Morning arrived and Akira and Young Sam had gathered in Mary’s container for a planning meeting to discuss how best to handle the interview with Dalton later that day, when Mary’s phone rang. “Sir Damien here” said the purified East End accent she recognised from their previous meeting. “I understand from my staff that you’ve some new team members. Before I can offer any of you a position on Dalton’s Defenders I need to test what their abilities are and how much of an asset they’d be to the team. Meet me at my Research facility in Silicon Dell on the outskirts of Wessex. Can you come this morning instead of this afternoon when we’d previously agreed?”
An address followed and a short time later the team found themselves at Dalton’s facility being ushered into a warehouse with a large square room at the centre. As soon as the security guards left, Dalton appeared from around the side. He seemed friendly enough (not dashing off Morse code messages on his phone at least) and invited them to enter his latest experimental training room which he had built for use by AEGIS and his proposed teams. Young Sam offered to shake his hand but Dalton ignored the gesture and walked inside.
Within the cube was a large room made up of segmented panels in the walls and floor. Dalton smiled and explained that this is the Superhuman Active Field Exercise (or S.A.F.E.) Chamber. He explained that before he would consider hiring them as his First team of Dalton Defenders, he wanted to witness them in action.
“The simulation chamber was originally designed to train counter-terrorist and Special Forces units, and features powerful moving floors and holo-projectors that can project extremely lifelike images and realistic environments. All the equipment has been hardened, so you do not need to worry about collateral damage.”
“For today’s exercise, let’s start off with a simple game of capture the flag, shall we?” Dalton grinned. “There –” he gestured with a remote — “is your objective.”
A flag on a flagpole about three feet high appeared in a red circle at one end of the chamber. “Your goal is to take the flag from the red circle, and plant it in the green circle here –” a green circle appeared next to their feet. “If you can get three flags in your circle, you win. Watch out, because enemy units will try to steal the flag from your circle if you aren’t guarding it.” He took a moment to explain the rest of the rules.
“Each of you is individually very powerful,” Dalton said. “But you may need the advantage of good teamwork. Think of this as an opportunity to work on your coordination skills.”
The whole situation seemed… Off somehow, and Young Sam and Mary tried to read him only to find nothing – no aura, no magic, nothing. It was as though he didn’t exist. Very different from the reading Mary had got the previous time they had met. Akira tried a post-cognition reading and got nothing – again it was as though he had no past.
Could this be a hologram and if so, was this a trap?
Unaware of the psychic probes and reading, Dalton carried on. “The rules are quite simple. The goal is to get 3 flags in your team’s green circle. The flag initially spawns in the enemy red circle in the far corner of the chamber. You must pick up the flag, and plant it on the ground inside the green circle. You must each grab a flag separately though it can be planted by another player. The flag is really just a hologram with some interacting force fields to make it feel real and only moves when it is in physical contact with someone.”
“You can’t throw the flag or grab it by telekinesis. Once planted in your area another is spawned inside the red circle. This continues until you have captured 3 flags. Please note the S.A.F.E. Room defences will attempt to steal the flags back so you will need to guard them.”
“I’ll give you some time – let’s say three minutes – to discuss strategy before I turn on the simulation. I’ll be watching all of you from the control room, so just talk to me over your communicators when you’re ready to begin. Scream if you want me to stop the simulation early.”
With that Dalton walked out of the simulation chamber, and the armoured doors slide shut behind him. A second later, his image appeared in the observation room above the chamber; appearing way too quickly for someone to have walked there in such a short period of time.
Quickly a strategy is decided. It’s obviously a trap but to what end? They decided to play along with this for the moment and see what happened. Young Sam volunteered to be the first to try out the room defences and set off running towards the flag. Within seconds a cylinder appeared from the floor and metallic tendrils shot out grabbing and enveloping him in its grasp. Mary turned into Banshee and unleashed a shattering shriek which stopped the coils from tightening whilst Akira blasted it with a bolt of pure Chi energy, shattering it and liberating Young Sam. Nodding thanks to them both, Sam again set off for the flag but as he ran he widened his senses in participation of another attack.
In the meantime Akira was forced to defend against a flame thrower and managed to throw up his forcefield just in time. He could feel the heat but remained unhurt.
