Avenger Assembled
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"No guessing!" said Tarva brightly, laying a finger aside Kimber's lips and winking. "You'll ruin the surprise if you guess, and then I'll have to find you something else!" With a naughty smile on her face, she turned and sashayed out the door, swaying her hips with the pleased languor of a satisfied cat, obviously enjoying Kimber's very intimate presence around her neck. "It's not easy keeping secrets in this place, you know, but a girl has her ways." She laughed prettily as they reached her door and she pushed it open. Sure enough, there was a new piece of furniture in Tarva's room just adjoining the door, a baby bassinet shaped like the fingers of a large, jagged hand. Inside, wrapped snugly in what looked like a black blanket form Tarva's own bed, was a small, pink-faced baby, sound asleep. "Don't worry," Tarva reassured Kimber, her voice now a whisper as she reached down to stroke the baby's cheek. "Her parents don't even know she's gone. They'll still be asleep for hours yet. We have plenty of time to be mothers."
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Fall 1945 "You have come to spoil this land! You dogs! You filthy vampires of men!" Frost paced in front of the Japanese colonists, visions of Red Fox, of Spitfire, of Lady Celtic, dying in agony in his mind. He was acutely aware of the terror on their faces but he truthfully cared very little for that now. The Allies of Freedom were dead. Heroism was dead. What else mattered but his duty? "It is ONLY through intervention of the heroes of the Soviet Union that you have been allowed to LIVE! Now! The skilled workers among you will proceed to the train that will take you to Siberia for processing. After that, the rest of you will be repatriated to your embarkation port in Korea!" "But that's two hundred miles away!" shouted one colonist, braver than the rest, still wearing the work fatigues that meant he must have been a mechanic for that Datsun corporation that had been headquartered up the road. Most of the executives, as was the way of things, had fled before the arrival of the Red Army. Frost decided the man was lucky as he spun to look at him - another member of the People's Heroes might have had him beaten for his pains. Frost instead laughed and pointed down the railroad track, smashed a few weeks earlier as the Red Army had steamrolled through Manchuria. "WHY SO IT IS!" he declared, throwing up his hands. His escort, the rear-guard troops who had been charged with keeping the Manchuko colonists from being murdered by the surrounding Chinese guerillas, laughed too. No one else did. - "Ah, Manchuria!" declared Frost, looking up at what was a fairly minor part of an exhibition that devoted itself after all to primarily American and Western European superheroes. "I remember it well. What a pesthole." A tourist was taking his picture, and somewhat distractedly he waved. "Yes, it is I, famous Comrade Frost, fellow in statue right over there." Looking around, Dimitri was acutely aware of how young the crowd was. The men and women with whom he could have shared jokes, memories, the common experience of war even if they had fought very different wars at the same time, were now mostly gone - even in the Motherland, where veterans had once been as thick as the Siberian snow. "Glad to be here to see museum of capitalist heroes and their war against the forces of fascism - and also Soviet!" he declared brightly, pointing to a handful of nearby displays, rather cattily. "So glad to be remembered. What do you think, Lady Talya, did _your_ war make it into American history books?"
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"I'm glad you said that," said Tarva warmly. "because I have a little, ahh, secret." She smiled down at Kimber, smiling more broadly as the shadow-hounds eagerly embraced their mistress's lover, practically climbing all over Kimber as they bestowed tarry dog kisses that left behind a faint, distinctly black residue that quickly faded across Kimber's face. "But you need to get dressed first." She slid out of bed and slid her hand down her body, neatly summoning a black dress like the one she'd been wearing before - which come to think of it had disappeared entirely earlier in the morning. "It's not a naked secret," she admitted, "but you know, you _could_ fly around completely nude now and I'd be the only one who knew." She winked. "Maybe next time." At her command, the dogs bounded off the bed and vanished, seeming to dive their way into her shadowy outline and vanish entirely. "It's in my rooms."
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Spend an HP, man!
