fandomtownies | The Park, Friday evening

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jessica drew

The Park, Friday evening

While other people seemed to be getting together to work as a team or some junk like that, Jessica held back. She was a lone wolf. She put the ME in TEAM before doing what was best for her. She was a CIA-created supersoldier build from the DNA of a solo artist.

That's why Arachne was on the prowl by herself tonight, fully expecting to find the source of all these monsters and assassinate it to make things easier on herself and everyone else.

Because yeah, that's how these things go.

Bear	Wolf vs. Bear was the ultimate, the original in animal kingdom match-ups. Besides T-Rex vs. Apatosaurus, maybe, but nobody counted lizards. This grizzly had popped into being, torn from its rough and tumble island home where it had been peacefully terrorizing the population and placed on... this rough and tumble island where it had been peacefully terrorizing the population. It had been prowling around for a while now, but then it had ran out of targets, and that been boring, and... And now there was a spider. Wolf. Human. Thing. The bear pulled itself up to its full bipedal length and roared in triumph. RUMBLE!
Arachne	"A bear," Arachne said, swinging down to meet the bear. "I'm terrified." She expressed this by immediately launching forward with a jumpkick to its gut. No wasted time! When it was bear-fighting time, it was BEAR-FIGHTING TIME!
Bear	The bear howled with rage as her kick hit him in his vulnerable, soft, pettable underbelly. He dropped to three feet, swiping at her angrily red shoulder with his angrily brown paw.
Arachne	Arachne sensed the attack and reached up to grab the bear's wrist. Guess what, bear: you were going to get judo flipped. Um. If the physics of that worked out. That was a lot of weight to try to flip with just one front leg to use as a fulcrum. She hadn't thought this through.
Bear	Nope. All that accomplished was making the bear angrier. Hello there, neck! He was going to try and bite you!
Arachne	Arachne dropped down, pointed her fingers in the direction of the biggest impending danger, and fired webbing at what she was fairly sure was the bear's mouth. Even if that worked, she would still be under an angry bear now, so she kicked upwards, hoping to stun it briefly.
Bear	Considering the bear's bulk, under normal circumstances, that wouldn't help much. Fortunately, he now had his mouth full of webbing and found it rather more important to gnaw, roar, and generally shake his head until the webbing cleared up.
Arachne	Arachne rolled forward to get out from under the bear. But just as she landed on her feet, she sprung back with a jumping uppercut to the throat. It was basically a Shoryuken. To a bear.
Bear	Most of what that accomplished was to refocus the bear's eye on the goal. Okay, he couldn't make use of his jaw at the moment, but he was going for Punching With Front Paw: Mark Two.
Arachne	Arachne took the punch, using it to help propel her into the air. While she was flipping back, she fired a webline at both of his front shoulders so she could pull herself back in with a dropkick to the head.
Bear	Ow. Ow ow ow ow ow. The poor bear's front hit the floor's back really hard. He spread out across that floor, temporarily incapacitated.
Arachne	After the kick connected, Arachne launched into a backflip, loaded her wrist-mounted stinger shooter, and fired a few poison darts at the bear's neck, all before she landed. If it was out cold, it wouldn't even feel a thing.
Bear	That poor bear. At least his demise was humane. Please don't make him into a rug. That would be... mean.

[OOC: Preplayed with

fjordicswagger. Post can be open if anyone wants to chat with an assassin.]

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Dinah had watched this fight with interest, from a perch on top of a nearby rooftop.

That would be a golf clap. "Nice technique."

It took Priestly a little while to catch up with Dinah. Keeping up with a meta was difficult even when you spent most of your time training specifically to be able to do it.

"Kestrel," he called as he reached the she was on. Other than a few loose harpy feathers, he'd made it not too worse for wear, but it'd been a little bit harrowing. "What are you doing out here?"

Dinah winced, going to the edge of the roof. "I got restless. I didn't want to bug you." She gestured down at the street, and around Fandom. "Lots to do, you know?"

A wolf was howling off in the distance as it was eaten by a dinosaur.

Yeah, that was creepy even for them. "Too much to do," Priestly said, coming closer and brushing the feathers off his shoulder. "I thought we were going to spend the night celebrating."

Hawke was finally dead. Priestly was still scrubbing the blood out from under his fingernails.

