Mutants & Masterminds: The Indigo Children - Chapter 2: Subject 43 (Dominic)

[jameson (ST)]

The evening had been all kinds of awesome thus far. Tuxedo clad, Dominic had arrived at Donatella's in a long black limo, well worth the cash he'd had to save to make it happen. Donatella had proven that even a beautiful woman could dial her appearance even further with the right dress and makeup, dropping Dom's jaw in the best possible way. Her parents had taken some pictures and then they were off to the ball. Donatella's school was just a tad on the rich side and so instead of a senior prom it was a ball. Dom had poked fun at the apparent snobbery of calling their prom a ball, until he arrived. Class exuded from the hall and the decorations and attendees both were just subtly different from what he had seen at his own prom. Everything had just felt a touch more genuine.

The band was live, performing covers with the kind of surprising skill that makes people think that Karaoke must not be that hard. By the time the clock was creeping toward the midnight hour the music and dancing had slowed down. Many couples, eager for some backseat romance, had already left causing the assembled students to fall below the critical mass required for the more energetic music and dancing. The band was playing old power ballads and slow dance songs to close out the night. Everything was perfect. Or it should have been, but then nobody would have expected the fire alarm to go off...

[Ira Sagebrush]

Dom and Donny had been enjoying what would be their last dance of the night, slowly shuffling in a circle to a joke request of Rod Stewart's "Have I Told You Lately".

Donny had just snuggled into Dom's chest, breathing in the orchid-tinged scent of his Derek Jeter cologne and thinking how perfect her night had been when the annoying klaxon of the fire alarms went off.

At first, there was the requisite confusion as everyone tried to figure out what was going on, but then people fell into their preprogrammed mantra, (as they had been taught their entire school-going years,) and most started meandering towards the doors leading to outside.

At first, some seem determined to stay, regardless of the alarm, but as the band trailed off into silence and the upon the insistence of chaperones, even the stragglers started herding out like cattle to the slaughter. At least except, Dom and Donny.

Dressed in all black like they were, and dancing in the shadows near the stage, they managed to be looked over, and Dom had convinced her to finish the dance, passing off the alarm as probably the antics of some rejected teenager angst for not getting a handjob in the bathroom. At least until the sprinklers kicked in, drenching them in cold water.

Donny immediately pulled away, gasping in the sudden icyness and nearly laughing as she held her hands out and looked around in surprise.

Dom flipped his glasses up onto his head as they started to mist and fog over. "Guess they thought the party was getting a little heated." he said in delight, holding his hands out and leaning back.

At this point, the band had ran back into the room in a vain attempt to save their precious equipment. The crowd they had run back from was now squeeling with damp teenage girls in too-expensive dresses, all now desperate to squeeze out the doors.

"I did need a cold shower after tonight though..." he finished, offering an arm out to her with a cheesy grin. "Shall we relieve ourselves of the party my dear? It seems to have gotten a trifle damp."

"We shall good sir." she answered in mocked haughtyness as she took his arm.

And together they started heading to the exit, thoughts of the quiet, dark, limo ride home dancing through both their heads.

[jameson (ST)]

By the time they made it outside the majority of the students had gathered on the lawn bathed in the ruddy red-orange glow of the fire. The very real, very serious fire. Flames bellowed forth from the opposite end of the school, belching out windows and licking up into the night sky from the roof. The night was breezy and the smoke was whisked away from the fire as quickly as it was generated, but that same breeze fed the flames and threatened to spread the fire to other buildings. Dom looked around the crowd, faces that had so recently been happy were now scared, concerned, or simply slack with shock. Mascara and eyeliner ran down faces both male and female turning the students into a mass of sad clown visages.

Fire engines were already arriving and police were setting up blue sawhorses to keep the crowd back. Hoses, flattened and creased from storage snapped into full cylindrical mass as water coursed through them to the spray nozzles. The flames were transfixing, hypnotizing the revelers as their past was consumed by destruction. Donatella looked at the fire with a mixture of rapt fascination and utter horror for a moment. She turned to Dom, "Do you think they can save the school?"

