.|. COHERENT COMICS PRESENTS ----X----------------------------------------------------------------------- '|` =====, ======== ====. ===. ======= ======= // // // )) //|| // // ===== // //===< // || //=== //=== // // // \\ //==|| // // `===== o // o // // o // || o // o ======= o Superhuman Tactical Resources and Affiliated-Field Experts original concept by Dave Van Domelen development by Marc Singer and Terrone Carpenter Issue #17, "Burial" (Step 4 of THE PYRAMID SCHEME) by Marc Singer Copyright 2000; a Legacy House production ============================================================================ [Cover shows Morgan Adams standing in front of a mirror. His reflection is replaced by that of Pino Archangeli. The small pyramid at the bottom of the cover is red except for a golden capstone. "PYRAMID SCHEME: STEP FOUR"] ============================================================================ [STRAFE Headquarters, McLean, Virginia. August 10, 2024.] Downtime was a rare commodity in STRAFE Headquarters, group holidays even moreso. But Colonel Hendrick had ordered Jay Teller, Tony Drake, and Lana Smith to recuperate from their exhausting Vatican excursion while he, Dan Tracey and Jen Kleinvogel investigated some potential lead. They weren't complaining. The agents were congregating in their private lounge, where Jay and Tony were watching a Paraball game on the holographic display (Baltimore/ Washington Federals at the New York Neons, down by three runs in the top of the eighth). Tony had stationed himself in the easy chair while Lana hovered on the fringes of the group, sitting at a table full of chips and pretzels she would never dream of eating. Jay reclined on the couch, twined arm in arm with his girlfriend Claire Auger, the European superagent codenamed Arc. Both were ecstatic because the European Union and North American Combine had finally agreed to cooperate on the Rebus/CSV problem, and Claire was appointed special liaison to STRAFE for the rest of the case. Claire whistled as "Strontium" Sam Kelso belted another ball out of the park, increasing New York's lead to four. "Jay," she said, "explain to me again why this isn't as good as regular American baseball?" She nestled further into their mutual embrace. For one instant, Jay caught Tony's eye and looked mildly apologetic; the guy wasn't used to his romantic side being on such public display. Worlds Were Colliding, as Jay was no doubt thinking. At least, that's what Tony hoped Jay was thinking...he didn't want Jay to feel sorry for him because he'd waited too long on the whole Jen thing. Tony just wanted to write off the whole stupid crush. It wasn't like he'd had much of a chance against Dan Tracey anyway; the guy could go nuts for a month and *still* get the girl. Jay was happily working the remote control with a lightning trigger, zooming in and freeze-framing the game to illustrate his highly opinionated lecture. "Well, they claim it's the same as baseball, honey, except they're allowed to use certain powers for certain designated functions, but those powers deform the entire game. See, for example, New York has loaded their bullpen with telekinetics, which pretty much makes a mockery of the idea of the designated hitter..." "Designated hitter?" "That's a player who just comes in to bat when it's the pitcher's turn, but like I said that's pretty much irrelevant in New York's case. That's no big deal for the Feds since they're under American League rules, but it makes a huge difference in the postseason and a lot of regular season games thanks to the abomination that is interleague play." "Inter-league play...?" "Claire, stop," Tony interrupted. "*Please* stop. I know you're just curious but you're giving Jay a prime opportunity to mouth off." "And nobody wants that," Claire added, smiling. Jay pretended not to hear her, and continued to rant: "...even get me *started* on the infield fly rule, which is meaningless when you've got a three-dimensional playing arena; if your second baseman can fly then every hit becomes a potential double play! Now last year the Commissioner tried to modify the infield fly rule to take into account which powers were possessed by which infielders, but he was rightly marched out of town on the end of a sharp pointed stick." [For more on Paraball, see the Editor's Note - Ed.] "Pointed stick?" "That's a Tellerism, babe." "I know, I was just questioning its unusual lack of vivacity and humor." Jay's flustered silence set Tony bursting with laughter. "Claire, you always could trump him. I knew there was a reason I liked you!" Lana leaned ever so slightly into the center of the conversation and meekly said, "Seems like everybody's in the perfect