide and deep and half that in height, though the clutter of craft and people make it appear anything but empty. Entrances to corridors leading to the rest of the ship line the bay on all interior sides, at multiple levels. Most of these entrances have enemy troopers using them as covered firing positions to rain energy blasts down on the target-rich environment.

The VoyagerSIM resyncs with the Model 9 Prototype after bringing its ramshackle craft to a sliding halt inside the hangar. Once the sparks clear & emergency systems put out the various fires onboard the android disengages its homebrewed docking mechanism & gets out of the pilot seat as troopers exit to go back up Earth forces. It moves to follow.

It calculates that it must ration its reserve power for this frontal assault so disembarks from the ship without any particular boosts to its default configuration. Still, the living mechanism maneuvers to the front of the contingent to help lead the charge.

Meanwhile on the opposite side of the ship the Colonial Bay Sentinel, Griffin Freeman drags 5 specially manufactured drop pods each containing a small contingent of soldiers who know what's on the line.

Griffin flies up to the ship and begins burning his way inside, cutting a hole in the spaceship and pressing a drop pod to the hole just made. He defends each position in between with the help of two small orbital craft that were towed into inter-lunar space by other heroes. Specialized hatches grip onto the the hull and seal any gaps before opening and releasing the soldiers inside.

Griffin radios that he's completed his task and flies to help press a frontal assault to keep the pressure on the enemy & off the small contingents he's peppered throughout the lower decks. The hope was they'd make it to defensible positions and keep the Evil, Megalomaniacal Porter Variant's forces off balance. Its a plan designed by Griffin specifically, working with a number of others in the Industrial-Military Complex. All sorts of corporate sponsored ideas came out of the wood work for this assault. Griffin chose his favorite, thinking that the guerrilla tactics used as a Tier-One operative might help edge out 'NegaPorter' & assure their victory. Still each trooper aboard knows this might be a failing operation- a suicide mission. They don't have any verified information about the ship or what's aboard.

Griffin knew that he'd still have no shortage of volunteers. The world was on the line.

Griffin finally takes a breath as soon as he gets into the docking bay, landing near a ship still smoking from the intense firefight outsie.

The Super Soldier would be impressed with the size of this place if he weren't worried about how exposed such a cavernous space makes them.

Starlight hates to have to leave the Earth's defenders fighting outside the giant warcraft on their own but she knows that the survival or not of Earth will be settled by what happens within the ship. So that's where she's heading. Although a few minor detours from the straightest path en-route sees a couple of the enemy figher craft disabled by passing kicks from super strong legs before she joins one of the boarding parties.

Paragon steps off the ramp of the ship that got her and Porter into the landing bay. It was a rocky flight, one that seemed to startle Porter. She's trying to be positive in the face of overwhelming odds. "Sweetie, we should help clear the front line so our forces can advance, then move on to find your other." Her eyes turn blue as they scan through the ship hulls in search of where the Trans-Verse conqueror may be hiding.

Breach looks out into the docking bay from within the shuttle that dragged him here. It takes him a few seconds to parse the immensity and the layout both, his brown eyes scanning steadily under the mirrored orange lens covering his face. Keying his comms, Breach comments to Griffin, "This set-up feels kinda familiar doesn't it, Griff?"

With a shrug, Breach looks over his shoulder at the rest of the heroes aboard his shuttle. The Undead Soldier draws both of his enormous revolvers and thumbs back their hammers. One simply clicks into place, which is not at all suspicious. Its twin starts to emit a keening whine as though some sort of electronic motor were spooling up to speed after a long inactive period.

Clucking his tongue, Breach goes rolling out of the cover provided by the ship. Energy blasts immediately come raining down on his position as he rolls quickly free of cover. He pops up, weaving amidst the blasterfire as he shifts his sights between both of his revolvers. One revolver fires an energized bolt of its own toward one goon who broke from cover at one end of the bay. Breach's other revolver ROARS, belching smoke and fire in nearly equal measure as a rocket propelled round screams out of the barrel of the gun and toward one of the access points that's still providing cover for troopers in waiting. As it enters the frame of the doorway, the rocket detonates in a cloud of frigid white mist that rapidly coalesces into an 8m block of ice. What it does to any troopers caught in the blast radius is unclear.

Turning his head toward the shuttle, Breach roars, "DO YOU WANT TO LIVE FOREVER?! WELCOME TO THE SPACE MARINES!"

Copycat arrives via another shuttle. Well, CopySpirit arrives, having had to put up a barrier to protect her shuttle from heavy fire. The light wall falls down, the troops file out and CopySpirit powers down into Copycat, who looks nervous and on edge from the close calls. She flies off of the hull in her black Torus-enhanced space suit to help engage the enemy.

In Paragon's shadow (of both light and incoming fire) toddles a ...MiniGon. Porter doesn't look nearly as imposing despite the matching aesthetics and color scheme of his armor. The stumbling doesn't help much, either... though it DOES happen to spare his noggin as a trip brings his head below a blast that scorches the bay floor. "Sweetie... the lenses on this thing keep fogging up. Not breathing didn't seem to help much, either..."

Thunder, for his part, was a bit in awe. Even whenever his shoulder had crashed into the docking bay area. The landing is jarring before Thunder does the sensible thing any super-strong individual will do once a ship has crashed and they needed to get into the fight. The door is literally punched off, picked up, and used as an impromptu shield for the soldiers coming along with the super strong teen. Along with another piece of the hull of the downed shuttle.

And Thunder does the sensible thing after that as he moves to setup barricades using pieces of the downed shuttle to make sure his allies have places to hide. When one blast does manage to tag him, the teen looks where it came from and literally chunks a sizeable piece of ship hull that way.

Thunder looks to the others, "What? Those things sting even if I'm tough as hell." He proceeds to rip off more ship pieces by hand.

Paragon's head whips over and eyes expand as the laser fire almost--but just misses--Porter. Much to her relief. She offers to take his hand. "I'll guide you if you need it. There's atmosphere, so you can take the helm down if it's making it hard to see at the moment," she offers protectively. "We can do this like we did the pyramid maze and Event Horizon," she suggests, to see if he remembers.

Starlight slows to a more maneuverable speed but is still flying fast as she immediately heads for the nearest passageway out of the cargo bay. The Earth forces cannot afford to get pinned down so she's going to open a way for them.

<<"10-4. Getting all sorts of Deja Vu over here, Mason." Griffin replies cooly as he moves towards the point of contact between the two forces. He fights the urge to say its a good day to die- at least for the morale of the assembled fighters here today, He knows there are probably just as many civilians & 'empowered forces' pressing the assault as trained soldiers like he and Rick Mason. They're all doing their part! (Are You?!) The path to citizenship is rife with dangers- tyrants who want to destroy your freedom!

<<"First one to drop the other's doppel buys drinks Earthside." He says to Mason, though he doubles down & shares the same signal on the common band for anyone else to hear, hoping to keep spirits high.

He wonders where his friends are in the mayhem but forces himself to keep his mind on the task at hand- otherwise he'd just spend the whole assault protecting his Handwarmer+.

He needs to do his job and she needs to do hers.

Griffin charges up as a laser blast passes him. He begins glowing and then deflecting the oncoming fire coming towards those directly behind him.

His field flashes with each impact but the Super Soldier does not slow or tire. HE stands taller, becoming fiercer with more on the line.

He shouts, "Let's show these Invader's what our Earth does to protect its freedom!!!!" He points striaght for the closest entrance into the ship itself. That's where he's going and God help anyone between he and that point.

Laser beams lance out from his eyes straight across a few soldiers firing on them.

"Lead on, Sweetie!" Porter takes Paragon's hand so she can lead on. He knows she knows the way to go. He leaves the helm on for now, and even makes use of its speaker, cranking it up to yell, "C'MON EVERYONE! THIS WAY!" He can help by rallying the troops! He even points! Lucky for him Paragon is the one leading, as he points out through the atmosphere-shielding of the open bay into space.

Paragon pulls Porter close, then wraps an arm around his waist. She charges forward a few steps before leaping her way across the landing bay towards the objective, letting Porter be the one to announce the charge.

The troopers at the corridor entrances beging to concentrate their fire at those approaching their respective positions (namely Starlight from upper levels and Team P on the lower), as both approach the same sector at different elevations. Obviously, keeping the Earth forces bottled up in the bay is not in the heroes' favor. The rest continue to suppress, though cover from shuttles, Thunder's use of shuttle pieces (and others prompted to do similar by his creativity) limit casualties.

<< Good! I look forward spending all of your beer money on scotch, >> replies Breach to Griffin.

Breach holds his ground, firing Freeze Rockets and blaster rounds back at the troopers. His first role, Breach seems to have decided, is combat engineering for the offload process. For the moment, Breach seems content to remain pinned down, dancing around blasterfire as best he can. Plenty of energy blasts still light him up, spinning him here and there, but Breach seems to stay on his feet and return fire with a Freeze Rocket.

Only when Breach is certain that the shuttles near him have fully disembarked and none of Earth's heroes are dead yet does the Undead Soldier holster his heavy revolvers. Up comes a conventional sidearm and a ridiculous looking little pistol. Breach charges after Porter and Paragon, providing suppressive fire around The Porters in the form of bullets and lasers!

Setting up enough barricades, Thunder takes off after the Paragon and Porter duo. The good news is that Thunder's apparently pretty fast on his feet now. He covers that distance pretty quickly, dodging laser fire as he goes and occasionally tossing out a wave of something from his palm as he moves to catch up to the two. The fact that it sounds even louder than the gunshots and rockets in such an enclosed place probably draws some attention, but afterwards... well, Thunder's on the move with them down the corridor.

