Official RP Thread: The Evolutionist's Stone

[Celadon's Penultimate]

As he looked out over his territory, grumbling angrily, he heard footsteps approaching.

"Who the hell is that?" Caleb didn't even bother to look behind him.

"Uh, uh, it's me...bro," his half-brother stammered, looking around nervously, hoping Caleb wouldn't call for his goons like he had before, "Dane?"

"Oh, you. What the hell you doin' up here?" Caleb demanded without the slightest implication that he actually cared, "Beat your last video game?"

"Uh, dude, I'm outta weed. And I guess I need some sunlight. Or moonlight, whatever. So, uh...whatcha up to, Trey?" Dane asked, looking down and fumbling through his pocket for something to eat.

"Don't call me Trey. And go back to your...room, if that's what you call that disaster area. I got stuff to do, freakin' stoner."

Dane shrugged and turned around to head back to his room, pulling out a granola bar from his pocket, and chomping it with delight.

Caleb turned back finally and watched in disgust as his brother walked away. What a slob. Damn junkie, Caleb thought to himself, how did he get stuck with such a totally idiotic, irresponsible and useless jackass of a half-brother? Luckily, his mother Samantha Trelaine realized what a loser Dane was, too, and left the territory to Caleb when she "died". Dane was loveable (in that brotherly, "I fake-hate you", "mistreat each other on a normal basis, but stand up for each other when it counts" kind of way), but totally useless for anything other than carrying out Caleb's dirty work, getting into trouble and blaming others.

Putting his disdain for his half-brother aside, Caleb went back to looking out the window and looked out to see if he could spot any unfamiliar people on the streets of Santa Fe. He highly doubted he would find any such thing, though.

Caleb kept a tight grip over the throat of the society he ruled. It was hard to find any place that didn't have propaganda with his face on it, surveillance to serve his purposes or AT LEAST one spy. No one in his town trusted one another (besides only the closest family and friends, of course), but they ALL trusted (or at least feared) HIM. And that was how he liked it. How else would he get things done? If the people knew that his eyes were everywhere, they would stay in line. And his eyes WERE everywhere, in the form of highly trained goons, both human and superhuman. And how did he keep the goons, and spies, and assassins, and mercenaries in line? Why, a potent chemical cocktail to induce subservience, of course.

After a while of considering his rule and how effectively he was running things, his thoughts were abruptly cut off by the sounds of screams down the hall. He could tell they were approaching his "throne room".

"Oh, goody," Caleb thought to himself sarcastically, "Another jackass who thought he could oppose me."

He turned around to face the two goons that held the captive, one a durable man, the other an elastic man. Behind them, a girl with Superhuman Accuracy holding a taser at the ready, in case the captive tried to escape.

"What did this one do?" He asked, eyeing the captive condescendingly. She was brown-haired and big-eyed (with a pleading look on her face, as many before her).

"Nothing! I didn't do anything!" She wimpered frantically, knowing the stories of how so many superhumans entered Trelaine's mansion, and only his goons ever got out alive.

"Oh, really?" He scoffed, "Then I have a problem. You see, whether you're innocent or not, I'm offended one way or the other. On the one hand, you didn't do anything, meaning that I didn't train these guys very well. Otherwise, they wouldn't have picked you up unjustly. Am I right?" He leaned in to the girl's face to see her fear up close.

The girl nodded hesitantly.

"And on the other hand", he continued, "you're NOT innocent, and that makes you a liar. And I don't tolerate liars." He stepped back and looked to the elastic man for an answer.

"What did she do?"

"We caught her out in the street after curfew. Not on a bus home, not on her front porch, not somewhere she could be monitored by our patrols. She was walking, and we just HAPPENED to find her." The elastic man paraphrased form the citation he'd written down.

"Interesting. And what, may I ask, were you doing walking hom ALONE after dark? Were you trying to escape my notice? What were you up to?" Caleb demanded gruffly.

"I...I didn't have money for the bus. I was coming home from the store, and I was mugged. I even dropped my food. And right after that, your patrol caught me."

"You lying b***h. I know a liar when I see one. You think you're smarter than me, huh? Well, let me ask you something...you got a power?" Caleb's question cauht the girl off guard, causing her to give him a strange look. So he repeated his question, louder and slower.

"Yes...I can hear thoughts. I really can't control it, though. Why?"

"YOU don't question ME..." He answered bluntly, "Morris. Dobbs. Take her to the echo chamber with the others. Play one of the white noise recordings backward, the other one forward. And turn 'em on full blast. Give her something to listen to while she's a guest here..."

The two goons chuckled maniacally to themselves and nodded at their tasks. Caleb, on the other hand, remained stone-faced, as he had throughout the ordeal.

"What?! No! Wait, this isn't fair! PLEASE! PLEASE! PLEASE!!!" the girl pleaded, panicked and frantic as the two men dragged her down one of the longest corridors, out of Caleb's sight, to be tortured. He stood there briefly, listening out for the girl to make sure she'd been transported safely and quickly (you never could be too sure). Finally hearing her blood-curdling screams as her mind was being inundated with the electromagnetic noise, Caleb sighed, only now showing signs of fatigue from his day. He rubbed his neck sorely, and groaned in frustration.

"Man, sometimes, I almost wish I wasn't the boss," he mused to himself, before laughing at the thought and repeating for emphasis, "ALMOST." That thought finally voiced, he took one final sighing breath and decided it was time for some sleep.

[Ericus Europaeus (Bug)]

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[FlyBoy4]

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[667]

Overlord Trelaine was waiting in his carriage, and Pierce, Nadia, Tessa, Ivan, Flores, and Jack got a good look at him for the first time.

He was tall and lithe--not as bulky as Ivan, but definitely as imposing. He had brown, almost black, spiked hair and a wonderful smile that was totally faked (even Flores could see that). His clothes were fine without being opulent--silk shirt, dress pants--and he radiated an air of barely restrained aggressive energy.

Trelaine smiled a faked smile and said, "So you-all come from...?"

"California," Jack blurted out as calmly as he could. "We're a goodwill mission to the East. This is our bodyguard, Ivan."

Trelaine nodded sagely. "And why do you have these three prisoners?" He pointed accusatorily at the restrained Pierce, Nadia, and Flores.

Tessa smiled her most charming smile. "We caught them harrassing people outside your town. We thought you could take them into your palace, teach them a lesson...?"

Ivan watched Trelaine laugh his first really sincere laugh. "My reputation precedes me! Brilliant, brilliant! Of course I would be more than happy to rehabilitate these...mongrels." He worked up some phleghm and spat on Flores' shoe. The excitable strongman immediately colored.

< Easy, Flores>, Tessa urged with her mind.

<Where are Wayne and Fitz? Why don't THEY have to do this?> Flores fumed.

<Right outside, invisible. They're better off as surprise attacks, but so help me if you make us use them!> Tessa Mand spat.

Flores ground his teeth and closed off his mind.

Tessa then turned back to the conversation at hand. Jack and Trelaine were discussing old fights. She wouldn't be needed here. Which left her free to do other things...

She leaned against Ivan. "Do NOT take this the wrong way," she hissed. Then she shut her eyes and walked into Trelaine's mind.

Almost immediately she was caught up in a hurricane of hate and rage and death and was pulled from her tether into a howling gale that blew her past memories of murders and attacks and beatings and mindless assaults that all made sense and were justified because they were nothing, nobodies, no-ones, and then she was pulled from those into a churning subconscious that urged to gorge itself in every way possible with the best food, the best women, the best land, the best deaths, the best of the best, and then something noticed her and she was drawn up in a sawblade pull into the eye of the storm and spat back out through a meat grinder into a glassy room with a malnourished, emaciated, inner child who was near death and would not survive the week, and then the floor broke and she was falling, flailing into a pit where a thing with no name and a dozen mouths would catch her...

Outside, Tessa was whimpering in her sleep.

Jack chuckled. "How cute."

Trelaine smiled his fake smile. "Yes, she certainly is a pretty one."

Jack felt an urge to change the subject. "So how do you handle the problem of power out here in Santa Fe? There's not exactly a river you can dam."

