2014-03-17 - A Flaming St. Paddy's

Happy St. Patrick's Day! The Irish section of Brooklyn, especially, is a cacophany of noise, even this early of the day. Bars already have people in them, but that's nothing entirely new.

It's nice not to have official school hours, as far as Adam is concerned. It makes things easier to find this /other/ street crew that's taken over since his stopped running the area. Turf wars among street kids aren't quite as fatal as they are among adult gangs and mafias, but they are taken just as seriously. And Adam had been plotting this since he got the crap stomped out of him outside the S-Mart* by a couple of little punks last month.

It was the perfect day to hunt them down. He had an excuse: he was technically looking for a stolen car for his uncle. Technically.

In reality, he had called up Tommy Shepherd, his oft-larcenous white-haired Speed-ster and pyrotechnic 'bro'; and his girlfriend, Princess Powerful, usually called 'Mols'; to help him find the group of street kids dealing on his turf. And dealing harder stuff than Adam himself and his crew were willing to touch.

"Trust me," Adam is saying to Tommy as they stroll down the street, "Pretty sure if we find the car, we'll be able to hold that over Clint's head forever. Also? I've already checked the other areas of Brooklyn. This has /got/ to be where those little punkasses are holed up."

Editor's Note: See Issue #2014-02-11 - New Deal In Town

Molly Hayes walks along with the two boys. In celebration of St. Patrick's Day, she's wearing a hat that would look more appropriate on the Lucky Charms leprechaun - a green bowler's hat. At least it wasn't an animal hat this time.

"Hey... I was thinking, since it's St. Patrick's Day, maybe I can try beer? I mean Chase gets it sometimes but Nico said I wouldn't like it because it tastes like horse pee. But now I think maybe she was fibbing, because how would she know that unless she's actually drank horse pee. Right?" How Molly got on this conversation is a mystery, but then goes back to the topic.

"Who are we looking for again?"

Okay, well maybe not back on topic, but at least she's trying to remember what the topic is, and that's a step forward.

Tommy isn't the white-haired kid today. His hair is a shade of dirty blonde and has grown a bit longer recently, nah not really, it's a wig. He wears that sometimes when he's pulling scams and doesn't want people to identify him at first sight or clue in too early that he's a mutant. He's got a Notre Dame hat on, and a green 'Kiss Me I'm Irish' t-shirt on as well as jeans, a thrift-shop jean jacket and hiking boots on, as well as green tinted shades to complete the ensemble.

"Sure man, no problem. I mean they're little punks how hard can they be to deal with?" he asks both rhetorically and distractedly as he checks out a couple of girls who saunter past. Sure he was taken but he wasn't dead. He turns back to Mols. "We're looking for a sweet car and some punk dealer kids, as for beer,"he shrugs and looks at Adam, Mols was his girl, he's leaving that one for him.

"Maybe when we get back to the gym," Adam replies with a shrug, as to the beer. He's still in his standard trenchcoat and fingerless glove combo with the black-and-purple backpack slung on his back, but his shirt was at least green.

With a logo for Harp beer.

"Yeah. The car is stupid sweet. The actual owner wants to sell it for cheap, just not as cheap as the asshole who stole it was willing to pay. And I think Clint nearly nutted himself when he saw the picture of it." He hrms, eyes narrowing at the entryway to an alley up ahead. "As for the punks-- yeah. We should be able to handle them. Looks like a decent bolthole, that alley. Should we check it out?"

Molly Hayes smiles. "Cool..." Then looks over at the alley. "Yeah! We're gonna totally clobber them." She heads towards the alley with Tommy and Adam. "By the way, what does nutted mean?" she asks as she peers down the alleyway.

Tommy peers down the alley. "Want me to circle around to the other side and cut them off?" he asks Adam. "You and Double-P can take this side." Then when Molly asks her question he smirks. "That's really a question your boyfriend should answer," he says putting an arm around Adam's shoulder. "Right?" he asks giving Adam a smug look.

Adam flushes a bit pinkly. "Uh. Tell you later. Mols." And he shrugs out of Tommy's grip, shooting him a slightly dirty look. "And yeah. Meet in the middle?" He begins walking towards the alley opening, sliding his hand into Molly's-- half out of boyfriendness, half subterfuge and half to guide her int he right direction.

Three halfs means a whole lot of trouble.

Molly Hayes holds Adam's hand, blushing. She does that whenever Adam gets boyfriend-y. "You know... I really like when you let me come with you on these things." she says as the walk along down the dark alleyway. "Speaking of which, why did you let me come? I mean... I know you probably think ..." She shrugs. "You know, that stuff that Finesse says about me having no training whatsoever?" She looks around the alley a bit more.

Tommy laughs and then zoom, he's gone with a bit of old newspaper flying around in his wake. A second or two later he appears at the far end of the alley hands stuck in his pockets. He whistles 'Like a Virgin' as he walks, yes, a taunt aimed at the couple down the other end of the alley.

"These dilches don't have training either," Adam replies to Molly, his eyes flitting about the alley, looking for any doors or openings. "And I didn't want to bring anyone from the Young Avengers in. Well, besides Tommy, but he's street scum like me, so he knows how things work. Finesse would have lectured us all the whole time, Rica would have punched /me/ for asking her help, and Hulking's too nice of a guy to get mixed up in this shit. And Hellion-- well, he's a rich kid." He shrugs. "You're a street kid. You have a crew. You know how things work."

"There." A carefully piled up grouping of detritis, but it covers up a broken window into a building sublevel. "Looks like a front door to me."

Molly Hayes turns to Adam, looks at him, then gives him a kiss on the cheek. Then looks around. "So where are those dilches?" then looks over at the detritus.... better known as junk and debris... covering the window and heads over to it. "I used to be a rich kid, yknow. All of my friends were. I mean... you know because they were all supervillain bad psycho rule LA people.” She scrunches her nose at the garbage covering the window and walks over to clear the opening. "Last one in's a rotten egg!" then slips in through the window.

Tommy joins Adam and well, just Adam, because Molly's already going through the window. "I see why you like her," he smirks to Adam and then says. "Want to see if there's another way in? All of us going through the front door is a good way to get shot," he pauses. "Actually never mind I forget your girlfriend is invulnerable." With that he zips in after Molly landing in a cool looking crouch on the inside.

Adam may be the last in, but he slides in quickly as well, looking around the place.

It's dim. There's furniture, but it looks salvaged-- stuff picked up that people had thrown out on the side of the road. Rats squeak. There's a vague odor of rot and mildew.

Adam narrows his eyes. He'd slept in places like this before, before his crew found the apartment building to squat in. He steps forward, examining the place further, but his foot catches a pile of syringes. They clink and clatter as the are scattered.

"Not cool," he breathes. "All right. Doubt the power's on..." he gestures to the jars scattered that hold blown-out candles. "So we should probably stick together. Looks like no one's home at the moment."

Molly Hayes eeks for a second after going in through the window. She looks over at Tommy when he flops on the couch "You don't wanna sit on that thing. It really smells bad. Like poop.... and I think I saw something moving in it. Like a mouse - it tried to bite my butt!" Then looks around a bit when Adam comes in. "Are you sure this is where they'd be?" She walks around to look for a door.

Tommy wrinkles his nose. He'd been to places like this before too, mostly to visit or make deals. He wasn't a rich kid but he'd spent most of his life either with some sort of home or in juvie. He keeps his eyes open and begins vibrating the molecules around him just a bit to form the beginnings of a shield and if needed that same energy could be used to blow shit up. Tommy has reconnected.

"Yeah," Adam says quietly. He shakes his head, to steady himself. "Gonna have to try this old school. They didn't have guns, so most we'll have to worry about is knives-- so Princess, make with the glowing-eye bit." He glances to Tommy. "See if you can find their stash, bro, and torch it. I don't want any of it going back out on the streets." He steps forward, and calls into the darkness: "Hey, /brats/. Looks like you picked the wrong streets to deal on-- so come out nice and peaceful-like, and nobody gets hurt. You make us have to hunt you down, and I'm gonna make some regretfulness 'bout that nutshot your boy gave me."

Silence reigns for a few moments after he calls into the darkness at the back of the basement. Then whispers, too soft to hear.

