6835/You can't have suicide without U and I

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You can't have suicide without U and I
Date of Scene: 07 July 2021
Location: Suicide Slum - New Troy
Synopsis: No description
Cast of Characters: Blackagar Boltagon, Jane Foster




Blackagar Boltagon has posed:
A good glance through the under boroughs of these cities presents a window into the true soul of them. It isn't always the glitter and glamour of the main thoroughfares but these places where a heart beat can be felt. Blackagar has learned that lesson in his travels. Gotham's underside had been a true event. He had been mugged three times. Each time he just politely handed over some money rather than confront the mugger. Their desperation was worn like a thick blanket.

It is not as severe in Suicide Slum but the same feel is present. Cheap apartments, desperate people, and those who prey on them. Nothing like this exists in Attilan. The city isn't perfect, he would be the first to admit it. But no one is driven to these depths. The dark haired man walks slowly and looks at the depravity being put on display, put out for sale and he shakes his head a bit sadly. This is a city in decay.

Jane Foster has posed:
Metropolis shines like the fabled city on the hill, partly because so much money ends up sacked into keeping the city of Superpeople looking beautiful. Not that everything about the place echoes the American Dream, though it sure looks nice. Shining towers, neatly combed lawns, tidy sidewalks abound.

Unless you're in Suicide Slum, where the gentrifying forces that build Centennial Park somehow fall apart. No fault of the residents, who amount to among the least wealthy or educated. Probably a gaping hole where a city councilor hasn't got the backing of big business or the oomph of a family name to really elbow his or her way into a pot of funds that aim to keep Metropolis from looking like New York, or god forbid, Chicago. Ugh, never. The sickness leaches into the bedrock and lies in every looted window, every broken alley winding past trash that never gets picked up, the detritus of castoff lives.

She'd rather not be here, on any given day, except *being* here means being at all. Jane steps out of an apartment block with a grim task ahead of her, something that cannot be denied. Gone away is the gentleman she escorted, invisible to anyone but a very rare few gifted with a second sight for the damned or the dead. Up to a certain point she played escort, and turned back. Back to herself, not absorbed, but here. Again here, not thrown into another body. It's practically a thrill to step over the unnamed trash in the gutter, stretching out, feeling the ground beneath her feet again.

Same jeans, same sweater sliding off her shoulder. Same boots she walked away in. It's too hot for that, but never mind, when she slides past the staring faces and empty facades, her duty done for another moment. Death is a damn imaginative employer; that said, she turns over a slender ribbon in her hands like it holds the mysteries of a rosetta stone, quietly engaged with something troubling. When someone glides too close, she just moves into the street to veer around them, dodging a parked car, a cyclist, a pothole deep enough to turn an ankle. Shift around again and it's back into Blackagar's path.

Blackagar Boltagon has posed:
Absorbed into his own thoughts, letting them roll around in his head like a series of waves crashing on the shoreline. Slowly they'll break down rock, grind it into a fine sand that then will filter around and swirl. This is much like the ponderings of the Midnight King's mind while walking the streets. How does a society turn a blind eye on these when two streets away wealth pours out in an abundance that is unreasonable. The faults of his own system lie on him alone. A rsponsibility he carries. Here, it is as if they abdicate their duties to someone else, no one taking ownership of what they should.

The wrapped up mindset has him step past the figure of Jane without an immediate recognition until a vibration of something strikes Blackagar. Rather than a visual acknowledgement, her presence triggers within him. A mental beacon of familiarity and he pauses, turning to see her walking in the opposite direction. Certainly it is not...

About to disregard it as mere coincidence and someone who looks similar, he is unable to shake the familiarity of thought he feels from her. The frown etches his face and he starts to walk towards her as if to confirm the woman's identity.

The distraction serves a purpose he did not know, nor anticipate, as an energy blast from a building across the way streaks across the street and strikes Blackagar squarely in the shoulder. Unprepared, unanticpating, the blast is powerful enough to heat the air and make it crackle with electrons. It sends the King flying backwards into the building he was standing near, cracking through the brick wall into an eruption of dust and debris. The street falls quiet shortly after. Those moments of surprised silence before chaos erupts.

Jane Foster has posed:
The patchwork of wealth and despair links up neigbourhoods, stretching them within an unseen boundary carved by an interstate. Within the heart of Metropolis, its richest families rub shoulders in those glittering towers wrapped in glass and steel, peering down on worker drones wandering back and forth. They might not possibly be aware at all of the small shadows creeping here or there, huddled at the rotten roots of those castoff buildings beyond reach. It's easy to forget the poor. It's easy to ignore the voiceless, when deaf ears are bent only to the murmurations of one's own kind. A pattern repeats again and again, bastions of the mighty curbed from any unwanted influences.

Jane turns that ribbon in infinity loops, the figure eight wound around her fingers. Where one end curls, the next stretch flows, the worn thing clearly carried by some book or another person for a very long time. It has a scent to it, the vellichor of old pages and the faint whisper left behind by tobacco, possibly a light musk..