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"Children," replied Tarva, without hesitation, her face just inches from Kimber's, grief flashing briefly in her dark eyes. "I would want children." That produced a sad whimper from the corner, and with a laugh, Tarva sat up, her wistful mood broken. "Here babies!" Two or three of the shadow-hounds leaped up from the corner and bounded up heedlessly onto the bed, squirming around as they settled onto Tarva's bare legs. They had long canine teeth and shadowy bodies the size of German shepards - and smelt distinctly of brimstone. "You are my beautiful dark ones!" she told them, petting their heads and skritching behind their ears. "But you are not what I had in mind." She shot Kimber a look, secure in her fortress of shadow-hounds, and went on, a quiet little laugh in her voice, "I know how that sounds - here we are together once, and already I would have us with children riding behind us in the wagon. It...I should not have said anything."
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"No, you aren't attempting to hide at all, are you?" Hermes seemed appalled by the very idea, eyes going wide and hand to the speedster's mouth. "I was hoping you'd been hiding out and the games would start again - but you have no idea where you are? About the war? About what happened-" That head shook back and forth, then the body, as if the divine messenger were trying to shake dirty water off that lovely frame. "I'll give you whatever help I can," Hermes offered, moving with mercuric speed directly to Alexis' side. "I'm no Hephestus or Vulcan, but I can make sure no one else knows you're here. No one but my step-uncle Neptune, anyway."
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"Mmmm..." With a feeling of satisfaction both personal and physical, Tarva reached over and brushed Kimber's hair out of her eyes, stroking her hand along her lover's cheek. "A mistake well-made. That made up for lost time, didn't it?" Tarva hadn't commented on it, but her flesh was clearly marred by scarring - Kimber had seen it before, back in Canada, and up close there was no denying that those raised black , irregular lines on much of her torso had not come with the original woman - nor had she shown much interest in them being touched. For her part, Tarva was content. Whatever Kimber had lacked in experience she had made up for in enthusiasm - and that was a pleasant enough tradeoff in her eyes. In the corner, shadowy phantoms watched them, the familiar toothy shadow-fiends she had come to know and love so well. She looked up at the ceiling for a moment, then over at Kimber. "If we were gone from this place, if we were in a...a house, like normal people, what would you want to do now?" Kimber knew Tarva well enough to know when she was leading up to something.
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Caradoc advanced on the enemy mentalist, swinging his mighty blade around his head and in front of him, its mystic blade gleaming with awesome power! It was a flashy, attention-getting maneuver, the sort that spoke of skill and prowess with the blade, that promised a deadly duel of broadsword against psychic powers. Then, without further ceremony, he smashed the flat of the blade directly into the creature's face, then against its left knee. Caradoc wasn't interested in duels, just in fast, deadly manuevers that took down the enemy as quickly as possible. "Don't let it enter your minds!" he called to the others. "Strike it down before it can ensnare you!"
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"Yes, Set. They were canoodling right there on Heroes' Knoll - right where anyone with the senses to make out a vampire could be watching, ready to destroy the monster polluting their sacred spot. Except his teachers, evidently." With long experience, Taylor could tell Jack was staring right at the Bluetooth, trying to pry what had been left unsaid by his lovely wife. "That's the one you met at the park the other day, wasn't it? The one with the cat girlfriend and the website? If I hadn't known Set switched genders, I'd have thought it was his randy sister." Sometimes Jack didn't really pay attention when his wife spoke, but he usually caught most of the pertinent details. "Did you think to ask, boy, if perhaps a 5000 year old god might be the wrong person to fool around with?" he went on. "That they might have ancient enemies, and old lovers, that would gladly feed you your liver?"
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"Hold up," said Riley, giving Matt a baffled look. "Are you...are you some kind of vegan?" He asked the question about the bizarre lifestyle with the same bafflement as he was asking whether Matt was actually from a planet orbiting the star - it wasn't mockery, really, just a complete lack of understanding. "Listen, you don't have to eat any meat if you don't want to, and I won't even hunt around you if you don't want. Not like I'm killing dogs or somebody's Nobody's gonna notice a few dead animals," he said, "not if I'm doing it patiently. People around here live so well they hardly pay attention half the time. Hell, two-thirds of the time is more like it." He was stripping off his boots now, undoing the heavy laces and sliding off the leather, then unrolling thick, heavy outdoor socks. "And you shouldn't go calling people crazy."
