Day 50:Late 60’s ultra death ray! Saddle-operated, with Satan-gearing! If this were a lady, I wouldn’t marry it: Necessitus would. And I’d jeopardize our friendship by ‘indiscreeting’ his hot wife. 23:20; Impounded in a Vigil Alliance Vault, inserted into a retro-fitted black-ops van, specially braced for force, supplied with Bose-Einstein condensate canisters, & below-0 liquid nitrogen tanks, all, for this.
23:25; Not for me, for superhuman capture; that is Vigil. Super-cops like Jeans d’Armes are policed by the Lunar Luminaries, watchers like the Lunar Luminaries are watched by Vigil Alliance & its … friends.
23:30; And, sitting astride the modified Laseradicator, 1 of the 3 heads of the Western Europe Vigil Alliance, (along with Black Forest & Paradigm), none other than the very wonderfully Deadly Light Shade!
23:35; The Deadly Light Shade notes me, notes the time; the singularity ceases. Excelsoar, 1 hour abroad, 1 year(?) experienced, is reeled via a tractor beam, into a liquid nitrogen tank, underneath gun barrel.
23:40; Today a magical witch, a chemical titan & a sorcery/science dryad tried to save me. A very disciplined baseline human succeeded. It fundamentally terrifies me that I stole designs for this woman’s hat.
23:45; Look blankly at TDLS: she looks at me. Then: tell her that P is trapped underneath that collapsed construction. Intellectually she knows P has weathered worse. Emotionally she is momentarily terrified.
23:50; Equilibrium re-established, I’m already unbolting struts to swivel the gun around towards the building, when she decides to use the tractor beam. Rubble is being lifted out in seconds, cleared in minutes.
23:55; Fair is fair, P was almost out. Even had the temerity to chide for taking so long. I would strike her with an empty glove, but she saved me. & I lost my glove. & her girlfriend broke my arm, by accident.
00:00; TDLS (was probably chasing a lead on Necessitus abroad) worried I can see & wishes to make these feelings a little more clear. To oblige her privacy I throw up on her shoes, then faint into a puddle.
07:00; … I’m strapped down, to a bed … naked but for a loincloth … Open holds candle wax an inch over my chest … tells me to recant … No! … Pluto should never have been a planet! …she pours the wax!
07:05; She manages to keep it out of the majority of my chest hair. Picking out the rest, we switch places and I become a nouveaux Inquisitor, to her modern day Galileo. I have missed this, the past few days.
07:10; Arrived at LPR in the early hours of the morning; covered in sewer-muck, Open stripped me herself, then scrubbed me down, thoroughly, then we were arguing about planetary classes. Usual foreplay.
07:15; Familiar with the sewer system (from my tracking of Saniac’s sepulchre & my party days with Mon Sieur) I emerged into the basements of the Paris Library. ‘Library Ann’ let me out at 3 in the morning.
07:20; I am to install the half Marquis de Made, half Saniac mind into a relatively-human body, out of the goodness of my heart & because if the symbiote child isn’t born in 6 months, all my illegalities are told.
07:25; Ah. Deep beneath Paris a purely-computer calculates atomic weights & probabilities … and, if it doesn’t get a message from its brother within a half a year, it will broadcast video & audio of my crimes.
07:30; Not overly worried; the renovated Whitby lab should be up to it. I’ve seen the opposite of this operation – a bio-computer brain, made for an existing body – done, by a friend of mine, on his ‘girlfriend’.
07:35; I dress carefully, in summer-weight Boleskine tweed I’m considering for the Nabilac venture. Ms Deal’s work is magnificent & purloined, as usual. I shall get a chance to air it out; I’m due in court soon.
07:40; Not exactly ‘due’ – I have never myself been sequestered in an impregnable prison, nor laughably called to the witness box. Still, I feel entitled to get good seats, for the Projectionist Protector’s hearing.
07:45; Packed to the rafters, but early attendance, & employment of my stout stick assures Open & I far more than a worm of a seat. Open attends; she wishes to see the enemies of her hero ‘fry like piggies’!
07:50; I commiserate with her that they no longer commit corporal & capital punishments in public as they did when we were younger, with the celebratory barbecue, maypole dancing & flags, for the kiddies.
07:55; She is in a minority; the crowd is for the Projectionist Protectors, if the banners, songs & interpretative dance, are anything to go by. The Mexican wave when the PPs enter is also typical of the French.
08:00; The state prosecutor ducks, dodges, dives, deflects & ducks again a lot of scatological stuff hurled at his head. My own barrage of rotten sun-dried comestibles should impact his ability to hear the trial.
08:05; He seems super-agile; possibly the Jeans d’Armes super-speedster, ‘Le TGV’ in a civilian disguise. Superheroes secretly in the civil service; insanity! Also, everyone else was throwing things at the time.
08:10; Why yes, if everyone else jumped off the Eiffel Tower, I would too; if everyone jumped, the pile would be of sufficient mass to let me ski from top to bottom, sifting the bodies, for cash. Also; I can fly!
