Mutants & Masterminds Mutants & Masterminds: The Unlikely Prophets - Issue #2: The Man Who Built Yesterday

[CyCo]

Originally Posted By: Armor Dude

Kenshin reached into his pocket and held the little pocket knife and looked at Cyco. They stood over the hole and stared into the darkness that had swallowed the last of the flashlights. "Perhaps one of the others, maybe the lady of darkness, perhaps they can figure out how to determine what this is and what is down below.

Kenshin pulled the knife out and looked at it. "You are far faster than I, you should go and see if they will come. I'll wait here."

Cyco nodded, "Okie Dokie."

And then she was gone, racing back to Assjack's house and appearing in front of Gloomy Gus with a torrent of swirling vortex's behind her.

"Me and Kenny need your help."

It had been more than enough time for her to deliver the money, but based on her shaggy, mud-clad appearance, that hadn't been what she was doing.

[The Scarlet Samurai]

Cyco was gone in a flash of muddy red. Kenshin pulled the knife that wasn't out of his pocket. The knife twisted and grew into a long katana, its hilt and scabbard blood red, shiny as though they were wet with fresh blood. He held the sword out over the hole, "Give me one good reason not to drop you," Kenshin spoke aloud, unsure if he would get a reply or not, unsure if he cared. The demon blade was a burden that he could do without, perhaps it would be better to be free of the bloodthirsty weapon?

[SalmonMax]

Larissa gave Sharatur a sympathetic smile.

"I can keep working on refining some kind of technique to try to work out what the magic on it does. There's got to be some way to find out that doesn't involve prying into its past. But that'll take time, I think...weeks, or maybe months."

She looks at Necronaut, and the others in the room.

"I think we should work out when and where to meet again...assuming we all want to. I know I do."

[Charlotte]

"The signal system we set up with Hikari should work out fine. I'll log on to FaceTweet or whatever the hell you use nowadays and when you see me online that's the signal for 'come here.' I can't see it being tough to track it if it's publically viewable. If there's an emergency we'll exchange phone numbers."

At the arrival of Cyco, Jack arched an eyebrow, reflexively steadying the beer he'd been nursing, lest it be spilt and tragically wasted. "You find something?"

[Necronaut]

"Don't worry about it too much Miss D. Larissa probably has the right of it anyway and nothing will come of it. I'd still like to get a closer look at its nether form. I mean there's obviously something out there." He hefts the crystal and tilts his head for the door. "If there are no objections."

...and, indeed, if there are not he will go do just that.

[z-Gloom]

Originally Posted By: Bodhie Armstrong

“Hey – are you ok?”, she asked her cursing herself for asking such a stupid question. These kind of situations weren’t her strong suit but she tried.

Gloom sat still, staring at nothing. In her mind, she was somewhere else, a world of darkness, a place that felt more real than this hard, bright place. In her mind, she saw the family that she'd left behind - offspring and mate and a wide territory with plenty to eat and drink, and places to rest. Darkness keened in Gloom's mind for all that had been lost, and the human was forced to ride along with it.

Originally Posted By: CyCo

And then she was gone, racing back to Assjack's house and appearing in front of Gloomy Gus with a torrent of swirling vortex's behind her.

"Me and Kenny need your help."

Only then did Gloom move, jerking back to herself as swirling winds slapped her in the face. She looked up at the woman in red and brilliantly said, "Huh?"

Cyco replied slowly, pronouncing each word carefully. "Me and Kenny need your help."

Blinking and out of sorts, the hybrid woman stood, looking at Cyco. "Alright," she grunted, her black eyes meeting Cyco's. "What for?"

[Charlotte]

Norman knew, right away, that this would be a tough one. It felt like he was trying to stuff an ocean into a drinking glass. He strained at the rock, trying to pull its nether-aura into being, until the vein in his forehead bulged.

It reminded him of the time he'd had to push his car through a thick Chicago winter snowdrift. How he'd pushed until his back hurt, one foot on the pedal, skidding on the ice, getting nowhere. That's what it felt like. There was no leverage, and whatever it was... it was too heavy. Heavier than anything he'd ever tried to pull back.

[Radiance]

Hiari armed with what she now new, and another lead sighed, resigning herself to the fact that she'd embarked on a course of action that would make her former life an impossibility to return to.

