Nightmare smiles, and murmurs, "Āparēśanōṁ kī kō'ī yōjanā mukhya śatrutāpūrṇa bala kē sātha pahalē sē samparka sē parē kisī bhī niścitatā kē sātha phailī."
Pulling an available chair back to the wall near Poco, he sits in the chair with his hands in his lap and is quiet. Those with extremely good auditory sensors will hear him murmur, almost sub-vocalizing, "ommanipadmehum ommanipadmehum ommanipadmehum..."

"W e would like to see what ever files you have sir. I know Oscillator has been studying the files. But we all need to spend some time  acquainting  ourselves with the opposition."

"You can always view my research ... on supers."

Osc looked happy for a moment hearing himself referred to as a supergenius.  But when he recalled his beat-down, his smile turned ti a frown.

No genius would put themselves on the battlefield just to be a target.
This message was last edited by the player at 04:04, Sat 13 June 2015.

"Any other questions for us commander?" Muldoon asked.

Seeing nothing more forthcoming Commander Barnes figures it is time to call the debriefing; "I have no more questions for the team. If there is nothing else any of you wish to report then I consider this debriefing to be over. Any further information that people may recall can be added to the database. The team will have some extended R&R to recover and do some training. I will be in touch when anything else comes up. Team dismissed!"

"Thank you Sir." Muldoon said as he stood. He and the team could use some down time as well time to get up to speed on the known Soviet supers and begin training as a team.

"When you are all ready to get back to it, I will ramp up the training. Meanwhile Ossy sounds like you can head up the enemy recognition and capabilities training. If anyone else has something they think will enhance team performance, step up and we will see if makes sense to the rest of us."



"But for right now I think we all need at least 48 hours to clear our heads."

"As we are officially off duty I'm going to have a beer." Muldoon said as he headed to the kitchen.

"Certainly.  Once I finish my current project in the lab, I'll put some resources into our enemy recognition computer database.  But I could use Vosper's help as well."

Intel was an area the team had been lacking on every mission, throwing the team 'into the frying pan' each time.

But the solution might not be just having a computer database -- maybe they needed someone to go through all available data, use their 'intel network' to gather even more data than the US govt seemed to have available, and enter all of that into the system.

Vosper would be the perfect person for the project -- if she agreed to do it.

Eddy got up, and tossed the drawing pad and pencils casually on the table, as he headed for the fridge.

The picture was a great impression of 'Caress of Steel'

Sure, it was comic-book style, with CoS levitating, hands out stretched, and steel whirling about her.  But the features were a fantastic representation ... almost photographic.  And it showed a little of what she can do.


Eddy, meanwhile, was looking to fry up: steak, eggs, bacon, toast, beans, hash brown, mushrooms, sausage.
This message was last edited by the player at 00:33, Mon 22 June 2015.

While the others file out of the debriefing, Nightmare sits in the chair by the wall. His mantra has subsided to a slight sibilance and his eyes have closed. While the lights are shut off and the screen goes blank, he sits quietly. As the lights come back on and the staff enters to dust and vacuum, he is quietly sitting in the chair. They pay him no mind, although as they leave one does say something about 'staring at goats'.
The next day, as the sergeants file in for the morning briefing, Nightmare stands up, opens his eyes, scrutinizes the soldiers, and wordlessly leaves the briefing room and heads of the kitchen.

Eddy came wandering into the Ready Room on casual, yet swift paws.

He looked around, and seeing that he was the first to arrive, quickly vacated the room before anyone chanced upon him being untardy; there could come no good of such a reputation.

A barefoot Lamar Cragson jogs into the Ready Room with a towel around his waist and another across his shoulders. He chooses a chair and carefully arranges himself in it. Then he looks around the room and shrugs, saying only, "sauna."

Lance looked up at the klaxon speaker and shrugged cleaning up his plate of lunch... which was mostly done... and gathered up the photographs he'd been looking through of his short week's vacation~ two weeks ago in Florida with his sister Sarah and the 'new prospective' girlfriend she had been trying to get him hooked up with.  Tandy Morrison was one of the women in his sister's college dorm.. also studying for doctorate in physics like her.

