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Sylvia tries to put her shoulder behind the effort to take care of Hamilton.  He messed with her girls.  And she likes this squad.

She puts out the call to arms over the Usual Suspects' cell phones, letting them know in a flurry of messages that she needs to talk to Colin, for one--

news room plz

--and that anyone who wants to cram in and have their say is welcome.

want to turn H over to police

need to find med help for pep sqd

Sylvia gets a private message back indicating Sammy's willingness to help.

Rhys also replies.

I know Im new here but if u can use me Id b happy to help

Alicia's text is short.

gonna tail Hamilton. lemme know wat the plan is

If this text message takes place between classes during the school day Monday, Sylvia receives an immediate response: 
Laney wandering through the door of the news room with a dazed expression, as if she has no idea how she got here.   She smiles crookedly at Sylvia then slips her hand into her backpack to answer Sylvia's text message.  As her face turns an amusing shade of red, Laney looks up from reading the message and stammers, "Oh. U-umm...H-hi."

If this text message takes place during one of Laney's classes, Sylvia receives a text response after the bell:
brt

If this text message takes place during the lunch period, Sylvia receives no answer.    
Laney merely looks up at John, confusedly wondering what this has to do with visiting the library.  There must be a connection, and her brain begins its strange revolution... She'll show up at the news room, probably with John.

If this text message takes place after school, Sylvia receives no answer.
Laney does not make an appearance.   The reason may be revealed at a later date.

Colin puts down his large backpack and turns to Sylvia.

"How did the girls react to the news?"

Sylvia has her notebook out, and she's already got a little checklist going.  Only superheroes in comic books can keep track of everything they're supposed to do without writing it down, she reasons.

"Calmly," she tells Colin.  "Of course.

"So did you talk to Chris?  Is he going to take it from here?"

"He would like to, but he needs a little more. One of the girls denouncing something happened to her would do. That or us finding something more... evident, I guess."

He sits in front of her.

"Did they manifest something peculiar?"

"Strength.  Invulnerability.  Suddenly John and Jakob aren't the only muscle in town."  And at the mention of Jakob's name Sylvia suddenly looks speculative.  One of the cheerleaders was asking about being set up on a date, and Jakob's a hot property among the athletic set.  If you can't play matchmaker, what good is telepathy?

"We could conduct a systematic search of Hamilton's home and office.  And brain.  We can find out where he stashed the equipment, or the formula--something.  And they never give that Gatorade container a soap-and-water wash.  Maybe there are traces of something in the cooler, still."

[OOC:  ref. Motley's multiple-choice response, did you decide when the message goes out?]

When does Sylvia send out the message? (1d4=1) (http://invisiblecastle.com/roller/view/2034355/)

[The answer is "between classes on Monday."]

Hurray!  Laney's there.

She's curled up in a corner, quietly listening, hugging her backpack to her chest.


Edit:
Oh, but she does murmer, "What did Dave find out about Hamilton?" at the appropriate moment.

Sammy has to come from the other side of the building, so she'll get there after a while.

As she walks through the halls in the general direction of the newsroom, she's crooning along with Frank Sinatra on her iPod.

"Fly me to the moon
Let me play among the stars
Let me see what spring is like
On Jupiter and Mars
In other words, hold my hand
In other words, baby, kiss me ..."

"Sweet summer breeze, whispering trees
Stars shining softly above
Roses in bloom, wafted perfume
Sleepy birds dreaming of love

Safe in your arms, far from alarms
Daylight shall come but in vain
Tenderly press close to my breast
Kiss me, kiss me again"


"...It's perfect for a flying honeymoon, they say
Come fly with me, let's fly, let's fly away

Once I get you up there where the air is rarified
We'll just glide, starry-eyed
Once I get you up there I'll be holding you so near
You may hear angels cheer 'cause we're together..."

Donnie bustles in, muttering curses at his chem homework. "Sorry. Just got bitched out about sloppy organization in my homework. Sloppy? Just organized the way my brain reads it. Ever seen one of my notebooks? I have to write in code in case some enterprising punks steal them and try to use them to rip out my friends' souls again. It's not sloppy, for cripesake. I do something sloppy and I go careening off into space or making myself blind instead of invisible. Bastard."  Donnie realizes he's muttering like a mad scientist and that everyone is staring at him. He pops a cocky smile and waves his finger at his assorted friends "You sly dog! You got me monologuing. I can't believe it. It's cool, huh? Zero-point energy. I save the best inventions for myself. Am I good enough now? Who's super now? I'm Syndrome! Your nemesis!"

He sits in a corner and opens a can of coke.

Sylvia glances up as he enters, listens to the whole spiel, and seems to fight with herself.  Make nice?  Cold shoulder?  Pretend nothing's wrong?

