Not Started Capefire

[Flo]

This is the campfire thread for Capes, located here.

This will contain all Character Forms.

Discord is here.

 

[Flo]

Name: Celeste Barkworth
Hero Name/Alias: Marvelous
Age:22

Design: Celeste wears a long black trenchcoat that trails down to her feet. She stands at a respectable 5"6', and usually wears combat boots. A red bandana is tied around her head, keeping her long black hair out of her face. Her eyes are a deep green, with soft, round features. Her right hand is covered by a leather glove, and her underclothes are usually a button-up shirt and combat trousers. When she turns to Marvelous, the trenchcoat begins glowing, revealing the tattoo mark etched ont the back of it, glowing a sickly green, alongside her eyes radiating green light and smoke.

Abilities: Celeste has an extensive tattoo that was grafted onto her soul at a young age. The tattoo is the manifestation of the Soulkeeper, an extradimensional god. Using the powers granted by her patron, she can manipulate souls, animate corpses, harden blood into weapons and at her most powerful, resurrect the dead. These powers come at a cost, however. The toll put on her soul by the Soulkeeper's abilities will eventually loosen her tether to reality and make her fade away from existence.

Equipment: While not typical equipment, she carries a backpack filled with typical survival gear. On her right ring finger is a ring that has a small dagger on it that she uses to draw her own blood for weapons if needed.

Personality: Celeste Barkworth is a reclusive girl, shy and never the first to speak up in a conversation. She has lived her life with her head down, hood up and doing her best to ignore reality. As Marvelous, however, she is a boisterous, charismatic and charming young woman who is at her best when in the thick of the action, whether that be an argument or a fight. Where Celeste would hide away, Marvelous relishes the challenge and the attention. Where Celeste sees her Mark as a weakness and a symbol of shame to hide away and try to ignore, Marvelous wears her Tattoo with pride, showing it off as often as she can. Interestingly enough, it isn't a clear defined cut between the two. Occasionally, slips of Celeste break into Marvelous, and flashes of Marvelous shine inside the darkness of Celeste. They aren't seperate entities, just different views that Celeste has of herself, the civilian who cannot save a life, and the woman who can change the world.

Backstory: Celeste was born in the United Kingdom, to two members of a group of smugglers known as the Esta Xaday, who specialised in the stealing and delivery of registered Heroic Artefacts for whoever was the highest bidder. Because of the nature of her families lives, Celeste travelled the world with her extended family, learning the tricks necessary for her to play her part, typically being the distraction or the 'little lost girl' who distracted the heroes while the Xaday got away. As time went on, and Celeste gre up, she began to see the true dangers and the truths that Xaday were fighting for. A grand operation, of hundreds and thousands to gather enough mystical artefacts to a small island off the coast of Madagascar, where a Silver Age Hero known as Sigma Braver would use his ability and condense the magical energies and create a rift in reality to allow their pagan god, a being known as the Soulkeeper, into our plane of reality. Celeste was shocked to learn how no heroes or villains had discovered this plot, and she learned that the appropriate figures were either paid off, or were suitably blinded and distracted by those who were willing to take the bribes. Celeste soon realised that her entire life was orchestrated and planned so that her vitality, as well as all those in Xaday and all the other smuggling groups could be given to the Soulkeeper. For the first time in her young life, Celeste showed rebellion against the life she had been given, and lashed out at Sigma Braver while the cast the ritual necessary. The disruption meant that the ritual was no longer being channeled through the archaic ritual circle drawn on the ground, but instead through Celeste's own body.
For a time, all Celeste could see was darkness, darkness and the faintest green whisperof energy that caused her to both breathe deeper and retch all at once. Soon, she heard the whispers of the Soulkeeper in her mind, felt his fingers dance along her back, carving patterns that binded them together until Celeste's willpower finally gave in, and whispered one final word through her mind, something that resonated deep in her very being.

"Marvelous..."

When Celeste came to, the people that were meant to be her family had fled, along with all the others. Turns out a hero had managed to sneak into the scheme, and managed to alert the authorities who arrived to arrest and chase the interlopers down. Reacting purely on instinct, as her back burned green, Marvelous reached towards the limp, cold body of Sigma Braver and felt a rush as his blood shot out a small cut on his finger surrounding her in a cocoon of crimson. She was later retrieved by a hero after she had finally calmed down, and was let off from charges. Celeste didn't see it necessary to inform them of her dealings and ties to the Soulkeeper. She became a wanderer, eventually settling down for a time in the Heroic State of Edmonton. The letter from Presidium was a shock to be sure, she was sure that any hero would want to be nowhere near her, or was even aware she existed. Celeste didn't want to go, but Marvelous was already out of the door, ready to see what the hero wanted from her. The letter only promised her answers and a stage, and Marvelous would take both... and make it showy while she's at it!

 

[Karolina]

Who am I
To say what any of this means?
I have been sleepwalking
Since I was fourteen
Now as I write my song
I retrace my steps
Honestly, it's easier
To let myself forget

Still, I check my vital signs
Choked up, I realize
I've been less than half myself
For more than half my life​

Name: S9-541wX3z or “Kara”

Hero Name/Alias:

Age: 19

Wake up
Fall in love again
Wage war on gravity
There's so much
Worth fighting for
You'll see
Another domino falls
Either way

It looks like empathy
To understand all sides
But I'm just trying to find myself
Through someone else's eyes​

Design: Kara is tall and lean with icy blue eyes and long blonde hair. She is traditionally attractive with feminine features and full lips, though her face and demeanor are serious and guarded. She cares little for her outward appearance and wears casual, unassuming clothing to allow her to blend in with the rest of the population. When her powers are active, her body projects a tangible aura of golden energy and her eyes blaze brightly.

Abilities: The embryo chosen to develop S9-541wX3z was taken from the famed heroes Voidstar and Calamity, with Entmark Industries using their genes to promote energy projection and manipulation, telekinesis, and flight in their progeny. Kara was further altered with neurofibers to enhance her strength, durability, and healing. The energy surge from the lightning strike made her powers and genetic makeup extremely volatile, resulting in an unpredictable phasing factor. The subsequent removal of her Entmark chip resulted in an exponential increase in her powers, but also made them more difficult to control.

Spoiler: Detailed

Energy projection and manipulation: Due to amplification of Voidstar’s powers, Kara does not need an actual source of energy for her own powers and can generate massive amounts of potential energy that she prefers to manipulate into focused blasts. She can also transfer the potential energy into kinetic energy to fuel physical attributes, such as strength, speed, and defenses.

Telekinesis: Kara is capable of communicating telepathically with others, as well as affecting the gravitational fields of objects with her mind. However, these abilities from Calamity were less developed than her energy projection, which were deemed more powerful by the scientists at Entmark.

Flight: Kara’s power of flight comes from a combination of her telekinesis and energy projection powers. The upper extremes of her flight abilities is unknown, since she was unable to test this at Entmark. At the current moment, she can fly at the speed of a fighter jet.

Neurofiber augmentation: The addition of neurofibers into Kara’s tissues and bone structure have reinforced her skeleton to withstand her other abilities. Without the added healing and durability, Kara’s body could not withstand the violent forces of her own powers. That being said, Kara is extremely durable and can tank large amounts of physical damage. The only way to kill her would be to degrade the neurofiber matrix within her body with Entmark’s specifically-made bioweapon against their experiments.

Phasing factor: When the lightning strike hit the complex, the scientists at Entmark were in the middle of editing a sequence of Kara’s DNA. The surge of energy effectively mutated her cells and created a highly unstable matrix. This resulted in an unpredictable phasing factor that Kara has struggled with controlling since the accident. The DNA mutations and the removal of the Entmark chip further resulted in her previously controlled abilities becoming more powerful, at the cost of being volatile and prone to spikes.

Equipment: Kara doesn’t carry anything on her. She has a vast knowledge of weaponry, though she greatly dislikes weapons and refuses to use them for the most part.

So show me what to do
To restart this heart of mine
How do I forgive myself
For losing so much time?

Wake up
Roll up your sleeves
There's a chain reaction
In your heart
Muscle memory
Remembering who you are​

Personality:
In her first 15 years, Kara was only S9-541wX3z. It has only been in the last 6 years since her escape from Entmark Industries that she has created a life and identity for herself. As a result of her time at Entmark, she is guarded and suspicious of other people and their intentions, though her true personality is quite curious, genuine, and hopeful. She aims to be generally forgettable and does not like to make herself stand out in any way, keeping a low profile in all the ways she can. She does not like to speak up unless the situation calls for it, giving her an air of apathy and inattentiveness, though in reality, she actively listens to and analyzes every moment that goes by. She goes through life in a carefully planned out manner, and likes to plot out a course of action and various contingency plans before proceeding. Her biggest struggle is learning how to trust people and to not doubt their abilities or intentions. Though she guards herself, Kara is very kind at heart and has a great weakness for wanting to help those in need.

Stand up
And fall in love again and again and again
Wage war on gravity
There's so much
Worth fighting for
You'll see
Another domino falls
And another domino falls

A little at a time
I feel more alive
I let the scale tip and feel all of it
It's uncomfortable but right​

Backstory:
Long before the creation of S9-541wX3z, Entmark Industries had been genetically experimenting on metahumans ever since the Golden Age of heroes. In fact, the company had been covertly researching abilities and powers in cases many years before the emergence of the first heroes in the public eye. However, to the rest of the world, Entmark Industries appears as a technology company specializing in genetic research in relation to public healthcare and is internationally recognized for their humantarian work and advances in disease prevention and treatment. Many superheroes made public appearances with Entmark Industries, and many more allowed Entmark Industries to take samples of their DNA. It was believed that if the company could amalgamate hero genomes into their research, Entmark Industries would have the resources and knowledge base to revolutionize modern healthcare for the rest of the world.

Of course, the public front of Entmark Industries was a complete lie. The company’s base in Latin America is the main hub for the trafficking and weaponization of metahumans to various terrorist organizations, rebel groups, and corrupted governments, in which they supply specially-made metahumans to those who can pay the hefty fee. Even still, the company’s true goals are known only to the higher ups in Entmark Interprises, who believe that metahumans are the genetically superior race, with an overall plan to centralize superpowers with their creations and topple any governments who dare to oppose them. S9-541wX3z was one of many in a long, long list of cruel genetic experiments to create the perfect metahuman.

