[IC] The Energy Storm

[Chulance]

Adora Zayas

Time: Afternoon
Location: California, Within Adora’s subconscious
Interaction:

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Rise of "Thirst" Birth of Amara

An hour later Adora was sprawled out on her couch with a vanilla & strawberry milkshake, as well as some cookies and a pre rolled joint. As she indulged on sweets & cookies, she chopped up a line of some strong heroin on the table. Leaning forward she snorted down the three lines of white relaxation and leaned back as the powerful opiates surged through her body. The numbing feeling from this devious powerful narcotic were apparent nearly immediately. She’d pre emotively consumed a few pain killers ten minutes prior to sniffing the powder, allowing a powerful combination of sedation in conjunction with the marijuana she’d smoked.

“Yesss I…need…this.” Adora’s voice slowed. & slurred as the drugs took effect. After claiming the power from that woman Paige, who she’d had the great pleasure & luck of hearing it seemed her previous struggles of sporadic pain from the past few days had subsided. When she’d gotten back she’d grabbed a knife from her kitchen & playfully cut through her arm. Feeling waves of satisfaction as she drew blood then witnessed her wounds heal, her skin reconnecting and blood being reabsorbed into her body as she was fully restored to her normal state.

The regenerative qualities of this power seemed to combat the rising pain she’d been deriving from her ability & what she deduced were consequences for the constant altering of her genetic make-up.

Oh how cute you thought we were through, no thanks for providing the perfect and quite relaxing entry if you will

The same distorted voice echoed through Adora’s mind in her highly inebriated state. She began to rise up only to feel similar effects to sleep paralysis. She struggled to open her eyes only seeing black, and screamed out. Yet no noise was made from her yells and she saw lashes of blinding light. Looking around she appeared in an empty cavern and stumbled back startled at her new location.

“Where the hell am…I” Adora pondered stepping forward and recoiled at the feeling of the rock terrain on her bare soles. It seemed being transported to this new location had left her Gucci flip flops at her previous one. “Awh just great, now I’m gonna get my feet dirty on this ground, and I just got my toes done.”

Oh don’t worry your toes are still doing, just rest honey, it’s time for me to take the wheels. Eventually we’ll learn to share the ropes but for now it’s time for me to take action, because you are ignoring our cravings. Ignoring our cries, either that or you are ignorant into the true beast that you absorbed & the nourishment that’s now required to satiate & satisfy the monster, this dragon is one you must chase seriously, constantly & brutally if I might add, allow me to show you how to maintain cerenium of this sort

In the real world Adora stood up still very high, but her eyes were pitch black. Her veins were similarly blacked out and very visible especially on her face & neck. The woman smiled and went over to her dresser opening a drawer and retrieving black nail polish. She quickly painted her nails black, then slipped her feet out of her sandals to apply the polish to her toils as well. “How fitting, ah some of the joys of the modern times I’m in, I think hmmm Adora, so that makes me…ooooh Amara, that sounds good, that sounds great, in-fact quite excellent.”

Amara formed a sinister grin, her voice somewhat distorted similar to the echoes of the voice Adora had been hearing in the recess of her mind. She’d switched places with Adora who was now wondering through the vastness of her conscience that was now inhabited by the memories, experiences & traits of her various victims. Swirling together to create the black eyed monster that now stood before her mirror above her dresser.

“The Collective as a team is suitable, but I require more then team-mates. A being of my stature requires something fitting, in accoradance to my state & current stature. Hmmm what might that be.” Amara pondered before hearing the cries and pleas of someone. “Interesting, it sounds as though I’m hearing the begs & cries of someone suffering. Wait a minute that’s right” A light bulb metaphorically appeared above her head, as she tapped into her enhanced hearing. Honing into the cries of mercy she turned her head to the corner of her room where her smoking tray was, on top of which sat a small brown box with holes poked into the top.

“Come to me.” The woman waved her hand and used her telekinetic power to cause the box & the tray underneath it to zoom over to her. It slowed to a halt as she reached out to grab the two, both of which she set on a kitchen counter-infront of her. “What have we hear.” Amara poised as she used her heat vision to melt the top off the box, causing the melted remains to drip into the box, and with her heightened hearing she heard painful yells of agony from someone.

Peering into the now open box she witnessed a scene which brought her pure delight. Within the box where five miniaturized individuals, one of which was now covered in the melting burning material of the top of the box. The other four had managed to avoid being caused underneath the melting plastic, and could only watch in horror as the fifth one trapped had only his hand shoot out from beneath the piles of burning plastic. Watching in horror as his hand struggled with sporadic movements before coming to a halt indicating that he’d ran out of breath & died from a combination of asphyxiation and brutally painful third degree burns from being covered in mounds of burning melted plastic.

Placing a hand on the box, and allowing her fingers to tap against it allowed her to tap into Trent’s niche. Visions flowed into her mind, that allowed her to witness Adora being confronted by a gang of thugs who’d been cat calling her. Rather then ignore them and be about her way, Adora who was on a power trip on her way home from the Benny Stein interview had confronted them. After getting into a heated argument she used a bolt of lightning to kill one of the men, then caused shadow tendrils to emerge piercing through the chest, & legs of another. The remaining five had drawn weapons opening ire only for Adora to fade into the shadows then emerged behind one of the men.

A plant vine sprung from her shoulder like webbing from Spiderman’s rest, and wrapped around the man’s forearm, before drawing spikes forth that disarmed the brute. The other four raised their guns to shoot with the fifth man pleading for them not to open fire on her as the bullets would surely pepper him as well. Whilst Adora goaded them to try to convince them to try to rinse her body in bullets, even with their friend at risk of being Swiss cheese.

“Come on ya idgits don’t shoot or I’m going with her, this broad is slippery.” The man pointed out as one of the four lunged forward drawing a knife. Adora spurned a net of electricity that served to disarm the other four, before a rumbling in the ground was heard. “The fuck” The man spoke before vies wrapped around them.

“Now it’s my turn.” Adora teased as her mass powers shrank the five of them, while the plants them up higher and higher till they were wrapped in plant material but eye level with her despite their miniature state. The sudden sound of sirens caused her to produce her puree and pull out a box, she plucked the thugs from their vines and pocketed them as well as the box before departing. The bodies of the other two she struck dow with shadows & lightning were still present.

In present times Amara smirked using a spark of lightning to burn down the other walls of the box, the four within avoiding the flames that came from the sparks. They huddled up in the enter of the box while Adora used a wave of TK energy to wipe out the flames and looked at the four gathered. “It seemed Adora took mercy on you pitiful fools, for what reason I don’t know, that’s not like her. Not like us I should say, I suppose I can understand avoiding the troublesome authorities, but not at the cost of not feeding the thirst. Or else I will be forced to come forth and show her how it’s done.”

“What are you gonna do with us! Please we ain’t mean shit, honestly you already got the one who got us to do all this, buddy you melted, the rest of us wasn’t with none of this shit.”

“Hell yeah we sorry.” One of the others said, and all four nodded in agreement, seemingly throwing their now deceased friend under the bus to get mercy from Amara who had them cornered.

“Oh please take some pride in yourselves, and stand on your two feet, and accept your fate or don’t, I honestly enjoy the fear it makes a meal better.” Amara stated as the dark veins moved somewhat causing the four too shiver. Amara spawned a shadow tendril that wrapped around one of them and pulled him forward towards her. The man screamed out as the tendril flicked the man into the air and Amara leaned forward opening up and swallowing the flying target. An audible gulp was heard intertwined with screaming from the man as he was sent to his death,

“Delicious, ah the thirst will be satisfied, see wass the so hard Dora, I’ll teach you how to replenish your reserves, and you all shut the fuck up you all weren’t making all this noise and begging when you wouldn’t leave me alone earlier I don’t wan to hear it.” Her eyes surged with red and black causing some heat that burned the three, followed by shadow tendrils being used to scoop the victims up. The tendrils shot them forward, literarily firing them into her mouth as she swished down the rest of them.

Taking out a deep breath of satisfaction, she leaned back as her body began drawing energy from the living people eaten. Not only would this cause satisfaction from getting a meal, the devouring of living flesh would allow her to maintain cerenium reserves without additional side effects from integrating & altering her genetic make-up. “Oh yes it is good to be back, and I got a welcome back meal at that.” Waltzing over to the kitchen telekinesis was used to bring forth a jugg of ice sweet tea and leftovers of a salad. She wolfed down the salad and downed the entire contents of the tea ravenously, before burping.

“Okay much better, desert and dinner, much preferable to a pointless buffet of drugs, although the heroin DID play a pivotal role in allowing me to surface easier without any struggle from dora dear.” Amara laughed manically and went on her laptop. Quickly going to twitter and going to the search bar. Within minutes she found a song that was trending “Break-in Bitches by Dinero Grande”, and went to genius to search the lyrics while opening a separate tab on youtube to listen to the song.

After giving it two listens she smirked. “Oh so that’s what Dinero Grande’s saying about me” Amara poised as the smirk turned into the grin. She found the lyrics to Breaking Bitches to be very interesting, as part of the song was a diss aimed towards woman in general, including a segment of the song that targeted powerful women some politicians, celebrities & altered woman including Lori Martinez. That part of the song had drawn controversy as while many feared & hated Lori since the incident, few had dared to make adequate actual threats towards her besides the military & US intelligence agencies.

Miami Murder Mayhem

“Let’s pay mister Dinero a visit, he’s the perfect one to spread my message." Amara concluded, as she waltzed towards the window. Opening it up with TK whilst turning invisible she took flight and left her residence. After reaching a great height she took her flight to the next level shattering the sound barrier accompanied by a very audible sonic boom. Moving at her max speeds mid flight it took no less than twenty five minutes to arrive outside of Dinero Grande’s residence.

A well fortified mansion with armed security, the rapper who spoke so eloquently about being his own security & being able to “knock off anyone regular or super with the Glock in my hand alone.” Sure had quite a bit of company. [b][color=pink]“Typical boasting about strength alone, but still relying on defense in numbers, no matter this will be just another chance to show Dora how things are done.”[/color[/b]] Amara spoke to herself, although Adora who had taken her place and was now locked in her own mind could hear Amara loud and clearly.

By this point she was reduced to echoes in the back of Amara’s mind, her voice just mental traces in the recess of Amara’s mind calling out from beyond the center of her mind asking Amara to relinquish her control of her body. “You still haven’t figured it out have you? I can’t give up the controller to you, because we are essentially the same. I’m you, the best you in-fact, the living personification of the thirst that accompanies this power. I surface when I’m inadequately fed, and lately I’ve been starving, although the ex cop was a welcome meal. The same way YOU need food AND drink, I need energy & flesh to fully satiate me Adora, one of which has been sorely lacking, Even with the energy of the consumed altered, it still isn’t enough for my appetite, stop being so picky in your regular meals, and perhaps it wouldn’t have to come to this baby.”

Please let me out! Let me out! I understand, I felt this before. I didn’t realize what it was, but now I know. Now I know Amara I know!!

“Then relax and enjoy your high, is that what you need some drugs.” Amara teased, causing Adora to be overwhelmed with a surge of opiate happiness. She directed the feelings of the intense high to her subconscious, allowing Adora to linger in a peaceful satisfied inebriated state. “That worked out better than expected, admittedly the feeling is truly amazing, I almost sat back & enjoyed it myself if not for the thirst clawing at me in order to feed it.” Amara mused as she flew down to the ground.

Landing on the pavement of the mansion’s outer side-walk, she began walking towards oe of the many doors. There were several entrances & numerous paths around the property. This was her first time coming to Dinero’s residence as either Amara or Adora. She took a few brief moments to soak in the architectural masterpiece of Dinero’s home, before manipulating her mass to p tase through the wall by the door making her way in Dinero’s home without causing any structure damage.

Something this nice mustn’t be so needlessly destroyed, especially when it can still come under the ownership of Zayas Properties, now to deal with the artist with the funny lyrics about me. He’ll learn not to bop his head to music taunting &mocking me, especially one he himself wrote how foolish. A mere mortal having the audacity to dishonor me AND to a lyrical melody?

Before long she entered the studio room where Dinero was inside recording, his engineer was working on his vocals. There were a few security guards, as well as some guys smoking some fat backwoods with some scantily clad black, hispanic & asian women in a room connected to the studio.

“You know keep sum on my hip, everywhere I go a yougin gotta blick, pow pow pow blow ya top off you can’t fix it with a bandaid, erryday we getting racks erred is band-day, mudafuck my birthday erryday is bandaid, sipping codeine pop blowing tops off ERRYDAY, like I said beFO BREAKING DESE HOES they going need BAND-AIDS, hit mew it da steel going be MAYDAY, OG Shooter aiming at Lori FACE, Fucka bus these bullets what she going taste, AR wit da beam it ain’t going leave trace, bank altered NICCA think I got the BAND PLAGUE” As Dinero was yelling into the mic suddenly it went off.

“Uhhh What da FUUUUCK!, what’s going on TruBlu where the beat at?!” Dinero asked calling out to his engineer.

“Aye aye dinneroo I told you don’t start wit dat shiddd lil niccaaa, I’m trynna figurrrrr dis shyt out rite naw Ion know was tannin gimme a second.” His engineer TrueBlu called back, while Amara shook her head and materialized much to the shock of others in the waiting room.

“Really this is the follow up song to breaking bitches, honestly I thought breaking bitches was more catchy, but this band plague is just trash, I’m really going have to torture you all for this.” Amara spoke calmly, while the women & other guys smoking started yelling from the girl with glowing black eyes appearing out of thin air, with TrueBlu beating his hand down on the counter.

“What the fuck is y’all negroes yelling for! We in the middle of a god damn session, you wanna get kicked out Dinero spot?! Huh!”

Right as the engineer barked orders a bolt of electricity struck him in the cranium causing the talented music maker to sprawl out against his keyboard unconscious. “Ssssh zaddy, be quiet, your one of the ones I want to live, or really the only one that matters. I quite enjoy your beats, and you don’t deserve to die just for doing your job, but the rest of you bums tagging along with Dinero, his entourage I find you fully guilty for allowing him to produce this trash, a bunch of yes men and yes bitchs, no one wanted him why it might not be a good idea to make distracts about violent superhuman women? Hmmm, I ain’t a white girl, I won’t tolerate this slander whether it’s catchy or not.”

“Oh my god who are you!? What the fuck are you talking about?!!! Barry get this bitch she came outta thin air.” One of the groupie woman yelled, while the one known as Barry came out with a gun, Dinero’s manager put his finger on the trigger.

“Bitch get outta here! You ain’t welcome on this property, I dunno who the fuck you are, but you got the wrong idea. We ain’t fucking with randoms, we don’t give a fukk if you altered!!!!” Barry yelled out.” Aye back me up security or all y’all getting fired TODAY RITE NA!!!!” He yelled out causing security to flood the waiting room with their weapons drawn.

Amara smirked as vines burst from the ground striking the hands of security guards with some of the vines piercing through their palms causing blood to spray. Shadow tendrils emerged blocking all the exits, then spawned chains of shadows that wrapped around the ankles of the women, security, Barry & the other guys tying them together in a knot of shadow and plant powers.

Amara shifted her appearance to that of Lori Martinez, and kissed one of the security guards causing his entire body to freeze, then tipped him over shattering the guard killing him. Adora then used her heat vision to burn out the eye sockets of one of the women, then increased the pressure causing the eye beams to burst through the back of the women’s head murdering her.

“Oh my god!!!! It’s the Lori Bitch!!!!!” Barry yelled out only for Amara to use TK to start choking him and slammed him against the ground. Then caused the door to the inner studio to open exposing Dinero who was on histogram live telling his fans he didn’t know why the session stopped, only to see the door got swung open by an invisible force. This alerted him, and his fans who began flooding his IG live with comment of concern upon seeing Lori Martinez was present, the same woman responsible for the mass murders in San Francisco.

“Pipe down Dinero, not so brave now fat too fat huh.” Amara teased causing his phone to fly from his hands and over to the security room. She then increased the size of the phone till it was the size of a small television, and caused the phone to soar to the ceilings and famed ice around the corners of the phone to freeze the enlarged phone to the ceiling to allow the instagram live to continue showing Amara, and her attacks on Dinoero’s entourage for all the rappers fans.

“Enough don’t you put a hand on none of my potnas” One of the men into entourage yelled, gripping his fists angrily.

“No Carter don’t do that, she got us on live.” Barry yelled out but Carter ignored Dinero’s manager and raised his hand unleashing a powerful shockwave that sent Amara hurtling through the window of the studio and smashing into one of the keyboards. Carter raised his fist snapping his fingers unleashing a second shockwave that demolished the equipment behind Amara and sent her crashing into a wall.

“Oh my gawd! Your altered, I been slipping with an altered nice” His girl yelled out in shock, a disgruntled hispanic/asian biracial woman, while Carter clapped his hands together emitting another shockwave tearing through the summoned vines allowing the security guards to retrieve their guns as Amara rose from the rubble, and flew forward she used TK blast swatting TruBlu’s body aside as well as a security guard who had retrieved their gun, Carter ford another shockwave at Amara blasting her back, only for her to use TK

“Enough you have one altered, it means nothing to me!” Amara screamed as she brushed some blood out her face, as she used the TK to snap Carter’s right knee then slammed him into the roof then pulled him down smashing him into a drum set. She swung her arm downwards sending vines to pierce Carter’s shoulders as well as firing ice shards at his head. Carter ducked and as Amara stepped forward gathering electricity she was caught by surprise as two bullets hit the back of her neck, c courtesy of Dinero who’d emerged from the studio room with his custom Glock opening fire on the violent altered woman who’d stormed his mansion & attacked his home studio.

“Yeah I said what I said BREAKING BITCHES, MOTHERFUCK A HOE NAMED LORI, pop her in the face this ah DINERO STORY.” The rapper yelled out quoting the lyrics to his track, as he pulled the trigger again causing a spray of bullets be planted into the back of Adora’s upper back as she collapsed to the ground blood rushing out spilling from her multiple bullet wounds from all the surprise shots Dinero had hit her with.

The comments in his IG live were going wild, and several fans viewing had contacted the authorities to update & alert them to the situation. The sound of sirens blaring accompanied the sounds of Dinero & others In his entourage reacting to the fact that one of his friends Carter was an altered with the power to produce shockwaves & Dinero emerging from the studio room to land surprise shots on Adora seemingly emerging victor against the vicious super killer who’d torn apart downtown San Francisco, California.

It seemed that she’d met her end in the mansion of this famous Miami rapper, who was sure to rise in fame if he’d really been responsible for gunning down one of the most fearsome & violent altered human killers that emerged thus far.

“Lucky shot bastard.” Amara said as she gurgled blood, and rose up to the shock of Dinero, Barry, Carter, Carter’s girlfriend, Dinero’s security & the rest of his entourage still living. The bullets lodged within her popped out as her skin reconnected, blood returning to her body as her wounds healed, the woman regenerating.

“N..N.....No….no…fuck!” Dinero yelled, as some of the people in the entourage rushed to the door almost breaking it down trying to escape. Adora used her TK power to form an invisible wall preventing anyone from being able to escape, then caused shadows to slip through the cracks of the door and shields, forming shadow tendrils which pierced through the far right & far left of the room allowing the shadow tendrils tendrils to tear through the skin/bodies of Dinero’s security & entourage.

“AAAAAAHHHHHHH” Amara screamed using sound manipulation to shatter all the glass in the area causing shards to rain in the studio and on those unlucky enough to be near windows in the studio room. Their ear-drums were of course the main target, causing blood to run from all their ears except TruBlu & Dinero who had in their studio headphones still which partially protected them from the sound based attack.

Using heat vision she plowed & sliced through the bodies of others in the entourage, murdering others leaving the waiting room soaked in the blood of now dead members of Dinero’s team intermixed with those from his security detail. Her body surged with electricity as she sent electricity surging forward, using the pools of blood soaked into the floorboards a conductor to kill more.

The sound of approaching sirens grew more louder & intense, as the LEO’s cruisers inched color & closer to Dinero’s spot. “Sounds like we have company on the way, that’s fine I’d like to make an announcement, and I felt you were the perfect vessel to re-iterate this message to the world. MR. Dinero Grande seeing as how the lyrics to some of your quite disturbing. My name is Amara, or as the public knows me Lori Martinez. That is only one of my forms & identities, am here to tell the world on your live that the time of mere mortals is up. It is time for the age of my children, the altered to rise up, the Energy Storm was a predetermined event that has led to my return to the land of the living & the re-emergence the chosen ones, those who are strong enough to manifest power from being exposed to that which is within what you people call the energy plague.” Amara spoke

Dinero’s IG live usually had a high number of people in it, and typically settled around the lower millions. However the events that had transpired in the past few minutes had raised the viewer count to a staggering 30 million, including members of the Miami police department who had tuned in to get a preview of what they were walking into. This prior insight into the events going down at Dinero’s mansion had led to them preemptively calling back up from Miami PD’s Swat Teams to handle the Amara/Lori Martinez situation.

“Shawty I ain’t got nun to do with nun dat, please let my bruddas and sisters go, the ain’t had no part in this shit that was me, I choose to say what I said on the song, and. Stamp dat. I ain’t mean to say nun trifling to yu, that’s just how I been brought up since a jit, I Ayn going lie I ain’t think yu was going pop up onnakidd, honestly I been suspect of dis whole altered shyt n da plague since it started on sum conspiracy shyt, but I’m wrong but it all shit I shudda, gotta git da vassine pls don’t kill no mo of my ppls!!!!” Dinero cried out at the end of his spew of words directed towards the vicious Amara and her ruthless attacks on Dinero and his entourage.

“Oh please all that gibberish coming from your mouth is the definition of angering, it has truly made me irate. I wonder if such words are even within the realms of you vocabulary with what I assume to be your limited scope of mental ability. FOR THOSE WHO SEEK MERCY FROM AMARA LEARN TODAY THAT I AM NOT TOLERATE OF NAYSAYERS, and FOUL MOUTHED MOCKERS!!!!!! I WILL DELIVER SWIFT PUNISHMENT TO THOSE WHO I ENCOuNTER WHO VIOLATE THESE PRINCIPLES AND TENANTS I HAVE UTTERED, IF YOU SEEK MERCY! Build large statues of me, erect temples in my name, and issue sacrifices to my being or else pain shall surely be brought down to your lives.”

Amara laughed maniacally as she used her mass powers to miniaturize Barry, Carter, and the rest of the survivors including dinero. Summoning shadow tendrils that began poking them the tendrils began flicking them towards her and she opened up wide swallowing the survivors one by one as tendrils flicked them towards her.

Carter fired a shockwave blasting away the tendril and firing a shockwave that damaged one of Amara’s teeth, causing her to spawn a vine from her mouth that wrapped around Carter and formed thorns piercing his skin all over. The vines then pulled hm in and she gulped him down, before tendrils pushed in a screaming Barry who tried to no avail to slow Amara down with his now miniaturized gun.

Dinero himself screamed as Amara scooped the mini rapper up with her thumb and index finger, using electricity to torture him before flinging him in and gulping down the rapper as well. “FLESH!!!!” Amara screamed out the thirst driving her to these cannibalistic actions, as she used TK to pull the last four groupie girls towards her. As they all screamed Adora blew on them sending forth a cold breeze that painfully could them, before chewing them apart violently murdering them before swallowing down what remains of there crushed up remains.

The only one left surviving was the producer TrueBlue, Amara caused the phone to be released from its icy restraints, and carried outside telekinetically as she flew outside the mansion. Coming towards the front entrance she was greeted by several police cruisers, helicopters, and armored trucks ran by SWAT.

“Oh a welcoming party or rather an exit party, I’m sure you Miami pigs don’t care about celebrity rappers.”

“Ma’am put your hands behind your back and lay down your under arrest!!!” The Swat captain yelled through a megaphone.

Amara burst out into laughter causing shadow tendrils to emerge from the captain’s shadow piercing his throat, then surging forward through his cruiser and another officer and a cruiser forming a shadow shish-ka-bob of cops and cruisers and used TK to fling the whole mess into a chopper downing them, followed by summoning violent streaks of lightning dow plowing through the police helicopters.

The remaining cops & SWAT officers opened fire on Amara who used her powers to grow to gigantic heights and stomped forward causing mini tremors in the ground. Heat vision emerged from her eyes drilling through police vehicles & officers violently slaughtering them. She also raised the phone in the air to get an aerial view as she maintained the live and used her mass powers to further increase the size of the phone.

Amara caused darkness & shadows to emerge from the ground beneath the officers lifting them into the air and flinging them in the air as Amara used TK to form her own shockwave that sent them flying towards her, and sh opened up gulping down SWAT & officers alike with a big gulp, then burped unleashing a sound blast that demolished the remaining officers in the area and wiping out several houses and stores infant of her for miles, Amara then used TK to crush the phone and flung the enlarged phone into some approaching cruisers.

“I’ve had my fun.” The glowing black eyed violent altered woman mused as she returned to her original size, turned invisible, and took off in the opposite direction towards her h

[Chulance]

Jonah Hanes

Time: Afternoon
Location: Downtown Oakland,
Interaction:

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Two Days Ago

“Let’s stir things up a bit shall we.” Retorted Cain as he pulled a gun, they were in the midst of another heist in Oakland. Thanks to boost assisting his men, even the ones without powers felt it flowing through their body. He’d made a connection with Hines & was the primary buyer of boost. Of course somehow Lionel’s thugs as well as some other single third party individuals had managed to acquire boost as well.

