Log:Icelantic Holiday, Scene 5

Icelantic Holiday 2014/04/25 	 Eve Cecila Titan Anthony Quinn|Anthony Paragon Sukeban

5

In the Restaurant
The Steels, Mark and Patrica, are cheerful as they leave the Baron's table, turning and waving back to him after a few steps. But they slow down as they turn around to face the group, Sukeban in particular, Their shoulders sag a little and their faces show worry. Instead of heading towards their reserved seats they move towards Sukeban.

Sukeban looks over at the kids, "Enjoy yer little chat?"

Eve thinks. o O (Hm, now what?)

Titan returns from the rest room, and asks Eve as he gets back, "Did I miss anything?"

They nod. "I'm sorry." Mark starts. "I didn't want to make you mad at me." Patrica continues. ""But he's my dad, kind of." Mark says. "and I only get to see him once a year." The children are switching who's speaking every few words. "I'm not going to be a supervillain. Honest. I'm not even going to be a soldier like my brothers and sisters either. I'm going to be a hero when I grow up, like you and Gemini and..." Mark and Patrica wave towards the escort chaperones.

Cecila is actually at the table with the rest of the kids, probably getting some help from one of them by getting them to read her the menu... Hopefully at least they have english menus. Still there's probably enough local words to make it difficult.

[To Titan] Eve says, "Nothing much. I hope. At least, unless that Baron guy is trying to pull a fast one."

Titan blinks. "Baron guy?" He looks around slowly. "Ohhh....like last year."

Sukeban sighs and smiles ruefully as she reaches over and ruffles their hair, "Be a better hero than me, OK? I'm not really mad, I'm just worried about you. I got lucky when I got my powers. I was already a bad person, but there were people in my life that kept me from going full-on supervillain, and kept me in check long enough to become a better person. I just... I'm just a nanny hired once a year to babysit ya on these trips, but, I care about ya, OK? I want to do what little I can to help ya grow up right."

Quinn heads over toward Titan and Eve's table. "I don't think he is," he says, slipping the small box into the pocket of his coat. "He's just interested in seeing how his 'children' are doing really. I can kind of relate."

Eve nods. "They seemed happy talking to him, but Sukeban didn't like it."

Titan raises a brow, looking amused as he gazes at Quinn, "Do you have kids? I didn't realize that."

Mark and Patrica hug Sukeban. Watching their strength as they do but the strength is obviously there. Then they head to their seats and sit, asking the other kids what to order.

Quinn shakes his head and chuckles. "Oh, no," he says rather quickly. "But there's plenty of people out there using stuff that I've worked on and every so often I want to check in and see how well it is working. I mean, I'm not trying to compare the kids to a piece of equipment or anything. Just that...I can understand how sometimes you want to see how something you had a hand in creating is turning out...if that makes any sense."

Eve grins. "Must be a mad scientist thing."

Sukeban sips her drink and thinks about someday having children of her own.

Back at the Hotel
Titan has taken some time in the morning to get Paragon up to speed on the current situation. "Please let me know if you have any questions." He then smiles. "And I'm glad to have you along."

Paragon nods, only a little transmat-lagged, thanks to getting a little rest on the plane ride from Heathrow. There was a misunderstanding at Heathrow's airport security desk, and based on the appearance of her armor, they assigned Paragon a passport and holo-projector with a male identity. It suits her mannerisms, and Paragon didn't want to cause any trouble for the hard working security officers of Heathrow. "I'm sure I can ask as they come up. I think I'm briefed for now. Thank you for having me along to help, Titan. Or...what should I call you on this trip?"

Titan nods to Paragon, "You can call me 'John'. My real name is Johnathan...and I'm using a holo. It wouldn't do to be recognized here."

Paragon shakes Titan's hand as she reactivates her holo-projector in preparation to leave the room for the day's escort. A tall, fit man in his early 20's wearing black and white winter gear shimmers into view, with loose, shaggy waving brown hair and a short trimmed beard appears. "Very well, John. I'm Steve Larson, according to the papers they gave me." Paragon's voice is still metallic sounding. She clears her throat, and, hidden by the holo-projector, her helm seperates and retracts into the rest of the armor. "There, that's more like it," she says in a normal voice.