As Sam ran he sensed a floor tile sliding aside to allow a laser cannon to emerge just off to the side of him. The laser fired directly at Sam but his fire-proof skin seemed capable of handling the initial, glancing attack. Throwing himself up and over he reached out to make contact with the first of the ‘flags’. As he did so, the laser refocused only to be hit by Banshee’s shattering shriek. Although it threw it off target, Banshee apparently hadn’t managed to hit quite the right frequency to take it out. Akira however used the opportunity to send a bolt of Chi energy straight at it, causing it to explode. His reward was a second cannon emerging behind him. Hearing it emerge he dodged its first blast which almost hits Banshee’s insubstantial presence.
Young Sam then flew up about six feet and soared at speed towards the green circle. As he did so a second coil launcher appeared from the walls and aimed its metal tentacles at Sam only for it, a second later, to explode as Banshee targeted it. Fragments flew across the room powered by the explosion. Young Sam landed between Banshee and Akira and planted the ‘flag’ then stood guard as Banshee in her insubstantial form headed across the room towards the second newly spawned flag. A flame thrower emerged and blasted her. Although unhurt, the energy of the blast caused her to be blown apart momentarily. Before a second shot can be fired, Akira targeted it with his Chi blast and caused it to explode. Seeing an opportunity, Akira teleported to the flag, grabbed it and teleported back, planting it in the circle. Young Sam was meanwhile hit by a taser cannon but it failed to do any serious damage. With Akira now guarding the two captured flags Young Sam elected to fly up and interpose himself between the taser and Banshee. Suddenly a robot appeared from the floor but before it could attack, Young Sam pushed himself between it and Banshee allowing her to make a ‘dash’ for the remaining flag.
Wondering if being insubstantial would mean she couldn’t touch the flag she reached out and to her surprise it moved when she did. The room’s computers seemed unable to differentiate between a physical presence holding the hologram and the ghostly presence of Mary as Banshee.
As Banshee started to head back she saw a chameleon field behind Akira dissipate to show two armoured figures and a collection of battle droids. She shouted out a warning and Akira quickly activated his illusions of Idolon spell to make the flags and himself appear a few metres away as though he had teleported there whilst disguising his real presence. It seemed to work as the robots immediately unleased their cannons and Gatling guns on the new location peppering the room with shrapnel, some of which bounced off Young Sam’s scales and other fragments flew though Banshee.
One of the armoured figures unsealed a box-like container and emptied its contents out onto the floor. Even they seem surprised as its contents as dozens of small slug-like creatures with several limbs rushed forth and attacked every living creature in the room, including the two armoured figures while completely ignoring the pawn-like robots. The cry of disgust from the armoured figures as they tried to brush the creatures off them made it clear that they weren’t expecting the contents to be this. Several of the creatures swarmed over them trying to find an entry point in the armour. A quick reading by Mary showed that the creatures had the same sickly, yellow aura as Dalton and the others had displayed on their necks. Could this be some form of alien parasite?
Hoping to get this over with, Banshee headed to the real green circle and planted the final flag. In response the lights in the room flared up and the lock on the door clicked open but the two armoured figures and the robots remained, seeming waiting to see what the parasites will do to the three of them. Young Sam was happy to discover that his scales appeared to be impenetrable to the creatures. Mary as Banshee seemed unaffected by the creatures in her insubstantial form. Akira however was forced to drop his illusion spell and instead form his forcefield as the creatures seemed to be immune to his deception.
Banshee unleashed a wail of destruction causing some of the parasites and several of the robots to explode. Young Sam started to unleash a fiery blast when one of the knights tried to hit him with a cold attack from his suit cannon only to miss because of Sam’s struggle with the parasites.
Banshee targeted the cold weapon and blew both it and the person’s armour apart. As Akira grabbed at a parasite while still trying to maintain his shield, Young Sam unleashed a fiery blast that fried the rest of the parasites, the two armoured figures (apparently paralysing their suits) and blasted the robots which in turn exploded peppering that end of the room with fragments. As the parasites were hit by the fire, they curled up and died turning almost immediately into dust. That left only the creature struggling to be held by Akira. To try and calm it down Banshee reverted to Mary and tried to calm it down with a mystical lullaby but it failed and the creature escaped Akira’s psychic grasp and headed to Young Sam and crawled inside his flame retardant shorts. A trouser snake indeed! Panicking, Young Sam asked for assistance and Mary tried her corrupting touch to kill it but only succeeded in putting a large hole in Sam’s shorts. Quickly Akira grabbed a robot’s head from the pile and hollowed out the components so that he had a makeshift cage and got Sam who had finally managed to grab it to drop the creature inside whilst Akira used another sheet of metal to enclose it.