The first memories she had were of pain, unimaginable pain that tore through each of her cells with a blinding fury. She remembered being scared and confused, yet being unable to move or cry out. This pain and paralysis was a near constant experience in her early childhood, when the scientists were still molding her genome and integrating the trillions of neurofibers into her growing bones and tissues. She was alone when they weren’t experimenting on her, closed in a small, compact room with only one door that peered into the long hallway of identical cells where her siblings were kept. They couldn’t communicate in words at this age, but the scientists underestimated the powers of telekinesis that were added to this round of experiments. The siblings shared a constant feed with each other, connected through their growing minds and shared experiences. Steadily, however, one of them would blip out of the feed, usually prefaced by a large spike in fear and pain. She soon learned that sibling would never return afterwards.

Soon enough, the scientists would visit them less and she was transferred to a barrack. Instead of being closed by herself all the time, she was with many of the other experiments, though groups of soldiers were watching all the time. At first, she was happy. She was no longer alone any more. But then, the training began and the soldiers forced them to fight each other. Any disobedience was swiftly punished - if they refused to fight each other, one of them was killed at random while the other watched. Usually, the scientists would watch the fights too, and the winner would be taken away for more augmentation. They added a chip to the base of her neck, which would cause her to black out at the push of a button. The soldiers and the scientists used the button to control them, and soon they learned to listen and to obey. The ones that survived were allowed to learn. The scientists told them that learning would make them blend in with the rest of the world, so they would look and act like a regular civilian.

Life during these times was hard, but she kept surviving. As the groups became smaller and smaller, the scientists and the soldiers began to take notice of the individuals. Each of the remaining were honed down to precision with additional combat skills and knowledge. She was the last remaining of her siblings, so the scientists wanted to perfect her energy manipulation. She still remembers the day that they took her back. It was in the middle of a thunderstorm, and the rain was pelting the walls with a vengeance. Even though she was scared, she knew better than to resist the pain when they began altering the neurofibers. The scientists were in the middle of editing a certain sequence of DNA when the lightning hit the building. However, she doesn’t remember what happened after.

When she woke up, she knew something was different. Something was wrong. The lab was burning and the scientists and the soldiers were screaming at each other. What were they screaming about? What’s going on? she wondered. She wasn’t in her barrack yet, which was strange. She always woke up back there. She reached up to steady herself, but there was nothing. Her arm was there, but it wasn’t. She looked down at herself, confused when she saw her body phase in and out of existence. She couldn’t control it as much as she tried in the ensuing days. The soldiers and the scientists deemed her a failure, disappointed that she hadn’t been able to finish the program. They took her in for termination, shaking their heads sadly.

As they connected the tether to her chip in order to extract her DNA for sequencing, she knew didn’t want to die. She had never even seen the world outside of the base. She didn’t want to end it here. A surge of power ran through her, more powerful than the lightning strike that began all of this in the first place. She blew a crater straight through the center of the research wing, letting the fresh evening air wash into her lungs. What was this? she thought. She was strong before the accident, yes. But her powers before were nothing like the pure energy that was singing through her veins. She reached to the base of her neck to check for the chip, but her finger came back bloody and empty. It was gone. She was free and floating high above the burning buildings and chaos below her. She turned to the jungle around her, a flutter of hope replacing the fear that had curled itself deep within her for the past 15 years. Without a second thought, she gathered the energy in her body and fled into the night.

She knew that Entmark would be looking for her, as she was a liability and threat to the company. She also knew that she wouldn’t be safe around civilians, since her powers had grown in both magnitude and volatility. The only safe place would be in Edmonton, where she chose the name Kara as her first name outside of Entmark as S9-541wX3z. The ensuing 6 years since her escape have allowed her to explore her own identity and freedom without fear. Since then, she has created a small, quiet life for herself as a university student in the local area, keeping to herself and keeping off the grid. It was incredibly surprising when she received a letter from Presidium, revealing his knowledge of her previous life and a promise of answers and safety. Despite her uncertainty and suspicions, her curiosity got the best of her and she decided to go and verify the validity of Presidium’s claims.

We were born to try
To see each other through
To know and love ourselves and others well
Is the most difficult and meaningful
Work we'll ever do​

 

[Flo]

yo thats schnice

Kara is, of course, ACCEPTED

 

[SarasaKat]

Name: Zeal Sona
Hero Name/Alias
Age: 17
Design: I’m going to draw this later. That said, she’s indian in ethnicity, and dresses kind of like Indiana Jones. Fit for her age, considering the adventuring she does, and she's 5'9". Doesn’t really care enough about having a disguised hero form - she isn’t out here to be a hero, she’s out here to find and study as many powers as she can and to have fun!

Abilities: Zeal was born with a relatively simple power: light manipulation. It isn’t anything too strong - she can make “illusions” of objects by structuring light, but only for objects around as large as her hand, and they’d appear to be glowing. There is also redirecting light into strategic spots, such as heating up a small object or illuminating a small place, or sometimes, using it in some unlucky *******’s eyes and blinding them. That said, there is the caveat that there needs to be light in the area for her to redirect in the first place.

She hasn’t done much with her research, but she has stumbled upon one artifact that she hasn’t just gotten her kicks out of and dumped it off with her parents - one that gives her enhanced reaction time and eyesight. It comes in the form of a necklace she wears shaped like an eye.

Spoiler: Aight you want logistics I'll give logistics

Wavespectrum reflection
Zeal redirects light, specifically. She cannot create light, nor destroy it. This light can be any kind of light, and in fact, if she tried, she could control all forms of wave frequencies (radio, infrared, visible, xray, gamma, there's more but I'm just rattling off some examples). However, due to wave frequencies other than visible never coming up in her daily life (she isn't a scientist, she's an explorer damn it), she is only aware of her visible light manipulation, and she would never think to try to manipulate other frequencies on her own.

Structuring light into illusions
"Illusions of objects" work by structuring light waves in a precise way in her hand (or wherever, but she tends to put them in her own hand first, for her own reference). If she tried making large objects (think the size of a house), she could do an outline, but the inside of it would appear hollow since she couldn't structure the light wave's path precisely enough to give something depth. If she's working with only a 2D render of something, she could scale it up a bit larger. For example, she could make a light barrier that would provide visible (but not physical) cover from others, with the caveat that the "wall" would be glowing, and would only be big enough to hide 1 standing or 3 crouching people behind it. The objects are, of course, not physical, but if they're particularly detailed, they'd be warm to the touch.

Living magnifying glass
Zeal's main offensive use of light is acting as a form of magnifying glass. She can take a bunch of light waves going in different directions and concentrate them into one direction. The heat this light causes depends on how many light rays she grabbed. It can be anywhere from a glorified laser pointer to a miniature laser that'll burn on contact with human flesh. The latter is only achievable when Zeal puts her all into it however, and she'd be exhausted after such a maneuver (Zeal has never attempted something this extreme yet). However, if she is able to concentrate light onto a person and keep them held down however, she can do some serious damage. Concentrating that much light into the beam lets heat energy compound on top of itself. She can set clothes on fire after 15 seconds if she's putting effort into the beam without killing herself over how strong the beam could be. Flesh would be getting charred and burned to an unrecoverable point by around a minute.

Flashbangs, Fires, Distractions, and Shadows
Rather than do that, she's more likely to find strategic uses of her light manipulation. The most direct instance of this is to just blind people. It works precisely like a flash bang by overloading every photorecepter cell in the eye, rendering someone blind for around 5 seconds, and then leaving them with an after-image burn and impairing their ability to aim for the next 5 minutes. She also utilizes the heat caused by her light beams. If she concentrates it on an object (for about 15 seconds if she's trying but not killing herself over putting everything into the beam), she can start a fire in a flammable object. Five minutes on a metal object would start to see it glow red hot. She can also send quick blips of light to serve as distractions for targets. Mirrors and reflective surfaces are a particular fun tool she loves playing with, and can be used to create some ridiculous distractions. Finally, she's able to send all light away from an object, rendering the area a black void from a particular angle. This essentially lets places have invisibility, to a degree.

Ability Endurance
Her stamina is pretty strong when it comes to using her powers. When she's putting a decent amount of effort in, she can keep it up for 10 minutes of consistent use, or an hour of frequent use. She could keep a laser pointer kind of light going for days (the limit would be how soon her body needs sleep, not her power). If she's pushing herself to her limit, she could keep it up for only 30 seconds at most.

Eagle's Eye
Zeal's control over light isn't incredibly strong, but it is incredibly precise. Her artifact, which she's dubbed her "Eagle Eye", helps this as well. Think of pixels-per-inch (like in a photoshop document). Eagle Eye basically doubles this number for Zeal, but in real life, and affects her brain so that she can actually process this information as fast as she's receiving it. Because of this, she can notice details too subtle for others to catch - with the caveat that she's paying attention and not being a ditsy dumbass. She can notice details others would notice after intent observation with a simple cursory glance, however. This ability to see things in clearer detail also gives her the ability to notice when something is off sooner than others, and as such, gives her more time to react. This makes it look like she has a better reaction time. As the name would suggest, her only heightened sense is sight, so her hearing, smell, taste, and touch is still the same as an average person's. Zeal has the artifact powered 99% of the time, and because of that, her eyes look amber/gold, but her natural eye color is a deep brown. She has a mental connection with the artifact and can turn it on/off silently and at will. The cosmetic change Eagle's Eye, to her, is like makeup, and while she is okay with others seeing her without its influence, she'd prefer to not.

Physical attributes
She's an explorer. She doesn't have much experience with interacting with others, but she does have experience noticing traps, doing boy-scout and adventure-y things (tie knots, start fires, and other such survivalist techniques), and has a very fit body due to the amount she explores. It's not a "power", per se, but she is strong and dexterous for her age. She can push boulders aside by herself, with the help of some rope. If she were given stats, she'd rank high in Strength, decently high in Int and Dex, moderate on Con, and low on Wis (despite her high perception) and Cha.

Equipment: She’s very outdoors-y, so there’s a lot of boy-scout type equipment she carries around. Think swiss army knife, rope, flashlight (yes, even though she has light manipulation). Notably no guns.

