Log:Reign of Terror, Scene 5

Reign of Terror 2010/05/20 	 Weston Dark Horse

5

On the outside, the castle is bordered by defensive walls nearly five stories in height. The sole entrance is through a gatehouse the leads to a bridge and to the main part of the city. Within the walls of the castle there's the courtyard garden. It's lush, vibrant, and colorful. A cobblestone path leads towards the tower that stands in the middle of the castle grounds.

Dr. Nathaniel Weston opened his front door and flipped on the hall light. He picked up the mail on the floor and flipped through before setting it down on a side table. He went into the living room and tossed his coat onto the sofa, flicked on the light, and picked up thr remote to turn on the TV.

Dark Horse comes out from behind the curtain by the sliding door leading out to the deck. "Dr. Weston. We need to have a talk."

Weston jumps, "Wha--? Who the @#$% are you!?"

Dark Horse stays where he is, by the door. In a relatively non-threatening manner. "A local hero. And I recently ran afoul of one of the...results of your research in your department. About which I need to ask you a few questions. Before more people die."

Weston blusters, "I don't know what you're talking about." He pulls out his PDA, "Get the @#$% out here before I call the police."

Dark Horse raises a brow, "Dr. Weston. The Fearmonger. He was created in your department. Just answer a couple of questions for me, and I'll be out of your hair." He walks relatively casually toward the man, making it clear that he doesn't view the doctor as a threat.

Weston presses a button on the PDA and Dark Horse can hear it start to ring, "I have no idea what the @#$% you're talking about."

Dark Horse moves quickly, attempting to force the man to drop the phone.

The phone drops to the ground. A voice speaks from it, "Aberdeen PD 911. What is the nature of your emergency?"

Dark Horse reaches down to pick up the phone, and picks it up...saying into it, "Sorry...misdial." Then he quickly hangs up, trying to avoid too much background noise coming over the line. After all the police might check it out anyway in that case.

Weston glares at Dark Horse.

Dark Horse steps away from Dr. Weston, but keeps the phone with him. "Dr. Weston. This won't take long. Honest. I assume you keep abreast of the news, yes? You're familiar with the Fearmonger? At least in a general sense?"

Weston nods, "Yeah. Some crazy that attacked Colonial Bay."

Dark Horse smiles slightly, barely visible under his mask, "That's correct. He mentioned specifically that it was at Aberdeen where the experiment was done that created him. And this experiment matches a n experiment done back in 1973, in Germany. And...this experiment lines up with what your department does. Warfare of the mind. Causing fear in people, and feeding off of it. The problem is...the Fearmonger got loose from an experiment done in your department." He lets that sink in a moment, before continuing. "I want to make it clear that I'm not accusing you personally of anything. However, the Fearmonger has a power source. Other people hooked up to a machine, presumably. Generating fear for him to use his abilities. Do you know of any projects in your department that might be related to what I'm talking about?"

Weston is silent for a while, "The East German system wasn't really workable. It burns out the 'batteries' too quickly. And no, we didn't test it in people, we ran simulations. You still need guiding minds for the system to work though."

Dark Horse nods. "So...what happened, then? I assume you know who Fearmonger is then? Which 'guide'?"

Weston shakes his head, "All the guides died during a wildcat incident 2 months ago. Somehow the limiters on the Clockwork System failed. The guides were all Special Forces, volunteers who had undergone SERE training. They should have been able to shut out the Clockwork System manually even if the system went wild, but they ended up the same as those poor @#$ing bastards back in the 70s. Complete neural disassociation."

Dark Horse raises a brow. "That's about the time that the Fearmonger started to show up, actually. Are you sure they ALL died?"

Weston nods, "All but the mentalist we were using as the focus. He's brain dead, and his family donated him to science. He's just an empty catatonic shell, but the portions of his brain that gave him his powers were still functional."

Dark Horse takes a deep breath. "Where is he currently?"

Weston says, "At the facility, in the secure medical wing."

Dark Horse nods. "What's the state of the project currently? Is the system still operational?"

Dark Horse shrugs, "Well, perhaps not 'running', but I assume it hasn't been totally dismantled? And...what are you using for batteries for the system?"

