Break a Leg [PLOT / OPEN GROUP TWO]

Chin perched atop his palm, lazily slumped on a wheelchair the body didn't need at all, a thousand yard stare drifted through the surroundings of the destroyed theater. Debris and rubbish everywhere, fit for a so-called prestigious academy that was supposed to be the best of the best yet couldn't even stop everything from falling apart once the first domino crashed. The stupid wolf in the back wasn't helping matters either with lowly pathetic Beata coming to their rescue. Fools, aren't they? To stoop to a level to ask the inferior academy to save them. Well. Whatever.

The porcelain doll-like figure glanced over at the pallid canine, snickering, "Careful now. Wouldn't want me to kill you and your precious classmates slowly and painfully, right~?" Without another word, air pressure increased to crush. Just enough to stop mobility. Not enough to poison and kill. Yet. "If your saviors don't come soon, I'll consider the slaughter for my own amusement."

Vitriol and malice slipped into the otherwise soft and gentle voice, a complete juxtaposition to the appearance and sound. Difficult as it was to see his eyes behind the strange visor he wore, anyone could tell a dark expression and smile weaved its way around his innocent features.

Did they have a plan going into this? Echo to Bravo, code names, control points, a map with a bunch of scribbles in red marker, that kind of thing? She didn't give a hoot what the plan was, only if they made one to begin with. Either way, she knew the second they kicked through that door, any sense of procedure would evaporate and they'd all break apart, doing their own thing. That was fine.

But if they were just winging it, then suddenly she wasn't so sure about all this. She kept telling herself that it was a simulation, like the Summer Tournament, and if she got crushed by a roof again or something, no biggie, just get some ice cream afterward like last time.

She slipped her hands out of her pockets. Poppy popped a jagged chip of marble up on the toe of her shoe and kicked it up like a hacky-sack, swinging her other leg as it came flipping back down. It whistled like a bullet, whizzing through the air and dead-center into the middle of the doors. CRACK. There was an explosion of white dust as the doors banged open, the chain lock around the bars clattering, shattered, to the floor.


Showtime, she guessed.

The mission was simple; get in, save the captured, beat up some bad guys, and get out. His confidence was contagious. Sure he had just graduated, but he couldn't help that he was excited. The sooner the threat of these people in black were dealt with, the less he had to worry about for Shepard's future. They both could live their lives in safety, and death would never have to be on their minds. This is what Leo wished for the future, simple in theory but a bit messy in practice.

Which were exactly his thoughts as the group entered the building, a bow and arrow in his possession. One arrow drawn towards the door. Boom. Poppy was kind of scary, Leo figured it was in his best interest to try and not piss her off. He let it fly into the room as the smoke cleared, whizzing in the direction of a porcelain doll like person, a golden hue drove it toward with extreme accuracy. So, it was a bit messy already. Leaves little to be desired, truly.

Explosions.

Great way to get the show started up. And with the scattered debris of the door thrown around in a hazy white smokescreen came the cavalry. Well, they certainly took their time getting here after all, but that didn't matter. The end result wouldn't change - Beata would lose, foolishly risking their precious students to save a branch that wanted nearly nothing to do with them, and then what? Experiments, murder, or anything else Argona would want out of getting new subjects to handle. This was the act leading up to their death throes.

Keeping the captives in check, Callum didn't spare a glance, let alone acknowledge the arrival of poor Sophia's rescuers. "Lucky you guys~" Leo's arrow bounced right off his figure, scarcely missing its target by a millimeter. He would spare them the details of how that worked. Anyone knew better than to shoot projectiles at a manipulator of air, let alone pick a fight with someone with a sacred ability. Not that they had to know what his gift was yet. "I get to kill and destroy your remaining hope of getting out of this alive." His expression darkened from behind the visor, a malicious and uncharacteristic smirk making its way up his lips.

As swift as the wind itself, he seemingly disappeared, moving behind Leo. "Peek-a-boo." Playfully and innocently as it was, the green-haired doll launched a flurry of kicks at the angel, beginning with one squarely aimed behind his knees. The other girl would be easier to handle, so all he had to do was get rid of the slightly larger threat. Should be easy enough if angel boy fell from heaven faster than god intended him to.

Certainly Leo was not aware of Callum's air abilities, watching the arrow bounce away with the golden hue fleeting. There was the slightest narrow to his eyes, thinking back to the time when he had fought Mason in the tournament. The angel was just about to chalk it up to something similar to sound manipulation when the figure vanished, then reappeared behind him. Now, 'Peek-a-boo' in the sense of the daycare was non-threatening and normally a great activity for children learning object permanence. But--damn was that startling to hear that behind his head.

