Empty New York City Streets -- where did everyone go?

Stella rarely went outside camp -- she had always preferred the supernatural hustle and bustle of camp to the crowded, sometimes smelly streets of New York, which was one of the reasons why she always avoided Olympus trips. (Another reason would have been the fact that her father would probably not have been at Olympus, anyway. That's to be expected when your father was finely filleted like a fish by his own son. He probably didn't care about her as much as the other gods did with their kids; he was busy "being the sky" and "not falling on Gaea". Bah.)

But tonight, she had decided she was tired of sitting around camp, avoiding people or harassing them until they got annoyed or frightened and, finally, she ran off at around midnight, avoiding the harpies easily with a combination of her speed and wind powers. Camp was getting boring -- most of Stella's fellow demititans had disappeared inexplicably over the past few weeks, aggravating her to no end. She needed people she could talk to that were on her level, not some... stupid demigods who didn't know a butter knife from a sword.

Stella huffed and ran a hand through her hair as she walked through the empty backstreets, content to hear the classic traffic of New York City far, far away from where she was. The honking and talking and shouting she had heard on the first hour of her walk had forced her, in her irritation, to go through some random back alley that curved and twisted like a serpent, until at the very end she came out onto a street full of homes, quiet and tranquil like something out of a movie (a horror film at the beginning, specifically). Just the way she needed it.

Now she was in the middle of the street, kicking an empty crushed can of grape soda around like a soccer ball -- once, twice, and now it had slid under a car beyond her reach. As far as the girl could see, there was nobody else here -- not coming out of the houses, not driving, nobody. It was a relatively clean neighborhood, comfortable even, but Stella couldn't see herself living here, a quiet oasis in the middle of the bustling city. For all she knew, come morning the cars and shouting would rush in like a bursting dam, to ebb away at night. For tonight, at least, it would do.

Ace was in New York, or in a better term; Eliza was in New York. She had come to the city during the day, pick pocketing tourists and shoving people around. Cursing at cabs and shouting at people like any good New Yorker. Her brunette hair was loose and tangled, not clean and blonde like her other two personalities, the ones she despised for being weaklings. Her brown eyes looked up and down the streets as she walked and locked onto the only other person within sight, some girl about a block down the quiet neighborhood. Eliza cracked her knuckles and laughed lightly, picking up her speed as she thought about what to do. Should she smash her over the head with her mace? Perhaps just beat her up and leave her in the gutter. Eh, she didn't care as long as it was a fight. Of course, her other personas weren't going to let her do that so easily.

Her first and main personality andria was fighting for control, trying to stop Eliza from carrying out her plan to beat up the other girl, although the two were evenly matched, each one the opposite of the other.

OOC: sorry it's short

[ooc: That's fine; you don't really need to rush to post, though. I can wait if you want to make your posts longer.]

As Stella continued her walk down the street, mourning the loss of her crushed can under that stupid car, she became aware of something in her vicinity, not too close but not very far -- a sort of disturbance in the wind, perhaps, that tipped her off and made her assume a more cautious manner, less carefree than she was only seconds ago. It was wonderful that she was so in tune with the wind and sky, could feel the rushing of people running towards her and use the winds to speed herself up, slow them down, blast them away, or just plain-out know that they're there, breathing and moving -- the winds were sensitive to movement, the small blast of air from just a simple exhale would tip Stella off if only she really paid attention.

But now, she couldn't stop and admire what gifts the Fates had bestowed on her: something was close by. A small monster, perhaps, would have been very tempted by her scent, but then this thing could also be some mortal, walking home from work or a party or something. Stella decided that she would wait and see what this disturbance was with her own eyes before acting; she wasn't in the mood to kill a monster, and a mortal would probably bring her no trouble.

She stopped underneath a streetlamp illuminating the corner of the block, waiting and listening to see what news the winds would bring her, turning her head this way and that: left, right, and then -- there was a girl. Jogging -- running? -- towards her at this very fine hour. There was something about her that immediately put Stella on the alert; the girl was still a bit far from her, but speedily making her way in her direction? That was... off.

Tensing, the demititan readied herself to either run or fight, her hand closing as if around a sword handle.

