Avenger Assembled

"Been in fights before," said Ashley with a flippant shrug. "Got out of 'em." She met Nicole's gaze for a moment, then away with an eyeroll that was classic "Whatever." "You may have seen Ashley on TV," confided Jaycee almost apologetically, "she's the-" "Hmm." Astrid's arrival made Judy yelp in surprise - but Ashley looked ready for it, shooting a cool gaze into the corridor even as she slid one hand in her jacket pocket. "Wow!" said Judy after a moment, "you just...beamed in! That's cool," she said with a smile. "Do you have a teleporting gadget?" "Lucky the shields aren't up," said Ashley, grumbling as she leaned back against the wall. "Splat you."

"Things aren't like they are here," growled Ashley. "Wouldn't like it." "Yes, um, Ah don't really like to talk about it," said Judy, reaching up to run her fingers through her long hair. "Ah've been to Alabama, though, it's nice," she said, pronouncing nice as 'nahce.' "That was the first place I ever had soul food, that was so good! And you, Selena, I bet you miss Puerto Rico when it's winter up here. I heard it gets real cold!"

Ashley took out what Nicole recognized as a high-end scanner, the sort of device used by super-scientists for rapid data gathering, and pointed it at Salvo - pressing a few buttons, she waved it in her direction before nodding at Judy, her ever-present scowl not leaving her features. "A place this small, rumors spread quickly," said Judy with a relaxed smile, pulling one leg up underneath her as she leaned against the bed. "But Ah think everyone here can keep a secret. So what do you girls like to do for fun?" she asked, pronouncing "like" as "lahk".

Ashley did some calculations in her head as Lulu took the seat on the other side of Pan, flush against the side of the gym wall herself. Dammit - I knew I should have made Jaycee sit on this side. But she begged to be near the other kids! "Hi Lulu, Ah'm Judy, this is mah sister Ashley," said Judy with a beauty queen smile sent Lulu's way. She did indeed have a Southern accent, though not one from Lulu's immediate neck of the woods. Ashley didn't smile, though - Ashley glared at Lulu like she'd sat on her dog. "Pan was just telling us about the other world he's from - that sounds so cool!" she enthused. "Mah home world isn't nearly that cool," she said, smiling brightly. "So you're from Alabama? What part?"

So how do you keep her from having the same stories/niche as existing characters with very similar backgrounds?

Can you put in his skill modifiers? And Power Feats like that Improved Crit should just be under Powers - no need to use them twice

"We're, um, from another dimension too," said Judy, glancing briefly at her sister who still hadn't done more than grunt Pan's way since the latter had sat down. "Not a nice one like yours, though," she added in a whisper. "At least it sounds nice," she went on. "Do you want to talk about it?" she asked frankly. "Ah'm sorry if that's a rude question, but Ah never met anyone from another dimension before and it looks like we got a couple of minutes yet."

The Dockyards were lonely this early, hours before the start of the first shift - and cold. The lake was going to start freezing before too long, and then the truly terrible cold of a Bedlam winter would settle in. Chromium was alone for a while by the berth, where an ancient freighter of no particular vintage sat rusting quietly at anchor - and then suddenly he wasn't. "You must be Chromium. I'm Anna." Anna turned out to be a slim blonde woman who looked to be in her mid-fifties, though it was hard to tell with the bright yellow hair escaping from underneath her Maniacs-themed stocking cap. "Are you hungry?" she asked, holding up a fast food takeout bag in one hand and a beverage holder in the other. "I went to Chik-Fil-A; got you their sampler."

It seems a little weird that an ancient Hindu goddess would speak with a Received Pronunciation accent, @Supercape

"This is mah sister Ashley." Ashley nodded her head in Pan's general direction - seeming far more focused in shooting a quick scowl in the direction of the people making the sudden loud noises on their way into the building. "Pan's a pretty name," she commented with a smile. "Where are you from?" Sitting this close to Ashley, who shifted unhappily inside her hoodie, Pan had the distinct impression that the question had made her twitch almost as much as the brief ruckus by the door.

This is Bhramari - the Hindu goddess of BEES.

"I'm Anna, I'm a frienda Wadjet." Speaking of ladies, the woman on the phone had a tone in her Jersey-accented voice that sounded like somebody's mom. "I'm gonna meet you at Berth 13 in the Bedlam City Dockyards at 6:30 AM tomorrow morning, all right? I'm gonna bring you some food and we can talk. Don't bring nobody with you now, this is just you and me."

