Ions and Argent

[MarkK]

The Emissary had a deep respect for the street patrolling vigilantes that frequented locales like Freedom City's south side (Though he found the prevalence of carrion, shadow, and rodent motifs slightly mystifying. He lamented a lack of clown themed crimebusters. The image showing up far more among villains was just sad). For his own part, some of the city's worse off districts were regular features of his circuits through Freedom. But he found that the combination of nocturnal efforts like those, and the wrath of nighttime guardians of the city lead to an unfortunate side effect: increase in daylight crime.

And so it was he shifted about his usual routes this day to do a fly over of the south side from the morning on. The sun glinted brightly off his silver skin as he emerged from the clear blue of the horizon as a herald of the dawn.

[Angelica]

Usually Ionica tended to stay near Southside, mostly because that was her home turf, her territory. In the darkest alleys, the most godforsaken places in all of Freedom City, those were the places where Ionica tended to focus on, stopping those bullying her fellow homeless or the gangers trying to hurt the few who actually were having businesses of their own.

Yet on this day Ionica was soaring the sky, stretching her metaphorical wings, as she expelled energy through her feet, which allowed her to achieve a high speed. She was not so much patrolling, she didn't really pay much attention to what was below her, no, she was mostly just flying for the sake of flying, to keep up her skill, possibly even gaining more control. Thus she could be found zipping from building to building, at times moving with very high speed and at others hardly flying faster than anyone could walk.

[MarkK]

The Emissary's keen senses couldn't help but pick up on the blue and yellow blur flickering in and out of his field of vision in shimmering, electric arcs.

He paused to try and get a sense of the random flight path being taken, then shook his head to himself and opted for a far more basic strategy.

He cupped his hand to his mouth and called out "Hello!"

[Angelica]

The flier continued her flight for about 10 seconds more, before she realized that the yell was perhaps at her. She looked around confusedly, trying to determine it's source, so of course her eyes focused on the streets below, trying to find someone looking in her direction, someone who looked like the were trying to catch her attention and simply not staring simply because she did something normal people could not do.

"Uhm, yes?" she then said out loud, hoping to see any reaction from the bystanders.

[MarkK]

He blinked at the particular response to his greeting, but at least it let him get a look at who had been buzzing around. He flew over at that to where Ionica was floating, waving in his usual polite and cheery fashion.

"Ah, no, I was the one that said hello. I was simply curious at all the zooming about."

[Angelica]

Ionica does look rather stunned as she notices the Emissary, studying him for a few seconds, before she shrugs.

"Uhm, hi. I'm just like doing patrollation or something like that of this place. I'm Lady Ionica," Ionica replies with a smile.

"So you can, like, you know, fly like I can?" she then asks, staring at the other flyer. "Does that make you a good guy or a bad guy?" Well, let's just say Ionica is not the sharpest tool in the shed and let's keep it at that.

[MarkK]

A warm smile in response to her introduction.

"I am the Emissary, it is a pleasure to meet you."

He scratched the back of his head for a moment at the questions that followed.

"I am unsure if the ability to fly really reflects much on whether one pursues good or evil. I certainly try to live up to the heroic ideal of course. But though I feel that the sheer, well.. fun of flying should grant with it an appreciation for the world one is graced with soaring through, it sadly doesn't"

A pause.

"Ah, anyway, you are new to the superheroic scene? I don't think I've seen you around the city before."

[Angelica]

Nice meeting you, the Emissary. Ionica says and extends her hand for a handshake.

She then looks up, then down and finally back at the Emissary.

"Well, I don't think flying makes one a bad guy or anything, but if you can fly you have superpowers, right, and if you're then a bad guy, it means you're a super-bad guy, so I must stop you. But since you're not a bad guy, it's okay." Ionica explains, her logic being rather flawed.

"But yeah yeah, I know I'm new on this whole heroic stuff. Flying around has been fun so far and I kinda like the outfit, so now I must just find a super-bad guy, so I can do super-heroics'n'stuff."

[MarkK]

"Oh.. my."

He fell silent for a moment, thinking.

"Listen, would you like to come on, ah, patrollation with me? I have been at this sort of thing for over a year now, I could share with you what I have learned from my own experiences?"

