Fiber

̸/̸̅̅ ̆̅ ̅̅ ̅̅𝙴𝚃𝚄𝚁𝙽 𝚃⌖ 𝚂𝙴𝙽𝙳𝙴̸/̸̅̅ ̆̅ ̅̅ ̅̅

What he heard at the bar was enough to know it would be worth his while. It was a late night of drinking, and he spent more on the tab than he should’ve, but once everyone was multiple beers deep they were willing to share things they shouldn’t with former officers. There was this Vet, guy was involved in some real mess involving a kidnapping victim that they were still trying to get to the bottom of. They wouldn’t share much, and what they did let on at the bar was only what they had found so far, but it sounded like the guy was into some shady stuff. Even drunk, they were trying to keep some of his info private, but they let slip the name of his clinic. Back at home, Mike got the address of his home after spending some time with the yellow pages and the white pages.

It had been a long time since he’d done a residential burglary. Back in his high school days, his brothers and his friends would get up to that, but as he grew up he learned it wasn’t worth it just picking random houses. In his police days, he’d done some smash and grabs on commercial places, those had a guaranteed return and was easy to get the right BS in the police report to throw them off the trail. He hated to be doing this again, but money was tight and he wasn’t going to let an opportunity go to waste. He knew they were arresting the guy tonight, so it was guaranteed that he’d be out. Ideally, he’d like to rob in the middle of the night, but no telling how long the guy would be locked up for, so it was a dinner-time raid or nothing else. The house was in a nice neighborhood and that vet business seemed to be going well, Mike figured they’d definitely have some nice stuff he could fence. Of course, he was really hoping to find something unexpected, like cash, drugs; the stuff that might be there if this guy really was in bed with some shady figures.

Why did it take him so damn long to find his .44? It wasn’t in the safe with the rest of his guns. Did he need that one for what he was going to do tonight? No, any old gun would do, but he liked showing that he meant business, and ever since he saw Dirty Harry he knew that there was nothing you could hold in one hand that would get that message across better. He counted out as he loaded it full with bullets, 1,2,3,4,5, click and then gave it a good spin. Dang, he liked the way he looked holding the gun, seeing himself in the mirror. Then he reminded himself that wasn’t what he should be worrying about, he should focus on how well the balaclava fit. He didn’t have any of those fancy ones for skiing, so he used his “talent” for improvisation. All it took was a few knife holes in an old knit hat, and Mike had something that would obscure his face just fine.

It was always risky doing a crime with your own car, a lot of people liked to steal one to do some business. But Mike thought all of that was unnecessary. He found a side street and pulled out one of the oldest tricks in the book. Undo the screws and remove the license plates from his car. No plate, no number, and he could outrun them if they bothered to chase him over something that stupid. There was plenty of parking on the street for his car, so that’s where he went. He acted like a guy just walking the neighborhood, but when he had ducked behind a corner he put the balaclava on, scrunching and shoving it to get the eyeholes lined up. He also strapped his messenger bag on, hoping to put some good stuff in it and be out of there.

White picket fence around the backyard, of course they were that kind of family. He got closer and could see the paint fading, the owner must’ve been a softy if he wasn’t able to get his kids to do it. Mike got a running start, held out his hand, and prepared to jump it. He got a few inches away when he realized it wasn’t going to happen, Mikey had to remind himself he was no Dr. J when it came to jumping. He paced back and got running again this time, shoulder down and aimed right where the latch was. Bam, it burst right open. Mike wasn’t thinking about if they heard him, he was just thinking about how people that really needed fences always went with chain-link or metal.

There was a feeling in his gut when he stared at the sliding glass door on the back porch. They had the blinds up, the suckers. Meant he couldn’t see in either, but he had a gun, and what did they have? Dining utensils? This’d be a piece of cake. He breathed in and gave it one kick with his heavy boots. The shards went all around and the screams reached out into the yard. Mike ran in with one hand shielding his face from the flying glass and the other holding his revolver out. They knew what was up from the moment he stepped in with the balaclava on his face and the gun in his hand, but he always figured they could use a little bit more terror. BANG! One round into the ceiling as a warning and then everything else ceased.

He had the urge to swear when he realized he just barged into the middle of the dining room; them New-fangled house layouts keeping him guessing. He started talking before he could hesitate.

