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| Hushed whispers; HFC | |
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| Topic Started: Dec 7 2011, 11:49 PM (561 Views) | |
| Max_Coleridge | Dec 7 2011, 11:49 PM Post #1 |
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Darkforce Manipulation, Teleportation
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Dec 19, night-time In the blackness of the hidden place, nothing stirred; it was as its master had left it - safe, and secure from prying eyes. In the crowded streets above it, New Yorkers were caught up in the hustle and bustle of their own tiny lives never knowing the silent horrors that lay hidden and silent as the grave, beneath their feet. To the master of the laboratory however, they weren't horrors, they were beautiful - they were scientific knowledge waiting to be gathered, dissected, studied with loving care, and poured in with the rest of a long lifetime's accumulated data. "I see it," the Shroud said from within his cloak of darkness as the stood on the roof of one of mid-town's quaint hotels, the Black Orchid; Max had liked the choice. It was in New York's historic district, so there no chance that inconvenient construction would reveal the lab. It wasn't near anything important or any of the known mutant hot spots, so it would've been safe from accidental discovery from that too. And it was a hotel; open at all hours, with tourists and strangers coming and going without being noticed. An excellent choice. They'd waited as the Black King had swept the tunnels and underground hiding places with his odd omnidirectional sight; painstakingly searching the darkness. Their information, though impressive to get this far, was still vague as to the lab's specific location. No doubt the lab's intended entrance was a long, grueling tunnel filled with traps and security devices to deal with unwelcome intruders before they ever penetrated the lab's pristine interior. The Shroud's jaw set in concentration and darkness erupted before him as tendrils of Darkforce opened a portal leading down into the dormant lab. "We aren't sure what will be down there - assume everything we encounter is lethal and will attempt to kill you. Refrain from needless destruction, but we free to defend yourselves with as much force is necessary. This is the laboratory of, possibly, the most brilliant and dangerous man on the planet." Dr. Sinister - the Shroud didn't say the name, it was one spoken of in only hushed tones, even by the most jaded and fearless of the World's criminal underground. Like the old superstitions about the Devil, don't speak his name too loudly, lest you wish him to hear you and appear. "I want this lab cleared," he gave the order, letting his team loose, to do what they did best. |
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| Mastermind | Dec 9 2011, 03:34 AM Post #2 |
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Unregistered
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Her last two months in Sanctuary had been educational, to say the least; she'd made more new mutant contacts in that period than at any time since her first encounter with the mutant-heavy New England chapter of the Hellfire Club. Thus far they were mostly civilian contacts, granted, but the powerfully individual nature of X-gene mutations meant that even civilian mutants often turned out to be enormously valuable resources when their specific talents became useful. Most of the Brotherhood was still suspicious of her, and the Acolytes especially so, but she'd anticipated that; that would get better over time, especially once an opportunity to be useful to them came along, as sooner or later it inevitably would. In other words, the Black Rook's assignment to Sanctuary was proving useful in many of the ways she'd anticipated. But there was a price, as well; even commuting via instantaneous teleportation, she was spending less time at Hellfire's headquarters than she used to, and a certain amount of organizational distance was an inevitable consequence. Which meant in turn that it was important for her to take opportunities to be active on missions, even combat missions that weren't usually her cup of tea. And, truth be told, she'd become fonder of active engagements ever since the Winter Island conflict; that had been fun! She'd even started combat training with a couple of suitable Pawns, just in case she might need it at some point. Which was how she'd found herself in her field armor, a blaster in each hand, standing with her King on the roof of the Black Orchid hotel, getting ready to invade an underground secret lab belonging to a shadowy secretive figure with the entirely implausible name of Dr. Sinister. Not that she was foolhardy enough to take the lead; she left that to the more combat-oriented members of the Inner Circle, and followed them invisibly through the Black King's portal. |
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| Betsy Braddock | Dec 11 2011, 07:45 PM Post #3 |
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Telepathy (I'm not a bloody ninja)
