Somewhere in Mandelovia:
There is a large warehouse which appears to be run-down from the outside, but which until recent days has been guarded by hidden sentries, disguised in civilian clothing. If one were to find a way into the warehouse -- something nigh-impossible without the proper clearance until the Strikeforce military attack of today -- one would merely find an old warehouse interior filled with dusty air and rusting metal beams. A broken-down battery-run forklift could be seen sitting in the corner in disrepair. Several odd pieces of left-over shelving could be seen piled against one wall, a few of them having slid and fallen to the concrete floor. A few metal rods and a box full of assorted nail, screws, and various electrical equipment -- all rusting due to a leak in the ceiling above it -- sit next to the battered old electric warehouse bay-doors, the outside entrance of which sits some four feet above the pavement and was once used for shipping and receiving via large trucks. The yard behind the warehouse is surrounded by a chain-link fence thrice padlocked despite it being virtually empty. The lawn in the empty lot next to the warehouse is overgrown and weedy. There is nothing -- absolutely nothing -- to all appearances special about this warehouse.
However...
Some 60 feet below the concrete floor of the empty warehouse is another building, one surrounded only by rock and limestone. This building is an advanced and post-modern laboratory facility which is as empty as the warehouse above it, though it was not always so. Until a few days ago this facility was the center of a very secret project, one which was abandoned for reasons as yet unknown. Much of the equipment which had been in this laboratory has been moved elsewhere, though a ring of differently-sized tubes could be seen in one cloistered room in this large facility. Like the warehouse above it, no guards are anywhere around. There is only one apparent way into this laboratory facility, and that is through the tubes which are currently humming to life as a generator kicks in and supplies power to them. Half a minute later, a shimmering light shines from them, and two silhouetted figures of men appear in one of the tubes.
"--ARE YOU CRAZY?!! You could kill both of us! You--" The voice of the younger man is cut off in mid-sentence as he realizes he is no longer where he was. "Well... that was simply... incredible."
"Isn't it, though?" the older man says, his voice sounding slightly amused.
"I didn't feel a thing -- was the transportation instantaneous?" the younger man asks, his keen eyes carefully studying the control panel as he steps out of the tube with eyes of wonder. His name, as of course you have already guessed, is Kristofer Schanz, the Vanguardian known by the nickname of Chance. "And you say this works on some kind of 'probability matrix'?"
"Keep your mind on the mission, kid," the older man says. His name, of course, is Roman Marko, the self-described retired Elite Agent who is middle-aged though still fit. "You wanted to learn what happened to Helen McKenzie, didn't you? Well, look around."
So Kristofer Schanz did.
*************
Outside of the smoking crater that was once Promethean City, the National Guard troops from several states around the eastern seaboard were having a hell of a time trying to keep people away from the ruins. The countless industrial wastes which had been exposed in the destruction of that city had polluted the air and were keeping the fires burning even now, several days after the death of so many people, including the President of the United States himself, Robert Brown.
The only thing people were thankful for at this point was that no nuclear power plants had been damaged, though nearby facilities were nearly critical at some points due to minor structural damage resulting in the unnatural earthquakes caused by the meteor strike.
In Washington, DC, the funeral procession for Robert Brown was held in honor of all those who had died in Promethean City. Record numbers of people turned out for the memorial services, most of whom showed up because of the Prometheans rather than President Brown, a fairly unpopular leader during his second term in office. However, few statesmen or dignitaries, either American or international, were present at the funeral due to security concerns. Considering the world situation with the so-called "Prince of Hell" declaring war on the entire Earth and showing his apparent power in such drastic ways, the U.S.A. was probably the last nation in the world anyone wanted to be right now. Even the Middle East felt safer at the moment.
The United States of America had been dealt not one, but two, heavy blows upon its most populated urban centers -- the east coast and the west coast. And while Promethean City was NOT New York City any more than Athanon was Los Angeles, the deathtoll was still in the multiple millions, something unheard of in America. It was estimated that more Americans had instantaneously died in the last few days due to the meteor attacks than had died in every war America had taken part in since the American Revolution.
Something had to be done. Something would be done.
*************
"All this is so... so incredible," Chance said for what seemed the thousandth time as Roman Marko lit up another cigar. "Despite most of the equipment having already been removed, it's still so..."
"'Incredible.' Yeah, I get it."
"But it doesn't answer my question about Helen McKenzie. What did General D'goon do with her?"
"I wish I knew, kid. I think you'll have to ask the General that yourself when you see him. Last I knew she was in charge of this project, though something obviously happened to it and her since then. All I know is that she's gone. She's just gone. Don't know where, don't know when..."
"When, indeed..." Chance remarked. He had spent the better of 20 minutes exploring the laboratory facility, yet there was little actual equipment left to study, except that which was built in as part of the actual structure. One room had once had a purpose he could only guess at. This kind of science was completely out of his field, as he was a mere chemist, but it instilled in him a desire to study the other sciences in more depth than he ever had before... someday.
At the moment, however, Chance found it difficult to keep from being distracted by the apparition of Pete Glover's ghost dancing and making faces in front of him in an attempt to break his concentration. Chance had seen Pete a lot more than he had ever let on during the regular missions, but he never spoke with Pete unless he was completely alone, a fact which annoyed Pete to no end.
"'Ey! Look'ee here, me old son!" Pete said after ducking out of his way a few seconds earlier. Chance resisted turning around for several moments, until finally, after Pete kept shouting at him in his mind to turn around, he did. And he couldn't help but laugh.
"What's so gobdamn funny?" Roman Marko said frowning as the invisible (to his eyes) ghost of Pete Glover stood with his pants down around his ankles and sticking his ghostly posterior in Marko's face just as the latter was kneeling down and inspecting an LED apparatus on the floor. Pete turned around and thrust his pelvis in the direction of Marko's face while putting his hands behind his head and pantomiming the signs of pleasure while screaming in a woman's voice.
Chance just shook his head and stifled his snickering. As his hands passed over a sensor, however, a blue light lit up the room.
"WHAT THE FUCK?"
The Vanguardian turned around, instantaneously alert, only to find a very shocked and angry Roman Marko flung back onto the ground, his cigar having fallen from his mouth. Chance couldn't understand why Marko wore that expression on his face. That is, until he realized he was looking at Pete. He was LOOKING at Pete!
"Y-you can see him?" Chance said, his eyes widening.
Pete was still swinging his hips like a hula-girl with his pants around his ankles. He suddenly stopped, however, as Chance's words kicked in. "He can see me?!?" Pete stumbled back and fell down on his bare buttocks with a slap! on the floor. "SHITE that hurt!" At that same moment, a recovered Roman Marko was almost upon Pete, and had attempted to thrust an incapacitating kick at Pete's head, only to miss due to Pete's own misstep and fall.
"This is incredible!" Chance exclaimed. "Somehow this device must have tapped into the temporal dimension which Pete must have apparently been trapped in all along." He went to Pete and offered his hand.
"Ow! That smarts!" Pete said as he grabbed Chance's hand with his left and pulled his pants up with his right.
The little monkey-faced man seemed to be at a loss for words just as Chance was. He stumbled around in a bit of a daze as he felt the walls, the tables, and support beams. Tears were freely flowing from his eyes. Pete tried to talk, but his voice was too choked.
Roman Marko sighed in frustration and glared at Chance. "I should've known something like this would happen," he growled. "Always something with you meta-freaks, isn't it? Well, I don't really give a shit one way or the other. I had a debt to repay to the Old Man, and I've paid it in full. Now, if you've seen enough of the so-called Kronos Project, I'll take you back... and maybe your little friend if he'll stop being such an asshole."
"HOLY MOTHER O' GARFUNKEL!" Pete finally exclaimed in a shrill brogue. "I'M ALIVE! HA-HA!"
"I've got to show this to Doc," Chance said. "This would completely blow his mind."
"No time for that, kid," said an impatient Marko. "Besides, I'm blowing this place as soon as we're gone."
"What? But you'd be destroying a great deal of scientific advancement along with it!"
"Look, kid -- do YOU want a dictator like D'goon in charge of something this powerful?"
"Ah, shut up your prate!" Pete shouted merrily. "Breath in the fresh musty air, me old sons! Looka' the bright fake light shinin's on us all! I've been a dead'un fer a year-and-a-bit an' I never felt so alive ever 'efore! Ha-hee!"
