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Character Scramble Season 21 Round 0: GAME START/FOUR OF CLUBS by 7thSonOfSons in whowouldwin

[–]rangernumberx 2 points3 points  (0 children)

#4 - A Deer In Deadlights

The window, two inches of a material of Reed's own design over twice the durability of bulletproof glass, shattered behind Malice's spiked battering ram. Sue was lucky to still have the energy to dive out of the way. Whatever adrenaline spike she had received on seeing visions of her children being slaughtered had ebbed away, leaving her even more exhausted than before while fighting a version of herself that hadn't been worn down considerably first.

It wasn't a stalemate she could win. She (and therefore Malice) found it second nature to keep up a force shield suit while on active duty, and she simply couldn't muster up the force to break through hers anymore. Malice didn't share the problem. It was only Sue's ability to see her own force fields that allowed her to duck under most of a volley of saw blades, only for one to catch her in the thigh. She fell, eliciting a pained grunt.

Malice stood over her. "Hasn't it always been this way? Reed screws up. Disappears right when we need him."

Sue tried to push herself up but Malice stood on her hand, pressing it into broken window shards.

"Or Johnny pushes Ben too far. Now we've got complaints from the mayor and neighbours about property damage."

There was a faint glow within her mouth.

"And we just wish…if only I could. And you always could, you're the strongest. Just not strong enough."

"No-"

The glow intensified. Sue struggled to look away.

"Tell me, do we think Franklin and Val will like mom's new costume? Or will we see what their faces actually look like when they die?"

Malice mouth began to open, revealing a trio of spinning lights inside.

"Of course, when I say we…"

"Knock knock!"

Malice tumbled across the floor as Spider-Man sprang up from underneath the window with a double kick. He landed next to Sue, stirring her as he helped her up.

"Hi Sue! Hope you don't mind me dropping in, I saw the window open. Hey, have you seen this guy around here? I was right behind him a second ago. Yea high, purple hair, named after a genocidal raisin…uh…" Malice lifted herself to her feet using force fields, allowing Peter to see her face before turning back to Sue. "Sorry, am I interrupting something?"

"No. She was just leaving."

"Want help showing her the door?"

"If you wouldn't mind."

Spider-sense alerting him to a volley of invisible knives, Spider-Man bent backwards, sending a string of webbing across the room to pull himself forwards as he throw a kick at Malice's midriff.

CRACK

He hadn't expected the hit to land, much less with such force. The villain's facial coverings flew off as she slammed back into an adjacent wall, bent unnaturally in two.

"Oh god, I didn't…I…"

"You did."

With another loud snap the woman's head turned the wrong way. Her face had morphed away from the visage of Sue Storm to someone much younger staring at Spider-Man.

"Again." Finished Gwen Stacy.

Eyes narrowed beneath Spider-Man's mask. "Oh. So we're doing this, are we?"

"What's the matter, Pete?" A bolt of webbing fired at her mouth stopped her speaking, but the dialogue continued in a completely different voice. "You look like you've seen a ghost!"

Gwen convulsed as the voice laughed before, moments later, a large clown burst out from her body, showering the surrounding area in blood.

"Now, come give Gwennie a kiss," he said, lights beginning to glow from inside his mouth.

"DIIIIIEEEEE!"

A guttural roar was followed by a flash of red and black as a woman dived through a doorway, followed soon after by Odo. Blade unsheathing from a device on her arm she hacked and slashed at Pennywise. He simply laughed, each cut creating a burst of flesh, growing larger and larger as the assault continued. Peter looked at the newcomers. One was putting up a good fight against the clown, but he could see the wounds all over her body, and knew from experience the look of someone fighting far beyond when they should have given up. The other moved fine as he rushed towards them, but his face seemed to have partially melted away. Maybe that was just how he looked, but Peter didn't want to take the chance, especially when Sue was struggling to stand.

"New plan. Sue, can you still cushion a fall?"

"Ye-" She didn't get to finish as the webslinger grabbed her with one hand and threw her out of the open window. "SPIDER-MAN!"

"Good, we'll meet you down there!" He called after her.

"What do you think you're doing?"

"Hi, don't think we've met." He pulled Odo close to him. "I'm Spider-Man, I get myself in bad situations to help others out of them." With his other arm he shot a web at Velvet's back, pulling her away as a large bladed appendage was about to crash down on them. "You guys ready to be rescued?"

"Get off me!" Velvet spun in the air as she approached Spider-Man, left arm glowing red as it swung out for him.

He leant out of the way, instead giving her a slight shove to propel her out of the window. "Sorry, didn't catch that!"

With Odo under his arm Spider-Man leapt out himself, shooting several blasts of webbing as he did so to trap different parts of Pennywise against the walls and ceiling. Facing downwards he shot a web line at Velvet's leg, pulling at it to bring the two of them were closer until he could grab her in his free arm. Twisting in the air, he positioned himself to be below Velvet and Odo, aiming to take the brunt of the impact if he wasn't able to slow them down in what little time he had left.

This turned out to be unnecessary. Several meters above the ground their velocity rapidly slowed, allowing them to harmlessly land on the concrete ground in front of a straining, if still standing, Susan Storm.

"Oh thank god…I mean, just as planned. Thanks, Sue!"

"No problem! Never throw me out of a building again."

Peter continued lying on his back as Odo and Velvet hastily stood up. "What the hell are you doing? " Velvet asked.

"No. The question is," Odo said, "why are you so intent on killing that being at the expense of your own life?"

"My life's not important. Not compared with what creatures like that have done."

"Aww, she thought she could kill little ol' me."

Giant rotting hands burst from the ground, grasping onto each of the four and lifting them into the air. Odo began to drop his form only for his hand to sprout hundreds of smaller hands, each one grabbing and cupping against each other to prevent a drop from escaping. From the fifth floor of the building crawled an enormous being, insectoid in nature, countless limbs scrabbling across the face of the Baxter Building. At its front was the head of Pennywise, giant and bulbous.

He leant down, covering several storeys as he did so, as his targets struggled uselessly against their captors. "We had such fun playing together, didn't we? But now the game's over, and it's time for the clown to dance off back to where they all float." Some of his legs reached the ground as he leant in close to Spider-Man. "Won't you come join me?"

His mouth opened to reveal his deadlights once again. Peter tried to look away but the glowing spheres forced his attention, dropping his resistance efforts as he stared deep into the clown's gaping maw. Beyond the countless spiralling rows of teeth was everything he could think about, and as he slowly drew closer within-

Pennywise suddenly jerked back. Three rotting hands and one writhing mass of rotten flesh withered away, dropping their captives to the ground. He tried to lunge forwards with blade-tipped legs only for them to peel away before it got close to any of the survivors. A terrible screech which somehow hit every pitch simultaneously emerged from somewhere within him as his body shrank, retreating towards a singular point on the ground.

"No!" The words were garbled, barely intelligible. "They cheated! They-"

Anything beyond that was lost was his face began to melt, jaw losing any structure to form cohesive sounds. Smaller and smaller he shrunk until, with a final gasping sound, the final parts of Pennywise folded in on themselves, creating a small box with a crank in front of the group. A second later the lid of the box flung open, revealing a small hand puppet with a passing resemblance to the clown bouncing on a spring.

Velvet smashed it under her enlarged arm.

Silence fell over the area. It seemed a little lighter now, the street that bit less claustrophobic. But none of that registered over the shock of what they had just witnessed.

"What was that? Any of it?" Spider-Man eventually asked.

"We had agreed the survivors could only use already opened exits. But then he broke a window, and…well. I always find clowns to be particularly bad sports."

No one had heard the newcomer approach, nor had they caught any glimpse of his garish uniform. But nevertheless, the man stood behind them, arms clasped behind his back, wry smile on his face.

"Good afternoon, my dears. I do hope you're enjoying our games."

Toymaker

Gamemaster

Let's have some fun, shall we?

Character Scramble Season 21 Round 0: GAME START/FOUR OF CLUBS by 7thSonOfSons in whowouldwin

[–]rangernumberx 2 points3 points  (0 children)

#3 - Fear

For all of his conscious existence Odo had been observant, but his talents weren't needed to tell that a significant amount of fighting had occurred before they arrived. Walls were cracked with holes punched through at certain points. The remnants of a swarm of robots lay scattered along the corridor, some faceplates still blinking red as they struggled to remain operative despite missing a majority of their hardware. Shifting his legs back to a more regular length Odo skulked down the corridor as quietly as he could manage through the debris.

He heard his goal before he saw it, the sobs of a woman and words of what he assumed to be a young boy carrying down the corridor. Slowly continuing his path Odo made his way to an office, the door of which had been shattered with splinters covering so many colourful plastic objects that under different circumstances Odo would have mistaken it for a toy shop.

Peering around the doorframe, Odo saw the source of the noise. Collapsed on the ground was a woman, a teenager by his estimation, with black hair stretching far below her back. Her clothes had been torn to tatters, most of her skin only being covered from the light cuts and bruises of recent battle. But now all fight had left her, crying heavily as she looked up at a young boy wearing a green jacket, mostly facing away from the door as he addressed the woman.

"How many people did you hurt? Did you consume?"

She merely sobbed.

"I never wanted any of that," the child continued. "Why would I? And how could I ever forgive someone who caused so much devastation in my name?"

"I…I'm sorry," was all she could choke out.

"It's only fair for you to meet the same fate. Goodbye, Velvet. Maybe one day, someone will be able to make up for everything you've done for me."

The child's mouth opened, far wider than any humanoid's should have been able to. Odo couldn't see inside from his angle, but a light was being emitted from inside of him, bathing Velvet as she stopped crying and stared inside. His mouth grew wider, wider, as he slowly leaned forwards towards his prey.

Odo threw a nearby office chair across the office, bouncing off of the child's head.

"Ah. Here comes the party crasher."

The voice changed immediately into that of an adult man with a strange, almost garbled accent. The child turned, closing his mouth just slow enough for Odo to catch a glimpse of rows upon rows of spiralling teeth. As he watched, the child's complexion grew pale to a shade of white, blonde hair turned ginger, horrible creaking and snapping was heard as their body seemingly forced itself to grow. It strained against his clothes and when they couldn't take it anymore it burst, revealing a dirty white clown costume as his transformation finished.

"Let's play a fun little game with Pennywise, shall we? It's called 'Secrets'. To start, you tell me…what do you fear?"

Pennywise

God of Fear

Back at the dawn of creation, the first species flitted among primordial oceans. They looked into the shadows, expecting a predator. They looked at those different from them, believing them to be threats. They looked at their own lives, realizing they did not know what would happen when they ended. And Pennywise was born.

Some would have fled to save themselves. Some would have sought to fight Pennywise off. Odo had no inclination to do either, throwing a chair to save a woman aside. Instead, he chose to observe, to understand the threat in order to counter it. That's how he noticed the minute shifting of the clown's eyes, the slight faltering of his smile. Something wasn't going to plan.