08:15; A call of ‘Madame President’ goes out & I momentarily think Sarko has tipped tipsy-silly into transvestitism! But that is a judge’s title here! What was I thinking; Sarko could never pull off those heels!!!
08:20; Joan Justine, resplendant in robe & wig, a guise even more ridiculous than her old ‘Diana D’Ark’ outfit. In ten years, she really will be able to row showboat trials like this into the presidency. Heil J.J.!!!
08:25; A city councillorship position soon, district governorship after that … I see the origami of orchestration in her mind rotating like mobiles made from finger bones. She has a bet going with Hillary Clinton.
08:30: Opening arguments – this trial will run to several weeks of time, & thousands in taxpayers €s. ‘Probably TGV’ develops a twitchy look hyper-agiles get, when their odd neurology processes in real time.
08:35; BORE *pings*. I appear to have absorbed something from ‘Probably TGV’. Might be ill-advised to test this out in a court of law – I don’t want any chaos to start … until I am the invisible ringleader …
08:40; As a measure of preparedness, I wire the new BORE into the projector. Also; justice is boring, but injustice done badly is worse. The PP’s lawyer expects to win; he is hoping to set up a counter-suit.
08:45; Murder cases take months to come to trial. But the PP’s jury-swaying popularity won’t last: the lawyer used the prior cases to argue the state had all the prep it needed – delay draws on the taxpayer …
08:50; We’ve moved onto video of Monochrone & Psylent Film’s capture & Open, engrossed at seeing her idol onscreen, stops doing that thing with her hand that was until now taking my mind off this trial …
08:55; … ‘the camera doesn’t catch me until I’m beating the assassin to the ground … totally missed my promptings of murder’ … I do need to acquire a machine-invisible BORE … getting ‘praise’ all the time …
09:00; … I point the BORE projector out the window, into pedestrian traffic. TGV is a speedster; what could he possibly have up his sleeve that could be overly disruptive? Hopefully, lots and lots of things …
09:05; These high gallery windows give an excellent expanse of foot traffic lab rats below. Picking out a jogger, I engage. Nothing happens. Then he blurs in a burst, doppler-effect doppelgangers in his wake.
09:10; Turned off he stops abruptly as if tripped, probably breaking something important in the fall. All the blood seems to indicate so. Then his arm falls beneath a van. The ambulance made wonderful time …
09:15; … strange though; it isn’t as if this is TGV’s speed ‘ability’. BORE can’t take, or impart physical attributes. Besides, he didn’t run as fast as TGV; the subject’s speed only increased somewhat, not super.
09:20; More interesting; the body exhumed from under the van shows no sign of super-friction on shoes or clothes. Massive lacerations from a brief fall, upper body contusions from the van; no friction burns.
09:25; Quit your blather – he was wearing a pro-PP T-shirt. If he is for vengeance from above, then I’ll oblige, from my high seat. More importantly; I think I have gained a tactile telekinesis BORE from TGV.
09:30; Tactile Telekinesis: ‘Secondary power’; bodies emit a ‘field’ that hovers 1-2 inches above their skin. Anything within that “field” is treated by physics’ caprice as if it were a super’s own invulnerable skin.
09:35; It is the single greatest secondary power: it facilitates the survival of all super types (curses!); cleverly applied, such as with Teflon, can become a power in its own right, free from physical & legal laws!
09:40; Thus their costumes are skin tight, just as invulnerable as they are & less prone to wardrobe malfunctions; like extreme friction burn. Their clothes are only torn when their skin is; great for ‘fight pathos’.
09:45; Capes are brief shields for innocents, hostages can be scooped up at super-speed safely, & planes can be caught by the nose very carelessly, rather than shattering to shreds at such ill-tutored touches.
09:50; Speedsters need this ability the most. They need to lessen friction on their clothes & bodies, yet still get traction on surfaces not designed for high-speed travel. On ice Grease Lightning is a mere spark.
09:55; Next: too high a speed for a given vicosity & collisions have no time to resolve quietly: soft objects begin to behave like hard ones; steel grass blades, glass puddles, buckshot raindrops, shrapnel snow.
10:00; This tactile telekinesis also deals with a paradox of propelling speedsters far faster than bipedally possible, yet anchoring them to the Earth instead of allowing them to achieve escape velocity off-planet.
10:05; For those that exceed light speed (& there are a few of those, walk/running contradictions that they are) this aura processes light by some spectrum to see & stops their shockwaves shattering the crust.
10:10; Oh, yes, Special Relativity doesn’t forbid space moving at light speed, only matter. This field bends space, it seems. Believe me, I wish Relativity forbade postlight: with ropes, chains & big damn sticks.
10:15; Invulnerability to accleration/deceleration g-forces – without immolating like fireworks … allowing runners to ram scoop air into their lungs – without the effect of flying a windshield-less supersonic jet …
10:20; … A very wide range of powers indeed, all to so an ability looks easy. Definitely mental; speedsters all have odd neurologies; reacting at super-speeds, but staying sane in the work-a-day’s ‘slow’ pace.
