5000/Germination: North of the Rift

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Germination: North of the Rift
Date of Scene: 29 July 2018
Location: Unknown
Synopsis: The group in the north battle the onslaught of the fungus!
Cast of Characters: Shadow King, Green Arrow, Shatterpoint, Doctor Doom, Siryn
Tinyplot: Germination


Shadow King has posed:
The sky has broken open. A rupture. It is south of New York City, and approximately a quarter mile high, and 100 yards wide. It blazes, pulsing a fluxing energy, a streamer that all can see for quite a distance. It seems to be churning, and where it leads is truly anyone's guess. But there are other problems, beyond the rip in the sky.

Mushrooms are everywhere. They came out of the ground, having burrowed, dormant. The fungus seemed to have been so dormant and quiet, giving some illusion in the quiet that it was gone. And now they lunge upwards in the darkness of the evening, and start to move. They head towards the rip in the sky. All of them: they pulse along the ground on churning oozing piles of fungal spores, eating whatever is in the way, or burrowing under things they cannot easily pass. Many of the mushrooms are the size of people, a few much larger. Most of them are outside of the city, but still some come from inside it: the parks, the graveyards. They singlemindedly move towards the rupture, bringing with them herds of their squid-like guardians.

Green Arrow has posed:
Daily patrols in New York had gone mostly quiet for Green Arrow... but there were still stragglers, and Zetaporting over was easy for this leg of his weekly route.

Then the sky ripped open, and some new variant of mushroom came out of nowhere. His skybike almost running into one as he drove along, "WHOA!" Green Arrow exclaimed as suddenly he was surrounded by stalks out of the ground. Loud screeching can be heard on the edge of town as the emerald archer skidded along the road, banking this way and that to find a relatively clear section of the city to survey the surroundings... and upon doing so, Green Arrow frowned under the domino mask. "You'd think I'd be used to weird shit from these things by now."

A number of fungicide arrows are fired in rapid succession from the intersection Green Arrow is at as he worked on crowd control for himself and the civilians around him, keeping in place for the moment. Lucky for him, his Skybike cargo pod had plenty of spares in case of a serious outbreak... and this definitely qualified.

As he fired, a phone link was established mentally to Alpha Flight station, his voice mask keeping his voice machine-like, "This is Green Arrow. I'm in Manhatten and we have a serious outbreak of these spore things. I'm calling for emergency backup down here."

Shatterpoint has posed:
    Caroline has heard of these... Spores, and the associated growing fungus. However, until recently, she hasn't necessarily been involved. A little too much of a loner to properly receive the information about the fungal aversion to cold from the superhero community- and too much of a cold homeless woman to receive it from the news- she hasn't pulled herself into this... Evil... Germination Plot.

    Not that fungus can plot, as far as she knows, but scheming mushrooms aside, she cannot ignore a rift in the sky. Shuffling puddles carrying the fungal behemoths themselves aside- anything six feet tall is a behemoth of a mushroom- the black shape of a coated figure is slinging itself from rooftop to rooftop at an almost frightening, inhuman pace.

    A silent racer amidst the chaos, and trailing behind her a wave of cold determination- the streets below enjoying an uncharacteristically chilly minute amongst the usual heat of summer. Her path is direct, and she is headed straight for the crack in the sky.

Doctor Doom has posed:
     Doctor Doom was here to check on the Latverian Embassy....mainly to check if it had been tampered with in any way by Mushrooms or by shadowy figures delivering the mushrooms. But...as things subtly went to extreme chaos, Doom, already decked out in his armor, hood, and cloak, exited his building to see the chaos for himself. A small part of him is only slightly amused that someone beat him to the punch of sending Mushrooms to an enemy. But...it will be what it will be. These things are monsterous abominations, and Doom was going to...for once, help the so called 'heroes' in battling the threat.

     Only a small glance is given up to that rip in the sky, watching as new variants rain from teh sky. Thus, Doom extends his hand, black magic circles appearing around them as he fires beams of magic at the Mushrooms that gather about and emerge from the ground, attempting to blast away more than one mushroom that comes his way.

     Then? He starts to fly, rather, levitate as he floats into the air to get an eagle eye view while also managing to stay away from the rip itself. Though he is running the math through his head on viable ways to close it.

     Doctor Doom. Helping people. Will wonders ever cease?

