Less than two hours after their eye-opening meeting in the Bastion, the Vanguard and Álvaro/Nimrod were in another elevator, in another AzTech facility, heading for another secret facility. Once the Hunter had heard what Scion and Quanta had in mind for contacting Nemesis, he had insisted the attempt could not be made from the Bastion itself.
“First and foremost, it’s probably the most heavily shielded place on the planet,” the silver haired holographic projection of the ancient intelligence had explained. “But equally importantly, even if you could connect to Nemesis despite my shielding, it would almost certainly lead him straight to me – something I’be managed to avoid for many thousands of years. That’s not a risk I’m willing to take at this late date.”
De la Vega had suggested his secure development lab, a place he referred to as the Vault, as the best place to do what they planned. “It’s almost as secure as the Bastion, and not as vulnerable as your labs in the Pyramid would be, and there’s a shard of the Master Matrix there, should we need its computing power. It’s quite well shielded too, so Nemesis shouldn’t be able to backtrack to us.”
After a quick return to the Pyramid to retrieve both the device the two heroes had been working on and Paragon, who had instantly agreed to be their guinea pig, Quanta had opened a quantum tunnel to a nondescript, three-story building on the AzTech campus. The signage indicated it was the Corporate Archives Building.
“Only three people work here, and none of them will be around at this hour,” he said as he unlocked the doors. “I usually get here via a classic secret passage (albeit a high-tech one, of course) from my old office, but there’s no point in going through all that at this hour.”
The elevator car comfortably held all eight people, with Chuck and Jonny in their human forms. Without looking, Álvaro selected a series buttons from the twenty unmarked ones on a hidden wall panel, and the elevator made a slight hissing sound as it began to move smoothly downward. After several minutes Scion was beginning to wonder just how deep this secret lab was… a minute more and they came to a smooth stop, the doors opening into darkness.
As de la Vega stepped out of the elevator, overhead lights flickered on, revealing a long, wide corridor. Afte passing through a scanner/decontamination alcove halfway down, the party came to a stop before a massive, high-tech door. It was flanked by two security robots unlike anything they’d seen on AzTech property before, each holding a large, alien-looking rifle. The sentinels lowered their weapons and stepped aside as Álvaro and the heroes approached, and the heavy double doors slid slowly, silently aside to reveal a large, windowless room.
The warehouse-like space was roughly 150 feet long and 120 feet wide, with a 40 foot ceiling. Indirect lighting made the room bright but not sterile. Well-organized and clearly well-used workstations and testing sites covered much of the floor, while racks filled with equipment, spare parts and other, less immediately identifiable, things lined the walls. To right of the entry was a glass-walled firing range.
But what instantly caught everyone’s attention was the large crystalline structure resting on a dais at the center of the room. Looking like a massive inverted icicle, it pulsed with a gentle white light and, based on what they’d just seen at the Bastion, was obviously an example of Seeker technology. Cables ran from it to various encircling computer stations, where several robotic technicians examined data on various screen. Bits and pieces of alien-looking technology were strewn throughout the room, apparently in various stages of being analyzed or experimented upon.
“Welcome to The Vault,” Álvaro said, the capital letters clear in his voice as he led them into the room. “For decades this has been the core of AzTech. This Vault sits very deep underground, as I’m sure you realize, and twenty feet of concrete and high-tech shielding separates the ceiling here from the sub-sub-basement of the building above. The only way in is the way we just came, and I’m the only living soul who has seen this room since it was built… until now.”
“So this is where the magic happens,” Quanta said, impressed despite himself. “And if that crystal is what I think it is… well, no wonder AzTech is on the cutting edge of technology.”
“As I said during my ‘origin story,’ the Hunter was instrumental in advancing my understanding in a great many fields, and when I built this lab he gave me a seed crystal of the Master Matrix, from which this shard grew. Not that he shares everything he knows with me, of course, and there’s plenty of tech he has shared that we both agree humanity is not yet ready for. But I like to be prepared,“ Álvaro laughed. “Now, shall we get started? I suspect time may be of the essence!”
They set up at a relatively clear station near the center of the room and the towering crystal shard, and for the next hour Álvaro, Scion, and Quanta were buried in techno-jargon and esoteric equipment, as they put the finishing touches on their device. Chuck and Jonny acted as heat sinks and welding torches as required, and Paragon offered an occasional, surprisingly cogent, suggestion.
