Your Place or Mime?

Declan entered the Launch Bay and for the first time since he had become the Revelator. The girls were waiting for him, and they actually seemed eager to be going with him. As if reading his mind Second Sarah said, “What, you didn’t think we’d just sit around the house eating bonbons and waiting for you to get home did you?” The others let out a giggle and nodded in agreement.

Rah was bouncing up and down anxiously, “I can’t wait to go, go, go!” She said full of enthusiasm. “I want to go and see another world!”

Countess, the vampire, rolled her eyes and said, “You’re on one now, you nib nab.”

The beastion nodded her head like a jackhammer, “I know, isn’t it great? I can’t wait to see another!” The living vampire chuckled and shook her head in resignation. She was wearing a skin-tight dress, but it was unnaturally tight as if darkness had been stretched thinly over her nubile flesh. Declan tried desperately not to look at her, but Crowe’s topless figure just happened to be where his eyes went next. His head twisted of its own volition and did not stop until his eyes rested on the resident centaur.

“No, seriously,” Sarahtaur said in exasperation, “Why do I still have this freaking bow? This is utter bullshit!” She was deliberately holding the arrow with the tip towards herself while struggling to pull the bowstring backward. At least, Declan prayed, she was doing it deliberately. He shifted his eyes to Essea, who seemed to be the calmest of the bunch. She had pulled up what looked to be a HUD of her own; the screen was black and green binary numbers were falling from the top of the display to the bottom like falling stars. The glittering digits reflected in her eyes, making them sparkle like little flares of jade. He found it to be . . . enchanting. He wondered why he could see her HUD since he had never seen anyone else’s, not even when they were actively using it in front of him.

Kristine did a quick circle around the bay twice then she floated over to Declan and said, “We are ready to go. I think you’ll be pleasantly surprised at what the girls came up with.” Declan gave her a quick nod and twirled one finger in a circle. “Let’s go, we are on the clock.” He heard Mother initiate the transport process and felt the world slip away from him.

Less than a second later he and the Sarah Squad had arrived on the target world and Declan couldn’t help but think that he was little more than a gun that pulled its own trigger. He was given a target and told to get the job done as quickly as he could. He flinched as his dossier pinged in his HUD. Now he would get to know a little bit about who he was annihilating and how long he had to get the job done. He opened the info box and gave it a once over.

His eyes ran over the words repeatedly. He had no idea what Apoc points were, but he could guess what the Stat point would do for him. He wanted that. A free way to increase one of his physical or mental abilities would be fantastic. Declan shut down his HUD and looked around. As far as he could tell, this world was about as advanced as his planet had been about one hundred years ago. The buildings were constructed of steel and concrete but there were no land bound cars that burned petroleum for fuel. For that matter, he didn’t see any kind of a vehicle anywhere. There wasn’t a sign of a skateboard, a horse and buggy, a rickshaw, or even a scooter. Granted, they had appeared in what looked to be a vacant lot in an empty industrial part of the city but there was always some sort of transportation around.

The thing that stood out to him was the silence. It reminded him a lot of Essea’s world, a place in which no one seemed to speak unless they absolutely had to for a valid reason. The bay had not set them down where it usually did. They had not arrived near a Bucky Starr’s Coffee Shop, nor were they deposited near Sarah’s apartment. That meant that either there were no B.S. coffee shops or any Sarah Crowe that existed on this world.

Kristine motored up beside him. “Here is surprise number one. I can scan the local area and search for the genetic marker of DNA matching Sarah Crowe.” Declan glanced over at Sarahtaur and the vampire and was about to say something when the mini-car cut him off, “It takes into consideration variants such as hybridization or complete non-human genetics. No worries.”

The replica Chevy floated up into the air about one hundred feet and started rotating silently above them. She quickly picked up speed until her frame looked more like a rotary fan than it did a car. After three seconds of intense spinning, she stopped suddenly facing a direction southeast of their location.

“I have a fix on out girl’s location, how do you want to proceed?”

Declan rubbed his chin, “Hmmm, why don’t you take Crowe and everybody’s favorite bloodsucker. See if you can’t get her to come back on her own if she refuses,” he paused, “Figure something out that will convince her to come. If you need me, give me a shout. I need to look into this world and see if I can figure out the proper way to put it down gently.”