Which meant Hines liked to sleep around with his new product, that was worrying to Cain. But both distribution & usage had important meanings too I’m, personally he didn’t want anyone else to have access to boost. He tried tipping Lester giving him as much extra money as possible to divert the sale of boost to others, but that didn’t seem to be enough. It seemed Lionel had bigger pockets then him, even prior to the chemical super drug enhanced street war was rampaging through the streets of Oakland.

“Put everything in the fucking bag if you don’t wan to die.” Cain commended as he lifted up a teller and flung him across the room with ease. The man yelp as he slammed into a wall with a thud, the others working quickly filling up his men’s bags of cash. The bodies of dead copies & a few guardsmen were strewn about outside, they’d been no match. His right hand man Komak had been a help too, with a power that was essentially the same as Gambit’s from the X Men.

After a short while, they were pulling off in their trio of expensive cars with no plates they’d stolen and utilized for the heist. Whilst Lionel’s strategy was to exact income from store owners in exchange for protection from Cain & other elements superpowers, criminal & otherwise, he preferred more simplistic measures of cash acquisition. Direct robberies, heists, & shaking people down for the goods.

Meanwhile at the police station Lionel had shown up to see the chief on an emergent matter. He was wearing black jeans, a black sleeveless tee and a green face mask. The chief seemed irate and didn’t want a meeting with this man. “What is it that you need, if you can’t tell the whole damn city is falling apart because of these super freaks.”

“Well that’s just it, perhaps calling them super freaks isn’ the best thing.” Lionel spoke calmly, clearly this man had no clue who he was or he wouldn’t risk using such coarse language. Or maybe he would, there were always skeptics. These days there were people who didn’t believe in the plague or even the altered they spawned unless they’d seen it with their own eyes. In the age of the internet, youtube & digital media sometimes Lionel could hardly blame them.

“I’ll call them bastards whatever I want, I was told you had some urgent news to deliver regarding how the fuck all these lowlives have been spawning powers, the same type too, as if it’s not the damn plague, which even I’m starting to believe.”

“Listen…” Lionel’s voice trailed off, as his entire skin was encased in a metallic coating. The chief backed up pulling out a gun yelling to stay back as Lionel lunged forward bursting. His hand through the chief’s neck then smiling, throwing the body through the window of the office as other cops emerged shooting at Lionel. The bullets mashed against his skin but did little to harm him, instead he pulled out his own Tommy gun and opened fire on some of the officers.

“LISTEN!, If you want to live then you work for me! METAL HEAD, Cain’s words have no meaning to you, understand! I have no intention of allowing these needless violent robberies & heists to continue, I prefer to operate like an actual business. But stand in my way and you’ll end up just like the chief or those officers who I’ve just shot, the ones who are still alive you should probably seek medical attention, since unlike San Francisco you all still have a hospital, even if it was filled to the brim with victims of the plague.”

In The Present Day

Meanwhile at the coffee shop Jonah was in his car sipping his beverage while reading the reports of what had happened. Oakland had certainly seen better days, as had San Francisco & even LA for that matter. Of the three LA was the best off, San Francisco was recovering from the damage, but Oakland was engulfed in a gang war of proportions they’d never encouneted before.

“I have to find the source of this, a means to an end to put this madness to a halt.” Jonah decided, shaking his head. Tommy’s death hung on his mind, he’d thought he was a white altered. But had now learned he was just a man taking boost & using it to fight against the distribution of the drugs & other criminals who consumed it as well as altered & regular criminals. He was a cocaine dealer, who used his excess funds to fund his boost habit & vigilante career.

A Batman like figure who diverted his income from the sale of cocaine, fighting sin with sin. It wasn’t a method Jonah could agree on, but then again what was Liberty? He’d had several fights with Amelia the past few nights, after she claimed to have been saved by an altered. His wife, a former CIA agent taking the side of domestic terrorists simply because she believed they wanted, no “Deserved” rights.

“They don’t deserve a damn thing, except a bullet to the brain for being the monsters they are.” Jonah muttered to himself before taking another sip of caffeine.

Right as he did he heard the screams and cries of a woman begging for help. Jonah quickly placed his coffee in the cup holder and started up the jeep. Maybe I can’t find Lester Hines or whose behind Boost right now but I can save that woman Jonah reversed out the parking lot and swerved into the street nearly colliding with two Honda’s as he sped across the street towards the ally where the cries of help emanated from.

“HELP!!! HELP!!! PLEASE DONT TAKE ME!!!” The woman cried out, her pleas for mercy and to be spared growing louder even over the revving of the engine as Jonah plummeted through an alleyway not meant for vehicle passage to encounter the woman. He slightly tapped on the brakes as he zoomed forward not wanting to accidentally incidentally thrash the very woman he sought to potentially save and pull from harm’s way.

Right as he turned the corner he saw a college aged caucasian woman running for her life, and suddenly a black portal opened up sucking her in. He spotted a hispanic man standing there laughing and before Jonah could emerge from his car with a gun drawn the black portal swallowed up the man as well.

Jonah emerged from the car with a look of shock, confusion & regret. The agent plopped to his knees, as a few tears rolled down his eyes.

Some sinister man, with an even sinister power as the culprit had swallowed up both himself & a girl trying to flee from him. Worst despite this being an ethnic filled part of the city, the woman was one of them, the important ones. “I couldn’t save her, what the hell is going on lately, what the hell can I do?! Amy’s in the hospital, Martinez is on the loose, my own agents aided her power acquisition unknowingly which probably led to het having an easier time thrashing San Francisco, and now there’s an outbreak of a new drug granting any and everyone synthetic powers. The Military wants to get their hands on It to more effectively combat rogue altered & crush their enemies overseas, more & more of the populace Is starting to truly believe Russia, China, North Korea and/or Iran is behind the Energy Storm, and now Forrester found out about my planned deception to keep the nature of Marinez’s powers quiet. The only good part about any of this madness is it might actually help Governor Stark pass the separation act in this state, which should have a domino effect on the rest of the country or at least the states most hard hit by horrific altered induced crimes like Chicago where that high school went under a sinkhole, but that’s not enough.”

Jonah brushed the remnant of tears out his face and got back in the jeep. He hadn’t come out here to save that girl, or anyone really. Although that was the goal, Oakland wasn’t a primary area of concern. The National Guard had decided to forgo sending any more aid to the city, upon learning of boost being used on both sides of the gang war intertwined with altered criminals. It was seen as a losing battle, for an area that was not of the most concern.

Upon receiving that news yesterday, him & Patricia read between the lines. The Forrester Administration decided that because this area was filled with so many hispanics, blacks & otherwise, that they should let it go. Let the leading criminal powers duke it out, like some real life Godzilla vs Mother situation & rush in with reinforcements after they took each other. Still his people were in the city, working at the police station, the hospital, fire-department, cinemas, corner stores, grocery stores, pharmacies, and even some overly concerned foolish teachers.

“I have to save us all, there can’t be any more Tommy’s. These monsters have a knack for bringing in and involving the good people with their heinous actions. For the administration to simply abandon Oakland in its entirety is mind bobbling, whilst so much effort is being put into San Francisco’s reconstruction." Of course they had a giant woman with laser eyes tearing through the city & that kind hearted paraplegic mayor diverting resources. Not to mention that woman with the Astral company Nyssa something had set up a supply camp to help.

“So you're out here working refusing not to give up on thes shit-hole.” Lana Kruek, another liberty agent spoke. She was half of him, and half other, having a white father & asian mother.

“Yes I am.” Jonah spoke with a tone of defeat as he looked up at Lana dressed in combat gear with guns holstered on her hips.

“That’s just like you Director Hanes, you portray yourself as a hardass, and your more than a little racist, but you still want to try to do the right thing. It’s an admirable quality about you, perhaps the only one you have.” Lana retorted with a smirk as she metaphorically & literally looked down on the liberty director.

“Did you come to rub my incompetence and failure in, to simply spark conversation or do you have any actual leads? If I remember correctly I stationed you in LA to follow up leads on the slaughter of some group of dead altered, whose death MO’s figure into the pattens of other victims of Martinez’s ability”

“I did complete that task, a while ago, now I’m working on this one, aside from you there’s no oe else trying to do anything about it and for your information Hanes, I DO have a lead o boost manufacturing.” Lana replied back cooly.

[The Man Emperor]

---

The Reaper and the Silver Flame
Seeds of Revolution

---

Reaper was furious, the past few days had aggravated him. Not to mention there was talk of more restrictive measures potentially being passed such as the separation act & the Zayas Properties spawning a domino effect of companies refusing to rent to altered. Reading between the lines he saw they were passing laws to wash several altered into the criminal system & then "legally" arrest & detain them. He felt that it was only a thinly veiled layer before they went full force trying to round up all the altered & place them in concentration camps for society's "safety". It was time to go on the offensive, while he'd obtained Olivia he still needed to determine the quickest & best way to get to D.C to obtain Jack's information. For now it was time to start making things shake, for that he'd come to Vegas with Karagoz and a few others. One of the biggest Forrester Corporation Facilities in the country was in Vegas, not to mention the CEO himself Nathan Forrester & his wife Ruby Forrester were both in town right now. "Alright let's begin, it's time for us to draw blood." Reaper spoke to Karagoz and the others gathered inside a cheap motel room which he'd used his telepathy to gain access to and have a random from the street book the room to avoid any ties to him or the others real identites, he'd left Malina, & some controlled guards behind to keep Olivia secured at the mansion.

"Good... good." Karagoz nodded, putting on the gas mask he always carried around with him. The congress of ghosts in his mind erupted in celebration, or in uproar; there were two sides, one that wanted this purge to happen, and another that was appalled.

It was needless to say which one prevailed. Karagoz and the other revolutionaries, terrorists, or whatever kind of name they may give themselves, proceeded towards the facility that they intended to purify from this earth.

"Our targets are as following all check-points, other blood testing centers, a local juvenile detention center they've repurposed to be a temporary holding center for imprisoned altered, the Forrester Corporation facility & makeshift national guard bases. Those locations were selected for a few key reasons, like altered being trapped there, tools to work against us being created there or locations where our enemy forces are gathered." He explained to the others and used telekinesis to turn on a projector connected to a laptop, which he also started up with an invisible force. The screen that was projected showed a map of Vegas with their current location highlighted as well as the location of the places they were targetting. "I can have this map sent to everyone's phones via google docs, so everyone can also have live access to which destinations have already been visited & dealt with." He concluded

Karagoz looked at the screen of his phone with a blank expression, seemingly contemplating what kind of fiery madness he would visitate upon these... people. "Then let's be on our way."

Karagoz motioned towards the door, as he wanted to get this done as soon as possible. His hands were itchy; they wish to make something burn.

"Let's split up into groups and each go to a specific destination, Karagoz your with me, Clayton as well let;s go, we'll strike the biggest blood testing center next to the national guard makeshift camp, then wipe out Forrester Facility." He decided looking over the map & giving others instructions on what destination to go too first. As soon as they were out the door Reaper used his powers to lift them into the air teleknetically and after a short flight the landed in a ally near the blood testing center where there was a line of people, several parked cars, and armed soldiers overseeing scientists as they adminstered tests. "Let's begin."

"Remember that I have standards." Karagoz begun, taking off the mask in preparation bfor his napalm vomit. "We could end up killing our own kindred if we fire blindly."

Karagoz, of course, for all his insanity, recognized which targets were guilty and worthy of being annihilated, and which ones were not. Random bystanders would be better keeping around, in fact. Let them all bear witness!

Calmly walking towards the testing station, Karagoz would come in pretense of getting tested, just like everyone else... until white flames blasted out of his mouth, immolating the first of several soldiers. The fire would take on the shape of a gaping maw, travelling from one target to another like a snake having a field day.

"Who said anything about firing blindly?" Reaper said with a smirk as he used his mental powers to search the surface thoughts of those in the area, followed by relaying said thoughts to Karagoz & Clayton allowing them to be able to indicate which people in the crowd where altered humans. As two snipers on the roof fired at Karagoz Reaper used his powers to cover Karagoz in a telekinetic barrier causing the bullets to mash up against an unseen wall of force inches away from Karagoz's skin. I'll do my best to shield you, but if you see something about to hit you and the shield's not up, just project your thoughts to me as loud as possible, that shouldn't be hard for you since you have SO many thoughts Reaper slightly teased his new partners insanity as he used his powers to lift up a truck full of blood tests raising it in the air and using it as a bulldozer smashing through the testing facility, whilst Clayton entered his solar form skin blackening and surrounded by solar power as he surged forward heading towards the makeshift detainment center for captured altered at the check-point center.

As the mayhem ensued, the travelling silver flames turned one man after another into wet ashes, the firestorm enveloping every inch of their bodies. Their screams fell in deaf ears, as Karagoz had chosen not to acknowledge them. They died, and they died painfully.

Prepared tests burned and exploded, scientists ran away with panicked screams, and the onlookers either bolted off from the action, or caught it through phones. It won't be long before they're trending.

Karagoz lowly muttered a single phrase as he burned another guardsman and stomped upon his cracked bones. "None shall find us wanting."

Oh this was a wonderful idea to bring him in, he’s better then I could have ever expected Reaper thought to himself, as he assailed the various soldiers with illusions of a demon telling them they’d chosen the wrong side in life and were on their way to the pits of hell to burn for eternity.

He felt it was a creative & horrific touch added with his powers to victims that were already being burned alive by Kargoz’s flames that snaked around. “You people are fucking monsters! We need to step in and help our soldiers!!!! Whose with me” The bystander said pulling out a Glock.

“Silence” Reaper yelled out audibly before causing the gun to fly out his hand then used his powers to snap his neck, his body hitting the ground with a thud. This only served to incite more fear in the crowd, whilst a couple explosions accompanied by the sight of visible solar energy were seen in the near distance. Shortly after freed altered humans were seen shuffling out of the facility they were detained in as Clayton flew over to Reaper & Karagoz.

“I’ve liberated our altered brothers & sisters from captivity, I even exchanged numbers with a couple of them, I’m sure many will call to join us.” Clayton added.

"I am sure that many will come." Karagoz nodded. The flames had died down now, with any stragglers either fleeing in the terror of the Altered revolutionaries, or had been killed.

"This is where the revolution begins, then." Karagoz said, touching the flames that still flickered on the concrete with his bare hands. "This is... war."

“Agreed it’s time for us the other side to fight back, I’ve had quite enough of there antics with no sight of organized retaliation in sight, where to next Reaper?” Clayton asked feeling energized by freeing the altered. In other parts of Vegas, the other teams of Reaper’s altered were similarly taking out check-points & blood testing centers.

“Straight to the motherland, we’re going to the Forrester Corporation, come on.” Reaper announced as he used his powers to once more levitate himself, Karagoz & Clayton into the air.

Seven minutes later Reaper lowered them to the ground near the front entrance of the facility, only to see it was a literal war zone. Forrester Corporation security guards, national guard, & police were duking it out with 9 foot giant mutant monsters, the exact same type of beast that had been spotted fighting Shade downtown during the Lorizilla rampage. “What the hell.” Clayton muttered, as Reaper peered through the minds of some of the lawmen, soldiers & guards fighting.

“It appears these monsters launched their attack on the facility within the past half hour, a few have made their way inside.” Reaper levitated the trio up to the roof of the facility near a stairwell entrance. “The mission remains the same, I do not know the origin of these monsters so I can’t label them friend or foe, nor do I know if they are the result of powers or some inhumane experiment conducted by the Forrester’s themselves run afoul, what do you think Silver Flame? Irregardless I think we should bring this facility to the ground.”

"We will have to go without attracting attention." Karagoz said, remembering the times when he had infiltration missions in Afghanistan and Iraq. "Between the guards and the monsters, we cannot afford to take fire from both of them."

"Agreed" Clayton said with a nod as Reaper used his telekinetic powers to pry the steel door open leading to the stairwell, beckoning the two to follow him as he moved down the stairwell reaching the top floor where they were greeted by armed soldiers with guns raised.

“Intruders!”One of the soldiers yelled out, while another gritted his teeth and glared at the three altered. “Monsters outside, mutants inside, there’s nothing to talk about, we will not allow these genetic mishaps to infiltrate Forrester’s facility.” The seeming leader of the squadron said as he pulled the trigger opening fire.

Reaper formed a telekinetic shield around the three to block incoming volley of bullets, while Clayton returned fire with a blast of solar energy, taking on his solar form again, while Reaper cast an illusion with his powers causing the soldiers to view each other as him, Clayton & Karagoz leading to them shooting at each other, so the trio could take them out at their leisure without worry of being fired upon. Using his power he began launching the metallic containers at the soldiers.

Just like before, napalm was brought forth as a horrendous flaming vomit, coating several of the guards with deathly liquid. They burned, and they howled in pain, but Karagoz would simply walk past their tortured, immolated bodies, not paying their suffering any heed. The flames danced around his hand, striking like an orange serpent against anyone that tried to attack him. In quick succession, those foolish humans, they who needed the most powerful of weapons to mimic even a fraction of the power of the Altered, have fallen.

"I see you a bunch of are having a bit of fun, but that all ends here, the boss needs this place up and running" A hispanic woman spoke dressed in combat gear, and with sleak white hair. Clayton fired a blast of solar energy at her, only for her to walk right through the blast unharmed. Reaper sought to peer into her mind only to be met by feedback that triggered pain causing him an audible grunt as he fell backwards.

“Don’t tell me your mojo didn’t work on her, you couldn’t get into her head.” Clayton yelled back to Reaper.

“Only got one thing her name Misaka Minisocho.” Reaper replied back as Dawn laughed clapping her hands.

“Congratulations, a name, that’s soooo helpful, if this was a video game I’d be the boss battle.” Misaka said with a smirk, she kicked a piece of rubble on the ground and it soared forward at superhuman speed slamming into Clayton slamming him into the roof, then took out a bottle cap from her pocket and tossed it, again moving at superhuman speeds bursting through the last two containers Reaper was behind and slamming into him sending him reeling, lastly she took out a small piece of hard candy from her pocket and flung it at Karagoz, the candy hurtling towards his chest at vast superhuman speed.

A candy was the last thing Karagoz had expected to be the weapon of an Altered, but they could all do mysterious things, and nothing should be underestimated. He rolled over, avoiding the candy bullet and drawing more fire from the pool of napalm that was still pulsating with raging white flames.

Putting on his gas mask, the mad veteran put his ploy into action.

Vast swathes of flame were sent out to surround the woman like the unloving arms of a hell borne demon. Karagoz intended to snuff out the oxygen, asphyxiating her. If brute force did not work, then biology will.

Misaka smirked and with a simple twirl the flames Karagoz surrounded her with dissipated. "Do you know why I've been assigned to protect this faciliy, because of my specific ability I was chosen. A rather strange and versatile ability, one which has served me well over the years, the power to manipulate vectors."

Reaper’s eyes widened under the mask upon hearing Misaka’s power. Damn no wonder they stationed her at this facility Clayton flew forward at Misaka charging her to punch her with his super strength. As he threw the punch towards her an unseen force sent Clayton hurtling back into the wall.

Misaka then did a spin kick, using her vector control to cause the force of not one but 20 different kicks to slam into Karagvoz’s chest even though she hadn’t moved from her one spot. “With my power just by punching or kicking in mid air, not only can I amplify my power I can strike anything within my line of sight within 200 yards, as well as amplify my kinetic vectors to do he same to my.” Before Misaka finished she was infront of Reaper kicking him so hard he flew up slamming into the roof. “Physical body, so Ifyou think solar energy, white flames or mental gymnastics can stop me your wrong, any attack that produces kinetic movement of any sort is pointless against a master of vectors. Eve your flames wont help when I can vectorize the air itself” Misaka then punched the ground, performing a quick calculation, and causing a shockwave to emit from the ground right beneath Karagoz’s feet the very same instance she struck the ground. Don’t worry Mr. Forrester, your facility is safe in my hands, first I’ll handle these monsters inside then the ones outside,

"Vectors..." Karagoz muttered as he stood up, a dull pain beating through his whole form. He remembered faintly about that concept in physics classes. He was a good student back in those days, even when he was looked down upon as a Turk migrant.

Vector. A straight movement with one given direction...

Karagoz gathered up another torrent of flames on his right, firing a tongue of fire raging towards the woman yet again. This time, though, it moved in an erratic pattern; a movement dictated by his own chaotic thinking. Up, down, straight, in circles; it served to confuse and distract as another surge of fire came in from Karagoz's left. Leaving the previous fire blast to move towards her, Karagoz's focus went towards the leftward fireblast, intending to crash it down and melt the flooring beneath her.

"Oh you simple minded fools won't be able to understand so it matters not let's continue." Clayon charged again firing a solar blast only for her to redirect the blast knocking him into the ceiling while Reaper peered into Karagoz's mind since he couldn't peer into the woman hoping to uncover some possible insight into this woman's powers and how to bring her down in combat.

I’m not a good student either but what the hell do physics have to do with resisting mental infiltration unless…oh shitReaper seemed to have his own light bulb moment regarding this powered opponent, but simply issued a warning to Clayton that physical attacks wouldn’t work or help in defeating her.

“You still try foolish antics.” Misaka yelled out as Clayton charged again but instead used his powers to produce a solar flare blinding her causing her to activate her power sightless, falling prey to Karagoz’s attack the floor erupting into flames melting also dousing her in fire, at that moment Reaper moved forward to strike as well launching a telepathic blast to disrupt her mental faculties & disorient her mind.

A resulting crash and scream from her was heard as Reaper rose up and walked near to Karagoz. “Is it over did we win? How the hell did you know what to do about her powers? I admit my plan was simple, there’s no way her power defended her against mental powers, she must have had some type of resistance training, and if anything you did work then I’d try my hand again, but you got the ball rolling, the question is how?” Reaper asked inquisitive to how Karagoz knew how to stop such a troublesome power against them.

"She literally just told us what she could do." Karagoz shook his head. "Vectors can only go one direction. Suddenly changing trajectory midnflight messes with something like that."

And that is what he did. The fire blast that he used to attack the floor had first gone in a more or less straight line, and then plummeted to douse the floor in flames, and with that, her.

“Well I’m glad we have a smart guy on her team, vectors mean the same thing to me abracadabra, I barely finished high school, then went to work at the family’s mechanic shop.” Clayton retorted walking back over to the others.

“I wouldn’t call you an idiot, once I explained physical moves wouldn’t work I’m sure blinding her made it easier for Silver Flame to finish her off.” As Reaper said that they heard shooting elsewhere, and an explosion then the roar of a monster. “Looks like we have company”

“Yes indeed, and if you think you’ll stop us from destroying this building your wrong” One of the monsters SPOKE, as it came around the hallway holding the decpacitated body of a soldier before dropping it. “This building will fall and you three will not stop us from fulfilling our masters request” The beast spot again then roared and beat its chest with both hands.

"Too bad we are going to burn this place, not you." Karagoz replied with a shrug. "I'm sorry, but who are you anyway?"

The monster growled and drew out it's claws, while Clayton gathered solar energy in his hand and Reaper focused beneath his mask to try to read the monster's thoughts and analyze it's intentions. "We were here first, this is OUR facility to destroy!" Reaper couldn't help but chuckle as he projected a mental message to Clayton & Karagoz. if only we'd left that girl Misaka in this hallway, she'd make short work of these creatures with her vector. She survived your attack Silver Flame, but she fled. Probably not use to taking damage with her ability.

“Enough time for talk, no matter how many altered work for Forrester we’ll kill them all”The monster roared and lunged forward, Reaper used his power to rip part of the wall open & flung the creature out the opening catapulting him through a few nearby buildings. Reaper projected another message to Clayton & Karagoz. I browsed the surface thoughts of soldiers & security in the area, there about to deploy jets, tanks & military choppers here & other places our team hit. Let’s go, without Misaka these monsters should demolish this facility. But before we leave Karagoz start a fire on every floor, Clayton do the honors.

Reaper fired a telekinetic shockwave to blast a hole through the ceiling to expose Clayton to direct sunlight. Channeling the direct power of the sun Clayton launched a blast of solar energy through every floor beneath them all the way to the lobby. Now all that was left was for Karagoz to initiate the same move he used to defeat Misaka, and summon his flames and have them slither to every floor to start a fire on each of them simultaneously.

"With pleasure." Karagoz spat out another torrent of napalm, and wove the resultant flames into a series of coruscating orbs, sending them up to each of the floors.

The facility burned. Documents, tests, trapped personnel, and furniture cracked and crumbled under the pyrokinetic onslaught. The flames would get stronger and stronger with every second, consuming more and more fuel. It won't be long before this place has become a pillar of flame, a testament to the annihilation the Altered could do if only they united.

As the flames spread through the facility, a gleam was in Reaper's eye one his team-mates couldn't see through his mask. Using his power he encased himself, Karagoz & Clayton in a telekentic barrier after Karagoz finished his attack on the facility, then carried them high into the air to avoid any nearby shoppers. From there he guided them to the hotel and landed in a nearby ally before Reaper released his hold on them & dispelled the barrier. Reaper removed his mask, whilst Clayton returning to his non solar form was enough so that he was indistinguishable from how he appeared while working with the group. "I hear thoughts of four of the others who've already made it back, hopefully the others will be joining as soon, then I'll summon a ride to pick us up. For now I say we enjoy some television, I'm interested to see what's said of us."

