2013.09.01 - The Black Amulet of the Pyrenees

In the middle of the night in a tube over the Atlantic, very few of the lights in the airplane are on.

Most passengers rest easy under company-offered blankets, eager to use this opportunity to sleep in order to have a full day ahead of them in the Big Apple. One person not doing the Red Eye is a man by the name of Bertrand Wolfsdotter.

Wolfsdotter is a University of Professor from NYU, who specializes in antiquities. He's just found something so precious he cannot fathom sleeping.

Deep within French caves, he uncovered a mysterious crypt underneath miles of rock in a widely known settlement of prehistoric man. He'd been searching for a rumor, likely a hoax, about a magical deity who wore a black jewel over his chest in pre-historic times. All he'd had to go on were cave paintings from parts of Europe, but when he found the crypt and dug down farther, he found a necklace that was similar in its description.

Telling no one but his fellow archaeologists of his find, he made it to the Paris airport as quick as possible. The quickest route back to New York was a connecting flight from Germany, and he wanted to waste no time whatsoever.

The black buzzing in the back of Amanda's head has had her on edge since the passengers first embarked back in Copenhagen. Assigned to First Class, as she has been, she hasn't been able to get back into the Economy section of the plane since take-off. Now, however, she has a few moments and an excuse to head to the aft galley, so she eases her way into the middle passenger compartment, maintaining an easy professional smile as she does, and walks slowly down the aisle between the mostly sleeping bodies. Occasionally, as she passes someone still awake, she asks them if there's anything they need, but most don't require a thing. Regardless, the extra seconds that takes gives her a little more time to ease out her internal magical radar with the hope of isolating whatever the Hell (literally?) is making the hairs on the back of her neck stand up straight on end.

The professor, hunched over his research notes beneath the narrow beam of light catches her attention -- particularly when the feeling of dread and darkness grows with every step that brings her closer to him.

She sets that professional smile on her lips and regards him with bright blue eyes. "Everything alright here, sir? Can I get you anything? A pillow, perhaps?" A beat. Her smile widens, as if sharing a conspiratorial joke. "Coffee?"

Professor Wolfsdotter looks up to her with a smile, "Coffee would be great, thank you miss." A pen is grasped in his elderly hand as his red eyes stare over the notes for another second before he looks up at her. "No sleep for the weary, I'm afraid. I appreciate the assist."

Beneath him is a black briefcase. Though not noticeable to either him or Amanda, the crevice between the folding sides begins to glow a magenta purple.

"Certainly," Amanda replies, smiling to the man as she studies him as subtly as she may in those few moments. But, she makes her way back to the aft galley quickly enough to fetch the coffee -- and the small carton of water bottles that was her excuse for coming back in the first place.

"Everything okay?" one of the other flight attendants asks, her dark head cocking to one side. There's a subtle tension around her eyes, as if she feels something of the same 'disturbance' the blonde does. Of course, that's quite possibly true. A lot of people, particularly those who are naturally empathetic -- even when they're not magical themseves, tend to pick up on the heavy stuff. That's why there are cursed and blessed places all over the world that everyday people avoid or flock to in droves. Somehow, the human spirit just knows.

"Yeah," Amanda replies, trying to look reassuring. "We're just out of water, is all. And the fellow in M4 wanted some coffee."

"I can bring it to him, if you'd like."

Amanda waves the offer away. "Nah, it's okay. I got it." She tucks the small box under one arm and picks up the coffee she's poured and capped with the other.

Returning down the aisle, she pauses once more beside the eld archeologist. "Here you go. It's even a fresh pot."

"Oh thank you," says Professor Wolfsdotter. "This will be perfect. Do you by chance have cream?"

Outside now, the black clouds grow angry and begin to swirl in insane circles. In their midst lightning begins to crackle and thunder.

"It's not necessary but I l. . ." Wolfsotter pauses as he looks out the window. "It seems as though the weather is getting poor."

Odd, usually international flights go way above the clouds.

The reflection from Wolfsdotter shows a frightening image as lightning lights up the outer sky. The clouds have swirled together to appear as a large dark dragon against the dark sky.

Wolfsdotter spills his notes onto the floor in fright. The cave pictures had told of a dragon that looked terribly familiar to the one outside. If the lore was to believed, the crypt belonged to an evil mage who ruled over the dragon.

Unfortunately, Wolfsdotter has no such training or magical power. So when the dragon smashes its claw through one of the wings and the plane begins to fall downward towards the water, everyone who was previously sleeping is now wide awake.

And screaming.

The dragon certainly captures Amanda's attention. The coffee is forgotten -- by both of them, no doubt -- as turbulence hits and the wing is sheered off. At least they haven't lost cabin pressure yet. "Sir, sit back, put your belt on," the flight attendant says firmly. Even with people screaming, the flight crew is moving into emergency action. They've been trained for things like this, after.