[Ira Sagebrush]

"I don't know cara, it looks pretty big." Dom said, watching the familiar dance of flame flick at the night's sky through the billowing smoke. "Sure they will do their best to try though."

He put a comforting arm around the shivering girl, trying to shield her from the New England spring weather, as much to calm his own involuntary quivering. "Why don't we head out? Won't do us any good to be in the way or to watch it go down."

[jameson (ST)]

Donny took a long look at the burning school. At the men and women fighting to put out the blaze, and the student watching with mixed emotion. She leaned close and whispered, "I understand if you don't want to try and do anything." She laid her head on his chest as Dom started to lead them away toward the parking lot where hopefully they could get in the limo and leave. Fate is a fickle bitch and what she hath given she will take away at a whim, the school would survive, or it would become yet another burnt out shell in a city that too often could not afford to even level the rubble left after a fire.

As they walked away they passed through the crowd. Young men in ruined tuxedos, their arms around their girls, the faculty and parent chaperons, even some bystanders who couldn't help but revel in the misery of others. The hushed tone of the crowd changed suddenly. Stark silence was punctuated with murmurs and suddenly somebody yelled out, "I think there's somebody in there!"

[Ira Sagebrush]

Dom and Donny both whipped around at the new realization, both searching the building and following the pointed fingers to the trapped victim on the third floor who was beating on the plate glass window with a chair in a vain attempt to break it.

"Dom..."

"Alright," he said, interrupting her, "You stay here, I'll see what I can do." I am not a hero.

"I'm coming with you." she said, wiping her soaked bangs out of her eyes. She had that look of stubborness that said he wasn't going to change her mind, but in truth, it would be nice to have the company and another set of eyes.

"Yes cara. Let's go." he nodded after a moment.

They quickly moved off to the side, starting to circle around the crowd and weave through the campus to try and get to the backside of the school and apparent start of the blaze.

[jameson (ST)]

The police were everywhere by now and had cordoned off much of the area for the firetrucks and their crews. Even in back there was already a cop, his cruiser parked on the sidewalk with its lights spinning. "No closer please, let the fire department do their work kids." The guy had his hands full with police tape and was stringing it up between stake standing up in orange street cones.

There appeared no way to get closer until Donny tugged on his arm. "Come on, I bet that they haven't closed the annex and sky walk yet," she whispered." As it turned out Donny was correct, the annexed building was home to the new art studios and the musical and computer labs. They quickly found their way to the second floor sky walk that linked the building back to the main school. Already they could see some smoke in the sky walk itself, not much, certainly not enough to even hamper Dom's vision, but it did not bode well for Donny's continued presence.

[Ira Sagebrush]

"Alright, I think you need to stay here. It's going to get hot in there. Keep a watch out for me and buzz me if it gets hairy." Dom said, stopping midway down the skywalk.

She hated to admit it, but he was right. She had seen him dance a quick jig in a campfire and only come out with a blister. "Fine. But be careful...promise?" she asked, tugging on his lapels.

"Of course tesoro mia." he replied, bending down to give her a quick kiss before heading down the causeway.

With a quick glance back, he disappeared into the smoke, breathing through one side of his wet jacket that he had drawn up over his nose.

[jameson (ST)]

The smoke only got heavier as he crossed the sky walk toward the main building but Dom found that didn't even tickle his throat, he could breathe the hot smoke as easily as a cool autumn breeze. He shoved the doors open at the end and immediately felt the heat of the fire. He paused for a moment and simply felt, focusing on a mental sense he had found he possessed. He suddenly knew exactly where the nearest fire was, and every other fire within about a hundred feet. Things were worst on the third floor on the south side but the fire had broken down to the second and first floors as floor and ceilings collapsed. The sprinklers where slowing the spread of the fire but they would not be sufficient, there was simply too much heat and fire on the third floor. He took a further moment to orient himself. Whomever was stuck in that room was in the path of the worst of it. Dom raced up the stairs half a level and saw a fire hose station. He needed to act quickly and decide how best to deal with this situation.

