You are (Not) the Heroes IC

"Manacles maybe. Some kind of magic blocker to stop him from bringing more of these clay things out." Gaia says, morphing back into her pony form. She sighs, shaking out her mane and rubbing where the rifters had hit her. "Annoying little pests."

Crimson had seen many things in his time as a street superhero, through a small part of him had to acknowledge that none of it was quite as awesome as watching a flying robot fist punch the head off a different robot. It was like encountering something you didn't know you needed until you saw it...

As the headless suit came to a stop next to Lex and.. did nothing but stand there, Crimson couldn't help but feel on edge as he looked not just at the suit (in the event that this was some kind of trap that was meant to go off once their guard was down) but at the room around him as he tried to work out if it was meant to be some kind of trap or distraction... or if this was all just some kind of joke he simply wasn't getting. "Wouldn't let our guard down just yet Lex..."

Actions and Dice rolls.:

The silence after the battle stretches for a few seconds.

Daff cheers, lifting a protesting Rousseau up in the air with his forehooves before setting him back down on his head. He enthusiastically extends a hoof to Sunset for a hoof bump.

"Heroes win again!"

"Oh, I did it," whispers Madame Mask to herself as her decoy floats towards her and overlaps her again. "Tres bien darlings," it mouths along to announce to the group, "Was there any doubt? Keep Haven under control and make sure Lexicon is safe, I'm going after Vanish. I'll tell Argent his exact location when I get there. He's a few kilometres that way." The illusion points in the direction her tracking magic leads her. Then both real and fake Madame Mask begin to leave, looking for a window they can fly out, or any other fast way to get outside...

(When I do get outside, I want to ask Argent some questions, but I'll wait until that happens in case something happens before then...)

Rest of the Party
All law enforcement exosuits are equipped with magic suppressors for apprehending unicorns. The LUNA suit beeps and a high-tech looking horn ring, alongside hoof-cuffs, are dispensed from a side-compartment.

The doors to the testing chamber slides open again, revealing a battered looking Crimson Chef, a curious looking Lexicon, a headless SOLUS suit, and a half-melted dragon warsuit.

"Well, it looks like your teammates have things handled. How did that go?" Lexicon says, inching away from the headless Solus suit, though it moves to follow after him. "...Hm."

Madame Mask
She easily makes her way out through a window, finding herself very high up - the laboratories appear to be located in the upper levels of the whole Lexicon Tower. She does notice that at a few points, the tower is smoking, the glass windows smashed and in some cases apparently exploded. There's definitely been an attack on the building - it's only a miracle that you haven't noticed it during the fight. it explains why the security were so slow, they were probably dealing with intruders elsewhere in the building.

"Works for me."

The cuffs and horn ring fly out from their compartments and attach to Haven's hooves and horn, respectively.

"Well, I ain't gonna lie," she smirks to Lexicon, "partial's I am toward my guns 'n' gadgets, the suit was real nice to have in that fight."

The battle won, Dove relaxes and looks around for something else to do. Noticing the console with the datachip, he goes up to it, trying to see if he can tell what the villains were trying to retrieve.

Daff trots to Lex and Crimson, eyes growing wide as he notices the increase of heroic wear and tear.

"Crimson! Mr. Author! Are you alright?" He looks behind them. "Are those supposed to follow you like that?"Daff trots to Lex and Crimson, eyes growing wide as he notices the increase of heroic wear and tear.

"Crimson! Mr. Author! Are you alright?" He looks behind them. "Are those supposed to follow you like that?"

Looking behind him at the suit that is still following Lex around, Crimson gives it a small shove to see if that would actually do anything. "Honestly, this is either some elaborate plan or whomever was hacking the suits was just screwing with us for the sake of it."

The suit turns around and punches Crimson in the face before turning back to follow Lex silently.

Lex shakes his head at Daff's question. "Ah... no. No, it is not."

Meanwhile, Dove finds in the datachip incomplete copies of files related to Lex's prototype suits, as well as a complete video file named "Open Me".

It's pretty obvious what the datachip's owner wants you to do.

Sunset can't quite suppress a snicker at the SOLUS armor unceremoniously punching out Crimson.

"Looks t'me like ya got some bugs to work out before ya go public with these here suits, if somepony can just take over their brains like that. Their other bits work like a charm, though. Maybe try makin' a few of 'em their own gadgets 'n' lettin' a gadget-usin' hero with some charisma use 'em while ya work on the suits. Be doin' your PR guys a favor."

As much as she distrusts Lexicon, it's clear from the scene he was stepping out of and the battered Crimson Chef that these suits might become a problem. Better to already be equipped to solve it when it happens.

Madame Mask turns her attention from the smoking tower and flies towards her mark. As she does, she pulls out her card. "Sunglow. We have apprehended Haven, and there seems to have been other attacks on the building the rest don't know about yet. But Vanish teleported out with some data chip thing, and I'm pursuing him. I need to know anything that you have about him. I need to know what I'm trotting into here."

"Guys - there's a thing here, some kind of video file. It looks like they were after the armor suits." Dove gestures for someone good with technology. "Can someone take a look at this? I'm not sure if it's bugged or something."

Crimson grasped at his nose as he darkly cursed under his breath.

