Tag: Arc 15

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She let him fall, and then pressed the sword to his throat.  If he gave her an excuse, she would finish him.

Take a deep breath.

She stared down at him.  That long hair, it was such a minor thing, but there was something else about him that stirred that distant, dark memory of the lightless room and the failed attempt at ransom.

Ah, fuck. Whether he actually was involved back then or he just happens to remind her of it, this isn’t good. For him.

Her skin crawled, and she felt anger boiling in her gut.

It took some time for the others to recover, getting their bearings and ensuring their wounds weren’t too serious.

“What were you so intent on protecting?” Manpower asked.  “This where you stash your illegitimate gains?”

…maybe. Was he married to Amy’s mother?

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Marquis surrounded himself in plates of bone that resembled the petals of a flower blooming in reverse, and sank into the ground.

Here he goes again. And he’s got style when he does it, too!

Any other day, Brandish would have followed him into the room below.  A wine cellar, it seemed.

So what’s different this time?

Instead, she turned and charged for the closet, creating a sword out of the crackling energy her power provided, slashing through the plates of bone that had surrounded it, then drawing the blade back to thrust through the wooden door-

Oh, she’s checking out what he was defending.

Or rather, whom.

Marquis emerged between her and the closet door.  She plunged the sword into his shoulder without hesitation.

Oh, hi there. Yeah, he really doesn’t want her going in there. And certainly not thrusting her blade in there.

She could smell his flesh burn, the wound cauterized by the same energy that formed the blade.

“Damnation,” Marquis muttered the word, sagging.

Pfft. That’s certainly a way to swear.

So the truth here is that Marquis was defeated not because he wouldn’t hurt women, but because he was protecting Amy at the cost of having to break from his usual tactics.

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And Flashbang can’t shoot because Marquis will just armor himself before the sphere detonates.  Lightstar is injured, Fleur needs her hands free to strike, and Lady Photon’s incapacitated.

It’s not looking great for you guys.

This certainly doesn’t sound like the sort of easy victory what we knew of Marquis’ arrest made it sound like, along with the whole “all-female” thing.

So is this not when he was arrested? Except all signs point to this being when they find Amy. So was finding out about Amy and arresting Marquis two separate events, meant to build a moral dilemma about whether they should’ve done what they did to get Amy away from him? Or did someone get misinformed about how he was arrested?

“Brandish!”  Manpower shouted.  “Same plan, just the two of us!”

Right.  Their battle plan wasn’t useless, now.  Just harder to pull off.

Well, at least they’ve got something.

This would take some courage.

She charged forward, manifesting energy in the shape of a lance, driving it toward Marquis.

Is this a distraction for Manpower to attack when Marquis changes his target to ward off the lance?

He cast a glance her way and stuck one foot out in her direction.  His toes mutated into a jagged, uneven ripple of bone that stretched out beneath her.

Stop stepping on his toes like that.

Unable to maintain her footing, she had to cancel out the lance, using her hands to brace her fall.

Spikes of bone poked out of the ground in a circle around her, rising to form a cage.

Whoops.

She created twin knives out of energy, slashing out to cut through the bars.

The hardest part would be what came next.  Brandish threw herself in the way of the scythe’s swing.

Hm. Freeing Manpower from the pin by sticking herself into it? Except I’m pretty sure Brandish is more vulnerable than Manpower when she’s not in the morph ball form, so that really does sound a lot harder.

Marquis’ weapon virtually exploded into its component pieces, blade, join and shaft flying past her.

Oh! It’s not a pin switch, it’s basically parrying the weapon with her body.

But the scythe was made of bone, right? We’ve already discovered how much of an issue shattered bone can be in this fight.

“Careful now,” Marquis chided her.  “Don’t want to get decapitated now, do we?”

Sometimes, when the situation has gone completely fucking pear-shaped, there’s no other way out of it.

No longer on the defensive, Manpower charged the villain.

It wasn’t a pin switch, but it had the same end result – well, actually, a better one considering Brandish isn’t pinned in Manpower’s place.

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In the seconds it had taken her to deal with the blindfold, Marquis had trapped Lady Photon, binding her in a column of dense bone that had likely sprung around her from the floor or ceiling.

Once he gets a good amount of bone going, this power is really strong.

From the glow that was emanating through the barrier, she was apparently trying to use lasers to cut her way out.  She was strong enough to do it in one shot, but she couldn’t do that without risking shooting a teammate if the shot continued through.

Ahh, right.

That left Marquis to duel with Manpower, striking the hero over and over with a massive scythe of bone that extended out from his wrist.

Bones and scythes? Classic combination.

Not usually like this, though.

