10702/Scarlet Bumper

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Scarlet Bumper
Date of Scene: 08 April 2022
Location: Long Island
Synopsis: No description
Cast of Characters: Wanda Maximoff, Hellboy




Wanda Maximoff has posed:
    No matter what the podcasts or the telenovelas say, life isn't all sunshine and coming up roses.
    By 8 AM, Long Island is already up and moving, people commuting into the City or hauling their carcasses into towns strung along the coast. Halfway along the island, Kings Park is more likely to see students straggling into class or headed south for Suffolk. They hasten a little faster or shake off sleep more poorly thanks to the mist clinging to the ground. Stingy glimpses of blue sky through the haze aren't welcoming. The sun is reduced to a pale grey-gold disc. Restlessness and a bit of morning anxiety to go with that coffee, anyone?
    Smack dab on the outskirts of town, pressed to a state park, stands the ruined madhouse that everyone in town knows about. Kings Park Psychiatric Hospital is a tall brick building that would better suit Brooklyn or Manhattan. It stands many stories tall, mostly intact. The outbuildings nearby lie in various states of disrepair, gutted by urban explorers and tagged copiously by graffiti artists. Anything of value that could be stripped from the pump house, warehouse, or such has been pulled away. Chain-link fences around a potholed road emerge from the gloom.
    Something went wrong here recently. The fog clinging to Long Island Sound is nothing new. What could be attracted to a place of psychic torment? An Avenger, for one, floating in the middle of the courtyard and carving a scarlet rune into the air as the spiritual landscape shudders. Power runs off her fingers and her hair floats around her as she sculpts that shape. Not even a seagull is foolish enough to get too close, crying forlornly over a lost bag of chips.

Hellboy has posed:
    Hellboy's superiors in the BPRD have gotten the reports from wherever they get them of things right in their wheelhouse. Red's been sent for whatever reason they send him. He's not really an investigator. Not a scalpel or a magnifying glass, no. Red is a hammer. He can be a lot of other things when needed, but the thing he excels at is hitting stuff.
    Low to the ground, Hellboy is doing his best to be unseen. Instead of using wire cutters on the chain link fence, he grabs and pulls it apart, which is noisier, but much faster. He runs through and rolls into a bit of overgrowth for cover. Peeking out, he sees the floating woman and narrows his glowing, ember gaze. "Hmmm," Hellboy says.
    Pulling his phone from somewhere in his nebulous coat, he snaps a picture and sends it away. His phone buzzes. He looks at the screen and pockets the device again.
    Stepping out of the bush, Hellboy stands upright and bellows out to what his contacts have told him is the Scarlet Witch, an Avenger. "Hey, lady!" he says, extraordinarily diplomatically. Such charm!

Wanda Maximoff has posed:
    King's Park smells like damp rot, partly from the slow-moving, brackish Nissequogue River meeting the sea nearby. Partly from the squashed raccoon rotting on the loop drive where someone brought a wheeled vehicle in. Other bits don't feel quite right. Splotches of drying fat form a ragged circle not far past that. Several bushes not fully come into bud ended up burnt, their broken or sliced branches contributing to the cinders drawn in a diamond. All of it adds up to a pretty stinky little mess.
    If someone wants to look at that over the auburn witch floating mid-air. She is dressed for a walk around town, in jeans and hiking boots instead of an impressive ensemble in wine-reds that give her name. The glyph doesn't resemble the futhark at all, something more eldritch and wrapped in a series of concentric rings. Quite pretty by an artistic standard. She probably doesn't hear Hellboy marching through the park or peeling open a fence. Aware of him somehow, though, that's probably a certainty.
    She turns her head when he gets closer. The faint residual glow in her eyes fades to leave them a friendly green-amber. "Hello." For a given value of friendly around two strangers crossing paths at a site renowned for its torment and abuse. Mental health patients and their staff don't tend to be tranquil, despite the best hopes of the hospital founders. "Careful, someone left a slimy mine around here. There could be others." Diplomacy works! Score a point for him. Maybe he can get that on his performance review, not being flung by the witch halfway to Queens.

Hellboy has posed:
    Hellboy is dressed about like he always does. Shirt he's been wearing as of late, that nebulous coat, boots...no shoes no shirt might be hampering his style, but it looks the hardest on his shirt. One flex from that demon looks like it will pop that shirt like a ripe pea pod.
    "You, uh--" Hellboy definitely doesn't want to speak wrong to one of the most powerful witches that has ever been. He's pretty sure she'd win in a confrontation against a Kryptonian, so he'll definitely be treading lightly this particular conversation. "--doing some magic to get rid of them, then?" Smooth. Yup. Definitely not an awkward, ill-socialized demon with the mindset of a teenager here!

