Heroes: Shadows over Millenium

[Hotfoot]

Hotfoot was still in his happy place, sheathed in the flowing plasma of his shield. As Argenta and Legacies appeared, he looked at the rather disturbing individual in front of him. The crawling skin was particularly disturbing, even moving as slowly as it was. He tilted his head from side to side, looking over the new member that Argent had described to him as barely being human anymore, and he could see why. "Uh, hey." The sound was merely a small squeak to anyone within hearing distance, but over the radio the message was made clear.

He was used to watching people move at glacial paces when he was like this, but this guy was just plain creepy. By the time everyone else had finished chatting back and forth, Softskin McLotionbasket was still staring at him.

[SirNitram]

"Standby for transit." Gravitas spoke, and space and time twisted under the pressure of his very will. The two seperate teams were brought together, not quite to Saibot. Not yet. "Saibot. I can track you from here. You ready for cavalry yet?" They were close, though. Down here.. Everything looked the same. At least the so-called demigod had avoided the barrier of emotions this time.

[Charon]

Legacies turned away from Hotfoot, towards Argent. "We doubt he would taste good." As time and space shifted to bring the teams together Legacies looked over at the others.

"What is the situation?"

[LadyTevar]

"You can feel him?" Argent asked urgently, her slitted dragonic eyes wide with hope, but with her emotions carefully locked down so they didn't leak to the rest of the team.

[Cynical Cat]

"I told you to bring Legacies through, not merge the teams," Blackheart said to Gravitas. He was angry at both of them now, Argent for running off and grabbing Legacies when he had asked Gravitas to do it as well as her convulsive empath theatrics, and Gravitas for bringing his group over in a sudden hop. Was it so fucking hard to just do what he fucking said? It's not like he didn't listen to other people. Fucking arrogant, dilettante amateurs with delusions of power and competency. "Can you take yours back without straining yourself? And keep an eye open for Saibot?" It was amazing how Saibot could make trouble for him without even being around. Violence was becoming very appealing.

[Hotfoot]

First the shadows, then the crazy cannibal, now spacetime manipulation. It was like there was someone upstairs trying to see what would make him freak out first. Okay, the empathy field technically did, but that didn't count, because it wasn't his own freaking team doing it to him. "Okay, new experience number three hundred fourty-seven of the night. We have matched donations to your favorite charity at five hundred folks, so let's keep them coming." The fact that he felt like vomiting from feeling gravity go nuts on him for the first time didn't help much, but he did what he could.

[SirNitram]

Gravitas' eyes were steady on Blackheart. "Consider your requests wisely." He spoke, and his voice was laced with something.. other. It was inhuman, that voice. "Do you really want me opening portals down here without being there to regulate them perfectly? Do you want me trying to pass that far beyond the limits of this frail little puppet I have to wear? Alerting the Freaks would be the smallest of our troubles..."

The inhumanity of Novas.. Or whatever Gravitas had become, in his long lifespan.. was on display here. "I will return you to where you were, since my actions were unneeded. And Saibot is fine. I can detect his presense, and he contacted me on the secure line. He's fifty feet from them." Time and space bent again, and Gravitas and his little team were back where they were, give or take a few meters further along. "Blast, it's time. Show me where they draw power."

[Hotfoot]

A bit of the previous meal shot up into his mouth as gravity chewed him up and spit him out back to where he was a few moments ago. He only just barely managed to keep himself from vomiting uncontrollably, but the acid and bile in his mouth kept him from making an off the cuff comment about it. He doubled over and caught himself on one of the rails, trying to swallow the partially digested food again, through the burning of the acid. To any observer, he simply dropped to the ground for a moment, staying down for almost a full second of real time before getting back up, his hand over his mask. The ground was scorched where he had been on his hands and knees a moment before.

That had not been fun...he was beginning to appreciate the raw creepiness of the shadow realms Argent used.

[Charon]

Legacies shook his head slowly. His emotions breaking through for a moment. "Wonderful, even the members of the group we can rely on to be stable are beginning to crack." Legacies looked over to Blackheart. "What are your orders sir?"

[Cynical Cat]

"I didn't ask you to bring him to me," said Blackheart mildly over the com. Control. "I asked you to bring Legacies through. Your section was as good as mine." He turned to Legacies. "If Argent is up to scouting again she'll take point. Legacies your stealth skills make you a good choice of back up for her. Any questions or comments?"