Personality: Zeal’s naive, curious, and sickeningly optimistic. Doesn’t realize that situations can go bad, and if they do, it’s really fine since that’s all apart of the fun isn’t it? :D She really has no sense of fear. She also loves studying anything new she comes across, and doesn’t really care about what happens in the process, even if others get hurt. She certainly doesn’t mean any explicit harm, but she also cares more about unearthing mysteries and figuring things out than she does their well being. They’ll pretty much always be alright, in her mind. The one thing that irks her is mention of her status as a daughter of a company. She’s proud of her sense of exploration, not the boring life she left.

Backstory: Her parents are in charge of Yellowstone Company, an American-based artifact and other magically based item collector and trader. As someone who lived a very comfortable, lavish lifestyle, Zeal always got what she wanted. But she grew bored quickly. Her parents were largely absent as they were running their business. Her attendants were fine enough, but largely monotonous. She started pushing her limits to see how far they’d let her go, and it turned out that the sky was the limit, really (her parents had just instructed them to give her whatever she wanted, and who were the servants to disobey). She lived in a mansion in the forest deep in the rocky mountains, so she started exploring the place. Eventually, by playing around in increasingly dangerous environments, she got into some legit danger and was being chased by a bear, but with a blast of light from her hands, he fell. That’s when she discovered she had powers, and she was ****ing elated at this revelation. From there, she was unstoppable. Much of the Rockies had already been looted for artifacts, but she kept searching, stubbornly trying to find what magical items awaited her in the vast wild. And some she found! Many she turned over to her parents so they could use it for their business, but Zeal did keep the one perception-enhancing one.

Presidium’s letter showed up for her one day, which was strange, since she didn’t get mail, let alone with offers this grand. It promised seeing the sights of the world, and seeing powers and treasure she could never dream of. Being the sucker she is, she fell for it instantly. And since she got whatever she wanted, she pretty much instantly packed her bags and left for the meeting.

 

[Flo]

yeah ok i'd already read this and you know you in this pack ACCEPTED

 

[Zerade]

Name: Kazeko Harumichi

Hero Name/Alias: Harukaze

Age: 19

Design:

Haru is rather short, standing at 5 foot even, and often is mistaken for a child due to this, belying how dangerous she really is. Despite spending pretty much all her time outdoors, she is rather pale, which only serves to further the idea that she’s frail and delicate, which couldn’t be further from the truth. She wears the same thing during her hero work as she does while going about her life. When she’s bored, her eyes look dead, like there’s no soul behind them, but when she gets excited, they light up and her pupils become slit, much like a cat’s.

Abilities: Haru only has one real innate ability, which is rather simple, both in concept and execution. To put it simply, she lives as if she were the player character in an RPG. This means that, for one, she can’t actually be injured - any physical harm she endures is instantly healed, and damage is instead dealt to her HP. Similarly, she has an MP bar that governs how much she can use her other skills, and an invisible stamina bar that governs how long she can keep fighting in general. All of these replenish over time, the rates of this (and the maximum values of the bars) determined by her stats, and can be completely recovered by sleeping - which, in fact, is another benefit, in that she doesn’t actually need to sleep, or eat for that matter, though going for too long without either will damage her stamina. However, arguably the largest benefit of her ability is that she can learn other abilities, increase her stats, and level up like any game character, giving her an unrivalled amount of learning and growth potential compared to most “normal” people.

Due to this potential, she’s learned how to use a sword masterfully, as well as stealth and acrobatics like a ninja. She also knows basic fire and wind magic, and intermediate energy manipulation. She also has her (at least for now) one original technique - paralysing enemies with pure intent to kill. She’s currently working on learning a hand to hand style, however her stats aren’t yet high enough to learn the most advanced skills in the style. Also, she can see other people’s names before she’s told them due to her ability considering, at least from her perspective, everyone else in the world an NPC in the game that is her life.

Equipment: Aside from the katana she received from her master, Haru keeps minimal equipment on her. Aside from some wire up her sleeves and knives in her shorts, she’s bare.

Personality: Haru is a mystery, even to herself. Despite being one person, there is a dichotomy to her, some split that causes her to react very differently to the same stimuli given different circumstances. For the most part, she is, while good at heart, extremely detached and entirely self-serving. Most things bore her; and while she does help and save people, that’s only due to the fact that not doing so would probably make her feel bad about not helping out, not because of a sense of obligation or duty. She is chronically lazy, and so only really helps when it’s something that either directly effects her and hers, or something that’s happening literally right in front of her.

The other side of her only comes out when something manages to interest or excite her. She suddenly becomes much more open, more playful. When she’s feeling this way, she’s entirely ruled by her animal urges and instincts, and so acts entirely without thought; which, to be fair, isn’t that different to how she normally makes decisions anyway. While she’s not exactly friendly or approachable, Haru is very loyal to those who have helped her in the past or those she considers friends, and will fight for them - until she gets bored. She is also, while moral, pragmatic. She has no qualms about killing people if they have or will do harm, a philosophy that may clash with others, and one she inherited from her master.

Backstory: Harumichi Kazeko was born in Japan, to a rather average middle class family. While both her mother and her father had powers, her mother’s were useless for hero work and so stayed at home, while her father, who while young was touted as a promising prospect as a sidekick who could become a great hero, burned out and never really progressed any further.

Due to this, there was never really any pressure on her to become a hero - both her parents expected that’d she’d be capable of being one, but seeing as they’d never really managed it, they didn’t much care if she tried or not. While she had her powers since birth, Kazeko only really started to understand that the way she saw the world was different to others when she was about 6 years old, and it still took another 4 to understand exactly what her power was and what it meant for her. Once she understood this though, she went on a massive learning spree, trying to discover everything she could using her powers. This lasted about 3 years, until she finally grew somewhat... disillusioned. It was all just too easy. Things that should take months to learn and years to master, she could learn in a day and master in a week, if she focused on it hard enough. She became the best at every sport in her school in a matter of months, was beating her instructors at every martial arts class she could take, everything. And it wasn’t just that she was outclassing them in pure skill - her power made it so much easier for her to increase her stats that she was far stronger and more intelligent than any 13 year old had any right of being.

She hated it.

People started to resent her for getting better than them in weeks when they had been practicing their entire lives at their chosen craft. That wasn’t what bothered her. She hated her power because it removed all challenge she had. Nothing was too hard to learn, and anyone who tried to challenge her in anything was either child’s play to beat, or would be in a matter of days after she learnt and practiced whatever it was they were good at. It didn’t help that her WIS and INT were far higher than any of her peers, giving her a sense of maturity that no one else around her really had. She began to feel incredibly listless, like she had nothing really to accomplish. Despite her brain, she had no real scholastic ambition, and while she didn’t necessarily want to be a hero, she had no intention of being some office drone either. Her constant boredom and sense of being out of place made her seriously question her life and what she was doing, and she considered leaving home many times, but never really went through with it.

Until, at least, the hero Strider came knocking on her door. Being someone who worked in the shadows and lived off of rumours, he of course had heard of the golden child in his home country that had a power that seemingly let her learn anything she wanted. He wanted to see if the rumours were true, so at first secretly, and then more openly later on, he started teaching her the basics - and once they recognised each other as master and student, everything - of how he fought and worked as a hero. He taught her acrobatics, stealth, torture, interrogation, survivalism, swordplay, and even trigonometry in how it applied to the use of throwing weapons. Kaze was thrilled. While it was all still easy, it seemed like Strider always had something more to teach, and each new topic was more interesting than the last.

Eventually though, the day came where Strider’s catalogue of skills ran out, and there was nothing more he could teach her. Kaze was 15 at this point, and she had a tearful farewell with the older hero. Strider left her with the katana he’d been given by his master before they parted ways, never to meet again. With Strider gone, Kaze once again felt like there was no point to her existence, and everything bored her again. So, without a word, she left her home and began drifting around the world, helping those she came across and learning what interested her. It was at this time that she started calling herself Harukaze, as a form of... reinvention, in the hopes a new name would bring a more interesting life. It didn’t really work.

Over the years, she learnt some basic magic from various sources, but never stayed long enough to learn from these teachers properly, instead developing these skills in her own way once she had the basics down. She also managed to develop her own skill, the channeling of her intent to kill and animal instincts to force her enemies to be paralysed at the feeling of being watched by an apex predator.

Her wandering eventually lead her to Edmonton, where she stayed longer than most places. The amount of heroes there would surely mean there was a lot for her to learn, so she decided to settle down there at least for a couple of months so she could see what’s on offer.

Two weeks into her stay, however...

“What do you want?” Haru asked, staring over the edge of her perch. The man behind her stopped, and smiled.

“I knew you would be able to sense me coming.”

“Why’d you even try to sneak up on me, then?” She turned now, looking at the man before her. He had a veil over his eyes. Haru briefly thought the man was blind, but a second after, when she glanced at his level, she realised that he must be some sort of hero.

“I felt like it.” She shrugged. “I’ve come to give you a message. I’d like you to help me.”

“Sure.”

“Without knowing what it is?”

“You’re a hero, right?” The man nodded. “Then that’s all I need to know. Not got much else to do anyway.”

“Fair enough.” Presidium smiled.

 

[Flo]

yeah okay welcome aboard ACCEPTED

 

[Franciscosta]

Name: Silen Dumont

Hero Name/Alias: Thief of Sound

Age: 20

Design:

Spoiler: Design

Spoiler: Hero costume concept

Abilities:
Sound in Motion - Able to manipulate sound waves at will. This gives the ability to reroute any communication made through the air. Possible uses include eavesdropping, cutting off enemy communication, and long range private planning. It doesn't have any true offensive capabilities, other than incapacitating foes with loud sounds. Fairly large range, but limited number of sounds capable of being controlled at once.

Equipment:
Mega Horn - A megaphone shaped machine that can be used to generate loud noises, or increase the volume of any sound that passes through it.

Personality: Silen is extremely polite to those who have earned his respect. He has a strong sense of responsibility, and will take any duty assigned to him seriously. He often ends up having having to rely on other people, so he tries to be reliable himself. He's able to not only dream, but follow those dreams and turn them into something concrete. His soul is hard to break, but once broken it is hard to piece it back together. His need for outside approval makes him vulnerable to criticism from his peers, and not able to share much of himself with others. All this fuels his inferiority complex, where he feels he's the least valuable hero in any situation.

As the Thief of Sound, one would be lucky to hear his voice. He conceals his presence often by muting his footsteps, and in general isn't much for talking. He tries to be as mysterious as possible, like many other heroes, as instructed by his mother, who advised him to always hide his identity.