relationship now." It was her first comment in several minutes. "I mean, the two of you, Dan and Jen..." "Um, Lana." Jay was trying to shut down the new line of discussion without specifying the reason why. "I wouldn't, y'know, I wouldn't say any relationship is *perfect*..." Claire proved considerably more adept. "And any successful relationship is built on the backs of a half-dozen failed ones." The unpleasant reunion with her old teammate Castor had greatly disturbed her. But Lana was undaunted. "Then those past failures just mean the future is all the brighter." She was staring, without making any attempts to conceal her staring, directly at Tony Drake. Claire sat up as if she'd been hit with a jolt of electricity. "Oh, Lana, there's something I've been dying to show you." Claire took the younger, tinier girl by her slender wrist and led her down the hall, hoping there was something, *anything* in her luggage which she could pass off as the latest Parisian fashion. Jay and Tony, on the other hand, sat motionlessly even after the women had left. The paraball game color commentary sounded tinny and faint in the quiet room. "Jay?" Tony finally said. "Yes?" Jay answered. "Was *Lana Smith* just coming on to me?" "I...I think so, yes." "Oh God." Tony buried his face in his hands. "Oh God. Has she forgotten the past eight months? She put a *bomb* in my *stomach,* I tried to *punch* her...is she *crazy*?" Jay raised an eyebrow. Tony sat up. "Okay, point taken," he said, "but what do I *do*, Jay? I mean, she's a single mother! Am I, am I being some kind of creep if I reject her?" "You're being some kind of masochist if you don't." His friendly advice was somewhat tempered by the fact that he was actually watching the game. "Bad news, man." They heard women's voices bubbling back down the hall. "Oh God! Oh crap! She's coming back! What do I do, Jay? What do I..." The paraball game was interrupted as Dan Tracey's voice rang through the room speakers, loud and clear. "This is Grind calling all team personnel. Report to the following coordinates *at once*. We have a Conclave of Super-Villains member sighting in Washington, D.C." Tony jumped into the air, pumping his fists. "YES!!!" * * * * [Elsewhere.] Morgan Adams woke up in a sturdy metal chair, held there by heavy metal restraints around his wrists, chest and ankles. The restraints looked like they'd been bolted to the chair fairly recently, and in fact he awoke in a workshop of some sort. The blacked-over window well told him he was in a basement, probably of a fairly large and expensive house, and the workshop was filled with tools of every trade from masonry to electronics. Mostly, however, the array of glass-cutters and lockpicks suggested the implements of a world-class thief. A woman sat across from him, hunched over a workbench, clad from head to toe in form-fitting black spandex. "How the hell did I end up in a home-improvement bondage movie?" Adams groaned. "Ah, so you're awake." She spun her stool around to face him, and wisely chose not to acknowledge the wisecrack. "I'm Tiara of the Conclave of Super-Villains, and I do apologize for the coarse accomodations. In fact, I apologize for having taken you at all, but you see, STRAFE and I are in a bit of a competition right now, and I had to make sure I got your information first." "Information? What...?" "The Book of Thoth, and specifically its association with Rebus. Lorenzo Archangeli." "I thought he was one of you." "Before my time. Apparently they're not on good terms anymore. And *you*," she said, hopping off her stool and sidling over to him, "are going to tell me why he's interested in this Book." "I'm not in the habit of helping my own kidnappers, girl." She seemed to pout underneath her mask. Adams figured she had to be young. "Fine," she said. "You don't have to talk to me. As soon as I'm done with my other project I'll be heading straight to Khadam, and then you can talk to Triton, or Caryatid, or Conflicto." She returned to the work bench, put on a jeweller's eyepiece, and started examining some kind of computer drive. "I doubt this will take much longer..." The girl was a good thief, but not a very good kidnapper; she'd left a clock in view. Apparently it had only been a couple of hours since his capture. He'd have to hope those STRAFE people were as good as they thought they were. "You sure we can't settle this right here?" "That's up to you," she said, pretending to be more interested in the hard drive. "What were you going to tell STRAFE? What else do you know about the Archangeli family?" "Well that's a long story," he said, staring at her, the computer drive, the workbench, anything but the clock... ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- The year was 2010. Mexico had just been formally annexed into the North American Combine, and Combine troops had quelled the last of the Church Riots. The economy was picking up again and people were starting to move back into the cities. The chaos that had erupted in the wake of the Godmarket was finally beginning to subside, although the new era of peace was bittersweet at best. We were still left with the memory of all those who had vanished...and more than a few read the signs of a future doom in the children who were, for the first time, beginning to display paranormal powers again. I think we all knew that our hard-won normality wasn't permanent... just the calm between two storms. I had been working pretty much nonstop for the last twelve years, trying to quell riots, catch looters, right wrongs. Most places in the country it never got too bad, but it was always bad *somewhere* in the Combine. It's funny; I could have been king of the hill with all the paranormal adventurers gone, but I didn't particularly relish my new position. Nobody wanted to see lone individuals butting into situations anymore, not after the last wave of heroes had deserted them. Those goons in SPIRIT told me more than once to ease into retirement and mind my own business. They never understood that getting involved *was* my business. But in 2010, it started to look like I was finally done. I wasn't sure how to spend my retirement; most of my old friends were dead, either in the Godmarket or the troubles that followed. The only thing left for me was to sit down at my bay window and stare out over a city that was completely peaceful because it was completely dead. That was when Marx came to me...I was sitting in my room one night, lights out, watching a street that had been dark for a dozen years. Refusing to believe this was how I'd spend the rest of my life. Then I saw the limousine pull up outside. Even from the way he rang the buzzer, brusque and impatient, I knew it was Devlin Marx and I knew he'd only bring trouble. Marx hadn't changed much in fifteen years. He'd put on a little weight, and cut off his trendy ponytail, and he was wearing a black trenchcoat that looked exactly like the one I'd had when he met me. Otherwise he seemed even healthier and wealthier than before. And that was the first sign of trouble, because Magnum Industries had gone belly-up right after the Godmarket did. He had to be pulling his money in from somewhere else. "We have a problem," he said. "The Book of Thoth has been stolen again." "Then *you* have a problem," I said. I hadn't even risen from my chair. "You're the one who shelled out for it." So Marx stepped forward, dropped his voice to a low but intense whisper. "By Pino Archangeli," he said. And suddenly I was interested. Archangeli hadn't just tried to kill me and trash my city...although usually that was enough to get me interested... he'd also thrown away one of the most beautiful and caring women I'd ever known. I had heard that she, as a paranormal, had died in the Godmarket while he, as an Anchor, still lived and had reclaimed the son she'd tried to protect from him. One of those little ironies that tells us there is no justice in this world unless we make it so. It was high time somebody brought a little justice to Pino. But I didn't tell Marx that...I had to figure out what his angle was. "And you want to protect your investment?" I asked him. Marx huffed, losing his last veneer of patience. "You know it's more than that, Adams. The *last* time he possessed the book, he tried to crack your precious city in two." He paused. "And it's not like either of us would be unhappy if Pino Archangeli departed this earth." So that was it. I had never, ever taken a contract for wetwork...but plenty of people had tried to con me into one. "If that's your game, Marx, why've you waited so long? He must have lost the protection of the Anchorites ten years ago." That was because, in fact, there were no Anchorites anymore; hard to support an organization of power-dampening bounty hunters when there are no more powers to be dampened. They folded around the turn of the century. I'd been keeping tabs. "There's nothing to protect Archangeli anymore, right?" I gave Marx a nice big smile, flustering him even more. "So why is it taking you so long to bump him off?" "I'm *not* a killer," he muttered. "And he *did* steal the Book. If he should return it to me, fine; but if he should get in my way, I won't hesitate to kill him. Do you have a problem with that?" "Hell, no," I said, sliding a clip into my favorite Glock. "I want in." Because really, retirement was looking pretty lethal. And Pino and I had a score to