Log:ACRO - Stage 5, Scene 1

ACRO - Stage 5 2015/02/26

1

It's a quiet day in the Industrial Park. Sure, there are cars parked at various businesses, as is normal on a work day. But a call comes in to the police from a consulting firm nearby, mentioning a couple of suspicious hovervans in a nearby lot. The police then refer it to the heroes as well, since part of the report included visible cybernetics.

The police are responding as well, but the heroes have been asked to assist.

Third and Porter were on an afternoon walk with plans for a late lunch date together when Third's systems pick up the police call in via HeroNet. She frowns to herself as they stroll, without realizing she's doing it at first. Then she blinks away the frown and looks to Porter apologetically, because once again, she's let hero business interrupt their personal time. "Police alert: suspicious hovervan activity in Industrial Park. There was mention of cybernetics involved. Do you think it could be...?"

Chen was already in the Industrial Park. She's found that workers from the various businesses are generous when it comes to pleading kitten eyes at the fast food vans that serve the park. Until something clues her in though she won't be aware of what is happening. Maybe the police will clear the area? Or she's see heroes arriving?

As it happens, Frankie Ghostfist (P.I.) was just two lots over from the growing kerfuffle when police start arriving with lights and sirens going. The gumshoe casts a thoughtful look toward the corner office, presently devoid of people, then to a grey late model hovercar with muddy license plates in the lot - also devoid of people - before shrugging. Briefly gaining a limning of pale blue light, Ghostfist turns toward the direction of the sirens and takes off like a shot!

Who knows, maybe the person she's supposed to be surveilling is in trouble with Johnny Law?

Porter knows Third's distracted looks, and usually what they mean. Radio calls, recipe creation, internet research... At least police radio calls won't give her malware. But he frowns some at the reveal. "Cybernetics... It could be? Or a lead!" Or terrible danger, but he doubt's she'll ignore it. And Porter's not going to let her go off alone when he doesn't have to. "Let's check it out?" He lets her take the lead on getting them there, since she knows where, and is faster.

There are two hovervans next to each other...engines running. The back doors to both are open, and crates of something are being moved from one van to the other. There are also a good nine people around the vans, about half of whom are Asian. Sirens can be heard in the distance. One of the Caucasian men perks up and motions to the others to hurry up.

ACRO Agents(#525TOn)

Disguised in street clothing...there are a few hints of cyberware on them. And they're armed with plasma weaponry.

Third nods to Porter and smiles slightly. "Let's go, Partner," she says as she scoops him up into her arms and flexes her legs. "Arrival in 2.93 seconds," she announces as her cybernetic mind calculates trajectory and pathing. Which may cause dread in Porter, because he may suddenly realize its Paragon Express: rollercoaster edition time. She makes a sudden massive leap that sends them climb up and up, through an alleyway, over the next few buildings, and sailing briefly before she lands down in the industrial park like a drop ship. She bleeds off speed with a few smaller hops, then sets Porter down delicately.

More crates get moved from vehicle to vehicle, and just as the heroes are getting within sight, the last crate is shoved in. The back doors for both vans are closed by the workers.

The sound of sirens gets Smokey's attention. Leaping half way and climbing the rest of the way she goes to the top of the fast food van and looks out over the park to see what the comotion is about. The transshipment from one hiovervan to another draws her interest enough she heads in that direction. It could just tie in with some rumors she's heard in Chinatown recently.

Following the sirens' approach vector leads Ghostfist to the lot with suspicious hovervans. She frowns slightly as she spies the opposition, arms folding across her chest as she skids to a halt for but a moment, surveying the tableau set before her. One dark eyebrow quirked, the gumshoe rolls her shoulders and comments to no one in particular, "I need to get a good gun. And a flying gorram carpet."

The only people talking for the most part are the Asian men...and they're speaking in Chinese. The others are very, very quiet. Though a couple of them draw firearms of some sort.

Smokey(#2559PeACcF?)

