Mist of Shadows
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Endbringers Hate Paperwork Part 18
🕑 Added 2023-04-01 06:34:33 +0000 UTCTaylor glanced over at where Tony, Gor-Don, Barbara and Kara were discussing modifications to Kara's forcefield belt then focused on Myst. "Do you have an actual plan for dealing with the rest of the gangs?"
Myst glanced between Amy and Taylor then looked over at where Vicky was talking to Cloud and Tifa about combat. "In the world? Nope. In the city? Yeah, I've got a couple of ideas."
"Care to share?" Amy asked, hoping they were more useful than the typical keep a lid on things that the heroes generally stuck with.
"I'm sort of partial to letting the Captain…" Myst trailed off as he realized Hookwolf was heading into the docks with Alabaster and Cricket. "Change of plans, Hookwolf, Alabaster and Cricket are in the docks."
Amy winced as she thought about the innocents that were going to get caught in the crossfire. "They're probably going to hit the ABB now that Lung isn't around to stop them."
"Do you need help?" Mon-El asked, hoping they didn't because he was running low on energy and hadn't recovered from his fight with Darkseid.
"We should be fine," Myst assured him, knowing they needed a different type of 'hero' for dealing with the Empire 88 since the system was corrupt and they'd probably just bribe their way out of jail or get busted out in a couple of days if they couldn't deal with the capes. "We'll be back in a bit."
"Scream if you need help," Kara said with a grin, reasonably sure they wouldn't need the help but wanting to make the offer.
"That's the plan," Myst agreed as he turned to look at Amy. "Do you think you and Vicky can handle Stormtiger?"
"Shouldn't be a problem," Amy replied, thinking of the various times that Vicky had fought Stormtiger and almost caught him. 'Wind immunity for the win.'
Taylor reached out and touched Amy's arm, refreshing the durability boost she'd given her in the Item World. "That should give you another six hours."
"Thanks. Where can we find him?" Amy asked, looking forward to capturing her first villain.
Myst focused a second on his power duplication power and compared it to his mental map of the city. "He's on the north side of the docks and moving south."
"What are you going to do?" Amy asked.
"We're going to deal with Night and Fog," Myst replied as he headed for the door. "That just leaves Crusader and Kaiser which means the Empire should be out of capes by the morning."
"Hopefully the PRT can hold them," Amy muttered as she headed over to talk to her sister.
[So what's the plan for Night and Fog?] Taylor asked as she followed Myst outside.
Myst turned invisible and walked out. [That depends, how do you feel about collateral damage?]
[We should probably limit the collateral damage], Taylor argued as she turned invisible and followed him outside.
Myst sighed dramatically. [So much for my idea of tossing Night and Fog into Winslow so you never have to go back.]
Taylor froze as she thought about all of the shit she'd had to deal with because of Winslow. [On second thought, I'm willing to put up with a bit of collateral damage to get two dangerous capes off the street.]
Myst smiled as he flew into the air and headed for the docks. [Excellent, I just need to swing by the docks first and summon a present for Hookwolf then we can swing by and pick up Night and Fog for a bit of urban renewal.]
[Please tell me that you're not summoning a rust monster], Taylor said, thinking about some of his stories about D&D monsters and his warped sense of humor.
[Nope, just a retired cape], Myst replied as he started looking through alternate dimensions, looking for the right 'hero' for the job.
0o0o0
Hookwolf stared at the unmasked white haired old man standing in the middle of the street wearing a red and purple costume and holding a red and purple helmet, seemingly unconcerned about the thirty people pointing guns at him and looking at him like he was shit on the bottom of his shoe. "You must be new, no one wears a cape these days."
"No sense of style," the man replied as he studied the idiots that had branded themselves with Nazis tattoos. "I'll give you one chance, drop your weapons and surrender."
"And if we don't?" Hookwolf asked.
"Then I'll have to disappoint a friend of mine that thinks I can be better," the man mused, not sounding particularly concerned about disappointing his friend.
"Fuck him up," Hookwolf ordered, figuring this was a decent chance to test some of the rank and file.
The old man let the men close the distance then ripped the iron out of their blood when they swung their chain wrapped clubs at him. He ignored the dead people falling to the ground like puppets with their strings cut as he turned his attention to the rest of the thugs. "Sorry Charles, but Nazis aren't people."
"Kill him!" Hookwolf shouted as he transformed into his metal form and lunged at the cape that had killed his minions.
