Questions Of Morale (EC|IC)

(Happu Thanksgiving)

There was no warning, no announcement of his arrival. Seattle was just as busy as any other day. People raced to their destinations whether on foot or by car. All were oblivious to the destruction that would occur. There were, however, a few foretellings. Scattered across the city, frozen statues of a man covered in dismembered hands. They all stood near a generator of source, whether it was a furnace or a car battery. The heat and electrical energy mysteriously disappeared, seemingly contradicting the law of conservation. When in fact, they were fueling the statues, fueling the destruction that was to come.

While his plan was slowly unfolding, Finis stood on the ground floor of a parking lot, submerged in the darkness around him. The stench in the air thwarting curious passerbys. He watched ahead at an intersection, The same intersection he was going to make his grand appearance.

What was going to happen wasn't personal, nor was it part of a mission to conquer the world. In his eyes, it was nothing more than a test for Morality and Survialism. To see if his fellow humans have developed a sense of survival after the numerous attacks by mutants, aliens, and even gods. But even though it was going to be a test, he was still going to enjoy it.

"One." That word was the catalyst to the calamity that followed. The foundations of a nearby skyscraper exploded , however the view wasn't of fire and flames but of an invisible concussive force that ruptured its skeleton. Missing the leg it once stood upon, the enormous building began to fall, kicking up smoke as they did. Within this smokescreen, Finis moved. Various pedestrians screamed as the building's debris rained down upon them.

Finis watched as people cowardly ran from the danger, some forgetting those who were trapped underneath the debris and others went back to save them. He continued to wait in the shadows, wanting to draw out as many heroes as he could to this scene. So he could nab as many powers as he could.

"Another" As he spoke, another building lost its foundation, as it crumbled to the ground in a fantastical display. Finis watched as the debris came crashing down, a wicked smile came across his face. Is society fit enough to continue to surivve?

Nothing could be heard in the endless void of space. No molecules for sound to bounce off of. No vibrations.

Just cold stillness.

It was just him and the little blue marble he often observed from up high. A planet worth protecting. To him, it was not some big endless expanse of mountains and towns and cities. It was all just one small place to him, a small town. With neighbors and people that needed to take care of each other.

But sometimes, some of them weren't strong enough or were in too much trouble to handle by themselves, especially in times like these.

Times where metahumans could cause terroristic acts of violence and mayhem just because they could.

Scanning the planet, alert from any trouble, big or small, Superstar would have missed the chaos surrounding Seattle. Buildings collapsing don't make much noise or sound or anything until they collapsed. But his senses had been trained to listen to the telltale sounds of the concrete and steel rebar snapping and bending when those buildings were on the verge of collapse.

Then the fist syllable of a scream. Of panic.

His senses zoomed onto the source within less than a second. Seattle.

His entire visage blurred as he entered the atmosphere, not burning up at all as he smoothly yet quickly broke the sound barrier without even a single sonic boom to accompany it. Traveling at speeds faster than Mach 7, the man in red and blue targeted the first building as he began making a beeline for it. The entire skyscraper structure appeared to be tilting before falling over, ready to collapse onto everyone as debris began to spill.

His eyes glowed, becoming a faint-blue before becoming a hot-crimson energy. It expelled forth, scorching the debris midair into broken molecules, burnt up and useless before he flew and placed his palms on the side of the building, stopping it as his super-particle field extended his kinetic force into having a greater surface area as to avoid going through the building instead of stopping its fall.

Then, with a mighty heave, he pushed it back to its place before gathering air into his system and blew out of his mouth a strange gaseous compound.

A form of icy gas would form in an instant at the foundations, focused through the super-particle field towards the damaged area as the strangle particulate gas would instantly freeze the area around with a solid variant of ice. The gaseous molecule the caped man expelled from his mouth simply had a higher melting point that any substance found on earth, and it simply froze upon contact with the temperatures of the Earth outside of his field and into the building, being also remarkably durable at these temperatures.

Safe and sound with no one caught in the pseudo-ice. He would break it apart and deal with it afterwards.

For right now, there was the matter of the second building. Still operating his mind and body at superspeeds, the superhero hit the ground before running. This building appeared to be collapsing differently that the other one, simply collapsing in on itself rather than falling over.

His feet kicked up a few rocks behind him before he simply moved faster than anyone could every hope to register to their senses.

