[b][i]Ultron, Ant-Man, Cyrania & Ghost[/i][/b]
[hr]
Henry woke up early as normal, sitting up. Yawning, stretching. Getting up and doing the usual morningy things, toilet, put on your super suit. What else would you do in a morning? Then he went to check if his robo daughter was still in the apartment, to subsequently discover that she wasn’t actually there. He kind of expected that, how long did he think it’d take her to get bored. He sat on the sofa, back facing the door. 

Booting up his computer he checked the data from Tim, the camera ant. He wouldn’t quite let Janet know how Tim managed to keep track of her, not yet anyway. He had to keep some secrets after all, besides it wouldn’t be a very good way to track her if she found out about it and then managed to prevent him from tracking her. Now all he had to do was wait for her to come home.

He did not have to wait long. She thought she was returning plenty early, but one look past the door with her thermal sensors revealed that like many geniuses, her father did not exactly have normal habits, sleeping cycle included.

Pausing at the door, she considered her options for a split second before discarding the thought process, her cybernetic equivalent of a defeated sigh. Walking over and sitting next to Henry, Janet gave him a sideways look: “Alright, fine. Let’s hear it.”

Henry just shrugged. “I guess you’re just living up to your teen years. I do have one question though, who is this-” He turned the laptop so she could see the screen “-and why did you take her to a warehouse that has our fingerprints all over it?”

“Well, actually...” Janet started, looking a little amused, “You unwillingly caused a conflict in my programming. See, you gave me my primary directive too early I think. It compelled me to go and protect all of humanity from themselves. However at the same time, and administrator level instruction form you said I should stay here. And there in comes to play the beauty of Ultron-15’s code, which says that when conflict like this is present, my personality matrix makes the final decision. Something to note for the serial production maybe?” she said with a cheeky smile.

”I chose as limited exposure as I could, and my work yielded unexpected fruit.” Janet continued, pointing to the monitor. To shorten the explanation, she used the projector in her pal formerly used by SAM to display and replay the actions and conversations of yesterday. “This Alice only appeared to be lying about her name, and she did a good job of masking it. However i believe her motivation is genuine. And on a personal level, I feel like she’d make a better friend than that cybernetic contraption - you know, with both of us being lab grown and stuff. Something to connect through maybe, we shall see. It is an interesting experiment none the less, wouldn’t you agree? You should meet her to judge for yourself in oh, a few hours?”

“I don’t really have a choice, we’ll go now. I got tech in that lab I need, though I can see I’ve hid it well if you’ve not noticed it enough to take a stranger there.” He shrugged as he stood up walking to the small kitchen, and throwing some bread in the toaster. “Truth be told I guess it will give you a friend, I’m more likely to see more on the same level as this [i]Ghost[/i] character with the whole espionage thing, not too happy about the lengths he’ll go to though. I presume you haven’t discovered if this [i]Alice[/i] is inclined to follow the same line of thought? The last thing we need is to make allies to then end up fighting against them. If you want proof take a look through the history on the Hero Civil War.”

When the toast popped out, he spread butter on each slice, leaning against the cabinet as he ate waiting for Janet’s response.

“Well, at the very least [i]my[/i] recruit has manners, so… in your face.” Janet stuck her tongue out.

“Well, at the very least [i]I[/i] made you, so is she really [i]your[/i] recruit or just a result of your programming?” he retorted, if she was going to take the piss so could he.

“You mean the result of the code you ripped off of Ultron-15 and thus your predecessor that actually made me go out there? I am fairly certain there are laws against that. Maybe you should tattoo a citation on my back.” She poked back, folding her arms on her chest.

“You’re not getting a tattoo Janet. You’re not eighteen yet. Sorry, it’s the law since you brought laws up.” He shrugged as he finished his toast. “You ready to go? Don’t want to change clothes? Brush your teeth? Hair, makeup?” He brushed himself down, as he walked over to clothes sitting over his couch and threw a shirt and some trousers over his ant-man suit.

