Heroes: The Rise of Omnicorp

[Cynical Cat]

"Stay available or go very far away," said Blackheart. "Your choice on how you play it." With that he headed through the front door. "Honey, I'm home. Miss me?"

[rhoenix]

"Stay available or go very far away," said Blackheart. "Your choice on how you play it." With that he headed through the front door. "Honey, I'm home. Miss me?"

By now, Alexander's reserves of pissed-off-ness had more or less been depleted, and he was no longer really interested in taking a walk. This currently-developing situation looked far more interesting, in the same way that the "situation" of Hiroshima at the end of World War 2 was "interesting."

He followed Blackheart back to the house, walking directly in the front door as he reached it.

[Cynical Cat]

"No answer and no waves of turbulent emotions. I'm going to guess that Argent is gone. She bother to take her phone? Shall we find out? Lets. First things first. Big meeting. Living room. Now." He pulled out his cell and phoned Argent.

[General Havoc]

"Your absence was indeed noted, I believe," said Hydro deadpan with admirable restraint as Blackheart walked in moments after Argent had vanished into thin... darkness. He was shaking like a pond in an earthquake, swelling and subsiding as the liquid that comprised his body surged left and right and only with difficulty came back down under control. "Moreover, I am afraid I do not know where to procure Apisetic Fructo-Glucose composite."

He showed no inclination to explain what the hell he was talking about.

"For..." he stammered a bit, still obviously struggling to retain control of his own constituent water, "forgive... me... I have... there is something... drastically wrong." Far more concise than he normally would have been, he quickly excused himself and slithered back out of the building towards the 'swimming pool', where he could collapse safely without dispersing.

... or rather that was the plan until Blackheart called for a big meeting.

"Erm... apologies..." he stammered, "I do not... there is something amiss... I am... I am uncertain if..." he seemed nearly unable to produce the appropriate words. "I am at... some risk of dissolution... I fear..."

[Cynical Cat]

Blackheart turned away from the phone. "Then stay where you are. Is there anything we can do to help?"

[General Havoc]

"I do... I do not..." Hydro stopped speaking for a moment and forced his turbulent waters back under control. After half a minute or so, they finally began to subside, and when he resumed talking, it was with a somewhat more normal tone.

"I... have experienced certain... 'disruptions' to my capacity for control of my constituent dihydrogen monoxide," he explained, "they began shortly after I was liberated and began accompanying you flesh beasts. Generally they have been sufficiently minor that I thought them a valid subject of reflection and study... but... today... they have been most... powerful..." he shuddered again as his tendril quivered before stabilizing, "and of uncertain magnitudes. I do... I do not know their cause, nor what they portend, and while they seem to be subsiding for now... I am... concerned... as to what they may augur for the immediate future..."

[LadyTevar]

When it seemed the phone was about to go to voicemail and be ignored completely, Argent answered with a torrent of Chinese that sounded far too calm and happy to be anything but a flood of insults.

[Cynical Cat]

"You can spend your life running or you can do something with it that will save thousands of lives while spending it with Tachyon or whoever you wish," said Blackheart. "Your choice. Don't fuck yourself over because you're pissed at me."

[LadyTevar]

Tachyon. Argent closed her eyes and gripped the phone tightly. It had taken so long to answer because she had needed to assume human just to reach the damned thing. Her eyes opened again, and she looked out of the alleyway, across the Chinatown street to a small TaiChi dojo that took up the first floor of a three-story building.

"Or I could come back and let you kill me, like you've been threatening," she answered absently, her vision fixed on the large front window, where several young children were practicing very familiar katas.

[Cynical Cat]

"People died. You imposed your will on me in a combat situation and people died. I might have been able to save them. Did you expect me not to be angry. That those lives would be meaningless to me? That your violation of the agreements that kept you out of jail had not consequences. That you could do it again and again and nothing would happen to you, no matter what happened?

"I'm an asshole. I won't deny it. Picking me for this job is a sick joke. And you've set my trust on fire and that hurts. I went to the mat for you and you did it again. No, I'm not happy with you and I think you're holding back on me.

"But if you don't help us, more people will die. Tachyon might die. Do you want to watch the news and see them pull children out of the rubble and wonder if they would still be alive if you had been there? I don't think you do.

"I could have picked better words to express my anger, my concerns, my disappointment, my resolve to do what needs to be done. But if you think Blast or Tachyon or Hotfoot will allow me to murder you in cold blood, your empathic powers need work. Its going to be a while before I trust you again. What happened happened. But people are still dying out there and they won't wait for that trust to heal."

[LadyTevar]

It was probably as close to an apology as she was likely to get out of him.

