Hound55
Izurich
Simple Unicycle
Skai
EventuaThat's a weird, chaotic post that didn't entirely turn out how I first envisioned all those weeks ago, but fuck it. It's out there. Can't keep delaying.
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D O O M P A T R O L
The Future Foundation was home to many students. Children as young as ten were hosted at the Baxter Building, though the majority were teenagers by the time they were recruited and accepted. Brilliant young people with exceptional gifts of mind and imagination who the Foundation believed were the future of America and the world at large.
Most of the students called the Baxter Building home, its extensive dorms currently housing nearly one hundred youths, with only a small handful deciding to commute daily. While most outsiders viewed the Foundation as a place for young scientists, having been featured in the news countless times in recent years for various technological and medical innovations, the truth of the matter was that students across the academic spectrum were admitted. The founders, doctors Franklin Storm and Niles Caulder, had spent the last two decades of the Foundation's existence eagerly seeking out freethinkers of all kinds. For every Victor Von Doom and Reed Richards, two of the most brilliant, scientific young minds to ever pass through the Baxter Building's doors, there was a Rita Farr or an Alicia Masters.
Rita Farr had come to the Baxter Building four years ago at the age of fifteen after a video of her performing a one-woman play for her local school talent show went viral. Rita, born a metahuman with the natural ability to expand, shrink, and reshape her body, and ever the one to seek out the limelight, had decided to out her mutant nature in spectacular fashion by altering her physical appearance dramatically to play every role. Her high school was the center of controversy for days afterward as the young girl was expelled, protests forming around the country in solidarity with Rita. Niles Caulder, recognizing brilliance, recruited Rita to the Foundation shortly thereafter. In the years since, Rita's creativity was fostered and grown, and now the young woman boasted over eighty million subscribers on YouTube where her short skits and dramatic reenactments earned her countless praise.
When she was twelve, Alicia Masters lost both her vision and her mother in an unfortunate accident. Her step-father, Phillip Masters, already a teacher at the Future Foundation, pushed for his step-daughter's admittance after the incident so he could keep a closer eye on her. Niles Caulder, seeing the potential in the young girl and understanding that adversity often inspires exceptionalism, agreed to accept her into the program. His theory was proven true as Alicia used art to cope with her blindness and, by the age of fourteen, made headlines for her realistic sculptures. Despite still being so young, she is currently heralded as one of the leaders of neo-realism, with her depiction of the Justice League freeing Earth from the enslavement of Starro being regarded as a modern masterpiece.
Despite the Baxter Building housing academics of widely different fields, the students are not separated into scientific and artistic groups, even sharing certain courses. Steve Dayton, inventor and novelist, was one such professor at the Foundation responsible for teaching several of these joined classes. The epitome of the bumbling professor, Dayton was absentminded and timid with a penchant for allowing his students to act out. His classes, while certainly educational, were not what anyone would describe as 'orderly.'
A fact that Julie Power had come to hate.
The strawberry blonde fourteen-year-old sat at her desk, head buried in her notebook, furiously scribbling down notes from Professor Dayton's lecture. Her face was scrunched up in concentration as she fought to ignore the distracting sounds of her fellow students, as well as make sense of the ramblings her literature teacher espoused.
Julie Power, and her older brother Alex, had come to the Future Foundation just eight months previously. Both had been accepted based on their academic merits and scientific minds, though neither had received the same recognition as their peers as of yet. Julie had found acclimating to the setting of the Baxter Building challenging. Intimidating, even.
And the chaos of Professor Dayton's classes didn't help her in that regard.
Tap. Tap tap tap. Tap tap.
"Uh, so, class, if you could take out your tablets, and, uh, open the assignments I sent to you yesterday, um..."
Tap tap. Tap. Tap.
"Mister Dayton, I don't feel so well," a voice called from the back of the room.
Tap. Tap tap. Tap.
Julie's head snapped up and she shot a glare across the aisle at Jane Morris who was in the process of using her pencil as a drumstick. The older girl with her tangled black hair and permanent indifference was the bane of Julie's existence. Or so it had felt these last few months. Not only did they share this class, as well as several others, during which it seemed like Jane did her all to drive Julie mad, but the pair were roommates. Jane's hair wasn't the only thing messy about her, and it was all Julie could do to maintain her composure at times.