Mary and Young Sam left Akira to struggle with keeping the makeshift cage sealed and checked out the two armoured figures. Opening the shattered armour they were surprised to find that the bodies were already decomposing and as they watched, they disintegrated into dust! Checking for magic, they found none and have to assume it was some form of technology built into the suits (the alternative was that the suit occupants were zombies)… A quick postcognition reading by Akira revealed that they had a connection to the yellow suited Stormtroopers the other two had met previously; from the Foundry. Going outside they see Dalton’s security heading towards them, but before they arrived, they headed up to the observation room where, not surprisingly, they discovered Dalton had disappeared. On the ground was a holographic light bee with an L shaped symbol on it that Young Sam and Mary recognised as representing Labyrinth. Akira pocketed it before security arrived. As they tried to explain what happened they found that none of Dalton’s staff had witnessed Dalton arrive and don’t think he had even been on the premises at all today.
Mary phoned Dalton to find out if he knew what was going on only to be told Sir Damien was in his office and wasn’t expecting them until this afternoon.
A quick decision was taken and after another phone call, it was decided that Akira would transport the parasite to Max Challenger-Wildeman whilst Young Sam headed back and changed his trousers before the interview.
In Romaine Wharf, Akira was appalled to discover that Max had little regard for karma; having examined the creature and confirmed its alien origins; Max elected to see what happened when the creature was exposed to another living creature and put both it and a lab rat into a sealed chamber. Nothing, the parasite seemed unwilling to attack the rat. Then he wondered if the parasite was somehow connected to the equally alien nanites and what would happen if he were to expose the rat to the kairomones?
As soon as he sprayed the sickly substance on the rat, the parasite went crazy and rushed the rat, burrowing into the back of its neck causing its skull to bulge. A quick MRI and other scans showed that the creature was now attached to the rat’s brain and to remove it, Max would need to surgically operate. Akira realised that Max was planning to kill the rat to retrieve the parasite, got angry at his lack of concern for another living creature and left muttering about the sanctity of life, after handing over the holo-bee as well.
Back at Chrono’s offices, Young Sam and Mary were collected by one of Sir Damien’s limos whilst Akira made his own way to Pyramid Towers.
Arriving they collectively entered Dalton’s private elevator and had to endure Gordon Lightfoot’s classic tune “If You Could Read My Mind” as it travelled up 90 floors to the Penthouse suite.
The elevator exited on to a lobby facing panoramic windows, a grand piano and a full size pool table.
Dalton greeted them with a reassuring grin. However before they can start talking a brilliant white light appeared at the far corner of the room and outstepped a quartet of shady-looking costumed characters teleporting into the room without so much as a by-your-leave; the same four enforcers that had been at the warehouse the day before. The golden suited Dreadnought emerged screaming at Dalton “Why did our foundry guards die..?” Then, seeing the three of them, immediately attacked.
To their surprise instead of firing at either them or Dalton, Dreadnought’s drones blasted the windows with deadly effect and the security glass evaporated. The size-changing villain, that the heroes immediately nicknamed Alice, jumped through the hole and started increasing his size until he stood on the balcony at over 30 foot tall. Akira initially considered just blasting him off the building but knowing it would have meant the man falling 90 stories to his inevitable death, changed his blast direction and blew him upwards forcing ‘Alice’ up onto the roof where he was left clinging on by his fingers.
Dalton certainly didn’t seem afraid of them, and the sinister foursome seemed to know him. Mary noticed that he did rub the back of his neck several times. While this was going on Tempus had got behind Young Sam and threatened to kill his grandparents, removing him from history. In reply Sam applied his power of suggestion but was shocked when Tempus pulled down his mask and goggles to reveal a face he knew. A face, despite burns and age he immediately recognised as the aged face of Flint! Whilst this was happening Banshee unleased a terrorising wail targeted at Dreadnought and Cannon but was distracted as a giant hand thrust through the roof from above and tried grabbing at her.
Turning she caught sight of an unmasked Tempus. Despite his burnt face, aged looks and white hair he looks remarkably like an older Chrono. He laughed, “Don’t look surprised Mary not all of us age as well as you did”
Akira unleashed a blast at Dreadnought causing him to crash into the giant screen TV. “Promoted to the big screen” he mutters as Banshee joins in with a “The things you see on TV these days” as Young Sam picked up the pool table and ‘threw’ it across the room just as Tempus speeded up and vanished from sight whilst reactivating the portal. Cannon was the first through followed by ‘Alice’ who had shrunk down and dropped through the hole in the roof and followed him through the portal. Before Dreadnought could follow, Banshee unleashed her corrupting touch on his armour and as he screamed he fell back through the portal and disappeared, revealing Flint as Tempus, who had been injured by fragments of the thrown pool table through his leg. He fell backwards and vanished himself. “looks like that was another clean break!” muttered Young Sam.
