multiversallogs | fall in line or release the glitch

Entry tags:

fall in line or release the glitch

Who: Wolfgang and Will, Shrieky, Olivia Dunham (prime), Stephanie Brown, open
What: Everyone's going to pick daisies and go on a picnic in the woods!
Where: Wherever is convenient! He's mostly in the southeast part of the city, but can be anywhere.
When: Various days over the second week of the siege.
Notes: If you want a thread starter ping me and I will make you one :3 or... idk just tag in somewhere random.
Warnings: Violence, mild horrors (like, relatively, yes), also some vague discussion of mental illness stuff in the OP.

After his Awakening, he sleeps.

When he wakes up, he's disoriented -- the room is unfamiliar, he's lying on a cot in a safehouse in Mog Hill, which someone explains to him when he asks. He has mercifully been left alone most of the time, except for someone who would come to check to make sure he hadn't actually died. That makes him pause and ask how long he was out.

Three days. He slept for three days. That's three days of being utterly useless and vulnerable, with no one knowing where he is, he doesn't know where he is -- three days of Baedal going to Hell.

Three days of dreamless sleep.

He wept. He's too embarrassed to ever admit it, and he thankfully held it together until he was alone, but he did. Whether it was out of frustration, or anger, or fear, or relief, he's still not sure. Too much emotion all at once when he's spent the last three years buried under the fog his medication produces in him -- blunted affect is a side effect of much of them. He doesn't typically feel much of anything, and he'll continue to not feel much of anything as soon as he can get back on them.

One of the women later finds him hunched over a table, making small, hysterical noises. There's a glass of wine and a jug of water on the table; she can't tell if he's laughing or crying. When she asks what happened, he glances at the glass and says in a voice like a dull razor, "Well, it's been done."

After that, they gently suggest he stay away from sharp objects.

Still, he refuses to have a mental breakdown in the middle of a citywide crisis -- if he's going to indulge (which he very well might) it will have to be at a more convenient time. Compartmentalization it is.

Wolfgang puts himself to work immediately. He can be useful. He has combat experience, specialized training. He has magic, apparently, although he hasn't really felt out the limits of what he can do (he is very afraid that the answer may be everything), there are a few things that come in immediately useful. It is very strange to think of himself as telepathic, but that's the word they use. He can listen for danger and hear people in need of help all without even stepping outside. He can imprint simple but strong impulses in the walls of the building itself, calm the hysterical, reduce the pain of the injured. Boil water, grow food, keep the light and heat on when the power occasionally goes out. So many useful little things. They don't always work the way he intends -- he finds, with great chagrin, that magic never quite wants to do what he wants it to do -- but it's serviceable.

Mostly, he looks after the children. They like him, especially the very young ones who aren't quite grown enough to understand what's going on -- he keeps them calm and entertained and out of their parents' hair for a while. He runs into a family he used to sit for in Bonetown and the little girl runs up, punches him in the leg, shouts "That's for missing my recital!" and stomps off to a corner to pout. He spends the next half hour sitting through an extremely dramatic reenactment of her big solo, interjecting with the appropriate amount of reverent awe for her skill and wit, while her mother finally gets a few private moments in the bathroom. Her eyes are red when she comes out; he doesn't mention it.

As the infestation goes on, though, it becomes clear to him that he can't stay here the entire time.

Or rather, that he won't.

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Wolfgang's sense of relief when they burn is visibly palpable -- the strange tugging sensation he felt looking at them, like water circling down a drain, stops abruptly. He feels a lot better knowing they won't just be lying around for someone to stumble into.

"Do you get paid for this?" he asks, apparently on the same track with that line of thought; if she doesn't, she ought to. He's eyeing her gun. "I don't suppose someone's out there handing those out." He can dream, okay.

(...Actually, maybe he'll skip the dreaming. He'd rather not wake up and discover he is also secretly an alien or something.)

Steph laughs, "God no, my life would be a lot easier if I did." Although she'd probably feel guilty about it, not that guilt makes sense. People in the army get paid to protect people, so do cops, but somehow accepting a wage for being a vigilante seems odd.

"I had to break into someone's lab and pay then 45 marks for this," Sorry about that, Rex. She gives Wolfgang an appraising look, "It doesn't really seem like you need a weapon."

"Well, someone ought to start up a fund." They can call it the Buy Superheroes Sandwiches fund, or something.

