Gizmo
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"Rooock?" Rock spoke up from the corner where he'd been quietly keeping Nae-Dae from picking up anything that looked too important. He lumbered back over to the main discussion then, stony brow furrowed. The small simian on his shoulder made a wet sound. "You got a real talent for understatement, y'know that? 'Cause it sounds like some whackjobs got their hooks on Star Knight armor which ain't supposed to be possible." She knew this from multiple attempts to purchase even minor components from a functional suit on the black market to satiate her own curiosity. Only a Star Knight was supposed to be able to use a Star Knight's armor and the idea of a murderous gang cracking that security feature was not a comforting thought. "Why ain't the Knights takin' care of this themselves, like?" With a low, reproachful rumble, Rock interjected, "Rrrrock." They all knew why not: there just weren't enough Star Knights left in the galaxy to meet demand. Assigning a decorated Knight and war hero with the authority to recruit additional help was enough to show how seriously the order took yet another death among their dwindling numbers.
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I'm going to hold off on posting Kimber's reaction until we've seen what everybody's doing outside!
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Jack of all Blades Diplomacy check: 1d20+7 20 Gather Information check: 1d20+15 27 Notice check: 1d20+15 29
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Winifred had accommodatingly placed a hand over her eyes when Raina had called for a dearth of peeking but hadn't taken it away when the witch had stepped back around the corner. Instead she waited several beats to listen to everyone else's comments, getting some sense of what to expect. Not entirely in the spirit of the exercise, she had to admit, but probably much safer for all of them than risking a sudden shock. "Ah, that's a relief," she sighed, speaking a little more loudly than usual after her second cup of the 'wine' but otherwise remaining poised and controlled as ever as she regarded the glamour. "There seemed a risk you would aim for 'arousing' corpse and I doubt my old fashioned sensibilities would have been up to the task." For a moment it looked as though she might be waggling her eyebrows up and down but she schooled her expression again almost immediately as she tilted her head back to drain her cup again.
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Mia squirmed about in Raina's arms for a few moments, not much happier to find herself abruptly restrained than she had been at the sudden absence of gravity but eventually the bobbing motion seemed to calm her down and her crying petered off. Eden, on the other hand, had taken up a scowling expression and was attempting without much success to drag her feet while Raina pulled her through the air. "You're not s'posed to make Mia cry," she pointed out somewhat unnecessarily, not at all placated by the offered cookie. "Don't make her cry 'gain." She jutted out her chin as best she could at the awkward angle in which the levitation had left her and the teenaged witch realized she was being threatened by a three year old. "Tss, yeah, that doesn't really work for us, is the thing," 'Dave' told Buffy, leaving his foot exactly where it was. "Staying outside, I mean. Waiting's fine; I got all the time in the world." As he said that his left hand moved toward his belt and the young woman's heightened awareness of the underpinnings of the universe began to shout a warning, temporal ripples traveling backward from whatever he was about to do. 'Jake' similarly was reaching for the zipper to his tracksuit, something jingling like bells as he moved his shoulders.
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Kimber is using the Fear effect from her 'terribly beauty' AP setting: Emotion Control 12 (Beautiful Terror; Extras: Area [Perception, +2], Flaws: Range [Touch, -2], Sense Dependent [Vision], Drawbacks: Power Loss [in Sunlight, -3]) [9PP] Morph 6 (Terrible Beauty; Any Humanoid, +30 Disguise, Feats: Attractive, Fascinate [Diplomacy], Drawbacks: Power Loss [in Sunlight, -3]) [11PP] Super-Senses 6 (Fear Awareness [Mental], Extras: Acute, Analytical, Radius, Ranged, Tracking) [6PP] That should be a DC 22 Will Save against Fear for the Power Corp who can see her and their ninja buddy.
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--Aw, they have their own baby psychic,-- Kimber conveyed to Eve with a distinct note of amusement in her thoughts. If she'd been able to just whisk away the robbers' prize without ever being detected that wouldn't have given Eliza or Mali much to do on their first outing, after all. Sending the French telepath a rough mental map of the bank and the location of the hostages, she slid invisibly through the air to position herself between the vault door and the Power Corps. She wasn't planning on letting them set off any incendiaries, thank you very much. --They're already pretty worked up. I can work with that!-- Indeed, an undercurrent of fear was thick on the air to her supernatural senses. Foremost in the minds of the group was a masked figure that it took her a moment to recognize as the supposedly immortal villain Mastermind, which certainly painted the little heist in a new, more concerning light. She also caught a whiff of what she could only really describe as a sort of devil vampire. Or maybe a vampire devil. Either way, she had a winner. As she blurred into view in front of the armored thugs with a predatory grin her form shifted into a dead ringer for the monster of their collective fears with a few of her own embellishments for good measure. "You DARE endanger my tome?!" she bellowed, wreathed in swirling arcane power and clenching long talons toward the closest of the demolitionists.
