A Good Time to Disappear

Two weeks passed. With the involvement of the city of New York into the Cosmos case a relocation seemed best. Bliss and Ashley went their separate ways, but planned on meeting up in a small town in Nebraska. Only thirty minutes to the north Bliss had spent her teenage years learning about people who suck. They did in fact suck Bliss concluded, now older and wiser. Bruises and cuts faded and only left small traces that they ever happened. At worst it appeared that Bliss underwent a rather poor climbing expedition. She took out a tube of cream and applied it to the large scar that marked the middle of her arm. This scar would stay with her for sometime.

Winter faded into memory under the heat of the mid-western sun. Sitting in a little diner off the interstate, Bliss redialed a number into her phone. Digital tones sounded against her ear fro thirty seconds, but nothing came. She didn't answer again. Bliss thought to herself placing the phone in the pocket of the gray vest she wore over a button-up, white-collared shirt. Making a quick sweep of her skirt seemed necessary after moving against the faux leather; her right leg moved over the left elevating the black boot above the dirt ridden floor. She conjured a compact from her hand bag and looked over her face to make sure her make-up stayed in place with the heat baring down on her. Sweat did not come from the heat though; an empty plate sat in front of Bliss. She finished close to an hour ago, and that calculation came without the wait to get the food.

Ashley was late, almost two hours late. A lump sat in Bliss' stomach, while a bead of sweat ran down her brow.

Archie walked into the restaurant with the Abnormals in tow, though he wasn’t sure this restaurant in Nebraska would even allow him through the door since literally no other place had but he figured he ‘d take the chance. They had been walking for hours since they crashed their bus and unlike his companions Archie was capable of becoming exhausted, and he was doing just that. “Bones, please stay here and allow me to do the talking this time” he instructed the skeleton and walked up to the obnoxious looking tall, balding man staring at him from behind some sort of podium. “Hello, sir. I am Professor Archibald Adams and these are my friends, The Abnormals; perhaps you have heard of us? Anyway, my friends and I have crashed our vehicle and are in need of assistance. Would you be so kind as to allow us the use of your phone, Robert?” Archie flashed him what was probably a smile… his winning smile. The man, whose name tag read Robert, stared at the well-dressed gorilla with the same wide eyed expression as the rest of the restaurant before answering him, “First of all, it’s Ro-bare. Second, phone is for paying customers only… company policy.” Robert had a bit of venom in his voice Archie wondered if it was always there or if it was reserved for freaks like him. “Well then, Ro-bare, prepare a table for my friends and I. You'll find I have quite the appetite.” His smile was gone but his voice was the same happy pitch though the fact that he was annoyed probably seeped through. “I’m sorry but..” Robert shook his head, “we don’t allow animals in the restaurant, company policy.”

Archibald could feel anger welling up in his chest, but he didn’t want to cause any more of a scene. He gritted his teeth and managed a “very well then” before turning around to face his teammates. They had only been together for six months but they already felt like a family… they drove each other absolutely crazy.

"...because apparently some people can't fucking drive," a feminine, crass, and slightly synthesized voice groused loudly as its owner breezed through the restaurant doors.

The gray metallic frame of the team's magic-powered robot entered the restaurant with plodding foot steps, the glowing baby blue of her optics scanning over the interior of the dining space with lazy doubt. Her right hand absently rubbed a spot near her rear where a good sized chunk of metal had poked her when their vehicle had crashed. Considering the size of the dent, which made her ass take on the general shape of a croissant, it shouldn't surprise anyone that it had hurt immensely, and considering her personality, which anyone could get the general feel for within five minutes of being introduced, she was still complaining about it. And if anyone told her it was her fault the thing crashed in the first place, she'd tell them where they could file a complaint and what to do with themselves afterward.

Pausing mid-rant, she raised her left hand which held tightly the map she'd been looking at to help the group navigate this wild, backwater terrain.