Had that been their Flint in say 30 years’ time or this Earths future Flint?
Turning they saw that Dalton stood unfazed by the whole event. During the fight an errant ranged attack had grazed and scorched Dalton’s custom-made suit, but he hadn’t even flinched. In fact, he hadn’t budges at all during the battle, and in any case had never shown any sign of fear or panic.
Mary quickly checked his aura – this was the real thing this time.
As his staff arrived to start repairs, the three of them quickly questioned Dalton about the attempt on their lives earlier that day. Dalton claimed that he has been in his penthouse all day and his staff could confirm he hasn’t left.
His behaviour was unsettling though and Akira attempted to do a post cognition read on him but only got an impression of a hostile, blood red sky.
Dalton then asked them why they had come to visit him as it was extremely good timing. When they reminded him that he invited them to come at this time he seemed genuinely surprised.
Asked about Labyrinth, he admitted to knowing about them – but stated he wasn’t involved with them or any criminal organisation for that matter.
“I know who they are,” Dalton related, “And so long as their interests do not conflict with mine, I will normally pay them the courtesy of a polite audience.”
He continued, “They must know of my ambition to prepare the planet for a possible future alien invasion. It is well known after the death of my wife in the Terminus attack back in 2009.” he got slightly upset at this point.
While this was going on Bethany came in behind him and looked at her father, anger in her eyes though they’re not sure why. She then seemed to go back out but instead just stood out of sight of her father, listening.
“I invited you here to become my first team of Dalton’s Defenders, I eventually intend on having several but I need to deal with this matter first. I will arrange for you to meet with Mark Lyndon in a couple of days to discuss the job requirements and possible financial package.”
Akira started to argue about financial compensation for today and seemed angry that Sir Damien was uninterested in paying them now. Dalton eventually agreed to pay them £500 each to cover whatever and dismissed them. Surprised at his ‘mercenary’ attitude towards getting paid, Akira whispers that if they were to buy the scrapyard they needed every penny they can raise.
Whilst Akira was arguing with Dalton, a text message arrived simultaneously on all of their comm units “There is another choice… If you value your independence then don’t agree yet. I’ve a counter offer. Meet me at Big Belly Burger’s on the Plaza in 20 minutes. Young Sam needs the protein anyway… B.”
Leaving Pyramid Towers, they crossed the road where Bethany met them armed with several trays piled high with burgers (including veggie burgers for Akira) and a counter offer – she offered to fund the team as a fully autonomous team without any restrictions.. She explained that she was independently wealthy thanks to her mum leaving her own fortune and portfolio to her when she died…
She didn’t want to go into more detail about her mother and quickly changed the subject back to her finances…
“Although I can’t touch the capital, I do get a substantial allowance based on the interest every month and I don’t spend most of it… Money doesn’t interest me and ‘FATHER’ stopping monitoring my spending years ago. I have enough to secretly sponsor you as a team and allow you to retain your independence. I do want you to find out what is happening to my father, he’s been acting even weirder than usual lately.”
Bethany offered to help them with premises (if required), to repair Chrono’s loft and provide them with up to a million pounds in capital, as well as access to one of her (admittedly older) grav-vehicles, which she referred to as the Raft, which they could renovate themselves as well as provide them with a reasonable monthly wage (which she points out “while less than my father would pay, comes with independence.”)
It is obvious that there was no love lost between father and daughter no matter what the press may paint their relationship like — primarily Sir Damien Dalton as a loving father with a distant and rebellious daughter.
Her final act was to call over a young man she introduced as Adam Meyers; someone who she’d learned about from the Challenger-Wildeman family and who had a reputation as an excellent pilot and mechanic… She went on, oblivious to Young Sam’s discomfort as he looked across the table at his estranged older brother!!! Thankfully Adam had no idea who Young Sam was.
They had been willing to work for Dalton to try and figure out what he was up to but did they really want to risk becoming contractually obligated to him and possibly having to sign contracts that would limit what they could do and where they could work for the next ten years? As for Mary’s hatred of spandex..! Here was an opportunity to continue to do what they did best, provided they were willing to work for an 11 year old (even if she was a genius)..?
Superhero Adventures, UK Style 