Heritage

Grim held both arms straight up in the air, and spoke loudly like a circus ringmaster. "Ladies and gentlemen, Atlas the Man Mountain has mastered....the Cube!" She whistled and applauded loudly. "Yes! Give it up for him! Now, a final test of his amazing ability to become anyone or anything! This...girls' bicycle!" With a wave of her wand (hey, where'd that come from?), she summoned forth a hideous pinkish-purple thing, complete with tassels and training wheels. Despite her best attempt at a straight face, her lips started to quiver from the strain of holding back peals of laughter. No way in hell is he gonna fall for this. :twisted:

The older suit felt a bit odd, not nearly as comfortable as her regular suit, and the heat buildup was rather disconcerting, but there weren't a lot of other options. When Barry the senior tech started to describe the sensor device, a predictable tangential discussion began. "Gentlemen! How exactly does it work, briefly. Is it proximity based, like a Geiger counter, ranged like radar, or something else entirely? Also, how does the interface work?" As she spoke, Gossamer did a few tentative stretches to check the fit and flexibility of the suit, sadly very much aware of who she was dealing with at the moment; she usually did her best to tune out the extreme nerdiness of the FAR boys, but some of it always slipped through, much to her discomfort and mild amusement :roll:

I think we need to name these jokers, just to keep things straight in the future; based on previously mentioned names and famous mad scientists, I like these ones: Norm Sivana Rudy Langstrom Barry Irving

"I'm participating!" :D

Grim nodded happily as she reached out to warmly shake Sam's hand. "Nice to see you again, dude! Yeah, that highlight reel was pretty freaky." She scrutinizes her face and body, gnawing on a thumbnail. "Well, we know you've got a great start on the general shapeshifting; by the way, I'd recommend you read some books on acting, maybe even take a class or two. I can recommend some places in the Theater District, so you can start working on your movement skills; really helped me out a lot." The changeling clapped her hands to together, then rubbed them in anticipation, an evil grin on her face. "Okay, now we get to the good stuff; let's see if you picked up anything else recently." She turned to one side, and a large wooden cube, roughly three feet across, appears on the floor; she gestured towards it like a game show model. "Ta-daa! Let's see if you can do shapes; now I can't join you in this exercise, 'cause my powers don't work that way, but who knows, maybe you got lucky."

Grim had barely been able to murmur her thanks to Atlas, too overcome with appreciation to speak coherently, but her small hand patting him on the back spoke volumes more. She tucked her head under Colt's shoulder and just held him for a few seconds, but then finally found words when others pledged their support. "I'm there for you, too, kiddo, and you too Jack; thank God you had a colorful guest list, huh?" She untangled herself from Colt and stepped over to the newly-married heroes. "Seriously, though, whatever you need to fight this, whenever; call me." As she stepped back to Colt's side, she took a brief detour to stop by Derrick and Stesha. "You guys know you're my new heroes, right? Especially you, Stesh; without you, this would have been a massacre of innocents. Thank you. You guys are awesome." She gives them both a smile and two thumbs up before returning her boyfriend's side

Estelle nodded as she looked in the general direction of the park. "I can do that; this is very much appreciated, gentlemen." Then she smiled wryly. "And as to what I'm wearing...well, you can see what's left of it at the Promenade, so you'd better hurry." The blonde chemist tucked the phone back into her purse, then leaped off the roof, a tentacle shooting out to grab first one streetlight, then another, and soon she was swinging at great speed down the street, making excellent time and creating a bit of a stir among the pedestrians below. In short order, she arrived at the Promenade, eyes scanning the area as she hung from a streetlight, her right hand shading her eyes from the glare above, while her left hand and feet provided additional balance as she leaned out over the sidewalk. "They'd better get here soon..."

Understood. Wasn't trying to be a pain, but I know from experience sometimes older, less active threads are easier to forget :D

Lynn beamed and gave Colt a welcoming peck. "Hey, you! And it's 'Lynn' out on the street, doofus! Good to see you, Ja- uh, what am I calling you now?" Her drink arrived and she thanked Summer with a smile. "I went ahead and started a tab for us. And as I recall, Mr. Colt, I wasn't sure if you knew what a toilet was at first." Lynn laughed and shrugged. "It's simple; we replace one annoying and destructive form of behavior with another. Works every time!" Once the guys had ordered drinks, her face took on a more serious expression. "Actually, I do think we have something to celebrate, guys. When this team started, it was because a crazy German scientist thought we'd make a good team, and he offered us a cool house and lots of money. We chose to join the team, but we didn't choose each other." She wiggled her hand from side to side. "Well, you could say me and Colt did, but that's another story. My point is, someone else decided we would work well together. But today, the three of us, by actually talking about a problem, and working at a solution? I feel like today is the first time we're really a team because we want to be a team." And here she held up her glass in salute. "And that, my friends, is why I plan to get s***-faced tonight" :twisted:

Grim came over to look at the picture, and smiled wistfully. "Wow, she was beautiful." She suddenly looked a bit uncomfortable. "Is? Was? Is she...?" The more experienced shapeshifter stroked her chin thoughtfully as she stepped around Atlas' new form. "You're probably overthinking it, dude; your body still remembers what it felt like all those years, even if your brain doesn't. It should be more like gravity, falling naturally back to Earth, to use a really lame metaphor." She stepped forward and put her hands on his shoulders. "Think of stuff you used to do, like if you played sports or had like a physical job; remember how your body felt doing those things. How did the sun feel on your face, or the wind?" She reached up and gently touched his face, first his nose, then his cheeks, eyebrows and earlobes, almost like she was modeling clay. "What did you face feel like when your mom touched it, or a girlfriend? Or boyfriend, maybe, I dunno how you swing. Did you ever get punched in the face or gut? How did your skin feel at the point of impact?" Grim started giving him a few friendly jabs in slow motion, sometimes to the torso, sometimes to the face, then laughed self-consciously at her touchy-feelly approach to 'morph coaching'. "Hey, I'm just spit-balling here; lemme know if I start driving you nuts, okay?"

Grim smiled and kissed him right back. "Hmm, not sure I know the words to this one; I might just have to hum along..." The next morning, the mildly hungover changeling was as good as her word, cooking up a mess of eggs, pancakes and turkey bacon in a stainless steel pan, with wheat toast made on a hot dog fork. She'd slithered undetected out of the tent while Colt was still asleep to get started on breakfast, as well as drink a lot of water to start clearing her fuzzy head. In a way, camping wasn't that much different than squatting, or her time living on the rails out West; something about this simple living really appealed to her. Grim sighed happily as she fixed herself a steaming hot cup of joe, laced with lots of cream and sugar. "Ahh, that's the good stuff..."

Hmm, this doesn't seem to be a very popular thread; anything I can do to jazz it up for folks?

whistles, twiddles thumbs :P

GECKOMAN EATS INSECTS! Well he does whatever a gecko can, right? So it stands to reason :P

You're not the only one struggling with this issue, Moira; as can be seen in this thread, I've been having trouble finding Gossamer's hero within as well. She's a good person but really has yet to do anything heroic, though that might change over the course of her disastrous date with Doc. I think the fundamental issue is it's much easier to involve an active character in storylines than a passive one, and I for one have been playing Goss far too passively. For her part, despite not being overtly 'heroic', Divine has managed to find a lot more thread activity than Goss ever has, so it's obviously not so simple as that.

Gossamer is up for it.

Oops, you're right, I forgot the river! We have the Nine of Diamonds, ladies and gentlemen.

Dude, welcome back! :clap:

You could have knocked Grim Golightly over with a feather; the look on her face was both delighted and gobsmacked. "Oh my God! I thought you were gonna copy off of me, not come up with something on your own! This is huge, dude!" She stepped around the elegant figure of Atlas, shaking her head in disbelief. "Is this someone you know, or did you come up with this girl out of whole cloth?" The changeling stood with her hands on her hips, her voice filled with frank admiration. "Outstanding, Atlas...outstanding. You'll never have to pay for another drink for the rest of your life." She winked and wrinkled her nose before ditching her fancy duds for black sweats and a New Jersey Devils hockey jersey, and plopped into a director's chair she conjured up, which had the words 'Coach Grim' across the back. "Ok, enough paper doll crap, we need to find the old Atlas in there somewhere; can you find your way back to the old you? You know your face and body; you've been taking care of them for years. If you need to use the mirror, go for it."

Dropping back into her seat, Grim took another sip of Sprite and sighed. "Yeah, we need to do this again, if only so I can get die with dignity next time. Do we think we could do this once a month? A few more regulars might be a good idea, too. Plus the tuneage, of course." She waited to see if Colt would indeed be the victor, the most likely scenario. Yep, he sure was a likable guy; maybe she could finnagle a way to see him more than once every thirty days?

:shock: "Wow. Wow, that's...wow. Okay, so your mimicry is very impressive, and disturbingly accurate. Hah." Grim tentatively approached...well, herself, and gingerly reached out to touch the material of Atlas' shirt. "Damn, that is amazing, especially because you made it out of yourself, dude! Excellent work!" The changeling shook her head in appreciation. "Heh, you ever see The Sword in the Stone, when Merlin and Mad Madam Mim have the morphathon championship? Me and Wes tried that a few times; got a little freaky one time, too." The tiny shapeshifter got a little pink in the cheeks and took a few steps back from her fellow shifter, swinging her arms to and fro, as though preparing to compete in some sort of athletic event. "Okay, enough about that, though! This time we're gonna go for finesse; see if you can play in the big leagues." She gave him a playful wink. "I'm sure you can do it, though; you just needed the right coach, am I right?" Grim rolled tension out of her neck and shook out her hands. "Okay, you ever seen Breakfast At Tiffany's? We're going for the full Holly Golightly, pearls and everything; if you can't do it all, no big deal, but if you can, awesome. After this, we're gonna see if you can mimic other people's powers and stuff, and also work on getting you back to being a guy, alright? By the way, does it hurt when you do this stuff? Because if it does, let me know now, and we can take a break." She closed her eyes and took a deep breath, and once again the mist flowed out of her body, ringing it with circles of gray vapor, only to disipate and leave Grim looking pretty darn elegant. When the change was over, she peeked with one eye to see Atlas' progress. "How you doin' there, big guy?" ;)

