Gizmo
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"Hey, baby, hey," Kimber murmured soothingly, kneeling next to Tarva on the bed and cupping her cheek gently in one hand. She used the other to carefully slide locks of raven black hair out of the way. "Look at me." After so many years of survival at all costs, planning for every darkest possibility, Tarva telling her not to be afraid was one of the most alarming things the phantom could imagine. She ducked her head enough to make eye contact with the shadow witch, giving her a small comforting smile before telling her, "You're full of bull-pucky. Now who do I have to go scythe? 'Cause nobody upsets my liquorice whip like this without getting scythed." - - - - - Ellie gave Mara an amused smile over her own nearly finished food. With her own busy schedule and myriad of commitments she'd become comfortable with the idea that sometimes food was just quick and easy fuel. "The occasional moments of scientific tunnel vision are part of the package, hermosa but it's sweet of you to worry." She knocked her knee lightly against her partner's leg under the table. "There's less meeting pretty girls here but I'm pretty happy with the one I've got so that's fine by me." Her expression turned more serious as some of the weariness of the day became clearer on her brow. "If your expertise means mine doesn't come up, I'd be fine with that, too."
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Vince's expression said that he was less willing to absolve himself than Talya; unsurprising given the group of people the artificial intelligence had built portions of his personality by emulating. Without a word the tablet display winked out, his attention elsewhere while he followed up on her request. Erik had taken a minute to carefully dissipate the heat he'd gathered around his hand, the muscles in his hand tensing and untensing involuntarily. "Okay. Alright," he muttered largely to himself, eyes losing focus slightly as he stared at the array of photographs. "So this @#%$ is trying to call you out or get in your head but if he doesn't know about the rest of us he's got no idea the hammer about to drop on his neck." Despite his often ill-concealed distaste for firearms he hasn't blinked when Talya mentioned her gun safe. Instead the part of him that found common ground with a millennia old destroyer of cities and a career espionage agent familiar with both sides of the law had come to the fore, the singular weapons master and proven field tactician prepared to leverage every available advantage. And yet it was the husband and father who turned to look at Talya, brow creased with concern as he searched her expression. "I'll get everybody here. What do you need?"
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On the tablet display Vince's image turned choppy for a few moments as the artificial intelligence furiously ran calculations and played back footage. "I have algorithms, alerts," he insisted in the tone of a desperate man bargaining with a higher power. "Anyone who shows up within two blocks of the place enough gets flagged. I know they work, that's how I caught the Dakanan sword guy, Nassar." His avatar placed its hands on either side of its face then winked out, replaced with a wireframe representation of the building they were in and the surrounding street. The scene was quickly populated with red dots labeled with heights and dates, dashed sight lines illustrating from where each photo had been taken. "The only way those photos make sense is if we're talking about dozens of different people, maybe a different person for each one even! The DPI's all over the place, some of those were taken with phones, some probably high end hobbies equipment, quality's all over the place. Hold on..." The screen went black again and scrolled with text for a split second before a video feed of the sidewalk in front of the dojo appeared from just over a week prior. In it Erik and Min were returning from the farmer's market, the latter with two almost comically large bundles under her arms while the former had his chin lifted in the way that meant he was telling an intentionally awful joke. As they stepped inside a heavyset blonde woman passing by snapped a picture with her smartphone without ever slowing her stride or even looking at what she was doing. The woman didn't seem to check the photo afterward, tucking the phone away without ever seeming to realize what she was doing. Vince popped back into view. "There's a bunch like that now that I know to look. Guys, I swear, I'm so careful. I mean, I barely have anything else to do all day. I scrub anything that catches you in costume before it hits the cloud, I do background checks on anybody who signs up for classes, nobody's even tried to get onto my servers. I've got countermeasures that could stop-- stop anybody." He didn't have to name his own creator as an example, the implication was always there. Ever since his code had been violated and he'd been forced to betray the team years before the overall gregarious and whimsical intelligence had been almost obsessive about security and closing potential back doors. Now his avatar had a haunted look on its slack features. "...there's just no pattern. I can't catch it if there's no pattern."
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Ignoring the man who's just broken his own hand against his concrete form Lou took another step to close the distance between himself and Ha Ha. "You're putting me in a real lousy position, Lenny. This is gonna be a genuine pain in my ass." His voice had taken on an even more gravelly echo and the eye in the yellow stripe squinted slightly as he scowled. "So it's important to me that you understand," he continued before slamming his right fist into the squirrelly enforcer's stomach, "this right here is absolutely personal." His left fist followed suit, working the body and driving the air out of Ha Ha's lungs and knocking him back against the door of his car.