10:25; This inability to be bored allows them to type millions of combinations or run across continents without becoming tired … or eyes drooping … mind wandering- Hey! Wake up! Must I kill for attention!?
10:30; Obviously I used too many big words.*Sigh* As ‘The Fix’ explains it: ”Lois Lane is falling, accelerating at an initial rate of 32 feet per second per second … Superman swoops down to save her by …”
10:35; ”… reaching out 2 arms of steel … Miss Lane who is now traveling at approximately 120 miles an hour hits them & is immediately sliced into 3 equal pieces … Frankly if he really loved her he would …”
10:40; … ”let her hit the pavement; it’d be a more merciful death!” Yes? Personally, if I knew what ‘Lois Lane’, ‘Superman’ & ‘love’ were, I might actually have an opinion beyond: ‘logic at last! Dashed fiction’!
10:45; Most supes fidget when their powers are discussed like this – a primary reason to do it therefore! If supes overthink their powers, they get obsessed & paranoid: compare it to thinking of one’s organs:
10:50; I am Fitzwilly’s mega-liver … I have built up a tolerance to Gibbering Spider Monkey Poison … I am Fitzwilly’s stomach … I have built up a taste for Gibbering Spider Monkey Poison … Strawberries!
10:55; I work it into my cane – should allow me to fly at high speeds, without collisions and keep me from developing piles … Applications for proximity-triggered friction-shield are quite endless, like this trial!
11:00; Time to end it! Activate invisibility, descend to courtroom floor &, as a doctor, plan to resuscitate a dead man & give the PPs a taste of their own medicine! Invisibility key; still, pity nobody heard that!
11:05; What does The Monochrone fear? Her power & her victims, as does the jury – in that order. Time to use both power & victims to turn those odds to the advantage of truth, justice – haha!, sorry there.
11:10; The probably-TGV prosecutor asks TM if she feels any remorse for her murders. She answers no, my mind-read confirms, but she does feel apprehension; believes in ghosts. Time to make her know.
11:15; Using TM’s own ability, trace image she has of a cabal of spectres falling upon her. Line up Psylent Film’s projection power just as the prosecutor proclaims he intends that dead have their say; my cue!
11:20; Suddenly a circle of 20-foot tall spectres coruscate into the courtroom. Faces of fire, pointing fingers of judgement, voices elliciting shame in all at this sham trial. Guilty! Guilty! Guilty! Turning on jury …
11:25; Quivering in their seats, stench of excrement arisen from their ranks, the jury has their many secret crimes read out to them. Pederasty, imbezzlement, murder, … ”he was your son, you sick, sick fiend!”
11:30; The devils disappear just as I reach my seat. Whole crowd now condemns PPs and jury alike. A few hardcore fans fisticuff each other, Justine attempts to restore order, the audience mobs the floor …
11:35; Total mistrial declared when this is over. But there now isn’t a single juror in Paris who would side with the PPs openly. With a few lies, I have efficiently caused truth to be served up ‘revenge, ice cold’.
11:40; This detailed to Open, I hand her my hat & cane. Developments outside the courtroom have prompted me to visit an … old friend who would rob me blind as himself for such inventions. She kisses me.
11:45; She says ‘thank you’ for jailing her hero’s harrier with wit where justice could not. Intend to say ‘I was doing it for myself’, but she is already gone & I’m still touching my lips. Poison check, o-of course.
11:50; Yes, yes, she can still do that to me. Yes, we explored each other alone & all possible positions together. Its not that I’m unused to ‘thank yous’ from idiots; its from geniuses like her that confuzzles me.
11:55; Hurry now, have to get in before Vespyrs … pulling a Rodrigo Rosenberg Marzano on the French legal system puts one in a praying mood … prey praying to the ultimate genetic predator … interesting.
12:00; The Beast of Our Lady, looking hungry as ever. Earplugs useful in the bell’s roar. He projects into my unshielded mind easily (once lost his vocal chords, & developed telepathy) ‘Why are you here?’ …
12:05; ‘Simple really’, I *oomph* back, ‘I only wish to ask about the ‘breeding program’.’ He laughs, like last time. He admits; he has had 3 children. I counter; he has 3 children in the last 3 Paris occupations.
12:10; Wroth/Man/Lovechild; all relatively recent in genetic terms & Paris has been held more than a penis in prison cell. He has lived much longer than there ever has been a city here. He has birthed nations.
12:15; He asks if this is a crime. Of course not – it isn’t the law and it is my dream. It just adds a piece to an old gene puzzle – time. The puzzle; how do super powers actually work? I mean really, deep down.
12:20; ‘Secondary Powers’. If Someone-Tron is superstrong he is, inevitably, invulnerable, or his muscles would shatter his bones: a pity! Flamers/Freezers are resistant to extremes of heat/cold – or are dead!
