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GM Continued from OVERTHROW in City Hall! The Iceberg, headquarters of AEGIS, Freedom City September 12th, 2012, 2.15 PM The walk to Director Powers' office was a short one, made longer by that sense of unfamiliarity coming from new environments and the unceasing hustle and bustle of the American Elite Government Intervention Service going on all around them, reports of events happening around the globe the subject of constant surveillance and study, dour military officers considering tactical difficulties and pondering the best way to safeguard the world marching cheek-by-jowl with lean and excited scientists explaining new breakthroughs in cybernetics and the tantalizing results of new tests done on metals from another dimension, and they quickly opened ranks to accept the neat and professional shapes of the direct agents of AEGIS, who opined on new ways to undercut and overcome the forces of evil and villainy. They quickly stepped to the side to let Agent Anthea, Agent Silas, and the heroes of city hall past, giving them stern but warm words of welcome, and more than a few quiet waves and thumbs-up as they went by. For their part, the guiding agents looked neither right nor left, acknowledged only a few close friends and followed the dark purple line that led them straight to the office whose thick oak door was marked H. Powers, Dir. of AEGIS with a smaller sign below it saying "Do not disturb, bureau business" Knocking three times on the panels, Anthea called in "Mr. Powers! The fine people you wanted are here." From within there was a brief sound like shuffling papers, and then the door was abruptly opened to reveal the towering, eyepatched, confident and vigorous master of the agency, Harry himself. Dressed in a neat black AEGIS uniform, the man oozed command from every inch of his being. "It says do not disturb, agent" he snapped, shutting the door behind himself and briskly taking the lead down another corridor following a green line "Do you think I put it there as a test? Dismissed! You and Silas are due for another assignment in four hours in India, get ready" he said crisply, folding his hands behind his back and leading the team in silence to a room dominated by a narrow table and large screen. Silas and Anthea saluted and marched off, Silas giving a slight wave before they were out of sight. Tapping a small button on the table, the screen clicked to green life, showing the schematic of a ship, and the layout of a base. Turning to face the assembled heroes Harry Powers said gravely "Good day, I am Powers, the director of this agency, I am pleased to meet you and would like to request your assistance on a delicate mission." turning to Gabriel he added "Of course, I cannot force you to help, and if you would prefer not to act in tandem with us, you may use the information I am about to give you as you see fit." he leaned on the table, his one eye boring into the very hearts of the group who had saved city hall "Any questions before I begin?"
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Thursday, February 7, 2013 Early evening A couple of days ago, Lucy Harker had received a visit from a mother that was concerned about her young adult son being in some sort of trouble. Ms. Diaz was originally from Mexico, having moved to the United States more than twenty years ago before becoming a naturalized citizen. Her son, Benito, was a first generation Mexican-American, and his mother had worked hard to make sure he had plenty of opportunity and did not fall into the wrong crowd. One of the activities Benito had taken to was boxing, and he had even won a few junior competitions in the city. Ms. Diaz had told Lucy that Benito had changed dramatically in the last couple of weeks, often staying out late at night and occasionally coming home with injuries which he gave shaky explanations for when she would question him about them. But Lucy had barely been able to start looking into things when she had received a call from Ms. Diaz this morning, informing her that Benito had been gone since Tuesday night. After assuring Ms. Diaz that this was now a top priority for her, Lucy had called one of her clients, the Bloodhound detective agency, and invoked part of their "agreement" to enlist their aid in tracking down the young man. Then, she had gone with Fred Furlong and Harry Hound to Ms. Diaz's home to start trying to figure out what might be going on with her son. After searching his room, they had found a fair amount of cash hidden in a drawer, but nothing else that would suggest gang activity or drug dealing. They had spent the rest of the day asking around in the neighborhood, but could not turn up anything that would suggest Benito had joined a gang. At this point, Harry and Fred brought up a rumor they had been hearing recently about some underground street fighting rings being run in parts of the Fens and Greenbank. Of course, the two private eyes knew little more than the possible existence of these operations, but they knew someone who likely knew more. Of course, given how their last visit to see Ricky Ferreti had gone, they decided to try to catch him before he reached his favorite watering hole. So now Lucy, Fred and Harry were sitting in the Bloodhound agency's Cadillac outside the bar, watching for Ricky to arrive.