[Charon]

Legacies looked over at Argent, seeming to size her up for a few moments before turning back to Blackheart. "Is lethal force authorized?"

[Cynical Cat]

"Yes," said Blackheart. "You will answer to me for every body you drop. I had better like those answers. Clear?"

[LadyTevar]

Disturbing thoughts preyed on Argent's mind. Saibot was alive... but the Link was broken. It didn't make sense. Yet, he was alive. The bond could be reforged if they wished.

But ... did they want it again?

Blackheart was talking to her, she should be paying attention. Later, she would deal with it. Later, she would see if Saibot perfered freedom or bondage.
Later... she would decide if she wanted freedom herself. Now, it was business.

"Understood, Blackheart," Argent said, giving him a small boost by having someone do as ordered, and a slightly larger boost by once again sending him calming emotions. "If you wish, I will try to find the one who controlled the wall now. It should be easier from inside."

[Charon]

Legacies nodded slowly before looking back at Argent. "We are ready when you are." With that Legacies stepped back into the shadows and faded from sight, leaving nothing but what looked like some odd heat wave moving as he climbed up the wall and hung from the ceiling.

[Cynical Cat]

"Go for it," said Blackheart. "Legacies, keep an eye on the physical and lead the way now that our shadowmancer will be playing mind games."

[LadyTevar]

Argent nodded to Blackheart, and she faded into the shadows, becoming nothing but silver eyes, half-hooded as her empathy stretched out, seeking the source of the wall. Wherever s/he was, it was more than likely the center of the Freak's hideout...

[Charon]

The walls around the group seemed to speak. "Of course Blackheart. Argent, follow the tie." With that the symbiote began moving at a fast rate, leaving the group behind quickly. His senses paid closer attention now, listening for every breath, a heartbeat, an odd noise. An oddly flittering shadow. Though knowing these creatures, they may just leave themselves in the open.

[Hotfoot]

After the helpful words Blackheart had given him earlier about killing, the idea that he just gave Legacies more or less a blank check to kill felt wrong somehow. He didn't spend much time thinking on it though, as he was still trying to keep his stomach under control. Damnit, he had just asked if Gravitas could teleport everyone to Saibot, and for that trouble he had been shunted through reality twice.

He stayed back with Blackheart, just glancing at him every so often as he looked around the tunnel, wondering just what the hell was going on with the guy. Whatever was going on, it was clear it was entering into a bad place...

[LadyTevar]

"I've located the source," Argent said, the silver eyes opening in a shadow further down. "In the center of the area, as I feared. I could make them miserable, if you wish, Blackheart, but that will only tell them how strong I remain."

Which wasn't as strong as she'd been before battling the wall. Still, she slid between shadows, leading Blackheart and Hotfoot in Legacies' wake.

[Cynical Cat]

"No, don't tip our hand," said Blackheart. "We are, in theory, attempting stealth. Let's keep moving."

[LadyTevar]

"Very well," was her answer, as the eyes seemed to flow from shadow to shadow. With Legacies scouting, she did not need to leap ahead and send back pulses to tell them if an area was clear or not.

Although she was sure if something wasn't clear, Legacies would have it cleared by the time they arrived.

[B4UTRUST]

As Saibot moved closer towards the populated area of the tunnels he was not alone.

One step into the wrong shadow proved to him that.

His foot was stuck and refused to come loose. Then the shadow grew. It took on life, like it was a piece of cloth, billowing and moving in an unfelt wind of its own creation. It flowed upwards and outwards till it nearly surrounded Saibot. And looming at him from above was a pair of softly glowing eyes from within the empty cloak.

The cloak swirled around him, then seemed to flow back into itself, leaving nothing as the figure disappeared in a fluttering of shadowy cloth and nothingness.

A brief second later Saibot tumbled through an open doorway. The door slammed shut behind him with the sound of a lock engaging. A window by the door looked outwards onto nothing. Eternal blackness ran onwards to infinity in every direction.

Looking around the place revealed it to be something that was reminiscent of an after-hours sex club if it were ran in Hell and catered to the torture of the damned. The effect was completed with the nightmarish hulking figure serving drinks behind a bar.

