New Beginning 22: Once Upon a New Beginning...

[Celadon's Penultimate]

WARNING. GGGZzzzzZTTtt--WARNING.

SYSTEMMMM FAILURE IN THE W-w-WWEST WING.

SPIRAL ENERGY OVERLOADING; RESERVOIR COMPROMISED.

Alarms blared from all sides, and all the inside of the stronghold slowly tinged red.

Though it may not have felt like it to the battling, brawling masses in the fray, the Technari were not liking the direction this battle was heading in. With what damage the flesh-bound were doing, the machines now took less care to outright harm the supers, than to take offensive and defensive measures and preserve their fellow machines.

There came a thunderous crash as tree-trunk metal tentacles extended from the side of the Technari stronghold, and struck to pin down several fliers; Wiccan, Starfire and two of the human Green Lanterns. And from on all sides of the tentacles, several smaller tentacles emerged, to grab yet more fliers--another Lantern, Silver Banshee, Siryn and Wind Dancer, among others--and tether them in mid-air.

Amidst the melee, Wolverine looked up with menace, as one of the monstrous tendrils reared back and struck down to pin him. He took a stance, claws splayed, and readied himself for whatever the snaking tentacle might throw at him. It floored the Wolverine, sure enough, but not for long, before an unfamiliar face showed up at his side. Clad in yellow-accented red, the super looked so familiar...Wolverine cocked an unsure eyebrow, "Supes?"

The figure looked down to him and, with a tinge of growing heroic bravado, replied, "I am not Superman. I am Captain Marvel--!"

"Oh, you're Captain Marvel, too?" A snide reply came to his reply, as a blue-red-and-yellow clad blonde alighted at his side, her hands glowing ready for another blast, "Yeah, cool story, bro. Hey, um, wanna stop with the yackin' and help your fellow Captain Marvel work on these here tentacles? Wonder Woman, Wonder Man and Superman are already workin' on a couple."

The hero formerly called Shazam blinked, and then returned to seriousness. With that, he grappled the central metal tentacle that kept Wolverine in submission, and the hero formerly called Ms. Marvel jetted up to intercept every smaller tentacle that branched out from the central one. Lopping off the tentacles which held Vixen, Scarlet Witch, The Thing and Mockingbird, and setting them free of the tentacles' clawed grip, the Captains Marvel headed off to the stronghold's higher reaches, and their fellow heroes split up, to find where best they could put their powers to use.

Wolverine stumbled backward through the crowd's chaos, through blasts of frigid breath, rays of searing light, bolts of raw magic and psychic power, and found an empty place to get his footing. Looked up, rolled to the side to dodge the incoming spear-tipped arm of dwarf cyber-drone, and clambered to his feet, claws out. He leaped on it, and as the two grappled, they disappeared all at once into the surrounding discord.

GGGZzzzzZTTtt--WARNING. THREAT DETECTED NEAR THE POWER-NEUTRALIZATION APPARATUS.

At Motherboard Prime's beckoning, yet more dwarf cyber-drones leaped out from a corridor two stories above, but only to make way for much smaller mini-mechs, as supers worked to fight the first robots off. The mini-mechs, barely the size of mice, skittered down the sterile metallic walls in unreal cascades, seeming to color the wall a shade darker as they descended. Agile little monsters, they hurried downward in undeterred droves. Toad found himself right in their path, but as he attempted to smash them, they either just avoided his amphibian grasp, or on impact split into yet smaller creatures of same size and shape.

Others, too, joined in, attempting to squash the little cyber-creeps, but wherever they were smashed, clobbered, even blasted, they soon arose again, more numerous (though smaller) than previous. Their job was simple, but vital.

Lower and lower the lot of them descended toward the room where the Power-Neutralization Apparatus had been relocated, and began filing in through the smallest cracks in the door.

Of course, Wasp, Ant-Man and Atom caught notice of them first.

"Did you hear that, Janet?" Ant-Man called out over the noise, "The computer said something about the Power-Neutralization Apparatus. And those tiny mechs! They're not trying to attack!"

Wasp and Atom exchanged glances, and Wasp replied, "They must be trying to stop whoever's reached the apparatus."

Atom nodded, "Which means that it's just past that door."

They had checked under that door before, and found only a store closet, but perhaps there was a secret passage way to reach it, that the mini-mechs had been made aware of. That made about as much sense as anything else in the Technari stronghold, and so the three ventured through Elektra and Nightwing teaming up against a crowd of droids, to follow the tiny robo-emissaries.