settle. Tracking him down wasn't easy. First we tried his digs in Fiesole, a hilltop suburb outside Florence. He was long gone, but he'd been so kind as to riddle the villa with traps...and that was when I began to understand my place in Marx's scheme. Half of Pino's deathtraps were negated by supertech containment devices...devices which would shut down the second another Anchor traipsed by them, propelling a jet of flames or a ten-foot spear into their precious Anchor body. Marx needed someone who wouldn't trigger them, a nice little normal human boy to do all his dirty work. Pino had also left behind some hired help, mostly Anchors themselves, all sharing his fondness for ancient weapons and Egyptian decor. I was tougher than any five of them, even with my joints cracking and my muscles complaining, but they would have finished us through sheer numbers if Marx's own backup hadn't dropped in by helicopter and gunned down the whole lot of them. At this point my curiosity was piqued, so I did what any self- respecting investigator would do: chucked a grenade into Marx's men. It didn't go off. It was supertech, some photonic explosive I'd "borrowed" from a government warehouse years and years ago. And they were all Anchors. "So," I asked Marx, who was still in shock from my seemingly suicidal action, "am I really supposed to think the Anchorites are dead?" "They are," he said, guiltily. "We're the Conclave now." No, no, not the Conclave of *Super-Villains*...that's *your* bunch of yahoos. It seems the world's leading Anchors had planned ahead...reorganized in the wake of the Godmarket into a group whose aspirations lay far beyond bounty hunting. They were inserting people into positions of power, locating and taming the most powerful children in the next wave of superhumans. And wouldn't you know it, their leader was... "Pino Archangeli," Marx told me, not bothering to conceal his shame. "I didn't like it any more than you do, but times were desperate." "And it's a rare opportunity to control the world before the next crop of paranormals grows up, right? Spare me the excuses." I unwrapped a cigarillo and lit it, striking the match off Marx's imitation leather coat. "Thanks for getting me embroiled in another power struggle." I stalked off through the galleries of Archangeli's manor, only pretending to be fuming at Marx. I was really looking for any clue as to where that crazy cracker Archangeli had gotten off to. Because I wasn't hunting him for Marx. I found armories stocked with weapons of every style from Algonquin to Zulu...stored in that order. I found training rooms where those weapons had been used on a host of devastated dummies, including one that bore my face. I found rooms of games, *every* game of every culture known to man, each of them played and replayed by Pino and his son almost to the point of disintegration. And then I found the sanctum, the key room, concealed by a fresco which could only be unlocked by tracing the maze in a pattern of mosaic tiles. The painted wall swung aside, revealing the room where Pino Archangeli went to be himself, unfettered by any facades of family or society or basic human decency. And there I found the pictures.... ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Tiara didn't notice the pause for a few seconds; she was busily fidgeting with the hard drive, and had been for most of Adams's story. She had two such drives sitting on her workbench and they commanded her attention far more than Adams did, until the silence finally registered. "What pictures?" she asked, still fiddling with the hard drive. "Pictures of Dendera. His ex-wife." "The one who'd died in the Godmarket," Tiara said. "No," Adams said, "she *hadn't*." After his full meaning dawned on her, she allowed him another moment of silence. When he spoke again, Adams said, "He must have known it was coming...the end of the Godmarket, I mean. With only a couple days to spare, he tracked her down to Cairo, and he... "He'd filmed and photographed the whole thing, in chilling detail. And I knew he'd done it just so he could leave the pictures for me to find, twelve years later." His voice was hard and unforgiving, his whole body animated by an all-consuming hate. "Marx told me it was a ritual. Archangeli had taken her out to the Pyramids at Giza and tried to sacrifice her so that when the big showdown came, the Egyptian gods would take him up as one of their own. It didn't work, of course; the crazy fuck was an Anchor. And so after it failed, he went back and told his son that the gods had taken his mother, and rejected them." He shuddered with fury, straining not against the chair's restraints but the weight of twenty-six years...an absolute barrier that would always keep him from saving her, and always throw that failure in his face. He shuddered in silence, until Tiara touched his shoulder and spoke. "Mister Adams, I don't mean to disturb you..." "Well you got a funny way of showing it." This time he *was* pulling against the restraints, with a sudden outburst of force she never would have expected from such a frail man. "Just get to the point," Tiara said. "The Book. The end game." "It wasn't the end game," Adams said. "It was only the beginning..." ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- It started in Archangeli's compound in Egypt. The Moslem Confederacy hadn't quite gelled yet, and huge swaths of Africa were up for grabs for any warlord with a bankroll. Archangeli had a huge mercenary camp in the desert near Giza...so near to where he'd killed Dendera that I knew his own sense of perversity would lead him there. Marx gathered his forces and led a full- scale invasion. If in the past I would have chuckled to be part of a big battle between two armies wearing different-colored uniforms in an exotic desert compound...well, I had something more serious on my mind. We cornered him in his command center, a bunker buried underneath the sand. He'd designed the place like an old Egyptian tomb, as if we needed any more proof of his mania. We could still hear the sounds of fighting outside as Marx's followers traded gunfire with the last of the Archangeli faction. Pino had a giant viewscreen in his command center--don't they always?--which was split between two observers, a dispassionate Chinese man and a choleric Italian one in cardinal's robes. Marx wasn't bothered by their watchful expressions, one a calm butcher, one an agitated saint; he thought they were the only witnesses to the end of Pino Archangeli. We pressed him slowly back into the corner, Marx with his silly crossbow, me with my twin Glocks. Soon Pino was stuck, with the viewscreen off to one side and a long, narrow mirror at his back. Me, I was waiting for some outburst of violence...I remembered all those trashed dummies back in Fiesole...so I kept my distance. There was a loud, muffled _whump_ in the distance, and tremors that reached even through the stone. "That was the last of your guard towers, Pino," Marx crowed. "My faction's won." "You're a fool," Archangeli spat. "You think you can buy your way out of any problem...but one day your coins will desert you, Marx." "You brought this on yourself, Pino," Marx said. "This has been a long time coming." I smiled over my guns. Archangeli pressed one hand to the mirror behind him, with a softness and a sorrow that was almost tender. But he stared at Marx and me with utter loathing...with such contempt that he must have thought the victory was his and not ours. Suddenly I was lightheaded. The carved stone walls seemed to spin around me as I finally knew how everything fit together: why he'd stolen the Book of Thoth and why he'd left the pictures, why his command center looked like a tomb and even why that one detail just didn't fit. The mirror. The *mirror*. Marx's trigger finger was bright red, and itching to send the last bolt flying. "You don't have the will," Pino spat. I swung my left arm around, keeping one Glock on Pino but pointing the other at Marx. "Don't do it!" I shouted. "It's a scam!" "It's too late," Marx said, "he's already lost the Conclave." Above him, the Ambassador and the Cardinal nodded their tacit approval. "You and the Conclave will never be anything more than the merest pawns in my game," Archangeli crowed. "And as for you..." he turned to me, his eyes dancing with sick joy. "...she cursed your name as I finally slit her throat." And then he tensed his legs as if to lunge at us. "NO!" Marx bellowed with rage and I pressed the trigger, pumping two nine-millimeter slugs into his arm. But I was too late; the garishly-painted bolt flew out of the crossbow, arcing with deadly force across the scant yards that separated Marx's weapon from Pino Archangeli's chest. The impact knocked Pino backwards into the mirror, which cracked... ...exposing the horrified face of Lorenzo Archangeli. Our two observers peered down at the body and the spreading bloodstain with polite dismay. "Pyramid has fallen," said the Cardinal, sounding deeply relieved. "The Eye of Horus now runs the Conclave." They broke their connections. Marx wanted me to help him tourniquet his arm, but I was already into the secret room and trying to think of something, anything, to tell Lorenzo. But what could I say? The room was soundproofed; he hadn't heard a word his father said, only saw Marx kill him. Silent men wrapped in white drifted into the room. They were the last