49

It is 2 weeks later

Kate and the others are questioned but mostly released

School resumes tomorrow

Gabe has not shown up.  This seems important

Our search indicates that the Grail has him.  But who knows where they are

While looking for Gabe, we stop a robbery

We meet Oliver North, Major Thefts division

We go looking for a black market magic weapons dealer named "Midnight"

We disable the alarms and enter Midnight's warehouse

Molly Midnight

She uses Eclipse King for deliveries

Detective North wants us to look into some burglaries

Shows signs of powers in the course of the crimes

Shock suggests it was Blackhawk

Next morning: school

Bear has changed

Shock and Robyn make a date for Friday night

We're all going to Bear's on Sunday for schoolwork

We go to Eclipse Phase to see the King

 

50

Ms Ward is unreasonable

We remonstrate with her and her minions

She is persuaded to talk

She wants a deal in exchange, but we don't agree

She tells us where King should be

It's at a Mars facility, very high security

We meet Roland, a flunkie of the King's

He directs us to an old church.  We go check it out

It's totally a Grail Base.

We storm it. Subtle-like

Shock area blasts lots of guys

Oh look, Raphael and Ethan

Raph is tough.  Ethan, not so much

DOOMSQUID 2.0

Free Gabe

And in one of the cells: Kate!?

 

51

There are two Kates

This seems bad

We give Dupli-Kate to the cops

Run some tests - seems like the same person

Silver residue from fingerprints of this one, though

Next morning, I talk to Gabe

Kate had been there a long time - maybe since the Storm?

We re-confirm for the weekend with Bear

He's kind of into the assignment

And he's a good artist

Robyn is pleased to see Gabe

Dupli-Kate's last memory is the Storm

I check on Croak

He is going into care & counselling services

Make an appointment to see Mars about Croak.  Would prefer if I had other options, but I don't.

Detective North calls Shock

Re: the burglaries.  Diplomat's place was hit

I do the patrol thing.  It actually does some good

I ask Ms Ward about swapping some fighting tips

She wants 24 hours to think about it

Robyn has conspicuous new wealth

Bear's experienced steroid induced brain enhancement

Remember kids: don't do drugs

I go see Mars

Shock waits for her date

Then she sees burglars breaking into Mars tower

They throw me out of the building

 

52

PopCat throws me into another building

I go back in and give Shock an excuse not to get involved

Robyn rakes charge of Shock

She wants Shock's computer so she can hack into Mars

Meanwhile, Mars is being robbed

Oh joy, it's one of the Vanguard stooges (Lockdown)

Burglars are GRAB:

    Defenestrator: density control

    PopCat: teleporting martial artist

    BlueJay: power armour

    Hummingbird: psychic Janet van Dyne

Lockdown and I look for bad guys

Shock and Robyn spot them in Mars's bedroom

Shock sets off all the alarms there

Robyn wants to know how.  Shock lies.  It doesn't go well

At least now Shock can join the fight

Which she does with ball lightning

Lockdown is useless of course, and gets mind controlled

I KO PopCat

GRAB do a runner.  Shock chases Defenestrator

I KO Lackbrain - I mean, Lockdown

Defenestrator escapes, injuring Robyn en route

Mars turns it into a press conference

After, I ask him to help find Croak a job

Mars wants closer integration between us and the Three Stooges.  No chance

He agrees to arrange a job anyway

Robyn has been evac'd by a Mars medical team

Babbage (Mars's computer) won't tell Kris where Robyn has been taken

 

53

Shock mopes

I have coffee with Bear

Bear suggests I talk to Robyn

First I talk to Shock: "Tell Robyn about your powers or stay away from her"

Shock agrees

It gets cold in there, so I suit up

Shock didn't bring her costume, she so fritzes out the cameras in a store and bags a ski mask

Chilly McFreeze (aka Glacier but who cares)

I attempt to persuade him to be nice

Shock tries to sneak up on him

Both fail, so we beat him up

Shock finds a power amp in the fountain but can't disconnect it so we inform the authorities and leave it to them

Later, we go to Bear's for rehearsal

His mother is worried about him.  I promise to look out for him

Bear engineers a situation for Kris and Robyn to talk 

Yeah, like that will work

As we leave, there is discussion of the formal

Me: "If we go, a supervillain will attack."

