WELCOME TO S&S

[William St. Jude]

Will had been minding his own business. He'd been drinking a pop, finishing off a sandwich, and suddenly there was ice flying through the air, nearly impaling him in the balls. He yelped, and jumped, and eventually ended up rolling backwards in his chair until he was sprawled in a heap on the opposite side and looking for what the hell had caused the icicle of death to rain down from the sky.

He didn't see anything, at first, but other folks had noticed the ice. Someone screamed, which caused a bit of a commotion. Will hated that. You had to stay calm in situations like this. Screamers were always the first ones to get hurt, because they were careless.

Will blinked, stunned, when he saw the man land from... jumping from where?.. and then stand. He was looking at Will, so Will cursed under his breath and wondered if taking off would work in his favor or against.

Something made him stand his ground.

[Shiloh Saunders]

Shiloh was coming home from work. Today she had to do cleaning, which always made her miserable and the chemicals from the products always gave her a head ache. While walking down the street in the city center, her phone started to ring. “bzzzzt” she looked who could it be, the number was not recognised, but she knew. It must be another child protection agency Zack's school called on her... Another day of crying and another day of begging for more time. She pressed the red button and sent the caller (whomever it might) to voicemail. She couldn't deal with this right now.

She closed her eyes and let out a tired sight. “why am I doing this?” this was a question she always asked herself, but the answer was clear. Her siblings, she looked at the Wallpaper on her phone, a photo of her family from a happier time, she was about put the phone away when screaming and people running came from her left.

Her attention was caught by the small crowd running in panic and Ice everywhere...
“Ice...?” she thought. “It's not even winter yet”
She ran against the crowd and saw a blonde man in a suit stand there, holding his ground against another strange man.

Shiloh saw the large man try to shoot out another ice attack, her mind was in panic “He won't be able to evade it...” She held out both of her hands, like it doubled her powers and wished and prayed hard that the earth would rise for her to make a shield for the young man to protect him and enough blockade for both of them to get away.

“up...Up....” she thought. “UP!” Shiloh screamed...

The Earth obeyed her words and managed to create a barrier just about reaching the height of the man in the suit, but it wasn't thick, it wouldn't hold long. Shiloh's nose was bleeding and she felt tired. “I used too much power” she declared to herself, but she needed to hold out for the unknown man in front of her.

[Alex Thorn]

After his initial assault the dark senshi smiled; already having been told of the potential star seed carrier being the blond man that was still standing there. Now that intel was proven true. He leapt off his perch on the small rooftop to land across from the little café that would be their stadium tonight. Blondie didn't look fazed anymore, another sign that he was who he was looking for. This brought another smile to the ice senshi's face; tonight would be a success after all. Now to see which seed he carried...

Dark Mercury brought his hands up and formed another javelin of ice, this one bigger than the last, then hurled it at the star seed carrier; he would defend or deflect and reveal the nature of his star seed, or he would become impaled and die. making one less potential enemy for Metallia and he.

By now the crowd's screams could still be heard but the epicentre, where Mr Blond star seed carrier stood, was pretty empty; the silly people having ran away from his initial attack. They were still around them, and still screaming; something which was fast annoying Dark Mercury but he couldn't do anything about it - freezing them wasn't an option...

His javelin sailed across the distance and Dark Mercury though it would actually strike true without the man doing anything to stop it when a wall of earth rose up to take the hit. Dark Mercury's eyebrows rose, having not expected that one. For two seconds he wondered if the man had done it, but then he saw the girl in his periphery; the red headed girl off to the side. Upon a real look at her it became clear that she had caused the earth to move; her body looked hunched, tired or in pain; an energy drawback of using it the way she had. Foolish girl, and now Dark Mercury had two potential targets; if they were not on the side of Metallia.

[Arien Alexandrov]

Arien had felt the need to leave the house tonight, he had been spending a lot of time in his office or at home pouring over research papers on the different types of models he could be running his data through to work out which would work best. He needed a break and he needed some air. He could have called Arina and seen if she wanted to grab dinner, but she'd been so distant lately. He needed more time to work out what was going on with her before they had another encounter and hopefully not another argument.

Arien stopped mid step as his forehead stung slightly, a corrupted version of Mercury's power was at work nearby. He could feel it, that meant Dark Mercury was active nearby and that didn't bode well for anyone. Arien would need to move fast, rendering himself invisible he rode in a force field towards the scene moving far quicker through the air then he would have managed on crutches.

He arrived on the scene in time to see Dark Mercury hurl a javelin of ice at a blonde man and a wall of earth move to protect him, a woman nearby slouching as it did. So there were two star seeds about and Dark Mercury was hunting. Arien projected a force field at Dark Mercury that would have had the same effect as a shove. Just enough to get his attention, maybe push him off his feet. Standing between Dark Mercury and his targets Arien made himself visible.

"Raising Mercury's strength against me is one thing, I can't let Mercury's power be utilised to harm innocents though." Arien motioned towards the two star seeds as he spoke "I see the Queen has sent you hunting for star seeds, this is all you've found her. I'm hardly impressed and I doubt she would be. There isn't much power here. That is irrelevant though, they are still under Mercury's protection."

Arien brought another force field into existence, this time it snapped around Dark Mercury. Not wrapping it around him directly and holding him still, that would require a lot more energy than Arien would have thought it wise to expend. This was a sphere in place around Dark Mercury, it would keep him contained for a while.

"Run." He spoke the word to the two star seeds, hopefully they were intelligent enough to listen. Arien now devoted his attention to his barrier. Without his crystal and with Metallia's power thrown in Arien was at a clear disadvantage here but he would stand his ground. He would not let Hyperion do things now he would regret later. His senshi needed to be protected from himself.