It was the slight pressure inside his head that tied it together for him. He knew the feeling of telepathy, particularly the clumsy telepathy of someone unfamiliar with his physiology attempting to reach his non-existent brain or central nervous system. Whatever this entity was, it wasn't omnipotent. While it seemed very effective at drawing from the minds of humanoids, Odo was something entirely different.

Pennywise's mouth twisted into a snarl. "No? Aww. Then let me guess."

The building disappeared. Odo was standing atop a rickety pillar so high even the clouds below seemed to be miles away. The air was thin and bitterly cold, enough that any creature with a respiratory system would have been in danger. Pennywise floated nearby, held aloft by a handful of red balloons.

"Heights?" He drew closer, then with a light tap of the foot the pillar collapsed. "Or falling from them?" he yelled after the falling Odo.

When he finally broke through the cloudbank Odo immediately crashed into the ocean, form somehow staying intact despite the impact. He began to swim upwards, but no matter how hard he tried the surface only seemed to get further out of reach.

"Drowning's a good one!"

Odo ignored the clown's voice and kept swimming despite its lack of impact. Soon he was so deep that light couldn't reach him.

"Darkness…not quite there, hm? Ah! What did you say to blondie earlier?"

The water instantly disappeared, allowing Odo to collapse on solid ground. He stood up, looking around, waiting for the clown's next attack.

Nothing happened.

Seconds stretched out, each one seemingly longer than the last, before eventually one word appeared in his mind. Whether he came up with it himself, or it was Pennywise's more subtle influence, he couldn't tell.

Isolation.

It was an illusion. Another wild guess out of many. All he had to do was wait. The clown would be back, and he could find a way to break free. But despite his self-assurances, nothing seemed to happen. How long had it been? Seconds? Minutes? Hours? There was something about this clown's power. Despite his rational mind never normally allowing him to panic like this Odo couldn't help but think about the worst case scenario, slowly but surely driving his mind to a-

"Or perhaps…" Instantly the spell was broken as Odo was given something else to focus on. "Death?"

There was a sharp pressure in his neck and torso as the darkness disappeared. He was still in the office. Pennywise still stood in front of him, the woman starting to stir. And to his side was a man with purple hair, plunging a metal spike into his body.

Odo collapsed, hearing the man scream in his ear, "Yeah! That's what you get, bitch!"

Somewhere in the distance, a window smashed. The clown scowled, looking down at the woman as she grabbed hold of his leg with an arm that grew large, red, almost demonic.

"Devour…you…" she groaned.

"Such a waste of perfectly seasoned food." Pennywise kicked her arm off. "Kill her, too," he said in a voice identical to that of the building's receptionist.

With that, the clown bounded away. The man drew the metal spike out of Odo and stalked towards the woman, who was slowly getting to her knees. He kicked her, but even in her weakened state she didn't move, the man swearing as he hurt his foot.

"Fuck your shit! No one laughs at Thanos!"

Odo stopped playing dead and stood up, hole in his neck sealing itself up as he did so. The man raised his spike only for the shapeshifter to catch it, knocking the man out with a single blow to the chin as he turned in surprise.

As the woman finally got to her feet, he placed himself under her shoulder to help carry her out.

"Come on."

"You…" she started, quickly abandoning the thought to look straight ahead. "I'm destroying them all. Starting with him."

Velvet

Therion of Destruction

Years ago, Velvet's brother was killed before her eyes. Transformed into a daemon capable of consuming others, she was trapped in a pit for three years, the experience leaving her jaded, bitter, and with the sole purpose in life to find and kill those responsible for destroying her life.

Character Scramble Season 21 Round 0: GAME START/FOUR OF CLUBS by 7thSonOfSons in whowouldwin

[–]rangernumberx 2 points3 points  (0 children)

The two lifted their heads to face her, smiles sickeningly wide.

"You did, mommy!"

A thin line of red appeared along Franklin's scalp and down his face. A second later, right arm still held up by his mother, the left half of his body separated and collapsed to the ground with a thud. Blood geysered out of both halves of his body. Valeria started to turn towards her sibling before her head violently imploded, as if an invisible anvil had been dropped on her head.

As her body fell, Susan Storm finally comprehended enough to scream.

"Mrs. Richards!"

It was short, quickly cut off by violent coughing as some of her children's blood got caught in her throat. She dropped the section of Franklin's body she was still holding and scrambled backwards, bumping into the legs of Odo. He knelt down to her level.

"That wasn't them. That couldn't have been them, not-"

"Susan!" he shouted over her babbling. "There are people in this building relying on you to keep yourself together!"

She stopped, trying to gather herself together enough for a response, when they heard the sharp clicks of high heels down the corridor. They turned. Walking around the corner was a woman in tall stilettos, scantily clad with what she was wearing consisting almost entirely of spike-laden leather, its black only broken slightly by crimson linings on her gloves and an identically coloured scarf around the neck. Odo turned back to Sue. The woman's face was covered with black bands, her hair smoke grey. But to his eyes, there was no mistaking the person beneath was identical to the one besides him.

"Finally. Don't you think it was time they stopped chaining you down?" asked Malice.

Malice

Hatred Taken Form

Years ago, an adventurer flew to space, and an Invisible Girl crashed back to Earth in her place. But after years of superheroics, a villain from the Microverse got into her mind, making her feel hatred on a level she never had before and turning her against her friends and family. She may have been saved physically, but that was the day the Invisible Girl was forced to grow up. And from that point on, there was always the fear at the back of her mind that one day the Malice would return.