Tap. Tap. Tap tap. Tap.
Having grown up with three siblings, Julie had expected to be able to handle the noise.
"Mister Dayton! I really don't feel good!"
Tap tap. Tap tap. Tap tap tap.
Her expectations had proven incorrect.
"Can you stop, please?" The words softly passed from Julie's lips and were immediately drowned out.
Tap tap. Tap. Tap tap. Tap.
"Jane, will you quit it?" She said louder this time. "I can't hear the professor's lesson."
Jane kept drumming her pencil against the table but turned to face her roommate. "What? Speak up, Lightspeed."
Lightspeed. The nickname Jane and the other teens had taken to calling Julie due to how quickly the latter got her assignments finished. She knew it had begun in a teasing way, but truth be told Julie enjoyed the nickname. It made her feel special in a building full of exceptional people. Except for when Jane said it, then it felt dismissive in a way only she could achieve. Not that Julie felt her roommate was intending to be hurtful, it was just how naturally indifferent the dark-haired girl always sounded - like you didn't matter one way or the other.
Julie repeated herself, voice raised slightly, "I can't hear the lesson. Can you stop tapping?"
She could barely hear herself over the noise of the other two dozen students.
"I... I don't... I feel..."
The student from earlier was shouting now, making Julie cringe at the additional ruckus. She was sure it was Bentley Wittmann now. Nearly two years younger than her, Bentley was the definition of a child prodigy. He was also socially awkward and about as quiet as Julie on most days. She didn't know what, exactly, his issue was at the moment, but she wished he'd just return to his normally silent self.
Jane chewed her bottom lip, regarding Julie for a moment, her pencil wavering an inch above the surface of her desk. Then, decision made, she let the pencil drop from between her fingers.
Just as Julie was preparing to thank the other girl, the room exploded in a series of screams.
"Professor!"
"Oh my god!"
"Oh, shit!"
The shouts and curses and screams were joined by the sound of vomiting.
Julie spun around to see what had happened.
I guess he really wasn't feeling well, she thought, expecting to see a sickened Bentley heaving at his corner desk.
The screaming continued, though. And Bentley was nowhere in sight.
A group of five students was gathered around Bentley's desk. A pile of puke coated the spot where Bentley had been sitting just moments ago. The students' faces were a mask of disgust and confusion, and one was wiping away traces of vomit from the corner of his lips.
One of them, a young girl who sat beside Bentley, and who had been screaming nonstop, collapsed out of her chair as she scrambled away. This gave Julie a better view of the commotion. She squinted, unsure of what she was seeing, and rose out of her seat to take a few steps closer.
She could see now that it wasn't vomit coating Bentley's chair. It was goo. Or a puddle of some pinkish-white liquid slop. It looked thick and coagulated, with tiny strands hanging loosely over the seat's edge. And amidst the goopy pile was a t-shirt, shorts, and other clothing.
What...
Professor Dayton eased past her now, gingerly nudging her to the side so he could walk through the gathered students. It had taken him a moment, even with the screaming, to stop his lecture and come forward. He cleared his throat as he neared the group.
"What, uh, what seems to be the issue here?" He said in his typical wavering voice.
The girl who had fallen out of her seat was crying hysterically now, the last of her screams fading away. The older boy who had thrown up spun around and retched again.
"Professor, it's Bentley! He..." One of the other girls tried to explain but her voice trailed off as she watched her teacher absentmindedly reach into the goop and pluck out a pair of glasses. Then, she too vomited.
"Hm. Curious." Dayton murmured, holding the glasses up towards his face. "Where, uh, did Bentley go?"
The first girl answered him. "T-that... is... Bentley," she managed to say between heavy sobs, "he... j-just... melted!"
A long moment passed before anyone spoke again, students and teacher alike processing that information, and Julie realized that for the first time in memory Professor Dayton's class was finally quiet.
Most of the students called the Baxter Building home, its extensive dorms currently housing nearly one hundred youths, with only a small handful deciding to commute daily. While most outsiders viewed the Foundation as a place for young scientists, having been featured in the news countless times in recent years for various technological and medical innovations, the truth of the matter was that students across the academic spectrum were admitted. The founders, doctors Franklin Storm and Niles Caulder, had spent the last two decades of the Foundation's existence eagerly seeking out freethinkers of all kinds. For every Victor Von Doom and Reed Richards, two of the most brilliant, scientific young minds to ever pass through the Baxter Building's doors, there was a Rita Farr or an Alicia Masters.
