Intrusion: SHIELD

May 02, 2015:

The SHIELD Group have their work cut out for them in the battle for Metropolis

Daily Planet - Metropolis

Characters

NPCs: None.

Mentions:

Mood Music: None.


Fade In…

At 9:47 AM Metropolis just… vanished. Briefly. The skyline shimmered and a dome of couruscating energy appeared over at and the entire place just… vanished. And then it was back about ten seconds later, though something was off…

The obvious first, the dome of energy remained in place and something was drawing like hell from the Gotham and New York grids. Or at least it was until the Gotham operators shut their grid down. Which did, yes, take out power for the entire city, but also prevented the power grid from burning out. That'll cause problems to be sure…

At 10:02 AM something happened on the road between Metropolis and Gotham but by that point SHIELD was already responding to a the situation, even if it was most unclear what the situation was. Matters became a lot clearer when the Helicarrier Insight - freshly refitted after it's disasterous capture a couple months back - came under attack by flying creatures that could only be described as armored, bioengineered dragons… with missile racks. And riders in powered armor. The troublesome thing was the symbol painted on the armor, the same symbol that could be seen painted on buildings across the city. The Skull-and-Serpents of HYDRA. The city had been completely taken over. Somehow.

It's now nearing noon and SHIELD forces have engaged in pitched battles outside Metro Airspace but there seem to be a lot of HYDRA forces in the city. Something has to be done. And it may take heroes to do it. To that end, they've put out a call.

"This is Maria Hill onboard the Insight. May, Fitz, I hope you know what you're getting into. If what you've told me is true then this is some kind of dimensional swap. We need you to get in there and find the locus of the spell - I cannot believe I'm saying that - and reverse it. Which is something I'm sure your magicky friends already know. Two other teams are already working on bringing down the shielding spell to let us in. We need you to cut HYDRA off so we can go after the head. Based on everything we're seeing there's a lot of resistance there but near given your information the center of this whole mess is what used to be the Daily Planet in New Troy. It's… pretty heavily fortified in whatever hell version of Metro this is, so getting in there might be a trick. But we don't have any other options. Good luck out there. Hill out."

Jericho frowns at the city before him. He can somehow feel the turbulance and buffetting and he's guessing it gets worse closer in. "Might be tough to just portal right to the heart of the matter, mmm?" He murmurs. "Couldn't be that easy right?"


"I wasn't planning on trying to teleport anywhere near this mess." That much is clear when this particular team — hand-picked by May — are approaching the hot zone in a very decidedly not SHIELD standard helicopter. As much as it was just this side of physically painful to do so, May had a HYDRA emblem added to the underside of the craft in hopes of getting the enemy to hesitate. Even just a second or two would be enough to work in their favor.

With Trent acting as copilot and communications, she tells the others that had better still be securely strapped in, "Brace yourselves. We're almost there. It's about to get dicey."


For all intends and purposes, Leopold Fitz is the epitome of calm. He's got the SHIELD body armor. He's got the ICER strapped to his hip. He's got the combat boots, the utility belt, the whole nine yards, and his Portal Buster Mark II is strapped to the wall with three slave units connected to it, powering up. He'll be the one wearing the primary pack, but those slave units will be juiced up and ready for two others to wear and utilize, as well.

Fitz checks his harness for a moment before raising his eyes to brood at the fuselage opposite him. As we mentioned, his is the epitome of calm, his expression ready for anything.

Of course, his right foot is bouncing in rapid fire; it would seem the sum of his anxiety has settled in down there.


Zee's holding on for dear life, flying is not something the young magi is particularly comfortable with and flying into a HYDRA infested area? Um…. she has a better definition for a good time. Zee looks a little paler than normal and grim, she knows this isn't going to be easy.

Wearing the SHIELD body armour that May had thrust at her, the raven haired woman glances at the companion. "Just don't do anything rash, I know your worried about Fenris, but today… we have to focus on this, alright?" Jes was given K-9 kevlar armour and Zee had instructed her friend to wear it.


Jes sighs and nods, turns and rests her muzzles on Zee's knee. She's coyote for two reasons today. Not only is her God missing, he's one of her bonded and the worry and strain are making it hard to be human. The second is this has HYDRA written all over it and she intends to kill as many of those bastards as she can. She's promised the titans to reign in her killing, as much as she can, but this is HYDRA and she'd also told them that when it comes to her bonded she makes no promises. This coyote is out for blood. She also isn't about to let Zee out of her sight for even a second and its a lot easier to stay close in a combat situation when she's small and agile.


There's a muted thud as the chopper hits the bubble and pushes through. The small craft is about as large as anything gets before the barrier bounces it back. It helps that certain people are currently in support in an unusual way, strengthening the local magical network so that HYDRA can't completely take it over. Which is itself making it easier to slip through this shield.

