GM WhtKnt's Forge of Heroes

Game Master WhtKnt

I'm going to assume that Rigel will try to envelop Ivy as well, trapping her without oxygen.

Ivy takes two steps and is pummeled by MINOTAR and blasted by Voltage, then placed in a protective sphere by Rigel. Overwhelmed, she chooses to surrender.

Combat is over!

MINOTAR steps up to make sure Ivy is restrained.

“Statement: Everyone stay back. I am immune to her ability to control male humans.”

With the villains restrained, Gemstone feels safe enough to come out of hiding. "Thank you," she says to the heroes. "I never figured that writing could be so dangerous."

With the villains restrained, Gemstone feels safe enough to come out of hiding. "Thank you," she says to the heroes. "I never figured that writing could be so dangerous."

"Historically, the written word has scared the mightiest of men far more than any superhero. Words are power."

"There is that pen and sword thing. "

Without missing a beat, MINOTAR nods and expounds on the idea.

”Historical Factual Statement: ‘The pen is mightier than the sword’ is an expression indicating that the written word is more effective than violence as a means of social or political change. This sentiment has been expressed with metaphorical contrasts of writing implements and weapons for thousands of years. The specific wording that "the pen is mightier than the sword" was first used by English author Edward Bulwer-Lytton in 1839.“

"Yeah, thanks Mino, that was the thing. "

"We should get these two to someone who can hold them." Voltage says as he looks at the two fallen villians.

The police arrive on the scene, equipped to handle supervillains. Soon, all three are in handcuffs and placed in squad cars.

MINOTAR silently begins to help with the clean up process. Coordinating with the facility and law enforcement as needed.

Straightjacket will pitch in helping to clean up what damage may have been caused in the tussle.

"Shouldn't you be studying Son?"

he replies to an open patch of hall
"Hey, this is important work too. We helped make this mess. "

The aftermath is soon cleaned up (as much as it can be) and the remainder of the convention goes without a hitch. Apparently, in one of her books, Gemstone had written about Frost, Cheshire, and Ivy and they each took exception to what had been said about them and wanted revenge. As soon as word of this gets out, Gemstone is besieged with fans vying to get their books signed. The heroes are also hounded by autograph seekers and those wanting selfies with them.

The next few days are mercifully quiet, a welcome change from the chaos of the convention. But quiet is boring, and so you are almost grateful when a call comes in. It seems that a young woman is in the middle of downtown, asking for help, and she is requesting you by name!

On arrival, you find an attractive redhead woman about 25 years of age looking very upset and talking to the local police. She seems relieved when she sees you approaching and calls out to you. "Over here! I must speak with you!"

Immediately suspicious of such a strange call, MINOTAR is already on the lookout for ambushes or scams. He is monitoring all the radio channels he can, scanning each over time, including the local unsecured CCTV cameras and anything else he can find as they approach the area with the woman.

He falls behind the others as they finally approach to let one of the other members speak to the woman while he continues to scan for possible trouble...

Perception(Awareness): 1d20 + 5 ⇒ (15) + 5 = 20
Technology(INT): 1d20 + 8 ⇒ (9) + 8 = 17

Silently communicating to the others via his internal radio transmissions to their personal comm devices, he warns the others in the JL group that the woman is not who she appears to be (according to the description he was originally given at least) and to be on extra alert for an attack or surprise maneuver. He also sends a transmission of the alien's true look back to the base for further, but hopefully quick, research.

"Statement and Query: She appears to be green with four arms. Is that what you all are seeing, or not?"

"What? Green with four arms? That's a hot redhead!" Straightjacket replies to his robot buddy.

"I am seeing the redhead version as well...could your optics be having issues from the fight or is there some illusion going on?" Voltage asks MINOTAR.

"What? Green with four arms? That's a hot redhead!" Straightjacket replies to his robot buddy.

"With 'hot' being seriously subjective given how big of a Universe it is and that the disguise is female, which may or may not be attractive to all males, or all species for that matter."

Rigel smiles at his own humour ...

"Plus it seems like she chose to look that young; so she would have to be an alien: no one in their 20s has any credibility whatsoever, as I am sure we can all agree. Poor girl, guess she hasn't studied Earth all that well."

SJ grumbles "I'm credible. Anyway, she certainly looks hot whatever she is. "

MINOTAR keeps himself from chuckling, seeing a chance at humor.

