Titans of Tomorrow

Nicholas Gilman was a "normal" high school student; well, as normal as a high school student can be anyway. He was about 6 feet tall, blond hair, blue eyes, but overall, just average. He was a little wiry for someone his height, but other than that, you could simply pass right over him in a crowd and never even notice him.

He was neither popular, nor unpopular in school, his parents were having problems (Who’s weren’t?) and divorce seemed an ever-present specter on the horizon. "Nick" as he was called by his few close friends wasn’t an A student, nor was he a failure, but he was liked, at least until the rats started coming around.

At first, he dismissed it as just his imagination, he’d see rats on the street, peeking out of sewer drains, or lurking near dumpsters, but whenever he’d walk by, he’d have sworn they would stop what they were doing and watch him pass.

"Imagination, plain and simple" he’d tell himself. Nick was deathly afraid of rats, it was a fear that had no basis, and it infuriated him to no end. But when he’d see the rodents following him in the gutter, he’d clutch his books close to himself and cross the street to avoid them. It was more or less just a nuisance that he blamed on living in a dirty, crowded city.

The day one was seated on his bookcase looking at him in his bedroom was the day he fainted. The fear gripped him so hard that he lost consciousness and fell into blackness, but after that, he was frequently tormented by them. The rats never did anything malicious, they would simply stare at him, the brave few mustering up the courage to rub against his leg were usually startled away when he would shriek or throw something at them to scare them off.

The rats were a daily occurrence in Nicks life, an occurrence that he dreaded, but then something strange happened, he met a girl. Her name was Dana Jenkins, and when she smiled at him, the world just seemed better somehow. At first, Nick was skeptical that her interests in him were some kind of cruel prank, but her continued interest in him outside of school quickly convinced him that she was genuine. In short, Dana made him happy, and when Nick was happy, the rats kept away.

They had been together for about a month and a half now, and Dana was a great kisser. Frequently, Nick would pull away from her with his eyes at half-mast feeling drunk. When he got to second base with her, he was completely awe struck. She would have gone to third, but her parents came home, and Nick had to creep out of her bedroom window.

One night, Nick borrowed his dads Volvo to take Dana to the movies. It was a slasher flick that both of them had seen before, so they agreed to go Dutch. Nick would buy the tickets, and Dana the popcorn and coke. They arrived at the theater a little early and sat in the back, both knowing that the movie was simply an excuse to be together in a dark room and make out. They settled in to their seats, cuddling close to one another when a large figure loomed over them. Nick looked up and quickly recognized Rad Thompson, the school bully and also the Quarterback to their less than successful football team. The Midtown High Raiders were really having a tough season and Rad had a lot of aggression to let out.

Rad looked at Dana and said "What are you doing hanging around this loser?"

The rat must have been hiding in the rafters of the theater, watching what progressed below. It was a well fed rat, about the size of a small housecat, and before Dana could answer, it dropped from the ceiling and onto Rad Thompson. The impact alone caused him to stumble a bit, and then it was biting and clawing at his face, moving quickly and dodging Rads attempts to remove it. Chunks of skin fell from Rad’s shrieking form.

Dana screamed and clutched at Nick who sat paralyzed in fear as they watched the grizzly scene unfold before them.

At the hospital, the official report was that Nick was in shock from seeing Rad Thompson mauled by the rat. Dana, who had left hours ago was still shaking when her parents picked her up. The rat had been removed finally by a theater usher armed with a broom who had taken the Babe Ruth approach to rodent removal and had unfortunately bad depth perception. He ended up knocking Rad Thompson out and giving him a concussion in addition to the significant damage the rat had done. The boy would be blinded for life, which was a small blessing considering the mess the rat had made of his face. The rat was taken to a lab for rabies testing and Rad Thompson would have to undergo the series of painful rabies shots "just in case".

Several days passed before Nick would speak to anyone, he kept replaying the horrible scene over and over in his mind. He felt somehow responsible for what happened, but he didn’t share his fears with anyone. He couldn’t remember how he had gotten to the hospital, only driving to the movies, and the terrible attack on Rad. He didn’t need to ask about Dana, she was a frequent visitor to his room, and a card and some flowers at his bedside were a constant reminder that she was always thinking about him. One afternoon, she even told him that she loved him.

It was that afternoon that he was thinking of as he drifted off to sleep with a smile on his face. What had happened to Rad was terrible, but he couldn’t hold himself responsible. Dana loved him, and everything was going to be all right.

Early that morning, an woman wearing cheap yellow shoes and a yellow dress showed up at the hospital. Her perfume was cloying, something cheap that one might pick up in a drug store. She carried a white leather purse that matched her white cotton gloves. She said she was a friend of the family, and the nurse showed her into Nicks room and left. The woman in yellow approached Nicks still sleeping form removing a small vial and a syringe from her purse.

"You stole my sons sight you little freak!", she whispered harshly. "I know what you are even if they don’t!" She inserted the syringe into the vial, removing a black liquid from it. She then injected it into the IV line watching as the liquid quickly spread down the tube and into the back of Nick’s hand and left the room, telling the nurse that Nick was still sleeping and that she would come back tomorrow.

At around eleven o’clock, Dana’s parents dropped her off at the hospital to see Nick. She was excited to see him, in a weird way, she enjoyed coming to the hospital to see her boyfriend. It let her express a motherly, caring side of her that she was unaware she even had. She stopped by the hospital florist and picked up some daisies in a glass vase to brighten up Nick’s room. She waved and said hello to Rad’s mother, Mrs. Thompson who was sitting in the hospital cafeteria drinking coffee from a styrofoam cup. She smiled to herself, happy that she had told Nick that she was in love with him, and fantasized about what it would be like to be Mrs. Nicholas Gilman as she walked through the hospital.

The daisies fell to the floor and she screamed as she entered the room. The nurse came running from the desk down the hall trailing behind her a parade of orderlies and doctors. Dana leaned hard against the wall for support and slid down until she was seated on the cold tile floor with her hands covering her face, she began to weep uncontrollably. She could hear the confusion in the doctors voices as they worked frantically in Nicks room.

Nick lay in bed, his sheets soaked through with blood, so much so that it had pooled around the legs of his hospital bed. A fine mist of blood still coated his cooling skin as if it had seeped out of his very pores and his normally pale skin was even paler. Nicholas Gillman was dead.

Roc Radney: Welcome back to the Rad Pad. I'm Roc Radney, your host for the hour. Our subject today Metahumans. Unless you've been born in a cave,. you know what I'm speaking of. The men and women who are blessed with particular abilities and powers who protect us on a daily basis without thought to their own lives from crime, corruption, invasion, and sometimes ourselves. Everyone's seen the reports on TV and the news, and let's face it, everyone gets that little jolt, whenever someone sees the Canadian Shield or the Royal Ensigns or even the Protectorate performing some amazing rescue or feat of heroism in living color. Some of us even have had personal contact with these icons of virtue. It's exciting. It's thrilling. And sometimes, a little scary. For some people, the existence of superheroes is so ingrained, that it it doesn't even occur to them until it stares them in the face, but we all sleep better at night, knowing that there are those few individuals who gamble their lives everyday for our protection.

RR:But of course, as with everything else, there is another side to this. There are those metahumans who use their abilities to harm others. These "supervillains" thrive on destruction, disorder, chaos, and most of them will stop at nothing to accomplish their agenda, whether it be the destruction of an ancient enemy who no longer exists, or an attempt at world conquest. They are the yin to the Superhero's yang, ultimate evil battling against ultimate good. And sometimes the collateral damage skyrockets.

My guest this segment has a totally different view on the concept of metahumans. His new book, Help for the Survivors of a Metahuman Battle, is in stores now. Ladies and gentlemen, let me welcome Dr. J Hamilton,to the Rad Pad.

RR: Please call me, Rich. I'm burning with curiosity and I'm sure your readers are as well. What does the J stand for?

JH: Oh that's because there were two Hamiltons where I previously worked.My first name's John, but the other was Dr. Leon Hamilton, so we were paged as Dr. J Hamilton and Dr. L Hamilton.

RR: So, Doctor Hamilton, I read your book. It seems to me that you perceive all metahumans as a threat, is that correct?

JH: This year, there were fifty-seven thousand, two hundred and fifty. people were injured, permanently disabled, or killed as a result of metahuman activities. So no, there's no delineation.

JH:Fifty-seven thousand, two hundred and fifty. Not just victims of "villainous" activities. You've seen the news and watched the battles unfold. How many times has one of the participants crash through a crowded building?Or land on a parking lot full of cars?How many of these battles have you watched that include gigantic explosions leveling an entire city block? Not mentioning the billions of dollars for repairing damages from the battles, or the innocent bystanders killed or injured as a result of such activities...

RR:(Interrupting)Wait a minute.We've all seen that whenever such occurrences happen, that most of the heroes first concern is the safety of those around them. We've seen the Canadian Shield or the Protectorate doing their best to get all innocent bystanders out of harm's path whenever something like that occurs..

JH:I agree. Don't mistake me, their efforts have not gone unnoticed. But think how much higher the count would be if they didn't! Their best efforts are still resulting in over fifty-thousand injuries and deaths a year!That's a very lousy track record for doing their "best"

JH: Except at what cost? The cost of innocent lives? The ends don't justify the means or otherwise put, one doesn't break the eggs to make omelets. We're the eggs in that equation, Mr. Radney. You and me, and all the other innocent human beings on the planet are the only true victims here. We're the ones who suffer while these metahumans soar off into the sky leaving a trail of death and destruction in their wake. Who gets left with the bill? Us.

JH: Eighty percent of all insurance companies in this country alone deny any claim where the cause of injury or damage is metahuman related.

JH: Yes, eighty percent. And more and more companies are taking that stance each day. According to most of these companies, it's "cost-prohibitive" to provide coverage for metahuman related damages. It shows in the remaining twenty percent:their premiums are much higher than those who do not cover metahuman damages. There are actually insurance companies right now which provide "metahuman insurance" for a separate and exorbitant fee.

JH: Not quite:You see, fires, floods-as I'm sure everyone's aware-are referred to as Acts of God by the insurance companies. The reason for the extra insurance coverage for these acts is not only because they are extensively damaging,but also because they are unpredictable. Insurance companies base their rates on certain predictable critera-like the likelihood that your home will be robbed based on the natural crime rate in your area. Natural disasters are unpredictable, and are charged at a higher separate rate due largely to that unpredictability.To their concept, however, metahuman damage is considered predictable in that the cause of metahuman damage is human error or human behavior-conscious beings making a conscious decision to engage in these activities.Logically, conscious beings have the ability to stop themselves. So the insurance companies list the damages as human fault and charge an additional rate for coverage because of the normal extent of the damage.

