2759/Stopping a Bullet

Stopping a Bullet
Date of Scene:	03 August 2020
Location:	Central Business District - New Troy
Synopsis:	A fight with DEATHSTROKE! And it totally does not go as the Outsiders planned, at all...
Cast of Characters:	Tim Drake, Slade Wilson, Conner Kent, Cassie Sandsmark, Laura Kinney, Rose Wilson

---

Tim Drake has posed:
It's late afternoon in Metropolis. The sun is out. The breeze is blowing gently. The clean, shiny streets of the business district are at a distinct odds with the similar district in Gotham. Likewise, there aren't puffs of smog or tumbleweeds of garbage rolling through the city streets. Gotham is a hellhole. Metropolis is a beautiful city filled with hope and a sense of pride in itself.

<<I'm in,>> Red Robin's voice comes over the comms. <<I've got the Marianas Pharm building's security feeds as well as the traffic cameras on both Jefferson Street and Dale Boulevard. Can't find anything up higher than that.>>

The team should be arriving to the business district. <<My assumption is he's probably got a sniper's nest somewhere nearby with a view of the front doors. Ravager may correct me if she thinks I'm incorrect, though.>>

Slade Wilson has posed:
This job, all told, is normally the type of job that Slade would turn down. Go get Deadshot, or Taskmaster, or Bullseye, or any one of a number of hardened killers-for-hire that are out there. But it was a Metropolis job, and that meant that Slade could tack a "Superman premium" on to his usual fee, which suddenly made a mundane job entirely worth doing.

He's actually a block and a half away from his target, on the roof of a tall building that has a single corner with line-of-sight to the target area. The client was explicit about what they wanted: A public assassination on the front steps of their building. Slade has spent the last few days exhaustively researching, learning as much of the routine as possible. Fortunately Dr. Freeman likes to see and be seen, and often uses the front door rather than whisking themselves away out a private entrance or the like. She seems like a nice lady for a Corporate CEO, shame he'll have to kill her, but business is business.

Deathstroke's hide-site is deceptively simple...he's underneath a blue tarp next to some construction supplies, looking for all the world like there's another crate or pallete of something someone doesn't want to get wet. He has assembled the sniper rifle over the course of 14 minutes and 27 seconds, putting together each individual piece at irregular intervals so that anyone with super-hearing wouldn't pick up a rhythm and the collected sounds of a weapon being assembled all at once, just random clicks and clatters here and there. There's a small monitor linked to a tiny remote camera positioned to watch the entrance, letting him see the comings and goings without coming out of the hide-site, and he's positioned so he can get into firing position and take the shot quickly. Finally there's a small device that detects spikes in X-Rays, so he might get some warning if a certain Man of Steel or his kin peeks behind the curtain. And so he waits, with the practiced patience of one well-trained as a sniper and scout. A lot of tense boredom, waiting for those few moments of violence and chaos and the escape that follows. Naturally, he has three or four separate plans for that escape in mind, depending on how things play out.

Conner Kent has posed:
Conner is currently hovering a mile over the building, with the sun at his back. He can see everything pretty well from here. And he is not seeing Slade because of the blue tarp and a lack of X-Ray vision. He is listening, but let's be honest, Metro is a large city and he lacks the ability to focus his hearing in specific sounds. Conner ain't Daredevil. If he hears something suspicious, he will investigate, but so far... "he might be in a room with views to the building. There is nothing in the rooftops. Well, nothing obvious. It would be nice if we find him before the woman leaves the building - I am not very good at catching bullets yet. Bart is the one that can do that."

Cassie Sandsmark has posed:
Cassie has not actually been around the base much - a quick reversal from her apparently cheerful and chummy meet-n-greet with the new members. That, too, is a story for another day. But once Tim gets wind of what is happening and gets everyone onto the comms, she arrives quickly, making the short cross-city flight at just under the speed limit. Donna gets annoyed when her or Kara upset the FAA with sonic booms over populated areas. But it's also practical, in this case: the same way Slade keeps a low profile from certain Kryptonian surveillance, she doesn't actually want to announce her comings and goings to the whole city. She makes two trips - one to the base to meet with the team, and then one back to the site once they've gathered and set their plan.