Grim could only shrug and look sympathetic. "Hell if I know, bud; no one's powers work just the same. When I woke up in a dark alley one night and found out what'd become, changing came as easy as breathing, but I think that's because I ain't really human any more. You, I dunno, I guess are some kinda mutant or something?" She paused for a minute and stroked her lower red lip thoughtfully. "Although I did nearly s*** bricks when I found out I could do this-" In a flash, her body lost all cohesion and collapsed to the floor in a pile of goo, which then shot back up into the five foot three inch form of Grim, wearing a pair of polka-dotted boxer shots and an 'I (heart) Freedom' T-shirt. "Let's see if you can do clothes, too, and after this I gotta another test to run."

January 19th, 3:02 AM Greenbank, near the rail yard Ask just about any detective what their least favorite part of the job is, and more than a few will say 'winter stakeouts'. Nothing is more conspicuous that an unmarked Crown Vic with the lights off and the engine running; this means thermal underwear, heat pads and a lot of hot liquids with few bathroom breaks in an ice-cold prowler with no heat. Sadly the criminal community rarely take the needs and feelings of the police into consideration when they plan their activites, which is what led Det. Colby to were she was at the moment. "You still awake over there, Colby?" The beautiful detective yawned before grabbing her radio and responding to her fellow officer, parked in another unmarked car across the street and halfway down the block. "Just barely, Kolanski. How are you holding up?" There was a sigh of static before Detective Bernard Kolanski, on loan from Narcotics, responded. "I've been poking myself in the leg with a pencil for the last half hour to keep my eyes open over here." Colby laughed. "Ah, the glamorous life of Freedom's Finest, eh?" "You think this little b**** is gonna show?" "She'd better, or I'm gonna file a complaint with the Crime League." She rolled a bit of tension out of her shoulders, hearing a satisfying crack as she did so. Her eyes happened to flick to her rear view, and that's when she saw the girl in the back seat. "Jesus Christ! You have to stop doing that!" As usual, Grimalkin looked mortified, a face Colby was getting used to, for better or worse. "I'm sorry, I didn't want your 'perp', y'know, whoever he is, to see me enter your car." The cop could only shake her head in disbelief; luckily, she hadn't been taking a sip of coffee out of her thermos, or there would have been serious consequences. "Why did you have to come in here at all? Can't you see I'm working?" "I know, but I thought you might need some help on that case you're working, with whatsername, Madonna Nightshade." "I told you, the last time you stopped by my office and nearly gave me a heart attack, that I don't need any help on the Bennett case. Now get out of the car before my partner sees you." Grim smiled and shook her head. "Ah, y'see, I took care of that! Right now, you're the only person who can see me!" A pair of bunny ears sprouted out of the top of her head, and she said in her best Jimmy Stewart, "Harvey's always been my favorite name." Colby rubbed her face with her hand. "Will you get rid of those things? You look ridiculous." The ears obidiently vanished as the changeling looked around the inside of the car. "So, can I climb into the front seat?" "No!"

I'm going to use this as a solo thread to develop Grim and Colby's evolving relationship in a series of scenes. We'll do a new thread for the evaluation of Jackie B.

For perhaps the first time, Estelle was happy to have the boys from the Force Applications and Robotics lab on the phone; they might be eccentric and painfully nerdy, but the man-children of FAR were exactly the kind of help she needed right now. Scampering nimbly towards the exit in her bare feet, the beautiful chemist rapidly brought the lads up to speed, her hair coiled into a tense braid. "Well, I was on a date with Archeville here in Hanover, and a pack of thugs in powered armor crashed the place. I don't have your wonderful suit with me, and despite my best efforts they knocked me down and made off with him. He's out cold, so I doubt his cloaking field is active, which may prove to be a blessing in disguise." Once out in the street, she quickly ducked past the paparazzi and a few police and EMTs; when she found herself clear of the crowd, her hair snapped out, found a nearby streetlight, and yanked her off the sidewalk and on to the roof, where she quickly scanned the area for any clues as to the gang's chosen escape route. "If there's any way you can meet you somewhere, I need another suit; for the love of God, tell me you have a backup."