************** Playground 10
"How much exposure to diseases have you had in your healing?' The Doctor's voice was calm, their face younger than I would have expected. "Please, any information that hasn't made it to your public dossier might help your situation."
From inside my room size bubble of what appeared to be plastic but rang like metal when the guard rapped on it for my attention.
"Hey! Answer the questions." The guard repeated the rapping noise.
"Or what? Are you planning to hit the 'burn' button on me?" I wasn't feeling all that cooperative just yet and I had noted the gas lines through the transparent material of the 'cage'.
The Doctor, youngish, in her late twenties maybe, held her hands up to placate the guard as she moved closer.
"Well, have you?"
I shrugged, turning my head all the way around to look at her even though my body was still feet pointing away from her. "How would I know for sure?" I lift my hand up and wiggle my fingers. "Anyone I touch is affected a little, anyone I wrap around like clothes a lot or faster. Injuries they have from wounds to mental issues --I feel them as pain as they are healed. I can kind of tell when it is mental or not, sometimes I even get a blurb of the memory causing it. But if they are hurting from drugs or past injuries or smallpox, I don't know which thing I heal because it is all or nothing."
"And this is true with any part of your material?" She asked after making a note.
"I've given out pieces. If a person is injured and holding a piece I can feel it. So far I've healed anything I've felt like that." I turned my body toward her while keeping my eyes locked on hers. "Do you have infected people quarantined where you can send a piece of me?"
She went green a little. "Anyone found to be sick is immediately taken to the Hospice."
I blinked. "Did you mean to say Hospital there?"
Quick shake of her head 'no'.
The guard isn't so squeamish. "There is no coddling of the sick here, demon. Soon, you too will know the blessing of fire."
"Really? Demon? I thought that religious belief was one of those things that failed after the first few years of the diseases.
He sneered. "Demon, as in 'dimensional monster' like your predecessor, Haywire."
"In case you hadn't noticed, I was brought here against my will from my world. I've been kidnapped."
The Doctor piped up. "What of the bandages sent to Congress?"
I shrug. "Those were sent by a group that operates across multiple worlds, when they thought that the bandages were how I was attacking them. It was not the only item of apparel I could connect to." I smiled a little.
"So you do admit to attacking another world, just not this one!" A new voice approached. Another suit, with a few aids following her around like little ducklings following their mother.
"I was responding to an attack on me, and did not know there were other worlds involved. I was able to heal their psychological issues and remove them as a threat to Bet." my eyes note that one of the aids is more aware of their surroundings, likely a bodyguard dressed as an aid. The speaker was not that far from the look Doctor Motha favored, except for lacking a white coat.
Gray hair tilted as she looked me up and down. "You don't look like much. That means we should be giving less credence to the threat your parahumans pose, or those Endbringer things."
"Your lack of faith is disturbing."
She snorted, causing a sort of echo laugh among her aids. "At least I see the movie industry has put its stamp on Bet."
"I don't know. Our version of the later movies managed to avoid using Jar Jar." I note.
"Well, WE didn't create a so-called hero to destroy our ICBMs." She smirked a little.
Oh, I know that face. Let's see, Oracle I think she goes by. This was getting tiresome. "What is the long term goal for kidnapping me --a minor-- across interdimensional lines?"
"You assume we consider you human enough to care if you are not an adult. It is a pity your array of power classification appears to be missing the Thinker aspect." One of her aids rolls a chair closer where she can sit in front of me.
"Fine. You are all heartless dicks. Let me rephrase. Why am I here?" I let a little red eye gleam from within my hood.
"One traveller to our world nearly destroyed it. We want to be sure the next, is incapable of harming us. Since you also have powers to heal, we want to see if you are able to redress the injuries caused by Doctor Haywire…"
She paused as I chuckled.
"What is the cause of your mirth?" she asks archly.
It takes me a few seconds to stop completely. "It just occurred to me how offbase your assumptions are, really. Have you considered that just because we admit to having lost a Haywire, that we made a communication attempt using his equipment to reach out, that the one you found is the same person and not an equivalent from another world entirely?"
Her arms cross and she leans back. "How would you prove such an assertion?"
"You just called him Doctor Haywire. Was that from his own statement? Something he wrote or spoke that was recorded?"
She nods.
"On Earth Bet, cape names have big mojo. You don't get them wrong or you might have smacked for it. The Haywire we know was known as 'Professor Haywire'."
She's sitting straighter, blinking as I continue.
"From what has been said around me, your Doctor Haywire committed crimes here. What was his M.O.?"
The woman sitting across the wall from me looks at her aid, not the bodyguard, who flips out a phone.
"Doctor Haywire plundered the Louvre, Fort Knox and gold depositories around the world, using guns that fired bullets that took the thing hit to other dimensions. Guards who came back after hours missing were the first definitive disease carriers found. Haywire himself stayed healthy and active for months despite the sicknesses his attacks released."
