ic SCP 46591- Dennis Deacon of Woodbury, New Jersey

[Poncho]

April, 2024

 

A.E.G.I.S. had sent out a request to the Atom Family about a situation involving a situation with an unknown origin point that was affecting the city of Woodbury; County seat of Gloucester County, New Jersey. Wanting to move fast, A.E.G.I.S. had sent out requests to two individuals on their rolladex; the mental manipulator Echohead, and the dimensional refugee with her own suit if powered armor, Predator.

 

The Atom Family had, in turn, decided to send out Rewind. The three represented a vary broad set of powers and skills, which meant forging into an unknown area and an unknown situation would be less dangerous.

The three were currently in a specialize train car of A.E.G.I.S.' design, traveling as incognito as possible when moving from Freedom City to the south of New Jersey.

 

Their handler was an older black woman named August Shrine, standing in front of three white sheets, each on a table.

"...I apologize that A.E.G.I.S. has pulled you out so suddenly, but we're having a significant issue in Woodbury of unknown origin." She explains. "24 hours ago, Dennis Deacon of Woodbury, New Jersey disappeared on a routine walk. He reappeared 8 hours ago, highly dehydrated and malnourished. He was transferred to a local hospital, where 4 hours ago, he passed away." she recounted. "...That is when the trouble began. Once Dennis died, anyone who touched Dennis' corpse became Dennis. They turned into Dennis, and then died within 4 hours. Anyone those people touch turn into Dennis, and so on. Each Dennis copy is highly aggressive to those who aren't Dennis, but primarily out of confusion and seeking help." she indicates to the tarps and pulled them off, revealing 3 corpses in full containers.

 

Each contained the body of a late 30s man, with bright orange hair and green eyes. They were each exact, perfect copies.

 

"This is Dennis Deacon...well, some of them. Don't ask how we got these, you don't want to know. These are being incinerated soon." Shrine said, calm, composed, and absolutely not going anywhere near the cases.

 

"We need the three of you to enter the town, determine what is going on with Dennis- if he's a metahuman, or has some other situation occurring- and stop it. I would rather not have the entire county become consumed."

 

She looked intensely, extremely serious about this.

[Supercape]

Echohead

 

Echohead felt the sweat on his brow. Not from heat - his impervium weave cool black suit was excellent at, well, keeping him cool, but from anxiety. 

 

This was proper spy stuff, and he was determined to look like a cool spy. Despite his bald head, weak chin, and flubbering speech. And five foot five of weedy bones. 

 

But underneath the neurotic ball of anxiety was a deeper fear. This could be a pandemic of Dennis, that could swarm over the world. The threat was potentially very serious. 

 

Predator and Rewind had been sent from AEGIS too. And he was glad to have their company. They looked like they knew what they were doing. Echohead tried very hard to look like he knew what he was doing, too. 

 

He examined the corpses. Same height? Same temperature? His cool sunglasses gave an indepth HUD of various aspects of the corpses. He adjusted them, zooming in on the bodies. Anything suspicious?

 

"Uh... I suppose you have... ah... put the corpses through a full forensic examination?" he asked August. "If.. I mean.. is it safe to do that?"

 

 

[Spacefurry]

Predator

 

The train was obviously of custom design and construction, Jean thought when she arrived. She met up with the other heroes recruited for this mission, giving Echohead a nod as introductions were made.

Jean regarded the other hero, she seemed young, but she had work with a number of younger heroes lately and they all seemed to be promising heroes.

 

Jean had been sitting calmly as the train sped along. She watched out the window as it carried herself and two others out of Freedom. She had worked with the Agent code named Echohead twice before. He was a good man and he could be counted on.

The other one though, called Rewind, she wasn’t familiar with. Jean had seen a few photos of her with other members of the Atom Family, but this was her first time meeting the woman. She would evaluate her by her actions as she did everyone else.

 

When Ms Shrine brought them to the covered tables and began to debrief them, she gave Ms Shrine her full attention.

 

The events Shrine described were unusual, without question.

“How quick is the transformation?”

Jean asked, leaning a little closer to look.

“I assume the transformation occurs despite protective attire.”

She added seemingly unphased.

“Otherwise you would have contained this already. What about bodily fluids? Spit or saliva?”

There was a ripple in the air around Jean and the Predator armor covered her. She scanned each body through the visual spectrum, everything from thermal to ultraviolet, recording and comparing them. Leaning in as close as she dared, Predator switched to more detail inspection, zooming in to a microscopic level.

