I dreamt of HERO last night.

Almafeta · May 26, 2005

I very rarely dream of RPGs... but last night, HERO was an exception.

In it, I was a Champion. No, I don't remember what my powers were; in fact, I think the most super thing I did was ride a ride-on lawnmower. More on that in a second.

You see, I live just outside of the town limits. The road past my house goes up and becomes less and less developed, until it becomes a gravel road that stretches for about a half mile through woods and reaches the judge's estate. I've only been there only once, but it must have been enough for my subconscious to deem it a devious and spooky place, because in my dream, that's where VIPER had built their school.

It was five Champions, myself included; I can't tell you their names, because I don't remember which they were. Besides, we were all in disguise. VIPER was building a school where talented superkids were coerced, and normal dropouts and rejects were enticed, to become VIPER agents. We were all infiltrating the school in disguise, trying to figure out where they got their power, and most importantly, who was in charge so who would best take them out.

The 'school' was odd. It seemed nice in the foyer -- almost like Harvard or MIT -- but as the team left the main room, we found something odd: A room filled with nam-shub.

Our mystic quickly determined that the supers were being coerced by gradual introduction of nam-shub into their minds, and that was gradually changing their minds without their knowing about it. This ominous room (filled with lava flows, Incredibles-style) was where the nam-shub were written, and the plans for their introductions to the student body laid out. That was a hefty clue into who did it -- but it was also a danger, since even merely seeing them would also change our minds subtly, making us want to join VIPER. Going through the room with our eyes half-lidded, squinting to blur out any meaning in the letters and symbols, was not easy. At a split, three of us went left while two of us (me included in the two) went right; I never saw the three that went left again.

The two of us entered through an unusued door into a quite well used locker room. The locker room was serpentine, and I recognized some teenaged or pre-teen versions of other supers (including some pre-teen versions of heros in VIPER garb). We went towards where the weaker students denounced the 'bullies' as living, taking that to mean the super-teens, likely to be closer to the source of the school's leadership. The tunnels became smaller and more labrynthine as we went, and I was sure we had gone the wrong way. I lost the other Champion in the confusion. (We had to stick together, but we couldn't stick too together, as that would arouse suspicion... when it comes to having backup in case the shit hits the fan, and not having it hit the fan in the first place, I choose to have it not hit the fan.) And thus, I was alone.

References to the leaders being royalty (right down to a 'Serve the King' logo in the shape of a 'Burger King' logo above the mess hall) were frequent, but I never found out who the leaders were... because Mentalla found me first.

No, I don't know how I wasn't out-willed by her. Someone must have rolled an 18. But needless to say, I never gave her a second chance. I ran.

By the way... actual dice were being rolled, as this was a not only a Champions dream, but a Choose-Your-Own-Adventure Champions (as in the book) dream. Occasionally as the dream went on, I read instructions to roll a skill check or make a EGO roll, I'd make the roll, and the story would change when the roll succeeded or failed.

Anyhow, Mentalla saw through my disguise like I would see through glass, the alarm was raised by her, and many armored teenage 'grunts' and bewildered superteens were alerted. I managed to run back through the locker room in the confusion before the students realized that this 'fellow student' was the intruder.

I never met up with another Champion as I high-tailed it, but I heard indications that my fellow faux students were giving the locals trouble. Sneaking through maintenance hallways and other areas normally not accessed by anyone but the maintenance and janitorial staff, I made my way to the grounds building.

You see, I could see across the estate's lawn to the fence. Their exterior peremiter was a normal wire fence (to maintain the appearance of normalcy) with two well-armed, fully-trained adult VIPER agents standing guard (because this was a VIPER instillation, after all). I knew I couldn't superspeed out, I couldn't fly out, and I sure as heck couldn't fight out. So I had to, well, Foxbat out.

The grounds building had a ride-on mower, so I had a crazy idea. I fired it up -- hardly noticed, as there were plenty of blasters going off perhaps ten meters behind the grounds building, and the gate guards were watching the front door, not the neglected side entrance to the grounds building. Firing the thing up to its maximum speed, I bolted out.

Now, you see, VIPER is prepared for many things. VIPER is ready for cyborgs. VIPER is ready for inquisition into the veracity of their fronts. VIPER is ready for speedsters, bricks, mentalists, gadgeteers, weapon masters, martial artists, personalities, and all sorts of enemies. They are not prepared for a kid streaking down their path at thirty miles per hour on a stolen riding lawnmower screaming at the top of her lungs.

Normally, VIPER's hidden FTL energy fence would have detected any speedsters running in and automatically activated, and their guards would have automatically taken out any slower threat. But these two agents were definately caught off guard by my 'advance', and as I blew by at the rather-slower-than-light speed of 30 miles per hour, I crashed through the fence without nary a blast.

Oh, they caught on to me, eventually. I had one of the faster agents (must have been super, in retrospect) run up to me and hang onto the back of the lawnmower, but I kicked his helmet and he fell off, just as I crashed the lawnmower -- well out of the forest, and back into the eye of public scrutiny. I was safe again.

The last thing I remember was walking back to Champions HQ, which looked suspiciously like my house at the other end of the road. And then I woke up.

No, I never found out what VIPER was planning to do with Nam-Shub U, or who exactly was in charge. I suppose I'm going to have to bribe a GM to finish this story for me...

(I wasn't sure where to put this, I hope this was the right forum...)

pinecone · May 26, 2005