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Monday, February 4, 2013 4:30 PM Though the late afternoon air was rather cool, the sun was shining as Megan Howell made her way down one of the tree-lined streets of Riverside. She had left work at her internship with Summit Transnational a bit early today to take up Angus Stone's invitation to see the small recording studio she owed in this part of town. The young blonde had met the former pop star during the Midnight Society's holiday party back in mid-December. But given the holidays, starting her internship at Summit, as well as Angus' own busy schedule, it had taken until now for Megan to be able to take her up on the invite. Looking around as she made her way towards the address Angus had given her, Megan smiled as she took in some of the sights of the bohemian neighborhood. I really need to try to get down here more often. The young woman thought to herself. Especially now that it is an easy monorail ride from my apartment in the Wading Way. Reaching the street the studio was on, Megan turned to her left and walked down another block before coming to a stop in front of a building with the sign *Zenith Stuido* out front. Well here we are. She through as she opened the doors and made her way in. "Good afternoon," she said to the receptionist inside with a warm smile. "I am Megan Howell, and I am here to see Angus Stone."
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GM Monday, February 4, 2013 9:35 p.m. It was always an unnerving thing when police sirens pierced the night air, blue and red lights washing over everything with a sudden sense of danger and urgency. The West End was no stranger to violent interludes, but somehow tonight seemed different. The overcast and starless sky only made the scene unfolding on the streets worse. It began with a 911 call, two blocks away from an out of the way sports bar, someone heard something that sounded like gunshots. Less than fifteen minutes later, an ambulance and two squad cars arrived to a find a man lying on the ground, barely breathing and unconscious. Not long after that, detectives arrived on the scene. "Geez. Looks like a war broke out here..." The first detective pulled on a pair of gloves, putting his hand against the brick wall of the alley where the victim had been found. "...are these bullet holes?" "We didn't find any bullet casings... We found these." The officer held up a paper bag, and the detective raised an eyebrow. "Are those... construction rivets?"
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Ready for anything, the heroes erupted from the pyramid ship, weapons raised as they prepared to do battle with unending robot hordes! But instead they found...stillness. The lights were bright, just as VINCE had suggested, the sharp white glow of the central spine overhead casting harsh shadows everywhere. There was a scent in the air vaguely like the stuff added to natural gas back on Earth, and everywhere there were robots! Eerie humanoid skeletons with three eyes and clawed limbs, ferocious-looking guardians of the Curator that were doing absolutely nothing. For a long time, Harrier eyed the robots, his armor having chunked open over his skin, before he spoke in a voice loud enough for them all to hear. "Look at them. They are not arranged. They are not armed. They are...immobile." And sure enough, the robots were silent and still, caught in the middle of walking, pressing buttons, circulating around the hangar bay, but not a single one moved a metal muscle. Harrier walked over to one, still wrapped in armor. "It does not react." "So what does that mean?" asked Quickstep, scrubbing her hands along her arms as she leaned out of the ship. "Is he waiting for something? Is this really his base? Are we were we're supposed to be?" She wrinkled her nose against the smell. "What do we do now?"
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Early January After School Claremont Academy As it turned out, there were a lot people who liked teleporters at Claremont, and every one of them wanted to go see London, take a quick jaunt home and back before someone could note that they were gone. Kat had been happy to help at first, but time worn thin her patience at playing taxi for everyone who came to ask. She had things to do, people to save, bad guys to punch. She couldn't help with everyone who didn't want to bother with the actual traveling part of travel! There wasn't enough hours in the day. Normally, using her gifts to help someone go shopping was right out. But promises of free stuff along the way from Darren, one of the richest kids on campus—Maybe the richest!—had bolstered Kat's willingness to play taxi. There had been other reasons to say yes too, of course. Other reasons to try to corner Darren somewhere she could ask a few questions without being obvious. But the free stuff helped. Kat marched down the steps in front of Claremont along with the rest of the student body, all eager to get out of school and do their own thing. Rather than try to hold her place in the crowd Kat veered off to the side, stood on the green, knuckled a kink out of her back and waited for Darren.
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January 15 It was not a good day for getting commlink messages in Freedom City. It seemed like every message that came in heralded some new disaster in the city, another hero replaced by a robot double, another fire that needed put out somewhere. In the middle of the parade of messages assailing the communications array of Dragonfly's suit on a day when she was already considerably distracted, one message managed to stand out, for its oddity at least. The message was in text, bald blinking letters that scrolled across the screen of her suit. <> That was one voice who had been silent through the tumult of the day, Miss Americana had been nowhere to be found during all the rescue work, though there had been word of her at Blackstone Prison early in the morning. What followed the message header, though, was no description of danger or location, but rather a long string of scrambled letters and complex equations.
