Society of Justice 3: Crisis on the Earth

[socialtangent]

"You can have all the 5.56 you want, Richard. I still have plenty of toys to play with," Levi said as he looked over the many crates of ammunition again. Richard definitely was well-stocked, although that was to be expected from the head of a weapons company. Each crate had a number stenciled into the wood that denoted the caliber of ammunition it carried. There were several marked as

5.56

. Others were labeled with

5.45

,

.45

,

.38

, and

12-GAUGE

.

Wasting no time, Levi pried open a few of the 5.45 and 12-gauge crates and examined their contents. Each of the crates contained two separate columns of metal boxes, neatly stacked. Perfect. With a brief moment of concentration, he pulled the boxes from their containers and floated them around him. "I'll see what I can do to help Steven and Tommy," Levi told the others, his voice reflecting the mild strain on him that holding up multiple heavy boxes of ammo were causing. Before leaving, however, he set down most of the boxes in an organized pile near the Lounge doors, opting to levitate one box of 5.45.

He headed out of the Lounge at as brisk a pace as his floating cargo behind him would allow. Alex's barrier of ice and grey energy blocking the entrance to the Garden was doing its job; he could hear the sound of sizzling zombies coming from the other side. It wouldn't be long before they had to cover their flank as well. They had to be long gone from here before the energy field failed and the undead broke through the ice.

The din of battle grew louder as Levi approached the site of the intensifying battle. He passed through the First Generation section just in time to see Steven smash in the skulls of a few unlucky zombies. Tommy, on the other hand, had just finished splitting a zombie in half with a large axe. Looks like they've been busy, Levi thought, noticing the sizable amount of mutilated corpses littering the floor. Despite the respectable number of ghouls that Tommy and Steven had dispatched, more continued to shamble their way towards them.

Levi opened the box of ammo and released his hold on the container. The metal box crashed to the floor, leaving the rounds inside floating lazily behind him. He quickly fixed this, however, by rearranging them in front of him, pointing bullet-first towards his undead foes. Ensuring that he wouldn't harm his allies in the process frist, Levi applied enough precise magnetic pressure on one of the bullets to make it fire. Because the explosion wasn't being contained inside the barrel of a gun, the bang that followed wasn't as sharp or as loud, but it still managed to rise above the incessant moaning.

The round pierced the skull of a nearby zombie. It entered cleanly, but upon its exit blew apart the back of the creature's skull. The zombie stumbled forward and collapsed face-first onto the ground. Levi frowned. It wasn't his usual procedure to leave a mess like this, but at this point he didn't have a lot of options. A second bullet fired, grazing the shoulder of a second zombie. A third found its mark in between its eyes. Three empty shell casings clattered to the floor as Levi assessed his next targets, delivering a bullet to any ghoul who dared get too close to him.

 

[elementsoul]

Eighteen. Tyson slowly breathed out as he fired his shots in order to keep his rifle from moving. Seven. The rifle stock slammed back into Tyson again; the impact being mostly absorbed by his armor. One. The bullet left the barrel of the gun and in an instant it was through the skull of a zombie, leaving a small hole in the front of it's head and a slightly larger one in the back of it's head, before ricocheting off the concrete ground into the knee of a following zombie.

Tyson hit the magazine release on his gun and the empty magazine fell onto the ground as another magazine was fed back into the gun. Twenty-one A loud bang sounded below Tyson as he moved up beside his rifle and looked down off the roof's edge. The zombies were clearly trying to climb over something and get inside. Not sure what had happened at the doors Tyson contemplated going back downstairs to the doors before a zombie came flying back out. Even with Tommy's message asking for help, Tyson figure that the others would move to help him and that his best position would be the one that he was currently at.

I can't stop all of them from reaching the doors but I can sure as hell kill as many as possible to help slow the amount that actually reaches it. Tyson moved back and readied his rifle again taking aim. This time Tyson didn't bother looking for larger groups and instead just started killing the closest zombie to the last as fast as possible.

Although this seemed to work faster something started to become much more apparent. The rate at which the zombies were moving was increasing. The distances that they were moving in between seeing the next one that was going to get killed and actually adjusting the aim to kill it were growing slightly but noticeably bigger. If this rate was going to pick up Tyson knew that what he was doing was going to become a lot less effective.