“Ey, alright, alright, no need to get quiet now, glad you noticed me. I can see the old man ain’t here now, he fucked up real bad. Nows, me and my people, listen we ain’t got no problem with you, you hear some of them want to make the bloodbath a family affair, give ‘em all nice plots with the same death date in the cemetery, but we ain’t like that. We don’t think Youse a problem less Youse make a problem for us. I’m only here to collect some stuff to make it right. Help me out with that and you’ll be able to forget I was ever here, but get wise, and I might decide ta make myself more memorable”

Mike was waving his gun and two scared faces looked back at him, a teenage boy and a woman that was obviously the Vet’s wife. He’d run it through a dozen times in his head and never thought what to do if he ran into people. He wasn’t sure if they bought his whole speech, if they weren’t moving because they were in shock, or if they knew something he didn’t. Maybe it was time for something else, maybe ice ‘em now and hope they’d think it somebody else, but then he ended that thought. Getting money was what mattered, don’t get distracted. Remember you’re the guy with the gun, and go forward. No fancy thoughts. No big plans. Just hold your gun and go.

He saw a closet door sitting open. Without a word, he pointed towards the kid, and then the closet, and when the kid didn’t get the hint, he cocked the gun and said “In. Now!”

It sounded like the kid was going to say something. Mike just shouted wordlessly and he stopped. Mike saw him huddled in the dark. There was a shelving unit full of shoes and old toolboxes; that’s all he saw in there. He shut the door and shoved a chair underneath the knob. It was jammed shut. He faked like he was walking off, and fired another round. It made a deafening blast and a hole in the wall next to the closet.

The kid was alive, he could hear the breathing. In the silence, Mike said

“I see you leave that and ya dead, understand?”

Then he walked away and considered that situation handled.

“Now, give me the good shit and I can get outta here. Where’s it at?”

The missus was still stammering. She stuttered, not speaking but she could point. That was all the communication he needed.
He went upstairs. The stairs creaked under his heavy footsteps. He wouldn’t let her run off, and she led him to the right spot. In the bedroom he noticed that at least one of them actually gave a shit about the décor. There were shades of orange he had only seen on hotels and TV shows in there. Too bad he couldn’t sell that. He said

“Okay, whatcha got?”

“I…I have some jewelry. And a nice fur coat. I don’t wear it much, but my husband wanted to surprise me. It’s mink.” It was fox. Mike wouldn’t know.

“Anything else? Got cash, heirlooms, collectibles? He ever keep any ‘em vet drugs in the house? C’mon, quicker you answer, quicker I’ll be out of here.”

“No, nothing like that. My husband like guns, I don’t know them but I think some of them are nice ones. Maybe you could sell them.”

“Alright, so where’s the guns, and where’s the rest? Point, and I’ll check”

Place was big. Full bath, walk-in closet, California King bed in the center and still plenty of floorspace. Fuckin’ respectable types, they always spent money on the shit you couldn’t just dump off at a pawn shop.

“The…the guns are in that safe.” She pointed to a large green gun safe sitting near the door to the bathroom. “The fur coat and the jewelry, we keep that in the closet.”

He gestured with the gun, and she led him to the closet. When she opened the door, he grabbed her wrist. Then he shoved her aside to make sure he got the first look. Damn big closet, even had a little window. Too small to climb out of, though. Then he shoved her past the threshold and waited in the doorway.

She was hurrying, tossing clothes and boxes of mementos aside. Every time she pulled out something, he had his hand outstretched to grab it before she could squirrel it away. He got a pearl necklace, some earrings, bracelets and rings that were heavy enough he knew there was some gold in them. A bunch of silver too. All of that he stuffed in his bag, one hand still holding the gun. The pace got slower, but she did hand him some nice watches, two ladies ones, and some fancy men’s one by Omega. Damn, it was one of those new quartz ones. How does a rock tell time anyway? Figures the Swiss would find a way.

“Hey, I think your friends are here. I see them out the window. they’re not doing the best job at hiding.”

“Very funny. I ain’t got no friends with me tonight.”

“I’m…I’m not lying, who are they? You can see them right there!”

He grabbed her in a headlock and shoved her off and to the side. He kept a solid grip on her just in case she tried to run away. Maybe it was rough, maybe he’d hurt her throat, didn’t matter to him now. Then he saw it outside. Even with a peek, he could tell what shattered glass on the lawn looked like. By the look of it, it was the windows leading to the basement. Then he saw the back of the legs of someone trying to crawl in. He loosened his grip on her and walked back to the entrance of the closet. He said nothing, and his eyes never left her the whole time. She could see the look of disquiet on his face through the balaclava.

Where In The World?

Y'know what, I'm in.

ᵀʰᵉ Last Avatar & ᵀʰᵉ Red Lotus.

