Inspired by Chapter 3: Power Play from Emerald City Knights
“While it’s nice to be honoured, I absolutely refuse to wear a tux!” muttered Akira. “Don’t worry, we’re expected to turn up in costume, or in your case your usual attire, and it’s a chance for the high an’ mighty o’ the city to meet X-Ray here.” Replied Banshee.
She glanced again at the formal invite. The team were to be guests of honour at a banquet that evening. The Mayor, Councillor Adam O’Connor would give a speech thanking them for their recent involvement in saving so many of his voters (it was an election year after all) at the Wessex Warriors’ Dalton Stadium last weekend and would present them with the keys to the City.
The event was to take place in the glass-covered banquet hall at the top of The Tower (another Dalton-owned property, was someone trying to tell them something?), the largest, tallest building in Wessex.
X-Ray noticed that the team’s A.I. Frankie had even managed somehow to wrangle a spare ticket for Stacy, his wife, so she could attend even if he would be unable to publicly acknowledge her presence, at least until later when he hoped to be able to sneak away and change into his own tuxedo and join her on the dance floor. He suddenly laughed as the thought of Banshee and Akira ‘boogieing down’ on the dance floor and was forced to turn the snigger into a coughing fit. He had to find out if Akira could really read minds and did those being mentally invaded know when he was doing it?
Before he could ask, Frankie announced that she had an incoming transmission and the giant view screen cleared to show a middle-aged man, balding hair but still reasonably fit, wearing a well-worn suit while sitting uncomfortably in an office somewhere.
“Ah, good morning. I’m Agent McKenzie and I’m a senior security analyst and field agent for M.E.T.A. here in Wessex, and I’d, ah, like to ask you for a favour?”
M.E.T.A., the Metahuman Evaluation and Tracking Authority was the Government agency set up initially to enact the Powered Registration Act 2001, which required all people with powers to be registered and, in their case licensed. Thankfully, in the UK, unlike in the rest of the European Community, this was watered down by existing legislation so that no one under 15 needed to be registered and once they did, they could register under a unique alias to preserve their public identity.
Banshee was still technically unregistered as it had actually been her para-twin who’d been evaluated and registered before she’d even arrived in this dimension, but the other two had gone through the evaluation process when their powers had first manifested. It left a bitter taste in their mouths, yet they knew that for most new Meta breakthroughs and Stormers it could literally be a lifesaving process.
After the first Silver Storm event in 2012, the Registration Act was amended to class all new meta-powered breakthroughs as a potential terrorist threat until they had been evaluated and registered.
It was the power the label “potential terrorist” gave the Government that really annoyed. The maximum period of detention that a non-terrorist could be held was 72 hours, after which they had to either be charged or released pending further enquiries and they had the right to a lawyer and a phone call. After the first Silver Storm, stormers and breakthroughs were classified as ‘weapons of mass destruction’ and ‘potential terrorists’ which meant they could be held in a ‘testing’ centre (read prison) for up to 14 days completely incommunicado under Section 41 of the Terrorism Act as amended by the Powered Registration Act.
Given the stresses that a stormer suffered due to being forced to manifest their powers, the Government had previously also used the Mental Health Act to detain them without trial indefinitely, declaring them ‘psychotic and liable to injure themselves or others.’
Thankfully, M.E.T.A. was a reasonably honest (and independent) Government agency and most Metas were registered and received an assessment of their abilities quickly, before being released and allowed to get back to their lives and family.
All this flashed through Akira’s mind in the seconds that passed while McKenzie studied them to see if they seemed receptive to his request. After all, he was very aware that not all Meta’s looked on the agency favourably.
He continued, “AEGIS and the Police have been struggling to contain so many new stormers from the Stadium event as well as those who had been outside the stadium when the little buggers caused them to experience breakthroughs and they started wreaking havoc. Then they rounded up a couple of unregistered Metas that had been on the run. The city hasn’t had to deal with such a large Silver Storm event for sometime and they definitely weren’t ready to deal with so many power-enhanced, so quickly.
They are using our power dampeners and inhibitor collars to detain the stormers as best they can, but the Centre is reporting a suspicious series of malfunctions in them…”
Frankie interrupted him to ask, <<Designation: Agent McKenzie what make are the malfunctioning units?>> Surprised by the unexpected interruption, McKenzie replied, “Ah, I think the Police use Dalton’s version of the CrimePrev model. We use OmniTech’s original models but even those have malfunctioned.
