Adventure: The Stone
Prelude: During one February weekend, Russell Anvernacht sits in his Rocky Mountain hideaway.  He has routinely gathered information on the heroes who humbled him in Lansing, Michigan a few months ago.  He did not require too much information to recognize the stone he lost then, or the girl who stole it from him.  He now recognizes her power over the stone - and not over minds, as he originally thought.  
Judging from background information on the stone and from the stone's recent use, he could probably use it as part of his grand plan.  It might be worth his while to return to that godforsaken corner of the world, reclaim the stone, experiment with it, and (coincidentally) revenge himself upon the heroes.  
He stalks to the armory and finds several weapons that could be of use if incorporated into a battle suit.  After several days in the lab, he begins his enterprise.  
Part I: Revenging the Stone 
Anvernacht returns to East Lansing, but with powered battle armor this time, in the identity of Domesday.  He draws his plans carefully.  
His objective: the capture of Morningstar, and her removal to a place where the rest of the 
Balance cannot follow.  	- 
His weapon, in all cases, shall be a quick discharge of colorless odorless nerve gas.  Quick elimination of each hero will allow him to subdue each member of the team, one by one.  He has monitor devices that will tell him when each hero appears.  Each hero, once subdued, will be injected with a long-lasting sedative.  
To bring the heroes to battle, he will place devices across the campus which will cause strange phenomena, probably causing arrival of one or more of the heroes.  It is desirable to combat at least two of the heroes one by one.  Thus, the devices shall be activated in places which no more than one hero would strongly associate himself with (according to his probability calculations).  These devices will be activated one by one, with Domesday near each as they activate.  
The first device is activated within the Biochemistry building.  The reasoning is that among so many super-powered beings, in a remote location such as central Michigan, science must be responsible for at least one of them.  An occurrence at each distinct facility of the sciences should draw the hero of that science forth, and probably without his comrades.  
During Mike Roberts' biology lab, the fire alarm goes off.  This is followed by multi-colored light beams shooting through the walls.  The students evacuate the building - all except Mike.  He notices that the beams seem to be shooting from the Radiology Lab.  Quickly he puts his basic costume on and teleports there.
He loses consciousness.  Domesday ambushed him from behind.  
Mighty Tim is tranquilized, unmasked, photographed, and loaded into the back of a van purchased with cash in Alabama, with the title under the name of Richard M. Nixon.  Have fun tracing it, Domesday thinks. 
Domesday hits his next target: the Cyclotron.  The building is evacuated as was the other one, but he gets no response from the heroes.  
He respects the telepathic power of Ellipsis.  This power will summon the remaining Balance against him, if this man-mutation Ellipsis knows what is happening.  And the mutant may well sense what IS happening throughout the city.  If Ellipsis has not already started counter-measures, he may start them before Domesday’s next attack succeeds.  
Domesday's portable status monitor blinks at him.  There’s a break:  Captain Gonzo is advertised for a radio appearance that day, at a shopping center on the other side of town.  Domesday goes there, with his armor under a parka and white martial arts pants.  
As the workmen assemble the platform where Gonzo will appear, he surreptitiously primes it with several capsules of the gas.  
Captain Gonzo appears one and a half hours later with singer Christine Lassiter, to promote a performance of Christine’s band Stances at 101-FM Radio Night , He casually remarks to Chris, "Yeah, the Cyclotron changed my life one day ••• "
As they take the platform, Russell Anvernacht activates his gas capsules.  The hero, the singer, and the D.J. who introduces them all fall.
Anvernacht discards his parka, and strides to the stage, wearing an official- looking white outfit.  He loads the three onto a floating platform, which follows him as he departs.  As he returns to his van, he discards the other two, tranquilizes Captain Gonzo, and loads him into the back seat next to Mighty Tim.
Stephen Wolcott, at work in the Computer Center, could not help but notice the uproar at the Biochemistry building and the Cyclotron.  This may be important.  He seeks for the minds of the Balance, to find if they Know what causes the uproar.  Bob Brannigan and Mike Roberts are not responding.  (They may both be out of range, but on a Tuesday?) 
Laura Greene feels the touch of Stephen’s mind.  Even before he realizes Mike and Bob are absent from him, Laura offers to help him investigate the disturbance.  As she offers, Stephen pauses for a minute: Mike and Bob are still not responding. He finally responds to Laura, to accept her help.
Anvernacht’s next target as Domesday is the commons outside Wells Hall, near the center of campus.  He intends to draw Ellipsis and Morningstar out.  With his new battle armor, he is more than equal to the opposition of any two of the four heroes.  And he intends to take them by surprise.
Ellipsis and Morningstar respond together, flying across the river from the Computer Center to investigate.  As they isolate the devices, the toxic gas billows out.  Ellipsis falls.  
Morningstar· turns - and says, "You!"  Domesday approaches, levitating on a platform.  
He says, "I see the stone you hold defends you from gas attack." (He was not sure it would; the stone must somehow have sensed the gas independently.) 
Domesday therefore has the pleasure of defeating Morningstar personally.  He begins with a force bolt from his gauntlets.
Morningstar has her force field up.  The bolt bounces off and dissipates, as anticipated. 
Domesday twists a dial on his right gauntlet.  Morningstar recoils in pain! 
Anvernacht remarks, "I intended this particular setting as a defense against Ellipsis.  But it more than exceeds my specifications as an attack weapon is well!" He steps off his platform and advances on the heroine.  
As Laura looks down in pain, she sees the defenseless body of Ellipsis.  What will happen to him if this villain wins? She can't let him die! She forces herself to strike.  Domesday, in mid-stride, is blasted several yards back.  But he rises! 	.  
Morningstar looks around.  The crowd has grown and is watching the fight.  How can she lead the villain away from them - and Ellipsis?  Maybe she can fly away while protecting them.
She extends her force field, and takes to the air.  But she rises only a yard before falling! 
Domesday sees his opponent leap up as if to fly.  She goes nowhere! Perhaps her control over the stone is incomplete as yet.  She only dodges as he fires at her again.  This might make his task easier.
He fires again - and hits.  Morningstar falls quivering on the ground.  
As Laura lies, she wonders, Why doesn’t he kill me and end it?
But Domesday strides up to her again.  He states, "I want my stone back, girl." 
The stone pulses.  Laura suddenly thinks - No! 
Before Anvernacht can react, his opponent with stone has shot like a catapult missile over the top of the building behind her.  
Well...  this is his chance to sedate Ellipsis before he rises.  With a casual force bolt he scatters the crowd around the mutant, and sticks the needle in.  
Laura, still trembling, watches Domesday from around a corner of the International Center.  
She couldn’t save Ellipsis - and the others are missing! What can she do? 
She sees Domesday mount his platform once more, and advance in her direction.  No! 
Again her power blasts out.  The armored villain falls off his platform to the ground! But 
he rises once more.  	- 
There's only one way she can end this.  
As Domesday rises, he sees Morningstar emerge from concealment.  He shoots force bolts at her, but her field must be up: the bolts have no effect.  
She says, "You might as well end this now, if you still can." 
He has a weapon especially intended for subduing Morningstar in such a situation.  It should turn the power of her force field back upon her.  Perhaps he can test it now.  He reaches for· his left gauntlet.
But before he can adjust it, his foe is upon him! 
As Laura sees Domesday advance, she suddenly sees him as an evil engine in the service of Hell.  Her body suddenly fills with energy! Don't submit to the villain - defeat him! She rushes the armored man.  
All his attacks have come from his gauntlets, she thinks.  She has to keep them pointed away from her! She grabs Domesday's wrists.  
As the crowd reassembles around them, Morningstar pushes Domesday back! 
Meanwhile, Ellipsis lies on the common, tranquilized out of his senses.  The crowd around him wonders what to do.  One man decides to remove his mask so he can breathe.  
