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Post by johnreiter902 on Nov 13, 2019 15:08:50 GMT
DarkFactor's base was in a valley in a remote mountain range. Though the Avenger's crew had passed through the vast air/space hanger when they'd transferred from Augur's spaceship to an atmospheric flier, they hadn't been brought into the base and knew nothing about its defenses. The Justice Mandate hypersonic flier landed about five miles away, apparently undetected. Quick recon flights over the fortress area by Mighty Man and Strobe showed that the valley and the mountains around it were heavily armed and armored. Strobe estimated that they had seen almost a thousand gun emplacements and several thousand heavily armed robots, and there were a lot of areas that were shielded from Mighty Man's super vision and the Glove's sensory capabilities.
Stormgirl was thrilled about her part in the battle plan for the coming conflict. "On a planet with weather control, I don't get much chance to exercise my own weather control powers!" she gushed to her teammates for the umpteenth time in the last 10 minutes. Even Angstrom, who normally followed her around like a puppy, was starting to get a little annoyed. They were all outside the flier now. Mighty Man, Valor and Jessiat were working around the vessel, driving titanium-alloy storm anchors deep into the ground and then weaving a net of cables over the filer.
The Teen Thunderer moved apart from her teammates. She spread her legs, then raised her arms to the sky, leaning her head back and stretching her body to the fullest. She frowned for a few seconds in intense concentration, and then her expression changed to a smile. Around them, the wind velocity picked up, it grew much colder, and dark clouds began to form. As it grew darker around them, Stormgirl's teammates were awed to see her start to glow - faintly at first, a strengthening, flickering aura of brilliant blue-white, the color of lightning. By now totally unaware of her teammates, without moving, Stormgirl floated upwards from the ground, still in her fully extended posture, a look of rapture on her face.
The winds buffeting the Justice Mandate were making it difficult for them to stand upright, and now rain was falling, big drops that were blown horizontally by the powerful winds, striking the heroes with stinging force. Strobe made them a force field shelter, anchored to the cables holding down the flier, but Juna and Solvent eschewed the protection. Juna strode forward in the direction of the valley, and as she did, a wave of water built up behind her, a wave that moved unnaturally slowly and grew taller, until it finally caught up with the Xenonian scientist - and gently lifted her, until she was more than 25 feet off the ground, sitting in water that surrounded her up to her waist. She rode calmly on top of the wave as it accelerated, and continued to grow larger as it moved.
"Don't you guys worry about the external defenses," Solvent said to her companions. "The three of us will take care of them. You guys get DarkFactor!" She dove into the trailing edge of Juna's wave, her body converting to liquid and merging imperceptibly with the receding flood. A few seconds later, her head popped out of the water next to Juna.
Stormgirl was now drifting slowly in the direction of the fortified valley, still glowing. Lightning was flickering through the clouds, and she was struck several times. "Nothin' to worry about," an amused Tree shouted to the concerned alien heroes. "Her body is a natural battery, and that's how she gets the charge she uses to throw lightning bolts."
"Can't get close to her for weeks after a big storm, unless you're wearing rubber. Very kinky!" Angstrom hollered. Then, smirking, he added more softly, "I know, it's 'Shut up Angstrom!' time again."
The storm drifted slowly after Stormgirl, and the rest of the team realize that they were now experiencing a full-fledged hurricane. The flier was being buffeted against the cables; if it hadn't been anchored to the ground, it would have been tumbled away and smashed.
"Luck thing we took a military troop lander with all kinds of emergency equipment!" Jess exclaimed, the PA system built into her suit amplifying her voice so the others could hear.
Mirage smiled at her, calmly ignoring the wind and the driving rain, which blew right through him. "There's always a lot of fortunate things happenin' when Solvent's in charge," he shouted, then chuckled, "but don't think any of 'em are just good luck!"
"I don't get why she's going with Stormy and Juna," Jess yelled back. "Sure, she's a great strategist, but her powers seem awfully weak."
"A lot of our enemies make that same mistake," Mighty Man answered her, his powerful voice cutting easily through the din. "She can move through any fluid almost instantly, and she can convert it from water into any other kind of liquid - or any kind of vapor. Just think how useful those guns are going to be after being immersed in acid." He winced. "Even I wouldn't want to be going up against those 3 in conditions like this!"
"We better get moving," Tree shouted at the top of his lungs; his companions could barely hear him. "We're going to have enough trouble moving through this storm, even with all our powers, and it's still getting stronger! And the boss won't like it if we're late."
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Post by johnreiter902 on Nov 13, 2019 15:09:20 GMT
Strobe reshaped his force field into a large egg shape with a glowing white chain attached to the center of the larger end. Most of the remaining heroes, except for Mighty Man and Mirage, were enclosed in the protective field. The Terran Torpedo grabbed the chain over his shoulder and flew slowly in the direction of the fortress. Even with his tremendous strength, he had trouble fighting through the incredible storm; the going was slow and the ride was tremendously rough. Strobe had padded the inside of the egg with thick, soft cushions, but even so, the team was jounced around continually. Mirage floated peacefully alongside of Mighty Man, seemingly unaware of the powerful maelstrom that washed through him as if he wasn't there.
They finally reached the location of one of the hidden gun emplacements Mighty Man had spotted earlier with his super vision. With Mirage directing them, Mighty lowered the egg into a large crater where the bunker had once been, easily big enough to hold a half dozen terrestrial squash courts, then Strobe reshaped the force field once again, as a roof over the crater. Jessiat turned on the external lights in her armor, and the group could see that they were in a large, ragged crater that looked like the result of a large explosion. The floor of the crater was rough, dirty glass, as if the ground had been melted by incredible heat, and already covered with about a foot of water, still steaming from the heat of the floor. There were melted lumps of robots, guns and electrical gear scattered around.
"It's hard to believe that lightning did _this_!" Tree said in an awed whisper as he looked around the rugged hole and the blasted remains of a once-powerful fortification. "Remind me never to harass that kid again
"
Mirage had disappeared into the ground; now he popped out of the side of the crater. "Zarl, this way," he called to Mighty Man as he pointed. "There's about 10 feet of rubble and then you'll come to the remains of the tunnel." The earlier surveillance had detected the presences of lead-lined tunnels connecting many of the gun emplacements though neither the Glove or Mighty Man's refractory vision could sense through lead; hopefully, the tunnel would lead to the main fortress. "I'll scout ahead," Mirage said as he disappeared into the rock wall once again.
Before Mighty Man could start digging into the rubble, Valor began pounding on the glazed rock. He was getting very frustrated that he didn't have his gravity controller back online yet, and some of his other powers were not completely restored either, but breaking rocks into smaller rocks, he could do, with great enthusiasm. Mighty Man stood aside and melted any flying shards that might have threatened their teammates with his blaze vision. It only took a few minutes before the passage was clear.
"Not being very subtle, are we?" Angstrom observed with a smirk.
"Blasting the valley with a hurricane isn't very subtle either," Jess agreed. "I don't think our presence here is a secret. DarkFactor knows we're coming for him. But, with our three water witches out there, wrecking everything they can find, he's not gonna know where we're coming from."
***~~~***
One of the mountains had been hollowed out to provide DarkFactor's fortress. The top quarter of the mountain was only a shell; inside lurked a large, fast spaceship. Inside the control room, DarkFactor monitored the battle as best he could on a wall of viewscreens, along with Augur and a heavily armored human wearing combat armor, Colonel Elbaroon, the leader of the elite mercenary army that DarkFactor was employing as his personal bodyguards. The mercenaries guarded all approaches to the ship. If worse came to worst, they would fall back through the cargo airlocks as DarkFactor made his escape. In the control room, the black giant seethed as he watched his latest plan being destroyed. The external monitors showed the devastation of the valley and his robotic army and weapons.