He calls towards the two, "So how do you know which way to go, anyways!? I thought this was like an evil twin thing or something! They always think the other way!"

Starlight uses her small size to advantage, being both a difficult elusive target and small enough to dart past the makeshift barriers at the passageway entrance, kicking at a alien trooper on the way. Now the troopers at that strongpoint have threats both front and rear.

Thunder

This young teen looks to be powerfully built for being, well, a teenager. His face is angled slightly with a pair of sea green eyes in his face. His hair is shoulder length, streaked with blue on black. that is left wild and untamed as if he stepped out of a shower or been rained on due to the wild curls to his hair. Otherwise, the most noticeable thing about his body is the large dragon-like tattoo that circles his torso and down his left arm.

As far as clothing, he wears an open, sleeveless vest in a white that almost borders grey in coloring. The vest has lining in a deep blue fur along the openings and seems a bit baggy in wear, but leaves him with full arm movement. Those well versed will note it to be a haori. He is extremely well muscled, having a six pack abs and a young body builder in physique underneath the haori. The haori is kept closed by a red sash around the waist with a long tail trailing on the left side.

He wears a dark blue set of pants that match the lining of the vest, with a lack of shoes showing despite his ankles and calfs being wrapped in white cloth with what appears to be leather boots of an older style than most around his feet and under the cloth wraps. The slight bagginess of the pants hides his legs, giving no real clue as to if he is as well built on the lower body or not.

Lastly, he is armed it seems. Across the back in a braided looking cord that wraps across his body is an ornate looking sword in a wooden scabbard. The sword appears to be a straighter version of a katana with a golden hand guard or tsuba as it is known. The scabbard is decorated with a wave like pattern. The handle looks to be wrapped in some sort of leather with a blue, leather-like piece beneath it. When drawn, the light reflecting off of the sword shows it is not quite ordinary as it seems almost to shine with all the colors of a rainbow freshly made from falling water.

Paragon crashes down on a group of enemy troops, picking up one of their barriers and sweeping the group with it. Most get knocked away and scattered, while a few manage to dive away to safety. Her helm pans to Thunder. "This is not a place for children," she alerts with concern.

Now harassed close behind by nigh-untargettable Starlight, and firing rather ineffectively at the nigh-unmissable-yet-remarkably-durable Paragon, the positions at that sector all but collapse as they are overrun. Breach's ice-blocks trap some troopers and provide a concealment or outright barrier to fire from others on the flanks.

This pause, the flocking of known heroes, and maybe even Porter's yell, draw a charge as others break cover and rush in the wake of the spearheading group.

Null slips off one of the ships he stowed away on. Most of his former extended family and friends are safe elseworld, whether they liked it or not. He told Norah he was tired of fighting, but there's still something he can possible do. He throws down a smoke pellet and vanishes, in search of a villain to use his particular set of skills on, not knowing his Alter is onboard somewhere.

"Little late for that sentiment," growls Breach at Paragon. He leaps up and lands on her shoulder pauldrons for a split-second, kicking off so that he can go flipping through the air. Breach picks off several of the troopers that got scattered by Paragon's impact. "Kid's old enough for powers, kid's old enough to fight for the survival of the planet. It's his planet too."

Paragon hears Porter's voice inside her head: << I know you're just worried, but he's got a point... >>

Paragon's eyes dim at Breach's comments. If it was a teenaged Kysmette, she'd feel it unsafe, too. "Your logic is...sound," she unhappily remarks. "I cannot guarantee his safety for the very same reason. The planet must come first." She tosses the barrier effortlessly at a few more enemy troops. To Thunder, she answers, "Scans and the mission brief told us where to go. Also, Xray vision." She taps her temple, then leaps onwards.

Sentinel charges up and flies forward now that he's close enough to absorb and deflect the majority of the laser fire his contingent is facing. He holds defensively letting his troopers fire on their attackers while he neutralizes their offensive capability.

Its slower going that way but it ensures he has more fighters to bring to the table later on.

<<"I'll buy 'em when I see it, Mason." He says mirthfully over the line even as he charges forward- drop kicking a large object towards (but ahead of) a pair of Earthside fighters coming up on his right. The object skids to a halt a few meters ahead of them, providing cover so they can keep pouring it on.

Griffin strides for the door, trusting his contingent to deal with any leftovers so he can hold the line inside the corridor.

Telepathic message from Paragon to Porter: << "He does. But...I..." Paragon's words drop off, but memories of Arania and the other Regent successors deaths bubble up in her mind. The kids she couldn't save. >>

Paragon tries to keep her mind on the mission, but her thoughts wander to the children and teens who died on her watch over the Regent's legacy.

Starlight flips over in the air, reversing direction is an unfeasibly short distance. Then she's flying back at the rear of the barricade, smashing it aside to reveal the alien troopers to Earth force firepower. Before the barricade even comes to a halt she's reversed direction again and is flying on down the passage.

Thunder looks to Paragon, then shakes his head, "Hey, I didn't want to come along. They said I would be more useful causing chaos for the guys up here than trying to stop riots." He shrugs.

Then he comments to Paragon, "Hey, I'll have you know I'm probably just a little less durable than you if what I saw on the news footage is proof." He then runs forward directly into a group of soldiers before spinning suddenly as his leg sweeps out. A wave of something sweeps through the soldiers, knocking them all down.

Afterwards, Thunder grabs the leg of the nearest one and uses him as an impromptu weapon to sweep the others before tossing him away and commenting, "Just worry about the planet first, Paragon. I'm more worried about it than my own safety. You should see what it's doing to my patron's domain."

"Let us hope that proves true. I am certain I could not bear having to bury another child," Paragon says with a hollow, haunted echo as she continues the charge with Porter in tow.

Starlight finds a vertical access shaft, and hearing noise from below darts down the shaft to the lower level, looking for the source of the noise she heard.

Thunder nods, then hums. "In the mean time..." He pulls his sword, using it to cut a piece of the bulkhead towards the inside of the ship and pull it off. Followed by another piece as he offers one to Paragon. They're nice, tall, and impromptu riot shields. Putting the sword away afterwards, he comments, "Think you can keep up if we just run this through whatever's in the way?"

The teen, after saying that, proceeds to do just that. The impromptu battering ram/riot shield now being used as he charges ahead of Porter and Paragon full speed. Sure it might not last, but it's definitely sturdy enough for him to run over a few people! Right?

"Yeah, yeah. Dropping the Moon on the Earth is pissing off a lot of rich people, kid," comments Breach to Thunder at the 'patron' remark. Breach chases after The Porters, holstering his little laser pistol for the moment. Instead, Breach keeps two hands on his pistol and maintains a rearguard position since Thunder has thundered off into the lead with some bulkhead plating as a shield/ram.

Thunder calls back, "Try literal /god/, old man!"

"FOUND THE PALADIN," shouts Breach.

As more Earth forces rush from the bay, other positions fall and other corridors are entered, in parallel. It's a big ship and a single line would bottleneck needlessly. Not to mention be a tactical blunder. As this group charges forward, the others work to keep pace: alongside, but not in sight in other longitutdinal corridors.

Over comms, there are calls from other groups that seem to confirm the fleet's initial assessments: they are massive energy readings ahead, indicative of the ships main reactor and the weapon's systems nearby. Not surprisingly, it is the next largest source to, and largest single draw on main power. It takes alot of energy to move planetary bodies.

The corridors soon prove to be both a blessing and curse as they move forward, however. Cross-corridors, hoziontal and vertical, make mean that the flanks of the advance are threatened, and allow re-organized and increasingly concentrated enemy forces to harass and outflank. Some of the trailing groups become pinned down anew, or divided by fire from all sides. What began as a mass charge and divided into columns is now getting divided into smaller, and smaller pieces. Some in the far rear are stopped altogether as those in front of them are pinned down.

Somewhere in the fighting, CopyCat perks up. It sounds like Breach may finally be getting into Creatures & Caverns.

Starlight swerves rapidly out the way as a changring riot shield bears down on her as she seeks out the sound of human voices. "Whoa, try not to spatter me, okay." she calls out, although having avoided the makeshift shield her voice is more amused than anything else.

Griffin turns down the hall and begins firing shots down it 5 at a time. Its mostly suppression fire to clear their path but a few brave souls try to get shots off not realizing who they're firing on with concentrated polarized electromagnetic radiation. The bolts that do strike him almost seem to shatter on his bioelectric field before being absorbed across his form, recharging him for another salvo.

His contingent fires along his side as they enter in behind him, covering his six.

Griffin can feel the way they need to go- his energy sense lighting the path forward.

Paragon catches the makeshift riot shield, though she doesn't have much need of it. At least it will help her keep Porter protected. Her eyes scan for the most direct route. She spots the equipment ahead. "Hang on, Sweetie. We're going to be meeting more resistance," she warns Porter.

Thunder shouts back, "I need more armor for that, you old arse ranger wannabe!" Thunder, notably, does not run around in heavy armor. He continues the charge before slowing down as he reaches a junction, then calls back to Paragon and Porter, "Which way were we going again!?"

Well, that's the bad part. Then he happens to spot Starlight. "Oh, hi. Sorry. Just kinda grabbed it and went with it. It worked, mostly?" He pauses, then looks behind him as he notes what happened and sighs. "Yeah, mostly." He shrugs as he looks a bit amused by that one. "I need to thank the cat lady for ideas like this."

