(no subject)

[gone_byebye]

The police in Poughkeepsie, New York, are a pretty competent bunch of people. Not as easily set off as big-city cops, sure, but they do a good job by their charges. And sometimes, they're more observant than anyone might suspect. The word's out about Pennsylvania, after all. Anything that involves the National Guard and what amounts to the Pied Piper in reverse is something that they don't want in their town.

So when one of them spots a Peterbilt truck with out-of-state plates wheeling into town, and later that afternoon spots a small flotilla of strangers checking into the Days Inn, well... he's gonna ask at the front desk, and then he's gonna call bullshit on all of these guys from Illinois supposedly having come all this way to visit the Culinary.

And when he looks down at the sound of a squeak and a crunch and realizes the parking lot is just beginning to crawl with mice? He's gonna call a few people in Pennsylvania, and then he's gonna call his chief, and then, by mutual agreement, they are going to call the Ghostbusters.

Where that truck is he doesn't know, but he wants it gone.

Comments

Orientation

[gone_byebye]

Ray and Ecto made a point yesterday of driving up to Wappingers Falls and scouting around where they could be seen. They're staying at one of the motels on Highway 9, and that's where everyone from Milliways is led. "Thank you for coming," Ray says. "It's only about a fifteen minute drive from here to Poughkeepsie, if we're going to go straight up. I wanted to be sure everyone was properly briefed on the situation first, but here's how it looks at the moment: the chief of police of Poughkeepsie has reason to believe that our Ark thief rolled into town this morning around seven-thirty AM. He's arranged for some temporary road blocks to demand inspection of all outbound commercial traffic. Poughkeepsie's broken out in mice, and there's been a run on the local Wal-Mart and CVS pharmaceutical sections. A triangulated PKE scan from three different distances outside the city appears to confirm it: the Ark is somewhere in Poughkeepsie, at least for now. That's what we've got for starters. Who's got questions?"

Re: Orientation

[henry-jones-jr.livejournal.com]

"I think I'm good," Indy says in a lazy drawl.

Sensitive to the existence of his celebrity look-a-like in this dimension, he's made an effort to conceal his identity on this mission. A Cubs baseball cap takes the place of his usual adventuring headgear, and large 80s-style aviator shades cover his eyes.

It was very much a token effort. The trademark leather jacket, beige shirt and khaki pants are still very much in evidence, and his weapons of choice are fastened about his person—though they're stored a little more discreetly than usual.

Re: Orientation

[slayer_fray]

Mel, on the other hand, might just be wearing the exact same outfit she had when fighting the Sabretooth cats.

She's not used to celebrity status.

She doesn't say anything though, and just shrugs to pass on questions.

Re: Orientation

[gone_byebye]

Ray nods. "Chief Szabo says he has reason to believe that our thief brought some co-conspirators with him. They're currently checked into the majority of rooms in the Poughkeepsie Days Inn. Most of them arrived this morning. When he ran a search on their license plates, he discovered something interesting. Most of the vehicles are registered to residents of the state of Illinois- extremely antisocial residents of the state of Illinois."

"Indy, I almost hate to say it, but it looks like the majority of the Illinois Nazi Party's come to town with Walter Peck."

Re: Orientation

[henry-jones-jr.livejournal.com]

"Just my luck," Indy groans. "I come to Earth seventy years after the fall of the Reich and still have the same nemesis working against me."

Re: Orientation

[gone_byebye]

"If it helps at all, it's a really bad time of year for snakes," Ray offers.

Re: Orientation

[henry-jones-jr.livejournal.com]

Indy shows the Ghostbuster a wry smile.

"It doesn't," he chuckles. "But thanks."

"At least I'm familiar with what we're up against, unless all Nazis have become peace loving, power averse and mentally stable since my day."

Re: Orientation

[gone_byebye]

"A significant percentage of the license plate holders are wanted on illegal firearms trafficking charges, three of the Party's leaders have criminal records as long as your arm, and the majority of them've left an Internet trail a mile wide of rantings about everything from US immigration policy to white power to Inu-Yasha convention exclusive toys being the tools of the Zionist conspiracy. So, no, not particularly stable people here. I'm not so sure how well armed they are at the moment, if only because the police haven't exercised their warrant for the cars yet."

Re: Orientation

[basic_powers]

"None, Ray." Tyler,er... Moonshadow speaks up quietly.

He's dressed in his patrolling uniform, a dark gray bodysuit sans blue cape with a white crescent moon on his chest, grappler loaded with tazer darts and utility belt. At least this thing is going down at night, he doesn't know what to wear to blend in with the shadows during the day.

Re: Orientation

[precocioustilda.livejournal.com]

Matilda is standing by Tyler, logically.

When he speaks, she nods and adds, "Nor I."

Everything seems perfectly comprehensible so far.