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With such an unpredictable mission ahead, the White Queen had donned the protective body armour that her King had created for her, just in case. The suit was purely protective; it didn’t increase her strength or speed and it certainly didn’t enable her to fly (although she was sure Forge was capable of making that happen), but it encased her body in a durable, lightweight material and it had saved her from countless sticky ends and that was what she wanted it for. Her mind was her weapon and so anything else other than protection was unnecessary and would likely only prove to making her cocky, which was something she could do without on the field of battle, as she was bad enough as it was sometimes with learning when to stop. She was there that night due to the air of unpredictability of the mission; they really might find anything down there. Her powers would be useful unless they encountered a swarm of robots, in which case she could transfer her skills to other areas, such as using her abilities to keep the others in constant communication, without the concern of any robots scrambling their comm. channels. It always paid to be prepared. Stood on the roof, the winter air bit at them as they waited for the Black King to use his abilities to scan the location they were about to enter. At his instructions, the telepath smiled darkly. “Everything usually is trying to kill us anyway,” Betsy thought back to when they had made a similar entrance to Murderworld, back before they were on reasonable terms with Magneto and the Brotherhood. Back then they had Rawson with them and the Black Bishop had provided them with one of his signature entrances. Thankfully, the Shroud had a lot more tact and their way in would be much more simple and elegant. Still, Rawson had been a handy man to have around in a fight, especially then. The portal opened before them and stepping towards and through it was something of second nature, like stepping through any doorway. Teleportation was never a delightful way to travel, aside from maybe for the teleporter themselves, but it no longer brought about any feelings of nausea or dizziness as once it might have. But there was always that mild feeling of disconcertion as you suddenly found yourself in a new environment…especially one such as this laboratory that they had passed through into. Not for the first time, Betsy was very, very glad that she was able to see once again. |
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| Longshot | Dec 15 2011, 11:00 AM Post #4 |
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Probability, Psychometry, Cloned Origin, Empathic Charisma
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His last memory was pushing the girl to safety, the knife wielding man facing him, the desperate pulse of his ill luck, and the wall that came tumbling down on him... and then there was the murmurs of the teaching computer, and the pink warmth, and the nothing else. No more fear. No more shame. No more... anything... Just the knowledge of what must be done... and the acceptance that one form of slavery had turned into another. Longshot hated laboratories. Before his free will was restored, he had not thought about them, not understood that if he was inside of one, the probability was high that something untoward was occurring there. No one paid Mojo's prices to have good men assassinated, after all. Later, when he had some sort of consciousness about him, he associated the very clinical stench of a facility like this with the humiliation of a life lived at the behest of another no matter how good he had been at it, innocently believing that what he did now had value because he believed he had a choice. For all of Longshot's soul searching and confused quest for a nobility that few naturally born men reached and no vat grown man had, he was still very young, and very broken in ways that simply could not be mended. Like a very young child, the more immediate discomfort was the lab itself... ... which did not smell of alcohol and the clinical cleanliness that was expected. Longshot clenched his blades in his hand and raised his arm to press the back of his wrist to his nose in disgust, "It smells," he said, "That is not the smell of death or the filth of life," he said, "I can't tell what it is, but it's rancid." His king gave the order, and Longshot looked to the others, "Let me go first. My luck will hamper any traps and you will pass through once I've detected them... or tripped them, I suppose, but then I like to think I am luckier than that." He moved into the tunnel that led deep into the earth and Longshot muttered, "Why do mad scientists seem to favor dank tunnels. At least Mojo set dear Arize up with a tropical beach house. Have to give some credit to the fat bastard." Turning a corner, the star in Longshot's eye lit up, and the brightness of the flare was advantageous, because directly in front of the little clone was a blockage, a door made of a mat of long sticky blueish reddish tubules, meeting in the middle and weaving together. They pulsed slightly like something alive and Longshot reacted the way that he was trained to. He cut. Throwing out his hand, he released his razors and they sank into the mass that suddenly writhed and convulsed and several dozen of the thickest strands untangled themselves to be tipped in bulbous unblinking eyeballs that focused on Longshot. Blue, brown, green, hazel, even pink and violet, all looking at him, balefully, more than one turning quickly cloudy as the gooey sclera leaked from the slashes of his razors, blood spattering on the ground. Disgusted and intrigued all at once, Longshot shook his head at the thing, "Poor beastie, this mad scientist may just be one of the maddest I have ever seen." He grasped a handful of the eyeball stalks in one hand and raised the other, knife in hand.... Then with a disgusting slurping sound, the thing pulled him directly into its maw. |
