Heritage

Am I correct in assuming that the section that starts with 'Lynn, on the other hand' is actually describing what Gretchen notices?

Up until this point, Grimalkin had been slouched down in one of the seats, legs stretched out, hands folded on her belly and eyes closed. By her slow and steady breathing, one might have assumed she was sleeping, but in fact, she was conserving her strength and listening to the others. She had nothing to contribute to the discussion about the Four Horsemen, seeing as the Apocalypse was an entirely Christian concept, and her chiming in on that topic wouldn't help anyone. But once the subject turned to the inevitable 'so what do you do' conversation, her eyes popped open and she sat right up, because this stuff was mission critical. The changeling listened attentively to each team member in turn, taking careful mental notes. Once Gabe was finished, she cleared her throat. "Guess I'll go next. I'm a dark faerie, which means I'm good at shapeshifting and deception; I'm also sneaky as hell and pretty scary in a straight-up scrap. I'm good at getting in and out of places, and they never see me coming." She shrugged. "That's about it." Grim avoided going into a lot of details not to keep her own team in the dark, but for fear of showing too much of her hand to the Jade Dragons.

Notice: 1d20+15=19 Survival: 1d20+5=21

I'm trying to make Ditra likable while still acknowledging that the Nameless are unnerving; let me know if it's working!

Their contact smiled and stood on tiptoe to kiss the Xobron on the cheek. "Nice to see you again, Gear, and nice to meet you, Starshot." She was quite pretty, with light green skin, dark eyes and an unruly mop of dark green curls. The Diplo gave Cain a disdainful look, and then sharply shook her head. "First rule of Bugtown, never discuss business on the street; anyone could be listening. Follow me." She took the Xobron by the hand and led the three men around to the back of the bar, leading them inside via the service entrance, then down a narrow hallway to a magnaseal door with a dull silver circle in the center. The Nameless agent place her palm against the disk, there was a hum and a click, and the door slid open. "After you, gentlemen," she said with a mischievous smile. Inside was a circular booth upholstered in some dark tanned skin, with an ugly lump of a table in its center. The room was lit by red biolight, though a small blue lantern on the table led to strange shadows. Already sitting in the booth was a young woman in a pale gray jumpsuit, with light green skin, dark eyes and...an unruly mop of dark green curls? She looked up as her guests arrived, then frowned when her 'twin' followed after them. "Sindra, what exactly are you doing," asked Ditra as she got up from her seat, looking very annoyed. The other 'Ditra' laughed as her skin shifted from pale green to bright pink, her curly hair straightened into long and silky strands like cotton candy, and her face became another, with a grin like a bratty child. "Teaching your friends the second rule of Bugtown; nothing here is what it seems!" She bowed dramatically with a flourish, and then backed out of the room. "Sorry about that," she muttered as she stepped over to kiss the Xubron on the cheek, exactly as her duplicate had. "Nice to see you again, Gear. And you must be Starshot? Please, have a seat."

Floating just above the floor so as to make as little noise as possible, Miracle Girl slowly tracked the bizarre little creature throughout the house until she finally spotted it. Oh my gosh... Despite her best efforts, Casey could not help but find the tiny dinosaur adorable; she had to keep reminding herself that it or one of its friends had more than likely killed a man, who's only crime was curiosity. "Omigosh, it's in here," she hoarsely whispered. "How could something so cute be so deadly?"

Okay, I have to admit that this thread has me a bit overwhelmed; there's so much going on and so many bad things happening that I have no idea where I should have Casey and what she should do once she gets there. Is there a roll I can make (for instance, maybe Survival) to represent her quick assessment of the situation to help me determine where to send her?

I'm with KD on the 'no real world parties' idea. Hollywood disaster films have shown you can have a believable POTUS without them; you just have the Secretary of State say, "The party backs me on this" or the like. All elected officials worry about being reelected, and you can have a 'conservative' on either side of the aisle, none of which takes away from potential storyhooks.

Hope that's okay, Kolo; let me know if I overstepped my bounds, and I will edit accordingly.

