Aether, in her secret identity, actually got sent down there on a research assignment, while Crimson Cricket and Animalia zoomed on down in their superheroic ship.

Quick and Dirty: Where this worked, it worked really well. My players correctly pegged this as "Archnemesis Week", given that each hero ran into at least one villain that was clearly set up to be a long-term enemy. On the other hand, where this didn't work, it fell pretty flat. I felt like I did a lousy job of getting information across, so I had to occasionally jump in and infodump mercilessly  in order to keep the plot moving.

Aether's Arrival: She showed up, did an interview at a research facility in the area, and lurked in air form, invisible and sneaking under doors, to discover that someone in the facility was transmitting a signal to parts unknown, likely containing the facility's data... and that this transmission was also damaging something in the valley.

Cricket and Animalia: They decided to investigate a drilling rig near the volcano, to see whether it was the cause of the impending eruption. When they arrived, they quickly saw that the drilling rig had heavily armed guards and antipersonnel turrets, and they opted to hunker down and scout a bit.

Things Go Pear-Shaped: Aether joined Cricket and Animalia, and the team decided to move in invisibly... except that they didn't do anything to check energy patterns around the drilling rig, and were instantly spotted by non-visual motion detectors. About 30 battlesuited guards rocketed up into the sky and started blazing away, and 6 heavy turrets started pounding people.

Aether rapidly went down. Cricket rapidly went down. Animalia had some shots bounce off her harmlessly, then went from Bear (invulnerable) to Lion (not-invulnerable) to take out some battle-suit guys with an area-attack roar... and rapidly went down. Fortunately, both Cricket and Animalia were just stunned. Unfortunately, Aether was unconscious.

The GM Invokes Story: The two battlesuited villains running the rig, Chimera (melee monster with animal-based powers, like Animalia, only he gets them by killing animals and processing their genetic material -- he's Sylar to Animalia's Peter Petrelli) and Red Roach (a guy wearing a suit similar to Crimson Cricket's) show up and sent the battlesuit-boys back. An order is given to initiate the self-destruct at the drilling rig.

Aether tosses a Hero Point to regain consciousness, and battle is joined. Cricket dashes back to the drilling rig to stop the self-destruct, while Roach takes on Animalia and Aether.

Roach has a nasty ability -- a Subtle (you don't notice him doing it), Insidious (you don't notice its effect on you), Area Effect Aura (you get near him, you're automatically hit) Fortitude-save-based damage effect. After several rounds of dodging and trying to keep the ladies talking, Roach laughs triumphantly as the women keel over. Meanwhile, Chimera clobbers Cricket right as Cricket takes down the battlesuit guys. Chimera then hits the self-destruct and flies off.

Stuff Gets Good Again: Cricket gets back to his feet, gets the unconscious women to safety, and then heads back to stop that self-destruct sequence. He ends up having a nasty fight with Red Roach, in which both guys use a lot of their special abilities. Cricket disrupts Roach's death field with sonic waves, then takes some nasty shots, but ends up throwing Roach for a loop with his acrobatic attacks. Then, as Cricket tries to take down the self-destruct sequence, Roach hits him from behind with a wave-attack that disrupts the connection between Cricket and his battlesuit. It does the same to Roach, but as Roach notes, battered but upright and carrying a hunting knife, under the suit, he's a mercenary with fifteen years of experience, while Cricket, under the suit, is just a kid.

And Cricket says, "What do you mean, 'Under the suit'?" and turns his suit back on, ignoring the disruption field because he has, over the last few adventures, paid off the Device flaw on his armor completely. It's now a part of him, and can never be totally removed, only momentarily nullified like any other power. He clobbers the unsuited Roach and, as a battered but bright Aether arrives to help, takes down the self-destruct sequence.

More Dull Investigative Crap: The heroes check the drilling rig's computer, which is really just an operations manual. It doesn't have a big master plan on it, but it does mention that the evil bad guys were drilling for some kind of unique energy source that was thought to reside beneath the valley, giving the valley unusual properties. The rig's computer also notes that while drilling, the evil guys had encountered an energy field, and used a sonic modulation wave to cut through the energy barrier. Notes are dutifully taken.

The heroes head over to the research station to figure out what's going on. They sneak in (invisible, chameleon, and tiny tiny Cricket) and sneak around, whereupon they learn the following:

- The entire valley is like a living organism, and it has some kind of energy, just like the drilling rig computer suggested.
- The research facility is apparently legit, but someone there is a spy, transmitting information somewhere else in secret.
- The "living organism" has an energy flow that looks, to one of the researchers, almost like whalesong.

