Karhythadrizsa the Bookwyrm perched on the chair of the study carrel, flipping the pages of the book with her foreclaw until she found the story she wanted. The cavern described would do, if no one had claimed it already. The book was over seventy years old, and it had been more than twenty years before that when Karhy had seen the cavern herself.

She paused to consider the ad she'd seen. It might pay well, but the clients did not seem like the sort of people she really wanted as neighbors. On the gripping hand, though, the information was already available here in her "lending hoard". Anybody could find the cavern from this story, if they could get into the restricted areas of the subway. Her decision made, she left, flying back to the F&SF racks where the secret passage to her main lair was concealed.
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Hypatia Argyros was one of at least two people who noticed the bookwyrm leave. She held her finger to her lips to preempt the squeal of the child who had looked up from the story circle at the wrong time. Then she went to put the book away. It was most unlike Karhy to leave "her" books out and opened. It was so unusual as to be effectively begging one of the librarians to take notice of what the bookwyrm was reading. "The North Bradford Cavern", from [I]Titan City Subway Tales[/i]. She looked over towards the speculative fiction shelves. Maybe that's exactly what the dragon wanted...

Hypatia put the book back where it belonged, then went and tapped on the shelf under McCaffrey, shave and a haircut. There was no answer.

Following directly was out of the question. With her staff, she was sure she could break the wards on the secret door, but it would be noisy and cost her a valuable information resource, not to mention friend. Besides, she had almost an hour left on her shift. So she retrieved the book and brought it to her desk, and read about how the people digging the subway had found a large cavern...

In her tiny form, Karhy could be very stealthy, between a natural lack of noise as she crept along to the last corner, a subtle spell that changed the color of her scales to match the concrete, and a slightly less subtle spell that caused the viewer to disregard the subject of the spell as supremely unimportant, unless the viewer was magically or psionicly warded. Or was a non-sapient machine or spell...

She poked her head, a bit larger than a cat's head and decidedly saurian, around the corner and looked at the spot where the cave had been, then some instinct made her look to the far side of the opening. It took her a moment to recognize the humanoid shape as a human, or something close to human... She recalled a report of a new player in Titan City's covert community, and she raised a claw to her mouth, in a manner that would be instantly familiar to any patron of a library, and looked straight at the stranger.

Karhy looked into the cavern as she walked along the wall opposite the opening. The traces she remembered when she'd first scouted it were still there, no stronger, but not any weaker, either. The Beast would seem to be asleep, still. Whatever it was.

She crossed over to the humanoid, closing to within a few feet and sniffing briefly before speaking softly. "You're new here, aren't you? To Titan City, if not Earth..."

Karhy sat back on her haunches and folded her wings. "That depends on one's point of view, I suppose. I've heard that certain persons were looking for a lair- that is to say, a base of operations. And much as it might be entertaining to see this group deal with what is sleeping in the back -" she indicated the cavern with a claw that looked opposible to the others on that forefoot -"from a safe distance, my own lair is here in Titan City, not Sri Lanka. So I'm thinking about warning people off of this cave, maybe hire contractors to seal it off... Oh, where are my manners? I'm Karhythadrizsa, also known locally as the Bookwyrm." She produced a business card from some extra-dimensional space, with her names, email (with the same domain as the Titan City Libraries), and the profession "Information Broker", and handed it to the odd visitor who didn't quite smell like anything else on Earth.

"You're in luck, that information I'll give you in exchange for your name. Or at least what you use most commonly around here." Karhy grinned, showing lots of small but sharp teeth. "Or you can wait until I post it on the appropriate weird websites after I get this sealed off, and get it for free..."

Karhy put the name of his company together with certain aspects of Kartanian's scent and snickered. "A cat that walks dogs? I like that. Pleased to meet you, 'Mr. Tanner'.
"As to what's back there, I'm not entirely certain. When I first found this cave, in 1918 AD, I was using a spell that worked within natural stone and earth to find its boundaries." A wave of a forefoot, the digits in an unusual position, produced an image of the fifty meter long cave, with a "You are Here" arrow at on end and a bowl shape at the other. A creek cut from the near right side to the bowl and into a crack on the other side. "That circular depression at the far end attracted my attention. So I used that data to cast a spell that determined that the last sapient being, or agent of a sapient being, to have entered that cavern had entered it about eleven thousand one hundred twenty-eight BCE."