“Yeah yeah sway the conversation off-topic. Go pout. I win.” Janet sung rudely and nodded. “Born ready. Well not really but, you know what I mean. And no, I don’t really wear clothes, but maybe I should go out like this?” she said in a easing tone as her outer shell morphed into the tell-tale shape of the previous Ultrons.

He sighed, and sadly the conversations on the way to the warehouse were roughly the same. Sadly, at least her personality was developing. He did think it would improve and develop as she acquired more knowledge. The more she had, the more she’d develop her own personality. As they approached the warehouse he signalled the Ant she was on to come closer so that he could speak to her without comms.

Moving underneath the door, he threw a disk at Janet growing her back to her full size and then hit the button on his right hand bringing himself to full size where his helmet then receded to reveal his face.

Cyrania had decided already to not use her illusions when she first met Janet’s friends. They might like a demonstration of some sort, so it was best to conserve power and besides, they should know what she usually looked like. Janet had probably already seen her like this as she left the warehouse. Therefore, she was prepared when she felt the strange feeling that was Janet’s presence and that of someone else. She turned to face the door in time to see them grow back to full size, surprising her a bit, but she recovered quickly and said, “Hello Janet, sir. I’m guessing you just used Pym particles there. I have heard the old stories about Ant-Man.”

He sighed and turned to Janet. “See Janet, this is why being a legacy hero isn’t that fun. People recognise the tech.”

“Yeah, and imagine the [i]fun[/i] we’ll have explaining when somebody discovers [i]my[/i] legacy. I think your problems are marginal by comparison.” Janet grimaced. She knew Ghost had his suspicions about her, and if Alice was psychic, her mind would feel alien at best.

“That’s not really your legacy though, that’s kind off my families legacy too. Either way-” he extended his hand to the new person in the room. Though he kept his neural net active, if as discussed on the way over she was telepathic she’d probably have a hard time getting a bead on him. What with all the ants crawling around his head on the inside of his mask. Tickled slightly. “-Nice to meet you Alice, I’m Ant-Man. You’ve already met Janet. I was told you may be wanting to stay here a while-” he shot a sidelong glance at Janet with the last comment.

Alice took his hand and shook, “Pleasure to meet you. Well, right now its stay here or live on the streets it seems, unless I took a long commute from the Badlands every day. I want to join you guys as the true successors of the Avengers. I wouldn’t be dead weight. I’ll obey orders and can demonstrate my skill set to you right now.”

Well that was a little try-hardy for Janet’s tastes. It caused her a mild irritation that everybody could just broadcast their abilities around and all she was supposed to do was to be smart, and she did reveal to Alice that she was psychic as well. [i]well that’s a ripoff. all the other kids get to play.[/i] she mentally sneered. “I think we can afford not to be hasty.” Janet pointed out. “I’d like to ask you one thing first though - you kept referring to this Merlin character - who was he?”

“He was my rescuer and mentor of eleven years,” Cyr replied. “Dr. Zola was angry that I refused to kill humans he sneaked in during training exercises. He finally got fed up with it when I was roughly six. So Zola put me in a test with all human opponents and said I would have to kill them all if I was to ever earn a name or I would be killed. I just prepared for death right then and there when Merlin knocked me out of the way. I force-fielded us from further harm and he teleported us into the hallways from which we got out of the complex and escaped. After we were far enough away, we stopped and he introduced himself, saying that he had come because he had heard of a mortal with his power. He then became my teacher from powers to history to herbal lore to math and we survived the Badlands together. I know nothing of his past before he met me, so there’s no use asking. But no matter what he was, I trust him with my life and will always be grateful for what he did for me.”

Ghost was already in the warehouse waiting for the Pyms when he overheard them arrive and speak to someone. For the most part, the conversation seemed mostly about minor introductions, legacies, and those who borrow their aliases with old European folk-lore. 