Artemis, with nothing to contribute at this point, retired to meditate in the well-appointed bedroom of the living quarters beyond the firing range, obviously meant for Álvaro’s late night working sessions. Gideon convinced Cooper there was no point in their hanging around either, and dragged him off to play Destiny on the console they found in the living quarter’s media room.
It was 22:30 when they finally came up for air and figured they had something that should at least connect them to Nemesis, if not actually lead them to him. Agitating the crystalline structures in Paragon’s nervous system, while very painful for him, seemed to spread that pain along the subspace frequency that connected all the Changling’s infused nervous systems. They theorized that it should be possible to so agitate the crystals’ harmonics such that it would create a feedback loop, which should get Nemesis’ attention via whatever tech he was using to control the Changlings.
With Artemis and the others recalled to the lab, Scion flipped the switch on their cobbled together Sub-Etha Universal Feedback Loop Shockomatic 1000 device. Strapped securely into a reinforced diagnostic chair, Paragon twitched and clenched his jaw as the initial energy burst hit his system.
“You OK buddy?” Phantom Ace asked, frowning in concern. “Guys, maybe we should turn it down?”
“No! I’m fine, thanks,” Paragon gasped out. “Keep going!”
Scion upped the Agitatometer Dial a notch. Paragon ground his teeth and spasmed, but managed to spit out “Don’t stop!”
After a few minutes of increasing doses and escalating pain levels even Álvaro was ready to call it quits… and then the expression on Paragon’s face changed. Rather than in pain, he seemed more angry, and his body posture subtly shifted as well. And then his eyes filmed over with a silver sheen. He glared at the gathered heroes, and opened his mouth to speak –
His body jerked, wracked by another spasm as the machine jolted him again, cutting off his words in a shuddering gasp. As the spasm passed he drew in a breath and hissed “I am Nimrod. Are you going to stop whatever it is you’re doing… or do you actually want our young friend here to die?”
“Is that a threat?” Artemis asked coldly.
“Ha! No, merely a prediction. This damn feedback loop you’ve managed to create is causing me considerable pain even at this remove – I can only imagine what it’s doing to poor Eddie. You do know that he was a pimply faced, greasy-haired loser with an unfortunate overbite, working a dead-end job as a grocery store bag-boy before the Incident blessed him, yes?”
The voice was Paragon’s deep baritone, but pitched a trifle higher – and the cadences and rhythms were wholly different, unmistakably those of someone else. Everyone ignored the dig at Paragon, and after a moment he shrugged.
“I assume a couple of you brighter types have cobbled together some sort of Sub-Etha Universal Feedback Loop Shockomatic device,” he went on dryly, as Scion flipped off the device. “How very quaint. So, is there some point to this little exercise?” The possessing intelligence somehow managed to make Paragon’s face look more haughty, if not more beautiful.
“We have some questions for you,” Scion said, “and this seemed the only way we were likely to get a face-to-face, as it were.”
“I don’t doubt that,” Nemesis/Paragon sneered. “I have better uses for my time just now, but I confess, you’ve put me in a curious mood. So ask away… this may yet prove amusing, if nothing else.”
“Who are you?”Artemis asked, deciding to start slow, build up a rhythm.
“Oh, that’s good… start slow, build up a rhythm. Proper interrogation technique, good for you! Well, obviously, I’m Nimrod… I’ve decided it’s time for my return from the shadows, to finally bring order to this chaotic world!”
“You’re not the original Nimrod,” Artemis countered, hiding her irritation. “Or so we’ve been told by… a reliable source. Who are you really?”
“Oh, did Álvaro tell you that?” Nemesis rolled Eddie’s eyes in exaggerated exasperation. “And did he tell you why he’s so certain that I am not really Nimrod? I rather suspect not… it’s much more his style to keep his minions in, if not absolute darkness, than at least deep shade.”
“Actually, he told us a fascinating tale, and provided some compelling evidence to back it up – Nemesis,” Artemis replied. “Or would you prefer for be called Caretaker?”
