Ellen Park, the Lone Wanderer

X uses the cover of the lizard's roar to dart farther into the cave, ascending a slightly smaller stalagmite and positioning herself --

Wait for it --

-- wait for it --

snikt

X leaps from the stalagmite tip down to the head of the nearest deathclaw, her own adamantium claws out and digging in.

It helps to anchor her against the sudden thrashing, for one.

For another, it gives her some leverage to pull herself up toward the top of the skull.

She'll get down to the brain eventually.

From:

Voodoo's Mark 14 isn't as powerful as Ellen's Gauss gun, but it fires quicker and has a bigger magazine, and nothing likes getting shot.

Especially not the Deathclaw in front of Mark about to feel the brunt of four SLAP rounds on its center chest with a CRACK-CRACK-CRACK-CRACK.

"Goddammit, you piece of shit, fuckin' die already."

From:

For what it's worth, Voodoo, you're doing it serious damage. It's just that this deathclaw is close to twice the size of the one you originally winged, so the damage is currently at the 'making it mad' stage rather than 'making it dead'.

On the bright side, you do seem to be severely impairing its movement, so Invincible down there has more time to correct his form before it tries to swipe his face off?

(Oh, and the other deathclaw that X's landed on is making some seriously hideous noises. It's gonna be chaos in these caverns in about two seconds.)

From:

katyafeline

Katya spends the first few minutes of this fight being about as surprised as the reptiles. If she'd done anything like that in Moscow... well. Bear wouldn't have been pleased, to put it mildly. The Boss would have been less pleased.

After watching in bemused fascination, she takes two steps backwards into a patch of deeper shadow, and steps down into the Twilight. From there she can stroll across the cavern, her nails lengthening to proper claws as she goes. There's other large creatures back further in the caves, and it'd be a good idea to limit their mobility a bit before they get up the nerve to strike.

From:

There are indeed. There are junior deathclaws about twice the height of a human man, and several older ones significantly larger than that, and one very nearly the size of the bluegrey female outside; it's currently snapping at the smaller ones, apparently because it's less than thrilled with the idea that they might come any closer to the carcass it's gnawing on (some kind of mutant bear creature, by the smell of things).

None of them are really familiar with the threat they're about to face, of course.

Edited Date: 2014-03-11 12:40 am (UTC)

From:

katyafeline

Certain things are a privilege when they are possessed by those who go up a determined Other.

Things like knees, and shoulders, and intact abdominal walls.

The main problem is, of course, catching the Other at her work - there's a flicker of a suggestion of stripes, of hooked claws, of heavy fangs, leaping to catch and claw and rend at the largest deathclaw's right knee, making a fairly educated guess about where important tendons and ligaments might reside.

And then there's only the shadows, dark and deep.

From:

Hear that, fighters outside? That's the sound of two predatory reptiles bucking for allosaur status in agonizing pain.

And severe loss of structural integrity.

But mostly agonizing pain.

From:

1nv1nc1ble

As soon as Invincible hears the report of Ellen's gauss rifle, he's moving. There's a yellow-and-blue blur of movement, and the sound like a sledgehammer hitting a side of beef. The first wounded Deathclaw doesn't have a chance to fly backwards before his fist penetrates its skull. He grabs one of the beast's horns with his free hand and wrenches his other free in a spray of blood and brain tissue, leaving viscera coating his hand and arm. With a maneuver similar to his first encounter with a Deathclaw, he snaps his arm up and down, to try and smash the thrashing beast to the cavern floor. Unfortunately, his grip isn't as solid as last time, and it cartwheels out of his grasp, bounces off the ceiling and lands, still in its death throes, a short distance away.

Invincible shakes his right hand, loosing a spray of gore across the cave floor, and looks for another target.

Edited Date: 2014-03-11 03:26 am (UTC)

From:

There are several. The smaller ones are fleeing for the deeper shadows, the middle-sized ones watching the carnage warily, but two of the largest dusky ones are lowering their heads, eyes fixed firmly on the flash of blue and yellow.

One of them paws at the ground with a hind leg before charging, far too swiftly for an animal its size.

From:

X rides the dying one with the ravaged brain down to the ground, then leaps off and sprints for a new target.

Invincible can probably handle two-on-one, but keeping him from having to is part of a teammate's job description.

Some of the time, anyway.

X slashes her claws across the location the Achilles tendon would have on the Hulk, then digs her claws in and begins to climb the left-most dusky one.

She's using her foot-claws, too. It helps.

Edited Date: 2014-03-11 09:20 pm (UTC)

From:

1nv1nc1ble

Invincible's only really aware of X as another moving body on the battlefield, and one that won't try to eat him. He adjusts his charge to target the one she crippled, rising off the ground and turning it into a left-handed uppercut. His blow shatters the jaw and rocks it back on its heels. He takes the hovering equivalent of a step back, and then drives forward with a right-handed jab.

Unfortunately, while the shoryuken is an impressive looking move, it does leave one fairly open. Invincible's guard is starting to come back up as he starts his jab, but not before a claw the size of a car door catches him amidships and sends him tumbling. Broken jaw or not, torn tendon or not, the Deathclaw advances after the superteen, who has been caught off-balance and landed on the ground.

