"Why do I have a sinking feeling? Well one way to find out."
Check the news.
You check the early morning news, but see nothing of any real interest aside from news of one of Dissent's storms. A bad one, seems like. You're not sure of the details, since the story's pretty much over by the time you get to it, and after that it's just the weather and other regular stuff.
She returns to her body, remaining in cowering position. She'll have to deal with the gas no matter what. The police should be able to handle everything else.
You return to your body, not eager to experience tear gas once more, but equally cognizant of how there's no other choice, pretty much. You walk over to it and settle in it, feeling instinctually that it's the right thing to do, and slowly you begin to reconnect with it. Oddly enough, you run into a sort of barrier in the way, a point where it becomes less intuitive to slip back into your body somehow, and you need to consciously push for the process to happen properly. Curious, you think, but beyond that it's a downhill ride back into terrible pain, and you resume cowering, the sudden intensity of the resuming noise, compared to the complete silence of frozen time, being almost deafening. You hear an odd sound, followed by exclamations of surprise, then a sort of tense silence as people start walking around and investigating the area. One police officer appears to have found you, and seems to be asking you to identify yourself.
Then the noise rings out again, and you hear something falling to the ground nearby and further away, and another exclamation of surprise.
((you know Harry, its generally helpful if you inform people when they actually get into the game. A_D never even sent me a confirmation that my sheet had been accepted. ))
Becoming more than a little concerned about the amount of attention he is receiving Steven decides that putting a little distance between himself and them is the best possible course of action and he deliberately keeps himself walking at the same pace as he walks past the alley. As soon as he is out of sight however he immediately breaks into a dead sprint and doesn't even slow down for the next corner at which time he throws his gaze back over his shoulder in an attempt to satisfy his drunken paranoia and make sure he isn't being followed.
((You knew that last fact, A_D possibly knew that last fact, but I did not know that last fact. 'Tis the way things happen sometimes. I also forgot you were in the first time I updated this, so go figure. You must just be easy to skip.))
The whole bunch of people let out a collective guffaw as you continue walking, and a chill of fear runs through you. Looking back, you notice them walking toward you, one guy with arms raised - you're not sure to what degree they want to fuck with you right now, but you're also not about to find out, and so you take off at the same pace, and as soon as you are out of sight you sprint like the devil, charging toward the corner of a nearby construction site and navigating it at a breakneck pace, not even looking where you're going as you throw your head back to make sure you're not being followed.
This, naturally, proves to be a mistake, as you careen right into a man standing past the corner, and together with him you fall down on what feels like a case of beers, breaking the whole damn thing and filling both this one guy and yourself with a bunch of broken glass. It hurts like a bitch, needless to say.
"Motherfucker!" you hear shouted in unison. You groan and look up, and notice that you seem to have run afoul of a bunch of skinheads. They look pretty damn pissed. They roll you off your buddy and stand both of you up, then give him a half-empty beer bottle. The guy takes a sip with a sour expression on his face, and then cracks you over the head with the bottle while the other two hold you. You go slack in their arms from the impact, and they throw you to the ground.
"How you like that, you piece of shit?" the injured skinhead asks, and then kicks you. His mates give a kick each as well, and each one hurts a whole lot, with their goddamn steel-toed boots and everything. You think you felt something break on that last kick. Worse, you think they heard it as well. You begin to curl up, but that just opens up your kidneys to greater assault, and that just hurts even more, so you just go limp while they kick the shit out of you, hoping to god that they'll stop eventually.
This is bad. This is really bad. If we stay in here, we might get caught as the place burns. If we go outside, the lightning could fry us. What the hell am I supposed to do? And what the hell is wrong with that parahuman bitch? What did we do to her? I swear if I survive this, I will end her. Jake thinks to himself, a note of panic mixed with anger creeping into his thoughts.
"Come on, we're moving. We can't stay here where we could be crushed." He states, trying to keep his tone calm and ushering him family towards the front of the house. He stopped near the front door, still unsure of whether he should take them outside or not. He continues to listen to the broadcast, trying to time her outbursts and the effects to make sure his family wasn't caught in the aftermath.
As the house becomes progressively more on fire, you move over to the front door. The girl on the radio seems to only become angrier and angrier, almost to the point of incoherence, in fact, starting to shout about acts of institutional racism that hardly even pertain to whatever she was talking about in the first place, or parahumans at all, and you notice that the ground is beginning to quake. The three of you move to the front door through the flames and the flying objects, when you hear the house begin to collapse in places, and you think the roof might get ripped off any second now.
And then lightning strikes the lobby, and all three of you are floored by the release of energy, pelted by flaming splinters and disoriented by the shockwave. It does not take long to recover, but you notice something gravely alarming almost instantly. The floor right under the hole in the roof, authentic wood - it seems to be hissing as the rain hits it, giving off fumes.
Oh god, it's raining acid. What the fuck did you do to deserve this, you think as you observe your mom's favorite vase melting nearby as the pouring rain starts hitting it, white mist rising from it.
Would hold the knife in his hand. He would stare at the blade, then at Ms. Black. He would move forward, the knife at his side. He jumped at her, attempting to cut into her.
The knife digs deep into Mrs. Black's thigh as she attempts to back away. "Augh, you're going to kill me aren't you?" She laughs, "Fine, put me down. At least I'm going to leave some good in my wake."
Would loom over Ms.Black. He would stare deeply at her and didn't feel any guilt for what he was about to do. He violently slashed forward, attempting to cut open her throat and finally end her.
You swipe with the knife with all your might, easily cutting out a chunk of Mrs. Black's leg despite her attempts at backing away. She begins to talk to you, but you are disinterested, and slit her throat mid-sentence with only one hand, tearing flesh messily despite the quality of your instrument, and then watch her expire as arterial blood spurts out of several new openings you've made in her neck. The woman, you are completely sure, is dead now, in under a minute. Thank fucking Christ for that. You breathe a sigh of relief, but it gets cut off as you are suddenly propelled back into the normal world - Mrs. Black twenty meters away from you, just as dead as you left her, you standing where you were before, cops looking confused, one that you seem to have sent flying with your violent appearance. A load of information hits your senses all at once, and you process it remarkably quickly, one question going through your mind as the police begin to raise their weapons toward you. Who's next, if, anyone?
That didn't really sound like Lucian, though Dominic might have. I thanked the woman for her time and turned to go. If those little bastards did this to fuck with me, there'd be hell to pay. First, I just had to make sure they were safe, though...
You thank Miss Hanstead and quickly head out - the store was just nearby, you remember, down the street - looking over there, you don't see anybody coming, so you go closer to see if maybe they're in there - walking over to the window, you spot nobody inside, though one kid, a girl roughly your brothers' age, seems to come out of the store just as you are prepared to go inside.
Selina MartinYou awaken in an unfamiliar place. It's damp, and it smells distinctly of chlorine, the strong scent accompanied by fluorescent lighting making you a little sick. The room's a little cramped, and seems to be a basement of some kind, judging by the style of window you can see. Your gaze wanders blearily through the room before settling on a man wearing an apron and an elaborate silver skull mask. He's a white guy, with a shaven head, a little on the plump side, and seemingly sweating heavily, large armpit stains visible on the weird off-brand labcoat he's wearing. He seems to be pacing around the room currently. He seems to vaguely notice you're awake, leaning forward to double-check from the looks of it.
You notice that your arms and legs are strapped to the table in a spread-eagle manner, with rather thick leather straps at that.