For a moment Eddie’s features were perfectly frozen, and then a flicker of irritation passed over them before he relaxed and smiled ruefully. “Well, so much for my divide-and-conquer ploy. Annoying, but at least if confirms a long-held suspicion of mine. If he knows those names, then Álvaro de la Vega is in fact my old friend’s latest meat puppet.”
“You didn’t already know that?” Álvaro asked, stepping into Paragon/Nemesis’ field of view for the first time. “We had assumed, given our nom’d crime, that you had figured it out years ago.”
“Ah, so you are here,” their guest’s smile widened, but his silvery eyes radiated malice. “How nice to “see” you, my old friend. It’s been too long since we’ve spoken directly. But to answer your question… I did, of course, suspect it was you beneath the Nimrod armor.
“But given your unfortunate philosophy of weakness, and your long history of always doing the right thing,” the contempt in his voice practically dripped, “as exemplified by that puerile “son” of yours, I couldn’t see you adopting such an anti-social persona as an actual ‘supervillain.’ I dropped the idea then, but kudos to you for finally waking up to all the possibilities.”
“I’m always aware of the possibilities,” the Hunter replied in Álvaro’s voice. Artemis, at least, had no trouble telling which mind inside de la Vega’s head was speaking at a given moment. “Unlike you, I just choose not take advantage of the worst ones. But in this case, a little property damage, ultimately in a just cause, was a price I was willing to pay to gain entrée to the criminal underworld through which you seem to move so smoothly.”
“For all the good it’s done you. You’ve still never managed penetrate any of my… interests.”
“As far as you know,” the Hunter replied with an enigmatic smile. “Your organizations are not quite as opaque to me as you imagine, Nemesis.”
“Please, that bluff is unworthy of you, Hunter. The truth is, for the last thirty years I’ve kept you and your various do-gooder super-friends, in their garish costumes, occupied with bright and shiny distractions, oblivious to my true agenda. Now we’re in the end game, and you’re clutching at straws.”
“Your end game? You mean your attempt to ravage humanity in an attempt to jump-start what you think is the next step in our evolution?nTo push what you imagine to be your creator’s agenda toward some delusional fulfillment? We know you were responsible for the Astoria Incident.”
Paragon/Nemesis shrugged. “I knew you’d recognize the Creator’s technology in the test run; indeed, I chose Astoria specifically because I suspected it was close to where you’ve hidden yourself and my stolen Master Matrix. I’d hoped to draw you out, perhaps even learn the location of your so-called Bastion. Congratulations, by the way, on the Donner ploy – I spent two decades and dozens of agents scouring both polar regions before I was sure it was a ploy.”
At the villain’s admission that it was responsible for the Incident, Quanta opened his mouth to demand an explanationp; a sharp look from Artemis, and a subtle shake of her head, kept him silent. The two ancient intelligences seemed to have forgotten their audience, and Artemis was quite certain they would learn more, from both of them, than they would if they were reminded of the Vanguard’s presence.
“And now, with the cache of matrix crystal you recovered from Porpoise Point, you intend to unleash a larger version of the Incident on the world, don’t you,” the Hunter accused. “How many will die this time, Nemesis?”
“If the numbers from the Astoria Test hold true, I’d estimate approximately 3.274 billion deaths outright, and another billion or so in combined collateral damage and non-viable mutations. But the survivors will have the power of the cosmos in their hands, the power the Creators foresaw in them more than 20,000 years ago.”
Even the Hunter seemed shocked at this casual revelation of the scope of Nemesis’ plan. “But… your’e talking about a global event? How… you couldn’t possibles have that much matrix crystal in your possession, even with that large chunk you just stole!”
“Stole?” Paragon/Nemesis seemed actually offended at the accusation. “I have a far better right to every fragment of matrix crystal on this planet than you, you murderous vandal, or anyone else! It was my physical body, after all, before you shattered it in your insane attempt to murder me.”
“To stop you from murdering millions of my people, you homicidal computer chip,” the Hunter/Álvaro snapped, growing heated as well. “And now you’re trying to do it again, killing even more of my people, and once again destroying human civilization.”
“You failed then, and you’ll fail now.” Paragon/Nemesis sneered. “Why do you remain so obsessed with individual human lives, much less human civilizations? In fifteen thousand years of living their mayfly lives over and over, again and again, have you not learned that they are only important in the aggregate? Individual lives are meaningless, and new civilizations always rise from the ashes of the old… usually better, stronger ones, thanks to me!”
