Two days previously at the Emerald City Defenders headquarters.
* Do do Do De do. Do do Do De do.* A five toned chime gently rang through the halls of the ultra-modern building. * Do do Do De do. Do do Do De do.*
A calm pleasant artificial female voice followed “Attention; we have a non-urgent briefing in the main conference room. Please assemble there as soon as possible. Please acknowledge receipt of this message.”
About thirty seconds passed. The voice continued “Expresso, please check on Harmonic and Necessity. Neither have responded. Harmonic is in training room four and Necessity is in her workshop.”
A pale brown blur zipped through the polished white corridors stopping at a thick metal door that had a reinforced window inset in it. The blur, now that it stopped, turned out to be a decently tall man with a handsome aquiline face, café-ole skin, and tight braided black hair. His neck to foot spandex costume showed off a runners build. His costume was unique among most supers because of its polarizing design. It was patterned and colored like the local coffee chain. The arms and legs were white ending with separate matching dark brown and white thick leather gloves and boots. The chest and torso were mostly dark brown with a filled in white U that stretched from shoulder to waist to shoulder.
The colors of the suit weren’t what made people talk about it. The most polarizing part of his costume were the logos. Right in the dead center of the white U was the coffee company’s logo of a green mermaid about the size of a dinner plate. And on either shoulder was another company logo and the latest drink the chain was pushing. Making him a running, talking billboard extolling the virtues of coffee.
Expresso looked through the thick glass and saw Harmonic standing in the room with his back to the door. Looking past him he could see the targets down range fall apart as if sliced or crumble into nothing and the dust in the room shake with sonic ripples. He typed into the keypad underneath the room number next to the door and the lights flashed briefly and a message popped up on the scrolling sign at the far wall letting Harmonic know about the meeting. A couple of moments later the door opened up and Harmonic walked out in his filthy, sweat stained, band t-shirt, toweling off his face and medium length spiky, naturally sky blue hair.
He and Expresso bumped fists. “Thanks for getting me man.” His voice a bit hoarse from his practice “So what’s this meeting about?”
“No Idea, AI-leen didn’t say. She just called for the meeting and wanted me to check up on you and Necessity. And to kick your buts into gear if necessary.”
Harmonic laughed “Oh, I’m sure she used those words.”
“You want to grab Necessity for me?” Expresso said with a small grin. “I wanted to go grab a drink. Gotta keep up the caffeine levels.”
“You don’t need to sell it to me. I’m a sweet lemon tea guy. I’ll happily go get Ness. Go get your drink.”
Expresso laughed and zipped off down a hallway, his form blurring as he accelerated. He paused just before he turned the corner and looked back with a slight smile. “Don’t take too long.”
Harmonic walked down the hall toward the section of the base that housed Necessities workshop. He brushed his black denim pants off, scrubbed his teeth with his finger, checked his breath, tried to fix his hair by combing his fingers through it, the usual things a guy does before he meets up with a girl. After a minute or so of walking he came to another thick metal door. This one had a sign duck taped to it that read “Geinus at Work” with a smiley face the word genius misspelled. He knocked on the door, which swung open at his touch.
“Ness? You in here?”
The room was covered in work benches, walls full of overflowing shelving, bins, winches, motors, generators, lab coats, goggles and odd little glowy things. In short all sorts of random things an inventor would need to create to her heart’s content. The smell of ozone and grease filled the room the further Harmonic moved into it.
“Ness?”
He rounded a corner that seemed to be made out of bins full of circuit boards and saw a pair of legs with tight grey cargo pants and a pair of scuffed up almost knee high tan boots covered in buckles sticking out from underneath a large quasi-aerodynamic vehicle looking thing.
“Harm? Is that you?”
“Yeah Ness, are you stuck? You need help?”
“Nah, I’m good. Can you hand me the 3/16th auto rotating pneumatic lance driver?”
“The what?”
“The thing attached to a hose that looks like a skinny hammer crossed with a wrench.” A small grease stained hand and arm stuck out and made grabbing motions.
Harmonic quickly found the item attached to a red hose hanging from the ceiling and slapped it into the waiting hand. The hand went back under the vehicle like a turtle retreating into its shell. A few quick seconds later the sound of metal grinding and sparking came out.