Stumbling back a little, he growled as he glared at the suit for a moment... before letting out a sigh. "...Lex, I think your going to have to work on the suits a bit more... stop that whole hacking thing from happening again."

Madame Mask
"Vanish? Uhm... He's an anomaly. Stealthy, unpredictable. Our scrying magic doesn't work on him, and he's avoided our security many times. Because of his erratic movement patterns we suspect he's some kind of freelance villain for hire, only recently has he focused on Lexicon facilities. In fact his attacks on the Lexicon Facilities are the only officially reported instances of sightings, but we suspect several other unresolved break-ins are also his doing."

"From what we know, he's very adept at breaking and entering. Physical barriers, most magical barriers, they hardly slow him down. We've not seen him directly engage in combat, so we have no data there."

The Rest
"It would appear so," Lexicon says in response to Crimson. "I'll reinforce the security software as an immediate priority."

But he goes over to Dove Colt and looks over his shoulder at the console. "Yes, give me a moment. I just need a second to make sure..." He cracks his knuckles and starts tapping away at the keyboard, a stream of almost-incomprehensible software information appearing onscreen. "ALEXIS, you are authorized to interface and isolate LexiCon lab console 2A. We're opening a potentially bugged file."

Understood. Isolating... isolated.

Lex nods, and opens up the video.

What the party sees onscreen is what seems to be a dark room, illuminated by only a white monitor at the back of the room. There are many figures silhouetted in the white light, their features indistinct aside from their general build. There's what looks like two ponies, a minotaur, a drake, a griffon, and a goat, standing in a line in that order.

Good day, Lexicon Author. The figures speak together, their voice artificially garbled and modified to be unrecognizable. How does it feel to have your security so easy breached?

The leftmost pony speaks. This is a... greetings, I suppose. A neighborly gesture I'm sure you'll appreciate.

The next pony then speaks. After all, we are rivals for dominance of Maretropolis. You with your corporate conglomerate, and us with our... new order.

You see, Maretropolis is stagnating, The minotaur says. Your patronage has lulled the people into a sense of security.

Yet ponies go hungry. The uneducated remain unenlightened, the unemployed remain in poverty. The drake speaks, and the light outlines a toothy grin.

Consider this a warning to you. The griffon says, flashing a handful of sharp talons. Maretropolis is our city. A city of the people, not the elite.

Finally the goat speaks. No one - not the Power Ponies, not the police, certainly not your new amateur team - will stop our rise to power.

Then together, This day, Echelon declares war.

The video stops. Lexicon is silent, regarding the screen with narrowed eyes.

"Well," Gaia speaks up, breaking the silence. "That was unexpected."

She taps her chin thoughtfully. "Echelon... does that ring a bell for you, Mr. Author?"

"You know, I'm all for the idea of reforming the system to be more fair. Everyone deserves the chance to make something of themselves and if they are willing to put in the work to do it they should be rewarded for it with a safety net in place for those who are unlucky or stricken by misfortune." Crimson began after the video had come to an end. "However, I seriously doubt that some group of shadowy figures calling themselves Echelon declaring war on the wealthy, the police force and superheroes in general is going to be the driven force behind said change."

"That sounds like villain talk," Dove says doubtfully. "Sure, the city needs some work, but they just almost blew a building up."

"Echelon..." Lex wrinkles his brow. "I've never heard of it, but their speeches sound suspiciously like the countless terrorist statements I've heard over the years. I'll inform the city council of this, and have my security force on high alert."

He sighs, looking around. His sight falls upon the mechanized suit following him around. "...I'll have to authorize a full overhaul of the security firmware as well... this will set the contract back at least a month... gods, the paperwork for this, I can feel my claws going numb already..."

He quickly orders a few curious lab assistants who have poked their heads into the room to start cleaning up, and soon enough a full clean-up crew has entered the building and restoring the place to some semblance of order. The security staff finally arrive as well, and begin to drag Haven off to be put into custody of the police.

---

"Erm, no official cases, no. But we have good reason to believe that he has been active since before the date of Complex's death." Argent pauses. "Do you think Complex has something to do with Vanish?"

"Um!" Dove runs in front of the security staff, gesturing at Haven. "Is he... okay? He got hit pretty hard just now."

"I'll take a look at him," Gaia says, stepping up to Haven and giving the fallen villain a look over.

Heal: 13 (roll) + 19 (bonus) = 32

Sunset tilts her own head at the headless SOLUS suit, then looks to the video Echelon left. Every super villain strives to create his or her own signature look and silhouette. Sunset takes inventory of what these characters are wearing, and uses the LUNA suit's visor to try and find out which villains match which silhouette.

Actions:

While the rest of the team focused on trying to figure out who this Echelon group was or did whatever else it was they were inclined to do, Crimson sat down for a little while and waited a few minutes until the numbness and the sharp tingles that were lingering faded away proper while thinking about a couple of things. Getting shocked wasn't fun... maybe he could look into updating his costume to have some rubber in it to help prevent shocks like this in the future? Was an idea at least.

When the security staff arrived, Crimson felt somewhat better as he stood up and strode towards them. "If it's alright with you... Can I come with? Just... I feel like Haven could use a friendly face to talk with when he comes too." He requested, actual concern in his voice for the well being of the fallen former hero.