As he moves it up, the crowd around Ellipsis sees nightmare visions!  The man runs back to the crowd, which backs away.  
The heroine thinks: I still can't hit him!  How can I possibly stop him? 
The villain thinks: What weapon can I use for this? Of course: the one intended for Captain Gonzo! 
Simultaneity: 
Anvernacht sends electric shock outside his cape.  Morningstar stumbles back.  But Domesday doubles over! 
The stone! She's affecting his body through the armor! 
Instinctively, he activates every weapon system in his armor at once.  The area around him 
explodes.  His foe pauses for a second.  
He aims the gauntlets at her for a second more.  His power runs out.  
But Morningstar falls insensate at last.  
Anvernacht looks at the human sheep around him, now cowering a good distance away as they should.  He lifts Morningstar onto his platform with him and flies away.
Morningstar alone is his target.  He unloads his other captives into the campus garbage heap.  They are obviously no concern to him, he thinks.  
Part II: Ravaging the Stone 
Domesday selected non-lethal nerve gas to use against the heroes.  Thus Ellipsis, Tim and Gonzo recover and reunite – but without Morningstar gone.  Several people saw Domesday defeat her and depart with her.  Now they have to track Domesday.  
Ellipsis, for once, is at a loss.  Captain Gonzo's exhortations ("Well, pull something out of your big thinking cap like you always do!") don't help any.  Mighty Tim has no better suggestions.  In the end, all Ellipsis can do is retreat to his own mind: He has to leave the others for several hours.  
Mighty Tim wonders: Is this what it's like to be a comic book hero - and have a teammate captured? Superheroing is much more serious than he ever thought.  
After lengthy examination and cross-correlation of his memory, Ellipsis derives a most 1ikely name for Domesday: R. Anvernacht.  He remembers Anvernacht from their brief mental contact several months earlier.  
The heroes reassemble, check the fanciest hotel in the metro area (with Ellipsis forcing cooperation), and find the address from which Anvernacht paid for his room: an office in Denver.  Tim knows no reason why he can't try to teleport them out there that far, so they go.  
Domesday returns to Wyoming with Morningstar under constant sedation.  Oddly, though she is unconscious, the stone cannot be pulled from her hand.  There is a simple cure for that, though ••• he remarks to himself as she IS wheeled to his medical lab.  
The heroes arrive at the offices of Nightfall Systems in Denver, and continue their attempt to track Domesday.  Several of the personnel there are uncooperative, though, and Ellipsis has to 
force their cooperation.
But each time he does, a special sensor activates an alarm in the Nightfall security office, alerting specially equipped guards.  These guards finally drive the heroes off.  
Laura Greene wakes up screaming.  She calms down to find herself strapped to a monitor unit in a dimly-lit chamber.  The unit, sensing her return to consciousness, rises through the ceiling into a larger chamber where Anvernacht works at several computer terminals, with large video-screen displays.  
Laura recognizes the man.  He's the evil one who mind-wiped people in the Engineering Building, the night she first got her stone!
He greets her: "I hope the restraints I've placed upon you are not too uncomfortable; I was unable to place them uniformly, considering your recent operation.1I Operation? she thinks.  
Her ankles and one wrist are chained to the unit.  A fourth chain is fastened to her other arm, just above the elbow.  Then Laura notices: one of her hands is missing.  
Anvernacht continues: "A crystal of my property was somehow grafted to your hand.  To remove it, I was forced to amputate at the wrist.  I apologize for the inconvenience: I should have kept better watch on the stone."  Laura barely restrains herself from sobbing openly, but is unable to say anything. 
"Some acquaintances of yours are attempting to find you.  Regrettably, they've run into difficulties at my main business office and are unable to proceed:" Anvernacht, at the terminal, calls up video projections of the battle between the Balance and NiQhtfal1 security.  "Nonetheless, I'm pleased to have you here at this exciting stage of my operations.  I have just begun to unlock the full potential of my crystal to control the behavior of organic materials.  I anticipate startling effects upon the world's ecosystem, to say the least.  I plan to experiment upon the local terrain; I'll make sure you can view the results." 
