7.2
The bulk of the tsunami wave crashed through the streets. I saw bits of debris from shops, the Boardwalk, even cars being shoved through the city like so much garbage.
The PRT HQ was still standing, but all the windows were broken, the water pouring out of the destroyed building like blood from a wound. Did the agents get out? They should have, staying by the sea would have been insane.
The buildings that had been knocked off their foundations along the shoreline were further damaged as explosions surged out, gas leaks were the only things I could imagine doing that.
Leviathan stood atop one of the toppled buildings, seemingly surveying the whole field of his future victims.
When he moved, it was something absurd. A building moving with the speed of a bullet train.
Glory Girl seemed as shell shocked as I was. Leviathan's feet smashed into the line of barrier capes and Brutes, instantly we could hear the armbands going off, listing the tally of casualties.
I looked up, seeing Legend and a virtual army of fliers swooping down right behind him, blasts of energy, fire, ice, and lightning rained down from above, smashing into the Endbringer with enough power to level the whole city.
It barely spared them a glance before moving again, rushing between the buildings like a snake in the grass as the Brute capes all rushed after it.
"Five-O down, CD-5. Joyboy deceased, CD-5. Caricature down, CD-5. Shellshock down, CD-5…"
I reached for Glory Girl, pointing. "Get me down there!"
She nodded, grabbing my arm and pulling me up and off the roof, rushing forward towards the line of wounded capes.
Vicky swooped down fast, our speed almost made me close my eyes, even with the ash armor and helmet on. My feet skimmed over the water. If Vicky let go right now I'd probably fall flat on my face rather than my feet.
The hiss of the rain and the boom of the thunder in the distance nearly drowned out the half moaned calls for help. Vicky had the mind to slow down before letting my arm go. She kept moving, rushing forward to join the Brute rated capes currently pursuing Leviathan through the city.
I wasted no time, the grains of ash I had placed on everyone in that room immediately allowing me to find the nearest cape that was still alive.
Even with a Brute rating, it's hard to move fast when you're nearly hip deep in water.
When I made it to her my helmet immediately gave me her name, Villain from philadelphia, Shellshock.
Volunteer.
The helmets diagnostics scan measured her heart rate, the chemicals rushing through her body, her breathing rate.
I got to her, grabbing at her shoulder and feeling the sick crunch of grinding bones. I heard her scream in pain and felt a bolt of unbridled fear run through me with the fear that I'd hurt her.
I activated the X-ray vision and winced.
Her entire left arm was… pulp. The bones were quite literally shards and with every movement those shards were cutting into muscle and sinew beneath her skin.
"Ashburn!"
I turned, looking over my shoulder as Gallant flew down on his tinker-tech jetpack.
"Give her here!" He shouted as he landed on a nearby car.
I reached down and picked her up, I was careful to avoid touching that arm but it was still jostled.
She screamed as I picked her up and again when I handed her over to Gallant, a second later he took off again back to the med-evac center.
I looked around, finding other capes gathering the wounded.
When I registered more wounded and dead being called on the Armband I moved, jumping high to reach the top of a building in a second.
I found Leviathan almost instantly.
He pivoted, avoiding some attack from Purity as his tail lashed downward, slicing through the water at street level, sending a single, extremely high pressured water blade down the length of the street. I couldn't see how many it hit, but when I heard the band go off again with more names I could only imagine the worst.
"Saurian deceased, CF-4. Resolute down, CF-4, Warden- Deceased -
I moved and I moved fast, rushing towards where I'd seen that attack hit.
Coming down from above like a meteor, a Brute cape that could only be an Alexandria package smashed into Leviathan with the force of an angry God. I could actually feel the concussive force from here.
Leviathan was barely even moved, recovering quickly before delivering his counter in the same amount of time it took me to even register a blow had been landed on him. He smacked the cape with a downward swing that sent him or her face planting into the asphalt as his water echo rushed to the side to crash into the backup.
Missiles streaked down from above, exploding in blasts of blue fire as I saw Dragon's attack suit soar over the bay with a scream of jet engines before it turned, unleashing a full salvo of her missiles and energy based weapons.