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Reagent Will Save vs DC 15: 1d20+9 25 Sense Motive Check: 1d20+5 13 Notice Check: 1d20+5 21
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Lou Move Action: Demoralize Ha Ha: 1d20+10 20 Standard Action: Attack Ha Ha: 1d20+10 18 That should hit, for a DC 25 Toughness Save.
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Winifred couldn't hear anything around her over the sound of blood pounding in her ears, the muscles in her back and shoulders spasming against the unyielding rock and a cord standing out on her neck. She tasted copper on her lips and wasn't sure if it was from the impact or if she'd bitten her own tongue. Primal fear surged through her as her vision focused enough to register the golden creature looming over her, poised to attack again but instead of feeling a chill she was burning up, sweating through her blouse. Desperately, forcing her hands to move despite the involuntary twitching as her body tried to tear itself apart, she grabbed at another glass container and smashed it at the monster's feet. The adhesive splattered across the rough ground and the misshapen limbs, strong as steel. She scrambled away from her cover, fingers grabbing at loose stones as she nearly tripped. Risking a glance over her shoulder she watched at the creature simply discarded the trapped pieces of itself, roiled like a landslide and formed new limbs, not inconvenienced in the slightest. She looked about for Riley but the edges of her vision her turning dark, eyeballs feeling as if they were about to burst from her skull. "Smith!" she shouted, panicky. "You have to get away! Just go!"
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Reagent Will Save vs DC 15: 1d20+9 29
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Reagent Standard Action: Resin Adhesive vs Monster 2: 1d20+8 22 Snare 8 (Resin Adhesive; Extras: Contagious, Flaws: Unreliable [5 Uses] Feats: Reversible, Ricochet, Triggered 2) {20/20} (chemical) Move Action: Run awaaaaay!
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"Well, I'm a very interesting version of me! Your version sounds depressing," Set opined, giving his dreadlocks a little flick. One really would have expected that after six, seven reincarnations at most the pair of them would have gotten their fill of killing each other but mortal did tend to be massively stubborn over the strangest things. He wasn't entirely clear why this woman was cosplaying as Heru-Ra but evidently she was familiar with enough to the story to take issue with the details. That was passably interesting, at least. Looking out over the water the godling squinted. "Best of fortune emptying a beach in fair Miami. What dread threat shall sending us fleeing to the hills, perchance?"
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Jack of all Blades / Jill O'Cure (6) Dance Me To The End (1) The Nothing From Coming For You (5) Midnight (1) Vous Répétiez Ces Mots Suprêmes (1) Set / Sekhmet (2) Set in His Ways (2) Reagent / The Alkahest (59) Skipping Leg Day (1) Quarrel in the Quarry (6) Deep into that Darkness Peering (1) Fragile (12) Elevator Pitch (22) A to Z (Everything Changes Except When it Doesn't) (16) Chrysopoeia Cosmetics (1) Lou Lubrano (7) Knock on the Door Job (7) Ref Point can go to Reagent, Rollover can go to Lou to get him over the 15 hurdle with 1 post tossed to Rock to earn him a PP.
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Lou Initiative: 1d20+7 13
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Lou worked his jaw back and forth, nodding at the string of insults. He hefted the drives in his hand, considering their aluminum housings and the ramifications of what he was considering. "See, this really highlights how we approach the job real different, Ha Ha," he used aloud, not getting out of the way but stooping to set the drives down on the parking lot pavement. "You're all about the hurting people part. S'funny, I was just having this same conversation, too." He laid his palm flat against the uneven surface, feeling a crack that had slowly spread over the past two decades, fingertips brushing the tiny peaks where the yellow paint dividing the spots hadn't dried quite flat. "Me, I'll be honest, I focus more on the other side of it, y'know? And I gotta warn you." The slightly shiny black colour of the pavement crept up his fingers as he stood back up, skin taking on that same rough texture. Faster than the other three men had time to understand what they were seeing it spread across his entire body with the exception of a bright yellow stripe that started at his hairline and crossed one eye before disappearing down the collar of his shirt. He clenched his fists with the rough sound of unyielding materials grinding against each other and met Ha Ha's sneer with pitch black eyes. "I've been told it's kinda @#$%." He hauled back and cracked Lenny across the jaw like a sledgehammer made of asphalt.
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Alright, going for a surprise round here, remembering that Lou still has a bruise from the last fight. Lou Free Action: Activate Alternate Form with Impervious 2 (Total 6; Extra: Reflective 6 [Unarmed Attacks]) [5PP] (pavement) Standard Action: Attack Ha Ha; Power Attack 5: 1d20+5 8 Hero Point: Attack Ha Ha; Power Attack 5, HP Reroll: 1d20+5 10 #$%! sake. Well, that's a 20 after the +10 and a DC 30 Toughness Save.
