Gizmo

With a deep, baritone laugh that was surprisingly open for the reserved young man, Trevor gave Eve a brief one-armed hug, tightening the arm on her shoulder for a moment. "It's good to hear your voice," he told his considerably shorter friend before adding across their telepathic rapport, For his part, Travis seemed faintly bemused by the open show of affection on his grandson's part, though not displeased. "So I keep hearing. Pleased my rearing skills have improved, but growing concerned about his ego," he noted in a crisp deadpan. Raising his cane for a moment, he gestured toward the campus proper. "Come on, can't let an old man stand all day, hm?"

As I've already said, given his history it wouldn't make any sense for Wail to join a new team, especially with a bunch of kids. You can assume that he sent Sil a polite but firm 'no thank you', with the addendum that if they ever needed his help, they'd know where to find him.

Wail didn't look much more impressed than Willow as he set down a chunk of concrete roughly the same prodigious size as he himself was and folded his arms across his broad chest. "Sister, I think I made myself clear about that 'not people' talk," he told Runs-With-Claws flatly, his voice echoing in the cavernous hole in the ground. "To paraphrase a popular quote on this world, you act like the folks you run into don't have rights 'cause they're different than you, next thing you know there's nobody to have your back when the Nazi T-Rex comes knocking on your door." Continuing his work clearing the area, he nodded to Bloodfang. "If I follow, then yes; there's plenty of parallel worlds with human populations. Then there's one that's nothing but shrimp. Multiverse is a mother of a teacher of humility."

"Oh, that was you, huh?" Jill replied with a thoughtful noise, tilting her head slightly to regard Blake. "Small word, I guess." In turn she gave CT a level, if not unamused, look. "She likes to be specific, is all," she defended Dragonfly, putting her arm around the shorter girl's shoulders in a vaguely protective gesture. "Anyway, don't sweat it, Tiny, it's not like we had classes together or anything. And yeah, mi hermano tends to leave an impression. You remember when the Crime League attacked the Liberty Dome during the playoffs last year?"

As he held the car door open for his grandfather, Trevor saw his diminutive friend approaching and gave her a small wave and an uncharacteristically warm smile under his concealing sunglasses. "Eve," he greeted, closing the door behind Travis and stepping around the car to place one hand lightly over the snowy haired telepath's shoulders, "Like you to meet my grandfather. Gramps, Eve Martel, one of my best friends." Travis followed his grandson out from between the parked cars, leaning heavily on his polished black cane with one hand and absently stroking his stately greying goatee with the other as he regarded the young woman. "Ah, yes. Believe I knew your... great aunt," the elderly man noted with an amiable nod to Eve, the faint ghost of a smile touching his features. "Fine woman. Trust you're keeping Trevor out of trouble?"

The hellhounds attacked with the coordinated precision of true pack hunters, cutting off the fencer's avenues of retreat and herding him toward the true threat. Barely managing to pull out of the acid dripping jaws before they snapped shut, he found himself surrounded. Surprisingly, his immediate thought was that it seemed too easy; a quick glance revealed the pair of hounds headed for his front door. Ignoring the pack surrounding him as a whole, he spun his blade in a crisscrossing slash to make a hole to sprint through, charging across the half-cut lawn to intercept the hellhounds. There was no hesitation in his movements as ripped through them, leaving him standing with one acid splattered boot atop a canine head, greatcoat faintly sizzling from the corrosive liquid as he turned to face the remaining beasts with a grimace. "Bad dogs. Play dead."

Well, got the HP to burn, so I may as well double his dodge bonus to avoid that attack. Jack of all Blades Standard Attack: Energy Blade Flurry; Power Attack 5. (1d20+15=22, 1d20+15=30, 1d20+15=19, 1d20+15=17, 1d20+15=17, 1d20+15=27, 1d20+15=22, 1d20+15=18) Extra Effort: Surge Standard Action: Energy Blade Flurry; Charge, Power Attack 5. (1d20+17=31, 1d20+17=33) He's still got a move action, so let me know if there's anything left standing he needs to distract or whatever.

"Right," Jill confirmed to Estelle a little more coolly. Acting like an idiot certainly sounded like her brother, but she was the only one who was allowed to say it. "And no, I'm more what you'd call a... combat medic, among other things." Her disposition toward the elder woman improved considerably when she complimented Dragonfly, eliciting a grin from the dark haired young woman as she slipped her hand into the inventor's and gave it a squeeze. "That's what I keep telling her, yeah." She offered Jessica's boyfriend a wave, hesitating slightly at his anachronistic gesture of greeting before introducing herself, "Jill, Jill O'Cure"

Following Nick through, Jack nimbly kept his feet under him, but tugged at his greatcoat against the sudden chill. The energy manipulator had to close his eyes for a few moments, grimacing as he adjusted to being completely surrounded by magic. The sensation was so deafening that he almost didn't register when the first of the trolls addressed the group. Shaking his head roughly to clear it, he rubbed the back of his head as the second imposing guard showed deference to his teammate. "Well, look at you, all respectable and such," he noted quietly, with a small smirk.

