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Team Argos

Book 1: The Unveiling

Chapter 3: Team Argos Forms

Part 2

By Jear77

Team Argos

As Robin/ FyreFoxx was being pulled through, the hedgehog reporter said "Who are these mysterious heroes who helped capture Multi-taur and Ms. Stoner? Where are they now? Are they going to help with this new emergency? Will they need help to save the day?"

Art told the un-listening screen "We need to know what we're up against first. We're not going to jump in without a plan."

After Robin appeared in Matt's place, introductions were made. He asked, "So, what're we up against?"

Matt said, pointing to the screen, "See for yourself."

The hedgehog reporter said, "This just in, the electrical coils are traveling back along the paths they had originally created, and they appear to be merging into one central location: the hospital on Sharon and Plainfield, and forming into what looks like a giant feral spider. The MegaCorp paramilitary units have been called to take care of this situation. The power outages throughout the city are becoming more widespread. Even locales with backup generators are failing. We do not know how long we will have power as this situation develops."

Robin whistled, "That's one BIG spider"

Tom said, "We really don't know what this is. Bring up a map of the buildings that weren't damaged by the electrical coils."

Motioning to the screen, Matt brought up a map of the city, he dragged several open windows around, and connecting the news feed to the map, he populated the map with the data. "They should have done this themselves on the news-feed" Matt murmured. "Fucking MegaCorp controlled news..."

Looking at the map, there seemed to be no rhyme or reason as to which buildings were undamaged by the electrical coils, and which were not. As Tom looked at the random patterns of red dots, he asked, "Can you bring up the specs on the buildings that were unaffected?"

In the background, the hedgehog on the vid-screen said, "The electric spider is on the move. It's shooting more tendrils of electric energy, forming a giant web over the city."

Fiddling with the screen several more minutes, Matt said, "That information is restricted to authorized users."

"What about telling me what the buildings are used for?"

Several more minutes pass, searching on each building, he said, "Some I can, some I can't."

Tom pointed to a random building on the map, and asked, "What about this one?"

"Yes." Matt said, "It's a... farm."

"Dangers?"

"The building has state-of-the-art fully automated fire and defense systems. But it doesn't say how touchy the defense system is. According to the readout, the oxygen levels are low."

Art said, "Doesn't sound right. Plants take in carbon dioxide and expel oxygen."

Robin said, "I think I know what's going on. They are trying to make the environment as CO2 rich as possible. I heard some of the inner-city farms are expelling all the oxygen in their farms to make breathing outside healthier. It seems to be working, too."

Tom questioned him, "How do you know about that?"

Robin touched his eyepiece, grinning easily "news-feeds. That and I'm in college. I picked up some things in tech-class."

"Could be why fires didn't break out. Still, it's worth investigating," Tom said

Akhela asked "Do you have any medical equipment here?"

"Not above a basic first aid kit, why?"

"If we have to go there we're going to need something to deal with the low oxygen levels. I have something that may help: Encapsulated Oxygen hypos. I use them all the time in my performances as the 'Masked Magician' because I need to hold my breath for long periods of time. They should help for a time in such an environment. Unfortunately, I don't have any on me at the moment. I'll go back to my place, change, and be back in a few minutes."

"Hurry," Tom said. "I don't know how much time we have, before this gets out of control!"

Sway Saber-tooth

Kiva Felix Keani was an average saber-tooth tiger that had life easy from a very young age. Lots of times he got what he asked for, just by asking for it. Very rarely did people turn him down in anything he asked, except when they either knew his powers, were mind-shielded, couldn't hear him, very opinionated, or in 'emergency mode.'

Not that he was rich--far from it in fact. Not that riches mattered much to him. People gave him stuff for the asking if they could afford it, didn't need it, or even was a bit of a stretch. But he didn't take advantage of that too much. He wasn't poor but was taught not to take advantage of strangers' generosity, as it was rude to do so.

Not that he was well liked and had lots of friends, he didn't, but on the other hand if he asked to hang out with virtually anyone, he was allowed to do so without any problems, but over time, he ended up hang out with kids who were smart, dumb, athletic, lazy, and everything in-between. He ended up learning a bit of everything from everyone he hung out with, making him a more-well-rounded tiger.

Not that he was good at sports, but he often had split second judgments ruled in his favor.

Not that he was amazingly handsome, but he cleaned up nicely when he put some effort in it - and he did so constantly. He was attracted to both guys and girls, and after being with both found out he like guys better. But girls still asked him out, and he did his best to accommodate. With either gender he was always a considerate lover, making sure to get his partner off first, and didn't care about being top, bottom or in-between two lovers.

It's just that when he asked people had a hard time saying 'no,' more so than with other people.