 

[Captainguy42]

The zombie kept coming faster, and even with Tommy, Steven and Levi fighting on the ground, and Tyson's sniper support, they were still losing ground to the onslaught.  However there was a silver lining, the zombies were paying dearly for every inch of ground.  Already there were at least a hundred corpses on the floor, piling up in small mounds around the heroes.

Tommy decided to change his tactics to slow the tide and buy his teammates time.  He chucked his axe into the crowed, spinng sideways, with enough force to decapitate six zombies before the handle got embeded in the head of a seventh.  Tommy then switched his gloves to wind, and began swinging his arms wide, hitting several zombies at once.  On impact the zombies went flying, propelled even further by the gale force winds that the gloves summoned.  The zombies wouldn't be killed, but they collide with others in the horde and slow the overall progress.

 

[blaze96]

Richard grabbed a couple boxes of ammunition before taking up a position on the barricade protecting the doors leading the gardens.

"Alright I'm joining the guarding of the back doors." Richard said as he set up on the barricade, opening the boxes before lining up a shot on some of the zombies. He aimed for the head and legs to hopefully slow the group down. Between himself and the others at the back it was at least possible they could stall them for some time.

 

[Pm0n3y]

"Didn't we just come from there? Why did we even leave?" Jason mumbled, beginning to relieve himself of the heavy boots and chestpiece that made up his costume as Levi quickly exited the lounge, admitting to himself how much harder it is to remove than it is to put on. Soon after, he took after Levi, sprinting down the hall he once traveled only moments before, slowing as he reached the trio of heroes holding a defense at the front doors.

"It's so much easier to move without all that extra stuff on." He mumbled, passing towards Levi, glancing momentarily at his abilities before sprinting pass Tommy, leaping over his shoulders and diving head first into a gaggle of undeads, spikes and claws bare as he began to furiously dig into the opposing force. The surrounding enemies eventually found themselves skewered in several fatal places on long black stakes, suspended in the air. He quickly retracted said spikes, after realizing that he summoned them inside the lobby.

"Oops..." He said to himself, now feeling slightly guilty as he dug a foot into the face of an expecting zombie, the force launching it backwards into its undead brethren.

 

[RBMidknight]

Taryn noted Levi's flying bullets with interest. It was a fleeting interest though as she became occupied with zapping two demon-ridden corpses. The zombies stopped their shambling approach and began to shake as electricity coursed through their bodies. Taryn found that the amount of power required was different than that used to electrocute a normal person. 'These things feel no pain. Of course.'. With all the Left 4 Dead hours she'd clocked Taryn acknowledged that she should have known better.

She glanced toward the barricade as the fried bodies fell, still twitching, to the ground. More zombies were coming through the barricade that Levi had put up. 'That really didn't seem to last very long.' Taryn ruefully noted. Though it took the zombies a few seconds to get a good grip on the metal they were still pouring into the Promenade at a good rate.

'Hmm...' Taryn tilted her head before firing a blast of electricity at the metal barricade. She used both hands and aimed at a two open spots of metal. Instantly the enemies who were in contact with the barricade became electrocuted. Smoke began rising from the bodies as the electricity traveled from one to the other. When their limbs could no longer support their bodies the zombies collapsed to the ground. Taryn continued to pour electricity into the barricade. Like demented dominoes zombies continued to fall. But after a short while the monsters began climbing over top of their fallen brethren, rendering the electrocution not worth the energy it took. Taryn shook her hands briskly before returning to fighting individual zombies.

 

[elementsoul]

As Tyson continued to fire off shots and kill off as many zombies as possible but it didn't take long before his sniper work lost any standing effect on the horde charging the Promenade. Tyson left his rifle where it was and emptied the ammunition from his bag so it was lighter to carry. Tyson started running back towards to staircase to head back down and help defend with the others at the front door before the smell of burning flesh overcame him. It took him a few seconds but Tyson finally identified the direction of the cafe entrance as the source of the smell and headed over to it.

