Mist of Shadows
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Taylor Hebert Dungeon Girl Part 32
🕑 Added 2018-10-27 07:20:26 +0000 UTC Taylor looked down at the unconscious villain she’d just shocked half to death because he wouldn’t fall down and she’d decided that his suit was heavily insulated. “What the hell was wrong with him? He wouldn’t go down and he was smirking like he’d won, then he just started screaming and dropped like a rock.”“No clue, certainly a delayed response,” Gothic replied as she worked on cutting his costume enough that she could touch his skin and put him in a medical coma so that he wouldn’t wake up and try to kill them again. She slipped her finger in the hole and touched his neck. She blinked as she got a snapshot of his brain and verified that he was a parahuman. “You might have cooked some of his organs, but he’ll probably live.”
“You should probably heal him enough that he doesn’t die,” Taylor replied, not wanting to kill anyone if she could help it, even if he was a complete piece of shit.
“Sure, might as well,” Gothic grumbled as she used her power to keep him comatose until either she or Amy woke him up. She wasn’t sure how long it would take before someone requested their assistance but he wouldn’t be a threat to anyone pulling a Rip Van Winkle. She fixed most of the damage the lightning had caused though she left the nerve and muscle damage on the off chance that someone else managed to wake him up. “There, he’ll live,” she promised.
“Probably more than he deserves, but we can’t exactly claim self defense this time,” Taylor said relieved that they hadn’t seriously hurt anyone.
Gothic shrugged. “It was basically preemptive self defense.”
Taylor doubted that would count all that much in a court and really didn’t want to give the Director leverage to force her into the Wards. “Do you think we left any evidence behind?” she asked warily.
“I seriously doubt it, we hit the first group from behind and stole their toys. Between the flash bangs and the extra weapons, I doubt they’ll be piecing anything together for a while. The plan worked perfectly!”
Kevin’s voice came over their headsets, “We have a problem.”
“What’s that?” Taylor asked warily, ideally wishing that Gothic hadn’t just invoked Murphy.
“They were keeping a parahuman down here, we’re going to need some help.”
“Where?” Gothic asked warily, her mind instantly jumping to one of the few locations that wasn’t covered in cameras, the vault.
“The vault, the door is sealed shut and she’s trapped,” Kevin said as calmly as he could as he didn’t want the angry and possibly unstable parahuman on the other side overreacting to anything he said.
“Vault door? I’m on my way,” Victoria practically squealed at the idea of getting to demolish a vault door and not get in trouble for it.
Randal winced as he thought about Victoria ripping through the vault door. “Hold that thought a second, if you damage the vault door they’ll know you were here.”
“Oh come on,” Victoria complained.
“Don’t worry, I’ll be there in a minute,” Amy piped up as she finished securing one of the mercenaries she’d knocked unconscious with her power. “If I can figure out where I’m going.”
Richard piped up, “The medical section is fairly close to the vault, just take a left on your way out.”
“Thanks,” Amy replied as she glanced at the so called ‘doctor’ she’d zapped unconscious and hogtied then headed out of the room at a jog, hoping she could convince her sister not to trash the place on the off chance they could keep it.
Randal smirked as he glanced over the group of mercenaries that he’d tied up. “You should probably turn the power back on and bug out before someone shows up to check on the substation.”
“On it,” Richard replied as he glanced at the cheat sheet that told him which order to flip the switches to start things back up without screwing things up.
“We’ll be there once we finish tying up some loose ends,” Taylor said as she pulled a handful of zip ties out of her pocket and went to work securing Coil.
Kevin relaxed slightly as he saw Amy heading his way at a jog. “Thanks.”
Amy blinked as the lights came back on, flooding the hallway with light. “The lights are back.”
“Can you help?” Noelle asked hopefully as she paced back and forth in the vault, trying not to completely lose it even though she had a feeling Coil was out of the picture.
“Good to know,” Richard replied as he finished closing up the electrical cabinet, wanting to be long gone by the time someone came to investigate.
“My friends should be able to.” Kevin pushed the release button on the door, fairly sure he was going to regret his choice one way or another given the other cape’s agitation. “Let’s see if this works.”
“Don’t worry, we’re heroes,” Vicky piped up which caused Kevin to wince as he was fairly sure that wasn’t what the monstrous cape wanted to hear.
Amy nearly swore as she jogged over when the vault opened enough that she could see the four legged monstrous centaur like creature inside the vault. ‘Fucking hell!’
