ic Midnight Dynasty

[Electra]

"I think we should be asking you that question," Sojourner replied, her face stony, "since you are the intruders here." 

 

"You are all intruders!" Erin barked, "and if anybody is going to be asking questions, or alternatively beating all of you unconscious, it is going to be me! Which I will do unless I start getting some answers that are actually related to what kind of deadly danger we're supposedly about to face but not notice for thirty years!" She took a deep breath, then turned to the new arrivals. "So who are you? I mean besides being my children from an alternate dimension who may or may not be related to each other." At least this new pair looked like they were actually younger than she and Trevor were. The fact that this was at all comforting just told her how low the bar was set right now 

 

"I'm Knightfall," the new girl said as she pushed back her cowl, looking a bit intimidated. Without the hood, she favored Erin very heavily, with the same bone structure, pale skin and auburn hair, though her eyes were red and black like Trevor's. At least until she blinked, whereupon they bled back to a more traditional brown on white. "With a K. And this is my twin brother Daybreak. We're here to save you from a terrible danger... that I gather you've already heard about," she added, losing a little steam from what had apparently been a prepared speech. 

 

"Twins?" Erin said incredulously, losing the color she'd gained from her previous outburst. 

 

"Huh, must run in the family," Tensile observed. 

[Gizmo]

"Man, thunder stolen," Daybreak sighed in disappointment, patting Knightfall on the shoulder as she braved the brunt of Erin's frustration and not coincidentally hiding a bit from that venting himself. Taking stock of the rest of the room, he whistled and began pointing with his free hand, nudging his sister with his elbow. "Hey, that guy's got a robot arm! And that guy's got like a little Redbird hologram lady!"

"Hello. I am Blackbird, a Furion autonomic machine intel--"

"Hey, don't talk to that twip, c'mon!" Hematite interrupted Blackbird, running a hand over his face in an expression of annoyance that made him look an awful lot like Erin for a moment. "What, just 'cause Scarface over there says it's fine we're throwing the not-messing-with-timelines plan out the frelling window?"

Daybreak pursed his lips in an expression of dismissive nonchalance. "Aw, chill out, buddy. You're like our weirdly angry alternate future brother guy, yeah? That's not that bizarre. Oh, hey, you ever been to Earth-XX? You'd think having a twin sister would make that less wacky but it super does not."

Blackbird continued to maintain her composure next to Hematite's shoulder. "Fascinating. The convergence of so many temporally inert individuals is presumably quite anomalous."

Trevor had let his shoulders slump completely by the time the newest pair of arrivals had introduced themselves and could find little response to the twins other than shooting Erin a vaguely apologetic shrug. Glancing over at his grandfather, he accused, "Enjoying this."

"A bit, a bit," Travis admitted with a small chuckle, a little hoarse but genuinely amused. "Alright now. Sure you're all trained better than to stand about shouting and giving your, ah, mother a heart attack, hm?" he continued to the room at large, fixing each of the time-travelers with a stern look. "All here for a reason, time to get organized."

"Woah," Daybreak whispered to Knightfall, gulping slightly. "Midnight, original blend."

[Electra]

A stern look from the original Midnight worked at least as well on the fourth generation as it ever had on the third, and soon all the "kids" were silent, looking from one to another with some throat-clearing. Finally Tensile, the obvious eldest of the group, took a half-step forward and adopted some semblance of gravity. "Well sir, I can only speak for myself as far as what I know of the situation, but there's got to be some similarities. Ah, in my family, all of the kids have limited temporal immunity because our mom isn't a native to the dimension. It's not perfect, but when something comes along and tries to overwrite the past, it usually always missed her and at least some of us."

 

"That's similar," Sojourner confirmed, looking over at Erin with an unreadable expression. "Even when Dad would get hit by a ripple, Mom would avoid them and get them fixed. We theorized-" She pursed her lips and swallowed hard before continuing. "We theorized that for this temporal attack to have hit them, it would need to be specifically targeted and precisely aimed. It was also tailored to avoid both of their immunities." 

 

"Yeah, exactly," Tensile agreed. "Once we realized that, we figured the temporal insertion had to be made decades ago, because of... reasons," he elided, suddenly looking a little uncomfortable. "Look, I don't want to get into all the gory details, you understand? Someday you might be my parents, and I don't want to make things weird. Weirder." He grinned quickly, then sobered again. "Anyway, I figure we all came to some similar conclusion, zeroed in on the date and time, and jumped back. Or sent back their little brother." 

[Gizmo]

"So, spatial warp tech, huh?" Daybreak whispered discretely to Hematite, leaning toward the other young man slightly. "Recognize some of the design. Did you not get any super-strength? That's rough, buddy."

Hematite made a motion with his jaw that suggested grinding teeth before answering under his breath, "I can bench press a tank, 'buddy'. The suit is to keep me from accidentally taking off somebody's head when they annoy me. Which is often."

