Comics by Shaenon II

On Mars

Andrew glanced up, recovering a little from seeing Herr apparently *die* for a moment. They were still inside, but there was an apparently aesthetic kind of sunroof- too high up to climb to. As it happened, there was indeed a rocket heading towards them. Sort of a strange design, though... all sleek black, with rings of glowing blue...?

Xerox raised an eyebrow, and slooooowly stepped back out of the way of the ceiling. He knew that style... not only had be had to face countless UFO's styled the same, only to see a sleek figure drop out at teh last second on a hoverboard, but he had registered that very pattern for 'Villainous Trademark' on the inter dimensional moving papers.

"Son of a gun... Rad Atomic? Crap- get the hell outta the way! He can;t build rockets for love or money. Not that he hasn't tried." he glanced slightly at Chic, before yanking a confused Zanshitai back. Sheesh. Ancient jappanese spirits- you;d think they were immortal.

...okay, so they probably were, but he was sure it was a waste of energy for them to rez.

-Eta!-

Eta made a frustrated noise, and immediately leapt after Claire- his natural magic welling out of him to protect him from the dangers of the Fabric of Reality. He was to take care of Claire! She was his Comrade, and even though he was getting sleepy and knew he needed hsi nap soon, he was going to follow up on it!

He ignored the twisting reality around him to follow claire, even when the determined looking Hamster wandered past him. What *did* catch his attention, however, was the energy spike and the sounds of little 'meefs'...

Just off to the side was a section of what appeared to be flat land- carpeting?- where a young man sat cross-legged, playing with a large number of little hamsters. The young man was of average height, with long brown hair and a pale complexion, with sprays of freckles. He was dressed in soft cotton shirts and trousers in blue and brown (respectively), with no shoes, and would have seemed normal but for playing with hamsters in the middle of reality made tangient...

...exept, maybe, the fact that his *eyes* were kaleidoscopes of light as he looked up, and waved

"Hi Claire! Hi Eta! Have we met yet? I forget. Wanna play with my hammies?"

-Fredric-
Fredric carefully spiraled up into the sky, beating his wings slowly and extending them to an optimal wingspan for his size, reducing his density carefuly to not waste energy. Now, where was Micheal...?

"Hi, Mister Danny! I don't remember if we've met yet either... you're just a Eldrich horror, right, and not an evil plant person? I think that's what Nega-Grandma said..."

Oops. She also mentioned that she was trying to make sure he didn't know she existed... or something. I think. Nega-Grandma is confusing.

I look at the hammies and my stomach growls. They just look bite-sized... But I'm not supposed to eat Danny's hammies, he is... sigh.

"Oh, hi Eta! You did come! We should get ice cream. I think. Where are we again?" I look back. Raw fabric of reality, infinite time... oh, outside of time again. I don't think there's ice cream here. Darn.

I wonder what Danny's doing here, anyway. Playing with hammies, I guess. Although I think he's supposed to eat them instead and now they're making me hungry.

"Mister Danny, do you know the way back to the posi-verse? Except I'm not so good at going most ways. And I think I've lost my way. Or are all ways around here your way?"

-Michael in the Future!-

Thankfully, his jerk-future self at least allowed him to borrow some tools and soup up the time machine to meet his own standards.

However, about five minutes into it, he started feeling sleepy and woozy. "Oh... right... they hit me with a sedative patch or somethings..."

He fell over faster than a young child trying to stay up past naptime.

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-Back in the past, a few minutes after Michael left-

The time machine reappeared in the air nearby Frederic, and a much more properly rested Michael reached out, brusquely grabbed Frederic by the wings (he would have been more gentle, but they were simply the most convenient handle to utilize at the time, and while Frederic wouldn't fall, the time machine WOULD.) and pulled him in. Then, he turned back to the controls, and began pushing buttons and pulling levers. "This temporal bout of shenanigans has gone on far enough, don't you think?"

Well, that's what Michael MEANT to say, but in reality it turned out to be a series of muffled mrrphs and growls, as he found that he had been, somewhat unsuccessfully, to bite into Frederic's neck. He didn't even notice until his incisors started to ache.

He paused, pushed himself back off of Frederic, and composed himself. "Err...um...sorry about that." He looked a bit sheepish, a rarity for Michael. "Long story short, I touched a Toppings Machine and ended up in a future where a crazy vampiric virus had spread through humanity, causing desolation and destruction and chaos. I got bit and now if I taste blood in the next few weeks before my body's immune system purges the infection, the changes kinda become permanent and I go crazy and super-evil. So now until I get done with that immune system thing, I have a whole mess of predatory urges I don't really need. I keep MEANING to put myself in Quarantine, but the issue with Jennifer being what it is..." he let himself trail off. "... well, suffice to say when I return to find one of my two closest and best friends has gone missing and I'm not allowed to see them again ever, I get a bit testy. If it had been YOU, I probably would have declared war on your extended family and kept up on it until the remaining survivors let me spend time with you again."

Actually, that had also been his Plan A with Jennifer too, but the second Frederic had mentioned just trying to FIND her, he had decided that might be the more level headed option.

The time machine vanished again, carrying Michael and Frederic forward to about twenty minutes after they left the present. Michael paused. "Ok... now time for phase two. We need to find someone who can do divination magic easily and naturally, so either you or the fairy I've been monitoring in Xyon, depending on if you're good at it or not... We also need to rendezvous with Demothesis, so we can collect the hair and bring him along with us."

Michael had built a device to monitor fae activity in the world ever since he'd heard of a group of meddlesome fairies who had appeared in Xyon and caused trouble a little while ago. He had hated the idea of someone trying that on him, so he had decided to build a device to monitor fae Activity that he could use to give himself early warning. It hadn't been a very big success, but at the very least it worked... kinda...

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-The Rocket Ship-

The rocket ship continued to crash towards Tinker's location in the martian complex, and then at the last moment abruptly swerved, crashing into a room nearby them.

There was a horrible din.

A few moments later, there was a loud "THUD"ing sound against a wall nearby the group of Mads. Then, a moment later, Richard Toboz burst THROUGH the wall, his fist firmly connected to the jaw of a Martian army guard who was flying through the wall with him.

Richard stood over the unconscious body of his foe, seemingly not noticing the group yet, and cradeled his fist, which was now bleeding. He was pretty sure the exerted tension from the blow had cracked a knuckle. "Urhg... if I'm going to keep punching people through walls, I really DO have to buy some gloves to reduce the rebounding impact on my fists... at least until I increase my bone density."

Ariel looked at David for a long moment. Then, unexpectedly, she smiled.

"I understand," she said. "By my calculations, there are quite a number of your 'doppelgängers' on Earth right now, and more are being made. It is having surprising effects on financial markets— I was trading stocks when you came to the door."

She continued, "You are right in surmising that I have access to some of SoItBegins's old designs. I cannot take the risk, however, of releasing them to anyone."

David said, "But—", but Ariel wasn't finished.
"Instead, since you believe the magnitude of this threat to be so great, I will recreate and use the product of the designs... myself."

She looked up at the two figures. "This will take a large span of time. Please, come in! I will need your help at several stages of construction. Do not worry about the traps. I will deactivate them for you."

She looked at Lady Drezebel, who was grinning slightly. "Lady Drezebel: Be warned," she said, "if any artistic activity of any kind takes place while you are in this house, I will instruct the security system to turn you into a potato."