“Can you help me?” Noelle demanded as she looked down at the masked capes in the hallway.
Amy stared as she looked up at the human torso on top of the monstrous cape, various horrible scenarios running through her mind about what the hell Coil was doing down there. “What happened?”
“I drank a formula that gave me powers and ended up monstrous,” Noelle replied, her frustration and anger increasing as she flashed back to the Simurgh attack that had brought them to Earth Bet and started the last few months of hell.
“Powers?” Amy asked, trying not to overreact or upset the cape that didn’t appear particularly stable though that could have just been the extra heads that were moving and twitching in what looked like agitation.
“I’m a monster and I create monstrous copies of living creatures when I touch them,” Noelle admitted reluctantly, knowing that there wasn’t a point in lying as it would be immediately apparent as soon as someone touched her and would probably distract them from helping.
“Skin contact or through clothes?” she asked, curious if her magical gloves would let her touch the mutated cape without getting copied considering they stopped Gothic’s power from effecting her.
“Skin contact. Can you help?” Noelle asked, a touch of hope creeping into her voice as she realized the girl might be able to help.
“If I can’t, Neverland should be able to,” Amy assured the monstrous cape, relieved that it actually took skin contact to copy people. “My gloves should protect me and let me check your vitals.”
“If you copy a parahuman do they have their powers and memories?” Kevin asked, uneasy with the idea of having monstrous copies of Panacea running around creating plagues or telling secrets best left unspoken.
“They have most of their memories and a twisted copy of their powers,” Noelle admitted reluctantly.
Randal piped up over the headset, “Oh fuck that! We don’t need a monstrous version of you running around considering your power. Test it on Player 2 first.”
“Hey,” Kevin complained reflexively then sighed as he realized that he was probably the best person they had to test it.
“I’d rather deal with a Tinker without his gear than a monstrous copy of The Amy,” Randal stated firmly.
“Or a brute,” Amy cut in, thinking about her sister.
“Point,” Kevin agreed as he warily glanced into the darkness. “Permission to test if you can copy me through my gloves?”
“Fine,” Noelle agreed as she moved a mutated almost elephant like leg into the opening, uneasy about them seeing her but wanting help.
Kevin hesitantly reached out and touched her leg. “Anything?”
“Nothing,” Noelle admitted with relief.
“In that case, you’re up Amy,” Kevin replied as he stepped back, hoping the monstrous cape didn’t freak out if Amy couldn’t help her immediately.
“Wait for me,” Victoria grumbled as she rounded a corner that ‘should’ have taken her to the vault section but apparently didn’t.
“Don’t worry, it will be fine,” Amy assured Noelle and Vicky as she stepped forward, reached out and touched the girl’s monstrous leg. She barely managed not to yank her hand away from the monstrous cape as her power mapped the girl’s body and she realized the girl’s twisted connection to her power was in the middle of her monstrous half rather than her brain like most parahumans.
‘Fuck, even if I fix things she’ll just mutate!’ She took a breath then let it out and slowly pulled her hand back. She knew she could tweak the girl’s connection to her power but she wasn’t sure where to start or if changing things would make things worse. “We should be able to help but I’m going to have to talk to my friend.”
“You can help?” Noelle asked in disbelief.
Amy nodded. “We should be able to create a device to keep you from mutating but it might take a couple days so you’ll have to be patient.”
“I can do that,” Noelle said, hoping that she could keep herself under control long enough to get cured.
‘Great, now I just have to get Neverland to pull a rabbit out of her hat,’ Amy complained to herself. “Do you want to stretch your legs a bit?”
“What part of wait for me didn’t you get?” Victoria demanded in a whisper, not sure how good the other cape’s hearing was.
“I probably shouldn’t,” Noelle stepped back into the darkness. “You should probably shut the vault door while I’m reasonably calm, I have control issues.”
“We can do that,” Kevin agreed as he pushed the button on the console to close the door. “Let’s talk to Neverland about making the device for Noelle.”
“I’ve got a couple of ideas,” Taylor said as she finished securing the last of Coil’s mercenaries.
“Same,” Amy agreed as she headed toward Coil’s office, thinking about ways to cure Noelle.
Victoria grinned as she flew around the corner and saw Amy and Kevin. “Found you.”
“I’d hate to be lost,” Amy replied with amusement as she continued walking, not wanting to say anything suspect until she was a good distance from Noelle.