Backstory: Parenthood proved a much harder challenge to Silen's mother than any of the tough foes she fought during her life as a hero. Turns out that a son that can cry in 4 different directions requires more than the ability to generate super-powered sound waves. His father wasn't able to help much either, other than with inventing some reinforced ear plugs so they could both keep their sanity. In the end, this early awakening to his abilities, even if bothersome, was a sign of hope for Silen's future. Silen's father in particular was relieved he wouldn't have to make the same sacrifices he did; as someone with no supernatural ability, he had to hone his intellect and walk the path of the inventor, creating gadgets and gizmos for heros to boost their abilities. One of the costumers that ended up making him regular requests was Sonicboom, the famous hero capable of leveling a whole building using only her voice. At first, the fine craftsmanship of the tools was what kept her coming back, but has time passed, the cupid decided to intervene and create the love that would later result in plenty of headaches.

As he grew up, Silen would learn to control his power, with some help from his mother. Contrary to her husband, she was rather preoccupied with her son's future. It was a competitive industry, and his ability seemed to lack the strength necessary to make him a hero. Despite of her efforts to teach him more offensive uses of his power, either through inability or stubbornness, he simply wasn't able to. This left his mother with no choice other than to use her connections to get him into the best school possible.

It has now been two years since Silen has graduated. As a graduation present, his father gave him his very first piece of gear: a weird megaphone shaped machine made by him, called the "Mega Horn". From that point on, it was time for Silen to start making his way in the hero world. Being the son of the famous Sonicboom, he was expected to act as such, and for that he had to start working immediately. Looking to kick-start his heroic journey, he said his goodbyes to his parents; he didn't want to rely on them, specifically his mother, his whole life, so he would be moving to Montreal. Not only would that make him more responsible, but it was a famous spot for young heros to get their first taste of the hero world.

At first, Silen was very contested among recruiters. The fame of his mother made him a very interesting candidate for an internship, so he was soon picked up by an up and coming hero. This wave of fame wouldn't last, however; noticing his lacking offensive skills, it wasn't long until he was dropped. From there, it got tougher and tougher to find anyone to work under. Word spread quickly, and it spelled doom for Silen. It soon became common knowledge with recruiters that Sonicboom's son was the black sheep of the family, and no one worth his salt would even consider the guy. Going solo is something he considered briefly, but quickly disregarded. He was no good in battle. The only thing he could do was hold the line before actual capable heroes could arrive, and that's if he didn't get defeated in the process.

Failing to follow in his mother's footsteps was something that really scared him, and the future seemed more and more uncertain each day that passed. He was remembered every day of how impossible it was to live up to expectations, and even if it wasn't truly his fault, he couldn't help but bear all the blame. He started lying in the messages he sent to his parents, telling them everything was going great and that he was making real progress. From their point of view, their son was on his way to becoming a famous, full fledged hero, and he was going to keep that facade up for as long as he possibly could. Something had to happen eventually, he thought. But there was no way such a convenient solution that would blow all his problems away even existed.

Silen's mouth hanged open as he read the letter. More than surprised, he was confused. He rubbed his eyes and pinched his arm but, no matter what, the letters on it didn't change. Questions filled his mind, but none of them mattered. This was his last chance, the only way he would be able to build up his reputation, the thing that might just make him a hero to rival his mother, and to bring pride to his father. It was a long ride to Edmonton, but to Silen it seemed to take only a couple of minutes. Tearing his eyes away from all the famous buildings and heros that crowded the streets, and repressing his desire to explore the city, he focused on his goal. This was it.

"Time to make it count."

 

[Flo]

bro thats sick ACCEPTED btw

 

[Resolute]

If I leave here tomorrow
Would you still remember me?
For I must be traveling on, now
Cause there's too many places I've got to see

But, if I stayed here with you, girl
Things just couldn't be the same
Cause I'm as free as a bird now
And this bird you can not change ​

Name: Chuck McCoy Cromwell

Hero Name/Alias: Tarheel (aka the Redneck Rocket, Pride of the South)

Age: 20

Design: As a good ol' country boy, Chuck doesn't care much for fancy clothes or modern fashion. To him, the only clothes you really need are checkered flannel, a few pairs of jeans, and a couple of "beater shirts" for when things get dirty. Red flannel jackets are his favorite, but you'll occasionally catch him in blue or gray. He wears an old pair of boots that have definitely seen better days and typically doesn't comb or style his medium-length hair. Contrary to hick standards, though, you'll find that Chuck likes to keep himself clean when he isn't working - particularly around those gosh-tootin' city girls. ;)

As Tarheel, though, Chuck makes his clothing as flashy as possible so everyone knows when he's coming. He wears a bright red jumpsuit with the Stars and Bars emblazoned on the chest. He wears a red hood that goes over his head and big aviator goggles with a built-in communicator and night vision. He wears dark blue boots and a utility belt with a supply of steel ball bearings, a first aid kit, and a grapple gun. He ties a large Confederate flag around his neck as a cape that extends down to about the back of his knees.

Abilities: After taking a bullet to the spine, Chuck developed the ability to move at speeds impossible for the average human with ease. Running as fast as a racecar is a casual jog for him, and he can hit speeds of nearly Mach 2 when pushed to the limit. He possesses increased durability and healing, but just enough so that he doesn't hurt himself when moving.

Unfortunately, unlike contemporaries like The Flash, Mach 2 appears to be near the limit for how fast Chuck can go. Any faster, and his body becomes unable to cope and starts to collapse like a fighter pilot in freefall. Maybe with special conditioning it'd be possible to reach higher speeds, but Chuck doesn't have the resources or knowledge to do so yet.

Equipment: Tarheel packs goggles with built-in radio and night vision to keep things out of his eyes when running. He has a utility belt with a pouch of steel ball bearings, a first aid kit, and a grapple gun he got at a Goodwill. He wears boots designed for running with good tread.

Personality: Chuck's a relaxed doofus with a heart of gold. He's clumsy, inconsiderate at times, and completely out of touch with modern society, but he never acts out of spite or to purposely hurt someone. In his youth, he was definitely a homebody without dreams and aspirations. That's changed a bit since taking on the mantle of the Redneck Rocket, but aside from his desire to help others, Chuck's content to go wherever the wind takes him. He's outgoing and a great conversationalist, but loves even more to spend some time alone and think. Chuck makes friends easily and will do everything in his power to make sure they're taken care of - especially if they're family. He talks with a thick country dialect.

Backstory:

All my memories gather round her
Miner's lady, stranger to blue water
Dark and dusty, painted on the sky
Misty taste of moonshine, teardrop in my eye

Country roads, take me home
To the place I belong
West Virginia, mountain mama
Take me home, country roads​

Chuck was born to a couple in living in Baltimore, Maryland, but lived with his grandparents on a farm in southern West Virginia for most of his life. He had a happy life at home and his grandparents cared for him like their own child as Chuck's mother served life in prison. They taught him to always be optimistic and to always be the best person possible. That said, Chuck never aspired to be extraordinary. Working on the farm made him happy and he didn't want to abandon his guardians like his mother had.

Fate, however, had other ideas.

Chuck's home has a very real dark side that is practically unknown to those outside the area. Southern West Virginia has the highest number of drug-related deaths in the United States and has been impoverished for years. Although Chuck's grandparents did everything they could to keep him away from the horrors outside the farm through homeschooling, they didn't count on the horrors coming to them. One summer night under the new moon, the Cromwells were robbed by an addict who needed money to pay his dealer for a fix. Hearing someone going through the house for valuables, Chuck grabbed his pocketknife to fend off the burglar.

Chuck took a bullet to the spine for his troubles. As the burglar fled and Chuck's grandparents found him near-dead on the floor, they lamented. Even if their grandson lived to see another day, they thought, he'd never be able to walk again. But as ER doctors rushed to save him some time later, they discovered that not only had Chuck's spine repaired itself around the bullet, a strange red energy was leaking from the wound. The trauma of the night had awakened a latent power in Chuck's body.

When Chuck awoke, he found that he had developed the ability to run as fast as a racecar - fast enough to help police catch his assailant a month later. Chuck decided that it'd be crazy to have his powers and not put them to good use, so he took up the mantle of Tarheel and pledged to chase down the lowlifes that were turning his little part of Appalachia into a war zone. So when Presidium got in contact and offered a partnership in exchange for some help, Chuck strapped on his boots and took off for the big city.

 

[Flo]

ok fast lad you got a fast-track for being ACCEPTED

 

[Thundawave]

I go I go I go
I just wanna feeling
It’s my instinctive impulse to go to you
I go I go I go
I just wanna love you
This is all a predetermined scene, yeah​

Name: Jiyu Kim
Hero Name/Alias: None yet.
Age: 21

Design:
Ever since Impulse's last album release, Jiyu has had violet-black hair with her iconic bangs. On camera she wears blue contacts to cover her naturally brown eyes. She has a typical hourglass idol physique, standing at 5'4" and weighing 100 lbs. Her wardrobe is fashionable thanks to her company supplying all of her clothes. To avoid attracting attention outside shows, she removes her contacts, hides her bangs, and doesn't wear makeup when going about daily off-camera tasks.

As a hero, Jiyu wears a black bodysuit with lines of mana extracted from artifacts that glow sky blue when she uses her powers. Her face is hidden beneath a black butterfly-shaped mask, and her hair is tied in a tight bun.

Abilities/Equipment:
Jiyu can manipulate electricity and technology driven by it, though the power is negligible in the absence of artifacts. Her main tool to channel and amplify her power is a levitating mana ball artifact that converts her electricity manipulation to abilities such as a shock field, healing, attack-buffing, and lasers. She is still mastering the skill of using this energy to interfere with and control electronic technology. The ball only responds to Jiyu's commands, and it will always return to her when she wishes. Her abilities generally have low cooldowns, but her powerful attacks need more time and energy to charge.

Jiyu's hero outfit, while fashionable, also has functionality. Her bodysuit has lines of electric mana that she can channel for heightened dexterity while the mana on her mask aids her night vision.

Spoiler: Detailed

Jiyu's powers deal with two main sources: electricity that had been latent within herself for a long time and mana from the artifact and her outfit.

Shockwave: Jiyu channels her electric energy through the mana ball and blasts it at an area to stun all enemies in the area. The smaller the area, the longer the stun lasts.

Laser: Instead of blasting the electric energy inside the ball over a wide area, Jiyu concentrates it to deal damage to enemies in a line.

