Electra

Miss Americana worked quickly and surely, rerouting damaged pathways, jury-rigging patches to replace parts that were unavailable, and generally doing whatever was necessary to salvage the function of the sophisticated robot. Rather than putting Victory under general anesthetic and losing his input, she administered a nerve block and turned off the network of synthetic nervous tissue that provided sensation from his robotic exoskeleton. With him feeling no pain, she was able to harvest what she needed, though she tried to be extremely sparing. After several hours of very tricky work, she stepped back and stretched, a sight that was hard not to appreciate. "All right," she finally said, "he needs a lot more work, but that's a patch job."

Erin goggled a little bit when she realized Mona was eating her kebabs stick and all, but decided not to say anything about it. Maybe she had some weird dietary imbalance, or maybe she was so huge it was like eating a sprig of parsley with her meal or something. Either way, it wasn't really the subject at hand. "It's good that you keep going to see her," Erin opined, scooping up a forkful of lettuce. "Even if it doesn't really work out like you want, if you say all the things you need to say and keep trying, then you won't have as much to regret when she's gone eventually. You don't want to leave things unsaid or undone."

"That's too bad," Erin said, figuring that was a safe response, at least. She poked a scallop with her fork and ate it, thinking about what to say. She was pretty interested in the fact that Mona had apparently been extremely tall even before she got her powers, but mentioning that at the moment seemed tactless. "She's probably proud of you anyway, even if she doesn't show it. Maybe she doesn't want to have to admit she was wrong. But I mean, you're a hero, and she's your mom." She took a few more bites of salad, enjoying the fresh taste and the change from school lunches. Then she reminded herself again to be grateful for the school lunches, because she was pretty sure she'd miss them when they were gone. "When's the last time you talked to her?"

"I think you're right," Miss A agreed, after taking a moment to parse out all the missing words in Dragonfly's ideas. "There's a strong chance that if he goes back and tries to be a hero openly, he'll be the target of a great deal of suspicion and fear. You and I will have to go completely incognito and try to avoid changing anything while we're there, at least on the first trip. If we have to come back during the repair process, it'll only be more complicated if they're looking for us or suspicious of us. I could be wrong though," she said, changing ideas without breaking stride. "Tronik is more technologically advanced than Earth, they could be more socially evolved as well. They may be able to absorb and celebrate Sharl's unique new abilities. He could be very happy there." Her voice said she wanted to hope more than she actually hoped this was the case. As she spoke, Miss A walked over to a full-length mirror set in on wall and tapped her own ribs several times in what seemed to be a pattern. An invisible seam in her skin opened up, revealing a maze of circuitry and tubing inside. Watching herself in the mirror, she began deftly patching the leaky tube that was causing all the surface "bruising."

"We've got a little time to play with, I'll see what I can do. I'd like to see it on the big screen as well," Miss A told Lois with a quick wink before going to meet the three other girls who would be on the tour and their parents. She wasn't altogether sure why, but something about Joan's attitude just rubbed her the wrong way. She'd never been the reporter's greatest fan, certainly. Too nosy by half, and a little too ready to impose her morals on everyone around her, but Miss A knew plenty of people like that. She certainly wouldn't be friends with Gabriel if that put her off too badly. Maybe it was just that Joan seemed so unenthusiastic about being here. Freedom City was a competitive city for the sciences, and Lois' project really had been good for a child her age. What was the mama's problem here? No time to think about it now, she decided, and finished her cordial introductions, then went to the front of the group. "It's such a pleasure to have you all here today. As you probably know, the Lab was founded predominantly by women scientists, so we take the cause of women in science very seriously. I want to congratulate you all on the excellent work you did to get here, and I hope you enjoy the tour. If you come with me, we'll get started at the top, and work our way down."

Miss Americana laughed and shook Lois' hand with a firm grip. "It's a pleasure to meet you, Lois. And that paper is out of date, I'm afraid. I'm closer to two terabytes now, and would probably have more if I weren't kept so busy by other things. But that massive file was definitely my biggest single catch." She looked right into Lois' face as she talked, careful not to let her attention wander to the other people arriving. It was good to make people feel important, even awkward young girls. Maybe especially awkward young girls. "I looked at the science fair project you did when they sent it over to me. You've done some great work on vectors. Maybe one day you'll be interning here at The Lab." She looked up then and gave Joan a smile that was polite, if not as warm. "Ms. Collier, it's a pleasure to see you again as well. I hope you're both looking forward to the tour."