Wanda Maximoff has posed:
    Good that neither of them come toting hellfire and brimstone off the top. The glowing mark hovers in the air surrounded by circles that slowly rotate, clearly not the work of a projector on the ground. One, the hospital has no power, being derelict and all. Two, the mist would show the beams and the shape up there has no such projection. It gleams a steady cherry red, bit like the end of a lit cigar.
    Wanda slowly sinks down lower towards the ground. Her hands are still wreathed in the glow of magic, probably necessary to keep her aloft. She bobs lower until her boots touch the ground, committing her weight. "Up to no good?" she supplies an answer with a bit of a wry smile. Her accent carries Slavic hints, Transia being smackdab in the Balkans and inescapably stamped on her as Hellboy is, well, red. On the ground, he could probably fold her in half without even trying. Not to mention the various other gewgaws, talismans, and weapons he probably has at his disposal. Glass cannon is a glass cannon, in this case.
    Clearly he's smooth enough. She tilts her head carefully to the looming building that disappears through the thin fog, streamers of moisture turned white and grey by the dim, watery light. "I'm trying to feel what happened. What happened here is not good. I think what happened here finished. Not good for us." Her smile fades away, and she shakes her head. "Not good for anyone. I don't like slime, but I worry more about surprises that hurt unsuspecting people."

Hellboy has posed:
    "Likewise," Hellboy says. He gestures with his head at the spray-painted facility. "You heading inside?" He asks, looking at her spinning magic thingy. Neat, but he definitely didn't know what it was or did. "I'm heading inside," he continues, making eye contact with the Scarlet Witch. "Wouldn't mind the backup." To be fair, with her along, his firepower exponentially increases.

Wanda Maximoff has posed:
    "Afraid I have to," Wanda says grimly. Her expression tightens, and she pulls her gloves from her coat. Pulling them on takes a few seconds, and no more glowy hands. "You here because of the same woo-woo problems?" She waves a little to indicate the space around her. Hellboy turning to move prompts her to follow after him. He's awful big, a good shield. "I would absolutely like the help. No shield with a star for me, right?"

Hellboy has posed:
    Red leads the way. He's not afraid of the big bad wolf...or whatever it is inside. Drawing his comically oversized revolver from under his right arm with his left hand, he clicks off the safety and points it at the ground, ready but not aimed at hurting anyone. The weapon resonates with the same magical what-not that a lot of the artifacts in his coat do, only stronger. Using the invulnerable Right Hand of Doom, Hellboy pushes at the door, clearly ready for what lies inside.

Wanda Maximoff has posed:
    The large hulk of a building isn't fully intact inside. Though the doors are barred, they've been forced open or wedged by cement blocks, broken bricks, and other junk. Windows boarded over and bashed open stare like blank, empty eyes down to the cul-de-sac. It's still horribly unfriendly, oppressive even, fire escapes strewn in litter and bad scents floating up. The place is not in any way inviting.
    Wanda lowers her head, shoulders rolled protectively against the weight pressing down on her. A shiver traces down her spine, heavily enough. Her weapons aren't pointy, but spells, and no one's going to see her holding one.
    Nothing awaits on the other side of the door but gloom, but the oppressive sigh of the wind through the windows. A shuffling comes from somewhere above, through layers of concrete.
    And of course, those mines. Sticky, tricky things triggered by stepping on them. By walking by. By a dangly parachute guy toy hanging from a strand. The people who sacrifice animals don't have problems being 'clever.'

Hellboy has posed:
    Hellboy looks at the deeply depressing interior of the depressing building. In his line of work, he's dealt with much worse. There's also the fact that he originated in the depths of hell, a place so much worse than Earth, even this lovely spot looked like paradise in comparison. Not much phases Hellboy, gloom-wise.
    Red leans at Wanda as he looks around. Quietly, he informs her, "Someone's above. You do anything about these sticky booby traps?" He does a fantastic job not giggling at the word 'booby'. Tee hee...booby.

Wanda Maximoff has posed:
    Depressing is a proper description. It's all miserable from the top to the bottom, trashed and thoroughly the product of a time when 'seen and not heard' applied to psych patients and children alike. Scratches and scribbles mark the walls. In places, animals have burrowed and roosted, chewing through wires. The attempts to find shelter aren't limited to animals alone.
    "Places like this attract bad people," she says softly. The pitched whisper ends up a little distorted. Her efforts to walk quietly tell of a life where it wasn't for fun that they played at stealth, where a misstep meant death. Seeing in the dark may be no problem for him, but a murmured sound shifts her vision into a different spectrum. Whatever she sees leaves her paler under her olive skin, setting her jaw. "I can make them malfunction or not work. It's best to destroy them, but that's loud." In more ways than one. Red motes circle around her pupils, floating over them, rose petals of pure light. Her finger flicks and a thin red line meanders through the corridor and up the stairs, a weak glow belched by the parachute toy and another spot against the wall. "Follow, don't touch or they go boom."