12:25; High fliers are very light-bodied, have a lessened need for O2 in high-altitudes & an ability to throw off the chill of the upper atmosphere’s adiabatic lapse rate, and REALLY hard to break their arms …
12:30; Organs shouldn’t survive stretching, force-fields shouldn’t be O2 permeable & those in an intangible phase shift shouldn’t be able to breathe. Until shot with phase-shifting buckshot – THEN they stop …
12:35; In point of fact, one needs at least a half a dozen ancilliary abilities to successfully survive any one such ability. Some would call that ‘fate’. As ‘fate’ might give walking A-bombs high IQs, I call it a ‘con’.
12:40; One can imagine how it might be: a lineage displays successive generations pyromaniacal powers, growing stronger & more articulate with breeding, with occassional short-lived, self-destructive sports.
12:45; It was as such in Chateau Flambeau lordly line. Many such self bred family powers have existed since medieval times, picking up the odd talented peasant for in-breeding &/or summary fiery execution.
12:50; But, even accounting for regular regional droit de seignour, gene pools sport too many terrifically complete genomes of power appearing spontaneously, like a floating scatological brick in a child’s pool.
12:55; *sigh* You are an innocent, aren’t you. Every gene variation available now was present a thousand years ago & shall not be greatly differed by another millennia. These powers aren’t appearing, they …
13:00; … are natural selection discriminating against million-year old mutations! *sigh* you like dogs? Dogs did not evolve from wolves – they were bred! All dog variety genes already existed in elder wolves!
13:05; Ten percent of our DNA – 3400 genes – are variant alleles; alternate gene versions, like blood type, hair colour. It, & ‘junk DNA’ in all of us, contain the full spectrum of biologically-born superpowers.
13:10; Therefore; all these powers existed in potentia for millions of years – yet now, within these modern centuries, and at astronomical odds, each breakthrough has all their ancilliary powers pre-provided …
13:15; … against all laws of biological probability, which I’ve shattered often enough! As every schoolboy knows, provided that their school’s ‘biology’ was not the state-sponsored sex-talk shirk by parents …
13:20; … as it so often is in this pansy post-‘practical-pre-coital-performance’ era. Learning oral sex at my father’s knee, I also learned mutations in DNA take millions of years to be ‘judged’ ‘good’ or ‘bad’ …
13:25; … a speed which today’s legal system could learn a thing or eight from science! But if DNA assessment takes so long, how can full-blown DNA combos come about naturally, so efficiently, ‘recently’ …
13:30; Truth is, they don’t. BOOL has been finding & splicing together unique & obtuse sets of DNA to create well-rounded power bases. For centuries. He looks like has just met a fellow cat breeder in me.
13:35; He tells me of those who could breathe under water, walk through flames or were invulnerable to bullets, and how they were shot, drowned or burned alive, respectively, for their limited invulnerability.
13:40; He tells of those who could breathe in high atmosphere, resist frictions of high speed, weather deep pressures, and how they never were higher than a hill, moved faster than a horse, deeper than a bath.
13:45; He speaks of pyrokinetics who burned themselves alive, seers who saw too much & or they who could move in time but not in space: exploding in the vault of stars, or crushed in the deep of the earth.
13:50; I consider Him carefully, then remind that He once tore a man’s eyes out, ate the balls & made the corpse dance from the optic nerves like a puppet. BOOL is only humanitarian in that He eats humans.
13:55; Splicing powers pre-natally into his children’s genitals or immaculately conceiving offspring with every everyman in this church I have 1 query: Did he bring Excelsoar into the world? He is … inscrutable.
14:00; Departing, feeling exposed & missing the ability to read minds, I ask Him if He believes He is making ‘better’ humans. He considers this. Finally, BOOL comments He is making ‘better tasting’ humans.
14:05; Privately, I add 4 items: There is more than 1 monstermaker in the world. To His genetic, They are no doubt magical, mechanical, radioactive &, already, I really don’t like them & I want to meet them.
14:10; This Parisian parasite is not only a connosieur, He also owns the vineyard. Diversifying flavours, mixing, creating new scents. My kind? Scientists … make bottles, and break bottles. Quite a ‘quandary’.
14:15; He could read my mind. A necessary evil, as well I know. Will He ‘tell’ on me? Doubtful – He wasn’t consulted on Mister Scripts. The supercops hate Him for His fiendish nature & His taste for virgins.
14:20; The Vigils hate Him because of the virgins. The Jeans d’Armes hate Him because BOOL makes them feel- impotent. He gives power in moments of passion & He takes them in moments of disinterest.
14:25; Excelsoar? E lacks tactile telekinesis. Grasped an airplane by the wing, trying to save its passengers. Tore it in half. If BOOL bred E, why lack such a standard superpower? Risked ruining the vintage?
14:30; E would hate BOOL, if he could be made to understand what He does. E would have to reach at least a biology doctorate, specialising in proviruses & mitochrondria to understand, so He is very safe.
14:35; I’ve seen E’s mind. He hates ”normals”, yes, but he hates the other supers more. Discard isolationist angst: If he was the only one of his kind, he would be as a god. Here, E is a great big, blue condom.