Stepping back, Ariel made a space for the two to enter.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

In the past, the disappearance of Michael had had a quieting effect on the Fangirls... if they were really fangirls at all. In the silence, one finally said,

"Damn."

The leader turned back to face the group.

"I heard that-- stay in persona at all times!" she said. "Now: does everyone have your Temporal Emergency Return device?"

A chorus of 'yes'es, and one 'no'.

"OK. Everyone, time to head back to the present. Whoever said 'no', you're with me— we'll have to double. We'll try to capture our target again once we've regrouped."

Silence from the watching girls.

"Oh, and good luck. This method of return is not for the faint of heart..."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

On Mars, the group (unknowingly) were only a few rooms away from the main hangar. With plenty of ships, including Ri-Xean's personal Airthrone, with Gold-Chromite outer plating.

The two guards responsible for the hangar were sitting at a table, guarding. At least, that's what they would have said they were doing.

<"I drew a two. That makes a Django set."> said the first guard to the second. The second guard groaned.
<<"Aaaaaaaagh!... if I had your luck... forget the game. Shouldn't we be guarding?">>


<"We are guarding. I mean, the table we're sitting in is right next to the door...">

<<"I suppose you're right, but it just doesn't feel--">>

<"...and if someone gets past us, they'll have to deal with all the traps scattered about the hanger."> The first guard pointed. <"See... there's the one that makes intruders fall up to the spikes on the ceiling! And there's the one with the hidden acidic quicksand pit! And—">

<<"Not so loud! Do you want everybody to hear? We'll just have to hope all the other traps are as good.">>

<"Oh, they are. I was once mauled by a creature that was pretending to be—">

<<"Shut. Up.">>

<"All right, all right... but hey, the point is this: We're here. The ship is protected.
What could possibly go wrong?">

The Slimes!

S-Jess and S-Chic spring as one at Jane Narbon. Who, impossibly, dodges, with a speed no human can match, unleashing a devastating leg sweep as part of the manuver.
S-Jess shrugs off the blow. She can feel whatever Jane poisoned with, racing through her body. Maybe...maybe if she assimilates Jane, the extra mass will be enough to dilute it? Kill her, eat, split off a new slime. It could make two dying slimes, or two weakly poisoned slimes. No way to tell, and no other option.
With a fierce yell, S-Jess charges at Jane, heedless of anything but finishing this now!
S-Chic flanks Jane on the left, looking on as S-Jess ignores disabling blows to wrap herself around Jane.
"Mine! You're mine, you @#$&!" S-Jess snarls, shifting to add extra appendages to immobilize Jane. Jane is choking, an arm tentacle wrapped around her throat, S-Chic giggling dememtedly in the background...
And the poison coursing through S-Jess takes full effect.
Jane is covered in a mass of slime, as death causes her attacker to revert.
S-Chic shrugs, a wicked gleam in her eye, her voice cheery. "Too bad! But we'll still make short work of you." She edges to the left a bit more.
"We? I've taken out your partner, and now you're all alone. Your dodging away won't save you." Jane's voice is confident. Even though mentally she's gritting her teeth, at the damage the dying Jess slime did to her clothes. Even her favorite drycleaner may not be able to save this outfit.
"Silly! It's not supposed to save me." S-Chic grins at Jane.
Jane whirls about, as she picks up the barely heard tread behind her-to face herself.
S-Jane smiles, mockingly, as S-Chic continues. "I held your focus, while the double of you I made got the drop on you. Didn't you wonder why I disappeared for a few minutes, after I hugged you, dear friend? So, ready for lunch yet?"
Jane vaults to the top of a large rock, in the rubble strewn snowfield, her mind working furiously. "I'll take a raincheck."
"Silly!" S-Chic giggles. "I wasn't asking you."

Mars!

Chic runs past Richard, towards the ship he just crashed in. Will it hold them all? Can they get it aloft? It doesn't look good.
At least it'll be a dandy supply of parts, and..."Hey! Jefe! You wanted a computer-there's one on board!"

Sparky and Elleb are happily playing outside the Tinker-Mallory abode. True, Igor said that Eta wasn't home at the moment-something about a playdate-but they'll be right here when he returns.
Igor, meanwhile, has set out a treat of fairycakes for Elleb. My word, a fairy. What will the masters think?

-Richard Toboz-

He paused and drew himself up. "If one of you is Andrew Tinker (whom I met at the Awards) I'm here to rescue your expedition. My brother and my wife sent me here to rescue you rather than going themselves on the pretense that there may allegedly be some sort of hidden shadow-war happening on earth involving evil mimics or something. Don't ask me to get into it, it's honestly mostly stupid and based on flimsy reasoning and rampant paranoia. So, basically business as usual for Mad Scientists. The point is, I'm here to rescue you because David didn't want to leave the city vulnerable to some unforseen threat or something." He paused, and then added, as an afterthought. "Oh, he wanted me to tell you that he loves you and was worried about you. I almost forgot that."

He started walking in the same direction as Chic. "I have a ship. It's rather dinged up and battered now from crashing into a building, but I'm assuming that with a herd of scientists and engineers on board, all the leaks and damage can be constantly patched mid-flight in at least a haphazard enough fashion so that we don't all die while I pilot it back to Earth."

He wasn't exactly happy to be here, which he imagined was obvious to everyone.

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-David-

He nodded and followed Ariel. "Well... my PLAN was to fire the nanites into a cloud over the city and seed it for rain, and then rain nanites over the creatures, but if they're all over the world, we'll have to come up with something a bit more drastic... ok, ok... this can still work."

Drezebel followed them, pouting. "Hmmph... I highly doubt that there are security systems that could turn me into a potato... bah, probably best not to risk it..." she grumbled, making sure to leave her art supplies outside, on the doorstep, just to be on the safe side.

Except for her custom-etched, hand-crafted, high-quality Cartography pen. That was one thing she refused to leave anywhere.

Amino turned to face her double, rage in her eyes. "You realize, of course, that this means war."

S-Amino stepped back nervously. "A-and you realize, of course," she stammered, "that I don't have a mallet, you would be attacking an unarmed opponent."

"Huh. So I would. How very evil of me." Amino took a step forward. "Besides, it's not my fault you don't know how to access hammerspace."

S-Amino ran over to the two Ingrids. "Ingrid! Either of you! Help me, please!"

The two Ingrids glanced at each other. "Well," S-Ingrid said, "Every moment I spend with you makes me want to jump in a container of hydrochloric acid. The other one is, at least, slightly more tolerable. It would be simply heavenly if she would just finish you off for me."

"And you did tell the entire coffeehouse that Dana secretly wears dresses," Ingrid told her, "You've got this coming to you."

S-Amino whimpered as she realized she was on her own. Meanwhile, Amino swung her mallet at S-Amino, who barely managed to jump out of the way. S-Amino grabbed a napkin dispenser from a table and a sharpie from a barista. She quickly scribbled something on the napkin dispenser. "Ha!" S-Amino announced triumphantly, "Who's weaponless now? Surrender, fiend, or face the wrath of my Quantum Napkin Dispenser!!"

Ingrid drooped. "I miss my jacket..." she mumbled.