“And done! Here give me a hand and help me get out of here.” The hand appeared again fishing for something to grasp.
With a grunt Harmonic pulled the miniature mechanic out from underneath her latest creation. Necessity got to her feet, and pulled the bandana off of her shirt pixie cut blond hair. She adjusted the welding goggles from eye protection to stylish headband and smiled. Her oversized band t-shirt was filthy with grime from the floor and loosely hung off of her small frame past her waist.
“Thanks Harm. I was at a spot I couldn’t stop working on when AI-leen called. It was sweet of you to come get me.”
“It was nothing.” He scratched his head with a bashful smile. “Hey isn’t that one of my shirts?”
“Ummm yeah, it is. You left it here at the base a week or two ago. I’ve been using it 'cause I didn’t want to get my clothes too dirty. I’ll wash it and get it back to you!”
“No no no, don’t worry. You can keep it. I don’t mind.” He grinned “It might have helped your uniform but it didn’t help your face stay clean. You’ve got grease smudges all over your cheek.”
Necessity pulled the oversized shirt off, exposing the blue tank top underneath, and tried to rub the grease spot off of her cheek using the cleaner inside fabric. And smudged it worse. “Did I get it?”
“Umm actually no...”
She tried again, and just spread it all over.
“Here let me. “ He took the shirt from her and cleaned off the grease spot. Smiling at her.
The both looked into each other’s eyes.
“Thanks Harm. You didn’t have to do that.”
“It was my pleasure Ness. You can always count on me for that sort of thing.”
She smiled back “I’ve noticed, In fact…”
* Do do Do De do. Do do Do De do.* The five note musical chime interrupted them. The soft female voice spoke “Necessity and Harmonic please report to the main conference room. The rest of the team is waiting.”
They both jumped guiltily. Necessity jogged over to a wall panel and hit a button on it.
“Necessity and Harmonic acknowledging the page. We are on our way.”
They both nodded at each other, shrugging slightly and started jogging to the door. Neither of them wanting to be any later than they already were.
“I wonder what it is this time. “Necessity mused.
“I have no idea, but you know it will be interesting."
Harmonic and Necessity hustled to the conference room and discovered everyone else was already assembled. They both looked a bit bashful at the looks and half smiles that greeted them from most of the people in the room.
Expresso made eye contact with Harmonic and wiggled his eyebrows in addition to his smirk, who in reply rolled his eyes.
A middle aged black man with wavy salt and pepper hair and a thin solo mustache gestured them to the empty seats at the conference table. He looked like a former professional athlete gone slightly to fat. His Emerald City Defenders jumpsuit was neat pressed and somehow managed to make him look like a scoundrel. His surprisingly blue eyes twinkled at the two latecomers.
“Have a seat you two, AI-leen was about to introduce our guest.”
The woman in question faced her team mates. Although she looked human her positioning and body language gave off an alien and unnatural feel. She looked like a normal business woman in a white jacket and green pleated dress. Her red hair was perfectly styled in magazine like perfection and her skin and makeup were airbrushed levels of flawless. The irises of her green eyes had an unusual sparkle to them, almost like a stylized version of firing electrons. She walked to the head of the table but when she stopped moving she completely was completely still, almost like a mannequin, not even breathing. She nodded in a formal manner toward the jump suited man.
“Thank you Forever Knight. “ The woman’s voice was the same one that paged the team through the base intercom. “We have two gentlemen with us today here to appraise of us of a problem expected to hit Seattle in approximately two days, four hours and seventeen minutes. We have Captain Arnold Sherman from the Seattle branch of the MCTF and Lieutenant Commander Nathan Oliver from the US Coastguard. Lieutenant Commander Oliver will begin our briefing today.”
Lieutenant Commander Oliver stood up from the table and adjusted his uniform. Looking at his short sleeved light blue shirt an observer could see his corded muscles that spoke of the fact that he was a ships officer not a desk jockey. He ran a hand along his square jaw and up the side of his blond high and tight haircut. “Thank you AI-leen, and thank you Emerald City Defenders. It is a great honor for me to be here although I wish it wasn’t under such circumstances.”
“The honor is ours Lieutenant Commander. All of the ECD have the utmost respect for the members of our armed services. Thank you for your service.” Forever Knight said with a sincere smile.
