3980/Demon Heart Part 2

Demon Heart Part 2
Date of Scene:	30 October 2020
Location:	The Western shore of Pago Pago Island in the North Atlantic
Synopsis:	The robot revolution is coming! Also the zombified super hero revolution
Cast of Characters:	Ted Kord, T'Challa, Douglas Ramsey, Joan Wright, Helena Bertinelli

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Ted Kord has posed:
As the heroes begin to emerge from the Bug, the surf behind them erupts with submerged wrecker drone. the automata move in to attack, saws and pincers clattering. Simultaneously a kaiju sized mechanical octopus emerges and singles out Diana for its attacks wrapping tentacles around her and getting them sheared with alarming speed.

Ted works a control in his glove and yells, "Kill!" to the Bug. The airship opens several concealed panels and begins laying down a withering fire at the horde of robots, that continue advancing despite their losses.

"What now? She can't hold them off forever! Doug, get the **** out. The Bug can fight by herself!"

T'Challa has posed:
T'Challa lands on the ground, dropped almost to one knee, and a hand on the sandy beach. Superhero landing! He straightens up, looking around the island beach when the sound of the robots breaking the water's surface turns him towards the water.

"And we have confirmation the robots are active," he says with his penchant for understatement. Rather than engage them in the water or on the sand, he backs slowly away up the beach, onto firmer footing where it turns to normal dirt.

When the first automatons reach him, Black Panther ducks under a pincher and shears off the metallic arm with an ease that one does not normally expect for cutting metal. He swings it like a bat, bashing the attacking robot sideway and then whirling to throw it into another to create more space as they come at him.

Douglas Ramsey has posed:
"I'll be more useful in here right now than I am out there." Doug says, before he sits at a console, and says, "I'm correcting your ship's targeting data, and telling it where it should be aiming on these robots." His fingers race across the keys, as he lets it all unfold before him.

"It's the difference between surviving and winning, Mr. Kord. The ship will cover you."

Joan Wright has posed:
PREVIOUSLY ON DEMON HEART: Okay, so we've established that Joan is not really wearing a costume. Right now she looks like she got taken off a construction site. And, it's entirely possible that actually was the case. She's wearing steel toed boots, a hard hat, safety glsses, work gloves, a sensible light weight but long-sleeved shirt, and cargo pants with LOTS of pockets (ALL the pockets). And it appears she's got stuff in each one of them, buttoned and zipped away for security. Perhaps you might think the helmet and safety glasses is overkill. But with the backstory of them most likely going into an UNSTABLE STRUCTURE... No. Not at all. If anything she's underdressed for this. As the robots come out it's definite. She is very much underdressed for this. Geez Ted, at least give her enough notice to bring a hammer with her.

"Oh my g-" Joan responds, scooting away from the rope to clear the way for anyone else who may need to use it. Also scooting in the direction opposite from where the robots are coming from. Yeah. NO. Eee!

Helena Bertinelli has posed:
Huntress swings out of the The Bug and lands on the cute sand, then as soon as she looks up, some automaton flies through the air like out of some horror movie that will go unnamed. She grits her teeth as she flips a little switch on a tiny little stick in her hand, and the stick exteeeeeeends to full length, just in time for her to swat the stupid little fluttering enemy in the big ole face. She smirks.

Huntress backs up in whining distance of Black Panther and the others, "&&*$&*$$ dammit, this is not covert," she notes helpfully. She frowns, taking a moment to assess the situation, "Here they come!" she says to nobody in particular, seeing three or ball horror movie automatons dive bomb right for her.

Ted Kord has posed:
Ted Kord dives out of the Bug. "If you make me come back for you, you're fired, you OCD, Swoofy-haired, perfectionist nerd! Bug shoots fine! At least she did in the sims... make for the overhang! It hid the tunnel I used. It's part of the entrance. We can keep them from getting around us. Ha! Take that!" He fires at a robot trying to cut him off. The pistol flashes light rapidly and the robot falls over. "Sonuvagun... you *can* give a robot a seizure! It works! Yay me!" He kicks or is tripped by the robot's head and half falls, limping towards the entrance.