Mana Wash: Jiyu can heal one person fully or multiple people at a time partially by temporarily draining half of her mana from her ball and coating them in it. Until Jiyu recalls the mana, her attacks do less damage, but the coated targets have increased attack power.

Technology Manipulation: Though Jiyu is still developing consistency with this ability, she is able to manipulate technology to suit her purposes within the capabilities of the object with a mix of her electricity and mana. The smaller and less complex a piece of tech is, the more likely the manipulation will succeed.

Personality:
On camera, Jiyu has the type of personality that all the fans love. She's bubbly, warm, and enthusiastic. She loves to tease her fellow members with playfully savage comments, and she frequently joins in with any craziness that her members pull off. Off camera, almost all of this is toned down because she doesn't feel the need to charm fans. Everyone knows that Jiyu was an honors student in high school, but she has hidden from even those closest to her that she actually has the mind of a genius.

She is very concerned with rules, promises, and secrets after having MGC Entertainment drill in the importance of confidentiality. Since she has just started training her hero side, she is still not quite confident in her abilities. Most crippling, however, is her self-consciousness about how others see her, especially because she has to keep a low profile when she's not with the rest of Impulse.

On duty as a hero, she is completely serious and business-minded, focused on getting her tasks done above all else. She looks down on those who goof around when people still need to be saved and villains still need to be put down. Regardless of her feelings towards her comrades, she remains a team player especially because her powers support those who are working with her.

Backstory:
Jiyu's early life was rather normal for a girl growing up in the United Republic of Korea, which was formed when South Korean heroes toppled the oppressive North Korean regime. Her family and friends quickly realized that she had a talent for singing ever since her first music class in school. Jiyu was encouraged to take voice lessons from a young age, which she eagerly took up.

MGC Entertainment took notice of Jiyu near the beginning of high school when she performed a powerful ballad at a local talent show and placed first in her age group. Though Jiyu had no idea at the time, the scout who watched her could sense supernatural power flowing from her. The scout approached her after the show, inviting her to audition as an idol for MGC. With the support of her parents, she attended and passed the highly selective audition, training many long and hard hours as an idol while completing high school with near-perfect grades. Dancing was new to her, but it added a whole new level of connecting her voice to the rest of her body.

The years of training culminated in Jiyu's debut as the main vocalist for the five-member girl group Impulse, which had an overwhelmingly positive reception thanks to the group's charismatic performances and ability to portray both their soft and powerful sides. Impulse quickly drew together a fandom, which they dubbed Nova, within Korea and internationally. The group was popular enough that casual K-pop listeners knew and loved them, though those who were completely clueless about the industry probably wouldn't have heard of them.

However, no one outside MGC knew the true purpose of the company. While the idols were making music on camera, they were working behind the scenes to become the next generation of heroes. As part of a collectivistic culture, Korean heroes tended to work in groups, honing their powers to support one another. Being heroes and idols at the same time meant that MGC Entertainment's members easily knew how to be team players while being physically fit for the job at all times. After their debut promotions, Jiyu and her fellow members began to train their hero abilities under incredibly strict agreements of confidentiality. Though they could choose when to stop performing, they weren't allowed to ever disaffiliate from MGC, as mentioned as a condition in their contracts. The trainee period was over, so now Impulse was completely dedicated to MGC.

The revelation that she had supernatural powers came as a complete shock to Jiyu, as nothing had manifested earlier in her life. At first, she didn't believe what they told her in the slightest. She had had sneaking suspicions about some of her fellow members, but her? Jiyu thought that this was a giant mistake until the technicians took the group to the closet of artifacts. She was immediately drawn to an obsidian ball with a blue center that glowed the moment she touched it. During "breaks" in the schedule, Jiyu worked with MGC's technicians to perfect the ball to her use, first making it channel her innate abilities to different purposes and then making the ball portable through levitation.

Jiyu's first hero assignment arrived after the promotions of Impulse's fourth album release, which was one and a half years after their debut. MGC Entertainment announced a hiatus for the group to "let them have vacation and rest," though in reality that definitely wasn't happening. All of the members were split up to work with more seasoned heroes within and outside MGC, and Jiyu was assigned to help out Presidium. With haste, MGC flew her out to Edmonton, where she was both excited and nervous to try her powers outside the training grounds for the first time.

Other:
Text Color: #54acd2
MBTI: ESFJ normally, though her hero persona is an ISTJ
Theme Song: Colors - Loona

 

[Flo]

bro you brought some bangers and i'm bring a fat ACCEPTED

 

[seaturtle]

​

am I wrong for thinking out the box from where I stay?
am I wrong for saying that I'll choose another way?
I ain't trying to do what everybody else doing
just cause everybody doing what they all do
if one thing I know, how far would I grow?
I'm walking down this road of mine, this road that I call home​

Name: Alexander (Zander) Antonov
Hero Name/Alias: N/A
Age: 21

Design:
Zander has striking ruby eyes and shining blonde hair. Standing at 6'1" and sporting the latest fashion designs (tailored by his marketing team), he's the heart throb of Slovene. He's got a toned physique, weighing in around 180 lbs (~80 kg). As he absorbs energy his eyes take on a more intense glow, and when he begins to near his max they start to shine.

Abilities:
Zander possesses energy manipulation on a powerful scale. He is able to absorb most forms of energy (such as electricity, fire, radiation, and other forms of plasma) and store it within himself. He can then use this energy in different ways - energy blasts, fireballs, powering kitchen appliances, the applications are endless. His training has mostly focused destructive applications of his energy, but he's dabbled a bit on his own time with creating force fields.

He has also trained in swordplay, used primarily with a handle that he can channel energy through. This "beam sword", as dubbed by the scientists who created it, is closer to a sword of molten lava than say, a light-saber. The length of the sword depends on how much energy Zander uses to power it, and while the blade itself cannot be broken, it takes a lot of power and concentration to keep the blade up.

Zander can seemingly absorb a limitless amount of energy, but there is a limit to what he can safely contain. Breaching this limit results in his body heating up and energy radiating from him in waves. Too much time int his state may cause lasting damage to his body and those around him. Further applications of his power are being studied and investigated by the scientists of Entmark Industries, but these potential abilities have not been shared with Zander himself.

Equipment:
As Zander's powers require little beyond his own presence and an energy source, he doesn't have much in the way of equipment. The hilt of his beam sword is usually in his pocket as a safeguard, but besides that, all he carries is a small plug he can use to easily draw energy out of different sources. This plug isn't essential to his abilities, as he can absorb energy any energy around him if he focuses, but the device frees him up a bit in a pinch.

so am I wrong for thinking that we could be something for real?
now am I wrong for trying to reach the things that I can't see?
but that's just how I feel, that's just how I feel
that's just how I feel trying to reach the things that I can't see​

Personality:
On the surface, Zander is the perfect gentleman. He's charming, smiling at the right times and saying the right things to get people to like him. However, beneath his pleasant demeanor, he's honestly just sick of all the fake-ass posers there are out there. Ironically, this includes himself, which has led to him loathing who he is and how he acts. The Zander Antonov that everyone sees is the worst of all the fakers out there, and only when he's alone is he able to escape from the cold charade that is his life.

His good nature and hope for the future is what makes him slog through the "destiny" laid out for him, trying to do what he can to make the future brighter for others. He tries to find the positive in a situation, but this is mainly just a way of convincing himself that things really will get better. Despite his training and background in using his powers for offense, he's afraid of harming others and would put himself in harm's way before putting someone else at risk.

am I tripping for having a vision?
my prediction, I'mma be on the top of the world
hope you, hope you don't look back, always do what you decide
don't let them control your life, that's just how I feel
fight for yours and don't let go, don't let them compare you, no
don't worry, you're not alone, that's just how we feel​

​

Backstory:
During the beginning of the era known as the "Golden Age of Heroes", a crisis broke out in the ruins of Chernobyl, Ukraine. The site had been relatively untouched since the incident in 1986 when a nuclear reactor overheated and led to the destruction of the entire power facility. With the recent rise of heroes, some unsuspecting villains had hidden in the abandoned plant, hoping to use it as their base. However, these villains were not the brightest, and they had failed to realize that the plant was no longer in use for a reason - the site was still filled with nuclear radiation.

The radiation had a sort of reaction to the villains who possessed superpowers, and they ended up mutating into a group of radioactive monsters. William and Mary Sorenson, two Americans who had been inducted into the newly formed "International League of Heroes", were quickly called in to assess the situation. The Sorensons possessed the ability to manipulate energy, and were called into this particular job because of their immunity to radiation.

After dealing with the radioactive mutants, the couple stayed in the area to work on cleaning up the radiation left at the site in hopes of preventing a similar incident in the future. However, the two of them ended up settling down nearby when they worked out a way to use nuclear energy safely and efficiently, effectively creating a clean energy source for this new world of heroes. They had a single child, a girl they named Jocasta.

When Jocasta was 16, her parents tragically died in a laboratory accident, leaving the now orphaned teenager as the single heir to their legacy. She herself possessed energy manipulation powers to a small extent, but nothing on the scale of her parents. Now the sole owner of the entire Sorenson fortune, she began to integrate herself into the political landscape of Ukraine. Together with Ivan Antonov, her fiancé , she was a prominent force in the movement to unite the surrounding countries into a new nation - the Sovereign State of Slovene. With the recent boom in the tech industry (largely because of the clean energy source invented her parents), Slovene quickly rose as an international power, and Ivan was eventually elected as the president of the country (with Jocasta providing support behind the scenes).

Zander was born as Jocasta's third child, but was the only one of his siblings to show promise with regard to his powers. He himself is a ******* child, the result of Jocasta's attempts to sire a child who would be able to rise to power in this world of superheros. She worked with Entmark Industries after his conception to guarantee that he would have extraordinary abilities, and from his birth he was groomed to become the leader of Slovene. His lineage is unknown, and the fact that he isn't his father's legitimate child is known to none outside of Entmark and Jocasta herself.

As the prospective heir to his parents' legacy, Zander was taught from a young age that nothing short of perfection would be accepted. He had to be the perfect child, the only person who could possibly fill his father's seat. The only slip ups he made were the ones carefully planned to make him easy to relate to, more human - a stutter here, a planned "scandal" there. While the general public knew that he had powers beyond those of his siblings, the full extent of his abilities were kept secret. He would be the ultimate weapon of Slovene - a political power who could back up the country in the event of a war.