Eliza approached her, catching more details in this girls stance as she stood under a light, illuminating her so she could easily see the sword hilt, but not only that, her hand tightening around the handle. This made her slow down, actually...think. Thinking made andria stronger though, and she couldn't have that. She was torn with the choice though, as andria began to argue with her inside her head. Growling, Eliza stayed in control as she brought out her mace and walked over to her, though stayed out of the swung of her sword. "Hey there!" She called with a light smirk dancing along her lips.

"Obviously your not mortal, that weapon at your side confirms that. So, demigod, or monster? Please say monster, I need a good fight" she smirked and tapped her jagged mace, the spikes all sharp celestial bronze. She could have placed poison along the tips as well, but she had no need to fill the internal storage compartment with venom, brute strength usually was enough to crush a skull, shatter ribs, or just plain break a limb.

Eliza pressed some of her brunette hair back and smirked, waiting for her to say somethng.

OOC; ok! Thanks!

As the girl walked towards her, Stella could feel her sword hilt materializing in her hand, ready to cut the girl in half if she came any closer. Thank the cactus lord that she didn't -- but the demititan could see she had a celestial bronze mace and was, most definitely, going to use it on her. The girl looked slightly disheveled -- her hair was a mess, and there was something just a teensy-weensy bit off about the way she smirked and called out to her. But it was nothing she had never faced before; the crazies at camp liked to try muscling in on her territory, so she liked to pay them a little visit and, you know, put them in their proper places. Nearly all demigods couldn't hold a candlelight to her power, and this one would be no exception to her. It was boring, really; nobody at camp was an actual challenge except her cabin-mates, but no, they all decided to take a vacation or whatever without telling her. Freaking idiots. She'd give them a piece of her mind next time she saw any of them.

There were two levels of psychotic in camp: the first were the people who picked fights to try killing people and come off as horrid wannabes who failed at even acquiring acting lessons to sound scary, and then there were those who actually killed mercilessly, who were never afraid except very rarely and who would not be put off by some of the wannabes wandering around.

Stella could confirm she fit into the second category -- the girl with the mace probably fit into the first. There was no way to confirm that without knowing her name, however, but she'd find out her identity soon enough -- only if the poor girl didn't die first.

In reply, she chuckled softly, holding her sword at her side. "A good fight, huh? Well, you've come to New York -- it's a better place than that piss-poor excuse for a camp, anyway. Have at me. Haven't had a decent fight in ages." She tapped her sword on the pavement, as if to say, Ladies first.

The wind blew softly across the neighborhood, waiting for her to start, to unleash its power and reduce the girl to nothing more than bones and mangled flesh. It would bring Stella great joy to do so -- perhaps the neighborhood would wake up in several hours and find the corpse on top of a car, or find parts hanging from the lampposts, flags, car antennae, even tucked into some plant boxes outside of windows. Most people at camp would probably be unaware until the girl's friends -- if she had any, obviously -- noticed her disappearance, but be unable to explain where she was. Maybe they would tie Stella in to it, or maybe not. This was all fun and games to her; it wasn't like she had ever met a sufficient punishment to deter her from these sorts of things. Any would-be avengers she met were swiftly crushed.

Eliza smirked and looked her over, checking out the large sword, but also the way the girl stood, how she acted and reacted. This wouldn't be a simple fight like in training, or in a simple fight-no. She was put off and could tell that this girl was no run of the mill demigod, no, there was something in the air that was off... Her sensitive hearing could pick out a slight increase in the rustling of street trash, of paper in the gutters and thought about it, allowing the rare opportunity for andria to help her out. If the wind is moving when she pulled her blade, the chances of her being related to a wind god is high. God of storms? God of the north wind? South? Perhaps she's one of the rare demititans. Just watch yourself Eliza.... before andria could finish her sentence Eliza tuned her out and stroked the mace, smirking at the other girl. "So, I suppose I won't get your name before the fight? Maybe I'll get it after I win"

Lifting her mace she twirled it in her hand, her other weapons on standby if they were needed. Then with a grunt she swung her large mace, swinging it towards her, aiming for a harsh side attack, leaning into the blow to increase the power in her wrist, in her entire arm as she swung.

