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Writing Prompt Responses

Day 4: When I said "It’s lovely weather for a sleigh ride together with you," this is not what I had in mind.

"Sorry. I guess." Tamara muttered. She couldn't even hear herself, though. The wind rushed past as she and Blue, in the convertible, hurtled down the back streets of Chicago, in pursuit of Father Belacci's black van. The back hatch of the van opened, revealing a man in a trenchcoat, sunglasses, and the strap of a Tommy gun.


Tamara casually took her right hand, which held the clutch and her revolver, off the clutch to deal with the mafioso. He fell back into the van, the door swinging wide. "Actually, no, fuck you." She said contemplatively. "What did you have in mind?"


"What?" shouted Blue over the wind.


Tamara grunted "Goddamn right."


Belacci himself appeared in the back of the van, wielding a rocket launcher. He said something corny and misogynistic. Neither of them could hear it, but they recognized his 'corny and misogynistic' face.


"Take the wheel."


"Did you say something?" Blue yelled. Tamara grabbed her wrist and put her hand on the steering wheel, flooring the gas. "Oh, you said grab the wheel! Uh, NO!" Blue said, panicked.


Tamara fired a few suppressing shots, holding off the rocket attack, and brought the hood of the convertible into contact with the van's back bumper, staggering Belacci. He prepared again to fire.


And then he was in the Courtroom. It was white this time, perfectly white, and so was Tamara. Invisible. Belacci got his bearings and kicked at nothing. "This again!" he spat. "You're not gonna get in my head this time, bitch, but I'm not sure how I'm going to stop that from happening! Shit."


Tamara laughed, floating around Belacci. "I don't need to get in your head. Just under your skin."


Spiders, centipedes, ticks, crickets, earwigs and countless other insectoids emerged from the white surface of the floor. Belacci screamed and kicked and swatted as the swarm crawled up his legs or burrowed into them.


Then he was back in the real world, as was Tamara. Instinctively, he took up where he left off on the screaming and writhing, and he fell out of the back of the van, onto the hood of the convertible.


Tamara slowly braked, causing Belacci to slide towards the front bumper. He grabbed for any traction, finding the upper frame of the windshield. Tamara slowed the car to almost the speed limit, then put the clutch in the lowest gear it would go and floored the gas.


The convertible complained, a lot, and Belacci, who was pulling on the windshield for dear life, was thrown by the acceleration into the backseat. Tamara turned off the road, quickly losing the van. Blue took the revolver and trained it on their new passenger before he could recover.


"Hi handsome!" she said, cheekily smiling. "We got a few questions for ya!"

Day 18: A Christmas ghost.

Tamara opened her eyes. A faint glow filled the room. John sat on the chair in her bedroom, reading a phantom magazine, which had no print. She scoffed. "It's you. Finally."


He looked up in bemusement. "Finally?"


Tamara nodded, bleary-eyed "You're here to take me back."


John frowned. "Take you back?"


"Into death... I'm not s'posed to be here! It's not- ... It was a mistake."


John shook his head. He pointed at himself. "Death." he pointed at her. "Here. Not... Mistake."


"What do you mean? ... Why are you here?"


He shrugged. "You."


"Saucy ol' tomcat..." Tamara muttered.


John grinned playfully, pointing at her. "Saucy!"


She smiled, head down. "Can you tell me why I am here? Yes or no."


He tilted his head back and forth, pondering. "Yes..."


"... But not unless I say it myself. Shit."


He nodded. "Not. Shit."


She looked at him, eyes stinging. "I'm not going to see you until I die, again, am I?"


He nodded mournfully. "Not going to see you."


Tamara wiped her face, sniffed. "Well... Until then... I guess. Goodbye..."


John nodded understandingly. "Goodbye." his image faded from the room, swathing Tamara once again in darkness.
 
Day 3: Carols on the radio.

Anneliese reached for her cocoa mug, stopped, pulled off her right wool mitten so The heat had stuck the shoddy coaster to its base, and both of them came up in her hand. She paused the mug's ascent, knocked the coaster off with her left hand, still mitted. The mug sloshed a little, getting cocoa on her left mitten. "Klootzak."


She flinched, her words dissonant. She wasn't sure why... She'd been saying 'klootzak' since she was five. It was possible... It was possible that she had learned enough languages that her mother tongue had begun to sound alien. She sucked on her bottom lip.


Mary was visiting. "I walked to town in the pouring rain" she said "... rode that train to the station under the avenue."


"Mmhm." Anneliese nodded. "Know what you mean."


"At the cross streets, I played in tune with the winter rain, collecting dimes and dollar bills."


"Sounds to me you were seeking a theoretically miserable experience so you could take pleasure in having one..." Anneliese crooned in response, and quietly continued "Since you knew at the time that you'd have bragging rights now." She worked her mitten off and tossed it onto the brick foundation of the fireplace to dry. "As you can tell, I'm more a Gemütlichkeit kind of girl."


"Well the vendors huddled and the taxis honked, as I played for change beneath the neon clock..." the song went on. "When the crowd thinned out and the rain had quit, and my fingers felt cold and stiff, I took their money and I closed my case and I headed back towards home again. As I walked back to the subway stairs, I had twenty eight dollars in change for fare. There was an old bag lady with an outstretched hand-"


"'Old bag lady.'" Anneliese chuckled. "English and German might not come up with the same turns of phrase, but between them they cover a lot of good stuff..."


"... I folded up one dollar bill and I tucked it down into the till." Mary continued.


"Mm, I'm backing up my guess." Anneliese sipped her cocoa. "You didn't need the money from playing for change, but you wanted..." she waved her hand in the air "- the experience of that unpleasantness, because there's a certain pride in misery. It's sort of the same feeling as giving money to charity. Hell if I know a word for it though..." she ran her tongue over her teeth. "It's like the polar opposite of schadenfreude. Taking pleasure in your own misfortune. Mudita? Not quite..."


Mary had long since left. Mariah took her place. "I don't want a lot for Christmas..." she said.


"Hehe, you go! Don't let them tell you what to do!" Anneliese waved a fist in the air. "You wanna release a Christmas album in the middle of your career, do it!" She took a long drag from her cocoa as the song played on. "This song isn't going to get him back, though. Sorry. He was kind of a cock, though, and I think you know that..."
 

Carols On the Radio
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Day 3
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Kyle Keysor


Kyle was sleeping snugly in his wonderfully cozy bed, snoring the hours away as Sketch slept at the bottom of his current residence beside his feet, also sleeping soundly. He was busy in his own world, dreaming the world away as he made truly beautiful landscapes in his own mind that he hadn't gotten the chance to see just yet. Right now, he was traversing the great blue skies filled with clouds of plenty in their various shapes and forms like floating pieces of art, gazing down towards a calm mountain and the steep sides of it, caked in great blankets of snow that seemed to never end, falling gently from the sky in perfect unison and harmony. It was a beautiful site really, to look upon the highest peak of the world in total calm. Sure, he wasn't really experiencing it, but he personally loved using his powers like this, not fighting bad guys or saving people from their own misfortune & mistakes, but to create perfect landscapes of pure art within his very own mind. There wasn't really a word to describe it but....It was just so tranquil. Just the pure sounds of nature complimented by the harmonious howling of the wind, dancing through the skies, beside Its snow white partner, slowly descending down on the ground beneath him. 


Well, It was a tranquil site anyway.


The beautiful landscape he had created in his mind began to suddenly crumble and fade away, dissolving into dust as the blaring of a Christmas carol began to resonate throughout his entire house. No doubt the work of his family who were far more proactive in their festivities than he, who would have preferred and been content with simply looking at that wonderful site he had made. Being pulled back into reality, he groaned as the loud songs of Christmas made their way into his ears, groaning loudly as he put the pillow to his face. Sketch leaped away, annoyed at suddenly being disturbed from her own slumber and quickly skipping out of the room, leaving Kyle to sigh heavily as he rested his eyes upon the clock.....Guess It was time to get up!





 









When I said “It’s lovely weather for a sleigh ride together with you,” this is not what I had in mind.
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Day 4
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Kyle Keysor


Lauren looked suspiciously at her brother before turning her gaze back to the great giant slope that they stood just above, the two of them standing upon a colossal hill of snow that was absolutely perfect for a great sleigh ride. Of course, the one thing they lacked that was actually needed was a sleigh itself, which their parents had unfortunately forgotten in the midst of Christmas shopping, something which they were still doing, leaving the two of them to their own devices at the manor they had bought in the countryside, which Itself was covered in as much snow as the hill they were standing upon. The two of them were actually quite unsure whether this hill had actually existed before or whether It was purely made of just snow. Who knows? 


All they knew was that they were totally going to go down it, sleigh ride or not. 


Without even need to share a word with each other, Lauren simply grinned at her young brother, who rolled his eyes at her idea, which they both knew exactly because of her rather predictable, creative but reckless attitude. Thinking about the safety of it and whether It would actually work, Kyle sighed as his sister began to tap her feet. She was certainly going to say something along the lines of "Well, don't make It so we both climbed up here for nothing!" or something along those lines. She did love a good old guilt trip when things didn't always go her way. Sighing heavily as the mist formed in the air, her face lit up as Kyle began to lower himself onto the floor and delve into a deep sleep. A black substance found itself forming in the cold air before twisting and molding into a large sleigh built for two. Lauren squealed with delight as she picked up her brother like a toy, placing him at the front as she herself sat at the back of it to hold him, making sure to hold onto him so that in his sleep state that he didn't end up flying off of the sleigh or falling off of it whilst they went down the grand hill. Kyle, meanwhile, was sighing in his mind, one hundred percent sure that something would go wrong with this silly plan of theirs and that they'd both end up having their heads stuck in the snow like Ostriches. Of course, In this sleeping state of his he would be near totally powerless to actually do anything, sure, he could still see everything going on whilst still being asleep but that didn't mean he could casually walk about. He wasn't some mystical sleep walker. 


All he would be able to do would be hope that this didn't go wrong.


But It did.


Because It always went wrong somehow when you combined the powers of Kyle with the reckless abandon of his sister, Lauren. 


It started off good as Lauren pushed the sleigh, the two of them beginning to descend with haste as the wind whipped their hair back, with Lauren herself getting a good bit of Kyle's in her face. She was shouting in praise and joy, that was until they hit a small bump the two of them didn't account for in the slope of the hill. Kyle was caught utterly unaware by it and didn't have a chance to fortify his concentration when the sleigh suddenly broke apart, promptly sending the two of them flying down the rest of the hill. Lauren flew through the air rather gracefully and ended up rolling on her side with a slight grunt, annoyed at the thought of ruining all of her clothes by rolling about in the snow without a jacket on. Meanwhile, Kyle had less grace as he awoke mid-air and with not much time to react, face planted directly into the snow itself with an "Umpf" sound and what one would presume to be a muffled groan. 


Kyle was lucky enough not to have smacked his face into some sharp stick below the snow and got away with some mild scraping on his face whilst Lauren suffered nothing at all. 


In his mind, It was an alright day, save for the incident of smacking his face into the snow, which he did not appreciate receiving. 


For Lauren, It was absolutely hilarious to see her brother just laying in the snow. That and she got to go on a cool ass sleigh ride down a giant hill. 





 
 

Putting up holiday decorations.
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Day 5
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Urial Ursler


It was a glorious day indeed, a very special thing was to be done upon this splendid day. Heather looked less than enthusiastic than Urial when he ran into the living with a box of decorations above him and a tangle of Christmas lights wrapped around his body, something which she quirked a brow at before rolling her eyes and grinning at the sight of his clumsiness. The two of them both knew their roles, as Heather took the box above him which he held high for her. She was given the task of the easier inside to decorate. Urial meanwhile, was given the task of decorating the outside of the house so that the local populace could gaze upon their Christmas splendor and feel nothing but joy & possibly a tiny bit of envy when they saw the full glory of the things Urial was capable of doing with the decorative materials he was given. 


Quickly running outside, the menagerie of arms dwelling within the backpack situated on his back began to reveal themselves, a box of materials waiting just beside the doorstep ready for him to unpack and unravel so that he could give this house some festive glow! 


Time flew by as Urial took his time making sure that everything was perfect, they had started in the early evening but now It had begun to reach dusk and the sun began to retreat early like It always did in the winter time, the moon slowly starting to make it's ascent to show It's light to Baltimore. That, however, was not the only light Baltimore was going to witness upon this night, though, as Urial took a few steps back to gaze at his work that only needed one more thing done to complete it. It needed to be turned on. Flicking the switch as the darkness of the night began to consume the streets, the surrounding area was suddenly bathed in a ray of rainbows, bright colors of red, gold, blue and green revealing themselves to the world. Though he himself was limited in the colors he could witness, those still blessed with their human form were not! 


It really was a beautiful spectacle





 









christmas-food.jpg


 
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Day 6
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Urial Ursler


Whistling a jolly tune as Urial was marching above the Kitchen with his metallic arms lifting him in the air, he was careful to weigh out each and every ingredient needed to pinpoint precision, not wanting to dare make even the slightest mistake. There were two things Urial took pride in, his Medical skills and his bakery skills. Those two skills came to him naturally in life, they were the abilities he boasted about freely without ever having to feel bad about it. Truly, baking was one of his favorite pass times and It was one of the things that he took absolute comfort in no matter the situation before he had started baking. It was calming but yet. The perfect combination. 


Quickly finishing and perfecting the product, he gently shuffled the ready to be baked cookies into the oven with a smile across his face that shined brighter than any star you could see in the night sky. 





2
 
Day 20: The poor unfortunate soul in a Santa costume.

It was approaching Christmas of 2019, and Owen Mills Mall was packed with excited children, those who had not yet learned the truth about the icon of Christmas. No longer was that hidden reality the fact that he was not real, no. Now, the most heartbreaking enlightenment a child experienced was that December 25th, 2019, would be the first anniversary of the death of Sinterklaas.


And yet, a man sat in the large red-styled chair in the central plaza of the mall. He had a long white beard, a whimsical red suit and hat, both of which were loose on him. There was a long line of small children, waiting to see him.


The parents of a screaming infant girl removed her from his lap, much to his relief. She had been there for at least five minutes, and her disposition had not changed in that time. "Send the next one forward." He decreed.


A young child stumbled forth, its gaze unswerving from the winking face of the man who, in its eyes, was nothing less than a god. It stood before him. "Santa..." it whispered.


"Yes." He said. "Ho ho ho ho... ho." There was a moment of uncertainty, and then he lifted the child into his lap.


The child woke from stupor and began. "For Christmas-" it inhaled "I would like-" it inhaled "a little-" it inhaled "red toy-" it inhaled "car, and a-" it inhaled "Groot acti-" it inhaled "-on figure from-" it inhaled "Guardians of-" it inhaled "the Galaski!" It smiled, both expectant and very pleased with itself.


The bearded man took a moment to puzzle out what it was that the child had said, then nodded. "It shall be so." He grabbed a staff, which leaned against his throne, and beat it on the floor, summoning two aides. He whispered in their ears, and they took off to opposite ends of the mall.


The child watched them go. It had forgotten to breath through its nose, and a bit of slime began to crawl out over its upper lip. The bearded man produced a tissue and offered it to his guest.


"Now..." said the man "Have you been a good... Have you been good, this year?"


The child nodded vigorously. "Yeah! I helped-" it inhaled "mommy with-" it inhaled "the dishes, and-" it inhaled. It went on. For a long time.


By the fates, I should have sent my aides for an inhaler... the man thought, pretending to listen very closely.


Mercifully, his aides returned with two wrapped boxes, which the child gleefully accepted and ran off.


"Let the next come forward!" The man said.


A surly girl of nine years came and stood in front of him. They stared at each other for a moment, and she began: "You're not Santa. Santa's not real. That beard's not real, and you're winking wrong."


The man straightened. "Well, you who are so wise. If I am not Santa, then who am I?"


"I don't know. Just a person." the girl crossed her arms in defiance.


"Just a person? Oh no, that's not right at all." He gestured for her to come forward, which she did. "I-"


She yanked his beard before he could continue. It did not come off, as she had expected, which gave her pause. He glared at her with one eye shut tight. "Okay," she said "the beard is real. But Santa's fat and you're skinny. And you're still winking wrong!"


"What is that supposed to mean?"


She sighed "When you wink you just close one eye for a second, not all the time!"


He blinked, one eyelid staying shut.


"See!" she said, and threw up her arms in exasperation.


He nodded. "Look, why don't you just tell me what you want for Christmas?"


"I don't want anything for Christmas. Not from you. Santa's not real and you're just pretending!"


"Shh!" he said, glancing at the line behind her. They all seemed far too self-absorbed to have heard her proclamation. He turned his gaze back to her and closed his eye. "Hmm..."


She rolled her eyes. "What are you doing?"


"Reading your mind, of course." He smiled.


"No you're not!" she stomped her foot.


"When you went through Pandora Jewelers, what was it you saw that you wanted? Round... I see that it was round... and it had markings on it... It was... a silver baseball charm? Yes. I see now." He snapped his fingers in the air.


She looked at him, stupefied. "How... How did you..."


"Mraw!" the sound interrupted her, and a midnight-black raven swooped down to perch on the man's shoulder. He plucked the charm from its beak, which it briefly protested and afterwards sulked. The man held the charm out to the girl, who absently took it.


"You really are... Santa?" she asked.


He hung his head, then asked "Can you keep a secret?"


She nodded. He gestured again for her to come forward, and she leaned right up next to his face.


"I am not Santa." he said. "I am his brother. Er... Harald Claus."


She puzzled this news together. "Wh- where's Santa?" she asked.


He thought for a moment. "Santa is with his family this year. He is with his close friends. They are rejoicing, drinking milk and eating cookies, and so will be doing for some time."


She accepted this, nodding, and threw her arms around 'Harald'. "Thank you. Merry Christmas." she said, and wandered off, content.
He shakily retrieved a tissue from his pocket and wiped his one good eye. "S-send the next forward."
 
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Recruitment Season 2024

Lars picked up the small pile of mail under the slot in his front door, sifted through it. Mostly bills and the like. Fan mail. Junk mail. He is about to toss the whole pile in the garbage when one of the pieces of junk mail catches his eye. It is not addressed to Lars Magnusson. It is addressed to Magus. Not “The Amazing Magnus” no. Not his stage persona. His other identity: Magus, Man of mystery. Paranormal investigator. Consulting detective. This is not good. This is not the kind of notice he wanted to attract at all!


He tore open the envelope violently, ripping the stationary inside. It was a handwritten note. Piecing it back together, he scanned the message, then read it again more carefully.


4/5/24


To: Codename Magus


From: Katheryn Barrett, AKA Janus.


RE: Twin City Guardian Membership


You sir, are a hard man to track down.


Don't panic just yet, I doubt there are many besides me who could have done it, and I had help from some of the best in our business. And we haven't outed you, nor will we. You come highly recommended by Captain Blanco, and I know from personal experience how hard she is to impress. I am sure you are busy so I will come right to the point. We lost a key member of our team this year, and another member is planning to retire this fall. We are seeking new blood. While I know you prefer to work alone, I am hoping you will at least consider consulting with us as you do with the police. If you would like to discuss terms, meet me at noon on the 10th at Caribou Coffee, just off of New Brighton Boulevard in St Anthony. We'd like to be able to announce our partnership by Saturday to beat the Monday deadline


He crumpled the letter in his fist, smoothed it out and read it a third time. He dropped it on the floor and ran his fingers through his hair, mind racing, eyes darting back and forth, trying to see all the angles. He stopped, closed his eyes, and took a deep breath. This could work. He could do this. He knew the Caribou cafe. Passable coffee. Good muffins. A lot of windows, but some seating toward the back, out of direct sunlight. They'd had a help wanted sign in the window for weeks now. They'd be open for four and a half more hours, and a proper disguise would take two at least. Drive time of 87 minutes. It would be close, but he'd make it. Time to get a part time job.



Goddamn it. He had intended to get some sleep this week...



2045: the year everything changed, and nobody noticed.

Lars landed heavily on the sidewalk, startling several passersby. He had appeared, seemingly from nowhere, spat up onto the shores of reality from some forgotten corner of deep time. He lay still for a moment, trying to take it all in. He could hardly believe he was still breathing.


Breathing!


He gasped, choked a little, rolled over and sat up. He hacked up some phlegm and spat between his knees. People continued walking by, barely willing to spend the effort to even look askance at him. He closed his eyes and rolled his neck around, gingerly touched the abrasion on his cheek. When he opened his eyes again, he found his gaze unexpectedly met by a small child who had stopped to investigate him.


“Are you ok Mr...?”


Lars considered this, then nodded. “Yes. Yes, I guess I am. You'd think I'd have gone mad, all things considered, but I think I may be 'ok' after all.”


“Your eyes are different colors.”


“You... are a very observant child. That is true. The scientific term is 'heterocromia iridis' ...I was born this way... would you like to see a magic trick?”


“Mama says magic is not real.”


“That, I will not dispute. Reality, however can be quite tricky, even if you think you know where to look.” He produced a quarter, set it on his open palm. A small hole appeared in the center and it shrank and reformed into a fifty yen piece. He handed it to the child. “There's a tip for you: Never talk to strangers, they may have odd ideas. Now. Let's find your mother shall we?” He scooped the child up and turned to scan the nearby foot traffic. The child, peeking though the hole in the coin, pointed matter-of-factly to a woman talking on her cell half a block away, waiting for the crossing light. Lars hurried over to her.


“Excuse me, madam, I think you forgot something.”


The woman turned and looked him up and down, wrinkling her nose in disapproval before her eyes had even finished the journey. She snatched the proffered child with one arm, and fled across the street, never once putting down the cell. Over her shoulder, the child peered back at Lars through the coin, and he waved goodbye.


As they disappeared from view, Lars stuffed his hands into his pockets and headed up the street, walking slowly amongst the bustling crush of humanity, with no direction in mind. It was almost more than he could stand. All these people hurrying about their little lives. Just a few days ago, he could have ignored them. Background. Filler. Hardly even extras. More like... scenery. Now, the scales had fallen from his eyes, and he felt so keenly his connection to them, and their separateness too. The tension between the two poles was unbearable.


How could there possibly be so MANY?! Where did they all come from?! How did they not simply fall to their knees agog at the majesty of it all? Each one of them unique. A microcosm of the multiverse, and a universe unto itself. His breath hitched, hard, and tears began to flow. He pushed open the first door he stumbled across and found himself in an internet cafe. The attendant looked up.


“Are you all right, sir?”


Lars gaped at him. He was real! They were all real! This young man had a job and a private life and he was talking! They were having a conversation. No plot, no ulterior motive, no hidden agenda. Just a conversation. The clerk looked at him, expectantly. Slightly worried...


...right! Conversations required that both parties speak. Lars wiped at his eyes and sniffed hard.


“...yes, sorry. I'm fine. Really well actually. Just... having a moment. Bit of an epiphany. Took some doing, believe me, you. I feel thick, to be honest. Like Dorothy. Had to go on a grand journey just to find out that what I really needed was in my own backyard.”


The clerk eyed him suspiciously. “Are you on something buddy?”


Lars's laugh was short and harsh, like the bark of a small dog. He smiled a genuine smile, tinged with sadness. “No sir, I am not. In point of fact I don't think there exists a drug that could touch this... did you ever get everything you ever wanted, only to find out that nothing was how you thought, and all your lifelong dreams were for nothing?”


“Um... no?”


“Well I don't recommend it. Leaves you feeling like a right prick. And now I need to make amends. How much for a table for 20 minutes?”


“Sixty bucks.”


“Thank you, my good man. And keep the change. I am not sure what the inter-dimensional exchange rate is, but by and large their Baltimore is just like this one. I expect their money is close enough to pass.”


The clerk took the bill, examined it, shrugged, and rang up the register, pocketing a couple of twenties from the til. Lars threw him a wink, and he winked back. It was exaggerated and sarcastic, but it hardly mattered to Lars. This was the end of his story, or at least this chapter. Hopefully he would get a chance to write a better one. He'd made a mess of the first bit.


He sat down, opened an old chatroom, and started typing.


Larry has entered the chat


Larry: Are you there, God? It's me Magus.


Deadstar has entered the chat


Deadstar: What do you want, Lars?


Larry: I want to turn myself in. I trust you to do it right.


Deadstar: … ...Let's say I believe you. Why now?


Larry: Because I was wrong. I see that now. I've been there, Aaron. I met them. They aren't the authors. They are just writing stories. Some of them line up some of them don't. Their stories of Iron Wing are of some kind of cyborg made from metal of a crashed alien spacecraft. In their stories, Orion actually IS an alien. And the final kick in the head, was that that world actually exists too. I went there, by accident, trying to get home. Their 'Guardians' are called 'Protectors' though, and they're based in Phoenix.


Deadstar: ...You aren't making a lot of sense.


Larry: Oh, it gets weirder. Some of our movies actually happened in their world. You wouldn't believe who is president there if I told you. It's a big multiverse. Everything's gotta line up with something somewhere. Nobody is in charge of this mess, Aaron. Or if there is, I don't want to meet them. There's just us. We are the story tellers. For ourselves. For each other. We are the authors and the subjects, both. And I have done so much harm. I want to do better. I want to make amends.


Larry: I want to write a better story. …


Larry: ...are you done with the fucking trace yet or what?


Deadstar: Yes. Just double checking for trickery. Don't move. I'll be right there.


Deadstar has left the chat


Larry has left the chat


He pushed back from the keyboard, waved to the clerk and stepped outside. He didn't wait long. With a whoosh and a pop, Aaron was there. Lars nodded hello. Aaron gently took his hands and put them into cuffs. Lars raised an eyebrow, and handed them back to Aaron with the faintest smile.


“I was thinking we could do just 'a walk' instead of a perp walk? There's a station for booking just three blocks over.”


“Fine. But no more tricks. ...and I apreciate you choosing somewhere close. Walking is for the birds. My knees are too old for this.”


“Oh, but I didn't choose the place, old friend. Total coincidence. Everything is, turns out.”
 
Pumpkin Spiced Non-fat Soy Half-caf Lattes... to go

Adelaide Hameldon had planned this moment for years. This was how it would begin. And nothing, nothing, would stand in her way...


She was twelve when she discovered Pumpkin spice. None of her friends could stand it. They didn't even drink coffee, the philistines. No matter. Having a sophisticated palate made her interesting. She could wait. She would sit in the coffee shops everyday after school being interesting by herself. She would read her teen girl power magazines, and sip her pumpkin spiced non-fat soy half-caf Lattes, and she wasn't lonely at all. Not at all. She was patient. One day, and soon, somebody would notice her. She would look up and they would be staring, trying to work up the nerve to ask her name. She was 15 when somebody finally noticed.


