2014.03.29 - Stolen Tech

Usually, crime in Gotham falls underneath the purview of a certain select group of 'vigilantes'. The majority of criminals who operate within the city limits know this, and take certain... precautions. But every so often, a criminal gets a little full of himself -- maybe eager to make a name, maybe out to show they're the biggest dog out there.

Pablo 'Picasso' Rodriguez -- so nicknamed because the unique knife-scarring across his face that makes him look like a work of cubist art -- has a shaved head, numerous prison tats, and is clad (despite the cold weather) in what appears to be loose denim jeans, boots, and nothing else. Nothing else save for... an unusual metal vest he's wearing. It's ornate, interlocking segments give it the appearance of something out of the Victorian era; it's accompanied by two 'palm' rings, locked in place by leather straps -- and a pair of... are those miniature vacuum tubes? -- jutting out of either shoulder.

He almost looks like a steampunk cosplayer of some sort. It'd be downright funny -- if the vest wasn't currently humming with electric power, engulfing him in a blue corona of swirling energy as he extends his arms toward the car in front of him -- sending it REELING with a violent, explosive KRA-FWOOOM! The car is upended, spinning wildly as it crashes and tears over asphalt with a metallic shriek, sparks flying -- the three hooded gun-men he's up against running for their lives, diving for cover in the junkyard.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah," Pablo says, grinning wildly -- electricity swirling around him, gathering in a pulsing field as he clenches his fists. Striding forward toward the gunmen, who -- panicking -- begin opening fire. The bullets never even reach Pablo; they hit that energy field, their forward momentum arrested -- and dismissed. Crumpled lead tumbles to the ground.

Gotham isn't one of Berto's typical haunts, but he's taken a train into the city to inspect some industrial initiatives that might be worth investing in. He's wearing a pale yellow shirt (buttoned a little lower than the American standard), form-fitting khaki slacks, and pointed brown short boots. Simply put: he's not dressed for a meta fight. "Ay merda!" he spits out as, like any other Gothamites present, he dives for cover. He skids to a halt behind a parallel-parked car on the side of the roadway, peering over the top to try and assess the tactical situation. Three gunmen in a junkyard, one power suit in the street, and he's on the other side of the road. He sets his jaw and starts dipping into his reserves of solar energy.

Nico doesn't head to Gotham often either. She's here for two things: Vigilantism..and hot dogs. There's a pretty good hot dog place here, and /maybe/ she'll see some old friends here if she's lucky. Instead, walking down the area with half a hot dog in hand, she spots the commotion. Trouble. Just what she's here for.

Slish. Nico's pulling her pocket knife from her right pocket, cutting into the stub that is left of her left arm. In seconds, the wound is vanishing..as an ornate gauntlet appears, Nico dashing towards the gunmen and the suited freak, floating upwards, having not spotted Berto yet, as she shouts out to everyone there. "Convention's out of town. Might want to come back and toss some cars when your geek buddies are in costume.". Nico cringes for a second, realizing how bad her rite of superhero passage statements, as she calls them, are. "Uh..forget that that was dumb. Just, hands up or whatever!"

"Where's my money, chingado?!" Pablo bellows. The gun-men continue to fire, hunched behind the ruin of an overturned golden-tan Dodge Spirit; their pistols aren't having much effect on Pablo, who walks with impunity toward them -- lead *plnking* off of that electric-blue shielding. "Where's my money?"

"Die in a fire, Picasso!" one of the three rogue gang-members hollers from behind the car. Pablo grins.

"Got a new name, boys. Call me Rayo." Not very creative. Pablo's hands rise up; lashing tongues of electricity whip out to catch the car they're hiding behind -- and with a wrench of his arms, it's suddenly flipping into the air, thrown aside as if it was just a piece of trash... leaving the three hooded gunmen exposed. Continuing to open fire, even as they scramble back fruitlessly against the pile of garbage and metal behind them.

It's at this point that Nico emerges, floating above the fray, calling out. Pablo glances back, up behind him -- so do the gunmen. One of the members of the latter group start cursing: "--capes! Get the hell out of here--" Soon, the hoodlums are doing just that, trying to scatter to escape from what's clearly a superhero intervention. Pablo, though... Pablo's just holding his ground. Grinning, oh-so-cockily.

"Was hopin' a cape might show up," he shouts up to Nico. "Y'know, it was a two-bit vigilante like you who got me thrown in prison? And now..." He swings both arms up to extend toward Nico -- and -- BA-ZWOOM! A bolt of lightning rushes out to greet her, aiming straight for the chest.

When Sunspot emerges, he's an inscrutable matte black figure wreathed in a fiery solar corona. His eyes burn like embers and his breaths are thin flames around his gritted teeth. He briefly considers a nice, dramatic car-toss of his own, but the jalopy he took cover behind isn't his to wreck. He shouts a challenge instead: "Ei, idiotas! Put down the guns and the... armor... shirt... thing?" He glances up and spots the flying girl just a moment before Picasso takes a shot at her. He bellows in anger, sets himself, and bull rushes at the armored criminal.

The lightning is flying. Nico is thinking fast, as she shouts out. "When blood is shed, let the Staff of One emerge!".

At this point, an ornate staff, similar in texture and design to her gauntlet, is emerging from her chest, deflecting the bolt away, and floating into her gauntlet. "Okay, that's it. No more nice witch.". A growl from Nico, as she shouts out. "Shortcircuit!". Nico has no idea what the spell will do to him, they always..are random and sometimes chaotic and bad for her. But, we'll see.

"...th'hell?" Pablo just stares as a staff emerges from Nico's chest; he's not sure what to make of it as the lightning bolt -- bounces off of it? But then there's shouting to the left; he turns, briefly, to see Sunspot -- his eyes narrowing, his scowl deepening. The three gunmen are booking it; unless someone stops them, they're going to make a clean getaway. But meanwhile...

