Risk your life is the heroes duty (Neverwinter)

Animal Shifter holds her arm while in costume having been punched in the arm right where she barley dodged a bullet in her last fight. She knew she probably shouldn't already be back out there fighting before she fully healed but she couldn't help it putting your life on the line was what heroes do even if it is to stop so thieves that ran to the junk yard to hide. Claira hunches over before turning into a green Lion and roars at the thieves before running at them.

Eddie had found what people call The Junkyard with a bit of doing, but that wasnt really a problem - she had to find it, and after dredging herself out of the bay and doing some serious diagnostics and analasys, she had something she could work on. Deadlock wasn't really set up to deal with that kind of speed or agility.

But what could she do? The reactors were heavy and taxed to their limits as it was - it was enough that she maintained the powered plating and musculature - and that was only something she could manage at maximum capacity by cycling around the reactor power carefully. To improve Deadlock, she would need to improve the Active-Ion reactor. That kind of thing... Would take a bit of time. Repairs, a tuneup, and careful tweaks were enough for now.

The water hadn't been kind. A lot had gotten into the cabin before she'd managed to turn off the air cycling system, and that meant some of her instruments were waterlogged. To the rice bath with them! Dry rice was best at sorting out water from electronics. Fun tip! Don't let water get in, and waterproof your %#!@!

Eddie had gone through six cigarettes already, and she'd only been working for... Four hours. A part of her dimly recognized this was displacement activity, and keeping her hands busy was something she was doing to take her mind off things. But, a bit of hard work never did anyone any harm.

Gunshots caught her ears. Bullets just might though. And here she was... With Deadlock put out of commission by a bit of #%!$ing seawater.

Well. THIS would never happen again.

Bending, she scooped up the reinforced leather, slipped on the heavy chaps, gloves, boots and helmet of the Skullsuit, and... Considered her little pet project. The Icarus Repulsor was not finished. Not by a long way. But... It wasn't actually all that big, and the control scheme... Was pretty simple, wasn't it? She glanced at the harness she used in Deadlock, and unfastened it from the sleeping giant. A bit of work with some duct tape, and she'd slung the fifteen pound improvised jetpack onto the back of the skullsuit and fastened te controls into the palm of her glove. If this worked like she was almost certain it would... Maybe she'd tool something more refined up later? It would do.

Scooping up the Grim Hitter, Eddie strode a bit away from the improvised workshop she'd set up, tested the harness... And squeezed, pointing her backside away from the sounds of the screeching tires and gunfire. Tere was a feeling of the bottom dropping out of her world... And she rocketed madly into the night with a woop of exhileration!

====

By the time the men made it over the fence and into the Junkyard, Animal Shifter was already on their tail. Eddie watched from atop a thirty foot stack of cars, grimhitter tapping on her spiked, shoulder pad thoughtfully she had a getup... And even as Eddie watched, turned into a lioness! It was green - it was beast boy!! She wasn't close enough to the other heroine to see it WAS a heroine... But she would have done what she did next... Regardless.

So it was that Eddie landed in a flare of blue ligjt very suddenly in front of the fleeing thieves, her fist already whirling around. The punch had momentum and support behind it, and came to a point on the end of metal skull adorned brass knuckles! It laid out the first gun toting thug before he even knew what he was seeing, carrying him up and flat on his back with a yell of brief surprise. He was out like a light.

Very neatly, the black leather clad figure wearing a fearsome, fanged steel skull helmet stepped smartly forward, using the momentum from her punch to bring a bat around in a full body swing at the man immediately behind him, who was only just now skidding to a stop, eyes wide as saucers!

This bat had about as much to do with baseball as a set of spiked nunchucks had to do with threshing rice! It was a weapon, longer and heavier than a normal baseball bat, and it ended with a metal ring just behind the broad end, studded with round protrusions of metal. It hit with a sound like a shovel hitting wet concrete and sent him instantly down, moaning and swearing and wheezing for breath - he would have some busted ribs, that was for sure.

By now, the four other men had time to stop and consider things. In front, a maniac with a tetsubo and goddamn glowing blue eyes in a metal skull helmet! Behind, a shapeshifting lioness, giving a roar as she approached. They leveled guns at the pair, eyes desperate as they tried to keep both young heroines in their sights at once.

