::End Of The Line – Open Air Confession::

"Kenny McCormick, please report to the main laboratory. Kenny McCormick, to the main laboratory, please."

The PA message echoed throughout the entire complex, long before Stan made it back up to the main floor with the machine... although he'd decided to take a different path to get back up.

Descending down to the floor he'd been on before, he remembered far more than just where the supply closets were on the map he'd seen. No, he remembered seeing a notation for utility access tunnels, and ladders marked for such on said map.

Kenny had suggested he sabotage the machine itself, from the main floor of the lab, but what if he could just fuck with it from below? The utility tunnels ran right beneath the machine, as did the cables that powered it. He could do some damage without ever poking his head up where he might be seen... and sneeze his heart out without fear of getting discovered.

Seriously, if he kept sneezing this hard he was pretty sure he was gonna fucking spit his heart out into his hand.

He'd been half-way up a ladder into the access tunnels when the announcement came through; armed with a blow torch, a power drill with the biggest bit he could find, and a ten-pound sledge. He was pretty sure the drill belonged to someone else who'd been working down on the utility level before today- it looked newer, and the battery had been fully charged and ready to go. Whatever had been his thought upon finding it; he wasn't gonna question good luck. Either way, the sound of Marie's voice coming through spooked him, and caused him to stop cold while clinging tight to the ladder.

A number of thoughts shot through his mind, but most dominantly was how did she know Kenny was here?

She didn't call Mysterion to the main lab. She called Kenny, and she didn't use one of her 'fucking listen to me' noises to do it. She just... asked.

Well, asked with a threat attached. One Stan knew Kenny would listen to- guy would go to the end of the fucking earth for Karen, and everyone knew it.

Stay focused is what Stan told himself, hefting himself the rest of the way up the ladder. The utility tunnels were lit in the same manner as the stairwells; circular lights set into the ceiling and walls, creating a sort of running lights effect. Once he arrived, he found he wasn't alone; a great number of people were down in these tunnels, hard at work now that the power was back up and running. Electrical panels were open, and the few words any of them were allowed to say to each other whilst under Marie's clothes were being uttered- directing others on where to go and how to fix things.

It was the only speech allowed among the drones; speech needed to communicate their objectives and work together. Anything else, and they could not speak.

It had scared him when he'd still be under control. The near-total silence still unnerved him, now, but there was a pang of pity to go with the unsettling discomfort. No one working down here wanted to be doing this.

He knew they all had to be fighting, despite the silence.

Marie is gonna fucking die the second these people get their free will back. No riot like a South Park riot. She should probably just kill herself; it would be less painful.

The consideration to try and make these people laugh, to shout out something that would trigger some local humor, was something Stan dismissed as he hurried through, already able to sight his general objective ahead of him. Freeing any of these people had a possibility to help them, but outside of Kenny getting called out? They were still in stealth mode. If someone lost their shit, and it tipped to Marie that they were staging the equivalent of a prison break, she'd slam down hard and take control again... and with the PA system? It was pretty unlikely that she'd miss anyone.

Even knowing how to get himself free, he wasn't sure he could get himself to laugh if he got hit again. There'd been something about the nature of being trapped that mad it hard to be anything but overwhelmingly angry.

Hadn't Wendy said something about that? That the priming noises worked because they were painful and annoying, and that anger was what Dee took control of? Wendy had just been theorizing, but if she were right, it would fit right in with humor being a release. It was hard to be violently angry and laugh at something at the same time, unless one was in the midst of absolutely losing their shit. Laughter usually released the energy involved with being angry or freaked out.

He'd have to tell her that thought later. Maybe he'd impress her.

Later. Right now, he was passing by the massive power cable that was connected to the machine on the floor above. One of four he'd observed before; carrying the dizzying amount of juice the thing needed directly from the power plant in the lowest level... one that had been, until recently, flooded. There was another one of the cables, in its black mesh casing, in front of him. Approaching the central intersection of the utility tunnels, he could look left and right into the intersecting pathway and see the other two cables... which meant he was directly below the machine.

Looking up, there was a hatch in the ceiling, bigger than a manhole cover was wide and square. He tried to pull it down by the handle, but it was locked.

Well, well, well... perfect job for Toolshed... though he would have remembered the safety glasses.

Didn't matter. Between what he brought with him, he'd get this thing open- if it was important enough to lock, it was important enough to destroy.