Siryn has posed:
    In a green and yellow outfit, a red haired woman named Siryn saw the rift near new york and almost immediately flew towards New York to see what the heck was going on. Thankfully, her sonic flight didn't have to be 'heard' as much as felt as she took a wide circle around the fungal abominations that was 'protecting' the main stalk. 'Ah'll be. I had heard about these at the institute, bu' I didn't think I'd actually see one in person." She flies lower and manages to spot Green Arrow. She also spies Doctor Doom flying, but that's someone she doesn't completely know...yet.

She quietly flies to the side of Green Arrow.....and her words are, strangely, easy to hear despite the rushing wind. "Need any 'elp 'ere?"

Shadow King has posed:
The mushrooms aren't just moving. In the past, when one mushroom has grown so large as to encounter another, it absorbs the new one into itself.

And these are still doing that behavior. As small ones move into proximity with each other, they stop, and merge. One of the two stalks bubbles and collapses into the ooze of the other, and the larger one cannibalizes its 'friend', growing more powerful and larger. And resuming movement. It's happening in a scattered way, more heavily where the creatures are more concentrated, naturally, creating less concentrated areas: and bigger monsters. Some have clearly eaten enough to be horrifying building-tall stalks lurching their way down and through streets, though their mushroom-shaped tops aren't fully grown yet. It makes them very eerie, swaying tall forms.

Doom's dark blasts peel big holes into the squidlings that leap to protect the mushrooms from the blasts, tearing the minions apart. Similarly, the toxins fired by Green arrow, while some do meet mushroom, are intercepted in this same way. The 'squid' like minions, the white tentacle critters, very clearly are doing one thing, and doing it well: protect the stalks as they go wherever it is they are going.

Shadow King has posed:
After a little while, the mushrooms shot by the specific toxic arrows start to truly suffer. They start to melt, to slow down, and cave in. the spore ooze continues on, to leave the toxin-covered mushroom behind, decaying.

Shatterpoint has posed:
    It's easy to ignore stalks the size of a person- but when she starts coming across the larger, building sized set, Caroline is driven to pause. Her eyes narrow, and she moves along the rooftops in silence as she approaches the rift- but it becomes important now to delay as much of the things as possible.

    Does she know how to do that? Not really. Is she in possession of a skill and powerset that will prove useful? She hasn't fought a mushroom before, but she's pretty sure she can handle it.

    Leaping from the tallest rooftop she can find, the undead monstrosity that used to be a simple detective attacks with all the fury of an Apokoliptian gladiator fueled by Death Itself at the epicenter of an incommprehensible blizzard.

    That is to say, she leaps at one of these improbably tall stalks with a fist imbued with frost and a whole lot of issues to work through. The air around her very being drops below freezing, as Caroline rips the laws of physics and thermodynamics a new subclause.

Green Arrow has posed:
"Since I can hear you, I'm assuming you have some sort of aerial based powers." Green Arrow states matter of factly as he continues to fire more of those fungicide arrows at the incoming tide. His priority is civilian traffic. "What can you do?" Green Arrow asks as he set his motorcycle to skybike mode, and set it to autopilot down a street. As more squidlings come into view, more arrows are fired, "If you can clump them together, I have something to deal with a large number of them at once. My priority here is getting civilians off the streets so we can take the war to whatever that is in the sky."

Even as he speaks, Green Arrow continues to fire... when he finds large clumps of the squidlings together naturally, he has a cloudicide arrow crafted and fired, exploding into a large gas block to attack them all at once, "I have plenty of these, but the more grouped together, the more arrows I can use elsewhere. Meanwhile, herd them away from civilians in general." Despite the voice mask, Green Arrow speaks with a subtle authority. He's definitely had command experience.

Doctor Doom has posed:
     "Pests. You dare defy Doom?" Doctor Doom declares as he watches the Mushrooms try to defend themselves. The thing that pisses them off is that they are truthfully rather wildly successful. So, to try and wreak havoc on them, Doom uses his repulsor technology, flying around and blasting multiple beams of that raw, ultra-hot force to burn holes in the enemy and try to dwindle that squid-like protection...and even better, hit a starch. This is just one of many strategies for Doom.

     Though this is when he notices true other heroes like Green Arrow and Caroline Ramsey. Of course, they are just the ones he witnessed, as they all work together. Beam, beam, boom boom. They just keep coming! Doom seems to be keeping using this strategy, however, seeing as it will hopefully hold the enemy at bay under such rapid fire.

Siryn has posed:
    "Not really aerial as it is sound." Siryn says as she stays out of Green Arrow's firing arc. "I don't know what sonics will do to them, but I'll try not to shatter any windows."