Manpower was strong, and he was durable thanks to his electromagnetic shield – sparks flew as the scythe hit home over and over.  Even so, the hero didn’t try to fight back.

Why? To avoid punching Marquis through a wall? Or maybe to avoid shattering more of the bones?

It took her only a moment to realize why.  Each swing of the scythe was calculated so that if the movement followed through, it would strike either the crippled Flashbang or Lightstar.

Oh! Devious.

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Well, only in a sense.  They still hadn’t touched him, and two of their members were out of commission.  Three, if she counted Fleur being occupied with a wounded Lightstar in her arms.

I think I’ve decided. Fleur Delacour is the better fit so far.

But the fact remained that Marquis wasn’t pushing his advantage.  The way his power worked and his very personality meant he was exceptional when it came to turning one advantage into another.  Or turning one advantage into three.  It was in his very nature to trounce his enemies, to grind them into the ground without an iota of mercy or fair play.

Damn. So much for honor.

Was he distracted?

If he was, it was barely slowing him down.  She felt something clutch her from behind, covering her eyes.

s k e l e t o n   h a n d s

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When she tried to tear it free, she found it hard, unyielding.

Is it a full bone covering?

She dropped into her ball form and then back into her human form, taking only a second to break free of the binding.  She caught the offending article in one hand before it could hit the ground.

It was a blindfold of solid bone, but it had been a skull of some sort beforehand.  Probably something that had sat on a bookshelf behind her.  Stupid to overlook it.

Neat trick on both sides!

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“Seems like we should take every advantage we can,” Manpower said.

“If you’re talking purely about increasing your odds of victory, yes.  But should you?  No, you really shouldn’t.”

Trying to play the moral card here?

This isn’t his usual behavior, Brandish thought.  His power let him manipulate bone.  If it was his own, he could make it grow or shrink, reshape it and multiply it.   It made him, in many respects, a competent shapeshifter.

So if it’s not his, the power’s more limited?

His abilities with the bones of others were limited to a simple reshaping, and there was a nuance in that the longer his own bone was separated from his body, the less able he was to manipulate it.

That makes sense. After a certain time, it might be hard to justify it still being his bone to his power.

Parabiologically speaking, it may have to do with bacteria on/in his bones or something like that, which die after a while exposed to the air.

Every second he was wasting talking was a second that the bone splinters he’d spread over the area would be less useful to him.  He was putting himself at a disadvantage.

Clearly there’s something at stake that he cares about, hmm?

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He’s going to burrow, Brandish thought.  He’d done it often enough in the past, disappearing underground the second he’d dropped out of sight, then attacking through the ground, floor or rooftop.

So what you’re telling me is that Marowak knows Dig.

“Careful!” she shouted.

Lady Photon spent the rest of the energy she’d gathered in her hands, spraying another spray of lasers at Marquis’ shield.

That makes it sound like she needs charging, like Purity or Battery.

Then, as they’d practiced, she prepared to use her forcefield to shield Flashbang, Fleur and Lightstar.  Brandish and Manpower could defend themselves.

I suppose Brandish could use the morph ball, and Manpower is, well, Manpower.

A barrier of bone plates erupted around one corner of the room, rising just in time to keep some of Lady Photon’s salvo from striking a closet door.  Marquis emerged from the floor a short distance away, driving a spike of bone up through the ground and then deconstructing it to reveal himself.

That probably looks pretty cool.

“What are you protecting?” Lady Photon asked.

*waves hand in air* Ooh, ooh, I know!

“I’d tell you, but you wouldn’t believe me.”  He glanced around, “I don’t suppose we could change venues?  I’ll be good if you are.”

“Let’s not wake up my daughter.”

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Lightstar was the next to go down, as one splinter that had embedded in a bookshelf branched out to pierce his shoulder.  Fleur caught him before he could land on top of more of the bone needles.

Hmm. Do I joke about Fleur-de-Lis from MLP or Fleur Delacour from Harry Potter…

Brandish shifted her footing, and the slivers of bone that scattered the ground around her shifted, some reshaping into starbursts of ultrafine needle points, waiting for her to step on them.  She knew from experience that they would penetrate the soles of her boots.

It really seems like Marquis was the kind of villain you should probably try to fight from a range.

Lady Photon fired a spray of laser blasts in Marquis’ general direction, tearing into bookshelves, antique furniture and the rack of wine bottles.

Yeah, like, this is exactly what I’m talking about. His power is well suited for near combat and setting traps close by. These lasers and the like are the attacks you should probably be focusing on.

Marquis created a shield of bone to protect himself, expanding its dimensions until it was taller and wider than he was.

Even if he can do this.

To be fair, I suppose that would leave it all up to one or a few members of the team, with the rest being largely unable to act.