Magneto gestured and pulled the metal monstrosity apart, rather amused by the looks of terror on their faces as he turned their weapons against them. He absently put his helmet on as he crushed the metal cage like mask the woman was wearing and popped her head like a grape. He sent the metal shards from the mutant tearing through the rest of the thugs then ripped the iron out of their blood, wanting to make sure they were dead. He blinked as he found himself back in the mansion playing chess against Charles. "Mind games?"
"Not my style," Charles replied as he moved his pawn. "Besides, you have your helmet on."
Magneto gave his old friend a look then took his pawn with a bishop, deciding to ignore his friend's mind game or the fact that he might have to upgrade his helmet.
0o0o0
Vicky stared in disbelief as Amy went through the group of Empire goons like extras in a Jackie Chan movie as Stormtiger frantically tried to hit her with blasts of compressed air. 'That's surprisingly effective,' she mused as she landed in front of one of the thugs and punched him, sending him flying into his friends with a couple of broken ribs. "Surrender to the power of truth and love!"
"Die!" Stormtiger shouted as he tried to rip the other girl apart, hoping it would give him a chance to escape and get some backup.
Amy winced as someone opened fire on her and the Empire thugs with some type of automatic weapon, killing half of them before she could even figure out where the bullets were coming from. "Stop him!" she shouted to Vicky as she pointed at the alley.
Vicky winced as the surviving Empire goons started shooting back, turning what had been a fairly simple fight into a cluster fuck as more asians with guns came out of the shadows and opened fire. 'At least we're nearly indestructible,' she thought as she flew towards the person spraying everyone with bullets, hoping they didn't end up with a lot of dead civilians.
Amy winced as she watched Stormtiger's head explode despite his best attempts to deflect the storm of bullets coming their way. She lost count of the number of bullets that bounced off of her as she dove behind an old car, trying to get behind some cover so they'd stop shooting wildly.
Vicky felt sick to her stomach as several of the shooters opened fire on her despite the fact that she was right next to their 'friend', splattering her with blood and killing the guy she'd been trying to stop. She wasn't sure what they were shouting as she flew towards the next guy and knocked him out, mostly because she didn't speak whatever the hell they were screaming in but also because she could barely hear them over the constant roar of thunder. She ignored the fact that the guy she'd just dropped had at least five holes in him and flew towards the next gunman as they continued shooting at her, less concerned about saving the idiots as stopping the idiots from shooting innocent people.
'So much for an easy mission, at least we have masks,' Amy thought as she rolled out from behind the car and flew towards the nearest gunmen, wanting to stop them from spraying bullets everywhere.
0o0o0
Myst focused and summoned a mostly heroic version of Emma Frost that was in the process of bleeding out from a gunshot wound, hoping the mental defense tattoo that Amy gave him would keep Emma from screwing with his mind. He cast his healing spell on the woman, causing the wound to fade and vanish.
"What the hell?" Emma sputtered as day changed to night and the pain in her chest vanished.
Taylor helped the gorgeous blonde woman in an elegant, if blood stained, white costume to her feet, unlocking telepathy, a mental shield and a diamond form for her future minions.
"That's fair," Emma admitted as she read Taylor's mind and realized that she was a power copier and that they were in another dimension. She reached out with her telepathy and checked the school across the street. "It's empty."
"I had to check," Myst replied. "Besides, you're trying to be a hero, we might as well make sure you live long enough to get there."
"If I was actually a hero I'd stop you from destroying a school," Emma replied, having picked up the plan from Taylor's mind.
"You're a telepath, I'm sure you picked up enough to understand," Myst replied as he reached out with telekinesis, ripped open the passenger door of Fog and Night's car as it drove down the street and tossed Night through one of the second story windows of the school, knowing that she'd be fine once she transformed. He used his telekinesis to create a person sized and shaped immovable object in front of the car on the driver's side, causing Fog to go flying through the windshield as he hadn't been wearing his seatbelt.
"Do you want me to fight Night?" Emma asked, figuring that would help sell their fight.
"That would be fantastic," Myst replied as he used telekinesis to finish snapping Fog's neck since getting tossed through the windshield hadn't quite killed him. 'You're too fucked up to save.'
Emma smiled as she transformed into her diamond form. "Toss me."
Myst laughed as he tossed Emma into the soon to be destroyed school through another window.
[You're not a very good hero, are you?] Taylor asked, her amusement bleeding through the mental link.
[She's a brute. Besides, I'll settle for effective], Myst replied with amusement as summoned a version of the Rhino fifty feet above the school then tossed him at the school with telekinesis.
