We'd All Go Down Together (IC)

[Gizmo]

Trevor placed a hand on Erin's hip in response, letting out a long breath through his masked nose. Normally he wasn't physically affectionate while they were on the job, but the young man felt the need to remind himself why he was on Anti-Earth and for whom he was fighting. "Sloppy ethics, sloppy thinking," he noted rubbing the bridge of his nose with his free hand, squinting behind his mask's lenses. "Sorry. Got under my skin for a minute."

[Electra]

"You're not him," Erin reminded Trevor quietly, brushing a hand over the side of his face lightly enough that he could just barely feel it through the mask. "You're so much more, so much better. The fact that you can pretend to be him for a few minutes, well enough to fool people, that's a tactical advantage. I bet he wouldn't do nearly so well trying to pass for you if he even thought to try. And we can use every single advantage we can get. We've lost most of the day, but we still have some time to look at the maps, go over the plans." That was one of Trevor's best things, so she hoped it would seem at least somewhat appealing. She herself might have preferred just charging in, but that was why she hadn't come here alone.

[Gizmo]

Trevor made a short, flat noise that could have been interpreted as a chuckle. "Should pay attention to my own advice, hnn?" He placed his gloved hand atop Erin's as she brushed the side of his face, closing his eyes for a moment beneath his mask's lenses. "Love you," he said softly, though it sounded vaguely like he was answering a question he hadn't asked out loud. "Should keep moving," the young man noted, regaining his composer and professional manner.

[Electra]

"Love you too," Erin murmured, "and you're right about that." Giving him a last quick smile, she resumed her rear guard position, dashing back down the tunnel a little way to make sure nothing was following them before circling back to the group. "We're clear in the back," she reported to the others, "if anything saw us and tried to follow, they're way behind us. Let's keep it that way." When the going got rough, she scooped up the little girl and carried her piggyback, the better to keep her own arms clear.

[Avenger Assembled]

"Oh, no!" Caryatid went white, and pulled at her sister's arm helplessly for a moment before she subsided. "I mean, uh...I can get us all there faster," she offered quickly, looking at the others. "If I work at it, I can scoop us all up at once, and we'll go right through the sewer walls without anyone noticing. If Midnight can block their sensors the way he did upstairs, it'll be fine." Her parents didn't seem to have anything to add: after all, they didn't recognize Erin, and evidently weren't going to put themselves in the middle of a Syndicate, well, not-Syndicate argument.

"I guess we could do that," Mark offered, shooting a look at the others. "If Midnight can block any vibration sensors, and if you're sure you can carry all of us. The last thing we need is to get separated down here, much less bring the Syndicate down on our heads. We've done this, and that's great, but we still haven't done what we came here to do." Caryatid swore she could do so, and indeed seemed very interested in carrying it out.

[April]

--Sounds good, let's get it done,-- Sage said, a thread of tension lacing her thoughts. Mentally she kicked herself for nothing thinking of doing such a thing sooner. Sure it would have been a little taxing, she reflected, but her telekinetic control had greatly improved over the past few months.

--Sooner we can start the mission, the sooner we can all leave this place for somewhere a bit.. nicer.-- A ghost of a smile flickered across the telepath's expression as she added, --nicer, with a nice, hot shower.--

[Electra]

Erin stared at Caryatid a moment, then stopped and crouched to let Donna off her back, her expression unreadable. "If we're going to risk using powers," she said to the group, looking at her teammates, "then we're better off having Edge just teleport us. I thought we were going this way for maximum stealth, not because it was necessarily the fastest. We don't know exactly what kind of sensors they have."

[Avenger Assembled]

Edge blinked, "Oh, right! Sure, I can do that. Hang on, everybody." Mark didn't like to think about how powerful he was most of the time, so quite often he just didn't. "Everybody hold hands." Once they were all doing so, Mark closed his eyes and concentrated: they got not the black dots this time, but something else, a pointillistic display as the world seemed to fall apart in a circling pattern of colored dots, then reform itself into the sewers nearby Talos' hideout. The robots, their king, and Mind-Master were on hand to greet the new arrivals, the Gravois family looking ill-at-ease in their new surroundings. Edge wound up moving aside with them and Caryatid to tell them all about the wonders of Earth-Prime. That left Talos and Mind-Master to brief the heroes on what they'd done.

"I've constructed a map of the Academy's current structure," said Mind-Master warmly, "which I can show to all of you," he tapped his temple to suggest how, "before you leave. From what Talos tells me, tunneling straight through to the unfortunate Singularity's prison is entirely possible given our resources. What plans have you formulated?" he asked the others as they all bent over a strategy table, robots bustling busily around them. The once-gloomy, rusted place was looking much better in the wake of Trevor's repairs; Talos' headquarters, and much else, had obviously done well out of their visit.

[Gizmo]

"Don't have the prep time for complicated," Midnight prefaced grimly, placing one hand over his chin in concentration. "Sticking to basic guerrilla methods; difference is scale." The young man, having switched back to his customary black, indicated his friend. "Edge is the distraction. Can cover a staggering area with chaos. The rest get in and out with Singularity, cause as much lasting damage as we can along the way." He didn't get into his personal plan for dealing with the eventuality of the Blank making an appearance, but that was the basic outline.

[Electra]

"If Caryatid can tunnel us straight in there, that'll be an asset," Erin added, studying the map. "Less chance of us being spotted on the way in or out, and less chance of Singularity escaping. I'm hoping that if Sage provides us with psychic cover, I can talk her into coming with us quietly, otherwise I'm fairly sure I can take her down in a fast fight. In any case, I need to be the one who goes in to deal with her, because the possibility of her killing anybody else is just too high. I'm not going to sacrifice anyone to try and save her."

[April]

--Wander, I agree with you on everything but that last part.-- the telepath smiled at her taller, stronger teammate and raised a hand to forestall any immediate objections, --I know you mean well but it isn't your place to decide that.-- The smile faded and green eyes met brown and Sage held the gaze unflinchingly.

--If needs must when the devil drives.--

[Electra]

Erin gave Eve a slightly harassed look. "I appreciate the sentiment," she told her teammate, "but we've got to be practical too. I mean, I know a lot of what we're basing our strategy on is guesswork from what we've seen and pieced together. I still think it's pretty safe to guess that Singularity is really not going to react well to somebody who comes in and starts talking to her in her head. If Pathos, evil Psyche, is her personal bogeyman, any psychic may be enough to set her off. It doesn't mean you aren't going to be part of the mission."

[April]

--I meant about sacrifice,-- Sage whispered in Wander's mind. --It is a small price I would happily pay for a victory against the Syndicate and against the malignancy of this world. I know you have been here before, I know you have seen what goes on here.. but I feel this filth crawling around in my head and I can't begin to explain how much it sickens me.--

[Electra]

"It's okay," Erin murmured, not quite able to get the words to stay in her head without saying them, but dropping her voice to match the tone of Eve's mental communication. "We all feel it, this place is just... it's just rotten, and evil, and only a few good patches like this make it even bearable. But we're leaving soon." She raised her voice, turned to the others. "I say we wait through the night and strike at dawn. Anyone who's been patrolling will be tired, anyone who's been sleeping will be sluggish. It might give us a couple more minutes."

[Avenger Assembled]

The next morning, after another night in the sewers, this time joined by the Gravois family, the Claremont kids were in uniform and ready for action. With Caryatid in the lead, they would tunnel under the streets, blow up the school, and then tunnel back down to release the captive Singularity and make their escape back to Earth-Prime with the good offices of Supercape! Or Talos, if for some reason their ride were waylaid. But that was the sort of plan Edge left up to the others, because now it was time to remind them why they fought: with all of them there, even the so little terrakinetic Caryatid at their side. They'd moved out of Talos' hideout, so that their tunnel couldn't be traced from whence they'd came, Mind-Master's 'downloaded' map of the Academy in all their minds. As they waited in darkness, Edge said, "All right, Young Freedom, I don't need to tell you why we're here. This city lives under an empire's lash and a tyrant's boot. Most of the people with superpowers are murderous thugs who crush anyone who stands against them. Well, us? We're the other guys. Let's go show them what freedom is all about."