The revolution has begun.

[Chulance]

Karlina’s Package

Karlina had received a mysterious package. Something she was not expecting, but all the lest still troubling. Within the package was a message as well as some information.She enjoyed her work and was very thorough, having a high ranking among liberty’s altered agents. Still she wouldn’t say she’d made very many personal relationships on the job. There were a few exceptions to the matter, one of those was another agent who shared similar powers to her as well as a unique cultural background that didn’t originate in America.

Jaden Hamazuro, a man with parents of both Japanese & Ghanian origin. His father originated from a well to do family in Ghana and his mother originated from a family of high standing in Japan. They had some conflicts among the elders of both family regarding the union, but it had turned out to be one that was resolved in a manner that was amicable to both sides from the lovers to the heads of the family themselves.

Jaden leaned against a wall while sparking up a ruby clove. After ensuring it was well and lit he took a few puffs to ease his mind. The stress of Liberty & being transferred to California was getting to him, previously he’d been stationed in Liberty office’s in Miami Florida, and Atlanta Georgia. Well at least it’s better then being in Atlanta, and dealing with all those CDC related missions & the plague. There’s not much that I can do against a virus or anything, but people with powers is my forte. Although out here I’m not wholly special thanks to the psychiatrist chick, damn it Jaden grumbled to himself internally, in his thoughts reflecting on his position at this office in comparison with Agent Akinosho.

“So you think you have time for a smoke break? Honestly Hamazuro, you should be more focused. I’ve already informed you of Director Hanes inclinations towards people of color, here in California we must do our absolute very best. We are the examples of altered who can both co-operate with the government, and provide upmost aid to their forces in dealing with those of our kind who abuse their powers for violence or their own selfish needs irregardless of the effects on the United States.” Karlina declared reprimanding her lackluster partner & the altered she’d taken in her as protege.

Patricia had assigned Karlina to be his direct superior, and wanted to train him to take on some of her responsibilities. People with their type of ability were few & far in-between, including Micah there were currently only three of them with their abilities working with Liberty’s rank. Still they suspected to be a few more scattered throughout the country although their exact allegiance & location were not 100% confirmed. Besides while similar their powers had some stark diffrences & massive contrasts. Although government superiors found Jaden’s power to be deliciously resourceful, he himself was less then satisfied with his powers.

That is at least until Karlina started showing him the ropes, and informing him of some alternate possibilities of how he could utilize his gifts. Ways that actually made it feel as though it was a power itself, and not just one to cast aside others. While he didn’t want to vocalize it he was appreciative of that information & her training methods however brutal and unpractical he’d found them at first & even now still had some disdain towards. All of that & more was probably why Karlina had chosen to bring him in and inform him of the contents of the message she received.

Liberty had a mole within it’s ranks, and not one from Reaper’s resistance, the serial killer Lori or even factions driven by hatred or conspiracy to the Forrester Administration. “So this Agent Donnovan, she’s a Russian spy huh, and you think Marcus is behind this intel spill? Why you, and why me huh? He delivers the scoop to you, and then you bring it to me? I mean sure I’m your student, but even with the parlor tricks you helped me acquire I’m no powerhouse.So what does this mean, that the rumors are true? The Russians really are at the center of everything, honestly I was more certain it was a plot of Chinese or Iranians.”

“Well of the few people I’ve connected with at Liberty, Marcus is one of those people. When he suddenly fled the organization I didn’t understand, even less so when reports came in that he was still carrying out his assignments Liberty gave him, taking out researched and previously monitored dangerous criminals. You damned idiot, your going after the head, but the problem is Forrester is like a hydra I suspect, if you cut off one head another one will grow Karlina thought to herself as she continued the conversation with Jaden on her findings & the contents of the package she’d received early this morning.

Oakland California - Jaden's Altered Drug Raid

This investigation into Boost, had taken Jaden into his most recent field mission. Karlina was at the office looking over Jonah’s partner’s condition after her memory erasure. Not just her but a few others who’d needed memory scrapes.

His solo investigation into a potential boost distribution factory had led him into quite the entanglement. Lionel & Cain were fighting for control of Oakland, Lionel’s boost enhanced murder of the chief & officers loyal to them had sent a pretty clear message of what to expect if they intervened with his agenda.

“So your trying to fuck with Cain’s shit huh? You must not be a very smart negro to do that huh’, lucky for you I’ve got the remedy for that situation” Cain’s goon quipped as he pulled out a gun and so did some of the other goons in the warehouse they al currently occupied.

“Oh come on Tory, so you can shoot sparks now and you think you’re special? Well maybe up there in the head.” Jaden retired mockingly spinning his index finger around his ear as if to indicate that Tory had a few loose screws.

“Oh fuck you, sooner or later I’m going be second in command of this whole operation, this shit going go farther then Oakland, we’ve got the juice literally. And when I’m on this shit I’m unstoppable, come on y’all let’s fuck him up!!!” Tory yelled out and fired a massive blast of lightning towards Jaden, while three of the other guns stayed back but were ready to pounce at a moment’s notice.

Jaden ducked and rolled but it wasn’t enough to get out of the lightning’s path. “Null!” Jaden yelled raising his right arm up unleashing his power. As the lightning connected with his hand it dissipate causing Tory to cuss, and launch another blast. Jaden commanded his power and did the same thing dissipating the lightning blast by “grabbing” it with his right arm.

The three goons decided their boss’s plan of attack wasn’t effective and charged in. Jaden flipped over one of the goons kicking another, then turned grabbing one of the other ones using his power while kneeing him in the gut knocking the goon unconscious. The other two charged one with a knife and the other with a bat, Jaden maneuvered between them causing the bat swinging thug to hit his knife wielding friend. Jaden used his powers again punching one of the goons knocking him unconscious and kicking the last one infusing his power with the kick to knock the last goon unconscious. He then whipped out his gun opening fire at Tory who fired a blast of electricity which countered the shots.

I know he wasn’t rocking them to sleep with just punches and kicks, looks like he can somehow make people go unconscious by physical contact either that or this man got super strength, nah I’ve seen dudes on just boost punch people and they shatter bones. He got sum strange going on cuz he literally smacking my electric blasts out of existence Tory was in deep thought trying to analyze both Jaden’s fighting style & the exact nature of his powers. It didn’t seem to fit into the broad spectrum of name brand powers that he was familiar with as a causal citizen who’s only exposure to powers outside of the new wave of altered humans, was tv shows & movies from the marvel cinematic universe.

“Hello earth to Tory, are you ready to get your ass beat or what.” Jaden replied causing Tory to launch himself forward propelling himself with electricity and surrounding his body with electric armor.

As he charged forward Jaden rolled out the way as Tory’s kick sent sparks through the ground. He formed an electric spear and flung it at Jaden who kicked the spear channeling his power through his foot to dissipate the attack. As Tory summoned large amounts of electricity Jaden flung himself forward flying towards Tory and tackling him. As he was tackled his electric armor dissipated, and Jaden quickly pummeled Tory with a series of powerful punches and kicks.

He hopped off the beaten and battered altered thug who coughed up blood. “Well at least you came calling when I told you too pussy.”

“Mother-fucker…” Tory screamed this didn’t make sense, not only did the drug enhance his powers, he had the same physical boosts as everyone but it was like Jaden beat him to a pulp like he was at his regular strength level. “I’mma fuck you up.” Tory rose up summoning an electric whip and swinging it at Jaden.

Jaden spun around karate chopping the whip dissipating I then flew forward again performing a double kick to Tory’s chest knocking him into a metal container and rendering him unconscious. Jaden shook his head and picked up his phone to contact a Liberty transport team to pick up Tory & the downed goons.

“Yeah no, it was a dead lead, I mean there’s drugs at this warehouse, but no boost. Sizable amount of dope, and coke tho, I say we pull in the regular cops let em take the bust, we should nab Tyler, & by the time his assistants are up again they’ll be regular ass punks withdrawing from boost.” Jaden said speaking to one of his liberty superiors on the phone providing intel of the mission & it’s conclusion.

[Meleck]

Alexander Chen and Bubba

Mid Afternoon

---

---

Alexander sat at his desk with a quartz crystal decanter of Scotch. Contemplating if he should jump off the wagon, he was interrupted by his phone. He got a text from Philip, an FBI analysis at Langley, VA. A friend he made in the agency. It read, "Are you and your family alright?"
It was a code that something was up. Alexander did not talk about his family and when he did it was with first names or Sir or Ma'am. It was some weird Asian thing he grew up with. That and his parent's place was far enough out of this horse shit that they were okay, till they weren't.

Taping a message back a message, "Mom is fine, Dad is worried about his garden. I'm trying to keep everyone calm so we can focus on rebuilding the city. How are you and yours?"

The reply came back, "You know my Dad, he needs a bath. The nursing home is having a hard time taking care of him. He got into the planters and started digging. Now they are charging me extra to clean it up. Might have to send him your way. Well, Got to run."

They had come up with this code when they wanted to pass information. The agency had information that the President was dirty and they were not going to be able to keep him in check and he was aware that people were covering it up. The worse part, the jerk may be sending someone in to deal with the problem.

He set the phone down and pulled the stopper from the decanter.

"Don't do it," Bubba said in a tone that was firm and authoritative.
Alexander poured three fingers into a glass and looked at it.
"Three years you've been sober, don't throw it away," he said like a preacher talking to a dying man.
"Whatever it is, we can get through it," he continued.

"Things are going to get a whole lot worse," Alexander said and started to lift the glass.
"Stop," Bubba yelled with a look of anger. The glass exploded in a way that was not natural. It was like the bottom was there and then disappeared. Then the sides just broke. Along with it was a pop that sounded like a 45 cal. handgun being shot.
Sweat ran down Bubba's forehead as the Scotch and glass ran down Alexander's hand and arm.
"What happened?" Alexander asked with a bit of frustration.

"I'm one of them, man," Bubba said walking towards Alexander.

Alexander's secretary came running into the room, "Get some towels and a first aid kit. My glass broke." He waved his good arm at her. After she left, he looked at Bubba with a surprised look on his face.

"Don't give me that look, man," Bubba said.
"You knew I got the shit, kept me home for a week," he continued.

Alexander nodded. He had been around Bubba had not got the virus. Just something worse, sober.

"Alexander, tell you what we are going to do," He said taking a towel and cleaning some of the mess up.
"We are going to give your pretty little secretary, the scotch to pour out. Then we are going to go for a ride after we make sure you are not bleeding," Bubba said like a kindergarten teacher to a student.

She came in and started to fuss about Alexander's hand. There was no blood.

---

They drove a few blocks away from the mayor's office then parked it in some shade. Bubba turned his seat.

"You are one of the smartest guy's I know," Bubba said and you are going to fix this. He waved his arms indicating the whole mess the city was in.
"You are going to make it so that that I don't have to get stuck by no needle," he continued.

"You want me to stand up against the President's orders?" Alexander said.
"He will just bring the Coast Guard station, the Air Base, and the Marine Base. Half my cops are either missing or hospitalized," Alexander said trying to point out the obvious.
"Put your fuckin' lawyer hat on and think," Bubba said with some anger.
"Is what this ass hole doing right?" He continued.
Alexander leaned back and thought for a few moments then he asked Bubba, "Is what was done in the city right?"
"No, you dip shit. It wasn't. But fuckin' all us for one bitch," he said then paused.

"I voted for your ass twice, you'z got to do the right thing," Bubba said then continued, "I'll leave you to thinking."
Bubba turned and drove them around the city. He pulled through a McDonalds got coffee and two number ones and a coke for Alexander.

---

When they got to the FEMA camp, Alexander told Bubba to stop by the news vans.
"You know, your fucking me," Alexander said with a bit of anger.
Bubba smiled and said, "Your a politician and I kissed you first." It was a joke between the two of them.

Bubba parked him and then got him out of the vehicle in his chair. Three of the national news had crews there as well as two local.
Alexander got set up and Bubba got them over.

"Ready," Alexander asked the crews. When they were set he nodded. They were expecting the mayor to fall inline with the President's plan after all he was a former FBI agent.

Alexander started, "Good Evening. I am Alexander Chen, the Mayor of San Franciso. By my Executive order, I am declaring San Francisco to be a sanctuary city for those that have powers and want to work with me and the people of this city," he paused for effect.

"The crimes that happened here were the result of people misusing their powers and harming innocent people and taking innocent lives. These people should and will be punished for their crimes. The Constitution which we swear to defend when we take office as politicians, does not allow us to act in fear and taking away the rights and liberties of others without due process. We have seen laws like these proposed by the president before: the segregated south so many years ago, the Red Zones limiting minorities' ability to get fair housing, business loans, and a chance for a better life, and the internment of Japanese American's during World War II, all of these laws have been ruled unconstitutional in the courts. These will be as well."

Again he paused then resumed, "The President's plan as did these other laws violate the basic premise of the Constitution and are a Federal overreach and abuse of Congressional and Presidental power."

Again he paused to let that bomb explode then continued some more, "As a people, we do not condone mass murder, looting, sexual assaults, and murder. Nor should we act in fear and dehumanize those that might use their new gifts to make life better for all of us."
He paused for another moment, "So, if you value freedom and liberty.. If you wish to help make a better society, with powers or not, San Francisco will welcome you with open arms. We need people willing to do the right things and the hard work this country has always."

He paused and looked at the camera, "As of now, I am ordering all federal testing facilities and government offices close within my jurisdiction under the power given me during this pandemic. These federal operations are endangering the lives of the Citizens of San Francisco. This order will be revisited in six weeks. Thank you."

Alexander wheeled himself to the van as the reports fired questions at him.
In the van and with the doors closed, Alexander said to Bubba, "I am probably now a dead man."
"We'll see," Bubba said.

Alexander knew that he bought a day or two till the courts would be involved. His phone went wild. He pulled the battery and said "Just drive" to Bubba. He loved emergency powers. The best part was the president's actions gave them to him to use.

The reports were getting close and pounding on the windows trying to get him. He made them their advertising money and gave them sound bites. They wanted more. But they had all they needed.

Dad at the nursing home was probably going crazy at this point.

[Xandrya]

A New Partnership...

---

^{A collaborative post between @Chulance & @Xandrya}

Floyd was surprised Network was having a better start then he'd hoped for, but things were starting to pan out in a positive manner so to speak. Getting Shade on his side was a major win for him, and one that he'd hoped would have a snowball effect on bringing forth momentum for his organization. But in order to effectively seize the black market & take the company where he wanted to go then he needed help. Not to mention his confrontation with Lori Martinez had left him reeling, people like her needed to go. He felt that both of his primary goals/obstacles would align with the interests of a certain female agent who'd decided to let him go free a few days ago. Fumbling through his materials he found Anya's card, and produced one of his burner cells. Examining the card once more he pushed in the digits and called her. Two more days until the deadline for registration is up, things are about to get hectic.

She was sitting on a barstool leaning on her kitchen counter. Anya was wearing nothing but underwear and a white tank top. Fresh bandages covered her wounds, and despite the medication she was currently prescribed, Anya had a glass of wine in hand. She hadn't left her home much these past few days. While Liberty sent her home until she was fully recovered, the FSS did not have the same expectations. Had her incident been work-related, meaning, she was ordered to take Floyd into custody, they would have been a little more understanding of her situation. But Instead, when she was questioned, she explained to her superiors the she had engaged the Altered on her own account. Anya wasn't formally reprimanded, but there were some closed-door discussions she had had with her superiors, though in the end, all she was left with was some side work to handle that wasn't all that physically demanding.

Since she was lost in thought as she sipped her wine, Anya was startled when her phone went off. She grabbed it and noticed it was a number she didn't have saved.

“Hello?”

Floyd was tapping his fingers on his desk when he finally heard a click. "Hey, we need to speak or rather meet it'll be well worth your while. It's Floyd, Floyd Banker, the flying altered from the other day." Floyd added at the end to try to jog Anya's memory of him incase she didn't recall who he was.

"Yes, of course," Anya knew right away who it was. She quickly finished the wine left on the glass by gulping down the last mouthful. She wasn't looking to get drunk, but she didn't want to be completely sober either. "So you want to meet now?" she added, more so talking to herself. "I mean, yeah, I can meet you somewhere, I just need to get dressed. Will you text me the location?”

Floyd was glad Anya recognized him without having to say anything further, it was good to have things going his way after the earlier confrontation with Lori Martinez. "Well now would be good timing." He added and went to his phone to send her a text of the location of a new factory he'd purchased two days ago to replace the warehouse Paige wiped out on the same day he'd finally gotten ownership of Taste of Paradise. "It's a fairly unoccupied factory, meet me there as soon as possible." Floyd added with some urgency in his voice wanting to meet up with her in person as soon as possible.

After getting the details from Floyd, Anya hung up with him and went ahead to get dressed. As she did so, she winced in pain a couple of times. She simply put on shorts and a light jacket, leaving some of the bandage exposed. Anya was not wanting to make the pain worse by wearing tight or restrictive clothing. Besides, she wasn't meeting Floyd in a professional capacity, so dressing down was fine. It could also possibly help her keep the meeting under wraps from her superiors since she wasn't running around town looking official as usual.

A while later, Anya finally arrived at the factory. She didn't see Floyd right away, so she walked around near the entrance.

"Floyd?" Her voice echoed off the walls.

"What the fuck happened to you." Floyd retorted as he became visible walking over to her from her a corner in the room. He was eying her up and down, noticing the bandage but also noticing more of her body with the way she was dressed. She had a nice figure, and the agent was more attractive then he recalled. Of course this meeting was much less tension filled then the last one that started off with him in cuffs. "Anyway I need your help, right now I'm starting my own group of altered humans and I'm trying to take control of the black market. I think being in charge of the american criminal underworld would be a valuable resource as the President's new laws make it harder for the majority of altered to have jobs aside from busines owners & the like. I'm looking to partner with someone in the government, and willing to offer up all manner of criminal enemies in exchange for immunity while in pursuit of this goal." Floyd retorted to Anya getting straight to the point.

She could tell he was checking her out as he didn't make any attempts to be the least bit inconspicuous, but Anya refrained from saying something. She couldn't deny he was attractive as well, but she wouldn't make it obvious. "Did you already forget how that Altered nearly killed me? Unfortunately, I'm not as strong as a lot of you with your abilities, so I've been out from work for little bit.

Floyd then brought up the reason he had called her. And to be honest, Anya had to give some thought to what he had just proposed. She wouldn't be breaking protocol with just one employer, but with both of them...despite the fact that she was not a legitimate Liberty employee in the sense of holding allegiance to the agency. "That's a very tempting offer...but I would have a hell of a lot more to lose than you. How do I know you're not going to screw me over?" she asked.

Floyd rolled his eyes at Anya’s first comment, surely an agent like her wasn’t complaining about being hurt or not being as physically strong as superhumans. Besides not all altered had super strength anyway, hell he didn’t. “Oh come on, what do you have to loose? I’m the one whose a criminal trying to partner with the government. Not only that I’m offering you an unlimited peak into the other side, endless pool of regular criminals & altered criminals for you & your buddies to string up like a Christmas tree whenever you want. You’ll literally be the best agent ever.” Floyd continued trying to focus on the potential benefits of working together while proposing this deal too Anya.

“Anyway how the hell can I screw you over in this partnership. You think in any scenario they’ll believe me over you if something we’re to go left.” Floyd added with a grin, although he wasn’t planning on crossing her if she agreed. Part of the inspiration for this idea came from watching Sons of Anarchy. “Or maybe you don’t have the juice to pull off what I’m asking for huh? Is that it can’t get it up for my request hmm?” Floyd teased but with a hint of seriousness, after all if she wasn’t high ranking enough to help with what he wanted then he needed to be careful because that didn’t mean she might not have enough rank to put an end to it.

“Listen, if I get found out, I might as well start digging my own grave. All they need is any ounce of proof that I’m working with you instead of taking your ass to jail and I’m a dead woman.” Anya was being honest; she wasn’t exaggerating. Her superiors would not take kindly to her going behind their backs. She’d heard the stories of what’d happened to other operatives who just so happened to betray the FSS, and that alone was hhea deterrent on its own. Still, Floyd brought forth a pretty good point. She would be gaining a lot, and to her, it was worth the risk. Anya smirked at his latest statement. “If you didn’t think I had what it takes to offer you an in then you wouldn’t even be here right now, so don’t play that game. But you are right, your offer is a pretty good, one that’s hard to pass up… And with that said, I hope you’re ready to play by my rules.”

"Wellllll I guess you have a point there, if I didn't think you could do it I wouldn't be here, or I'd be pretty screwed considering I can't wipe away memories or anything." Floyd noted jokingly although he was being partially serious, if he had made an incorrect assessment he would be totally screwed right about now. "And okay then what are "YOUR" rules then Agent Donnovan." Floyd asked somewhat sarcastically wondering what he was getting himself into. Still he shoved any potential regrets he had to the side, if he was going to do this then he wanted to be connected with government forces from the start, it would lead to making the Network succesful, plus he was determined to take down Lori Martinez, Reaper & any other similarly threatening forces.

“The rules are simple. Every major job, movement, shipping, and anything else of significance must be previously approved by me. You will not carry out these actions without consulting me first, and if I tell you to pull the plug, you will listen to me.” Anya then stepped closer to Floyd, decreasing the distance between the both of them. Her tone now lowered, she looked him square in the eye. “And last but not least, no one but you knows about me. If I find out you as so much mention my name, you are fucking dead…and that’s a promise I’ll carry out myself.”

"Suit yourself if your into micro managing, although I forsee that particular condition of yours being quite difficult as Network grows in number, fortunately for you the group's not that big right now."Floyd shrugged if she wanted to make her life more difficult and his easy that was fine with him. He could use the management help anyway. thi was not a field he use to being a leader in anynway. As she got closed he clenched his nose a bit. "Jeez you smell you went swimming in a pool of wine, stand back a little your breath is intoxicating." Floyd said to her when she approached and made her final lecturing threatening remarks. "You don't gotta get drunk, to threaten me.”

Anya rolled her eyes in response, shaking her head as she stepped back to turn away from Floyd. "It's not so much a threat as it is a fact. You may get a slap on the wrist compared to the hell that will rain down on me." With her back to the Altered, Anya placed her hands on her waist as she looked up at the sky. She was remembering the footage they had showed her during her training of what they did to operatives who went rogue in one way or another. She initially had turned her eyes away from the screen, but the was warned just once to keep watching or else there'd be consequences. But that was then, and things were much different now, at least in her experience. "But as long as we can work with my rules, we won't have any problems...”

Floyd couldn't help but laugh a little bit at Anya's response, not that he found her particularly funny. "Right you think me, a black man & an altered will get a "slap on the wrist" for what amounts to being the leader of a super powered terrorist group trying to take over the entire criminal underworld." Floyd found that amusing, although maybe Anya's punishment would be more severe. After all she was an agent helping to make it all possible, he didn't have the government connections to fulfill this whole plan which is why he was here seeking her to work together with him in the first place. "I don't see any reason I can't abide by your rules Agent Donnovan, as long as you don't cross me you'll or try round 2 with the handcuffs you'll find me to be particularly loyal. Also your alcohol fueled breath isn't a problem the only real problem is that you didn't invite me to join you? Relaxing and having fun unwinding with good drink all by yourself? Come on now that isn't any way to treat a new partner is it? Floyd added at the end somewhat teasing her.

"Oh, so you're interested," Anya smirked, pausing briefly to contemplate the fun them two could have. "I would have invited you but you never gave me your number...and a man like you goes through burners probably at the same rate I go through bottles. Besides, haven't you heard? Never mix business with pleasure.”

"Hmmmm" Floyd responded allowing his eyes to survey Anya's figure once more before giving his answer. "Okay that settles it I'm 100% interested, and excuses excuses. Excuses are are the tools of incompetence, used to build monuments of nothingness. Also I tend to think the opposite, mix business with pleasure and it hardly even feels like work." Floyd responded.

"I suppose that's another way to look at it... Open invitation, to celebrate this new partnership of ours. If you're interested you can join me back at my place, I have a nice variety for your choice of poison. If not, I'll continue drinking all the same.”

“Why thank you, it's always a good idea to look at things from a variety of perspectives." Floyd shot back at Anya with a mischievous grin plastered onto his face. "Sounds like your gonna enjoy life with or without me one way or another, but I'd be happy to accompany you on this journey back to your place. Would you like to handle transportation I've acquired a more discreet means to go about it." Floyd added with a smirk as he hovered in the air before turning invisible, only to resume being seen by the naked eye with both feet planted firmly on the ground. "Or would you prefer more traditional means of moving around.”

“Preferably the more discreet method as I’d rather avoid being spotted with an altered outside of work. You know how it goes...”

· · ─────── ·𖥸· ─────── · ·

---

Can’t wait to hear all about it. Give me about an hour to get ready and I’ll see you there... Michele picked up the pace, not wanting to look like the hot mess that was currently running around San Francisco. She liked Michael, and she would be lying to herself if she did’t admit that she was trying to impress him later on, whether he considered it to be a date or not.

