ic Mind And Matter

[RocketLord]

GM

 

3:30 PM, Friday April 12th, 2024

City Center, Freedom City

Powers Holdings Office Building

 

It started innocently enough. Parker had been to a family dinner, his family had asked him about his friends and students, and he had mentioned a few of them. When he mentioned Iris and Daniel and their telepathic powers, Tracy, his older sister, had perked up and asked more about them, how powerful they were and so on. Apparently, one of the R&D teams under her is working on a device that should, hopefully, be able to expand the scope of telepathic powers, potentially allowing a telepath to aid rescue efforts in a much wider area in terms of catastrophes. So... Parker had asked Iris and Daniel to come with him, explaining things as well as he could, and when Michael had overheard, Parker invited him along as well. 

 

The weather is nice for mid-April, as the group exits the car that had been sent to get them once classes were over for the day, once it has stopped in front of the Powers Holdings office building in Midtown. The building doesn't particularly stand out. Sure, it is tall, but so are most of the buildings in midtown, and the area is dominated by Freedom Hall, City Hall and the DuTemps Building, so, it doesn't particularly stand out.

 

Still, there is a big POWERS HOLDINGS INC. name plate over the revolving glass doors, and on the window next to them, the large P with an explosion inside the upper part of the letter that makes up the Powers Holdings logo, which makes it easy to identify the building, at least.

Edited April 8 by RocketLord

[RocketLord]

Spaceman

 

Parker has to remind himself that this is all to help out Tracy's team, and to maybe help out Iris and Daniel. He doesn't like to flaunt his family's wealth or status. They are doing good with their resources, but it still feels wrong, when he knows that many of his friends have had to deal with poverty or worse during their life, something he has never tried. 

 

Stepping out of the car that had come to collect them (it is a nice car, though not overtly so. A generic model, nothing too fancy), he is wearing a pair of jeans and a white t-shirt, with his bomber jacket held in one hand. It's never cold inside and the weather's nice enough, anyway. 

 

"So... yeah. This is it, I guess. Powers Holdings' big Freedom City office building." 

 

He is feeling awkward. It's the first time he has brought any of his friends here.

Edited April 8 by RocketLord

[Poncho]

Powers Holdings. Of course Parker Powers would be the scion of Powers Holdings, though he hadn't said anything about his assumptions to his friend before; it wasn't his place to say anything.

While Michael wasn't exactly a scientist himself- obviously far from it, he was just a high schooler!-, he kept an eye on and off on the stock market at times, and he had seen Powers Holdings as a company in Freedom City; one of the ones that he'd have to get to know if he ever finished his goal of becoming a politician in the city, understanding the motions of big business in the area, and the people in charge of it. So he was aware that Powers Holdings was a combination of old money and new technologies, two things he had an interest in. It had been very easy for him to agree to come along to see where his friend 'came from', so to speak.

 

In early spring, it meant appropriate spring colors to match Michael's own Spring palette. Dauchsand brown loafers and matching belt, with biege slacks. His biggest splash of color was a sweater vest with hibiscus and georgia peach coloring and a flower imprint; standing out to match his palette and make a focal point on his outfit.

 

"It's a nice building." he said, a bright smile directed at Parker. "It was recently highlighted for it's interior decorating, right? I'm excited to see it in person, interior design is something I'm not super well versed in. Thanks for inviting me." he finished to Parker before he turned to help Iris and Daniel from the car, offering a hand.

 

[Dracostern]

Cerebral and Cerebellum

 

The twins stared up at the large building in awe. They did not expect their classmate to come from some place so high end. Sure it might not be the tallest building in the city but compared to what the Twins had seen it was mighty impressive! 
They would thank Michael and step out of the car. They were wearing matching shirts with some floral patterns on them for the springtime. Iris would have her shorts on, denim, along with running shoes. Whereas Daniel had sweat pants instead, something a bit lighter then normal. 

They would look around as Daniel wondered why they had been chosen specifically. After all while he had met Parker before, they were not exactly close. Still friendly gestures were friendly gestures and since this was for research it was actually not hard at all to convince Iris to come. 
Speaking of Iris, she was staring at the building in awe. "What do you guys develop here?" She asked, a hint of excitement in her voice. 

[RocketLord]

Spaceman

 

"I think so," Parker responds to Michael's question about the interior decoration. He is probably right, but it's honestly not something Parker has paid too much attention to. The company has always been more his sister's thing. With his powers, he always had other things in mind for what he would do, and besides, Tracy is the heir apparent.