Re: Orientation

[gone_byebye]

"Okay, good," Ray says. "The reason I had to use a PKE meter from so far away is because trying to suss out the Ark directly tends to overload the meter's pinpointing systems. With a damper on, I can't get a precise enough reading to determine where it is, only that it's within a mile or two. Without the damper on, the PKE meter shuts down as soon as it gets within about a mile- if we're lucky. One of the basic models I gave the National Guard exploded a while back. So we're going to have to find the Ark the old-fashioned way: by breaking up into groups, every single member of which will carry his or her own radio because I refuse to be a horror movie cliche, then infiltrating the likely targets. Keeping the Illinois Nazis from reporting in to Peck or to one another is a good thing. So is incapacitating Peck and removing any artifacts, spell books, and so on that he might have."

"We don't want him killed, for the record. Someone does need to figure out how to separate him from his arcade abilities and sever any connection he might've made to the Ark."

Re: Orientation

[librarian-flynn.livejournal.com]

Flynn, for his part, is just grinning like a madman. He is standing in a room with Indiana-freaking-Jones about to go looking for the Ark. The Ark. Sure, he's seen it before, or at least, the one in his world. That one was already in the Library by the time he got the job, though, so he didn't have the experience of actually hunting it down.

Re: Orientation

[gone_byebye]

Ray holds up a sheaf of papers. "I found several major loci of psychokinetic energy during those triangulation runs," he says. "They're probably our best candidates for the Ark's location, although I should warn you that if you've got a problem with mice you really need to consider doing logistics and coordination with my daughter instead of going into town on foot. Just so's you know. Anyway, I've marked the locations on this map here- we're the green dot at the southern edge of the map right now."

He starts passing the maps out. Several of the dots are located in Poughkeepsie proper; one is in an area directly alongside the Hudson River; one is at the northern end of town about half a mile off Highway 9.

"The Days Inn is the blue dot across the highway from Marist College, for reference's sake. Uh, the others are the Smith Brothers cough drop factory, the Bardavon Opera House, the IBM corporate research campus-"

Re: Orientation

[henry-jones-jr.livejournal.com]

"I'm guessin' you'd rather we didn't shoot to kill, as far as it's reasonable not to," Indy advances. He glances at Mel, knowing she has the combat skills and the zapper to take people out without permanent damage. He kinda lacks the luxury of those assets.

"I'll... er... do my best."

Re: Orientation

[md_donighal]

"I wish I could help with that. If he were a nova, I know I could shut him down. Alternatively, I wish we'd brought Moiraine Sedai; she's demonstrated the ability to shut me down temporarily, which I think was based on a technique for blocking access to the One Power as used in her world."

He shrugs. "But in her absence, this ought to make the nut. I can even free up a radio for someone else, by using my powers to maintain radio contact."

Re: Orientation

[librarian-flynn.livejournal.com]

"-- And the Culinary Institute of America," Flynn finishes, looking over the map. "Formerly known as St. Andrew's Jesuit Seminary, which closed in 1969, but never quite got around to emptying all the crypts underneath the main building. Most famously, the body of the palentologist-and-philosopher-turned-priest Pierre Teilhard de Chardin still remains on the grounds."

Re: Orientation

[gone_byebye]

"We appreciate the effort," Ray says. "Do what you can. Given that the President authorized this operation, there's probably going to be a measure of leeway if things get messy."

Re: Orientation

[gone_byebye]

"Seriously? de Chardin?" says Ray. "The last I heard about him, Elizabeth Orme was citing his work on the evolution of the noosphere as part of her character's development in the Metapsychic Saga of Pliocene Exile. Wow. Okay, I think that automatically means you know the place better than anybody else here- did you want to check that out?"

Re: Orientation

[gone_byebye]

"That would be helpful," Ray says. "Ecto's going to be doing her best to monitor the local communication frequencies, at least the ones she has police permission to tap into, so that'll be someone else you want to stay in touch with."

Re: Orientation

[basic_powers]

"Considering Peck's certain brand of magic, maybe some distractions would help." Tyler mutters thoughtfully. "He kinda needs to 'focus his Will' to get anything done, right?"

Re: Orientation

[gone_byebye]

"That or spend a lot of time and energy preparing an arcane matrix to physically embody his Will, yeah," says Ray. "Either way, distraction and disruption are an excellent prospect."

Re: Orientation

[basic_powers]

"What about the Daffy Putty?" Tyler says. "Either programmed to act like a giant sludge monster or to entrap people, it'd be pretty darn distracting."

Re: Orientation

[librarian-flynn.livejournal.com]

He grins and nods. "You got it."

Re: Orientation

[md_donighal]

"Good idea." He lets the radio spectrum into his awareness, a faint but non-distracting visual overlay and background noise addendum.

Re: Orientation

[gone_byebye]

"That should work nicely," Ray says. "I kind of like the sludge monster idea, for starters. How big can the volume that you brought me assemble into?"