“No, I’m not really super happy about this either,” Ariel muttered into the phone. She knocked another high-tech piece of trash to the ground around the other bits of the PILC-DI. The machine looked like it had been nuked, and from the inside. “Look, Batey, I was here as soon as I could after you rang. The big guy’s the one who could travel at will remember?” She kicked over some debris as the phone...

Another slap across the face. This kid’s got a good back hand, good enough to knock a tooth loose. He practices, I can tell that kind of thing. “It’s now or never, Abyss. You tell us how you are resisting, or we break you forever.” He was a scrawny runt, despite the back handing. Probably all his exercise done on blow up dolls and tricks from the street who don’t know his reputation. I tell him as much and he gives me another...

“Of course it’s not perfect. You didn’t really give me much notice.” “Are you implying that had you more time, you’d be better prepared to alter the physics of reality itself?” Bates sighed as he looked over Wesley’s office. His eyes went from various award plaques to the countless papers scattered about the desk. He did his best not to look at the eight foot tall chamber currently taking up...

Bates sighed. A week ago life in the present had been so much easier, but now because of the heroics of the pile of muscles and rags sleeping on his couch, the past had come knocking like a sledgehammer. He looked over the man’s shaggy beard, puffy eyes, and rosy skin. This was probably the first time Theo had been clean in weeks. Theo, Theodor Smith, The Abyss. He shook his head. No, not that name. Theo hadn’t been known by...

The smell of wood smoke carries on the wind while embers of the fire are extinguished by firefighters walking over the wreckage. Dozens of police offices line the side of the square keeping civilians at bay from the scene. The breeze dies down for a moment and the reporter begins. “Karen Adams, reporting live from downtown at City Grand Park Square before City Hall where the remains of this morning’s fire are finally dying...