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"I can't be th' only one who remembers what happened th' last time we did a favour for the crazy Terran Knight, yeh?" Nae-Dae chittered sullenly as she repositioned herself on Rock's shoulder, one of her four hands gripping the handle of her toolbox while she looked around suspiciously. "Barely made it out alive, just stuck fightin' a whole bloody war? Ring a bell, like?" Getting to the bottom of the landing ramp, Rock took a moment to stretch to his full height, the uneven stones in his back popping and scraping against each other in a manner that was disconcerting for any shipwrights listening nearby but satisfying for the lumbering mercenary. Seeming much less worried than his diminutive partner, he posed the question, "Rock?" The cobalt blue furred mechanic glared at him from only a few inches away from his face. "Yeh it's still a favour even if you're gettin' paid. What kinda stupid question is that? We better be gettin' paid, s'all I'm say-- Ooh, I want one of those." She was immediately distracted from her grumbling as the multitool in the hand of a passing technician caught her eye.
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Erik gave Dimitri a slightly skeptical look; it was hard to imagine Faretti saying anything nice. About anyone. Ever. The swordsman fairly artfully glided past the question about plans for the future but couldn't completely hide a frown when Min mentioned the Olympians. It was a particularly sore topic for his wife and if she was bringing it up it was a sure sign her mood was about to turn melancholy. He moved smoothly around the circle of conversation to flank the dryad on the other side from Talya, letting his upper arm rest against her shoulder. "Yes, yes, I'm a delectable treat," he snorted with an exaggerated roll of his eyes. "That's the thing with you immortals: you think everything you do is because you're immortal. 'After a huuuuundred years of eating pizza I can finally say that I like it.' Everybody likes pizza! Everybody thinks the pizza in their hometown when they were a kid was the best!" He used his free hand to gesture even more emphatically than he might have otherwise, a ready distraction from more somber topics. "You just need to accept that I'm everybody-catnip, immortal or not."
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"Hold on, one sec," Ellie insisted, waiting until Mara was defenseless with her hands full to lean over the stack of plates and kiss the engineer soundly, weaving her fingers deep into blonde hair. She took her time, predicting that the intimate gesture might have to last them a while once they headed back downstairs, then finished by vigorously ruffling Mara's hair with both of her hands, grinning incorrigibly as she left it irrevocably mussed. Tugging her fitted vest back into place she picked up the remaining dishware. "Much better." Just as Min was handing Mia over to Talya, Gina wheeled back into the living room with a giggling Eden in her lap. Before any of the women could say anything Erik spoke up a little too quickly, "Oh, hey, I think somebody just pulled up, how's that for timing, huh?" Crossing back over to the door in a few steps he opened it before either Steve or Miss Americana could knock. "Hey! He actually managed to drag you along, that's great! Get in here!" The swordsman blinked a few times at the stacked deserts the patriotic paragon was carrying, unsure if he could offer to take it without risking spilling the truffles everywhere. "Dios, look at that monstrosity!"
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Watching Riley and Robin's back-and-forth for a few moments while she drained her cup, Winifred made a sound of comprehension as she refilled it. "Ah! I know this game! We have this, too. Had this. This is a game that was had." She enunciated each syllable of the sentence even more precisely than usual, taking another gulp of the blackberry concoction to calm her nerves and belatedly realizing that that probably wasn't really helping. Still, it was heartening to recognize the mechanics if not the name of the party game and find she understood some of the social tenor implied by it for what felt like the first time that evening. She sniffed at Raina's caveat, crouching down to absently scratch Matt's hound behind its ears with her free hand. "Well! Beg your pardon, Princess. If the experience was unsatisfactory I hardly think the fault can be laid at my feet."
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"Took the words right out of my mouth!" the poltergeist beamed from where she was sitting sidesaddle on the snath of her floating scythe like a cartoon Elizabeth Montgomery atop her broom. As she hopped off it became clear that the weapon wasn't supporting her weight in the air but the other way around. Gliding behind Eliza and coming around on the elementalist's other side she added in a low aside, "I talked to Tarva about being a little less catty, so you know. We're all glad to have you and Mali around, she can be a tiny bit territorial, is all; I'm sure it'll work out." Where that might have once been a statement of pure optimism the confidence and power Kimber had gained recently gave it a sightly different ring. Turning to Eve and the rest of the team she grinned and made a little bow. "I'll go scare up some information! Bee-are-bee!" With that she abruptly disappeared from conventional view and sped away to slip immaterially through the bank wall.