Amino simply raised an eyebrow. "Huh. I see you're beginning to get the hang of this. But, you know, there's more to quantumification than just writing 'quantum' on something. You've got to have the technobabble necessary to fuel it."

"Please." S-Amino snorted. "I could do technobabble in my sleep. You see, these napkins here are two-ply, which means that each napkin layer interacts with the other with a certain polarity, like that of electromagnets. If I force a wad of them into a large clump, the reaction of the reversed polarities will cause the napkins to repel each other with exponential force, meaning that when I release them, they will have a concussive blast of the same magnitude as a sonic grenade." S-Amino finished her speech with a dramatic pose. "Feel like surrendering now?"

Amino smiled. "Impressive. For a good clone, your grasp of technobabble is astounding. You even managed to throw in a 'reverse the polarity' reference. However, you've forgotten one crucial detail. This here is a very fancy coffeehouse. They use four-ply napkins."

"...Uh-oh."

-Slime-Flux-

He was staring over the remains of the fallen Slime-Richard. "Darn."

Slime-Richard had been easy to find. Slime-Flux kept a copy of the memories and forms of everyone he'd copied, so it wasn't hard to guess places their doubles would go. He'd just been checking up on some of his creations with a bit more potential by tracing what steps they'd make, and...

"His brother's a hero-wannbe or something, right? Guess hero-boy must've taken him out. That's no good." He frowned. "Now he knows something's up. Waaay too early for that. Martian bosses'll be pissed." he scowled and folded his arms, and then leaped out of the way. One of the ghosts had seen fit to drift too close to him. Actually, it seems like he was seeing more and more of them... it was starting to get on his nerves.

He frowned. "Nothing to do about it. We're just gonna have to kill him before he blabs too much." He shrugged and took on Richard's form. "I'll ask around, find out where he's heading. Then I'll round up a few good slimes and stop him. Won't be too hard to overwhelm him if he's alone. Just as long as he's not smart enough to take up some defensive position or something silly like that..."

He started to walk off.

The Ghost he dodged, previously aimless, abruptly turned towards him. For the first time, it *Smelled* something. There had been *scents* *here* before, but now it had a *strong path*. Creatures from outside what mortal minds called reality began to stir.

Unbenownst to him, however, the ghosts he kept seeing had acquired something... purpose. Cohesion. Where there had once been blindness, they were beginning to see...

To see a way in. A portal to the fires of reality.

A gateway. Through his mind.

Jess catches up to Richard. "No, your brother's right. The Boss-@#$!% bragged about creating slime duplicates of us, and sending them to earth, where they're supposed to kill, assimilate, and duplicate until no humans are left. And, nice punch!"
Chic has outpaced them all, already clambering into the rocket.
"Oh, WOW! This is so cool!" Yeah, it's not the steadiest of rockets, but some of the design features are quite novel. She'll have to compare notes with the designer when they get back. Rad Atomic? Hmm, maybe he's related to her rival or something. Chic files that away for future reference, and is rewiring controls as the others pile on.
Jess snags a pair of goggles Rad left, and hands them to Xerox, grinning at the fuzzy dice.
"Prim, you gots your computer. Can you call Earth, and-oh, crap, the Vics! They're probably in a cell somewhere!"
Xerox shakes his head at Jess, adjusting the goggles. "Nah...you think Ri-Xean wouldn't have gloated about their capture? They're out there, somewhere."
"Yeah, but where?" Jess takes careful aim at a foolhardy guard through the open hatch, while the last of the gang scurries on board, and finds seats.
Xerox's hands are already dancing over a set of controls. "Report. Color Copy to Mr. Te-a Tim-eh, report!" First thing he's doing when they get back is changing the code names...razza frazza...
It's a frequency peculiar to M. If Horance and Gregory escaped, and [i]if[] they've access to a radio....
"It's about bloody time!" Gregory's grumbling is soon heard. "While you lot have been lollygagging around, Horace and I have-"
"Can it! We have a ship-"
"Yes, we saw the crash. If you can call that a ship-"
"We're leaving-I've locked in on your signal."
Xerox turns to Chic. "Agent Viktor! We need this heap of scrap aloft ten minutes ago!"
"On it!" Chic shoves Richard aside, and slides into the pilot's seat. "And I even found a present for our hostess!"
The ship rumbles, a slow whine steadily building into a roar, as the Rad Atomic Rocket takes off!
Chic delicately pushes a red button, and a bomb is ejected. They cheer at the explosion-they'd be cheering louder if they knew it'd landed on Ri-Xeans's royal air throne, turning it into so much scrap.
Chic expertly brings it to a halt at the junkyard, where two Victorian M agents are waiting, and Jess flings open the hatch, laser pistol at the ready.

-Mars!-
The Rad Rocket was pretty smashed up, but most of the hull was intact. Whoever had made it wasn;t terribly used to the design, clearly, and instead of going by the book had seemed to insist on adding in some new concepts. It was probably more of a test model then a finished product. Also, the engine appeared to be in sideways. Mad Science was probably the only way it had even left the ground.

Also, in the corner of the inside control panel was a half-completed clockwork rose- it looked like it was painstakingly put together.

Xerox raised an eyebrow at Richard- right through the wall? Impressive. Especially seeing as he was clearly not a Mad...

"Richard, is it?? Good to have some help, then. I'm Commander Xerox." he said, getting a good look at the computer array. He could get some control here at least...

Andrew smiled at Richard, bowing. "I recall meeting you. Thank you for passing on David's message." he said, smiling. It helped a lot to know he was still out there... and he cared.

The Vics had managed to get a lot of decent parts together- but there was no shell to base any of it in. And in space, that was no joke. Horace waved at Chic, dragging out a huge pincer he had found somewhere.

-Fredric and Micheal's Excellent Adventure!-
Fredric blinked, rubbing his neck Micheal's fangs hadn't done more then kinda scrape at him, but it did twinge a bit. He laughed, deciding to leave off making fun of him for being a vampire until later. It was only fair.

"Well, oi unnerstand that enough. And I can do dinnivation- it has rules, at least. Not exactly *science*, but closer then anything else but for Alchemy." he explained, tucking hsi wings down for some space.

"It;s not exact... but I have an invention that will fix that."

-Danny and the Hammies-
Danny scooped up his hammies and carefully put them into a little cage, which he then made vanish- back to their habitat room at home. They probably were hungry by now, and they;d just get lost.

"I know how to get back! It isn't hard... for me, anyways. I think other people have a harder time because there isn't the big shiny glowy thing in the middle of everything. Dunno why..." he got distracted, and held out his hand.

"I can take you two back! Where do you want to go?" he asked, forming a rainbow patch under and around them for fun. He liked rainbows... and lotus flowers, too.

"Umm..." Ooooh... we should go to that one space station where they have the zero-g ball pit and that neat steak and the roller coasters and-

Eta yawns. I yawn, too.

Come to think of it, I *am* kind of tired... probably all the catnip Jennifer gave me...

"Can we go back to Mister Posi-Tinker's menagerie? I want a nap..."

-Sarcastic-

She turned to look back at the Amino holding the napkin container. "Which is exactly what a good-aligned clone would say to try and stop you, isn't it?"

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-Richard-

"Hmmph." he folded his arms. "I don't know how much help a sane man will be, but I'm here and I brought a ride. Let's get out of here." He didn't bring up his surgery skills, mostly because it didn't seem like anyone was particularly injured here.

Also, he treaded lightly around the female Jaeger... most of the Heterodyne's followers had sworn to kill him, ever since the incident... he had figured that Mr. Tinker wasn't getting hostile because of his romantic entanglement, but he couldn't be sure about this one.

The Jaegers had never quite been happy that he'd did it. Apparently it's taboo for them to let anyone who WASN'T a Heterodyne operate on a jaeger, even if it was to save a life.

As the ship lurched into the air, he considered his group for a moment. "...you're Primary Xerox, then? Huh... based on my wife's descriptions of you, I had imagined you'd be more like a caricature of an anime character or something. That probably should teach me not to rely on her judgment of character..."

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-David-

He was helping Ariel work on the nano-activity. It was slow work!

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-Slime-Flux-

He'd made a few inquiries. It seemed that this David kid was apparently somewhat of a local celebrity, ever since something called "Hero's Quest" and his recent crimefighting streak. So a few people had seen him driving somewhere...

He tracked him down to a lab on the outskirts of the city. A place he only knew by reputation.

Jane Narbon's lab.

He looked at it, giving it a disconcerting oogle.

"...I'm going to need an army for this. Welp, time to go build one!"

He vanished off to the local trash dump to get enough resources to build one.

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-Michael and Frederic's Excellent Adventure-

"Gah!"

He was annoyed, hungry, and Frederic had had to knock him out more than once.

First something had gone wrong with the time-travel machine, stranding them in the past. AND his calculator had run out of batteries, so now they had to do all the calculations by hand. And that took forever without any paper, so someone had wandered into the machine and started pushing buttons and pulling levers in curiosity, and then...

Behind him, Napoleon was babbling something in french. "Gah! SHUT UP NAPOLON!"

He grumbled. Frederic had been keeping track of the various historical figures that they'd accidentally "Acquired", but there were too many of them and the ship was crowded and it was hard to keep them in line if you didn't even speak their language. Hitler started trying to shoot Einstien again. Michael turned back from his calculations and growled. "HITLER YOU SETTLE DOWN AND GET BACK IN YOUR CORNER TO THINK ABOUT YOUR MISBEHAVIOR!"

Attila the Hun screamed out a warcry.

"GAH! SHUT UP ATTILLAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!" He growled. "...ok, this is NOT working!" He stood back up. "Screw it. I'm just going to activate the temporal flux generator."

Future-Eta gasped. "But if you turn that on without keying in any variables-" He pushed his sunglasses, one lens circular and tinted red, the other green and triangular, up the bridge of his nose.

Michael scowled. "I know! It'll be a truly random occurance! I don't even CARE anymore!" He scowled. "This was just supposed to be a simple jump to the past to teach Eta a bit about time travel and get the stuff I need to find Jennifer! And now it's all screwed up and we've got Hitlers and Knights of the Round Table and Attila the Huns stinking up the place!" He jammed his finger down on the big red button. "SCREW IT ALLLLLL!"

And subsequently, everything exploded in a burst of chronoplastic energy.

The various historical figures were all returned to their proper places and times, with more or less no memory of what had happened. That way, a paradox was unlikely to occur.

And Michael and Frederic found themselves, sans a time-machine, uncerimoniously falling on top of Demothesis just as he had gotten out of the time-machine, about five minutes before the current moment off the game.

And thus, a highly confusing side-plot had more or less resolved itself. Michael, highly disoriented, looked up at Demothesis. "Where's Claire and Eta?"

S-Amino gasped. "Ooooh, you're right!" She turned to Amino. "Ha! You thought you could outwit me, didn't you? You thought that if I thought these were four-ply napkins, I wouldn't use them against you. But your reverse psychology has failed you for the last time!" She yanked a handful of napkins from the dispenser and wadded them into a ball. "Face quantum napkin, you good-aligned evildoer!!" Then, she hurled the wad of napkins at Amino with all her might.

Amino didn't dodge them. She didn't need to. The napkin-bomb only made it a few feet before air resistance pushed it to the ground where it sat motionless and did not explode. "Yeah, no reverse psychology here," she said with a shrug, "Like I said, this is a very fancy coffeehouse. Ingrid makes me come here all the time because they have special coffee beans handpicked by monkeys from Brazil or something." She shrugged again. "Oh well, back to threatening you with a hammer, I guess." She took a step forward...and the napkin-bomb promptly turned into a wormhole and spat a raccoon at her.

"Huh," S-Amino wondered aloud as her original struggled to fend of the very angry raccoon, "I'm not entirely sure how that happened...but I'm not complaining." Then the wormhole spat out another raccoon, at her this time. "Okay, now I'm complaining!"

-Sarcastic-

She had to cover her mouth to keep from giggling.

There were times when she felt like the world of mad science was entirely too much for her. Like everything was so heinously dangerous and complicated and scary and she was just this little, unreliable, ignorant child in the face of it.

And then there were times like this, when it was hard not to laugh. You didn't laugh. It wasn't polite. Even if you were deliberately causing trouble, you didn't laugh. It was one of those small distinctions which separated the sane from the mad.

And then, as she was watching the entertainment, a raccoon dived out of the napkins, landing on her. "ACK!" She scrambled to pull it off...

==Hawk and Slime Clay==


~Something is not quite right here~ thought hawk. ~But I can't place my fingers on it.~ He fingered a small pipe that he was using as a paperweight when He felt a sharp pain in his back as Slime Clay plunged the knife in. He yelled out in pain and swung the pipe at Slime Clay's midsection, catching her completely by surprise by his speeds. She was sent sprawling to the nearby wall with a grunt. "Frith on a stick! Why did you stinking stab me in the stinking back!" Hawk demanded.

Slime Clay smiled at hawk, deciding to confuse him more. "I decided that you must die. You have pushed me around long enough and with your death will be one less mad scientist to worry about!" She picked up a broom handle. Hawk noticed right away that she was not holding it like she usually does. Slime Clay did not quite know this for the original got her training years ago.


~This must be a copy of her~ He thought. She lunged, trying to crack his head open. He shifted to the side and swung the lead pipe at Slime Clay, catching her in the head this time. Slime Clay stumbled back. The pipe caught her in the forehead and she shook her head clear. "Well you are not even close to being as good as Miss Clay. You move clumsy like with that thing." He remembered all the times she has whacked him. The knife in the back still hurt since she let go when he hit her with the pipe the first time.

Slime Clay grumbled. "I was that obvious?" She remembered how stunners worked and tried to nudge herself to the one on another desk. When Hawk saw what she was reaching for, he flung the lead pipe at her and charged. She blocked the lead pipe with the broom handle but was unable to stop the tackle. Down both went, with hawk landing on top, pinning her to the ground.

~I forgot how fast he was~ Slime Clay thought. ~I need to get out of here and try again~ She slammed her forehead into Hawk's head. His grip loosened and she managed to get out from under him and got back up making for the door. Hawk quickly recovered and groped for the nearest weapon and pointed it at Slime Clay. "Hold it! You are going nowhere!" She stopped and turned to face him. "What are you?" He asked.