Trelaine leaned back and spread his arms over the back of the chair. "There's an old research facility out of town that we commandeered as a nuclear reactor. Naturally, I have a monopoly on all the energy here. Only fair." Suddenly, he broke down in laughter, genuine laughter. "Wait, wait. I have to tell you this story."

Jack relaxed. Finally, humor. "Do tell, Overlord."

The Warlord began. "Okay, so a few years back-- '20 or so-- we find that a certain block isn't really paying for their juice, but they're still lit anyway. They're completely off the grid, totally dark on our screens, but we go down there and they look like a Christmas tree. Naturally, we raid the place. We find it's a electric man! He managed a way for one of his kind to power an ENTIRE block using a series of magnets and electromagnets."

Jack cocked his head. "That's pretty clever."

"He says to us, 'You wouldn't pay attention to me when I tried the patent, so I thought you'd want to see it in action.'" Trelaine broke down again, but continued amidst his mirth. "So I say, 'I got a patent just the other day. "Applied Uses For Chain". Would you like to see how it works?' He smiles and says 'Oh yes, oh yes!"

"What did you do?" asked Jack.

"I found the rustiest, nastiest dog chain in the block, and beat him with it!" Trelaine crowed. "Beat him to DEATH!"

Jack Ryder felt his insides chill and his blood turn to ice. Beside him, Tessa jerked back to life, tears in her eyes.

<We have to stop him,> Jack told her.

Tessa quivered like a beaten dog. <Don't have to tell me,> she said.

[FlyBoy4]

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[667]

In the confusion and the darkness, Tamara McShay seemed like a dozen people and the confused group was quickly herded out of the carriage and into the waiting arms of Renee.

"Down down down, go go go!" she cried as she ushered them down into the sewers.

"Wait, we're not--" Nadia began.

"I SAID DOWN," Renee shouted as she shoved Nadia down the metal ladder. Waiting for them at the disgusting, trash-strewn bottom was a pubescent kid who looked like he'd run a marathon. Once all six were standing in the ankle-depth sludge, Renee dropped down behind them and pushed them forward while the boy led the way, weaving his way through intersections, low areas,  and huge septic holding bins like he was born there. They could hardly get a word in edgewise--all that they could do was follow the boy.

On the top side of the pavement, Damien jumped out of the darkness, followed by Tamara. She clapped Mark on the shoulder. He dropped his hands and the unnatural cloud began to dissapate, replacing moonless night with high noon. The boys made for the safety of the alleyways, but Tamara stuck around a little longer. She could see a confused and scowling Trelaine stumbling out of his carriage.

"TRELAINE!" she called. The sadistic Overlord turned his head just in time to see her flip him off with both hands. He roared and began to run for her, but she let off a blast of fire-sparks intermingled with smoke that set him to choking. When he looked up, the little elemental was long gone.

Caleb Trelaine emitted an animal howl that echoed up and down the abandoned street.

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"Awesome," Wayne muttered.

He picked up a comatose Fitz in his arms and turned them both invisible. Time to find an alley. As he left as silently and quickly as the broken terrain would allow, he caught the Overlord's maddened orders.

"Find them NOW! Tear this town apart, turn it upside down! Destroy buildings, interrogate civilians! Just FIND THEM!"

Wayne Cobane once again noted that he was not getting paid for this.

[667]

Several twists and turns later, Pierce, Jack, Tessa, Ivan, Nadia, and Flores found themselves ushered up a second ladder into another place.

Flores found himself struck by nostalgia--this was a war room, just like he'd had once. A naked lightbulb cast harsh light on wall maps tattooed by pushpins and blue pen, and the wires fueling the lightbulb ran off into other rooms. There were old banks of mismatched computer servers all along one wall hooked up to 40-year-old monitors that cast the digital world in a sickly green light that were attached to keyboards with letters missing. Every spare space was cluttered by coffee cups, pens, pencils, diagrams. And as a centerpiece was a pool table commandeered by a 2-D map of Santa Fe with little figurines denoting patrols, secret police stations, allied forces, and even ammunition dumps.

Flores sighed. Good times, good times.

Renee climbed up from the sewer and heaved the manhole back over the pit.

"Hello. My name is Renee Velatruz. You've been rescued from Trelaine by the Santa Fe Resistance. This is our headquarters, where we have food and beds for you. Now, I'm sure you've got a ton of questions for me, so ask away."

Pierce elbowed his way to the front. "Yeah, uh, I gots me a question."

Renee looked up at him with open and perfectly honest eyes. "What is it?"

Pierce took a deep breath and then exploded. "WHAT IN THE F--" The next few minutes were nothing but a diatribe, a spewing volcano of rage and bile. He insulted her, her ancestors, her children, whoever her boyfriend was--if she could find one who'd want such a blasted fool--her friends, her colleagues, her city, her resistance.

"No WONDER you haven't overthrown Trelaine yet, you're just a bunch of idiot kids with guns! You can't tell friend from foe, and what's more, I bet the LOST BOYS would have gotten the job done by now! That's right, I trust a prepubescent boy in a raccoon suit over the likes of YOU," he spat in a voice raspy from screaming.

"HEY! Why're you making my healer cry?!" a raspier voice called out from down the hall.

The group turned to see a young woman with brilliant red hair marching toward them. Tamara McShay was back.

[Wish]

Meanwhile.....

Wayne had just gotten into the alleyway when he got an idea. Wayne made Fitz visible again and put him on the road. Soon two of Trelaine's guards arrived in a car. As the two proceeded to report, Wayne fired a silenced shot at the one with the radio and took out the other one by covering his mouth and chopping him from behind.

"This is going to be messy" thought Wayne as he threw a naked guard into a nearby dumpster and handcuffed his hands and legs too. "Just in case he's another immortal," thought Wayne.

He placed the other guard in the trunk for interrogation later. He duct taped his mouth and handcuffed him as a precaution.

Wayne grabbed the keys from one of the guards and hastily placed the still invisible Fitz in the back seat.

After donning his new guard disguise, Wayne proceeded to drive the car away.

Fitz woke up thinking he had been captured. He soon tried breaking out to no avail of course. At this time he was visible again of course,

"Quiet down, there", said Wayne disguising his voice.

Wayne had planned to not let Fitz know who he was because in Wayne's opinion he was a terrible actor.

"You're going to the torture room for a long time," said Wayne in his most brutal sounding voice chilling Fitz to the core.

Wayne drove all the way to the detention center. His plan was to be simple but effective.

Create a prison outbreak as a distraction to lower security around the overlord. Then assassinate him.

Then finally....loot the overlord's financial reserves to fill his own coffers.

Wayne smiled inside the vehicle. He would finally get some money for his hard work.
___________________________________________________________________________

Wayne stopped the car near the detention center. He dragged Fitz out and knocked him out.

"Standard procedure," said Wayne as Fitz fell onto the floor.

Wayne packed Fitz back into the seat then he opened the trunk. Wayne pointed a gun as the guard's head. Now I want to make this really clear. I want you to get us inside that place or else and you better not make a sound.

Wayne shot the man's leg with his rubber bullet gun.

The man yelled in pain to no avail since his mouth was duct taped.

"That means I'm serious.," said Wayne. "Do you understand?" said Wayne.

The guard slowly cried and nodded.

"Good"

Wayne placed the guard into the driver seat and got in the car through the other door.

*Bang* Wayne shot the man's handcuff's only.

"Drive," said Wayne before turning invisible.

The muzzle of Wayne's gun was lodged in the guard's head. Wayne applied some pressure to make his point.

The jail doors opened for the car after the cameras saw the guard in the driver seat.

"Hi, Joe what you got there in your cab," said the warden outside.

"Nothing, just caught a guy messing around on the streets. Needs to (Wayne pushed the nuzzle slightly) Uhh, I'm Sorry I can't talk much today just send the guys to pull the guy out back into the detention cell."

Two big guys came in and dragged Fitz from out back

"Park," muttered Wayne under his breath.

The guard parked in the lot that Wayne chose which was free from cameras.

"Your services are no longer required" said Wayne as he pistol whipped the guard.

Wayne slowly trailed behind the two big guys as they went in the jailhouse.

Fitz was scared beyond belief.

"I didn't do anything," said Fitz "Let me go"

As tempting as it was to shoot both the two guys right now, Wayne resisted and was just happy that he wasn't him.

