Electra
-
Posts
11,284 -
Joined
-
Last visited
Content Type
Profiles
Forums
Freedom City Guidebook
Freedom City PBP: A How-To Guide
Gallery
Events
Everything posted by Electra
-
Erin had been silent while Trevor spoke to Accolon, scowling at the floor while she clenched and unclenched her fists. Finally she looked up and broke back into the conversation. "It was me," she told Roland flatly. "I led the team that broke the spell and undid the universe that you remember. It was to save our universe and everything we've ever known, but it still happened. Your powers kept you from disappearing with the rest of the changed universe, but the rest of your world is gone now. As far as I know, there's no way to change that back, and if there were, it would mean erasing the lives of everyone who exists now, and we can't let you do that. But if you need someone to blame, blame me, not the other heroes, and definitely not Jessie."
-
Erin went over to the window and looked out, reassuring herself that Trevor and their allies were all more or less in one piece before returning to the problem at hand. The holes hanging in the middle of the room were definitely a problem, even if one of them hadn't swallowed up the most injured of their number with no indication of where he'd gone. "Hematite?" Wander called cautiously, looking into the rift where he'd gone. "Can you hear us? Are you okay in there?" Knightfall shifted impatiently from foot to foot. "There's really only one way to find out," she declared with great certainty. "Beearbee." With one solid swing of her arms for balance, she leapt through the portal after her wayward almost-sibling.
-
Paige skidded to a halt just inside the door, staring uncomprehendingly for a moment at the sight before her. It took another swipe from the gorilla's giant hand for the puzzle pieces to slide into place. "Edge, Velocity, get back!" she called. "And don't hurt him!" For her own part, she edged forward carefully, staying well away from those long, scarred arms. "Keep the camera on," she told Frank, "but stay way back." Leaving her slightly winded crew behind, Paige took another few steps forward. ~I can hear you,~ she sent telepathically to the enraged simian. ~Can you hear me? We're here to help you.~ "He's sentient," she murmured under her breath to the other heroes. "And telepathic. He's broadcasting. He's so angry..."
-
Tensile brought his weapon to bear on the hostile shadows just a second after his sisters, but it was already too late. He didn't seem put out about it, his face a study in amused resignation. "No matter how far from home I get, some things don't change. Pushy sisters stealing my KOs," he joked. "Whine, whine," Knightfall retorted, rolling her eyes. "Less talky, more shooty." "I tell you, the youth of today, no respect," Tensile mourned, shaking his head. "Right, Mom?" Even as he spoke, he was lining up a shot out the window, punctuating the question with a blast of light that tore apart the final shadow creature on the grounds. "I'm pretending you aren't even here right now." Erin used her shoe to beat out the flames on the couch, assiduously ignoring the squabbling heroes.
-
Tensile is going to shoot out the window to try and hit the one remaining baddie with his energy bolty thingy. Result is a 23
-
Erin kept her hands loose at her sides, her feet flat on the floor. Unarmed, in her civilian clothes, a faint smear of axle grease on her cheek, she didn't look like much of a threat. Of course, someone who'd just been put through a wall by the even less imposing Jessie would probably not be fooled by that impression. "I'm not here to hurt you," she told him, "but you aren't going to want to hear what I have to say. Your world is gone, and it's never coming back. The reality that you know was a spell, overlaid onto this world that exists now, by a villain looking for more power and a hero trying to stop him. Your world, your village, you, everything that you remember, existed for less than a day before we changed it all back. I don't know why you're still here and why you remember when nobody else does. I'm sorry."
-
Paige fished a slightly crushed single-serve packet of cookies from the bottom of her camera bag and tossed it to Will with a faint smile. "There you go kiddo, the last, or maybe first, chocolate on earth. Mazel tov." She settled in with her own plate of less-than-inspired camping food balanced on her knees. "Even if we find a way around the space visitors," she pointed out, "we still haven't addressed all other problems that would arise trying to take thousands of dinosaurs into the present day. There's no feasible way to move them all with the time and equipment we have, and if we go back to the present and try again earlier, we risk splinching ourselves from the paradox or getting Dr. Tomorrow and the time police after us again." She took a bite of her meal and looked meditatively up at the sky. "It's a shame we can't get the aliens to take the raptors with them," she mused offhandedly. "Solve both our problems at once, and what a story."