Eliza was rash, she may be mean and a bully but combat was her area, her time to shine. Andria may be popular, and Charlotte may be a shy bookworm, but Eliza was the warrior. She knew when words weren't useful, and when she needed to use action.

"After I win," the girl had said. That poor deluded fool -- no regular demigod had ever really won against Stella, had never beaten her down enough to get her to stop pursuing them, had never gotten her to take them seriously. This one was no exception: Stella could confirm her opponent wasn't a demititan and, thus, not a sufficient threat to warrant an immediate takedown. She had time to play, see what this girl was made of -- and if it didn't satisfy her enough to consider her opponent worthy prey to save for later, the demititan had no qualms about taking her down and stringing up what was left of her for the world to see.

But now, the fight had begun, and Stella swiftly leaped back from the swing of the mace, using a strong blast of wind from her free hand to propel her back far enough, out of range of the mace. Speed had always been her strong suit -- endurance of pain not so much, but her ability to avoid things kept her from experiencing too much of it at one time. The great thing about maces was that they were usually heavy, making their users a bit slower when attacking and probably defending or dodging -- Stella could tell the girl liked powerful attacks. Good, good. That was fine. She could be outmaneuvered.

The wind began to pick up speed -- at first it had been a soft breeze when she had first tapped her sword on the ground, but now it was more insistent, but not yet quite violent. She wanted to hold back at the moment; they were just getting started, and she wanted to test her and see what made her tick and how she fought. It would be useful information for later, in case Stella decided this girl was going to provide her with entertainment in the future -- but if the girl didn't quite fit into that category, the sword-wielder would be content enough flinging her around until finally putting the poor thing out of her misery.

"You won't need my name," Stella told her, holding up her sword. "You'll figure out who I am when this is over, if you've got half a brain."

And then she swung her sword in a large arc, sending a strong blast of wind in the girl's direction, relishing the feel of power surging through her arm as she did this. This type of blast was easy to perform for Stella, who was aided by the fact that her sword could be used to direct the wind in a much cleaner, precise way, than if she were performing air blasts via her limbs or mouth; it was perfectly deadly, a combination most children of air gods would kill for.

Eliza could hear the whistling in the wind as it was directed towards he, blasting her back a few feet as she managed to use her mace to deflect some of the wind away from her face. Once the wind had died down she looked over at her. "I think I already know about you. Stella, child of wind. Demititan. A legend in camp, or, somewhat of one" she tapped her mace on the ground, allowing the poison in the handle to flow through the veins and into the head of the mace. Now she has the poison, next, she needed to balance the playing field. She knew a demititan was powerful, and with wind she could be blown away easily. What did she have...what did she haw...sonics. It was a risk but if she had to, a banshee call would be enough.

Lifting her mace easily with her right hand she pulled out a large axe with her left. Of course the axe belonged to Charlotte, but Eliza didn't give a damn about it as she wielded the axe with as much precision as her mace was powerful. She grinned, and swung her mace downward towards Stella, before following up with the blade of her large celestial bronze axe.

So she did have a brain -- good, good. Another reason not to kill her, although the next few minutes could certainly diminish any desire Stella had to spare her.

"Congratulations," she said dryly, "you do have a brain. That's nice. Let's see if it's still inside your skull when we're done here, eh?"

Now the girl had pulled out an ax in addition to her mace, which she had tapped on the ground only seconds ago like she was mocking what Stella had done before at the beginning of this poor excuse for a fight. This was certainly irritating; she didn't really have a second weapon, although she guessed that her wind powers would be sufficient enough to knock the girl around and maybe strike her against a wall or car and render her unconscious. Then she'd certainly be at Stella's mercy, just the way she liked it.

As those thoughts completed themselves, the girl struck at her with both weapons, the mace going down at her head first and then the ax following for a side-blow. Unfortunate, unfortunate -- so Stella first jumped back (more like leaned far back, honestly) to avoid the mace before it could make contact, regarding her head as a bit more important than her arm, and then disappeared in a gust of wind as soon as she felt the axe cut into her shirt sleeve.