"Either you get him to shut the hell up or I'm going to tranq him, Schanz."
"I don't think that's possible, Marko," Chance laughed with obvious relief at this burden finally being lifted from him. "You'd probably end up tranquilizing yourself if you tried. Besides, as long as you're with us -- or at least with him -- you have nothing to worry about. They didn't call him 'That Lucky Bastard' for nothing."
"Fine. Whatever. Now let's go."
"Just wait a moment. Keep Pete entertained for a minute or two. I'm going to bring see if I can bring along a souvenir from our visit..."
*************
In California, a gaping pit which was once known as the city of Athanon was still burning. The city lay just a few miles north of San Franciso on the coast, directly above the San Andreas Fault which was currently undergoing a shifting process, causing widespread destruction up and down the North American west coast.
Besides Athanon itself, San Francisco was the next major city to see the most destruction resulting from the meteor strike on Athanon, though cities as far north as Vancouver, Canada and as far south as San Diego saw earthquakes much larger than usual.
Tsunamis caused by the California quakes as high as skyscrapers attacked Hawaii some short hours later, though large numbers of people had been evacuated onto ships which merely rode the waves made harmless over deep waters.
In an undisclosed area somewhere in central North America, the newly-sworn in President of the U.S.A., one George W. Bush, speaks on the telephone with a man who keeps many secrets: "I don't CARE what Robert Brown's policies on metahumans was! I'm rescinding the ban on metahuman genetic research as of today -- now get the job done!"
On the other end of the telephone, a man replied in the affirmative and smiled with relief as he hung up the receiver. He had been in charge of a "Metahuman Weapons Research Center" which was so top-secret that neither Robert Brown nor George W. Bush had known about it. Finally, though, reason had come into the White House -- metahumans were NOT going to go away, and the U.S.A. needed to regain the edge if they were to be able to prevent the disasters that had befallen both Promethean City and Athanon in recent days. President Bush had been forced to sign on to this Strikeforce group despite the natural American distrust of the United Nations, but he sure as hell wasn't about to sign over the sovereignty of the world's greatest superpower to anyone!
America had fallen behind in the only "Arms Race" that mattered anymore, and it would be a tough job catching up. Thanks to secret funding, however, a great deal of progress had already been done in a project known only to a small handful of individuals in Washington. It had been coyly named "Project: Indestructible Man". Maybe it was finally time for America to embrace the metahuman after all, though it would be on its own terms.
*************
In the Presidential Palace of Mandelovia, a special room came to life a few minutes before three individuals materialized in a large tube.
"--don't think you should have done that, Marko," Chance said. "The loss to scientific advancement alone is reason enough to preserve such a project despite its drawbacks."
"And you'd really rather leave it in the hands of the General, would you?" Marko replied, no longer really interested in the debate now that the point was moot.
"Of course not! But there must have been some way to salvage it for later study..."
"Not until Mandelovia has freedom restored to her," Marko said wistfully. "And maybe not even then." He held his hand out to the Swede. "This is as far as I go. I'll leave you two on your own from here on, okay?"
"Okay," Chance said, shaking his hand. "And thanks."
"Don't thank me. Thank the Neanderthal who sent me." And in a moment Marko was gone.
"If I 'ad a face da likes o yers, me son, I'd walk back'rds," Pete grumbled under his breath as the Mandelovian freedom fighter left. "Well, ya dumb Swede, where are we off to now, then? Time to beat the pat again, eh, b'y?"
"Just a moment." Kristofer Schanz carefully checked the heavy device he'd taken from the lab to ensure no apparent damage had been done during the transport. No damage was found. "Good, good."
"It be quiet now," said Pete. "All them fightin' gone home, y'think?"
"Maybe, just maybe," Chance replied warily as he looked around a corner. The Palace was strangely quiet and empty compared to when he had left it with Roman Marko. "I wonder if--"
BEEP-BEEP!
Chance picked up his communicator and noted the name on the display. "Kristogar! What's the situation?"
"Chance?! Where the hell have you been all this time? The Strikeforce is gone, and the General has given us a short amount of time to leave the country."
"Where are you now?"