Which arrives at the present, where she is back in flight out over the business district. They suspect Slade is on a rooftop, and she comes in high, scanning over the nearby building tops. Her getup is the more athletic version that is as close as she gets to 'costume'-y, the red yoga pants and black sleeveless top. Its streamlined and doesn't get in the way - though it shows off the bracers.

<<I am over the plaza>> she answers on the comms, all business in the field. <<Conner, you've got the better eyes, lets go into the search pattern. >> They've probably worked out some kind of flying search grid. <<Ground team, what are your positions?>>

Laura Kinney has posed:
<< Heard. >> Laura's response to Tim is simple, precise. With the target's locale, or at least, vicinity known, X-23 moves forward in her black combat outfit and black domino mask that was required by Red Robin; she had not seen the point but it wasn't worth arguing about either.

She might not have super-hearing, but she comes armed with something Slade isn't expecting. An overactive sense of smell. And, she begins sniffing the air here and there, searching for the smells of gun oil and combat gear, coupled with human. << Searching for the target now, near the plaza also, >> she calls, even though she is at street level presently.

She keeps an eye on her new teammates, and an ear open, all senses on full alert as she stalks for the building that Slade is occupying.

<< I will need to get up higher to find his scent. >>

Rose Wilson has posed:
Does Ravager have a better idea how her father works? Does she understand his methods? Probably. Much like Tim or Dick, even Jason, understand the way the Bat works. Slade trained her. Drilled in certain behaviors, certain ideas. Made sure that she knew how to find the right perches, the right entrance angles, the right way to approach a problem.

So when people start speculating on what her father might do, she's silent. It's not because she isn't going to be helpful, instead she weighs and measures what she knows about her father, what //she// would do in this situation.

When the response comes, it's matter of fact, << He wouldn't be in a room, too much risk that an exit would be blocked. People in hallways, people in the stairwells, and while he could exit a room and go up, it'd add time to the escape route. He'd want to stay in the open for freedom of movement, until he needs to reach the ground, then he'd make the fastest, shortest trip. Which would be a straight line down. >> Hopefully, any gun oil and armor smell that she carries with her Laura has learned and identified as belonging to Rose, so that it doesn't mask any potential sniff of Slade. << He'd be on a roof, and not directly across from the building. I'd say angled, and back...he's capable of a kill shot from a distance. He'd need just one. >>

Positions? Well. She has to check that, and she looks up. << North side, coming in towards the entrance. >>

Slade Wilson has posed:
Slade continues checking his monitor and sensor readings, thus far unaware that he is being actively sought. His helmet is patched in to local police feeds but certainly not hero-team comms, and so as far as he can tell, everything is peachy. Which means he's naturally assuming it's all about to go sideways any second now.

But there's the monitor picking up the doorway as it opens, and just like the several dozen times before he watches, even if several dozen times now it's just been normal comings and goings of random people he doesn't give the slightest care about. This time though? It's a positive ID. Of course, if he can see and identify her, then others can too.

Slade shifts in an inhumanly smooth motion, sort of rolling from sitting against a backstop of bags of unmixed concrete, to a kneeling position with the rifle brought to his shoulder and with his good eye looking down the sights. He's careful to make sure the barrel does not extrude from the small opening to allow for the sighting and shot. The rifle is suppressed of course, to minimize the sound and muzzle flash from the shot, but the distance involved and the power needed to insure a one-shot kill meant he couldn't use subsonic rounds and the suppressor he's got won't be able to completely mask the signature. A gamble, but one that the geometry of the hit demanded be made.

Crosshairs come to rest on the target...Slade halts his breath halfway through exhaling, and squeezes the trigger gently....

Cassie Sandsmark has posed:
<<Red, what's the position on his target?>> Cassie communicates back to Tim as they continue to circle. Between some random executive and Deathstroke the Terminator, she suspects the former is a lot easier to keep tabs on. <<If we can't locate Deathstroke before she's due to clear cover, we go to plan B.>> Plan B being: there's no chance they find him, but they may be able to protect the target as he leaves the building, and then move in on the would-be assassin after he gives away his position.

As it turns out, this is more or less what happens, albeit perhaps not as cleanly as anyone would like: Conner and her are both rotating, and neither quite as close to the building as they might like when the shot comes, sooner than expected.