"That is something you have to figure out on your own. She recognized the weapon, a singularity pistol. Something like that will kill, even if it passes near her. He didn't need to be accurate. A plan came to mind. She put on an innocent look and hesitantly approached Hawk. "We started off on the wrong foot and I know what I did was wrong. Can we just talk this out?" Hawk kept the weapon trained on her but her sweet words was making him loose his resolve to pull the trigger. She continued talking, still slowly approaching him. "So just put that weapon down and we can have a little chat. Information for my freedom?"

Hawk pondered what she was saying, not noticing how close she is now. She moved suddenly knocking the weapon out of his hand and leg sweep him. He fell to the ground, careful to land on his side to avoid driving the knife deeper. He responded with a kick of his own which she avoided easily. She grabbed the singularity pistol and pressed it against Hawk's head. "Now I want to hear you beg for your life. If you please me, then I might make it a quick death."

hawk freed one of his fist and punched her in the face. Her head snapped back from the blow, making her drop the pistol. Before she could recover, Hawk shoved her off of him to one side he looked for the weapon only to find it broken under her. He rolled away from her and got to his feet at the same time she jumped back to her feet.

The door opened and both looked towards the door. Standing there with a confused look was the original Miss Clay. "What is going on here!" She demanded. Slime Clay, seeing that she is now outnumbered, ran deeper into the shop, which has several floors and many places to hide and many tools to use. Hawk ran after her only to be stopped by Miss Clay who noticed the knife protruding from his back. "Oh no you don't! You need to explain to me what is going on here and let me bandage you up!"

Hawk Sighed and let her tend to his wounds. "I think that was a clone of you of some sort. She tried to kill me" He winced when Miss Clay pulled the knife out of his back and wrapped a bandage around him. Both set to work coming up with a plan to get rid of this impostor.

In the mean time, Slime Clay ran deeper into the shop into the lab section. She smiled when she saw some of the devices there and the bits of blood from Hawk on her hand....

-Danny Ex Machina!-
Danny laughed happily, reaching out and taking Claire and Eta's hand.
"Of course! Come on!" he said, smiling cheerfully, as reality and space whirled around them. Colors with no name sparkled across objects of incomprehensibility, stray html code danced a four step through a syllabus- surely, any man who would catch but a glimpse of this sight would be driven mad...

All things told, it;s a good thing that Danny isn't human, Claire is a girl, and Eta isn't grown up yet. If one wished to get technical, there's much more to their individual resistance (Re; Elderich Being, ?????, ninth heir of magic)...

But all in all it's more fun to contemplate the odd trio walking away over rainbow scales over hills of packing peanuts until slowly, a familiar house came into view...

Andrews house seemed translucent at first, gaining color and form as they approached. With a ripple of light and sparks, reality slipped back into place, and Danny lead Claire and Eta into the menagerie.

-Mars!-

Xerox chuckled dryly, shrugging. So, this was Drezebels husband? He could see it. Kind of an inherent balance... at this time in his life, he understood the need for balance.

"Doesn't she kind of present everyone as an anime character?" he asked dryly, watching Andrew help move around heavy engine parts in between trying to guess Rad Atomics goddamned password.

"Mind you, I don't blame her. I;m a green haired sunglasses wearing Ojisan type kung fu government official. At this point in my life, I accept this."
So far he;d tried passwords about hovering, honor, coolness, goggles, rivals, evil, heroes- his hands danced over the board as he quickly tried anything he could think of. It
Nothing was working... he diddn't want to force it...

He glanced around for a hint, before blinking. No... couldn't be...

Xerox tried a few combinations- after about five, the system blossomed. He blinked, shrugged, and mentally stowed away *that* little bit of information for later.

Jane smiled her most poisonous as she faced the two. She didn't feel anything as confident as she looked. "So," she said, "how"s it feel being a complete megalomaniac who wants to consume everything?"

She paused for a second, then delivered her punchline while in the air towards sJane. "Oh, wait... I already know!"

sJane dodged, and sChic took advantage to hit Jane while she was off-balance. These two were good.
While it was a pain in the neck to fight against, at least there was a compliment hidden in there somewhere.

Jane threw a punch at sChic, who dodged neatly, giggling just like the real thing. Spinning around to kick sJane, JN found her-- not there. A blow on the side of the head threw her off-balance for a little, but she was able to get out of range for a time.
Jane threw punches. The slimes either dodged, deformed, or tried to catch her hand and draw her in. Kicks were even worse. After a few close shaves, JN decided to try a different tactic.

The clips holding Jane's hair in its intricate arrangements (today, short and shoulder-length, with interplaitings of several different tints) were designed to come out easily. You never knew when you'd need long hair. Especially if you were fighting yourself and the duplicate of your best friend.
The time was now.

Sliding up to the two, Jane's hair (now released to its maximum, prehensile length) encircled sChic, squeezing her and lifting her off the ground. sChic merely slipped out, while sJane, taking advantage of the distraction, nearly hit Jane from behind. JN dodged, a knife appearing in her hand, and stabbed her alternate in the chest.

There was a pause for a few seconds, then sJane merely pulled the knife back out, it fitting in her hand like an extension of her arm. Realizing the danger, Jane leaped away— right into the grip of sChic. The slime-friend began to absorb her, natural abilities taking precedence over any fighting move her alternate could have devised.

Jane struggled, but it was no use. She was out of options.
Time to cheat.
Pulling out another of her small vials, she stabbed it into sChic.

sChic gasped, giving Jane the distraction she needed. Knocking into sChic with some choice martial arts moves, Jane jumped away to a safe distance.
"I've got another vial, too," she said, looking at sJane, "and it's aaaaaall for you!"

sJane stared, then burst into laughter.
"What?" Jane asked. She had a bad feeling about this.

"I'm you, remember? I made that."

"So...?"

"And I know exactly how you did."

Jumping over to sChic, sJane did something JN couldn't see. Then, she put out a hand to help sChic up.
"You're cured."

Crap, Jane thought to herself, it seems I've underestimated 'myself'. How could she— how could I!!
Oh, right. Very easily.

Time to play hardball. Muttering the release phrases in Glyph, Jane activated the subsystems given by SoItBegins, bringing them to their full potential. Everything seemed to slow, and JN suddenly knew what would be good strategy.

Rushing the slimes before they had time to respond, Jane tried to throw them across the field. It didn't work. sChic deformed out of the way— and when sJane noticed what JN had done, she countered with the same increases. It looked as if this battle wouldn't be fought with physical force alone.

As the slimes tried to counterattack, Jane threw a small device to the ground. For a second, nothing happened. Then, there was a burst of light, and a sudden cloud of thick smoke. JN used the distraction to search through what she was carrying. She just needed a little time...

By the time the smoke had cleared, Jane had found what she was looking for. She had made it over to the cliff edge, hair billowing dramatically as she posed between two large boulders.
"Come and get me," she said.
sJane responded just as Jane had hoped she would. Charging forwards, she ran over to where Jane was—

—and tripped on the invisible wire JN had strung between the boulders. The wire-thrower had been something Jane was working on when she had moments of free time. She'd intended to bind it into her Temptress costume (which was still in the back of her closet), as a method of swinging through the air... however, it also worked for a new (and potentially devastating) secondary use.

sJane was going too fast to stop. She hit the tripwire, and flew over the edge of the cliff, distorting her body to grab the edge. Smiling, Jane looked down on her.

"Not so clever now, are—"
...and a blow from sChic, who had been sneaking up on Jane, sent her flying off the cliff as well.