14:40; In point of fact – Damn! Damn, damn damn! This suit was new! Some flying fool’s bad landing jittered me … off … my … my … my great Satan … speak of the devil, and *pant* he appears. Excelsoar!
14:45; Uh … Egads! Flee!
14:50; Okay *pant* he doesn’t *pant* appear to be *pant* following me. He is just standing *pant* in that crater *pant* his landing created. Just staring, *pant* at me,*pant* face as blank as infertile sperm.
14:55; Street of distance & Excelsoar remains unfazed. Smiling. Happy. How horrible. Well, perhaps the moron smile & bad landing infer mass loss of E’s already absent faculties. I’ll just nip down to the left-
15:00; Great Sir Walter Scott! That car is heavy! The people inside are a neglible ballast, particularly now that the impact has pulped them, but still it would be inefficient to move for my escape. Off, the right-
15:05; Shy Bizarro Oscar Wilde! That Italian truck’s size is only surpassed by the cargo of German washing machines it spills upon the road. The Swedish driver’s splat is of little consequence. Pry a sewergr-
15:10; Brain-Jane Austentacious! E tosses a washing machine in my personal space as I try to squeeze down a drain or unscrew a man-hole. I miss my staves, Mechanical or BORE , for screwing man-holes.
15:15; Charcoalotte Brontosaurus! Neanderthal brute cornered me like an intellectual mastodon in a pit of physical-strength-fuelled mental-mediocrity! In the name of invisible elephant avenger Triumphant I-
15:20; And now Excelsoar has finally focused enough to come kill me. I make a break for the restauraunts on the side of the street – perhaps I can cut through one through to the other side – escape this fool-
15:25; Note Reads: ”Have closed to see the PP trial, a deciding judgement in the restauraunt industry. Have taken in-house ninja to trial. If the PPs lose, we’ll all probably go out drinking. All day. Goodbye!”
15:30; Never has I been so absolutely hoisted upon my own petard. As punishing Excelsoar & the Projectionist Protectors, while fun, were also ‘good deeds’, I think this decides my never helping, ever again!
15:35; All my techtoys are in Whitby. All my BOREs are back in LPR. Even breaking into a restauraunt would provide a small television & microwave – visible light spectrum wave cannon parts. No time to-
15:40; I turn at his touchdown. Still leaping rather than flying, still smiling. He isn’t going to hold back; control simply isn’t in his featureless face now. His fist will skewer me like 3 homosexuals in a public toilet.
15:45; Fist draws back. I think of Open. Probably means I’m in love with her. Or I really wish she’d pop up with my hat & cane. Or I regret incensing this fool to save her bordello. I don’t have time to think…
15:50; … Then E’s hand is wrapped in pink string at swing’s apex. Few moments; manly-pink muscle explodes in liquid fire. E’s permanently dazed state shifts not at the pain, but when fire splashes in his eyes.
15:55; The classic retort to restrictive string follows; yanking in the offender for a punch. The attacker leaps at Excelsoar’s at this, ablaze, both now wreathed in flame; an elastic kamikaze riposte in cartoon-fu.
16:00; I sit down a moment. No, I hide behind a car. I have my pistol; might as well be rubber bullets. Excelsoar closed off the upper street at his back, before advancing. I roll my lockpicks out & start work.
16:05; Currently working on access to ‘Les Girondins’ which, according to the note on the door, has a mummy guardian, since the PPs started raiding, along with barred windows & exceptional locked doors.
16:10; Odd. I’m getting a lot more time to lock pick than I expected. Had assumed the attacker to be a passerby – seems to be holding his own, the warty bombardier. Still, keep picking; he isn’t that good …
16:15; Finally! Broke apart from a fiery embrace. Aha! This batractian bunsen burner, swinging from an elongated threadbare tongue overhead, hurling plasma fire balls from his webbed fingers, is Krakatoad!
16:20; Grandfather: French diver Frogman. Father: the masked adventurer Salamandrake. Mother: English civil writer Charcoalotte Brontosaurus. Brother: Electrical manipulator, known as The Brontosaurus.
16:25; Current affliation: Les Jeunes d’Armes, their third strongest member. Well it was convenient that-
16:30; -Convenient like heart attacks in prospective organ donors! He released E from his Chrono holding cell in the middle of his psych review; still reduced to the level of an infant!! Well, moreso an infant!!!
16:35; E’s confinement care must have been tendered to this adolescent idiot. At E’s current mental level, nothing exists but the id of the kill and the instinct of revenge. Revenge upon me. Drat that Krakatoad!
16:40; Innate acrobatics & well placed plasma balls (extruded from KT’s body FlameBoils) shan’t save me. E still can’t (won’t) fly, but KT was just concussed by E: a car. Girondin’s locks are many & good.