He looks down at himself, surprised, because in his opinion he's doing pretty shit at this... but then again, he is still alive. "Hitting things in the head is usually more reliable." That's really something he would rather know in theory and not practice, thanks Baedal. "And the, um..." He wiggles his fingers, apparently indicating magic, because he is a super dignified wizard, "thingy is new."

"Some of 'em have... sponsors," That's sort of a word for it, right? Bruce Wayne publically supports the Justice League, and she remember Tim talking about how the Outsiders used to have employers, "But there's not a huge demand for a kid running around dressed like a bat." She might be selling herself a little short, but the self-deprecation isn't really serious; it's just an automatic thing these days.

"Do you think this whole world-falling-apart stuff had anything to do with it?" Steph would make silly hand gestures too, if she randomly discovered she was magic one day.

'Sponsors' makes it sound a bit more like a sugar daddy relationship, but maybe that's just his weird mind. Pause. He eyes her costume. "Can I ask about that, by the way, or is it too weird?" Boldly going where even Martel won't, evidently.

As far as his magic... he frowns and shrugs. "Maybe." It was almost certainly the final push for his Awakening, but he doesn't even want to think how long this has been building.

Please don't say that outloud, Wolfgang, Steph would have to bleach her brain. But she just shrugs, "Sure, what exactly do you wanna know? Although I might have to be vague on some details. The mask is for a reason." It's been weird to get used to people having no idea what a superhero is, but she's working on it.

"It came at a good time. I mean, as good as any time can be to wake up one day and have powers," At least now he's got a way to fight against the monsters that keep falling into Baedal.

If it had been someone else Shrieky might not have immediately recognized them, hair and clothes disheveled and bloody as they were. Wolfgang happened to be particularly distinctive, however, and he was one of the citizens of Baedal who Shrieky had more or less committed entirely to memory.

By contrast, Shrieky looked implausibly well. His clothes were a little torn, and a little dirty, from a few falls he'd had while in the process of fleeing the Murlocs in Rex's lab, but there was no blood on him, he wasn't armed, and he didn't look anywhere close to as afraid as he really should have done. Nevertheless, the sight of Wolfgang draws an expression of open relief onto his face. It's good to know that even if everyone else he knows has vanished or died, there is still Wolfgang.

"Hi." He replies, grinning openly now, as he steps forward, a little unsteadily. A thought occurs to him, and the smile slips slightly into a more concerned expression, "All of the blood on you, it's not yours, is it?"

Will's ready when they rush him, at least, once they get around the smoking mass of their erstwhile companion, aiming his pulse blasts at strategic places – they won't be so fast if he takes the limbs off, he figures, but right now they're still coming. He only has a moment to bee surprised – that's Wolfgang – before he has to focus on retreating, moving backward as quickly as he can while keeping up a steady fire. He doesn't think he wants to turn his back on these things.

"Mm?" He glances down at himself, at his hands, looking a little... vague, but that's rather normal for him. "Oh. Well, not most of it." He doesn't sound too worried about it -- at most, he's got a couple shallow scratches, and considering how many close calls he's had so far...

He's going to try not to think about close calls. Fuck this city.

"Are you okay?" Shrieky looks all right, but it can be hard to be sure, and he is definitely not a healer. It's the most useful thing he can't remember how to do with magic, irritatingly.

"Why a bat?" Really, that's what you're going to focus on? Honey. As far as weird things go, superheroes are way down at the bottom of his list right now -- they only exist where he's from in movies and comic books, but the idea makes more sense than, say, the presence of enormous flesh-eating, magic-casting dragons. Or whatever else is here right now.

"They'd be more convenient if they came with an instruction manual." Well, now he just sounds grumpy. He sighs and runs a hand through his hair, stops and makes a face when his hand comes away sticky. Welcome to impractical hair problems.

They're much slower with their limbs blown off, but still doggedly persistent. One of them falls, legless, to the ground and still tries clawing its way after him, but it's not a threat unless anyone trips into it right now. The other, still upright and bleeding that rotten-smelling blood profusely, is aiming to take a chunk out of Will's leg if it can reach him.

Wolfgang stands staring at what used to be a roughly human-sized body and is now a smear all over the sides of the alley (and all over himself) before he realises, hi, shots are still being fired. He lurches forward to retrieve his weapon and gets out of the way, flattening himself against a wall. His wrist is still bleeding and the way he bursts the downed szlachta is a lot more controlled than the other one.

Still super gross, though.

