Electra

Quick question, don't I still have 3HP? I went back through the thread here and counted down and I am pretty sure that I did not spend all my HP.

Koshiro gave the little girl a brief but practiced bow in return. "Nice to meet you," he told Eira. "Stay out of trouble in the observation room, or Mr. Archer will get you!" With a smirk that said he was joking, he turned and began doing some indifferent warmup stretches, mostly in case they had any running to do during the scenario. Koshiro was a decent climber, but he wasn't much of an acrobat or a hand-to-hand guy. He'd leave that to folks like Mali. "I'm Papercut, by the way," he thought to mention to the new girl, then nodded to Sharl. "He's Citizen."

His eyes flicked up to hers, even as his fingers continued their practiced movements of folding and creasing. "Origami's not hard," he told her casually. "Anybody can learn the basics pretty quick. But it's what you do with it that counts." He held the finished product out to her, a rather unimpressive little red diamond with a crimped base and open top. "Here, hold it by the base," he instructed, putting his hands under hers and curving them so that she held the figure loosely cupped in her palms. As the paper settled into her hands, it seemed to warm and soften for a moment, and then it began to move all on its own. With a soft rustle, the top of the figure began to bloom, paper petals unfurling and curling outwards into a double-layered crimson blossom. Koshiro looked at her over their cupped hands, gave her that quick grin. "Even normal humans need a few tricks up their sleeves," he told her, then removed his hands from hers, leaving her with a pretty red paper flower.

"Sure, go ahead," he told her, nodding in the direction of the girl's locker room that sat halfway between the subterranean gymnasium complex and the Doom Room. "I'm just gonna head in." Since he'd been coming to train, he was already in costume, such as it was, so he didn't need the next-door boy's locker room. Hands still in his pockets, he left Mali to her own devices and walked into the simulator. It was live but unprogrammed, the light gray grid humming softly with power over the dark gray walls. Belatedly, he realized he didn't know what program they were running today, so with an air of nonchalance, he leaned against one of the gridded walls, took a sheet of paper from his pocket, and began to fold.

Koshiro shrugged on shoulder as he climbed in the elevator. "Sort of," he told her as the door slid shut and the lights began to flash, indicating descent. "Personalities, that's not too bad. Nobody here is too far from basic human psychologically, it's mostly different backgrounds and stuff. Sharl's a computer program, but he still acts mostly the way a human would, wants the same sort of thing. It's the physical stuff that's harder to get used to. I'm the only "normal" human on Young Freedom now, and it's a pain in the ass to get a lunch break or five minutes to rest sometimes. And picking a headquarters..." He just shook his head over that, then moved on. "So where are you from?"

"Yeah, aight," Koshiro replied, turning to walk with Mali towards the admin building. As he went, he began checking his pockets in a way that seemed habitual, drawing out what seemed to be colored squares of blank paper, dozens or hundreds of them in different sizes and hues. From his hoodie pocket, he pulled a handful of little folded paper figures, visible upon closer inspection as little white paper cranes. He eyed them critically, seemed satisfied, then tucked them away again. "This your first trip to the Doom Room?" he asked conversationally as they went up the stairs and walked down the broad central corridor. He stopped in front of a stainless steel elevator door and pressed his palm against a recessed plate next to it. A blue light flashed on, sweeping across his eyes before the doors slid open. "Security's kind of tight."

Wander tensed at the mention of that name, her entire body going still as her eyes flicked in Midnight's direction. "Do you think she's around here anywhere?" she asked cautiously. It had been some time since they'd faced off against Medea, and they'd come off victorious in the end last time, but it was still hard to forget what had nearly happened in that fight. The Crime League's crafty sorcerer had eschewed a direct attack on Young Freedom, in favor of clouding the mind of its most dangerous member. With her mind filled with images of Grue attack, Wander had turned on her friends, nearly putting Edge through an impervium wall before Hellion and Midnight had teamed up to incapacitate her and shove her into a pocket dimension where she couldn't hurt anyone. That was not an experience she ever wanted to repeat. Turning back to Orion, she gave him a smack across the face, not hard enough to bruise, but enough to get his attention. "Hey you," she demanded. "Where's Medea? Is she with you tonight?"

