Freelance Immortals

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Freelance Immortals

Chapter Two: Destroyer Rising

"You two make a good team," Mercedes Targer, owner and proprietor of the Stranger Coffee House, said to the Freelance Immortals as she opened for business.

"We noticed," Roland replied dryly. "And you _did_ help."

"I noticed. Morgan, you like coffee?"

"Not really," Morgan said, a bit apologetically.

"That's all right. I've never met _anyone_ who didn't like chocolate, so--" Mercedes began.

Her door turned to splinters.

"DAMN! Third time this month," Mercedes sighed.

Morgan quirked one eyebrow at the intrusion, though her hand was already on the dagger-sized Aramegil.

The Defender armor began to flow around Roland...to no avail.

"By the numbers, people! Just like the Master planned it!" A figure clad in black and gold, looking almost like the Blaze form's evil twin, fired a bolt at Roland. As he reeled, the attack was followed immediately by a slash from Gremlin at his arm and a bear hug from another man almost entirely in red (except for the black gloves, boots and star in his chest). "Now, Menton!" The bruiser shouted.

"Do not presume to command ME, Blackstar!" A third man, this one in a flowing white robe, appeared in front of Roland, who snarled and knocked them all away. "Only Destroyer commands me."

"Yeah? Well, he's not going to be commanding you for much lon--" Roland began, then looked down at his wrist, annoyed.

His Lens was gone; the bloody wound that remained was rapidly healing, but it still felt like he'd lost a limb. "You people are SO dead."

Morgan, whose sword was already out, gave Roland a brief quizzical look as she approached.

^Well, I'm not _really_ going to kill them, but if _they_ don't know that, so much the better,^ Roland replied as his armor finally solidified, throwing back Menton with one blast and the Blaze-like character with the other. "I don't know what you're up to, but Solitaire--"

"Defender," a voice like the crack of doom hissed, "_you_ were the difficult one." A field crackled around Morgan briefly. "You are a powerful, multi-talented psion, and getting your device properly contained before you could shift it back required ingenuity." Morgan's Lens also vanished. "But Solitaire, in this incarnation at least, is merely a straightforward warrior without knowledge of the tenth part of her potential." Dr. Destroyer strode into the room, holding a silver box.

Morgan glared at Destroyer and bore down on him, sword first--but a man who looked for all the world like a movie ninja leaped from the shadows and parried Morgan's blade with a bo staff. He thrusted, and was surprised to find his own attack parried. Morgan thought she saw, for a moment, the briefest of smiles behind his mask...

"Charger. Stormwatch. Cease playing with these two and come away," Destroyer commanded the Blaze-alike and the ninja.

"I don't think so--" Roland barked.

"Not in MY place--" Mercedes snapped.

"As if--" Morgan replied.

All six intruders vanished.

Roland rubbed his wrist. "I, for one...am not amused."

"Anyone want to tell me what the HELL that was all about?" Mercedes asked.

"Either he wanted those so that _he_ could use them...or so that we couldn't. I'm not sure which option I like least," Morgan said darkly.

"Less," Roland corrected absently as he paced. He didn't notice Morgan half-heartedly sticking her tongue at his back. "Morgan and I are connected to an impressive group of allies called the Callahanian Army of Light. Most of them are more powerful than either of us, and some of them could defeat Celestines." Mercedes whistled, impressed, as he continued. "Apparently, 'Doctor' Destroyer doesn't want us to call in reinforcements."

"Which means that's exactly what we should do. I'll contact Dhyrc-- aw, nass." Morgan said quietly. She held up her hand. "Dhyrclhanc's rings. They're gone, too." She looked at Roland with worry in her eyes.

Roland's eyes went flat as the Defender armor flowed back into him and he looked at his hand. His right ring finger was also bloodied. The ring was missing. "Destroyer was very thorough. I imagine that whatever containment field he has around that box sends an 'all clear' as needed." He concentrated. "I can't leave this dimension, or send out of it." Roland sighed. "I can reach Barsoom, so the Mantles--and probably the Horizon Realms--are still accessible. But we're on our own this time."