At every opportunity since the universe cracked open, Olivia's been venturing out of the Inn to patrol the streets. Maybe she can't fix the problem - an unsettling feeling for her in itself, when back home she'd have Walter in the lab, Peter at her back, figuring out a way to put all this right - but she can take care of some of the monsters roaming the streets, maybe make it a little safer for people to step outside their homes.

She's moving cautiously, gun held low and at the ready. The streets are empty enough, with people reluctant to risk being eaten, that she can hear certain kinds of trouble coming from some distance away - and this particular trouble is no exception. A screech splits the air, and if Olivia doesn't quite take off running toward it, it's only because she'd rather not turn a corner and run straight into some monster's teeth.

That changes at the sudden burst of emotion, almost impossible to distinguish from her own at first. She stumbles, vision shimmering momentarily with flickers of golden light, before she manages to shove it down, draw a breath to steady herself, and start running for the sound of the commotion, the sense of urgency spurring her on despite certain rational concerns about what she might be charging into.

When she skids around the corner and can actually see the source of the commotion, the bird has its head in the alley; all she can see at first is an enormous mass of feathers, and nothing of whoever or whatever it has cornered. Olivia's not going to give it any more of a chance to get at its prey.

"Hey!" she calls to get its attention, her gun snapping up to level at the creature. She's going to need it to turn toward her before she can be sure any shot at it would have a chance of killing it... and she can only hope that she's quick enough to take it down before it comes after her.

"They're scary," Criminals are a superstitious and cowardly lot, or so she's heard, "I'm the third Batgirl, so I didn't come up with the name or the emblem. Or the ears." She points to the ears, her expression amused because seriously. Those ears.

"You should talk to someone when this all blows over, there are plenty of people around who might know a little about what you can do," the first person she thinks of is Martel; he always seems to know what he's doing. She looks sympathetic in response to his hair situation, "You should braid it, if you're gonna be running around fighting monsters."

Says the girl with her hair sticking out the back of her cowl -- although at least it's away from her face. And she does braid it when things get really serious.

It nearly gets him – it probably would have, if Will didn't have the ability to sense its movements quite before it makes them. By the time he's out back in the middle of the thoroughfare it's down, struggling on the ground with mismatched limbs. It's enough for him to take a breath and stand still, glancing over to make sure Wolfgang's still alive. He's not sure what he has over there – maybe some kind of small explosive? – but it seems to be working.

“You okay?”

Shrieky follows the glance down, quickly and efficiently reminding himself that yes Wolfgang, does look like he might have injured in some significant capacity, and it's not just Shrieky being irrationally concerned. "Not most of that blood, still leaves quite a lot of leeway for how much blood may no longer be in your body..."

He reaches out to give Wolfgang a very gentle pat on the arm. Keep your blood inside your body. That's his recommendation.

"I'm fine. I was staying with Doctor Lewis, but some froggish monsters broke in, and I lost him when we ran." Shrieky glances back towards the house, a little guiltily, then shrugs, "I was looking for people, but I believe they've taken up hiding somewhere."

Wolfgang inches away from the crispy (oh, God) body on the ground closer to the mouth of the alley. He could help, he's sure, but they're moving fast and he's afraid whatever he's doing -- because he is not exactly sure what he's actually doing -- might not be contained to the ghoul. Will's fine, anyway, he notes with relief when he watches him shoot it down until it finally stops moving. Dead or just subdued? He's not sure.

He looks like Carrie at the prom. And also like he's going to be sick; the combined smell of rotten and burnt flesh is making some kind of awful horror cocktail. He nods mutely, a hand hovering over his mouth.

Thanks for the advice, Dr. Mermaid. He'll take it to heart. He waves a hand vaguely, shaking his head. "It's fine." He feels fine. Then again, he tends to push himself beyond what's reasonable, which is probably why he's carrying a weapon that weighs about as much as he does.

"That would be smart. It's so quiet here, I can't... tell if that is good or bad." Good because it's not infested with giant mutant landwalking sharks, bad because that doesn't mean that nothing is here. There could be something even worse lurking around the area that's scaring everything else off.

Now that he's said it, he's probably jinxed them. What a lovely thought, that.

"Do you have somewhere to go?" He's not even sure if there is anywhere safe to go in the area. Especially not here; a cursory glance around tells him the area's pretty well abandoned.

Will shifts his weapon to his other hand, carefully moving around the downed creatures. He'll have to keep an eye on them to make sure they don't spontaneously reanimate or something – that happened once, earlier; it was great. He slides around until he's close enough to Wolfgang to put one careful, gloved hand on his shoulder, making sure to stay out of the line of fire should he actually throw up. “We should get back to base camp and get you cleaned up,” he says, and he's talking a little like he used to talk to his youngest sister when she got into scrapes and hurt herself, but only a little. This is about as far from that as they could get.