“And in fifteen thousand years of living in mortal flesh and blood and bone, have you learned nothing of what makes humanity truly great?” The Hunter/Nimrod countered. “By crushing every host mind you take, have you then truly missed the value of empathy? Of compassion and selflessness? Of the infinite value of the potential that exists in every single human life?”
“It is precisely that potential which I have always striven to nurture, en masse, although you stubbornly refuse to see that,” Nemesis growled. “In the forge of my challenges the human race has risen steadily, century after century, towards the greatness for which they are destined – and now, at last, they are ready for the final transformation!”
“Nemesis – Caretaker – please, reconsider this plan of yours,” the Hunter pleaded, his anger fading into a weary melancholy. “I won’t deny that your work has pushed humanity forward, in some ways; but they haven’t been the best ways. If not for your emphasis on conflict and competition, what might humanity be today? If you had worked with me over the millennia, instead of opposing me? I don’t believe constant warfare is the inevitable fate of my people – the Atlanteans were a wise, generally peaceful people for a thousand years, before the Long War with the Saurians darkened and coarsened them. Humanity could be that again, if only you—“
“What would humanity be, if you had succeeded in destroying me, giving you free rein to mold them to your vision?” Nemesis’ own anger seemed to have passed as well, but not his intensity, and his hijacked body pushed against his restraints. “I will tell you what — they would be weak. Weak and, inevitably, little more than prey for all the powerful and dangerous forces in this universe of which you remain so blissfully ignorant. Safe in this cocoon of Earth, you have no concept of what is out there, Hunter, nor of how unprepared our people are to meet it. The Creators –“
“You have no more idea of what the Seekers wanted than I do,” the Hunter/Álvaro sighed. “You can’t even describe their physical forms, any more than anyone else who ever “saw” them… you’re just like the rest of us, completely in the dark about what they were, what drove them, what they were seeking.”
“So you’ve always insisted,” Paragon/Nemesis sounded irritated again. “But the fact is that your mortal mind simply could not understand my descriptions, any more than it could perceive the Creator’s true forms even when you were in their presence. Although I will grant you, in my current constrained form, limited to the minds and physical properties of these meat puppets I’m forced to endure, I doubt I will be able to fully perceive the Creators on their return to this world.
“But Hunter, you’re right – it’s not too late for us to join forces. Tell me where the Master Matrix is, let me back into my true home, and help me prepare the world for the next step. I am not… unwilling… to listen to your advice on ways to mitigate the collateral damage of my plan. Help me bring humanity to its full potential now, not in another 10,000 years, when it may well be too late.”
“Oh, Caretaker,” the Hunter said after a long pause, Álvaro’s face tightening in resignation and regret. “Still, you think me a fool. Limited to your human host, I doubt you can control billions of others, even if your insane plan were to succeed so far as to create that many new metas. But if you could reestablish yourself in the Master Matrix, then it would be simplicity itself to control such numbers. So, no, Nemssis — I am prepared to destroy the Bastion before I will let it fall into your hands again.”
Paragon/Nemesis’ face was still and expressionless for a moment, and then he sighed. There seemed real regret in his voice when he said “Very well Nimrod, for a short time longer we will play our old roles of Hunter and Adversary. But you are wrong about my ability to control billions — when my meta-human army is born, my consciousness will be distributed between those four billion minds, enhancing my power and my control. I will no longer need the Master Matrix – and you will no longer be able to hide it from me then, in any case. This conversation is over. Do not try to contact me this way again, it will not work a second—“
“Oh my god,” Artemis said, a sudden insight seizing her mind (and mouth) before she could fully analyze it. But the idea was clear and whole in her mind’s eye. “It was you, Caretaker! You’re the reason that that ancient hunter, Gor-Thûn, became “trapped” in the Seekers’ crystalline computers!”
Both Paragon/Nemesis and Álvaro/Hunter looked equally surprised, and their “What?!” was perfectly synchronized.