Upon reaching the edge of the roof above it Tyson looked down to see a pile of fried corpses with zombies going over them and entering into the Promenade. Considering a smaller amount of zombies were currently at the cafe entrance Tyson figure that he could jump down there and move to other entrances if he wasn't need there by whoever was defending it at this point in time.

Tyson removed two throwing knives from the holder on his shoulder and held one in each hand as he jumped down. Looking down below him Tyson chose his landing site, two zombies walking over top of the pile of corpses that littered the ground. Tyson had the bottom of his boots land directly on the top of the zombies' heads and felt the softened skulls of the decaying bodies give way, allowing the force of the fall to crush the gray matter that was held beneath it.

As the corpses that he landed on collapsed, Tyson threw the throwing knives at two zombies located in front of him. The knife from his right hand landed in the target zombie's eye and the knife from the left hand landed in the target zombie's neck. As his feet hit the ground with the corpses Tyson dropped his bag from his back and pulled the short sword from its sheath with his left hand. Running forward he drove the short sword into the top of the head of the zombie with the throwing knife in its neck, removing the throwing knife with his right hand at the same time.

The zombie who took the throwing knife in the eye fell down to the ground as more zombies pushed through it in order to attack their newest obstacle. This time letting the zombies come to him, Tyson drove the short sword through the side of an approaching zombie's head pulling the zombie to left behind him. Driving the throwing knife into the skull of the next zombie, the blade broke off inside of its skull. Dropping the handle onto the ground and reaching the his left side with his right hand, Tyson removed the full length sword from its sheath and impaled three approaching zombies with it.

Pulling the sword free from the zombies Tyson looked around. There were a lot more zombies that anticipated and being outside by himself was only going to get himself completely swarmed. It was more apparent now that the cost of not having a full area to work with due to a chance of hitting an ally was an easy cost to pay for a more controlled amount of zombies that can attack you inside. Tyson turned to the cafe entrance and started to head towards it, decapitating a zombie with his long sword as he grabbed his bag. Leaving a trail of corpses behind, Tyson reached one of the holes in the barricade at the cafe entrance and killed the immediate zombies within reach by doing a full 360 swing with his long sword in order to remove the top part of several zombie heads.

Throwing his bag through the hole first, Tyson quickly followed it in. Upon getting to his feet again and looking for the next series of soon-to-be-again corpses Tyson called out, "So, do you need any help here?"

 

[tsatoma]

"Hmm...well that certainly was a spell," Leland muttered after standing up from behind the kitchen table with Renton that had been thrown up against the counters after his small twister spell ran it's course.

"Assuming that wasn't the right one!" Garrus yelled back after climbing out of the wreckage in the lounge, brushing some splinters off of his shirt before helping the terrified Doctor out from under the couch and coffee table that had fallen on top of him. The Doctor slowly got up, wobbling all the way to the least damaged corner and sitting down in the fetal position. "Are you two alright?"

"We're fine. The coffee maker and fridge aren't though...same with the table. Talbot's all good though," Leland replied as he opened up a bar cabinet that Talbot had gone into when the twister started to head into the lounge. "And thankfully the book is fine too," he added after picking up the table with his free hand and seeing the book still duck-taped to it.

"I'm very tempted at this point to go and fight the zombies instead of this," Garrus muttered, figuring his abilities would be more useful out int he field.
"They'll be fine, at least until the deadlier zombies come around. Then they will be needing help I imagine," Leland replied, handing Renton back to his father, "So that plan didn't work...we'll have to come up with another one."

"What plan? I don't see how it's possible for us to get him to say that spell backwards. He can't even form sentences yet! Isn't there a loophole or something that we can use?"
"Er...maybe there is but I don't know it. I've only ever figured one out myself, the rest were already written down. So yeah..." Leland replied as he pulled up a somewhat-intact chair to sit down on.
"I fu- friggin' hate magic," Garrus stated bitterly.

 

[Captainguy42]

The horde was huge, but the heroes had more than enough power to fight it back. Slowly but surely the thinned the zombies out until none reminded, and the entrance to the Promenade was carpeted with inanimate rotting corpses. Tommy dropped a zombie that he had just ripped the head off of, and punched in the direction of where the horde was, only to hit air. Without something to push on he tumbled, tripped on a leg, and fell face first onto the ground. When he stood up he took a look around, " Huh, that's all of them I guess."

