Electra
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Freedom City PBP: A How-To Guide
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"We'll make a pass around this floor and see if we can find him," Raina suggested, "and then it's time for clothes, shoes, makeup, and food. Keep an eye out, see if you see anything cute you like on the mannequins. Be open-minded, wearing boyclothes is very in this year, so whatever strikes your fancy." Checking her phone one more time, she slid it into her little purse and headed out in the direction of the Juniors section. "Hey Matt, you around anywhere?" she called softly enough not to carry too far over the muzak. "We're done in Scary Bra Land!"
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"Yeah, but you'll need that to fill in your summer look, or get a windbreaker or replace stuff that gets torn," Raina pointed out as they headed for the register. "Anibal already said he was fine paying for our shopping, remember?" She waggled the card at Fred. "Just because he's not here doesn't mean he can't pay. And it's not like he'll even notice the kind of money we'll be spending today. They don't even have the kind of stores worth spending more than maybe a couple thousand dollars in here. We'd need a completely different mall. My mom and I used to go up to Chicago three or four times a year because Indianapolis was so completely useless. But anyway, unless you're planning on dropping twenty grand on school clothes, you're not even going to make a ripple." That said, she neatly appropriated all of Fred's new undergarments and marched them off to the register to pay.
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"I know, right?" Raina called cheerfully through the door. "Try on a couple more in that size, see what you like. You should get at least a beige, a white and a black, plus a couple of pretty ones to mix it up and for, uh, spares. Then yank the tags off the beige one so we can pay for it and you can keep wearing it. You can't try on other clothes with a bad bra, nothing will fit right." A few more outlandishly colored and patterned bras found their way over the top of the door to punctuate the witch's advice. By the time Fred finished making her selections, Raina was leaning against the wall outside the fitting room, playing with her phone and with a shopping bag slung over her arm. "Anibal found a thing he wants to buy, can't really tell if it's at a store or is the store, but he'll be along in a little bit. In the meantime, I've got this." She did a magician's pass and produced a black credit card. "Let's pay for this stuff, then go round up Matt and get you some clothes people can actually look at."
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"My techniques for body alteration are a lot less dramatic and permanent than yours," Raina reminded Fred glibly. She looked into one of the wall mirrors and hummed a few bars, scrubbing at at imaginary smudge on the glass, and suddenly she was the saleslady, right down to the dressmakers-tape scarf. "And really, who doesn't want to be somebody else every once in awhile? Whoops!" The sound of approaching footsteps had Raina passing a hand over the mirror and returning to her normal self just in time to hurry out and let the actual saleslady in. The woman carried in half a dozen bras in different colors and styles, ranging from the highly utilitarian to the extremely decorative. Raina stuck her head in again and oohed over the lacy pink and purple ones, but steered Fred towards a very staid beige model. "Try that one on," she instructed. "If you know that it's the right size, then you can buy whichever ones you want, easier that way. Just remember to bend forward at the waist and shake a little to get yourself situated in the cups," she advised, then ducked out once more. Outside, Fred could hear her having a discussion with the saleslady for a moment before moving off. A minute or two later, another four or five colorful choices were flung up to hang over Fred's door from outside. "Here's some more to choose from. Don't worry, I didn't let her come near you with an underwire. Those things are the freaking worst."
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"Don't worry about it," Raina assured her blithely, "the scoring is pretty much exactly opposite of the grading scale in school, in terms of what you want to get. Well, to a certain point, anyway." She grinned. "If you get an F, they pretty much send you to a specialty store. But you're just fine, you're proportionate and that's plenty good, especially since you don't even care most of the time." She swept into Fred's dressing room and sat down on the narrow bench. "A boob job is when you don't get the letter you were hoping for and give Mother Nature a little hand," she confirmed, even as she pulled out her phone and began texting. "Some of my older friends were already getting them when I left Indiana, but my mom said no way before I was eighteen." Raina sighed dramatically. "At least there's always magic."
