Electra
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Reflex save: 17
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Erin watched Mark take off, shading her eyes as he rapidly disappeared into the blue sky above. After a few moments of empty sky, she looked over at Mike. "I don't think he's coming down the easy way," she commented conversationally, glancing again at the sky. "You want to go catch him before he coincidentally lands on a 747 or something?"
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Erin watched him, folding her arms and leaning against the hollow metal shell of a rooftop HVAC unit. "Just because there's hell doesn't mean there has to be heaven," she replied quietly. "Or that a devil means there's a god. It's a lot easier to have a devil, someone who messes things up and makes people want to do bad things and tortures them for fun. I don't know if it even makes sense to think there's someone or more than one someones who are all powerful and use that power to make sure things go well, or that good people are rewarded. Why would they even bother, and then make it seem like no one is intervening, and not letting anyone be sure of what happens when they die? I mean, what would be the point?" She turned her head up and looked at the sky, spotting the couple of stars visible through clouds and light pollution. "I guess I hoped he would be able to explain things, not just, I dunno, try and score points off you. Maybe he doesn't know either. He doesn't seem to know much about the way things work on Earth."
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Erin had made pretty good progress getting back towards the school by the time James caught up with her. She paused when he spoke, turning from the leap she'd been about to make. "I'm okay," she replied, though the words weren't exactly convincing. "It was dumb to come out here tonight, I don't know what I was trying to prove. I guess maybe if he was just some clown with wings and a tinsel halo, it would've made me feel better." She shrugged. "It's just I used to believe all that stuff, you know? Like God keeps an eye on things and makes sure they turn out how they're supposed to if you pray hard enough and do what you're supposed to. But it wasn't true."
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For a moment, Erin's entire body tensed as though she were preparing to jump into a fight. She reached for her bat automatically, but of course it wasn't there, not on her street clothes. They hadn't come to fight. She made herself straighten and looked the angel in the eye. "I've seen the end of the world," she told him spitefully. "And maybe there's no anger or injustice, but there sure as hell isn't any reaching of potential or brotherly love. It's just empty, just nothing, after all the millions of people who were begging God to save them were all dead. If there is a God, then your sadist God let six billion people die on my world and did nothing to stop it. I hope you're just some voice-hearing crazy with wings." Sick to her stomach, Erin didn't wait around to hear whatever the "angel" had to say next. With a half-apologetic look at James, she turned and leapt into the sky, landing on the roof of the nearest building and heading back towards the school. If she stayed, she was sure to do something that would only get her in trouble.
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"I know for a fact that's a damn lie," Erin spat, clasping her hands to fists behind her back. "The tendency of the universe is toward entropy, and the only thing holding it back anywhere is people. Not God, and not angels. And when people fail, God couldn't care less. Why did you come here, anyway, if you are who you say? Why aren't you in Haiti, or Bangladesh or Somalia, someplace where there are a lot more people God is ignoring?" she challenged.
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Erin listened, cocking her head skeptically. "I guess that's true," she finally said, her voice caustic. "If just because it seems like that God, anyway, is blind to everyone, no matter whether they're good or bad. Or if not blind, maybe he just doesn't care very much any more." She shifted from foot to foot, still studying the angel as though he were a puzzle she really wanted to figure out. "Did He send you down here to Freedom City? What are you supposed to do here?"
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"I'm not sure anybody at Claremont quite makes it to normal, even the teachers," Erin pointed out. "On the other hand, not too many girls have a boyfriend who can take them out flying or carry their books to the moon. I bet he comes around eventually, he's got a lot of hormones and stuff. I mean, look at the other guys." She laughed. "Maybe you should be happy you have to coax him out of his shell a little." After another moment's consideration, she added the bikini to her try-on pile, then immediately covered it with another safe black one-piece number. "You ready to try these things on?" she asked, craning her neck to find the changing room.
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Erin blinked at that, turning to regard the angel all over again. "So are you from, like, the Christian heaven?" she pressed, studying the self-proclaimed emissary. "The one in the Bible? Where were you guys back in November, anyway?" That just sort of popped out, but she was very curious.
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Erin looked at the angel guy's suddenly combative posture, then at James' momentary expression of rage. She quickly stepped into the space between the two of them, hoping to defuse things before anyone made an aggressive move. She suspected that if they really wanted to, James could teleport or Freedom Angel could dive bomb, but hopefully it wouldn't come to that. "This is Hellion, my teammate," she told Freedom Angel matter-of-factly. "We're students at Claremont Academy. We wanted to know if you're really an angel."
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Erin shrugged. "No, I don't think so. I mean, maybe if he had convictions that he shouldn't do anything before marriage, one of those really restrictive religions or something, it might be kind of mean to try and push him out of them. But if he's just too nervous to do anything, then you're trying to help him get over that." The corners of her mouth pulled upwards. "The evidence is pretty suggestive that you two eventually do manage to get past second base, even if it does take another fifteen years. I can't blame you for maybe wanting to hurry that up a little bit." As she spoke, Erin pulled a blue and green bikini in her own size off the rack and studied it. "I can't decide if wearing one of these would make me look like I've been inflated with a bike pump." It was a little tempting to try one on, just for curiosity's sake, but she strongly suspected she'd look stupid in it.
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Stesha yelped as the room shook and she went tumbling over, smacking her head smartly against a work counter. "Oh, that is the very living end," she muttered, shoving her cowl back to bare her green hair to the sun streaming in through the hole in the wall. Reaching into her pouch, she drew out a seed and tossed it at whoever was masquerading as Captain Thunder. It grew in the air, becoming a vine of ivy as thick as a man's arm. It anchored itself around an embedded work table then snaked out to wrap around Captain Thunder, snaking up his body and yanking him to the ground.