Rita Farr had come to the Baxter Building four years ago at the age of fifteen after a video of her performing a one-woman play for her local school talent show went viral. Rita, born a metahuman with the natural ability to expand, shrink, and reshape her body, and ever the one to seek out the limelight, had decided to out her mutant nature in spectacular fashion by altering her physical appearance dramatically to play every role. Her high school was the center of controversy for days afterward as the young girl was expelled, protests forming around the country in solidarity with Rita. Niles Caulder, recognizing brilliance, recruited Rita to the Foundation shortly thereafter. In the years since, Rita's creativity was fostered and grown, and now the young woman boasted over eighty million subscribers on YouTube where her short skits and dramatic reenactments earned her countless praise.
When she was twelve, Alicia Masters lost both her vision and her mother in an unfortunate accident. Her step-father, Phillip Masters, already a teacher at the Future Foundation, pushed for his step-daughter's admittance after the incident so he could keep a closer eye on her. Niles Caulder, seeing the potential in the young girl and understanding that adversity often inspires exceptionalism, agreed to accept her into the program. His theory was proven true as Alicia used art to cope with her blindness and, by the age of fourteen, made headlines for her realistic sculptures. Despite still being so young, she is currently heralded as one of the leaders of neo-realism, with her depiction of the Justice League freeing Earth from the enslavement of Starro being regarded as a modern masterpiece.
Despite the Baxter Building housing academics of widely different fields, the students are not separated into scientific and artistic groups, even sharing certain courses. Steve Dayton, inventor and novelist, was one such professor at the Foundation responsible for teaching several of these joined classes. The epitome of the bumbling professor, Dayton was absentminded and timid with a penchant for allowing his students to act out. His classes, while certainly educational, were not what anyone would describe as 'orderly.'
A fact that Julie Power had come to hate.
The strawberry blonde fourteen-year-old sat at her desk, head buried in her notebook, furiously scribbling down notes from Professor Dayton's lecture. Her face was scrunched up in concentration as she fought to ignore the distracting sounds of her fellow students, as well as make sense of the ramblings her literature teacher espoused.
Julie Power, and her older brother Alex, had come to the Future Foundation just eight months previously. Both had been accepted based on their academic merits and scientific minds, though neither had received the same recognition as their peers as of yet. Julie had found acclimating to the setting of the Baxter Building challenging. Intimidating, even.
And the chaos of Professor Dayton's classes didn't help her in that regard.
Tap. Tap tap tap. Tap tap.
"Uh, so, class, if you could take out your tablets, and, uh, open the assignments I sent to you yesterday, um..."
Tap tap. Tap. Tap.
"Mister Dayton, I don't feel so well," a voice called from the back of the room.
Tap. Tap tap. Tap.
Julie's head snapped up and she shot a glare across the aisle at Jane Morris who was in the process of using her pencil as a drumstick. The older girl with her tangled black hair and permanent indifference was the bane of Julie's existence. Or so it had felt these last few months. Not only did they share this class, as well as several others, during which it seemed like Jane did her all to drive Julie mad, but the pair were roommates. Jane's hair wasn't the only thing messy about her, and it was all Julie could do to maintain her composure at times.
Tap. Tap. Tap tap. Tap.
Having grown up with three siblings, Julie had expected to be able to handle the noise.
"Mister Dayton! I really don't feel good!"
Tap tap. Tap tap. Tap tap tap.
Her expectations had proven incorrect.
"Can you stop, please?" The words softly passed from Julie's lips and were immediately drowned out.
Tap tap. Tap. Tap tap. Tap.
"Jane, will you quit it?" She said louder this time. "I can't hear the professor's lesson."
Jane kept drumming her pencil against the table but turned to face her roommate. "What? Speak up, Lightspeed."
Lightspeed. The nickname Jane and the other teens had taken to calling Julie due to how quickly the latter got her assignments finished. She knew it had begun in a teasing way, but truth be told Julie enjoyed the nickname. It made her feel special in a building full of exceptional people. Except for when Jane said it, then it felt dismissive in a way only she could achieve. Not that Julie felt her roommate was intending to be hurtful, it was just how naturally indifferent the dark-haired girl always sounded - like you didn't matter one way or the other.