"It's good to see you, Master Mage," Fleur told Eldritch with a smile, happy to offer up the wrapped package of villain. The luckless young spellcaster was just starting to come around, but was still too groggy to offer any resistance. "I'd wondered if you would stop by to deal with this one." Her smile changed to a more impish grin. "It's not every day you see Malador trying to rob a bank in the Fens, after all. But no one got hurt, and he seems more stupid than evil. I'm glad you can do something to keep him from getting more punishment than he's due." When the prisoner was safely in Eldritch's custody, the vines began to wither and fall away, clearly unnecessary now. "I'm not sure you've met my associate," she told Eldritch, "though you obviously guessed where he's from. This is Beekeeper III, he's reclaiming the legacy for the cause of good." She patted the young hero's arm encouragingly. "Beekeeper, the Master Mage. Always a good man to have on your side."

Koshiro looked over and cut across the quad at Sharl's call, loping past a couple small groups of students headed for class or the caf. He was dressed for training himself, his uniform partially concealed by a ragged-edged sleeveless hoodie with an odd and angular symbol scrawled across it. He gave Sharl an upnod, but most of his attention was on the new girl, who actually got a quick smile out of him. "Hey," he said, shoving his hands into the pockets of his hoodie. "You're Mali, right? I think I've seen you around this summer." He wasn't quite smooth enough to hide his quick visual assessment of her, but at least he spent most of the time focused on her face. "Training at the gym on Tuesday nights." Much as he preferred his own style of combat, Koshiro had been in enough close calls already to start him putting in time at the gym himself, mostly when there weren't a lot of other people around to see it. He had a ways to go yet.

Ooh, that sucked. Miss A goes on 9.

"Blue and gold, of course," Erin told him with a faint smile. "It's Freedom City, after all. Since they're the home team today, they'll be wearing uniforms that are mostly white, with color accents. The Jets are green and white. If the Jets' quarterback scores, he'll do a funny dance, so watch for that. The Heroes had a terrible year last year, partly because the stadium kept getting busted up with all the bad things that happened in the city, but they've got a decent lineup this year and should do okay. They got some good draft picks this year and beefed up their defensive line with some college stars, at least some of them should be on the field today." All right, so maybe the conversations at work had given Erin a better grasp than she thought on the basics of watching football. Plus, on the rare nights she wasn't patrolling or with Trevor, it was more entertaining and less fraught to watch sports than most of what was on television. "Anyway, you'll catch on." As she walked with Trevor, Erin tucked her arm through his and rested her cheek against his shoulder for a moment. "He's afraid of being lonely," she said, apparently apropos of nothing. "That can make people do dumb things. I hope they'll be okay."

"We'll go get the TV set up," Erin said quickly, taking Trevor's arm. "You two can get the plates and cups and napkins and stuff, and how about make the cheese pizza a supreme instead? Make up for missing out on the variety earlier." She all but pulled Trevor out of the room in the direction she hoped the TV room would be in, leaving the not-quite-affianced couple alone in the kitchen to chat. "I have no idea what we're supposed to do now," she murmured to Trevor sotto voce as they walked away. "Is it weird that we're all just sort of pretending that didn't happen now? It seems weird to me. But we're not exactly barometers of normal," she conceded, looking around for the biggest TV.

Fleur listened to his entire recitation with the proper gravity, even if perhaps her lips twitched upwards at the corners once or twice. "So you're Beekeeper III," she summarized at the end of his recitation, "and you're a hero. Well then, good for you!" Her face lost its sternness when she smiled at him, and suddenly she seemed much less formidable. "Bees are admirable creatures, and someone ought to redeem their good name. If you'll just look after our friend here for a moment, I'll put up a wall to keep the civilians from getting too grabby with the money, and then we'll find out what's what. He should be waking soon." With that, the green-cowled heroine walked off a little ways and rummaged in her belt, tossing seeds into the air as though she were feeding birds. All through the streets, flowers began to grow and bloom, small at first, then growing bigger and closer together until the places where the money golems had burst or collapsed were screened off by tightly-woven topiary walls. A few civilians had to be gently moved with vines first, but the entire operation took a surprisingly brief amount of time.