-
Erin nodded to Blue Jay, mentally filing away all the anger and guilt to work through later. "All right, at least I can straighten him out on a couple of things, like who he's really mad at. You," she said to Cleary, in a voice that wasn't a request, "go talk to Jessie and tell her she's not in trouble. Maybe even get her to unpack her bug-out bag if you can." She turned her gaze to Trevor and Blue Jay, looking lost for a moment. "Do we know anything about what happens when universes overwrite each other, like what happens to whatever gets smoothed away in the merge? Maybe... I dunno, maybe Mark would know, or somebody smart like Dr. Atom. I don't know what we're going to tell this guy about how his world got destroyed, or what happened to his family." Squaring her shoulders, Wander walked into the secure ward and stood at the foot of Accolon's bed, waiting for him to notice her. It didn't take long, that thousand-yard stare snapped to attention on her within moments. "I hear there was a misunderstanding here earlier," she said neutrally, her voice flat. "If you're looking to take out your anger on somebody, Jessie's not the one you want. I am."
-
Paige sucked in a breath as the telepathic message slammed into her mind, her head automatically whipping around towards the source. "What the hell?" she asked aloud. Almost without thinking, she began jogging towards the outbuilding and was outpaced in fractions of a second by Velocity. "What are they keeping in there?" she demanded of everyone and no one. "I thought all the Crime League prisoners had been remanded?" "They have been!" Frank chimed in, falling in beside her with the crew stringing along behind him. "Second unit collected footage this morning. We were told that only the animals are still on premises." He looked concerned, both for the potential mystery and for the heart attacks the insurance guys were going to have if the SuperCrime crew got into another dangerous situation so soon after the last one. "Are you picking up someone else?" "I don't know," Paige admitted. "I got a definite coherent thought, someone is enraged, someone is trapped. I can't tell more from here."
-
Wander pushed herself up off the floor with some effort, smoke still trailing from her lips as she got to her feet. For a second she looked towards the window where Midnight had disappeared, then turned to face the danger that threatened close at hand. The shadowy creatures were half-visible, incorporeal things, nothing she was going to be able to hit with her bat or her fists. That made things more difficult, but not impossible, not if they could keep working as a team. "Light or energy," she suggested to the "kids," even as she dropped her bat. Picking up the sofa instead, she launched it across the room, plowing it into the shadowy creatures, then right through them. It didn't seem to harm them, but it was certainly a distraction. "Can you do that?" Sojourner asked Knighfall, even as she swapped out the loads in her guns with barely-human speed. "I can do both," Knightfall assured her with a cocky grin, "watch this." A flick of her wrist and the girl's bo staff suddenly crackled with energy, then began to glow with searing red light. It looked not unlike a lightsaber, which Erin had to think was probably intentional. "Hey shadow puppet," she called to the closest of the creatures, twirling her staff like a majorette's baton. It seemed to focus its attention on her, but it didn't seem happy about it. "Your boss is dead, you know. And you're just a smear on the wall." She struck then, grabbing the center of her bo staff with both hands and swinging for the fences. The bright red arc of light cut through the creature with no resistance at all, and continued on into the shadow creature next to it. Both creatures wailed, an unearthly keening noise, before disappearing into nothingness. "Not bad," Sojourner acknowledged with a quirk of her lips. She turned her attention to the remaining shadow, raising her guns in one fluid motion before double-tapping the thing, shots so closely spaced that they sounded almost like one explosion. The bullets she used burst into flames upon contact with the air, passing into the shadow and tearing it away before embedding themselves into the cushions of the sofa. The final shadow creature wailed like its fellows and disappeared, leaving the room silent but for the crackle of burning upholstery. "There goes another couch," Wander observed dryly. "Two in one night, that might be a record."
-
Okay, Wander is going to aid attack for Sojourner, who will wait to go until after Knightfall has taken her turn. Wander will spend an HP to shake her daze. I will ask for an HP to be given her because now that the group is split, she has to choose between staying and protecting women who are her future family or going out and finding Trevor. Wander successfully aids in the attack Knightfall will attempt a fast demoralize against one of the shadow critters. She gets a 34 She will then target that same shadow critter to hit with her bo staff. Using her variable descriptor, the bo stick will be charged with electricity and glow like a lightsaber with the power of AWESOME. She rolls a 21. Sojourner, aided by Wander, will target the third critter with flaming fireball ammunition, using a partial power attack. Everything Wander does in this fight is cursed, so the first attack misses. Spending another HP for a reroll, which is actually even worse, but results in a 26.