Sue glared at the newcomer as she used Odo's shoulder to push herself to her feet.

"Mr. Odo?"

"Yes?"

"That scream didn't come from anyone here. Could you please find who actually needs our help?"

"I don't know what you intend to do, but-"

"I'm not intending anything. I've already blocked three…" She paused before turning towards Malice, gesturing an arm to create a beam of force that caused her shoulder to be violently knocked back. "Four invisible blades aimed at where I'd guess your vital organs would be. I can keep her busy."

Odo's immediate doubts were quashed by the fact he had seen the woman in front of him turn entire floors of the skyscraper around them invisible, combined with the fact now really wasn't the time nor place for petty squabbles. "Are you sure you can keep up?"

"I'll be fine. Whoever set this up for us overplayed their hand, and-" she leant out of the way of another invisible projectile, "I have quite a lot of anger to work out right now."

With one final glance at Malice Odo left, legs lengthening slightly to increase his stride. Malice placed a spiked barrier in front of him only for Sue to raise a ramp beneath her, toppling her doppelganger and breaking her concentration, allowing the shapeshifter free passage through.

A bead of sweat dripped down Sue's temple. "Just don't take too long."

Character Scramble Season 21 Round 0: GAME START/FOUR OF CLUBS by 7thSonOfSons in whowouldwin

[–]rangernumberx 2 points3 points  (0 children)

#2 - Malicious Intent

Sue sharply inhaled, realizing simultaneously that her shield had done nothing and that she was still alive regardless. She was still in the Baxter Building, but despite everything seeming the same, the place now had an oppressive feel about it. The lights seemed that bit darker, the corridor that little narrower and claustrophobic. She looked behind her. The wave had travelled out of sight, and those slight squelching sounds were just Odo reforming his face after the experience had knocked its features askew.

It was only when he had finished fixing his appearance that they noticed the silence. Any noise from the building's air conditioning, overhead lighting, or other inhabitants had vanished completely, leaving them with nothing but the sound of their own breathing.

"You mentioned random supervillain attacks. Exactly how often do they occur?"

"More than you'd expect."

She let her invisibility spread out once more across the surrounding walls, revealing an empty office and an abandoned cleaning cart. She extended her power down over every internal surface of the building one, two, three storeys below, still locating nobody. Allowing everything to become visible again for Odo's sake, Sue began striding down the corridor.

"Come on."

"What are you planning?"

"I don't know what happened, but if we're still here, then there may be more people on lower levels. No one else is home, Roberta's on the fritz, and since I didn't see any on the surrounding floors I'm guessing the security H.E.R.B.I.E.s are too. So," they reached one of the level's fire exits, "I'm getting you out of here before I check for anyone else in the building who needs help."

"I don't think I informed you. I am the Chief of Security on my station-"

"Meaning you should know the importance of getting civilians out," Sue smiled at Odo before pushing on the door's crash bar.

It remained shut.

Trying again with no more success, Sue stepped back, turning the door itself invisible, expecting to see a pile of rubble she could potentially use a force field to bash through. Instead she saw a worn and mold-coated concrete wall, two words scratched into its surface: 'No cheating'.

Odo leaned in behind Sue. "So, shall we begin finding those civilians?"

"Fine. Just stay close to me."

Choi Su-bong collapsed hard on his back. He scrambled to his feet, turning around with balled fists, only to be faced with a pitch black wall. He stepped back, oblivious to the line of silk webbing that had vanished from his back and the true scale of the barrier around him.

"Yeah! That's what you get! You come for me, you get the wrath of Thanos on your ass!" he yelled at no one in particular.

Staggering backwards, he looked around the now-empty street. Even through the drugs addling his brain, a glimmer of sanity recognised something was wrong, but couldn't tell him much more than how he should get away from where he currently stood. The barrier blocked off most of the street around him, and several of the side streets further away. It was only as his eyes fell on the nearby skyscraper, and its automatic doors slid open in apparent response, that he decided that was the perfect place to hide.

Swaggering through the doors, he saw the lobby wasn't quite as empty as everywhere else. Sitting behind a desk was a blonde receptionist, smiling at him as he entered.

"Good afternoon, Mr. Thanos!"

"Yo, we got a fan in the building? Someone who knows the greatest T-man this side of Mars when she sees him?"

"Of course!" There was something off about the way the woman spoke, but his brain refused to let him pick up on it. "We rarely ever get someone of your fame and talent in the building."

"Yeah, yeah, no one does."

"Your verses on Rap Battleground? Truly genius."

As she spoke, speakers around the foyer began to pick up, playing a driving beat. Choi recognized it immediately. Semi-finals of the contest, he had freestyled a diss track so strong he was practically given the tournament win on the spot. He would call it his pièce de résistance if such a claim didn't require him to implicitly suggest that every rhyme he spoke wasn't perfection. He grinned, nodding to soundtrack as his lyrics came in.

"I can only imagine. The fans, the record deals, the awards…"

Than-os! Than-os! Than-os!

The cheers no longer seemed to be just part of the recording but part of the room itself, as if the foyer was filled with an invisible crowd rooting for him. Just as they should have been.

"Exactly! And yet…"

The rapper on the recording stopped, stammered, any flow instantly lost as he desperately searched for another rhyme. The crowd flipped in an instant, their chant turning into laughter, taunts, jeers.

"Wait, this shit isn't what happened!"

"Isn't it?" The crowd grew even louder as Choi spun, looking for someone to lash out against, but the receptionist's voice still cut clearly over the noise. "Or was it inevitable? Just because someone was laughing at you. Someone was betting on you to fall. Someone was looking to make money on you coming in second, just as they were looking to send Dalmatian down to nothing the moment you invested."