Julie repeated herself, voice raised slightly, "I can't hear the lesson. Can you stop tapping?"
She could barely hear herself over the noise of the other two dozen students.
"I... I don't... I feel..."
The student from earlier was shouting now, making Julie cringe at the additional ruckus. She was sure it was Bentley Wittmann now. Nearly two years younger than her, Bentley was the definition of a child prodigy. He was also socially awkward and about as quiet as Julie on most days. She didn't know what, exactly, his issue was at the moment, but she wished he'd just return to his normally silent self.
Jane chewed her bottom lip, regarding Julie for a moment, her pencil wavering an inch above the surface of her desk. Then, decision made, she let the pencil drop from between her fingers.
Just as Julie was preparing to thank the other girl, the room exploded in a series of screams.
"Professor!"
"Oh my god!"
"Oh, shit!"
The shouts and curses and screams were joined by the sound of vomiting.
Julie spun around to see what had happened.
I guess he really wasn't feeling well, she thought, expecting to see a sickened Bentley heaving at his corner desk.
The screaming continued, though. And Bentley was nowhere in sight.
A group of five students was gathered around Bentley's desk. A pile of puke coated the spot where Bentley had been sitting just moments ago. The students' faces were a mask of disgust and confusion, and one was wiping away traces of vomit from the corner of his lips.
One of them, a young girl who sat beside Bentley, and who had been screaming nonstop, collapsed out of her chair as she scrambled away. This gave Julie a better view of the commotion. She squinted, unsure of what she was seeing, and rose out of her seat to take a few steps closer.
She could see now that it wasn't vomit coating Bentley's chair. It was goo. Or a puddle of some pinkish-white liquid slop. It looked thick and coagulated, with tiny strands hanging loosely over the seat's edge. And amidst the goopy pile was a t-shirt, shorts, and other clothing.
What...
Professor Dayton eased past her now, gingerly nudging her to the side so he could walk through the gathered students. It had taken him a moment, even with the screaming, to stop his lecture and come forward. He cleared his throat as he neared the group.
"What, uh, what seems to be the issue here?" He said in his typical wavering voice.
The girl who had fallen out of her seat was crying hysterically now, the last of her screams fading away. The older boy who had thrown up spun around and retched again.
"Professor, it's Bentley! He..." One of the other girls tried to explain but her voice trailed off as she watched her teacher absentmindedly reach into the goop and pluck out a pair of glasses. Then, she too vomited.
"Hm. Curious." Dayton murmured, holding the glasses up towards his face. "Where, uh, did Bentley go?"
The first girl answered him. "T-that... is... Bentley," she managed to say between heavy sobs, "he... j-just... melted!"
A long moment passed before anyone spoke again, students and teacher alike processing that information, and Julie realized that for the first time in memory Professor Dayton's class was finally quiet.
If anyone has any thoughts or comments on my posts so far, as few and far between as they may be, I'd love to read them.
Most of the latter half of that post is sub-par. But I had to get it out, I've delayed too long.
Vignettes are over, now, though. I'll be moving on with the start of the first real arc, and/or participating in the first mini-event should that come between now and when I start writing the next post.
EDIT: That was a fast like, Andy
Vignettes are over, now, though. I'll be moving on with the start of the first real arc, and/or participating in the first mini-event should that come between now and when I start writing the next post.
EDIT: That was a fast like, Andy
D O O M P A T R O L
"So, what's the deal with this latest Doombot?" The blond-haired man asked as he stretched back in his seat, arms behind his head.
Victor Von Doom fixed Johnny Storm with an unamused look. "Must you call them that?"
For the better part of six years, the young man sat aside Victor had shown little care or respect for the numerous inventions created by the latter. It wasn't malicious, at least Victor didn't believe so. Although, he was confident Johnny did take joy in teasing him. What future brother-in-law wouldn't? Storm's favorite jape was to refer to each one of Victor's mechanical creations as "Doombots."
"Says the guy who calls himself 'Doctor Doom,'" Johnny added, his movie-star good looks twisting into a grin.
Suppressing a sigh, Victor turned back toward his task. He flipped two switches on the dashboard stretched out before him and pulled back on a lever beside his seat.
"Well, Jonathan." He spoke slowly and deliberately, his slight Eastern European accent highlighting each syllable. "My name is Von Doom and I do have a doctorate. Several, in fact."