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In the rush of sensation bombarding both his usual senses and his energy-sensitive awareness as they came out the other side of the rift it was easy for Erik to let his mind click into the rapid prioritization of a duel, filtering through with barely a conscious thought. Steve was upright, more or less; whatever it would have taken to put the big man down for good they weren't going to find out that day. Chris had managed to bring the cloned dinosaur along with him; they could worry about that later. One item checked off the list and another dropped to the bottom. Echo keeping it together, barely, but he thought he recognized Miss Americana toppling over nearby. He felt his sister's forcefield drop without having to look and recognized Min's handiwork in the plants amidst the rubble. He hadn't seen her cut loose like that in the city since the Gorgon's attack-- and immediately the calm observation was washed away in a racing pulse and pumping limbs as he ran to the edge of the pile of rubble where the dryad was desperately tossing chunks of road and building out of the way. "What happened?!" "They..." his sister's voice began from behind him, trailing off as she swallowed thickly. Ellie had pushed herself to her limits battling against the Withering's power and the past them to maintain a barrier big enough to protect the rift and machinery from the Atavisms but that wasn't why she felt impossibly tired. "Listen, hermano, you need to, you need to sit down or--" "Where's Talya?!" the fencer demanded, the grinning daredevil who'd suggested a dinosaur stampede and the icy warrior promising retribution for an attack on his friend both gone as he looked about with mounting panic. "What happened?!"
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Midnight took the Deep One's assumption impassively; Jessie and Aquaria were codependent enough that clarifying the lack of a romantic element didn't seem like a priority. Instead he focused his attention on the 'Star Orb'. From context he gathered that it was an artifact of some cultural significance but he certainly wasn't going to rule out actual supernatural properties. Reluctant to pick the thing up without proper examination he instead let a trickle of midnight mist roll from around his ankles and out the cuffs of his pants, blanketing the apartment floor in a disconcerting cloud of inky darkness. The mist hid the orb from the intruders and reached far enough to start licking against the Deep One Wander had pinned. The visual effect was perhaps more impressive than the actual advantage it provided but he was counting on the amphibians to be as superstitious as they seemed and fill in the implied show of shadowy might for themselves.
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"Right. My turn. Wuff." Hands pensively on her hips Becky's attention was pulled from admiring the stark claw design on Eve to looking over to the array of tattooing equipment that had put it there. "Worried about the pain?" Lane asked not unsympathetically when the Canadian didn't immediately get into the chair her girlfriend had vacated. "No use fretting, luv. Big gal like you'll be fine." Becky snorted wryly. "Yeah, no, I'm not worried about that part. I just have... strong reflexes. Don't want to, uh, knock your arm in the middle or anything." She shot a look toward Eve as she took a deep breath and unbuttoned her pants. It probably went without saying but she expected she was going to need a little help keeping the wendigo quiet for this one.
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Min and Talya weren't waiting long before the door swung open and they were greeted by a grinning Erik, who gave each woman a brief kiss before looking over his shoulder back into the house. "Hey, get in here! Abuela is in the kitchen." If Talya had been avoiding Gina it was fair to say that Erik had been avoiding the topic of Talya avoiding Gina, not much more eager to have any version of that conversation than the Englishwoman. He could only will himself to be so oblivious, however, and an innocent enough update on relative location seemed like a fine compromise. Eden hopped down from Talya's arm in response jetting through the living room to go say hello. "Steve called to say they're on their way," Erik continued, stepping out of the doorway and offering to take either the pies or the infant as necessary.
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While Foreshadow opted for the straight forward option Midnight remained hidden, moving from shadow to shadow, always carefully in the precise spot where no one was looking as he followed the other vigilante and the police into the museum. Not having to explain himself left him free to take a closer look at what was evidently the crime scene despite the lack of any obvious signs of intrusion. The tidiness was almost conspicuous; not so much as a layer of dust sat atop the exhibit. He expected to find it similarly devoid of fingerprints, fibers or other material evidence as well judging from the immaculate clean up. The alarm certainly hadn't been tripped but as he slipped past the curator to get a closer look he noticed that the built in timer was flashing 12:05, an hour and a half behind the actual time. It said something about his life that he had to consider some sort of time manipulation as seriously as electronic tampering. Mulling that over he found a spot behind another exhibit from which he could continue to observe.
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Midnight II Notice check: 1d20+15 29 Not quite! Still enough for the first two tiers, though.
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Jack blinked once at the proffered piece of paper before reading it, frowning a bit as he did. "I think we can rule out your friend just wandering off, yeah," he agreed soberly, looking down at her unconscious attackers. Glancing up he met Kimiko's eyes with a reassuring nod. "Don't worry, we'll find your friend and figure this thing out. I take random stabbings in the neighbourhood pretty personally." Turning to Foreshadow he offered the paper to the other masked man. "Don't think we've met but I appreciate your style, man. You up for hunting down some wannabe ninjas? Guys are like cockroaches, for every one you see there's another dozen hanging out nearby."