Another person was walking down the hall and that forced Wayne to go into the Records Room.

Wayne swore under his breath for losing Fitz. Though he knew that he would probably go into the interrogation room.

The records room was empty except for a few smelly files, a computer, and picture of the prison's structure on a desk.

Wayne took a look at what prisoners were in the dangerous ward.

These would be the first he would have to free in order to start up a good distraction.

"Oh, she's here......,"thought Wayne as his finger rested on the name "Skull"

[667]

Wayne knew Skull by reputation.

A dangerous amalgam of Viking beserker, Celtic swordsman, and Deep South axe murderer, Skull was known to kill mobs like they were so much wheat to be harvested. Aside from her unnatural red-eyed murder spasms, she had some strange shadow powers to boot. Wayne'd heard stories that those powers looked a lot like a certain rebel leaders', but in his 20 year career he'd learned not to delve so deeply into such matters. That chainsaw sword she always was waving around made him nervous too.

"She's a creepy one, isn't she?" asked Jolyne.

Wayne swore and drew his rubber bullet gun, but he knew it was too late to make any effective saving moves. He slowly replaced it and asked, "What are you doing here?"

Jolyne Isonov laughed coldly. "I could ask you the same thing. Are you done following those amateurs around, or what?"

Wayne felt an unexpected twinge of hurt, like she was talking about his friends or something. "They're not amateurs. That Jack's a smart guy, and Pierce'd be good at anything he tried."

She waved his comments off. "Answer the question."

"I was, uh...looking to make some money. Trelaine has to be sitting on a lot of loot, what with his monopoly and all."

Jolyne chuckled. "Sounds like your profile," she noted. She scratched the back of her head nervously. "Listen, I'm not usually the one to do this sort of thing, but I got my orders from up top this time." Jolyne Isonov got very serious very quickly. "The USA government is still around, believe it or not. And so far, the Warlords have kind of let us go about our business."

Wayne had to fight down the urge to laugh in her face. "You mean ignore you completely."

Jolyne shot him a quasi-murderous glance. "They want to offer you a job. Break up that little group of amateurs you're traveling with, I really don't care how. In return, you get enough money to live comfortably for the rest of your life."

Wayne Cobane was intrigued. But, he didn't let it show. "Living comfortably was never my intent. You got any bonuses?"

She smiled. "You could say that." She took a very foreign, but familiar gun from her belt.

It was a Mark I Photon Gun.

Wayne made a grab for it, but found nothing but air. Jolyne reappeared a foot to the right and waved it in his face. "She's all yours if you break up that little group."

He was practically drooling. But he found enough prescence of mind to ask, "How do I know it's real?"

A passing guard looked in at precisely the wrong moment. "HEY! What're you doing in the command roo-"

Wayne grabbed the gun from a shocked Jolyne and fired. A piercing beam of light shot from the muzzle and caught the man in its blast. When the two could open their eyes, they found that there was nothing left of him except a shadow blasted on the wall and part of a sneaker.

Jolyne took the gun from Wayne. "The choice is all yours."

They both felt a switch flip inside. Wayne rolled his eyes. "That's probably Fitz. He's in trouble more likely than not."

She sauntered over to the display screen. "Fitz is just now running towards us. Looks like he's got quite a following."

Wayne sighed, walked over to the open door, and snagged the panicked Irishman. "Where do you think YOU'RE going?"

Fitz was still bleeding profusely and wasn't totally with it, but he managed to squeak out, "Oh my God."

He couldn't resist--"Nope, just me. Now turn off the turn-off, stupid. We gotta go."

The Irishman complied by passing out and leaning his bloody head on Wayne's bleached white shirt. Jolyne grabbed his shoulder and in an instant they were out of the Detention Center. She slipped Wayne a note before vanishing for good, leaving him a wanted man on mean streets with a dying man--and still broke.

[Celadon's Penultimate]

Unfortunately, Trelaine was having a few ideas of his own. He looked over to one of his bodyguards, with the kind of smile that, when HE had it, always meant trouble.

"What are you thinking, sir?" The guard looked at him, troubled (and slightly disturbed).

"Oh, nothing...I need you to bring the limo around." Caleb reached in his pocket for the only cell phone in the town.

"What's up?" a groggy voice answered.

"Dane, wake the hell up! I told you don't go to sleep."

"Chill, bro...what's the damage?" Dane tried to shake off his sleepy stupor.

"Plenty of damage, Dane. Plenty of damage. And still more to come. Call Willis, Phil, Bruce and Bruno." Caleb looked at the time on the cell phone, realizing quickly that time was of the essence.

"Aren't they YOUR guys? Why can't YOU call 'em?" the stoner mumbled.

"Just do it. They're on the perimeter with YOU." Click. That was that.

Caleb stormed off, with his bodyguard behind him and headed back into town to watch the carnage ensue. People ran for their lives and took cover as best they could. Screams of hellacious terror could be heard ringing all through the streets. A big brutish tank ran through a brick wall like a living wrecking ball, a redhead woman blasted a hole through a wall with a beam of unknown energy, jumped inside and unleashed a flurry of bolts on the inhabitants. Fliers scoured the skies for stragglers on the streets, and strong men hurled cars and busted through doors and roughed up civilians trying to find Trelaine's targets. All mayhem ensued, and this was just the street HE was on.

As all the bedlam was going down in Trelaine's vicinity, among the worst supers had yet to arrive. At Dane's beck and call, they were on their way: Willis, a man with the power to become twenty feet tall (with strength and durability to match), Phil, whose telekinesis was more than just a little destructive, and the twins Bruce and Bruno. Bruce could possess people and Bruno could possess objects.

In less than ten minutes (as a giant, Willis covered more ground), the four arrived at Caleb's side, anticipating even his most heartless, brutal commands.

<<OOC: These four new villain guys are extras, feel free to use them as you see fit; they're not really important to the story other than being Caleb's goons>>

[FlyBoy4]

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[667]

Jack leapt to his feet. "Quick," he cried, "does this place have a videophone?"

Tamara cocked her head. "Videophone? What does this look like, a 90's action movie?"

Pierce hummed with latent power. "If we can get something like a videophone running, we can call Wayne and get them back here relatively unharmed." He snapped his fingers, prompting a spark. "Do you have Skype?"

Damien nodded, and led him to the computer bank. "We do, but I don't know if we can run it on these monitors. These things are older than both of us, for Pete's sake. And how would you hook up Skype to the videophone network?"

The electric man cracked his knuckles. "Move aside, my man. I'm not Fitz, but I've got a few tricks up my sleeve..."

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Wayne huddled in the alley, dodging the chunks of concrete that fell, trying to keep Fitz alive. He was perfectly aware of the irony-- being the second best assassin in the world and all.

His mildly embarassing ringtone started, and he picked it up with mild annoyance. The annoyance was replaced by sheer relief when he saw the eager faces of Pierce and Jack--and some other guy in a polo shirt and short hair.

"You could not have called at a worse time," he panted into the microphone. "I'm trapped, and Fitz is losing blood all over my shirt."

Jack's voice buzzed through the speaker, crackling and popping like an old 45. "Wayne! We have a safe house! Just follow Damien's directions and you'll find us!"

"Okay, um...where are you right now?" the stranger asked.

Wayne stuck his head out of the alley long enough to read a street sign. "5th and Main!"

The stranger replied, "Alright, cross the street."

"You have to be kidding me."

Pierce cried, "Wayne! DO IT!" So the assassin hoisted his bloodied companion up on his back and sprinted like there were dogs on his heels across the street to the adjacent alleyway. Not many people noticed him, but the three who did took after him, barking and clamoring for him to stop.

"Take a left," said Damien, and Wayne skidded to a stop and started his dead sprint down the next back alley. His pursuers did as well, one of whom was on fire and not burning. This woman hurled a chunk of her arm at the burdened assassin's back, and he jerked right just in time. Wayne swore and kept running.

"Okay, let's run into that bakery on the intersection of 9th and Hennepin," Damien suggested all too calmly.

"Just a moment," Wayne puffed. He took out his killing gun, whirled, and fired. The largest of the three--a man hewn from granite--was hit by an incendiary round packed with concentrated napalm, and the resulting explosion knocked him to the ground and set the other man to burning. Wayne fell right back into stride with a smile on his face. "9th and Hennepin? There," he said as he broke through the bakery window.