The next morning the Adventure Holiday company jeeps turn up dead on time to take the entire group off to Hofsjokull glacier for the ice walking. Again the three guides go around to every room booked by the group and knock to tell people the jeeps are there.

Eve gets to the jeeps early and watches to make sure all the kids are arriving. She's looking forward to this particular part of the trip, as something rather new.

Quinn arrives a little bleary eyed, having been awakened by the guides. "So this is what morning looks like," he says. "I thought it was a myth."

The guides explain it's a hour and a half drive to get to the glacier. They ask if any of the group has done ice walking previously.

Cecila is one of the more average ones when it comes to getting up and to the jeeps but far from the last person either though still a bit tired as she yawns some and shakes her head

Mark and Patrica put their hands up. But they seem to be about the only ones to do so.

Eve laughs, and says to Quinn, "I know what you mean. Well, I used to be more like that.

The guides nod to the Steels. "For those who haven't, we'll be walking along the Hofsjokull loop, which is an easy walk on the western area of the Glacier. Warm clothing, waterproof boots and ice-cleats can be hired from the shop at the start of the walk. The secret to ice walking is to finish every step with a bit of a stomp on the ice. That digs the points of the cleats in and gives secure footing."

Hofsjokull Glacier
The journey to the glacier is enlivened by some terrific scenery. The glacier itself is quite huge, with tall ice peaks on the more rugged eastern area lit by a sun that is still below the horizon when viewed from the west side.

The senior guide, Haraldur Sveinsson, strongly recommends hiring waterproof boots and cleats at a minimum.

Titan does rent the boots and cleats when given the opportunity to do so.

Sukeban does likewise. . o O (Cold doesn't bother me, but wet feet are gross.)

Quinn also buys a pair of cleats. He forgoes the waterproofing, however, as he isn't wearing standard clothing anyway (not that anyone could tell at a glance).

Eve goes for the boots and the cleats, but otherwise looks, typically, distinctly underdressed for the temperature. . o O (Renting warm clothing could be awkward if it goes and changes on me....)

Paragon rents out the waterproof boots and cleats, and buys a scarf and wool cap. . o O (Glad I wore all those layers beneath the armor, but now my head's all chilly.)

When everyone who wants to has visited the shop and hired suitable attire, the guides fit everyone with a safety harness and then rope the entire group together.

The walk starts with a climb up to the west ridge, from which there's a magnificant view of the far more rugged easten expanse of the glacier. The guides inform the group that nobody but experts should risk the eastern area. From the west ridge the group descends to the glade, a smooth ice valley that leads into a large ice caven. The guides time the journey so as the group enters the caven the sun rises over the west ridge of the glacier and the interior of the caven is illuminated by sunlight shining through the icy walls.

Titan grimaces a bit when the guide says, 'nobody but experts'. The way it's worded is sure to pique the kids' interest.

The light show from sunlight filtering through the various strata of glacier ice lights the caven with a bright icy-blue luminance.

A sudden earth tremor rocks the ground. Chunks of ice break free from the roof of the caven and fall. A woman tourist in the group screams as it seems to her that one massive chunk fell right on top of a young girl. And a number of the group lose their footing.

Titan manages to keep his footing. He then tries to move up where the ice fell to see if he can help...potentially with freeing someone who is trapped.

All your children keep on their feet except Patrica who was caught mid-step. She goes down looking embarrassed. Peter emits a groan and holds his head in his hands.

'Steve' admires the way the glacier lights up the cave. "Amazing," he breathes, his breath visible in the cold air. Suddenly the tremor catches her off-guard and her immediate instinct is to try and protect the children. She stumbles to maintain footing, but she's thrown off balance as she turns, falling on her side.

Eve leaps toward the icefall in an attempt to save others but only succeeds in falling down.

Quinn manages to keep his footing and like Titan immediately moves toward the icefall.