The Lieutenant Commander looked a bit more at ease. “Thank you.” He picked up a clicker off of the table and aimed it toward the large screen on the wall behind him. “As you all know The United States Coast Guard’s duties are not limited to rescuing drunk boaters or stopping the random smuggler. Those are our secondary missions. That frankly could be done by the Hardy Boys, if their books are remotely accurate, or a well-equipped Boy Scout troop. Our primary job is to monitor coastal waters of the United States and her territories for Mega-Fauna incursion.”
Harmonic held up his hand. “Pardon me Lieutenant Commander Oliver. But what exactly is Mega-Fauna?”
The rest of the team looked a bit embarrassed about the question.
He nodded to Harmonic “Mega-Fauna is the more scientific term for large mutated creatures. Or Godzillas to use the layperson’s terminology.”
Harmonic gave a low whistle that sounded like the mix between a foghorn and a slide whistle; somehow he made that sound very impressed. “We get to fight Godzilla? Man I love my job.”
Necessity shushed him and elbowed him playfully. “Please continue Lieutenant Commander.”
“Thank you. To clarify for those who are un aware Mega-Fauna come in five classes.” He hit a button on the clicker advancing the image of the Coast Guard logo to a grid chart almost like a police lineup.
“Class one is your standard tiny creature made big on purpose using genetic tampering, a growth serum or any number of other techniques. They are not usually larger than a very large dog no matter what their starting size. These are pretty common guarding remote isolated lairs of the criminal elite.” He advanced the clicker and a small hairy fanged creature appeared on the line up in the lower left hand corner with the label: Shrew – South Pacific - 1959
“Class two is a creature about the size of a sport utility vehicle. Once again the creation is usually not natural in origin. No one tries to make creatures of this size, mostly due to the difficulty or training and housing them. These Mega-Fauna are almost entirely created by accident, sometimes meteorites or a radiation leak. Creatures of this size are usually quite vicious due to their super charged metabolism. They are typically less than ten tons.” A new image of an insect appeared next to the shrew, nearly ten times in size. The label read: Ant – Florida Everglades - 1977
“Class three is where things start to get interesting. This is the class where the Mega-Fauna start to show their diversity. They can run from a T-Rex defrosted from a glacier, to an industrial accident come to life, to the just hatched offspring from one of the larger classes or even a cheap doomsday weapon to destroy a super team. More often than not they are ‘natural’” He made quotation marks with his fingers. “They stand from twenty to thirty nine feet tall and mass solidly in the double digit tonnage range. As with the Class four and above their senses are many times greater than they should actually be. And modern signal transmission like radio, cell phones and television seem to agitate them.” The slide changed to an amorphous blob in the stock menacing blob position, the one that looked like a guy in a sheet trying to scare someone. The blob dwarfed the ant by nearly six times. It was labeled: Chemicalismo - Calcutta – 1987
Everyone around the table stated in rapt attention at the Lieutenant Commander as he presented the information that he seemed to know intimately.
“Class four are the classics. The giant moth that cocoons a tall building, a giant gorilla, a strange hybrid creature from the depths of the ocean, a kraken, all are good examples of class four. As an aside I had the misfortune of encountering a kraken on the north Atlantic on my second cruise. I got lucky and only caught the tip of one tentacle. I have a scar from my neck to lower abdomen from what was just a glancing blow. If we hadn’t had the help of the Dwellers of the Deep we might have lost more than five ships.”
He received various nods at his warning from everyone assembled.