“What happened when robotics were used to collect samples?”

She asked, assuming they had attempted already.

[Poncho]

(GM Post)

 

Echohead and Predator examined the corpses with beyond human senses, eyes scanning over the beings hidden behind the glass.

 

"Robotics become unresponsive and short circuit when exposed to the corpses or the person; it's causing disruptions in the power grid when the Dennis Deacons touch circuit breakers or similar. It's very odd, maybe a clue?" she offered.

"As for touching, yes, this occurs through PPE. That's why they're sealed like this. It's...well it's an unknown situation that seems beyond dangerous. We wouldn't be calling for heroes if we didn't think that this was something worth an intense, very careful examination."

 

Meanwhile, the super-senses were active, filling the heroes with information about this extremely questionable situation they were in. A horror possibly unfolding!

 

"...I won't lie, this situation is concerning."

 

[Supercape]

Echohead

 

"C-concerning, y-yes..." blubbered Echohead. "T-terrifying, more accurately."

 

He pulled himself together. 

 

"These are perfect copies, down to the fibres of their clothes. And they disrupt electronics? And infect those who touch them? I mean... this is a potential pandemic? Don't we need to call the WHO? or WEST?"

 

He turned to Predator. "What do you think?"

 

He gulped. 

 

"Or more precisely, could I borrow your brain a bit?" he tapped his own shiny scalp. "You know more about science thingies than me, I am sure..."

[Spacefurry]

Predator

 

Information scrolled across her screens as her suit scanned and magnified. Without a properly equipped lab even her sensors couldn’t tell the difference down to a cellular level.

 

But there was something amongst all the data…

 

She turned her attention to Echohead as he asked to copy her mental capabilities. Everything she had been able to find out about the man and his ability said it was harmless to those he ‘copied’.

Though the long term effects on him are something yet to be seen.

 

Still, she gave him a nod.

“That’s fine, you may proceed.”

Predator turned her attention back to examining the bodies.

“Your input may be useful.”

She added.

“I am detecting something from the specimens.”

 

She sorted through a few screens before settling on one in particular.

“You have a monitor I can use for a moment?”

 

[Supercape]

Echohead

 

Echohead reached out and extracted Predator's brain. 

 

No, this was not a B-Movie with an axemurder and a gallon of blood. 

 

Instead, it was a subtle as a camouflaged feather. With the lightest of touch, Echohead copied Preadtors brain and left it nice and cozy within his own skull. 

 

Intelligence! And skill! 

 

Suddently, complicated maths and circuit boards seemed, to Echohead, to be the simplest things in the world. Obscure codings software seemed to be as malleable as a lump of placticene. The most exotic technology seemed to be no more arcane than a hammer and a nail. 

 

"Wow... that's better!" he muttered, peeking over Predator's shoulders with new eyes, finding the previous unknowables seemed to have swum into crystal clear focus. 

 

[Spacefurry]

Predator

 

Predator followed Agent Shine’s lead to a computer she could use. She easily slid into place to work, connecting to it only enough to send her findings to the screen for the others to see.

 

On the screen, several widows appear. Some contain graphs, others, shifting numbers and text. She points to one set of widows in particular, the signal’s signature.

“Here.”

 

“With no identifiable electronics, one can only assume this is some form of electromagnetic signature.”

A second, identical set of windows open.

“Both bodies are emitting identical signatures. But no normal person should be registering a signal like this.”

Predator sat back to allow the others to examine the data as she spoke.

“While it’s too early to assume its purpose, I think we can assume its source is the cause of this epidemic. Perhaps the original Mr. Deacon, or perhaps more likely, whatever happened to him.”

 

A single articulated finger on her gauntlet tapped the chin of the helmet.

“But perhaps with some work, we could modify trackers to pick up on the signal. With a strong enough signal we could possibly find our patient zero, or possibly even the source.”

She offered.

[Poncho]

(GM Post)

 

"Interesting..." Shine said, frowning. "So some sort of electronics...that does explain why there have been electrical problems as well; so this really is a multi-pronged epidemic, a physical disease changing from person to person, and some sort of electrical problem. Combined, if it swept across the county, or the state, it could cause severe destabilization. This might be the start of a terrorist or extra-terrestrial attack, at this rate." The Agent muttered, looking between the gathered heroes.

