Search the Community

When the last of the one hundred drops from the sacred vessel splashed home, the bowl was again filled to the brim, reflecting the stars and Moon above. Neko rose to her feet and began to chant in an eerie caterwaul of a voice that was the only thing about her that actually sounded like a woman nearly a hundred years old, her yellow eyes cast up to the night sky as she turned in a slow, deliberate circle, her tail twitching behind her the way it would if she was about to spring. She called to the goddess of the Moon. “Tsukuyomi-no-Mikoto!” She called out their purpose. “Silent night; moon bright! Calling down its magic power! Gentle glow, all hour!” She called out their plans for the evening: “Strength beyond measure; protected by magic’s might! No one can harm us!” She called out their plans for the future. “Elegant and strong; crowned with wisdom and beauty! Queen of all we survey!” When the bowl dumped its contents out on the sacred circle between them, she knelt down again with a smooth, economical grace and spread her hands, rejoining the mystic circle she and Raina had made for what Americans called the Wolf Moon - the full moon in January. - Neko had proved to be a good housemate for Raina because Neko knew how to do magic. Oh, Owain knew how to do magic too, with a command of dusty old Hermetic tomes that would surely have brought about envy from some of the stuffier mages who had never stopped judging Raina even after her parents had been put away in warded cells on her testimony. Neko knew the good stuff. She knew the names of things you weren’t supposed to say and would never admit knowing around anyone else. She knew how to snap a pigeon’s neck so the tiny soul would power the sort of spell you didn’t admit to casting; even if Raina had had to tell her early on that biting off the pigeon’s head was not something she was ever going to try and not something that Neko had better do in front of her again either. She knew how to summon the essence of fire; not the stuff Raina shot at people who had it coming but the pure stuff, and bask in it, the light in her eyes and her belly in the air, for hours at a time. - Neko had appreciated someone who didn’t pretend to love her. Oh the affection she got from the adults in the Espadas household was all fine and good, the sort of thing she’d have gotten from the aunts and uncles in her home village. (Owain was the brother who had lived, the one piece left from the girl who had never come home from going off to war.) The feelings she had for her classmates, her peers in some ways, were all fine too. Raina was a friend who didn’t try to be a sister. That had been right - that had been what she needed. And besides bringing her business partner Merlin into her life, Raina also knew things that non-magic users didn’t know. She knew the names of the spirits in America, the ones that didn’t respond to Japanese but had English or Indian names, and she even knew the machine-things that sometimes came out to trouble her. And most importantly, at least for this conversation, she had a solid knowledge of the nature of American teens - and post-teens. 17… “Things are all right. No one digs too deep.” She shrugged her shoulders fractionally. “It was a nice New Year. Luke’s family should be fat with how much they eat.” The host of Neko’s new year, Luke was the friend of Leon, who with a little advice from Raina, Neko had figured out how to make her boyfriend. He was by all accounts nice to look at and did what Neko wanted him to do, which was all she really wanted. “I thought the boys would fight the other day, but-” She made a small noise as she felt the power of the circle growing, and there was a faint crackle as of static electricity when she shifted her position. Looking annoyed, she pulled one hand out of the circle and licked it. “Careful,” Raina murmured, not even looking Neko’s way at the small commotion. She had both hands still in the circle, manipulating the power between her fingers with the sure focus of a master weaver setting a weft, not even looking as she worked. Her whole attention was turned to the moon itself, its light making her blue eyes almost luminescent in her upturned face. “This would be a bad night to make a mistake.” Another few twists, knots in a line Neko could feel but not see, and the circle settled down with a sigh of power, humming peacefully instead of crackling. It was still very powerful, but more like a sleeping lion than one pacing its cage. Raina settled back on her heels. “You know boys and their hormones,” she told Neko, which at least proved she’d been listening some. “If they’re not fighting over dumb shit, it’s only because they’re figuring out something else dumb to do.” Scrubbing the back of her hand through her hair and assuming a distinct ‘I meant to do that’ air, Neko resumed her place in the circle. “They are easy, like you said,” she agreed, having found Raina’s relationship advice remarkably useful in negotiating both male friendships and male interest around Claremont. There were rude boys and nice boys, and boys who liked boys and boys who were from other places or other times, but boys were boys. “And the girls too.” She’d been worried about the mind reader but that girl didn’t go where she wasn’t wanted; which frankly put her ahead of several of her classmates when it came to courtesy. “I was afraid of leaving,” she said out loud, “but if everyone is so - easy, it will not be so bad.” Certainly she was doing well out of her online presence; from what Merlin had told Raina, Neko had successfully monetized herself to a degree unusual for a high school student. “They are all - babies anyway,” she added. 