_______________________________......

_______________________________________ University of Ba Sing Se. @canaryrose@Fiber. ____________________________________________________________________________. “You know, An, you really didn’t need to do this.” The semester was fully underway at the University of Ba Sing Se, but one wouldn’t have known by the look of campus. Banners were hung all around campus with phrases like ‘Welcome Back!” and “We’ve Missed You!” Students were laughing and embracing in the commons, shouting and smiling. To An, it all seemed rather jarring. Classes had been cancelled for nearly two weeks after the explosion, and to her, everyone looked… fine. As though nothing had happened. But An didn’t feel that way, and the girl next to her certainly didn’t. An turned her head to the girl beside her: Jie Yuan, Chu’s little sister. She looked anxious, in the way that people resigned to their fates did. Jie was taller than An, not a difficult feat, but shorter than her elder sister, and a bit darker. After much cajoling, she had decided to go and finish out the semester and see what could be done about her attending the next. An had considered paying for it out of her own account, but she would see first if it came to that. For now, here they were. The sun was shining, the grass was green and the campus sprouted around them, shiny and modern. “It’s really not a big deal,” An said, walking alongside her. “It’s nice to be back here. I know I’ve bored you with all my stories of my college days, but…” It brought a smile to her face to think of it. “Don’t worry about it. I can’t say no to your mom anyways.” Jie half-smiled. “I know. She’s… well. Persuasive.” She rolled her shoulders, coming to a stop in front of a shiny glass building with a throng of students streaming in. “This is my stop. I’ll see you… well, some time.” Jie gave An a hug, and that was it- she went inside, and An was left alone. She checked her phone for the time, a habitual gesture. She had plans to grab tea, maybe, and then walk around in a building where she’d had class once, and then go home and do more work… an internal sigh. She couldn’t stop thinking about what Chu’s mom had told her, at dinner two days ago. Firebending. Since she was six years old. No wonder… But her sisters didn’t know, or her father. How could they keep that secret for so long? From An too? But her work wouldn’t stop for her musings. Not her work work, nor her… other, more clandestine work. An turned, resolving to go to the tea shop she had once frequented and then go straight back to the Moon residence. She had little time to waste. Zhen saw An in the hallway from distance and adjusted her path through the building so they would just happen to brush by one another. It was important to look natural, but even the most innocent encounter might still be brushed off; that party would surely leave a sting for a long time. With careful spatial awareness, Zhen made it look like she wasn’t paying attention as she walked, a head fake one way, then another, and then she came close to running into An before stopping herself mere inches away. Faking a startle, she said “Oh, Mrs. Tamura, I’m sorry. I wasn’t watching where I was going. I meant what I said in the note that came with the flower arrangement, I hope it was well received. I don’t want to trouble you further because I know these past weeks have been a trying time for you.” The arrangement arrived to the Moon household, the courier had the signature at least. That was all Zhen knew, it could’ve been tossed out by Vyska’s security for all she knew. That would have been a shame. She had picked the flowers in it carefully, Aster, Chrystanthemum, Plum, and Lotus, to those who had spent countless hours in classes meant to acculturate them to the upper class, they had a meaning over their own. The note attached had been simple. “I’m sorry. I sent this because I knew my husband wouldn’t.” An looked briefly startled at the sighting- it’s the university, of course she’d be here, idiot- her mouth parted, her eyes hidden underneath dark sunglasses. She recovered fast, pulling the glasses up her nose and into her hair. “Dr… Mie Lun, yes? It’s, erm, Ms.” It didn’t really offend her, but the reminder stung a bit all the same. “Yes, yes, I got the note. It was well-appreciated. The arrangement too. Very nice.” She had liked the arrangement, and the note. She had thought it sweet, even if she knew to be wary of the prosecutor’s wife. An had put the arrangement up on her desk. The flowers had started to wilt already, but they were bright. “The apology was kind, but unnecessary. You can’t control your husband if he chooses to be a certain way, can you? Men will be men. That's why I don’t particularly care for them.” She flashed a wry smile, a clear joke. Zhen said “I understand that sentiment. When I was in these very halls many years ago I had the great luck meet the esteemed physicist and mathematician Vo Nui Man before he died. There’s a saying of his that is one of my favorites, ‘All stable processes we shall control, all unstable processes we shall monitor.’ I thought it unwise to ask him what category male impulses fell into, even though they have baffled me so often. “ Zhen let out a large sigh and shifted a little bit, then said “In my life I have many causes that I care about that, causes that I am willing to sacrifice for because I know it will benefit the world at large, things like life extension research, ending food insecurity, public health initiatives, free access to education. There are also many things I do not like but I find I have to tolerate because they are expected of me if I am to remain in a position where I have the power to do the maximum good for the causes I do care about. Faculty meetings, reporters asking for comment, donor appeals, tax paperwork, strategic planning meetings, public ceremonies, lazy students. I believe you can infer which category my husband is in. “ Zhen talked a lot. Just like her husband… was she trying to get something out of her? Or, maybe, it was just a trait of professors, An mused. Someone who lectured so much might just like to lecture. Her professors had liked to drone on and on, but it had just been about math, and An had been at the very least mildly interested. The philosophy… well, she hated the one course she had taken. So had most students, though. “There’s something sad, under all that philosophizing, if you don’t mind me saying,” An said. “No offense. I just couldn’t imagine being with someone I considered a chore. Or someone who I didn’t like, though I guess those come hand in hand. Can’t be for the greater good, if you ask me.” “Not to get in your business, Dr. Lun. I’m hardly a person anyone should take advice from. Or a person who has much experience with men. Still, though. He’s hardly worth much.” Zhen said. “I am one person and my happiness or unhappiness is worth no more than that of anyone else’s. My current position allows me to affect the welfare of millions of equally valuable lives in the present, countless more in the future. If it takes my unhappiness to assure that the status quo remains and I can continue to do maximum good, I will choose that option over risking some mess of a divorce and the distractions and reputational damage that may come with it.” Zhen had some resignation in her voice. She said “That is one of the challenges of being a public figure, it gives me the ability to do good in the world, but only if I behave in certain ways. My private life has less restrictions, but the times when I can enjoy it are rare due to my demanding schedule.” “I’m not so sure that’s relevant,” An said, cocking her head. “I’m no public figure, but I can’t imagine being married is a requirement. Well, actually…” Her mouth quirked, in an ironic, almost-angry smile. “I suppose I was on my way to it. Or that I was married to one, or almost-married. Sports stars are very different from… philosopher activists. Still. It’s a modern world. If they can accept women being married to women, they can accept a single one.” She shrugged. “Again. I don’t mean to be rude. I hardly know you. I’m just tired of excuses. We live in an unfair world, why not just do what you’d like if it doesn’t hurt anyone or truly compromise the greater good?” Zhen looked down the hallway, into the distance and said “In another world, in another timeline, it may have been possible. I suppose I could gotten where I am without being married to a man; I’m not a modal realist so I don’t spend much time thinking about those flights of fancy. Standing where I am now my ‘idyllic marriage’ is part of my image, or so the marketing consultants that the charity board insists I hire have told me. If our next fundraising drive delivers 20% less revenue, because of distractions or reputational damage; statistically, that could be as many as ten thousand children who were unable to get live-saving medical care because of a decision that was in my control. Everything we do effects everyone else, it is what we are cursed with. It’s not unfair, it’s just a brute fact of existence” Now Zhen decided it was time to take a riskier line of questioning. “Forgive me what I am about to ask, I am somewhat addicted to questions and I know this might be sensitive, so if you don’t want to discuss I apologize and we can end it here. I cannot help but be curious about what Chu was like, and how it was to find out that she was bender. I may have written about Benders, but I have never known one well, there have been a few occasions where the authorities have asked me to speak with a bender in custody, but those were limited and hardly organic interactions. I am always eager to reexamine my own conclusions. And before you ask, I will keep anything you say private, especially from my husband. ” She also made a gesture towards an empty classroom, in case An wanted to say these words in a place where there were less people to overhear. “Hm. I…” An struggled for a moment. It was a personal question… but people might as well know. There was no reason to lie. “I was overly familiar, too, so I suppose it’s only right… No, no. It’s okay. I was actually about to go get tea.” “No one knows if she’s dead or alive, you know, so I prefer the present tense. There are all these fucking people on the TV trying to say this and that, profit off of knowing her. Most of it isn’t true. If she was a firebender before, which isn’t likely-” - she was- “then I don’t think there’s some sort of bender psyche like they say. She’s a good person. Kind and sweet. Passionate and ambitious. I’m not sure I’ll find someone better, so I really do hope she’s alive.” “Finding out was a nightmare. I won’t elaborate too much more. That day is a bit fresh.” Zhen said “Difficult times are when character matters the most, and I have nothing but praise and sympathy for the way you’ve been dealing with it. We don’t have to talk any further. I could use some tea myself, I don’t know if you had a place in mind, but if you don’t, there’s a spot close to here that I really like. Much better than the campus dining hall.” Zhen learnt a lot from that conversation. Was any of it about the Moons and where the sympathies of Vyska may lie? No, but there was no need to rush into any of that. If there was any intelligence benefit to talking to An, it would come later, and if there wasn’t, then at least it helped give Zhen a rare refuge from her duties that weighed on her every day.