What's more cute than a long haired tortoiseshell kitten? Nothing. Such a thing is simply not conceivable or possible. Smokey, her name is engraved on the silver disc hanging from her collar, is such a kitten. With large pleading eyes and a self-conscious regal manner as befits any cat.

Ghostfist(#2579PenACcF?)

Blessed with a smoldering beauty, shoulder-length black hair that shimmers in the light, and flawless tan skin - so far as the eye may see - it is difficult to discern her exact race or nationality. Standing a striking 6'3" tall, she exudes power and confidence like a jungle cat. Adding to that impression is her broad-frame, distinct muscularity, and a certain sinuous grace to her movements.

Dressed for work, she keeps her bright hazel eyes hidden behind mirror-lensed sunglasses much of the time. Resting on her chest is a piece of fossilized root, suspended in place by a simple leather strap wrapped about both the root and her neck. Her choice in clothing is otherwise uniformly utilitarian in its replaceability: jeans, fitted and seasonably appropriate shirt, and broken-in work boots. Over the top of that, she wears a floor-length coat of almost blood red reptile hide; its scales and sheer size suggest it came from an alligator of truly prodigious size.

Third(#1641POeACcF?)

She's a tall, young woman in her mid twenties with deathly pale white skin and straight chestnut colored hair. The hair tumbles down to mid-shoulder blade, and loose with long side bangs parted to the right. Her lips are ashen, and her eyes are hazel with green flecks. Her eyes look a little sunken with vaguely lavender hue eyelids. She stands at about 6 feet tall, with a well-toned athletic build. While she looks like someone who keeps in shape, her deathly pallor makes her appear unhealthy.

Currently, she's wearing a black peacoat that reaches down to mid-thigh, black leggings, and brown leather lace-up knee-high boots. A long, deep red cotton jersey scarf is wrapped loosely twice around her neck, the ends left hanging long and billowing.

A 2-inch widebrown leather wrist cuff sits on her right wrist embossed with a stylized lightning bolt. Wrapped several times around the outside of the wrist cuff is a black rawhide strip. The strip is threaded through the center of a 5 yen coin centered in the middle of the cuff. Around her neck is a circular pendant with many pieces of polished onyx and mother-of-pearl are arranged inside the silver frame in a complicated mosaic on a thin silver chain. While the chain looks relatively new, the pendant does not.

Porter(#2528POQeACcF?)

This young man is several inches under six feet with an average build. Brown hair is cut in a short but current style and coffee eyes are bright yet generally unremarkable. As a whole, he could probably be overlooked in a crowd fairly easily.

His clothes are fairly common, with comfortable jeans, name-brand sneakers, and a tee that varies by mood. Most common are popular bands or catchy quotes. When it's cold or wet outside, he covers up with a jacket.

One of the few times Porter can fall and land on his feet. When carried. He looks over at the vans and men around them, pointing. "Don't s'pose they're just making deliveries? Or picking them up?"

Smokey overhears a comment that sends her streaking across the park in a flat out run, trying to push under the skirts of the hovervan that has the crates in it. And if she succeeds in getting there in time she lifts a dainty kitten paw up into the rotating fan. A dainty kitten paw that is second in toughness only to Questonite.

Third shrugs her shoulders and armors up as a precaution. "I hear sirens," she murmurs in her now tin-canned voice.

Smokey gets snatched up off the ground as the fan blades impact against his super-tough body. The blades do no damage to her although the same cannot be said for their condition after the kitten version of a bird-strike. Meanwhile Smokey is whirled and spun and bounced around. Instant vertigo time.

The fan makes a crunching sound just as it was starting to take off. Smoke starts to billow out and the van settles back down to the ground partially...starting to drag its back end. The other van starts up as well, with the cybernetic agents in it.