Leviathan moved down the street, letting the water carry him away from the volley, bull-rushing straight through a formation of capes like they weren't even there.
Then there was a line of barriers in front of him. Hard light, rock, even Kaiser's distinctive blades.
The Endbringer stopped dead where he was.
At least for all of the three seconds it took him to simply plow through the buildings to get further away with a mere detour.
They can't pin him down. And if they can't pin him down, my home is going to become a sinkhole straight into the Bay we were named after.
Warning: Tidal wave inbound
Already?!
"Ashburn!" I heard Dragon's voice, "Call for a Brute rated cape, the building that just got knocked down. You're the closest one assigned to search and rescue, Go!
I did what she asked, running from rooftop to rooftop with powerful leaps. I saw a red streak down below in the streets, running on water. Velocity.
I felt just as much as I heard the wave crash into the line of barriers on the shoreline.
"We need more to reinforce the barriers" I heard someone shout through the radio. "They won't take another hit like that."
I reached the ruined building and jumped down, going from the roof onto the destroyed second floor.
I stop and stare, dumbfounded.
Grue is there, holding onto Regent in a fireman's carry. He looked up at me, and I wonder if he's as surprised to see me as I am to seeing him.
"Bitch." He panted, and I almost chucked a fireball at him until I realized he wasn't insulting me. He pointed at something underneath where I was standing. "Trapped, under the bricks."
I leaned over the edge, all but hanging in order to catch a look.
Her legs were pinned under the collapsed bricks, plaster, pipes and metal.
Her mask was destroyed, only about a third of it remained and it was hanging on her neck, rather than her face. I leaned down, laying flat on my stomach before offering him a hand. "Grab hold."
"Why. We just need-"
"Grab hold." I insisted. He was carrying an injured teammate and had another that was half crushed and this idiot wanted to go around walking in waist deep water.
He reached up, and with our hands grasping each other's forearms I pull both him and Regent up onto the second story before jumping down.
I reached the dog girl, Hellhound, Bitch, or whatever, blood was leaking from a crushed nose and the inside of her mouth, I looked at the rocks and focused on the excess ash I had on me from the five barrels they'd brought in back at the PRT.
I slipped it in between the cracks and broken masonry, pushing it like water through dry earth.
It was filled, mapping out the area around her.
Then I poured more.
I can't lift things with my ash. But pure physics worked in my favor this time, the mass of ash cocooned Hellhound's lower half while pushing the mass of broken bricks and shorn metal up by the simple fact that it had nowhere else to go.
Then I just pulled her out.
I placed her on my shoulders, using my ash to keep her legs stiff and still, before I jumped up to the second floor, and then up to the roof.
I reached down, tugging Grue up again.
"Give him here." I demanded, placing Regent on my other shoulder before I moved to jump onto a more stable building clear across the street.
"Can you carry them both?" Grue asked, incredulous.
I ignored the question and jumped.
I set them both down before turning back and doing the same for Grue.
I heard a crash and an explosion, and the both of us turned. We couldn't see Leviathan through the buildings, but Legend and an army of fliers were firing down at a single spot, so it was a fairly safe guess as to where he was.
I brought my armband up, listening to the tally as another wave smashed into the line of wave breakers.
"Abstract down, AQ-1. Touchbase deceased, AP-2. Dauntless down, AP-2. Aegis down, AP-2. Burner down, AP-2. Velocity deceased, AO-4. Blackguard down, AO-4. Aegis deceased AP-".
I froze.
I need to get over there. I didn't say another word to Grue, he could call for a Mover on his own. I jumped off the building and began sprinting from rooftop to rooftop.
As I moved… I… I had to shake my head...This just seemed so… I'd been talking to Velocity less than half an hour ago. And Carlos…
Were they really gone? Just like that?
I felt pain bloom in my mind, a vision passing before the inside of my eyes.
The Knight, Raime. His hand reaching towards me...
I gripped my skull. "No! Fuck off!"
The pain receded, just like that.
I kept moving. But before I'd even made it, the monster moved again, rushing through the water like like a slipstream, punching a hole straight through the Brutes.
Where the hell was Alexandria? She could have slowed this thing down a lot better than most...