Kris: "No they won't."

Robyn: "Yeah, they will."

Kris: "No they -"

We get attacked.

 

54

I catch the flying car and put it down gently

Robyn sees me

Shock: "Oh @#$% it."

Robyn now knows about both of us

The source of the commotion is Donnie More

He's a biker with density/strength powers

I politely ask him to desist

He calls himself Anvil

He refuses to be reasonable

We bludgeon and (more effectively) blast him into submission

Metaswat shows up and I hand Anvil over

Guy in charge is Anderson

He's "Looking forward to working with (us)."

Robyn has disappeared

Shock sends her a text which will be misinterpreted

Ms Ward turns down my offer from the day before

I patrol, then text Robyn.  She asks to meet

I maybe persuade her give Kris a chance

On reflection, this was probably poor judgement on my part

Next day I call the authorities to check on Kate(s)

Demon-Kate has no soul.  No ideas why

No ideas why there are two Kates, either

They need Black to come in and take a look

I let Gabe know that Robyn knows about us

Then I check on Kris.  She blubs a lot

We have pancakes

 

55

We give our performance at school

Bear and I give Shock and Robyn some space

Bear wants me to go to the formal so he has someone to talk to

Kris and Robyn are awkward

It is not adorable

Robyn has issues with the superhero thing

Some of them make as much sense as Kris normally does, frankly

We all go for frozen custard

I chat to Gabe

A day passes

Gabe calls Kris

He complains about her not coming to training

And about her 'letting' me patrol alone

She comes out on patrol

We stop a purse snatcher

The victim gives me her card, which will do her no good at all

I check in on possible attacks against the school formal

And yeah, someone has hired powered mercs

To kidnap a student

We have at least a dozen potential targets

Robyn takes the news poorly

 

56

Shock talks to Gabe about training

Gabe learns she is not attending the formal (me either)

Shock comes over to spar. She's getting pretty good

We rest up for the evening's exertions

Later, we take up position on the clock tower

Oh look, an attack

I send Shock directly in and go save Cross and Wright

Then I head to join her

It's Black Taffy Jones II

With Infernoa and Funkasaurus

Our writer is a hack

They attack Shock

I come in through the roof, setting off the sprinklers as I do

They're after Bear, of course

BTJ claims he has a detonator for corrosive taffy

Shock disables it

The bad guys are scripted to get away with Bear, which makes this all rather pointless dice rolling

We do capture BTJ and Funkasaurus though

Figure Bear's kidnapping has to do with the steroids he was given

That means Rook Industries

We pretend we're not going there

Cross pretends to believe us

 

57

We check Bear's medical records

And get a contact point at Rook Industries: Dr Mike Racine

We go to Racine's place

We totally don't break in

His computer has been wiped but Shock manages to recover stuff

We head to Rook Industries

We turn off power to the block and then fgo for the generator

We head for the terminal where Racine's laptop was wiped

We gently incapacitate the tech guy there

User "chaos theory" sent the virus

Call Robyn.  She knows about "chaos theory"

Patrick Riggs is the guy - that's our tech

We question him.  He calls Stephen Kale, his boss

We agree to meet Kale

Kale and Riggs thinks Racine took Bear

They claim not to know about human testing

They also claim MarsTech was involved in the project

Racine will need specialised tech to continue work

They suspect Racine has kidnapped a lab assistant named Ernest Tilly

Meanwhile, Funkasaurus and BTJ were busted out of custody by Boombox II

Because last session's fight wasn't pointless enough already

 

58

The most likely person to have info is Molly Midnight

We break into her place, KO the guards, and text chat her

She is not happy

But she tells us about Hassan Gabsi to make us go away

He deals in medical tech down near the airport

He's likely to have powered henchmen

Shock pulls the Racine data out of Gabsi's system and covers her cybertracks

Gabsi circumvented, we head to Racine's lair

Boombox II is on overwatch

Shock takes on Boombox while I bump into Funkasaurus

It starts poorly, but we do take out Boombox

Shock detects electrical stuff and turns it off

Oh look, BTJ and Disco Inferno

I KO Funkasaurus; the other costumed villains run

Shock KO's Racine, grabs Bear, and gets out

And then we graduate