 

Parker shrugs lightly in response to Iris' question. "So many things, I'm honestly not even sure. My parents are really into trying to use their money to help everyone, so, they bring in anyone that wants to do that." He smiles fondly, as he looks up at the building. "Renewable energy, medicine, anything they can try to fund in some way."

 

Leading the others into the building, he stops at the reception, where the young man sitting there already have visitor badges ready for them.

 

"My sister, Tracy, asked me to bring you. She's in charge of a few teams, one of them is doing something with psychics. I don't really know the details, but apparently, having some real psychics like you to help out could really help them out."

[Poncho]

Michael placed his badge on his neck with a smile and a quick thanks, looking around at the decor in the building. He wanted to talk about the way this building's layout was designed, it's thoroughfare and presence. But he realized this was not the company for it, so he just smiled and nodded as he listened to Parker.

 

"So they're looking into just about anything, huh? I wonder if I can help them with some energy studies...or maybe they can help me? Hrmm." he pondered. "But they're working with psychics too? Like...what, trying to awaken everyone's third eye or something?" he looked at the twins. "Like why is it that people always suggest everyone has latent psychic powers, that's clearly not the case, right? This is such a cool place to be, there's plenty of research I'd love to see, even if I probably couldn't understand even the start of it."

[Dracostern]

Cerebral and Cerebellum 

 

The twins followed their friends in and would take the badge, pinning it to their collars before turning back towards Michael and Parker with a nod. "Makes sense." Iris would say briefly before her eyes began to scan the building itself. It was almost as if she was trying to get a layout of this floor. Though it would be harder to do that without moving. She did not want to get lost however and would just stay with the boys. Daniel was silent as he was still somewhat awestruck by everything.

[RocketLord]

Spaceman

 

"Maybe? Parker offers in response to Michael's question about awakening everyone's third eye or something like that. "I honestly wouldn't put it past Tracy. Some of her ideas are interesting."

 

He leads the group through the building, using a combination of his memory and his enhanced senses. 

 

Once they're in an elevator going up, he can't help himself.

 

"This place is probably the reason why I got powers. Tracy pushed some buttons, and my mom was hit by some strange radiation while she was pregnant with me." He doesn't know why he wants to tell that story, but it feels appropriate. "I kinda hope that she's gotten better at all this since then, but then again, she was three."

 

The door opens, and Parker steps out, leading them towards a laboratory.

[RocketLord]

GM

 

Before they have a chance to go in, the door slides open and a blonde woman dressed in a white lab coat over a black dress shirt and slacks combo walks out, pauses for a moment, then promptly grabs Parker with an arm around his neck and starts playfully messing with his hair with her other hand.

 

"Hey, bro! About time you showed up! You should've been here ages ago!" Her tone is playfully angry, and while Parker could probably get out of the grab, he doesn't. 

 

Without letting go, she looks up at the other students, like she is only just noticing them there.

 

"Oh, hey! Welcome to the lab, I'm Tracy. You guys ready to do super science?"

[Poncho]

Michael got what was going on here; he had an older brother. But he understood what being a younger sibling was like, so he just smiled cheerfully at the sibling's play and waited to be acknowledged. When she did, he waved at her.

"Yup. I'm Michael Adon, and I'm ready to do super science. Or to learn about how you manage such a large and broad company. I'm interested in that as much as the actual science; good bureaucracy is a science all it's own, after all." He said, extending his hand to offer to shake Tracy's, and maybe get Parker out of the headlock in a gentler way as he did so.

[Dracostern]

Cerebral and Cerebellum 

 

The twins look at each other for a second before watching Parker and Tracy interact. That seemed familiar to them for obvious reasons and as such they could not help but smile, even Iris had a small smile on her face! Once Michael had introduced himself, Iris would bow her head. "Iris Evans."

 

Daniel then followed suit almost as if this was planned, even though it was not. This was something that happened often with the twins. Both Michael and Parker would have seen this more then once when interacting with them at the Academy. "I'm Daniel Evans. It's nice to meet you Tracy." He would smile brightly at her with a wave. He was excited to get started, and so was Iris actually. 

"So what did you need us to do?" 

[RocketLord]

GM

 

Tracy smiles approvingly at Michael when he shows his interest, and, with some reluctance, lets go of him to shake Michael's hand. "Ah, still learning all the bureaucracy myself. Mom usually takes care of that, but I guess somebody will have to take over the family business when somebody is more busy playing super hero." She looks at Parker with a rather pointed look, before sticking out her tongue and turning to Daniel and Iris. 