"This diner isn't on the map," she stated grumpily, still not taking into consideration the patrons seated around her. Of course, the diner wouldn't be on the map since it was a map of Nebraska's highway system, but she still thought to point that out just to nudge their group leader back out of the stuffy eatery. Subtlety wasn't her strong suit, though. "We should leave, Arch - "

Rockback stopped and watched with some astonishment the audacity with which the little 'Row Bear' was speaking to the Boss Monkey. Just looking at the guy, just hearing his haughty tone, made her circuits tingle with something like disgust. He was one of Those people.

When Archie turned towards the group not having attained the help he needed, then, all Rockback could do was throw her arms up and ask, "What the hell? You're just gonna walk out of here?" She shook her head in defiance. "No. Let me talk some sense into him."

She started to march forward, unhurried but stiff in her taken offense.

Bones had trouble keeping a straight face. Firstly, he didn’t have the muscles for it, since he had decayed quite a lot since the 1930s. But secondly, something inside of him was filled to the brim with laughter. His funny bone had been officially tickled. It began soon after the “Abnormal Bus” had been crashed when the upstart Robot had tried to wrestle the controls from Archibald, who had been driving at the time. There was a brief and violent struggle before the bus ended up in a ditch, but Frankie had been lucky enough to flex his shield before being tossed about like a rag doll. He ended up in Archie’s lap which was lucky, because the big boned ape had cushioned his fall when the bus had ended up at 90 degrees.

Since then, he had been chuckling away, even as he cut his way through the side of the armoured vehicle. He had been giggling as he walked along the back roads, not even stopping when the pickup trucks refused to slow down to pick up the weirdo group. He had been laughing outside of each different restaurant that refused to serve them simply because they were Abnormal. He supposed to the robot he looked like he was suffering some sort of nervous breakdown from all the times he just stood there with his shaking shoulder blades and bouncing skull.

What did he find so funny? The answer Rockback had given when scalded by Archie about her carelessness. She had presented him a map of a completely wrong place. Since then, his skull had been chattering away with the giggles.

That all seemed to go south when stood outside of a fancy up turned restaurant. Rockback seemed completely uncomfortable stood outside with a creature that couldn’t even talk to her, so she muttered something and lumbered inside. Frankie waited for a moment, before he glanced over to the left and followed after her. It wasn’t want one of their best ideas. The entire place had fallen silent and watched with surprised eyes as an ape, a robot and a skeleton all wandered in off the street. And that’s when he heard a snooty no good bastard say, “We don’t allow animals in the restaurant, company policy.”

“Very well then.”

Frankie stopped smiling, which seemed to make his permanent grin even more eerie. Bones slowly glanced over to the big robot to his left, lumbering at a good 500lbs. She wouldn’t take this well. Right now, he wanted to punch the pretentious little man out, but he knew Archibald wouldn’t like that. However, Nuts & Bolts wasn’t going to take it lying down.

"What the hell? You're just gonna walk out of here?" Frankie lifted a bone hand and covered the empty sockets of his eyes, hoping to god that she wouldn’t do something stupid, that the very least she could do was call him a rude name, flip him off and then storm out, breaking the door in the process. And of course, she didn’t. "No. Let me talk some sense into him."

Okay, so now would be a good time to step up. Bones moved in front of the big lumbering robot and waved his hands back and forth while shaking his head, walking backwards to the podium. ”Archie! Tell the toaster that is a bad idea. A very bad idea.” As he talked, he shook his head to try and communicate the level of dislike he had for what she was about to do. It was a shame that she couldn’t hear him, however, because of some stupid magic mumbo jumbo, because if she had heard him call her a toaster he would be the one about to be pummelled.

"Get ya dessert, hun?" Refusing a moment or reflection to Bliss a middle aged waitress walked up. "Or a check." Bliss looked around the diner and saw several unoccupied booths, and no great influx of new comers to the diner. "Its about to be the busy time."

"I'll take a check." With no intention of using the money she lacked, Bliss levitated the waitresses tip money out of her pouch and into her hand as she turned and walked away. Out of the quaint silence of the diner came a ruckus of abnormal stature. While counting out fifteen dollars to cover her keep, Bliss turned her head to see the posse that entered the diner. The situation definitely dampened the already slow pace of the lazy community.

