Glade's voice comes over her comm as the downed ex-agents start to get back to their feet. "I'll take the squad, you keep Reaper busy."
"Oh, keep Reaper busy, is that all?" Facing Reaper mano-a-mano isn't exactly her definition of a good time; she and Sentry could barely hold their own fighting him together. But they can't afford to ignore him. The big vine is strong, but Reaper's scythe could just slice and dice the wood, and Glade needs it. She pushes away the panic at the back of her brain and takes a deep breath. "Yeah, let's do it."
Her partner swings the long, whip-like arms of his suit at the squad. A few of them dodge, but one falls and another drops his rifle. Two little dryads run into the fray, grab the rifle at each end and carry it away. The commotion gives Crusade the opening she needs to get through the thugs to their boss. Using her wind walk she zig zags between them, dodging the butt of a rifle aimed at her as she goes. She launches herself over Reaper's head. He stoically watches her, his hooded head tilting up slightly as she flips and lands on the opposite side of him.
The tall man in black, flowy robes rotates slowly to face her, unconcerned about the tall tree assaulting his men. She takes a few steps back, trying to draw him away. But he just…stares at her from the depths of his dark hood. He's waiting for her to make the first move.
Crusade spins in, swinging her swords in an arc. One knocks his scythe off to the side a bit, opening him up to a hit to his side. He brings the scythe back around, but she ducks. As she stands up, she gets knocked backwards by the staff of the giant weapon catching her in the gut. It doesn't break her powered armor, but it throws her off balance enough so she can't dodge when he swings the blade at her. The point pierces her armor and it falls away, but she jumps back in time to avoid getting stabbed.
She puts her armor back up as Reaper glides towards her. If she keeps getting in close like that she's going to keep getting hit by that scythe. It's huge, easily able to reach her even at 10 ft away. She needs a longer weapon if she's going to be able to last against him.
Focusing on her right hand, she reaches out with her power to make a sword longer than any she's wielded before. The blade extends 10 ft before coming to a sharp point. Reaper's head tilts, following the point of the weapon as it grows. He swings his scythe at her and she brings her own giant weapon around to block the blade. The length makes it a little clumsy and she catches the point on the ground, but she still manages to keep Reaper from hitting her. Her brain keeps telling her that the larger weapon should be heavier, but it's not. She'll need to adjust, and fast.
With both hands on the hilt, more for stability than anything else, she brings the sword around in an arc, getting some momentum, and connects with his arm. The blade bites into the fabric and Reaper actually grunts. She rips the sword back, slicing further into him and tearing at the robes. He grabs the wound, blood seeping through his fingers. He says something, though she can't hear what, and he looks over his shoulder.
One of the thugs comes over, dodging Glade's attacks as he runs away, wariness on his face. Reaper grabs him by the throat with his bloody hand and lifts him off his feet. The agent's eyes bulge, hands clawing at Reaper's and feet kicking. "No! Not me! Get off!" Reaper holds him there as he thrashes.
Crusade should be doing something, but she's frozen by curiosity. What the hell is he doing?
After a few seconds the agent's face starts to turn ghostly pale. His cheeks sink in and his skin gets sallow and wrinkly. Another few seconds and his feet stop kicking, hands falling limp at his sides. Reaper drops him unceremoniously on the ground. As he turns back towards Crusade the deep cut in his arm closes, leaving only a coating of blood as evidence that he was ever injured at all.
He can't just heal by himself; he steals…life from other people and uses it to heal. If he touches her, he could suck the life out of her too. Better get the hang of this longer sword, and fast.
Apparently feeling better, Reaper swings the scythe at her. She jumps back, trying to keep distance between them. She comes back at him with her sword, but he dodges. It's clear how much more comfortable Reaper is with such a large weapon. He's keeping her on her heels with quick, long-reaching attacks. If this sword wasn't so awkward she would be having an easier time with this. But she can't switch back to shorter blades or she'll have to get within arm's reach of him.
Reaper swings at her again and she blocks, her long blade catching at the base of his. She yanks, trying to pull the weapon away from him, but it catches. She hears some kind of clanking as she tries to yank it, like a chain. Looking down, there's a chain wrapped around one of the handles that trails and disappears into the folds of his robe. She smirks a little; guess losing his weapon to Jackass really got to him.
Her breathing is getting more labored and her arms are getting tired. She can't keep this up for much longer. Crusade grunts as yet another hit breaks her armor. "How you doing over there, Glade?"
"They're not giving up without a fight. Got most of the rifles away, but these bullets are causing an issue. The building's going to go if it takes too many more of those vibrating bullets." They need to either lock these guys down or get them to run. But they're the ones on the defensive.
