Hell Comes To Missouri (IC)

[Electra]

Miss A looked startled to see yet another hero touching down in this tiny patch of nowhere, and with each new shock it seemed to take her just a bit longer to bounce back. Still, after just a couple of seconds her smile was in place and her voice was almost entirely normal. "Cobalt Templar, fancy meeting you here. We haven't seen you around Freedom City in a bit of a while. It's nice to see you back." She cracked her knuckles and thereby avoided cracking her comm radio in a too-firm grasp. "I think you've met Caradoc already, and this is Cavalier, also from Freedom City. It's practically old home week around here." There was definitely something brittle in her voice when she said that, but then it was gone as though it hadn't been there at all. 

 

"If the man you met up in Kansas City was named Charlie Evans, then I'm sure the situations are connected," Miss A told the ring-bearing newcomer. "I just got word that other members of the same family are apparently suffering from an unknown physical ailment, including the young man who was driving the truck." She took a breath. "We've got some strength of numbers here for the moment, so we should put that to work. Cavalier, you seem to have the recovery operation well in hand, if you could continue supervising that and see if any salvageable computer pieces are brought up. We need to know why that distress call was sent. Cobalt Templar, if you would be willing to assist him, he can bring you up to speed on what's been going on here. Caradoc," and here her voice was cool, but she'd apparently set aside the anger of earlier for the moment, "see if you can find the ambulance that's headed to Marshall and accompany it by air, then stay with the plane. There is very sensitive equipment on board, and it would be disastrous if anything happened there. I'm going to go check in on the situation with the Evans family and arrange for their care. Keep a sharp eye out for people acting strangely, especially anyone in positions of authority." 

[Avenger Assembled]

There was a lot Steve wanted to say to Gina, but in the field was never a good time - especially not now. "You have my radio frequency. Call me if there is a problem." At that he erupted into the air on a column of brilliant flame, vanishing into the northwest after taking a few moments in the air to orient himself. It was a short flight to Marshall, even with his relatively slow speed, but he wasn't able to find the ambulance until just before reaching the airport - criss-crossing the many small country roads that lay between Blackwater and the town itself produced no sign of the missing vehicle until he finally caught it at the airport itself. He landed beneath the plane itself and held his position, his silence broken by startled exclamations from the crew of mechanics working on the plane itself. From their tone, they thought a plane had passed by the grounded jet! But with no plane in the sky and an invisible Omegadrone hiding in the shadows beneath, they went back to their work just seconds before the ambulance itself arrived. 

 

Invisible, Caradoc watched the medical team and their assistants still on the plane begin loading the unconscious Peter Evans aboard the plane. Something about the process struck him as peculiar, and he moved closer to watch. They were efficient, hard-working, and eager to get Peter Evans aboard the plane as quickly as possible, albeit as eerily silent as the rest of the town. He briefly considered climbing aboard before deciding to stay where he could handle emergencies; he took up an invisible position along one wing, ready to keep up with the flight while watching through the open windows of the flight itself. He shot glances at the cargo hold, wondering briefly what lay inside that was so important to Gina. Had she actually come out to this place? It boggled the mind, but if family was threatened, perhaps that had been reason enough for her. 

 

At that thought, just as the plane's doors began to close, Caradoc pushed the limits of his invisibility circuits to the limits and leaped - waiting until the airport's refueling truck was just about to touch the plane, he simply moved from his position by the wing and moved through the still-open door into the body of the plane proper. The confusion as people aboard shouted at the 'clumsy driver' was enough to let him find an unoccupied corner and lurk invisibly - a plane this large surely had the spare fuel capacity to absorb his extra weight! 

[trollthumper]

Cavalier looked over Cobalt Templar, and once again, he found himself at a loss. Even trying to keep abreast of all the various heroes of Freedom, he was reaching to recall if he'd seen the man in burning blue armor. He could have sworn there was an article or two on the young heroes of Freedom City...