The connection to nostalgia dances over her fingers and she abruptly lifts her head. Blackagar turns in direction when she stuffs that ribbon in her jean pocket, sweeping the street with a sharp look, her eyes gleaming violet with death's heads dancing over her pupils. Where-- where--

"No," a word that has been uttered countless times in a similar situation, has all the effect it has for every other mortal. It doesn't do a damn thing when the energy blast shatters the calm. She dives for cover like many would, staggering through an open hole to find anyone. Walls crumble and her role bears down, forcing her to scramble to avoid the bricks that shower down. Her body doesn't bruise, exactly, but she's not figured out what the injuries now might entail. Another shot is surely following the first, no one stupid enough to fail to follow up.

Choices crumble along simple lines: be the SHIELD agent with all the associated weaknesses, a scientist and not a sharpshooter like so many of them. Spies do spy things. Debris rains down, making another victim hiding in the dark.

Blown pipes hiss and wail. The collective inhalation begins. A young woman twists the golden bangle around her wrist, shining dully in the light. <<Have it your way.>> Lips compress and she runs her thumb over the runes. The shockwave of light is just another battered street sign blowing. Just a streetlamp flickering, fading.

Blackagar Boltagon has posed:
It isn't that it hurt. It was a shock. The HYDRA personnel put on to Blackagar's existence and location were not given a lot of detail. Only that he should be considered a threat. The why was left out. Sitting in the rubble of the first floor room he was knocked into, he slowly pushes some rocks off his body and starts to pick himself up. Looking around, he sees those that were in the room when he was knocked into it. An older woman, her grandchild. Frowning, the King moves over and makes sure they're alright, motioning them out of the room towards safety.

Brushing the drywall dust off his shirt, blue eyes lift and he starts to walk out of the hole he created to the street. Brow furrows as he enters the open space and looks around. The first one, that was free. The second one...

It comes from a window, striking him directly in the chest. This time he is ready, he slides back a few inches against the blast of the energy before it dissipates around him. The whole building could be collapsed with less than a whisper. But there may be innocents in there. People he will not have hurt on his behalf. The third shot comes and has the same effect as the second. It knocks him back a half step until he can realign electrons into a shield around him.

It is times like this when the inability tos peak is most challenging. There is no yelling for people to flee. There is no calling out the opponent. So the only thing he can do is to make sure all focus remains on him. He walks to the center of the street like a clear sitting duck. Hopefully /someone/ is capable of dealing either with the threat or with getting people away.

Jane Foster has posed:
The cosmos works in funny ways. Ask anyone treated like its plaything, they can tell long, wild stories about how sometimes the universe gives a swerve of luck, and how often they get tripped up by a huge pothole no one saw.

Blackagar will have to decide later what applies to him, if Inhuman philosophical codes even allow for such deviations of thought. Does the universe serve a backdrop for all the grand plays and tragedies of his people? Can it play an active role? Have they ever had the freedom to tease the cosmos into working on their behalf or struggled against its open, active intent to defy them?

She'll ask, one day. Not in this form, though. Silver droplets tumble in a protective sheet, and the crumbling ceiling overhead collapses atop her with an ugly couch, three ruined end tables and a sheen of glass. Damage to the building housing the Midnight King isn't minor at this point; the Damage Control agents salivating in New York might hear the cha-ching! of a claim already piling up. The coroner's office is another matter, too slow to tally up the injuries and fatalities.

While he steps out into plain sight, calling down fire or doubts from his would-be assassins, Blackagar is open. The figure slipsliding through pre-existing rubble or opening holes carefully would rather not. A structural fissure remains open as an alarmed little dog comes bolting out, yelping and frantically charging away through the slum. Purple death's heads loom large overhead, forcing a diversion to the curb in order to get leverage. Third mobile target for the shooters: a figure, helmed, shaking herself off. Grabbing one of the bricks isn't really much for leverage, but she starts climbing a few meters up without any particular difficulty. There's not a great deal to distinguish the woman except that particularly dark set of garments: midnight blue, black, silver.

Right, easy to mistake her for an ally of the guy they're trying to pin down, probably. Especially when she kicks open a window and darts inside, scooping up a dusty and terrified resident.

Blackagar Boltagon has posed:
It takes a dedicated effort from Blackagar to not consider what happened to the woman he thought could have been Jane Foster. There is a preferential view of that human. She has been an intriguing element in his life and one that he would be extremely upset would something happen to. But beyond the sensation that was momentary of having seen her, there was nothing to confirm that. In fact, it is far more likely that he was simply letting his mind wander and she was on it when the attack happened.

Because of this he has diverted his attention to the continued attack. Into the street spill a few of the black tactical garbed individuals. The intent to capture him becoming clear. It is not the first attempt in his life, it will certainly not be the last. The question is more of how they knew of him. Suspicions begin to grow in his mind but they are quickly squelched as a series of weapons fire is launched at him. Quickly he directs energy to himself, strengthening his shield around his body so the bullets simply flicker away and off. In the city of Metropolis, it could be considered a normal affair. A black-haired man standing in the streets being shot without effect. For the Midnight King, it is something he is not accustomed to.

As the approaching me to get into range, one takes a swing. It is side stepped, he is grabbed by Blackbolt and thrown down the street for him to bounce and slide many yards down the way. The others immediately reevaluate their life choices.

Blue eyes turn, preparing to deal with them when a scream erupts from the building. Eyes turn, he spots the Blue, Silver, and Black-figure moving throughout. A friend? A foe? Uncertainty etches his features as one of the assailants swings their weapon butt against him. He was unprepared. It stuns him and he quickly backhands the man, attention going back to the building.