His computer-controlled weapons were useless. No aimed projectile could search out a target through the swirling winds, and the conditions made energy weapons almost equally impotent. The cold, drenching water made infrared sensors ineffectual; the darkness and fog, along with the almost confusing stroboscopic flashing made visual aiming impossible, and the electromagnetic roar of lighting filled the aether, interfering with radar. Even his external monitors were almost thwarted by the storm occasionally, a flash of lightning would allow the observers a view of some part of the valley, but even those glimpses were mostly obscured by the driving rain and clouds of debris being carried by the howling wind. Audio sensors were worse than useless even with all external microphones turned off, the roar of the wind and the rumble of the almost constant thunder penetrated the mountain and the hull of the ship.
During one of the barrages of lightning, one of the screens showed Stormgirl, floating high over the valley, still surrounded by her blue-white nimbus. "The girl is certainly impressive, Revolutionary. I hadn't heard that she had such power," Elbaroon commented impassively. He had made a thorough study of the reams of information about the Justice Mandate that DarkFactor had provided before he had signed his mercenary unit to a contract with DarkFactor and the Thrannian Underground. 'Although I've never met with any representatives of the Underground after the contract was signed,' he thought suspiciously, not for the first time.
"This one controls water," Augur pointed to a screen that showed Juna standing on top a stationary pillar of water while a giant wave crashed down on a hardened weapons emplacement nearby. "She is drawing atmospheric water vapor from a wide region around us, allowing the weather witch to build an increasingly powerful storm."
"Shut up, you fool!" DarkFactor's thunderous voice echoed painfully off the walls of the control room, and Augur wrapped his arms over his head, covering his ears, as he cowed before the black giant. The wizened little seer whimpered from the pain caused by moving so quickly. "This is YOUR fault. The aliens were supposed to be our allies, not join the Justice Mandate to fight against us!"
"They were at the location and time where the War Stones foretold I would meet allies," Augur contradicted meekly.
"Why didn't your precious Stones predict their treason?" DarkFactor asked, sarcastic anger clear in his voice.
"As I've told you, milord, the Stones are somehow blocked from seeing the future for those four. A power much greater than my own has taken interest in them. But they were our allies until they weren't rescued after your escape."
DarkFactor didn't even bother to answer that. He swept his arm around, and slammed a backhand blow into his tiny follower's chest. Augur was lifted from his feet and thrown backward against a wall. Almost, it seemed that the small twisted body would stick, a grotesque wall decoration, but then it slid down into a pitiful heap on the floor. Elbaroon watched this silently, his combat helmet hiding his expression.
"Even with the power of the alien, even with the weather witch in control, the power of the lightning we have witnessed exceeds by orders of magnitude what a natural storm could generate. The witch must be harnessing an external source of power..." DarkFactor mused.
"The broadcast power, Revolutionary?" Colonel Elbaroon suggested diffidently. DarkFactor ignored him as they watched the destruction of the external defenses.
In one of the hardened weapons bunkers, it started with a thin stream of water, trickling under the door. A thin gray mist rose from the stream, and come together into a vaguely spherical shape, gray and transparent. Ghostly features developed and solidified until the face was almost recognizable, and then it vanished again and in a second screen showing a view from miles away, seconds later a similar face appeared next to Juna, unaffected by the wind and driving rain, eerily lighted by the constant barrage of lighting. Within minutes, the alien's uncanny pillar of water had carried her across the valley, and the bunker was battered into wreckage by incredible blasts of water.
"I guess you didn't know that Solvent could almost teleport through a body of water, or that she could create a signal like that?" Elbaroon commented sardonically as he pointed at the screen. "I wonder what other unknown powers the rest of the Justice Mandate will reveal today?"
On the screen Elbaroon was indicating, Solvent was varying the destructive routine. Instead of contacting Juna, this time Solvent flowed back outside the bunker she was scouting and the water around the bunker suddenly began glowing brightly. Almost instantly, a barrage of dozens of lightning bolts exploded the bunker into rubble, the booming of the thunder they caused almost lost in the background roar of the wind.
Outside the bunkers, DarkFactor's mechanized army was virtually useless. The robots couldn't stand upright in the howling winds, and when they toppled into the swamp that the valley had now become, they would be instantly swallowed up by the rising waters and sucking mud underneath. Vehicles with wheels and treads were immobilized, and the winds made hovercraft or fliers into deadly traps. Fortunately, the tunnels crisscrossing the valley allowed him to withdraw his remaining affective forces into the hollow mountain fortress. Any invasion would have to come through the hanger, so he concentrated his robotic forces there. He would still have vengeance on the Justice Mandate, and then he and his mercenary bodyguard would escape.
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Post by johnreiter902 on Nov 13, 2019 15:09:37 GMT
From the control room, DarkFactor and Colonel Elbaroon watched intently as the robot army tried to stop the augmented Justice Mandate.
Mighty Man blasted into the giant room like a rocket, smashing through robots until his momentum ran out. A center of chaos developed as hundreds of the human-sized robots tried to reach the Terran Torpedo, like a swarm of bees, virtually crushing those in front of them in an attempt to reach the combat at the center of the mass. From the control room, the watchers could see flashing rays, flames and smoke, and pieces of robots flying through the air, accompanied by explosions, shrieking, tearing noises, and other incredibly loud, chaotic sounds.
Strobe didn't have the raw power of Mighty Man, so he improvised tactics based on his akido training. He rarely exerted his powers directly against the robots, only using the Glove to tear them apart when they managed to close with him. Instead, he used their own powers against them. Several robots would fire and the beams would pass through him, as he used the Glove make him appear to be several feet from his true position. Protected by his force field, he would use a white tentacle from the Glove to grab a robot and use it as a shield from the attacks of its fellows, destroying that robot in the process. When the robots started to figure out those tactics, he reconfigured his shield into a mirror and reflected the beams so they bounced off and hit other robots. When he was pushed by a force beam or pulled by a tractor beam, he would use the Glove to add his own speed to the enemy force, hardening his force field so that he slammed into his enemies like a cannonball.
As Valor charged the robot army, he was staggered by a barrage of energy blasts. He fell, and the continued barrage threw him backwards, bouncing and rolling. Unfortunately for DarkFactor's forces, as more robots rushed toward their fallen enemy, one of the new attackers fired an electrical blaster. Valor absorbed the power of the bolt, then slammed a fist into the concrete floor of the hanger, driving it into the ground like a spike. He jolted to a stop, rolled onto his knees and slammed the other fist into the floor as well. He came up with a large chunk of concrete, which he threw at the approaching robots. While the robots were concentrating on Valor, Jess unleashed her plasma flame blast and a dozen robots collapsed. She then helped her teammate to his feet and they stood back to back, destroying every robot that came near them.
As DarkFactor watched the battle he suddenly swore as he realized that Tree, Mirage and Angstrom were missing. He instantly activated the special force field designed to prevent Mirage from passing through. This emergency security measure also automatically closed and sealed all the external airlock doors.
"DarkFactor, you COWARD!" Elbaroon screamed. "Lower that field and let my men on board or I'll blast you." The mercenary leader was on his feet, moving faster than any normal man, his atomic beam blaster menacing the black-armored giant
DarkFactor ignored him and commanded the computer to begin the pre-flight checklist. Deep within the ship, the massive engine powerplant came to life, filling the air with a low, throbbing hum.