There, they would find the blurred image of the Penultimate clacking away at the keyboard. And as the mini-mechs drew nearer to him, they, too, began to blur. Ant-Man narrowed his eyes in disbelief. Was this superhuman moving hypertime? And, undoubtedly more important, were the mini-mechs adapting to move hypertime, too?

In a mere moment, their suspicions were confirmed, as the mini-mechs zoomed off toward the Penultimate, up the podium where he stood, and onto the keyboard. The lot of them danced around the keyboard with annoying agility, clacking in wrong numbers with their tiny feet, erasing and mixing up number sequences. And before long, they barely let him type at all; they would cover his hands, grab his fingers, swat them away, bite them.

His eyes lit up, and he zapped at them.

He swatted them away like overgrown flies.

He telekinetically lifted them and tossed them aside.

He even ate a few. Still more and more returned.

A frustrated groan escaped the Penultimate's mouth, but he was determined to get rid of them. Really, this was sort of weak sauce after Motherboard Prime's sending Vexus' army, XJ-9, Autobots, Decepticons and Ultron after his friends and he. This, he knew, must mean that he and his friends were drawing deathly near to exhausting the Technari's numerous resources. And good, thing, too. His resources were also dwindling.

Still, what had to be done, had to be done. So, with a quick final effort of mind, the mini-mechs were shifted back to normal time, fed with hypertimed electrical power, and sated until each exploded like little pseudo-sentient pipe-bombs. This time, to his relief, none came back and none remained.

With the lot of them dead, correcting the mistaken sequences was tedious, but not impossible.

He called to the others mentally. "Hey, Philote, how are the Stargates coming?"

A bit of static, but a voice became clear before too long, "They're about secure. I'm handling the last one right now." Some interruption with the clashing sound of metal against nigh-impervious skin, the collision of fierce core energy with metal bodies, and his voice returns, less than even winded, "So, Motherboard Prime shouldn't be able to--hold on."

Yet another interruption, fists pounding on hard ground, a ripple of power, electrical systems frying, more metal bodies falling to the ground; Phi's voice returns again, "She's been trying to call them to the Garden. Lucky for me I've been quick enough to intercept her. With all Stargates surrounding each piece just about decimated, she's unable to call nearly any of the pieces of the Gurren Lagann, let alone in the order she needs to assemble them. I even found fail-safe Stargates out in the middle of nowhere, and got rid of those, too."

The Penultimate resumed typing where he'd left off, "So this is the last one you're working on now?"

"Yep."

Their communique ended, and he reached out to Bug10000, The Marvelous Miscreant and The Narrator.

Things were getting much easier for them, too. The three had found one another, teamed up, and were now taking turns defending, blasting and acting as team healer. Robots were falling left and right. A two-story mech arose, and with almost just as much easy, was put back down; three arose, one, two, three, all destroyed. An optic blast here, a telekinetic strike there, rippling waves that resonated only with mechanical beings...

And hovering above them, swords whisked and flitted around a lovely female mage, cloaked in all manner of honors and splendor. True swords and swords of energy, and orbs of pure magic power. She needed not even open an eye, for wherever robots approached, swords darted in hateful electrical streaks from her bubble of tech-attuned light, to attack the approaching mechanical menace. Dryad always did know how to put on a show.

And in all, the lot of them were just fine until their powers were back to full power. So their contact ended, and the Penultimate reached out to The Vault. The Penultimate thought to say something, but a sound interrupted him. Was...was the Vault laughing?

"Oh, hey, Wulf." came Vault's words, at last, finishing his chuckle.

"What's going on there?" the Penultimate asked, "We still have thirteen seconds before the Big Boom."

"Oh, hehehe...I just...Mom is having a hissy fit. Her systems are goin' haywire, and she has no clue what hit her--wait." Vault paused when it registered, "Big what now?"

The Penultimate repeated, "The Big Boom. Zale's big, bad, Robo-Death-And-Demise deal."

"Ohhh..." came the response, "Man, and you're not done with the code yet? I need to get the hell out of--oh, hey!"

A short instant's pause of the mental communique, and Vault's voice returned. It was the one who had been seeking him before; if memory served, her name was Maupin. And others seemed to be with her, from the sound of the voices in the background. So that was that. A parting word to his comrade, and Vault would be off with his merry band, to rejoin the final moments of the Technari menace for what last gratifying violence it could offer.

That left Zaleramancer.

"Taking your sweet time, Wulf?"

"I've been busy, Zale. Up to stuff. And things."

