by Juice Box » Sun Jan 08, 2017 1:07 pm
"What the fuck, Trenton?" Juice chastises. "Lazarus just left us! You know how powerful that guy is. We could've lasted so much longer with him here!"
"I hate disagreeing with you, Trent," DM continues. "You know I do. But Juice has a point. You did nothing as they left but could easily have stopped them. So why didn't you?"
Trenton sighs, then walks towards the ends of the blue sphere the six are currently inside--it's another one of James' time manipulation abilities: time in that sphere moves much faster than normal. The Reapers slowly converge all around them, but they're moving at a rate of an inch a second and they're still many meters away, so the group doesn't worry about them right now.
"Think about it," Trenton rebuts, her pale blonde hair brushing over her shoulder. "The Rational has a point. The Citadel has fallen, so this is all about Denas now."
"Exactly why we're staying! If he dies, then it all ends. If we stay here and fight, we'll delay the Reapers and give him more time to reach Silversword--"
"But what if time isn't what he needs, Juice?" She rebuts. "I agree with what you want to do, I really do. The battle here is still important, and I genuinely believe we should stay and fight. But at the same time, Denas needs security, and the only security he has right now is the two-hundred broken men he's gathered with him."
"And that's more than enough--"
"From a first glance, yes," Trenton meets Juice's eye. "But consider the wounded and the villagers. Not all of the two-hundred can fight. Then consider the Reaper Lords. A single one of them can obliterate droves. How much more when his thralls help him? How much more when the other Lords join him? If we stay here we can prevent them from reaching Denas at all, but what happens when even a single one manages to get away from us? The Rational can't defend Denas, but Lazarus can. We should let him leave."
"I..." Juice looks down on the ground. "But--"
"I can make you agree with me," Trenton interrupts. "A flick of my wrist and you would. You know that. All of you do. But I'm not going to, because I believe you're logical. You know that I'm right, Juice. I wish I wasn't, but this is the best way we can ensure Denas survives."
The brunette doesn't raise her head, a grim expression still on her face. She nods, but shortly retaliates: "If any of us dies because Lazarus isn't here, the blame goes to you."
---------------------------------------------------
"Recap," James says, expecting them to list down their powers. "I'll start: time manipulation, telekinesis, hyper-enhanced vision and teleportation."
"Fire, lightning, earthquakes, strength," Juice replies.
"Metal, cloning, agility," Repeat continues.
"Energy, metal, telekinesis," from DM.
"Astral form, negation, self-resurrection." Cloudfall, the pale, grey-haired boy, ends.
That last one from Cloudfall should have intrigued everybody--both negation and self-resurrection at once--but instead everyone's eyes move on to Trenton.
A tall, pale girl with pale blonde hair, Trenton attracted attention wherever she went, regal in her beauty and elite in her nature, but she didn't look at all to be a powerful Superhuman. Repeat knew better, though--she briefly recalled one of her past adventures--it was not too long ago, and they had one, incredibly powerful ally. Her name was CC, and she had with her the ability to simultaneously negate and mimic any form of power an opponent had, effectively stealing it from them. She alone could easily have taken down entire armies without showing any particular sign of fatigue, and later on in the quest, that was exactly what she did.
Trenton rivaled that power.
"Absolute mind manipulation," she declares. "And disintegration."
-----------------------------------
James is against a wall, yelling as a Ravager attempts to gnaw at his throat. He uses his time manipulation abilities to slow down the area within the Ravager, months' worth of experience and practice ensuring the utmost precision, capturing only the space occupied by the alien mutant. Admittedly, he was caught by surprise--he was among the most valuable support warriors the Superhumans had--time manipulation, telekinesis, precognition and farsight were all incredibly potent supporting abilities--but he was never a good upfront warrior, always needing a tanker to protect him and lacking both the experience and the pure raw power to deal sufficient head-on damage. Another Ravager runs towards him nearby, but he flings it back with his telekinesis, and the poor alien lands right on Trenton's sword as if she were just waiting for it.
They know each other so well.
The woman walks forward towards James, taking her time, intense focus in her eyes. Once she's a few feet away, she stops, lift her sword to the Ravager slowly, then releases a burst of swift, white energy. The Ravager stops all of a sudden, then lets go of James and charges towards a nearby Reaper, battling it and subsequently ripping its throat out by utilizing the sudden surprise it had. It runs forward, looking for another target to kill.
Trenton lends James a hand. The black-haired boy takes it and brings himself up.
"An hour so far," Trenton says. "How much longer do you think we'll last?"
"Still more than too many Reaper Lords inside the Citadel, each commanding their own horde of thralls, and even more are coming. We can maybe last more than a day if we're lucky. A few hours if we're not."
"How do we get lucky?" Trenton continues.
"We already are," James smirks. "We have you, don't we?"
"All right," The blonde woman sighs. "That was smooth. Inappropriate, given the circumstances, but still smooth."
The six fight their way just to the outskirts of the Citadel, where they can ensure that all the nearby thralls can see them. They've grown much larger in size--the Reapers have grown tremendously, fiendish spikes protruding from their backs, the Hornets now attack faster and stronger, a single one of their wings now easily doubling their own size, and even the hulking Juggernauts have somehow gained even more muscle than normal. This must be the work of the Queen of the Reapers. The six do not know how this has happened, but they fight on nonetheless. Juice continues slaughtering Reaper then Ravager then Reaper again, but she has been fighting for hour after hour after hour, and her strength is faltering. She stomps the ground, and another gigantic earthquake rocks their surroundings as their enemies tumble around them. Repeat and Cloudfall--the last of the six--capitalize on this and slaughter their dazed opponents before they can get back up. With her signature gigantic sword, the metal woman swipes and blazes through scores of aliens as she runs. Cloudfall continues but with less tenacity--he's weaker than Repeat, just like always, and he's the most likely in the group to die, just like always.
"James and Trenton are starting!" DM declares. "Cover them!"
"Let's go!" Cloudfall acknowledges, then shifts to an astral form to reach his friends faster, flying through aliens as he does so. He cannot be harmed in this state, nor can he harm in kind, though this comes at the cost of being incapable of using his Negation. So as to say, he cannot use his second most potent ability without completely putting himself vulnerable. Not to say that he is incapable of protecting himself, but unlike Juice or DM, he is not all that much of a hardy warrior.
Beside James, Trenton spots a hulking Juggernaut approaching them. It's more than huge, almost as tall as the castle itself, hundreds of veins rippling through its ginormous muscles.
"I want that one," Trenton says, pointing her thin blade at the Juggernaut. "And the ones around it."
"It'll be tough for me," James replies. "But... should be worth it."
James raises his hand, and all of the aliens in front of them come to a silent stop. Time has slowed directly around them, and they will be unable to move until James wills them to.
Then Trenton points at the Juggernaut, and once again a bigger, much brighter white pulse is emitted from her and heads for the behemoth. It hits, and he and all other nearby aliens converge towards the unmoving group of time-stopped Reapers, whom they now see as threats. A group of Ravagers have begun assaulting a Queen, who stands completely still as they do so. A larger group of Hornets bombards the commanding Reaper Lord with attacks, receiving no retaliation as they do so. The Juggernaut just roams on, slamming through the pink fleshlings as if they were butter.
The other four Superhumans have created a circle in protection of their two most important allies, enveloped by Trenton's white energies. It's odd, but being around them, they feel strangely empowered--lusting for blood, even. James feels this, too, but he knows this is the work of Trenton, manipulating the emotions of her allies as well as harassing that of her foes' so as to put the battle in their favor. Juice and DM once more fight with renewed vigor, launching bolts of energy and lightning at all who dare come close, and Juice using sheer brute force from her gauntlets to punch away anyone (un)fortunate enough to get near her.
A stray Ravager pack charges right towards Trenton. The group is too preoccupied to help her, so she decides to take care of them herself. She stands her ground, and with minimal effort and movements in the body, gracefully swipes away each of the beasts. Her posture is firm as she does so, a hand on her back, her thin blade's tip curving in elegant arcs as she swipes forward. The last Ravager finds an opening and assaults her straight and forward, and the blonde woman watches as it disintegrates on contact with her armor.
"Next one," Trenton says, then points to a nearby Reaper Lord, just as it roars loudly.
James drops the time field on the halted group of Reapers, watching their infighting as the Juggernaut tears all of them apart, ally and enemy alike. He shifts his gaze to the Reaper Lord just as Trenton releases her powers on it, shining white smoke surrounding the beast. In one quick motion it raises its schythe-like arm, and cuts down all the Reapers in front of it. The Queens follow the primal actions of their leader, their spawn turning on each other, alien against alien.
The friendly Reaper Lord charges towards another one of its hulking kind, and the two engage in a gigantic, bloody battle. Their thralls do the same, tearing each other apart viciously. Hornets shoot at each other, falling down from the sky in swift succession, and Ravagers assault the larger Reapers like Twilight Blood Servants attacking Elven Forest Keepers in the Twilight War decades ago.
James and Trenton repeat this strategy throughout the battle, turning the aliens against each other, Trenton's manipulation keeping their team in high spirits and assaulting the enemy's as they tear each other apart. Hours pass, and the bodies of dead aliens form entire piles around them. The infighting has spread to the entire Citadel, as well as between and around it: no longer do human swords clash against Reaper fangs--now the four-legged creatures create corpses out of each other, their blood littering the lost human capitol. Other groups of unified Reapers led by their respective Lords--their mental condemnation still made apparent thanks to Trenton--give chase towards those who broke off to assault King Denas. They attack the hunters upon meeting them, delaying their progress further and causing further disarray amongst the alien army. Juice and her group continue the battle right outside the Castle's gates, showing no sign of giving in to the still-endless hordes approaching them.
Last edited by
Juice Box on Sun Jan 08, 2017 1:50 pm, edited 2 times in total.