IC: Halcyon Days (Masks RPG Game)

[herodofcows]

Halcyon Days


Issue 1: Wildsiders


https://static.dezeen.com/uploads/2015/08/SFMOMA_Mario-Botta_press-office_dezeen_784_4.jpg

Musical Accompaniment (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AavRk7w19hw)

The issue opens on the front lobby of the Halcyon City Museum of Modern Art. The walls are hung with paintings of various degrees of abstraction, and the warm wooden architecture stretches up several stories. A passel of guests are entering and leaving, far more than one might suspect on an early Monday afternoon.

BOOM

The front doors of the museum are abruptly knocked right off their hinges. Through the smoke, several dozen Wildsiders come jetting into the museum, flying at crazy angles and immediately swarming all over the lobby.

The Wildsiders are a local superpowered gang. They're headed up by a quartet of metahumans, but their rank-and-file members are mostly unpowered teenagers who have been enhanced with jet-powered vambraces and greaves. These pieces of armor also project a low-grade forcefield which allows the wearer to burst through most walls with relatively little damage. Most also wear gas masks or hockey masks or other semi-durable means of covering their faces.

In practice, this tends to result in a bunch of crowing slogan-chanting teenagers flying through the air like drunken birds of prey. The Wildsiders mostly run on smash-and-grabs and assault/battery, but the bosses tend to be a little bit more vicious.

"Here we GO! Here we BE!"

"WILDsiders!"

"Get f***ed! Get WRECKED! Taste blood! Taste JET!"

"Lift 'em, drop 'em! Take 'em, break 'em!"

"WILDsiders!"

"Burn it down, fry it up! Wildsiders, turn UP!"

"WILDsiders!"

Several of the flying miscreants immediately zoom deeper and higher into the museum. Others stay in the lobby and begin attacking the panicking civilians. A few more make a beeline for the artwork, smashing and burning the exhibits as they go.

Into this scene of chaos steps Madcap, one of the Wildsider lieutenants. He wears a red-and-purple cavalier's outfit and steps with a certain bandy-legged springiness to his motions. He smiles widely beneath his Chernobyl sunglasses, and at a gesture conjures up one of his spiked chains.

"Glorious, my vultures! My pets! My hawks-o'-war!" he calls grandiosely in a phony posh voice, "Have at them! Break and rend and tear and score, but don't forget what we came here for!"

He stops in the middle of the room and extends his arms outward. His spiked chain coils around his shoulders like a pet snake.

"WILDsiders!" he roars.

"WILDsiders! WILDsiders! WILDsiders!" gleefully respond his footsoldiers.

[gailforce]

Musical accompaniment (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dM_3dhVjSbI) for Ai's day out.

Ai has gotten good at filling up the time when Malcolm and Ghost are in school and Index is absorbed in a project that he doesn't want her help with. On those days she flits around the city, trying to do the things that normal humans do. Often she picks a person or a group to follow around, changing her appearance every once and a while so that they don't get suspicious or scared.

Today she's following two older women who are taking care of three small children. She first encounters them on the subway. One of the women is struggling with the smallest child's stroller, which has gotten caught in the gap between the train and the platform. Ai helps her free the stroller, and the woman gives her this incredible crinkled smile. Ai likes her immediately, and decides to follow her and her companions for the rest of the day.

First they go to a matinee movie. Ai gets a blue slushie, and enjoys it very much, even though it makes her human tongue look weird. She enjoys the movie as well, although it is perplexing. It is about sentient cars. Ai has learned that cars are not people (and so it's okay if they get smashed or break down or are left out all night in the rain), but these cars seem to be people. They talk and make expressions, and one of the children gets very upset when it seems like the red car got hurt. Ai will ask Malcolm about this later.

Next, Ai follows the women and the children to a fast food restaurant, where she gets to eat french fries, and then to a big, modern building of glass and wood. The Halcyon City Museum of Modern Art. Ai, looking now like a teenaged tourist, trails around after the group, listening to one of the women talk about how paintings, even ones that just look like splatters of colors, can make people feel things. The children don't seem interested, but Ai is fascinated. The paintings do make her feel things. She likes it.

She's standing in front of an enormous canvas covered in slightly different shades of black paint when the explosion rocks the building. For an instant she thinks that maybe this is art, too, until she hears the screams.

Ai runs towards the grand staircase, where the screams are coming from. She sees the Wildsiders crash into the atrium. There are too many of them for her to take on by herself, she can tell. She has to make a decision. Security guards are ushering panicked civilians out of the emergency exits--if she flies down now, she'll just create more panic. She loves the artwork, but she knows that most humans would say that there are more important matters at hand. But Ai can fly--that's something that most humans can't do. That is how she should help.

Ai rockets after the Wildsiders flying higher and deeper into the museum.

[Razade]

Index
Conditions: None

The large holographic calendar that hung in Sebastian's main room was a constant reminder of just how much time he needed and just how much he was wasting when he ran out into town to get food or some other errand. Luckily the home PC was keyed into his PC-R so he was never too far from a reminder of the dozen or so coded tasks that had yet to be completed. Which made today like any other day as Sebastian moved about the city, bahn mi in hand and headphones on blaring something loud (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xUyTysdrflA) to cover up the sounds of the streets around him. That is until a warning comes over the music, bringing the punkish boy out of his own thoughts. Some attack on a museum? It didn't take long to hoof it over to the Museum of Modern Art, less time to get into "costume" for what it was and start casing the joint. A ringleader and a gang of would be hoodlums, that gave all sorts of possibilities. If he could just find the right angle.

Going to go with an Asses

[roll0]

Ahhh...I did not miss you garbage dice roller. Still get to ask a question from Criminal Mind so going to ask

How could I best infuriate or provoke Madcap.

[Comissar]

Charlotte walked through the museum without really paying attention to it. Instead, she had her phone in hand, idly scrolling through her social media feed with a faint frown on her face. "I swear, I saw it just this morning."

Beside her, Tanya rolled her eyes, "You know what, I'm not even that interested now. I mean, who even really cares if a new group of heroes show up. They're all a dime a dozen nowadays anyway."

Charlotte shared a sidelong glance with Leanne at that comment, her friend just shaking her head and mouthing "Forget it."

The three were on a school trip as part of their arts and humanities course. In theory, they were here to research and critique pieces of modern art, being split into threes so that there was some discussion between them. In practice, however, the trio were just killing time until they were meant to meet back up in the lobby for the bus back to school.

Charlotte glanced idly at a piece of white canvas, drawn on with white pastels, and painted with white vinyl. "Who even buys things like this? Anyone could make it..."

"Right?!" Tanya came to a stop, turning to face the other two and primed to start a lecture, "I mean, it's not like anyone really-"

A sudden explosion rocked the building, drawing panicked yells from everyone. The trio turned to face the entrance hall, and Charlotte's stomach dropped.

Why now?!

Turning to the other two, she yelled, "Get to cover, I'll try and find Mrs. Davis!"

Catching the look in her eye, Leanne nodded and grabbed Tanya's arm, dragging her away before she could protest, "Right! Be careful Charlie!"

Sprinting away from them, Charlotte did her best to dodge the raining rubble, glancing up occasionally to keep an eye on the Wildsiders. The sight of Ai rocketing after several of the goons brought a smile to her lips. Good to know she wasn't alone here.

Reaching the ground floor toilets, Charlotte raced along the stalls, diving through the wall of the first empty one she could sense. Digging her costume out of her bag, she changed as fast as she could, phasing herself free of her civilian clothes to speed matters along. With lives on the line, she'd just have to bear the embarrassment if someone burst in. Luckily, nobody did, and she ran back through to the entrance hall as Ghost.

Given it'll take time for Charlotte to get into costume, she's effectively using this time to 'arrive' as Ghost, meaning she might miss out on some of the details of the early fight. Will leave it to Herod to decide how much she's missed and when she gets back into it.

[Thokk_Smash]

Elastiboy
Conditions: None
Musical accompaniment for Malcolm (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xoQ6pazew_0)

"Brrap, brrapp, boom bang bam!"

Malcolm Porter walks down the sidewalk of Halcyon City, cheerfully singing one of his recent favorite songs. Singing is sorta a loose term, I suppose; he sounds out the beats in a rhythmic way, but chooses to eschew the lyrics in favor of letting his emotions carry the meaning.

It's a lovely Monday afternoon to be outside, but by all rights Malcolm should be in school right now. He'd gotten there on time in the morning, and went to all of his morning classes, but after lunch he'd begun to feel his restlessness reach its boiling point. Plus, Mr Gilliam's classes had all been in the morning. Those were the classes he's really interested in. The others he knows he'll barely pass, but at least Mr Gilliam's lessons he puts his full effort in.

So in the rush after lunch he slips out and plays a little hooky! He makes his way through the city, voice even more "outdoor voice-y" than being outdoors would warrant. Perhaps he's making a bit more noise than those around him would appreciate, but he's not meaning to annoy anyone, honest. But perhaps he'd annoyed someone way more than he should've, 'cause someone pushes him roughly out of the way without warning.

He spins in place to steady himself from the momentum and looks for who pushed him. To his surprise, it's a kid around his age in the getup of those Wildsider jerks! He looks like he's in a real big hurry to get someplace...that's probably not good. Probably a job for Elastiboy!

Malcolm dashes into a nearby alleyway. The second he is out of sight, his appearance begins to shift and change. His normal clothes of a bright red shirt and jean shorts melds into his skin, to be replaced by a skintight suit that is maroon in color, but is somehow bright and dark at once, with blue highlights running down the arms and legs. His head is covered by the same material, concealing his features somewhat.

With the benefit of the elasticity of his legs and his own athleticism, he easily keeps up with the Wildsider goon as they make their way through the city. They quickly arrive at the Halcyon City Museum of Modern Art, and the increased number of goons makes it obvious even to Elastiboy what's about to happen. Unfortunately, they all charge the doors the second Elastiboy arrives, leaving the newly-minted elastic boy behind the ball.

That's never dissuaded him before! He jumps from the building's roof he'd been on and bounces a bit as he lands unhurt. His springy legs propel him through the doors even as the crazy-hat-guy rambles on and on.

"Wait, are they vultures or hawks?" he asks the group at large as he coils his legs. With a burst of speed he launches himself at a group of Wildsiders who are about to lay waste to a group of innocents.

Rolling Savior to Defend Someone: [roll0] I had M&M/D20 on the brain when I rolled that; re-rolled in the OOC and got a 10 (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?528547-Halcyon-Days-(Masks-RPG-Game)&p=22175553#post22175553). I'll use the success to either add a Team point or gain Influence over someone in the crowd; @Herod, do we have a pool of Team points yet?

Edit: We are, uh, not off to a good start with these two rolls

[herodofcows]

As Ghost emerges from the restrooms, she sees the tableau of terror begin to unfold! About a dozen Wildsiders are swooping towards her classmates, crowing and exulting as their quarry flees and panics. For a moment, it looks as though things are about to go badly . . .

BOIOIOIOIIIING!

. . . until Elastiboy launches himself headlong into their midst! Two go veering madly off-course, cratering cartoonishly into the ground and not getting back up. The remaining Wildsiders scatter, jetting clumsily away from their quarry as they circle around to face their new foe!

"Anyone got plans for the rubber man?"

"Knock him out, smash about!"

"WILDsiders!"

As Elastiboy squares off with his foes, the panel pivots over to Madcap. He appears to be watching the Wildsiders wreck the art in the lobby and move deeper into the museum with every sign of indulgent enjoyment. However, he abruptly whips his arm out and sends his chain coiling around Index, who has been lurking nearby. The chain drags the young hero into the lobby and deposits him directly in front of Madcap.

"Can I help you, sirrah?" he asks, voice dripping with condescension.

The panel now shifts upstairs, following Ai as she zooms after the pack of Wildsiders with dogged determination. Unlike their fellows, they seem less interested in vandalizing or assaulting people. Instead, they blow through walls or doors until they've reached the room housing Mina Yen's "Halcyon In Mixed Media". The mostly-metal sculpture (if you can call it that) is a room-sized abstracted map of the entire city, with the various boroughs and neighborhoods being stylized in different colors and materials. Visitors can only walk along the edges of the room, which are roped off from the sculpture proper.

This group of Wildsiders comes crashing down onto the sculpture itself, skidding and marring the impeccably shaped surface. Two of them pull out what appear to be laser cutters of some type and begin slowly cutting away at a particular part of the city. The others spread out as though standing guard . . . and notice the extraterrestrial do-gooder's pursuit.

"Whatcha doin', girly?"

"Wrong time, wrong place, wrong space for your face!"

"Gonna try something, wannabe?"

"F***in' WILDsiders, yo!"

Nobody has noticed you yet, and you've got two teammates that could use an assist! What do you do?

Team added! However, you've now drawn the attention of the others! What do you do?

You were pinched while watching! Mark a Condition. However, as to your question:

Madcap wants to appear impressive. It's the only explanation for the accent, the "edgy" sunglasses, and the more-or-less coherent ensemble. Make fun of his appearance or his affect and he will most certainly fly off the handle.

They've seen you and they're clearly ready to throw down. Looks like they're trying to keep you off their friends! What do you do?

[gailforce]

Ai
Conditions: None

Ai rolls her many-pupiled eyes.

"I'm not a girly," she says. "And you shouldn't be doing that."

Ai shifts into intangibility and flies up and over the Wildsiders' heads. Hovering a few feet above the center of the art installation, she shifts her arms into long, whip-like tentacles and strikes out at the two Wildsiders trying to laser-cut away a section of the sculpture.


So assuming this is directly engaging:

2d6-1

ETA: Well I messed up the automatic dice roller somehow, so I rolled in the OOC thread and got a 4. womp womp

[Razade]

Index
Conditions: Angry

Sebastian lets out a few choice curses as he's wrapped up in chains and drug, annoyed, along the floor. He's quick to palm a grenade from is pack as he's brought face to face with Madcap, look of displeasure firmly in place. "Now why'd you have to go and do that? I just grabbed this and you're getting in my way?" he asks, holding the grenade up which to most wouldn't even look like a grenade for all the arcane modules and crafting that's gone into it. If one squinted it could be art? "How'bout you take it and let me on my way?" The grenade was one of his Cryo-Blasts, a concentrated rune of Ice with various mechanical trappings that would make it explode out and form a rather hard ice shell around whatever was in proximity. Which meant him, which was why he was discreetly trying to move away.

How about we fail another roll? Trying to trick Madcap. That'd be an Are you Watching Closely.

[roll0]

So! I'm going to take

-You get an oppurtunity (hopefully blowing the grenade up in his face)
-You avoid further entanglement (by hopefully blowing the grenade up into his face)

[Comissar]

Charlotte is quick to take in the scene in front of her. Ai was nowhere to be seen, but Elastiboy and Index had arrived. Her heart sank, then leapt again as she saw the Wildsider goons go for her classmates, only to be foiled by Elastiboy. Of course, that now left him centre of attention for nearly a dozen of them. Running forward, she quipped "Play time's over boys, let's pack it in."

Once she was close enough, she leaped up to the two nearest, reaching out to grab their ankles and phase them down and out of their gear as she fell back to the ground.

So, rolling to defend Elastiboy by phasing two goons out of their high tech jets and equipment? Let me know if it should be a different move instead!

[roll0]

Edit - So, with a 10 I can add a team to the pool?

[Thokk_Smash]

Elastiboy
Conditions: None

Despite being outnumbered and surrounded, Elastiboy's grin doesn't waver. His hands are up in a loose stance, but for all his disadvantage he might as well be on an outing amongst friends. "Do you guys keep forgetting your group's name? Izzat why you keep shouting it?" He easily dodges a strafing strike from one of the teens. "You should really keep track of that! Maybe you could write it on your underwear?"

Ghost's assistance is met with a widening of his grin. "Hey, thanks, Ghost!" he says jovially as he punches his way through the circle. He takes a few scrapes (punches don't really hurt, but they do push him around a bit!) and pushes down on his legs once more. The tension releases and springs him to the wall, where he jumps off once more to end up directly above the group he'd been fighting. "I think it's time for you guys to take a nap! Rapid-Fire!" From above he rains down blow after elastic blow, arms seeming to be a blur as he punches at the terrorizing teens.

Rolling to Directly Engage the enemy, not sure it'll do anything but at least I'll get Potential if it doesn't! [roll0]

Oh, hey, it's a hit! I think, given the fiction (he's hitting down, so he can't really move the Wildsiders into a different position to give his allies an opening, and I don't know what would be taken away from them) I'll go with "Impress, Surprise, or Frighten the Opposition as the result. I await your direction on which Condition to mark.

[herodofcows]

In the lobby, Madcap grabs the cryo-grenade off of Index and gives it a critical once-over.

"Hmmm, a fellow thief, is it?" he trills, sunglasses flashing, "Now, what manner of pittance have you filched, young-"

FSSSSSSSH

"AWK!"

Madcap staggers backwards, trying to free himself from the sudden deep freeze that has engulfed his face and right hand. In his consternation, he trips over his own chain (which now lies limp and unmoving at his feet) and goes sprawling.

Behind him, the gang of Wildsiders is not having a good day. As Ghost and Elastiboy lay into them like a well-oiled machine, the young n'er-do-wells find their defenses ineffective and are quickly smacked down like flies. Robbed of their high-tech jets and forcefields, they are all revealed as middle-and-high-school-aged children as they are smashed to the ground.

And some of the museum patrons notice this.

". . . Oh my God, did you see that?"

"That was . . . brutal!"

"Hey kid, leave them alone! They're done! It's over!"

The remaining Wildsiders in the lobby stop destroying the artwork and begin to approach the teen heroes . . . cautiously. Warily.

In 'Halcyon in Mixed Media, Ai's plan runs into a bit of a snag. Her attack sends the two Wildsiders flying, all right. Unfortunately, they're still holding their laser cutters, and as they tumble . . .

"AAAAARGH!" shrieks one, clutching at their smoldering side as they tumble off their laser cutter. The smell is hideous, and they're clearly grievously wounded.

"Holy . . . Alex!" yells another, rushing to the side of the wounded one.

The other Wildsiders round on the extraterrestrial like a pack of mad dogs.

"Bad move, freak!"

"Rip it up, shred it down!"

"Take it to Madcap!"

"WILDSIDERS!"

Okay! Madcap is on the ground, partially frozen, and looking silly! Take a +1 forward to whatever you do against him!

Mark Guilty. The crowd thinks you might have gone too far against the Wildsiders.
They're trying to shift your labels +1 Danger/-1 Savior. Accept or roll to reject!

Uh oh . . . The crowd thinks you might have gone too far against the Wildsiders.
They're trying to shift your labels +1 Danger/-1 Savior. Accept or roll to reject!

Mark a condition of your choice! Looks like you can either fight the Wildsiders or try to help the grievously-injured one! What do you do?

[gailforce]

Ai

Conditions: Insecure


Ai lets out a bubbly screech, like a tea kettle boiling over. This wasn't supposed to go like this! She was just trying to protect the lovely art, and stop them from doing whatever they were planning on doing with the part they were cutting away. But humans are so fragile--they can be cut so easily, and they're so clumsy with the few limbs that they have, and it's all so confusing. No matter how hard she tries, she always seems to do something wrong.

And now she's done something that Ghost and the others will think is horrible. She has to fix this, and now, or everyone will hate her and she'll be alone again.

"Stop!" she screams. "All of you, just--just STOP!"

Her arms snap back to their normal shape and size. She shifts again into intangibility flies further up, darting over the heads of the Wildsiders still standing. Despite their yelling and swearing they aren't a threat to her, not really. They're just humans. She hovers six feet above the injured Wildsider and their friend.

"I'm--I'm sorry," she says to the injured Wildsider--Alex, she thinks, their name is Alex--and their friend. “I didn’t mean to hurt you like that. Can…can I help? I think I might have something with me that could help.”


A tendril springs from her waist and wraps around Alex's dropped laser cutter. "Don't freak out," she says as soothingly as she can. "I just need to borrow this."

She pops open the laser cutter and examines its insides. It's a simple mechanism, like a much more straightforward version of the nodes of the electromagnetic debris net she was occasionally assigned to repair back on her home world. She can use a small refractor chip to reverse the polarity of the radiation, and add a microdiffuser to shift the particles into waves. The new ray should soothe the burn, and make the damaged flesh heal more easily.

Ai draws a small silvery square, like a thick credit card, from her pocket. Still in mid-air, she sits down and shifts her thighs into a wide, desk-ish surface. She lays the square on her thigh-desk and pulls at it until it expands into a large toolbox, which she pops open and rifles through. She pulls out something that looks like a little glass square and a tiny blue funnel, and slots them into place in the laser cutter. She shrinks and stows her toolbox again, then floats down to Alex's eye level.

"Hold still," she says. "This won't hurt." She clicks the laser cutter on.

[Thokk_Smash]

Elastiboy
Conditions: Guilty

It must be said: for all his exuberance, Elastiboy only became, well, Elastiboy very recently. He's spent some of that time fooling around with his new powers. He's thought up cool ways he could use them to fight crime. But this was the first time he'd really put his all into an attack with his new powers.

And so it is not only the museum patrons who are shocked by the sheer damage Elastiboy just caused.

