Legion World Forums LEGION OUTPOST Bits o' Legionnaire Business RAINBOW GIRL - BOOK 10 - SEQUESTER

CHAPTER ELEVEN: MEANWHILE…

* * *
Elsewhere: City of Dublin, Ireland, 31st century

Drura Foccart was on vacation, with Jacques and Dryscoll, in Dublin. She had told Jacques she wanted to see Earth. It was a world of diverse and ancient cultures that she was just beginning to appreciate. Some areas more difficult to appreciate than others.

Dublin was damp and foggy and cold, a seaside town criss-crossed with rivers. Still, it was a fascinating place. The restored Dublin Castle and the Cathedrals were truly impressive. The Guinness brewery tour had been a favorite of Jacques, the Time Beacon Spire shone brilliantly above the fog.

The Old Town portion of the city had been reconstructed as a 17th-century village, for the benefit of tourists. And tonight’s fog made the illusion nearly complete, as the more modern high-rises in the far distance were obscured: only faint, ghostly lights were visible in the dark.

The three were out in the foggy night streets, enjoying the ambiance.

“Maman! Maman! There she is,” shouted Dryskoll. “Oh! I can hear her, too. I’ve never heard one speak before! Can you hear her, Maman, Papa? There she is!” he cried.

Naturally, neither Drura nor Jacques could see the specter of Molly Malone, but they did hear a plaintive, punctuated wailing drifting up from the Irish Sea to the East. Or was it only the wet wind blowing through the streets?

Aah-whee-Aah-whee-aah…

“Hello,” said Dryscoll, staring up into the swirling fog. “I’m Dryscoll.”

There was no reply audible to his parents, but Dryscoll Foccart was grinning from ear to ear.

Molly Malone (Dublin)

Molly Malone (Sinead O'Connor)

CHAPTER TWELVE: TRYOUTS

* * *

Elsewhere: The Legion World, Legion Headquarters Complex, 31st century

“Candidates, we appreciate your patience,” said the handsome platinum-blonde young man. “I am Sol Purtha, and these are my associates Korvea Mallor and Rann Varal. You may know us better by our Legion code-names, Dreamer, Umbra, and Wolfpack. The two Legions are in the process of creating a third, because, frankly, we are all getting a little long in the tooth. However, this Tryout is for admission into the Legion Academy; there will be no offers of full Legionnaire status for at least one to two years. This is a young person’s game, but we cannot send you out there green and untrained.”
“Thank you for your written applications: you all have survived the initial winnowing; but we have some twenty candidates here, and we want to give you all a fair trial, so we will be here for some time. There will be a lunch break at 1300 hours, and a dinner break, if necessary, at 1700 hours. You are welcome to take advantage of the Legion commissary, as our guest.”
“Now, you have drawn lots, and the first on our list is… Ollo Mellon of Sindar.”

There was a profound silence.

“Ollo Mellon… am I pronouncing that correctly? Are you here?”

Some murmuring from the candidates’ gallery.

“Ollo Mellon? Last call,” said Sol Purtha.

An slender elfin teen suddenly appeared in front of him.

“As I have been explaining to the other Legionnaires, I was born under a magic curse: I am only able to be seen and heard by one individual in the Universe at any one time. I call myself ‘Imaginary Friend’.”

“Interesting,” said Sol Purtha. “You also seem invisible to my oracular senses as well.” He turned to Rann and Korvea. “He spoke to you as well?” he asked. The two nodded.

“Can I test his powers?” the lupine Rimboran asked.

It was an engaging battle for Sol Purtha to witness. Wolfpack descended from the dais, carefully, but unintentionally, avoiding walking into the Sindaran. He also easily avoided Ollo Mellon’s attempted blows—again, without seeming to know what he was doing. Frustrated, the ‘Imaginary Friend’ grabbed the Legionnaire’s wrists from behind.

“Rann, raise your arms,” Sol Purtha suggested.

“Why?” said Rann Varal. “I’m perfectly comfortable with them where they are.”

“Humor me,” said Sol Purtha.

The slight Sindaran was thrown into the air, as Wolfpack unconsciously applied his super-strength. He seemed unharmed, however.

“I can see his usefulness as a member of the Espionage Squad,” said Sol. “But I wonder about the inconvenience of only being able to communicate with a single Legionnaire at a time.”

“Let him allow me to see him,” Korvea suggested. Immediately, a black shadow appeared outlining the previously invisible figure. “I suppose we could order custom programming for the telepathic plugs,” she said. “Allowing him to be visible and audible to all Legionnaires when he is visible to any Legionnaire.”

