Gizmo

"Uh huh," Wail responded dryly, turning to face Temperance directly and crossing his arms across his broad chest. The young heroine was of a little better than average height, but the older man still had nearly a foot on her and the imperious gaze of an experienced educator. "Well, you've got a good bag of tricks with the water and ice and you did a good job watching out for civilians and property damage; lot of young bucks have to learn that one the hard way." He lifted one hand to stroke his grey streaked beard in thoughtful consideration. "Actual fighting skills need work, though, and you're not going to want to keep up the hoity toity voice long term," LaMarr advised bluntly. "Does explains the melodramatic and unexpectedly passionate tone of your last civics paper."

The state of the art resolution on the screen of Midnight's device did nothing to improve the quality of the grainy, black and white footage it was displaying. It was impossible to get a positive ID on the figures he spotted, but the distinctive headgear on one of them at least let him make an educated guess. "Wildcard. Have to assume Crime League," he relayed to the others, grimacing very slightly behind his featureless black mask. That meant the remaining intruders could be any of several powerful, varied villains. "Visual on two more. Forth isn't on camera. Could be Orion." He didn't have to explicitly warn his teammates to be on guard for an ambush if that was the case; Orion wasn't the only Crime Leaguer adept at stealth or misdirection, but he was perhaps the most deadly master of surprise among them.

"Well, I hear they've got rules about using convicts these days," Wail drawled in his low, reverberant tone. Naturally the aging hero had his own reservations about unchecked experimentation; seeing how badly Kirkstrom had messed himsef up, he was acutely aware of how lucky he'd gotten as a young man forced to take a foolish risk. "Have your chat," he told Gabriel with a nod, "but it wouldn't surprise me if they were set to shoot up with that shark juice themselves, push comes to shove. Rest of us should cover the exits. Just in case." He meant it as a suggestion, but there was enough presence in his stance and way of speaking to make it come across more like instructions.

"Phrasing, Mark," Trevor called calmly from in front of the monstrous contraption that had originally been at least six or seven separate grills of varying size. Not surprisingly, the mechanically inclined young man in the sunglasses and apron had disassembled each in turn and built a multi-compartment beast in its stead, capable of barbequing truly impressive quantities of food while requiring significantly more involved operation. Some of its components appeared to be automotive; there was definitely at least one hubcap involved, and an awful lot of fire. Trevor himself looked a little out of place in the direct summer sun, his pale skin liberally applied with sunscreen and his ever present fedora providing only minimal shade. Despite the beverages Erin had listed, the mug readily at hand was clearly filled with coffee, warm enough to be steaming. Some combination of those factors likely explained the trickle of inky mist rising from the back of his neck as he mopped his brow with an oven mitt. He gestured with the tongs in his other hand toward an umbrella covered patio table and several chairs, turning in the process to reveal red letters on his black apron which read 'Making A Midnight Snack'.

Ghost Girl was glad Wraith had answered Nick's question before she'd had to; the phantom was having difficulty not looking vaguely guilty let alone skirting around the topic of the curfew they were technically breaking. Meanwhile, the manticore kitten opened one eye lazily as Wraith's finger brushed the whiskers protruding from his simian face. The single feline iris moved back and forth with the wagging bit of living metal, properly entranced as the newly hatched creature tried to decide whether he was looking at food or not. The three throws of teeth in his ajar mouth suggested that more things fell under the former category than the latter. "Oh, sure, I'm gangbusters at disguises!" Kimber chimed in at Indira's implied question. For a brief moment the poltergeist seemed to blur out of focus as though just on the edge of any viewer's vision. When she became clear once again, she appeared as a properly opaque, living person, albeit still hovering a ways off of the ground. She appeared to have taken her normal human form but aged more fully into adulthood, perhaps her mid-twenties and dressed in a suitably chic evening gown. The intricate up-do her hair had arranged itself into was admittedly a little dated in its sensibilities, but the overall effect was convincing. It wasn't quite the form her teammate had seen her take on while distracting the cultists in the woods on one of their previous adventures; this was very much human while that transformation had been strangely otherworldly, but there were similarities. The manticore took the display fairly well, though his attention was taken away from Wraith's finger as he readjusted himself as Ghost Girl's sleeves disappeared. "I can do specific people, too!" she added, blurring momentarily once again before appearing as a near duplicate of Nick himself in full skull-faced make-up but still wearing the same evening gown. "I haven't gotten to really use it to fool anybody on a for reals mission yet," she admitted, her voice unchanged despite the shapeshifting, "but I'm sure I can pull it off!"

Well versed in the realm of stoicism, Midnight was not one to complain aloud or let irritation get to him. Riding on the back of a flying motorcycle while someone else piloted, his own bike shattered into charred salvage and having to hold onto his girlfriend just to stay securely upright, however, was just about the final straw. The indignity of it all was only marginally blunted by his hand-to-hand victory and worsened by the intensely disturbing scenery of the Terminus as they sped past. Indeed, it was enough to make the young man silently press his lips into a thin line behind his mask. Resting against Erin's back, he gradually became aware of her heartbeat growing slower. Intimately familiar with her usual rhythms, even after the trying battles of the day, his attention was roused. The faint chill radiating through her clothes soon had his own heart racing faster and once the pure light of the Silver Tree made the malevolent glow visible all thoughts of his own discomforts were extinguished. "Healer, now," he demanded of their Overrider chauffeur in a terse bark that offered no room for debate. "Faster or I'll kick you off and drive myself." Simultaneously, his thoughts were firing urgently over the mental link he shared with Eve regardless of distance. I need everything Etain noticed or inferred about Nightmare Doom's magic, quickly.

Notice Check. (1d20+10=17) Nope!

Kimber did as Koshiro instructed, gradually bringing the paper airplane to a skidding halt on the museum floor, rolling off of it in what was perhaps not the most graceful or dignified dismount but at least effective. The aircraft shrunk back down to it's original size and she pocketed it with the careful reverence of someone borrowing a friend's favourite toy. With her feet back on solid ground and Indira's voice in her head, the newly corporeal teenager quickly snapped back to her excitable nature. "Ohmigoodness, you're human right now? Like with bones and eyeballs and stuff? Me too! I am going to hug everyone, seriously, you don't even know!" Pausing mid-outburst, the Canadian blinked and placed one hand over her stomach. "Also, I haven't eaten in like sixteen years."

Initiative. (1d20+2=15)

Unfastening his mask to hang about his neck once they were in reasonably private company, Trevor looked faintly apprehensive about the prospect of zero gravity. It wasn't so much that he didn't think he'd be able to manage; he'd done some basic underwater simulation and was perfectly confident in his acrobatic abilities. Even so, for someone with a finely tuned, intuitive sense of distance and timing the idea of jumping and not actually coming back down was a little unsettling. Even so, it was obvious how enthused Erin was with the idea - Mark was more or less always enthused and Joe was an affable sort by nature so far as Trevor had seen - and that was enough for him to put his unease aside. "After you?" he offered.

Given his Gadgets, Midnight should be able to patch into the video cameras pretty easily (modeled with ESP, probably), but are there any skill checks you'd like him to make?

"No jinxes," Midnight warned Edge from the shadows, appearing as little more than a pair of glowing embers as he retrieved a handheld tablet computer from his belt and began patching into the museum's system of security cameras. He'd never considered himself a superstitious person before meeting Mark but the gregarious legacy hero tended to tempt fate with his mere presence. The last thing they needed was to further confuse their personal timestreams. The computer network in the building was actually well secured against most mundane intrusion, discouraging tampering with alarms systems or exhibit records. The internal monitoring devices, however, had not been warded against the possibility of someone attempting to view their findings while already physically inside. "See what we're dealing with, then plan," he advised quietly, though it wasn't hard to guess which way he was inclined to come down between the stealthy and more direct approach.

Right next to Rave and with his hands occupied, Wail didn't have the luxury of covering his ears before the waves of palpable despair crashed into him. There were days LaMarr fight with himself just to get out of bed in the morning, and there was nothing that some slip of a girl on a power trip could do that could compare to the dull ache of an empty apartment. "Enough." Shifting his grip on the villainess, he clamped a broad hand over her mouth, cutting off the dirge like caterwauling and preventing any further use of her sonic powers.