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| Shatterstar | Dec 15 2011, 08:19 PM Post #5 |
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Unregistered
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Oh ho ho, Assume everything is lethal and will attempt to kill you. That was his favorite type of assumption, because it led to his favorite kind of situation. Shatterstar was a very happy little clone assassin. He was going to get to kill things, and later, back at the club, he'd get some hot chocolate. There was no finer way to spend a night, in Shatterstar's opinion. However, he was slightly unhappy that his Queen was here. He had failed his royalty again and again. The attacks by Sabretooth and Kingpin, the Shadow King taking over Forge's mind, and then the Purifiers. They took his Queen's eyes. Regardless that his king was able to put her all back together again, that was an abominable failure on his own part. It was mere luck that his Queen didn't go the same way as her Black counterpart. Despite his and his brother's best efforts, things kept happening to the royalty, and Shatterstar was getting tired of it. He had decided on dual wielding dao. They were Chinese swords, a mix between a saber and a broadsword. They were Ming Era replicas. He had been on an Far Eastern kick recently. It wasn't that the Europeans made bad swords. Far from it. And it wasn't that the Orient produced better swords. Katanas, for example, were very over-rated by most amateurs. They were fine swords, but not the universal best sword that so many seemed to think they were. No, Shatterstar was using dao because he had such a collection, that it just wouldn't be right to use the same swords over and over again. Besides, it would be fun to practice shuang dao. The art of Both Knives. "So you want it cleared of what, exactly, Mi'Lord? I thought we weren't to mindlessly destroy," though that would be fun was the unspoken implication. Longshot requested to go first, and Shatterstar was reluctant but acquiesced. Better Longshot go and trigger the traps before hand then go in there blind and risk someone hurting Betsy. Shatterstar was willing to let Longshot have all the fun and stay here and protect his Queen. |
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| Max_Coleridge | Dec 17 2011, 10:18 PM Post #6 |
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Darkforce Manipulation, Teleportation
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“Everything usually is trying to kill us anyway,” the White Queen echoed with a wry smile. Longshot entered the portal without hesitation and Shroud expected Shatterstar to be at his clone-brother's heels, but instead he hung back and asked, "So you want it cleared of what, exactly, Mi'Lord? I thought we weren't to mindlessly destroy." :: Betsy, :: he thought loudly, on the off-chance her mental shields weren't fully up and she could hear him, :: if Shatterstar can't function independently to a certain degree and needs all orders meticulously explained, then he's more of a hindrance in the field than an asset. I suggest you and Jonathon think about putting him into a maturation-chamber and let it develop his mental functions.:: The muscles of his jaw tightened and the king had to remind himself that it wasn't Shatterstar's fault that he was the way he was, he was more or less a man-child with a specialized skill set that was useful. "You have an excellent memory, Shatterstar," he said, pleased that his tone held no hint of irritation. "I said, refrain from needless destruction, and I also said I wanted it cleared, what does that..." the lesson ended abruptly; the king had been watching Longshot's progress as he was seemingly devoured by a some kind of hideous creature construct. "Longshot's down," he said by way of explanation and darted through the portal. The room smelled strongly of something that should've been disinfectant, that was what the laboratory setting suggested, but this was too organic, almost like spoiled meat but not exactly. Concealed by a sudden cloud of black fog that erupted in the room, filling most of it instantly, the Shroud advanced in a cautious run. When he'd searched for this place earlier, he looked for the structure and any obvious security devices: security cameras and gun-turrets, and didn't spot any, but now that Longshot had triggered them, he saw concealing panels move noiselessly away, revealing human-sized nests of tentacles tipped with eyes; several of them, each one trying to peer into his darkness. "Rook, hide us from them," he ordered, though how much success she'd have with the creatures was no certain thing. "Queen, do these things have minds?" he called out as he continued his progress toward Longshot. The eye-creature sentries were incredible and disturbing at the same time. The man who had created them was a genius of the biology, the same way that Forge was of the mechanical; the comparison did not fill him with pleasure, he knew that only Forge's morally, his sense of what was moral and what was an abomination restrained him from becoming a true mad scientist; Shroud doubted that Mr. Sinister had any restraint left after all these years. "This is worse than I thought," he muttered. |