"Um, you two should probably be paying attention, don't you think?" a small voice suggested from the testy time traveler's other side, causing both he and Daybreak to look over with a start. Perhaps sixteen, the petite teenage girl wore a black jumpsuit topped with an equally dark cloak and hood not unlike the one Knightfall wore. The featureless mask she removed with one hand was of a smooth, porcelain-like material while her other hand supported a tray carrying two steaming pots of coffee and several stacked mugs.

"Interesting," Blackbird repeated, walking across empty air to Hematite's other shoulder to get a closer look. "I did not detect the approach of this individual."

Redbird made a grumbling and largely unintelligible comment to the same effect while Travis raised an eyebrow. "One of you learned some stealth, at least. Beginning to worry."

Behind the mask, the sudden new arrival was obviously the youngest of the time travelers, favouring Trevor's side of the family as she blushed a sooty black at the focused attention, her raven hair held back with a dark blue headband. "I'm, um, Mystery. I got here while Sojourner and Tensile were introducing themselves to Mom but she looked pretty upset already so I thought maybe it would be better if I just hid until everybody calmed down a bit?" There was a note of question in her voice as she steadied her heavily laden tray with both hands. "I made coffee in the meantime if anyone wants some?"

Stepping over with long strides, Trevor leaned down and took the tray from Mystery, setting it down on an unoccupied section of the Manor's control board. "Very good idea. Thank you, Mystery." Setting about pouring, he looked around the room. "How does everyone take it?" The chorus of 'black' the echoed back sparked an unfamiliar feeling of familial pride he wasn't sure how to process.

[Electra]

"I'm not upset, I'm... absorbing information," Erin muttered as her many, many, many offspring all began to clamor for coffee. She had a sudden fevered image of all of them as infants, simultaneously crying for attention, and could swear she felt her ovaries beginning to shrivel. She took a few moments to catch her breath and think while refreshments were passed out, and thought she had something close to a handle on rationality by the time she spoke again. "All right. So the upshot of all of this is that Trevor and I are going to be infected by a deadly virus sometime in the next day or two, unless we manage to stop it. Do we know the vector?" 

 

"Not really," Knightfall admitted after a glance at her twin. "I mean, we're pretty sure it wouldn't be airborne, because it would be hard to control and Dad wears a gas mask like, everywhere. Plus, if it got into the general population..." She went quiet, and suddenly all the kids were looking at Erin. Erin swallowed past a suddenly dry throat and nodded understanding. "We don't really know much about the perp," Knightfall continued, "but we're reasonably sure he's not looking to cause a mass slaughter."

 

"Scant consolation though that may be," Sojourner commented. "But I agree, it's almost sure to be a contact vector of some sort, delivered at a time when you're vulnerable. Even a routine patrol battle would make it simple to administer a skin-contact virus." 

 

"That's kind of the weird part," Erin mused, ignoring the voice telling her this whole thing was the weird part. "We're not even on duty for the next four days. I don't know that we even planned to leave the house." She had no interest whatsoever in discussing their weekend plans any further in this company, but silently bid them farewell.  

[Gizmo]

Mystery did not look convinced by Erin's assurances of calm but elected not to say anything about it aloud. The youngest of the time-travelers ducked her head down between her shoulders and focused quietly on the contents of the mug Trevor handed her, a little put off by the large gathering herself. Apparently unintentionally the ends of her dark hair, grown down past her shoulder blades, wavered subtly in the air, the tips of each strand turning into a wispy trail of inky mist.

"Well hey, we can pretty much just hang out and smash some face in when the guy shows up anyway, yeah?" Daybreak chimed in optimistically, hefting his sledgehammer in his free hand. "The bad guy won't be expecting basically a small army wise to him. Way I see it we've already got this one in the bag!"

"Don't be thick," Hematite grumbled in response, distractedly looking over his shoulder as he realized Mystery had been edging gradually to one side until she was half hidden behind him. "Even if Tensile's from as far forward as this Charlie Foxtrot goes, there should be practically infinite timelines shooting off between now and then but only six of us showed up. What does that tell you?"

The black and gold wearing teenager paused for a moment to take a sip of coffee and consider. "Uh... What does that tell us?"

"No idea, but probably nothing good."

"Presumably in the majority of timelines Trevor Hunter and Erin White expired before they produced any progeny," Blackbird chimed in, her hologram placing an index finger alongside her chin while affecting a tiny mug of her own in her opposite hand. "The highly variable and hypothetically random timetable of the murder weapon seems well designed to impede further time-traveling interference."

Trevor didn't bother to correct the choice of surnames; he suspected they would be running into similar slips again before the night was over and drawing attention to it only seemed more awkward. Discussing the method of his own murder was grim enough to keep his attention focused. "Hhn. Limited access to time-travel to begin with. Allies without... 'temporal inertia' unable to help."

"Auntie Eve really, really didn't like sending me by myself but Auntie Alex said it was the only way," Mystery chimed in softly, looking up briefly and seeming to regret meeting a roomful of eyes. "They don't usually agree much anyway, though, and I, um, had to at least try to help. Right?"

[Electra]

Erin suddenly placed her hands flat against the table and pushed herself to her feet. "I'm going to go... check the defenses again. You all talk amongst yourselves." Turning on her heel, she strode quickly from the room and off towards the stairwell, closing the door just a little too firmly behind her. The eyes of most of the kids were on her as she went.