Jane Foster has posed:
Right; blame afterward as the body under the teetering building. One of the many unfortunates that dwell in an overpopulated tenement, Jane Foster is just another injured victim. A tally that might be increasing by the moment. Certainly someone aims to lessen the dead toll, and leave the injured numbers a little higher if she were to have any say in it. Scooping out destroyed cabinets to pull someone with a head injury should take time and it certainly undermines the architectural integrity of the building. She can't save everyone and everything at once. Valkyrie nonetheless doesn't waste her time implementing protections for the building, hauling out the bloody, dust-soaked figure. Two stories up should be a hell of a plummet, but she drops effortlessly over that and lands in a deep stance, taking three quick, bounding strides into the alley to lay the victim on a back balcony away from the shots. One down, so many to go.

So damn many.

Her attention isn't on the weaponsfire much at all, though the energy blasts are probably enough to worry anyone with two braincells to rub together. Neither can she afford to ignore a pair of scared faces in a broken window, higher up, the fifth. Just jumping or climbing is too damn slow, so the simple exhalation unravels a chain of coppery, brazen feathers from her back. Wings stretch to catch the sunlight even in the dimness, and make a very prominent target indeed for anyone taking shots. Their orders are clear, but another would-be superhero, possibly mistaken as one of those Hawkpeople, calls for a potshot at her. Probably.

The Hawkpeople would be the nicer choice, with their nth metal and their ancient view on things. A psychopomp of Death with a capital D, on the other hand, has opinions about people forced off the mortal coil prematurely. Those wings flash when she gets airborne and the time to yank a teenager with two kids clinging to him isn't much at all. She swivels sharply midair when scruffing the boy and scooping up the wiggly, round-tummied toddler, presenting said wing broadside and carrying the three like they're nothing. Hollering and sniveling from the kids isn't quiet; scary people with their face covered by a metal helm to the nose are scary. Blackagar, by contrast, is just a nice guy somehow getting his clothes shredded in silence and contemptuously bashing aside agents.

The Metropolis Airlift adds another three people to a back balcony, away from the teetering building. Next target acquired. Next shot: her.

But a small shape is rapidly becoming a large one. "Dear me. This is what I get for appreciating Thelonious on a balmy afternoon?" The twinkling of starlight that is not, though a particularly basso voice emanating from a very deep, wide chest carries cadences of being English. Probably northern English, not RP fanciness from somewhere like London. Said shadow just ... sort of ... appears. From somewhere over that way, a moon-pale horse with wide, arcing wings would make a 787 blush in jealousy. Or green with envy, nosediving out of rage. Said comments about a jazz impresario originate from a horse, if one could compare a 'mere' horse to that in the same way a boat includes, say, a nuclear-powered aircraft carrier or a Kree death ship in the same definition. Asgardian pegasi are sort of a thing. Mr Horse, enter stage right.

Blackagar Boltagon has posed:
Whoever it is that is swooping with wings is clearly helping to rescue people from the building. What they need is time. Time he can provide. If someone is taking care of the people in the building, then he needs to make sure they do it without obstruction or threat. Blue eyes turn on the attackers now. The slow stride of intent begins as he walks towards the building where the energy blasts are coming from. Another strikes him in the shoulder. Blackbolt's brow furrows. Another hits him in the other shoulder. A deeper frown.

Feet plant upon the ground and he jumps through the wall at the fifth story window where the blasts come from. Whoever provided the intelligence to this assault group did not do a good job. Of course, all observations of him would depict just a plain man that walks around. A wanderer. Grabbing the weapon from the stunned agent, he snaps it in two with his hands then throws them both, knocking the other down. A few others in the room take their turns. They are sadly overmatched.

A severe talking to is on the way until Blackbolt hears a rumbling from the building across the way. The foundation looks to be having issues, one of the support corners starting to crumble. The difficult decision. Does he deal with these assailants or aid? The decision is not truly that difficult. He runs and jumps back out of the hole he just made and moves to the corner of the building, putting himself there to act as the support. A surprised expression hits his eyes as it is much heavier than he was anticipating. Silently, he leans back against it.

How does he call for help? How does he communicate that he has this? How... is that horse talking? That causes his blue eyes to look in surprise at the creature. A talking horse. Perhaps... Lockjaw understands him through thought. Focusing, projecting Blackagar sends out with his mind, ~I will hold this as long as I can. Someone get the people out!~

Jane Foster has posed:
A plain man doesn't jump five floors up because he can. On the contrary, anyone who leaps like that might cause a serious reassessment and tactical reconsideration. Goons won't typically stay to face that. Mercenaries might be wiser, using burner phones to demand another two zeroes added to their payments or some kind of orbital strike to get rid of the problem that so effortlessly approaches. In Metropolis, regular-looking people often have blue shirts beneath their clothes and immunity to anything but glowing green stones.

Then there is one of Asgard's flotilla of warriors, apparently taking from the fight to tend and minister to the injured. Mustn't be much of a combatant, then. Blackagar might just end up taking several rattles of conventional gunfire to see if bullets do anything where energy is not effective. What's next? Maybe shooting him with darts tipped in poison, ancient rattled sabres and spears! Again, a good assassination squad needs to have multiple avenues of escape and assault alike.