Knowing what she did now, she went and head and sent the signal to Larissa to arrange to come get her, so she could share what she knew. Delving any further alone would be far too risky.

Inwardly she sighed. Playing spy wasn't something she thought she'd be doing. She was actually more at peace with the other aspects of her powers.

[Bodhie Armstrong]

Gloom stirred but only after Cyco arrived and asked her to help out. Bodhie faked a smile and sighed. Now that went particularly well, Bodhie. Maybe there's a reason you only got one friend back home...

For the first time Bodhie felt misplaced. She watched Larissa and Norman forging plans and they were already investigating the next matter. The oversized woman stood up again and waited patiently for her que. She had no idea what was going on and this wasn't the kind of after lunch talk she'd expected. Maybe someone should've turned on the TV and watch the news?

Bodhie shrugged concluding her inner monologue and looked around trying to find a TV and if not that maybe a radio to tune into a news channel.

"Jack, you don't happen to have a TV or Radio around here? I'm curious what's going on out there.", her deep voice resonated through the old building drawing a bit of the attention back to her.

[Necronaut]

Norman ground his teeth as he meandered back to the house. "There's something huge attached to this rock out in the netherworld." He announced to Sharatur and Larissa "And I'm not sure huge works the same way it does there that it does here. I mean, I can twist an airplane out of the nether without breaking a sweat. It's like the crystal is a little nail in reality holding up a great big..." his brain and his mouth faltered at the same instant "...heavy thing, in the netherworld."

The reason his brain faltered? He caught sight of Bodhie standing back in the kitchen, and his brain was in a problem-solving sort of mood. A safe sort of mood, less so. He'd seen her lift a building with no difficulty...

"Hey, um, Miss, Misses, Mizz? Armstrong?" He cringed, not sure what title was appropriate. "What are your thoughts on meddling with matters beyond the kin of science and all mortal experience?" He recognized that his questionable flare for the dramatic tended to obfuscate his real intent, "I'm trying to to haul something ancient, mysterious and, most of all, heavy out of the land of the dead, and it's just possible that raw physical strength could be applied to this problem..."

[SalmonMax]

"I don't think you're using your muscles to pull on these things," Larissa says, "though I guess I really don't know. I guess it can't hurt to try...but these shadows you're bringing out...they don't have 'mass' or 'weight' in the same sense that normal things do."

Then she caught sight of the computer's screen and realized what she was seeing.

"Oh! Hikari's ready. Okay, I'm going to write on your door again, Jack. Sorry..."

She hurries off to make a link to bring Hikari back.

[CyCo]

Originally Posted By: Gloom

Only then did Gloom move, jerking back to herself as swirling winds slapped her in the face. She looked up at the woman in red and brilliantly said, "Huh?"

Cyco replied slowly, pronouncing each word carefully. "Me and Kenny need your help."

Blinking and out of sorts, the hybrid woman stood, looking at Cyco. "Alright," she grunted, her black eyes meeting Cyco's. "What for?"

Cyco ignored the blind, self-righteous prick, responding only by waving her pinky at him as she answered Gloom, "We found a really deep, dark hole. Seems right up your alley...ready?"

[Bodhie Armstrong]

Originally Posted By: Necronaut

"Hey, um, Miss, Misses, Mizz? Armstrong?" He cringed, not sure what title was appropriate. "What are your thoughts on meddling with matters beyond the kin of science and all mortal experience?" He recognized that his questionable flare for the dramatic tended to obfuscate his real intent, "I'm trying to to haul something ancient, mysterious and, most of all, heavy out of the land of the dead, and it's just possible that raw physical strength could be applied to this problem..."

Bodhie almost instantly perked up and smiled at Necronaut, “Bodhie, just Bodhie is ok.” and it would be Misses….

“Sure I can help – I mean – I’ve got no idea what you guys been doing and talking about, but if you think I can help I’ll do it.”, the impressively muscled woman said. She walked over to the group of ‘Mystics’ and placed her hands on her hips giving Norman another smile and a good look-over of her body. If he thought she was up to the task she wanted to present herself in the most advantageous way.

[z-Gloom]

Originally Posted By: CyCo

Cyco ignored the blind, self-righteous prick, responding only by waving her pinky at him as she answered Gloom, "We found a really deep, dark hole. Seems right up your alley...ready?"

