2606/Night Lights

Night Lights
Date of Scene:	28 September 2017
Location:	Somewhere outside Salem Center
Synopsis:	Karen and Kate stumble upon an abandoned vehicle on the side of a highway. What they find in the woods nearby is a disturbing twist to an otherwise uneventful night.
Cast of Characters:	Iron Fist, Karen Page, Hawkeye (Bishop)
Tinyplot:	The Key

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Iron Fist has posed:
The road leading from Salem Center to New York City is a quiet one with little traffic. At night, it's also chokingly dark as the quiant town disappears and all that's left are stars and flanking rows of impenetrable pine trees. Every now and then, another vehicle passes, dimming their brights so as not to blind other drivers. Mostly, though, the road makes for a contemplative drive.

A few miles down the road, there's a van parked near the tree line, it's emergency lights flashing ominously. On the side of the road, bright red flares have been set off, still burning. This would be hard to miss, and since there's no exmergency vehicle around, one might assume the van has only pulled over recently. Strange, though, is the fact that there are no visible people around the vehicle.

Karen Page has posed:
Probably not the brightest idea she'd had in a long while, but she'd been doing any number of things that weren't bright lately. So it was that Karen had rented herself a car to go on a road trip - fancy word for running away, really. Well, she wasn't running away, she just needed some time and space to think, and the skyscrapers and tenament buildings werne't helping. Nor was the invasion.

She'd spent the past days at the staging grounds for the relief efforts for those displaced, and the first responders still digging out, until she could recite the litany of services in her sleep. She wasn't sure she /hadn't/ recited them in her sleep.

It was almost literally the last of her cash she'd put into this day trip, and the kicker was? She'd made a wrong turn she couldn't recover from somewhere just outside the city proper and had only managed to circle the damned thing and come up on the other side. Now, just outside Salem Center, the car was blinking all it's engine warning lights. She'd pounded on the dash the way her father had shown her years ago, but to no avail. Worse? Hitting the dash had somehow sent the gas gauge from quarter tank to fumes. At least the car was telling her it was running on fumes..

Rounding a bend - that bend as it happens - the car just sputtered to a stop and refused to budge.

The stream of expletives from Karen? Those she learned from her father too.

Hawkeye (Bishop) has posed:
    Kate Bishop needed to get away from the city too. She had seen a friend on a news alert, getting her ass handed to her by Apokalyptian beings from beyond time and space. So, though she ought to stay and defend her apartment building or go to the Themysciran Embassy or even check in with Danny Rand and Jessica... no, she took a bike and left.

    She and the crotch rocket crested a hill and she could see down the other side - a car with its lights on, and another... a van? with flares around.

    "Huh." she said, slowing as she neared the car. "I should check." she told herself.

Iron Fist has posed:
There has been a lot of fighting recently. In Metropols, in New York City, all over the damn country. Murder and violence and invasion. That's what the news was spewing and that's what people were living, each in their own way. But you wouldn't tell out here, in the spanse of land given only to curving road and forest and three motor vehicles that just happened on one another. Out here it's quiet.

The van and the lights stand between Karen and Kate's vehicles. Maybe it's by coincidence that this happens. Maybe it's by design. Whatever it is, though, it's not immediately discernable.

The van still sits there, it's windows tinted and dark. The emergency lights illuminate the ground and trees in steady intervals. Flash. Flash. Flash. The flares dim just slightly.

Beyond, there's a rustling among the pines. A breeze, surely.

Karen Page has posed:
Coincidence? Design? Karen could give two.. well, right now even if she could get back into the city /and/ to the car rental agency without any other mishaps, she was already late with the return. Which meant another day's charge /and/ the loss of her deposit.

Getting out of the car, she takes her frustrations out on the front, left wheel. "That was the money for my phone you stupid piece of crap. Now where am I going to scrounge up enough to pay the bill huh? Huh?" Each bit punctuated with a kick. "AND.. and because someone can't keep her mouth shut, I have a house guest.."

Which is about where the worst of her frustrations give out and her curiousity kicks in. Van, off to the side of the road ahead. And lights past that.

Reaching into the front seat of her car, Karen grabs up her phone, her wallet, and a flashlight. It's not really a great collection if you're thinking self-defense, but it's what she's got.. Unless.. Nope. No crowbar in the trunk.