"Outside, by the iron gate... or at least what's left of it. Someone brought the Stormloader in. Don't know who."
"That was me. I signaled it to follow us in after the Strikeforce attacks began. I thought we might need it eventually."
"Good call. Well, if you've found what you were looking for, I guess we should leave."
"Hmm... I didn't exactly find the answers I was seeking, but I did find something else along the way."
"And what would that be?"
"You'll see when I get there. Be there in a few minutes. Chance out."
"Okay, seeya."
"Fuckin' 'Kristie Garr' Velo, his panties in a wad again, I bet," Pete said with a wink. "Ah, it's not so bad bein' alive after all, izzit? An' the best part o' the whole deal is that I won't haveta rely on yerself for human interaction no longer, eider. You owe me a beer, 'Chancie.' You owe me a filthy pint o' Guinness, me old son."
The Swede was too busy looking out for anyone who might give them trouble, but luckily no one was around as he left the Palace from the front doors. Pete really was a lucky charm when he was alive, after all. Chance spotted the Stormloader and Velo standing in front of it by the Estate entrance, and he waved. Velo waved back, straining his eyes to see the small figure hobbling next to him, hesistant to believe his eyes. Chance and Pete took a few steps down the Palace steps, into the Honour Court and past the destroyed fountain in the middle of it, but stopped as a voice was heard behind them.
"Mr. Schanz," said the dangerously charming voice of General Colton D'goon, "you weren't thinking of leaving our fair country without saying your farewell, were you? And Mr. Glover, is it? How... interesting."
Chance turned around to face D'goon, who was next to one of his Honour Guardsmen and the unnamed new head of the Mandelovian Security Agency who'd addressed the Vanguardians when they arrived at the Palace.
"D'goon," Chance growled.
"I believe you have something of ours, Mr. Schanz," said the General. "I appreciate your salvaging it for the good of Mandelovia." The confident smile on his face made it obvious he would brook no dissent.
"Where. Is. Helen. McKenzie?" Chance said after a pause as he stared into D'goon's eyes fiercely.
The General was nonplussed, but merely smiled. "I wish I knew, son. I really wish I knew. Now, if you will hand that device to my guardsman, here."
"Fine," Chance said, returning the smile. "But there is something I must tell you. It's for your own ears alone."
The M.S.A. head put his hand on D'goon's shoulder. "It's not a good idea, General."
"Nonsense!" General D'goon replied. "Kristofer Schanz is a man cut from the same cloth as I am. He's a man of honour. I have nothing to fear from him while he is my guest in this country." He took a step forward and said, "I'm listening, Mr. Schanz."
Chance held one hand up to his mouth, cupping it behind D'goon's ear as he whispered something to the General. The barest flicker of a reaction registered across the otherwise cool facade of the Mandelovian leader as Chance spoke to him. Stepping back, Chance said out loud, "Now if you don't mind, General, I'll be taking this with me."
"Sir?" the M.S.A. head said, alarmed after D'goon nodded hesitantly at the Vanguardian. "You can't be serious!"
"Silence!" D'goon shouted at him. "You have my leave, Mr. Schanz. I would suggest you take it while I still have control of my patience."
Chance smiled and tipped an invisible hat to him, then walked towards the Stormloader, Pete by his side.
General D'goon's fists were balled up tightly as he watched them walk away with rage and fear in his heart. How did he know? HOW DID HE KNOW?!?
"General D'goon," the M.S.A. man said, "I really must protest."
"Get out of my sight."
"But sir, I--"
"GET OUT OF MY SIGHT!!!"
The M.S.A. man turned at that and walked quickly back up the steps and into the Palace.
Meanwhile, Kristofer Schanz and Pete Glover walked side-by-side towards the hovercraft and the team standing around it. The expression on Kristogar Velo's face was priceless.
"My gob..." Velo breathed, his usually cool demeanor now gone. "Well, Chance -- and Pete, if that's really you there and not another fucking shape-shifter -- I think you have a bit of explaining to do."
"Ye're still as dim as ever, ain'tcha, 'Kristie Garr'?" Pete 'the Chimp' Glover said with a toothy grin. "Never could see the forest fer the trees, could'ya?"