Damien grinned. "This guy is good," he said to Jack. "Okay, Wayne! There's a hidden entrance under the 3rd tile in the women's restroom! Just go down into the sewer and you're home free! Wayne? Wayne?"

"Uh, Damien, could you hang on a second?" Wayne muttered into the phone before hanging up. The flaming woman had walked in and was staring him dead in the face with what he thought were her eyes. The heat roiling off of her was melting the broken glass on the floor and scorching the walls. Slowly, the assassin put Fitz down on the ground and drew his gun.

"I've tangled with the likes of you before," he said. "Fire Mimic, right? You don't have anything solid in there, so shooting you won't work. And I know any fires I start will just heal you up, make you stronger. So the odds are on your side for this."

She grinned and spat a little bit of herself onto the floor between them. It hissed and sizzled.

"Though really," Wayne mused, "I was just shooting the breeze before the sprinklers popped on."

With a snapping noise, the very, very active sprinkler system in the recently abandoned bakery did its job and started dousing the place with ice cold water. The woman screamed like she was being hit by acid and reflexively turned human again. Wayne smiled and fired--the round hit her square in the gut and the blast knocked her out of the bakery. She laid very still.

Wayne hoisted Fitz up over his shoulder and headed for the ladies' room. The Irishman was on the ropes.

[667]

==SANTA FE RESISTANCE HQ==

A bed was prepared for Fitz. Unfortunately, the Resistance already had many victims in its hospital, so one had to be made out of the rec room pool table.

Wayne lumbered into the room and flumped the Negator on the table. "Wayne Cobane," he panted at the head nurse.

"Renee Velatruz," she returned. She was short and thin; Wayne doubted she'd ever really eaten a good meal a day in her life. But she wasn't short on compassion--or moxie.

"How was he hurt?" she demanded as her 2 or 3 orderlies laid Fitz in a more dignified position. "Any broken bones, cut nerves...?"

Wayne scratched his invisible hair. "Not to my knowledge. He did hit his head pretty bad, though--I'd say the guy lost about a gallon of blood. Most of it on my shirt," he grumped.

"Oh hush. You good at doctoring or medicine?" Renee asked as she put on an apron to protect her clothes.

He shrugged his shoulders. "I can tell you how NOT to kill him."

A smile flitted across her face before it fell back into deadly seriousness. "That's not good enough. Get out get out!" Renee herded the second best assassin in the world out of her makeshift operating theater like he was a stooge and shut the door in his face. Wayne stared at the wood for a split second and then burst a gut laughing. THAT sure hadn't happened in, say, 25 years. Still chuckling, he made his way to the war room. He wanted to meet this Damien kid.

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Inside the room, all Renee could think about was this dying Irishman in shock because of his sheer pain.

She pressed his brow with a morphine-laced touch and he opened his eyes.

"Hey there. Who might you be?" he postulated in a weak, heavily accented voice.

"I'm Renee. You've been hurt," she replied with a worried smile.

"Really? I don't feel anything..." Renee showed him her blood-covered hand that had been on his forehead. "Oh my. I'm guessing you're a healer."

If he hadn't been slipping away before her eyes, she might have smiled. "Now, can you tell me where your wounds are?"

"Just me head. And maybe I bit my cheek when I fell. Other than that, I'm fine," he slurred.

"Right. You might feel a little something," she said as her hand descended over his eyes. A split-second later, he was screaming as not only her numbing touch was washed away, but his body was forced to make a gallon and a half of blood, and his scalp was urged to do in seconds what normally might take a day, and his inner cheek was pressured to close up in a thousandth of the time, and his brain was bullied to drop its state of shock....

But after that, he felt new. There was no other words for it. He wasn't better, or healed, or back to normal. He wasn't cured or recovered or even mended. Every cell in his body felt better and every muscle he had was filled with life. He swung his feet off the pool table and hit the floor smiling.

Renee opened the door for him and pointed the way to the War Room.

[Celadon's Penultimate]

The ramshackle room was still and silent, waiting for Fitz to make his way in. Ivan, Nadia, Tessa and Pierce exchanged worried glances, hoping he wouldn't be too hurt. Realizing that he was totally unscathed, they looked on in amazement, and the Irishman sat down as though nothing was wrong (because after all, nothing was...).

"Ah don't suppose any of ya can get me somethin' t'drink? Ah'm kinda thirsty..." Fitz looked at his comrades to see who would. In a second, the back of his head was met with a cold, moist metal can and the familiar feeling of a shooting pain.

"You coulda go' it yerself, TOAD." Ivan snickered.

"So, what have ah missed? Ah don't suppose we've got aneh ahdeas how to take down the overlord? Anybody?" Fitz rubbed the back of his head and picked up the cold soda.

"No, that's what we're here for..." Tamara smiled, "We think that with your help, we can take down Trelaine and his moronic brother."

"HELP?" Pierce jumped up from his cross-legged position on the ground with a familiar glow surrounding his fists, his hair and his eyes. "You DO realize that WE'RE superhumans, too, yeah? We could've taken him if we weren't AMBUSHED by the likes of you..." The electrokinetic' voice became tinny like a robot, both hands now crackling with erratic sparks of electircal power and his eyes aglow; Tamara and her friends knew that he was on the verge of attacking. They readied themselves, and Tamara stepped forward to meet Pierce's challenging stance, with an imposing posture of her own. She felt the heat build behind her ears, and could tell than any moment something might spontaneously burst into flame. NOW, Pierce's friends knew it was time to intervene.

Nadia had seen elementals duke it out before, and it wasn't pretty, especially in a ramshackle little place like this. She stepped between the two, parting them each with her hands. Everyone soon felt a sudden chill in the air.

""Ey!" Her breath and everybody else's in the room was now visible, "Just cool..the hell...down." Her glance alternated between Tamara and Pierce. But Pierce wasn't having it; the very insult that he was somehow a SIDEKICK to a team of ragtag "heroes" that seemed creations out of a bad issue of X-Men was just ludicrous...Tessa saw the frustration in his eyes, and knew that he wasn't going to let it go so easily. He took one step forward, and to his surprise, was soon grabbed up by Ivan, who had no idea what was going on.

Tessa knew SHE couldn't stop Pierce herself, but IVAN could somewhat withstand electricity, so she figured she would instead use HIS body to get the job done, in case her beau decided to resist. Indeed, the bruiser lifted Pierce about a foot off the ground by the back of his neck, and craned him back over to Tessa's side.

"What the HELL, Ivan?!?!" The fussy electrokinetic struggled uselessly in Ivan's grip.

"Oh, don't fuss, Sparky." Tessa chuckled, before calling to the mind-numbed strongman, "Put him down, big boy."

Ivan dropped Pierce absent-mindedly on his 'arse', at the blonde telepath's side, illiciting a laugh from everyone in the room. The heavyweight regained consciousness from being compelled by Tessa and he started laughing, too. Now thoroughly embarrassed, the blushing electrokinetic crossed his arms and crossed his legs, resolving to remain silent for the rest of their stay, with the exception of the occasional show of emotion (electricity fizzling off his now-red cheeks like a temperamental, cutely-pouting Pikachu).

"Sorry 'bout that, Tamara," Tessa looked over to Pierce, rolling her eyes, "You were saying?"

[667]

The war room shook like it had been hit by a bomb. Which, if you did the equations for the sudden and rapid dispersal of sound energy from a cosmically fueled blast down through the foundations of the building in which unmarked basement they resided, was exactly what had happened.

Wayne brushed some plaster off his suit. "It's a hellhole out there, and that's no joke."

Everyone could see Tamara's eyes light up with a retaliatory glee. "I say we get out there and show those goons who they're fighting against."

Jack laid his hand on her shoulder and smiled with his unearthly eyes. "I admire your spirit, but that's not the brightest idea." He gestured around. "Look at this place. Sure, you can pull a pretty decent sneak attack, and you've probably got some experience as saboteurs, but do you really think that you've got the personnel to mount an attack against trigger-happy mercinaries who are gunning specifically for you? Even with my crew helping you, you don't stand a chance." He watched Tamara's face fall before he continued--"But I do have a plan."

He took the Evolutionist's Stone out of his pocket and let his tattoos glow ominously.

%&%&%&%&%&%&%&%&%&%&%&%&%&%&%&%&%&%&%&%&%&%&%%&%

Fitz, Jack, and Tamara popped out of the manhole to see a city in rubble.

Buildings were ripped apart, the street was cracked, and smoke was rising into the sky. Tamara was white with fear and anger, but Jack cooly placed his hand on Fitz's shoulder and clenched the Stone in his free hand. The timid Irishman's eyes popped wide open and the whites of his eyes took on a yellowish tinge. When he'd had all the boost he could handle, he shrugged off Jack's hand, stepped forward, and screamed at the sun.

Jack and Tamara were hit by an nigh-tangible wave of numbness. The disturbance carried on like a shockwave through buildings, fences, concrete, water, and air, only to be stopped by the bodies of the gifted. Giants shrank, rubber men stiffened, strongmen were crushed, flying men fell from the sky. Fitz's blast traveled a good mile above, below, and across the earth, encompassing all of the riot.

Tamara staggered and blinked, color slowly returning to her vision.

Jack cocked his head. The sounds of explosions and pain were slowly dying out in the distance. He could even see the thick smoke thinning. He smiled and nodded at Fitz. "Nice work."

Fitz rubbed his eyes and shook his head. "My God, this has been a day. From running to dying to being shot full of juice by that rock. I think I'll go back to where nothing will kill me and have a nice drink."

The redheaded elemental smiled dryly. "Sorry, no alcohol back at the Resistance."

Jack slung an arm around the swearing Fitz's shoulder and eased him back down the manhole.

%&%&%&%&%&%&%&%&%&%&%&%&%&%&%&%&%&%&%&%&%&

There was a small, low-key celebration in the Resistance Headquarters. Noise and lights at a time like this could be the kiss of death. But there were a few mismatched musicians playing in a thumping, foreign-sounding dance band, and someone had bought a pinata at one of the few surviving party stores. It was Ivan's turn to take a swing, and he couldn't quite get the hang of it.

"C'mere, you festive donkey, you!" he bellowed as he swung the baseball bat around like it was a toothpick. Everyone, Nadia especially, was dying laughing. And Ivan, despite himself, was chuckling a little bit too.

The only person who wasn't laughing, in fact, was Fitz Tanner. He was nursing a chocolate milk by the pot-bellied stove in the kitchen and flicking pistachio shells into the fire. He sighed a little bit, hearing the party a few rooms over. Fitz was so wrapped up in the trauma of the day he didn't even hear the footsteps.

"Hey," said Tessa.

Fitz fought down his sudden, unheralded nervousness. "Hey," he said, voice cracking. He tried to nonchalantly toss another shell into the grate, but it bounced off. "The party's not in here, in case you were wondering."

Tessa pulled up another chair. "I know. Gimme a shell." He acquieced and she took up his game.

There was a short silence before Fitz said, "Your powers still dead?"

She stuck her tongue between her teeth as she chucked a shell right into the heart of the coals. "A little. I mean, they're numb, but not dead. That must have been some blast you did."

"Yeah. I had a lot to fuel it with." He cracked open a pistachio and ate the meat.

Without taking her eyes off the fire, Tessa said, "Listen. Fitz. Earlier today, when we lost you and Wayne, that wasn't on purpose."

"I knew that."

"Don't interrupt," she admonished with false contempt. "When he called in, said you were dying...and when he carried you in with you bleeding more than thinking, not a single spark of life in your head...that was scary. I don't think I really realized how scary that would be."

Fitz stopped throwing shells.

She continued, gesturing with her hand, leaned back on the chair. "So, um...next time you don't think you're important, or wanted, just remember that I was terrified while you were dead." She got up and walked off a ways.

"And Fitz?"

He turned from the coals.

"NEVER do anything like that EVER again, or I will hurt you."

Fitz mulled it over. "You'll kill me if I die?"

Tessa choked back a smile. "Hush."

She walked out the door. Fitz stared at the fire for a second or two, grinned to himself, and resumed eating pistachios. These things were bloody delicious.

[Celadon's Penultimate]

BACK WITH TRELAINE, AMIDST THE CHAOS...

"What the HELL!" Caleb watched with wide-eyed frustration, as his minions were reduced to their baseline human capabilities, "WHAT the hell was THAT?!"

He looked over to the four who stood next to him (Willis, Phil, Bruce and Bruno) and the thought quickly came to his mind.

"YOUR powers f***ed up, too?"

Willis looked at his boss a bit taken off guard by the question. Of course, though, letting Caleb down was the last thing on his mind. So, with much more concentration than was normally needed, he tried to grow to his enormous form. Due to the power-devastating effects of Fitz's 'power outage' earlier, however, things went a little differently than the size-shifter planned. His body shifted only slightly larger, then slightly SMALLER, then a few other ways which would be too wrong to describe, then his form went entirely back to normal. His size-shifting capability had been disabled for now.

"Hey, wait, I think I still feel some power..."  Phil spoke up, not realizing that the little glimmer of power he felt was the last of his power finally fading away. He reached out his hand to telekinetically lift a tire from a car that had been totalled in all the chaos, and instead the tire tipped over only slightly. He focused all his power to make the tire pop with telekinetic pressure, and instead it bounced away a few feet. Indeed, Phil's powers were dead, too, much to the entertainment of his comrades. There'd be no impressing the boss for now...

Finally, Bruce and Bruno looked at each other and decided uniformly, "We ain't gonna go run into something to see if we can still possess it."

"D*** it! I can't believe this! Some random cloud of power-death is just randomly hanging over this part of the town? S**t, that's annoying as hell!" Caleb raged, spewing out a few more curses in his anger. Then, in that storm of frustration, a thought hit him, "Wait a minute. Did any of you see energy pass across the sky, through the streets or along the ground?"

The four looked at each other blankly, before looking back and answering their boss in unison, "No."

"Good. Neither did I..which means it's no random electromagnetic event from the aftereffects of the meteor. Mother of hell, these people must think I'm an idiot. Phil, you have your palmtop, don't you?"

The telekinetic reached into his pocket and pulled out a literally palm-sized device that looked more like a big calculator.

"Pull up the Superhuman Intel Matrix."

Phil did as he was told, typing with the stylus pen that was attached, and then gave the palmtop to Caleb. The Overlord looked at the Google maps screen at what should have been little blips all over the city. He'd ordered a superhuman with inventing skills to make a huge mechanical apparatus at the center of the territory, that sent waves which reflected off of the bioelectric fields of superhumans, effectively giving him their real-time locations at all times (without them even knowing). However, something apeared to be wrong with the map. It was only showing the presence of ONE superhuman within the whole of his territory.

"Uh, Willis?" Caleb smiled.

"Y-yes, boss?" The size-shifter stammered, nervously thinking about why the Emo King might be smiling so devilishly.

"What are the chances that a single superhuman within the entire territory somehow hid from that devastating power-disrupting blast, and then, among the chaos, found it safe enough to finally come out?"

"I don't know, but sounds pretty far-fetched." Willis replied.

"I think so, too..." Caleb's grin only grew wider, "Now, what would YOU say could be a solution for this singular superhuman retaining his superpowers?"

Willis thought hard. Phil tried to interject, but Willis put his hand up: it was on the tip of his tongue. It finally hit him. His mind flashed back to the last week of their basic training.

"A power-manipulator. Either this superhuman has ONLY the power to give off the indication of being superhuman, which is HIGHLY unlikely. OR, he's a power manipulator. Power retention is most commonly a sub-power of someone who can perceive and/or manipulate others' superhuman abilities." Willis' reasoning made Caleb chuckle a bit.

"That's right, boys. Now, whoever he is, he's obviously quite the little asset. Or, MORE likely, quite the little threat. He's not one of mine, because that adaptation isn't present in ANY of my power-negators, so find him, and get rid of him..."

<<OOC: New tech introduced- palmtop and the power tracker apparatus>>

[667]

==SANTA FE HQ==

All was quiet.

