A Conjuror's journey

Deciding to start off with something simple, you approach Alec and Louise with Moira following to see what you do. Meeting the boy's look of bored indifference, you say, "In order to know what we are looking for before we begin, tell us what exactly your ability is capable."

Turning his masked face toward the other pair of children, Alec seems to give it some thought. After a few moments switching his focus between you and them, he starts speaking in a quiet voice, "Oookay... Well, I just kind of control people's body parts. Tats says it's something to do with their nerves, which makes sense I guess... I never really cared to check." He pauses and gives you the most overdone shrug you've ever seen. "Anyways, it's small twitches at first, but it gets better the more time I have to practice on someone."

"What's the limit?" Moira asks, setting her datapad down to rummage through a crate.

A smirk playing on his delicate lips, the boy replies, "Who said there is one?"

"How many people can you affect? How much fine control do you have? Is there sensory feedback? What is the maximum distance you can affect somebody? Can you influence someone's thoughts?" With each question you ask, his smirk fades until he's scowling.

"You wanna know my bank info too?" He complains, but the unspoken threat as well as the promise of payment quickly overcomes his annoyance. "Fine... You could say I like to live vicariously. Masters like me get a bad rep... for good reason I guess, but I'm no Ziz. No emotional influence, no subliminal thoughts, no mind shenanigans at all, just physical control. The Protectorate probably already figured it out since they'd have to be completely retarded not to, but I used to go by Hijack 'cause I can completely control a person's body. It's not much of a secret, but don't tell Little Green and her moron sidekick over there. More distance and people makes it harder... I guess a couple dozen or halfway across the city would be my max."

By the he finished talking, Vahlen pulled out a series of small white pads and began sticking them to your confused apprentice's skin. Before the pinkette could question it, the doctor hummed, "Hmm... While not the type of thing I was hoping to test our implant against, it could be useful information for countermeasures we might need later. Wait moment while I sync our sensors. Alright, make her do something."

"Wait, what? I never agreed t-" Louise's attempt at protesting is cut off as she bites her own tongue and hisses in pain. Glaring at the snickering boy, she tries to take a step toward him, but her left leg spasms and she almost falls over.

This continues for an hour, your apprentice growing more and more aggravated as the severity of her control problem increases. The moment she loses all control is easily noticeable from both her lack of attempted violence and the severe shift in body language, but the later quickly fades away until you might not have been able to notice if you didn't already know. Flouncing over to Alec, Louise wraps her arms around the boy's midsection and presses herself against him.

"Oh Alec, you're so amazing!" The girl's mouth says in a sickening saccharine voice, her hand coming up to run a single dainty finger across his frilled shirt, displaying just how dangerous and in control of her he is.

Of course, Louise immediately bursts into flames and ruins the image of total domination he was going for. The boy screams and shoves her away, throwing himself on the floor to put out his smoldering costume. Everyone in the room stops to watch as Louise pins him to the floor with ice and repeatedly kicks him in the groin and declares. "Y-you stupid animal, who do you think you are? I'm going to kill you slowly for that!"

Regaining some modicum of composure, he immediately locks her legs at the threat, too busy clutching himself in agony to do much more. Taking pity on the fool, you siphon some of Louise's magicka to heal his burns and drain his stamina until he falls asleep. Moira takes advantage of the silence to moan pitifully as she watches Louise peel the melted devices from her still burning skin, "Those were our only adhesive sensors you just destroyed."

"I'm not apologizing, you should have kept your new pet on a leash." Your apprentice argues petulantly tossing the charred objects at Alec's face.

"The next ones go under the skin, you little menace!"

Rubbing your eyes, you ignore them in favor of looking to see Clockblocker trying to hide behind an amused Vista.

Status: Healthy
Magicka: (650/650)

Choose:
[] Wait for the clean-room to be finished and then vivisect one of the parahumans.

[] Kill Alec and reanimate him to see if you can control his power or understand more about it. The monstrous pair would be more convenient due to not being close to Louise's friend or part of a large organization, but their mutations might contaminate the experiment.

[] If they are creating a similar effect as your Oblivion Gate, perhaps you could increase the effect to something more easily studied.

[] Write in.
------------------------------------
A/N: I just went with the winning one since only two people responded to the last author's note.

While Moira and Louise have their little spat, you make your way over to the pair of Wards. Between Clockblocker's childishly exaggerated fear of Louise and Vista's casual dominance over the area around her, the dark skinned scientist that was trying to study them was quickly growing frustrated.

"I cannot make heads or tails of why their abilities work the way they do." The man admits to you when you get close. "Live or dead plants don't matter, dead animals are treated the same, but living animals prevent her powers from function, but anything smaller than a mouse has no impact. It's entirely arbitrary on what works and what doesn't. The boy doesn't have the same problem, but if his ability was truly stopping time then whatever he froze would stay in place as the planet flies through space... but otherwise it is completely inviolable."

Off to the side, another man speaks up, "Hey, at least we know the girl's somehow making new matter and then erasing it when she returns a place to normal."

"But that just brings up more questions!" The first complains and at your questioning glance says, "We used Meld to mark the molecules of a brick and asked her to stretch it, but the resulting brick was missing all trace of the marking and Meld. I just can't figure out how she's doing it! None of our gear was made to resist being replaced molecule by molecule, so we can't get any readings inside her field, it just comes up as an error."

If Vahlen's findings are correct, it is likely that she is actually pulling matter in from another realm rather than the more difficult magic that is creating it from raw magicka. It would explain a great deal about the parahuman phenomenon if they all had an instinctive grasp on harnessing chaotic creatia. Being the very thing that the daedra make their bodies and equipment from, the formless high-energy material is maleable enough to account for every parahuman ability that isn't covered by other more mundane magics.

"I have an idea as to what is happening." You tell the two, turning your attention to the bickering children.

"-you have to be so immature?" The green clothed girl sighs, stepping around the boy in a single step that took her much further than it should have. Noticing your attention on her, Vista straightens up and wipes away the remainder of her visible amusement.

Raising a brow at Clockblocker's commendably ruthless use of a tiny girl as a shield, you announce, "Hello again children, I trust you have been well cared for?"

"Well no, not really." Clockblocker replies, getting elbowed in the ribs by the girl. "Ow, hey! I was just saying. I for one prefer to sleep at night instead of get poked with needles."

"Shut it Clock, you drank most of that energy drink they gave us!" Vista heatedly points out before turning to you and asking, "How much longer are you going to keep up here? Not that it hasn't been more interesting that patrolling or school, but we should probably check in at least... I'm pretty sure the PRT are freaking out by now."

"Yeah man, I got that medicine you promised, but it's kinda useless just sitting in my pocket."

Gifting them with a kind smile, you stall any further complains and tell them, "I am quite sure we can arrange something after another few tests. In fact, I promise to personally arrange transportation for you to deliver the cure to your father, but I would ask for one of you to volunteer for an important experiment first."

"What kind of experiment." Vista asks suspiciously and you wouldn't be surprised if she was carefully inspecting you beneath her visor, measuring your threat level.

In a few ways, she is like another Louise. Her standoffish nature, pretending to be more mature than she is, and of course her height. Just like with when the pinkette used to look at you the same way, you decide to be just truthful enough for the promise of power to sway her.

"We have determined that the unusual brain structure you parahumans have developed is a form of gateway to allow energy through. I propose that we widen the opening to allow for more energy, possibly boosting your power as a side effect, but the more important thing is that we could more easily study how they work."

"I've never heard of anything like this in any parahuman studies." Vista says, skeptical of your offer despite her similarity to your apprentice.

From his spot against the wall, the scientist calls out with a laugh, "That's because your people suck at their jobs."

"Ignore him." You tell the children, earning a pout from the eavesdropping man. "You can ask Doctor Vahlen for proof of her findings if you would like."

The two exchange a nervous glance and Vista fingers a small scar at the base of her skull before Clockblocker shakes his head. "No, we'll take your word for it. I guess I'll do it... What am I doing exactly?"

---------------------

With Clockblocker sitting in an octagon of his own blood, similar to the one you used to leave Nirn, you set a filled soul gem on each corner. Since the portal doesn't need to be very large or create a new opening, the eight trapped souls should be capable of filtering enough raw starlight to power it. Daedric clusters identical to those that create an Oblivion gate are painted onto his skin, a Doht for entry upon his brow.

Laughing nervously, the boy runs a hand through his reddish hair. "Just so we're clear, we're not summoning Satan are we?"

You ignore the idiotic question and continue finishing the last letter and cast Paralysis on him. It would be unacceptable for him to ruin the experiment through childish impatience. Layer after layer of Barrier Ward are the next step at making sure nobody interferes.

"And now I know what Vicky drew on her sister's face." Louise mutters, covering both her and Vista's eyes in mortification, dropping the box of spare soul gems they had been carrying out of the warehouse to make room.

"Why does he need to be naked?!" Vista squeaks, having been distracted by her own task of helping move the newly arrived truck loads of materials that had finally arrived. "D-Clockblocker, why would you take off your costume? Now they know what you look like!"

You neglect to point out that you now also know his name starts with a d and instead tell her, "He cannot answer you, I have immobilized him for his own safety. As for the nudity? His outfit would obstruct the process of layering his flesh in daedric lettering... though I suppose he could have dressed himself if we waited to delay and let it dry."

Silencing any further protests, you start the process. Sending magicka through the lines of blood causes the soul gems to release their own magicka into the crimson liquid and on to the boy's skin. The Daedric clusters slowly take on a malignant glow, the hateful language of Oblivion twisting the energy to it's purpose and the air takes on the telltale red tint that denotes a nearby oblivion gate.

As everything reaches a stable point and you are prepared to call it a success, there is a spike of energy and the boy's head collapses in on itself to reveal a borderless portal expanding further and further to encompass the entire area within the barrier. Rather than the usual fiery ovoid, the portal is simply a circle of flames with an empty hole in the center.

You distantly hear the sound of horrified screaming, but most of your attention is centered on the mass of folded hypercubes made of transparent and almost crystalline flesh that pulsate on the other side of the portal. At least you don't need to keep your promise to see him home.

Status: Healthy
Magicka: (650/650)

Choose:
[] Nope! Immediately close the portal and recall everyone from Brockton bay before closing that Oblivion Gate as well.

[] May as well try to make the boy's unwitting sacrifice meaningful.

[] Kill it with fire... And Lightning... And Ice, lasers, explosions, and more fire.

[] Write in.