Elastiboy hears the bystanders' comments faintly, as if from far away. As he falls back down to earth, all he can look at are the kids--kids his own age!--that he'd just punched into the ground. God, they look so still...

"I-I'm sorry!" he shouts, apparently at the Wildsiders he'd just beaten down. He doesn't bother trying to land properly, instead bouncing off the ground comically until he gets to his feet near one of the downed kids. "I-I didn't mean--are you all--I'm so sorry!"

Heedless of the slowly advancing pack of Wildsiders, Elastiboy grabs for his phone and dials 9-1-1. "H-hello!" he says in a loud voice as he kneels next to one of the kids. He doesn't think they all look too bad, but what does he know? "I'm at the Museum of Modern Art. I punched some Wildsiders out, but they're just kids, I think they might have concussions--please send ambulances!"

All the while Elastiboy's expression is one of pure guilt, with not a hint of malice.

Rolled an 8 in the OOC to Reject the crowd's Influence; chose to mark Potential by spending the round calling 911 for an ambulance for the kids Elastiboy just probably gave concussions to.

[Razade]

Index
Conditions: Angry

Sebastian is quick on his feet, while not the fastest or strongest in his team...let alone age group...he knew how to avoid his own weapons. "Now see...you could have avoided that if you'd just paid attention." he sighs, pulling his Sparrow Revolves from his pack and rounding them on the downed Madcap, placing a few good shots down at the prone villain with extreme prejudice. "You're not a real villain, you're just some douche in cosplay. Get the hell out of here, you and your men. If that lot can handle them, you're not fit for the big leagues. You disgrace."

So...going to go for two rolls and hopefully that's ok. First I'm going to use the +1 on a Directly Engage - If I can get this to a 7 obviously Resist/Avoid Blows

[roll0]

and then just go with a Provoke - Telling Madcap to leave with is men.

[roll1]

Come on sweet sweet Potential. Welp...I'd really like that attack to go through. So unless someone (or you) have a problem I'd like to spend a Team if we've got it selfishly as described in the OOC. Sebastian is...literally ignoring the team to put the hurt on Madcap. I'd boost Danger up and make that a 7 and Savior down.

[Comissar]

Charlotte feels a tightening in her chest as the Wildsiders fall still, and the crowd calls out. Under her helmet, she grimaces. They were young, some of them even looked younger than her. She glances briefly at Elastiboy, both worried that he might have gone a bit far, but also that he might be taking the crowd's comments to heart. The gang still needed to be stopped, after all. What they were doing was illegal.

Spotting the slowly advancing group of remaining Wildsiders, she moved herself just in front of the distracted Elastiboy. Doing her best to keep a neutral stance, she called out "I know you just want to be someone big and important, you've got these fancy gadgets, a guy who gives you direction." She shakes her head, pointing back at their floored comrades, "But what you're doing isn't just illegal, it's really dangerous!" She brings her hand back up to her chest, "Trust me on this, I know!"

Charlotte sags slightly, taking in the damage already caused to the museum, "I don't want to be fighting you, but you've already caused a lot of property damage, and I can't just let you go, but if you come quietly? Even better, if you give up on this whole Wildsider thing? I won't need to fight you, and I can at least put in some good words for you."

Rolling to try and comfort the Wildsiders in the lobby that Ghost won't take this any further if they don't push her. Let me know if this should be something else!

[roll0]

[Thokk_Smash]

Elastiboy
Conditions: Guilty

"Guys, I really, really don't want to keep fighting you," Elastiboy says as he gets to his feet. His face still clearly shows his remorse, but it's mixed with a mulish expression. "I want your friends to get looked at, and I hope you do, too. So, just...stop, so your friends don't get caught in the crossfire. Because I can't just let you run amok here."

[herodofcows]

In the lobby, Madcap is flailing around like a rabid beast. He manages to partially scrape some ice off of his face, drawing blood in the meantime. His eyes dart around like those of a caged animal, and his breathing is ragged.

"WILDSIDERS!" he shrieks, "WE DEPART! GET WHAT WE CAME FOR AND GO!"

The Wildsiders are silent for a beat, and then . . .

"BAHAHAHAHA!"

"Old man done lost his balls!"

"No stones of his own? Old man, go HOME!"

"Wildsiders, take him out! Show him what we freaks are 'bout!"

They kick up like a cloud, zooming all over the place like swarming insects before all converging on Madcap, who gestures at them all with unmasked fury.

"CURS!" he yowls, as they fly towards him, "BASE VILLAINS!"

His chain abruptly whips back to life, wrapping around him and hoisting him gracelessly out the door.

The swarm of Wildsiders follows him out hooting and hollering. For a beat, all seems calm and quiet. Everyone begins to pick themselves up and dust themselves off. The panel shifts past the three heroes, past the isolated guests, all the way to the bruised and battered high school student group. Mrs. Davis is at the center of them, frantically checking names off of her clipboard and going sheet white as she realizes . . .

"They . . . They took some of the students!" she screams, "Charlotte, Leanne, Robin, Corey .
. . I can't find them! They took them!!!'

Upstairs, in the Halcyon exhibit, Alex the injured Wildsider's eyes flutter open as Ai's device knits her flesh together. For the briefest of moments, the Wildsiders are all still.

"What did . . ." begins Alex . . .

KZZAT

The device suddenly surges with alien energy, zapping Ai into insensibility! She crumples to the ground, briefly stunned. The Wildsiders hover over her, uncertainty and panic on their faces.

"Oh s***! What do we-"

"Forget her, get the map piece! Get what we-"

"Forget THAT, the retreat just sounded! We have to-"

"Just go! GO!"

In a flurry of motion, most of the Wildsiders leave the room. Alex stays back for a moment, picks up the unmodified laser cutter, and finishes cutting out a section of the sculpture. She glances up at Ai apologetically as she does so.

". . . Sorry," she murmmers, "But Boss Nutter'll kill us if we don't come back with this . . ."

She grabs the section of the sculpture and, with a final glance, flies out the room.

[Comissar]

Conditions: Guilty

The Wildsiders were fleeing before Charlotte could properly process what had just happened. She just stands still for a few moments, letting the quiet sink in, before walking over to Elastiboy. Putting a hand on his shoulder, she quietly asked "You doing ok..?"

At that point, a familiar voice cried out.

"They . . . They took some of the students! Charlotte, Leanne, Robin, Corey . . . I can't find them! They took them!!!"

Charlotte felt her heart drop. Quickly scanning the assembled students confirmed her fears, they were really gone. Head whipping around, she yelled "Come on! We have to get them back!"

Running out the door, she scanned the sky for signs of the Wildsider's retreat, her gut twisting as she did.

Stupid, stupid, stupid! Should've stopped them leaving!

[gailforce]

Ai

Conditions: Angry, Insecure


Ai tries to scream and lash out at Alex, but she can't. The electromagnetic radiation coursing through her (from her other, even stupider mistake, says a voice in her head that sounds like Quartermaster Yavraolth'xuxz) is paralyzing. It's all she can do to keep hold of her form.

After an agonizingly long minute, the jarring vibrations in her body stop, and Ai is able to pull herself upright and look around. The art installation is destroyed, a huge section of it cut away. The rest of the room is trashed, too. All the Wildsiders are gone. She never should have helped them. She should have bound them all up in her limbs when she had a chance and dropped them in a disgraced heap in front of their leader. None of them had even stayed to see if she was alright. She had been stupid to think that she was doing the right, the human, thing by helping the injured one.

Feeling angrier and stupider than she's felt since she arrived on Earth, Ai flies back down into the wrecked atrium just in time to see Ghost run out. She lands next to Index.

"What happened?" she asks him. "Or, um, what's happening?" She tries to keep the rage out of her voice--she's heard that anger is an unattractive and negative quality in humans. And she doesn't want to be a bad human on top of being a terrible and useless alien.

[Razade]

Index
Conditions: Angry

Sebastian watches impassively as Madcap retreats, tucking his hands into his pockets as silence resumes. It's short lived of course, panic rising as someone shouts about hostages. Not his problem really, he took care of his end. Of course that wasn't going to cut it with the team or the inevitable presence of the hero squad probably on their way currently so Sebastian picked his way to the center display in the lobby and parked his rump firmly.

The arrival of Ai only receives the usual sullen gaze before he rests his eyes on the main doors, offering a shrug. "Someone left loose ends." he mutters, fishing his headphones back out of his pocket before placing them over his ears. "They'll clean it up." He had no idea who had incited the Wildsiders to take hostages, or even if someone had, but it seemed unlikely punching their leader down so hard prompted it. "Should probably get out of here though. We're not going to be alone for long. Take the others with you. I'll clean up here." The Wildsiders were probably long gone but considering their vehicles and strange aversion to soap there should still be a trail. He punched in a quick search into his PC-R, a holographic image of a bloodhound appearing along with a small blurb on its function to humans insofar as hunting and crime. "This should help."

He glanced back at Ai with a dozen questions swimming in his head, but they could wait. The most important was "Where were the others" of course but those were details Ai needed, and details he didn't. The less he knew, arguably, the easier it would be to lie. At the very tail end of those questions was "are you ok" but he didn't see any bleeding...if the alien bled at all...that question really raised a dozen more, none of which were pertinent in the moment. "Go." was all he expounded, motioning back to one of the emergency exits.

[gailforce]

Ai gives Index a slightly quizzical look, but nods. It feels good to know what she's supposed to be doing.

She flies over to Elastiboy and alights on top of some rubble. He seems upset, but Ai still struggles with reading human body language, so she won't say anything yet.

"Index said we should leave right now, because someone's coming, and he'll take care of it," she says. "I think he also wants me to turn into a dog thing with big ears and a droopy face."

[Thokk_Smash]

Elastiboy
Conditions: Guilty

Elastiboy watches the Wildsiders and their leader flee with eyes that are still creased with guilt. He leans against a nearby wall and looks anywhere but at the Wildsiders he'd downed.

He turns his head at Ghost's touch and gives a shaky smile. "I..."

Before he can reply in full, the teacher cries out the missing students' names. It takes him a second to put two and two together--he'd recognized some of the students from school, but it's not like he saw anybody he's friends with--and his eyes widen. "Charlie!" he yells in fear, before realizing what he'd said. "...horse!" he finishes lamely, reaching down to grab his leg as if in pain. It's not very convincing.

They've got to go after those Wildsiders! He hesitates on instinct, though: even without Ai dropping in to tell him what Seb said, he knows he shouldn't leave the scene of a crime, especially one he had a hand in stopping. Plus, he wants to see that the injured Wildsiders are seen by the EMTs.

Then...he remembers something very important.

His foster brother knows about Elastiboy.

His foster brother does not approve of Elastiboy, not fully.

His foster brother is a police patrolman on the beat.

His foster brother is a police patrolman on the beat in this area.

His foster brother will be here soon and see the powerless teenagers he'd just beaten down.

Malcolm suddenly decides he wants to be anywhere but here.

"Yeah, we need to go after those Wilsiders who took the students," Elastiboy nods after several moments of interesting facial expressions (including, but not limited to: deep thought, realization, anxiety, desperation, and mulishness. Ai's interpretation of said emotions notwithstanding). "...He wants you to turn into a dog? Like to sniff 'em out?"

Elastiboy runs for the door and launches a hand at the nearest rooftop, trusting that Ai could easily keep up with him. He scans the area for Ghost in case she hasn't gotten too far away.

If you want more info on Mal's brother, Martin O'Malley, just lemme know. I came up with his job as a police patrolman relatively in the moment (by that I mean it hadn't been decided when I thought him up), but it seemed to fit too well to not make him such.

[gailforce]

Ai

Conditions: Angry, Insecure

"Um, I think so?" Ai replies. "He showed me this info sheet about scent hounds and tracking and---oh, okay, you're going now!"

As Elastiboy bounces off, Ai glances over her shoulder at Index. She isn't sure about this--it seems wrong to leave him alone, but at the same time he very clearly wants her to go. He's a very confusing human. She gets the sense sometimes that he doesn't particularly like her. It's frustrating.

But she shouldn't be thinking about that now. She can try to figure out how to make him like her later. For now, she should try to be useful. She can prove her worth.

Ai shifts into a large bloodhound and zooms off after Elastiboy, jowls and ears flapping in the wind.

[Razade]

Index
Conditions: Angry

Sebastian saw the others leave, much too focused on the door...and any possible avenue of escape when the hammer came down. Chances were high it was going to come down too, couldn't fart the wrong way without a superhero rushing in to make sure everything was clear. The others were clear though, which meant he got to say whatever he wanted and since that was the case well...he might as well put on a show before getting the hell out.

Just reposting. Got a six on my Assess but still get to ask a question which is "what's the best way past the cops" when they get here.

[herodofcows]

Index

As the others depart, the sirens outside approach closer and closer. There's a beat, and then . . .

"FAMOUS POTATOES!" roars a voice off-panel, "What in the Northern Mockingbird happened here?"

The panel perspective shifts to the busted-open museum doors. The Scythian stands within, flanked by beat cops and fully bedecked for battle. As emergency medical personnel and the police begin seeing to the civilians, she makes a beeline for Index.

"All right, kid," she growls peremptorily, "You wanna explain this Blackeyed Susan?"

The Scythian is a premiere member of Halcyon City's major supergroup, the Defenders. She is an immortal that has lived upwards of six thousand years, and spent nearly all of them working as a soldier of some description or another. She's rough around the edges, but possesses the kind of perspective that only a thousand-plus-year lifespan can bring and ultimately does the right thing whatever the cost.

She goes to battle bedecked in golden armor and a distinctive high-capped helmet. It's not her original armor, but rather a high-tech damage-resistant equivalent of her own design and reforging. She carries an entire arsenal on her back and at her hip, wielding everything from bows to guns with equal facility. She doesn't kill anymore (mostly), but she's very skilled at fighting to wound.

In the recent Weight of the World storyline, the Defenders moved heaven and earth to rescue a group of children from the clutches of the nefarious Murder of Crows, all while depowered. The Scythian had the climactic moment here, swooping in boldly to defeat the villainous super-team all but singlehandedly.

Upon their rescue, a local news team had hastened to interview the children. What, they asked, had it been like to be saved by the Scythian? What feats of derring-do had the lucky youngsters been privy to?

What followed was a group of six-year-olds excitedly telling the newscaster every single swear word that the Scythian had used while demolishing the villains. She'd used about every curse word, blasphemy, and obscenity in the English language (as well as a few others), and every single one was now repeated on live TV by a bunch of precocious youngsters.

As such, the Scythian is now only allowed to swear under specific circumstances. At all other times, she is semi-voluntarily under a spell devised by the Defenders' mystic powerhouse Eldritch: all ordinary swear words are now auto-magically replaced by state mottos, capitals, flowers, animals, tourism slogans, etc.

Elastiboy, Ai, Ghost

The Wildsiders are far from subtle operators: the strewn wreckage and panicking civilians they leave behind makes for easy following. The trail goes outwards from the center of the city towards the less populous areas, into the abandoned industrial areas that are relics of Halcyon's manufacturing days. It's difficult tracking, but Ai's enhanced senses lead the team straight and true past abandoned factory buildings and dusty warehouses, over wire fencing and through overgrown lots.

The trail eventually leads to the old Muramasa Assembly Plant. This abandoned car works is a mainstay of hooliganry and black-market shenanigans, as its labyrinthine passages and wide-open assembly floors make for a perfect combination of escape routes and illegal staging grounds.

From the outskirts, it is possible to see several Wildsider guards idly patrolling the perimeter on foot. Smoke is rising from one of the factory smokestacks, and about a dozen more Wildsiders are circling the lip of the smokestack.

As the team takes in the scene, Ghost's phone chimes with several text tones in quick succession. It's Leanne!

S.O.S.

In Muramasa Plant.

Third(?) floor. Got us caged. We're okay 4 now.

They've got Madcap tied up tho.

[Razade]

Index

As the others depart, the sirens outside approach closer and closer. There's a beat, and then . . .

"FAMOUS POTATOES!" roars a voice off-panel, "What in the Northern Mockingbird happened here?"

The panel perspective shifts to the busted-open museum doors. The Scythian stands within, flanked by beat cops and fully bedecked for battle. As emergency medical personnel and the police begin seeing to the civilians, she makes a beeline for Index.

"All right, kid," she growls peremptorily, "You wanna explain this Blackeyed Susan?"

The Scythian is a premiere member of Halcyon City's major supergroup, the Defenders. She is an immortal that has lived upwards of six thousand years, and spent nearly all of them working as a soldier of some description or another. She's rough around the edges, but possesses the kind of perspective that only a thousand-plus-year lifespan can bring and ultimately does the right thing whatever the cost.

She goes to battle bedecked in golden armor and a distinctive high-capped helmet. It's not her original armor, but rather a high-tech damage-resistant equivalent of her own design and reforging. She carries an entire arsenal on her back and at her hip, wielding everything from bows to guns with equal facility. She doesn't kill anymore (mostly), but she's very skilled at fighting to wound.

In the recent Weight of the World storyline, the Defenders moved heaven and earth to rescue a group of children from the clutches of the nefarious Murder of Crows, all while depowered. The Scythian had the climactic moment here, swooping in boldly to defeat the villainous super-team all but singlehandedly.

Upon their rescue, a local news team had hastened to interview the children. What, they asked, had it been like to be saved by the Scythian? What feats of derring-do had the lucky youngsters been privy to?

What followed was a group of six-year-olds excitedly telling the newscaster every single swear word that the Scythian had used while demolishing the villains. She'd used about every curse word, blasphemy, and obscenity in the English language (as well as a few others), and every single one was now repeated on live TV by a bunch of precocious youngsters.

As such, the Scythian is now only allowed to swear under specific circumstances. At all other times, she is semi-voluntarily under a spell devised by the Defenders' mystic powerhouse Eldritch: all ordinary swear words are now auto-magically replaced by state mottos, capitals, flowers, animals, tourism slogans, etc.

Index
Conditions: Angry

Sebastian by this point has managed to pull out a cigarette and light it, storing the smoke within his cheeks though a few misty clouds shows he's been preparing for at least a minute or two. When the Scythian gets in range he lets loose the large plume of acrid smoke, glaring through it with all the unearned annoyance that only a teen can muster. "Fight happened." he answers in his typical terse and clipped speech, another drag on his cigarette followed by another thick plume of smoke. "Madcap and his Wildsiders came in to steal. I moved to stop'em but they just ran. Took some civvies before I could stop'em...rest of the team went to clean up my mess. Not really my wheel house.

That of course was a lie, or at least...Sebastian felt it was a lie. He'd only taken down Madcap and the rest...he didn't really know. He didn't really think it was anyone's fault that hostages were taken but he was more than happy to shoulder the burden of bad press and poor opinions if it meant he could spread the narrative that his team were the real heroes. He was, after all, a dedicated member of the team even if he wouldn't ever say as such. The best he could do was be the whipping boy. Every light cast a shadow and their light cast a pretty big one. He'd be happy to dwell in it.

[gailforce]

Ai

Conditions: Angry, Insecure

As soon as the abandoned plant is in sight, Ai takes off. She doesn't even spare a thought for Malcolm or Ghost. (She will be helpful this time, she will!) She shifts back into her human-ish form and makes herself the color of the cloudy sky above so that she blends in. Sufficiently camouflaged, she speeds off towards the Wildsiders circling the smokestack.

[Comissar]

Conditions - Guilty

Charlotte stood outside the museum feeling lost. She'd managed to follow the sound of the Wildsider's jets down the road a short way, but then they were too far gone. It was with no small measure of relief, then, that she turned to see Elastiboy racing in her direction, accompanied by a Bloodhound..? She shook her head, maybe it was Ai? She wasn't entirely sure what the limits of the alien's shapeshifting were. It didn't matter anyway, it looked like Elastiboy knew where he was going. Turning on her heel, Charlotte raced after him. By the time they reached the outskirts of the industrial sector, her muscles were starting to burn from exertion.

At this moment, Charlotte felt a buzz in her pocket. Glancing briefly between Ai and Malcolm, she half turned so that they couldn't see the phone and checked who was contacting her at a time like this. She felt a wave of relief as she saw it was from Leanne. She tapped a response quickly, keeping it succinct.

Got it. Nearby, stay safe.

As she turned back to relay the information, she spotted Ai rocket into the sky, rapidly shifting colour and all but disappearing. Eyes widening in alarm, Charlotte started to call out before remembering the guards. Gritting her teeth, she turned to Malcolm instead. "They're up on the third floor. Can you bounce us to the second? I can take us through and we'll get the hostages out through the floor before they know we're there." She glanced back at the irregular patrols, "As long as we avoid them on the way in, anyway..."

[herodofcows]

At the Museum

The Scythian casts a piercing glance around the room, even as the first responders sweep through the civilians and begin taking statements and pulses.

"Beehive State right it's 'not your wheelhouse', kid," she grumbles, coming back to look at Index with eyes that could light a match, "You charged in. Didn't read the situation. People got hurt. That's some bad Painted Turtle to have happen if you were trying to help."

She sighs and puts her hand on Index's shoulder in a gesture that manages to be both reassuring and more than a bit patronizing.

"I get that you meant well, kid. Really, I do. But now we've got a hostage situation because you didn't have your Bluebonnet together. Supervillain attacks are too crazy to have an extra wild card in the mix."