Weston shakes his head, "It's shut down at the moment while we try to figure out while the Special Forces guys died." He hesitates, "Rather than use mental patients and burn them out, the DEW folks figured out a way to create psychokinetic emotion traps. It turns out it doesn't have to be fear, any emotion works. Esentially you create a psychokinetic standing wave. Any emotional energy in the area will reinforce it, and be stored in it. If you can tap into the same requency as the wave, you can siphon off the energy. As long as you don't draw it below the critical level, the wave won't collapse."

Dark Horse nods. "And these 'emotion traps' are in your facility, I assume?"

Weston shakes his head again, "They're not exactly tangible. You use a burst of psychokinetic energy to set up the standing wave pattern at the target location. But when we shut the system down, we drained down the existing traps."

Dark Horse shakes his head. "There's still a power source for the Fearmonger someplace. He's getting power from a battery of some sort." He furrows his brow, "Could the emotional energy have been redirected someplace?"

Weston shrugs, "I don't know. Maybe a powerful mentalist could tap into them, but we know our traps are gone. They create a sort of aura of unease in the area they're active, and we don't detect anything like that at our trap locations."

Dark Horse nods. "How...many mentalists have you had working on the project? I assume more than just the one who ended up in medical. Perhaps a couple more as consultants?"

Weston says, "We have a PSIOP Command triad serving as consultants."

Dark Horse nods. "Can you give me names for them?"

Weston shakes his head, "I don't even know their names. PSIOPS is a blackhole."

Dark Horse nods. "How do you get in contact with them, then? Are they at the facility? Or elsewhere?"

Weston says, "They're at the facility still. We just call them in when we need an actual psychic to test something for us."

Dark Horse nods again. "I...think that's all I need for the moment, Dr. Weston." He walks back over to the man, and hands him his phone. "Thank you for your time. I have some suspicions about this, but I need to confirm them. You've been...very helpful."

Weston shrugs, "Sure. Whatever."

An insanely bright light shines through all the windows in the house and a loud voice speaks from outside, "INTRUDER, THIS IS THE US ARMY COME OUT WITH YOUR HANDS UP."

Weston looks surprised, "What the @#$#2182?"

Dark Horse looks to Dr. Weston, "I suggest you get in your basement. At least for the moment." He moves to the sliding door, and slides it open...before slipping back to the front door to open that enough to look outside.

Weston nods and moves to the basement.

Dark Horse is assuming there's an aircraft up above watching the building, with a searchlight. So, he takes a flash bomb, and chucks it as far as he can out the front door, to try to draw the attention of whomever is out there...and cause them to search by the front of the house. He then sprints to the back door, hoping that the light there is gone before heading outside into the darkness and hopefully into cover of trees and hte like.

Peering outside, you see the ominous site of a large helicopter gunship hovering about 25 feet up, totally silently, its spotlight trained on the house. Past the glare you can make out two US ARMY SCRAM Suits (Superhuman Combat Response Armor, Manned).

Dark Horse heads to the back to look out there, seeing who is outside the back of the house.

There is another gunship and pair of SCRAMs

Dark Horse mutters to himself, "Am I going to end up hunted by the Army? Damnit."

Outside: "YOU HAVE 30 SECONDS TO COMPLY."

Dark Horse tilts his head, considering his options. He then heads to the sliding door, and steps outside, with his hands up.

Dark Horse mutters, "How does Batman make this look easy?"

The two SCRAMs approach Dark Horse, their APG40-Fletchette Carbines at the ready.

Dark Horse muses. o 0 (They'll be armed with infra-red cameras of some sort. And they're faster. I'm not going to get away from them without actually beating them up...and the odds of that are long. Makes me wish I could fly. And...I don't want to end up like SS, getting hunted by the locals.) He smiles slightly, "Gentlemen, what seems to be the problem?"

The two SCRAMs seem to look at him carefully, then one speaks, "Identity confirmed Sir. It appears to be Dark Horse."

Dark Horse tilts his head slightly, "Assuming you folks are from Aberdeen, I think you'll want to let me talk to your commander. You all have a major, major problem."

They stand there silently for a minute. The the hovering Shadowraven drops hoist and lifts them into its twin transport bays. The searchlight shuts off. On the other side, the other Shadowraven follows suit. They hover there for a moment more, then fly off toward the base.

Dark Horse blinks. "Huh. That...was odd, all around." He lowers his arms, and then scratches his head. "I...better get going before they change their mind."