 

Oh, well. This was where diplomacy came in handy. "Pleased to meet you," he said, extending a hand. "Now, as for what's going on here... well, to be honest, I'm still not entirely sure what's going on here. Recently, a truck went over the bridge and plunged into the river. Driver's at a local hospital, and the truck was full of Grue tech. Some of that tech is transmitted - the transponder keeps going on about encountering some sort of hideous threat, the kind where the Grue tell their friends, 'Don't bother, we're already dead.' If something's going on, it may have affected the town - there was word of an 'alien sighting' at the hospital, and by the time Caradoc and I showed up, the deputies had set up a firing line. Miss A got them to lower their guns, though, so we didn't have to deal with that mess." 

 

The containers now raised, Cavalier started looking around them. "So... Grue aren't exactly my focus. But now that we've got most of this stuff back on dry land, maybe we can find something that gives us an idea of what had their undies in a twist."

[KnightDisciple]

The young man in blue armor (which was at least no longer radiating flames) smiled and shook Cavalier's hand.

 

"You as well."

 

Cobalt Templar helped Cavalier dive down and retrieve the last few bits of the tech, at least that they could find down in the muck. After that, he used his (admittedly limited) telekinesis, or his larger-than-life form, to move various items. Finally, he stepped back and stood next to Cavalier.

 

He shrugged as the man explained the situation, and where things stood for their knowledge of it.

 

"Can't say I'm overly familiar with Grue technology either. Only seen it a couple of times. I've been....away....for a while now. Didn't ever get a chance to dig into Grue tech where I was. Not that I'm much of a tech-head either; I could probably recite facts and strategies from their last few invasion attempts, but that's about the extent of it."

 

Still, he'd help Cavalier as best as he could, moving or retrieving things for the other man who he hoped had at least some better idea of the technology around them.

[Electra]

As soon as she'd flown out of sight of the others, Miss Americana touched down in the tiny scrap of public park that was all Blackwater boasted for dedicated green space. Taking out her tablet computer, she quickly began running searches, the pad almost more a prop than a necessity as she linked in with all the old familiar databases and a bunch of new ones besides. This couldn't be a coincidence. Something was targeting her family, and she had to figure out why. Maybe they'd gotten onto somebody's radar somehow and this was an attack focused on them. The probability of that was low, but she couldn't ignore it.

 

The other, even worse possibility was that someone had run down her secret identity and was using her family in an attempt to hurt her or draw her out. It didn't matter that she hadn't spoken a word to anyone in her family in the nearly six years since she'd been kicked out of the house, or that her life with them had helped make her the ridiculous mess she was today. She'd made herself a hero, and a hero wouldn't let even strangers suffer on their account if they could stop it. So she ran a search on herself as well, with the same parameters. Gina routinely kept a flag program running for any correlation of her name with anything associated with her secret identity, words like Miss Americana, ArcheTech, Cyberknife or even Freedom City. That was common sense,  but her name was simply too common to keep a close eye on all the time. In retrospect, that may have been an error. 

 

The cyberkinetic cursed softly as results began racking up on her search. Nothing unusual on anyone in her family, what looked to be standard pre-employment runs on Peter before he'd gotten the trucking gig, her father's yearly disability approval process, Charlie's son winning a Little League award. All normal things, and she even smiled at little at seeing little Chuck's picture with the bat and glove she'd sent him for Christmas last year. Her own name, though, brought the frown right back. Somebody, or somebodies, all over Cooper County had suddenly gotten _very_ interested in Gina Evans over the last two days. It was a pattern that started at the hospital in Boonville nearly as soon as Peter had been admitted, and that had spread within hours to nearly all of the households in Blackwater, with the notable exception of any of the Evans family homes. Someone was looking for her hard, but without any technical skill at all. Google and Spokeo, White Pages and Peoplefinder, but none of the more powerful tools that might have (unlikely but possibly) have tracked her down. As far as she could tell, no one had even come close to Freedom City, concentrating their searches much more locally. That was scant consolation. This had to be something to do with flushing her out of hiding, but why, if they didn't know who she was? And what did it have to do with the Grue artifacts? 

 

Putting the tablet away for the moment, she retook the sky and headed the few blocks to her family home, now solely her mother's. Before she went in, she called Cobalt Templar. "If you have some police contacts in Kansas City, ask them to put a watch on Charlie Evans," she requested. "There's reason to believe he and his family might be in danger."