It was a blustery day in early November, and Adelaide was settling in with her usual. But something about it was different today. It tasted the same. It spread the same warm feelings outward from her stomach to her toes. But something felt odd. She flushed. She felt... watched. Glancing up from her magazine, she locked eyes with a middle aged woman, staring at her openly over her own latte. It was a pumpkin spice. She could feel it. From all the way across the room, she could tell. She could feel the hot liquid splashing down the woman's throat as if it were her own. The connection was electric and disorienting. And apparently doubly so for the woman. Her eyes widened in alarm and she choked, spilling a good deal of the latte down the front of her pricey looking blouse. Adelaide chuckled, nearly choking herself. Luckily she was not so gluttonous as to open throat such a delicately flavored beverage as if it were a beer keg at some ridiculous 'rebellious' teen party. Impulsively, she crooked a finger at the woman, as if to call her to account for staring. Weirdly, the woman dropped her cup on the floor, making an even bigger mess, and shuffled over to her table. Alarmed at first, thinking the woman wanted to fight her, she sat up, prepared to flee. But then she just... stood there. After an uncomfortably long silence she finally spoke up.


“What do you want, lady?”


“You beckoned, miss. What would you have me do?”


Adelaide considered this. As she did, she could feel the first few swallows of the woman's latte sloshing around in her stomach. Somehow, the pumpkin spice connected them. It called to her. Somehow it granted her control. She was intrigued.


“Go home. Behave normally. Come back tomorrow at the same time and order the same drink.”


“Yes, miss.”


The next day, the woman arrived on schedule. She did not seem to recognize Adelaide, and didn't respond when beckoned. She ordered a latte. Drank it. Headed for the door. Nothing. Then Adelaide took her first sip of the day. The woman stopped. Turned and came back. Adelaide smiled.


“Hello, miss.”


“You were going to leave.”


“No miss, I'm sorry. I didn't recognize you.”


“But you do now.”


“Yes. I am here to serve you. I forgot.”


“Go and get your friends. Bring them here for coffee. Be sure they try the pumpkin spice.”


“Yes miss.”


••••••


17 years have passed. Little by little Adelaide has grown her empire. Drip by caffeinated drip, she took over the city. One by one the coffee shops fell. The grocery stores. The bakeries. As her grip tightened it got harder and harder to find any coffee in the city uncontaminated by her influential drug. Soon supply became an issue. In order to supply enough doses to maintain her empire she eventually hit on the idea of repurposing an old oil depot. Her slave labor cleaned the ancient tanks and set to work turning them into giant coffee percolators. Soon, all of baltimore would fall. DC would follow. And when she controlled the machinery of government? The FDA would start putting pumpkin spice in EVERYTHING. Her plan was glorious. Every knee would bend. Every tongue would crave just one more drop of the precious spice. The spice must flow.


••••••


Adelaide sat at the counter of her new coffee shop, at the very center of her web, sipping her ritual beverage. Just outside, the huge white cylindrical tanks were brimful of her spicy secret weapon. She had concentrated the last of her product here for the final push onward to DC. Her local slaves would only be under her control for a few more hours before they metabolized the spices and recovered themselves. But it hardly mattered now. In a few minutes the fleet of stolen MilMi-26 helicopters would arrive. And then the spice would rain down on DC. And the fleet of tanker trucks would bring in the rest for mop up. Nothing could stop her now!


A perimeter alarm began to blink. Somebody was trying to stop her. She swallowed the rest of her latte and went out to greet them.


Kate landed in the open area in the midst of the converted refinery. The air reeked of coffee and over cooked pumpkin spice. This had to be the place. She subvocalized into her earbud. “I'm in. Looks like my leads were accurate after all. This place is surreal. It's like Starbucks, Microsoft and Exxon had three-way and this is the result.” She listened for a moment and replied “Understood. Will leave the channel open.” She turned to see a somewhat younger woman coming out of the nearby office building, wearing a hard hat and holding what looked for all the world like a giant syringe, but with no needle at the business end. She nodded in greeting. “This your place?”


“Yes. And you can't be here. My plans come to fruition tonight. My hand will not be stayed.”


“Oh, yah? Crazy talk, huh?" she wrinkled her nose with a squinty smile. "I love when the crazy is right on the surface like that. You know where you stand with that sort of crazy. I take it you are the 'Basic Bitch' in chief, then?”


“Oh, you fly in here in flip flops, wearing a taijitu on your blouse, but I'm basic? That's rich. Let's hear how you call the tune with some spice in your veins.” She hefts the syringe looking thing to her shoulder like an RPG and lets loose a blast of hot spiced latte. Kate tries to dodge, but the spread is too wide, and she is coated, head to toe. “Ha. Now we'll see. Come here.”


Kate stumbles toward her across the slick coffee muddied ground, feigning confusion, then rushes forward at the last second, shadows erupting from her palms, entangling Adelaide and holding her fast.


“Sorry, BB. My veins are otherwise occupied. No spices allowed up in here. I got my own crazy to deal with. But your crazy? That's all she wrote!”


Adelaide relaxed into it as the shadowy forces writhed around her. The darkness held her, but it could not touch her. And she had a back up plan...


“You think I didn't have contingencies? I have been planing this for almost 20 years, little hero. Let me go or all those workers up on top of the main tank will jump in and drown themselves. You wouldn't want that on your conscience would you?”


Kate reluctantly released her hold and slumped in defeat, hung her head and said “Very well. You win. What now?”


“Now? NOW?! Now you will bear witness to my final victory. Come up to the top of the main tank, and weep. For you shall see perfection! None shall escape my grasp! All shall-- why are you touching your ear? Are you listening to me?”


“Mm? Oh, sorry, not really. The point is to GET you monologuing. Listening is, well it's boring, frankly... Well, tell you WHAT, Aaron, how about you don't tell me you told me so, and I won't tell you so either. This plot has been years in the making, and if you had... Fine. Fine!” She turns back to Adelaide. “Sorry. We're ready for you now. Go ahead.”


The Latte Mastermind gestures furiously to her slaves up on the tank and they step toward the precipice, gently bubbling hot milky death waiting inches from their feet. With a bright flash of light, Kate shoots upward, restraining the nearest ten with shadowy tendrils from her fingertips. With a whoosh and a pop, Aaron appears and grabs four more, tossing them back over the safety barrier. Another day saved! He flashes Kate a quick 'thumbs up' to which she rolls her eyes and starts to turn away. And then the catwalk gives way, and in the next instant, he is gone, vanished beneath the foam.


“AARON!”


An evil chuckle from behind her sets Kate's teeth on edge. The dark tendrils contract, and the darkness in her veins boils with rage as she spins to face the Basic Bitch once more.


“Oh... did your friend... wait. What is that noise?”


Kate turns back to look, genuinely puzzled. The tank is rumbling and the foam is swirling around like a whirlpool. Swiftly the speed of the muddy brownish grey liquids rotation increases, and the level begins to drop. Moments later, a very green around the gills Aaron is revealed, slurping down the last few feet of Latte in the tank. He tosses a wave at the two women looking down at him in stunned disbelief, and then with pop and a whoosh, he is gone. High above, a small muddy stain begins to spread across the Copernicus crater on the moon...


After half a minute, Aaron reappears alongside Kate and Adelaide. He hiccups loudly, looking slightly ill. They stare at him, incredulously. He shrugs.


“Sorry. I prefer my coffee black.”
 
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5 Years Later
​

Dream Journal:


I had the strangest nightmare last night. I'm not sure what it means, but it felt so real. Is it possible that I have seen the future? Is this what I do? Is this what I become? Let me describe it for you...






Election Day, Summer 2045


In a dark room with wall-wide windows showing the night skyline of Baltimore, BREAKING NEWS flashed on the TV screen in the corner with a fancy red, white and blue banner behind it as fanfare plays.


"Breaking news at this 11 o'clock hour, WBAL has an exclusive projection in the close race for Baltimore mayor. WBAL is projecting at this time that with 34% of the vote in, Julie Scotts will hold on to her current 45% of the vote. Julie Scotts, the outsider candidate from Texas, will become the youngest mayor of a major city, breaking the record set by Luke Ravenstahl who was elected the mayor of Pittsburgh in 2006 at only 26 years old. Julie Scotts, whose campaign garnered nationwide attention on her promise to enact meaningful change in the often strained super and human relationship, first rose into the national spotlight three years ago as a vocal leader against the so called Superman Laws beginning to merge as bills in many states around the country. Mayor-Elect Scotts faced significant backlash from the Humanity Now movement who..."


The TV clicked off as the obscured figure in front of the desk pressed the power button on the remote.


"So it's done then. We won."


"No. Not yet."


"You know if they ever suspect that we had anything to do -"


"-they won't. Who would believe that Julie Scotts, the poster child of supers everywhere, would be in league with Humanity Now? Exactly. No one. Now, give me the projections. How many can we have ready for inauguration?"






Inauguration Day, Dec 2045


"And it's going to be a tough road, but we are going to see it done." Applause rang out among the crowd gathered at Druid Hill Park.


"Now," Julie took the opportunity to grab the edges of the podium from which she was giving her speech, casting her glare out among the crowd and hundreds of cameras in the back row, "I have something that I am extremely pleased to announce." She drew her breath for a moment, preparing for the storm that was about to be unleashed. "Thanks to extensive work by the good people at HG Pharmaceuticals, I'm pleased to announce the creation of SA6G23 vaccine. This vaccine results in permanent suppression of the A6G23 gene, also known as the super gene, with no clinical side effects. In collaboration, the FDA will be releasing a report today verifying the safety and results of SA6G23 or what we've simply come to call, the Cure. Already at this moment across Baltimore, medical fronts are being opened to allow for any super willing to take this vaccine...today."






Summer 2045


In a dark room with wall-wide windows showing the night skyline of Baltimore, now cracked and destroyed. In the corner, BREAKING NEWS flashed on the shattered TV screen in the corner with a dark, somber tone.


"Breaking news at this 11 o'clock hour as we have multiple reports of clashes between groups of supers and the military turned violent over the signing of a nation wide Superman Laws, mandating that all registered supers take the Cure. This, after HG Pharmaceuticals faced one of the deadliest terrorist attacks in history earlier this month, a coordinated nationwide strike on their facilities. Military fired into a crowd of supers which resulted in... Hang on. One moment. Oh my god. I'm being told by my producer that Washington, DC...is gone. It has been nuked... Obviously this is just coming in so we will..."


The TV turned to static as a large explosion rocked the Baltimore skyline, spreading outwards as it enveloped the city. Julie, in that dark room, watched the explosion race towards her, certain to end her life. "I just wanted an equal society..." Instead, all she had started was war. A war that would envelope and consume the world until only supers remained. Julie would eventually get her wish, a society of equals, of supers, but standing over the graves of billions.
 
Storming The Castle part I

Kate breezed in through Aaron's front door. Perhaps it was rude of her, but then, he was the one who hadn't even shut it all the way. She had long since given up encouraging him to lock his front door like a normal person, but this was ridiculous. She rolled her eyes, shutting the door behind her. He was impossible to argue with. “Being invulnerable to physical damage is no excuse!” she'd said. As if home invasion and assault was the only reason people locked their doors. Honestly! What about personal items? What about, say, vandals? “Wouldn't it be disturbing to come home and find your walls spray painted with anti super slurs or something?” she'd ventured He'd just sighed in that infuriating way he had, and pointed out that pretty much everything he cared about, he carried with him, and that his second week in town somebody had spray painted his house with slurs. “And wasn't that awful? Didn't it just make your blood boil?” He'd just shrugged. What it would take to pierce that thick skin of his didn't bear thinking about, metaphorically or literally.


“Closed your front door for you, again! ...you home?”


Silence. So either he wasn't back from classes yet, or he'd come home early, and then gone out again. Little details jumped out for her trained reporter's eye indicating 'out.' He'd left in a hurry too. The goldfish tank cover was off, and the food shaker was set out, but the fish was still swimming up to the surface waiting for food. So something interrupted him. Something urgent. He'd knocked over that pile of papers on the way out too, rushing past the coffee table. Clumsy old man... She was bending down to tidy them up, when she saw his cellphone. It was inobtrusive, almost totally concealed by the disturbed papers as if it had been deliberately hidden. Now she began to be worried. Leaving abruptly was one thing. He was as forgetful as any other man in his mid forties. But his cell was one of the few things he cared for enough to take with him everywhere. That and his Dana Dabbs suit. And somehow, this didn't look forgetful. It looked planted. She picked it up, crossed her fingers, and slid the 'unlock' bar... It lit up and went to the home screen. Of course. No lock on his door, no passcode on his phone! She'd have rolled her eyes again but she was busily looking for any sign of... there! New video file. She opened it. The video was almost useless, a jumble of tumbling images before being covered by the papers. The audio was not much better...


“Hurry, up.” a modulated voice. Unrecognizable.


“I am going as fast as I can. If you've read my file, you know it is true.” That was Aaron.


“We also know you can teleport. Step outside and you will be given coordinates. Go there immediately. We are prepared to kill one of your students for every 15 seconds you delay. Best get moving.”


“Alright! I'm going, I'm going! Please don't hurt them!”


The rest of the audio is just bumps and thumping, and a faint pop as Aaron opens a wormhole to the moon. She checks the timestamp on the video. This was less than 20 minutes ago! She plays it again in frame by frame. About ten frames in she sees it. Plain as day. An armored gauntlet, imprinted with the symbol of the Knights of Raguel. Well shit. She had hoped to do some bar hopping. Maybe break up some brawls. Or start a few. Trust extremist nut jobs to ruin any plans for a pleasant evening. Oh well. Time for some thrilling heroics. Step one: find the knight's secret base. How hard could that be, right? They'd only avoided the entire east coast's best attempts to find them for the last, what, five months?


Easy-peasey.


Fuck.


Then again, Aaron was a clever cuss. Thought a lot faster than he moved. Maybe he had left her more than just a vague clue with the phone. She paged through his apps until she got to page five, which was empty except for a single chatroom link labeled Baron Mordo. Kate's jaw dropped. No. Couldn't be. He wouldn't! ...except he totally would. Aaron saw the best in everyone. Naturally he'd keep a backchannel open. Even for him.