As a result, we’ve transferred all of the Police’s Meta-prisoners and the stormers to the Evaluation Centre in the hope we can contain the situation while I look into it from our end, but I guarantee we would not provide dampeners with anything but a spotless maintenance record. So, I’ve asked your friend, Max Challenger-Wildeman if his team could help out.
A few minutes ago, his techies confirmed my suspicions that someone, somehow, was sabotaging the dampeners. Once they finish the repairs, our techs should be able to stay on top of the problem, the Police – and yes, us – are hoping you’d come by the Centre and help keep an eye on things until the work is completed and back online. Plus I’m not just the Senior Security Analyst for the region I’m pretty much the only one around while the other agents are dealing with other assignments. I’d really appreciate it if you could help. It shouldn’t take more than a couple of hours until everything is back to normal.”
“What’s the pay?” asked Akira. “Ah, I haven’t, I can’t… I can authorise you get your standard Hero Certification rate for the time you spend on this. Best I can do I’m afraid, I didn’t expect…” was McKenzie’s response.
HCP payment rates were the same as for a police officer, but were only paid when they were authorised to participate in a Police operation otherwise, they received nothing. Banshee stared at Akira hoping to shame him into an apology but failed. Bethany, as their secret sponsor, paid them extremely well, so there was no need for McKenzie to pay them for their services other than Akira enjoyed upsetting the agent.
“We’ve got this covered, boys and girls,” replied a jovial X-Ray. “There’s nothing on the box so I suppose we can help out,” replied Akira then realised that the only thing currently ‘on the Box’ was Frankie and he muttered a very insincere apology to their artificial ‘friend’.
Thankfully, X-Ray as Brian had a clear work calendar that day so he was available to attend the Centre with the others.
They headed there immediately and fifteen minutes later had landed the Crate in the carpark and were staring at the outside of the evaluation centre, a modern box-like building with a flat roof and heavy security doors and windows. They could see a guard in a battle-ready Brute Suit standing remarkably still, inside the main entrance.
The layout of the facility was familiar as all of the centre’s followed a similar design. Ground floor was reception and security. The first floor should house the Meta’s and stormers while they underwent testing which usually took place on the top floor. The two middle landings housed the cells for powered villains either being detained for questioning, attending court, or were temporarily housing convicted criminals while in transit to a suitable prison facility.
On the roof of the Detention Centre (X-Ray refused to call it an evaluation facility) was a figure in a gold-coloured outfit. He appeared to be breaking into the facility though why go through the roof when every single door and window on the premises had just sprung open was anyone’s guess. Standing beside him on the roof was a figure in dark armour, including a full opaque faceplate whose hands were glowing with energy.
Akira seemed to recognise them. “Dreadnought! And is that Cannon in a snazzy new set of armour? Haven’t seen them since the Battersea Station rescue a few years back! I’d heard they’d been sprung by Tempus while enroute to the Deep Six…”
Both Banshee and Akira knew that Dreadnought’s and Cannon’s presence meant that either the Foundry or Labyrinth were behind this jailbreak and as the Foundry didn’t trade in Metas (as far as they knew) that left Labyrinth who did have a history of human experimentation.
As they watched, four large quad-winged drones, the size of a large rucksack, came into view heading towards the facility.
All the external doors and windows of the facility were open leaving the building completely unsecure, yet no police or staff had appeared, which didn’t make sense. Evaluation Centres were secure facilities; even the figure in the Brute Suit didn’t react.
Then they saw some people run out the main entrance, straight passed the armoured guard. They looked shocked and paused as though unsure what to do next. They were dressed for the most part in normal clothes though some wore the bright orange jumpsuits issued to those undergoing evaluation and training and seemed to be all ages and levels of fitness.
The team elected to ignore them for the present and flew up towards the roof and the two figures they recognised as criminals. “Don’t let them get in the building;” shouted Akira to X-Ray, “They’re bad’uns.”
X-Ray flew up and saw that all of the skylights were wide open. Someone had breached the Centre’s security. He didn’t think such a thing was possible yet someone had clearly tampered with all of the buildings security. Add to that that the figure in the dark armour appeared to be some form of energy blaster this was clearly a well-organised breakout. Both figures appeared to be just waiting for something or someone even as the drones drew ever closer. “Excuse me gentlemen, I realise that you don’t know me – yet – my name’s X-Ray and I don’t believe you’re supposed to be up here. Would you mind explaining what’s going on?”