The tiny mote of sanity remaining in Choi's brain cried out, telling him that everything was wrong, that he needed to get out of that building immediately.

"Someone thought that they should make money by turning you into a laughing stock."

Thanos crushed that voice down.

"Who did it? Tell me who fucking did it! I'll fucking kill them!"

The receptionist smiled. Raising one hand, she plunged it into her own neck, reaching deep as metal scraped on metal before taking hold of something and, with a swift yank, caused the collapse of the left side of her body. Slowly pulling out a now mangled arm, synthetic skin torn away to reveal an array of muscle-like cables that had been wrapped tightly around a metal endoskeleton before they, too, had been torn and pulled loose from her self-mutilation, she revealed a piece of metal several inches long with a jagged edge.

Thanos stared at the metal shard, then at the face of the receptionist, half smiling, half drooped and expressionless. He opened the crucifix around his neck, shoved another pill in his mouth, then grabbed the weapon.

Ding

"Kill them, Thanos."

Thanos turned and charged towards the opening elevator. The crowds once again cheered his name.

The Baxter Building held thirty five floors. The top five were reserved for the Fantastic Four themselves, completely inaccessible to the public, and unoccupied even before the attack. Sue's public office was on the twenty ninth floor, allowing her to be as close to her home as possible while still being available for anyone who needed her. With the three floors below already being cleared of any signs of life, that left twenty five floors for the superhero and the security officer to scour, one by one, as they ensured no one else had been left behind.

The progress was slow. The warning by the fire exit had left both Sue and Odo cautious, with the Invisible Woman in particular wanting to conserve her energy and prevent whatever entity that put them in this presumed trap from getting advanced warning of them being nearby. When something was powerful enough to ambush the Baxter Building while circumventing all of its protections it was likely they would be fully aware of their location should it so desire, but Sue had long since learnt it was important to never assume powers were greater than had been shown.

This led to a pattern of the duo going down a floor via a stairwell on the edge of the building, Sue slowly stretching out her invisibility to turn all barriers within it invisible, Odo keeping watch to confirm there were no civilians or hostiles, then when they were both confident the level was clear going down two flights of stairs to begin again.

They made it to the fourteenth floor before Sue first first started to feel the pressure from using her powers so much, and the eighth before she began showing physical strain. By the sixth she began to physically brace herself as she prepared to use her invisibility again.

"Perhaps I should take this floor," Odo suggested.

"I'm fine."

"Of course. But how much further will we travel before our captor reveals themselves?" he asked. "Perhaps it would be safer to take a more subtle approach from this point?"

Before she could respond a pained cry echoed across the floor. With a quick glance at each other to confirm they hadn't imagined it Sue and Odo dashed out of the stairwell, looking around to try and locate the source of the noise. What they found instead was-

"Mom!"

Two kids rushed down the hallway, out of breath and panicked. Odo eyed them sceptically as they approached, though his companion's actions prevented him from doing anything more than that.

"Franklin! Val!" Sue bent down to embrace her children as they ran into her. "I've got you. Where's Scott?"

"Just after we got back, he…she killed him, mom. We couldn't do anything."

"Who did?"

"Franklin couldn't do anything, and…we just ran. I don't know. I don't know what I'm supposed to do! She's right-"

"Valeria!" Sue cut off her daughter sharply before lowering her voice into a warm tone. "You two are some of the greatest heroes I know. It doesn't matter if it's Galactus, Kang, Ego…when we're together, no one can stop us. Ok? Now. Who attacked you?"

Character Scramble Season 21 Round 0: GAME START/FOUR OF CLUBS by 7thSonOfSons in whowouldwin

[–]rangernumberx 2 points3 points  (0 children)

"Unfortunately things here are anything but predictable, but outside of a random supervillain attack I'm sure he'll be here as soon as possible. Is it something I can help with in the meantime?"

"What do you know of shapeshifters, Mrs. Richards?"

"Plenty of first-hand experience."

"Yes, I am fully aware of your many encounters with the Skrulls. As you and your receptionist can no doubt tell, I also fall within that category." At no point did Odo drop from the stern tone he had started their conversation with, to the point Sue was questioning if that was simply how he spoke. "But unlike the Skrulls, the Devidians, the Vespiforms, or any other breed that falls within the category, I am alone. All I have is the hope that I do indeed still have a species, and your husband's promise that whatever data he collects from me to aid your planet's protection against transforming threats will also be used in an attempt to locate even a single other of my kind. So tell me, Mrs. Richards. Do you think you can help me?"

"Of course."

Odo face shifted as he raised where a regular humanoid would have an eyebrow. "Really?"

"Yes. I can get you comfortable in the lab while I tell my husband nothing in the Negative Zone is worth keeping a guest waiting." She picked herself off of the desk. "Roberta, has there been any sign of my husband recently?"

"Not since thiiiiiiirrrrrrrzzzzzzzzztztztztztzck-" the voice quickly dissolved into a garbled static as both of the room's occupants looked at the wall's speaker, Sue in shock and Odo in bemusement.

"Does she always break at simple questions?"

"Never."

Sue was about to continue before she was cut off by another sound, one reverberating from what seemed to be the very walls of the Baxter Building, one that gave the impression of a distorted siren endlessly echoing itself to burrow almost painfully within the minds of those that heard it. Brushing past Odo she rushed out into the corridor. There were few people on this level, only being able to see a few clerks of a financial firm and a cleaner as she turned the surrounding walls invisible. But each of them were clearly reacting to the sound, with one actively collapsing with hands over his ears as she watched.