RR: I see: The only way the insurance companies can recoup their expenses is to pass the charges along in higher premiums.

JH:Yes, that's where we come in. The New Jersey Brotherhood Chapter has started a nonprofit organization designed, in part, to provide financial and legal assistance support for victims of metahuman caused catastrophes and their families. We are also applying pressure to the insurance companies to to regulate the costs of metahuman insurance as well as pushing the US government to enact more stringent legislation on the insurance companies and on all metahumans operating within the United States. We have been in contact with the President's Cabinet to form a Secretaryship of Metahuman Affairs to try and get some cooperation on a federal level. Unfortunately, just as no one is regulating the insurance companies, no one is regulating metahuman behavior.

JH: Why not? We regulate our own behavior. We have laws concerning alcohol consumption,, gun ownership, drug abuse,and so on. It's no different. All of these laws were enacted out of concern for the Public Safety. That's all we're suggesting when it comes to metahumans-it's a matter of Public Safety.

RR: Well, some may argue that the superhero "community" has a history of governing itself-that metahumans can regulate their own behavior.

JH: To those people, I'd say I can think of about fifty-seven thousand families that are likely to disagree.

RR: Well, the music means we're out of time. Dr. Hamilton, thank you so much for joining us today on the Rad Pad.

RR:Anytime, doctor. Alright folks, coming up next, Nike Corporation's alleged Vietnam sweat shops. Unfounded rumors, or based on reality? NYU's Vietnam deputation to Nike shoe factories. My analysis, and your phone calls, after these commercial messages.

Susan twitched from the electrical current. Dr. Hamilton was still asking her where she and her sister had hidden the weapons. Weapons that they had stolen from the mob, along with several million in cash.

She wasn't going to tell the pompous prick anything, and this was just one more time he had asked out of countless others over that past two weeks.

“Alright Mrs. Oakman, your usefulness has finally ended. Since you wont co-operate we have other uses for you. Uses that don’t require your co-operation.” He said as the door opened. “Hold her Ivan and if she attempts any of her light tricks use the cattle prod.”

Ivan grabbed Susan by he hair and pulled. She was pulled to a standing position. “Now turn her head just a little,” The doctor said. “Lets she how she takes to NV37a”, the doctor said injecting a small amount of something into her neck, next to where he had swabbed a spot in alcohol.

Susan struggled but Ivan was too strong, the needle going into her neck burned like fire. When the doctor removed it, the burning continued.

“What did you do, You BASTARD!,” Susan screamed as she was tossed onto the bed.

“Ivan note the time, our little miss light show should be showing advanced signs by midnight and be dead by one, unless she tells us what we want to know. We will reform this meta one way or another.”

They walked back down the corridor as Susan screams rang down the hallway

I knew something was wrong when I got home. Oliver never looks worried, even if he’s telling us about how the squid monster got loose from the school lab, and the genetics teacher needed to subdue the creature.

“I’m serious, Derek. She’s been gone for forty-eight hours. I contacted the police, and they said she’s probably gone off with a paramour. I dialed *69 and got the number. “Oliver’s worry infected his voice.

“Look, if it makes you feel better. I’ll have someone check. “I replied. He looked immensely relieved. In truth, I wasn’t that worried. Whoever attacked Sam had bought more trouble than they had anticipated.

“The custom in the United States is to give your name and number. “Hopefully, that little hint would jolt them.

“No, and that’s a personal question. If you wish someone to call back, leave your name and number so they can reach you. It’s common sense. “

“Really, why would I do that if she is not home. “ The caller must be a tourist or something. Caller ID is listed as a dot. How very intriguing. The caller hangs up. *69 says something along the lines of being a private number. I do not feel like attracting attention from definite hostile forces inside a residential building. Commercial buildings are fine, but the forces are indeed trying to kill me before I kill them. I decide to go the old-fashioned route.

“May I see your register? “ I held up a facsimile of a badge. “I’m here to investigate a questionable disappearance. The sergeant at the desk was of the opinion that she was a runaway, but I was the one picked to look this over. Has anyone seen this person?“I grumbled in imitation of a man who is picked for an unpleasant, but necessary duty. The clerk who’s nametag read Ronnie obligingly gave me the register. I flipped through it, and noted a Samantha Tsien’s name registered alongside a Susan Oakman. I’d need a genetic sample to obtain a telekinetic lock or a photograph of some kind. I display the photograph copy of Sam I made to the clerk.

“Sure. She came in during my shift. “I tracked the signature to where it said she checked out. It was around 9PM.

“She used a credit card to pay for the night, but walked out at 9PM the very same day?” I used the skeptical tone of voice police always use. It’s used because it’s effective.

“Yes, we have a tape for every video. Ronnie, called up the video feed. Careless. Slipshod work. Since the bloody tape’s a fake. It’s obvious that whoever’s doing whatever they need better help.

"Thanks Ronnie. By the way, could I get a room for a friend of mine? He wanted me to check the place out if I was going to come here anyway. He needs a weekend getaway at some place new. " I told Ronnie.

"Thanks, Ronnie. "I smiled at him while half of me wanted to introduce him to the pleasures of breathing Tibetan air with no decompression. The videotape's datestamp hadn't even been changed. He had attempted to give me the wrong tape.

I noted that during my absence to change disguises someone new had checked in. I took the time to check the register. The register was signed by a Richard Moreau who hadn’t been there before. The register had also indicated the room number. I would keep an eye on it through the use of my Sight from the next room through the walls. I attuned my Sight to the occupant. There was only one living occupant although his aura read weirdly as though a thread of objects were sewn threw him. Invisible lines formed weird patterns. There also seemed to be a slumbering spirit in the shape of a blade and other threads that kind of looked like mental control, but not quite. More than one, if I was reading the aura correctly. There were also other skittish things, although they didn’t read as life forms. Perhaps the hostile forces had chosen a mortal to deliver the killing blow. I probed that as thoroughly as I could without attracting attention. A sword spirit, it was bound to slay it’s opponent in combat. The spirit stirred and I withdrew.

Carl opened up several files, His eyes were closed and the images appeared directly in his mind.

“Interesting, Peter Bateman is listed as one of the main board members, and has been moving large sums of cash around for almost a year now”, Carl thought to wedge.

“Tween, technically are you not violating your agreement with Mindshadow, by hacking these bank statements?” Wedge asked.

“Maybe, but we are just looking not interfering, interesting what are these payments in late December for?”

“Tween it appears that our assailants have arrived. I advise playing possum.” Wedge advised shutting down the data feeds.

“Oh well I will look more into it later when I have some time. Lets see if these goons bring us to Susan”, Carl said collapsing in the chair. Carl then made a dramatic collapse onto the floor and had Wedge take over some of his body and relaxed.

Several minutes later two men wearing gas masks entered the room. They both seemed professional and removed his brief case, and took it into the hall. They came back, wrapped his legs and wrists in some duct tape. They picked Carl up and carried him out to the hall and dropped him into a large laundry bin on wheels. Wasting little time they wheeled him out a back door into the ally. A delivery truck waited its motor running. They wheeled the laundry bin into the back and closed the door. The truck then drove off.

“See easy as pie and we each get another five G’s for this finders fee. Says here he is a precog. Bet he didn’t see that coming.”

“Quiet you two, we have to catch a plane in five hours, I want this done with”, a third voice said, this sounded like a woman.

Carl listened to the road sounds, noting when they traveled over the Washington Bridge and going past a toll station. They drove for a half hour more before stopping for a moment and then slowing down and stopping again.

“Ok you take this freak down to his new room, I am going to let the doctor know his new patient has arrived.

The doctor looked at his database thoughtfully. A new arrival came so soon after the last one? Perhaps the drop point was becoming too well known as a place where people disappeared. It might be time to move them again. Still, a potentially dangerous creature if left alone. He made his decision. He descended into the special wing.

“Ivan, send out the team for evidence dispersal. They’ve been getting kind of arrogant with their string of easy captures. “

“Yes, sir.“ Their old employer had lent them to the hospital when he had complained of lack of restraint techniques. Close combat, ranged combat, transportation, and stealth made for a very good team.

I’ve settled in for the night, to watch the threaded-man. His skittish servitors seem to attend him, scurrying behind corners hidden from plain sight. The hotel has nice thick walls. So I watched him remain in a stationary position for a length of time. I viewed through the corner of the room, and two other life forms entered the room. I flick off the switch with a finger, and walked silently to the door. I had left my door jarred open with a piece of Scotch tape. I slowly inched the door open to watch the two men in gas masks next to a laundry cart place some kind of hose under the door that extended from a blue canister. After about five minutes, the two hirelings breached the door. First a briefcase was transferred to the laundry cart in the hall from the hotel room. Then the alleged Richard Moreau was carried out and dropped into the laundry cart.

I followed behind the cart. One was in front, one was in back, and neither looked back. My shape shifting ability was rippling to match colors, so a faint outline would have been seen if they looked back. I was ready to freeze still when they did, but they never did.

I observed the thread-man rather than looking at his aura. He was still conscious. The hirelings didn’t seem to know the difference between a man who’s breathing when unconscious and when someone’s falsifying their breathing. I still had a power in reserve and I was determined to keep it in reserve.

They set a brisk pace, and I kept them in sight at about thirty paces. They wheeled Richard Moreau right off the back door and into a ramp. Aura sight, animation, shape shifting were my three powers, and I really wanted to keep one in reserve. I struck upon the perfect solution. I tied my cape to the handle on the right door, looping it around, so I wouldn’t fall off. My shape shifting ability isn’t as good as my invisibility ability because invisibility is invisible. Ultraviolet and infrared imaging will penetrate just as if nothing was in the way. With shape shifting, I’m eminently detectable by the naked eye, even if it’s just a faint ripple. On the other hand, I wanted to keep the power in reserve, so I occupied my time by meditating on what Samantha and Oliver were likely to do to me once I told them about this trip. That far outfaced any possible hazard I might encounter. I strained to hear what the people inside were saying.

“… Easy as pie…five G’s…finder’s fee.. precognitive. …didn’t see that coming. “

“..precog. .. the future. “Then another voice entered the picture. This one was a woman.