He was also quite fortunate and had amazing recuperative powers. Like all cats, if given enough time and distance, he could fall all fours. Even being a cat and able to land on his hands and feet didn't always help, as some falls were such that he took knocked him over in such a way that he couldn't twist himself around, were too close to the ground, geared up in such a way that it made his natural reflexes too slow, or a combination of factors. He took several falls that would have killed other anthros, yet was virtually unharmed after taking them. Sure, he broke a few bones in his youth, but unlike others who took many weeks to heal, he was completely healed in as little time as overnight or a few days at most if the break was a bad one. He got beaten up badly a few times. The guys that were beating the crap out of him didn't hear his pleas for them to stop. Most of the time, within a day, he was back to normal. Even though he knew he would heal quickly, after being beat up a few times, he learned how to fight, and dirty if need be.

When he got his first job at the MegaCorp fast-food joint, much of the time when he asked people to get more or the special of the day, the complied - more than the other employees.

He transferred to a sales job and quickly outstripped any of his supervisors, being given the head position in one MegaCorp position, then another, then another in different sectors. But sales were too easy for him.

So he decided to apply for a security position. He passed the tests to qualify and started. He was able to qualify physically because he kept in pretty good shape. For security jobs MegaCorp was concerned about personality stability, which he got high marks for. His job was to walk the grounds of the MegaCorp building he was assigned to and ask them what their business there was. Because of his abilities, most of the time he didn't have much difficulty with getting answers. Yeah, there were a few anthros who had to be restrained because they were acting crazy, or the ever-present protesters of MegaCorp, but that was to be expected. His job was routine until one day when...

Mirror

Exiting through the bathroom mirror into Mirror World, she went back to her stage room from where she came. Grabbing the Encapsulated Oxygen hypos and EMP smoke-bombs, she changed into her super-heroine costume, and stepping back into Mirror World she headed back.

Team Argos

Meanwhile, Tom, Art, Matt, and Robin were discussing where else they should go. Art asked, pointing at a dot on the other side of town, "Why not have one team go here? That way we can determine if there's anything that links them."

The hedgehog reporter on the vid-screen said "Paramilitary forces wearing hover-belts have just arrived and are attempting to use EMP pulse generators to little obvious effect. In fact, tendrils of electricity are shooting up to their belts to..." the vid-screen blinked, as the power went on backup generator. Matt turned it back on "... appears to not want to hurt anyone, as it's using its tendrils to save the lives of the troopers whose belts it disabled."

Tom agreed "Yeah, see if you can bring up that building's info." Matt said, "It appears to be an office building. There seems to be lots of computers in there and has a state of the art electrical repression system, much better than some of these other buildings."

Just as Matt was saying that, Akhela came in through the bathroom mirror and joined the rest of them. Tom asked, "How will we break up into teams?"

Akhela said "I was just thinking about that myself. I was figuring just myself and Art for the farm." Turning to Robin she said, "Fire takes a lot of oxygen, and we don't want to be burning up air needlessly." Addressing Tom she said "Also your powers of speed and your metabolism would go through oxygen more quickly. What is the other place you decided on?"

Tom informed her of the details.

"Then it's set," she said.

Mirror & X-Zorb

Argos sent Mirror and X-Zorb through the Maze to the farm after having given both of them a hypo of Encapsulated Oxygen. She warned him "Let me know if you start to feel short of breath, so I can give you another hypo."

True, Mirror could have gotten there by herself almost just as fast, but wanted to make sure they both ended up in the same place, and didn't have to go searching for one another. When they arrived, they were on the scaffolding above the hydroponics. Even with the reduced oxygen levels, they were comfortable.

X-Zorb asked, "What are we looking for?"

Mirror said, "I'm not quite sure, but we'll know when we find it."

They went around inspecting different things. X-Zorb inspected the fire retardant equipment, which hadn't even gone off. Or if it had there was no evidence of it having been used recently. Mirror inspected the hydroponics themselves, having to use her cape as a rope to climb down to them. They were of a non-conductive material. While she was down there, she inspected the lights. Upon closer inspection she found out that they weren't really weren't lights at all, but plastic instead tubing that took in sunlight, magnified it so that it could be carried throughout the entire building, and only got supplemented if got below a certain level. Some of the plastic was melted, and some of the metal housing was scorched. She collected some of the blackened material for study.

Argos, she thought, Link me to X-Zorb. Argos did as she requested and thought X-Zorb?

X-Zorb thought back, Yeah, what's up?

There doesn't seem to be any damage, except for some blackening. I'm collecting some of it. Same here, save for the fact that the scaffolding itself is blackened. I'm collecting some of that too. As he does so, he thinks back to Mirror: Look around you. I'm seeing some black specks that don't appear to be a part of the damage. I'll collect what I can here.