Trevor Hunter pulled the long black car into the Claremont campus smoothly, heading toward a reserved parking space. His grandfather sat in the back of the classic vehicle, holding his cane between his knees with both hands as he looked out the window. It was the first time Travis had seen the school in person, though Trevor had no doubt the elderly mystery man had done all the research required to navigate its grounds as if he'd studied there himself. Fortunately aside from the young man's rather intimidating reputation among the student body, only a few knew his specific powerset and an even smaller number were aware of his chosen codename. Of those, only the peers he trusted implicitly knew of his specific connection to the original Midnight; in short, Travis was able to attend with relative anonymity. "Big day," the elder man noted quietly as Trevor parked the car and turned off the engine. The youth murmured softly in agreement, and that was the extend of the verbal exchange between them. Even that much, however, was enough for Travis to convey his pride, and Trevor smiled faintly as he got out of the vehicle and moved to open the door for his grandfather.

"Argh, Dios, stop talking like that!" Jill groaned, waving one hand in CT's direction. As she did, a faint blue glow surrounded it, and a softly humming energy construct materialized near the mountainous teen's ear, lightly whacking him upside the head before disappearing again. "Glad to hear things are going alright, though," she noted more graciously as she finished applying Dragonfly's sunscreen and gave her girlfriend a quick peck on the cheek. "And yes, thank you," she added in reply to the underclassman's question, evidently intending that there be no confusion as to the nature of their relationship. If anyone was uncomfortable with the idea, they didn't seem to be showing it, and it would have been their problem, anyway. "Yes, querida, magic bad, science good, I know," she assured the engineer with an exaggeratedly soothing tone. "Your 'messy' might be a little worse than other people's, Nick," she noted to the necromancer. She legitimately hadn't recognized him without his makeup until he'd been pointed out to her, which presumably was the idea. "Er, wait, are we calling you 'Nick' right now?" Secret identities were always a touchy issue, and everybody seemed to have their own ideas about the proper etiquette outside of 'work'. Speaking of paranoid mystery men... She nodded with somewhat surprising politeness to Estelle. "Dr. de Havilland. I'm Jill, I think you've met my brother." In this case, the bandanna mask the young woman was wearing only emphasized the familial resemblance to Jack of all Blades.

Bouncing slightly against the wooden door, Jack hadn't been expecting the suddenly aggressive move, but if the low, appreciative growl he made in the back his throat as his lips parted invitingly or the strong fencer's fingers that slid through the dryad's long white hair to hold the back of her head were any indication, he certainly didn't object. His other hand moved slowly up Willow's back, the fabric of her borrowed bathrobe bunching between his fingers and sliding upward until he released it, finding just enough room pressed between the door and the slender woman's curves to pull the top of his black bodysuit over each shoulder in turn, letting it hang about his waist. The exposed sienna torso was etched with the lean musculature of a professional athlete, lithe and well defined but crisscrossed with scars of various lengths and thicknesses, most barely more than pale lines punctuated by the occasional distinctive circle of a bullet wound. All this Willow could observe only by touch as the swordsman responded hungrily to her kiss.

It took a while to make it down the hallway as Jack paused every few steps to brush his lips over the backs of Willow's knuckles and wrist then rising to kiss her slim neck, the delicate point at the top of her ear, her flushed cheek and back to her mouth. Eventually he led them into one of the individual rooms looking out into the backyard. It didn't look particularly lived in - in truth, the swashbuckler relied largely on brief naps in the more spartan quarters deep below in the Interceptor's hidden base - but there were a few outfits worth of clothes in the closet and a handful of personal effects scattered here and there. The plain, light blue bedsheets that matched the open curtains were the work of his more decorative teammates, but as he nudged the door quietly closed behind them with his foot, he ignored the bed for a moment to simply look into the ancient guardian's amber eyes. "Qué guapa eres..." he murmured to no one in particular.

"Figures you'd be used to the sun, helpin' Ma and Pa around the farm all day, hmm?" Jill teased CT dryly as he approached. Her deadpan might have made it difficult to tell if she was joking if they hadn't already established that their conversations consisted almost entirely of her poking good-natured fun at the imposing underclassman. Retrieving a dab of sunscreen from the bottle Dragonfly had produced, she began applying it to her girlfriend's neck and the exposed portions of her back and shoulders, massaging it in a little more slowly and thoroughly than was probably strictly necessary. "So, how've you been?" she asked CT absently before she could become too distracted. "Classes going alright?"