"Let's just get out of here," said Chance. "The stink of this place is getting to me. I'll explain everything on the way."
"I'm serious!" Drake Marshall was saying to no one in particular. "It was a pirate ship! A pirate ship right up there in the air! I saw it! It was real!!!"
"There, there," Tayden said as he patted the young man's back. "I think I saw it too..."
************
In a suburb somewhere in Vancouver, BC (God's country), a self-styled "writer" (hack writer, that is) who suffers from insomniac, shouts at his computer, "This is CRAP! Man, I can't fucking write any more! I can't believe how crappy and horrible this post is!" He looks at the time on the computer. "Oh, bloody hell! I'm supposed to be registering for the winter semester right now! CRAP!"
************
The Stormloader, an Army-made vehicle adapted with an engine from an extraterrestrial spacecraft, again held 12 individuals in all. Besides Chance and Velo, only Grimm recognized Pete Glover from the brief time he met him.
Chance had been elated at the things he had seen and the return of Pete to a mortal body once again, but he now had some bad news to bring back to Dr. Henry Quantos about his daughter. She was gone. Just gone. Maybe she had traveled in time somehow, he didn't really know, but the answers he sought were incomplete and full of holes. He wondered if he would ever truly know what happened to her. In any event, he was much too tired to talk about it for now.
The piece of chronal equipment he had salvaged from the laboratory facility now sat snug on his lap in a large towel. It had been completely dormant ever since he removed it carefully from the casing it had been in.
"Man, that was crazy," Ozzy Baxter said to break the silence as the hovercraft began to slowly rise into the air, Kristogar Velo at the driver's seat. "So was this typical of a Vanguard case? Do you fellows do this kind of thing often?"
"Pretty much," Grimm replied after nobody else spoke.
"I'm still not exactly sure why I'm here at all," Adem Different said after a moment.
"That makes all of us," Drake said with a sigh.
"I'm only in it for the dental plan," Phil Smith said with a smug grin on his face.
"I'm only in it for the sex," said Banshee.
Everyone looked at her, as Banshee's face turned red.
"Cheques! I meant cheques! Money, you know?"
The hovercraft was silent for a moment, the only thing being said for a while being "heh."
"This group's gotten feckin' WEIRD since I's a member," said Pete after a few moments.
Chance wasn't listening to any of this. Something was bothering him. Something about Mandelovian technology that he couldn't recall at the moment. Something about the alloy used in some Mandelovian-made scientific equipmnent having special properties. It really bugged him that he couldn't remember what that was. Oh well, it would come to him eventually.
Back at the Palace, the M.S.A. chief stormed back out of the Palace onto the Honour Court and aimed a shoulder-held cannon-like device at the Stormloader as it continued to rise into the air and slowly move south toward the Adriatic Sea. He pressed a button on the device, and invisible rays shot out towards the hovercraft.
The Stormloader shook suddenly and was jerked off-course. The chronal device in Chance's lap was thrust into his stomach and all the air blew out of his lungs. He couldn't breathe, and he felt like the device was going to cut him half.
"My GOD!" someone shouted as the hovercraft shook all the Vanguardians out of their seats except for Chance. Everyone was trying to get themselves up again.
Finally someone noticed Chance pinned against the wall. "Holy fuck!" Phil shouted. "Chance, what the hell is--?"
"Get it off of him!" Grimm commanded, trying to pull the device away from Chance himself.
Chance's face was turning red, and his eyes were watering. He had remembered what he couldn't think of earlier. A lot of Mandelovian tech was made with a special alloy which was highly magnetic under the influence of certain rays. He tried to push it off of him, and even with Grimm's physical strength and Phil's telekinesis, it wasn't budging. There was only one thing to do.
The Vanguardian leader tried to say something but no words could come. Kristogar Velo finally realized what was going on and stopped trying to fight the magnetic pull's influence on the hovercraft, though it still wasn't enough.
Chance's eyes were bulging as his lower ribs cracked. His spine would be next. He looked at Pete, trying to make himself understood. Pete just stared back at him, a scared look on his face. This was real. Chance was going to die for real. It was one thing to be transferred immediately from a physical to a spiritual state, but it was quite another to die a horrible death by being cut in half by something. Even Chance's remarkable healing ability couldn't cure an injury that bad.
