Behold A Black Horse - Log 7
Nov. 26th, 2023 04:12 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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xp_logsSpectrum and Conduit meet Prism and Malice.
While splitting up was a classic mistake in any cartoon or horror movie, the priority was getting Dunn to safety, which meant drawing off both the military and the Marauders in different directions. However, as they moved out from the cover of the rear of a strip mall, they found themselves facing the Marauders across a stretch of parking lot, lit up by the empty Waffle House on the corner. The crystalline one Spectrum had encountered before, but beside him was a face they'd only seen reconstructed in the Danger Room by Kane: Malice.
Darcy's fingers twitched, a subtle tensing that was difficult to see in the limited light. Her voice was hushed, but felt almost as loud as a shout in the unnatural stillness of the city. "That's unideal," she breathed out. "You recognize the one with Lau–with Malice? I can make an educated guess, but you're the one with the actual field experience facing these assholes."
"I don't know the name, but yeah. Cal and I ran into him and some giant bruiser in the Clan Akkaba tunnels." Nica's voice had turned hard, her face expressionless. Talk about your worst nightmares, but she was determined to not let things get to her this time. "He can reflect and amplify energy, so be careful how you zap him." She glanced over at her partner. "How do we do this?"
"If you can handle amplifier, I'll take Malice." Darcy's gaze was cool as the other two mutants drew closer. "See if I can get her arrogant mouth running ahead of her brain." Akkaba again. But why were Essex and his Marauders involved in that weird cult? She missed the woman who would've been angry and horrified at the death toll of this latest mess with a sudden fierceness that had her shoulders going stiff and straight. "And if not... well. I have my gun, but it was meant to be more a last resort than a first option. Still, I'll put a bullet in someone to buy us escape time if we need it."
"Tag team might work too. That's what Cal and I did." As much as Nica didn't want to have to deal with the authentic Malice, she also didn't want to subject Darcy, whose own trauma with the woman was so much more personal, to dealing with her alone.
"It might, but I don't know that I'll be able to do much against someone that can amplify energy. You, on the other hand... well. Amplifying energy and redirecting it at you is like shining a big, natural spotlight, isn't it?" Her lips quirked up just a bit. "I'm trusting you to put him down hard enough that he'll stay down, and then be able to help me with Malice as necessary. You know how overconfident she gets."
"Gotcha." Nica flashed a brief grin at the other woman. "Ambush? I should be able to get behind them if a channel x-rays."
“Are you quite done strategizing?” Malice called out, having used the advanced hearing gifted to her by Essex’s manipulation to listen in. “If it's quite alright by the both of you, we do have other pressing business. I'm sure you understand.”
"Who has the dolly? Who has weird Barbie? We want Weird Barbie." Malice looked at him and he shrugged. "I saw the movie twice. I am a feminist, you know. Things that you don't listen about-"
“Just kill her, we don't have time for this,” Malice gave Darcy a smile, perfectly white teeth morphing into a set of foxlike fangs both lower and upper as she dropped to all fours and launched herself across the distance in a lope.
Darcy braced herself for the impact. She could move, certainly, but Malice had the edge on speed and recovery. Better to flow with it, see if she could get an edge while they grappled. "You're not killing anyone today if I can stop it," she said lowly as the other woman barreled into her, hooking a leg around and collapsing into a controlled fall.
Malice led with her claws as they went down, digging them into Darcy’s shoulders as her head snapped forward to bite at her neck. It would have been a death stroke had it not been for Darcy’s armored collar and Malice reared back with a frustrated expression, giving her former lover a look of disdain.
“Been training for this have you? A VI simulation won’t save you here.”
Meanwhile, Nica was cautiously circling Prism, aware of how skilled he was in combat from their last meeting. "I'd say we don't have to do this, but even I'm not that naive," she said, more to see if she could push him into striking first.
"I kinda do. I mean, if you don't get the joke, you shouldn't have enlisted was what my old Drill Sargent used to say. " He paused as he held up his hand, looking through it at her. "You know, I bet with your powers, I can make you lase in a transitionary energy form. I mean, I've been thinking about it ever since last time. Based on the-" Malice shot him a poisonous look and his crystal teeth clacked shut. "Right, fighting. Got it."