24… “”They haven’t seen what you have,” Raina agreed, spreading her fingers wide and letting the power flow through them. It rippled blue in the air, making her hands look like starfish in a tropical tide pool. “They haven’t had to do what you had to do, so they got to stay kids a lot longer.” She turned her hands, pulled the power like taffy, braided it like dough. “You can pretend though, if you want to.” Raina glanced up and caught Neko’s eye for a moment. “Try to act like they do, just for a night or a weekend. Throw caution to the wind. Dare to be stupid.” She grinned. “You might get in trouble, but you’ll probably have a good time.” Neko smirked at Raina’s words, obviously thinking it over. “Will Erik give me a lecture?” She rolled her eyes, though not with any particular malice. The older women of the household could be stern taskmasters when the situation called for it, but Erik tended to be a softer touch. The key, as she’d learned from Raina, was to make sure he found out about it first. “They talk about some things. Leon and Luke know places.” She stretched her fingers like claws and pulled slightly at the power, loosening it so it could spool quickly up her arms. “If we bring costumes, it is…patrolling…” She fell silent, concentrating on a particular fiddly point of magic, a glowing crimson dot that hovered between her fingers for long seconds as she leaned her face closer and closer. No! With a palpable effort, her fingers almost trembling, she pulled her face back and let the dot fade away. It wasn’t that long ago that she’d have tried to eat it, with disastrous consequences for the evening. I’ll get that crimson power yet! With an exhale, she said, “Can you cover, if they ask?” 42… “I never know where anybody is unless there are lives at stake, it’s my personal policy.” Raina cupped the magic in one hand, stirred it with one finger from the opposite hand. “Just make sure to have guardrails on your stupidity at least. Keep the tracker on your phone, don’t go anywhere alone. Stupidity in groups is more fun anyway. Make it a date night and drag Luke along.” She tilted her hand, spilling the magic from one palm to the other. “Okay, this is about ready. I’m going to start prepping the talisman so we can charge it up.” Neko was all business for a little while, rising to her feet to help control the gathered magic while Raina prepared the silvery-bright moon talisman. She paced around the still-filling bowl, her hands outstretched and tail twitching heavily behind her, careful to keep it out of the way of the falling drops. She seriously considered inviting Raina along, but the older girl had been quite vocal about having no interest in hanging around with “a bunch of high school kids” in the past despite the fact that their age gap wasn’t that big. It had been frustrating at the time but now, with significant exposure to them, Neko could see where Raina was coming from. 62… It didn’t do to vocalize specific intent around so much magic, not when one’s words could become real, so instead she bounced lightly on the balls of her feet before whispering, “And then, spring.” She was already thinking ahead to what the two of them had planned for the equinox. “We will have so much.” she added excitedly. 87… “Sounds like a good time,” Raina murmured absently. She wasn’t talking much now, instead humming and singing under her breath. Whatever Raina’s school of magic was, and she’d always been a bit cagey about that around Neko, it was tied up intricately with music and rhythm. Most of her spells seemed like doggerel, nursery rhymes with power behind them, but for complex spells like this one she had entire songs that had to be completed for the power to grow. Neko had occasionally seen even the pragmatic Merlin participating in the music that helped power the magic. He couldn’t sing, of course, but he could keep time with claps or a small drum and chant along, after a fashion. Having a familiar with hands was convenient. Raina’s song trailed off finally, and she lifted the amulet in cupped palms as the last notes faded away. Moonlight began to pour down from the sky, covering them both but concentrating itself in the charmed jewelry. It glowed like a small moon itself, throwing Raina’s upturned face into shadows. Neko closed her eyes, raising her wrists in front of her with hands pointing down, and gave a soft, almost inaudible nya from low in her throat as the crescendo of the song and spell came at the same glorious moment. This was the kind of magical power she could hardly ever get in the safe, secular confines of Claremont, the kind of thing she generally could only get through her friendship with Raina. She hadn’t sung during the casting because this wasn’t her spell, not really - but as her power grew under Raina’s tutelage, she knew her time would come. When she opened her eyes, they were glowing from the reflected moonlight, and she watched with great interest as the amulet shone. She folded her hands, ears twitching and tail lashing behind her, obviously eager for the power that lay in the twin amulet but clever enough to avoid breaking the circle until Raina could give her share to her. In a soft voice, she whispered excitedly, <“feline now with power, whiskers aglow, spells take form, mystic cat now reigns.”