Onwards, she makes her way up the side of the road, careful to keep the beam of the flashlight ahead of her, but focused down so not to blind anyone. "Hey? Hey? Anyone in there? Someone?"

Hawkeye (Bishop) has posed:
    Kate flips down the kickstand and shuts off the engine. She doesn't actually need the light because she has her glasses with the special optics. So, off comes the helmet and that is set on the bike's seat. She switches her glasses to low-light and heads slowly for the van.

    "Is that a light?" It is, it's Karen's flashlight, but she's not sure who this light belongs to yet. "Hello?" she calls as well as she nears the van. "Everyone alright?"

Iron Fist has posed:
There's a lot of light going on for such a dark place, becoming more concentrated now as Karen and her flashlight move closer to the van. There's still nobody around, or at least nobody readily visible. Not even Kate's glasses pick anyone up.

As the two women near the van, though, one of two things may become more apparent. First, the smell of wet earth becomes strong near the van. Second is a pulsating green glow emanating from the forest.

Karen Page has posed:
She can't see the other woman, but she can hear her voice. At the calls of 'hello?' Karen calls back, "Hey! My car died. Not sure what's up here. Maybe someone stopped for the night?" Probably not the brightest of moves to have gotten out of her car to check it out, but really? What else was she going to do. Besides, there might be a story here. She still nursed ideas of getting her name out there in print. Somewhere in her spare time.. Right. What spare time?

"Eww.. do you smell that? Smells like a bog. Wonder if they had trouble and just left it here." New story. Abandoned vehicle. She flashes her light into one of the side windows and makes her way towards the front, where she notices, finally, the green glowing off in the distance. "Ok. That can't be good."

Odds are even 'that can't be good' and 'I'm going to check that out' are the same in Karen's lexicon.

Hawkeye (Bishop) has posed:
    "Oh, is that yours up there?" Kate wonders. "You're alright, though? No accident?" She sniffs at the air. "I _do_ smell that. Ugh. I hope it's not a fresh grave." Negative much?

    "Well, I guess I should see if there's anyone in here." and she reaches for the van's side door. "I'm Kate, by the way." that's for Karen, of course.

Iron Fist has posed:
Investigations into the van will find it empty of people. The front seats have a couple disposed candybar wrappers and a half-full bottle of Coke Zero. A copy of National Geographic rests on the dashboard.

The air still reeks and the glow in the forest shifts horizontally a few feet. With it is the sound of snapping twigs and crunched leaves. The glow dims and the sound continues moving further into the woods.

Then, from the same soure of sound, a high-pitched shriek!

Karen Page has posed:
"Karen. And yeah, that piece of crap back there is mine. Engine just died. Lights started going crazy and then nothing." The whole while she's checking out the van. "Who drinks this shit anyway?" The half empty can is dumped out. She's saving someone. It's a good deed, really.

She's about to say something about the light when the shriek does it for her. "That can't be good."

Still about even odds.. She starts flashing her light that way and making towards the sound.

Hawkeye (Bishop) has posed:
    "Stay here!" Kate hisses and moves around the van. She switches to thermal and peers out into the dark, where the sound came from. Yes, she's headed TOWARDS the danger, with no gear. But it can't be any worse than parademons.

Iron Fist has posed:
Kate will a sneak peak of what's beyond the tree line. It's not parademons, that's for sure, but it doesn't look to be anything good, either. From the direction of the shriek and the glow is a massive, hulking form giving off a thermal reading that fluctuations between cool blues and greens, then warmer hues. On the ground is a now flailing body being dragged deeper.

Karen may not see all of this, but focusing one's senses on the area makes it clear that something is moving someone against her will. And fast.

Karen Page has posed:
Stay here, she says. 'Who the hell are you kidding lady?' - Of course Karen doesn't say that out loud. It would be rude. But she doesn't listen, either. Despite the fact that it's probably not wise to run into the shrieking, especially when accompanied by a moving glowing green.. Well, Karen has no clue what. And maybe Vermont Karen would have stayed behind, but not New York Karen. New York Karen shuts off her flashlight and creeps closer to the green - even when strange lady hisses at her to stay back.

Just who the hell does Kate think she is anyway? Her mother? What's so special about her?

Yeah, Karen's heading right for trouble. On purpose. Guess she didn't learn last time.