The audacity of a skeleton, a gorilla man, and a robot, could detract from the thoughts on Bliss's mind away from the pressing manner at hand.

"Place gets weirder than a California hair salon." The bill slid before Bliss with the total circled. She slid a twenty to the waitress and stepped out of the booth.

"Keep the change." Not the most gracious of tippers, but with the family she came from generosity never payed well. Linoleum tiles echoed against the heel to toe stride of her boot. "I've got a phone you can use." The group seemed oblivious enough that a good deed would put them on their way. A five dollar tip and the offering of her phone to those in need, she felt as though sainthood might one day adorn her. "We can take this meeting somewhere more inviting." With a slight flick of her wrist and a turned back to the host, Bliss levitated the phone to her hand and presented it to Bones. "Dial the number for your gorilla friend; I don't trust him to keep the phone in one piece while punching in a number."

”Archie! Tell the toaster that is a bad idea. A very bad idea.”

The gorilla looked at the skeleton and opened his mouth to him not to call their robot friend a toaster but decided against it, waste of energy he thought and instead turned to Rockback. “Let you talk some sense into him?” his voice was a low growl through gritted teeth. He raised his arm to halt her, “The very idea of you talking sense into anyone is hard to imagine.”

He didn’t mean to vent his frustration onto her the way he was, even if it was her who got them into this mess in the first place. Archibald wasn’t normally so easily upset, but this was the fourth establishment that turned them away since Rockback totaled the bus outside of town. Didn’t any of these people realize they were HEROES? That they were out there protecting them at risk to themselves? They sure had a funny way of showing it if they did.

This had been one of the longer days in Archie’s life and it was really taking its toll on him mentally. He just wanted it to be over but he had to find a way to get a hold of the rest of the team first. He mentally cursed the cellphone carrier who designed the team’s communicators, “They work in the heart of the rain forest and in the middle of the desert but oh no, no signal in Nebraska” he muttered under his breath. He’d have to remember to give customer service a piece of his mind once they made it home. “Let’s go, Abnormals… we’re clearly not wanted here.” Archie hung his head as he continued to the door when he heard a woman’s voice call out from behind him.

"I've got a phone you can use."

This brought the smile back to his face, “Ah, finally a decent person in this godforsake… Hey!” she didn’t trust a cute cuddly zoo animal to use the phone but apparently wasn’t bothered by Bones. She was right not to trust him though. Aside from the Abnormal communicators, which weren’t exactly phones, there wasn’t a cellphone around that lasted very long once he got his hands on it. Archibald shrugged and flashed her the same “winning smile” he had flashed Ro-Bare a minute earlier, “The Abnormals owe you a debt of gratitude, Miss.”

“Let you talk some sense into him?” his voice was a low growl through gritted teeth. He raised his arm to halt her, “The very idea of you talking sense into anyone is hard to imagine.”

Rockback stopped before she even got near the counter, taken aback at Archie's growly tone and surprised at the flurry of activity from Bones, who was apparently trying to get her to stop.

"Alright, alright. I wasn't going to crush his skull or anything, damn," she protested, crossing her arms and facing the door again before the nasty look on Row Bear's face made her do something stupid.

Her optics fell back to the skeleton man, who she liked but didn't exactly know too well. Or at least, she thought she didn't, because she couldn't hear him. It had something to do with him being all voodoo and her having mechanical ears. It lead to some misunderstandings. Like, for instance, she could never tell if he was happy or sad or when he was joking around. Of course, it'd be easier if he had an actual face, even without the voice, but who was she to complain. They all had their quirks as a side effect of their magicalness.

To be honest, she was worried about him. Since the crash, he'd been shivering a lot, with his teeth chattering loudly, and sometimes he'd double over, like he was laughing, but she thought he was hugging himself. So, she came to the conclusion that despite the hot weather, he was cold, which made sense to her because he was literally skin and bo - no, just bones. But now, since Row Bear spoke up, he looked fine. As soon as she could, she'd get him a blanket.