"You can take whatever you need from this train to see if you can build some sort of tracker to find the source of this and take it down before it spreads any further. We can stay in contact as well and if you need heavy firepower, we can scramble a jet to bury something in firepower." she looked at a screen, then at the bodies in the containers, and shuddered a little.

 

"We'll be hitting the last stop before Woodbury in a few minutes. If you need to keep looking at these corpses you can, but as soon as you're done I'm going to incinerate them. As soon as you're ready we'll send you out to try and find the source and set it down."

[Poncho]

(GM Post)

 

Predator and Echohead carefully work together to create an appropriate pair of trackers. Handheld devices; handles with a beeping scanning screen on them and a spiking antennae, they have the ability to test them on the sealed corpses. In the specially designed train, they work quite well, but as soon as they leave the safety of the train, they start to beep in frustration; you can even feel the scanner's own frustrations as they start to spit out errors. Specifically, two errors;

 

Error 1: Radio Signal from Prime Tower currently interfering with radio signals. Need in person calibration from the Prime Tower.

Error 2: Unable to locate Prime Designate; please locate Original Body to determine prior passages.

 

As the pair were standing in a forest overhanging Woodbury; where only a few lights were on, fires pressed across the street, and from where they were standing, they could barely make out groups of people traveling, finding singular stragglers, and falling over them like a wave. Then the singular straggler joined the group.

 

In the very center of town was the Central Radio Tower; across various burning streets and possible groups of roving zombies. They needed to get there.

 

And to the East, along the edge of the city, was the hospital where they had taken Dennis after they found him. Lights on individual floors flickered on and off as did the sign for the Hospital in general, like it was aghast at the sites before it and blinking.

Hard to decide which seemed more dangerous, and which was more important, though both were necessary.

[Supercape]

Echohead

 

"I don't like th-this..." gabbered Echohead, sweat on his bald head. "But, the hospital?"

 

Hospital had people in it. Sick people. Maybe people in danger. 

 

They couldn't just leave people there to... to, what exactly? Die? Mutate? Become Dennis Deacon? Turn into Elvis and start dancing down the street singing a medly of his greatest hits whilst a zombie followed him, smashing out the beat on a pair of fibula?

 

Well, probably not that. But still, it was uncertain land. 

 

"We have to go there, right? People might be in danger..."

[Spacefurry]

Predator

 

Predator frowned under her helmet as she watched the readouts on the scanners. Between the two of them they had produced a pair of functioning scanners. They were supposed to help track down the original source of the ‘event’.

Obviously the number of overlapping signals was more than they accounted for. The bodies on the train didn’t exhibit the apparent magnitude increase they were now encountering.

 

The errors were directing them to both a local radio signal tower and a local hospital. Both would be needed. She contemplated for a moment…

 

On 4/30/2024 at 4:27 PM, Supercape said:

Echohead

 

"I don't like th-this..." gabbered Echohead, sweat on his bald head. "But, the hospital?"

 

"We have to go there, right? People might be in danger..."

 

Predator looked at Echohead and then nodded.

“You’re correct. The safety of possible survivors should be top priority.”

She looked out over the town again.

“We should traverse the rooftops. Traveling the streets would invite too many potential encounters.”

[Supercape]

Echohead

 

"Th-the rooftops?" blubbered Echohead, the sweat intensifying. He was - and not for the first time - glad that his black supersuit did an excellent job of cooling his body, and preventing sweat patches. 

 

"I mean, how?" he asked. "I can't fly? Or jump. Or even run, not well, anyway..." he said, voice faint and wobbling. He was five foot five and little of it was muscle. 

 

"Do you have some kind of hover bike? Or zero gravity generators?" he asked. "Or I suppose you could carry me..."

 

It was not exactly a dignified solution. But better to swallow ones pride, as opposed to falling face first onto concrete...

[Spacefurry]

Predator

 

The smooth face of the Predator armor reflected Echohead’s nervousness, but behind it, he just knew…

The vixen was giving him an apologetic look, but there was a tinge of mirth behind it.

 

Predator secured her scanner and scooped Echohead up into a carry. Luckily, the man wasn’t taller than her in the armor.

“Hold on tight.”

 

Oh ya, she was definitely finding this humorous. He had an idea of how her mind worked right now.

 

Thrusters fired and the duo were airborne. The arch of her trajectory carried them to the first rooftop. A second leap carried them further, where her fingers dung into the wall of the building.

She shifted Echohead and climbed up to the ledge.