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Doing her best to minimize the potential for catastrophic embarrassment Winifred picked up a bottle of water from the bar rather than trying to order anything more complicated and had gotten back to their booth before the others. Consequently she found herself wedged between the conglomerate entity that was Robin and Riley on one side and Raina on the other as they packed more bodies into the curved seating than it was probably meant to accommodate. Studiously ignoring whatever the couple were doing with their feet under the table meant turning to face the blonde instead. "So, ah, is it a dancing sort of music, then?" she asked, stumbling a little over the wording. She wasn't exactly expecting a waltz but she'd come across enough EDM and house music in her broad sampling of modern fare to understand that certain styles were definitely meant for moving. She eyed the open space in front of the stage apprehensively. "Would it be difficult to learn the steps, do you think?"
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The brief pop of hellfire had Erik spinning about from the kitchen counter reflexively, the kitchen knife he'd been putting away flipped about into a combat grip and his heart immediately racing the way it always did when he wasn't expecting that particular sensation tightening around his metamagi senses. He let out a relieved breath when he saw it was just an envelop, beginning to calm... until he noted Talya's reaction to the printed label. He exchanged a look with Min before putting the knife down and stepping over to the table to watch over the Englishwoman's shoulder. As the pictures were laid out it took him a beat to process what he was seeing, then his entire body tensed visibly and he let out a long string of Spanish cursing under his breath. Without looking up from the contents of the envelope he called to the room, "Vince!" The cheap tablet he'd been convinced to purchase for recipes sprung to life where it was propped on the counter, displaying the AI's avatar dressed in an opulent, monogramed robe with hair disheveled. Affecting a yawn, Vince inquired, "What's the word, big guy?" For once not bothering to play into the conceit that something needed to be shown to the avatar's face for Vince to see it Erik made a clipped angry gesture at the grid of photographs. Immediately Vince's image was dressed in a noticeably low res version of his default lime green suit, a clear tell that he was using processing power elsewhere as he repeated Erik's profanity. For his part the swordsman brought both hands up to either side of his face, willing his razor honed fight or flight instincts to silence themselves in favour of rational analysis with mixed success. The last time he'd been so simultaneously furious and terrified he'd been facing a gang of superpowered mercenaries on his mother's front lawn. Even the ambush during the birth of the twins hadn't carried the same sort of cold threat, that someone could reach out and hurt the people he cared most about when they were most vulnerable and whenever they chose. It sounded like they'd already done something to Talya's protege and her friends and he looked down to realize that the fading heat from the stovetop had flowed across the room to gather about his clenched right hand, distorting the air around it as it burned hotter to match his tightly coiled rage. "Do we know who this is?" he asked Talya, usually melodic voice little more than a flat growl.
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Ghost Girl followed Wraith outside and focused on the glowing figure under the lamppost, letting her ectoplasmic jaw distort to unleashed a torrent of howling cold that washed over him and left jagged rime across the pavement. With an inarticulate shout of defiance the man staggered to his feet, arms crossed in front of his face and force field flaring brighter as he pushed against the localized blizzard, fully committed to continuing the fight. Done with pageantry and theatrics for the evening, Kimber simply rolled her eyes and worked her mouth back into shape. "I'm trying to save you a beatdown here, come on." Sighing she whirled her scythe about and flicked its blade through the henchman's skull, neatly bisecting it just below eye level before passing though to the other side. Though physically unharmed the crescent of supernatural metal tore through his consciousness, snapping the stubborn resolve powering his force field like a taut string. The glow flickered out and he finally fell, eyes wide open even in unconsciousness.
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Lou looked like he wanted to object, though whether to Sofia's assertion or the one made by Xavier was difficult to say. Instead he made a noncommittal grunt and stepped out of the van, sliding the door shut behind him. He maintained that flat expression upon seeing 'Ha Ha'. He didn't know the other two from Adam but Lenny was a twisted little creep on a perpetual power trip and the less he had to deal with him the better. Lou hefted the proffered bag for a moment, gauging its weight before setting it aside but when Lenny held out the gun he visibly tensed. There was a palpably awkward silence as he made no move to take the weapon and instead turned his ice blue gaze upon man holding it. "You want to run that by me again?" he demanded, one side of his mouth curling up in a snarl despite his attempt to remain professional. "They made a deal and they did the job, Ha Ha. What are we, a bunch of @#$% bangers now, can't hold up out end?" He hefted the drives in his hand. "They don't even know what's on these things. I don't know what's on these things. Get your damn head on straight."