He pauses, then hums, "Do cat ladies like catnip?"

Porter is holding on to Paragon, as he has all this way down the corridor. "We're winning, right?"

"Not yet," Paragon informs Porter. Her glowing yes shift to Thunder. "Creating hostilities with your allies only aids the enemy. Maybe you shouldn't charge ahead of you do not know where you're going." Her tone is neutral and informative.

"Oh god. The paladin's from the Navy," gasps a horrified Breach at the mention of catgirls.

While they bunch up in the intersection, Breach whips his Particle Revolver back out. He lays down coverfire for the group as they convene and decide on their advancement deeper into the planet-killer base. Orange energy bolts wreathed in blue and white electrical surges crackle down one corridor while bullets scream down the other. Breach reloads one gun and then the other during a break in the fire, switching which corridor gets which type of ammunition.

"Just pick a route and let's get moving. The longer we're here, the more likely we get pinned down."

The rushing heroes are getting closer, and now even those without special senses can note the changes in their surroundings. The corridors grow larger and fewer in number. The hum of systems and the power through them grows loud enough to be heard over the sounds of many footfalls, weapons fire, and the cries of those who catch some of the former.

But most conspicous of all is the bright light through the respective hatch ahead, and perhaps the hatch, itself. Resembling more a blast door, it is the full width and more than the height of the corridor and looks to be more than a meter thick. Whether a security precaution for such vital systems or a safety measure in case of catastrophe involving the copious amount of power generated beyond, it looks all but impenetrable.

And it's closing

If the heroes wish to advance any further, it may be now or never.

"Up ahead. MOVE!" Paragon wars as the doors start to close. She tucks Porter in close and tight and leaps ahead.

Griffin keeps his slow slog through NegaPorter's troopers with Earthforces pressing behind him.

Griffin wishes they could radio in with the others but he won't risk giving the enemy valuable intel about their progress or location.

The Super Soldier comes to an intersection. He feels which direction he should go out before reaching up and sinking his fingers into the bulkhead above. His fingers grip the metal and he wrenches it down in front of him, blocking off the other approach so they can continue on with some defense from oncoming forces. He repeats the process with a panel from the wall to double down before heading on.

Thunder leaps forward, foregoing the riot shield to chunk it at the nearest enemy soldier group with a bit of force before he crouches and leaps forward. He looks behind him briefly in mid-leap, to see if the others can keep up with him and Paragon since they seem to be the forerunner tanky types. Glancing forward again, he tries to land and push the blast door back as he calls to the other heroes, "This way! Now!"

He's not sure how strong the mechanisms behind the hatch are, but hopefully with the ki enhanced strength he can hold it back as he solidifies his stance and pushes full force against the closing blast door to try to give the other heroes time to get inside it. The only problem otherwise? He's a sitting duck!

When Paragon shouts, Breach cocks his head and looks toward the closing blast door.

"Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I got it."

Breach holsters both of his weapons as he steps out of the line of fire in the junction. He draws his other giant revolver and cocks the hammer, walking patiently down the hall toward the door so far away. Wasn't he just the one shouting about hustling? Now there's no particular hustle in the Undead Soldier?

Aiming around the leaping and flying heroes in the hallway ahead of him, Breach steadies his hands, his aim, and his breathing. With a final inhalation, Breach pulls the trigger and another rocket ROARS down the corridor, past everyone else, to detonate in the middle of the diminishing space of the doorway, somewhere around ceiling level (or beyond!) so that it can flash crystallize into another massive block of ice. Breach may be hoping that the block of ice is enough to stall the door's progress and/or that the Freeze Rocket's payload will also freeze up some portion of the door's mechanics for precious seconds.

Braced and pressing up against the door, Thunder gets the impression he's slowing it down... for about half a second. While he may, in fact, be slowing its descent, the difference will be miniscule. Hopefully as many as possible will still make it through before he has to decide to choose a side to place himself on. Option C isn't terribly appealing as it would leave him ...significantly shorter.

Breach's icemaker makes a cube that stalls the door. Just long enough to give some hope. Then it loudly shatters into thousands of pieces that would make for passable use in snowcones.

Starlight flies fast and true through the closing hatch.

Paragon lands and bleeds off her speed with a few steps. Seeing the ice shatter, she sets down Porter and her riot shield and steps up to it, placing both hands against the hatch and digging her feet in to try and slow it down while Breach and others make their way through.

While the rocket is in transit, Breach starts sprinting to catch up. He holsters his Rocket Revolver and pulls out his Line Tonfa instead. Spinning both of the metal batons in his hands, Breach takes a leap upward and forward. With a pneumatic hiss, swinglines are fired from the Line Tonfa to help accelerate Breach toward Paragon and the closing door.

Griffin flashsteps as he sees the door closing, taking a glance back at the soldiers he's protected and lead so far. In an instant he's on his way to the other side of the door, trying to brace it with his great, super charged strength.

He gives it all to try to brace and prevent the door from closing so his team can get into the area beyond.

His only other option is to try to melt it and that will likely cause other issues, so he hopes his relatively prodigious strength will do the job.

"Everyone! Hurry!" Porter is Paragon's sounding board, afterall. He isn't totally useless, otherwise, though, and stretch up on tiptoes to help Paragon push up. His archnemesis shall not prevail! That would be doors, not the other Porter, by the way. "We can't hold it for long!" 'We' being Paragon, really, and even her might only fractionally forestalls the inevitable closure.

Starlight is in, and continues her flight, intending to present a target, albeit a near unhitable one, to distract any firepower from those trying to delay the door's closing.

Griffin holds the door as long as he can, hoping some make it through.

Paragon gets pushed along slowly by the door, trying to delay it as long as possible for the heroes to get through if they can. "Sweetie...make sure to get inside," she grunts from the strain. It's been a long time since she's come across anything she couldn't hold. Griffin's added strength and others helps, but it's just delaying.

Breach accelerates to his full swinging speed, moving just as fast as his arms and Line Tonfa can carry him! Toward the end of his last swing, Breach engages the safety disconnect and clips his swingline. He goes sailing forward as he completes the lower portion of his pendulum swing and hits the floor on his armored knees. Momentum carries the sliding Breach between Paragon's braced legs and past the enormous doorway to the inner chamber.

Kicking to his feet, Breach half-sprints the last few feet that his momentum can carry him while he sheathes his tonfa again. Looking around slowly, Breach draws his sidearm and gets ready to shoot whatever threat may await the teams.

Porter steps inside as the door starts to reach a position where he could easily reach it. That means Paragon doesn't even have room to stand upright. "Ok! I'm in, but not without you!" He grabs ar her armor to try and help tug her in. She's slightly easier for him to try and move than the door. Not that that puts it in the realm of possibility. "Get clear!" he yells out to anyone on the other side, just in case.

"Come on! On three!" Griffin says, prepping to get under the door so he can hold it for a half a second so the last of them can get through. "WE CAN'T HOLD THIS MUHC LONGER!" He bellows, warning everyone on either side of the door that its about to drop. "MOVE IT!"

Paragon is straining as they start running out of room. "I'm with you...Sweetie," she says with exertion, preparing to let go and leap in. Her head turns to Thunder, and Griffin, seeing them still there. "Agreed. On three. Then go."

Thunder moves once he hears the count to get the hell out of the way. Thunder's might is obviously not fully up to holding a freaking overgrown blast door. But there's one thing that always seems to give way to in just about anything.

Once he moves on the side the heroes are on, he looks around as he puts a hand to his sword just in case.

He then comments, "Well, that didn't go so well. No troops, and just us. So, what are we looking for to break or turn off again?" The teenager's definitely got his mind on the right thing. His off hand tightened into a fist as he looks around very, very cautiously.

Paragon is relieved to see Thunder leap in, even if off timing and adding extra weight for her and Griffin to bear. "Two. Three," she counts with Griffin, and leaps out of the doorway, most certainly pulled to safety by Porter.

"We're not here to break anything- except maybe NegaPorter." Griffin says. "We're here to save the planet, kid." He adds as he turns to Thunder. "We need to keep things in tact so we can reverse whatever Porter's doing here. I'm sure Spirit would give you a good sciencey answer but all I got is 'Break something and loose the moon'. So hands off the equipment until there's a big brain in the room to work it."

Starlight nods to Griffin's comment. "That means me not touching it then. Tech things break when I get close. They always have."

Starlight continues on an upbeat note, "No soldiers, but no reinforcements for the other side either. All we have to do is defeat the ones in here."

Paragon looks towards Porter as Starlight mentions that, but she keeps quiet and looks back to the others.

The doors close with a deep, solitary rumble that bears a distinct sense of ...finality.

The chamber in which the heroes stand is very large, at least 100m across and tall and three times as deep. The rear (from the heroes' perspective) is occupied by several pieces of massive machinery, pulsing with power and shedding much additinaly illumination into the room. Around this machinery are a multitude of catwalks and consoles, many currently manned by variants of the plant aliens. Smaller and less wood-skinned than the troopers, they could well be scientists or technicians.

As the echo of the doors closing fades into eternity, a new series of sounds echo through the chamber, spaced more than a second apart.


 * CLAP*


 * CLAP*


 * CLAP*

"Bravo!" comes a man's voice, familiar to all, from a near catwalk above just ahead of the machinery( nearer the heroes than the center of the room).

After a momentary brush to straighten his suit jacket, he adds. "I'm quite impressed that you managed to make it this far."

