Death, Crime, Rage of a Beast, Etc. [IC]

[Avenger Assembled]

Richard eyed the other man uncertainly, his accelerated brain chewing on the implications of Rick's statement. "So your dupes, they're the you you were in the 1980s, all the time, forever?" Richard thought about the man he'd been in the 1980s - an arrogant cokehead adrenaline junkie who only didn't get himself killed because of the good sense of his best girl. And this guy was an ass compared to me. Jeez, that must suck! "We'll help you track your boys down, Rick. Fast as I am and with Paige's mind powers, we'll get it done." He shot a glance at Paige, uncertain about going on, and knowing full well she would know why. Repentant or not, Rick Allen had been a violent criminal back in the day, doing things that went well beyond both Fast-Forward and Hologram's boundaries - and unlike them, he'd had no public heroism on his record afterwards. "What have you been doing with yourself out on the coast?" 

[trollthumper]

"I've been... trying to do good, best I can," Allen said, stirring his coffee. "Popping off more of me would send up a red flag real fast, and... I felt I had to do penance somehow."

"Guessing prison wasn't an option," said Cannonade. His voice didn't have any judgment; it was just a statement of fact. Given some of the guys in his scene, he had an idea how Allen might be thinking.

"God, even back then, the system was broken," Allen said, "and that was before the corporations started thinking they could make a killing by getting people in for years for smoking pot to sew shirts or put together computers for 5 cents an hour." He turned to Fast Forward and Hologram. "I mean, uh... don't get me wrong. I heard about what you guys did. That took some guts. But... well, you mainly played the margins. I engaged directly, and I engaged the cops a lot. Guys with a record like mine don't exactly have a fun time in prison, powers or not.

"So, I did what I could. Helped some of the crusties trying to jam up the logging trade. Lent a hand with a whole lot of groups - AIDS charities, queer youth shelters, clean needle exchanges... I mean, I didn't die down entirely. Went up to Seattle, 1999. Wasn't in the black bloc, but... I wasn't exactly stopping it. A part of me wanted to - wanted to pop off a few guys and try to corral everything - but I knew they'd be more likely to join in than anything else."

He shoved his chair away and stood up. "All right, enough of the pity party bull****. Let's go find me before I do something even more stupid."

[Electra]

"I don't think any of us are entirely proud of the people we were back in the day," Paige agreed thoughtfully, her eyes on Allen. "And I believe that if we hadn't been offered clemency, Richard and I wouldn't have chosen to go to prison either. There are all kinds of ways to atone." She stood up as well, walked towards the former Slamdance with a considering eye. "We'll help you shut down your doubles before they cause any more damage. But you know what this means. If your doubles have acquired autonomy, that's not likely to just fade away. It means you can never use your powers again, or you risk the same disaster, maybe worse. Are you going to be able to live with that?" Her voice was firm, but not unsympathetic. 

[trollthumper]

GM

Allen paused as he got from the table, stroking his chin. The expression on his face indicated that he might not have thought about it - or rather, that he did, but didn't want to think about it for any longer. "I... don't think the connection's entirely broken," he said. "There's still this... inkling, I guess. I've got this rough idea of what he might be doing, where he might be... it's what led me to Riverside, at least. If I can still tuck 'em away... well, yeah. No more of this 'longing for lost youth' bull****. Let's do this."

The former supervillain stepped out into the late summer air; despite the humidity, he shivered slightly. He put his fingers to his temples, as if trying to fight off a headache - or, as if in some parody of an old fortune teller, trying to attune himself to psychic wavelengths. "They're to... the northwest, I think. A mile or... three out?" He shook his head. "Like I said, really crap connection. Gone from five bars to one. Maybe if there was a boost..."

[Electra]

"I can help you, but you'll need to let me into your head a bit," Paige told Allen, coming up to stand beside him. "Not deeply, just the psychic impressions you're picking up. If I can filter those with my own perceptions, hopefully we can home in on your runaways. I think I sensed one earlier, actually, but you were so much closer that we came looking for you instead." After waiting for assent, Paige closed her eyes and carefully insinuated herself into Allen's mind, concentrating on the impressions he was picking up, sending her own power in the same direction to bolster the psychic signal. It was an odd and echoey feeling, being inside Slamdance's head and looking for Slamdance at the same time, but she managed to tune it out. 

 

After a moment, her eyes snapped open. "Pyramid Plaza," she told the others. "And he's got something planned, he's going to try and do something big. We'd better get there before he can." 

[Avenger Assembled]

Thought was mother to the deed as Fast-Forward took Hologram by one hand and Cannonade by the other. "Grab on, Rick," he said seriously as Slamdance joined the circle, and then - he didn't have a lot of experience being powered by other speedsters, but Richard still knew his 'look' was different. All around them the city seemed to slow down to a near-crawl, then to an almost-perfect stillness, before Fast-Forward called "Run!" and they all ran together, the static city flashing by so fast that without the experienced speedster to guide them the group might have crashed into a building! As it was, in an instant they were dead center of the Pyramid Plaza complex, looking around for trouble

[trollthumper]

Cannonade once found himself zooming through Freedom City at wholly unconscionable speeds. Then again, having done this once before, he wasn't as gripped by the need to close his eyes and pray to whatever higher power might be listening. But it was still there on a fundamental level. Soon, the blur of everything came to an end, and he found himself in the midst of chaos.

People were already running, as the horde of Slamdance had come packed for damage. Carts were being tilted over or ripped apart. Large blocks of sodium were dropped in the fountains, prompting massive explosions and flares. One Slamdance stood on top of a turned-over car, screaming into a loudspeaker.

"Sorry to disrupt all the mindless consumerism!" he cried to the crowd. "You all built temples to a false god! Time to see what happens when it's torn down!"

"Aw, Christ," said Allen. "That's what I sounded like."

"We all do stupid stuff when we're young," said Cannonade. "Some of us go fight crime."

Somewhere in the chaos, one of the Slamdances noticed Allen with the other heroes. He pointed to them, and soon, the other clones locked eyes with the group. Cannonade cracked his knuckles. "Well," he said, "Let's go play Whack-a-Mole."

[Avenger Assembled]

"Hang on. A few new tricks." 

 

Richard reached into his jacket and snapped open the spell book he'd been casting from earlier and began zipping around the battlefield, leaving behind a blue-white

givemeyourlightohasteroth

trail of fire as he traced an arcane design the size of the Pyramid Plaza's central courtyard. "Man, this is tedious," he complained to one of the Slamdances as the

starofwonderstarofnight

latter was in the middle of ripping apart a Jonathan Grant campaign poster. "Not your terrible fashion sense and punk-ass punkery," he added to another who had

thelightthatburnsawaythesin

overturned a beverage cart, "I'm over that. It's this thing!" He hefted the book as he zipped a glowing circle around another. "Do you have any idea how tedious it is

givethemyourjustice

reading this little handwriting and following these little starcharts? I didn't even go to high school and this is all Victorian magic mumbo-jumbo! If I couldn't speed up

lettherebelight!

my perceptions of time, this would be like four, five hours! Totally not radical!" 

 

He finished by Paige's side and went on, "But it does have one big thing going for it. Everybody down. Whammy-shazammy!" He snapped his fingers and a celestial flash of blue-white light erupted from his fingers, detonating in the center of the mass of Slamdances with a tremendous eruption of soul-searing light with a glow that burned and burned and burned the eyes. 

[trollthumper]

The light washed out over the plaza; even with his arm thrown over his eyes, Cannonade could see the radiance through the corners of his vision. And judging by the agonized yell some ways off, Slamdance hadn't been so lucky in avoiding the brunt of it. Once the light died down to somewhat acceptable levels, Cannonade looked out to see the many duplicates stumbling about the plaza, as if trying to regain their balance. One of them, the one who'd been shouting, was standing stock still - his eyes were forced open, but judging by the look on his face, it wasn't a pleasant thing. "You really think it's changed?" he said. "It hasn't! None of it has! All of it, over and over again! You really think you can just go along with it and make it better?"