Darcy let out a pained laugh at the look on Malice's face. "Oh honey, you know I remember how much you like biting. Of course I prepared for that." Her arms wound around the other woman in a parody of a lover's embrace, hands sparking with electricity as she pushed her hands against Laurie's back. "And this." She grinned fiercely up at her face as she increased the electric load. "Remember how I ruined your life with electricity? Let's see if I can do it again."
The surge of electricity through her body made her claws flex, digging deep punctures into Darcy’s shoulders as Laurie threw her head back and screamed. It was not that of a human woman though, but that of a fox, a piercing wail that drilled into the ear and unsettled the senses.
After a moment, her claws released as her healing factor kicked in and she pushed herself hard away from Darcy, using her feet to get distance in a bound.
She crouched at that distance, and panted for a moment as her healing factor worked to heal the electrical damage to her nerves.
“You’re a fool, Darcy Lewis. You’re all fools and you’re going to die ignorant without even knowing that which you face.”
Her tone was almost gleeful at the mention of death, as if she couldn’t wait for them to cease existing in her world.
"Well, I tried," Nica said mostly to herself, before lifting her hands to blast the crystal form with a wave of infrared. She wasn't sure if crystal had a melting point, but she was going to try to find it.
"Oh, that's the good stuff." He said, spreading his hands for a long moment as his body soaked up the energy. "See, for the class, what spectrum did the first lasers emit? That's right..." He held his hand up and a beam shot back at Spectrum. It went through her, but as it did, the tight collimated rays felt like a punch to her.
If she'd had air in her lungs, it would have been knocked out of her. As it was, Nica grunted and flew back across the parking lot several feet before she managed to stop. "Physics 101, dumbass," she muttered to herself, trying to think which wavelength she could use that wouldn't empower her opponent. Precious few, from memory. But that wasn't her only weapon... Focusing on solidifying her hands, the same as she had for Alex in the riot, she flew at Prism, aiming a punch at his face.
Darcy's gun was in her hand, safety off, pointed at the ground – for now. "You've got my attention. Make it good. What are we ignorant about, Laurie?" She stalked closer, keeping Monica in her peripheral vision. Did Laurie actually have anything interesting to say, or just gloaty posturing? Time would tell, but seconds spent running her mouth were seconds that gave the rest of the group time to reach safety. "You know I like having all the information possible before making my decisions when I can. What am I missing here, between Essex and Akkaba?"
Malice rolled her eyes at the obvious attempt to prick her need to be the smartest in the room. Darcy wasn’t wrong of course, she was missing a great many things but far be it from her to make any information an easy give.
“Not so fast, Darcy. That sort of information comes at a price. Just what are you willing to lose for it?”
Darcy's answering smile was pointy. "Boring," she sang out as she reached Malice and curled her sharp nails around the purple skin of her jaw as the muzzle of her gun pressed into the woman's side. "But see, I don't need your information. It might be useful, but it might just verify things we already know. But you? You need to tell me. Need to hold your knowledge over the rest of us. Need to keep your pretty blood in your pretty purple body." She clicked the safety off, gently rubbing her thumb along Malice's jaw. "What are you willing to tell me so I don't blow a hole in you, babe?"
Meanwhile, Nica's punch glanced off Prism's crystal face. He took the opportunity to grab Nica and suddenly started to radiate a kaleidoscope of energy, like raking her over the coals of an extremely hot fire all at once.
The young X-Man screamed, a combined sound of pain and frustration and she instinctively tried to escape his grip with a full-spectrum blast against his chest.
The blast staggered him, but the bulk he was able to convert. The rest, he expelled in tight beam form, lasers spiking out haphazardly over the battle zone.
“Arrogant,” Malice reflected as Nica’s scream gave her a temporary distraction, enough for her to swipe the gun from Darcy’s hand with one claw and follow up with the other in a rake across her chest.