Especially when said Midnight King decides to hold up a building and invites pockmarking that foundation with as much violence as possible. Dropping an apartment on him might kill him. Maybe they can leave, in the meantime. Chips of rock and rising smoke from a charge flung out the window *should* offer one last reprieve for the last of the group in that quadrant. He flattened the main team, the lookout is left to be deeply miserable. Batman gets to bamf out in a burst of smoke. He doesn't, he just throws it and runs for the fire escape, HYDRA heiled and hated in a moment.

The horse's mind is as complex as any human's, when caught by a broadcast. Mr. Horse tilts his head and proceeds to trot closer to the building, looking up. Without arms, he is limited in what he can do; his broad side is suitable, for example, at acting like another reinforcing bar. But that isn't what he was asked to do. "You are quite certain not to be flattened beneath that burden? I would never underestimate your intentions. Verily, it's honourable you would." He throws his head up as a glinting ray of fire becomes another set of people dropped off, and he perks his ears right up. "But try not to perish in the rubble. Heroes most oft count as the victims of great deeds." A gallop leads to those massive wings beating downward, forcing the horse up to follow the far more agile woman storming around through the smoke, and if the smoke grenade isn't annoying to him, then he's probably blowing great billows of the acrid, stinging cloud out of the way.

One Valkyrie can be heard, though she calls out in Aesir, <<Stop showing off, I've got two on the side who could use a ride. One more in here isn't reachable unless I rip out the wall.>>

"Watch out below!" helpfully calls the pegasus. In case Blackagar wasn't aware of the sudden inundation of dirty concrete and several bits of rebar hurled out as the Valkyrie rips her way through to another person bleeding death.

Blackagar Boltagon has posed:
Rebar, rubble, drywall and even some good old fashioned asbestos rain down over the top of the King who just holds his weight against the wall. Those fleeing pot shots strike him, a few of them hinting that the potential of a bruise may develop as all his focus is on directing his energies to strengthening himself. To keep the building upright.

The talking horse is very verbose, enough so that Blackagar actually quirks an eyebrow at the extensive conversation taking place. If he could sigh, he would. Instead he simply makes a small roll of his eyes and tilts his head in the direction of the voice that is calling for help.

Feet brace further into the ground, digging up some of the sidewalk where he angles himself but the realities of old construction can be felt. It is not a battle of him holding the building up, it is a battle of the building holding itself up. Fortunately, the attacks have ceased.

"FIRE IN THE HOLE!" yells out a voice from near a van. Whoever it is, somewhat undisciplined, has raised an RPG and has aimed it not directly at Blackagar, but near enough. He's unfamiliar with the weapon. It isn't something they use although the history he has read gives him a clue that it is perhaps a projectile of some kind.

The spray of fumes out the back ignite and the rocket flies in a straight line, striking a few feet away from him. The eruption of explosion echoes through the street.

Jane Foster has posed:
Yes, Grani is nearly as bad as his forebear for chattiness. Sleipnir can absolutely talk someone's ear off, but that chatter *has* a secondary purpose. Not just annoying the King anyway.

In that case, hearing a perfectly calm English male voice ignoring the crack of gunfire to which he's impervious anyway draws a few exhausted, frightened people to their windows. Or out, trying to escape the crush of the floors toppling above them. There will be a few victims who drew their last breath from the attacks, but many more who have not.

One or two of them end up staring so much they have to be yanked out by Grani's great horsey teeth, a bad habit he loathes. But if the decision is a dead body or a grumping bruise to his ego, the choice is flying off with the yelping teenaged girl or a half-conscious mama in her dusty cocoon to get them away. One Valkyrie of Asgard takes a much harsher approach, storming through the walls and ripping past fallen curtains, smoking appliances and hauling those deeper and further. No one is there to really see when her wings curve in protective walls or a golden chain whips ahead of her, wrapping around an exposed leg and pulling an older man back to her.

Death calls. The helmed sentinel refuses to adhere to the requests painfully, patiently signed off by an unseen figure. Explosions rock through the building and skew another danger along fresh axes. Booming echoes rattle through her armoured body, and the Valkyrie swivels. When she comes flying out with another body to give the pegasus to carry, he intercepts, snapping up the catatonic victim.

The woman with the brassy wings doesn't even bother to land, stooping in a dive. Near a van is enough to orient on; Blackagar doesn't necessary know what an RPG is, but the Valkyrie sure as Hel does. She sweeps around in a sharp veering circle, gold reforming in living metal to shape a slender whip. Not too hard to lash that and hope it will connect with the man who decided to use a rocket against a civilian. Unlike a sword -- or a really smart hammer -- she doesn't need a ton of melee skill to wield the whip, as unlikely as that might seem. It helps that the whip-by-another-name has intent of its own, gleefully snaring the mortal in aureate coils.

A target to question, at least. Even if the one who would question isn't necessarily asking the verbal questions.

Blackagar Boltagon has posed:
The feel of an explosion about him rocks Blackagar, the building above him crumbling further than it had before. His force is kept against it even as the weight of the toppling structure begins to shift and fall downwards upon him rather than simply leaning against. Blue eyes catch the sight of the Valkyrie whipping the one who fired the weapon, the trail of a smile on his lips growing. It had still been a guess as to friend or foe but now he has a certainty to it.