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| Mastermind | Dec 18 2011, 01:28 AM Post #7 |
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Unregistered
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Staying what she hoped was a safe distance behind the Black Knight, Mastermind couldn't see what he was fighting as he turned the corner. Whatever it was, though, she put it out of her mind as soon as the knives left his fingers; she'd never seen anything get back up after Longshot went after it like that. So she was more than startled when her Knight disappeared around the corner amidst some truly disgusting noices; she was frozen in shock for a moment. That moment was long enough for the Black King to join them. "Rook, hide us from them" the King ordered as he stepped through his own portal, and Regan promptly cloaked Hellfire in imperceptibility -- those who had stepped through the portal with her, in any case. Not that she had any notion of what she was cloaking them from, granted, now that the room had been plunged into an impenetrable darkness. The darkness, at least, was familiar; she recognized it from earlier adventures and training exercises with Max. "Done," Mastermind's clipped voice echoed in reply, emanating from nowhere in particular. She didn't bother reminding Max that her power was useless against automated devices; he knew that perfectly well. Besides, both the slurping noises she'd heard and the reputation of this "Sinister" fellow as a biological wizard suggested that whatever the Black Court was facing, it most likely wasn't mechanical. In fact, now that she thought about it, it had very much seemed as though something had swallowed Longshot, and while her respect for his probability-manipulating power was such that she would ordinarily assume he was enjoying it, the current situation was far from ordinary. Taking a deep focusing breath, Regan embroidered her illusory imperceptibility with two additional refinements. The first was to position a full-sensory image of the Black King several meters away from his previous position, in the hopes of further distracting observers. The second was to wrap Longshot in the foulest taste she could imagine, in the hopes that whatever had deep-throated him would promptly spit him back out. |
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| Longshot | Dec 18 2011, 10:46 AM Post #8 |
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Probability, Psychometry, Cloned Origin, Empathic Charisma
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The funny thing about luck is that it doesn't particularly care to explain itself. Longshot, ensconced in belly of the creature that was the guardian of the gate, could hardly know what the reasons were that his luck had allowed him to end up in such an unsavory place. How could he know that in the place where he had stood moments ago, and where his King had not yet reached, that there were traps of another sort, and had his attack on the beastie not angered it, he would have been standing on that spot where the trap was to spring. In the darkness of the Black King's shadows, and the mental assault by the Black Rook (and don't think Longshot would not have an opinion that the White Court had not stepped to the fore on this), the eyes suddenly retracted into their tangle and a wall of flame shot up, intent on burning the intruder to ash.... ... if the Intruder had not been spitefully and disobediently swallowed whole seconds before. Though he had no idea what was happening outside, the thin membrane sack that served as the whole of the many eyed beast was translucent enough that when the momentary flash of flame cut the Shroud's darkness, Longshot's gelatinous prison lit up with a faint orange, and it was enough to let him get his bearings. As the flames died, anyone who was watching the weird creature that served as the door to hell would see it begin to rise, and suddenly oddly sprout a fluid covered blade that pushed through the flimsy skin, followed by a hand that tore at the mass of gooey skin until the beast ripped right open, and a wet, and furious Longshot tumbled out, covered in God knows what. Despite the ungraceful method of extricating himself from the seemingly impossible trap, Longshot rolled to his knee, blades in both hands, ready instantly to fight. But that injury was far more than insult, and the eyestalks shriveled, falling limply all along the length of the tunnel. Longshot rose, scraping gunk off his leathers, and with dignity, as if this was nothing, which to him it like was just that, he smoothed his blond hair. "My King," he said with a bow punctuated by the faint drip slouch plop of the goo sliding to the floor. "The hall is clear." |