[Ira Sagebrush]

Dom hopped to the hose, quickly pulling it out of the wall and flipping the lever to start the flow of water.

Never having handled anything above a garden hose, he was not prepared for the burst of pressure that came down the line and the firefighting tool quickly sprang free and started thrashing about like a snake in its death throes as it blasted itself down the stairs.

Knowing he had no time to attempt to get a grip on the hose, he raced up the stairs, content to let the water do what it could to help the fire from there.

I seem to be handling the heat okay anyway.

Click to reveal..

Str Check

(16:16:40) ChatBot: (Dom) rolls 1d20 and gets 5.[ew]

[jameson (ST)]

As soon as the valve was open the hose filled with high pressure water. Dom pulled back on the valve at the nozzle and water jetted out of the end and sent the hose flying out of his hands. No longer able to keep the valve open the water ceased to flow and the hose thudded to the stairs inert once more. Dom shrugged, it made sense that the hose wouldn't stay whipping around without anybody to tend it, chalk that myth up as busted.

He took the stairs two at a time and pulled the third floor door open; heat and smoke slapped him as soon as the door opened and Dom could see flames licking their way across the floors, walls, and ceiling. He recalled the design of the school and estimated that the room the people were trapped in was behind the advance of the flame. Classroom doors were usually not airtight and at least half frosted glass, Dom estimated that they didn't have much time.

[Ira Sagebrush]

Not willing to test his ability to walk through an inferno just yet, Dom concentrated, using the trick he used frequently to put out others' cigarettes, only...more.

Click to reveal..

Nullify Fire

(22:35:26) ChatBot: (Dom) rolls 1d20 and gets 13. [16]

[jameson (ST)]

Dom concentrates and the advancement of the fire first halts and then reverses. Fire pulls away from melted tile and charred paint, lockers, twisted and melted by the heat sag as if in relief as the fires within and without subside. Dom moves forward maintaining his concentration and pushing the fire back as he goes. He cannot sap the heat from the area but with out an ignition source the fire has little chance of starting once more behind him. Ahead he sees flame rush into a room with the sound of breaking glass and a rush of hot air. The firemen must be breaking the windows to get at the fire and extinguish it.

He comes to the room where the person was trapped, the door knob glows slightly from the heat remaining even as the fire is pushed further away. Dom reaches out, his hand covered by the sleeve of his coat and grasps the handle, turning it and opening the charred door. His coat smolders but the heat does not burn him, he marvels at that simple fact and then sweeps his eyes through the room. Standing amid the scattered desks and chairs was a figure readying to heave a chair against the window once more.

[Ira Sagebrush]

Marveling at how far he was testing his ability, and succeeding, he stepped just inside the room and shouted at the figure, while beckoning him with a wave.

"Hey! C'mon! This way!"

[jameson (ST)]

The figure turned, casually throwing the chair away. As the figure turned toward Dom he realized for the first time that it was a woman. Her outfit was black, jeans and a leather jacket, not something to be worn to the ball. "Oh thank god. I was wondering if anybody was going to rescue me." She walked to him, her eyes skating over his body, "You don't look like a fireman. How'd you get in here and put the fires out?"

[Ira Sagebrush]

"I know the school better than these dudes, though maybe now is not the time to be asking questions, this place is going down, quick, follow me." Dom said as he turned to leave, pulling his jacket up over his face again.

Abilities or not, had to keep up the vulnerable appearances.

Did she check me out?

[jameson (ST)]

She nodded and followed Dom out into the hall. Though the fire was held back the smoke and fumes were not and she was forced to crouch and cover her mouth against the smoke. Dom found himself breathing easier than he expected though the heavy chemical fumes did irritate his throat. They headed back the way he came in, moving as quickly as the woman was able. As Dom pushed the heavy fire door to the stairwell open he heard heavy footsteps coming up from below.

[Ira Sagebrush]

Thank God, firemen are here.

Coughing some from the fumes, making it sound a little worse than he had to, "Up here! ...We're up here!" he yelled.

Making sure the woman was behind him, he headed down the stairs cautiously, careful not to touch any metal railing, and looking for the familiar sight of the calvalry.