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Wednesday, January 23rd 10:13 PM There was no reason the Levant Arms should have loomed the way it did. It wasn't even that tall - a mere five stories, and there were much taller buildings on this stretch of the West End. Likewise, the street was fairly well lit, and lights were on in most of the buildings surrounding it. But then, that just made the shadows inside loom that much taller. Nick took the building in, trying to get a more detailed read off of it. It had only been empty for the last few hours; there was no official word from the city, but so far, their opinions ran everywhere from "gas leak" to "undetermined event" - the usual code for "we don't know, but boy, is this weird." He'd heard rumors over the past few nights, from all over the city. Customers at the Black Petal whispering about the strange lights in closed-off rooms. Ghost hunting websites talking about strange wails. The ghosts themselves at Lantern Hill, speaking of an "overwhelming presence." He had been about ready to check it out tonight when all hell had broken loose. There was little word on what had happened, but a 911 call brought most of STAR down on the place, and the first response team had been quick to get all the tenants out. Nor was there any one solid account, with stories ranging from "phantom fire" to "I saw this horrible face looking at me in the mirror" to... "there was a unicorn in the elevator." He'd had to make sure he'd heard that one right. More than once, in fact. Nick checked his watch and kept his eyes firmly on the building. It probably wasn't the sort of place to go in alone. Fortunately, he wasn't going in alone.
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The Morning of January 15, 2013 The Wonderbus roared through the skies of the Northern Hemisphere almost impossibly fast, the extra-dimensional construction of the craft shunting away the excess heat energy from its hypersonic flight enough to keep it undetectable in the air. They were flying thousands of miles, but the fantastic speed of their craft would get them there in less than an hour. Trying to keep his mind off the crisis of Erde-Tronik, the bioweapons, and the advanced plasma weapon that had nearly killed them all, Sharl had pulled up situation monitors from the computer inside the Bus, trying to keep track of what they'd left behind. "The good news is, the chaos seems to be limited to Freedom City, so it must be something there...I don't know, that bomb was extra-terrestrial, but I didn't recognize the maker. Maybe it's something with the Grue again." At least what they hoped to do with the Sanctum was easy enough. "I'll connect Erde-Tronik to the power supply there and keep it safe until Miss A and I can get it protected. As for the bioweapons, we can just drop them in one of the stasis fields there. It's not a long-term solution, but it'll last long enough for us to keep things safe. We-" A distant beeping interrupted Sharl. "That's the proximity alarm. Maybe there's somebody from the League there already." He tapped a few buttons on the bank of monitors they were all sitting around, the black and white screens looking as much like something from a 60s sci-fi TV show as the high-tech pieces of super-science they were. "I don't understand, there's something on top of..." The great grey vessel squatted over the Sanctum like an anteater scooping out ants, tentacles rising from its lower half scooping away huge chunks of ice even as they watched. The three eyes and slight horn at the rear echoed the face of the Gorgon, but Sharl knew that face well enough from his studies and his nightmares. He saw the details in an instant; the great digitizing towers driven into the icy Arctic landscape like tent spikes the size of buildings, the glowing red 'eyes' that bespoke an active subspace connection across the galaxy, and worst of all, much, much worse, were the smaller tentacles already buried in the exposed roof of the Centurion's Sanctum. His eyes wide with horror, Citizen managed to form the words: "It's the Curator."
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GM January 5th, Saturday, 2013 South America, the gateway to the Lost World Zandar, Jungle Lord of the Lost World, had recently sent word to the Freedom league that he wished for greater understanding between his domain and theirs. He had offered a guided tour for several young people from Earth-Prime through the reaches of his kingdom, something that had led to a scramble among the Claremont Academy student body, all of whom wanted to be the one that got to see the fabled and secret land where prehistoric beasts lived beside humans! At last, Headmaster Summers had selected four teenagers to go. Blodeuwedd, El Heraldo, Myrmidon and Tsunami were to explore the strange Lost World and bring back a written report on what they had learned and discovered about the place and its people. No less than twenty pages were allowed for the final product, as Prof. Skyler had declared with no little smugness. But that seemed far away as the four teen heroes stood on the rocky and wooded plateau far above the jungle that glistened below in the sun, the teleportation quick and precise. All they had to do now was wait for their guide to show up. The South American sun beat down on them with the full weight of summer, and at the edge of sight and hearing all of them could tell animals were creeping just out of sight...