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| Betsy Braddock | Dec 20 2011, 01:20 AM Post #9 |
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Telepathy (I'm not a bloody ninja)
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About to move forward through the portal, Betsy stopped in her tracks as Shatterstar hung back and the White Queen frowned deeply. “Shatterstar, if you cannot follow an order, then why are you here?” she scolded, a touch of annoyance rising. The clone was changing and the telepath was not sure if it was for the better. Max’s thoughts filtered though and she glanced over to the Black King. ::You’re right. Based on his performance tonight, we shall take…measures. The situation has not been going unnoticed…:: Opening her mouth to address Shatterstar further, her words were halted as she felt Longshot go down, a split second before Max called out and without wasting another moment, followed him quickly through the portal, coming out in the laboratory on the other side. It appeared that Longshot was not just down, but that the assassin had been swallowed up and was now encased in a gelatinous prison. Reaching out with her telepathy, Psylocke started to scan the immediate area, starting with the bizarre creatures that were constructed from eyes. Grimacing, she pulled back, as if she had dipped her hand unknowingly into foul water. “Minds? Of a sort. Simply base emotions and instincts. Nothing readable other than that…Guard dogs, basically.” In the meantime, Longshot had gotten free, in a wet and filthy mess and presented himself to his King, proclaiming their way clear. At least that was the case for the moment. The place made her skin crawl and the telepath carefully picked through the debris of the place, screening out all unnecessary background chatter. From what she could tell, there were no higher operating life forms in the laboratory, but considering the welcoming that Longshot had received, then Betsy was not going to leave it at that and remained on high alert, keeping her bionic and telepathic eyes wide open. So much for science…From what little she had already witnessed, this place seemed more of a freak show than a laboratory and they had barely gotten through the front door. Whatever else this place had in store, Betsy was doubtful that it was going to be any less deadly or any less strange than the guardian that they had already encountered – or rather Longshot had encountered. |
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| Max_Coleridge | Dec 25 2011, 09:40 AM Post #10 |
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Darkforce Manipulation, Teleportation
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JP Max and Longshot "Well done," the Black King said, banishing his darkness and gave the slime-coated Longshot a curt nod. He wasn't the sort of man to heap praise on anyone. He fingered the comm link of his black armor, like all of their tech, a marvel created by Forge, "Shatterstar, remain where you are and watch for any response to our trespassing." He passed the slimy horror bleeding-out on the floor, at once intrigued by its creation and repulsed by the twisted God-like mentality that would create such a thing. "Rook, keep the false images up; they may not be completely effective against these things but even if it's only a slight edge, we may need it. Queen, let me know if you detect anything more complex than those security-eyes." He drew a clear glass-like dagger from a sheath on his thigh and held it ready as they continued down the main entrance corridor. There were more masses of eye-creatures that stared at them, blinking for a few moments of confusion. A few moments was all that Max or Longshot needed to dispatch them with their blades. As they moved further inside, the horrors became more and more unimaginable. Some of the walls were pinkish membranes with worm-like feelers along the surface that seemed to taste the air and though it had no mouth or throat or brain, according to Betsy, its edges curled and convulsed in pain when Longshot cut through it. Max's face was stony and grim as they continued to make their way from one horror to the next in what he was increasing beginning to think of as an extension of Hell on Earth. All the while the face of the man he had met, to be more accurate, that Shadow King had met, floated in his mind; Sinister was an urbane man of refinement but his gentility was a mask that hid the most evil monster the Black King had ever encountered. In this lab, his Frankenstein experiments were unashamedly displayed. Monstrosities floated in vats, some of them not dead. Chilled vapor poured off frozen preserved specimens: hands, legs, heads; those of men, women, and children, all ages and races were in the collection. "Sinister is apparently a non-discriminatory monster," Max said finally to break the chill. "Rook, after we finish this first sweep, assemble a team of biology technicians to pack up and move all of Sinister's works. If there's any benefit to what he's done, he won't be the only one who gets it." Max would not have sanctioned such work but, what's done was done and turning