[ASH] Shadow Girls #7 - Monster Of The Week

[Drew Nilium]

On 6/19/22 1:08 AM, Dave Van Domelen wrote:
>       [the cover shows a hulking, misshapen man smashing his fist down
>        into the pavement, scattering the Morning Stars in a burst of
>        speed lines and rubble.  He's shouting, "KNEEL BEFORE
>        KILLGAMESH!"]

Oh my GOD. XD

> [May 28, 2027 - Spanish Harlem, Manhattan Autonomous Sector]
> 
>       "KILLGAMESH WILL SMASH YOU!"

X3

> On the plus side, she was keeping "Killgamesh"
> distracted and he didn't seem like he was ever going to hit her.  On the
> negative, the police had backed off and were doing crowd control, and the way
> some of them had been looking at her, it was clear that their intent was to
> apprehend both of them once the fight was over.

ACAB.

>       Even more in the debit column, Killgamesh had ignored her strongest
> strikes.  It was clear that she had inflicted significant tissue trauma, but
> he was simply too far into an altered state of consciousness to care.

Oh dear. D:

> There
> were many drugs that could have turned a previously unknown to her paraganger
> into this asymmetric three-meter-tall monstrosity, but most of them should
> have started wearing off by now, or at least showed a diminution of efficacy.
> No one calling himself Killgamesh was in Professor Shade's files, in any
> case, but this could be one of dozens of minor paragangers who just came into
> an augmentation of physical, if not intellectual, power.

Hmmmm, fair. o3o;

>       This was not how she had planned to spend her Friday after school.

X3;;;;;

>       "Where is Enkidu...or Enkilldu, I suppose?" Hexa-Blue taunted, trying to
> lead Killgamesh closer to the egress point of the secret tunnel network that
> Black Opal had entrusted the Morning Stars with knowledge of.
>       "HUH?" the ragged goliath seemed more stunned by that question than by
> any of her strikes.  "WHAT'S AN INKYDOO?"
>       "You named yourself after Gilgamesh of Akkad and don't know about his
> boon companion Enkidu, the beast man?" Hexa-Blue mocked.  "Did you get your
> name out of a particularly unusual book of baby names?"
>       "I AIN'T NO BABY!"
X3;;; Oh dear.

>       "What-gamesh?" Icosa-Pink goggled.  "What kind of name is that?"
>       "THE NAME OF A KING OF THIS CITY!" Killgamesh roared,

Amazing.

> Hexa-Blue took advantage of this to
> drive a savage kick into his ankle, and was rewarded by a crunching sound and
> the would-be-king's lurching gait becoming even more irregular.
>       "Got it, joints," Dodeco-Yellow nodded,

Ahhhhh, that'd do it.

>       "Grabbed this before heading out," Tetra-Red brandished a coil of steel
> cable, and she and Green took advantage of Killgamesh's momentarily stunned
> state to bind his arms behind his back in such a way that he would be hard-
> pressed to apply enough leverage to break it.
>       He tried anyway, and found that the cables would cut into his flesh more
> easily than they would break.  His blood spurted into the air in many
> directions, and everyone jumped back in shock and disgust.

D: Well.

>       Dodeca-Yellow recovered her composure first, ripping up a parking meter
> and smashing it repeatedly over his head.  Between the blood loss, broken
> ankle, and severe head trauma, Killgamesh eventually fell silent.

X3;;;;; Also fair.

>       The police were starting to screw their courage to the sticking place,
> so Hexa-Blue directed the others in the most effective way to bind Killgamesh
> via bondage techniques her mother would blush to find she knew...and
> Tammy herself would likely be too embarrassed to admit to if not for the
> heightened analytical state she entered when "powered up" as Hexa-Blue.

X3 X3 X3 Adorable.

>       Icosa-Pink frowned, strongly enough to be apparent through the shadows
> covering her face.  "I feel like there's something I should be doing here, my
> gem's tingling, but...."
>       "FREEZE, vigilantes!"
>       "Okay, figure it out later," Tetra-Red ordered.  "We out!"

