Shellshocked (open)

Optional stuff:

The hustle and bustle of the bank was always the same, people shuffling around paying bills and cashing checks, while people shuffled around filing checks and shuffling paper around. Sadly the hustle and bustle came to a screeching halt with several loud thundering bangs and a forceful commanding shout. "Everybody get down, this is a robbery!" Another loud thundering bang as two more shots rang out and bits of ceiling came down in a cloud of dust and insulation. These guys, clad in their ski mask's and body armor meant business, shotguns, handguns and automatic weaponry; even hand-grenades and plastique explosives.

These guys were loaded for bear as they rounded up the civilians and bank guard alike, corralled them up into a corner of the room and kept them under wrap and key. Save for one boy, one boy up in the offices that had seen what was going on and sighed. He didn't work for the people, but he did work for one of the...benefactors of the bank, his father and he had a lovely job of keeping their assets safe, money, jewelry and stocks and bonds. Losing those would be a hard blow to the Benedetti family and as the boy slapped a pair of goggles over his face and affixed a steel visor over his lower mouth, he looked up at the monitors again and rolled his shoulders. He was going to get quite a few lumps, bumps and bruises today.

"Your lives, meaningless / Money burns while you suffer / Death is absolute," he finished up his little one-sided conversation by drawing the red hued blade of his katana from it's sheath, a soft little sigh leaving his voice as he exited the office and made his way downstairs. The stairs would be slower, but he could surprise one or two of them, maybe more if...yeah he'd probably let them try and capture him. Get them close, let him do the most damage possible. Hands were less intimidating than a sword, but they were also deadly weapons when used right and Nicolas could use them properly.

The door opened and one man took sight of Nicolas and chuckled, training a sub machinegun on him. "Oi, oi get a load of this you guys, we got ourselves a heeeeero~" the words were muffled, but Nicolas could read his lips, could tell he was saying hero in a mocking drawn out sing-song tone and he mentally shrugged. They didn't quite get it did they? They were in for a world of hurt right now, in for the last moments of their lives and they just didn't get it. "Alright hero boy," he felt a gun press against his back, wasn't sure what kind it was, but it was a gun all the same to him. "March that way, no funny business or you're gonna get some impromptu spinal reconstructive surgery."

So he marched forward, mumbled softly with his hand's raised head height and splayed out several inches from his face. He marched and marched that slow deliberate march, taking his sweet generous time until he felt the gun shove against his back. Nicolas snapped around like a whip, left hand grappling the barrel of the gun and jerking it straight down, several jerky bursts tore up the carpet at their feet as Nicolas brought his right hand up, the open palm striking the man on the jaw with restrained force. He didn't need to waste his stamina, didn't need to brute force these people, he was a normal boy as far as strength was concerned, but when you could cause injuries to the inner body with a simple touch, strength didn't matter.

The man dropped back, his body dancing and jerking around on the ground, muscles seizing and relaxing so quickly that it looked like someone had ran a few hundred volts through his skull. He had caused damage to the frontal and parietal lobes and just then the man finally decided to scream, and even Nicolas was surprised by it as he looked down at the man, jerking and flopping against the ground like a fish out of water, then up at the others that were all aiming for him. Well, damn that could have gone a bit better as he back tracked, grabbed his blade and felt several rounds pepper his back like white hot fists as he tumbled over a counter and lay there with a groan. "This...could have gone...smoother."

It just so happened, that one of the bank guards was not truly going to surrender, he, in fact, was just biding his time, and his time came when someone else tried to combat the guards, it didn't go so smoothly, but that was still a good enough opportunity for the guard to rise to his feet and shoot one of them in the spine, it wouldn't kill him, but he would be crippled. The others turned to him and aimed their guns Why does everyone have a death wish today!?! one of the robbers yelled before they all opened fire, but the mans body went under a strange transformation and the bullets pierced the clothes, but not the skin, they didn't realize this until they had peppered his body with bullets, his uniform and undershirt was ruined but there was not a mark on his body Now, who wants some? they were all so focused on him that they completely ignored the other boy.

More gunshots, muffled but detectable as he laid there for what seemed like forever before crawling to his feet with a grunt and leaped back over the teller's counter. "A problem to fix / Death is a finality / your lives are forfeit" his voice came out slow and deliberate, the back of his outfit was in tatters as he stared down the closest man, the sound of his blade was a soft echo over the dying staccato rhythm of gunfire as he moved in, the blade held at a downward perpendicular angle as the distinct sound of automatic gunfire echoed through the room now thick with gun smoke and dust, one would think there was a slaughter going on as Nicolas felt more hot burns against his flesh, more places for bruises to show as the bullets plowed into him like numerous fists.

