Log:Art is Pain

2015/01/26 Felicia Frankie Grimm Pelana Porter 1 In the Artist Quarter...

It is one of those artsy fartsy scenes where people with moderate to no talent that think they are going to be the next Picasso or Rembrandt show off their 'master pieces.' There crowd is as sparse as the talent, which doesn't make two of the 'artists' any less likely to get into a massive shouting argument outside the gallery. Both men, dressed in all too skinny jeans and vneck shirts three sizes too small are actually throwing art supplies at each other while shouting obscenities about the quality of the other's work.

Grimm is stepping out of the diner, one of her go-to places for studying and snacking. As she slips her messenger back over her hsoulders, she glances over to the arguing artists nearby. Heh, artists. Dramatic much?

The narrow alleys and architectural idiosyncracies of the Artist's Quarter make it prime territory for photographers seeking moody and atmospheric backdrops or skylines, or, at the other end of the spectrum, parkour enthusiasts who view their surrounds not so much as a work of art as a roller coaster ride. It is in the latter capacity that Felicia swings from pipe to guttering to overhand and onto the pavement below miraculously avoiding any passers-by as though that was her aim.

Pelana, on the other hand, is here because it's stylish to be seen here, and she HAS been looking for things to decorate her still-newish home. Granted, with the scales involved she's more likely to pick up some grand sculpture than a nice little painting, but she looks at the fight with some amusement. If the two were actually hurting each other, she might have to step in, but this... hey, maybe it's performance art!

It's unclear why Ghostfist is here, though from the expression on her face astute readers may suspect the gumshoe is still in pursuit of her lost time. Stalking through the blustery evening in the Artist's Quarter, Frankie looks deep in thought up until a can of paint goes skipping by in front of her boots, leaving a trail of reddish slime spread across the sidewalk and into the street proper.

Slowly, Ghostfist's head lifts from her thoughts and swivels toward the battling artists. One dark eyebrow quirks upward as she regards the duo, perhaps waiting to see who will win the chance to be her bridge over spilled paint.

As the two artists continue their argument four shimmering patches of air come into view. They measure 4 feet tall and a foot wide, the shimmering patches resolve into the shape of like sized robots, the four of them standing on three thin stilts, wicked looking armatures swivel around the tops, bright red lines march around the rims. Lasers sweep over the area and the closest figure speaks, "We are here for the art." The words are as stilted as the robots.

Felicia blinks. Teleporting robots here after street art. Not something you see every day, her lips purse for a moment. "You know, time travelling and stealing stuff is rude."

Pelana calls out, "I dunno, it's pretty horrible art, I'd imagine if anything we should be relieved. I mean, it's not MY problem robots have bad taste, is it?"

Robots resolve into being around the artists' general location. Frankie Ghostfist's expression contorts into one of willful disbelief for several seconds, her gaze panning around the area to see if she is, in fact, on Candid Camera. After determining that yes, Virginia, both Santa Claus and mystery art robots are real, Ghostfist cocks her head to one side.

"Do your android souls dream of electric artwork or something?"

Grimm raises an eyebrow slightly. First ninjas, now robots? Hopefully they're just trying to understand art appreciation? She watches the fighting artists, the robots, and then notices a familiar face and offers a wave to Ms. Justice.

Leading robot seems to take offense at Pelana's statement about the art, it turns to focus the lasers on large dragon lady. "You offend us, this art will save this world. We need it before it is destroyed by these fools." One stilted arm points at the the artists behind it. The artists take offense to Pelana's words as well, one of throwing a bottle of red paint at the dragonlady.

"My art is AMAZING THE ROBOTS WANT IT!"

"They don't want your art, they want MY ART!" The second artist shouts as he takes a running leap at his foe. The various sundries that are deemed too unvaluable to steal out on the sidewalk are crushed as he does so.

Felicia heaves a sigh and steps over to pick up the tangled knot of ego, vanity, and unfulfilled talent. "Nobody said it was your art they're after, could be someone else's that you nitwits crush." She tries to grab each by the collar and hoist them high enought that they can't do real harm.