"Spectrum, you okay?" Darcy called as she skidded a few feet backwards, dropping to a crouch as she groped for her gun. The safety clicked back on, and it was tucked back into her holster. There was a nagging, persistent pain in her finger where Laurie's claw had clipped her, but the rake across her chest had done nothing more than move her back. 'Slash resistant fabric was worth every penny and minute I spent,' she thought to herself as she watched the lasers spiking.
"Fine," Nica grunted, although that was somewhat of a fib as she pushed herself up from where she'd landed on the ground. "I could really use a ceiling to drop on this jerk again." She wobbled a bit as she climbed to her feet and winced as a laser or two hit her - it was less actual pain and more a powers sensation.
“Prism, stop playing,” Malice growled, maneuvering herself to get a better run at Darcy. If she couldn’t kill her quickly, slowly would do just fine. Preferable even. “Kill the bitch or keep her contained.”
"Shut it, Malice. Greycrow would have already stitched them all up." Prism shot back. He'd served with the other Marauders for years and they'd reluctantly accepted Malice as their new leader. "You kill your cunt and I'll do mine."
"We can make one of those a reality," Darcy muttered, feeling electrical charge building through her body. "Yap yap yap, you're so obnoxious even your own teammates don't want to listen to you. That's not new for you though, is it? The X-Men hated working with you, Medical hated working with you... most of the scientists tolerated you at best. And you couldn't even get a kill shot on me when you had me dosed to the eyeballs." She stalked towards Malice, slow and intent. "Pathetic," she spat, "that you were so desperate that you ran right into the arms of the child of a man who had already unmade you once before. Same tired, boring Laurie victim complex, same tired, boring fight tactics. And the same sad, completely ineffective field leadership." Her eyes glowed as she reached out to the alarms along the strip mall, setting them off in a cacophony of high, piercing screeches.
“Pathetic?” Malice’s eyes turned feral, their normal purple changing to something more animal-like as she winced at the annoying clanging. It hurt her ears, something she’d have to thank Kyle for the next time they met, preferably with claws to the brain. “You don’t even realize the person you were facing was a horseman, Famine. Nobody has ever survived her till now. Essex was curious, so here we are. Just in time to watch you fail.”
She dropped back into a readying crouch, a shimmer, almost like a heatwave growing around her body and hands. Anyone who had known Laurie would recognise the power signature. Normally enough to fell a crowd these days but with Famine’s influence, maybe only enough to kill one person at a much more personal distance.
Nica saw the shimmer and realised what it was. Between whatever was messing with their powers and the energy she'd expended on Prism, she wouldn't have enough in a blast to singe Malice, but there was a way to increase the power. She lined up the shot, thinking back to playing pool with Cyclops at Harry's, and let loose a beam of infra-red. It hit Prism and redirected, boosted by his crystal form and heading straight at Malice.
It wasn’t a scream but a roar that Malice let out as the beam met her bicep and punched through to the other side, leaving the smell of cooked pork and a thoroughly distracted bad guy behind.
She clutched at her arm, healing factor now working its way through several problems, counting the hole in her arm as less important than the still damaged nerve ends more central to her nervous system. She’d just have to manage for now.
She whimpered, the air around her clear but a layer of viscous liquid still attached to her working hand.
"Oh, that was not fair. She's going to bitch about that for weeks, you know." Prism shifted, moving quickly with the kind of precision that suggested advanced training. As Nica tried to pass by him, he reached and grabbed her by the neck, somehow aligning his grip to bypass her attempts to shift into energy as he lifted her up.
When he’d grabbed her by the leg before, it had been painful enough. This time it was like all her nerves were on fire. Nica let out a strangled kind of noise, struggling to get free, but her efforts were as effective as a kitten struggling to escape being grabbed by the scruff.
“Slow then, and as painful as I can make it.” Malice gasped, refocusing on her prey. “What do you know of En Sabeh Nur and his Horsemen? Tell me you aren’t running around blindly.”
Darcy tsked. "Enough to know that you keep showing up like a stalking groupie. Your teenager not enough for you anymore? Gotta get your kicks with some cultists too?" She wasn't going to just hand over intel. "Better question, sweetie. Why are you here, chasing after this particular mutant?" Her hand had curled around Malice's arm, and she dug a few fingers into the hole left behind. "Less questions from you, and more talking."