Animal Shifter hadn't noticed this other girl but was  surprised to see her. Animal Shifter saw them draw out guns pointing at them and narrowed her eyes. There was no way that she would get shot in another fight right after the last fight she had. Animal Shifter qucikly ran forward to get their attention from Eddie and changed into a cobra to avoid the gun fire. She quickly shoots up into the air at the men doing one of her best moves. She quickly changes into an elephant koncking the men to the ground while mid air and lands by them an dlooks at them to verify they were out cold.

Deadlock stared briefly at the girl as she calmly circled the men. It was tue oter hero who made the first move, and Deadlock knew the first shot was coming long before it left the barrel of the man's weapon. She darted sideways very suddenly and moved in a flurry towards him, the tetsubo she wielded skipping along the old gravel and kicking up spikes fiercely. Bullets whizzed past and sang through the air past her head and body, very narrowly missing as she changed direction very suddenly...! And went for them!

She brought her fist up and through, catching one man under the chin, popping him right off the ground with a crack and a groan as she hit his jaw, knee coming around to catch the stunned thief and send him down hard. The helmeted woman spun to see the shapeshifter rising into the air as a green serpent. She had a feeling about what would happen next, and saw one man raising his weapon in vaun to shoot her. Gripping the jetpack's control, she squoze in a burst and jumped, just as the girl became a great elephant. Animal Shifter knocked men flying in her wake in an impressive display of destruction.

Skidding to a stop on her feet, she squoze again and burst forward very suddenly, jerking herself har with a grunt as her world spun a moment. One man was rising with a shotgun, a surlier sort than the others. He looked stunned, but he was already grabbing for a shotgun he'd had on his back - right up until Eddie cannoned into him, sending them both earthward with a meaty thud!

Eddie was the first to recover, rising on his chest and hammering a couple solid punches into his face with her skull-clad knuckles. He brought one meaty fist around and socked her squarely upside the head, knocking her off, and rose, howling with rage. He was rising before Eddie could fully recover and planted his boot in the heroine's side as hard as he could. She'd had the sense to curl abit... But it still slapped the wind out of her and hurt like blazes, sending her rolling away. The beast - that bit of the human that doesn't bother with words, that keeps beating someone long after they have passed out, that smells blood and likes it, was in control of him.

Eddie was stunned - she struggled for breath, to get up an defend herself, but quick as a lion he was on her, grabbing her, lifting her bodily and tossing her against a car. She hit solidly, pain streaking through her body as the world flashed in unpleasant reds and purples before her eyes. She was in trouble! He picked up her tetsubo... And started walking towards her, twirling it once to get a feel, eyes full of murder... She was in trouble - this human being was mostly muscle and almost seven feet tall with a neck you could bend a steel bar around!

Once seeing them knocked out Animal Shifter changes into her human form flinging her arms in he air excited that she finally beat a bad guy without serious injury. "OOH YEAH WHAT NOW!?" she leans over to the knocked out men "CRIME DOESN'T PAY NOW, NOW DOEN'T IT! WHAT WHA-" She sees Eddie in trouble getting an oops expression before she turns into a cheetah to get over to the man faster then turns into an Ape swinging her large arms with great momentum at the man hitting him to the ground. She then pounds her chest as if to challange the man that is she would be challanging him if he was not knocked out if he was then it would be in victory.

Eddie watched with amazement and a good measure of relief as a cat that became an ape knocked the cobwebs out of the massive murderous man with one very powerful punch that even she sitting there felt, sending him not just earthward but to ground as well - he wouldn't get up again in a terrible hurry! If Eddie was any judge, that was a broken jaw and whiplash, at the very least! He'd live. They all would.

Slumped against the truck like she was, Eddie tried to stand up again and sat back down until the nasty lights went away - it wasn't something she was managing all by her onesie just yet, not with every motion of her breathing hurting like seven blazes. Hm, ribs were hurt. Not the first time... Wouldn't be the last either. She doffed her helmet, pulled a rollup cigarette from her vest in a little metal case, and lit up surreptitiously woth shaking hands like the motion was something she was terribly useful. She was a younger woman, had brilliantly blue hair that flopped loose once the helmet was off - maybe it had been mohawk once, but the bit that had been a mohawk was long now - well past her collarbones, and the rest had caught up to maybe half that length.