 

"But you two! You gotta be the telepathic twins, right? Right?" She sounds excited. The science is clearly her passion. "So, the idea here is that we're trying to set up telepathic communication. Like a phone or a headset or something like that, but with telepathic communication instead of having to talk. Quicker, easier, hopefully wider range, but not easy to figure out." She smiles, and holds her hands out to the twins. "Which is where you come in. We need to get some data, see what happens when you use your powers, but can you tell me something about yourselves first? Like, what are your powers like? Do you know how they work? Did you get them in some kind of accident, were you born with them?" She is talking fast, going a million miles an hour. 

[Poncho]

"Ah, yes. I imagine a holding company like this has truly astronomical beaucracy to navigate. Learning the ins and outs of it could take ages, especially if you're carrying out research at the same time." Michael said, then looked at Parker and grinned. "Parker's great though. He's got a real knack for the superheroing, you know. Plus he's actually pretty smart about all the sciencey stuff too." He noted.

 

But when she moved over to the Twins he just watched. He raised an eyebrow and waited to see how the twins would react, willing to step in if they got uncomfortable.

[Dracostern]

Cerebral and Cerebellum 

 

The twins just blinked at the overly excited Tracy, now Iris was actually into talking about science with the older lady. The issue was the sheer amount of questions bombarding her. As such she took a step back and replied in the other lady' head. "One at a time please." As she said that she would look over at her brother with an expression that could be traslated as 'help me!'

 

Daniel understood this and stepped foreward. "Umm...Ms, our powers are just basic psychic stuff, telepathy, telekinesis....what have you, though we are hardly the most powerful."  

[RocketLord]

Spaceman

 

Parker visibly winces when Tracy mentions how he is too busy playing super hero to take help with the family business, despite Michael coming to his defense. He is... well, he doesn't exactly disagree with Michael, but he doesn't quite agree either. He's not stupid by any means, but Tracy is on a whole other level compared to him. She is right, though. He's not really interested in the business. They're doing a lot of good for the world, but he can do something else, something that other people can't. She usually agrees, but not today, apparently.

 

"Take it easy, Tracy," he says, trying to come to the twins' defense, rather than his own. "We haven't read your thesis statement or anything, you have to give everyone time to breathe."

Edited June 15 by RocketLord

[RocketLord]

GM

 

Tracy stops when she hears the voice in her head. She looks surprised, her eyes quickly scanning over the twins, resting on Iris for a moment, something a bit more than just the surprise in her eyes for less than a second, then returning her focus fully to Daniel as he starts talking to her.

 

"Yes, I'm... sorry about that." She has slowed down considerably now, the shock being enough to drain at least some of her energy. "We haven't really been able to find any psychics that wanted to help us out, so I guess I got overly excited."

 

Pausing, she turns to her computer and jots down a few notes about what Daniel is saying, before turning back to him and Iris. "Power doesn't really matter for this. It's more of a map, I guess. Range and power can always be boosted, right?" She smiles, trying to move past the awkward moment. "So... how did you two get your powers? It's fine if it's personal, but it might help us out when how to duplicate things, and... how do you feel about wearing a big helmet for a moment, so I can get make that map? Both of you would be best, if you feel up for it."

[Dracostern]

Cerebral and Cerebellum 

 

The twins looked at each other again. They knew that Tracy didn't mean any harm. But she was poking around old wounds. Neither were willing to tell her where they got their powers, for it was likely she could have them arrested for crimes commited in the past. That and it was too painful for them both to discuss at the moment. After a moment of hesitation, Daniel spoke once more. It was clear that he was the 'face' of the duo. 

 

"We do not mind wearing a helmet but umm...all I will say is that we got our power in a lab." He was not going to say who's lab, but he would at least give that bit of information. 

[Poncho]

"...Is she always like this?" Michael whispered to Parker as he watched Tracy move a million miles an hour. He thought he moved fast, but this was on a whole new level; he was having to speed up his brain just to keep up with the speed at which this lady was talking, and it wasn't easy in the slightest. He indicated his head slightly to Parker before heading towards the other two highschoolers and putting his hand on Iris' shoulder supportively.

 

"Ms. Tracy, not to talk out of left field here or anything, but we did just get into the building...can you maybe show us the lab and stuff before we start talking about putting people in helmets? I'm really interested in this mental mapping idea you've got going on; I can manipulate how fast my thoughts go but I've never had any sort of mental powers like that, I'd be curious to see what a normal person's brain looks like on your mapping software, if that's something you have available." He actually was absolutely certain that he'd have no way to make heads or tails of Tracy's scientific exploits, but he was just saying stuff to try and make her back off of Iris and Daniel for a second, at least long enough for them to take a breath.