Striding in Edge's direction on the sand, Midnight caught the microphone out of the air in one hand, bringing it up to his masked face in a single, confident motion. "We win. Annihilists lose," he intoned to the thousand worlds watching and listening. His voice, echoing through the filter in his mask and steeled with resolve rung with the certainty of retribution as the air, stirred by the Wyldrides overhead, whipped about him. "Get used to it." With that simple message, the black clad hero pressed a control on the device, cutting the transmission. Tossing it back to Mark, he turned away before twisting something on his belt. The morphic molecules of his temporary armor fell from his dress shirt like oil sliding over water, the electrical current holding them in place removed. Immediately inky mist began to rise from his exposed forearms, the onyx flesh there slowly regaining its usual pale complexion. Lifting the chin of his mask to expose his mouth and nose, he made a disturbing retching sound, holding up his other hand in a forestalling gesture to reassure the others as he spat out a considerable amount of viscous tar-like liquid that was only vaguely recognizable as blood. As a subtle wisp of mist rose from the small puddle itself, Midnight pulled his mask back over the lower half of his face and cracked his back mightily before rubbing his arms until the involuntary shaking brought on by the prolonged electric shocks subsided. Turning back to the others, he nodded tersely, walking away from the stained sand. "Have to retrieve Night Cycle's wreckage, too, he mentioned casually, ignoring his rather unpleasant display. "See what I can salvage. Disarm any damaged munitions."

Blarg. Shaken, then. Fine. Wail Free Action: Maintain Grapple. Standard Action: Opposed Grapple Check to cover Rave's mouth and stop her powers. Opposed Grapple Check vs Rave; -2 Shaken. (1d20+21=22) For @#$%-- okay. Opposed Grapple Check vs Rave; -2 Shaken, HP Reroll. (1d20+21=22) ...I kid you not. Alright, with +10 that's 32.

Jack of all Blades (3) Demon in a Bottle (1) Interceptors: Eden (2) Vignette: NPC Limelight - Yolanda Midnight II (15) Vault Construction 101 (1) Greater Love (1) Faded Giant (2) Double Date of Doom (6) Gathering Like Clouds (5) Vignette: NPC Limelight - Redbird Wail (10) Science Shenanigans (1) Street Sharks (1) Wood and Clay Will Wash Away (5) Unfair Science Fair (3) Ghost Girl (17) Call, Raise or Fold (1) Mile in My Shoes (6) Enchanted Species (10) GM (11) Interceptors: Eden (1) Mile in My Shoes (10) Send the PP for the vignettes and the GM point up to Jack, which should bump him up to Impervium status, then feed it into Ghost Girl along with the rollover from the maxed out characters' posts.

Ghost Girl used two fingers on her free hand to point toward her eyes then toward DeVore, huffing as she floated across the room to peek over Nick's shoulder at the card, shifting her arm protectively around the cub. "I don't think she should be trusted with geese, either," she opined under her breath as she reread Milliner's job title a few times. "Anybody who would sell poor beasties to someone like her is probably a butt," the poltergeist continued in an uncharacteristic bout of harsh judgement. The manticore's tail twitched lazily as Kimber nodded decisively. "We've totally gotta shut them down!"

Wail Reflex Save vs. DC 20. (1d20+5=8) Fortitude Save vs. DC 20. (1d20+12=31) Will Save vs. DC 20. (1d20+10=15) Crud. Which is that, then?

Wail ran his hand through his beard thoughtfully as Miss Americana described her findings. The experienced hero had seen more than his share of mad super-science in his time and it was sometimes tough to keep track of what was and wasn't in the realm of science fiction anymore. If he had to confiscate one more of those phones with the texting messages in his class, honestly. "Well, not everybody can afford shiny new transistors and diodes and what," he rumbled aloud, looking about for Jennifer to make sure the students had been safely seen to. The ex-Marine knew her way around a crisis situation alright, so he wasn't too worried. "Maybe some folk found a trash pile, figured to do some recycling."