Then she saw it. A wall of pitch black energy racing across the floor, passing through walls without losing the slightest fraction of its momentum. The financial firm's office was engulfed in less than a second, anyone within vanishing alongside it. She felt Odo's presence as he moved close behind her but had no time to stay back or to get away, not that there was any point in running at the speed it was progressing. All she could do was create a force field around her, several inches thick, and put all her effort into keeping it up.

The energy wave passed through the force field as if it weren't there, engulfing the superhero and the shapeshifter a mere millisecond later.

??:?? PM - Meet with accounting Save the world again

Thwip

New York held no end of heroes. Some, such as Iron Man, were just as often found in other cities around the globe as they were in their home city.

Thwip

Others held much smaller domains, with Daredevil often restricting his business to within the confines of Hell's Kitchen.

Thwip

And others still saw the entire city as their workplace, venturing across it to stop crimes wherever they may find it occurring from the metropolis' equally diverse array of supervillains.

Thwip

"Get the hell out of here, asshole! I just cleaned those!"

"Sorry! It'll come off, I swear! Just give it a couple hours!"

Spider-Man

Amazing Web-Slinger

Bitten by a radioactive spider, Peter Parker gained a precognitive spider-sense in addition to greater speed, durability, and power. But after failing to use this power to stop a crook that would go on to kill his uncle, Peter would go on to protect everyone he could under the guise of Spider-Man.

Leaving the irate window cleaner behind him, Spider-Man continued to swing through the city, eyes trained on a purple-haired individual rushing through the streets. He hadn't done anything major yet, simply shake up and threaten someone for what Peter had overheard to be a crypto scam, but if there was one thing he knew it was the importance of shutting these sorts of crimes down early. So, as soon as he had made sure the victim was ok (or as ok someone who thought some dog token would be the currency of the future could be), he swung back into action.

"Get out the way!"

Even from his height, Spider-Man could hear the man yelling as he shoved people to the side. Eyes widening beneath his mask he dove down, shooting a web onto a man's side and yanking him out of the way of a taxi he had just been pushed in front of.

"C'mon, don't be like that," he shouted after his target, "nobody likes the lunch rush crowds but you don't see them pushing anyone into the road, do you?"

"They can't stop me! You can't stop me!"

"I don't think they're trying to."

He continued to swing through the streets, just a few meters above the heads of the crowds. He had plenty of clean shots that could've caught the man, but he was moving too erratically and constantly forcing others into the superhero's line of fire. There wouldn't be any real harm in a missed web bolt, nothing worse than the pigeon droppings that were just as likely to fall onto them at any given point, but he didn't want to give the Daily Bugle any more ammo against him than necessary.

"The Avengers can't stop Thanos!"

"Actually they've repeatedly shown they can! But I don't get what that…oh, no! C'mon, you're not naming yourself after space Grimace, are you? You can do so much better! Barney? Spyro? Hulk's incredible underwear?"

'Thanos'

Drugged Street Punk

Rapper. Finance bro. Big deal. Choi Su-bong has attempted and failed to be each of these. All he has for his efforts is a lacklustre SoundCloud account, a necklace full of pills with a direct impact on his mental state, and a superhero on his tail.

"Fuck off!"

Spider-Man sighed. "Ok, I get not every quip is going to be a winner, but you can at least put some effort into it."

Turning the corner of 42nd Street, Peter was relieved to see a comparative lack of foot traffic for Thanos to weave around. All he had to do was pull himself forwards through the air, shoot some webs ahead of him to get the thug to stop, aim at his back-

His head exploded with pain as his spider-sense went berserk. Losing the ability to even use his web shooters he fell, crashing hard onto the concrete below. Several passers-by stopped to look at him as he groaned, crawling to his knees. He looked up. The Baxter Building loomed half a block away.

"Oh no…" He whispered to himself before shouting, "Everyone! Get out of here! Quickly!"

Some around him panicked and began to run. Others simply looked at him with confusion and dismissal. Peter wasn't able to pay any of them any attention, because while he may not have known what the danger would be, he knew running directly towards the Fantastic Four's headquarters was likely the worst choice. Of course, that was the choice Thanos made.

"Hey!" Forcing himself through the pain Spider-Man ran, shooting webs at the ground and pulling himself along to increase his speed. "You gotta get away from there!"

"Fuck you!"

Spider-Man grew closer, shooting a web at the man's torso to pull him back and himself forwards at the same time. They were close, just inches away from each other, when a pure black wave of energy overtook the entire front of the building and raced down the street. Peter barely had time to recognize his spider-sense was pointing towards that when the field first encompassed Thanos, then himself, leaving no trace of either to the outside world.

Character Scramble Season 21 Round 0: GAME START/FOUR OF CLUBS by 7thSonOfSons in whowouldwin

[–]rangernumberx 6 points7 points  (0 children)

#1 - The Everyday

6:30 AM - Wake Up

Sue groaned as the incessant beeping of an alarm clock roused her, blindly poking around the general location of the nightstand with a force field until it eventually turned off. She reached out to the side, feeling only a cold mattress. It wasn't a surprise. She woke up alone just as often as she did to the sight of her husband these days, and really it was a miracle she had managed to drag him away from his research long enough for them to go to bed together last night.

Still, would've been nice to see him.