"Maybe we should get you two on the weapons array." Griffin says with a smirk to Thunder and Starlight. The smirk is gone when he hears the voice up above. He was too busy getting in to give the place a good scan with his energy senses.

His head flashes up above to the man of the hour- NegaPorter.

Paragon coils her legs as she spots the man behind this all. "You've severely underestimated the resourcefulness and courage of humanity, then," she replies loudly, preparing to leap right for him if need be.

Looking upwards, Thunder frowns. "I don't suppose you would consider surrendering before this gets a lot worse for you?" Thunder says as he gets ready to leap as well, crouching down in preparation. The teenager's definitely looking ready just in case as he looks around. The technician types are definitely getting a bit of attention from the teen as he tries to figure out what they appear to be doing.

Starlight simply calls out, "You have one chance to surrender. You should do it now."

Breach doesn't say anything. He's got people for that in this particular instance. Instead, Breach checks his handgun quickly and then sights up on NegaPorter again while he waits for someone to light this powder keg.

"Ever eager to rush to your fates, I see," Portennant comments, noting bold words, coiled legs, perhaps even tenseness in jaws. "I would be a terrible host if I did not indulge you then, hmm? And who better to do so than my own Moira, my own Sisters of Fate!"

There is a spot of movement above, and then a rapidly-growing spot...


 * WHAM!*

.. that impacts the floor, dimpling it as it lands in a three-pointed stance. A large, armored individual... bearing a pink bow welded to the side of her helm.


 * WHAM!*

Alongside, to her left, a second, whose bow is red.


 * WHAM!*

To her right, a THIRD, this one bearing a black bow.

"Now, shall we-"

"Waah!" *CLUNK*

In attempting to get a better view, Porter steps forward, plated foot not clearing Paragon's plated foot, leaving him flailing until he faceplants on the floor. He taps out to make his helm vanish. "I'm sorry, I gotta see... oh"

Portennant glares. "Would one of you ladies PLEASE remove that bumbling idiot's head from his spine and throw it all out the nearest airlock!"

Porter blinks, turns to look behind him to see who... "Uh oh."

Paragon is already crouched for a leap, so she tries to help Porter up patiently. Ever so patiently. "It's alright, Sweetie," Paragon says softly. Her helm pans towards Portennant at his threat, eyes expanding by 150 percent of their usual diameter. "That will not happen," she states clearly. It would seem she'll be playing defense.

Telepathic message from Paragon to Porter: << I won't let them hurt you. >>

Tilting his head, Thunder looks at the two extra Paragons, then up to Porter. He comments, "You do realize once we're done with them, we're coming up there, right?" He moves to get ready, sliding into a martial artist style stance as he looks at the closest Paragon to him. The teenager seems to consider, then comments to Breach. "Didn't I see this in a movie once? Or was that an anime? Ah... any good plans for this situation, old timer?"

Paragon hears Porter's voice inside her head: << "I know you won't, Sweetie. Just don't forget about the planet, Ok?" He believes in her and trusts her completely, but there's also a hint of worry mixed with that. >>

One of those clenched jaws is most certainly Sentinel's who has fallen quiet now that they are here- the final confrontation. The final countdown until Earth's fate is revealed to all. He wouldn't miss it for the world and he's glad to have Rick Mason at his side. There is no one else he'd trust more to get the job done on the battlefield- regardless of where it is.

He turns to look at his other allies and nods before the trio of dangerous Paragons fall from up above. He steps to the side to defend Porter from them since his Alternate has made his murder a priority.

He's quiet but he's certainly not inactive.

This isn't the time to put on a show for the citizenry- this is a time to do what's required. Sentinel's stepped out of the building and Griffin Freeman, Soldier is on deck.

He clenches his fists in preparation for a grueling fight.

He smirks at Thunder's bravado.

As the Antigons rain down from the heavens, Breach safeties his sidearm and holsters it. Out comes the Rocket Revolver, getting reloaded in a hurry as he eyes the trio of undead cyborgs. Breach looks over at Thunder and then over at Sentinel.

Locking the fresh cylinder into the Rocket Revolver, Breach thumbs the hammer back as he replies to Thunder, "Go high, kid. Get the Porters to go with you."

Telepathic message from Paragon to Porter: << Paragon knows what's at stake. She's just going to have to hope she can help save everyone, including Porter. But just in case, she offers a thought. "I love you, Sweetie. Always." >>

Starlight doesn't wait. She takes off in a angry buzz of wings sweeping around to pass by the pink bow antigon kicking out toward her flank before continuing her flight up and away, moving to get behind a part of the catwalks. Aiming to position herself for a run at Negaporter's back next.

Griffin nods to Breach without breaking eye contact with the Antigon he's preparing to step in front of. He's in.

"Keep 'em in the fight Kid." Griffin says to Thunder. "We'll keep these three busy. But don't break anything but him." He points to NegaPorter


 * TINK* The tiny but high-velocity foot makes a tiny foot-dent in Pink's armor!

Red leaves the ground in a leap on her same side, arms lifted to swing in time as she leaps for ..Thunder!

Black performs a similar maneuver, arcing towards Breach! Maybe these two were confused on which was the bumbling idiot?

Paragon hears Porter's voice inside her head: << Wait. Got an idea. You don't have to choose! Kick their butts! >>

Telepathic message from Paragon to Porter: << "Wait, what? Sweetie, what're you going to do!?" She panics, thinking of when Porter had an idea with Ariel. >>

Thunder, attempting to move out of the way, ends up struck by the Paragon double and sent flying into a wall. He hits it hard enough to leave an imprint before falling forward and not really moving at all. The good news is that he looks to still be breathing! The bad, well, looks like he got hit that hard that he's feeling it at the moment.

Breach hears Blackie launching forward. His head snaps toward her armored form and then he shifts his weight automatically, training kicking in on pure reflex. The Undead Soldier drops backward, tucking himself into a ball in the process, and rolls away from the incoming HYPER MEGA FIST OF DEATH.

Porter gets back to his feet and stares back at Portennant. "You... you're... not going to win!" He tried to think of something inspiring or witty, but that's all he comes up with. He then looks past Portennant at all the ...gizmos. Probably the same gizmos that are trying play pool with the moon. Well, all that power running through all those circuits. If they're anything like human tech, they're all made by the lowest bidder, too!

There's a short at one of the panels, electricity arcing over part of of it. Alarms start to blare. A transformer-like thingy pops loose and rolls out to impact some sort of energy field surrounding the area behind Portennant, briefly highlighting the field.

Portennant eyes the flitting and darting Starlight in all her bio-energetic glory. As she starts to swing around for another pass, she suddenly gets a brief case of the hiccups, inadvertently discharging her own energy pulse. In her own face.

Sentinel winces as he sees the kid struck with enough force to stagger even him. He takes a deep breath, keeping cool so they can get the job done.

He doesn't expect to be able to stun any Antigon so easily & he's certainly not going to be able to eyebeam them into submission. He knows he needs to engage up close and hope to wear them down & stumble over each other while Thunder shakes it off.

He lets out his breath, flash stepping in between and appearing between the two nearest Antigons. He lets his energy levels rise to the surface and his bio-electric field begins to surge violently. Cosmic energy powers the Super Soldier and so, like a living star small prominences rise off of him in between magnetic field lines that twist with his motions and snap chaotically over his whole body. Plasma flicks off his form before the energy contained within the superheated air is reabsorbed by his field once more and falls back to his body.

Once he's there he bobs and weaves defensively at Red for stunning the kid and because he thinks he can at least manuever the two Antigon's into each others way a bit.

to an unsettling angle from forward to point at him. Not quite 180, but near enough.
 * THUNK* Sentinel strikes Red and ...gets her attention. Her helm pans around

Griffin meets Antigon Red's steely gaze with his own- glowing defiantly.

Pink seems to be the only one not confused. She leaps in a low arc towards Porter, right arm reared back with hand held with armored fingers tight together rather than as a fist.

There is the grinding sound of metal on metal as Pink's pointed spearhand impacts Paragon's interposed armor.

Paragon is about to go for Pink when Pink goes for Porter. Paragon sees the pointed fingers and quickly leaps into Pink's path to interpose herself in front of Porter. The metal on metal sounds worse than it is. Paragon's armor is unpunctured, but has new scratches on it.

Starlight goes for a double, continuing her flight toward Megaporter and then swooping down to have a second kick at Pink. She continues after that to get out of Negaporter's line of sight.

There's a definite difference in sounds between kicking Negaporter and the metal sheathed Pink. Success though.

Portennant is, perhaps, caught by surprise by the tiny kick. He is thrown forward and looks like he might clear the catwalk to fall down below... until a FLASH returns him to his original position via reflexive teleport. Starlight makes a *tink* as her foot hits Pink with a glancing blow.

Black strikes at Breach again, where as Red... well, this is new.

The faceplate of her helm snaps open to reveal a familiar face. Well, mostly familiar: the pale face within bears only sparse clumps of faded hair, with blank, clouded eyes and mouth seeming frozen open as if a death scream was frozen by rigor mortis. Then there is the ...tongue? thing? that darts out from the mouth at Sentinel.

Griffin is too quick- flickering out of sight for a half second before coming to a halt having spun around the blows and the kiss- and thank goodness. He has enough nightmares as it is and he only sleeps once a week.

"Okay. Warm corpse powers aren't so bad now," admits Breach to Sentinel as Red's faceplate opens to reveal... Horror. Pure. Unadulterated horror.

