2014.01.31 - Snowball Fight!

Last night's wispy winds brought in a new dusting of snowfall across New York. The urban landscape normally deals with nature's little miracle with a cacophony of grumbled shoveling and people trying to go about their day pretending as if it wasn't happening. And, while the snow had stopped falling, the 10 inches had still made its mark, albeit a gross one: over half the stuff got pushed into the street, eventually turning into a sweeping, monumental barrier of grey and brown 'slush' across the city's gutters.

Normally downtown, certain buildings have no problem with this situation: The Stark Tower building's facilities department, for example, had its own snow plow. Today, however, the darn thing was on the fritz, and the entrance way and surrounding block lay full of snow, save the numerous footprints of it's slip-slidin' employees who were comfortably typing away at their desks in the well heated building. One particular corner of the block, just outside, however, had been completely untouched up until just two minutes ago. But now it was different: because in the last two minutes, large, soccer-sized snowballs had started launching themselves against the thick panes of glass against the east side of the lobby.

One of the security people wandered off to check it out, and his eyes boggled at what he saw: It was a man dressed in bright blue and white, arctic-style snow-gear... he was gathering up large balls of snow within a second's time, with no effort... like the snow had a mind of its own, and catapulting the balls across the small park-like area. Apparently the man was specifically aiming these at a young, blonde woman who was dressed in a neon-yellow track suit with black, puffy snow-boots. This was Tabitha Smith, the unflappable Boom-Boom, and apparently she was having a snowball fight. The snowballs that'd hit the window outside were just incidental.

"Hey, Cap'n Crunch, you couldn't hit the barnside of a broad!" Tabby taunted. She wound up her arm and flung a snowball at this Very Warmly Dressed fellow, smacking him straight in the head--upon inpact, the snow seemed to explode with extra force--a loud snapping/popping sound emitted from within, and it caked his entire body in snow.

"Ya little brat!" he shouted, and began to make another large snowball to hurl at her.

One person the snow and cold don't bother in the least bit? Everyone's favorite frosty mutant, Iceman. He'd been in the city checking out a potential backup plan for the little X-Fieldtrip mission he's been assigned when his attention was caught by the flying snowballs. On one of his trademark ice slides, he comes to a stop when he sees Tabby and her opponent. "Huh..." he trails off, head tilting to the side as he waits to see what else is going on.

With last week ending in a giant snake monster attack Molly has been in dire need of some rest and relaxation. Which is why she's been roaming the streets of New York bundled up against the cold. Mostly so she can throw snowballs, make the odd snow angel and if she's lucky mooch enough small change for hot cocoa. It's in an attempt to evade a police officer who was beginning to wonder why she was out by herself and not say in school that she ducks into the little area of parkland.

Captain Cold let out a furious growl, as he got tired of missing the wiley Tabitha with his snowball assault. He hurled one more, this one extra large. It missed and nearly hit Molly in the face, striking a tree next to her.

"Nice work," Tabitha said sarcastically, "You almost hit that kid. How do you suck so much at this? You *MAKE* snow!"

Having just about enough of this, The good Captain reached into the pockets of his over-sized pants and pulled out a slender, high-tech looking... gun! Oh, man, shit just got real.

Tony Stark is making his way through the lobby of the building that bears his name. He's just come out of a /grueling/ budget meeting - one of the few he's compelled to attend every fiscal year to okay the budget framework for the various departments for the next fiscal year. It's a long, ugly process with not a small amount of headache, faceapalms and Tony himself having to put out fires that erupt right in front of him - thank criminey it's over. He's making his way to the elevator when all of a sudden there's multiple *THUNKS* against the thick panes of the buildings glass. Looking to see what's threatening his building now, there's a slight bit of alarm on his face when when he turns, and almost immediately relaxes when it's a harmless snowball fight.

Hmmm..snowball fight. That could be--

Annnd gun.

Tony sighs, and goes to his personal express elevator that reaches the Penthouse. It only takes a few seconds, and in only a couple of moments, he's armored. Diving off the edge of the flight deck, he lets himself free-fall half way down the building's height before engaging the flight system. He course corrects, makes his way around to the front of the building, finishing the descent with a somersault into a three-point stance that puts him between the gun wielder and the two young ladies.

Standing, he says, "Are you kidding me? You're gonna shoot your eye out."

Iceman winces when Molly almost gets hit, deciding that it means it's time to spoil the fun. He starts forming a snowball in hand when he sees Cold's gun. He knows what that one does. Switching tactics, he ends up startled by the dramatic entrance of Iron Man. Staring, Iceman gives a little sigh before just whipping a snowball right at Captain Cold from above in hopes of knocking that gun away. Molly Hayes giggles as the huge snowball hurtles past. "Oh! I wanna play too," she proclaims, ducking down to begin rolling her own giant snowball. She doesn't even notice the gun getting drawn, only glancing up when Iron Man lands. "Whoa. Hey Iron Man could I get your autograph?" Her own attempt at a snowball is, although crafted with nothing but natural snow, starting to get quite large. Big enough a girl her size wouldn't be able to lift it and yet she keeps on going.

"Boly Hokes, Smokeswinkle!" Tabitha shouted and pointed, "It's Iron Man. You done messed up now," adopting a momentary generic-Southern accent.

Captain Cold was visibly surprised to see Tony hovering over him suddenly, but not entirely. I mean, he was in front of Stark Tower and, in fact, Tony was just the man he'd wanted to see. His plan: march into Stark Tower, and blast every single person who wouldn't take him to Tony Stark for a meeting. He wanted to sell Tony his ice technology, but really hated making appointments. Due perhaps to both bad timing, and his bad attitude, he stumbled--literally--into Tabitha Smith, bumping her and making her drop her sloppy chili-cheese dog she'd been so preciously enjoying. This started a shouting match which led to the aforementioned snowball antics.

Sir Cold flipped up his gun towards Iron Man, and it let out a squealing, wide radius blast straight at Tony--he was specifically targeting his repulsors to interrupt his flight. Just after firing, he's hit with Iceman's snowball, and slumps forward, letting out an 'Oof!'

"Hey, Captain Fuzzyhood!" Iceman calls down to Captain Cold, sitting on his ice slide and waving. "Didn't you learn last time that New York isn't healthy for you? Shouldn't you be sticking to Cental?" he calls, teasing. He glances at Iron Man and Molly, quirking a brow at Molly's snowball and wondering how Iron Man will deal with the freezing beam.

Molly Hayes has, much like a character from Katamari Damacy, started to roll up a sizable snowball. Careful observers might even have spotted a violet glow in her eyes as she charges around building up something that'd do well as the bottom half of a snowman. "My turn!" She scoops the giant projectile up with careless ease and launches it at Captain Cold. Of course her special power is super strength and not amazing throwing skills. So who knows where her snowball'o'doom will end up!

Iron Man takes a blast from the gun in the shoulder, and it freezes to the neck and down to the elbow and almost to the visible reactor.

"Sir, surface temperatures are dropping to a temperature of negative sixty degrees. It's gooing to be hard to move until it thaws."

"Well then, JARVIS, let's thaw it out - let's start shunting the heat from the suit to the surface. Maintain a constant temperature of fifty degrees."

Nothing noticeably visible happens to the suit, except the ice thaws in a matter of seconds, and Iron Man is able to move again.

"Who the hell are you - Doctor Horrible?" he asks the guy and raises his right hand, the repulsor fires after Iceman knocks the gun out of his hand and sends the weapon skittering. Also? Kinda breaks it in the process.

He looks over to Molly and Tabitha and says to the request for an autograph, "Yeah sure, just give me a second to work here - you guys okay?" palm still raised, he turns back to this freeze guy..and out of the corner of his eye sees the young girl throw the massive snowball. He shakes his head slightly, "I should've known."

Captain Cold craned his head to the side and noticed Iceman, his face showing an emboldened scowl.

"Stay out of this!" he shouted, as if that were going to deter the mutant. "This is a BUSINESS MEETING!" he shouted, trying to get Tony's interest, just as Tony blasts his gun to bits. "GAAAH!" He fumbles around his jacket, no doubt looking for something, when the sound of some kind of rumbling catches his notice. He turns to look, and is sudden face-to-...ball with Molly's enormous, rolling snowball. Shrieking, he attempts to panic-dodge, but his legs get smacked by the snowball and he spins 360-degrees-twice against the slippery ground below, falling in the process.

Tabitha laughs, "Fifty points!"