Listening to Edge's words, Francois gave a grim nod as she put her hands against the sides of the sewer wall and abruptly the teenagers were hurled through rock itself! They were surfing on a wave of stone and steel underneath the black-hearted city above, and the world around them was an ocean of concrete and steel and stone, the earth looking like they'd never seen it before. They had to be getting close..."Now!" And then they were just breaching the surface, rock wall beneath their feet, the grim, grey confines of the Academy all around them. Just as they'd planned, alarms were going off, sending people either out of the buildings with grim looks or into secured, heavily armored bunkers where they could survive an enemy attack. Mark waited for it, waited for it...

Edge closed his eyes and spread out his hands, concentrating, and the air seemed to erupt around him in a fireball of swirling, multicolored bubbles. And then the world exploded. Even Edge cried out as concussions upon concussions shattered the air, buildings collapsing in on themselves like falling cards, hidden fortifications underground catching fire as every window in view shattered and every building broke and crumbled like a shattered child's toy. "Holy freaking...I mean, it's done! It's done!" Mark called over the sound of construction avalanches. "The buildings are going, but the people are okay! Let's move!" And then they were plunging beneath the surface again, leaving behind them the sheer destructive force of Edge's terrible power.

[Electra]

They emerged in an open space underground, and for a moment everything was completely dark, eerie especially with the distant thunder of the destruction going on overhead. Her breath loud in her own ears, Erin turned on her flashlight and played the beam around, turning quickly to make sure they hadn't tunneled straight into an ambush.

The room was strange, perhaps fifty feet in diameter and very unfinished, and looking more like an animal burrow than an actual room. Roots hung down from the dirt ceiling, and the concave floor curved up to become the walls, as though someone had dug a hole and then put a lid on it. A single large retractable door, something like a garage door, was set just under the ceiling, providing the only non-burrowing access to the cavity. It was obviously made of impervium and seemed to have no latch or handle on this side. There were several infrared security cameras set around the walls, set to catch every angle.

In the center of the room, at the lowest point of the concavity, sat a box that all of them but Sage had seen before. It wasn't very big, perhaps twelve feet on each side, but it was reinforced impervium underneath the wires, cords, and pipes that ran across and around it. Though the dirt in most places was supernaturally smooth, molded by the power of Caryatid and other geokinetics, there seemed to be places on the walls where the dirt had been disturbed, by mechanical tread tracks that led in a path between box and door, and in a few places by digging that seemed to have been done by human hands.

Erin blew out a breath. "This isn't going to be easy. Midnight, can you open that box without us destroying it this time?"

[Gizmo]

Midnight made a sound in the back of his throat that suggested he was offended that she even needed to ask as he darted forward silently and lept nimbly to crouch atop the box, landing light so as not to disturb its occupant. A specific gesture popped a thin, notched pick from the index finger in his left glove, and the shadowy young man set about picking the lock on the hatch. It wasn't anything terribly complex; clearly the goal had been to keep Singularity from getting out rather than keeping anyone else from getting in. His work took only a few delicate moments, and he gestured an affirmative to the rest of the group.

[Electra]

Wander nodded to Midnight, then turned to the others, speaking in a whisper to Caryatid. "If I yell go," she told the young geokinetic, "you go, and you get the others out of here, understand? No questions, no waiting." Taking a deep breath, she turned and moved to the box itself. "Jump down here and start making noises against the big door on the side of the box," she instructed him, still barely above a whisper. "Distract her while I get in. Then lock the hatch behind me." Erin didn't have Trevor's stealth, but she was relatively quiet as she swung herself lightly up onto the top of the box.

[Gizmo]

The face Midnight pulled behind his mask was extreme enough that one of his ruby red lenses seemed to practically widen as his head pulled backward in surprise. An objection sprang to his lips and sat their, on the brink of verbalization. There was no way he was going to leave Erin inside with her maddened alternate self and no way to get out. And yet... he was only on that nightmare world because he loved her, trusted her more than anything, and it was her mission. Hunching his shoulders in a near-stoop, he paused for a long beat before nodding tersely and slipping off the side of the impervium box to do as she said.