She does manage to keep them away from civilians....but it's obvious to Green arrow that this kid isn't flying with the wind.

She's screaming.....

The Sonic attack on the squids don't shatter windows, mostly because they're being directed away from them and onto the squids.....and the only reason anyone else can hear it is because it's in the uppermost range of hearing of normal human beings.....this includes Doom.

Shadow King has posed:
The mushroom stalks are all being dragged towards the rift in the sky. Many of them, now, are being stopped or deterred by the heroes, though. Kinetic force blasts from Doom level even a large mushroom; it topples, while the spores still continue to move along, unheeding of losing the mushroom top. In fact, they may notice that the squidling minions are more protective of the ooze than they are of the stalks themselves. Stalks start to litter the street as the barrage continues. The ooze creeps on, with the squid minions. At least, the ones not exposed to the toxin. Those... turn dark and decay, into ugly patches that other mushrooms then avoid, as if it were a bad place.

However, the sonic attack from Siryn makes everything stop in place, and mill around. It doesn't group up, but things seem unable to figure out where exactly the sky rip is, and start to move every which direction, lost.

As Caroline joins the fray on one of the largest building-sized fungus, the mushroom itself doesn't defend itself: in fact, it freezes, suffering the cold immediately, but the minions attempt to swarp her, their tentacles reaching for her to try to rip her to pieces. They flinch at her cold aura, though, but still try, even if they are slowed way down.

Green Arrow has posed:
"Sonic. Right." Green Arrow states musingly before he fires another fungicide arrow into one near a civilian. "Their priority is the gliding ooze... try to cut them off from moving further, and leave the large groups alone. I'm going to see if they fall back to defend the ooze. Your sonic attacks will stun and disorient them, as you can see."

The Skybike suddenly hovers off towards the nearest near ooze gliding stalk as he manually pilots it, and once within range Green Arrow brings his compound bow back up and starts to fire single payload fungicide arrows into the ooze. Does it set off a chain reaction of mass defense from the squidlings? Time to find out.

Siryn has posed:
    "Well...tha's one way to stop them from being so coordinated." Siryn says before she starts using a wider range sonic scream. Still not trying to shatter windows or pierce eardrums. The larger tentacle monsters however, get a sonic Lance attack that CAN be heard....because she's actively trying to vibrate them apart.

Doctor Doom has posed:
     As Doom remains flying in the sky, he then stops wasting the energy, and instead concentrates hard, using his telepathic abilities to search the mushroom swarm that threatens the city! With a deep breath, Doom manages to find what he //thinks// might be the control point, and he tries to telepathically take control of it!

     Though...Doom also discovers that a powerful telepathic presence is already here, and Doom will likely have to combat him. To defeat doom in a bout of telepathica willpower? DOOM'S WILL IS ABSOLUTE.

Shatterpoint has posed:
    For a moment, Caroline is surprised. To her credit, it's only because she has begun to think there is more ceremony to things like this, but the moment the mushroom freezes and doesn't fight... She figured there'd be more. Then, the squidlike minions swarm her just as she reaches the ground- her attention clinging momentarily to the way the puddle seems to move on without the stalk she'd just attacked- and wrap her up in order to pull her apart.

    The disturbing thing is not the lack of screams- A normal person would clearly have been torn to shreds- but how Caroline responds.

    Her touch is like reaching into a bucket of ice-water moments before, and yet such temperatures seem like child's play, as the intensity doubles, and redoubles again- her cryokinetic ability enough to freeze and halt molecules by will alone.

    Touching her now is like having the very -idea- of heat ripped from one's very being. The idea is to render the minions brittle, and then shatter them, thus freeing her. If freed, the revenant will make her way towards the pool they'd been so carefully protecting.

    In the meantime, the wind howls through the streets.

Shadow King has posed:
The disruption is, at least, causing a pause in the flow towards the rip in the sky. Between the sonic attacks, toxins making 'land mines' for them all over, and the freezing combat, the stampede towards the rip has turned into a confused mix of paths. The disarray in the ranks has reduced how many are making it to the rip itself.

The sky overhead has clouded and turned to ice: snow is imminent. A mutant, if one looks, can be seen gathering the situation high above, just to the south of the sky tear. The chills pair well with Caroline's screaming winds, as tempratures plummet from multiple sources.

Caroline freezes her enemies to the core, though they try to still defend the ooze areas, despite being frozen. They will give their all, even as they get shattered and turn to a spore-like dusty mulch. Otherwise, the squid-like minions do, and will, defend the ooze as much as possible. They will, in fact, enter the ooze areas to grab the arrows and hurl them out, even if it kills them to do so.