[Angelica]

Ionica's hand returns to her side, as she considers the Emissary's words. Then she nods.

"Sure, why not. Perhaps we meet a super-bad guy and then we can both do our super-heroic stuff."

The Ionic girl gives the Emissary a smile, before looking first in one direction, then another.

"Uhm, do you fly until you find one, or is there like some sort of secret way of finding the bad guys that us super-heroes know?"

[MarkK]

"Oh.. dear." The words said quietly to himself.

"Just to ask before we move out, or discuss, er.. our super heroic stuff.. have you had any chances yet to use your powers? Annd.. what might they be? It always helps to know."

[Angelica]

"My powers? Hmm... Haven't used them that much, it was rather sudden, but let me tell you, they are awesome, although also weird." Ionica says with a smile.

"I can fly, as you've already seen. And I can shoot strange energy, which feels kinda tickly when I do so. Oh and I'm very strong. I can lift cars and stuff, as if it was very light. And I'm bulletproof."

[MarkK]

"Alright, well.. to start off to say.. I don't just fly about seeking super bad guys. That is definitely part of things, but a large part of patrolling is also to keep an eye out for more basic sort of crime, violence, or emergencies and to do what you can to help. We also do it to try and remind the people of this city that they are not alone, that we are striving to be here for them, with them, as best we can. It is how we show we are part of their community, and how we give back to that community for making us part of it."

He starts again to fly forwards through the district, waiting for her to move alongside.

[Angelica]

"So no just seeking out super-bad guys? But helping people with normal problems? It sounds kinda boring." the Ionic girl says to the Emissary, a confused look on her face.

"I thought heroes beat bad guys, not helped kittens down from trees. Being a hero doesn't really sound as interesting anymore. I can help kittens down without wearing clothes like these, yaknow," she then comments with a pout on her lips.

[MarkK]

He looks to her with just a bit of a frown.

"I was going to say a very long speech just now. I do not think you are one for speeches. Please come with me, I would like to show you something."

He flies off at that, if slowly enough to invite her to catch up.

[Angelica]

Ionica shrugs, but doesn't reply to the comment about being one for long speeches. It is kinda obvious that she's not.

Instead she follows the Emissary, floating through the air next to him, studying him as she flies.

"So, where are we going?" she finally asks.

[MarkK]

He soars through the air with his usual effortless grace.

"You'll see." is his only cryptic note.

After some time, it becomes clear he is leading her further into the South Freedom, into the worst, most run down of its districts, the decay a palpable force in the air.

[Angelica]

Ionica follows the Emissary. Her curiousity seems to go down a bit as they head into the most run down areas of Freedom City, but she doesn't look like she's feeling particularly influenced by her surroundings, where some might seem a bit disgusted by being in such a place.

"Where are we going? Are we there soon?" the young woman questions as she continues her flight.

[MarkK]

He lands after a while in front of a half crumbling brownstone that seems just a few steps shy of ending up condemned. The walls have been tagged in a multi coloured, overlapping flow of graffitti, from thick signatures, to far cruder proclamations.

The words "Kosoy Free Clinic" are emblazoned in slightly chipped and worn wide plastic letters above a set of double doors.

"We're here. If you'll follow me once more?"

The Emissary proceeds through the doors into an interior showing the building's full conversion to use as a clinic. The pair emerge into a large waiting room, rows of chairs arranged off of beige walls pock marked with white where the paint has cracked and fallen away. The lines before the reception desk snake outwards. The chairs are filled to capacity; everything from families comforting their children through racking coughing fits, to junkies in tattered clothes, shuddering, clutching at themselves as they glance around furtively through gazes sunken in pale, sweating flesh, to the homeless and indigent right off the street. Some of age well indeterminate through matted, wild hair and grime covered clothes. Others can be marked out both for their too apparent youth, and a bleak eyed gaze that hints at the numbing burdens of streetwalking.

The would be patients of the clinic nurse badly stiched wounds, open, festering sores, arms in slings. All the same, at the sight of the Emissary's arrival, some of them lift their heads to look to him with a warm familiarity. Others even smile. There is something to the silvered hero's smile, the presence about him, that pushes back against the misery and malaise that otherwise holds the room.

