08 01 09

<shadowmyre> Location: The Scene of the Crime
<Paladin> I don't suppose that you have any ideas about how to fix that? pointing to the dead area in the bay.
<Adisa> Um…let me thin… no. No I don't.
<Niles> None at he moment
<Niles> the*
<Paladin> Can't you just… waves his hand in a magical way
<Paladin> You know…dispel it or something?
<Niles> Paladin, It is magically DEAD.
<Niles> Meaninig magic won't WORK when in there.
<Niles> If I were to go in there, I would have no powers whatsoever.
<Niles> If I were to cast a spell on it, it would be neutralized.
<Niles> However…

  • Niles continues looking upward a bit.
  • Niles rises off the ground a few feet.

<Paladin> But what is it? Magically dead, physically dead, but why?

  • Niles says quietly "Sprite, are you alright?"
  • Sprite jumps, startled, looks over her shoulder. "For now."

<Niles> Can I do anything for you?

  • Paladin looks up after Nile and shifts his stance slightly noticing Sprite for the first time.
  • Adisa looks up.
  • Sprite balances upon the suspension cable that supports the upper part of the bridge, looking over her shoulder at Niles.

<Adisa> You would think in this world, with so many people and threats in the sky, we'd all look up a bit more. But we don't, and that's far more likely to kill us than the Avatara.
<Paladin> Humans never look up. I read that once.
<Adisa> Humans only look up when shit falls on their head.
<Paladin> What an appropriate metaphor for the current situation.
<Adisa> I have a gift.

  • Sprite drops off of the cable, sliding down the strut to land upon the bridge. "Sometimes not even then."

<Paladin> We need time to figure this out, and samples of that water.
<Adisa> Samples I got, time is another matter.
<Niles> What can we do Sprite?
<Paladin> I am in the company of a man who alters reality to his whim and another who builds alien warp drives or whatever, and we can't get more time?
<Adisa> I stoped studying time travel when I was fifteen. Trust me, forward or back it's never worth it.
<Paladin> We don't need even need to travel through time, just slow it down a bit.
<Adisa> You say that like it's better.
<Paladin> As if I would know. What is that Sprite?
<Niles> I believe there might be other entities in this universe that might have a problem with a universal constant being changed.
<Niles> That is attention I would rather us not have.
<Adisa> Good point, Niles. Cosmic politics. Hadn't thought of that.

  • Paladin points to the dead water area.

<Adisa> This is the first sample of water I can not move. I've tried adding salt, sugar, crude oil, and even MSG, and I could still manipulate it. But not this stuff.
<Sprite> Its an absence. A… void, for lack of a better term.
<Sprite> An abscess in reality. The object of many a sorcerer's attention.
<Adisa> A elemental vacuum?
<Paladin> Where Fire and Water are unable to perform their functions?
<Sprite> An energy vacuum.
<Paladin> So energy is being lost every moment to that thing?
<Sprite> No, thankfully.

  • Sprite bites her lip in thought.

<Sprite> The water you see… it isn't water.
<Sprite> It isn't there.
<Sprite> Its…

  • Sprite fumbles

<Adisa> It does not exist on a spiritual//mystical level?
<Sprite> I don't really understand the principles behind it, but the sorcerers are warping space to fill in a gap.
<Sprite> That water is… somewhere else on the planet.
<Sprite> Or… maybe not even this planet. I don't know.
<Sprite> But through their efforts, the loss of energy is dropped to a trickle at a time.
<Niles> Ah.
<Paladin> We need to figure out how to plug that hole first then. Otherwise anything that can be done will just become lost energy too.
<Niles> Hmmmm. Well, is there any way I can assist them?

  • Sprite spreads hands. "I have all the magical knowledge of a not-very-magical-rock.
  • Sprite No idea."
  • Paladin spreads his hands in a "I have all teh magical knowledge of a not-very-magical-rock and I am a magical rock."