> The Moon, Raina knew well, was a common source of illusion and misdirection - one reason why she’d brought Neko along with her natural talent for illusory magic. Thus it wasn’t too surprising when the power bound into the amulet fluctuated and squirmed as Raina bound it, seeming to speak in half-whispers that a less experienced witch might have tried to listen to. When it was quiet, it was Neko who broke the new silence, distracted from her hunger for the power by a question. “Out there,” she said with a wave towards the city, “they…they think this is not real. Even though there is…very much in Freedom City. Why don’t they?” “Because they can’t feel it.” Raina’s voice had an absent quality, preoccupied as she was with handling the powerful trinket safely. “If you can’t feel the magic around you, then you don’t know what’s real magic and what’s bullshit. Even worse if you learn confused and messed up stuff about gods and magic and reality when you’re little, you grow up with no idea what to believe. Easier for them to just say no to all of it. Plus then they don’t have to feel bad when they can’t touch it or use it. Here, gimme your hands.” When Neko extended her hands, Raina carefully tipped the amulet into them, her face intent. “Drop it right away if it starts to burn,” she warned. “Should be okay, though. Cats and the moon get along.” Neko clung to the amulet excitedly, chittering in her delight, and held the amulet up to her face, where the magical glow was reflected behind her eyes. For a moment, it looked like she was going to try and pop the thing in her mouth, before she put it around her neck, grateful that Raina had put it on a chain with a clasp so she didn’t have to try and fit it over the top of her head. With the amulet on, her eyes glowed for just a moment before her body adjusted to the magic. “T-thank you,” she stuttered briefly, obviously trying to remember her English in her excitement. “Verry good. Good.” Raina reached forward and put the tips of three fingers against Neko’s forehead, her face serious and solemn in a way she almost never was. “The gifts of the Moon: safety and strength, light in dark places, and protection from the evil that lurks in shadow. May you use these gifts to protect others and bring light in your turn. Blessed be.” Neko closed her eyes, flushing briefly as she fought embarrassment at being so overcome in a sacred moment. But when no tart comments from Raina followed, she relaxed. I will remember this always! She thought. This is one of the most special gifts I’ve ever gotten. I must find some way to repay her for this boon. “Tsukuyomi remembers, because she sees all,” she murmured softly, then opened her eyes to look at Raina. “Thank you,” she whispered reverently. Raina nodded. “Now close the circle by yourself,” she instructed. “I’m going to watch you to make sure you do it right.” She said nothing else as Neko extinguished the candles and erased the lines they’d drawn while murmuring the ritual words, so apparently she’d done it right. When it was finished, they stood together in the clearing, Neko’s new amulet gleaming in the light of the moon. “You feeling okay?” Raina asked, giving the girl a close look-over. “Don’t feel like you’re going to collapse or barf or anything? No sudden evil impulses that you didn’t have before?” Neko took the questions seriously - all of them. “Here,” she said, running her hands along her arms and through the fluffy white hair on top of her head, which seemed to be sticking up slightly, the way it did when she was especially nervous or on particular cold, dry autumn days. “Not here,” she clarified, pointing to her stomach. “I am okay. Just brighter,” she added, hand resting on the amulet. When she did so, her eyes shone briefly, but it was more like light reflecting behind her eyes rather than actually emitting it. “I will wait. It is very late,” she added, removing her hand from the magically empowered gem. “You?” “Fine,” Raina told her briskly, putting away the ritual gear into an embroidered backpack. Neko could recognize a few of the designs on it as magically significant, power woven into the very fabric. “This is pretty basic stuff, you’ll probably do this again dozens of times during your practice. It’s a good way to gather energy for big work, or just to recharge.” Raina’s fingertips were glowing slightly after handling the amulet, but she otherwise seemed unchanged. “The amulet will be attuned from now on, you’ll have an easier time putting energy into it and it’ll resonate to your power. Don’t give it to anybody you don’t want having a key to your heart,” she warned. A few faces flashed behind Neko’s eyes - and she dismissed them just as quickly. “It is mine.” she said firmly. She smiled, points of her teeth showing. “They will not have it.” It wasn’t as if any of her friends would understand how to use it, anyway. Neko’s aura was already charged by the amulet to Raina’s eyes, though subtly enough that she probably only saw it there because she knew to look for it. Just as planned. For her part, Neko gave into temptation and tried a small magic backed by the power of the Moon. With one hand on the amulet, she raised her other hand. For a moment a spectral white fiery cat with huge eyes and grinning teeth circled them in the air, leaving behind the smell of brimstone and the sound of a distant miaow when it vanished. Neko looked very pleased with herself.

Spring 2022 They had all said she was crazy at the school. Oh no one had said it in so many words, but Neko knew what they meant when they spoke about transference and false memories; false memories when she knew what she had seen and heard, with eyes and ears better than most of them put together. But who could she tell? It was a thorny problem. While Danica was a good friend, the tortoise kami in human flesh was someone Neko talked about the future with - not the past. Owain was a good friend too, to whom she owed a debt she could never repay, but at the end of the day, Neko knew she couldn't add to his burden. Erik and Talya and Min were all fine people who had taken her in when they never had to, and truly seemed to want nothing in return for the boon - but in the end they were not like her. A year in the Hinomaru, maybe more, maybe less, and sometimes it defined her as much as being a girl from a village so isolated that it had only ever been "the village" to her people. And besides, they had babies to deal with now, and needed nothing from the past. And so it was that one Sunday night, when neither she nor Raina were on babysitting duty, Neko presented herself at the older girl's door with a firm knock. She'd been here before, mostly to talk about computers with Merlin, but today she had come just for herself, tail puffed behind her and ears pointed high, wearing a purple and red dress she'd found at the 'second-hand store.'

Fall 2021 The Espadas School of Self Defence and Swordsmanship! Things were changing in the Espadas household this year between Min's twins, Raina's recent 21st birthday, and now the arrival of the two timelost teens from Burma. Owain and Neko had, in their first weekend, been consciously perfect guests - both ready to volunteer for any task around the house that was asked of them, neither of them in much mood to get into detail about their lives before they came here. (Neko had her own obstacles there, for that matter.) When they returned, they had a little more to say; or at least Owain did. "And so between the two of us, James, and Simon, it seems fele of the class is from some age other than this one!" He was gesturing with his knife as he spoke, thrusting vigorously and speaking loudly. "Who knew this would be the year of people wrested from another age to come to this one? Withal, to answer your question, sir, it goes well. Haven't seen any carrying any particularly fine weapons, but when I do, I'll see what fires their heart." For her part, Neko simply nodded, catching the buckwheat soba noodles around her chopsticks and popping them in her mouth. These were a fair approximation of the food she'd eaten back home, but not quite the same. Her ears and tail were seemingly out of view at the table, though the hair on her head was still a mixed patch of white and brown and was obviously cat hair rather than human. It was nearing the end of dinner; it was almost time for the younger children to head for bed. "It is okay," she agreed after Owain was finished speaking. "My roommate is very nice."

Summer 2021 When Raina's phone rang, it was from a contact she'd actually picked up from Talya - the one Talya had just dubbed Anna. "Hey! Is this, er, a secure line?" The woman on the other end had a heavy, old-fashioned Jersey accent, the kind that Raina associated with very elderly people or cartoons. "Because I got yer number from Talya, see, and she said you were the right person to help me with a job."

Okay, let's see Computers for Merlin and Disable Device for Raina.

April 2021 Lantern Hill Cemetery Late evening Raina had saved Comrade Frost's number on her phone at Talya's suggestion but that didn't mean she got a lot of calls from him. "Hello!" came the cheerful, oddly-accented voice when she picked up. "Is this fire witch? This is Dimitri Peshkov! Tell me are you free this evening?" Dimitri peered around the side of the crypt as he looked around for the groundskeeper, nodding in satisfaction when he saw the man had gotten off-shift. Things were so much easier now that the graveyard had decided to hire a company rather than actually pay a man to live on-site.