But he didn't stop, didn't even flinch as he brought the blade up into the man's left hip with a sickening crunch that turned into a blood curdling scream, as the blade continued up and through before exiting just under the right shoulder. Fresh blood, feed the blade extinguish the lust, if one could see his eye's right now, black with white, they'd think he was a demon as he spun and slashed once again, a second man fell onto back, ten feet away with a deep gash in his chest. Dead as a door nail. Now one would have to ask, how he manage to do that? simply look close enough and one would see the ripple of air-pressure, hear the soft harmonious hum, as death greeted the man with the man with open arms.

"Four down....four to....go," he spoke in that soft, slow deliberate whisper as he snapped his hand to the side, flicking several droplets of blood free with a yawn. "Stay and die, or run and live, your choice," he exhaled and readied the blade again, he could easily deal with every one of them without breaking a sweat, but the surprise assistance from the guard was helpful, speaking of the guard. Nicolas looked at him with suspicion, he didn't know the bank had a meta-human on the payroll, he was going to have to watch his back as one man took the hint and bolted for the door. He was the smart one, the one that probably had too much to lose.

"Three to go..."

Obviously, the robbers did not take desertion lightly, as one turned and shot the one trying to escape in the head, then they all fired on the one with the sword, not that it would do anything to stop him from killing the next robber. Metamorphi ran up to the nearest one and punched him in the back, the body armor saving his life, but not the damage to his spine and his knocking over a second one to his front, he quickly trod on the other knocked over ones wrist to keep his arm in place, then trod on his elbow to break the arm Ahhhhhh!!!!!! he wasn't dead, but he was as good as useless now, one to go.

And then there was one against two, a poor situation to be in and one without any real escape for the last man standing. Nicolas felt the bloodlust, it pulsed along the blade and into his fingers like a soft vibration as he looked at the last crook and cracked a smile. "My blade is...still thirsty," he murmured softly, barely a hushed whisper as he flicked the side of the blade, the sound steadily growing in pitch and volume until it sounded like a church bell was going off in the room as the windows shook and pens rattled off desks with a muted clatter. The last man, the last victim covered his ears, much like the hostages were doing, he lost his focus as the sound pounded him like a hammer, dropped to his knees with a silent scream, the noise reaching it's peak before dying out and much like that raucous din, the man was dead.

During that brief period of fifteen seconds, Nicolas had crossed the distance, closed the gap and slit the man's throat. But he didn't step away from the arterial shower of crimson and copper, rather he placed the blade to the gap and watched, waited until the life fluid came to a trickle before removing the sword and placing it against his shoulder with a grunt. "Blood and confusion / the chaos has been silenced / ending the turmoil" He looked at the guard, stared at him and watched, the reflection of light on his goggles giving them a pallor green shimmer.

Metamorphi yelled out in pain and covered his ears during the sound attack Ahhhh!!! when it was over, he could not see the final robber What the!?! he looked down and saw the dead man, he then looked up at the man who aided him Thank you, although, you didn't need to kill them

Nicolas looked at the other meta and snorted, the front of his shirt had holes, his back had holes, but there wasn't any visible damage done to him as he stared up at Meta, clenched his free hand with a deft snap and crack. "There is always a need to kill people like them, it's to send a....message." He spoke softly and slowly, a brief pause as he wrapped his lips around each word and tapped the back of his katana against his shoulder, the gray fabric beginning to turn dark and sticky in that area as he walked towards him, felt a hand grab his leg. One of the survivors, crippled - he put the blade through the mans head, twisted it and drew it back in one motion; a mercy killing as he exhaled softly and stared at the other boy.

"Do not, screw with us; that's the message," slow and deliberate, a certain force to each letter, an impact in each pause as he looked at the first one he struck down, he was alive and slowly, he marched towards him with a purpose, the blade swinging at his side like a metronome, looking more like a genuine reaper of lives than a hero, truthfully he wasn't a hero, heroes didn't do bad things to bad people. But his goals were the same, morally, however, they couldn't be any different than water and wine. "You'll do just fine to spread the word."

Metamorphi glared at the boy That may be true, but I prefer to spread the message with crippled bodies, rather than dead ones he wasn't going to arrest the guy or anything, he wasn't that ungrateful, especially seeing how he's breaking the law himself by taking justice into his own hands. He sighed Well, guess that makes me fired, not the first job I've lost, won't be the last, even though I avoided killing any of them, we're both going to be blamed for killing these guys, I don't know about you, but I'm running. Which is exactly what he'd do, unless something stopped him.

