Nox Somnia

Chapter Two

I stood in front of a seemingly abandoned warehouse. The chipping paint and rusted metal helped it blending in with its surroundings, on the shadowy industrial side of town. Luckily, no one was around, so there was no one who could see this extremely strange woman walk up to a warehouse that hasn't been touched in years. I walked up to the side of the building and used my sludge to pick the lock on the rusted side door, as I always do. The door opened with a satisfying click and I walked inside.

The warehouse was cool, dark, and mostly empty, save for a few mechanical gizmos that didn't fit downstairs. I walked towards the far corner of the large room, passing objects with spikes, blades, flamethrowers, and assorted launchers of strange weapons. I stopped and stood on a certain patch of the dust covered ground and looked in the direction of a small hidden camera drilled into the support beams that reached to the roof.

"Come on Gavin! I know you're in there!" I stomped twice for effect. I felt the metal panel shift beneath me and suddenly I'm being lowered into my underground lab. Well, it's Gavin's secret lab, but it's cooler to say that it is mine.

When the panel stopped moving, I stepped off and glanced around. the large area covered the entire area of the warehouse, but underground. Stairs leading both up and down sat in the corner, leading to both the living area and a quick escape. it was just as I remembered it, machines and computers as far as the eye can see, books, folders, and loose papers cluttering every surface, and the only place that there wasn't any mess were the experiment tables, riddled with multi-colored bubbling liquids and strange powders of every hue that you could think of.

"Why don't you ever call me by my code name?" Gavin whined. I shot him a look. he was sitting in his favorite chair a few tables down from the elevator. The chair was currently positioned in front of the computer the controls the electronics. Hey, when you steal money, you accumulate a lot. Why not have separate computers for every simple task? Answering Gavin's question, I started "Because 'machina' is just weird. it sounds like you're a robot or something." "I am a robot!" Gavin said, loosing the whiney voice and holding up his right arm. "Look at this!"

Gavin's robotic arm was nothing new, but I had to admit, it looked cool when it was all polished and shiny. In shining silver with cleverly exposed gears and wires, the arm was impressive. Especially when you consider that Gavin made the arm himself. Gavin's arm was awesome, but there is no way that I would ever say that out loud. So instead I muttered " Some puny robot you are."

Gavin either didn't hear the last bit or chose not to care. he wheeled himself over to a desk with out a computer and waved me over to him. I complied, leaning over his shoulder and attempting to see what he was doing. " So," he said, still shuffling through his papers. " I'm still trying to figure out your powers." I took a step back as he spun his chair around to face me. " I just need you to go over them again so that I know my data is correct."

"Well," I started " I can control a substance that I like to call sludge. It begins as a sort of liquid, but I can change it and make it become whatever I want it to be. I can do things like put it in my shoes and fly around like that, or I can harden it and hit someone with it." I finished and glanced at Gavin, waiting for another question. "How did you come to have these powers?" he finally asked.

Wow, that's a new question. " Umm, I guess that it all came to me when my brother died." I could feel the memories bubbling up as Gavin scribbled on his clipboard. "It was a completely normal day, and my brother and I were walking home from school. Right where we were standing, a super-fight broke out." I clenched my fists at the horrible memory. I had attempted to forget that time for so long, and it felt horrible to bring it back up. "My brother was able to push me aside, but he couldn't get out of the way fast enough. He was hit. I was angry. I could feel my power inside of me, and I knew that I had to do something about these horrible people who had killed the only family member that I actually cared about." I let out a breath and unclenched my fists. I was sure that they would have marks from my fingernails later. " I didn't even know what my powers were, but I reached up, grabbed the supers with sludge, and slammed them against the nearest building. I ran and never came back."

"Wow." Gavin whispered. " I'm sorry if I stirred up any bad memories for you." Gavin looked down at his clipboard, a guilty look on his face. " no, it's fine," I assured him. " I needed to let that out." After I said that, he immediately perked up.

" I should get going," I said, louder now. I glanced at my wrist, looking at an imaginary watch. " I was hoping to rob the 11th Street bank by seven." Gavin poins at a table with one of my belts and a lot of assorted tech that I had seen him working on lately. "I have some new gadgets over there. I can explain them later, or you can just take them now."

I looked over at the tech, an exited and wicked grin growing on my face. I stood up and walked toward the table. grabbing the strange objects, I looked over my shoulder at Gavin.

"I think I'll just wing it."