Really fucking annoying, Clockblocker revised his summation of the teleporter.

Ahaha 😛

Shadow Stalker had positioned herself on the ragged top of the wall where the roof had crumbled away, high above the skirmish, cloak billowing.  She fired a shot at Ballistic and Sundancer, reloaded as Ballistic sent a piece of rubble flying through her shadowy form, then fired again.

I wonder how long that position’s going to last. Pretty helpful to have objects pass through you when you’re fighting Ballistic, at least.

The Travelers had body armor, so she wasn’t doing more than distracting them.  The needles of the tranquilizer darts wouldn’t pass through the durable armor or material.

And the other darts are off-limits.

“Red rover!” Vista shouted, “Go!”

Good girl.  Clockblocker dashed for Trickster, and the distance between them compressed to a matter of feet, the highest points in the uneven ground flattening to make running easier.

Ooh, named combo tactics!

It’s a pretty good tactic – Clockblocker needs touch range, and Vista can arrange that for him.

As he spun in place, catching a glimpse of Genesis exchanging blows with Glory Girl, he had his position swapped yet again.  He found himself once more with his back to the brawling pair.  One of them bumped into him, and he sprawled.

Bunp.

If only he’d been able to tell if it were Genesis or Glory Girl that bumped into him; had he known, he might have used his power, taken Genesis out of the fight.

I suppose that’s why he was teleported in the first place – Trickster tricked him into turning around.

Annoying.  He climbed to his feet, wary of more teleportation hijinks.

So far, Trickster’s being the MVP. I have a feeling this chapter is going to show us more from the others too, though. Weld vs Sundancer, for example… What happens when a man made of metal goes up against someone who can melt it?

Ballistic is also a threat to Weld if he somehow knows how Weld’s power interacts with metal.

Kid Win wheeled on the spot to raise a square-nosed pistol and fire what looked like a brilliant blue flare at Trickster, but the teleporter swapped positions with him.  Kid Win ducked the moment he was teleported, but he still got grazed by his own shot, blue sparks showering off his armored costume, small arcs of electricity dancing briefly around the metal joins.

Ouch.

Sundancer created her flaming ball – small, but still far too bright to look at – and sent it after Kid Win.  The young hero scrambled for cover, dropping his gun in his hurry to get away from the superheated orb.  Flechette moved to shoot, then reconsidered, threw a handful of darts at Trickster instead.

Sending projectiles after Trickster didn’t work out so well for Kid Win.

The darts disappeared in midair, and splinters of wood and small stones dropped straight out of the air where they had been.

Huh, interesting. The teleportation swaps positions, but not momentum. Don’t know why I expected it to do so, really.

Might have some interesting implications for a hypothetical interaction between Trickster’s power and quantum physics?

“A shame,” Trickster bowed.

In the blink of an eye, Weld disappeared, and Genesis loomed in his place, eight feet tall and nearly as broad across the shoulders, a body of pebble-like scales, heavy with muscle, a short tail and broad bat wings sprouting from her shoulders.

Hah, nice. But doesn’t this just put Weld over to the side?

I guess it might’ve been more about putting Genesis in a strategically important position than about sending Weld off.

She spun to face the rest of the Wards as Weld fell from the window.

Oh right, her gargoyle-like position is a bit of an issue for Weld, especially with the element of surprise.

Ballistic turned on the fallen captain of the Wards, unloading a barrage of debris and rubble to keep the metal skinned boy off-balance and on the defensive.

Sounds like they’re focusing a lot on Weld so far. I’m not sure he’s the biggest threat to them here. That would probably be Clockblocker or Vista, both of whom can keep one or all of them in place.

Clockblocker lunged for Genesis, hand outstretched.  He was mere inches away when Genesis disappeared from in front of him.  Or, rather, Clockblocker had been moved somewhere else.

It’s entirely possible for Trickster to swap the positions of one of the corpses with one of the Wards. He probably can’t adjust the pose they show up in, though, so they’d presumably just fall down from there like Weld just did from the window.

A lack of proper footing made him stumble, and he nearly collided with one of the dilapidated walls of the ruined building.

One thing’s for sure, Trickster’s power can be quite disorienting.

“I believe you,” Weld spoke, “I’ve read your file, and this isn’t your M.O.”

Yeah.

“Excellent, excellent.  I commend you,” Trickster tipped his hat, “Then we’ll be on our way?”

Hehe. As if you aren’t still wanted villains.

“No.  But if you come into custody-”

“You’ll arrest us for any number of other criminal charges we’ve got waiting.  And you can’t promise that one of your superiors won’t try to stick us with the blame for this.”

Sounds about right.

Weld frowned.

“Let us go.  Whatever happened here, it deserves your full attention.  You should be trying to find and capture the real criminals.  This guy here was still alive when we arrived.”  Trickster pointed at the man with the chain limbs.

He does have a point, the Wards are probably better off focusing on the matter at hand, whatever the fuck that actually is.

My guess is on Fenrir’s Chosen. Hookwolf is among the characters I’d most expect to be willing to do something like this.

“Can’t do that.  You’re still suspects, regardless of how much this deviates from your usual methods.”

Also fair.

Each had received a different kind of treatment.  To their left was a corpse that had been flayed, the gender no longer identifiable.  Directly opposite their group was the corpse of an obese woman, charred black.  Completing the scene was the body of what appeared to be a homeless man, or one of the people who’d been rendered homeless by the recent disaster, judging by the layers of clothing he wore.  His limbs had been severed at each joint, then reconnected so each was joined by a short, foot-long length of chain.

Sheesh. Someone’s got a flair for dramatic desecration.

Nails placed through the chain kept him in position, head hanging, a macabre puppet with an overlong body.  The chains jangled and swung in the wind.

Only thing missing is a cross.

Occupying the same building as the corpses was a familiar group.  Trickster, Sundancer and Ballistic stood beneath the corpses.

What.

What are you guys doing here? And why are the heroes talking like they aren’t?

Did the Travelers find the corpses and report them, despite the risk of their own arrest?

A winged figure that might have been a gargoyle, demon or dragon was clutching to the sides of an empty window frame with three talons, the other reaching toward the homeless man.  Genesis.

Right, that was the cape name of the pseudo-shifter.

“Pardon the cliche, but this isn’t what it looks like,” Trickster spoke.

Yeeah, this really isn’t something I’d expect from the Travelers.

The scene was set up in the husk of a building.  Walls loomed on three sides, but there was no roof remaining.  The floor was uneven, composed of layers of broken boards, shattered drywall and chunks of concrete.

This city is such a mess right now.

Yet there’s no way of knowing whether or not this building was like this before.

“There’s two more crime scenes like this?” Clockblocker asked, eyes wide.  He craned his neck upward to look above them.

…alright, sounds like that was an even newer development than I thought it might be.

“Yeah,” Weld spoke.

“It’s the middle of the day,” Kid Win spoke, “Broad daylight.”

Huh. Someone destroying buildings… stealthily?

Clockblocker looked at the overcast sky above.  Not quite daylight. And people weren’t around.  It was still ballsy, and more than a little scary.

On each of the three interior walls of the older building was a body, twenty feet above the ground.

Oh.

Yikes.

I haven’t liveblogged since last year, wow. Let’s finish up 9.3!