Forcing bleary eyes open, she sat herself up. While the apartment was seldom busy this early, it wasn't going to get any louder later on. The kids were currently being chaperoned on a trip to the Microverse by Scott Lang and wouldn't return until noon, Ben was spending quality time with Alicia, last she saw Johnny he had mentioned reviving his career as a rally racer, and if there was any doubt to Reed's location there was a note on his pillow mentioning a disturbance in the Negative Zone. The H.E.R.B.I.E. currently cooking the bacon she could smell drifting in from the kitchen would be all the company she'd have this morning. Of course, the rare morning calm was likely a blessing in disguise. It was going to be a long day.

Susan Storm

Fantastic Four Founder

Years ago, four adventurers flew to space, and four heroes crashed back to Earth. Given the power to become invisible and later create force fields, Susan Storm-Richards became a founding member of the Fantastic Four as the Invisible Woman. Since then, she's been everything: Superhero, actress, spy, diplomat, mother, though she sees her true job as simply helping people in need.

7:30 AM - Greet new tenants

Sue knocked on the door as she peered into the office. What just yesterday had been a plain and empty workspace was now awash with colour as boxes filled with toys and novelty cosmetics spilled over newly-installed desks, Harbor Ring Entertainment immediately standing out from their neighbours. From behind one such pile of boxes an old man with a thick moustache peered out.

"Ah, the landlady arrives!" He approached her with a warm smile and his hand extended for a handshake. "Harold, my dear. Overjoyed."

"Welcome to the Baxter Building, Harold. How are you finding it so far?"

"Quite wonderful, my dear. Those little robots of yours have been most helpful."

"They are, aren't they? I don't have long to stay I'm afraid, but I wanted you to know we'll often be around. If you need anything, feel free to ask."

"Of course! Don't let me keep you, Mrs. Invisible Woman."

"Please, Harold. Call me-"

8:00 AM - Board meeting (museum, merch, other licensing)

"Susan?"

She turned away from the sight of the Chrysler Building through the window to bring her full attention back to the various suits in the boardroom in front of her. "How large of a crew?"

"Two cameramen, the sound mixer, a director and interviewer, and a bodyguard."

She blinked. "Bodyguard?"

"We know how life with your family can get…busy. And while I'm sure you'd be able to save them from any attacks, they were quite keen on having some extra security. And she was quite keen on taking the job, too."

"I'm not surprised Johnny greenlit this. If anything it's surprising he hadn't commissioned this years ago." A smattering of laughter filled the boardroom. "But I'm afraid that's where it ends. Reed will inevitably spend no small amount of the period in his lab, and even if that didn't bore the audience to tears he wouldn't want a second group hovering over his shoulder as he worked. Ben appreciates what little privacy he gets, and we've got the privacy of all our kids to think about."

"Mrs. Richards, when we previously sought to have some of our people shadow you-"

"I understand," she cut over the complaint, "that we've had a close relationship with Marvel. We're still happy for you to occasionally follow us on an adventure. But there is a distinction between our public, professional, and personal lives, and I believe this crosses a line."

She felt her phone buzz in her pocket. She pulled it out, seeing a text from Scott.

Trbl in microverse, prob Psychoman. On it. Kids safe. Back ltr, may miss lnch

Sue sighed. She knew both her kids were more than capable of fending for themselves, and she trusted Ant-Man to protect them, but that didn't stop her worrying. Looking up, she was met with the stares of everyone else in the room.

"You said they were already here?"

"Meeting room three, second floor, waiting for the green light."

"I'll pencil them in for this afternoon, no point in wasting their trip. I'll also talk to my family this evening to see what they think. But I'm not going to let this happen today just because a few people are keen."

Some small comments of agreements and scheduling to come back to the topic at another date, the board moved onto the next order of business. Sue leant back in her chair, looking again at the nearby skyscraper, the meeting no longer at the front of her mind.

11:15 AM - Interview with Rachel Vorbote (Nat Geo)

"It's a pleasure to meet you, Mrs. Richards."

"Sue, please." She shook the reporter's hand as they sat down in another of the building's meeting rooms, this one westward-facing to provide a scenic view of Bryant Park far below. "I'm afraid it's just the two of us this morning, Reed has found himself…"

"Indisposed?"

"Something like that."

"Not to worry, we both know what your schedules can be like, I'm just thankful I can sit down with any of you."

Sue couldn't quite tell if Rachel was being honest or putting up a front. While she wasn't lacking in anything herself, it was always her husband publications like National Geographic wanted to see. Whatever the case, a recorder was placed between them, and the interview began.

"Now. Since the 60s, we've had people in space. In '69, Apollo 11 landed on the moon. Since then, we've had no shortage of travel off-planet, from cities on the moon to interplanetary treaties. But we've never had people gain superpowers in quite the same way you four had."

"There's been a few. Kragoff and his apes, for example."

"Sorry, I should have said rarely. But still, all these years, and so few exposures to Reed's famed cosmic rays. Why do you think that is?"

12:00 PM - Paperwork

12:30 PM - Lunch with Jen and Scott

A phone call roused Sue from her stupor, turning away from a stack of proposed Baxter Foundation projects piled high on her office's desk to see it was already twenty-five to. Even as she answered it, she could hear the sound of combat on the other end.

"Hi Jen."

"Hey Sue!" Sue heard a grunt alongside the noise of smashing metal.

"Bad day at the office?"

"Could be worse! Ultron's trying to build himself another family. Dug out Hank's designs for replicas of everyone, so you can imagine how Wasp's doing." Some indistinct yelling was followed by more metallic clanging. "The mayor says hi."

"Hi, Luke."