After several seconds, in another gust of wind Stella had reappeared several yards behind her opponent, standing on a car roof with her sword down and free hand on one hip. Her arm had barely been grazed by the ax -- a small cut, nothing a bit of ambrosia couldn't heal. She smiled widely, amused at the sheer audacity the girl had to try such a trick; she wouldn't let it happen again, of course, but Stella liked a bit of a challenge. It was a pity now, though -- the poor fool either had to die now or be forced to have Stella haunt her for the rest of her time in camp. She was talented, the demititan could admit it, but that talent wouldn't be enough to save her now.

"Nice try," she called to her, "but no dice, friend. Try again?"

Instead of waiting for a reply, Stella sent a second strong arc of wind at her, aiming to knock one of her weapons far away or, at least, knock her onto her face to taste the delicious road. A distanced approach would suffice for now -- axes and maces weren't exactly long range weapons.

Eliza had been momentarily shocked by the quick movement, realizing that Stella was more dangerous then she thought. She watched as a gust of wind was sent towards her, listening as the wind whistled and approached her. Eliza crossed her weapons in an Xover her chest, blocking the blow as much as she could, although she was forced back by the force of the blow.

This certainly was going to be tough, but she knew it was only like a game of poker, you had to know how to play your cards, when to hold, when to bet. "I don't think I'll try that again, your powers certainly give you the advantage" she grinned and opened her mouth, shrieking at her with her sharp banshee cry.

She shrieked for only half a second, but in that half second the sound traveled 543.5. Feet, easily knocking into her with the sound equivalent of a shotgun being fired besides your ear. She did have the recoil though, for that half second of sharp sonics now she was dead for thirty seconds.

And before Stella knew it, the girl had shrieked -- but not like anything she had ever heard before. It sounded much higher-pitched and ten times louder than a regular scream, leaving her ears ringing, her hearing muffled probably only for a short time.

Damn. Stella shook her head, disoriented and confused for the moment -- but that was okay. She still could see where the girl was, could still feel the wind around her and coming from her as she moved to know where she was, and that was all that mattered.

Giggling softly, she balanced unsteadily on the car for a brief moment before disappearing, reappearing on the roof of one of the houses behind the girl, one which was at least thirty feet away from her. She stood tapping the side of her head, waiting for the hearing to come back, but until then, she still had a few things she could do. With her free hand, the one holding her sword, Stella made a sort of spinning motion, twirling the tip over the ground.

As if by magic (ha. ha.), something at the end of the street began to materialize, the wind picking up speed and collecting there with a sharp whoosh, spinning and furious -- until a small tornado, about as large as a pickup truck, had appeared in the street, majestically standing there for a brief moment until, with a swing of her sword, Stella sent it rushing at the girl.

"Feel confident that you can still win?" she called to her, grinning as she watched her creation shaking cars furiously, throwing up trash and dust and flinging it everywhere on its mad rush to get to the girl. Stella's own voice sounded muffled to her, but her disorientation was fading, to be replaced by a slight feeling of a migraine coming on or such. But she shook it off, and as her tornado raged in the street she waved her sword in the air, forming a small dark storm cloud above the neighborhood.

This fool wouldn't win -- demititans didn't lose.

Eliza stared, her eyes looking into the center of the storm as she backed up slowly, looking around to take in her surroundings. Once again she called for andrias help, and at once her better side gave her several options, of course Eliza chose the craziest one. Still deaf slightly from her screech she tucked her axe back into her back and gripped her mace, running TOWARDS the cyclone. She dug her sneakers into the pavement with each step as she advanced into the storm, feeling the air move in a circular movements. If this cyclone was as powerful as she thought, her hairbrained idea might actually work. Once she was close enough, she jumped into the tornado, allowing the winds to circle her around and build momentum up, until the vortex flung her outward, and up towards Stella as she grunted, slamming into the roof next to her, rolling and standing. She had sustained bruises, no one could make a move like that unscathed anyways. Her lip bled slowly, red dripping down her chin as her hearing fully returned, once more listening for the little changes in the air that she knew Stella had control over.