of Pino's acolytes, but they hadn't come to fight...Marx was their new master now, at least in name. They began to clean up the body, fulfilling Pino's final orders. Marx was full of big talk, already blathering about how he'd ship the Book of Thoth to the Cardinal for safe keeping, how he'd try to remove the Conclave's unhealthy Egyptian fixation and bring in some terminology from another mythology. Meet the new boss, same as the old boss. Marx also took the boy in his one good arm and promised to explain everything to him...apparently Lorenzo was also a member of the Conclave, codename Sphinx, and he had to be kept in good graces. Marx said he'd raise Lorenzo as his own son, but I knew the boy would never forget what he'd seen. So what if Marx told him what Pino had done to Dendera? Then the boy would just think he was a liar as well as a murderer. His eyes blazed with a hatred for Devlin Marx more intense than anything I had ever known or felt. And as for me, the guy who'd tried to stop Marx...I was merely a bug, a creature as irrelevant as I was incompetent. Even as I tried to explain what had happened I knew that to him, I would never matter again. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- "All those weapons and training dummies in Fiesole hadn't been for Pino," Adams said, "they'd been for Lorenzo. The sick bastard molded his own son into the perfect weapon. And for his final touch, he stole the Book of Thoth and lured me and Marx to Egypt...planning all along for us to kill him." Adams bit his lip. "And I didn't even have the satisfaction of doing him myself." Tiara had completely abandoned the hard drives and was listening intently, but she was still confused. "Wait, I thought you didn't want to kill him..." Adams snorted. "This was a man who was willing to kill hundreds of thousands of people for his own personal gain. A man who knew the Godmarket would claim billions and did nothing to warn anyone about it, a man who killed his wife when he knew she was already doomed, a man who warped his son into an instrument of terror and revenge purely out of spite. If Pino Archangeli was going to die anyway, I'd like to have been the one who shot him." "...Wow." Tiara didn't think any reaction could have done justice to Morgan Adams's anger, but that one seemed particularly insufficient. "Remind me not to piss you off." "*Too late*, girl. You've kidnapped and interrogated me, asked me to relive my greatest failure, and I'm damned if I even know why." Tiara breathed deeply, then tried to explain. "It's nothing personal, Mister Adams. The CSV has stolen the Book of Thoth from the Vatican, but it doesn't seem to work. I was sent to investigate it, and its history led me to you. If STRAFE hadn't been there, I might not have had to kidnap you at all..." "I think that's quite enough." The voice sounded from outside the interior door, which was suddenly kicked open...and knocked off its hinges... by Dan Tracey. The STRAFE field leader charged in, in full uniform this time, and said, "I won't tolerate a Conclaver blaming my people for *anything*." Tiara backflipped away from him, landing atop her workbench. "Darling," she lilted, "so *delightful* to see you, but I really can't stay and chat. Au revoir...." She reached down for the holographic generator on her belt, unaware that Lana Smith was phasing out of the wall behind her. Lana turned the generator intangible, slipping it off Tiara's belt and out of her grasp. Tiara leaped off the workbench, running for a rear exit which was knocked to splinters by Claire Auger, who was followed by Tony Drake and Jay Teller. To Morgan Adams, they were all just a bunch of kids in black and blue uniforms...except for the one girl he'd met earlier, who flew in behind Tracey. Jen Kleinvogel smiled underneath her mask and said, "This one's mine." She sprang across the room in an antigravity-assisted leap, then increased her gravity on the trip back down as she lanced towards Tiara. Tiara tried to tumble backwards...and rolled right into Morgan Adams, who toppled himself, chair and all, into the small of her back. Then Jen landed, kicking Tiara in the chest and thoroughly knocking the wind out of her. "I know you didn't need the help," Adams grunted from the floor, "but pride demanded I get a lick in myself." "You were great, Mr. Adams." Jen unfasted his restraints and helped him stand up without seeming to. "Took you long enough," Adams said in mock complaint. "I couldn't stall her much longer." "Actually," Dan explained, "I've been here almost the entire time...I only pretended to be knocked out so I could tail Tiara here. I was just waiting for back-up." Adams nodded his approval. "I can tell you work