by Chewy Walrus and The Eurostar
Edulcore Cicciotto:
In my hiding place, I watch as Eddie, my son, gently falls asleep. His sleep is so peaceful that I wonder if he realizes how dangerous his life has already been in the short amount of time since his unnatural birth.
I wish I could sleep as peacefully as him. Although I become drowsy and want to sleep, my thoughts, my worries, keep me awake long past the point of exhaustion, until finally, I close my eyes.
And then I sleep.
"Where?"
"Sicily."
"Figures."
"Ready, everyone?"
"All forces are primed and ready."
"Excellent. Sicily."
At the word, a swirling blue doorway opened up as six figures, similarly clad, step through, defiant and dead set on their task.
Sicily:
Edulcore Cicciotto sat quietly cradling a child who was a clone of himself in his arms.
"Hi there, Eddie," he said softly as the baby began to weep. As he cried, the snakes on his head began to hiss at him.
"What's wrong, Eddie?" the former Italian racer said softly. Shaking his head, he glanced around at his surroundings. Meager, to say the least. He was living in what appeared to be the hollow of a cave, hundreds of feet below the ground. A small stream brought him water and fish to eat, on occasion.
But, still, he couldn't make his son love or trust him.
"Curious, isn't it, Cicciotto?" came a voice from behind.
"Who?" the former leader of the Revolution said, turning and taking in the true horror of the situation.
Six figures, dressed in similar bodysuits. All were angry. All were powerful. All were the EPS.
"Miss us, Cicciotto?" said Charles Elias Walker, a slight sneer creeping across his lips.
"Wha--?" Cicciotto stammered. "H-how?"
"Quite easy," spoke a wonky figure off to the side, dressed in a dull orange bodysuit. Edulcore recognized him as Knell's assistant from TriVext Corporation. "We planted a tracker in your clone's bloodstream. Led us right to you."
"But," the former Eurostar exclaimed, "you cannot have found me! Tempus said so!"
"I don't know anything about any 'tempus,' but I hardly expect you to be surprised," Walker said, crossing his arms across his chest. "You trash our headquarters, steal what we rightfully stole, and expect us to just sit quietly aside? I don't think so."
"Do not expect me to sit quietly aside!" the Italian said, standing intimidatingly. "I am now the most powerful metahuman that this earth has ever known!"
"Screw you," said John Doe, his eyes flickering with a shining silver energy.
"My thoughts exactly," said the man who once called himself Agent Turner, his eyes crackling with a scarlet energy that matched his new bodysuit.
Two giant bolts of energy -- one silver and one red -- hit the man known as Eurostar square in the chest. At first, he stumbled back, but quickly recuperated as his body mass and composition changed before the very eyes of the EPS.
"Nice try, Turner, Doe," the hero said, a slight smug on his face. "The human body may have been vulnerable to your attack, but this body of granite is nonconductive! Now that my body is made up of the very elements of Earth itself, your energies cannot hurt me!"
"Elements, eh?" John Doe asked, raising his eyebrow and smiling menacingly. "Well, if it isn't my lucky day."
Suddenly, a blood-curling scream filled the room as the hero was lifted high into the air, the very elements that made up his body falling to the ground.
"Elements, huh?" Doe said again. "Well, then, you must have been mistaken about that 'most powerful metahuman' bit, because I have control over Earth's elements."
"All right, EPS," Walker said, taking a step back as the portal behind him faded into obscurity. "Attack formation -- NOW!"
In an instant, Tweed dropped out of sight. In an instant, Curie rolled into a corner, pulling a small device from his belt. In an instant, Reynolds began to hover a few inches off the ground. In an instant, Owens pierced Eurostar's mind, increasing his pain immeasurably, his screaming growing even louder. In an instant, Turner fell back to stand behind Walker, arms crossed in Walker's position. In an instant, Doe released his hold on Eurostar, sending the hero crashing to the ground.
"Commence Operation Retrieval," Walker said in monotone.
Eurostar stood to his feet meekly. His spectral form had been restored, for the time being.
A bolt of lightning flashed from Turner's hand, hitting the spot where Eurostar stood, scrambling his molecules just so.
Eurostar screamed some more as he felt a hand enter his ghostly body. He turned to see an intangible Tweed, gripping the nape of his neck with all his might.
"Flour, huh?" he said, ramming a ghostly fist into an equally ghostly solar plexus. The ghost of Eurostar fell to the floor, clutching his chest.
"You like messing with female emotions, eh?" came a female voice. "Mess with this!"
A rush entered Eurostar's head. A garbled mess of emotions ran amuck through his head: fear, apathy, greed, horror, terror, hate, love, sadness, depression. The changes occurred so quickly, the spectre doubled over, vomiting wildly on the floor.
"Now," Walker said, nodding to Reynolds and Curie. At the signal, Reynolds burst forth, illuminating the small cave and momentarily blinding the ghostly form, sending it into a blind writhing on the floor.
"Walt!" Walker yelled out. Curie nodded, aiming a small metallic cylinder at the fallen Eurostar. Tweed suddenly became both tangible and visible, scooping up the baby, who began to gurgle and laugh at the familiar touch.
As Curie hit a switch, a violent hissing noise filled the room. The noise grew louder by the second, and as it did, the spectral form of the hero was whisked into the small device in the scientist's hand. When the form had totally vanished, Curie pressed another button, sealing off Eurostar's only possible escape route.
"Got him," the bald man said with a smile.
"Excellent," Walker said, placing a small headset on his head. "All right, I.G.O.R., take us back."
"Affirmative, Doctor," came I.G.O.R.'s robotic voice.
At the voice, a bluish portal opened. As the members of the EPS stepped through, Walker turned to Curie. "Get him into the lab. Don't let him out of that container, understand? His friends think he's still dead. With that under our belts, we can keep him in our custody at our leisure. And find out what's on that disk. Chances are, they already have a copy, if what I've been told is correct, but I'd like to know in advance what it can do."
"Got it, Charles," Walt said, stepping into the blue swirling mass.
Walker, the last one still in the room, turned toward a shadowed area of the cave.
"I know you're back there," he said, obviously expecting someone to acknowledge.
A straight-laced, androgynous man in a bizarre futuristic garb stepped out as if from nowhere, bowing slightly to Walker. "I trust everything went well?" the figure asked.
"Indeed, Tempus," Walker answered. "Thank you for your assistance."
"Do not thank me," the talos said in a monotone. "He threatened the very planes of time itself. I am just glad that you have helped me restore them to order."
"Well, considering it all worked out well, the pleasure's all ours," Walker said, nodding to the android as he placed his foot into the portal. "Take care of yourself, Tempus. Be seeing you."
With that, Walker disappeared into the portal, causing the blue disk to fade into obscurity.
"Of course you will," Tempus said, raising his eyebrow and fading back into the time stream.
And then I awake.
I put the light on. My son is still here, sleeping next to me in his cradle. It was only a bad dream. All my worst fears were realized. It did not actually happen.