One van blows out immediately - Frankie can smell Porter in the area and immediately blames it on him - but the second van is trying to make its escape. Ghostfist crouches down and launches herself across the intervening meters, her long coat flapping in the wind behind her like a cape, as mystical energies coalesce around her right hand. The gumshoe slams into the ground alongside the lifting hovervan in a three-point stance.

A spell circle momentarily flashes into existence under Ghostfist's right hand before it is replaced by a wall of glowing light. The wall arcs up from the ground and, hopefully, at least partially over the van to forestall its intended escape.

Paragon looks to Porter and slides an arm around him as they communicate wordlessly. She leaps over to the damaged van, landing beside the driver's door and sets Porter down just behind her in case things go south. She stands akimbo and fires off a cub scout salute. "Greetings, Citizens! You appear to be having hovervan trouble. May I be of assistance?" she announces in her usual cheerful, heroic cadence of a 4-color superhero. Yes, she's suspicious. But one should always be polite until they are sure of malintent.

The van that Ghostfist blocks bounces off of the barrier gently...and the slope of the pavement causes it to drift to the left just past the barrier. But it's stopped for the moment.

Smokey should deal with the front fan in the same fashion as she did the rear fan. Maybe when her head STOPS spinning. Digging her claws into the underside of the van she just holds on and waits for her sense of balance to return from wherever it went on holiday to.

Oh if only Ghostfist could be sure that was the end of that - villains, be they monsters or men, rarely give up that easily - and so the gumshoe steps around the corner of the wall she's built. More mystical energy starts to coalesce about her hands as she advances on the van. With a quick stoop, she plants both hands on the ground to duplicate the previous effect...

Except this wall erupts from the ground to lock itself around the front of the van and a little ways along the opposite side.

The van with the ACRO agents in it kicks into reverse, gliding backward away from the barriers. One agent leans out the passenger door with a plasma pistol in hand. He takes a shot at Porter.

A burst of rapid fire plasma sears past Porter, missing entirely.

Porter blinks as the gun comes out and the startle makes him stumble and all but land on his keister. Which happens to also make the shots fly over his head.

Big mistake. One does not simply fire hot plasma at Porter and expect not to get a fist to the face from Paragon. Or to have something equally unfortunate happen to their villainous plans. Paragon steps forward to intervene. And then she reaches for...the van door?

There's some shouting in Chinese...and the back door to the van opens up. One man jumps out. Just one. The van tries to take off after that, still dragging the back end along the ground.

He may have looked like a normal Triad thug. But he's clearly more than that. He charges directly at Paragon at high speed, attempting to plow through her.

Paragon rips off the passenger van door with some leverage on the weaker unarmored hinges, crumples it, and wraps it around the man who leaned out to shoot at Porter, making him a metal and armored fiberglass jacket with some strained effort with the armored material. "Drop your weapons and surrender peacefully, or I'll be required to use force."

The man bounces off of Paragon at full tilt. He tumbles and rolls to his feet, looking only slightly worse for wear.

Paragon stands tall and just watches the man bounce off of her with a clang of metal. "Resisting is futile. Surrender immediately," she repeats again in her mechanized voice, completely unmoved by the man's attempt.

Smokey is changing her mind second by second. Her first thought to disable the van was replaced, after she has already damaged the rear fan, by thinking she made a mistake and she should have let the van get to it's destination and thus discovered Prides base. But now she's committed to stopping whatever 'a dose' does getting to Chinatown. With claws dug into the van underside she moves to the front fan and does the same to that, except this time keeping hold of the van so she won't get whirled around so badly.

The impact of the fan blades does no damage to Smokey but in her small form she's not strong enough to resist being torn free of the van underside and bounced around in the fan housing. . o O(Ohh.. my head!)

The hovervan comes to a halt, skidding along the ground.

Porter winces in sympathy for Para as she's charged. Then maybe some for the charger as Para proves she's more immovable object than his unstoppable force. "Hey! Leave her alone and do what she says!" He reaches for the nearest handy something, which happens to be a chunk of fanblade shrapnel, and chucks it at the guy. Maybe he can at least distract him.