Edited August 3, 2013 by Electra

[KnightDisciple]

The call from Miss A had to go through Cavalier, since Templar didn't have any high-grade comm equipment on his person. He nodded at the request, though.

 

"Tell her I'll ask them to get him somewhere safe, and then try to get at least some of the Barnstormers out here. At this point I think we'll need whichever members are free..."

 

He quickly stepped aside and withdrew a cell phone that was set up to make secure calls that weren't easily traced back to his civilian ID, if nothing else.

 

"Yeah, KC PD? Hello, yes, this is Cobalt Templar. No, I'm not in KC any more. I'm in Blackwater. Listen, you guys were checking out the situation with Charlie Evans earlier. I just spoke with Miss Americana. We're out here and we think Mister Evans may well be in danger. If possible, could you place him somewhere in protective custody or something similar? We'll try to see what we can find out here. Also, we could use some support from the Barnstormers, I think. We're still pinning this down, but it's looking big. We'll keep you in the loop, yes."

 

When he was off the phone, he suddenly snapped his fingers as he remembered something.

 

"Hey, Cavalier, could you let Miss Americana know that Charlie's family was, or is, in town? He mentioned his wife and kids had stayed with "grandma and grandpa", which I took to mean Charlie's parents. I don't know where that is specifically, though. Just thought she'd want to know, since we're trying to secure the family."

[Avenger Assembled]

With that news in mind, Miss Americana touched down in the backyard of the house where Gina Evans had grown up and could immediately tell that something was wrong. The backyard was covered in boxes covered by tacked-down tarps, as if someone had gone through her mother's house and cleared out the lifetime's worth of cardboard she'd been accumulating there for years. The house was otherwise how she remembered it; tacky decorations that aped good taste, a little shabby now that there was no one around who could regularly fix the place up, albeit with considerably more cars parked outside on the asphalt driveway and on the street adjoining. Out the back door somebody almost immediately came running - she immediately recognized Charlie III, the oldest of her brothers' kids. "It's Miss Americana! Woo-hoo! She came to help Nan and Grandpa!" The boy hugged her, looked her in the eyes as Dr. Irons came out the backdoor behind him, and mouthed a distinct "Help us." 

[Electra]

Miss Americana would've liked a moment or two to settle herself after landing and seeing the house, but the child and the doctor gave her no time. She almost flinched when little Chuck grabbed her, but managed to turn the movement into a crouch so she could hug him back. "Absolutely, kiddo, we're going to get this all figured out," she promised, all the while looking over the child's shoulder at Dr. Irons. She nodded fractionally, then raised a questioning eyebrow. "Looks like a lot of stuff's been moved out of the house," she observed casually. "Should we find a less crowded place for a consultation?" 

[trollthumper]

"What was that?" Cavalier said; he was starting to get readings out of the emergency beacon, and had briefly missed what Cobalt Templar had said. "Sorry, CT, my radio function's fairly limited. Miss A's far out of my range. I can try boosting the signal, but that's require some on-the-fly rerouting, and --"

 

And suddenly, that didn't quite matter. "Got the readings off the beacon," he said, trying to stay calm. "Apparently whatever triggered the beacon was part of some hideously powerful psychic entity that wasn't part of the Grue Collective. There's only a few people on Earth who could throw that kinda power about, and they're more of the 'subtle and quick to anger' school." He turned to Cobalt Templar. "You said you saw people acting weird, right? If you were a psychic entity this big, how many heads do you think you'd have to hide in to keep under the radar?"

[KnightDisciple]

Cobalt Templar frowned heavily at that notion. He'd encountered a fair number of hostile psychics in his days, and most of them were thoroughly unpleasant folks he didn't want anywhere near a small town.

 

"Well. Given what we're seeing, I'd say the bottom threshold is the population of the town. I think everyone who is...infected, for lack of a better term, has the ability to pass it on. The police guys from earlier were kind of touchy-feely. I don't know though; I've fought psychics, and fought beside them, but understanding the mechanics of their powers and behavior is a bit beyond my scope. But as a guess, I'd want at least a thousand minds, if I could manage it."