[Avenger Assembled]

Edge touched Wander's arm just before she jumped. He wasn't much for quiet whispers most of the time, but despite evidence and speculation to the contrary, he wasn't stupid. "It'll be all right," he told Erin, believing it for her when he wasn't sure if he believed it for himself anymore. "You're going to save Singularity. I know it." As to how, well, that sort of thing was never really Mark's area. Especially not now, when he knew what might be required of his friend. He let her go then, down into the dark cavern and the box below.

[Electra]

"Thanks." Wander gave a quick nod to both her teammates, then, as Midnight began tapping and drumming on the door to the impervium box, she found the ceiling hatch, popped it, and dropped silently into the box, drawing it closed again with one smooth motion.

___

Inside the white box, Singularity startled when she heard noises coming from the door to her enclosure. The box hadn't moved, and the box always moved when she was going to be let out. Well, almost always, she thought, as often as she could reliably remember anyway. She hadn't been out of the box in... she couldn't remember how long. It seemed like a long time. And she was hungry. The dim light in the enclosure meant it wasn't even awake time yet, but there were those noises... She crept closer to the door, wondering if she could surprise whatever was coming in. If she could get the drop on them, she could get out! Everything was bad outside, she remembered, but everything was bad inside too. At least outside... maybe she could get away? The concept was an open-ended question in her mind, but she would worry about that later. As the noises increased, her focus sharpened, to the point where she didn't even notice the hatch in the ceiling open until it was much too late and something big was coming down on her! She screamed in rage and fear, even as she was tackled roughly to the ground.

___

Wander hadn't necessarily meant to fall in right on top of her double, but she'd forgotten how ridiculously close the quarters were inside the box. With Singularity occupying the only open space, it was almost inevitable. She tried to make it count, pinning her counterpart to the ground as she landed, but the other girl was extremely strong, perhaps even a little bit stronger than Wander herself was! With a yell, Singularity flipped herself over and used her legs as pistons to toss Wander across the room.

Wander crashed into the wall above the bed, corrected her own trajectory, and shot herself back at Singularity without missing a beat. Strength or not, there was no question who was faster and better trained. She caught Singularity in the midsection, driving them both across the small space until Singularity crashed into the wires that crossed in front of the door. The powerful electric jolt seemed to take the fight out of Singularity, at least for a moment.

"It's okay," Wander told Singularity, backing off to stand by the toilet and raising her hands. "I'm not here to fight you. I want to help you. Do you remember me?"

____

Singularity shook her head to try and clear the stars from her impact with the high voltage wires. She hated the wires! Even if the damage didn't last, they really hurt! Thinking about that distracted her from fighting for a moment, long enough for the intruder to start talking, and for her to get a good look at who had dropped in. The new person looked so familiar... When asked if she remembered, Singularity hesitated, looking down at her shoes and wrinkling her forehead. So familiar... she knew who the new person looked like. "Mom?" she asked uncertainly.

[April]

That Wander's mind was such well-traveled territory to Sage made it easy to distinguish her mind from her caged counterpart. Facing the Box, the telepath placed one gloved hand on its impervium surface, less out of need but more as a way to center her thoughts. It was hardly a time to start experimenting but the telepath wanted to give her friend every advantage, so she lightly touched Singularity's mind, seeing through her eyes and hearing through her ears.

And tasting her thoughts. What have they done to her? the telepath asked herself as she connected her mind to Wander. --I see through her eyes, and hear what she is thinking. I dare not probe deeper.--

[Avenger Assembled]

From the other side of the cavern suddenly came applause and a low, mocking laugh. Edge turned, peering into the darkness, but even though he couldn't see in it the way Midnight could, he knew perfectly well who was there. Who else would it be? "Well well well," said Hex as he stepped into the light that had conveniently just snapped on over their heads. "It appears the cats have chosen to take the poisoned bait left for them by...the rat! Nyesss!" He stroked his wicked goatee and glared evilly as he faced the three heroes, a look of malignant triumph on his face. "Uh-uh-uuuh!" he said, waving his finger mockingly at them as they tensed. "Come at me and I'll pull the cavern down on all of us." He pointed up at the ceiling overhead and snapped his fingers, a ball of colored dots appearing between them. "I'll survive, I always do, and the rest of you can be just more grist for the mill."