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Booooo. Surge: Spirit Sever vs Stubborn Goon: 1d20+10 17 Hero Point: Spirit Sever vs Stubborn Goon, HP Reroll: 1d20+10 29 Alright, she's got Improved Critical 2 with the scythe thanks to Indira's Instruction so that's a DC 29 + 5 = 34 Will Save vs Damage.
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Ghost Girl Move Action: Fly outside. Standard Action: Ice Breath on the less damaged goon. That's a DC 22 Snare.
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"I don't think I can reasonably promise any of that," Winifred mused aloud as she filed in behind Robin. Prim elocution and proper posture substituted reasonably well for self-assurance but she'd never been to a musical performance of this sort and fear of committing some faux pas competed with simmering excited. She shared Riley's apprehension about a crowded, enclosed space albeit for very different reasons but after listening to so many recordings with Matthew she was thrilled at the opportunity to take in a live show. Her friends' excitement wasn't lost on her, either. Raina had been practically aglow with the feeling of once again being the one with the exclusive connection but when Robin of all people had mentioned procuring a new outfit for the evening it had crystallized for her roommate that this was the sort of activity modern young people were meant to be able to enjoy, a normalcy frequently denied to her her small circle. Resolving to hold up her end of the proceedings she'd layered a pair of high-waisted shorts over dark leggings and a dark blouse, along with a taupe cardigan that hung open and an ochre knitted scarf. It was a touch conservative for what she understood to be a party more than what she thought of as a concert, as was her makeup but she was confident that it remained fashionable and normal. She glanced over her shoulder at the rest of the group, trying to keep an eye one everyone so that she could take her etiquette cues accordingly. "Ah, I realized I've asked already but the selling point here is that we're not meant to know what to expect?"
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Kimber Storm passed through the wall and part of the floor as she rushed to her lover's side by the most direct route. "Tarva?!" The shadows in the corners of the room writhed and wailed with screams of their own as she look the taller woman by the shoulders, face creased with worry. "Baby, what is it?! What happened?!" - - - - - "Never assume technological superiority when you can assume some moron falling through a hole in space, yeah?" Jill quipped, the tightness in her voice making the joke fall weakly. Not needing to be at the controls of the drone she paced about the room with nervous energy. "If he is still kicking somehow, though, he'd just be one guy, right? No army, no dragons, no toys. I dunno what powers he's supposed to have himself but that's not that bad." She didn't sound entirely convinced of her own argument.
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"Aw, buddy," Ghost Girl answered with sympathy that was only mostly feigned for the sake of mockery. "Yeah, you are." With both hands on her scythe she wound up and swung with her whole body, carving an arc through the air in front of the two criminals still intent on fighting. There was an eardrum-popping moment of displaced air in the split second before a concussive wave ripped through the room like a bomb had gone off. The wave passed by those who had surrendered as a breeze just strong enough to pull at their baggy clothes. When it hit the other pair it impacted like a wrecking ball, hurling them off of their feet and flying backward like pebbles in a hurricane. The far wall gave way at the force of their impact, leaving crumbling holes while they continued until one slammed into a streetlamp hard enough to bend it in half and other into a parked car, rolling the vehicle onto its side before he finally skidded to a halt. The quiet of the night outside was broken by a cacophony of alarms and protesting metal.
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ic A to Z (Everything Changes, Except When it Doesn't)
Gizmo replied to TheAbsurdist's topic in Bayview
Winifred was either less generally interested in the 'air-walking' trick or else had noticed Corinne's wince, as with a small cough she reigned in her scientific curiosity to a more manageable level. "Ah. That was thoughtless of me, after you had expressed the emotionally taxing nature of your abilities. I beg your pardon." Though she would have liked to make a thorough investigation of the blonde's transmuted top right then and there she reminded herself of her own frustration whenever her condition was referred to as a 'gift' or 'power'. Pursing her lips she turned her focus to the other girl's social concerns to keep her mind occupied now that she'd built up a head of steam. "Mmh. The ginger one, I've encountered him a few times. Bit of an ass, frankly. Could do with a smack." -
The bearded man grunted an affirmative, removing Alice's disguise from where it draped over part of his head and shoulder and tossed it into the trolly without comment. "Better not to give the boys any new faces to get twitchy over." A pair of pocket-sized twenty-somethings and a middle-aged librarian shouldn't have presented as much of a thread to a group of made men who were already expecting them but Lou tried not to rely too much on the competency of career muscle. Speaking as career muscle. He picked up the drives Sofia had pulled, trying to hold them the way he'd seen her doing and looking to the hacker for confirmation. He wasn't an electrician or anything but he'd broken enough phones to know they probably wouldn't take well to being tossed around carelessly. "Just keep your heads down while I get your money then none of us have to bother the others again, yeah?"