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Stesha succeeds in the reflex save, but does not have any evasion, more's the pity. She fails the toughness save and is bruised. Luckily, there is a big hole in the wall through which the sun can shine in. For her turn, she'll be using Move Object to attempt to grapple Captain Thunder. She fails, spends an HP, gets a 20 on the reroll. I am told that hits, so there is a grapple roll to be made. She gets a 36.
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Erin blinked at Mark a few times, unable to hide a skeptical look at that idea. Sure he was technically the leader of the team, in the sense that he really liked to charge out in front whenever possible, and he had a knack for inspiring everyone else with his speeches and stuff. That didn't mean he usually had very good ideas. Like inviting someone they'd never met to join the team because he couldn't seem to take his eyes off her. "Well, what can you do?" Erin asked Faith. "I mean, besides heal people. Do you know how to fight?" She tried to be open-minded about it, some people learned how to use their powers long before they arrived at Claremont, and some were very quick studies. Maybe it could work.
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Erin snorted. "Between Faith and Mark and Eddie and Zoe, we might have to curtain off half the pool to protect our eyes," she joked. "I guess I better hope James isn't bringing a date, or I could be the only one there alone." Frowning thoughtfully, she replaced the blue suit on the rack, it looked a little too much like the swimsuit version of the Claremont uniform. "Are you going to try all of those on?"
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"Um, he can't come in," Erin said hesitantly. "It's sort of an allergy thing. Can you come outside and talk to us?" It sounded a little suspicious, even to her, but hey, if he was an angel, he shouldn't have anything to be afraid of, right? "It won't take very long." She studied the "angel" as he decided, trying to make up her mind about him. He was beautiful enough to be an angel from a painting, but then again, so was James.
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Sorry to be late... again. It's this unmodified d20 of mine. Stesha goes on 14
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"I have some money," Erin replied, trying not to sound defensive about it. "Roger and Clarissa sent me some for my birthday and Christmas. Not that I know why anybody would need two swimsuits. Who goes swimming that often, anyway?" Keeping an eye on Alex's investments a couple nights a week wasn't that hard, and it kept Oliver in cat food, so it was not a bad part-time gig. Erin wasn't so sure about the actual investment portfolio stuff, that was Alex's deal. Watching bemusedly as Alex found suits in every color of the rainbow, she selected a couple of one-piece suits that looked like they'd probably fit, one navy blue and one purple. "Who else do you think is going to come to this thing?"
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Erin grimaced at that hypothetical glimpse into Mike's fantasy life and decided not to pursue that line of thought any further. "Well, maybe you can go with a mix of what you like and what he likes. Like your tastes, but a little more... dark. Sober, maybe. How much skin do you want to show off?" she asked, pulling a deep red bikini off the rack. It wasn't a style that would likely do Alex's endowments a lot of favors, but it certainly showed plenty of bare flesh. She twanged one of the straps experimentally. "There's a lot of spandex in these things, they probably won't fall off unless the roughhousing gets really rough. Kind of expensive though," she added, grimacing at the price tag. "All of these are."
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"Well yeah, that might be a little too ready for second base," Erin joked. She held the tankini up on herself consideringly, then put it back on the rack. "The little kid ones are probably no good anyway, they haven't got any cups in them," she pointed out. "You're more likely to fall out of one of those than something that's designed with a little more engineering. But you know, you've known Mike all your life. You know what he likes, right?"
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Erin blinked at the selection, trying to think of something tactful to say. When that didn't work, she admitted, "I think they more kinda say "I'm ready for Kool-aid Man to come serve juice at my pool party." She pulled a silver and blue tankini off the rack that was a couple of sizes too big for Alex, but a lot calmer in colors. "Maybe something a little more subtle," Erin suggested, holding up the swimsuit for example. "You, um, want him looking at you, right, not at the pattern on your swimsuit?"
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Erin and Alex go shopping.
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The entire Bayview mall was bathed in red. It hung in streamers from the ceilings, covered the walls, and painted the glass display cases, spattering signs and drenching employees and their wares alike. All the unrelieved visceral color was tiresome to the eyes, but that was what you got for going shopping just before Valentine's Day. None of the cash-hungry stores were about to let anybody forget that the best way to show love was to buy your significant other plenty of presents. Alex, though, had taken care of her gifts far in advance of the holiday, and it wasn't something Erin had to worry about. They were on another mission entirely. "Don't you think it seems kind of, I dunno, optimistic to put out the swimsuits in February?" Erin asked rhetorically, perusing the racks of lycra and spandex in Macy's Juniors department. "We've got James to make a pool party work out, but it's not even thirty degrees outside yet. Who's going to be going swimming yet?" Despite her skepticism, she paused in her searching to examine and discard several different suits. She'd gotten some money from her sort-of-parents for Christmas, and she wasn't going to wear a borrowed suit anymore if she could help it.
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Dressed in jeans, a red sweater, and an unzipped blue winter coat, Erin looked like a regular high school student, not like much of a hero. Even so, for some reason she felt reluctant to give her real name. I'm Wander," she told the man. He looked the part of an angel, that was for sure, but that didn't mean much, especially in a place like Freedom City. "My friend and I read about you in the paper, and we wanted to talk to you. He's waiting outside. Will you talk to us?"
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"I'm Erin, said the taller girl, the one who'd yelled the warning initially. She was bouncing lightly on the balls of her feet, and looked like she was interested in getting back to the game or training or whatever it was as soon as possible. "Sorry about almost getting you run over. I wasn't expecting anyone to come out of that door this time of day."