In a gigantic hanger bay, deep in the bowels of the Omni-Carrier, the heroes boarded a sleek black amphibious vessel, the Manta Craft. At 50’ by 100’, it held five comfortably. Onboard were pressurized suits in case of emergency.
“There’s no time to train any of you to drive this baby, so I guess I’ll haveta tag along,” smiled Agent Grey, now attired in a black combat uniform that was webbed with straps, holsters and pouches. The elderly Doc Rocket would stay behind. “With a telepath arriving shortly, I’ll remain in contact with you without being a burden upon the team,” he said quietly.
“If only I had my uniform and equipment with me! Well, next time, no doubt. Good luck gentlemen. God speed!”
Grey said, “The telepath and Doc will operate from the omni carrier, our base of operations. Strap yerselves in. Time’s a wastin’.” He sealed the airlock and VROOOOM! The Manta Craft launched from the carrier and dove beneath the black waves of the Atlantic. SPWOOOOOOOSH!! Nine hours left.
“We’ll maintain radio silence,” explained Grey as he dove deeper and deeper, scattering a school of silver fish. Bubbles fell away behind the ship in a white trail. With lights extinguished, driving by sonar, he continued, “We’ll be at the coordinates in another hour. Didn’t want to bring the carrier any closer than we had to.” The Manta’s eye screen windows were blue black.
Forty minutes later, the telepath initiated contact with everyone on board. Each man sensed a voice speaking directly to them, as well as an image of a beautiful blonde woman’s face. She seemed sad. “I am Venus,” she said. Her lips were not moving. “I’ll maintain contact with each of you. When you need Dr. Rocket’s expertise, he’ll be ready.”
With eight hours left, the Manta Craft approached the coordinates. At 10,000 feet below the surface, there was nothing there. Nothing on sonar. Both Lightning Strike and Sentinel were unable to detect any energy sources.
“Damn,” muttered Grey, turning the control stick. “We’ll begin a circular search pattern.”
Two hours of searching passed, with tension mounting. Only six hours remained!
Then Venus ‘spoke’ again. “Doc Rocket has a message for you. Investigations into gold purchases, and futures contracts on gold prices have been fruitful. One financial group, The Temple Foundation, has cornered the market in gold since the Asian Tsunami.
The Foundation is privately held, and centered in Zurich. Its members are rumored to include major international investors, including some political figures. The CIA has contacted Interpol.
Also, last month, one Silas Caine began purchasing gold futures in extraordinary quantities.”
Silas Caine was known to all as the richest and some say the most evil man in New York City! (Imagine Lex Luthor, Henry Potter, Gordon Gekko and William Randolph Hearst all wrapped up into one rotten s.o.b.)
“Not bad,” said Grey. Then, “What the hell? I’m picking something up on sonar!”
Lightning Strike and Sentinel still detected nothing out of the ordinary.
“I’ll risk some light,” said Grey. He activated the Manta Craft’s floodlights, revealing a massive school of hammerhead sharks! They were moving toward the ship!
Suddenly, the Manta Craft lurched violently! There was a dull impact sound… something had struck it from above, out of view!
On the sonar, a large mass was around the ship, and within the shark school something else was moving very quickly.
“Hold on!” shouted Grey, fighting the controls. “I can’t steer her!” The ship was shaking as it descended into the black depths.
OOC:
Actions? Feel free to include replies to any and all of the above, as well as Blue Comet’s reply to Issue 7.
-Ye Editor
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Lightning Strike:
OOC: I figured maybe getting ahead is a good thing. Wouldn't want any deficit playing.
IC: As the Manta ship dives in, Lightning Strike observes the design and structure of the craft." What's the power source driving this submarine? Will Skull be able to detect us coming? I wouldn't want any greeting from those devils."
My response to the report on The Temple Foundation and Silas Caine is a bitter sneer. "If someone was going to make money off of tragedy, I knew Silas Caine would be one of the bloodsuckers stepping up to the plate first. But why would Caine want to destroy the east coast? He has major holdings here and he would be in a position to lose more than he could make back on the market given how much The Temple have bought? Is there any record of Caine launching any ships in this area recently? It's possible that he is hedging his bets and trying to stop this just like us but buying the gold as an insurance policy.