"They didn't say they wanted either of your artwork. They said that you two were going to destroy the artwork that's going to save the world," comments a grouchy Ghostfist. She tips her head and a little two finger salute in Grimm's direction. Calmly the gumshoe starts strolling toward the robots, hazel eyes darting back and forth between all of the available targets as she tries to gain more information.

Pelana neatly dodges the poorly-thrown paint. She's already red enough. "Hey, now, if you wanna fight, I got PLENTY of fight for alla you, you know. Do you even know who you're talkin' to?!" Her face clouds and she begins stalking towards either the robots or the artists, or perhaps both.

Grimm grimaces as things begins to escalate. "Hey, it's just art, guys..." is perhaps the exact wrong thing to say to people that love art. "It's not worth throwing stuff around and putting each other's skills down. Everyone's style is different?" She adjusts the strap on her messenger bag as she prepares for the inevitable escalation point.

As the artists crash into each other and a small piece of pottery falls to the ground and the robots begin to whine in anger. And it's at that point that the lasers start to go haywire, "THEY HAVE DESTROYED IT! ELIMINATE THEM ALL!"

Felicia blinks. <> she reacts instinctively, covering the distance to the nearest robot, rather than take the shortest route however she moves round behind and back-hands this robot trying to aim it at the nearest of its friends. "What good is kiling everyone going to do dumpster-brain. And why don't you talk via radio?"

The hit occurs, but doesn't actually seem to do any damage to the robot as blue energy flares around him, reducing the damage done by the hit.

Grimm winces as the pottery breaks, and then her eyes widen as the robots go berserk over that thing. "I...I can fix it! I can fix it! I..." she stares at the pottery very hard and tries making a wish. "...can't fix it..." she groans after nothing happens.

The robots go berserk over pottery. Ghostfist quirks an eyebrow, glances over at the shouting Grimm, and then looks back toward the robots and artists. She reaches into an interior pocket and produces a pair of mirrored sunglasses as she fixes her gaze on the robots.

"It looks like things here," intones Frankie, pausing dramatically to settle her sunglasses over her eyes, "Just went to pot."

The Robot that was hit by Frankie whirls around and one arm whips out in an attempt to hit the thing that tried to stop the recovery of the art. "YOU HAVE DOOMED US ALL."

Felicia seems to regard dodging as either a sign of weakness or way too hard and simply takes the hit which threatens to knock her off her feet but sticking out a hand she cartwheels back to upright position. "What's the point? Why not travel back in time to when it came out the kiln? If it was destroyed how do you know it's the right pot? You've got no idea, you can't come from a time *after* the world was destroyed, so you're basically gussing and now you're just throwing a hissy fit." A big attack like that would convince most people to talk less.

The robot nearest to Ghostfist opts to take offense to her pun, it's arm spinning out to smack at the sunglass wearing hero. "YOU MOCK OUR PAIN!"

Porter doesn't know anything about art.... unless it happens to be food. Such as the greasy spoon diner with the ridiculously awesome cheese fries and burgers. Why is the food so good? Because of all the starving artists, of course! Always business, and artists are finicky folks.

He exits the diner with his date for the evening. His most recent lady. The little one, strapped to his chest. Just because she can't joni in all the wonderful food doesn't mean he can't work on her appreciation of it... but it does mean he doesn't have to share.

Felicia blinks. "Ummmm.... Life is pain Princess." Her brows furrow. "What the hell is a robot doing whining about their emotions? And why do you say everything out loud? You could have radioed one another the exterminate message and you'd have had surprise."

Seeing the Robots begin to turn to eliminate the artists, an outline of blackness appears around Grimm as she holds her hands with fingers outstretched towards each artist. "Okay, did this one before...I can do it again..." she murmurs under her breath as she tries to concentrate and make it happen on purpose. Her eyes are closed and her brow furrowed. And then her eyes fly open, completely black. "Art guys? Trust me on this, I got you covered. But I suggest you run away from here as fast as possible. NOW!" she commands as her fingers curl in to close her hands. The two artists and Gabrielle begin to turn into darker shadows of themselves and semi-transparent.

