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Trace Tanner sidestepped a group of people who were obviously not paying attention to where they were going. It was a fairly busy day at the Law Enforcement Officer’s Expo and there was lots to see. Trace had been on the offending end of the trampling more than once today. Especially that time with the booth babe from the Taser company had smiled and winked at him. He’d nearly walked straight through a booth that snuck up in front of him. That had been a bit embarrassing.


He walked along, browsing the booths and inspecting the fares. He stopped by the Smith & Wesson booth and looked at their wares. He decided that he’d requisition an M&P 9 the next time he was back at HQ. The weapon just seemed to be a good fit for him and he figured it might make his life easier in the future. Plus, it didn’t have a safety, which was good for a fast reaction situation. A government agent like himself might end up in a situation such as that.


After leaving the booth, Trace stopped and nearly fell to the ground. He staggered and caught himself on a nearby table, placing a hand down to keep himself upright. The source of his disorientation was a massive (and sudden) splitting headache that overtook him very quickly. This was the second time today that this had happened. It was starting to become alarming. He wasn’t overly used to pain such as this, but it had happened one other time, when he’d tried to make 30 time bubbles in a row. That hadn’t been a great day. He’d ruined his favorite pair of Converse by vomiting on them. That was unfortunate.

Steadying himself, Trace stood back up and looked at the girl who had been sitting at the table. She’d jumped up when she’d seen a man stagger over and look like he was going to vomit all over the place, a good move by anyone’s estimation. ”Sorry about that. Horrible headache… he explained, as if that made the situation any better. He slowly walked away, looking for a water fountain.

This day was going to be a doozy for some reason, and Trace wasn’t quite sure why.

The Brooklyn Expo Center hosted many events including a wonderful Coffee and Tea expo that Trace had been given passes to. He’d taken a date and shortly realized that there really was only so much you could talk about at a place boasting hundreds different kinds of coffee and teas. Plus, after that many samples of coffee, he was practically vibrating through the walls of the building. But, at least he knew his way around the place a bit and was able to locate a drinking fountain nearby.

With heavy feeling limbs, Trace staggered over to the fountain and depressed the push bar, bringing water forth from the spout. He leaned down to drink, the cool water splashing more on his face than getting into his mouth. I may need to go see a doctor… he thought to himself as the water washed away some of his fatigue. He was in a pretty interesting position at the moment and it would be unfortunate for someone to stumble upon him.

Oh, so outright hostility and purposeful neglect of a joke was going to be how it was? That was not a good turn of events for Trace. He usually did best when people were willing to accept his humor and not think that he was being a smarmy phallic object.

Not that he wasn’t a smarmy phallic object. He just didn’t like people to realize it at their first meeting. But, Trace was also pretty good at working with what he was given and that just happened to be an all too serious psychic that could probably turn his brain to goo. The man was currently, at the least, making him see what he thought were dead people, so that meant that he was already affecting him. Hopefully that didn’t progress to the goo-forming stage.

“I hope my friends were hospitable to you on your way up. Either way, I’ll bet you’re having a much better time than your friend you left at the ferry.” That didn’t sound good. Trace stopped and listened in the direction of the dock. He thought he heard some faint screams coming. Apparently, his ferry pilot was not enjoying his visit very much either. “Well, That one—“ he pointed at the all to handsy spirit Dan— “Needs the personal space talk again.”

“Who are you, and what do you want?” Okay, down to the point.

” Well, my name is Trace Tanner. I’m here on behalf of my organization. We work towards the greater good, keeping innocent people safe. We’re always on the lookout for people that fit well into our organization and that are able to help us.” he said, gesturing to the side “If these guys are any indication of what you can do, your powers could be put to a lot of good, Mr. –“ Trace trailed off, leaving a gap for the psychic to insert his name.

Trace started to notice that something wasn’t quite right when two more forms just appeared around the other two that were there before. As in, not physically present. As in, they hadn’t been there! This mission was suddenly seeming to be out of his depth. What the hell? Were they standing in a single file line to conceal their numbers? Was that really a moon? Did size really matter not?