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January 13th, 2013 "This is the place" said Fred, in the cold rain of a miserable overcast January morning. It was just past nine and the city had failed to catch alight with its normal energy. People were tired, sluggish, and down after the festive period. "Looks like it" said the mangy but large dog by his feet. The dog had looked around quite carefully to check nobody was listening before it spoke in a gruff, dog-like voice. "Stay there, Ill just nip over and..." continued the dog, before scuttling off between some buildings and behind some trash cans. In the blink of an eye, the dog vanished, replaced by Harry "the Hound" Hound, wearing a crumpled mac, crumpled shirt, and crumpled tie. His hair was crumpled. He was crumpled. Fred didn't act surprised. He had seen Harry change several times now. Instead, he focussed on the building. He couldn't read the sign outside, but Harry had told him all about the place. "Looks a bit...y'know...old and crumbly..." he said about the building. "Just like our lawyer" said Harry, failing to light a damp cigarette in the rain. "Still, what a thing, hey Harry? a dead Lawyer, all back to life n' everyfing! She must be something, eh. Must know a lot about the law and all. Good thinkin' as always, Harry. Good thinkin'. She must be dead good..eh?" he chuckled. "Ha Ha" said Harry cynically. "I'll tell you what, she is dead cheap. I'll give her that..." he said, cheering himself up. At the back of both men's mind was that they were in a dangerous business. Harry was good at hiding and running if need be, and Freddy could more than take care of himself. But neither really wanted their lawyer at the end of a Mafia sniper's sights. Fred, particularly. "Anyway, stay here and keep lefty and righty to yourself. Don't get into any trouble. Just..err..enjoy the rain..." "Hmphhh..." said Fred, kicking a half eaten discarded hot dog in the gutter out of boredom. "Right then, lets see what this lady has to say for herself..." said Harry, to himself, as he entered the building and knocked on the door to Ms. Lucy Harker's office. A natural coward, he had a slight sense of unease about her not-alive status. He had done his research, he had his contacts... But she is cheap! he reminded himself.
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9:30AM January 10th, 2013 Katasrof & Sorenson Technologies, American Branch, Freedom City HQ K&ST's Hanover building somehow managed to look simultaneously "old world" and "shining future" as Jessica Anne Parker walked up to it. The strangely perfect fusion of stone, steel, and glass seemed like an impervious fortress...But the front doors appeared to be ready to receive visitors, so. Once inside, she could quickly spot the front desk. After introducing herself, she was given a guest pass, guided to an elevator, and told which floor to go to, as well as how to get to the conference room (she couldn't miss it). Indeed, once she stopped at the second-from-the-top floor, the elevator opened to a hallway with a few clearly-marked doors; a couple of bathrooms, emergency stairs, a couple maintenance/cleaning rooms, and at the far end, a set of double doors that were marked simply "Meeting", with an electronic indicator underneath that said "Open". When she stepped inside, it was a large, comfortable meeting room. The far wall was floor-to-ceiling windows that seemed to auto-tint themselves; the other walls had display screens covering most of their surface, including the inside of the (surprisingly thick) door Jessica had come in (which seemed to smoothly close into the wall. The table itself was metal and "glass", though it looked as if it could also serve as a display unit; the chair surrounding it were large and very comfortable. The ceiling had discrete climate control vents, some speakers, and some nodes that might just be holographic display units. Perhaps 2 minutes after she entered the room, a young blond man just a few years her senior entered the room, wearing a dark grey business suit, holding what looked to be a translucent tablet PC, and with a somewhat distracted look on his face. When he noticed Jessica's presence, he looked fully up and walked over, a smile on his face. He offered her a firm handshake. "Excellent! I was hoping you'd be able to make it this morning. We've got a lot to talk about, and probably not as much time as we'd like to do so in. Oh, right, names. I'm Baron Magnus Vilhelm Katastrof; welcome to Katasrof & Sorenson Technologies. Would you like to have a seat? Do you need any refreshments?" He sat down in a chair that was shaped a bit differently from the others (though not by much) at the "head" of the oblong table; he gestured to one of the chairs next/near to him.
