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[img]https://i.ibb.co/chfMMdXw/Copy-of-Guardians-2.png[/img][/center]
[color=#f6dd69][h3]The White Mountains, New Hampshire[/h3][/color]

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[color=#f07244][indent]“So, no dress?”[/indent][/color]

[color=darkgray][indent]“You’ll be representing the US armed forces, it felt prudent you rock up in a ball gown.”[/indent][/color]

[color=#f07244][indent]“Well, sounds like their loss.”[/indent][/color] [color=darkgray][indent]Carol replied, her legs swinging back and forth as she sat atop the nearest available space, which in this case, happened to be someone’s abandoned desk.[/indent][/color]

[color=darkgray][indent]“Plus, it was suggested it would help highlight that most of anyone else there is just a celebrity of a sort, you’re the real deal, officially sanctioned, American hero. Apples and Oranges.” Jim, who by this point Carol had adopted as the human member of staff she could get the closest to a full conversation out of, was rather busy at his own desk, fixated on the scroll of data on his screen as he kept up the chatter with Carol.[/indent][/color]

[color=#f07244][indent]“Makes sense, I suppose.”[/indent][/color] [color=darkgray][indent]Carol stood up with a stretch, taking a few steps away from the desk, thankfully otherwise unoccupied at this particular time.[/indent][/color] [color=#f07244][indent]“I’m surprised they’re even thinking to send me, not that I’m complaining.”[/indent][/color] [color=darkgray][indent]She paused to look around the main floor of the Project, mostly abandoned for now. With a pause on operations for the moment most staff had made themselves scarce with the opportunity to take some actual time off.[/indent][/color]

[color=darkgray][indent]“There was some debate about whether this sanctions the general state of independent ‘heroes’ too much, but I think they decided it was worse for the Warbird to not take centre stage.” Jim finally turned from his screen, his swivel chair doing a full rotation before he aligned himself properly to look at her, just as Carol was ‘adjusting’ a few of the personal decorations on another desk.[/indent][/color]

[color=#f07244][indent]"Centre stage, no dress."[/indent][/color] [color=darkgray][indent]Carol picked up a photo frame from the edge of the desk, tilted it toward the light. Jim, younger, an arm slung around someone in a Cardinals cap. She set it back exactly where it had been, corner aligned to the same faint dust-mark.[/indent][/color]

[color=darkgray][indent]"Different stage, different rules." Jim didn't look up from the screen, though the corner of his mouth gave him away. "Nobody's asking you to twirl."[/indent][/color]

[color=#f07244][indent]"Shame. I've been practicing. Cheer Captain and all that."[/indent][/color] [color=darkgray][indent]She drummed her fingers once against the desk, a short percussive burst, then let her hand fall still.[/indent][/color]

[color=darkgray][indent]“You want some good news? I can tell you the canapés are supposed to be excellent.”[/indent][/color]

[color=#f07244][indent]“Now that’s the kind of intel I signed up for.”[/indent][/color]

[color=darkgray][indent]He huffed something like a laugh and turned back to his screen, fingers moving fast over the keys, the scroll of data collapsing line by line into whatever shape he needed it in. Carol drifted the rest of the floor while he worked, past desks gone quiet, a corkboard still pinned with someone’s half-finished rota, the hum of an idle server somewhere behind a wall. She didn’t sit back down. Standing gave her somewhere to put the restlessness that talking hadn’t used up.[/indent][/color]

[color=#f07244][indent]“Alright.”[/indent][/color] [color=darkgray][indent]Jim straightened, keys clacking through one last save, then stood and rolled his shoulders with the particular satisfaction of a man closing out a task list. “Come on. Let's get you sorted before anyone official shows up to hover.”[/indent][/color]

[color=darkgray][indent]He led her off the main floor, down a corridor she hadn’t had reason to walk before, key card raised to a door with no markings beyond a small printed number. It clicked open onto a room laid out like a tailor’s fever dream, garment bags hung along one wall, a rack of accessories catalogued with more care than the file cabinets out front. Front and centre, already lit like the room had been built around it, hung the outfit.[/indent][/color]