“You will have our decision in a day or two,” said Sol Purtha to the shadow-enveloped applicant. “We will perhaps consult with other Legionnaires. We do not want to make hasty or immediate decisions at tryouts. Unlike the Legion of thirty years ago. Please accept the hospitality of Legion World while you wait for our decision.”

CHAPTER THIRTEEN: ACADEMY

* * *

Elsewhere: The Legion World, New Montauk Point, 31st century

Garridan Ranzz was mortified to be accompanied to the Legion Academy by his parents, his brother, and his sisters. Fortunately, his parents fell into a conversation with their trans-temporal replicants: Saturn Girl 2 and Live Wire, as well as Cosmic Boy 2 and Triad. Garridan snuck away, into the tower at Montauk Point.

He was met by a chubby young boy in a green-and-chartreuse costume.

“You’re Garridan Ranzz, aren’t you?” said the chubby boy. “Wow, you’re sure to graduate up to the Legion. I mean, your parents were Founders!”

“I know it’s what everyone expects, but, well, I have a history, too, you know,” Garridan demurred.

“Yeah, you were under a magic spell, or curse, or something, right?” the boy said. “My name is Wil Gibbs, from the planet Faustoll, but I call myself ‘Fizz’. Have you thought of a code-name yet?”

“Well, you know, I was thinking ‘Validus’,” said Garridan. “Do you think that’s too weird?”

“Nah, it’s wicked,” said Fizz. “Let me introduce you to the others. There are only seven of us left, since the last promotion.”

They first came upon an eight-foot-tall monstrous creature. “You’re an Interplanetary Bank Beast Guard, right?” said Garridan.

“Nah, the Interplanetary Bank uses Kurlijons for guards, sure,” said the creature. “But not all Kurlijons are Interplanetary Bank guards. There ain’t enough employment for all of us, no way.” It was the face on the creatue’s torso that was doing the speaking. “We call ourselves ‘Symbiote’ at the Academy, but of course, there’s really seven of us, so we all oughta have names.. Head there likes to call himself ‘Krainiak’, but I’m just ‘Torso’.”
“This here’s ‘Right Arm’.” The right arm waved. “And this here’s ‘Left Arm’.” The left arm waved. “You can guess who’s ‘Right Foot’, ‘Left Foot’, and ‘Tail’.”
“Guess we’re not that good at names. Names ain’t such a big deal on Kurlijo, since we’re always formin’ new groups an’ affiliations an’ partnerships an’ stuff.”

“Thanks, Symbiote. Where’s the Kid?” asked Fizz.

“He’s up in the lab, as usual,” said the Symbiote.

“I never know whether to call it ‘they’, or ‘her’,” said Fizz, as the walked upstairs.

“Oh, are all seven female?” asked Garridan.

“Yeah, you actually hardly see male Kurlijons. They’re little snail-like things, about as big as your fist. Dumb as rocks, too,” said Fizz. “Hardly ever leave the planet. All they ever want to do is--- Hey, hi, Kid.”

A young boy in a turban, looking perhaps four years old, turned and greeted them. He was sitting on a high stool, in front of a computer monitor, surrounded by lab equipment.

“Gnill Opral, last son of Hajor,” said the child. “They call me ‘Kid Psycho’.”

“Are you related to the Kid Psycho that was in the original Legion Reserve?” asked Garridan.

“Very related,” said Kid Psycho. “He is me, and I am still in the Reserve, but now the Legion Academy as well. Using my power ages me; creating a powerful force-shield can take up to a year off my life. But I found a solution to the problem, as you can see. I just haven’t got the proper dosage figured out quite yet. It’s tricky. Looks like I think I’m going to need to carefully measure my telomeres every time before I take a dose.”

“Telepathy, telekinesis, force-shields, and super-intelligence,” said Fizz proudly. “This is his second year, like most of the rest of us. I’m betting he makes it into the Legion this time.”

A girl about Garridan’s age, dressed in a half-black, half-white costume was walking down the hall with another girl wearing a peculiar jeweled belt.

“This is the other first year, I mean, besides you,” said Fizz, indicating the black-and-white-clad girl.

“Hi,” said the girl. “Aalma Atlew of Carggg. Um… ‘Positive / Negative Girl’, they call me.”

“HI,” said Garridan. “Garridan Ranzz. ‘Validus’.”