As he was prepared to inherit his father's position, Zander began to resent his parents and their plan for him. Despite his popularity and the amount of attention he got, he longed for a life where he could do what he wanted for himself. Everything he did, every word he said, it was all scripted for him by a team that was trying to play to what the public would want. At the age of 13, he expressed his desire to go out and be with other kids, to be normal. His mother responded by slapping him across the face, calling him selfish, and telling him that it was his duty to the family, no, to the country, to become a great leader. After that, he never voiced his own thoughts again, afraid that any more outbursts could jeopardize his family's good name and his nation's prosperity.

As part of his cultural training, and as a political move to show that the Antonov family was happy and active, he and his siblings took a short vacation to Edmonton. When they arrived at the villa that had been prepared for them, Zander found a letter addressed to him hidden within his dresser drawer. He wasn't sure how it got there - the entire building had been searched and secured as safe before the family had arrived - but his curiosity got the better of him and he opened it. Inside, he found a message from the hero Presidium, inviting him to break free from the future that was planned for him and to seize his own destiny. He quickly orchestrated an escape plan and ditched his family to pursue something that he actually wanted for himself.

To hell with his controlling mother and her plan for him, consequences be damned.

if you tell me I'm wrong, wrong
I don't wanna be right, right
if you tell me I'm wrong, wrong
I don't wanna be right​

 

[Flo]

praise be to Zander, take this gift of ACCEPTED

 

[SarasaKat]

We really uh
yeah we're a lot further ahead in discord than we are in thread; arc 1 just wrapped up
Gonna tl;dr at the very least so as to give us some idea of what the ****'s going on if we ever look back, my memory's already starting to get a little hazy on stuff

Outside the Clock Tower:

Spoiler

• Pulled into a room by Miss Fortune, a hero who claims she can see what the future isn't.
• Entmark is aware of Kara's location.
• Celestia is trapped in the world by some kind of dream and promise. She is not the killer.
• The killer relishes their role as such, and is employed in the area.
• The chosen crew will escape alive, but will pay with the lives of others. The "Charred Duchess" will "descend from the ashen heaven".
• Miss Fortune then dies, and Celestia's LED counts down.

• All agree that this rule change means that this serial killer will be through before the end of the day.
• Haru brings up that information must be found.
• Zander starts looking into the methodology of killing (specifically, energy spikes)
• Zeal laments that too many have died today. Haru tells Zeal that she gets used to it. Zeal calls Haru scary.
• Small tangent out of the way, Zander and Haru start focusing on an energy field. Zander pinpoints it, whereas Haru uses her magic to pin it down.
• Haru calls Jiyu to help, Jiyu calls Haru a "solo player", and Haru gets suspicious of Jiyu, thinking she knows too much.
• Haru knocks down the energy source, just to find it's a floating camera. The energy otherwise slips away.
• Jiyu notices Zeal ****ing off and runs after her. The others end up splitting up in kind.

Research:

Spoiler

• Zeal's picking at a closed, password-guarded gate. Jiyu finds her and Zeal laments that it needs a password, and she's gonna just break through.
• Jiyu simply hooks into it and hacks the two of them through.
• Jiyu floats down, while Zeal clambers down on the ladder. Jiyu tells Zeal she only needed to ask next time.
• The room they find themselves in has a bunch of computers saying "TRUTH" on them, and someone inside is working on a computer listening to Nickleback. Zeal goes to investigate further, and in walks the Suit Man. He snaps his fingers, and the "TRUTH" on the screen changes to "SHINE". The man and the laptop he was working on disappears, along with the suited man.
• Zeal shines some light onto the "SHINE" screens, which reveals "IN" being circled in purple paint. She continues to shine on it to the point that the paint of one particular screen leaks out of the screen, and pixels in the screen start to die. The other screens have the same thing: "IN" being circled.
• Jiyu notices a security camera, and tries to hack into it to see if there's anything to do with it. There isn't, so she breaks it.
• Jiyu starts hacking into the computers to try to find information. Zeal asks if there's any information on Raskaeria, Presidium, or Elliot Hawks. Turns out Raskaeria has been giving cash injections to Peter Kingston, and Lamina DeVleram is someone who is maintaining the same credit score despite spending ridiculous amounts of cash. Raskaeria has been moving a lot of money to burner accounts, and Elliot Hawks has missed 3 rent payments.
• Zeal investigates the area where the Nickback computer boy was, and finds nothing, though she notices it smells of books.
• Zeal leaves the area through the entrance Suit Man came through, and burns through the lock. Jiyu's right behind. The doors fall open, and they find themselves in an alleyway.
• The two walk out. Zeal looks around to see if it matches the alleyway with the injured man from Presidium's office, but it doesn't. She bounds ahead, and stops. Calls for Jiyu.
• They are outside of the barrier of the "game".
• The two telegraph via Kara's link that they need to look out for a guy named Peter Kingston, and that they're outside of the game.

• Silen comes into a nearby hotel alone, hoping to find lodging for the crew. Seems booked, finds a bellhop. Goes by Martin Kingston.
• He tells Silen that the dome built around the city's awful for business, but the hotel is completely booked.
• Haru joins, finds Martin of note. Scares the hell out of Silen, and asks him to follow her.
• Haru shares her side of things to the others upon Zeal and Jiyu opening a link. Informs them that Silen and she found someone named Martin Kingston.
• Silen does not like this. Silen's made a note to keep his name hidden. He demands to know how Haru got his name. Haru scoffs at him for jeopardizing the mission with his selfishness. Tells him she can see peoples' names above their head. Silen asks her to not tell others, and she tells him to shut up about his stupid name or she'll kill him. Silen sulks off in a very depressed state, making Haru decide she'll kill Silen on sight.

• The three joke about being left behind, and Zander/Celestia introduce themselves to eachother. They leave to go investigate the market.
• Celestia asks who Elliot Hawkes is, and gets a vague answer as being the one who brought them together.
• Zander asks Celestia why he should trust her. Celestia gives some background, saying she was the next incarnation of the Soulkeeper, and she has control over the process of life and death itself.
• The two go through the market towards an odd energy structure, but both Zander and Kara get hungry. They stop by for some poutine, and have a good lunch.
• After, they go to leave, but then Celestia's LED beeps down. Celestia quickly reanimates the body, and ask what happened. They were headed to the hotel, and they worked at a mine. They didn't get much else in before a massive cloud of thermal energy passes through the man, killing him once more. Seeing the cloud, they identify that's their method of death.
• Kara gets Zeal's/Jiyu's transmissions at this point, then Haru's, and disperses information across the whole group
• The gang agreed they need to meet up with the others sometime soon, and that Silen should not be alone.

The brewing storm:

Spoiler

• On the way towards a central meeting point, they come across the lightning rods. Zander plays with the energy in them, noticing they creak more and more as he plays with the energy within. Kara and Celestia call him a dumbass, but he suspects something's amiss.
• He breaks one of the rods in the process, and Kara settles it on the ground slowly. The other rods around the tower starts failing. Celestia recites the curse that's supposed to befall the tower if the rods fail.
• Kara reports that Jiyu and Zeal found Suit Man.
• Zander notices the other rods start to creak and fail, and tries to shoot a bunch of energy into them. Kara races around and settles all of the rods down gently, but they are unusable. She returns back, and Celestia points out the clouds circling overhead.
• Zander asks about the ramifications of the curse, and Celestia recites that it spells in the city's doom or something. Zander says he'll absorb the lightning strike when it CLANGS overhead and shocks everything below them.
• Kara swears, before pointing out a beacon Zeal made and telling the others to join up there.

• Zeal looks up more information on Peter Kingston, forwards it to the others.
• Jiyu notices the barrier is surrounded by people. Zeal notes the book smell she noticed, and Jiyu spots a library. She and Zeal, with no better ideas (Haru was already at the hotel), go over there to see if there's anything they can find.
• The entrance is locked. Zeal says that's no problem and breaks a window. She and Jiyu climb through into an office of some kind.
• The office is a standard library office. The book stack nor the computer mention anything about Raskaeria or anything else of this affair (though the books do, indeed, smell like the books from the SHINE room). The two move on and end up in a back room, Jiyu starts looking through them while Zeal charges forward and goes into the library proper, despite Jiyu's warnings not to do so.
• The library proper is empty, except for some shuffling noises in one of the aisles, Zeal goes over, and lone and behold, it's Suit Man.
• Jiyu catches up with Zeal as he greets them. The two mentally notify Kara, to which he joins the mental link and greets them too. Kara's disturbed he can do this.
• The man asks the duo how they're doing, and upon being told they're lost, tells them they're closer than they let on. Zeal expresses absolute confusion at the Shine room, saying it's a lead but not a significant one, and he tells her that's all they need to know. Before leaving, he introduces himself as Darren before vanishing, leaving the smell of burnt ozone in his wake, and The Art of War on the ground.
• The two look at eachother for a second before projecting to the others that Peter Kington is the killer.
• Kara warns them of the storm. Zeal wants in on the action, and pulls Jiyu back through the barrier through the Shine room. Everything is starting to fall apart. Zeal tries leaping up through the grate when the ladder falls apart, and Zeal falls flat on her ass. Seconds later, the lightning strike hits, heating up the air around them, but not killing them.
• The two of them collectively :monkaS:
• Jiyu carries Zeal out of the hole, as the ladder got destroyed. She notices Zeal's limp, and Zeal mentions she thinks she has a sprain, to which Jiyu responds with healing with her mana.
• Zeal contacts Jiyu mentally and tells her they should meet up, and shines the light around them up, creating a beacon.