a blind eye and wasting it, would have compounded the horror. Cautiously entering the next room, Max crouched and readied his dagger, pressing a trigger on the hilt, when a vat in the center of the room spewed vapor as though it were a pressure vessel venting gas. Electricity arced along the clear blade as Max sent as sight into the vat. The room was another horror chamber, along one wall were obviously failed babies in containers, but in the center of the room, a child floated in a vat. Lowering his knife as he got closer, he watched the child, a girl, struggling, her young face contorted in soundless crying. The logical part of the Black King, the part that separated him from his emotions, letting him make the hard choices and do what needed to be done, even if it was unpleasant or monstrous, spoke up - this is an unknown element, it's too dangerous, let it die in there, after what Sinister has done here, it may be kinder to put it out of its misery. For a fraction of a moment, Max did do nothing; he stayed his hand and did what a Black King should. Inside the membranous tank, the child weakly struggled. But Max was trying to be more than the Black King. He was a father and in the sudden thought, what if that was your son? Max slashed the strange membranous vat; the skin slit open but in the next second regenerated from the wound as fast as it was created. "Longshot," Max commanded. But the skin healed like Wolverine's before they could get through it. Dropping his knife, Max focused his will, opening a small portal just over the skin of the vat and another just inside, and plunged his arms inside. He held the child in his arms was slick with slime as she screamed and coughed the ooze from her lungs. From her size, she appeared to be a toddler, just two or three years old. His black-clad hand smoothed over her long silvery hair. The deeper they went into Sinister's house of horrors, the more Longshot's jaw set. This was not fun, and the stories here were not good. This man had turned cells and blood and scrapings of the skin into monsters... and the fact that he was a created monster himself did not slide past him. The only difference between him and them was that he was pretty. Otherwise, he was just as much an abomination... maybe more so. After all, these things did not attempt to hide their monstrosity. "I hate this place," he muttered, looking around, and clearly make a concerted effort not to touch anything. "I hate everything about it. We should just burn it to the ground, completely. No good will come of this." His King barked his name, and Longshot turned to see him producing a tiny noisy child from one of the vats. "Oh good," he said, dryly, "Another baby." "Betsy," he called to the White Queen as he continued to wipe slime from the baby's face, "take her to the infirmary." And then added privately, :: Scan her, she might not be a child at all, but a trap. :: "We'll stay here and continue our search. Gather a team of technicians and security," he handed her the toddler. "We can't wait; she proves that time is of the essence. There may be other vats set to fail if this place compromised." A portal opened behind the queen, "Notify me when the team is assembled and you're ready to return." "Longshot, Regan," he snapped with seriousness, "Sinister must has research notes here. Find them." As his king tended to the baby, the only human looking experiment in this whole place, Longshot did as he was asked, not at all pleased with this turn of events, but too given to following his King's orders to disobey. He began to search the place from top to bottom, finding many different folders and notebooks. "Pryor Viability notes... A Treatise on Shapeshifting, as Demonstrated by M'ssr Gavin...What is a Treatise... Hmmm... Shaw, Jacob... Shaw, Esau... there is so much here," he complained, finding flipping through file cabinets to be ridiculously boring. He looked around at the many many many boxes and drawered holding places piled, shoved and squeezed between the vats and bottles and perserved oddities. Deciding that there was no way to do this by simply looking, Longshot pulled one of his razor blades from his bandoleer and flipped it in his hand, before spinning around and launching it where it seemed to want to be launched. The blade skimmed the matted silver hair of the infant in his King's arms so close that it could have shorn her bald had his luck not worked for him... But, his luck always worked for him, and rather than splitting the baby's scalp, the razor came to a quivering bullseye in a notebook stacked with a hundred identical notebooks. Longshot retrieved both book and blade and blew a layer of dust off the black leather surface. "Project Luna..." he read aloud. |
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| Mastermind | Dec 25 2011, 04:46 PM Post #11 |
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Unregistered