[Avenger Assembled]

"Certainly," said Irons equitably, the look on his face that of a tense, worried physician. "You run on back to your momma, boy. She's looking for you." Charlie III shot Miss A another wide-eyed look before he turned and headed back into the house with alacrity. As he left, Irons turned back to Miss A. "I still can't believe Suri was a Grue this whole time. I can't imagine what kind of damage he might have done in the short time he had. I checked for any sign of alien DNA on the Evans, but all I have is the cheap little litmus paper that Atomtech makes. I've never even used it before today." 

 

Glancing around at the life piled on the lawn, he said, "We had to clear the household out when the extended family started movin' in. There just wasn't room with all of Mother Evans' junk piled everywhere. No place for the family at all. She's got a real hoarding problem...or did before all this started. You're welcome to look her and Mister Evans over," he offered, gesturing back to the house. 

 

---

 

Suddenly, from out of the cloudy sky over Cavalier and Cobalt Templar's heads, two figures swooped down onto the scene. One was a dynamic woman in what looked like a dark blue leather flight suit, rainbow wings stretching from her back as she made a fast circle in the air above the two heroes. Concerned by this development, the Archtechnicians were moving to the shelter of their vehicles when the second figures approached, the fantastical figure of what looked to be a flying man in a train engineer's costume. "Howdy, folks," said the man, "My name's Casey Jones, and this is my colleague Stormchaser. We have reports of some alien activity here in Blackwater, and you fellas are about as alien as they get around here. You mind explaining what you're doing?" It wasn't a threat, really, but it certainly had some weight. 

 

"Aw, shoot, Casey!" exclaimed Stormchaser, "these fellas don't look like they're doin' no harm! Maybe they'uns is just here to catch the Grue guys too! Man, we had a mess of trouble with them back a few years ago out here and the Barnstormers have been keepin' an eye out ever since. C'mon, Casey," she gestured, "this one's another Star Knight! You know how much those fellers hate the Grue!" 

 

----

 

It didn't take long for Steve to realize the tactical error he'd made - he could rip his way through the thin steel and aluminium of this plane with his bare hands, much less his armored Omegadrone flesh. But for the moment he was trapped on the runway, with no ability to leave without betraying his presence to the people inside. He was suspicious of some of them, the group inside the body of the plane growing strangely quiet even as they worked closely together, but so far he'd seen nothing to actually attract his suspicions. He thought of Gina, somewhere stored away in the cargo hold perhaps, and wondered if she knew just how many times he'd failed on this adventure. Until suddenly there was a knock at the secondary airplane door, firm and insistent. After the recent 'near-miss' with the fueling truck, the people aboard were evidently ready to have it out with those outside. Annoyed, one of the Archetech staffers opened the door with a call of "Who's there? This is a medical evac fli-" a moment before a man in a navy-blue bodysuit burst into the plane and sent the staff member hurling aside with a blow from a long silver staff! 

[KnightDisciple]

Cobalt Templar actually seemed relieved as the two Barnstormers came in for a landing. While he hadn't worked extensively with them...before here, they were still fairly well-known to him (though he was probably best acquainted with Maverick and Thresher), and he was glad the call had finally gotten through.

 

Then Casey Jones said they were the suspects! It took him aback, but before he could speak up, Stormchaser spoke in their defense. Which somewhat confused him, as he was sure she didn't have that accent before...then again, different universe, so maybe different rules.

 

"I was actually the one who asked for the call in. How long ago did you get notice? Anyways, right now we're cleaning this site up, trying to make sure none of the material gets left behind. Pretty routine, though. It's some of the other goings-on that have us concerned. A bit more subtle, you see. What were you told on your way in?"

[trollthumper]

Cavalier looked over the two recently-arrived heroes, ready to reach for his blaster once more when he heard them associate him with more of this malarkey. Y'know, he thought, for once I'd like someone to recognize this armor means I'm not gonna start shouting "Klaatu barada--"

 

Fortunately, Stormchaser had chosen that moment to point out the heraldry. Huh. Wishes do come true. He was a little surprised to hear that they were with the Barnstomers; he'd last heard the name on the radio when driving through Missouri on that fateful road trip, and then it had sounded like more of an upstart team, and not with those names on the roster. But with what he was starting to piece together, he was happy with backup from anywhere. 