Acting on natural instinct Ten tries to take the impact of the large chunk of ice that's falling on Anne-Maria Phillips. But Maria-Anne steps in to hold Ten back if she has to. "You'll hurt yourself." Maria-Anne tells Ten. The ice falls on Anne-Maria and splits into several fragments.

The woman who screamed takes a deep breath and gasps in relief. "Oh, you're all right, little girl. I thought the ice had fallen on you. The odd light in here must be playing tricks with my vision." Fortunately the woman doesn't notice the stress fracture cracks now radiating out from under Anne-Maria's feet.

Eve grins to Maria-Ann. "Hurt myself? Not likely."

Anne-Maria giggles at Ten's comment. "Oh! Me neither." She says to Ten.

Peter goes to the nearest of the chaperones, which happens to be Anthony. "Someone got hurt really badly when the ground shook." he tells Anthony. "Over there." Peter points to the east.

One of the men in the group is down on the ice. He is telling a guide he thinks he has broken his ankle.

Quinn immediately looks to the east. "Stay here," he starts to tell Peter and any of the other kids within earshot as he goes to check out Peter's report. He stops, however, as he reconsiders things. "You, come with me," he says indicating Peter. "The rest of you stay here."

Eve goes to examine the ankle of the downed man.

Cecila really does not like the glacier all that much, particularly since she needs to put on boots and stuff which leave her with even less senses to rely on than usual, thankfully she's still able to hear quite well "Well you'll get no argument out of me, though I wasn't exactly thinking we'd be getting earthquakes out here"

Peter goes with Anthony. "Can I use my powers to find out exactly where he is and what happened to him?" Peter asks Anthony.

Anthony nods to Peter and flashes a quick smile. "I was sort of counting on it," he says. "It occurred to me that it might be more difficult to find whoever it is than just walking this way."

Eve smiles. "Nothing broken, at least. I'll bandage it up and you should be fine." And she proceeds to do so.

'Steve' digs his cleats in and gets back to his feet. Seeing the other heroes attending the injured man, Paragon decides to be one of the escorts keeping an eye on the kids. Looking up at the ceiling, 'he' says, "Alright, kids. Make sure not to stand under any icicles."

Peter concentrates. After a few seconds he winces. "He's about a mile and a half east of us. That's in the rugged region I think. He was climbing down the wall of a crevice and fell when the ground shook. He broke both legs when he hit a ledge further down. And ice filled in the crevice and buried him." Peter looks up at Anthony, "He's really scared."

Anthony nods and glances over his shoulder. As soon as he is out of sight of the rest of the group he switches on his force field and picks up Peter, flying low in the direction indicated.

 Q says, "Peter says he's picking up the feelings from someone who was climbing down an icewall during the quake. He's buried under ice. Peter's going to help me locate him but if someone could come to us and help get Peter back before people realize he's missing it would be a good thing."

The flight reveals just how rugged the eastern area of the glacier is. But following Peter's directions, fairly soon Anthony and Peter can spot two figures digging frantically at a mass of ice filling a crevice.

"Down there." Peter says.

Titan beckons both Eve and Paragon over, who are without team communicators. He says to them quietly, "A hiker got buried to the east. Quinn's working on getting him out. He asked someone to go get Peter. Someone quick who's able to get there and back without getting spotted easily."

Quinn sets Peter down close by where he can't be seen by the diggers. "All right," he says, "Stay here for a minute. I'm going to see if someone can come pick you up and get you back to the group." He starts unbuckling the cleats as he talks, his clothing shifting into a black and blue costume with a full mask and goggles. "Good work, really." he says, then asks, "Can you stay in mental contact with me until someone gets here?"

Paragon walks over to Titan and listens to the situation. She says in a quiet voice, "Well, I can go, but I don't know if I'm the most suited. I can't fly, but I can leap pretty far. But my landings may be tricky out in that rugged territory, especially carrying a kid." She looks to Eve.

Peter nods, "If you give me permission to enter your mind. Uh, you won't tell Mr Kirk or the school I used my powers will you?"

Eve says, "I'm afraid I'm not better. I'm not sure how well my staff will adhere to ice *and* I'd be very visible..."