While Cassie doesn't have the Super-hearing to pinpoint the silenced shot, her sight is good enough to catch the bullet's trajectory, even on a bounce. Bouncing bullets is Amazon 101, after all. <<Sighted. Bunker on rooftop diagonal from the GBS building. Blue tarp.>> She probably sees the blur of motion of Conner in flight, too, and can only hope he's fast enough - or that Laura is closer - while she dives at the identified position. The specifics of Slade's exact placement in the little fort aren't SUPER relevant because Cassie is not one of the precision operators: she dives at the thing like a human bomb, perfectly happy to let their insurance cover the inevitable rooftop damage.

Conner Kent has posed:
Nothing. Nothing. Noth... <<the hell, she is out early!>> Shouts Conner through the coms. The he dives. There is a sonic boom because, well, better to annoy the FFA and some broken windows than a corpse on the street.

He can see the bullet now. It moves very quickly, as rifle bullets tend to. And Conner can't hit the street at match three without injuring a lot of people. Where is Bart they need him!?

He needs slow down, but he needs to intercept that bullet. Solution is:

He lands a few yards from the door of the building, a three-point landing to minimize damage, and still leaves eight-inch deep holes on the ground, and a loud crunching sound. But it gets rid of the inertia.

Then he jumps over the CEO and raises a tk-shield around her to protect her from the impact with the floor. The bullet hits his back. Hard enough to feel it. It leaves a big hole in the leather jacket. Damnit. "Go back into the building, ma'am," he tells the woman, helping her up. <<Where is he?>> Into the coms.

Laura Kinney has posed:
Conner manages to save the victim, and Cassie manages to spot, and call out the target. Seeing Cassie's divebomb gives Laura the location she needs and she dashes forwards to the building itself, her claws popping out on both hands -and- feet - she never mentioned, or showed anyone, anything about foot claws. And, althought a little slower than Spiderman, she begins to climb up the building at a rather decent pace, her built-in claws providing the ability to puncture and find purchase in the masonry and steel of the building and working both hands and feet in tandem as if she's done this many times before. It won't take her long at all to scale it.

<< Building on the southwest corner, in the plaza. Tallest one, >> she answers Conner. << En route now. Leader is engaging. >>

Tim Drake has posed:
Everything is happening fast, and Red Robin immediately pulled the focus onto the cameras with the relevant movement. <<Calculating-->> but Cassie's sighted Deathstroke already. <<Be careful, he's dangerous.>> A vast understatement. He grits his teeth, wishing he were there instead of watching the plaza level with out being able to keep his eyes on the likely area of the fight... hm.

Fingers fly across the keyboard in front of him, forcing his control over the cameras more completely. He's probably triggering alerts to the buildings security and to Metropolis's civic traffic camera department, but he doesn't care. He wrests complete control over the video and audio feeds and coaxes the servos and positioning gears to move. <<<Higher, you useless pieces of-->>

There. He gets two of the cameras, at least, on the tarped off section (three more fighting their way to it) about the time Cassie hits it at speed.

Rose Wilson has posed:
Flying, running faster than bullets, fast enough to cause windows to explode. None of those kinds of things are within Rose Wilson's wheel house. She is faster than an average human, and she's stronger. But that isn't where her strengths really are.

Don't let anyone tell you that she's just a mindless thug, because she's smart. Not just that, she's damn good at guessing things. If a guess it could be considered. And after Tim dropped the bomb that dear dad had a job, and they were going to mess it up, she vanished with a vague 'I'm going to shower and get ready' sort of comment. And thus, she planned, and she made sure that she had Plan C, D and F tucked into her belt. So when the exact building is called out, and two of the three start heading for the sniper roost at speed, she moves from her own spot. Which, if anyone had been paying attention is neither on the ground, nor as turly north as she earlier claimed.

She's inside one of the buildings, and doing the exact opposite of what she said her father would do. Boxing herself in. But that might be the point, as she heads for the window facing the building in question, and the tip of her own rifle appears as she sets it up calmly on the sill. << Blue tarp you said? >> She starts looking for the tarp in question, to take her own shot.

Slade Wilson has posed:
It's a very impolite word that flits through Slade Wilson's mind as he sees the target swept away in a blur. He doesn't speak it aloud though...no sense potentially offering up his exact position. Though his next move effectively does it anyway. A small thermite charge is dropped on the rifle, which will render it to mostly-slag in a few moments, and then he slides back, and hits a small switch on his belt. A rapid succession of "*POP**POP**POP*s" is rather audible even for some of those WITHOUT super-hearing, as a ring of shaped micro-charges erupts in a perfect circle around Slade, intended to drop him through the roof and into the room below. Which happens to be the fancy living room of someone's penthouse apartment, though there doesn't seem anyone in residence at the time. He tosses a small micro-charge to the floor-to-ceiling window in front of him, which sticks to it near the center, and starts to run in that direction.