From:

"Go for the torso, Voodoo," Ellen says tersely. The Gauss is sufficiently recharged for her to line up a shot on the massively muscled hind leg of the Deathclaw making for Mark.

"Knees. Are. A. Privilege."

CRACK.

From:

No need to tell Voodoo twice. He swings the Mark 14 over, rests the crosshairs right about where he guesses the heart would be, and-

CRACK-CRACK-CRACK-CRACK.

"GET YOUR CANDY ASS UP, 'VINCE."

From:

1nv1nc1ble

Invincible isn't wounded; in fact, the only blood on him is the Deathclaws'. But he has yet to master the implacable immovability that older Viltrumites are able to almost weaponize, where a foe can break itself against them. Catch him by surprise, and he's 175 lbs. of teenager, and can get tossed around as such.

He pulls himself to his feet, muttering, "Yeah, yeah." at Voodoo's shout. Focuing on the oncoming beast, he steps into it, ducking past the first swipe to step inside its reach. He's not completely successful, but as the massive claws tear ineffectually at him, he delivers a sharp jab direction into the Deathclaw's sternum. The massive lizards are very tough, but even it can't survive having its heart caved in. It collapses forward on top of Invincible, and he shoves it backwards and turns to survey the room. "Okay," he asks, "who's next?"

From:

X slams into a stalactite at high speed, thrown off by the deathclaw she was attacking.

She manages to twist even with broken bones, digging her claws in to give herself leverage to leap back into the fray.

It helps that the deathclaw no longer has any claws with which to do damage.

Adamantium is good for a lot of things.

(Most of the blood on X is probably not hers.)

From:

The smaller ones are scattering like bunnies, several of them running for the exit tunnels while the adults attempt- poorly- to form up in circles. This is supposed to be defensive. It does not really work because they are unclear as to whether they should defend against Invincible or X. The largest ones being dead all over the cavern floor don't really help much, either.

Ellen's quietly humming to herself as she lines up the next shot- a torso one this time, centered on the spine of the largest deathclaw currently facing Mark. "Hope Delores-"

CRACK!

"-isn't too attached to those babies. D0G's likely to tear them in half."

From:

"Fuck 'er."

CRACKCRACKCRACK.

"If she's so concerned about 'em, she shoulda done this herself. I'm moving up, cover me."

From:

"On it," Ellen promises, and brings the Gauss around to recharge in the appropriate direction. Anything so much as moves in her field of vision, it's going to bleed.

From:

Voodoo moves forward, canting the Mark 14 to the left to use the iron sights as he takes some more potshots at the Deathclaws. He's got nine shots left, and they run out faster than he'd like.

"Shit motherfucker- changin' mag!"

Edited Date: 2014-03-15 12:19 am (UTC)

From:

Maybe it's the sound of Voodoo's motion, or the sight of something other than muzzleflashes from above, or just the cessation of flying stinging pain from that direction. Hard to say. Regardless, two of the mid-sized deathclaws- the twelve-footers, the ones Ellen normally runs into in the Wasteland- break off from the main melee and make a run at truly horrifying speed towards the end of the cavern where Voodoo and Ellen are situated.

"Covering," says Ellen, and CRACK! says the Gauss, and one of the creatures falls back covered in a sudden spray of blood. The other staggers, shakes its companion off, and swipes futilely at the place where the bullets have been coming from with one forepaw.

From:

Quick, Deathclaw #2! What's black and stompy and pinning down the hand you just took a swipe with?

"I DON'T FUCKING THINK SO."

Survey says...Voodoo's boot!

"TRY HARDER."

Now if you'd please look down the barrel of his pistol, your souvenir photo will soon be taken.

(All fifteen of them. Just smile and wait for the flash!)

Edited Date: 2014-03-15 12:53 am (UTC)

From:

Pistols are small, deathclaws are big, and generally going up against one of the reptiles with a pistol is pretty much suicide by lizard. But Voodoo is at very close range and firing directly into the creature's eye.

The chunky salsa rule states that "Any situation that would reduce a character's head to the consistency of chunky salsa dip is fatal, regardless of other rules."

That's not the kind of head-crippling that you can recover from.

From:

1nv1nc1ble

Invincible's in the dark (literally) and surrounded by apex predators. As a result, he's unaware of the softer, squishier members of the group getting rushed by the second tier of Deathclaws. (In truth, this is why Invincible doesn't work with teams very often. He's better with everything trying to target him, allowing him the leisure of not having to worry about other heroes.) Fortunately, Ellen and Voodoo are very well-trained, very well-armed, and smart enough to keep the lizards out of melee range.

He moves towards the sounds of motion, ready for any Deathclaw to leap at him. "Anybody got a flare?" he asks the room in general. "I'm running out of targets I can see." He mentally makes a note to ask Art for a utility belt or something.

From:

Somewhere in the darkness, it sounds like a match is being struck.

"CATCH."

Only that road flare sailing toward you, 'vince? Is much bigger than a match.

From: