6/19 Instance: Gallio-Kent Investigations

[Starfish]

Timeline: After "Chilling".


Darren: Darren slithered out of the vent, carrying the camera along with him before dropping onto the floor with a splat and reforming, holding the fried camera in his hands, "... Okay, thst's odd," he held it out to show his good lady wife, "looks like it ... I dunno, overheated or something? It's fried."

Selene: "And here I thought we specifically avoided the bargain bin models to prevent such things from happening," Selene commented, stepping up to Darren to take a closer look at the camera. "Do you think your little uncontrolled outburst the other day could have caused that?"

Darren: Darren shook his head, "Nu-uh, I shielded these things against shit like that, and in any case we have footage from this camera after that ... there's no way Cortez could have messed with it himself without us knowing, wrong powerset, and he's been perfectly well behaved anyway. It's just ... odd, don't you think?"

Selene: "Strange indeed." Selene took the camera and turned it in her hands. "We would have noticed had this happened before or during any of the attacks on the school. Hence, this must have occurred recently."

Darren: Darren played with his labret piercing thoughtfully for a moment, "Yeah, let's check out the monitors for this sector up in the security room, could maybe just have been Sparks discharging some static nearby or something, doesn't hurt to be sure when you're monitoring possible security threats after all."

Selene: "Yes, let's." Selene nodded. "If it turns out to be some kind of design flaw, we should make sure the other cameras aren't affected as well." She shook the casing and listened for any loose bits tumbling around inside.

Darren: "To the security room, let's hope Kevin isn't lurking in there today," he offered his arm to Selene, "we should get outta here before Fabian gets back too, I don't wanna question him about this just yet."

Selene: "Speaking of, what's your impression of him and his friend with the questionable taste in headwear," Selene asked, hooking her arm into Darren's. "To say it's hard to make sense of them would be understatement."

Darren: "I think I'll like them a whole lot better once Scott manages to reverse engineer that anti-truth serum they were given," Darren sighed as they made their way through the corridors, "but they seem pretty geniune, I wouldn't trust them with my life but I might trust them to let me know when the oven's pinged for my pudding, you know?"

Selene: "Their not exactly unwavering loyalty to their employer doesn't fill me with much confidence, to be honest," Selene commented, walking beside her husband. "While it certainly seems to benefit us at first glance, who's going to say they won't do the same again once another opportunity presents itself to them."

Darren: "I dunno babe, what I do know is that I'd much rather have them where we could keep an eye on them and squeeze them for intel then anywhere else. They're our best lead for getting the others back and that's all I care about."

Selene: "Fair point, I just hope they're not another means to deceive and sent us on the wrong track," Peeking through the door, Selene found the security room unoccupied. "I can't decide whether our enemies displayed arrogance, desperation, or sheer insanity by sending only those two to retrieve Malice."

Darren: "Lukas is pretty powerful in his own right, with Fabian boosting him like that .." Darren shrugged, sliding into the seat infront of all the monitors, "it was just bad luck on their part to run into most of the staff," he smirked before connecting into the systems and trawling through the data.

Selene: Selene took a seat next to Darren and placed the broken camera on the console in front of her. "It almost feels strange to have luck favour us for once," she said, poking the casing a little.

Darren: "Shush, don't say that, you'll jinx-" something flashed and Darren frowned as he double checked it, "... Huh ... that's strange ..."

Selene: "Whatever it is, it's not my fault," Selene said, sitting up to glance at the monitors lining the wall. "Probably."

Darren: "Look at the atmospheric readings here, don't they look a little messed up to you?" Darren pointed at the screen, "background humidty dropped sharply before just as sharply returning to normal, and the timestamp matches the last transmission from the camera. And look here, temperature readouts, it got very cold very quickly around that room too."

Selene: Selene's brow furrowed. "Are you sure that's not an error in the sensor instruments," she asked, parsing the lines displayed on the screen in front of her. "I know the climate is supposedly all shot to hell, but an extreme decline like this strikes even me as a little unusual."

