by Tobias Christopher, The Eurostar, Kristogar Velo, T5 and I'm Not Mister Mxyptlk
"You've been on a plane before?" Mick Harrison asked Tobias Christopher.
"When I was three, my mother took me to Canada to visit my cousins," Tobias said. "I always thought about going there to visit them someday."
"What's wrong with him?" Mick asked as Danny Hearn hurried down the aisle.
"Air sickness?" Tobias supposed. "Let's see what's on TV, M'xy."
"I'm Mick, not M'xy... Oh, shi--" Mick's eyes started to light up as a top hat and overcoat appeared.
"I love doing that," Tobias said.
Edulcore Cicciotto:
I watch Danny standing up and going to find the water. I have heard his words, and now I can't stop to wonder. This is not the first time he flies. He once fled from Mandelovia to Chicago with me, months ago after he appeared in the desert having arrived from the future, if what he has said to me was real. I traveled hidden inside him, in ghost form. And now, he seems to have forgotten everything. I remember it, so it has happened. Changing history has nothing to do with it. There must be something else.
Or maybe HE has something to do with it. Maybe by changing HIS past, he's altering OUR future, and now his own set of memories keeps changing out of sync with the rest of reality.
Could he be a walking time-bomb?
In his own seat, Marv Velo was feeling worse and worse. He'd been trying to mask his knee injury since joining, but the more time that passed in the plane trip, the worse it got. He'd fly away and catch up later, but something would seem a little suspicious about sleazeball Vern Keith jumping out of a plane hundreds of feet over the Atlantic Ocean.
Velo didn't pay attention to the time traveler's apparent sickness, worrying too much about hiding his own pain.
Eurostar tried to cheer Naecken up by showing him the map of Mandelovia. Naecken took a look at it and asked, "Why is it round?"
"Sorry? What was that?" replied Eurostar.
"The sand... why is it round?" Eurostar explained the myths and legends about the place, and secretly hoped that he had finally reached the transformed Naecken, but his only reply was, "I see."
And then Naecken looked outside the window and said with a calm voice, "Who are they? And why are they fighting?"
Eurostar almost jumped out of his seat to take a look through the small window. Two men in halfplate armor and carrying swords were floating above a cloud, fighting with swords that ignited lightning each time they struck. Luckily not one bolt hit the plane, and the scene was soon lost behind them.
He recalled a news report about two brothers living just outside the border of Mandelovia named White Scorpion and Red Scorpion, otherwise known as the Scorpion brothers. They were hunted metahumans from Mandelovia who may or may not have been responsible for many deaths of innocent people in their brawls, with others or themselves. They too lived on the run from government agencies.
Naecken started to rise from his chair, but Eurostar stopped him. "It's not the best time to do anything now. We will have to wait until the next time we see them. Who knows, they may show up in Mandelovia."
Naecken looked at him with his red, unemotional eyes, then relaxed and sat down.
The plane landed at the Mandelovian airport.
M'xy complained about how the flight seemed to last days, Nowhereman complained about being in Europe, Danny complained about feeling sick, Velo complained about his knee, Lance Lorenzo complained about the airline food, Naecken complained about how they should have taken care of the men fighting in the sky (he also complained about the huge amount of makeup he had to wear to make everyone think he was a normal guy from Africa, and the wig that kept sliding around), Tobias complained about everyone complaining, and Eurostar complained about the group of terrorists pointing guns at everyone.
The rest realized Eurostar was right, and they started acting against the terrorists. They began protecting the other passengers without using any powers, while Eurostar and Tobias moved at superspeed (so fast nobody could see them) and quickly took the guns away.
In two minutes, the terrorists were defeated without any sign of metahuman activity, so the guys could go back to their whining.