Reaper brings his massive weapon up over his head and brings it straight down. Crusade brings her sword up to block, but the long blade breaks her armor anyway. He lifts it again, smashing it down, and it breaks her sword. She stumbles back, tripping on her feet and falling. Shit, this is bad. He brings the scythe down, making her roll to dodge. He brings it down again and again, and it's all she can do to roll and scuttle away from the massive man looming over her. She doesn't even have enough time to get her armor back up.
As she shimmies away from another strike, her back presses up against a wall. He's pushed her all the way across the street. She has nowhere else to go. As Reaper raises his scythe again, a figure jumps between them, arm up to defend against the strike. The daunting weapon collides with a shield, metal clashing on metal, lighting up the metallic pattern running down his arm and towards the pack on his back. A tube leading from the pack lights up and the gun pulses, knocking Reaper back a few feet.
Siphon looks down at her over his shoulder with a half-smile. "Up and at 'em, Crusade. I'm not crazy enough to try and take him on alone."
Crusade chuckles as she climbs to her feet and puts her armor back up. "Nice to see you out and about." The hero nods to her and turns back to Reaper. "That scythe packs a mean punch. But more importantly, don't let him touch you."
"Got it." His gaze flicks to her. "I need a favor first, though." She raises an eyebrow as she creates the extra-long sword in one hand again. He drops his arms and turns towards her. "Hit me."
Blinking a few times, she looks at him. "What?"
"C'mon, just one solid hit. It'll help." She remembers the flow of energy when Reaper hit his shield, how he turned it into ammo for his weapon. Redirection of energy is supposed to be his specialty. The tinker bounces on the balls of his feet a little. "C'mon, I know you want to after all the crap I've –" Crusade winds up her huge sword like a bat and slams the flat side of the blade into his stomach. He doubles over and coughs a laugh as the silver veins of his armor start glowing and traveling into his pack. Straightening up, he shakes himself out with a smile. "Let's do this." He grabs his weapon, charges it, and fires it at the approaching Triple Six member.
Reaper stumbles back a little again, but he mostly pushes through the blast. Maybe with Siphon distracting him she can stick with the size weapons she's more comfortable with. Ditching the big sword, she forms a 5 ft blade in each hand. She darts in, skirting around the scythe, and hits Reaper twice before backing up again.
The villain seems torn between going after her and Siphon as they coordinate their strikes, him from afar and her up close. They hit him in quick succession, falling into a pattern. As Crusade tries to hit him again after another blast from Siphon, Reaper knocks her swords away with the staff of his scythe and brings the blade around to break her armor. Dammit! They got too repetitive. She jumps away and puts her armor back up before he can hit again, too distracted to notice Reaper getting in arms reach of Siphon.
Reaper grabs Siphon's energy gun, yanking him in, and pulls his arm up. He grabs the tinker, gripping his exposed jaw. No! She can't let him drain Siphon. Crusade sprints in and brings both of her swords down at once on his arm. The arm bends and he grunts in pain, but he backhands her with the scythe and she falls back.
As Siphon starts to struggle, a pair of vines wrap around Reaper's torso and the villain is pulled backwards. Glade throws Reaper to the side and whips at him with his long arms. Crusade looks around to see all the remaining ex-agents wrapped up in foliage, their weapons nowhere to be seen.
Reaper gets back up and catches one of Glade's arms as it tries to strike him. The wood starts to turn dull up the arm alarmingly fast. The arm disconnects halfway down and Glade backs up a little, appraising Reaper.
The three of them hold, waiting to see what the imposing villain does. Reaper puts one hand to the side of his head and, after a few seconds, lowers it and turns, gliding down the street. Crusade starts to chase him, but she hears a loud thud to her right. Looking over, she sees Siphon on his hands and knees, one hand holding his head.
She rushes over to him, kneeling down. "Siphon, you ok?"
He waves his hand. "I'm ok, I'm alright." He tries to climb to his feet, but he falls back down with a groan. "I just…need a minute. I feel like I just ran a marathon."
She helps Siphon into a sitting position. Even after just a few seconds of touching him, Reaper drained all of his energy. Who knows how it affected him internally? Patting Siphon on the shoulder, she stands. "Just sit tight. Call for backup." He nods as he lies down on the ground.
Glade's voice comes over her comm. "Should I go after Reaper?"
Crusade looks over at the captured squad. He managed to disarm and secure four of the agents. Their weapons lay in a pile over by the shot-up storefront with a couple of dryads sitting by them. The bound thugs struggle, more than one of them pulling or biting at the branches holding them. They've got their weapons, that's probably the most dangerous thing about them.
She looks over at the agent on the ground. She goes over to him and rolls him onto his back. His eyes are closed and his mouth hangs open. She puts a couple of fingers to his neck and tries to feel for a pulse. He's cool to the touch, but she feels the flutter of something. Leaning down, she puts her cheek next to his mouth. After a moment, she feels a soft breath on her skin. He's still alive! But he may not last until the ambulance gets here.