Then one of the kids, no older than Molly, strolls out, defiantly. "Bite me."

Molly Hayes looks at the kid who says that. "You know, if you sit on taht couch, a mouse probably WILL. Bite you, that is." She looks over at Adam after a second. "Am I supposed to punch them? I thought you said we were gonna beat up dilches." She looks back at the other kid. "Sooooo you're a dilch?"

Tommy spots the kid and takes that opportunity to go search for the stash. He zips forward, giving the kid a shove as he goes past. Tommy is freakishly strong, not like Molly, but he can lift about 800 pounds just using his upper body and he's not that careful with the push. Then he's on to zip around the room with time seeming to move in slow motion as he searches for the stash. You paged Tommy with ‘Feel free to find it next round.’

The kid stumbles, and by stumbles, that is, he falls to the floor, landing heavily on his side. Other voices raise in a fevored pitch, seeing that. And just over a dozen kids, dirty, with intent of violence, rise from behind boxes and appear from behind furniture.

"Coming peaceful?" Adam has to ask. But there isn't peace in their minds. The snkt! of switchblades being opened sounds, and then a wave of preteen and young teens attack Molly and Adam-- Tommy moving faster than they can really see.

"Freaks!" one of them shouts, regarding Tommy's speed--Molly's glowing eyes--and Adam... well, he's just a regular guy, right?

But he doesn't take the attack too well, as his first order of business is to step aside, as Finesse taught him, and instead of swinging on the first kid, let him pass by, foot out slightly to trip him. He swings on the second guy though, connecting firmly. "Couldn't just make this easy, could you?"

Molly Hayes says as the fight starts, "You know, I don't really feel comfortable with fighting other kids - I sorta thought we were gonna be fighting dilch grownu-" *clang* when one of them swings a pipe at her face. The result is a bent pipe, and a glowy-eyed ticked off teenage Molly.

Followed by a *POW!!!!!* as the aforementioned Molly punches him into several others.

She grabs the pipe from the ground and just gives it a squeeze to crush it and tosses it aside. "Geez! Adam was right. You guys ARE dilches!" she says fists clenched as she grabs another one.

Tommy sees the kids coming out of the woodwork like roaches, except with switchblades. He continues his search though, after all it will only take a second. Then, bingo. Stash. There's some kid holding on to it, though, ready to bolt. Tommy grabs him, smacks him in the mouth and grabs the stash. "Tooslowloser," he says before he blurs back to the others and holds up the bag. "Got your shit, if you want it back, throw down your knifes and bow down like the losers you are."

That's when someone throws a knife.

It's hard to throw a switchblade it's bottom heavy but this one sticks into Tommy point first, not getting too deep but- "Ow! Jerk," his hand blurs and then he tosses the stash. It explodes.

The explosion also sets some of the easily-lit up scraps and furniture, papers, trash... on fire. Things go up like flash paper.

So, great. Now it's three of them, against a bunch of angry, possibly drugged up, street kids. Tommy's been stuck. And the room is on fire. And the fire is spreading rapidly.

Adam curses, but swings on another kid, just as he's piled on by three more. One of them stabs him with the switchblade-- short knives, and it's not deep, but it's deep enough that he lets out a snarl of pain. He headbutts one of them, rolling aside.

Flames lick up around the periphery of the room. The first guy Tommy knocked down roars for his crew to get out.

Molly Hayes would normally run to help Adam. But instead she's having to deal with several of the teens trying to dogpile her as well. Which results in a bunch of teens getting thrown all over the place. "GEDDOFF ME!" Molly looks ticked. "And someone touched my boobs! NOT COOL!" she yells as the 'leader' starts yelling at his crew to retreat. Molly winds up running to Adam to grab one of the ones atacking her boyfriend, flinging him backwards at the aforementioned mouse couch.

Tommy blinks when his exploding trick sets the place on fire. It's never done that before. "Didn't even hit it that hard, must have had a self-destruct system," he murmurs under his breath, quoting Star Wars. He yanks the knife out of him and blows that up too before he says to the others. "Time to go," he says and moves back towards where he came in.