Okay, maybe not the dragon, but potential crashes?

It's going to be a water spashdown... if they're very, very lucky.

It's only when the man sits back that the sorceress perceives the glowing case. "Oh, bloody hell..." The words come out very, very softly -- being as unprofessional as they are. But, her stint in London evidently rubbed off on her.

"Sir," she says urgently, locking one hand over the nearest seatback with an iron grip, "I need that case." She extends her hand other towards him, hoping he'll pass it to her.

If not, she will take it.

"Now, please."

An exasperated Wolfsdotter looks to Amanda with wide eyes as the dragon flies around in the background to make another attack at the plane as it continues to hurtle downward. Just after he clicks his buckle closed and just before he hands the case to her, it slides forward and down the aisle. The change in the trajectory throws him forward against his restraints, as well as the other passengers. Meanwhile, Amanda, who is not strapped in, is pulled back towards the front of the plane when gravity in the plane seems to shift without warning. In short, they're heading down and heading down quickly.

Amanda stumbles forward, tucking herself into something of a ball and redirecting her momentum to maintain pace down the aisle rather than colliding with any of the passengers. Seems her circus training is good for more than trapeze acts. As the case hits the bulkhead, she rolls on top of it.

Once her hands close around the black leather, she utters a soft word of power to pop the flimsy locks. The case flops open, revealing the black amulet. She slaps a palm down on it, fingers curling around it and spits out one more spell.

Of course, to the people nearest her, who might actually see what's going on, it looks more like the case popped open because of the impact and when she tried to right herself she just happened to end up with the necklace against her flesh. Thus, when she teleports out of the plane with it, it seems to be more the fault of the glowing artefact than the woman handling it.

Does it seem cowardly to abandon the plane like that? Amanda's no coward, but she hasn't the strength to try and right the plane's flight and fight off a dragon/heavy-dark-magic-whatsit at the same time. She knows, however, that the amulet likely has some sort of link to the dragon, and she's hoping that pulling the thing away from the plane will give the flight crew the chance they need to at least try to regain enough control of the fusilage to avoid killing everyone on board. It's a thin hope -- and one that will doubtlessly play on her conscience for a goodly while, if they're not successful... or if some miracle doesn't intervene on their behalf.

In freefall, now, Amanda lets her magic flow over her, transmuting her flight uniform into her combat leathers and engaging her flight spell to actively move away from the plane, amulet clenched in her now black-gloved fist.

When Amanda disembarks the plane she'll be able to see it fall away like a dropping leaf in autumn. Eventually all she will be able to see is the flaming part of the wing that was torn through.

High in the sky, however it is her and the dragon. It is either black or purple, with large flaming eyes, a tongue a city block long and claws that seem ready to take care of the young mage.

It soars towards her, intent on ripping her to shreds.

Meanwhile, as the plane reaches its maximum dropping speed; after the religious and the non-religious have said their final prayers, the plane mysteriously rights itself. The cabin's relationship with gravity rights itself once again.

Shooting through the black clouds as fast as she can, Daytripper's leatherclad form is hardly the blur other flyers would be. She's not blessed with super speed and her magic can only give her so much... particularly since she's now trying to maintain a glowing purple shield around herself, with the hope it will keep lightening, dragon fire, and heavy claws from turning her into bloody mist. She falls beneath a claw swipe by dropping back into freefall and piking her body to plummet like a spear. Even so, it's a near thing. She can hear the clack of claws and teeth scant inches above her as she drops.

She considers calling up a portal spell, but that's dangerous given she knows next to nothing about the amulet in her fist -- save that it's evil and attractive to dragons. Portal into the wrong place could cause all sorts of harm. But, far below (and getting rapidly closer) is a huge expanse of ocean. And flowing water can have a detrimental effect on magic. And most certainly on fire. So, her best alternative may, in fact, be a swim.

Of course, from this high up, and at this speed, hitting the water right now would be like slamming into a concrete barrier. Not even her magic shield would protect her from that. So, she adjusts the portal spell as she weaves it. Ingoing speed always equals outgoing speed. The portal she falls into vertically, fists first, she shoots out of horizontally several feet above the waves. The vertical speed is enough to give her horizontal height and distance when she shoots through, at least until she can reengage her ability to fly... skimming over the wave tops in the middle of frosty nowhere and regaining control over her momentum.

The dragon is left thousands of meters behind and above. But... it's a dragon. She knows it'll catch up. So, she keeps an eye on the sky and the reflections, such at they are, on the water.

"Come here often?" the figure who sidles up to her with a grin says as he follows her eyes and looks up. Superman's eyes lower once again and he shakes his head. "We always seem to meet at the worst possible times, don't we?"