Fuck.


She tapped the icon and a chat window opened.


Deadstar has entered the chat


Deadstar: Hello?


…


...


Larry has entered the chat


Larry: What do you want, Aaron? I think we pretty well said everything there is to say.


Deadstar: Oh great. It IS you. I was hoping it wasn't. Aaron. Is. Such. An. Idiot.


Larry: Kate.


Deadstar: Right in one, douchenozzle.


Larry: Charming. I've got things to do, Kate.


Deadstar: They have Aaron, Lars. I don't know where. They've kidnapped his students, and he caved like a cave bear and went where they told him. No way to trace. Wormhole was at least ten minutes ago. He left his phone. You're my best shot.


...


Larry: I wondered what that all that chatter was about. Fine. Uploading coordinates to your cell. Recommend waiting until dark to go in. They are well prepared for frontal assault, Kate.


Deadstar: How do I know you're not sending me into a trap?


Larry: Are you serious? I just texted you the home address of the Knights of Raguel. Of course it's a trap, don't be stupid. And if you die, try to make it at least interesting, ok?


Larry has left the chat


She hit the sleep button and pocketed the phone. Dear god she hated that man. And now she owed him. Her own phone buzzed, and she held her thumbprint on the unlock button... ...huh. Hiding in plain sight it seemed. Who would have thought to look for them there? 


Not bothering to open the front door, she punched through it and rocketed into the early evening sky on a column of purified sunlight.


••••••


Kate waited on the rooftop across the street, peering over the false front of the building through the stealth periscope she had ordered last year from Thinkgeek. Bailey had laughed at her for trying to get it approved as a business expense, which was annoying, because she had found it at least as useful for chasing down stories that didn't want to get told as it was for hero work. She probably should have asked Harry instead though; he almost certainly had better tech.


The sun had been down for almost fifteen minutes now, and her daytime jitters were almost completely calmed. As the shadows deepened around her, she could feel her muscles loosen, her blood—or what passed for it—quickening. The familiar quicksilver feeling shivered down her spine and the urge to move was becoming irresistible. She forced herself to wait. Counted to a hundred, and then again. She would have to be at her absolute best for this. There were 15 sentries on the top floor alone. And presumably the prisoner levels were somewhere down deeper. She needed to be flawless. She needed to flow like a shadow, leaving no traces until it was too late. The only help she'd have was in their dungeons already. She checked. All the best and brightest of 108's staff and students had been disappeared in under three hours time. They had gone to a lot of trouble to take them all alive, but there was no telling how long they would remain so. She took one last look through the periscope, and then pulled up the hood of the stealth suit Harry had gifted her upon his retirement. The night vision gogles painted everything green, and reduced her emissions to as near to background as Harry's genius could achieve.


She leapt over the false front, flickering off of the buildings flagpole and vaulting across the street, tucking and rolling silently across the roof. Don't mess with the classics! Her heads up display indicated that she had tripped the perimeter alarm, as predicted. Coming out of her tuck, she bounced up onto the awning above the stairwell door, and waited, crouched in shadow. Moments later, the door burst open, and two goons with guns swept the roof 360 degrees in opposed rotation. Hm. Well trained. But not well trained enough. Before they had even got as far as looking left and right, she was already flowing down the stairwell like a river of shadow. At the first landing there was a camera. No sweep either. Barely hesitating, she threw a small flare directly at the lens, and another solid burst at the stairwell light, destroying it and casting the landing into shadow. In the same motion, she dove over the railing, catching the edge of the stairs, flattening herself against the wall. She clung there, suspended between floors in the deep shadow left by the smashed light. After a minute or two, booted footsteps came thundering up the stairs, flashlights on assault rifles dancing. As they rounded the last corner, she tossed another two flares further up the stairs to hold their attention, and let go of the wall. She let herself drop two flights to be sure she was past them before tuck-bouncing off of a railing to slow her descent. Five more railings softly touched, and she was perched on the last landing just out of sight of the... she peeked under the lip of the drop ceiling with her periscope... Camera. Sure enough. Reasonably certain the other landings cameras had not registered her drop through their view (since there were no more jackbooted thugs entering the stairwell yet) she took her time slipping into the drop ceiling, easing it back to check for traps or alarms. Nothing. Almost disappointing really. But then, this was the public part of the building. No doubt it would be trickier past the door. Which had some kind of electronic lock...
 
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Lab Notes
​

Name Hadrian B. Alburn


Age: 17


Approximate power description: adaptive / compensatory physiology






1
 
The Night of Donner Party


Ezekiel 25:17 & Bonus Nemesis Prompts

“...So, why do you have this just lying around?”


Gearlock didn’t bother looking at Oliver as she replied, “I told you, in case I needed to reach the top shelf.”


While that may have been true, the oil stained girl being quite vertically challenged, Oliver felt like that wasn’t quite good enough of an answer to explain away the high tech artificially enhancing mech suit he was looking it at right now.


It looked to be a slim fitting body suit made out of green metal, but Oliver couldn’t even begin to fathom what kind of metal, exactly. Gearlock didn’t seem to be forthcoming with the information, either. Not that he could blame the girl for keeping secrets. He was a hero, she was a villain. Usually. Right now, they were both known to each other as different things. Survivor.


Both of them were among the few Supers left in Baltimore that hadn’t suffered a fate worse than death in the midst of the tragedy that was Donner Party. From what Oliver had looked up, she was initially an assassin for hire, using her insane jaw strength and ability to generate mouths all over her body, she could bite someone in two with but a quick tensing of a muscle. She also had the tendency to eat her prey, but no one could have expected this happening.


Donner Party’s ability didn’t stop at enhanced biting capabilities. No, her main power, it seemed, was to take whatever she ate, and replicating it after digestion. Initially, Donner Party had put Baltimore on high alert after she came in and killed a bunch of kids at Facility 108. It was horrible, and many of the local S-Ranks had been sent to deal with her once and for all. Imagine their surprise when the kids she had eaten were fanatically fighting for her like she was a god. Imagine how they feared for their life when she was able to make multiple copies of the same Super.


Imagine their terror when Supers like Klaus von Schieffer and Red were finally eaten and digested after a long never ending battle.


Oliver had no idea what had happened to Aaron, but word was that during the fight, right before some Klaus clones took him out for good, he suddenly disappeared out of existence. Oliver prayed for his safety, but was mostly relieved that Donner Party didn’t get a hold of the powerhouse that Aaron had proved he was on many occasions.


After a while, there were few Supers left. AEGIS had officially put the city on quarantine and made their plan all about keeping the problem from growing, instead of dealing with it. Donner Party wasn’t hurt by plans to starve her out, though. Plenty of civilians were left, and while she couldn’t keep up as many clones as usual due to rationing, that didn’t mean she was weak. She could have a small feast of civilian flesh and an army of Supers would be prepared in moments. Even then, she kept a healthy amount of Supers around to keep her secure.


Really, it was insane that Oliver had stayed, and maybe to an outside perspective, it was also insane just how Oliver could talk so nonchalantly to a villain in this kind of situation. Gearlock was a self-proclaimed “emotion hater”, and had admitted to doing away with such things when she first got her power to supernaturally understand clockwork technology. Oliver, himself, was definitely feeling a sense of what could have been fear, but it was a distant thing due to his power, and he had decided when the situation began to become dire that fear, while useful, wasn’t needed for this.


What he needed, was his sense of justice. His courage. His determination. Fear was a great motivator, but it was a drug that gave you strength and then took it away if it got too strong. He would need what made him Rescue for this final mission.


Donner Party always had protection and expected danger at every moment. Every moment, except one. For the past 2 weeks of observation, Donner Party was never as worried about attacks when she was gorging herself, every night, on a random human being picked up from the hoards like livestock. For good reason, too. With food at the ready, she had ammunition to spit out Supers who could protect her from harm, but it was that complacency that would be her undoing.


He arrived there at night, just as the stolen bell of a cathedral rang loudly to announce that it was time to eat. Somewhere inside, a copy of Red was controlling it. The metal suit Oliver was given to wear by Gearlock was said to be made in a unique way to disallow Red’s manipulation. If she was lying, which he knew she was very rarely capable of doing unless in very obvious ways, then he was dead, no further discussion needed. If not, well, Oliver decided to leave that up to God and began the night’s ceremonies.


The explosion rang out very clearly on the opposite side of where Oliver was stealthily crouching in wait. The thoughts of the clones spiked, and Oliver inwardly balked at the fanatic tinge that all the mental voices had, some painfully familiar. As the thoughts moved to the open hole in the side of the warehouse Donner Party called home, Oliver moved towards the unguarded door. His drive was focused on one particular voice he heard in the crowds.


'What a quaint way of making a new door. I thought it was getting stale in here.'


The blase words didn’t match up with the rising stress she was feeling. That’s all Oliver needed. His clockwork suit launched him across the distance, and wasn’t surprised as a lone Super noticed him. Stealth would only last so long with how Donner Party had picked her Supers.


With a quick wind up of his arm, hearing the click as the proper gears fell into place, Oliver’s fist shot forward, leaving a bloody and bruised fist shaped impression on the disgusting clone’s face. Many satisfying cracks were heard and the clone was sent to unconsciousness. It was quite dark, but even if he wasn’t, he didn’t want to stay around long enough to recognize who he had just punched.


The gears in his legs locked into place and he was bounding across the ground once more, kicking open the door of the warehouse with a solid planting of my foot. A few Supers hadn’t quite left to see to the disturbance quite yet, a few sticking around.


For the sake of his efficiency, Oliver dare not think of the clones with the same names as his friends.


Two clones of the same likeness came forward, their multiple appendages lacking the same finesse of the original and easily grabbable with Oliver’s new capabilities. A quick rip and the clones were no longer a problem, and Oliver dropped what was now just two female clones trying to bite at his ankles and force their limbs to regrow faster.


For a moment, Oliver’s vision was obscured by heavy purple gas, but with calm steps pre-planned for this occasion, Oliver placed the rebreather into his mouth and jumped up high, grappling onto the steel beams that held the warehouse together. There, in one of the corners, was a murderous looking blonde haired clone of Klaus. It had none of the respect the original had for himself.


Oliver flung himself at the clone, and while Klaus’s memories and skill had been passed along to the clone, there was still a disconnection between it and it’s abilities. It would never have a chance to grow used to said skills as Oliver’s enhanced kick took the will to fight and the right to live away from the clone, along with most of it’s stomach.


As the poison fog cleared away, Oliver finally saw his target, her stressed thoughts becoming actively more and more apparent. Her pink hair was a dyed pink, but was becoming closer and closer to the natural brunette that she was. Her happy smile was strained and the mouths on her neck and arms were naturally drooling, preparing for either a feast or a fight. As Oliver made his way to her, he ignored the obvious aspect of her that made this the most difficult.


She was only 14.


Her eyes grew bigger and bigger as he moved closer, looking quite intimidating with the green metal plating that only partially concealed the eye-catching gears that made his suit work at all. When he reached a certain distance, that fear sharpened, becoming a knife to be used.


Her eyes became slitted pieces of barbed wire and her skin folded oddly as more mouths formed on her cheeks, shoulders, and hands. It was the small bulge in her throat that alerted Oliver as to what was about happen next. Out from her main mouth and the two that formed on her shoulders, came 3 small clones with wings, already using their power at the behest of their goddess.


Oliver’s legs made to step back, but he stalled them with his eternal calm. How could she have known? Or maybe she didn’t know? Maybe this was just an unhappy coincidence. A horrible coincidence that reminded Oliver of his failures. Of his mistakes. Of his friend, Julie.


And yet, it was a coincidence he could work with. He had been one of Julie’s training partners before all this began. He knew her powers almost as well as she did, and he sure as hell was more experienced with them then some two-bit fresh out of the cabbage patch clones were. The clone’s stings stung at his face and body, but he kept going, his fear and anger forgotten as he kept pushing himself closer and closer to Donner Party.


She seemed to get the message as well as she stood up unsteadily, her stance becoming one of a sloppy martial arts, probably learned from a book. They looked textbook enough. As the clones swarmed Oliver, he pushed on, rinching back his fist as he heard the clink and letting his fist shoot off like a bullet, piercing the air Donner PArty would have been if she hadn’t dropped to her knees, her mouth shooting upwards at his extended appendage and attempting to take a bite out of the metal.


Deciding to help her get a taste of metal quicker, Oliver let his leg, ready to release, fly into the side of her face, the sound of a girlish whimper and metal tearing cleanly mixing together in a horrifying harmony.


The Julie clones dived down on his exposed skin, shooting sharp prods of energy at his injury. He hadn’t underestimated Donner Party, but he was still surprised at the chunk of flesh she had taken from his calf along with the metal caught between her cheek mouth’s teeth.


Ignoring the pain, Oliver rushed her, not wanting to let her regain her stance, and went to do her in with a mighty stomp of his leg. What he hadn’t expected, though, was for a bundle of tentacles to sprout from her stomach mouth, the appendages revealing to be a angry looking clone, but interestingly, only half made. The clone only had one eye, and it’s ears seemed to be missing, along with all of it’s hair. The tentacles, however, were very much developed, almost over developed.


Oliver felt himself get thrown across the room as the tentacles had their way with him regardless of his weight. Crashing into a pile of boxes, Oliver began to feel the constant stinging of the small flying clones as something more than just annoyance. The constant rippling of his skin and armor was beginning to take a toll on him. He couldn’t keep this up for much longer.


