Heroes: The Road of Good Intentions

[Agent Fisher]

Ghost had introduced himself to the new guy and then remained silent from then on. He rubbed his shoulder where it still hurt. The 40 year old agent looked around. "Has anyone seen my baton?" He asked.

[LadyTevar]

Silently, a shadow curled around the forgotten baton, fetching it up and over to Ghost. Obviously, Argent had not left the room. Odd, since one would think she'd have gone to visit Saibot ... until they recalled her statement to Reason that she did not know whether she would have killed him, left him with the Freaks, or simply hidden him from Ultima.

With Saibot in custody, which option did that leave her? Did she even want to see him? Blackheart had bluntly stated he did not want to see anyone, which included her, so why should she go?

The answer was as blunt as Blackheart: she had to know.

The shadow holding the baton fell apart as Argent left the room, but there was no other sign or emotion to mark her passing, nor her arrival beside Saibot's bed. She was simply, suddenly there, wearing her older costume, staring silently down at Saibot with black, unreadable eyes.

[Dark Silver]

Garth was laying in the bed, no nurse had come back to reattach the disconnected medical equipment - as long as the basic monitoring equipment functioned, they were no longer very worried - his vitals remained stable. He hadn't opened his eyes in a few minutes, closing them after he and Gravitas had spoken, yet he felt the sudden change in the very air, when Arent arrived.

His eyes opened slowly, looking up at the face of Argent, someone he thought had died last night when the connection was broken, the memory brought back by the U.M.F.'s machinery and powers had him think her dead yet again, but Gravitas' words let him know she was alive.

He didn't think she'd come...he was almost certain she'd hate him for what happened. He still felt nothing from their link, it was like a empty space within him still.

"Hello beautiful.." he spoke softly, not wanting to disturb Gravitas, who he didn't know if the man had drifted to sleep or not.

----- o -----

Warpath stayed out of the way of the rest of the group, letting them get straightened up and sorted. Hekept a sensor on Tachyon and Blackheart, when the other man had returned, and the announcement that Saibot was awake.

"Guess that doesn't bode well for him.."

[LadyTevar]

Argent jerked slightly, before her head tilted to watch him cautiously. " ... You said that before you stabbed me ...."

He did not have his sword, nor his ring, yet she found herself tensed to move if he lunged out of the bed. This was despite the paleness of his features, the IV still in his arm, and the patterned hospital gown he wore.

[Dark Silver]

"I could make a excuse....could tell you I wasn't in my right mind...but you have no reason to believe me." he said the words slowly, as he looked into those featureless black orbs.

"I could tell you I thought it was another illusion, that you were there to kill me, you and those two kids. But...I'm not even sure if I believe that myself. I tried to kill you and Blast. I tried to kill Blackheart and Gravitas...and I killed innocent people when I brought that street down. The only things I can say won't fix that."

He looked into her eyes, "I could say I was under that creatures control, I wasn't in my right mind, but that won't change any of it. I did it all.....and excuses and sorry won't fix any of it."

[LadyTevar]

"You were not in the creatures control," Argent said bluntly, her eyes and face troubled as she looked down at him. "His influence, perhaps, as you were reacting to whatever he did to your mind, but not controlled."

She was trying to feel his emotions, but kept hitting the black void, the scar in her mind where they had been bonded. She could feel nothing beyond it.

[Dark Silver]

"Actually....before the mind fuckers got here...which you missed by a few moments, after the abduction, I didn't remember what happened. Even now...the memories are like it was someone else. I remembered being caught in some hellhole, a sadomasochists wet dream taken to the perverse... then you Legacies and Blackheart coming in, rescuing me....then all three of you attacking me....Blackheart and Legacies ripped away my costume and weapons...raped me....you berating me...saying how much you preferred Blackheart - then fucking him infront of me. Then...a white light....and my costume got off the floor where it was thrown....and then...nothing.."

It didn't make sense, almost as if he was rambling when he said it, half remembered, even after the mental invasions and probings of the psycorp.

"I still did it....and I am going to answer for those crimes. I'm sorry Lei...for what I did to you. It won't change the fact I did it.......but I'm sorry...."

[LadyTevar]

She winced as he described what Portico made him see, the first emotion coming to her eyes as she dropped them. preferred Blackheart echoed in her mind, and she couldn't meet his eyes again.

Nothing of her emotions came to him, it was as if he was cut off completely. To Gravitas, the air was full of guilt, shame, and pain.

[Dark Silver]

"I didn't ask for you.....because I didn't think you'd want to see me..."

Garth closed his eyes, trying to sink into the medical bed's hard mattress.

"I don't think I'd blame you...."

[LadyTevar]

"Blackheart prevented me," she said softly. "He stopped Legacies from killing you as well." Her eyes crept back to his face, looking at him, remembering other times she'd watched him resting.

Had it only been three months? Such a whirlwind ... yet the rose-colored glasses the bond had wrapped around her had fallen away. "Guardian. Hero..." she whispered, wondering if he'd been too far gone all along.

[SirNitram]

Gravitas watched them both, sighing quietly as the emotions from Argent washed over his mind, and the sight of Saibot's face told a story of it's own. The Nova closed his eyes.