He turns back to his monitors; the video screen shows the stone hooked to several probes.  Laura can almost feel the stone ••• crying? 
The other heroes, having fled from Nightfall by day, return by night and lie in wait.  They ambush a security guard and a computer room employee after they leave the building, and Ellipsis forces their full cooperation.
The guard reveals the security procedures: all incoming people are mind-scanned; everything within the building is filmed; the guards in the monitor rooms are screened against mental control.  Ellipsis says to the guard, “Suppose is hopeless, then,” and the Balance teleport away.  
But in East Lansing, Ellipsis logs on to a campus computer and dials into the Nightfall system, with the dialup number obtained from the computer room employee.  In Denver, Mighty Tim teleports Captain Gonzo into one monitor room and himself into another; they quickly subdue the surprised guards and destroy the cameras.  Tim then enters the computer code which enables Ellipsis to access the system, and departs with Gonzo.  	.  
Additional guards arrive and try to shut down power to the computer; nothing happens.  The system is now on survival power, from batteries within the computer itself.  Ellipsis is now controlling the system - and has finally Found Anvernacht’s home addresses.  All that remains is to try each one.  
Part III: Returning the Stone 
Domesday now has preliminary results from the tests he has conducted upon the power crystal.  
He suspected that the stone cou1d affect the properties of organic growth, but he never dreamed that it could do so much! Already it has denuded all terrain-within three miles! Has this stone suddenly enabled the day for which he has labored to suddenly come upon the Earth? 
But suddenly the phone rings.  It is the security department at Nightfall Systems, duly reporting the breach in computer security to Mr. Anvernacht at his Wyoming retreat.  
Domesday thinks: Dammit, they shouldn't have been able to do that! They're only college students! 
But so is Morningstar, and she did far better than expected.  Must I destroy them all to be safe? 
The Balance begins to teleport to each of Anvernacht's known addresses, checking at each for the psychic presence of Laura Greene.  On their second try, standing on a mountain slope in Wyoming, they find her.  Homing in on her, they plan their attack.  Captain Gonzo remarks, "Just like the Wizard of Oz, ain't if?" 
The original plan was to teleport in, grab Laura, kick the villain's ass and get out.  
However, the heroes see a wall of energy rolling down the mountain at them; all vegetation behind the wall is destroyed.  Laura, in mental contact with Ellipsis, tells them what's happened.  The stone is first priority! 
Ellipsis tries to find someone who knows the stone's location, but cannot.  At Mighty Tim's urging, they QO in and do things the old-fashioned way: take prisoners and interrogate! Shortly they have the-entire complex in an uproar, but they find the stone.  
But Domesday, bringing Laura along, gets there first.  His gauntlet is upon the stone as they enter.  
He says, "Welcome to Project Ecotopia, gentlemen.  This is a project that Nightfall Systems is conducting, based upon the ability of this crystal to control the growth of organic matter.  The end result should be startling, especially when applied toward famine situations such as that in Africa." 
"Don't trust him!" Laura shouts.  
“Obviously you cannot be thinking of denying the crystal to our eager research teams, especially when it was our corporate property in the first place.  As I recall, this young woman stole it from Nightfall Systems when I first went to Lansing." 
"I did not!” 
"You did.  But nonetheless I am prepared to offer clemency.  My security forces will release this woman and offer you safe conduct with immunity from prosecution for your offenses against us.  Naturally, we will retain the stone." 	- 
Mighty Tim says "No way." Domesday's hand upon the stone erupts in flame.  
“I'm afraid that won't work," Domesday says.  The flame dispe1 s. "Leave.  Now." 
