~Rokhan~

Sitting hunched over a blank slab of obsidian Rokhan contemplated just how to control the ever growing number of super powered individuals popping up over the globe. Deep in his heart he knew he had little hope of containing all of them; he would still try. His desire to confine them wasn’t born of fear, hate, or the need to show his own power but instead the need to protect those who could not protect themselves. He let his mind briefly touch the iron door that guarded his memory’s flooding him with the the sights, sounds, and smells of a redheaded girl he only wished he could see again. Her name was Kate. She was eighteen in this vision with her skin still pale enough that the sunbeams seemed to use her as a beacon. A white stemmed rose with brilliant shining petals of red. His vision of beauty flashed quickly to a different red, this time she was older, twenty two, her skin broken like rice paper torn to shreds. Hair that once held the red hues of life now soaked on the dark thickening liquids of death. Rokhan cringed slamming that heavy iron door of his mind closed.

With a mild shake in his hand he pressed two fingers lightly into the obsidian. Instead of meeting the resistance of cold stone it gave way under his will as if it were a liquid. A ripple cascaded over through and into the rock, as it passed over the smooth surface tiny shapes began to rise. They started as crude shapes slowly gaining detail the further the ripple went until the whole surface of the table was the exact replica of a small city. Rokhan sat in complete stillness as he focused his minds eye on the city his hands placed on the stone floor between crossed legs creating a link between him and the earth. While connected to stone he was able to become sturdier, “see” through the stone as if the whole world was able to become an extension of his senses. The sensation was close to overwhelming unless he was able to channel what he was seeing into something solid like the table before him. The buildings grew spreading out from the middle pushing some to the edges of the table where they were swallowed down to the underside. In the center of the table walked an obsidian figure masked in obscurity, Rokhans stone sight could make ouy nearly any structure he focused on, could pinpoint any foot falls he knew, could tell when a drop of blood hit the ground. However when it came to seeing into buildings or trying to make out exact details of a moving person his ability became harder to maintain, harder to focus. Instead it gave him a broad view of what was going on, if not a detailed view.

With a sigh to break his trance and connection to his sight Rokhan with drew from the room he called the Scrying Chamber. He had located a hand full of new Supers that needed to be confronted and tested to see if they were good at heart or if they too would end up in holding like the last eighteen he had found. Those ones were bad beyond a doubt, or simply crazy due to their new power of from their minds not being able to control their new bodies. His luck so far had been less than good, out of the twenty three supers he had found only five had been able to properly control their power and were going to use their power for the greater good. Two of those he left alone because they wanted to go it alone, the other three had been killed by a super he now had locked up. Rokhan would settle for anyone seeking justice, vengeance or even some one that “removed” supers to protect those that couldn’t defend them selves. He himself would prefer not to kill anyone unless he deemed it absolutely necessary. Thats what BlackBall was for, to preserve life and hopefully someday be able to help those inside that needed it. Rokhan shivers with the fear that it may never happen, that all he has done is make things worse by forcing himself on the world. As the shiver passes he steels himself and continues on his way to the only exit to BlackBall prison.

Robin was seated in a place called Starbucks. It was some sort of coffee place that was apparently founded back in 1971, but Robin had never heard of it. Must not have been popular back then. In the past 50 hours Robin had been unable to sleep. Well 50 hours to him, according to a clock on the wall it had been around 28 hours since he arrived in the year 2014. A lot had changed since 1971. The Vietnam war had ended and a new one had begin in the Middle East. The Seahawks beat the Broncos in the Super Bowl this year. Technology had made gigantic leaps in advancement, evidenced by the notebook thin computers everyone was carrying around. Even as a scientist Robin had trouble believing such small devices could be computers far more advanced than the ones of his day. Not much had really changed about the world though, people were essentially the same all around. Aside from the incredible technology this was still very much the city he had grown up in.

But he had to find someone he knew, someone had to be alive. His friends would all be in their 60's by now, but he might be able to locate them if he searched hard enough. He had looked around his old neighborhood and couldn't find anyone he recognized. Really, he was most worried about finding out about his mother, if she was still alive. Robin had already figured out that his father must have gotten flung much further into the future than he had. He didn't know how he'd find the resources but somehow he'd build a new time machine and find his father. Even if he had to jump indefinitely into the future to find him.

Robin left the Starbucks and went outside. Everyone around him was moving slowly, even the cars were moving slower than he ran. He waited a while at the crosswalk, but the wait was unbearable. A good 5 minutes had passed and Robin had a feeling it wouldn't be changing any time soon. He looked around and didn't see any police; he figured this would be a good time to jaywalk. Robin looked both ways and hurried across the street. There was car coming rather close to him but Robin was able to get out the way. There was a guy on the sidewalk at the other end of the street who got wild-eyed and started shouting at Robin.