The mercenary commanded didn't bother to speak again. Instead, he fired, and the atomic beam flared, so brightly that the computerized light-adaptive goggles in his helmet were momentarily turned totally opaque. The blaster was the most powerful hand weapon Elbaroon had encountered in over 30 years as a soldier and mercenary, capable of overwhelming most portable force fields and disintegrating the densest, most resistant matter in nanoseconds, but the beam simply glanced from DarkForce's armor, instantly vaporizing the board which controlled the ship's weaponry and defenses.
Snarling with rage, the revolutionary leader pointed a fist at Elbaroon and a beam of yellow energy smashed the blaster from his hand. Before Elbaroon could react, the yellow beam changed to a giant hand that picked up the mercenary and slammed him back against the wall. Another beam sprang forth from the same fist and as the glowing yellow hand crushed the Colonel helplessly against the wall, the new beam formed an object resembling a pencil, which traced the outline of the merc's armor, welding it solidly to the wall.
Elbaroon wasn't totally helpless inside his armor. He pulled his right hand back from the immobile gauntlet and touched an internal control pad, set in the inside of the wrist guard. Using all the stored energy in the suit, suit's computer blasted out a radio signal. Now he was virtually helpless until someone got him out f the suit - although he did have a couple of nasty surprises inside. The signal was a predefined code that no mercenary officer ever wanted to hear - much less to send!
"The client has betrayed us and voided the contract. My situation is impossible. Number 1 priority is now escape with as much of the unit intact as possible. Do not attempt a rescue!' followed by Elbaroon's recognition code. Every command-level officer in his unit could send a similar disaster signal; each of them understood that they must trust the judgment of the person who sent this signal; instant action was required to save the unit. Major Laztroe, formerly the second-in-command, instantly took charge and began to implement the alternate plan for escape.
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Post by johnreiter902 on Nov 13, 2019 15:10:01 GMT
massive bolt of lightning blasted open the door of the hanger, and Stormgirl drifted to the pavement just inside the door. Most of the valley was now a lake, and a single large wave rushed toward the Teen Thunderer. Juna stood casually on the crest, which gradually grew smaller until the Xenonian scientist stepped easily into the hanger. There was a ripple on the surface of the muddy lake, and then Solvent stood beside them, almost as if she had teleported.
"You did really well, Gretla," Solvent congratulated Stormgirl. "That was unbelievable!"
"Yeah, boss, wasn't it great?" Gretla sounded excited and bubbly, almost drunk. "I never did anything like it before. I never felt so alive, never controlled so much power and it was easy!" She was practically euphoric. "I should be exhausted, but I've never felt stronger! Let's go find the rest of the team." She turned toward the interior of the hanger, eager to join the battle. Then she staggered and would have fallen but for the Juna's high-gravity reflexes.
"I take it back," she moaned. "I feel terrible. Whatever it was, just wore off..."
"Say, where'd Solvent go?" Juna looked around, the commander of the Justice Mandate had been there a second ago.
Stormgirl managed to smile. "Don't blink!" she whispered. She knew how elusive her boss could be.
"It's all over inside," Solvent said, as her solid form rose from the floor. The three heroines walked into the large room and stared around them in astonishment. There were no enemy robots left, just metallic body parts and smashed components spread throughout the vast room. There were some piles of smoking rubble, a third of the lights had been destroyed, there were craters in the floor, and holes blasted through the interior walls. But the Justice Mandate heroes hadn't had it all their own way.
Strobe was limping and moaned as he moved. Although his force shield had protected him from beams and rays, the battering it had taken had shaken him around inside like a jumping bean. Mighty Man's uniform was ripped and torn, his cape totally gone, and his face was covered with bruises although they were already starting to heal and disappear. But Jess and Valor had taken the worst damage. The last wave of robots had finally overwhelmed the pair of them. Jess's armor had been immobilized and a laser had sliced through one of Valor's arms just below the elbow, before Mighty Man had destroyed the last of the robots.
"Good thing you're wearing an android body!" Juna greeted her teammate. "You can do what no man can do, and switch to a new android body when we get back to the Avenger.
"That was FUN!" Mighty Man enthused. "I haven't been able to cut loose like that for a long time."
"Weird idea you have of fun," the battered Strobe grumbled. "Of course, you don't have to live with your bruises for a couple weeks afterward..."
"OK enough chatter," Solvent cut int. "Time to take care of DarkFactor."
"Gee, boss, didn't we just do this?" asked Mighty Man. "I feel like this is where we came in."
"I know," she sighed with a grimace. "I'm getting tired of this guy. Let's wrap him up for good this time, shall we?"
***~~~***
Laztroe and his men were carefully headed for their ship, when a device attached to his belt buzzed a warning. The device was a 'Mirage' detector, invented by DarkFactor. Laztroe and his men quickly slipped into a room off the corridor. They were no longer being paid, so they were trying to avoid any further fighting, but Laztroe didn't think the JM would just let them go.
He decided to take a hostage. With a flurry of hand signals he got his men ready for an ambush. A handful of tiny video cameras, scattered in the corridor, showed Tree, Angstrom and Mirage approaching. Laztroe pointed at Angstrom on a monitor and signed 'That one!'
The Justice Mandate trio was taken totally unaware by the ambush. Before they could react, Laxtroe and another mercenary grabbed Angstrom and the Major had a gun at his head.
"Let us go, or I'll blow his head off!" Laztroe ordered.
"Oh ship oh ship oh ship oh ship," Angstrom whispered harshly, until Laztroe shook him. "Shut up, you!"
Mirage looked at the mercenaries, then looked at Tree. "I say we can take them, what do you say?"
Tree grinned; it was unsettling to see a mouth with long sharp teeth. "There's only 10 of 'em. Hardly seems fair."
"Shut up, you!" Laztroe almost screamed. He was rattled that the two heroes were seemingly ignoring his hostage. "I swear I'll blast his brains out!"
"Oh ship oh ship oh ship oh ship," Angstrom whispered again. "I told you to shut up!" Laztroe cuffed the cowering hero in the head.
"He won't miss 'em," Tree mused to Mirage. "I say we take 'em!" They started moving closer.
"Oh ship oh ship oh ship oh ship oh ship..." Angstrom continued to whisper desperately, in terror.
"Stop!" Laztroe screamed. The two heroes continued forward. "I warned you!" the Major screeched, and pulled the trigger. Tree and Mirage turned their backs and shut their eyes.
Instead of firing, the blaster backfired, with a flare as bright as a spotlight. It wasn't difficult for the three heroes to subdue the blind mercenaries. They were just finishing binding their foes when the rest of the Justice Mandate arrived. By now, Angstrom had recovered from his terror, and he was furious.
"Solvent, when are we going to stop using the 'Let them take Angstrom hostage' trick?" he demanded of his commanding officer.
"We'll keep using it as long as it works, you beanie!" Tree laughed at his teammate. "The first time it doesn't work, we'll stop using it."
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Post by johnreiter902 on Nov 13, 2019 15:10:18 GMT
The ship's computer wasn't responding correctly. The preflight check was taking much too long, and it kept reporting issues that should have been ignored or automatically fixed. It was like the computer was
stalling, though that was ridiculous. But then, a message popped up. "Launch command overridden. Preflight process shutting down." The display then changed to an input screen: "Enter Command-Level Authorization Code". Fuming, DarkFactor re-entered his code. "Authorization Denied. User Access Privileges Restricted." Someone had changed DarkFactor's user authority!
"But that's impossible! There's only one other authorized user and he's..." Struck by a horrible thought, DarkFactor spun to the rear of the control room - and Augur's body was missing! There was a bloody trail on the deck where his former aid had crawled away. Augur must have been in agony, his already twisted and arthritic body now broken, and yet his escape had been quiet enough that DarkFactor hadn't noticed. The black-armored titan screamed in frustration and crashed out of his seat, intending to search the ship for his erstwhile ally - but he didn't have to move. The door slid open and a small flying craft floated through. It was fortunate that this ship, and the entire fortress, were built to accommodate DarkFactor's giant frame; the flier could not have passed through a standard human-sized door.