I acquired the gist of the conversation. Try doing better and see how difficult it is to eavesdrop upon a conversation with the cloak looped around the handle, and trying not to get squished while shifting.

They thought Richard Moreau was a precognitive, so they had kidnapped him. The task had been a cakewalk as far as they were concerned, and they were receiving five thousand dollars each as a finder’s fee. The “didn’t see that coming” was a jest at the expense of the precognitive. There were two crunchies and one lady boss. All three of them needed to catch a plane in five hours.

I was also noticing landmarks in the distance. We crossed the Washington Bridge, and some of the cars came close enough to touch my footwear. Then we went past a toll station into New Jersey. We passed a bunch of cars watching construction going on in New Jersey. Don't people in New Jersey have anything better to do?

I looked at my wristwatch to note the time. It was about half an hour before we stopped for a moment due to a traffic light, and then we stopped at a sign advertising Happy Acres Psychiatric Facility.

I unlooped the cape, and jumped off before remaining force could slam me against the doors. It didn't work as the doors opened outward and hit me with a thunk. I dropped and rolled under the truck

"Thought I heard something. "The first voice mumbled to himself. I saw two white pants with black shoes. There was also one with what appeared to be yellow trousers and yellow shoes. I mentally labeled her Yellow Shoes.

"Okay, you take this freak down to his new room. I will let him know his new patient has arrived. "Yellow Shoes informed her two flunkies.

The woman removed the briefcase and waited as the two large men picked up the duct taped Richard Moreau and put him onto a gurney. They cover him from the neck down with a sheet and started wheeling him through the hospital. She followed silently behind until they arrived at an elevator without any call buttons. The woman removed a key and used it on a lock where the button elevator call button would be.

“I will go inform the Doctor his patient has arrived, and don’t give Ivan a hard time”, She said walking down the corridor.

“So you wanna get dinner before the flight or after?”, The larger tough asked pressing a button.

“Lets get dinner in LA, I know this nice spot the Jaguar Grill, we might even get a shot at that asshole Omega”, he says his hand reflexively going to his crotch.

“Hey I was stoned, I thought if I could get him into one of the back rooms,” The larger tough said as the elevator doors opened.

“So what have we got here gentlemen, another freak for the doctor?” Ivan asked.

“Yea, a precog shouldn’t be tough like that light bitch”, the larger tough said nodding to his buddy.

Ivan lifted up a clipboard, and ran a ringer down it. “Room 536 is open, I have your fee’s once he is under lock and key. This way”, he said jangling his keys.

“Nope, easiest one yet. Aside from that light bitch and her ninja bitch friend, this was a cake walk.” The smaller tough said as they reached the door.

Ivan opened the door and the two toughs placed him on the bed. Ivan removed the duct tape and stripped him down to his underwear. The put on a Johnny and closed and locked the door. Ivan then pulled out to two packets from his pocket and handed one each to the men.

“Don’t spend it all in one place. Ill show you the way out.” He said heading back up the corridor.

The yellow outfitted woman set off on a brisk pace down the well-lighted hall. Following her was a sable-hued form. The power of Animation allowed him to take control of the videocameras in the hall so they would replace any camera which had his image with that of an empty hall looped over his brief appearance. He followed noiselessly after her.

"Proceed." Someone's voice crackled. She looked behind her, saw nothing and went into the elevator.

She pressed the button marked 4 and waited. The elevator music played until the elevator opened with a musical ding. She walked with purpose to an office marked Thomson with the plate on the door. She shut herself in the cubicle and then dialed a number on the hospital standalone computer network. The doctor's face appeared on the screen sitting at his mahogany desk.

"Patient acquired, doctor. He's a precognitive according to files. " The woman told the doctor. She hesitated for a moment.

"What's on your mind, Miss Thomson?" The doctor recognized a troubled conscience when he saw it.

"I understand that these freaks of nature must be eliminated, but why must we treat them for mental disorders? Wouldn't it be simpler to eliminate them entirely? "Miss Thomson inquired.

The first is ethics. We don't sweep our patients under the rugs like most institutions. We engage in active therapy so they may once again rejoin society without the traumatic event that triggers such a need to engage in vigilante activities. If we simply eliminated such disturbances in the manner suggested, it would be tantamount to vindicating such measures used by soi-disant supervillains".

“The second reason is that of reeducation. It is far more satisfying to know that a patient has been reformed and is actively trying to help others to reform. For the extreme cases, we engage the Isolation Ward in Grimlocke Sector. It is only for those unrepentant patients who will not and actively reform and those too dangerous to be left alone. If we lobotomized their brains, their power discharges will become random with no will to control it. The experiment on the Rubicon case proved the hazard hypothesis.”

“The third reason is that we are a psychiatric facility, not a technological torture chamber. I am a doctor who has taken the Hippocratic Oath. We are to do no harm. Turning live patients purposely into cadavers violates such an oath. Shall I go on?" The doctor inquired after his elaboration.

"Yes, but it's a terrible security risk with such lax measures. "The woman said firmly. "But I sincerely doubt handheld tasers will withhold these patients if we capture a particularly powerful specimen or one who has an ally and manage to liberate themselves from imposed confinement. "

"Very well. I understand in your resume you have worked in security evaluation before. . You are to work up scenarios which may involve the metahumans currently incarcerated for their own good and see how they may best be neutralized. Nonlethally optionally, but lethal options as well. "He added the last part as a rider.

She called up the database listing incarcerated patients and which had progressed to the point of therapy enabling them to enjoy such limited freedoms and those who hadn't progressed as much. The list was troubling. There were ten categories of vigilantes and villains, and Pantomime fit the type of a wizard, however limited he was in it's application.

The screen held the name of John Carrow. His mental disorder was that of delusion, believing he was the metahuman known as Pantomime. He also had violent tendencies and was an involuntary patient deemed a hazard to himself and society in general. He was currently on a program of medication and psychoanalysis. He was no threat until he figured out how to use his power more effectively.

She scrolled down to another patient. This was of a Susan Oakman . Her particular category was that of a Blaster/Psi using photons as her energy base. Her sister, Sharon Oakman was still at large, reputed to be working in California, also a Blaster/Psi. She and her team would be out before then. As Team Leader, she had the joy and duty of information retrieval on possible opposition. Sharon Oakman would undoubtedly help her sister if she learned of her fate. While Susan was able to manipulate light waves, Sharon could manipulate sound waves.

There was also someone named Samantha Tsien who was acquired in the operation. It had been a side effect as she wasn't a metahuman and was justifiably angered at being gassed, and imprisoned in an unknown location..

Her skills were unimpaired however. A student of different styles of martial arts, she had wounded Ivan and Anthony both before they managed to sedate her. The strike she had used was that of a knife strike to the head. Ivan had been lucky to avoid a concussion. Her other strike had been a kidney punch which had staggered Ivan before Tony had lifted her bodily off the ground and the nurse, Debbie, sedated her in the same movement. Tony had still been staggered by her follow through elbow strike, before she succumbed to the sedative.

Gold Team was engaged in evidence dispersal. By this time tomorrow, the clerk would have been found and the police would deem his murder to be suicide. The place would be wiped of DNA traces, and fingerprints, and the server would be relocated.

Thinning her oxygen intake to simulate arctic winds. Works every time. Derek thought. It would put her out for several hours at least. He withdrew his hands from the ceiling and dropped to look over the workstation. The ceiling retracted the columns that had been holding him above Miss Thomson. He had filled the last slot with telekinesis. The woman couldn't have visited the doctor personally, that would have been too easy, Derek grumbled a bit. Gloved fingers touch-typed rapidly on the keyboard. He eyed the map location of where Miss Tsien was incarcerated. Her acquaintance Miss Oakman was also on the register, and Miss Okaman was related to Sharon Oakman, better known as Mezmera.

The information database was too good to pass up. He took a ZIP disk of 220 MB from a pocket in his cloak. He then downloaded the database into his ZIP disk. The database contained not only the prisoners, but over three thousand cases of metahumans ranging from Abattoir to the Zebra.

2 Minutes to Download read the progress bar. He shifted into Miss Thomson's likeness and stored the unconscious body under the desk. The download was half finished when the screen flicked on. There was just enough room for the database without having to delete some of his school work.

"Rie present. We're all done here, sir. The evidence dispersal was textbook. All witnesses and traces of our presence has been erased. "

"Well done. "Derek said as briskly as Miss Thomson's manner indicated. The screen flicked off. The download was finished. He stored it in his cloak. The call had only taken three minutes. They may have suspected something, but they wouldn't be here in thirty minutes at the least . He patted Miss Thomson down and retrieved an identification card along with what appeared to be a handheld taser. He also took the opportunity to retrieve a printed map of the special wing and the report she had pulled up to print out, a categorization of superhumans. He also called up Richard Moreau, the precognitive had been captured. He had the same rating as Susan Oakman, so that was a medium precognitive. A dark-cloaked figure chuckled to himself with gibing mirth and vanished from the scene. He was off to a daring rescue. He would take the normal precautions. The elevator went down with a musical ding. The map printout read that the prisoners were located on the lowest floor accessible only by a key.

The cameras were recording an empty hall once more as he slipped silently along the hall. He took the elevator above an orderly who was escorting two enforcer types.

"Here's your plane tickets to California. Please don't miss the flight. "The orderly requested the two enforcers.

"Don't worry, Ivan, we got it in the bag. "The smaller guy grinned. Neither saw a dark-cloaked figure who crawled out of the elevator on the ceiling above them. He paused a moment to make sure whatever cameras were recording only saw the image of an empty hall.

He dropped to the floor and transformed, walking noiselessly among the corridor. He spied the thread-man again, only this time, he was fully covered in threads. The man was the one who had been carried away by suspected aliens. Wait, he was listed as a precognitive in the database Derek had hacked, not as a man wanted by aliens. It also made no mention of glowing green eyes and black skin?armor?whatever it was?

He wasn't here for him, he was here for Samantha. The last reports said she was sleeping off the effects of 30 mg of Sodium Pentathol. She had also wounded two orderlies named Ivan Vostek and Anthony Castapoulos. She was sedated by a Deborah Ratched. Hopefully, the man would only see a stray dog inside the hospital.

Carl lay on the small cot, waiting for Wedge to restore his neural functions. He had spent most of the past two hours in a semi conscious state. It was unreal how much Wedge had taken over, a little frightening as well.

