Sunday, May 15, 2011

The Episode in Which Things Start to Change

The episode begins when Sagitari decides to come to Team Falcon headquarters to see about switching teams.  It's late at night, because a large centaur is somewhat less conspicuous when it's dark.  (As in "Was that really a half-man-half-horse, or am I still tripping from the LSD I dropped earlier?"  or "Hey, was that a centaur?" "Who cares, we need to pull over some more brown people to ship back to Mexico when they can't produce proof of citizenship on demand!").

As it's dark, Sagitari figures TFHQ is probably locked up for the night, and attempts to break in.  And fails.  Well, he failed in that instead of quietly picking the lock, he broke off the door.  And if he had bothered to check, he would have found the door unlocked.  He encounters a tired and surly James, who calls Mister Sarcastic about a visitor.

Mister Sarcastic conducts a short interview, and then tries to figure out what to do until Agent Randall or Bob Latimore can do something more official.  Somehow the best that Mister S can come up with is to hand him off to Stephanie who is busy working on her secret project.  She gives Centauri a short tour and then leaves him to his own devices.

Centauri decides to set up shop to produce some arrows, and begins scavenging parts to construct a forge.  He apparently breaks into a local liquor store for everclear, and disassembles a mini-fridge.  In order to keep from being disturbed he wires the HQ cameras to feed to the workshop so that he can monitor for visitors.

Eventually morning breaks.  (Not Mister Sarcastic's fault!!!)  Little Max has a vision of weird goings on to occur at 645pm, and relates the information to everyone he can think to tell.  Centauri, working in the shop hears noises that he determines come from an unattached hard drive.  Being the type to jump right onto a task, he sets up a computer and plugs the drive in.  He discovers an AI on the drive that really would like to have a robot body.  He noncommittally attempts to soothe the AI's anxiety and then puts everything back how he found it.

Strobe eventually stops by TFHQ and meets Sagitari.  Agent Randall also comes by and says that he's start some paperwork.  Max continues working on synthesizing some doses of drug that Cerebro (why does that sound like the name of a geeky rapper.  "Yo! I am Cere-bro!") was trying to score.  He manages to produce some of the compound but determines that it won't have a long shelf life.  Something about the process is off.

Eventually Max divines that the 645 event will consist of a rift opening up out on the street, and a pyramid shape falling out.  And then things will become un-predictable.  The team makes limited preparations for the event, and then stands by to watch what happens.

At 645, the predicted rift opens up.  Out drops a pyramid.  And then out drops Dreamcatcher.  He is holding three silver threads (apparently connected to three souls) and wants to talk to Mister Sarcastic.  He said that he is conveying a message from The Astrologer, and that Sarcastic has to choose to either "dispatch" Mister Fantastic, or to "lose those closest to him".  The implication is that the three cords are connected to his sister, and her kids.

Mister Sarcastic tells DreamCatcher that he would like to talk directly with The Astrologer.  DreamCatcher says that S would need to act as interpreter, and that he would require a fee for doing so.  He wants a diamond made from a coal sample that he provides.  Mister S agrees to try to get the diamond made.  DreamCatcher says that he has about two weeks.

After DC departs, the team begins to discuss how they might produce the diamond.  Strobe suggests that Sun Devil, her new "friend" might be able to provide any necessary heat.  Sagitari says that he could devise a machine to produce the necessary pressure.

While the team is working on this problem, someone (Max?) notices the hard drive on Stephanie's work bench buzzing away, and points it out to the group.  The group hooks the hard drive up to a PC and begins to talk to it.  (Unbeknownst to the rest of the group, Stephanie tells the AI not to tell them that it's Beta.)  The machine says that its name is "2" while Steph says that it's "5".  This causes a great deal of excrement to begin to hit the rotating air mover all at once.  But unfortunately, Mister Sarcastic has an appointment to talk to his brother-in-law.

At the meet, S asks F whether anyone would be wanting to kill him, and whether or not he knows DreamCatcher.  Fantastic says that he's been laying low, and has no reason to think anyone would want him dead.  He says that he met DC years ago, but that no particular animosity exists between them.  Sarcastic evades questions about what's going on, but promises to update F when he knows more.  As Mrs. Fantastic comes in the door, S teleports away... 

...to a remote location where he decides to call Usurper, so see if the arrest warrant might be related to all of this.  The ever gregarious Usurper volunteers that he has no such contract out on Mister Fantastic, and that he feels the arrest warrant is sufficient for now.  Not seeming to be the type of villain who would subcontract out a matter of honor, Mister Sarcastic takes this as probably somewhere close to the truth, thanks him for his time and bids him adieu.  And then decides that he needs to tell his boss what's going on.  Unfortunately, Agent Randall is swimming laps, getting back into fighting trim.  The now wet S gives Agent Randall a run down on what's going on, and Agent Randall promises to do some research, while advising S to keep Bob in the loop. 

Sarcastic returns to HURT and talks to Bob.  During the conversation, he mentions the AI and this immediately sends the two two the workshop.  Bob and Stephanie begin to argue, and then come to tazing blows over the fate of the AI.  During the scuffle, S grabs the computer with hard drive, and teleports back to Agent Randall (and into the pool).  The water eventually shorts out enough of the drive to probably kill Beta.  S leaves the pool telling Randall that he's going to grind the drive into powder before returning it to the lab.  He leaves, back to a remote desert location where he buries the drive, and then to a store where he purchases a similar drive which he grinds to said dust, before returning to TFHQ.

Stay tuned for another exciting episode...

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