Darren: "Everything else seems to be fully functional," Darren's frown deepened, "I think I should go talk to Fabian about this, something isn't right here."

Selene: "Do you suspect he might have something to do with it," Selene asked, tapping a finger against her chin. "Would it be possible he caused the powers of one of us to go haywire and cause this?"

Darren: "It's a possibility, to affect both the temperature and humidity we're looking and either Bobby or Ororo ... maybe Michael but he's still being watched down in the medlab ... but what would they have been doing there anyways?" He played with his labret a little as he thought, before saying carefully, "... Bobby has been acting really strange recently."

Darren: "I thought it was just because of the accident with Vertigo but ... I dunno ... I just got a feeling you know?"

Selene: "Believe me, I noticed, as well," Selene replied, turning her head to give Darren a look. "Remember, I'm the local expert on acting strange." She frowned at the displayed data once more. "Normally I'd chalk it up to collateral damage. Perhaps he needed to vent pent up frustration somehow. He has been rather tense lately, after all."

Darren: "But why would he sabotage a camera in Fabian's room? Fabian's not laying all beat up in the medlab or anything, unless maybe he just wanted to ... I dunno, mess with him while we couldn't see, but the idea makes me uncomfortable ... and then what Fabian said ..."

Darren: He trailed off and worried his lip for a moment, "I dunno, maybe I'm just getting paranoid in my old age ..."

Selene: "I've always said you're not paranoid enough." Selene leaned forward to scroll through the readings on the monitor. "You're right, it would have been an odd coincidence." She gave Darren a sideways glance. "We did make sure Malice was still in the box when we reclaimed it, yes?"

Darren: "Danger assured me she was," Darren nodded, "it's just ... Bobby being all weird like that, Lorna said he's been having some strange conversations and the Marauders turning up dead ... Fabian seemed to think the X-Men were behind thier deaths, he was convinced I was gonna kill hm when I interviewed him ... this is leading me down a very unhappy train of thought her babe ..."

Selene: "Now that you mention it, he did seem rather concerned I would kill him when we captured them." Selene leaned back, putting on a thoughtful expression. "I didn't give much about it, as I was in fact trying to intimidate him. Still, it's odd how anyone even remotely familiar with the X-Men would expect such a thing."

Darren: "Uh-huh," Darren gave the system a final check before unplugging himself, "I think we're gonna have to take a closer look into what's been going on, if there's something shady going on I'd like to know about it before it blows up in our faces," he gave Selene a look, "I think we should keep this between ourselves for now, don't you?"

Selene: "Ooh, you mean like a dark secret?" Despite the serious nature of the matter, a faint smirk appeared on the edge of her mouth. "How thrilling."

Darren: "Yes, our dark and dirty secret," Darren returned the smirk, "I think I'd better go have a chat with Fabian, see what I can learn from him. Maybe next time you and Lorna have a girly chat you could maybe gently prod her about how Bobby's been acting?"

Selene: "Oh my, dark secrets and scheming girl talk, I almost feel like having been dropped into an episode of Desperate Housewives." Selene chuckled. "Sounds reasonable, however. And keeping a close eye on our guest can't be the wrong idea, either."

Darren: "Well, we were keeping a close eye on him and his buddy," Darren tapped the busted camera, "I'll make sure I get this one replaced and hooked up into the network too."

Selene: "Perhaps we should set them to trigger a silent alert if they detect another temperature anomaly like the one that fried this one here," Selene suggested, picking up the camera again. "Just to make sure we don't miss any other freezing mishaps in the mansion."

Darren: Darren nodded, "Yeah, good idea, I'll get them set up," he gave the readouts one last frown, "better safe then sorry after all."

[Slarti]

*Bobby scribbles two more names on the hit list.*

[Ferguson]

and now he knows how Darren got on the Brotherhood hit list.

[puppygirl]

Poor Darren, he just doesn't know when to butt out

[Chaos]

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