Starting from the bottom floor, which was in the most immediate danger, before working his way up as each floor collapsed, he ran and grabbed each and every person he could before circling around the building once or twice, scanning each floor while he did so. This was done for several reasons. The most important and simplest ones were this. With his super-particle field, the super man could run around the building a few times, creating a vortex that ensured the resulting debris did not spill out and hit anyone else running away or passing through. Meanwhile, checking each floor would ensure he would miss no one, even if he could hear all the heartbeats inside of building, a quick yet thorough double-check never hurt anyone.

A tornado of red and blue would surround the building to any onlookers before it simply stopped. The building, while a heap of concrete and a mess of steel bars, would house no lost life.

Everyone was outside of the building, safe and sound and experiencing no whiplash or nausea, even after being moved at such sudden speeds. Only a little disorientated at best or trying to find their footings as their brains registered that they were no longer inside but outside into the open, fresh air.

All of this was done in mere minutes.

Which left the first metahuman responder to pause for a moment and reassess this bizarre situation.

Because while everyone was panicking, there was one individual smiling and walking towards the chaos. That was never a good sign.

The man made invincible had his back to this individual and remained a good several yards away, and he turned his body sideways to him but his face would be towards this smiling individual. Who was this stranger clad in simple clothing?

The one and only caped Superstar would ask a singular question, zeroing in on the man's heartbeat and face to check for any tells for a lie.

"Did you do this?"

Danger.

Danger is close. To my left? No, it feels stronger from my right. Wait.

Oh no.

The emerald-haired teenager felt the following explosions reverberate through his bones and his eyes widened in shock. The view from his school bus was perfect, he saw the foundations of one building launch into the sky as if they were nothing more than a Lego block to be discarded. A series of shockwaves teetered the bus as with the sound of the explosion also came the terrible echo as if it were the anguished cry of God. The city seemed to immediately scream in agony, it's inhabitants spurred into a frenzy rushing to either help or escape.

Far from Metro City Aidens reasons for coming to Seattle now became obsolete as the imminent destruction of the city drew closer.

He prayed to see someone in the distance sporting a cape and bright colors, someone to save the day so that he didn't have too. He hadn't put that suit on in a year, but he always kept it with him just in case...there was no lack of heroes in Metro City meaning that there was no pressure for Aiden to jump in the fray, there were those like Superion, and Paragon and the random Spider heroes running around. The worried whimpers and mumbles of his classmates were drowned out in his ears as he weighed his options, he still didn't see anyone coming to the rescue meaning that the longer he stood idly by the more time it gave whoever did this to either escape or strike again. If he lay still and did nothing then the bloodshed would partly be on his shoulders.

He sat near the back of the bus, taking a quick glance to make sure no eyes were on him and he quickly slipped the window open and slid out into the open air climbing to the buses roof and leaping off the interstate into the traffic below. Twin tendrils of black energy sprouted from his hands and shot straight upward attaching to the edge of a skyscraper sending the teen hurling up.

He slung his backpack over his shoulder and pulled put his uniform, his fingers trembled slightly as he slipped it on, fastening the latches on his gauntlets, crimson arm guards and steel toed boots he reached into his bag and pulled out one more item: the tattered remains of a cape...his mentors. The only piece of him that remained. Tossing it over his shoulder and fastening it like a scarf Aiden stood on his feet and surveyed the nearby damage.

Whoever is responsible for this might be somewhere nearby, both buildings were only a few blocks away from each other, if he moved he couldn't have gone far.

Saving civilians is top priority until the villain shows himself.

Pulling his mask over his face a faint flicker of emerald electricity sparked around his body as he began bounding from building to building to his destination. Plumes of smoke billowed in the air and the screams of the city only seemed to get louder as he drew closer. Then suddenly...silence. It was subtle at first, a streak of red and blue moving between buildings to keep from collapsing but the more Aiden put his focus into the streak the clearer the figure became. A superhero...

No one else could see the individual as he dashed around to swift for regular eyes to follow but Aiden was much different. Even from above he could see the caped figures priority change from the buildings to something else on the ground level as if another situation had caught his attention, at the same time Aiden felt a tingle in his brain coming from the direction of the Superstar. In a blur he vanished down to the street level.

He saw the Super man, and one other figure, one clad in hands with a sardonic grin plastered on his face. Excalibur lifted his hand palm outwards as the Omigios whips lashed about aiming to pull Fin into their grip tying him up.

