Dual Purpose

February 14, 2018:

A young cry for help prompts Miss Moreau to act in tandem with a local Speedster to come to her aid.

Upper Manhattan, NYC

Characters

NPCs: None.

Mentions: Luke Cage, Spider-Man

Plot:

Mood Music: None.


Fade In…

Miss Moreau and her gang are most definitely city types. For all their belief in their own beasthood, the wildness of their desires, urges, and calling as a 'Pack', they thrive in urban environments. Unfortunately that urban environment is Gotham, and they rarely stray from their territory. Today is different. A few rumors of new exhibits in art museums have drawn the gang of thieves and murderers to New York City.

Specifically the AMNH, hosting a new exhibit of an extinct species of sabertooth cat recently unearthed. Miss Moreau's designs are to yoink the thing wholesale to better incorporate it into her own living tiger friends. And part of the would-be thieving process is to case the place. That means using an old alias, 'Alicia Crowley' to get tickets. Too bad one of her more well muscled and less intelligent goons did the mapping. Thus, Miss Moreau is four streets away from the Museum, alone, scowling as she finds herself in front of a Starbucks instead of a museum. She's dressed almost causally today: a simple blue skirt to the ankles, matching blouse, and slightly clashing honest-to-god fox-fur scarf draped over her neck. Her cane taps the sidewalk as she sips a venti cinnamon dolce latte.

A building away, up top, glass shatters. An abusive father has shoved the upper-middle-class girl to the window in a day-drinking fury. Too hard. Enough that the panes shatter, and the sound of a twelve year old screaming in terror as she falls from ten stories up in the nearby apartment building can be heard for nearly a block. YOung girl has some lungs on her.

Miss Moreau is a murderer, a thief, a Gotham Siren of a rogue to be sure. But she knows the voice of a Cub, as she puts it. An old fear, of a man lashing into her fills her heart. She was that age once. She knows that timber, even now as it haunts her dreams. Drink fallen to the ground, she pulls out a Scarlet Tome, and whispers words hurriedly as the sounds reaches sharp ears that grow even sharper.

"Come to me, loyal Servant! Araneae!" The cold chill wracks several unknowing spines, and purple-black shadows dance as spiders the size of small horses crawl upon the highrise the girl falls from. They spit, weave, and make a web as fast as can be. Miss Moreau, book in hand, ducks to a side alleyway.

But they won't be fast enough. No matter how much magic she pumps into her Tome, she won't be fast enough. Even as she slides down to one knee from the effort, Miss Moreau sweats.

But more than one would hear that poor girl's howl.


It's been a month since Luke's Bar burnt down to the ground, blown apart from the inside, although miraculously without casualties but for the fact that the current staff and patrons consisted of a fair amount of metahumans who instantly filled in for the things they did best. Bart still comes by the place now, not really out of habit, but his time working as Luke's barback, brief as it was, had been fun, and if it bothered the teenager that the place no longer existed, he could only assume that it was a million times worse for the owner who had been scarce after making sure his employees were all right.

Staring at the bare corner isn't going to make the place come back, so Bart moves onward with a sigh. He doesn't get very far at all. Screams of that particular sort aren't something to be ignored, and while his hearing may not be as sharp as some, the speed at which he processes the following makes up for the seconds he'd otherwise have lost in visually seeking out the origin.

Bart Allen was born with speed, and to him, it came naturally to move at such that were otherwise untrackable by the human senses. The world moved in slow motion around him, but since he was essentially the odd one out, he had no choice but to learn how to adapt. Do things at normal pace, act like a normal teenager. But that's all it is, an act. And when things like this happen, it's all reflex that falls instantly into place.

In the time of a normal human's step he's already halfway down the block, in the next he's changed out of plain clothes and into costume, stored so conveniently in the ring he'd been given. A breeze whips by the alley that Moreau has ducked into, a brief chill licks at Impulse as he tears past, but he pays it no mind, figuring it's to do with the general New York winter. He races, his brow set behind his yellow-tinted goggles, an expression of concentration.

It flickers for a moment and only a moment, but in the young Speedster's perceptions a moment can be minutes. Giant spiders?? Did Spider-Man have a new trick?! Too late, not fast enoughgoGoGo!!!

The moment he realizes that their efforts won't work in time, Impulse is already nearly upon them and their webwork, running straight up the wall of the building, arms out to scoop the girl out of midair from her plummet.


Bart tears by, and Moreau's rather impressive brown locks flutter in the Speedster's passing! Even her own above-human senses, bolstered by the Scarlet Tome, can't quite catch up with Impulse's motions. The only sense that even catches a hint of him is her sense of smell. And being so distracted? The minor anomaly is entirely disregarded.