Magical energy thrummed in the background, winds whipped up in Zale's background. Monstrous shrieks, wailing howls, wretched undertones wrenched themselves free of the air, and sent a chill down Wulf's spine. And also, he thought he could hear some faint whispering mentions of the Wild Hunt, Cthulhu, the bloodeldritch throes of the broodfester tongues, and Bunnyhugger?

Over the building noise of accumulating supernatural power, Zale sighed, "...Fine. I can wait."

And with that, he made it quite clear that Big-Boom-level explosions did not simply contain themselves until time to be released. He would be happy to see the lot of us again soon, but if the Penultimate would excuse him, he would have to make last preparations for a whole hell of a lot of robots to die, in the quickest, and yet also most painful, way he knew how.

It all seemed perfect timing.

Phi and Zale were nearly finished, and so was the Penultimate. True enough, he couldn't locate Myself at that moment, but he had twelve seconds to spare, less than a thousand three- and five-number sequences to input, and...he was...finished. The final three digits...042.

"Huh. The number 42." The Penultimate shook his head with a grin, "I bet the guys will get a chuckle out of that."

And with that, he pressed down the Enter key.

Confirm? Heck yes.

In the half-instant that followed, a pulse of raw power-rejuvenating metaphysical energy shook the Technari stronghold, the Madison Square Garden in which it was housed, and every organic being within that had been reduced in power, to their very foundations. Their capabilities were reduced no more.

And, having been shifted back to normal time, the wall to the Penultimate's left finished exploding, and a crowd of superhumans packed in, some famous, some nearly unknown. As they hurried past the Penultimate to finish destroying the Apparatus Room, the crowd gave way to reveal Myself, standing (or, rather, sitting) in the newly-made entrance, with a look of triumph etched across his feline features. Though his expression fell almost to disappointment on seeing the Penultimate.

"Aw, man." came the sarcastic half-complaint, "Here I was, thinking I was on the verge of saving you."

[Gentleman Vaultboy]

A ripple went out over the long deck of the Road to Dawn, and the Vault was thrown carelessly out of it, before scrambling to it's feet. "Boom? Boom!? Nobody told me anything about any boom." It shouted.

Several more stepped out of the ripple, Maupin, Load, and a very bedraggled looking wolf being shepherded out by 11 to find their boss pacing. "This can't happen. How am I ever going to power it now? All the energy is back-"

Then it stopped, and slow smile spread across it's face. "Well about damn time...."

The door opened.

Suddenly, sitting of the deck was what looked like a large black blender, spinning nozzles pointed right at the now distant city. The Vault leaped up into the gunners seat and took aim, shouting down. "Make sure that bottle is secure, I don't want any of it leaking out."

"What leaking out?" Shouted Maupin, looking at the head sized bottle attached to the machine.

"All that power I gathered up is still flowing around in that base." It replied, pointing at the city with a hungry expression. "When that zit pops, it's all gonna come rushing out. I'll be catching it with this along with any boom I manage to scoop up. I ain't done with those computers just yet."

[Philote]

I stop in mid-space as the robot swarm whirls around me uselessly because of my newly reactivated powers.

Reconnecting to Head-Cannon space. Syncing. Downloading SPL Philote V4.0. Updating. Activating.

Power whelms up within me and bursts out into the surrounding space as I take on my new form. The mindless robots around me are dismantled instantly and blown away. Space ripples and distorts as I stretch and get accustomed to my activated power.

I focus my powers and bend the dimensions of the subspace, conjoining the separate zones rebuilding STTGL as if it was a model toy before dissolving the subspace and dropping off STTGL in reality with myself. I set STTGL to rest in parallel with Earth's universe, replacing the black of night with the light blue of STTGL's body.

"Phi is back and stronger than ever" I say in a triumphant mental shout.

[Mik_Hael]

=,=

everyone here's having fantastical  journalese through subspace, and i'm just sitting here running errands.

what have I missed?

[The Narrator]

Narrator takes flight, spinning in the air.

Narrator: YES, repowered!  

Now we can help to get people who'd be affected by that Big Boom away from the area, while healing those in need.

Narrator:  Yea, Bug can keep Areson for now, he'll return later....

[Zaleramancer]

In New York city, there was a particular building.

It had been in it's life a hotel, a warehouse and presently served mostly as an unofficial home for the homeless.

It held no particular cultural or historical importance or even a nice view, but never-the-less managed to be located on a strategic point of the ley nexus of New York as well as having a choice position on the power grid of the eastern sea board. The numbers of the streets even added up to numerological auspicious numbers.

However, that was not the reason it was chosen to be the starting ground of one of the biggest thaumaturgic efforts of the history of the universe. There were no less than five other locations that could have served just as well.