I was shaking my head. "Yeah no. Professor Haywire developed 'gate' technology. He tried to get government backing for his forays of comparative history. He lost his life when a malfunction split him across multiple dimensions. That isn't to say he wasn't involved with the way your Haywire died. It's possible they both created a gate to the other's location at the same moment."
"Prove it."
I reach into a pocket, with the guard clearly opening the cover to the switch that would burn the interior. My phone is just inside Blanket Space, where I left it.
Taking it out slowly. "Phone. It has internet connection through Blanket Space."
She simpered. "Not now. Commander Wallis set off an EMP bomb there."
I raised an eyebrow as I brought up a search page and loaded a video of Professor Haywire in action. "Doesn't seem to have stuck."
I hold the phone to the glass --well, uh transparent wall-- so they can see it.
"That proves nothing! Anyone could create that with common CGI hardware."
I tilt my head. "Really? Remind me to pick up a locally sourced computer before I leave, will you?"
Her lips press, showing lines. "I could have them press the button now to burn you." She muttered.
"Ever heard of Pyroflex? Or should I just say 'fire blanket'?"
"You still have to breathe."
"Inaccurate. Don't NEED to sleep, breathe, eat or excrete in this state. There are a few things a girl can't live without, but you don't appear to HAVE them."
*********************
Atlantic ocean, research ship "Augustus".
"This is Navigator Hussman of Research Ship Augustus, I have a sighting of Leviathan in the Sargasso."
"Roger that Augustus, this is Coast Guard Cutter Prometheus, Seaman Cross speaking. Levi has been hanging out below that bit of fluff for a full month now, what is changed?"
"Prometheus, Levi is breaching the surface. He has a bunch of that netting stuff around him, the stuff tied to that longboat no one wants anyone to go near." A pause. "Strike that, he is holding the boat in front of his 'face'. If it were anything else I would say he is 'sniffing' it."
"Oh, so not good. Retreat to safe distance Augustus. I know we are intending to. Prometheus out."
**********************
In Director Piggot's conference room, she had gathered people involved. She winced at seeing Kid Win sitting with the Hebert parents, his hand in Professor Rose's as she held the Docker in a hug, hiding her face.
Dragon was off to one side, next to Armsmaster. They were distracted from the issue at hand, enough so she held up her hand for quiet. "Dragon, what has you two chattering in the middle of this?"
Blushing in a way her skin had not been able to do when she was just an avatar, Dragon addressed the group. "We have signs that Leviathan is becoming active. He has been satisfied thus far with maintaining a slow circle underneath the bait boat and nets that Blanket put in the Atlantic."
Sighing, "Well we knew he wouldn't stay out of things forever. Has he lined up a run?"
Dragon shook her head 'no'. "There's more. Scion just changed course from his position near the eastern coast of Australia. He is now moving toward Leviathan's position."
Emily was flabbergasted. "How can you be sure of that?"
Armsmaster spoke up. "We had luck that he was on scope when he shifted, the exact moment Leviathan breached. His course changes show he is tracking to reach where Levi is, despite the circling path the Endbringer is taking."
Blinking rapidly, the Docker broke into things. "How does this relate to Blanket?"
Dragon gestured to a wall monitor that cleared from showing pictures of Blanket Space with the explosion. It now showed Leviathan surfing on the surface. He had an orange colored longboat as he moved, held in front of him in both hands.
"He --ah-- appears to be dowsing with the lifeboat she made filled with her materials." Armsmaster coughed slightly at having mentioned dousing.
"Dowsing?"
"Casting about for the location of … Would one of you please alert Uber and Leet and the fucking Navy that Leviathan may come calling to Norfolk." Director Piggot growled.
"Language!" Assault got his deserved glare and made a zipping gesture at his lips.
"Uber is the one who alerted us. He said the Enterprise got underway immediately. They are heading north along the banks and will be passing Boston in twenty minutes." Dragon noted.
Director Piggot sat back at that. "That seems fast."
Dragon nodded expecting this. "Leet's printer frame printed a larger frame which they mounted on deck. That frame has been tasked in printing upgrades for the ship itself, engines similar to the fighter but scaled up. While the ship can't fly its speed increase is ... significant."
*****************
The children were waiting on the porch. Mama didn't want anybody leaving the yard, so Suze was sitting there waiting. Her cape was upstairs in her room with little Taylor.
The baby was finally asleep up there too after crying herself out. Seems like all the adults knew that Blanket was in trouble, but none of them could see that little Taylor knew --that she knew already.
Moping on the porch, Suze heard a noise from the roof above her. Looking up, she found herself looking into the face of her friend Ryu from the park.