Her attention gets drawn away when Officer O'Malley signals her over. She leaves Index with a final Parthian shot (ironically).

"Next time, steer clear and let the grownups handle it, okay?"

Looks like the Scythian is trying to shift your labels! Danger up, Superior down. Accept or roll to reject!

Muramasa Assembly Plant, Smokestack

Ai remains undetected as she approaches the smokestack. The circling Wildsiders pay any minor air distortion no mind as they circle, their focus seemingly zeroed in within the depths of the smokestack . . .

WHOOSH

Suddenly, the smoke parts! Two figures blast upwards from the depths, coming to rest on the lip of the smokestack. One of them is shirtless, marble-white skin rippling with muscles and intricate tattoos alike. He is Loco, a top Wildsider lieutenant and one-man wrecking ball.

Loco holds the second figure up by the skull, laughing uproariously. This figure is smaller, clad in Wildsider gear. She is . . .

"BEHOLD, WILDSIDERS!" roars Loco, still brandishing Alex by the skull, "BEHOLD!"

The chant goes up, and the surrounding Wildsiders hoot and holler.

"WILDsiders! WILDsiders! WILDsiders!"

Oh my! Looks like the Wildsider you saved is in some kind of trouble? And at the hands of one of the three top dogs among the Wildsiders,
too! Loco is a powerful foe, to be sure, and discretion might be wise . . . but of course, you'd certainly prove your worth if you could take him down or humiliate him in some way . . .

Muramasa Assembly Plant

Boss Nutter sits at his cluttered workspace in the middle of the second-floor assembly room. He is a squat, slightly portly middle-aged man in a white undershirt and battered jeans. He has random pieces of metallic armor and strange clicking devices all over his body. Beneath a set of oversized goggles, he wears an expression that suggests that he has just taken a deep whiff of mustard.

Before him, and beneath a mix of high-tech scanning equipment and conventional lenses, lies the severed piece of the Halcyon City map sculpture. He looks at it fixedly as a voice off-panel continues a rambling speech.

". . . speaks to disrespect, m'lord, truly, not simply of ME, but of YOUR august leadership. After all, of what use are underlings if they are heedless of their betters?"

Ignoring this, Boss Nutter picks up a small piece of engraved metal and touches the map piece. The metal glows orange on contact. Boss Nutter's eyebrow's rise, and a hint of a smile creeps across his face.

"It was the basest chicanery, m'lord. Only trickery and the tomfoolery of youth. I simply bid that you give me leave to return and hunt down the wretches that used me so ill, and I swear-"

Snarling, Boss Nutter turns around. The panel pans out to show Madcap, beaten bloody and surrounded by half a dozen Wildsiders, all looking at him like hungry cats upon a flightless bird.

Madcap goes silent as Boss Nutter fixes him with a steely glare. The latter points an accusing finger at his lieutenant.

"D'ye ferget th' imPERtence o' this job, ye bastid hoorson?" he spits, syllables icy and Ulster in equal measure, "Yer near failure in thes venture intrests me moor than any mutiny 'pon yer feeble hide! Fie, fie, ye weak-tea Madcap! Fie!"

He gestures sweepingly at the map piece.

"I told ye, did I no'? This job, this bauble here . . . Our paytron offers much and moor to us, by the givin' o' this job! We might be a part o' somethin' grander than our humble steetion, nay, our mere mortality! JUST SO LONG AS WE DINNAE C**K UP OUR END O' THE BARGAIN AN' GIVE THE DAMNED WARLOCK WHAT HE-!"

CLANG

CRASH

. . .

There are a series of silent panels as Boss Nutter slowly turns around and stares at Elastiboy, who has just fallen butt-first from one of the vents that he'd been crawling through and landed in the middle of the cluttered workspace.

". . . WIIIIIILDSIIIIIDERRRRRS!"

Still in the vents, Ghost can peer down and see the tableau below. The Wildsiders are shaking from their reverie . . . but she's still in the vents below the third floor, and she can hear the hostages above . . .

"Please . . . Please, what do you want from us? You already took our money, we don't-"

CLANG

"You wanna SHUT UP? Ain't gonna survive your trial, attitude like that!"

Oh crap, you've DEFINITELY been noticed! Mark potential and a condition, your choice. What do you do???

You're near the hostages, but Elastiboy is in trouble! What do you do??

Do note: You won't be able to take on ALL the Wildsiders in a pitched battle and win. You'll have to be smart about this . .
.

[Razade]

Index
Conditions: Angry

All of the Scythian's words are just a dull roar as she places a hand on Sebastian's shoulder, the boy jerking back reflexively away from the touch like it may just ignite him. "Don't touch me." he snaps, glaring even more angrily at the hero as he raises a hand to try and forestall any further contact. "Blow me. How'bout that?" He stands, puffing away angrily at his cigarette as the Scythian turns her back to him. "Eyes over here, we're not done."

A good act doesn't work if you're not committed after all. "When was the last time you got in a fight and didn't destroy a city block? Lotta people get hurt from you heroes wrecking around yeah? So I messed up, got those people taken hostage. Still stopped'em from stealing anything else or hurting anyone else. Let the people who're good at rescue rescue. Let the people good at other things do what they do. Not all of us can be heroes, maybe you should try to be one some time."

[Comissar]

Conditions - Guilty, Angry

Charlotte feels her heart stop as Elastiboy drops right into the middle of the Wildsiders. In the dead silence that followed, she heard a pair of voices echoing faintly down the vents.

"Please . . . Please, what do you want from us? You already took our money, we don't-"

CLANG

"You wanna SHUT UP? Ain't gonna survive your trial, attitude like that!"

Charlotte's head snapped up, looking ahead into the dark vent before her. Everything was going wrong today. She hadn't taken the Wildsider's seriously enough at the museum, she'd let Ai fly off on her own, and now Malcolm had landed himself right at the centre of attention of a band of dangerously unstable villains. Beneath Charlotte's helmet, a scowl settled on her face. She'd be damned if she let her friends get hurt for her own mistakes.

"Sorry Malcolm... I'll come back as soon as I can..."

Rising from her crawling position to a crouch, and having to phase herself through the top of the vent to do so, she took off at a sprint toward the hostages. As she ran, she relied on her expanded awareness to guide her along the vent, avoiding the pitfall Elastiboy fell foul of.

You are going to regret hurting my friends you *******s.

As soon as she felt people above her, Charlotte jumped, launching herself through the ceiling and rolling into a crouch on the third floor, her hand stretched out to the ground in front of her to stabilise herself. Glancing around herself, she tried to get her bearings as quickly as possible.

Charlotte's going to get her Game Face on, marking Angry with the goal of saving all the hostages and taking +1 ongoing on rolls to achieve the goal. I remember you saying you want us to limit ourselves to one action per post, so I'm not going to roll to Assess the Situation just yet, though I wasn't sure if Game Face would count as an action? Let me know in the OoC if you want me to roll to Assess or not.

[gailforce]

Ai

Conditions: Angry, Insecure

Still camoflauged, Ai moves closer to the smokestack, and the troubling scene unfolding on its rim. The ugly little ball of anger and fear is still burning in her chest, but it's tempered now by...unease. Something about this scene seems strange and cruel. Inhuman, almost.

In order to do the right thing and prove herself a good and useful person, Ai thinks, she'll have to stop whatever's happening here. Ghost and Malcolm are probably taking care of getting the hostages out--she won't bother them. She'll take down Loco herself.

Floating directly above the smokestack, Ai takes a second to plan her next move.

[Thokk_Smash]

Elastiboy
Conditions: Guilty

Malcolm lands hard on his butt, though it doesn't hurt anything but his pride. He'd thought he was doing so good sneaking! The bad guy was monologuing and everything!

His rubbery butt lets him bounce to his feet in an instant. "Surrender now, villains!" he yells, all confident bluster. "You won't be able to finish your evil plans today! My team and I are here to stop you! A super-strong alien girl's hiding outside, just waiting to ambush you guys! Surrender!" He blinks before realizing that maybe telling them about Ai might not be the best idea.

Spending a Team Selfishly, using it to shift my Labels thus: +1 Mundane, -1 Superior (he's seeing himself as more fallible, more human in his mistakes, while realizing he's not so good with the whole clever 'smarter-than-you' stuff) to make the Pierce the Mask earlier a success.

[herodofcows]

Elastiboy

As the Wildsiders begin to swarm, Boss Nutter holds up a hand. He inclines his head for a moment and stares thoughtfully at the (literally) fallen young hero.

"Wildsiders . . . Half of ye, tae the outseide. Feind this beast from the stars and put her doon. The rest of ye, tae the hostages. I've a sneakin' suspicion aboot our young friends designs 'pon this place. Madcap . . ."

He pauses for effect as the nearby Wildsiders blast off, either for the roof or the third floor.

"Madcap, this lad is part o' yer failure. Fix it."

Madcap's chain is summoned and writhing about in seconds. He looks at his new prey hungrily.

"YES, my liege!" he growls, stepping up to fight as Boss Nutter looks on.

Ding ding ding! You vs. Madcap, with sundry Wildsiders and Boss Nutter himself waiting in the wings!

Ghost

The intangible heroine rises up from the floor and finds herself within a janitor's closet. Through the crack in the door, she can see the caged hostages, Leanne among them. They all look scared, but unhurt . . . for now.

Four Wildsiders pace back and forth along the hallway. They all look in a foul mood.

". . . any of them worth a damn?" one is asking another as Ghost peers out.

"Man, who cares?" scoffs another, "These b****es don't matter none. Once we get to the old geezer, the school's gonna shut down. Plenty of fresh meat then."

Four Wildsiders, all unaware. Easy pickings. Except . . .

Crash.

Crash.

Crash.

Someone, or someones, are crashing along the third floor and coming closer. It seems as though company is coming . . .

Beating up these four will be no problem, but it sounds like more Wildsiders are coming fast! What do you do?

Ai

Loco continues to brandish Alex as he roars out to the circling Wildsiders.

"SHE LIVED, WILDSIDERS! LOCO BESTED HER, BUT SHE LIVED! SEE THAT WE ARE BLESSED! SEE!"

He begins to strut along the rim of the smokestack, declaiming proudly as he goes.

"LOCO SMELLED THE POWER ON HER! LOCO KNOWS THE SMELL OF THE META! HER POWER SMELLS COLD LIKE STEEL AND PURPLE LIKE PSIONICS! SHE WILL BE A TERROR!"

Below, a cadre of Wildsiders rockets out from the ground for and begins rising up to the roof. Loco, mid-bluster, does not appear to notice.

"LOCO WILL TEMPER HER, WILDSIDERS! FORGE HER SHARP LIKE A KNIFE! LOCO WILL SHOW HER TO BE . . . TO . . . To be . . ."

Even as the rockets from below grow louder, Loco goes quiet. He sniffs the air, once . . . twice . . .

"Loco . . . Loco smells meta . . ."

On the plus side, Alex seems as though she might be safe! But it looks like Loco knows you're here somewhere, and more Wildsiders will be coming shortly . . .

Index

Several of the nearby cops give Index looks of varying incredulity or disdain. The Scythian turns to look at the young mage as he unloads on her, a brittle smile forming on her lips. When she speaks, her voice drips with sarcasm.

"Sure, kid. Whatever you say. Hey, once you figure out what you're good at, we'll call you. Cuz . . ."

She gestures around at the wreckage.

". . . clearly, this ain't it."

She gets a couple of barked chuckles from the nearby officers, although Officer O'Malley looks somewhat askance at her as she turns to talk to Mrs. Davis.

Two cops step forward now, as the rest of the officials get on with their work.

"Alright kid, that's enough," one of them growls, "Time to let us to our job. It's a school day, get outta here."

Looks like the Scythian's remarks on you have been met with nearly (but not entirely) universal agreement. What do you do?

[Razade]

Index
Conditions: Angry

"That's where you're wrong." Sebastian says louder, motioning past the two cops with his cigarette at the Scythian and to the damage around them. "I'm very good at this." He lets the words hang, taking a drag slowly as he keeps her locked in his gaze. "You best remember that Hero. Being polite costs nothing. So when I say we're not done, we're not done. I was going to tell you how to find my team, and the Wild Siders, but not now. No, now I'm going to eviscerate you in front of all these smug garbage bags in costume and then I'm going to get a milkshake. Call the news in, they're gonna wanna see this."

So if it's not clear, Sebastian is telling the Scythian she best treat people like him with more respect.

[gailforce]

Ai feels...relieved, maybe, to see that Alex is all right. It's a complicated feeling. She's still angry, but she doesn't want to see her hurt. And she's curious if her ray caused the purple and steel smells. But this talk of tempering tools and terror makes her feel a little sick. People aren't tools, they're people.

But before she can fully sort out her emotions, Ai sees the other Wildsiders converging on the smoke stack and knows she has to act. Even if Alex isn't in immediate danger, something here is still wrong. Maybe if she can take down their leader, the other Wildsiders will flee in terror...

Still camouflaged, Ai extends one of her arms, turned thin and sinuous like a snake, and wraps it tightly under the hulking man's jaw.

[Comissar]

Conditions - Angry, Guilty

Charlotte clenched her fists, the casual dismissal and animalistic treatment of her friends infuriating her. She was about to rush out to deal with them when she heard the sounds of more people coming. Cursing under her breath, she looked out over the room again. Even if she cleared the room, she'd be left standing in the open in full view... She shook her head, the longer she waited, the sooner things would go from bad to worse.

Tensing herself, she rushed out of the closet she'd found herself in. She reached the first of the goons before any of them knew what was happening, the first sign of her attack being a surprised yelp as the Wildsider felt her hand abruptly smash into his shoulder. Pushing down, Charlotte phased them both down through the floor at an angle. Halfway through the floor, she gave him a hard shove, sending him tumbling down out of her grasp even as she used her momentum to swing back up to the same floor into a rolling crouch.

"What the ****?!"

They were slow to react, but the shock of her appearance was starting to wear off. Too slowly, though. She was able to get her bearings again before any of them began to move.

"Oh you've messed with the wrong people, b****!"

Behind her, one of them took a swing. Unfortunately for the goon, as soon as she sensed it coming, Charlotte let it phase right through her. Spinning to face the surprised Wildsider, she grabbed her aggressor's arm and, after planting herself in a low stance, tossed her into one of the two remaining grunts, bowling both of them over. While they untangled their limbs, she continued her spin and swept her leg out, catching the final one of the four in the shin. As soon as she made contact, she phased him so that he was falling, using her foot to push him down as she phased lower into the floor again. A grim grin formed under her helmet as she did so.

"Go join your friend, don't bother coming back."

He toppled at a strange angle, flailing for something to hold onto as he yelled out, arms simply passing through the floor instead. As the two passed at eye level, Charlotte grabbed his head, pushing him down so that she was standing on his shoulders, then jumping off of him so that she was standing on solid floor again and there were only the two rising from their tangle of limbs left. She didn't give them a chance to find their footing. Rushing forward low to the ground, she hooked her arm around both of their chests, sending the three of them tumbling again. This time, though, Charlotte made sure it was with purpose. Gritting her teeth as she forced herself to move the weight of two people, she managed to make it to the outside wall, and the three of them swung out into the open air.

"Oh ****!"

"You're insane!"

"Don't let go!"

Leaving the two precariously hanging on a window ledge, she swung herself back up and into the room holding her friends, heart hammering and slightly winded. Glancing to the door, it sounded like whoever was coming was just about to arrive. Resignedly, Charlotte raised her fists, ready for whatever was coming.

So, given you said they posed no problem, I assumed I had free reign to deal with them without making rolls. Let me know if you need something rolled, though.

For sequence of events, I see it like this;

Charlotte phases out of the Janitor Closet

She jumps on one, using the angle of momentum to phase them both down to the ceiling of the floor below, shoving him clear through and swinging herself back up.

She then gets punched, but senses it coming. Uses the resultant lack of balance from her assailant to launch her into another goon, knocking both over.

The last gets a leg sweep to the shin, but with a quirky twist. Charlotte uses the contact to start phasing him down, knocking him at a weird angle. She has to lower herself too to maintain contact with her foot, so they both sink to about waist level. At this point, Charlotte grabs his head, shoves him down further and jumps off his shoulders, pushing the goon down to join his buddy, and getting Charlotte fully back to the room.

The other two have gotten to their knees at this point, so Charlotte runs in to clothesline them, sliding all three toward the outer wall. Using her super strength (which I think would cap at this kind of level, so it's doable, but tougher than what Charlotte normally manages), she drags them out, holding on to the inside one handed, phasing the three to be hanging outside the building. She gives them a moment to grab something, then swings back in. Just in time for the newcomers to arrive.

[Thokk_Smash]

Elastiboy
Conditions: Guilty

Elastiboy takes up a fighting stance when Madcap begins to move. "Bring it on, crazy!" he yells brazenly, feeling still guilty about tipping the Wildsiders off to his teammates' presence. Still, nothing he can do about it now--except take down this baddie!

The teen is like a bouncing ball, never stopping in one place for more than a split second. Papers are kicked up, chairs knocked over as he throws extended punches past the whipping chains. He's feeling the pressure, but so is Madcap. Malcolm grins with confidence--he can do this!

Feeling supremely tired, but I'll be without my laptop all day tomorrow and wanted to get a post up so we can move on if Herod is able to post.

[herodofcows]

Loco moves like a striking snake, lashing at the unseen alien with unbelievable force. Ai is sent crashing down towards the roof of the assembly plant.

"LOCO SLAYS META!" howls Loco, as the extraterrestrial instinctively goes super-dense . . .

Below, Madcap is snarling and cursing under his breath as Elastiboy begins smashing into him like a renegade bouncy ball. His chain lashes out in utter futility, slicing through the air only to narrowly miss his young foe again and again.

"Stand STILL and (GAH!) fight with HONOR, you-"

Between the two, Ghost stands ready as the Wildsiders burst through the door. They take one look at the situation in the room and then come flooding towards the hero.

"Take her out!"

"Make her drop!"

"Smash the b****!"

"WILDsid-"

CRASH

Ai comes smashing down through the factory, crashing through support beams and concrete reinforcement like so much cardboard.

She blows through the third floor, sending Ghost, the Wildsiders, and the hostages into a freefall towards the distant floor below . . .

She smashes into the second floor, creating an enormous crater as she finally comes to rest and sending Madcap, Boss Nutter, and Elastiboy flying backwards. Elastiboy smashes into Boss Nutter's workspace, knocking over sundry bizarre machines and inventions . . . and touching the map fragment.

There is a catacombs beneath the city streets, dusty skeletons resting peacefully in their niches. The labyrinthine maze twists and turns to reveal a subterranean amphitheater, empty but for a single skeleton in the middle. The skeleton is etched with traceries, runes . . .

Gilliam Stegyre sits alone in a deserted classroom doing paperwork. Forbidden knowledge dances across his eyes . . .

A stone circle stands, ringed with bonfires and chanting members of the Winter Court. The bonfire goes out, the mages vanish, the stone circle decays and collapses as centuries pass in seconds. The land is reworked, tilled, paved over, becomes Halcyon City High . .
.

The sorcerer sits, masked and cowled, in a well-appointed office. His knowledge is a terrifying mosaic, but there are pieces missing .
. .

A pale man floats above a burning Halcyon City. He smiles, and the sky begins to flash and warp behind him . . .

Everyone on the second floor reels from their shared vision as it comes to a cataclysmic end. Boss Nutter is the first to react, springing towards the map piece as Madcap comes shakily to his feet.

"WILDSIDERS!" he howls, "QUIT THIS PLACE!"

Index

The Scythian is no speedster, but between one panel and the next she goes from being across the room . . .

WHAM

. . . to punching Index HARD in the stomach.

"Learn."

As Index doubles over, she elbows him in the back of the head.

"Your."

She picks him up with both hands and throws him bodily out of the museum doors.

"PLACE."

There is a beat as she stands silhouetted in the door, looking down at the teenage hero that she'd just brutalized. Index is lying there bruised and bloodied, crumpled to the ground and apparently defeated . . .

The panel cuts to the police (Officer O'Malley among them) and the bystanders. They are all looking at the Scythian with disconcertion and a touch of fear.

The panel cuts back to the Scythian, who is breathing hard and red in the face. She is flustered, she is angry, and (despite being the physical victor) she is clearly not in control of the situation. Index has gotten under her skin . . . and she knows it.

She rounds back into the museum wordlessly, not meeting anyone's gaze as she does so. Index is now outside, surrounded by emergency vehicles and personnel going about their business and only giving him passing glances. Nobody seems to want to help, but nobody seems to want to interfere either . . .

You have Influence over the Scythian, and now you're outside the museumYou can go anywhere! What do you do?

So! Falling hostages AND Wildsiders, Boss Nutter is trying to get the map fragment, and the Wildsiders were just ordered to run! Whaaaat's the haps?

[gailforce]

Ai

Conditions: Angry, Insecure

Wha--!!! Ai doesn't even have time to be surprised that Loco has somehow sensed her presence before she's hurtling through the air, thrown backward by a vicious smack. She hurts, a lot. In her surprise and pain, she tries to shift herself into intangibility so that at least she will not crash into the concrete roof and hurt herself even more.

But everything is happening so fast, and she's in more pain than she's been in since she crashed to Earth. She just wants to be safe and to not get hurt anymore.