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"Not here," Raina said with a poorly suppressed scoff, though that seemed to be more at the idea that one would make an appointment at a place like this than anything else. "You want a real professional fitting at a lingerie store and you're prepared to drop a few grand on your unmentionables, then you get an appointment. Here you just find the lady working the register and tell her you want a fitting." Matching words to action, she headed for the nearby desk and flagged down a sensibly-dressed middle-aged woman with a nametag on her blouse and a dressmaker's tape draped around her neck. "Hi, my friend doesn't know her bra size. She needs a fitting and probably three or four new bras," Raina explained with complete ease. "Can you help us out?" "Yes of course, come right this way." The woman gave Fred a friendly smile, perhaps noticing her unease, and led them into a narrow corridor of booths, each one with a latching door, a number of pegs on each wall, and several mirrors. Raina stood outside and studied herself in a three-way mirror while Fred and the shopwoman went into a dressing room and the woman put her tape to work. It was a bit strange, but fairly clinical and Fred didn't have to take her clothes off, merely raise her arms and turn from side to side while her torso was wrapped and measured. "So I've been thinking about getting a boob job," Raina called from outside, apparently bored with quiet study. "I could wear a lot more of these negligees and stuff if I had a little more oomph in the balcony rows. What do you think?" "You really ought to wait," the saleslady called back, completely unfazed. "If you have surgery before you're finished developing, you could rob yourself of your full natural figure." She wrapped her tape back up and told Fred some meaningless numbers and letters. "I'll be right back with a few things for you to look at." As she left, Raina stuck her head into the dressing room. "All good?" she asked Fred.
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"You don't want pale," Raina informed Fred as they walked briskly down the main concourse of the mall, dodging around small knots of shoppers. "Pale's just gonna make you look like you've been spending too many hours in the lab. You've got really decent skin already, so that's a plus. I'm not talking like caking you with makeup or anything, just the basics. If you've got some decent foundation and blush, a good coverup, some liner, shadow, and lipcolor, you're in pretty good shape. Even if you don't want the makeup look everyday, you should still have some stuff in your toolkit. Get the right makeup and a little technique, nobody ever needs to know if you're sick or you've been crying or you've got a huge zit." Raina's own makeup was fairly subtle, so at least she mostly practiced what she preached. "But anyway, clothes first. Here we go." She led the way into one of the large stores at the end of a long corridor, one that beckoned with counters full of jewelry and blank-faced mannequins wearing slacks and blouses. A moment's consultation with a map had them going up an escalator, into a section of the store that seemed entirely devoted to women's undergarments. "Peel off now, Matt," Raina advised with a smirk. "This isn't for the faint of heart."
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Stesha laughed. "Nah, I live here," she explained to Lilly. "If I went away for a long time, it might wither, maybe even die," she allowed, "but while I'm nearby, nothing dies." Indeed, though the bite in the air here suggested a time of year similar to Freedom City's, the grass, flowers and deciduous trees surrounding them seemed to speak of nothing later than early fall. "I built the core of it with some judicious use of trellises, but for the additions, I really just grow the plants in the shape I want. I had a friend help me with the windows. Come on in." She led the way into the house, which was cozy and warm on the inside, with a faint smell of leaves and cinnamon tea. There weren't a lot of interior walls in the main area, just one large room that had a compact kitchen, a dining area and a living area complete with a television. Walking into the kitchen, Stesha poured water from a pitcher into an electric kettle and started it going. "This is an alternate Earth," she explained. "You got some dimensional theory at school, right? This is one of those Earths where things went really, really wrong about seventy-five years ago. We still haven't figured out exactly what it was, but there's some evidence there was an arms race spurred on by the Grue and everything got wiped out. Pockets of survivors here and there, but it was mostly completely trashed and empty. Back when my powers started growing to the macro scale, I needed somewhere to practice large-scale transformations that wouldn't hurt things in Freedom City. A completely blasted landscape was pretty safe. And it sort of grew into a project." She smiled, a little ruefully. "How dark do you like your coffee?"
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Jessie threw an uncertain look after Bliss, but judged that there was nothing violence could do to solve that situation, which left her with a pretty empty toolbox. Somebody else would have to solve that problem. In the meantime, it sounded as though there might be something she could actually fight, finally, at long last. That was so much more palatable than trying to work her mind around the idea that they were about to be thrown into the past and live the rest of their lives there and there was nothing to be done about it. She leapt after Aquaria, landing partway up the building and then swarming up the rest of the way as easily as though she were climbing a ladder.
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"I could get you some, they're surprisingly easy to propagate," Fleur told her as they stepped out of the green light and into a clearing in what looked like the middle of a dense forest. In the center of the clearing was a house made of live plants and what looked like faceted quartz, still green despite the season and a striking visual in the morning sunlight. "But if you don't have any trouble making them right now, there's no reason to mess with success! Everyone's powers work a little differently, that's what's so fascinating about metahumanity." She turned and led the way up a little crushed-rock path towards the house. "This is Sanctuary, the world I'm terraforming. Ammy and I live here most of the time and take care of the place. It looks a lot nicer in the spring, obviously, but it's home. Where do you come from?"