 

"I'm kinda suspecting that she's not as not-upset as she says she is," Knightfall commented dryly, turning back to the table. 

 

"It's not an un-upsetting sort of situation, really," Tensile pointed out, his scarred face settling into a frown. "And right now we're just shooting the breeze about how she and Dad end up dead in most universes. You know how she is about other universes already. We need some kind of a plan. Preferably something better than "wait around and try to kick the ass of whatever shows up." If it were that simple, I don't think we'd all have to be here today." 

 

"What we need is some intel," Sojourner put in, throwing back her coffee like medicine. She looked to Mystery. "Eve and Alex are taking care of you, are you a psychic of any sort? Maybe you can pick up some hostile intent floating around?" 

[Gizmo]

Trevor started off after Erin as soon as she left the subterranean base but Hematite smoothly stepped in front of him. "Last thing we need is both of you off on your own right now," he pointed out, crossing his arms. "I'll go talk to her, anyway, seeing as we're all technically your fault, old man."

"Oh there's an image we all needed," Daybreak commented, pulling a face and putting down his mug so he could cover his eyes with the freed hand while Hematite walked out into the mansion above, Blackbird winking out of sight over his shoulder for the time being.

Without the surly strongman to hide behind, Mystery met Sojourner's gaze with a silent gulp, the misting effect around the edges of her dark hair intensifying. "Um. Yes? A-- a bit?" Holding her own mug with both hands the petite teenager took a long drink from her coffee to buy herself some time to form thoughts into words. "I'm still, um, growing into it, though? I don't know if I can do what you said..." She looked quite glum at the admission, staring down into the abyss of her cup.

"Alright," Trevor assured her, finally looking away from the exit Erin had used to regard the time-travelers around the table. "Your age when I--"
 
"Woke up with strange new eyes," Knightfall and Daybreak finished in unison, their own eyes filling in with black and red like oil pouring over water.

Trevor paused, placing his hands on his hips. "...had this conversation before."

Mystery nodded with a small, subtle smile. "I like the one where you accidentally turned into mist and crashed the Nazi helicopter into a tank."
 

* * * * *

 

Upstairs, Hematite quickly found Erin. "Hey," he greeted brusquely, expression suggesting he was at least partially regretting volunteering to go after her. "Sorry about the whole frell fest and all."

[Electra]

Erin had reached the nearest kitchen by the time Hematite caught up with her. The tension in her shoulders made it obvious she knew he was there and had heard his greeting, but she remained silent while she poured herself a glass of ice water. She drank it slowly and watched the snow fall outside for a minute. "I was always pretty sure I'd die before I got old enough to have kids," she finally said. "But hearing that someone deliberately went back in time to wipe me out of history is still weirdly troubling.And now you're all here, and I have no idea what the future's supposed to end up like." She half turned, looking at him from the corner of her eye. "What's your name?"

 

Down in the basement, Sojourner smiled a little at the byplay between her "siblings" and "father," obviously privy to all the stories as well. She sobered a little as she leaned toward Mystery. "It's okay if you can't get much," she assured the younger girl, "but it couldn't hurt to try, right? Use every tool available and gather all the information you can before you make your plan," she added, obviously quoting as she looked towards Trevor. 

[Gizmo]

Hematite hesitated, trying to gauge how great a risk it might be to impart any more future knowledge. With a short huff, he decided that the line had probably already been well and truly crossed. "Troy. Uh, Hunter. Obviously." Grumbling unintelligibly under his breath, he followed Erin's gaze out on the snow covered grounds. "Look, you didn't exactly raise me to be the touchy-feely type but you did always say that if you're not frelling off one psycho or another you're probably not doing your job, yeah? So, y'know. There's that, anyway. Plus most of the twips downstairs seem pretty well adjusted," he added, pointing a gloved thumb over his shoulder in the direction he'd come, "so on averages you're doing alright."
 

* * * * *

Trevor met Sojourner's gaze with a subtly raised eyebrow before pointing silently at Travis, who responded with an equally wordless shrug. Good advice was good advice, after all, regardless of with whom it had originated. Mystery took a slow breath and nodded to the older time-traveler, giving the taciturn heroine a shy smile. "Right. I'll try. I might need a bit of time, though, okay?" Closing her eyes, the youngest of the descendents crossed her legs beneath herself, hovering a good meter off of the Manor's stone floor atop a billowing pillar of mist that spilled downward.

"Ooh," Daybreaker observed approvingly, nudging his twin sister repeatedly with his elbow.

[Electra]

"Troy," Erin repeated contemplatively, turning to look at him. He looked a lot more like her than most of the others, though she could see Trevor in the lanky body shape, in the turn of his nose. Oddly enough, his personality reminded her mostly of James, the brash cockiness that concealed both power and underlying insecurity.  "That's a nice name. And you won't have to change the monograms when you inherit, that's a plus." She smiled faintly and drank the rest of her water. "And you're right, we've always got somebody or other gunning for us, or plotting how they're going to get us someday. I know one day Omega's going to come back for another round, and I don't know how we can possibly defeat him again." She shrugged. "But this isn't him. Not his style, too indirect and uncertain. Not enough terror. I have no idea who we're ever going to piss off enough that they want to eradicate us from history. Which means we're pretty short on clues right now." 