Breach tracks Blackie without seemingly looking in her direction, waiting for the wind up to her strike. He bends backward in a classic Matrix dodge, knees bowing outward as he watches the air around Blackie's fist ripple with the sheer magnitude of the force behind the blow. Whistling appreciatively, Breach's hand moves to his thigh to grab the butt of the Particle Revolver. Instead of drawing the weapon, however, Breach thumbs the hammer back to let the accelerator spool up to power. Narrowing his eyes behind his visor, Breach fires at Blackie's leg in an effort to drop the extremely fast murderzombie to the ground.

Portennant focuses again upon the annoying pixie flitting about. He pulls a coin from a pocket and flicks it at her. A penny for a pound, so to speak.

Porter tries to stay focused on what he's doing to the machinery, but Red's opening faceplate can't help but catch his attention... and then his horror at the face... then his horror gets horrified at the tongue thing. He tries to do something about that, but is apparently too shocked to have anything happen.

Sentinel keeps moving. Can't stop. He knows if he slows down enough to land a good solid strike they'll both do the same to him. He can't afford to take a nap- not even a catnap. Wouldn't be able to anyways as jacked up on laser fire as he is getting here.

His plan hasn't changed. He flickers towards Black and with a leaping side kick attempts to get her attention as well so Mason can get some breathing room and let his revolvers howl. He strikes her in such a way as to hopefully put the other Antigon directly between he and it.

They need an advantage against this enemy and he's pretty sure Breach is the man to change the game in their favor against these titanic forces.

Griffin keeps to plan but rises up off the ground- keeping his Coronal Mantle charged.

Sentinel strikes Black, scuffing armor while his radiant excess of personal-er energy also cooks flesh and components within the armor.

Paragon looks to Porter, worry hidden behind her faceplate. "That's not me," she tries to reassure him. She faces off with Antigon again. They have limited time to stop this machine and the moon. But Antigon might kill Porter if she leaves. That just means Paragon will have to take Antigon with her. She lunges forward, trying to get her arms around her double.

There is the squeal and grinding of more metal on metal. Plates creak and some bend as near-immovable object is constricted by nigh-unstoppable force. Pink remains singular-minded, narrow-focused, following the last directive with robotic dedication. She attempts to lash out at Porter with a foot as her arms are pinned.

...and misses.

"Oh no you don't!" Paragon says as she struggles with Antigon, lucky that she misses Porter. "Sweetie, take a step away while I try to move her."

Meanwhile, Thunder is finally starting to come around and move as he shakes his head.

Starlight darts out from cover and quickly assesses the situation. Pink is grabbed, making her an easy target. Megaporter seems to be focused on her. So with those factors in mind, and leaning on her now decades of hero experience, Starlight swings around to kick at Pink on the way to try the same against Negaporter, flying on away from Negaporter but this time staying in sight. Offering herself as a target but being largely defensive.

Portennant now flicks his pen at Starlight, though it passes by to plink against the wall. A shame, as that was his favorite pen.

Pink gain another pixie-foot dent.

Reactor enters from Starguard - Reception Area.

Black does not appear to enjoy Sentinel's strikes and/or microwaving of her organic components. He now gains her attention, as well, though her reaction is not especially frightening. Her slightly steaming armor simply gains a soft glow, that then perfectly refracts the light and energy in her surroundings and she vanishes from view.

Red, however, still wants that ...whatever she is trying to do with him as the tonguetacle lashes out again.

"Oh," is all that Breach can say as Blackie vanishes from sight.

He doesn't stand up straight though. Instead, Breach flips over onto practically all fours, scuttling away from ground zero as quickly as his legs can carry him. Breach gets upright somewhere along the way and skids to a halt, checking his distances before he lifts the Rocket Revolver again. Griffin's in the air, Thunder isn't in range, and everyone else is up in the catwalks.

How fast could a Paragon really be? Even if it is a stealth-enabled Paragon?

Breach thumbs back the hammer on the Rocket Revolver as he glares down the iron sights. With a pull of the trigger, there's another ROAR as the oversized handgun ejects a massive round that trails a pillar of fire and smoke. It detonates more or less between Griffin and Red and where Blackie once stood. Translucent sludge erupts outward in a massive blast that coats the floor and Red at the least; most of the sludge explodes in a violent flash of fire on impact with Griffin's coronal display.

Griffin is planning on keeping the Antigon's busy but with one turning invisible there isn't much he can do to assure Breach's safety without atleast letting him know.

Sentinel's warning proves accurate as Black reappears at Breach's flank, several meters distant. Worse, she re-appears with faceplate open, and with that tongue-tendril already lashing out at him. He gets a "kiss" of sorts, leaving a dab of ...goo on his cheek. That wasn't so bad. At least until his muscles stop listening to him.

"... SNAKES," roars Breach as he feels the burn of that tongue-tentacle goo sinking into his flesh. He growls while he still can, muscles locking up sharply as he tries to figure out a good way to break free. The battlefield needs engineering. Isn't he supposed to be immune to crap like this? Stupid super powers always crapping out when it's most inconvenient.

Porter pulls his eyes forcibly away from the tonguing not-Paragons and tries to focus on his original plan. Another panel amongst the many controlling the ginormous moonpushy beam blows. The bright power flowing through the machine dims and flickers some.

Griffin's warning is too late and he feels some kind of way about it, but he's fairly certain Rick Mason is supposed to be immune to crap like that so he gives his buddy a second to shake it off.

So he keeps to plan. Keep hitting Antigon's with potshots while the Porter's take NegaPorter. One of them will have to be successful and the rest should fall into place- or so they hope.

Sentinel flashsteps to Blackie- running in between his position at Red & to Blackie. Flying at these speeds makes everything stop in its tracks as if time is frozen.

It resumes as he comes to a halt next to Blackie.

He flips sideways and lays a couple of quick blows at Blackie- hoping the force applied will at least have her stumble back enough to buy Rick more breathing time but he's seen Paragon take worse.

"Now not the time for a nap, Soldier! On your feet!" Griffin says with a smirk, not realizing the poison is actually doing a number on his nervous system.

The punch dents Black further, but it may be the radiation cooking her from within that is most disagreeable. Steam pours from armor joints and the tonguetacle flails.. then flops limply. The rest of her wobbles before toppling backwards onto the floor.

Paragon is still wrestling with Antigon. The Pink one. And she has to get her away from HER Porter so she doesn't rip him in half while she's forced to watch. She tightens her bear hug on Antigon and leaps towards the barrier at ground level. She plans on using Antigon as a battering ram once she gets there!

The pair leap away, and more metal screams as it bends and buckles.

Now that Pink deems Paragon a significant impediment to her directive, her focus shifts to the ancilliary directive of removing said obstacle. A heavy foot lifts to strike at Paragon's knee.

Something cracks from that impact and Paragon stumbles, losing her hold on Antigon as she drops to a knee. The pain is so sharp, she needs a moment to recover.

Starlight sees one opposing Paragon go down. Darting at high speed on an evasive path she flies by and kicks, making sure that Antigon won't be returning to the fray, and then continues to kick at Pink again, aiming to keep whittling away her consciousness.

Black stays down, and slides via the flightly fairy feet of force. Pink adds another dent to her collection. They are getting numerous, and there are some shorting sparks arcing between them.

Starlight spots Thunder is up and active, "Hi. Welcome back. Hit the pink bow armored girl if you can before she hammers Paragon."

Thunder does a quick bend of his back, then his legs to get himself back on his feet as he looks around. Then he looks upwards as he sees well... the ring leader with most of the Paragon clones down it seems. Then Starlight says something and Thunder nods. He crouches before he leaps upwards into the air. Bringing a hand back, he almost looks like a Street Fighter character if it wasn't for the black hair streaming behind him before he descends on the Pink Paragon, aiming to land beside her and instead of punch her, tries to grab her and throw her in the direction of Nega-Porter.

Pink catches the solid blow, already deformed and twisted plates deforming further. Were her internal organs present and/or necessary, some of them would likely be punctured or bruised by the figure now twisted by so many impacts. She retains her footing, however.

The pixie wanted to be a nuisance, and she certainly has. Portennant's eyes continue to follow her, this time, as she flits about hitting his minions. Even worse, she struck HIM. He focuses a little harder on her as she kicks his toys, broken or otherwise.

Starlight's tiny foot impact on Black causes a forced exhale that spits some of that tentacle-goop upwards... to splat on Starlight's wings, sticking them together!

Starlight gulps as her wings stick together. It's especially unfortunate as she's flying fast and not that high. Shrugging her shoulders she exterts her str to tear her wings free, biting on a cry of pain as her sensitive wings are stressed severely. The goop stretches and then tears apart. Starlight is going to need a hot bath after this. But she's lost too much speed to reach her target for a kick, so she momentarily turns into her energy form and sends a beam of intense coherent light at the pink bowed antigon.

Pink happens to see the flash of light, though does no more than turn her helm towards Starlight. While not an evasive maneuver, this causes the beam to glance along the side of her helm rather than burn through the center.

The affect side of the helm burns clean off, revealing a pallid face. Fortunately, there are no tongue-snakes. In fact, her mouth is visibly sewn closed with heavy external stitches akin to long-outdated mortuary techniques. The visible part of her head is hairless, with numerous technological components jutting a centimeter or more from her skull. The visible eye is not clouded, but lit with a red glow.

Red slipped and fell in Breach's slick snotting of the floor. She still has a fondness for Sentinel, and he is in the air.. so she kills two with one. With a sound reminiscent of a nearly 100 year old animated television show, her shoulder blade plates spread and alter, sections extending and rapidly unfolding into mechanical facsimiles of angelic wings. Functional facsimiles, as she accosts Sentinel once more with a ....tongue-lashing

The Super Soldier flies up and around the charging Cybornetic Tongue of Christmas Horror in time to avoid that life-altering horror.