As energy cracked across their suits in response, X-Ray replied by erecting his force-field around himself in readiness as he kept one eye on them and the other on the incoming drones. Now they were closer they appeared to be unarmed but their weaponry could be concealed.
Even as cannon readied a shot at him, X-Ray got a rad-blast in first. A burst of orange-tinged radiation shot out of his hand hitting the roof instead as his target dodged out of the way of the blast. Missed! This cannon fella was more agile than he’d expected.
Banshee, seeing what happened, turned insubstantial and unleashed a wail against both of them. Cannon seemed unaffected by the assault while Dreadnought stumbled back but was otherwise unaffected. They appeared to be shielded against sonic attacks. Akira also put up his own protective shield even as he focused on a suitable response.
Dreadnought could be heard saying “Nightblade, where the hell are you?” The name wasn’t familiar but seemed to indicate there was at least one more person involved in the breakout. Or was Nightblade the person the other two were trying to break out? X-Ray heard Akira over his commdot state that he “needed to take these two out before this Nightblade gets here.” even as Akira unleashed a series of mystical blasts at both figures. He targeted Dreadnought first and the blast hit him square in the chest, knocking him to the ground before he could respond. Without waiting, he unleashed a second shot, this time at Cannon and again hit. Result! Then two lightning bolts lit up the sky as two figures climbed out of skylights and onto the roof, unleashed by a man in a long coat and a woman who closely resembled him and seemed to be of a similar age; twins? The bolts erupted from their hands and branched across the sky towards X-Ray. The man’s blast hit first dead centre on his heart! Even through his force-field he felt the blast but was able to shrug off the assault only for the second blast from the female to strike the lightning conductor rod next to him instead.
Going by their appearance they seemed to be stormers so could the man’s blast have just been a lucky shot? Both of them had surprisingly got the same powers? Lucky blighters, was that due to them being family or just the luck of the draw? He wiped the sweat off his visor at his lucky escape and focused on his response.
Cannon turned into a blinding beacon of light, momentarily blinding everyone as he unleashed an energy blast. The resulting explosive blast was overwhelming, melting part of the roof and setting it on fire where the blast hit but failed to hit any of them, thankfully.
X-Ray saw the drones getting closer and realised that they had some sort of harness hanging beneath them. He immediately unleashed his rad-blast at the two storm twins, who were now standing beside each other. His blast slammed the male into the skylight, bruising him and left the female dazed.
Banshee unleashed an aura of fear at all four of the villains on the roof. The male stormer stumbled backwards as the emotion overwhelmed him, twisting his ankle in the process; again, Dreadnought’s outfit seemed to provide him with some sort of protection, though both Cannon and the girl weren’t so lucky and stumbled under the emotional onslaught, bruising themselves in the process. The twins immediately grabbed the harnesses hanging from beneath the drones and hurriedly put them on in an attempt to escape even as they responded by unleashing lightning bolts at Akira, striking the roof close to his feet.
On the ground another person, a young teenage girl in fashionably torn jeans and a sparkly t-shirt, exited via the main entrance. She seemed to be surrounded by a thin, gaseous cloud, which surrounded her. She seemed scared and just stood in the middle of the carpark apparently unsure what to do next. She looked vaguely familiar and they thought she might have been one of those they’d seen collapse at the stadium.
Akira elected to bring her up to the roof using his TK and ‘let her join the party’ rather than allow her to escape. He gestured and the now panicking young girl began to defy gravity and floated up towards him on the roof. X-Ray saw what was happening and wondered at the wisdom of this action given the gas cloud surrounding her.
Cannon unleashed another blast, this time at Banshee, which passed straight through her insubstantial form even as she noticed that the two storm twins were keeping their distance from the new arrival on the roof. What did they know?
As she reached the roof and was released by Akira on to her own feet, Dreadnought unleashed an energy blast, which hit her, leaving her stunned and bleeding. The storm twins now safely in the harnesses of two of the drones began to lift off only for X-Ray to gesture towards them and for localised gravity around them to increase threefold, bringing them struggling back down to the rooftop as the drones struggled to stay in flight under the increased weight.