Pete's mind just swirled. He couldn't think straight. Why wasn't Phil reading his mind? And then it hit him.
"D-door?" Pete muttered. "H-hey, someone get the door... open the door! Let him get outta the door!"
Chance was pinned next to the door. After a few more moments, someone finally got the door to slide open.
"Let him get outta the door!" Pete was shouting again, and Grimm and the others began pushing and pulling Chance by the door. A whining sound could just barely be heard beyond the din of shouts and the air rushing past the now-open door.
It all happened in a few seconds.
Chance slipped out the door, pushed by the device virtually embedded in his stomach now and halfway through his spine. His body rocketed towards the Palace suddenly.
"CHANCE!" Grimm shouted, leaping out of the hovercraft still 50 or 60 feet above ground.
And then the explosion.
A blue wave of electromagnetic energy flashed as the device exploded, sending shrapnel and skin and bone matter in all directions.
"CHANCE!!!" the other Vanguardians cried from the hovercraft, which was pushed back by the blue energy wave.
At the Palace, General D'goon looked on in horror as he saw the explosion in mid-air between the hovercraft and the ground. He spotted the chief of the M.S.A.
"You fool!" D'goon screamed at him. "You damned fool! What have you done?!?"
"I did what must be done," the man replied calmly. "For Mandelovia."
General D'goon was fuming. He grabbed the pistol from his Honor Guard's holster and thrust it into the M.S.A. chief's temple. Then he pulled the trigger. He didn't even try to clean up the bits of blood and brain-matter from his uniform when he met the Vanguardians when they landed the Stormloader shortly thereafter.
Kristogar Velo quickly jumped out of the hovercraft after a hasty and bumpy landing and stalked up to General D'goon. With a non-typical display of emotion, Velo swung at the General, knocking him to the ground. "YOU BETRAYED US!"
The Honor Guards were immediately on Velo, their guns ready to shoot at D'goon's word. The General waved them away, taking a handkerchief to his nose, which was bleeding profusely. He said in a humbled voice, "I'll grant you that one for free, Velo." General D'goon rose slowly to his feet, suddenly feeling his age despite his exceptional good health. "I wouldn't try that again, though -- my men are very protective of me."
"If you've killed Kristofer Schanz, General -- believe me, you WILL pay for your actions!"
"And I deeply regret what has happened, Velo," D'goon said. "You must believe me when I say that I was not responsible for this unfortunate occurrence. And I am deeply sorry to say that I was not able to stop the man who was in time to save your friend. He will harm no one any longer, however. I have seen to that."
Kristogar Velo looked disgusted as he noted the bits of brain-matter and blood on the General's hands and uniform. "How very convenient for you, isn't it? No suspect, no trial."
"It is... the Mandelovian way."
"No," Velo said. "It's your way, D'goon."
"These days, my young friend, they are one and the same," D'goon said with certainty.
Kristogar Velo just turned and walked away.
Several feet away, in Mandelov Square, the Vanguardians were looking around for some remains of the explosion... some remains of their current leader.
"Begorra!" Banshee cried as she stumbled upon something.
"What is it, Bree?" Phil shouted.
"It's--it's... Chance..." she said as she pointed at the thing on the ground. "...or at least what's left of him."
It was Kristofer Schanz's arm, obviously blown out of the shoulder socket, the flesh ripped jaggedly from the rest of the body.
There was nothing left to say. If the situation with their former teammate Naecken threatening the world was not such a paramount danger at the moment, perhaps they would stay and properly investigate the crime. Perhaps they would even get rid of General D'goon themselves and give democracy back to the Mandelovian people. But the world would not allow them such luxuries. All they could do was take what was left of their teammate... their friend... and bury his remains when all this craziness was over with.
The Vanguardians returned to the Stormloader in silence. It was then that Phil Smith noticed, "Hey, what happened to the little homeless guy...?" Just as suddenly as he had reappeared, Pete Glover was gone. And nobody knew the reasons for either occurrence...
Ironically enough, as Dr. Henry Quantos noted much, much later, the Kristofer Schanz of this timeline had died almost two years earlier in Mandelovia from a freak car accident just two blocks away...