As soon as Stella figured out what the girl was doing as she watched her run at the tornado from her rooftop position, as soon as the girl flung herself in her direction using her tornado's momentum and landed on the roof, she moved back -- thanks to her demigod reflexes -- and jumped to the next rooftop, using the air to propel herself farther and allowing her to land softly on her feet, turning back to face her opponent.

"Beautifully done. Congratulations. Perhaps I should leave you to beat yourself up, hm?" With a wave of her sword the tornado disappeared, leaving Stella alone with her new friend on that rooftop. Zeus knows what the people inside the houses were thinking -- some freak storm that the Weather Channel had failed to predict, perhaps?

With Stella around, though, of course it would be a freak storm.

Her hearing was still muffled, but now she wasn't so disoriented, could concentrate and maintain her powers better. Now the dark storm cloud was crackling as if with thunder and lightning, and a second was forming itself twenty to thirty feet over the girl's head, dark as the second but larger, stretching to encompass the size of the roof and part of Stella's new perch, only stopping ten feet from her.

"Of course," the demititan continued, "it's been fun playing here with you, but now you're getting a bit boring. Let's see how much longer you'll last, hm?"

With a new wave of her sword and a surge of power, suddenly large pieces of hail began to fall from the larger cloud, the size of quarters at first, then approaching the size of half-dollars -- but it would build in size if Stella maintained it longer. A second wave caused her smaller cloud to approach, not quite touching its brother as it crackled, waiting to be unleashed and shock the girl to death. Stella's sword felt heavier now, and she could feel the migraine growing stronger in her head, but that was fine -- it was just that she hadn't used her powers in so long.

Eliza knew she wouldn't win, but she wasn't done fighting either. The powers were outmatched, hell, the whole match was a loss but Eliza still had some strength left as she brought out the axe once more, using the flat of the large blade to deflect some of the hail like a sort of umbrella. Of course she couldn't stay like this forever and ran, letting some hail smack into her, leaving bruises as she grunted, lifting up and swinging her mace at her, the head of the mace filled with a poison as she swung it at her, from the left, and then the axe straight downward almost three seconds afterwards.

She could screech, she still had a few minutes left before she was maxed out, but she wanted to do as much as she could with her own skill first, she did not want to be deaf in this fight, her advanced hearing of the winds barely allowed her some foresite on Stella's movements.

As the girl came at her again with that stupid ax and mace combination, Stella just hopped to the side to avoid the mace a bit longer and disappeared in another gust of wind just as she felt the ax touch her hair, cut in to her forehead a bit maybe. Would it kill her to be mix things up a bit? This really was becoming boring.

She reappeared on the next roof over, tutting to herself as she forced the hail cloud towards her, following her opponent across the rooftops -- the hail now remained the size of half-dollars, but Stella noticed a few stray pieces of hail were flying and hitting cars, landing in gutters and just making a general ruckus. And then a piece flew and -- a car's window broke. Even with her still-muffled hearing, Stella could hear the car alarms go off shrieking, prompting her to glance back at her opponent and sigh.

"Well, it looks like we should finish up here or whatever. The mortals will call the cops, try shooting at us maybe -- and I don't think you can block bullets." She shrugged, as if this were a perfectly normal occurrence -- and, thinking about it, she did remember a few occurrences when she did have the cops called on her. Stella was always able to run off and disappear before they could find her, but it was always such a drag. Stupid mortals, ruining her fun.

With a wave of her free hand, the other storm cloud moved in, but the crackling was louder now, and one could see the faint surge of lightning still trapped inside the cloud, waiting to be let out. And so, Stella let it go once -- one strike of lightning shot out from the cloud at the girl, crackling and buzzing in the air as the hail stopped now.

"I'll take my chances." She replied and smirked at her, although the sudden shot of lightning forced her to jump back and to rethink her strategy. Obviously her shorter and closer attacks, the mace and the ace weren't working so well, but surely she could pull her last two cards. In her arsenal of long range attacks that was. She tucked the axe away and pulled a high heel from her bag, it was andrias, somce neither Eliza or Charlotte would wear one, but it also served another purpose. At the thought the show became a throwing knife and she threw it at the gir, followed by a short screech, propelling the blade faster, but also having a wide range of effect with a sharp point. If she did dodge the knife, traveling at almost the speed of sound because of her screech, the loud sound of the screech itself could disorient her, maybe a little.