Once they're through… well, that's where the fun begins. The JL:A is off to the east drawing a lot of fire but there are plenty of cyber-dragons in the air and several of them hone in on the chopper. Jericho closes his eyes, concentrating on Illyana briefly and then nods. "Best way into the Tower is going to be from the bottom. Top's too heavily covered. And it looks like they have missile sites up there." He points to a section of clear ground near the Planet." Can you put us down there May?" With Illy scrying for them at least they know what they're getting into. "Fitz… I hope to hell your Portal Gun is up to working overtime… Zee, Jes… hang on!"


The moment the words 'hang on' come out of Jericho's mouth, she banks the helicopter to one side as hard as the craft is structurally capable of handling. Which means about a third as harshly as Fitz has experienced in a quinjet. "Trying," is all she tells Trent when he points out their landing spot. One thing's for sure, they are NOT gonna get there in a straight line.


"I've done some enhancements, Trent," Fitz begins to reply, shooting a slightly cross look toward the cockpit. "They'll -" However, May's bank cuts him off sharply and his hands reach down to hold the bottom of his seat, eyes widening, mouth grimacing. " ……… bloody hell."


Zee closes her eyes at Jericho's call, one hand clenching in Jes' fur, the other her chair. If May needs help clearing anything, she'll have to ask, Zee's…. not looking. Clenching her jaw, she swallows slightly, she'll be right when their feet are on the ground.


Jes is to upset and angry to really even notice the flight, or care that its getting alittle bit dicey. She does care about Zee though and can scent her fear so she just climbs up into her lap so Zee can hold her with one arm and hang tight to the chair with the other. She licks Zee's cheek and wags her tail a bit, though with her eyes shut Zee doesn't see that.


Jericho doesn't fight what May's doing. Copilot's don't pilot unless the actual pilot relases the stick and May flies better than he does. Though this is one craft he actually has a chance of competing in. The chopper takes a hit and Jericho swears as they swearve in toward a landing, unstrapping and leaning out the (open) door to take aim with his gunblade. His target veers away from the rotors and… BRRRRRAAAP

The chopper skids to a halt, upright thanks to May and a dragon thuds next to them. Jericho's already out. The rider brings a sidearm up but is quickly relieved of both weapon and limb. And then life. "Quick. Inside before they lo-" Before he can finish a pair of portals open between him and the chopper. "Fitz! Zee!" A pack of cyber-rottweilers lunges out at them.


Melinda May bails out of the helicopter the moment it's solidly on the ground, moving to help Fitz and Zee with disembarking. She'll also grab one of those spare packs things that Fitz brought along, even if the weight and ungainliness is going to affect her ability to fight. "Move! Now!"


As soon as the chopper 'lands', Fitz proves that the diminutive scientist does have field training, and does have some guts to him. The harness is ripped free, the primary portal buster strapped to his back, and the slave units set out for whomever feels comfortable grabbing one.

Once they're out, his eyes are drawn immediately to the portal and the cyber-rottweilers. "Oy! May, cover me!" he cries, and primes the Portal Buster with a uniquely sci-fi sounding whine. The wand lights up with red, blue, and yellow color, and he takes a knee to aim the device at the portal. When discharged, a field of glowing pink and purple spreads out, connecting with the portal. A few seconds pass, while the runic nanostructure cycles through the feedback coming from that portal. Once the AI selects the proper warding, the device delivers a punch of translucent, fiery red energy that shuts the portal down with a clap of thunder, preventing any more of those beasts to come through.


Jes gets something of hug, hard when they're both in armour, and Zee shoos the coyote off her lap and unstraps herself, heading for the door.

As the hounds lunge, Zee's eyes blaze bright blue as she draws on her power.

~~ slaminA fO ARDYH enogeB ~~

She's not going to mess around, Fitz can see to the portals, she'll take care of what comes through….


Jes snarls and darts in, tearing open a vital vein on the fleshy part of one of the dogs before Zee's spell hits. Then she's back and crouched in a defensive posture in front of Zee, ready to leap at or rip into anything that comes towards her.


Jes would not ordinarily have the strength to take on a cybernetically enhanced rottweiler, but with her Pendulum enhancing her natural abilities (in times of dire need), she can. This once. She can. The creature falls to her mystically buffed assault moments before Zee sends them all… elsewhere. Hell's Kennel? Who knows. Jericho'll find out if he notices them wandering around Limbo though…

The first portal closes. The second collapses mometns later, unstable to have begun with. Seems not all are made equal. Or maybe Fitz's buster disrupted it when it hit the first one. Either way by by the time they're done and May has a Buster Jericho has forced the doors open. No one saw how but most people here can guess. Given that he's now a glowing blue demonwolf. "I'll override the elevators. Get in. Quickly." Before more show up. He has no doubt that there'll be more at the top.