It had been something of a scandalous vacation, at least to the locals, both Lance and Sarah being black and Tandy every bit of the Caucasian, blonde-haired, blue-eye beauty queen-like models that lined the pages of Vogue... and clearly  interested in Lance for more than just carrying her luggage!  Tandy was real nice...smart, funny, insightful... and not to mention Dead Sexy.  Sarah and Tandy .. spoke at length with Lance about the physics behind his powers and wondered at if those powers could be duplicated artificially and the great vistas of science that would be opened to mankind.  Lance had... really enjoyed their company, even if his sister was way smarter than him~ he knew enough to mostly keep up with the conversation.

Lance sighed.. {When were people just going to let people be people?  Surly there were enough problems in the world than getting all angry over the color of someone's skin...?}  But apparently not in America.. 'Home of the Free and Land of the Brave'... at least, as long as you were not Black... that is.

He smiled sadly and put the pictures away in his pocket.  Usually when he was on standby... and not on leave, Lance wore his costume with combat gear.. though the SMITE team was not really a military organization.. they almost were in everything but title; so he tried to always stay ready for action.

In his heart... he really wished he could be off base more often~ helping the general public with his powers... lending a hand with emergencies, stopping criminals.. true public service.  But the government kept a close watch on their 'Nuclear-Man'.. even when he was on vaction sunning on a beach with Sarah and Tandy... he was sure he spotted the distant flicker of a pair of binoculars down the beach from his ubiquitous 'Handler Team of watchers' that the Brass always kept on him.  There were a myriad of good reasons for this.. but it ALL still came down to the fact his 1st Amendment rights didn't matter in the face of "National Security".

The really sad thing was... even though he did not like his right to privacy always being invaded.. he still believed in America, at least, the Core Values of what America represented!  It was better than what the civilian commies had.. and he believed America was STILL the best Damned country in the World. So, grudgingly, he put up with it.  What else could he do anyways?

Lance made his way to the briefing room with a spring in his step.. always the Gung-ho ready-for-anything type.. he whistled the refrain to a Nat King Cole song, his favorite; and found a seat in the Situation/Briefing Room... as usual near the front.
This message was last edited by the player at 10:41, Mon 29 Aug 2016.

Vosper didn't rush, but she did act promptly.  Entering the room in gym clothes, she moved to a nearby chair and plopped down, lamenting her interrupted workout.

Muldoon had also been in the gym bench pressing a jeep when the klaxon sounded. The old soldier used to responding to alerts quickly made his way directly to the ready room. Whatever was going on it sounded urgent.

Arriving quickly he arrived quickly and entered the ready room in grey sweats with a white towel hanging around his neck. Despite having been lifting a car up and down for a half an hour he not broken a sweat.

Spotting Cragson in only a towel Muldoon suppressed a laugh.
This message was last edited by the player at 03:40, Fri 02 Sept 2016.

Oscillator vibra-flew into the meeting room, arriving unusually late.  He had his usual work wardrobe (lab coat, jacket, tie, slacks, dress shoes) and an unusual piece of tech-gear on his head.  Oscillator hadn't been seen by people for awhile, spending most of his time in the lab -- but occasionally talking to teammates.

It wasn't that he was antisocial, per se, but rather that you couldn't hold the position of 'Global Vibratory Science Expert' of the USA (and various universities and other organizations) without some lab time.

As he flew in, he was mumbling, "Why must there always be some foolish military drills in the middle of my important experiments?
I was just testing my latest SMHAARTE ('Secure Mind' HAART 'Expansion') build and that annoying claxon had to go off at 440khz!
If they could pick a less annoying frequency, like B flat or G, but no, they have to use 440 and ruin my lab's vibra-stasis!"

He flew into an empty chair and looked around, saw the others, took of his helmet gizmo.
"Oh, perchance this isn't a drill?"

Muldoon watched Ozzy enter the room sporting that reminded the old Master Sergeant of Marvin the Martian. Taking the heavily chewed cigar out from his teeth, Muldoon looked at the man he knew was the smartest person in the installation. No dumbbell himself, he wondered what it was like to have that kind of metal firepower. Whatever that funny hat no doubt it was important.

"Looks like the real deal. Glad you could join us Doc."

"Glad ya could join us, Osc," Vosper smirked with a slow grin.

"So.  What's all this that's got you Yanks in a tizzee?"