The Bug fights on. The gatling guns glow cherry red and fall silent. The laser fires slows as heat builds up.

T'Challa has posed:
Black Panther weaves through the machines, agile as his namesake as he evades clanking pinchers and spinning sawblades. His claws are cutting through the metal quite easily, if something short of a hot knife through butter. But they land their hits as well. One bludgeons him from behind, staggering him forward a few steps before he pushes back towards it to send the drone flying with a hard kick.

He makes his way towards the overhang that Ted mentioned, fighting as he goes, though making sure he keeps himself between the attacking robots and Joan Wright. "Get inside," he calls to her as a saw blade just misses his head. T'Challa cuts the limb free and then slams the saw back into the robot.

Douglas Ramsey has posed:
    "I do not have OCD." Doug says, "I just learned to whistle 'Raspberry Beret' while I wash my hands in Boy Scouts. I-" He studies a command line of code that the ship puts through itself, and then says, "Oh, all right- be that way," Before he gets up from his seat and drops out of the hatch. "It's either that or the ejector seat, but I still feel more useful in the ship than I am out here *being shot at* Ted-"

Joan Wright has posed:
At the instruction to head towards the tunnel given by both Ted and T'Challa, Joan is not about to disagree. She skids slightly as she diverts her direction towards the indicated place. In her defense, she's not SLOW. She does seem reasonably fit, which might be due to a lot of her time spent at construction sites working. But those robots? Yea- no.

As she approaches she assesses the damage of the overhang pieces blocking the actual entrance. Fingers already curling she focuses on the debris ahead. "GIVE ME SPACE!" She warns the others, "Stuff is going to fly!" Fingers swaying in a circle, the broken pieces of overhang start to lift slightly. She skids to a stop at the site, pointing to the broken pieces. "BACK YOU GO!" She flits her hand up, slinging them upwards. Commanding them back to where they once were.

Helena Bertinelli has posed:
Huntress ducks under the buzzing metal ball as the automaton swoops past her and she looks astonished as it is joined by another, then comes in for another pass. She narrows her eyes at these evil horror movie automations, wondering where they've come from, "Dammit, where are these things coming from?" she wonders curiously.

Raising her wrist, Huntress FLING FLANGS a bolt through the air at the two silver balls steaking back down at her menacingly. BOOM! The explosion blows the two of them into a million little tiny metallic bits. The explosion staggers her and she smirks something wicked, "DAMMIT! My ammunition must be from an arsonist," she comments sarcastically. She's able to make it over to the heroic Black Panther thanks to the work the others are doing.

Ted Kord has posed:
Ted Kord is last giving robots coniptipons. He has a great view of the Bug getting swamped by the remaining robots, her laser cannons and gatling s disabled. Then her engines shutting down. He stops transfixed by the sight.

"Oh my God... baby, fly away!" He works the control in his glove to no avail. "Nononononono!" Then he turns back to the others. His lips are white. He activates the flashlight mode of his goggles and sighs. "Diana is still fighting the robot octo... Bug is done for. Come on..."

The tunnel is a gloomy affair sloping down into a pool of clear water some distance beyond. There is no lighting.

T'Challa has posed:
Black Panther slices through a robot, ripping it in half and then using the remains to club another as he backs up, making sure everyone get inside the tunnel before he backs into it as well as Joan has cleared them a path.

Once they have travelled far enough down and the robots no longer seem to be following, T'Challa turns his attention to the path ahead. As they emerge near the water he crouches a little distance from it. "Fresh water, not seawater," he comments after sniffing the air. "Very fresh. It would be more stagnant if it had just drained down here from rainfalls long ago," he comments.

He glances up at the ceiling overhead, something about it feeling off, as he looks to see what it might be.

Douglas Ramsey has posed:
    Doug makes his way up the beach, with a seemingly instinctive knowledge of where not to be - and then he isn't in those places. His hair isn't even ruffled by the time he reaches the tunnel. He reaches into a pouch on his belt and takes out a powerful handheld flashlight before he clicks it on, and shines it down the tunnel, seeing what's ahead of them.
    "Whoever's here has managed to avoid detection even given all this wreckage."