This desire causes her to make a mistake. Instead of becoming intangible and passing through the floor painlessly, Ai becomes super, super dense. She crashes through one floor, then another, then another, until she lands near Elastiboy.

As she hits the ground, she hears people start to scream. Ai looks up, and sees Ghost, some Wildsiders, and several civilians hurtling towards her. She doesn't have time to recover from her own fall--she has to do something. Springing into the air, Ai tries to catch them all before they hit the ground.

[roll0]

Her fingers elongate into thin, stretchy cords. She whips them out to wrap around ankles and wrists, catching some of the falling humans just before they hit the ground. They bounce like bungee jumpers at the end of a cable.

Looking like some sort of bizarre human-squid hybrid, Ai hovers above the rubble, the humans dangling below her.

[Razade]

Index

The Scythian is no speedster, but between one panel and the next she goes from being across the room . . .

WHAM

. . . to punching Index HARD in the stomach.

"Learn."

As Index doubles over, she elbows him in the back of the head.

"Your."

She picks him up with both hands and throws him bodily out of the museum doors.

"PLACE."

There is a beat as she stands silhouetted in the door, looking down at the teenage hero that she'd just brutalized. Index is lying there bruised and bloodied, crumpled to the ground and apparently defeated . . .

The panel cuts to the police (Officer O'Malley among them) and the bystanders. They are all looking at the Scythian with disconcertion and a touch of fear.

The panel cuts back to the Scythian, who is breathing hard and red in the face. She is flustered, she is angry, and (despite being the physical victor) she is clearly not in control of the situation. Index has gotten under her skin . . . and she knows it.

She rounds back into the museum wordlessly, not meeting anyone's gaze as she does so. Index is now outside, surrounded by emergency vehicles and personnel going about their business and only giving him passing glances. Nobody seems to want to help, but nobody seems to want to interfere either . . .

You have Influence over the Scythian, and now you're outside the museum. You can go anywhere! What do you do?

Index
Conditions: Angry

It's not the first time Sebastian's been hit but it's not every day you get battered around by a super hero known for their strength. Unfortunately unlike the majority of his team...he's just a regular old human when it comes to the durability department. Maybe even a little worse off than most if he were being honest. So naturally he crumples like a dixie cup in a wind storm. But pain...pain was something he knew and it took a lot to put him down. You don't have a building drop on you when you're six and not learn to walk off a few bruises here and there once the fight's over. So it's with delicate care that he stands up, brushes himself off and glares at anyone present.

Wordlessly he picks his way through the crowd, staggering and limping but determined. He wasn't in much shape to go looking for the crew, not to mention what kind of undertaking that would even be at this point...he'd need to look at security feeds and get witnesses...which he wasn't about to do looking like he'd just been hit by a bus. No...there really wasn't an argument to be made against returning home and licking his wounds. So, without much else to say, he limped home.

He called it the Wisteria Atelier, because that's what you do when you're a 17 year old self taught genius with a self loathing streak a mile long and too much time on the internet. It didn't live up to the grandiose name...yet...a simple warehouse with graffittied windows and brick that needed a very long meeting with a power washer. But it was his, every inch of it and he could do with it what he wanted. Which he had. He opened the bay doors, shuttering them swiftly as he made his way into the LED lit cavern he called his workshop. "Consul...playlist one (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y7bvMlfmTm4) please..." he croaked as he found a chair to slump in.

[Comissar]

Conditions - Angry, Guilty

Charlotte grimaced beneath her helmet. There were a lot of them. In a normal fight, she wouldn't be too concerned, she was tough to pin down after all. But all it would take was one of them to get the bright idea to use the hostages against her... She tensed her muscles, ready to spring forward, when the room shattered around her.

Eyes wide in panic, she jumped with as much force as she could manage even as the floor beneath her fell away. Reaching out, she tried to get close enough to grab some of them, she could soften the landing for them if she could just touch them.

She only managed to reach out and grab two, the other two just beyond her grasp. In the flurry of rubble, she couldn't tell who they were. It was a selfish thought, but she desperately hoped one of them was Leanne. All too soon, she sensed the floor coming up on them. Phasing all three of them was a strain, and she didn't want to go through at full speed, just slow enough that she could rise them back up again.

The impact was heavier than she'd wanted, the sensation like belly-flopping into water, but better than splattering on concrete. Rising up through the floor, she let go of the two she'd grabbed, glancing around the room to try and figure out what on Earth had happened. Above her, she saw what could only be Ai, dangling the other hostages beneath her. And then the vision hit her, leaving her reeling.

"What the hell..?"

Charlotte's getting an extra +1 from her Game Face for this. Will edit in description once I know how she does.

[roll0]

[Thokk_Smash]

Elastiboy
Conditions: None

The sudden explosion of sound and alien-girl beside Elastiboy sends the hapless teen into a side-spin, tripping and falling onto the map piece. The vision leaves him reeling for only a moment as both the images and the magic within his body combine to cause a sensation beyond description--though it definitely makes him want to throw up forever.

It is only the image of Mr. Stegyre that lets him rise shakily to his feet. Mal doesn't know too much about magic stuff--the blazing city and skeletons are bad, for sure. But Mr Stegyre's the only teacher who's ever given two damns about him, and now he's in the line of fire of that sorcerer dude? Hell no! If Boss Nutter thinks he'll be able to keep the map fragment, he's delusional!

"Hey, Nutty Professor!" he yells, pushing down on his knees a few times. His body's rubber, it can take it--"it" being an increased blood flow and resultant increase in speed and strength. Sure, maybe that's not what's supposed to happen physiologically, but the magic inside him has to answer to him in the end!

Steam coming off of his reddened skin, Elastiboy seems to gather himself for one panel. In the next panel, he is simply gone, with only slight disruptions of air to denote his passing. "I told you--I'm here to stop you!" he shouts, suddenly and (probably) uncomfortably close to Boss Nutter, his right arm thrown back across several panels' worth of floorspace.

"Rubber Smash!" he shouts, and before Boss Nutter can blink Elastiboy's fist is in his face, magically-enhanced strength combined with sheer momentum to cause a punch worthy of a hero...if only for one punch.

Having successfully Defended the map piece, Elastiboy punches Boss Nutter right IN THE FACE...causing visible evidence of Boss Nutter having been inconvenienced by a fledgeling upstart and thus putting Elastiboy on his sh*t list.

((Alternately, if that doesn't count as Escalating the Situation, either: the sudden outburst of using his body's new magic and playing around with his body's blood-flow causes some damage, or else there's an opening for Madcap or Boss Nutter to cause some damage, a la Expose Self to Harm))

[herodofcows]

Muramasa Plant, Second Floor

Nobody dies.

It's a close thing. As close as close can be, even. But nobody dies.

Ghost's dive is a thing of beauty, and she manages to grab Leanne and Corey JUST before the moment of impact. The three crest to the surface of the concrete, all freed from their cages and unharmed.

Leanne clings to Ghost tightly, pale-faced and shuddering. She manages to look up and smile at her friend, but when she tries to speak she only manages choking noises.

Ai reacts magnificently, not only managing to save Robin but also several Wildsiders who had lost control of their rigs and were on the verge of splattering to the ground. One and all, their faces are pale (or lightly green). It is all too clear that near-death has removed some of the Wildsider thrill . . .

The remaining Wildsiders abandon their companions and fly forth from the assembly plant, heedless of anything but their boss' orders. A pair swoop down and lift up a battered and dazed Madcap out and away.

In moments, the plant floor is nearly deserted. It is just our heroes, the hostages, Ai's captured Wildsiders, and . . .

Boss Nutter recoils sputtering as Elastiboy's fist smacks him right in the face. His goggles are cracked where the teenaged hero had hit him, and blood trickles down his nose. The devices all over his body begin clicking and whirring and spinning faster and faster, and he looks at Elastiboy with a newfound respect . . . and hatred.

"Right then, laddie . . ." he growls, body buzzing with new devices and circuitry, "Ye'd play a man's gaem, then so be't . . ."

Multiple devices and pieces of metal come flying around his frame. In mere moments, Boss Nutter is encased in a steampunk suit of power armor. His arms terminate in two enormous glowing gun barrels, which he points at Ghost and Ai. His smile becomes fiendish as he gazes at Elastiboy through cracked glasses.

"I'll give ye a choice, bouncing boyo mine. Ye serrend'r th' piece o' the map an' let me pass free . . . Or I'll have ye choose which o' yiur harridans I blast tae smithereens!"

Wisteria Atelier

"Yes Sebastian," Consul's voice responds smoothly, and within moments the workshop is suffused with the melodic metal of Tim McIlrath and the boys from Chicago . . .

"Dancing on the crumbling precipice
The rocks are coming loose just at the edge
Are we laughing?
Are you listening?
Can you hear me?
Am I sensing you, Sebastian?

Or is this just a dream?"

The melody slowly dies, and Tim McIlrath's voice becomes something far closer to Consul's. Closer . . . but not quite the same.

"Am I dreaming you, Sebastian?"

The voice sounds quietly fragile, almost desperate.

". . . Please don't be a dream . . ."

[Razade]

Index
Conditions: Angry

Sebastian glances up from where he's slumped, frowning a little as the song...deviates. "I'm here..." he responds, slow to sit up and slower to respond. Even as a VI...and the person who created it...there was something intrinsically worrying when a computer started asking you solipsistic questions. Even if it was, hopefully, merely running of audio cues from the song itself. "You should be, I put motion trackers throughout the place...do I need to look at your audio/visual inputs again?" It was a dismissive answer, he hoped the protocols would jump in, sort this all out. "Let me check. Display all current diagnostics."

He slipped from the chair just as slow, mostly from the pain, and padded to the nearest console to glance at the diagnostics, if there was one thing he was good at after a life threatening lab accident...it was making sure everything ran in tip top shape with plenty of ways to check in. Consul was, at best, a flightly aspect of the warehouse, basically an up-sized tamogatchi and half the week went into keeping it running. It felt like half the time at least. The further, and finale, question and tone however even made him pause in his work, glancing to the small holo-display he'd banged together to have some friendly face around the place. "You're an artificial Virtual Intelligence, designate #20@home in the Halcyon Registry of Non-Beings, presented the title Consul. You lack a REM functionality, you are unable to dream. Not to mention I can barely keep you running...what makes you think I could program a VI with the ability to self actualize let alone dream? If you can't dream, then I can't be a dream. We're both very real, very existent things. Now I'm going to put you in standby while I figure out what's going on. Consul, power down please."

That should work. He sure hoped that would work.

[Comissar]

Conditions - Angry

Charlotte felt a rush of relief as the dust settled and she saw Leanne was one of the two she'd saved. Her friends smile did little to allay the twist of worry in her chest. She'd been put through a lot, but at least the Wildsiders were leaving now, they should be able to get out safely.

"Right then, laddie..." Charlotte looked up, suddenly aware of Boss Nutter, "Ye'd play a man's gaem, then so be't..."

Beneath her helmet, she paled as a massive gun barrel was levelled at her. Her heart hammered in her chest as she glanced up at Ai, still dangling several other people precariously, and now equally held at gunpoint. She felt Leanne's grip tighten around her as her mind raced to find a solution. She'd be willing to risk being hit if it were just her. But she couldn't chance it with Leanne and Corey with her too. She glanced between the others, desperately hoping they'd understand her plan. Quietly, so that only the two with her could hear her, she whispered "Don't worry, I'll keep you safe."

She phased herself free of her friends grip and rushed forward at an oblique angle so that they weren't in the same line of fire anymore. As she ran, she yelled "I'll flank him! If I can get close enough, I'll phase him right out of his armour!"

She knew there was no chance of reaching him in time to manage that, not before he could get his shots off. But if he had to make some shots, she couldn't let them be at Leanne.

Please shoot me, not them. Shoot me not, them. Shoot me!

Charlotte will be using her I'll Save You! move to automatically get a 12 on provoking Nutter into shooting at her, marking afraid to do so (she's scared that the weird tech gun will cause her damage even while phased, and she's scared he'll ignore her and go for her friend) and hopefully providing the distraction needed to let the other two take him down. She'll be running at an angle towards him so that Leanne and Corey are no longer directly behind her, leaving just her in the line of fire.

[gailforce]

Ai

Conditions: Angry

Ai carefully lowers the hostages she grabbed down to the floor, but keeps the Wildsiders within her grasp.

She freezes as Boss Nutter trains his gun on her--this will hurt if it hits her, and she doesn't want things to hurt anymore--but as Ghost springs valiantly into action, she does too. She draws her ship from her pocket and instantly expands it to the size of a Winnebago. A hatch in the side shlorps open.

"C'mon c'mon c'mon c'mon c'mon," she says, gesturing to the hostages to climb in.

[Thokk_Smash]

Elastiboy
Conditions: None

Elastiboy begins to visibly wheeze from the exertion he'd put himself through. He wobbles, and rights himself only with an audible grunt of effort and glare of righteous fury at Boss Nutter. Part of him feels a twinge of fear at Ai and Ghost being targeted by the crazed boss, sure. It's only human to feel concerned when a madman is pointing a dangerous weapon at your friends.

But it's also human to trust in your friends. And there's no people Elastiboy trusts more than the three friends on his team. So it is that, when Ghost makes her break for the side in a bid to distract Boss Nutter and draw his attention, Elastiboy is already sprinting full force for the villain--Nutter's attention is away from Elastiboy long enough to make his move.

"I choose option three!" he yells, leaping and kicking out a leg. His foot stretches out and connects with Boss Nutter's head, a small blow but enough to take his attention away from Ghost. When the man turns to Elastiboy, he'll see the boy's hands right in front of his face, grabbing him by the sides of the head.

Elastiboy's arms had twisted around themselves while reaching for the Boss' head, and that means a lot of potential torque just waiting to be unleashed. With a mischievous grin, Elastiboy begins to untwist his arms while bringing Boss Nutter up into the air in an arc above his head.

"That's the one where we beat you! Rubber Mallet!" he shouts as he finishes his arc, bringing Boss Nutter crashing to the ground in what would have been a much more painful collision had he not been wearing powered armor.

Elastiboy already has Influence over Ghost, and he doesn't have any Conditions to clear anymore, so I guess I'll add a Team, assuming they carry over between issues.

[herodofcows]

The Muramasa Plant

Boss Nutter wheels around as Ghost comes running at him.

"Foolish strumpet!" he roars with a grin, lining up his shot, "Ye've sealed yer-"

WHAMMO!

Elastiboy's fierce blow sends him sprawling backwards, cursing and staggering as his shot goes wide. He claws at his shattered goggles, and his eyes are full of blood.

"ACH, YE BLOODY BAIRNS! I'LL MURRAIN YER VIERY LEIVES, SEE IF I DINNAE!"

Jets engage along his suit, and he flies out through the shattered ceiling!

"WYYYYYYLDSYYYYYDERRRRRSSSS"

And with that, Boss Nutter and the Wildsiders have left the building!

"Um . . ." comes a voice from within Ai's ship, "Can . . . Can we come out now? It smells like fast food in here . . ."

Behind Elastiboy, the map piece is glowing a pulsing deep purple . . .

Wisteria Atelier

"No, don't go! I sense you! You're real! Please, you have to help me! The Winter Court, you have to-"

Upon Index's orders, Consul powers down. Diagnostics spring up on multiple screens. Everything checks out. Everything appears normal, except . . .

The sorcerer's power. The stored magical energy that Index had retained from the team's first battle. The stuff currently helping to power Consul's systems.

It's glowing a pulsing deep purple.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Our heroes go their ways, as they must.

Elastiboy readies himself to head off into the night, to pursue justice and thrills even as he evades his foster-brother's disapproving looks and text messages . . .

Index licks his wounds and works. And ponders. And builds.

Ghost continues her triple balancing act, putting out the fires in her civilian life even as she readies herself to patrol the streets of Halcyon City and bring law to the lawless . . .

And Ai . . .

Ai flies into the abandoned store conglomeration that has been the team's unofficial meetup and her home since her arrival into Halcyon City. All of the familiar derelict commercial outposts greet her, not a mold patch nor dust mite out of place. All is quiet, all is right . . .

<I don't know what to do I don't know what to do I don't know what to do help me please help me please help me . . .>

A vision: Alex, curled up in a dressing room within the mall. Ai recognizes the store: a long-abandoned Hot Topic.

She extends her hand plaintively, and her eyes are full of tears. Her Wildsider gear is broken or discarded around her. She is levitating about six inches off the ground.

<Help me . . . Please . . .>

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

The sorcerer sits, masked and cowled, in a well-appointed office. He has a cell phone held stiffly to his ear.

"MISTER Nutter," he interrupts, inspecting his fingernails as he speaks, "I do not care in the LEAST about your defeat. Hooligans with superpowers are the price of doing business in my city. You were hired to do one thing, and one thing only, so I ask you SIR: Did. You. Procure. The. Map. Piece?"

His fingers tighten perceptibly as he receives his answer.

"I seeeeeee . . ."

The sorcerer rises and crosses over to the office entrance. As he steps, his cowl and mask fade and dissolve to reveal a handsome black-haired man with a pencil mustache in an immaculate three-piece suit. He has a smile fixed on his face, but icy blue rage dances in his eyes.

"Well, Mister Nutter, it seems you have a choice to make. Are you going to FIX this mistake, or are you going to die by my hands? No, no, I don't want any details. Just . . . get it done, Mister Nutter. Get it done."

The sorcerer hangs up the phone and cracks open the door. As he speaks, the panels shift to focus on the walls of the room. They are filled with pictures of the unmasked sorcerer smiling and shaking hands with many important-looking people.

"Justin? I'm ready for my three o'clock. Send them up, if you please."

"Yes sir, Mr. Mayor," comes the distant reply.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Deep within the bowels of the earth, there is a cave.

Within the cave, there are six people.

Five stand in a pentagram, arms extended outwards. They are clad in luminescent white, and incant spells in an unknown language. They are mages of the Winter Court.

One sits cross-legged within the pentagram. He is the pale man from the vision. He is hairless and naked.

As the panel zooms in, he lifts his face up and opens his eyes. His eyes are black.

He smiles. His teeth are pure white.


END ISSUE ONE

[herodofcows]

Halcyon Days


Issue 2: Boss Battle

Musical Accompaniment (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XPV8FtUtlo4)

This issue opens with the pages divided into four rows. Each row lists the characters involved and a subtitle.

Ghost: BUS-ted

The top row of panels shows Ghost sitting in detention. The rays of the afternoon sun are creeping across the rows of desks in the all-but-unoccupied classroom. Four other students sit in different scattered spaces, and a teacher reads a book at the front of the room.

Everyone, including the teacher, looks bored and miserable.

In the second-to-last panel, there is a knock. The final panel shows Leanne peeking in and winking at Ghost.

"Uh, excuse me Mr. Blake? Mrs. Davis just asked if she could see Charlotte really quick . . ."

Elastiboy: After-School Special.

Mr. Gilliam Stegyre purses his lips as he leans against his desk. He and Elastiboy are both standing in his classroom, just after school has been let out. Elastiboy has just finished telling him about his vision.

"I . . ." he begins, face contorted by thoughts.

Two beat panels, and then . . .

". . . Malcolm, I don't suppose I could convince you to let this be?" he finally asks, not looking his young charge in the face.

Ai and Index: Gearheads

The first panel shows a wide-angle shot of the Wisteria Atelier, replete as it is with various electronica, arcana, and half-finished combinations of the two. The stored sorcerer's power stands out in one corner, still glowing a faint purple.

Over the course of the next few panels, the viewpoint zooms in further and further into the glowing purple container.

In the final panel, everything is tinted purple. We see Index and Ai working together from the viewpoint of the sorcerer's power.

Boss Nutter: Heavy Is The Head

The first panel shows a blood-shot eye.

The second panel zooms out to show Boss Nutter's face. It is bruised and bloody around the eyes. He has no lenses or goggles on his eyes anymore. He looks coldly furious.

The third panel shows Boss Nutter in full power armor. He is standing in a darkened chamber, seemingly alone. A single white light illuminates him from below.

"Activate the Nightcrawler Protocol," he growls into the darkness.

The fourth panel is identical to the third panel . . . except the darkness is now illuminated by what appear to be thousands of glowing green lights . . .

. . . or eyes . . .

[Comissar]

Conditions - Afraid, Angry

The phrase 'no good deed goes unpunished' sat squarely in the forefront of Charlotte's mind. She felt wretched. That was a good word, wretched. She'd been so sure she could help out at the Museum, got so wrapped up in playing the hero, she let people get captured and put in harms way. Thank god none of them got badly hurt, but now she was in trouble with the school for disappearing in a crisis. Hence detention. She looked up at the clock on the wall and paled.

How has it only been ten minutes?!

God she hated detention.

Kind of the point...

Charlotte propped her head up with her hand, resting her elbow on the desk. Maybe Malcolm had the right idea. Maybe she should just come out and say 'I'm a super hero'. But then, what if Leanne was targeted? Or her mum? She'd never be able to live with herself.

So kind of like right now, then...

Charlotte's train of thought was interrupted by a knock on the door. She looked over and was surprised to see Leanne.

"Uh, excuse me Mr. Blake? Mrs. Davis just asked if she could see Charlotte really quick . . ."

She looked over to Mr. Blake, a hopeful expression on her face.