 

"Like my colleague said," he said, "we've been overseeing the retrieval effort. The Grue wreckage had an alarm signal ringing from the moment it broke atmosphere. Apparently the fleet came into contact with something incredibly powerful, and there's a good chance it might have found its way down to Earth." 

[Electra]

Miss Americana looked around the yard for a moment, catching sight of things here and there among what could only be termed wreckage. Sequins flashing in the sun caught her eye, and she saw an entire wardrobe box filled with small and enormously floofy cupcake dresses and white satin sashes. That they'd been allowed out of the house at all was surely a sign that the homeowner was not in full control of her faculties. "When did the family start coming back?" she asked. "Moving all this out can't have been easy. Was it just since the accident?" She took the time to look at a few more boxes, moving in the direction of the house only slowly, very nearly reluctantly. 

[Avenger Assembled]

"Oh, since the accident," said Irons seriously. "We've tried to make a space for everyone in the family, just as we'll do in Freedom City once we find a place there for Mr. and Mrs. Evans. This is a serious time of crisis, and everyone in the family needs to stick together." He walked by the boxes, some of them (particularly that wardrobe box she'd noticed immediately, still labeled "PAGEANT DRESSES - REGINA") very familiar to Gina Evans. "Even with her problem, Mother Evans was eager to help us out once we showed her just how urgent her son's situation was." He walked Miss Americana to the door, seeming not to notice her feelings about going inside. "Won't you come in? I would like to start getting everyone out to the city as soon as possible." 

 

-

 

"We heard there wuz Grue activity around here," said Stormchaser as she flitted around in the sky. Sure enough, as Corbin listened, her accent _did_ sound different from the version he was familiar with from his own world - no, wait, this _was_ his own world, that other one had been his home for many years but it wasn't his native soil at all. "Some folks hear tell that there maght be Grue impersonatin' superheroes, pretendin' to be who knows what for their godforesaken alien purposes. Them folks is just a bunch of pod people anywayz." Her accent sounded almost...local?

 

Ever the peacemaker, Casey Jones spread his hands. "Listen, I'm not one to pry, but we've had some real problems with alien infiltration in the last few years. You boys have both spent time in Freedom City, and I know how it is over there too. If it's not aliens, it's robots, and if it's not robots, it's demons, and if it's not demons, it's the damned Gorgon sending down clones. Anyway, all we need is for you boys to both submit to a blood screening so that we can make sure you are who you say you are, then we can all be on our way." 

 

- 

 

Caradoc stepped out of invisibility and parried the staff, smashing it against the side of the plane for a moment before the fast-moving man in armor pulled back his weapon. For a moment, the two figures faced each other as civilians scrambled for the rear of the plane, the doctors forming a protective cordon around their patient. Steve badly wanted to call Miss A, but lacked the internal ability to do so. Shouting, "Call Miss Americana!" in his mechanical voice, he raised his weapon at the costumed adventurer before him and said in Caradoc's voice "What is thy purpose here, varlet?" 

 

"You know damn well what I'm trying to do," spat the other man. "The name is Thresher, and I'm not going to let you take this anywhere!" 

[KnightDisciple]

Cobalt Templar fought a sigh of annoyance at the sudden shift in the conversation. The whole thing bugged him, but he just couldn't put his finger on it. Something about Stormchaser's accent, this insistence on alien threats, all of it wasn't quite right. At the insistence from Casey about a blood test, the man in blue crossed his arms over his chest.

 

"Casey, look. I won't speak for Cavalier here, but I don't just go handing out my blood to anyone. You guys are legit, but this isn't exactly a lab situation, either. What next, you want me to take off my mask? Are all of you going to de-mask in front of me?"

 

He shook his head.

 

"Look, we'll sit and wait for the Archetch folks, who have all sorts of paperwork confirming who they are, to actually take this stuff away. We'll keep our hands out of any weirdness in town if you guys want. I'm not here to make trouble or get into anyone's territory or anything. We're all on the same team, right?"