"You're not the only one sick of it." Cannonade stepped forward, trying to draw the leader's attention. "We're still fighting. But we know what to fight for, and --"

"Oh, **** that! You're nothing but another weak-willed sellout trying to justify the fact that you like the feel of a boot on your neck!"

Well. So much for goodwill. "You know what? **** that. I can endure. That's what makes us different from you. We're not any less pissed-off at the bastards than you are, but we know that if we swing and we miss, people get hurt. And maybe you're able to laugh it off, but we won't. People around us get hurt every day, suffer under the yokes of assholes who don't care or won't bother - our friends, our families, our communities. But we swing wildly, others get hurt - and maybe they actually start to listen to the bastards, when they tell 'em that we're just angry little ****s. I'm sorry you feel the need to rip this place up from the roots, but you know what? It's my city! My world! I'm gonna fight for it! I don't care if assholes at the top think I'm some asshole with a grudge, or some piddly-ass purist like you mistakes caring about the consequences for weakness! Maybe if you'd actually given a ****, you could have done something! Because we will!"

It was then that Cannonade realized that the man he was addressing was, technically, right behind him. "Look..."

"No, I had that coming. For a long goddamn time."

[Electra]

For her part, Hologram didn't seem to be doing much of anything, just standing out of the way and watching the highly destructive show. Her lips curved in a slight smile as Fast-Forward performed his spell, but otherwise she seemed to be concentrating very intently on the bevy of identical villains. Finally she murmured "there you are," and pursed her lips flat for a few seconds. 

 

Out in the crowd, one of the Slamdances dropped the parking meter he'd been using as a bludgeon and looked around as though confused. He shook himself, then grinned broadly and smashed his fist into the face of the Slamdance standing next to him. "I always did hate your smug face, you bastard!" he crowed, his eyes just a bit unfocused. 

[trollthumper]

GM

For a few seconds, all the chaos that Slamdance had wished to unleash was turned inward. Clone turned on clone, in a storm of headbutt, gutpunches, and attempted kicks to very sensitive areas with steel-toed boots. Someone at the center of the horde stood one central Slamdance, trying very hard to avoid the blows of his fellows. "You can't tell me... can't tell me you want this. Can't tell me all this is - watch it! - good for you. We were supposed to rip it all up! It was - ****! - the only way we could rebuild!"

"No." Rick stepped forward, in front of the other heroes, locking his eyes on the central Slamdance. "I - we - used to think that. The slow route sucks. Trust me, I know. But sometimes, you have to do what you can to help who you can. You can't just flip a switch and remake the world --"

"Then why did you bring me into this?" Slamdance didn't get sound pissed off now; he sounded unhinged. "Why did you force me to look at all of this? We were supposed to change things! And it's still here! It's all still here! How the hell can you sit back and just stare at it?"

"I -- "

"And why the hell did you make me deal with this?"

[Avenger Assembled]

~Hah, nice! Baby, you're the greatest~, he thought before getting down to the touchy business of what to do with the blinded, self-battering Slamdance. He zipped over near a blinded duplicate and called "Hey, Slamdance, stop hitting yourself! Stop hitting yourself! Bwahaha!", enjoying the look on the thug's face before he went to work himself. ~Can't just punch him or he'll make ten more jerks; can't just hit him with Instant Sunshine or I'll crater the plaza floor...~ Luckily, he'd spent enough time fiddling around with his big book o' spells that he had a pretty good idea of what he could and could not do with it! Instead he traced green fire on the floor around the various Slamdances, his footsteps leaving behind a complex geometric pattern as he chanted at a rapid-fire pace, his voice on, well, fast-forward as he summoned forth the mighty harvests that grew beneath the light of green Spica! 

 

When it was done, he reappeared next to Hologram and declared, "Time for you to get in touch with nature, thugboy!" he called.

