| Subject: The legend of WrongWay |
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Nike Young
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Date Posted: 16:30:20 05/12/03 Mon
In reply to:
Nike Young
's message, "The legend of WrongWay" on 16:08:41 05/12/03 Mon
WrongWay: The Beginning
BROKEN
Welcome to Exton, Iowa: Redneck Country. There are only four points of interest here. The first is Reverend Veneru Montolian, A guy that can empower a group with his glare and move them with his words (well, at least everyone but me).
The second is the only political opponent of Veneru, Nike Young.
The third is our own version of Batman, the superheroine WrongWay. She came into this town like a gust of wind. No one knows who she is. Some say she’s a robot. Other’s say she’s an alien. I’ve heard a combination of ghosts all simultaneously possessing a girl. Some have even gone to the extent of saying that she’s the illegitimate child of Janet Reno. Few people know the truth.
And I’m one of them. If you want to know, I’ll tell you, but you have to keep it secret.
And as for the fourth one, the one that creates most of Exton’s commerce, it’s car trouble. Thank you, thank you, try the veal, don’t forget to tip your waitresses, I’m here all week.
And oh yeah, my name is Norman Yoric, 6’0”, 150 pounds, light brown hair. You may know me by my stage name, Mystico the Magician.
The date is June 8.
I was spending my time at Ben Vero University as a junior. I got through two years by being a magician for kid’s parties. The Exton Daily Probe (pause for your laughter and my crying) said I was the Iowan form of David Copperfield: the Iowan, effeminate, cheap, girlie form.
But, I use that for my real passion, physics. I plan to be a physics professor when I grow up and get out of grad school.
“Well, Norman, the girls are out tonight.”
Okay, that’s Jason Ronson, my best friend and roommate, and we were both in the dining hall. Dunno what to say about Jason, other than he’s as conservative as they come, and I’m as liberal as I can be. How we can stand each other is beyond any scientific law I’ve seen. Also, he isn’t the sharpest knife in the drawer. He may have dark brown hair, but he’s a blonde at heart.
“Norm, NORM! Look, it’s her!”
Yep, there she is, Noelle Deborah, the goddess of my dreams and the woman I intend to marry. Just as soon as I get the courage to ask her out and have a long, drawn-out relationship.
She turned to me, tossing that short, jet black hair of hers. “Hey, Norm, my computer’s shot again. Can you stop by my dorm and have a look at it?”
“Of course, I’d love to do that.” I just stared at her as she left the dining hall.
Jason tried getting me back into the real world. “Norm, Nor-orm, NORM!”
“What, oh, yes.”
“Norm, when are you ever gonna ask that girl out. This is day 600 and you’ve barely said things beyond ‘Hi’ and ‘Good-bye.’”
“Number one, I’d have to get past Skate. Number two, it’s only day 597. Number three, I’ll do it when the time’s right, that may be tod-”
“-Not today.”
I paused. “Lemme guess: he’s behind me.”
Yep, behind every nice-looking, intelligent, confident woman is a guy out on bail. Skate Taylor is the black-haired personification of the stereotypical jock, aside from any actual sense of teamwork, knowledge of rules, or compassion for the game, or just about anything that would qualify him as a jock; on second thought, he’s just a jerk.
And he’s set his vocab to “slur", “Well, how’s the queer squad.”
“Dunno. Your sister’s not talkin’.”
He made an assortment of glares and gestures. Looked like he tried to switch gears without hitting the clutch.
“Look here, No-man, you better know your place. You better leave me alone and get your homo agenda out of my face.”
Idiot! Still doesn’t know I’m straight.
“An old saying comes to mind: ‘In war, one should not cover the arrow holes of his castle while the drawbridge is down.”
“Look, I don’t care what ‘inniendo’ you use: I’m not interested.”
“It appears to me that one should not dive to conclusions when they reside in the shallow end of the gene pool.”
“-STOP IT!” Skate left in a huff.
“Every day, I fight to stop others from controlling my life, and I win. Every night, I fight to take control of my life and lose. Skate, he’s makes cartilaginous fish and wheeled footwear ashamed of their name.”
I took out something shaped like a “T” and hit a red button on it. “Hey, Jase, guess what this does.”
"Hmmm, you hang your ties on it?”
“No, it’s a voice mask, with a little improvement. While you said that little piece of stupidity, I recorded your voice signature. It already has mine, so when I put it on-”
I put the mask over my neck.
“-I can sound like you.”
“Whoa, Norm. If you sold that, it could be worth a fortune.”
“No, I can’t. I think it’s too good. It might be able to deactivate voice locks.”
“Norm, you worry too much. You need to stop worrying about every little thing.”
“Norman, do we have to go through the test again.”
Ray Manix, my friend, the black-haired athlete, which allows me to pull some experiments and tests on him like he was a lab rat.
“I’m sorry, but I don’t want to have to set up again.”
“Set up what? I don’t have any of those sticky things on me.”
“This is a test of my sensor. It’ll find certain parts of the body via camera, and locks on them, showing stuff that other people need sensors to show. See.”
I hit a button on my computer, showing a stick figure running in place on the screen. Ray said “Hey, that’s me?”
“Yep, and I can also transfer the action to this suit. It can copy your most efficient step, allowing the suit’s wearer to be faster than you.”
“Heh, faster than me, let’s try it.”
“I’m just finishing the last downloads. It’ll be good to go in a while.”
Out onto the track, I put on the suit and got ready to run a 100 meter dash. Ray was also getting ready. I gave him the advantage. “And since we’re out here, you call it.”
“Okay, ready, set, go.”
The suit sped up my pace. Even though Ray had a slight lead when we began, it didn’t last long, as the suit directed my strength straight ahead, and I beat him by several feet.
“What the heck!? That thing’s too damn fast.”
“No, it just copied your best step, and made me make it every time. Also, if I wanted it to, I could make my physique look like a six-foot version of yours.”
“Norm, you have too much free time.”
Who’s WrongWay? Well, I’m getting there.
While heading back to my dorm room, I bumped into Noelle. Right then and there, I couldn’t hold back much longer.
“Noelle, I don’t know why I’m saying this, but dump Skate.”
“What, Norm. You’re kidding, right?”
“No, I mean it. He barely knows you exist. I wouldn’t make that mistake.”
“Norm, no, this isn’t happening. We’ve been friends for four years. I can’t do it.”
“If you need to think about it, or if you don’t want to, I’ll understand.”
“Good-bye, Norm! Don’t come back.”
“Wait, what about-”
She ran into a crowd where I lost her.
So, in the span of less than a minute, I not only lost all chances I had at having Noelle as a girlfriend, I lost her as a friend as well.
Today was not my day.
I moped around the dining hall.
“Hey, No-man.”
Skate. One of those bad things that happen to good people.
He began his idiotic banter, “Heard you tried to step into my territory.”
“Yeah, I thought the gates of hell were open, so I stopped by for a look.”
“Well, you know I’m going to rock her, something you’ll never do.”
“Y’know, Noelle’s not going to let you do that. She’s saving it for marriage. I know. She told me, herself.”
“Well, I can make her change her mind.”
“That’s what her other three ex-boyfriends thought. She is one resilient woman.”
“I said I can make her change her mind!”
Skate said that in an angry, ‘my way or the highway’ tone. I had a gut feeling about it. Something about that tone tells me that it wasn’t any moral method. I just had to tell Noelle before something happens.
Of course, I had a class to deal with, so it was a while before I could get to Noelle’s dorm. When I finally made it there, ol’ cheap-Skate was there with her.
Noelle was looking away from me.
“Noelle, look. If you won’t be with me, at least hear me out. You know that you want to save your virginity for marriage. Well, Skate doesn’t give half a damn about it. He told me himself.”
Noelle said “Norm, you just don’t quit, do you. Skate already said you’d do this. I just can’t trust you.”
“Why? We’ve been friends for four years, two boyfriends, and an ‘I think I’m overweight’ period, and I never steered you wrong. What reason do I have to-”
“Enough, Norm. Here.”
She tossed a small necklace, just long enough to go around her neck, to me. I gave her this necklace for her birthday. This was it. After four years of friendship, it was over.
I walked away in shock.
The next day in the paper:
GIRL RAPED AND KILLED LAST NIGHT
Noelle Deborah, 22, was raped and killed last night. The police now want to question Ben Vero University student Norman Yoric.
Skate. Skate did this and blamed it on me. That bastard!
VENGEANCE
I can’t stand it. I warn her that something would happen, and she didn’t believe me. And now, Skate’s saying that I did it.
I decided to go with the police. The judge was actually an ex-professor that knew me, so he got me out of jail on no bail. My trial would be in ten days. In those ten days, I’ll make Skate pay.
But, there’s the point of, well, the law. I club Skate, and I could be in prison for assault.
I was just sulking when I wondered, if Noelle really did leave Skate for me, what would she say. I had her voice in a file in my voice mask, so I could hear how it would’ve sounded.
I set the mask to turn my voice into Noelle’s. Then, I said what I wanted to hear.
“Norm, you are a really good friend, and if you think we could be more, I’d like to see that. Skate doesn’t understand about me like you do.”
I had a good cry, but then realized how I could take my revenge on Skate.
And Noelle was gonna do it.
I got out the suit that I tested with Ray, and got a scanned pic of Noelle. I loaded it up. I then pieced the working part of the voice mask (which was really small compared to the real voice mask) and I hot-glued it to the Noelle’s necklace. I then created a helmet to cover my eyes.
I was working on this like a man possessed. Piecing together odds and ends, adding tools like a boxing glove that shoots out of the sleeves (I also added something like the claw to an arcade game and a grappling hook to each sleeve), and adding a microphone and headphones to the helmet, so I could record and playback parts of a conversation, I hooked up all of the equipment to the CPU of the suit, allowing me to activate them through the suit. I put some clothing up to hide my suit from view. I had an eclectic color scheme: green pants, purple cape, black shirt, blue sleeves, red helmet.
The suit was completed in five days, but there were a few bugs. What if I can’t change the action files? I could be going in one direction forever.
My plan went to a screeching halt.
In my sulking, I heard a voice from my computer. It was the voice of a little girl.
