You Can't Go Home Again (IC)

[Azuth65]

Wisp watched the Russian agent leave, noting how as he did her breath ceased being visible every time she exhaled. "I wasn't expecting something requiring what sounds like three days local time, unless your hyper-drive or warp-drive or mass relay system or whatever messes with relativity and we'll be gone for years instead of a weekend. I need to step out real fast, make a couple phone calls and grab a few things from home."

Slinging her bag over one shoulder she eyed the Lor military, "Say, any of you folks ever catch Star Trek? I read something about tv signals spreading out into space and it being likely non-terrans would pick it up to one degree or another."

[Raveled]

The group broke up and the heroes went their separate ways, with instructions to regroup in several hours. Each went to alert their loved ones and comrades as to where they would be, and gather what supplies they needed, and as the skies darkened they reconvened on the lawn in front of Freedom Hall. At first there was nothing to suggest that the Lor were anywhere around, or that they ever had been; but after a minute of mulling about the familiar green glow descended, focusing into three coherent beams, out of which stepped the Commander, the Ethnologue, and the Engineer.

Commander Brey stepped forward and shook everyone's hand briskly, again. "Well then! I'm glad to see we didn't scare anyone away, heh heh heh. Are you already to get teleported up?"

[Azuth65]

Wisp stood with her repacked messenger bag slung across her body. Her teleportation had served her well in getting from Freedom Hall to her home and back in less than twenty minutes. She was anxiously tapping her foot waiting with barely contained excitement and nervousness at the prospect of traveling through space. It was nearly enough to keep the big question of what a Soviet era colony was doing on a planet millions of miles outside of their solar system. And the even bigger question of where everyone went.

[Avenger Assembled]

"I am prepared," said the icy ex-Soviet agent as he joined the others, his insulated space suit looking like the cross between an old science fiction spacesuit and a parka. Gloved hands in his pockets, he said with a nod. "And you are not scary spacemen. I have seen much worse." He took up a place next to Vicky as they wanted for their teleport up to the stars. "" he reminisced. "" He said with another nod. ""

[Raveled]

"Bully!" Brey pulled a flat piece of plastic from his pocket and started poking at the surface. "The Omni's computer should be done crunching the numbers, so we can simply move directly to the ship. No time like the present, ehn?" The heroes were surrounded by a slight green glow, which grew to block out the entire city, until they almost seemed to dissolve in a sea of emerald. After a moment the green withdrew and dissipated, but now the five of them were standing in an open, metal bay. One wall was a single long, curving window, and outside the window was Earth, hanging in space. Brey glanced out the window and nodded sharply. "Well, that went fine." He clapped O'Rouly on the shoulder. "I told you that incident with the fern was an anomaly."

O'Rouly had never stopped looking Comrade Cold's suit up and down. "You have all of Lor technology to turn to," he said, disbelief evident in his voice, "and you go with a relic like that?" He shook his head and grabbed the other man's arm, almost pulling him out of the room. "We have to fix this."

[Avenger Assembled]

"Feh!" said the ex-Soviet agent with an old man's stubbornness, but he was too much the practiced veteran to actually resist. "I took this suit into space long before you were born, boychik," he said with authority, his accent thickening as they walked. "Fighting the Venusians, you know, both times!" he added with a waggle of his finger. "You won't see _that_ in your Western history books, let me tell you that! Capitalist heroes left _us_ to deal with the flying swarms of red-hot Venusians while they were busy smoking their American cigarettes and listening to their jazz records!" On the way out, he turned and winked at Vicky to show he wasn't serious before they disappeared out the door so the scientist could work on him.

[Azuth65]

Noticing the view, the teen's jaw almost dropped. She suddenly felt like one of the characters in her science fiction novels. Taking a calming breath she stepped back from the observation window and noted what Dimitri was saying. Wisp smirked as the Lor and ex-Soviet, not wanting to get into another discussion of Warsaw vs NATO. The white haired teleporter followed along, "I'm not as picky. That said, if you've got a way to fabricate things from scratch up here and if it wouldn't be a bother, I have a few ideas..."