[trollthumper]

The plants of an alien world erupted from the earth, hungrily trying to ensnare Slamdance and his many duplicates. Many of the clones, including the one that seemed to be leading the group, were lashed to the ground, ensnared by alien flora. "God, you ****ers always sound the same! Trying to act like you're clever when you can't do **** to change things!"

"God, didn't we have this talk?" Cannonade rushed forward, dodging both the alien plants and the twisting clones. "You keep talking like you're some goddamn revolutionary, when all you ever were was a thug who thought he was hot ****." His hand reached out for Slamdance's shoulder and grabbed tight. "What were you ever going to change? Make it easier to break things?"

"I would have made this better! I... I should have..." He looked over across the square towards Allen. "You should have..."

[Electra]

"All right, that's quite enough out of you," Paige murmured, giving the head Slamdance a look that said she was entirely done with his nonsense. It was a look she'd perfected over decades, one that was potent in its own right, but when backed by her mental powers, it was insurmountable. Slamdance relaxed in his bonds, his eyes closing and his head lolling as he surrendered to the pull of sleep. Paige stepped forward then, ignoring the clones who were busy fighting with each other for the most part. "Can you pull them back in?" she asked Allen curiously. "Or is this one entirely separate from you now?" 

[trollthumper]

Allen walked up to the unconscious Slamdance, studying him. He didn't exactly look innocent sleeping, but he did look slightly pathetic. He reached down towards the duplicate, but paused, as if he was feeling the air for something but couldn't find it. "I'm sorry," he said. "I... think it may have been too long. I, uh... I can't feel the connection anymore."

"You're sure about that?" asked Cannonade.

"Trust me, I'm a lot more sure about something like that than you'd be. I don't know what it is. Maybe he's spent too long independent of me, or..." He sighed, and shrugged. "Listen. I know this is going to sound like a cliche, but... he's a dumb kid. He's the same idiot that I was back then, and he's not even a week old. You heard him. He doesn't know what this world is like. All he knows is what it was back then, and what I wanted it to be back then. And the only way he knew how to respond is how I would have. If he is independent... what can we do for him?"

[Avenger Assembled]

"Geez, I dunno," said Fast-Forward not unsympathetically. Some quick thinking told him this probably wasn't a good situation for the 'younger' Slamdance. Paige's powers had worked on him, which meant he wasn't some mindless construct. And if he wasn't going away now, that meant he was probably going away. Mindful of exactly who it was that lived at the Pyramid Plaza, he kept his thoughts to himself even across his link to Paige. Don't need the Scarab staring at my dirty brain-laundry. "I'd go get him a New Coke, but not in the middle of the damn Pyramid Plaza." That was one bit of code phrase they'd worked out a long time ago - New Coke, after all, had a way of disappearing. "What do you think, babe, can you get anything from him?" 

[Electra]

"I might be able to," Paige replied, "but not while he's asleep, so we'd better be in a more secure environment. Might be we could get him a bed at Providence for evaluation instead of putting him in jail. He does have a pretty unique mental situation, having literally lived in someone else's head for decades. Some therapy, some temporary power suppressants, he might end up on Project Freedom for a little while." She shrugged. "I don't think we can in good conscience just let him go, but we can get him some help." 

[trollthumper]

Cannonade looked down at the unconscious Slamdance, then at the man he had become. "I'm probably gonna hate myself for this someday," he said, "but... he did sound like someone who... okay, 'regret' is probably the wrong word. But who didn't really know the world. I think he thought everything was the way it was before. He didn't see what the world had become; he just saw the stuff he hated was still there. Maybe if... well, he probably won't calm down. But at least he'll get a chance to find something he can actually change." He paused, looking up to the sky. "Or at least someone who deserves to get kicked between the legs."  

 

Allen nodded. "I'll need to make some arrangements."

 

"What do you mean?"

 

"Well, hell, I can't just leave him here, can I? I mean, he's going to be pissed at me, but I'm probably the strongest relationship he has at this point - well, outside of our selves. Maybe he'll actually start to like me - eventually." He looked down at his passed-out, younger self. "My son. F**k. I guess he is..."