-
"Okay guys, why don't we set up in front of the cage here, get the transport shots, and then do an on-camera piece?" Paige Cline walked up with her film crew, a SuperCrime! baseball cap shading her skin from the harsh sun. "Frank, is the sun going to be a problem?" "Not for the next hour or so," Frank assured her, checking the reading on the lux meter David the cameraman was carrying. "Just keep the boom high, Kelsey, I don't want to see shadows in the shot." "Or for a monkey to grab your windsock," David chimed in teasingly. Kelsey gave him a look, but obligingly raised the boom mike a few degrees higher. "Okay, good." Paige nodded to her crew, then turned to Edge and Velocity with a bright professional smile for the two younger heroes. "I understand you're about to move these bears, Edge? Do you mind if we film, maybe get a little description of what you're both doing?"
-
Erin paled as the impact of his words struck her, shaking her head immediately. "That can't be right," she replied, her voice a vehement whisper. "That world existed for barely a day, it popped out of nowhere, it was never really real How could it have generated new people?" The answer struck her immediately; Jessie herself was from a world that had likely existed for no more than a few hours, yet she was perfectly real. "But... there was nothing else we could've done! What were we supposed to do, let reality be unwritten? Why wasn't he changed back along with everyone else?" She rubbed her hands over her face, struggling to absorb the implications of Roland's claims. She shoved her concerns aside for the moment when Cleary reappeared, this time with Blue Jay in tow. She nodded cordial recognition to the young woman, then turned baleful attention to Cleary. "You might have mentioned," she suggested, her voice crisp almost to the point of snapping, "that the reason Jessie 'attacked' another resident was because he screamed at her and tried to stab her in the face. And you might have given her some reassurance that she wasn't in trouble, in which case she might not be in her room with her bags packed, terrified that you're going to send her back to prison!" With a deep breath, she took a deliberate step back, keeping more than arms reach between herself and the target of her ire. "Has Roland said anything yet?" she asked Blue Jay.
-
Wander Reflex: Succeeds Wander Toughness: Evasion 2 Sojourner Reflex: Fails, despite a +12 reflex, bummer Sojourner Toughness: Succeeds and with Evasion 2 as well, she soaks Knightfall Reflex: Fails by one, just like her sister Knightfall Toughness: Suceeds and has Evasion 2, just like her sister Tensile Reflex: Succeeds Tensile Toughness: No Evasion, but his Impervious makes it moot
-
"So he attacked you first," Erin repeated slowly, wanting to make sure she had everything straight. "He yelled at you and he came at you with a knife, and that's when you fought back?" Jessie nodded, back to looking at her knees as though she had answers printed on them. Erin took a deep breath, made sure her voice was totally calm, as reassuring as she could be. "All right. I need you to stay here while I go talk to Mr. Cleary and some other people. But I promise, I promise," she repeated, crouching next to her counterpart for a moment, "you're not going back to Blackstone, or anywhere else. You didn't do anything wrong tonight, and that's what matters." Erin could feel Jessie's eyes on her back as she walked out, and knew that her counterpart probably didn't truly believe a word of that. Once enough bad things happened to you, it got a lot easier to just stop believing that life could get better. She wondered for a moment how it would feel to worry that one day she could be permanently jettisoned back to EZO1 without a chance to so much as say no, but the thought was disturbing enough that she didn't want to hold it for long. She had too many other things to think about right now. In the corridor, she nodded to Aquaria but zeroed right in on Trevor. "Where's that jackass Cleary gotten off to?" she asked, her voice quiet and full of wrath. "I want to ask him why he didn't think to mention ahead of time that Jessie was attacked with a knife before she started hitting back. And I'd like to know why she's locked in her room and wondering if she's upped her body count now because of some psycho's ranting. And I'd like to know why her shrink-" She broke off and shook her head. "No, I'll save that one for another day. Cleary first."
