GU power vision 2

The effect fluctuated, barely visible in how it distorted the air. When looking at any person or thing closely enough, the light distorted around the very outline of that person, shining brighter or appearing darker than it was. This was like that outline, wrapped around a wide area.

People in very drab clothing were gathered as a mass nearby, wary enough that they huddled together, parents gripping their children to keep them from approaching or getting too inquisitive.

Two people had gone inside the effect, fallen, and couldn't get up. Attempts to rescue with tools had failed.

Shadows bubbled forth, emerging just enough to use powers or prod at the edges of the effect.

[...]

Time," came the answer, from a member of her greater entourage. "Slowed time. It's easier to enter the field than to exit. The fit barely notice, but the sick and elderly can't push out."

She had a wide collection of shadows at her beck and call, and a strong squadron of other capes supporting her otherwise.

It was a question of finding the right ones. At least here, there shouldn't be any wounds to tend, nothing to delay her.

This was better than a mercy kill, tinkertech left unattended, a power run rampant.

She had other work to do. There was a source to this effect.

[...]

Here," Valkyrie said. "I feel them over here."

The path was a circuitous one around a house, knocking and getting permission to enter, and finding nobody else within.

It was only when Valkyrie and the now-impatient old woman stepped out onto the porch that Valkyrie had reason to pause.

Machinavelli.

The specter took form.

"No traps," she instructed. Then she pointed at the porch. "We'll want to put it back the way we found it, or better."

Machinavelli nodded, mechanical mask switching between modes each time the head stopped moving.

Nails were pulled free and boards were uprooted. In a matter of seconds, the porch was in its constituent pieces.

Beneath it all, matted and wet, was a large dog, breathing hard. She could view it with a kind of double vision, and she saw the rush of images, the flickering, and a collection of impossibly tall people with the faces scrubbed away.

"I'm sorry, girl," she murmured.

"The dog?" the old woman asked.

"Things aren't as they should be. Power fit for beings of myth are falling here and there like litter. Sometimes it dissipates. Other times it swells."

"And other times it finds it's root?" the old woman asked.

"This beast is the cause of your mysterious deaths and incidents. It couldn't know what it was doing."

"The massacres?"

"I would guess it trapped prey by accident, and driven to the edge by hunger, it ate pieces of the accidental victims."

"I see."

Valkyrie had to pick her way through the foundations of the porch, with concrete settings for pillars- the pieces that couldn't be uprooted. She knelt by the dog.

She could tell almost immediately. "Too far gone. Even if it wasn't, it's incapable of using the power it has. More would die."

Settling down, sitting in the mud, she coaxed the dog closer. Stroking it, she spoke to it in a soft voice, keeping her awareness tuned for any power use or flickering from the animal.

"If I could conscience it, I would bring you with me, brave girl. How scared you must have been."

The tone was more important than the words. She lapsed into her native tongue, and the dog seemed to like the sound of those words better.

With her awareness of powers, she studied the dog as thoroughly as she could manage.

The dog was fast asleep when Valkyrie snapped its neck. She could feel a tension release over the entire area, as the ravelings of time came undone.

The ones that had been slain by this accident of nature wouldn't be coming back, either way.

The mess was tidied up, a means of communication established, and farewells said.

She actually used her phone this time, rather than relying on an intermediary.

"Chevalier."

"It's Valkyrie. I found the culprit."

"They're not blaming us? We're their new neighbors, they have reason to be squirrely."

"No blame. They thanked us and invited us back."

"That's a relief. Thank you, Valkyrie."

"Chevalier. It was a dog."

"Pardon?"

"A dog with powers. I tried to feel around it, see why or how. I looked at the moment of the trigger. The poor beast had a refrain of human words running through its head at a critical time, and the agent was damaged enough to try meshing with the animal, sick and diseased as it was."

"How much do we need to worry about this?"

"One in a million chance. But it's a chance, and that chance may grow."

- Interlude 9.i