Malice lashed out with her good hand, claws sliding across Darcy’s eye and cheek close enough to draw blood but not to damage anything vital. It was to the pain now, death would be slow.
"Stop fucking around with them, Malice. Boss said get the girl, not waste time on your little revenge fantasies." His attention was diverted for a moment as he hissed at Malice, shaking Nica twice to maintain his grip.
’I can’t get free, he’s killing me, how is he doing this…?’ Nica’s thoughts were a panicked jumble as she fought to get out of Prism’s grip. If he kept hitting her with energy, she’d overload, and she didn’t want to know what that looked like. ’Maybe I’ll explode all over the place…’ The thought tagged a memory, a woman whose power was to explode, and a desperate plan came to mind. She’d stopped Esme by absorbing her energy at a cellular level… Maybe the same would work here?
Without a second thought she twisted in Prism’s grip, taking advantage of his expectation that she was pulling away, not towards, and dived into his body.
“It’s like talking to children.” Malice muttered, shrugging off Darcy’s grip with a quick movement that had her back and to the side. “You don’t even understand what’s happening. Famine is here, returned, which means En Sabeh Nur need only wake his final Horseman, Death.” She lashed out again, moving quickly enough to slash her claws along Darcy’s shoulder this time. “Tell me, my former love. Do you think your pathetic X-men can face Death?”
"How many of them already have? And won." Akkaba. Horsemen. Famine. She didn't like the picture this was painting anymore than she'd liked the gash across her face. Darcy let out a grunt as she shoved back into Laurie with a side tackle. They fell to the ground in a tangle of limbs and rolled, Darcy letting out a curse as claws got under her cut resist and dug across her abdomen. She persisted, hands lighting up with electricity in an effort to press any pain advantage she could get to make the other woman talk. Keep her off her game. The pain was worth it, if she kept talking and gave up something valuable.
"What the- fuck- ?" Prism cursed, twisting and turning to try and figure out just where Nica had gone.
Malice could end this now, a twist and Darcy’s entrails would be on the floor between them and she could go back to Adam. But…
“Energy. Mutant life force.”
She pushed the other woman, sending her flying backwards from her and flipped back to her feet. She could hear the alarm on her communicator, summoning them back. It was time to go.
"Malice, we-" Prism started to say, trying to shake clear the odd sensations cascading through him. Ever since his physical body had converted to its crystalline form, he had lost most normal sensations. If it hadn't been for Kwannon's telepathy helping him adjust, the sudden void of input would have driven him mad. But now, there was sensation again - heat, vibration - and pain. Pain which suddenly erupted inside of him, like a current touching from one atom to the next, chaining through his body. He gave Malice one final, puzzled look, before his face suddenly cracked diagonally. Other cracks hit, sounding like cannon shots in the air, increasing in speed and volume. Until finally, Prism's body exploded like a shattered column of ice, leaving Nica to crumple into a ball on the ground.
Fuck. That was not in the plan. Malice glanced around, picking out her quickest exit strategy. She needed out now, but first. A warning for them, at least.
“Enough in one place, that’s all that’s needed for Death to take them all. Remember it.”
Malice turned and sped off, using all her considerable speed to leave the site of battle, and them behind.
'Gross,' Darcy thought to herself as a shard of Prism's body cut across her forehead. "Nica, you okay? Report."
There was a long pause before the young woman uncurled from her huddle and looked up. "Wha-?" She seemed bewildered, but made a huge effort to pull herself together at Darcy's professional tone. "I-I'm fine. Fine." Then she focused on the blood running down Darcy's face and it seemed to bring her back to reality. "You're hurt. We should get back to Clarice."
"Head wounds bleed a lot. It's shallow." Darcy let out a low groan as she attempted to leverage to her feet, abdomen burning and left leg attempting to buckle at her weight. She paused for a count of three mentally, arms stiff, and then heaved herself upright with a wobble. "I think I'm going to need some help walking, if you don't mind," she finished off. "Bitch got my leg, too."