Function restored. I have identified the woman from a clipping that was in Arthurs database.

Carl stood up, the cameras in the room were now under his and Wedges control. “Who is Arthur?” Carl asked as the nanites coated over his body.

Arthur Simons a friend of Tom Black, the Meta human that you had the sword fight with in the park, and the one you almost killed.

“You got him to help you, how did you manage getting around the directives?”, Tween asked curiously.

I didn’t, my directives are to keep myself safe and to obey you, his actions did not interfere with either directive. During your encounter with Mindshadow you told me to do it and do it now. That overrode any directive, since you were not specific as to what it was, I was free to act as I did.

“I see, and this Tom Black can be trusted?”

Yes, he is honorable. I also like him. I also have given him limited access to the base. Tween I know you’re a little angry but it was necessary.

“Yes I suppose, it was. You did what you had to, I will see if there is something we can do for Tom when we get Susan back. Now lets get moving.”

Tween moved to the door and with his hands outstretched he blew the door off its hinges.

“Holy shit you were not kidding about upgrades, “ He said as the door slammed into the far wall.

Floating a few inches off the floor, Tween moved down the corridor.

Derek counted off. Aura sight, shifting, telekinesis, and animation. Time to go to work. He scanned the corridor looking for one particular aura pattern. He found it as he loped down He seized control of the cameras in that particular hallway and turned at a corner. An orderly had come from the other side and took aim with a gun. His shot was accurate but sparked something and fell to the ground.

"Gather and analyze" The alien ordered. Something that looked like a spider dropped down from the ceiling and covered the dart. Then it retracted up and both vanished into the wall.

"Surrender or else. " Derek could still hear the voice. If he heard it, he would have to guess digital reverberation. An alien wouldn't use terrestrial technology. He smiled to himself inside as he skidded to a door and transformed back to his favored black outfit..

He saw three aura patterns with the attendant implications of their poses. He struck silently and quickly, as the door marked Operating Room unlocked by itself and flew open. With his other hand, he struck the nurse with a blow amplified by telekinesis. He lifted her clear off the floor, and she came down unconscious.

Derek didn't waste time on heroic declarations as the doctor had been about to make some kind of incision. A chop to the base of his neck sent the doctor stumbling forward, telekinesis dragging him along and his scalpel to miss as he toppled over the patient. The scalpel embedded itself into the operating table.

He whispered encouragement, as he waved a hand, and straps on the tables opened by them selves and dumped Sam off.

"Whoa. Still a little groggy from their medication," she stumbled against Derek, whom supported her.

"I came with a friend. Susan Oakman, she was really who they were after, because she's metahuman. "Sam's explanation was concise.

The dark man acknowledged it with a hiss. He then rasped some other things. Sam would have to make contact for him. Sam stole the nurse's identification and clothes. The dark man only stole the doctor's identification and keyrings.

"Security to the Involuntary Danger Wing. Security to the Involuntary Danger Wing. Patients are loose. Repeat patients are loose. "

"Maybe that lightning thrower will draw all the fire. "Derek muttered to himself, as they backed out into the hall.

"Dr. J Hamilton, Nurse Ratched, thank God you're here, there's a breakout in-..hey you're not... " Sam hit Anthony with a straight punch, and Anthony went down. She kicked him in the ribs for good measure and then smashed his head on the floor. She finished by kicking him in the groin.

"Done now. "Sam told the dark man. The dark man nodded as he added his own insult to the various injuries, stealing Anthony's airgun, identification, and keys. He also stripped the man of all his clothes.

"What kind of technique is that?" Sam whispered her incredulence. The dark man shook his head. They were still in hostile territory, outnumbered security force to two, three if they managed to find Sam's friend. He looked at his watch, the whole encounter had taken about ten minutes to get from the elevator to here. Twenty minutes to zero.

"The cameras.."Sam started. The dark man acknowledged and conveyed the fact that the hospital cameras were recording images of an empty hall. The man who had come had wanted to trap the lightning thrower between him and the other one that the lightning thrower had taken care of. Those spiderbot things had converged on the thread-man.

The sword spirit was not being used. A beneficial spirit by some accounts, able to boost someone's skill to slay, and only in real combat and would stay by a warrior's side so it could not be stolen.

He looked through the walls and saw auras in some of them. There was one other aura which had burst out. Except the aura was deteriorating as he looked. The life force was slowly being eaten away by the inside.

"That person's going to be dead if nothing's done about it. "Derek told Sam grimly. He ran, trusting in Sam's ability to keep up. Sam was still a little groggy, but she was maintaining Derek's pace easily.

Suddenly, she skidded right into the back of the lightning thrower or would have if someone's telekinesis hadn't halted her before she hit the energy shields.

"Arf!"

Tween stopped as a large orderly ran down the hallway with what looked like an air-powered rifle. He stopped and took aim and a small dart deflected of the energy shields and dropped to the ground.

“Gather and Analyze”, Tween said to one of the spider bots on the ceiling. It dropped down and recovered the dart and vanished into the wall.

“Surrender or else, “ Tweens voice reverberated.

“Screw you Freak!,” Ivan said firing several more times.

Tween covered the distance pulled the rifle out of Ivans hands and lifted him off the ground.

“Where is Susan Oakman!”, He said getting angry. Ivan started shaking, “I didn’t hurt her honest. Shes in room 453.”

He is lying Tween There is a man in 453, I have found Susan she is in room 503.

Tween carried the man down to the door marked 453 and then kept going. “Shes in 453, where are you going?” He said as he tried to punch Tween in the face.

Tween backhanded him, knocking him out cold. “Lying sack of shit.” He then pulled the door and frame out of the wall. Susan was against the far wall curled up in a ball. A beam of red energy lanced out and struck Tweens energy shields.

“Now Susan is that any way to treat a rescuer?” Tween said jokingly.

“Mr. Terrance?”, Susan said tentatively.

“Uh, no my name is Tween, but I know Mr. Terrance and he sent me to find you.” Tween said pulling off the blindfold and tearing the straight jacket off of her.

”Why the deception Tween?”, Wedge asked “She already knows about the nanocoating.”

“Just in case we encounter any other lying assholes”, Tween thought back.

“Have you seen Samantha? She is a friend of mine they grabbed us at the hotel”, Susan said franticly.

“No, but come with me, we will find her. Wedge anything?” Tween said stalking back up the corridor.

”Searching…this complex is huge Tween perhaps you should search that level I will continue to deploy Xardds. Sending Mafdet guardian to your location.”

A mechanical Panther stepped out of the wall in Tweens path. It turned toward Tween, “Defensive protocols initiated Tween” The Panther fell into step behind Tween and Susan.

“Who are you Tween? That is something out of science fiction, are you an alien?” She asked following behind, stumbling slightly.

“Susan we don’t have time right now to get into it, I am here to help.” Tween paused at the desk, and picked up a clipboard. He read the pages. “Says she is in 413”

”Empty Tween… still searching…Several of the people in the rooms on this floor are missing persons, John Carrow in 453 has been missing for several month.”

“Wedge look up Triavil, says they have been giving him daily doses.” Tween said aloud.

”It is an anti depressant drug, not used very much anymore because of the side effects.”

Susan had reached the desk, and stumbled and fell over. Her eyes flickered opened and shut, “The doctor, he….”, she reached for her neck and then passed out.

“WEDGE!, I need you, something is wrong with..” He pulled her hand away from her throat,” Good God!” Several nasty black and red lines radiated out from a single spot on her neck most going down under her shirt. Tween pulled her shirt down, most of her body was covered in black and red welts, there were several areas that had a silver sheen to them that seemed to be more normal.

Initializing beta avatar. Stand by.

“Susan is dying here Wedge we don’t have time, just send your,” Tween paused for a second, “Beta Avatar?”

A woman about twenty five appeared in the hallway with long flowing blond hair. She was well figured, and a sexy voice emanated from her. “Tween one moment while I adjust my structure.” For a moment her form melted and standing there was a silver skinned woman and then all the shapes flowed away into a black flowing mass.

“WEDGE!!,” Carl said panicked.

“That is my beta avatar, I had to move her from San Francisco, Chameleon was helping me interface with Arthur.” The form shifted to an exact duplicate of Tween. It began to examine Susan by touching her skin “I will attempt to halt whatever she is infected with, I have also analyzed the dart retrieved by the Xarrd, it appears to be a delivery system for a nasty nanobot construct.”

Tween appeared to be relaxed now that Wedge was examining Susan. “Anything?”, he asked.

“Tween she has been infected with the same nanobots that were in the darts, thirty eight percent of her body mass has been converted to nanomachines. It appears to feed on DNA strands. I am attempting to isolate them as well as keep Susan alive.”

Susan regained some consciousness as a form almost slammed into Tween. She saw that the person was Sam, “That’s Sam,” she said passing out again.

Sam looked over her shoulder and spoke to a small dog in the corridor “That’s Susan.” The dog barked once as if acknowledging her statement.

Tween stood up from the crouch, “Return all systems to security mode, and get Susan to the med chamber. Then do a sweep and see if anyone else on this floor is contaminated. Sam is it, we need to get you to a safe location, and rescue the rest of the people on this floor and call me Tween.”

The second Tween gently picked up Susan and walked through the wall. Several spider bots also disappears and appeared in one location off to the side of where Susan had been taken.

Tween looked at Sam, she was a striking looking young woman, Asian, about 25 and seemed fairly athletic at a glance. She wore her hair long, and brushed a stray strand of it out of her eyes as she studied Tween. She wore street clothes and she observed Tween unsure what to think about him.

Tween turned to walk down the corridor to free more of the Metas, when the elevator doors opened. Four large men in fatigues stepped out, they each had an assault rifle and several grenades. In back of them was someone setting up a machine gun on a stable platform.

Tween moved in front of Sam interposing his body in between her and the new menace.

The dog watched the lightning thrower as he moved to intercept the guns and grenades. Sam had already figured out what was going to happen, and leapt through the portal. Grenades and machine guns are serious trouble.

Only the dog and the thread-man remained. He knew that since Susan had been the first one searched out by the lightning thrower, he could have gone. An idealist, he had come back to free other metas.

Two directives echoed in his mind. One was to make sure that his identity stayed secret. The other directive was to make sure this guy didn’t get killed. He followed Sam after the portal and he watched the hallway on one side to divert any potential explosion from the inside.