16:45; Ah! Good show! E leaned over, viced KT’s lips shut with a single hand, then squeezed the amphibian fire-eater’s bulging cheeks (his main methane gas reservoirs): Blowback! Bad for KT & I, but still-
16:50; -Here they come. Jeunes d’Armes no.s 1 & 2, in no particular order: Sabrianna, aka ”Witchgirl – Teen Hero of Justice” & Allen, aka ”Spaceboy – Emissary & Ally From Another World”. Good grief.
16:55; Didn’t hope for a Jeans d’Armes rescue – I had expected them to clean up their mess. Instead of the adults I get … what teen dramas do the kids today talk about at the box socials, or what-have-you?
17:00; Oh, lord, don’t they have an ongoing graphic novel? & podcasts. *Sigh* this will be a ‘team-building’ story; quirky animalist comic relief releases madman, kills me, gets recaptured – all have ice-cream.
17:05; I know J.J. hates the concept of youth-group supes; she was in the Jeunes d’Armes herself from pre-teens. Though I hear, for all her teen idol act, Sabrianna has a solid, JJ-style, head on her shoulders.
17:10; Descending on broomstick, I recall ‘The Fix’ described S as ‘Sexy schoolgirl plaid skirt & pointy Hermoine Granger hat’ mix. Don’t know who that is: a minion of ‘mind-control’ Rowling’s? So: Maybe?
17:15; As for sexy schoolgirl, why would schoolgirls be sexy? They are by definition thoroughly under-educated & inexperienced. Silly fetishes! Still, as president of the Witchgirl US fanclub, The Fix had info.
17:20; A fated birth … cross-discipline powers … princess of a lost kingdom … daughter of star … DAMN MAGIC! This lock must have magic seals on the lockplate opposite. Curse you, … unseen mummy!
17:25; Spaceboy? What about him? Prince, from another galaxy! Ambassador from beyond, learning our ways & customs, resembles a unitarded ‘Edward Cullen’, I am told! He has a website! I’m busy here!
17:30; Witchgirl tying E in glowing golden ribbons, while Spaceboy, in a bubble helmet & jetpack, is shooting multi-coloured lasers. Either it isn’t going well, or they are having an impromptu celebratory disco.
17:35; Not surprised about the lasers – E has taken his share of those in any number of extraterrestrial fisticuffs – but the magical invulnerability wasn’t something I knew about. Egyptian lineage claim, possibly.
17:40; Door is set to Henderson’s Itemised Combination! Wave a certain string of items in front of it, as well as keying the lock, it opens. The company’s standard combo should have been changed by owner.
17:45; But apparently hasn’t been! Gordian Knot Co recommends individualised combos – then charges a fortune for the reset! Lets see … yes! Siguls of light pulsed at the flash of a €5 note!! Combo 1564!!!
17:50; Indefatigabella’s Sequence! Why, yes, I did work that out in 5 minutes … because it was only 1 of the few possible pre-set combinations whose starter symbol I have on my person. Only sort-of lucky.
17:55; Sort-of lucky: sequence siguls 2-8 require a reddish-green light, a cat’s kiss, a jaunty flute tune, cheesy smells, sprinkled salt, gold & north winds blown through a blonde girl’s hair as she holds a mouse.
18:00; Yes, owners carry gladstone bags of very specific contents when such a lock is set. Not lightly locked, only in exigency … such as when he & all his neighbours are absent. Presumably, he rents the girl.
18:05; Then E careens through the door. The locks holds well – not so the doorjamb. Appears he intended to smite me, was smitten by the kitten with the ribbon whipped around his leg. S is yanked: she falls.
18:10; My, quite a headwound under her hat. Under the guise of applying Witchgirl’s own Rhythmic-Gymnastic ribbons her gushing cut, I observe Spaceboy fire laser round after round, at E, inside Girondins.
18:15; The only change to the prior fires is that the moody darkness inside the restauraunt & its recently deconstructed decor give the ineffectual light show the appearance of a homosexual celebratory disco!
18:20; I bandage over Witchgirl’s eyes, grip Spaceboy’s fishbowl helmet by the zigzag antenna & shake it swiftly, concussing him off of the inner walls, throw his jet pack into the restauraunt, shoot with laser!!
18:25; Intrinsic magics of windows & walls contain the blast, causing building to implode, rather than explode. A vent of fire out of the open doorway blasts the pubescent paragons of law up, up, and away!!!
18:30; Leaping wreckage & I am flushed into a police cordon *pant* where nobody knows me, offer help *pant* hence, I prefer supervillainy without a cape *pant* they might slow Excelsoar down, a little.
18:35; In scene of strength, no doubt inspirational *pant* if E wasn’t about to kill me *pant* his rubble-studded fist punches up through the brick-&-mortar bulge *pant* promptly beginning to dig himself out.
18:40; Saw E’s kind of rage fought before *pant* various of my employers took hostages *pant* metal doesn’t work – stronger than any metal *pant* riddles don’t work – too stupid *pant* too unstoppable!