The youngest, orphans or bastards all, slept in their bunks and clutched dear stuffed animals or mementos from before the Event. Their nursemaids came through reassuringly every once in a while, rearranging pillows, tucking in sheets. The adults and teens slept where they could--Renee on the floor below Tamara on a line of chairs, Pierce under the pool table with Tessa, Jack leaning against the wall with his thumbs frozen mid-twiddle, Ivan looking surprisingly vulnerable with his huge arm around a sleeping Nadia, Flores scowling even in sleep. Even the War Room was perfectly still. Night had spared them its typical noises of anguished screams, suppressed rage, and murderous mutterings.

Fitz came awake suddenly and shook his head. He chuckled lowly and patted his stomach. Pistachios were no kind of dinner for a growing Irishman. He pulled his jacket around so it wasn't so awkward on his skinny frame, scratched his stubble, and shuffled into the kitchen.

The kitchen was homey and orange. The pot-bellied stove where he'd finally felt some requition shone a dull red from its coal-fired guts. He smiled at the memory and grabbed an apple. Fitz took a bite and then blinked hard. One by one, tiny lights began to come back on in his mind's eye. His power outage was finally starting to turn itself around. Fitz Tanner closed his eyes and tilted his head up like a musician finding that note, that perfect run, that chord as he watched Nadia's blueness come back into being, Jack's strange blend of green, red, and black, Flores' orangeness...

His eyes popped open as a whole constellation lit itself up directly 15 feet above his head.

Fitz dropped his fruit and burst into the War Room. "Ambush! AMB-"

The ceiling above them shattered into a jigsaw puzzle of plaster dust, concrete, and shards. The entire place erupted with shrieking and pleas for help. Jack, Tamara, and their comrades slowly--too slowly--shook off the bonds of sleep. Bright spotlights shone down from above, showing only silhouettes of their awakeners.

"Well, well, well! I was just wanting a little rebel of my own, but here I found the entire matched set! Brilliant work, Phil!" said a tall, broad shadow in a much-too familiar tone.

"Any time boss. I just wanna get to that little piece a--"

"In good time. ATTACK!" Trelaine barked.

The small army he had brought with him dropped down into the light-blasted pit and hell broke loose.

Flores screamed with a mixture of poorly-managed pain, animal rage, and exultation. He bodily leapt to a man who looked like he was made of a lava flow, sunk his hoodie-covered hands in a searing hot crack in his torso, and ripped him in two with the man's molten rock interior spraying everywhere. Flores threw his flaming hoodie into a second man's face, simultaneously howling over his blistered hands. Behind him, the torn man was crawling back to his legs grotesquely.

A feral man who somehow squeezed his hairy bulk into a police uniform leapt to take Tamara down from behind. She would fall, and morale would plummet. Out of nowhere, in mid-leap, the wolfman was blindsided himself by a silver-haired attacker. He hit the rubbled wall and started to slaver, but his assaulter grabbed a rock and bashed him between the eyes. The feral man shook off the effects as best he could, but was prompted to immobility by the short claws that extended from the man's hand. In another second, the wolfman would have been missing a throat or two, but the attacker was pulled off him by a huge giant he knew as Mr. Willis.

Willis held Jack at arm's length, letting the noble half-breed slash the air. "Aren't you feisty," he commented before hurling him into a group of his allies. The giant turned around and looked down at his next opponent, a well-dressed bald man wearing sunglasses. He grinned. This would be too easy.

"My, you're a big one, aren't you," Wayne called up at Willis. He grabbed a short shank of shattered rebar from the wreckage. "I've dealt with bigger." He ran at the giant at full speed.

Willis, surprised at the very least, made a grab for the moving target but missed. Wayne stabbed the rebar into the giant's 4-foot long forearm right at a crucial junction (his old sensei would have called it a subo), clambered up his arm while drawing his incendiary gun, and while Willis was still screaming over his arm, fired several rounds into his temple.

Wayne rode the corpse to the ground and back into the fight.

The fight for Mark Yamada, however, was not going as well as he would have liked. While it was night, the light-saturated environment was working against his shadowy powers. All he could do was call enough darkness to repulse a single attacker, and even that wasn't proving enough--the man had Flores' brand of unassuming super-strength and was using a piece of rebar to knock the blasts aside. Finally, Mark fell on his back and cowered as his killer raised his weapon. But an unassuming hero leapt between them and raised a cinderblock as a shield. The rebar blasted Damien's shield into pieces and he fell down too, trying not to land on Mark. The strongman sneered with disgust and decided to try again. Out of nowhere, Wayne leapt over a barrier, destroyed the strongman with a flying knee to the jaw, and then finished him with a stomp to the throat. The assassin smiled a too-white smile at Damien. "Boy, I am liking you more and more."

Over near Tamara's end of the fight, things were not going half as well. Goons who recognized her piercing eyes and her red hair from the wanted posters were ganging up on her in hopes of a reward, and the fight had pushed her and Pierce together. The two powerful superhumans worked quite well as a team, which was something neither could ever admit to.

"I still hate your guts," Tamara screamed over the noise of her fire-and-smoke blast that intercepted a Leaper.

"Likewise," Pierce reassurred her as he unloaded a thousand Ohms into a twosome of fliers.

The crowd pushed closer and Pierce began to feel the heat. What was worse, he felt his reserves running a little low--he hadn't gotten the chance to sneak a snack, and the only thing that kept the bolts flying was blood sugar. He grunted at his unlikely battlemate, "You got some kinda surprise attack that we could use?"

Tamara nodded. "Drop." The electric man dropped to the rubbled ground as Tamara spread her arms open, uncoiling the power inside her, and then brought them in and COILED. A huge windstorm erupted with her as the epicenter that blew all the men who wanted to kill her and Pierce shoved away as by a hand. Some hit hard and didn't get up. Those that did manage to land on their feet were hit by expulsive blasts of spiderweb lightning and blasts of heat and fire. Tamara turned back to Pierce and grinned.

"Why didn't you do that in the first place?" he wondered.

The grin turned to a scowl. "Didn't your dad ever teach you that those are impolite questions?" An incoming fireball caught her eye and she turned to intercept it. Fitz ran through the middle of them as it detonated in midair, scared for his life.

"What's the matter, power killer? Don't you want a hug?" Phil called after him. Fitz glanced over his shoulder and dove to the ground. A pile of rubble in front of him exploded into dust; Phil grimaced--a miss. The nervous Irishman continued to run the gauntlet of dangerous terrain and battles of life and death. He sprinted past Jack, who was firing a volley of thorns into the wolfman's hide, past Nadia and Ivan, who were making their way though the killing fields as a singular team. He stopped, though, when he saw Tessa's situation. She was paired up with the small kid from the abduction--Felix, was it?--and was trying to repel a small army of perfectly identical men. His body language stammered when he heard Phil's call and saw a nearby cinderblock shatter seemingly all on its own.

Then, he knew what to do.

Thinking of what Jack or Pierce would do in this situation, he lunged at the closest multiple man and grabbed him in a full nelson. Fitz's eye whites turned yellow for the shortest moment and the struggling body in his hold vanished into dust. The original duplicator was right in Tessa's face, talking seductively, suggesting things, promising things. A rage that Fitz'd never felt before hit him like a train, and he grabbed the man by his collar and the seat of his pants. Phil came over the ridge, and Fitz smiled a bloody smile.

He hurled the multiple man at his telekinetic troubler, while simultaneously restoring his ability. The one creepy man became several creepy men out of reflex and sheer panic, and Phil was bowled over by a multitude of flying duplicates. Fitz cried out with something between righteous rage, pride, and pain over his torn rotator cuff. Tessa grabbed the shoulder in question--something that would have been nice if not for the searing poker it provided.

"We have to go!" she cried. "Down the sewer!"

"Tell everyone!" he shouted back. "Tell everyone!"

As she ushered Felix and Fitz down the hole, she put out an intense feeling-transmission:

<allislostallislost takethelivingrun takethelivingrun downsewer. Followfollowfollow.>

Everyone she sent it to understood, but that didn't mean they liked it.

"NO!" screamed Tamara. "This place is MINE, you don't tell me what to do with it! Screw you, screw all--" She ran out of words and simply loosed an uncontrolled wave of earth that sent up spikes and either pulverised or gored the people in its way. She caught sight of Trelaine and screamed a word that might have been his name, then ran to take him out.

Trelaine chuckled and took off his gloves.