<Paladin> Niles, can you find out where that energy is going?
<Paladin> Maybe…maybe it can't be plugged up from this side.
<Niles> I am uncertain. I almost think I need to analyze what happened exactly when that guy impacted in that spot.
<Paladin> Well then do that vodoo that you do so well and watch it happen?
<Niles> I can. But I would prefer to do that at my shop.
<Niles> And now that I think about it. The energy isn't going ANYWHERE Paladin. There just isn't any energy there. It's gone completely.
<Paladin> Gone completely. Gone where?
<Niles> Disappeared. No longer there. Vaminos. Via con Dios. I don't know. Further analasys will be needed.
<Adisa> Well, I can see why The Avatara might be pissed about this. Nature abhors a vacuum after all.
<Niles> More is disappearing as well, but it's not like it leaves a forwarding address. It's just gone.
<Niles> Mind you, it's a minute amount, most likely due to the sorcerers efforts in this.
<Paladin> Then don't let me keep you here. You have work to do at your lab. If I can help, please let me know how.
<Niles> Then you are all OK to get where you need to go without me?
<Adisa> Yeah sure. This needs solving and we need the exercise.
<Paladin> Yes, thanks. I think that we need to look for the Pheonix and try to mitigate that damage as much as possible. I will concentrate my efforts on that since I have nothing to add to this gestures to teh dead area conversation since I have no idea what is happening.
<Niles> Alright then.
<Niles> Good day Gentleman.
<Niles> Sprite, be well.

  • Niles disappears.
  • Sprite nods to Niles as he disappears.

<Paladin> Sprite. I..well..I'm… sighs never mind. I'll catch up with you later, Water Elephant.

  • Paladin teleports away

<Sprite> Well. That wasn't awkward.
<Adisa> Paladin is not a Social Creature. But now that he's gone I have a question to ask you.
<Sprite> Yes?
<Adisa> When Paladin fought the Fire Prince… how should I put this… if anyone else had done what he had done, namely toss him in the harbor to cool off, would this have been the effect?

  • Niles Note: the ritual will take roughly 6 hours of game time.
  • Sprite ponders

<Sprite> I don't know. This is slightly unprecedented. This should not have happened… but the elemental lords have never been this weak before. I guess it could be related to him, but I'd have to look into the matter to be certain.
<Adisa> Hmmm. There are way too many unanswered questions for my liking.

  • Paladin appears inside his apartment, rapidly punching in the code to disarm his alarm system.

<Sprite> This kind of thing doesn't come up often. Real apocalypses, I mean. Oh sure, something threatens the world with destruction three, four times a day, but that's all mortal stuff. This is much bigger than that. You have to expect a few unanswered questions.

  • Andre grabs something cold and vaguely resembling Chinese form last Tuesday and eats quickly checking his messages.

<Adisa> All right then. I'll be heading back and analyzing this water and get some answers. Keep your grades up.

  • Adisa walks back to his apartment.

<Andre's Answering Machine> You. Have. Zero. New. Messages.
<Sprite> …grades?

  • Sprite disappears from the bridge

<Andre> Of course I don't have any messages. That would mean that people noticed that I was gone.

  • Andre finishes his meal dropping the empty carton into the trash and throwing the chopsticks into teh sink.
  • Paladin teleports through three rapid, and now practiced, jumps to arive outside of Second Chances.
  • Adisa begins every test he knows on the water samples once he gets back to his apartment.
  • Paladin notes the "Closed" sign on the door and heads around to the back, the way that the Pheonix reportedly took when it left. Using his newfound ability to See the world he searches for traces of the great bird's passage.
  • shadowmyre It takes a few minutes to attune your mind to what the circlet is revealing to you. Slowly, the area around you darkens slightly, as if you were looking through a cloth with a loose weave, as a trail of reddish orange light shimmers into sight before you.
  • Paladin Studying the light he walks to the end of the alley looking after it.
  • Adisa first tries boiling the water into steam and see if that has any effect, then allows the steam to condense back into water.
  • shadowmyre The trail moves to the end of the alley, then curves straight up, shooting off into the sky.
  • Adisa then tries 'infusing' the inert samples with various other forms of energy, from the relatively mundane energy of electricity to the unique radiation frequency of Vibranium.
  • Paladin Teleports to the top of the tallest nearby building and looks for teh trail, seeing if it changes direction at all.
  • shadowmyre The trail continues straight up, into the sky.
  • Adisa having exhausted the possibilities of energy, turns to the material world. He begins allowing various materials in different combinations to dissolve into the inert water, then distills it back to the pure form.

<Paladin> This may not be one of my better ideas but here goes….