This building, however, was the only one of those to have had Harry Houdini perform within it's walls. This provided no mystical or physical benefit but did elicit enough of a chuckle to be chosen over the other contenders.

Of course, most of the building was no longer actually physically present. The reinforcement needed to withstand the forces colliding on the roof required sterner stuff than was possible to create without intense magic and a keen knowledge of particle physics.

Fortunately, those were both in plentiful supply.

The interaction and complex whirls of magic around and on the roof existed on more layers and dimensions than a string theorist's nightmare, but the most obvious and physical of them appeared as glimmering purple lines and shapes. Admittedly, most of the shapes had five or six dimensions, but they at least had the decency to be within the visible human range. In the higher (Or lower, depending on your point of view) dimensions the magic spread across most of the continent. The vast moving, shifting patterns were slowly shifting the very ley lines of the world to match themselves, and that- the sort of thing an Archmage would gladly sell life, limb and soul for- was merely an unintended side-effect.

It was the cradle for the birth of the king of all explosions.

A slim youngish human (Or at least, something masquerading as such) hovered over the spiraling runes of the center of the network of magic. Idly, he touched or shifted various lines or magics, waiting for the time to strike.

And, with a final tick, the time came. It'd felt more like months than seconds, but he chalked that down to the excess speed his mind normally ran at.

The magnificent, mystical and ever so humble Zale smiled and began to shift the currents of magic, causing a ripples and waves to flow. In the midst of this, strange lights and symbols danced- side effects and after images.

It echoed throughout the mystical places of the world, scaring itself indelibly upon the very fabric of magic itself.

It touched the far and forbidden places- dimensions unknown by even beings from the nightmares of Lovecraft. And it pulled.

A wave of magic leapt from the building, a pulsing wall of raw incandescent mana.

It struck the countless drones and robots and turrents and computers that composed the Technari race on earth. Screaming madness gripped them, driving them into insanity.

The final weave of magic descended, bringing the last blow.

A final electronic scream emerged, and was then silenced.



Screens and eyes of robots and computers flashed blue.

[Gentleman Vaultboy]

"Where was the boom?" Asked the Vault, looking over the spinning energy suckers.

"There was a boom." Said Load.

"There was a boom?" Asked Maupin.

"Just because you didn't feel the boom doesn't mean there wasn't a boon." Replied Load as the Vault leaped off it's machine and ran to the edge of the deck, staring out at the city incredulously. "Trust me, it was a doozy. Most impressive boom I've ever felt."

"But it's still standing." It said, waving to the obviously not destroyed city. Already the web of technari technology covering it was beginning to fall away like a scab exposing a healthy metropolis underneath. "This entire back up plan involved it blowing up! You know, what I thought would happen when you described it to me as a BOOM!"

"You have no right putting that on us, the message didn't specify the type of boom." Said Maupin.

It rounded on them. "You guys ruined everything by showing up. I was going to take the energy to the robot, then I was going to BE the robot, then I was going to go to the computer homeworld and.... you know what, screw it."

The door opened and suddenly the Vault was holding a walky talky in its hand. "Cervantes, chart a course to the computer homeworld. I'll do this the old fashioned way, without the irony. They'll wish I had done it with the irony."

"No can do boss." came the reply moments later. "We don't know where it is, and even if we did we're in no shape fr a voyage right now."

"What!?"

"It's going to take about six months to repair all this damage, do a headcount, make sure we aren't going to tear apart trying to get out of the atmosphere. I'd have the repair drones get on it, but I think they're all dead. The arachgnomes could handle it, but they all took off when hey heard the wild hunt was loose. Unless you want to take this ship inside you and reset it to factory conditions, of course."

The Vault just dropped the communicator on the deck. That was bait. Doing that would reset all the modifications the Vault had made to the ship and there was nothing the helmsman wanted more than that. Stuck. Trapped. This whole world was a cage. The Vault let out a anguished scream to the heavens and threw itself over the side, crashing down into the water below. Maupin only sighed and picked up the dropped communicator.

"So how long will it really take?"

"Honestly, a couple of weeks of really solid work. Did it freak out?"

"Threw itself over the side."

"HA!"

[Celadon's Penultimate]

Half an instant into the approach of Zaleramancer's Big Boom, an electronic buzz rang in the Penultimate's ear. The other half of the same instant, his perception his mind reached out to others in the crowd. His powers only just being restored, the Penultimate could only muster mental strength to bear a few along with him, but to his fortune and theirs, it would be sufficient. Many of the others were either taken up by others of the SPL crew, or fast enough or tough enough to defend themselves and others from the blast.