"So you keep reminding me."
Victor didn't bother to dignify that with a response. They both knew the repeated reminders were only ever prompted by Johnny's comments.
"So," Jonathan said, his tone shifting away from the playful mockery. "This thing's the real deal?"
Victor nodded. "By all calculations, yes. It's the real deal."
The two young men sat aboard a state-of-the-art hovercraft designed by Victor. Hemispherical in shape and measuring nearly eighteen meters in diameter from bow to stern, the vehicle was the trademark mode of transportation for the Doom Patrol. Designed to operate in most environments, over the years it has ferried the foursome from the depths of the ocean to the heights of the Himalayas and even the other dimension of the Negative Zone. Today, it carried the pair of Doom and Storm out of the stratosphere and into the upper atmospheric layers of the planet.
For months Victor had been toiling away on this project. From the moment he and Reed Richards had devised the device responsible for their initial discovery and voyage into the Negative Zone, Victor had dreamed of the potential. Two years after their maiden voyage into the N-Zone and the subsequent incident, he had perfected the dimensional rift machine and incorporated it into the design of his hovercraft allowing him to enter into said Zone at will via the flying vehicle. A year later, he had tweaked the device to expand its capabilities and enable travel to a host of different dimensions, including the mythical Avalon. Since then, he had been theorizing how to utilize the N-Drive, as he called it, to reach the so-called 'final frontier.'
It had been Susan's idea for him to bring Johnny along on this trip. Some 'family bonding time' as she had called it. Not that the two men didn't see much of each other - not only did they adventure with the rest of the group constantly, but both had lived in the same building since they were teenagers. Still, while they were far from strangers, the pair had never been as close to one another as they were with other members of the Patrol. With nuptials pending, Sue Storm no doubt intended to change that.
A blinking green light on the dashboard signaled the duo had arrived at their designated location. Victor reached towards the lever on his right and throttled it back down. The craft slowed before eventually settling in place more than 300 miles above the surface of Earth. Here among the thermosphere, above even the International Space Station, Victor could put his calculations to the ultimate test.
"You know, Vic," Johnny said, leaning forward to peer through the panoramic view displaying the black expanse beyond and the blue marble beneath. "Sometimes your nerdy gizmos are pretty cool."
Jonathan's use of Victor's name in short-form made him frown momentarily. Yet another example of the former's jests.
"Sometimes?" Victor asked with a raised eyebrow.
"Yeah. Sometimes they blow up in our face. Literally," he answered.
"Let's hope, then," Victor said with a hint of a wry smile, "that this isn't one of those occasions. There's only an infinitesimal chance of catastrophic failure."
Johnny's eyes widened slightly and a shadow of panicked confusion passed over his features. "Wait, what?"
Victor's response was in the form of swiping his fingers across a series of buttons.
From the bottom hull of the hovercraft, out of view for both, a set of bay doors silently dropped open. From the opening, a series of spherical objects about a meter in diameter each were released into the void. Mere moments after passing the threshold of the bay doors the orbs rocketed out in a wide-spread arc as their built-in thrusters engaged.
From within the craft, Johnny could now see a dozen of the white spheres distancing themselves from one another and the vehicle itself. He leaned toward the viewport as they hurtled away and eventually out of sight. After nearly a minute of waiting, he sat back and cast a disappointed look at Victor.
"That's it? That's all we came up here for? To shoot some oversized baseballs into space?"
"Wait for it." Victor pointed a finger towards the viewport.
Another twenty or so seconds passed before Victor grinned. "Now.
Before he had even finished saying the word, the space in front of them exploded into color. Emanating from a dozen points, a series of burnt-orange glows brilliantly flashed as each of Victor's probes exited the upper limits of Earth's atmosphere nearly 6,000 miles away. Preset programming engaging their respective N-Drives as they reached deep space, forming a bubble of dimensional space around the spheres. The distant but bright sparks of energy remained above and ahead of them for several seconds before just as suddenly winking out of existence.
"I'm guessing that was more than just a few fancy fireworks," Johnny said in a tone that indicated he knew just what that display meant.
"I could rattle off an intense and highly technical explanation for you, Jonathan, but we both know what we just witnessed. History in the making."
