by Sonja, T5 and Danny
"Why have you voted against the consulting company, Sonja? You are the only one that doesn't agree on the matter!" said Marv Velo, standing on the door of the woman's apartment.
Sonja Ljzavet was staring out of the window to the horizon and the distant sea. Suddenly, she turned toward him, shouting very angrily at him, "I can't believe it! I really can't believe it!"
Velo raised an eyebrow. "What can't you believe?"
"What can't I believe? You ask me what I can't believe? You are really asking me what I can't believe?" said the woman, very upset.
"Actually, yes."
"You have founded a company! Heroes for hire! And you want to publicize it! You are selling out our location to our enemies! No, not selling... giving it for free!" The girl was now screaming directly into his face, although she had to stay on the tip of her own foot to be at the same level of the tall man.
"I know."
"You know? You know! And you, knowing it will be our death, you have allowed that -- that idiot to sell us as mercenaries? There are forces you can't ever begin to understand that will be over us the very next day your MBL will appear over the Internet!"
"What forces, Sonja? What do you know that we don't? And, while you're at it, just who are you?"
"That's my business. And we were talking about--"
"It can't be your business, Miss Ljzavet, not while you live among us. Who are you? Why were you spying on us in Mandelovia? Why does your tattoo seem to disappear every once in awhile? What forces were you talking about?" asked Velo, cold as ice, still standing in the middle of the door.
"And you, Velo? Who are you? You have never told us. You arrived at the circus, asking to join the metahuman team when the guys were only trying to find a safe place to hide. You arrived with other two people. Where are they now? You seemed their best buddies. Where they have disappeared?"
"Hey, hey, you weren't with us at the time. How can you know?" asked Velo. His cold face had changed to an upset expression.
"Uh... Tobias told me. Don't ask me to reveal my secrets until you are not ready to reveal yours," said Sonja, and soon a wry smile appeared to light her face.
"Deal," whispered Velo and turned to leave the room. Then he stopped and came back.
"Well, Sonja. About the company. First, La Perdita is one of the few nations in the world where metahumans have equal rights. Here, we are safe from any interference from the United States. This nation has an elite security agency, composed exclusively of metahumans with psychic powers. There will be no secret mission from any hostile country.
"Second, Naecken is sure that Eurostar has not died. We are unable to locate him. We hope that by going public he will find us, and the same is for Nowhereman, should he want to return. I have faith in that man.
"Third, my goal, the motivation for which I have joined this group of fugitives, is to help to form a team of metaheroes. Please, don't laugh. Metahumans are not to be feared. We know this, but the people at large, the so-called normal people, don't, and they want to isolate or eliminate them.
"Cicciotto understood this, out of his experience, but his background as a Communist had him to imagine a revolution to free the metas. He basically wanted the metas to free themselves. This, in my humble opinion, would cause more fear among normal people.
"I want to free the metahuman world, too, but by talking directly to the normals instead of the metas. I want to set examples and inspiration. I want the people to look at the metas as their big brothers. I want people to feel protected by the fact that there are people with gifts who watch over their peace. Basically, I want to fulfill the plan of the U.S. government, but by my own means, through my own way."
"What plan are you talking about?"
"Sorry, I can't reveal that, Sonja," and with a sad face, Marv Velo left the room.
Then he paused a moment, turned back once again, looked Sonja in the eyes, and said, "I can't reveal it... yet."
A flash, and a young man stood in the rain on an open field in Mandelovia.
"This is Giorgio. I have found the right temporal-triaxial co-ordinates of the lost agent. She seems to have been here longer than me, which suggests that the time-differential sync is slower here. I'm jumping downstream in time to locate her bio-signature."
Naecken finally joined the others for dinner. When asked why he had been alone upstairs, he just replied, "My headache is gone now."
The gang looked at each other. Then Tobias Christopher asked, "You... get headaches? Aren't you supposed to be this composite being, made out of devils and angels and stuff?"
"I am. But this isn't really a headache, as you call it. It's more a splitting sensation, as if part of me wants to tear itself out of me. It hurts, but I endure it. Ever since we got here, I have felt better. Please pass the salt."
The team sat around the dining table, enjoying their dinner of roast lamb and a smörgåsbord of fruits and vegetables. Given the exploratory nature of their activities on the island since their arrival, they had all been rather split up, and dinnertime was one of the few times of day that the whole group was together.
Danny Hearn hungrily consumed the portion of salad on his plate.
"Lamb, Danny?" Lance Lorenzo said, offering him a freshly cut slice.
"No thanks, I'm a vegetarian," Danny replied.
"Really?"
"Yes."
"Really?!"
"Yes!"
Shirley Francis sat next to Mick Harrison and was offering him a second helping. "Any more, Mick?... It IS Mick, isn't it?"
"Of course it is!"
"Well, it might have been M'xy."
"Why would it be M'xy--?"
A brief pause.
"Hi, everyone!"
"Hi, M'xy!"
"Man, that never stops being funny," Tobias said, laughing.
"But on a serious note, everybody, Sonja has raised a legitimate concern," Velo said, shooting Sonja a quick glance, "when she says that she thinks this new... endeavor may be a risk."
"Correct. We could be opening ourselves up for those who wish to track us down," Sonja added.
"Right," Danny said, as if expecting more from Sonja's sentence. His expectation paid off, as she continued.
"Velo has partially succeeded in reassuring me about these concerns. But I do think we should all be aware of the possibility of risk before we proceed, so we can all agree on the plan."
The group was silent for a second, contemplating.
"Well, yeah, but... anythin's a risk then, innit'?" Pete Glover finally said. Everyone looked at him.
"Yeah. Well. Y'know. We could all fall down off'a bridge or sumthin', or get stampeded by one o' dem bulls or sumthin'... all I'm sayin' is, y'take risks every day, doin' all sorts o' stuff."
"Well, most people do. Not so much you," Danny said to Pete.
"I take yer point, but then, you take mine. There's gunna be a slight chance o' risk, we all know dat... but there's gunna be a bloody huge chance o' helpin' people out wid stuff, isn't there?"
"He's right," Tobias said, speaking to everyone at the table. "The good we can do far outweighs the potential danger."
Everybody voiced their agreement. The group seemed to have come to a final consensus.
"Well, that's settled then!" Velo said, sounding excited about the new venture.