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"I am not my father, fool," Nina sneered at Set in a hard whisper that was also familiar. "I am Monsoon, princess of Socotra, and its future liberator. And that ring you covet is on the hand of my second-eldest-brother's bride, a mighty alchemist of the Serpent People. If you want it, by all means, go looking for it." Edge, off the phone with UNISON, rejoined their group as he slid his communicator onto his hip. "Okay, so a cleanup crew is on its way. Monsoon, you and I had better do what we can here. Hydrokinesis and matter creation are going to really come in handy. Hey, you ARE Set," he suddenly exclaimed, looking at the deity as if for the first time. "Oh man, this must be rough!" he said sympathetically, reaching over to pat the deity on the arm as he turned on the charm. "I am so sorry. I promise, we will figure out how that jerk pretended to be your brother. Horus the Avenger deserves better than some jerk stealing his identity."
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"I like teeth," replied Tarva, showing her own, which gleamed brightly in her black-lined mouth. When it was clear that Kimber wanted to talk rather than play, though, she gave a little sigh. "I promise, whatever we do, I will be exactly the woman I am now. And if you remember, my lovely ghost, you already told me you didn't want me as your concubine." She leaned close to Kimber's ear and whispered, "Instead, why don't you have me as..." As she spoke, shadowy, canine-faced forms appeared behind Kimber and swung the door shut behind her, giving them complete, well, almost complete privacy in the bedroom.
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"Yeah, what the hell, man?" demanded Riley of his instructor, letting his anger find a solution to the crisis. "I thought this was supposed to be testing our powers and crap, not getting everybody all upset! What is this, Mindscrew 101?" Riley would never have talked to a Woodsman instructor like that, of course, but the teachers here demanded a far less strict standard of discipline - and seeing somebody's brain get screwed with had never been his favorite part of training. He stalked into the training area and put his hand on Robin's back. "You okay, baby? What was that?" He'd occasionally felt the hanging shape of her necklace in intimate moments, but he'd never before put two and two together about what they were.
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Yikes! This guy seemed pretty tough - Black Knight had seemed like a tough customer before, but this Surfacer thug had tossed him around like a dolphin toying with a fish. "You...you jerk!" Aquaria yelled, crouched low on bent amphibious knees, her throat sacs bulging obscenely from the bellowing echo of her unrestrained voice. "You don't even have your story straight," she croaked. "First you're a god, now you're a time-traveler!" She ticked off points on one of her long froggy fingers. "You're just a crazy pinkskin! You should go back in Providence where you belong!" She leaped close and slapped him across the face - not with her hand, but with her tongue, the organ lashing out of her mouth and slapping him from some two feet away. I really wish Jessie was here!
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"Y-our son is in the doghouse," replied Jack with the tone of voice of a man who just realized he wasn't going to get any this afternoon after all. "I just picked him up from his school field trip where evidently he snuck away to get high with Set on godblood." He punctuated the words the way he punctuated a beating - with gusto. "He's currently tripping his damn balls off in the backseat of the BMW. I'm on my way home, where I've told him that you will have some words with him about misusing his precious gift of life on stupid teenage buffoonery. On the plus side, he finally managed to grow his damn fangs. We can have a party after I chew off somebody's head at that school of his."
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Ooh, Aquaria is scared now! =( But this magician guy looks pretty tough. Aquaria will Leap behind Boomer into melee range and then Aid Phantasmo's next attack vs. Boomer. http://orokos.com/roll/329321 = 20!
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Citizen erupted out of the melee of bones, trusting in Papercut's ability to make his own way free now that the latter had moved on to fighting the wolves. He didn't really know exactly what had happened over on the hill - just that evidently Kimber's plans for personal improvement had been a tremendous success. "Starting to get tired of these things!" he called, his eyes glowing red as he carved a scorching black line across one's midsection, just missing his aimed shot at the creature's spine. "Ghost Girl, I think it's time for the harvest!" He wasn't entirely sure how her weapon worked - psionic empowerment letting her tear apart whatever remaining psi-energies were holding these skeletons together. Oh well - the important thing was that it worked very well indeed, and that science would eventually solve its mysteries.
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Citizen flies up in the air out of melee range! He then eye-beams one of the jotuns at his feet. That'll be a DC 29 Tou save for one of those chumps.