And then Cassie comes crashing through a split-second later in a whirl of blue tarp, a cloud of powdered concrete, and enough momentum that the polished hardwood floor craters and buckles as she lands, very nearly breaking into the NEXT floor. It's not a "clean" landing by any stretch, mostly because she ends up flying about half-through and half not on that hole Slade made. It won't do any real damage to her, of course but it might put her a bit off balance.

Sadly for Slade, she's not the only one off-balance, as Cassie's impactful landing staggers him, sending him pitching forward, though he tucks into a combat roll, twisting along the way and extracting the high-caliber automatic pistol at his hip, coming up in a kneeling position facing back towards the new arrival, and sending a hail of rapid shots in the teen-Amazon's direction. More than likely no more than a distraction for her, but distraction is his aim at the moment. Of course, he's not quite aware that Rose has line-of-sight on the middle of his back, right through that window with the explosive charge planted on it.

Conner Kent has posed:
Conner spares a few seconds to make sure the woman is back into the building and no more bullets are coming. Deathstroke is supposed to work alone, but one never knows.

By then Cassie has made a landing, and Laura is climbing like a spider-woman. And Rose. <<Where is Rose?>> he asks through the comms.

Then he takes off. "Want and hand?" He stays to Laura as he catches up with her. If the brunette girl accepts, he flies up and over the roof, letting her go so she can fall on Slade, or maybe behind him. He follows up, ready to support Cassie if she needs him.

Cassie Sandsmark has posed:
'Careful,' in the best of days, is not Cassie's strong point. And this is not the best of days. Frankly, it hasn't been the best of /months/.

So the headstrong junior Amazon has a lot of anger pent up, and letting loose on a verifiably infamous supervillain is precisely what she needs. Or at least, feels like she needs. She's not in a mood to be cautious, go easy, or hold back. She's seen the files, and this guy has some kind of healing thing, right? Like Rose and Laura. So game on.

Which means she's very much not thinking super tactically, either. Ending up in the apartment below isn't actually a surprise with how hard she came in. But how she gets there definitely is. In her mind, she'd grab the dude and either squash him on the floor or smash him through it. Instead, the floor breaks /for/ her, and she comes through in a pile of blue plastic and concrete dust. And zilch, enemy-dude wise.

<<We've fallen into the penthouse below,>> she mutters into the comms while getting to her feet, shaking loose of garbage she's accumulated on the way down. <<Target is...>> Well, she can't see him at first. <<-Agh, get this shit off->>

She throws it free just in time to see the pistol come up. "Oh fu-" A little more mature than the typical 'Suffering Sappho,' but to be fair, it's a much more instinctive reaction, and she's been cursing like a cool kid on the internet a lot longer than she's had her Amazon friends.

Fortunate she DOES have those Amazon friends, though, as in that moment of surprised fear, she falls back on drilled defensive instinct, bringing up her arms, forearms gleaming, and goes into full 'bullets and bracelets' mode. The automatic pistol's high speed and volume of fire makes her blocking is a little panicked and frantic at first, forearms snapping between angles to catch the bullets, but putting the ricochets only /generally/ back in Slade's direction.

Laura Kinney has posed:
At the moment that Cassie is sending the bullets back Slade's way, Laura plummets, and does an exquisette tuck-and-roll, twisting 'round in the air like an acrobat so that she is falling - silently - through the air and hand-claws out. She makes no noise, and her combat suit, so well tailored to her form doesn't give her away by snapping in the wind either.

Like a death-scythe falling from the heavens, Laura and her two pairs of hand claws move to fall and take out Slade - her foot claws having been retracted the moment that Conner had picked her up in order to be a surprise for Slade.

Her stance, too, makes it easy for her to land, and spring into action should her drop-bomb miss.