<I'll grab a room in back right now, and have a friend waiting up front to lead you to me.> Ditra broke off the call and turned to Sindra. "Can you do me a quick favor?" The lovely Pink grinned and stretched like a hungry cat. "For you, Deet? Anything." - - - The Bugtown tram was not quite an official conveyance, but it did have a regular schedule that it at least tried to follow. Even calling in a 'tram' was giving it too much credit, since it was really just a heavy duty cargo mule with three trailers attached to the back, each with pair of long benches bolted to the floor, back to back. The 'carriages' each could hold about twelve people, if they weren't much more than a meter wide, and it bumped and rattled quite a bit on its way to the far end of CoVic Station. A handful of other passengers shared the ride with Gear, Cain and Starshot (though they all gave them a wide berth), mostly Lor or other humanoids who very much kept to themselves. The long hallway was only intermittently lit, but as they got closer and closer to Bugtown, its walls were increasingly decorated with advertisements for the various nightclubs and other establishments to be found there, lurid signs traced out in luminous strips of red, green and blue that floated into view before once again disappearing into the darkness. Finally the tram pulled into a wide circular chamber, the turnabout, which was closet thing to a central Bugtown square. A 'fountain' of cascading blue light danced in the middle of the circle, and there were a wide variety of storefronts around its edge. The crowd wasn't as dense as it had been back in the Main Plaza, but it made up for it in color, as Nameless shells in blue, gold, green and pink in every shape and size went about their business, along with the members of several other races. Everyone moved briskly, head slightly down, as if in a hurry to get out some nonexistent rain. The air was a heady mixture of potent smells, some tasty, others rather repugnant; underneath it all, one could detect a faint whiff of methane that must have slipped past the air scrubbers. Across the circle, a pretty green-skinned woman in a jet black jumpsuit stood in the doorway of Otto's, beckoning the three travelers to join her.

"You can have one as young as sixteen," Casey explained. "The main thing is to know someone who flies and have the time to log the hours; oh, well, and have access to plane, obviously, which, you know, not everyone has..." She trailed off at the end, suddenly aware of what she must sound like: another rich white girl who's daddy probably bought her a pony for her sweet sixteen. Her cheeks got a little pink, and her natural golden glow even seemed to dim a bit. Once Naomi showed up, Casey brightened considerably and waved before awkwardly signing 'Hi. I. Am. C.A.S.E.Y', which pretty much exhausted her ASL vocabulary. There had been a few students who signed during her time and Claremont, and she kept meaning to take the ASL class the Scouts offered; she knew a few girls who had the badge, and she felt Miracle Girl should know how to sign, too. The blonde powerhouse did her best to position herself so that Naomi could read her lips, but still felt natural to talk with Annie. Casey took the paper Mr. Joseph handed her, and then her eyes did a sort of terrifying spastic dance as she read it and reread it a few times in the blink of an eye. "Okay, well, yeah; you only have to worry about movement in two directions instead of three, and instead of using the radio, it's all about signalling. That makes sense."

He seems fine to me as a president for this sort of campaign; on the one hand, I too don't want to see our fun hobby to turn into a political debate, but on the other, I like putting a face and character to the position. I'm happy that my characters wouldn't exactly agree on him, which feels more realistic than 'everybody loves him' or 'everybody hates him'.

Ditra doesn't necessarily hate the Lor, but since she does face discrimination from them, she often doesn't like what they do. She's typically based out of CoVic Station, but she can leave there from time to time. Bliss is one of the Voidrunners, right? I thought there was a Guidebook listing for them, but I guess I was wrong; who are they and what do they do?

Grimalkin/Shrike (9) [Maxed] Cat Mother & The All Day Babysitters (1) Empire of Emerald and Jade (2) Homegrown Breads (1) The Box of Delights (2) Viva Val Verde (2) You Never Get A Second Change For First Impressions (1) Miracle Girl (14) Crystal History (3) Driving Him Through A Wall (3) Dueling Storms (3) Lights, Camera, Action! (2) Once Seen (1) The Doctor is OUT (2) Ditra Fifty-Five (4) Unsportsmanlike Conduct (4) 20 Questions (1) Vignette (1) Guidebook (2) The Nameless Bugtown Guidebook and Grim's points go to Ditra Fifty-Five

So I'm looking for threads for Ditra Fifty-Five, my new space-based character. She is one of the Nameless, a race of cyborgs designed to overthrow the Lor Republic, before they went 'native' and more or less assimilated. They were exposed during the Incursion, and now are trying to find their place in a galaxy that doesn't trust them. Ditra ('Deet' to friends) is a PL9, and would probably do best in social or investigation type threads, though she does have a sweet built-in blaster.

Spotting the oddly-damaged glass, Casey wandered over to it, picking it up with her gloved hand as she turned it this way and than, watching the light play over it. "This is kind of weird; it almost looks like...maybe it was shot? Like those slow motion videos of ballistics tests on YouTube." The blonde heroine watched them from time to time, looking for ideas for things she might be able to do or figure out with her super-speed. She brought the glass over for Terrifica to look at it, hoping the super-genius might be able to make something of it. "Does this look like anything to you?"

Casey squeezed her eyes shut and shook her head, before opening them again and staring down at her hands; she flexed her fingers, watching all the muscles, bones and sinews sliding beneath her skin. She was able to see where she'd broken her left index finger when she was in seventh grade, during the ski jump accident that nearly killed her; it had healed fine, but you could still see where the impact had left its mark. "It's okay...it's a little better, I think." She gave Possie a quick, nervous smile before going back to the fascination of watching her body work. "My, uh....my eyes are different; I can see through stuff."

"Ohmigosh, I'm sorry!" The poor girl was so flustered she forgot to help the barbarian out of his cell! "Uh, just to be on the safe side, take a few steps back, sir; there might be some flying debris." And with that, she firmly grasped the bars and yanked them apart like they were made of Play-Doh, effortlessly bending several of them to give the big man plenty of space to climb through. "There you go! Now let's go find your truncheon and get your two friends out." Casey took a few steps towards the newly-lit area, once again sweeping the area with her eyes, looking for any more signs of life.

"F###!" A drenched Grecthen ducked underneath a storefront awning, shivering as she pulled off her denim jacket to try and squeeze some of the water out of it. Thank God the new notebook and markers were in two plastic bags, right now held between her knees; hopefully there wouldn't be any water serious damage. Overall, she was a very digital girl, a product of the end of the 20th century, but she still did her best musical composition on a big fat notebook with a fine point Sharpie. She'd asked the cashier for the second plastic bag because Shaul mentioned storms. And she looked like the kind of girl who felt the weather in her veins.

Gretchen looked up from her spot in the corner of the elevator and scowled. "I already said my goodbyes. Let's just go." She was hunched slightly forward, and seemed very uncomfortable and antsy. "See you back home, Gretch," Lynn said while offering a crisp salute. "We'll all laugh about this someday...or, y'know, go into group therapy or something."

Duty-bound Ditra Fifty-Five, CoVic Station The alarm in Ditra's berth woke her promptly at the sixth hour, powering her shell up from rest cycle. She lay flat on her back on the soft sleep pad for several moments, eyes closed as she ran a full set of diagnostics, every systems' current functioning displayed in the cool black space behind her eyelids. Across the bottom of her field of vision, the daily news feed scrolled from left to right; she highlighted a few items that looked interesting for later perusal before shoving all the data away and out of sight. A quick stretch, half affected and half diagnostic, and then she grabbed the handles on either side of her berth portal and slid out into the hallway. The young councilor joined the queue for the sanitation station to freshen up, then returned to her berth to get dressed; a zip-up jumpsuit in dove gray and a pair of comfortable charcoal boots were all she needed, as makeup, comm units and the many other humanoid trappings were for Lor, not the Nameless. The Diplo unit rode the lift up to the Market; normally, she would take in a light breakfast with friends at Nemo's, but she wasn't in the mood for conversation today. Today she had her civic duty to do, to vote in an election that may or may not improve the lot of her race. Frankan was on the record as disliking the Nameless, which shouldn't come as a surprise; all she could see was a horde of cyborg infiltrators who'd have overthrown the Republic years ago if they'd actually managed to agree on how to run it. Ambassador Th'emme publicly stated her appreciation of Ditra's people, but could they ever really trust a Lor politician after all they'd done to the Republic over the years? Though it was said the Bugtown Market never slept, this wasn't entirely true; at half past the sixth hour, most of it was still asleep, the twisted maze of streets and signs in lurid biostrip dark and lifeless. Ditra wanted to miss the crowds at the polling place today, and getting to it right as it opened seemed the best option. The green-skinned beauty stood at the turnabout, waiting for the tram to the Main Plaza to arrive; once it did, she climbed aboard, along with a burly maintenance Tac and an Astro unit so thin it was doubtful he could lift two kilos without snapping a limb. They rode the rattling tram in silence, each alone in their thoughts or in wordless communion with one of the station's many wireless networks. Once at the plaza, the councilor's features became more animated, her pace more energetic as she entered into the social milieu for which she'd trained for five years prior to getting her own unique shell, graduating out of the featureless Gray shell of childhood. She returned smiles when she saw them and nodded at acquaintances, joining the eternal dance of the individualistic races. By the time she got in line at her designated polling place, there was a twinkle in her eye and a bounce in her step that the Lor found appealing, arguably the greatest asset to her work among them. After half an hour of waiting, she stood in front of the uniformed poll warden, fished her Republic ID out of a hidden pocket and presented it to him with a breathless smile. "Good morning!" The warden grunted something unintelligible as he took her ID and swiped into his datapad, which produced the double beep Ditra was all too familiar with these days. His gloved thumb ran over the embossed 'RA' on the lower right-hand corner, which marked Ditra as a 'Registered Agent', a compliant member of the Nameless race. His eyes flicked from the ID down to her smiling face, and he scowled. "Is there a problem, sir?" Who could say no to that face? "I need a biosample." "Excuse me?" "A biosample." He indicated his mouth. "Saliva." "But I don't...that is, our shells don't work that way; my saliva is a synthetic digestive compound." "You're registered, right? That means your genetic material's on file." "Yes, but that belongs to my pilot, who's-" She waved her hand over her stomach area. "Down here." "I'm sorry, ma'am, but without the genetic match, I'm not allowed to let you into the polling place." The Lor behind her, a heavyset man dressed in a food technician's smock, rolled his eyes and groaned, "Look, why don't you just get out of here, bug? Let the actual people vote?" Ditra felt color flowing into her cheeks as she became more and more upset. "I am a person and I get one vote, just like any other citizen of the Republic." She turned back to the warden, his arms crossed and eyebrows raised. "Just...give me a moment..." The Diplo unit doubled over and winced, as she forced some of her pilot's digestive juices up her synthetic digestive tract and into her mouth. She quickly waved for the warden to give her a testing strip, which she held under her tongue for a few seconds before handing it back to him. Once he put it into the side of his datapad, a single note chimed, the key to the kingdom. "Thank you, ma'am," he said with a rehearsed smile as he handed her back her ID and waved her into the polling place. "Have a nice day." The young councilor mutely nodded as she stepped inside, arms protectively around her belly; she felt violated and exposed as she walked over to the polling booth. None of the other voters in line where required to produce a biosample. She pulled the privacy screen closed behind her, and the touchscreen ballot lit up her face as it sprung to life. It was the easiest decision she'd ever had to make.

I did not give you guys all you need to move forward? Let me know if I should add something to my post.

Grim's Notice: 1d20+15=26 Shrike's Notice: 1d20+10=30 Well of the two, Gretch is the more paranoid

I totally forgot to have Casey Bend Bars/Lift Gates (AD&D represent!), but being Distracted by the Sexy will do that to you! Anything to roll, or is it pretty easy for her to break them?

Though she was a superhero who could fly, shoot heat rays out of her eyes and lift several tons, Casey was, underneath it all, still just a teenage girl. And the man who now stood before her was a...very impressive man. She felt her cheeks go pink as she awkwardly got to her feet, her cool, diplomatic manner now somewhat disrupted by good old fashioned hormones. "Okay, good, you're...you're up! All, all of you..." The Claremonter had a hard time looking at the barbarian's physique, opting instead to look at him sidelong, like he was a solar eclipse. "Let's just, um, rejoin my friends. Who are...up the shaft thing." Thankfully there was a loud crackle of lighting overhead to distract her! Shielding her eyes, she peered upward with a mixture of concern and relief. "Hey, guys? What's going on up there?"