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Coughing slightly as he swallowed badly, Erik interjected, "I, uh, don't think he needs any more than the broad strokes of that story, florecita." He had a strong suspicion that at least some of Dimitri's bawdy old man persona was a bit - if nothing else he'd never met any other immortals who'd managed to hold onto an accent that thick - but he also knew that Min wasn't one to spare details just because of silly little societal conventions. If he was playing at being a little more scandalized than he might have normally it at least bought him a chance to study Talya's expression for a moment. Inwardly he wished he'd payed more attention in either history or geography classes in school; he had to rely largely on context to understand her reference. Silently he promised himself to crack open a book in the near future. "Our circles sort of overlapped back when we were still living in the brownstone," he spoke up instead, referring to Talya's context-free anecdote. "Danger needed somebody who could fight a guy made of energy to help Phantom and the Broodmeister to--" He cut off for a moment with a small frown. "...how many immortal people do I even know? Definitely Lynn, Stesha can come back from the dead, I'm pretty sure Steve's actually super old, Gecks regenerates so that's probably like a 50/50 shot..." He started counting off on his fingers and quickly had to move to the second hand.
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Until the very last moment it looked as if the leaping swordsman had caught Jack unaware until suddenly his own weapon snapped upward in an instant, parrying the ambushing strike. With a metallic clang one half of the offending blade clattered to the alley floor, cut clean through by its own momentum and a combination of the fiery sword's intense heat and the impossibly sharp edge the metamagi had chosen to imbue it with for that instant. Jack drove his left elbow backward into his descending attacker's solar plexus, trapping him between the blow and the brick wall, dropping him with a sharp, pained grunt. With a flourish his flickering rapier whipped forward past the other mugger's guard as though he had been standing still rather than an actively blocking opponent. This time the sword plunged deep into the brigand's chest, protruding out of the shocked man's back. In the heartbeat between sundering the opposing sword and striking against flesh and blood, however, Jack had altered its properties and rather than drawing blood it left only charred marks on the man's clothes and sharp, burning pain that dropped him to his knees as quickly as though he had actually been skewered. "Amateur hour," the swashbuckler sighed, evidently disappointed with the poor showing from the fallen thieves. Spinning to face the woman he flashed a grin, "Exciting stuff, right? You okay there?"
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"Not going to kill you," Midnight promised, the words echoing chillingly through the filter in his featureless black mask, red lens like glowing embers set in gaping void. "No such mercy." Whether the similarity to the terrible, half-hidden predators of the depths the Deep Ones were familiar with made him more intimidating to them or whether he was frightening in spite of that familiarity was difficult to guess without a better understanding of their culture but the look on the face of the one Wander had pinned needed no translation. He glared upward at the second intruder, making no immediate move to attack but letting it know it was marked. "Know how to treat prisoners on the surface. Start talking. Will tell you when to stop."
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Midnight II Standard Action: Intimidate Deep Ones w/ Skill Mastery: 35.
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"Sure, sure," the man in the windbreaker agreed affably, squaring his shoulders a bit so that he more obviously loomed over Buffy while widening his smile even further. "Ricky's what the boys all called him back in the day, is all. I'm Dave, this is Jake. We were hoping to catch him here, see." "Just bad luck, huh!" the other man laughed, the chuckle a little high pitched for a man his side, not to mention out of place given the lack of anything actually funny. Dave didn't even look back at his companion, instead staring Buffy down with a thin veneer of friendliness. "You could call him, though, yeah! Why don't we wait inside with you?" Upstairs Eden gaped as she floated into the air, giggling as she figured out how to flip herself head over heels in surprisingly short order and with uncommon coordination for a three year old. Mia was equally startled to find herself rising off of the ground but where her older sister was delighted the infant flailed all four limbs looking for purchase, making increasingly plaintive noises. Within moments her face had screwed itself up into a knot and she'd begun bawling at the top of her lungs, still thrashing about in the air. "No, Mia!" Eden called, trying to propel herself toward her sibling without much success. "You're not hurt, don't cry! Put her down-down-down!"
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It wasn't until Miss Americana's blaze of laser fire faded that the next brightest light source on the battlefield drew the attention of the varied combatants. The blue light around Jill's fists had grown in intensity until it was impossible to make out more than the vague silhouette of the woman behind it. With a shout like she was lifting some great weight she pushed the rippling field of bioelectricity outward in a rush of power that tossed back debris and rubble as it went. Before Mastermind had even finished reeling a glowing translucent dome had solidified over the remaining Interceptors and the machinery attached to the rift in time, a thick barrier against any attack. "Take your best shot," the masked woman growled upward at the Atavisms before calling over to Americana, "Make sure Willow's alright then help 'Fly figure that thing out. I can do this all damn day."
