March 29th, 2008

2:15 AM

It was into the wee hours of the next morning when HrlyQnn began to see her destination. Before her, isolated from the populated Washington, D.C. area yet still close enough for easy access, was the Rook Squad base.

A tall chain-link fence, topped with barbed wire, encircled fifty acres of concrete, scattered with floodlights, runways, small pillboxes, shooting ranges and vehicle housings. In the very center sat the massive, multilevel fortress, all blast-proof steel and one-way glass. Its defining feature was a tower that rose from the center, a spire that formed the heart of the Rook Squad's internet and communications relay. This tower sat right on top of the best-protected chamber in the entire base, the area referred to by the team as the "war room" in which they met for mission briefings. The war room also held the laboratory as well as all computers and record files. All other sections of the fortress connected directly to this core structure.

At the south end was the hangar, a wide, low box with a row of massive sliding doors across the face. Emblazoned on its roof was a helipad, well-lit and equipped with a windsock.

The barracks enveloped the east and north side of the base. While it did not have a heavy security system or encryption systems to deal with infiltration attacks like the war room, it boasted the thickest walls in the base. Each agent had his or her own private, if cramped, room. On its bottom floor was the mess hall where they congregated for meals, provided by the taxpayers of the United States of America.

The west side was devoted to the gymnasium. A multilevel training complex, developed by the finest team of minds the government could bring together, made use of an artificially aware mainframe to examine new agents and determine how best to challenge them to hone their abilities. It spoke in a pleasant, English-accented female voice, but the indifference with which it threw death-defying challenges at new agents was unnerving. Commander Rook had named this program MEH for its blasé manner.

The base was still very much awake and active when HrlyQnn made her approach. Several beacons swiveled to face her aircraft, and panels lit up in front of her to let her know she was undergoing a security scan. Her identity instantly verified, she was allowed to proceed.

She had herself designed the unmanned drones that would have been dispatched to confront her if her craft had not carried the right tag or behaved in a hostile manner.

When she landed on the roof of the hangar, the steel door was already opening, and a group of agents were emerging into the floodlit area to greet her. She couldn't help but smile as she shut the Comanche down and disengaged the cockpit.

HrlyQnn was one of a very small number of agents that held the rank of "Class I," meaning that her innate gifts were deadly, in need of serious training in order to control, or otherwise very extreme—in her case, her ability to expertly pilot any air, land, or sea vehicle within moments of feeling out its controls. The other members standing on the helipad, all six of them, constituted the entirety of her fellow Class I agents.

53V3N was the first to the chopper, with a big smile even at this ungodly hour. Tall, dark, and extremely handsome, "V3N" was a master of disguises. He could render himself invisible to the naked eye using only what lay at hand, or clever use of shadows. Because of this ability, he had received countless hours of training as a field agent and as an assassin, trying to move without sound as well as without visibility, and he could kill with his bare hands.

As he came near, Hrly nodded to him, but his eyes drifted down.

"The fuck are you looking at?"

"That was some explosion. I was wondering if I'd find a pee stain."

She shoved him, laughing as she jumped out onto the pad.

Next to greet her was Jude. A strikingly beautiful young woman, none were surprised to learn she possessed the power of male manipulation, but it went further than most thought. At will, she could exude a pheromone from her pores that would overcome the logical mind of any sexually mature man within range, literally bending them to her will. She could convince a man that he could win a night with her by jumping off a cliff. No male was able to resist this scent—save for one.

Hrly next greeted Unspun. Pallid-skinned, dark-haired and decorated with piercings, she looked less than comfortable in the harsh glow of the floodlight. When she smiled at Hrly, her lips revealed elongated, sharp teeth. A vampiress from birth, she'd found that some of the mythos applied but certainly not all of it. She was not at ease in the light, but direct sunlight did not kill her. She certainly did despise garlic, but holy water and crosses had no adverse effect. As for the stake through the heart, she wasn't too keen on trying that out.

