| Building The Team | ||
| [The Foundry]
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Issue #1: Welcome To The City Of Crime. 25 January 2002. Ravensgate, Oregon, the Rust Belt of the Northwest, is a study in contradictions. The coastal metropolis is the 12th-largest city in America, it ranks 97th out of the 100 most populous cities in per-capita income (even Little Rock, AR is ahead of it), yet it has the largest representation on Forbes magazine's list of the 400 richest Americans. Also, it boasts the single most powerful metahuman crimefighter in the world, yet crime continues unabated. Maybe this has something to do with the registered-superhero law on the books. Joshua Caine, known as The Frozen Ghost in another life, believes the law is being used to neutralize metahuman crime-fighting. He also is haunted by the mysterious deaths nine years earlier of the city's original superhero team, a team that included his wife, brother-in-law and younger siblings. Caine runs Collegium Caine, a school for young metahumans learning to deal with their powers. He and his prized pupils decide to do some superhero work of their own in defiance of the law and in an attempt to tear down the castle of corruption. His prized students are:
Great sagas must begin with small steps. The team foils a bank robbery by Samurai Seven just before cops arrive. They find it strange that the cops would just charge in during a potential hostage situation. 26-27 January 2002. Oscar Washington left Collegium Caine a couple of years ago, afraid Joshua Caine was needlessly endangering his students on some quixotic quest. News of the foiled bank robbery draws him home. At a diner, he overhears some honest cops—-an oxymoron in Ravensgate—-discussing the event. Readers learn that the reason the cops charged into the bank, is that a rookie among them did so without thinking and the other cops sprinted in behind him to minimize casualties. [This is the first appearance of the core of the Ravensgate Bureau of Public Safety's (RBPS) elite Street Crimes Unit (SCU): Lt. Matt Shinmen, Sgt. Wilton "Frank" Franklin, and Offs. Joey and Jimmy Meaaloa. Rookie Off. Danny "Rube" Cody appeared in the previous issue but was not identified.] Oscar arrives at Collegium Caine, and it is a happy reunion with Danielle and Joshua. He meets Jack and Max for the first time and becomes smitten with Margaret, the team's mechanic. The gang discusses the events and the legal concerns, then decides to do an espionage mission: scope out the deals being made at a political fundraiser for Danielle's cousin, Mayor Salome Throckmorton-d'Aubaine, at the historic Al-Amarja Shrine Temple. International terrorist Abu Scirocco gate-crashes the party along with henchmen drawn from the local "Goth" community (i.e., vampires). He immediately announces he's holding the entire fundraiser ball hostage "for a mere pittance—-$6,554,000,000!!" (Oddly enough, this is what Danielle is worth.) He then reveals the tin-can-shaped nuke strapped to his waist. At this announcement—-and Abu Scirocco's subsequent demand for Danielle to step forward—-the Mayor grabs Danielle and escapes via a secret passage. The team eventually regroups, changes into costume, and proceeds to trounce the vampires. Unsure of how the nuke works, the speedster Velocity grabs Abu Scirocco and runs—-yes, RUNS—-out to sea with him. He drops the terrorist in the Pacific about three miles away from shore. This is the first appearance of Jeopardy (Oscar Washington), a mentalist capable of assuming animal forms—-and stretching. It is also the first appearance of the following:
See what the Ravensgate Oregon Journal has to say about this. Issue #3: A Night In The Old World (or, Fangs But No Thanks). 28 January 2002. While Jack recuperates from duking it out with vampires at the Al-Amarja Shrine Temple, and begins his research into the local money trail, Joshua sends Danielle and Max on a mission. Afraid of police reprisals against benevolent "Goths" in the wake of the Temple Incident, Joshua wants the pair to extract a source of his for protection. They drive down to Club Sanguine and realize immediately they are in a seedier part of the Old World neighborhood. They find Club Sanguine nearly empty due to fear of reprisals and shmooze a slick hustler, Vladek Grozny, while waiting for Joshua’s friend. Then some Checkerheads (RBPS), with SCU back-up, show up and harass the patrons. Dani flaunts her pedigree—-and who her pedigree knows—-to make the Checkerheads back off. Joshua’s connection arrives and is grateful for the protection offer. He says he will meet the pair at Devereaux Manor after packing up some things. Dani and Max are attacked in the parking lot by malevolent “Goths” seeking food. In the subsequent melee, a parking-lot security shack gets demolished and the head vampire gets knocked backward into an oncoming elevated train. The train does not stop. Eventually, the head vampire returns to the fight but is knocked back even further—through the el-train mezzanine window of a furniture store and onto a couch. The couch collapses under the impact, and its splintered wooden frame impales the vampire. Issue #4: Who Do The Voodoo? Do You Do? 6 