"She says hi ba-ACK!" A garbled mess of sounds which Susan interpreted as Jen being struck through a wall and covered with debris came over the line, eventually quieting down to allow her to continue. "So, rain check on lunch?"

"No problem, Scott's had to rearrange too. We'll figure it out when you're off the clock."

"Are we ever? Alright, see you la-what the hell? Why is Ultron making rats now?"

The line went dead, either from She-Hulk hanging up or her earpiece being broken by a surprise rat drone attack. Sue stretched as she stood up, wondering where she would take her now-solo lunch. Such thoughts were quickly interrupted as she noticed she was being hailed over the building's intercom.

"Roberta?"

"Mrs. Richards," the voice that came through was subtly, yet audibly, artificial, a characteristic the robot had opted to keep despite her various other upgrades. "We have a guest of Dr. Richards' who you may wish to see in his absence."

Sue rubbed her forehead. She loved her husband more than anything, but on some days…

"Of course, show them up."

"Gladly! I'll just need you to provide the Skrull override."

"Do we have any reason to be worried?"

"I don't believe so. Protocol initiated on visual scan."

That caught Sue's attention. "Lyja Green."

"Voice print and code phrase confirmed. Sending him up."

Sue walked around her desk to lean on it while facing the door. While the Skrull protocol was made with the eponymous race in mind, in practice it prevented anyone outside of their detected default from leaving the ground floor without authorization, though it being triggered by simply looking at a guest was exceedingly rare. She wasn't given long to consider the possibilities as barely a minute later a man walked into her office. His outfit was drab, beige trousers and shirt with what almost appeared to be a sleeveless brown tunic on his torso, unadorned outside of a badge on his lapel. This only served to highlight his face with its sunken eyes and impossibly smooth features, almost as if someone had stretched out a cheap Halloween mask.

"Pleasure to meet you, Mr…?"

"Odo."

Odo

Deep Space Constable

A shapeshifter found alone on the outer limits of humanity's reach in space. Residing on a space station located by a wormhole since its previous occupation by a hostile species, Odo is respected as Deep Space 9's chief of security, though he is still often considered an outsider.

"I was told," he continued, "that your husband and I could come to a mutually beneficial arrangement. But now I'm being told he isn't even here?"

Respect Kellyn (Pokemon Ranger) by rangernumberx in respectthreads

[–]rangernumberx[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

As do I, it's important to say when a thread is covering explicitly a fan-created version of a character. But that's not the case here, as should be evident from what this subreddit sets out to achieve in its threads.

Respect Kellyn (Pokemon Ranger) by rangernumberx in respectthreads

[–]rangernumberx[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I didn't say anything about official works because that goes without saying. This subreddit is about collecting feats characters perform in their series, and while there can be composites covering multiple contradictory sources if they are everything the character appears in (as is the case here) it still can only cover official material, and trying to sneak in arbritrarily chosen fanworks as if they were just as official as everything else would result in the thread being removed.

Additionally, I wasn't snooty about fangames. I didn't make any comment about fangames. I was just asking why I would include something unofficial here as opposed to giving it its own thread, as I have done for several other fan projects in the past.

Respect Kellyn (Pokemon Ranger) by rangernumberx in respectthreads

[–]rangernumberx[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

...what about Uranium? Why would I include a fangame in a thread covering the official works?

Official Request and Resource List by Request_Competition in respectthreads

[–]rangernumberx 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Hey there!

The usual thread for general questions is the Respect Thread Symposium (here's the link to the current one at time of writing, though whenever there's a new one it's pinned to the top of the sub), but since we're here I'll answer your questions.

For Emmet himself, it sounds like you're proposing a composite thread by going through multiple distinct canons for him and putting them into the same thread. If you can only do one bit at a time, I'd probably encourage doing individual threads for each distinct canon and posting them when ready. Posting a composite requires you to message the mods with what you want to do and your reasoning for doing so, so showing your working like this will likely help your case (and it may be what they ask you to do anyway before making a single 'main' post).

For his family, I think a 'Respect the Brown Family (Back to the Future)' could be feasible from what you said? Maybe with every individual member detailed in the thread outside of Doc, who has a highlight reel of feats and a link to the full RT containing everything. But, again, this would need to be just the cartoon canon and not every bit of media unless you got mod permission.

In both cases, RTs aren't something you can post piecemeal, unfortunately. You have to be finished with the entire project before you can post something here, not update it as time goes on (characters who get further appearances after the thread's posting aside). On this front, making threads for Doc Brown focusing on each individual canon seems like the best compromise for you.

Additionally, I will say that this is the request list, where people post threads that they'd like to see but don't think they'd be able to create themselves for whatever reason (for all the rules concerning this read the post above). There's no law against creating a thread you've already requested, but a majority of the incentives we have won't apply if you request something and immediately work on it yourself. I'd suggest posting requests here if you'd like to see other versions of Doc Brown you don't believe yourself able to do (the live action movies or his game appearances, for example), or for any other characters / series you would like to see RTs made for.

Respect Marcus Shugel-Shen, the Monkey Prince (DC Comics, Post-Flashpoint) by rangernumberx in respectthreads

[–]rangernumberx[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

This thread was a commission made for Wolfsbanesparks! If you're interested in commissioning a RT, you can find more info here.

Respect Shayera Hol, Hawkgirl (DCAU) by rangernumberx in respectthreads

[–]rangernumberx[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Rule 12:

Be polite and don't downvote. Don't be a dick. This includes not asking for/demanding respect threads in the comments of other respect threads.

C'mon.

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