“Show him your power,” said Fizz. “This is so cool.”

Positive / Negative Girl took a step away from the group, and split into three, as Cargggans will. But one self was engulfed in a sparkling, white-and-gold energy and the other was a glowing, black-and-indigo negative energy shadow-being. “I really came to the Academy to get my powers more under control,” she explained. “I’ve had… more than a few accidents back home.”

“I suppose you’re going to ask me to explain my powers?” said the other girl. “My name is Ruby Gold. My homeworld is a place called Txanz. You probably haven’t heard of it. Since we need codenames here, I’ve let them call me Pitagora Girl, for now, but I’ll probably come up with something better, eventually. I do stuff with stuff, and then other stuff happens with other stuff. OK. Watch.”

She went into the lab where Kid Psycho was sitting, and placed a beaker on the table. Then she took a marble from her jeweled belt, and laid it next to the beaker. Then she walked out of the lab, took a second marble from her belt, and tossed it to Garridan. “Catch,” she said.

He fumbled the marble, slipped, and fell. The marble flew out of his hand, bounced off the ceiling, hit a wall, and hit the first marble set beside the beaker. The stricken marble flew straight up in the air, and then came down cleanly inside the beaker.

“Believe it or not, I meant to do that,” said Pitagora Girl. “It’s some kind of probability manipulation, they say.”

“You know how they say you can never tell exactly what the consequences of your actions will be in the future?” Fizz asked. “Well, Ruby can sort of control just what the consequences of her actions will be in the future, even if it seems pretty unlikely in the present. And she has a whole lot more control if she’s dealing with only inanimate objects. She made you a part of her ‘pitagora switch’ this time.”

A blue-skinned, noseless alien with red hair turned a corner, nearly colliding with Garridan.

“Is this our newest recruit?” he asked.

“Garridan,” said Fizz, “This is Turtle, Bogdan Tarka of Doopa.”

“Wait,” said Garridan, wrinkling his brow in thought. “’Doopans are hermaphroditic saurians, noted for their extreme durability.’”

“Is that what they teach you in the U.P. schools?” Bogdan Tarka asked.

“Yeah, sorry, is that wrong?” asked Garridan.

“No, it’s exactly correct,” said Bogdan Tarka. “It’s just weird that your schools would teach that.”

“Turtle is no ordinary Doopan, though,” said Fizz. “He has virtually complete invulnerability. We haven’t found anything that can physically damage him, so we haven’t even been able to even measure the extent of his enhanced healing powers.”

The smiling Doopan nodded in a friendly way.

“And what’s your power, Fizz?” asked Garridan.

“I thought you’d never ask,” said Fizz. “Fizz out!” His body began to fizz and foam, and then dissolved into a mass of airborne bubbles. The bubbles swirled slowly through the air, then re-combined into the familiar chubby boy a few feet away.

“Fizz In!” said Fizz, smiling broadly. “It’s kind of a super-slow teleportation, but I’m completely resistant to harm while in Fizz mode. Any attack just breaks me into smaller bubbles.”

“Hello, Garridan,” said a voice behind them.

“And this is our last Academy member,” said Fizz.

“Hello, Ivy,” said Garridan, turning around to greet her.

* * *

Legion 1.O was founded by Saturn Girl, Cosmic Boy, and Lightning Lad.

Legion 1.5 was founded by the Batch SW6 trans-temporal replicants, and eventually came to include Legionnaires such as Kinetix, XS, Monstress, and so forth.

Legion 1.O (now mostly in their mid-to-late 40's) and Legion 1.5 (now mostly in their early 30's) created Legion 2.0 as their successors.

Umbra, Wolfpack, Dreamer, Gear, and occasionally Quislet act as Adult Advisors.

01 Validus: Garridan Ranzz of Winath
Enhanced strength and durabilty, unique 'mental lightning'

02 Ivy: Ives Benem Jor of Rimbor
Daughter of Ral Benem and Jan Jor (Elastic Lass, 'False Pretenses Kid'); ward of Jo Nah and Tinya Wazzo
Talks to plants.
(Actually able to psychically sense events which occurred in the past, as long as it was in the vicinity of plant life; probably due to some sort of quantum effect of sound and light on the plant structures. Straight-up telepath with Arborans, though)

03 Chip: Parthenogenetic offspring of Blok
Enhanced strength and durability, mass/energy absorption & reflection, silicon telepath, resistance to organic telepathy. Legacy hero from Legion 1.5. Has some of Blok's memories. Apparent age at organization: 8.