She pulled out her tablet and once it had booted up, she flipped through some pictures of various sci-fi armors, one of them painted to look like a Star Trek: Voyager-era starfleet uniform.

[Raveled]

Doctor Caranas tilted the tablet and studied the picture. "Yes, I think we can reproduce that without too much trouble. If you'll follow me, I can take you to your quarters." The door to the conference room split down the middle and folded to either side like wings, revealing a burgundy-painted corridor, curving ever so slightly, presumably with the lines of the ship. Caranas led Wisp down to the end of the hall and opened a door that lead into a room about twice as large as her old dorm at Claremont. There was a desk sitting off to one side, two generous beds set into the wall, and another, small door on the far side of the room.

Caranas led Wisp in. "I'm afraid you'll have to bunk up," she said. "The Omni's a fairly small ship, only about twenty crew on-board, and only four of them are women. So you're going to be in my room. The washroom's through there." She pointed at the other door, then walked to the wall and slid up a panel to reveal something that didn't look entirely unlike a laser printer. After some finagling, the two women managed to find a connector that mated between the tablet and the wall socket and the clothes started being extruded from the slit. "Nanofabricator," Caranas said by way of explanation. "Fantastic machines. They can build any instrument or clothing we need. Without them, have the ship would be devoted to storing different tools and sensors that are only useful one voyage in a hundred.

The doctor leaned against the wall and folded her arms, watching the younger woman as the outfit printed. "So I take it you've never been in space before?"

[Raveled]

O'Rouly led Peshkov down several decks to what appeared to be a workroom; a low-ceilinged area strewn with half-dissembled machines and other items in various states of repair or disrepair. O'Rouly grabbed a plastic wand as long as his arm and started poking under the ex-Soviet's arms and legs. He sniffed at the readings he got and turned to a wall console. "Forty years ago, ehn? So by Earth standards it's merely a relic. By Lor standards though, it's practically prehistoric! We'll start with a basic pressure suit, and see if we can't get some armored sections hanging off that. Though with your, uh, unique metabolism we'll have to make sure heat build-up isn't a problem..."

The door opened with a swish and they both turned to see Brey standing there. O'Rouly snapped off a salute and Brey returned it. "Chief, I'll be borrowing your project for a bit, alright." O'Rouly nodded, and the commander led Frost back into the corridor. He looked the ex-Soviet superhuman up and down. "I understand you were in your tribe's military," he said, "and it sounds like you've been in space before. Ever dealt with the Lor before now?"

[Azuth65]

Wisp set her bag down in the writing desk's chair, "Not before today, no. It is, well, was one of my fantasies. I grew up neck deep in science fiction and fantasy stuff; movies, tv shows, novels, comic books. And now to earn a living, when not beating up criminals and puppets of would-be world destroying things named Gorgon, I sometimes get to draw space battles."

Watching the copyright infringing envirosuit finish being created on the spot, the white haired girl nodded, "Must come in handy. Reminds me of the replicators from Star Trek..." Picking up the finished suit she turned to the identical beds, "So, which one's yours?"

[Avenger Assembled]

"From time to time, I have encountered your people, yes." said Comrade Frost, dealing with the alien's ministrations with a jocular grace. "Others dealt with you and yours far more intimately. My primary focus was on supernatural rather than superscientific." In thinking about it, Dimitri was fairly sure he'd never killed, nor giving any lasting cause to hate, any of the space-going humanoids. It was sad that was his primary worry when dealing with peoples these days, but his life was what it was and there was no point in dwelling on the grim times. "I tended to deal more with personifications of Behenian stars walking Earth with murder on their mind rather than peoples of those stars themselves."

[Raveled]

Caranas nodded towards the bed opposite the door. "If I stare at my own bed from my desk," she said, "I'd never get any work done." She moved behind the desk and sat down, leaning forward and watching Wisp. "I have to say, it's pretty fascinating to watch someone's first reaction to space travel. The way some people talk, Earth heroes go to space all the time!"