Midnight rolled his shoulders stiffly as he unsealed his borrowed spacesuit, resolving to come up with a better, more personalized option in case the need to opperate in vacuum arose again. It was good to have the situation dealt with, though the defeat of the energy entity left him uneasy. If it had survived, he wasn't sure that anything was preventing it from returning to Earth, better prepared in the future. Then again, now that they were aware of its existence, the heroes of the world would be prepared as well. He had to admit inwardly that Mark's claims of awesomeness were not unfounded; there was something very, very cool about actually being in outer space now that the immediate threat was over. Aloud, however he cleared his throat quietly and glanced toward Pseudo. "Don't want to tie up League resources..."

Wail muttered something uncomplimentary under his breath in annoyance as the chaos continued despite giving the miscreants ample opportunity to stop. "Boy, you're just making us all look bad with that aim. You want to be planting your feet," he advised, matching his actions to his words, his boots cracking the pavement beneath them as he steadied his considerable weight. "Then you gotta breath, take you time... and SHOUT!" The cannonball of sound barreled across the abandoned party, smashing into Rant while he was still unbalanced from Temperance's volley of ice. As much as his patience had worn out, Wail was still holding back on his full power; from what he could tell, neither of the criminal siblings were any sturdier than the average person.

Kimber had had time to get used to Cobalt Templar's fires, enough to know that they didn't actually burn like normal flames unless he wanted them to. Even so, the difficulty Sharl was having exerting that kind of fine control over the borrowed ring was beginning to make her more than a little nervous. With the entire team only a hair's breadth from panic, however, the temporarily living girl did her best to remain calm as her giant paper airplane flew back into the museum, dropping the doused Fathom off next to the similarly unconscious Sylph by banking and letting him tumble off heavily. "Cee Tee, don't get too close!" she yelped as the cowboy hat wearing phantom floated closer to the struggling AI. "You, um... fire can still hurt you. A lot," she finished quietly and a little sheepishly as the airplane carried her around the entire group in a wide circle. "But hey! We beat the bad guys, right? I mean, that's totally the hard part done!" Holding onto the front edge of the plane with one hand, she gave the team a thumbs up with the other as she circled. "Plus finding an artifact is probably going to be like super easy, 'cause a whole third of the gang is basically Indiana Jones already! So cheer up!" There was a silent pause that took her all the way through another loop around the showroom. "...I don't know how to get down."