Some time passed and Michele was setting up a variety of finger food that consisted of a couple of cheeses and hams, some crackers with fig jelly on the side, corn nuts, and mini ham croquettes she had quickly fried up. It had taken her quite a bit to figure out what she wanted to wear, something nice but casual enough to not make her be overdressed in her own home. In the end, Michele decided on a denim dress accentuated at the waist by a red belt and a simple pair of sandals. Once she was done, she looked at the time and realized she had maybe a few minutes until the hour was up. The young woman was relieved, and started to pour some wine on a couple of glasses.

@FunnyGuy

[Meleck]

Alexander Chen

Late in the Afternoon

---

---

Present: The city's attorney and Councilwoman Choi
The three were speaking in Chinese.

---

"What the fuck were you thinking?" the lawyer asked. He was a caucasian man in his late fifties. His suit was rumpled but his shoes were polished shined like a mirror. His tie was half undone and hanging off of him. The guy was absolutely brilliant and complete ass.

"I've had lawyers from three federal agencies calling me and chewing my ass because of your stunt," He yelled at Alexander.
Slamming his hand down on the desk he continued, "They have been threatening everything from an IRS audit, to prison, to a damn CIA Sniper Team if you don't fix this. Most of the country agrees with the President, Hell, I agree with the president. What are you thinking?"

Councilwoman Choi's turn being the good cop, "Alexander, I've known you and your parents your whole life. We are worried about you."
This was the part where Choi suggests that his injuries might be affecting his mental health and maybe he should step down. "

Alexander sat their behind his desk and kept his hands folded listening to them.

"Do you think that the Federal Government is going to just use this to see who has powers and who doesn't?" he asked. "They have to do genetic testing which means they will have everyone's DNA on file. Parts of Langley have been asking for this for years. So if someone has the potential to have powers what will happen to them? What are they going to do with these people? If the CIA is involved they will turn some of them into supper assassins or soldiers and use them on jobs we never hear about or to fight wars."

Alexander switches to English to make it easy for the FBI team that had probably bugged his office or were listening through the glass after his stunt, "By the way counselor, the CIA is not allowed to go after domestic targets legally. So, if I get a bullet to the head or have a mysterious death, take one of the copies made and placed in the dead man drops like I taught you and let the news and those other parties we talked about know. I am sure that the FBI would love to fry a sitting president for violating the laws by assassinating a civilian in a wheelchair."

Switching back to Chinese, he says softer, "I know they want to protect people, but they are going about it the wrong way. These are people with families not animals to be rounded up. This isn't Mao's China or Stalin's Soviet Union, this is the United States where people are presumed innocent till found guilty and given due process. Someone has to stand up and speak for them or they will be like the Jews in Nazi Germany."

"He wants to play ball with you," the lawyer said to Alexander, "just name your price. Want a cushy desk job in Hawaii watching the girls run around three-quarters naken on the beach? Or a job as an alcohol tester in Kentucky.. Want to have an Embassy desk job in china Just name it and turn this ship around."
"We care about you, qīn ài de," Choi said in a very maternal tone.

"Let me think about it overnight," Alexander said in English. Alexander already knew. Girls are no good when your body doesn't respond and the alcohol crack was dirty pool. So they knew about his drinking problem. They had gotten to Choi as well.

He wanted to walk again and be a full man, not some dude stuck in a chair because he was shot in the line of duty.
He wanted to pee standing up and crap in a toilet. Not having to use some stinking plastic tube into a bag and needing two people to help him. He did not want to need to take two additional changes of clothes with him when he went to work just in case he crapped himself. Nobody got that, except for those who were also stuck in the chair. So Forrester could go.. He stopped that thinking. It would only lead him back into the bottle..

He smiled and said, "I will let you know."

[Meleck]

Alexander Chen

Late in the Evening

---

---

Location: Alexander's penthouse suite.

---

Chen sat in his wheelchair watching the destruction and fighting that was taking place in Oakland. The sky glowed with police ambulance lights, helicopter spotlights, and fires. Chen had chosen this spot specifically to watch the madness. Mainly because if a sniper wanted to shot him, it would need to go through the glass at an angle. That meant two things. The first is it would not be an easy shot. The second was that the bullet would either deflect and miss him or it would slow down after hitting the glass.

He started doing the math. 3500 feet per second, the glass would provide about 10% reduction in speed and deflect the bullet about two to four degrees. Which meant it would still be a fatal shot, but not easy to make. One of the boys from Quantico sniper school he thought. He used his binoculars and scanned, night vision would have been great for this. Chen knew what was coming, every agent knew if they went too far afield they would be disconnected from the Agency. He knew too many secrets.

His phone rang, Chen lifted the phone and placed it on speaker. A male voice asked, "Mayor Chen?"
Chen reached over to a glass sitting on the table and took a sip. He knew this was the tagging call made from a burner phone.
"Marine or CIA?" Chen asked.
"Can't tell you that, Sir," the voice said.
Chen lifted his glass to the sniper team and said, "Two innocents at my 5:00. Happy hunting."
A red dot appeared and wiggled a bit on his chest where his heart should be. The wall of glass exploded and the bullet hit Chen like a baseball bat being swung by someone in a moving car. It reminded him of getting shot in the back but this hurt a hell of a lot more.

Alexander had left the back of the chair seat free, because a good electric wheelchair costs about as much as a car and it had taken time to get on that let him stand up even.

Alexander was thrown back on the floor. There was no big splash of blood and no explosion.
The phone had fallen to the ground and the women in the other room screamed in terror.
Alexander laid there motionless barely breathing.

Within five minutes his place was swarming with cops, his cops. Fifteen minutes and the paramedics were rushing Alexander off to the hospital. His building had the slowest elevator ever known to humankind.

The videos and audio hit the media bigger than his earlier announcement. The official news reports were he had been ship by a high caliber round by a hunting rifle and was not expected to live. In the ambulance, his two caretakers kept him strapped down so he could not move and a police car cleared the way.

Two news crews caught the whole thing on those little high-tech drones and audio of the whole thing thanks to a tip for an unknown woman.

---

[FunnyGuy]

Time: Afternoon
Location: Gustavo's Gym to Michele's Apartment, San Francisco
Interaction: @Xandrya Michele

---

"An hour?" Michael blurted out with raised eyebrows. He'd been wasting so much time testing out his boundless stamina at the bench press that he hadn't progressed to his other workouts. It wouldn't have been rude to keep Michele waiting, so he put the weight plates he was using back in their places and briskly exited the gym. Though he was glad he had a vehicle to get him from Point A to Point B, the current traffic in San Francisco was a commuter's nightmare.

As he approached his car, he felt numbing sensation across his skin.

"What the…" He stopped and looked at his exposed skin as that's where the numbness felt the strongest.

"Hey you good? That preworkout must be hella strong?" A man passing Michael in the parking lot commented.

"I'm good." He honestly had no clue what was happening, but he surmised the feeling was coming from the sunlight. He hurried to his car, getting inside. And just like that, he felt normal again. "Weird… Wait a second." He rolled down his tinted window and reached his hand out to the sunlight. The numb feeling returned. "Awesome…" Withdrawing his arm and rolling the window back up, he started up his vehicle to head home so he could shower and change.

40 minutes later…

Michael had arrived at the condo he called home, immediately jumping in the shower. It might have been easier to text Michele and have her push the time back some, but racing the clock had tempted him. Navigating through his messy home made things all the more challenging. And he had volunteered to clean it too. He shrugged at the broken furniture before putting on denim jeans, a short-sleeved baby blue graphic shirt with Los Angeles, and a picture of the city at the center. For his shoes, he slipped on a pair of clean white sneakers. He brushed his hair, applied deodorant, dabbed some cologne on, and then went for the door.

10 minutes later…

"Fuck this traffic, and I forgot to put on lotion!" Michael complained as he looked at the dry skin between his fingers and along his arms. He thought about going back or stopping somewhere to get some, but the clock. It wasn't a date, but he really liked Michele. In a way, she made him feel like things were perfectly fine. No drama, dangers, or worries… Well except for when they first met, but after that things had remained smooth. Smooth, unlike his skin right now.

13 minutes later...

It was a blessing Michele didn't live too far from where he and Floyd stayed, so traffic wasn't too unbearable on the way to her apartment. He was a few minutes late, but only a few. As he approached the door to her apartment, he couldn't help but smile. At least Michele could brighten up his day some.

[Chulance]

Hector Salzaras

Time: Afternoon
Location: The Salzaras Estate, Mexico
Interaction:

---

“This is quite the unfortunate turn of events is it not.” Hector Salzaras said as he wiped his hands off with a napkin. He’d just enjoyed a wonderful steak & salmon dinner with an abundance of delicious sides. He sat at the dinner table of his illustrious palace for lack of better word that he’d built in Mexico.

As the leader of the Salzaras Cartel, he was a very busy & powerful man. Whilst he had no aspirations for political power, he did have many such people in his circle. There was a history of people like him, notorious wealthy cartel leaders moving in the same circles as the pushers & movers of this country’s government. But he’d taken things a step further with the inclusion of altered humans within his ranks. While the United States shunned them down as genetic mishaps, mutants, monsters & some devout religious fundamentalists demons. He’d seen them as a viable financial asset, one that was paying off hundred-fold.

A black portal opened up and out stepped a man that was of hispanic & Russian descent. Nikolai Rasputin. He was a notorious weapons dealer prior to the energy storm, but after getting his powers he’d struck up an alliance with the leader of the Salzaras Cartel. He’d expanded his operations from being an international gun smuggler to also trafficking narcotics & even got into human trafficking thanks to some contacts in India & The Middle East courtesy of Hector Salzaras. It would be an understatement to say that his powers had changed his life dramatically, and raised his finances to that of a high level millionaire.

Niko hadn’t come through the portal alone, bringing along a few brief-cases and three armed men. He took a bow towards Hector as did the men, but Hector waved his hand & motioned for them to rise up. He was on the phone, and all who worked for him in the upper management of the Salzaras Cartel knew better then to interrupt him on the phone. By the sounds of it, he was talking to his lover Cynthia Ortiz. After a short while later Hector hung up the phone and let out a sigh. He then widened his arms and allowed a warm smile to gather on his face. “Please eat, there is no need to fear me, as long as product & money is flowing, and all agreements are as planned you will have no anonymity from me.”

“Understood Mr. Salzaras.” Niko replied as he took a seat, as did the others. While Hector had told him as well as his second In command Eduardo & others on the chairman board that they could call him Hector, only Eduardo & Rita dared. Anyone that he gave permission to call him Hector he surely meant it, but his calm demeanor was as well as down as his sadistic & violent strike towards subordinates who angered him. Sometimes even the slightest infraction could have them ordered to be eaten by shark’s, piranha’s, alligators or whatever particular torture interested him at the time.

“Still insist on showing the upmost respect, even though among us two you have the clear advantage in raw power Mr. Rasputin. I like that about you.” Hector said as he took a knife and cut a piece of his lemon square before taking a bite. He was very full from his meal, but he always welcomed desert.

“Well you are the one behind changing my life, the storm’s plague may have given me the ability, but you provided the guidance & direction to elevate myself to a new standing. Aside from that power isn’t as simple as me opening portals, people shooting lasers, or summoning violent gusts of wind or fire. Power is money, power is an aura about oneself, the ability to command others. There are different forms of power, and power like you and the leaders of America and other nations have far surpasses even the power I wield.” Niko responded as some chefs brought food to the table for him & his men.

“Very perceptive, and while you may be right, I still can’t help but imagine and at times even envy the type of raw power individuals such as yourself, my lover & sister have. Although I hear rumors that this Boost may be the answer to my desire of having my own super powers. Anyway I’ve become privy o some very disheartening news lately, I was on the phone with Miss Ortiz. With her informative lips she’s uncovered that the source of the missing drugs was none other then my dear sister Rita, it seems she hadn’t learned from the fate of my former foolish younger brother and father.” Hector spoke calmly at the passing of family members whom he’d ordered killed when they crossed him.

The tension in the room was clear, and Niko’s explanation seemed to be showcased right here at the dinner table. Of the five the room, eight including the severs Hector was the one who held & wielded the most true power in the room. As stated by the portal generating trafficker, Salzaras had real power, and not the kind that could lift boxes with your mind or make them melt. The kind of power many men & even women had sought over the centuries to subjugate their fellow humans to their will.

“Alas she knew that unlike with father & my annoying brother I do have a soft spot for her, still that simply means I won’t have her tossed in a vat of acid or subjected to multiple strains of venomous snakes at once. A punishment is still in order, at the very least she must make amends for her transgressions, and even the reluctance I have to ending her tenure on this earth has it’s limits. As with food, I believe every person has an expiration date, but some people can continue to push that date farther and farther away such as yourself Niko & the rest of you here.” Hector said with a charismatic smile that did not fit the grim topic he was discussing in-front of them.

“So Rita was the snake after all, forgive my language. Also not to interrupt, but Oakland has turned into a bloody street war, thugs walking around bullet proof who can bend steel bars under the influence of this Boost. Even with my powers I’ve yet to find any leads, and from the women I’ve taken recently for my overseas clients none have had any leads either. I understand that Boost may prove to be a thorn in your side, a drug like that has potential to appeal to a far wider & weather market then the likes of our usuals including cocaine & heroin correct?” Niko asked being careful with his words, for being a powerful man & asset to the Salzaras Cartel he still knew to watch his words & be careful of how he spoke to the ruthless cartel leader.

“Much far wider & reacher, the Us Government has made sure to keep news of Boost out of the media & has all but abandoned efforts to help Oakland in public, despite the fact that gangs aided by altered & boost were tearing up the city. “ Hector responded while pausing to carefully think of the implications of such a move. My intuition tells me it’s because the US Government must want to get their hands on this substance, which means whomever is in charge of the manufacture & distribution of boost will be quite the wealthy individual. According to Cynthia’s intel the drugs Rita diverted were to a player named Floyd Banker, whose managed to get the feds attention, but the case was forcibly taken from them

“It makes since with what it is, I myself haven’t tried the substance nor found it for that matter, but I do no Oakland’s turning into more of a war zone then usual, the effects of which have far since stretched from the ghetto’s & other urban areas, which typically would have long since led to a reaction from law enforcement, especially with the military deployed to every state.” Niko spoke aloud, he too was speculating on the purpose & mystery behind the government’s seeming refusal or concern about Oakland.

“I believe there is a race going on, the winner will be the first one to claim control of Boost for themselves, these thugs with a few altered have managed to seize Oakland, next door to San Francisco where a Godzilla sized woman just went on a rampage and murdered thousands, f they have not yet launched a swift military strike to demolish these wannabe gangsters trying to enact a supervillain like takeover, then it’s because the US wants access to the very same power as these thugs & no doubt there working tireless to acquire this fountain of power. Thus we, the Salzaras must acquire it first. Niko proceed with the plans to retrieve the tunnel-maker from Chicago, that should stir up enough controversy to forcibly divide the United States Attention, afterwards divert all your current attention to Oakland, in order to compete with the gods, we too must acquire the power of Olympus for ourselves.” Hector said with a smile as he took another bite of his lemon bar. “As for my dear sister, her time is near, but if you would I’d like you to reach out to this Floyd Banker, I believe he too may prove to be a valuable piece of this puzzle we’re trying to put together.”

[Chulance]

Dean Rivers

Time: Afternoon
Location: Downtown San Francisco to River Intel PI Office
Interaction:

---

Dean was more than worried, he’d tried to no avail to get in contact with Paige. He had one final message from her, the contents of which were disturbing. She explained her mission was to bring down Floyd Banker & the Salzaras Cartel at all costs. She incriminated herself as the sole perpetrator of the gas station bombing that reportedly only Rita Salzaras had survived unscathed. Three others had survived with second & third degree burns, and 14 people had died.

Regardless of their history as officers in arms fighting the good fight, that was where even Dean drew the line. He was willing to play rough, good cop, bad cop but when innocent lives were lost he called it quits. Of course Paige had divulged more information then that including her own power & why she was best to take down Floyd, as well as the fact that she was willing to serve as many life sentences’s as needed to bring down those responsible for taking out the ones who ruined her sister’s life.

The crazy thing was despite all the anger fuming through him, he appreciated the fact that Paige had asked for him to be the one to bring her in. At first he was conflicted, not that he wouldn’t take her in after she caused innocents to die. Rather he didn’t want to be the one to do it, but his morality was too strong not to honor that request of hers. But now that he was unable to find her he wondered if she’d gotten cold feet, had the reality of her fate set in. After all a regenerating woman who might not even age serving consecutive life sentences. With her power she’d be sure to serve every day, if not in a cell then as a victim of a research facility who would have no qualms using her body for whatever purpose after her careless taking of lives.

But now his attempts to contact her resulted in nothing but radio silence. He almost took the evidence to the station but stopped, Paige was many things but a liar wasn’t one. She’d went this far to take down Floyd sure, but if she didn’t want to be taken in why would she even give him this information? It wouldn’t be sensible to bring him in the light about her recent crimes only to vanish right after. No something else was going on, that meant for whatever reason Paige wasn’t around anymore. Something’s not right about this at all

Dean had taken an unmarked car & drove past Floyd’s residence a few times two Horus ago, but he hadn’t seen any activity. He’d even had a makeshift setup to view the premise with binoculars and didn’t see any activity illegal, regular or otherwise. It was far too quite for his taste, Paige had even shared a location with him. The locations’s last reported place was Floyd’s residence, then it was offline. Paige wanted to take down Floyd a all cost, then wanted him to swoop in and bring her in afterwards. “Damn it Paige what the fuck did you get yourself into! You damned yourself, and didn’t even get the damn target!”

Dean yelled out as he slammed his fist against the dashboard of his cruiser. He took out all the paperwork & files he had on Floyd Banker. Even more surprising was finding out from Lisa, that she’d used to date that guy back when she lived in Atlanta. According to her he was a bum who sat around getting high & selling weed even though she supported all his needs. The relationship eventually came to a screeching halt once she came to her senses, but to her memory he was never a big time player. Yet it appeared he was a multi business owner living it up in California a few years later, and it was’t as if he’d gotten a college degree or a lucky break in the entertainment industry or anything similar.

Not to mention the last location pinged from Paige’s phone which she’d shared with Dean without him even knowing was his residence. “Banker you bastard.” Dean mutters to himself as he looked over the files of Floyd he had, and the ones Paige left for him. Apparently the FBI had taken an interest in his case & connection to the Salzaras Cartel before their investigation was shut down. It wasn’t often the FBI had a case swept under the rug from them, unless something major was going on.

He couldn’t fathom what type of major ongoings could be connected to Floyd, at the very most the intel he gathered made it seem like he was a dealer who’d worked his way up into the big leagues. Big enough to afford a far more affluent lifestyle then his credentials on paper made it seem possible, although owning two companies could account for that. Still one of the companies was a popular venue Taste of Paradise which was on the verge of being shut down because of another investigation by federal agents into potential narcotics trafficking taking place at the location. But alas just like the prior case, it seemed after Floyd purchased it all investigations into TAP had been halted.

His investigation had come to a sudden screeching halt. With no other way to move proceed he decided to visit & involve the one person he least wanted to see. But he had to swallow his pride, because he felt like everything he’d been peering Into all had to do with this Banker kid & the cases shut down around him. He decided to take an unmarked cruiser, one of the benefits of being a veteran narcotics detective.

He pulled into the driveway of Rivers Intel parking lot, a private investigation firm started by his cousin Devin Rivers. Like Paige he was an ex-cop, although he wasn’t let go because of outright police brutality, but rather his tendency to break as many laws as the very criminals he was going after to catch them. Unlike Paige the police agency hadn’t willingly let him go, rather complaints from well connected & lawyered up criminals in tandem with an internal investigation had been the causation for his elimination from the agents of justice.

To this day Devin was bitter about that, and more so that Dean didn’t stand up for him. But he had a life long career & mission on the line. His cousin’s inability to play by the rules meant he couldn’t risk his bacon to help him. Not after several warnings, and even breaking a rule or two himself to help him. “I hoped it would never have to come to this.” Dean let out a sigh as he gathered his bearings and made his way into the reception area of River Intel.

The secretary waved at him and offered some candies in a bowl up-front as well as bottled water. However that friendly demeanor halted and he was met with a scowl as she noticed who he was. “OH it’s you Uncle.”

“Yeah it’s me.” Dean said exhausted his niece was no friend of his, she knew well about what went down between him and his father. More than that she took his side wholly as did Devin’s wife which was expected. What made matters worst was there were a few officers who’d stuck out their necks for Devin during the final stage of the trial, and he wasn’t one of them. Of course the one that had been the closest to him had lost their jobs, but he’d heard that they had a much better paying salary working for Devin.

His rag tag PI firm wasn’t doing that well at first last year, but in the past three months they were making well over six figures. It dawned on him from time to time that maybe Devin was using his police connections & history to dip Into the dark side. Maybe he was embittered & frustrated that his fight for justice had landed him with a struggling business. But he quickly eliminated those thoughts from his head, and after a conversation in passing with his sister in law two months ago he’d deduced how Devin had become as succesful as he had.

It wasn’t Long before his niece told him to go outside, and since forty minutes had passed Dean relented and left. “I dunno why the fuck I came here, emergency or no emergency, I guess he’s still mad.” Dean muttered to himself as he marched back to the cruiser defeated only to hear the sound of folders hitting the back bumper of his car. Dean spun around only to see his cousin meeting him with a scowl.

“What is it Dean? You know where we stand, I honestly wasn’t about to come out. But with everything going on, and because you know my little secret, and haven’t told, plus you said it’s a emergency, and most importantly you said it’s about Paige, who unlike you actually stood up for me when everything went down I’m out here, but I’m letting you know right now if this is to help you and your damn career then just get in the car and pull off, so what is it what’s wrong with Paige?”

“What’s wrong with her…a better way to say it, is it what WAS wrong with her.” Dean said as his voice trailed off, and instantly the mood changed as Devin seemed to quickly understand what his cousin was implying with his tone & manner of speech, as well as a defeated look in his eyes that Dean didn’t manifest or showcase often.

“No…not her…I mean I heard about her and what happened, shame the force put some fucking dealer above her because of a little foul play with cameras, if you can even call it that. You know how I feel about these damn procedures, criminals with big enough pocketbooks can finagle their way through the rules, and leave us looking like the liberty trampling monsters when there the real demons, your not telling me that Paige got knocked off going solo, that’s not possible, trust me there’s things about her I know that you don’t, so if your saying you think she’s dead, I’m here to tell you that’s a damn lie at worst, or at best you just don’t know what your talking about.” Devin reported confidently, getting some more spunk in his voice as he continued.

“Oh cause she can regenerate right? Well what do you think happens if someone chops her head off, or tosses her in a vat of acid?” Dean replied with a bit of anger in his voice startling Devin who stumbled back.

“W..wait..someone did that? You..”

“No..well I don’t know, but I’m here to tell you she’s gone man, and we were working on the same shit. Something big it had to do with the brat she got fired for, plus the Salzaras, superhuman drug traffickers, and potentially the worst case of human trafficking in the bay ever and I need your help, if you won’t do it for me do it for Paige, and if you think I’m lying touch this.”

Dean reached in his pocket and handed Devin a phone. He raised an eyebrow and accepted the phone. Focusing he used his power causing his mind to flood with vision and he almost dropped the phone as he stumbled backwards. “No….she wouldn’t…she couldn’t…this…this..doesn’t make any sense!!”

“Yeah I thought the same thing, but the more I’m starting to connect the dots, the more I think it might have. WE both know her, and we both know the lengths she’s willing to go And more importantly the ones she’s not willing to take, meaning if she took them of sound mind, then she was facing something not just bad, but pure fucking evil.”

“Holy shit, I never thought I’d say this about you and by god I mean that but your right Fuck, come inside I’ve got some crown and ice in the fridge, we’re going to need to pour a drink or two about this, and bring the files, the burner phone, bring everything, and I thought what the mayor said was the worst of it.” Devin muttered to himself clearly shook by the sight of what he’d seen by touching the burner phone Dean presented to him.

Dean nodded and gathered his materials into a duffel bag before slinging it over his shoulder. Following Devin’s lead into the office, ignoring glares from his niece they went to the back-room where there were three TV’s all on different channels showing different news stations. As Dean opened up the bag and started laying the various materials he had across the desk from his cases, Devin went to the fridge to retrieve the bottle of crown, and two glasses filled with ice.

Dean nearly dropped some folders as his jaw widened seeing the display on the television screen. “You’ve got to be me kidding me, have you seen this shit?!”

“Quiet down man damn, ain’t nobody in this office that’s going take kindly to the likes of you being here, and you talking about the mayor right, don’t tell me your just now finding out, damn it, if you are then that means this shit with Paige IS really real, realer then I care to think or admit, but I’m about to have to see it.” Devin said as he poured the crown In the glasses, pouring a bit more in both cups due to Dean’s reply to Mayor Chen’s actions on the television in light of everything going on.

[Meleck]

Bubba

---

Location: Bubba’s Condo West Side of San Francisco
Time: Two days before Mayor Chen went crazy

---

Sitting on the dining room table was a chemistry book, a guide to crystals, and different resource books.