 

Setting the glass in the sink, she walked into the small breakfast nook and looked out the three-sided windows there. No new intruders on the lawn, and the snow was still falling, shining like bits of glitter under the floodlights that bathed the grounds while the house was on alert. The silence stretched for a few minutes, till she finally said, "I'm sorry I didn't raise you to be more touchy-feely. It's hard for me, even though that's how I was raised. Too many memories, I guess. I hope it didn't make you feel unloved." 

 

 

Downstairs, the gaggle of time-travelers was being mostly quiet in deference to Mystery's concentration, barring the occasional grunt from the spirited elbow-fight that had broken out between Knightfall and Daybreak. Taking advantage of the distractions, Tensile made his way over to the chair where Travis was sitting. "I just wanted to say, sir," he began softly, "that it's an honor to meet you. I don't think it's spoiling the timeline to say I never got a chance before, but I've heard stories all my life. You were one of the first really great heroes." 

[Gizmo]

Hematite barked a sharp baritone laugh at Erin's melancholy concerns, quickly covering his mouth with the back of one gloved hand and looking embarrassed for the outburst. "Hht, sorry, it's just... That was never an issue. Seriously." Coughing awkwardly, he looked away, uncomfortably rolling his left shoulder as though trying to loosen a tense muscle. "Not going to pretend we always, y'know, got along, especially when I was younger. Dad always said we were too much alike or something. Dunno. ...this is really frelling weird to talk about like this." Folding his arms, he turned back to face Erin, his expression aggressively defiant of any uneasiness, resolved to barrel through in spite of the strange situation. "You never missed a tournament for anything less than a global threat and you always... Look, I'm just not letting anything happen to you this time, alright? It's going to be a bigger pain if you up and walk out while we're still planning though, so... So."

 

* * * * *

"Watch the past tense there, son," Travis recommended to Tensile dryly, making his way unsteadily over to the swiveling chair in front of the computer bank and sitting down with a grunt. "Not incorrect, pride just worn out with the rest of me." The subtle twinge at the corner of elder hero's mouth suggested humour, though the creases around his dark, intense eyes seemed tired. "Didn't expect to meet any of you, either. Heartening."

Back over at the conference table, Mystery reopened her eyes and set her feet back down on the solid ground. "...nothing. I can't sense anything that seems, um, wrong? Sorry." The petite telepath seemed to shrink even even more into her own silhouette, shoulders coming together and head ducking down between them while she wrung her hands.

"It's alright," Trevor assured her, hesitating a moment before placing a reassuring hand on the teenager's shoulder. "May not be anything to sense. Stay attentive." The dark haired engineer looked across the table to Sojourner with a small shrug that asked whether or not he was handling the situation correctly. There was something inherently wrong about asking one of his daughters for parenting advice regarding another but with time travel skewing all of their respective ages he was willing to look for any help he could get.

Attempting unsuccessfully to get his taller twin in a headlock as their elbowing quickly escalated into full on horseplay, Daybreak caught a look at the motorpool stretching out behind them into the further recesses of the Manor. "Hey Nightie, look, it's the Vincent before you get a chance to crash and total it," he pointed out, indicating a motorcycle in the lineup while stepping on her toes to try to get a literal leg up.

[Electra]

Erin frowned a little at her future-son's laughter, but let annoyance fade in the relief that apparently she'd done a decent job with him. Even though it was still weird to think about. Weird for him too, she allowed, especially knowing that the parents he knew were very recently deceased. She decided to spare them both any more talk about emotional business. "I wasn't exactly planning on going for a walk," she told Hematite archly.  "This isn't my first day on the superhero job. Just needed a breather for a few minutes. I guess we should get back downstairs and see if anyone's thought up a brilliant plan." 

 

As she spoke, Charlie wandered into the room and began butting against her legs till she picked him up. "What, you have something to contribute?" she asked the orange cat facetiously as she scratched his chin, then paused before adding hastily, "Please don't start talking. I don't think I could handle that today." Charlie purred, watching Hematite out of half-closed eyes. 

 

Downstairs, not a lot of progress was being made in the planning department as the meeting dissolved in the mild chaos of four different conversations. Tensile grinned at his great-grandfather, shrugging his metal-clad shoulders broadly. "Could be I'm just trying to throw you off for the sake of the timeline, right?" he told Travis. "I hope we have a little time after all this is finished to just shoot the breeze, I'm betting you've got great stories. Plus you can tell us all the embarrassing stuff about Dad that he would never talk about." 

 

Sojourner gave Trevor an encouraging smile as she put a slightly awkward arm around her younger "sister." "You're doing fine," she told Mystery. "Like da- um, Midnight says, the bad guy may not even be here yet. We'll get a perimeter set up, make sure we're all on the lookout, and one way or another, he won't set a foot around here without us knowing." 