The tentacle clone removed itself from Donner Party, assisting the girl in getting up, before it moved for Oliver’s location, a deformed scowl present on it’s face. It was taking far too long, however, and with controlled movements, Oliver released the weapon he had been saving for this occasion, just in case.


The clone suddenly buckled as the first bullet ripped through it’s leg, and toppled as it’s other body parts were hit. With no bullets left in his Gearlock quickly made revolver, Oliver rushed over to Donner Party with the intent to kill, a feeling so different than the one had when he was saving people.


The girl’s thoughts were clear as he drew back his fist. She knew she could dodge it barely, or call upon someone from her hellish digestive tract to help her. This was going to be a cycle that ended with Oliver’s death.


She wasn’t wrong.


Oliver’s stance shifted at the last moment, the readied mechanized limbs of his suit all ready to release, and let his arm, become a loose lunge followed by his other arm in clumsy synchronization. Her eyes were wide in surprise as Oliver gave her a loose hug, but that didn’t stop her body’s countless mouths from beginning to feast on his suit and the flesh beneath.


As he felt the gears in his suit break, so too did the restraints release, the very same restraints that kept the mechanized suit from crushing him, but also keeping his enhanced strength at a respectable level. And so, as he felt his life flashing before his eyes, his arms and legs crushed Donner Party’s body with the same intensity as he was being squeezed. Their snapping bones sang the sweet somber song of death, together, but Oliver's mind had wandered long ago. Oliver's divided mind made his last moments seem like hours.


Hours he spent reminding himself of why he did this. Of that cute smile he would never get to see again, but could die knowing that it was safe from this horror.



For once, his power didn’t need to keep Oliver calm as he faced death with a smile, thinking of his sister.
 
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The Dawn of Gearlock


Main Nemesis Prompt 

If you had Oliver describe himself with one word, it would be driven. He knew that his drive to save people was what kept him going. His drive to do what’s right. So, as he looked upon the slightly bulky, waist high spider automaton, it wasn’t only his face that he saw in it’s reflection. It flittered back and to on it’s bronze colored metallic legs, skittering across the piles of junk you wouldn’t be surprised to find at a junkyard.


It hadn’t noticed Oliver, and it had done nothing illegal as of yet, beyond stealing from the junkyard, so he was content to merely wait and follow. After another thirty minutes of waiting, it was time to follow the spider robot, it’s backpack like accessory attached to it’s center part filled to the brim with pieces of scrap.


Oliver had expected to have to go far to find where the bot was going, but to his pleasant surprise, it was at the cusp of the junkyard that the spider began to fiddle around with some stray pieces of junk, before it uncovered a strange cellar door in the dirt. Opening the door up, the spider jumped inside, and didn’t notice as Oliver kept it from shutting, easing himself into the dark hole. Feeling around for the ladder that he assumed was there, Oliver climbed down and let the cellar door shut gently behind him.


Reaching the bottom quietly, Oliver stepped off the ladder into the dark. Looking around and listening, Oliver realized that he was in a average sized room that, beyond a path from the ladder to an open door, was completely filled with scrap metal. Oliver walked over to the door, opening it up to see a hallway with a bright orange light coming from a room at the end of a small hallway.


Not hearing any thoughts, Oliver continued quietly, sneaking down the hallway, but stopped as heard quiet humming coming from the room. It was soft, but had a thoughtful edge, like it was someone in thought instead of any kind of actual intentional tune.


Peeking into the room, Oliver’s eyes widened as he saw a figure standing over a large wooden table, their hands meticulously working on something or other. It looked to be some sort of glove, no, a gauntlet. When the figure, Oliver realized that they were quite small, whoever they were, put it on, it came up to their elbow, with metallic clamps keeping it on.


The figure suddenly turned around, looking at something near where Oliver stood peeking in. Backing up at the movement, Oliver began to make his way, as quietly as he when he came in.


Until he accidentally kicked a bucket with his foot, that is.


“Who’s there?”


Oliver’s power kept him calm, but he began to hurriedly make his way out of the hallway. He didn’t want to get into a fight with a possibly villainous Super in their own layer. Absently, Oliver noted that the voice sounded feminine and also, even more peculiar, their mental voice wasn’t there at all. Oliver had run into plenty of hard counters to his powers, but it was a surprise each time. He wondered what made her so different.


It was a good thing, then, that he didn’t need his power to hear the girl stomping after him. Reaching the door to the junk room, Oliver looked back and saw the girl standing there, her face looking like someone had just told her the weather looked nice when they knew she didn’t care, and yet, Oliver had the strangest feeling of absolute danger.


With short black hair that didn’t go far past her ears, and a pair of goggles hanging around her neck, Oliver didn’t need the oil stains on her cheek to get the clue that this girl spent a lot of time working. It was at that moment Oliver noticed the gauntlet on the girl’s shoulder, before taking a step back and dividing his mind to help react to whatever happened.


The girl flung her covered arm out, and to Oliver’s surprise, the gauntlet seemed to fly through the air at the unheard command. As the gauntlet began to spin and whirr as it headed towards Oliver, the telepath realized the small machine was unfolding into a very familiar looking bronze spider. Bending backwards and letting the spider fly over his head and into the pile of garbage behind him, Oliver stood back, thanked his days in gymnastics, and went to kick a bucket at the girl’s head.


In hindsight, there were plenty of things to do, many of them meant running, but if that girl commanded the spider, then giving her some confusion would help him out in the long run. It was unfortunate that the bucket was the only thing there, but as his mind snapped back together, the course of action had been unanimous.


The metal container flew through the air, and with a loud clang, smashed into the face of the smaller girl. Her hands went up and Oliver could distinctly hear a low hum of displeasure beginning to grow. From the pain or the rage, Oliver did not want to find out. Oliver was many things, a telepath, a first responder, and a hero, but what he definitely wasn’t, was fighting a Super on their home turf and expecting to win with a power that didn’t affect her.


And so, Oliver took one last look at the girl, before he bolted into the junk room. It was in his haste to get out quickly that he didn’t hear the low hum of a camera building up, before suddenly, as he went to put his hands on the first rungs of the ladder, a bright flash filled his eyes, along with a loud noise to go with it.


Oliver almost gestured wildly out in shock, but his power kicked in, and after rubbing his eyes for just a moment, Oliver began to blindly climb the ladder as fast as he could with his blurry eyesight.


“I’m gonna get you for that,” the simple statement came from below him, down amongst the junk room that he had left behind.


Oliver had been opening the cellar door when he heard the almost emotionless girl spoke up, sounding oddly blase about what kind of situation she was. Looking down, Oliver noticed the girl had put the goggles over her eyes, probably in case Oliver tried anything else, and it was in those goggles, Oliver once again found himself seeing something familiar in the reflection.



As he firmly closed the cellar door and began running away, taking out his phone and calling the cops with the address on his lips, Oliver realized that it hadn’t just been his face that seemed familiar in the goggle lens’ reflection.



See the epic team up between Oliver and Gearlock in The Night of Donner Party!
 
Skeleton Wars

Memes puzzled Lars. Not in the abstract, of course. The principles of memetic transfer of information was fairly straightforward. Simple, catchy, and easy to copy faithfully. Or alternatively, easy to modify. Highly mutagenic ideas could be very durable, even if barely recognizable from their roots. Those qualities, plus a little bit of sass, sarcasm, or cleverness was all it took for unbounded viral spread from mind to mind across a culture, or page to page across a network. Anything that could successfully reproduce did do, and settled into its niche, as if by design just like genes. Nothing much puzzling about that. In the abstract.


Certain specific memes though, puzzled him. Complicated. Low fidelity, cruddy art. Stale humor that barely counted as such. And yet still, they spread. It made no sense. Biological systems made no such allowances for genes. Genetic competition was fierce, and ruthless. And for the most part, memetic competition was the same. If anything it was more ruthless, and the wheels spun faster, ground finer. So why were there so many throwbacks? He'd wondered about it for years before he finally resolved to do the math. What he found was... surprisingly exciting!


There was room for throwbacks, of course, and almost all of the memes that irked him were within normal tolerances for a chaotic system. All except one: Mr. Skeltal was impossible.


Scratch that. Mr. Skeltal exists, ergo Mr. Skeltal is possible. But no model of mimetic reproduction, no matter how generous the tolerances allowed him to continue to exist past three generations. Mr. Skeltal should be dead by now, a thousand times over. Somebody was supporting it. Pushing it. Guiding it to succeed somehow, in spite of the odds. And that led to several key questions. Questions of such profundity that curiosity overcame Lars's better judgement. Questions that demanded investigation in person. Questions like “Who in hell would support an annoying, dying meme?” and “To what end are they guiding it?” and most critically: “How are they doing it?” That level of control over the wild badlands of the internet is unprecedented. It suggests some new form of speciality AI. Perhaps even a virus capable of zoonotic transfer to biological brains. That is tech Lars would kill for. Had, in fact, killed for far less...


It took him a few weeks to set up the necessary safeguards. Whoever, or whatever, was behind this, it was huge. There could be no half measures. He started out frequenting an internet cafe in Dundalk, disguised as a goth girl some ten years his junior. For the first week, he just surreptitiously installed micro-holo-cams and recorded himself for 10 hours a day, bouncing around chat rooms, buzz-feed, and a few borderline adult RP sites. He also recorded each of the four cafe attendants, memorizing their mannerisms and surfing habits during his down time. For good measure, he researched their familial relations, work schedules, relationship statuses, and put bio-tracers on them to map their movements outside of work. One of them was too close with too many people to bother with, but the other three would barely be missed by anyone. Eight days into his research, he wrote all three of them out one by one. To avoid unnecessary story complications, he disposed of the bodies in a warehouse fire across town. Taking their places was a pain in the ass, as he needed to change disguises frequently based on their work schedules, but it was essential to his plans. He now had unfettered access to the business and was able to set up micro projectors all over the space so as to assure an utterly natural appearance of the goth chick hologram, from any angle, regardless of any pesky customers walking through the shot.


Once he had full control of the cafe environment, he set up three different escape routes, covering pyrotechnic displays, several actual demolition charges, as well as carefully placed antipersonnel shaped charges. Physical measures in place, he turned to cyber security issues. Calling in a favor from John, he faked the destruction of a minor league communication satellite and suborned it to his use. With an untraceable uplink to the internet, he felt reasonably secure. Just in case, he rerouted all communication to and from the goth chick's regular terminal through a secure server he had custom built in the storage closet, from there to Washington, Norfolk, and Goddard through dedicated hard-lines he'd tapped into a year or so ago, and saved for a rainy day. From there he pinged the signal off the satellite back to a TV network affiliate he used to work for in LA. From there he reached out into the internet properly. Admittedly, the latency was pretty bad, but he wasn't planning on playing games. For chatrooms it would do.


Fifteen days after he began, he had dominated the work schedule to the point that the one remaining attendant quit. He drove away the majority of the customers as well because they were a pain. The boss didn't mind because on paper, the cafe was bringing in more money than ever, and he never came to oversee operations in person. By the 17th day, he had moved into the back room and dispensed with disguises. He was getting rank, but he was ready. On day 19, he made contact.


d00t has entered the chat


d00t: You have acquired our attention. You may come to wish you hadn't


gathchck17: Really? You're behind the Skeltal memes? d00t, I am SUCH a huge FAN!


d00t: Indeed? You seem to think we have... how did you put it? Zero sense of how internet culture works. You attempted to physically destroy several thousand hard drives remotely merely for containing a single image of “Mr. Skeltal” We may have a poor understanding of your culture, but we do not believe you are a 'fan' of our work


gathchck17: FFS, d00t, not the meme itself. The spread of it! Genius. How on earth do you get it to spread when it is so insipid and flat? That is how you got MY full attention. And believe me, that is pretty hard to do! Normally I have got a lot of irons in the fire, but I haven't thought of anything else in weeks!


d00t: You are too kind.


gathchck17: Seriously, what is your secret?


d00t: Secret.


Gathchck17: !!!


d00t: We will tell you, but then we will kill you.


gathchck17: You messed up the joke d00t, it is supposed to be 'could' tell you.


d00t: Is that so? We meant what we said. We are coming for you now. You think your obfuscation of communication pathways keeps you safe from us, but you are wrong. We can smell you. Anyone who looks at our memes we can find. You have been obsessing over it for, as you said, weeks.


Gathchck17: …


Gathchck17 has left the chat


Lars sank slowly down behind the register, fingering his phone's failsafe button. He wasn't nervous. Not yet. Not hardly. His phone chirped and he jumped, banging his head sharply on the bottom of the register. He swipes back to his chat ap and groans. God damn it Mallory, not now! Oh. It's her.


He was about to close the chat when she said the knights had taken Aaron. He considers this briefly. The statistical model says Aaron's a major character. No telling what might happen to the plot if he dies. Kate can probably get him out. And if she can't, well, Kate is expendable. He texts her the knights' address and wishes her well. Then he returns his attention to the problem at hand.


A quick adjustment to his holographic projectors, and there is a new attendant at the register. The goth chick gets up and crawls underneath the terminal table to hide. Lars goes and stands across the aisle from her, and then paints over himself with a static view of an empty row of terminals. If they are not just bluffing about the 'smell' thing, fleeing the room will not help and may actually be less safe. At least here there are visual distractions. He adds a few more 'customers' to the scene scattered at various terminals. That should buy him a few seconds, even if they aren't bluffing. “Smell” implies limited targeting accuracy. And if they are bluffing, he can still escape from here through his tertiary bolt hole. He opens the trap door with his foot, and then paints over that with floor.