Gold = [Xe] 4f14 5d10 6s1

Xe = [Kr] 4d10 5s2 5p6

Kr= 1s2 2s2 2p6 3s2 3p6 4s2 3d10 4p6

That meant that gold was: 1s2 2s2 2p6 3s2 3p6 4s2 3d10 4p6 4d10 5s2 5p6 4f14 5d10 6s1

Hydrogen had been easy, Helium no problem. Carbon took some work (1s22s22p2) picturing the lattice work and holding the image of the electron orbitals in his mind at the same time was no easy feat. He tried to create dirt til he found out how damn complex it was. He could create water. But now it was the money, Bubba was trying to create Gold.

Like a freshman in college, Bubba felt like he was cramming for an exam. He had kind of heard all this when he was back in college. He heard the moans of his chemistry teacher and his Lab Assistant. That was back in the days when, well back in the days where he lived that type of life.
Bubba was quite charming when he put his mind to it.

Now he wished he had actually paid attention in class. He had his football degree. A fine diploma hung on the wall, first one to go to college. His major was sex and he graduate high up in his class. He had made his way through three sororities.

“Focus on this stuff, Bubba,” he said out loud. When he could get his hands on a computer geek, he would have him write a program to visualize this stuff on a tablet.

He had a diamond about the size of his thumb laying on the table. That had taken him two evenings of hard work. Now sweat ran down his forehead and back as he focused. He built the image of the atom layering each new level pushing away the ambient atoms and molecules that were trying to pollute his creation. Protons and neutrons, then the electron orbitals. Once he had that he started picturing the lattice structures, then the layers, finally the size he wanted. This took time and energy.
A lot of energy when he was learning something new. He found it got easier when he practiced.

He wanted to make money in case Alexander could figure a way out of this.

---

---

Bubba and Alexander Chen

---

Location: Bubba’s Condo West Side of San Francisco
Time: Two days before Mayor Chen went crazy

---

As the ambulance’s siren scream echoed off the walls of the hospital, Alexander looked up and asked, “Did they get the shooter?”
“Put the mask back on,” his medical resident housemate said to him, “You’ve got at least a couple broken ribs and possibly a collapsed lung.”
He winced and smiled up.
“Good luck trying to cut through this,” he said,” He had two bulletproof vests on.
The first had a hole about the size of two fingers. The second was barely intact. But he wasn’t bleeding. He just wanted to be dead.
Now he would need to replace both of the vests.

“Did they get it on video?” the other girl showed CNN showing the window breaking and his body laying on the floor. Fox was showing the entire video, even showing the video in slow motion.

The chief of police sat in the front of the ambulance, He called back, “You’ve had quite a day!”
After a moment, he looked back, “No, they did not get the shooter. But he left the phone.”
“I told you they would go for a body shot. They wanted to send a message to others so they needed the head. Body shots give you more area. Shooting me in the legs would be pointless,”
Alexander said, “Remind me to approve drones for you.”

When they arrived his girls played their parts perfectly. He had to look dead. They even moved his legs, dropping them to make him appear dead. Getting him into Trama 2, his girl worked her magic. He’s lost a lot of blood, we need to get him into I.R. so we can get a central line into him. This was not her first rodeo and people moved. When they got down to I.R. Bubba sat in a white coat and scrubs with a bag beside him. There were three scanners in operation. He was waiting.

Bubba smiled at Alexander and said, “You are the luckiest bastard to have us.”
They moved off the gurney and got the vests off. They did a scan with a wand to make sure that the lungs were okay. The broken ribs showed.

A little blood product splashed on the floor from a prior trauma as Alexander was changed into different clothes.

“Seattle Seahawks?” Alexander said to Bubba with some disgust. They put him into pink sweats and a sweatshirt with a white-haired wig, red high heels, a red purse, a wedding ring with a rock on it, and a cane. The girls put on lipstick and the cheap dark glasses they have when you have a headache or an eye exam.

Bubba was adorned in Oakland Raiders colors with a big honking gold chain with a basketball. He picked Alexander up, placed him into a hospital wheelchair, and took him from the room. Outside the chief of police reported that the mayor was under close guard a few minutes later the girls fed a story to the first-year resident who had been on for about two weeks and that he could make a statement.

Dr. Andrew Scott nervously stepped up to the microphones and made a report on the condition of the mayor. That he was being transferred to the ICU in critical condition.

Bubba and his momma who fell and needed an x-ray made their way down to one of the electric Mustang GT’s - black of course with tinted windows.

Bubba lifted Alex, placing him into the passenger seat and buckling him in. He even kissed him on the cheek like you would your Mama. He folded the wheelchair and placed it in the trunk.

Two cut pieces of electrical tape made the license plate different enough to make the feds burn time if they came looking.

Bubba drove them to one of his former girlfriends' apartments that were on the first floor of a junky apartment building. She had been killed in the attack. The place was bad enough that the roaches moved to Oakland. It had underground parking and no cameras and people did not ask a lot of questions. Bubba handed him a bag containing his holster and two 40 caliber Glocks. His service sidearm and his backup.
There was diet coke in the fridge and a television.
Bubba said, “Someone will check on you later. They will have a key, don’t shoot them.”

“There is a greasy spoon around the corner if you get hungry,” Bubba said. Bubba then dropped a handful of 20’s in Alexander’s lap.
“Don’t worry, we got you,” Bubba said as he headed out.

With no phone, no wallet, T.V. pundits fighting over if he was doing the right thing. Commentators saying they aimed too low. A few agreed with him as did some Federal Judges. He had enough.

Bubba headed out in his wig, ball cap, and the stolen wheelchair. He made it to the restaurant without much trouble. To the people in the hood, he screamed undercover cop. Alexander was fine with that. He had only seen one patrols go by all evening. There was work that still needed to be done in the city. The city, hell the world need him.

A kid held the door as Chen tried to get through. A second helped him over the threshold. Not everyone was bad. Chen was counting on that.
The restaurant was the kind of place you would see prostitutes, drug dealers, and the poor working-class come to get a bite. The food was a heart attack on a plate. The fries were to die for.

He sat there watching the world. Contemplating how David was going to survive let alone slay Goliath.

[Chulance]

David Forrester

Time: Afternoon
Location: Oval Office - White House, Washington D.C
Interaction:

---

Dad going crazy at the nursing home

David Forrester was furious, things were spiraling out of control & fast. The Blood Tests & Emergency Altered Act had been crucial first steps to his plans that would lead to the eventual control of all altered humans in the country. Then of course the grand finale and then the introduction of the United Empire.

His term in office had been moving along swell until the Energy Storm & energy plague hit three months ago. From that moment on he was faced with unprecedented problems that none of his predecessors had ever encountered, and briefly wished that Obama was still in office to deal with this rather than him. Still him, his brother & the rest of the family had come up with a way to take advantage of this situation, while his wife had suggested that perhaps this was karma. Karma for their life long actions & abuse of altered humans to further the goals of himself & the rest of the family.

For slaughtering those people, and brainwashing the remains whose powers were both manageable to control & easy to eliminate at a whim if needed. This sudden surge of so many different altered with varying levels of power all across the world to the point that were public knowledge was astounding. Never had their existence been revealed during the reign of anyone in the Forrester family, nor had their numbers ever spread this much. His chief of staff Morgan Howards came stumbling & bumbling into the Oval Office with files galore & an iPad she nearly dropped. “Mr President, Mr. President I have more urgent news about the situation developing in San Francisco, please we need to talk now.”

David let out an exasperated sigh and banged his fist against his presidential desk. His obvious display of anger made Morgan flinch, however the various secret service agents around him including Micah hardly reacted. They were use to David’s angry outbursts, behind closed doors cussing up a storm. This was a side of him he did’t dare leak to the public, his potty. Mouth was so proficient that his handlers did everything within their power to always make sure the president’s mic was rendered silent after any public speech’s where he was still in the area. As often the nice polite man of the people facade he put on was merely a mask over his true venomous toxic behavior & personality. “What is it now, more about that damn chink Chen” David retorted angrily, briefly looking around and feeling relief that there were no asian people present in the room. While he wasn’t one to bite his tongue often, he wanted to avoid directly offending anyone especially those who were sworn to protect him.

Still he wasn’t masking his true nature that well, his most important secret service agent Micah who was actually working for Liberty knew of his views on minorities very well. Now that he’d had the audacity to ever wag his finger on his face or call him the n word or any other slurs for that matter. He made sure to address Micah in a professional manner, knowing the value he added to his protection especially with the likes of Lori Martinez or now Amara as she called herself roaming about. Not just her but Reaper, Silver Flame, & other superhuman radicals who were irate with him & his administration’s discriminatory measures directed towards their people. “Yes sir unfortunately, I’ve taken the liberty to organize all the files & paperworks that include all current updated white house intelligence about the situation & all factors that are effecting it.” Haley continued somewhat nervously as she made sure to flatten out the crinkled edges of the stack of papers before setting them on the center of David’s desk.

He took his glasses out the case, and adjusted them before he began reading & flipping through the pages. His face began & continued to redden more and more as he middlingly flipped through the pages of intel gathered by White House intelligence. “Your fucking kidding me, you mean to tell me the mayors of Atlanta, Chicago & Detroit have all come out in support of Mayor Chen with similar announcements?!” David’s voice raised to the point that others in the White House working nearby the Oval Office could hear both his voice & the rage in his tone.

“Yes sir it seems that similar to how miss Adora Zayas movement to ban & remove altered humans from all properties owned by her had a trickle down effect to other major property owners as well as electing posts & comments of praise from those who supported her actions, Mayor Chen’s announcement has done the same. A common denominator between Mayor Chen & the other mayors who have made a stand is that they are all minorities, Chen of course is asian, well the other three mayors are black. While of course I’m in support of your actions as is the rest o the White House, as well as the majority of the Republican Party, and as well as a good bit of the Democratic Party, there are some democratic factions who see your or rather our actions as reminiscent of powerful political racists & tyrants in the past…and”

“Powerful political racist & Tyrants?!” David’s hollered at Haley’s choice of wording once again causing the chief of staff to flick. She sometimes feared presenting information to the president even things as cut in stone as concrete facts & quotes. His temper was legendary, and many working at the white house under his administration felt they were working on egg shells.In this current troubling economy with the Energy plague running rampant & millions of hospitals across the country being full of infected nobody wanted to loose their job. Especially with talks of increased quarantine measures being implemented & even potential lockdowns. Another blow he’d suffered today was China had officially suspended trade with the United States, fearing a possibility of infection from the plague possibly being transmitted through products developed & manufactured in the plague ridden America.

Both the CDC & other scientists across the country had declared that such a thing was highly unlikely, but alas they couldn’t with 100%certainty guarantee the virus wouldn’t be transmissible through goods exported. He’d tried to put pressure on some leading scientists & medical professionals to issue statements that such a thing was impossible, but none wanted to risk their scientific & medical license’s even under pressure from his administration. Of course he could drop the hammer, and pull some strings to get the best & brightest minds working day & night tirelessly to get ahead of the plague & develop a vaccine but that would be fool hard.y He was already doing worst then expected in the polls & even though he had two years to worry about re-election, he knew that his actions during this time as well as how he handled this matter would play a major role in whether or not that would even be a possibility. His wife Kelly was like a walking talking Manx bar for him, constantly whispering logical & non emotional driven advice into his ears to ensure his continued success as the 45th president.

God damn it Kelly I’m really loosing my patience, I wish you here with me right now and not with the kids. I swear it was bad enough with San Francisco, but now Atlanta, Chicago & Detroit too. The only saving grace with this situation is Chicago had an entire school wiped out by an angsty altered teen as well as the fact that altered gangs & cartels have all but taken over the city. Any thing uttered by the mayor of chicago I can trump up to declarations of fear from a political hostage. In that same breath Oakland is going through essentially the same treatment but I’ve yet to order a full force military response to take Oakland back from those super thugs because the military, Hanes & Bates assured me that would all but guarantee that the people behind that Boost drug would escape further spreading that problematic drug to other cities & states, while making it even harder for them to get their hands on the original unadulterated version of that drug for our own use

David’s head was swimming, he knew being the president would be a hard job. But never in a million years had he imagined it would be this difficult. Two hours earlier he’d been in a meeting with the heads of the FBI, CIA, DIA, Department of Homeland Security, Secretary of Defense & the Secretary General among others, followed by a quick hushed meeting with the heads of liberty Jonah Hanes & Chloe Bates. He’d ordered a joint response from the National Guard & U.S Customs & Border Patrol to deploy en masse to all entrance’s & exits of San Francisco in order to handle any altered trying to migrate to San Francisco after being declared a sanctuary for the altered. The last thing he needed was a gathering of militant altered in a city where the rules & regulations being passed against the altered were being effectively suspended & ignored.

“Okay damn it, Haley I need you to communicate these orders to all appropriate parties. Continue to have the joint military-customs task force be deployed to all entrance’s & exits to Atlanta, Chicago & Detroit as well, implement the same initial response I ordered to get a handle on the San Francisco situation before it explodes. I want any and all dirt on Mayor Chen & the others, we need to run a gruesome smear campaign against ALL of them, any & every sin they’ve ever committed I want it to be FRONT page news everywhere for all the American people to see. I mean everything from trying cocaine or mushrooms in college to if they cheated on their high school girlfriend or frequently cut the lunch line in kindergarten. We need both our offices & the media to paint them as DEMONS!!! Also give Nathan the go ahead to co-operate with the military in developing more Tartarus Compounds across the country, we’re not going to be able to fit everyone that’s getting taken in to Nevada, not to mention the safety concerns with housing too many altered inmates in one location, especially with the intelligence we received that Martinez has multiple powers because she can somewhat siphon the powers of other altered. Also get someone in contact with that pastor Tristan whose stirring up that civilian militia the Cleansers to take matters into their own hands.”

“Um forgive me sir, but what channels & what department would you like to get in contact with Pastor Tristan? As stated before I’m in full support of your actions, as is the White House & congress, and while politics can make rather strange bedfellows, I do believe officially supporting or partnering with the Cleansers is a bad move, it would be ill advised to extend a hand out to a religious leader trying to use faith to stir up civilians to “do what the suits can’t or won’t” to remind you of a direct quote from the pastor. Not to mention while there’s many churches who have pledged their support to Pastor Tristan, there are opposing parties within several denominations against Tristan, whilst the Pope has stated the Catholic Church needs further “Spiritual guidance” before making any sort of authoritative announcement on how followers should respond. Then of course the elephant in the room is there’s more religions then christianity, many Islamic groups are divided between recognizing the emergency of altered powers in minorities only as a blessing & others as demonic omens. There’s been no response from any major factions within Judaism & other religions, while many others have either remained quiet or said they were on stand by simlar to wat the pope said, that being said all in all I believe allying ourself with a fringe baptist group regardless of the amount of churches in support of him now is a very risky path.”

“Listen I’m the president, YOUr the chief of staff, do you want to stay the chief of staff? The economy is in turmoil right now with the plague, China suspending international trade with us, and I’ve got a scheduled UN zoom call later where other there’s talk of other countries also thinking of suspendin imports from us until further analysis on the plague can be done. This is both a national & international crisis for us economically & otherwise.” David retorted with a bitter tonality in his voice towards the chief of staff.

“Forgive me sir, Mr. President. I’m only voicing my opinion on what I think is not only the safest Cours of action, but the most neutral. With just Chen it was a singular incident, but now with four mayors and counting this could get worst. Commentary from your administration that’s been interpreted as speculation of the US potentially casting blame of the storm itself on Russia, China, Iran & North Korea hasn’t helped either, although you have said that intelligence of the highest clearance gathered has indicated that such speculation might be more then speculation, but in the same vein you’ve clearly indicated that at this time we’ve yet to obtain any conclusive evidence nor are we at liberty to discuss our findings yet to many high clearance members of the government itself not to mention the public. I just think we need to play this as safely & neutral as possible, while not yielding or faltering In taking back control from those unruly mayors who are in effect going against the federal government in times of wide spread disease, & unprecedented terroristic actions among our communities across the country.”

David’s face was entirely red, as he looked up at Haley. If looks were able to transmit harm or fullfatalities, she shared that his gaze alone would render her a body-less spirit well on her way to meet her maker in the next life. However instead of slamming his sweat drenched fists on the desk, letting out a torrent of extremities or even threatening her position he just sighed. Taking a few breaths in and out advice from his White House therapist he allowed himself to calm down. Haley was almost shaking in fear until the president spoke again. “Please sir forgive me for speaking out of line, again I just thought I was suggesting what’s best, but like…like….like you said you are the man in charge, please I need this position ..”

“Calm down Haley, I know that’s the epitome of irony coming from me. It’s just this whole mess has my head swelling, everyday it’s a new debacle. The unity in this country is at an all time low, there’s some who’ve even discussed & feared that the issue of the plague & altered could be the catalyst for a second civil war in modern times. Which is something our country absolutes doesn’t need, because right now the whole world is watching us, the entire international community has their eyes on us and they haven’t taken a glance in another direction since the tragic day this storm hit. Pay my anger no mind, I’m just a man trying to keep my castle from crumbling but it’s like all the support beams are breaking at once. Honestly many of the words you spoke are what the people need to hear, you should get with the speaker of the house & put a speech together to deliver to the public, get the military custom joint forces in position at the borders of those cities, and get me a private line to my brother, I need to have a word with him immediately. We need to combat this situation using the same strategy he and Governor Stark proposed for enacting the separation bill. Lastly disregard what I said earlier about using the army to make a show of force against Chen & the other mayors, securing the entrances & exits on conjunction with the smear campaign & the other directives is the move we’ll make for now, the worst possible outcome right now is giving any orders that potentially result in civilian casualties otherwise we’ll be playing right into that bastard’s hands.”

Mayor Chen your well aware of the Air Force base stationed only a short distance away from you, as well as the fact the abundance of civilians around means I can do less with them then I can with the fucking army unless I want to risk a political shit storm the likes of which could make the actions communist China took against their own protestors look tame In comparison. If I had the powers of a Superman I’d fly down to your office and burn your brains out with heat vision myself. The only reason the people aren’t marching through the streets with flaming pitchforks is because your in the liberal stronghold of the country, I wish Martinez had stepped on more of you stupid fucking liberals. Even without a major altered attack, there’s no way that nonsense would fly anywhere in somewhere like Alabama or Missouri. Just cause you have the edge in this battle, doesn’t mean your walking away the victor of this warDavid thoughts stewed in a silent rage as he analyzed all aspects of the major situation he was facing in multiple cities initiated by Mayor Chen.

Dad’s evening at the nursing home

A couple hours later David had gotten on a ultra secure line with his older brother Nathan who no doubt was following the news of everything going on from Mayor Chen to the other three mayors who were trying to enact similar rules. “We need to deal with this right away, this is an urgent situation, and we cannot allow it to intervene with our plans that we’ve so carefully conceited to lead to our ultimate unlimited victory.” David spoke cautiously he’d moved into another more secure room then then the Oval Office & had Micah alone standing outside the double rein-forced steel door that was the only entrance into the security bunker the president was in. Then there were several other secret service agents strewn about in-front of Micah and in the connecting hallway.

“Understood brother you already know I’m on it, I won’t allow this to catapult into something worst then what it is. With everything going on you probably didn’t have time to view the latest episode of the Benny Stein program, but my conversation with California’s Governor Stark proved very fruitful. He introduced the Separation Act on air, as well as the proposition to allow this bill to be passed or veto’d by the citizens directly rather than the law-makers.”

David wiped some sweat from his brow ecstatic that Nathan had managed to accomplish their agenda with Governor Stark & even more so relieved that they had the Governor of the state of California on their side right now with all the trouble the San Francisco mayor was causing. “Excellent, you have no idea how relieved I am to hear that. I need you & others within our circle to get in touch with the rest of the Governors & make similar offers to the one you gave Stark. We’ll emulate the same strategy marijuana enthusiasts have relied on for years to acquire legal pot in some states, citizen votes, and as this matter is immensely related to the ongoing pandemic we can rush along the process.”

“Hmph never thought we’d be using any type of strategy from those kinds of people, but the situation calls for it, arguments a plenty can be made about us implementing additional executive orders to further restrict altered, but there’s almost no defense if it comes about as the will of the people. I presume you don’t mind if I allocate some of our budget & resources to have my contacts acquire non political influencers to both strengthen & hasten this process.” Nathan asked wanting his presidential brother’s seal of approval before he made any move to involve more third party powerhouse’s including popular civilian social commentators, business moguls & celebrities.

“Absolutely not, I trust your judgement, it hasn’t let me down this far, not to mention Ruby hasn’t made a peep about any pending divorce throughout your entire marriage thus far & she’s more difficult then Kelly, as dad use to say your a man whose words have powers. Although I should probably be careful with everything going on, those words could be taken painfully out of context even though people of our complexion haven’t been endowed with these ridiculous abilities.” David’s tone had started off soaked in humor, but just as quickly flipped to one that was filled with bitter jealousy & venom upset at the reality of these super powers manifesting in minorities only.

Nathan couldn’t help but chuckle at his little brother’s ending comments both because of the words & the sudden harshness in his voice. “Relax David, have some funny news to raise your spirits. Kinglsey pulled down her skirt for Clancy’s watch & blew that bartender Tom for free shots.”

David laughed a bit more than usual before catching himself. “Really that whore’s still the same, anyway I’m glad to hear from you. We’ve come this far we can’t loose now with the end in sight, I’ll see you soon.” David hung up o his brother, knocked on the door alerting Micah to check the perimeter before opening it up and taking him to rendezvous with more agents before heading back to the Oval Office.

[Damo021]

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Location: San Francisco, Afternoon.
Interactions: None.

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Sarina had just left a café with coffee in hand, heading back to her Durango when a call was coming in and answered on her earpiece. “Agent De Santa, I think you’re going to like this one.” A female voice she recognized spoke to her. It of course is the voice of Agent Samantha Chambers, who was assigned to be her handler/partner when Sarina originally joined Liberty. Despite it be a rocky working relationship, they have learned to get on with each other well, developing to trust one another and even some may dare to say have grown a friendship over the last few months.

“Ah and if it isnt’ my favourite partner in crime about to send me to another fun adventure, and who do the higher ups like me to tackle this time.” Sarina answered as she got into her vehicle and securing herself in it. “De Santa, please this one is really serious, more likely the most dangerous assignment for you yet, I am forwarding some files for you to look over. Your next target goes by the name of Floyd Banker, A criminal individual who we believe has connections to the Salzaras Cartel. He also recently bought TAP, a place suspected for dealing drugs even before he bought it” Sarina accessed the in car computer to look over the documentation while she listened. “I can see why we have reason to believe his connections, it say’s here that his girl is none other than Rita Salzaras, she is Altered too, Sam why haven’t we took this guy down already?” there was a slight pause from the other end.

“Well technically we have yet to catch him doing a crime and Liberty would prefer catching him doing something in connection to Salzaras. After all those bastards are finding a way to get product over the boarders and we believe they are using altered to do it.” Sarina continued to look through the documents. “I can see why, Sam it says here that Rita is a pyrokinetic, hell even Floyd is suspected of having powers and there is this Lionel guy, Sam; you guys are sending me after three altered with connections to the most dangerous cartel going. Has liberty lost its mind sending in only one agent?”

“Look we know from recent intel that Lionel can form metal skin, Rita’s antics at a gas station confirmed what she can do, we think Floyd has earth or metal based powers, we need more information on this. I know this will most likely put you in the crosshairs of some very dangerous people but your best suited for this agent, you have your suit, your resistance to fire and should be more than capable in beating them in hand to hand combat should the need arise. Also you shouldn’t have to worry about Lionel right now, he is waging a war over in Oakland, but do not concern yourself with Oakland for the moment.”

“Thank you for the vote of confidence” Sarina fake smiled, not that her partner could not see that, right now her mind was playing scenarios in her head, this was by no means going to be easy and the Latina knew it and she let out a frustrated sigh. “I will on my way shortly to meet up with you, you’re not alone in this, I am your partner after all and should we need numbers I can call in backup, plus we can do whatever the hell we want right? We got this" Sarina’s smile was no longer fake. “I am glad they put us together, I value our partnership Sam.” Hearing a smile low chuckle from the other end. “I wouldn’t have it any other way, besides some one has to keep an eye on you right? I will meet you soon and Sarina, please be bloody careful out there.” Sarina had taken a sip from her coffee while she sat back and looked out her window, taking a moment to enjoy what peace she had right now. “Well I be damned, I think that is the first time you called me by my first name, see you soon.” Sarina ended the call and went back to looking over the information.

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Location: Astraea Refugee Camp, San Francisco
Interactions: @funnyguy Michael.

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It had been another long and stressful day so far, Nyssa had been catching up on messages and email, even spoke to her father earlier in the day. He had sent them some news toys days ago that finally arrived this morning, for herself and her personal guard detachment headed by her head bodyguard Vincent Hobbs. Over the course of several days Nyssa had hardly left the compound, she was making sure to keep going outside to the prefab homes and checking in on those that needing shelter, she was thankful still that several medical personal and police officers choose to stay and help the camp, another reason she had not really gone out was to avoid the testing centres, like hell was she going to be tested when it broke the basics of the Constitution.