Inside the dojo, the children moved on to the next kata as Argent watched, looking for the dojo's master ... or the mistress of the house. *That* would be better. Far more satisfying if -SHE- came into view.

But ... there were still the children there.

Do you want to watch the news and see them pull children out of the rubble and wonder if they would still be alive if you had been there? I don't think you do.

Her eyes, black orbs without white or pupil, closed again and she turned away, deeper into the alley. "On my way...." was all she said before snapping the cellphone shut. A moment later, the alley was empty save for the natural shadows within.


***
The time between her disconnect and her reappearance was short. Still in dragonform she crept out of a shadow and coiled onto the couch, her head lying along the back of it as she met Blackheart's gaze. "I'm here."

[Cynical Cat]

"We have a mission and far too much shit getting in the way," said Blackheart. "My fault. I'm the leader, I let us get off course. We're going to fix it. Now."

[LadyTevar]

Argent's eyes half-hood as she thinks a moment before she speaks. With a deep sigh the draconic head lifts from the couch. This was either going to get her in a LOT of trouble, or Blackheart would take it as an apology/confession and move on. He never did what her empathy said he was feeling: in that way he was as confusing as Tachyon.

"You ... were right," she admitted slowly. "I had left something out." Her silvery eyes never moved from Blackheart as she spoke. "Over the last week, it slipped my mind with all the other things going on." whether he believes me or not, it's his problem

[Cynical Cat]

"Water under the bridge," said Blackheart. I hate this shit. Why did this fucking have to come to me? No part of me is any good at it. But I can't let go of the responsibility, not until someone better comes along. "What is it?"

[LadyTevar]

He was restraining himself. Argent gave him a slight nod to let him know she knew he was being generous to her. "As I was leaving Ghost's house... someone was coming in," she said. "I was in the kitchen with Ghost, so I never saw who it was. Ghost urged me to vanish, and I started to teleport." Now came the rough part.

"As I was vanishing, Ghost headed out of the kitchen, and started talking to the intruder, and I thought I heard a name," she continued, her tail starting to twitch on the floor. "I thought I heard him say 'Garth'.... but I can't be sure." Another heavy sigh, her eyes closing in relief as she gets the tale out.

"That's why I didn't tell you," she finished. "Now, I can't even be sure he said that. It could have been Gar-ret, or Gar-vin, or even the start of some codeword." And you were already sure Ghost had killed Gazer

[Cynical Cat]

"So Ghost, the maybe killer of Gazer, might be hanging out with known escaped killer and virulently anti-meta Garth Saibot. And to think I was considering asking Ghost a few questions unrelated to him being a murderer." He tapped his fingers on the arm of the chair. "Thoughts? Suggestions? Extremely detailed plans of action?"

[LadyTevar]

The draconic head slapped down on the couch in exasperation. This is why I didn't want to mention it.... "First... it didn't feel like Garth," Li Na sighed. "It didn't feel like anyone I knew. It was someone -Ghost- knew, I could tell that before I vanished."

Li Na slumped further. "Hell.... I'm not even sure Garth survived..." she admitted softly.

[General Havoc]

Hydro was, with difficulty, following all this.

"Pardon the interruption," he said, "and forgive me if this is an inopportune moment, but... who is Ghost? And who is Garth Saibot?"

[frigidmagi]

Blast stumbled into the living room.

"What I miss?"

[rhoenix]

Alexander walked to the recliner, picked up his laptop, and sat down with his cane next to him. He placed it in his case next to the chair, just to avoid the potential for accidently sitting on an expensive piece of hardware. Once he was comfortable and felt satisfied about his laptop, he spoke up after adjusting the bottom of his sweatpants.

"I agree with Hydro - may we get the whole story from the beginning, for us newer folk?"

[LadyTevar]

Li Na's head raised again, looking from Hydro, to Alexander, and then to Blackheart. With a sigh she looked away. "Garth Tobias, codename: Saibot, was a member of Mirage team ... and my lover for several months," she explained quietly. "He and ... Legacies ... were partners of old, before they joined Ultima."

"He was worse than I am at following orders, had strong opinions on what was right and wrong, and hated nearly all meta because they'd killed his first wife, and then his first team." She was not going to sugarcoat things, but she wasn't going to tell them who that 'first team' happened to be. "He cared for me deeply, was jealous of Blackheart, and was trying far too hard to be the hero once again." Her eyes weren't on the present now, but on the past. "On the last mission, he went off by himself after yet another verbal fight with Blackheart. Somewhere in the sewers, he got jumped and captured..."