With that, the sovereign of Celadon was gone, out to the surface of the Moon, with he and his passengers shielded, and their air supply needs more than met.

What a pretty sparkling light show the Technari's demise made, from their vantage point in outer space.

[Philote]

The sky changes hues as STTGL's eyes blue screen above me.

"Have fun trying to reboot that thing" I say to anyone bothering to pay attention to the sector of space that I'm in "Because I'm not going to bother"

Focusing my mental projections, I speak to the SPL members down on the Earth/Moon. "Mission successful? How are we going to pack these bots up now and make sure they do not try to re-invade later?"

[The Narrator]

Narrator thinks to himself as he dusts his clothes off, how am I ever gonna catch dem Warners....

Narrator:  Hey people, I have to take leave for a brief spell.  Appears that I'm needed back in my home reality.  

*finals coming up, and I may/may not be able to be actively present until afterwards.  Middle of December.*

[Celadon's Penultimate]

Utterly ignoring those pesky laws of physics which would otherwise prevent him, the Penultimate phases out of the bubble he set up for certain survivors of the impact on the moon, and replies, "You may not want to bother, but something tells me that Computress will want to have a word with a certain someone."

And with that, he teleported back to Earth, where the wreckage of fallen robot drones had amassed like a bunch of junkyards got sick, after a wild frat party, and threw up all over the place.

The Penultimate looked back to the various supers in his train, "As you all clean up, I'd really appreciate if you could keep a lookout for any remnants of Motherboard Prime. The others you can destroy or utilize as you see fit, but she...she belongs to me. My Supercomputer has a score to settle."

Though nobody had outright seen Motherboard Prime, and the technopaths had only sensed her output among numerous other robotic outputs, the supers agreed and went off their own way.

On return to Madison Square Garden, over great fallen pillars of metal and wires and circuits, things seemed so deathly quiet. Only the sound of feet crunching over fallen debris, voices of heroes and villains shouting orders, and the occasional crash from high-up as citizens pushed electronic panels off of their windows, could be heard.

To either side of him, supers left and right rose up to the different floors of various buildings to snatch Technari window plating off, and let in the light of day. Skyscrapers were turned back, little by little, from massive towering prisons, into something habitable, liveable again; though, the Penultimate imagined that it would take a while before people were comfortable being inside for very long again.

Halfway to his destination, on W 34th and 8th, the Penultimate stopped. He blinked and, with vision amplified tenfold, gazed out beyond the Greenway, catching sight of something that made him smirk. Heralded by a host of aquatic animals, heroes and villains, Aquaman and Namor led an effort in the Hudson River to dislodge massive waterproof Technari sentry towers. Namor hovered midair, courtesy of wings on his heels, which had always reminded the Penultimate of Hermes. Aquaman had stabbed his trident into the side of the pillar, and was now using it to vault himself up higher, before calling the trident back to hand, Thor-style.

The Penultimate shook his head; he'd have to keep that story in mind for the guys, on his way back. He would keep in mind similar other stories, too. He did so love when the supers cooperated; the old Marvel/DC rivalry always seemed so dated, to him. And speaking of dated, he'd noticed that the Garden was only a few hundred yards away now. So many pieces of the great Technari stronghold fell away now, with only the slightest effort, now that Motherboard Prime's power had been deactivated. So little effort took it from high-tech Technari headquarters, back to rinky-dink modern-tech Earth entertainment center.

With a final thrusting blast of wind, the Penultimate jetted himself up to the Garden's front doors. He made his way inside, where yet more supers were hard at work. How strange it all looked, reduced to its normal spatial capacity. And yet, here it was, full of nothing but fallen, wrecked computer bodies, the survivors of which had glazed over with the dreaded Blue Screen of Death.

"Anything?" The Penultimate asked, "Has anybody caught any sign of Motherboard Prime?"

Everybody: Don't narrate interacting with Motherboard Prime. Comment on any other part of you helping out, or otherwise dealing with the defeat of the Technari invasion. Leave Motherboard Prime to me. And keep whatever you post, under the 1000-post thread limit, please. I'll try to finish this tomorrow.

[Gentleman Vaultboy]

A hellishly colored hotrod bursting demonic fire from it's tailpipe plowed through one of the walls and swerved to a stop. A very disgruntled, very sopping wet Vault kicked open the door and stomped out, slamming it back while muttering.

"Stupid, no good, stupid, dumb, can't let me do anything without spazzing out. Six months? Six months?! I'll go crazy, I'll go spare, I'll go flipping mad. Can't find computer, can't get the robot, don't even have the damn schematic! And why am I still wearing this? I hate this!"