Ted Kord has posed:
The flashlight reveals a number of electrical cables hung over the water filled section. Te insulation has been removed from their ends. They look held up by more wires, that are run tautly through hooks and hoops into the water.

Joan Wright has posed:
Once in the ... somewhat safety of the tunnel, Joan looks back with a frown, momentarly tempted to undo the repair to seal off the tunnel but... well, that'd be bad for the others if she got killed. Supposing there was no other way out.

There is the sound of a pocket unzipping before a song of velcro, and clunking. A bright light shines from the hard hat. "Anyone else need a flashlight?"

The beam turns, shining upon the water. She parts her mouth to make a comment but T'Challa's words are sufficient to convey the oddness of it. She frowns at the exposed wires. "Oh that's not good. We got an electrocution hazard here."

Douglas Ramsey has posed:
    "Hmmmn. Let me see if I can..." Doug's glove sort of... absorbs into his body, revealing the shiny black stuff and golden thread circuitry of his right arm. He flexes his fingers, and holds his palm out above the water. There's a tickle of electricity against it, and it sparks along his fingers. "Oh that's a w-e-i-r-d feeling," He says, as his eyes glow. "All right, I think I can absorb the charge long enough for someone to disable this without electrocuting themselves, but hurry, because I don't know what this is going to do to me, I'm sort of unsure of how precisely energy intake via alien techno-matter *works*--" His hair is certainly suddenly fluffier.

Ted Kord has posed:
Ted Kord jumps into the water, splashing across the section. He grabs the wires and pulls their dangerous ends away from the water, pulling them down and finally yanking them free, He takes a few shorts and sparks but the insulation in his gloves seem to handle it with only a few twitches. "Ngggh. Okay Doug, they're clear. Phew. Come on down everyone. The main control room was through here."

The chamber the tunnel opens into is dark and immense. The walls are lost in the gloom. Despite this, you hear the whine of heavy machinery all around and clinks and clanks or movement."

T'Challa has posed:
T'Challa crouches by the water's edge as Doug and Ted take care of the electrified water. Once it is disabled, he moves into the water, swimming or wading as needed, quietly over to the other side. He checks on the progress of the others before continuing down the tunnel.

As it opens into the larger chamber, he pauses to listen and to scent the air. As he does, T'Challa switches his suit's vision over to thermographic and surveys the chamber for heat signatures.

Joan Wright has posed:
Joan's head tilts as Doug gives his instruction, glancing around for some sign of a breaker box, but not holding out much hope. Evil lairs are not very good at following building codes. Honestly a lot of minion related deaths could be avoided by proper wiring practices.

She waits patiently for Doug and Ted to do their thing before she moves in, crossing along the way.

The architect shakes her head as she wades through, headlamp lighting her way.

Douglas Ramsey has posed:
Doug withdraws his hand, and says, "Well I can't belief that worked, is everyone all right? Let's go get this done, I feel like I could take on the world right now, I tell you, I am *pumped* I think the last time I had this much energy was when I was taking my advanced college placement courses when I was fifteen and I mixed Jolt Cola, Red Bull and Five Hour Energy so I could stay up all night studying but this time I don't have the shakes--"

Ted Kord has posed:
Ted Kord steps into the room. Feeling the wrongness of it. As he steps in a wheezing and oddly mechanical voice booms, "Welcome Theodore. This is a charming family reunion. Surrender now, give me your continued assistance and you can all live. You would be priceless to my plans."

Lights snap on revealing an elderly, twisted man in a huge suit of exo-armor. Beside him stands a towering figure in a blue costume similar to Ted's. His head and torso seem partially cyborged but theyse devices as overshadowed by the ancient and ornate blue scarab embedded in his chest, pulsating weirdly with a blue light. Dan Garret the first Blue Beetle, his face pale as death. The Dead Beetle glares at Ted and ten spouts, "You... imposter!"

"As the robots ready to attack and Dan Garret moves towards Ted, Kord lifts his pistol. Unheard over the clamor he says softly, "Yes Dan, I often feel the same way."

To be continued...