"--sonofa--" Pablo begins, hands extending toward Sunspot, right before that spell hits him. The 'suit' is a Telluric Vest; it harvests electrical current from the very crust of the earth -- a piece of bygone technology that is a hundred years ahead of anything currently existing -- by a man who designed it a hundred years in the past. When this thing 'short-circuits'... it isn't pretty. Pablo's eyes pop open wide; suddenly, he is engulfed in a massive field of bright, oscilliating blue and white; bolts of lightning rip out from him to smash into anything nearby -- cars, sinks, fridges, chunks of metal...

And then Sunspot hammers into him. Pablo screams; suddenly, orange-and-blue are intermingling as they both slam into a nearby car -- crumpling it on the side. A vacuum tube 'pops'; the vest crinkles. More lightning lances out in every direction.

By the time Berto notices that his target is exploding with lightning, he's got way too much momentum to try to veer away from the blast zone. He flings his arms up over his chest, arcs of blue energy burning across the skin of his arms and chest. Some of the energy is close enough to light for his absorption abilities to handle, but not all of it, and not this much at once. He rams Picasso into the car and immediately rolls away, scrambling back on all fours and hissing out a continuous stream of Portugese profanity.

AS the lightning explosion comes..Nico was definitely not expecting this. She's shouting out for another fall, quickly. "Shield!".

And, this is when it goes super wrong. An old, medieval styled metal shield appears in her free hand. Not good when being arced with lightning. The bolts smash through the shield, and she's flung by the power, down to the ground. Her body twitches, she's alive but unconscious. Probably down for now atleast, let's hope someone doesn't attempt to murder her right now. Luckily, any more lightning is missing her while she's down and out.

The three gunmen are gone, by now; all that's left is Pablo -- Pablo, who is apparently getting fried by a short-circuiting telluric vest. Not long after Roberto has hammered him into the car, he's still screaming -- the pitch increasing as the swelling power from the vest continues to escalate; it's a rapidly increasing self-sustaining reaction that's gone out of control. Regrettably for Pablo, Tesla Tech is very dangerous -- especially when it goes wrong.

The ball of lightning grows, more strokes lashing out to slam against nearby cars -- bigger, bigger -- until an electric screech fills the junkyard, drowning out the sound of his screams. And then, as it glows brighter and brighter... it finally reaches 'criticality' -- and with an earth-shuddering KA-FWOOM, Pablo, the car, and anything within five yards of him is engulfed in a massive ball of brilliant blue flame, rushing up toward the sky before it unfolds into a gout of smoke... leaving little more than pulsing, glowing metal -- and smoldering ash -- in its wake.

Berto groans as he sees Nico go down. "Don't do us any favors, menina," he mutters before scrambling over to her and kicking the shock-bait shield away. Between his powers and his long years of national-level futebol competition, he's a hell of a kicker: it sings through the air and embeds itself a foot deep in a concrete wall. Fortunately, that puts him in a perfect position, when he glances over his shoulder and sees Picasso going up in flames, to crouch over Nico and shield her from the blast. Lightning is tough, but a fireball? It's like a particularly scrumptious amuse-bouche for Berto's abilities.

Once the blast has passed, Berto reaches out to shake Nico by the shoulder. "Wake up, kid. You okay?" he asks, glancing around for anyone else who might be injured. His powers start to fade, his normal dark skin replacing the impenetrable shadow of Sunspot. His shirt is torn up pretty badly, the skin beneath it crisscrossed with minor burns. He reaches for his smart phone to call for help, only to find it blackened and useless, scrambled by the electric shockwave.

Nico Minoru coughs, slowly opening her eyes, before jolting awake. "Is he..dealt with?". Nico's slowly lifting herself up, gauntlet and staff both gone, her left arm back to a stub. "What about the gunmen? They escape?". Nico's getting up to sit up..before remembering something. "Oh uh right that was awesome thank you for helping! I'm Sister Grimm..on AIM or something. I usually go by Nico though. It's like..my name.". Nico's looking over to the ash, and cringing. Bad memories of people getting burnt to a crisp.

Pablo 'Picasso' Rodriguez is scarcely more than a charred outline that resembles a human; the telluric vest has been melted to slag -- along with the car where he had been slammed into. Whatever technological device he had been using, it's probably been reduced to a point where it's unidentifiable.

Nico notices Berto's glance at her arm, and responds with a tiny grin. "Darkseid.". She says this as she holds up her stub, before putting it down. BRAGGING RIGHTS!

"X-Men. Niiice. I'm with..some dudes who fight evil and travel a bit it's nothing much.". A grin, before she attempts to float upwards..before learning her magic arm is gone. "Oh right. Can't do that without the gauntlet.". Nico walks over to Pablo's deathspot. "I'd try and cast another spell but my staff doesn't like it when I try to take it out right after I use it I might require like a billion drops of blood for that.". She grins, before looking over to the exit. She also has no idea where her hot dog is. "Well, thanks. Nice meeting you, Sunspot."

"Meu Deus," Sunspot breathes, looking suitably impressed. He's been out of circulation for a while, but of course a threat like Darkseid made news all around the world. "Didn't seem to slow you down any," he says with an approving nod. "Although I would be lying if I pretended to understand anything about what you just said. It was nice meeting you, too. Take care of yourself." Berto glances down at his ruined phone, grunts in annoyance, and crosses his arms. He would like to call in some backup, but as it stands, he figures he'll have to wait for the police to arrive so he can give his statement. Then go phone shopping. So much for the productive evening he had planned.

"I have no idea what you just said.". Nico shrugs, before running off, a wave of..a stub. She has no one to call and has no clue if her comms are still working, so. Get another hot dog time!