While splitting up was a classic mistake in any cartoon or horror movie, the priority was getting Dunn to safety, which meant drawing off both the military and the Marauders in different directions. However, as they moved out from the cover of the rear of a strip mall, they found themselves facing the Marauders across a stretch of parking lot, lit up by the empty Waffle House on the corner. The crystalline one Spectrum had encountered before, but beside him was a face they'd only seen reconstructed in the Danger Room by Kane: Malice.
Darcy's fingers twitched, a subtle tensing that was difficult to see in the limited light. Her voice was hushed, but felt almost as loud as a shout in the unnatural stillness of the city. "That's unideal," she breathed out. "You recognize the one with Lau–with Malice? I can make an educated guess, but you're the one with the actual field experience facing these assholes."
"I don't know the name, but yeah. Cal and I ran into him and some giant bruiser in the Clan Akkaba tunnels." Nica's voice had turned hard, her face expressionless. Talk about your worst nightmares, but she was determined to not let things get to her this time. "He can reflect and amplify energy, so be careful how you zap him." She glanced over at her partner. "How do we do this?"
"If you can handle amplifier, I'll take Malice." Darcy's gaze was cool as the other two mutants drew closer. "See if I can get her arrogant mouth running ahead of her brain." Akkaba again. But why were Essex and his Marauders involved in that weird cult? She missed the woman who would've been angry and horrified at the death toll of this latest mess with a sudden fierceness that had her shoulders going stiff and straight. "And if not... well. I have my gun, but it was meant to be more a last resort than a first option. Still, I'll put a bullet in someone to buy us escape time if we need it."
"Tag team might work too. That's what Cal and I did." As much as Nica didn't want to have to deal with the authentic Malice, she also didn't want to subject Darcy, whose own trauma with the woman was so much more personal, to dealing with her alone.
"It might, but I don't know that I'll be able to do much against someone that can amplify energy. You, on the other hand... well. Amplifying energy and redirecting it at you is like shining a big, natural spotlight, isn't it?" Her lips quirked up just a bit. "I'm trusting you to put him down hard enough that he'll stay down, and then be able to help me with Malice as necessary. You know how overconfident she gets."
"Gotcha." Nica flashed a brief grin at the other woman. "Ambush? I should be able to get behind them if a channel x-rays."
“Are you quite done strategizing?” Malice called out, having used the advanced hearing gifted to her by Essex’s manipulation to listen in. “If it's quite alright by the both of you, we do have other pressing business. I'm sure you understand.”
"Who has the dolly? Who has weird Barbie? We want Weird Barbie." Malice looked at him and he shrugged. "I saw the movie twice. I am a feminist, you know. Things that you don't listen about-"
“Just kill her, we don't have time for this,” Malice gave Darcy a smile, perfectly white teeth morphing into a set of foxlike fangs both lower and upper as she dropped to all fours and launched herself across the distance in a lope.
Darcy braced herself for the impact. She could move, certainly, but Malice had the edge on speed and recovery. Better to flow with it, see if she could get an edge while they grappled. "You're not killing anyone today if I can stop it," she said lowly as the other woman barreled into her, hooking a leg around and collapsing into a controlled fall.
Malice led with her claws as they went down, digging them into Darcy’s shoulders as her head snapped forward to bite at her neck. It would have been a death stroke had it not been for Darcy’s armored collar and Malice reared back with a frustrated expression, giving her former lover a look of disdain.
“Been training for this have you? A VI simulation won’t save you here.”
Meanwhile, Nica was cautiously circling Prism, aware of how skilled he was in combat from their last meeting. "I'd say we don't have to do this, but even I'm not that naive," she said, more to see if she could push him into striking first.
"I kinda do. I mean, if you don't get the joke, you shouldn't have enlisted was what my old Drill Sargent used to say. " He paused as he held up his hand, looking through it at her. "You know, I bet with your powers, I can make you lase in a transitionary energy form. I mean, I've been thinking about it ever since last time. Based on the-" Malice shot him a poisonous look and his crystal teeth clacked shut. "Right, fighting. Got it."