Hellboy has posed:
    Hellboy watches, and while loud might sound like fun, it's not the right time for it. He's had decades of experience being a 'shadow in the night', so stealth isn't something he's terrible at, but he's definitely not built for it. He follows along, keeping as close to the safe space as possible. "You have any idea what's up there?" he asks just above a whisper as he moves. He's got plenty of variety in rounds for the Samaritan. It's possible he's even got the right ones.

Wanda Maximoff has posed:
    Loud explosions or ectoplasmic ripples coating the area might draw attention. Security is thin but has to exist somewhere, dealing with the problem of vandals or ruin traceurs who love free running off the dangerously unstable walls. The hospital is a hulk washed up on the shore, creaking and always noisy. The scratching sounds aren't too weird. Neither the sound of air moving through broken windows or scrape of a bloated plywood covering rocking in the breeze is very strange, though the wind should be moving the mist and it isn't.
    Wanda frowns a little, focusing on keeping the line moving. Much of the magic is purely chance, keeping it likely that Hellboy won't blow something up. Won't end up covered in caustic powder or a stinking goo that makes deer urine seem pleasant. But contact can set them off. Wanda moves slower, more cautious, high-stepping to get over a suspicious patch of slime on the floor from a broken, long-disused pipe. Her footing isn't great on the stairs, since not an inch is without some grimy finish.
    "I hope for a homeless person. I worry about a magic user or a spirit. Here, they're more common." She shakes her head, looking up to the discoloured ceiling. "They will not like interruptions, either way."

Hellboy has posed:
    Hellboy nods, opting to stay with the heavy, lead rounds. One to any part of a squishy, human body would definitely end any kind of threat, but he also knew these sticky bombs and his bosses sending him here meant homeless persons weren't even remotely likely. Still, with nothing else to go on, big gun was still a big gun. Making it to the steps, he carefully inspected the first few, making sure there wasn't some kind of stairway bomb for him to set off before putting weight on the first step.

Wanda Maximoff has posed:
    Birds, rats, and mice all have been through. Bigger things, human things, are more cautious. Up they go past the second floor, into a space where the wards kept the long-term patients. The ones sick and in need of full time treatment. Corridors have a depressing sameness to them. Long stretches of weathered linoleum, scarred walls, doors hanging off their hinges leading into small private rooms that housed one or two together. Each is a cell, each unaccountably filthy or mangled.
    The door from the fire exit is the first wrong sign. The tacky smell of fat and blood marks it, a quarter circle slashed by a hooked eye.
    Wanda winces when the stairs creak, but the danger may be the gooey smear from some poor creature. Man or beast? Hard to say, but the shuffling noises are behind that battered, rusting barrier.

Hellboy has posed:
    Hellboy pushes open the door slowly with his Right Hand of Doom. Blood lines the walls, drawn into arcane shapes, sigils, runes, and what-not. "Ah," he says as he recognizes something. He tosses the Samaritan between hands and flips it open, pulling the large bullets out, each the size of a shotgun shell, one at a time. "You don't have any cold iron on you, do you?"

Wanda Maximoff has posed:
    The bloody walls surrender to the miasma. Behind Hellboy, the Scarlet Witch lives up to her name and brings a shield up in cherry bright light with her left hand. "Do you need those ones to be cold iron?"
    Her eyes narrow at the shapes blurring out of sight, a chaotic sort of trouble playing on the edges of her vision. Her eyes can't focus entirely on the shapes. "If we need them..."
    Reality has a funny way of warping to make it happen, even if it's a rain of bullets or a box lying on a shelf, guarded by a mutated, howling rat-horror. It needn't be that dramatic.

Hellboy has posed:
    Hellboy stops at the third bullet, looking at it for a moment as he watches it change from lead to what looks like regular iron. Just the material changes, not the shape, or even the scratches or dings. "Huh," he says. He reloads his weapon and pushes farther in. He kicks open another door and tosses his weapon back to his left hand. However, that's too much time, and he hasn't accounted for there being traps on the second floor this close to what appears to be a young and attractive homeless woman.
    A set of arms is released, knives slashing as they cut through the doorway. Hellboy jumps back to avoid the trap as the woman, her sleeves and hands drenched in blood, stands over the entrails of an animal. She hisses and begins quickly uttering out a magical incantation. She clearly has no idea who she's dealing with.

Wanda Maximoff has posed:
    Must be nice to change things on the fly. Wanda steadies herself against the flood of her power and the noise of that door being kicked open. She walks straight into the hallway, magic filling her hands, a nice counterpoint for Hellboy's impressive proportions and that Right Hand. Or the gun. Or really anything.
    The attractive homeless woman doesn't fit the bill. She stares at the extra arms for just a moment, flinging her arm out to bring the mystical barrier up. "Not today." Bad news for the bloody caster, considering the uniform shapes of the Mystic Arts make up the shield.
    The raw blast hurled at the caster to tear into the spell is another matter, infused with the chaos that embodies Wanda's very augmented soul. Ooh, witch battle. Okay, not as cool as epic rap battles of mystery.