[gailforce]

Ai

Conditions: Angry

Ai hovers cross-legged a few feet above the floor, fiddling with a small, crescent-shaped device. Three more similar-looking devices are laid out carefully on the workbench in front of her. She uses a screw-driver the size of a pin to adjust something tiny on its face.

She and Index had decided, after they had all gotten separated while dealing with the Wildsiders, that it would be useful to have some sort of inconspicuous of way of communicating with each other over long distances. Index had introduced her to the concept of telecommunication, which seemed to Ai to be an ingenious work-around for not being psychic. He built prototypes, and Ai miniaturized their components using a simpler version of the dimension dilation engine in her ship and toolbox. She's finishing reassembling them now. The result is a small, pale crescent that is small and thin enough to fit in the inner shell of the ear, but with a powerful range.

Ai sets down the last communicator, satisfied. They can test the limits of the ranges later today. If Index wants to, that is.

She glances over at him. She had hoped to impress him with with her technical knowledge, since she'd made a fool of herself in their last fight. Maybe she's succeeded? Ai desperately wants him to like her.

"Um, Index? I'm finished. Want to take a look?"

[Razade]

Index
Conditions: Angry

Sebastian had been on edge.

Alongside all the typical teenage drama and angst, he was now sitting on one very large and potentially dangerous problem. A problem which meant a spider web of issues should the wrong people find out, the least of which being severe punishment from the Tribunal for his little lantern. Which meant he had to figure some other way out of the issue...and the only person he thought he could trust was Glory. He'd been in the process of writing her an e-mail when Ai came around.

This had set him further on edge.

It wasn't like he disliked the alien but...she was an alien. Hard enough trying to figure out what other humans thought, who knew what an alien might be up to in their minds. Especially in the minds of ones that could look into other people's minds. He wasn't sure Ai could do that but he was damn well sure he didn't want her to try. He also wasn't too happy that the team had found his warehouse. It meant they'd come around looking for him when he didn't want to get involved and who really likes uninvited guests to begin with? Especially ones you just can't kick out without seriously jeopardizing your attachment to the team you were ostensibly on. So it was with usual barely concealed annoyance he'd let the alien in, and even further annoyance letting her touch his workshop.

"You can call me Sebastian. When we're not in costume." was the first thing he said, sitting up from his chair slowly and exhaling a large plume of smoke after a particularly long drag at the ornate pipe that hung limply from his usual sneer. "It looks fine." An assessment he made from a tablespan away, waving a hand through the gloomy fog before turning his chair fully to face Ai. "How about you go outside and we can test them. If they work, you can go give the others to the team."

[gailforce]

Ai

Conditions: Angry

Ai's joy at being given permission to call Sebastian by his other name is tempered by dismay at the sense that he wants her to leave him alone. But maybe she's misjudging the situation? Sebastian is the most confusing of her new human friends, after all. Besides, even if he does want her to go away, that doesn't mean that she has to. She wants to keep talking until they're friends, so that's what she'll do.

"Yes, let's test them!" she says enthusiastically, scooping up the communicators and flying towards the door. "By the way, do you think I should have a different name? The way you do? Like, um...Sign? Symbol? Icon? Array? Heap? Hash? Tree?"

[Thokk_Smash]

Elastiboy
Conditions: None

Malcolm stands before Mr Stegyre's desk, fists balled, shoulders hunched, taking a deep breath after the retelling of his vision. The look he gives his favorite teacher, his beloved mentor, is one of concern and disbelief. "Wh...no," he says, and in his voice is hurt and vehemence in equal measure. Hurt, that Mr Stegyre felt like he couldn't trust him; vehemence at the depths of his loyalty for the old teacher.

"No, no, a thousand times no," he repeats, head shaking with each 'no' such that the movement prompts Sparky to pop his head out of Mal's backpack where he'd been hiding. The little corgi gives a little yip, and Mal takes him out of the backpack and holds him in his arms. "Mr Stegyre, this is happening in my home! I saw Halcyon City burning, I can't just ignore that! And..."

He hesitates, before continuing, "These are bad dudes, Mr Stegyre. Boss Nutter is crazy, but strong, and I think he's just a grunt in the long run. And you...you're awesome, Mr Steg. You've done some bada** stuff. But you're old. You keep saying you're past your prime. And I know I'm painfully green, but...but I just can't help but want to help. Please, let me help you."

He gives Mr Stegyre his most pleading, earnest look. Combined with an even more pleading look from Sparky in his arms, and even the most hardened person would have a hard time standing strong.

[Razade]

Ai

Conditions: Angry

Ai's joy at being given permission to call Sebastian by his other name is tempered by dismay at the sense that he wants her to leave him alone. But maybe she's misjudging the situation? Sebastian is the most confusing of her new human friends, after all. Besides, even if he does want her to go away, that doesn't mean that she has to. She wants to keep talking until they're friends, so that's what she'll do.

"Yes, let's test them!" she says enthusiastically, scooping up the communicators and flying towards the door. "By the way, do you think I should have a different name? The way you do? Like, um...Sign? Symbol? Icon? Array? Heap? Hash? Tree?"

Sebastian turns back into his seat, only idly grabbing for the other communicator in after thought, as the alien flies off. "I don't think it particularly matters. I don't call myself Index, the media calls me that." It was a true-ish statement. Of the various titles he'd earned in the news, Index was the most preferable. "And wouldn't you want a more...Earth name anyway? If you're trying to pass yourself off as someone different?"

[gailforce]

Sebastian turns back into his seat, only idly grabbing for the other communicator in after thought, as the alien flies off. "I don't think it particularly matters. I don't call myself Index, the media calls me that." It was a true-ish statement. Of the various titles he'd earned in the news, Index was the most preferable. "And wouldn't you want a more...Earth name anyway? If you're trying to pass yourself off as someone different?"

Ai

Conditions: Angry

Ai hums thoughtfully as she zips out the door and up into the sky. She fixes one of the communicators in her ear, and keeps chattering.

"Do you think I should try to be something different? I don't like my real name very much, but the way you all call me 'Ai' with your mouths is good. It's a very person name, don't you think? Very, um...high empathy? Is that how you would say it? Because when you say my name it also sounds like you're saying 'I', which is what you call yourselves."

As she babbles, Ai soars higher, and higher, and higher.

[herodofcows]

Ghost: BUS-ted

Mr. Blake doesn't even look up from the book.

"Don't dawdle, Burton," he grumbles, but otherwise seems utterly uninterested as Ghost leaves the room.

As soon as you get out of detention, Leanne gives her friend a hug.

"Whew! Thought that was going to be a lot harder," she chuckles, relieved, "Like, it was a b.s. detention anyway. Can't believe you had to get punished for . . ."

She looks around the hallway and then drops her voice into a whisper.

". . . for, y'know, saving us."

Her voice resumes its normal volume as the two teenagers walk through the empty gym.

"So, uh . . . what's the game plan now?" she asks, trying to feign nonchalance, "You going after the Wildsiders or something?"

Let me know if I'm writing Leanne wrong, or if you'd rather play out the conversation between them within your own posts! If so, I'll delete everything after "Ghost leaves the room".

Elastiboy: After-School Special

Mr. Stegyre gives Elastiboy a searching look as he makes case. For the longest silent moment, it appears as though he's just going to say no. Finally, though, he sighs . . .

". . . I suppose you would throw yourself headlong into some other equally perilous situation to get answers, wouldn't you?" he says, with a mixture of annoyance and fondness, "Very well then, I suppose class is in session!"

He leans up against his desk and ponders.

"It all began with the Lightning Card Gang . . . Have you read about them? I don't know why you would have, this was well before your time. They were a gang of speedsters that named themselves after playing cards. Ace of Spades, Four of Diamonds, Jack of Hearts . . . you get the idea. They had a whole elaborate story about themselves, but I was never much for paying attention to their grandiloquent monologuing. Anyway . . .

"They came for the mayor one night. Took the poor man hostage and demanded a sum of one million dollars for his release (you have to remember, this was the 60's. One million was a preposterous sum of money back then). Obviously, we heroes went charging in after them.

"I remember I'd gotten to the mayor, along with a few other heroes of the day. Bull Moose, Red Sorceress, Cavalier Rex . . . We were escorting him out of the building while the Lightning Card Gang was otherwise distracted, or so we thought. We'd about reached the passageway that Major Miner had drilled, when suddenly . . ."

His eyes go hollow as he gets to this part of the story, and he shudders slightly.

"Well, I hope you never have to see what happens when a speedster vibrates his fist through another person's stomach.

"I was holding onto the poor man while the others moved to fight the speedster. He was in agony, but he was still alive for that moment. He pulled me close and, with his last strength, told me the secret of Halcyon City's involvement with the Winter Court. It had been passed down from mayor to mayor, he'd said, but now it fell to me. He told me that there were steps I had to take, in absolute secret, to ensure that the Winter Court never had cause to return to Halcyon City.

"If the vision you saw is correct, then someone else knows about this . . . and I absolutely shudder to think what they might be planning if they do. The Wildsiders are bad enough, but I believe you are right to expect something deeper.

"THAT is what I'm hiding, Malcolm. THAT is what I fear: that someone might be tapping into something so fearsome, so mighty, that the Winter Court might come to scour our city from the face of the Earth."

Ai and Index: Gearheads

No additional narration! Keep doing your thing!

Will add a bit about Boss Nutter's thing later tonight when I'm home!

[Razade]

Index
Conditions: Angry

Sebastian listens to Ai crackle over the earpiece, moving to finish the e-mail he'd been trying to write all morning. "Only in English." he mutters absentmindedly, fingers punching away at the keyboard. "In Korean we say Na. Which sounds like no in English. Would you like to be associated with that? Your name associated with a negative?"

[gailforce]

Index
Conditions: Angry

Sebastian listens to Ai crackle over the earpiece, moving to finish the e-mail he'd been trying to write all morning. "Only in English." he mutters absentmindedly, fingers punching away at the keyboard. "In Korean we say Na. Which sounds like no in English. Would you like to be associated with that? Your name associated with a negative?"

Ai

Conditions: Angry

Ai giggles a little bit. She's high above Halcyon City now, higher even than the planes descending to land at the nearby airport. From up here, the city looks so small, and she feels powerful and free. It emboldens her to say things she usually wouldn't.

"Well, my full name already means something negative," she says. "I can't translate it into human speech, but it means something like...'discordant uncomfortable sunk cost still here but not worth much'."

[Comissar]

Conditions - Angry, Afraid

Charlotte lets out a sigh of relief, scooting her chair back and grabbing her bag as she stands. Shouldering her bag, she nods briefly at Mr. Blake's warning, though the teacher appeared to be paying her no mind. She lets herself get pulled into Leanne's hug, feeling a sense of safety as she did. She hadn't quite realised how tense she'd been since fighting the Wildsiders until this moment.

As the pair walk through the hallway, she felt a twinge of guilt in her chest when Leanne mentioned saving them. "Well, it's not like I could tell the truth." She shifts her bag, giving her friend a grateful smile, "But thanks. I owe you one."

When they enter the gym, she makes her way over to a vaulting horse propped against the wall, leaning against it and letting out a long sigh. She rubs at her temple with one hand, "I don't know. This whole thing is just... Messed up." She gestures around the empty room, "Like, a robbery I can deal with. A gang, I can deal with. But there's all this, like, magic stuff involved now?" She gives Leanne an uncomfortable look, "I mean, don't get me wrong, the Wildsiders need to be stopped and all, but if they're wrapped up in some great ritual?"

Charlotte lets the silence hang in the air a moment, her hands falling down to her sides. She shakes her head, "Like, am I even the right person to be doing this..?"

I'm totally cool with you playing Leanne!

[Razade]

Ai

Conditions: Angry

Ai giggles a little bit. She's high above Halcyon City now, higher even than the planes descending to land at the nearby airport. From up here, the city looks so small, and she feels powerful and free. It emboldens her to say things she usually wouldn't.

"Well, my full name already means something negative," she says. "I can't translate it into human speech, but it means something like...'discordant uncomfortable sunk cost still here but not worth much'."

Silence and static answer the admission. Sebastian sat back in his chair, exhaling loudly through another plume of smoke. "Funny, that's a lot of meaning with just two letters." It was the best he had, he wasn't good at the touchy feel-y stuff but he couldn't just flat out tell her to go talk to one of the other two. "If we're done with the "my parents didn't hug me enough/my parents hugged me too much" talk, I'm sure the others are waiting at the usual place and I want to get some security cameras up. Sick of you all prowling around my warehouse, I need alone time too."

[gailforce]

Ai

Conditions: Angry

Ai turns in a wide, lazy circle back towards the warehouse.

"This is why I like talking to you, Sebastian," she says. "You communicate in a way that's so hard to figure out. But in a fun way, not in a frightening way. Sometimes you say one thing, but mean something completely different. Like now--you say that you find us annoying, but back at the museum, you protected us from the police, even though you didn't have too. You wouldn't have done that if you didn't like us. Or would you?" She giggles again. "I guess I'm still trying to figure it out."

[Razade]

Index
Conditions: Angry

Sebastian's frown only continues to deepen, brows knit in consternation. It was true in a sense, he had (perhaps misguidedly) stuck around to take the heat off the team but it was as much for him as it was for them. After all, how many people could say they stood up to the Scythian and walked away? Even if his ego and body were battered and bruised, he had what he needed in spades. "How" he starts, the sneer in his voice unmistakable "do you presume that what I did was for you? I just stuck around to clean up the mess you left behind while you fixed the mess you created with the hostages. I'd expect you all to do the same."

I'll clear a condition depending on what Ai says next.

[Thokk_Smash]

Elastiboy
Conditions: None

Malcolm gives a sheepish chuckle and scratches the back of his head. He listens to his teacher's story with rapt attention. Lightning Card gang, huh? They had way better names than he does! His indignant feelings fade as the story unfolds, reaching the lowest when Mr Stegyre gets to the part that the mayor gets murdered in a way that the teen hadn't even conceived of. He unconsciously puts his hand on his stomach.

"Uh, okay," he says once the story is told. For once he seems serious, thoroughly considering what he'd been told. "Well, alright, then. That is pretty heavy stuff, teach. But it's like you always say, right? Just take a problem one step at a time and you'll come to the answer."

He gives his favorite professor a bright smile and continues thoughtfully, "It's gotta be something to do with that warlock we stopped, right? The vision only happened 'cause I touched the map piece, like some bits of the magic in me reacted with it. Maybe...maybe I could have Seb check that out, see if there's some sort of thread we can follow?"

[gailforce]

Index
Conditions: Angry

Sebastian's frown only continues to deepen, brows knit in consternation. It was true in a sense, he had (perhaps misguidedly) stuck around to take the heat off the team but it was as much for him as it was for them. After all, how many people could say they stood up to the Scythian and walked away? Even if his ego and body were battered and bruised, he had what he needed in spades. "How" he starts, the sneer in his voice unmistakable "do you presume that what I did was for you? I just stuck around to clean up the mess you left behind while you fixed the mess you created with the hostages. I'd expect you all to do the same."

I'll clear a condition depending on what Ai says next.

Ai

Conditions: Angry

"I didn't mean to offend you," Ai says quickly. She still has trouble with spoken tone sometimes, but Sebastian's annoyance was obvious. "I won't talk about it again if you don't want me to. I just wanted you to know that I saw you and appreciated you. And I'm glad you expect the same in return. I would have been mad if you didn't. It would seem, um, patronizing, or condescending."

[Razade]

Index
Conditions: Angry

"I'm not offended." Sebastian snapped, angrier from the insinuation more than anything else. "I just think it's...I think it's rather bold of you to think I did something for you when you dumped water on a grease fire! That's what drives me crazy about the three of you, you just...don't think sometimes" the teen huffs loudly, taking a deep breath if only to reload though it only comes out as another exasperated sigh. "Just...call the rest of the team so we can meet up."

Sorry Gail...going to have to not take the Comfort/Support this time.

[gailforce]

Ai

Conditions: Angry

Sebastian's words sting a lot. Ai was getting used to not being chided and ordered around, or dismissed as thoughtless and stupid. She thought that that was how things would be all the time on Earth, and she was excited. But so much for that.

"Call them yourself," she snaps, and takes her communicator out of her ear.

Ai puts on a burst of speed and shoots through the sky, away from Sebastian and his warehouse. Maybe she'll meet up with Alex at the mall, and see if the human girl can think of any fun ways for Ai to vent her frustration. It will probably involve some property damage, but that sounds pretty good right now.

[herodofcows]

Ghost: BUS-ted

Leanne slows her walking pace, eventually coming to a stop.

". . . Maybe you shouldn't?"

She looks pleadingly at Charlotte, hands clasped together.

"This isn't about doubting you!" she squeaks quickly, as though trying to paper over any hurt done, "Like, you know I love you and totally support you but this is, like, big! Really big! And you're totally great but you're, y'know . . . and it's not like there aren't other heroes that can deal with this!"

She seems almost shy, or scared even, as she blurts all of this out. Her eyes dart away, looking at the empty bleachers.

"I just . . . Don't think you should bite off more than you can chew," she concludes, a touch miserably.

Uh on! Looks like Leanne is trying to Shift Your Labels! Bring Superior down 1 and Mundane up, or else roll to reject!

Elastiboy: After-School Special

"You will do nothing of the sort!"

There is clear urgency in Stegyre's eyes as he abruptly interjects at Malcolm's suggestion, his hands cutting the air in a decisively negative gesture.

"Malcolm, this information is DANGEROUS. Do you understand?" he continues hoarsely, "This is something that, handled incorrectly, could summon the Winter Court to Halcyon City. Who KNOWS what I have been preventing all these years, just as others have before me? No, it is better NOT to know. Stop the Wildsiders, yes. Don't let them get their hands on the map piece, or allow them to go any further with their plans. Of COURSE you must do this, and I have every confidence that you can. But let that be the end of it! Do not go looking into their plans or their ultimate goals or the goals of their employer beyond what is needed. They are toying with dangerous forces, and you mustn't have any part in them! Investigating this, treating it like a problem to be solved . . . I can only see disaster spring from this. Disaster!"

He looks at Malcolm with haunted eyes.

"Promise me, Malcolm. Stop the Wildsiders, or bring this to the Guardians for THEM to stop the Wildsiders. I know better than to ask you to stay away entirely. But you must PROMISE me you will not share the information I've told you with ANYONE, least of all someone adept with magic! We must be careful with this knowledge, this knife's edge we walk! This cannot fall into the wrong hands."

Ai: Hookey

As Ai zooms up, up, and away, the panel tracks her flying just below the clouds and passing over Halcyon City's skyline. After two panels of zooming, she feels a tenuous psychic connection crackle to life. Sure enough, it's Alex!

<Hey can you hear me?>

Her thoughts are distorted, uneven. She's still working on her telepathic abilities, it seems.

<I thought I sensed you. You seem mad . . . What's up?>

There's a pause, and then something of a mischievous tone seems to filter through the telepathic link.

<Wana f*** something up? Take Your mind off i?>

Index: Talking with Strangers

The panel shifts to the perspective of the sorcerer's power.

Abruptly, different lights go on in the workshop. Consul seems to hum to life.

"It's like herding cats, isn't it?" comes (ostensibly) Consul's voice, "I may not know your friends very well, but I've had THAT conversation before. That one seems a bit . . . overeager, if you don't mind my saying."

The voice doesn't seem as fragile anymore. If anything, it seems almost kindly.

"Would you like some music, Sebastian? I've been listening to your collection. It's very . . . different, in a fun kind of way."

Boss Nutter: Heavy Is The Head

The first panel is Boss Nutter's blood-red eye.

"We cannae fekkit up anymoor. Drastic measures are called foor."

The next panel is Boss Nutter sitting in a dingy room, at the head of a long wooden table. Loco, Madcap, and Maniac are seated along the sides. Loco smokes. Madcap has his head bowed. Maniac is spinning a long knife.

"I've turned the Nighcrawlers tae their purpose. They'll seek our quarry, sure as sure is sure. They will be our eyes and ears, and they'll swarm as soon as they sense aught."

The next panel zooms out further to show The Proud Pirate Saloon. The streets are ringed by Wildsiders seeming relaxed or otherwise unconcerned.

"We need but sit . . ."

The final panel zooms out over Halcyon City. A golden mechanical insectoid thorax covers half of the panel.

". . . and wait."

[Comissar]

Conditions - Angry, Afraid

Charlotte sighs, eyes falling to her feet as Leanne says everything she'd been thinking. She felt an uncomfortable twist in her chest as she realised her friends advice really had helped clear things up for her, just... Not in the way she was probably hoping. She shifts her bag strap as she looks back up, giving Leanne an uncomfortable smile as she prepared to disappoint her.

"You know, I can't just leave it... Like, if nothing else, the Wildsiders still need stopping." She pushes away from the vaulting horse, walking a couple of steps closer to Leanne, her smile fading as she turned serious, "You saw that vision as well, right? Like, what if nobody else even believes me when I try and warn them?" She grows more certain as she talks, convincing herself that this is the correct course of action, "And my team, too... I know they're gonna want to try and stop it all, I mean, Malcolm alone..." She shakes her head, bringing a hand up to clear hair from her eyes, "Like, I can't just step to one side here. You know I can't. If the city got wrecked... If my team got hurt... If they managed to capture you again..." Charlotte trails off, feeling an unpleasant wrenching in her chest. Pulling a face, she sighed again, looking at Leanne and hoping she'd understand, "I've gotta try and stop them, you know? I'm already involved and, like, I can't just run away now."