Wendy didn't get much of a chance to fuck with the computers before the announcement... one which suggested that Marie would be on her way down from wherever she made said announcement to meet Kenny in the lab. She was torn for a moment, having only recently arrived at a terminal and trying to force her way past the password protection. If she had managed to go with her group, she might have been given that information, but she hadn't.

If Marie came down, Wendy would need to hide. Otherwise her cover would be blown... and who knew what the woman would be willing to do to her at this point, if she was willing to escalate that far on Kenny? What could she do in the time between here and there? She wasn't going to just duck away without committing to any action.

She glanced around. There was plenty of movement in the lab, but none she identified as being more purposeful than the drones. She also didn't hear Marie's signature heels clacking against any nearby floors. For the new few moments, it seemed, she was safe to move.

"Damnit, Dee, you're a bad influence...!"

The muttered curse followed hurried steps down one of the stairwells from the upper catwalk of the middle floor to the pit of the main floor. Wendy rushed across open space, exposed, to the machine itself in a matter of sections whilst dodging between the wooden desks arranged around it. Upon arrival beside the machine, she ducked low and pressed her back to the shiny metal siding of its round platform, once again looking up and checking various lines of sight for a threat.

Nothing. Okay. Next step.

Crouched down, she followed around the edge of the machine. She wasn't looking for anything on the metal behemoth itself... rather, she was looking for one of the techs assigned to it.

Ike.

The kid was hard at work. He had a panel open on the side of the monster, one of its tiered steps up, using a volt meter to check power flow of connections within the panel. He also had a little notebook with him, and a pen, where it appeared he was writing down those readings once in a while- she had to guess when something was off spec.

He didn't look up at her when she approached, of course. He couldn't. He was trapped, just like everyone else.

"Ike... hey Ike..."

No recognition. Not even a twitch. He continued with his work, noting down another reading from his meter.

"Do you like fish sticks?"

Communications was near the B stairwell- the stairwell that didn't reach the loading dock, and next to Habitation. Marie was happy to see the PA system was actually still working after all this time; she was worried the various speakers would be too damaged by the damp and time to even function.

She was happier to take the stairs down to the lab and find her announcement had brought her a present. Arriving at the mid-tier of the lab, looking down to the main work level, she could see the very boy she requested had arrived just before her... exiting the double doors that led into Containment.

"Now how did you get in there...?"

A faint muttering, but hardly consequential. Without the special key she was currently in possession of, there was near no way he could have unlocked the door on Lyssie's cell. Rather than a traditional key, made up of a flat and toothy shape that could be mimicked with a properly bent bit of metal, it was a round sort of key that resisted traditional lock picking. There was also an electrical component; now that the power was back on, anyone who did manage to open a door without using the right key would trigger an alarm.

She was talking to Lyssie when the power came back; there was no way a door could have been unlocked before then or right under her nose. She remained confident that her younger self had gone nowhere... she likely interrupted an attempt being made at getting her free.

Inwardly reassured, she descended the stairs to the lab floor, eyeing the subject of her recent announcement.

"Kenny McCormick... how nice of you to be prompt."

The blond boy turned around, without the accompaniments that she remembered from childhood that would have made him Mysterion- the hood and cape where nowhere to be seen, nor was the sweatshirt with the signature M stitched to the front... but the pants were the right shade for the costume. Rather than wearing his underwear over the top of his pants, as he had when they'd been a bit smaller, he had a set of ripped up jean shorts held on with a rough leather belt... both of which she suspected were third or even forth-hand. Without the usual shirt, he was in a ratty and threadbare sleeveless that was off-white with age and use.

She'd never known Mysterion's true identity as a child; he'd been wary of her, once he learned that the people in her home were not in fact her parents but government handlers. It wasn't until later, when Eric had let it slip during some long-forgotten conversation. It was something she figured would never matter; it wasn't like some kid playing at being Batman would ever be something she needed to care about.

Funny how these things worked out, where he turned out to be the missing piece. The key part of Alyssa's group of friends that she underestimated, at every turn.

"Not like you gave me a whole lot of a choice." He responded, turning away from the main space of the lab to face her, fingers clenched into fists. He was tense, ready to fight- she knew the look in his eye extremely well. He was sizing her up, considering his options.

"More choice than I've given most everyone else." She noted blandly. "I'd like to keep things civil, if at all possible."