"Crippling someone is...cowardly....and foolish," he mumbled before pulling the goggles from his face, the rest of his face obscured save for those violent, stormy gray eyes that seemed to stab into Meta with a dispassionate intensity. They were the eye's of someone who could turn off a little part of them, to become a calm impartial killer as he yawned and flicked his gaze to the man at his feet. "Leave and spread the fear...." he spoke with that slow deliberate murmur. He had been placed here by his father to keep his and the families asset's, no, all of the asset's in the bank secure. He was a violent man but he had...some morals, he looked out for the normal people, had their best interests in mind.

Now if only they could spread into crash alley and slowly close their steel grip around the crime and control it but so many street gangs, metahumans and the like made it hard, if not impossible, to preform this task. Then those intense eye's hooked back into Metamorpho and he smiled behind the face guard. "You might not lose your job, my...father could see to it. Powerful man, lot's of...friends." He whispered and twisted his head from side to side, various little pops rolling through his neck as he pulled a cloth from a pocket and ran it along the blade, staining the soft virgin white a sanguine red. He had slaked it's thirst for now but eventually, someone would...make a mistake and the blade would hunger again, requiring death and violence to quench it.

Metamorphi stopped right in front of the entrance, turned to the boy and smiled Thanks, but no thanks, I could stay, but there is one big reason I can't save my job, no matter who helps me... he took off what little uniform was not ruined, revealing another layer of casual clothes underneath ...I don't work here with that, he ran out the door, he heard the police sirens and ran in the opposite direction they came from, disappearing from sight.

"Ah...." the voice came slow and soft as Nicolas followed after him with a neutral expression. He'd let the police deal with what had gone on here, for now he had to deal with someone playing dress up as a bank guard. Another person that had likely wanted to steal from the bank, to hurt the people that felt safe and secure, but had been stopped by those people, had his plans ruined. The blade wasn't thirsty, but that wouldn't stop Nicolas from breaking an arm or both, maybe the legs if he felt like it. He wasn't upset, nor pissed, just calm and thinking of the person he chased, as that mental switch clicked again and he flexed his hands open and shut with a yawn. "Now....where are you?" He whispered to himself slowly, his eye's glancing around, the focus in them was...frankly insane; comparable to a marine sniper that was on the hunt for hostiles.

(OOC: Don't you just love it when assumptions lead to things like this?)

Metamorphi ran, he was running so the police didn't get him, but what he didn't realise that by extension, he was running from the very man he had just helped fight off a bunch of bank robbers, not realising that Nicolas was looking for him he ran into an alley to hide from the police, but he would enter Nicholas's sight.

He was hunting, prowling and searching, the police would obviously be in an uproar over the dead bodies but his father could assuage their feelings partially, he was good at those kind of things; talking and convincing. Right now however, that wasn't going to be for a few more hours, right now Nicolas had someone to...hurt. He spotted Metamorpho, his fingers gripping around the scabbard of his blade oh so tightly as he plodded towards his target; the goggles were back on and there was a distinct air of calm dispassionate menace about him, he wasn't angry, nor mad; he was....just doing what he was setting out to do. He was going to hurt someone and that was fine in his books.

He never said a word, never made a sound as he stopped six feet away, tapped his scabbard on the ground; the sound magnified into a heavy banging, like that of a judges gavel being struck against it's block. There we stood, softly tapping away; bang, bang, bang, as a small plume of breath left his lips, the cool air turning turning the moisture into a mist. "You...."

Metamorphi almost jumped at the sudden sound, he turned to the source and raised his arm in defense, then he realised it was just the guy who helped him and he lowered his guard What is it?

Nicolas exhaled, another bang of the scabbard echoed through the air and then all sound outside of his own ceased, the sound of cars, the buzz of power lines, the distant sirens of the police. All sound died as he stared at Metamorphi, the scabbard swaying in his hand as he popped the blade free and marched towards him. "Lies and falsities / We are tired of the black veil / bring us back the truth." Nicolas muttered softly, yet those words seemed to carry a force of their own, as if each letter, each syllable, were a brutally heavy fist being swung at Metamorphi. "Liar's must...be broken to see the truth," he spoke again, normally this time, no force to the words, just a threat, menace and that same tired listless attitude as he dropped the scabbard with a clatter.

He stuck out his right foot, the blade aimed down and forward, hilt hovering by his left hip as he narrowed his eyes at him and cracked his neck from side to side, the blade slowly being enveloped in a sheath of energy, not sharp but blunt, grinding, capable of tearing and breaking with ease. "La miglior difesa è l'attacco." Again there was force in those words, foreign as they were, each word was an attack, each syllable like a punch, a kick or a stabbing blade as he slowly sidled towards Metamorpho, no hate no malice just....doing what he was doing, it wasn't personal, he was just tying up a loose end.