Dinah winced, and finally started climbing down the building's fire escape. "I know." She hopped down to stand in front of him, feeling a little lost. "I just... can't believe it's over."

It had taken a good while for Hawke to die. There had been monologuing. Dinah was still embarrassed about that part.

Hey, it hadn't turned into an opportunity for the bad guy to escape, so Priestly figured a little monologuing couldn't be all bad.

"Yeah, but it'll be really over if you get turned into a zombie. Or something worse."

Was "half-monkey, half-pony" contagious?

He wanted to reach out for her, but wasn't sure him initiating contact would be welcomed again, yet. His punishment for the Raven incident had gone right up to the moment they left to take out Hawke, and he was still reeling, just a bit.

Half the reason Dinah was out on the streets was she'd wanted to clear her head; sometimes the feedback from Priestly, the worry and the carefulness, could get overwhelming.

"It wasn't enough," she blurted out.

And that would be the other half.

"The bloodlust," Priestly said. He'd noticed that. Had a couple bandaged fingers to show for it. He straightened his shoulders, using every bit of his couple of inches on her. "You think I'm going to let you get killed out here?"

"No, I mean yes, it's that, no, I don't-- wanna pull you down."

Dinah knew she was selfish with him, sometimes. A lot of the time. If she was going to take stupid risks, he didn't have to be part of it.

She reached out for his hand, being extra-careful. Not reading his mind, for once. "You got hurt. I didn't plan that."

"And what do you think would happen to me if something happened to you?" Priestly said, leaning into her touch. "You made me, Dinah."

He'd just been an idiot kid when they met, full up on pointless rebellion and a romanticized idea of anarchy. With her, he was anarchy. Was the chaos and the fire.

He didn't want to be that punk kid again.

"You'd..." The bleed of his feelings was making her happy again, and sad that she'd left him, and glad they were together, and --

More chaos, more fire. Hawke was just the first, the most important. Her mood lifted. "I'm never leaving you." She grinned and leaned in. "You get to pick the next one. You earned it."

The happy -- and the crazy -- fed right on back into him. He wrapped his arms around her and grinned back.

"Hell," he said. "I'd be happy just setting this town on fire."

Dinah kissed him lightly, and then said, "I bet we can find some matches. Anything you want." She grinned. "Everything." And if you want to use the handcuffs on me this time....

It was like Priestly's brain glitched. His thoughts just stopped on that image for a second.

"Anything, huh?" As much as he loved the idea of setting the world on fire, Dinah spread naked and cuffed to the bed was too good to pass up. "Best get started, then. We'll have a busy weekend ahead of us."

"Uh hunh." Feedback loops were the best. Dinah was now plastered against Priestly, giggling at the rush of hormones. "Race you home?"

"Honey," Priestly said. "Right now, I'm pretty sure I could fly."

Arachne heard the clapping in the night as she swung away from the dying bear. A second later, she landed on the rooftop by Dinah.

"I know."

Total badass, right?

[Ed.: Crazy Comic Crossovers, True Believers! This thread takes place before the preceding Priestly thread! Excelsior! -Nit-Picking Nick!]

[[I've always wanted to do that.]]

Total. There were cage-fighters and guys named Luke Cage who were fangirling her right now!

"I particularly liked the part where the bear almost fell on you." Dinah's lips twitched, but she sounded amused and not sarcastic. "Good recovery." She tilted her head, studying the mask. "You could make good money with the mask and wrestling schtick."

[Ed.: YAY. I am now part of a Stan-Lee-like footnote! WOOT!]

"Are you kidding me?" Arachne asked. "I've got more important things to do than play fake combat sports."

"Like wrestle bears?" Kestrel gave the sad dead bear a pointed look. "Lotta them back home for you?"

"In case you didn't notice, they're one of about a dozen different kinds of monsters wandering around," Arachne pointed out. "Every one of them that gets killed now means one fewer people have to deal with later. So if I've got to go a couple rounds with a bear, that's what I'm going to do."

"What if I'm one of the monsters?"

Dinah, looking for a fight? Duh.

"Then you'd be the prettiest monster I've seen around here," Arachne said before lifting her arm to aim her stinger shooter at Dinah's chest. "But I'd still have a job to do."

"Awwwww." Dinah's grin got happier. "Well, I wouldn't want to compromise your work ethic!"

And aimed a blast of TK at Arachne's feet, zig-zagging sideways.