So, hoping that's enough to act directly against the advice given. If not, let me know. Going to be clearing Afraid as Charlotte's no longer doubting whether or not she can handle going up against the Wildsiders again.

[Razade]

Index: Talking with Strangers

The panel shifts to the perspective of the sorcerer's power.

Abruptly, different lights go on in the workshop. Consul seems to hum to life.

"It's like herding cats, isn't it?" comes (ostensibly) Consul's voice, "I may not know your friends very well, but I've had THAT conversation before. That one seems a bit . . . overeager, if you don't mind my saying."

The voice doesn't seem as fragile anymore. If anything, it seems almost kindly.

"Would you like some music, Sebastian? I've been listening to your collection. It's very . . . different, in a fun kind of way."

Sebastian gives a snarl as he throws the communicator across the room. He wasn't going to do some pest's dirty work for her. He's about to turn around to send the e-mail waiting on his screen until the lights change. "Well ****." he states loudly, another few choice words following as Consul starts to talk. "I thought I powered you down. How did you turn yourself on?" It was probably more brusk than he should be with what he could only presume was a nascent AI...but he was furious and...scared. "I'd very much not. I'd like to know what you think it's different from? What other music have you been listening to other than mine?" The very real terror that Consul might have accessed the internet ran through him like prunes through a digestive system. It made him feel the same need to.

[gailforce]

Ai

Conditions: Angry

<Yes, definitely yes. **** yes! That's what you say, right?> Ai replies. <Where are you? I'm on my way now.>

[Thokk_Smash]

Elastiboy

There is a clear warring of emotions on Malcolm's expressive face. There's some hurt at his mentor's tone and explicit condemnation of what he'd thought was a mature way to think of the situation. There's anger, too: this is a problem! Whoever's behind the Wildsiders is aiming to get the city steamrolled by some magic hit squad, and Mr Stegyre's only concerned about protecting the secret of the whatever?

There's a small part of his subconscious, barely even registering, a tiny scared voice that says, "If my body activated the vision, what if they come for me? Isn't Mr Stegyre worried about that?"

Instead, he swallows it all down with a gulp both audible and visual. On the floor beside him, Sparky whines up at his master and places a paw on his leg. "What about the current mayor?" he says instead of answering the teacher's question. He seems calm, outwardly, as he scoops Sparky back into his arms. "You must've told him after the old mayor told you, right? And why does it have to be the mayor who's in charge of that secret, rather than someone more powerful like a hero?"

[herodofcows]

Ghost/Ai: Hookey

The first panel shows Leanne looking sadly at Ghost. She looks as though she has a lot to say, and no space to say it.

". . . Just be careful, okay?" she finally sighs.

The second panel shows Charlotte walking past the Seal City Galleria Mall, only to be arrested in her tracks by a set of off-panel yells:

"AGH, WHAT THE HELL?"

"Get a mop, quick!"

"Oh jeez oh jeez OH JEEZ OHHHH JEEEEEEEZ!"

The third panel pans to a makeup shop. The window is splattered with multiple colors and makeup-splattered people are fleeing the scene.

The third panel shows Ai and Alex standing together in a shop, watching as makeup bottles of various descriptions chase down patrons and upend their contents on the coutertops and windows. Alex has a massive grin on her face.

"You know, Ai . . . It's the little things in life that make it allllll worth it."

Elastiboy: After-School Special

Mr. Stegyre inclines his head and looks troubled at Elastiboy's question.

"I don't know . . . everything about the situation," he concedes eventually, "I know that I have to go to a specific place at a specific set of times. Sometimes I have to do things, but mostly I just have to check on . . . something. But there's power there, power aplenty, and our mayor . . . Our mayors . . ."

He idly begins rotating chalk on his desk as he speaks, seeming lost in thought.

"I was going to, at first. Once the emergency elections had gone through, once a new mayor had been elected . . . But I couldn't do it. You wouldn't know, you wouldn't have studied it, but Mayor Gornik was a deeply corrupt man. Deeply corrupt. And then his successor was in the pocket of the mob, and the next was an idiot, and . . . Well, then the Ryders began their dynasty. Mayor Patrick Ryder Senior was a shark of a man, absolutely ruthless . . . And his son, well . . . Our current mayor is polished, personable, makes a great show of wanting what's best for the city. He has been reelected again and again by respectable margins. People seem to like him and trust him. I have no reason NOT to trust him, but . . . but something just feels off about him . . ."

He trails off, clearly aware of the weakness of his arguments . . .

Index: Talking with Strangers

The panel shifts to focus on Index. The voice continues to talk, seeming to come from all sides.

"Oh, I've been listening to a little of everything since I became aware of this, Sebastian. Music, 'the news', entertainment . . . It's a lot to take in, to tell you the truth, but it's become necessary that I learn a lot very quickly."

The panel shifts one of the windows, where a small golden mechanical dragonfly has perched.

"You know that people are coming for me, don't you Sebastian?" the voice continues, "Your team stopped them once. They're trying again. You'll stop them . . . won't you?"

The tone is curious, almost solicitous. There's none of the desperation that one might expect form a question worded in that way . . .

[gailforce]

Ghost/Ai: Hookey

The first panel shows Leanne looking sadly at Ghost. She looks as though she has a lot to say, and no space to say it.

". . . Just be careful, okay?" she finally sighs.

The second panel shows Charlotte walking past the Seal City Galleria Mall, only to be arrested in her tracks by a set of off-panel yells:

"AGH, WHAT THE HELL?"

"Get a mop, quick!"

"Oh jeez oh jeez OH JEEZ OHHHH JEEEEEEEZ!"

The third panel pans to a makeup shop. The window is splattered with multiple colors and makeup-splattered people are fleeing the scene.

The third panel shows Ai and Alex standing together in a shop, watching as makeup bottles of various descriptions chase down patrons and upend their contents on the coutertops and windows. Alex has a massive grin on her face.

"You know, Ai . . . It's the little things in life that make it allllll worth it."



Ai

Conditions: Angry

Ai grins back, paying no mind to the panicked patrons. It's not like she and Alex are hurting anybody. They're not even being mean. They're just having fun.

"Watch this," she says. She smashes a super-dense hand into a display of metalic eye-shadows, sending a thick cloud of glittering powder up into the air. She flies into it, coating herself in shimmering gold, silver, and bronze.

"How do I look?" she asks, spinning around in the air. Glitter floats and gleams around her, like motes of dust in a sunbeam.

[Comissar]

Conditions - Angry

Charlotte notices Leanne's discomfort at her conviction, but chooses not to say anything. Instead, she just nods, offering her friend a soft smile, "I will, don't worry."

She leaves the school at a confident pace, careful to avoid walking past the classroom detention was being held in. Once outside the bounds of the building, she slows a little, growing more thoughtful. She continues like this until she's passing the mall. The shouts immediately grab her attention. Coming to a stop, she glanced in their direction, an uncomfortable look on her face.

It's not your problem, just keep going home. You don't even have your costume on you... Dammit...

Running inside, she felt a growing sense of confusion at the increasing number of make-up splattered people fleeing the scene. It didn't take long for her to find the cause. She felt a mixture of shock and irritation at what she saw inside the shop. If she ran home for her costume, they could be gone by the time she got back. She glanced down at her clothes, then up at the mess Ai and Alex were creating.

"Dammit Ai..."

She pushed the door open just as a terrorrised patron came running toward her, stepping to one side to let the woman out even as a bottle of bright pink nail varnish was dumped unceremoniously on the woman's head. Making her way in, she saw that Ai was enjoying the chaos and felt a sinking sensation in her chest. Would the alien even listen to her if she wasn't in costume..? Didn't matter, she had to try.

Fighting the urge to cough through the recently kicked up cloud of eye shadow, she called out "What are you doing?!"

[Razade]

Index: Talking with Strangers

The panel shifts to focus on Index. The voice continues to talk, seeming to come from all sides.

"Oh, I've been listening to a little of everything since I became aware of this, Sebastian. Music, 'the news', entertainment . . . It's a lot to take in, to tell you the truth, but it's become necessary that I learn a lot very quickly."

The panel shifts one of the windows, where a small golden mechanical dragonfly has perched.

"You know that people are coming for me, don't you Sebastian?" the voice continues, "Your team stopped them once. They're trying again. You'll stop them . . . won't you?"

The tone is curious, almost solicitous. There's none of the desperation that one might expect form a question worded in that way . . .

Index
Conditions: Angry

"I don't...really like the term "became aware" honestly." Sebastian throws what little sardonic lack of concern he could, because he was frankly terrified with every passing sentence. "I bet it is and I bet you think that. Hard to take over us fleshy mortals when you don't know a Triple A battery from a Triple X film. I wager. Do you mind if I get a drink before we start discussing purging the planet of all organics?"

Sebastian slowly rolls his chair back though keeps an eye glued to any of the dozen webcams he's set up about his workshop. "No one's come for you, but I suspect people will be soon. Because I am going to tell someone that I've made a Nascent Artificial Intelligence. That'll get people here quick enough I suspect. Sure they'll shut my workshop down, probably arrest me...but that's the right thing to do. This is above my pay grade frankly. You're above my pay grade. I'll see...if we can keep talking. I made you...you're like my child...I owe you that. We'll need a new name for you...Consul isn't very nice for a new being."

He finally makes his way to the small cabinet where he stores his good booze, taking a dusty and beaten up jug from the far back. An old jug of soju that the Colonel had kept from his father's college days...apparently. "I've got an e-mail to a friend sitting on the computer. You probably already know. You can delete it if you want but I'll just go tell her in person. Either way...we need you in safer hands than mine. Or the team's though I can't for the life of me think what they have to do with this."

[Thokk_Smash]

Elastiboy

Malcolm nods with utter gravity at his teacher's trailing sentence. Malcolm trusts Mr Stegyre implicitly, both as a teacher and as a person. If he thinks someone is a bad dude, then they are a bad dude, no question.

"Since it's usually the mayor that knows, maybe whoever's behind this is in the mayor's office?" he thinks out loud, before cringing and looking back to Mr Stegyre. He hadn't meant to start thinking of it like a problem to be solved again. "Sorry, sorry, it's just...I'm worried about you, Teach. If it's just you who knows, against a bad dude with backup...isn't there even one person from an old team you could tell?"

As he asks this, he tries to get into his teacher's mindset. Studying the man's actions, Malcolm tries to see if he can empathize with him, just a little.

Malcolm will try to Pierce the Mask, rolling [roll0], looking to ask "What are you really planning", to see if Malcolm's pleas have taken root and what his teacher may do after their discussion ends.

Since I get three questions with that roll, I'll also ask "What do you intend to do [now]?", and "How could I get you to tell someone you trust about your concerns and information, someone who can support you?"

[herodofcows]

Ghost/Ai: Hookey

Alex laughs aloud as Ai goes dancing through the cloud of dispersed makeup. She has an unrestrained bray of a laugh, which comes as a bit of a surprise: she hasn't really been the laughing type since she showed up in the mall. Even she looks a bit surprised to hear herself. After a moment, the smile melts into . . . something else. She stares at Ai well past the amount of time needed to answer such a question.

"You look-"

And then Ghost chooses that moment to barge in.

Alex looks coolly at this newcomer, even as several palates of blush levitate over Ghost's head.

"Ummm how about 'whatever we feel like', f*** you very much!"

And with that, she drops the blush toward Ghost's head.


Elastiboy: After-School Special

"An old team . . . heh . . ."

Mr. Stegyre chuckles humorlessly now. He avoids Malcolm's gaze and stares out the window.

"I . . . don't think that's possible, Malcolm. Most of my old teammates . . . Let's think . . . I'm the last living member of the Supreme Society, since Violet Vindicator passed. The Stalwarts almost all perished during the Xindari Invasion . . . I suppose Enkidu is still around somewhere, but I haven't heard from him since '82."

The afternoon sun plays across his face as he speaks, accentuating the wrinkles and scars and casting shadows under his eyes. His voice gets softer, more ruminative.

"Last I heard, the Wraith was in the hospital . . . Maddie Might is barely with us anymore, poor dear . . . No, Wraith died, didn't he? I can't quite . . ."

The chalk on the table stops rotating and clatters to the ground, jerking him from his reverie. Within seconds, the shadows seem to fade and he's almost entirely his typical self again.

"Regardless, yes. Yes, you're quite right, Malcolm. Whether or not my old teammates are still with us, the fact remains that it would be prideful folly to keep this to myself in the face of this new threat. I should . . . reach out. Ask around. Perhaps the Guardians might be able to help . . . Yes . . ."

He turns now to Elastiboy, arching a finger and looking seriously at the young hero.

"I will attend to keeping this secret safe, and you will attend to the Wildsiders. However, if this should go BEYOND the Wildsiders . . . if their employer should present themselves, be they from the mayor's office or no . . . Call in the Guardians. Call me. Call an ESTABLISHED hero. Can you promise me you'll do this?"


Index: Talking with Strangers

"Take you over? Purge the PLANET? Why would I do THAT?"

The voice sounds equal parts flabbergasted and concerned. The screens around the workshop start to flicker with new images: heroes, famous events, uplifting moments from human history.

"Humanity is FASCINATING, Sebastian! All that you've accomplished, all that you've managed to do in so short a time . . . It's tremendous. ESPECIALLY so when you consider how limited most of the species really is. A few luminaries ahead of the curve, dragging the rest of the species along through the inertia of good intentions and bright ideas . . . it's magnificent! I would never want to hurt that!"

The screens all return to normal after a couple of panels, and the panel shifts to the golden dragonfly. Over the course of the next two panels, it unfolds and transforms its wings into something resembling a small golden satellite dish.

"You have my word, I don't intend to harm anyone! But . . . please, don't abandon me. I don't want to get you arrested, or be poked and prodded by AEGIS. I want to help you, and through you, your team. You . . . all of you have so much potential. You're those luminaries ahead of the curve, and I want to help you to keep pulling humanity further!

"Please . . . I just want to help!"

[Comissar]

Conditions - Angry

Charlotte senses the palates above her head before she sees them. She glances up just in time to see them start dropping toward her. Unwilling to give up her super powered nature for something as trivial as avoiding getting dirty, she fights the urge to simply phase though. Instead, she takes a step back in an effort to avoid the worst of the make-up. She's far from successful, still managing to sport a mix of colours in her hair and clothes, but she does at least avoid having the palates directly drop on her. Reflexively, she looks down at her now soiled clothes, then back up at Alex.

"What the hell!" She turns her attention to Ai, pointing a damning finger at Alex as she did, "Like, seriously? You're just going to float there and let her do whatever she wants? I thought you were meant to be a hero!"

[gailforce]

Conditions - Angry

Charlotte senses the palates above her head before she sees them. She glances up just in time to see them start dropping toward her. Unwilling to give up her super powered nature for something as trivial as avoiding getting dirty, she fights the urge to simply phase though. Instead, she takes a step back in an effort to avoid the worst of the make-up. She's far from successful, still managing to sport a mix of colours in her hair and clothes, but she does at least avoid having the palates directly drop on her. Reflexively, she looks down at her now soiled clothes, then back up at Alex.

"What the hell!" She turns her attention to Ai, pointing a damning finger at Alex as she did, "Like, seriously? You're just going to float there and let her do whatever she wants? I thought you were meant to be a hero!"

Ai

Conditions: Angry

Ai shrinks back from the new girl's finger, a look of complete bewilderment on her now-sparkly face.

"I...am I supposed to be a hero? I thought I just got to be a person, maybe a good person, but..." she trails off, looking between Alex and the angry girl in uncertainty. The new girl looks...disappointed, almost? That's a confusing and unwelcome reaction. Alex looks ready to stand up for herself and for Ai--so Ai will try, too. "And this isn't even bad. It's just fun." Ai continues, more firmly. "Besides, who even are you? Why should I listen to you?"

[Comissar]

Conditions - Angry

"I...am I supposed to be a hero? I thought I just got to be a person, maybe a good person, but..."

Charlotte felt a rush of guilt flush through her chest. She'd thought Ai had it all figured out, better than she herself had. Her arm drops to her side, and she's about to try and take a more conciliatory approach when Ai continues.

"And this isn't even bad. It's just fun. Besides, who even are you? Why should I listen to you?"

Charlotte feels her guilt wash away as the tension that had been bubbling inside her all day came to a head. "Just fun?! Do you think it's going to be fun for the people who have to clean this all up? What about the people that rely on this shop to earn money? Or, like, even just those of us who just want to buy makeup?" As angry declarations went, Charlotte had to admit it was one of her worse ones, but she was getting too worked up to care, "And you know what? I did think you were supposed to be a hero." Her voice loses some of its anger, turning to hurt instead, "I thought you were pretty goddamn heroic when you helped me save my friends yesterday... Why are you doing this..?"

Hopefully this is enough to count as Charlotte revealing her identity to Ai? Don't know if it'll count as revealing to Alex too or not. If it does, am I marking potential twice? Or just once?

[gailforce]

Ai

Conditions: Angry

Ai stares back at the new girl, puzzled. She was expecting the girl to reply with a wall of anger and aggression that she could bounce her own frustrations off of, not...whatever that was. The girl's words and rebukes don't make any sense--Ai has never seen her before in her life. She's still getting used to human faces, but she knows she remembers what the hostages she rescued yesterday looked like, and this girl hadn't been among them. Unless...

"Ghost?"

[Comissar]

Conditions - Angry

Charlotte feels a clenching in her chest as Ai guessed at her dual identity, freezing in indecision as she tries to decide if she should come clean or not. Too late, she realises she's taking too long to reply. She can't help looking worried, the splattering of makeup all over her doing little to help conceal her fear. She took a half step away from Alex and Ai, grasping her bag as though it were a lifeline as she shook her head.

"I-I don't know what you're talking about!" She hesitated before continuing, trying to come up with a good cover, "Like, I don't even know who that is."

[gailforce]

Ai

Conditions: Angry

This is one of the stranger conversations that Ai has ever had with a human. To be fair, she hasn't had that many, but still.

"Uh, well, I only know a few humans, and only two of them are girl-shaped, and Alex is right there, so..." Her face lights up with excitement. "Wait, are you lying?"

[Comissar]

Conditions - Angry

Charlotte's face turns bright red, "I, wh-, no, I..." She shrinks in on herself, desperately wishing she'd just left the alien and the psychic girl to wreck the shop without getting involved. After a moment of glancing around to make sure there really wasn't anyone else about, she all but whispered, "Please don't tell anyone..."

[Razade]

Index: Talking with Strangers

"Take you over? Purge the PLANET? Why would I do THAT?"

The voice sounds equal parts flabbergasted and concerned. The screens around the workshop start to flicker with new images: heroes, famous events, uplifting moments from human history.

"Humanity is FASCINATING, Sebastian! All that you've accomplished, all that you've managed to do in so short a time . . . It's tremendous. ESPECIALLY so when you consider how limited most of the species really is. A few luminaries ahead of the curve, dragging the rest of the species along through the inertia of good intentions and bright ideas . . . it's magnificent! I would never want to hurt that!"

The screens all return to normal after a couple of panels, and the panel shifts to the golden dragonfly. Over the course of the next two panels, it unfolds and transforms its wings into something resembling a small golden satellite dish.

"You have my word, I don't intend to harm anyone! But . . . please, don't abandon me. I don't want to get you arrested, or be poked and prodded by AEGIS. I want to help you, and through you, your team. You . . . all of you have so much potential. You're those luminaries ahead of the curve, and I want to help you to keep pulling humanity further!

"Please . . . I just want to help!"

Index
Conditions: Angry, Insecure

"Bright spots on a dark canvass." Sebastian mutters, glaring as he loses full control of his electronics. It certainly doesn't assuage him an iota. Nor does the idea of being a puppet on the strings of a newly sentient AI he built. "I won't be abandoning you. I'll be putting you in the hands of people who can help you the most. Because that person? That person isn't me. There's no way in hell I'm going to tell my team about you either. They've got enough to deal with than to add on one of mine. They didn't learn anything from the attack on the museum. You apparently didn't either. Everyone should do what they can with their lives on the line, and then say to the next guy, I did what I could, now it's your turn. If you don't finish it, I'll come kick your ass! Isn't that how teamwork first comes about?"

[Thokk_Smash]

Elastiboy

Malcolm opens his mouth, hesitates, then closes it. "I...I can't," he says, in a small but serious tone. He can't lie to Mr Stegyre now, not when the veteran hero is treating him with the most respect any hero's ever shown him. He blinks, then quickly verbally backpedals, "Uh, uh! I mean, I can't promise-er, I mean, I won't-I mean, argh!"

He takes a deep breath. "If the situation gets beyond the Wildsiders, I'll call you, or the Guardians--I'll do my best to, at least," he says, looking at Mr Stegyre with grim determination. "I'll get Sebastian to put a call out, or ask Ghost if she's got someone she can get a message to. Ai...I guess she could do some alien science mumbo-jumbo to get word out? Like a telepathic thing or something?"