The N-Drive had been modified and installed on each of a dozen probes. Once engaged, they would generate an isolated dimensional rift around the objects that allowed them to essentially defeat the rules of space-time. Shunting each sphere through the Negative Zone, where the flow of time was exponentially increased, the drives would carry the probes for what would amount to be hundreds of years worth of travel before re-emerging in real space after a dramatic fraction of time. And many lightyears away from their original departure point.
The nature of dimensional space was such that each overlapped one another in what was essentially an infinite layer. While each dimension remained physically separate from one another, unable to be interacted with through normal means, accessing an alternate dimension opened a host of possibilities. Victor had tapped into such a possibility by understanding that he could make use of the overlapped layers by shifting out of one dimension and into another then back again after a period of travel, appearing to near-instantaneously relocate from one point to another in the originating dimension. Thanks to the differential with time between his own dimension and the Negative Zone, this allowed for incredible leaps in distance.
Delayed teleportation without all of the nasty side effects of completely breaking down your atomic structure and reassembling it elsewhere.
A warp drive, as the Trek-loving Susan had taken to calling it in the early days of Victor's designs.
The first example of humankind developing interstellar travel, as far as Victor Von Doom was concerned.
The scientist once more flipped several switches and pulled back on the lever at his side. The hovercraft's engine kicked in as he brought it around in a half-circle. The viewport was filled with the image of a familiar blue planet.
A moment passed before Johnny broke the silence. "I'm glad that one didn't blow up on us."
Victor, soaring with elation, allowed himself to chuckle. "As am I."
"Well, guess it's time to head back home, then. If we hurry, I think I can still squeeze in a date with Kourtney tonight," Johnny added, referring to his on-and-off-again supermodel girlfriend.
"Apologies for putting a damper on your love life, Jonathan, but we're not returning quite yet." Victor stepped away from his seat and walked out of the cockpit into the room beyond.
Johnny twisted around to watch Victor depart. "Try to sound a little less creepy when you say that, Vic."
A long, quiet minute passed without Victor returning.
"Uh... Victor?" He called out. "This is the opposite of less creepy, man."
It was another few seconds before Victor answered. Rounding the corner into the cockpit he said, "Susan requested that you and I spend some time together, so I brought these along should the day prove successful."
In his right hand was a six-pack of beer. In his left a simple wooden box barely larger than his palm.
As Victor removed a bottle from the case and handed it to Jonathan, the latter questioned, "and if your test didn't succeed?"
"Then I suppose we would still be drinking; albeit with a more depressive atmosphere."
Reclining in his pilot's chair, Victor popped the cap off of his beer and took a long sip.
"So..." Johnny let the word linger for a moment. "What did Sue expect us to talk about here, exactly?"
"I am sure we'll think of something, Jonathan." Victor flipped open the small container he had carried over and pulled out two items, offering one to his companion.
Johnny raised a brow as his eyes settled on the cigar between Victor's fingers. He had never known the man to smoke and had rarely even witnessed him partake in alcohol. Today, Johnny found, was full of wonders small and large.
Then Victor uttered three words that caught him off guard. Jonathan Storm grinned as the man he had always found to be too serious made him nearly choke on his beer with such a simple phrase.
"Got a light?"
Victor Von Doom fixed Johnny Storm with an unamused look. "Must you call them that?"
For the better part of six years, the young man sat aside Victor had shown little care or respect for the numerous inventions created by the latter. It wasn't malicious, at least Victor didn't believe so. Although, he was confident Johnny did take joy in teasing him. What future brother-in-law wouldn't? Storm's favorite jape was to refer to each one of Victor's mechanical creations as "Doombots."
"Says the guy who calls himself 'Doctor Doom,'" Johnny added, his movie-star good looks twisting into a grin.
Suppressing a sigh, Victor turned back toward his task. He flipped two switches on the dashboard stretched out before him and pulled back on a lever beside his seat.
"Well, Jonathan." He spoke slowly and deliberately, his slight Eastern European accent highlighting each syllable. "My name is Von Doom and I do have a doctorate. Several, in fact."
"So you keep reminding me."
Victor didn't bother to dignify that with a response. They both knew the repeated reminders were only ever prompted by Johnny's comments.
"So," Jonathan said, his tone shifting away from the playful mockery. "This thing's the real deal?"
Victor nodded. "By all calculations, yes. It's the real deal."
