17239/The Call to Violence

The Call to Violence
Date of Scene:	21 February 2024
Location:	Basement Apartment (The Curio)
Synopsis:	Robbie has to contend with his darker side when a mysterious call comes through, and Phoebe stops responding.
Cast of Characters:	Phoebe Beacon, Robbie Reyes

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Phoebe Beacon has posed:
SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 17, 11:37PM

    Phoebe usually texts at random times during her Balm nights. Jokes. Observations. Pictures of entertaining graffiti. The little things and communications that she thinks might make Robbie smile, or sent joint to the Reyes brothers if she thinks Gabe might get a kick out of it.

    Tonight there hadn't been any communication. She wasn't responding to her phone. She wasn't responding to any messenger services. A certain tenseness had hung in the air at the home of the Reyes brothers.

    It was Robbie's phone that rang first. An Unknown Number, No Info, the number coming up as all zeroes. A Tupperware marked 'GABE - (do not eat Robbie's)' was on the table, some Cherry Tye-Dye sugar cookies remaining from Valentine's day and the lid opened, some show on TV playing in the background to provide a baseline of noise for the apartment.

    The tense energy tightens.

Robbie Reyes has posed:
    The gnawing sense of doom is something that Robbie has grown familiar with when he shares a body with spirits dedicated to vengeance and terror. So it was easy for him to rationalize it away as the night went longer and he did not hear from Phoebe. She was likely on a stake-our or performing some other duties for the Bats, and all he had to do was wait.

    And then the call came through. THAT was worrisome.

    No one ever called Robbie.

    He presses the phone and brings it to his ear. "Hello?"

Phoebe Beacon has posed:
    There was a buzzing sound, and then a voice. Voices.

    Trying to all speak at the same time in different languages. Layered, rolling over one another. English and Spanish, but also others. Eli would recognize the Latin. Italian. Russian.

    All boiling down to: They could not protect her.

Robbie Reyes has posed:
    Immediately, Robbie tries to force Eli back into his box. It is the first and perhaps last rational thing he is capable of. He starts to feel himself getting hot already. "I've got to run, hermano," he says to Gabe, already striding towards the door. "Don't wait up."

    Hopefully Gabe doesn't, and assumes he is off to see Phoebe. Which he is, but...

    "What is going on?" he demands of the phone, as if somehow that will all coalesce into a single message.

Phoebe Beacon has posed:
    "What? Robbie? -- is something up?" Gabe asks as he rolls from the livingroom towards the door -- but is stopped after the door slams shut.

    She has been taken from this world. You can feel it, can't you? the voices say, disjointed, some whispering, some crying ougt in the distance. Sirens in the background. The rumble of thunder -- or a railroad train?

    She has been taken from you.

    The voices shudder, and Robbie would recognize the intake of breath -- Phoebe's breath -- and then the call cuts, leaving RObbie Reyes with no more information.

Robbie Reyes has posed:
    Robbie does not quite recall how he got from the apartment to the Hellcharger, but somehow he is driving. To where, he does not know. He hears voices, and they are telling him things that he cannot possibly accept. And yet, somehow, he feels them.

    He takes off towards Gotham. Wherever Phoebe is, it is somewhere there.

    And he hopes that Eli stays away.

Phoebe Beacon has posed:
    Gotham City. THe city everyone hates unless they grew up there. A city so vile that fate tried to wipe it off the map with No Man's Land and it came back.

    The voices arguing in Robbie's head are diametrically opposed -- of course, Eli wants Robbie to give up control. Let HIM handle it. Robbie's not smart enough, not ANGRY enough to get revenge -- not vengeance, no, revenge -- not punishment. Annihilation. And then he'd punish Phoebe for not knowing her place.

    The search leads to an older dockyard. POlice tape separates the scene. There has been fire here, the stench of burnt flesh and gasoline. Lines of Dockyard Dogs in various states of consciousness, and a few metahumans in a similar state are lined safely in cuffs and zipties (and one guy who has a bola around his head).

    A wrecked crane dangerously floats in the water, slowly pulling away from its mooring with the gentle screech of metal.

Robbie Reyes has posed:
    The Hellcharger settles down. How RObbie got here, he doesn't know. But he knows.

    He knows.

    Eli knows.

    Those response are ...right there. So close.

    Robbie's knuckles go white on the steering wheel as the jacket gets hotter.

    No. She would not want this.

    Eli's howl of fury can be heard dully in the back of Robbie's mind as he manifests enough presence of mind to get away from this scene before he truly loses control.

    The Hellcharger roars away. But it does not get far, as the need for VENGEANCE starts to overwhelm Robbie. He pulls off from the street across from a well known hideout for villains and super villains alike.

    The guilty.

    Robbie knows he has to find some. Before he loses control.

    His boot melts the pavement the moment it emerges from the Hellcharger.

Phoebe Beacon has posed:
    Someone has a sense of irony. It's a place near the Narrows in Gotham, the basement of a building that used to house a bank. It now houses a 'motel'. The bar in the basement is full of scumbags. The rooms above occasionally house even worse.

    The place was called The Pearly Gate. A bit like if you ordered your Hellfire club off Temu, it is cheap, it is sad, and it reeks of stale cigarette smoke and broken dreams and threats of violence. Somewhere in the building, a woman screams in pain.

    The doorman is huge, a six foot six hulk, built like a brick shithouse, with shitkicking boots on his feet.

    The pavement hisses below Robbie's boots as he steps out of the Hellcharger, and the bouncer reaches over to put a hand against Robbie's chest.

    "No entry, Ese, unless you pay. Comprende?" he asks, reaching out for cash "An' we'll have to see your ID."

Robbie Reyes has posed:
The pavement sizzling should be a give away. The burnning sensation against his chest, more so. But when the man challenges Robbie? Asks for ID. Robbie gives it to him. In spades.


The face of Robbie Reyes melts away, engulfed in flame as he gives himself over to the Rider. Better the Rider than Eli, at least.


Fortunately for the bouncer, he is just a dick, and so he is flung off to the side with the effort one might use on a fly, and the Rider does not even hear the crunch of the bones as he hits the brick wall. He will recover.


The Rider strides into the wretched hive of scum and villainy.

Phoebe Beacon has posed:
    The metallic form of Robbie Reyes's Rider form catches the horror in the doorman's eyes as he shrieks out a warning -- and then he's flung off the side. He smacks a wall, and goes down hard, breath and senses knocked out of him.

    Down into the stairway, it's dark and stinks, reeks of failed men and broken people.

    THe bar seems to smell the danger though. People -- mostly men -- stand. Several draw guns at the Rider's showing up and one of them asks.

    "Uuuuuuuh... is dat da Bat...?!" in confusion, looking at the flames.

Robbie Reyes has posed:
The Bat would be silent. Or say something about how they have made bad choices.

The Rider pulls out his chain and ignites it. Guns may be drawn, they may be fired, but the burning hot hellfire infused chain begins cutting swathes through the weapons, tables, chairs, discouraging anyone from trying to stop this particular Spirit of Vengeance as it seeks to claim....


What, exactly?


Distraction.

Phoebe Beacon has posed:
    A Bat would be silent, or momentarily lecture. The Pearly Gate bar however is somewhat off their radar as of yet -- but it will definitely be on there after tonight.

    Patrons draw their weapons as The Rider draws his. THe one at the front appears to have concerns about the action, and regrets about many things as the chain lights up in Hellfire. There is a scream, and the guns fire off, aimed squarely at The Rider's chest.

    The first sweep catches one of the sinners in the reaches and fire, his back twisting, writhing in pain before he turns to ashy gray. A useless human, pays women for their time and then calls the bank to sau his credit card info was stolen. They get stiffed even if he can't get there.

    A table breaks down. The patrons are firing again, this time in fear. The bartender (largely innocent, just in a bad place) ducks behind the counter in abject horror. Big Freddy, another big guy who likes his pizza and doesn't like girls over the age of twenty turns to try and run, shoving his 'date' in the way and into The Rider's path!

    What a guy.

Robbie Reyes has posed:
Even in this state, the Rider understands innocence. The date may have broken laws, and may be a criminal, but moral terpitude? The Rider pushes her out of the way with an arm, a bit more violently perhaps would be necessary but not overly so. She will be able to walk - run - of there. The others are not so lucky.


The Rider can taste the guilt in the air, and it starts reaching out to avail itself of the veritable smorgasbord of sin. The eyes glow as the Penanance Stare makes its appearance, reducing those who are not eating the hellfire from the chain to blubbering masses.


This is sin infested waters, and the Rider is the Great White Shark.

Phoebe Beacon has posed:
    The girl is shoved out of the way, gathered up as she's flipped over the counter -- a shoe goes flying.

    And the Pennance Stare is brought into play.... people fear. They sense the harm they have inflicted on others. They feel their eyes BURN and their brains aflame as they stumble around in the new darkness of their souls.

    There is sobbing. Fear.

    But is it enough to distract the predatory nature of The Rider?

Robbie Reyes has posed:
On another night, it might be.


Tonight? The Rider is insatiable.


Burning through sins and steel, Penance Stare and Hellfire, the Rider marches patiently and relentlessly through the Pearly Gate, rendering most of its occupants quivering masses, or worse.


Until it gets to the bartender. He gets a regular stare, unsettling enough as it is, as the Rider turns its face to him.


"Leave."


There is no negotiation, and no second warning.

Phoebe Beacon has posed:
    "YEP I HATE THIS JOB ANYWAY!" the bartender squeaks out, grabs the 'date' and gets the fuck out, up the stairs towards Freedom.

    The rest of the bar is either in traction, in their own personal Hells, or preparing for the worst. This level of the Pearly Gate is cleared -- still reeks of sin, but the Sineater has consumed as much as this dismal place would allow him -- on the ground level. There is an elevator in the corner.