"Is it true?", the wild hair, extra bushy brows and sideburns for a boy his age, all added to the concern on his face as he hung over the edge looking at her.
"Is wut true?" Suze wiped her nose. Brute or not, she still got the sniffles.
"Uncle says the PRT are scrambling. Said Blanket was ab- ab- said she was taken." Ryu's stuttering when he got excited was a thing. "The heroes are scrambling."
"You don't know what that means." Suze accused him, half smile coming to her face anyway.
His grin was telling. "It sounds exciting!"
"Nothing exciting happens here." Suze looked around for anybody watching then climbed the trellis on the end of the porch to the roof where he was.
The roof creaked a little. The two windows at either end were dark. One was Sophia's. The other was her room shared with little Taylor. She motioned him away from hers to keep from waking the baby.
"I want to help. I can help. I can feel Blanket, know where she is." Suze spoke quietly.
"You can? How?" Ryu looked confused.
Realizing her mistake but too late to fix it, Suze winced. "I got powers --from Blanket."
"Really?!" Ryu leaned in. "That is soo cool." he toned down the whisper, but his excitement was clear. As was the size --he'd grown at least a size as his shirt ripped a little. There was a smoldering smell where his hands touched leaves on the roofing. Sparks of electricity made his fur lift on his bare arms. Fur?
"You are a cape too." She said it like she knew all along, but hadn't said.
His blush was telling as he turned his head. Nodding. "Uncle says I am Lung's le-ga-cy." He sounded the word out slowly, tasting it. Turning back to her, red showed in his eyes. "But I'm not bad!"
The sound of the window behind them going up startled both of them. "I'd say get a room, but you are too young for that." Sophia snarked.
Emma was right there with her, leaning out to see. "Huh. Son Goku. Heh, did you get your staff yet?"
Ryu squinted at her. "Uncle says that name sometimes. Something about a trip."
"Nevermind that. Suze, can you get us to Banket Space?" Sophia asked, consideringly.
Suze nodded yes. "The big doll house with Simmie. Yeah." She blinked. "I don't know how many I can take with me."
Sophia waved the two to come into her room. "We need to strategize."
*******************
The squirrel in the tree watched them go into the house.
The radio transmitter strapped to it relayed the conversation. As the window shut, the squirrel scampered down to the roof and placed itself on the windowsill.
********************
From the van parked down the street, Brian looked at Lisa and Alec, raising his helmet's faceplate to not show the skull.
"Those are my sisters prepping to do something stupid. I have to help." He winced.
Alec smiled but put his hand out in a fist bump gesture. "Sibling love is a thing. Besides, it sounds fun."
Lisa pouts a little. "You took my line." She also put her hand in. "The PRT has Baity in hand, and Caterwaul is there to keep him safe enough, but I do have this little device in case of emergency." She patted a case which had one of Baity's devices.
--Device designed for limited usage, in case of Endbringer attack. Most likely Endbringer to attack is Leviathan. Irony is escaping one Endbringer by hiding with another.
"What may I ask is that?" Alec noted. All the squirrels inside the van assumed a pose of being highly interested.
Lisa --Oracle since she was in costume-- absently tossed a king size Zagnut to the other end of the van as she took the case onto her lap. "This was meant to be a ticket to Blanket Space if Levi came calling. From the chatter on the PRT frequencies I can get, that isn't too far from wrong either.
Grue paused. "What was that about an Endbringer?"
Oracle rolled her eyes. "They have been using a boatload of Blanket's material as a red laser pointer to keep Levi in the Atlantic. Since she is gone, he is on the move."
"Here?"
"Maybe. Why do you ask?" Oracle questioned.
--Is worried about mother, sisters, extended family.
Before Grue could answer, she held up a hand. "Right, dumb question. Pull the van around to the alley behind the house. We need to check in with your ma."
Grue hesitated, but got the van rolling. "Step-mom." He thought about it as he drove around to the back. "I guess she is better than our blood mom, right Aisha?"
From the empty drivers seat. "Right." Imp looked over to him. "How did you know I was there?"
"I didn't. But forgetting you are there doesn't mean I forget you like to hang around unremembered." Grue laughed.
"Right."
As the van rolled up to the fence, Grue put a cloud of darkness around them to cover their entry into the backyard.
Coming up the backyard in his darkness, leading the others, Grue got a start as a voice came from the unlit back porch. "Wondering when you were going to show."
He stammered out, "Mrs. Dubois, we … ah"
"Call me Ma or Mama boy, just get your friends inside quiet like. And disperse that cloud of yours."
Inside, visible again, Grue realized there was a white woman with a little girl on her lap on the couch. He had to look twice at the mustard yellow bear in the girl's arms, the angry bear face on it just like Blanket's hood.