February 2002. The team, still unnamed but called “The Doe Family” (John Doe #1, Jane Doe, et. al.) by the media and cops, ventures into Aurora Gate purely on the word of Joshua—-and his Salvador Dali Tarot deck. Along for the ride is another of Caine’s prodigal students—Francois Champeaux, on leave from his criminologist job in the Midwest. They check out Marley’s Caribbean Cuisine and Rainbow Serpent Books. While browsing at the bookstore, they expect to find Odette Daviele, a friend of Joshua’s, but instead find a mysterious young woman behind the counter. Out of nowhere, a semi truck deploys an overstuffed clown car, and members of the feared Pagliacci Gang attack Marley’s. At Rainbow Serpent, the mysterious young woman cloaks the windowed walls in darkness and tells Oscar and Francois that it’s OK to change costume. The team discovers that the even-more-feared Haitian gangster Simon Etienne Legba and his two top lieutenants, Arnaud “Top Hat” Blanc and Tomas “Too Tall” Darteguenave, are in the restaurant. The team and the gangsters repel the clowns, and the team splits before the cops arrive. The restaurant suffers only minimal damage in the scuffle. This is the first appearance of Pyro (Francois), an invisible heat and flame manipulator. On the way back to the Manor, the Mist Runner intercepts a 911 call from Refinery Island. Arriving there, the team discovers that mercenaries from the terrorist group VIPER have taken over the entire island and plan to blow up the liquid-hydrogen refineries—-and, yes, the island, too. VIPER’s accomplice is Mogg, a dim-witted but inhumanly tough strongman who takes on the entire team. Our heroes prevail, despite such mishaps as Velocity accidentally knocking out Frisson, and leave just as the Checkerheads and FBI arrive en masse. Velocity finds two pins with odd “time signatures” at the island. He says they’re from either the future or an alternate-timeline dimension. Also, in an ominous bit of foreshadowing, and the first appearance of Giuseppe “Sloppy Joe” Spanno, we meet the Ravensgate Crime Commission. See what the Ravensgate Oregon Journal has to say about this. Issue #4 Back-up Feature: A Long Way From St. Patrick’s. 7 February 2002. Jack returns to Rainbow Serpent Books the next day to ask more questions. This time, Odette Daviele is behind the counter and is unable to answer Jack’s questions. She has no memory of what happened the day before, insists the store was closed that day, and is bewildered as to why Joshua would send him down to ask questions. Then Top Hat and Too Tall arrive to ask Jack some questions: “We’re the neighborhood watch. And we’re watching you.” Jack explains to the two gangsters that he’s a student looking for books on Irish Mythology—-yes, at an occult bookstore specializing in Haitian mysticism. They ask him where he goes to school, offering up several possibilities, and Jack confuses them when he acknowledges that attends Hillel Academy, a private Jewish school. Eventually, the two gangsters convince Jack that he’s “a long way from St. Patrick’s”—-where he’d have better luck finding those Irish Mythology books—-and learn that Jack really attends Collegium Caine. Oops. 7-8 February 2002. Robbers knocking over the Chung Muhl Market get more than they bargained for when a man with no face trashes them and the store’s main window. The Checkerheads are baffled as to whether to call this an unregistered-superhero crime, as they have no idea whether having no face constitutes a metahuman mutation—-an accident of birth—-rather than a mask. One of the Checkerheads empties the register while no one is looking—-well, almost no one. Vic Charlton snaps photos and makes the Checkerhead a prime feature of his “You Know I’m Right” commentary on KRGO’s Good Morning, Ravensgate. For all his agitation on behalf of the unlicensed superheroes “The Doe Family,” against the registered-superhero law, and for a “Vote The Bastards Out!” recall campaign, Vic Charlton is one of the least popular people in town. Crank death-threat calls, fake bomb threats, angry advertisers and some nut-case mailing Boraxo powder prompt Morrie Rosenklein, KRGO UPN-11 General Manager, to ask Vic to take two weeks off. James Smithson, a retired homicide cop, contacts Charlton to arrange a meeting. Since Smithson used a cellular or cordless phone, Charlton decides to meet the man as the no-faced vigilante Tabula Rasa. Convincing Smithson that he’s a friend of Charlton’s, Tabula Rasa gains entry to Smithson’s boat. Below deck, Smithson shows Charlton a data disk he found in the rubble of an apartment building where Romanyi, the late sorceress on the original Team Hyperion, lived just before Hyperion’s plane exploded. Smithson says the disk incriminates vast segments of the local police force and the local-industrialist Throckmorton clan, just before some mysterious gunmen interrupt. They tie up Tabula Rasa and Smithson, but the no-faced vigilante breaks free. Smithson and two of the gunmen are killed in the struggle, then another gunman blows up the boat. Tabula Rasa leaps off the boat before the explosion but struggles in vain against the chilly Pacific waters. |
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