Jack looked between the two packs of ravenous beasts and their master, eyes narrowing as he let out an annoyed grunt. "Just so you know, I'm still going to find you, and it's only gonna go worse for you after this," the fencer promised the manically laughing summoner before sprinting off at the first of the two groups of hellhounds. Somersaulting into the air, he struck only ten blows, each with startling precision and ruthless efficiency. When he landed again of the street, he left only a collapsed pile of raw skinned behemoths in his wake. Straightening from his crouch, he turned to glance over his shoulder at the remaining beasts down the street. "Get along, little doggies."

Alright, taking the first group of hellhounds, then. Jack of all Blades Move Action: Get over there! Standard Action: Energy Blade Flurry; Power Attack 5. (1d20+15=34, 1d20+15=27, 1d20+15=20, 1d20+15=27, 1d20+15=35, 1d20+15=19, 1d20+15=26, 1d20+15=25, 1d20+15=34, 1d20+15=27) Okay! So lots of rolls in anticipation of Takedown Attack 2. Hits 1, 5 and 9 are critical hits, for the sake of argument. Let me know how that goes.

"Lesson the second," Jack smirked as he gracefully slid back a step out of the hellfire's reach and held his sword to one side. With the barest of thoughts, it extended its length, giving the fencer the distinct range advantage over the demonically powered brawler. "If you can scratch somebody, you can scratch them again. And again!" Launching forward, the master fighter was suddenly everywhere at once, moving far to quickly for the eye to properly follow, his sparking blade making brutal slashes from every angle. Thin lines of red appeared across Keter's entire face as long tears appeared on his clothing. "And those scratches add up!" Coming an abrupt halt, Jack delivered a final, devastating blow that sent his opponent tumbling backward off of his feet and across the street's pavement.

Jack of all Blades Hero Point: Stunt Extended Reach on his sword. Move Action: Auto-DC 36 Feint w/ Skill Mastery and Fast Talk. Standard Action: Energy Blade Flurry; Power Attack 5. (1d20+15=33) And 18 is a crit on Jack's swords, so that's 15 + 10 + 5 Power Attack + 5 Critical Hit + X Autofire (up to 7).

The blond man was felt waiting for a few minutes, just long enough for him to begin to wonder if something was amiss before a royal blue and silver form rocketed over the suburb's rooftops, a grappling line and finely honed muscles defying gravity as a crackling blade of sparking electricity drove toward him. "Pro tip, Candy-In-The-Van Man," Jack of all Blades all but shouted, his mocking tone overlain with barely controlled rage, "you wanna come off sweetness and light, buy some deodorant for the hellfire reek!" The rapier of thrumming energy flashed with the utmost precision, but any questions the swordsman had about whether his opponent was human or not were answered by the way he easily weathered the assault. "You made a big mistake coming here, creep!"

Created with this.

Ffffft... okay. Jack of all Blades Move Action: Auto-DC 31 Taunt w/ Skill Mastery. Standard Action: Energy Blade; Power Attack 5. (1d20+15=16) Oh, for...

Of course he does. Whelp, not going to stop him from charging in head first, I suppose. *cough*GrandstandingComplication*cough* Jack of all Blades Surprise Round Standard Action: Energy Blade; Charge, Power Attack 5. (1d20+17=19) Yeesh, thank goodness for flat-footedness. That's DC 22 on the Fort Save vs. Toughness Drain and DC 30 on the Toughness Save itself. Initiative. (1d20+9=18)

Physically biting her lower lip to hold back a number of off-colour jokes that sprang to mind at Dragonfly's mention of exposing skin, Jill looked about the gathered beach goers and their range from fair skinned to outright pasty. Clearly the pale tendencies of the invitees had occurred to Jessica as well, and the prospective medical student was glad their hostess had thought to come prepared; between the multiple inventors and force field projectors, they probably could have worked up something to block UV radiation, but it would have been a lot of work for a party. "Well, I guess it's my responsibility to help you out with that," she sighed to her girlfriend with exaggerated weary resignation. "Work work work work work."

Forgoing words for once, Jack gently tilted Willow's chin upward to kiss her once again, consciously keeping his movements slow and almost exploratory despite his quickening pulse, brushing his hand across the slender woman's cheek and running his fingers into her white hair. Even after changing, the ancient plant controller smelled faintly of rich soil after a light rain, an earthy bouquet that filled his head. Keeping one arm slung tightly around he waist, he led her out of the kitchen and back toward the stairs upward.

:shock: Uh, tell you what, he's going to make a Notice check first: Notice Check. (1d20+10=30) ...niiiiice.