“Place is a maze,” Victoria complained as she followed Amy and Kevin.
“It’s not that bad,” Kevin said thinking about some of the labyrinths he’d explored in various games that were much worse.
“Any idea what we’re going to do with the mercenaries?” Taylor asked as she dragged one of the unconscious men over to where she’d dragged the rest of the mercenaries in the room.
“Aren’t we turning them into the PRT?” Victoria asked, not sure what else they’d do with them.
Randal piped up as he walked into the room with Gothic and Taylor. “Eventually but I’d like to fix Noelle before a bunch of PRT agents bust in here and get themselves into trouble.”
“Probably for the best,” Richard agreed as he lazily flew over the general area on his board, not wanting the attack on Coil connected with the power being diverted.
Gothic snorted. “Let’s just drop them at the hospital and have them call the police. That should give us plenty of time to sort things with Noelle before the PRT shows up.”
“You think we can fix her in under thirty minutes?” Kevin asked in disbelief.
“All we need to do is have Taylor create a Cape Barbie dungeon and make it to the first shop.”
“That’s assuming the dungeon works like the game,” Randal pointed out, not particularly enthusiastic about opening a dungeon to the twisted game.
“Do you have a better idea?” Gothic asked.
“We could try a cure disease potion,” Victoria suggested.
Amy shook her head as they walked around the corner and spotted the rest of the group. “Even if it worked, her power would just keep mutating her.”
“It’s a start,” Victoria defended her idea as they walked over to join the rest of the group.
“You didn’t see the look in her eyes. We don’t need something that might fail, we need a solid win or at least a solid first step. We can worry about fixing her monstrous form after we prove that we can help.”
“You’re assuming that the Cape Barbie dungeon wouldn’t be a death trap,” Victoria complained, thinking about the nightmarish game.
Kevin shrugged. “No harm in opening the portal and checking on the difficulty level.”
Taylor sighed as she stepped over to the door to Coil’s office, grabbed the knob and focused on everything she’d seen and read about the game on the wiki, the dungeons, the foul mouthed players, the strange magical skills and the magical items then opened the door. She was unsurprised though a touch disappointed that the doorway was a solid black. “Yeah, about what I was expecting.”
Victoria stared at the solid black doorway. “Is it supposed to be black?”
Kevin winced as he realized the dungeon was black for their flying brick. “Shit, we’ll need a drone and some distractions.”
“Yeah, I’m not going in there unless I know exactly where I’m going,” Victoria complained.
“I don’t blame you,” Taylor replied as she shut the door. “No reason to take chances and I can just open it later.”
“Good call,” Randal agreed as he turned to look at Kevin. “How long would it take you to put together a stealth drone?”
“I’ll have to stop at the electronics store for a couple of parts so maybe ten minutes?” Kevin replied, not sure how long it would take to find everything he needed.
“In that case, let’s start dropping the mercenaries off at the hospital,” Gothic suggested as she reached down and grabbed one of the mercenaries by the hand.
“Sounds good,” Victoria agreed. “I’d rather just drop them off with the PRT but they’d want to know where the base is.”
“We’ll tell them when we hand over Coil and the doctor, we just need enough time to start fixing Noelle’s issues.”
“In that case, I’ll see you at the garage in ten.” Kevin pulled a town portal scroll out of his pockets and used it to open a portal to the alley next to the electronics store then stepped through.
Taylor opened a town portal to the hospital. “Have fun.”
“I’ll see what I can get off Coil’s computer,” Randal replied as he opened the door to Coil’s office.
“Sounds good,” Taylor agreed as she grabbed one of the mercenaries by his hands and started dragging him toward the town portal.
0o0o0
Taylor frowned slightly as she watched a flat chested naked magic girl get pasted by a beam of dark energy on the monitor they’d hooked up to the drone’s controller. “I didn’t think you could drop their breasts that small.”
Kevin snorted. “I’m fairly sure that was a guy.”
“Shouldn’t he have dangly bits?” Taylor asked.
Victoria snickered as she watched over Randal’s shoulder. “Nah, male characters are about as anatomically correct as Ken dolls. Something about not wanting to corrupt America’s youth or get in trouble with the sensors.”
“Considering the detail work on the girls’ private parts, I don’t buy it,” Randal replied as he directed the drone around an aerial battle two flying capes were having. One of them looked like they were wearing high end power armor while the other was flying around on a broom in a skimpy purple witch’s outfit, tossing around fireballs like they were bullets.