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"Thank you!" Pleased with the gift, Ammy took the flower, hugged her mother, and then ran off to join her friends. Stesha watched her go with a fond, slightly wistful smile. "No separation anxiety problems there," she murmured, then turned to grin at Lilly. "Right then, coffee time." A wave of her hand opened the portal again, this time with light of a slightly deeper green. "Do you spontaneously generate all your plants?" she asked curiously, in the way of shop talk. "I usually find it easier to start from seeds when I can."
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There was a quick rush of green light, the scent of crisp autumn leaves, and then all three of them were standing outside an entirely different school building, in front of a tree with a rapidly-decreasing person-sized knot in the trunk. The sign above the front door read simply "Nicholson Primary School" in the same font as a thousand other aggressively unmemorable elementary schools. A yellow school bus was just pulling up outside, discharging a handful of children, one of whom had silvery-blue skin and white hair, one of whom literally flew out the bus door. Amaryllis waved to Lilly, then pbviously decided that this was not good enough. Reaching down, she drew a circle on the ground with her small finger. In the center of the circle, a green shoot began to grow, shakily at first, then increasing in both size and speed. Very quickly, it sprouted lacy leaves, then a green stem and a fat yellow dandelion head. Plucking the flower at the base of its stem, the little girl presented it to Lilly with great pride. "It's for you!"
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"Okay, great," Stesha replied, pleased. "If you don't mind coming with me to drop Ammy at school, we can go to my home on Sanctuary and have coffee and talk. You don't mind dimensional travel, do you? Just a quick hop and back, really, but if you'd rather, we can drop by Starbucks instead." She led the way back out of the building and onto the lawn, where a massive sunflower had apparently grown from nowhere and bloomed a flower six feet around. As Stesha approached, it yawned open like a door, revealing green light within. Amaryllis acted like this was nothing unusual, she hitched up her little backpack and hopped into the flower without any hesitation at all.
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Amaryllis gave Lilly a shy smile and a finger wave, though she didn't seem quite ready to come out from behind her mother just yet. "Sorry I didn't tell you ahead of time I was bringing her," Stesha apologized with a somewhat abashed grin. "I told her this morning I was coming to meet another girl who could control plants and she insisted on getting an introduction as well. I'll be dropping her off at Nicholson in just a few minutes." Lilly had heard of Nicholson School, it was the feeder school for Claremont, where children with metahuman abilities could learn to control their powers before starting hero training at Claremont. If Amaryllis was attending so young then she almost certainly had powers, if the green hair and famous mother weren't tip-off enough. "I don't have a lot of concrete plans for today, I thought this could be more a getting-to-know-you session. Do you like coffee?"
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The front door opened and a small woman walked in, even shorter than Lilly. She wore faded blue jeans and an old Northwestern College sweatshirt under a jacket and what must have been incredibly long green hair was braided in a tight crown against her head. Next to her was a little girl, maybe preschool aged, with riotously curly green hair and a puffy pink winter coat. The little girl got a load of Lilly and hid behind the woman's leg, but the woman herself smiled kindly in the student's direction. "Hi, are you Lilly? I'm Stesha Madison, and this is my daughter Amaryllis." As Stesha approached, Lilly could feel a faint stir of well-banked power, and smell a faint whiff of flowers.
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Paige plucked the image from the man's mind, sending it automatically to her family members. ~That's James Monaghan~ she informed them, puzzled disbelief in her mental tone. ~He's an accountant for the studio, he crunches numbers for the show. I think I kind of recognize the place he's in, that's the hotel the producers stay in when we go on location to Freedom City. What would he be doing talking to this guy?~ Out loud she remarked, "I hope you got paid up front. You'll need a good team of lawyers if you wind up a felony accessory to kidnapping and murder. Plus there's no reason this guy would have that kind of money to give you. He's nobody. How did he arrange to pay you?" As she spoke, she extended her mind again, searching for Errant himself, or for any psychic dead spots where he might be hidden.