Star Trek references aside, it was becoming clear that something was quite off about this situation. Trace was aware that the subject of this visit was recruiting a powerful psychic mutant to SUPER. Was the mutant making him see things that weren’t there? Had he even actually made it to the island? Was he drowning in the sound? Was he eating his left shoe?

Looking down, he noticed that he did have his left shoe on his foot. Which was a good start. And he couldn’t really perceive that anything odd was going on or that reality was being changed. He held his hand up in front of his face and it looked normal. So, these things in front of him might have been some kind of psychic constructs. That made sense.

“What could you possibly have to say that would be of interest to anyone here?” One of the new shapes said. “Well, I have lots of things to say. I’m not sure if anyone will be interested in them or not, but I’m really more of a face-to-face kind of guy. I don’t mean anyone any harm here.” Trace said, trying to sound genuine. He actually was genuine, but his nerves had him so on edge that he was having trouble controlling his tone. Something about the situation was causing him to have a major case of the heebie jeebies and he was not sure what it was.

The second new shape acquiesced and said that Trace could follow them to where they wanted to lead him. That seemed odd. What if they led him to a cliffside and over? That seemed very suspicious. Come play with us, Danny. Forever.

Trace stopped walking altogether. The island. The history. The millions of poor departed souls that surrounded him. The shapes appearing. The mist. It all clicked into place in a crystalizing-ly horrifying moment that made Trace want to stop and shout “I see dead people!” at the top of his lungs. The next word out of Trace’s mouth was a very, very impolite word to say at the final resting place of a human. “Y-You guys don’t happen to be dead people, do you?” he asked, trying to sound nonchalant. How exactly were you supposed to broach the topic of mortality with a spirit again?

Now there was no choice but to keep walking. He didn’t want it to be awkward with the dearly departed, now did he?

Trace Tanner stood on the deck of a ferry slowly chugging its way across the Long Island Sound. The wind blowing off the water was cool and nearly clammy on a dreary May day. He wasn’t exactly happy about the duty he was performing. He’d made a few of the higher ups in SUPER a little unhappy with his antics with Constable Barbie (that half a block of New York was going downhill anyway) so he’d been assigned to a recruitment mission that was taking him to Hart Island.

Hart Island was a small island that was nearly dead center in the Long Island Sound. The dossier for the mission had detailed the island’s history and it wasn’t a particularly bright one. The island had been home to several different organizations. Recalling the details, Trace recounted that the island was a prisoner of war camp, a psychiatric institution, a tuberculosis sanatorium and it held the largest Potter’s Field in the world.

Trace initially didn’t know what a Potter’s Field was; he’d thought it might have been an old-time site where pottery was made or some kind of manufactory. It was not. A Potter’s Field was a place where lost, disenfranchised and unwanted souls were lain to rest. New York state had operated the cemetery with the efficiency gifted those that didn’t quite find their place in society: stacked in boxes, in mass graves.

It really wasn’t the city’s fault; what were they supposed to do? But it left Trace feeling uneasy and a bit empty inside as the ferry moved towards the island. The island also held the bodies of some people dubbed enemies of the state. Those individuals had even the most basic rights stripped from them. They weren’t even afforded a decent burial. Unfortunately, many of them were mutants. The world had seen some troubled times as far as they were concerned.

Trace was never quite sure how he fit into the whole issue. He was a mutant working for a government that had oppressed, murdered and mistreated a group of people that he had belonged to. His direct job was to suppress mutants that the government saw as a threat. And these people were a threat. Trace had seen mutants with powers that could take out city blocks and end the lives of thousands with minimal effort.

Trace viewed it all as a police effort. Serve and protect. Help the people that couldn’t help themselves. It was a noble cause and SUPER served that purpose incredibly well. Trace was still pretty new to the team, but it really seemed like it was on the up-and-up. But the word on the street was pretty negative surrounding SUPER. There were rumors floating around about people disappearing in the night, people showing up crazy from having been tortured. But there wasn’t ever any confirmation of these events and there were always rumors about the government doing these kinds of things.

Trace had received a special permit for the ferry ride out to Hart Island today because he needed to make sure that he was alone. Recruitments for SUPER were always kind of dicey; the unseemly reputation of the organization preceded them anywhere they went and Trace was not going to endanger civilians on this trip. The ferry approached the dock and Trace waited for the ship to tie off. He’d contacted another member on SUPER’s roster to pilot the ferry. His instructions were to wait at the dock and keep the motor running in case things got hot.