The artists decide that they don't really want to be turned into pulp, although they both consider how much more famous that would make their work. Either way they don't fight the pull into the shadow realm. They start looking around for new ways to interpret the world.

"Hell yes I mo-"

Ghostfist doesn't get to finish that sentence. She is hit dead in the chest with an armature, lifted several inches off of the ground, and sent hurtling backward. There is a very faint nimbus of greenish energy around her body as she sails backward that drags her quite quickly back to the Earth. Frankie promptly curls her body in on itself, rolling gracelessly, but efficiently to a stop about two meters from where she started. Inexplicably, Ghostfist comes out of the roll in a catcher's crouch, glaring at the robots.

Pelana is delighted by the lack of bystanders, because she can do the things she does best. Namely, rampage around like a giant monster. She drops her shrinking magic, so in seconds there's a hundred feet of angry red dragoness looming over the combatants... and then, well, it's easy enough to stomp one of them, with her foot. It's as good an idea as any!

As Pelana stomps on the two robots they flicker for half a second before the blue energy around them seems to deflect most of the damage.

"If you want to stare around at the colors, try acid! But for now, run! I can't keep this up for long!" Gabrielle barks at the artists in irritation.

The two artists flip Gabrielle the bird as they dive back into the gallery their art is in.

Felicia looks a little non-plussed that her first attack had no effect and insted tries wrapping her opponent in a grapple. "You guys don't seem like real future robots. Is this like a video show or some sort of stunt to check out Colonial Bay heroes?"

Felicia moves clos to grap the robot's wrists and pin them behind its back. Shifting a knee to keep it slightly off balance. "So 'fess up, you expect me to believe homicidal future-bots throw around..." Her jaw drops open. "Any chance that those artists are robbing the gallery while we're fighting these things?"

"Seriously? -Seriously-?" Gabrielle says in exasperation as she takes back her gift of protection, which may have started a new art movement inadvertantly. She begins to solidify and regain color. Well, some color, since she was wearing mostly black to begin with. Inside, the artists become solid again, too. While Gabrielle fumes at being flipped the bird, and without her quite noticing, a massive shadow tentacle snakes out of her field of darkness and snaps out towards one of the free robots to try and snag it.

Blue energy flares around the grabbed robot who then disappears into nothing.

The kraken-sized tentacle winds around one of the robots and squeezes its appendages to its size. Then it hefts it up several meters up before slamming it down on the pavement like a metal club. Gabrielle blinks and looks over to the tentacle acting on her frustration. "Ack! Well...that worked...at least..." she murmurs as she rubs the back of her head in worry.

Porter what does Porter expect to find walking out of the diner? Well... not a giant Pel stomp on robots, Felicia smacking robots after they smack Frankie, or Gabrielle and her shadows crushing robots. "Pel? Grimm? Frankie? Felicia? What the he...ck is going on?!" He wraps his arms around the Kysmette on his chest. Who's eyes widen. Ooh! New things to see!

A gigantic red foot covered in dragon scale slams into the ground in front of Ghostfist's face as she stands up. Opening her mouth to say something, Frankie looks up (up, Up, UP) at Pelana and then back at the robots, whose numbers are rapidly dwindling. Her attention shifts toward Felicia at the inquiry, flickering toward the remaining robots... Who appear to be rather in a bad way.

"You guys should try energy attacks against them," comments Ghostfist as she takes a moment to gather herself. Drawing in a deep breath, Ghostfist's whole body momentarily gains a nimbus of faint blue light that quickly fades. She promptly starts sprinting toward the gallery. "I'll check the inside. Back in a flash!"

One of the robots that was stepped on hits the dragon lady back, the other extends a leg out to hit Grimm. "THEY HAVE RUINED OUR PEOPLE. THEY MUST BE ELIMINATED." While the third grabbed, by Felicia whips his leg around to attack the heroess.