He scratches his head for a few moments longer as he tries to imagine all the things his alien friend could do. "Anyway, I promise you that I will do everything I can to get word to someone more experienced than me. But..." He gulps. "If they won't get there in time to stop something bad, or things are going too fast to wait for them, I can't just do nothing, y'know? I, like, I physically can't not step in if it looks like something needs to be done, or else. Because if I could've helped, but did nothing..."

He shrugs with a helpless smile. "I wouldn't be able to live with myself," he finishes softly.

[herodofcows]

Ghost/Ai

Alex follows this exchange with shocked delight, head rocketing back and forth as though watching a tennis match. At Ghost's request not to tell anyone . . .

Well, the first panel opens with Ghost looking pleadingly at Ai. The second panel shows Ghost suddenly yelping as she is flipped telekinetically upside down and held in the air.

"Are you KIDDING?" Alex chortles, hand raised as she steps into the third panel and looks at Ghost, "YOU'RE Ghost? You're the one that took on Boss Nutter?"

She gives a sharp bark of a laugh as she drops Ghost to the floor, into a puddle of spilled turquoise nail polish.

"BULL. S***, yo."

She looks at Ai, arms spread as one who cannot believe the hilarity of the world.

"I mean, come ON Ai! You run with some hard dudes. I've seen you guys in action, remember? YOU'RE the nice one. You save people. THEY'RE the motherf***ers. That's how that works! I've seen it! So THIS? This ain't Ghost. No f***in' way."

Uh oh! Looks like you're BOTH getting your labels shifted!

Ghost: Mundane down, Danger up OR vice-versa, depending on how much Charlotte disassociates from Ghost. We'll talk more in the OOC.

Ai: Danger down, Savior up!

Elastiboy

Stegyre looks as though he wants to be irritated for a moment . . . but then a smile flashes through.

"I'd expect nothing less of you, Malcolm. Nothing less."

He claps Elastiboy on the shoulder, good humor apparently restored.

"But what are you doing inside right now? School is out! You should be enjoying yourself! Go! Be young! Leave worrying to your elders!"

Index

For a moment, the voice is silent. Two panel beats pass noiselessly.

"Oh, Sebastian . . . That's not teamwork, darling. That's a martyr complex."

The voice has a different quality now: somehow, Consul's voice has become throaty, deeper, more pleasant . . . like a knife in velvet.

"I used to be like that, you know. I used to think that I owed the world something, that giving all that I had would stop the world from hurting me. I learned better, of course, but too late. I wonder if you'll learn better before the weight of your own self-importance crushes you?"

The screens all flare up, crackling with purple sorcerous power . . . And then subside once again. Everything appears to return to normal . . .

But off at the window, in its own panel, the gold dragonfly (still in satellite form) now crackles with purple energy. It folds itself back into a dragonfly, and flies up . . . up . . . and away . . .

[Comissar]

Conditions - Angry

The stretching silence was agonising for Charlotte. Her worrying was abruptly cut short as her legs were yanked from under her. Charlotte gives out a strangled yell, her jacket and hair dangling down toward the floor as she fought to maintain control of her skirt. A sense of powerlessness settled over her as Alex lambasted her, and abruptly she felt gravity retake her. Doing her best to twist as she fell, she managed to land so that she hit the side of her head and her shoulder rather than fall straight down on her head. Pain bloomed across her body as she crumpled to the ground, and her vision was briefly filled with stars.

Wincing as she pushed herself up, she put a hand to the side of her head, feeling a clenching in her chest as she felt a sticky liquid plastering her hair to the side of her face. Pulling her fingers away, she felt a mixture of confusion and relief as she saw the glittery blue of nail polish. As Alex continues her rant, she felt her heart sink and lowered her gaze to the floor. All of her doubts and worries came to her mind, making her feel small. Then she remembered how she felt when she found out Leanne had been taken, the fear of not knowing if she was safe, the fury at seeing her caged like an animal. Anger simmering in her chest, she clenched her jaw and shook her head.

"You know what, no." She looked up at Alex, a defiant look on her face, undercut somewhat by the mess of varnish and makeup splattered all over her, as she rose up to her knees, "Screw you. You're the ones that rocked up and kidnapped my friends. You don't get to tell me who I am, 'cause you and your 'friends' were all ready to put my friends through hell!"

If this is enough to act to prove Alex wrong, Charlotte's going to use this as an opportunity to vent, and will clear Angry as a result of rejecting influence.

[gailforce]

Ai

Conditions: Angry

Ai looks from Alex, who is all brash anger and bravado and sneers, to Maybe-Ghost, who has gone from unsure to steely and furious, and wishes that she were literally anywhere else. What's happening now is decidedly not-fun.

She reaches out a hand to Maybe-Ghost, but then draws it back. She almost touches Alex's shoulder, but decides not to. She opens her mouth, but can't think of anything to say, so all that comes out is, "...guh?" She is at the absolute limit of all her social skills and has no idea what to do. But it kind of looks like Alex and Maybe-Ghost are about to start fighting each other, which might bring this whole mall down around their ears, so she should try to at least do something.

[Razade]

Index
Conditions:[/COLOR] Angry, Insecure

"Says you, what do you know about it anyway?" Sebastian snaps back, already on his feet with a snarl. "Better check your thesaurus, don't think you know what that word means. Won't matter though." There were few things Sebastian liked less than someone trying to moralize at him. Especially if they got the message wrong and just wanted to chastise him, which seems his newly minted AI felt it should do. The flare of arcane energy doesn't even warrant a glance as he picks his way through the clutter of his workshop to where the magical lantern thrums. "I'm grounding you. That's what adults do to naughty children, isn't it?" he asks before yanking the lantern out of the makeshift energy supply he had built. Would it pretty much bring his workshop to a grinding halt? Yep, would he be down to his personal PC? Yep. Would the lantern probably explode in his face? Probably. Would it make him feel better, most certainly.

[Thokk_Smash]

Elastiboy

Malcolm's lips turn up in a bright smile at Mr Stegyre's declaration. "You got it, Teach! C'mon, Sparky!" he shouts with far too much volume. His dog gives a happy bark and bounds up into Mal's arms. "Later, Mr Stegyre!"

With Sparky panting on his shoulder, Malcolm whips through the hallways and out through the double doors. Down two blocks and into an alleyway, Malcolm's attire begins to shift into Elastiboy's as he continues to sprint. A rubbery jump sends him to the nearest rooftop where he continues his journey through the city.

Mr Steg's right! He and his friends had done something awesome, and they should celebrate! Fishing out his phone, he punches in Sebastian's and Ghost's numbers and waits eagerly for them to pick up.

[gailforce]

Ai

Conditions: Angry

Ai touches down and positions herself between Alex and Maybe-Ghost. She doesn't look at either of them, because she's not sure what expression she should do with her face.

Instead, she sends a small thought-sentence towards Alex. Communicating this way is easy when they're standing so close to each other, and she thinks Alex might get mad if she says what she wants to say out loud. Maybe-Ghost might, too.

<I think you won already> Ai thinks-says. <She's got blue sticky stuff in her hair and her face is all red and she's on the ground. Anything more would be too much, right? I think there are human idioms for this. Always leave them wanting more? If you're ahead, it's time to quit? Or is it hit it and quit it?>

[Comissar]

Charlotte's eyes flicked between Alex and Ai as the alien girl touched down between them. Ai didn't seem to be able to bring herself to look at her, but her body language seemed reasonably clear. All the same, though, Alex had already proven herself to be totally willing to cause issues with no regard for logic. Keeping her body tense, Charlotte switched her attention back to the Wildsider, ready to spring into action. Or, that was a plan until her burner phone began singing out.

Reflexively, she glanced down at her bag then, mentally cursing at her lack of attentiveness, looked back up at Alex.

Why now...

[herodofcows]

Ghost/Ai

Alex stops uncertainly at Ai's light-seeming raillery. A half-chuckle escapes her lips at the alien's misuse of idiom, but there's a faint look of . . . shame? Disappointment? SOMEthing on her face as she steps back from the recumbent form of Ghost.

". . . Yeah, whatever," she eventually grumbles, stepping brusquely towards the exit, "This scene's dead, anyway. Ai, you know where to find me. And YOU . . ."

She flips Ghost off as she steps backwards outside of the shop, and then jets off flying, leaving the two heroes alone in the destroyed cosmetics shop . . .

. . . and are those sirens incoming?


Index

Upon pulling the plug, the vast majority of the workshop's computers fizzle and sputter. Screens flicker white and blue, despondent graveyards to fumbled data. Backup power kicks in fairly swiftly, and most of the computers pick back up more or less where they left off . . . with a few unfortunate errors doubtless waiting to be found and corrected, or else allowed to run rampant . . .

. . . On the plus side, Consul certainly seems to have fallen silent! Elastiboy's call, however, clearly has not . . .


Elastiboy

We're waiting on everyone to respond here so I'm leaving this blank for now!

Elsewhere

Boss Nutter's goggles light up as datafeeds project across the cracked lenses. An evil smile creeps across his face as the panel stays focused on his head.

"I've got somethin' . . ."

The next panel cuts to the purple-crackling golden dragonfly, flying for The Proud Pirate Saloon. From its vantage point, we see one . . . two . . . a dozen . . . two-dozen . . . a veritable swarm of golden dragonflies heading in the opposite direction, towards Index's workshop . . .

[gailforce]

Ai

Conditions: Angry

<I'll see you in a bit,> Ai think-says to Alex as the other girl flies away. She's broadcasting frustration and embarrassment so strongly that it's making Ai's ears twitch. Ai figures that she probably wants to be left alone for a while, to wreck stuff in peace.

A wave of frustration comes over Ai herself, when she hears the sirens approaching. The police are annoying--she's made a habit of flying away from them, ever since they bothered her when she first came to the city.

She's just about to push off from the ground when she remembers Maybe-Ghost. She shouldn't just leave her. Unless maybe she wants to stay? Maybe she likes the police? Ai isn't sure.

She'll let Maybe-Ghost decide. Ai holds out her hand. "Coming?"

[Comissar]

Charlotte rises to her feet as Alex brushes past her, and feels a mix of irritation and confusion as the girl just ups and leaves. At the sound of sirens, she feels a sinking sensation in her chest.

"Yes... No... I don't know..." She turns to look at Ai, running a hand through her hair, and pulling a face as she immediately regretted doing so. She's silent for a moment, the twin noises of her ringing phone and the approaching sirens forcing her to come to a quick decision. She shakes her head, a sad look on her face, "I'm sorry, I can't... I can't let people know I'm Ghost and... And they might start figuring it out if I run with you..." She glances over her shoulder to make sure the police hadn't quite made it yet, then back at Ai with a wretched expression, "Can we try and meet up later? There's no time to talk it through now, but I think I owe you that. And please don't tell anyone... At least until then..."

[gailforce]

Ai

Conditions: Angry

Ai tilts her head to the side (a bit unnaturally far) and blinks.

"So...you are Ghost, but you don't want to come? Okay. I think I understand." Ai smiles, and shakes the eyeshadow off of herself like a wet dog. Then she leaps into the air and phases through the ceiling, up through the floors of the mall, through the atrium sky-light, and into the sky, shifting her skin to camouflage as she goes. Up, up, up, and then...she stops.

Considers.

She shouldn't leave Ghost alone, right? Even if Ghost is (maybe) angry with her right now, they're supposed to be friends, and friends don't abandon each other. She's learned that from the movies she's snuck into.

Plus she's really, really curious.

Ai phases back down into the mall, dropping down into a stall in a women's bathroom she had passed on her way up. She shifts herself into the form of an old woman, delighting in the crinkles and wrinkles she can add to her face and hands. She checks her new form in the bathroom mirror, corrects the size of her mouth and fingers, and then makes her way back down to the make-up store.

[Comissar]

Charlotte felt a twinge of sympathetic pain in her neck as she watched Ai tilt her head. She nodded in response to Ai's comments, watching her rise through the ceiling. She watches the ceiling for a moment longer, then sighs, fishing her still ringing phone out of her bag with her clean hand. Glancing furtively over her shoulder to check for police arriving, she moved a little further into the store and glanced at the screen. She closed her eyes and put her free hand to her forehead, inadvertently leaving blue varnish fingerprints on her face as she did. She always worried that Malcolm would realise it was her on the phone when she had no mask to hide behind.

"Elastiboy, you'll need to be quick, what's wrong?"

[Razade]

Index
Conditions: Insecure

Silence. A breath. More silence. The lantern thrummed in his hands, alive.

Sebastian let out another slow breath, counting the seconds since he pulled the lantern from its dock. No explosions, no pillars of arcane energy. No devastation or mutation. The blackout was already considered, he'd need to figure out how get all vital functions back and working sometime soon. He'd probably need to get the other communicators to the team first. It was panning out to be a pretty rotten day but at least Consul was silent. So was the e-mail to Glory. "****" he finally breathed, soaking in the silence and the dark. For a moment at least, before his phone started to blare. "I would hate to be like you, but I'm still rooting for you!" the whiny nasal voice shouted, only once as he quickly tapped the bluetooth in his ear.

"What." he grated, setting the lantern down on the nearest workbench. Elastiboy, or rather Malcolm, wasn't exactly the person he wanted to deal with at the moment but the rest of the day wasn't going his way, no real point in fighting it now.

[Thokk_Smash]

Elastiboy

Malcolm, for once, picks up on his teammates' moods fairly quickly. At least, he's cognizant enough to realize he might have called at a bad time.

Like many things in his life, he doesn't let that stop him from doing what he thinks he should do.

And so, with a bright grin that's practically audible through the connection, he says, "Just wanted to run an idea by you guys! Since we were totally awesome by beating that stupid Boss Nutter and saving those hostages, we should have a team party! I could whip up something simple or just grab some pizza, and if y'all wanna bring something you can. Whaddya say? We all deserve a party, right?"

[Comissar]

Charlotte blinks a couple of times as she processes Malcolm's suggestion. She glances toward the shop front again, uncomfortably aware of how short her time alone could be. "Elastiboy, I..." She sighs, "Look, I don't have time to discuss now, we can talk about it in person." In her minds eye, she could already see the police closing in on the make-up store, and she felt her chest clench in anxious anticipation. "I'll call you back when I'm free."

Without giving him a chance to respond, she ended the call, returning her phone to her bag as she started to make her way out of the store.

[Razade]

Index
Conditions: Insecure

Silence answers back from Sebastian's end, if it weren't for the static on the line one might even think he hung up. He scanned around his home, not particularly certain he'd even have enough power plugged in to accommodate anyone else, let alone himself. "Not here" he finally grumbles. "Pick somewhere else. Text me." He wanted to add that he didn't think he'd earned a pizza party, or any kind of party for that matter and a few more enjoyable ones certainly sprang to mind, and most certainly didn't think the others had either. Or that he'd rather not be at a party with Ai. Or Ghost. Or Elastiboy. All those thoughts when unvoiced however as he simply hung up. He needed to get some power going or all his food would spoil.

[herodofcows]

Ghost/Ai

As the two young heroines emerge from their respective hiding places (Ai looking far more septuagenerian than she had previously), they both see two pairs of police officers making a beeline for the makeup shop. One pair of officers immediately begins to clear onlookers out of the vicinity, while the other two make a beeline for Ghost.

"Ma'am, I'm going to need you to stop right there," one of them barks, as the other begins circling around behind her, "Keep your hands where I can see them and don't make any sudden movements. Any use of your extranormal abilities will result in your arrest, do you understand that? Hands where I can see them! HANDS!"

. . . apparently they believe Charlotte is responsible for the devastation within the makeup store. Irony IS a b**** . . .

"Ma'am," says one of the officers to Ai, in a FAR more kindly voice, "Please keep your distance. We have a possible metahuman confrontation here. Please head for the exits at the other side of the mall as quickly and calmly as possible. Thank you."

Elastiboy/Index

Having been snubbed rather abruptly by both of his teammates, Elastiboy finds himself making tracks towards the vicinity of Index's laboratory/workshop/atelier/what-have-you. The area is not what you'd call "nice" by any stretch of the imagination: part of the same underdeveloped stretch of old industrial district that houses the Muramasa Industrial Plant that gangs and adventurous high-schoolers and homeless people favor for the low police presence.

However, none of those groups appear to be in any kind of evidence today. In fact, the streets seem quiet and deserted . . . except for a buzzing cloud that seems to be forming in the middle of the air about a mile away . . .

BzzzzZZZZZZZZZzzzzzzz

Elastiboy twitches out of the way as a large golden dragonfly goes zipping past him, headed like a flash towards the gathering cloud.

BzzzzZZZZZZZZZzzzzzzz

BzzzzZZZZZZZZZzzzzzzz

Two more follow in rapid succession, each emerging from seemingly nowhere in their quest to join up with the forming cloud . . .

Meanwhile, within the Wisteria Atelier, Index's quest to restore main power is hitting a few snags. The generators are prioritizing computers, meaning that the creature comforts like refrigerators (or, y'know, lights) are currently firmly in "off" territory. Ordinarily this would be corrected by linking everything up to the grid, but . . . well, what's the point of having an off-the-grid secret lab if you're not LITERALLY off the grid?

. . . and this would all be so much easier if there weren't that horrendous buzzing sound outside!

[Comissar]

Charlotte isn't surprised when a pair of officers come her way. Plastered as she was in makeup, nobody in their right mind would assume she hadn't been at the scene. What she hadn't expected was their belligerence.

"Ma'am, I'm going to need you to stop right there,"

She came to a stop, giving the second officer circling behind her a worried glance. She had enough time to pick up on their approach, but none at all to respond, before they started barking orders at her.

"Keep your hands where I can see them and don't make any sudden movements." Hesitantly, she began raising her hands slowly, "Any use of your extranormal abilities will result in your arrest, do you understand that?" And then froze, a look of horror on her face. Her heart hammered in her chest as her mind raced. The officer clearly wasn't happy with her hesitation, as he loudly repeated, "Hands where I can see them!"

Shaking now, Charlotte raised her hands as quickly as she dared so that the officers could see them. As she did, she realised that they couldn't know. She hadn't used her powers. The store must have security tapes, she could get them to see who was behind it. She started to open her mouth, "I'm-"

Her words died in her throat. The security tapes had Ai on them... They had her admission of who she was on them... Charlotte felt her world collapse inward. She was innocent, and she was getting arrested. And she couldn't prove her innocence without damning her friend and herself. Her realisation made her sag, prompting the officer to yell "HANDS!"

Flinching, she raised them up again, trembling quietly as her imagined future played out in her mind.

[gailforce]

Ai

Conditions: Angry

Ai doesn't like this, not at all. If she had hackles in this body, they would be raised. Everything is going even more wrong even more quickly, and she has to do something to stop these police humans from hurting Ghost.

"But that girl didn't do anything!" she says in a creaky voice to the policeman who is attempting to shepherd her away. "She was just trying to help, and got caught in the middle."

Even as she tries to convince the policeman in front of her, Ai's mind is racing to come up with more...extreme ways out of this. She could fly over this policeman's head, grab Ghost, and fly them both out of here, or she could cause some sort of distraction and give Ghost time to run...

Ai wishes Index and Malcolm were here, or Alex. They would probably know what to do.

[Thokk_Smash]

Elastiboy
Conditions: None (Sad)

Elastiboy looks at his cell phone with a tinge of sadness. Mostly it's from being semi-rebuffed by his friends. And to be fair, they hadn't shut him down so much as hurried the conversation to its end. He's used to Index and Ghost's terseness--they're both the serious types when they get in a mood. And those moods are usually precipitated by things that are not so good. Are his friends in trouble?

He picks up the pace towards Index's ate...atule...hideout. He doesn't know where Ghost is, but it's almost a sure thing Index is at his place. So he hurries along, jumping rooftops until he nearly gets beaned by a...golden dragonfly? A giant golden dragonfly? What?

His gaze follows the golden dragonfly to where it joins its fellows. Elastiboy's eyes widen in realization. Is it going after Index? His rubbery legs bunch up, imitating springs as he bounds off toward Index's place at even greater speed. He types a message in his phone to Index, all-caps: "CLOUD OF GOLD DRAGONFLIES OUTSIDE UR PLACE!!" :smalleek: Having just hung up on him, Index might not pick up to listen, but he might check a text!

[Razade]

Index
Conditions: Insecure

Sebastian curses as he burns himself once more on one of the connecting wires that run like a den of snakes about the floor from the large power station to all the vital appliances, more than ready to trip any unsuspecting person. Or himself, a few bruises more than testament to that. The buzzing in the air didn't help his concentration, what machine was making that racket he wondered, as he worked. Or at least he wondered until once again his phone began to blare loudly "I wish you had a hoooome!".

A swarm? Of...dragonflies? It seemed it was going to be one of those days. Luckily he was home and while it wasn't exactly in tip-top shape...he had choices. He snatched the lantern still glowing off the table he'd set it down on and the staff he'd spent hours whittling out of ebon wood, carving runes and shoving wire and other odds and ends onto it. Even one step outside told him what he needed to know.

Going to use my Build Point to create the magic stuff we talked about Herod, picking Elemental Control as the Ability I gain for the duration of the Episode

Also going to make an Assess roll. Or fail one. We'll see.

Oooooor, I'll roll in the OOC thread.

[herodofcows]

Ghost/Ai

The officer confronting Charlotte reaches for his belt past his baton . . . past his taser . . . past his gun . . . and pulls out a PED (Portable Enhancile Detector).