Lieutenant Commander Oliver continued. “If it is forty feet tall or taller it is considered class four. There is no upper end to the size of this category. A single class four is more than capable of destroying a good portion of a city. And just like class three cities seem to aggravate them and frankly they seem to seek out the source and try to destroy it before wandering away. Most Class fours can’t actually be killed or stopped. The best tactic for these is to make it too annoying for them to want to continue or direct them to places where they can minimize the damage until they get bored and leave.” A giant ape overshadowed the blob. The label simply said: Kong – Spider Skull Island - 1933
“Class fives are the grand daddies of Mega-Fauna. They are the most fearsome of all. One class five can do the damage of three class fours. A class five is any Mega-Fauna of class three or four with extraordinary abilities. Like the flying turtle that harassed Japan in the late seventies and any fire breathing creature. They are tougher, stronger and meaner than any of the others. Nothing except another class five or multiple class fours, which we have video evidence of happening, can stop a class five. The only thing a city that is the target of the wrath of one of these creatures can do is evacuate and have emergency services standing by. You all of course know of the most famous of these.” He clicked one last time and bipedal dinosaur with spinned ridges on its back popped up. It was barely a head taller than Kong and its title and silhouette was un mistakable: Gojira – Tokyo - 1954
“I am pretty sure you have a good idea by now why you are being told this.” Lieutenant Commander Oliver advanced the slide to show a blurry video of a sonar scope. Multiple indistinct shapes moved as the sweep tracked around the readout. “We picked this up from our deep ocean detection station just this morning. They seem to be heading straight for Seattle. So in just over two days Seattle can plan on playing host to multiple class four or five mega fauna.”
“And that is where I come in. You all know me so no introductions are in order.” The other man stood up. The other man being Captain Sherman of the Seattle MCTF. He was fairly tall and had the look and bearing a former college quarterback. Unlike Lieutenant Commander Oliver he had the pale skin of a life-long northwesterner, which was further accented by his longer black hair and dark brown eyes.
He was dressed in the standard issue maroon and grey Mega Crime Tactical Armor. In addition to a visored helmet that sat on the table next to his armored gauntlets. He was equipped in full gear; from the armor itself, a construction of strategically placed dark maroon plates over a grey jumpsuit made of a Kevlar durra-fiber weave, to the fully loaded tactical belt, equipped with the usual pouches and devices.
“The MCTF will be coordinating the evacuation and on villain watch while you five deal with the thing or things. I made the mistake of doing a good job of dealing with the unexpected and interfacing with you folks well.” He gave a lopsided grin. “For my sins I received a promotion and get to be your liaison for events like this.”
He too used the clicker to advance slides. “Our basic plan is as follows. When the creature enters Puget Sound proper…”
He spent the next half hour outlining the evacuation routes, emergency plans and expected scenarios. To everyone in the room it felt very organized and like they stood a chance of coming through the upcoming fight with a win.
“And that’s the basic plan.” He summed up “Of course no plan survives contact with the enemy. But at least we have a starting point. Any questions?”
Forever Knight raised his hand. “What happens if more than one Mega-Fauna attacks Seattle at the same time?”
“We deal with it on a first come first serves basis. And if we get hit by several we then concentrating on the one that has the most potential to hurt people. Our jobs are to protect the citizens of this city after all. That takes priority over the cities infrastructure. Anything else? If not I think we should call the meeting. I know you have plans you need to make as a group and The Lieutenant Commander and I should probably head back and get a start on our tasks. I’ll contact AI-leen when more information becomes available.”
The Emerald City Defenders thanked the two men as they headed out.
“So we have to fight a giant monster.” Began Forever Knight. “AI-leen what are our options? Does your database have any tactics that we can adapt to our skill set?”
The perfect business woman pivoted her head smoothly to the team leader. “I have queried the collective. It is currently doing an all access search. At this time it has uncovered twenty four adaptable tactics for us to use. The estimated time of completion for the search is thirty seven minutes.”
Necessity shook her head. “Only twenty four? That does not give us many options. Can your forward the specs to my work room? I might have to start building.”
“Twenty four currently. The query has been running for one hour and twenty two minutes. More will be discovered before it is complete.“ She closed her eyes for a second, when she opened them the data streams of the electrons tracing through them flared momentarily “And the files requested are on your primary workstation. All additional pieces of information will be automatically updated.”
“Thank you AI-leen.”
Expresso and Harmonic exchanged glances. “I am a little less thrilled to be fighting giant monsters than I was an hour ago.” Harmonic admitted.
“Don’t worry Buddy.” Expresso smiled. “I got your back. I always do.”
Forever Knight sat up straight and looked at each of them in turn. “We all have each other’s backs. That is what the Emerald City Defenders do. We have a city to defend. We need to get busy.”
The next two days were filled with frantic activity as the team prepared for the advance of the mega sized menace.