The concern which grows at this moment is for the remainder of people within the building. What of them? He looks around, turning his head momentarily to look up above for the Pegasus that had seemed to understand him and he thinks outwardly once more. ~How many are left within the building? I do not think it will remain together much longer.~

Feet continue to slide, pushing down as Blackagar's etched forehead grows, effort in it and a stronger shove backwards to try and fight against the inevitable efforts of gravity and physics. It is a battle that cannot be won, only forestalled. More and more pieces of the building begin to drop, an entire wall on the side sliding free and collapsing to send up dust.

Jane Foster has posed:
The building will only survive so long, engineered to withstand the occasional collision with pedestrian or vehicle. Not so much RPGs launched at close range. Devastation on par with a quiet corner of Beirut or a collapsing corner of Afghanistan, where violence rips through what might have been a scene of domesticity and urban community, peers through the smoke of the grenade set off. Chunks of stone rain down, wires and exposed beams slewing like a drunken Jenga tower over a man alone trying to bear it up. Honourable effort that isn't seen often in Suicide Slum; if anyone were really there to admire it instead of killing the keystone holding it all together, they might feel like Superman called in a friend.

What of the pegasus? Mr. Horse is fully competent to haul people out but he can barely be expected to barge through a standard window to grab someone. He leaves that to lesser people; Asgard's daughters and sons. No chance of him breaking through, though a well-placed, dinner plate-sized hoof smashes open a hole for a dazed, bloody man to shove his cat through, only to be bitten on the arm and carried off together. Angry yowls radiate above. Pussycat will be on its four feet, followed by a staggering man. "I shall inquire."

The inquiry is spoken -- yes, it's a talking horse, and yes, the woman dancing with chain and unexpected captive has the relayed question directed to her. The reply comes quickly, yanking along the man (mercenary?) in his bound gold prison, her flight hastening the path to land and survey the building.

Left to right, her shielded gaze scours, that long chestnut braid snapping side to side. Silver and platinum shield the face, flickering lines molded in the icy contours of metal. "Six," she replies. "Four may be saved. Do not be a third casualty." Brusque as Mr. Horse is loquacious, she launches herself headlong at the sloughing wall, flinging away blocks to land relatively harmlessly on the ground. Enough to make a hole to winnow through, something she can use to tear through the ruined walls and to a deeper chamber.

Blackagar Boltagon has posed:
Blue eyes look at the Valkyrie and Blackagar gives a crisp shake of his head. He will hold his position, it is etched on his face like stone, determined to remain at his post while the others, horse and winged figure do what they can. Six. Four can make it. To think harder is to invite weakness of his body. Instead he focuses otherwise.

Others would perhaps expect groaning, some kind of effort and the curses of social media begin to rear their head as individuals pull out their phones and begin recording the man holding up a building. He is an unknown, a figure that they do not recognize. No red, blue and gold. No green skinned hulking. Just a man in a casual shirt with laces at the neck and a pair of distressed bluejeans.

He holds it as long as he can, but soon the building's collapse reaches the inevitable conclusion and it comes down. Blackagar feels the structure falling on him, hitting him and underneath a cloud of drywall and rebar he falls. But it is only momentarily before the rubble that buried him in the corner is knocked aside and he comes striding out, looking back at the building falling. Pained eyes knowing that not all made it.

Jane Foster has posed:
Why argue with a man like that? Might as well shout at the Moon for all the good it does. An astrophysicist isn't needed to know the futility of that effort, especially where the resolute lines harden into solid forms and the wordless stance say it all. Gold light dances around the captured rocket-launcher, the whip held tight until a very large hoof pushes down on the man's back and pins him to the ground. The whip recoils, soaring back, swiveling through the wreckage to an invisible terminus.

One, two. It's a good thing not to know how Valkyrie senses them. Their hovering deaths are enough to guide her, seeing them in the darkness, drawn out as intended to the path of a fatal destination. Holding one arm higher than the other gives her a means to batter through drywall like paper, some swift snaps and crackles warning of the imminent collapse. She sinks to her knees, dragging hard at pancaked layers to reach that bubble formed by a twisted bedframe. Half-visible under sheets and detritus is a thin face, a hidden arm. At its side -- his or her, impossible to know -- is another faint light, a sniveling, whimpering face blinking at emptiness. With an inexorable sigh, she forms a thick shaft of unyielding uru, the stave smashing into the ceiling and holding back a chunk of concrete that threatens to jar loose from the skewing building. The floor's slant requires her to army-crawl uphill, a short distance full of pushing away junk, toys, and more. Two: she can reach them and pull them to her, then shelter them against her body. Emerging needs to be faster than that, as the violet effigies of death loom over them.

Hurling herself up isn't safer than down or out, disrupting Blackagar's balance. But something has to be jeopardized, and going up at an angle for the sky is the best route possible. Hugging them one armed and the uru staff in the other, the skyward-pointing lance gives a hope of escape. She doesn't draw back, but rushes onward to find fresh air, using her shoulder and her arm to guard the two best as she can.

Lurching out into the warm hour allows freedom, briefly. All the force of the earth and summer's boundless, ageless weight wraps them up. Dropping both at the first available space is ideal; a balcony, too close to the crumbling apartment. But what more can she do when he is waiting, //counting// on her to finish it? A terrible awe for that sacrifice, for that hope.

Back. Dive. Find the unconscious ones sandwiched between layers. Pull them together to her, wings of a celestial storm wrapped around them all tight, when the world crashes down.