---

Brey nodded slowly. "Well. You should know that the Lor consider Earth to be a protected zone. We make sure no one interferes with Earth on a large scale, before you're ready for it." He inhaled deeply and held it; Frost could feel the tension and uneasy in the man. "If this turns out to be an Earth colony, a lot of that could change."

[Azuth65]

"I know how you feel, in my room at school if I tried to do any of my homework in bed I ended up either reading random articles on Wikipedia or watching videos on the internet," she said, setting the suit down on the foot of the bed before taking a seat next to it.

"Well, several of the Terran heroes do. I mean, the Freedom League has their own satellite in orbit." Flopping back on the extremely comfortable bed she added, "I have to admit my first experience in space isn't exactly how I pictured it. After reading A Princess of Mars as a kid, I'd always expected any trip into space to include more swords and princesses in need of rescue but the journey has just begun. That said, I don't suppose there's an area with a good view that's also open to civilians?"

Turning her head to look over at Caranas, "Say, I don't suppose we can hook one of those nanofabricators into my apartment when this is done? College, work, and heroing doesn't leave a lot of time for the little things like grocery shopping."

[Avenger Assembled]

"Did you know, when the Grue showed themselves on this planet the first time, they came to Soviet Russia as well as the United States? Liberty League tells great story of how Dr. Atom built a machine to find all the Grue in Freedom City, then mindwarp them into believing they are sheep so that they will be easy to capture and put back onto their spaceships. Their fleet showed up a leetle bit after that, of course, but it was still big American victory." Frost looked away for a moment, remembering a long-gone struggle. "We had no such resources. There was no way to do tell who was who, or where they were, or when the monsters would come from the sky. So we...dealt with them. All of them. And when we were done, the world was safe." He made a little fingerpointing gesture, and for the first time in a long time felt his age. "If men from space come, world will be ready for them, just as we were then."

[Raveled]

Caranas laughed. "I think that would count as unduly influencing a protectorate world. But frankly, I'm surprised your tech level isn't more advanced than it is with people like Doktor Archeville and Daedalus on your planet. Who knows, in a few years you might have fabbers in your houses, too."

She stood and tapped her chin, considering Wisp's question. "I suppose the only place to really see the stars is the lounge, where we transported in." She led the way back to the room, but there was a noticeable change -- Earth wasn't in the window anymore! Caranas searched the points of light visible in the view and pointed at one that gleamed blue. "That's Earth," she said. "Take a good look, because once we make the jump it'll be hard to even pick out your main star."

---

Brey nodded grimly. "I had a feeling you were a man who could do what needed to be done," he said. "I looked over the history of your nation-state; quite a harder struggle at times than most. I should tell you that there are factions within the Lor government that are quite frightened of Earth's heroes, of what you can do. I mean, you fought off the Gorgon! Without a space fleet! And if there was evidence that Earth had colonies outside it's solar system, it would be all the pretext some would need to push for a reevaluation of Earth's status within the Empire."

[Azuth65]

As she walked with Caranas she shrugged, "Maybe. Though with the materialism and greed running rampant on my planet, I'm sure any plans to mass market them would be met with massive roadblocks."

Wisp barely kept her jaw from dropping. She had expected to feel, well, something when the ship moved out of orbit but there had not even been the slightest notion of it. Shaking herself from her shock she held up the tablet and snapped a quick full-body photo of her temporary roommate. "For reference," she said as she started to explain, "After bringing up the John Carter series, I've got an idea and part of it involves a Lor uniform and some wear and tear after surviving on an untamed planet."

[Avenger Assembled]

"I preferred Aelita myself," replied Frost, who had joined the pair in the lounge by the simple expedient of passing through the gas-open vents. "Carter is very American story. Man goes to Mars, beds beautiful princess, and can think of nothing more to do with his time than stab Green barbarians in the mountains. Space should mean something more than that." He pulled up his parka hood, so that only his red eyes were easily visible in the gloom. "But I suppose that was before your time, Vicky. And that of so many others. A shame. But then it is those below who we suspect to have clung to the old ways far longer than anyone else, eh? If they are alive at all. Such are the ways of our people." He folded his gloved hands behind him and shot a glance Wisp's way, as if inquiring about something.