Anything was better than suffering homesickness for a place she'd never been and likely couldn't survive. She stood up and nodded. "Sure, not like I'm doing anything else."

[Necronaut]

"Right, well, it's like this." He held up the crystal. "We have no idea what this thing is or how it works, just that it put a bunch of useful stiff in Miss De Vasch's head. It's attached to something in the netherworld, but whatever it is I can't wrench it out. I think you might have better luck, though as Larissa said, it may not be possible to translate physical strength into the, er, direction stuff needs to move to to cross the nether-gap. But this is how we learn. I think I'll need to be touching the crystal, so you can use me as a fulcrum."

His brain nudged him and he chuckled nervously.

"A little more elbow grease could make this work but first priority is not damaging the crystal. Second priority not damaging me, though I guess I could cope with a few bruises if it meant getting some worth while results. Distant third priority is actually yanking whatever's out there into the land of the living, since it could easily be more trouble than it's worth. Fourth priority is not looking silly while we try this, but I think that's a long shot."

[Bodhie Armstrong]

“Alllllright. Gotcha – So how is this going to work? You touch the crystal and I…?”, Bodhie tried to imagine how this was supposed to work.

“I have to pull you while you hold on to the crystal? I’m not sure if I won’t end up tearing you in two…”, her voice was really concerned about this issue. She didn’t want to hurt anyone and she still had no idea about the limits of her strength. She thought the mulcher would be a challenge and though it was heavy she felt she could push some more if she wanted.

“Maybe you can attune me to this thing somehow so I can pull it directly? If that’s even possible, I’m not a specialist, you know. Unlike you…”

[Necronaut]

"Oh, don't worry. I have no idea what I'm doing either." he glanced upward, considering that this was probably not as reassuring as he had hoped.

"Anyway, yeah, there are a couple things we can try here. I was thinking maybe you could use my forearm as a lever. I should be able to tell you to stop before my bones shatter. As long as we work slowly and carefully I think we can manage without causing me any permanent damage." Norman asserted this with the enthusiasm of someone happy to let his curiosity override his common sense, but who rarely had occasion to do so and was thus particularly excited at the prospect.

"Helping you move it in the right direction yourself would be ideal, but I'm not sure if this is something I can share or not. We'll see."

[IndyPendant]

On sheer impulse, Sharatur takes hold of the rock as well. "Tell me if you pull it out" she says, "whatever it is. I'm thinking it may get drawn back in. If you think some sort of connection to the crystal has been broken, tell me--and I'll teleport the thing away.

She shrugs at your looks and grins. "Hey, it's no better than the bullshit you've been spouting these last few minutes!"

[Bodhie Armstrong]

Bodhie raised an eyebrow curiously and somewhat irritated by Necronaut’s obvious joke. If he wasn’t the specialist in this matter who else?

“Are you sure you want me to use your arm as a lever? I’m sure you know when I should stop – I only hope I notice it fast enough. I’ve got no idea how strong I’ve become but just FYI – that mulcher wasn’t my limit – I still had some ‘room’ for more.”, she walked around to get behind him and a better look at the crystal.

“I’m ready if you are.”, the large female bodybuilder said leaning forward and practically reaching around him and grasping his right arm. “Like this?”

She didn’t apply any strength yet and waited for Necronaut’s go – then she would gently try to pull and apply more and more strength if necessary until they either managed to ‘pull’ whatever needed to be pulled or Necronaut said stop because she was about to break his arm. She didn’t hope for the latter, of course.

[Charlotte]

After some positioning and a few false starts, both Norman and Bodhie started 'pulling' again.

Norman ran into the same resistance, even with Bodhie's tremendous strength. Whatever was attached to the rock in the nethersphere, it wasn't something that could be yanked out with physical strength - as one could surmise by looking at Norman's slightly spindly arms. After a few minutes, it became clear that this was something Norman didn't have within him to pull off... yet.

[Necronaut]

"Bodhie, Miss D, I think we're done here. I really appreciate your help but like Larissa figured, the thing just won't budge."

He slumped for a moment, but then brightened up and declared, "However! The crystal is intact, my limbs are all still in their sockets and we've learned many valuable lessons about how physical kinetic energy relates to netherworldly matter. These can be summarized as 'mostly it doesn't'."