Out of one of the skylights a grey-skinned female, flaming yellow energy claws erupting from her clenched fists clambered out onto the roof followed by a guy in a skull mask and sculpted body armour beneath which was an overweight youth that had clearly seen too many vigilante movies.
“Now it’s a party” muttered Akira as Banshee rushed across the roof to try to grab the young girl that Akira had brought up from the ground and pull her to safety. She turned substantial so she could check she was okay, only to find as soon as she was close, that her skin starting to burn from contact with the gas. The miasmic mist surrounding the girl was clearly acidic! She tried grabbing the girl again in order to pull her out of the firing line but was unable to drag her to safety.
Akira watched the storm twins still trying to break free from the gravity hold and instead he unleashed blasts at Dreadnought and Cannon. Cannon was forced to fall to his knees but the second shot missed even as the man in the skull mask seemed to momentarily turn into energy and then released it through his fists. The blast lit up the sky but it was clear that he hadn’t practiced hitting a target as it shattered the roof next to Akira even as the whole building began to shake as though it was experiencing a major earthquake from the ground up. Windows shattered in response. Then they began to smell smoke wafting up from the middle landings – from the cells, which were followed by agonising screams. It was clear that more was happening than just the escape attempt from the roof.
“Told you we shouldn’t have taken this job,” muttered a frustrated Akira as he tried to work out what to do next.
Banshee was still trying to pull the acidic female to safety when she was attacked by the woman with the flaming claws. She dodged even as she immediately responded by turning insubstantial again which had the added effect of allowing the Ban Sidhe to start to heal her.
X-Ray saw the storm twins were still hanging from underneath the drones though they looked to be trying to undo their harnesses and elected to drop the field and focus on using his gravi-kinesis to slap the brother down, hard. He gestured and the drone crashed to the ground with its passenger. The crash shattered his legs and thankfully rendered him unconscious though the other drone, now freed from its gravitational budget scooted away with its female passenger cursing her inability to control her flight and unwillingly having to leave her brother behind.
A second quake knocked everyone off their feet and almost sent the female with the energy claws off the edge of the roof. X-ray looked down and saw a guard hanging out of one of the windows clearly bleeding out only for someone or something to drag the body back inside the building.
The other two drones flew in, ready for another pair of passengers, but for whom? The woman with the energy claws and the kid with the skull mask or Dreadnought and Cannon? The question was answered a few seconds later when they hovered over the female and skull-face.
Banshee turned insubstantial and flew towards Cannon and his compatriot before unleashing her wail on them both. Cannon collapsed even as one of the drones changed direction, scooted in and tried to grab him with a cable. Dreadnought however was able to weather the attack.
Akira wondered about using his Wheel of Weyan spell to reverse the damage done to the building but a third quake shook the building and he realised that even if he was to repair the damage the attacks were still ongoing. Better to wait until the risk was over and try to repair it then. Frustrated, he looked down and witnessed several more people fleeing via the entrance and heading away from the centre, some of whom were clearly injured. An injured guard was dragged out by one of the inmates, who then appeared to be administering first aid.
That was when he realised that there were no sirens, no ambulances, no police and Dispatch had been silent ever since they’d arrived. It looked as though someone had created a communications dead zone. He looked at the latest two Metas to clamber on to the roof. Like the storm twins, they were still wearing power dampeners yet they were clearly still able to use their powers. The units were clearly not functioning.
He glanced down again and this time saw a female he recognised from the stadium, the one that had partially transformed into a reptile like person, fleeing the centre.
Frustrated and angry at what he considered illegal detention, Akira turned to the four still on the roof and unleashed a cascade of mystical blasts at each one in turn. He aimed at the injured Cannon first. The blast hit and he collapsed unconscious. Dreadnought was next as he tried to escape and he too was hit and he collapsed to the ground. As he fell, a man in a long coat and bandana over his mouth materialised, grabbed him and disappeared. The familiar, though admittedly aged face of their old partner, Chrono glowered at him. Chrono who’d vanished one day while with them only to reappear months later, much older and now calling himself Tempus had rescued the two of them before and was clearly going to do so again.
His power was time travel, with the ability to travel in time or slow it down so that he could experience several hours while only a second passed for the rest of the world. He used those abilities to remove first Dreadnought then a second later the unconscious Cannon from the battle. Akira just wished he knew why he was working with Labyrinth now.
