Rainbow Legacies 11166

  Rainbow Legacies: Between a Rock and a Headcase

Author's Note: I am picking up this dropped thread. I performed minor edits for clarity and punctuation. It occurs before the events of the Powers Contest Entry. (Taste of Ashes)

Brock couldn't move. All he remembered was a rumble like an Earthquake and then the weight and the darkness. Earthquakes were frequent in Angel Port, which had to be what happened. He couldn't call for help, not after last time. He couldn't shift the weight of the rubble. He thought he heard a voice.

"Brady, you have to let me know where you are. You have to let me in so I can lead you out."

He wouldn't answer. He hadn't been Brady in years. No one he trusted would ever call him by that name. No one who knew that name had his best interests at heart.

He hunkered down and hoped help came.

+++++++++

Power Bottom morphed his uniform into a black bodysuit. His usual look captured a little too much attention for breaking and entering. Noticing  Morphon detectors, PB thought, "Someone must have gone shopping during the "Halloween Party" at BADGE HQ."

 :Great: He Telepathed to his brother, :I get to do this the mundane way. I could use the practice.:

:At least they didn't swipe the life detectors.: Underwatch observed

:Oh? When did they rename eyes?: PB snarked with a roll of his "life detectors." :Think we should go radio silent?:

:We had telepathy before we were "enhanced." It should be passive. We should be good.:

:Says the Immortal Twin sitting outside the line of fire: PB observed. : I'm going in for the MacGuffin.:

While Lance began his entry, Leo reviewed his notes. A relic known as the unfinished Stone had disappeared from Angel Port Museum of Natural History. After the Legion had exposed the world to morphons, the Stone had begun glowing periodically. A collector had made the museum, many outrageously generous offers to acquire it for his personal collection. The museum refused.

Something about the case nagged at Underwatch, however. He reached for a stack of folders on his desk and knocked them over. Several pages fell loose.

He gathered the pages, quickly reading and sorting them to be refiled.

A report from BADGE revealed that the number of people who had gone Troll after morphon exposure was higher than any other "mythic transformations." It also noted the trolls were disproportionately male.

A note from a friend asked if Leo and Lance could help locate a roommate who had vanished.

A police report reported multiple missing persons. All of the victims were bodybuilders. All of them worked out in Gyms owned by PB's suspect.

:Crap! Get out of there Bro.:

:Why? The place is empty. I'm checking the rock garden now, and then I'm out of here.: PB replied.

:Is the rock garden outside?:

:No. Why?:

:Are there any windows?:

:No. Why? Hey, I found the Stone. It's in the center. He must have been hoping to hide it among all these rocks. If you look at the other stones just right, they almost look like trolls.:

:Because they are trolls. They're also your missing bodybuilders.:

: I'm counting ten. Plus, one that looks odd. You ever hear of a crystalline troll? Hold that thought I need to fight now.:

:Okay, try not to rubble them. Our patron of the arts owns a pharmaceutical company. We knew this. He also operates a chain of gyms popular with serious bodybuilders. He's been trying to get the FDA to allow testing of morphon infused pharma.  They declined, What do you think the odds are that he decided to go ahead with testing anyway and the trolls are side effects?:

PB paused before answering. The crystalline Troll was the last to enter the fray. It was defending him.

A fight involving eleven trolls was going to get noticed. PB decided the morphon detectors were no longer a priority. He switched his senses to the sight. The power coming from the unfinished Stone nearly blinded him. The force felt different than any other he had encountered. "Would you please knock that off? You're harming people." He addressed the Stone.

The power stopped. The Stone went dark.  :Hey bro, I just had a thought:

:Congratulations?:

:Jerk. Check my math. I'm the gatekeeper, but the world walls in this reality are strong. We have been unable to find any natural world gates. Now we have a relic that is flooding the area with enough Earth force? Earth power? To elementalise the natives but I asked it politely, and it shut itself down. I think this relic is a gate.:

:Safe to assume. Ask it to withdraw its power.:

:Good call all the trolls all back to normal, except for the crystal one. It's gone motionless, though. It's nonverbal. Not responding to telepathy either. Can you get me the name of who it was?:


:Yeah, my best guess is his given name is Brady Rockwell Stone. You're going to enter the gate, aren't you?:

:I pretty much have to.: