(AoH) BlackMoon Rising [Fic]

[jameson (ST)]

May 3, 2012 - Presidio Heights

Angie hadn't expected the ritual to work; she'd only even tried it out of boredom. Boredom consumed her life of late. Her husband worked long hours, and even when he was home he seemed little interested in her the way he had been when they were young. The children were her little darlings, but Angie wanted more.

The voice boomed again, thudding against her mind. "Your soul for power Angie, that is the deal now and ever."

Angie quailed, the excitement had turned to fear, when the voice has first spoken. Now it offered her the power to do as she wished for her soul. Angie hadn't been a believer in some time, but now she wondered if her soul truly was a precious thing.

"You are hesitant. Perhaps you do not believe in that, how is it that your people say?, you will not get a return on your investment?" The voice seemed almost amused by the concept, as though it found the very idea laughable. "Perhaps then a taste? A small investment for a small amount of power, to whet your appetite? The tenth part of your soul, for the tenth part of power."

"T-t-ten p-percent?" Angie stammered out. "Ten percent?" she repeated, mulling the idea over, and immediately finding it appealing.

[Talos]

May 5, 2012 - Alamo Square

Talos stood stock still, crouched really, as the children climbed and clambered over him like some kind of jungle gym. The park had been merely a stopping point on his way from dropping a pickpocket off at the nearest precinct, but with little reason to continue he had stopped to greet a birthday boy and his friends and ended up becoming a plaything.

The boys played at wresting the the great metal man, but there was little they could manage except to dangle from his outstretched arms, and run about through his wide legged stance.

Through the built in radio pickups of his body Talos monitored the police bands, but the sunny Saturday afternoon was largely quiet. Nearby the childrens' mothers were asking him some rather pointed questions.

What do you look like under all that armor? Is there a Mrs. Talos? What does a ten foot tall mechanical man do with his time off? And more. Talos answered as he could, politely refused where he chose, and apologized where he simply lacked the information to answer. He would have smiled with amusement had he a face, but the single amber eye in the center of his head conveyed no emotion or thought.

" ... units to Golden Gate Jewelers. Sansome Street near Pine. Repeat all units to Golden Gate Jewelers ..." Talos' head swung suddenly in the direction of downtown.

"Children, there is an apparent robbery in progress. I am sorry I must go." The voice of the mechanical man was a deep bass that befitted his size. The children slid off, or were plucked from him by their mothers. "Happy Birthday Billy," Talos said, stepping away, "and remember to be good." The little boy nodded enthusiastically as Bay CIty's only sponsored hero took three long strides and leaped into the sky.

[z-Tempest Greer]

May 5, 2012 – top of Argo Deli

Tempest sighed slightly and shifted on her perch. The day had been long and rather boring, and the young superhero was considering going home. She was very glad she hadn’t seen Headsman, not since that first encounter. The memory of that battle chilled her to the bone, even now. Eagerly, she pulled out her grappling arrow, making sure the line was drawing out smoothly and not going to foul her shot.

A large shadow passed over her and Tempest looked up to see Talos passing over her head. Interesting. It wasn’t, really. Tempest sighed inwardly as she realized she needed to follow him instead of going home. Her father would be angry if she didn’t follow up on Talos’s track and find out what he was doing.

Her bow came up as if on its own; her arrow fitted itself to the string. Her body did her father’s will as she straightened and aimed. The grappling arrow flew out and bit into the building; its hooks clenched tightly into the stone and held. Tempest gave the line a tug to satisfy that it would hold and then she swung out into the air.

This drew a smile from her. Her body responded with strength and power, her legs aiding her swing as she arced to the bottom of her swing and then up into the air. Her line disconnected as she tumbled into a back-roll, already pulling out her next grappling arrow. At the height of her tumble, she had her arrow ready and she shot again. Her fall became another swing as she followed Talos’s path through Bay City.

He was heading somewhere hot, no doubt. As Tempe swung her way downtown, she heard sirens, then saw flashing lights. The police were responding as well, but the chances that they were outmatched with Bay City’s super criminals.

[jameson (ST)]

Moments Ago ...

The sidewalk in front of Golden Gate Jewelers erupted a gout of flame that spiraled half a dozen feet into the air before losing fuel and guttering out. The form of a comely woman dressed in leathers and silks that accentuated the curves of her body stood where the vortex had been only seconds before. She looked around the area, sneering at the fear that people showed as they backed away from her, and from her companion.

Not three paces away in the center of the street a similar, if larger, conflagration had sent cars careening out of their lanes and into oncoming traffic or parked vehicles. Car alarms and horns mixed with screams of terror and the hissing sounds of ruptured radiators. Pedestrians cried out as the second vortex of flame guttered out revealing a massive demonic humanoid.

Towering over nine feet tall with skin like burnished gold Malrog the Golden Skinned stretched the oversize ape like arms that hung nearly to its cloven hooves. The demon's visage was a mixture of man and beast with great curling horns and coarse hair as black as its skin was golden. Burning hoofprints formed in its wake as it waded through the tangle of cars toward its mistress, the witch BlackMoon.

BlackMoon's hand came up and a cone of hell-fire liquefied the facade of the jewelers, creating a burning hole that gaped in hellish mockery of the charming Victorian Era facade that had been there before. She strode into the building, ignoring the fire as though it were of no concern, and confronted the man behind the counter. "All of it. You will give me all of it if you value your pathetic life," she all but cooed, the sultry sound of her voice at odds with the dangerous tone of her request. Shaking with terror the man barely retained the presence of mind to press the hidden alarm button, though it was hardly needed.

[Talos]

Now ...

Talos landed on a rooftop halfway between Alamo Square and the Downtown area to get his bearings. He was oblivious to the costumed form following in behind him. With vision ten times more acute than a human's he located the trouble spot, it was easy to see the tangle of cars near the corner of Pine and Sansome. Mnemonic poly-alloys flexed and Talos sprung into the air once more, on a ballistic course with the small empty space amid the chaotic snarl of crashed cars.

In no time at all Talos was on a downward trajectory but his leap had been misaimed, and instead of a clear and empty section of street nine hundred and change pounds of metal, plastic, and good intentions landed feet first onto the hood of a 1967 Cadillac DeVille. Talos would have blushed had he blood, or skin, but lacking the required physiological components he instead stepped out of the ruin of the car's front end. "Sorry! Sorry about that, misjudged my jump. Sorry ..." he said, making pacifying gestures to the irate hipster who had climbed out of the driver's seat and was berating him.

Talos looked around the immediate area, stopping at the sight of the demolished jeweler's. "Oh, well, I guess-" he had started to say when a golden form had catapulted itself at him with the force of a freight train. Malrog hit Talos like a battering ram and sent him tumbling through the Cadillac, to land in the crumpled bed of a pickup truck. "Ow ... I think." The demon continued the charge and now loomed over the fallen hero, its golden arms held together over its head ready to swing down upon Talos like a two-handed pile driver.

[z-Tempest Greer]

The arrow hit the demon in the back of the head, exploding outward. Coils of rope snapped out, their weighted ends arcing around the demon’s upper body. With a bellow, the monster belayed his downward strike to throw off the netting. Roaring, it spun to look up at the newest assailant; a cloaked, hooded figure crouching on the ledge of the building.

Tempest didn’t try speaking. She didn’t have the voice to scare, so she didn’t try. She’d been practicing, but she had her mother’s fair, soprano voice. It didn’t make people quiver in fear. So she waited for the demon’s reply in silence.

The monster drew a breath and spat a gout of flame at her. Tempest threw herself off the edge of the building, bouncing off an awning and landing in a safe crouch on the ground. She snapped off another shot, pleased to see Talos rising behind the creature. But what the young archer didn’t know was that she was in front of the burning hole of the jewelry store and behind her was the witch. Blackmoon pointed at Tempest, menacing flames gathering around her fingers.

[Talos]

Fire blossomed from the woman's hand like a volcanic eruption a vortex of fire so thick it seemed to have mass that took the young heroine, the golden demon, and the metal man in a single expanding gout that coated the facades across the way, melting glass and brick alike. Malrog's skin changed from burnished gold to golden orange as it heated under the onslaught. The demon smiled, showing teeth pointed like a shark's.

A shouted warning, desperate and brief, was all that kept the young archer from being burned to the bone. She spun, flinging herself away and down, falling into a roll, and coming up with an arrow to nock. No string met her fingers however, only wafting strands of carbonized filament. The bow itself was fine but a new string would be needed.

Talos was too big, too slow, too heavy to move out of the way. The attack was massive by the time it reached him, a boiling cloud thirty feet across and growing. Instead the cyborg ducked his head and brought up his arms shielding himself with heavily armored and reinforced forearms. His armor began to glow, and sensors displayed warnings about heat stress and temperature limits.

With his arms up Talos couldn't see and Malrog used the distraction to hammer the hero with a series of rapid blows. Braced as he was Talos simply took the blows, but the rubber pads on his feet were melting, liquefying and each hit drove him backward, sliding on gooey rubber.

Talos grunted, an affectation that had nothing to do with effort and more to do with frustration, and leaned forward, throwing himself bodily forward with his legs like a battering ram launched from a cannon. He hit the golden demon with full force and like a pair of billiards balls Talos came to a stop as the demon was launched backward into the jewelry store.