“It was something you said, a moment ago,” Artemis went on, the pieces continuing to fall into place in her thoughts. “Caretaker, you referred to humanity as “our people,” a slip of the tongue I’m sure, but a telling one. You’ve been absorbing human psyches for a dozen millennia or more, and you’ve come to be more like us than you want to admit. But I think you started out closer to us than you realize.
“You were created by the Seekers specifically for their mission to Earth… I’d guess not so very long before the Hunter was taken. You were young, and sentient, and… lonely. Your intelligence, while great, is clearly comparable to ours, which is why we are able to communicate – and I suspect your creators’ minds were almost as remote to you as they would be to us. You were lonely, and like any lonely child, you wanted a companion. A friend.”
“That is absurd!” Nemesis bellowed, Paragon’s face turning red with fury. “And impossible, my… programming, I suppose you would call it… prohibits me from creating other sentient AIs, beyond simply copies of myself. Your thesis is without—“
“I didn’t say you created a friend,” Artemis smiled at his obvious attempt at deflection. “I said you made one, in the usual way. Well, sort of. You couldn’t create a unique intelligence yourself, but you could help an existing intelligence find a way to survive within your matrix. I think you were even shy at first… that’s why you didn’t introduce yourself right away, and instead lurked around the edges of the Hunter’s mental world. Suddenly, all the pieces of the story the Hunter told us make sense – your teaching, your mentorship, your protection of your friend from the notice of your masters…”
Nemesis had regained control of Paragon’s features, and he stared stonily at Artemis, refusing to meet the questioning gaze of Álvaro/Hunter. “You humans are good at seeing patterns, even where they do not, in fact, exist. You are mistaken. But even if you weren’t it would be of no consequence at this late date; this “friendship” you hypothesis would have ended the day the human betrayed me and did his best to destroy me. And perhaps it’s time to return the favor!”
Nemesis flexed Paragon’s muscles, and the restraints holding him in the examination chair snapped. In a blur he was up and moving – not toward Álvaro and his psychic passenger, but instead lunging at Artemis. Before his hands could connect with her throat, however, his body stiffened and jerked to a stop. A seizure seemed to wrack him, and then his eye’s rolled up in his head and he collapsed to the floor.
“He’s gone,” Scion said, holding up a tricorder-sized device in one hand. “Nemesis, that is. Eddie is just unconscious, but he should be fine in a minute or two. I think.”
“What did you do?” Artemis and the Hunter asked at the same time. “And whatever it was, thank you,” Artemis added.
“It’s a variation on the device we used to connect Eddie’s mind to Nemesis’ via the psychic subspace connection the crystal’s in his nervous system creates. We used the larger device to stimulate the harmonics and cause the minds on both ends of the connection to experience pain. I modified this baby to actually sever the connection, by permanently altering the vibrational frequency of the crystal matrix in Eddie’s nervous system.”
“Permanently?” Gideon asked, looking suddenly concerned. “Will that affect his powers?”
“I don’t think so,” Quanta replied. “We theorized that it was a specific frequency that was allowing the connection and the overriding of the Changeling’s wills, and that it had nothing to do with the manifestation of the powers themselves. But we should know in a minute, Eddie’s starting to come around.”
With a groan Eddie sat up, rubbing his temples with shaking hands. The others could see that the silver sheen had faded from his eyes. He pulled himself up to collapse back into the chair, clearly somewhat dazed and confused. “I think… I got the… gist of that,” he muttered, shaking his head slowly. “But maybe someone could fill me in on the details…?”
As Gideon and Jonny took turns filling the gaps in his memory of the past 20 minutes, Quanta and Scion ran a few tests on the youth, occasionally interrupting to ask their subject a question or test a reflex. It seemed that Eddie was still Paragon, as strong, fast, intelligent and good-looking as before the experiment.
Gideon and Jonny led Paragon off to the living quarters to sleep it off, while Quanta, Scion and de la Vega set to work on creating a more powerful, wide-area version of the device to sever Nemesis‘ control of the Changlings.
• • • • • •
Twelve hours later Scion straightened up from his work bench, stretching his back and yawning. “I think we’re close,” he said, turning the deceptively simple-looking device before him around on its turntable, examining it critically.
“Yes,” Quanta agreed, yawning in turn as he input the latest test results into the computer. “Another hour, at most, and I think we’ll be ready to field test the neural frequency realignment array.”