“You got it, Deck.” The car zipped over and rounded up her helpers. “OK, ladies, let’s go.” The three of them left but not before Crowe pulled a wedgie out of her ass crack and the regal vampiric Sarah gave him a saucy wink goodbye. He watched them go. Crowe already had one of her pistols drawn and was running in a hunched shoulders up style that she had seen on one of the old TV vids. It had probably a very bad police drama. He almost choked when they vanished from view in a blink.

“What in the hell just happened?” He started running to where he had last seen them, but Essea placed her metal hand on his shoulder and held him back. She turned her head in a way that reminded him of a quizzical dog and stared into his eyes. “You really do care,” she whispered to him quietly, “About all of us. Don’t you?”

His brow furrowed, “Of course I do, but I need to,” she waved him off before he could say anything more, “That was another of Kristine’s surprises. As is this,” so saying she punched a small screen that opened over her wrist and in a shimmer, her metallic body was replaced with one of flesh and blood. Or, at least it appeared to. Declan reached out a hand and touched her wrist, and could feel her metallic chassis still in place. She had covered herself with a holographic image. Essea appeared in a blue business suit that complimented his own clothes. Her hair was pulled back into a tight bun, and she wore round black-rimmed glasses. The cybernetic girl pointed at Rah and Sarahtaur and he watched as they also shifted their appearance. Rah changed into a farm girl who was wearing a short denim dress, a sleeveless flower printed top with a large V-neck and a straw cowboy hat. Sarahtaur now looked like a perfectly normal woman wearing a white tank top, an unbuttoned plaid shirt that was tied at her stomach, and a pair of baggy blue jeans that all but covered her white tennis shoes. Second Sarah was unchanged. She still wore her goth styled wardrobe but did so with panache.

With the squad camouflaged they moved out from their location. Declan assumed that Mother was downloading the info from this world, but he didn’t bother to ask. She knew her job and he didn’t want to talk to her any more than was necessary. They moved out and Declan was impressed that somehow the cloaking tech had managed to muffle the sounds of the centaur's hoof steps.

The team rounded the corner and found the local populace. The group stopped in their tracks as soon as they saw the people that lived there. They were not what Declan had expected. He had anticipated normal humans, maybe some sort of hybrid. Pretty much he had considered every other option but this one. The girls all looked at one another, then at Declan, and then at the crowd of people before them as if they were some sort of synchronized Olympic staring team. Declan opened his HUD and did the one thing he didn’t want to do. He contacted Mother.

With a finger placed to his temple he projected, Mother. Can you send me some information on the local populace? I’d like a little background info on these people before I go any further.

As if sensing that he did not want to talk to her a screen opened before him. He read it quickly.

Two hundred years ago the people of this Earth, known collectively as the Metamfiezomaio, had brought their world to the brink of extinction. Through war, pollution, and numerous government bailouts of major corporations their Doomsday clock was moved to one second to midnight. All seemed lost until a one man unified the people of the world via his clever use of humor and a limber body. The simple application of greasepaint and a strong no talking stance the man known Markel Moreso used exaggerated motions to enact simple everyday life events. Through the use of his comedy, the various countries of the world began working together and rebuilt their entire way of life from scratch.

The Metamfiezomaio emulated Moreso in every way possible. Like him, they refused to speak and allowed their actions to define them, not their words. They too began to wear greasepaint in honor of him, but after his death the people felt that simply wearing greasepaint wasn’t enough, and so they genetically modified themselves so that the skin of their faces and hands became so white that they looked painted on, their lips, eyebrows, and the edges of their eyes became a stark black. They also removed the ability to speak from themselves, so that they would be forced to communicate physically. Their wardrobes were now duplicates of Moreso’s clothing which consisted of a horizontal black and white striped shirts, tight black pants, suspenders, white gloves, and a beret.

Declan closed the info sheet. He didn’t want to read anymore. He could see that he hadn’t lost his mind and that he had been right when he saw the locals going about their daily routines. Somehow, a sick and twisted god-like being named Ozob had created a planet that was populated by mimes.