Grimm gets kicks in the side and goes rolling along the sidewalk until she lands on her stomach, holding her ribs. "Unnnf...oww..." she groans as she pushes herself up into a crouch and tries to suck air back into her lungs.

Pelana growls at the mostly not-very-effective attack. Both her stomp and the return hit, although she hardly feels it. Then she hears the bit about energy attacks... well, it's worth a shot, isn't it? She aims at the one attacking her at her feet, trying to not catch anyone else, as she inhales, and a storm of red lightning erupts from her mouth!

There is a solid fleshy thump as the robot lashes out with a metallic foot and she loses her grip and flies backward a bit before rolling to her feet. "Who exactly are 'your people'? Anyone we..."

Porter blinks when there's more smacking, and people get knocked around. People he knows. So, yeah, he knows all the ladies. He's a chivalrous kinda guy. "Hey, leave them alo-Oh crap!" Because there's red lightning. Which he knows about. He just didn't expect it to come flying his way. No, THEIR way, since he's carrying Kyssie. And then he's carrying her towards the ground... thattaways, as he tries to leap away and try to point her away from both lightning and the ground.

Pelana's lightning washes over the shields around the robots which doesn't appear to do anything to damage them.

Felicia's question is interrupted by a sharp crack and then a rolling boom as a cone of flickering incandescence rips over the scene. Her knees buckle under the impact but she tucks her chin to her chest and neatly rolls back to her feet, closing in on the lead robot. "Ruined your people? What the hell are you talking about?" She aims another backhand punch at her antagonist.

Grimm gets driven into the ground again, this time by lightning that burns her clothing in parts and causes some of her hair to hold a static charge. She tries to bolster herself to get back up. "C...c'mon...people are in danger, Grimm. Get...UP..." she grunts as struggles to push herself up to her feet against the downward lightning strike. But she's not strong enough physically, so she remains prone on her stomach, smoking for a little.

"THE ZOR COLLECTIVE REQUIRES YOUR DEATH!" The robots respond to everyone's question.

The back of Felicia's fist clunks solidly against her target, the metallic reverberation ringing across the street. Her tone is mild and she doesn't seem to be breathing hard despite being kicked up and down and blast. "I should've brought my grenades..."

Porter lands with an oof. Kyssie... giggles?! Really? << Oh, great, of course you'd take after... >> "Pel! Keep your big damned mouth shut!" He's mad. And scared. Terrified, really, and maybe more than than mad. But he can focus that at the robots, for now. It's their fault. And that blast was enough to rattle buildings. Or maybe Pel bumped one of them? A large chunk of concrete and stone breaks off to tumble down, down, right for one of the bots. This time, gaviry can help him out for once.

The robot is hit by the rock, which bounces off the blue shield around it.

Grimm pushes herself up to her feet and dusts herself off as she studies the blue shield around the robots. Maybe...if she can get at the shadows inside the machines. There's plenty of dark spots in there that she can use to wreak havoc with its systems in theory. Her right hand glows and she throws it palm forward as a dark blast streaks towards the robot that got hit by the rock.

The blast looks to go straight into the machine. The Robot shudders for a moment and then makes like its friends and goes poof. Gabrielle stands there blinking, first at the spot where the robot was, then at her hand. "...how did I...? That...wasn't expected..."

Felicia dashes over to the last remining bot and winds up. "These are lightweight 'bots you don't even need to rip 'em apart. Any news on whether those artists are ripping off the gallery?" She unleashes a dspinning couble fisted punch to try to knock off the last of the opposition.

Blue light flashes over the robot as the shield blocks most of the damage, some does seem to have gotten through, as the bot's body flickers.

Despite all the fancy footwork and the big two-fisted wind-up Felicia ends up making pretty poor contact with the remaining bot, the impact more or less completely deflected. "Cause I reckon these things are a kind of flashy distraction, all they do is babble incoherently and take up time that could be better spent folding laundry." For someone whose own conversation isn't that easy to follow she's pretty quick to throw stones...