[jameson (ST)]

They took the stairs carefully, despite the heat they were still wet from the fire hose that Dom had turned on earlier. They arrived at the landing for the second floor as a pair of yellow clad firemen arrived. "What the hell are you two still doing in here?" the first asked even as the second pushed the door to the skywalk open. "Quick get out of here, this is dangerous. And make sure you see the paramedics, you've probably inhaled a lot of smoke."

[Ira Sagebrush]

Dom nodded, still coughing into his jacket as he continued past the firemen and out onto the skywalk.

Glancing back to ensure that the woman was okay, he jogged out, dropping his jacket as he looked for Donny.

She should have called me. Where'd she go? he thought as he looked around where he left her.

Now that the rescue was done, they needed to get out of there, the last thing he needed was to be seen getting someone out and getting recognition...that would be bad.

[jameson (ST)]

He found Donny behind the police line, having been forcibly evacuated from the annex building. She was visibly relieved to see Dom and practically threw herself at him. "Phew ... you stink." She grabbed his hand and pulled him into the crowd, evading the paramedics until he got to the street. "I had the limo driver wait here. I figured you wouldn't be long, where shall we go now?"

[Ira Sagebrush]

Dom had just leaned in for a congratulatory kiss when she pulled away at his stench and led him over to the limo.

He responded as he stripped off as much of his excess clothing as he could, the jacket, tie and shirt coming off and leaving him with his white tee and slacks.

"No need to let this disrupt the evening cara. Let's head to the room so we can get cleaned up and you can tell me what an awesome, heroic guy I was tonight. Actions like these do deserve a reward you know." He said, raising his eyebrows as held the door for her.

"You have mighty high expectations for what amounted to running up a couple flights of stairs." she said, teasing as she climbed in and sat down.

Dom climbed in after her, throwing his shed clothing onto the opposite seat and sitting down next to Donny. He looked up at the driver, making eye contact in the rearview mirror, "Hotel dude."

With a small nod, the chauffeur started the luxurious car and pulled away from the curb. Dom quickly raised the privacy screen and turned up the music a little, flipping the station over to 106.7, hoping the soothing contemporary music would set the mood.

"Well, yeah, you wanted heroics...I ran into a burning building for a, literally, 'hot' woman. Doesn't the hero get the girl?"

"Only when he doesn't smell like the chem lab, cara." she said softly and smiling as leaned over and lay her wet hair onto his slouching chest.

He was content to let the short conversation rest at that until they had both cleaned up. As they rode, swaying with the bumps and turning of the limo, occasionally being lit up by passing headlights, Dom gently combed his fingers through her hair, trying to soothe away the recent events of the otherwise wonderful evening.

Before long, they pulled up to the New York Palace, the stopping of the vehicle bringing both occupants out of their relaxed coziness.

Dom straightened up as Donny lifted her head and they both waiting for the driver to open the door for them.

"Your palace awaits cara." Dom said, stretching his legs.

"It's gorgeous Dom," she said, looking through the window.

"Only the best for mia tesoro." he said as the door opened.

[jameson (ST)]

Epilogue:

The woman got into the unmarked ambulance and shut the door. It drove away silently, its lights off. She doubled over as she inserted a plastic rod with a hook at the end into her mouth and down into her throat. She felt it catch and pulled hard, her gag reflex triggered and she dry heaved as the rubber flanged cylinder slid up her throat and out her mouth. The driver looked into the the rear view mirror at the woman, "Did it work?"

She nodded, "Hurts like hell going in and coming out though." She leaned into the cab and grabbed the coffee from the dash and drank it down, soothing her throat with its comforting heat. "The subject displayed the ability to inhibit and extinguish fire. I didn't notice any signs of sensitivity to the smoke either."

The man nodded as she discarded the smoke scented jacket and sat in the passenger seat. "Subject forty three may well be promising then. Are we to bring him in?"

"Not just yet, it'd a bit of a different situation. He's still human, still a citizen, but we'll find a way..."

[jameson (ST)]

ignore me