trans_9 | Reign of Destruction

"Good question." Dick arrived on scene and knelt, accessing one of the compartments on his boots. It came open, spilling out a couple of rebreathers. It would at least keep anybody who went in from dealing with too much smoke inhalation. He handed one to Dean. "That'll work better than cloth."

Fortunately, the cryo blast, when properly modified, could also make a handy fire extinguisher. Mordin, the rebreather of his armor already clipped into place, took up a position next to Dean with a nod.

"Have flame retardant. Think that it will prove useful in your endeavor." He prepped his omnitool. Preserve life. That was what he did. And the people inside very badly needed theirs preserved at the moment.

Dean grinned, all right, got some supplies, and even got some of the fire contained. Awesome.

He gave a thumbs up, and readied the rebreather on him, and grabbed the flame retardant. This felt good. Less on the hunting things for the moment, but still can save people.

"All right, Services was saying we got maybe six or seven people still in there. Some on the second floor, some on the third. We gotta move."

He then headed inside, and immediately noticed what could only be a pair of squid people who were stuck behind some debris in one of the apartments. He moved to clear a path for them to get out.

Edited 2010-06-23 21:36 (UTC)

Katara was glad to see that Dean was already forging ahead: that gave her time to continue to start putting out the fire. She had an idea that Aeneas would be doing the same too, but bringing the water to them in the first place would be a good start. Katara took a breath and started to pull more water for the house: it started to cool, but the problem was dealing with all the smoke. She was lucky: her BG training had helped her to regulate the fresh breaths she could nab, and ease Aeneas into the building.

But in a minute, she was going to have to go big and douse the whole building with water so that the structure didn't start to fall apart and further endanger them all. For now, she could make the first floor cooler.

"Can you help me?" She asked Aeneas.

Loren had grabbed one of the rebreathers, put it on, and followed Dean without hesitation, trusting on the others to douse the flames enough to be safe. Or at least, safer.

And really, even if they hadn't been there, she would have gone in anyway.

Dick glanced toward Katara, Aeneas and Mordin, nodding in acknowledgment before following Dean and Loren in. "I'm gonna head up to the next floor," he called after the other two. "I'm pretty light on my feet. I'll use my ring if I find anybody."

Aeneas cast a glance at Katara, eyes wide as they peered over his arm, expression obviously frightened. He wanted to help, desperately, but…but this heat…it sucked the moisture out of his lungs, made his ears shrivel, burned his eyes and chapped his feathers. Already he was having difficulty breathing, and he wasn’t even inside the building yet.

Not to mention that his water magic abilities, though heightened since he last used them during the Nightmare King fight, were still rudimentary at best, to the point where he could lift and shape water, direct it for a distance, maybe, change the temperature somewhat—but there was no water here. No moisture, no floating particles, no nearby sources, no water abilities. Aeneas would have to rely on Katara to bring the water to them.

…Nevertheless, it wasn’t like he could turn down her appeal. The alien gave a brusque nod of acknowledgement—he would’ve added the obligatory, ”I’ll do my best,” but his throat was too sore for any sort of vocalization. Instead he worked with what he was given, relishing in the brief waves of cold from the first floor as various measures were taken to douse the flames, using them as times to focus his mind, find something to work towards.

The quickest, most logical way to solve this seemed to be to just submerge the place, but that would take too much energy on both their parts, not to mention it might drown those that they were trying to save. Single ‘handfuls’ of water, though more effective, would be just as tiring and would take longer.

…Although…The smoke! That was it! Aeneas closed his eyes, willing the water Katara was bringing to evaporate, made easier by the very thing they were trying to quench; mass amounts of water vapor were less difficult to direct, and thus he bound them to the choking particles floating within. Soon the smoke would be turning into a heavy mist that slowly fell to the ground, cooling the area and depriving the flames.

Ever more smoke was produced. And already Aeneas was growing tired. Those inside needed to hurry…

Katara could see now Aeneas's idea. She couldn't believe she'd overlooked it! Now she started to bring more water into the house but allowing it to evaporate, and in a minute there was a fine mist falling. Aeneas had a great idea, he just needed help because the smoke was getting worse. There was no time to do this slowly, after all. It needed to happen now.

So Katara closed her eyes, taking a deep breath. She started to move her arms back and then forward, as if she were bringing up waves. At first, it looked as if nothing was happening. A moment later, the water that was flowing slowly coming into the house was starting to get bigger as she drew more water from around her. Now her brought her hands up and down, gathering it and yet holding it back. Just when the water looked as it was going to crash dangerously against the house, it evaporated inside, and with Aeneas's assistance, it was just enough to cover the whole house.

She only hoped that the building was still intact enough for it to be an easy job.

Edited 2010-06-24 02:50 (UTC)

Having made the necessary adjustments, Mordin plunged ahead of the others, spraying wildly at the base of the flames with his improvised fire extinguisher. There was no way he could lift the rubble to help the trapped aliens, but he could do his best to keep the flames away. He acknowledged Nightwing's departure with a nod and got back to concentrating on his work.