[Bodhie Armstrong]

“I’m sorry.”, Bodhie apologized knowing that it wasn’t really her fault but it still felt like she failed. She had tried to exert as much strength as possible given the kind of leverage and limits she had. She hoped it would suffice but it didn’t.

Norman’s positive outlook on things was refreshing and she had to chuckle even though she failed to help him.

“You always find a way to take things positively, don’t you?”, the large woman smiled at him. “So what do we do next?”, Bodhie asked crossing her mighty arms over her huge chest exposing her abs which looked more like armorplates than muscles.

[CyCo]

Originally Posted By: Gloom

She stood up and nodded. "Sure, not like I'm doing anything else."

"Awesome!" Cyco lit up, "Just in case I would rip your arms off, let's do this piggy-back. You don't look too heavy."

Cyco turned and offered her back to Gloom, who, after a quizzical look and opening her mouth to say something, instead just stopped, shook her head and awkwardly climbed onto the dirty girl.

"We'd be great in a chicken fight...you ready?"

"Yeah."

Jogging at first, Cyco slowly picked up speed until she could feel Gloom pulling harder on her body, trying to stay on. It wasn't all that fast relatively speaking, and it was no cake walk with a person on her back, but Cyan had them back at the top of Ayer's Rock in short time. Gloom wasted no time in prying herself away from the speedster.

[SalmonMax]

As she waited for Hikari to come back through the door, Larissa looked over at the others in the room and called, "So we're going to check out this building she was told to erase, or are we calling it a day for now or..." she looked at Gloom and Cyco quizzically as they went speeding off. "...I don't even know what to say to that."

[Charlotte]

"We'll wait and see what she's got to say. If there's no rush, then there's no rush. If there is, well... we'll take our fortune as it comes." Jack drained the last of his beer.

[z-Gloom]

Gloom shuddered as her body adjusted to being back at normal speeds. Note to self. Learn to shadow-port to places I've never been before, so that I never have to do that again. "Alright," she said after a moment, when she felt more normal. "Where's your hole?"

Cyco gave her an arch, amused look, then pointed it out to her. Gloom peered into it, wondering if this was really worth all this effort. It was something more to do than moping or watching people mess with a rock, so she called upon Darkness, transformed herself into half-shadow, and began to work her way down into the hole.

[CyCo]

Cyco looked at the disappearing shadow-girl.

"Now that's just not right."

[Radiance]

Hikari stepped through the door grabbed a beer and sighed.

"Yeah, it's that bad."

She took a seat and told the rather boring tale of her first forray into espionage. " Apparently the building was owned by the Order and is lent out to no one. Its exterior was maintained, its interior is empty. It doesn't have running water or electricity, which struck Steven as odd because he swore he'd seen lights on the top few floors a couple of times. Apparently it was going to be demolished because something that they'd been working on for forever was coming to a close. When I asked which 'they' Steven meant, he clammed up."

She took a pull from the beer and continued. "He left the room and I found a sticky note about "Double-checking with Fitzgerald about Cardinal," and a flip through Klein's Rolodex gave me a phone number for this Mister Fitzgerald."

"I went to the libray next, Newspapers came back nothing, until I found an article announcing a funeral for a man named Marcus Gold, who had been a local jeweler and his business, at one time, owned the Cardinal building."

"I checked the number for Fitgerald using a payphone, and that's why I'm nervous, It belonged to the Seattle branch of Argus, the Order's intelligence service."

[Bodhie Armstrong]

Bodhie frowned as she felt herself being dragged into some kind of mystery crime plot-thing. "I'm not really sure what to make out of this. The Order is obviously hiding something...", she looked at her peers and felt somewhat misplaced. These people were smarter and less physical than her and theorizing with them about their options and next step made her feel... dumb. She suddenly got very quiet and resumed her slightly 'defensive stance' deciding to wait for someone to make a call.

[Charlotte]

Gloom slid steadily down the hole, clinging to the sides where she could - which wasn't often, because the hole was incredibly smooth, and almost certainly carved with a machine, if not some kind of super-power. But in this form she was difficult to injure physically, so she didn't worry.

In the darkness she could see clear as day, as if a different set of eyes was taking over. So she could spot the slight glow, easily, since it was where the Darkness's eyes couldn't go, but hers could.