18:45; If I can just get to *pant* Rue Belgique … in time … wait … is he gone? He isn’t behind me *pant* I’m almost there *pant* And … and then … and then there is a triangular shadow over my shoulder …
18:50; Like *pant* a rabbit in the grass under a hawk’s gaze *pant* a turtle in the eagle’s shade *pant* coyote beneath the boulder’s silhouette … he descends, having giant-leapt the tall building between us …
18:55; I turn … Excelsoar is at my shoulder’s height & a finger’s breadth distance. I try the useless laser; that I was frightened enough to try it scares me, more than Excelsoar does: He kills me, soul then body.
19:00; …
19:05; …
19:10; …
19:15; Dr. Morningstar calls a supertrouncing ‘the car crash that keeps happening’. Nothing but shock is processed. One doesn’t feel, until later – or not all. Classic pose: E holds a car, over his head, over me.
19:20; Car boot contents shift: E adjusts his hold. A bolt of white impacts upon E from the right so cleanly that car hangs in air absurdly, then drops harmlessly. With a voice like gargled glass, I say: thank you.
19:25; I sit up gamely – legs aren’t currently good for much else. Excelsoar has been driven through street & tarmac, pipes & wires, into the sewer. My rescuer: that angel, that goddess, The Mighty Paradigm!
19:30; Warrior angel on the jagged mouth of hell, I can just see sufficiently past P’s legs to the hole into hades, where E lies lengthwise, in ankle-deep eau de toilette. E is looks angry, looking a little … flushed.
19:35; An explosion of aqua! Excelsoar’s seizes the non-Mendeleevian element of surprise – choke hold! – inertia accelerating E&P into a nearby brownstone. Maybe the water powers weren’t entirely bunk.
19:40; I hate ringside seats to these debacles when I am without defences, video cameras & popcorn. Everything moves too fast, like an adolescent losing his virginity. I crawl, up steps of an adjacent building.
19:45; Paradigm is stronger & Excelsoar’s intellectual infirmity seems to have barred higher powers, like flight, but still – Plan A awaits! On this one occassion, I approve of disabled ramps on a public building.
19:50; P won’t kill & E, right now, will. Oh, she IS winning. That hand around her throat? Wriggled free, while holding the forearm in one hand & the upper arm in the crook of her elbow, – twist! Magnificent!
19:55; He screams. Her left fist comes up in a double stacatto, then a foot that must feel like teak twangs E behind the ear at roughly the speed of sound. Killing blow! KILLING BLOW! She! Speaks to him!
20:00; An avuncular abandoned insurance agency they impacted into is imploding. Out of pain, now, Excelsoar whips out blindly, shatters foyer support struts, load-bearing walls. It sinks down into the street.
20:05; The earlier sewer strata separation has compromised the architectural integrity of that area. The entire edifice goes down like a drunk secretary on his boss. I begin picking the lock behind me – quickly!
20:10; The semi-submerged hillock, a mound of earth pregnant with possibility & ruin, begins to shake. P: rendered unconscious by the events prior? E now has no pre/sub/unconsciousness to which to revert.
20:15; Lock unlocked just as a blue sleeve, Paradigm herself designed, breaches an earth birth once again. I stumble inside, careful on cracking joints, raid the Paris Library’s shelves, sit down to read in quiet.
20:20; C 34: ‘For the 1 the front mouth gripped, the teeth were as nothing to the claws, which sliced & tore the skin, until his back was stripped. That soul, my Master said, who suffers most is Judas Iscariot’.
20:25; Front doors shatter, behind I. ‘Head locked inside, he flails his legs. Of the other 2 who twist with their heads down the black mouth, holds the shade of Brutus, writhing, but not a word will he scream’.
20:30; ‘Cassius is the sinewy one, on the other side. But night is rising again, and it is time that we depart, for we have seen the whole’. A hand wrenches Dante’s Cantos from my mine, tears the spine. *Gulp*
20:35; Excelsoar’s face – bruised, broken in places. Excelsoar’s expression – pure rage, insane. Excelsoar’s eyes – blank, grey. Then, flying in the face of theology, a sinner such as myself, receives a 3rd angel.
20:40; Did I say Library Ann was beautiful? No? Still, inadequate. A deity in dame’s clothing. More beautiful than Open? Right now … perhaps, but only in that Open might leave me for this Ann in an instant.
20:45; That ‘a-single-second-from-stripping’ effect I mentioned, before? It blooms, now. Shirt undone, tie loosened, blazer unbuttoned, glasses down to the dip her nose, Ann asks E not to ‘bruise’ her books.
20:50; If E was in possession of full faculties, E’d do whatever she told him. She is … dazzling him, as is her kind’s prime most power. But E is far too far deep in his psyche to be touched. He swats her aside.
20:55; Hat crumpled to a concertina clump, jacket sleeve severed, spats torn & spattered. E grips me firmly by my lapels, pulling me up & my jacket’s back apart. Mental note: summer-weight fabric is weak.
21:00; A plant vine, with the sledgehammer strength of mychronoids breaching a cement pavement, wraps around E’s throat, draws him back. I go flying, wishing life was what I did instead of had done to me.