Spider-sense meant that Arachne was already in the air flipping forward before the force would have hit. She didn't want to stay in the air against a telekinetic too long, though, so she snagged a spot on the roof with a webline and pulled herself down quickly.

With her other hand, she fired a series of web-blasts, hoping to incapacitate - or at least distract - Dinah.

That was so shiny. "How are you doing that?" Dinah marveled, sending another blast at her, then gasping and having to stagger backward, batting at two blasts, but getting her knees caught up in the last. "HEY!"

She'd even seen Arachne do that to the bear, and she hadn't expected it. Which had her reacting by sending her TK going out much more randomly, weakly, in every direction.

"I'm really damn good, that's how," Arachne said. She couldn't dodge that kind of desperation attack, so she crouched down to stick to the roof with both her hands and feet as the TK tried to push her. Once it passed, she launched forward with a jump kick aimed at Dinah's face.

Dinah had managed - barely - to free her knees, but that kind of aggressive move left her no time to do anything but fall to the roof, rolling and rolling until she hit a smokestack.

She got to her feet, torn between loving and hating this, and sent another TK blast toward Arachne. She could win, easy, with the Canary Cry, but that would be-- overkill. "Did you ever think of joining the bad guys? You would be awesome at that."

Arachne let the push fling her back as she hit the roof with another pair of weblines. She landed on her feet, then pulled on the webs to slingshot her toward Dinah, aiming a forearm at her chest.

While all that was happening, she answered, "Nope. I know where my loyalties fall. They don't change for a payday."

"Shame." Dinah stretched out one hand, aiming her TK for the woman's wrist. There had to be a break in the suit somewhere, right? If she could just peel it off-- and get her hands on her-- "How 'bout vengeance? Who's done you wrong?"

Distract, distract, banter, distract!

"Just you right now," Arachne said. Her wrist was caught by the TK - and it was strangely being pulled at, even though the glove wasn't quite coming off - but that just forced her to spin and aim a roundhouse kick at Dinah instead. No wasted motion.

"I just wanted to play!"

And ow, crap, damn, that hurt. That was gonna leave a bruise.

With a snarl, Dinah snapped back. By snapping her teeth down on Jessica's hand, in lieu of anything else.

"You wanna play, pick a player. Not me," Arachne said, wincing at the fact that holy crap Dinah just bit her hand. The glove was made from tough stuff, so it was more confusing that she'd resort to biting than anything.

But if Dinah was going to keep her close, Arachne would press the advantage by, um, pressing her up against the smokestack.

"My game, my rules," Dinah spit out. Blood, then her eyes lit up, as she got an idea-- and slid her hand through Jessica's hair, pressing down, and - contact!

Hmmmmm! Hello, testing? Who's in here?

And a stab of mental pain as Dinah started mind-walking.

"Sorry, we're not having the kind of thing where you can run your--GAH!" Arachne started before recoiling in pain. "What are you doing?"

"Are you sure?" Dinah grinned, feeling vindicated. Banter paid off! Distracting paid off! And:

Hello, Jessica Drew. This is Mission Control Kestrel! So, what scares a big bad good girl? Oooo, CIA! Scary!

"Buy me a drink first," Arachne said through gritted teeth. The pain was intense enough that she went down to one knee, but she wasn't going down without a fight. That would be why a punch was aimed at your gut, Dinah. It was weaker than her earlier punches, but there was still enhanced strength behind it.

I guess we can do that, how about some tickling to loosen you--

And then Dinah was gagging and gasping for air, letting go of Jessica and slamming back against the wall as she coughed for breath.

"I'm not a fan of blondes anyway." Arachne's mind was still cloudy with pain. She knew she technically had an advantage here, but she was in no condition to press it.

She fired a web at the roof parapet and yanked herself over the edge. She needed some distance until she could clear things up.

If Dinah were able to follow, Jessica would already be long gone by the time she got to the edge of the roof.

"...come back here and..." Yeah, she needed another minute, hang on. And possibly to step up her hand-to-hand workouts, yeesh.

By the time Kestrel got her breath back, there was nobody there. Damnit. Next time, Arachne! Next time!

So Dinah sat on the edge of the roof, pouting. (http://fandomtownies.livejournal.com/7199700.html?thread=267745748#t267745748)

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The Park, Friday evening

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