̸/̸̅̅ ̆̅ ̅̅ ̅̅𝙴𝚃𝚄𝚁𝙽 𝚃⌖ 𝚂𝙴𝙽𝙳𝙴̸/̸̅̅ ̆̅ ̅̅ ̅̅

(Former) Officer Michael Dambrauskas

Title	☞	He was a bully hiding behind a police badge, stacking up illicit cash and enemies he knew wouldn't dare touch him, but now that he's off the force, he has no friends, no steady income, no restraints, and plenty of foes.
Name	☞	Michael “Mikey” Dambrauskas
Age	☞	43
Sex	☞	Male
Business	☞	At this moment, Mikey has no full time employment. He still has some part time work as a security guard at the rougher bars around town, but that isn’t enough to pay his mortgage. When he was a cop, he had some good sources of extra dollars, seizing cash from people that looked like they were up to no good, making drugs go missing from the evidence locker, collecting a “good will donation” from local businesses that either wanted more or less attention from the cops. If you knew him well, then for the right price he’d give you a tip off when police action was on the way or let you peek at some files, for real pals he’d have a conversation with someone who needed a bit of a reminder (no actual violence unless they were dumb enough to take a swing at a cop). A few times, when he spotted something real juicy in a store window, he’d come by at night and do a nice smash and grab followed by fencing the goods. Not much of that money was saved up, because whenever it was good, it was time for sports bets, rounds of beer for the boys, and some gifts to make him look like a bigshot with the ladies.
Savvy	☞	Mikey knows how to fight and how to shoot, those were the only police skills he actually liked to practice. He certainly isn’t beating anyone in a footrace or wowing people with his deductive skills. He also likes to drive his car fast; it’s one of the pleasures of being able to talk his way out of a ticket. He’s gotten good enough at it that if he didn’t know how to handle it he’d probably be dead. He’s also got some skill at making fake paperwork because he has had to make a lot of BS look right over the years, he’s not a master forger that could copy difficult things, but if you need a backdated report, Mikey is your guy. Mikey’s not a skilled analyst, and his eye for when someone is lying is far worse than he thinks it is, but the one talent he does have in the psychological department is knowing how to make a threat in a way that causes people to take it seriously. Lastly, he likes to fish, hasn’t come in handy yet but he wouldn’t give it up for anything.
Ruin	☞	If you ask Michael if there were any positives to growing up with eight siblings, he’d tell you one thing: you learned to protect your stuff. That came in handy on his street on the Southside of Chicago, where business was settled with fistfights, and if you could fight, then there would always been plenty of business that needed settling. Right and wrong were relative things, what Mikey learned quick was to sense an opportunity, whose bike you could steal, which stores you could shoplift from, and who was better off not being messed with. Life was about walking the fine line between being a bitch and being a big enough problem that someone decided to deal with you. On a whim one day after high school, when he was getting tired of waiting for a job with the pipefitters union that his friend swore was coming, Mikey put his application in with the Chicago Police Department. Could he do well on the written test? No. But what they thought about him was that he had the mind of a cop. He had a way of just looking at someone and deciding if they were up to no good. How often was he right? That’s the best part, it didn’t matter for the Chicago PD. Those years taught him skills he’d rely on for the rest of his life, he knew when to beat someone within an inch of his life and when to almost burst into tears about how it was all just self-defense, when to decide someone was the kind of person that belonged on this street and when it’d best to give em a forceful reminder that they didn’t. Some would call him a bully, but that’s what made him so natural at it: in Mikey’s mind, he wasn’t a bully, he just had an eye for who needed fixin’ and the power to do it, and the world would be in shambles without guys like him. In normal times, it would all be smooth sailing, he just had to suck up to the right people and avoid any foul-up that would make the papers, but this was Chicago in the 60s. Even when social unrest had them short-staffed, they were always wary of putting Mikey on a riot detail because deescalation wasn’t a word in his vocabulary. Then came the day when he had to explain why he thought it was a good idea to put a bullet through the back of the head of an unarmed activist. Mikey walked into that meeting all confident, he had spent all night concocting a story, but Mikey’s last 45 minutes as a Chicago Police Officer would