He walks over to a the desk to take up some clipboards to help in processing patients, and an expansive first aid kit besides that seems to have his name written on it. He walks out after that back to the waiting room, but is intercepted by a short woman in a doctor's white coat coming out of the back, her hair greyed and features wrinked prematurely both, likely from a wearying strain. She smiles to the Emissary, if confusedly so.

"You're about ten hours early."

"Oh, well, I shifted my routines to the daylight hours this time" A good natured shrug of silvered shoulders.

"Alright, and your friend?" The woman looking past the Emissary to Lady Ionica.

"This is Lady Ionica. She is doing a sort of.. super hero ride along. Is that alright?"

"I could hardly complain about anyone you bring along with you." A rueful smile, her hand on the Emissary's arm for a moment before she returns to the back rooms.

He moves out then into the waiting room, walking among those seated, helping to process them to speed things up, cleaning and tending to sores and injuries, performing basic first aid and diagnosis, and at times just sitting with people and listening as they talk.

Before boredom might crash too heavily on Ionica to see this, she feels a tug on the hem of her costume, the pulled fabric leading down to the tiny hand of a small girl dressed in a ratty, faded pink t shirt and tattered jeans. Her eyes are wide as she looks up at Ionica.

"Are you a superhero lady?"

[Angelica]

Despite the imagery, Ionica is completely untouched by it.

She casts a glance in the Emissary's direction, before she shakes her head and sighs.

"You know, if I knew I would be dragged here, I would just have gone here," she mutters, before she heads over to one of the homeless, who is sitting with his arm in a sling. She does this, while the Emissary is talking to the nurse.

"Hey Shorty, arm feeling better?" she then asks him, to which he nods, obviously already knowing her. "They m'ght 'move th' cask t'day, Lucy-de'r," he replies, before his attention turns back to the rest of the crowd and Ionica's is drawn to the nurse and Emissary.

"Hey there," Ionica greets the nurse, before she shrugs and begins looking bored with this. "I'm very strong, so I should punch bad guys. I ain't no doctor, so I can't give medicine to people," she finally comments to the Emissary, a frown on her face.

As she feels boredom is just about to overcome her, she feels the tug at her sleeve and looks down at the child. Ionica gives the child a smile, before she hesitates to answer the question for a moment and then shrugs.

"Ain't no superhero yet. I hope to be one, because I'm very strong, but he dragged me here instead," Ionica explains to the child. "Maybe I'll become one when I get out of here though," the uneducated girl says.

[MarkK]

The girl looks confused at Ionica's response.

"Um... so you're learning to be one? Can you fly?" Her look a bit hopeful at that last question.

The Emissary has in the meanwhile sat down with a young man who's spiked and crusted orange hair is half (badly) dyed blue.

"It is my understanding that you missed a session of rehab.."

A squirm of the kid in his chair. "I just don't have the time.."

"Well. How about if I come with? I will attend your next session with you, we can go together. You will make the time, and I will make the time."

A somewhat agog look.

"Seriously?"

A thoughtful pause from the Emissary.

"I suppose you would need to give me an exemption for an alien invasion or some such thing occuring, but yes, seriously."

"I... uh.. well.. alright.."

[Angelica]

"Yeah, I'm only still learning to be one. Haven't really done any super-heroic yet or anything," Ionica mutters with a shrug. "But it'll change and stuff, I just need to find some super-bad guys and stop their evil and I'll be a super-heroine. That's going to be so awesome."

With that said Ionica starts to float, moving a couple of inches above the ground. "And yeah, I can fly. I can fly pretty fast I think. Faster than a car."

[MarkK]

The little girl claps in delight when Ionica floats up off the ground.

"I want to be a superhero when I grow up too! ... but my mom says that's silly."

[Angelica]

"If you have super powers you can become a superhero. If not, well, then you can become something else I guess. Not everybody has superpowers and stuff. In fact I think it is only few. But you can always hope to have powers and if you do not, you can find yourself another dream or perhaps build some rocket boots?

[MarkK]

She looks a little crestfallen at the response.

"Oh.. okay. Thank you for flying for me though."

She throws her arms around the heroine's leg in a hug before scurrying off back to her family.

Some more time passes, and eventually the Emissary moves back to Ionica.

"I am done here for the moment, if you wish to follow me out."

He moves to leave at that.