 

On the other side of the room, Knightfall lifted her endangered toes and used them to catch her brother behind the knees, tripping him long enough to wriggle free of his grasp and secure his hands with something that looked like a futuristic zip-tie. "I was twelve," she reminded her brother in a furtive growl, "and if you hadn't begged to ride pillion, there wouldn't have been any trouble! I wasn't the one who couldn't understand leaning into the turns!" 

 

Straightening up, she did her best impression of a serious adult person conducting serious adult business as she looked over at Sojourner and Trevor. "The snow should give us a tracking advantage as long as we don't have too many people searching outside. One, physically guarding the perimeter, one on the cams, one patrolling at large in the house, one each on the principals, and Mystery here handling the psychic stuff? Or something like that," she added uncertainly, checking for the reaction from the more experienced heroes. 

Edited March 31, 2014 by Electra

[Gizmo]

As Erin picked up Charlie, Blackbird's hologram blinked back into view, this time large as life with her statuesque build making her resemblance to Redbird more evident. "Kitty," she greeted with a small smile, bending slightly at the waste to look the feline in the eyes and reaching over to run a holographic finger across his nose, the ionized light ruffling the fur just enough to be noticeable. Erin could see faint lines of light emitting from Hematite's costume, generating a three dimensional albeit transparent image that remained perfectly rendered even as the young man with dark auburn hair shrugged by way of explanation.

 

* * * * *

In the Manor, Redbird herself had edged the motorcycle she was inhabiting closer to the conference table to allow her hologram more room to walk about unhindered. She'd found the humanoid representation made interacting with Earth natives considerably easier. "Twelve? Hmm." a series of strobing green lights from the bike ran over Knightfall and the autonomic machine intelligence grinned broadly. "Fast-twitch muscle fiber rating at... Ho ho! This one I like!"

Nimbly hopping into the air with his knees pulled to his chest, Daybreak slipped his restrained wrists under his boots so that they were in front of him as he landed. A quick, forceful motion against part of his sledgehammer's handle snapped the zip-tie cleanly in two just as quickly as his sister had placed it on him in the first place. "Typically, the driver gets all the attention while the hard-working mechanic is to blame for every little thing," he sighed with exaggerated melancholy, ruining it with a chuckle. "Don't even check my compatibility, Birdie, it's too embarrassing. Almost as bad as Uncle Mark."

That caught Trevor's attention away from the interaction between Sojourner and Mystery, narrowing his eyes. "...why would Mark be riding the Night Cycle?"

Daybreak looked like he'd just been caught doing something he knew he shouldn't have, freezing mid-step. "Er. Actually, she's right, we should really get a perimeter set up, right? Aheh."

"I can help keep everyone in communication," Mystery volunteered, heartened by Sojourner's encouragement. "I'm still getting the hang of it but even though we're from different timelines I guess some stuff is the same? Um, so your minds are kinda like hearing somebody else tell a story you've heard before. If that makes sense? I'm an only child so it's kinda neat..." She glanced up at the older woman with a soot hued blush colouring her cheeks, embarrassed to have admitted the sentiment aloud.

"Hmm, a degree removed from shared experience," Travis mused, stroking his goatee with one hand. "Interesting. Would very much like to chat with all of you, indeed," he agreed with Tensile, letting the cyborg's attempts at time-traveling reassurance pass by.

Trevor frowned slightly, looking about the faces in the room. "Tt. Don't like putting you in harm's way," he objected, feeling an undercurrent of instinctual protectiveness. He wasn't one to ask anyone else to risk their own safety protecting him even in normal circumstances. These, emphatically, were not normal circumstances.

[Electra]

All of the kids got a good laugh at Trevor's words, with Tensile going so far as to actually slap his knee. "Come on Dad, look at us. Nobody here hasn't seen their share of danger before, and we were all trained by the best. If anything, Soj over there and I ought to be telling you to stay in where it's safe, youngster." He leaned back in his chair, unconcerned. "But even Mystery is as old or older than you and Mom were when you started heroing. No unringing the bell now." 

 

"We're here to help," Sojourner added more diffidently. "We wouldn't have come if we didn't have anything to offer, and we can't help you if you ask us to stand on the sidelines."

 

"And that would be a hundred times worse," Knightfall chimed in. "To have to stand aside while something bad happens to you. We had to do that once already." She reached for her brother again, but this time for a comforting half-hug instead of a tackle. 

 

"But we're not going to be crazy about it," Sojourner assured Trevor. "There's no reason we can't all come out of this just fine. We've got a damn good team here." 

 

"That's true," Erin said from the doorway. She walked into the room, still carrying Charlie in one arm, seeming more like herself than she had since Sojourner had first appeared in the upstairs hall. "With this many Hunter-Whites all in one room, any bad guy should be running desperately in the other direction. Have we got a plan worked up?" 

 

"We've got a start," Knightfall offered, then outlined her idea for patrol patterns. "And the house has its own systems too, so the coverage should be pretty thorough." 