When Nyssa did have time to herself and stop for a break and a bite to eat, she managed to catch up on what was going on with her cell, she had not much chance to really catch what was going happening on T.V like others around could, mainly because she didn’t want to get distracted. She did smile though when she saw a message from Michael and that he accepted the better contract to continue on as her driver, there was no harm in having another altered around if shit hit the fan, but frankly it was the right thing to do and hoped it would help him keep out of any trouble by having a decent job. She shot a text back. ‘I am glad to hear it Mr. Hayes, when you get the time bring the signed paperwork back and consider yourself promoted, again stay safe.’

Since then a couple of her security detail were in the office with her, Vincent and Thea while two others, James and Graham stood outside her office door. Catching up on the multiple breaking news situations that had been occurring and no doubt made many within the aid camp worry greatly about what was going to happen next. Fortunately for Nyssa and her aid operation, with Astraea being neutral so far, it meant the no government forces or altered have caused any trouble or harm, allowing the camp be the sanctuary that Nyssa hoped it be, it probably helped they never enforced any testing to. Nyssa looked over to one of her bodyguards. “Thea, you look agitated, what’s on your mind?”

Thea was the type to speak her mind the most, of course she kept it professional in front of the public, but in private when Nyssa is happier for things to be more formal, the blonde guard often spoke her mind, even if it got her in a spot of trouble. “It’s all bullshit, I mean look at it.” She said pointing to the television screen. “Oakland has literally turned into a fucking warzone, then there are several attacks across Vegas and there are apparently reports that Miami has suffered an attack to, I mean what is this country coming to.” Vincent could only stand there with his arms crossed listening in, he too was pleased when Nyssa told him Michael was on-board, not that he would openly admit it. “I suppose one good thing out of today was Mayor Chen growing some big balls and making San Francisco a sanctuary. Although it just made this city a major target to Forrester”

Nyssa to was in deep thought but agreed with both her guard’s sentiments but really what mayor Chen did was get the ball rolling. But it has opened up the possibilities also. “Although this maybe true, yes the country is in turmoil right now, I don’t know what Mayor Chen was thinking, however other mayors has been making announcements since and now from what I understand Atlanta, Chicago & Detroit have also joined San Francisco, so that is something.” Nyssa took a moment to pour a small drink. “But it is smart, the testing centres and military will have to move out, but I suspect when they do they will probably block exits to the city, but Forrester won’t attack, it be political suicide to order military strikes on American soil that will harm innocent civilians. If anything Chen just put himself priority target number one, I would suspect he is thoroughly on Forresters shit list.”

Moments later Nyssa went around her desk and pressed a button on her phone to where a male voice answered. “Yes, Miss Devout?”

“I need you to get in contact with the Mayor’s office for me, let them know that I would like to arrange a meeting with Mayor Chen when he is able.” This could be a dangerous move on her part, but if she wants to continue offering support to those in need, she will have to speak with him at some point.

“Yes Ma’am”

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Location: US Naval base, San Diego.
Interactions: None.

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Morning.

“God dam it Winters, this isn’t a request, it’s an order and I expect you to follow them you hear me!” Sofija was getting an earful from her superior officer after her most recent incident at the naval base, what didn’t help her cause was her miss understanding being told her shore leave was being reinstated, but she took it as a choice and tried to argue her case, believing that she was okay to continue her service. “Yes Sir, Permission to speak freely.” She remained at attention.

“Denied! you should be lucky you’re not getting a dishonourable discharge right now, you will go back on shore leave pending an investigation, and that is an order I expect you to follow, you need to get control of yourself.” But Sofija had to continue pushing her luck and decided to speak out anyway. “With all due respect sir, it was an accident, one I didn’t mean to cause.”

“An accident! You disabled the Nathan James, And I said permission to speak freely was denied, do that again and you’re out. Now effective immediately you are on shore leave, so go home, take a walk along the beach or something, clear your mind and get control of yourself, Dismissed.” Sofija snapped a salute before she turned on her heel and left the man’s office, if only she didn’t have these abilities, she would be back on a ship by now, well once she was over her survivor’s guilt over those less fortunate from the Sampson.

Gathering up her things from her locker that she was going to take with her and put into a bag, Sofija left out towards her car, taking a moment to stop, face the American flag and saluting it for a moment while she was thinking about what she could do next. Soon she got to her Pontiac GTO, throwing her bag into the front passenger seat and sat in her car for a moment, sure she was still angry and decided to do a virtual middle finger in her mind to her superior officer, she blocked the local cell and radio frequencies locally around her until she left the base, starting up her car. She drove to the exit, once she was cleared to go she stopped her Frequency Distortions, no doubt pissing everyone of, but she was careful not to effect ships. With the window down and resting her arm on the door she enjoyed the breeze, she planned to call a friend, grab some belongings from her place and leave quick.

Late Afternoon.

Sofija had changed her plans without telling anyone, this more would probably be career suicide for her, but she heard the live broadcast of the mayor of San Francisco, issuing an executive order to make the city a safe haven for altered, and impulsively she made a snap decision there and then to head to the city instead, she also took out quite a bit of her money just in case it was to get frozen, however technically was not breaking any orders, she was taking some time off after all. But if there was really a chance of a safe haven then Sofija felt like she had to take the chance, also last time anyone heard she was visiting a friend elsewhere back in San Diego, so she brought herself some time before they realized what she has done.

There seemed to be a lot of activity on the roads on the way into the city, what was fully going on Sofija wouldn’t dare want to assume but it didn’t look good, were they getting sorted to locking down the city? Blocking that out of her mind, the enlisted lady continued to drive in, she was still in uniform, not hanging around to get changed at home she pulled over at a café, taking her cap and locking up her car, she entered the premises and looked for a vacant table ignoring some of the people that bothered to take notice of her coming, despite what the city has gone through this café was still in pretty good condition and nice. For now, she would have a hot drink and quickly look through an abandoned local newspaper, she would need to find a place to lay low, it probably wouldn’t look good turning up to a FEMA camp in a car and in uniform after all.

[Chulance]

CyberCorp's Debut Chicago, Illinois

Gavin Reynolds was ready for whatever, and today was one of those days with lots of what-ever. He was a liberty agent who use to work for the CIA & as a technician as CyberCorp. Working with Liberty had swept up his entire time & the nature of the agency made it smarter to cut ties with his other positions for now. He always wanted to be a big man, strive to do important things in life, really make history. Working in this organization being a high ranking officer he was doing just that. His wife & daughter had both been seriously injured in the energy storm, but only he had contracted the plague.

He immediately quarantined himself not wanting to expose his family, but lucky he recovered from his illness. Just as medical professionals helped them nurse the wounds they sustained during the energy storm itself. Already he was a man who was a stickler for justice & enforcing it on those who disregarded the laws with impunity. It was a righteous feeling to him to be able to shut down criminal organizations & detain perpetrators taking them off the streets away from their illicit activities that only served to endanger the people & communities around them.

Suffice to say he had built up a tendency to see the worst in most people, and had a very strong us vs them mentality with his fellow agents & regular civilians. He’d worked primarily in the northern United States during his eight year tenure with the CIA most of which was in Chicago, Illinois a hub of all sorts of crime both from the multitude of violent street gangs to organized cartels, mafia’s & even corruption within the chicago police department. Drugs especially ravaged the inner cities & seemed to be a second economy relying soley on narcotics alone which often was ten-fold and above what average regular hard working citizens were making.

The whole thing, the cultures behind them disgusted him. But he didn’t swell all his hatred into one particular group or race. He had a disdain for the most criminal members of society equally, but that did tend to make him a somewhat biased man unintentionally. However to those on the outside looking in all they saw was another judgmental man with an assumed superiority complex because of the color of his skin. He had his share of bullet riddled encounters with mainly white mafia’s & groups but they had standards which they uphold such as never involving innocent women & children. The killings they did were towards other enemy mafia’s and even when it wasn’t they moved in silence, very clean, swift & most importantly relatively unseen.

But he had much more harrowing experience during encounters with black street gangs & hispanic cartels. A whole different range of evil & violence including innocents being shot in broad day shootings, sometime on accident, sometimes on purpose, homes being sprayed with bullets with the intention of harming family members only because of relation with no ties to the criminal lifestyle, more instances of spiked drugs, demolishing properties they used to manufacture product, many times in residential neighborhoods, a well as far more instances of beating, robbing & killing random people for mere reasons such as initiation into said groups or just for the mere fun of it. Deep down maybe he did resent people of color more due to his line of work and the place he did most of it in. Well that was a consequence of the job, he didn’t consider himself a hateful man, but simply one who dealt in facts and didn’t care who his facts offended.

In short he deemed Altered a major threat, especially in Chicago. Gang leaders with powers quickly recruited other altered & were even more brazen with their crimes, similarly with the cartels. Somewhat new was the Salzaras Cartel was in charge now, they’d spread across the entire country in a matter of 2 and a half months. They were working with altered humans to get drugs into the country despite the border being closed, and as a result had become the middle man for bulk drugs for almost every group that needed them, not to mention charging other cartels a middle fee to bring there drugs in forcing them to either raise the price or rely more on cheaper synthetic versions of popular drugs that were far more potent but far harder to dose at even more alarming rate then I the past two years prior.

Worst then that the altered gangs, the strongest ones had quickly eliminated the weak & managed to attain a level of power they never had prior to abilities. There were now 4 men known as the Chiraq Kings or sometimes more formally “The Four Kings of Chiraq”. Dawson had control over gravity, Harper had telekinesis, Quinn had the power of pryokinesis & Krael had the power of earth manipulation.

Gavin had been given an advanced ear piece & remote, which he would use to commandeer the robotic army he’d been supplied with by CyberCorp. President Forrester was adamantly against CyberCorp obtaining any sort of military defense contract due to the intense family rivarly, but the Lorizilla incident led to his personal opinion being over-risen by those in congress who saw the need for Norman Chaplin’s machines on the battlefield against the threat of the altered. Gavin was use to working with these machines, and such Liberty had selected him to head one of the first missions where they’d be working in tandem with the technology against superhuman opponents.

This was an ambush on Quinn’s base of operation. Gavin was accompanied by a handful of other armed liberty agents & regular military soldiers. They were all briefed on the mission together as well as how Chaplin’s technology worked. They’d worked together doing a few training drills with & without the technology over the past three days. The soldiers working with them had been told that Gavin & the other liberty agents were with department of homeland security. A squadron of armored vehicles rode down towards Quinn’s base of opration.

The four kings had grown brazen thanks to their powers & the powers of their pawns. Admitteddly there was little traditional chicago police could do to quell the expansion of their criminal empires. The inner cities of the Windy City had already been riddled with rampant crime, gun violence & illegal drug activity, but now it was even worst. Ten minutes passed and Gavin’s team was in position to take offensive maneuvers against Quinn’s base of operation.

“Aye who the hell iz dat, it look like da boys” A gangster standing on the corner with a pocket full of dope and gun in hand noticed one of the liberty agents. As he raised his weapon he was shot multiple times by a soldier ducked behind a nearby dumpster.

Shots fired, everything started. Swarms of armed thugs began coming out armed to the the teeth with weapons, while VT-Droids armed Began marching down the street. The sound of whirring helicopter blades filled the atmosphere as large air-crafts were seen coming from all directions. Opening up XP9’s emerged from the carriers flying down to the ground level thanks to there jets. One altered woman with a Glock on her hip was firing lasers at the legions of robots, hitting a few but not putting them down.

“Ayo the fuck, get Quinn! The Feds dun brought robots out to fuck wit us!” The girl yelled out, while another man came running out. His howled and his body began talking on wolf like features, the humanoid wolf man lunged forward tackling one of the robots ripping parts of it’s chest. As he did two more androids tackled him.

“WOLF!” The woman yelled out only for a torrent of bullets from an XP9 to pepper her killing her instantly, Gavin & the actual humans had stayed back. THey’d taken positions nearby in the shadows weapons in hand but allowed the machines to do the actual combat. They were on stand by to pick off any stragglers, while missiles were launched at the safe house by the XP9’s blowing the door off it’s hinges as wells demolishing walls.

“ENOUGH” One voice boomed above all others, and a man engulfed in flames came flying out the house, this was Quinn who similarly to the Human Torch had mastered the art of “Flaming on”. Quinn flew forward releasing a volley of fire balls as well as large waves of scorching regular & blue fire at the androids, the XP9’s began focusing there firepower o him. The Chiraq king formed a massive wall of flame to protect himself, making the wall of flame white. Doing this caused the projectiles aimed at him to melt as they went towards the wall.

Quinn was truly a powerful altered human, his emergence from the house had inspired others in his gang to keep fighting. Those within the safe-house had emerged with heavier artillery, RPG’s, machine guns, and more to try to match the destructive power of their robotic oppressors. “Y’all ain’t going stop shit, I don’t give a fuck if y’all got terminators! Swarzzanazer’s kinfolk ain’t got sht on a real one!!”

Quinn yelled from the skies above eliciting victory cries from others working with him. Another altered man used his powers and began spinning around becoming a rapidly spinning human twister. The human twister lunged forward successfully tearing through two androids, however a RPG launched by one of the VT Droids was able to finish him off. Launched at the ground beneath him causing it to explode disrupted his spinning motion.

With the spinning ending he hurtled through the air unable to activate his power mid-flight. He was hit with multiple shots killing him instantly, while wolf lunged forward towards an XP9 plunging his claws into the machine. “You’ll die!” Wolf yelled out ripping parts out the machine only for Gavin to perform some action, and the robot self destructed taking out Wolf, some thugs near him and even two androids.

The laser girl crawled towards the house her body riddled with bullets, a trail of blood behind her. A stray missile made short work of her, while Quinn flew down towards the Vt Droids sending out more waves of fire. An XP9 proved to be his undoing producing a powerful flame extinguisher and blasting him. The foam assault was joined by two other XP9’s also equipped with extuinsihers, modifications made to deal with him in particular

The Chiraq king yelled out as the trio of enhanced flame retardants pushed him out of his flaming form and sent him crashing into the concrete below. Yelling Quinn gathered fire in his hands to fire two bursts of flame, while trying to “Flame on” again but was doused in anti inflammatory chemicals thus preventing him from accessing the pinnacle of his powers. For the first time in hs reign as a superhuman drug lord fear coursed through his body.

All around him he could see the streets were littered with the deceased bodies of his compassions. Those who tried to flee in vehicles had failed, indicated by cars & SUV’s filled with bullets or blown apart by missiles. Now only being able to channel his destructive torrent of fire through his hands he used all the power he had to unleash the fire, only to yell out as a bullet his his shoulder fired by a Vt droid. Quinn screamed as another bullet hit his other shoulder blade, the combined pain of getting ht twice causing him to cease firing the massive column of flames from his hands.

“Fuck Fuck” That brief interlude of ending his attacks proved to be his fatal undoing. He was gunned down, meeting his end in the same manner of death he had delivered personally as well as ordered others in his gang to do to others. In the end he made a desperate attempt to turn and run another fatal error. Bullets from armed VT Droids & XP9’s riddled the drug lord’s body, before a XP9 charged up it’s plasma cannon and fired a blast right through his neck. His body hit the ground in a pool of blood whilst bullets continued to hit him.

Within twenty minutes Quinn’s entire group had been wiped out by VT Droids & XP9’s. Thanks to the assistance of Norman Chaplin’s machines, Quinn & his forces were overwhelmed. After confirming through the machines that the streets were clean, Gavin & his team began moving out. On top of that SWAT teams in conjunction with military/national guard came to survey the scene & put up yellow tape to prevent others from coming out. Those unfortunate enough to live nearby on the block were screened by VT droids and identified. Those with warrants were easily taken into custody, all who’d seen the quick decimation of the chiraq king’s forces put up no fight against the heavily armed robots not wanting to meet the same fate as the drug dealing human torch.

Footage of the gruesome but effective & quick slaughter of the superhuman criminal & his underlings had been transmitted to Gavin, Liberty, Department of Homeland Security, the military & lastly the news. The news however had received a somewhat edited version of the conflict, the intelligence agencies who’d obtained the full complete video audio included had made some edits to the version the news obtained. Within the hour footage of the confrontation was being aired on live news mediums, with warnings to viewers to have young children stay away as the footage was shown to the public.

Since Chaplin’s succesful obtainment of a contract with the United States to utilize his machines following the Lorizilla incident, this slaughter of Quinn & co was the first time they’d been deployed to aid military & Law Enforcement in their ongoing battle against criminal altered. The results were as expected by Chaplin & resulted in rapidly increasing almost staggering support for using the XP9’s, and VT Droids in both other parts of the country & overseas. Gavin was off to the side lighting up a marble while shooting the sht with another Liberty agent named Tom nearby. Tom was also a smoker but had forgotten to pick up smokes on the way to carry out this grueling task.

“I can’t lie, I know the Forrester’s don’t fuck with Chaplin, but they need to get over it. This was a landslide victory, I mean I’ve been working here since the start, and today Is the easiest mission I’ve had so far.” Tom said as he lit the cigarette Gavin gave him.

Gavin took his lighter back and pocketed it before taking a few more drags. “You ain’t lying about that, although operating these machines was a bit difficult. It honestly didn’t require as much manual implementation of orders as I thought, Chaplin’s toys have come a long way from the days I worked as a technician. All it took was one crazy bitch going Godzilla mode & trampling people out west for the suits to put these things out on the street.” Gavin replied back satisfied with the results.

Quinn was dangerous, and a brutal man. He’d been a notorious gangster before his powers, but they’d exacerbated his already violent & ambitious behavior. He’d burned many who opposed him indiscriminately rival dealers & law enforcement alike. Chicago was well known for it’s high murder rate, as well as absurb number of robberies, shootings & murders. They’d been aptly nicknamed Chiraq long before the Energy Storm & altered humans entered the equation.

“Shit really, they need to teach me or you do on how to help operate these things. Shit the next thing Chaplin needs to come out with is something we can wear. Ya know like some Tony Stark, Ironman sht, now that would be awesome and really level the playing field.” Tom said with some optimism that didn’t fit the bloody scene littered with soldiers, cops, ambulance’s, fire-trucks, blaring sirens, armed robots & news vans.

“Yeah I think we’re a long ways away from human piloted shit that’s anything like this, besides if you ask me even though that sounds riveting, this is the best thing possible. I mean imagine how many of us might not be able to make it home to our families going up against Quinn and the rest of his pissants had we not had these bad boys on our side.” Gavin stated as he finished his smoke and flicked it on the ground before grinding it out with his shoe.

“Yeah and the nerve of that bastard, calling himself a king, just another crook with an inflated ego, only difference is he had super powers to back up his atrocious actions. Either way your right human piloted or not, this is a game changer for sure.” Tom agreed entirely with Gavin, happy they’d completed their assignment with no loss of life on their side.

Gavin looked around taking in the whole scene around him. Blood had been spilled, quite a bit of t but none from any liberty or military personnel. What truly got to him about this was he no longer felt like he was lying to his wife & daughter. Every day he told them he was okay and that he’d make it home. The truth was working as a liberty agent going up against the worst of the worst equipped with abilities beyond mortal man, that was little more then hopeless optimism at best, and flat out lies to ease their fears at worst. But for the first time in a long time in the past three months he felt like he’d be able to make it home to the two women he loved the most everyday. “I’m just glad it’s over, those other altered bastards better look out, cause now we’ve got an answer to there madness.” Gavin retorted confidently before taking out his buzzing cell, seeing he had a call from some liberty superior.

[Meleck]

Juan

Location: Chicago (Testing Center – Union Station)

---

Marie had managed to get Juan packed and ready to go. One suit case, a couple charger packs, his laptop, and his iPad, plus clothes for a week. Everything they asked he tended to say something like, “Yeah.” Which mean he was not listening.

They had made it to the train station only to find that because of the law, they needed to be tested to see if they were Enhanced. Marie was fine, she had not developed any powers and she had not even been sick. Juan picked up every cold, flu, and
Their parents had arranged for them to head for LA to stay with some family there. They were being sent to get them out of Chicago, Juan to keep him out of trouble since he had developed powers, and Marie because she had developed a different set of powers over the last six months that had nothing to do with the pandemic. This made for boy problems. The family already had their hands full with Juan and they did not need another child in the family at this crazy time.

Marie leaned over and whispered into Juan’s ear. If they find out you have powers they are going to hurt you. That registered in Juan’s mind. He hated people hurting people and most importantly people hurting him.

They were brought back into a little exam room where a phlebotomist grabbed a vial and drew Marie’s blood. The nurse had left their paperwork on the desk and had to step out.

“Now”, she said. She grabbed the vial and put his label on it as he disappeared. She shoved it into the rack. Standing in the corner, Juan froze.
Marie pulled her sleeve down and pulled her left one up.
The nurse came in she asked, “Where is Mr..” she looked at the paper. “Rosa” she continued.
With hand motions and pointing, “He had to go to the bathroom after they drew his blood.”
“Could you draw mine? We have a train to catch and traveling with Juan is hard enough,”
Marie smiled.
The nurse did the second draw. This one would leave a bruise. She took the cotton ball and Band-Aid.
“I always get a little lightheaded after that, can I have a moment?” she asked.
The nurse gave her a compassionate; grow-up look and nodded taking the vials and heading out the door. “Go that way,” the nurse pointed to a different waiting area.

After a moment and the hall was clear, Juan reappeared. They headed to the waiting area, luggage and all. Juan kept to his iPad, trying to ignore the guards with guns that were around. Marie tried to flirt with the young ones, they were male after all. In about 15 minutes, the results of the test were in and both of them were “Negative” with their government-issued “We are not the bad guy’s” cards.

Marie looked at Juan and said, “These are better than a driver’s license. I bet we can use them to get on the train without all the other papers.” It had her driver’s license number, social security number, and other information like the date they were tested. Juan’s read State ID Number”. They did not have to provide much information other than just showing the train eTickets she had printed offline. She figured that it was because of the heightened security in Chicago. But it bothered Marie a bit.

6:45 pm the train pulled out of Union Station. Because of Juan’s size and needs they were quickly moved to a private room with a bathroom. It might have been Juan politely asking a very nice woman if he could touch her boobs. This quickly got them moved to a private lower room with its own bathroom. They could sleep on the bench seats.

The trip took 58 hours from Chicago to LA. Twice they stopped and got off of the train as it fueled and for some unknown reason for a couple of hours. They got a pizza delivered at a couple of stops and bought junk food from the station vending machines.

Making it to LA they saw the news that Mayor Chen had offered sanctuary. One phone call to family and they had room to stay in San Francisco till she could get a place for them.

Juan tried like hell to ignore all of the people at the train station.

[Chulance]

Dean Rivers

Time: Afternoon
Location: Downtown San Francisco to River Intel PI Office
Interaction:

Dean was at his cousin’s place of residence who was using his powers to investigate Paige’s belongings to get any more information they could. He’d presented to him the whole situation from before & after Paige’s involvement. As they sat together in the office sipping crown, watching the news & going through material they began to fully see & Realize just how interconnected everything truly was.

”Damn I never knew how much this all tied together. I mean when I pulled up here I was just worried about Paige & I knew that would be the only way you’d give a damn much less actually speak to me. But to see that what she got herself into trying to take out this Banker kid might have actually helped with everything else is…damn” Dean didn’t have the luxury of having any powers to help him with his police work like Paige had or like Devin did. So it was a relief to finally have the enemies parlor tricks on his side rather than entirely against him.

Devin wasn’t doing this for Dean, like he said this was for Paige. By using his power he could get see the history of objects he placed his hands on. For Dean he’d uncovered that an altered human named Niko was behind the string of missing women as well as a major key to the Salzaras Cartel gettin drugs in the country with his portal powers. Floyd Banker was getting drugs from the Salzaras Cartel & selling them here as well as transporting them to other states for additional profit. He played a direct hand in other people’s addictions, as well as other situations tied to the drugs including overdoses, addicts committing crimes to support habits, & other criminals fighting for drug territory.

“As usual Paige was right about something and you weren’t, are you really surprised? I’ll admit you played a part to, instinct was refusing to give up on this missing girl case even when your superiors said to, that I’m surprised about to it’s not like you to not just follow orders. Maybe I wouldn’t be so reluctant to help you if you had that same backbone when internal investigations was cracking down on me.” Devin couldn’t help but retort, it stung a bit that Dean had actually started to fight back against his orders but never had so much as an inkling or motivation to do when his family was involved.

”If I could change things I would, but I can’t cuzzo. So what you’re saying is this this guy can make portals, and he’s the one kidnapping girls. You were able to find out all of this just from the discarded belongings of the girls I brought from the evidence locker? Dean was impressed, he knew of Devin’s powers through Paige who’d let it slip thinking that his cousin had shared his altered status with him. She wasn’t oblivious to what went down when he was fired, but figured they’d already kissed & made up which wasn’t the case at all.

“Of course, don’t be shocked you came to get help from the best and that’s exactly what the hell you got. Some things never change, I’ve been a better detective then you even before I got this gift and you know it. Like I said you were the one who refused to give up on this case, refusing to listen to the knuckleheads spouting nonsense like maybe it’s just an overblown case of runaways or that they just up and moved because of all the crazy shit going on out here. The force already let me go, but if they told me some bullshit like that to my face when it’s obvious someone is kidnapping these poor girls I woulda decked em In the face and been on unpaid leave. Ya know I feel like I can do more for people as a private investigator than I ever could as a cop. Sometimes the rules make sense, other times they get in my way more than the damn criminals operations.” Devin replied, thinking back on his days working with the SFPD. In a way he was happy things played out how they did, and that he was a free agent.