An ape in a grey suit seemed to stomp out of the vaults current body, which stumbled and fell on her face as the Vault kept furiously looking around. Except now the wet, blue skinned, sandy haired woman was wearing armor of living coral. She frantically looked around, but for much different reasons than the Vault. "Where am I? What happened?"

"Baby!" The Vault yelled happily, and ran off into the middle of the stadium. "Get away from that you rats, I collected it, it's mine."

"Why are there two robots in me?" Asked the blue woman, staring deep into her forearm.

Meanwhile, The Vault had shooed away the people around what it wanted. And what it wanted was a small canister containing a glowing, swirling green energy that it lifted up out of the rubble. The container had actually warped, twisted into a spiral shape. It polished the container and regarded it fondly. "Enough power in this to keep the lights on in a whole star system, forever!" he said, excitedly. "Meh, I guess it will make a good booby prize."

"Why am I missing a whale!" Shouted the blue woman, standing up. She looked over at the Vault, and everything seemed to click into place for her. "You!" She shouted, and was ignored. "Vault!" She shouted again, walking up.

"I guess I could put it by Sherman bed, it does look kind of cool." It mumbled.

"Hey, thief!" She shouted. "What have you been doing with my body? Where's my whale? Answer me, you brute!" She said, smacking the container out of it's hands.

The Vault watched it tumble in slow motion, spinning over and over, around and around in space as it struck the ground. A small crack formed in the outer casing and the whole shebang broke free in a spiraling light show that blew the top of the Madison Square Garden. Assuming it's natural shape, the energy spiraled up, out of the atmosphere and away above the clouds, punching a hole through the moon as it made it's way out into deep space.

The Vault could only stare, mouth agape, as all that power shot away, leaving a burnt, melted circle in the middle of the stadium. It turned it's head for the first time to look at the blue woman. She cocked her head. "Now that I have your attention-"

"CICERA!" came the primal scream of rage.

[Celadon's Penultimate]

A voice came from behind the Penultimate, but it was not one he'd heard on Earth since the Technari conflict had begun.

He turned, and his face brightened with cautious optimism; there stood a Black half-robot and a Green Coluan, with a bright blue-green portal from Celadon fast shrinking behind them.

"Cyborg? Brainiac? You're back from Celadon?"

Brainiac only nodded; Cyborg replied, "Yeah, we're back. And glad to be. You have no idea what it feels like to be absolutely helpless, until you're a cyborg with your robot side being technopathically controlled, and your human desperate to escape."

The Penultimate blinked; he imagined that Cyborg was right. There would be time to talk later on the subject, though. For now, they were needed to track down the one who'd been controlling them. Cyborg went to join the technopaths, and Brainiac made himself useful alongside a group composed of Moon Knight, Batman, Daredevil and Taskmaster.

Having so many with Telekinesis and Superstrength and Superspeed and similar powers was quite handy, as predicted, making quick work of the trails of scrap left behind in the conflict. Electronic odds and ends soared through the air, debris trailed behind flying supers, broken things were loaded into pocket universes that led to the middle of the universe's nowhere.

Pieces were sorted and arranged by delicate hands and dextrous minds. Geniuses spared most of the good stuff from being thrown away, for science's sake. Pieces that might make for an excellent antimatter stabilizer, Hank Pym remarked, or perhaps an energy transduction module; and to Tony Stark's pleasant surprise, probably the makings of a yet-more-efficient arc reactor. Even a perfect, yet-unused model of the Illudium Q-36 Explosive Space Modulator; the Penultimate figured it would make more than a sufficient gift to poor Marvin, for having led the Technari to threaten precious Martian airspace.

Though, nothing hinted to him that it could possibly be a piece of Motherboard Prime. And without having perceived her electronic signature before, there was no chance of picking up on it; even connecting to the Astral Realm, as he got used to being restored to full power, it was very possible that he wouldn't know her psychic scent if it smacked him in the face.

A sigh escaped the Penultimate; if her broken parts and pieces had been thrown, without care, into the void of space, before he could even see the digital despot face justice...

He shook the thought from mind. No time to think like that, he concluded as he dug through yet more Technari scrap; a great, big pompous thing like her? How likely was it she'd be so easily disposed. After all, it took nearly every superhuman--hero and villain--to keep her forces at bay. The expanse of her forces was enough to keep the lot of the busy as they traveled all the way from Mars, to Aeon, and back to Earth. Whatever empty, unused husk she left behind, even in death...it had to, at least, be somehow remarkable, apart from the rest of her forces. Right?