"The danger I'm sensing is coming from here. So I'm guessing you're responsible"

The masked teenager took one moment to look at Superstar to see if his analysis was correct.

@the_superstar_: @aiden_james:

Debris fell around him in a spectacular manner, the screams of the civilians was an alluring tune in his ear. A symphony of panic. Of course, the original reason for his unexpected arrival was to test the survival instincts and the morale of today's citizens, this sound was musical.

However the sensational moment stopped when a blur of red and blue rushed from the heavens. It broke through to atmosphere with incredible and surprisingly managed speed. It rushed to the collapsing towers, halting their magicnficent fall in only the course of five minutes.

In Mere minutes, was the destruction halted, but Finis wasn't surprised. This was want he wanted, to draw out those who call themselves heroes from their underground caves and floating cities, to see demonstrations of power he has never seen before, and to obtain that power for himself.

The fantastical display of strength from the superhero in front of him made him overlook the younger hero, a boy with emerald hair. Finis watched with childlike fantasia as the sky-born hero froze the buildings in place and save the many citizens who were endangered in a matter of moments.

"Did you do this." The hero asked, his welcoming aura transforming into some more ominous.

No point in lying, this was his work. "Did I do this?" The One Man Army outstretched his own two hands high. As if introducing the hero to nothing more than an art exhibit. On cue, ten more building exploded in various ways. All in highly populated areas of the city. "What do you thin-"

Cutting him off, tendrils of black energy lashed out towards him from his side. Another hero was present, but he had not time to look right now. His body rocketed upwards as an incredible concussive force exploded at his feet, narrowly avoiding the unexpected assault.

He twisted his body to look at his attacker, expecting a hunk of muscle or some dashing vixen in latex, but all he saw was a child. "You interrupted me!" He yelled as he positioned his feet in front of him, clapping his hands in the direction of the child, an explosion occurred with enough force to cause the ground to shake. Fulfilling its second purpose, it propelled him towards the puesedoice the alien god used to hold the collapsed building in place.

The placed his hand upon it, and a total of twelve more versions of him erupted from it, taking the properties of the ice with him. They propelled themselves in various directions, some of them even crawled within the sewer ducts. While the original was off running else where.

Aiden's fist was moving before the criminals hands even clapped. In a single moment the silence erupted with the collision of two attacks. Gale force winds met the explosion forcing the heroes feet deep into the concrete, he followed through with one final push of his fist dissipating the attacks and returning the silence once more.

The villain was gone, splitting into twelve fragments of himself each bolting in a different direction. Wasting no time Excalibur burst into chase after him. His footsteps propelled with velocity barely stirring dust and wind in his wake Aiden ran in pursuit of the ice clones that evaded into the sewer. Dropping inside he flicked his finger sending a cyclone of air through the confined space in order to flush the clone out of hiding.

"C'mon. Where are you?..."

@the_superstar_@omega_finis

@aiden_james:

As around a dozen of his cyro-clones darted off in various directions. Finis stood in an alleyway to ponder his next action. Everything was going so well. However, he has yet to gain a singular power from either of the two costumed crusaders. And something told him that it would be more difficult to nab one from the being traveling at Mach 80000 than a kid with tentacles and an annoyingly prepubescent voice.

Yet, he still needed to keep the caped one occupied, because if he decided to look for him. Finis's options would drastically dwindle. On command, one of the cyro-clones nearest to the block of pseudo-ice turned and headed back. While Finis never made his cryo-clones make clones, he knew it was also a possibility. However, how he'd manage them was the reason he'd never make him unless an emergency like these called for it.

A clone placed his hand on the ice as a few dozens more versions of itself began to emerge from the ice. They also darted off into various directions. As a dozen more explosions occurred throughout Seattle, shaking the infrastructure.

Within the sewers, the Cryo-clone turned as a flash of green light entered the tunnel. The kid was back again. And what shortly followed was another strong gust of wind. The cryo-clone's already durable skin hardened drastically withstanding the harsh force. It tried to speak, but only the crinkles of ice could be heard as his mouth moved. His eyes turned visibly frustrated, as an aura of heat was produced around him. Ice slowly turned into drops of water, as the heat grew around him.

An explosion erupted at his feet and sent him soaring down the corridor towards the emerald haired child. The thermal energy within the aura suddenly changed into a swirling dome of electrical energy. Lighting the sewers and taking out a few electrical applications.