[z-Tempest Greer]

Another young woman might have cursed about her foul luck; Tempest didn’t have time for that. She kept an extra string and her fingers dove into the pouch where she carried them, trying to get her bow restrung before she really needed it. Once she had the cord in-hand, she rapidly restrung the bow and snatched up an arrow just as the demon reappeared in the doorway.

Ignoring the ticks and pings Talos’s armor made as it slowly cooled and ignoring her worry for the robotic hero, Tempest fired a grappling arrow. She needed to not be at street level with that thing, and being out of sight—and shot—of that woman seemed like a better idea.

The grappling cord caught and then the mechanism pulled her up off the street. Tempest twisted her body, and by the time the cord stopped drawing her in, she had caught herself with her feet. Her specially-made boots caught and pushed against the bricks of the building as she reoriented herself. Talos and the demon had reengaged with one another and she was just in time to see the metallic hero lift the demon high over his head and smash him down into the pavement.

Chanting filled her ears and Tempest pushed against the building, carelessly leaning her body out into open air. Below her, she could just see the woman, her arms moving around her head and as she prepared to do… something. Magic wasn’t really Tempest’s thing, but tight shots were. She snatched loose a blunt arrow, put it to the string and fired in a heartbeat of time. The dull arrow slammed into the woman, interrupting whatever she’d been doing. BlackMoon was knocked to the ground but didn’t stay down as her head snapped up, eyes blazing with anger. Sensing that the witch was about to get some payback, Tempest snatched and fired another grappling arrow, preparing to move buildings.

Below her, even as she unsnapped herself from the arrow holding her to the wall, the demon had twisted back to its feet. With a scream, it stomped the ground, and the asphalt buckled, then heaved like a bronco under foot.

[Talos]

Malrog rose to its cloven hooves and leaped out of the now thoroughly ruined jewelry store and back to the street. Its mistress was gathering magic about her, chanting, preparing a spell of great power. The demon smiled, seeing just how thoroughly addicted to the power the woman was growing. Then the little woman fired another arrow and BalckMoon was sent sprawling the gathered magic suddenly bereft of the consciousness that was controlling and shaping it.

The golden demon stomped the ground, a shockwave arcing out in front of it and making Talos stumble as he climbed to his feet. The hero lowered his arms and checked the operation of the servos in his head and shoulders, despite the warping of his armor he seemed to be in otherwise fine fighting shape despite the previous attack. Talos brought his fist back ready to attack anew. Over the demon's shoulder he saw the roiling ball of half-formed magic as he lashed and seethed angrily. "Uh oh," the titanium titan said.

Blackmoon was crabwalking backward, propelling herself on hands and feet away from the out of control spell, as she spied the young archeress swining across the street. With a snarl of rage she hurled a ball of gelatinous fire the young woman, missing her completely but splashing the side of the buildings with a cloying, runny, nalpalm-like ooze that burned even as it dripped from the facades and toward the huddled civilians below.

Seeing only a single opportunity Talos charged forward, but rather than striking the bronze demon he grabbed the creature and spun, hauling the golden form around and sending it tumbling through the air toward the unstable spell. Without the gripping pads on his feet Talos quickly lost his footing in the manuver and the demon, seeking to not touch the rampant spellwork grappled onto the robot. Cursing both demon and hero tumbled toward the mystic maelstrom ...

[z-Tempest Greer]

Tempest has a second—less than that. She wasn’t sure what was going to happen but she did the only thing she could think to do in the situation. Standing up, she drew back and aimed, then fired. Her arrow flew straight, right past the flailing demon and robot and hit the magical spell.

The touch of something physical set off the spell. The spell pulse and contracted, then exploded, throwing out magical force across the street. Talos and Malrog were tumbled the other direction even faster than they’d staggered toward it. Malrog’s roll stopped when he made a Malrog-sized impression in a lightpole, while Talos was buried in another SUV. BlackMoon was tossed back into the store, rolling across the floor and slamming into a jewelry case. When the wave hit Tempest, she was not immune; the blow knocked her backwards into a wall. “Ah, shit,” she moaned as she slumped to the ground, feeling the muscles of her back tighten in pain.

Talos pulled himself out of the car with a shriek of metal that left those listening wincing from the shrill sound. Malrog rose again, shaking its massive horned head to clear it. Even BlackMoon was only momentarily set back, and Tempest was cursing to herself as she dragged her body upright. There was the taste of sulfur and copper in the air.

Malrog pounced on Talos, who caught the demon with a grunt. For a moment, they wrestled together, each trying to get the upper hand. Shakily, Tempest pulled out her arrow and started to advance on BlackMoon, skirting wide around the fighting brutes. “Stand down!” she ordered BlackMoon, drawing on the woman as she staggered out of the shop. “Stand down and order off your demon!”