 

Predator and Echohead continued making their way towards the hospital, one rooftop at a time.

[Poncho]

(GM Post)

 

As Predator carried Echohead across the rooftops, the wannabe secret agent could...feel. He could feel, below him, the beings moving around now that he was close enough, and Predator carrying him gave him the time to focus.

 

Each of the Dennis Deacons, even in their brains, was the same. More than 'the same', they were identical. These weren't surface level changes to the individual person. Even the connections in a person's brain were overwritten. Memories, IQ, Feelings, Emotions. All of them were all the exact same. But it wasn't just one mind; there was a second, somewhere, laying over each of the brains; a passenger, on each of the Dennis Deacon's brains. There was something at the root of this, infecting the inside of the brains.

 

And then the pair were at the hospital, and one of the windows opened. In the darkness, lit only by the slowly flashing sign, someone waved them in.

 

"Hurry, get in here before they see you. We're trying to hide in here." The voice was panicked, concerned, scared. It opened the window and stepped back to let the two in. "I don't know who you are, but I'm hoping you can help."

 

In their hands or attached to their suits, the scanners they built beeped. They needed to get into the Hospital. To find the original Dennis Deacon and begin calibrations.

[Supercape]

Echohead

 

Echoheads buzzed. Normally he would have closed his eyes to help him focus on the sensations in his cranium. However, he was being carried by Predator and if he closed his eyes he would get motion sickness from the bouncing and flying. He didn't want to throw up over the power armour. 

 

"I can feel something..." he explained to Predator. 

 

"All the... Dennis Deacons. Its like... like a hive mind. Absolutely identical... like they all share one brain. And... and something behind them all. Like a puppetteer..."

 

"I don't know if thats good news or bad news. Its probably both. But I thought I should tell you..."

 

With the sound of the panciked voice, Echohead piped up again. "We are absolutely heere to help! Whats the problem?"

 

We are here to try to help, he thought. Whether they could or not... that was another matter that he swallowed down his throat and let fungate in his stomach. 

[Spacefurry]

Predator

 

Predator watched her screens as she followed the overlay showing their projected path across the roofs.

 

She nodded as Echohead informed her about what he sensed.

“A puppeteer may be beneficial if it stops the puppets when we cut his strings. Otherwise, it could be problematic if doing so sent the copies in to a frenzy.”

 

Pausing on a roof across the way. They spotted the open window and someone waving them in. Cynthia already has the trajectory calculated and a small thrust and leap easily carried the two over to the building. She let Echohead pass through the open window first, then followed him in.

 

“How many survivors are here?”

Predator asked even as she switched between scanning modes, searching for potential threats.

[Poncho]

(GM Post)

 

"We've got about 25 people holed up in here. We're...really not sure what's going on. We know what we need to not do." said the woman, clearly the charge nurse for the hospital from the fact she was still walking around carrying the primary phone. An older woman in her late 50s.

 

"We're okay for now, we've got this floor barricaded, and most of those...well, they're zombies or something, I guess? They're almost all out of the hospital at this point. They started here, but they're spreading out." she said carefully. "I'm glad someone is here to help, or figure out what's going on. I'm really not sure myself, and it's way out of our league, I think." she was talking in concern but was still pretty confident and trying to be in control.

 

"What do you need from us?" She asked.

Somewhere in this hospital was the body of the original Dennis Deacon, something the pair needed to get close enough to calibrate their sensors, but they weren't sure where. This woman probably knew. But they were also in danger.

[Supercape]

Echohead
 

"Figure out what to do. That's...ah... yes... right. We should figure out what to do...." said Echohead, wiping the sweat from his brow. His super cool black costume literally kept him cool (thanks to its thermal reverse tremie pipes), but he wasn't sweating from heat. It was nerves, pure and simple. 

 

"Its a bit of a ... zombie mob... out there..." 

 

Echohead didnt like using the word zombie. But the z-word had reached escape velocity now, and there was no way he could reel it back in. 

 

"I think we are probably best barricading you all in here, safely. Then we can get to the source..."

 

He crossed his fingers. Then uncrossed them, realising that he had done it plain view. 

 

He turned to predator. "Can we keep them safe? Hidden? Locked? Then we can snip of the head of the beast... whatever that is. That should work, right?"
 

He crossed his fingers again. And once again, it was in plain view. 

Edited May 20 by Supercape

[Spacefurry]

Predator

 

Predator nodded to the nurse.