Give me either an Arcane Lore or a Knowledge (Theology) check, @SpicyWaffle - typically this would be a hard one for Baxter but the DC isn't that high. @Supercape, let's call this one a Civics check!

In the end, the searching of the two men led them back into the vault Diamondlight had discovered. All was as he had left it - the decades-old bags of cash, jewels and other items that must have come from the bank's safe deposit box, and of course the statue of that Hindu goddess. A statue that was, as the two men approached it, beginning to emit a distinct buzzing sound. As they watched, the black bees on the statue's body began to slowly vibrate in a deep, almost bass rhythm like insects waking up from hibernation. And then - and then the statue opened its eyes and spoke in a voice full of the cultured refinement of the sub-continent. "BEE-KEEPER." She fixed her gaze upon Baxter, eyes glowing, raising her voice over the buzzing sound emerging from her apian adornments. "YOU HAVE RETURNED!"

"Claremont's good enough," said Judy diffidently. "At least, that's what everybody keeps telling me. Ah've never been to a school like this before - but I guess most people haven't," she added with a smile. Turning to Ayjay as the conversation focused on her, she said, "Is it hard, going from being a princess to being a high school kid?"

"Hi," came a voice off to Pan's left. The girl on the far end of the row, the long-haired one with the accent, was smiling shyly at him. He'd gotten the stink-eye from the girl sitting between them; the one with pink-tipped hair who he knew was the first girl's sister - the speaker was Judy, the grouchy-looking one was Ashley. "Nice to meet you. You're new too, right?" she asked, brushing the hair out of her face. (She pronounced right like "raht.")Pan wasn't much of a fashion critic when it came to the style of Earth-Prime, but he could tell the two of them were in matching outfits - bulky grey hoodies over loose-fitting jeans that didn't flatter either of them. "Ah'm Judy"

"Walk whatever path you like; I do not actually care what you do, woman - important thing is that I won by losing, which is, uhf, important philosophical principle...." Frost was sitting down and bleeding from the mouth more heavily than he would have liked. "Joseph, please do not taunt helpless man even if is Sin - is unseemly and he is laughing at your face." He dabbed at his mouth with a handkerchief and found more blood still, icy and thick like a child's treat half-melted. "And as for you, you miserable little man," he said in the Duke's direction, his voice growing weaker as he said it, "I know your type. A man who has taken eternal life for himself at the expense of his neighbor has damned himself all unknowing, you...ugh." He slumped down to one side and said, "Listen, am very tired. Will meet you all later." And with that, in a cloud of icy mist, he vanished.

A couple of days later, the phone rang. "Hello. This is a friend of Wadjet's." The voice on the other end didn't sound like the woman Chromium had met, anyway. "Do you eat?"

"I'm not some washed-up old loser or their spoiled grandkid," said Ashley with a sneer. She was almost certain Midnight and the other refounders of the Liberty League had been at Claremont around the time she'd been there - oh well, if she ever saw them, she'd owe them a beer. "Minute we graduate, Judy and I are history." "Um, let's talk about something else," said Judy, shifting where she sat. "Ayjay, can you...can you show us your crown?" she asked, smiling a little awkwardly. "Ah'm sorry if that's too personal, but Ah don't meet a lot of princesses!"

Judy stared at Ajasoro for a moment, as if looking for a lie - then grinned. "Wow! Lady Liberty and a secret princess. Claremont's gonna be a lot more interesting than Ah thought. A pleasure to meet you, your highness," she said, executing not a bad curtsey despite her humble dress. She folded her hands on her lap, then shot a glance at a decidedly-unimpressed looking Ashley before saying, "Ah suppose Ah should tell you where we're from. Ashley and I are, um-" "Classified. We don't know them yet." said Ashley, taking her toothpick out of her mouth and giving the two girls a hard stare, picking up on the momentary hesitation that had tossed the ball into her court. "Yes, well...Ah gotta actually know people, Ashley!" said Judy, frustration creeping into her voice for a moment. "So I'm just glad to meet both of you, I mean...I haven't met anybody normal in a real long time, so it's nice to just be with other girls." She smiled. "Ah mean, I haven't really talked with anybody new since Raven put Ashley away." That actually made Ashley drop her toothpick - even if she wanted to smile at Jaycee's quick thinking. "Yeah, well, bastard shouldn't have brought you into it. He never actually put me away, just...put me here."