[color=darkgray][indent]Navy shading into something closer to violet where the fabric folded, a deep-cut bodice with a neckline that left no ambiguity about the tactical decisions involved, gold at the cuffs and collar in the sort of ceremonial excess usually reserved for admirals who’d never seen a deck in their lives. Epaulettes caught the light in small starbursts. A single glove, fingerless at the knuckle, sat displayed on its own stand beside a belt heavy with braid and buckle.[/indent][/color]

[color=darkgray][indent]"You don't like it?" [/indent][/color]

[color=#f07244][indent]"Jury's out."[/indent][/color] [color=darkgray][indent]She was already reaching for the hanger.[/indent][/color] [color=#f07244][indent]"Give me a minute."[/indent][/color]

[color=darkgray][indent]Jim took the hint and turned himself toward the door, suddenly very interested in something on his phone. Carol disappeared behind the changing screen in the corner, fabric rustling, a muttered string of words which could have been reaffirming cheer chant designed to deal with the struggle of trousers having to fit both hips and waist. When she stepped back out the jacket sat exactly as designed, collar closed high, every button doing its assigned job.[/indent][/color]

[color=darkgray][indent]She caught her reflection in the mirror propped against the wall and stood there a moment, turning her shoulder one way, then the other.[/indent][/color]

[color=#f07244][indent]"Right."[/indent][/color] [color=darkgray][indent]Her hands went to the top button.[/indent][/color] [color=#f07244][indent]"Vision needs a rewrite."[/indent][/color]

[color=darkgray][indent]"Danvers—"[/indent][/color]

[color=#f07244][indent]"Relax, I'm not setting anything on fire."[/indent][/color] [color=darkgray][indent]Three more buttons went with a slight flex of power, until the collar fell open into something that would've given whoever briefed her a minor cardiac event. She adjusted the fall of the lapel with two fingers, tugged the fabric flat, checked the new line in the mirror.[/indent][/color] [color=#f07244][indent]"There. Now no one is going to mistake me for the Rear Admiral."[/indent][/color]

[color=darkgray][indent]"That's not exactly the read the Pentagon's going for."[/indent][/color]

[color=#f07244][indent]"The Pentagon can’t prove I didn’t lose them in flight if you don’t tell them."[/indent][/color] [color=darkgray][indent]She shot him a wink over her shoulder before heading towards the doorway, sweeping past him, using a few inches of flight to easily pat him on the head as she left.[/indent][/color] [color=#f07244][indent]“I won’t rat if you don’t.”[/indent][/color] [color=darkgray][indent]Then she set the mask in place, a modified version of her warbird mask, matching the colours of the rest of her attire, a golden and dark blue masquerade mask with just the hint of an Aqualine shape. Masquerade in style, it was as much propaganda as a disguise.[/indent][/color]

[color=darkgray][indent]She didn’t wait for any further reply from the man before she was back in the main chamber. She caught her own reflection in the dark screen of a computer. Suddenly thoughts of her brothers, her father, were competing for a place in her mind that had been momentarily thinking only of the night ahead. Doubts niggled along with them. [I]You can never replace them[/I] a voice that sounded a little too much like her dearest father wormed its way among the memories, and she felt the sudden urge to cover herself back up.[/indent][/color]

[color=darkgray][indent]After a moment’s pause, she frowned at her own reflection.[/indent][/color]

[color=#f07244][indent]“Screw you too.”[/indent][/color]

[color=darkgray][indent]Then she was back in the air, a rush of movement around her as she soared into and out of the flight tunnel, back into the mountain air.[/indent][/color]

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[color=#f6dd69][h3]The Therapeutix Gala[/h3][/color]
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[color=darkgray][indent]“Look Up!”[/indent][/color]

[color=darkgray][indent]The crowds and reporters outside of the Gala had only a moment to behold the newborn golden star bursting into life above them before the Warbird touched down, practically among them, at the far end of the red carpet.[/indent][/color]

[color=darkgray][indent]As Carol stood from a pose that was half-kneeling, half a runner’s pose from where she had landed her eyes, hands and feet still burned with the same golden light, slowly easing to allow human eyes to discount the brightness and see the woman within. As she threw a casual salute to the stunned masses, that very same moment of suspense burst into cheers from the crowd and the clamouring of reporters for the best angle. Instead, Carol paused to take a few pictures with a few of the crowd screaming the loudest, before making her way towards the Gala entrance proper, her golden light slowly bleeding away as she did so.[/indent][/color]