A moment later, there is a crackling sound and a smell of ozone. Three portals of some kind appear spaced around the cafe in an equilateral triangle, one by the door, one by the register, and one between Lars and the goth chick. Two quick taps to his phone and the customers busy themselves looking panicky and generally distracting. Out of each portal steps a black clad humanoid figure. No skin is visible, but the face mask is a stylized human skull. The portals sizzle closed into a brilliant point of light and are gone. The customers revert to avoidance mode, and the clerk ducks down behind the register. All three figures raise some kind of short barreled projectile weapon in not quite perfect unison. The nearest one moves forward to the cowering goth chick while the other two cover him. He ducks down and points his weapon at her.


“We promised to tell you our secret before we killed you, and we shall do so. We are here from an alternate version of your world. Our world is dying. We need your calcium. We spread the Skeltal Meme to your minds to create weak spots in the dimensional barrier. Soon we will have spread them widely enough for a full scale invasion. Until then we three are the vanguard, and you will now be amongst our first victims. Do not fret. You will be saving our world! Your rendering will be painless. This I promise you, gathchck17.”


There is a flash of light from the weapon, and the goth chick screams but is otherwise unaffected. The creature rocks back in puzzlement. Lars ducks down low and hits the 'heroics' button on his phone.


“Die you monsters!” shouts the attendant. He pops up from behind the register with a shotgun. Several customers jump up from cowering and pull out handguns. Lars triggers the antipersonnel mines in the ceiling and floor by the register and the skull faced gunman disappears in a hammer-smash of fire and gore. The nearer gunman falls backward, while the one by the door opens fire on the register. Lars records the attack and then with a few quick gestures, loops the recording, shifting the projection sixty degrees to the right. The crouching skull-man looks back from seeing his first companion disappearing in a fusillade of fire from the door to see his other companion now opening fire on him as well!


“NO!” he shouts, and swings his weapon up and toward the door, letting loose a quick and deadly volley.


Even as the second would-be invader crumples into dust and is sucked into some kind of swirling mini-portal, Lars is already circling to the remaining skeltal warrior's left while projecting his avatar moving to the right. Tossing his burner phone in that direction, he then throws his voice and puts his avatar into mirror mode. “Here now, friend! That didn't go so well for either side now, did it? What do you say we parley before it gets worse?”


“What have you done? Who are...? How did you...?” The warrior faced his avatar warily, right hand brandishing the 'rendering' weapon, but notably hovering its left hand over a small black box on its belt. That looked important. Disabling mirror mode, he froze his avatar in a hands up, placating sort of stance while he crept forward and filched the box. A sparking portal about the size of a quarter appeared on the belt where the box had been. The warrior half turned and looked down, its whole body language expressing horror.


“My dimensional transponder, no! You've destabilized my attachment protocols! A dimensional protuberance is forming!”


It tries to move away from the bright spitting and hissing flare, but it seems to be stuck. The left side of its body folds up around the spot with a horrible crackling sound. It swings its weapon around, as if trying to bring it to bear on Lars, but the arm and the weapon both whip around the now hidden flare as if pulled by enormous invisible forces. The crackling noises continue as the creature's body crumples into a ball, floating a few feet off the floor. At last there is a spluttering burble, a wet sucking sound that tapers off into a hiss. All that remains is a black stain on the floor.


Lars looks at the little black box with interest, pockets it, and then shuts down all the holograms.


“Not bad for a few weeks work!” he murmured to himself, “Inter-dimensional invasion prevented! Black box tech for visiting other realities recovered! And there's still time to get over to the Knight's HQ to make sure Kate doesn't fuck up rescuing Aaron.”


You'd almost think somebody 'out there' was on his side, wouldn't you?

SKELTAL.png​
 
Storming The Castle part II

Aloysius was late for work. Again. The power had gone out in his building overnight and his phone, uncharged, had died. Damnit, damnit, damnit, damnit! This is it! He's already on his third warning. If this gets reported up the chain of command, he's going to get called for an audience. And nobody as low as he was in the organization ever came back from those... Then again, if he failed to show up, they'd come for him. Maybe he should just start running now. He grabbed his charger, phone, wallet and keys and ran for the door. Yanking it open, he nearly collided with a strange man, fist upraised as if poised to knock. He starts to apologize, say he hasn't got time for whatever the guy wants, when an important detail niggles its way into his consciousness: this guy is like looking in a mirror!


“What the hell? Mister, you look...”


The familiar stranger flounced into the apartment like a force of nature, talking up a storm.


“I was about to say the same to you, Al! Can I call you Al? Can I come in? I've been looking for you the better part of a year now, and holy shit, I knew from the court records I had a brother, but a twin?! Holy shit! C'mere, brother!” The hug is almost concussive in its perfunctoriness, and then the man is exploring the apartment eagerly like a dog in new digs. “Hey now, this is not bad, but we can do better you know, now that mom's gone, and I've found you, and we can share the inheritance, we'll live like kings, high on the hog until the cows come home!”


Aloysius has difficulty following this new turn of events, but he has not forgotten about his commitment to the Knights and the consequences of failing to show up for work. He attempts to cut in to his the steady stream of chatter coming from his 'twin.'


“Look, uh, brother, I am reeeally late for work and if I... did you say inheritance?”


“I did indeed, brother, mine! Millions. Each. Oh and don't worry about being late for work. I paid a visit to Knut before I came here. I promise you, he won't be making any more reports.”


With agonizing slowness, the wheels set turning in his mind at the mention of 'inheritance' and 'millions' eventually turned up the fact that...


“Wait... If you just found me, how did you know my supervisor's name was Knut?”


“Ah, Al my friend. Thereby hangs a tale. I tried to give you a few lines, perhaps a respectable paragraph. But a whole chapter? No my poor Al, you are meant for lesser things; sadly your part in this story has come to an end.”


••••••


17 minutes later, Lars swiped Al's keycard in the lock and held his eyeball up to the retinal scanner. Deftly pocketing both, he stepped into the main security dispatch center for the Knight's primary HQ. “Hey, Philip! Sorry I'm so late for my shift! Anything exciting happen?”


“Aw, dude, you are so lucky Knut didn't show today. Your ass would be in a sling! Oh and exciting?Check this shit out: the angels brought in more'n half the students at 108 this morning, and this afternoon they got a bunch of the big fishies: Solo, Audio, Red, Vape, Jericho... Hell, they even got the damned secretary what'sername? Serenity? Tell you what, that one needs a new codename. She gave the most trouble of any of them. Put two cherubim, a bona fide seraph, and 5 elohim in the hospital! Some kind of 'dragon breath' attack; guess they really mader her mad or sumpin'. It's a miracle they managed to take 'em all alive!”


“Yeah, I reckon so! What they wanna do that for anyway? Why not just kill 'em?”


“Eh, who knows? Mysterious ways and all that. I ain't gonna ask the Mistress questions, am I? Would you? I 'spect she's got something special planned. Public execution at daybreak or some such.”


Lars nodded sagely, and went to Al's seat at the bank of monitors. It was going to be a long wait until nightfall, with just this jackalope for conversation.


••••••


She was pretty good, had to give her that. She slipped past each of the cameras and guards like one of his own holographic characters set to 'fluid' mode. It was actually hard to believe flesh and blood could really move like that. He didn't even have to over-ride any of the cameras, and his lump of a partner certainly didn't notice any of the trace flickers of motion through the stairwell cameras. The guards sent to the roof were an automatic response to the proximity sensors. The second wave had already decided the top landing light had blown out on its own, and Lars did nothing to dissuade them from thinking this. The locked door at the base of the stairs was going to be tricky though, even for her. Time to make some use of his useless fellow monitor monitor. He activated the solenoid he'd put under the monitor when he'd first come in and sat up, suddenly projecting an aura of alertness.


“Hey, Phil, check this out: see that flickering here? I think there's something wrong with the camera at the end of the hall. Go check it out, would you?”


“Huh. That's odd, ain't it? Never seen that sort of glitch before. Be right back!”


“Hey man, don't forget your helmet and sidearm, right? Could be trouble!” Lars winks.


“Ha. Safety first, right?” Phil puts on his helmet and ducks out the door.


Lars waits a few seconds more before he plants the bomb under the desk. 5 minutes should do. She should reach the lower levels in three. This will give them some cover. Possibly even alternate escape route, depending on how sturdy these floors are... Setting the cameras along his own escape route for cascading failure, he throws up a half assed hologram of Al in the hot seat and heads for home. Time for a hot shower and some sleep.


••••••


Kate crawls across the duct work until she is out of the camera's range and gently lifts a ceiling tile, dropping down into the camera's blind spot. She examines the lock. “Shit.” That is some serious tech. Maybe she can squeeze through the window if she can break the glass... though no doubt setting off every alarm they have in the process. And not even sure she can fit through. Not for the first time, she finds herself wishing her strength would last past sundown. Peeking through the window, she sees somebody coming! “Oh, too good to be true!” She shrinks back into the shadows in the corner and waits. The lock cycles, flashes green, and the door opens. A lanky man in a generic security uniform and helmet pushes the door open and turns to peer upward at the camera. He gives it a quick thump, and grunts in a puzzled sort of way. Kate flicks him in the leg and he glances down. The photonic shard bursts through his right eye and she catches him as he slumps down, dragging the body over into the camera's blind spot. She quickly checks that the he holds will cycle the lock on its own and lets the door swing shut. Swiftly, she relives the body of it's uniform and slips into it. She grabs the keycard and as she picks up the slightly bloodstained helmet, she finds a note inside.


You're welcome. Again. You'll find Aaron and the others three levels down. Mind the sentry guns! Oh, and by now you have roughly three minutes until the building comes down. Most of it anyway. I didn't have time to thoroughly check their construction specs. Tick tock, katie-dear!


-L


Yanking the door open, Kate begins to run, a steady stream of very creative profanities spilling from her lips.
 
Ezekiel 25 17

Baltimore, Maryland


Outside the Horseshoe Casino


December 29th 2033


Eddie lightly touched his limiter armband and it reshaped itself. Metal warped and flowed, circuit boards rearranging themselves. At no point did the green light turn off. As far as commonwealth was concerned, he was still behaving himself. The little robot that stood on his shoulder booted the green light, along with the tracer element, into the darkness of the parking lot and struck a heroic pose which made Doris burst out laughing. “You'll be glad to know I guided it somewhere safe for later, Ed. Unless you want Commonwealth enquiring in the morning why you're still hanging out in the Horseshoe cassino lot...” Ed grinned.


“Ah, screw 'em! I got job offers coming out my ears with what I can do. They can keep their lousy blue card if they can't take a joke. Tonight, we're gonna have some fun, tomorrow, you all can graduate and I'll take the fall if it comes to that. Not that it will. I just want to see how far we can get up before we hit the craps table and hand it all back.”


Doris and Ollie glanced at each other. Eddie stared at them, incredulous.


“No. Absolutely not, you two!” Do you know how heavily the odds favor the house in craps?! You will get us caught in a heartbeat if you start with your dice manipulation shenanigans!”


Ollie threw up his hands in protest


“Man, Eddie, you lame, bro! You talk about fun, but where's the fun in counting cards? We don't even know if we can do it yet! Let us try it out! It would be good team practice! Doris can only bend one die at a time, and I can only bounce stuff so soft you know? I need to practice subtle, like.”


“That's what I'm afraid of, dummy! Bounce 'em off the table, they'll kick us all out. Not to mention ban us for life and pin our pictures in every casino from here to Vegas! I can only handle the security cameras, not the security guards, capiche? No means no!”


Ollie folded his arms in a huff and turned away. Stuart knitted his brows, puzzling over something. Eddie favored him with a look.


“Yes, Stu? You got your thinkin' face on. What's going on in there?”


Stuart frowned and looked up, as if straining to remember. Doris and Tasha rolled their eyes skyward, but for a different reason.


“I... uh. I still get to play in the slot machines though, right?”


“That's right, buddy! You get three freebies. Climb right in there, and let the silver flood flow, k? You're going to make some little old ladies very very happy tonight, eh buddy?”


Stuart lit up like a sunrise over the harbor and pumped his fist.


“Yeah! Hooh!”


Tasha smiled in spite of her annoyance, something about Stuart you just couldn't help smiling. God he was thick though! She shook off her irritation and held up her limiter for Eddie to bamboozle next.


“Whatever, losers. You can play whatever loser games you want, but don't come crying to me when you're out of cash. I'll be at the blackjack table, and I don't want to be disturbed.”


Eddie flicked his finger at her limiter and it began to disassemble itself as his had. A few seconds later, five diminutive robots invaded the casino and began disabling security footage storage media. At the count of 30, the young heroes linked arms and skipped toward destiny. They had gone all of fifteen feet when Roger struck.


The papers the next day carried reports of a super fight that began at the Horseshoe casino and spread across the river to the oil refinery. No known vigilante was confirmed to be involved, but speculation ran rampant. Most papers had a fairly predictable spin on the story based on their editorial policies toward super-humans; some focused on the oil spilled in the river, some focused on the amazingly minimal collateral damage otherwise. But one fact was incontrovertible: An S-class super-villain had been jailed with minimal fuss and with maximal panache and banter. Anybody who disputes it can go screw, and for those who were there, the fist bump at the end was reward enough.


Eddie: Technokinetic, Codename: Chop shop


Doris: Projectile bending, Codename: Tilt


Ollie: Air-trampolining, Codename: Double Jump


Stuart: Density Increase, Codename: Magnum


Tasha: Split second precog, Codename: Improv
 

Welian's Li'l Babu
​


 
​

Today, Maryland went through one of its most trying times ever known. It was attacked with immense force by a being that did not officially name itself, but instead, the media have taken to naming it Leviathan, as it came from the waves of Maryland's coastline.