He got on his comm-link and broadcasted to everyone else. "Alright, the zombies are taken care, of at least this horde. The demons are going to go find new hosts, and come back, so take this time to catch your breath, check the barricades, and do what you've got to. The next time they come around things are gonna be a lot tougher."

Tommy then looked at the corpses carpeting the floor, his recent tumble was still fresh in his mind. "Steven, can you make something like a giant plow for me to push, I need some way to clear out these bodies quick, or else I'm gonna be tripping over limbs all day."

 

[socialtangent]

Levi's final bullet found its mark through the forehead of one of the last standing zombies. Like many other ghouls before it, it fell backwards in a spray of grey matter and unceremoniously crumpled to the floor in a heap. The sound of the shell casing landing and clattering about the floor was clearly audible in the somewhat unsettling silence that followed.

Well, that wasn't so hard, he thought as he surveyed the carnage around him. Over three hundred corpses littered the area, if not more. Making his way over to the Cafe entrance, he caught sight of Taryn and Tyson. Nearby was what was left of the metal sheets placed over the windows. The charred corpses of multiple ghouls lay sprawled across the ground near the breached barricade. He didn't even need to feel the electrical disturbance in the air to know that Taryn had taken care of these zombies.

"Alright, the zombies are taken care of, at least this horde...the next time they come around things are gonna be a lot tougher."

"Ta ma de...[footnote]Mandarin Chinese, equivalent to "Dammit", "Fuck" and similar phrases. [/footnote] Levi mumbled as he straightened out the vest to his costume. "How much time do we have before they come back?" he asked Tommy through his own communicator. If there was going to be more undead, and tougher ones at that, then he needed more ammo. But how tough was this wave going to be? How many of them were going to be coming at once? Levi recalled that there was supposed to be exactly nine hundred thirteen demons attacking the Promenade. Since they dispatched close to three hundred, that left...at least five hundred.

This wasn't going to be easy.

 

[NeoAC]

Brian looked outside, the bodies were hitting the floor so to speak. However, he didn't feel like he was really contributing much. Every time a zombie shambled up close enough to be shot at, another member would either shoot it themselves or take it out with a plow. No one ever felt so impotent while holding a shotgun and a Death Scythe in their lives.

Jeez, more of these bastards are coming though. We've been handling them so far. Can we keep this up? He looked nervously out the windows towards the spawn points. I hope so.

 

[Captainguy42]

"20- maybe 30 minutes at most, if they follow precedent they'll wait and gather power before making the all out attack. Really that first wave was just to test our defenses." Tommy walked back into the Promenade and noticed the dents on all the window barricades, he then found the nearest bathroom and began washing blood and brains off of his arms and face.

"I suggest we figure out a plan with how to deal with them, if we can't get the spell reversed in time. If you have anything special stashed away, now might be a good time to grab it."

Once he was a bit clean he went to the lounge.

"So, how are we doing? Making any progress?" Tommy asked, but he was able to notice that the room was looking worse since the last time he was there.

 

[tsatoma]

Leland and Garrus simply stared at Tommy once he asked his question, looking back at each other before back at Tommy. "There has been progress, yet it was more of for the zombies since the lounge got all messed up..." Leland told him, adding, "We've gotten no farther on the front we actually want to progress on."

"Why did you let him get the book Tommy!? WHY!?" Garrus yelled out with frustration, hitting his fist against the table which collapsed beneath them.
"Uhh...so how are the zombies and defending against them going Tommy? I'm assuming good since you're here...or bad if you were the only one that survived and have come to tell us that all is lost," Leland said with a scared look on his face.

 

[Lefthandofgod]

The last of the wave fell with a thud as Steven brought his army of weapons to a halt. His vision was blurry. He couldn't hear anything anymore. His entire body was numb. Every last nerve cell in his body had been drained. His heart was beating like a war drum. He couldn't stop laughing.
"YOU THINK YOU CAN KILL ME!?! NOTHING CAN!"
He approached a zombie on the floor, barely having dodged a kill blow, and barely alive. With strength he shouldn't have had left, he grabbed the zombie by its jaw, and threw it against the wall. You could hear the stud crack beneath the weight of the throw. In one fluid motion, he leaped towards his last victim, slamming the heel of his hand into the zombies forehead. If his eyes were working, they would be rolling to the back of his head.
"I am unstoppable. I can block out the sun. I will rend the flesh from your bones and have the marrow within. I AM A GOD AND NO DAEMON CAN EVER STOP ME"
The broken zombies attempt to struggle was useless; feebly clawing at his armor with one good arm. With a final cry, Steven crushed its skull in his hand.
He was still laughing.
And it seemed nothing would stop him from laughing until she appeared in her usual blue dress and sorrowful expression, and gently touched the back of his helmet. The point where she touched his armor changed instantly, from his bright light to her ethereal blue. The color slowly spread over his armor, and jumped to his weapons. Once the last of it changed color, Steven fell out of his armor and onto the floor.
"Poor thing. He always had problems with his temper." She tapped lightly on the armor's hand.
"Be a dear, would you?",she asked. "Take him to his room to rest. He needs to sleep off whatever mood he's in right now." The armor nodded and, picking him up slowly, took him into his room. It came out a moment later, grabbing one of the floating halberds out of the air, and stood quietly by her side.
"That's better", she said with a slight smile. She approached Tommy, Garrus, and Leland with confident strides and introduced herself. As best as she could, anyway.
"Hello boys. Steven went a bit ill, so I'll be taking over tonight. Don't worry, though, I expect he'll be fine after sleeping it off. Now, about these zombies..."
She turned toward the battlefield, littered with corpses, and thought for a moment. She then raised her arms, and two massive sheets of pale blue light appeared in the sky. One slid under the fallen un-dead, the other rested on top of them. With a slicing motion from her hands, the pressed sheets folded in half. She repeated the move, over and over again, until the entire remains of the last battle could fit in her hand.
"Man, everything is so much easier when we don't have to split the power down three ways," She said with a smile.

 

[RBMidknight]

"So, do you need any help here?"

Taryn looked up from the zombie, or rather half-of-a-zombie, she had been frying. "I'm good." she replied. With a casual flick of her wrist she stopped the flow of electricity. The infected torso twitched a final time and then lay still. Taryn observed the carnage Tyson had caused then whistled quietly. Severed zombies bits were now quite scattered. 'This is not going to be fun to clean,' the technopath noted. She started to comment when Tommy's voice over the comm unit confirming that more zombies would be on their way. 'Great...'

A Chinese profanity caught Taryn's attention and she turned toward Levi. "Nice trick with the bullets." she complimented. "Zhu yi."[footnote]Mandarin Chinese: 'Watch your back' ; pay attention; concentrate.[/footnote] she added with a brief grin.

 

[socialtangent]

"20 -maybe 30- minutes at most"

More than enough time for Levi to prepare for the next wave, but nowhere near near enough to repair the barricades. When the onslaught of undead resumed, they would have to up their firepower to compensate. He had an idea of what to do, but that would require more ammunition. Best case scenario, not a single zombie would lay their hands on him. If they were going to be faster and tougher, he preferred it that way.

"Zhu yi."

Levi flashed a grin of his own. "Xie xie,"[footnote]Mandarin Chinese, "Thanks"[/footnote] he replied quietly before turning his attention to Tyson.

"Hey, Tyson! How much ammunition do you have left in your bag? If so, do you think you could spare some?" Levi didn't want to make the trip back to the Lounge, if only in case the army of demon ghouls decided to attack now as opposed to a half hour later.

 

[elementsoul]

Tyson had found the removal of limbs from the zombies added more fluidity to his flow of his slaughter. The loss of three limbs from a body would normally cause a demon the leave the body of its own choosing because it wasn't possible for it to continue forward onto the book or fight. This also caused a massive mess to be made in their current location but that didn't really bother Tyson. The smell of burning flesh was still ripe in the air as Tyson looked on to the outside of the Promenade only to notice the absence of any visible zombies from his current position.

Tyson sighed heavily and took a few seconds to catch his breath as the weight of his armor and the constant motion required for killing off such a large number was making its presence know through out his body. Tyson heard the exchange of a few words clearly sound of Oriental languages before he was addressed.