Tim Drake has posed:
Tim's voice comes through comms to Conner's question, <<I've often found asking 'Where is Rose' ends with a hail of bullets coming from an unexpected location, Conner.>> His tone is dry, and for those who have known him for years, with the barest edge of sardonic humor. <<I've got eyes on the building. Trying to patch into the penthouse.>> Look, he may not be present but he's relatively sure that there are a lot of internet-connected security and safety devices there.

<<Would you look at that...?>> he murmurs to himself. As usual, some rich people leave the default usernames and passwords on their router. How lame. <<Can I make it rain? I can make it rain.>> The fire-suppression system pops in the penthouse, and a torrent of water dumps onto the ground from the sprinklers in the ceiling. The area with the nice hole directly above it might not get so wet, but there's ragged, cut-off piping that breaks off at the hole that are suddenly inclined to shoosht water all over.

Rose Wilson has posed:
Exploding windows make for a very good cover for bullets coming through, but there's a time and place to wait for the glass to explode. The fact that not just one, but two, of the team are within close range to her father means that Rose doesn't wait for the glass to be exploded.

Instead, she takes the shot, and crosses her figurative fingers that the glass won't be a great barrier between her father's back and the bullet that is flying in his direction. However, she probably should warn those on her side to maybe not step between her father and the window, but she sucks at team work most of the time. Especially when it comes to dear old dad. Something about his presence just messes her head all up.

At least it answers the question of 'Where is Rose?'.

Slade Wilson has posed:
"AAGH!" Slade growls as the bullet smacks between his shoulder blades. The armored suit holds and prevents it from piercing him, but that doesn't mean that it doesn't hurt like hell. It also sends him pitching forward again, which by sheer luck on his part takes him /just/ out of Laura's reach. He's not as quick on the recovery this time, either, because did we mention that really hurt?

Still, Slade makes it back to his feet, reflexively hurling the now-empty pistol at Laura's noggin before extracting the sword on his back in a smooth, swift motion. His head stays in motion to track the trio he's facing off with in here...and he slow-sidesteps to try to keep out of line of sight of the now-nonexistent window.

"Really? The Pee-Wee Justice League is down to bringing in shooters? And here I thought you all frowned on that sort of thing." There's a brief half-moment pause before he adds, "Field on."

And suddenly a hexagonal grid of orange lines briefly imposes itself over Slade's suit before disappearing from view (for the moment).

"Ikon suit operating within normal parameters." A voice says in Slade's ear (though Laura and Conner can pick up on it as well).

He doesn't reply verbally, but "Not for long" does flit through his head. He brings the sword up in a defensive posture and all-but-growls.

"Come on then, take your shot."

Cassie Sandsmark has posed:
Slade exhausts the clip quickly, and Rose's shot turns his attention, so Cassie's blessedly freed from the bracer game. And as soon as her hands aren't occupied with keeping her from getting shot in a half-dozen places, she grabs for her hip and pulls the lasso free. Laura's entrance makes three, plus their range support, and here at least, she gives her 'charge angrily' approach a break in exchange for some would-be teamwork, looking between Conner and their new clawed recruit. She can't exactly comm tactics in front of their opponent, so they'll have to rely on some training excerises. 'Surround the dude' is at least a fairly simple one.

And then it starts sprinklering, and Cassie gets sprayed by a broken pipe sticking out of the hole she at least helped make in the ceiling. <<Really, Red? This is you helping? Does he share a weakness with the Wicked Witch that no one told me about?>> The snippiness on the comms betrays her mood. <<How about you tell us what this orange glow-y bullshit he's wearing is and if we need to be worried about that?>>

But she can't really wait. She twirls the lasso and gives it a throw as Deathstroke brings the sword up, hedging to get the weapon if she can't get the man. At the same moment, she up-nods the other two to charge.

Conner Kent has posed:
Conner pauses when the bullet hits Deathstroke's back. He realizes where it come, and that Rose just shoot her own father on the back. That is -so- not cool in so many levels. He will have to talk to her later.

"Why don't you surrender, Wilson? You are outnumbered and outgunned and Superman could be here any second." He offers, hovering down. Wait, 'Ikon suit'. <<Is this guy wearing a power armor?>> he asks on the comms. His heat vision activates when Cassie gives the signal, eyes going red. He is going to check out of he can put a hole in Slade's armor. Right shoulder, non-lethal, but it would be nice if he is forced to drop the sword.