Leviathan surfaced near Baltimore, striding on six legs out from the ocean. It was initially met only with people amazed by its sheer mass, towering many stories high with a thick-set body, and surprisingly, no head. Amazement turned to terror as they realised that it was not stopping, and soon it was tearing through buildings, roads, and nature alike.


The military was the first response to the new threat. Even heavy machine gun fire and tanks proved ineffective against the monster's incredibly tough hide, and its march towards Baltimore continued evermore. Only heavy mortar shells seemed to even slightly dig into its flesh and then only from above when they desperately needed to damage its legs - if only to stall for time until other measures could be taken.


By this time, Leviathan had reached Bear Creek, drawing ever closer to the main city. When it surfaced, it found new adversaries waiting for its arrival.


A call had gone out to all of the blue cards to the USA, and many students of AEGIS had been allowed to join the fight.


The superheroes had arrived.


The battle that followed was long and bloody. The dire beast had revealed great long tentacles that extended from its smooth black body. Dozens of them lashed out, tens of metres in length, holding fast onto heroes and crushing them before slamming them into the ground.


Several heroes were lost to the surprise of this change in Leviathan's apparent nature, luckily none of them from facility 108 itself. Not that they were exempt from the grim reality of this world.


Evie Knox proved herself incredibly useful in constructing barriers to slow the bastard. Red was able to create great javelins of metal that speared into Leviathan and wedged open wounds seeping black ichor. Aaron sadly could do little more than trip one leg at a time, though he did contribute more than most to the effort of slowing the beast down.


The rest of those who had made it to the fight of attrition did their utmost to keep wearing Leviathan down, and for the most part, it worked.


A notable attempt at heroism was made when Hadrian was given a jetpack and a giant energy sword by a scientist that wasn't durable enough to get sufficiently close to use them himself.


Hadrian fought valiantly, and the number of tentacles laid waste by him alone nearly equalled the record set by Red. His body was laid to waste, but he soldiered on as a ruined wreck. This was until Leviathan managed to take a hold on the jetpack itself, crushing it to scrap and leaving it useless as the boy fell to earth. He might have survived the landing if one final blow hadn't been struck. Hadrian's head was crushed with incredible force, and the boy's body fell to earth.


Luther wept for their love could never be. Tabitha wept because she does that.


The death of one of their own dealt a heavy blow to the morale those students at AEGIS that had come to defend their home. The attacks slowed slightly, as people were both more scared of the beast's retaliations and less keen to even keep on going over time.


After nearly a day of fighting, the forces of good were struggling to continue fighting, even with some help from villains native to Baltimore and, surprisingly, a scattering from across the country, picked up by teleporters and fast movers as many heroes had been.


Leviathan had not gone undamaged. While the meat of its body had been worn away, it had not regenerated, and it had noticeably slowed. Its legs were barely a third of what they had once been, and its body's rounded mass had been halved in volume.


The defenders of Baltimore watched as the gargantuan before them slowly sunk into the earth. Somehow, it was burrowing into the ground with some sort of terrakinesis, and soon all that was left of it was a pile of earth, roughly the same volume as the beast had been.


There was no cheer. No fanfare. Few believed that they had truly won. Most realised that they had survived, and even then not entirely. This was a new threat, bigger than the Knights, and more potentially destructive than anything else seen so far. It was alive, and it would come back. The only question was when, and where.





 




 
 
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Welian's Li'l Babu

[SIZE=11pt]It started early in the morning. No one was quite sure when exactly it began, but most first noticed it around 7:23 am when the sky turned green. There was seemingly no cause. No colored lights hidden behind gray clouds. It was a cloudless day. The sky just began to turn green.[/SIZE]


[SIZE=11pt]Although the sky turning green was enough for some to believe it was the sign of the apocalypse, most simply treated it as another unusual sign of the times they lived in, one in which some kind of super could control the sky. AEGIS students and staff arrived at the facility for classes for the day.[/SIZE]


[SIZE=11pt]Interesting, it was revealed that this green sky wasn’t simply a local occurrence as many first dismissed it as, but a worldwide phenomenon. Everyone, across the world, the sky had turned green. Scientists naturally took up airwave time, although few had any concrete answers.[/SIZE]


[SIZE=11pt]Everything was brought to a halt when the first changes started. It happened innocently enough in AEGIS. One student’s fingernails looked a bit longer they had before. Another’s hair started to change colors. This distraction quickly brought most classes in AEGIS to a grinding halt. Looking at your nearby neighbors, it wasn’t too hard to figure out what was happening. People were swapping body parts, eventually culminating in full body swaps. [/SIZE]


[SIZE=11pt]Students found themselves in the bodies of teachers, teachers other teachers, and even the Director found himself in the unusual position of swapping with Kendrick. The “faculty” in their changed bodies tried as best as possible to restore some semblance of order and peace to the facility, but were not extremely successful.[/SIZE]


[SIZE=11pt]It was quickly discovered that not only had they swapped bodies, but the powers had changed to that of their new body too. This lead to a major problem quickly, as across Baltimore many people who were for the first time experiencing superpowers were doing so uncontrolled and dangerously, in some cases even resulting in crime.[/SIZE]


[SIZE=11pt]With many supers swapped into non-super bodies, it fell to students and staff at AEGIS to get out among the public and try to restore some sense of common good to the world, namely by restraining these newly powered people before they did serious damage or killed someone in their panic. The students and staff were relatively successful, although there was some damage and injuries, resulting in a large PR boost for AEGIS at a time they desperately needed one.[/SIZE]


[SIZE=11pt]By this afternoon, NASA felt confident enough that they had identified the cause of this strange body swapping, some kind of bizarre galactic cloud that they were passing through. The Earth would be clearing the other side of the galactic cloud within the next few hours, and they believed, or perhaps hoped, that once Earth made it through people’s “parts” would revert back to their original bodies, swapping everyone back before dinner time on the East Coast. [/SIZE]

[SIZE=11pt]Everything did indeed happen as NASA predicted, to somes’ relief and others’ disappointment. By supper time, things were winding down as people were swapped back piece by piece into their original bodies. All told, it made for a bizarre, eye-opening day for everyone involved.[/SIZE]
 

Welian's Li'l Babu
​


 
​

On April 2, 2040, an elderly-aged super known internationally as "Recall" was in Baltimore, Maryland. She was known to be able to manipulate time; specifically she could 'rewind' an area no larger than one square mile for a duration relative to the area affected, until a certain preset condition is met. As she was playing with one of her eleven children she heard the Knights of Raguel had attacked Facility 108 and there were several casualties, mostly students under the age of eighteen whose names could not be released yet to the public. Recall rushed over to the facility and rewound to five hours prior (the maximum her powers allowed). She couldn't stop the attack entirely, but she set the parameter to stop the repetition once "No one at Facility 108 dies."


Time rewound five hours and everyone who had been at Facility 108- including the Knights of Raguel, staff, students, and visitors- were reset to that morning. Those who died surprisingly remembered they had died though not anything afterwards and began their day.... again. The Knights of Raguel also had their memories intact. Not knowing entirely what happened, they decided to attack regardless and this time students and staff were a bit more prepared but a student was cut down.


Time immediately rewound and everyone found themselves beginning the same day... again. The Knights of Raguel were suspicious now as were the people of Facility 108, but there was determination from each side to take out the other. Some at AEGIS believed killing the Knights of Raguel might stop the repetition, while the Knights of Raguel believed they had to hunt down the super that was messing with time, furthering their conviction of what abominations supers were to be able to do this to begin with.


It took two more repetitions before two hours passed without any AEGIS deaths, but time rewound immediately when a Knight of Raguel died at Red's hands. Recall hadn't been able to be too specific with her directions, so AEGIS quickly determined the death of a Knight of Raguel would not help them escape the time bubble. The parameter was "No one at Facility 108 dies," not "No one affiliated with Facility 108 dies." Frustrated, the people of AEGIS put all their effort into defense so they didn't have to repeat everything again. A couple students that had died in one of the repetitions were showing signs of mental trauma and were consoled by Annelise and Urial.


Day 5 neither AEGIS nor Raguel lost anyone. AEGIS stood victorious in their defense and Raguel fled, not defeated, but realizing their limitations. No one was convinced supers were good necessarily but it planted seeds of doubt in a few that perhaps the repetition was a sign from the heavens that not all of them were necessarily evil... even if they'd never admit it aloud. AEGIS was simply relieved to have a day where nothing went horribly wrong for a change except some emotional and psychological anguish, but that was a small price to pay for life.


Recall has gone missing once more.
 
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Welian's Li'l Babu
​

It was the cold day of 25th of July, 2040. The sun was out, bathing everyone in its warm and fuzzy rays. Outside was the place to be! The denizens of Baltimore had decided to forfeit their cozy apartments and took to the streets and beaches. The stark contrast between the freezing winter of early 2040 and the warmth of the past few weeks. In spite of the division formed between supers and normal people at the start of the year, conflicts ceased. And June 19th marked the day of the final terrorist attack. If it could even be called that.


With the ever increasing threat of the Knights of Raguel, several resistance groups had risen. Each tried to take them on their own but failed terribly. It became evident that the only choice was to stand united. The scattered groups became one. The numbers were large and the skill sets varied. Progress was achieved quickly and the hunt was on. For every Raguel attack, there was a counter-attack. The casualties were great in both camps, but Raguel's troops lacked one thing in particular, and that was the enigma particle. Supers might be easy to hunt one by one, but true strength comes in numbers. Desperate times call for desperate measures. As Raguel lost territory, they ordered the assassinations of the leaders of the Resistance. One in particular was very troublesome, as for whenever he'd appear to be dead, he would return 






 
 
Welian's Babu


May 18th 2017


Twin City Guardians HQ

Harry Triest looked up from his laptop to see a curious sight. A young man in jeans and a hooded sweatshirt was standing in the front office speaking to his secretary. His face was covered; it was his bearing that marked him as a youngster. What caught Harry's attention however, was the kid's hands. Light seemed to slide off of them, like water off a duck. They were recognizably hands, but distorted, as if by an identity filter. He keyed the front desk and told the secretary to show him in. The floor groaned slightly as the kid walked in the room, and Harry raised an eyebrow.


“Should I be concerned about your control over your powers, Mr...?”


“Oh, uh... Mallory. Aaron Mallory. No sir. My powers are under control. I'm just... a little heavy. Some floors can take it better than others for some reason.”


Harry's eyebrow went from raised to furrowed. The Guardian's Tower was one of the most sturdily built structures in all of North America. After that nasty business that had only ended with the fortuitous and unlikely rain of peppermint Schnapps, they had rebuilt to withstand almost anything, up to and including, a nuclear strike. And yet there went his pencil was rolling across his desk toward the kid.


“How heavy, exactly, are you Mr. Mallory?”


“Well, it is hard to establish an exact number, but Professor Kakalios over at the U of M estimates it as between 350 and 400 sextillion tons.”


There was a beat as Harry digested this statement.


“Are you joking?”


“No sir, I am told that I am a walking contradiction. That it is impossible for me to exist. Nobody has any theories other than dark mater, super symmetric strings, or multiversal transdimensional implosion. They're basically grasping at straws, near as I can tell, but then all I have is a mechanical engineering degree, so what do I know? At any rate, I have my blue card, which took some doing with an S5 rating, and now I am looking for work. Professor K pointed me to you guys, and said you might be the only one in the country smart enough to figure out what my deal is exactly.”


Harry kept his face impassive, barely.


“Well, we'll need to do some trials down in the arena, Aaron, but I'll be honest, we've never had an S class in the Guardians. I am not sure if that is a good thing or a bad thing, but I guess we'll see, hm? Ask the secretary for a visitor combat pass, and follow the floor lights to the elev-- mm, no, stairs I suppose, eh? I'll assemble the team and be down momentarily.”


Aaron does as he is told. As soon as he is out of sight, Harry blacks out the room and signals his Iron Wing armor to assemble. As the nanite swarm flows up his body forming the anti concussive bi-layer over which the carbon fiber plates begin to find their places, he calls out to the empty air, his voice now flat and deadened by the echo-field.


“Secure channel. Connect to QCIC branches. Local, Chicago, Boston and Baltimore. Lars, Janet, Lucinda, Gunnar? I think you're gonna want to see this.”
 

Welian's Li'l Babu
​


AEGIS: Civil War
​


The totally original idea never done before that would also be really hard to set up
​




A surprisingly bright day in Baltimore brought about the notice of major change.  Register Supers were blasted with notices of further limitations on their powers and the idea of being heavily restricted from even being able to use their powers out in the open.  This was all brought about by the new bill being debated in Baltimore and, even with all of it's unfair restrictions and limitations, it's seems likely to pass.  Thus an argument has broken about among supers and powerless humans of what is fair and just.  Some argue that the limitations can only serve to better protect the city while others say that supers should not be arrested for using their power in public.  After a day of tense negotiations the whole city was shook when a police officer shot and killed a girl who was using her power to climb up a building.


Immediately the sides draw their lines even deeper into the sand with one claiming that the girl knew that she wasn't supposed to be using her power out in the open and as obvious as she was while the other argued that what she was doing was hardly harmful and there was no reason for her death.  With the sides being further set in their own morals and beliefs the two began to actively campaign for Supers in the city to side with them.  One side, The Free Supers Initiative, began setting up across the city with the intent on banding together and pushing against the new bill set in place by Baltimore.  The other side, Supers for the Safety of the Public, began setting up forces ready to counter wherever the Free Supers Initiative will attack first.


So with the city divided as it is it's up for the supers of AEGIS Training Facility 108 to decide: Where do you stand?  As this question might just determine the future of living in the city for Supers.
 