"Oops," Molly exclaims, wincing slightly. "Sorry! I got a little carried away and... forgot not everyone is a superhero just a little bit." She looks a little sheepish. "Are you okay Mister? I hope you nothing got broken 'coz I don't really have any money to send you for your medical bills."

"Dude! You suck at this business thing then!" Iceman continues to taunt. Iron Man's rapid thaw gets the mutant's attention for a few moments, Bobby paying attention to the temperature changes. He makes note of it all and then flashes a grin. Molly launching her snowy attack gets the mutant laughing and he points a hand down at Captain Cold. A little delay and he fires off a stream of ice and snow to hopefully pin him under another pile of snow. He's a super villain after all. You paged Molly Hayes with 'can I get Molly hit with a snowball? that okay?' Molly Hayes pages: Sure!

Captain Cold's body, though momentarily stunned, had a rush of adrenaline in the midst of not one but FOUR super-types surrounding him. He pushed against the painful bruises he'd just gotten, and stood back up to his feet, looking proud of his resilience. That's just when Iceman's ice surrounds his legs, and he looks down, now unable to move. "Aw, crap."

"Time to pipe the payer!" Tabitha shouts, her arms full of at least a dozen snowballs she's been industriously fashioning in the last minute or two. Following Iceman's trapping, she begins to pelt Captain Cold again and again. When nobody's looking at her, she hurls one at Molly's back, and then steps a few paces away, whistling innocently.

"TONY STARK!!" Cold yells out, trying to cover his face, "I wanted to demonstrate my technology to you! CALL YOUR CRAZY FRIENDS OFF!"

Molly Hayes gahs! "Who threw that?" she wonders, spinning around and scooping up a more sensible handful of snow. She giggles and adds "This means war!" Launching a flurry of snowballs at pretty much everyone. Except Iron Man. Wouldn't wanna ruin her chances of an autograph after all! Her eyes seem to have returned to a more normal color and the throws are entirely mundane in power.

Iron Man's faceplate retracts, revealing the billionaire industrialist's face - "Then you should've called and made an appointment like everyone else. I'm not unreasonable. You're just an ass." he looks to those that have Cold surrounded. "Nice job, everyone. Really good work." he's about to leave, but stops. Looking to Molly, he smiles, "Still want that autograph?"

Tabitha didn't hear Tony at all, and decided to engage Molly's attack, assuming Captain Cold had sufficiently faced her wrath, and began sloppily scooping up snow and hurling it in not-so-nicely packed clumps at her. With each step, she got a few steps closer, and started cracking up.

"What's your name, girl?" she asked with a grin, "I'm Tabitha. And I'm YOUR WORST NIGHTMARE!" Tabitha then did a baseball slide towards Molly's feet, in an attempt to push up the snow around her, possibly knocking her over into the snow.

"H-hey!" Bobby frowns as Molly starts flinging snowballs all over the place. A few hit his icy armor before he moves out of the way. Sliding down, he hops to the ground next to Iron Man and offers a quick grin his way. He crosses his arms as he looks at Cold, quirking a brow at him. "You're gonna sell the same tech that like four or five other cheap knock offs of me use? Dude, you -really- suck at business," he says. A quick glance back at Tabitha and Molly and Iceman laugh. "Hey, go easy on the little kid."

"The name's Princess Powerful!" Molly declares, leaping up into the air. "And my worst nightmare is the /dentist/!" And what a leap it is. Super strength sending her soaring a good ten meters vertically up. "An autograph would be super-mega-awesome. It'll go nicely in my scrap book next to Wonder Woman and Squirrel Girls." When she lands she scoops up handfulls of snow and returns fire at Tabitha.

Tabitha protects her neck and face with her forearms from Molly's snowball attack, and laughs while running back... But then she stops dead in her tracks, in front of Iceman.

"Hell the what? Dude, PRINCESS, check it out: it's Frosty the emm-effin' snow man! He's REAL!" she says. Captain Cold, still trying to pull his feet out of the ice, grumbles and starting making pretty horrible whining noises, much like a toddler might.