Once the mass hits the ship, do I sense any electrical activity? Even something as simple as driving the sharks limited brainwaves? (That would assume I can sense electrical impulses at that small a level).
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Sentinel:
Reaction to Comet leaving:
As Comet prepares to leave the room it seems like Sentinel starts to motion as if to speak to him, but instead does nothing.
After he leaves the room for debriefing Sentinel turns to Grey and says, "That was hard. He seemed like a good man... we wouldn't have beaten that Robot without his help and he saved Lightning here. I know he wasn't sure of himself just now, but he came through when we needed him most, and he was open here with all that information. Part of that information you feel confident enough to trust and base our plans on... I think you made the wrong move and should have reassured him and persuaded him to stay.
"That being said, I'm confident that you likely know more about each of us than we think you do ... perhaps more than we know about ourselves, so I'm hoping you know more about him than you let on and had good reason to let him leave that easily ... but I'd point out that we were already short on manpower here and now we are down another man ."
Reaction to Issue#8 and the craft situation:
"This isn't good ... this isn't good at all. Grey I'm going to try to give you some breathing space here but with not knowing what's going on out there I have no idea if this will help or how long it will last ... can't this billion dollar bucket of bolts prototype give us a better reading of what's happening out there???"
Sentinel moves towards the front of the craft by one of the viewing windows so he can best see the outside of the craft. As he gets close to the viewer he has a look of concentration amid the chaos going on and he reaches out and touches the edge of viewer window where it meets the metal of the craft; energy seems to flow from his hand and appears outside the craft, encircling the entire ship.
OOC: Sentinel is hoping for a couple of things here depending on what is happening. First the craft will have some extra protection in case something hits it again. Second, by projecting the energy the way he did, Sentinel hopes that if something has attached itself to the craft and is somehow damaging it or controlling it, the force shield will knock it off the ship and loose it giving Grey control once again. Finally, he's hoping that if there is some mass attached to the ship, if it latches on to the shield, he would be sensitive enough to get an idea of the shape/mass attached (ie if something had somehow encircled the entire craft he'd know it was encircling his shield entirely, if there was a mass on one side, he'd sense how much of the energy shield was covered, etc - I'm not sure if that is actually within his power realm, but thought it reasonable that since he controls the energy he could sense what was happening with it ... you can let me know if I'm totally off here
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Viper:
Sorry for the delay super hero fans!
Grey.... Mis-Ter Grey! This is a beauty! ((Viper caresses the panels on the ship)) Only seen stuff like this in movies! So this is what the governments been doin' with their dough. Almost makes me feel bad I haven't been claiming all my pay. ((Viper checks out as much of the ship as he can, not understanding much of it))
((After some time in the water Viper doesn't like the trapped feeling of the ship and paces back and forth a bit. He takes a special interest in the workings of the pressurized suits. He's startled when Venus contacts him but it acts as a diversion.))
Whoa! I'm hearin' things. ((Viper jumps from his seat and looks around and senses he's the only one hearing things))
Should warn a guy, you know. ((Viper mumbles then continues)) Venus baby! I'm Viper, the cute one. I'd like to orbit around you a few times and maybe plan a landing. Whatcha say? Hello?
Doc! Don't tell me we don't have a shark repellant button on this thing! Damn government ships! What can I do Doc? I don't think *down* is the direction we should be goin'!
Sentinel, Lightning, I hope you boys have a trick up yer sleeve!
((Viper glances at the pressurized suits))
Alright, this thing is goin' down, I'm suitin' up!
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GM Replies:
Sentinel’s Reaction to Comet leaving: "…That being said, I'm confident that you likely know more about each of us than we think you do ... perhaps more than we know about ourselves, so I'm hoping you know more about him than you let on and had good reason to let him leave that easily ... but I'd point out that we were already short on manpower here and now we are down another man.”
“Yeah?” snarled Grey around his cigar. “What if SKULL had brainwashed him when he was working with them? What if THAT’S the cause of his amnesia? You want SKULL in front of you and the Comet behind you? Comet is a good man. He protected the team by leaving it. You’re telling me I shoulda talked him out of that?!”
Grey was quiet a moment. “But as for manpower, you’re right. I’ll have to do something about that.” The next time Sentinel saw Grey he was suited up and at the controls of the Manta Craft.
