[AI] At Least It's Not a Gluten Allergy?

[iamaghostfearme]

The call came in over the Defenders secure commline. Danny wasn't a full blown Young Ally, especially now that he'd gone off the grid with the Thunderbolts, but he still tried to help the Defenders and Young Allies where he could. All his grassroots connections were useful and not many heroes that had come back yet from the Crisis had phasing powers.

Hence them giving him the comm.

Which he was very glad he had at the moment. He'd still been recovering from another fight and the other T-bolts were off on a mission and had warned him they'd be on radio silence.

Despite his injuries, when he saw a bank getting robbed by two supervillains, he'd jumped right in. He wasn't that hurt and they were a total joke.

Only problem was the bank wasn't the real target and they hadn't been alone.

So now, after a merry chase, he was crouching hidden in a warehouse as they tried to find him, wheezing.

"This - is Hollow. Need backup," he wheezed over the comms. "Warehouse - 9th and market - in Nu Nyc. Pinned - by supervillains. Need - epipen."

My, didn't that sound serious?

"Nobody's - allowed - to laugh."

Maybe not that serious.

Comments

[siujerkjai]

"Nobody's - allowed - to laugh."

Dinah Laurel Lance raised an eyebrow as that statement came over the comms. "I'm on my way," she said as she leaned forward on her specialized motorcycle. She wasn't too far from where Hollow was, but there wasn't any place she could go to get an epipen that wasn't out of her way.

"If anyone can meet me with an epipen though, I'd love you forever and keep you in free flowers for a month."

She swerved a corner, the navigation unit on her bike chirping as she approached the warehouse. Quickly, Dinah parked the bike far enough away that any present villains wouldn't necessarily find her and snuck into the warehouse.

"Where are you?" she asked Hollow, speaking into her comm. If possible, she wanted to sneak him out and get him gone, in case no one else could come with an epipen in time.

Okay. See. This is a case for a utility belt. You know Bruce would have a Bat-epipen in his.

[arach_nerd]

Peter grabbed an epipen out of a first aid kit, placed it in his own utility belt, and went for the roof, leaping off and firing a webline towards Nu-NYC

"I've got one ready and I'm headed out. ETA's five minutes. You know what we're walking into yet Canary?"

[siujerkjai]

"Besides a severe allergic no-no, not yet," Dinah said softly. She was on one of the upper levels of the warehouse, looking in. That she hadn't heard from Hollow yet, and that worried her. She slunk in, sticking close to the shadows, hood up so that it covered her bleached blonde hair.

She surveyed the scene below her and quirked up an eyebrow as a familiar black, yellow, and red colour scheme came into view.

"So. I'm seeing Condiment King." A small smile tugged at the corner of her lips. "Don't know if he's working with anyone else, but hey. He's not that difficult to take down." Unless you were allergic to something in one of his condiments.

[idiotboyfriend]

"Rikki and I are like two minutes away!" Billy called, maybe a tiny bit too loud over the comms because he had a lot of wind in his ears. He was trying to mostly focus on keeping Rikki in the air with him while moving as fast as possible.

It was probably a good thing he was giving a ride to an adrenaline junkie.

[withoutaworld]

"Assuming Wiccan doesn't lose concentration and drop us..." The comment's not meant for the comms - but since it's purposely pitched loud enough for Billy to hear, some of it might come in over his comm anyway.

She has her arms as tight around his neck as they can get without actually choking him, but she's grinning anyway. The kind of girl who throws herself off buildings without any powers doesn't exactly balk at heights.

[iamaghostfearme]

If it was just the Condiment King he might have managed, even if he would've still needed that Epi-pen. But Condiment King wasn't alone.

Something exploded at the far end of the warehouse and a villain was visible... shooting rockets from his crotch. Yeah.

Danny was visible again, diving out from behind the crates where he was hiding, just barely avoiding the blast and now that his cover was blown anyway and he didn't need to keep quiet anymore, he spoke again.

"Not just - him. Crotch Rocket. Dalmation Man. And Captain Astroglide. Too."

He was covered in something brown that was probably (hopefully) nutella and also in ketchup and mustard.

Hollow turned down another little sidepath in the crates just in time to avoid getting hit by one of Crotch Rocket's Codpiece's rockets, then jumped over a section of some kind of slimy substance on the floor - a lubricant left by the now visible Captain Astroglide Trapster, who appeared trying to shoot some kind of glue at him.

He ducked that and threw some kind of strange alien magnetic device (a little something from Noh-varr's alien arsenal) that flew over to the Trapster and tazed him, putting more distance between himself and the villains, aiming for the nearby door.

"Fake bank robbery. Ambush. Captain "Parents-Should-Have-Used-A-Condom"...iment there-" Even breathless he was still trying to quip "- Got a lucky shot. Nutella'd. In the face. Allergic to Hazelnuts."