In reply to Vosper (msg # 336):

Lance smirks, "Your guess is as good as ours Vos'...we're ALL 'Mushrooms' here.  'Kept in the Dark and fed Shit...!'..."

"I'm not going to complain about operational security."

"Loose lips sink ships." Muldoon added. He was thinking of their last big op when they had launched whet they believed to be a surprise attack only to end up in what amounted to an ambush. It had been a close call and the team had been lucky to escape intact. The Soviet supers were proving as tough as advertised.

The old soldier was as curious as anyone what had merited the alarm, but after the recent downtime he was itching for a fight. South East Asia was heating up, perhaps the team would be deployed to assist the government of South Vietnam in defeating their neighbor to the north. There were reports that a couple of the Soviet supers had already been operating in the area.
This message had punctuation tweaked by the player at 03:39, Fri 02 Sept 2016.

"Screw that," Vosper replied glibly.

"I'm an agent of the greatest Empire on Earth, AKA the British Empire.  I'm here to work with you Yanks in the name of Freedom and Democracy.  But the Queen's gold isn't price enough for blind obedience.  We're soldiers, yah.  But we're hardly grunts.  Let's not lose perspective," she said.

"Vosper, you know better than most what need to know means and why some things need to remain secret. Now that we are all here I have no doubt Commander Barnes will bring us up to speed ASAP." Muldoon replied. Muldoon could be as frustrated as anyone by the way the powers that be held back information, but his many years as a soldier had conditioned him to keep such comments to himself unless the situation required him to take some intelligence officer to task. Even as he engaged in the ritual of bickering between comrades he could see Vosper's  point of view.
This message was last edited by the player at 05:38, Fri 02 Sept 2016.

Lance smiled at Vosper~ giving her a wink. He had not really intended to needle the Master Sergeant.. Lance knew he was kinda sensitive about that kind of stuff... {But hey what good is the freedom of speech if you don't indulge it a bit?}

Lance shrugs, "...well Vos' kinda has a point there Master Sergeant~ all that secret-secret need-to-know crap the Brass is SO fond of throwing in our faces didn't seem to help in the last op when the Ruskies seemed to know more than we did.. and ambushed our asses!  Not that I could possibly know what more knowledge might have changed the incident anyways; but we'll never know now will we?"

"But I guess we got to draw the line somewhere... just wish it were drawn sometimes a little MORE in our favor seeing as it's our necks on the line out there!  But hey... we proved to be some tough son's of bitches so.. bring it on... one more for the good old USA.. huh?"
This message was last edited by the player at 06:04, Fri 02 Sept 2016.

There is no intercom click as people have been used to and suddenly Commander Barnes's voice is heard, making everyone think it has been on the entire time. His voice has a momentary edge of sarcasm which quickly fades into business mode; "Glad to see everyone could make it on time. Anyhow Muldoon is right, I will be bringing you all 'up to speed' right quick. We have a situation on our hands that we need to address immediately. According to the scientists we have been able to consult with apparently the atomic testing in Nevada that has been going on for quite some time has born some unusual fruit. There are swarms of giant ants roaming about all along the perimeters of the Proving Grounds. Overall that is not a problem as we can use aircraft and artillery to hit them hard but they have approached Mercury where we have a lot of personnel involved in the testing housed. We are working on evacuating the town but with the speed of the ants and us stretched all around keeping them hemmed in on the perimeters it is slow-going. We need your group to get in there north of Mercury to engage one swarm of the mutated ants heading in that direction. You have 100% authorization to use whatever force necessary to take them down."

Muldoon listened closely. The mission was a bit of a surprise but a life in the military taught him to deal with surprises.

"Sounds like an excellent chance for our team to show our capabilities on a high profile mission. That work is top priority. We get to be the good guys and save some lives." Muldoon replied.

As Muldoon spoke his sweats transformed in more formal civiliand clothing. "I'm ready to go, but some of the team may need a bit more time. When do we go wheels up Sir?"

"Hmmm... ok that's NOT what I expected.. but cool..we get to be public heroes, Great!"

Turning to Oscilator, "Hey Ozzy.. ant queens transmit on some form a radio frequency don't they?  Can't you rig up some large scale area jammer that will mute her commands and make the swarm.. more chaotic and less focused as it were?  Might be a big advantage...!"
This message was last edited by the player at 21:32, Fri 02 Sept 2016.