"Hey kid, are you crazy? You could've gotten you-" Robin walked away. The words were coming out of his mouth so slowly that Robin couldn't take it. That part would take some getting used to. At first Robin thought it was kind of cool being faster than the world around him but it was starting to get irritating. Robin was getting really hungry, he would have to find some way to get food. That's when he saw somewhere familiar, McDonalds. Robin jaywalked across the street again and into the restaurant. There were three people in front of him but to Robin it took about half an hour for all them to get done ordering. He didn't even wait for the kid at the counter to ask him what he wanted.

"I will take a big mac with a large fry and coke. To go please.", said Robin.

The cashier looked at him bewildered, "Woah dude, slow down. What was that?"

Robin realized this was the first person he'd talked to since he'd arrived in the 21st century. He hadn't even consider that other people would hear him talking at hundred miles an hour. He tried again, slower this time. He felt like he was trying to talk to a mentally handicapped child. The teen understood Robin this time and got him his order. That's when Robin realized he didn't have any cash. He'd left his wallet back in his room. He had feeling that "I left my wallet 40 years in the past" would be a bad excuse. But Robin was hungry to the point of light-headedness. Acting on instinct he grabbed the bag of food and ran out. He was halfway down the street when he looked back and saw the cashier just getting out of the door. Wow, life was going to be easy for Robin.

He ran for a while longer until he felt he was a safe distance away. At one point he ran by a woman in skirt and the force of the wind he was creating blew it upwards. He looked back and stared, it took a while for the skirt to go back down so he got a good view. He ducked into an alley and sat down along the wall of an apartment building to eat his meal. The Big Mac had gotten smaller than they were in his day. But it still enough to fill him up. Not long after he finished he passed out asleep. He awoke a little while later, he felt like he had slept a good 7-8 hours but it was still just the late afternoon. This whole thing was going to take some getting used to. Robin took a sip of the water that was left in his cup, threw the garbage on the ground and walked off.

The smell of fear...

Fear is a tangible thing. It can be collected, bottled. Its is real as real can be. Oh, we like to imagine it as an emotion, something that can be substituted for another, driven out by a simple frame of minded, in other words, ignorance.

No, fear is physical, and just like any physical thing, detectable. It comes as a cocktail of stomach acid, adrenaline, and many other chemicals. You can smell it yourself, sporting events are massively swayed by it. We call this detection "stage fright" or "home field advantage" or many other things. To Barsavis, however, it was more. He could tell very subtle differences. Terror was different from worry, spooks were different from startles, even uncertainty was different from certain but negligible misfortune. To describe it as oder would be not particularly accurate, it was a different sense altogether just as sight was different from taste, and taste was different from touch. Describe the Mona Lisa in the form of sound. You can't do it in a way that makes sense. Now use words to describe it, that is much more plausible. So it is the same for Barsavis.

A new scent had arisen. It was a resounding dread almost, as if fear had come and stayed. It was elusive. Night after night he probed and searched with little success. So he tried searching nightmares. Such tragedies would surely yield nightmares, and there he could find this victim and glean information from them. He thought he had found it, but instead he had found Rokhan. He wasn't entirely sure who or what it was, but Barsavis called him "The Fighter" because every day he struggled against something. His dreams were plagued with imagery so terrible. The question remained... where in the world was he? Who was he? What... was he? Barsavis could honestly not say if this was a human or not, and that made him curious, and as you well know curiosity was a seed of mystery.

There had come clandestine communication, starting with Rokhan. Barsavis wasn't entirely sure how, but the entity had pieced together some considerable evidence, not on the WHO Barsavis was, but on the impact he had on crime scenes. Rokhan was not entirely sure on who was fiddling around with things, but he had scried objects moving on their own, villains being subdued by a force that was insubstantial.There was a note and a clue, and that came with a likewise veiled response on behalf of Barsavis. Trust didn't come easily, but it wasn't the trust of others that was the issue.

It had been some time that Barsavis worked overtime trying to track down his associate to be sure of who he was involved with, and no matter how far he looked, he never found him, Rokhan was always just out of reach. Barsavis began to collect a grasp on just how far-reaching Rokhan's powers were, and it didn't settle well with his own modest abilities. One thing brought him comfort, nobody knew who Barsavis was, nobody, but his wife. Autumn was just getting used to her abilities, and far from practical use. Barsavis was proud of his handful of foiled crimes and the fact that no one, not even the crooks he fought, could fully testify that it was even a someone. Most reguarded it as mere dumb-luck. They blamed the convenient placement of incriminating evidence was simply illegally obtained, or that someone had ratted them out, but they couldn't tell who. Only a couple suspected a mind behind the catastrophic failures that resulted in police response. The vigilante justice enacted in back corners was not something they could testify to, some suspected guardian angles, or even demons that protected the victims. Guns failed to fire, knives failed to cut, muscles refused to follow through, and poison always seemed to be misplaced. However, none, not even one, could testify that it was a person pulling the strings, that they were flesh and blood, or that Barsavis was more than some supernatural gobbledygook.