• Haru corners Martin, asking for Peter Kingston. He claims he doesn't work at the hotel, and the last he saw of him was a year ago. Martin says he's his brother, and has no powers.
• Haru leaves him after getting this information. Behind her back, he whistles a tune and clicks something under his jacket.

ty francis writing this was gonna be hell

• Silen, still pretty depressed from what happened in the hotel, wanders to the nearby, 7 floor garage.
• Upon checking the security stall, he's shocked to find the security guard there dead.
• Silen checks the computer for the first and last cars to arrive. The first one was a car on the 5th floor, being there for 20 hours, and the last was one on the 7th, arriving 35 minutes ago.
• Reaching the 5th floor, he finds a green car on the spot indicated by the computer. It had nothing out of the ordinary other than a strange bundle of stuff in the back seat.
• The spot on the 7th floor was occupied by a black van, like the ones Silen saw before back in Marvelite's house.
• Influenced by everything that happened, he decides to break into the van. In order to do so, he begins climbing down back to the ground floor, to frisk the guard for a weapon.
• As he descends the carpark, he hears footsteps from both above and below him. Resolute, Back at the security office, he sees that the body of the guard had vanished, leaving a pistol and a crudely drawn smiley face on the foggy glass.
• The footsteps continue as he makes his way up, plus he notices that the green car had moved. Silen shoots the van window and mutes the alarm.
• Opening the glovebox reveals a set of keys and a post-it note with a crudely drawn smiley face on it, plus a folded up wad of paper. On the paper were some hastily scribbled instructions but Silen can only make out 'bomb', 'strike' and 'shining'.
• Just as Silen uses the keys to open the back doors, the clouds circle overhead, and a massive lightning bolt crashing outside knocks him back about 15 feet.
• As he recovers, he sees a device in the back of the van. It's large, about the size of an engine, chromed and with a microphone from a headset sticking out, and what looks like metal pipes holding it to the floor of the van.
• As he moved closer to the back of the van, he hears two pairs of footsteps on either side and the dull roar of an engine getting closer from below.
• Silen tries to escape in the car, but the engine doesn't work. The footsteps get closer, and Silen can make out a man in a hooded jacket walk towards him, his face obscured.
• Thinking fast, Silen shoots the gun towards the sky, and redirects the sound behind the figures. He takes this chance to get out of the car and escape.
• He proceeds down to the 5th floor, where he is blocked from descending further since but the slope was coated on burning petroleum, marked in a crudely drawn smiley face staring at him.
• Silen decides to try and investigate the green car, so he shoots its window; as he does that, he notices the hooded men had followed him to the 5th floor, plus the bundle in the back seat was gone. The men are completely unresponsive, and chase Silen wherever he goes, forcing him to regularly put some space between him and these "zombies".
• The inside of the green car had faded leather seats, and the first thing Silen noticed was some tears on the driver seat that formed a crudely drawn smiley face.
• Deciding to go back to the 8th, despite the fire being gone, Silen runs back up the ramp noticing a few bits of trash have gathered around the pillars.
• He goes to investigate the machine again, finding it tied to the bottom via a long piece of rope with some complex knot over the top. He shoots the rope, which seemed to invoke a response from the machine, and takes the machine with him.
• As he's descending, not only does the green car change places again, but he sees the van on the 3rd floor, in the same state he left it.
• He continues descending down to the 1st floor. He stands on silence, hearing nothing as he looks around, and see the 8th floor, covered in garbage and chock full of cars, including both the green car and the black car. Regardless of how far down he goes, the only thing that changes is the quantity of cars and garbage.
• Still being followed by the hooded men, Silen heads to the van, only to find that the gun he dropped to carry the machine had turned into a crossbow, and there was a new, massive version of the machine as well.
• Before he can do anything, the clouds begin to gather overhead. Silen braces for another strike, but it never comes. Silen tries to use the crossbow to fire the machine, but to no avail. Taking another glance at the cracked windscreen of the black van revealed a crude smiley face.
• He's unable to find any landing spots for a leap of faith. While doing that, he tries and is able to trigger the machine with a loud sound from the Mega Horn.
• As he's about to check the result of his experiment, he finds himself surrounded by the hooded men, his only options being fighting or jumping.
• Silen swings the crossbow like an axe at the closest figure, but it passes right through, not even leaving any trace of it even going through. The closest figure reaches forward, the hand reaching over Silen's face as everything goes dark.
• He wakes up in a fit. He's in the security shack, the dead body still there. On his wrist he sees a large swelling, creating a symbol similar to that of a crudely drawn smiley face.
• He takes a baton from the guard instead of the gun, and checks the computer again, noticing that nothing had changed except for the times, the longest being 86 hours, and the most recent 8 minutes.
• As he makes his way up, he finds the garage to be in the exact same shape as from his first ascent, including the green car and black van.
• He breaks into the van with the baton, find everything he did before, though the wad of paper, rather than having a smiley, just says '3 3 5'.
• After noticing everything else had stayed the same, the clouds began circling overhead. Silen held onto the van door as the lightning shook the garage. A clunking sound comes from the device.
• Silen notices that the unintelligible note from before now reads "The bomb is set to arm when the Second Strike hits, and the flashing light and roar of fire will usher in the Shining Age".
• He heads down to the 5th floor and breaks into the green car, finding a remote control, a wrench and an old PDA in the bundle. The PDA is unresponsive, and Silen doesn't chance flicking the switch on the remote control.
• Going back to the van, Silen begins to suspect the device is actually a bomb triggered by the sound of the lightning. Therefore he decides to stay there and block all sound to the van, so it would never be triggered.
• While waiting, he notices inside the van a phone charger which he uses to charge his own phone. There he finds a message from a mysterious "S" that, after giving him a some shockingly accurate information that he shouldn't know, advises him to go to the hotel and ask for the Duchess' Suite.
• Silen decides to abide, but not without making sure that the bomb would be dealt with. He contacts Kara, who calls Jiyu to the garage.

• Kara joins up with Jiyu/Zeal. They ask what the hell happened with the storm, and Kara tells them Zander caused it. They ree.
• The others eventually join us. Zander barely stays around though, guilt consuming him. Haru informs them that she couldn't get anything useful from Martin.
• Kara receives the message from Silen, and tells Jiyu to go to the garage. She obliges.
• Zeal splits off with her own agenda, leaving Kara/Haru/Celestia. Silen joins this group shortly (see A Promise)

 

[Thundawave]

Bless Kat. The quote block titles are amazing.

 

[SarasaKat]

Cheers for character limits

Hotel Misadventures:

Spoiler

• Upon arrival, Silen and Jiyu talk about how the bomb works. He gives her the materials he found in the green car, and asks if she can handle this. She affirms, and he leaves.
• Upon poking around with it, she realizes it's a transmitter rather than a bomb. She transmits this to Kara.
• She focuses next on the PDA. She powers the thing using mana, and finds two emails. One is addressed to a Lejj by Ryo Bernsky asking for an urgent payment, and that he placed the "stuff" in the place asked of him. The other is from Peter Kingston with the subject “Vanishing", which is a blank email with an attachment unopenable on the device
• She tries to laser the piping holding down the transmitter, and it emits a heavy blue gas that smells like plastic. Decides to think better of it, instead using the wrench she got to bash in the transmitter. It dents until the top open, which reveals circuitry. She kills the power, shut the door, and immediately distanced herself, but nothing happens other than a small whine before silence coming from the car. The gas pools at the base of the car, slowly.
• She transmits everything to Kara, and is about to stand by when the van distorts and vanishes in mid-air in front of her. Confused, she decides to head back to the plaza.

• Zeal goes to the hotel, having research Peter Kingston's place of work. Goes to the receptionist, asks for Peter Kingston. She says there is no such person who worked there. She asks about past records, and she doesn't have have access to that, shooing Zeal off because she doesn't have a search warrant.

• Silen joins up with the trio from the meeting, and asks Haru to come with him. Haru obliges, but not before some serious taunting, telling him she'll enjoy killing his family. Silen's not reacting to her bait at all, saying he needs her help in the Empress Suite.
• The two go via Flare Boost. They crash in, and don't see much of anything in the room they jet into. Exploring the top floor some, they find the Empress Suite. Haru knocks down the door before saying they're room service, to which the occupant, Major Thunder, replies with a dismissal and sends Haru flying back with a lightning bolt to the chest. She staggers into the elevator, which shoots down to the first floor, having failed from the immense electrical discharge.
• Silen attempts to run, but is electrocuted by Major Thunder. Thunder proceeds to start taunting him, telling him he ought to be the change he shouts. He seems to be okay with being the "bad guy" in this situation. He throws Silen into the suite, giving him a "front row view to the beginning of the world" before running off through a hole in the room. Clouds have once again begun to circle the clocktower.
• Meanwhile, on the first floor, Zeal runs to the elevator, and finds Haru on the ground. She starts to get up, but another lightning bolt from Major Thunder leaves her solidly immobile, paralyzed. The former panics slightly before jumping down and slinging Haru over her shoulder. Haru yells at her, saying she's insane, she'll get killed by Major Thunder. Zeal sets down Haru, saying she'll go confront him. Haru yells at Zeal that she'll get killed once again, and an aetherial voice interjects that they will not die. The two float up slightly before their vision was blinded by white light.

• Haru and Zeal come to, blindfolded and handcuffed to eachother. The two of them try to find something on them that can break the chains (Haru could theoretically, but she's paralyzed, and her MP's gone), but find they don't have their equipment. When they both decide to try to find something sharp in the room, a figure enters.
• She introduces herself as V, and claims to have saved their lives. V leads an anti-terrorist group called Artemis. They know of Raskaeria, and are here to fight Major Thunder and the others. This is happening around the world, but there are by far the most high-profile targets here.
• She reveals that she knows of Haru's connection with Strider, and that Zeal's family is tied to Raskaeria. The former reacts with distrust and concern, while the latter reacts with denial and then silence on the matter.
• V explains that they need to get back in the field and meet up with the others currently out there, and to "break the lightning". Haru asks what this is, but she doesn't finish asking before white fills their blind-folded vision once more.

• 7 seconds after being raptured, Zeal and Haru return to the base of the stairs, Haru back to full HP/MP (albeit still paralyzed). Zeal carries her up the stairs, Haru aiding her ascent using wind magic.
• Zeal asks for details on who's upstairs and what happened. Haru tells Zeal that Silen's alone upstairs with Major Thunder. The two talk strategy, Zeal wanting to pull a rescue operation should Major Thunder still be there, but Haru telling Zeal that's suicide.
• During this time, Zander enters the hotel, down on his luck. He sees the destroyed shaft, and that everyone in the hotel lobby is gone. He investigates the electrified elevator shoot before deciding to go to the top to see the source, and starts his ascent.
• Silen cuts in, finally close enough to hear them. Zeal asks if he's okay, using his real name. He gets a little angsty, telling them he's fine and alone. Asks if anyone else knows of his name, to which Haru and Zeal both reply with everyone in the group. Silen's upset about this, but accepting.
• Zeal comes into the suite Silen had been dropped off in. She slings him across her other shoulder, and leaps out of the window.
• As Haru focuses on using her wind magic to slow their descent, Silen sees Darren sitting on the bed. Silen wants to go back up, and Haru's about to oblige, when Darren jumps down with them and teleports just before hitting the bottom.
• Silen laments being unable to ask him questions. Zeal offers he ask anyway, and he'll probably answer. Silen does so, and Darren answers, chastising him for not following the instructions on his phone. Haru asks for a way out, and he reminds her that she already knows. Darren claims he's busy, and doesn't have time for chit chat, and blasts off. Moments later, Zeal braces for impact as she makes a rough landing on the ground, but stumbles back into a sprint towards the town square.