Not Quite Hercule Poirot: The team goes visible and hauls the researchers into a room to figure out who the spy is. After accidentally picking the wrong person, they get a hint the right person (a woman named Nakamura) shouts "Bakuhatsu!", turns into fire, and blows through the ceiling. Aether goes after her, and Animalia and Cricket do a quick "I'm sorry, what?" with the researchers.

Which is hilarious, because Aether being on her own against the evil fire person is just perfect. The fire person lands, chants a ritual, and keels over, unconscious... and a tear opens up in reality, and from that tear come a pair of Leviathans... the evil elemental-type aliens from whom Aether herself is secretly descended. The evil aliens admit that the woman is their tool, and that she was trying to send them information in order to screw up the nature of reality enough to let the aliens enter the solar system -- the Leviathans, scary and evil as they are, can't enter a solar system without dying immediately, because of some aspect of natural gravity. They have to have inside help screwing up a solar system's gravity before they can come in and destroy everything; otherwise, they're relegated to deep space.

Seeing Aether, who is obviously one of them, but a) able to shift into more than one elemental form, and b) able to live on Earth, the Leviathans (who I've elsewhere referred to as the Dyotz!k'aj, but that's a pain to type) put forth an interest in taking Aether into custody.

Meanwhile, Animalia and Cricket get the researchers to disable the transmitter, and then they go out to see how Aether is doing, just in time to see Aether start fighting two weird elemental monsters. They completely miss all the "Aether is a Leviathan" stuff, and so we get to play "someone has a secret" for at least one more session.

Boom: So these two Dyotz!k'aj are pretty badass. Both of them are tougher than an individual party member. Both of them have ugly powers -- the whirlwind one has an aura that knocks back anyone who gets too close, deflection ability, and suffocation and lightning attacks, while the ice-based one is essentially a cold blaster -- area stuff, ice slicks, trapping people in blocks of ice, all of that.

And they rolled for crap.

The ice guy got staggered on the first shot. Then he rolled a natural 1 on his big nasty "I snare you in ice, and freeze the air in your lungs" shot, which turned into an opportunity for a complication... See, the research facility was on the top of a hill, resting on stilts. And at the bottom of the hill was a cliff...

And, well, this is a superhero game. You know the rest. :)

The blast hit a stilt, the research facility collapsed and started sliding, Cricket leaped in to get people to safety, and Animalia shouted to Aether, "Are you okay here? Okay, I'll go stop that thing!", ran up the hill, shouted "Aspect of the Elephant!", and went crazy:

Damsel: Okay, so... how much does this research facility weigh?

Me: It weighs about as much as a drilling rig.

Damsel: Coincidentally, in elephant-aspect, I can lift a drilling rig.

Me: Okay. The research station plows into you, you brace yourself, your heels digging into the soft turf... and you stop the research station from sliding any further.

Team: Woooooo!

Me: At which point several barrels filled with explosive liquid tumble off the platform, crash to the ground near you, and explode.

Damsel: You suck.

Me: Have a hero point. You can make a Reflex save for half damage, but doing so means letting go of the research station.

Damsel: You suck. I take it.

Me: 8 damage.

Damsel: I have Impervious 14.

Me: ... Well, okay then. You completely ignore it, standing strong, holding that research facility, as oil barrels explode on your back.

Team: Wooooo!

Me: And then the torn power cables fall over the side...

Damsel: You son of a bitch!

Me: Have a hero point. Do you want to make a Reflex--

Damsel: Shut up. No.

Me: Fortitude Save to avoid being stunned.

Damsel: (rolls) 28.

Me: Well, okay, then. Animalia stands firm, holding that research facility, as oil barrels explode on her back and power cables blast her with electricity.

Team: Woooooooo!

Me: Next up is cold-guy, who throws out a cone of cold at Aether and... uh... Animalia. For 12 damage.

Damsel: Impervious 14!

Me: Animalia stands firm, holding that research facility, as oil barrels explode on her back and power cables blast her with electricity and blasts of cold energy slam into her from behind.

Team: Wooooo?

So even though Animalia wasn't the biggest offensive powerhouse of the fight (that would be Aether, who punked the two Leviathans with a series of nasty attacks), she pretty much held up a building while being hit by everything in the book. It was a pretty awesome picture.

Finally, the elementals went down (and promptly returned to their home plane)... and the volcano went off.

Except that instead of lava and ash, what came out of the volcano was a hundred-foot-tall monster.