"Not exactly, but it's the same general idea," Gina said, so dryly that it had to be some sort of joke, even if it was one he couldn't understand. "Anyway, they didn't stick. I'm very nearly tone deaf unless I'm using a robot to hear. I can enjoy music, just not perform it." She jotted a couple more notes, then set the pad aside. "The fat woman in the horned helmet is a parody of opera, she represents Brunhilde from Wagner's Ring Cycle. Which, incidentally, is playing sometime next year at the opera house as part of the series, but I'm going to make sure to be very busy. I like opera as much as the next uncultured engineer, but eighteen hours of it is a little much." She grinned at him conspiratorially. "At least in the VIP box, nobody can tell if you've pulled out your phone. Or gone to sleep."

Fleur cocked her head and looked at the young man, pursing her lips as though trying to place him. "He looks familiar," she finally said, "but I'm not sure from where. He's probably caused trouble before." She flicked her fingers and suddenly the unconscious young man was engulfed in vines, bound securely hand and food, and with a leafy gag for good measure. "If he is a magic user," she pointed out, "we don't want him casting any more spells around here. Now," she added, ignoring the bound villain for a moment and focusing her attention back on the Beekeeper, "we have a moment or two before a riot breaks out in the street from all the money rattling around. So you can tell me exactly who you are and why you're masquerading as Freedom City's most irritating insect-themed villain." Her tone suggested that to demur would be to court the same leafy fate as the unfortunate young magician.

"An opera is like a stage play... which is like a television show acted out in real time on a live stage," Gina added quickly, not sure Steve would understand plays either. "The audience sits in a large theater, many rows of seats and elevated boxes with the stage at the front. The actors stand on the stage and perform the story for the audience. In an opera, the performers are acting out a story, but instead of dialogue, they sing everything. In this case, they'll sing everything in German. It's interesting, but it can take some getting used to," she allowed. "The first opera in the series is Fidelio, by Beethoven, so that's lucky. You should find that a lot more accessible than The Ring Cycle. I'll find you a little book about it so you can read up beforehand. Opera is better when you have an idea of what everyone is singing about." Gina smiled, a little amused that she should be talking about taking her boyfriend to see an opera, given where they'd both come from. "I endured a couple of years of singing lessons when I was younger," she told him, "and my teacher was very hung up on using opera as a talent. I absolutely butchered the Habanera from Carmen for at least six months before she gave up on me. These singers, though, are going to be very good. Do you prefer a double-breasted coat or... never mind, I'll take care of that part."

"Well, that will be a sure thing," Gina told him, in a voice that was very nearly rueful. "Miss A goes to a lot of red carpet events. I've been finding dignitaries and minor celebrities to escort her so far, but this will toss you right in on the deep end. We'll need to get you fitted for a tux and some new suits. I don't mind one way or the other, but if it will make you feel more comfortable, we can use cosmetics or technology to cover the visible scars when you're on the red carpet. I'm set for the VIP booth at the Opera House next weekend, ArcheTech is sponsoring a whole season of the Germanic operas. Do you want to go?" She set aside her full plate and took her pad computer from her pocket, jabbing at it with the stylus as she began making notes.

"Well, you can't get rid of me entirely anyway, the robot's not anatomically correct," Gina pointed out dryly. "There are some lines I don't believe in crossing, even for science." She seemed very complacent about the whole business, except in her fingers, which were busily shredding the crust of her barely-touched garlic bread into dust. "But I know spending all these evenings here has to be boring for you. Going out with Miss A should be anything but that. She's got no secondary identity, and she's not exactly easy to miss, so everything's going to be public with her. Do you know if you want to date her as Steve, as Harrier, as Caradoc, or some combination thereof?"

Gina considered that, her enhanced mind turning over options and possibilities much faster than the blinking of an eye. "Yes," she agreed complacently, "I suppose it wouldn't be much of a difficulty for us to have a public relationship in our heroic identities, or even you in your non-heroic identity. We do spend quite a bit of time together that way already, between me patching you up and all the diagnostics and schematics of Omegadrones we've made. It's the sort of relationship that could grow up naturally." She tapped her finger against her lips, considering. "There is the issue of ArcheTech and HAX technically being competitors, but Dragonfly and I already work together at the Lab and we've never had any problems. It's not as though I ask too closely what you're doing at work." The idea of kissing and cuddling while inhabiting the robot body was strange and a little uncomfortable to Gina, but it wasn't as though he was asking for sloppy makeout sessions in public, she reasoned. Miss Americana and Harrier were both fairly reserved with their emotions, so no one would be expecting too much. And she could readily understand the social coup it would be for Steve as a man to be seen with the lovely Miss Americana on his arm. He'd made a lot of compromises to meet her where she was, literally, in terms of the relationship. Giving something back was only fair. "We'd have to be even more careful about meetings here, though. A public relationship will draw a great deal of attention, and I can't afford to have anybody finding my hideout."