21:05; ‘Deity’ is inaccurate for Ann, as is ‘angel’. ‘Dryad’, really. Tree spirit: insectile & reptile varieties, South American & African jungles. Depending on species: tree’s protector, or bait for man-eating plants.
21:10; First line of defence is beauty – pheromones, neuroendinocrinology, ‘glamour’. Second line is sheer, destructive, strength. Her eyes become segmented, faceted, her face thin & triangular: Ann is shown.
21:15; Strong, tendril-thick & whip-quick fingers hold E in a boneless embrace. My guess? Ann’s mother laid her eggs in a redwood … which was a Paris Library shelf by the time Ann herself awoke, to duty.
21:20; Probably would have slaughtered the staff as tree-killers, except Marshall Lore must have been reading there. Using his elohim algebra of place & purpose, he redefined ‘sexy dryad’ into ‘invisible lady’.
21:25; The glamour became invisibility, the runes tattooed upon her entrusting her to protect the paper her tree had become. Lore no doubt recommended her to the Bookpimp, to protect books, by midnight.
21:30; Except tonight: She told me, early this morning that the Bookpimp’s night shift had closed up, ostensibly preparing for a new location, but in reality prepping to hunt Dr. Nation, newest 30-day defaulter.
21:35; A risk to rely she still would be in the Library, true – without BORE, she was invisible to me. Taking my life, & a particularly South-American smelling book, in my hands, I decided to … daftly wager it.
21:40; I exit by the main door’s dearth, limping to an ambulance parked outside. Dark, cold & rail slippery in my hands, I am glad things work in threes & thankful for the death of trees. Then! E is free, again!
21:45; He has wrestled free of her ferocious fronds. Part of his cape; fizzles with Ann’s acid. Part of his neck; scored with ugly red puckers. His mask; torn off, don’t know whether it was him, or her. I: … run.
21:50; I fall, down the steps he takes one at a time. I crawl, across the concrete his feet effortlessly dent. I wrench, useless, at the back doors of the ambulance he does not need. That E will never, ever, need.
21:55; Somewhere Witchgirl’s eyes are still blindly bandaged. Paradigm is still unconscious under a building. Library Ann is still bound by books to the library; she cannot get out, without the Bookpimp work.
22:00; Street swells with water from a building-blocked sewer. Quiet splash of E’s feet approach. Police cordons far too far away. Am about laser the van doors open only to see … its seams seem all wrong?
22:05; The laser blast glances off the panels, not so much as streaking the paintwork. The doors open with pressurised force, breaking my arm and knocking me aside. From below, I see the van’s steel struts.
22:10; Steel supports, drilled into asphalt. From gutter, I notice the shape of the entire automobile is wrong for an ambulance. A whirr of minor motors & a cannonhead is birthed from van’s now-open behind.
22:15; A rectangular barrel: I think rail gun, for a moment. Then: the energy canisters along its length signify Laseradicator. It preps a moment, then a red dot appears upon Excelsoar’s chest, in the central ‘E’.
22:20; He looks, then laughs. It is long, lonely thing from the man who believes himself to be most powerful in the world. He may believe his enemy believed it would hurt him. Just the targeting array … I think.
22:25; Still, I can’t imagine a Laseradicator doing E much harm. He wouldn’t exactly take it on the chin, but it wouldn’t end this. Then, over the scent of my blood(!), I smell Bose-Einstein condensate in the air.
22:30; A laser in the megawatt range using a light-bending condenser ether … I struggle out of the blast radius & into a good viewing spot. Only 1 person could have arranged this; she deserves total attention!
22:35; To make a wormhole in time, one bends space. Mass is curved space – light has energy, can act like mass. A circular beam of light takes great energy … unless, the light is slowed: with BE condensate.
22:40; A Bose-Einstein condensate: degenerate form of matter, occurs at absolute 0, atomic contents all in identical superfluid quantum state, with 0 viscosity. Here, my broken teeth chatter, in pure adoration.
22:45: The light only gains inertia as it slows, more energy for less effort. The bent-light circle time machine of Mallett traces a helical world-line … going back in time until the traveller exits the loop, in the past.
22:50; Looked into it as a time machine, but limitation: the machine cannot go back further in time than the date on which it was built – the timepod would be deconstructed in the attempt, killing the traveller …
22:55; … because the only way to overcome would be to externalise the machine from the process, leaving the traveller exposed to the vaccuum of the void – staying still, the earth moves out, into outer space.
23:00; Therefore, the only a man invulnerable to vaccuum, able to breathe in space, would survive such a trip. I presume Excelsoar can – he has been in the centre of the singularity for the past thirty minutes …
23:05; The water frozen, the condensate smell everywhere, a coccoon of light hangs in front of the gun barrel, a silk line of light, twisted around E. Between the light-line & E is the dead, deep, dark, of space.
23:10; E is suspended in space & moving in time, along the earth’s invisible orbit around the Sun. Experientially, E could have spent a year, hanging in space, in these past 40 minutes. Can he starve? Hope so!
23:15; Laseradicator:
Defcon Magenta!
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