What Came Before

Though the artwork may have been shredded for hamsters' nests it turns out that hard-drives are sometimes made of stronger stuff. The file was heavily corrupted, but we have managed to salvage and clean up the script of the last three pages of League of Powers #247, the last known appearence of The Goose in any ACC publications, and the inspiration for the start of our new series.

Page 25

 

Panel 1

 

An energy bolt blasts into the side of the panel above the head of a ducking MYTH.

 

NATHALIE:  [off panel, radio voice] ‘Livewire, status report.’

 

LIVEWIRE: [off panel] ‘It’s too late!’

 

Panel 2

 

Pull back to LIVEWIRE and myth on the top of a burnt out, building-sized robot, in a load of girders that once might have been a command nodule. MYTH is crouched in a defensive position behind a bit of blasted hardware and he looks unhappy about it. LIVEWIRE looks disgusted with the technology before her.

 

LIVEWIRE:  ‘The thing’s completely burnt out.’

 

MYTH:      ‘My pages are blank, Live’.’

 

Panel 3

 

Cut to the ATOM TWINS, BILLY THE KID and THE GOOSE, all sheltering in a crater. NATAN ATOM is unconscious between them all, NATHALIE ATOM talks on her suit radio, in command, THE GOOSE looks lost and BILLY THE KID looks like he sees a threat coming.

 

NATHALIE:  ‘Then why are they still coming? I thought that Brainbox’s command routines were being augmented by the mega-suit.’

 

LIVEWIRE:  [on radio] ‘That’s right.’

 

NATHALIE:  ‘But he’s gone, so the suit should have no more effect?

 

LIVEWIRE:  ‘I know, but it looks like the structure is acting as a synaptic hub, and now it’s baselined to a feedback loop that just says kill.

 

Panel 4

 

Pull back even further to show a mass of people coming to kill THE LEAGUE OF POWERS. They flow round the broken-down robot in the middle of the shot, its arm outstretched to show that it had been fighting the League, and caused the crater that most of them now sit in. BILLY THE KID is sending out a laser beam from his eyes to blast back the closest of the horde.

 

NATHALIE:  ‘Damn. There’s not enough time to change the chemical structure of something that big before they overwhelm the city, and there’s no guarantee that that’ll even work.’

 

BILLY:     ‘I can’t stop them!’

 

THE GOOSE: ‘I can.’

Page 26

 

Panel 1

 

SPLASH PAGE.

 

The whole thing is one panel, but the panel outline is in the shape of the silhouette of the giant robot. In the centre of the page there is THE GOOSE, powering up with her head up and her arms outstretched and leaching energy into the overarching structure of the robot. BILLY and NATHALIE look at her, but they are not important. Around her we see the faces of BRAINBOX’s slave army, they are just ordinary people. White leaches into their heads as their minds are drained.

 

CAPTIONS:  ‘It’s all in the structure’

 

           ‘I can connect out, find their minds with mine.’

 

           ‘Only those already linked.’

 

           ‘And drain them of purpose.’

Page 27

 

Panels 1-6

 

A succession of panels showing members of the army of mind slaves suddenly realising the futility of their existence and either dying spontaneously, or committing suicide. Essentially, the entire army gives up and dies.

 

CAPTION:   ‘Is this then freedom? When the pressure to act is lifted, what remains?’

 

Final Panel

 

BILLY and NATHALIE look on horrified at the carnage. There is accusation towards THE GOOSE as well.

 

BILLY:     ‘What have you done?’

 

GOOSE:     ‘I gave them... nothing, a void where their lives once were. I thought they would just... stop, that all I was taking was what Brainbox had left behind.’

 

NATHALIE:  ‘This... this is too much.’

 

END CAPTION:    ‘What next, for the Goose?’