“Let’s go, Abnormals… we’re clearly not wanted here.” Archie hung his head as he continued to the door when he heard a woman’s voice call out from behind him.

As Archie finished his final attempt on his communicator and called for the team to leave, some woman walked up offering her phone. She looked... Meh. She couldn't pass judgment on anyone she didn't know, now could she?

"Finally!" she yelled loudly into the diner. "Somebody with some goodness. All the fucking work we do to keep people safe and we can't get any help ourselves. What a world, gentlemen!"

Seeing as the lady wanted to take their phone call somewhere else, which Rockback thought was ridiculous (shouldn't they stay here and inconvenience the dude a little longer? Just for kicks?), she turned and exited the diner, returning to the sweltering heat. She kicked on her built-in A/C and rubbed her ass again, grumbling over discrimination against heroes that didn't conform to society's expected ideal of what a hero should be. Wasn't America about standing out? About being unique and pushing for independence and crap? This was bullshit...

Bones was a moment from lunging over the podium, grabbing the French guy and running for the hills until Rockie calmed down when he heard something that would have put a couple of shivers up his spine if he still had a libido. Frankie was always a sucker for a woman in heels and the one before him was pretty. He smiled at her and was about to slide out his good charms when he suddenly remembered that he was a goddamn decomposed corpse. "I've got a phone you can use." Bones threw his hands up into the air and almost yelled hallelujah. Being a part of this team had its upsides now and then, but the level of hostility that got just by wandering around was surprising. He watched the attractive woman seemingly levitate a mobile phone from one of her pokets into her hand, which surprised him, before she presented it to Frankie. "Dial the number for your gorilla friend; I don't trust him to keep the phone in one piece while punching in a number."

Bones, however, burst into another fit of barely suppressed laughter when Archie scalded the Robot. Really, the level of ridiculousness about them was something to be marvelled at. They could start up their own damn Circus. He wandered briefly what kept the bunch of them together before realising that it was the fact they didn’t fit anywhere else. The laughter died in his “throat” and he was left limply holding the mobile phone. As Archie said thank you, Bones carefully tapped the tip of his gloved hand against his teeth, forgetting that you can’t lick a finger without a tongue or a finger and began to stick in the number Archie needed.

He chuckled again, when Rockback exclaimed, "Alright, alright. I wasn't going to crush his skull or anything, damn," It wasn’t hard to feel slightly nervous around the big girl. She was abrasive in a good kind of way, with a big mouth and bigger ego. The 500lbs of machinery that whirred away inside of her was something to be frightened of, however. One trip and Bones could be skipping around he Astral Plane within minutes. "Finally!" She exclaimed quite loudly, almost shaking the teeth from Frankie’s jaw. "Somebody with some goodness. All the fucking work we do to keep people safe and we can't get any help ourselves. What a world, gentlemen!” As she stormed out of the diner Bones laughed again, this time loudly, glancing over at Archie.

”I goddamn love that machine.”

He continued to giggle while finally punching the call button on the phone and leant over towards Archie, pressing the tiny thing against his big hairy face while he did it. He heard Aurora say something in his soft little voice and he glanced back, smiling warmly at her as the phone call was made. He always liked her. She was a cool kind of girl, and he supposedly felt that she was a little sister of the group, if Archie and Bones were the parents.

Wait. No. That’s not right.

The calamity of the situation almost made Bliss regret her hospitality towards the assortment of misfits. The large robot mouthed off threats and abrasiveness while the dryad appeared to calm the group with her soothing ways. Even Bliss began to feel the effects of her sweet voice. Maybe helping these misfits was not such a bad idea, but she could not determine whether the skeleton wanted to hit on her or shivered because he lacked skin. Either way Bliss tried to put the group into their respective places within the group. "Whatever." She dismissed from her mouth to the situation of everything around her. She stepped out the door and tried to get a view of the highway. Nothing was moving.