The reaction time was not nearly as fast has he would have liked it to be, twisting while throwing a punch toward the man in black. The man's own foot making a solid connection to his knees. Pain shot through his legs, and the angel toppled to the ground. While his fist ultimately missed its target, Leo swung his other hand around--bow clasped tightly. The longer weapon was not airborne, but rather a quick reaction to swipe at his attacker.

He hit the ground with a thud, knees stiffly protesting his movements as Leo scrambled to pull himself up, or at least get into a defensive position. Like hell he was going to lose this easy, Leo had people waiting for him at home. Losing was not an option.

I get to kill and destroy your remaining hope of getting out of this alive. Wow. That was a real buzzkill. She hated that kind of negative garbage. Poppy stood watching as the girl—err, yeah, boy—put Leo onto the ground with a string of kicks. For a second, she considered sitting back, see how it played out, maybe put down a bet, make some popcorn, but she had to be a team player. This wasn't just a schoolyard fight. Somebody actually, might, y'know, die.

Poppy pressed off against the tile, launching herself through the hole in the wall and toward the man—err, woman?—in black, a human projectile trying to spear tackle her—him!—into next week.

Alright, so what was he supposed to do now? Stay in the back, call some bird whistles, and sing the entire room to sleep? Including his fellowmen, in a Hellscape like this, for who knew how long, and then just win by default? That was tempting, real tempting honestly. It was the easy way out, but he hadn't the time to even find a corner to hide out in when a sudden burst of wind had hurled their way - like the gust from a tornado, and from some little kid of all things.

"Well, I had a decent life, I think."

The blonde forced himself up in a mere matter of moments. He could see the slingshot of the arrow soar back towards them; straight back to the angel of the academy. There was no real time to think about it. All that ran through his head that this dude that went in saved his little sister was about to get his jaw kicked into oblivion. He slipped his short blade out of it's holder and into his grasp, swooping in over Leo's back, arm full out swinging.

He hadn't even noticed the other girl throwing herself straight at their assailant - literally, out of the corner of his eye like a god damned rocket.

Three on one would be easy enough with the small fry that these students are like. It would have been more of a challenge if their previous champions had fought him - like the rotten sound man -, but Beata sent some meager gifted instead. They didn't prepare or research enough if they were going to send multiple people with a disadvantage against the organization's powers. Angel boy's frantic swipe with the bow grazed his cheek, a thin line of red dripping. Too bad that was the only blow he would be able to land. I'll make sure of it. Feral animal desperate to win landing a lucky shot.

In the near-background, the deadweight pushed off a shifting tile, launching herself straight at him. The headmaster's own beloved son was within the audience as well, darting from behind the angel as he pulled out his knife. His lips twitched upward in an amused crescent as he bounced on one foot and sprung himself up into the air, landing a few feet away from the trio, safe from the line of fire. He could've easily repelled the human weapon and disarmed the musician. It was far more amusing to see if they would hit each other by accident.

"You'll have to do better than that to catch me!" Callum snickered, scarf billowing behind him as dark wings. A flat monotone, gaze darkening as lambent blue dimly lit beneath his clothes. "Is that the best you can do?" He launched himself back into the fray, aiming vital strikes at the three in succession, faster than any wind could blow. Each one employed a similar technique that the sound man used: air gathered into place for even more power in any blow that managed to hit.

While their opponent took their time to monologue a threat of an oncoming attack, the angel brought forth a golden shield. The light based energy shimmered in response to the attacks coming into contact with the physical shield. Two graced their presence, a small spherical shield took the blunt of the attack for Poppy--but didn't seem to arrive quite fast enough before the attack made contact, even one or two. The second shield was much larger, covered both Leo on the ground and Jason who stood defensively behind Leo.

As soon as the natural blond figured the attack had stopped--the shields vanished--and Leo's own barrage of light based attacks were sent Callum's way. In what Leo had figured a sudden stroke of genius, his light attacks would not be tossed away similar to his arrow. The grin on his face vanished just as soon as Callum breezed past him, and landed multiple blows into the blonds abdomen. Gritting his teeth, Leo found purchase in the man...woman? His fist clenched tightly on their uniform. Taking the blows from the enemy would be better then letting them get away from his holy light attacks, which he brought down upon them both.

Though--Leo realized--He wouldn't last long like this. Blood already seeped into his mouth, copper filling his taste buds.

Fauntleroy was nervously lingering towards the back of the room, hoping to remain unnoticed until he was ready to attack. He took a few shaky breaths to help steady himself before he put on his "mask" of confidence. He strutted forward, staying behind the shielded angel boy, however, and placed a hand onto the ground. After a moment he stood back up, having analyzed the ground beneath them. "I hope you saved some of the fun for me," he said, stepping forcefully with one foot. At first, nothing happened. Then, a rift formed between Leo and Callum and the crack continued to surround Callum and he was shot upward into the air as a column of Earth flew upward. "Hope you don't get vertigo, hot stuff~" he called to the green-haired boy.