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January 15, 2013 Morning West End There's a man in a giant robot suit marching down the street, calling down vengeance on all who have oppose him. Just another day in Freedom City. "Fools!" boomed the voice of the giant automaton, the pilot just visible inside. "Everyone always said old Jerry Craven wasn't ever going to amount to anything, but look at me! I've got a giant warsuit! Now I'm big, and YOU PEOPLE ARE SORRY! AHAHAHA!" He laughed manically and stomped forwards, people fleeing in terror as he made his way from the warehouse that he'd simply walked his way out of, heading in a leisurely fashion towards the sea. His suit was big, towering as tall as the small tenements on either side, and wide enough that he nearly brushed them on both sides as he went. This was a big problem for the neighborhood; one false move in that big suit and the whole thing would come crashing down on the neighborhood!
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January 15, 2013 Bayview "...and there are even rumors, my friends, of Terminus mutants so powerful that they can enter our minds and control our thoughts, taking away our God-given free will. Now I think the American people deserve the right to decide if they want their children to be in school with Terminus mutants. To be taught by Terminus mutants! Ladies and gentlemen, the truth is that Terminus mutants are very real, and that they are among us. We must know who they are, and above all, what they can do!" Aaron Walsh's rallies are always raucous affairs, the blue-collar Freedom City Congressman being something of a political showman. But something has happened recently, perhaps in the wake of his recent election, that's given the Congressman's simmering anger at the world outside South Freedom a particular focus. "Am I saying we should _abandon_ these people? That we should turn our backs on the _victims_ of Omega? No!" That silenced the crowd in front of him, a mixed bunch of Bayview locals who for a moment looked like they were ready to go beat up a T-baby or two. "Many of you, my friends, have lost family, or friends, to the forces of the Terminus. The wounds left on our bodies, and in our hearts, can't be healed as easily as those fixed up by Dr. Metropolis. The national T-Census will not only help keep us safe by letting us know the strength and power of the T-mutant problem, but it will also be the first step to finding a cure. So that our sons, our daughters, our friends and our family, can live free from the Terminus. Now and forever, I make you that my pledge! No! More! Terminus!" He pounded on the dais and the crowd roared. Maybe this wasn't how they had planned to spend Croatian Independence Day, but Walsh's charisma had swept the audience along anyway. Across the street, a less-friendly crowd, mostly college kids and hero groupies, had taken the other angle. "No more Walsh! No more Walsh! Take your hate back home!" The campus radicals are a plucky bunch to be out here in a Freedom City January for the sake of a protest against one of the most controversial men in Freedom City, bundled up beneath parkas and breath turning to steam. They waved banners high and chanted, "All heroes welcome! All heroes welcome!" The mood between the two crowds was getting ugly, especially with rumors that at least one T-baby group had put a hit out on the life of the Congressman. Walsh didn't seem to fear the danger, though, standing alone on the stage as he whipped up the crowd of his supporters, his wife, son, and traveling party guarded by uniformed Freedom City cops among the honored guests at the celebration.
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January 15, 2013 Blackstone Prison With rumors of clandestine Terminus activity circulating through the city, it was only natural that the Freedom League wanted to interrogate their most high-level Terminus prisoner...and only natural that the most experienced expert on the Terminus would be part of the interrogation. Steve was waiting for Gabriel when the latter arrived on Blackstone Island, standing near the outer perimeter fence in a suit and tie and looking as menacing as any of the prisoners inside. "Good morning, Gabriel," said the former drone, his expression hard to read as he faced an imminent reunion with the monster who had destroyed his life. "Thank you for calling me on this case." With a faint smile, he cocked his hand towards the outer gate where the 'blackguards' were watching attentively at the arrival of the famous Gabriel. "They thought I should wait for you to actually go below. It seems I set off the security system." - Down below, in the ultra-high-security wing where the clone of Shadivan Steelgrave was currently sleeping in his cell, the man in the cell opposite was whistling. Miss Americana had been called in to repair a very high security, albeit damaged computer system; the tough, albeit rigid, circuits inside the cell's door control, among the most high-security in the entire facility and a restricted design trusted to only a few super-geniuses, had fractured into pieces like broken glass the night before. Only a backup system had kept the big impervium door blocking his cell from sliding right up and out of the way. "Yeah, 37042 thinks he's funny that way," Officer McInnis was telling Miss Americana, the stocky blonde rolling her eyes with a guard's amused distaste for a persistent prisoner. "Courts say we can't actually stifle him if he's not attacking people with his sonic powers, and he's been in here long enough to know the score. Nothing says we can't put you in solitary, though, does it 37042? " she called, rapping on the impervium with her billy club and making the whistling stop. "No pretty girls like me and Miss A to look at in there!" The only response was a single, defiant wolf whistle and a wordless grumbling that finally lapsed into silence.