Gina woke up late that morning, but that wasn't much of a surprise. She'd been up till dawn chasing down a real honey of a virus halfway across the Northeastern Backbone, and though she'd gone to bed triumphant, she'd only slept four hours. She fried the internal workings of her alarm clock when it rang without even fully waking up, but managed to restrain herself when the second, "this is important" mechanical alarm clock went off. She sat up and stared blearily at the clock, her mighty mind dragging itself out of the fascinating playground of sleep to try and remember why she was waking up. "Science fair, right," she muttered aloud. "Gotta impress the future women of science..." She staggered to the bathroom to splash water on her face, mentally commanding the coffeemaker downstairs to get a move on. A hit of caffeine and a quick shower got her awake enough to head down to the basement, and moments later, half a mile away, the graceful shape of Miss Americana rose into the air above her lab. Perfectly groomed and put together in the rose and powder blue pantsuit Gina's had the foresight to choose for her the night before, the incomparably lovely superheroine touched down in front of the lobby five minutes before the tour she'd agreed to lead was supposed to arrive. Whew. Several of her colleagues had begged off this duty, but she didn't mind. She liked children, most of the time, and as long as she could give them back.

Miss A chuckled, but there was a rueful edge to it. "You're thinking too small, Dragonfly. We'll be gods there, literally. Capable of creating or destroying on a whim, with a thought. Of course, we don't want any of them to know that, but the reality is still there. In fact, with the changes I've made to Sharl's program, changes he's internalized to the point where I'm not sure I could safely remove them, he's going to have superpowers when he goes how. Flight, strength, the ability to walk through walls. And that's a big deal, considering that they don't have a superhero tradition there. I find myself wondering how well he'll fit in there, now that he's seen the real world," she confessed.

"They do, though I haven't talked to Sharl about it very much," Miss a replied. "The end-time cults seem to be focused on the holes in reality that are almost certainly running errors in the program. My current plan of attack is to get physical access to Tronik and expand the available overflow memory, just so adding more data isn't quite as risky. When that's in place, I want to accompany Sharl into Tronik itself, projecting myself into the computer and following him through the same back door by which he left. Once inside, I can see what's going on there for myself and get an idea of what sort of problem we're looking at. You can do the same thing, can't you?" she asked Dragonfly. "Project yourself into machines?"

Notice check, Wander rolls a 31.

Singularity paused when the man in black talked to her, he knew her name as well, and his voice seemed strangely familiar. He had monster eyes, but they were strange, not like zombie eyes, not like anything she remembered seeing. She stared at him, giving up for a moment on trying to kill the stranger and get away. Before she could decide what to do about the man in black, though, the light came on and she heard another voice: the bad-luck man! Singularity cringed and drew herself up small, giving up the fight and tucking her limbs unoffensively in against her body. The bad luck man was no one to make angry, horrible things would happen. And then he would tell Pathos. ______ Wander rubbed her aching head and rolled to a sitting position on the moving deck of dirt, looking around at the situation. Something about the boys had obviously intimidated her counterpart into surrender, though god knew how long that would last. If this was the last quiet moment they were going to have, she needed to do something to earn this other Erin's trust. She decided to play her one ace in the hole. Reaching into her bag, Wander drew out a very old and very battered-looking teddy bear. Its fur was clean but faded and worn down, its cloth nose hanging loosely, one ear half torn away. Trevor and Mark could both recognize it as one of the scant handful of possessions Erin kept in pride of place on her dresser at Claremont. "I think this is something of yours," she told her counterpart, extending the toy. Singularity's eyes lit with recognition the moment she saw the bear. "Bronwyn," she murmured excitedly, reaching for the toy instantly. She seemed to think better of it for a moment, withdrawing cautiously with a look over at Edge, but the temptation was much too strong. Singularity grabbed the toy and hugged it, petting the matted fur and closing her eyes. Wander pursed her lips,her whole face tightening for a moment, then she rocked back on her heels and gave the others a wordless shrug.

"There's an amazing amount of potential," Miss A agreed, "but the catch is that they're all in the Matrix still, so to speak. Sharl was shocked and very upset when I explained his nature to him. They don't know they're not organic beings anymore, and I'm really not sure it would be wise to just put that information out there. From what he's told me, the error rate is increasing, but rational people try to ignore or explain it away, and the ones who don't, they start joining end-times cults or get dismissed as crazies. It almost seems too convenient. It's crossed my mind that the only way the system could remain relatively stable and the people ignorant would be if there was something in the program that was self-aware enough to act as a programmer, adjusting things in real-time to try and maintain the status quo."