"Humorous Response: She doesn't appear to be sweating to me...just green."

She pleads with the heroes as soon as she sees them. "Please, I must speak with you! It is urgent!"

She pleads with the heroes as soon as she sees them. "Please, I must speak with you! It is urgent!"

to his ring, softly
"Ring, scan for a UT signature/carrier to see if we can find this alien's original language? It seems unlikely it is 'speaking' english."

to the 'woman'
"You are a long way from home this day I would think, please, be at peace. How can we help?"

The police are more than happy for you to take over. As strange as it seems, she does speak English. "Not here. There are too many people. Is there someplace that we can speak privately?"

The police are more than happy for you to take over. As strange as it seems, she does speak English. "Not here. There are too many people. Is there someplace that we can speak privately?"

Rigel makes a 20'x20' cube of glowing blue force, shapes a door into the facing side and says, "Step into my office? It's sound proofed, and we will ascend about 250' or so to be less observable. Gentlemen? You'll come with us?"

Nonplussed by the Guardian's Ring power, MINOTAR nods and continues to monitor local remote camera frequencies and scans local radio for anything unusual while the others talk.

Once safely ensconced within the ring's construct, the woman's features change, melting away to reveal a green-skinned, purple-haired, four-armed young woman with two small antennae. "I apologize for the deception but in this century, I find it easier to get about if I look like everyone else. My name is Kythea and I'll come right to the point, though you may find it difficult to understand. I come from your future; the 35th century to be exact.

"In the 30th century, there will be a collection of heroes, a Legion of Super-Heroes to be more precise. They will protect the Earth and many other worlds besides and will be a force for good and justice. But recently, something has gone wrong. People have been disappearing without a trace, changing personalities, and the like. History is being altered! The Legion was never formed and a galactic war has eclipsed my time.

"I have been sent back to retrieve a group of, forgive me, relative unknowns to travel to different eras to correct the issues that have been caused. We feel that a small band of unrecognized heroes would be able to move undetected through history, correcting the alterations, and would be more likely to pass unnoticed by whoever is responsible."

SJ grumbles "First I'm not credible, then I'm a nobody. I should have stayed home and studied. "

Nodding at the new information, MINOTAR begins processing the possibilities. Too many… his processing center ‘brain’ temperature quickly begins to rise too quickly. So he relents and focuses on the here and now.

“Statement and Request: Obviously you seem distressed, and you tell a good story, but can you prove any of this? You are asking a lot of us, and possibilities abound on potential lies dealing with time travel. You may very well be trying to cause what you are asking us to prevent.”

She sighs heavily. "Alas, I have no way to prove to you my good intentions." She snaps her fingers suddenly. "Or have I? Let's see, this is the 21st century, you still have a president of the United States. Who is the president?"

This is what Kythea looks like.

MINOTAR begins to rattle of the name of the President, the Vice President, and the Joint Chiefs of Staff before he notices everyone's annoyed looks and stops.

Voltage watches her and waits to see what she has to say about the president.

Listening to MINOTAR, she says, "Are you certain?" Perhaps you'd better check."

Listening to MINOTAR, she says, "Are you certain?" Perhaps you'd better check."

"He right. That's the president. " not going any further in the offices because he can't really remember beyond the VP/

"Except that's not the president. Can you check current records?" she asks MINOTAR. If he does so, he will find that who he thought was the president is not who it is. In fact, the past three presidents have not been who he had recorded. "The changes to the timeline have begun to show far-reaching effects. You see, time is like a river. When you toss a stone into the river, the ripples spread, becoming weaker the further from the point of impact they are. In this case, a change in the past has resulted in your change in leadership. Near the impact point, the point in time that has been altered, the changes are more drastic."

"Ok, that just makes my brain hurt. "

MINOTAR merely stands quietly to those watching. Inside, he is running calculations and triple verifying the woman’s statements. After nearly 3 minutes he finally speaks, as the others look anxiously at MINOTAR for his unusually slow response.

”Verification Complete: She is speaking the truth as she understands things. The physics involved are very convoluted and dangerous, but she is essentially correct. As far I can understand such things. Sentience is still new to me, so is time essentially… or at least how I experience it still is. But that borders on the philosophical, so I will skip that for now. Basically she is speaking the truth… as far as we can prove at the moment.”

"Doesn't look like we have a choice then do we?" says SJ.