Darcy let out a pained laugh at the look on Malice's face. "Oh honey, you know I remember how much you like biting. Of course I prepared for that." Her arms wound around the other woman in a parody of a lover's embrace, hands sparking with electricity as she pushed her hands against Laurie's back. "And this." She grinned fiercely up at her face as she increased the electric load. "Remember how I ruined your life with electricity? Let's see if I can do it again."
The surge of electricity through her body made her claws flex, digging deep punctures into Darcy’s shoulders as Laurie threw her head back and screamed. It was not that of a human woman though, but that of a fox, a piercing wail that drilled into the ear and unsettled the senses.
After a moment, her claws released as her healing factor kicked in and she pushed herself hard away from Darcy, using her feet to get distance in a bound.
She crouched at that distance, and panted for a moment as her healing factor worked to heal the electrical damage to her nerves.
“You’re a fool, Darcy Lewis. You’re all fools and you’re going to die ignorant without even knowing that which you face.”
Her tone was almost gleeful at the mention of death, as if she couldn’t wait for them to cease existing in her world.
"Well, I tried," Nica said mostly to herself, before lifting her hands to blast the crystal form with a wave of infrared. She wasn't sure if crystal had a melting point, but she was going to try to find it.
"Oh, that's the good stuff." He said, spreading his hands for a long moment as his body soaked up the energy. "See, for the class, what spectrum did the first lasers emit? That's right..." He held his hand up and a beam shot back at Spectrum. It went through her, but as it did, the tight collimated rays felt like a punch to her.
If she'd had air in her lungs, it would have been knocked out of her. As it was, Nica grunted and flew back across the parking lot several feet before she managed to stop. "Physics 101, dumbass," she muttered to herself, trying to think which wavelength she could use that wouldn't empower her opponent. Precious few, from memory. But that wasn't her only weapon... Focusing on solidifying her hands, the same as she had for Alex in the riot, she flew at Prism, aiming a punch at his face.
Darcy's gun was in her hand, safety off, pointed at the ground – for now. "You've got my attention. Make it good. What are we ignorant about, Laurie?" She stalked closer, keeping Monica in her peripheral vision. Did Laurie actually have anything interesting to say, or just gloaty posturing? Time would tell, but seconds spent running her mouth were seconds that gave the rest of the group time to reach safety. "You know I like having all the information possible before making my decisions when I can. What am I missing here, between Essex and Akkaba?"
Malice rolled her eyes at the obvious attempt to prick her need to be the smartest in the room. Darcy wasn’t wrong of course, she was missing a great many things but far be it from her to make any information an easy give.
“Not so fast, Darcy. That sort of information comes at a price. Just what are you willing to lose for it?”
Darcy's answering smile was pointy. "Boring," she sang out as she reached Malice and curled her sharp nails around the purple skin of her jaw as the muzzle of her gun pressed into the woman's side. "But see, I don't need your information. It might be useful, but it might just verify things we already know. But you? You need to tell me. Need to hold your knowledge over the rest of us. Need to keep your pretty blood in your pretty purple body." She clicked the safety off, gently rubbing her thumb along Malice's jaw. "What are you willing to tell me so I don't blow a hole in you, babe?"
Meanwhile, Nica's punch glanced off Prism's crystal face. He took the opportunity to grab Nica and suddenly started to radiate a kaleidoscope of energy, like raking her over the coals of an extremely hot fire all at once.
The young X-Man screamed, a combined sound of pain and frustration and she instinctively tried to escape his grip with a full-spectrum blast against his chest.
The blast staggered him, but the bulk he was able to convert. The rest, he expelled in tight beam form, lasers spiking out haphazardly over the battle zone.
“Arrogant,” Malice reflected as Nica’s scream gave her a temporary distraction, enough for her to swipe the gun from Darcy’s hand with one claw and follow up with the other in a rake across her chest.
