Part Six

They grilled him for over an hour more, getting some additional details, though frustratingly few of them. All of this information was served with a large helping of self-aggrandizement and matter-of-fact bragging. Fosworth clearly found the entire process boring and not worth his time, but was determined to make the most of it by making the most of his contribution in stopping the monster. He made clear through his attitude that he was cooperating for the good of the c\o\m\p\a\n\y\ team.

"One final bit of advice," he said, obviously deciding unilaterally that the meeting was over. "That thing is fast, strong, tough and cunning."

"It would be far less of a problem with your help," said the Black Mask.

"Not my problem any more," said Fosworth, blandly. "I'm retired. Just remember, this won't be easy."

"Of course this won't be easy!" said Bowman, slamming his fist on the conference table and actually yelling at the older super. "That's why we want your help! Real heroes don't retire unless they're disabled! What makes you think you deserve the easy path?!"

"This isn't about taking the easy path!" shouted the former Kid Dynamo, outraged at such treatment. "This is about changing paths! I was sick of the hero business, especially with the way supers were being treated in the early Seventies."

"That's enough!" said the Black Mask, perhaps the only person present who could make such a declaration stick. He turned to Fosworth. "Thank you for the information. If we need any more of your help, we'll be sure to let you know."

"You're welcome," said Fosworth, in a tone which was anything but gracious.

Security guards were called to escort him out of the base and back to his helicopter.

"Just remember," the Black Mask said, once Fosworth was gone, "whenever he said 'I' you can probably substitute 'we' and whenever he said 'we' you can probably substitute 'they.'"

* * *

"All right," said Bowman, tiredly, back in his usual seat, "the information from the microprobes should be coming in by now."

He looked to his right as he activated the main display and set it to their contact channel. Indeed, there was a message from the Danish government that the probes had been deployed and information was already flooding in. Bowman set the display to show what those requesting the help had discovered.

"Okay, we don't have a lot of time before we're supposed to leave, so let's get this done. The way this works is like one of those virtual tours. The data from the probes is used to create a composite, explorable image. I'll start with this view, then move in and around the two ships to see what we can see."

"What information do these probes provide besides visual images?" said the Black Mask, as what was shown shifted.

"Three channels of infrared, plus sound and atmospheric composition," said Bowman, as the view moved into the pilot house of the Coast Guard ship. "Nobody there. No signs of violence."

He had just moved the view into the access corridor behind the bridge when the PA system came to very loud life.

"Security alert!" shouted whoever was currently at the microphone. "Intruder alert, in the mountaintop garden!"

"Great," said Bowman.

As one, the team rose and rushed into the hall outside the meeting room and towards the elevator. Fortunately, all the team members were in good physical condition. Also, security knew to divert an elevator car to their floor. It was waiting, door open, when they arrived.

Bowman got the view from the topside security cameras on his pad as the elevator rose.

"Well," he said, not certain how to parse what he was seeing. "Looks like an elf maid. A rather irritated elf maid."

"I wonder if Runner could act as an intermediary?" said Rapscallion.

"If this is a European elf - which it appears to be - they tend to look down on the Bluegrass elves," said Solange.

"Well, she's currently just looking around, so let's give her a chance to talk," said Bowman.

Accordingly, the team members slowed as they approached the security lock for the mountaintop garden.

Bowman nodded to the head of the security squad waiting just inside the closed outer door. At his gesture, his men and women backed past the inner door. With that closed, Bowman opened the outer door. This was disguised as a rock face in the knoll on the top of the mountain, which held the elevator and the airlock. With vines and other plants growing over most of it, the actual door was very well disguised. Which was likely why their strange visitor hadn't found it.

"Hello?" he said, as the team members walked out into the carefully landscaped area around the knoll.

"Oh!" said the very fey looking woman there, obviously startled by their arrival. She was wearing a plain, sheer gown of some sort, something very impractical but extraordinarily fine. "I'm, uhm, looking for my brother."

"Let me guess," said the Black Mask. "Your brother is Hiram Fosworth!"

"Yes! I know he's somewhere close. I just want to talk with him! It's important!"

"Well, you better hurry," said Jet Jaguar. "He's getting read... Ow!"

That last as Solange stepped on his foot.

"What the Hell is wrong with you?!"

"Fosworth was here," said the Black Mask, trying to salvage the situation. "He has already left. What is it you want to talk to him about?"

"That's his helicopter, isn't it?" said the strange woman, her tone accusing as she peered down at the landing pad. "I recognize his company logo!"

She launched herself off the top of the mountain, diving towards the helipad. Solange suddenly realized the strange woman was barefoot, since the soles of her feet were the last part of her to disappear over the edge.

"Just for that, you go after her!" snapped Bowman.

"Of course I go after her!" said Jet Jaguar, taking off. "I'm the only one who can fly!"

"He still has trouble with this stuff," said Solange, in a stage mutter, as the rest of the team hurried back inside, to the elevator. "His brain just can't accept that you don't always tell everyone everything."

* * *

Jet Jaguar was there when brother saw sister. As he and others later reported, their reunion did not begin well and quickly deteriorated.