NPC Limelight - Wingman Redbird [AI Imprinted Upon Trevor Hunter] June 22, 2012 The Furion autonomic machine intelligence known as Redbird did not sleep in the sense that organic beings did. When at rest she generally preferred to remain merged with a vehicle such that she was afforded some mobility and metaphorical breathing room. The Midnight Manor, underground base of operations for the partner she was currently imprinted upon, the second nocturnal vigilante to go by the name Midnight, offered no shortage of choices to that end, a variety of selection that she quite enjoyed, but her favourite remained the newly rebuilt Night Cycle. She considered herself a motorcycle, really, in the way a being who wore clothes might consider themselves a summer or winter. The Manor also allowed her to remain in contact with Earth's myriad of information networks, primarily the internet but also television channels, police radios and other broadcasted information to which she supposed she technically wasn't supposed to have access. She was also able to place herself in a sort of stand-by state of rest when her talents were not immediately needed. That did not mean she couldn't get bored. She certainly respected the need for the private time Trevor Hunter was presumably enjoying with his battlemate, the shieldmaiden Erin White, in the mansion above. If anything, she encouraged it! Part of the reason her current persona was female was in direct response to the increased effectiveness Midnight demonstrated when working in tandem with his formidable female allies. In fact she had adopted a few mannerisms almost directly from Wander, who frankly was much closer to what the intelligence was used to in a warrior than the stealthy detective, but she'd picked up early on that admitting that openly might have been somehow socially awkward. Humans were oddly sensitive about such things but on the other hand were considerably less likely to challenge each other to duels to the death over perceived slights, so perhaps it evened out. She'd also picked up that the battlemates received frustratingly little time for strictly amourous pursuits amidst their other responsibilities. Redbird did not perceive the passage of time quite the same way the mortal humans did, but the imprinting process had helped with that once it had settled in fully. Organics certainly had a talent for filling their hours and humans no less for their distressingly brief lifespans. Red Falcon had never settled on a single mate but he'd certainly been active in that aspect and Redbird was well aware of how important such interludes were to her organic partner's peak efficiency. Privately she also thought the rider and shieldmaiden made an aesthetically pleasing pair but that was not really the sort of metric a machine intelligence was supposed to measure against. Still, she was somewhat at loose ends when a notification popped on on the bank of computer screens in the Manor indicating that the silent alarm of a jewelry shop a little further into the city had been tripped. Eager for battle, Redbird turned on the Night Cycle's headlights and warmed the engine but hesitated as she prepared to patch into the mansion's intercom. By her calculations, it had been a period longer than average since the humans upstairs had had opportunity to engage in their customary courtship rituals. Both were warriors born, she knew, and would still ride into battle if summoned but it seemed ill timing. If she'd had the appropriate musculature, the intelligence would have frowned. There was a human social role the luck-weaver Mark Lucas had spoken of briefly, a noble facilitator tasked with seeing to obstructions to romance as they arose. A 'wingman'. An appropriate duty for Redbird, then! she thought to herself, the Night Cycle's paint job shifting to incorporate a stylized wing pattern across the sides in a deep crimson while simultaneously holographic projectors unfolded in discrete locations along the motorcycle's framework. With a flicker of power a statuesque woman on amazonian proportions appeared atop the vehicle, clad in dark leathers that matched the colour scheme of the bike. Allowing herself a brief moment of vanity, the intelligence observed her holographic avatar in the Night Cycle's mirrors, ensuring that it was convincing. Satisfied with the effect, Redbird instructed the motorized pathways of the Manor to align themselves in the direction of one of the many tunnels with led to the city above. With a mere thought, she was speeding away to the scene of the crime. Coming out through a passageway cleverly concealed behind a wheeled refuse container on a track, Redbird rocketed out of an alley and onto the lamppost lit street a mere block away from the source of the alarm. The Night Cycle's sensors were able to perceive three masked men exiting through a broken window, bags laden with stolen trinkets over their shoulders as they piled into a sedan. A chase, is it! the intelligence exalted inwardly. She decided to restrict herself to the motorcycles natural speed as the car sped away with squealing tires, foregoing the enhancements of her Furion technology to make things more sporting. Disappointingly, she found herself caught up to the thieves almost immediately. Redbird supposed she should not have been surprised; Midnight appeared to take considerably better care of his vehicles than the average philistines of this world. The holographic avatar atop the Night Cycle affected a sigh before pulling up alongside the car. "Ho, villains!" she shouted at the startled driver, his ski mask pulled up over his eyes to rest on the top of his head. "You are most unworthy quarry, but still you have been caught. I believe it is custom on this world to offer a chance for surrender!" The robber in the back seat responded by rolling down his window and letting off a few rounds with his handgun. The bullets passed harmlessly though the hologram but came perilously close to scratching the paint of the motorcycle below. Redbird sped up enough to pull in front of the sedan and released a stream of caltrops from a compartment beneath the seat. The small spikes proved more than a match for the tires of the thieves' car, which popped loudly and sent the vehicle into an uncontrolled swerve that ended with its front end folded around a streetlight. Pulling back up and around, Redbird noted with satisfaction that the car's primitive safety precautions had successfully deployed, leaving the criminals groaning groggily but otherwise unharmed. With a thought, a small mechanical arm extended from the body of the Night Cycle, its end lighting up with a miniature spot welder. With a little work the doors of the sedan had been fused shut, turning the vehicle into a temporary prison. Just as she finished, the auditory sensors on the bike picked up the sound of wailing sirens. "Ah, the enforcers of your laws approach. It is a shame I do not have colourful paper wrappings on hand to properly present you to them, ha ha!" Well pleased with her work, she pulled back into the road, loudly announcing, "And now to disappear as silently as I arrived, the better to nurture fear and confusion amongst the criminal element!" With that the mysterious motorcycle and its intangible rider rode off into the night.