Smoke is filling the room, as some of the cushions catch fire as well. Adam nods to Tommy. "EVERYONE OUT!" he calls. He's including the other kids-- fire kills, and he wasn't intending on anyone actually getting hurt. "Go, Mols," he coughs. "Everyone needs to get out, Princess."

Molly Hayes runs to the stairwell. "Um...." Then she looks at the window. Okay, that's too high for people to get out of. "Wait, I have an idea!" Then runs to where the window is, over the couch, shoving the couch out of the way... then, purple glowy eyes - she draws her fist back and smashes it into the wall, causing a hole where she punches. "Okay... um... not big enough." Then takes a few steps back and runs at the wall. "Emergency Exit!" she yells as she smashes through the wall into the alleyway. "Everyone out!"

Tommy for his part climbs out the window and rolls into the alley beyond. Yeah he could use his super-speed powers and phase through the wall but he didn't want it getting out that a speedster had been setting fires to places. He had a business to run after all.

Of course the idea of keeping a low profile is more or less blown when Molly does her impression of a wrecking ball. "Geez, Mol, subtle," he says to her before he calls out for Adam. "C'mon man, let's go."

Adam looks towards the hole Molly had made, and back into the room, alit by flame. "C'mon, kids, get the hell out--"

Thud. One of the brats had taken the moments Raptor had been trying to make sure everyone got out to crack him in the back of the head with a heavy brick. Adam's eyes roll up in the back of his head, and he crumples into a boneless puddle in the midst of the flames.

As the kids pour out the windows on all three sides, they are all bolting into the crowd, making themselves scarce. Even Adam's attacker makes his way for the far window.

Molly Hayes looks around outside as people run out from the building through her makeshift exit. She looks at Tommy. "Where's Adam?" She calls in, "Adam? Come on! Hurry!"

Then Molly runs back in. "Adam?"

And sees him crumpled on the ground. "OH NO!"

In the choice of 'save your boyfriend from the burning building' or 'catch the fleeing person' - the answer is obvious. She grabs Adam and picks him up, running out through the hole. Fortunately, there's a speedster outside who she can summarize to. "TOMMYSOMEONEHITADAMANDISESCAPINGOUTTHEBACKWINDOWHELP!" before putting Adam down outside in the alley, sitting by him and holding him.... looking at his head nervously. "Adam? Are you okay?" Because getting hit in the head can do anything - unconscious. Concussion. Amnesia!

Tommy is an expert at deciphering rapid speech and by the time Molly has finished speaking Tommy's moving anger welling up inside of him. When he finds the kid by the window he grabs him by his collar and rips him back into the building and slams him /hard/ on the floor. "You going to leave my friend to burn?!" he shouts and drives a fist into the kid's gut. "Huh? he gives him another punch. "Huh?!" Tommy coughs and hits the kid again. Each punch is aimed at soft tissue where it will hurt the most and do the least damage to Tommy. "Should leave you in here you little bitch," he growls but then he grabs the kid and blurs out of the building, tossing the kid against the wall as he stops by Molly and Adam.

The kid slams into the wall with a hard thud, and crumples to the ground of the alley outside the building.

Adam's covered in soot and smoke, but beyond a crack to the head and a knife wound, he's fine. He's half Barton, that means he's got a pretty hard head, right? He's knocked out, but... he should come around. Eventually.

Sirens blare in the distance. Every one of the other kids are making their escape before the cops get there.

Molly Hayes frowns at the guy who Tommy slams into the wall. She'd have slammed him THROUGH a wall, but was too concerned about Adam and making sure his head was on her lap. She bites her lip. "Tommy, is Adam going to be okay?" She gives the unconscious Barton boyfriend a kiss then props him up a bit cautiously.

Tommy frowns down at Adam, what was he a doctor? He puts on his best face for Mols. "Dunno Mols, but we're going to get him out of here," he says and reaches down to grab Adam and Molly. Once he has them secure, he blurs off to the Aerie stopping when he's in the gym, with the smoke and sirens left behind. Once there he sets both down carefully and gives Adam another frown. "Crap, if he doesn't wake up we'll need to call the Academy, they've got doctors and stuff."