He's right. There's a few moments to check and prep as they head topside but as the door to the lift opens the gunfire starts. Jericho is out first because he's at least kind of bulletproof, creating an opening. Aside from standard HYDRA guards there seems to be a trio of large hulk sized hardsuits and… Zyklon. WHo is standing next to a portal. "FITZ! ZEE! Illyana says the portal is feeding the spell. You have to close it before it can be reversed!"


Melinda May sheds the secondary portal-pack and sets it gently on the floor. "Stay down, Fitz." Then she's pulling a pair of sharpened metal spikes and charging toward the armored suits. Let's hope like hell they have some weak spots, or this is going to be a really, really short fight. The first one she reaches gets a metal spike aimed at its knee joint.


Fitz breathes out a breath of relief when the second portal collapses, and rises to his feet. He moves up alongside of May as they enter the building, speaking to her without taking his eyes away from where they're headed. "Just point and pull the trigger. Hold it 'til the portal shuts down. The Buster will do the work for you." Or the wand will become overloaded and backfire. Which would be bad. Fitz doesn't mention that part. He's been at the receiving end of Mark I's backfiring, and that was ARC Reactor technology at work. Fringe Psybertech? Well, there's no telling what might happen.

When they arrive on the upper level, Fitz does as he's told and takes a knee. He looks to Jericho, then calls to the others, "Get that thing away from the portal!" He's referencing Zyklon, of course. With that said, he gives Zee a worried look before aiming the Buster's wand toward that portal, waiting for an opening where he can fire.


Zee's quite happy to keep behind Jericho and May. As she steps out of the lift, her eyes light on Zyklon causing her to miss a step and pause momentarily. She really, strongly, dislikes this Cyborg… not having being able to beat him before. "Zyklon" she breathes to Jes "Cyborg, fast and nasty, be ready."

Fitz's worried look gets a frown from the magi… before she focusses again.

Blue eyes glow as she draws more power to her, her gaze hitting Zyklon

~~ elbasiD nolkyZ, ezeerF miH nI ecalP ~~

Last time she tried this type of spell, it sort of worked… this time, she channels deeply and lets her spell go.


Jes's fur stands on end as she scents Zee's alarm. She stares down the hall at the cyborg, her mismatched then flash over the room looking for any advantage against this thing should Zee's spell not be enough. She has utter faith in her friend but she's not going to risk her being hurt if she can help it. She spies a possibilty further down the room but it would mean leaving Zee so for now she just waits, ready to move as needed.


The hardsuits stomp forward to engage May and the spike she wields… just rips into it's armor. A glowing nimbus is surrounding May, and Zee and Jes as well. Source? The pendulums of course. Well, someone had said that in times of great need…

Zyklon is at the heart of his power. He sneers at Zee and brings his arm back. 'Incendius!'. The ground beneath the young mage begins to glow red… Which probably isn't good.

Meanwhile Jericho has put paid to most of the normal guards and vaults over a desk to help may take on the Hardsuits. These things are big. And strong. Actually stronger than he is. But they're not faster than he is. It's a window. And it should give Fitz the shot he needs to close the portal powering all this. And if he can do that… Zee should be able to set things right…


If May's surprised that the's able to tear through the hardsuit's knee that easily, she doesn't let it show. Instead, she takes the opportunity to completely separate the hardsuit's leg from the rest of it and goes full brute force, swinging the detached leg at the hardsuit like a really clunky baseball bat. Hopefully she's knocking it out of the path Fitz needs to close the portal. Or at the very least that she's going to knock it into this Zyklon character to mess with him a bit.


"Come on, come on, come on," Fitz nervously emotes while the others rage around him, before finding the opening he needs. The Portal Buster comes to life, forming a link with the portal much in the same fashion at it had down below. The gun whines and screams while channeling the psionic energy through its runic nano-system. "This must be one complicated spell!" he cries over the noise his weapon is making.

The field, linked between the device's emitter and the portal itself, cycles through a myriad of colors and patterns, like something out of a terrible 1980's music video only with much better graphics.

Fringe science is weird.


Zee yells as the floors glows, her spell dropping as she does. Thankfully she's wearing her heavy bikers boots, her feet protected from the heat for the main part. Moving out of that glowing section, Zee glances at Fitz and rolls her eyes … of course the spells complicated, she could have told him that before they began.

Focussing back on Zyklon, eyes still glowing, Zee see's May knock the hardsuit towards Zyklon… she can use that.

