Toby Schippers's Story

Before Mina could make out all that she thought of this Jake character, Dawn was in her head yet again.

With more bad news.

Mina was careful not to let her eyes wander immediately upwards; whether or not the newcomers were in league with one another, it would be easy for Jake to use the confusion caused by an additional variable to make a move. She leaned her chest forward to form an arc in her spine, and moved her left hand to the small of her back as if rubbing out a pinched muscle.

The backs of her fingers brushed over the grip of the pistol at her waist.

“Like the others said,” she stated, a grimacing smile gracing her features as she let her hand rest behind her, “I’m afraid there ain’t much left, save for stiff mattresses and bones.”

Her left hand came up to shield the light from her eyes as she spoke, and she moved with intention to watch the sky, checking the position of the sun, “And I’d say it’s still a mite early in the day for you to be looking for a night’s shelter. So, ain’t a whole lot of much for you here, save for an escort in one end of the premises and out the other.”

In the clouds. On my one. Coming right at us, she warned to the network.

There was the faint shape of a bird just a smudge too big, or perhaps to steady, or maybe even too high to be a bird. It was hard for Mina to take her eyes off of it, but she turned her attention back to Jake before she had lingered long enough to give away the check.

Whatever the thing was, it was moving toward Helton with a very deliberate purpose.

We gotta handle this kid before we’ve got bigger problems. Call the others to handle the flier.

Mina turned her back to Jake (again, against all instinct, and nodded forward for him to follow. “Come on, then. I’m happy to walk you along through. Ain’t got much to offer, neither, but I can fish you some ration packs out of my bag along the way.”

Distracted in her progress by the appearance of a lizard, Rei had delayed her attempts to find the others by a few minutes.

She was still kind of hungry after all.

The flicker of a shadow overhead however drew her immediate attention. Possibly she'd just spent too much time hunting animals out in the ruins that her sense of perception had gotten highly attuned to movement, or perhaps it has always been a feature of her ability's strange physiological effects, but she identified something far above that was moving. Something that was alive.

Rei stared at it, limp lizard tail still jutting from the corner of her mouth for some moments, before the mutant snapped it up and sprang off over the rubble to follow the trajectory.

Her hasty course almost caused her to jump down right into the centre of a group of other Helton residents.
The creature hurriedly cut her momentum,skidding in the dust to stand about level with the edge of a group.

"Did you see the big flying thing? It's definitely alive, but it's not moving right for a bird. " she asked, tilting her head upward again.
"Also hi everyone. I guess I slept in as everyone seemed to be out when I got up."

Well, that was technically right, in that her 'sleeping in' was the duration of about three days.
"Also also, who is this guy?" she eyed Jake with some level of wariness.

Whilst Rei would not consider herself a very unwelcoming person, her experiences with strangers entering the area lately had been...less than positive. Most of the people who turned up seemed to make things decidedly worse, and she wasn't exactly liking the odd as they stood.

Mina whipped around at the sound of footfalls behind her, only taking in Rei’s voice a second after her pistol had been drawn.

And in the span of about ten seconds, the effort spent hiding her weapon and the fact that they were expecting an unwanted incoming was wasted. She tucked the gun back into her waist and cast Reith a nod, before training her eyes back onto Jake.

“Listen, sugar,” she said, taking a step forward into his space, “We’ve got bigger problems than you at the moment, so I suggest you get along out from underfoot. I’ve not got the best track record on watching my crossfire, so back the way you came’s gonna treat us all better in the long run.”

Poor hospitality taken care of, she brought her gaze back to watching the encroaching figure. “We all saw it, Reith. Mr. Talin or Schippers… You got anything to tell us about our new friend? Because I’m not a fan of the way he’s coming in.”

Then, back to the mental channel, ‘Trying to keep the Mind-Manipulator card in the back pocket, for now. But if you’ve got anything, please do share. Or... Sera? You think you can cast some light the wrong way and hide us?’

----

Larke, meanwhile, was wholly unaware of the situation he was drifting dangerously near to. The healer had been holding himself afloat on a warm updraft, keeping as hidden as possible behind a cloud. While there were peeks he managed to catch below, the small gathering in Helton was all but impossible to make out given his near snow blindness from the thick sheet of white he was gliding over.

The courage to swoop lower and get a better read was still beyond him; perhaps if he flew more directly over, he could descend on the back gate and take them by surprise?

We’ll see. Talin?

On it

“I’m going to check the radar” the speedster announced casually, strolling away from the group. As soon as he was out of sight, he broke into a run, and was on the roof in seconds, gazing down, sharing the semi aerial view with the mind linked wanderers. Mostly for Sera’s benefit, she could create her illusion now. It was from this height, however, that he succeeded in catching a proper glimpse of their flyer, causing him to blink in shock.

It’s odd… he broadcast, tying together the image and knowledge that came with it. It says it’s a…healer? Not quite, it’s how he’s trained though, but no flight gift. Toby, do you get that?

Sera, meanwhile, directed lights to create an empty street below when looking down, although not perfect without being able to see it herself. Should we try to ground him? the young woman asked seriously, while visibly deferring to a leader with her body language.