"Not really long in geological terms, it's just before the end of our most recent Ice Age. Although there do seem to be a lot of little caverns like this under Titan City, some of them may not be as 'natural' as my spell indicated. As for the sleeper, I did some careful probing, and there is a sapient in some sort of stasis; it wasn't actually thinking or dreaming when I checked. I am fairly sure that it is not a human, dragon, or any sort of Fae I've encountered. It could be some other sort of extraplanar creature, possibly extraterrestrial, and possibly artificial. But someone had put a sort of warning ward on that end of the cavern, any animal would have to be coerced into going into that depression, sapient beings without shields would feel unease. So far, I've thought it best to respect the warning."

The ward was either psionic or mental magic, inducing an increasing level of fear, but even the most basic of natural, trained, or artificial shielding would blunt its effect. An image was buried in it: a human-like face, contorted in rage, behind clawed hands gripping vertical bars and trying to shake them. Perhaps it is intended to represent a violent prisoner?

"I'd put the spread at two months. Maybe longer if those... vampiric cockroaches are known to have found another lair before this gets found." The pause was very short. Karhy wasn't certain if Kartanian had even seen the ad, but she'd bet hardcovers to used paperbacks he had. "Magic isn't my specialty, but I did leave a message with someone who has the skill and patience to beef up these wards and add in some basic alarm spells. Might not be a bad idea call in a real professional in that area, maybe even someone who's worked the other side of that coin. Then after that's done we can figure out how to keep that creek from undercutting whatever physical defense we can put in." She sighed. "I'd hoped to be able to figure out how to get some books out of this before it became more important to fix the problem than to profit on it."

"No, I meant books. I'm not sure how much of Earth's popular culture you've seen, but the depiction of Smaug's lair in [I]The Hobbit[/i] is a bit of an outdated stereotype. Not all dragons crave gold and jewels, but they were the ones that caused problems that got heroes and villains alike going after them. My ancestors got along quite well with humans, aside from the odd fanatic who thought all dragons were greedy monsters. Actually, we are all greedy, but my kind are greedy for books. The older and rarer the better, though most of us have no problem with copies being made. Most of what I earn in the information broker business goes to buying more books."

"That depends. You could give me cash, and I could use that to buy books, or..." The dragon grinned again. "How many books did you bring from wherever you came? I'm thinking hardcopies, not electronic editions. Bound, preferably hardbound. Digital copies will do if the work is in the public domain where it was written, or if we can arrange compensation to reach the author. But something that's never before been published on this world is, naturally, much, much more valuable to me than anything I can pick up for twenty dollars at Books-A-Million. I'll pay my consultant, most likely in credit, and the more you can add to my collection the more I'll be able to help defray your other expenses."

"Original language, of course. I have some excellent translation spells, and it's not as if English was my mother tongue, either. Although we may want to consider the possibility of publishing the translations locally, later, some things like that do quite well..." Karhy pulled a tablet and claw sheaths out of the XDS and began some calculations. "Boxes about so big? Pages about a tenth of a millimeter thick?" Other variables either tended to cancel out, or were not definable without actually reading the works in question, and for those a minimum assumption of goodwill on Kartanian's part - or at least a desire not to be seen as overly greedy - set a value she could work with. She showed him the results of her work, a figure comparable to a state lottery jackpot that hadn't been paid out for three weeks or so... "I have a contract with a courier service called Psychopomp and Circumstance; they can complete the delivery."

Kathy nodded, "Farewell, Chesire Cat." She used the tablet to send messages to her associate and her delivery service, to let Goldenrod know of the prisoner on the verge of freedom and to let Psi&C know about the expected delivery.

Karhy watched as Goldenrod shaped the wall of the cave to cover the cheap - one might almost say disposable - cell phone. "Okay," the young witch said, "If anyone tampers with that prison, or if it cracks open from age or whatever, that cell phone will send out appropriate texts to you, to me, and to the Hot Seat at the Titan's Legacy. And because this phone," she pulled out an apparently identical phone, "is linked by similarity, it will send them, as well. I'll put this where it can get lots of bars." Unlike some modern wizards, advanced technology didn't have problems with Goldenrod's magic, unless that was the point of the magic. Sometimes she could integrate them in useful ways.

"But you can't do that time-view thing with a mirror to see what happened here?" asked Karhy.

"Nope. Even with my staff and ideal conditions, my limit seems to be about fourteen hundred years. Thirteen thousand is a bit beyond that. So far."

The voices became intelligible (at least to moderately enhanced hearing) about the same time that the electric eye fence came into view. Walls and floors had been knocked out, opening a volume twelve meters (about four stories) high and wide, and over thirty meters long off to the north, where there seemed to be some excavation going on. On the east wall, a cargo elevator was lifting up a mining cart, and a short distance north of it, two figures looked at something on a table.