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It was over, in a roar of flame and blades, almost as soon as it started. When the Shroud withdrew his darkness Longshot was standing triumphant, if messy, over the noisome corpse of the laboratory's former guardian. By then, the White Queen had joined them, reporting similar watcher-minds throughout the complex. Regan couldn't see anything else in the immediate vicinity, but that didn't mean much; she'd had many years of experience to teach her that sometimes it was the enemy you can't see who is most dangerous. So she continued to wrap Hellfire in concealing illusion, and continued to maintain illusory copies of them a hopefully safe distance from their actual locations, displacing their voices and their scents at the same time. It was a routine defensive maneuver, one she'd mastered years earlier. She accepted the Black King's order to maintain the false images with a simple nod, and kept him and Longshot in sight as they travelled a hallway filled with Lovecraftian horrors. She took particular notice when Betsy reported brainless sentries; these might be biological rather than mechanical, but that didn't necessarily make them vulnerable to her power. She wondered if any of the drugs or poisons in her kit would affect them, and made a mental note to have a sample of the creatures' tissue sent out for biochemical analysis and have her suppliers come up with something that would. It wouldn't do her any good on this mission, of course, but she suspected this was only the beginning of their relationship with Dr. Sinister. As the Knights slaughtered creature after creature, Regan used the specialized monitors she'd had built into her field armor to record their appearances, their smells, everything they could detect. Those recordings she would review more carefully later, in case she was ever called upon to reproduce them. She did the same with the experimental subjects they came across, fascinating creatures whose purposes were for the most part entirely opaque to her. Well, that was why Hellfire maintained a staff of specialists, after all, and the King's order made it clear that he was thinking along the same lines. "Consider it done," she acknowledged briskly. The final lab was apparently some kind of bizarre nursery, primarily occupied by dead children in various stages of disassembly, or perhaps assembly. The exception was a small girl in a vat -- or rather, she corrected herself promptly, what appeared to be a small girl. Was Sinister creating synthetic humans, as well as more gruesome creatures? He would hardly be the first; Longshot himself was an equally artificial product, as was the White Knight they'd left on the hotel roof. But given what she'd seen so far, Regan doubted the girl was anything quite so mundane as an ordinary human being. Was Sinister engineering his own version of Homo Superior, perhaps? For just a moment, it seemed the King was going to leave the girl there to die, and Regan thought about objecting... not on sentimental grounds, but pragmatic ones. Whatever the girl was, she clearly represented a significant investment of effort and resources on Sinister's part, which meant Hellfire would do better to own her and turn her to their own purposes than to kill her. On the other hand, she'd been having that argument too often of late, and if the girl did turn out to be a threat to Hellfire Regan preferred to not be held accountable for it. Before she could make up her mind either way, though, Max made up his own and extracted the girl from her... prison? birthing chamber? containment pod? Regan hadn't a clue what it was, but resolved to direct the science teams to pay particular attention to it when they analyzed this place. If they could determine what the vat's functions were, they could perhaps learn some things about the girl. Meanwhile, she began searching the lab for more clues as to Sinister's research plans, though her search had barely gotten started when Longshot ended it in his own inimitable fashion. "What on Earth is 'Project Luna'?" |
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| Betsy Braddock | Dec 26 2011, 08:40 PM Post #12 |
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Telepathy (I'm not a bloody ninja)
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With Shatterstar remaining in place to guard their passing, they moved onwards. Keeping her eyes, ears and mind open, Betsy ‘listened’ in more ways than one; the laboratory had already revealed a rather unpleasant surprise and it was important to catch any other little trick before another attack was triggered. The place gave Betsy the creeps and she was not too proud to admit it, either. It was rather like being in some grotesque theatre of horrors or old freak show exhibits, preserved only after they had been left to rot and ruin. Body parts floated in vats and were crammed into containers, draped with wires and other tools of a science wholly corrupted. “There is very little to read here,” she noted to Max. “Very basic thoughts, nothing above the most primitive level. With some, it’s like,” the White Queen paused for the briefest of seconds to find the most appropriate analogy for a non telepath. “It’s like hearing an echo or a double exposed photograph. There is something there but it’s more like the memory of a memory,” she gestured to a severed head, hung upside down in a murky chamber. “No consciousness though. Nothing high functioning.” The Black King was already trying to get into the vat holding the baby when Betsy entered the room and she watched