"What the fuck?!" the man in the rhino themed costume blurted out as he crashed into the building, going right through the roof and taking out a couple of support beams as he crashed through two floors.
[Is there a reason you dropped someone on the school?] Taylor asked.
[I needed someone to wreck things. I would have used the Juggernaut but he's an avatar of a dark god, I'd rather avoid the attention], Myst explained, not seeing a point in asking for that sort of trouble since things were already complicated enough.
[Probably for the best], Taylor admitted as she watched sections of the building sag as the capes wrecked parts of the building. [This is going to screw up the city's budget, you realize that right?]
[Not as much as you'd think], Myst replied as he turned his head slightly to look in the direction he could feel Velocity rapidly approaching. [I should have a new private school built by the end of the holidays which means the district can shuffle the rejects that aren't willing to sign a behavior contract to Clarendon or Arcadia or get them started on homeschool packets.]
[It's nice having a genie], Taylor replied as the man with a horn on his forehead came flying through one of the walls, causing that section of the school to collapse and giving her a brief look at some type of monstrous appendage before a dark oily and very alien leg was pulled back inside the building and out of sight. [That's creepy as hell.]
[Yep], Myst agreed as he gave that section of the building a nudge with telekinesis, causing more of it to collapse. [It wouldn't be my choice of powers.]
[No thanks], Taylor agreed, not seeing a point in unlocking the power even if she might get something interesting since Myst could always summon an alternate version if she changed her mind.
Emma grabbed a monstrous leg and tossed it through another wall then transformed back to her normal form, causing the monster to change back into a woman right before the ceiling collapsed on her, putting a metal support beam through her head. "Idiot," she muttered as she headed for the exit. [I dealt with the brainwashed monster and the school is basically wrecked, did you need anything else?] she asked Myst and Taylor via telepathy.
[That depends, how much would I have to pay you to let me make a clone of you so I have someone competent to run the school I'm going to build?] Myst asked, knowing that having a telepath on staff would help with troublemakers.
[What are you offering?] Emma asked, wondering if they could make it worth it since she'd never have to deal with her clone.
[How would you like to be immune to fire and electricity?] Myst asked, knowing that she had enough money from her time as a villain that tossing her a couple of bags of silver wouldn't make a difference.
[I would have done it because you saved my life but I'll take that deal], Emma replied as she walked out of the school.
"Frost!" the Rhino shouted as he charged the mutant that was obviously at fault for him being in a strange city.
Emma reached out with telepathy and put the idiot to sleep, not seeing a reason to try to fight him physically since she wasn't in his weight class. She erased the last couple of minutes of his memories as she didn't want him going after her alternate on the off chance he was from a different reality.
Velocity skidded to a stop ten feet away from the large man and attractive woman. "What happened?"
"No clue," Emma admitted as she scanned the hero's surface thoughts, curious how much he'd seen. "I was walking by and saw the man dressed like a rhino stagger out of the building and collapse. I was just about to check if he needed CPR when you showed up."
"I'll take care of it…" Velocity trailed off as another section of the school collapsed sending dust everywhere. "You should get out of here, it's not safe."
"Got it!" Emma turned and bolted for the street as Velocity tried and failed to drag Rhino away from the school, doing her best to act like an innocent civilian. [Government heroes?]
[They're trying], Myst replied as he floated down so he could follow Emma. [The government isn't perfect but at least they're not making giant robots to destroy humanity.]
[Where am I headed?] Emma asked as she started walking, wanting to be gone by the time the rest of the heroes showed up.
[Down the street, we'll pick you up], Myst replied as they flew after her.
[At least Blackwell and Gladly are out of a job], Taylor thought, not trusting the school board to actually get rid of them, unaware she was smiling so broadly her cheeks ached.
0o0o0
Rhino blinked as he found himself in a warehouse filled with loot. "What's going on?"
Myst tossed a bag of fairy dust at the man. "Some bastard with an Irish accent mentioned that you wanted your costume gone, I can help with that."
"It's fused to my skin…" Rhino trailed off as he realized that the man talking was actually a giant and that his costume wasn't fused to his skin anymore, as he could feel his skin move under… he could actually feel things! "How?" he asked, tears filling his eyes, his emotions getting the best of him.
"Magic," Myst replied as he hit the man with a healing spell to fix any scars or issues being bonded to the suit had caused over the years. "Best of luck," he told the sometimes villain then let him vanish, hoping that his life improved.
Emma touched the last of the magical items on the desk that would give her magical defenses then turned and looked at Myst. "You should clone me before I change my mind."