"What the Hell... Laurie?!"

"Don't you 'Laurie' me, you son of a bitch!"

By the time the main part of the team got back to the helipad there was a screaming argument well under way. Jet Jaguar stood by, in his highly streamlined and armored costume, watching helplessly as brother and sister had at it.

"You had an abortion!"

"You frittered away your fortune!"

"I gave most of it to good causes! Yet you somehow see that as equivalent to an abortion! That just proves all your priorities are screwed sideways!"

"Of course they're not the same! With money you can get an abortion! With charity you get nothing!"

"With charity you get everything! You never did anything except for yourself!"

Fosworth's people were standing beside the helicopter, watching helplessly. No, correct that; they were cowering against the helicopter.

"I had to take charge!" Fosworth shouted. "Use a firm hand! You wouldn't even open the box Great-granduncle Hiram left us!"

"Of course I didn't open the box!" Laurie shouted. "He warned us not to! I knew that doing so would let the magic out and ruin everything! You went ahead and did it, anyway! Even though you're his namesake! It's taken years for the magic to recover!"

"There is no magic!" Hiram screamed, red-faced in fury. "It's all alien science! You're just too much of a romantic to admit that!"

At Bowman's gesture, Jet Jaguar came over to join the rest of the team.

"I doubt this will become violent," the team's chair said, quietly. "There are also lives at stake on those two ships. Let's get out of here."

"Five-to-two they're still at it when we return," said Rapscallion.

There were no takers.

* * *

On the way to the hanger Bowman finally finished checking the imagery from the microprobes, on his pad.

"Yeah," he said, putting that away as the elevator neared the hangar level. "There's no sign of the thing on either ship. It seems to have laired somewhere the probes haven't reached. It's probably still asleep in one of the cabins on the retrieval ship and, well, most of the people are still alive. We need to get there now."

"Something else to consider, once we have this monster business settled," said Solange. "What happened to the wrecked spacecraft the creature arrived in?"

"Probably on the bottom of the ocean, still near wherever the ice melted enough to release it and the creature," said the Black Mask. "Remember, the creature was out of the ship and in the abandoned base, so they wouldn't have been together. There's also probably a lot of debris from the base, confusing the situation."

"When does the first team get to the ships?" said Rapscallion.

"In just a few minutes," said Bowman, anxiously. "That's why we need to boost now! If they need backup, we and the Intrepids are supposed to be it, and they should already be on the way to Greenland."

"Well, we can't have those newbies showing us up!" said Rapscallion, cheerfully, putting on a burst of speed as the elevator finally opened on the hangar level. "Who did they find to be the first-in supers?"

"Some regional supers - a couple of lone wolves and members of two different teams - who are all known resistors," said Bowman, as they hurried towards the hopper which their staff had made ready for the trip. "Uhm, Vulcanic, Hope Springs, Cull and Joseph."

"Joseph?!" said Rapscallion, grinning as they climbed inside the suborbital transport. "Oh, I am going to have fun with that one. Hi, Runner. We need to go, now!"

"I wondered what was keeping you," said the Bluegrass Elf, who was already the hopper.

"Everyone securely fastened in?" said Bowman, as he took the controls. "Okay, here we go!"

The airbreathing engines wound up as the concealed hatch in the side of the mountain opened. Bowman firewalled the throttle and the magnetic launcher hurled the craft out through the opening.

* * *

"The Greenland Coast Guard had lost contact with the first team of supers," said their Danish liaison, as the Intrepids and Runner hurried from their hopper to the amphibious helicopter waiting for them. "They landed successfully on the Coast Guard ship. Then we got a couple of terse messages that they were being attacked by a flying super, then nothing."

"Damn," said Bowman. "Just what we were worried about. A rogue super who is a non-resistor got there first."

"Their plan was to come in at wavetop height, to reduce the chance of being shot down," Champion elaborated, as the Assembly joined the Intrepids, who were already on board. "One of the supers on that team is checked out in large helicopters, so there were no military personnel aboard. Just like us."

"That's what we should do," said Bowman, nodding. "Come in low and fast, except we'll land on the water and swim, climb or fly aboard. Any ideas about a different course of action, now?"

"Fly in as quickly and directly as we can," said Champion, as the last ones aboard finished belting in and the door was closed. "Stay near the water until we're right on top of the Coast Guard ship. We drop Jet Jaguar off as soon as we see the controlled super flying towards us; he diverts the guy and we land. Or ocean, rather."

"We need to hurry," said Dr. Gorgeous, from the pilot's seat. "Sea state is already rough and is forecast to get worse."

"Let's go!" shouted Bowman, as the rotor of the flying machine wound up. "Oh, and lets get the anti-domination devices distributed and checked."

"I thought you had them," said Rapscallion, looking concerned. The others ignored him.

* * *

The flight was not a short one; the incident had begun with the ships well out to sea, and they had drifted south and west since. The increasingly rough weather didn't help.

"Much longer, and the current those two ships are in turns southeast," said Dr. Gorgeous. "We need to settle this before they near inhabited land."