Akira wasted no time as he turned his blast on the female with the energy claws before moving onto ‘Death-face’ – he hit them both, immediately dazing them.
Flames could now be seen through the open windows of the middle floors, as even more people fled out of the main entrance and fire doors on the ground level.
X-Ray sent a call to the others that he was going to get the unconscious girl down off the roof and then try to see what was going on if they could deal with the remaining two escapees in front of them who were still trying to harness themselves to the remaining escape drones.
He grabbed the unconscious girl hoping that his force-field would protect him. It worked, just. He floated down to the ground with her in his shielded arms hoping to see paramedics arriving but thanks to the blackout no one knew what was occurring. He was immediately approached by one of the fleeing guards, his shirt torn and cut by something, his arm bleeding profusely from a large knife or shank wound.
He explained that the cell area was under attack from a malevolent shadow that was cutting down guards and prisoners alike. He stated that there was no way he was going back inside but offered to stay with the girl, who he called Acid Beth, until help arrived.
He warned him that most of the guards had been trapped inside their Spartan Armour or Brute Suits when they suddenly froze and went offline trapping their wearers inside, unable to move. That was after all the cell doors had sprung open and the power dampeners and inhibitor collars had all gone offline. The prisoners were now running amok throughout the building, at least those not being attacked by shadows, or had already escaped.
He confirmed that his communications were down so he was unable to call the authorities for help.
“We’re in the same boat,” explained X-Ray. “You stay with the girl until we can get help but don’t go anywhere near her.” He injured guard confirmed that he knew the procedure for being with her as her acidic power was always on. She was one of the unfortunates in that way. “Just stay with her and protect her as best you can.” He placed her on the ground behind a parked car to hide her from any unwanted attention and headed towards the main entrance.
As he walked through the door, the first thing he saw was one of the guards trapped inside the Brute Suit positioned there, his muffled voice pleading with anyone to get him out. There was nothing X-Ray could do to help him, so we walked passed the unwilling ‘statue’ and the scanners heading to the emergency stairs leading to the upper floors.
As the stairs came into view he could make out a female figure in a black bodysuit and some sort of device on her arms, gesturing towards the ground. As though in response every time she gestured the whole structure shook wildly. He’d clearly found the source of the quake!
“This is your first and only warning. Get on the ground now!” he shouted. She turned and smiled at him, a serene smile even as she unleashed an earthquake straight at him. The vibrations caused the roof to start to collapse and the floor beneath his feet begin to sink. He jumped into the air and floated above the quake. He smiled back and exclaimed, “I did give you the opportunity,” as he responded with a rad-blast. He tried to focus but missed, hitting the wall behind her.
In response, X-Ray was pelted with fragments of the shattered staircase which quake sent straight at him. Not only could she quake things to bits she could also direct the remnants as a weapon.
He was forced to dodge the shards and chunks of concrete even as several bounced off his force-field.
Banshee and Akira were still on the roof dealing with the two escapees – Banshee let out a shattering shriek at the incoming Drones causing them to malfunction and crash uncontrollably into the roof stranding the two escapees. ‘Claw’ suddenly spread her fingers towards them and the flaming claws suddenly shot out, extending and went straight through Banshee’s insubstantial body.
Akira blasted both of them. It missed claws but hit skull-face and caused him to stagger back as he responded with another blast back, which thankfully missed.
Banshee decided to leave Akira to finish them off and headed towards and down into the training floor below intending to stop any more prisoners escaping onto the roof. That particular floor was currently unoccupied. She initially headed towards the emergency stairs, which were open heading down to the cells in the floor below. She noticed that the lift to the middle landing was unlocked but she didn’t want to risk using it in case it alerted the prisoners, instead she used the shaft in her insubstantial form to travel to the next floor.
It was chaos; all the cell doors were wide open, someone had elected to start fires in the corridors and pools of blood but no bodies that she could see. There were still a few prisoners fighting but the assault on the remaining guard ended the second the remaining prisoners saw Banshee and shuffled back to their cells. The guard was bruised and battered but was able to head towards the stairs unassisted. Banshee meanwhile continued to walk down the corridor towards a suit of Spartan Armour leaning against the wall.