The craft resembled an inverted saucer set atop a half a grapefruit - blown up so that the half sphere was large enough to enclose a seated Augur up to the waist. The top half of his body stuck up above the saucer; in front of him a control panel rose to mid-chest level and there was a small windscreen on top of the console. The vessel floated high enough that Augur's head was level with DarkFactor's head.
Without speaking, DarkFactor aimed a fist at the small flier and unleashed a deadly yellow energy blast. It was deflected by a force bubble surrounding the flier - invisible until it was called upon, and it then glowed the same yellow as DarkFactor's beam. The sliding door was melted to slag, but Augur and his flier were unaffected.
"The War Stones can't predict the aliens' future, but they warned me to of betrayal. They couldn't tell me who - but who else could betray me but you?" Augur stated, his voice louder and more confident than DarkFactor had ever heard it. "I didn't want to believe it, but I made my preparations anyway."
"You failed me!" DarkFactor roared in anger, his amplified voice crashing through the room. Augur's forcefield flickered faintly as the dangerously loud sounds washed across it. "The 'allies' you sought have aided in the destruction of my current plan to liberate Thrann!" Another beam of yellow energy; this one turned into a giant C-clamp, attempting to crush Augur's spherical force field.
"Remember, I designed the device that allows you to control the yellow energy," Augur sneered. "It's useless against me - in fact, the more power you use, the stronger I become!" His field easily withstood the immense pressure DarkFactor was applying; in fact, it expanded even as the energy clamp tried to close. The result was a tremendous explosion which almost knocked DarkFactor from his feet, while Augur again was totally unaffected.
"You are no more a liberator than Othar or the Pillar of Freedom; like them, your true goal is nothing but personal power. I'm ashamed that you managed to fool me for so long, but no more. I'm through with you and your plans!" Augur exclaimed. An intense, sparkling yellow beam flicked out from his flier, swept the room, pulverizing or melting the remaining control consoles. The standard lighting failed, replaced by a demonic half dark filled with flickering light from flames and sparks leaping from the demolished consoles. When the dim red emergency lights came on, the hellish atmosphere of the room was only enhanced. "An appropriate background for your final defeat at the hands of the Justice Mandate!" Augur laughed manically as his flier rotated and retreated down the corridor.
DarkFactor stood motionless for several instants, stunned by this abrupt betrayal. Finally, he released one last, futile blast after the retreating flier, then followed it through the ruined exit. Their paths diverged; Augur raced towards the ship's main airlock, while DarkFactor headed for the teleport room. The teleporter had an independent power supply; he should be able to escape to another hidden stronghold. "This is nothing but a minor setback!" he roared at Augur's back. "No longer will I rely on quislings and traitors!"
Augur passed through the air-lock, and discovered a half circle of angry heroes waiting outside. Yellow energy beams immediately shot from the flier, blocked as quickly by Mighty Man and a force shield from Strobe, while Augur's own forcefield easily deflected attacks from Mighty Man's incendiary vision, Strobe's white Glow energy, Stormgirl's lightning bolts, and Juna's water blasts. While the attack was occurring, Mirage faded through the hull of the ship.
"You've foiled DarkFactor's plans this time, Justice Mandate, but that that doesn't mean he's failed!" Augur crowed through his flier's amplified. "While you foolishly battle me, my master is once again escaping to continue the Revolution. As long as DarkFactor is free, the hope of freedom remains alive in the Protectorate!" He attacked again, this time blasting the ceiling above the heroes. While they were protecting themselves from falling rubble, his flier raced over their heads and down a corridor that sloped deeper into the planet beneath the mountain stronghold.
At that instant, Mirage's head popped back through the ship's hull. "DarkFactor's still aboard, Boss, headed for the fore escape pod. He tried to use a teleporter, but someone slagged it before he got to it."
Solvent made a quick decision. "Valor, Strobe, Juna, Jessiat - you four after Augur; we'll handle DarkFactor!" She'd expected the aliens to object, but they had a grudge with Augur. This division of labor suited them well, especially given their weakened conditions.
"Good luck!" Jess saluted their temporary commander. "This shouldn't take too long." The Avenger's crew headed down the corridor following Augur, while Solvent deployed the Justice Mandate to breach the ship while insuring that DarkFactor couldn't slip out undetected.
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Post by johnreiter902 on Nov 13, 2019 15:11:10 GMT
It couldn't have been a coincidence that the 4 members of the Avenger's crew regained consciousness within seconds of each other. They were in a small, well-lighted room, with metal walls, ceiling and floor, each of them arrayed in a comfortable bunk. Outlines on the walls showed the touch points that would open closets and cabinets or deploy accessories such as a desk or a sink. The bulkhead door was open, showing a short, narrow corridor, another door immediately across the corridor, and at the end of the corridor, they could see a small section of a control room. The low hum that pervaded the room, the crowded, efficiently arranged quarters and the grilled vent high in one wall suggested that they were on a spaceship Augur fled through the corridors of DarkFactor's stronghold, easily outdistancing the 4 alien heroes. Instead of racing towards the hanger and the exits the heroes had discovered during their invasion, he moved in the opposite direction - deeper under the roots of the vast mountain range.
"How we goin' catch him" Valor asked in frustration. "I'm not'n pain from having arm sliced off my droid body, but ich throwin my reactions off'n makin' me wobbly." It was affecting his speech as well, his companions noticed.
"I feel very vulnerable, running around in nothing more than padded long underwear," Jess added. She'd been forced to leave her damaged armor behind. "At least I've got some weapons," she continued, holding up two hand blasters she'd recovered from wrecked robots. "But I can't run as fast as he can fly."
"I could catch him on a wave," Juna suggested. "But not if I had to carry you guys"
"Tell you what, team," Strobe spoke up. "I'm beat, too, but I can make it easier on all of us. Pick your seats!" Four glowing white easy chairs appeared on the ground in a 2 x 2 arrangement. He sank into one of the chairs with a weary sigh, and his team sat down in the others. The chairs moved closer together, shrunk as required to fit their occupants snugly, and a streamlined capsule formed around them. "Soivice in style wit' a smile!" he quipped wearily. "Plus it gives us a chance to rest a little until we catch him."
Strobe soon found out that the chase and capture wouldn't be as easy as he had hoped. Augur's flier was well-designed to maneuver in these wide, well lighted corridors; anywhere the giant DarkFactor could pass, Augur and the flier could pass as well. But while Strobe's glowing capsule was faster, it was bigger and harder to maneuver around corners - and Augur kept turning into cross-corridors seemingly at random, though his path always trended downward and deeper into the vast mountain range. The new corridors were obviously less well used; the lighting was becoming intermittent, there was dust on the floor, and sometimes the wall and ceiling panels were damaged.
By straining his will to the utmost, and ignoring his own pains and the groans and complaints of his passengers as his capsule jolted too quickly around sharp corners, Strobe was actually able to slowly gain ground on the fleeing flier.
"He must'a made wrong turn!" Valor observed triumphantly, as Augur reappeared out of the last side corridor he'd taken, his lead greatly diminished. "He mush be gettin' rattled, knowing we're gaining on him!" An instant later: "Hah! It was... dead end!" he crowed as they flashed past the turn. His speech was a little better than before.
"If you could make me a window, we're close enough that I could probably hit him" Jess suggested, holding up one of her pistols.
