The Sun Rises
Those we call heroes appeared before the 1940’s of course, but the population wasn’t in general aware of them. Only with the projects being run by the Allies, Nazi’s, and Imperial Japan bearing fruit in the form of the first recognized super-humans did the idea truly become something more than a comic book fantasy.
When the Germans revealed Kriegsmarine, the living battleship, many felt terror at the idea of a man who could fling artillery barrages from his hands, and rumors of Japanese shapeshifters were the stuff of nightmares. Everyone felt fear.
Then a tiny nurse, barely five foot two and petite enough to be called elfin decided to pick up an aircraft carrier, and everyone felt a certain sense of perspective return to the war effort.
-Doctor James Ortega, “Super-Humans and the Greatest Generation”
Her awareness started with the itching. Not a casual itch like from a bug bite, she barely remembered what those felt like. No this was a full body, burning itch, the kind that made you want to take your skin off with sandpaper. She couldn’t move to scratch though, her muscles wouldn’t respond, or only slowly.
Then there was light, a familiar soft golden glow, her light. It was fuzzy at first, but her eyes began to clear, the haze blinking away as she began to see a dust shrouded lab. Cobwebs covered much of it, and hers was the only light. She sat slowly up as her body started responding again.
“What happened?” Her voice was thin as she spoke to herself. Just moments ago, she remembered, the lab had been lit with hundreds of tiny lights, meticulously clean with the sound of machines whirring, the scent of heated oil keeping parts moving smoothly.
She looked down at herself, sitting in a small puddle of greenish water surrounded by a tube of stainless steel and brass. Thin ice still clung to some of the pipes running along it. “A frost trap?” she said, lifting herself out of the wreckage, gliding. “Bloody McCarthy. If I’ve missed the World Series, there won’t be enough of you left to re-elect.”
Her feet settled on the floor, her small practical heels clicking on the dust coated flooring. She checked the small pouch on her hip, finding her camera still there along with her locking document bag. Nodding as she saw both were still intact, though much worser for wear than they should be. She wasn’t sure if the film was still going to be good. “Nothing to do about it now. Looks like they have cleared this place out properly.” Her voice was strengthening, her oxford accent filling the echoing space.
She checked around for any intel, she was a professional after all, though it turned out to be fruitless. Then turned to the big heavy door and pulled it open onto the old tunnels she remembered, heading through the storm sewers, dust falling from time to time from the roof, hear ears catching loud thumps from time to time, though it was as though they were filled with water. Finally, she found a manhole cover.
“I should be down near the docks, the lower west side, right?” She thought as she climbed up and up, it was getting louder and louder. “Whatever is going on?” She wondered as she pushed the manhole open, a delicate hand casually moving over 100 pounds of steel and climbed out into the daylight.
Her eyes went wide. The crowds were thick and strangely dressed, with strange sleek cars choking the streets. She turned, gasping as she saw huge white ships that looked bigger than an aircraft carrier nestled against large buildings with gangways bridging the space between them. “My word.” She whispered. Several people stopped, holding up what looked like all the world to her like tiny walkie talkies at her, before continuing by.
Then there was a roar from the harbor. Some people screamed and ran, others just turned towards the sound holding up the strange little devices like it would shield them from harm.
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The woman known so long ago as Solaris flew up above the crowd to get a better look. Out in the harbor was a huge, mechanical monster, an uncanny mix of a dinosaur or dragon with some mechanical nightmare, but with four long squid-like tentacles adding to the insanity of it.
The monster was heading for the huge white boats, and before her foggy mind could act beams of light burst from its eyes, searing the paint off the ship’s hull, La23r5AUrU2.
She shook her head, trying to shake out the cobwebs, as she watched a young woman fly, with a trail of flame, from the other side of the bay towards the bizarre war machine, firing disks of crimson fire at the mech, who used it’s squid like appendages to smack the fire disk down before firing a water cannon at the red clad heroine blasting her back.
“Well, I don’t know what’s going on, or what that code is, but I know how to deal with a robot!” With a golden trail of light, she flew towards the enormous thing.
Apparently, her appearance was noticed as the robot turned, revealing a cockpit in the chest of the monster, the pilot a shockingly gangly and acne covered teenaged boy. “You! Who are you! How dare you challenge Lasersaurus!”
“Seriously young man, you are going to injure someone with these antics. Shut that robot down before…”
Solaris didn’t get to complete whatever she was going to say when the fifteen-year-old pulled a trigger, and the beast’s mouth opened. A torrent of superheated seawater poured out, striking with a shattering force, causing the flying target to slam back into a concrete wall, several seconds of torrential steam and superheated water cutting off moments later.
With a flex of her shoulders Solaris freed herself from the five foot nothing crater she’d made, glad she’d used extra pins to keep her hair up. She frowned as she watched the tattered mess of her suit jacket fell away, leaving her only in a white silk blouse and barely intact skirt. “That was silk, you little heathen.” She muttered, moments before zooming towards the mechanical terror, grabbing the lizard-like nose and twisting it a full circle around, metal and wires shattering with sparks and smoke.
“No!” The boy yelled as the robot he had been piloting started jerking spasmodically, the tentacles falling limp, before the torso began plummeting towards the water and the cruise ships. The blonde woman who’d just ripped off his monsters, reached out and plucked him out of the robot, giving it a soft kick so it wouldn’t fall on the ships, instead tumbling sidewise with a large splash.
“Really. All that, and no plan for ejection? I bet you think you’re smart, too.” she muttered.
Penelope Ward was already pulling the light blue uniform blouse off as she burst into the muster station. She was the first there, which made sense since she was still riding a desk and was closer than the other UNLOC agents on the shift. Either way, she stripped her skirt off, tossing it aside as she climbed into the open shell of her assigned RESOLUTE armor, starting the emergency, abbreviated start up sequence, managing to not shiver in the bathing suit like undersuit she wore which allowed uninterrupted connections between her and the contact sensors that read her bodies commands for the mecha.
“Ward! You’re still not cleared for field duty!” The stern voice came from the woman who’d entered moments after the taller Penny. Her hair was a faded shade between grey and the red of her youth.
“Director! We have an all-hands signal. I can’t…” the alarms which had been going off cut out as she was speaking. “What the hell?”
“Someone showed up and managed the snot nosed brat. Remind me to chase down what idiot let him out of juvie this time. We’re not going to have to send out an action team, assuming NYPD ever bothered to ask for the help.” The last part was spoken with long suffering irritation.
“Oh, I’ll… get back to my desk.” She said disapointedly
“No, you’re going out.” The director countered.
“Sir?”
“You can call me Helen, kid. This isn’t the Coast Guard.” Her boss pointed out.
“Um… Yes sir.”
“Right.” The older woman rolled her eyes. “You’re going to take the mech, and you’re authorized to use a Chariot. Get to the scene quickly, because we’re seeing social media posts claiming Solaris is the one who finished the fight.”
“Are they sure it’s not just Luna Fuego again?”
“She showed and got fucking clobbered, what the hell is a fire type doing attacking a water monster, idiot. No, the woman who stopped it reportedly glowed with ‘golden light’, and schooled laser brain like he had built a half functional tinker toy, instead of a city threatening mecha. Pictures we are seeing are compelling but not certain. Go, make contact if you can, and if it’s Major Elizabeth Summers you get her ass back here so we can find out where she’s been for the last seventy years.”