Chaotic Clusterfuck 18 (Patreon)

Commissioned by Definitely Not Dio

Chaotic Clusterfuck

Chapter 18

-VB-

The air raid sirens. 

She knew that her school was supposed to teach her what to do and where to go… but her school was Winslow High, which didn’t even bother to replace the expired fire extinguishers. Why the hell would they hold sessions to tell students critically important information when they couldn’t even do BASIC necessities?! 

And so Taylor Anne Hebert found herself running around scared looking for her dad as the rest of the city descended into panic all around her. 

Her bugs were out in barely subtle force, roaming across the entire city all around her to find her dad. 

Unfortunately for her, she was nowhere near home or the Docks proper but had been out patrolling as an independent in the Docks South. So she was trying to intercept her dad by getting to where he should be passing if he was trying to speed back home directly from work.

But the entire city was now gridlocked after multiple accidents created a traffic that couldn’t be solved. Not by her and certainly not by the fire department that couldn’t get its fire trucks through the packed streets to get to the fires started by -.

She quickly directed a dense swarm of cockroaches, flies, spiders, gnats, and more at a group of looters trying to take advantage of the chaos mere half a block away from her. She stopped just momentarily to ensure that the opportunistic looters suffered the full wrath of her bugs before she took off running again. 

People briefly stared at her before they dove out of her way. 

Dressed in her yellow and black helmet and chitin armor, she knew that she didn’t look the most friendly; it was for camouflage purposes! But the way people moved out of the way, they made it look like they were scared of her. 

… Whatever! 

She rushed forward. 

She needed to find Dad! She needed to make sure he was okay! 

SCHHHHH - !!!!!

She froze and then her head snapped up just in time to see an alien and bulky aircraft rush over the skyline and the street she was on.

And it was trying to land on one of the flatter rooftops! 

She didn’t hesitate. 

She let the swarm rise.

She watched as her bugs rise almost like those nature documentary shows about bird flocks, but her swarms were denser, louder, and, most importantly, armed to the teeth.

Like a tidal wave, the black swarm rose up … and then crashed into the alien aircraft. She made them tear into everything, flesh or machine. Her bugs crawled into every hole. They bit and clawed at the electronics and eyes alike. She ignored the screams around her and in the aircraft as she made sure nothing would stand in her way to find Dad. 

And when she felt through her swarm that everything inside the aircraft had stopped moving, she began running again.

This time, people really dove out of the way. 

And since the alien raiders were already here…

She needed to scare them away from her and Dad. 

She pulled at all of the bugs that her power could grasp and swarmed. 

-VB-

Armsmaster rode out on his bicycle, speeding far ahead of the PRT, police, and national guards as they tried to get ahead of the Batarian raiders. 

His helmet’s omnidirectional cameras noted Batarians attempting to perform strafing bombing runs, but the anti-air guns  - ‘where did those comes from?!’ - in the southern end of the city kept them at bay handily, preventing any major infrastructure damage by covering not just the southern part of the city but the entire city except maybe the furthest reaches of the Trainyards and northern suburbia. 

Then his UI blared at him as it spotted someone far ahead. 

He brought his bike to a stop.

The skid alerted the man standing where he had intended to arrive at in time to fight the Batarian raider troop transport that was predicted to land there because it was one of the wider areas that would allow for quick drop-off. 

And standing there with his blank mask and the butler outfit was one of the Four Musketeers: Black Sebastian. 

“Black Sebastian!” he shouted using his helmet’s built-in speaker. “Are you here to fight the raiders?”

The man looked down slowly, glanced at him, nodded, and then looked back up.

“Good! There is a Truce in effect.”

Black Sebastian looked at him again before nodding and looking back up.

And then -.

There were shrieks as five troop transports began to come down from the sky. 

“Sebastian, get to cover!” Armsmaster shouted as he got ready to fight.

This was bad. Batarians carried mass effect weapons, which used an exotic substance called Element Zero to accelerate their projectiles to ridiculous speeds. Most projectiles flew faster than sniper rounds. Being out in the open like this was the worst decision he could make. He needed to -.

Then he watched as Black Sebastian’s shadow extended out, and the rest of the Musketeers rose out. Seekowl, the one covered completely in a robe and with a owl mask, turned to look at him before turning to look up.

Armsmaster realized what was happening. 

The Batarians also employed kinetic shields, which were too powerful most conventional weapons to break through. That defensive technology was something that also required element zero to operate, and with how little the government could obtain them, it was simply impossible for anyone outside of very select few individuals to have kinetic shields. 

But kinetic shields, as the world learned, did not block the esoteric powers of the Ritualistic and System parahumans. 

Seekowl leaned forward and hands and arms came out from under the robes. Each hand held a metal rod as long as he was and … 

Weren’t metal rods the worst power multiplier for “magician” System parahumans? 

The cape raised his metal rods up and -.

Lightning. 

A pair of blue lightning cracked out and slammed into one of the five transports. It instantly lost all power and began to fall. Mere moments later, it crashed down to the ground and blew up.

The other four realized that they were under attack and began to look for them. Armsmaster quickly got back on the bike to get to a better position, but the Four Musketeers didn’t. 

Instead, Terrapin, the Hopolite and Dauntless copycat, pulled out a book and tore a page. 

And almost immediately, his helmet began to warn him about an anomalous change in the atmosphere. He quickly noticed intensifying condensation, IR and radar interference, and even ECM. 

He noted to have the Four Musketeer’s ratings in the internal PRT files and his personal records updated. 

A fog rolled over this area of the city, and just in time, too, because the Batarian transports finally spotted them. But by then, it was too late, and the dense fog covered the entire area that they would have used as their landing zone. 

And tow more lightning strikes cracked out from within the fog to strike another transport. 

Armsmaster watched from just outside the fog cover before he pulled out his own dedicated weapon, one that he made for an occasion like this. He knew that the aliens would eventually come, and during his early days, he made something to counter their kinetic shields. He grunted as he pulled out a micro-fusion reactor powered pulse gun. The pump shotgun lookalike in his hand was heavy, but he just never got around to minituarizing its components. Thankfully, he had his power armor.

He hefted it up, aimed, and fired.

The transport he aimed at fizzled out and fell into the fog. Moments later, there was a loud crash but no explosion. Less than ten seconds after that, he heard multiple screams.

He presumed that the Four Musketeers were quickly taking care of the survivors. 

Good. 

Unfortunately, the last two transports quickly pulled away and began to climb, which put them out of his weapon range. Two more lightning strikes crackled out but they didn’t hit anything in the air, instead bending down halfway through and striking something else. 

He grunted. “Four Musketeers! Continue to guard this area! I will move onto the next zone!” 

He wasn’t useless. He downed a Batarian transport by himself, a feat achieved by less than two handfuls of USA Protectorate heroes. He could do this. He would save his city!