“If you want, I can help you.”
“What, who’s that?”
“I’m going to help you. Trust me.”
The suit downloaded something. I put my ear to the helmet. The program just said, “Put the suit on.”
Usually, I’d be afraid for my life. I don’t know, something just pulled me to the suit. I put it on. The first words I heard were, “Now let’s get Skate.”
I spoke back, “Hey, how’d you know that?” but then noticed that my voice had changed. The voice mask was active, changing my voice to Noelle’s.
“What’s wrong?” the voice asked back.
“Next time you change my voice, tell me. Like say, ‘Voice mask activated.’”
“Okay, voice mask activated.”
Jason came into the dorm at this moment. “So, Norm, this is what you’ve been working on for the last several days.”
“Yeah, so.”
Jason was holding back laughter. “You... really think... you’ll pull this off?”
“Yeah. Everyone says I act more like a girl than a guy, I look more like a girl than a guy, and I think more like a girl than a guy. Now it’s time to put it to good use. If Noelle would’ve just chosen me over Skate, then I could’ve protected her from Skate. Even if I had died, it would’ve been in a heroic glory, far from her distrust in me.”
“Well, if you believe in it enough, don’t do anything you’d regret.”
“Thanks. Now, Skate, time for your last breath as a free man.”
I ran to the place where I knew Skate would be. It was approaching ten p.m., and not very many people saw me. On the way there, I noticed that my speed was even faster than Ray’s.
“Hey, whose file is this.”
“I didn’t like your action files, so I added those of professionals. Track stars, acrobats, and great fighters.”
“Cool.”
I soon met up with Skate in an alley. I hope that I look enough like Noelle to trick Skate.
There were three people with Skate. Skate stood up and looked at me. “Who are you?”
I had to think of a name quickly. I had apprehensions of using Noelle’s name, but I had to use some sort of alias. I looked around and saw a street sign. Well, it’s better than nothing.
“WrongWay. I’m WrongWay.”
Skate heard “my” voice, as he got up in a sweat. “No, it can’t be. Noelle, is that you?”
I was in a panic. On whether Skate was the real killer or just a mistaken, protective boyfriend, I would have my answer.
One of the others shot a bullet at me. The computer moved the suit to slide me out of the way of the bullet.
Okay, I have my answer. However, I’m now in danger. I activated one of the claws to stretch out and take the gun from him. I threw it aside. Another guy threw a punch at me, and I shot one of my boxing gloves right into his chest, knocking him back and out. I retracted it. The third guy threw a punch at me. I shot a claw at his arm, and swung him into a wall. The guy who tried to shoot me saw me stop those other guys and ran off. It was now just Skate and I.
“How, why, Noelle. It’s not possible. What the hell?”
Now it’s time for him to suffer. I’ll just send claws to slam against his head until he dies. I’ll have my revenge.
But when I tried to shoot a claw, I was held back. It wasn’t any person. I think it might have been the ghost of Noelle holding me back. I tried to fight it, but I realized one thing: Noelle is gone. Killing Skate won’t bring her back.
I glanced at him and said, “Turn yourself in, or I won’t be as ladylike next time.”
Skate started to get up, then brought out a knife. He ran at me, slashing. I shot out one of my boxing gloves right at his head, knocking him out cold. I figured to take advantage of the situation, and just take him to the police station.
The next day in the paper:
BOYFRIEND ADMITS TO RAPE: CLAIMS WAS BEATEN UP BY DECEASED
Skate Taylor admitted to police yesterday that he was the real killer of Noelle Deborah, and not Norman Yoric. He claims he was beaten up by -get this- Noelle herself.
He said that a costumed fighter that called herself “Wrong Way” beat up his accomplices before turning on him. He also claims that this person used Noelle’s voice.
“I can’t believe it,” says Skate, “I killed her and she still beat me!”
Witnesses are highly doubted, since their descriptions of the girl who fought them don't agree. “They don’t even agree on color. One says she was wearing black, another purple, a third blue.”
This turn of events asks important questions: Who was it that scared this man into confessing? Was she really the ghost of the deceased? If she doesn’t exist, why did these men lie about her?
Well, if this is or isn’t Noelle, the streets will be safer, knowing that a stranger is now walking them.
“Hmm… Skate finally got it.”
I turned to my computer. The program was still there.
“Well, we did it.”
“Yes, we did.”
“You need a name. Something better than ‘Computer’ or ‘System.’”
“What did you have in mind?”
“Well, you tinkered with my design, and gave it some impressive bells and whistles. How ‘bout ‘Tinkerbell’?”
“Hmm… Tinkerbell. Yes, that’ll work.”
Jason came in and said, “Hey, who’re you talking to?”
“No one!”
“Hey, I read the paper. Seems your ‘little friend’ got to Skate.”
“Yeah, I really scared him and his friends.”
“Well, would you do it again?”
“Definitely not! Skate’s in prison, and I’m happy with that.”
I passed by the alley where I beat Skate. I can’t explain it, but I swore, in the shadows, I saw Noelle.
Under my breath, I whispered, “Good-bye, friend.”
She made one last glance and vanished.
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