"Thanks," she told him, the slight twist to her smile making it clear that she didn't believe the words. Despite her general disdain for mirrors, Gina knew perfectly well what she looked like, and it certainly wasn't close to the beautiful superheroines they both worked with, and certainly not to the sculpted perfection of her own created counterpart. She came up to a sort of minimal adequacy when she worked hard enough at it, and that had to be enough. "I'm sure the lighting helps." Steve had turned on the overhead lights in the kitchen to cook, but she'd quickly employed the dimmer switch to give their meal some ambiance. She took another sip of wine and watched him eat. "What have you been thinking?" she asked, a note of caution creeping into her voice.

She dressed while he cooked, an operation that took rather a long time since she insisted on doing her hair and makeup even though it was the middle of the night. Though she wore sweatsuits and didn't bother with cosmetics when she was alone, whenever she was with Steve or had warning that he was coming over, that particular sort of feminine armor went on. It was sometimes odd to see Gina and recognize the same fashion sensibility that went into Miss Americana, just without nearly as striking a canvas. By the time Steve was dishing up a lasagna skillet and freeze-and-bake garlic bread, Gina was out and setting the table with two places, then pouring an incongruously nice wine for both of them. "You'll have to take the leftovers," Gina told him as they sat down. "Sharl's dropping by tomorrow and he'll raid the refrigerator and make a mess." She took a sip of her wine and toyed with her fork, then picked up her bread and took a dainty bite from one edge.

"Yeah?" Gina asked as she stepped out of the bathroom, bringing with her a puff of warm steam and the scent of pomegranate soap. She was wrapped only in a towel, with her wet hair hanging in ropes to brush her shoulders, but since it was dark and there was half a hallway between them, she didn't mind as much. "Shower's free," she told him, even as she stepped down the hall towards her room. "I ordered some of that guy-wash stuff you like, it's on the rack in there." It felt a bit weird to her to have Steve's shampoo, Steve's toothbrush and toothpaste in her bathroom, but with the amount of time he was starting to spend over, and how dirty he sometimes was when he arrived, it made sense. Plus, Gina was very particular about her own toiletries and cosmetics, so it was easier to just get separate ones for him. It wasn't as though Sharl ever went in the bathrooms, anyway. "You hungry?"

Fleur's eyes narrowed behind her domino mask as she took in this new contender. "Wow, and here I thought that seeing the Beekeeper robbing a bank was the most uncharacteristic behavior I'd see today," she drawled, even as her vine slowed to a halt. "I guess the economy is bad all over, if it's got even you turning to petty thievery." The bank might have disputed this characterization, but for a magic-user of Malador's capabilities, it was apt enough. "Let me give you something to help you relax." From the end of the tree-trunk vine, another vine suddenly shot forward, unspooling itself like it had a grappling hook attached to the end. Instead of a hook, though, a brilliant orange flower bloomed, its center a solid cluster of pollen-laden anthers. In a moment, the flying flower had reached its destination, smacking into "Malador" with a harmless paff that released an enormous yellow cloud of pollen into the air. The villain barely had time to start coughing before he was quite overwhelmed, his eyes rolling back in his head as he passed out. And since he was right over the water... Fleur muttered something unladylike, then raised her voice to the Beekeeper. "Catch him!" she ordered. "I didn't expect it to hit him so hard!"

Stun attack on Fake Malador! 1d20+7=24! That's a DC 28 fortitude save for our cheeky boy.

"There's no way you can know that for certain," Miss A pointed out, looking as profoundly uncomfortable as anyone but Sharl had ever seen her. "By going back to the past and attempting to change it, you have irreversibly altered the causality that created your future in the first place. According to current dimensional science, all you've accomplished is to create a divergent alternate universe of your own timeline, no matter how successful your mission is." She folded her arms across her chest, one perfect finger beating a rapid tattoo on the opposite wrist as she studied her strange benefactor. "How many people did you enhance like this?" she asked matter-of-factly. "Was it only in this time, or in other times as well?"