It didn’t take long to reach the surface, relatively speaking. Izzy lead us down a hall off of the main room, giving me a chance to look at the dead, frozen bodies of all the people Rook had turned into robots as well as his own transformed body.
Amy shuddered as she passed it, telling me, “The little bit of him that’s left saw his dead body. Even for him, it’s weird and creepy.”
Haley shook her head, saying only, “Yuck.” Continue reading Reality Tweaks: Part 4
Lim glanced off to the side, adding, “I really should go now. I’m going to assume that explaining what’s going on with Ray’s corpse and the Xiniti is one of those things that would cause more problems if you explain it than if you don’t. Tell me if that changes.”
“Sure,” I said, intending to say nothing forever unless Ray reappeared on Earth.
Lim stared into the camera for a moment, giving the impression that he was studying me even though I knew he was just getting a still of the Rocket suit in his video feed. Continue reading Reality Tweaks: Part 3
I spoke over the comm system’s general channel, “Magnus is powering his people up. If I had to guess, he’s powering up everybody he can. Expect people with powers to become more powerful. Don’t be surprised if they develop new ones or if unpowered people start changing…”
I stopped, and Amy added more, “Magnus is trying to escape into the portal. Some of his people will be trying to escape with him. Watch for that.”
I understood how Amy knew. She’d grabbed all of that out of Rook’s head as her spear sucked it in. Continue reading The Portal: Part 1
I checked Jaclyn’s, Tiger’s, and Izzy’s feeds. They’d been fighting the cadre of guards that appeared to be tasked with defending the teleportation systems.
Even better, they’d stepped inside Teleportation Operations. It said so on a black sign next to the door.
The first word that came to mind was “industrial.” Continue reading Stage Two: Part 6
Cassie added, “I’m ready.”
She was. According to her suit’s stats, her leg had grown back.
“Now would work,” Tara said.
Still camouflaged, I poked my head up, pointing my arm at Dr. Mind, testing his shield. My sonics ran through various frequencies at a low volume, checking which were the most resonant.
Then I passed those frequencies to everyone’s PAs and even my spare sonic on Julie’s costume. I pushed up the volume to the maximum. Continue reading Stage Two: Part 4
It was as good a throw as I’d ever seen from her, but for the first time, the Bloodspear stopped in midair, hitting nothing and stopping. Then it fell to the ground and disappeared.
As it fell, though, magical symbols appeared in the air. I recognized a few. Everyone in Stapledon had had to take a survey course in magic and magical creatures. While I couldn’t read many, I recognized the one for blood and felt a burst of energy.
That worried me. I couldn’t feel magic. Anything I could feel had to be Artificer-related. Continue reading Stage Two: Part 2
As we neared the end of the hall, Izzy said, “Here,” swerving to the left of the elevator and punching the wall.
Jaclyn swerved with her, their arms a blur, leaving a hole wide enough for four of us to jump through at a time—which they did the moment they were done. We followed, all of us seemingly in Syndicate L’s armor, some flying, others dropping at the safe speeds that my anti-gravity tech allowed.
Haley didn’t bother, using my goo gun tech to fire off a line and swing down to the floor. Continue reading Stage One: Part 9
I hadn’t noticed. Glancing down, I found that one of the glossy black pouches on the glossy black belt of my glossy black armor had a small glow around the edges of the top flap.
Except for a moment where I concluded that Syndicate L had been going for looks rather than functionality with the design, my attention gravitated to the pouch. As it did, I remembered what was in the pouch.
Back when we’d met with the Wizards’ Council and a few other hidden immortals, Urin, a former Cabal member who dated back to Sumer, had given me a rock. Flat and white, it hadn’t looked like much, but he’d claimed it had a connection to Lee’s device and to the Artificers. Continue reading Stage One: Part 8
From there, the day turned into planning sessions, the first with those of us who hadn’t been drugged. By the afternoon, even those of us who had been drugged were with it enough to participate.
From there, it grew into a cast of thousands or at least it felt like it. We had everyone—Amy, Tara, Samita, Rod, Alex, Brooke, Jenny, Sean, Dayton, every member of the original Justice Fist but Jody, and every living member of our original group. If that weren’t enough, Dr. Transylvania, Ape Nasty, Prime, and his second-in-command attended remotely. Continue reading Bigger Things: Part 8
“The one good thing is that we don’t have to worry about how to keep them imprisoned. The bad, I guess, is that we have no chance of that. Now that I think about it, the base had teleportation blockers. They shouldn’t have been able to take anyone from upstairs at all.”
Rachel glanced over at me, “I think they’re off. I tried to get over here and help as soon as they appeared, but I couldn’t float through the walls. I found that they’d ripped the door off its hinges outside, but they’d also blocked off the stairwell on the lowest floor and broken the elevator. I was about to give up and go outside, but then everything worked and I could float up the tower.” Continue reading Bigger Things: Part 1