X3

> "Killgamesh" had been a first try, and
> clearly a failure on most levels...especially aesthetic, ugh...but the raw
> power was certainly promising.  She was quite glad she hadn't tried it on
> herself first, this would need a great deal of practice.
>       Fortunately, she had a great many willing subjects.

Oh dear.

>       "Are you sure you don't want credit for this?" Principal Arthur Gomez
> asked.
>       Maddie shook her head.  "I think it'll go over better if it's your idea,
> and I just got roped into helping," she replied.  Of course, just in case
> Beth's private line wasn't so private, it was best to make sure that the
> cover story she used the other week match the official story.  And, frankly,
> it seemed like the paraball team idea was worthwhile on its own.

Oh, lovely! :>

> The
> Macoute had tried rebuilding as a non-voodoo group, but the wild times were
> already ending...she couldn't even recall their current leader, but it was
> more of a community organization than a gang anymore, despite the fearsome
> history of their namesake Tonton Macoute.

Awww, good, I think.

> He had the sort of wiry too-lean build common among
> physically-focused paranormals, and thick black hair tied back into a braid.
> She'd have to ask the girls later if that was fashionable with Kids Today
> (the more time she spent around them, the older she felt) or if it was just
> Hand's thing.

Heeheehee

> You ever play stickball?"
>       Hand shrugged.  "When I was little, yeah."
>       "Don't need nine on a side for that.  Don't even really need teams, if
> you're playing for fun," Maddie pointed out.  "Everyone takes turns at all
> the positions, at least we did when *I* was little."
>       "Parastickball?" Hand looked unconvinced.
>       "The idea is that each school play 'stickball' style games to learn
> who's good at what position," Principal Gomez explained, "and then once both
> we and Manhattan Unified Secondary School Number Two have our lineups
> established, have a championship game with the full paraball rules on a
> proper diamond.

Hmmmmmm! Thoughtful!

>       "Go ahead, our contact information is on your cel," Principal Gomez
> tapped his terminal screen.  All students had school-provided whitecels, but
> most of them also got personal units because, well, school phones were seen
> as snitches.  And they were.

Yeah, legit o3o;

> Yeah, her name on anything
> was going to have gotten interest above the level of the Secretary of
> Education, but hopefully this sort of do-gooder activity would convince
> Umbrae that she wasn't engaged in more hands-on stuff.
>       Assuming he didn't already know anyway.  But everyone appreciated a
> convenient cover story, even the ones who were supposed to be fooled by it.
> Plausible deniability was always popular among the powerful....

Well, I'm glad she's thinking that way. X>;

>       "Just regular guilt, or," she dropped to a whisper, "gem business?"
>       "I'm...not sure.  I mean, I didn't feel anything from him that was like
> what I feel from you guys, but it was *something*.  When I concentrated on
> that, I could get a vague sense of where he was, until he got taken somewhere
> deep deep underground.  Maybe he's dead now, I really don't know enough about
> how this feeling works to tell, yah?"
>       "Okay, that was almost linear and coherent, now I'm definitely worried,"
> Jess smirked lopsidedly.

awwwwwh. Healy feely!

>  Killgamesh was in my original notes as an
> early Bathory's Monster Of The Week throwaway antagonist, and as I read back
> over Maddie's telephone conversation with Beth the other day I realized it
> might be a good idea to actually put that cover story into motion.  It'd also
> let me focus on some of the ex-paragangers at the school in a context other
> than doing crime, which is always nice.

Tis. X>

>       The status of Dr. Jacky and Baron Crossroads was decided on for this
> story, although that leaves the matter of a couple of houngans and a gang of
> zombies still being in Manhattan and tolerated.  That probably needs to be
> addressed...are they working with Bathory now?  Are they a side threat so
> that I don't have to make everything about Morning Stars versus Bathory?
> Eh, I'll figure it out.

That's the spirit!

Drew "just toss it all in the stew" Nilium