 

Erin nodded, looked to Trevor for agreement, then started handing out the jobs. "All right then. Tensile, you look like you can handle the cold and dark pretty well, you do the outside patrol. Daybreak, you're on inside patrol, Knightfall, you're in charge of camera watch. Mystery will keep monitoring the psychic wavelengths and give us a heads-up if anything goes weird. Hematite, you stick with Trevor, and Sojourner, you're with me. We're going to start watching the news channels and the internet, monitoring the police bands, keeping an eye out for anything out of the ordinary that might mark the arrival of a time traveler. Everybody good with that?" 

[Avenger Assembled]

Their enemy was a subtle one, as it happened - the night passed, giving Tensile ample time to patrol grounds that were at once achingly familiar and alien strange, and the rest to patrol the house that had, at one time or another, been their home since birth. It was a strange situation for all of them, and other circumstances, a call for action might have been a welcome one. When it did come, though, it came in a form so unexpectedly mundane as to take all the heroes off-guard.  Zipping along the street outside the Mansion, a big, blocky vehicle - an armored car marked with the Brinks colors, came speeding wildly down the street and smashed directly into the Mansion's closed iron gates with a deep boom! The solid gates, which had been reinforced even before Travis began upgrading it (and which had since been upgraded by Trevor, Erin, and just a little genie magic) held - but the armored car began backing off for another try, its tires squealing on the streets. Mystery, from her position by the window, tensed. "Something is wrong with that thing," she called, her voice unusually confident...for a moment. "I mean...be careful going out there." Her brow furrowed. "...the people in that truck aren't who they think they are...I don't know, does that even make any sense...?"

[Gizmo]

"Huh," Daybreak hummed in bemusement, jogging over from his patrol of the adjacent hallway and following Mystery's gaze out the window. Resting his sledgehammer on the floor he placed an elbow atop the petite teen's head with the familiarity of someone who'd only ever been a sibling. "Wasn't even laying odds on 'berserk bank van'. Knightfall, you seeing this?" he added over the radio to his twin.

Just to one side of the bank of monitors that displayed the views from the multitude of cameras encircling the mansion and its grounds, Travis turned to the quietly tense but animated discussion between the Furion autonomic intelligences. "Would be my cue. Redbird, if you please?"

The taller hologram glanced briefly in Trevor's direction, receiving the faintest hint of a nod before bowing in deference. "Of course, honored shadow-walker." The humanoid image winked out of view as the Night Cycle scooted forward and folded in upon itself. The wheels slid about until they were adjacent rather than one behind the other and the seat extended upward. The result was altogether too dynamic and obviously combat ready for 'wheelchair' to feel appropriate but the basic shape remained.

The original Midnight took a seat, placing his cane across him lap and glancing over the chair's information readouts with unshakeable calm. "Switching mansion defenses to manual control," he noted for the benefit of the others in the underground base, driving through a previously hidden door that revealed itself as part of the computer bank slid away. When the door closed it was as if it had never moved.

"Panic room? Didn't know about that," Hematite grunted, pulling his mask back on and disconnecting the interface between his suit - and by extension Blackbird - and the Manor's extensive databases.

"Control center," Trevor corrected him smoothly, pulling his own featureless mask into place and securing his utility belt around his waist. The sleepless night had given him a chance to change into his actual patrol gear and stock its many pouches and pockets with a few surprises for their unwelcome guest. "Knightfall, keep watching. Possible distraction. Checking with Wander and Sojourner upstairs." He gestured with his shin for Hematite to follow and headed for the ground floor.

Back at the window, Mystery ducked her shoulders up and down, unsure how to respond to the elbow on her head but trying to stay focused on the more pressing matter. "Um, I think maybe we should go help Tensile?" she suggested quietly to Daybreak, frowning down at the armored car. "My mist form is pretty tough to hurt, if it's a trap... and I think it's maybe probably a trap."

[Electra]

"Isn't every day that an armored bank van tries to break into you," Knightfall quipped over the radio. "I've got a license plate on the van, going to input it and see if I can pull up the depot it's based out of. Even odds the plates are stolen too, though. I'll let you know." She began typing with the slightly awkward air of someone trying to recall a skill learned in school and forgotten, then was distracted by Travis' departure. "Freaky-deaky," she said approvingly. "On it, boss," she added to Trevor, "just don't call me late when the fight breaks out." 

 

Upstairs, Erin was busy being thrown into a wall when the radio sounded the first warnings. She put out her legs and rebounded neatly to the floor, holding up a hand as she cocked her head to listen. A few feet away, Sojourner did the same thing, her breath heaving loudly as she rested her hands on her bent knees. A night of tension and forced inactivity hadn't been doing either of them any good, till eventually it had seemed the most sensible thing to just push all the furniture in one of the larger parlors out of the way and try a little sparring. Erin was oddly gratified to know that whatever her deficiencies as a parent might have turned out to be in the future, she'd apparently taught her daughter everything she knew. They both held back significantly to avoid any injuries, but it was great exercise and the footprints would probably come off the walls and ceiling eventually. 

