Reroll

The Guardians are dressed up like the FBI this time… and in full riot gear.  I had to wash my proxy of the makeup, but that's not too bad of a cost given I have a spell for it, so it just means she looks pale on camera now.

One of the Guardians approaches Rosie, “Okay, where's the terrorist?”

Rosie glances at my proxy as I watch very carefully, “Do you mean Alice?”

“The winged woman who you were interviewing live.  She's a terrorist, fraud, and a murderer. I have a warrant for her arrest,” the Guardian presents a rather official looking paper.

I have my proxy bring her index finger up in front of her mouth and smile at the talk show host.

“She was sitting there just a minute ago,” Rosie points to the left chair, where my proxy is in plain view, “IF she's not there now, I honestly have no idea where she is.”  Rosie looks honestly quite perplexed.  Which, you know, totally fits the narrative I'm going for.

“Look, we know you've aided and abetted good folks on foreign soil before… but this one isn't good. Spill it.  Where is she?”

I direct my proxy to walk up and wave her hand in front of the Guardian's face.  And of course, he doesn't react.

Rosie blinks and stares, “I swear to you, I am not hiding her.  You can even check the recording if you like to see where she's gone.”

I have my minion relay, “I mentioned I wasn't the only one?  I have some friends with cool tricks.  We kind of expected something like this.  I can't touch him right now; as far as he's concerned, I don't exist.  It's really fun… but easily abused, which is part of why these people are so paranoid.”

Rosie looks at my proxy, “So… you're saying you can just walk out of here, and there is literally nothing they can do about it?”

I consider, and have my proxy dance about the room while she speaks, “Pretty much. I still need to open doors and stuff: If they were properly prepared for this trick they could use that to shoot me… but doing so would risk civilians in a place like this, and that's… something they are very loath to do. It's one of the things I agree with them on, even. These people do need to exist: They just need to be more discriminating with their targets, and more ethical with their methods and… ‘recreation’.  I had hoped to show you some videos they've made… but perhaps another time.  I take it you won't mind if I see myself out?”

The Guardian looks around, seemingly just surveying the room.

“I won't take offense, no,” Rosie is having a bit of trouble keeping her mouth closed.  I'm sure this will be HILARIOUS if it's ever permitted to be broadcast.

“Great! Maybe we can do this again sometime.  Ta ta for now.”  I guide my proxy calmly out the door, right past the giant goons that are the Guardians, and set her to be there only for me.

I then watch the aftermath… I should have brought popcorn.

The Guardian sighs, “Look, ma'am, this woman is DANGEROUS. We subpoenaed the original videos they uploaded to UsTube; they didn't clean the location metadata before they uploaded it, so we obtained a warrant and raided the address.  It was a trap.  She and her friends slaughtered some forty agents.” Ah, that's where we slipped up….

Rosie goes pale, closes her eyes, takes a deep breath, and asks a question, “Was this before, or after, she was shot in the face by someone who looks EXACTLY like you for healing sick kids?”

“FRAUDULENT videos of ALLEGED deeds by this MURDERING TERRORIST have no bearing on the matter.” Technically, I think I am a murderer… but those monsters deserved it.

Rosie nods slowly at that answer, opening her eyes… and I'm pretty sure they are open in the other sense now, too, “I see.  Well… if you think I wasn't cooperating… feel free to check the recordings.  In fact, how about we go do that right now?”

I resist the urge to follow them out (it helps that I know the Guardians are not expressive, so the look on his face when he sees my proxy waving her arm in front of his face won't be worth much)
instead heading out of the building by way of walking through the floor… just in case they have a trick that can beat “Undetectable” from my Mythic ring.

Selective Illusions ROCK. 

I look around… ah, there's the truck… also leaded… but I can still reach through. Hmm… exploding the Guardians’ heads would be a bit too harrowing for any witnesses… and there are civilians walking and driving past, so no grenades or other area weaponry… I settle for using a Paragon Reaction Cannon to disable their power.  It's a Starfinder heavy weapon, shoots a bullet with enough force to get through two inches of steel reasonably reliably… goodbye generator… and the Invisibility on the sound even deals with the noise.  