The Phillips twins ... Well actually all the kids, have moved closer. "We can fly." Maria-Anne says quietly.

 Q flashes an image of where he has placed Peter. "I've got a mind link with Peter going," he broadcasts, "but if someone could hurry it would be much appreciated."

Titan nods. "Alright...fine. I'll go with a couple of you who can fly. I'll be fine on ground...I'm just concerned about carrying someone back with me. I wouldn't be hurt, but I couldn't say the same for Peter."

Graham says "I can fly too."

Anne-Maria tells Graham, "Silly. They," She points to Titan and the heroes, "want us to not be seen. Your flight makes noise like a thunderclap going off if you go fast."

Titan nods. "Only two, though. And yes...it has to be subtle. Quiet. The mission is to bring Peter back here. No signtseeing, alright?"

Eve says, "Thunderclaps are especially bad if ice is already collapsing."

The Phillips twins cross their hearts, "We promise. Haven't we been good this year?"

Titan smiles slightly, "I have no idea."

Titan chuckles and looks to Eve, "Can you distract the guides briefly?" He then looks to the Phillips twins, "Come on." He starts to make his way east toward Anthony and Peter.

Eve, as requested, distracts the guides, with a request for adjusting her crampons, with a fair bit of bending down to show the problem.

The Phillips twins walk with Titan until they are round a bend and out of sight of the guides and rest of the holiday group. "Should we fly you now?"

Titan nods, "If you can, sure. And remember...your goal is to bring Peter back to the group."

The Phillips twins start flying. Anne-Maria offers to pick up Titan. Maria-Anne says "I'll go get Peter."

Titan lets her pick him up...

The twins aren't the fastest flyers on the planet but it's only a minute or so before Titan spots Anthony in costume and the two ice walkers digging at the ice filling a crevice.

Titan says to Anne-Maria, "Just set me down by Peter."

The young twin nods and sets Titan down by Peter. The other twin is already there with Peter and telling Peter he has to go back with her to the holiday group.

'Steve' runs his fingers through his hair and rubs the back of his head, a little confused. "Has the whole trip been this interesting?" Paragon asks Eve with a shy smile.

Titan heads over to where the ice fell to see if he can clear it using sheer brawn.

Eve smiles at Steve. "Yeah, actually pretty much."

While his current suit isn't up to the standards of his combat suits it does still provide Quinn with a great deal of power, enabling him to toss multi-ton blocks of ice aside and shatter other chunks that appear to be in danger of falling.

Titan digs his hands into the ice, clearing large chunks easily, hoping to get a view of the fallen hiker. He doesn't worry about the reactions he gets from the hiker's friends.

Titan and Anthony clear enough of the ice to make the hiker visible. Titan looks up to Anthony, "Any good with first aid? I don't know much about it, since I never really get hurt."

As the injured walker is revealed Quinn moves to pick him up. "I can fly him back to the nearest medical center," he says. "It won't be as fast as normal but it should still be a lot quicker than driving him."

The injured hitcher is unconscious. His two companions speak Spanish which neither hero understands but are obviously thanking Titan and Anthony.

The Phillips twins return to the holiday group carrying Peter, landing out of sight and walking back the rest of the distance.

Titan does his best to try to communicate to the hikers, saying that Anthony will take their friend to a medical center...trying both English and Greek.

The two companions don't seem to speak either English or Greek. But Titan and Anthony's actions have already shown them to be heroes and they allow Anthony to carry the injured hitcher away without fuss.

Peter was with the Phillips twins. Peter tells Anthony over the mind link that the three children are now back with the holiday group.

 Q says, "This will take me a little bit of time. Try to distract people if anyone thinks to do a headcount of the chaperones or someone starts looking for me."

Meanwhile back at the holiday group, now the immediate and fortunately minor injuries are dealt with, the guides are indeed starting a head count to make sure everyone is present and accounted for.

Titan heads back toward the group, jumping as need be, but remaining out of the guides' line of sight as much as possible.

Eve does her best to keep them them distracted and so delay the headcount, but doubts she can do so for long.