"That's what I need," Miss A assured her, "someone else thinking along the same lines, to make sure I don't miss anything. I'm good, but nobody's perfect, and if we don't get this perfect, we could destroy a lot of sentient electronic life, and ruin something very unique. And I wouldn't want to have to tell Sharl I accidentally all his friends and family, either." She smiled dryly. "I can send you the information I have on the system, but it's sketchy at best. What would really help is if I could get someone at the Freedom League to give us physical access. Hell, if we could hard-patch in another zettabyte of memory, that might be enough to stabilize the system right there... for awhile, anyway. Sharl's full programming bundle is well over a terabyte by itself, but the system's only got about twenty million inhabitants. It would be interesting to see what could be done with a lot more memory. Sharl mentioned that the city is surrounded by mountains and sea, probably to save space. An entire new city could be programmed and opened. It'd be cool."

Wander looked up towards the projection booth and debated going up there as well, but decided against it. Jack of All Blades was already hanging off the only good rafter, and it seemed like the situation was in hand. She continued walking towards the screen, glancing down the aisles as she went. Aside from the rapidly-rotting food, nothing seemed to be amiss with the room itself, and the movie was just a movie. But something was going on, something had scared the bejesus out of all those people. What could it be?

"I'm going to have my staff get in touch with you and start making arrangements for a local facility," Miss A told the anxious parents. "Magnus will probably be overseeing most of that end of things, so you won't need to worry much. I will need releases for all of Eina's medical records, and for free access to speak with her doctors about her condition. I'm also going to send you some literature to read, to help you understand exactly what we're going to be doing." She gave them a reassuring smile. "Other than that, take care of your daughter, and take care of yourselves as well. I'm sure that when Eina is up and running around again, she's going to keep you busy, so you'll want some rest before then."

For a moment, Wander was totally disoriented by the sudden change of scene and feeling of motion. They were definitely out of containment, and seemed to be standing in a dirt tunnel... that was filling in right behind her! She braced to run before she realized that they were staying inches ahead of the landslide, even as the walls rushed by around them and the floor seemed to tremble and vibrate under her feet. She could barely see a thing, just outlines and shadows from the faint glow of the flashlight Caryatid held loosely at her side. It was instinct more than anything that had her turning to her counterpart,just in time. ________ Singularity knew this dream,and it was a bad one. She buried Megan,after she'd murdered her, no, not murdered, it wasn't like that, but she was dead, and Erin buried her, only she wasn't really dead, but the dirt was falling down on her and choking her and getting in her mouth and eyes and nose! And then it wasn't Megan in the hole anymore, it was her, with her hands tangled in the filthy My Little Pony blanket and unable to move while the other beings in the hole stared and whispered and prepared to leave here there in the dark... ___________ Wander just managed to catch her counterpart around the middle as Singularity leapt for Edge and Caryatid, a move that tumbled both of them to the floor. There was very little space to maneuver in the tunnel they raced through, and both of them took a few hard knocks as they hit the sides and nearly got sucked into the backflow of dirt. Wander fought in near-silence, typical for her, grunting or cursing softly when her opponent got in a hard hit. Singularity was different, crying frantically for her sister even as she did her best to separate her counterpart's head from her body. Wander just hoped this was going to be a really short trip. Things were already not going according to plan.

The sound of the explosions, muffled as they were by the impervium, were still clearly audible from inside the box. Wander had just enough time to mutter a bad work and Singularity to stop her escape attempt and look upward before everything began to shake. Both girls were naturally agile enough to keep their footing, but as a rock hit the generator and the room plunged into darkness, the shaky ground was the least of their worries. It took Wander a moment to find her flashlight, ignoring the unearthly moaning coming from her counterpart. Rarely had Erin ever been as relieved to see anything as she was to see the hatch open on a familiar black mask. "Can't leave you guys alone for a minute," she joked to Trevor, managing half a smile. "We'd better get a move on. She turned to try and find Singularity, who had wedged herself into the narrow space between the dresser and the wall, and was staring up at the hatch, wide-eyed. She didn't seem to know whether to keep hiding or to attack. "Come on, Erin," Wander encouraged, "we're getting out of here." She stepped up onto the bed, ready to jump out the hatch. "We can't stay here, it's dangerous and dark." ___________ The world was falling to pieces, and Singularity didn't know what to think anymore. The stranger knew her name, the real name that no one called her except... she couldn't remember, that was a bad memory anyway so no great loss, but it was still very strange that someone should know her name. Before she could puzzle that out, everything got dark and started shaking and exploding! That didn't happen in the box, the box was for before and after all the bad things happened! She tried to hide, but the stranger had a light, and just as promised, suddenly the door in the ceiling opened up. When the stranger encouraged her to go, Singularity shook her head. Even if it wasn't a trick, it was much too confusing and dangerous. At least in the box she was safe. She shrank back against the wall, the pitch of her moans taking on an edge of new hysteria. _________ Wander studied her counterpart, then looked to the hatch. This was... not good. "How long do we have?" she asked Trevor tersely.