"He hasn't actually attacked us," Juna was concerned. "Until he does, I'm reluctant to take potentially fatal action against him." Jess started to protest, but Juna cut her off sharply. "He's not just an invading plant, you know - he's a person, just like you and me." Jess filed that for later thought - she still wasn't used to fighting sentient enemies.
Ahead of them, Augur made another turn, this time not into a side corridor, but a large hole in the wall. This hole was smaller than the corridor, barely wide enough for Augur's flier. Tracks in the dust and splashes of congealed rock spattering the corridor suggested that it had been created only recently. When they reached it, Strobe had to come almost to a full stop in order to make the turn. He had to lengthen the capsule, and rearrange the seats into single file; they were now riding in a glowing white missile! The tunnel had been melted through the rock by a beam of tremendous heat, and there was no lighting; Augur had by now almost vanished into the darkness
Strobe concentrated and the front end of the capsule emitted an intense beam like high-powered headlights. The glassy sides of the tunnel seemed to intensify the beam, lighting it brightly, and they could now see that it ran straight as an arrow, at least as far ahead as their fleeing foe. Strobe aimed their missile down the exact center of the tunnel and concentrated on increasing thir speed. Far ahead, they could see that Augur was having trouble holding a straight path at his new, higher velocity. Showers of sparks exploded from the walls whenever his flier would drift slightly to one side or the other.
They blasted down the corridor at jet speed, rapidly closing the gap between them and their prey. And then things started to go wrong.
"Jim, I don't like this! It reminds me of a trap I encountered with the Invincibles, before I assumed command." Valor had his voice fully under control now.
At the same instant, Augur passed a boundary of some sort, and the walls of the tunnel now revealed were glowing bright green. 'Warning! Green Kryptonite radiation detected; intensity is increasing!' a mental voice shouted in Strobe's mind. Green Kryptonite radiation interfered with the operation of his Glove, as he had discovered early in his career*. He and Juna, the greatest expert on Kryptonite on Xenon, had experimented to find a way to fix this weakness during the earlier part of the trip, but had so far come up with nothing better than a detection and warning system. Jim immediately ordered the missile to slow down. Already he could feel his energy constructs starting to dissolve.
*see "Another Manic Monday"; 5EP Presents, 1987
"This capsule's about to fall apart!" he warned his friends. "I'll slow us as much as I can, but it's going to be rough." Ragged glowing white cushions formed around Strobe and his teammates, providing some padding against deceleration. but these new constructs were already fading, along with the missile itself.
Glowing green light was starting to fill the missile's interior as they moved into the green-walled section of the tunnel. The pillows and the capsule itself evaporated, dropping the heroes the floor while they were still moving , perhaps at 'school zone' driving speeds. The air was filled with gasps of pain, moans and groans as they quickly bounced, tumbled and finally skidded to a stop. Coming on top of their existing beaten condition, Strobe and Jessiat were smashed into unconsciousness. Valor struggled to get to his feet, only to discover that something was interfering with his control of the android body - his mental commands were being blocked by some kind of intense mental static. No matter what he wanted to do, the android body remained in a lifeless heap on the glowing green floor. Worse, the static was still growing more intense, and now it was blocking sensory messages from his body. He was locked in his mind again!
Juna's force field allowed her to survive the tumbling relatively unscathed, and she scrambled to her feet. She could see that Augur had by now ended his headlong flight and was now approaching his decimated foes. 'Well,' she thought with determination 'I'm not finished yet! It's not going to be that easy!"
She used her water-control powers to call up a wave to wash down the corridor and smite her opponent, but nothing happened! Something was blocking the turquoise sun energy that gave her control over water; perhaps the miles of mountain range overhead, or some scientific weapon Augur had devised. It didn't matter; she still had super-strength due to the low gravity conditions of Thrann compared to Xenon, and her shield made her nearly invulnerable. She picked up Jess's weapons and strode up the corridor until she was shielding her friends, prepared to defeat Augur by herself. She was discovering that determination could be a lonely feeling.
A barrage of small missiles blasted from the front of Augur's rapidly-approaching flier. For just an instant, Juna was terrified that somehow her field would fail; then the missiles exploded and she was engulfed in flame and smoke. As soon as she realized that she was safe, she took a deep breath in relief - a little too soon. Somehow the explosions had forced a watery mist through her field, though she hadn't been able to discern it while she was inside a fireball. She switched off her force field, jumped backwards to where she hoped the air would be clear, and tried to breath heavily, but it was too late. She felt consciousness slipping away from her as she collapsed to the floor. Her last thought was that in the Terran adventure novels she was learning to like, it was never a good sign when all the heroes were unconscious at once in the presence of a villain. Even the adrenaline that washed through her at that thought wasn't enough to bring her back to consciousness, and she slipped into darkness.
Augur slowed his flier, and stopped only a few feet from his fallen former allies. "I'm sorry I took advantage of your trust," he told them sadly. "During the time I spent on your ship, I learned everything I could about the four of you, including how to defeat you. I can't be captured; now that DarkFactor has been exposed as a traitor to the Revolution, I must escape to rejoin the Underground!"
Augur reluctantly reached out and touched a button on his control console, and the yellow energy beam lashed out, briefly touching each of the four unconscious aliens. With a flash and a slight pouf of smudgy smoke, each hero simply vanished. Augur's flier rotated, and again he flew down the long, slick tunnel, deeper and deeper under the mountain range. His speed was much higher than before he'd sprung his trap, and an alert observer might have noticed that his flier never touched the sides of the tunnel. Darkness quickly closed around him, as he fled toward the vanishing point.