The silence was awkward for a moment - but Judy spoke up quickly, seeming to shake off her confusion by sheer force of will. "Well, it's exciting to have a real celebrity on our floor!" She smiled like a beauty queen. "Lady Liberty was always mah favorite superhero." Behind her, Ashley scanned the room with a practical eye, tensing for what could become a real argument. The real world was a lot more diverse than the world Jaycee Cahill had been raised in, whether you meant the small town where she'd been born or the exclusive private schools she'd attended all her life. If that was going to be a problem, better to find out about it now under controlled circumstances than out in front of the liberal Claremont student body. Change the subject. Don't let her hang out there. "Hm. Must be theme. Outsider floor?" she asked, making a gesture that encompassed the whole fourth floor.

Briefly taken aback, Judy blinked as she looked at Monica, her eyes wide. "We're sisters," Ashley chimed in, a hard beat to the last word. Even as she spoke, she was snapping a device off her belt and pointing it in Monica's direction, briefly interposing herself between her sister and the new arrival. Nodding after a moment, she moved away without another word. "Um, yeah," said Judy, reaching up and entangling her fingers in her hair. "Ah'm Judy, and that's Ashley." She pointed back at Ashley, who'd resumed leaning against the wall and glowering at the room. She fixed her gaze at Monica and said, "...hey, Ah know you! You're that new Lady Liberty. Ah didn't know she was on our floor," she said, swiveling her head to look back at her sister. Ashley responded with a shrug and a We'll talk about this later look.

Okay, everybody take an HP for me temporarily NPCing Aquaria. Cobalt Templar, the giant robot is bound and helpless on your turn. @Electra, Singularity is up.

As the Omegadrones closed in again, in desperation Aquaria struck the ground with her trident - and knew with a sudden certainty that she'd done exactly the right thing. "Sing!" she bellowed at the top of her lungs in her native tongue. "Sing for the land that was! For the world that is! And the future that will be!" She looked above and felt awesome power crackling through her, and with a shout she felt the waters of Hydra close around her and suddenly rush outwards everywhere, blasting away the drones that surrounded her and sending them scattered through the wrecked plant. Her voice shifted to Lemurian as she went on - "Sing! For OUR WORLD!" She could hear the humming of the universe as it rose against the invaders from outside that sought to destroy it, the singing of the gods themselves and of the awesome power of a million Deep One voices rising as one. When she sang, she sang with the joy of the gods themselves in her voice, their gratitude filling her like a warm meal. "FOR THE STARSI AREI RIGHT!" From outside, from where Singularity stood, it looked for all the world as if a bubble of dark oceanic water had formed around Sea Devil and suddenly erupted outwards in a miniature tsunami! The ground around Aquaria was glowing in a strange eldritch pattern, and so was the glowing elder sign on her shield. The drones that had been besetting her and the humans she guarded were in retreat now; no, they were giving up their harrying of the prisoners and their guardian and heading pell-mell for her friend, who seemed weak, down on one bended knee amid the drones she'd sent scattering from her earlier attack. Across the field, something was happening to the giant robot Cobalt Templar was fighting. He wasn't entirely sure what was happening because it was happening behind the abomination, the vast pulsating bulk of its metallic midsection concealing it from Corbin's view, but he could see a sickly-brilliant yellow glow emanating from back there and hear a low, guttural song that the overall noise of the battle partially obscured. Suddenly, something wetly organic erupted around the robot's back and grabbed it by one arm, then came around from the other side and grabbed it there, stretching its arms out wide and leaving it for the moment helpless. It was hard to make out exactly what had a grip on the creature - something with limbs like a gigantic octopus, but with toothy maws at the center of each sucker, and skin that was more like closely lined fishhooks than soft wet hide. But whatever was back there, it seemed to be on his side...

Ashley stood up off the wall and walked brusquely in first, taking out her handscanner as she went. Her face set, she walked quickly through the living area, peeked into the bathroom without comment, then looked back at Judy with a nod. She knew she couldn't do this across the campus - but if people got used to it now, they'd stop thinking about it later when she really needed to clear a room before Judy entered it. Biting her lip as if worried Ajasoro would object to her sister's scrutiny, Judy stepped inside and looked around. "Looks nice! Guess they all look the same, but at least you have the tree out there," she said with a nod towards the most interesting view outside Aja's window. "Ah already got all of my stuff unpacked," she said. "Ah didn't get to bring much." "We have what we need," said Ashley, seeming to look away and peer out the window. "So what do you like to do?" asked Judy. "Ah was thinking of joining one of the clubs here, but Ah don't really know anybody except Ashley yet."