The two young men sat aboard a state-of-the-art hovercraft designed by Victor. Hemispherical in shape and measuring nearly eighteen meters in diameter from bow to stern, the vehicle was the trademark mode of transportation for the Doom Patrol. Designed to operate in most environments, over the years it has ferried the foursome from the depths of the ocean to the heights of the Himalayas and even the other dimension of the Negative Zone. Today, it carried the pair of Doom and Storm out of the stratosphere and into the upper atmospheric layers of the planet.
For months Victor had been toiling away on this project. From the moment he and Reed Richards had devised the device responsible for their initial discovery and voyage into the Negative Zone, Victor had dreamed of the potential. Two years after their maiden voyage into the N-Zone and the subsequent incident, he had perfected the dimensional rift machine and incorporated it into the design of his hovercraft allowing him to enter into said Zone at will via the flying vehicle. A year later, he had tweaked the device to expand its capabilities and enable travel to a host of different dimensions, including the mythical Avalon. Since then, he had been theorizing how to utilize the N-Drive, as he called it, to reach the so-called 'final frontier.'
It had been Susan's idea for him to bring Johnny along on this trip. Some 'family bonding time' as she had called it. Not that the two men didn't see much of each other - not only did they adventure with the rest of the group constantly, but both had lived in the same building since they were teenagers. Still, while they were far from strangers, the pair had never been as close to one another as they were with other members of the Patrol. With nuptials pending, Sue Storm no doubt intended to change that.
A blinking green light on the dashboard signaled the duo had arrived at their designated location. Victor reached towards the lever on his right and throttled it back down. The craft slowed before eventually settling in place more than 300 miles above the surface of Earth. Here among the thermosphere, above even the International Space Station, Victor could put his calculations to the ultimate test.
"You know, Vic," Johnny said, leaning forward to peer through the panoramic view displaying the black expanse beyond and the blue marble beneath. "Sometimes your nerdy gizmos are pretty cool."
Jonathan's use of Victor's name in short-form made him frown momentarily. Yet another example of the former's jests.
"Sometimes?" Victor asked with a raised eyebrow.
"Yeah. Sometimes they blow up in our face. Literally," he answered.
"Let's hope, then," Victor said with a hint of a wry smile, "that this isn't one of those occasions. There's only an infinitesimal chance of catastrophic failure."
Johnny's eyes widened slightly and a shadow of panicked confusion passed over his features. "Wait, what?"
Victor's response was in the form of swiping his fingers across a series of buttons.
From the bottom hull of the hovercraft, out of view for both, a set of bay doors silently dropped open. From the opening, a series of spherical objects about a meter in diameter each were released into the void. Mere moments after passing the threshold of the bay doors the orbs rocketed out in a wide-spread arc as their built-in thrusters engaged.
From within the craft, Johnny could now see a dozen of the white spheres distancing themselves from one another and the vehicle itself. He leaned toward the viewport as they hurtled away and eventually out of sight. After nearly a minute of waiting, he sat back and cast a disappointed look at Victor.
"That's it? That's all we came up here for? To shoot some oversized baseballs into space?"
"Wait for it." Victor pointed a finger towards the viewport.
Another twenty or so seconds passed before Victor grinned. "Now.
Before he had even finished saying the word, the space in front of them exploded into color. Emanating from a dozen points, a series of burnt-orange glows brilliantly flashed as each of Victor's probes exited the upper limits of Earth's atmosphere nearly 6,000 miles away. Preset programming engaging their respective N-Drives as they reached deep space, forming a bubble of dimensional space around the spheres. The distant but bright sparks of energy remained above and ahead of them for several seconds before just as suddenly winking out of existence.
"I'm guessing that was more than just a few fancy fireworks," Johnny said in a tone that indicated he knew just what that display meant.
"I could rattle off an intense and highly technical explanation for you, Jonathan, but we both know what we just witnessed. History in the making."
The N-Drive had been modified and installed on each of a dozen probes. Once engaged, they would generate an isolated dimensional rift around the objects that allowed them to essentially defeat the rules of space-time. Shunting each sphere through the Negative Zone, where the flow of time was exponentially increased, the drives would carry the probes for what would amount to be hundreds of years worth of travel before re-emerging in real space after a dramatic fraction of time. And many lightyears away from their original departure point.