I'm hoping that will make the Guardians drop, or at least leave them without direction for a little while. It should be a nice mess for the Inquisition to clean up. I'm sure they'll catch onto the trick and come up with something for it, but the mess that'll result from the “FBI agents” all suddenly being ragdolls while in the middle of a major broadcasting company… it's just too good to pass up.  For good measure I also shoot the antennas.

Also, the controllers are HILARIOUS when they're panicking.

I get a quick text from Ed on the comm in my armor shortly after I damage the mobile HQ: “Show’s back up; tune in,” and has the URL.

Eh, my armor is disposable. I pull up the link, and Rosie's on, “...so I have NO idea what to make of this.”

I look at the scene: They apparently had time to call paramedics who are systemically visiting each of the Guardians, cutting them out of their armor, checking for a pulse and breathing, shaking their heads, and moving onto the next.

The camera cuts back to Ms. O'Brian, who's holding up three badges, “The paramedics are telling me these guys are dead.  They just suddenly stopped and keeled over, all at the same time.  The really fun bit?”

The camera zooms in on the badges, “They're all ‘Adam Smith’.  We have thirty supposed FBI agents in here… and they all have the same face and the same ID.  They came in with a warrant for the arrest of our VERY special guest, and didn't bother to arrest her when she was right in front of them.  But hey, when they cut the feed, they didn't cut the recording, so let's rewind and let you all see it.  It was HILARIOUS.”

Oh MAN they got some good angles on that.  I watch through, listening to voice overs by Rosie, and eventually it gets to the time I missed….

Ms. O'Brian starts leading the Guardian who speaks to the recording room… and about the time she's opening the door, the Guardian simply collapses.  They flip through camera angles when that happens, showing several different Guardians collapsing.  The hostess’ voice over sums it up, “They all collapsed, at the same time, like puppets with severed strings. And… puppets may be right; I cannot tell these things apart.  Whatever they are, whatever they were… they were hunting a healing angel under the guise of the FBI, dirtying the name of that fine agency,” yes, she says that with a straight face, “I do hope that the real FBI tracks down these imposters’ masters and brings them to justice for this travesty, preferably before they catch that wonderful woman… although given what we saw today, I don't think they'll catch her any time soon… but it would be nice if she could sleep at night.”

The camera cuts back to a live feed, “But our time is up; so we should get back to your normal programming, ‘Muddled Management’, already in progress….”

The channel switches to some office drama, and I shut it off.

Ed calls, and I pick it up; he greets me with, “Did you pay her to say that?”

I laugh, “No, but I'm thinking about it.  Could that have gone ANY better?”

“You could have healed someone during the show…” Ed pauses, “But that would be little more than icing.  I'm going to go out on a limb and call this a big win for us. You got the agency's name out there, they got caught impersonating another agency, you showed their agents aren't human.”  Ed pauses, “Did Rosie give you an appearance fee?”

I frown, “Was she supposed to?”

Ed pauses, “It's common… but it's not bad if you didn't.  I suppose it's not like we need money now….”

I shrug, “Property to land the shuttles? I suppse with personal flight and trustable crew members we don't even need that… but yeah, we can produce basically everything we need… if it weren't for the ‘no leaving play’ thing, I’d be content starting a colony on Mars.”

Ed chuckles, “We probably could.  Make UPBs in the Industry, use those to make Environmental Field Collars and Swarm Batteries for unlimited air for one person per set; build shelters, food,  medicine… it's all totally viable, until we can't fit any more people into the Industry to make more UPBs.”

I hum, “That would be a problem eventually, wouldn't it?  Ah well.  For now I'm going to call for my ride. Meet you back at the ship? I have appointments on Sunday and Monday.”

“See you soon.”

I hang up with Ed, call my Eidolon, and have her come pick me up.