GM A Friday evening in late February, 2021 The Boardwalk, outside the Diamond Clover Casino It had not been a evening for Raina so far. Eddie had seemed like a nice enough guy at first. He had taken her to a magic show at the Boardwalk. The magician wasn't exactly good, but he was trying at least, not helped at all by Eddie's heckling and talking over each and every thing that he did, loudly explaining to Raina how he would have done the trick so much better. No, Eddie had turned out to be quite insufferable, and Raina had left, leaving the Diamond Clover Casino soon after. It had been a good day for Casper. No trouble at all so far, he had been hangng out with Carrie and had taken her to a kids' show at the Boardwalk, and she had absolutely loved it. He could have sworn that Jessie had looked a bit differently at him when she picked up Carrie, too. All in all, a good day, and he had spent the rest of the afternoon and evening hanging out at the Boardwalk, just feeling good about himself for once. Of course, either of those feelings wouldn't last. In the cold clear night, the roar of bikes echoed through the Boardwalk. A biker gang tore through the Boardwalk, all wearing jackets with an a horned skull with burning eyes and a pentragram on the forehead that identified them as "THE DEVIL's ADVOCATES FREEDOM CITY". Few wore helmets or any kind of protection, laughing and shouting as they drove amongst the people that had to leap for their lives to get out of the way. Of the two riders in the lead, one looked almost unnaturally pale, a red bandana tied around his forehead, his rapidly thinning black hair pulled back by it, and the other, with a full light brown beard and long hair, wore a helmet in the style of an Imperial German Pickelhaube officer's helmet.

OOC for this.

The Espadas School of Self-Defense and Swordsmanship! "Ha, making me work for it today!" Erik Espadas called across the length of the training mats while he intercepted a pingpong ball-sized fiery projectile a hairsbreadth from his nose with equally fiery rapier. The flame wrapped around his hand in an elaborate guard and the light of the deceptively delicate blade was picked up in the sheen of sweat across his chest. Where his shirt had gone and why he had bothered to wrap a dark blue bandana over his eyes when they both knew he was using his metamagi sixth sense to anticipate the incoming bolts of fire were questions his training partner had learned not to waste energy asking. Instead another flurry of little fireballs forced him to flip backward and contort his wrist to catch before they could hit him or the flame retardant tarp they'd hung up on the wall behind him.

January 2, 2018 On the last day of Raina Sanderson's last day of Christmas vacation at Claremont Academy, she got a text from her monkey. Merlin had been increasingly agitated over the last few days, for reasons that he swore had nothing to do with the monkey-sized Christmas sweater that he'd gotten from the floor Christmas present pool. It couldn't have anything to do with the temperature - Cathy was off on a date, or some sort of mystery, with Phaedra, which had left him master of the room while Raina was outside. The text said FOUND BIG THING. TROUBLE. With only three emojis, all of them from the "Hear No Evil, Speak No Evil, See No Evil" series, this was an unusually restrained message. NEED TO SHOW YOU.

Here it is

The Espadas School of Self-Defense and Swordsmanship! September 29, 2017 Whump. Whump. Whump. Erik Espadas' fists impacted the punching bag suspended from the dojo's ceiling over and over, hard enough to rattle the chain and give him time to switch up his footwork between strikes as the bag swung back toward him. It wasn't rhythmic exactly, as his attacks varied staccato triplets of quick jabs to single heavy swings with the entire weight of his body behind them. Even so their was a somewhat hypnotic quality to the overall pattern, his steady breathing framing the train of percussion while a light sheen of sweats showed on the skin exposed by his light tank top. He'd been at it when Raina had decided to set up in one of the stackable chairs lying against the back wall and he'd kept at it for at least ten straight minutes since, gradually picking up speed and punishing the bag more and more severely. He'd definitely seen her come in but hadn't said anything, expression focused and uncharacteristically severe. While the teenager knew the swordsman wasn't baseline human she was pretty sure he didn't have any measure of super strength and wouldn't be punching the bag clean off of its securely fastened chain. He certainly seemed to be making a go of it nonetheless. Whump. Whump. Whump.