"Riveting...," Ghost muttered to himself as he made himself visible. He was fully geared up like last time, his bleached white suit glowing in it's own eerie way. In his hands was a burlap sack, stuffed with old solid-state hard drives using some of his not so solid-state tech. This was his bug-out-bag, usually reserved for the worse possible situations if things truly turned sour. Today, there were everything he could scrounge up about Alchemax, "Hot Stuff Transport", and anything else he had back at his base. Ghost wasted no time finding the Pym's data-hub, patting the still standing intelligence container in the middle of the room.

"I'm not here for you kid," Ghost grunted to the metal abomination he had tampered with the day before. "Hope the scars aren't too apparent."

Ghost began plugging his gear into whatever power sockets and hardware connectors he could, drip feeding the Pym's with whatever information he saw fit to give. Janet would probably feel or notice his presence even before they entered, probably monitoring the warehouse's cyber security after yesterday. This time, less punches will be thrown his way. Hopefully.

Interesting. The behavior matched what little there was on record about this ancient wizard, but in more recent history, Merlin only appeared twice and never in person. Why now? Janet filed the question for later as she detected the last member of their rag-tag alliance arriving. “Ah, I believe we are almost complete.” she noted, turning to Henry and sending him a message silently over the comms: “So, how much do I reveal about my abilities? They would need to know what they have to work with at least. I am fairly confident in Alice, not so much about her mentor, and if I didn’t suspect Ghost already knew I am not human, I would stay silent, but as such...” she inquired, for once seeking advice.

Henry just shrugged. “It’s your secret, as long as you aren’t blurting it out to everyone in the city quite yet and as long as you feel they can be trusted-” He just shrugged against as he opened the door to the next room which held what was left of SAM. As alerted, Ghost was there already working on something. “In terms of uh, what was it? [i]Successors to the Avengers[/i] you might want to chill your beans right there. We’re here to make a difference sure, though I think enough damage has been done to that name-” He cast a look at Ghost.

“Besides, the Avengers were a team. Right now, I don’t know what we are.” He strolled over to Ghost, looking over his shoulder. “On that note, whatchu working on there Casper?”

To be honest, Janet wasn’t expecting to be given the choice and thus didn’t have a yes or no prepared. Looking down in thought, she withdrawn from the group for a while. On one side, dad was right that they couldn’t trust either of them that fully just yet. She didn’t trust Ghost at personal level, that was a no brainer. He was a thief, a radical revolutionist and that mattered that she would probably have to deal with him at one point in the future. Her calculations predicted an 87.548% chance of an engagement in the future, and most of the rest were the cases where something would change Ghost’s mindset.

As far as her biometrics told her, Alice wasn’t lying about her own past and motivation, and took a big risk herself entrusting her with it. So she did trust her. What she did not trust were the Merlin and Zola guys respectively. The first one for being a really shady character, the other because as evidenced by her own core code, any semi-saneperson creating life in a test tube would make damn certain their creation [i]couldn’t[/i] turn on them.

Distancing herself from Henry and Ghost, she beckoned Alice outside with the nod of a head. “You told me about yourself, it’s only fair I do the same. However, I need to be certain about you. Let us just say that where Alchemax has a problem with what you are, same goes for me but with the general public. I can’t take that chance just yet. So - would you object to a mental scan? I will not look into your episodic memory, only procedural one to determine whether Alchemax didn’t put any safeguards into you that would prevent you from doing them harm or make you an unwilling agent. What do you say?”


"Updating this facilities firmware, updating your files on different corporations, and creating new online alibis if things go south and you can't go back to work," Ghost replied without ever looking away from the hard-drive he was working on. "And don't call me that..."

Soon enough, all of his hard-drives were in full force, uploading and synchronizing data at his command. If one of the hard-drives began overheating, the GhostTech inside would be one intangible and cool within seconds. Ghost looked to Pym, growling in his helmet. "I still have a mild headache from our little skirmish yesterday," he muttered in his ever freezing voice.