YOU SAW NOTHING!​


Chris and Victoria bustled into the CD & Y classroom ten minutes before class, expecting to find it empty. Mostly, Mr. Mallory's classes were outside these days, especially now that the weather had turned nice again. Normally Chris would have noticed instantly that they were not alone, before even opening the door, but he was distracted; he had stepped all the way into the room before he saw the teacher... What Chris saw froze his blood and stopped him in his tracks. Victoria bumped into him from behind, actually causing him to stumble. She halfway giggled to see the human embodiment of grace and poise lose his footing, but then she saw it too. Mr. Mallory had a cardboard box full of kittens on his desk, and one of their little tails was just disappearing into his mouth like a strand of stripey spaghetti. As he reached into the box to scoop up two more of the mewling furry snacks, the students beat a hasty retreat, softly closing the door behind them.


Aaron glanced to the door, counted to five, then dropped the kittens in the box, folding the cardboard framework flat. He pressed it down, folded it again, creased it, and then shook it out like a beach blanket. The floppy cardboard floomphed out into a checkered tablecloth, which he then folded carefully and pocketed. He reached up to his throat and adjusted something under the collar of his shirt. Suddenly his permanent blur vanished, revealing baggy wrinkly skin and piercing blue eyes. He slipped off his wig and peeled off the goatee. Adopting an unsteady gait, as if uncertain which foot was which, he tottered to the door and slipped out into the empty hallway. As the man who'd traded blurry for bald wobbled his way down the hall, he heard heavy footfalls coming up the stairs. As he passed the blurry bearded figure just outside the restrooms, he nodded hello.

“Morning Allen,” Aaron said. “Forgot something at home, did you?”

“...uh. Oh! oh...hello... Mr. Mallory. My pet tern is loose again. I apologize, but I may be late for class today.”

Aaron walked down the hall to his classroom, shaking his head and chuckling quietly. What a strange set of colleagues he had found himself amongst! He unlocked the door and put his briefcase by the desk. He was about to head downstairs to get another cup of coffee before heading outside to the docks when he noticed the note on his desk. He leaned down and perched his reading glasses on his nose to see what it said.

What it said was this:


PRANK WAR!!!​

-L​
 
Nemeses

4/10/24​

Kate walks into the Caribou Cafe just a little before noon, ready for trouble. In hindsight, she will come to wish that she had prepared far more thoroughly, but at the moment, she is just excited to see that the perp is sitting right where he said he would be. He is kinda pretty too, though in the 'pretty and he knows it' kind of way, which long experience has shown is waaaay too much hassle. Anyway she's not here for a romantic liaison, she's here to make a collar. She strides up to his table and he looks up expectantly.

“Lars Magnusson? Kate Barrett. We made arrangements to discuss membership in the guardians?”

Lars inclines his head fractionally in acknowledgement, and gestures to the chair opposite him. Kate takes a fighting stance and begins her prepared monologue.

“Sorry, 'Magus' I prefer to stand. I have evidence tying you to at least three murders in the twin cities over the last two years, one of which you 'investigated' and pinned on an innocent man. I warn you, I am not to be trifled with. Come quietly or don't, it's all the same to me. But you're coming in. Now.”

Lars smiles faintly, staring straight ahead, palms resting on the table, utterly relaxed. His eyes roll back in his head and then close. The table and chairs begin to rattle, as if shaken by some kind of subtle vibration.

“We'll have none of that, now!” She shouts, dark tendrils of shadow erupting from her palms and whipping toward Lars... And just like that, he is gone and the table and chairs are tossed in all directions with considerable force. The quiet of the cafe is shattered by several panicked shrieks. As she casts about to see where her quarry might have gone she looks straight into the flash of a professional looking camera. The photographer snaps several more in the time it takes her to realize she has been thoroughly had. Lars was never here. The security tapes, naturally, show nobody at the table but her, and make it appear as if her shadow whips were what tossed the table and chairs. The fact that she's incapable of affecting inanimate objects with shadows does her little good in the court of public opinion. He set her up masterfully, and it will take her a long while to live down the ignominy of her very public freak out in the Cafe Caribou. But one day. One day she will find that slippery bastard. And he will pay.
 
Deserted, Tropical Island Prompt
Character: Scarlet Calloway
​
Seagulls squawked, their cries echoing in Scarlet's ears. With a groan and brief choking attack, thanks, sand, she rolled over and onto her side. Once her throat was mostly clear, and now very dry, Scarlet began blinking and trying to see where she was. Luckily, she was in the shade of this desolate beach, as the sun was shining down quite harshly. The flickering glare glinted off the lapping waves and Scarlet quickly looked away. She already couldn't speak, losing her ability to see was not ideal.

With a quiet grunt, she pushed herself up into a sitting position before looking to her other side. Seeing the backpack, she frowned before grinning. While it was not clear as to where the backpack came from, it was a chance at survival. Checking its contents, Scarlet was pleased to take note of the tent, matches, and food compiled inside. She'd have to take an inventory of the food later and determine when she'd need to attempt to hunt for more. Likely, she'd have to go tribal within the week. Yay.

Closing the backpack, Scarlet slowly stood up before putting it on. She realized her mistake too late, as the sand on her shoulders, and just about everywhere else, now was angrily scratching her skin.
"Crap!"
Quickly taking off the backpack, Scarlet let it fall to the ground before glaring at it. If it wouldn't get more sand everywhere, she would've kicked it.

With a sigh, she crossed her arms over her chest and then took the moment to survey her surroundings. A jungle-like biome was behind her, giving her the wonderful shade. In front of her, there was the beach and some rocky pool area not far off to the side. Given that the rocks could cut her, Scarlet decided it was best to avoid this place for now. Maybe she could set up some trapping system in there eventually. Perhaps catch herself some small fish to use as bait or even some crabs to boil. Poor things...but they would taste amazing.

Given that her food situation wasn't concerning at the moment, Scarlet decided to focus on the pertinent concern. Water. She had no bottle handy and needed to boil some water to make it drinkable. This meant she needed some kind of container that wouldn't burn or fall apart over a fire. She had matches, so no worries with starting the fire. It was a good thing she read so obsessively. Her 'Hatchet' reading would definitely be helpful in this scenario. Except she was on a seemingly deserted, tropical island and not in the mountains or near some nice lake. Darn.

Deciding to stick to the shade, Scarlet left her backpack in the sand and began making her way into the jungle area. After all, it wasn't like anyone was going to be stealing from her anytime soon.
Once inside, she sought out the driest sticks and branches she could find, mindful to avoid the wettest areas. All of this shade meant this place took forever to dry up, if it ever did, so she had an even more difficult time finding dry wood to work with.
Satisfied with her collection, and struggling to keep everything under her arm, Scarlet returned to the beach and dumped everything onto the ground beside her backpack. Sadly, her scavenging wasn't over yet and she still needed dry leaves. If those even existed around here.
Groaning to herself, Scarlet dragged her feet back into the jungle and all but broke her back with how often she had to lean over to pick up another leaf. Not at all having fun with this, she soon returned to the beach with what she figured would be a good handful of leaves. They weren't all dry, though, so she placed some out in the sun.
Almost immediately, she felt the heat and quickly retreated.

Surveying her collection, Scarlet chewed the inside of her cheek, as she now needed to figure out some kind of container to hold the water. Her best bet would be to make one, but she had no idea how to do that. Nor did she know what could work for her.
Slowly turning around to try and find some idea, her eyes soon landed on the rocky pool down the beach. She'd have to suffer in the heat, with no sunscreen even, but perhaps she could find some large seashell to use. She still wouldn't have a portable container, but it'd be a start.

Leaving the safety of her shade, Scarlet was panting by the time she finally got to the rocky pool. Sweat dripped down her face and landed onto her tank top, which frankly wasn't faring much better.
Approaching the pool, she chewed on her lip at the sight of the many rocks along the edges of the pool.
Her eyes lit up when she remembered - I'm an animal shapeshifter, duh! - and she took a step back to think of some animal that would help her out here. She needed thick skin to avoid getting easily cut...but also wanted to be able to swim about and find a shell. A crocodile would aid in keeping her safe from sharp rocks, but the large maw would make it hard to pick up a shell, or avoid crushing it. Alas, she really couldn't think of anything else that would help her in this scenario.

Screw it, she thought, as she suddenly lurched forward and fell on all fours. Bones snapped, shattered, relocated, and fixed themselves while muscles tore and expanded. Her fingers elongated while her fingernails began dangerously sharp, her toes shifted and became four while the nails elongated into claws. Her face grew longer with her nose and mouth all combining into her new maw, with her teeth shifting and becoming sharper. Her skin hardened into leather skin and her eyes soon blinked with their new transparent eyelids sliding over the eyes followed by the actual eyelids. Her tail had grown from her tailbone with it laying out on the sand now.
With a grunt, she pushed forward, dragging her now very heavy body into the water ahead. The pool was probably as large as a public swimming pool, with the edges lined by the dangerous rocks.
Diving underwater, Scarlet was surprised to see it went as deep as fifteen feet or so. She hadn't expected it to be so deep. There was probably a unique ecosystem in here as a result.
While it'd be fun to explore what lives in here, Scarlet figured her new appearance could freak out varying sea life and she just wanted a seashell for her water collection.
With her tail steering her towards the bottom, Scarlet soon was gliding about with her eyes flickering this way and that.

After about fifteen minutes of enjoying her swim, and not being burned alive in the sun anymore, Scarlet sighted her treasure. A large, curved seashell that could easily be used as a bowl.
Not wanting to count it as a success just yet, she slowly approached it before tilting her head sideways. This was the challenging part, as she opened her maw and carefully attempted to pick up the seashell. Sure enough, it slipped out almost immediately.
Screw you, seashell.
Huffing with bubbles quickly rising to the surface, Scarlet attempted a round two. Tilting her head again, she picked up the seashell again. Making sure to hold more of it in her mouth, Scarlet was rewarded with it sticking in place.
Success!
Looking upwards, Scarlet began moving her tail from side to side, lifting herself to the surface smoothly.


Once up top, she swam to the side of the pool and found she was in trouble again. She'd either lose the seashell while climbing out or she'd have to shift back into a human and take her chances with the rocks. Great.
Cussing in her head, she decided to take her chances with the rock.
For the damn seashell, she thought while shifting back into her human form.
Once she'd returned to normal, Scarlet kept the seashell in her mouth so she could climb out safely. Annoyingly enough, it was big enough to flip over and smack her in the face.
"Fuck!"
It slipped out and she made a grab for it, catching it before it sunk back to the bottom. There went that idea.
Taking a deep breath, she kept it in her hand, as she swam back to the edge and carefully reached for the nearest rock that didn't look like a dagger. Pulling herself out, or attempting to, she quickly realized she'd have to use both hands.
Carefully lowering herself back into the pool, Scarlet held onto the one safe rock, she reached back and lobbed her seashell somewhere onto the beach.
Now that she thought about it, she probably should've done that to begin with. Oh well.

Inhaling deeply, Scarlet reached out with her other hand and began climbing out, mindfully taking it slow. Well, she did at first, but the heat of the sun quickly scathed her right hand after she reached for another rock. This rock had not been in the cool waters, though.
Screaming at the sudden pain, Scarlet launched herself forward, rolling over the rest of the rocks and face planting into the sand beyond.
"That went swell."
If her throat wasn't still attempting to murder her with how dry it was, Scarlet may have laughed at her sarcasm. Instead, she slowly stood up and hoped she wasn't bleeding anywhere since she was still soaking wet from the pool. It was hard to tell if anything trickling down her face or body was just water or possibly blood.
Using her left hand to pick up her new bowl, Scarlet made her way back to her simple encampment while examining her right hand. The skin was reddened, but she had moved quickly enough to avoid any serious burns. It was probably the least dangerous kind of a burn, third degree if she could recall the terms correctly. Some cool water and shade would do it some good.

Once at her encampment, Scarlet knelt down and began organizing some of her branches and twigs to create a makeshift campfire. Stuffing some dry leaves underneath the branches to aid in getting the fire started, she then took out a match and proceeded to light it and blow on the branches until the fire finally lit.
"Oh, hell yeah!"
The celebration was short-lived, though, as her cool shade quickly was becoming warm. Gross.
Shifting her focus to finally getting drinkable water, Scarlet realized too late that she forgot to actually fill her seashell with water. Of course.
While her fire continued to build up to optimal burning power, she turned away and made a break for it across the beach. There was no way she was going to linger in this harsh sunlight any longer than she needed to.
Within two minutes of sprinting away, Scarlet was carefully walking back, mindful to not spill too much of her collected water.

Once she returned to her fire, Scarlet frowned down at it. It was a sad little pile of disorganized branches being burned and she had no safe way to put the bowl on it or remove it once the water had safely boiled.
"I need a fancy branch."
Nodding to herself, Scarlet turned away after setting down her bowl where it would not be spilled, beside her backpack.
After digging around her pile for a while, she was rewarded with her fancy branch. It had a fairly long reach and the end of it was pronged with two ends.
Gripping it was not easy, though, as her burned hand cried out in pain whenever she tried to. Dammit.
Sticking the branch under her left arm and sort of wrapping her left arm around it for more balance, Scarlet then scooped up her water bowl and shakily brought it over to her fire. Wincing when some spilled out, she managed to get it on top of her fire as safely as possible without putting out the fire.
Once it was settled, she slowly retracted her branch and then dumped it to the side before promptly collapsing on her bum. Sadly, she could only get comfortable in the sand for now and she was sweating again, but she more than deserved this damn break.
At least, nobody was here to tell her when her break was over. Scarlet decided her break would be over once the water was boiling...and then once it was cooled off enough to drink without burning her tongue.
 
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