She touched bottom. The bottom of the shaft was covered in fine dust, blown here by the elements. Half-buried were the most recent additions, a rock and a flashlight, the light still glowing.

Gloom looked up. The top of the shaft was a pinhole of light.

Digging through the dust, she touched bottom. The floor was curved, as if something very smooth had simply scooped up a chunk of Ayers Rock and pulled it straight out. There was no evidence of whatever it was, however.

* * *

"Argus, you say." Jack leaned back, steepling his fingers, thinking.

"They don't get called in for central heating installation, obviously. They're up to something. Something they want to keep quiet. Marcus Gold... jewelers aren't poor but they don't often own entire high-rise buildings, so whoever he was, he might have been hiding something too. Something Argus has been after for ages. Hmm. I wonder."

[The Scarlet Samurai]

Kenshin stumbled back as Cyco returned with Gloom. The sword merely laughed in his mind. In a fit of rage he threw it away, laterally it spun through the air and until it landed a dozen or so yards away.

[Necronaut]

"Well, it is quite a mystery. Fortunately we've got a pretty straight-forward way to approach it. Sneaking around and looking at stuff seems well within the abilities of our little band of rebels."

He stuck out his tongue briefly. Words like 'rebel' had been stamped with some pretty negative connotations. But it was the word to use.

"And, really, how complicated could it be in the end? Either the Order is working on something so horrible that it's worth our while to break it, or they aren't and it isn't."

He froze and bit his lip thoughtfully.

"Hm, no, wait, I can actually see this getting pretty complicated. But it might not be. And in case it is, we should maybe get an early start on it?"

[SalmonMax]

"I can get us close," Larissa volunteers. "From there we'll need to get to the building without making too much of a fuss, and get inside. Then we'll just follow our noses and see if we can find any clues."

[z-Gloom]

Gloom shrugged in the darkness, becoming solid for a moment. She picked up the rock and the light, clicking the latter off. Sticking them in her pockets, she moved her solid-state closer to Darkness non-solid state and began to climb out of the hole. That turned out to be impossible; the walls were way too smooth. Growling with irritation, she teleported herself to the edge of the shadow at the top of the shaft, scrambling not to fall.

Hauling herself out, she pulled her vicious form out of the hole and gazed up at the other two. "Nothing," she said as she solidified and pulled herself to her feet, slapping dust off her clothes. She handed Cyco her things as she added, "Hole just ends. Nothing's there. Looks like someone scooped a section of the rock out."

She caught sight of Kenshin's sword lying a ways away. "What's up with your pigsticker?" she asked, quirking a black eyebrow at him. "Did it bite you or sumthin?"

[The Scarlet Samurai]

Kenshin scowled, "It's evil. Or I have gone insane. I know not which." He looked at the sword. He felt odd, like if he closed his eyes and spun around he could still point to were it was exactly. Like he had a compass in his mind attuned to the weapon.

[CyCo]

"Bummer, that was so anticlimactic." Cyco lamented at the news. "If your knife is so bad, just toss it in the hole, no one will find it. I can fill it up with rocks quick-like, no one will know the difference."

She shrugged and then looked down, as if suddenly noticing herself. "Heavenly Hosts! I look like shite!"

[Charlotte]

Blackjack nodded in Larissa's general direction. "Okay. Gather everyone 'round. We ought to discuss this. It sounds like they're definitely up to something and that whatever it is they're going to be erasing their trails shortly, so we might need to act fast. Sam's still at the library, then? And Cyco said something about a hole to Gloom?"

[Radiance]

"Well we can go check out Seattle, but if that's the case it sould be more than one or two of us..."

[IndyPendant]

"Well, I can check the library anyways, get Sam." She headed out, shifting into that higher state of speed again. Before she even got to the library though, a glimpse of motion caught her eye, and she changed direction.

Using her teleportation and her greater speed, she covered in minutes a distance that would normally have taken her hours, perhaps days--and found herself almost guiltily enjoying the exhilaration of it all.

She joined the three others by the hole, gazing at them with a slightly amused expression. "What have you been doing?"

[CyCo]

"Spelunking." Cyco replied.

She looked up and saw who asked the question before looking down at herself again and nodding, "I need a bath. I'll catch up with you."

And she zipped off.