Farceur nodded politely to her as she passed. Although he seemed technically not to have any superhero-level gifts, he had been blessed with what he called "a way with words." He could break down anyone's resolve with his speech, using a combination of appeal to emotion, diplomacy, persuasion, and intimidation. He had initially simply talked his way into Class I status, but it was later decided he deserved it when it was realized he could send nations to war at his whim. To supplement his odd gift, he was extremely well-read, having versed himself in a wide variety of philosophical and political literature to give credence to his arguments. An unnatural memory allowed him to quote from the veritable library stored in his head, citing passage, title, author, and page number at will. Not a field agent or a participant in combat by any means, he was the Rook Squad's ambassador, holding his own seat in Congress as well as the United Nations. There was talk of him moving up to the Cabinet.

Kich was quick and enthusiastic to greet Hrly. He moved about encased in a protective hazmat suit—which was designed to keep chemicals in, not out. Kich, it was discovered, was unable to survive for very long in the Earth's atmosphere, instead needing to live on his own self-contained recycled gases. This made for an extremely toxic environment inside the suit, and whenever he chose to vent these gases, the consequences were deadly for his intended victim. The suit was bulletproof and fitted with hydraulic pumps inside the joints to enhance his strength and quadruple his weight, making him into something of a juggernaut.

Finally, Hrly smiled at AdrenaLyn. This agent had the ability to alter her physical form into any person or animal that she had previously touched. For some reason, her genetic code had never quite become stable during her conception, giving her the ability to absorb the DNA sequences of other creatures upon contact and transform her helixes to match theirs. Because she did this at will, and to the degree she wished, she could assume the full form of an animal while retaining her rational mind, or only imitate the voice of a person, or only grow a set of claws out of her fingers.

"Where are Dray and the boss?" Hrly asked her.

"In the war room, waiting to get chewed out."

"Waiting this long?"

"Well, the Council has been tied up trying to get the civilian authorities sorted out. People are royally pissed off on all sides."

Hrly grimaced. "Well, let's get down there."

2:28 AM

The tension was thick in the war room. All of the rows and rows of chairs in the theater-style chamber were empty, and two lone figures sat at the row of computers that stretched along the front wall. Above the computers, the wall was dominated by a giant, flat screen, which depicted another, darker chamber. There, several figures sat in luxurious chairs, each turned away from the central polished table, engaged in their own business. The Class I agents knew this scenario very, very well. Their bosses were on hold.

The two at the computers turned slowly, miserably, at the sound of the automatic door. The shorter of the two stood. This was Draygoon, the head of security at the Rook Squad and Rook's second-in-command. Face concealed by a black ballcap on his head backwards, black shades, and a goatee, he never seemed to smile or reveal any emotion at all, though he always knew all of their thoughts at once. This was his power. He could project his own brainwaves into the head of any person he wished, allowing him to read anyone's thoughts, or direct them. His power overrode Farceur's and Jude's in that it used brute hijacking rather than suggestion or bribery like theirs for manipulation, leaving him immune to their gifts and able to seize others away from their control.

Draygoon approached the other Class I agents. "Hrly, it's good to see you back safely. We're just waiting for the Council to get back to us. They didn't specifically say the conversation has to be private… y'all feel free to have a seat or go to bed, whatever you want. I made coffee." He motioned to the line of chairs at the many computers along the wall.

They all elected to stay for the talk. Hrly took the chair on the other side of her commander, and he swiveled around to look at her. He looked exhausted.

But he looked no less powerful than he normally did. Rook was very tall, with an extremely toned and athletic body. Bright-eyed and handsome, his Cuban features gave him a charm few women were ever able to resist. Years of football had conditioned him into a physical powerhouse, and his fierce manner and quick temper demanded respect from all. But he was young, and had not been commander for very long. Others in positions of authority regarded him as a "greenhorn" and an "upstart," and he carried a chip on his shoulder for that. "Hothead" was probably the best word to describe him, and in more ways than one.