He looked up and down both corridors and then looked back at Tween. Doors beeped and slid open wherever Derek had looked. Those cells now released the prisoners inside.

“We have a containment breach" one of the men in fatigues said into a headset, "Repeat we have containment breach!”

Tween drew the sword from his back, “I think it is you who should surrender.”

Then all hell broke loose, the gunfire from the machine guns echoed down the hall. Bullets richoched off of the energy shield surrounding Tweens body and were stopped cold leaving metal disks on the floor. Smoke began to fill the hall.

“Pull Back!” The leader said taking a step back and barely getting out of the way as the sword flashed inches from his face, the blade continued down and sliced through his gun like a hot knife through butter.

“Tween They are carrying the same guns that the orderly was using. What should I do with Samantha Tsien” Wedge asked through the mental link.

“I’m busy Wedge”, Tween said taking several more hits. Tween gritted his teeth, they were hitting hard and it was getting more painful as the bullets impacted his shields.

“ENOUGH!” Tween said releasing an electrical discharge down the hallway, dropping all of the men in the blast.

Derek yelped at the explosion lit the hallway and then went dark. The men were toppled like blowling pins. The ricocheting bullets had not come near him yet as the assailants had been focusing on the flying, black meta. That tended to garner more attention than a normal dog. He leapt through the portal, his aura sight showing him where to head.

One of the overhead lights flickered and went out, plunging the area into almost total darkness. Tween began searching the fallen men, and checking vitals. He removed their guns and the special dark pistols. He also took care to remove the clips of darts from the guns. In the darkness he could see several men and women emerging from the opened doors. Some were in straight jackets others blindfolded and handcuffed.

Tween then took the confiscated weapons and walked into the gateway. Arriving on the beach, he saw that Sam was lying on the beach with several spider bots around her. One of the panthers stood next to her.

“She is still heavily sedated, Tween I will bring her to the dome”, the alpha avatar said coming out of the trees. Tween examined the alpha avatar, it still unnerved him occasionally, and it was a design only a machine would have come up with. Wedge gently picked up Sam.

Derek looked around at the white beach and the different-colored sky. The spiderbots had all produced glowing energy weapons, until the lightning thrower walked into the gateway. The glowing energy weapons were still in evidence, but the spiderbots had now surrounded Derek. The spiderbots surrounding Sam and a panther was guarding it from Derek.

“She is still heavily sedated, Tween, I will bring her to the dome. “The squid thing came out of the trees. It was a very small forest. The squid thing picked up Sam.

Derek batted the glowing energy pistols aside, and trotted over to the squidlike form. He barked at it interrogatively, and seemingly satisfied by the bark, followed the squid, making sure Sam wouldn’t be out of his sight.

She was on sodium pentathol in a currently friendly base. Sodium pentathol was also known as truth serum, and he had no idea what she had told the doctor and the nurse, or why they had been prepared to perform an operation on a perfectly healthy human being.

“Ok, keep an eye on her dog, and give it some water. I am heading back to check on the other metas they may have incarcerated. When you get a second get me a phone connection to the local authorities”, He stepped back through the flowing curtain.

Seeing several people milling about in the lighted area farther down the hall. Tween moved into the light and there were some gasps and a ripple of fear washed down the hall.

“I'm here to help you, my name is Tween, the authorities will be here shortly, please remain calm and if you have any issues please bring them to my attention.” The small crowd seemed to relax a little; one of the men in a straight jacket approached him.

“Scuse me, Tween is it could you remove this straight jacket? Names is John, but some people call me Pantomime. They have been giving me injections, making me see things. They grabbed me a couple of months ago, must have followed me home.” There was sadness to him; as if part of him had been stripped away.

“Sure”, Tween said shredding the straight jacket. John aka Pantomime flexed his hands, “Oh man, that feels so good.” He offered his hand to Tween, “Thanks man, I will keep order here, you go get that god dam doctor.

“Phone connection established, I will relay”, Wedges voice said in Tweens mind.
“Doctor? One second,” he said as John started to speak, “Hello, this is Special Agent Tween, I have a situation here on these premises. There are several dozen people being held against their will as well as machine guns and grenades and a possible Bio-agent. If you need to confirm my identity contact the NSA and tell them Agent Tween needs a code 9 for operation ferret.”

“We will send a car to your location.” The woman on the other side of the line said.

“You do that.”, Carl watched as Pantomime started freeing the other metas, by using imaginary bolt cutters and cutting off handcuffs or pantomiming cutting the blindfolds off.

“I will keep the line open, there are several people leaving in a hurry.” Wedge informed him.

“Let the cops deal with it, look for the computers, we need to get as much information as possible”, Tween thought back.

“Ok folks the stairs are here down the hall to the left, the police should be here any minute.”, Tween said forcing the emergency door open. He headed up the stairs to find the man responsible.

"Ok, keep an eye on her dog, and give it some water. I am heading back to check on the other metas they may have incarcerated. When you get a second get me a phone connection to the local authorities."The meta identified as Tween spoke to his mechanical squid. He stepped back through through the door. Derek could see the hallway past the door, even when the door had rippled as Tween passed through it.

He let no emotion show through his canine visage. One of the Tendrils from Wedge had swung over to what appeared as a refrigerator, and came back with a bowl of water that had appeared in the compartment inside.

On the face of the matter, it appeared as if the water was safe to drink. His sight had shown no intentional deceit in Tween's aura. With the squid, it was a little hard to tell, as his aura sight couldn't seem to decide whether Wedge was alive or not. There were brief and strong flickers of the telltale flux, but then it vanished. He nudged the bowl over to where Sam was being carried by the squid. The squid hadn't put her down. He settled the bowl between his paws and watched the squid while drinking the cold, crisp water.

A second Tween had placed Susan in a plastic or thick glass box, which had been off to the right upon entering. One of its hands appeared to be inside Susans chest. A clear liquid solution began filling up inside the box. The second Tween then placed a mask over her nose and mouth. The liquid filled up to several inches below the top and the second Tween removed its hand.

Tween stepped out of the portal into an office. Off to one side was a computer workstation three spiderbots were examining it.

The three spiderbots waited until Tween sat down at the terminal before two disappeared in crackles of blue energy. The third positioned itself on Tweens shoulder.

“Hi, I see you found a computer. I take it you want to learn?” Tween asked the small spiderbot.

“Yep, Wedge has been teaching me, but you made all of us”, The Xarrd replied sounding like a munchkin on helium.

“Yes, he says there are a couple in a locked room several doors down.” The bot said in his munchkin voice.

Carl powered down the PC and disconnected the connections. Lifting the desktop PC he found that it was secured to the desk with a length of cable and a lock.

“Son of a,” He swore noticing the security lock to prevent theft and opening of the case. Carl unplugged the computer and all the power from the wall, he positioned the monitor and desktop in the center. He then noticed the desk was attached to the wall. “That’s not going to work.”

The spider bot hopped down and used a small cutting laser and burned the cable into two pieces. Tween then hefted the desktop and walked back into the gateway.

“Wedge get a scan of this and replicate me an exact copy,” he said placing the desktop into the replicator. The alpha avatar connected into the replicator.

“Scan complete, remove it I also have the two servers to scan as well, the authorities are almost here Tween.”

Tween removed the desktop and returned it to its desk, looking at the two pieces of the cable, “Can’t be helped I guess.”

Several spider bots dropped down, and rethreaded the cable. Bringing the two ends together, they began working. “We will have this fixed in a jiffy boss, don’t worry about it,” one of them said imitating a gangster.

“Now that would be telling boss, we have to have some secrets”, one of the bots joked.

“Tween I have the two servers replicated, and returned to their rack mounts. The authorities have arrived. There are four draughtsmen with them.” Wedge informed Tween.

“Wonderful, ok clear out the bots, and wait for my signal. Lets go meet the cavalry ”, Tween sighed.

Tween opened the door and walked into the hall. A man wearing a doctors garb walked towards him with one hand behind his back. “You dam Meta’s always causing trouble, always interfearing, well your time is about to be cut short.” He said leveling a gun on Tween, it appeared to be a higher powered version of the dart guns Tween had seen earlier.

The man pulled the trigger several times, without more than a hiccup sound several darts ricocheted off the shielding and fell to the floor. Tween took two steps and in a fluid motion drew the katana.

The man fired several more times, completely ineffective as that gesture was. Tween advanced on the man. He knocked the gun out of his hand and put the sword point against his chest.

Tween dragged the doctor out to the waiting authorities. One of the two draughtsmen approached him, after ordering the other to stand down.

“Tween, we just keep running into each other. Your done here, we are taking over this investigation. Now go sit in the van and we will wrap this mess up you made.”

“Fine, I have other things to deal with.”, Tween said pushing the doctor towards the police. “This man has a lot to answer for, there are a number of people inside who can use some real medical attention” Tween said walking to the van.

Once the draughtsmen and police cleaned up the mess, and were not paying attention. Tween vanished and returned to his bubble.

Derek took in his surroundings. The woman identified as Susan Oakman was completely submerged in an unidentified transparent liquid. This was a cul-de-sac, there was no exit, except the silver curtain. There was a battle out there, and the first Tween hadn't returned. This would be his likely exit route.

It would be better to have an edge on his new acquaintance. Susan Oakman was fading but she appeared to be stabilizing, so that would make it a stasis chamber. The mechasquid appeared to be watching Derek. The spiderbots went merrily about whatever they were doing. A second Tween had apparently submerged it's hands inside her chest, in a position that would gave have definitely got it slapped, even if it was a brief period of time.

If he needed an escape route, killing the technology would get them all blown up. He looked around to find a more preferable means of egress. If he really, really had to, he could probably activate the curtain but he had no way to fix it's destination. They could wind up in the middle of a star. He looked for a computer terminal. Instead, he found jagged arcs of electricity, what looked like an operating table for computer parts, and some other things that belonged straight out of Frankenstein.

Carl sat on one of his chairs in the bubble examining a schematic of one of the nano-virus nanobots. Carl decided whomever had made them was sick and twisted. Wedge had finally stabilized Susan, and her friend Sam would wake up shortly. After dealing with the authorities, Carl had returned to check on the copies of the servers and desktop the doctor had in his office.

Carl setup the desktop and the servers, they were copies at the quantum level the data would be an exact match to the original systems.

Carl and Wedge broke into the servers and the desktop with relative ease, breaking the passwords on the files however took a bit more time.