He shuddered at the word. Nothing about him wanted to be civil. She could see it in his stance. He wanted to destroy her.

She arrived at the bottom of the stairs, heels clicking on the metal floor of the main lab.

"Threatening my entire family isn't exactly what I'd call civil, lady."

"I had to bring you to the negotiating table." She shrugged. It wasn't like she would have made the command absolute; no, just a little something to put on a show if he decided to be difficult; with the clawing and the gaping and the panic- right up until the commanded individuals lost consciousness.

The non-peril clause was still a major component of the active priming noise. She couldn't command anyone to kill themselves, or take an action that would cause deadly peril. It was a built-in release, that if deadly danger occurred, all commands were moot... but he didn't know that.

"You don't have anything I want."

Ah, there was the Mysterion in him- that voice, dropping an octave and going rough. He was angry.

"Don't I?" She asked him, eyebrows raising up. "... last I heard, your mortality was a thing of value."

Kenny blinked. Blue eyes went wide, and his head drew back. She watched as he shook a little, like a dog with water in the ears, before staring at her again.

"... what the fuck do you know about that?"

A smile. Faint, but it still spread across her face. She didn't step up to him- she wasn't dumb enough to enter swinging range. If any hostile move was made, she fully intended to be far enough away to tranq him the same way she did Alyssa.

"Enough to know it was something you never got in my timeline, nor Haley's. Sadly I don't know the nature of your ability, but it is an ability, is it not? A power?" She made a faint gesture towards the machine. "... the very sort of thing that I built that machine to get rid of?"

She watched him as he looked, slowly, peering over his shoulder. She let him linger.

"Why?"

"I need a test run." She responded simply. "The machine is... deadly more oft than not, practically the flip of a a coin. Getting it up to speed to run calibration will help, but... well, without a body in the chair..."

She shrugged as he looked back to her.

"... why? Why ask me? Why not just... order me?"

"Psychological damage is a concern. There was a trend of it being more likely when commands were used to force the complacency of a test subject- Believe it or not, Kenny, I am rather intensely preoccupied with the future... I didn't want to do this. Not this way. My intent was set things up quietly, slowly, and cause as little fuss as possible. All of this? It's an incident, and the last thing I wanted. People are going to notice an entire town going off the rails for a day. There will be news. There will be memories. There will be anger, and recriminations... but it had to be done."

"Or what? What are you doing, and why are you doing this if you don't want to do it?"

She blinked, staring at him. Would he understand?

… Kenny always was a good listener.

"... Alyssa is never going to know peace as long as she has powers, Kenny. You know that. Better than anyone else in this town, you know that. As long as she has the ability to influence people, and the ability to rip time and space as she pleases, there are going to be people who want to own that. Control that. I grew up on a tight government leash, and she would have, too, if not for my meddling. If I had gotten to her when she was a baby, none of this would have had to happen. I could have cut the cord then, and this would have been long over. What I'm trying to do is end this by getting rid of the real root of the problem; our abilities. I want to give her a normal childhood. No more adventures, no more crisis, just... life. Normal life. The way a kid is supposed to live it."

He was quiet. Thinking. He was looking back at the machine again, away from her.

"You can't tell me she doesn't want that. I know she does. I wished for it every day of my life when I was her age. Just like you would rather be rid of your immortality. You know what it's like to be special, and it's not fun. It's hard, it's scary, and there is no rest."

"... I'm not going to forgive you."

She blinked. "... excuse me?"

"We both know I didn't have a choice the moment you called me down." He responded, looking at her again. His face had hardened. He wasn't surprised or shocked anymore- no, he appeared to know exactly what was going on; everything had clicked into place for him. "You're going to use me for your test run, no matter what I say. If I try to run, you have a hundred hands to catch me before I make it to a door... which means you want someone to forgive you for what you're about to do. To tell you it's okay... and I'm not going to, Marie. You're not my friend. Alyssa is, and you're about to hurt her. Maybe even kill her. I will never forgive you, and she won't either."

Another blink. Then another.

Faintly, she let out a laugh. She reached a hand into her coat, drawing out the same firearm she'd used before on Alyssa.

"... you're right." She confessed. "So let's stop playing games. Start walking... it's time to get you strapped in."

::The Author's Corner::

Home stretch my friends, and I think I'm officially out of random shit to say XD

ONWARDS!

-Buttlord