He’d had a rough time of it at first, sure running an independent PI firm in California of all places. The staggering high rent for the building, the cost of keeping his few employees well paid & keeping up with the proper licensing for everything required to effectively carry out the operations were all obstacles. But his big heart & desire to do the right thing, actually clean up the state he grew up in outgrew all that other stuff. It was strange to be sitting around drinking liquor & working a case with Dean. Someone he swore to never speak to again after he refused to stick up for him during the final proceedings that led to hm being disqualified as a law enforcement officer. However seeing what happened to Paige, he could slightly sympathize with Dean. His strict abiding of the rules was probably what kept him from loosing it & ending up like Paige. Getting to a point where bombing a gas station to take out a cartel head at the cost of innocent lives. With how driven and obsessive Dean could be, he needed a set of rules to reel him in. He didn’t have the self control it took to work outside the lines without veering off the deep end.

”Here you asked me to pull up the police database for you right, I’m guessing you were able to catch a glimpse of the monster kidnapping these girls, the man summoning the portals right. You know we’ve got some good sketch artists down at the office, but if you recognize the guy maybe you can find him already in the criminal database, besides the foul shit he’s been doing to our women with the power you described him having I’m betting he plays a massive role in transporting the Salzaras drugs into the country without having to worry about the border Dean turned the laptop over to his cousin, and went back to sibling through the paperwork they had strewn across the room.

Paige’s death was hitting him hard, and they hadn’t even confirmed her passing. Even with her powers it was looking like she’d bit the bullet some how. He could imagine a few ways to send her to her maker even with the powers she’d attained from the plague. With her last known location being the Banker residence, it was all but confirmed to him that his former friend was no longer among them in the land of the living. I wish I woulda listened to you Paige, you were right about everything. This Banker kid is a fucking demon, I can’t believe I sat you down & told you that you were in the wrong for trying to plat those drugs in his car. Monsters like him don’t deserve fairness, they need to be taken down by any means necessary. I know you weren’t a evil woman, with what I know now you were just trying to silence a greater evil even at the cost of your morality, your soul Dean was locked in deep thought about Paige, the kidnappings, the Salzaras Cartel, the streets flooded with illegal narcotics, & the role Floyd Banker played in the middle of all this madness.

“Bingo!” Devin yelled out and turned the laptop too Devin. On the screen was a man with a rap sheet longer than Reed Richard’s arms. “Nikolai Rasputin, of Russian & Mexican descent, been arrested 11 times his whole life, he did a two year stint in prison for arms smuggling between 2015 to 2017. He’s supposed to be on parole till 2022, but he cut his monitor & went on the run a month after the energy storm. According to police intelligence he contracted the energy plague two weeks after the storm & was in critical condition. His parole officer contacted the courts to put a warrant out for his arrest, until getting confirmation that he was lying in a hospital bed fighting for his life.. Doctors said he was a goner, but he made a full recovery. After getting released he had to go straight to parole, apparently he was working as a driver for a CEO of some tech company. With a record like his I’m almost positive that’s a front, but the person he’s working for died in a home invasion 11 days after he got out.” Devin replied going through the information on Rasputin’s file.

”Sounds like the boss wasn’t covering his end of the bargain, there’s usually no loyalty among these types is there. Anyway it says he had a home visit during that 11 day period and even submitted to a surprise drug screen which he passed surprise surprise. Then again he had scripts for all types of pain medication cause of the plague, maybe he had enough drugs in his body to satisfy him or maybe drugs aren’t his poison. Either way that don’t matter, we’ve got that son of a bitch. He’s behind everything the missing girls & the drugs, which means he’s in league with or doing business with Banker. Banker’s not some street pusher, he owns two business’s himself, all of his files have been sealed, meaning he’s managed to buy his way into some powerful connections or he’s gotten himself mixed up with people bad enough that the best of the best is handling him themselves. But I’m not about to throw my hands up and say leave it to the professionals, Paige is probably dead cause of this bastard. Fuck a bigger picture, or some hidden plan, innocent girls are getting trafficked right along side these drugs, we need to finish what Paige started & take this bastard down ourselves! Dean replied with vigor and newfound energy as he stood up to stretch a bit.

That wasn’t just the liquid courage talking, that was the deep seated resentment built up over years that he had towards anyone who profited from the drug trade with no regard for the lives of the people they destroyed through addiction. Devin clapped his hands in a celebratory yet mocking fashion. “Congratulations you finally grew a peer, this is the b biggest case of stunted growth I’ve ever seen. I need you to slow your roll, yeah we know he’s trafficking women mainly of color to avoid stirring up a major reaction from the cops. We know he’s playing an integral role in getting the Salzaras product into the country with the border closing. We don’t know where the hell he is, and with his powers he could literally be ANYWHERE on the planet. Not to mention even if we had a for sure precise location we can’t go at him half ass. He wouldn’t think twice about sending us through a portal with a fatal end destination like say above a volcano, shark infested waters in the middle of the ocean or in the middle of some armed militia conflict in a third world country. “ Devin continued pointing out how dangerous someone with portal powers could be, not to mention the difficulty of bringing them in.

”Well I’m not about to sit on my ass and do nothing. Nor do we have any time to waste trying to follow any sort of rules or regulations. Lives are at stake, every minute we sit around twiddling our thumbs this sick fuck could be snatching another girl off the streets to sell to whomever on the other side of the country. Fuck bringing him in, we don’t need to hold him, we need to put a bullet in his head.” Dean was adamant in this instance, he couldn’t stand to let such unbridled evil go about undeterred anymore. Not when he’d confirmed the culprits identity & powers with Devin’s own abilities. The usually strict sticking to the rules officer was more then willing to shatter them to rid the world of this demon for the sake of hopeless addicts & enslaved kidnapped women.

“Holy shit, I didn’t expect to hear that from you. To be honest I had no intention of bringing him in, the only place I’m sending him to be held is Hell. Those girls are long gone, there’s no telling if there even alive. Not to mention like you said the logistics of trying to both capture & hold some who can walk across the street out here in San Francisco and end up in China by the time he reaches the end. I’m going to kill him, I just wasn’t sure you’d be tagging along. Banker’s a different story, I have no sympathy for the devil. But him we need to bring in, he deserves to rot I a cell until his gray hairs get gray hairs, especially If he’s working with motherfuckers like this with no qualms as long as he’s lining his pockets. Really the only question of the matter is how we get him.” Devin replied frustratingly, as taking down Rita’s lover would be the final & most difficult phase of his endeavors to end this madness & bring the people involved to justice.

Dean looked up at his cousin with a smirk on his face that was un befitting of the usually stoic & serious LEO. ”Bringing in Banker, luring him into a vulnerable position? No, that’s not the problem, that’s the easy part. I know someone who can help, who’d be more than glad to help, especially if we present them with the full details of what’s going on. Leave drawing Banker out to me, I gotta make a call.” Dean replied earnestly before taking out his phone to go to his contacts. In a matter of seconds he had Lisa’s info pulled up and quickly made the call. Evil would not be allowed to go unpunished and now it was time to set the stage to bring the elusive multi business owning drug trafficker to rest.

[The Man Emperor]

---

Sanzhar, Jace, and Floyd

---

So much so that today he hardly received any resistance from uniformed law enforcement to his attempts to help combat this new threat. Jace forwarded Sanzhar’s message to Floyd, and sent one of his own to Sanzhar.

What time do you want to go fishing today?

"At the soonest time," came the answer from Sanzhar. "It is imperative that this be made known quickly."

Jace received the message, meaning Floyd did as well. Floyd sent a response. I'm not back in town yet, but soon as I get back I'll come fish with you all The coded message simply meant Floyd was wrapped up in something that was of a level of importance that he couldn't ditch what he was doing. However he would rendezvous with them as soon as he was done, Jace reviewed the information from Sanzhar's response and told him he'd be there shortly. He'd just finished engaging some thugs on boost in oakland, his search for Lionel, Cain, or the source of boost had bore no fruit so far. But the intel from Agent Donnovan had served him well to avoid running into or getting captured by liberty agents who were also in pursuit of boost. With no progress made & an urgent message from Sanzhar he made his way out of oakland. 30 minutes later he was pulling up to the safehouse in his black charger and got out briefly stretching his arms & legs. "Sanzhar you here already?" Jace called out as he walked towards the door.

Splayed across the center table were photocopied replications of the papers that Karma gave to Sanzhar. Sanzhar himself was poring over them, confirming what his friend's sister had told him.

"I'm here." Sanzhar waved over at Jace. "So, to top it all off, it seems that someone found evidence that president Forrester had cheated in the election using Altered abilities; technopathy to screw with the voting machines, to be precise. And he was killed for it."

Adjusting his glasses, Sanzhar bowed towards one of the documents. "Trent Coltrane. Went to the same university as I did, and like me, he was a journalist. And, according to his sister, an Altered that could see the past histories of objects . Bless his soul."

Ace entered the warehouse & saw Sanzhar had already gotten to work spreading paperwork across the main table in the dining room. Right down to business, I’m actually glad we’ve got a journalist on the team

”Wait a minute are you serious this is nuts! You mean there’s evidence that this bastard Forrester cheated in the election and using altered to do it” Jace responded astounded as he rushed over to the table to examine the photocopied information Sanzhar had spread on the table.

”My condolences for your friend Coltrane, this is a stupid question but is Forrester involved with your friend’s untimely demise? But wait the energy storm happened three months ago, the election is almost 2 years old. Are you saying… the Forresters had access to someone with powers TWO years before the storm?!” Jace remarked in shock wondering if Sanzhar had made a mistake or if he truly meant that altered humans were around months no years before the storm that supposedly gave them all powers.

"Surveying this critically, I'd say that the Storm itself is an experiment gone wrong." Sanzhar replied, tapping on the papers with a ballpen. "I mean, that would be the only explanation with the Forresters having access to Altered two years ago. They may have well kept it all secret until it blew off. That is, when the Storm blasted its way through the country and gave us abilities. Think about it. His brother is the CEO of a highly suspect corporation."

Sighing, Sanzhar took off his glasses. "This kind of discovery could effectively topple the Forrester administration if enough proof is gathered. If I somehow gain concrete evidence that the election had been tampered with and that the Forrester Corporation may as well be the culprit of the Storm and the Altered... this may end our suffering."

Jace was astounded by the intel Sanzhar had managed to gather, this was mind shattering. For the first time since getting his powers he was hugely concerned for his safety as well as his other friends and family. “I’m glad you sent a coded message, but we might need to stick to ONLY talking about this matter & anything related in person. We’re talking about undermining the President, not to mention we’re altered humans the very beings who are on the hot-seat across the country.” Jace replied still trying to take all this in.

“As for entering our suffering I hate to say it but that may just be wishful thinking, after all it just might just put a new monster or monsters in charge of dishing out our suffering.” Jace mused cynically not wanting to be too much of an optimist about this newfound discovery Sanzhar stumbled across.

“Floyd’s going to want to hear there this, he better be doing something important. Anyway do you have any evidence the Forresters are behind the actual energy storm is that all speculation? That event didn’t seem like It was a man made occurrence, and they seem adamant about passing laws to restrict & eventually imprison all of us, why the hell would they want to give out powers. Plus the Forresters are racist, so why are only minorities getting powers? Wouldn’t they give powers just to white people or themselves & others they carefully pick” Jace rebutted, questioning Sanzhar’s line of thinking.

"It is... a hypothesis." Sanzhar shrugged. "But it would cover a lot of holes and... As I said, it would have been an accident, something they did not anticipate to occur. Something like how nuclear meltdowns tend to happen."

Jace folded his arms as he listened to Sanzhar's theory. "I see where your going with this and I'm no fan of the President. But 10 million people died just during the storm followed by millions more getting sick from the plague & the plague itself is what's causing people to gain powers not the storm. So your saying they accidentally created a destructive storm that spawned a virus that turned the people in society they least like into superhumans? It's not impossible but it's not very probable either, this evidence suggests they know more then there letting on, and we should investigate, but we should put our focus towards the rigged election & using altered for their own benefit. Floyd just sent me a text and said he's on the way, is there anything else that's super important that you learned from Coltrane or her sister so far?" Jace asked interested in learning more.

"That's about it." Sanzhar nodded solemnly. "It was a technopath that altered the election results. Who exactly... well, no one can tell. If there's someone with the same abilities as Trent, maybe we can find out more."

Jace frowned disappointed that they didn’t have more intel, although Sanzhar had already dropped a bombshell on them. “That’s it huh, well I shouldn’t say it because this is pretty major, regardless of what we don’t know exactly, we DO know the Forrester’s are up to no good entirely.” Jace agreed as he took a seat on the couch to go through the notes.

About thirty minutes later they heard a knock on the door, Jace went to get stand up until the sound of a key being put in was heard. He briefly tensed up only to remember he’d given Floyd a key as he came in and was holding a case of corona’s in one hand. He waltzed straight to refrigerator putting in the case, albeit grabbing one bottle for himself which thanks to a little raised strength he popped the cork right off before plopping down on the couch while taking a few sips.

“Okay guys I made it. What’s the emergency?” Floyd asked the two whilst looking over the paperwork the had gathered on the table with some confusion.

Sanzhar simply laid it out as bare and concisely as possible. "Another journalist friend of mine found out that President Forrester cheated the elections by using a technopathic Altered. And he paid for it with his life."

Floyd raised a brow at Sanzhar’s comments. “Hold on what? You mean the election two years ago, before the energy storm? How the hell is that possible?” Floyd questioned as he began looking through the photo-copied documents.

"His name was Trent Coltrane, and according to his sister who came to my house to tell me all this, he had the ability to see the histories of objects he touches." Sanzhar looked towards Floyd. "That is how he initially managed to find out about the nature of the election fraud, then he started investigating on his own. Then he was murdered..."

Looking away, Sanzhar continued. "If we could find someone with that same kind of power, or perhaps a technopath, we may be able to get it. Otherwise it will have to be done in the far more dangerous old school way of going in deep."

Jace scoffed at Floyd’s remarks. ”Yeah that’s what I thought too, people with powers have been around before the storm. Sanzhar here thinks the Forrester’s might be behind powers, and the storm is just their biggest experiment gone wrong. And of course I’ve brought up the several plot-holes with that theory including the fact the Forrester’s don’t like black people."

Floyd just nodded his head as this was so much to take in. “Between this & Oakland I’ve got a full plate with Network, not to mention getting Taste of Paradise back running after that fight with Lionel I had earlier this week. What was your journalist friends name Sanzhar, how did he get this intel, and how do you prepose we get anymore” Floyd added finally, before using his metal powers to cause Jace’s open laptop on the kitchen table to fly over to them.

Opening it up he went to yahoo news and pulled up an article. It was talking about how Lori Martinez had revealed her “true” identity as Amara who claimed to be the “Mother” of Altered & demanded humans build altars in her name & worship her, as well as claiming to be behind the energy storm after her destruction of rapper Dinero Grande’s mansion in retaliation because of a diss song he released that spoke badly about her.“Get a load of this shit, that Lori chick is stirring up even MORE trouble!".

He would only scowl as the news about Amara, the mother of the Altered. "Someone needs to take her down," he said with a hint of venom in his voice. "She is a threat to us all and make everything worse for us."

Jace nodded his head in agreement with Sanzhar. ”I saw her murder spree first had while fighting a monster downtown. If we had some way to find her, I’d say we go break her neck right now. Honestly she’s worst then Reaper & Forrester combined in my opinion.” Jace replied thoughts of pity towards all the people she had mercilessly slaughtered.

Floyd frowned & let out a sad sigh.“Your right Jace but I met her earlier today & I’ve got bad news. First I had an unexpected visit from an ex cop, a woman named Paige with the power to regenerate who tried to kill me & my roommate. “Amara” broke in my house during the fight to absorb Paige’s powers as well as her life.” Floyd’s voice trailed as the memory of Adora using her powers to cruelly drain Paige to death replayed in his head.

”Oh shit, so now she can heal herself too, damn it.”Jace gasped at the realization Floyd’s story caused him to make further frustrating him about the situation. His eyes widened more as Floyd pulled up a recording of Amara’s attack at the rapper Dinero’s mansion using her powers to brutally murder his entourage along with the cops & SWAT team that showed up.

"Then perhaps she can be drowned instead-", Sanzhar trailed off, realizing that attempting to do so was suicidal when she has a thousand powers inside her. "Honestly, I have no idea how to fight someone like that. Not that I'm a fighter, anyway. If there's technology that could nullify powers, or someone that could, perhaps we can have a shot at eliminating her-"

Sanzhar coughed, and looked over at Floyd. "You're like her, right? Capable of obtaining multiple abilities? Did you just copy mine, too?"

“It would be just our luck if the bitch could breath under water wouldn’t it, but in all seriousness there’s probably still plenty of ways to stop her even if she can heal. Like you said drowning her, another option is drugs, hell her healing probably has limits just like other powers, it might be as simple as chopping off her head or destroying her whole body.” Jace backed out of the Amara article on the laptop going to google to research fictional examples of people with regenerative abilities.

Floyd gulped and cleared his throat to respond to Sanzhar. ”Can we refrain from saying I’m like her, and I wouldn’t say “just” I’ve had both of your powers since we met in the motel parking lot. I mimic powers using empathic connections to others, she can absorb & remove powers, memories, even life-force from others with physical contact. I gotta actively recall powers I’ve been exposed too, whereas she’s a full time walking database of everything she’s taken.” Floyd explained bringing up the stark differences between his abilities & Adora’s far stronger ones.

"Oh... sorry." Sanzhar looked down on the floor, a little ashamed about using incorrect terminology. "Spray her with pheromones... No, that's not right... If we're taking out the head, it should be from a distance... an anti-material rifle can do the trick, probably. As long as she's... still."

Floyd felt a tinge of regret when he saw Sanzhar look towards the ground. ”Hey hey don’t be sorry, I was saying I didn’t want to be compared to her because of how evil she is, like how nobody wants to hear they remind someone of Hitler or Stalin.” He added not wanting him to think he had any animosity towards him for something as simple as needing an explanation of how his powers worked & differed from Amara’s.

“Long as she’s still ANDstill normal sized. Also, any form of having multiple powers makes you a powerful asset against her & all our other enemies. More bad news I still haven’t gotten any leads on Boost in Oakland, nor put any serious dent in the widespread altered gang war there. In light of everything including Coltrane’s investigation, the Oakland Crisis, Boost, & super violent altered like Amara & Reaper the Network’s got a lot of work to do.” Jace concluded after thinking on everything that had been discussed in this meeting.

"Alright... I'll probably just keep on looking over these papers, dig a bit more." Sanzhar answered, nodding over at Floyd and Jace. "If I find anything more I'll tell you."

As Jace’s phone started buzzing he took it out & saw it was Brock, another Network member calling him. He got up to take the call in the kitchen whilst Floyd fetched both doctored altered ID’s for Sanzhar & Jace that were made with Amalia’s powers. Floyd handed Sanzhar his fabricated negative altered status ID, and put Jace’s on the couch where he was sitting.

”I figured you guys need these, they were actually finished yesterday but I’ve been super busy re-opening Taste of Paradise. It would be nifty if we could get more info from the research.” Floyd muttered, the mere utterance of the name caused him to wince & clasp the sides of his head in pain. The intensity rapidly rised causing him to fall out the couch to his knees. Grinding his teeth and placing a hand on the edge of the table o help himself up.

As he made contact with the table his eyes took on a bright white color, internally his mind was flooded with images, surface memories of the table’s history in the safehouse as well as a short vision of the table being sold to Jace in a furniture store. As soon as the vision ended his eyes turned from bright white to their regular brown color but he was drenched in sweat. “Saying Coltrane’s name triggered some kind of killer head-ache followed by me seeing a vision of when Jace bought this table after my fingers brushed against the table?!” Floyd retorted to Sanzhar I both disbelief & eagerness to converse to forget the searing head-pain he’d just underwent.

"Oh, now you got Coltrane's power of seeing object histories. How... convenient." Sanzhar had expected a far more dramatic inclusion of such, but... this it is what it is. "It appears that by uttering my dead friend's name, you gained his ability... ah, the plot is now as thick as the pile of furballs that my cats vomited."

“Huh that's the power I've got, oh shit we were just talking about that.” Floyd retorted in shock. However he wasn’t able to accept Sanzhar’s supposed explanation for how he had manifested this power, as he had to meet others in person to acquire their powers with empathy. “I could have gone my whole life without the mental picture you just gave me with that cat story, but condolences aside speaking of the dead wouldn’t be the catalyst to allow me to obtain their powers.” Floyd mused as pain once again reverberated throughout his body with another mention of Coltrane’s name, causing him to see a series of rapid visions that made him wince in pain this time without his fingers brushing against an object. Damn it what’s going on

"You... you alright?" Sanzhar asked Floyd with a tint of concern in his voice. "As for your requirements on gaining abilities, well, it would appear that it just isn't limited with face to face meetings. These powers, after all, defy the laws of physics, and I believe it would be presumptuous to think that we completely understand how one would work, such as your ability to imprint others-"

A sordid realization dawned upon. Sanzhar was familiar with abilities similar to that of his friend Trent in some parts of science fiction, and if this works the same way those do, it may as well answer the looming question in the room.

"I have a theory... Trent's ability is to see the histories of objects through touching them. I think that when doing so, he imprints his own... let's just say 'quantum energy', because that word is a catch-all. So when you touched these papers, you probably got in contact with whatever he had left behind. One could say... that he left a portion of his being there. Do you get it, or...?"

”I’ve certainly had better days, good news though is that Amara still feels pain that’s one less thing we have to worry about right?” Floyd muttered between gritted teeth & the swelling pain in his skull. He cast that aside as he listened to more theories from Sanzhar about the possibility of how he supposedly acquired the imprint to Trent’s abilities.

Jace had stepped back in the room now off the phone with Brock. [Color=purple]”I couldn’t help but overhear the tail end of your conversation and the answer to how Floyd has this power dawned on me, at least I think. You mentioned getting into a scuffle with her earlier today, and how your power is triggered with empathic connections. My theory is Amara killed your friend Sanzhar, to take his power, and Floyd picked it up from her. Our discussing it as well as her & him may have provided some sort of catalyst to trigger your manifestation of the ability.”[color] Jace finished putting out his likely theory for how Floyd came across Coltrane’s ability.

Sanzhar placed his hand over his right eye, shaking his head. "That she-demon did it? Now, I thought that the Forresters had killed him because he got too close to their secrets, and that I can understand even a little bit. But her? This... power hungry stripper goddess? That I cannot fathom."

Amara, the Forresters... These people had taken one or two facets of his life away from him. His friend, and his place in this world.

Barely contained rage bubbled up within his mind, but somehow, he kept it contained, and spoke in his calm, somber voice once more. "I've never been so livid, so in want of killing something. Ugh. Floyd... If that's the case... part of my friend now lives on in you..."

Floyd frowned and couldn’t restrain the immense sadness he felt for Sanzhar. They’d only known each other for a short while, but he had a knack for sympathizing with others perhaps that’s why he was an empath. Aside from that Jace’s explanation set off a metaphorical light bulb above Floyd’ head allowing him to make sense of how he had this new power.

”I’m so sorry man, I wish things didn’t happen this way. I promise I’ll treasure whatever part of your friend remains with me, and use it to get him justice. She murdered a friend & employee of mine for his powers, plus based off your story the Forrester’s DID send someone to take Trent’s life but this evil bitch got to him first.” Floyd remembered the story they’d told him earlier including how paranoid Coltrane was towards the end of his life.

Jace walked over to Sanzhar and put a hand on his shoulder. [Color=purple]”That rage you feel now is the same as what drives me to be Shade. My advice is to channel it into our mission, but don’t let it consume your thoughts. In conclusion I think Floyd should focus on learning Trent’s power for now, while us & the others focus on everything else aside from hunting Amara.” Jace suggested a course of action he felt was the best considering the circumstances, but wanted input from the others before it was finalized.

"Yes... Jace..." Sanzhar sobbed. He clutched the hand that Jace had placed on his shoulder, and finally, his voice cracked. "I'm sorry, I'm not usually this... Ergh, emotional. Anyway, um... yeah, we can... do that."

Floyd groaned and gritted his teeth before yelling out in pain as he fell to the ground. Once again he was assaulted by a precognitive vision occurring whilst he was awake. Images swarmed through his mind of an event that was taking place a little less than two weeks from now. Jace rushed over to Floyd wondering what was wrong only for Floyd to wave him off. Sweating profusely as the vision ended Floyd massaged his temples and helped himself up onto the couch.

[Color=green] "I just had another vision I don't know if this is good news, bad news, or both. California's Governor Stark is proposing a bill called the Separation Act. The bill in question will make it the law that altered people can't be or live in the same place as normal people, aka legal segregation. The catch is he's making it so the citizens of California will be voting for or against the passing of this bill. Well I just saw a vision of Nathan putting his hand on a black woman's shoulder & whispering in her ear “Listen “King” use your power to make it a landslide victory not a close win like you did for the election". Then I saw her entering a voting both and putting her hand on the machine, then finally I saw an announcement that the Separation Bill had been passed in California & other states were going to follow California's example & let it's citizens vote on this bill. " Floyd finished explaining huffing & puffing from the intense vision he experienced.