"THE ZOR COLLECTIVE WILL NOT FAIL. WE WILL FIGHT YOU TO THE PAIN!" The last remaining robot cries out to Felicia.

Porter gets to his feet, carefully. While Kyssie seems to think this is all entertainment just for her. Or maybe she wants to jump in, herself? Arms flail and legs kick. "Would somebody just take it apart already?!" Which might be easier, since the shields might just be on the fritz?

Felicia's brow furrows. "That is this things second Princess Bride quote... Zor collective my tightly toned baby smooth ass!" she announces decisively. "Where are those painters?"

Grimm can take a hint. She starts to charge up her fist, the darkness swelling around it. "If you insist!" she snaps back at the robot as she throws her hand forward, sending a solid blast of darkness towards it.

The two artists are inside watching the fight from behind various pieces of theoretically valuable artwork.

Grimm's hand practically smokes from the discharge of energy as the final robot disappears under the onslaught of her blast. She stands there raggedly for a moment, expecting some other surprise. Finally, she pants out, "That's it...?" She glances over to Porter and the baby. "Hey, is your kid alright?" she asks as she straightens up and relaxes. "That was a nasty dive you had to take."

Felicia glances at the gallery and just shakes her head. "So they're not even a distraction?" She walks that way anyway. If only to make sure that they're really the painters and not just illusions. "Cause that was weeeeird-ass." The idea of moderating her language for Kysmette's benefit seems a distant consideration.

Pelana blinks in surprise as well, and she shrinks back to small mode. "Everyone okay? I noticed I kinda... hit everything but the robots there..."

Grimm glares up at Pelana. "Seriously? That's like the second time you hit other do-gooders who were trying to help stop the badguys. Do you ever NOT hit the guys on your side?" she shouts up and UP as she folds her arms over her chest.

Porter sighs with relief when the robot poofs. Then he immediately tends to Kysmette, pulling her out of the carrier to look her over. Which she flails at, because he turns her around and blocks her view. Or she's dancing to cheer the heroes on. Or something? "We're... Ok!" He finally sounds mostly sure. Then looks up to Pel and scowls. "No thanks to that! We noticed." He isn't sure what is or was going on, exactly, but for now he just holds Kyssie.

Felicia pauses in the doorway looking round. "Huh... It *was* a distraction, well that makes sense." Looking to the two artists her brow furrows again. "So y'all are in on it right? Or you wer mind controlled. You were the fodder for the distraction, without you it can't happen." She does have a pronounced limp from where she was kicked by the robot but Pelana's blast seems to have left her mildly singed.

The two artists look around, "What? No, we didn't steal anything... you think we were mind controlled?" They look excited at the prospect of being mind controlled. That's street cred.

Felicia shrugs to the artists. "Seems like it, or someone came by and dropped a comment or a compliment or something." Her brow furrows. "A good-looking woman, you both wanted to impress perhaps? How did your fight start?"

Pelana shakes her head. "Someone shouted out to try an energy attack, I only got the one! S'not my fault they were fake robots...."

Felicia comes back out onto the street. "No big deal Miss Ardoi, it was worth a try." She hikes a thumb over her shoulder. "Someone made off with a bunch of stuff from the gallery while we were busy." So it seems spitting lightning at her isn't enough to get her worked up, maybe it happens all the time.

"I think it was Ghostfist who said that...but dunno how accurate that was," Gabrielle murmurs. "Artwork to save the future...gah...what a freakin' line."

Porter is used to weird things happening. But now it's different. "No, Pel, not your fault. Pretty sure it's mine." He sighs. "For being too close. Sorry. You ladies can figure it out..." he nods at the gallery "..whatever it is. I'm gonna take Kyssie home. Where it's safer." Hopefully. And he turns to head thattaways.

Felicia flexes the leg that was kicked by a robot. "Well they sure felt real..." she grimaces a little. "But they didn't really act like robots, real robots you kind of have to rip to pieces not lightly bruise. The artists say they aren't in on it, but either they're lying, they were mind-controlled, or just flat out manipulated, or..." she pauses to watch Porter stalk off "the thief was incredibly lucky." Her voice trails off.