NPC Limelight - Brave New Day Yolanda Morales-Espadas [Foster Sister of Erik and Ellie Espadas] May 7, 2012 It was fairly common knowledge among the superheroic community of Freedom City that a school for teenagers with powers existed, by deduction upon observing the steady stream of surprisingly organized and well-trained teams of such youths that regularly cropped up if nothing else. The actual name and location of Claremont Academy was a more guarded secret and it was only through some unusual acquaintances of her own that Ellie Espadas had ended up studying there in her senior year. Even then she’d avoided much of the madcap misadventures that seemed to characterize the more prominent students of that institution and she graduated with the impression that she’d barely scratched the surface of Claremont’s ways. With that in mind she supposed it wasn’t all that surprising that the first time she’d heard of the Nicholson School in Port Regal was when a case worker from the Freedom League had brought it up as an option for Yolanda. The campus they found as they walked through the surrounding subdivisions of upscale homes wasn’t quite what the West End native typically associated with an elementary school but it was certainly impressive. "See, that doesn’t look so bad, right?" she asked, tilting her chin downward. The six year old holding her hand, dirty blonde hair recently trimmed and pulled back in a ponytail, clothes and backpack conspicuously new, seemed less convinced, silently looking about with wide eyes and gripping Ellie’s fingers a little more tightly. A number of school age children had been among the refugees saved from Yolanda’s doomed homeworld before the Terminus had destroyed it utterly, most from the school bus saved by Lieutenant Hudson and his fellow soldiers. Many of them had already been enrolled in schools throughout the city for the new term after summer vacation, but Yolanda was the youngest by a few years. The case worker and Ellie’s mother, Gina, had agreed that it was important to return the precocious survivor to a semblance of routine even with only a little less than two months left in the school year but expecting a newly transplanted six year old to carefully avoid compromising secret identities or League secrets was asking a bit much. At the Nicholson School, that wouldn’t be an issue. "C'mon, Yoyo," Ellie insisted, making a great theatrical show of struggling to drag the girl along as though she were an insurmountable weight, taking a pair steps before stumbling back again. It wasn’t quite as much an exaggeration it might have been; Yolanda was strapping, noticeably athletic child with a habit of digging in her heels when she was nervous. Still, it was enough to elicit a small smile and get her to follow her foster sister into the three story school building. All of the arrangements had already been made in advance but they’d purposely gotten there a little early to make sure everything went smoothly for the first day. The office was certainly a lot more organized than the one Ellie remembered from her elementary school days, and it didn’t take long to get Yolanda signed in. As they left to follow the directions they’d been given to the kindergarten classroom, however, the blonde girl was looking more and more downcast. Finally, outside the door adorned with fingerpainted artwork and macaroni and glitter festooned construction paper, Ellie stopped and got down on one knee. "Hey, what's wrong?" she asked seriously, using one hand to gently lift the small chin. Yolanda’s big eyes were sad but fiercely free of tears when she met Ellie’s concerned look. "I was just..." The little refugee took a gulping breath, her lower lip quivering slightly. "I was thinking about my friends from school back home and my teacher Miss G-gavineau and everybody and... I’m n-never going to see them again, huh?" Now tears were beginning to well up in the corners of her eyes, causing her to blink quickly and turn her head away. "" Ellie wrapped her arms around Yolanda in a tight hug, feeling the child shaking with ragged breaths against her. The stayed that way for a while in the hallway until the older girl pulled back enough to talk again. "We don't have to do this today, okay hun? If you're not ready, that's fine. This is one hundred percent up to you." The blonde girl bit her lip and looked down for a long beat before turning her face back up to Ellie’s and shaking her head. "No, I'll be okay," she decided resolutely, rubbing the back of one hand across her face in a fashion that really served only to smear things around. "I just have to be brave like you and Mara and Erin and Mister Steve, right? Then I'll be okay no matter what." Stifling a laugh, Ellie used the cuff of her sleeve to wipe Yolanda’s face clean a little more effectively then nodded. "Right. And I am so, so proud of you, you don’t even know." Giving the six year old another hug she stood back up. "C'mon, I want to meet your teacher, make sure she's cool enough, huh?" Getting another nod in response, she opened the door and led the way inside.

Wail Free Action: Maintain Grapple. Standard Action: Sonic Wail; Accurate Attack 5, All-Out Attack 5. (1d20+13=18) Hero Point: Sonic Wail; Accurate Attack 5, All-Out Attack 5, HP Reroll. (1d20+13=26) That's a DC33 Toughness Save for Rant.