He turns and keeps Antigon Red in his sights.

It's probably a kindness that you're not reading the Colonial Bay comic book. There'd probably be an entire page of random intrusive thought bubbles from Breach at this point. He can't act, he can't talk, and he can't fight. So instead, Breach thinks ANGRILY and rages at his own physical impotence to help with this battle. Even so, his immune system and metabolism are already hard at work trying to burn out the goo that has penetrated his flesh and filled his bloodstream to lock up his muscles.

Gosh! Does Breach's brain have a mouth on it! Just look at all of those Comics Code Authority censored swear words!

Paragon hears Porter's voice inside her head: << He can feel the pain of something breaking. Not so rare for him, but rare to feel it from you. "Sweetie! Are you Ok?! Just keep them busy a little longer! I think it's working!" >>

Telepathic message from Paragon to Porter: << Paragon tries to control the pain and get back up. "I'll...be fine. I'll keep them distracted as long as I can, Sweetie. Just keep up what you're doing and stay safe." >>

Porter could yell out his plan. The one that may actually be mostly working. But he's not THAT Porter. He's not a villain. He doesn't tell his enemies his entire master plan at the point where they could stop it.

Behind the barrier, a relay shorts, flipping over and reversing polarity. Anyone who's watched a sci-fi vid knows that's a Bad Thing(tm), right? The power level in the machinery drops further, flickering more frequently. The plan aliens many their stations are now frantically running around. Even the barrier, itself, flickers.

Portennant has an idea of what's going on. "How is it that he is not dead already?!" He doesn't seem inclined to dirty his own hands, though. Touch THAT thing? Hardly. Besides, there is another that seems to be harassing his minions, now that the pixie was slowed: the glowing one. All that energy welled up in there. So useful. All that energy out here, also obviously useful. Let's see how the two intermix, shall we?

Sentinel's senses flicker out of focus for a moment, but that is all.

Sentinel keeps moving- in fact, he often flickers, reappearing in different positions as he twists to strike and move out of the way. He's in an intricate dance- bouncing into and out of super-speed in rapid succession.

He doesn't have time to celebrate Blackie going down. In fact just as one of NegaPorter's hits the floor their Para is forced to take a knee too & Rick is still not looking spry he notes as his head flicks to him and back again.

He vanishes, seeming to appear in an instant despite having crossed the room.

He's still flying a few inches off the ground to keep from getting sludged up by Rick's slick & dodging the very Cyborg-Monster he's come to dance with yet avoid being touched by entirely if he can help it.

Coming to a sudden halt near Antigon Red, Griffin unloads a series of quick strikes at its chest while his energy field crackles all around him.

He knows he could do more damage grabbing the cyborg but then she'd have a better chance of damaging him too. As he strikes he gets that creepy feeling that comes from looking at Porternant despite the fact that he's not looking at the man. Likely because he's become the Tyrant's target!

Red has her paint scraped, and her internals pre-heated!

Paragon grits her teeth in pain, still down on one knee. Her damaged left one. She tries to rise to her feet from her, but half way up, her left knee grinds and clicks with the sound of angry servos that can't straighten. So she applies a little good old fashioned elbow grease and punches her knee back into place. TING! She rises up to her feet and steadies herself as she clears her head. "You still have to go through me before you can get to your objective," Paragon informs Antigon Pink, trying to buy Porter the time he requested through their mind link.

Pink's half-helm pans, visible eye narrowing as it returns to her Primary Target. She crouches, not unlike how Paragon did when she first spotted Portennant. There is a pause, and then she leaps for the Porter who's steadily ruining expensive and possibly irreplacable machinery.

(In Porter's defense, he's admittedly doing it on purpose and for a good cause, for a change!)

Telepathic message from Paragon to Porter: << SWEETIE! >>

Pink's pointed hand hits Porter's suit, and goes through. Then Porter, and goes through... and out the other side to *THUNK* into the massive hatch that they barely made it through. It isn't until Pink's chestplate, itself, impacts the impaled Porter that there is any momentum tranfeser. This then sends him into the hatch, to bounce back, to rebound back, for several iterations like a rather gory paddle ball.

"Ow..."

And he slumps, still dangling.

Paragon hears Porter's voice inside her head: << "Ohcrap! Ow. You... got ...this." *DIALTONE* >>

Starlight shouts out, "Someone take Pink out of the picture."

Paragon's head follows Antigon's arc over her, trying to grab her, but much too slow. Her eyes expand as she realizes where Antigon's going, and Portennant's command to Antigon. "No..." she starts, turning much too slowly, but with plenty of time to see Porter get impaled and pinned to the hatch. "NO!" she screams physically and psychically. And even still, Porter tries to give her mental encouragement before there's just....dialtone and disconnect.

And in counterpoint to Paragon's cry, from above comes a resounding "Yes! For the love of me, it is about time!"

And so it's proven that Red isn't the only variant which can fly, as Thunder chucks pink into the catwalk near Portennant. It doesn't hit him, though it does deform and twist the railings and part of the -walk to a form-fitting partial casket for Pink.

In the process, Pink's arm is removed from Porter, who drops a mercifully short distance into a pile of Porter on the floor.

Starlight flies straight to the downed Porter, "Keep those tin-cans away from us." she instructs in a doctor's voice. Putting a small hand and arm into the gapping hole torn in the armor she immediately sends healing bio-energy flowing into Porter.

Thunder, meanwhile, after the throw, calls up to Nega-Porter, "Wait until I get up there! I'm going to pound that smug face in!" And this from someone who just chunked a Paragon-clone into a catwalk, too!

Red is getting tired of this little dance with Sentinel, or at least her lack of progress in it. Her armor alters again, numerous shards now jutting from it. Not just sharp shards, but covered in jagged metal barbs. The Tonguetacle retracts into her mouth and her faceplate closes. One hand lift to Sentinel, fingers folding in a 'come hither.' gesture.

Breach strains as he feels his body heat continuing to soar. He actually starts sweating as his body burns out the invasive substance that's locked out his muscles. Rather suddenly, Breach stumbles forward and lets out a victorious roar. The Undead Soldier rips the Particle Revolver from its holster again as his brown eyes track toward Red and her suddenly barbed appearance.

Up comes the heavy revolver, hammer cocked and the particle accelerator inside of the weapon screaming. He resists the urge to narrow his eyes, the act wasted with his mirrored orange face lens in the way. Sass and sarcasm eschewed, Breach opens fire on Red while George Thorogood and the Destroyers rock out in the back of Breach's mind.

The shot burns its way into armor and throws Red forward and off-balance in the air. Now flesh is smoking from more than just Sentinel's microwaving.

Porter bleeds, though less, due to Starlight's care (though having less lefy to lose sort of helps, too). Portennant glances to the downed Black, the smoking Red, and the twisted walkway nearby bearing Pink. His Fates are not quite inflicting fate to his design nor satisfaction. If just to not be present should it collapse, he vanishes in a flash of light, reappearing as he looks from behind the stairwell to said catwalk. Cover? Caution? The situation may have turned.

Beyond the room, it has, as well, as comm chatter erupts from those fighting the pitched battle outside in the black. First, reports (uncomfirmed or not, they're spreading) that the moon's rate of travel has drastically slowed. Second, a battle that seemed only of attrition (which Earth forces had less to spare to lose), has also shifted. All due to the arrival of another "fleet" of metahumans from the moon, lead by 'some glowing purple guy' and including a number of those who might have been incarcerated on said moon, were they apprehended.

So they waited for the heroes to do most of the heavy lifting and take most of the losses before moving in. Would anyone expect anything less of villains?

Sentinel shudders at the thought. He gives a look that says he'd rather fly into the Sun than get anywhere near Antigon Red. Once Antigon Red goes full Pinhead Razorhog on him he changes tactics.

Especially now that Rick is back on his feet. A smirk slides across the Super Soldier's bearded face now that Mason's back. "Good to have you on my six, Brother." He says over his shoulder to his Army Bro.

Rick's shot gives him an opening.

He pulls in his coronal mantle and shunts that energy right into his hands- matching the energy signature of Rick's blast before pouring it onto Antigon too.

The energy builds up over his hands, causing the air to crackle around him as he squeezes it tighter and tighter. He brings his hands together and the energy begins to build higher until it looks like he's holding a sphere of energy. He knows they've got to get past these Antigons if they have a hope of seeing tomorrow. Plus since they didn't run into their dupes a Knockout/Kill Tally will be the only thing that will determine who's buying the first round at the bar after this.

Whether from copying Breach's blast or just the one-two punch of the pair, it proves effective. Red is blasted back even as armor and organics are burned through, barbed body flying -just- past Breach on her way to impact the floor and skid with horrid screeching and sparks. She doesn't look to be moving to get up.

Pink rises from her not-quite half-casket of catwalk.. or, rather, pushes herself out to land on the ground below. For the moment, she just scans targets.

There's a job to do. Two birds, one stone? Paragon is tempted to throw Portennant right through that dang barrier. Even though Antigon was the one that harmed Porter, she's just a tool. A puppet. And the puppet master behind all of this is still standing. Her eyes brighten by 50 percent before she leaps up and over to land before Portennant with a heavy, rattling thud. Her right arm cocks back as she regards him. There's all manner of emotion on her face, but none that he can see. She's looking down at a twisted version of her sweetheart's face, and it takes a moment to bring herself to do what she must. "This is the end of all your plans for world conquest, James." Her arm rockets forward towards his neck.