Blackagar Boltagon has posed:
The building's crumble continues, Blackagar now unable to do anything to assist other than to move people back. The only one able to filter about is Valkyrie and The Horse who carry out their rescues even as the collapse happens. A look of deep concern remains on his face as he starts looking for them to emerge from the rubble. When he sees nothing, steady steps are taken back into the mess, hands reaching into chunks of concrete to lift them and move them aside. The frame belies the strength to lift the weight. Energy poured from the universe itself into his body to make the effort attainable. Not mere Inhuman strength, but amplified to the nth.

If he could call out, he would, scream out to ask if they are there, within the rubble. But that is not an option. A slow break is given and Blackbolt reaches out with his mind, letting that call as loudly as he can. ~If you are there, I am coming!~

Jane Foster has posed:
Time wins in the end, until time itself is destroyed. The fundamental possibility the universe truly begins when the last particle of light dies, and there is nothing but stasis beyond the end of the Degenerate Era makes astrophysicists lots of fun at parties. They're just going to slay with their humour about falling buildings. Regret is a featureless plain to be strode across later, though.

No one comes forth when the building collapses with all the ease of a teenager hitting their bed. Chunks fall away. In a second there's almost nothing to worry about at all. The collapse is a sudden event; standing to fallen, ashen to stilled. In it all, the Midnight King stands alone except for coughing victims or the great horse and his prize.

Grani's task is simple: step on his captive and wait. As nice as shoving the human inside that van and disabling the engine with a double-hoofed kick would be, he deigns to deal with the spitting, struggling man patiently. White tail twitching, his wings remain folded close to his body in great crescent shapes echoing the lunar sickle of a young moon.

Digging will take time. Time to locate an unconscious pair, child and adult. Another body pancaked under a fallen block, one of the two named dead. Shift a ruined entertainment center and there lies another man with a nasty gash on his head, protected partly by his crushed headphones and a gaming chair. Alive, barely.

The brunette curled up in a hollow, soaked in plaster and dust, where two blocks of concrete skew up at sharp angles, breathing. A last victim smushed on the middle floors won't be found intact.

Blackagar Boltagon has posed:
It takes time for Blackbolt to move the pieces he needs to. A body is found, lifeless. A great frown growing on his face as he gently carries it out of the rubble before returning. Others have joined to observe, to help the injured at this point. The arrival of emergency personnel will be immiment but it does not deter the King's work. Half of a collapsed floor, a great mass is lifted and tossed backwards by Blackagar as he kneels beneath it and puts his strength to the task.

Underneath he finds a child and adult. Alive. These he picks up and carries back to those that are waiting, willing to offer assistance. Back to the rubble. The process continues. Emergency personnel on sight now offering to help with the injured and observing this unknown entity moving large swathes of the building to get underneath.

Six had been the count. With a seventh being the angelic figure rescuing. The dead are treated with respect, but done so hurriedly, nothing more could be done for them. It is the burnette that catches Blackbolt's attention and the barest hint of a smile touches his lips. With a hand, he tosses the two concrete blocks apart, leaning over to scoop the woman into his arms and begins to carry her out.

Jane Foster has posed:
Bodies, not stacked like cordwood, but surely accounted for somewhere. Metropolis must have some kind of police precinct vaguely nearby, but sirens aren't screeching the Ride of the Valkyries to come and rescue those in need. EMTs and paramedics, tireless vanquishers of illness and emergencies, don't race down those pocked streets that Blackagar Boltagon walked as a tourist, a student, a philosopher-king of an alien race.

Mostly there are a few scared locals coming out with towels and beaten-up first aid kits. One or two tote sheets, like they might be of use. At windows here or there, cell phones capture for perpetuity the fleeting glimpses of humanity in the face of sorrow. Back to those who can help; on balconies sit befuddled victims, the unconscious teen and child hauled in and given water. Stunned people might take time to come out into the street, but the slums are a dangerous place and the tight-knit few who call themselves friends or family stick together.

Six total; four alive, if battered in pieces, two dead. And one unquestioned person pinned by a hoof until a very angry man in a pair of jeans comes out wielding a handgun, pointed at the horse and the body, for which the pegasus is happy to accede. A toss of his head, and he's airborne.

The rocket-launching would-be assassin can't even get to his feet, wheezing for breath and making it a few inches off the ground before being thoroughly stomped into place by a most human foot. "You get your sorry ass back down, if you want your head."

Of Jane Foster? Being dirty is one thing, battered another. Scratches, stone shards embedded in her jeans, make for a rather sorry sight. He won't find resistance lifting her up nor carrying her out, even if shoving those blocks offers a fine grit crashing down in abundance. Jane isn't much for talking when dazed, no longer in her makeshift tent of debris.

Blackagar Boltagon has posed:
Blackagar carries the burnette woman a few steps away and looks around considering the status of things. It is not an environment he would wish to stay in. She needs safety, a place to be checked for injury. While Blackagar has sympathy for those here that are injured, he does not know them. They are not his people. Neither is Jane, but she is at the least a friend. A glance is given to Horse, a slight inclination of thanks from the King's expression and then manipulating the electrons around him, he begins to rise.

Blackbolt does not fly very often where any can see him. It draws to much attention. But in this case, he will make an exception as he slowly glides up out of the rubbled neighborhood and towards a quieter section of the city of Metropolis, setting down in a park near a hospital. During the flight he continually looks at Jane, eyes filled with obvious concern for the woman as he gets her to what he believes will be safety. He still does not fully comprehend her condition. But among the humans, these hospitals are clearly the location for the ill to be taken.