The telepathic foe is difficult to catch, because the mushrooms are changing and merging, and the leadership is pinging through them quickly. Even so, Doom will sense that someone is giving them orders: to the portal. To the portal. All else doesn't matter. Get to the portal.

Green Arrow has posed:
"We have a strategy." Green Arrow states confidently, "I don't know who you are, but you can call me Green Arrow. Cut them off from going to the rip as much as you can. I'm going to bait them into the ooze and destroy them in cloud gas as they pull back." Green Arrow states up to Theresa, before he starts to fire single payload arrows into ooze pits to deal with it... before launching cloud arrows once a number of the squidlings group up to try to remove them.

Two birds with one stone, as they say, dealing with the stalks and their minions. The best way to protect the civilians is to herd them /away/ from civilians after all.

Siryn has posed:
    "Siryn." Is all Siryn says to Green Arrow....and that's all the break the Mushroom warriors gets before she assaults sonically, yet again. Of course, she keeps them away from the civilians, who are still being evacuated. It also means the sonic attack is able to, somehow, keep the swidlings in the clouds that Green arrow makes. Cold as hell though.

Doctor Doom has posed:
     Doom remains in the sky, looking like some kind of overzealous savior of humanity. Nevertheless, Doom certainly does his part in that particular goal. He discovers that the orders are moving through each and every one of the masses that he faces. and so, before he wreacs havoc, he transmits this message telepathically to everyone. "They are moving for the portal. Stop their advance by any cost!"

     Then, it's zappin' time. Doom takes control of some of the big stalks, and with a thought? They just....die. They collapse on themselves, removing only some of the key mushrooms from this fight to hopefully send the rest into disarray.

Shatterpoint has posed:
    The assault on Caroline ends rather swiftly. The beasts holding her in place freeze and with a stray thought, they shatter apart- again and again and again, until all that is left is a snow that once resembled a threat. The revenant strolls forward, each step bringing the impossible wave of cold closer to the pool.

    The minions charge in order to defend their 'home' or their core or whatever the pool is- Caroline doesn't know. What she does know, is that they freeze. If it freezes, she can move it. At this point, she has become untouchable: They aggress, and then simply freeze- before being flung away, shattering on contact as if being pulled in so many ways by a force unseen.

    When she reaches the pool, Caroline draws one arm back and thrusts it into the muck itself- if a thing can be alive, the cold is such, seeking out the whole of the pool and using it as a conduit, to freeze anything to which it is physically connected.

    That task could take half a moment, or it could take longer- depending on how deep the pool is- and her only concern afterwards is the rift. She hadn't received the message... But she wasn't blind. Once the pool was dealt with, she was going to make her way to the real goal.

Shadow King has posed:
<Both scene orientation:>
    It has started to snow at the site of the tear in the sky, and much if it is now coming into the weather in the northern area as well. Heroes all around the tear are acting to stop the advance, though little appears to be directly on top of the rip itself.
    And then, the flash of Superman at the base of it shows, as he tears into the teeming swarms that are at the base of it, guarding whatever is below the rip itself. Similarly, other flashes of activity of other heroes show, from both north and south, as heavy efforts are made to stop the mushrooms' advances. It is effective, and those right on top of the rift have a short time to try to decide what can be done.

In the north, several massive mushrooms have been attacked: a few of them simply keel over and die, others hit with considerable toxin and frozen might. Whole patches of ooze are being frozen solid, which causes difficulty, as others approach but cannot merge with it, and everything just stops, while they try to merge but cannot! Sonic blasts continue to cause disarray, and the fungus from the north is virtually entirely shut off, with the well-coordinated team.
    In the south, Toxin is being spread heavily from some type of artillery, and the moving fungals are being stuck down with webbing, causing weird traffic jams of them while they stop to merge, and then get poisoned. The slowing snowfall has similarly slowed them, though there are now some truly massive mushrooms down that way, merging, as the huge ones have not been dealt with as heavily.

Siryn has posed:
    Siryn has noticed that, when she starts to scream at a specific frequency, they actually start to move around and heard towards areas she designates. So...Siryn does just that. She manages to stay in the air and scream the squids into areas easier for Caroline, Doom and Green arrow to pick them off. Or destroy them en mass.....