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The night of January 15, 2013 2 AM The call went out to le Renard Rouge's, Cobalt Templar's, and the Liberty League's line, one after the other, at a time that just happened to catch them all when they were otherwise indisposed. The woman's voice on the other end is rough and raspy, with the tension clear as she speaks. "
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Wharton Hill Harrier watched, as amazed as anyone else, as the Curator's ships gathered up the severed Freedom City and began to carry it away into the perpetually grey sky overhead. Over the distant rumble, he called, "We should not remain this area long! The subsidence from the city's removal may cause a collapse...and if the Curator's ships do come hunting for the missing ones who probed the sky, they will pass through this area early in whatever search they make. We should avoid being taken by the Curator...again," he added, chewing on that thought unpleasantly. "His attentions will not be in our favor." He was carefully not looking at Blue Jay or Bee-Keeper, eager not to resume the arguments that had nearly gotten the armored warrior and young (so young, was I ever that age?) archer captured by the collecting vessels.
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With the winter break over, a large portion of Trevor Hunter's time was once again being taken up by classes at Freedom City University. The bulk of his classes for the new semester were theoretical studies that had little chance of capturing his attention fully, since he'd had opportunity to put most of the principles being taught into practice in his alter-ego as the second Midnight. The dark haired young man wasn't adverse to restudying fundamentals and the course work's exercises were worthwhile, but he found it easy enough to split his focus while taking in a lecture. Telepathic communication was at least more polite than texting or browsing social networking sites in the middle of class. --Wrapping up here. Five, ten minutes. Meet you in the quad?--
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When the battle was done and the commandos defeated, Citizen floated out of the warehouse with his precious cargo tucked beneath one arm. "I've got it, guys!" He had both the truncated Erde-Tronik drive and the gold boxy storage medium from Earth-Prime in the same big black case. It would be up to he and Gina over the next few months, (probably as what would incidentally count as his graduation project) to integrate the Troniks together successfully but for now the backup was complete and the City of the Future (as he still sometimes thought of it, the very old motto that Tronik had kept even after the Exodus) was safe from the National Socialists. Assuming they got out there in time! "Wow!" He wasn't so focused as to not be impressed when he saw the battle with his own eyes; the smoking helicopters, the fleeing commando, the crack Nazi strike team that Young Freedom had taken apart with all of the skill and power of a master artist painting a portrait. "Nice, you guys," he said with a grin before disappearing into the Wonder Bus. "Now let me get the systems in here rebooted..." As the lights inside the Bus came back on, the other machines came out, Rogue in the lead in a humanoid body that looked like a human woman cast in the featureless nude, like something from a German Expressionist movie. With no explanation for the new shape, she cast her gaze from the scene of the battle to the heroes, back and forth, and for the first time seemed almost uncertain. "You did this. All of this, when you could have taken your Sharl and that city and..." She opened and closed mechanical hands before saying, decisively, "All right. All right, maybe you're right. Maybe there is another way to prosecute our war against the National Socialists." The group of robots behind her, which did not include her Sharl (who was in that system his counterpart was carrying) startled at that, but Rogue pressed on. "If you can fight the Nazis like this, teach them _fear_ without destroying them all, maybe we can try it ourselves. At least once, anyway. But you'd better take the Ragnorak with you. If we're not going to prune the humans back, it'll just look bad if we have it in our possession."
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December 15, North Bay The sun was just setting on another short Freedom City winter day when Erin pulled up in the driveway of the Hunter Mansion in her salt-streaked and dusty blue pickup truck. She swung out of the cab and tossed her knapsack over her shoulder, then shut the door and jogged the rest of the way up the drive. Most days she'd detour to the garage and code her own way into the house, but today she went straight up the front steps and tapped on the door. She hadn't seen much of Trevor and Travis lately, everyone had been busy with other things since Thanksgiving. Between work and patrol, Erin never had too much time for socializing anyway.