"I feel remarkably alive and quite free to move around!" Juna exclaimed in wonder. "I expected to be dead, or at least chained to the wall of a dungeon if I did wake up. What do we do now?" Strobe was already using the powers of his Glove to probe their surroundings. "We're in a small spaceship, and as far as I can tell, there's nobody else aboard. We ought to explore." He started to sit up, and groaned loudly as his rebellious body reminded him of the battering he'd recently taken. "Well, we haven't been unconscious _too_ long. Couldn't Augur have used some kind of super science healing ray on us, at least?" The team rose gingerly from their bunks and moved cautiously into the corridor, then into the control room. It was barely larger than the bunk room, with two comfortable padded seats facing the flight controls, and the walls were covered with active view screens. One screen showed a schematic of the Thrannian solar system, with a fine blue curved line connecting Thrann and the gas giant in the outer system, where they had left the Avenger in orbit. Close to the gas giant, a small blue spaceship-shaped icon blinked. Two other monitors showed apparently identical battle scenes: the Justice Mandate fighting DarkFactor. Before they could take in the rest of the monitors, the largest screen, dark until now, flared brightly to life, drawing their attention. The big screen showed Augur's head, larger than life, then the view pulled back to show that the tiny, withered seer was still seated in his flier, though the control panel had retracted. Behind Augur they could see a much larger control room than the one they were in, and through the window they could see Thrann from orbit. "Before you do anything else, my friends, I suggest you become familiar with your current situation. I regret that I'm not speaking to you live, so I can't respond to your questions. You are currently on a small spaceship which is drawing near the Trojan asteroid group of the gas giant Temro. The ship's autopilot is programmed to dock with the Avenger in about 4 hours, and it is fully capable of doing so, though you can turn it off and take manual control at any time. The ship is fully operational, easily capable of making the trip to Temro and sustaining you, and has not been sabotaged. It is programmed to return to Thrann after you have been delivered; please allow it to do so. It is a valuable asset - almost a friend. After you have reassured yourselves of your safety, the other monitors will help explain your current situation." After all that had happened, nobody was willing to take Augur at his (recorded) word. Valor and Jess familiarize themselves with the ship's controls so they could check their location and trajectory while Juna and Jim checked out the rest of the ship. As best Juna's fine scientific mind, the Glove's sensitive probes and the ships navigation instruments could determine, the ship was functional, safe, and where Augur had indicated. There were provisions for several weeks in the galley, water and air for at least a month, and fuel enough for several round trips between Thrann and Temro. Their opinions about Augur were confused. He could easily have killed them; instead he was aiding them in escaping from Thrann and the Protectorate. "Maybe Augur was being honest all along," Jim opined. "Certainly, from what I saw, the government on Thrann needs to be overthrown. DarkFactor was nothing but another would-be tin-plated dictator, but Augur might just be an idealistic revolutionary." "If so, I wish him well," Juna said quietly. "Still, oppressive government or not, that's the last time I'll ever get dragged into disputes on a planet I know nothing about!" she continued with added emphasis. Valor looked troubled but didn't say anything. Jim knew that as the immortal Lord of Order, Marnu, Valor had created the Galactic Patrol hundreds of centuries ago, with the purpose of preventing such evil as the Protectorate. He had just had a powerful lesson about ignorant intervention, but suppose a Patrol fleet had come in force to Thrann, instead of 4 would-be liberators taking on a star-spanning empire? "If you guys don't mind, I'd kind of like to do the docking myself," Jess changed the subject. "This looks like a really sweet little ship, and I can use the practice. Jim can use his power to protect the rest of you, or even ferry you across to the Avenger while I carry out the docking maneuvers." "Sounds like a plan to me," Jim responded, glad that what could have been a tense moment had been avoided. "Tell you what, though, some of the stuff that's playing on these monitors looks pretty interesting." He pointed at two screens, one showing the Justice Mandate battling DarkFactor, while the other showed the green glowing tunnel where Augur had captured them. "I wonder where he got the videos?" "There must have been security cameras in DarkFactor's base," Jessiat replied. "Check this one out, guys DarkFactor sure didn't put up much of a fight!" ***~~~*** The monitor Jess indicated showed the final battle between DarkFactor and the Justice Mandate. And she was right, DarkFactor was being beaten easily. Much too easily, given what they knew about his power and the abilities of the heroes in the Justice Mandate. "Something's affecting his powers," Valor observed, as a single blow from Tree shattered a yellow force field. "From what Solvent told us, that field should be able to withstand Mighty Man, and Tree isn't even close to being that strong." As the heroes rushed him, DarkFactor blasted the ceiling with a yellow energy beam. Instead of knocking out a big chunk to drop on his enemies, the beam barely managed to blast out a manhole-sized crater. Changing targets, the beam then enclosed the entire Justice Mandate in a force field globe, and DarkFactor attempted to flee while his foes tried to escape the sphere. But before he could run, Mirage floated up to him, then passed through him, disabling the black titan's armor. "His armor has a separate force field which is proof against Mirage. You're right, something is wrong with his armor." With the armor disabled, there was nothing DarkFactor could do to stop his foes. Angstrom concentrated for a while, and parts of DarkFactor's armor changed to vapor, allowing Mighty Man to peel it off like the cracked shell on a walnut. When the villain's face was revealed, the Justice Mandate reacted with stunned amazement. "I can't believe it's YOU!" Tree almost shouted. "You're DarkFactor? Why... you recruited me into the Justice Mandate!" He shook his head. "Now it's harder than ever to believe we beat him so easily," he said to his teammates. "Maxie here was the best fighter I ever saw even better than me. This is starting to feel like another trap." "BAH!" the beaten villain screamed. "If that weasel Augur hadn't betrayed me and sabotaged my armor, you'd all be dead now. That little traitor will pay when I catch up to him..." His voice trailed off into a mutter. Stormgirl didn't recognize the man in the armor a tall, thin man with a bulging cranium, black hair with a receding hairline, and bright red skin. "Who is he? What do you mean, this traitor recruited you?" She looked at her teammate with new distrust. "His name is Maxinestro, Gretla," Solvent told her youngest teammate. "He was the leader of the Justice Mandate before I was. Until he was caught in an explosion in the Markellis Uprising. No traces of him were ever found. We had no reason to suspect he was still alive." She sighed, sadly. "He recruited me into the JM as well, groomed me as the next leader. Hard to believe he'd turn traitor to the Protectorate." "It was simple to fake my death!" Maxinestro responded in a loud, defiant tone. "You fools have ruined EVERYTHING! If Augur hadn't betrayed me and sabotaged my armor, you would never have beaten me, and I would rule and make everything right! The Protectorate is a corrupt, repressive dictatorship, and you've insured that it will never change." "We've doomed the Protectorate by keeping you from taking over?" Angstrom laughed sarcastically. "YES!" the villain screamed again. "Isn't obvious that I am the perfect ruler for the Protectorate? I can make the Protectorate into a utopia, but only if I'm the ruler and everyone does exactly what I tell them too!" He shook himself, visibly exerted control over his emotions, spoke calmly in his most persuasive tones. "It's not too late. If you join me, we can still win! You can be my lieutenants; I'll give you each a solar system to rule in my name." The members of the JM looked at each other, then Angstrom spoke up. "Let me, boss!" He turned back to the defeated villain, used a line that he was too familiar with. "Shut up, Maxie!" The screen darkened. "A humiliating defeat for one who would conquer an empire," Valor observed gravely.
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Post by johnreiter902 on Nov 13, 2019 15:11:31 GMT
Before any of the others could reply, Jim pointed to another monitor. "This one is really scary, guys." Their attention shifted.
The space travelers watched as Augur lured them into the tunnel trap; they shivered in horror as Juna fell and the yellow beam from Augur's flier lashed out and disintegrated their unconscious bodies. Augur turned and fled down the corridor.
"I don't feel like I've been disintegrated," Juna responded to the chilling video in a hushed voice. "What's going on here?"
The scene played again, and they watched again, fascinated, no more able to turn away than a frightened deer in the beam of a headlight. But this time, the scene was different. As the beam flickered out at Juna, the replay went into what was apparently super slow motion and they could see that as the beam touched each of them, a yellow cocoon enveloped each body, and then the cocoon and body faded into invisibility. When the bodies were all invisible, the bodies became faintly visible again, and as Augur fled into the darkness, the bodies in their cocoons lifted from the floor and were pulled along behind him.
"That's as close to death as I ever want to come!" Jess said loudly, wrapping both arms tightly around her torso. "I guess Augur wasn't really our enemy after all." She was going to say more, but the large monitor flickered back to life and interrupted her.
"Now you know what really happened," Augur said with a sad smile. "I programmed the stronghold's security computer to broadcast these scenes, in real time, on every broadcast channel on Thrann, and through interstellar relays to every planet, moon, asteroid and space station in the Protectorate as well. The public saw the Justice Mandate defeat and unmask DarkFactor, as well as the four of you being disintegrated." He chuckled. "I didn't think anyone needed to know that you were still alive; that way, nobody will come searching for you." He stopped, and turned serious. "Provided that you leave the Protectorate and never come back!" His voice was stern. "I'm sorry to have involved you; this whole affair was none of your concern." He smiled sadly again. "The Protectorate turned the whole thing into a propaganda victory. They think people are going to forget what they saw live, and remember the government's version. They're probably right."
Augur faded out, another scene faded in. A pair of well-dressed, blandly attractive Thrannian undercits, one male and one female, were sitting behind a desk while a video played on a screen behind them. To Jim, the resemblance to the Seacoast City Channel 3 Evening News at 6 was uncanny.