Porter might get his attention with the metal whizzing by his head. On the other hand, the now-shrieking car alarm from the compact with the really big dent in it will surely draw somebody's notice. Like insurance company lawyers...

Ghostfist watches the van throw itself into reverse to escape her wall-ish fury. She frowns slightly, but rolls her shoulders in apparent dismissal of the tactic. Crouching down, Ghostfist launches herself after the van in reverse again. This time she seems to be aiming to land atop the van - it's not quite clear if she perhaps meant to land in front of or beside it, only that she's presently dropping out of the sky toward the top of the van itself.


 * WHUDD*

A Ghostfist lands atop the van. She looks mildly surprised by the result.

The van continues to back up, but the people inside the van start to draw weapons. Paragon can see that one of hte ones inside is a rather large tube-looking object.

Rather than go after Paragon again, since that did hurt at least a little, he pivots and he goes after Porter, attempting to run the hero over.

Smokey pushes out of the van's skirt and changes to Jian. "Your Fung Fu is weak, old man." she tells the Triad goon who's been attacking her friends. Then she waits to see if he will take up her challenge.

Steamroller deftly avoid Porter's block and plows through the hero, sending him reeling.

Steamroller turns to look at Jian, realizing that she likely had something to do with hte demise of the van. He keeps his focus on her, clearly intending her to be his next target.

Porter tried! But he's knocked for a loop... and a ways down the street. To bounce a few times in a very Porter-like fashion before coming to a stop on his face.

Apparently comfortable in her positioning now, Ghostfist squares her shoulders and plants her feet at shoulder's width. Breathing slowly and deeply, the gumshoe curls one hand into a fist and stares down at the roof of the van. Ghostfist draws her fist back as magical energy builds up around it until, with a tremendous KI-AIIIIIIIII, Ghostfist drives her fist down into the roof of the van, hoping to blow open a hole.

Steamroller just made a very poor life choice. Because for now, he has Paragon's only slightly divided attention. First, she mentally checked on Porter to make sure he didn't need immediate medical attention. Any thoughts not spent on worrying about his condition are focused on stopping Steamroller for doing it again. She leaps forward and draws back her right arm across her left in preparation for a backhand swipe.

Steamroller is tagged and sent flying...and again, he rolls to his feet. He tilts his head back and forth, cracking his neck a couple of times.

Steamroller looks at the damaged van...and then the ACRO van, doing a calculation in his head. He points to Jian and says in Mandarin, << Another time. >> He turns and bolts, running off to the north, clearing a good hundred meters.

Jian nods to Steamroller, "Another time." she shouts after him in Mandarin.

The police arrive in short order. They would have been too late to stop the vans getting away, unfortunately. But...with the heroes' help, nearly all of the people involved were captured. The crates were filled with ACRO weaponry. As for the comment Jian overheard about a 'dose', there's no clue as to what that was referring to.

Porter slowly sits up and shakes his head before looking around. And blinking alot. "We got 'em?"

Paragon leaps over to Porter's side as the police and heroes handle the rest. She kneels down at his side and gently puts a hand on his shoulder. "Got 'em, Partner. Except the guy who hit you. He was tough and too fast."

"Huh. I figured you guys would put up more of a fight," comments Ghostfist as she glares down into the interior of the van... You know, after it's finished screeching to a halt because of the cop cars swarming around it. The gumshoe stands still for the moment, just in case the cops have directions for her.

Jian checks out the contents of the Triad van herself. When convinced there's nothing except ACRO weapons she moves out of the police's way and sighs dejectedly. o O(I should have let the van get away and gone with it.)

Paragon's helm retracts so she can offer Porter a gentle smile. "Think you're ready to stand up yet?" she asks as she offers him an armor plated hand.

The police take statements from each of the heroes, just to make sure all the bases are covered. The ACRO agents are remarkably quiet.