Bliss let out a sigh and looked back to the group of miscreants and gave a small closed smile, while she waited for her phone.

(2 hours earlier)
The weather in Nebraska seemed calm against the never ending sky. Ashley walked out of a small convenience store and lifted her sunglasses on top of her head, pulling her hair back. I can't believe Bliss grew up here. The quiet life and lack of any life at all perplexed her. She ate a chip out of the bag in front of her while making her trek back to her BMW. She wiped her hand against the denim of her jeans. It seemed an easier sacrifice than the gray half sleeve shirt.

She pressed her thumb to the ignition and started up the car. The BMW pulled out and back onto the highway. In about fifteen minutes she would meet up with Bliss, and then they could get out of God-forsaken Nebraska. Bliss would probably come in late anyways, so a call hardly seemed in order. Speed picked up to a few miles over the speed limit, while the small town grew smaller and smaller in her rear view.

(Dante has God mode permission in the next post since I planned on Ashley being off screen and needed to bring the events up to speed. So enjoy...)

(2 hours ago)

In an instant, Ashley's car was smashed by an unknown spear-like projection. The sheer force of the blow caused the car to fly into the boundless plains to which no one could see or hear what was going on. The car tumbled and rolled along the ground, bouncing up and down until it managed to stop. It was a miracle that Ashley actually survived it, but to walk out of the wreckage was yet another miracle. However, once she emerged from the unstable wreckage, she was greeted by a large figure, one with massive horns, and a basic shape that has been told over thousands of years.

"No way" Ashley looked as the dark figure approached, it was what many mythologists speak of many times over their lives, a creature that struck fear into the hearts of the people it tormented. Before Ashley was the Minotaur, the ancient beast of the Labyrinth.

The Minotaur was surrounded by a large assortment of strange looking creatures, though their shape was human, their appearance was not. They converged around Ashley, it was then that the Minotaur reached out towards her, she would fight back, but the accident had caused her too many injuries.

"Drakontas wants you" The Minotaur said in a voice that made it obvious that he had a hard time speaking. However, it was also obvious that the Minotaur meant business.

"No fucking way" Ashley repeated to herself, she watched helpless to the Minotaur's advance, until a sharp pain came to her body and her world went black...

(Present time)

Dante walked into the small diner, his presence not hard to miss due to his massive armor that surrounded his body. However, the attention of all the people wasn't what Dante was after, he was after the attention of the small Japanese girl known as Bliss. His shades stood behind him, holding back the creatures of the Path of Hungry Ghosts. Dante looked at Bliss, her reflection glaring off his dark armor

"Are you Bliss?" Drakontas asked Bliss, he knew the question was rhetorical, but out of manners he asked anyway.

Aurora’s childlike optimism always cheered Archie up. She still had much to learn about humanity, but Archie almost wanted her not to learn any more than she knew now. He didn’t want people’s ugliness to taint her personality. Archie knew how people could be long before his transformation. The gift of his intelligence had made him an outcast growing up and becoming an ape certainly didn’t make him fit in any better. Despite that, Archie obviously still loved and had hope for humanity as a whole other wise he wouldn’t be running this group of magical abnormalities around protecting it.


Archibald listened to the tone of the phone ringing; he was relieved to finally be getting ahold Maxwell, the team’s awkward magician, who would hopefully send them help. Come on, Maxwell… Don’t tell me you’re afraid of phones too. Apparently he was, Archie was greeted by his voice on the Abnormals answering machine. “Hello, you have reached The Abnormals! Unfortunately we are unable to take your call at this-“Archie pawed the phone away from Bones and carefully hung it up. He looked to Bliss, “Miss, you wouldn’t happen to know the number of a cab company capable of handling people like us, would you?” He hoped he wasn’t interrupting anything between her and the strangely dressed newcomer; this guy made the Abnormals look almost normal. He wasn’t sure if it was the clothes or his tone of voice or what, but there was something about the man that gave Archie the chills.