"No you don't son. This has to be done or everything will go haywire. " mentions his dad only to SJ.

MINOTAR merely stands quietly to those watching. Inside, he is running calculations and triple verifying the woman’s statements. After nearly 3 minutes he finally speaks, as the others look anxiously at MINOTAR for his unusually slow response.

”Verification Complete: She is speaking the truth as she understands things. The physics involved are very convoluted and dangerous, but she is essentially correct. As far I can understand such things. Sentience is still new to me, so is time essentially… or at least how I experience it still is. But that borders on the philosophical, so I will skip that for now. Basically she is speaking the truth… as far as we can prove at the moment.”

"Then I guess we will have to run with the metaphor as presented, because I will tell you a secret: I'm not a scientist by any stretch, but I know that you cannot un-ripple a river by reaching in and removing the stone you tossed. You need to prevent the stone from being tossed in order to prevent its ripples."

"So...what are the chances that things get even worse with our actions?" Voltage asks. "Could us trying to change these things cause the changes that mess everything up?"

"That is a possibility," Kythea admits. "But without our intervention, we can be certain that things have changed, and not for the better."

MINOTAR nods yet again.

”Statement and Query: Then we should start immediately. Where do we begin?”

"In your past," Kythea replies. "I've identified six key points of interdiction, any one of which could be a triggering event that sets it all in motion. If I'm right, we should arrive shortly before each trigger, giving us a chance to ascertain what is going wrong and fix it. Your friend is correct, we cannot just remove the stone, we must prevent it from being cast in the first place. I have some knowledge of history, but my ancient history (for me) is fuzzy. Hopefully, some of you will be able to fill in any blanks.

"The first point of divergence is November 22, 1963. I'll take us back to November 20, 1963 to see if we can determine where the divergence occurs. The beacon should put us very close to the point of divergence in terms of coordinates."

She takes a small device from her belt that looks like a television remote with a lot more buttons and a small screen. After a moment of fiddling with it, she presses a button and a glowing portal opens before you. It is a doorway to somewhere else, but exactly where that might be remains a mystery. Kythea motions for all of you to enter.

Thinking he would be the best to go first, MINOTAR immediately turns and enters the portal. As he did so, he wonders what would happen if he managed to get the time travel device…

Voltage looks back toward the exit and wonders about when he will see his family again but steels himself and follows MINOTAR into the portal.

Straightjacket figures he's got no choice so heads for the portal. His father invisibly follows.

Assuming that Rigel follows...

You find yourselves in a scene right out of a movie. You arrive in a back alley of a busy city. Outside the alley, people are hurrying by on their way to wherever taking no notice of the glowing portal that swiftly fades behind you. Kythea looks the same to all of you and she swiftly assures you, "My illusory appearance is psionic in nature. I can control who sees it, but it has no effect on machines. I'll need to avoid cameras." She picks up a nearby discarded newspaper, the Dallas Morning News, November 20, 1963.

"What do you know about this time period and what we have to correct?" Voltage asks.

Scanning the paper in her hand, MINOTAR begins extrapolating their location and time with as many factors as he can see and hear, tuning into local TV and Radio broadcasts. Once he started to realize what was going on, MINOTAR decided to use the new word Straightjacket taught him.

"Statement and Expletive: Earth. We are in the Southern United States. Dallas Texas...somewhere in the past. There are no cell towers or major satellites, so our communication will be limited. Approximately late November...1963. Oh that's just 'Craptastic.' You brought us here. NOW."

He immediately starts to visually scan for local police, or interested locals, while trying to stay as hidden as possible.

"Question and Warnings: Can you disguise my visual form as well with your powers? Otherwise, a seven and a half foot combat robot might just start a panic. AND summon the army to our nearest vicinity. Not to mention, this IS Texas: Almost 30% of the population here was believed to have had access to multiple types of firearms during this time period."

Kythea nods. "I can disguise you as well psionically," she assures MINOTAR, "But it will have no effect on mechanical devices or tactile senses. Anyone touching us will know immediately that we are not human." She turns to Voltage. "If the beacon brought us here, I can only assume that the event revolves around the assassination of John F. Kennedy, 35th President of the United States. According to history as it should be, he will be assassinated by Lee Harvey Oswald in two days, as his motorcade passes through town. I do not know what happens to change the past, so we must be vigilant."