Ellipsis has been unable to mind-speak with his teammates since they entered the chamber.  Domesday must have devised some sort of mental interdiction device! Thus, the best plan Ellipsis can come up with is for him (with his heightened reflexes) to rush Domesday and try to free the stone.  Considering that he has no other options, it's worth a try.  
Captain Gonzo simply thinks: It's time to whup this asshole! 
Ellipsis moves forward, grabs the back of Domesday's palm, and strikes his wrist from beneath with all his strength: At the same time, by coincidence, Captain Gonzo charges Domesday with a good punch to the chin.
The stone is freed.  It erupts, knocking all around it back.  Outside, the wall of deforestation dissipates.  
Domesday, knocked to the floor, still responds with a powerful wide-beam force bolt against all three heroes, knocking two of them back.  Mighty Tim, on the other hand, teleports behind the villain and strikes - to little effect.  Captain Gonzo recovers and joins the attack - to little effect.  Domesday more than holds his own.  
Ellipsis, recovering but still denied his external mental powers, remembers: the stone is the key! He lunges for it.  Domesday notices, and aims a shot at him.  Ellipsis rolls away, but grabs the stone - and throws it at Morningstar.  But his angle is wrong: the stone arcs several feet away.  
But the stone swerves in midair towards Morningstar’s remaining palm! As it hits, the heroine exerts herself: she breaks all her bonds!  She then slams Domesday into the wall behind him.  As the other heroes look on, she blasts him through the wall and into the next room against the next wall.  
As they charge through the breach, they find that Domesday has escaped.  But, as if on cue, a contingent of security forces arrive.  Morningstar blasts them all immediately, and the entire team repels them from the room in record time.  
Then Ellipsis telepathically polls the others for course of action.  Captain Gonzo feels like rooting Domesday out; Mighty Tim thinks they maybe should depart before things get really rough.  Morningstar's thoughts are too incoherent to interpret!  -Ellipsis thus gives Mighty Tim the order, and they get the hell out.  
Captain Gonzo says, "What the hell?!? We were kickin' ass!" Morningstar just looks confused.  
Ellipsis replies, "Had to.  We won already." 
P?I ?Ii 
"Besides.  we had a casualty.  Laura: are you all right?" 
Morningstar stares at Ellipsis for a moment.  Then she sways and falls into Mighty Tim's arms.  
"Hospital!"  They teleport.  
Interlude: The Hand Benefit 
Laura Greene is hospitalized at Lansing Sparrow Hospital for trauma resulting from the amputation of her hand by the villain Domesday.  When she comes out of her coma , she says softly, ·Stephen?" But he is not there.  .  
Five minutes earlier, when Stephen Wolcott sensed her coming out of coma, he finally left her side.  
From down the hallway, he senses her disappointment.  "Better this way," he thinks.  He fades into the night.  
He will never serve as someone's drug!  Break the chain instead, 
The Balance (other than Laura) debate what to do.  
(Mike) Someone could graft her hand back on.  (Stephen) But Domesday still has it; for all they know, it is now fried flaming! (Bob) So why didn't we retrieve it? (Stephen) It wasn't worth her life! 
(Mike) Maybe a mechanical hand? (Bob) Maybe: we can even have a benefit concert by local bands to fund it! 
(Stephen) No!! Better way there must be! 
Stephen consults with Mike, who has some major knowledge of biology.  They decide to try something before resorting to a mechanical hand for Morningstar.  (Especially with a benefit concert.) 
Bob thinks: Great.  Fat lot of help I'm gonna be ••• But he volunteers anyway.
When Laura is finally released her friends are greatly concerned.  (The campus newspaper reported Laura hospitalized.) In the next session of the Maranatha Christian Fellowship , they ask how that horrible accident could have happened.  
Until this moment Laura had kept her identity secret.  She didn't understand why, but for some reason Ellipsis told her she should.  However, she can't hide the truth from her friends this time! Right now; she doesn't even feel like trying.  She tells the people around her story' as others gather round her, she repeats it.  