I ignored the names ringing out from my watch, calling me to help.
Water is his element, and right now there was too much of it, too much for us to deal with, especially with him practically sheathed in it from head to toe.
We needed something. Anything that could get rid of the water, a damn impossibility, or at least something that could-
I stopped… a thought occurring to me.
I reached for my Armband, pushing the buttons that had been designated for highest priority.
"This is Ashburn! I think I might have a way to slow Leviathan down!"
Almost a minute passed and I was afraid no one had heard me, or no one was taking me seriously.
After that minute though, Dragon's suit passed overhead, and from somewhere on its body, a drone was ejected, trailing down from the sky to hover in front of me.
"What is it?" She asked, her tone too complex to pin down in a single description.
"I need a mover here right now."
"Ashburn this isn't-"
"Get me the flier Dragon, or we're all dead in fifty three minutes anyway! I can slow him down if you give me some leeway with this."
The machine had no expression, but I could feel the eyes beyond it sizing me up, wondering if she should, or could trust a plan I'd come up with.
"What are you planning exactly?"
"Whatever it is it won't be worse than us all drowning when that underground reservoir does us in." I answered.
If she knew what I was planning, she might just try to stop me.
If she got the message, or she was just too busy to press the issue, I didn't know, and I didn't care.
"Calling in the Mover." She said before her drone took back to the air.
(X)
"Hang on tight!" Yelled Lady Photon as she held onto the arms of the girl she was carrying.
Emma had never been more terrified in her life. Aside from seeing Annette in her dreams crumble away, this wasn't a dream. This was real.
She saw the tsunami swathe over the beach and go inland.
Alexandria had come to her. Alexandria. Had walked right up to her and asked for her help. Saying that she was the most powerful Cryokinetic on record and that between her and Eidolon they stood the best chance of stopping the devastating waves.
Eidolon, the most powerful cape in the world not named Scion.
She was scared but how in the hell does one say no? To Alexandria of all people?
They flew over the Bay, she had no mask, didn't even have a costume. She wasn't a Ward, she'd never even been in a fight in her whole life. She supposed that's why Alexandria got Photon Mo-Err… Lady Photon from New Wave. Everyone knew her name already as well.
She looked off to their left, seeing Leviathan's form rampaging through the city, almost half a world away, giving the monster a very wide berth.
She looked out to the bay, to the near shattered line of wave breakers that just seemed to be hanging on by a proverbial thread.
She had only used her power a handful of times. In the Power Testing center, and of course during the Outcry incident, when her body and power had moved with a mind of its own.
Her control then had been superb, nothing like the out of control bursts of energy that she'd used on her own before that day. A macro-Cryokinetic.
But that was the woman in her dreams… The one who saved her from Annette. Who gave her the crystal that hung from her neck right now.
But she doubted it could do anything against tsunamis. The woman mentioned a 'they' and she doubted a 'they' could stop a force of nature.
She needed help. She needs the woman in white to help. As they touched down, Emma looked towards the city where the battle was still raging, and down the length of the Bay where Eidolon and a handful of capes were trying to reform the wave breakers in order to give the fighters inland some kind of chance.
The Bay seemed so… impossible.
"Well? What's wrong!?"
"I-I uhhhh… ohhhh..." She stuttered, swallowing thickly as she tried to think, wincing at the sound of an explosion off in the distance. "I-I don't know what to do!" She admitted. "It's the first time I've ever tried this…"
"You have got to be FUCKING kidding me! How many fights have you been in?"
Emma closed her eyes, thinking, trying to call out to the woman in white.
'Please help me. I need your help… I can't do this alone...I-'
Then… there was nothing. No rain lashing against her body, no wind cutting right through her…
There was nothing.
She opened her eyes and found herself in the place again, the place of her dreams, a room of white stone, and ice. The woman standing in front of her, taller than anyone she'd ever seen.
She finally saw her face.
She was… beautiful.
Her eyes were the same as before, ice-blue pupils in black sclera as the taller woman approach. "Speak my vessel..."
"Please… I… I need your help." Emma wasn't sure what to do… if she should approach, or stay away, bow her head or look her in the eye. The woman's dress was in tatters but she wore a crown of gorgeous silver and diamonds, carrying herself like a queen in the greatest finery.