She chooses the coward's way out and gives him a stretched, slightly pained smile.  Then she goes on.  "I haven't heard anything from Dave," she tells Laney.

"Donnie, can you hack Hamilton's machine and look for data pertaining to his experiment?"

"I can try. Give me a couple of days and I can do much better."

He looks blandly at Sylvia.

siiiip.

"So whatever we do, we can't tip him off until Donnie's had a chance to search Hamilton's machines.  We don't want him deleting those files, so everything else has to be one-hundred-percent covert, total MI-5.  If Donnie can't find information on Hamilton's machines, we're going to need a small team, no more than one or two, to break in and find the information.  No fingerprints, no fights.  All we need is evidence."

At least, that's the way Sylvia sees it.  She looks up, eying the attendant faces to see if anyone's got a brighter idea.

Donnie traces a runic symbol in the air, leaving a glittering trail that hangs there for a moment until he swipes his hand through it, shattering it into a cascade of glitter that fades from sight. "Magic. Cheat codes for the laws of physics and reality."

He looks down at his can, pursing his lips as he idily twists it back and forth in his hands.

Rhys rather sheepishly enters just as Sylvia is saying this, gesturing he had trouble finding the room.

"No fingerprints, you say? Not a problem."

He holds up his hand, and it's easy to see as all the lines on his palm vanish - implying that his fingerprints have, also.

"Buddy, I'm beginning to worry about you."


"I'm all for it. Can we also think of a legit way for me to approach him, or even better meet him in his office? I could get some clues that way. Or you think that would tip him off?"

Laney pipes in to answer Colin, though her dark gaze is still fixed on the space before Donnie, "Are you interested in taking AP Chemistry?  I will be.  Next year, I mean.  If I...can.   You could...just...um..."

It's about this time that Sammy comes dancing through the news room door, still singing

"...In other words, hold my hand
In other words, baby, kiss me--"

She fumbles her way to an awkward halt.  Blushing, she sits down right there, next to Donnie.  "So what are we doing?" she whispers to him, trying to catch up.

"Dude, the Incredibles? Pixar? Mr. Incredible and Elastigirl? You need to see more movies." He shakes his head in wonder.


"Just bump into him in the hall. Your powers work on touch, right?"


"The realities of the chemical make-up of the world are not that interesting to me, especially since they can be temporarily rewritten by teenage mages like me for example. It's just a required credit. Thanks though."


"I got caught monologuing like a super villain, Sylvia's playing Charlie to us as Angels. Possibly literally for fingerprintless man over there. I'm gonna haxxor the crap out of Hamilton's computer to see if there are incriminating files, and Colin is worried about me turning to the dark side of the force. That's all I've been here for."

Sammy snickers and whispers back, "ok, thanks."

Sylvia doesn't smile, doesn't even look up from her notebook, as she says, "I'm not Charlie.  Clearly I'm Professor X."

Then she looks up.  "So are we good?  Any other business?"

Donnie looks critically at Sylvia. "I just don't think I coiuld get into the whole my girlfriend-is-the-bald-cheerleader thing."

"Martian Manhunter?" is Sylvia's counteroffer.

"Well, hello Rhys!" Sammy laughs.

Sylvia racks her brain.  "Seer?  From Eagle Force?"

Sammy laughs and gets up to leave.

Sylvia sighs and glances at Laney.  "Hey, wait one second."  She reaches into a desk drawer and pulls out a manilla envelope.  "Could you do me a favor and pick a card, any card?"

The manilla envelope is full of newspaper clippings.

The back of Sammy's hand slides against Donnie's shoulder, almost as if she's looking for something to touch to ground herself.

Sylvia sucks hard against her lower lip until she looks not unlike a cartoon bulldog.  Then she forces a smile for Laney.

Donnie doesn't seem to notice Sylvia's pensiveness, concentrating on his can of coke for all he's worth. "I sincerely hope you don't mutate into a hairless green-skinned telepath. You do have the telepathy and the ability to go invisible. The power to go insubstantial would be pretty sweet. Anyway, I'll brush up on my magicking computers skill again. Just got to remember which notebook it was in.."

Sammy manages to get out, "Seer is pretty."  Her eyes are fixed on the envelope.  She has a vague deer in the headlights aura around her.

"Oh...I meant...as an excuse...to spend time talking to Hamilton.  He's not a guidance counselor, but he has an ego.  If approached the right way, he could be kept talking for...awhile.  If needed.  Sorry.  I thought that's what Colin was asking.  Sorry." 