She smiled at the aggressive display from the big green ape. "My hero." She said in a pained but surprisingly sincere wheeze. She stood. It was a sight - it was like her mind overruled the body and said 'walk it off you pansy you've had worse.' And she had, too. With cigarette bobbing in her lips, she smiled like a pumpkin at the girl, wiping a bit of blood on her sleeve from her mouth. The cigarette came out and she spat a gob of it like a boxer.

"Thanks for the save" she said, and nodded, looking at the men. One was getting up, and she gave him a tooth-rattling kick with a boot. That was a broken rib. She picked up her tetsubo, inspected the mechanism once, and nodded. It had a throttle by the handle, not unlike a chainsaw - it was anyone's best guess what it did.

Sirens were sounding in the distance now, and the blue-haired teen puffpuffed her smoke as she looked back and at the ape. "Hey, you coming? We should be pretty scarce in a minute or two - people will be by in a bit to ask some rather serious questions and I don't like that kinda thing." She said, beckoning for the shapeshifter to follow. "C'mon, I owe you one!"

Animal shifter looks to where the sirens were coming from then to eddie. She turns into a horse for eddie to ride on not wanting her to half to walk after what just happened. She goes over to eddie leaning her head to the ground as if to tell eddie to hop on.

Eddie blinked as the horse drew level, and won a small prize in the all comers uptake test. The horse, she noted, was a mare - inexperienced or not this wasn't somethin you could mistake, not if you'd seen a male horse once - and she had, Gotham had some mounted policemen. She, grunting with effort, got on Animal Shifter's back and wiggled into position, settling in on her spot between the shoulderblades, pointing the girl towards the way deeper into the junkyard

"I have a safespot in there!" she explained "we can hide there for a bit!" And gripped her mane in both fists with all the conviction of someone who had never ever ridden.a horse before in her life and was probably half expecting it to involve tons of jostling, with how her legs gripped and body was tense as wires. The sirens were getting pretty close now!

"Go baby go!"

Animal Shifter looks to the direction that Eddie pointed to she wasn't to sure why they needed a safe spot but this really wasn't the tor or possibly even the place to question her. Animal Shifter nods with her hold neck in understanding before Eddie grabbed hold of her mane. She then once hearing Eddie and the sirens began to race off at the speed you'd see from a race horse. She would continue to go until she or Eddie saw the place Eddie told her about.

Eddie held fast, every jump and jostle a rib-bending jerk in the dark, and her world started to go dark. She grit her teeth and focused all her attention on the moment. It was like squeezing water out of a flannel. She just wanted the pain to end, and each moment pulled her forward towards the dark, but she bouyed herself on wings of irrational, undirected rage. She was hurt - a part of her knew that, and she was being jostled so the body was reacting poorly - she knew this. How long had it been since she'd slept? Since she'd eaten properly? Since she'd really rested? She sagged over Shifter's back, each breath an agony, fought for tooth and nail against the jolting.

But the clearing was obvious once Animal Shifter got through two tight piles a good ways into the junkyard, gentle motions directing her this way an that until she stood before a behemoth of blue-black metal with a fearsome skull and an open chest in which wires were strewn. Connected to things in tubs... Full of rice? The monster looked forboding, its hide breakless and segmented, more like a creature than a thing merely mechanical, its hands looking as though they might reach out for her at any moment or rain hammering blows. Tools were set around it, arranged around a central workspace in front of what had to be the cockpit. A sphere set in a strange scaffolding with two other, similarly shaped spheres, hummed very softly, and very slowly, blue light passed from inside it to the others, which responded by humming and pushing light into the other two in a kind of slow, steady pulsing flow.

Deadlock slid off, stifling a grunt and wandered over to the workshop, laid on the ground and gave a sigh. She waved a hand vaugely at the arrayed oddities. "My workshop." She said groggily.

Animal Shifter ran as fast as she could to the location hurrying seeing Eddie in pain never thinking it could be the rough ride she was causing Eddie. She saw the workshop up ahead and run over to it slowing down to a stop seeing that Eddie wanted off. She watched Eddie feeling worst and worse with every Stifling grunt each one reminding her that she wasn't fast enough or paid enough attention enough to see and stop that brute of a man from giving Eddie such major injuries.