Magnus lurked on the other side of the room, not wanting to interrupt the interesting battle that was going on between 4 students and the green-haired air manipulator. He'd always found that boy a bit off, but he could hold his own, Magnus gave him that. He flipped a coin in his hand absentmindedly, watching the events unfold. When the white-haired boy walked up, he immediately wrote him out as a non-threat. He didn't look like someone who could potentially be dangerous. But when cracks formed into the ground he realized he had underestimated the young boy. A frown crossed the older man's face. Maybe it was time to step in, but maybe he should let things play out and when it was close to the end he would join. Magnus decided to go with the latter for now as he sat back down.

Whoosh. He was gone, but she was stuck on her crash course, flying helplessly on her set trajectory. She slammed into the tall blond, sending them both folding to the floor as she rolled over him with a violent somersault. The trap went back on offense just as she crawled back to her knees, tumbling over again just as Leo's shield spread around them.

Oof. She blinked away the killer throbbing in her skull and stood again, wobbling on uncertain legs, teeth clenched. I've taken worse beatings than this... Nana slapped her upside the temple with a dough roller once, and that hurt worse than any stupid superhero fight she'd been in yet. Poppy fell in behind Leo, shifting on her heel, white dust rising up around her shoes.

When she had her moment—...

Sooner or later she had to go in there and help, yet her fear gripped at her like a cold claw, telling her to stay put and maybe things would sort out by herself. She must've looked miserable, hiding in a corner under a table, hugging her knees tightly up to her chest. Ever since she'd slipped inside the hall she'd been cowering there, frozen in her place. The green haired doll-like creature was making handy work of defending themselves against the projectiles that the more experienced fighters were launching. Dust that you couldn't imagine to dwell in such an institution was making breathing hard on her lungs.

"You're a piece of thrash, go there and help." It was now or never, though. Seeing Poppy launched across the room made for a chilling sight, but she'd known those kinds of things too. Her small experience in the tournament wasn't anything compared to this, but the brief moment of thinking about those fights gave Anne the kick she needed to crawl from under the table. She squinted, thinking as she ran along the side of the room, avoiding the mayhem that was happening towards the middle.

Instead she followed another student that had just burst in. It brought to her attention the other person standing towards one of the corners, probably still unnoticed by the main fighters. Darting past the other girl who seemed to be focusing, Anne sprung towards the older man, arms stretched outwards. Throughout her body, her gift was charging up, ready to tear skin off of her opponent if she could get her hands on them for enough time.

After all the rest had entered, Montare entered into the room with a pair of shortswords at his hips. It didn't exactly take long for him to notice the students attacking the two visible people in black. He was also quick to notice the wolf chained to the stage at the other end of the room. After pausing for a moment he suddenly surged forward, sprinting for the stage. While the others kept the student's wardens busy, he'd free them and then they could either run like hell, or, even better, finish this fight. He definitely preferred the latter, but which one ended up happening didn't matter until he did free the one they were here to rescue. Reaching the stage, he quickly hopped up and grabbed at the base of the chain, his hands becoming clawed. Hopefully, he wouldn't end up getting shot in the back or anything before he could get the fellow wolf free. Hopefully. Maybe he'd have gotten so lucky no one noticed him make a mad dash for the stage. But that'd be too easy, wouldn't it?

Tch. Newcomers, previously hiding away and sneaking around actually joining the fray. Earth boy in the back, vector girl patrolling and going after his useless magnet partner, tissue girl trying to bear-hug a man she shouldn't even be getting close to. With the ground surrounding him cracking and rumbling, his movements stilled, palm on the ground, bracing for impact. So he was going to join into the fight. What he didn't anticipate was the pillar actually shooting him up into the air instead of being a flat platform to balance off of. Like a stake being driven through his chest, he launched into the air. Quickly recovering as best as he could, he turned his body upright in his descent and broke his fall with a roll. Throb went the pain at his chest, but that didn't matter.
Someone darted towards the stage.

Whatever. He can easily be dealt with later. His stupid plan would backfire anyway.

An unseeing gaze fell on Jace. "Run if you don't wanna be it~" Reducing air resistance and propelling himself with his gift in a single step, Callum darted back at the blonde even faster than before. Too bad he couldn't kill them, especially the one who controlled another element. That one should really die, but the mistress wouldn't take very kindly to that. He could just crush their organs and break their bodies instead. Applying as much pressure as he could to his next strike, he aimed a kick straight towards the other's face, steadying his other foot to bounce back and move out of the way before the ragtag group of students tried to attack him again.

I won't let you steal him.