"Suggest haste. Unclear how much longer building will be structurally sound."

Dean was making his way through, though at one point some of a doorframe landed on him. He crumbled to the floor for a moment, and it took him a moment to get the debris off so he could be standing. Bruises, but ok so far. He then went to open a door, and hissed at the hot doorknob. He sprayed some retardant, and finally got the door open, only to be knocked back by the backdraft. He was singed in a few places, luckily the rebreather was still intact, and coughed a few times as he sprayed more retardant. The mist also had a chance to get in to cool things down. He found a large truck driver, barely conscious in the bathroom, and was able to help him to the front before taking to the stairs. They were unsteady, but just held his weight.

On the other side of the street, well away from the structure they were all focusing on, another building burst into flame. Its residents fled, screaming, through doors and windows, and then a wall simply disintegrated, revealing an eight-foot tall Ohm. It spat a globule of something at one of the fleeing civilians, who screamed and fell to the ground as the acid began eating away at their flesh.

Katara had been concentrating on the house, and so far, so good: she and Aeneas were maintaining the temperature of the building a bit, and Dean and the others were starting to get the other people out of the debris. When she heard the crackle of MORE fire and MORE heat, she turned her attention outside: and saw it. It was an eight foot powerhouse, and it was already attacking and burning through a civilian. Katara made a noise in her throat, than turned to Aeneas.

"Please handle this! I'll be back!" She said, anxious to stop this new enemy.

Stop the enemy.

She looked at the sky a moment, staring at the moon that gave light to this planet, then at the enemy about to spit out more acid globs. She took a breath, because this was actually going to take quite a bit of strength, and she hoped that some of the people in this party would see what she was doing and finish it off. It was armored fairly well, and chances are not stopped, it would have started burning more buildings. She closed her eyes, and her heels started to dig into the dirt as she outstretched a hand toward the Ohm. Her eyes were focused, her head clear.

One minute, the Ohm was about to start advancing on some civilians: the next it was stuck in place, struggling to move but could not. A good twenty feet away was Katara, sweating and trying to keep that Ohm from getting up again. The Ohm was now getting a dose of the one method of bending Katara could only do during a full moon: bloodbending.

Now it just needed to be attacked in this state.

Edited 2010-06-24 12:55 (UTC)

Loren was oblivious to the Ohm attacks. The only thing she was focusing on now was getting up the stairs and to the trapped survivors. The heat was smothering and she didn't want to think how much smoke she would have inhaled if she didn't have the rebreather.

"CAN ANYONE HEAR ME?" But the fire drowned out most of her shout.

One thing about Batman was that he put the Boy Scouts to shame. 'Always be prepared' wasn't just a motto, it was a way of life. So the other boot had fire repellent. It wasn't easy to ignore the smell of burning plantsuit, but he did his best. The floor shifted uneasily underneath him, giving way just as he spotted a bar that he was able to jump to. And that he used to swing to a more reliable bit of the floor.

He crouched a moment, listening through the fire and the sound of the rebreather. It took a moment for him to hear anything over it. Turning, he tried to pinpoint the sound of yelling and finally started running toward the sound of it, stopping in front of a door. The screams were definitely coming from behind it. He could pick out three voices, though ages were harder to determine. Not that it mattered, anyway.

"Stay near the floor," he shouted, looking at the door. "And I need you to back away from the door." Dick really hoped Stacy's translation program or whatever it was was still working. The screaming did quiet some and he had to take it that the owners were following his orders.

Nodding to himself, Dick took a step back and kicked the door in, then had to drop as smoke billowed out of the room. That wasn't good. He started crawling forward, looking around to try to find the owners of the voices, which seemed to be mostly crying now. "It's okay," he said, reaching out and finding a small hand. "We'll get you out of here. How many are here?"

There was more sniffling and the hand turned to clutch his. "My brother and sister. And Wuffles."

"Wuffles?"

"Our cat."

Dick took a breath and nodded. "All right. Let's find your siblings and the cat and we'll get you out of here.

It took a few minutes to gather the others. Luckily, the other two were quite a bit smaller than the oldest. Dick gathered them up, having the oldest hold on to his neck while he grabbed up the smaller kids. The little girl held the kitten against her chest. Dick busted out the window, using a decel line that he shot up on the roof to give them a way down. "You know, I really wish this was the first time I'd ever done this," he said as they got to the ground, getting the kids down. "Come on, this way. We need to get you guys evacuated." And he needed to get back into the fire to check on the others.

Aeneas let out an odd sort of squeak, wincing as his throat stung. There was no sense in him trying to talk at this point, so instead he resorted to giving Katara a worried, pained sort of look, as if to say, ”—What? Me, take care of all of this? Are you serious? What could possibly—?”

The alien turned around and got his answer. It was not the one he was hoping for.

A surge of fear-induced adrenaline increased Aeneas’s abilities by several times, despite the fact that he was utterly exhausted and unable to keep up the wave-making that had been so useful to keep a steady mist on the back edge of the house. But at least the others were starting to get people out; several adolescent creatures and their cat were the first ones to make it to the bottom, escorted by one of his shipmates clad in an odd uniform. Aeneas motioned at them to come closer with a wave of his tail, mandibles cracked open to cool his chapped windpipe, managing a trill over the roar of the flames and the shrieks of the Ohm behind him:

“—They can stay with me until we evacuate the others, it might be dangerous to send them off to the shuttles in such small groups,” he insisted hurriedly, eyes squinted shut with discomfort and concentration, “You should go back in and continue helping the others. Please.”

The floors were unsteady the further up he got. Dean was trying to listen for any cries.

"Anybody still in here? Where are you?" He yelled to any possible remaining residents. He got near one of the blown out windows, and his eyes widened. He hoped his commlink still worked as he barked, "We got Ohm coming, repeat, Ohm. We need to get everybody out here now!"

He turned to move, and that's when the section of floor under him collapsed.

"Dean!" Loren had just returned from guiding out one of the occupants. She tried to run over to him but there were flames in the way. "Dean, are you O.K.?" She looked around a bit, then found one area where the fire was not as bad. She covered herself with the extra cloth she had been given and dove in.

Dick had gotten the message, of course, then heard the sound of the floor going through the comm. He nodded to Aeneas, pushing the children that direction. "You'll be safe with him," he told them before shaking out the rebreather to clear it and heading back into the fire on Loren's heels. "Any idea where he was?"

A floor down, and there was for the moment, an unconscious hunter. One of his legs was at a weird angle, suggesting a break. Possibly multiple, there was numerous bruising, and if Dean had been awake, he would have heard the crack also as two of his lower left ribs broke. Luckily the mist had drawn the fire away, but there was still some smoke, and he lost his rebreather. He would be unresponsive for a bit if not longer.

No help yet, and Katara gritted her teeth. They were still working on getting everyone out of the house, and that was going to cost her: this Ohm was still putting up a resistance even though it had no idea why its movement was so restricted. Katara might be a lot stronger now, but if she had to keep holding down an Ohm like this, it would start to diminish pretty rapidly. So she was going to have to improvise.

She took a deep breath, steadying herself. Bloodbending took quite a lot of concentration, and was something she had only done with humans before. Luckily for her, the Ohm's body actually needed quire a bit of water, so it wasn't immune. What she HAD noticed was that spit and what it was doing to that civilian. She closed her eyes, steadied herself, and then rammed the Ohm to the ground as hard as she could. If it didn't get up, she was racing back to help the others in the fire.

If it did get up...it went without saying she had a lot of work to do.

Loren let out a short cry as the heat of the fire burned her skin but she made it through otherwise unscathed. "There!" Loren spotted Dean and made her way over to him. She grit her teeth together as she passed through yet more fire and had to smother some flames that had spread to her pants legs before getting to Dean.

"Dean? Dean, can you hear me?" Ducking low, she took off her own rebreather to place it over his mouth so he could briefly get some oxygen.

Dick followed Loren through, having to pat at his own clothing before he knelt. He picked up Dean's rebreather, shaking it slightly before shaking his head. "We'll need to get him out. He can't keep it in his mouth when he's unconscious."

He looked Dean over quickly before nodding and handing Dean's rebreather and his last ~~Bat~~ fire repellent capsules to Loren. "It'll probably be easier if I carry him. I'll need you to make sure we have a path out, though." The building was rapidly falling down around their ears. If they didn't get out of here soon, all three of them would probably burn.

Loren nodded, reattached her own rebreather, and then put Dean's over his mouth. "Alright, let's get him up. Loren grabbed Dean by the arms and lifted him up as much as she could, trusting on Dick to take him from there.

This wasn't going to be comfortable for Dean in the least. Especially since they didn't have time to check for injuries. He knew what he could probably expect, so he did his best to be careful of ribs and arms. But Dean was a good few inches taller than Dick, which made picking him up unwieldy as hell. "Sorry, Dean," he said, working his shoulder into the other man's stomach and lifting him into a fireman's carry. "Right. Let's get moving, quick as possible."

"Don't need to tell me twice." Loren said, trying to scout out an escape route. "Alright, follow me."

Reign of Destruction

Re: FIRE

Re: FIRE

Re: FIRE

Re: FIRE

Re: FIRE

Re: FIRE

Re: FIRE

Re: FIRE

Re: FIRE

Re: FIRE

Re: FIRE

Re: FIRE

Re: FIRE

Re: FIRE

Re: FIRE

Re: FIRE

Re: FIRE

Re: FIRE

Re: FIRE

Re: FIRE

Re: FIRE

Re: FIRE

Re: FIRE

Re: FIRE

Re: FIRE

Re: FIRE

Re: FIRE

Re: FIRE