Myst reached out, touched Emma's hand and used Noelle's power, creating a naked blonde clone. "Welcome to Brockton Bay."
"Thanks," the clone replied with a grin at Myst then turned to look at Emma. "I really can't fault you, we both know I'd do the same in your place."
Emma laughed then looked at Myst. "Now what?"
"Now I send you back to the instant I summoned you, best of luck," Myst told her and let Emma vanish, sending her back to her world.
Kara tossed the clone a robe they'd picked up in the Item World. "You should probably grab some extra clothes if you're going to keep copying people."
"Probably," Myst agreed, making a mental note to swing by the second hand shop in the morning.
"Can you summon something that can kill Darkseid?" Mon-El asked hopefully, finding it hard to relax with the threat to the Earth hanging over him.
"Yeah, give me a second," Myst replied as he tapped his summoning power and searched for a version of Excalibur he could envenom to actually kill Darkseid that wouldn't be missed and that Mon-El could use. He smiled as he found a version of Mordred that had just managed to grab Excalibur off of Arthur's corpse. He summoned the ecstatic villain and used his telekinesis to rip the sword out of his hand, causing Modred’s triumphant expression to turn to a look of shock before he vanished back to his world. "Yoink."
"You're supposed to say that before you do it," Yuffie argued.
"Before, after or during, as long as it gets said," Myst replied with amusement as he focused on a version of Hercules that looked suspiciously like a certain actor while he had the human form of a golden hind on his lap from about five minutes before Zeus burst into the room and killed her, setting off a chain reaction that would lead to the death half the gods on that world after a bloody war.
"What's going on?" Hercules asked as he looked around the group. "Who are you? Where are we?"
"I'll grab a whiteboard," Taylor said as she dashed over and grabbed a whiteboard from one of the shelves.
"My name is Myst," Myst offered, explaining the basics as Taylor started writing the details down on the whiteboard.
"So you're basically summoning people to help the people that you've already summoned?" Hercules asked after listening to Myst's story about summoning people to help the people he'd already summoned, wanting to make sure he understood what was going on.
"Basically," Myst agreed.
"Thus you need her blood to kill a god?" Hercules asked.
"Yeah, can we offer you a trade?" Myst asked hopefully.
"What type of trade?" Serena asked.
"How about a one way ticket to a world where your version of the gods can't find you?" Myst asked, fairly sure they'd be interested.
Serena glanced at Hercules then focused on the giant. "How much blood do you need?"
"Just enough to cover a single sword," Myst assured her.
"Which god are you trying to kill?" Hercules asked, wondering if they needed help.
"Darkseid, God of Tyranny," Myst replied.
"I've never heard of him," Hercules admitted with a frown.
"He's not exactly local, but he's ruthless and twisted and makes Ares look like Hestia," Myst explained.
"Do you need help killing him?" Hercules asked.
"I just need the sword," Mon-El assured him.
Hercules studied Mon-El for a couple of seconds then nodded. "I can't see Zeus leaving us alone or Ares for that matter."
Serena held her hand out. "Let me see the sword."
Myst floated the sword over to Serena. "Thanks and sorry about the pain."
"Story of my life," Serena admitted as she carefully cut the back of her arm then smeared the blade with her blood, causing the blade to glow as it absorbed the blood. "That's new."
Taylor stepped and cast cure as she touched Serena's shoulder, unlocking the golden hind species when her hand brushed her arm. "That should help."
"Thanks," Serena replied as she handed the sword to Mon-El and pressed the cloth to her shallow cut. "Now what?"
Myst pulled a large bag of silver coins out of his spatial ring and handed them to Serena. "Now we have Kara pick you and Hercules up and I send her home which should leave you on her world, safe from your version of the gods."
"Thank you," Serena replied.
Hercules picked Serena up in a bridal carry.
Kara walked around the demigod and picked him up, fairly sure Diana would know where to put them or what to avoid. "Send me back."
Myst let Kara and Barbara vanish, wanting to make sure there weren't any issues because of paradoxes. "You should probably fly up into space for a couple of hours and soak up some sun and take the time to recharge your ring."
"I already took care of the ring but I could do with a couple of hours in the sun," Mon-El agreed, looking forward to stabbing Darkseid and ending his reign of tyranny, once and for all.
"Sounds good," Myst agreed, wanting to make sure he was charged before he got sent home in case they lost track of time.
0o0o0
Comments
Mist of Shadows
Why would I nerf a perfectly good blade? :)
Franklin Martinez
The sword is ridiculous. OP please don’t nerf.