She doesn't know why she was ever a hero.  It started painfully, the night she first fought Domesday.  She should have left his judgment for the Lord! but she couldn’t bear to see the evil man profit from his misdeeds.  Was that wrong? 
Afterwards she would have turned aside from the road of the powers, but she thought she could help, even though she was teamed with unbelievers.  For a while, she did help.  Was that wrong? 
It must have been.  The sign of God’s judgment is on her where her hand is severed! 
Stephen Wolcott, Bob Brannigan and Mike R5berts are in the lobby of the Engineering Building, outside the meeting room.  Stephen says, "She is in agony ••• " 
The people of the fellowship are surprised.  They have long denounced the local powered beings as being not in God's image.  But they know Laura; she is good! Perhaps God will forgive her for her presumption of power.  
The assembly offers prayer for her.  No immediate remedy is given.  But several of the brethren urge her not to give up on God.  His mercy is everlasting! 
Afterwards, her teammates, the Balance in their normal identities, approach her in the lobby of the Engineering Building.  They offer her a fighting chance at getting her hand back.  She 
gapes for a moment, then runs away.  Salvation lies in God alone!
  	"She'll never get it back that way," Mike says.  
"But is no arguing with her," Stephen responds.  
Laura runs.  But she notices her stone, pulsing with life for the first time since she left the hospital.  It started when Mike and Stephen first mentioned healing her.  
	It wants to help!
But this demon-powered stone, obtained from a villain, working in concert with unbelievers, 
the same unbelievers which caused her judgment by the Lord, must be outside the Lord! Any  
healing power it claims must be from Satan! 
But she's felt it before! It's natural! It's good! Twice it was claimed for evil works, and twice she felt it crying out against it! Now it wants to help, to heal! Can that be wrong? 
She doesn't want to call Ellipsis.  She doesn't!  If she called him, she'd give in to him, she knows.  But she wants to find out about this plan he has for healing.  
The next morning, Saturday, Mike Roberts (the Mighty Tim) is roused from bed by a phone 
call.  Laura is on the other end.  	- 
That afternoon Stephen, Mike, Bob and Laura assemble in Stephen's apartment.  Stephen links his mind with Laura’s first.  Together they mentally penetrate her cellular structure at her severed wrist.  
Then he links his mind with Bob's.  Bob will serve as memory space.  While the session goes on, Bob Brannigan will think no thoughts except for images of the hand's construction.  Very brave of him, Stephen thinks.  I would not dare surrender my will like that.  I must be worthy of his trust ••• 
Then Mike enters the link, and takes over.  He has biology texts at hand and Stephen is linked with Bob's memory to provide him with a full, near- holographic image of Laura's severed wrist.  They begin to reassemble Laura's hand, cell by cell.  Laura7 with her bonded stone, causes the cells of her hand to divide, and builds each one up as it does.  
Only a few Kinds of cells must be constructed (e.g.  muscle, tendon, bone, epidermis), but the process is still gigantic, and Laura (with her stone) has to provide all the physical mass for the construction.  By the time the day ends, only half the palm (and none of the fingers) is reconstructed.  Laura is drained, Bob is dazed, and Mike and Stephen are fatigued.  They decide to rest for a week and continue then.  
During the next week, the Maranatha Fellowship meets  and finds that growth has occurred.  
The leader praises God for his mercy upon Laura; the fellowship responds, “Praise Jesus!" 
This continues for two more weeks.  Each week, the Balance works long hours with her to restore her hand.  Each week, her fellowship praises Jesus for the power of their answered prayers.  At the end of three weeks, Laura has her full palm back, plus her thumb and one finger.  
Privately, laura goes to the leader of the assembly, Matthew Walker, and admits to him that she and the Balance have been using their powers to heal her hand.  Is that wrong?  Matthew accuses her of not glorifying God.  But Laura replies, "But he's responsible for everything! He gave me friends who could pray for me, and other friends who could help me!"  Matthew has no quick answer to this.  
Stephen can sense: The matter is not yet over •••