The taller figure was a tanned human male with straight black hair in a ponytail, and mostly Native American features. The other person had digitigrade feet, back and brown fur under her light body armor, and a distinctly canine appearance. She spoke with an accent, possible due to the shape of her vocal cords. "...ithin limits, tensile strength to volume is more important than mass, for our purposes. And of course you are familiar with outgassing problems with natural rubber."

The human replied, "Yes, Sister Wolf, if you get me the materials,I can build this hull for you." He glanced north. "And if you can get it into space, it will hold air, at least until you run into a big enough micrometeor."

"Then, we have a deal, Mr. Proudfoot."

For the majority of the people whose images Kartanian captured, Ciph3r found little of interest: Family photos online, driver's license from MassDOT, union membership, the occasional arrest or military record. They appeared to be construction workers or miners. The two at the table were different.

Matching the face to the name "Proudfoot" brought up records on one William Beauregard Proudfoot: Class of '06 at Annapolis (major in civil engineering, minor in metallurgy), followed by six years in the USMC, MOS 1302 (Combat Engineer Officer) leaving active service as a Captain...Master's Degree from MIT, during which he managed to get a stint on the International Space Station to supervise his professor's experiments as well as running some of his own and his classmates. For the past year, he'd been working for a minor aerospace start-up, until they ran out of funding about a month back. Further checks trace the "Proudfoot" name in his family back over a hundred years to a family of Cherokee living in Oklahoma.

"Sister Wolf" as a name brought no hits, it would appear to be a new nickname for an individual associated in the past two years with the Venetian Cosa Nostra, under the name "Sharlfi Erghen", as an enforcer. The TCPD suspects she is an illegal alien, in both senses of the word, but until they have enough to charge her they don't care to do the INS's job. She had also been spotted fighting both Tinker Belle and the Duchess at a private airfield (the only sighting of the two heroines together since early 2008) and once fleeing an exploding private lab in an abandoned warehouse.

Will (he never used Bill, it tempted would-be punsters to shorten his middle name and add it on) wasn't used to dealing with supervillains, so he decided to take the waiter at face value. "Sounds good. And unsweet-" He cut himself off when he realized his client wasn't taking the suddenly appearing waiter in stride.

Sharlfi glanced over at elevator and then at the electric eye fence that had been placed over the old entrance. She hadn't felt displaced air, and a scent that had been at the back of her awareness was now front and center. She pulled out one of her pistols and laid it on the table, covering the plans for what looked like the hull of a small cargo vessel and not quite pointing at the "waiter", and interrupted Mr. Proudfoot. "Who are you, how did you get in here, and what do you know about interstellar drives?"

Sharlfi put the weapon away, but not quickly enough that Will didn't notice it wasn't a normal handgun. "Sharlfi Erghen. I'm trying to get to a region of space called [url=http://cityoftitans.com/comment/46109#comment-46109]The Interstellar Jump Conduit Network[/url], the nearest point of which I know is about 3600 light-years - light Earth years, that is - away. I also call it 'Home'. Folks there travel between systems via a pre-existing network of..., well, I'm sure you can guess from the name. It overlaps with the region of space which is raided by a race of arachnotauroid arthropods, and they seem to use a different kind of hyperspace drive. I got a good look at one before crashing in the bay. I've done enough experiments to learn that I'm not going to learn more at the bottom of a well, and so I need a launch," she gestured to the plans on the table, "to get up there, run some tests, and get back down here to figure what my next step should be."

Will replied to Ken, "Pastrami. I'm Will Proudfoot. Currently a spaceship hull manufacturer. And might I ask why you're here?"

Shari spoke briefly into a communicator. "Jason, go ahead and weld that back door shut. It seems the laser fence is less useful than I had thought it would be."

"That sounds good. One sealed doorway, and the rigatoni with a root beer." She activated the comm again. "Belay the sealing of the door, Jason. It's been contracted out." Will raised an eyebrow at the nautical expression, but said nothing.

Shari entered a code into her com, and the teleport alarm was silenced. "Where was I? Ah, yes: I'll need a mass distribution analysis along the indicated axes, and I'll need to know what sections of each of these two areas will be sealed up last, so we can be sure all the major components are installed first..." Her discussion with Will went on, and in due course it was interrupted again as displaced air triggered the alarm. "Nice to know some of my security precautions work, " she commented, as she silenced the alarm again. "Thank you, Ken. Do you want me to keep you updated on my experiments, or do you have your own way home when you want it?"