Laura Kinney has posed:
Her claws out, the once-assassin moves with fluidity and battle awareness that will tell Slade here, indeed, is another trained assassin - despite her youthful appearance. She gives just enough pause for Cassie and Conner to get in their own attacks before springing on Deathstroke, so that their attacks are timed, and staggered rather than interrupting one another.

She presses the attack on Deathstroke, brandishing her claws and slash-slashing at him with deft awareness of martial arts combat and how to switch between attack and defense with the adamantium weapons, unrelenting until his sword, and armor break - or at least, that's what she is expecting them to do. Because it's happened every time before this.

Tim Drake has posed:
There's a crackling from the LexCorp aLEXa speakers scattered throughout the increasingly wrecked room as they rumble to life. Red Robin's voice (in the slightly deeper cadence he uses in costume, as per Bat-protocol) pipes through the speakers. "Pee Wee Justice League? Really, Deathstroke? You're down to weak insults?" Tim continues to poke around what's functioning in the penthouse, and ahahs quietly, before flipping on the very bright spotlight attached to the security camera he is looking through directly at Slade, bright light directly in Slade's... eye. Mask. Thingie. Blinding could be helpful.

Though Cassie's directive... he's got another screen up, hunting down 'orange glow', 'energy field' and et cetera. <<Working on it, Wondergirl. And I'm limited here! Cut me some slack and use the chaos.>> If he didn't have access to Oracle's deep-dive tools and the Fantastic Four's database of Seriously Weird Shit(TM), he wouldn't be able to pull up anything at all, but it's only a matter of a few moments... <<There's not much, but I'm assuming the 'orange glowy bullshit' might be a protective gravity field? Don't quote me.>>

Tim's also aware of where the bullet came from, and so Rose's private comms crackle quietly in her ear. <<You'll be all right.>> It's not a lecture or even angry. And he's not telling her to stand down, either.

Rose Wilson has posed:
<< I'm working here. >> comes Rose's private response to Tim. Which might give him a very big clue as to where her head is at. 'Work'. Her father is now WORK, and Tim knows that there are at the very least three things in common she shares with her dad. Work being only one of them.

But x-ray eyes she doesn't have, but what she does have is common, good old fashion tech, which gives her a lot of options as far as what kind of sights she might have on her own sniper rifle. Deathstroke moves away from the window, and she starts counting steps in her head as she presses a switch on the scope, and then she tucks her chin in, switching back to the team comms, << Raise your left arms on the count of three. One. Two.... >> There's a pause, then she follows it with a, << Three. >>

Assuming they listen, she uses that to pick which target to try and shoot through a wall. Assuming she can even see the heat signatures.

Slade Wilson has posed:
When you only have one good eye, it pays to protect it as well as possible. Tim's attempt to dazzle Slade is a smart play, but the lens in the mask polarizes and darkens nigh-instantly as the light focuses on it, preserving Slade's vision.

Heat vision is NOT among the things the Ikon Suit would protect from, not that Slade vocalizes this so much as demonstrates by...darting from the very literal line-of-sight, leaving a scorch-mark on the wall behind him and just barely an empty lasso.

The move brings him right into the fray with Laura though, and while one slash of those claws draws a line of glowing orange "sparks" that don't quite touch the surface of the suit, another dual slash of those adamantium claws come down on the flat of Slade's sword and...stop, the promethium blade holding fast. It all happens in the literal blink of an eye...superhuman muscles flex and jerk the blade upward, sending Laura's hands briefly above her head, and with a twist and a wicked horizontal slash, they're suddenly both severed just below the elbow. It's followed up with a hard forward kick to Laura's midsection, sending her flying right back out through that nonexistent window and plummeting towards the ground below....

No time to rest on laurels, Slade keeps moving, though heat vision seems to have ceased, with Conner looking a bit stunned at the sudden, horrific violence inflicted on his teammate. Slade takes full advantage, surging forward...nowhere near Kryptonian speed, but still several times faster than any human, and lashing out, not with the sword, but seemingly with an empty hand...except right before it connects a short, glowing green blade ejects from a lead-lined wrist compartment and into that hand, allowing him to jab the small Kryptonite blade right into Conner's lower abdomen...and just for good measure Slade gives a jerk and breaks it off inside the Teen of Steel's body.

Rose's bullet does find the right target though...except this time it deflects away against another spark of that orange energy field, and he doesn't even flinch.