"See, there is kindness even here," her lips twitched. She always stressed there was some kindness everywhere though not all the time she thought they believed her.

"Yeah, I know," Rockback replied to the dryad with some fashion of annoyance. Her hard feelings weren't directed at the small wood spirit, though. They were simply directed at pretty much everything all at once, perhaps Fate or Life in general. She didn't care which, since her thoughts were generally not so philosophical as to think about those things, but she mentally hurled curses at it all anyway as she was wont to do in these situations.

Straightening, she placed her large hands over her hips.

"Seriously," she began, facing the diner with something like bored aggravation on her face. "Is this going to take long? I thought we had somewhere to - "

She stopped as she detected a strange presence to her right. Stepping aside from the path in front of the doorway, she watched as a tall suit of black, mirror like armor walked past her and into the diner. She stared.

"Who the f - What's he want?" She asked softly, not addressing anyone in particular. Her tone took a sharp turn towards suspicious. There were no good vibes coming from this strange man, if it was a man at all. And he had these minions with him. Definitely magic, this guy. And Christ, he was covered in heavy, reflective armor. The outside was so shiny it was mirror-like, and the thick material made him look large and intimidating and spiky. Then the polite tone just sounded really at odds with the assembly. Rockback's conclusion? He was overcompensating for something.

Still, that didn't mean he wasn't dangerous, and she stepped forward into the doorway of the diner, subconsciously shielding the dryad next to her and sealing off the man's main exit. She watched his interest in the helpful girl, Bliss, closely.

"He hit about a 6 on my Creepometer just now," she noted in a loud and unsubtle whisper to her teammates.

Bones stood tapping one of his shoes, the black shining leather now dulled with dust and mud from the roads of Nebraska. He was getting sick of how his clean cut suits were getting dirtied whenever he stepped out of any car. Bones glanced at the Gorilla as he stood anxiously listening to the little phone in his hand. It was weird to him how such a little thing could have replaced the big clunky things that Frankie only saw in his childhood. The world had changed so much while he had been haunting a backwater mob safe-house. Towers along every horizon had sprouted up like grass and they had become shining beacons of light during the night. Car’s had changed, women had changed, fashions had changed. It really made him feel old when he thought about stuff like that, so he tried to ignore it and listened out for Maxie’s voice on the other end of the phone.

No luck, apparently, because Archie carefully pawed the thing out of his hand with one of his big... paws. Bones didn’t try and stop him, however, because you don’t try and stop a 490lb Gorilla from doing anything.

And then the door opened, which made Bones glance instinctively towards the sound. And in walked what looked like... Well. Things had changed, but Bones could still tell when a guy walking into a place intended to do something stupid or bad. He had picked up the instincts from his early years in the Mob, when noticing a man walking in with a violin case containing something not meant to be played was the difference between life and death. Also, the crowd of shady evil looking creatures seemed to speak a couple of volumes about the dude, as did the costume.

Though to be fair, he was judging a book by its cover.

“Miss, you wouldn’t happen to know the number of a cab company capable of handling people like us, would you?” Bones stopped from groaning in embarrassment as he reached forward and gentle tapped the big-ape on his shoulder. Sometimes Archie could be a little bit dumb when it came to things like this. Carefully, Bones tried to tug him back from the guy and his gang of... Shadow monster things. His other hand carefully moved up his body, to slip under the jacket he was wearing. The hilt of the Mauser slipped into his gloved hand.

And then Rockie came back in, lumbering through the door and glaring at the back of the guy’s head. She said something about a creep-o-metre and Bones smiled absentmindedly as the little Dryad slipped behind his back and agreed. In his skull, he was already figuring an attack out. Firstly, the crowd control might be difficult. They looked to be... Maybe... Magical constructs? Or other worldy things. So that means that Rockback, with her magic sword and shield, could carve up a few of them while Bones threw about his energy shots. That would leave Archie and Terra to try and stop the creep, with the woman named Bliss helping them...

Bones glanced at her, wondering what had caused a guy like that to come tramping in.