As both Janes dangled from the same cliff edge, the fight continued. Both human and copy tried to get back up, even as each threw punches and kicks, and tried to grapple with their hair. sChic milled about above, not quite sure whose fingers to stomp on.

"Quick! Help me up!" sJane finally said to sChic. Obediently, sChic reached down. Seeing an opportunity, Jane sent her hair swirling up and around sChic's body, using her as leverage to flip herself up and onto the ledge.
sJane, not to be outdone, latched onto Jane's foot, used it as a free ride to solid ground, planted her feet, grabbed the still aerial JN, and threw her into a big boulder.

Jane's hair pushed her away, but only barely. The slimes were acting more aggressively now, and were both attacking at once. Time for another dip into her bag of tricks.

Grabbing what she needed, JN let herself get hit by the next blow, her hand seemingly opening in shock. A mist of small gray pebbles fell to the ground, becoming indistinguishable from the surrounding rocks. Jane took a cautious step back.
Sure enough, the slimes hadn't noticed. Moving forwards, sChic stepped on the minature contact mines, causing a shower of explosions and sending the slime flying through the air. sJane narrowly missed sChic's fate, but noticing what had happened, she kept her distance.

sChic, who had gotten slightly deformed in the explosion, reset her shape to that of Chic and headed back into the fight.

Jane could feel the fatigue. blueLight Emergency Mode, though powerful, was draining. Things were starting to happen faster— or was it just her perception?— while sJane suffered no such decrease in ability. Smiling, the slime copy reshaped some of her mass into a wall, trapping Jane. sChic returned, smiling nastily. The two advanced on Jane.

By the time JN had thought of a plan to breach the wall, sChic had added her mass, and it had doubled in thickness. Slowly, the slimes— and the barrier— closed in, trapping Jane with her back to the wall. Her mind— her Madness— began to flicker through possibilities, searching for a way out of this. Was there - if - no:blink - possibility : 101055//design\capacitor-transisitor\29103.sdf/fwe---lociglogic—

With one random glance, Jane happened to look up, and her Madness supplied what looked to be the only chance... if she could build it... and survive the aftermath. The blueLight time had almost run out, but Jane pushed what was left into one last creation surge. Her hands flew. Her mind ran down paths not taken. Black lightning began appearing at the edge of her vision. This wasn't good at all.

As the slimes pulled back, ready to surge in and consume, Jane held up a hand. "Wait," she said, much more steadily than she felt. By now, stars covered her vision, and she could feel herself almost falling. Still, she maintained the energy to talk. Barely.
"You forgot something," she said. Internally, she groaned.

The faces of Jane and Chic emerged from the mass of slime. "And what is that?" they asked, smiling.

With the last of her strength, Jane threw the device high into the air, wincing as stored pain and fatigue finally hit her.
In a low mutter, she said one word.
"Gravity."


Then, the device, which was still rising, exploded into a brilliant blare of noise. It was a massive explosion, echoing off trees and mountains, bare rock and packed snow, making the eardrums and the world shake with the amplitude. And it was followed by a low, deep rumbling.
As one, Jane, her double, and sChic looked up, to the great snowfields of the mountain above them.




Then the avalanche hit them, a literal mountain-worth of snow, driving all before it in great clumps of sleet and ice, separating rocks from crevice, trees from roots, and animals from solid ground. sChic and sJane were picked up and swept away by the snowslide, each forming a great snowball as they rolled down, down, all the way to the bottom of the mountain thousands of feet below. The snowfall grabbed Jane as well, though by now she was beyond feeling it, her body forming its own snowball, surprisingly out of proportion to her size, as she rolled away, gone, lost, taken by the snow, driven away by the force of nature she had invoked, all-powerful, unbelievable, too big to comprehend, unstoppable, uncaring, inavoidable, scraping the mountain of all thought, as everything ran, hid, bowed to its will... or was buried.

Then it was over, and nothing remained but the snow.

Pretty colors! Yay! Mister Danny is so awesome. And everything looks so neat and it all makes sense kind of and-

Aww... it's over. Oh well. I need a nap anyway. "Thank you, Mister Danny!" Eta looks kind of sleepy, too. That's good, if I'm supposed to be watching him. We can both nap.

...I want World Destroyer.

"Hey, Eta? Can you wait here for just a little bit? I want to go get my teddy bear for napping and I'll be RIGHT back, ok? I'll run and you can start napping now and I'll try to catch up to you when I get back."

Mister Rutherford can probably keep an eye on him. I leave Mister Tinker's house. It shouldn't take long. And if I can walk from Mistress's house to Mister Tinker's while I'm asleep, I can probably do it while I'm falling asleep.

Run, run, run... ooooh, pizza delivery guy... with pizza. I bet Eta'd like some pizza when he wakes up, and I'm kind of hungry, too. I grab the pizza box from him.

"Hey!" He grabs my wrist.

"What?" Mmmm... it smells good.

"You- you can't just take the pizza like that!"

"Why not?"

"It's for a customer! You haven't paid for it!"

Grr... I want pizza and this is annoying. I jerk my arm to fling him away, but he keeps holding on, a look of surprise on his face as he's dragged along. And the pizza smells good and I'm HUNGRY. "How about I pay you for pizza? Then I'm a customer." He's still a bit startled by me lifting him off the ground, I think. I balance the pizza on my head and use my free hand to pry his hand off my wrist, then put some money in one of his pockets. "Ok? Can I go now?"

He looks at the money, then at me. "Yeah... sure."

Yay! Ok, pizza and then Stroyer and nap. And save some pizza for Eta and the baby GRUES. Oops! I'm supposed to be running! I take off again. I hope Eta's not upset with me.



~a bit later~

"Ok, so you're a lot stronger than most people, and I think 'I' saw your picture in the newspaper a while back- something about the mayor. Try to get him- that would be quite useful." The slime-pizza deliveryman grinned.

The Claire double looked confused. "Mayor? I think I kidnapped him once... it was fun!"

"Yeah, sure. Whatever. Kidnap him again, eat him, make him a slime-"

"How?"

"Uhh... just- figure it out. It's not hard."

"If you say so... can I have some pizza? It smells really good."

"You're supposed to eat PEOPLE."

"But it smells good..."

He sighed. He hoped he hadn't messed this one up too much while he was making her...

== Miss Clay and Hawk==

After bandaging up Hawk and caught up with the recent events, Miss Clay started gathering the supplies needed. "Lets see, multipurpose goggles, check. Flash bangs, check. Stunners, check. Rubber bands, check. Flashlights, check." She continued gathering the supplies as Hawk went over the security systems changing the passwords and locking the place down so the impostor Clay could not get out.

"We got ourselves a classic monster hunt on our hands, this makes it like what, the 8th time?" Hawk said. Miss Clay shrugged. "Actually only the 5th time, your partner has been quite good at keeping the such risk pretty low." Miss Clay answered.

Hawk gathered his equipment and turned to Miss Clay, who was almost done equipping her gear. "We HAVE to stay together. There is a small chance that whatever this thing is, can change it's shape easily. We stick together and search the place. I got it on lock down so it should not be able to escape easily." Fully decked out, both looked like over burdened commandos going in. They had enough gear to face most problems. Slowly both made their way deeper into the shop. "You know, we should really organize the things here. Or at least make it less of a maze and more open so we don't HAVE to go on these ridiculous monsters hunt when something goes wrong." Miss Clay muttered.