Commander Rook could secrete an extraordinary chemical from his hands that reacted explosively on contact with the nitrogen/oxygen mix in the atmosphere. This chemical was produced constantly by his metabolism, and at a fixed rate, so while he could keep a small flame going on one of his fingertips nearly indefinitely, he could only cast flamethrower-like waves for a short time, and if he wanted to hurl a few meteor-style blasts he would have to wait for several minutes for his body to produce more of the compound.

"Anything new?" HrlyQnn asked him.

"This has been what we've been getting from them for the past couple hours," Rook said, motioning at the large screen.

The Council of Moderators were the only authority that Commander Rook himself answered to, and were the source of the Rook Squad's government funding. A federal committee themselves, the Council were composed of several people with decidedly superior abilities and intelligence.

Nearest to them, chair turned completely away from the long table, was Gehtfuct, the handsome communications expert. Since birth he had possessed a unique undertone to his voice that stimulated the humor center of the human brain, allowing him to command the attention of others when he spoke, regardless of what he had to say was actually worth listening to or not. Together with his assistant, the infinitely patient and even-tempered HoneyImHome, the two of them formed the liaison between the Council and the general populace of the nation. Gehtfuct was speaking quickly and harshly into a headset, but no audio from the Council's chamber came into the war room.

Across from Gehtfuct, engaged in sorting out the damage control, was the studious BrIONwoshMunky. With his acute control over the motion of fluids, he had found himself in charge of the municipal water distributors for several surrounding districts, and so he had a hand in the issue of how to control the fires caused by the explosion in the forest. He, too, was on the phone, and not in a good mood.

Dustinzgirl sat in complete silence, looking at Rook, a slight half-grin crossing her face. She leaned back in her chair—reinforced, because of her ability. She could increase the density of her own body at will, making her completely invulnerable to physical damage as well as orders of magnitude stronger and heavier—but it took much of her stamina to sustain herself in this form, so she couldn't hold it for long. And it tended to happen involuntarily when she was irritated.

Across from her sat HavokChylde, nearly invisible in his black uniform against the backdrop of the darkened chamber. This ninja was second to none in unarmed and melee-weapon combat, stealth, assassination, and infiltration. Only 53V3N came close to rivaling his skill. Havok's many blades were laid out on the table in front of him—an assortment of long and short swords, daggers, throwing stars, and darts. He held a particularly wicked, straight blade in his hand and was deeply engaged in sharpening it to a keen razor edge.

Jane Deere, too, looked as though she were preparing for some course of action. Her extraordinarily beautiful face was crossed with an austere look as she pulled her hair back and laced up her shoes. Her outfit was streamlined to make her as aerodynamic as possible—and when one's gift was the ability to run at speeds faster than the human eye could track, that was only logical.

MaxPower was on the phone with the president of Giygax Corporation. Rook and the company had already confirmed that they had shipped ten Darkling Units—MaxPower was discussing how they would cover this issue with the media. MaxPower was hailed as quite a PR and intelligence expert, but his real respect had been gained in war. A towering, heavily muscled, grizzled, and battle-scarred veteran, MaxPower had the dangerous and unstable ability to produce and project kinetic energy directly from his body into any target he wished, usually in the form of shattering earthquakes to topple enemy vehicles or massive concussive-force blasts at aircraft or groups of enemies.

A static crackle got the attention of every Class I agent in the war room, and all heads turned to the screen. Audio contact had been established. Gehtfuct, BrION and Max had finished their conversations and hung up, and all of the Council's eyes were on the Rook Squad now.

At the head of the table, previously completely cast in shadow, the leader of the Council of Moderators leaned into full view. Sharp-tongued, curt, and foul-tempered, his two mewling pets Zolly and Chokies in his lap, BRiT glared at the Rook Squad from across the table. After a few seconds he sighed and his head sank into one hand, as if he'd suddenly had a dull headache.

"How…" he started, his other hand scratching behind Zolly's ear. "How do two such experienced, such powerful, such high ranking agents fuck up so badly? Rook and Draygoon, really. I'm all ears."