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December 21, 2012 An ancient civilization on an isthmus much to the south of Freedom City had called this day the end of the world, but for one visitor to Freedom City, their culture had provided the theme for an interesting Christmas party. As Feliz Navidad played over the speakers, the roughly-scarred second in command of HAX security was dishing out cups of Mayan hot chocolate with festive peppermint canes in them. "The bitter goes well with the sweet," he said to one of the programmers, the obviously memorized speech not doing much to impress the weedy-looking fellow. With a sigh, the man working the hot chocolate machine moved onto his boss. "A festive crowd," he offered to the chief as she approached, handing her cup and cane to go with the festive holiday theme. In a puffy red sweater with a white reindeer on it, the drone looked downright Christmasy himself. "I did not think so many would show, but I suppose those with family parties will make them on the day in question." Gina had put him off plans to spend the holiday together, but he had his own ideas about how he and his girlfriend would share each other's company over the holidays. "Is your young man coming?" he asked curiously, not wanting to pry when he already could guess the answer. "I know Mara is bringing her young woman."
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The chill of winter had begun to settle over Freedom City, the night air now bearing the biting chill that would soon extend into the daytime. But even as winter arrived, the holiday season provided a festive atmosphere and energy to the city that helped to lessen the cold in the air. Throughout the city decorations and lights had gone up, giving the nighttime skyline a very different feel. The cold night air did not seem to dissuade the crowds in downtown Freedom as people went about their holiday shopping; or taking in the various decorations throughout the city; or, of course, attending holiday parties. Just such an event was taking place this evening, at the very edge of Midtown. There, along 52nd Avenue, just across from Liberty Park, stood the mansion of the Midnight Society. Dozens of luxury cars and limousines were making their way into mansion’s grounds, delivering many of the richest and most powerful individuals in Freedom City to the Society’s annual holiday party. The massive mansion was set back from the street, with stone walls sheltering its grounds from the sidewalk. Just inside the walls were large trees that had long since shed their leaves, and well maintained lawns and hedges. A large circular driveway lead to the front of the old stone mansion, which had several towers and peaked roofs. To the right of the front of the mansion was the entrance to its gardens, which stretched around the building to continue on beyond. The large building, and many of the trees and hedges along the front of the building, had been tastefully decorated with lights for the season. Waiting along the circular driveway near the mansion’s main entrance were a number of uniformed valets, though they hardly had time to consider the cold air as they were busy opening the doors of limousines to assist their passengers, or parking cars driven by arriving guests. A couple of those valets moved up to a dark blue Bentley as it came to a stop in front of the mansion. As one moved to open the front passenger door, the other opened the rear passenger door, holding out his hand to assist the young female occupant to exit. Megan Howell shivered slightly as she left the warmth of her father’s car and stepped into the cold December air. The blonde young woman looked up at the old mansion, lit up by both the lights set up along its walls and those arrayed in the grounds in front of it. Megan had missed the holiday party last year, as she had been studying in England, and her family had decided to spend the holidays in Switzerland, and so she had simply gone to join them there instead of returning to the States. Though she had been to an event or two since, there was still something special about the holiday party that stood out from most any other of the Society’s events. The sounds of conversation and laughter drifted out into the night air from the mansion. She was dressed in a sleek black V neck sleeveless evening gown. The dress was perfectly tailored to her lithe and athletic body. Tonight she had her long hair up in a side chignon, and around her neck was a platinum chain from which hung a deep red ruby. In one hand Megan was holding a shopping bag, which held several unwrapped articles of clothing that her mother had purchased as part of the Society’s charity drive for numerous needy families in the city. Lowering her eyes from the sight of the mansion, the twenty-one year old moved near her mother, as her father came over to join them. Dressed in a dark green evening gown, with a slightly more conservative neckline, Erin Howell was carrying another shopping bag filled with clothing to be donated. Donald Howell, dressed in a tailored Italian suit, smiled at his daughter. "Are you ready Megan? Tonight you will not be able to avoid the business conversations all night." He asked as they started towards the door. Megan gave her father a slight smirk, thinking back to past events she had attended at the Society with her parents throughout the years, where she dreaded enduring endless business and political discussions, and always sought out ways to avoid them. "Dad, I think I knew full well what I would be getting into when I started towards my economics major." She then replied with a small smile. "But, I certainly plan to do more than just listen to business conversations." She then added, her smile growing a bit broader.