“We are here to attempt to identify the source of the outbreak. And potentially discover a way to halt it.”

 

She regarded Echohead and nodded again.

“Agreed.”

Predator turned her attention to the nurse again.

“Your best bet is to remain here behind secured barriers until a proper evacuation plan can be made.”

 

The armored helmet tilted to one side and she opened a channel to Agent Shine.

“Agent Shine, we have uninfected in the hospital. Possible 25 individuals.”

The helmet looked back at the nurse.

“I will transmit the phone contact for the nurse in charge. She can provide further details. We will continue as planned.”

Once she had the nurse’s contact info, she conveyed it on.

 

That done, Predator questioned the nurse.

“We believe patient zero may be present within the building. Given the timeline that was reported we would venture to guess the body may still be somewhere in the ER.”

Edited May 20 by Spacefurry

[Poncho]

(GM Post)

 

The charge nurse looked at Echohead like she was finally getting aware of his actions, and a frown crossed her face as she got closer to him.

 

"I'm sorry, sir...are you okay? You seem uncomfortable...are you ill or something?" she asked with clear concern. "...If you need to rest, or some water or tea, we can get you some, if you need it." she offered, reaching nearby to get a glass of water for him. "Take a deep breath." she was in nurse mode now, trying to take care of Echohead. "Do you need to sit down?"

 

"Um, Patient Zero? So like the original, you mean. We actually moved him down to the morgue. In the basement...." she looks quite upset now, sad, guilty. "...I was the one that had him moved. And the first person that changed was one of the people I had help move him...I should have done it myself." she said with a level of very direct frustration. "...I'm sorry. I shouldn't be pitying myself. I can keep everyone in here locked up, and I can give you my badge to make sure you can get anywhere in the hospital."

 

Agent Shine finally responded, a little crackly.

 

"Noted, 25 people in the hospital. We'll make sure to send someone in once the situation is resolved."

[Supercape]

Echohead

 

"I'm fine, I'm fine..." said Echohead. "Just a mild case of extreme anxiety. Nothing to worry about, eh?"

 

His throat felt dry, his cheeks felt flushed. He was very glad his high - tech sunglasses were black. The thought struck him - the hospital would have diazepam, wouldn't it? No - no - NO! that way lay madness. 

 

"Patient Zero. Who was he?" he asked. "How did this... happen?"

 

Perhaps the hospital staff had some clue. 

 

"Do you have his medical  records? I understand confidentiality, but given the situation we are in..."

[Spacefurry]

Predator

 

Predator nodded as the nurse mentioned the body having been moved to the morgue. She shook her head though as the woman blamed herself.

“You had no way to know. Just focus on keeping these people safe until we can clear the area and you can be extracted.”

 

“His records might hold a clue. If it mentions where he was found it would prove a sensible starting point. Any biometrics or evidence found on him.”

Predator regards the nurse.

“The apparel he arrived in, do you know if it was already disposed of or was it processed as possible evidence for the police?”

[Poncho]

(GM Post)

 

"Dennis...Dennis is..." she frowns and looks to the side a bit.

 

"Dennis wouldn't do this. Not if it was him. Dennis was a good guy. He volunteered at the local shelter. He coached a local little league team. He'd been employee of the Month at the plant for like three months. He liked camping, went out all the time...he didn't come back this time. We sent out a search party and found him starving, dehydrating, mumbling about some 'cave' he found. We took him back here and he just...slowly withered and died...I almost think it was natural, we didn't get to him in time. But then, after we moved him down into the morgue, that was when things started going bad. One of the people who had brought him in came back, complaining of headaches, exhaustion. Then we just...watched. As he shifted and turned into a copy of Dennis in front of us. And he started freaking out. That was when we started to know something was really wrong. The people who hadn't been touched barricaded on floors they could find, slowly grouping up here. Everyone else turned into Dennis." She mumbled.

 

"You can access his records though; I'll log you in on this computer. His apparel would be in the storage locker in the room he had been in. 845, two floors up. Please be careful with anything you touch that he was in contact with though. We're really not sure how this spreads. If you need anything, though, let me know."

[Spacefurry]

Predator

 

Cynthia was already loading the building’s schematics, a path to the indicated room drawing along it in a bright blue line.

She regarded Echohead.

“It should be safe to split up in here, briefly. Do you want to check the computer or the clothes? We can meet back up here afterwards and check the morgue together.”