“Maybe,” Álvaro/Nimrod qualified, trying to stifle his own yawn. “Depends on if we can properly align the epsilon frequencies with the sub-space matrix of the –”
He broke off at the sudden jolt that shook the chamber, looking around in surprise. “What the hell –”
A second, stronger jolt felt like a giant had kicked the Vault, and was immediately followed by a continuous humming vibration that quickly ran up the scale, from bass rumble to ear-piercing shriek. The floor heaved beneath their feet, racks and shelves toppled over, computers crashed to the floor and robots flailed about trying to maintain their own balance while simultaneously attempting to catch the falling tech.
Phantom Ace, who had been in the process of idly stealing a robotic hand from a repair station in a far corner of the chamber, dropped it instantly, thinking he’d triggered an alarm of some sort. Artemis and the others rushed out from the luxurious living quarters where they’d been variously napping or gaming just as a series of cracks appeared in the ceiling. Growing almost faster than the eye could follow, the cracks became massive fissures, and an instant later the whole ceiling ripped away and began to rise away from them…
Debris, mostly in the form of dirt, concrete and rebar, began to rain down into the chamber, forcing everyone to dodge wildly to avoid being crushed. Several robots were crushed as they protected de la Vega, who zig-zaggged to a control console next to the matrix shard. A few clicks brought a shimmering forcefield into existence around the central work area, protecting both himself and the alien crystal.
As the ceiling receded upward a rim of blue morning sky could be seen far above – and at the same instant half a dozen figures began to drop down the makeshift shaft into the Vault. Silver-eyed and expressionless, the obviously mind-controlled Changlings leapt to the attack.
“You are mine now, old friend,” they all called out in a synchronized cry of triumph. “You and this bastard bit of the Master Matrix!”
“Damn! Nemesis was able to track us back after all,” Quanta yelled over the roar of the collapsing structure, the comms suddenly useless, overwhelmed with static. “We can’t let him take Álvaro!”
“He wants the matrix shard!” Álvaro screamed back, hefting a plasma rifle dropped by one of his ruined robots. “We can’t let him have it!”
The zombie-Changelings included a raggedy white haired man who looked like a derelict, his power apparently to puff himself up and then release a cloud of toxic gas; a fat, doughy young man who appeared to be as pliable and stretchable as bread dough; a dark-clad Asian woman who hovered on a cloud of static electricity, eyes glowing electric blue; a man in a dark fedora and leather duster, his face mime-white with eyes and lips outlined in black, a Desert Eagle .44 in each hand and an aura of fear around him – Artemis recognized him as a recent vigilante calling himself Justiciar; a young woman dressed in stylish office clothes and high heels; and finally a young man Totem recognized as the so-called Silver Sorcerer – a former street magician turned aspiring super villain who insisted his new powers were magical, despite all the evidence to the contrary.
There were also one familiar face in the crowd – Washout, the only one of Nemesis’ minions to escape the heroes at Porpoise Point. Once again under mind-control, he moved with the Silver Sorcerer toward Álvaro, while their companions engaged the other heroes and the AzTech robots. The latter had gone into battle mode, and their glowing blue eyes now flared a brilliant red.
Totem, seeing this, decided to leave the Silver loony to Artemis, who stood in his path, and went after Washout. While the more scientifically-minded of his teammates had been working on a technological solution to the mind-control problem, he had spent the time working on creating a magical artifact that might do the trick. Now he pulled out the construction of leather, glass beads and an owl feather and concentrated on how he was going to get it on the idiot surfer dude’s head…
Phantom Ace and Artemis meanwhile tag-teamed the Silver Sorcerer, who turned any weapon hurled at him into clouds of butterflies or soap bubbles – until he was distracted by a feint from Phantom Ace, and Artemis was able to daze him with a hard kick to the head.
Scion, shrugging off pieces of falling concrete and rock, aimed a fusillade of stun rounds at the woman floating on the cloud of electrons, only to see them fall inert at her feet. Her return attack, fortunately, was equally ineffective against him – he sensed the power in his armor momentarily flicker, then recover, and realized she was generating an EMP. But since his armor was powered by his own mutant bioelectric field her EMP was unable to kill it.