“Wedge, find Omega and forward a copy of the file to Old Glory.” Tween said reading a list of names.

Susan had regained conciseness a few hours before, and was out on the beach taking a walk with her friend Sam. The dog had gone with Sam and left Wedge and Tween alone in the bubble.

“Tween I have found him, he is currently being loaded onto an ambulance on route to Los Angels Memorial Hospital.” Wedge replied.

“We need to make sure, get Susan in here, I may need her help. Find that ambulance and intercept it and put the gateway in its path” He said.

“I need your help Susan, I am sending Sam and her dog home.”, Tween said pressing some buttons on the control pad. Sam and her dog appeared in Sam’s apartment.

“That takes care of that, Now we are expecting company on the south beach in about 30 seconds. I need you to help me if things get dicey, Wedge will assist us.”

The dog blinked. One minute it was in a different dimension, the next it was in Sam’s apartment. The dog looked around, and searched for telltale signatures of electricity that marked technology. He killed it. He also killed the television, the computer, the lights, the microwave and, an alarm clock . As he shifted back into his dark cloaked form, his only thought was…

The ambulance sped down the road siren blaring. The two techs in the back and the driver rushed to save Omega. They drove towards the nearest hospital, Washington Medical Center.

“We are almost there,” The driver shouted. He of course knew they were to far and would more than likely not make it.

As the Ambulance sped down the road it slowed down for a moment to avoid a car in the high-speed lane. The next thing they skidded to a stop on sand.

“Holy shit, where the hell are we”, the driver said trying to gun the ambulance.

The back door opened and a black humanoid form stepped into the back of the ambulance.

The form moved closer to Tom and green beam flowed over scanned him. “Hes not infected, but he is dying Tween”

There was a short pause, and a man with dark hair stepped into view, “Ok you two I need you to take Omega to UCLA, and keep it quiet as to who he is. My friend here is going to take his place and we are going to the VA hospital.”

“We can’t do…” The woman said as her vision blurred for a moment and they were standing just inside the emergency room of UCLA. Her partner looked over across from the other side of the gurney

After they had turned over Tommy Champion to the Doctors, they both had a chance to talk “I wont say anything if you don’t”

“This is Frank Dascow with the Halcor board of directors.” The man was smiling and it was evident in his voice.

Arthur cut him off saying “Yes Mr. Dascow, I recognize your name from the Halcor annual report. What can I do for you today?” He had fielded a hundred calls of this sort from several of the companies he had significant ownership of. Halcor was one of them.

Halcor had opened their doors in 1984 as a medical research facility. Over the years they had diversified and began manufacturing biotech materials in 1993. Arthur purchased five percent of their stock in 1995, as an aggressive move to boost his holdings. As luck would have it, it was just on the doorstep of a several billion dollar contract thrown their way. Their stock had gone through the roof and he had used some of his significant earnings to purchase another ten percent of the company. This placed him at a comfortable fifteen percent ownership level of a company who seemed just on the verge of breaking though with some very cutting edge materials.

Frank continued “Mr. Simmons, we’ve just found out that a very lucrative offer has been packaged to buy out Halcor. As such, the Board has asked me to call all significant shareholders together for a meeting in Los Angeles. Of course, we will pay to fly you here and take care of all lodging arrangements.”

Arthur sighed, but inwardly was excited, the sale of Halcor could mean another significant gain. “When’s the meeting?” he asked.

“It’s this coming weekend. You may vote by proxy of course.” Frank offered helpfully. “I’d be happy to fill you in on the details.”

No way was he falling for that. Guys like Frank loved proxy votes, it allowed them to spin the details in whatever direction they wanted.

“No, that’s alright,” He responded “Just send me the flight details.” He could almost see Franks face droop in disappointment.

The soft glow from the monitor reflected sharply off of the man’s glasses, the tiny words flickering across the screen as quickly as his mind could absorb their meaning. A cup of hot tea sat next to him bearing the Hyatt Regency logo, with a spoon resting gently across the back of the saucer it was balanced on. Arthur took the cup in both hands and sipped from it, the steam rising in curls and blowing across his forehead. His eyes never left the glowing screen in front of him, board meetings or not, this was, after all, his passion.

He had logged onto the ‘metaboard’ website about 20 minutes ago and was reading through the days posts with great enthusiasm. The ‘metaboard’ was one of the few actually reliable sources on the net to learn about what was happening in the world of metahumans, and it was the first site in his list of bookmarks.

Arthur lived on the fringes of the spandex clad world, a lucky purchase in an auction afforded him a few luxuries not available to the average person. He could fly, and the material the pixie suit was made of was extremely durable, but underneath it all, he was as spongy soft as the next guy. Not like the real metas out there, not like his friend Tom.

As a result of being semi super powered, but a fledgling at best, Arthur was fascinated with what he considered ‘the real thing’, Heavy hitters like Omega and the Brickyard. It was this fascination that led him to the ‘metaboard’. This site was different than most of the boards he had found in the online ethers, it required membership, and only allowed viable posts. Although it was unclear by what method the posts were validated, the information tended to be somewhat accurate in most cases. The ‘metaboard’ members didn’t have to worry about sifting through the dozens of faked nude photos of Blur, or the numerous claims that Knockout was actually a man. The ‘metaboard’ was the New York Times of hero web sites.

So there he sat, in the halflight provided by glowing phosphor, sipping his tea and mentally devouring the posts.

“hmmnn…” he said to no-one in particular as he scanned a post about the protectorate, “nothing interesting in that…another Smax! interview…hold the phone, what’s this?”

The post was only a few hours old, sent by a netizen calling himself “The orderly” - that was the problem with meta sites, the people who posted on them always seemed to have handles that suggested they themselves were heroes. The post was sparse, but it read:

used force fields that were about two millimeters thick: very thin, very distinctive. But the bulk of the damage to The Nebraskan came from repeated blows to the back of his cranium, resulting in two skull fractures. These fractures are consistent with blows delivered by someone with superhuman strength. Unfortunately, there’s significant swelling in the brain, and no signs of higher brain function at present.”

“Holy shit!” Arthur exclaimed. “Lights” He spoke aloud to the voice recognition system “50%” and the lights in his room came on and adjusted themselves to half illumination. Grabbing the phone he pressed speed dial and called his friend Tom.

The clock read 2:15 as Tom Black rolled over to the phone without opening his eyes. “This better be fucking important.” He growled through a sleep filled daze into the phone.

Tom threw an arm over his eyes, blotting out the remnants of light peeking through his blinds from a streetlight outside. “I thought you were in L.A.?” he said, sounding more exhausted than truly pissed off.

“I am, that doesn’t matter” Arthur brushed aside Toms question and continued, “Omega’s hurt.”

“What?” Tom said, half sitting up to rest on an elbow. The shock of the news roused him from his daze and he opened his eyes.

“I’m not exactly sure what happened, but I read on the metaboard web site that he’s been hospitalized with multiple lacerations and a fractured skull.”

“He’s hurt really bad.” Came the response “He’s in a coma, they’re not sure if he’ll make it through the night.”

“They’re not sure, but they do know one thing - the damage done to his craniu- uh - skull, appears to have been caused by superhuman strength.”

“- - The guy’s still out there and may want to finish the job.” Tom finished soberly. His mind was racing. “Do they know where he’s being held?”

“I’m sure someone knows, but the papers are simply saying he’s being held in a Veterans Facility someplace here in L.A.”

Arthur took a sip from something on the other end of the phone and continued, “They’ve probably made the same conclusion we have, so they’re covering up where he’s really being held for his protection.”

Tom nodded in the darkened room. “That makes sense. Think there’s any way to find out where he really is?”

“I’m already on it, trying to contact the guy who made the post on the site. He hasn’t written me back yet though. I’ll call you as soon as I find anything.”

“Doubtful.” Arthur said with a smile on his face that came through in his voice. “smell ya later.”

“Later.” Tom said hanging up the phone. He lie in bed, but sleep would not come as his mind raced through possibilities of who would want to take down the Nebraskan. The list was long, but those capable of hammering the big man into a coma, that list wasn’t quite so long.

Arthur hung up the phone and continued to scroll through the information on the metaboard site. He scanned the user profile of the orderly. There wasn’t much useful there, favorite hero, hobbies, how often he scanned the web for hero news – typical BS questions. The personal information was sparse, but he had decided to let the world know that his name was Randy. It was a start.

The normally law abiding, blond haired Arthur made a choice that night to engage in some computer crime. It was, after all, for a good cause, so the ends justified the means.

He did a little online research and in minutes found out the metaboard was hosted by a web company in Iowa called Terrecom. Then using that information, he hacked his way into their server and located their database of user posts. He scanned the records until he found what he sought. Since the metaboard was so picky as to the validity of their users posts, they would frequently ban users who habitually posted false information. To avoid that same user returning under a different name, the metaboard kept a record of the ip addresses associated with each post and would ban not only user id and password use, but would further block an attempt to re-register if it came from the offending address. In order to protect the validity of their posts, they made certain that each member knew this fact. It was rudimentary security to be certain – a scare tactic at best, but good enough to stump the average user with a static IP address. Arthur scribbled down the address that was tagged to the orderly’s post and smiled at his own cleverness.

Logging off of Terrecom, Arthur used the information he had gleaned from their site and hacked his way into the server associated with the ip he had found. He caught two lucky breaks. First: it seemed the orderly was not a fan of AOL or any of the larger national internet service providers. The orderly used a local company to connect himself to the internet. Second: that company was located right here in Los Angeles. Arthur again smiled to himself and sipped his tea as he scrolled through their user logs for the evening. There it was, 10:19 pm, a Mr. Randy Knowles had logged on and had visited 9 websites before logging off at 11:34 pm. Further research showed that Mr. Knowles or “the orderly” lived in the suburbs of Los Angeles at 129 Herron Drive, Apartment C. He was delinquent with his cable bill this month. A quick trip to mapsonline.com and Arthur had a map to the guys front door.

“Bingo!” Arthur said, standing up, “I could so be a stalker!” He logged off and shut down his computer while he finished the last swallow of his tea. It was three o’clock in the morning but he was pumped up with the adrenaline rush from his victory and decided to pay Randy Knowles a visit.

The Pixie suit tugged lightly across Arthur’s belly each time the wings flapped, the durable material stretching and contracting as he moved through the night sky heading towards Herron Drive. It was a typically warm L.A. evening, and his heart pounded with the excitement of a first date over what he was doing. He was in the middle of something for once, this time, it was him winging off to be the hero, not Tom. Tom would come later.