Trace didn’t even know who the individual he was recruiting was. The file said, ‘suspected psychic’, listed the location as Hart Island and mentioned that previous attempts at contact were unsuccessful. He’d really pissed someone off with his shenanigans.

Hopping off the boat and onto the dock, Trace felt his hand drift to his sidearm. He had a habit of checking to make sure it was still there, as if it could walk away of its own volition. With the slightly misty, overcast weather, Trace felt as though it could. He couldn’t shake the feeling that he was being watched. Trace turned back to the SUPER grunt that he’d tagged for a ferry pilot “Keep the boat running but don’t call for backup unless I tell you to.” He ordered, proceeding along the dirt road ahead.

He’d covered a pretty decent amount of distance and began to approach a structure that looked as if it had been abandoned for decades. It might have been the remains of the old reform school that was located on the island. I mean, what a better place to take troubled boys than an island chock full of dead bodies to make them get their act together?



As he approached the building, he called out to the emptiness “Hello? Is there anyone there?”

"I work out" Trace rolled his eyes. Right. And milk really did make you grow big and strong. Spinach could give you super strength. Four rounds of lather, rinse, repeat could make you a super model.

The next reply illuminated the truth a bit further. Rianne explained that her power, essentially, was to adapt to the need that was presented her. That was pretty cool. From her description, that power applied to not only her physical strength but all of her physical senses also. That really could make her the perfect operative.

Surveying the scene, Trace thought about the entire situation. It had gone out of hand fairly quickly and because of that, he'd probably strained his purview a bit as far as SUPER was concerned. From the ESU response, it was evident that Rianne wasn't a normal officer, which meant that he was really lucky. Certain police entities had requisite knowledge of SUPER, but as illustrated by Rianne's statement, they didn't know the full picture.

"Well... We're the good guys." Trace said, simply. And for the most part, it was true. There were aspects of the organization that Trace was unsure about. He'd heard rumors of things that couldn't precisely be called good, but the overall direction of SUPER had the overall good of society at heart. Some threats needed to be dealt with and keeping an eye on those threats was a noble cause. "We keep the public safe and keep an eye on threats. I can't get much more into it." He said, knowing the explanation was a bit bare.

"Look, to get you further information, I'll give you this." he extended a business card "That's contact information for our version of HR. Give them a call. I'll let them know you might be in contact." He explained.

Trace released the shotgun as Rianne reached over and took it out of his hands. He wasn't offended or anything; he'd just hit three targets with impeccable aim and had executed their on-the-fly plan to perfection, but why would he be able to hit a target that was standing completely still? Of course, there was the little matter of not being able to see the target he was shooting at, but he could fire blindly into the cloud just as easily as she could!

Only, she hit the mutant pretty solidly. Trace heard the guy cry out. It sounded like he was moving. Rianne then sighted the shotgun again and fired several times in succession. It seemed to Trace like every shot was a hit. Super vision!? what else was she capable of?!

Suddenly Rianne was dropping the shotgun and had her SIG out. She motioned for Trace to follow her, and after that impressive display of shooting, he figured she knew exactly where she was going. He pulled his sidearm back out and followed, providing cover as they moved.

As they approached, Trace noticed a form on the ground. It was still and unmoving. There were no visible wounds that he could see, but visibility was still somewhat reduced because of the dissipating cloud from the fire extinguishers. Trace aimed his weapon at the unmoving figure and said "I'm going to check him..."

Trace knelt down next to the man's form and checked his pulse. It was there, but it was fairly faint. The man appeared to be unconscious, but Trace wouldn't trust that as far as he could throw him. Reaching down, Trace slipped a pair of handcuffs out of a pocket an secured them on the guy's wrists. He then took out his chip gun and injected the chip into the guy's arm.

"He's out cold..." Trace reported, stepping back from the mutant. "I'm guessing it was a bit too much for his system to handle. He probably redirected all the energy he could from the pellets. It probably overloaded him." He said stepping back from the man. "HQ is going to have kittens over this one..." He said, looking around the scene.