Green Arrow has posed:
"It's a hive mind that can't work on countermeasures. Something refuses to adjust and is using them for an agenda." Green Arrow notes as he continues to bait and burn squidlings and stalks. When he comes to a truly massive stalk that doesn't have as many defenders, Green Arrow starts to pump it full of anti-fungal payload arrows; those likely require concentrated doses, "Good work, Siryn." Green Arrow observes with a compliment as he works with the sonic based mutant, "the more we bait, the less civilians dealt with... and the less of an army whatever is doing this gets."

Another arrow is launched to bait squidlings, "Almost out of payload arrows. I'll need a few seconds to switch cargo canisters in a minute."

Doctor Doom has posed:
     Mwahaha....now that the pesky starches have been dealt with, it's time to eliminate the rest. Returning his mind back to the present and not willing to multi-task, Doom simply lifts his hands into the air, magic circles sparking to life around his hands, it appears to be an advanced magic as magic circles appears at the feat of ALL of the mushrooms, and then, Doom lands on a rooftop. What does he do next?

     He snaps his fingers.

     And a large multitude of the Mushrooms there, and even some in the south, literally explode in dark magical light, as if the magic literally tore them apart.

Shatterpoint has posed:
    Caroline becomes a walking nightmare for the fungus. She begins to move in earnest, hitting the pace of a full-tilt automobile. The temperature around her remains horrifically unlivable- whatever fuels the woman seems inexhaustible. Her mere presence is likely to flash-freeze stalks, pools, and monsters alike. The cracks, then, run deep, as the cold does not abate. The snowing gets worse with her presence, as if a sudden blizzard has hit this part of the city.

    Still, though, her objective remains clear. There are more moving to the portal, and all of them must be stopped. At a pace that would be impossible to reach, and would long ago have left another wheezing for breath and rest, Caroline seems to hold strong, paying visit to stalk after stalk, clearing out any that Doom doesn't- with ruthless efficacy.

Siryn has posed:
    Siryn continues to scream at that wonderful frequency where the squidlings are just hearded towards Doom and Caroline.....and away from Green Arrow so he can change canisters, if need be. Thank goodness she has Superhuman voicebox. or else this would have gone way past painful.....

Shadow King has posed:
The rift to the south wavers just a little bit, as the teams work at it. It moved, as if something was happening to whatever was generating it.

Those in the north are finally finding that they are running out of foes; civilians are far more clear and safe. Those injured by the activity are able to be helped, and brought to ambulances.

The rip does remain, though.

Green Arrow has posed:
With the majority of the fungal threat dealt with, it becomes clear that Green Arrows strategy is working... which gives him enough respite to set his Skybike to hover mode and take off his quiver backpack. A button is pressed to release one of the cargo pod bays, and the canister in the backpack is switched out for a fully loaded anti-fungal replacement.

The empty canister goes in, and the new one is clicked into place. A tug, and the quiver is replaced onto his back as he starts to go fly on the SKybike at high speed... looking for stragglers with single dose fungicide arrows as he starts to head southward, towards the biggest concentrations of stalks.

Doctor Doom has posed:
     After that is done, Doom lands on his feet subtly, like an overlord landing before his subjects. his armor, minus his face and peaks of his front, are completely covered in that pitch black cloak he wears. Nevertheless, he seems to just walk to the south, eventually just rotating his hand one way to create a magic portal to the rest of the group. Though he makes sure everything is //truly// alright before he walks through it.

     Thankfully, he doens't really need to resupply...

Shadow King has posed:
There is an array of things happening on the south face of the portal. Huge webs are strung up, holding back large sections of squid and channeling them. The mushrooms mostly tend to eat through it, but it's caused some brilliant areas where things are being channeled together that can be attacked. Spider-Woman is responsible for those web areas.

There is a grove of 20' cactus. Yes, really. They are spraying needles with toxin on them into the moving ranks of mushroom attackers. Or they were. They aren't now. There is a mushroom that has just erupted right in the grove of them, and a woman who was responsible for the cactus is being dragged into the digestive area to be consumed! (Ivy). She is under threat, but Crusader (with several freeze guns) is moving to rescue her by dumping toxin all over her.

Iron Man is nowhere to be seen.

Superman has gone directly underneath the mushroom stalk, into a huge frothing mass of ooze and enemies, and has found a man: the rift appears to be spouting directly from him. Superman has pulled the man from the grip of those under the portal, and is trying to speak to him. A slam of palm down on the man's head makes the portal source jerk and shudder, but doesn't knock him out. It is as if something is forcing him awake, well past when he should normally still be aware.

An invisible jet just passed overhead (Diana Prince), circling.