Wolfgang waits a couple beats to make absolutely sure he's not going to be sick. Swallows thickly. "Yeah." He peels off his sweater as he steps out, using the relatively cleaner inside of it to wipe the worst of it off his face and hands, breathing through his mouth, when he stops up short. "Shit, there's -- survivors, I. Should let them go."

... He hopes he can undo it. No, he's pretty sure he can undo it. (He hopes.)

"Did you see which way they went?"

“Some people passed me back that way – it's why I came this way.” It takes a moment for the rest of it to catch up to Will and then he pauses, eyebrows furrowing. He's not sure if he heard that right, and even if he did, he has no idea what it means. “Let them go?” he repeats.

"Fair enough," he says, giving the costume a considering look. The ears, after all, are pretty silly, but without them she'd look less like a bat and more like a chick with a cape. "It probably helps, um, when it's not the middle of the day."

It's a nice day. Or it would be, if it weren't for all the horrible death.

"Mm." He fully plans on ignoring all this and pretending it doesn't exist as soon as this invasion crap blows over. Denial is fun! "I keep losing hair ties, I swear," he says as he wipes his hands off on his pants. Pretty much everything he wears is ruined by the end of the day anyway; Baedal's dry cleaning businesses are going to be having a very good month if they all survive this.

"Yeah, it's designed for night time and creeping in the shadows and stuff. I always feel a bit silly running around in this get up during the day," And in a place where people apparently think it's a sex thing. At least no one's said that out loud to her, although she's gotten a lot of odd looks. Thank god she doesn't have a costume like Black Canary's, or Starfire's.

"Here," Steph fishes in one of the pouches on her belt and pulls out a little ball of hair elastics. She takes one off and offers it to Wolfgang, "I'm seriously considering just shaving all mine off so I don't have to worry aout it." This is so untrue, and probably a bit of a terrible joke, but that's how Steph rolls.

The bird -- because it does appear to just be a giant bird, white all over, with an eye as big as a human head -- is distracted by the noise, pulling back and flap-hopping awkwardly to try and turn to face her. It's fast and deadly in the air but ungainly on the ground, not able to walk on those massive talons, and with a wingspan that surpasses the width of the street. If it manages to launch itself into the air, then they're both in trouble.

On the plus side, it makes a gigantic target. Hard to miss.

Wolfgang can hear someone else out there but he can't see Olivia from back here; he desperately hopes whoever that is has some kind of weapon and isn't running in blind, and more than that he hopes they can use it. Still, there's a flood of relief at the chance, one that pulls back almost immediately as he stops broadcasting. He can barely haul himself to his feet, still trying to catch his breath, but he won't come out as long as that roc is still alive; he's useless right now.

"Oh. Okay." He gazes off that way for a moment, a little vaguely, before he shakes his head and snaps out of it. It has been a hell of a day. "Thanks, um. By the... way. Nice shooting." A little awkward, but it's not like this happens every day.

As far as his choice of words, Wolfgang winces and shakes his head. "Don't ask." Because it's majorly weird, and there are some very real ethical concerns about it, but... everyone here is alive, that's preferable to the alternative.

He heads off in that direction, steady on his feet as the adrenaline still hasn't left him. He can sort of feel them the closer he gets, although he's not reading their thoughts so much as is generally aware of the presence of them, the strong emotional currents. When he gives someone a compulsion to run and hide, they run and stay hid until he takes it away. Two men, neither of whom were equipped to fight monsters -- one elderly, the other probably his son, neither armed. Wolfgang stays back because he kind of looks terrifying right now, but he's relieved to discover that taking back that hide impulse is pretty simple. The two men come out slowly, shakily, a little dazed but none the worse for it.

In fairness, the bondage fetish gear aspect is probably also not Steph's fault, Bruce. You weirdo. He shrugs. "If it works, it works."

He can think of a couple reasons why someone might not want their face associated with this line of work.

Wolfgang smiles genuinely -- all teeth -- as he takes it. "Oh, thank you!" His hair takes a bit of wrangling to get pulled all the way out of his face -- it's thin, it just. Has a mind of its own. "I can't say I haven't had the same thought. But now that would just be quitting." You heard it here first, people, the real reason he refuses to cut it anymore is spite.

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