"Oh, fraggin' wonderful," Morgan replied sourly. "Which means we have to hope that someone decides to drop by for an unexpected visit."

Roland, however, smiled ferociously. "On the contrary. We've handled Destroyer before. We can handle him again. I'm looking forward to making that armor-clad prune _eat_ that self-satisfied smile of his."

Mercedes blinked at Roland. "Kid, you've got more guts than a whole sept of Garou, but you're crazier than a soup sandwich. That guy has a goon squad of some of the most powerful Awakened I've ever seen. Even _you_ two can't take him alone."

Roland thought a moment. "You're right, Mercedes. We'll need help." His smile grew. "We'll need the best the Councils have to offer. We're going to need Champions."

"Ohhh boy," Mercedes sighed, leaning over to Morgan. "He's got a plan. What am I sayin'; you've _got_ to know that crazy gleam in his eyes if you married the loon."

"I sure do," Morgan smiled. "And it's the crazy ones that usually work." ^And some of them just get us in deeper.^

^What would be the fun otherwise?^ Roland send with a mental grin.

Mercedes shook her head. "He's gotten to you too, huh? He thinks he's just another sword-for-hire, but half the immies that come in here worship him, and the other half want to use him somehow or other. I'm just glad he doesn't want me for his half-baked--" Mercedes blinked at Roland's confident stare. "OH, no you don't! I left all that crazy S-O-E stuff behind with the crazy Sons Of Ether! Getting soaked in that quantum solution of Volcano's was _more_ than enough insanity for me."

"Paradox doesn't affect you the way it used to." Roland waved at the Addams Family/Tomorrowland setup in the Stranger. "Come on, Mercedes."

"No."

"I know you want to use your Quantum Effect for more than kitsch."

"NO."

"You were a fangirl before I was born."

"NO!"

"Meet you at the Demise," Roland chuckled, waving off Morgan's gaze with a smile. "My love?" He extended his hand to Morgan.

Morgan sighed. ^Shouldn't we go home for our gear before we go off adventurin'?^

^Well, yes. But we're not going adventuring just yet. We're going recruiting.^ Roland laughed mentally as the two left.

Mercedes groaned. "How does the bloody man DO it?"

* * *

The Demise.

"It's his bloody Destiny, that's what it is," Mercedes muttered, wearing a one-piece sleeveless blue jumpsuit with gold gloves, boots, belt and mask. "Normal mage doesn't stand a chance. It's unfair, is what it is."

Roland and Morgan rezzed into the newly repopulated Spy's Demise, Morgan in her green supers outfit, Roland appearing as Defender. Morgan's hair is blown by a faint, nonexistent breeze.

"Interesting mode of travel," Morgan noted.

"Yeah, I never get tired of VR," Roland replied with a pleased nod. "And this is as good a place as any to start. Hey, Jess!" Roland waved to a perky young bartender.

The bartender smiled and waved back. "Welcome, traveller. Have you been here before under a different icon?"

^Whoops!^ Roland blushed beneath his armor. "Um, yeah. Sorry, Jessica. It's been a long while, and sometimes I forget how much has changed."

Jessica waved off the apology. "Don't worry about it. Superpowers paradigm, right?" she asked, looking over the curiously-dressed threesome.

^How'd she ever guess?^ Morgan noted, amused.

^She's just being polite,^ Roland replied. "Yep. Looking for more gung-ho crazies to try it with us, too. Any Concordians start hanging out here since the reboot?"

Jessica shrugged. "Not many--cyberspace still spooks the Enchanted, more's the pity. But we've got a Bastet with a taste for chocolate in the corner, a pair of duelist Sidhe in the Wyld Myle, and an enchantress whose hair keeps blowing in the wind. In the Demise." Jessica smiled kindly. "Who knows, you might be in luck. Why do you need--"

Before she could continue, however, a dozen creatures that looked like Xenomorph aliens made of electricity stormed the Demise, and started tearing into everything in their considerable reach.

"Nass! Destroids!" Roland snarled, his repaired Phoenix Rod springing to life. "Destroyer always _did_ enjoy keeping his enemies off balance."

TBC...

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