Sharlfi readied her com and nodded, keying the override code even as he disappeared, then she checked the business card. The food disappeared quickly, and both Sharlfi and Will made notes of the restaurant name and address. To the north, the workers continued installing what looked like a large vault door, over four meters high and wide.

Of course what High School gossip be without the school spirit hearing. Misty Spirit having spent some time around the Wanderers tower as well as haunting the school heard the whispers. Being dead does have some advantages turning incorporeal and invisible all that marked her approach to the bar was the flickering of the lights she passed by. 'Bad guys setting up a base. In this town that's nearly every day wonder what they are up to?' she thought to herself as she phased through the door causing a slight frost to appear where her ghostly form caused the water vapor to crystallize.

Misty's head appeared hovering at the door "Oops sorry guys. I'm just checking out the joint I was sure this was where the Party was. Enjoy the cold beer!" With that, she pulled back and went up into the air. "Hmm, was sure the rumour said the place was a front. Did I get the wrong bar?" She bobbed in the air much like the ghost she was.

Location Graveyard Shift Mausoleum base.

"ROTTEN! Jacob! We Got a MISSION!" The Specter terror known as Misty came flying in through the front door.

Sitting at a desk doing paperwork. In truth, he was going over school work from his day job. "What is it Misty?"

"Like I heard about a group of Nazi wannabes that are up to no good. The set up a base and everything."

He looked up and look at her "The Vril are on the move?"

"Oh no, not the clones. Another group of Nazi wannabes. The bird brains call themselves Avians."

"Avians? You mean Aryans right?"

"Oh them too!"

Ron rubbed his temples sometimes handling Misty was harder then supervillains. "Alright, Aryans. Any idea what they are up too?"

"Um...no. I don't even know where the base is."

"Then there really nothing we can do till they make a move. See if Jacob is up to making his debut."

"On the way Boss!" She flew down the hall to Jacob's room.

"Oh, well I was at the school and the kids are talking about some Aryan group. Nazi wannabees that moved into some base that using a bar as a front. Tried to find it and couldn't, I think I don't know I did find a bar but it was boring!" She bobbed up and down floating in the air before him.

"Well, then I got to thinking that if these guys are Nazi, you be like the best to fight them. You fought the real things not some copy cats. So I thought we could make our debut as the Graveyard Shift stopping these Racist Nutjobs." Then she zoomed real close just inches from his face was hers.

"So what you say? Are we going to bust Nazi heads?"

Ron walks in "Might be an inside informant. Not wantin' to be caught. Well, Misty seems tha talk ya heard had some grounds to it. Robots.. why does it have to be robots."

Misty touched her necklace and landed she looked solid thought extremely pale. Still didn't breath as she brought up Ironport map on the computer. "Like the bar called the Harbor Tap and it in the port area. Lost of storage buildings for shipping." A pin icon appeared at the bar location. "There like this ugly parking garage nearby."

"In this city? They won't need to advertise once thin's start heroes will show up there be plenty of targets. It's our nature." Ron looked at the map "I can't port us there directly. Have to make a few jumps."

"Oh, I can go and scout and stuff. Being a ghost has its advantages. It seems I'm a bit stronger now I got this necklace from my friends. I frosted the guy's drinks at the bar. The other ghost kind of stopped listening to me too. Think Ron here spook them. Working for a goddess of death and the underworld would do that. Good news I might be able to drain more energy from any bots and freeze things." Misty hopped on the seat a bit.

"Don't get carried away experimenting Misty. We test what ya can do now later. Jacob, have ya thought of a code name? Don't want to leak ya secret identity. Oh, and I haven't ask ya got a means of transport or ya be joining me on the Porting?"

"Alright then let's get goin'. I personally don't want to fight rampaging giant robots if we can stop them before they activate would be better."

Ron turned and opened the portal thought it would take a few jumps the last portal opened on top of a building. Stepping out he looked around "Got to love Titan City building codes. Don't think half the buildings would stand people jumping and standing on roofs elsewhere."

Misty was now back to her ghost state and hovered over to the others. "The bar is over in that direction."

Misty said standing and floated down to the Bar she visited earlier and just walked in going through the door. "Hey, Guys seems the party might be coming here anyway. Have you noticed any guys with sticks up their behinds moving heavy gear around here?"

Rotten looked around "Soldier focus on range during the fight. Just like Misty, we don't want to test how resistant to damage ya are."