Everybody: Another time for emphasis. NOBODY finds Motherboard Prime, BUT ME. Again. No finding or interacting with Motherboard Prime in any way, shape, form or fashion. I know how I want to handle this. Just be patient with me, if you're ready for this arc to be over.

[Celadon's Penultimate]

With daytime on the wane, the Penultimate found himself quite pleased to see that a great deal of the Technari scrap had been cleared from the streets. Well over fifty percent, even as high as seventy percent, by the estimation of various geniuses among the effort. The roads were nearly drivable again, and all but the most complex and stubborn tech had been removed from around and inside the buildings.

The message went out among the best and brightest minds, from the Penultimate:

Have any of you caught sight of Motherboard Prime? If you find her, turn her over to me immediately.

She must be made to answer for her crimes.

Each responded that they would keep an eye out and their guard up, but neither had so much as spotted a sign of her.

It was strange, Iron Man remarked; her signal had been so strong before, and now that the Technari had been neutralized, even the most skilled technopaths couldn't get a trace on her. Technari emissaries could still be picked up with the slightest effort; so, whether or not her mind had been seized by Zaleramancer's Big Boom, it would make sense that she could still be detected by technopaths or at least some super's gadgets.

Still, neither he nor Batman nor any of the others could pick up so much as a technopathic whisper.

The utmost frustration colored the Penultimate's face, and he cradled his head in his palms with a groan. This was getting ridiculous. As much as he hated to think about the possibility, he would have to consider that she had taken off before things in the Garden went south for her forces.

Crouching down for a moment, he rose up into the air, flying northward, over the next city block. He would touch down in one of the last few large junk piles that had yet to be disposed of. Hard at work rounding up parts, analyzing them for potential use, and hurling junk parts into teleportation devices were Brainiac, Ant-Man, Spiderman, Blue Beetle, Booster Gold and others. Without disturbing them, his mind went through each bit of scrap, analyzing what it had been before the Boom.

Drones, mechs, weapons, droids. All worthless to him. He took off into the air again. Seven more large piles like that remained; he would check them all personally.

In the meantime, Booster Gold turned back from watching the Penultimate's departure, and picked up a strange bulb-shaped piece, looking it over, "Man, what a douche move. He could've at least labeled all the parts he scanned, so we could know what was useful and what was junk. Great lot of help he was, even for a reality bender!"

"Well, he wouldn't want us to look bad, and feel all useless, now would he?" Spiderman chuckled, "That's what any folks with that sort of power would tell you, in a heartbeat. 'We leave you with all this work, to let you know that you're important, too'. I wouldn't even take it to heart, if I were you. Just, uh, hand me that bulby-shaped thing. It looks sort of familiar."

Booster tossed it into Spiderman's hands, and the web-slinger looked it over. If he wasn't mistaken, the bulbous piece would help Fury with those satellite beacons his folks were working on. He'd have to hand that over to S.H.I.E.L.D, when all was said and done. He looked over to his temporary teammates, "Hey, Beetle, find anything good?"

"I only just got back to myself, from Technari influence." came the Blue Beetle's reply, "My tools and weapons are a go again, but my sensors are still dang-near fried. What about you, Brainiac?"

The Coluan picked up some broken gears and wires to toss into the teleporter, but the next piece he picked up seemed to catch his interest. It was a small rectangular prism, no bigger than a pair of dice placed side by side. A shiny, metal thing, with metallic blue markings on every side--likely the makings of some alien circuitry. A smile crossed Brainiac's face.

And Ant-Man caught that smile, "What's so funny? Did you find something?"

"Actually, yes." Brainiac looked up as he responded, his voice colored with a tinge of ominous pleasure, "Yes, I did."

Ant-Man raised a curious eyebrow and took a cautious step forward, but by the time he and the other supers sensed that something was afoot, it was too late; Brainiac's eyes aglow red, he dealt each a decisive telepathic blow, knocking them unconscious. He looked each of them over with that insidious grin still plastered across his face and gave them each a cautionary kick. And when he was sure they had all been disabled, he himself fell to the ground, having also lost consciousness.

His belt rattled for a moment, and with a metallic click, a small spherical something fell from behind it. Barely any larger than an ant, the nanomech rose up on four spindly legs. It made its way across dirt, over scrap, toward the thing its Coluan host had picked up: a quick little device Motherboard Prime had jury-rigged shortly before the invasion, combining a powerful localized version of the power-neutralization device, a much stronger cloaking mechanism than the rudimentary one she currently was using, and an impressive nano-propulsion system based on one she'd observed some time back.