  • Adisa finally takes a spectrographic analysis of an unused sample.
  • Paladin begins to make a series of jumps following the trail that the Phoenix left keeping them to one mile intervals.
  • shadowmyre The trail continues straight up for about two miles, then heads south east.
  • Paladin marks the direction that the bird went and and then lands in the water of the bay, surfacing and making his way to shore before orienting himself South east and beginning to travel after the trail.
  • Paladin pauses whenhe gets tot he ocean, pondering something that Bianca had said. He heads back to his apartment and switche son CNN.
  • shadowmyre CNN is happily discussing the rising tensions between humans and mutants without a care for the real crisis that is looming.
  • Paladin boots up the computer to check the Pipeline for Phoenix sightings while he listens to the news.
  • shadowmyre There's about a dozen hits, most of them along the lines of "Did you see that big fiery bird that tore its way out of that antique shop?"
  • Paladin refines the search looking for information about the Phoenix sights overseas if there are any.
  • shadowmyre 0 hits.

<Paladin> Huh….so it either turned again or it hasn't made it there yet. It is about four thousand miles or so after all.

  • Paladin pulls out a phone book and checks the yellow pages for charter planes.

<Paladin> Take to the air on me will you….? Well I'll just have to follow you then won't I?

  • shadowmyre Conclusion of the research: The water sample does not exist. It has no specific heat, no mass, or any other defining characteristic. It is, for all intents and purposes, a mirage.

<shadowmyre> It fails to interact with any known energy or matter. Something stuck into it does not become wet.

  • Paladin punches the number for Aeronautics Int.

<shadowmyre> ((to save time, we'll say you get the copter reserved))
<Paladin> ((can I just pick up off the ground then?))
<shadowmyre> ((thats fine))
<Adisa> Well, that sucks. And not what I was expecting.

  • Paladin finds himself aloft forty-five minutes later ignoring the furtive glances from the pilot. H epoints souther-east of the city following the trail through the air.
  • Without the extra distraction from constantly being in free-fall, the trail is much easier to follow. Other than the occasional slight curve and a spiral that lasts for about half a mile, the trail does not deviate, still moving decidedly south-east. It doesn't take too long for the pilot to reach the helicopter's limit (about 100 miles out) and begin to turn back.

<Paladin> Damn it… where are you bird?
<Pilot> You dragged us all the way out here for bird watching? Have a real zen for seagulls?

  • Paladin picks up the headphones

<Paladin> Something like that only bigger. A lot bigger. Do you have a map or charts in here?
<Pilot> Of what?
<Paladin> The world? Ocean charts? I am just looking for a visual aide. It can wait if you don't have any.

  • Niles begins casting his Rewind - O - Vision spell

<Pilot> Buddy, I've got a map of New York. That's where this chopper goes.
<Pilot> Anything else, I use Google Maps.
<Paladin> Thanks for the tip.
<Paladin> Anything South East of here beside smore ocean?
<Pilot> Not anything close by. Cept garbage trawlers.
<Paladin> Garbage trawlers outside of international waters?
<Paladin> What could take me out farther than this? A plane, a boat?
<Pilot> Sure, either'd work.
<Paladin> Alright. Thanks for taking me up. I'll have to find another way out here later.

  • The helicopter returns to the barn.
  • Paladin settles his bill in cash and is on his merry way.

<Adisa> Well, I have tried every test but the stupidly obvious one.

  • Niles activates his ritual, and watches the Fire Prince walk down the street. Anything in its path erupts into flames, people, asphalt, buildings, cars, anything.
  • It moves slowly, pausing every few steps.
  • Adisa drinks a small amount of the sample.
  • Nothing touches Adisa's lips. The water flows out of the bottle, but slowly. Even gravity doesn't have much of a hold over it.
  • Niles: It takes five minutes for police and fire to show up. Water sprayed on the creature separates into hydrogen and oxygen almost instantly, only making the creature larger. Fire retardant foam, sometimes used to smother fire wielding super villains, ignites on contact with the elemental prince.
  • The creature walks through the police and fire crews, incinerating the people and leaving the vehicles smoking ruins. Not once did it ever seem to notice they were there.
  • After another five minutes, Paladin arrives.
  • Paladin teleports in front of the creature, catches it with one hand, and teleports both of them into the bay.
  • An enormous cloud of steam erupts, obscuring vision.
  • Niles concentrates on the water below the steam, if at all possible.
  • Niles is looking to see if that void was somehow there BEFORE the prince hit the water.
  • Adisa sighs and collects the sample. Will try again later.
  • You see nothing unusual about the bay. It is normal in every way that you can detect.
  • Paladin teleports then plunges a spear of jade into the elemental, which then vanishes entirely
  • Paladin teleports outside his door, looking around to be certian that no one is watching.
  • Andre uses his key to get in for the sheer normalcy of it.
  • Niles attempts to store the "video" into an old pen that is almost out of ink.
  • The vision is locked into the pen.
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