with concern as he struggled to free the child. Around them were other containers which housed other babies; grisly little specimens that had obviously not worked out as Sinister had desired and kept for reasons the White Queen cared not to think about. Coming forward as he spoke to her, Psylocke took the baby and placed a gloved hand on the back of her head, instinctually stroking the little girl’s hair. Max was right to be cautious in such a place, but there was something about a distressed child, even one whom was possibly not even real, that could overtake common sense. ::Of course. Right now I can tell you that everything seems in order, but the minds of babies are like kaleidoscopes. It’s all colours, fuzzy images and very simplistic emotions:: Betsy shared this even as she started towards the portal he had created for her to immediately return to the Club, then stopped for a heartbeat to add. ::I shall do a more extensive examination while the medical team conduct theirs then return with the team.:: Emerging from the swirl of darkforce, the Englishwoman found herself blinking in the bright, sterile surroundings of the Hellfire Club’s infirmary, a pristine room of the highest medical standard. Their line of work had proven many times to be deadly and on occasion, fatal, so the infirmary was of the highest standards, with a dedicated team in case of any emergency as well as a number of Pawns who were able to provide support thanks to their powers or even previous experience in a medical field. “Quickly,” she commanded as the team rushed to prepare. Carrying the baby over to the exam table that lay in wait herself, Betsy carefully laid the girl down, brushing the backs of her fingers against the child’s cheek. That hair… Her initial probe had reassured her, if only for the moment, that this was a real a child as possible, but she was not about to settle at that. “I need a full medical. Run her blood, check her DNA against the database and inform myself or the Black King of any sort of matches, partial or full or of any anomaly she presents. Then clean her up and get some food into her.” Stepping back to allow the team to get to work, Psylocke’s bionic blue eyes fluttered shut as she reached out to conduct a more thorough scan of the infant’s mind. As she had told Max, when it came to babies, things were often more simple within their minds, which in a way made things harder. There was precious little chance of anything solid to grasp hold of. It took no more than a few minutes, but she pulled back, satisfied but grim. Turning on her heel, she moved to a panel on the wall and pressed a number of buttons. “This is the White Queen. I require a combined team of technical and security staff to assemble outside of the infirmary in the next five minutes, for immediate teleportation. Come prepared for dirty work.” Pressing another button, she ended the brief communication and returned back to the examination bench where the team were delicately working on the infant, taking swabs and gently hooking her up to machines to assess her vitals. Removing her gloves, Betsy leaned in to help as a tiny vial of blood was drawn, making the baby scream. Holding down a ball of cotton wool on the area of injection, she made gentle hushing sounds and stroked her forehead, before looking up at the lead medic. “What do you make of her so far?” “Well, she seems a normal, healthy baby…Where did you find her, my Queen?” “The Black King removed her from a vat in the laboratory we were investigating. So you see it’s important we find out the truth.” Looking down at the baby, the man frowned then nodded intently. “Yes, oh yes of course…a vat…I shall personally run the DNA exam myself. If she is…well, you know, then she is a perfect example. The vat may have been intended to accelerate her aging process regardless of her origin or for any number of other experiments…” the man shuddered at the depravity; despite working for Hellfire with the dedication of any under its roof, he was still a doctor and still upheld the medical code very seriously. “If there are others…” “I shall keep you informed. Until we return no one is to come in or out of here,” Betsy said and with a nod, excused herself and exited the infirmary, locking the door with a personal access code behind her that would keep all but herself and the two Kings out. Pulling her gloves on, she found a team of eight; four technicians and four security in the corridor. Nodding at them, she reached out with her thoughts back to the Black King in Sinister’s lab. ::Max? The baby is in the infirmary. The chief of medical staff has taken charge and will personally be conducting the tests on her samples. For all intents and purposes my mental examinations show that she is a real baby. But things are…dark in her mind. Babies are normally mentally constructed of warmth and light. We shall know more later with the physical tests however:: pausing to check the team were fully assembled and waiting, she continued. ::I have a team of eight ready, we’re just outside the main doors of the infirmary. I’ve taken the precautionary measure of sealing the room for the short term, just in case I’m wrong.:: |
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7:34 PM Jul 11