"I need, Ice… we need it. Just like you did to stop Taylor before."
"Taylor… the host of my Sister. I cannot stop her. Merely call out, and hope she listens. If she has been angered again, she will not spare those who have provoked her wrath." She answered.
"I…" She shakes her head, the rest can be addressed later. "There's...a monster here, it can control oceans, we have to freeze the water to stop it. You have to help us! We need you… I… I need you!" Emma pleaded.
"I see…" She answers. "My strength will be enough for that at the very least."
She held out her hand like a Queen holding out her hand for the ring to be kissed.
She wanted to ask her name… but she wasn't sure if she'd be angry with her.
Next time. Next time she'll ask.
She stepped forward, reached up, took her hand.
(X)
When Emma's eyes opened, to the world of Brockton Bay, Lady Photon knew something was different, the young woman stood taller, her hands clasping themselves in front of her as though in prayer.
Then came the Ice.
It wasn't an explosion of cold from the girl. Frankly, all Lady Photon could notice was a light layer of frost cracking over the roof at their feet.
When the Ice came, it was on the water.
Slowly, inch by inch, meter by meter, the ocean water in front of her began to frost over. Like watching a nature documentary on glaciers in fast forward, the ice moved with the tide, crushing and bunching up, crushed again and bunched up, growing taller, taller, and taller still. Inch by fast forward inch.
She turned her head and looked down the length and breadth of the Bay, where she could see the waters along its entire length was frosting over, with Eidolon adding his own walls to the growing bulwark, an unsubtle splotch on a canvas of careful brushstrokes.
"Place me on the surface."
It took the New Wave cape a moment to recognize that the girl had spoken to her. She floated up and grabbed her outstretched arm. Where the young woman before had been so terrified she'd nearly cut off circulation in the woman's arm, now she didn't even bother gripping, trusting the strength of the Heroine's fingers to hold her aloft.
It was as if she was an entirely different person...
They touched down on ice that was already meters thick. And instantly the spread of frozen water began to increase, almost exponentially. The girl clasped her hands in front of her hips and merely stood as the wall of Ice grew taller and taller. Mere seconds had passed and it was already approaching ten feet from end to end along the length and breadth of the beach-front.
The worst thing was, the young woman didn't even seem to be putting much effort into it at all.
Tidal wave: Inbound.
Lady Photon looked at her armband and cursed, the wall wasn't tall enough. Not nearly tall enough, let alone thick enough.
"You better work faster."
The girl didn't say a thing.
When the sheer wall of water loomed over the top of her modest wall, that was when she acted.
Her hands spread out to either side of her, and from her fingertips, thick tendrils of ice, speared up from the ground to her hands and spread out.
Like the winding trunk of a tree, the main stem was ten feet thick, with smaller tendrils bursting out of it to wind and steeple together like laced fingers in overlapping patterns, bound together tightly like corded muscle. Lady Photon saw the massive spiraling tendrils of ice spreading across nearly the whole beachfront before the wave smashed into it.
Water poured over the rim of the barrier, she saw it crack and shake but hold steady as more ice instantly repaired what had been broken.
It looked like the whole thing was about to break and drown them all when suddenly…
It was frozen.
The off color tone of Clockblocker's power covered the whole, single mass of ice wall like a protective layer, keeping it completely and utterly inviolable, no matter how strong Leviathan's tsunamis became.
When the wave finally broke and receded, the young woman… went slack.
Lady Photon almost didn't react fast enough to catch her as she fell, completely unconscious, nearly cracking the back of her skull against the very ice she'd helped to make.
The Barrier Squad capes stared in befuddlement over the now frozen multi-story tall ice wall.
Lady Photon blinked, dumbfounded, as she did a double take over her shoulder just to make sure the wall was still there and she wasn't going crazy.
Before she could think of anything more… there was an explosion, a massive blast of heat that hit her all the way down here.
She looked up and saw the entirety of the South side slums lit up in flames. As if Hell decided to sprout out of the earth and consume the corner of the city.
What in the world was going on!?