be spent having the lieutenant scream at him before ripping the badge straight off his uniform. The next day Mikey took a road trip to hit up every town between Minneapolis and Chicago large enough to have its own force. He gave them all the same pitch: he was a tough Chicago cop, so tough he could just breathe and see the crime rate drop as small-town punks went pale, and he was looking for a place with a slower pace of life and people with their head on straight. It took him hundreds of miles on his Dodge Polara before he hit 𝙼𝚒𝚗𝚗𝚎𝚗𝚘𝚘𝚗𝚊 and they bought into what he was selling. He quickly learned the rules: Don’t touch anything related to the steel mill, keep the punks out of the nice part of town, and always make be able to make a few quick arrests if people got feeling uneasy. Mikey had a good thing going, he learned which hoes were worth asking for freebies, which hustlers were dumb enough to keep cash on them that he could skim whenever he picked them up, which business owners would be willing to give a few extra dollars to a hardworking officer, and which people were the ones he could arrest whenever they needed someone to stick on a crime and needed someone plausible to arrest. The worst thing about life in Wisconsin was that people would sometimes hassle him for being a Bears fan. When the economy got tough and the layoffs began to mount, Mikey didn’t worry, he noticed that the extra cash he took in was a little lighter, but his gun and badge were just as heavy as ever, and all of the people he ticked off just accepted him as a fact of life. One day the chief called the whole department into one room, and the ones who read the paper already knew what it was about. Mikey didn’t and did his best to hide his bewilderment when they told them how many officers would have to be cut from the force for budgetary reasons. The atmosphere changed that day, because everyone knew whose name was going to be top of the chopping block. No matter how much he intimated that he had dirt on others, it was an empty threat; maybe some others weren’t on the up and up, but there was no doubt who had the most to lose if someone started looking into police affairs. So, Mikey had to start thinking about what he's going to do when he is no longer an officer. Is he gonna actually worry about how he’s gonna pay the bills, keep himself out of jail, and deal with the years of blowback that’s gonna be coming once the crooks realize he can’t back up any of his threats anymore, or is he just gonna go fishing and ignore the storm brewing in his life?
Cred	☞	"What good things can I say about Mikey? He's never gonna rat on me the chief cuz I know he's done worse, he's good for picking up tabs after work when he's in the mood, and I can bet he'll be ready to kick down a door and check my six if I tell him there's police action needed. What bad things can I say about him? Don't get me started." "Mikey's the kind of cop we need. I show him some money as a sign of respect and he makes sure any shoplifters know they'll be on crutches for weeks if they try my store. Only questions he asks is if I got the cash and who needs a lesson." "First lesson for crime reporters around here is to never believe a word Mike Dambrauskas says. If you want be a pulp novelist then go ahead, ask him about Chicago and he'll give you so much bullshit you could make a whole series out of it, but I'm printing the news not some 25 cent paperback. The moment you fact check his stuff you'll see everything he says comes straight from his head where he's some kinda hero who can do no wrong. Don't confront him about nothin' neither, that won't go well for anyone." "There is no such thing as a one time transaction with Mikey, if he figures out someone is good for money once, he’s gonna keep coming back again and again. Best you can do if you've got a racket and need his help is never let him know how good the money actually is, because he'll want more." "Fuck Mikey. Don't matter how much you pay, don't matter what he did in the past, if he's feeling the heat or mad about something he'll lock you up or beat the tar out of you in an instant. Flipping on him won't scare him either, he's lyingest sonuvabitch north of the state line, but when it comes to court they all act like that uniform means something and he'll get damn creative with his story on the stand." "Why ain't nobody ever laid a hand on Mikey? Because no matter how many times he backstabs someone, people know how the pigs are. Go after one of their own while he's still with 'em and they'll bring down hell on you. Nobody wants to throw their life away to because they got wronged by Mikey Fuckin' Drambrauskas, it's like setting your house on fire because you can't get that mouse infestation out."
Ilk	☞	THE ACTION IS THE JUICE, COULD'A HAD CLASS