After collecting their samples, Mirror thinks to Argos: No need to stay. Take us back.

Shockwave & FyreFoxx

A moment hfter transporting Mirror & X-Zorb, Argos transported the remaining two to the office building to the 4th floor. Shockwave dashed at supersonic speed from room to room, but seeing nothing kept going. FyreFoxx took his time with one room, inspecting the windows, lights, walls, flooring and even some of the work stations in each room. He noticed that the windows were a form of Plexiglas. Upon inspecting the walls, he found that they had plastics mixed in. In fact the columns were "plastic wood." The lights, even though they had metal in them, were protected from arcing electricity by rubber seals. The flooring was a tile. Except for the fact that there was some minor scorch marks here and there, there seemed to be no damage.

While FyreFoxx was still looking, Shockwave passed him, making a U-turn to come to a stop next to him, saying "There's nothing out of the ordinary here."

Just then Mirror connected to them through Argos. We just got back. Look for scorch marks and black specks. That's what we found.

FyreFoxx thought back to her: Found some obvious scorch marks, will look for the black specks.

They had only been there for thirty, maybe fourty-five seconds when...

Sway Saber-tooth

Kiva was doing his rounds, when he saw two costumed anthros: a wolf, and a fox materialize out of nowhere. Following them cautiously, hiding behind a pillar, he saw the wolf race past the fox, and go in and out of all the offices on one side of the hallway, and do the same thing on the other side. He saw the fox enter one of the rooms and examine it closely.

As the wolf caught up to his friend, he said "There's nothing out of the ordinary here."

Kiva stepped from behind the pillar and said "Halt!" drawing his pulse weapon "What are you doing here?"

The wolf said "I'll distract him. Collect what you need to, and we'll be out of here." Faster than he could blink the wolf was behind him. The wolf said "I can move faster than you can fire that thing. Also you don't want to damage the equipment, so I would advise against it."

Kiva said, "Don't be too sure. Slow down a minute. Maybe we can work this out so no one gets hurt." As the wolf went to dash away, he felt compelled to move much slower.

Shockwave & FyreFoxx

As Shockwave stopped next to FyreFoxx, a saber tooth tiger stepped from behind the pillar and said "Halt!" drawing his pulse weapon "What are you doing here? These offices are closed for the day!"

Shockwave said "Do what you need to. I'll distract him, and we'll be out of here," and sped behind the saber tooth tiger.

FyreFoxx knelt down to look on the floor for the black specks that Mirror talked about. Finding some, he scraped them up, along with some of the scorch marks.

Shockwave said "I can move faster than you can fire that thing. Also you don't want to damage the equipment, so I would advise against it."

The tiger said, "Don't be too sure. Slow down a minute. Maybe we can work this out so no one gets hurt," turning to point the weapon at him.

Shockwave went to dash away, he felt as if he were surrounded in molasses and couldn't move at his normal speed. Comprehending what was going on, but still unable to shake the command, he shouts "Beware, this guy is Powered. He can alter your perception by talking to you! Don't listen to anything that he says," while lunging forward to grab the guard's gun. In their struggle the gun goes off into the ceiling.

"Ok, we're done here," FyreFoxx said, closing his eyes and thinking: Argos, we've got a bit of a situation here.

Argos responded: I know. I'm going to have to take them back together, and sort it out when we get here. I have a feeling he'll help us once we explain what's going on.

Grabbing ahold of them with ethereal hands Argos brings them through the Maze.

Team Argos

Tom, Robin and Kiva appeared in Matt's room. He said "There's no need to fight." Looking around confused, he asked "What's going on here? Where am I? How'd I get here?"

As he asks the rapid-fire questions, the hedgehog reporter on the vid-screen said "This just in... the web seems to have some sort of dampening effect on security measures, data streams, and so on. MegaCorp headquarter data has been severely compromised."

Matt said, "One question at a time. You are in my room. I'm not going to tell you where that is, until I am sure about you. I brought you through the Maze. It's a Minotaur ability. As far as what's going on..." Matt pointed to the screen and the hedgehog reporting on the electric spider, "THAT is what we're trying to take down. We were there to see why the electricity affected some buildings and didn't others."

Kiva's eyes became as big as saucers and his mouth dropped open, watching the spider as its web had almost engulfed the entire city. Before too long, even research facilities, newscasts, the air-lane infrastructure and hospitals backup power and data-systems would succumb and mass outages.

Matt said, "We may need your help persuading that thing to stop attacking the city. Will you help us?"

Seeing the whole city in danger, he said simply, "I will."