Deadpool Syndrome - Marvel's Folly

Chapter 20 - Where The Moonlit Water Falls

***GWEN***

The boys take on their own cluster of Dark Elves, and I wind up fighting alongside Ricky and Sierra. Their styles are noticeably different from those any of the three Spideys, mostly because they use completely different weapons in battle. Sierra should never be allowed to fall into the hands of our enemies, not with her fearsome sword skills. As for Ricky, he's (as usual) goofy as all get-out, and it's clear he hasn't logged too many hours with the shield. But while he's not so good at turning it into a lethal, Captain America-style Frisbee, he's very good when it comes to physically putting his shield right in the Elves' faces.

Still, he's no match for Sierra's awesomeness levels. When I land a webline smack in the middle of an Elf's stomach, she says, "Give me that line! I have an idea!" I detach the line from my webshooter, then she runs up and grabs it from me with her free hand. Turning on her heel, she runs off, past that Elf, wrapping the webline around his midsection even as it claws at it, trying to tear itself free. Along the way, she holds her sword out at the exact right height to slice through no less than four Elf necks in her path. Once my earlier target is totally wrapped up, Sierra grabs her sword with both hands and swings it, tennis-racket-like, before plunging it into the Elf's chest. The sword punctures it, coming right out between its shoulder blades - but with no blood, because it's one of the cyber ones. She raises her leg to deliver a powerful kick, sending the Elf careering backwards as it slides off the blade. It spins around and falls close to my feet, and my reaction is to kick it again. When my toes connect with the underside of its chin, the head detaches with the sound of cheap metal robo-joints snapping. These phony Ultron drones have come a long way since Ultron himself first used them - a long way into the world of shoddy engineering.

Sierra watches the cyber-Elf's head soar into the air and crash into another incoming target. "Not bad, Spider-Gwen," she laughs.

"Likewise, Wonder Woman," I say.

"Haha, I'm not that awesome."

"Looking at the way you fight," I say, "she's gotta be your spirit animal."

We move on to another fighting zone, this one occupied by Kamala as she uses a similar tactic to the one Sierra and I just employed, though a one-woman version. She stretches out her arm until it's thin as a wire and as long as a stretch limo, then wraps it around two Elves. She "embiggens" her fist - I think that's her favorite tactic - and crushes the Elves in her grasp. She discards these Elves, then sets her sights on another pair - but Sierra stops her.

"These two have some scary-looking staffs," she says. "Gwen?"

"On it." I snag their weapons at a distance and drag them this way. Kamala takes advantage of their surprise to use her "embiggen" trick. This time, she simply punches their lights out.

Sierra smiles at Kamala, then we leave her to her work. Next stop - Deadpool and Loki, who fight back to back. Loki's iced up one of Deadpool's katanas, allowing him to do some serious damage to the cyber-Elves in particular. They're doing just fine without us, but Sierra still has a chance to stop one Elf who's about to get the drop on them. Not on her watch. In the process, though, she accidentally gets in range of Deadpool's blade, and he cuts the back of her hand. Not lethally, I'm thinking, though the wound does look deep.

Still, she powers through her injury, and does that tennis-serve thing again when she cuts through the Elf. This Elf (a flesh-and-blood one) proves to be one of the last we have to destroy. I look around and see Kamala taking out two more with her fists, Videl and Jack beating up two of their own, and Pietro using his speed to distract and disorient another one while Harry swoops in with his glider. The Elf ducks the wrong way and falls over the edge of the Bifrost, the dull creature.