~~ tiusdraH tiH nolkyZ draH dnA tsaF ~~


Jes loses her cool, however little of it she had to begin with when they arrived when the floor tries to burn her bonded alive. Snarling, she races down the length of the room, sticking to the side of the wall before coming to an abrupt stop and pawing her kevlar free. She goes human just long enough to grab the fire axe off the wall, smash the glass case holding the extinguish open and then hurl the axe straight at Zylon in addittion to the leg May threw and Zee sent speeding along. Then she grabs the fire exstinguisher and throws it at him for good measure hoping Zee sees and explodes the damn thing in his face. The whole thing takes only a minute and then she's coyote and racing back to Zee, sans Kevlar and oblivious to the fact that she just gave everyone a nice view of naked angry indian. At least this time she didn't have blood dripping from her lips. That'd probably scare the poor science guy for life, and he's kinda cute so that'd be a shame.


Melinda May hehs.


May's fallen hardsuit is suddenly shoved //again by an unseen force. The speedster looks like he's about to dodge when the flickering of motion - this being an unclothed indian throwing an axe at him - gets his attention. Well. That's not in the least distracting.

It totally is.

The axe bites into his shoulder causing a scream and then the hardsuit collapses atop him. At that very moment Fitz's portal buster surges with a chromatic spray and the power-portal thunders shut with an audible snap. K'nert suddenly hops up next to Zee and worries open a stepping disk next to her.

"Zee! Tap Limbo and reverse the transposition!"

It's dark magic, in Limbo. But desperate times…

No sooner is that out of his mouth than the remaining hardsuit bullrushes him, knocking it over. He flips it off him with his legs and stands back up as it skids to a halt next between May and Fitz… and Jes.


Okay, yes, May just chuckled aloud in the middle of a fight. Because apparently even superfast Nazi Cyborgs are not immune to naked people. Good to know. Then Fitz's portal buster is closing Zyklon's portal and the last of the hardsuits end up at her feed as if it had been served on a silver platter. Really. What else is supposed to do in a situation like this? She stabs one of her metal spikes at the fallen hardsuit's 'face'. Let's see it stand up from this.


Soon as the Portal Buster does it's job? Fitz shuts down the device and grins widely. "Yes!" He even pumps a fist.

Then he notices one of the HYDRA guards moving nearby, and a hardsuit coming to his feet. The momentary victory is extinguished, and he scrambles back and away from the hardsuit while reaching for the ICER at his hip. He turns it upon that HYDRA asshole, takes aim, and fires. A flash of blue comes from the muzzle, and the HYDRA bloke goes down, dendrotoxin surging through his veins.

"That one's from Simmons, you brainwashed bawbag!"


Zee doesn't given a second glance at Jes, maybe she's getting used to seeing the girl naked in combat… or maybe she's just focussed on Zyklon. K'nerts appearance has her blinking until Jericho calls. A look of distaste crosses Zee's face and the young magi looks to May and Jes "I'm going to tap into your pendulums…. be ready."

Scott had alerady sent Zee a message, he's somewhere near, bolstering the magical network, Zee's going to try and tap his as well. Oh… she'll use Limbo too, she's not going to leave this to chance.

Taking a deep breath in, connects with her pendulum as she steps on the disc and plants her feet, reaching for the power of the Leylines and Limbo together.

If Zee's eyes glowed before, now they positively blaze with blue light… and maybe something a little darker as well.

~~ esreveR sihT noitisopsnarT ~~

Where Zee normally only speaks her spells, this one is roared…. and the raven haired magi lets the spell loose.


Jes whines in alarm. She's going to bite someone for this later. Not Jericho though, she's made peace with the hacker and realized he's not actively trying to cause Zee harm, dark magic is part of the man now, he doesn't know what its doing to zee. But Jes does and she's got to figure out how to keep Zee from using dark magic, dammit. That darkness in her eyes is worrisome. Now isn't the time though so Jes just turns and crouches again, ready to spring at any second.


The spell rings out from Zee. It obliterates Zyklon's form though… everyone present can feel something immaterial flee the scene. As a wave sweeps the city it converts back from HYDRA infested hellhole to the Metro we know and love.

Kind of. SHIELD moves in as the other teams disable the Barriers and it's a good thing too because switching the city back does not send back the warded HYDRA forces with it and Metro's citizens are forced to take cover as new battles errupt across the city. It takes a few hours but it will be solidly in US Hands once more at the end of the day.

Ominously, a huge rift remains over Hellsgate, and that part of the city remains shifted out of place, though pacified quickly by SHIELD.

"Good work people." Hill's voice comes over the comm. "Now regroup. We're gonna take the fight to them…"

Unless otherwise stated, the content of this page is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 License