She had to pause there, mentally pausing in front of the huge hole in her mind, the open black pit where the link to Garth once hung. "... it severed the empathic link I had to him. When Hotfoot, Blast and I found him again, he attacked us." She looked to Alexander especially at this point. "I know you've seen the scar on my stomach." And since she'd worn her bikini quite a few times over the last week, everyone had had a chance to see it. A strip of pale skin a different color from the rest of her body, running straight from her breastbone to vanish at the top of her bikini bottom.

"Whatever tortures were done to him when he vanished, he believed Blackheart and I were behind them. So, he tried to kill me, and then Blackheart. He smashed a section of city street on top of Gravitas, which killed everyone on that street and in the tunnels and sewers below." Flatly recited, as Li Na tried to keep her emotions inside. She'd caused enough trouble already today, yet a feeling of sorrow still tinged the air. Not sadness per se, but a feeling that something with so much promise had been cut short.

"He was caught, tried, and sentenced to life imprisonment on The Satellite," she said, continuing the story and refering to the massive prison in permanent orbit where Ultima and others kept the worst meta-human convicts. "The shuttle that was delivering him there exploded over a week ago." Her head turned, her eyes meeting Blackheart's. "I think Blackheart agrees with me ... Garth isn't dead. I think he wasn't on that shuttle, because he'd made a deal with some agency."

She broke eye contact, her head lowering mournfully. "But ... I can't Feel him. There's just a big hole where the empathic link was ... a dark pool with no bottom and no reflections, just blackness." Another pause, as Li Na's mental self turned to where Legacies had been inside her, which was gone as if it had never been, same as with Ember. "....... Death doesn't do that ....... Death makes it vanish ....." she trailed off with true sadness.

[B4UTRUST]

Vegas:

"Smile for the camera" came the cry as a young twenty-something store clerk working in the camera shop. The large 35mm black stainless steel Nikon camera smashed into the face of the middle-aged japanese woman as her husband looked on, incapacitated from similar blows. The telephoto lense, used as a makeshift handle, was already bending near the screw-on connection point, and the attachable 'Brite-eye' LED flash was a hollow hole now, the bulbs and glass long since broken.

Behind the scene of violence, the store was trashed. Displays had been knocked over and high-end equipment destroyed. Cameras lay in pieces, carrying bags were torn to shreds, rolls of film awaiting development had been pulled free and strewn wildly across the sales floor. And then the sales clerk dropped unconcious like the others.

Outside a fire hydrant erupted as a pick-up truck drove over it, throwing hundreds of gallons of high-pressure water into the underside and through the truck, causing it to rain down on the city streets. The driver was dead as he had been thrown through the windshield and into the middle of oncoming traffic.

The line of disasters was growing rapidly as more car crashes, store robberies, assaults and acts of vandalism continued down the main strip, making their way to the casinos.

[Dark Silver]

Saibot flew on, his Ring scanning for the distinctive energy signiture he picked up at the scene of the pile-up, the kind of energy signiture which indicated psychic phenomenon, meaning someone was being very naughty.

The further up the Strip he traveled, the worse it got, and always he was just a little bit behind, the damage already done, the people already dead. He stopped to help those he could, using the Ring's power to get those who weren't to injured but still passed out.

He had just arrived when the truck plowed through the fire hydrant, killing the driver, and sending water everywhere. He went to work, a hard light Hand pushing the truck off the hydrant, as a beam worked to seal off the outpouring of water by melting the cement and metal into a temporary plug.

Moving on, he continued to follow the accidents, ultimately he would have to stop rescuing people....the chaos was outpacing him even now...

"Ghost," he called on the Comm channel, "We got problems....it's like people are going nut sall the way up the Strip. The Ring's picking up remnants of psychic energy all the way up it. Finish up at the accident scene, and catch up with me."

The good news was, the blips of energy was growing stronger, meaning he was at least catching up.....and as such, he ignored the cries of those hurt, as much as it pained him, and flew on.

"I'm sorry..." he whispered, at having to leave them there, "I'll come back when this is over.."

He sped on, getting ahead of the chaos, and then erecting a wall of Hard Light from his Ring. It wouldn't block the jumps, but the Wall would stop anymore cars or people from crossing over.

[Agent Fisher]

Ghost had finished at the original scene and was hlping with another accident when he got the call. He focused and was quickly airborne, speeding above the street, following the chaos, death and destruction. Up ahead of him he could see a large wall of blue energy.

He looked down at the street as he out flew the dominoes of chaos. And slowed, stopping next to Saibot.

"What now, boss?" He asked, looking at the oncoming chain.

[Dark Silver]

"Behind me, set up another wall behind you like this," he said, through the comms, switching it to sub vocal with a flick of his eyes. He didn't want whoever it was doing this to listen in.

"Keep a eye out, if the chaos jumps behind out walls, we have to find the source."