"Fia! Come downstairs with your guests. Bring the monkey."
"Mama?" Sophia's voice was quiet, like she was surprised to not hear the baby crying.
"Just come down with your gear, girl. Baby already woke and worked up. Tell them to wear masks if they want to."
Grue's glance at the blond woman took in her putting a small pair of sunglasses on her daughter's face. Then the woman was too bright to look at.
"Purity?" He stuttered a little.
She held out a PRT issued affiliate card. "I don't expect to be invited to dinner. But I am here to help."
Oracle stepped around Grue to offer a business card. "Don't mind him, he is a sucker for a pretty face. Here is our card, in case you are looking for a new --officially heroic-- team."
The room changed color as Purity's blush caused The room to glow pink around where she sat.
Mama Hess watched as Shadow Stalker, Glam, Patches and a monkey boy came down the stairs. The last was tying a red cloth in place, settling the eyeholes of his impromptu mask. It was not a knee high red sock with holes, really.
"What do we call him?" All eyes went to Ryu.
"I am …" Casting about a moment. "Legacy."
"And what does he do?"
Glam, lingering on the last step a the last two passed noted that Suze was still reaching her waist, but the boy was now able to meet her eyes levelly. "He grows on you." She waved a 'get on with it'.
From the kitchen, sounds of rustling as a bag of cereal was poured on the table in there. Chitter came through with his tail glancing off the doorway, eyes bright. "That will only keep them distracted for a couple of minutes. What's the plan?"
Mama Hess glanced toward little Taylor on her car seat/carrier, one eye glowing slightly as she watched the group. That eye was looking at Oracle, who was in turn trying to NOT look in the direction of the baby.
Grue leaned over and put a woosh of cloud from his hand down across Oracle's back.
She shivered with the cold blast of it, shaking off the pain. "Thanks. So, some of us are here because Blanket is missing. Some of us are here to back up the ones who are already planning to go after her. And some of us are keeping a weather eye on Leviathan."
Different people around the room nodded at different points. Almost everyone nodded at the last. A line of squirrels on the couch back and entertainment center also nodded along.
Patches spoke up. "I can get to Blanket Space and find Blanket."
Her little hand found Shadow Stalker's left hand, her grip only slightly painful.
Glam ruffled Patches' wig a little. "If you can, so can I... now."
Purity raised her eyebrows, causing the light in the room to change even though she was damped down on output. "You can absorb powers?"
Glam put her hands on her hips. "Is that a problem?"
"Not at all. Come stand by me please." Purity held a hand over the couch back.
Bemused, Glam came over.
Oracle took up the thread. "I've got one of Baity's guns in here. It's a lot bigger in effect but only has a few shots in it. It's tuned to Blanket Space."
*****************
"Emily, President Obama is trying to talk down his Aleph counterpart. They are threatening to use their ICBMs through the Haywire inspired gates they have if we act." Legend's voice was strained. "We can put out a stage one Endbringer alert to get people moving to shelters in target cities, but we don't have the coverage to stop every gate they can activate."
"I see. Armsmaster thinks he can adjust the force field emitters to cover the city, briefly."
He nods. "Similar installations are using his method across the country. Unfortunately, Aleph is aware of the places the President or the rest of our government would retreat to."
A shiver ran down her back. Emily toggled an alert.
"I need a status on any of the Blanket 'themed' capes. Where are Glam, Patches and Parian?"
**************
In the Rig's cafeteria, Flechette and Parian, sitting together on one side of the table while Poppet sat on the other with a sign around her neck 'No this is not Blanket' in large print. They were drinking tea while Poppet was playing along, practicing holding her empty cup correctly as they did.
Parian paused a moment. "Did you hear something just now?"
Poppet just nodded yes, while balancing her teacup, pinky out.
Flechette shook her head no, definitively. "No. No I did not."
****************
Coming across one of the less occupied continents at a thoughtful pace, Scion noted that the second Engine of Devastation was acting strangely. Two of them had been deviating from their pattern, possibly an aftereffect of the correction to the control shard.
It seems to be fixated on the blank shard, one of those gained from interaction with the third Entity just before the Thinker's failed spawning.
The blank had linked in an artificial dimensional space to the system of similar dimensions that were part of this spawning. There may be leakage from other dimensions involved through that space.
In the normal scheme of things, such a breach's closing would be his primary goal. Now? He was mildly interested as it may signify a diversion from his own trap. Without the combined strength of a pair of Entities, he could not expect to breach the barriers they had placed together. Nor could he recall the shards alone.
<DIVERSION?>
Ah. Dimensional punctures to one of the shardless worlds kept as reserve. Correction, FROM that world. This bore interest.
<ALERT>
Ah, the host species was preparing their weapons of self immolation, but were targeting his primary shard dispersal zone.
That will not do.