Lifespring: At this point, a researcher showed up and infodumped mercilessly in order to make it clear that the researchers had been researching the powerful medicinal properties of all the life in this valley (Hey, Audrey, I used the word "bioenzymes" again!), which was fed by some unknown force that had grown unstable as the transmissions (and the drilling) disrupted it.

The researcher then went on to infodump more (can you tell I'm proud of this? It was late, and people were tired, and I didn't want this to run even longer) and said that a bunch of CO2 had been sucked out of the air and into the volcano, presumably into the geothermal vents, which also fed into Lake Paricia over near the research station, and that there was a tiny chance, and by tiny chance, we mean, this is definitely happening, that the creature could be preparing to cause a Lake Overturn that would kill everything and everyone in the valley.

Damsel: Oh my God, you totally stole that from that Discovery Channel thing I told you about!

Me: I did not! I had that idea years ago, for the game that took place in Washington, with the... stuff. I stole it from somewhere else.

Ah, the deep deep science and imagination of roleplaying.

So the heroes went off to pound the 100-foot monster.

A Final Nemesis: While Aether reached the monster quickly, Animalia flies at, like, bird speed, not supersonic speed, so she was a bit slower. On the way, she ran into Chimera, who had a spirit-animal (a powerful magical animal tied into nature; one of them gave Animalia her powers) imprisoned in a cage. Animalia asked the heroes to stall the monster, and she paused and dive-bombed Chimera, and then punched him through his escape craft... at which point the spirit-animal-cage fell into a river and drifted toward a waterfall. Animalia rescued it in time, set it free, and headed off to meet the monster.

Cricket felt the energy field around the creature, and promptly disabled it with a sonic modulation (just like the thing on the drilling rig did), and then Aether and Cricket distracted the creature for a bit. Shortly thereafter, Animalia arrived and tried to communicate with the creature. The creature, unfortunately, was too angry to be distracted by tiny tiny people, so they had to whomp it a bit to get its attention. The team combined forces and whomped like the wind.

Round 1: Whomp! The creature makes its toughness save and ignores the attack. It whomps Animalia and hits her, giving her a bruise (and by bruise, I mean, "She was sunk three feet deep into the ground by its fist, but then got up shouting, 'I'm fine!'").

Round 2: Whomp! The creature makes its toughness save again and ignores the attack. (It rolled a 17 this round, and a 16 last round.) It whomps Aether, who fortunately makes her Reflex save (the creature is so big that it's missing with its normal attacks, but its attacks count as area attacks because, well, it's 100 feet tall) and absorbs the damage stoically.

Round 3: Whomp! Finally, the team hits it, getting its attention, and Animalia gets her chance to speak to it, using her magical ability to communicate with animals.

Me: What animal do you want to be?

Damsel: Um... snake?

Me: Roooooar! It whomps on you and... hits. (Damsel makes her toughness save this time.) Try another animal.

Damsel: Um... worm?

Me: (Sigh)  Here, I'm taking one of your hero points, and you're getting an inspiration. Do you remember what you heard at the research lab, about the strange energy of the valley, and what animal that sounded like?

Damsel: No. See, while you were explaining that, I was dealing with one screaming baby and a toddler with a poopy diaper.

Me: ... Point taken. Okay, yeah, they said the energy felt like whalesong.

Damsel: Aha! Okay, whale. (imitating Dory from Finding Nemo) Caaaaan YOUUUUUUU stoooooop aaaattaaaaackiiiiiing?

Me: The creature says...

Jay: Please don't do the voice.

Me: ...that it has to attack, because evil creatures were misusing the energy of the valley and distorting it.

Damsel: I tell it that we totally kicked those guys' asses.

Me: ...(as creature) OH. OKAY. It turns and heads back to the volcano.

Team: Wooooooooo!

So there we go. Three nemeses (well, four, since there were two aliens) got defeated, and they were even defeated by the right people. The team also succeeded in learning enough that they didn't have to kill Lifespring (who was a force of nature and not really a villain), but could instead cut through his energy barrier (which made communication easier) and talk to him using whalesong (which, you know, let them talk to him, period).

People seemed to have fun. It felt pretty chaotic, and I think I'm still planning too much and then flailing when that plan fails to survive contact with the enemy, but it ended up okay, and that's the important thing.

(And while I planned well for 3 people instead of 5 or 7, I need to plan specifically for when the team's biggest blaster and healer isn't there. The lack of Sparks was pretty apparent in the problems with minions this time.)