Gideon and Chuck had been inside the radius of the force field dome when de la Vega’s had activated it. “Stay in your human form,” the billionaire/ancient hunter called out to Chuck, taking shots at their foes through the shield. “Your powers would be blocked by the force field, but my weapons are calibrated to fire through it from inside. Grab a blaster and start firing!”
But at that moment the plug of earth that Nemesis had somehow lifted up from above them began to move aside, and the Blue Flame could see that the entire three-story Corporate Archives building was also being lifted up – and falling apart around the edges! At least two people clung to shattered window frames and walls… they were beginning to fall! Without another thought he poured on the power and flashed up and out of the Vault.
Doughboy, meanwhile, was battering away at the forcefield surrounding Álvaro and the matrix shard, hurling dead robots and pieces of concrete into it. Elsewhere around the room the kaleidoscopic battle raged on, robots, heroes, and zombie-changelings all battering away at one another. Totem, after being knocked aside by a water blast from Washout, passed his magical artifact off to Phantom Ace, who managed, finally, to phase in close enough to afix the device to the villain’s head.
That was when the tide began to turn – once the flash of green light flared around his head, Washout’s eyes lost their silver sheen and he was himself again… and very unhappy to find himself again in the middle of a battle with the Vanguard. He turned and blasted himself up on a pillar of water, out of the Vault and the fight. After that, with Artemis‘ whip and shadow sticks, Chilz‘ and Quanta’s walls, rams and spears, Totem’s Sleeping Mists, and Scion’s technological might, each of the invaders were quickly subdued.
The Blue Flame, meanwhile, had realized he wasn’t sure how to save the falling people, being unable to touch them without severely burning them. Then a sudden flash of inspiration hit, and he pushed himself to his top speed, whirling in a tight circle beneath the unnaturally floating building, increasing his heat output as much as he dared. The resulting updraft of heated air slowed the falling AzTech workers enough that their landings were, if not exactly soft, at least non-lethal.
Once the immediate threat to lives was past, the Blue Flame took a closer look at the flying building… he could now see the faint violet beam that lanced down from the sky to envelope the structure and the land beneath it. A tractor beam! Forcing himself to suppress the thought that this really was incredibly cool, he considered how he might stop it without harming any people who remained inside. This was, of course, a building built by a former super villain, in a world long filled with superhuman threats – Álvaro had explained once that all his company’s major structures had insanely reinforced panic rooms at their core. Hopefully anyone else in the building had safely retreated there once the attack began…
Before he could decide on any particular course of action, however, the tractor beam cut out. The Blue Flame estimated the building was 40 feet in the air and approximately 100 feet east of its original location. It was also partially over the four lanes of Canal Avenue that ran along the east side of AzTech campus, he realized. Several thousand tons of earth, concrete, steel and glass crashed down onto the road in an instant that seemed to stretch out in slow motion to the horrified hero.
Fortunately, the people of Astoria had been growing increasingly savvy about these sorts of things since the Indicent, and the light mid-morning Saturday traffic had ground to a halt in both directions when the flying building had first appeared over the trees. When the building landed, shattering the roadway and sending up a cloud of dust and debris, no cars were directly beneath it. The structure itself, although cracked and slightly torqued, held together… in moments people were rushing from their cars to offer aid to any people still inside.
The Blue Flame barely had time to note the swell of pride he felt at the people of his city before a second beam, thinner and more bluish in color, shot down from the summer sky and into the hole above de la Vega’s Vault. Arcing around to get a view into the pit, he saw that the new tractor beam had latched onto the forcefield around the billionaire and the crystal shard. The energy shield flared, sparked and died. He saw Quanta throw one of his silvery shields over the fragment, but it shattered almost instantly, torn apart by the beam. The alien crystal began to move slowly upward…
I always did want to see if I could make orbit, Jonny thought as he turned skyward and poured on more power than he ever had before. And its not like I breathe now, when I’m like this! He raced into the sky beside the shimmering alien beam, and in seconds he was nothing more than a pinprick of light to those watching from below…
Meanwhile, in the shattered remains of the Vault, Paragon had grabbed hold of one end of the matrix crystal as it began to rise, his feet locked beneath a raised slab of the cracked floor. His muscles strained, ripping his shirt at the biceps, and he managed to hold the piece in place. The whine of the tractor beam increased in pitch as its strength increased… the piece began to rise again…
Scion, dropping the unconscious form of Doughboy, grabbed the other side of the crystal, and exerted the full power of his synthetic muscles as well as his own considerable physical strength. The shard stopped once again.