"Hey, Tyson! How much ammunition do you have left in your bag? If so, do you think you could spare some?"

"I left my gun on the roof since no one in the Society has any real fighting training in regards to a teammate using a gun in close quarters." Tyson replied as he walked over to his bag and removed an equipment belt and attaching several explosive and incendiary devices and attach them to it.

Picking up the heavy bag, half full of boxes of ammunition, and bringing it over to Levi Tyson continued to speak. "Because of that you can use whatever ammunition I have left in here. I should also warn you that any ammunition coming from a red box means that it has an explosive tip and will create a tiny explosion when it makes contact with anything after it's been fired."

Putting the bag on the ground in front of Levi, The turned around and saw the outline of zombies forming on the horizon of his vision. Fuck! Trying to focus provided no yield as whether or not the zombies were waiting for something or if they had started to march again.

Tapping his communicator to activate his communicator Tyson spoke out to everyone. "I can see the zombies again, but I'm not sure about what they are doing. I'd appreciate it if you could get that kid to end this now before I find out."

 

[Captainguy42]

"Why did you let him get the book Tommy!? WHY!?"

Tommy sat down, and stared up at the ceiling. " I don't know, something at the back of my mind told me it wouldn't be a problem. I mean I've done some pretty stupid things in the past but this? Leaving an artifact of doom just sitting on my shelf without any precautions, and forgetting about it? That just fucking crowns it. I mean normally I'm safe with things like this, I always lock up my reagents, keep my weapons stored in the pocket dimension, don't give a device to someone without training in magic. So I had a brain fart and now we're all gonna get killed by an army of demon zombies." Tommy let out a sigh, " That has to be one of the dumbest explanations I've ever heard."

Tommy, grumbled something under his breath, and stood up and poured a glass of cranberry juice.

"The fight went alright, no ones been hurt, but we've only taken out less than half of them, and we're already starting to tire, and that was easy mode compared to what's coming up next." Tommy chugged the juice, letting it wash out the taste of dried spit, sweat, and blood.

"We could use atleast one of you out there this time it's gonna get..."

At that time a glowing women deposited Steven on the coach.

"Hello boys. Steven went a bit ill, so I'll be taking over tonight. Don't worry, though, I expect he'll be fine after sleeping it off. Now, about these zombies..."


Tommy didn't bother finishing his thought as he watched the woman walk out. Who is that? Tommy thought, remembering the last time the glowing woman showed up.

Spoiler: OOC

So ya I'll be starting up the second zombie wave with my next post.

 

[tsatoma]

"I don't blame you Tommy. It was probably the evil book of doom making you stupid...or something like that. Maybe...it's also partially my fault for dropping him off with you," Leland replied, patting his best friend on the shoulder.

"I blame all of you," Garrus muttered hopelessly, glancing up to see the glowing women before completely ignoring her and standing up from his seat. "I'll help you guys hold down the fort while Leland tries to get Renton to stop this madness from continuing. I'm probably more useful helping you all out anyways," he said, trying to psyche himself up for zombie fighting. He turned to his brother quickly and said, "You better have gotten him to say that spell backwards by the time I come back."

"Can't guarantee that, but I'll do my best. I'll come up with something...I hope," Leland muttered, looking at the small child in his lap who was eying Tommy's drink intently.

 

[Pm0n3y]

Jason silently looked on as Tyson handed Levi the extra ammunition, still breathing heavily from the previous battle. He slowly lowered to sit on the grime caked floor, crossing his legs. The Keyholder took another long look around him, glancing momentarily at the mounds of dismantled undead that he helped contribute to, noted only slightly by the gaping holes left in skulls and vitals, and claw marks that left some without certain facial features. He began to meditate, in hopes to center himself mentally, and to prepare him for whatever else may come.

"How're you holding up there kiddo?" Erebus asked contently.

"I'll be fine. Just need to catch my breath, that's all." He replied, taking a long inhale before exhaling said breath. Tyson's words of another impending attack caused the Keyholder's adrenaline to race, but he subconsciously regained control. Like the others, he'll worry about the problem when it better presents itself.