The nature of dimensional space was such that each overlapped one another in what was essentially an infinite layer. While each dimension remained physically separate from one another, unable to be interacted with through normal means, accessing an alternate dimension opened a host of possibilities. Victor had tapped into such a possibility by understanding that he could make use of the overlapped layers by shifting out of one dimension and into another then back again after a period of travel, appearing to near-instantaneously relocate from one point to another in the originating dimension. Thanks to the differential with time between his own dimension and the Negative Zone, this allowed for incredible leaps in distance.
Delayed teleportation without all of the nasty side effects of completely breaking down your atomic structure and reassembling it elsewhere.
A warp drive, as the Trek-loving Susan had taken to calling it in the early days of Victor's designs.
The first example of humankind developing interstellar travel, as far as Victor Von Doom was concerned.
The scientist once more flipped several switches and pulled back on the lever at his side. The hovercraft's engine kicked in as he brought it around in a half-circle. The viewport was filled with the image of a familiar blue planet.
A moment passed before Johnny broke the silence. "I'm glad that one didn't blow up on us."
Victor, soaring with elation, allowed himself to chuckle. "As am I."
"Well, guess it's time to head back home, then. If we hurry, I think I can still squeeze in a date with Kourtney tonight," Johnny added, referring to his on-and-off-again supermodel girlfriend.
"Apologies for putting a damper on your love life, Jonathan, but we're not returning quite yet." Victor stepped away from his seat and walked out of the cockpit into the room beyond.
Johnny twisted around to watch Victor depart. "Try to sound a little less creepy when you say that, Vic."
A long, quiet minute passed without Victor returning.
"Uh... Victor?" He called out. "This is the opposite of less creepy, man."
It was another few seconds before Victor answered. Rounding the corner into the cockpit he said, "Susan requested that you and I spend some time together, so I brought these along should the day prove successful."
In his right hand was a six-pack of beer. In his left a simple wooden box barely larger than his palm.
As Victor removed a bottle from the case and handed it to Jonathan, the latter questioned, "and if your test didn't succeed?"
"Then I suppose we would still be drinking; albeit with a more depressive atmosphere."
Reclining in his pilot's chair, Victor popped the cap off of his beer and took a long sip.
"So..." Johnny let the word linger for a moment. "What did Sue expect us to talk about here, exactly?"
"I am sure we'll think of something, Jonathan." Victor flipped open the small container he had carried over and pulled out two items, offering one to his companion.
Johnny raised a brow as his eyes settled on the cigar between Victor's fingers. He had never known the man to smoke and had rarely even witnessed him partake in alcohol. Today, Johnny found, was full of wonders small and large.
Then Victor uttered three words that caught him off guard. Jonathan Storm grinned as the man he had always found to be too serious made him nearly choke on his beer with such a simple phrase.
"Got a light?"
Both. Either. Everything. All.
I have some posts I've done such comprehensive notes on that it's absurd, and others that I just wing it on. When I apply for a character I'll always have at least a dozen roughly sketched out arcs for them that I can use and know I can write towards. But things change as the IC and game progresses.
Many times I'll just write out posts, entire scenes and dialogue, in my head as I try to sleep at night. That's how the last Doom Patrol post was made, and how the next one is being drafted, as well. Written in my mind as I turned off the lights and closed my eyes for four nights in a row. Then just typed it out first chance I had and smoothed out the rough edges.
I have some posts I've done such comprehensive notes on that it's absurd, and others that I just wing it on. When I apply for a character I'll always have at least a dozen roughly sketched out arcs for them that I can use and know I can write towards. But things change as the IC and game progresses.
Many times I'll just write out posts, entire scenes and dialogue, in my head as I try to sleep at night. That's how the last Doom Patrol post was made, and how the next one is being drafted, as well. Written in my mind as I turned off the lights and closed my eyes for four nights in a row. Then just typed it out first chance I had and smoothed out the rough edges.
Meanwhile, I'm over here just still not using colors at all.
Throw all the hawks in. Get Lady Blackhawk in there, too.
Not a GM, but I think your best bet is to PM the Superman player. In this case @Master Bruce, and see if your concept gels with his. There are definitely ways to make Power Girl without making her a Kryptonian or tying her into Superman. But given she's a Superman legacy character he'd have say on what would work.
<Snipped quote by Retired>
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