Bart catches the falling girl, her shriek drawn out in pure slow motion to the man. There's a whole several buildings' worth to fall, and surely the man could make it. But the time he's bought as he arrests the girl's fall is well spent. Two more spiders fade into existence, completing a building-to-building web that's only two stories up. It looks strong and almost soft, exactly the kind of thing to fall into like a natural trampoline. People are taking pictures now.

Meanwhile, Moreau has pushed herself to her feet and has cane-tapped to the edge of the alleyway. One ear poised outwards, she aurally surveys the situation.


That's…actually a good thing that the spiders have completed their work. Impulse had worked out how to get to the girl. He just hadn't considered how he'd be getting her back down safely. Continuing to go on up would have worked, but the young Speedster hadn't quite accounted for the increased velocity and impact from gravity's pull and the girl's falling from such a height that it kind of messes up his own speed needed to keep on going vertically up the building. "Oops-" is all he says as he realizes this, and while he attempts to work out this new problem, catching the sight out of the corner of his eye, he decides to trust what he's misunderstood to be minions of the infamous spider-themed hero his teammate.

"Don't worry, I got you!" He holds onto the girl tight as they fall back and then into the netlike webbing, bouncing a bit, but better to be bouncing than street pizza. Most people might be a little disturbed by giant spiders, but once their bouncing settles, Impulse actually waves at the creatures. "Thanks Spider-Dude!" he shouts, and then pats the girl on the head as he looks around to try working out how to get down from this. Two stories isn't ten, so there's that, at least.


Miss Moreau lets out a sigh of relief she didn't know she was holding. Impulse catches the little girl, who almost immediately looks him into the eyes with tears. Despite the abuse, despite her terror, this little kid is made of tough stuff. She might be crying, but she smiles in pure joy as spider silk arrests the dual fall of hero and would-be victim.

"Thank you!" Sniffle. Her Dad did this. The trauma burns in her heart. She bites her lip.

And then breaks down utterly. By now Miss Moreau has made her way over to a bench, collapsed down with a slightly exhausted look, and crossed her legs. That braille tome is in her hand and lap, cane abandoned. She doesn't need to see or focus senses. The spiders tell her everything she needs to know.

Impulse wouldn't get a response from the odd animals. Strangely, they all seem to be branded with some form of tattoo on the forehead: two purple serpents entwined. As the bouncy motion fails, they start to skitter-walk the whole silky construct to the ground. Not enough that New York traffic interferes, but low enough that Impulse and the kid could hop with a little bit of effort to ground level.

A charcoal-grey suited thug sits beside Moreau. The kind of big guy that makes up many a street gang. Sharp, blue eyes betray the smarts despite his size, and a comforting hand falls onto the far smaller woman's shoulder.

"She'll be fine Boss." He mutters to her, eyeing spiders and Impulse and girl.

Moreau whispers. "…So close." A tear falls.


If Impulse knew the full story on how the poor girl ended up outside of a building to fall to her death, he'd be furious. Such abuse would strike too close a chord to what had happened to his best friend, and as Impulse he'd come to the wrong conclusion in which of the two parents was responsible, but thankfully not too late to help get things straightened out.

"You're okay," he assures the kid, and then looks to the spiders as they help them descend like some strange, organic elevator. "Whoa, sweet. Thanks again, guys!" He notes the odd tattoo- definitely not Spider-Guy's insignia. Unless Spider-Guy was trying out new trademarks. No, two snakes don't make sense.

With them drawn closer to ground level, Impulse gives the net-web a swing so they can hop down, but he keeps a hold on the girl in case her legs won't work right off the back. And if one of the spiders is close enough, he'd even offer the thing a pat. Weird kid.


The pair bounce down to street level, and spiders don't bob. The web does plenty though, wiggling about as gravity takes it's course. The kid gives one more sniffle, and yet finds herself standing. "…Yeah." She notes. A huff. Hands squeeze. And there's the tiniest of little electrical pulses from her body as she barely avoids breaking down utterly from the trauma.

Oh but she cries. The betrayal hits her hard, and she sobs. The newly minted mutant sparks, but doesn't prove a clear and present danger. Impulse might have to worry about static electricity that grows into a minor fury for the Mutant who has just learned her powers.

A book snaps shut, and the patted spider gives a vaguely gecko-ish hiss. And then fades to nothing but purple and blackness. As does the net. It's as if nothing was there.

Moreau meanwhile pushes the Scarlet Tome into a dress pocket. Her goon urges her to move. Instead, she simply rests. The sound of sirens finally have them moving along. Something slithers from her voluminous dress.

By the time the police come to arrest the man that tossed his daughter from a high rise, they'd find him cold and dead. Two pinpoints of a snakebite, the serpent long ago slithered away. A new mutant freed of her chains, and a legacy ready to be born thanks to a Speedster and a villain mage in dual purpose.

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