She saw Eddie laying on the ground as she told her that this was her workshop. Animal Shifter changed into her human from as she started to run over to Eddie looking down a lot to watch where she stepped many times having to hop on one foot not to step on something that probably wouldn't have hurt hurt her but wouldn't feel nice stepping on with your bare feet and Animal Shifter wasn't looking forward to a new injury to go with the one on her arm that she may have made worse with all that she had done with that arm.

Animal Shifter made it over to Eddie kneeling down as she looked Eddie over examining her. Animal Shifter was no doctor but with all the trees and rough fights she had with some animals growing up in the jungle all alone like she did she knew a broken rib or in this case ribs when she saw it. "Hey I don't want to worry you but I think we should get you to a hospital or something cause I'm pretty sure you have some broken ribs on your hands."

Eddie undid her leather super outfit a tiny bit a little and winced as things loostened. She thought about what her friend, the old woman at the orphanage had said to her years ago - if something sticks out and shouldn't, and you can't even force yourself to take a full breath, it's broken. She did so. The world darkened a bit for her and her chest aaaached as she felt over her ribs, where it hurt... It FELT swollen, but it wasn't really. She let out the breath and felt the pain flash a moment - but it wasn't unbearable.

She sighed, and repeated this to be sure, and shook her head. "Nah... Just bruised..." She muttered, and felt really, really ill. She grinned. "If you wanna be helpful though, get me a couple cans of soda from the cooler" she said, then after a moment's consideration, added "And help yourself to some too, take a load off." She said generously. Endorphines were starting to kick in a bit now. She forced herself to sit up and lean against the leg of the massive robotic suit.

Animal Shifter hated seeing Eddie like this and was hoping she said yes to the hospital but sadly Eddie like Animal Shifter was a trooper and didn't seem like shed go to the hospital without a fight which if Animal Shifter did try and force her to go she might just cause Eddie to get in worse condition which Animal Shifter didn't want happening. Animal Shifter nods to her going over to Eddie's cooler getting some sodas for Eddie and got some cover where Eddie couldn't see her.

She pulled out her device that looked like a Gameboy Advanced SP from her belt clicking the start button changing into her civillain clothes. She Takes off her green shirt placing it on the ground in front of her as she changes back into her hero costume putting her device back in her belt picking up the shirt and brings it over to Eddie along with the sodas. She places the sodas right next to Eddie and kneeled down by her. She balled up her shirt and gently lifts up Eddie's head putting her shirt under Eddie's head for her to use as a pillow. Eddie didn't want to go to the hospital so Animal Shifter figured she might as well make Eddie as comfortable as possible here then.

Eddie gave a short soft laugh as the girl moved to lift her head and put the shirt behind it. It was mirth like the amused grin of someone who was high as a someone could be on endorphines and whupassery. She accepted the shirt instead with a grateful nod and folded the ice cold cans of soda into it, then pressed them against her side under the leather with a hiss through her teeth.

"I've been here before" she said by way of explanation. "Trick is to keep it cool, see?" She continued. "If its not too bad it'll see too itself. If it is... Well, I'll find out, I bet." She chuckled, and gave a puff at the rollup cigarette between her lips. It wasnt lit anymore - she lit up with hands that had quite gone steady, and leaned back against the robot's leg. She offered her hand.

"Deadlock" she supplied.

Animal Shifter was glad to see Eddie at least let her give her her shirt for comfort. Animal Shifter sits down as she listens to Eddie She knew very well what it was like to be in Eddie's position far to well. Animal Shifter nods taking the hand shaking it with a slight nod to go with it as Eddie told her her name or at least the one she expected Animal Shifter to call her. "I'm Animal Shifter." Animal Shifter then sat down in front of Eddie looking at her with an understanding look on her face.

"I know what your talking about far too well, I spent most my childhood in the jungle alone." Animal Shifter explained not looking for sympathy or anything she was just looking to state that fact of her past to show Eddie that she knew what Eddie was going through and what she was talking about. Animal Shifter never looked down about her past despite how horrible it was she just saw everything she want through was just a way to prepare her for her future. Yes she was sad about her parents but she didn't want to linger on that part of her past some people had it worse than her and it wouldn't be fair to linger and look down about bad things that happened so long ago when others maybe suffering right here and now.