Hence all the rather horrible wheezing. His windpipe was closing up.

"No breathing? No powers. Controlled breathing. S'how I concentrate."

He couldn't focus like this to use his powers and it was getting to the point he could barely run. That he was still ducking a dodging was a testament to his willpower. It looked like he'd gotten some training in while with the T-bolts.

He held his own right up until he was ambushed near the door by Dalmation Man The Spot, who started appearing through his dimensional holes, punching and kicking him and making his arms and legs disappear because he could even punch back. It was hard to block when arms and legs were coming at you from every possible angle.

He managed to get a punch in to the Spot's briefly appearing chest only to have the spot arrange it so he was punching a portal and that his own arm came out of another portal right in front of his own head - essentially making it so Danny punched himself in the face through the portals.

Now it was looking bad. Growing green blood started to splatter on the ground and on his clothes from the endless array of blows. One good shot got him in the throat and he dropped like stone, clutching his throat. With his throat already closing up, it hadn't been a good place to be hit.

[holyevilbatman]

"Everyone laughs at us! We're a joke to the supervillain community! Nobody takes us seriously," the Spot called out as he kept kicking and punching the huddled over Hollow. "But you run with the Thunderbolts and that means something, right? Once we kill you, kid, once we kill a superhero, they'll finally give us the respect we deserve!"

This wasn't some random encounter gone wrong. It was a coordinated trap for a superhero and attempted murder.

[siujerkjai]

The smile that had threatened to appear on Dinah's face faded.

No, this was bad. This was bad.

Dinah reached into the pockets of her cloak and pulled out a few small, smooth, electronic spheres. Leftovers from a time when Dinah had lost the metahuman ability which she was most famous for, they tended to come in handy during moments like this when she didn't want to let loose with the real thing.

The spheres landed behind the spot. On impact, tiny little hidden doors shifted in, revealing speakers.

That's when the screaming start.

Using surprise to her advantage, Dinah leaped off of the second story bridge that she'd been standing on and landed behind Danny. Without missing a beat, she started blocking as many of the Spot's attacks as she could.

[withoutaworld]

It's hard to mistake the warehouse they're looking for as they close in on it, what with all the screaming and explosions and geez, what are they walking in on? It doesn't sound funny anymore, that's for sure.

"Don't slow down," she says to Billy, loosening her grip around his neck. "Just come in a little bit lower-- yeah, right at this angle. Don't try to catch me."

Now, the way they're flying, Billy will skim right over the roof, and Rikki... Well, Rikki lets go of him entirely for just a second, catching hold of his ankles before she plummets past him. She grins despite herself at having managed that, swings her body a little to gain momentum a short distance before the warehouse, and releases her grip at just the right time that her momentum combined with Billy's sends her smashing through one of the high windows of the warehouse, up near the roof.

She keeps her body curled into a ball at first, solid light shield flaring to life as she covers her head with it, so the glass from the shattered window bounces harmlessly off it and her uniform, and uncurls as she reaches the ground... crashing down with the ring of vibranium boots on concrete just a few feet from a guy with a very unfortunate-looking costume.

Rikki stares at him in momentary bemusement, too taken aback to immediately attack. She clears her throat. "So you must be Crotch Rocket..."

She brings up her shield just in time to deflect one of those rockets, aimed directly at her face. (Gross, dude. Really gross.)

[arach_nerd]

Peter finally gets there, swinging through the window Rikki had smashed, firing solid web balls at the Trapster.

"Guys, if the only way you can beat someone in a fight is by taking advantage of an accidental allergic reaction, you've hit rock-bottom."

[iamaghostfearme]

Danny was hunched over, hand at his throat, lips turning an alarming shade of grey.

"Saying. They fell. Implies. That they. Were ever. Any. Higher."

Totally wheezing in a way that suggested his throat was almost closed.

Totally still mocking them because they deserved it.

Not that it was surprising at all. By now they knew him well enough to know that he'd keep on sassing people to the point of oxygen deprivation.

[idiotboyfriend]

Billy comes in a little more slowly than Rikki, and drops down next to Danny. That is a very alarming color for a person to be, and Billy is not comfortable with this.

"Okay, less quipping, more trying to keep breathing. Please. SPIDER-MAN! We need the epipen like yesterday!" Right. Focus. "IwanthisthroattostayopenIwanthisthroattostayopen--" He doesn't know if it'll work, but hopefully it'll keep it open enough for a little air to get in until they get that epi in him.

[holyevilbatman]

The Spot disappeared into his holes, then popped out of one behind Dinah, aiming a kick to her head. Apparently he thought he had a better chance fighting her and manipulating his dimensional holes more actively.

"Accidental or not, a kill's a kill! It's a dog eat dog world out there and we're sick of being treated like we're pathetic."

