by The Eurostar and Chewy Walrus
The rooftop of the Uffizi Museum, Pisa, Italy:
Edulcore Cicciotto:
"...crap."
I raise my head, it seems it weighs a ton. Danny is worried. Chance is worried. Dirk chews his cigar hastily; I bet he is worried, too.
Noise. Big noise. And light.
There are helicopters. And men. How many? Dozens? Hundreds? I hear many voices, Italian, screaming orders and instructions.
I can barely keep my eyes open. I can't stay upright. I feel myself cut in half. I suffered so much only back in the desert, in Mandelovia, when my metagene manifested.
I am useless. We are trapped, and I can't even walk. Oh God, what's happening to me?
I hear fragments of the talk that goes between my friends.
"...they set up this long before. They had a plan if they were to find others in the museum..."
"...professionals in our same field. And better prepared than us..."
"Fuck them. We have to find a way out, NOW!"
"...there are snipers on the roofs. Special forces coming out from everywhere... Do you think your axe can take care of a hundred armed men?"
"Maybe we should just surrender. Ed is dying, guys, he needs medical care right now..."
I am dying. A second time. Then I was stopping a meteor. Now I am vomiting on a roof. This new life stinks.
"...Ed is smiling. I think we are losing him..."
What's killing me? Could it really be Ladnikia? The sword... I can't stay separated from her? I am a damned junkie again. I will never be free.
I close my eyes. The truth is too horrible to see.
"...Ed, Ed. Open your eyes, don't give up right now!"
"Shit, shit. They are coming. On the right. Do you really want to surrender?"
The noise of the 'copters is deafening. The lights blinding. This really is the end.
"...is there any other way?"
"...what I fear is the Italian policy about metahumans. It's one of the place where discrimination is higher... if they capture us..."
"I told ya. We have to escape..."
"How? How? There is no way out. They are above, under and around us..."
Among the incredible, unsustainable noise, the lights, the wind from the 'copters, something familiar hit my nose. A smell, forgotten since long time, that brings hope.
Ozone. Molecules of oxygen burned by a magnetic force field.
The screams, the voices from the policemen have suddenly stopped. The helicopters seems to have gone at large. Even my friends are silent.
And then they erupts into laughter. Big, releasing laughter.
I force my eyes to open... and right above something big is obscuring the star-filled night sky.
And then I see the form. I recognize it... the Stormloader, the MBL's hovercraft!
Big as a whale, it maneuvers gently, even if not perfectly, in the narrow space around the museum.
I see it lowering, meter after meter, until the deck is at the same level of the roof. Around us, the policemen are frozen in fear, unable to understand what's happening.
I feel myself lifted up on the shoulder of Grimm, and then I see him jumping, just like the other three friends.
The hatch is closed behind us.
The voices... I can't understand anything... and I can't see anymore... just when we are near freedom... my liberty... my life...
A soft warmth. In my hand. Heat. Nurturing me. Warming my soul. Feeding my bloodstream.
I open my eyes.
It's Tayden who is looking at me. Smiling gently, but with a worried look.
Then I look at my hand. There is Ladnikia, firm in my hand.
"I... she... the sword... I can't..." I whisper. The words simply don't come at my tongue. But Tayden seems to understand my gripe.
"You can't leave the sword. None of its bearers have ever been able to get away from her. It is a wonder, that blade... but her curse is inescapable."
I look toward the pilot seats. The guys are chatting. Chance seems worried.
"I tell you this thing isn't secure yet. We still have to conduct several tests. We don't know for sure how the craft can keep up with the engine's magnetic field..."
"Shut up, Chance! With you on board, there shouldn't be any problem!" says Grimm, and although that's technically impossible, I am sure his skull smiles.
Chance. Dirk. Danny. Grimm. Tayden is behind me.
Who is piloting the ship? Who has come to our rescue?
And, as to answer my inner question, a face appears behind the pilot seat, a face I didn't see from what it's like an age.
He looks at me. And for less than a moment, he smiles and winks, and suddenly returns to his piloting duty.
Marv Velo has returned.