The Finale of Arc 1:

Spoiler

• During their sprint over to the plaza, Haru and Silen both start to gain mobility again. Haru leaps out of Zeal's grasp (having to fight against it at first), and Silen gets out in a much more gentle fashion. Haru and Silen talk about trying to escape, and Zeal tells them she'll bring them to the Shine room, but she's staying.
• The trio stop in front of a massive fight. Celestia and Kara have kept back the civilians, while Major Thunder fights someone wearing full biker leathers, as a fully robed figure and a figure in spandex are literally pushing back a cloud.
• The fight brings the leathered man next to them. He urges them to leave, and Haru and Silen are willing, but Zeal tells them they were sent here by their friend. He introduces himself as Bast Man Standing, and tells them they need to finish the task Darren gave them. Zeal asks where's Kingston and how do they stop the lightning, and he tells her to look for the lightning rods before getting bodied. Haru literally carries away Zeal before she can ask any more, and she struggles at first, but then stops when they agree to go to the lightning rods.
• Haru attempts to use her powers to get them over, but find they don't work. Silen attempts to use his, and finds they fail as well. Zeal starts sprinting over. Jiyu catches up to them from the bomb, and her ball shrinks and drops to the floor. She picks it up, to which Celestia yells at her to KEEP THE **** GOING as she dove in to bring Bast back to life. The four meet up and continue to the lightning rods.
• Haru and Zeal are incredibly upset by the sight of the broken rods. Darren is next to them, and greets the quartet. Zeal curses that they weren't the fast guy, and Darren reveals a corpse he'd had next to him in his cloak; Chuck, defending a small child, and his entire body was scorched. Jiyu and Silen flinch at this while Haru and Zeal start trying to put together the pieces.
• Darren tells them to not bother. Their killer is in what they called the Shine room. And to please kill them quickly, since he didn't want to die. Zeal yelled at him to help, and he vanishes before she can get in more words. The group sprints over to the vent cover and opens it. Haru jumps down and takes actual physical damage from the jump, which is such a foreign feeling to her that it makes her start to question everything. Zeal's shortly behind her, having lowered herself down using a rope. The other 2 follow in turn.

• The SHINE room is dark. As the others lower themselves, Zeal flicks on the light in her hat into the room, revealing the receptionist Zeal had spoke with earlier. This is met with initial confusion, before asking why the hell she's doing this. Lamina, as she introduces herself, says that the city is set to blow in 11 minutes, and that the destruction of the transmitter meant that it couldn't be stopped. And she's choosing to live and die by her principles, which is more than can be said for the crew in front of her.
• Identity wise, she was Peter Kingston, before a transition surgery. She managed to be both people of note from the SHINE room.
• Haru reacts by trying to get close enough to hit her, to which a wave of heat leaves her staggering back, having felt an actual burn for the first time. Her mind doesn't know how to react. She motions for everyone to escape.
• Silen receives a text from S. "She requires focus. The Key is in the back. Strike while the Iron is hot."
• Zeal scrambles to the computer, trying to find something to disable the bomb. It just spits out a bunch of data. This movement also has left everyone else blind. She mentally projects to Kara that the bomb's set to blow in 9.
• Silen commands everyone to go silent, and for Zeal to turn off her light. All comply, but for Haru, who is softly crying in the corner, having a full on mental breakdown. In the veil of darkness, he leaps and attacks where he remembered Lamina, who shrieks in pain and blasts him back.
• Kara at this point comes over, and uses the darkness to pull the chair out from under her and send her topping onto the floor. She tells Haru to find the ****ing briefcase.
• Zeal, meanwhile, has found it, scrambling through it to get anything of use. The suitcase leads to another metal lock that she opens, and finds a gun with 2 bullets.
• The others, meanwhile, continue fighting Lamina. She uses her power to fight back in kind, and Zander arrives to keep kicking her ass. She starts using her power to rise the temperature of the room. Zeal aims, but hesitates. The others keep her pinned down and distracted. Finally, she shoots, resulting in a clean kill. Celestia's LED goes dark.
• Just as they're all signing in relief, a loud yell from outside and the rolling of storm clouds indicate the fight isn't over just yet.

• The others scramble out of the room, back to the surface. One last overview of the room shows no sign of being able to turn off the bombs.
• Zander carries up Haru, realizing she's really in no state to fight. Jiyu locates Celestia, who's bringing Bast back up.
• Zeal, in the light, sees the gun says ""Was always gonna be you, Z. Hawkes"
• Athena (the spandex hero from before) and Major Thunder are in a bloody battle. Zeal yells to Athena if she can hold him down, and she obliges. Another shot, another clean kill. The thunderstorm clouds that were gathering dissipate.
• However, the brain matter of Major Thunder starts putting itself back together, and he rises back up, albeit looking a bit worse for wear. He congratulates them all on winning, and tells them there's 3 minutes left till the city blows. He then leaves.
• The crew is in shock for a moment, wanting to try to stop the bombs, but they realize they cannot. They go back down into the Shine room, and flee through an opening that Celestia makes. Just as Silen, the last person, crosses through, Darren materializes in front of her, and Celestia exchanges a favor to get them out.
• They all materialize once again in a new city. They can barely catch their breath before Celestia welcomes them to Neo New Fuji, Japan.

 

[SarasaKat]

I'm not waiting as long to post updates this time
Will get in more specific details later, I just wanted to post to make sure I didn't lose progress formatting wise

ACT 1 INTERIM

Welcome to Neo New Tokyo!

Spoiler

• TL;DR: Haru leads us in, Celestia and Kara elect to stay behind

• TL;DR: Intro to Crue + Strider

• TL;DR group explains what's going on, Celestia arrives in cinders.

• Tl;DR: Kara goes ****ing ham on an Entmark facility

The City Never Sleeps

Spoiler

• TL;DR Zeal asks Celestia a bit about her powers, Celestia asks Zeal and Zander what Artemis did to them, concludes she was worked up over nothing. Zander expresses distrust towards Celestia, and Zeal gives him a peptalk

• Tl;DR Jiyu luls at Kara

• TL;DR Kara, Zander, and Zeal eat. Kara ****ing Dies

• TL;DR Kara+Zander come home, Kara+Haru talk

:D

Spoiler

• After handling the bill at the Sushi place, Zeal makes a detour to a supply shop. She buys some rope to replace the one she lost in the bombs.
• She only gets a few steps before her drowsiness overwhelms her. However, hitting the pavement shakes her back awake. She dusts herself off, and starts to make the trek back to the elevators.
• On her way, she's stopped by vehicle traffic, traveling blindly fast. She waits a little, before two hooded figures start approaching her from her left and right. Stranger danger kicks in, and she decides to double back and find a different intersection to cross.
• The figures grow more distant, until they're gone. In fact, everyone is gone. All of the pedestrians have vanished, but the traffic continues to travel blindly fast.
• Zeal doubles back to the hardware store, to see if there's anyone there or to get some kind of answer. The door opens up to reveal another intersection, again with blindly fast traffic, with a cracked :D face in the pavement.
• She considers trying to hitch a ride on one of the cars, before deciding against it and attempting to swing across on the intersection light. However, as she's doing this, she gets a text from her mom:
  
  Spoiler

  Hey :Dear, hope you are well. Thanks for telling us what you knew, you're being a big help. We love you.
  
  Oh, by the way, turn around and run.
  
  Mother Sona
  
  :D
• She's halfway through a reply when she looks up. This causes something to whiz past her neck, something long like an arrow. She panics and runs.
• Outside has now deteriorated into a ruin of flames, the only building still standing being the Cyberspire. A figure is waving their hands in the air, making a :D shape. Zeal continues running, but the figure chasing her is faster, nearly grabbing onto her shoulder. She dodges out of the way and shines light into their eyes.
• They flinch, covering their eyes. They're a robed figure, motioning for Zeal to be quiet. She demands to know why, and they point to the figure in the air, who seems to be doing a sort of scan. Zeal leaps into action, taking them to hide underneath some rubble and push light away.
• The figure sighs in relief, pulling down the scarf they were using to hide their face. It's an older version of Silen.
• He (through writing in the dirt using an arrow) tells Zeal that they are two years in the future, and she was snagged at some point. He gives her a note, telling her he needs to send this back, to trust S, and to change the future. He waits for her to finish reading before giving her a wadded note, and runs her heart through with the arrow.
• Zeal wakes up, lying face-up in the pavement. She lays there a moment longer before staggering up, noticing the rope and sushi takeout was neatly placed. She also feels for the note, slowly making her way to a place to sit to give the note a proper read.
• The note reads as follows:

  Hey Z,
  Sorry that was the way you found out. What I did to Silen, what I let happen to our world, it's unforgivable. Listen. The figure you saw was the Duchess. She's my aunt, and it was my responsibility to keep her in check. She found something that let her work around me, and I slipped.
  Oh, look at me, writing like you know who I am. Sorry about that.
  
  I'm your girlfriend, Lassky. I know the timelines don't add up, and your mind would jump to that. You need to trust the voice in the phone, and not give in. You have one more bullet left. Save it for my aunt, or save it for her.
  
  Love, Lassky. <3

• Zeal shakily checks her phone, with no message. However, just as she's about to put it away, she gets a text from S.
• S tells her that the gun wasn't meant for her, but now she must be the one to take the shot when the time comes. Zeal asks about her mom, and S says that what she does with her mom doesn't change the future, but to treasure her parents for those who cannot. They then leave.
• Zeal then breaks into tears. After a few minutes she regains enough of her wits to telepathically ask for Celestia. Celestia opens a Way for her, and Zeal enters the portal to her car hangout outside of the city.

• TL;DR Celestia and Zeal talk about the vision, Zeal calls mom and falls asleep

- END OF THE FIRST DAY -