[RocketLord]

Spaceman

 

"When she gets excited about a project, at least," Parker whispers back, leaning closer to Michael. He honestly haven't given it much thought, it's just been how his life has been the entire time.

 

He can understand why Michael is hesitating when Tracy goes like this, at least. He is kind of starting to wonder if this was a bad idea.

[RocketLord]

GM

 

"A lab, hmm?" Tracy responds to Daniel and nods, quickly jotting down some notes. "That's good. Perfect for this, actually."

 

She stops in her tracks and stares at Michael. "Well, yeah. Of course I'm gonna take you to the lab and show you things. It's not like I can lug all the equipment around, right? But sure, I can show you some of it, but you'll have to sign a NDA."

 

There's the business part of things showing up, as Tracy brings a NDA up on her tablet and shows it to Michael, before she starts leading the teens towards the laboratory that she had mentioned.

 

Inside, there is a number of screens, showing various diagrams of human minds, highlighting different parts. Several tables and computers are in the room, with one of the tables holding a large round helmet, connected with a number of cables to a large machine.

 

"All of these," Tracy says, gesturing to the screens. "Are regular human mind scans. Nothing that stands out. If we want to establish telepathic communication, we need to see what a telepathic mind looks like."

 

She turns to look at Daniel and Iris.

 

"So, who wants to go first?"

[Dracostern]

Cerebral and Cerebellum 

 

Daniel and Iris would follow Tracy and wait paitently to be addressed. Once Tracy moved back to them, the Twins would look at each other. They had been deep in thought about this whole thing. They did not want to be in another lab, but this time it would go towards helping people instead of terrorizing them. That thought is what kept them from just leaving. 

 

That and they wanted to help their friends. 

"I will go first."

To everyone's surprise, it was Iris whom stepped up to the plate.

[Poncho]

Michael signed the the NDA with a flourish as Tracy presented it to him, then when he followed her, he couldn't help but move towards the screen. He frowned as he followed the scrrens, examining the brain scans with natural curiosity that always kept him interested in learning new things.

 

"So do all these scans represent 'baseline' humans or are there powered people too? What does a speeedster look like compared to a normal human?" he asked as he wandered around without touching anything. When Iris agreed to go first, he looked back and frowned again, quite surprised at the less active of the two being more willing to sacrifice herself. But that was part of how the twins worked, wasn't it, always being willing to sacrifice each other.

[RocketLord]

GM

 

"You will?" Tracy asks, sounding at least somewhat surprised, but deciding to roll with it. She turns to the helmet, picks it up and hands it to Iris. "Here, let me help you. Just gotta adjust the strap a bit and once you got it on and are ready, we'll get started."

 

Moving over to the computer, she starts tapping away at the keyboard, while she responds to Michael. "All regular people, Mike. I don't really have access to a whole lot of super people, so I got no idea how it'd look." She pauses for a second, looks over to Parker, before returning to the screen. "Tried scanning Parker, too, but it didn't work. His powers interfered."

 

She continues for a moment more, then turns to Iris. "Alright, just say when, and we'll get started. I have no idea how this will feel for an actual psychic, but if it hurts or anything, let me know immediately, and we'll turn it off, alright?"

 

Once Tracy sounds on the helmet for the scan, Iris will start feeling a hum in the helmet. It doesn't hurt, but it feels weird, like she is suddenly very far away from everyone, like she is all alone, and then it all comes rushing in, and she can feel the others, like her psychic abilities are being blocked, then comes rushing back.

 

By her seat, Tracy's grinning. The scan of Iris mind is starting to appear, with several areas lighting up. "Are you doing alright, kid? Nothing weird or anything that hurts?"

[RocketLord]

Spaceman

 

Parker shrugs at the mention of his powers interfering with the scan. "It's not something I can control," he says apologetically.

 

He's not stupid by any means, but this goes beyond what he knows. He's not shy about admitting that Tracy is the true genius in the family. 

 

Parker looks over to Daniel. "Are you alright with this?"

[Poncho]

Michael was quickly finding this outside of his limited experience. Tracy was clearly way beyond anything he could hope to keep up with, Parker hadn't been kidding about that. He might have been able to talk about the design of the building and the structure of the offices, but she was talking about some clearly high class science stuff now, stuff he would have needed 5 college degrees or something to understand, and he hadn't even finished his high school coursework. At this point, he was the odd man out, so he went a bit more quiet, taking a seat in a nearby chair and just watching; observing the scan, watching Iris, not interrupting at the moment.

 

Maybe he'd even learn something.