The buildings whipped along below him as he approached Blalock Apartments at Herron Drive “A place you can call home”. He had no way of knowing which apartment was Randy’s. So he did what any red blooded pixie suit wearing American would do – he wandered into the building and checked the doors. He quickly found “C” and was happy that no-one came home while he stood in the hallway dressed in spandex. In the harsh light of the fluorescents overhead, he suddenly felt very exposed. He considered knocking on the door but decided that wouldn’t be dramatic enough, he wanted to make an impact. He quickly ducked back outside the apartment building and took to the air once again. His wings carried him to the second floor window of the apartment and he threw the bedroom window open and flew into the darkened room.

He careened into something with a loud crash and rolled to a crouching position seemingly unhindered. A light clicked on, and somewhere outside, a dog barked at the unexpected disturbance to his canine slumber.

“What the hell? Who the fuck are you?!” asked Randy as he squinted in the light from his bedside table.

Arthur looked toward the bed from a semi crouched position and saw the orderly, not much to speak of as he jammed his black rimmed glasses onto his face. His hair was a tangled brownish mass and his mouth was wide as he gawked at the purple figure before him.

Arthur scowled and rose to a standing position “No, I’m not a chick!” he snapped to the sleepy man.

“Well, what the fuck are you doing in my apartment?” he asked. Arthur noted he seemed to be reaching for something under the near side of his bed.

Randy laughed “You got that right, girly man!” he removed an aluminum baseball bat from under the edge of his bed and said “Now, I think it’s time you left, before I go Babe Ruth on your purple ass!”

Arthur felt totally ridiculous. Here he stood, just after his big entrance, with some sleep-riddled geek threatening him with a baseball bat. This was not the way it was supposed to happen, but, since he hadn’t wowed this yahoo with his smooth flying act, he decided it was time to change tact.

“Woah, calm down big fella.” Arthur said. “I just wanna ask you a few questions.”

Randy had the confused look of a man who had been awakened at 3:30 in the morning and had no idea what was going on, so Arthur continued.

“I saw your post about Omega, I want to know where you got your information, it couldn’t have been easy to come by.” He added this last bit to play up to the mans sense of pride, and it worked, Randy sat up in his bed with a smile on his face and propped the bat against the mattress.

Arthur turned beet red “I’m not a butterfly, I’m a pix – It doesn’t matter!”

Randy chuckled, sensing Arthurs insecurity about his costume. “Whatever man.” He yawned and rose from his bed. He wore a pair of bright red pajama pants with little blue and white dogs on them and a matching top. Arthur thought about making a comment, but refrained and instead noted “You got up rather fast.”

“Yeah, it comes with the job.” He paused and looked at Arthur “Orderly?” he said, as if he were talking to a mildly retarded person. Arthur simply nodded and Randy continued into the kitchen.

“Yeah, when you work hours as odd as mine, you learn to get all the sleep you need in small naps.” He pulled down a can of coffee and dumped a few scoops into the back of an ancient looking coffee maker. “Coffee?” he offered.

“Suit yourself.” He put the tin back in the cupboard and continued “So, you want to know how I know about Omega?”

“Oh ho!” Randy said, pushing his glasses back on his nose “That’s privileged information.” He said this obviously trying to make himself feel more important than he was.

Arthur rolled his eyes this was getting old fast. Randy’s arrogance was slightly maddening. “You seem fairly at ease with a super standing in your kitchen.” Arthur observed.

“That’s because I know who all the supers are, and I don’t know you. That means you’re just some freak in a costume.” Randy said smugly as he sat in a chair at the dusty kitchen table.

Arthur had had enough of this and stepped into the man. He grabbed him with one hand by the lapels of his pajamas and lifted him from his seat. “I’m a bit more than that!” He said menacingly.

“All right, all right!” Randy said, a bit surprised at the display of strength the pixie man had just displayed.

Arthur set him back down on his chair and said “Now, Omega. What’s the story?”

Randy smoothed his pajama coat and began “Well, he came in pretty beat up just yesterday – today if you haven’t gone to sleep yet. I mean, he wasn’t exactly on my rounds, but I did sneak a peek. I mean, this is Omega after all.”

“He was really fucked up, his vitals were pretty weak. I remember there was a lot of blood, but they cleaned him up and did their best to help him. Man I wonder who did that to him?”

“Yeah, anyway, they moved him to a private room, and they put a ton of cops around him. You couldn’t get within a hundred yards of him without some donut muncher stopping you for a urine sample and proof that you had reason to be there. Later in the day, some of the pigs left, but they still had him under close watch. The hospital brass won’t let anyone near him.” Randy rose from his seat and filled a cup with the now ready coffee. “You mind grabbin’ the cream from the fridge for me?” He asked.

Arthur opened the refrigerator and pulled out an opened carton of half and half and handed it to the man. “So, go on.” He said.

“No way man!” Randy said “I really like this job, and I’m not jeopardizing it any more than I already have. Besides, how do I know you aren’t with the guy who beat up Omega?”

“Because if you don’t tell me, I’m gonna be the guy who beats you up.” Arthur said trying to sound more serious than he probably was.

Randy gulped and did just what Arthur suspected he’d do, he buckled like a belt and blurted out “Washington Medical Center!”

Randy just nodded in silence. “Relax Randy, I’m not going to hurt you.” Arthur stood up and patted the man on his shoulder. “Thanks for the information and enjoy your coffee.” With that, Arthur happily left the Orderly’s apartment and flew back to his place.

A few hours later and he had a map of the hospital printed from his computer. He located the critical care ward on the third floor and surmised that this was the only place Omega could be kept and cared for. He had the pieces of the puzzle, it was time to call Tom.

The phone rang again at 6:15 in the morning and Tom Black rolled over crankily for the second time. He had managed to drift in and out of sleep for the past four hours and had mixed feelings about the ringing little beast next to him. On the one hand, the mattress called seductively, and on the other, he remembered the call from Arthur. He shrugged off his sleep and picked up the phone.

Arthur e-mailed me a copy of the hospital map and filled me in on his little adventure with Randy the night before. I laughed inwardly at the scenes as they played out in my mind, but I had to admit, I was impressed with his ability to track the information down so quickly. I called the office, faking a cough and freed my day up to head to L.A. and Washington Medical Center.

Tween sighed, everything was set, Tommys father had been informed of the true information and what had happened. His father seemed to take it all in that people wanted to kill his son and revealed nothing. Not that the phone call revealed much in itself.

Wedge was now set as the bait, and perhaps these meta haters would show up to be arrested. Daze was stationed in the hall with several other officers, who thought this was the real Omega.

“Gentlemen, we have an opportunity here to strike a blow against the one meta who has caused us so much difficulty.” The woman said to the figures around the table. All of them were in disguise and wore signature colors.

“Miss Raven, why should we commit resources to removing Omega, he doesn’t have his powers and at the moment is a laughing stock. The only reason he has stayed alive this long is shear luck.”

“Its not important, at least we have Omega in a position were we can finish the job. I will send a team over to deal with Mr. Bradley once Omega is taken care of.” Mr Plum said.

“Again gentlemen we are off topic, can I get authorization to deploy agents to eliminate Omega?” The woman in yellow said.

The assembled men all nodded, “Very well We know where he is being held, I will send the agents immediately to deal with him, and this will also send the message we have been wanting to send, That Metas need to be eliminated.”

The three men, who entered into 129 Herron Drive, in the early morning were not there long. They however left in a hurry. The coroner would later report that Randy Knowles had been killed execution style, from multiple gunshots to the back of the head. His computer had been trashed beyond recognition.

For the second time in my life, I found myself winging over the streets of L.A. Unfortunately, this time, my mood was significantly more sober. Gone was the adrenaline rush of a sparring match with Nebraska's golden boy. This time, I was here to see if there was anything I could do to help out.

Oh, I doubted that I could just pop in and announce myself as the guy who trashed Tommy's beach house. If I wanted to avoid confrontation, I'd probably be better served just waiting and watching for anything out of the ordinary - No small task when ones query is an entire hospital.

I approached the building and circled it once trying to find a suitable place to recon from. I didn't see anything promising, so I decided a wise course would be to use my anonymity. Simply put, I'd head into the coffee shop and see what I could see while sipping a cuppa joe.

I flew low over the parking garage and teleported onto the 4th floor. My feet made contact with the pavement and I took a step to steady my balance at the same time willing my costume to be replaced with a pair of faded blue jeans and a white linen shirt. I glanced around to make sure that no-one had noticed my transformation. I was lucky and the floor was deserted. The map that Arthur had sent me showed a connector bridge to the main hospital on the third floor of the garage, so I headed down the steps to the third floor and began my walk across the parking garage.

My covert entry was brought to a halt when an explosion echoed through the garage from the first floor. "So much for subtlety." I muttered to no one in particular at the same time willing my costume back into existence and increasing my density to match something on par with a mid sized automobile.

The explosion was marked shortly thereafter by the sound of squealing tires as a series of three vans careened up the ramp to the third floor. The vans came to a screeching halt in front of the connecting bridge and several men leaped from the first van. They wore camouflage pants and black t-shirts and looked like some sort of paramilitary group. Each man had a Rambo-style knife strapped to his upper thigh, and they appeared to be fairly heavily armed. They hadn't noticed me yet so I took up a position between them and the bridge and stood there intimidating.

One of the men looked up, apparently happy with the securing of his gear. He began tapping the guy next to him, never taking his eyes from me however. His friend glanced at him, and then followed his gaze to me. He locked eyes with me and sneered saying "I expected we'd find a freak like you here, but fuck it, the more the merrier." He bared his teeth then, half in a mocking grin, half in a snarl and leveled a pistol at me. It appeared to be some sort of high powered gas weapon, as it was connected via a rubber hose to what looked like an oxygen tank that was strapped to the mans back. He pulled the trigger on his weapon and fired a small dart at me.

Surprisingly, the dart penetrated my skin and left a gash about a quarter of an inch in my skin from its impact. The dart was mechanical in nature and as I glanced at it, I noticed it move as it injected something into me. "Aaaah!" I said, wincing in pain. I slapped the dart from my body and it clattered to the ground and came to rest against the dirty wall of the garage. I had no idea what was in the dart, but it felt like fire in my arm. I could feel the material spreading through my veins, in a bolt of pain moving up my arm. The flesh around the wound from the dart began to turn black, and my vision swam. Little did I know that the tiny nanites were replicating themselves inside of me. Turning my DNA, my blood cells, the very fiber that makes me Tom Black into more killing machines.