Iron Man a couple of small panels retract on the suit's cuisses, and from one he takes a 4x6 glossy photo of Iron Man posed (it actually looks like this: http://tinyurl.com/3s3vuzt) and from the other he takes a silver felt tip pen, and writes on the photo "To Princess Power - Keep the skies clear!" - with Iron Man signed in an exaggerated manner (let's face it - kids dig the suit, not the guy in it) and hands it to Molly. "I caught your name earlier. Nice job." he looks back to Iceman, "Duplicating what you can do is pretty well impossible, but there's always gonna be people trying to do a knockoff." he gives the mutant a smile and a slight shrug. He looks back to Tabitha, then back to Iceman. "Looks like you got a fan." he chuckles.

"Seriously?" Iceman asks when Iron Man takes out a photo. "You carry pictures of yourself. In your armor?" he laughs. Tabitha gets a quirked brow. "Hey, I ditched the snowman look ages ago. It's Iceman," he replies, puffing out his chest a bit. "Iron Dude, I got tons of fans."

Tabitha jumps at Captain Cold with a tiger-like growl, just to mess with him, pushing up on him for a moment. Flinching, he responds with numerous off-color phrases that are totally not G-rated. When he's done, Tabitha turns to look at Tony Stark, her face grinning widely. She then stands up-right and salutes Mr. Iron Man as if he were a high-ranking officer in the army. She speaks in a monotone, loud voice: "Mister Stark, Sir, Thank you, Sir. Sir!" -- then, dropping the act, she whimsically adds, "Whatcha gonna do with THE ENEMY?"

Molly Hayes beams. "I am /totally/ getting pictures of myself to carry around if I ever have a costume," she decides. "I'd have asked for an autograph on Sunday at the snake-man thingy, but I had scales in my hair and it was totally ick." She peers at Bobby and gives him a thumbs up. "Iceman is totes appropriate. Because of all the ice." She nods, then sneakily throws another snowball at Tabitha while she's distracted by Captain Cold.

Iron Man looks at Iceman and shrugs, "Well, it's not like I have a back pocket to stick them in." he explains, before nodding. "Judging from that reaction, I don't doubt the fanbase." thought it's then when Tabitha goes saluting and being military at him and he holds up his hands, saying "C'mon now, I'm Iron Man - not War Machine, and I thought maybe the cops would take him away, since I went to the trouble of calling them and everything."

It's true - the sounds of impending surens signal that the local Finest are on the way."

He looks to Molly and answers with all seriousness, "It's not a bad idea. Keeps the public at large happy, anyway..."

"Well, this was all-kindsa fun," Tabitha says, looking back at the police arriving. "Yo Princess, you wanna grab a hot chocolate down the street?" she asks innocently, and begins trotting away, expecting Molly to follow. "Nice meetin' you guys! Catch ya on the flip side!" When safely out of anyone's view, she unzips her jacket partway, and looks at her pocket. Yup, still there: Tabitha totally ganked one of Captain Cold's freeze guns. She's gonna have some fun with this, she thinks, snickering.

"Sounds like a plan! Especially if you're paying," Molly says cheerfully, waving to Iceman & Iron Man. She even gives Captain Cold a friendly wave. "Man this is totally cool. Now I have three famous people in my scrap book and a decent shot at meeting Superman again." She begins skipping after Tabitha, for really mighty heroes skip. It's a thing now.

"Hey, there's a kid here," Iceman snaps at Captain Cold before making Spider-Man's signature 'thwip' gesture. Of course no webbing from him...just a frigid beam that he fires off to make a quick icy gag on cold. The cops will have to get that from him. He glances up at the sound of sirens too and whistles. "And time for me to hit the road. Catch you all later," he says, starting to form a new ice slide and heading up up and away!

Iron Man looks around. Tabitha and the Princess have skipped away. Iceman just left on an Icebeam, leaving Iron Man all alone with a gagged Captain Cold. With the sirens getting closer, and things going down in front of his building, he figures he really should stay out here and be the guy the police talk to.

That doesn't mean he won't have a little fun, first.

"PHOTO OP!" he calls out, and spends the next ten or fifteen minutes taking pictures of people posing next to the immobilized and gagged Captain Cold, or with himself - doing selfies no less, as well - and various other positive PR things like that until the police arrive. He helps get the Captain into their custody, signs some autographs and does pics with the cops, before the faceplate comes back down and he flies back up to the penthouse, and goes about the rest of his day. Hmmm..maybe some lunch is in order. Yeah, lunch sounds good.