Matt had been waiting for her. He'd been trying ever-so-hard to not look like he'd been waiting for her, and on a normal day he probably could have pulled it off with his well-honed apathy and a set of scout dogs, but there was something under his skin and it was making him somewhat less than subtle. And so he paced, or tapped his foot, or drummed fingers against his knee to some song in his head, all while periodically pulling at a bandage wrapped tightly around his left forearm. He'd tried rolling the sleeves of his black overshirt down to cover it, but they didn't cover quite enough of his wrist and at some point he'd just given up. He'd given up on a lot of things, really. "Raina!" So much for playing it cool, well done. He pulled at the bandage again, unconsciously, pulling back a bit so that she didn't feel like she was getting ambushed outside her last class for the day. "It's...not that big a deal, but I could use a favor. Maybe. I'd definitely owe you one - heck, I'd owe you two, if it goes well."

Winifred lowered the blouse in her left hand and raised the buttoned dress shirt on its hanger with her right, frowning at her own reflection in the full length mirror on the back of her dormitory room's door. "If I'm meeting her at her apartment rather than her office I shouldn't be too stuffy, yes?" she reasoned, raising the blouse again to look at the pair of tops side by side. "But the apartment is still inside the company's building and it's still a business meeting. I can't look childish so erring on the side of professionalism might be wiser." Despite her limited wardrobe she'd already been debating her outfit for a good half an hour before asking for Raina's assistance. She'd been preparing for her meeting with Ms. Albright of AEON for the past week and while it would have been one thing if she were simply delivering scientific findings proposing a line of alchemical cosmetics necessitated a certain level of panache she wasn't confident she could meet. If any of her friends knew how to dress for success it was the self-assured pyromancer.

Beneath Claremont Academy 8:42 AM July 10, 2017 By design the impervium cell was nearly empty. The front wall was transparent due to a process that Winifred would have usually been much more interested to learn about and the cube was large enough to pace about comfortably but the only furniture was a smooth bench large enough to also serve as a bed, constructed from the same material as the walls. There was a television set outside the transparent wall, featuring rather clever motion controls so as to forego the need of a remote control but the young alchemist didn't want it even for the white noise just then. Instead she sat on the bench beside the pillow she'd brought with her, wearing the oversized flannel shirt she'd adopted as sleepwear. She hugged her legs against her chest and pressed her face into her knees, letting out a long, weary sigh as she continued silently reciting the elements.

GM Claremont Academy, Headmistress's Office Approximately 4:30pm, May 18, 2017 Four students had been called into Headmistress Summer's office, by way of notes handed over quietly early in the day (so as not to raise a fuss about the matter): Riley Smith, Winifred Wei, Matthew Rivera, and Raina Sanderson. Miss Summers sat behind her desk, typing away as the students filed in, a couple of quick clicks closing whatever she'd worked on, before she turned and faced the students. She sat back in her chair, folding her hands in her lap as she calmly regarded each of them for several moments. "To begin, understand that none of you are in trouble. Instead, this is me presenting you all with an opportunity for...let's call it something of a work-study program. I believe that, between your individual skills and your friendships with each other, you are well-suited to this task. I can't make you do this particular assignment, but you all do have hours and credits and the like to finish, so if it's not this particular assignment, it will be another. And unfortunately, I can't guarantee another opportunity that's as..." She paused and thought over her words for a moment, apparently quite conscious of some of the strong personalities in the room. "I can't guarantee you won't end up being forced to complete an assignment while working with one or more fellow students you do not get along well with. And don't think your companion's skills would let you bypass this requirement, Miss Sanderson; I'd know if he tried. Still, I have faith you all will be interested in this particular project."

January 13, 2017 3:45 PM Even in a city that catered to as many esoteric subcultures as Freedom there were only so many places a teenager might go to improve their skills with medieval weaponry. With the faculty of Claremont Academy in something of a restructuring period - and portions of the student body's faith in the combat training there having suffered somewhat - Cathy Clouston had suggested the next best thing to her girlfriend: a privately run dojo in the city's West End that had been introduced to her by her roommate. Said roommate had continued to receiving mentoring of her own there, albeit in the form of classes not openly available to the public at large. There were certain skills painfully absent from a young lady's usual education these days: picking locks while hanging upside down, disarming an attacker while wearing heels, disarming an attacker with a pair of heels...