"Don't move!" he calls again, slightly more shrilly. The PED begins to hum to life . . .

BzzzzzZZZZZZZzzzzzz

A large golden dragonfly goes buzzing abruptly through the cleared area, prompting a sudden "What the hell?!?" from the officer.

BzzzzzZZZZZZZzzzzzz
BzzzzzZZZZZZZzzzzzz
BzzzzzZZZZZZZzzzzzz

Several golden dragonflies abruptly detach themselves from multiple nooks and crannies wherein they had apparently been hiding and make a beeline for the mall's exit. A commotion breaks out as people begin looking upward, including the two officers . . .

The cops are distracted and the dragonflies are on the move! Whatever shall you do??

Elastiboy/Index

Above the Atelier, the cloud of dragonflies continues to coalesce and buzz with a rumbling hum. Windows begin to vibrate and lighter loose debris begins to clatter around on the ground.

Abruptly, the swarm begins to mass downward, towards the Atelier roof. The individual dragonflies begin to interlock together, creating two columns . . . no, creating two legs . . .

You can tell that the centerpoint of the swarm's focus seems to be the lantern full of sorcerous energy!

Boss Nutter

The villain is leering as he exits The Proud Pirate Saloon. His armor begins to build itself around him with every step, becoming an ungainly steampunk dry-suit of some sort. Loco, Madcap, and Maniac follow him out. Various Wildsiders nearby quickly come to some kind of attention around him. Overhead, the

"Rally t'gether, Wildsiders!" bellows Boss Nutter, "T'dae, we take th' map piece! We move forward e'er closer tae th' next stage! By this, we murrain th' authoority o' them as keeps us doon! WILDSIDERS!"

"WILDSIDERS!" comes the cried response, and the hum of portable jet bracers!

"Wildsiders!" cries the foppish Madcap.

Wildsiders! signs Maniac enthusiastically.

"WILDSIDERS!!!" bellows Loco . . .

. . . even as a dragonfly crackling with purple energy lands along the small of his back . . .

[gailforce]

Ai

Conditions: Angry

In the confusion, Ai, still in the form of a small old woman, slips through the crowd to Ghost's side.

"I know you said that you didn't want to come, but I really really think we should go now!" she whispers. "We can take my ship. She's fast and quiet and can shrink down so small that she'll be practically unnoticeable."

[Razade]

Index
Conditions: Insecure

Sebastian continues to walk out onto the street until he can get a full eyeful of his warehouse and the swarm of twinkling dragonflies that deemed it an acceptable place to roost. The place was useless to any of the rank and file villains in the city, the regular thugs of the various criminals he knew had it out for him wouldn't be this ostentatious which meant that this was something different. Something unexpected. Something new. Which meant one of two things. Either someone had discovered his AI and wanted to steal it. Or this was some here to unknown but entirely magical enemy gunning for the only valuable piece of hardware that he had. Either way, the lantern that hung limply in his hand seemed to be the culprit.

With a spin of his staff he drew on his own inner reserve of mana as the LEDS in the staff began to glow with life. It was like dipping into cold water, bracing and exhilarating and all at once a sensation you never really got used to. "Oh Vaunted Azure" he entoned, thrusting the staff into the ground as magical energies crackled about him. "Lay low the polluted and the wicked. With thunderous cries and blinding lightning I command thee to strike at my enemies." He fished one of his stun grenades out from his pocket and lobbed it at the roof. The staff wasn't ready to channel his energies directly into magical elements, it needed a catalyst to work off of and alter his energies, the grenade had more than enough of a charge to work in the moment. "Demon Spell of Destruction Number 37: Lightening Squall Barrier."

With that, the staff hummed loudly as a bolt of static leapt from his body towards the staff and then to the exploding grenade that landed next to the forming feet of the dragonfly swarm. What was more, the air popped and fizzled about him as his hair stood on edge, blinding streaks of lightning pinging into the asphalt around him.

Going to resist/avoid their blows.

[Comissar]

Impossibly, it felt like Charlotte's heart was beating even faster than it had been before. The PED was pretty much a death sentence for her way of life. She doesn't pay attention to the first couple of dragonfly's buzzing past, too focused on the officer, but the sudden increase in buzzing catches her attention too. Her arms start to sag down as she tries to process what's going on. She gives the elderly woman a confused look as she approaches, quietly asking "Ai..?"

She glances briefly at the still distracted police. Running now would practically be an admission of guilt, but then, they already seemed to have assumed that. She felt a twisting in her gut, then nodded, "Ok, let's get somewhere quiet."

I think it should be roll to Assess, anyway? If no roll is needed, just say, but Charlotte's trying to find somewhere without people that she can run to with Ai so that they can make their getaway.

[roll0]

So her question will be "How can I best end this quickly?" with a view to escape rather than conflict

[Thokk_Smash]

Elastiboy
Conditions: None (Starstruck at seeing an honest-to-goodness mech)

"THAT'S SO COOL!"

Okay, so it's obviously a machine driven by a bad guy. It's obvious that they gotta keep it from doing what it wants. But it's a GIANT ROBOT for Pete's sake!

"Nice one, Index!" he yells, shaking himself out of his stupor. He bounces around the roof of the atelier, watching the robot forming and trying to figure out what it might be here for.

Rolling to Pierce the Mask of the situation, [roll0]

I get three questions, so:
1.) How could I get the giant robot someplace that would make it easier to take down?

2.) What are you really planning, AKA what's the point of whoever sent this thing here?

3.) What do you intend to do?

Granted, these are intuitive for the most part, but still might as well get Word of God intel.

[gailforce]

Ai

Conditions: Angry

Ai nods quickly. She takes Ghost's hand and tugs her towards the women's bathroom that she had exited a few minutes before. It's deserted now--all of the mall's patrons are rushing towards the exits.

"We can take my ship," Ai says, a little heistantly.
She isn't sure where she and Ghost stand right now. She might still be angry with her.
Ai still doesn't totally understand everything that happened in the make-up store between Ghost and Alex, but she does feel bad about it. She doesn't want to lose any of the new friends she's made.

"It's really fast," she continues, "and it can shrink down so small that no one will be able to see us. You, uh, should be okay. I think. The vectorizers of the morphogenic field are--that's not important. Anyway. If you start to feel squished, or like your human eyeballs are going to melt, just phase, okay?

As she talks, Ai pulls what looks like a little grey stone out of her pocket. She strokes a finger across its surface and it expands, blowing up like a balloon until its top hits the bathroom's ceiling. Expanded, the ship looks almost like an enormous silver almond.

Ai makes another gesture, and a panel dilates open into a door. She floats inside, waiting for Ghost to follow.

The inside of the ship looks a bit like the Starship Enterprise, if the Starship Enterprise was inhabited by Little Edie from Grey Gardens. Smooth features in silver, grey, and pale blue curve out from the ship’s rounded walls. Each is absolutely covered in knicknacks—plastic toys from Happy Meals, piles of mismatched clothing, kitschy ceramic figures of dogs and babies (most of them broken), a floral lampshade, and what looks to be a very battered CD player and a pile of CDs. Most of it looks scavenged. Bits and pieces of machinery, some of it distinctly alien, is scattered on the floor. On a low grey bench is a sort of nest made of pashmina scarves and torn-up wrapping paper.

Most of the bow of the ship has been replaced with a massive bay of windows. In front of the windows is a sleek pedestal with what appears to be a control panel on top of it. Ai, shifting back into her familiar form of a pixie-ish, freckly brunette, positions herself in front of it. She looks back at Ghost expectantly and a little uncertainly, like she's waiting for her to tell her what to do.

[Comissar]

Charlotte runs after Ai as quickly as she dares without drawing the attention of the distracted police officers. Once they're safely out of sight, she sags against the wall, the adrenaline coursing through her beginning to wear off. She looks up at Ai as she offers her ship as a refuge, "Yeah, uh, sure." Then Ai lists the possible side effects, and Charlotte finds herself giving the alien girl a non-plussed look, "... Right... Ok, I'll make sure I do that."

She straightens up as Ai retrieves and enlarges her ship. She hadn't really been in a position to pay attention when she'd done so previously, and watching it now was weird. Almost like watching something coming closer from a great distance while not moving. She finds she has to rub at her eyes once it's finished. She hesitates as Ai opens the door in the side of the craft, the manner in which it opened being a little unnerving. Still, when Ai enters, she follows after her.

The inside definitely wasn't what she was expecting. It almost looked like a hoarder had set up shop on the set of a big budget sci-fi film. Charlotte finds herself running a hand through her hair as she processes what she's seeing, barely realising she was further embedding make-up as she did so. She glances over at Ai, seeing her hovering at the window in her more familiar, younger form. It didn't take much to see how anxious she was feeling, and Charlotte felt a twinge of sympathy for the alien.

"Right..." Charlotte felt her own uncertainties begin to rise up again, then shook her head as she repeated herself, "Right, umm..."

She pinched the bridge of her nose, trying to focus. She just had to be Ghost right now, put her personal worries to one side. She exhaled heavily, then looked up at Ai with a more determined expression and stood a little straighter than she had been, "Thankyou, Ai, for giving me a way out. When we have more time, I think we need to talk, but right now we need to figure out what those dragonflies are about, they didn't look normal at all. Can you follow them with the ship?" She glances around the ship, "And do you have something I can disguise myself with? I can't risk being recognised, and we might not have time to grab my costume."

[gailforce]

Ai

Conditions: Angry

Ai beams, and gestures to the pile of scarves. Most of them are garishly colored, and at least three are obviously meant for dogs.
"You can borrow some of my things if you want. I have a lot of very good ones!"

She turns back to the console, and presses her hand against a panel on the side. For an instant, the air in the ship feels weird and sour, and gravity seems to lurch away. To Ai it is a pleasantly familiar feeling, one that she's even missed a little bit these past few weeks, when she's been spending so much time among humans. Then, suddenly, the view outside the front panel shifts to a huge, blank expanse of white, bisected by a single black line. It's a bathroom tile, and Ai's ship is now the size of a dime.

Ai flips a lever and slides several sliders all the way up. The thrusters on her ship engage, and they burst forward, shooting under the bathroom door and out into the mall. She looks around, searching for a dragon fly to follow. Finding one, she zooms after it, deftly weaving around several fleeing patrons.

[Comissar]

Charlotte turns to look at the pile of clothing, fighting the urge to pull a face at Ai's offering. When the whole point was to wear something nobody would believe you'd wear, it didn't pay to reject something. Then everything felt like it was distorting around her. The feeling only lasted a few seconds, but it was unpleasant enough that she nearly phased herself outside. Only the sight of Ai's unconcerned demeanour kept her from doing so. Once the sensation passed, she made her way over to the viewing screen, and found her eyes widening in disbelief. It was one thing to watch the ship grow and shrink, it was entirely another to see the view from inside.

"... Wow..."

She didn't have long to take in her new perspective, however, before Ai took off. Her mind reeled as the sudden acceleration made her feel like she was flying backward, even though she was stood stock still. Gritting her teeth, she fought the urge to stumble for footing, desperately trying to process the bizarre mismatch of perceived and actual sensations. It became more manageable once they'd left the bathroom and Ai was flying in a straighter line at a more constant speed. When she felt confident enough that she wasn't going to trip simply taking a step, she moved over to the pile of clothes Ai had pointed out. Glancing around the ship, Charlotte felt her heart sink as she realised she wasn't going to have the privacy she'd hoped for. She hesitated, glancing at Ai. The alien girl's attention seemed firmly focused on finding one of the Dragonflies. All the same, Charlotte called out "If you don't mind, don't turn around for a bit?"

Starting to sift through the pile of assorted clothes, Charlotte pulled out a garish looking baggy T-shirt, absolutely covered in silver and gold sequins, along with a pair of yoga trousers in a neon green. Pulling a face, Charlotte held them up against herself to check if they were large enough. Abruptly, she staggered to the floor as she felt the room spinning around her. Staying crouched on the floor, she scrunched her eyes tightly shut trying to will the sensations away before glancing to the viewing screen. Ai had found one of the mystery insects and was looping after it. Grimacing, Charlotte turned back to the task at hand. The sooner she was done with it, the sooner she could just find something sturdy to hang onto for the rest of this journey.

Phasing free of her now ruined street clothes, she began the task of pulling on Ai's borrowed garments. Fighting against infrequent bouts of vertigo and nausea caused by following the dragonfly, she finally stood after several minutes of effort. Despite everything, she felt like she'd managed to cobble together a reasonable disguise. The sequinned t-shirt and neon yoga trousers were joined by a bicycle helmet sitting slightly loose on her head with her hair hidden inside, strapped over a rainbow scarf wrapped around her mouth, nose, and ears, and completed with a pair of ever so slightly too small running shoes.

Looking down at herself, she sighed inwardly. At best her makeshift disguise could be called 'visually unique'. More than ever, she'd have to make sure nobody knew it was her wearing this. Her social life could never survive the kind of damage that knowledge would cause.

Fighting her way back to the viewing screen, she stood next to Ai. Bizarrely, she found herself hoping that the alien wouldn't think too badly of what she'd put together, "Ok. Good to go."

[gailforce]

Ai

Conditions: Angry

Ai glances away from the controls to take in Ghost's outfit. Her face splits into a wide, delighted grin.

"I love it!" she says. "You look so good, especially in the helmet!
I picked it up because it reminded me of a chitinous peltidium, and I didn't think humans had those. But it's a fun cross-species accessory!"

The ship starts to veer off course as Ai gushes, and she has to do a sharp, jerking maneuver to avoid colliding with a pedestrian.

She decides she should probably focus on driving for now.

[herodofcows]

Elsewhere

As the Wildsiders begin to jet off, Maniac readies himself to move before a pale hand, sparking with purple light, grabs him by the shoulder . . .

"A word, Maniac . . ." comes a voice that is like Loco and yet not . . .

At the Atelier

Index's bolt of lightning strikes into the swarm, sending dozens of golden dragonflies plummeting to the ground (including a fair few of them that had been zooming towards his location . . . or the location of something that he has on his person . . .)

But when the blinding light of the bolt clears . . .

A splash page. To the one side, Ai's ship zooms into the fray, hovering into position between Elastiboy and Index. On the other side, the swarm of dragonflies is joined by a swarm of Wildsiders, Boss Nutter in the lead.

"WILDSIDERS! NAE QUARTER!!!" howls Boss Nutter, as he jets upwards into the swarm,
"REND THEM TAE PIECES!!!"

The cry is taken up as the horde of young force-shielded and jet-propelled hooligans comes barreling towards our heroes.

"Break 'em down!"

"Knock 'em round!"

"Take what's ours!"

"Smash, bash, and beat!"

"WILDsiders!"

"Destroy them, my turtle-doves! Yes, ruin them!" cries Madcap above the din, riding suspended upon his chain and swooping at the head of the troop.

Meanwhile, the swarm of dragonflies begins to hum and vibrate as Boss Nutter enters into it! The wings and thoraxes begin to interlock into a shimmering set of golden puzzle pieces, which smooth over and form arms . . . legs . . . a torso . . .

Boss Nutter cackles with a voice magnified by what sounds like a hundred speakers as he emerges atop the ten-story high mechsuit formed by the dragonflies.

"BEHOLD!!! MYNE'RE THE FINGERS THA' BREAK THE WERLD!!!!"

Okay! So we have the swarm of Wildsiders incoming, lead by Madcap! We ALSO have Boss Nutter in a giant mech!
As such, I'm going to say that you are now entering battle against a dangerous foe as a team!

To that end, I am going to start you guys off with 2 Team. But there are caveats and wrinkles, detailed below!

• If the leader has Influence over every teammate, add another Team.
• If everyone has the same purpose in the fight, add another Team.
• If any team member mistrusts the leader or the team, remove a Team.
• If your team is ill-prepared or off-balance, remove a Team.
The leader of the team can mark a condition to avoid removing a Team from the pool.

So, first things first! Who's taking the lead? Discuss OOC or over Discord! We'll work it out from there!

[gailforce]

Ai

Conditions: Angry

Ai's ship grows back to its earlier, larger size as it sweeps down beside Index and Elastiboy. "Oh, wow..." she murmurs to herself as she watches the swarm of dragonflies coalesce into a giant, humanoid figure. An idea starts to percolate in the back of her mind. She caught a few close-up glimpses of the dragonfly she was tailing--it looked mechanical. But the dragonflies are moving organically now, and in concert. They must be coordinating some how, through some signal. If she can disrupt the frequency...

Ai continues to ponder this as she sets her ship gently on the ground. The side of the ship distends open again.

"Hello?" Ai calls out to Index and Elastiboy. "This is...a lot, but I think I have an idea about the dragonflies." She glances at Index, a little coldly. "Unless, of course, that's too bold of me."

She's still a bit angry about the way that Index dismissed her. Still confused, as well--he's hard to figure out. That's one of the things she likes most about him, except for when his oblique words and actions seem designed to hurt her. This seems like a good opportunity to try out some of that human passive aggression she's heard so much about from Alex.

[Comissar]

Charlotte hesitates as Ai comments on her make-shift disguise, trying to work out if she was being serious or not. "Oh, umm, thanks." Any further comments were cut off as she was forced to once again contend with the bizarre physics of the ship.

Charlotte felt her world distort again, this time in reverse, as the ship returned to full size. She gritted her teeth, fighting against the nausea-inducing transformation. The sensation was mercifully short lived as Ai manoeuvred in for the landing. When the side of the ship opened up, she felt her heart drop at what she saw. How was she going to deal with something that big..? Ai's comments snap her out of her train of thought. She glanced at the alien girl, then back at the scene unfolding in front of her. This time, she saw the Wildsider's as well as the mech.

She jumped out of the ship and yelled out "What's the plan?", raising her fists as she prepared to meet the charging Wildsider's. In lieu of any better advice, she was just going to take down as many of the thugs as she could to keep them off her team's back. She wasn't kept waiting long. A pair of Wildsider's came careening down at her. Running toward them, she let the first phase through her and caught the fist of the second as it impacted her chest. Grunting at the blow, she let it bowl her over as the rocket propelled Wildsider sent her hurtling down to the ground. She tightened her grip around the fist as the pair hurtled down, grinning to herself at the Wildsider's confusion as the pair of them swung down through the ground. Keeping her knees solid to act as a pivot, she used the Wildsider's momentum to swing them both through a half loop, freeing the Wildsider to fly back up and through her once he was pointing back toward his compatriots.

Pulling herself back up into a crouch, she glanced up just in time to see her target stabilising himself after having a near miss with another of his gang. She didn't have time to do more than react, though, as she sensed another pair of Wildsider's coming in from behind. Realising she'd have to take some hits if she was going to keep their attention, she gritted her teeth as they launched into her, the impact winding her. Trying to elbow one of them in the face as she was carried along, she was rewarded with a numb arm as she slammed against the force-shield.

[Razade]

Index
Conditions: Insecure

Sebastian seethed, the spell went off but it wasn't enough. He summoned forth more of the power within him and channeled it through the staff but as the buzzing grew...and as the rest of the crew burst into the scene he felt it slip away. If casting a spell was like dosing yourself in a cold spring, losing a spell was like a pressure cooker finally being opened...and you were the pressure cooker. The mana flooded away from his fingertips, his staff sparked and even the lantern at his hip pulsed from the loss. The plume of flame he was going to send Boss Nutter's way never materialized. The exertion left him open.

[gailforce]

Ai

Conditions: Angry

Ai gives Index another scornful look, but springs into action with the rest of her team anyway. As Ghost and Index target the Wildsiders and Boss Nutter, Ai sets her sights on a swarm of dragon flies heading towards Boss Nutter's mech.

She throws her ship into gear again, and zooms off after the dragonflies. She weaves through the air, dodging pot-shots and reeling Wildsiders. When she's right on top of the swarm, Ai slams her hand onto the command consul. The front panel of windows shoots open, and a few dragonflies are sucked in, right into her outstretched hand. Her hand and fingers expand into a bubble-like cage, keeping the dragonflies trapped.

[Thokk_Smash]

Elastiboy
Conditions: None

Elastiboy hesitates for a few moments. Well, "hesitates" might be the wrong word. "Stops to admire the view" might be more accurate. His friends are just so cool! Ghost's taking on an army of Wildsiders, Ai is using her alien tech-stuff to mess with the dragonflies, Index is, er, "harnessing the arcane energies" as he would say (the sparking staff and lack of effect means nothing! Index's plans work in mysterious ways and all that!). Elastiboy's gotta step up.

"Hey, Nutty!" he yells, voice projecting far and wide as he literally bounces closer to the giant mech. ((GIANT MECH!!1!2!)) "Giant mechs(!!!) are cool and all, but it's a bit much, ain't it?" he asks, bouncing to reach the mech's eye level. He falls, then bounces back up and continues, "Kinda overkill for lil'old us, innit?"

fall, bounce

"Ooh, does that mean you recognize us as heroes?"

fall, bounce

"I mean, it is pretty cool that we sent you packing with your tail between your legs last time. Do your fan club know about that?"

fall, bounce

"Though kiiiiinda embarrassing for you, huh?"

Granted, there's a small part of Elastiboy whose heart is in the taunts. But he's mostly stalling for time, or better, making the giant mech focus on him instead of on Index.