She looks down the street the way Reaper left. Glade could follow him, track him all the way back to the Triple Six base, but they would either lose all the agents they captured or the thug Reaper drained would die. It's not worth it.
She shakes her head as she looks over at him. "No, we'll get him next time. This guy's still alive, but barely. I need to get him to a hospital now. I need you to stay and make sure the thugs stay locked down and keep an eye on Siphon."
Glade waves one arm. "Go, I've got things here." He turns to one of the thugs squirming out of his bindings and sends one of the dryads over. The creature leaps onto him and his appendages grow, tying him down again.
Crusade stands again, keeping one hand on the barely-alive man. She extends her barrier around him nice and snug; she doesn't want to risk jostling him around too much. Looking over at Siphon she gestures. "I'm getting him to the ER. You want a ride too?"
Not picking his head up, Siphon waves a hand. "I'm good, I just need to rest. You go."
With a nod, she activates her wind walk and runs in the direction of the nearest hospital. All things considered, this didn't go terribly for them. It wasn't easy by any means, but they were able to drive off Reaper and captured a bunch of disavowed agents. She just hopes the other teams fared better.
~0~0~
"What the fuck, Crusade?! We had a plan! You sent some random rogue to go extract my team! She knocked the goddamn building down on them!"
Lamplighter is not happy. Crusade and Glade went back to their base after dropping the guy Reaper drained at the hospital and handing off the prisoners to law enforcement. Before Desperado and Jackass even got back, the leader of the Cardinal Alliance burst in, absolutely fuming.
Crusade holds her hands up, trying to placate him. "I can explain everything. Something came up and we had to improvise. Is everyone ok? Did they make it back?"
Lamplighter throws his hands up as he paces. "Yeah, some-fucking-how. Who the hell is Lampoon?! They said she had a rocket launcher!"
"Just take a breath and let's talk about it."
"Don't tell me to calm down! What the hell was so important that you called in someone else to handle this?!"
She folds her arms across her chest. "Triple Six made a play in Kerrigan Heights and Downtown with the Parahuman Control Unit backing them up. They killed half a dozen people before we even got there. If we hadn't driven them off who knows how many they would have killed."
Lamplighter stops and his posture deflates a little. He pinches the bridge of his nose. "That explains why so few of them came after us." He huffs and drops his arm at his side with a smack. "Look, I get it. Ok? I probably would have made the same call. You could have said something, though."
Glade looks up at him from his wheelchair. "Would knowing in the middle of a fight have made things any better?" The leader of the Cardinal Alliance grunts and throws a half-hearted glare at Glade.
Crusade waves an arm, bringing Lamplighter's attention back to her. "You're right, we should have said something. I take full responsibility. It was my decision to send Lampoon."
"Where did you even find this person? I've never heard of her."
"We…met before. She and her partner…partners?...run the carnival on Gideon Island. I knew she could handle it."
He shakes his head, getting agitated again. "You knew? How did you know that this completeunknown could be trusted?"
Crusade hesitates. She doesn't really want to have to explain Prophet, because even to her it sounds crazy. "I just did, ok?" Lamplighter huffs and starts pacing again, throwing his hands up in frustration. Shit, she needs to fix this. "Fine. A precog thinker told me."
He stops dead and looks at her. "A what? You knew this was going to happen?"
She sighs. "No, not really. It's…complicated. The predictions are hard to interpret, but once I realized what was happening, I knew what the solution was. But regardless of all that, I would never have sent Lampoon if I didn't know she could do it." Know is a bit of a stretch, hoped is probably more accurate. But Lamplighter needs reassurance right now, and finding out they were just flying by the seat of their pants would not be calming.
He blinks a few times, trying to process everything Crusade is saying. The last of the anger melts away from his face and, after a few seconds, he just chuckles a little. "You guys have been in town, what, like three months and you already have a precog feeding you intel and found a rogue to help you out? Jesus." He sighs and steals a glance at her. "Any chance I can meet this precog too?"
She shakes her head. "Kind of in hiding at the moment. But if I hear anything important I'll pass it along."
Lamplighter shrugs. "Fair enough." He looks at Glade and then back at her. "Looks like you guys managed ok with Triple Six?"
Crusade makes a noncommittal noise. "I guess? Glade managed to capture a few of the rogue agents, but if it weren't for Siphon I probably would have gotten filleted by Reaper."
Lamplighter's eyes widen. "Siphon showed up? Didn't expect any of them to be out on the streets so soon after…you know."
"I was surprised too." Feeling a little less on the defensive, Crusade leans on the back of the armchair. "How's Corona doing?"
He runs a hand through his shaggy black hair. "She's…not doing great. They had her in isolation because of her power, so she's having trouble adjusting to…everything."