"Spectrum, you okay?" Darcy called as she skidded a few feet backwards, dropping to a crouch as she groped for her gun. The safety clicked back on, and it was tucked back into her holster. There was a nagging, persistent pain in her finger where Laurie's claw had clipped her, but the rake across her chest had done nothing more than move her back. 'Slash resistant fabric was worth every penny and minute I spent,' she thought to herself as she watched the lasers spiking.
"Fine," Nica grunted, although that was somewhat of a fib as she pushed herself up from where she'd landed on the ground. "I could really use a ceiling to drop on this jerk again." She wobbled a bit as she climbed to her feet and winced as a laser or two hit her - it was less actual pain and more a powers sensation.
“Prism, stop playing,” Malice growled, maneuvering herself to get a better run at Darcy. If she couldn’t kill her quickly, slowly would do just fine. Preferable even. “Kill the bitch or keep her contained.”
"Shut it, Malice. Greycrow would have already stitched them all up." Prism shot back. He'd served with the other Marauders for years and they'd reluctantly accepted Malice as their new leader. "You kill your cunt and I'll do mine."
"We can make one of those a reality," Darcy muttered, feeling electrical charge building through her body. "Yap yap yap, you're so obnoxious even your own teammates don't want to listen to you. That's not new for you though, is it? The X-Men hated working with you, Medical hated working with you... most of the scientists tolerated you at best. And you couldn't even get a kill shot on me when you had me dosed to the eyeballs." She stalked towards Malice, slow and intent. "Pathetic," she spat, "that you were so desperate that you ran right into the arms of the child of a man who had already unmade you once before. Same tired, boring Laurie victim complex, same tired, boring fight tactics. And the same sad, completely ineffective field leadership." Her eyes glowed as she reached out to the alarms along the strip mall, setting them off in a cacophony of high, piercing screeches.
“Pathetic?” Malice’s eyes turned feral, their normal purple changing to something more animal-like as she winced at the annoying clanging. It hurt her ears, something she’d have to thank Kyle for the next time they met, preferably with claws to the brain. “You don’t even realize the person you were facing was a horseman, Famine. Nobody has ever survived her till now. Essex was curious, so here we are. Just in time to watch you fail.”
She dropped back into a readying crouch, a shimmer, almost like a heatwave growing around her body and hands. Anyone who had known Laurie would recognise the power signature. Normally enough to fell a crowd these days but with Famine’s influence, maybe only enough to kill one person at a much more personal distance.
Nica saw the shimmer and realised what it was. Between whatever was messing with their powers and the energy she'd expended on Prism, she wouldn't have enough in a blast to singe Malice, but there was a way to increase the power. She lined up the shot, thinking back to playing pool with Cyclops at Harry's, and let loose a beam of infra-red. It hit Prism and redirected, boosted by his crystal form and heading straight at Malice.
It wasn’t a scream but a roar that Malice let out as the beam met her bicep and punched through to the other side, leaving the smell of cooked pork and a thoroughly distracted bad guy behind.
She clutched at her arm, healing factor now working its way through several problems, counting the hole in her arm as less important than the still damaged nerve ends more central to her nervous system. She’d just have to manage for now.
She whimpered, the air around her clear but a layer of viscous liquid still attached to her working hand.
"Oh, that was not fair. She's going to bitch about that for weeks, you know." Prism shifted, moving quickly with the kind of precision that suggested advanced training. As Nica tried to pass by him, he reached and grabbed her by the neck, somehow aligning his grip to bypass her attempts to shift into energy as he lifted her up.
When he’d grabbed her by the leg before, it had been painful enough. This time it was like all her nerves were on fire. Nica let out a strangled kind of noise, struggling to get free, but her efforts were as effective as a kitten struggling to escape being grabbed by the scruff.
“Slow then, and as painful as I can make it.” Malice gasped, refocusing on her prey. “What do you know of En Sabeh Nur and his Horsemen? Tell me you aren’t running around blindly.”
Darcy tsked. "Enough to know that you keep showing up like a stalking groupie. Your teenager not enough for you anymore? Gotta get your kicks with some cultists too?" She wasn't going to just hand over intel. "Better question, sweetie. Why are you here, chasing after this particular mutant?" Her hand had curled around Malice's arm, and she dug a few fingers into the hole left behind. "Less questions from you, and more talking."