-
Paige blew out a breath and finally put down her camera, shaking out the arm that had gone numb from an hour of filming. She didn't usually pick up a camera herself, but in this case, there'd been a lot to document, and no second takes. "Okay guys, you got all that?" she asked her crew half-humorously. Frank the director seemed to come out of a sort of trance state. "Hell yes," he said with great enthuslasm, looking as though he were about to hug Kelsey the boom mike operator. "Let's get to the editing tent and back everything up twice, then start in on some preliminary editing. This isn't just a special episode anymore. We're looking at miniseries, maybe even a feature-length documentary here. God, I wish we had IMAX gear!" He raced off toward the editing tent, the rest of the crew trailing after like excited ducklings. "Why don't we have some lunch?" Paige suggested to the others. "There's not much else we can do right now, and I don't know about anyone else, but I'm famished."
-
"Well that can't be right," Erin told Jessie, trying to inject her voice with a confidence she wished she could feel. "You've been monitored every minute since you came here, by me or the Blackstone guards or the staff here. And we know you haven't killed anyone." "But I was here before," Jessie retorted in that same hollow tone. "You went into my box, and I came here. And... and it was bad." "I didn't think you remembered that," Erin said softly. "Only parts," Jessie admitted. "Psyche couldn't sort out everything that was erased or changed. But my therapist showed me the videos from the office building." She blinked when Erin made a noise that was suspiciously like a growl. "He says it's important for me to own my crimes, even the ones I don't remember, so I don't forget how dangerous I can be." "That's stupid," Erin shot back, shaking her head vehemently. "He never should've made you watch that. It wasn't really you, it was what happened when you were crazy with fear and so messed up in your mind that you barely knew what was happening. That wasn't your fault." "Two people still died," Jessie pointed out evenly, drawing her legs up into the chair and wrapping her arms around them. "I don't think their families probably care how I felt." She ran a hand over her cheek, perfectly unmarred but for a line of dried blood. "I don't think Roland thinks it wasn't my fault." "Then he's wrong," Erin maintained, her voice even. "But I don't really think that's what this is about. Can you tell me exactly how it happened when you fought him?" Jessie shrugged. "It was after dinner and I was washing pots and pans, cause that's my job this week. It was lasagna tonight, and it's hard to get everything off without bending or breaking the dishes, so I was concentrating on that. Roland... I think he was sanitizing the hard surfaces tonight. But he was in a weird mood, being jumpy and mean and staring out the windows all day. He brought his bucket over to the sink, but he was staring at me." She twitched, her arms tightening around her knees. "Just staring, like he was getting angrier and angrier. So I asked him what his problem was, and he started just screaming at me." Her body jerked slightly, as though physically recalling the moment of shocked surprise. "About how I killed his whole family, and I was a murderous witch, and I didn't know what was happening! And I could feel-" she shifted uncomfortably, "I could feel a flashback starting, and I think I put up my hands, but I didn't want to hurt him! But then there was a knife, and blood, and..." Jessie trailed off, staring at her knees as one hand idly rubbed her cheek. "I didn't mean to break his arm, or put him through the wall. I just forgot."
-
Erin nodded to Trevor, ignoring the guards for the moment, before squaring her shoulders and heading for Jessie's room. She knocked lightly before opening the door and looking in. "Jessie? It's Erin. Can I come in?" There was a beat of silence, then a soft "Come in," from a voice so identical to her own that it still threw Erin a little even now. Erin pushed open the door and walked inside, shutting it behind her. The room was dim, lit mainly by the study lamp on the desk, but it was bright enough to see by. Jessie was sitting in a chair by the window with her gaze turned to the skies, her concentration complete enough that she didn't so much as glance at her visitor. Erin took the opportunity for a quick visual inventory. Despite the late hour, Jessie was fully dressed, wearing several layers of clothes unless Erin misjudged the slight added bulk of fabric all over. Her pockets were full, though nothing whose outline suggested a ready weapon, and she had a bag at her feet. Looking at the walls, Erin saw empty spaces and leftover sticky tack where pictures and photos had recently been hanging. Keeping her steps measured and slow, Erin walked to the bed and sat down. "What's this all about?" she asked carefully, gesturing to the bag. "I want to be ready," Jessie explained without turning her head.. "There might not be time to pack later." "Where are you planning on going?" "They're going to send me back." The lack of emotion in the words chilled Erin's skin. She knew it was how she herself sounded when there was too much going on inside to risk letting any of it out. "To Blackstone or... I hope to Blackstone." "Why would they do that?" Erin pressed, wishing not for the first time that she had some actual people skills to bring to bear. "Did you do something wrong?" "I killed Roland's family." Now Jessie turned her head, meeting the eyes of her counterpart. "I don't remember it," she continued hollowly, "but he told me so."