Claremont Academy Dormitories April 15, 2017 Winifred still wasn't used to the literal weight taken off of her shoulders be her recent haircut but after putting it off for so long there was a certain visceral satisfaction in having had the nearly waist length hair cut back to a tidy pixie cut with razor sharp lines that kept it off of her ears and neck. It had already proven to be more practical in the lab and if she were to allow herself a moment of vanity the displaced Victorian might have gone so far as to say that it combined with the collar of her slate grey dress shirt to make her neck and jawline look fantastic. A scientist had to acknowledge empirical fact after all. Shifting the strap of the bag slung over her shoulder, she strode down the dormitory hallway with her shoulders squared and her chin tilted slightly upward. It had taken almost half a year of trials and tweaking but the grin threatening to break through her composure came from the feeling of a craftsperson preparing to showcase their efforts. She counted slowly backward from one hundred as she rounded the corner; she wasn't in a position to let excitement or nerves get the better of her. Reaching the door to the room shared by Clouston and Sanderson she gave it a distinctive trio of sharp raps.

It wasn't entirely uncommon for Raina's training sessions to be unconventional, really. After all, Talya had made her practice running in heels and picking locks. The immortal spy's idea of well rounded skills was, to say the least, unconventional. Still, there was something out of the ordinary for even her training sessions when she arrived to the dojo and was hustled in quickly by a robed Talya. "Excellent, you're here. Just enough time to get changed," she told Raina, shooing her towards the restroom and a gown hanging on the back of a stall and a pair of shoes. "High end society - old money." Talya volunteered with a nod towards the cosmetics before vanishing towards the door to get ready herself although it wouldn't take her long at all. She was well used to the art of the quick change. "And we've just under an hour to be gone before Erik gets back for his evening lessons to make our escape. Never ask permission for what you can apologize for in the morning... Honestly, that's terrible relationship advice. I'm rather lucky that they're quite so indulgent. I'll wait outside the door."

April 2017 Claremont Growing up in what he now knew to be a small, closed community made it difficult for Riley to talk to strangers - and he tended to solve difficult problems by careful consideration. So it was that he'd earned a reputation for hanging around the quad staring at people and places before approaching them, which in all honesty hadn't done much to make him any friends outside of the small circle that centered around the people who'd fought Mr. Archer, exposed a cybernetic infiltration of Claremont, and kicked the ass of some of the top students of the school. They didn't have a name for themselves. Everyone already knew who they were. Considering his options carefully from the tree branch that he'd taken his lunch on, Riley finally decided to bite the bullet. Jumping down from his perch, he executed a neat little roll before walking up to the young woman just finishing her lunch outside, chattering little monkey in tow. "Hey, Sanderson!" He pitched his voice loud, so she knew he was coming. Even when he didn't mean to be, he was quiet - and Raina didn't like being snuck up on. He could appreciate that. "Gotta thing. You gotta minute?" He looked presentable enough, with nothing deadlier than a hatchet on his jean-clad hip, and a tablet from several years ago in his hand.

Winifred was still relatively new to being a friend, having been something of a consummate loner growing up in her native time period but she liked to think that she managed to be a reasonably good one, uncontrolled bouts of mass destruction aside. Certainly she still managed to be better socialized than the majority of her circle of peers, enough so that she'd been quick to scoop up her bag and borrowed music player and make her excuses when her roommate's boyfriend had knocked on their door. She'd almost let curiosity get the better of her once and asked Robin how exactly that worked before deciding that neither upsetting her friend or sitting through a detailed explanation were outcomes she particularly wanted. The Victorian was much happier to simply give the couple their privacy. That did leave her somewhat at loose ends, however. Normally she would have put in some time in the chemistry lab but the most interesting equipment there was in the process of being repaired or replaced and as those weren't entirely unrelated facts she had been strongly encouraged to find other ways to spend her time until further notice. The weather had turned brisk enough to discourage a trip outdoors without a destination in mind and the common room wasn't an appealing option, not at a time of day where she knew it would be crowded; the altercation with Madison and her squad hadn't done Winifred's reputation around campus any great favours. The miniature in-ear speakers Matthew had lent her made avoiding conversation while traversing the halls considerably easier but she'd found they did distressingly little to discourage interruption while sitting in one place. Sighing quietly to herself she placed them in her ears and gingerly pressed the triangular button on the player. Perhaps Raina and Cathy would allow her to hole up in a corner of their room for a while. It wouldn't be much warmer than the quad but the Scot was always eager enough to lend a wool jumper to any visitors.