Malice lashed out with her good hand, claws sliding across Darcy’s eye and cheek close enough to draw blood but not to damage anything vital. It was to the pain now, death would be slow.
"Stop fucking around with them, Malice. Boss said get the girl, not waste time on your little revenge fantasies." His attention was diverted for a moment as he hissed at Malice, shaking Nica twice to maintain his grip.
’I can’t get free, he’s killing me, how is he doing this…?’ Nica’s thoughts were a panicked jumble as she fought to get out of Prism’s grip. If he kept hitting her with energy, she’d overload, and she didn’t want to know what that looked like. ’Maybe I’ll explode all over the place…’ The thought tagged a memory, a woman whose power was to explode, and a desperate plan came to mind. She’d stopped Esme by absorbing her energy at a cellular level… Maybe the same would work here?
Without a second thought she twisted in Prism’s grip, taking advantage of his expectation that she was pulling away, not towards, and dived into his body.
“It’s like talking to children.” Malice muttered, shrugging off Darcy’s grip with a quick movement that had her back and to the side. “You don’t even understand what’s happening. Famine is here, returned, which means En Sabeh Nur need only wake his final Horseman, Death.” She lashed out again, moving quickly enough to slash her claws along Darcy’s shoulder this time. “Tell me, my former love. Do you think your pathetic X-men can face Death?”
"How many of them already have? And won." Akkaba. Horsemen. Famine. She didn't like the picture this was painting anymore than she'd liked the gash across her face. Darcy let out a grunt as she shoved back into Laurie with a side tackle. They fell to the ground in a tangle of limbs and rolled, Darcy letting out a curse as claws got under her cut resist and dug across her abdomen. She persisted, hands lighting up with electricity in an effort to press any pain advantage she could get to make the other woman talk. Keep her off her game. The pain was worth it, if she kept talking and gave up something valuable.
"What the- fuck- ?" Prism cursed, twisting and turning to try and figure out just where Nica had gone.
Malice could end this now, a twist and Darcy’s entrails would be on the floor between them and she could go back to Adam. But…
“Energy. Mutant life force.”
She pushed the other woman, sending her flying backwards from her and flipped back to her feet. She could hear the alarm on her communicator, summoning them back. It was time to go.
"Malice, we-" Prism started to say, trying to shake clear the odd sensations cascading through him. Ever since his physical body had converted to its crystalline form, he had lost most normal sensations. If it hadn't been for Kwannon's telepathy helping him adjust, the sudden void of input would have driven him mad. But now, there was sensation again - heat, vibration - and pain. Pain which suddenly erupted inside of him, like a current touching from one atom to the next, chaining through his body. He gave Malice one final, puzzled look, before his face suddenly cracked diagonally. Other cracks hit, sounding like cannon shots in the air, increasing in speed and volume. Until finally, Prism's body exploded like a shattered column of ice, leaving Nica to crumple into a ball on the ground.
Fuck. That was not in the plan. Malice glanced around, picking out her quickest exit strategy. She needed out now, but first. A warning for them, at least.
“Enough in one place, that’s all that’s needed for Death to take them all. Remember it.”
Malice turned and sped off, using all her considerable speed to leave the site of battle, and them behind.
'Gross,' Darcy thought to herself as a shard of Prism's body cut across her forehead. "Nica, you okay? Report."
There was a long pause before the young woman uncurled from her huddle and looked up. "Wha-?" She seemed bewildered, but made a huge effort to pull herself together at Darcy's professional tone. "I-I'm fine. Fine." Then she focused on the blood running down Darcy's face and it seemed to bring her back to reality. "You're hurt. We should get back to Clarice."
"Head wounds bleed a lot. It's shallow." Darcy let out a low groan as she attempted to leverage to her feet, abdomen burning and left leg attempting to buckle at her weight. She paused for a count of three mentally, arms stiff, and then heaved herself upright with a wobble. "I think I'm going to need some help walking, if you don't mind," she finished off. "Bitch got my leg, too."