Pisa, Italy:
In the penthouse suite of Pienezza, an Italian five-star hotel, the five members of Project Omicron sat around a table, munching on their room service meals and looking over the notes they gathered from the Uffizi.
"I still wanna know who those other guys were," Arges said, furrowing his brow as he stared at the paper in front of him. "I think the passed-out one looked kinda familiar..."
"Actually, you have a point there, Arges," Omicron said, taking a sip of his coffee and took a bite of his pie. "I know I've seen him before..."
"Who cares who they were?" X-Acute said, shrugging his shoulders and chewing a bite of his pasta primavera. "The point is, we got out, and they didn't! For all we know, they're locked up in an Italian prison somewhere getting sodomized by some guy named Guido..."
"I do not think that is likely," Sheik said, steepling his fingers in front of his face. "They seemed underprepared, yes, but resourceful. I would not think they would be so easily apprehended."
"One way to find out," Johnny Omicron said, flipping the remote control into his hand and turning on the big screen TV across the room. The sounds of a news broadcast filled the room.
"...back at the Uffizi Museum, where five mysterious men have just been whisked away by what appears to be a modified U.S. military hovercraft. The United States is currently denying any involvement in what is currently believed to be a robbery. While police have not yet found any stolen goods, the building is being searched to ensure that all the priceless works of art and history are intact."
"So, what's the deal?" X-Acute said, his mouth full once again. "So, they got away... big deal!"
"Shh!" Omicron hissed as Rose turned and gave X-Acute a hard look. The gymnast shrugged and took a sip of his beer as the beautiful woman pointed at the television. There on the screen were the five men whom they had met at the museum, frozen in the lights of the police and press helicopters.
"Are we taping this?" Arges whispered. Omicron pressed a button on the remote control as the television began to download the feed directly into a nodule on his armor.
"We are now," Omicron whispered. As he did, footage of a large hovercraft roared upward and an unseen man popped out of the top and helped the group into its belly and continued to ascend.
"What the...?" Omicron said, cocking his head to the side. "That can't happen!"
"What?" X-Acute said, sulking.
"It just kept going up..." Omicron said, pointing at the screen. "I know a few things about these military hovercrafts... and they're just that -- hovercrafts. They shouldn't ascend that far up at all."
"Look also at the markings," Sheik motioned as they replayed the footage. "All evidence of one-time United States ownership has been removed. This is a privatized hovercraft... though possibly not demilitarized."
"So, what options?" Omicron asked, finishing of the last dregs of his coffee.
"Mercenaries?" Arges optioned, swigging down an ale with a look of disgust on his face. He hated normal lager, preferring mead and ambrosia to human brews.
"Could be a group very much like us," Omicron said pensively. "In which case, we could very well have some competition for this case... and I wanna find out who."
"How do you propose we do that?" X-Acute asked, leaning forward on his elbows, while beside him, Rose fished out a cloth from her pack and began polishing her gun.
"We get a background check on the pale one with the ponytail," Omicron said, indicating the man on the screen who the group had seen passed out earlier. "Also, trace U.S. militarization sales preceding and immediately following the Clinton administration. Specifically that make and model of hovercraft. That should give us some bead on who or what we're dealing with."
Omicron rose from the table and walked over to where his armor lay in a pile by the TV. "I'm gonna e-mail this footage to Xyber and have her give us the results when we return to Switzerland tomorrow."
"Tomorrow?!" X-Acute asked. "Why are we going? We have to see if that book is here or not!"
"Chances are very unlikely that the book is here at all," Omicron said, moving toward X-Acute. "All evidence we found in that museum points to the contrary. Now, we head out and check our other options. See what Mimic, Pneuma, and Xyber have found. Maybe with their combined input we can come across something. We stop by Switzerland, then fly out to Washington, D.C., to rendezvous with Mimic. That's the plan. Any questions?"
There was no reply from the others, who merely looked at Omicron with a look that combined curiousity with understanding.
"All right, then," Johnny said, nodding. "Everyone best get some shut-eye. We'll need it. We head out tomorrow morning. Xyber's already got the tickets on reserve. See you all tomorrow..."