I fell to the ground, and the man lowered his weapon, smiling broadly. "Good bye freak!" he said, spitting at my helpless form.

I began to see stars, and then something happened. Unconsciously, my body fought back. Call it magic, call it energy, call it damn lucky ju-ju, but my ability to transform materials became more than a convenience suddenly. The nanites began to encounter something that they hadn't expected in my body. They began turning back into blood. One by one, faster than I could have ever willed it, they were washed over in a wave of energy that cured me of whatever was in the dart. My vision cleared, and I watched as the tear in my skin began to heal itself. I rose from the ground then and turned to face the back of the fleeing man. I cleared my throat loudly and he turned, raising his pistol again.

"Not this time Sparky." I said, unleashing a blast of chi energy into the man and knocking him over the low wall of the parking garage. I wasn't sure what he landed on, but I knew that a drop from 3 stories would not feel too good.

I took a step after the fleeing men when I heard footfalls behind me. I turned in time to see the butt of a rifle as it slammed into my jaw. I staggered back a few steps, more in surprise than anything else, as 10 more men exited the remaining vans. The nearest one, a Latino with a crew cut that rivaled any boot camp sergeant held the rifle he had struck me with proudly. An older man among the group then spoke up "Rodriguez, why don't you, Harris and Blakely show our new friend what the future holds in store for metas who seem unaffected by our little potion."

"No problem boss!" the man Rodriguez answered and he was joined by two more men who took up positions on either side of me. The rest of the men headed into the hospital, with the older man giving me a mock salute as he crossed the bridge.

I recovered from the surprise the rifle butt had delivered and addressed Rodriguez "You sure you want to do this?"

He answered by squeezing the trigger of his automatic. Before the bullets could strike me, I teleported behind him and took a hold of his arm. The uncontrolled machine gun fire walked across the deck of the garage and struck one of his friends twice, once in the upper thigh and once in the stomach. He went down like a sack of bricks, dropping the weapon he was holding. I wrenched the mans arm in an upward motion and heard a dull pop followed by a shout as his shoulder came out of socket and dislocated. I threw him against the wall and his head struck the concrete rendering him unconscious.

The last man, stunned to see his friends dispatched so quickly raised his weapon and fired upon me. The bullets struck me and flattened against my body in burning hot disks of lead. I raised a hand and a bolt of energy flew to the man, knocking him from his feet and into a Range Rover parked nearby. He struck it hard enough to break one of the windows and slumped to the ground in a heap.

I looked to the wounded man, he was unconscious, but his chest rose and fell regularly. Since he was already at a hospital, I assumed he would be just fine.

Seeing no additional attackers, I headed for the bridge and the hospital within.

Daze stood outside the room containing the false Omega surrounded by several hospital security guards and local policemen. The men were all vying for her attention and generally making fools of themselves. Some of the men tried to amuse her with jokes, some tried to wow her with scars from shootouts in the inner city, and all of them placed her very much in the center of their attention. She was enjoying the attention at first, but it was becoming uncomfortable now, so she decided to excuse herself.

She slipped between the men in uniform and headed down the hallway, around the corner, and to the elevators. She rode the elevator to three and unknowingly passed a carload of camouflaged men riding the opposite elevator up as she descended to the third floor.

She exited the elevator and walked in a roundabout way to the cafeteria, following the signs on the wall when she got lost. Little did she know that her longer route, lead her around the camouflaged dressed men entering the hospital.

She arrived at the cafeteria and got in line to buy a cup of coffee. She exited the line and raised the Styrofoam cup to her lips as she headed toward a table. Looking over the rim of the cup, she couldn't believe what she saw. There in the hallway outside the cafeteria was the black and blue meta from Central Park. He strode down the hallway toward the elevators very purposefully. He appeared to be looking for someone, and the people he passed all retreated into their offices.

"No way." She said to herself, setting her coffee down on the nearby table. So his bastard was after Omega this time. She had watched him assault Tween in New York and knew that a helpless Omega was no match for this guy. "Not on my shift." She said aloud, heading toward the man, who still hadn't noticed her.

Tom had just stopped at the elevator, and thumbed the up button when a voice sounded from his left.

He turned to tell the interloper that this was an emergency, but the words never made it from his lips. Suddenly, the world was gone, swept away in a bright flash of white light before his eyes.

“Son of a -” His comment was cut short as a small fist struck him under the jaw. The impact didn’t phase him, but it was enough to really piss him off.

“I don’t know who you are,” he offered, “But you just fucked up bigtime!” He punctuated his comment lashing out toward where the voice came from he heard a slight yelp and felt his fist clip someone, it felt like in the arm. There was a shuffling noise as she caught her balance and regained her footing, and then she was at him again, this time, he felt a foot kick him in the stomach. ‘At least she wasn’t going for the family jewels’, he thought. Her voice was familiar, but he couldn’t quite place it. The world began to return, he could make out vague shapes, a small one was in front of him, and slightly off to his left. She was smart, she wasn’t talking and allowing him to find her with sounds. He decided to play along with her and he swung wildly in front of himself, intentionally missing her as his vision continued to sharpen. She struck him in the ribs then, a one two punch that bounced off of his body.

“Why are you attacking me?” he asked as she moved back in front of him. She chanced an answer.

“Because I know the way you like to play! Hitting someone while they’re down!”

It came back to him suddenly, this was the girl from Central Park. Tween’s friend, if she was here, that might mean Tween was too. He should have contacted Wedge before all of this, of course he’d have one of his tendrils in all of this! Along with realization, his sight returned, and behind the girl, he saw 4 more of the thugs armed with heavy gear. One of them held a dart gun and had it aimed at the girl’s back.

Tom dropped his blind façade and reached his arm out, placing his hand on the girls right shoulder, he shoved her hard across his body, knocking her to the floor as a dart flew through the space where she was only seconds prior. Again, the dart tore into his flesh and injected the black substance into him. He winced in pain and managed through gritted teeth.

“Get out of here, whoever you are! I don’t hit people when they’re down!” He grunted as the liquid flowed through his midsection, attacking his body. “I was doing Tween a favor, now take cover from these assholes!”

Again, there was a warm sensation as his body fought back, transmuting the nanites into red blood cells. The pain subsided and Tom looked up at the gun wielding man. The man fired twice more, the first missing Tom and slamming into the wall of the cafeteria, the second one caught him in the arm, and once again spread it’s fire. This time however, Tom fought back, firing a Chi blast into the man’s chest, he flew into the man next to him and a hail of bullets walked up the wall to the ceiling as both men fell to the ground in a heap. The remaining two men looked a little less certain.

Tom felt his body purge itself once again and teleported behind the nearest man, putting him in a chokehold as he addressed Daze again. “Are you deaf girl? Take cover!”

There was a bright flash of light behind him, and the last man screamed as his world was plunged into darkness. Tom heard his weapon clatter to the ground and then the girl was on him, kicking the blind man into unconsciousness even as Tom’s own thug slid out of the wakeful world.

He turned to see a triumphant Daze standing over the man’s battered form. “I’m not completely helpless.” She said defiantly “You might have noticed.”

Carl was standing at the nurses station, when a half dozen men stepped off the elevator and ordered everyone to the floor at gunpoint. Two of the four officers on duty, drew weapons and were down before they could fire. The other two were held at gunpoint.

The nurse however refused to answer and received a rifle butt to the face, knocking her unconscious, and leaving a bloodied welt across her face.

“Where is he, tell me now or I shoot someone till someone tells me”, He said gesturing to several of his men. They began to check each room.

“Omega isn’t here”, Carl said to the three men still standing at the station.

Two of the men entered the room. There was a moment of silence, just before both men came crashing back through the door.

“You stupid arrogant shits, think you can stop me, OMEGA!”, He said floating closer to the remaining four men by the nurses station. His blond hair wasn’t even mussed.

“Kill him!” The leader said raising his rifle and firing several well-placed rounds where the omega symbol was. The others followed suit and fired also.

The rounds penetrated, however they didn’t seem to have any effect on the blond muscled menace.

Before they could fire again a black shape grabbed the front two rifles and a green burst of energy washed over the four men, dropping them like rocks.

“That worked well, now lets get these men restrained.” The black metahuman said to Omega, and the two remaining officers.

“You do that Tween, I however have things to take care of”, The blond icon said vanishing.

It didn’t take long for the rest of the terrorist to be rounded up and taken into custody. None of the Meta humans who had stopped them was available for comment, as they had all disappeared shortly after the terrorists had been rounded up. The officers took most of the credit for the capture of the terrorists.

Tween sat across a small table, across the table was Omega. To his left and right were Daze and Tom Black.

Tom held out his hand to shake Omega’s hand. “Im sorry about your beach house”

“Tom, That’s not, er Tom, thats Wedge”, Tween said grinning. The form of Omega shifted into a dark humanoid shape.

“Not exactly it was a smoke screen, the real Omega is still in surgery. I suspected something might happen, I had no idea they would storm the hospital. Omega is still in danger, I would like to send you two as body guards till he recovers if that’s ok” Tween said sliding a small badge to each of them. “That should get you into the hospital wing he is at, if you run into any trouble contact wedge with the wrist communicators. In the mean time I am going to check out a lead on the organization responsible for the raid on the hospital.”

Daze and Tom both nodded and turned to leave. “Hey Tom I need to talk with you a minute, Daze he will catch up.”

Daze left and Tom Black stood waiting. “Look befor you say anything, I wanted to say thanks, I didn’t get a chance before. Keep an eye on Susan, shes a good kid And don’t get hit by those darts anymore, I know you seem immune but they have even nastier version from what I gather and Im not sure just how much you could take.”

“Yea, ill be in touch, and tell Arthur I am gona boot him in the ass”, Tween joked.

Tween appeared on the fortieth floor, the same place he had traced one phone call the terrorists had made during the raid. The floor however was completely bare, with the exception of a small table and a phone in the middle. The lead was a dead end, Tween still didn’t know who the leaders of this Anti-Meta group were or what they were after of if they had any more plans. But he would be watching and waiting and with the help of Daze and Tom, he would drag them kicking and screaming into the light of justice.