04 Sizzle:Teela Spuunvll of Abaddonus
Energy transmutation

05 Turtle: Bogdan Tarka of Doopa
Enhanced durabilty

06 Gazelle: Giselle Smith of Triton
Able to accelerate or decelerate own biological systems

07 Sludge: Ty Jal of Antares XIII
Able to create a thin layer of 'sludge' in his immediate vicinity, and manipulate its coefficient of friction.

08 Spunge: Spunge of Sporran (real name unpronounceable)
Aborbs and neutralizes any form of energy. This is his species equivalent of eating. If he aborbs too much energy at once, he becomes 'drunk'. Humorously referred to as 'Energy-Drinker Lad'.

09 Theena: Theena Mommo of Sklar
Controls a clairvoyant symbiote. Honorary member. Permanent Supervior, Mission Monitor.

10 Outcast: Dendra of Hykraius
Telepathy and Telekinesis. All of Hykraius is now a member of the Dark Circle; she cannot go home. Where Tellus was yellow-and-purple, she is chartreuse-and-teal.

11 Symbiote: 7 of Kurlijo
Able to divide into seven separate creatures. Kurlijons are the race also known as Interplanetary Bank Guards.

12 Kid Psycho: Gnill Opral of Hajor
Telepathy, telekinesis, super-intelligence, force-fields, time tunneling. Using his powers ages him, but he has created a serum which reverses the effects. At the time Legion 2.O was formed, he had an apparent age of six years.

13 Dodgeball II: mmROARld of Fomalhaut 4
One of those weird furry bouncy things from the Satan Girl story. Has all the powers of Bouncing Boy and Matter-Eater Lad. Can also teleport 2 meters in any direction once per minute.

14 Algol (Living Liquid Lad): Ra's Al-Ghul of Earth
When Ra's inhabited a defective, undeveloped clone, he gained the appearance of a teen-ager and amnesia. Able to temporarily leave his host body as a living liquid, he was admitted to the Legion, mostly so they could keep their eye on him, and determine whether or not he was merely feigning amnesia. He was not faking, but later betrayed the Legion anyway, ultimately joining the then-current incarnation of the Legion of Super-Villains. No one was particularly surprised.

New members: One Year Later
15 Veritas: Graym Ranzz of Winath
When Graym Ranzz developed a brain fever, Brainiac 5 placed him in biological stasis, and downloaded his memories and personality into an android Probe. His electronic brain gives him limited mind-reading ability and enchanced intelligence.

16 Copycat of Nyorp (Action #285)
Like all Nyorpans, has the ability to exactly replicate any individual, including powers, abilities, memories, and personality, but only for a few minutes at a time. In their default forms, Nyorpans look like the cast of the musical CATS. Nyorpan social life is very interesting.

17 Mind Boy: Tenzil Kem Jr., actually the son of Eve Aries and Lex Luthor, her husband Tenzil unhesitatingly accepted him and raised him as his own son. Super-intellect.


New Members: Ten Years Later
18 Star Sapphire: Lauren Gand
19 Gemini: Dacey and Dorrit Ranzz
20 Magnet Boy: Pol Krinn II
21 the Wolf Princess (Princess Lycanna Brianna Valiente Voxvanna Annaxandra Londo Vauxhall of Orando), in vitro daughter of Projecta and Brin Londo
22 Atom Girl: Violet Ranzz, daughter of Ayla Ranzz and Salu Digby
23 Power Boy: Umbrial An'Nan, son of Kent Shakespeare and Kono
24 Lgxqzryp (Lig-ex-quizzer-yip), a half-Zrfffn, half-human with the ability to temporarily transmute anything into anything else, as long as he keeps concentrating. No conservation of mass restriction.
25 Improbability Lass: Norja Kem. Daughter of Tenzil Kem and Eve Aries, she is a living Improbability Generator. Although she does not have 100% control over her powers (there is a random factor involved) she is useful to have around. When her powers once threatened to grow out of control, she transferred a portion of her improbability energy into a blue guitar, and sent it into the future. Thus the future super-heroine Guitar Girl was born.
26 the Cheshire Cat: May Norg, daughter of the Batch SW6 Invisible Kid and April Dumaka. Invisibility, teleportation, and feral powers.

I love some of these concepts...Cheshire Cat is inspired!

Symbiote and Imaginary Friend are fun ideas too, as is Kid Psycho deaging himself.