The guard inside was dead, stabbed through the armour on the throat by a long blade of some kind. The guard trapped inside had bled out though how a blade had been able to penetrate the armour was unknown. Behind Banshee, a shadow moved without anything casting it. She turned and unleashed a shrieking attack at it. The shadow screamed in response.
The shadow was man-shaped and was trying to stab her with a long shadowy blade. Whatever it was, it was phased to the same degree of insubstantiality as Banshee, making them able to interface directly. In other words, the shadow blade could stab her. Was that how it had stabbed the guard? An insubstantial blade through the throat plates of the armour then turned solid to kill him?
Banshee’d previously used her staff in the same way after all.
She responded with a fearful aura but if it had any effect, she was unable to tell. Banshee grabbed hold of her and unleashed a corrupting touch on the figure, leaving it injured but unfortunately not badly.
It responded by trying to slash at her eyes and thankfully failed. Banshee could hear the alarms begin to sound for the first time and cell doors began to close and relock.
Akira was still on the roof, trying to render the two stormers unconscious. His blasts hit, rendering them both comatose and he headed towards the skylight intending to join Banshee in preventing any more inmates escaping, only to come across a mutated stormer coming up. He had been metamorphosed into a cross between a crab with massive claws and shell and a man and it, he wanted to get passed Akira and get to the roof.
He wasn’t one of the breakthroughs from the stadium so had clearly he had been altered some time before and possibly had been hiding away from M.E.T.A. since? Should he try to stop him or just let him get passed, after all there was no way he could escape that way now?
Akira elected to leave him and flew down the outside of the building and through the front door before it locked and through the reception area towards the lifts where he encountered X-Ray being pelted by the earthquake female who was floating in midair in front of them. He had enough, he immediately unleashed a mystical blast at her which left her dazed.
Quake unleashed another rain of fragments at both of them even as X-Ray used his gravi-kinesis at her, hoping to bounce her into the wall. It shook her but failed to do any real damage as she continued pelting the concrete fragments at them both.
Akira followed it up with another of his mystical blasts. This hit and succeeded in smashing her into the wall. To their surprise, she began to sink through the floor and disappeared from sight. The way to the upper floors was now clear even if the stairs to the upper floors no longer existed. They flew up the shattered stairwell and headed to the first floor searching for more inmates.
To their surprise, the guards in the powered suits were starting to boot up and the doors were again locking as the dampener fields began to reactivate . Those there to be evaluated and registered had apparently already fled earlier. The control systems were clearly reactivating.
The next floor had a guard in powered armour in the security booth. He was clearly regaining control but refused to step outside of the security of the booth even though they could see a dead guard and a gutted prisoner lying in the corridor. The riot / escape had not been victimless then. Damn!
X-Ray checked the bodies then returned to the security booth and the guard inside, “Hi, we’re the Balance, we’re here to help to lock down the premises. It looks like the power is back working.” The guard responded that yes, it appeared all systems were reactivating at last. He went on, “I’ve put a call out to request ambulances and police support.”
“Brilliant! Good man, keep up the good work!” The Guard asked if he was going in after the shadow assassin, wherever he was now? He seemed surprised that he would want to risk entering the cell areas again.
The two of them began to check the floors methodically for any security issues. On the third floor the guard there also warned them about an attacking shadow that had killed her mate Bert by stabbing him through the throat. She warned them that a couple of the prisoners were still outside their cells and she wasn’t willing to go in herself until additional support arrived. X-Ray thanked her for the warning but indicated that they would want access anyway.
Inside, Banshee was still facing off against the shadow creature, presumably the ‘Nightblade’ Dreadnought had mentioned and a couple of prisoners were trying to get back in their cells before they were locked out now the mass escape that failed. There were still fires in several of the cells and of course, the deadly shadow facing off against ‘Spooky’.
X-Ray and Akira entered the corridor and saw the bleeding armour and the fires, then at the far end they saw Banshee struggling with a shadowy figure. One of the arms of the figure resembled a dark sword or long blade that it was trying to stab Banshee with.
X-Ray rushed towards them while trying to erect a gravity field around the shadow but both figures wrestling seemed to ignore it as it wasn’t there. Banshee unleashed another corrupting touch on it only for it to disappear into the shadows. They searched but couldn’t find it anywhere and with the Police arriving, it was best left for them to continue the search.