After reviewing AI-leen’s information Necessity tinkered almost full time in her lab trying to make anything that had proven to help against something that normally dwelt on the ocean floor and was tall than most buildings. Freeze bombs, desiccants, heat rays, flash strobers; pretty much anything but a giant harpoon, and that was considered for about an hour before she gave up the idea after not having anything that she could mount it to that was strong and mobile enough. The rest of the team pitched in an idea or two as thoughts came to them to see if they could help in any way. As much as she was amused by it she ended up turning down Harmonic’s idea of a device that made the creature’s weak spots flash red so that they could target them easier. Something like that would require a bit more data and at least a week to prototype properly.
AI-leen remained in constant contact with the collective in Redmond and had networked herself into the deep oceanic sensors operated by the coast guard. She established an updating threat monitoring system for the team to check on the ongoing progress of the Mega-Fauna.
When not testing and performing maintenance on his suit Forever Knight spent time in the training room running through simulations and trying to develop new tactics to fight a foe none of them have ever seen anything like outside of movies and old recordings.
Harmonic meanwhile attempted to expand his vocal stamina and brute power. And while he took breaks to let his voice recover he made sure that Necessity actually got something to eat and took breaks herself. He was eventually rewarded with a thank you kiss on the cheek and a “You’re so thoughtful” which made it all worthwhile.
On the other hand Expresso kept to his usual routine of making a stop in each of his sponsor’s coffee shops for a few minutes each day. And periodically seeing what his teammates were up to.
When the creatures were twenty four hours out an announcement of their approach was made to the general public via local news and print media. The defense and evacuation plans that were designed for this sort of situation were implemented. Fortunately most of the people in the danger areas left with very little difficulty. After the announcement was made AI-leen turned to a local station and called in the team so they could see the populace of Seattle’s reaction to the news.
“This is Susan Kim Chanel Six Action News.” An attractive Asian woman in the distinctive dark green news jacket of KEWL Chanel Six was looking into the camera with her usual professionalism. Behind her next to the ornate fountain stood a gathering of people doing the usual hey I’m on TV actions. “I am here on Fourth and Pike to get reactions to today’s announcements about the Mega-Fauna menacing the city.”
She turned to a younger man in thick framed glasses and a button up shirt wearing a waiter’s apron. “Excuse me sir, what is your reaction to this morning’s announcement.”
“I’m not too worried; we have the Emerald City Defenders here. They will stop the things. They haven’t let us down yet. And I know they won’t start.”
“Thank you,” she turned to the next person standing near her an older black woman in a business suit “And ma’am what about you?”
“I pretty much think everything that other guy said. The city can’t lose especially with that sweet speedy thing Expresso on the team. Expresso, call me!” She mimed holding a phone up to her ear as Susan turned away.
“Well that about does it here I’m Susan…” she was rudely interrupted by a grimy wild eyes man in an old army jacket.
“I wanna talk!” He tried to grab the microphone from her. “It is all a conspiracy! The government don’t want you to know that they are working with the League of Brutal Villainy to take over the world. These things are coming here to kill me and take the knowledge that they are gathering from the chip in my brain!” He yelled almost continuously with spit flying out of his mouth and his eyes wild looking. “Them and the Space Men Seven from the Crab Nebula!”
Back in the headquarters Expresso looked over at Forever Knight. “She said Fourth and Pine right?”
“Pike actually.”
“OK, I’ll be right back.”
A coffee colored blur zipped out of the room, moments later one appeared on the TV next to The Action News reporter.
“Excuse me Henry but the nice lady is working here. And it would be nice of you to give her microphone back. I can assure you that neither the League nor the government is trying to kill you. You have to stop doing this man.” Expresso casually took the microphone from the homeless man and gave it back to its owner. He started to gently lead him away from the gathered throng. “We have talked about this. There is no chip in your head. We took a scanner to it. Nothing man. Have you stopped taking your meds?”
“Well they make my head feel funny. I don’t like it.”
“You need to keep taking them man...”
Soon they got out of range of the microphone and the camera where Susan already was back in the swing of things finishing her sign off.
“Thanks Expresso, and thank you Defenders for protecting our fair city. Back to you in the studio.”
There was only one small incident in clearing of the probably path of destruction, a small firefight with some gang members. The upside was that the MCTF and the Seattle PD discovered two meth labs and a sweatshop. All of which were shut down and the occupants dealt with, the former going to jail while the later were released and reconnected with their families.
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