"Why?" Erin asked curiously, taking a drink of her soda. They both fell silent when the waitress returned with their food, but she didn't take back the question. She'd spilled more about her own background to Fulcrum than she had to most other people, even people she'd known much longer. And she figured Mona wouldn't have brought it up if it wasn't something she wanted to talk about on some level. Erin wasn't totally sure that she would be objective in a talk about getting along with moms, but she could listen, at least.

"I would too," Miss Americana said with a wry smile that suggested she understood Dragonfly's feelings. "I've located the back-door access that I'm reasonably sure Sharl accidentally escaped through, but I'm concerned about putting him back into the system without a more comprehensive understanding of how it works. If he's picked up a virus, or if the changes I've made in his code to allow him to function here are incompatible, a system as unstable as the one he describes could be severely affected by his return. I could use another hand and set of eyes to work on the problem, if you've got a little free time."

"Have you ever heard of Tronik?" Miss A asked. At Dragonfly's look of incomprehension, she explained, "Tronik is a city that lives inside a computer's memory. Hundreds of years ago, it was a real city, on a planet far away. An alien being with obscure motives destroyed the city, but not before digitizing the entire thing, every building, every street, every plant... and every human being as well. Not just as raw data either, but as reactive programs, running in real-time and changing, developing. The city was in stastis for a long time, but the Centurion discovered it, activated it, and, not knowing what else to do with it, allowed it to run unmolested." As she spoke, Miss A removed her uniform top entirely and began scanning the ribs that were damaged in the fight as well. There was actual visible bruising on the skin, a sign of the hydraulic fluid leak that still needed correcting. "That was decades ago, and the program has been running ever since. And growing by leaps and bounds. The inhabitants don't realize they're in a computer program, or that memory is finite, and they are approaching the limits of their storage space. That's where Sharl is from."

"It would be hard for them to miss the fact that he's not a flesh and blood student," Miss A pointed out, "since he'd be needing space in the computer mainframe instead of a dorm room at night. But it might be something to look into. If nothing else, he's already missed several months of school, and that's not good for a boy his age. I want to get him back where he belongs, but it's not easy." She studied Dragonfly for a moment. "I know you're an exceptional engineer," she said, "but how good are you with pure computer programming?"

Wander glanced at Jack out of the corner of her eye, shrugging just a bit stiffly. "Knowing that someone is trying to scare me actually makes it less scary. Either they're playing a game, or they're worried they'll lose in a fair fight. When something doesn't care if you're coming, or doesn't even pay attention to you,that's when you should start to worry. And there's not really a lot that scares me anymore." She looked at him, her expression utterly deadpan. "If the ghost jumps out, you can hide behind me."

Miss A smiled. "You will be able to eat ice cream, yes," she assured the little girl. "Eating won't be quite the same, you won't need to eat food anymore, but you will be able to taste it and swallow it if you want to. And you will need to learn all over again how to ride a pony, but I'm sure that if you work hard, you'll be able to get back into the saddle. As for the flying... well, we'll see about that. The first thing we want to do is make sure that you are safe and well, able to do the things that a normal little girl can do. It's going to take some time for us to get everything ready before we can try the procedure. I will make arrangements for you to meet my sidekick. He can tell you a little more about what it's like to live inside a computer for a little while."

"Whatever's in here, we're not going to do anything by standing here except freak ourselves out," Wander suggested firmly. "It could be anything from a woken-up ghost to some kid with illusion powers and a nasty sense of humor, but whatever it is, we'll deal with it when we find it. The witnesses reported that they saw weird and creepy stuff when they were in the theatre itself, right? Let's go check it out." Bat held at the ready, she headed towards the theatre where lights flickered and sound played, keeping an eye out for any hint of further disturbance.

Fleur beamed at the officer. "That will be just perfect." Reaching into her pocket, she pulled out a business card that smelled lightly of flowers and passed it over. "If you'll just call when the cell is ready, we'll bring him back. You might need to leave a voicemail, but I'll make sure to check." With that, she laid a hand on Wail's shoulder and touched the flowers in her own green hair. There was a moment when the world was nothing but green and the strong scent of pine needles, and then they were standing in the middle of what seemed to be a massive virgin forest, in the middle of a little clearing full of buildings made of plants. "We'll be safe and have privacy here," she assured Wail, "and there's no way he can hurt anyone."