Possibly the tamest thing in the room was the furniture. A white cast-iron table, a thing of curves and scrollwork, sat just inside the doorway. Idential tables were spread throughout the room. There was something odd about them, something that brought to mind the art of Giger. Then the realization set in. The backs of the chairs were vertebrae, wired together. The chairs were made of scrimshaw, carved from the thigh bones of the dead; the decorative scrollwork of the table was a rack of human ribs. The table-top itself was made of polished, interlocking shoulder blades.

The patrons of this hellhouse of horrors and sin were equally gruesome in their deformities. Open sores, extra limbs, deformed skin, appendages and ornamentations that defied belief.

The center attraction seemed to be on the stage that dominated the center of the room. To call it erotic was far to polite, porn simply didn't describe it well enough. Hardcore BDSM fetishes were tamer then it.

On the stage were a group of figures that seemed to culiminate in an orgy of blood, tears, pain and raw, primal sex in positions and variations that boggled the mind and at the same time made it cringe.

A woman in tight black leather that looked like somebody's mistress fantasy. She would have been pretty, but the gaping mouths lined wiith razor sharp fangs that replaced her nipples seemed to ruin the effect. She was in the process of flogging another person that was suspended by their arms from hooks in the ceiling. The cat-o-ninetails she was using was leather with little silver balls threaded through each of the cords. The balls were stained a wet pinkish-red. With each swing of the instrument a spray of blood flew from it. Those closest to the stage eagerly licked up the blood that landed on them.

The victim of this torture was skinless from head to toe, giving no indication of sex. Raw muscle and tissue was visable with blood running freely down the back. The arms appeared to be dislocated and hung at odd angles from the hooks that were shoved between the radius and ulna bones of the lower arms. The victim's pale skin layed in a puddle at its feet, pooled like a discarded robe.

Past the first pair the show continued. One man violently thrust himself into the woman before him. Blood and other fluids leaked from her torn and violated oriface. As the man drew back with stroke, long sharp barbs were clearly visable, coated with the woman's blood. She would have screamed except that she was clearly choking. The man in her mouth drew himself out long enough for her to gasp for breath before shoving himself violently back in, forcing her jaws almost to the point of breaking with his incredible girth and length that appeared to be closer to a baseball bat then a penis.

Beside them a woman dominated a man, riding him roughly. He was screaming, or as well as he could through the ball-gag. He remained hard through the means of chemicals while he was tortured. Bloody bite marks were visable as she rose off of him, new marks appearing with every rise and fall. She smiled sweetly at him before drawing deep bloody claw marks down his chest with claw-like fingers. As she looked up she looked directly at Saibot, and whoever she was a second ago to him changed. Now, to him, she was Lei, petite and beautiful, casually torturing this man while he watched.

Elsewhere around the room the sexual torture continued in other ways. Mutilation through cutting, forced penetration with large objects in multiple orifaces, humilation and degradation abound. It was like a gonzo sex-site gone wrong.

And Saibot was stuck in the middle of it.

Some of the patrons of this hellish nightmare noticed Saibot's entrance. Some didn't even pause in their self-satisfaction when they gazed at him. The look in some of their eyes was disturbing to say the least, as if they saw him not as a person, but rather as a piece of meat to be tortured, used, fucked and abused in ways that no sane mind could handle. The floor around the stage was coated in blood and other less mentionable bodily fluids. Some of the patrons licked their lips as they looked at Saibot.

Maybe he would be the next show...

[SirNitram]

"Blackheart. Saibot's just vanished from this reality." Gravitas spoke on the coms as the trio lurked deeper. "Locating which one he just tumbled into will take time, but my initial estimation is that it's not another Earth."

[Cynical Cat]

Leave it to Captain Tough Guy to walk into God knows what all alone, while being all macho and lone wolf. "Fuck," said Blackheart, tapping the depths of his eloquence. "Do what you can can. Stealth is probably blown, so if you need to go loud do so. We'll pretend the universe doesn't hate us and be as sneaky as possible until we get better options."

[SirNitram]

"I'll have Blast and Ghost meet up with you. I'm going to go in." Gravitas reply came simply.

"You won't like what I'm about to do, Blackheart, but know this is going for the least body count. Besides, I don't plan to breath much."

Gravitas left Blast and Ghost to the power diversions and generators. He moved for Saibot's position, then towards the base, defenses up and running. His breathing had stopped minutes ago, as he drew the oxygen from the reserves he had built up. It was time to make contact with Freakshow, before it got out of hand. He sought out the nearest Meta, hands in the air.

"As they say in the films.. Take me to your leader."