 

"It probably is a distraction," Erin agreed, brushing herself off quickly as she went for her radio and bat. "Someone sneaky enough to be using time travel isn't going to make a head-on assault his only vector. Doesn't mean it won't cause a lot of trouble if it breaks through." 

 

"I'm all over it," Tensile assured her from outside, "approaching the gates now. We got any spike strips to throw down here, maybe a handy moat?" Even over the radio, the sound of his gun charging up was clearly audible. "I'll go for the tires first, see how long I can keep them outside." 

 

"We should get to the back," suggested Sojourner. "Find out what we are being distracted from. But you have to stay back!" she reminded Erin urgently. "We win the battle and lose the war if either of you are infected during the fight." 

 

Erin grimaced at that, but bowed to necessity for once. "I guess there's always throwing things," she acceded with a sigh. "But I swear, somebody had better kick every inch of this guy's ass." The pair headed back for the first floor, where they found Trevor and Hematite. "You guys gonna back Tensile?" 

[Gizmo]

"Mystery and Daybreak covering him," Midnight replied, nodding toward the front of the mansion where the black and gold costumed young man could be seen through the window touching down on the lawn followed by an unusually nimble cloud of inky black mist. Neither he nor Erin were very good at waiting while someone else put themselves in the path of danger, plan or no plan, and it seemed like that had rubbed off on the next generation regardless of timeline. "Attacker's advantage. Knows where we are."

Hematite made a flat sound from behind his mask. "Not expecting my suit's lightbenders, though," he noted, Blackbird's image blinking back into view over his shoulder, back to her earlier diminutive dimensions. "Can keep them guessing until they show their hand."

"So, what's your bet?" Daybreak asked as he jogged across the grass, twirling his sledgehammer at his side like it was no more than a baton. "Mind controlled security guards? Nav computer AI gone berserk? Ferrokinetic using the truck as a battering ram?"

The cloud of mist managed to look pensive, its path dipping downward momentarily. "Bet...?" Mystery's voice was recognizable but echoed as though coming from the other end of a long tunnel.

"Sure, Knighty and me, we always try to come up with the craziest thing we might have to fight before we find out." Coming up next to Tensile, he slapped his weapon into his opposing palm, crouching into a ready stance. "That way the real thing seems like no biggie. Do you guys not do that?"

"I think psionics would sort of be like cheating," the youngest time traveler fretted, remaining in her gaseous form. "But, um. Maybe... the tank is full of evil, sentient gasoline?" The cloud swirled a little more tightly, embarrassed to have said that out loud.

[Avenger Assembled]

The truck slammed into the gate one last time as Tensile, Daybreak, and Mystery all approached it - and suddenly, it stopped dead in its tracks, still and quiet at their approach. Inside, the guards were unconscious - and Mystery's ethereal voice sounded a clarion note of concern as she read their sleeping minds. "Something entered their minds and controlled their wills, but it's not psionic. It can't be umbral magic this early?" As this was one subject with which he was thoroughly unfamiliar, Tensile's usually ebullient voice fell silent as Mystery continued her mental explorations. "There was a dark shadow, and then they-" 
 
Suddenly her voice, and all other voices from outside, were cut off abruptly as a cloak of light-sucking darkness, a physical manifestation of dark energy that blocked all light, poured down over the Manor like a falling curtain. Only the interior lights kept up the illumination, and even they seemed attenuated by the glowing sheen from outside. Inside the Manor all was noise and activity, however, as the intruder alarm began sounding - when who should appear amid a curl of black fire and smoke but Nightmare Moon, the terrifying leader of Madrigal's Hounds, the chief assassin squad of the Terminus. She laughed an evil laugh. "Mwa-ha-ha! At last, I'm free - to get my REVENGE! Come and face me in battle, Midnight and Wander - if you dare!"

[Electra]

There was a brief moment of scuffle as Wander and Sojourner each tried to step between the other and the new danger, with Wander eventually winning mostly on grounds of seniority. "You couldn't take us last- wait." She broke off, cocking her head to one side. "It's a fake!" she called to the others. "I don't know what the hell it is, but it's not a Hound." Picking up a heavy leaded-glass vase from a side table, she hurled it at Nightmare Moon, gauging the trajectory to avoid hitting anybody if the projectile happened to pass straight through. 

 

Sojourner immediately followed Wander's lead, pulling one of her guns from its holster and bringing to to bear on the intruder. She held her fire, though, waiting to see whether the thing could be affected by weapons. A broken vase was one thing, a hallway riddled with useless bullet holes was quite another. "Any hostiles still visible outside?" she asked tersely into the radio. 

 

"Nothing out here anymore," Tensile replied, "we cracked the van open and it's full of sleeping guards. What the hell is going on in the house?" Already he was primed to move back to join the real battle. 

 

"Bogey on the first floor," Knightfall chimed in from the basement. "All internal security's been activated. It looks like Nightmare Moon, the leader of that freako Terminus gang, but Mom says it's a fake. Whatever it is managed to teleport in, so we may be in trouble." 

 

"On my way," Tensile replied, all levity suddenly absent from his tone. "Hey little sis," he called to Mystery, "can you stay here with these guys and see if there's anything more in their heads, or if they need hospital or something? We prolly shouldn't leave them out here in the snow." He turned and headed back for the house, his long stride eating up the ground beneath his feet. 