for Jack Hendrick's boy." Meanwhile, Claire had grabbed Tiara and was stripping gadgets from her uniform by the handful. "I have *had it* with your games," Claire growled as she reached for the mask. "I demand to know who you are and what you've done with...Princess Ursula?!?" Ursula Grace Caroline Maxine Stephanie de Grimaldi, Princess of Monaco and presumed captive of the Robin Hood of the Mediterranean a.k.a. the Laughing Oyster a.k.a. Tiara of the Conclave of Super-Villains, stared up at her captor. "Well, what do you expect?" she said hotly. "Haven't you seen Grace Kelly in _To Catch a Thief_?" Dan paced over to her. "So I guess that diplomatic immunity you were boasting didn't come from Khadam after all." "No, and I expect Father shall be quite cross when he finds out..." "The CSV has afflicted Monaco with bombs and a hurricane, so yes, I think he *will* be quite cross. In fact, wasn't the Laughing Oyster's first crime the theft of his wife's diamond and emerald wedding necklace?" "His *second* wife's," she corrected, lightly. "The tramp never appreciated it anyway. Her tastes run more to rhinestone." "Whatever," Dan said. "Your crown doesn't intimidate *us*, Ursula. Now, you were investigating your own theft of the Book of Thoth. What did you learn?" Ursula fell into a silent pout, so Dan spun on his heel and marched over to the workbench. While Claire clamped and handcuffed Ursula to the chair, Dan examined her handiwork. "Looks like two optical hard drives," he said, "and judging by the unusual design they're from Scytharian photonic units. I seem to recall two of the Scytharians at the Vatican weren't responding to commands." "I would have gotten more if you hadn't come along," she grumbled. Dan hefted one of the hard drives in his hand. "Well let's see what secrets they can give up." Within minutes, he'd deciphered their inner workings, networked them with Ursula's computers, and was examining the Scytharian's programming. "This is a complete mess," he said. "Someone's been in here, and done a lot of damage." "Rebus stole a powerful optic encryption system earlier this year," Claire said [see Warden Annual #1 and Time Capsules Annual #1 - Ed.]. "He could have easily overpowered the Scytharians' command systems with it." "But *why*," Dan said, sounding like a man who already had some inkling of the answer. His fingers flying across the keyboard, he accessed the Scytharians' memory files and networked them to a video player. "It looks like Rebus has tried to overwrite some memory, but he didn't have enough time to obscure it completely." "Or he wanted you to find it," Adams cautioned. "I've got them...yes!" The monitors began displaying security footage recorded by the Scytharian drones on July 5, merely one day before Triton's visit and Tiara's break-in. In the footage, the Scytharians stand by idly, seeing nothing as Rebus strolls into the sealed vault...removes a fragile scroll from its case...and replaces it with what appears to be an exact copy. Tiara's jaw dropped. "I didn't steal the Book of Thoth after all!" "So what does Rebus want with it?" Teller asked. Dan gave Adams a long, hard look. The two men appeared to reach some silent conclusion. "Nothing," Dan said, "just like his father. The question is, what does Rebus want the CSV to do with the fake?" He rose and walked over to Tiara. "What's in your copy of the Book of Thoth? What is the CSV trying to do with it?" She stared at him silently. "Well?" he asked. "Cat got your...*damn it*!" He punched her in the face...disrupting the hologram and revealing the empty pair of handcuffs dangling from the chair. A tiny painted pearl had been left on the seat. The superhumans scrambled through the house, but Tiara had vanished without a trace. "I'm so sorry," Claire said as they reconvened. "I thought I'd secured her properly." "We all did," Dan said. "I guess she's even better than I thought." He said it with grudging admiration. Dan turned to Adams. "Mr. Adams, I'm sorry we've dragged you into this affair. Under the circumstances, it might be safest if you accept our guard at STRAFE headquarters..." "I know what he's up to," Adams said. Dan blinked, and Morgan clarified, "I don't know exactly what he's up to with this fake scroll, but I do know what Rebus is up to. I'm sure of it." "How do you...?" "Something I didn't tell Tiara." He leaned forward, his voice dropping lower and lower. "Those clerics who came in to tend to Pino's body...where do you think they put it?" "A sarcophagus?" Dan guessed. "Close." By the time he reached Dan's ear, his voice was a whisper. "Suspended animation. "Pino's coming back." ========================================================================== Next