Content note: transphobia, profanity June 2016 11PM The Doom Room In the Doom Room, Riley was on edge. The training room itself was empty, its holographic displays silent while he waited for the rest of the team. He had taken the opportunity to polish and clean his bow, its gears half-disassembled on the plastic floor, and was crouching there as he worked. He was going in without a plan. He hated going in without a plan. Late night training, no notice about the scenario (which was pretty common, especially in the last few months) and no notice about who he'd train with (which was pretty common too), described by Mr. Archer as "the final event for the year." Not one to complain about his education, especially about combat training, Riley silently went about his work, his ears open to his surroundings even as his eyes focused on the work before him. It wasn't the first time he'd had to refurbish his bow without being able to watch his back.

Initiative time. http://orokos.com/roll/423896 = Woodsman has 27

Sunday April 24, 2016 Nuevo Laredo, Mexico There have been some interesting reports from Freedom City for the last few days - but honestly the news from Freedom City is usually full of something interesting or another. Nuevo Laredo was a dangerous city - its status as the busiest inland port in Mexico made it a hotbed of cartel activity, crime and violence such serious problems that even families separated by the border only met on the American side to avoid the risk of street violence. And yet even so, the people that lived there lived better than any prole in the Terminus - better than those people could have dreamed. In the trainyards, as the local security monitored the loading of Dragonfly's new electronic decompilers into the cars of the Southern Pacific, Steve Murdock brooded on these thoughts, and more besides, his dark mood a strange contrast to the "Pixar-blue" sky overhead complete with perfect white puffy clouds dotted here and there. "Thank you for coming, Echo," he said in a moment when his speedy teammate joined him on top of the train where he crouched, watching the work. Of all the Interceptors, Echo was the one with the simplest passport card - no wonder, for a woman who could cross borders when it suited her fancy. "The men appreciate seeing an American superhero - and I appreciate a comrade here. I apologize I am not a better companion." And with that, as he had been doing so often since they arrived, he fell silent. - Getting assigned as a superhero 'ridealong' to the famous Asad had proven to be a real coup for Sparkler and El Huracan - the wealthy playboy had had no real superbattles to fight during a week when business had taken him down to south Texas to supervise the acquisition of Multimedios Radio, one of the largest Norteño stations in the region, a gateway towards making a real financial push into the relatively untapped media market that was northern Mexico. Now he'd crossed the border to actually sign the papers that would make this territory part of his business empire, bringing with him his business staff and the two teenage heroes who hadn't had very much to do this week. The Crowne Plaza Hotel might not have been very big at 12 stories high - but it was the largest building in Nuevo Laredo. From the penthouse suite that Asad's party had rented for the occasion, the group could see out over the struggling city. From this high up, and behind glass, it was impossible to see the city's troubles, or hear them; just to see a nice, sunny day and a thriving commercial metropolis below them. The streets all around here were crowded with semitrucks, thicker than any the teens had seen even back in major cities in the States, making things far easier for those who could fly.

Talya was really at her limit of clever ways to disguise a pregnancy and while she could probably call in a favor for an image inducer, or get extraordinarily creative, she wasn't about to go through that effort for the classes she taught. For most classes, it simply meant that she stopped with concealing wardrobe and suffered through the well meaning well wishes of the students that she worked with. There was one student, however, that warranted a little more effort than that. It had been a few weeks since Raina's last session at the studio between school and apocalypses, and that sort of thing. It was only now that Claremont had gotten back into the swing of extracurriculars. The Espadas school was familiar and it wasn't unusual for the desk to be unmanned, especially if the teachers were setting up or tearing down for classes in the dojo proper. What was unusual was a small note on the counter attached to a very small Tiffany's box sitting on the countertop. In Talya's elegant handwriting, it said simply "Keep your shoes on today." Inside the box was a sterling silver keyring, empty but for an elegant pendant in the shape of a stylized lock on one side.