"You're a lucky son of a bitch, Garth." He murmured quietly. "My wife left me for a soldier because I'm a deformed freak." Must be another 'original body' thing. "I can't give you two divine wisdom on this; not my area of expertise. Can't even donate experience, because mine's all been bad. But I think you need to relax, both of you, for right now."

[Dark Silver]

He hadn't heard her whisper, not hearing anything really after her admission.

She tied to kill him...as did Legacies. She couldn't blame him, especially not after he tried to kill her. It was only fair.

He looked to her, his eyes opened, his age shown in them, "I guess......that means we're over...." he said softly.

Gravitas' words broke through that haze though, "Well, I'm got plenty of time to relax. What they pulled out of my mind won't paint a pretty picture. I won't be able to run from it."

[LadyTevar]

Gravitas' voice made her jump, as she hadn't even realized he was in the room. Lei had been that wrapped up in her own emotional maze. She blushed (third time today) realizing that he'd been hearing and feeling everything.

Her eyes dropped back to Garth, however, looking down at him sadly. She tried to block it from Gravitas, but gave up when she realized it was too much for her. Slowly, she leaned over Garth, bending to press a kiss to his forehead. "... goodbye..." she whispered, and then vanished into the shadows, leaving only the scent of her skin, the feel of her kiss ... and a slight wetness from a teardrop behind.

[Dark Silver]

And she was gone.

"You know Phil...." Garth said softly, "Sometimes I wonder why I get out of bed in the morning...the only regret I have at the moment, is that I never chose Scotch as one of those reasons....at least then I could say alcohol was a reason instead of my own pride."

Goodbye Lei.... he thought.

[SirNitram]

"Pride... It gets all of us in the end.. Men... Supers... Gods..." Gravitas grinned a bit. "Now you have something else, maybe. I don't know. Women are not something I'm good at. Nymphs, I could tell you. Women? Not a chance."

He closed his eyes. "Relax, though. The kind of full audio-visual hallucination you were put through, there's... A chance. And where the hell would humanity be without the million to one chance?"

[Dark Silver]

"Circling the depths of Hell, instead of just the drain to Hell I'd wager."

[LadyTevar]

Quietly as she'd left, Argent returned to the gym, ruthlessly oppressing all emotions. A pillar of shadow rose behind Blackheart, giving him a bit of warning before she stepped out, her eyes lowered in an attempt to hide the faint tear track on her cheek.

[SirNitram]

"You'll rise." Gravitas had a secret little smile. "Oh, but you'll rise. You'll stride the stars and do real good. There will always be evil, but mankind will rise. Beleive that, if you beleive no other word I utter. You've my word as..." A sigh. "No one beleives what I am, that doesn't work. Would you accept 'Doctor Of Astrophysics'? I don't think they're transferrable betwee timelines, though."

[Dark Silver]

"Well, on the bright side, at least you get to be safe in the fact you've got that doctorate in at least one timeline."

Garth laid back in the bed, and closed his eyes, "Right now...I just want to sleep till they come to take me away."

[Agent Fisher]

Ghost had frowned when the baton dropped to the ground. He walked over and picked it up and collapsed it, putting it back in it's holster. The old spook looked at Argent when she reappeared. He frowned noticing her look of sadness. He felt concerned but didn't say anything.

[LadyTevar]

Her eyes rose slightly, catching Ghost's for a split second. It was just enough for a faint whisper of gratitude to brush his mind.

[Marcao]

He watched Argent for a moment before she vanished, a rueful smile dancing on his lips when the woman seemed to vanish from view. It had been a gamble, one that he had not expected to work. He did not take it personally; on the contrary it provided him another puzzle to figure out. He usually enjoyed puzzles. He took a step back and then another. His eyes flickering around the gym for a moment before Ghost appeared out of thin air.

“Ghost right?â€

[Dark Silver]

Warpath moved over to Tachyon, the vocal modulators set to a lower volume, so he wasn't overheard to much. "From what I've gathered in the debriefing, Saibot tried to kill Argent on the last mission, along with most of the others. Argent seemed exasperated when I mentioned something about him befre the debreifing.....ahh..she's back already."

[frigidmagi]

The transformed monkey had hit Blast before he could raise up his shields. They had rolled across the ground, a ball of hitting, biting screaming noise. The monkey in all honesty had been kicking his ass. Lying the ground dazed Blast had been trying to gather the power to open up and get some breathing room, when the monkey faded away.

"What... Who called... The time out?" Blast gasped out catching his breath, fucker hit hard. He stood up wincing and looked around... ... ...

Shit... ...

He was in a pit. Literally.

"Uh... GUYS? Hello? Little help for the non-flier? Guys? Anyone?" He called out. Oh Yeah it was a great day, really.

[LadyTevar]

Distraction was welcome at the moment, even if it was Blast yelling from the bottom of a pit that he must have blasted himself into. Argent half-closed her eyes, concentrating.

Her shadow tendrils lifted small objects easily, without any effort or real thought upon her part. Pinning a person, as she'd done earlier, was more a matter of brute strength, leverage, and pressure. Lifting someone the weight of Blast, on the other hand, was going to be a test of her concentration and control.

Slowly, the inky shadow coiled around Blast's waist, as thick as that of a horror movie octopus. Chill to the touch, it gently started to raise him up off the ground, lifting him up out of the hole he'd dug himself into.