̸/̸̅̅ ̆̅ ̅̅ ̅̅𝙴𝚃𝚄𝚁𝙽 𝚃⌖ 𝚂𝙴𝙽𝙳𝙴̸/̸̅̅ ̆̅ ̅̅ ̅̅

Static filled noise from the TV droned on. Mike sat up on the sofa in a haze, all he saw on the screen was blurry. The words were too sophisticated for him to understand in this state, he just laid his head back in vain hopes they would go away, and he could get back to sleep.

“The Yamaguchi Steelworks might not be what one would expect to find amidst a city that still boasts about its age-old pagodas and ancient wooden gates, but inside this building we are witnessing a quiet revolution.”

It would not stop. He didn’t know what hour it was, but the TV was still loud.

“Behind me sits a carefully engineered vessel holding over two hundred tons of molten iron, but a mere forty five minutes from now it shall be steel suited for the most demanding engineering uses. Such a process would normally take up to twelve hours in a typical American steel mill. This remarkable feat involves injecting pure oxygen into the mix and reaching unimaginable levels of heat, but the men of the Yamaguchi Steelworks are betting their livelihoods that they can get it right.”

Mike stirred some more but then the language turned to what he knew only as “Jap” and he tried to sleep again, drowning it out as white noise.

“Germans were very stubborn….Bessemer Process…Ore Quality.”

Ah, damn it, there’s a narrator. He forgot what he was watching last night.

With a throbbing pulse in his head and one hand clutching his forehead he sat up enough to gain his bearings.

“Low quality ore in Japan…International pressures... up to 25% scrap metal”

He stepped forward, eyes blurry from the light. What channel did he leave it on? Was it that new-fangled PBS one wasting his tax dollars or did he have that pinko Cronkite on again. He was walking past the coffee table on the way to touch the dial when his elbow clipped something. A bottle fell with a heavy clunk on the table as room-temperature beer poured forth. It was enough to remind him of how his mother used to shout; that was the only way she got him care enough to clean up. He took off the stained t-shirt he was wearing and used it as a rag. No one to complain about the job he did these days. The TV continued on in the background, now the scene was something inside an American office.

“You have to understand; I have obligations to balance. There are certain rates of return expected by shareholders, and the way I have run this has never disappointed them."

“But surely they’d understand if they knew it was necessary.”

“Let me explain to you in a way even a tv reporter like yourself can understand. You see that letter on the wall back there? That’s from one Miss Tilly. She’s been a shareholder for thirty years now and she’s been writing us letters ever since. Right now, she’s 82.”

“I don’t see what that...”

“What she tells us every year is how wonderful this stock and it’s dividends have been to her, how it helped her even when her husband passed, how proud she is of it and how she hopes her grandchildren will be able to keep her shares, because the we’ve done such a great job with the dividends each year.”

“So, Miss Tilly…”

“Miss Tilly and the millions of shareholders like her that rely on us for their retirement are not going to understand any fancy words like “Basic Oxygen Process” or “Collective Bargaining Agreement”, but they will understand if they see me shaving cents off of that dividend. A steel company of this scale is run like a precise machine, the finance boys will tell you that we’ve kept it on the same course with the same spending for fifty years and made a company that is the envy of the world, and we are not about to start fiddling with those because of Union agitators or foreign governments trying to undercut American prosperity.”

Click. Mike finally found the dial. He bothered to finish the beer before he turned it off. The taste was awful. That wasn’t enough for him to reconsider drinking it.

More pain in the head as he figured what he wanted to do. Get some food. Probably. Eating was a good way to solve unhappiness.

He shuffled over the cheap linoleum and the thin film that covered them in the kitchen, kicking aside something metal that he didn’t bother to look down to see what it was. In the fridge he picked out some old casserole to microwave back to warmth, then looked out on the gray skies outside the window. No neighbors out now. Good, miserable bunch of pricks who want to tell him all about their kids grades or what color they want to paint their door this season. He paid all this money for a house near the water and even then, it was still downwind of the mill on a bad day, the nicest neighborhoods got the water and less smog, but he didn’t have the money for those. He barely had enough for this one.

Ding, that’s the casserole. He ate with a spoon from the dishwasher, one he didn’t bother to check if it was clean or dirty, and placed the dish next to an opened liquor bottle sitting on the laminated wood of the table. Nothing he cooked was good food; a side effect of the primary means of instruction for cooking being parents and siblings screaming at him. Once the casserole was in his stomach it was time to get cleaned up a bit, so off to the bathroom it was. Did he have to look presentable anymore? That was a question he asked himself as he shaved the stubble away. Easier to answer that than what his old buddies would be doing now. He heard Costas got some kinda security work at the Mill, and of course Lieutenant Robinson kept his job, heaven forbid Minenoona’s finest lose someone whose best work is done apologizing and filling out forms. The rest? Who knows. Hughes is probably mooching off his wife’s salary from teaching; pure bitch move like that would fit him.

In the bedroom he found a pair of jeans on the floor and new shirt in a laundry basket that he hadn’t bothered to fold yet. Being here made him feel like he should check something, something important. Not the safe, with its door cracked open by a hair, all he kept in there were guns and mementos, like his father’s World War 1 Victory Medal that he pried out of the hands of his other siblings. No, where he checked required him to push the nightstand aside and to pull up the right wood panel. There was a hole in the drywall behind it. With one arm he reached in and fished out a shoebox caked in dust.

The only thing in the box was wads of cash. Mike touched them, feeling a rush of calm when the texture of bills reached his fingertips, and then came the urge to count. He gave up halfway through knowing it wasn’t as much as he hoped. He knew he’d need more soon, might not be able to find the day, but it would come. He put the box and the wall panel back with wordless sigh.
It took him longer than he would have liked to admit to find his keys. He trudged outside, hands shivering in the cold, but once he got in his Mustang and heard the revving of all three hundred-some cubic inches of a cast-iron American V8. To him, it was the most beautiful sound in the history of the world. For those miles down the main strip, behind the wheel of his pride and joy, he felt like the biggest man in town. Then he parked at the Straight Shooter bar and remembered this would be his first time walking into it having to explain what he’s been up to since he got laid off from the force.