Glade nods a little. "It can be hard getting back into the world."
Crusade looks over at her partner with a pang in her chest. Sometimes she forgets just how much he gave up to be here, doing this, with her. Because of her. If she hadn't shown up on his doorstep, so to speak, he'd still be out there living life the way he chose.
Lamplighter's voice pulls her from her thought spiral. "I should get going, though. Tell Lampoon…thanks I guess?" She nods and waves as he makes his way out the back of their base.
As the door shuts behind him, Glade starts to shed the remains of his costume. "We may want to think ab-about getting a new b-b-base. Having people storm in all the time p-probably isn't the b-best."
Crusade snorts a laugh. "You may be right. We can see what the rest of the team thinks. Should probably get better about locking the door if nothing else."
Leopold chuckles a little, the last of the vines and branches falling away. A couple of dryads scoot out from under his wheelchair and start collecting the foliage, hauling it out to the growing compost pile in the back. He wheels his way over to the armchair and leverages himself into the comfortable chair, using his wheelchair as a footrest. A soother climbs onto his shoulder and starts patting him, cooing quietly.
Anna pushes herself off of the now occupied chair and sits on the couch, taking off her mask and tossing it on the table. Lately, Leopold's been really defensive when Anna asks how he's feeling, but she feels like it's important to ask anyway. "How are your legs feeling? Any worse after all that?"
He shakes his head. "I d-don't think it stressed anything, nothing hurts."
She smirks with a chuckle. "Good, 'cause that vine was epic. You locked down, like, four guys and then saved our asses."
His cheeks color a little and he looks down. He picks at something on his cast for a minute. "I…I'm sorry I've b-b-been a little d-difficult to d-d-deal with lately."
When he pauses for too long, Anna shrugs. "You've been through a lot lately. I get it."
He glances up at her and then back down at his lap. "That d-d-day, on the b-bridge, it made me realize how much I…I've b-been relying too much on you."
Anna tilts her head in confusion, blinking a little. "What do you mean? If anything, I've been relying on you too much. I still have a hard time sleeping when you're not around." She chuckles nervously.
Her partner waggles his head back and forth a little. "P-prob-probably a little of b-both, then. B-but I've been thinking a lot ab-about things and it's…I'm b-better now."
Better is good, she supposes, but that doesn't really clear anything up for her. "Are we ok? Do we need to talk?"
Leopold finally looks up at her fully. His face is relaxed and he seems a lot more sure than he has in a while. "We're ok. I'm…it was mostly in my own head and I'm all good now."
She sighs. Guess that's better than nothing. They worked well on the battlefield today and at least he's admitting something was wrong. "Ok. Well, I'm glad you got it worked out." She leans back on the couch. "I know you were trying to not rely on me or whatever, but you can talk to me about things. Especially if it's something I'm doing that's causing an issue."
He rubs the back of his neck with a small smile. "I'll remem-remember that next time."
She stands and walks past Leopold, clapping a hand on his shoulder as she goes. He grabs her wrist briefly, squeezing. Anna smiles, squeezing his shoulder back. Releasing him, she goes to the fridge and grabs two water bottles. As she straightens, the front door bursts open and Dakota and Po'boy hurry in, slamming the door behind them again.
Dakota slams her back against the door, eyes wide behind her targeting visor. "Y'all. You missed it."
Leopold's brow furrows as he twists to look at their teammates. "Missed what?"
The tinker pushes off the door and grabs the hat off her head. She points to Po'boy with her hat. "There we were, fightin' Hellion, and what does this asshole do? He makes a little ball with wings, and it FLIES!"
Anna's mouth drops open as she looks over at Po'boy. "You can fly?"
Dakota slams her hat on the table with a smile. "He can fly!"
Po'boy's cheeks redden a little, but his smile stretches from ear to ear. "I've been working on it for a while. Took some figuring out, but I managed to get everything balanced right so Dickwad can fly."
Anna can't help the laugh that escapes her. "That's amazing!"
Leopold nods. "What happened with Hellion?"
Dakota's head drops a little. "We were havin' a hard time, even with Dickwad goin' all Wright Brothers. There was so much fire. It took everything we had to make sure folks got away safe." She glances at Anna. "Those barrier bullets really saved the day."
Po'boy collapses on the couch. "If TidalForce didn't show, we probably would have had to run for it. But she took care of the fires so we could focus on Hellion."
Anna takes one of the bottles of water over to Leopold. "Same with us. If Siphon hadn't shown up I'd have been minced meat."
Po'boy sits up a little, looking excited. "So the heroes saved both our asses?"
She shrugs as she twists open the bottle and take a sip of the cool, refreshing water. "Seems like it."
He settles back on the couch, arms behind his head, a satisfied smile on his lips. "I knew they had it in them."