[Electra]

Miss Americana put her hand on the doorknob and then stopped, staring into the doctor's eyes. Despite the turbulent emotions and many shocks of the day, her brain was slowly managing to kick into gear once more, taking in information and drawing conclusions. She heard the hesitation in his voice when he referred to members of the family, as though not certain what he should be calling them. The utterly ridiculous story about Lissy Evans putting family ahead of herself even for a minute might just have been politeness, but not when the middle-aged Dr. Irons slipped long enough to call her "Ma," just for a split second. There was very definitely some psychic presence in town, but even her relentlessly logical brain would not make a leap that far. Not without more evidence. 

 

"But the whole family isn't accounted for, correct?" she asked, her voice surprisingly normal. "The brother in Kansas City, yes,  but Peter Evans had a sister as well. She doesn't seem to be here." 

[trollthumper]

Cavalier looked between the two local heroes, trying to figure out if he was supposed to buy this. There was a Midwestern attitude and mindset, there was a Midwestern attitude and mindset as envisioned by the most isolated city dwellers and hackish screenwriters imaginable... and then there was whatever level these two were on. And they seemed pretty damn willing to get him to submit to testing...

 

"Hey, the emergency beacon's back here, you can --" He thought on that, realizing how his suit had picked it up in the first place. "...okay, maybe you can't necessarily read it for yourselves. But whatever's going on here is a memetic hazard, not a biological or chemical one. Sticking hot wires in blood to see whose does the tango isn't really gonna get us anywhere. I'm with Templar here. Let's wait for the third party."

[Avenger Assembled]

"Yes, poor Gina," agreed Irons as he opened the door. "It would be so, so nice if the family could get back together, but she disappeared years ago when she went off to the city to be an actress." He shook his head. "It's a shame, because it's just so important for families to stick together. Especially, er, at a time like this. We've been trying very hard to find her, and that's definitely something we'll continue in Freedom City." He pointed inside, and sure enough looking through the windows Miss A could see almost the entire Evans family inside - Charlie's wife and kids, Peter's wife and kids, the whole bustling extended family that she'd sent so many secret presents to over the years. But the parents were missing; or at least not visible through the rear window, and there were other things wrong too - the adults seemed content, albeit concerned, without any serious worry about the grandparents who were supposedly freshly unconscious in the nearby master bedroom - the kids, though, were obviously on edge. The younger ones, the ones still being cossetted by their moms, were all right, but the older ones like Charlie III were tense, fright and hope on their faces as they looked out at Miss A. They were the ones enough to see that something was wrong. 

 

---

 

Suddenly the pretense seemed to drop; both Stormbreaker and Casey Jones seeming to lose a certain pretense they'd been putting on. "Stop it, damn it," said Casey Jones, fury and frustration crossing the older man's face even as his colleague's expression seemed to go oddly slack. In a heavy Southern accent completely unlike his usual speech pattern, he yelled "Ah'm tryin' so hard and you're ruinin' everything!" And then the two Barnstormers went for Cavalier and Cobalt Templar, and the fight was on! 

[Electra]

"I have access to a great many resources," Miss A told "Dr. Irons" casually, turning the knob and opening the door. "I imagine I could find your sister, perhaps even bring her here to the family. But let's take a look inside here." She stepped into the house, concealing a shudder with a momentary stumble on the uneven doorframe. "Don't worry, everyone," she told the assembled group, looking especially at the older kids. "Everything's going to be all right. We're going to get everything figured out, and you'll all be safe." Turning without being directed, she walked past the kitchen and down the short hallway to the master bedroom. Halfway down the hall, she paused as her radio chimed. "Yes?"

[Avenger Assembled]

"Miss Americana? There's somebody attacking the plane!" came an alarmed voice over her radio. "A costumed agent in a mask with a staff. But Caradoc," Archetech employees had certainly seen lots of the armored hero, especially once his secret identity had started 'dating' the boss. "appeared out of nowhere and he's fighting him off!" The vibrations evidently hadn't been bad enough to disturb Gina in her rest aboard said plane, but they had to be close if she was actually getting a distress call.