He cannot sign while holding her, but he does attempt through facial expression and deep mental focus to ask, ~Are you alright?~

Jane Foster has posed:
Grani takes wing the moment someone has a gun trained on the agent, who may or may not be of interest to Blackagar. He tosses his head and turns, taking wing before someone shoots him to find out if barbecued pegasus tastes good. Those proud feathers spread, sending him aloft, strong beats gaining altitude until he can dash away into the sky.

Convenient for escape purposes! Leaving behind the king and the unremarkable Nobel laureate may turn attention towards the horse, giving them an escape. Jane's not going to be fit to complain one way or the other, still fairly staggered by a building falling around her. Rampaging dust and crunched concrete pose their own kinds of problems, and she conserves some of her energy to vaguely stir herself back to something. Consciousness? It's close enough, that slender thread seized on to haul herself upward into the light anew. Slow, weary eyes open.

"Regularly get shot?" she asks tiredly, dry as dust, but friendly enough. "Be sore in the... now, actually. Not the first time waking up crunched like a pretzel." A rueful attempt at humour is still humour!

Blackagar Boltagon has posed:
The humored expression of Blackagar stems relief. He slowly, gently lays Jane down on the park bench and actually takes a knee next to her to look closerly into her eyes. His hands lift as he has them free now to sign slowly for her. No need to rush, let her process steadily. ~It is only the second time.~ A smile touches him as he continues, ~I brought you near a hospital. I will take you into it if you desire. I did not know if that would be your wish.~ She's awake so it means she may only be sore. But he does not know the human body well enough to know what it may need.

~There were six in that building, and a seventh went in. It was you?~

Jane Foster has posed:
A dry smile robs Jane of total levity, though her brow remains lined a little as she reads what she can from Blackagar's expressions. An empath she is not, just endowed by certain experience with people and the unfathomable ability to comprehend language in its forms. When he sets her down, she could well be heard to sigh, an unbroken curtain of breath pooling in the air. Useful bench serving so valiantly, it deserves and gets a trusty pat. She then might just about push herself up, twinging in places that announce their opinions about being blown through walls. "Thank you for considering that." Her lips turn in a wry look, though one haunted briefly. It was only a year past Genosha fell on her. Now a building. Hurrah! Progress.

"The second time being shot. You are likely to need medical attention more than me. I'm not officially a doctor of medicine but close enough to count. Do you need a quick review or have you stimpacks and special protocols?" she asks, a bit teasing, not entirely. Her dark eyes stay with his, and she gestures at herself. "Remember that thing about falling between dimensions? I get someone watching out for me when..." A hand wobble. "Until it's sorted out, anyway."

Blackagar Boltagon has posed:
He considers the woman for a few, especially as she sits up. A building had fallen on her and she was starting to recover. ~A guardian angel?~ he inquires using the venacular of the world he has picked up. Something that at least has a modicrum of familiarity for him to understand. He remains kneeling next to her, however, studying the woman to see just how well she really is doing. It would seem she is well, she is sitting, she is looking wry.

Then the concern for him comes. It brings a small wry grin of his own and Blackagar shakes his head, motioning to himself. ~No harm was done. I may have a couple of bruises, but nothing that requires any sort of care.~ A building, shot at with energy weapons, bullets? No need for treatment. He reaches out and gently touches Jane's arm with his hand before signing once more, ~You are sure you are ok?~

Jane Foster has posed:
"Without diverting into a lesson on cosmology, good enough." Jane nods, her dusty hair combed over by her fingertips, coming away unpleasantly greyed and in dire need of a good brushing to erase any traces of trouble. His consideration is returned in kind by sharp eyes, measuring any overt signs of trauma he might not be talking about. Burns and lesser discomforts stand out to a doctor's daughter with nearly sufficient education to make a go of the profession. More inclined above the bench thanks to one hand supporting her, she doesn't move fast. Those bruises come from another sort of place; different wounds, ones that lack medical explanation and belong to a realm of psychotherapy or religious experience. How, after all, does a soul hurt? What gives the self such indications of injury?

"You feel no contusions, no discomfort? Grinding joints?" The general questions could lead to some awareness, but that grin says it all. A laugh really deserves to be a sigh or a cough, angling some place in between. "I'm not injured. Knowing you were shot? No, that's not sitting very well with me. Makes me pretty angry anyone would, much less that you were thrown through a wall." Her hand rests on his, at least briefly enough. It won't linger if he needs to sign. "I'm not okay knowing people could have died and probably did, because someone out there wanted to hurt you. But being angry will neither help you or them, so trying to suppress that for the sake of everyone."

What, all one of them?

Blackagar Boltagon has posed:
Jane has become familiar enough, at least when they had danced prior, to be able to read a single handed signing from Blackagar, so he returns to that. The language is similar but a little more clunky, devoid of the normal nuance that both hands can provide. ~I am angry as well. That others were harmed is horrible.~ At no point is he considering it being a random act of violence. It was a substantial amount of firepower, not enough, but still enough to surpass attempting to attack a random target.