The (relatively) nearby Pink leaps into action, literally. Legs thrusting her armored form for the narrow space between Paragon and Portennant. The half-visible blank expression on her face does not so much as twitch. As Paragon noted, she is only a tool.. There is no conscience, concern, selflessness and certainly not affection behind her action. Only programming.

She leaps... but is too slow to cross the distance in time. Paragon has a rare opportunity to see something that torments her, but from the other perspective. Karma? Justice? Call it what you will.

Portennant makes an unexpected sound. A yelp. Right before it's cut off by Paragon's tight grip. Though it wasn't a very good yelp. Porter's are much better, from far more practice.

Starlight continues healing while activating her sense health sense.

Starlight mutters, "This is going to take a while. I have to rebuilt his right lung, liver, speen, ribs, and repair damage to his spine." She looks over to Paragon, "Porter's going to fine. Nothing life threateni9ng." .oO(Since I'm here.)

Paragon's eyes shade to red as she hears the list of damages to Porter, staring down the yelping Portennant.

Breach looks over at Sentinel as his Army Bro unleashes a duplicate of his own Particle Revolver's shot. The Particle Revolver gets holstered again as Breach starts walking toward Paragon, Portennant, and Pink. He ejects the cylinder again, swapping in a fresh cylinder once again. Snapping the Rocket Revolver closed, Breach turns his iron sights on Pink while he comments off-handedly to Sentinel, "You think Shadow the Hedgehog there's gonna stay down?"

Demonstratively, Breach jerks his helmet at Red. He promptly fires the Rocket Revolver at Pink again. This rocket comes apart in stages as it closes the distance until a single, small cylinder hopefully impacts the undead cyborg's helmet and affixes by undescribed means to do its terrible work.

That... well, Pink doesn't seem to like that very much. Her limbs and torso spasm and flail with enough force to dent and scar the deck. If she was intending to rise, it may take a little longer than calculated previously.

Portennant flails at Paragon's forearm, though only once, reflexively. They both know he's not going to be prying her fingers free. He then regains his composure, glaring defiantly and going so far as to smooth his suit. He even manages a smile, through which he hoarsely taunts. "What are you going to do? Arrest me? I will not be held. I will return. And when I do, I will not come for you first. You will be third, of course. After him. After her."

Paragon's eyelights narrow down to red slits. "Did you...just threaten....my family?" she says between clenched teeth.

Griffin nods. "I sure hope so, but if not we can hit her with another One-Two Knockout Punch." He says confidently offering his fist to bump. "If she moves, I'll feel it. You'll be the second to know."

Sentinel leaps towards the flickering forcefield and looks for emitters to destroy or perhaps drain directly.

Griffin nods. "I sure hope so, but if not we can hit her with another One-Two Knockout Punch." He says confidently offering his fist to bump. "If she moves, I'll feel it. You'll be the second to know." He adds, showing he's still taking this very serious.

He nods his head with approval as Breach drops Pinkie Pie Antigon with his EMP Shock Therapy treatment. "Ok- next time we're facing alien robots you start with the EMP." He says to Mason with a chuckle.

He looks around at their handiwork.

"Good job everyone. But we're not through yet. Lets go make the world safe for Tomorrow." He says so joyfully that it borders on saccharine sweet. He's feeling like they did the nigh-impossible here today- even with the cost so high, he knows their freedom is worth it.

Sentinel leaps towards the flickering forcefield and looks for emitters to destroy or perhaps drain directly.

Thunder looks over to the two soldiers. "So... question, but... I know Paragon's considered alive, are they alive?" He motions at the clones of her before looking up at the catwalk. He overhears, perhaps, before he calls up, "Paragon! Don't do it! He's not worth it!"

Pink continues to flop like a fish on land... albeit a fish that can juggle tanks.

"Do you think Pulse Rockets grow on god damn trees?"

Breach shakes his head a little bit at the suggestion of using those first.

"If they are, kid, I pity them and their existence."

Paragon may not be listening to Thunder. Or completely in disagreement as she regards Portennant's smug smile. She seems still for a moment at his taunts, before her hand snaps forward again to aim at this throat.

Thunder moves past Paragon and Portennant as he heads for the shield surrounding the equipment. His sword comes out as he gets closer, and he starts to hack at the shield to see how tough it is. Mystic sword plus energy shield, what will happen?

Paragon's cold metal hand wraps around Portennant's throat. "You seem to like to torment me. Was it because the Paragon on your world would not bow to you, or act as you accorded? Or maybe she broke that withered thing you call a heart," she says coldly as she begins to tighten her grip. She's shut off her emotion circuit for the moment to think with cold, cool logic. Her grip tightens further. She calculates the amount of force applied, factoring Porter's luck. This might be enough.

Griffin can be heard chuckling as he hurls himself towards the forcefield again.

He reaches for a projector directly while Thunder tries to slice and dice the field itself.

Griffin lets the energy flow away from the projector and into himself- hoping to drain it enough for hte others to get through.

<<"Maybe not on trees. But I bet Bad Company would love to keep you well stocked knowing those babies just saved the world." He replies over radio since he's a bit ahead.

With limited breath as she squeezes, there's no attempt at a yelp, much less anything more pained or loud. Some part of his jaw under her thumb cracks, and metal fingers break skin to make it bleed... though Paragon can see a sheen of metal form to 'clot' over them to repair. Her bio sensors confirm that the same is happening within. Porter does have his nanites. Portennant's just don't require anything so gauche as a 'doohickey.' They repair, but not in pace with the force applied.

Portennant uses his limited air, instead, to cough out, "She could have won, but she never had the dedication. The will. Neither do you."

Between the draining of its power by Sentinel and the interference of Thunder's sword, the field flickers heavily and winks out! This is enough to send the remaining technicians scattering for... anywhere but here. They're not combatants, no matter what their enlistment may have said.

Moving quickly once the field is down, Thunder catches one of the technicians, hoisting it off of it's feet so he can ask it the most important question. "How do we turn it off?" Hopefully they understand English!

Breach holsters his Rocket Revolver again. He casts sidelong glances at both Red and Pink, not entirely trusting them not to reanimate. That said, Breach continues patiently toward Paragon and Portennant while he draws his sidearm from its holster in the small of his back. Or is that a different sidearm from the one(s) he was using earlier?

"You can let go of him," intones Breach to Paragon. He holds his sidearm out in front of him and racks the slide with his other hand. The hammer is manually left cocked as Breach flicks the safety off with his thumb. Breach moves his free hand toward Portennant's face as he expectantly waits for Paragon to disgorge him from her massive, armored grip so he can take hold of him by the face.

"Go help Sentinel and the kid with getting this place under control. I got this, Paragon."

Judging by the (to Thunder) frantic unintelligible babbling, the eightball states: the outcome is bleak.

Thunder frowns, then calls to the others, "They don't speak English!" He drops the technician before he starts to look around at the consoles. Trying to make headway of them.

Paragon leaps towards the forcefield, carrying Portennant with her. "You must have a death wish to keep taunting me after who you threatened," she states. It's difficult, having to come face to face with a Porter that's cruel and nothing like hers, but who looks so damn close. Seeing the nanites, she realizes she miscalculated. She squeezes again, continuing to crush Portennant's throat. "Tell us how to put the moon back in place if you want to live to see a trial." Her head pans to Breach as she lifts Portennant off his feet. She's being calculated. This won't kill him. She still won't cross that line. Sadly, Portennant is right about that. Her eyes shift down to Breach's hand as he clicks off his weapon's safety.

Breach looks down at the gun in his hand. His helmet pans back upward slowly as he looks directly at Paragon's helmet.

"I don't think he's going to respond to your threats, Paragon. He knows you pretty well."

With the Forcefield down Griffin charges ahead a few paces behind the young hero, Thunder. He knows they're going to need a technical resource back through here as he looks over the controls and the various systems beyond. This is all well outside of his wheelhouse as a soldier & a hero.

"I'd settle for a button that opens those blast doors so we can get our techs in here." Griffin says to Thunder as he continues looking around.

Thunder looks to Sentinel. "I assume that you might have some idea? I'm a bit blank, and I definitely don't know the tech here." He starts looking carefully, specifically for possible ways out of the room as well.

"No, he doesn't. His Paragon never had a daughter. A family." Paragon looks towards Portennant as he dangles in her grip and squeezes his throat more. "Did she? You doesn't have a concept of family. Or how far I would go to protect mine and the planet."

"No clue kid, but we brought plenty with us. As long as they were as successful as we were holding the line." Griffin says. "But we've got to get that bulkhead door open if we want outside assistance I'm guessing. This is likely one of the most fortified locations in the ship." He explains.

He turns and begins flashstepping between consoles until he finds a likely candidate for unsealing the bulkhead doors they enteredthrough. "Here goes nothing..." He says as he flips the switches he thinks control that massive door.

There is a low rumble as the absurdly reinforced very large blast doors begin to open!

Paragon has slightly less success as Portennant croaks out. "I would not turn it off if I could."

"But you can," Paragon says as she walks him towards the consoles. "You're lucky, aren't you?" she says as she gives another full strength squeeze of his neck after the nanites have managed to heal him up some. What she wants, more than anything, is to see to her Porter. But until the earth is safe, she can't go to him yet. Finally, she looks to Breach. "What...are you going to do to him?"

"Make him understand that answering my questions is non-optional," replies Breach.