"Some morons calling themselves Ayvans going to use giant robots to hurt people. There was some information leaked that said the base was somewhere around this neighborhood." She smiled at the fellow who called her a ghost then at Mike.

"I didn't want to scare anyone when I was looking around earlier but the Ayvans made broadcasts. They are going to attack soon say they are targeting Metas. Not like any normal person could get caught in the crossfire or stray shots."

Then she flashed another smile "Oh I'm not a Meta I died seven years ago, I think. Gunshot got a grave and everything. I really am a GHHOOOSSSTTT!" She said as she faded into invisibility and flew out through the roof.

Elsewhere in the city

He stood before the mirror tugging on his last glove. "Aryans, I fought the real things like hell I'm going to let some two-bit copy cats attack a city in the good old U.S.A. with out a fight."

D-Day uniform was inspired by the standard WW2 US uniform just with modifications and updated flair. An almost retro look. Walking out onto the balcony he leaps over the side dropping three stories before impacting and absorbing the kinetic energy. It was the limit he had at first beyond that three stories he would have wounded himself. Now with the kinetic energy, it was double so he used that same force to start running and jumping each jump higher and farther than the last as his power built up. He really wants to hit those Ayrans with maximum force.

"For every brother that fell on Normandy, I am damned if I let some NAZI group get away with attacking Titans City!"

Tinker Belle smiled at the leader and returned gesture with a tap of a finger on her goggles. Anyone doing signals analysis with appropriate gear would note the burst transmission, apparently directed toward a communication satellite. She noted D-Day landing, and nodded at him, as well. Then she turned her attention to the robots. Were they sapient protesters, or programmed nuisances? More data would have to be gathered.

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Jake followed Ron through the portal and looked out at robots arrayed below. "Not a good position, here. Anything that misses us is likely to hit the school." He looked down the street for a spot that would offer less collateral damage.

They did seem to be robots, not cyborgs, but that didn't settle the question of sapience. Best to treat them as potential sapients. And so Tinker Belle would take no direct action, yet. Indirectly, though, the first priority was to reduce the chance of violence. Blue Tail drones, their camouflage reducing the chance of spotting them, were dispatched one to each column, two to the school. Their observations went to a series of live streaming websites, and the URLs were made available to the police. And where ever on the net people were trying to arrange counter-demonstrations, a warning went up. "Remember, y'all: if these guys are looking for an excuse, don't give one to them. DO NOT START ANY FIGHTS. Speak Softly. Don't threaten, and if they start using violence, record it if you can, and leave if you can."

The robots wouldn't be likely to notice, but some of the human marchers passing by might recognize the tune Tinker Belle was humming as her fingers flew across the virtual keyboard. [I]De pony run, he jump, he pitch; he throw my master in de ditch. My master died, and de jury wondered why...de verdict was de blue tail fly[/I]

Rotten Luck calls out "James Duncan High Students! I Better not see ya attacking! Remeber these jerk wads are still protected by tha constitution of our nation. If ya attack they have tha right to fight back. Tha what they want! Hold ya fire until they attack!" He looks about spotting the ice "In tha mean time get some water guns super soakers and raid the Science lab see if any mad scientist got some super slick lube."

He then looked to the cat "Fraid so Sir Sings Loudly. Until they do break the law we kind of got our hands tied. Old Soldier is our group newest member."

Misty smiled and lifted into the air "Think if I possess one of those bots and start shooting would it count?"

Ron sighed "Sadly you be breaking the law then Misty."

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Where the Black Rose had destroyed a set of robots a blue bolt of lightning jumps from a power line and then among the remains. At the same time the T.V.s, Radios, and anything connected to the internet flashed and sure enough, a voice was heard. "Ladies and Gentlemen! It's your Digital Diva, the Sexy Cyber Vixen! Hotwire! Well, our fair city is having a minor invasion of the Third Reich wannabes! Unfortunately, the Aryans are playing nice and obeying the law. So no bashing Nazis for the heroes. Well in our part of town we don't play by the law and order. What the old saying? Might make Right? Well, the Firebrands and Black Roses showed those tin cans who really in charge and it's not the government!"

"I chose to join in the play and cut all feeds! I don't know how long I can keep the Stations from showing the News. But for now how about some entertainment!" The robots stood back up repairing themselves and then start dancing the Macarena. "In the words of the late great villain 'Killer Klown' (Only because Joker copy writed ;p ) "“I may be a criminal lunatic, but I'm an AMERICAN criminal lunatic!”