ic My Dearest Angelica (IC)

[Kolohehonu]

"Hyperactive the ambush points look clear." Radioed in Doctor Orion. "I don't see the point of this." 

 

Hyperactive ignored the overly critical and very shiny paragon. He held pace with the other two speedsters. He was still positively giddy as he ran alongside his personal hero. 

 

"Charity and Publicity." Hyperactive retorted. "With any luck, Cahill himself is watching and will be impressed with how we handled this. At which point we could have tax funding. Get some real resources and hey real respect."

[KnightDisciple]

Thoughtspeed had had to hold back his laughter for, like, half the race so far. Not because he thought the other racers were funny; Hyperactive was definitely keeping them on their toes, and for all the truth to his boasts of being faster than his father, Will had to acknowledge the sheer experience his father had. 

 

Not that he'd ever say that out loud, if he could help it. Can't ruin his image, see. 

 

He kept running, letting his brain's incredible speed keep him from tripping on roots and rocks as they went off-road. Instead of constantly pushing himself faster and faster, he elected to maintain a speed that was still supersonic, but well below his maximum, and occasionally use bursts of speed to move over, under, around, or even through obstacles, depending on what they were made of. All in the name of showing off, and maybe putting Hyperactive just a touch off-base. 

[Kolohehonu]

Hyperactive matched Thoughtspeed as best he could. He did a lot less of the through, but he did a lot of sliding under and flipping over. Condor had taught him well and his acrobatics were very useful out here. Well at the very least, it made him look cool. He and Thoughtspeed both clearly knew just how important that was. 

 

As great as the race was, and it was truly great, Hyperactive was having trouble. He almost exclusively ran on streets. He was a city boy at heart, and this was a difficult race. But still he was thrilled! This was something he had been dreaming of for years! It was a delight to get to run with other heroes. 

[Avenger Assembled]

Richard kept his own council on the subject of the President of the United States. Cahill hadn't been his candidate (really nobody from either political party had been his candidate for a long time) and he was not a fan of the idea of putting superheroes to work for the government. It reminded him too much of the bad old days of the 1980s and 1990s - not the parts he'd liked, but the parts where it seemed like the relationship between the super and the mundane were close to breaking down and might never heal themselves. But he certainly wasn't about to badmouth the President of the United States over a live microphone. Even if it didn't make it into the audio actually broadcast to the audience, some things were better left unrecorded. 

 

He let Hyperactive take the lead as they passed through Waco on their first leg, knowing better than to try and take the limelight away from a hometown hero. They were just leaving the borders of Texas for the return trip when something peculiar happened...

 

 

[KnightDisciple]

Thoughtspeed tensed up as he picked up strange radio chatter. Within moments, he'd faded from visibility, and he'd surged his speed to be near Hyperactive, or at least less than a mile away.

 

~Hyperactive, it's Thoughtspeed! I don't have unlimited range here but we need to link up with Fast-Forward! I don't know if you heard the radio but it sounds like an ambush!~

 

After waiting briefly for an answer, Thoughtpeed, still invisible, would turn and run toward his father, all but blasting out a mental message as soon as he got close enough.

 

~Dad! I think there's an ambush or something! My radio's picking up some weird chatter!~

[Kolohehonu]

Hyperactive tried to reach DM2.0 and found her unresponsive. Made sense, they were well outside the reach of her usual range. He had heard something on the chatter. 

 

"I heard something." Hyperactive said out loud hoping his thoughts would track with his mouth, he was still trying to get used to psychics, the Warriors had none and it was still disconcerting to have anyone speaking into his own head. Still, it would be better to stick close. He made his way and fell in step with the older speedster. 

 

"It's probably one of the Masters, some of them are actually dangerous." Hyperactive warned aloud. He took in the area around him looking out for anything that seemed like an obvious trap as they barreled across the greatest state in the Union. 

[Avenger Assembled]

Texas, for its part, proved to be free from dangers - but for men as fast as them, state lines were just a momentary obstacle. They were in the midst of the Appalachians, running down a state road that paralleled Interstate 81, when the lightning hit. The twisting roads had slowed them all down (well, relatively speaking) but they were all still hypersonic when the blasts struck the ground in front of them, blasting craters in the asphalt in an instant that must have been measurable only on the nanosecond scale. An instant later, they were joined by three new runners, each keeping pace or surpassing the heroic trio of speedsters - an armored figure in black surrounded by crackling lightning, a lithely-figured woman in tight-fitting pink and black spandex with what looked like a high-tech motorcycle helmet over her head, and their quarry - a laughing androgynous figure in a toga, winged sandals on hir feet and helmet on hir head, zipping along with a speed that seemed to surpass them all. 

 

"Keep running!" yelled the woman, hanging behind to keep pace with the heroes as her partner sped up after the Greco-Roman looking figure. "You have to finish the race - and we have to catch Hermes!" 

[Kolohehonu]

What was going on here? Hyperactive thought as he had just narrowly avoided the lightning. He kept charging forward, now far faster. He'd been around the multiverse, met a lot of speedsters. But he didn't recognize any of these faces. Or well helmets. 

 

"Race right!" Hyperactive declared as he forced his body forward. He matched pace with the woman. He opened up his faceshield, which he was loathe to do at these speeds, bugs in the teeth were awful. "Who are you? Why are we chasing a Greek god? Is that the Hermes? Or someone who looks like him?" Hyperactive rattled off before locking his shield in place. 

[KnightDisciple]

Thoughtspeed blinked and slowed for a quarter of an eyeblink, before he redoubled his efforts, doing what he could to keep pace with the new arrivals. Within moments, he'd reached out his power to any newcomers he could, and his father and Hyperactive if they were in range, and "knocked" on their mental "door" so he could set up a telepathic connection.

 

~I'm Thoughtspeed! Who are you guys? What's going on? Why is...Hermes, for real? Come on, this is supposed to be for charity!~

 

For all his confusion and not-quite-complaining, Thoughtspeed never lost his place in the now-larger pack of runners, a miles-long trail of ephemeral green dots trailing behind him.