Griffin lets out a little cheer when he gets the right console and opens the bulkhead door. If he knew the trouble the otheres were having he'd tell them to jsut toss Porternant out an airlock and see if they have someone aboard who can do the heavy lifting with the gadgets, waldoes and humdinging-do-dads.

Paragon stares down into Portennant's eyes one more time before, with a deep breath, holding him out to Breach to take. "I'll do what I can to help with the systems."

Portennant lets out a gurgle as Paragon squeezes again. Hmm. The repair nanites could be fun? Squeeze. Wait. Squeeze. Like a delayed squeak toy?

Taking point on backup is still dramatic. The doors open, and a mass of armed units make their ways inside. "Para!" Ally calls out, wearing what appears to be some sort of bandolier of gear and such. But it's who and what she is. "You four, over there!" she calls out, gesturing to send a few of the forces off to give support somewhere off to one side.

But then she surges towards Paragon, hoping that she can find some way to help. Also, happy to find her safe and sound.. for the most part.

Paragon is intact, though she's holding the villainous James Porter by the throat and has been crushing his throat at full strength. It still hasn't been enough to do more than earn her taunts. The real Porter was just flown over by Ally as Starlight tends to the massive hole punched clean through him. All that blood explains why Paragon is doing what she's doing now. "Ally...we need your help with this device to put the moon back in its place," she explains in hollow tones. She's holding Portennant out towards Breach so he can take charge of the villain.

Amidst the massive influx of Earth forces, Red and Black both begin to ... dissolve into...goo. The goo then seems to evaoprate, leaving nothing behind. Self-sestruct mechanism, perhaps?

Breach takes Portennant from Paragon's iron grip. He grips Portennant by lower jaw, thumb and forefinger pressing into the muscle to force that jaw open as his other hand comes up to roughly shove the barrel of his sidearm into Portennant's mouth.

"Allow me to introduce myself, James. I'm Breach."

There is a shift in the pressure on Portennant's jaw. It's the kind of thing that makes joints creak and groan.

"If you fail to answer, I will not hesitate to test how good your rapid recovery is. If you try to escape, I will hunt you down and kill you with a spoon. Do you understand the rules?"

The Colonial Bay Sentinel is about to let out a cheerful SitRep across all Earthside bands & the bands originally used for this world saving operation. He is preparing himself for what he might say on this occasion and then inform them all that a technical asset is required for the final leg of the mission when Allison Temple makes her way through the bulkhead door.

She is a welcome sight for the heroes who managed to make it through the last door and face NegaPorter & his Bevy of baleful Paranots (Antigons).

He smiles.

Suddenly he knows just what to say. He clicks over on multiple channels & gives his sitrep to the fleet. <<"We've contained the Alternate James Porter successfully & we've taken control of ships core systems. Today- we've shown a Tyrant the door & just the lengths we'll go to keep our friends, family & freedoms safe from would-be conquerors!"

Paragon watches for a moment as Breach takes over, eyes dimming as she watches, until she can't watch anymore. She turns and starts walking towards the consoles.

Portennant can't annunciate an answer so clearly with a barrel in his mouth, so he does what he can. His eyes meet Breach's without the slightest hint of fear;shoulders roll lightly and he leans forward slightly, taking more of the barrel. Perhap he's hungry or has a lack of iron in his diet?

"Jules. Medical texts. Stat." says Ally as she glances down and sees Porter's condition. Julius manifests and produces a holo of a medical encyclopedia. "Trauma injuries are in chapter thirty seven. Allow me." he says as the 'book' flips to the proper information. Just in case anyone needs to consult with the info (complimentary skills?)

Even as he does that though, Allison is surging forward, "What do I need to know about it before I interface with it?" she asks on the way.

Pink remains on the deck, thrashing stopped, and now acting as a rather large paperweight.

Its only as Allison heading to Porter and not ot the giant systems behind him that he flashsteps to her. "Switch. I'll keep Porter breathing. You reverse this damned Moon Cannon. Please." He says to Interface ebfore flashstepping to Porter.

He's got his field kif in hand when he reappears next to Porter, already crouching.

"Incorrect answer," hisses Breach.

The Undead Soldier twists sharply, flipping Portennant over his hip and driving him down into the deck plates on his back. Breach straddles Portennant's hips and releases the other man's face to pull the knife out of its sheath on his chest. With a twist, Breach aims to drive his kerambit into Portennant's chest.

"Nobody's killing anyone here. RIGHT?!" asks Allison as she starts examining the machinery. She isn't stupid enough to just jump in before analyzing the things.

Inclining her head. Allison smirks. "No matter how complicated they make their tech... it always just takes the right amount of pressure at the right place to make it stop working." That said, she reaches a hand out and presses her palm to the machine. After two seconds, the power cuts off to it and the whole mass driver powers down. "Just had to get my hands on it. Turns out, the power source can be interrupted with the right application of energy."

Griffin sucks his teeth at Allison's question. Perhaps he opened the bulkhead door just a minute too early. Had he known the moral quandry on the line- well he wouldn't have had any qualms about doing what's necessary here. He put the world in his crosshairs & has already said he was coming back- liekly to doit again. If only Griffin had super hearing.

Instead his energy sense tells him everything is alright.

Paragon draws closer to Allison. "You stopped it from pushing the moon further. Can you operate this to get the moon back in proper orbit?"

"I can probably reverse it. But that'll take more time and effort. It's not a simple switch for that. I'll need to make sure that -everything- is right before I do anything. The moon is kind of a big deal." offers Allison. "But.. if you all can help me with some of the heavy lifting and things, I'm sure we can -eventually- do it.

Slammed into the floor by Breach, Portennant has regained more air post-Paragon strangle than is lost from the impact on the ground. Enough to laugh. Even as the blade drives into his chest, possibly with point hitting the deck.

"Too ...late.."

He laughs again, this time gurgling up blood. Not as much as the bumbling idiot, but it's there.

Then there's not a new breath drawn for anything further.

Many of the arriving masses see this. There is a collective intake of breath and then...

..mostly a chorus of loud cheers.

Breach, the man who took down The Tyrant!

Paragon's head turns at the slamming sound and metal striking the deck. Her eyes widen. "What...what have you done?!" She's frozen for a moment. She wanted to hurt him, but not kill him. She leaps over and lands by Breach. "You...he...should have faced a trial of his peers," she says in shock, performing a quick scan of his life signs.

Griffin flashsteps to Mason. He puts a hand on his friend's shoulder and crouches down to say, "Guess you just hit the Daily Double, Soldier." He laughs as the crowd cheers.

Frowning a lot. Thunder turns away, shaking his head and heading out of the room. That's not going to sit well with the younger hero. Probably not at all. He glances back, "Heroes... don't kill." He comments off hand, then shakes his head as he moves on. With the world saved, well... Thunder's probably going to try to catch a ride back to Earth now. Somehow.

Paragon doesn't cheer with the rest. She feels...hollow inside. And relieved? And troubled. "What did he mean by too late?" she asks as she takes a knee, unable to determine anything solid from her scans.

Breach doesn't celebrate. It's not something he celebrates. It's not something he takes pride in at all. When Breach is absolutely certain that Portennant's body is still and dead under him, Breach climbs to his feet and rips both his knife and his gun out of Portennant's body as Paragon smashes into the deck plating next to them both.

"I got answers," replies Breach. Both weapons go into one hand before Breach offers them to Paragon. "You can take me into custody after we make sure this place isn't booby trapped. He seemed to think something was funny and that it was too late."

Looking over at Thunder, Breach shrugs at the teenager.

"I never claimed to be a hero."

Paragon isn't thinking clearly. She still has a prime directive to protect life and seek justice, even if it's from a villain such as Dr. Destroyer or James Porter. After all this, she's too emotionally compromised to function properly, though. She tries stopping the bleeding. Chest compressions. She falls short of mouth-to-mouth because...she just can't bring herself to. "This isn't an answer!" she shouts at Breach. She turns her head away from the bloodied weapon and the gun. "This...isn't right..."

Thunder stops, then turns to look at Breach. "No, you're not. And don't ever claim to be either." Then he turns to walk out, disappearing into the crowd. "Enjoy your five minutes of fame for killing an unarmed, defenseless man." Is his parting shot. Then Thunder is gone, moving through the crowd with no problem. Those that get in the way are just pushed through.

"I didn't enjoy the last fifteen minutes of fame," mumbles Breach to himself, "Why would I enjoy the next five?"

The Undead Soldier disarms himself, leaving all of his weapons in a pile next to Paragon and Portennant. He promptly goes to make/lead a thorough inspection of the entire section of the facility. Breach doesn't trust people. When their dying words are 'too late', he trusts them even less. Color him paranoid if he tries to find any sort of trap or deadman switch in the area.

Paragon's eyes drift to the weapons Breach leaves behind, then back to Portennant. She keeps trying, futility, to render first aid and get a pulse. It starts becoming half-hearted as there are no results. Persistence is part of first aid training, but she's losing heart. The only thing keeping her working at the moment is her ethics and knowing her Porter is in safe hands. Behind her faceplate, tears are running down her cheeks. This is her fault. If she hadn't handed him over to an unknown, they would've taken him into custody. There's literal and figurative blood on her hands.

Paragon finally surrenders after making no progress for some time. She's silent and stares for several moments, filled with regret. She rises to her feet at last, sighing heavily, then leaps over to her Porter and Jackie, hoping she's made progress. She's not sure she's ready to see what happened to her Sweetie up close, but she has to be there for him now.