They had already rounded up some of those that had fled earlier, most of who hadn’t actually tried to escape but several prisoners and a number of stormers had either vanished or fled. Akira told them “If you’re looking for the ‘crab’, he’s on the roof with ‘Ripclaw’ and the ‘death mask’ fella.” X-Ray directed them to the carpark and the guard looking after ‘Acid Beth.’
They were allowed to check the security feeds but all that revealed was that something external had managed to take control of all of their systems and switch off the security cameras at the same time as they had opened the cells and doors and deactivated the dampeners. There was a couple of seconds, which showed Dreadnought arriving and opening the skylight and the suits locking up then everything went dark. There was no trace showing how they had managed to do it, even Frankie was baffled as to how anyone had achieved this or why.
X-Ray wondered if Mekha Prime could have done it, given his recent encounter with the entity but at no time had it ever aligned itself with organic lifeforms to achieve its purpose. It was contrary to its programming.
Dispatch or Frankie might have been able to do such a hack but there were not that many criminals that could interface with an Assessment Centre with dampener fields and none that had any known connections to the criminals involved. There was also the fact that only Cannon and Dreadnought seemed to be involved in the jailbreak, Nightblade had apparently been on a murder spree and Quake seemed determined to bring the whole centre down on top of everyone. Why?
As for ‘Death mask’ guy on the roof, despite Akira’s completely unfounded assertion that he had to be the mastermind behind the whole thing, the reality was that he’d just been a worker at MacDonald’s before his breakthrough and had spent his adult life either working or playing ultra-violent video games and was otherwise a non-entity.
It was frustrating. Anyway, they had an awards ceremony to prepare for.
It was only as they were heading to The Tower that they learned that The Green Man and his Brides had been temporarily detained at the Centre while awaiting a court appearance and were now missing. Petals found at the end of the corridor would seem to indicate that they had portalled away when the cell doors and power dampeners had failed. Several others, including some of the latest stormers, had also managed to flee – several just by walking out the front door while the guards were trapped inside their frozen armour!
Three guards were dead, including the one in the Brute Suit who was stabbed through the throat by a rematerializing Nightblade and the same number of prisoners, presumably in revenge for something or other. Several of the cells were either burnt or damaged by the smoke.
The Tower Banquet room was packed when they arrived. A band was playing a selection of classics though no one was dancing, just wandering around chatting with their colleagues and business acquaintances while sipping cheap champagne. There was a short burst of applause when the three of them arrived as the guests of honour then the crowd quickly went back to their networking and small talk. Across the room, Brian spotted Stacy but all he could do was a nod in her direction. He’d need to make it up to her later.
The Mayor arrived and headed towards the stage where he was due to give the welcome speech and present each of them with a fancy key that didn’t actually open anything. Mayor O’Connor approached the stage, went to check the microphone and began his speech when there was a loud crash.
Above them, the glass ceiling shattered into a million sharp shards cascading down on top of the guests, X-Ray instantly responded by blasting out a gravi-kinetic field, which only afterwards he realised he’d centred over Stacy, even as a four-winged dragonfly-like drone dropped through the rafters into the hall. An electronically-altered voice boomed out of its speakers, “This city is now ours!”
X-Ray focused on pushing his grav-field out, up and away, causing half of the falling shards and deadly slivers (“why the hell hadn’t they used safety glass in the manufacture of the roof?” he wondered) to float up and outside the building into the night sky, though he knew he would be unable to protect the people in the rest of the hall. As he focused, he saw Akira wave his hands in some sort of intricate pattern and mutter words in a language not meant for human throats, which seemed to be an appeal to some being called Weyan, even as Banshee turned back into Mary and called forth her harp, presumably intending to unleash some sort of healing or calming melody. Then, as though they were a flight of crystalline butterflies, all of the glass shards stopped and floated back onto the roof structure and, like a giant complicated jigsaw, began to mend themselves.
X-Ray dropped his field and looked over first to check on Stacy then at the Mayor who someone had thrown beneath one of the banquet tables. No one was hurt though the drone was now trapped beneath the magically repaired glass canopy.
Over their Comms they heard Dispatch informing them that there was a series of robberies occurring now in the Diamond District of Little Russia, a silent alarm possibly indicating an attempted robbery at the Museum of the Arts and some sort of weapons hijack currently in progress close to the nearby Theatre District.
To be continued
Superhero Adventures, UK Style 