Tamara came in with a haymaker backed by fire, but Trelaine just moved his 200 pounds aside and backhanded her, hard. She staggered, but recovered and tried an uppercut cased in stone shards. Overlord Trelaine stuck her elbow and her wrist with the blade of his hand, and then maneuvered the broken-down punch into a joint lock so painful it let him bend her over. Knee, knee, release the lock, palm heel to the back of the head. Foot on the neck.

Tamarra spat and swore with her mouth in the dust. The fragments of concrete began to dance, but a little extra pressure stopped that.

Trelaine smiled and snarled his words. "Poor, poor little orphan. All alone in the world."

"SHUT UP," Tamara rasped from the ground.

Overlord Trelaine smiled larger than he had in years. "You hear these noises, child? You hear the death of your young ones, the crunch of broken bones? Those mean you've lost, and I've WON. Finally, I've won."

"You won't kill me! I won't die!" Tamara started to panic.

Trelaine licked a little blood off his lip. "So accepting," he drawled. "Looks like not just a taste for rebellion runs in the family, eh, Ms. McShay?"

He could feel her freeze through his army-issue boot. "What do you mean?"

"You mean you've repressed the memories?...Understandable," he mulled. "Better unrepress them quick!" Overlord Trelaine unbuckled his belt and swung it in his hand. It was a rusty dog chain.

Trelaine drew back. This would be one of the most perfect murders he'd ever done. He'd remember this one for decades, savor it with unnatural intensity. He swung it forward, ready to break her spine, but found himself unable to carry through. He looked back over his shoulder.

A skinny Hispanic girl was holding it taut with all her might.

He would have laughed, but she lunged forward, grabbed his ankles, and toppled him off the hill like a child. He slid to the bottom and whirled to his feet, eyes blazing.

They were gone.

%&%&%&%&%&%&%&%&%&%&%&%&%&%&%&%&%&%&%&%&%&%&%

Renee Velatruz dropped to the bottom of the sewer, followed by a shellshocked Tamara.

Tamara tried to squeak out a word, but it was Renee who said "Go."

[667]

The Resistance stopped running.

They rested in a huge central chamber that served as a retainer for all the sewage before rerouting it out of the city and into the sea. It was a dank, joyless, evil-smelling cavern half-full of wet garbage and waste of all kinds. Only a narrow maintenance walkway, no more then 10 feet across, seperated the curved walls from the pit of waste that seethed beneath it. The surviving members of the Resistance all had to cram onto this concrete causeway--even the crying children and babes--under whatever light they could manage or make themselves. Torches, dim flashlights, and a solitary Luminary lit the darkness to an extent. It was a miserable place, a dark place, a sad place.

It was the only place they were safe.

Renee did what she could, but the wounded were many and she was one of the only healers without wounds herself. She laid her head on a 6-year-old boy's chest and heard his heart's mad flutter. He'd run right into a blood manipulator, and his heart was still scrambling to hold onto its possessions half an hour later. All she could do was calm his unconscious reflexes; no amount of healing energy would fix a confused body. Others, like the girl with a slashed gut, were easier--she'd be fine after a nice rest combined with healing juice. And, unfortunately, there were those she could only make comfortable.

Pierce, led by his own private electric arc lamp, walked over to Tessa. She was tending to one of Fitz's shrapnel wounds, worming the shards of stone out of his leg. Fitz looked at him with a mild apprehension, but Pierce Dary didn't notice. "This is...not good," he started.

Tessa looked up and the electric man saw she was suppressing tears. "I'm trying to keep my mind shut, but I can hear people die, people wish that they were dead, people willing to die, people unwilling to die. I can feel the pulse of a baby too young to understand going into shock. I can even hear that Yamada kid wishing people he's known his entire life goodbye as their ghosts leave the room. So yeah, not good."

Fitz winced but said, "I can turn off your powers if you want. You know, as long as you want them to be."

Tessa shook her head. "I'd rather feel this now. I want some fuel to light Trelaine and his like on fire with."

Pierce nodded. He completely understood. "Where's that Tamara? I wanna see if she's still good."

His telepathic lady friend smiled a short smile. Who'd have thought that Pierce would start showing compassion--even if he'd never admit it. "I think she's over there," she said with a gesture. "I don't think she's doing too hot."

Pierce thanked her and walked off, picking his way through the refugees. He walked past a sewer opening and over the grate that the liquid filth flowed beneath.

Further down the sewer tunnel, Wayne Cobane stood guard. He leaned against the cold stone wall, watching the sewage churn right beyond his toes, thinking about nothing and everything that had happened. He ran his hand through his invisible hair and let out a long puff of air. His fingers idly slipped inside his jacket and they found the butt of his gun. Wayne took it out and without knowing why began to fire into the slurry. BANG BANG screamed the gun, and the children and adults screamed too. Wayne seemed not to hear them, and he fired off a third and fourth shot before Jack stormed in.

"You f--king IDIOT! What d'you think you're doing!?" Jack's eyes had taken on a red inner light, and when he moved his head the light stayed for just a second in the darkness, trailing behind him like smoke.

Wayne looked up at him with dead eyes. "Nothing. Thought I saw a snake."

Jack slapped him, hard.

Wayne's head snapped back and he slowly brought it back to face the raging leader. Jack's claws had started to come out from his sheer rage, and three thin scratches started to bleed on his cheek. The assassin's eyes betrayed no anger or shock--they were as flat and black as river rock. Jack loosed a gutteral huff and left the tunnel, reassurring people as soon as he was in view. Wayne watched him go. He closed his eyes when he felt someone behind him.

"Not the move I would have expected from such a smart man," said Jolyne quietly. Wayne was almost surprised but not quite.

"Well, I'm not all my file makes me out to be. You should know that by now," he replied without looking. His broad black jacket was like a monolith to her.

She cleared her throat. "Have you considered our offer?"

He would have laughed. "I'm still mulling it over, Ms. Isonov. I've had to juggle a few other commitments."

Jolyne rolled her eyes, but carefully. "Wayne, I was there. I saw the fight. And quite frankly, I know you've fought in worse and seen worse."

Wayne whirled around. "You were THERE?"

She stammered and didn't know why. "Y-yes, but I don't see what that has to do with--"

His arms shot out on their own and shoved her to the ground. Jolyne Isonov looked up at him with rage coated in fear. She started to draw the Photon Gun, but he stopped her. "Get out of here, before I do something we both regret," he hissed calmly. She licked her lips and then cleanly disappeared, leaving him staring at the concrete. He sighed like a man who'd been given a huge burden and slumped down against the wall.

A voice called from the end of the tunnel, echoing like a spectre's. "Mr. Cobane? Were you talking to someone?" It was Damien, the dreamman.

Wayne forced a smile. "Not at all, my man. C'mere, sit with me."

Damien's eyebrows shot up but he came and sat.

The seasoned assassin let out a huge breath. "Damien, have you ever been offered a choice? Not a tiny choice, between a pen and a pencil, or a smoke and a drink, or a meal or hunger. But a REAL choice, something that could not only change your life, but the life of people you've come to know? Something momentous, something that could change the course of the world if you let it happen, something that could derail everything a man has worked for but save another man from the pit?...Don't answer that. Just know that if and when it does happen, you must think about it with not just your mind but your heart. And if you don't know what path to take, STAND STILL."

Damien nodded and closed his eyes. "Mr. Cobane? Can I ask you a question?"

Wayne pinched the bridge of his nose. "Absolutely."

"Why've you taken such a shine to me? I mean, sure I got you out of that mess with Fitz, but I don't see why--"

Wayne grinned and buried his face in his sleeve. "To be honest, boy, I'm not sure. I think--I THINK--you remind me a little bit of me at your age. Well meaning, smart, still ignorant of the world. Before I got caught up in this whole bloody business. You're what, 23, 24?"

"Thirty-five."

The assassin swore and laughed a little. "Looks like we got the same good genes; I'm 40." His face fell back into seriousness. "Killing folks who deserve it, that's no big thing when you do it, but when you lose your scruples--well. Never become an assassin for the money, boy, because you'll earn every red penny."

Damien chortled. "Wayne, I make people fall asleep and walk through dreams. I don't think I'd make a very good assassin."