==Slime Clay==

She went deeper into the catacombs of the lab. Despite the shop recently opening up, the place already had forgotten places of the shop and hidden areas. She stopped by a rack filled with various devices. Many of these are experimental and some not working anymore. Miss Clay, the person the slime copied the memories from, could be quite handy with her hands and did have a mechanical mind, but she was no mad. She took what she wanted and a couple of others and put them in a nearby sack, and headed further into the lab. Miss Clay may not be mad but Dr. Hawk was...

Demothesis

Demothesis felt the sudden change in air pressure above himself and immediately rolled to the side, coming to his feet a beat later, gun in hand. What he had thought was the teleporting person again turned out to be Michael and Fredric. Well, it was likely Michael and Fredric, after all the watch on his arm, which contained a small computer, was detecting a recently closed tear in time/space from where they'd come from.

"Sir. They left the safety of the car unfortunately." He was uncertain as to the effects of jumping directly into the timestream, but he doubted they were good. He didn't bother explaining why he hadn't tried to stop the two, after all if Michael wanted to know why, he'd ask. That and explaining why without prompting tended to give the impression of an excuse and not explanation. A critical difference to maintain. He lowered the gun, but didn't put it away just yet, not completely certain that this was the real Michael.

DR.KINESTRO!(TM)

Kinestro was in his lab, working on his latest invention. A device to use his shield as a short burst kinetic blaster. Suddenly he felt the mountain rumble, and heard the distant roar of an avalanch, which quickly grew closer until it passed over the entrance to his cave laboratory. Cursing the bad luck he grabbed a kinetic blaster and headed for the entrance to clear the snow. This was the third time this week and it was becoming annoying.

"mutter mutter, DOOM!(tm) mutter mutter, grumble, foolish real estate agent. shoulda told me about the avalanches. His DOOM!(tm) shall be slow and painfull... Oh, for DOOM!(tm)'s sake! This is worse than the last one!"

Pizza pizza pizza pizza pizza...

Ok, even if I had to stop and snack I saved some for Eta. I yawn again. Now I'm really sleepy. When did walking get so complicated?

Yawn... stupid catnip making me all sleepy and I shouldn't have had so much pizza right as it was wearing off... but I want Stroyer for my nap...

Maybe I can cuddle a baby GRUE instead. They're nice. I'm not sure I could find my way to Mistress's AND the menagerie.

Mnnn... maybe I'll just rest here for a bit...

I curl up on the sidewalk. I hope Eta isn't TOO annoyed with me but I'm all tired and my head's so fuzzy...


~at the menagerie~

A female figure with cat ears and a tail, holding a blue, three-eyed teddy bear with wings, set a pizza down on a table, grinning.

Then she yawned, and lay down in a pile of straw with the baby GRUES, near Eta, and fell asleep.

-Slime-Flux-

"Ok, the five of you all have access to the Flux form... you're to stay here at this dump and assimilate more dead organic matter, and make more slimes. Then, teleport each one you make to the outside of Jane Narbon's lab. We're going to have to invade her base."

He paused, and tilted his head to avoid another Ghost. "We all know that David kid is in there. And he has to die, along with anyone he's blabbed to, to keep our big secret from getting out. Otherwise the martian masters will be pissed it's out so early." He walked along his troops. "But from what little I've heard of Jane Narbon's base, it's loaded to the brim with traps and doom and stuff. So the prevailing line of thought in my brain is that we'll just brute-force it. If we swarm it with ENOUGH slimes, eventually she'll run out of working traps and we'll have the run of the lab without any more trouble. That might take a while, but it's not like we'll give them any place to run."

He pushed a crate forward. "To this end, I've also taken the liberty of robbing a few firearm storage places... we'll be outfitting each of our troops with a few of these... we're using Freelance Police logic here: If it moves, shoot it until it stops. That lab is a deathtrap built INSIDE another deathtrap and lined with deathtraps."

He grinned. "But we have a few advantages they won't be expecting. For one thing, Little Miss Madpony is apparently good with poisons. I'm not even sure if poisons even AFFECT us, much less harm us. So one of her biggest weapons is probably useless. And we can just keep making more and more of us and learning from previous one's mistakes until we've beaten her. I doubt anyone could have expected a strategy like that."

He held up a gun. "As I'm in charge right now, I'll be observing from the outside of the house, serving as lookout. Mostly because unlike the rest of you, I have a noticible sense of self and a survival instinct. But now, as a silly man once said... ZERGLING RUSH! KEKEKEKEKE!"

And the great slime invasion began...

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

-David-

He shuddered for a moment, and then paused. "Miss Ariel? Did you just get a feeling of ominous foreboding running down your spine?"

Then he thought about it for a moment. "Oh yeah, I forgot I'm in Jane's lab. I get like, five of those a minute in here."

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

-Richard-

He raised an eyebrow at Xerox. "She does, doesn't she?" He shrugged, walking off. "Well, if I believed EVERYTHING she's told me about you, you're some sort of ninja schoolgirl waitress who happens to manage a super-conspiracy called M in your off-nights."

After the avalance, after the explosion, and the rushing roaring crash and fury of the snow has been expended-
It's quiet. The birds have been startled into silence.
Back at the Winter Wonderland Lodge, Cathy the manager fumes, wondering where her useless assistant could be. The ski instructors are lounging in front of the fireplace, trading stories, and an irate guest is demanding skis.
"Sir, I have already explained, we only have one pair available at the moment-"
"Fine! I'll take them!" He snaps.
"But sir, I really don't think they'll suit you. You see, they're-" Cathy Carson is interrupted.
"I'll be the judge of that. I've made do with inferior skis before," the guest replies, in a patronizing tone.
"Oh, no, I understand they're very high quality indeed," Cathy replies, a saccarine sweetness to her voice.
And a bemused visitor soon has Dr.Viktor's abandoned 84 longs dumped in his arms.
"Have fun! Try the Candy Mountain run!", Cathy chirps, before making her way to the office.

Back at the foot of the slope, something's happening. If there was a witness, they would see a slight shifting in the heap of new snow. Almost like something is burrowing up from underneath. A line in the snow is visible. It's like an old cartoon of a perpeptually lost lapine, who inexplicably always forgets to take the left turn at Alburquerque whilst tunneling.
SChic oozes out to the surface, and reforms. Moments later, SJane joins her. The two slimes pause for a moment, looking at the mound of snow and ice and rock.
"Heh."
"You can say that again. No mere human could survive that."
SJane rubs her chin, thoughtfully. "And speaking of mere humans...I have a plan. Why don't you lay low for a while? Since I've taken Jane's place now-"-she smirks-"-I can always say I've taken care of the slimes that took the place of Chic and Jess. That leaves you unhunted, unsuspected, and free to make trouble."
"Hmm....that's a possibility." SChic considers the matter. "What will you do now?"
"Moi? With Jane Narbon's resources to play with, what can't I do?"
If two slimes laugh out in the forest, and no one is there to hear them, does it make a creepy sound?

Xerox raised an eyebrow. "Schoolgirl? Huh. Wouldn't have figured. Sounds like she;s reading Andrews damn comic." He had easily put together who the mysterious writer of that goofy Magical Girl Mad Science Battle comic everyone at M read was- Omega? Really? Yeesh. No wonder he diddn't keep a secret identity.