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Elsewhere Test Site I Freedom Hall Blue Jay woke up in a ditch, the smell of ashes in her mouth. She was in her costume and fully armed, the quiver at her back weighted with arrows. Raising her head, she found herself surrounded by a vision from Hell: a bombed out Freedom City laden with debris, ashes, and the broken remains of what once might have been bodies. She'd seen the effects of power pikes well enough to recognize their work. And there, screaming down from the sky like the armies of the damned, came the all-too-familiar sight of an Omegadrone troop carrier, big as a small jet liner but covered in the spikes and weapons she knew all too well. It roared overhead, antiproton engines screaming loud enough to nearly deafen her, and headed for what looked like Freedom Hall. Baxter awoke from a dream, and found himself in Hell. Bee-Keeper III felt the vibrations in his suit before he saw the ship come roaring down out of the sky; a monstrous vision of technological hell as it swooped overhead and plowed into a nearby street hard enough to rattle his teeth, careening along a street to plow into a nearby building. He noticed the apocalyptic surroundings next; the ruined Freedom Hall behind him, the smashed windows and fallen bodies of what looked like the aftermath of a grim and terrible battle here at the heart of Freedom City's heroing, and then finally what looked for all the world like a shattered city all around them. Jill O'Cure's eyes snapped open and she found herself in an empty hospital. She could tell that right away; the red, flickering emergency lights exposed a scene of wild chaos, torn and fallen beds and equipment in a mad jumble, but no sign of life, or death, for that matter. She knew this place, the waiting room of the clinic in City Center just down the street from Freedom Hall. She was in costume, not her scrubs, but before she could take further stock of the situation there was the brief scream of mighty engines and then a nearby BOOM, as if a plane had hit the ground just a few blocks away. Bones. Bones bones bones. Wander had seen plenty of those in her life, but the pile she was standing over was impressive. Smashed and broken, they were scattered over the front steps of the City Center Clinic like a child's much-abused toys. She could make out the familiar sight of skulls and other big bones, but these bones hadn't rested easy: something had disturbed the remains, if they'd come here first inside bodies. The ossurary at her feet was new; the burning city all around her wasn't. Suddenly, the familiar sight of an Omegadrone troop carrier roared overhead and disappeared over the nearest high-rise with a BOOM that shook the ground beneath her feet. When Harrier awoke, strapped into the recharging station of a heavy combat Omegadrone, Steve found himself frozen to the spot in the mortal terror of an awakened nightmare. He wasn't conscious of anything about his surroundings, only the sudden, horrible surety that his life was a dream and he was about to be taken away and dissected by the Physician. WAKEUPWAKEUPWAKEUPWAKEUPWAKEUP-the crash interrupted his frenzied mental shouts and tore him loose from the station, sending him bowled end over end against a hard steel wall before he realized the ship had crashed and that he was all alone inside it. Taking a moment to steel himself, and think of Gina, the Omegadrone chose to meet his fate head-on: armored up, he blasted out the nearest hatch and burst forth onto a murdered Freedom City street. It wasn't so strange, really, he'd seen many of those in his time. He distantly saw an armored figure in yellow and black nearby, and moved towards him with pike raised defensively.
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January 2013 Outside Heesterstadt (formerly Branson), Missouri It was raining when the Wonderbus arrived, a thick, icy-cold storm of freezing rain that would have surely been a blizzard had the weather been any warmer. Warm and insulated through the dimensional craft was, it wasn't hard to feel the chill outside. The bus had folded its way through space and time to come rumbling out onto a deserted stretch of concrete road by a grim, grey lake that might possibly have been more attractive in the spring. As it was, the whole world was grey and brown: the city across the lake, what was Branson on another world, was almost lost beneath the heavy fog which swaddled the area. Shifting his clothing over to the bland, servile pattern his counterpart had worn, Sharl peered through the front windows, just able to make out tall concrete towers and a massive, hovering flag projected against the clouds from the city below like a massive old-style holographic billboard. It was grim. "Everybody get changed," he said, calling back to the passenger compartment as he reached down to turn on the conventional gasoline engine. "The Tronik base is about five miles up this road! We're turning around..." He muttered a bad word in Lor, trying to remember how to work these stupid controls. With all the worries about fighting Nazis and transdimensional technology, maybe he hadn't paid enough attention to how to drive a stupid four-wheeled, rubber-tired bus! Why can't they just use antigravs like civilized people?