Issue: Aftermath and stuff...because the story continues in ASH #32, then the Capstone miniseries! Be there! ========================================================================== Editor's Note - Paraball: Okay, Paraball. By 2024, there's several score paranormals out there who are law-abiding citizens, yet lack the powers, temperment or ethics for work as a member of ASH or the Marshals. A big chunk of them work in private industry and are pretty well paid for their work. However, in 2022, someone got the idea of bringing paranormals into professional sports. Since that someone owned a baseball team, he felt that would be a natural place to put paranormals. After all, contact sports like football or hockey would give certain types too much advantage and limit the pool of useful paras. Baseball had room for lots of different powers, and could cope better with the sort of primadonna that was unsuited for work in a team like the one the government was already planning. And so the Paranormal League was formed. Originally there were just two teams of seven players...but when two guys could cover the entire outfield, it wasn't such a big problem. The PL was part of Major League Baseball and shared all the same rules, but the two teams just played each other for the most part, except for some exhibition games against the big money teams, like Atlanta or Chicago. In 2023, the PL expanded to four teams as graduates from the Academy entered the game, along with some reformed paragangers. More money in "paraball," as it was called, than in 'ganging, although only those without actual criminal records were let in. More exhibition games were scheduled, and the league became more a serious proposition than a novelty act. They even had a post-season of their own, albeit a short one. It was decided that half the teams would play by American League rules, the other half by National League rules. Of course, these rules were modified slightly to take powers into account: any use of powers on the ball counts as contact (invoking various rules for balks, dead balls and errors), teleportation counts as leaving the basepath, should any high-speed speedsters join, they have to stay below 50 mph on the basepaths, etc. But these were mostly interpretations of the rules rather than additions to them. The 2024 season saw full integration into MLB play. AL and NL teams tended to resent having to play against the PL teams more often, but games weren't the runaways everyone feared. Not yet, anyway. Powers make up for a lot, but most "normalball" players had a major edge in experience and teamwork, and the PL teams have won only about half the games so far. The interleague games were also intended to help break ties in the standings for PL teams and determine home field advantages in the post-season. The PL will not be eligible for the World Series in 2024, but there's plans for a single game between the World Series winners and the top PL team in October. PL players are not eligible for the All-Star Game, however, or Jay would have personally tracked down the person responsible and applied a pointed stick. With the Academy starting to turn out larger graduating classes, and the government willing to let some Academy students join the PL at the end of secondary school, the Paranormal League is set to swell to eight full teams of 12 (with paranormal healing, there's no real need for a DL and little need for a deep pitching bench) for the 2025 season. There's talk of branching out to another sport, but it's hard to pry paranormals loose from the PL to start it. Off-season play isn't much of an option, as many PL players work other jobs (often for companies owned by their team owners) in the off- season. Additionally, the EU is considering sponsoring a team or two, mostly drawn from Japanese paranormals already trying to break into paraball. Of course, to get those 96 players, the PL had to take pretty much everyone who was interested and eligible. Maybe a half dozen of the players started out with reasonably good play skills, and none of them would have even made a college team if they didn't have powers (in part because they spent their teenage years at the Academy, rather than playing baseball at a competitive high school). And while the AL and NL are still 100% male, the PL is nearly half female (and one or two "none of the above"). If the entire PL were to get into a fight with ASH, it would lose pretty quickly. But on the diamond, it'd be another matter. And then there's the rumors that Rex Umbrae's thinking of sponsoring some sort of shootfighting league to compete for ad dollars and give the "pacified" paragangers something to expend their energy on....