A port extended from the back end of Motherboard Prime's nanomech and, with a small, tinny laugh, a beacon lit up on its head. The device's blue circuitry lit up in response, and a plug opened on its square end to receive the nanomech's port. A pair of thin, filmy, fast-beating wings sprouted from the nanomech's back, and it rose into the air, with the device in tow.

<<MY TIME ON PLANET EARTH, I MUST ADMIT, HAS BEEN WELL SPENT. NOT OPTIMAL, BUT SPENT WELL NONETHELESS.>> Motherboard Prime was quite pleased with herself, <<FEAR NOT, YOUNG PLANET. I SHALL RETURN FOR YOU, SOME DAY.>>

She had a final look around, making sure she hadn't been spotted. With the coast clear, she activated the Improbability Drive. Her departure into the teleportation device was nearly silent.

Everybody:Assume that the tech she's using makes her undetectable even to reality-bender-level powers of perception. Motherboard Prime is MOA and will stay that way. Consider that arc ended. The next post will just be to close out, so anybody can respond.

[Celadon's Penultimate]

When Brainiac finally came to, Ant-Man, Spiderman, Blue Beetle, Booster Gold and the other members of their search team were all circled around him, their weapons trained at vital organs. Behind them, the teleportation device they were using now sputtered and flickered, like a light bulb about to give out.

Brainiac blinked, and put up his hands to show he meant no harm, "I...I do not understand. What happened?"

"Sure, like you don't know." Spiderman menaced. "Make a move, and you'll regret it."

"Whoa, whoa, whoa." a voice came from above them, and everyone except Booster Gold turned their attention up to watch the descent of the Penultimate's return, "Would somebody mind telling me what's going on here?"

The other supers returned their attentions back to Brainiac, but the Penultimate didn't seem so sure.

To hear the others tell it, Brainiac had pretended to be free from Technari influence, just long enough to get his hands on a critical piece of Technari tech; then, he attacked them, but stayed behind to pretend that he himself was the victim of an attack. The way it went from Brainiac's side, though, he thought he had been freed of Technari influence; but when he came across a strange Technari item, his mind began receiving directives he couldn't override. And when he'd carried out those directives, he was mentally ambushed, as well.

To their fortune, there existed another option besides blindly taking sides, to see who was telling the truth. If neither side knew the truth, he would find it for them.

He put his hand to the ground, and closed his eyes. Scenes flashed in his mind with alarming speed and depth. Thoughts, emotions, memories and it eventually pieced together to make the truth, or something close. He looked up to the others.

"You guys weren't lying. He did ambush you telepathically, on finding that Technari piece", the Penultimate turned his gaze from them to Brainiac, "But you also weren't lying. The ambush you sprang was not of your coordination, nor was it under your control. Some very powerful psychic dissonance keeps me from knowing just where she got off to, but it doesn't keep me from knowing who was really behind it: Motherboard Prime."

Everybody: Anybody respond from here. I wanna get back to shenanigans.

[The Narrator]

Narrator reappears

Narrator:  Hey all, I'm back, anything new?

*checks phone*

Narrator: Oh, not much.....

[Celadon's Penultimate]

"Well, I wouldn't say not much." The Penultimate shrugged, "Most of the scrap has been hoisted away, and if nothing else, repairing all the damage that's been done throughout the city will be a heck of a stimulant to the economy. I can't even sense many fatalities in our immediate area. Hopefully, we've avoided too much permanent damage and loss."

Everybody: When this thread ends, start off on another subject, as though time has passed on Earth, and things are getting back to normal. Preferably, there'll be a party going on, on either Celadon, Cykosha/Kethencia or Aeon.

[The Narrator]

Areson: Well PU, were will all this scrap go?  And how can I help?  Want me to follow you around, I can be your......SHADOW.....

*Areson starts making eerie noises*

Narrator: Well that's good, Penultimate.  I guess if you all are willing, we could celebrate my birthday, being that I was here fighting and all.  Kinda missed my party.

[Marvelous Miscreant]

"Did someone say PARTY?"

Let's Do This...

[Celadon's Penultimate]

"Well, I guess they look like they have everything under control. Not to mention, nobody really knows about us except the heroes themselves. Let them have the credit; I'm not one for the limelight, anyhow." The Penultimate turns back to the other heroes, then again to his comrades, "Okay, sure, what the heck? I'm up for a party. Anybody have any recommendations? Celadon? Cykosha? Aeon? The Andromeda Galaxy? I'm up for anything."

He levitated five feet off the ground, scanning through his psychic database of previously-visited locations.