"What do _you_ want?" said Edge, who found himself angrier than he'd expected at the sight of his evil twin. He dropped down to the cavern floor, automatically absorbing the twisted mastermind's attention even as he did his.

"Isn't it obvious, healer-man?" said Hex with a leer. "I want you all dead. You especially. I mean look at you! Prancing around in that black costume, going to all this trouble for a little piece of trash from a dimension you've never even seen!" He made a little gesture at the box and added with a look at the ceiling. "Nice technique with the school, though. I've got to admit, I've imagined doing that a few times! Who knew we were quite so powerful?" He grinned. "Feels good, doesn't it? Walking around the streets with abilities far beyond those of mortal men, lording it over the rest of the trash? Seriously, why take that and go prancing around with these people?"

"Because it's the right thing to do. Something you'll never understand, because you're too busy prancing around in a cheap suit to do something meaningful with your life." Edge made a gesture, and suddenly the black was gone from his uniform like tarnish, the gold and blue standing out with crystal clarity. "You're king of a rotting palace..." Suddenly, the Marks were interrupted by the appearances of two shadowy figures in white near the cage!

Furious, Hex shouted, "No, you're not stealing my monologue! Not this time! You fight your OWN goddamned nemeses!" And with that, suddenly steel walls shot up throughout the cavern, corralling (but not trapping) the teen heroes together with their terrible teen counterparts!

[Gizmo]

"Bloody idiot could have just given you all aneurysms and been done with it," the Blank noted in his dry, precisely enunciated tone, sounding unconcerned and conversational. "But he's an absolute slave to theatrics, you know." Clad in an immaculate white suit that seemed to defy the dirt of the cavern, he tugged absently at his cuffs with gloved hands before touching his featureless mask between his fedora and one ruby lens as though grooming his eyebrows."I suppose I can't say you didn't warn me, hm? 'I'll be back' et cetera, et cetera."

For his part, Midnight stepped slowly and deliberately away from the side of the impervium box, drawing his matte black escrima sticks from their sheathes alongside his shins. The young man had expected this confrontation from the moment he agreed to the mission, and had wondered whether he would be able to face it with his usual detached analysis or if he would be hampered by uncertainty. Instead he found only a cold, burning anger in his stomach that seemed to snake out through his limbs as he flexed his fingers and strode forth. "You let them put her back in the box."

The Blank looked vaguely taken aback by the statement. "Hm? What, Singularity?" He glanced over his counterpart's shoulder and shook his head in bemusement. "Good Lord, this is actually a rescue attempt, isn't it? Here I thought you were planning to just let her run loose and--" [/bg]

"Stop. Talking," Midnight demanded as he closed the distance between them.

"Heh... You're right, of course,"  the Blank agreed, clearly smirking behind his mask. With a flick of his wrists, long stiletto blades sprung forth from his sleeves and he launched himself forward. With an identical leap, the battle was joined.

[April]

"Please, nemesis? This little thing?" a surprisingly pleasant voice asked close to Sage. Too close, Sage thought whipping her head around as she sent Wander a brief apology while hastily withdrawing her senses from Singularity. Her breath caught when she saw Inquisitor not more than a few feet away who, upon noticing Sage's eyes on her, smiled.

"She's beside herself with worry," the villain with long white hair continued, playing with the end of her ponytail and paying little, if any, attention to Sage. "Can't you just, mmmmm, feel it? Like an op--" Inquisitor abruptly cut off as she quickly flew backward on wings of lilac energy, dodging a slash from Sage's glowing crimson blade, a tendril of telekinetic energy lightly caressing the mute hero's cheek.

--Oh,-- Inquisitor purred, --Someone is upset.--