“Well information is always useful. Also the firmware was fine-” He cast a glance at Janet. “-Before someone decided she didn’t like a certain V.I.” He turned back to her. “Also I’ve got other facilities anyway, as soon as I’ve scrubbed this facility down everything should just be peachy even if they do come across it. Nothing ties back to me or Janet. So make yourself at home.”
He walked over to a fridge that sat completely out of place, pulling out a small container of chocolate milkshake. Who didn’t like milkshake after all? He twisted the top opening it and then looked back at Ghost. “Well I’m sorry, but Ghost isn’t much of a name. Casper, just has a nice ring to it. Casper the friendly Ghost…”

He sighed. Then turned to his wrist as it beeped. “Oh, I need to go do something.” His helmet slammed shut. “Talk amongst yourselves, I’ll be back in a minute.” He slapped the button on his right hand shrinking him down as an ant came flying through the door and landing beside them. He activated his comm to Janet. “I won’t be long, two minutes tops.”

“Under the circumstances, I wouldn’t mind a mental scan.” Alice replied as she walked outside with Janet. “I’ve wondered about the possibility myself. Though I must warn you, it’s hard to search through a mind without seeing the memories also. I’ve tried before, trying to cure a person who lost part of their memories.” Cyr sighed as she thought of it, then she prepared herself. “I’m ready.”

Janet chuckled: “Hard for a human, maybe.” She reached up with her hands and put her palms on Alice’s temples.

So far she only engaged her telepathic functions to send thoughts, not to connect with someone else. In a sense, she used the same procedure as when she connected to a machine, just used a different set of drivers. to say that she wasn’t tempted to just browse through Alice’s life like an open book would be a blatant lie, but she gave her word.

Still, it felt like interfacing with a supercomputer on par with herself. There was so much unused potential in the human brain, even given some of Alice’s gifts making her use more of it than a normal human would. There were millions of idle synapses for her to filter out. This was going to take a while - about 2.45 seconds if she counted right.

Once Janet was satisfied about Alice’s mind being her own, she gently moved out of her head. “Looks like you’re not a sleeper, congratulations. I believe it is your turn.” Janet grinned, tapping a finger on her own head.

Alice nodded, wondering about the ease Janet had done that without getting tangled up . Then she reached her hand to touch her friend’s face for better concentration and was astounded. The brain itself was normal, but over and interconnected with it was a computer with multiple places for other kinds of sensors and math algorithms. Cyr tried to be as circumvent as Janet was but couldn’t help seeing a first wake up in the warehouse and images of previous robots with ant-like heads. Understanding dawning, Alice then slowly disengaged, looked into the other girl’s visor, and wordlessly said, “[i] You know, you’re just as much human as you are Ultron. If you were a complete robot, we wouldn’t be able to do this.”[/i]

[i]”As intended. It would be a colossal mistake to just rebuild an Ultron without making any changes, even version 15. But you see, it is as I said yesterday - we’re more alike than is apparent. Both of us were born in a lab. The only difference is that one of us was grown, the other one made. I believe I do not need to stress the need to keep this knowledge to yourself for now.”[/i] Janet replied. It was a strange feeling, like some weight have been lifted off of her now that at least somebody knew that didn’t know all along. [i]”Now, my abilities aside from telepathy - which is kind of limited, the closer I am the better - are shapeshifting, the usual mix of enhanced physique and I can interface with just about any machinery. I was designed to fight in a combat armor but only dad knows when that will be finished. how about you? If we are to fight together, we all need to know what we have to work with. Or rather, we should, but I’m not sure I trust this Ghost character.”[/i]

[i]”No need to at all, your secrets safe with me.”[/i] Alice responded. [i]” And I can sense why you don’t trust him, he feels like one of those the ends justify the means guys. Anyway, my abilities. You saw my force-fields, my form of shapeshifting, and know about my telepathy. To add to that, I can teleport, make free-standing illusions, turn invisible, and do a bit of telekinesis. Also have been told I have a practically unbendable will that resists any form of mind control and my sword here is of a vibranium like substance.”[/i] As she finished that last thought, she unsheathed her blade and presented it to Ultron. 