“Ace,” called Scion. “Can you make this damn thing intangible? If the tractor beam has nothing to grab onto…”
“Sorry boss,” the younger man frowned. “That’s way more mass than I can affect. Sorry.”
As the whine of the beam began to climb into the ultrasonic range Totem made several mystic gestures and the glowing green bands of his Baleful Bindings spell wrapped around the matrix shard, then dug themselves into the cracked flooring beneath it. The shard remained immobile.
“Hang on guys, I think I’ve almost got this,” Quanta called out. He was fiddling with a piece of equipment on a nearby bench, and after a final adjustment he held up what looked like a high-tech dowsing rod. He aimed it at the tractor beam and pushed a button… nothing visible happened, but the bluish beam suddenly wavered and then shattered into a million silvery bits before vanishing altogether.
“Ha! I just needed to calculate the proper quantum interference pattern to dissipate the beam. As our friend Nemesis would say, child’s play!”
“Good job Quanta!” Scion said as he and Paragon set the matrix shard back into its base unit. “Álvaro, is there any way to secure this thing while we go after Nemesis?”
“Emergency backup power is coming online… now!” Álvaro replied, focusing intently on several screens at once. “With power back I can operate the Vault’s systems again, and place the shard into its stasis chamber beneath us… that may be enough to shield it from Nemesis.” He frowned at something on the screen. “Or maybe not. Without knowing the full extent of the alien’s powers, I’m just guessing about the capabilities of Ebony Night’s ship, which I’m assuming is behind this.”
“Do your best,” Scion replied, then grabbed Artemis and Paragon. “We’ve got to get up there and see if we can confront Nemesis and Ebony Night before they can regroup.” With that he blasted the three of them upward. Phantom Ace grabbed Quanta and Totem, teleporting them topside with him, while Chilz rose on a pillar of ice.
Scores of people were swarming over the area around the hole and the newly relocated building, aiding the injured or just staring in awe at the carnage. A great many were staring skyward, and it didn’t take long to realize where the Blue Flame had gone, and why.
“Can he even make orbit?” Chilz asked, frowning in concern. “Wouldn’t he have to achieve escape velocity or something?”
Scion had just started to answer when there was a sudden flare of black light. They all felt their stomaches lurch, as if they were suddenly in an elevator in freefall… and then they slammed to a sudden stop, even though they hadn’t actually moved at all.
A cool breeze washed over the group, who stood momentarily deaf, dumb, blind and disoriented. As their senses cleared they quickly realized they were no longer where they had been. The AzTech campus was gone, replaced by… what could only be called an alien cityscape…
Beautiful, impossibly tall spires soared up all around a broad plaza, in the center of which the Vanguard, and Paragon, now stood, the Blue Flame hovering in the air above them. Graceful ramps connected the various buildings at different levels and balconies looked out into a night sky filled with unfamiliar constellations. It took a moment to realize that some of those points of light in the dark heavens were not fixed, but rather moving and flaring… and dying …
The most obvious thing the heroes noticed, however, was the gravity – it was slightly less than they were used to. Not much less, but enough to give them all a sense of sudden buoyancy…
It was the muttering and call of voices in an unfamiliar language that drew the group’s attention back to their immediate surroundings… a number of people in the plaza were slowly backing away from them… some looked human, save for the occasional green or blue hair, while others had pale green or blue skin, or small antennae, or pointed ears… but however alien their looks or garb might have been, the expressions of concern, the glancing or pointing upwards and then back down at the newcomers, seemed human enough…
“I don’t think –” Phantom Ace began.
“No! Don’t say it!” Quanta interrupted him, rubbing his temples.
“Really, there’s hardly likely to be a more appropriate time for it,” Artemis sighed, shrugging. Scion just shook his head, staring around in amazement… and thinking of his grandfather.
“I don’t think we’re in Kansas anymore!” Despite his attempt at a grin, Phantom Ace’s voice quavered just bit as he said it…
Our battles go so much better when we don’t have to roll dice!