The screen behind the newscasters showed an open square in a futuristic city. In the center of the square was a stage; on the stage were two groups, the Justice Mandate standing in a half circle, facing a podium behind which sat a dozen extravagantly-dressed overcits, including Othar. Standing behind the podium was the most extravagantly-dressed over of all, a man wearing robes and carrying a long staff. The staff was encrusted with gold and jewels.
"Our top story tonight!" the male broadcaster crowed. "Earlier today, in a ceremony that was broadcast by every station across the Protectorate, the Justice Mandate was once again decorated by the Pillar of Freedom."
The picture on the studio screen expanded to fill the monitor, while the female newscaster provided a voiceover. Valor stepped forward, looking troubled. As the camera panned, revealing that the square was jammed with festively-clad undercits, smiling and laughing, he touched the screen several times, revealing the locations of inconspicuously placed groups of armed soldiers.
The view zoomed in on the stage again. "Othar looks like he's been sucking on lemons!" Jim observed with a grin. "His pet commander defied him and his prize prisoners were killed..." his voice trailed off, and then he shook his head, and continued. "and now, the defiant team members are being honored by the absolute ruler of the Protectorate. No wonder he's not happy."
They listened to the broadcast; the male announcer had taken over again. "For foiling an invasion by the Realm of Red Stars, the heroes of the Justice Mandate were each awarded the Protectorate's highest honor, the Distinguished Star of Obedient Freedom, with Blood-Red Cluster of Liberty." On the screen, the Pillar of Liberty touched a medal to the front of Solvent's uniform, where it stuck as if by velcro or some more advanced Protectorate technology. As he awarded the medals to the other heroes, there was a humorous moment when he stood in front of Mirage, unsure of what to do until Solvent stepped forward and received the medal meant for the Insubstantial Itinerarian.
The view switched back to the studio. "As everyone is now aware, the day before yesterday while power was still being restored after the worldwide outage cause by DarkFactor, all of the emergency government broadcasts were mysteriously replaced by scenes that must have been transmitted from security cameras deep within DarkFactor's stronghold. The Justice Mandate's battle with DarkFactor was seen live, in its entirety, by billions of Thrannians."
Once again the studio screen expanded to fill the monitor. Once again, the Justice Mandate easily defeated DarkFactor. As DarkFactor was unmasked, the script was altered. DarkFactor's true face was never revealed, and the Justice Mandate's discussion of Maxinestro was not included. All the watchers could tell was that the man in the armor was tall and thin; even his skin color was obscured.
"Even after the vanquished DarkFactor was finally pried from his ruined armor like a rat from his hole, the villain's true identity remained concealed," the woman broadcaster continued as the scene switched again, to what was recognizably an electronics laboratory. "His captors suspected that he must be a spy, as no loyal citizen would ever rebel against the Protectorate. Government technicians quickly found a way to disable the villain's holographic disguise."
An undercit in a lab coat aimed a device that looked like a satellite TV dish with a pistol grip at a tall, thin figure. The view then zoomed in on the target; a tall, thin humanoid. The watchers barely had time to register that the target had red skin before the air around it started to shimmer in a sort of an aura; then the shimmering cleared to reveal a slightly shorter being, covered with fur and sporting a face that looked like a fox.
"In the end, DarkFactor was revealed to be an agent of our enemies, the war-like Realm of the Red Stars, sent to foment rebellion and weaken the Protectorate as a prelude to invasion." On the studio monitor, the scene changed, to show an army of fox-faced aliens marching in parade formation through the crowd-lined streets of an alien city. Interspersed with the marching soldiers were armored vehicles, much like tanks, and trucks towing missiles. The camera zoomed in to show that many members of the crowd were carrying signs, with pictures of Realm soldiers massacring Protectorate undercits. The female announcer took over again.
"The Department of Truth and Justice has publicly announced that it considers the attempt to start a rebellion to be an act of war. The Red Star ambassador, predictably, claims that DarkFactor is not an agent of the Realm, but instead an escaped terrorist who hoped to foment war between the two empires, while the Realm itself wishes to continue peaceful relations with the Protectorate. The Pillar of Freedom urges the public not to panic or jump to conclusions."
The scene changed, the voiceover continued. "The aliens who helped DarkFactor escape from his initial imprisonment are now being considered as agents of the Realm as well. As this scene, also mysteriously broadcast from DarkFactor's strong, shows, there is no honor among enemy agents. The aliens were betrayed by Augur, DarkFactor's aide, and destroyed." The 'destroyed agents of the Realm' watched as a beam from Augur's flier vaporized their bodies. "Unfortunately, the traitorous mutant managed to escape, but Othar, the Minister of Truth and Justice, and the ultimate commander of the Justice Mandate, has stressed to the public that Augur is considered harmless."
The screen faded to black...
***~~~***
"Well..." Jim said, after everyone had taken a few minutes to reflect. "All that little adventure gained us was a lot of bruises. And we're lucky we are still alive."
"And Thrann and the other planets are still ruled by the despotic Protectorate. The unders are nothing more than slaves, and the overs still wield absolute power ruthlessly." Jess spat out the words.
"Hold on we never once talked to an under," Juna reminded them. "The system appears evil to us, but it seems to work for them. There are almost a trillion people living on Thrann, and more than a trillion throughout the rest of the Protectorate. Maybe they are satisfied with the government they have..."
"What if they're not?" Jess asked angrily. "We may have destroyed their last chance for change."
"I'm pretty sure we haven't," Valor contradicted her quietly. "After all, Augur escaped, and he seems to be planning to stick around. In the end, he proved to more potent than DarkFactor." He paused, considering. "And I think perhaps the Justice Mandate is significantly less enchanted with their system than they were before our arrival. I wouldn't be surprised at all if there were major changes on Thrann in the near future."
He paused for a few seconds, but no one said anything, so he continued. "The four of us didn't have enough information, or enough power, to change a star-spanning empire. But we know exactly how to save Juneo, so let's get back to a mission that is within our power."
At exactly that instant, the small ship's navigational computer made an announcement. "Contact has been established with the starship Tiak Avenger. Approach maneuvering will begin in 20 minutes. Please insure that everything in the ship is secured before the crew straps in at acceleration stations."
"Hey!" Jess yelled, pleased with the change of subject, and excited for her first change to pilot an actual spaceship. "Places everyone. I'm on!"
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Post by dans on Nov 16, 2019 22:48:39 GMT
John, can you insert the content below in the post right above this one, following this paragraph:
>>>>>> Insert the content below here:
It couldn't have been a coincidence that the 4 members of the Avenger's crew regained consciousness within seconds of each other. They were in a small, well-lighted room, with metal walls, ceiling and floor, each of them arrayed in a comfortable bunk. Outlines on the walls showed the touch points that would open closets and cabinets or deploy accessories such as a desk or a sink. The bulkhead door was open, showing a short, narrow corridor, another door immediately across the corridor, and at the end of the corridor, they could see a small section of a control room. The low hum that pervaded the room, the crowded, efficiently arranged quarters and the grilled vent high in one wall suggested that they were on a spaceship
Thanks!
Here is the additional content:
Augur fled through the corridors of DarkFactor's stronghold, easily outdistancing the 4 alien heroes. Instead of racing towards the hanger and the exits the heroes had discovered during their invasion, he moved in the opposite direction - deeper under the roots of the vast mountain range.
"How we goin' catch him" Valor asked in frustration. "I'm not'n pain from having arm sliced off my droid body, but ich throwin my reactions off'n makin' me wobbly." It was affecting his speech as well, his companions noticed.
"I feel very vulnerable, running around in nothing more than padded long underwear," Jess added. She'd been forced to leave her damaged armor behind. "At least I've got some weapons," she continued, holding up two hand blasters she'd recovered from wrecked robots. "But I can't run as fast as he can fly."