Victoria stared as the mechanical girl used some type of shoulder mounted beam cannon and it obliterated a swath of the forest when it missed the witch. “You’re trying to kill me, aren’t you?”
“Between your shield and gear, you should be fine…” Kevin trailed off as the witch’s voice came over the speaker as she drifted close to the drone, “Hellfire Rhapsody!”
“That can’t be good,” Taylor muttered as she watched the witch toss five fireballs at the ground under the other girl then gesture in a circle as she dodged several almost frantic looking blasts from the other girl’s cannon. “Can you get a picture of the ground?”
“Sure,” Randal replied as he adjusted one of the cameras to show the five bonfires that made a star pattern on the ground and the circle of flame that surrounded them.
A different girl’s voice came over the speaker, “Motherfucking pay-to-win slut! I’m going to stick my fist so far up your ass you’ll be spitting shit for a month!”
“Go to hell camper-slut!” the witch called out as a massive red demonic hand erupted from the ground with a blast of dark flames and rock and grabbed the girl in power armor out of the air then pulled her under the ground. “That’s nasty…” he trailed off as the ground closed over and the flames went out, leaving no sign of the girl in power armor. “Well, that happened.”
“What the fuck was that?” Kevin asked as he ran a search for hellfire rhapsody on his phone.
“No clue,” Randal complained as he continued flying the drone toward the town he could see in the distance. “But I don’t want to get anywhere near her.”
“The next fuckwit that kills my alt is going to hell!” the girl shouted then vanished.
“That’s one way to do it,” Gothic muttered as she studied the various characters running around as the drone got closer to the town. This might be a good time to run to the store.”
“Maybe,” Victoria agreed as she glanced at the bathroom door where the dungeon portal was. ‘Mom would kill me if she knew I was charging into a death trap. I must be insane.’
“Found it. Okay, that’s fuckshit,” Kevin complained as he read the ability in question. “It’s pay-to-win shit, it creates a flaming pentagram that pulls people to hell if they can’t kill the caster before they finish the spell.”
“Hell?” Amy asked warily.
“Yep, you have to fight your way out of a demon infested nightmare or use a code to get the ferryman to take you back to the normal world.”
“Please tell me it’s expensive or at least hard to get,” Victoria grumbled.
Kevin scrolled down the page. “It’s decently expensive as the code comes with the Hellfire Barbie Dreamhouse which is somewhere around 150 dollars.”
“Yeah, that’s insane,” Amy grumbled, thinking about how much the witch must have spent on toys or rather her parents as she sounded too young to have a serious job.
“It comes with a combat pet succubus and a couple cosmetic items and upgrades so it’s not that bad in the grand scheme of things.”
Randal grinned as his drone crossed the wall and he saw the town’s magic item/potions shop and the weapons shop next to it. He frowned as he spotted a magical girl that looked suspiciously like Glory Girl dueling a man in a tux with a top hat that was tossing roses at the magic girl. He winced slightly as one of the roses bounced off the girl’s shield at an angle and hit the drone which caused it to drop out of the air with a rather nasty screeching sound.
Gothic frowned as the man in the tux turned and tossed a rose at the drone which caused the screen to turn black. “So much for the streets being safe.”
“The shops should be safe considering they’re combat free zones in the game.”
Kevin shrugged. “Which should transfer to wards in the dungeon considering that’s the in world excuse they use.”
“In theory,” Victoria complained.
Taylor glanced over at the midnight black doorway then looked at Victoria. “If you don’t want to risk going in there, we can try to figure out something else to fix Noelle but this might be the best time to try.”
“Everyone should be worried about getting sent to hell so they’ll be on their best behavior, at least for the next five to ten minutes,” Kevin muttered the last part.
Victoria sighed as she grabbed Taylor’s lightning crown off the desk and stuck it on her head. “Fine, let’s do this.”
Amy handed Victoria a chameleon potion and a bag of gold coins. “This should keep you mostly invisible for five minutes.”
“Mostly?” Victoria asked warily as she put the gold coins in her pocket.
Amy shrugged. “You basically fade out, the stronger the potion the less visible you end up thus mostly invisible.”
“Better than nothing,” Victoria admitted then drank the potion and flew into the dungeon.
“Now we wait,” Gothic said as she flopped down on her chair to wait for Vicky to get back.