Wayne cocked his head apprasingly. "Well, I dunno. Sleeping folks can't shoot you. And just think; I make stuff turn invisible. That's about as combat-oriented as dreamwalking, but I'm above people who can dodge bullets and split space-time. All in the head, Damien. All in the imagination."

The dreamwalker looked off into space. "Huh. You want to head back? I think they need medics."

Wayne waved his hand. "You can go if you want to. I got thinking to do."

Damien bade him goodbye and left Wayne Cobane staring at the wall.

[Wish]

Wayne fell asleep. He hadn't fallen asleep for about 2 days. He usually never fell asleep without protection because the kept him alive. He fell asleep and started to dream. He started thinking about how he became an assassin.

*Flashback Starts Here*

He had started out as the son of a street magician and he loved his father very much. He always remembered his father's words.

"Son, I have a terrible job. But one day, you'll find a better job. One that makes millions of dollars. Maybe you can succeed me and become a world famous magician"

So Wayne practiced and practiced. He became good at knife throwing at an early age and was his father's assistant in the knife throwing illusion trick.

Soon Wayne's father began to be noticed thanks to his son's skill and a traveling circus picked him up.

It was there that Wayne met his first friend Archer Flegn.

Flegn at that time was a sharpshooting prodigy at the age of 10. "If I can aim and shoot, I can hit any target," he always boasted.

He and Flegn became fast friends. Flegn even showed Wayne how to hold a gun.

One day, Wayne's father went to the ringmaster because he wanted a raise. The Cobane Magic Act had become a star attraction in the circus. However the ringmaster said no. Wayne's father then threatened to expose the ringmaster's questionable tax record to the IRA. The ringmaster responded with two gunshots later on that evening. He had tricked Flegn into shooting a dummy(which was really Wayne's father) and he planned to make it look like an accident.

When Archer found out what he had done, he was devastated. Only Wayne believed that he was innocent.

When the cops arrived, Wayne did something unexpected. He took Archer's gun and shot the ringmaster. "Archer's innocent, I'm the guilty one," said Wayne, who was already crying tears for his dead father.

The cops arrested both of the two would-be assassins to be held later on for trial. However the day was not complete without the sudden introduction of superpowers. Wayne's grief during the moment of the meteor's impact triggered his latent ability to make himself and other disappear.

The cops didn't know what happened because the meteor's aftereffect had only just reached their location. One of the cops started melting and another simultaneously combusted. Needless to say, some superpowers are best not worth having.

Archer grabbed Wayne-he still saw his tears flowing on the floor. "Pull yourself together, man", yelled Archer.

So Wayne and Archer escaped and Wayne vowed from that day that the only tears that come from his body will be tears of blood.

Fast Forward several years later. Wayne, Archer, and Licious formed the Twin Guns Assassins and Mercenary group.

Wayne woke up at the time and shot out at the darkness.

His rubber, non-lethal bullet grazed Damien by the shoulder.

"You thought that I didn't know," said Wayne.

"It's interesting, so you weren't always a ruthless assassin. I thought that you were trained from birth." said Damien.

"So, where is Archer now?", asked Damien who had become more interested in Wayne.

"Don't know," said Wayne. "He can take care of himself"

Wayne frown then turned into a smile and he started chuckling.

"What's so funny?" asked Damien.

"For a guy that says that his power can't be used as an assassin, you sure make a great interrogator. I mean that's one of the hardest parts of my job. Some guys can take a real physical punishment, but you..... You can go past all that and get it from their dreams", said Wayne.

"But....now that you know...I'm going to have to kill you." Wayne grabbed his other gun.

 "You see. I can't have anyone else know any of my secrets...it's a bad thing in my business", said Wayne grimly.

"I can make you fall asleep, again Wayne," said Damien while being slightly defensive.

"Well, how about this. If you become my apprentice...No, my new partner. Then I won't have to kill you," said Wayne calmly.

"I'm not an assassin, Wayne", said Damien.

"Well, give it a thought," said Wayne. "Until then, I won't have to kill you, and another thing..."

Wayne's tone become more solemn. "Don't tell anyone else."

[Celadon's Penultimate]

Back with the band of superhumans, everyone had either taken a seat on either side of the sewer, on the cement sidewalks that normally served as filthy, grimy highways for rats and various other vermin, or were talking amongst one another about the ordeal they'd just escaped. They could hardly imagine it being possible, but they felt as though NOW they hated Trelaine even MORE than they hated him before. The smell of defeat was trumped only by the smell of rotting sewage.

"Hell, Oi'm tired..." Ivan groaned as he plopped down on a sidewalk, into something greenish-black and sticky. He looked down and grimaced at what he saw, but to prove his point, didn't get up to move.

"I can't believe that damn Trelaine got the jump on us..." a random superhuman could be heard saying in disappointment.

"Neither can I...crap, that was unlucky..." Tessa looked down at her leg, which had been scraped in the conflict.

"Yeah, yeah, I think we can ALL agree The Emo King's a total wanker..." Pierce rubbed his shoulder in pain.

Mutterings of grudging agreement echoed throughout the small crowd. Each of them complained of the pains and wounds they'd acquired in their little skirmish with the human overlord. It was baffling to them that a human could go up against elementals, psychics, strongmen and WORSE, and come away with only a few scratches, cuts and bruises. However, something more baffling seemed at hand. The air was tense with a subconsciously shared question, until Nadia finally couild no longer stand it.

"Anybody know how the hell they found us?" she asked, demanding anyone with a solution to come forward.

"There's no way he could have chipped us all...especially without us knowing." a random technopath chimed in, "I'd have sensed it."

"He didn't even have any kind of tracking device on him." a telepath volunteered.

"An' if he did, who would 'e have been trackin', anyways?" Ivan asked, confused.

As the others deliberated, a sudden notion popped into Fitz's mind.

<<Holy hell,>> he thought, <<It musta been me. I c'not believe it, they musta picked up on me trail when everyone else's powers was out...>>

<<You think it was YOU?>>> a familiar voice responded. Tessa scanning peoples' thoughts to see what they all knew, <<Well, you've got to tell them...>>

<<Didn't anybodeh ever tell ya it's impolite to intrude on people's minds?>> Fitz snapped, a bit annoyed, <<Besides, if ya tell them, they'd probableh put me out into the streets...somebody's bound t'think Ah'm a hazard t'have around...>>

Tessa left his mind, a bit surprised at the fact that Fitz would be willing to keep it from the others, and even more surprised that he was so snippy about it.

<<Well, why not at least TRY to explain it to them? I'd stand up for you, and I'm sure the guys would, too...>>

<<Oh, yeah, of course, 'Iron Fist' and 'Zeus the Thunderer'. Ah don't think so...they'd probably be the first to want t'kick me out...>> Fitz rolled his eyes at the thought.

"Uh, got something you two want to share?" Pierce interrupted their mental conversation, noticing the signs of telepathic conversation. They were facing one another and not saying a word; Pierce wanted in.

"Nope!" Tessa and Fitz said in unison, and then turned away. Turning from them suspiciously, he looked back to the crowd of superhumans.

"So, I don't suppose we're gonna just sit here in this sewer..." Pierce demanded impatiently.

Tamara whirled around from a conversation with Renee, with an angry glare at the cocky electrokinetic.

"Will you stifle it, Streaky? We don't have anywhere to go..."

"Well, I don't know about you, but I don't plan on starting a life in the depths of filth and raising little mutant kids down here. We have to go SOMEWHERE..."  Pierce scoffed.

And the crowd realized, bluntly snarky as he was, he was right. So they picked up their belongings (those who had managed to bring anything with them in the conflict) and began again to trudge through the muck and the mire. In a while they would reach a ladder led up through a manhole back to the streets of Santa Fe.

The superhumans looked around at the carnage left behind by Trelaine and his goons. It was a shock to see such destruction in such a short period of time; cars upside down, windows broken, roofs caving in and countless wounded (even a few dead); then again, it WAS Trelaine. He was a crafty one. And worst of all, he was heartless. It wasn't below his means to wait around for a foe to trip up. As though by a single, shared thought, the supers looked around to see if the overlord or any of his shady henchmen could be seen anywhere around.

Seeing that the coast was clear, they made their way through the streets, looking for any building stable enough to support them without flattening them under the rubble.