The metaphysical concepts, beyond even a philosopher much like him, are unasked but are pondered often enough. Her concern for him so clear that it again brings a small smile to his lips. Slowly, he leans back and pats himself. ~See? Nothing wrong.~ He even lifts his shirt to show her the spots where the energy blasts sturck. There's a bit of reddening of the skin compared to other spots but no indications otherwise. ~Inhumans are by nature stronger than most humans. I am stronger than other Inhumans.~ Transitive property. A soft squeeze is given to her arm, reassuring her of the truth of his state. ~I should not linger. Authorities may seek answers which I cannot provide.~

Jane Foster has posed:
"I am sorry for all of this. You shouldn't..." She trails off. Words prove inadequate when the world of improbable wonders and bleeding edge equations fails to adequately supply the needed sentiments. Slumping back down a little to ease the strain on her supporting arm also entails curling her knees closer, repositioning herself to allow for ongoing conversation with minimal need to look like she just escaped from a drywall factory explosion. Not that far from the truth, really. "We both know it isn't right."

But how else is there to describe the situation, except that? Failure to find the correct description will have to wait by the wayside. Because for a moment, her cheeks flame a pale pink. For her fair skin, that's equivalently red.

Derailed thoughts dance behind her gaze dropping, that sudden smile flattened. "Is that it? Stronger? Then take good care of yourself, even so." Not exactly tongue-tied, the loquacious approach shared by her and that darn horse seems to be jumbled up, tangled, twirling its own autumn leaf duet on an unsteady breeze.

Fingers remain curled around his, sliding to his wrist, halting for a moment. "You should not." In that, they agree. Harboured thoughts, a pause halted, trailing into lingering silence like a plodding beast.

But don't go. The words just rest there, unspoken, ponderous as they must be. She cannot quite give them voice, but this is a man living all his life mute, as if it's not audible in every other way?

Blackagar Boltagon has posed:
~It is not your fault. Nor those that were injured. If any is to blame, it is myself. I had believed my presence here would be unnoticed, but I suspect that may have changed. How, I do not know.~ But then he shakes his dark haired head in discouragement. ~But do not apologize for what you cannot control or on behalf of others. You have done me no wrong, have never done me wrong. We know that this was merely an act of evil.~

It is unspoken, decipherable however from looks, from touch. Blackagar finds himself a bit surprised, looking slowly from her hand up to Jane's eyes and he tilts his head. She spoke the truth, that he should not linger. But she is betrayed as well by body language.

He hesitates a moment, then slowly lifts the unoccupied hand to sign slowly towards her. ~If you do not need the medical attention either. Then come with me?~ There is no expectation in his expression, but there was movement in his hand, an almost tentative nature to it. Uncertainty from the King, a very rare showing.

Jane Foster has posed:
An act of evil; on that they both agree, down to the inert golden bangle under her dusty sleeve. It certainly doesn't talk. But the weight of its presence serves as a mute testimony and reminder of an exodus from another plane. "I can apologize to the dead for their suffering, to the injured for being harmed, and to the target for being stripped of safety. They feed on fear and undermining a sense of protection, whomever they are."

No doubt this is going to be answered, but not in that moment, and revenge remains no concern of hers. Not then and there, consumed by other matters. A noble purpose, worrying about the fallen and how to avoid trouble with police, evading further shots taken at random.

Room for herself? Acts of selfishness? They take a moment as she nods to the offer from Blackagar. It starts and ends at that, the faint curve of a smile. Shy isn't in Jane's repertoire; hesitant, yes, but never shy. Words might not be needed, and they prove once again hardly up to the task. Shifting to sit up a little more will serve in its stead, a gesture as clear as any to signal readiness.

Blackagar Boltagon has posed:
She agrees.

Blackagar is slightly surprised that Jane does so, but with a small smile, he nods to her as well. The free hand signs to her, ~Then allow me. And do hold on.~ Leaning over, he moves to scoop the woman up into his arms once more, the same method with which he flew her to the park, to safety. Making sure she is settled, holding on as asked he pauses and frowns. The look is clearly readable. ~Where to?~

Even as he waits for an answer, Blackbolt puts the field of electrons around them once more, using them to lift from the ground and begin to glide away from the park.

Jane Foster has posed:
Asking that question is only fair, though about as bad as 'what's for dinner?' Everything is hardly fair as an answer. Anywhere would leave open possibilities like a trench, a volcano or a barren desert under the high sun: hardly ideal. Therefore Jane plumbs the depths of thought when she's carried off, relatively, by a king.

Unlike Hades, she actually has some hand in it, and wraps her arms easily around Blackagar's neck to avoid being unsettled. Flight, as she knows it, can be a breathtakingly quick or wobbly sort of thing.

Away from Centennial Park where the statue of Superman resides, out of the safekeeping of Metropolis' cares, the world resolves into a patchwork of greys and greens and browns. Pretty, in some ways. She isn't really paying attention. "What kind of distance are we working with? If you want somewhere close, somewhere close to the water."

A pause then she chuckles softly, just below his ear. "If it's less of an issue, take me to your favourite place so far in your wanderings."

That could be the other side of the central business district for the Super City. Or it could be a corner of Tahiti for all she knows.

Blackagar Boltagon has posed:
Holding Jane easily with one arm, he lifts the other long enough to say to her, ~My favorite place? That I can do. Hold on. It will take a short time.~ Putting his hand back to support her, to hold the woman against him, he angles himself off towards the East, heading out over the ocean and beyond. Across the Atlantic. A smile on his face as London fills his mind.