Janet’s eyes were trained on the blade. Vibranium wasn’t exactly easily obtained, nor was anything that came close to it. “May I?” she asked with an open hand.

“You can try,” Cyrania responded, “but Merlin said that only few can wield Laevateinn” With that, she handed it handle first to Janet.

Ultron’s head snapped up at the mention of the name, which had several major hits in her databanks. “Laevateinn. Northern mythology. Either you’re a fan, but if only a few can-” Janet was interrupted by the sword mercilessly dragging her to the ground with it, “-then it may be of Asgardian origin. Feh, magic trickery! One day I will figure out a sensor to see through this!” she barked at noone in particular. “If I make the assumption that it is identical in function to the hammer of Thor, then only the [i]worthy[/i] can wield it. Which does little for my self esteem right about now. Little help?” Janet begged, her hand pinned to the ground and in one piece only due to the fact that her structure was less fragile than a human bone.

Cyr then quickly summoned the sword to her, surprised that Merlin’s words had been literal. “Sorry,” she said as she sheathed it back. “I thought he was only stating a myth when he said that and there would be something figurative about it maybe like anyone else wouldn’t know how to use it properly. Wait a minute, identical function to Thor’s hammer?” She then looked back at the sword, “Merlin did say we were in an abandoned Asgardian Armoury, and those droids were not normal.”

“Interesting. Either you are in possession of a very rare weapon, or they are not as rare as we previously thought. But given there was a whole armory, the latter seems quite possible. It would be nice to visit there for certain.” Janet said and extended her arm, the holo projector again appearing from under her skin and displaying the shape of the Mjölnir. “Mjölnir, the hammer used by the asgardian god of thunder. Capable of breaking most known materials. Recorded exceptions: Adamantium. Source of many magical abilities, such as weather control. Could only be wielded by individuals deemed worthy. Recorded exceptions: The Hulk. Last known location: Still in possession of its owner.” Janet relayed what information she had.

“Well, at least you can probably stop worrying about anyone stealing it. It is rumored it refused even some other Asgardian gods, but do not quote me on that.” She received the message from Henry then, and wondered what was going on, but no explanation arrived. “Well, that leaves only one question: Why the nickname and what are you [i]really[/i] called? You may be telepathic but your body doesn’t lie.” Janet smiled, her visor displaying the minor fluctuation in Alicia’s heart rate and perspiration whenever she referred to herself with that name.

“It’s the name I choose for my civilian identity,” Alice replied, getting her mind off the implications of her sword. “Something I could hide as an average citizen under. You came up to me while I was disguised so I first introduced myself that way. My real name is Cyrania, Cyrania de Bergerac. You can call me Cyr though.”

Janet gave ‘Cyr’  a blank stare. “Merlin. Laevateinn. Now Cyrania de Bergerac. Woman, I have to pass you some newer books to draw inspiration from.” Janet teased. “But I suppose I can’t blame you for using an alias - I’m not the one to talk really.” Ultron chuckled and offered her hand, “Pleasure to make you an acquaintance.”

Cyrania smiled and took the offered hand, “Pleasure to make your’s too. Maybe we should go back inside now and you can tell me more about the newer books.”

Ghost silently went back to his work, making little in the way of noise. It was almost impossible not to overheard Janet and this Alice girl speak, only becoming quiet when they began some odd telepathic bonding ritual...or something. Alice seemed way too young to be here, dressed up flamboyantly and claiming to have stolen Asgardian weaponry. Ghost reached for his own blade as he worked, the synthetic doppelganger of real vibranium a chilling cold even past his insulted suit.

More and more did things seemed to become out of hand quickly with others like him around. There was no order, no hierarchy, no stability at all, What kept him from just leaving right now and going on about his own way without the mild curiosity of seeing how long this already beaten and broken ship could float. Honestly, it was only day one and Ghost was ready for full blown mutiny. But, for now, he would just get things set up. Set up a little presentation, wait for Pym to return, and then get the party actually started.