"Ikon suit at 3.7% capacity." Wintergreen's voice speaks in his ear, albeit an electronic facsimile of the man. Where once was three, now is one...with two teammates to worry about...and across the way his daughter, whose handiwork he's more or less recognized.

Conner Kent has posed:
Conner is rarely uses his head vision in more than short burst. It simply consumes too much energy from his solar batteries and if he goes all out for a minute or so his strength and invulnerability pretty much vanish, leaving him to rely on telekinesis only.

So, when Deathstroke avoids the heat burst, he grunts and hovers closer, to support Laura's attack. Moving to grab the mercenary from behind. "He has a forcefield," he states, informing Red Robin.

And then he cuts Laura's arms. "Laura!" he cries, shifting targets to go grab the young woman. Fatal mistake that leads to a Kryptonite blade into his chest. He screams in pain, and falls down like a rock, trying to pull the blade out, and finding his hand going numb almost instantly.

That took him out of the fight pretty quickly.

Laura Kinney has posed:
Unprepared for Slade's blade to /deflect/ her Adamantium Claws, Laura is caught off-guard only for the briefest of seconds. Against most opponents, this wouldn't be a problem. But most opponents are not Slade Wilson. Most opponents don't have forcefields, or swords that can rebuff her Adamantium Claws. She watches as her forearms are severed from her body cleanly, putting her off balance, and doesn't have time to try to recover before she finds herself plummetting out the window, a snarling growl of pain and anguish coming through the comms as she tumbles, only having a moment to call out into the comms << My hands ... >> before the comm goes both silent as her body lands with a crack and thud into the cold pavement below, snapping bones and legs into splinters that come through on the comm channel. It's not a pretty sound.

For the next few moments, she lays still, dead to the world. But only for a few moments. Then, there is a wet, sickly coughing that bubbles up from her chest as blood burbles from her mouth and a gasp for air as her body begins to rapidly regenerate and heal itself.

Her head twists up to look at the tall building jutting up to the heavens from her prone position, and she rasps, << ....my hands, >> weakly, and pathetically as an arm-stump uselessly points upwards as if it still had a hand to clutch up and retrieve them for her.

Tim Drake has posed:
Tim grimaces at Rose's response, but drops off the private channel, giving her that space for her head. Besides, an obsession with 'work' is something they both have in common, even if in very different ways. But then the horror of the scene in front of him plays out as Deathstroke moves through the team, sheering X-23's arms off then punting her and stabbing Conner with... something?

And with Conner's reaction over the video, Tim is suddenly very aware of what that something is. <<Shit, that's Kryptonite.>> It may not take a genius to figure that out, but Red Robin is suddenly very frustrated he isn't present in body as he watches helplessly as his teammates are savaged by the Terminator. <<Cassie, get Conner out of there.>> All it would take... Tim doesn't let himself think about that possibility. <<Abort mission. Get out.>> There's never really truly been a 'rank' among them until recently, when Tim relectantly took the role. But for this, he'll pull it.

He switches to the cameras still at street level and gets bead on Laura. He sighs with relief when he sees her moving, albeit barely... he knew she had a pretty extreme healing factor but he hadn't exactly tested it. He zooms as much as he can... the sight is gruesome, but in a strange way give him hope. <<This is gonna sound gross, Wondergirl, but kick X23's hands out the window on your way out.>> He's working under a reaosnable assumption having the parts to stick back on might make the healing go faster. He hopes. He flips off the comms and curses a streak that would have Alfred washing his mouth out before sinking his head onto the lab table, popping a couple of stitches in the process. He'll deal with it. He takes a few deep breaths. <<Rose... just keep him from following if you can. Please.>>

Cassie Sandsmark has posed:
The loop is slow; catching opponents that are intent on avoiding it is pretty hard in a world of super-reflexes, where her own speed doesn't really do much for the limited aerodynamics of throwing some rope at a person. But Cassie has been practicing her lasso work a fair bit, as it's one of the things that sets her apart from her sisters. They each have one, but they work very differently, and hers is undoubtedly the most... aggressive in application. The sequence is one she's rehearsed and so she's already into the next motion before she finishes the last: as she tugs back to try and tighten the lasso (around air, in this case), her body twists and the other hand whips the tail end of the rope around, ready to snap it outward like a whip. It's all pretty cool looking!

Except she's not really ready for what happens next, her eyes going wide as Laura's -arms come off- and she gets booted out the window. And Conner, almost simultaneously, impaled and drops like a big hunky clone of a rock. She was already to the window's edge after Laura, ready to try and lasso her as she fell (she doesn't realize just how good that healing factor is!), but stops as Conner drops, and in the moment of hesitation, fails to save either of them.

<<Oh, Goddesses,>> yes, she murmurs, voice breaking. <<She's- and he's->> Tim actually confirms what happened to Conner for her, but it's not much help beyond that.

Whatever's happened below, she moves toward the fallen Kryptonian, intervening herself between him and the armored assassin. The lasso, looped around both arms, suddenly crackles with divine lightning. "GET AWAY FROM HIM! Or Ares help me-" Not that Slade would know her care, but her asking THAT particular patron for aid is not a good sign at all.

Whether her bluster is anything for him to care about or not, she locks her gaze with that featureless mask and carefully moves to hoist Conner onto her shoulder, cautious that the moment of distraction might give him a chance to strike. And while she LOOKS like she would love to do nothing more than to simultaneously electrocute and throttle the man to death, Cassie doesn't linger- once she has Conner, she turns and soars from the window, the immediate speed of her departure shattering every window on that side of the building as she does precisely what she avoided on the way aover. <<Tim, can you treat him at the base? I'll be there in->> however long it takes to go from that spot to their base at her maximum flight speed.

Rose Wilson has posed:
<< Fuck. >> Unlike Cassie, Rose has zero filter. Not a single one. Even when she tries, she often fails to actually filter it out. Not that she usuall tries.

Normal rounds are one thing, but in light of the recent events, she changes tactics to something more destructive. Because, yes kids, Rose was actually holding back. She adjusts the butt of the rifle against her shoulder, bracing it as she reaches behind her, tugging open a pouch at her back to pull out a very extra special round. Anyone still listening don't hear a sound at all from her over the comms now as she turns them off.

As the Raufoss round is slid into the chamber, and she takes aim at the shattered window, there's a very quiet, "Sorry, Dad." Then she squeezes the trigger, trying to keep him from following, knock him out, kill him. Though, if she's trying to do anything but keep him back from the window and from following, she's doing a shit job at aiming in his direction.

Slade Wilson has posed:
Slade Wilson is a ruthless killer, there's little doubt about that. He has no idea of Laura's healing capabilities and he just shanked a Kryptonian with their fatal allergy. But he's also not a /wanton/ killer. That featureless mask meets Cassie's gaze unflinching, though he does buckle a bit as the Amazon blasts out the window going from zero to near-supersonic in less than the blink of an eye.

That's about the time the Raufoss round strikes. But again, the flare of orange hexes flashes, and Slade is unmoved..or at least he was by the initial impact of the round. The incendiary effect kicks in a fraction of a fraction of a second later, and suddenly Slade is feverishly (no pun intended) working to pat out the small fire on his chest. Though it takes a few moments he does manage to smother it, though certainly plenty of time for Cassie and Conner to be well clear of here. It would almost be comical but for the circumstances, with Slade "dancing" around a bit trying to find something to smother the flames with. In the end, the suit has some minor damage, but "Wintergreen's" voice informs him that it is now at 15% capacity. But he doesn't need that to realize what Rose just shot at him with. He's not sure if he's proud or angry. Perhaps both.

Either way, he now bolts for that empty space where the window was, launching across the intervening distance and burying his sword in the side of the building right adjacent to Rose's own firing position. He lingers there -just- long enough to make eye contact with her. There's no nod, no words, no acknowledgement, but does there really need to be?

And then the moment has passed, as he backflips away, pulling the sword along with him, and jabbing it into the facing of the opposite building, sliding down it's length with the blade as a brake, until he reaches the ground, leaving a clean cut down its' length. He briefly pauses to regard the still-slightly moving and breathing Laura on the ground.../now/ perhaps gaining some insight as to her recuperative capabilities, or perhaps just a degree of inhuman durability...and then he bolts, quickly out of Rose's line of sight and already on his way to escaping Metropolis. The police alerts have barely begun to sound on the radio. It's really only been a couple of minutes for the whole affair.

For all the spectacular violence that's occurred, it should be noted that Slade did fail to fulfill his contract. At least a partial victory for the young team called the Outsiders, but in this case also a costly learning experience.