Toby's eyes locked skyward. The closer the Erubescan flew, the more accurately Toby could track the movement, almost imagine a sillouette through the haze. He half-nodded at Talin's note. I thought the same. I thought there might be an aircraft, maybe, but...

There. A shadow, just for an instant, through the clouds. Like an angel of death. Maybe a bit of a clumsy angel of death.

Toby lined the beam of his arm to the tip of his .357 up to his eyeline. The heavy artillery, the rifles and submachines guns Montana had provided, lay back at base. With one shot of the .357, Toby could reliably shatter a bottle at 100 yards. Semi-reliably at 150. If he was lucky, 200. Larke would be a lot farther than that when he passed at his closest, but he was, even without his broad wingspan, a lot bigger than a bottle. Plus, Toby couldn't link his Gift to a bottle.

He felt perspiration on his forehead. What if he was a defector? Dread at the idea of feeling Larke spiral down leeched into his mental announcement: I think I have a shot.

He broadcast it as though he would ask for permission, wanting someone else to make that decision, wanting to defer like Sera. As if there was any time for permission or any authority from whom to get it. The stranger would only get farther out of range and closer to the others at the base. Toby had learned by now to somewhat detangle his emotions from others', but if he did that, he would have to disconnect entirely, and then his aim would suffer from the poor visibility. So Toby sent out more mental fibers instead, until he could feel exactly where Larke was - and could feel the pressure of the air under his wings and the moisture of the clouds, the nervousness, determination, and that heady soul-wrenching fuel that could only be loyalty. This man wasn't a defector.

Toby's lip quivered, but his hand didn't. Aiming a few feet high to adjust for the distance, he pulled the trigger, emptying his five remaining hollow-point rounds at a steep angle into the sky. He would be happy to make even one hit.
If happy was the word for it.

Larke blinked hard as a bright flicker crossed his vision— a flash of light from below that seemed to originate from nowhere. He squinted through the film of his goggles, but found nothing save for rubble and Ash in the streets of Helton beneath him.

The stillness of it was chilling: It cut through the layers of his flight jacket and traveled over his skin until the hair on his arms prickled as if caught by a static cling. Rushing wind dampened any sound for miles.

He did not hear the shots leave the gun. He did feel one burry itself in his defensive vest, casting him back with a thunk. A rush of air whizzed past his head, and another somewhere near him.

And then something far more direct: A sharp, fervid pain ripped through his right wing, setting ablaze nerves he never knew he had. Feather, skin, and muscle were all ravaged into meat, and his hollow humerus shattered like a clay pigeon. As the shot crumpled inside of his body, spidering cracks splinted from his shoulder blade to the very tip of his wing.

The wind stole the scream from his lungs.

Reflexively, the wing pulled into his body just as the compromised bone snapped from the sheer air pressure rattling against it. It mangled itself in the blustering squalls, folding and twisting into a gore-splatted work of modernist origami. As Larke plummeted toward the ground, his vision swam with black and pain. There was no differentiating between his spinning vision and spinning body as he tried his damned to show his descent.

The air pressure changed, and he was sure one of his eardrums burst.

He did not know whom he was expecting to answer his cry, nor what he gasping for as his arms flailed in search of anything to hold, but his instinct to live disregarded this logic; a bird beating its wings even as the snake gobbled its head. There was no directing this fall, but rather a shallow hope that his remaining wing could provide enough air resistance to break it.

In a horrid moment of clarity, he was struck by the sudden realization that he was going to die.

And then he was struck by the ground.

More precisely, it was the pavement of a road twenty or so yards behind his shooter.

His body stone-skipped across the fractured earth, the concrete ripping flesh and clothing alike his skeleton bashed against it. While the goggles had shielded his face, it was evident that not much else on his body had been spared damage in the ordeal.

Blood flesh flecked the Ash around the Erubescan’s unconscious form, and his backpack had split open to reveal a load of partially broken medical supplies.

A shower of wayward blonde feathers still floated on the breeze, settling long after the man who had shed them

Toby contorted with the scream the wind had stolen from Larke.

His spine arched with the explosion of pain in the wing he didn't have, then reversed in a fetal curl as desperate panic flooded in, twisting like a werewolf just before its first full moon. For a few seconds, he felt everything his target felt, plus a pinch of standard-fare guilt. Dizzy, Toby tried to untie his consciousness from the Erubescan before he hit the ground with same urgency he'd try to untie himself from railroad tracks in the face of an oncoming train. He didn't have time to unsnare himself completely. He watched Larke plummet and felt the crunch of the landing, and very nearly blacked out. Repressing a whimper, Toby forced his shaking limbs to understand they had not in fact been crushed after a drop from the equivalent of a small skyscraper and that he didn't need to limp, before he started walking through the snowfall of feathers.

Like any good dog on a bird hunt, Toby moved quickly toward Larke's crumpled body.

Though he didn't know whether he intended to ensure death for the wretch or to see if there was any life left to save.