[holyevilbatman]

"My name is Codpiece!" called out Codpiece to Rikki, as he shot out a boxing glove - yes a boxing glove - from his crotch. "And you're going to taste my crotch-based fury!"

[holyevilbatman]

The Trapster managed to dodge some of the web balls, but one messed up one of his glue guns.

His other hand was still free, however, to shoot lubricant all over any possible surface Spider-Man might try to stand on.

[holyevilbatman]

Condiment King started shooting mustard at Wiccan and Hollow with one of his condiment guns.

"I relish the fact that you've mustard the courage to face me!"

[arach_nerd]

"You get treated like you're pathetic because you are pathetic, Ohn."

Despite the fact that he was still quipping, Peter was making his way towards Danny. As Trapster fired the lubricant, he used it to his advantage, sliding underneath Spot's portal, past Dinah, and stopping near Danny.

"EpiPen delivery!" That was all the warning Danny got before the device was jabbed into his thigh.

[iamaghostfearme]

He couldn't really talk anymore so his face just contorted in a silent, "OOOOOWWWW," and he glared slightly.

Way to jam it in there, Spider-Man.

He fell back on the floor on his back, still wheezing slightly, but before long his breathing started to sound less labored and color came back to his lips.

He was still nowhere close to fighting fit, though.

[siujerkjai]

Crotch-based fury. What the hell are villains coming to? She ducked below the kick, brought her hands up, and wrapped them around the Spot's ankle. A low-level humming emanated from her mouth. It was a trick she'd learned while practicing with Dr. Mid-Nite during her days with the JSA - a manipulation of her canary cry designed to put people off-balance. She yanked on the Spot's leg. "Newsflash, Polka Dot. You kind of are."

[withoutaworld]

Rikki ducks back behind her shield, angling it to deflect the boxing glove back toward his face. Even if that had hit her, she can't imagine it would have accomplished much...

"Crotch-based... ew. I thought you couldn't make this whole shtick creepier, but you did."

She surges forward, keeping the shield between her and Codpiece. As she closes with him, she jumps, using the weapon attached to his hips as a convenient step up to knee him in the face. Taste that, asshole.

[idiotboyfriend]

"Spidey stealing my quips while I'm busy keeping the dying guy alive," Billy mutters under his breath after the epipen does its thing, but there's only so much he can complain when some guy is literally attacking Rikki with his crotch.

Yes, there is the mustard and relish puns and he may never be able to eat either again because those puns were awful, but...

"That is almost enough to make me reconsider being gay, dude, get a new schtick!"

He should possibly not draw attention to himself and the guy who was recently going into anaphylactic shock, but hey, let's not let logic get in the way here.

[holyevilbatman]

The Spot was thrown off balance by Black Canary so hard that he fell onto the floor and got knocked unconscious.

Codpiece getting kneed in the face made him drop like a sack of bricks.

The only ones left standing were the Condiment King and the Trapster.

The Condiment King changed settings on his condiment guns and vinegar started to shoot out in the direction of Black Canary, Spidey, Wiccan, and Danny.

"Try though you mayo, you still will never ketchup to us in this fight! I'll make you vinaigrette ever trying to face us"

[iamaghostfearme]

"Oh my god stop."

[siujerkjai]

"I'm going to relish kicking your ass," Dinah muttered, moving so that she was no longer being attacked by vinegar.

God, she was probably going to stink for a week. Thank god she owned a flower shop. That would help mask the hideous scent somewhat.

[iamaghostfearme]

"You also stop. You're not exempt." Okay, she had helped save him and he was super grateful and all but it was either people stopped with the puns or he was purposefully eating more nutella to escape. "Everybody stop. New rule: no more puns." Yes, he's looking at you, too, Spidey.

[arach_nerd]

"So you're saying we should put a lid on the condiment puns?"

There were very few people on and off Earth who could make Spidey shut up. Danny was not one of them.

While he kept talking, he fired webbing at Condiment King, trying to put a lid on the actual condiments.

[iamaghostfearme]

"If you don't stop, I'm gonna eat more nutella and then I'm gonna die, and I'm gonna do it all just to have an excuse to relentlessly haunt your asses. We're talking full on Ghost Dad. And yes I picked a terrible ghost movie because it will be that terrible." He hates you all now. All of you.

[withoutaworld]

"I should have sat this one out," Rikki mutters under her breath, keeping a boot on Codpiece's chest in case he tries to get up again. This is just embarrassing.

But at least with everyone focusing on the Condiment King and his terrible puns, she feels safe enough tossing a flashbang in the Trapster's direction and hopefully not blinding anyone else in the process. He's going to be a lot less annoying if he's too disoriented to aim... and to be honest, Condiment King doesn't seem like enough of a threat to worry about. One of the others will put him down soon.