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"Okay, what we're gonna do, is we're gonna start you at Bloomingdale's," Raina decided, with a quick look at the mall map to orient herself. "The clothes are boring, but they've got classic styles, and we'll get you fitted for a decent bra there. The ladies there do it all the time, they're like doctors, don't even worry about it. Once you get an idea of some stuff you like, some good colors and lines, then we'll branch out and get more adventurous. You carry off the baffled academic look okay, but you'll look better in more tailored clothes," she promised. "Then we'll get you a makeover, see what kind of skin gunk and colors you need, then some shoes and accessories. Perfect!" Raina started walking again, then paused and turned back to Fred. "It'll be fun, really. I won't let you be embarrassed by anything, swear to god. This is gonna be good."
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"It's okay, Will," Paige murmured, automatically trying to soothe her agitated son. It was well-earned agitation, but old habits died hard. She cautiously approached the disarmed man, making sure to keep her mental shields firmly in place and her senses extended in case of any tricks. "Who are you?" she demanded. "What are you doing attacking us? Do you have anything to do with Errant's disappearance?" She'd pick his mind to pieces if she had to, get help if she needed it, but her head was already beginning to ache from the assault that had woken her earlier, and she was in no mood to be denied.
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Jessie looked a little shaken after being set down, but she walked along with Aquaria and Kee'lee, still trying to absorb the situation and watch for threats all at the same time. "I'm not sure what's going on," she murmured to Aquaria. "Was that you from the future? Or are we from the future and going back in time? They're like how the Furions are with Erin and Trevor." She was somewhat unsettled by this idea, but somewhat intrigued as well. Erin was always the hero, always the important one who'd saved all the people or averted the apocalypse or made the daring just-in-time save. Jessie had been on the outskirts of a few heroic activities, but never anything big or memorable. Maybe that was different here.
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"It's not supposed to be an architectural masterpiece, and this is just the parking lot," Raina scoffed cheerfully. "The point isn't to wander around looking at the building, it's the stores inside." She grabbed Winnifred by the hand, her own skin nearly fever-hot but dry and smooth, and pulled her through the main doors and into the building. The front lobby opened straight into the atrium, which was at least prettier to look at than the outside, with a soaring skylight and a wide balcony running along the second floor of shops. A glass elevator ran between the floors, while the water splashes from the large central fountain arced nearly as high. "So, you need clothes. You want the boring everyday school-type clothes, or do you want something cool?"
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Dropped free of the hyperspeed bubble, Paige darted to cover behind the nearest wall, keeping one eye on the leader with the rifle. ~The one with the rifle is the psychic,~ she told Richard and Will. ~Keep him distracted and he's less likely to cause big trouble.~ For her own part, she sent a testing blast at his mental barriers, one that if successful would've stunned him and put an easy end to the situation. She wasn't particularly surprised when he was able to shrug it off. Psychic on psychic combat tended to be a complex and messy business, and she'd be much happier if one of the other Clines would just nail the guy in the head for a much easier denoument.
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Okay, Paige is going to try and Stun the bad psychic. Her stun is perception range and uses the Altenrnate Save: Will. I will have her enhance it with her Terminus array, which means it's a DC 22 Will Save, and for her move action she will seek cover.
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"That's nice, should make the holidays more peaceful. I'll let you get back to work." Erin gave him a quick smile before turning back to her own tasks, shoving more groceries into the already well-stocked larder. Every kitchen Riley had seen in this house had a well-stocked larder, in fact, full of nonperishable foods and canned goods enough to last the two residents of the house for weeks. Even though Riley and Erin didn't talk too much about it, in some ways they really did have a great deal in common.
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"I dunno," Erin admitted with a shrug. "We don't really have any Christmas traditions. The first couple years I was in-world, I didn't want to do anything with anybody. I couldn't handle being with my family the way you can, it just didn't work out. Then there were a couple years I spent with Trevor and his grandpa, but they usually got interrupted by superbattles, and one time I was kidnapped into space and replaced with a robot doppelganger over Christmas. We'll probably figure something out, maybe get an aluminum tree and drink eggnog and watch Christmas movies." She grinned at him a little. "Is this the first Christmas you're bringing Robin to?"
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She laughed. "Nope, that sounds pretty terrible. Also, they make you go to college if you want to be a teacher, and that's not really my thing. But if you ever need to talk about stuff, well, you're here at my house almost as much as you're at your dorm, so I'm pretty easy to find." Erin paused for a moment, studying him with his cookies and his cocoa. "What are you doing for Christmas this year? You going to be with Peyton and the other Riley again?"