Tonight was different, Barsavis knew it. There was something on the air. All day he had been distracted, and he was busy. Autumn had been understanding, and she had done her part as the crime-fighter's wife, but Barsavis had been out all night, ranging to all corners of the city. His efforts were failing, the criminals weren't getting more or less affective, but there WERE more OF them. This wasn't fun any more. There wasn't a lasting impact. It seemed like pulling weeds in a vacant lot. No matter how carefully extracted, how much poison or fire was emptied on the evil, the field would sprout twice fold with more contaminating vegetation outside of his reach, outside of the field he tended. Lately, even though most of his powers were not the sort that taxed the body, he was getting tired, frustrated, and he had noticed everything had dwindled in his doubts. This wasn't working, the superhero needed help. He needed a team. For one reason or another, he had never considered asking Rokhan for help with this. Now, now it was time.

The Hindustan Ambassador. Recently rated the world's best car by To-Gear. It was certainly a choice that no one expected. Most people drooled over the sporty cards, and overlooked the utilitarian such as taxi-cars. Under-the-hood, however, it was a different story. ‘Classy’, ‘reliable’ and ‘indestructible’ were all words used to describe this vehicle. To bad the company was hitting hard times, a dramatic drop in sales, it might be the car's last year in production...

So, maybe someone at Hindustan paid off someone at Top-Gear...

Her employer was Indian, however, a prosperous businessman with a taste for classic and unique cars. He provided a car-service for the other gazillionaires in the city.

It frustrated the hell out of Rodge that they would not let her under the hood. She had applied as a mechanic, but, the man interview her didn’t need a mechanic, he needed drivers… he didn’t typically hire women, however, the company was just getting over some sort of lawsuit and needed a token-minority-female employee for the sake of their image. That, and the man seemed to appreciate her… personality… both of them.

Ew.

Today she was assigned to pick up a couple from the airport. She got an early start, knowing that traffic would definitely be a problem. She dressed quickly, black slacks and overcoat, white blouse, tie, ugh. She was strict with her hair, pulling it back into a bun. The hair fought her, fraying, but eventually surrendered her her skilled hands. ‘I’ll have to get it straightened again soon...’ In the mirror she noticed that the jet-black hair was beginning to pale at the roots. ‘I’ll need to dye it again as well...’ Her stiff hat hid the root-problem for the moment. No makeup, no jewelry, no breakfast. Tar-black coffee. Out the door and on the road…

So, back to work. The car was black as her hair with the company logo tastefully printed on the back. It was a 2003 Ambassador Classic. 4-door, plenty of luggage and legroom, manual 5-speed gearbox, top speed only 86 mph, and (we-promise-only-theoretical) accelerations 0- 60 in 14.5 seconds,1/4 mile drag time of 19.7 seconds.

Now, the couple. She had to do the whole shebang, stand in the airport with a printed sign, drag the luggage out, pack up the car. She liked driving, and this was a much less frantic pace than a street-taxi gig. She could live without the customer service, yet, she had only made better tips at that bar in Vegas… Between this and her other two jobs, she would be comfortable in this city. Or so she hoped.

She made it a point to drive smooth and steady. She didn’t want the couple behind her to spill their champagne after-all. They chattered in a romance language she didn’t know, she had fur on her collar and he had thick rings on his fingers, she in periwinkle and he in navy, both with strawberry comb-overs.

She was staring off, Rodge was bored, she was day-dreaming about the ‘69 Mercury Cyclone that had rolled into the garage yesterday…

She slammed on her breaks as someone darted across the sidewalk and across the road. Her hat fell off her head, her breath was caught in her lungs, she had nearly hit him...

“Shit.” She wiggled the stick-shift and cringed at the sound the engine made.

“What on earth!” The woman in the back seat swooned. “Watch where your going!"

“Sorry ‘mam.” Rodge was back in gear and driving smoothly again. “Someone ran out into the road.”

“Who?” the man demanded. “We pay good money for a smooth ride, you’ve ruined my suit.”

Rodge only rolled her eyes. Of course it was the man, and not the woman, complaining about the state of his cloths.

Yet, his question seemed justified. For as Rodge looked about, she didn't see anyone. There was no way he could have run off that fast...

She shrugged, she had somewhere better to be. She gritted her teeth and hoped that the couple would not file a complaint. The company expected inhuman perfection from it’s driving staff.

They hadn’t lost all their champagne, and tittered to each other a bit more quietly for the remainder of the ride.

She dropped them off at a classy hotel, passed their things off to the bell-hop. She speed off a bit-faster-than-necessary, glad to leave them behind.

She wasn’t allowed to smoke in the car, and didn’t have another assignment until 5. After that, the diner would be expecting her. She checked her watch 4:00…

She parked in an empty lot under the bridge and produced her paper and tobacco bag from her inside coat pocket. She rolled her own tobacco, it’s aroma and taste were much more pleasant than normal cigarettes. She blamed her grandfather for this preference, it’s how he smoked.

She checked her watch again. I still have time to kill, but I could use another coffee…

She slid into the drivers seat, she left the door open, one foot still outside as she finished her cigarette and adjusted her mirrors...