"I could catch him on a wave," Juna suggested. "But not if I had to carry you guys"
"Tell you what, team," Strobe spoke up. "I'm beat, too, but I can make it easier on all of us. Pick your seats!" Four glowing white easy chairs appeared on the ground in a 2 x 2 arrangement. He sank into one of the chairs with a weary sigh, and his team sat down in the others. The chairs moved closer together, shrunk as required to fit their occupants snugly, and a streamlined capsule formed around them. "Soivice in style wit' a smile!" he quipped wearily. "Plus it gives us a chance to rest a little until we catch him."
Strobe soon found out that the chase and capture wouldn't be as easy as he had hoped. Augur's flier was well-designed to maneuver in these wide, well lighted corridors; anywhere the giant DarkFactor could pass, Augur and the flier could pass as well. But while Strobe's glowing capsule was faster, it was bigger and harder to maneuver around corners - and Augur kept turning into cross-corridors seemingly at random, though his path always trended downward and deeper into the vast mountain range. The new corridors were obviously less well used; the lighting was becoming intermittent, there was dust on the floor, and sometimes the wall and ceiling panels were damaged.
By straining his will to the utmost, and ignoring his own pains and the groans and complaints of his passengers as his capsule jolted too quickly around sharp corners, Strobe was actually able to slowly gain ground on the fleeing flier.
"He must'a made wrong turn!" Valor observed triumphantly, as Augur reappeared out of the last side corridor he'd taken, his lead greatly diminished. "He mush be gettin' rattled, knowing we're gaining on him!" An instant later: "Hah! It was... dead end!" he crowed as they flashed past the turn. His speech was a little better than before.
"If you could make me a window, we're close enough that I could probably hit him" Jess suggested, holding up one of her pistols.
"He hasn't actually attacked us," Juna was concerned. "Until he does, I'm reluctant to take potentially fatal action against him." Jess started to protest, but Juna cut her off sharply. "He's not just an invading plant, you know - he's a person, just like you and me." Jess filed that for later thought - she still wasn't used to fighting sentient enemies.
Ahead of them, Augur made another turn, this time not into a side corridor, but a large hole in the wall. This hole was smaller than the corridor, barely wide enough for Augur's flier. Tracks in the dust and splashes of congealed rock spattering the corridor suggested that it had been created only recently. When they reached it, Strobe had to come almost to a full stop in order to make the turn. He had to lengthen the capsule, and rearrange the seats into single file; they were now riding in a glowing white missile! The tunnel had been melted through the rock by a beam of tremendous heat, and there was no lighting; Augur had by now almost vanished into the darkness
Strobe concentrated and the front end of the capsule emitted an intense beam like high-powered headlights. The glassy sides of the tunnel seemed to intensify the beam, lighting it brightly, and they could now see that it ran straight as an arrow, at least as far ahead as their fleeing foe. Strobe aimed their missile down the exact center of the tunnel and concentrated on increasing thir speed. Far ahead, they could see that Augur was having trouble holding a straight path at his new, higher velocity. Showers of sparks exploded from the walls whenever his flier would drift slightly to one side or the other.
They blasted down the corridor at jet speed, rapidly closing the gap between them and their prey. And then things started to go wrong.
"Jim, I don't like this! It reminds me of a trap I encountered with the Invincibles, before I assumed command." Valor had his voice fully under control now.
At the same instant, Augur passed a boundary of some sort, and the walls of the tunnel now revealed were glowing bright green. 'Warning! Green Kryptonite radiation detected; intensity is increasing!' a mental voice shouted in Strobe's mind. Green Kryptonite radiation interfered with the operation of his Glove, as he had discovered early in his career*. He and Juna, the greatest expert on Kryptonite on Xenon, had experimented to find a way to fix this weakness during the earlier part of the trip, but had so far come up with nothing better than a detection and warning system. Jim immediately ordered the missile to slow down. Already he could feel his energy constructs starting to dissolve.
*see "Another Manic Monday"; 5EP Presents, 1987
"This capsule's about to fall apart!" he warned his friends. "I'll slow us as much as I can, but it's going to be rough." Ragged glowing white cushions formed around Strobe and his teammates, providing some padding against deceleration. but these new constructs were already fading, along with the missile itself.
Glowing green light was starting to fill the missile's interior as they moved into the green-walled section of the tunnel. The pillows and the capsule itself evaporated, dropping the heroes the floor while they were still moving , perhaps at 'school zone' driving speeds. The air was filled with gasps of pain, moans and groans as they quickly bounced, tumbled and finally skidded to a stop. Coming on top of their existing beaten condition, Strobe and Jessiat were smashed into unconsciousness. Valor struggled to get to his feet, only to discover that something was interfering with his control of the android body - his mental commands were being blocked by some kind of intense mental static. No matter what he wanted to do, the android body remained in a lifeless heap on the glowing green floor. Worse, the static was still growing more intense, and now it was blocking sensory messages from his body. He was locked in his mind again!
Juna's force field allowed her to survive the tumbling relatively unscathed, and she scrambled to her feet. She could see that Augur had by now ended his headlong flight and was now approaching his decimated foes. 'Well,' she thought with determination 'I'm not finished yet! It's not going to be that easy!"
She used her water-control powers to call up a wave to wash down the corridor and smite her opponent, but nothing happened! Something was blocking the turquoise sun energy that gave her control over water; perhaps the miles of mountain range overhead, or some scientific weapon Augur had devised. It didn't matter; she still had super-strength due to the low gravity conditions of Thrann compared to Xenon, and her shield made her nearly invulnerable. She picked up Jess's weapons and strode up the corridor until she was shielding her friends, prepared to defeat Augur by herself. She was discovering that determination could be a lonely feeling.
A barrage of small missiles blasted from the front of Augur's rapidly-approaching flier. For just an instant, Juna was terrified that somehow her field would fail; then the missiles exploded and she was engulfed in flame and smoke. As soon as she realized that she was safe, she took a deep breath in relief - a little too soon. Somehow the explosions had forced a watery mist through her field, though she hadn't been able to discern it while she was inside a fireball. She switched off her force field, jumped backwards to where she hoped the air would be clear, and tried to breath heavily, but it was too late. She felt consciousness slipping away from her as she collapsed to the floor. Her last thought was that in the Terran adventure novels she was learning to like, it was never a good sign when all the heroes were unconscious at once in the presence of a villain. Even the adrenaline that washed through her at that thought wasn't enough to bring her back to consciousness, and she slipped into darkness.
Augur slowed his flier, and stopped only a few feet from his fallen former allies. "I'm sorry I took advantage of your trust," he told them sadly. "During the time I spent on your ship, I learned everything I could about the four of you, including how to defeat you. I can't be captured; now that DarkFactor has been exposed as a traitor to the Revolution, I must escape to rejoin the Underground!"
Augur reluctantly reached out and touched a button on his control console, and the yellow energy beam lashed out, briefly touching each of the four unconscious aliens. With a flash and a slight pouf of smudgy smoke, each hero simply vanished. Augur's flier rotated, and again he flew down the long, slick tunnel, deeper and deeper under the mountain range. His speed was much higher than before he'd sprung his trap, and an alert observer might have noticed that his flier never touched the sides of the tunnel. Darkness quickly closed around him, as he fled toward the vanishing point.
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Post by johnreiter902 on Nov 17, 2019 5:55:03 GMT
all done
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Post by Dan S on Nov 17, 2019 12:49:21 GMT
Thank you for grabbing these fragments and making them a story! I know how much work it is...
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Post by johnreiter902 on Nov 20, 2019 21:04:02 GMT
Thank you for grabbing these fragments and making them a story! I know how much work it is... It was my pleasure.
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