The trip was normal - even boring - for most of the flight. However, as they came closer to the drifting ships, Runner suddenly came alert.

"There's two alien mind signatures!"

"It has reproduced?!" said the Black Mask, as surprised - and distressed - as they had ever seen him.

"That seems to be the most likely explanation."

"How could a single..." said Jet Jaguar, stopping in confusion.

"Some female insects can store sperm for decades," said Bowman, frowning.

"More likely, this alien creature is neither male nor female, but parthenogenetic," said the Black Mask.

"Like Godzilla, in that weird movie," said Rapscallion, nodding.

"Great," said Champion, sourly. "What if it reproduced before finding the ship? The one we were worried about might not even be the original!"

"We deal with this," said Bowman, determination in his voice, "then worry about cleanup."

"Speaking of cleanup," said Jet Jaguar, "I should bail, soon."

"Yes," said Bowman. "As our only flyer, your job is twofold; warn us about people trying to shoot us down and divert the rogue super."

"We're gonna need a bigger flyer," muttered Rapscallion. Jet Jaguar ignored him.

"Everybody have their survival gear on?" said Bowman, looking around. "Even during Summer, the water is cold, here, and we could all have to bail."

"Looks like it," said Champion, who noted that while some people - including her - had less to worry about from cold water and were dressed appropriately, everyone had flotation gear. She suddenly pointed. "There's the ships! It looks like the landing pad on the Coast Guard ship is empty, too!"

"Did someone from the first team get away?" said Solange, trying to get a better view. "Or did the controlled people on board push it into the water?"

"Either way, we should land on that pad," said Dr. Gorgeous.

"Right," said Bowman. "Jet Jaguar, deploy! Doctor, get us on the deck!"

"One advantage of the higher waves," said Dr. Gorgeous, as the team's flyer launched, Rapscallion quickly closed the door behind him, and the helicopter dropped, "we blend in better."

"Let's just hope we blend in enough," said Bowman, managing not to cringe as the Assembly's tame mastermind piloted them between wave crests, somehow without getting a rotor tip or sponson wet.

Just before reaching the Coast Guard ship Dr. Gorgeous pulled up hard, bringing them almost to a halt. Then she plopped them onto the landing pad as the stern of the ship began settling into a wave trough. The landing was just barely noticeable.

"Champion! Maciste! Tie us down, quickly! The rest of you, out after them!"

"Always obey your pilot," said Rapscallion, as he was the third through the doors.

While the two designated secured the helicopter, one on each side, the rest of the costumed figures quickly spread out onto first the pad, then the deck around it. There was no visible reaction.

"Less trouble than we anticipated," said the Black Mask.

"Yeah, tell that to JJ," said Rapscallion, pointing.

"Oh..." said the Black Mask, looking up. "Uhm, can any of you help him?"

"Anybody recognize that super?" said Champion, as she ran towards one of the fifty-caliber pintle mount guns standing at the ready to repel boarders or aerial approach.

"RedBird?" said Bowman, frowning. "Flyer - obviously - and medium-level physical super."

"Incoming!" shouted Maciste.

Crew from both ships were now running for the rear of the Coast Guard cutter. Many were armed. Some of those were already firing.

Bowman shot sticky foam arrows into the paths of some of the approaching crews. Maciste simply leapt across the short gap to the recovery ship and plowed through the opponents there. The Black Mask disabled firearms or disarmed opponents with his own guns. Several of the heroes were hit by bullets, as was their ride. However, none of the hits caused significant damage, partly due to the toughest members - either naturally or due to their armor - of the two super teams covering the softer targets.

Abruptly, the noise of the battle was overwhelmed by a short burst from the .50. Everyone at least glanced over at Champion, then at RedBird. The rogue super had turned and was headed for the Coast Guard ship before Champion sprayed him with those massive, high-velocity slugs. He dropped, recovered a bit, then got body slammed from behind by Jet Jaguar.

The Intrepids' flyer shoved RedBird towards the bow of the Coast Guard ship, then pulled up at the last moment. RedBird hit hard enough to feel throughout the ship.

"He does have his uses," said Rapscallion, grinning.

"That did it," said Runner, as she deftly climbed out from under the landing pad, her small size making that a practical hiding place. "All this noise and vibration has roused the two aliens."

"Can you handle both of them?" said Champion, as she hopped from the pintle mount, vaulted over a corner of the landing pad and planted the landing next to the Bluegrass Elf.

Both were speaking rather loudly, due to the ringing in their ears from the noise the machine gun had made. Given the size of Runner's ears her ringing must have been from cathedral bells. This despite the communication ear plugs all the participants were wearing.

"No; just one at a time. However, the area denial generator is working, as are all the individual protections. The victims will still have their implanted orders, but won't be able to receive new ones."

"So we move fast," said the Black Mask, suiting deed to word.

They split into three teams, with little discussion as to who was on each. One group focused on restraining the dominated humans, and one went for each of the monsters. Fen stayed with Dr. Gorgeous at the helicopter.