Meanwhile, 10 miles west, the plane has been landed on a small stretch of a sandy island. Sensing that danger was afoot, and backing it up with his supervision, Superman didn't waste time to mix in pleasantries. He's to Daytripper's aid in a mere moment.

"This sort of thing is really your expertise...What's your plan?"

"Gah!"

Superman's voice beside her startles the sorceress, who does a double-take at the red and blue paragon's sudden (and oh-so-welcome) appearance. "Trying to keep that thing busy while you save the plane," she quips in reply, perhaps even looking a little hopeful as she does. "Plane's good?" Because, you know, there's a dive-bombing silhouette above that suggests to her having a Man of Steel around is an awesome thing.

She holds up her hand, the amulet dangling from it. "It wants this, I think," she says, rolling onto her back as the dragon plummets towards them and raising her free hand. Violet magic coalesces around her fist as she calls up one of her magic bolts.

"But, given how evil it is, I'm pretty sure he shouldn't actually have it."

She stops abruptly as the dragon extends into the final arc of its dive, loosing the magic bolt so that the concussive energy rakes all down its soft throat and underbelly when it inevitably overshoots her position.

"Plane's good," Superman affirms and as he looks up, he sighs. "Normally I could probably get it up into space no problem, but it looks like it's booking pretty good. Most of the trajectories I'd take, it could probably cut me off. Bad news is guys like these, I have no power against."

His eyebrows raise as she conjures up a bolt. "You want me to run interference? Or just watch the show from here?"

"Interference is good," Amanda says, floating into an upright position. The dragon lets out a bellow of rage at having missed its prey, and perhaps even at the pummeling to the softer tissues of its belly and throat.

"I need to figure out if destroying the amulet is going to destroy the dragon, too, or just set it free."

The dragon sweeps around, now, for another pass, and Amanda drops closer to the waves so she can plunge her hand into them, the amulet wrapped around her fist, hoping maybe the salt water will 'short' it out. At least temporarily.

Superman soars upwards to engage the dragon and slow it down as Amanda gets to work. A mighty swipe from its tail misses and Superman runs the slight difference between fast enough to avoid the monster but slow enough to still be a nuisance.

Of course, that much free flowing water, Amanda has to be careful, herself, about the disruptive qualities of the ocean. An ocean, after all, is no small thing. Indeed, more than 70% of the Earth's surface is covered by it in one form or another. And only certain forms of magic can withstand it.

Too, Amanda is far away from any of her centers of power. The most she has to rely on, here, is what strength she has within, boosted by the Winding Way... which isn't nearly as strong as she'd like, given the Way is waning out here in the North Atlantic.

But, the flickering of the creature above gives her some hope. While Superman boxes with the thing overhead, she stops floats a foot or two at most above the ways. Beginning a hasty evocation, she pulls the chill from the water and pours it into hands. All around her, in a circle about 20' wide, the ocean begins to steam as if it were tropical. Frost, however, crawls across the face of the amulet where her hand touches it. Soon, it is encased in ice, and flecks of salt decorating the tops of the waves where evaporation leaves unusual concentrations of the mineral floating behind. (How to Make a Magic Circle Over Salt Water 101.)

When the metal and gems have frozen to the point they are brittle, Amanda flings the amulet skyward and cuts loose with a magic bolt, shattering it into hundreds of tiny, frozen pieces that rain down upon the waves.

With the final blast, the dragon disappears completely. In an awkward, but honest moment, Superman was mid punch and misses the beast entirely as it winks out.

As he floats downward, his red cape billowing in the night sky, she can see him smiling in the moonlight. "You're not going to tell anyone about that miss, are you?"

Amanda laughs lightly now, though her face is drawn and worn with fatigue. "Not if you'll give me a lift back to the plane so I can at least pretend my mystical secret is still in tact."

People saw her teleport out, after all. And while they may assume it was because of the amulet, they'll also assume she's dead, unless they see Superman 'rescue' her. Trying to come back from the dead is a serious hassle, one she doesn't need.

Her combat leathers shimmer for a moment and fade into her now slightly worse-for-wear flight uniform.

"And, maybe help us find a lift home?"

Superman nods and waits for Amanda to assume the rescue position. "Well, I suppose you have me at a disadvantage, Daytripper. I'll have no choice but to rescue you and bring your plane back to America. Lest I be mocked in the superhero circles as a nincompoop."

"My hero," Amanda says with a playful wink, eyes sparkling as she wraps her arms about his shoulders. "Let no one say the Man of Steel could ever be anything less than that."

"Yeah-yeah-yeah. Keep talkin' and I'll drop you in the drink." Superman begins to fly Amanda towards the small island to the west and to the plane that waits there in the darkness for a ride home.