"Card? I -oh.  Sorry.  Um...S-sure."  She keeps watching Donnie, or rather his coordinates within the room, adjacent objects, contact with certain persons...anything to understand his place within the patterns...and that weird light she saw before.    With an ethereal grace Laney rises from her seat on the floor, reaches out, and delicately plucks a bit of paper from Sylvia's envelope.

She didn't look once at it or at Sylvia.

Sylvia looks at the clipping and mutters, "Thanks," before she tucks the envelope back in the desk drawer.

"So, Angels, we all know what to do.  Good luck, girls."

As soon as the words leave Sylvia's lips, Sammy bolts for the door and is gone.

"Can I be Drew Barrymore? I don't think my chunky butt can be Cameron Diaz. I guess Lucy Lui is playing Charlie?"  He babbles as he watches Sammy zoom out the door and he shakes his head. He steps closer to Sylvia and reaches out tenatively for her hand. "Do you have practice this afternoon? I wanted to show you something.."

Donnie receives an slightly annoyed frown.

"I said 'Buddy'. You lose geek points for not remembering Syndrome's name."


"They do, but they also work much better if I don't hurry them."


Colin is about to say something about that, but he catches himself at the last possible second.


"Uhmph. Cheating can't be as effective if you don't know the rules you're breaking. Often things need only a little push in the right direction."


Colin gives up telling her not to say sorry, and considers what she said.

"Uhmm. Good point there. From simple things about photography, to more complicated stuff about fabrics and sculpture, there's a lot of chemistry that could be applied to art. I could try that."

After Laney makes her choice, he asks Sylvia "What's that?"


"Sorry to repeat myself, but you worry me, Bosley."

Rhys doesn't get the reference, but can't hold himself back from jumping to the wrong conclusions. He morphs into a flesh-and-blood Anime character - huge eyes, huge breasts, barely-there costume.

"Let's go!"

He speaks in that overly-enthusiastic little-girl voice so common in anime. It grates on every nerve...

Sylvia distinctly gets from Colin's direction the image of a huge drop of sweat falling down the back of his head.

[no wonder Sammy ran!]

"D'oh. You're right, I suck."

"Practice was canceled," Sylvia says.  "The squad needed some time to chill out.  I think massive amounts of ice cream and nail polish will be used to fight the effects of evil science."


Sylvia tucks the newspaper article into her notebook.  "Some guy's office got burned down a week or two ago.  Just a side project.  I wanted to see if Laney had a knack for picking things worth investigating."


Sylvia tries to hide her stunned stare by looking off to one side.  When she's recovered, she looks Rhys in his creepy, creepy eyes.  "My therapist will be billing you directly."

Laney looks at Colin.   This might be less unsettling if it were his reflection he sees in her shining eyes, rather than that of Donnie, who is now behind her.

Laney blinks once.  Twice.  The illusion is gone.  She seems to have relaxed, and she rambles in a nonsensical manner:

"No capes.  Office?  That lawyer, right?  Don't worry.  I have the numbers for six programmed in my cell.   There are more lawyers.  Still strange.  If you would like me to go with you after school, I have reason enough to keep him distracted while you do...whatever it is you need.  Fifteen.  Sorry.  I thought John talked to you about experimenting.   It's alright.  If you know the rules, you may feel obliged to follow them."

By the time she's done, Laney's turned and staring in awe at Rhys.
She ammends with no humor in her voice, "I've a list of things I don't discuss with my therapist.   A hinderance, but necessary.   Maybe Rhys should go with you, instead, as one of the girls contaminated.  One from the AP Chem class.  That would hold Hamilton's attention, and he'd give away more.  A lot more."

Rhys, having shifted back to his normal form, replies "Like I said - I'd be happy to help out in any way you need."

"Uhmm... I know I'll regret asking, but... Rhys, where do your clothes go when you change?"

"I don't know the rules," Sylvia says, still bemused by Rhys and dreading the answer to Colin's question.  "And while you're welcome to come along for kicks, I probably won't need help distracting anyone."

Rhys grins.

"Where are they now?"

"No kicks.  Too many factors will complicate things and may raise suspicion.  I only wished to help."

Laney solemnly adds, "You should probably wear clothing when you speak to Hamilton."

Rhys arches one eyebrow but says nothing.

Suddenly alarmed, Laney darts out of the room, mumbling something about being late for class again.

Donnie blinks in sudden understanding. "Dude, are you naked?"

Without the slightest trace of irony, Rhys simply states, "Define 'naked'."

"Oh Jesus." Donnie for some reason is embarrasssed by this and blushes. "Talk about having a dream where you're naked at school.."

He waves as he leaves the newsroom, mumbling about spell formulae under his breath.

Rhys shakes his head and mutters something that sounds like "Americans..." under his breath.

"Call me if you want or need my help with anything," he tells Sylvia as he heads out the door himself, on his way to his next class.