Pelana adds, "Or all of the above, yeah. I wouldn't blame Porter, though. Weird stuff happened before he was around, you know. Besides, was any of that art even valuable, given those two?"

Porter did already take the blame. Sort of. Now he heads home to where there is slightly less chance of strange killer robots suddenly appearing. Maybe.

Felicia shrugs. "What I know about art you could tattoo in block capitals on the ass off a fruit fly." she answers definitively. "But I guess it was worth taking at least... Maybe it was a fan or maybe they know more than we do. Guess the police and the insurance people will sort it out."

"Considering this isn't a museum, I'm surprised someone would go through so much effort trying to steal the art here," grumps Gabrielle. She takes a few moments to process things and blinks at Felicia. "Lucky thief?" she ponders on that notion.

Pelana shakes her head. "Well, maybe, but I know it can't have been Porter. He's hardly the only luck manipulator around, and this isn't the sort of thing he'd do. If he needed money, I mean, it's not like I wouldn't help out..."

Felicia shrugs. "I didn't say it was him, just seemed odd to turn up and then stalk away like that. Unless he's developed a new powers to carry works of art stuff up his butt I'm pretty sure he didn't take anything. But anyway the stuff is gone."

"Did he seem to be walking stiffly to you?" Gabrielle asks Felicia with an amused grin. "But like y'all said, it's up to the police to figure out the rest."

Pelana nods. "Yeah. Anyway... I... did kinda want to apologize. I was just tryin' to help, it's not like I go training with super types for tactics. I'm an actress, you know, not some kind of dragon-warrior. I just PLAY one!"

"Kinda hard for me to tell, if he was any more un-hip his backside'd fall right off." Felicia opines. Has she made a single utterance that doesn't involve someobody's butt? "I guess, though, I don't know, I feel kind of indulted that I was s'posed to fall for this."

Felicia shrugs. "Hey, what do I know, you seemed to be doing ok to me, though that stomp thing, not such a great idea near subways, sewers, or gas mains, following it up with lightning, not the best idea."

Grimm opens her mouth to say something to Felicia, then closes her mouth and looks to Pelana. "No kidding. By the way you blasted Bard the last time you breathed lightning and nearly punched me out with the villain, I couldn't have guessed you had no experience with all your big talk."

Pelana hmphs. "Look, I'm *trying* to meet you all half way, would you prefer I wasn't involved at all? Besides, the ground around here is pretty well reinforced. Earthquakes aren't a thing, but super-battles are."

Felicia inclines her head. "Ok, well I'm not duper-experienced myself, you know more about being super-sized than I do." She shrugs. "Anywa, my guess is where after a good-looking woman. Best way I know to get two guys fighting over who's more artistic is to drop a passing comment from someone they both want to impress."

"If meeting half way involves blasting people, maybe the ratio should be adjusted," Gabrielle sighs. She turns her attention to Felicia as she gives a description. "Huh...well, it's worth a shot trying to ask around to see if anyone knows who attended this art showing that matches that description."

Pelana nods. "I'm no detective... but if this isn't some common thief, I do kinda know a few of the jet-set crowd. I'll keep an eye out, see if anyone is showing off anything that they maybe shouldn't have. You'd think it'd be hard, but that kind of person just LOVES to brag and doesn't figure it'll get out of their circle of friends."

Felicia nods. "Yeah, well, not the circles I move in, I'll quiz the artists see if they remember what started their argument, if they din't then probably mind control." She shrugs. "Not sure what the deal was with the robots, maybe they were illusions or shape-changers, they weren't real robots."

"Anyway, I screw up too often myself to throw stones, so thanks all for knocking those tin cans outta here. And I'll let you know if I find anything." Felicia offers a cheerful wave and starts heading back into the Gallery to talk to the witnesses.

Grimm waves to Felicia as she goes. "I got classes in the morning, so I better skiddadle." And with that, she vanishes in a flickering swirl of darkness.