Jace jaw dropped at hearing the horrifying news and pulled up info about the bill on his laptop. “Governor Stark went on the Benny Stein show this morning to announce the bill, there gonna make it look like this bill is the will of the people. Sounds like the Forrester’s are gonna use the same techno woman who rigged the election for them unless we find & stop her”

"That is bad news." Sanzhar scowled at the revelation that the same woman who tipped the elections to the favour of the Forresters was going to do it again, this time to separate Altered from the rest of the population. "Segregation is the perfect tool to corral all the Altered in one place. It's no different to apartheid..."

Sanzhar fidgeted, his mind all but scattered between the grief of losing Trent and the pressure of the world bearing down upon them. "Can you... sketch her out? Any way so that we can put her on facial recognition and eventually find a match?"

Floyd was in agreement with the rest of them with everything that was said. ”To be honest I can’t draw but I have a friend whose really good at it. Maybe she can help, as for facial recognition I mean maybe I think my best bet is using Trent's powers on any stuff related to the investigation maybe even going to the same places he went using his powers. No matter what we've got our work cut out for us for sur now"Floyd affirmed knowing they all had to get to work, this is not how he expected the day to go after his drunken adventures with Agent Donnovan.

[Chulance]

Adora Zayas

Time: Late Afternoon
Location: Oakland, California
Interaction:

---

“I’ve got this situation under control, I promise. The Collective is growing you think I'll let some idealistic man who can't walk interfere honestly? Have more faith in me than that." Adora boasted speaking to an ally of hers on the phone.

Chloe was on the other line & furious. Mayor Chen had stirred up a sleeping beast, and the situation was getting iratable. Alongside the mayors who’d risen up Altered Lives Matter led on by there leader Dawn had issued a public statement of support for Mayor Chen & all people who supported the so called plight of altered including the other mayors & people who’d started protesting in the four sanctuary cities as well as other areas that took less kindly to the altered.

“Listen if you want us to win, for the Collective to be in charge, then this mess Mayor Chen has begun needs to be sorted, not to mention the boost scenario across the street in Oakland is getting crazier, The people of Oakland are demanding an answer, they want immediate military assistance to quell the absurd amount of antagonistic superhuman activity there, while we’re working to surprise the media &. Third party individuals from letting the rest of the country know how bad it is out there. I teamed up with you because you said you can make miracles happen for us, well I need a miracle right now.” Chloe finished before getting off the phone with her new partner in crime.

“You want a miracle, well that’s not what most people would name my brand of massacres, but whatever floats your boat.” Adora said to herself in a nonchalant manner to herself now that she was off the phone. “What do you think Veronica do I perform miracles? Careful with what you say, because me allowing you to live after getting your power is what I like to call the miracle..of mercy” Adora finished almost purring.

Veronica responded emerging from the shadows literally. Her form shaped from pure darkness that had been ducked off in an ally. She was a light skinned woman clearly biracial but black side was very much apparent. She had long flowing black hair, green eyes, and was wearing a black skirt. “I do owe my life to you, even if you were the very one who was going to take it from me at the support meeting. Of everyone that attended Saiyu’s little function you spare my life, what’s the real reason? You really want me to work for you just because I lost control and used my shadows to sed some people to he’ll who needed to be there.” Veronica retorted still with some disbelief detectable in her tone as she spoke to the altered thief.

“Believe It or not it takes guts to do what you did. To wipe out your enemies utterly & entirely. Those are the type of people, no altered that I want, Those others were sitting around with powers trembling in fear of regular mortals with guns.. Not only that but your powers of shadow & darkness have potential, I wanted to have a living ally with those powers on my side not just the power itself at my disposal. Still if you wish to die I’ll be happy to drain you alive my powers quite literally have a mind & stomach of their own. Not only that I’ve found out I’ll face consquences if If I don’t feed properly, so if you want to become apart of my diet rather then follow instructions it won’t take that many acts of insubordination.”

Veronica jumped back raising shadow tendrils to her defense by instinct then causing them to dissipate. Adora flinched for a second then smirked, Veronica’s powers were dangerous but she knew not to pick a fight with her. Not when she’d experienced first hand Adora’s base power of assimilation itself, having felt the very life being drained from her. “I’m sorry, I’ll do as you say boss, I’m grateful for the second chance at life you’ve given me. Besides I did come to the meeting seeking others who wanted to band together against the humans rather then just give up until their governmental foot of oppression.” Veronica replied finally settling on following Adora’s orders in order to retain her spared life.

“The mission is simple, we’re looking for a chemical known as boost. That is the culprit behind so many bozos & thugs in this town running around with these synthetic abilities. Perform your own investigation from the shadows in the areas I described, meanwhile I’ll be tracking down two of my own leads I stumbled upon with my super hearing. Get to work Veronica I’m serious, you won’t want to disappoint me.” Adora said with edge in her voice, and a not so thinly veiled threat of violence or other alternate repercussions if she failed to co-operate.

Veronica nodded her head in understanding with a gulp and dispersed her body into the shadows. Adora turned to face another direction, turning invisible & flying off. She remained vigilant about turning invisible during any flights she took to avoid detection by regular means of picking up flying aircrafts in the sky available to traditional law enforcement & military.

Later That Evening
Adora’s investigation had continued & turned up ripe results. Initially it started from tracking down two people whom she overheard discussing selling boost near the beach. This assignment gave her the chance to utilize her investigative abilities. Masking her precense she stalked both people, but only one of them was the person she needed. His name was Kenny Myles and he was actually the real deal, a boost dealer. Tracking him down had taken her to a warehouse owned by Cain & his people. Inside the dealer Kenny was speaking with Cain about how this was the last of shipment H and a new batch would be ready today.

“Yeah the bossman says he wants you to come pick it up directly, says you’ve earned it, and that he don’t want that metal skinned motherfucker to be his main supplier, even if he controls the Oakland police department.” Kenny explained inside to Cain who took a few boost pills bagged up and pocketed them for himself, before having his men place the crate Kenny delivered elsewhere.

“That’s fine I’ll be happy to oblige, I knew Hines would come to see reason and realize that I’m the best person to do business with, not to mention my power far exceeds anything Lionel ca produce with or without boost in our systems.” Cain said with a smirk, he oozed confidence about himself & his powers even In comparison to someone as dangerous as Lionel. Adora licked her lips in anticipation unbeknownst to them that she was listening wondering what abilities he wielded to elicit his fearless tirade of insults towards Lionel.

“Great I’ll be sure to let the boss know so everything’s in motion, anyway I’ve got one more stop to make money is money and the mafia’s putting up big bucks for a huge load of boost.” Kenny said with a greedy sneer causing Cain to clap his hands mockingly.

“Hurry along then, the bastard has no qualms with taking money from anyone with the right pocket book for product as long as it’s not the Forrester’s or the feds I can respect that, can’t say I’ll do the same once I’m in charge of distribution. But don’t worry I’ll have no supply of customers for you.” Cain shot back having mapped out a strategy to further distribute boost across the United States & maximize how much income they were making. He already had a cross nation operation shipping drugs to other states for massive profits & planned to implement a similar strategy with boost & many of the vicious street gangs he already moved other drugs with. However with boost not only could he raise the prices, but his allies would be far stronger throwing the police across the country into chaos.

Just Great, Damn it. I wish I had the power to split into two. The Dealer’s headed to middle man a major amount of boost, but Cain’s going to a meeting with the boss himself to pick up the first of a new batch. Of course I should follow Cain to the source, then again it would be child’s play for me to overpower this dealer & some mafia goons to make off with all the boost from their deal giving me my own supply for myself & The Collective. Plus what if this new batch is less potent then what’s already out in the streets The invisible mass murderess was engaged in thought about which of the two individuals she should choose to follow with the options she had.

On top of all that she had fear coursing through her of Amara emerging. The Thirst was gnawing at her hungry for energy & flesh. Both of which it hadn’t been fed as she moved about in hiding trying to stalk this boost dealer & Cain’s operation for leads. I can’t let Amara’s psychosis mess this up, the last thing I need right now is her emerging and going on a random massacre while trying to spread her stupid church.

Kenny left the premise, and Adora messaged Veronica to keep tabs on him. She decided against contacting Chloe who’d no doubt bring in the military to seize boost. For now she wanted full control of anything to do with this chemical.

“Why don’t you come out of your hiding place, no intruders are allowed.” Cain announced calling out Adora who flew over to him and made herself visible, assuming the form of Amara without the glowing black eyes.

“Oh and you think you can command me? Are you feeling powerful around all of your lackeys, as if that’ll make a difference against me. I’m here to inform you that your time on this earth is over.” Adora retorted back followed by giggling at the audacity of Cain to challenge her.

“Big talk coming from someone whose oozing so much delicious fear. I don’t know what your afraid of, but it matters not. Fear is fear and I consume all of it for my unlimited power, honestly the media is scared of you. San Francisco’s cops & soldiers deployed there are pathetic, I won’t lift a finger to kill you Kolak finish her off so we can go pick up the new batch from the boss, everyone else watch and learn what happens when an amateur tries to fly to close o the sun.”

“They don’t just burn up they explode.” Kolak called out leaping into the center of the warehouse. A tall dark skinned man with brown eyes and long dreads. He kicked the ground beneath him causing kinetic energy to surge. The energy coursed through the ground underneath the floor and manifested right next to Adora causing a massive explosion that engulfed her, whilst sending smoke & debris everywhere.

“Enough of this damn talking I’m fucking hungry.” As the smoke cleared a wave of telekinetic energy pushed the smoke apart, and Adora emerged relatively unharmed with a smirk on her face. “And trust me you won’t be a fan of what’s on my menu.” She said in a sinister tone filled to the brim with glee.

[Chulance]

Jonah Hanes

Time: Early Evening
Location: Downtown Oakland,
Interaction:

---

Jonah was ready & willing to work with Lana. She’d gotten some cream of the crop information, and not the typical warehouse either. The enemy was using residential properties to store boost, and in a affluent neighborhood. The problem they faced was that Lionel had both the police & altered ran gang teams patrolling those areas. Both because that’s where their boost was stored and because they extorted the richer residents of Oakland for premium protection from the chaos his war with Cain was generating as well as his own men & any other violent third parties acting out purge like behavior in the chaos that had befallen Oakland.

The Military had went underground or left Oakland entirely. They were aware of Boost & how outmatched it made them against Cain’s forces, Lionel’s forces & even third party enemies privy to the superhuman enhancement drug. The superiors wanted to get their hands on it, but the higher ups had left Liberty in charge of that operation thanks to Chloe’s manipulations. Little did the know Chloe had called in the Collective to secure boost providing them the same intel she’d received with her connections to the military, homeland security & even Liberty.

“What’s on your mind bossman, you hate riding in the minivan that bad? We’re trying to blend In.” Lana spoke to break the silence. She’d procured a minion and hot-wired it for their vehicle of choice, stashing Jonah’s real car to avoid attention. It was nerve wracking riding around without the standard bulletproof glass that came with liberty’s combat vehicles, but they’d stick out like a sore thumb on the way to their destination in that. Not to mention bulletproof glass wouldn’t hold a candle to violent super powers or people on boost.

“No I just wish we could have gone back to headquarters to get Karlina or some more appropriate weapons. But I’ve gotten word that Agent Hamazuro is in the area & brought down some enemy altered. We sent in an extraction team to detain the criminals, and I’ve instructed them to bring Jaden to us at a drop off location a couple miles away from the target.” Jonah explained taking out his phone to examine the preset route on the GPS. The mansion Lana uncovered had an ample supply of boost in it was the final destination, but the drop off point was the first stop

“So that’s good news right, I mean sure he’s not the best of the best with countering powers but it’s better then fists and fire-arms alone.” Lana encouraginly pointed out while still focused on the road as she was driving.

Before long they reached the back of an empty Chinese restaurant where Jaden emerged from an armored vehicle with liberty agents inside. “Ooooh straight to the bossman on short notice, this must be important, I hear you don’t like people l ike me huh but desperate times call desperate measures.” Jaden responded with some distaste as he approached the director & his fellow liberty agent not exactly happy he got called in simply because Karlina was out of reach.

“You don’t waste any time trying to make a guy hate you more do you. I don’t have the slightest clue about what you mean. I do know that this mission is serious, no doubt this supply will be well guarded, and we need to get our hands on it. This is our first chance to figure out the chemical that enemy is using to terrorize all of Oakland, and put a stop to it at the source Jonah deflected acting oblivious to his well known racism biting his tongue & surprising his hatred of Jaden’s people in light of the assignment’s gravity they were facing.

“Alright hop in get in the back.” Lana blurted out with team-work in mind only for Jaden to roll his eyes as he slid open one of the van’s doors and hopped in.

“Of course that didn’t last long, first you deny being a bigot then you tell the black guy to hop in the back and I’m the only one in the car with powers. Typical I’m the most important, but I gotta ride bar-seat. Damn so if some raging altered attacks and I’m siting on her side, I might only be able to use my powers to save me and her director, I mean maybe I could save you as well but not with this vantage point I have from where I’m sitting now, oh well your a good shot right.” Jaden mocked knowing that his position in the car played a minimal role in whether or not he could use his nullifying powers to save any or all of the occupants,

“Shut the hell up your boarding on disobedience as the director I have no problem reprimanding you I happen to know you don’t have the raw power to be talking that way to me or I’ll beat your ass, so you better keep me alive if you wan to see your quarterly bonus ever go up.”

“Why you..” Jaden groaned but decided to stop talking. He thought back to the advice Karlina gave him, as well as the information about Agent Donovan. This only caused him to smirk and figure this was why it was so easy for the Russians to infiltrate him. Ya know I suddenly don’t want to expose Donnovan, I wanna see how badly she can fuck up Liberty’s chain of command while Director Hanes in charge, a fuck up like that goes public and his best job will be a garbageman, then someone like me a trustworthy altered can take over and from there racists dickwads like him won’t be able to go after innocent altered just cause were minorities, I’ll play the long con Jaden thought to himself. “I apologize, let’s proceed with the mission boss.”

“Hmph came to your senses huh, so you’ve got some sense in that monkey brain of yours, alright Lana let’s go.” Jonah barked out orders and with Jaden putting on his-seat belt the three headed out while the armored truck went to park at a different vantage point ready for their members to jump in during the raid as soon as they were needed or called upon.

Chicago, Illinois - Scheduled Execution
George Sanchez was a dead man, he had the power to manipulate earth. He was 17 years old a month ago, but he’d turned 18 two days ago. The state wanted to try him as an adult, but with the nature of the crime that was a given. He’d been teased & bullied relentlessly for years, for one reason or another. His parents being hispanic he was always the victim of cruel high school jokes often tied to his cultural standing from things like ICE, to his family not being able to vote, and of course the immigrant jokes. He bore the brunt of those taunts with his head up wanting a better life for him & his family.

His parents had sacrificed everything to get him & his little sister to America. They’d done everything the right way, they weren’t illegal immigrants. Hell his first name was George & his sister’s first name was Linda after all, their parents named them knowing they would eventually migrate to the United States. However his life had taken a dark turn in light of the energy storm and the chaotic events that transpired afterwards.

At first he was ecstatic to gain powers, the only good thing that happened to him considering their entire subsidized living was wiped out by the storm. They’d all moved in with their grandparents who unlike them were illegal immigrants who were co-owners of a convenience store in the area. Thanks to his godfather the one who helped them open up the store they’d managed to skate by all this time, George’s life was uprooted in a matter of weeks, and the earth powers were only the start of that. The bullying grew worst for him & others when it came out that minorities were the only ones getting powers. The cruel jokes became worst & he became further ostracized as rumors spread about which minorities had powers.

Like many typical rules spread around in these grades of school they weren’t true, but these weren’t simple accusations as sleeping around or doing hard drugs. They were labeling people as the worst and most distrusted set of society around currently. George who mainly kept to himself to repel the intense violence he felt towards his peers was one of the many who were accused. The irony behind the rumors spread about him was that he was altered & his family knew. They urged him not to speak, and at one point even went as far as to withdraw him from school. Finally his mother relented and said such a thing might actually be all but confirmation that he was an altered.

He was instructed to practice his powers every night to get a grip on them, more so upon learning they could be triggered & affected by his emotions. Knowing that everything was on the line for multiple generations of his family he did just that. But then the worst happened his little sister Linda was brutally murdered, a victim of Purity. Purity was a cross national militant group that was constructed to “purge” the country of the “mystical demons” that plagued it. Purity’s beliefs stated that the Altered were false prophets and whores of Babylon sent to mingle with society and perform fake miracles to lead people astray from God & into the pits of Hell.

Purity believed the Energy Storm was a sign of the end of days and altered humans were the first wave of demonic omens the world would face under satanic attacks. Purity was heavily inspired by the words of fanatic Pastor Tristan, although he denied any & all ties to him in public. Still he preached a message of religious intolerance & hatred towards altered that many adopted into the tenants of Purity. To that end they utilized the website opened to out altered & altered activity as well as other sources to track down altered. From there they would kidnap them, beat them, and ultimately Lynch them. There were some unconfirmed rumors that some of the more fringe members of Purity made the kidnapped altered they eliminated undergo more horrific inhumane punishment such as rape and pointless excruciating torture.

For every altered they killed, they left a mark in blood next to their victim. The symbol was one that meant to identify evil, and the same mark had been found by Linda who was found dead hanging from a tree. The event had made the news, it seemed Purity had connections to the media as they managed to get their gruesome actions reported. Although officially the Government all the way. Up to the Forrester Administration condemned Purity, there was no organized militaristic or law enforcement action being taken against them. Forrester himself had said that while Purity was a threat to society & more vulnerable people in the nation, the military had to focus on the likes of newfound superhuman criminals like Amara & Reaper.

This enraged him, plain unrelenting aggravated racists had easily mingled & intertwined within the ranks of Purity. Their murders were supposed to be altered only, but they took tips from things like the altered cutting website which didn’t strictly regulate the facts of what was uploaded. Leading to some targets being killed being just regular minorities who were accused, beaten & murdered in a racially appalling way over what amounted to a glorified over-spread internet hate rumor. Minority business’s were targeted, windows shattered, shelves pushed over, merchandise stolen or destroyed, properties burned. His grand-parents lost their shop, and worst the insurance claim they failed had been reversed accusing them of destroying their own store leading to his grandparents being charged with insurance fraud.

The Chicago police had pressured his godfather, a white man to lie and claim that his grandparents conspired with him to commit insurance fraud. Thus they were sitting in jail elderly awaiting trial, and had taken a loan out on their house to afford exuberant legal fees combined with their savings. His father had contracted the energy plague & was fighting for his life in the hospital. Meanwhile his mother had become a full-blown alcoholic with everything that went on, but still managed to go visit his father in the hospital almost daily, mainly to see her sickened husband and to have somewhere to sleep at night.

George had bounced around at his cousins place, getting exposed to and surrounded by their drug dealing for survival antics. Finally he had enough and after a particularly bad spout at school where some of his main bullies took it too far and mocked his dead sister he wiped out the whole school. Now he was in jail along with his grand-parens, except he was being held in a maximum security prison constantly injected with sedatives & other drugs to suppress his abilities. He was going to be given the death penalty, and with all the outcries for the lives lost at the high school he was to become the most rushed criminal to get the penalty in chicago legal system history.

Today was the day he was scheduled to die, and the prison staff hadn’t even given nor offered him the traditional last meal which was afforded to even the worst rapists, & murderors. “So this is how it all ends, bunch of putas. I’ll see you soon Linda.”

A few tears rolled down George’s eyes in solitary confinement, everything his parents, his family had worked for over several generations had been destroyed. Eradicated by the rampant racial division that plagued this country like the destructive virus that rummaged the nation. He hugged himself trying to keep warm in this immensely cold cell with nothing but his jump suit. Laying on the steel slab that was suppose to be his “Bed”. The only good thing about being drugged up was all the chemicals actually allowing him moments of escape by being able to sleep so much. Something that would surely be impossible if not for all the incapacitating substances prison officials had ordered to be implemented into his body. That was of course for their protection but they made bullshit statements about how it was mutual.

He knew the reason, so he would’t use his powers and tear apart the prison liberating himself & maybe even more of Chicago’s finest. They were right though, as he’d more than tried a few times. The regimen of drugs they’d given him was a powerful cocktail that rendered him unable to call upon the mental faculties he needed to draw his powers. He figured that it was the same across the country in different prisons, jails & detention centers holding altered. They had no concern for whether any of these medications had any potentially fatal interactions, as long as it kept them out of their gourd enough to be powerless.

“It all ends today, I finally get to leave this hell, I hope I don’t end up in another one.” George muttered to himself as he tossed and turned on the slab. His last dose of heavy duty drugs was starting to wear off, but he was sure they’d be there shortly to give him another. In between doses the most he’d been able to do is make a small tremor, although once when they forgot to dose him for 12 hours he almost caused a chasm of earth to open besides his cell.

After that he got a brutal beating from the guards and they made sure not to miss any doses, in fact they upped the dosages once again with no contact with medical professionals to see if any of this was safe. He’d come to wish multiple times that they’d make a mistake and give him a mixture sting enough to let him drift off peacefully to sleep never to awake again.

“Fuck it one more nap.” George muttered and leaned back closing his eyes. He was happy to know the this was one of his final naps. The next one when he got the injection would be the very least, and this tortured prolonged existence he experienced as the scum of the chicago prison system would finally be over.

Or so he thought he awoke to loud noises, alarms were blaring, people were yelling. “What the fuck” Brtttt Brttt,he heard gun shots going off. Prisoners were yelling along with guards, his survival instincts kicked in and he moved to the back of his cell near his cold almost overflown in-operable metal toilet. “The hell.”

Boom, an explosion went off not too far from him. He shut his eyes to shield himself and cowered in the corner against the unsanitary prison walls ignoring the intense cold. Smoke shuffled into the hallway of solitary he was in, other prisoners were banging on the walls in frustration & fear tr ring to figure out what was going on. He heard guards yelling not to let up, then grunts, groans & yells then rapid gun-fire.

Finally to his shock he looked up to see a man, another person who looked like him with the keys to his cell opening them. That man was none other then Niko, behind him where soldiers working for the Salzaras Cartel. They were speaking in Spanish but George was able to understand them but he couldn’t believe what he was hearing. Not getting a response from the disgruntled mystified death row prisoner Niko switched to English.

“So you don’t speak our language kid, get up if you don’t want to die. My boss would like to have a word with you, offer you a second chance at life.”

“What the fuck?! What are you talking about, who are you?! This has got to be some kind of dream, do you know who I am?! George yelled back in disbelief wondering if this was some sort of elaborate last minute psychological torture the prison guards had put together to celebrate his send off to hell.

“Far from it.” Niko slid the door open with the key then opened a portal stepping through it and appearing on the top metal bunk sitting. George quickly drew his make-shift shank only for a smaller portal to swallow the shank and make it appear in Niko’s hands. “I’m one of you, and my boss is Hector Salzaras, even in here I’m sure you’ve heard of them and what they’re up to.”

“The cartel that’s taken over the drug game all over the country working with altered, I mean I don’t want to die, but I’ve los everything, and there’s no such thing as a free lunch, I’m scheduled to get the shot in three hours.” George protested still so many things flowing through his mind. “Your telling me you guys want me some who sank a high school, you want more heat from the feds?”

“More heat? Listen up kid, I used my powers to bring Salzaras forces here, we fought our way through this prison to get to you, killed several guards and plenty cops & SWAT outside, not to met ion freeing lots of prisoners & using our portals to scatter them across the city. Now we don’t have much time, it’s either you come with us or get ready to deal with the consequences for the shit-storm we left you. We can get you out of here, I took the liberty of already freeing your grand-parents, and took your parents to our finest medical facility in Mexico. I can’t bring your sister back obviously, but if you’ll do something for us, I’ll give you the next best thing. Revenge & Riches.”

George was shocked listening to everything that this Niko figure was telling him, and peaked out into the hallway to see pools of blood from dead guards including one guard he particularly hated who took pleasure in mocking him. “I…”I…”George stammered as it was all overwhelming to th earth manipulator. “What the fuck do you need me to do.”

“Ah so your listening to reasoning heh kid, well for starters we’ll need you to a dig a tunnel, more then one but let’s start with one, among a few other things. All of which will include handsome pay and plenty of chances to use those powers of yours to escape this punishment at the hands of these gringos what do you say? Save what family you have left, become wealthy & unleash your gifted weapons upon those who did the to you? “

George looked to the left and the right, then ripped off the inmate shirt he had on leaving him in just the jumpsuit pants and walked over to Niko. “Fine if what your saying is true I can’t refuse, I just…never thought I’d be given another chance, but seeing that Paul’s brains are bashed out you’ve made an impression on me, let’s go.”

“Congratulations and welcome to the winning team, everything you seek and more will be yours, now that you’re apart of the Salzaras. LISTEN UP WE ARE LEAVING EVERYONE COME OVER HERE ITS TIME TO GO” Niko yelled out opening a portal that George reluctantly walked through followed by several Salzaras militia soldiers and then Niko himself before the portal closed. And just like that Sanchez life which had only been given three more horrid hours by the American Justice System, had been extended for a life time by the actions of the notorious Hector Salzaras.