Edited May 11, 2014 by Electra

[Gizmo]

"Um, wouldn't I have the best chance of getting back inside?" Mystery suggested quietly, her cloud solidifying back into a recognizably human form as she reflexively raised her hand like a student in class. The dome that had sprung up around the mansion looked more than a little foreboding but if it wasn't quite airtight the teenager supposed she might be able to pass through.

Daybreak offered her a shrug and a grin as he loped off after Tensile. "Sorry, Mysty, guess being the youngest is sort of a drag! Who knew, huh? Try to finish up quick and meet back up with us." Hefting his sledgehammer into an easier grip for running, he accelerated to make up some of the distance between himself and the cyborg as he called back, "We'll just try hitting it really hard in the meantime!"

Beneath the dome, Hematite was not taking the latest turn of events nearly so well. "Whatever, she's solid enough to smash!" he growled as the vase bounced off of their intruder with an audible thunk.

"Furorsoul protocol initiating. Reducing strength inhibitors to 92.3%. 77.4%. 62.9%," Blackbird agreed, her small hologram falling into a pose that matched Hematite's exactly. The lines of neon blue in his suit began to glow more ominously while the material very faintly rustled with the tensing of muscles. "Warning: surrender is highly recommended." There was a new edge to her tone that implied she was hoping the advice would go unheeded.

Midnight didn't bother to comment out loud, twin escrima sticks appearing almost instantaneously in his hands as he moved smoothly to one side, beginning to surround the imposter in a tight semi-circle. Choosing Nightmare Moon as a cover didn't necessarily narrow down the suspects much, given that their fight with the Hounds had been broadcast across the multiverse but at least on Prime it implied a level of knowledge the young detective was not pleased about. Someone knew where they lived and what they'd done. He couldn't help but wonder what else they might already know.

[Avenger Assembled]

"Hrn."  

 

As the vase bounced off with an oddly metallic thunk, 'Nightmare Moon' seemed to straighten up - 'her' head suddenly looming a good seven feet off the ground. "I had planned to fool the Liberty League with the face of their old enemy, but the tattered loose ends of my enshadowed family tapestry deserve to know me for who I am. No matter." The illusion was fading, replaced with something that was hard to make out clearly - a matte black, nearly featureless humanoid form with no mouth, nose, or hair, one that would have looked like a bad special effect brought to life if not for the all-too-human eyes that glowed with a sizzling, malevolent fury, colored an inhuman red against swirling, inky black. From that mouthless face came a voice like nothing the others had heard before - or maybe it was all too familiar, the cold, insinuating voice of the shadowy darkness itself. As it spoke, through threats and worse, it never raised its voice above an echoey grate. "I am the alpha and the omega; the first and the last and the greatest of the line. Come and die now, in the place that you began."   

[Electra]

"Is that God?" Tensile asked over the radio as he raced for the house. "With the whole alpha and omega thing? Cause if you're fighting God in there, you'd better wait till I get in there too. Just wait till I get home and tell everyone I kicked God's ass." 

 

"It's definitely not God," Sojourner replied, her voice flat as she checked her weapons once more.

 

"But I think it might be Voldemort," Knightfall chimed in helpfully. "Definitely got the look going." 

 

"Damn. But kicking Voldemort's ass would be all right too," Tensile replied, not sounding at all winded despite his pace. 

 

"It's definitely not Voldemort," Sojourner snapped. 

 

"Uh, Voldemort is fictional in your universes too, right?" Knightfall asked.

 

"Focus, please!" Erin demanded, waving her bat to full extension. "Whatever the hell it is, wherever it's from, its ass will be kicked and then you can all talk about religion and Harry Potter all night. Just don't let it tag you, we know it's poisonous." 

[Electra]

"That goes for you too," Sojourner called back to Wander. "Maybe double, you know who he's trying to get at. Let us help you!" 

 

"Yeah!" Knightfall chimed in from the basement. "We came all this way! Be right there!" Moments later, the young heroine appeared in the hallway with the others, a slightly impromptu-looking device held in her hands. "Check it out, it's too early for the no-teleporting-in-the-house wards to be in place yet." 

 

"Man, I hated those," Tensile chimed in on the radio. "We're on our way." 

 

"Hurry," Sojourner said flatly. She looked to the young adult version of her mother, who was already poised to spring, and slammed a new magazine into her gun. Two quick pops, and the strange villain suddenly had two points of blazing light illuminating the center of his forehead and the place where his heart should be. The futuristic tracer rounds did no damage to the bizarre creature, but they served as enough of a distraction for Wander to charge in. 

 

With her bat fully extended, Wander didn't need to get close to a villain to smack him around, and in this case she definitely wanted to keep at arm's length. She used her bat as a pivot to vault herself over the others, appearing as though out of nowhere and shoving the end of the bat into the thing's center mass like she was making a really aggressive break at a pool table. It was hard to tell what might hurt an amorphous mass of darkness, but that seemed to have some effect.