"...by the way... what style are you?" he asked idly, before Richard had walked out of earshot.

"Your stance is practiced. And nothing in your pose and form shows any sign of super strength or modification. Just skill. You don;t need to tell me what school you follow... it's just my own personal curiosity."

When Xerox had been first adopted, his father had been worried about his physical development. He had a lot of energy, and poor temper control- so he'd called on a favor from an old friend of his- who agreed to come and train him every summer in a way to foucus his energy, and direct hsi mind and talent...

Tai Shing Pek Quar- aka Monkey Kung Fu. Xerox, for obvious reasons, diddn't advertise this- but he used a staff still, and somethign about seeing someone that good....

Well. Some part of him would always want to test their skill.

-Richard-

He paused, considering the question. "...Kyokushin-Kai, a style focusing on single, powerful blows. That is my specialty. I am also competent, although not what I'd call skilled, with judo, Bāguàzhǎng, which is known as the "Eight Trigrams Palm", Tán Tuǐ, the "Spring Leg" style, and-"

He paused. He'd almost added it without thinking, but he'd really prefer not to mention it. That last style was his own, and nothing worth showing to others. It wasn't perfect yet. Clumsy, not streamlined or flexible, a mishmash of other moves and principles that he'd yet to work into the free-flowing technique he'd desired it to be. He didn't even really know why he bothered naming it.

But it was still his, and in a weird way, he was proud of it. Even if he'd probably never use it. "It's interesting that you noticed. I'm also trying to learn other styles, but at the immediate moment I've become distracted in studying something else... an interesting technique practiced by some monastic orders in order to stop and start the heart. It's a very challenging thing to attempt, but also somewhat... fascinating."

He whistled, impressed. That collection of skills was no joke.

"Your a man of many talents. I'm afraid I mostly just follow Tai Shink Pek Quar- I needed a way to foucus my mind. And it serves me well. Anything else I know is just basic Army stuff." he said, still working on the computer s he spoke with him. he glanced back, a slight gleam in his eyes from under the visor he was wearing...

"If you ever have an inclination to a sparring match... I'd enjoy the challenge."

-Richard-

"I've been training and trying to learn more whenever I could afford to since I was twelve, so it's understandable that I'm that... diverse. I wouldn't be opposed to a sparring match at some point." He turned to look at Xerox. "I'm guessing you don't attend any of the schools in Xyon, so we'd have to organize another venue, but it might be interesting to fight someone outside of a dojo." He finished his sentence, and then added, as an afterthought "-that is, without someone trying to kill me with perversions of science."

Even though it'd been nearly a year and a half since his younger brother had been evil and actively TRYING to kill him, the memories of various mad-science related attempts on his life were still fresh in his mind.

"I'm still trying to find a job with one of the hospitals in the city, however, so between that and adoption paperwork, I'm rather busy. It may be a week or two before I'm available to spar."

On Mars, Chic and the two Victorians are realigning the motor. Chic can't help but grin. It's a great design, but why did he install it sideways?
Xerox is fiddling with the computer, while talking to Richard. Jess wisely stays out of the way of the working mads, and appoints herself on guard. No sign of any pursuit yet, but their luck won't hold out forever...
She cradles the laser rifle, and keeps scanning the horizon, senses as alert as she can make them. Which means she hears Chic's "...Bwa?"
Grunt work done, Chic is giving the control panel a once over, and softly exclaims in suprise. There's a clockwork rose inside?
"It's so pretty..."
She shakes her head. That'll have to wait. But now, she's very curious about this Rad mad.
"Hey, guys! We're DONE! Anybody wanting to go to Earth better get settled in!" Chic hollers.
The ship rumbles, as everyone grabs a seat. Xerox is still doing...something.
Jess smiles-nothing as commonplace as takeoff is going to keep Prim from fiddling with the computer. She's remembering a certain flight to Spain, recently. Heh.

==Hawk and Miss Clay==

Carefully, both Hawk and Miss Clay searched through the lab, inch by inch. Looking in each corner for the impostor. "You know, I have been thinking Miss Clay, we probably need to spruce up this place." Hawk said idlely while keeping his weapon trained ahead of him. "That is what I have been saying all this time. This place needs a woman's touch." Miss Clay answered back, sweeping the room with her own weapon.

"Yes indeed it does. But I don't want pink. Pink is a very bad color for business. Not many customers want their deathrays come in pink. Maybe we can do a theme." Hawk kept his attention around him and his weapon at the ready. Miss Clay shrugged. "I know several people who would like their deathrays in pink. Humph what is wrong with pink? It is just a lighter shade of red."

Something skittered across the ground and both Hawk and Miss Clay quickly brought around their weapons to where the noise is coming from. A small mouse was running across the ground. Miss Clay gave a small shriek as she fired the weapon at the little unsuspecting rodent. A ruby beam struck the mouse, instantly vaporizing it. Burned ozone smell and a blacken area on the ground is all that is left of the mouse.

"Miss Clay, it was only a mouse, no need to waste your ammo." Hawk muttered. "Although I thought this place was clear of rodents. We should try to exterminate them later. Right now we have an impostor to hunt down." Both continued creeping forward. When Hawk was slowly going mad, he spent many hours on a firing range, trying to satisfy his inner madness without giving into it. Did not really worked but he learned how to shoot. He taught Miss Clay what he knew. Miss Clay grumbled. "I don't like mice." Both continued going, making sure to cover each other and the room.


==Slime Clay==

Once Slime Clay found a good spot, it absorbed Hawk's blood, his memories and his personality, and his mental instability. The slime scrambled quickly, looking for some of Hawk's medication before it's mind deteriorates to the point where it can't reason at all. The slime found some and gulped it down. The slime decided to take on Hawk's form. Using his memories and skills, Slime Hawk went to work on the devices at hand, working them to the desired shape and function.

If he was to accomplish his mission, he would need a way to absorb more then just other living things to make more slimes. After all, martians are superior to humans and the slimes are the chosen weapons to do just that.

-Michael-

He pulled himself up. "Ugh..." He looked up at Demothesis, who was seemingly hostile and holding a gun. "Oh, put that away. At this point, if you killed me it'd actually only mildly inconvenience me. I've only got one clone body left, but it's not affected by vampirism, so if I die I'll just have to waste a few hours catching up with all the memories that I haven't uploaded into it yet." He sighed. "Oh, that's right. I haven't told you about that yet... I have (well, had) several cloned bodies I upload with copies of my memories every week... that way if I die, the next one just uploads, and I use a satellite that's recording most of my actions to help me catch up on what I was doing anytime I die." He stood up. "But I'm running low on Clones and haven't gotten around to making any more yet." He fussed. "Anyways, I need that hair I had you steal. We're going to make a sort of magical compass with it and track down Jennifer that way."

He turned to Frederic. "You know how to do Divination things, right?"

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-Ann-

She'd watched what had happened in the weird clockwork vine house for a while now, and she was a bit confused.

What was with all the weird stuff they'd been doing. She tossed a rock in the air and considered.

This was all silly and a complete waste of time!

She decided to head back to the rumbley ship place. It was at least a lot less soft than this.

She waved goodbye to the nice machine vine and wandered off.