Elithrion:
Yes, Ellie’s outfit is some sort of bastard offspring of the clothes of Taki and Nova. This is what you get for letting me write my own character. Shame on you =P
Escape Into Time
Ellie sat, legs folded, on her bed, poring over the schematics she had unrolled in front of her. If I just add a condenser here… reroute the probabilitas stream through the splitter… She glanced up at the wall clock and noticed the time, her brow furrowing in consternation. Damn that Protoheroics class for a bunch of pseudoscientific bunk, I’ve got real challenges to deal with. Interrupting her musings, the communicator on her desk flickered on. It was her father.
"Ellie… I hope you can hear me… this is very important… take the time machine… you must return to the past… stop the Ghost before it's too late."
Alarmed, she lunged for the device.
“Dad? What is it? Who’s the Ghost?”
There was silence on the other end, broken only by slightly audible panting. After half a minute a response finally crackled out from the speaker.
“Oh, it’s actually nothing,” the voice of her father, slightly jittery, came through. “I thought I would trick you, see if you were really prepared. You just keep doing what you’re doing, and I’ll come visit you shortly.”
“Daa-ad.You know I asked Netoe over,” she responded without hesitation. “You promised you’d give me some alone time with him!”
“Oh, of course dear, he is a nice boy. You enjoy yourselves.”
“Bye, Dad.” Ellie replied, turning off the transmitter, plans already crystallising in her head. Her father couldn’t stand Netoe. One thing was for certain – she had to leave before whatever had spoken to her through the communicator got here. First things first. She tapped a pair of buttons on the device.
“Mom, we need to go. Prep the ITJ, and grab your gear, we don’t have much time. I’ll explain everything later.”
Even as she spoke, she looked intently at her blueprints for a moment, her neural camera storing a perfect image. The plans would need to be hidden or destroyed. Ellie grabbed her suit hanging on the wall, cursing her choice of form-fitting design as she struggled to get into it. Fortunately, her Silent Thunder rifle was already in its holster on her back, and her black kodachi, Slicing Strike, sat at her hip. As she closed the last zipper, the suit powered up, sending a ripple of colour running down its length. Taking a last glance around the room, she pulled open the door and ran down the stairs, her motions amplified slightly by the suit, taking half a dozen steps at a time.
Below, Kronnie had already taken up all her gear and was making the final adjustments to the Iterated Time Jumper.
“I think father is possessed. He said to go back in time to stop the Ghost. Aim for two days before the Battle of Capitol Hill – this seems like it’s been a long time in coming,” Ellie quickly explained, continuing towards the door. Checking the external monitors she counted half a dozen ghouls lurking behind the bushes and trees on their estate.
“Also start the self-destruct sequence,” she said with a sigh. “I’ll clear up a little outside. Don’t be too long.”
“Be careful, sweetie,” Kronnie replied, with a simple nod of acknowledgement for the plan.
Ellie reached behind her back, pulling out Silent Thunder. She crouched, keeping the rifle steady. Breathing out, she switched her suit into camouflage mode, and pushed open the door. The ghouls she had spotted earlier seemed startled, but, not immediately seeing anything in the doorway, hesitated for a moment. That moment was all it took as Silent Thunder, Ellie looking calmly through its scope, disgorged six bursts of gamma rays, superheating the ghouls’ black blood, and making their hearts literally explode. The rifle, true to its name, had fired without making a sound, only the bursting flesh giving away that something was amiss. Seeing their companions fall, the other ghouls hidden around the house began emerging. A black form appeared from behind a tree, a second passed as the rifle’s barrel glided towards it, then, with the pull of the trigger, the form’s chest exploded in a spray of gore. The barrel glided on to the next figure, and then to the next, and the next, never slowing a beat or missing its target. Still, all the while, as the ghouls fell one by one, the rest kept on coming, and although sixteen of their forms lay motionless lining the path to the house, the final five bounded towards the doorway on all fours.
Ellie rose to her feet, swinging the rifle back into its holster with her right hand, while her left already rested on Slicing Strike’s hilt. As the frontmost ghoul leapt at her head, teeth bared, the kodachi swept out of its sheath while Ellie ducked slightly. The ghoul’s body passed over Ellie and tumbled in a heap inside the door, while its severed head rolled further inside the house. The other four ghouls, wary of their opponent, surrounded Ellie, while she went back into a half-crouch position, the blade in a reverse grip. The ghouls shifted around her, none wanting to be the first to make a move. Without waiting for them to decide to attack, Ellie moved towards the leftmost one, spinning low, sweeping her right foot out to knock the legs from under one ghoul while simultaneously passing the sword cleanly through another’s midriff, literally cutting it in two. With the final momentum of her turn, she plunged the sword into the third ghoul’s neck as it tried to attack her from behind. The fourth ghoul, unwilling to face this opponent, rushed for the doorway. Ellie pulled the short sword out of her victim’s neck and casually threw it at the forehead of the ghoul which was struggling to its feet, hitting it squarely between the eyes. From inside the house she heard the discharge of a laser pistol and the thud of a body hitting the floor.
As she pulled out the sword and cleaned it off, Kronnie came outside.
“Well, we’re about ready to go then, I think.” The ITJ backpack was strapped to her back, and the remote that would trigger the jump rested in her hand.
Suddenly above the trees a wavering jet could be seen. Johnny Zell was flying very unsteadily, barely able to steer, the jetpack’s flame waving from side to side. The stomping of several hundred feet could be heard from the forest, as a black wave of ghouls washed towards the house.
“Hello, my wife and daughter!” Exclaimed Johnny in a jerky voice, trying desperately to land. “I see you have come out to meet me! Relax, don’t mind the ghouls, I have them under my control. They’re temporary, I assure you.”
“You are not my husband! We’ll save him from your evil clutches no matter what, you fiend,” Kronnie exclaimed.
“Also, that acting? That was pretty weak,” Ellie put in.
“Then I’ll just kill you now!” Johnny Zell shouted, grabbing for his two ray guns. He fired sporadically, the shots going off in all directions as he wobbled in the air.
“Come on, mom, we need to go. There’s no time to waste,” Ellie said, turning her back on her possessed father, tears in her eyes, and hugging Kronnie close to conserve the ITJ’s energy.
Kronnie hugged her daughter back and pressed the button on the remote. As the air whooshed to fill the empty space they left behind, the house exploded spectacularly, throwing debris in all directions. A brick hit Johnny’s jetpack, finally bringing him down to the ground with a thud.