-
Fail by six, Erin is injured, bruised and dazed. Owwie
-
"A few I think we've punched before," Erin agreed with a faint smile. "But not some harmless low-power crazy with a temporal anchor. You're right, though," she concluded, slumping back against the seat. "Benefit of the doubt. Maybe there's part of the story we just haven't heard yet. Guess we'll find out soon, we're almost there." The lights of Port Regal were mostly dimmed at this late hour, but she could still recognize them from plenty of visits. "You might want to stay back just a little at first. It's been awhile since she's seen you, and she'll probably be scared if she's not in some kind of rage fit. We talk about you sometimes, but I don't know that she remembers what you look like."
-
Tensile flexed his metal-braced legs, glancing around at the layout of the house. "Just like old times," he muttered, "wonder if I'll still get yelled at for doing this." With that, he straightened his legs and took off, up the stairs and around the landing in a precision ping-pong maneuver that spoke of the hours of practice in his past that was his house's future. The walls in this house were certainly far more pristine than they had been after a half-dozen leaping Hunter-White children had grown up in it, but they still bounced the same way. In seconds the battle was in view, close enough for Tensile to draw his pike and aim it at the noseless face of the man who'd killed his parents. In that moment, he had no quip to make, his mouth tight as he fired a beam of orange energy across the room. It struck true, and though it wasn't the knockout blow it should've been, it obviously hurt the bastard. It was something, anyway.
-
With no research to keep her busy, Erin spent the car ride staring out the window and fidgeting, resisting the urge to tell Redbird to drive faster. The information on Accolon brought her to full attention. "That can't be coincidental. Most people don't remember anything about that little reality bubble, but he might be another one with some kind of temporal anchor. If he suddenly got dropped into sword-and-sorcery world and didn't find anyone else who knew anything was wrong, he might have gone a little nuts. But it doesn't explain him still being in custody, or why Jessie would go after him now. I wonder if he started talking about other dimensions or something like that, something that brought up bad memories." Erin tugged lightly on her own hair. "I really thought we were past all this by now," she admitted. "I thought maybe she could finally have some peace after so much violence. But maybe it's too late," she mused softly, turning her head to look out at the dark and the rain. "Maybe she was too broken, and deep down the violence is all that's left in her."
-
Tensile: Move Action: Supermovement (leaping) to reach the fight Standard Action: Blast WH with Pike of Powah First attack fails, Wander will lend an HP for reroll Second roll is a critical success at 33
-
"Roland Accolon," Erin repeated aloud. "I don't think I recognize the name." She looked toward Trevor, silently asking for help. If Singularity- if Jessie was becoming violent again, she wouldn't be remanded to Providence, Erin knew. Her history was too blood-soaked, the chance of disaster too great. If she lost Project Freedom, she would return to the quiet darkness of Blackstone's psych wing, possibly forever. "I'll be there right away," she said again. "Let her know I'm coming." She hung up the phone and held it in her hand for a moment, feeling the overwhelming temptation to hurl it into a wall and watch it smash into a million pieces. Everything had been going so well for Jessie, over a year with no major incidents. Even the freakish temporal displacement that had turned Project Freedom into a medieval monastery for a day hadn't been enough to freak her into attacking anyone. What could've gone wrong now? "I have to go to Project Freedom," she told Trevor. "Jessie attacked another resident and broke his arm, and nobody can figure out what set her off. They're talking about sending her back."
-
As might be gathered from the name, evenings at Midnight Manor usually didn't wind to a close just because the clock turned over. With a heavy rain putting a damper on both crime and patrolling, Erin and Trevor were spending the evening in the garage, restoring a heavily modded Graham Blue Streak from the late 30s while Erin learned the ins and outs of rebuilding a transmission. Information fatigue set in around midnight, and by a quarter past twelve, she was seriously evaluating the tactical considerations of necking in a half-built car with no backseat. The chiming of her phone interrupted these pleasant ruminations, and by the time the caller introduced himself, all other considerations had fled. "What kind of incident?" she demanded, dread curdling in her stomach. "Did she hurt somebody?" Is anybody dead? Pinning the phone with her shoulder, she began skinning out of her coveralls and wiping off her grease-smeared hands. "I can be there in twenty minutes."