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Tarva gave Kimber a level look for a moment, ever-calculating even now. "...my lovely ghost, you are all that you once were - and now you are a magnificent woman of great and terrible power. The girl who wanted to be touched was your childhood. This is, my dear, is the real you. And if you're concerned I only want your power, let me reassure you..." She pulled Kimber close enough to whisper in her ear. "It's not just that." This new position had brought their joined hands together over Tarva's chest, and Kimber could feel the witch's heart going a mile a minute. This was obviously not easy for her - making it a far cry from the nearly steady beat she'd felt back in Canada when Tarva had come to her in the nude. "Besides, if I cast a spell on you to touch you, it seems only fair you cast a spell on me to touch me..." Her breath was extremely warm in Kimber's ear, and tickly! "And besides, if we don't hurry, my dear Kimber, your present will spoil."
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"Who am I?" The figure that appeared was perhaps not who Apex might have expected to show up inside a cruise ship's engine room - or indeed anywhere at all. Its gender indeterminate, the being appeared in what Apex could identify as a Roman-style toga, cut short and well above the knees. S/he had fine-boned, dark-complected features and wore a silvery cap adorned with wings - wings that matched those fitted to the golden sandals worn by the lovely-voiced creature on strong, muscular legs over shapely feet. "Greetings. My name is Hermes." Almost too fast to see, Hermes whooshed around the room, seeming to study her from every angle. "I may not be able to hide from you, but where have you been able to hide from me, child? Surely you haven't been hiding from my family all this time..." - Neptune and Arcturus exchanged blows, the former knocking the latter aside, before the sea god fixed his gaze on Starlight. "This world has been ours for fifty years, foolish insect!" He raised a trident so vast one tine could have impaled Starlight from the head down, the oceans themselves rising at his fury in awesome waves of tremendous power, the unmatched fury of the sea itself at his command. "WE WILL NOT GIVE IT BACK!"
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http://orokos.com/roll/329310 = 22! Ooh! Neptune is dazed and staggered. That's a good hit, Bluefish. Go ahead and post IC, just as Neptune begins raising his trident for a deadly throw.
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"I am not so sure she is his agent," admitted Steve, putting his foot up on one of the chairs and resting his chin in his hand. His outburst, and the anger behind it, had left him unsettled in his mind - his grief, his rage, had been emotions he had long since bottled away beneath the certain knowledge that neither were the provenance of one such as he. The fact that it was Tarva who could bring those emotions out was...an unpleasant thought. "My parents were intimates of Steelgrave, long ago on their lost homeworld, and I was one of his personal guard after I was broken in the forges. I was close to him for...an age." He fell silent, then spoke, putting words to difficult concepts. "I do not think he would accept even the temporary humiliation of his concubine defecting to the Furions - not when his reputation is all that protects him from being pulled down by the other Annihilists. But Tarva has served many masters - the Tarvon whose name she bears, the Madrigal Martinet, her terrible Hounds...and she is a being defined by treachery." He looked at Tona and explained, "An Annihilist is one who betrays their world to the Terminus for power. An Omegadrone is one who is broken by the forges, and becomes their pawn. One such as Tarva is one who betrayed all that she was in order to live. A conqueror is an enemy to be destroyed. A collaborator is..." He trailed off, unable to finish the sentence without another explosion of rage.
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"Hm." Riley seemed to make a decision at Matt's words, which had won a real smile from him as he listened to his roomate's secret life. "You wanna go out tonight? Security's good- s'not perfect." When his bag was unpacked, a small scattering of personal possessions across desk and endtable, he rolled it up and slid it under his bed. "I know my own Freedom better'n anybody, but this one's way different. Sneakin' around's fun, too." He turned and shot a quick grin at Matt. "I've gone hunting with dogs, but never any like yours. You sure they don't like meat? Liberty Park's got some good squirrel even now, and there's parts the cops and tourists usually don't go."
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Steve quietly interposed himself between Gina and her house, so that she either had to stop or bump into his broad chest. He could see her emotions being pulled tight, and wanted to keep himself from making matters worse. "I am better off with you." He hugged her, then released her - claustrophobia was definitely not one of Gina's problems, but being boxed in sometimes was. "If we go back that way," he suggested, pointing in the other direction that meant finishing their journey, "we will be home in nearly as much time, and we can see the remainder of the block." Gina's home block was not very large; a typical residential block in this part of Freedom City.
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Aquaria swims across the water again and then climbs up to go for the shark on the wheel. If she can make it there this round, her attack roll is: http://orokos.com/roll/329281 25! DC 21 Tou save for the Shark