 

Following close, Dr. Irons offered with concern in his accented voice. "That fella sounds dangerous. We gotta get him out of that plane so we can get Peter and the family where they need to go!" He didn't seem to have noticed Miss A's slip; in fact, in his alarm he seemed to be agreeing with it automatically! The adults in the room behind seemed to agree, but it was tough to tell with the kids, who seemed to be moving around enough to try and keep the beautiful superheroine who'd come to save them in view. 

[Avenger Assembled]

The two heroes moved onto the attack, focusing for reasons of their own on the easily recognizable Star Knight over the flaming ring-bearer. Casey Jones swung a wild punch at Cavalier, something seeming to slow the veteran hero's reactions long enough to let the spaceborne Star Knight dodge the blow. The same could not be said, however, for Stormchaser, who swarmed in and hammered him with a rapid-fire series of blows that came down like the fists of an angry Fourth-Dimension ratatat. "Just shut up and let me think, damnit!" she yelled at him in an even heavier Southern accent as she landed a blow across his jaw that knocked him back a step. "Ah'm tryin' to think and everyone's jawin' at me!" 

[KnightDisciple]

Cobalt Templar sighed as his fears came true. He winced at the flurry of blows that struck Cavalier; Stormchaser always had packed more punch than you might have thought, given her comparatively small frame. Said the man built like an NFL player.

 

With nary a thought, he was suddenly a blue glowing giant, encased in a faceless version of his armor, the surface smooth like metal, but clear like glass, showing the ring-slinging hero floating in the midst of a roiling field of translucent blue flame.

 

"Sorry for the headache this'll give you in the morning, Stormchaser."

 

And with that, his giant fist flashed forward and struck her head on, though he'd had to adjust at the last minute; he'd almost whiffed that one completely, and only his decades of experience fighting Ubersoldaten helped correct the blow's trajectory.

[Electra]

Miss Americana froze in the middle of the hallway as she heard the distress call, her impulses warring in a half-dozen directions at once. "Hold your position," she instructed the pilot, "provide backup for Caradoc if possible." She switched channels. "Caradoc, do you need help out there?" Even at her best flight speed, reaching the airport would take precious minutes, but it was all she could do to offer. 

 

She turned for the moment to the situation closer at hand. Turning to Dr. Irons, she took him by the shoulders and stared into his eyes. "Peter," she said, her voice low and intense. "I know you have some understanding of what's going on here. I want to help you. Gina wants to help you. You have to tell me what's happened to you before more people get hurt." 

[Avenger Assembled]

"Listen, Thresher, I am not an agent of any outside force," Caradoc was saying, "I am-" but suddenly Steve's explanation was interrupted by a sound he heard before, a sound he knew in his own way only too well. An entire town, screaming at once in one voice. The words, however, were very different, and he and Thresher wheeled wildly on the crowd in the plane as perhaps half the medical staff joined the distant chorus echoing from the tower, on the radio, everywhere either man could hear at once. 

 

"...Ah just wanted a normal family!" Miss A could hear it too, a voice speaking through Dr. Irons and all the adults inside the house, sending the children inside into tears, a voice that did indeed sounded like her brother Peter speaking through hundreds of throats all at once. "I could hear them in my bed, fightin' and carryin' on just like always! Ah was maybe dyin, and my baby was cryin, and they were just tearin' at each other like cats! A just wanted us to be happy for once, for once!" Tears were in "Irons" eyes. "But it didn't even work on them! It worked on everybody else, but not my own flesh and blood! It was all for nothin'!" 

 

"But ah couldn't stop," Stormchaser was screaming at Cobalt Templar and Cavalier, joined in a eerie chorus by Casey Jones and (they could distantly hear) the people of the nearby town. "Ah couldn't just turn it off! It just got bigger and bigger, every time ah touched somebody! Ah thought if ah could get the family together again, even my poor runaway Sissy, that would fix it, but ah couldn't find her anywhere! And then ah thought if we made it to Freedom City, maybe it could get fixed, and mebbe then they'd just stop fightin' and be a family for once!" 

 

Casey Jones, nearly weeping, was leaning on Cobalt Templar. "Was that really so much to ask? Just that we could all be happy and not be all broken-up inside one time?"