The efforts of Ten work with remarkable success with the two male guides. The Australian female guide isn't so easily distracted. But somehow her count comes up correct, as if Titan and Anthony were present. Peter looks a little smug.

Eve is relieved to find that worked. Somehow. :)

One of the guides helps the tourist with a strained ankle, and they gather everyone together and start leading them of the rest of the ice walk, explaining it will be a shorter distance to finish the scheduled walk than turning back.

Titan tries to slip back into the group, no longer leaping as he gets closer.

Anne-Maria walks close to Ten. She whispers, "I bet you know all our names. "What is yours?"

Titan manages to get back into the group toward the back, about as subtly as someone like him can actually pull off.

Eve doesn't see any harm in saying, "I'm Eve."

Anne-Maria smiles, "Eve. That's a nice name. Do you have hero name too?"

Eve says, "Yeah, but probably not such a nice one. And of course if you have one I don't know what it is!"

Anne-Maria giggles, "We don't have hero names yet. At the school they say we're too young. I'm going to call us Super-Me and Super-Her."

Maria-Anne sticks her tongue out at Anne-Maria.

Eve laughs.

Paragon follows along the tour in step behind Eve, listening in on the conversation. Her head tilts curiously at the hero talk, but remains quiet for now.

While Anthony is flying the injured hitcher to a hospital the holiday group comlete the last leg of the loop and arrive back at the start and tourist shop.

Titan remains quiet for the rest of the trip, taking in the sights.

The jeeps take the group back to the hotel after the hired gear is returned to the shop. The tourist with the strained ankle is looked at by a doctor. He's told the ankle will be sore for a few days but can be walked on.

Back at the Hotel Again
The senior guide reminds you all that there's a late night trip to the summit of Snaellsjokull mountain by jeep to see the northern lights, so he suggests you rest during the remainder of the afternoon.

Eve would quite like to rest - but won't if the kids aren't!

The children remind the chaperones that Cecila said questions could be asked once they got back to the hotel. Actually that's not exactly what Cecila said but it's the way they remember it. There follows a deluge of questions about Leonid and what happened when the heroes rescued him, and what powers the heroes have and what are the hero's names, etc.

Paragon still has a lot of energy due to the ease of the hike. But it's nice to have a chance to warm up. Back at the hotel, Paragon goes to the lobby cafe and orders hot chocolates for everyone. She returns to the group with a tray of hot chocolates topped with marshmallows. She blinks a few times as the kids stream forth a torrent of questions that confirm her suspicions that the gig is up. "Umm, John...?" Paragon asks Titan helplessly.

Titan ensures they're in a private location before speaking to the kids. He turns off his holo-disguise as well. "I'm sure you remember some of us from last year, right?"

The children nod. "Yeah. When we kicked those aliens off our planet." - "I hope we get something like that again." - "Can we help this year. We're lots older now."

Eve smiles. "I doubt alien invaders do requests."

The children take hot chocolate drinks, thanking Paragon, and work on demolishing the marshmellows.

Titan smiles slightly, "You've already helped a lot. And hopefully there won't be any alien invasion this year."

Paragon offers the remaining hot chocolates to the 'guides'.

Mark grins, "We beat off alien invaders the year before too. They say good things come in threes."

Eve says, "The year before too? Really?"

Graham nods. "Yeah. They were really icky that time. Slime all over them. The aliens last year were much better. No icky slime."

Eve nods. "I get that. I prefer my aliens without icky slime too."

Titan raises a brow. "Huh. I didn't realize it happened the prior year."

The Phillips twins giggle at Ten's comment They seem to be hanging around Ten more than any other of the heroes. In a similar fashion the Steels are staying close to Sukeban and Anthony. Patrica with Sukeban and Mark with Anthony.

Peter, being the oldest of the children, and thus thinking he should be the sensible and responsible one, tells the other children they all ought to get a nap so they're awake when the jeeps come to pick everyone up for the northern lights.

Peter tells the heroes, "We'll stay in our room. Won't we?" The last question is said to the other children, and they nod their heads, although with a little hesitation from the Steels.