KNIGHT | Blake O'Crowley
Cosmo Industries - Morning
Damian Harris sat alone in his penthouse office. Behind him was the amber glow of sunrise over the clinical city of Heartania. He smiled, clattering away on his keyboard as he seemed to play some casual video game. Slowly his double doors swung upon and a young, attractive PA with a clipboard came peeking through.
"Your guests, Damian?"
"Thank you, Pacia, show them in."
She ducked out, opening the door wider to reveal the two figures standing behind it. Closing the door behind them, she allowed the two entry, leaving them alone. The first man strode in confidently, tan and clad in his white and purple armour; The Seer.
"Ah, Mister Seer!" Damian smiled, approaching the armoured sentinel and shaking his hand with two hands. The CEO then looked to the man stood behind him.
Following The Seer was a man in similar-looking, black-and-green armour, his face covered by a black helmet and a face-sized, domed, green visor. "This one of your Sentries, or is this the-?"
"The friend I told you about." Esteban smiled assuredly, with an air of caution.
"The man from another Earth!" Damian grinned, gobsmacked, "Is he really... Paladin?"
Blake dropped his head slightly. It troubled him to watch Damian speak, someone so familiar yet so different. Blake remembered his Damian; Cosmo to be a dry and calculated man. The charismatic CEO that stood before him was truly alien.
"Mister Paladin?" Damian prodded, his voice upturning, "Mister O'Crowley? Blake-- Can I call you 'Blake'?"
Blake too a deep breath and tapped the side of his helmet, allowing it to disappear with a quick pulse of green, revealing his pale skin and blond hair, along with the face of the dead man; Blake O'Crowley.
"On my Earth, they call be 'Knight'." he responded, his voice nervous but forceful.
Damian's once-overactive demeanor was gone. He stared at Blake, lost for words, his face gaunt.
"Is there a problem?" Blake asked.
Carefully, Damian shut his eyes, took a deep breath, and swallowed his reaction, "No." he replied, chirping up again, "I'm sorry."
"Did you know me?
Him?" Blake asked, correcting himself quickly.
"No... but I looked up to him. To you." Damian's eyes glassed over, "He saved so many lives, the whole of Heartania. No-one asked him to."
"They didn't have to." Blake replied plainly.
Forcefully, Esteban interjected back in, "I'm awfully sorry but can we get on track?"
Damian jumped into enthusiasm, clapping his hands, "Of course! Where are my manners?! I am Dr. Damian Harris, CEO of Cosmo Industries. It is a pleasure to meet you."
Blake smiled awkwardly and dropped his head slightly.
"And you too," Esteban replied, "Your work is truly spectacular."
"Thank you, Mister Seer."
"Now we'd like to know your progress."
"Huh? Oh of course. Well from what you've relayed to me from - ahem - Knight, it seems my alternate-Earth self constructed some sort of portable generator for dark matter, far more advanced than anything I've ever been able to construct."
"Right."
"It seems that, um... Knight combining this portable generator to his warp drive allowed the dark energy to permeate the warp drive's systems and enhance it."
"But I don't get it," Blake replied, "My superior warp drive was rendered defunct when I converted it to the warp bomb when the meltdown occurred on my Earth. Now I may not have had to detonate the bomb but there was no salvaging the warp drive from the explosive. The only warp tech I had left was the tech I used to transport and store my suits and weapons."
"So why did you install the dark matter generator to your inferior drive?" Damian asked.
"Well..." Blake began to slow, embarrased, "My old, superior drive was almost capable of safe human teleportation but it lacked an appropriate power source. I theorised that the dark energy might have been able to enhance my inferior drive enough to perhaps reach that goal."
"And your 'inferior' warp drive? Have you taken a look at PALADIN's warp systems? How closely do they resemble one another."
"They're basically the same," Esteban interrupted, garnishing a somewhat disdainful look from the star-crossed Damian.
"Well I've run some experiments combining my dark energy with the PALADIN Network's drives and I've had some minimal success."
"Oh?" Blake's ear pricked up.
"Don't get too excited." Damian replied, "I just about managed to warp some mice across the lab, but 93% came out the other end missing half their DNA."
"Right."
"It seems my larger, clunkier generators cant provide enough concentrated energy to appropriately fuel the drive without overloading it and... well... scattering the subject across space time."
Esteban pushed in with a charged statement, "But your generators can fit inside Fat Man's rifles perfectly well."
...
"Okay first," Damian was visibly stirred, "Those weapons don't
contain generators. They run on pre-developed pellets of dark matter."
"And second?" Esteban growled.
"Second; inter-dimensional travel is much more sophisticated than an assault rifle," Damian spat, eyeing up the purple sentinel, "And third; those weapons didn't come from me."
"Dr. Harris, you are the only man in the world to be able to stably generate and utilise dark matter. I have a hard time believing you're completely in the dark about this."
"I like money just as much as the next billionaire but I don't aid and abet terrorism!"
"Then who?!"
Blake pushed himself between them, "Guys, please calm down."
"Out of my face, Blake." Esteban snarled.
"What have I got to gain out of terrorism?" Damian spat, "I'm already one of the world's richest men and I'm not even thirty.
"Well someone is building the Atomic Militia dark matter guns, and you are the only one capable-"
"Okay! I confess!"
Beat.
"Excuse me?"
Blake turned to face the CEO.
"I may have had a partner who... maybe didn't get as much credit as he should have."
"You plagiarised. You're a fraud."
"Hey! I built the first generator! ... he just made it actually work."
"Name. Address."
"His name is Michael Fitzgerald, we went to college together, but I haven't seen him since I published the paper."
"We'll find him!" Esteban growled before turning on his heel and marching out of the building, leaving Blake alone with Damian.
"I'm so sorry," Blake said, "You have to understand his suspicion."
"Yeah..." Damian frowned, "But I would never. I work for you guys. I promise you Bl- Knight, we'll get you home. I just need to perfect the miniature generator and then all will take is some tinkering."
"What kind of tinkering?"
"Well from what I can tell from your scans, the fabric of reality on your Earth was a lot less dense, ergo the blast would need to be much bigger to cut through the dimensional barrier."
"And where are we going to detonate such a large blast? For all I know the small blast that took me here could have taken out my entire lab."
"I think the city has a large enough, pre-decimated area for us to utilise."
"The power plant crater."
"Bingo!" Damian shot finger guns at Blake, "Now, it was great meeting you. I'll see you again when I have more to report, if you'll just leave me be for a few. Maybe go see to your grumpy pet."
"Of course," Blake smiled, "Thank you, Damian."
Damian smiled back as he watched Blake leave the room, pulling the door to as he did. Quickly, Damian began to pace around the room, for around five minutes before he hurriedly produced a mobile phone.
"Sir, this is Damian, Damian Harris. Contact me as soon as you get this," he clung to the phone tightly, "They're onto me. I've sent them the way of Michael. Told him he was my partner and that he mighta built the guns. I need you to see to him, quick."
Click.