OOC: short, sorry! ;(

That stupid screech again -- it left Stella's ears ringing and put her right back to the original muffled state her hearing had been in before. And now, again, she felt very annoyed, but that was no matter. With the blink of an eye, she had forced a strong gust of wind from her right side to knock the flying knife to the left, making it clatter and skid when it landed on the rooftop to her free hand's side.

And again, the demititan found herself blinking and slightly confused, slowly trying to recall everything she had been thinking about moments before above the ringing of her ears. Stupid, stupid, stupid -- she'd make sure to shut her up.

Then her eyes locked onto the girl's figure in the darkness, and the corners of her mouth lifted in a smile. She'd try that screech again for as long as she could last, perhaps, but if she was stuck using long-range attacks to try defeating the demititan who could control wind, for Pete's sake, she was probably becoming desperate. That was fine. This was normally the point Stella's opponents began to grasp at straws.

With a wave of her hand, she forced her cloud to strike at the girl with two shots of lightning, one directly at her and one a bit further from her to the side where Stella was facing, to warn her away from attempting to come any closer to her. She'd fry her soon, no doubt; her bolts were weaker than regular lightning, not enough to kill in one strike like she would have preferred, but it would do the job to disorient or even knock her out with one or two well-placed shots.

[ooc: Speed of sound sounds a bit excessive, even for a demigod with sound-related powers?]

OOC; my apologies

BIC: Ace grunted as she was hit, falling back and stumbling to the roof. She still could screech, she still had the other heel/knife, as well as her axe and mace but she knew when she was beat. She wasn't dumb enough to go on and get herself killed, even if she want the smartest knife in the drawer, she still knew common sense.

"Alright, I submit, you win" she put her mace back away, the form collapsing as she slipped it into her pocket. Inside of her mind andria and Charlotte were both relieved, relaxing as they knew Eliza wouldn't be killing all three of them today as she approached Stella slowly, limping lightly in her left leg, a result from one of te large chunks of hail that had slammed into her during the fight.

OOC: so should we do the plan where she meets the other two personalities and works the puzzle together?

[ooc: Yeah, sure, that sounds fun. Where should they meet up again, though?]

Stella watched the girl approach her warily, sword still out and cloud still ready to shock the hell out of her if she tried anything funny. Common sense had prevailed, apparently, when the girl had finally submitted and put away her mace, but she still had her screech power to use and Stella was going to have none of that right now. With a wave of her finger, the cloud approached and hung overhead the demititan's opponent, the crackling softer but still there. In the distance, through her muffled hearing, she thought she could hear a door creaking open -- felt it, even.

"And what do you want now?" she asked her abruptly, raising her sword slightly to emphasize Keep away from me, and maybe you won't lose a limb. What kind of sane person would approach the opponent who almost fried them to death twice? Oh wait. A wannabe-tough-guy would. She almost snorted out loud, but caught herself at the last minute as she glared down the brunette opposite her, waiting for her response. "Do you want a trophy for not dying or something?"

OOC; andria? She's a popular girl, so common area. Charlotte? Shy, so the library, her cabin, mess hall maybe

BIC: She chuckled "no, I'll get you back in time" she replied and turned around, jumping onto a fire escape and then climbing down it, touching the asphalt and beginning her run, on the way back to the main New York streets to grab a cab.

OOC: I know it's short

With a wave of her hand, Stella had made her cloud dissipate, not even bothering to watch the girl run off into the distance. Whatever. If she couldn't win this time, she wouldn't win the next -- anybody who sought revenge against her always lost, no matter how hard they tried to train or gather friends to help.

She could hear now, through her muffled hearing, a woman exasperatedly talking to someone -- and judging by the inaudible responses, Stella could tell she was on a phone. With the cops? Maybe.

So, she disappeared in a gust of wind, headed back to camp.

[ooc: That sounds fine. Do you want to post first, or should I?]

OOC: well which personality first?

ooc: I did a coin flip and got Andria.

OOC: you start then