Amid the clinking glasses and rumbling conversation of the growing crowd, Mike found there was still a seat for him at the bar. At least that remained. In the corner, he saw Hughes, shooting pool with some schmucks. Guy was all smiles and laughs, outside of Mike’s ear range, Hughes was using phrases like “reset” and “new focus in life”. Mack was the bartender today, out of the crew, he was the least talkative and quick to shut down anyone creating trouble, but fair and hospitable to newcomers. Mike didn’t bother trying the “just lost my job” routine with him and just ordered one glass of Old Style off the tap and planned on doing his best to make it last.

Minutes rolled by and the guy they all knew as Stokes walked in. Normally he’d have been here over an hour ago, but his shift ran long. The spot he found was a few seats down from Mike; that was better, give him some time to get settled and to let Mike think about what to say to a friend who came out lucky when the axe fell. Stokes was already well into a story when Mike got up and walked over.

Stokes said

“So anyways, they’re on the radio tellin me bout this girl with broken ankles and bloody soles, and she’s talkin’ like fuckin crazy, lotsa words but trouble getting all of them through. Anyway, it’s near the end of the shift but they can tell it’s something crazy, so they give me a few hours overtime and tell me to check out some place because she got an address.” He paused when he saw Mike.

Stokes said

“Door was unlocked, halfway open and then I get this awful smell just in my face the moment I come in.”

Mike said

“Oh Yeah?”

Stokes said

“Yeah, so I go in and I’m finding blood, finding vomit, some guy with no pulse, and that’s just one room. It only got more fucked up later. They were still telling me about stuff they found when over the radio when I was heading down here. And y’know what the craziest thing about it was?”

“What?”

“The house was the one with all the boards on the windows, the one that the neighbors kept bitchin’ about. Robinson found five different complaints on file about the place when he dug through the files, but we never had checked inside.”

Mike was pretty sure at least one of those complaints reached him. He couldn’t remember for sure. When you’ve checked the “COMPLAINT UNFOUNDED” box as many times as Mike has, they all blur together. What’d they expect him to do, stake out a place because someone said the owner smelled bad?

Stokes said

“Ah y’know, maybe I shouldn’t be saying more, police business an all. You understand, right Mikey?” looking around at the others, expecting a knowing nod from Mike.

Mike said

“Well, yeah, guess I do. Guess you don’t need go telling everything to everybody.”

Stokes said

“Ex-act-ly.”

Mike said

“Now, I’m not a guy that needs to know everything, but y’know, I ain’t just a bum off the street, right? Old times gotta count for something.”

“Sure, sure it does. Mikey, if you’d been another guy I wouldn’t a said as much as I did, I know you’re a guy I can trust with a lot, but, uhhh, there’s always gonna be some stuff I can’t share.”

“Well, yeah, but we all know it’s just the BS that doesn’t matter, the important stuff ain’t gotta stop.”

“Ehhh, maybe. Lots of things could happen, I can’t tell you what I might have to keep my mouth shut about until I hear about how each situation is.”

There was silence. Mike looked at his beer. Stokes strained to see the lone TV in the corner. Then Mike looked him in the eye and spoke.

“If it was something about me, like if there was someone after me or something they were trying to stick on me, you’d let me know, right?”
Stokes said

“Mikey, what kind a question is that?”

“That ain’t an answer, bud. Now give me something.”

“Well, I prolly would.”

“What’s this prolly business? You fuckin’ got my back or you don’t, nothin’ else to it.”

“Well, Mikey, I think you of all people know that things can get complicated. You sit back and think it’ll be simple but of course, circumstances come up. Ain’t you said that a lot before? I can’t figure out how it’ll be til it happens, y’know?”

“Some fuckin’ pal you are.”

“Hey man, I’m what you got so next time you wanna bitch maybe look around and ask how you got here.”

It was easier to sulk and finish the rest of his beer than it was to try to find another person to talk to in hopes of proving Stokes wrong. He paid his tab and left, managed to do the whole transaction through gestures and nods with Mack. On his way home he thought and thought some more. He had to get gas for his car, maybe that’d keep him from asking the same questions about how much cash he had and who really had his back. The change in his wallet was short of what it took to get a full tank; he cursed the Arabs as he watched the numbers tick by. Outside there was a pay phone, a sight he could not look away from. He flicked and fidgeted with the coins in his pockets while his eyes remained fixated on it.

He knew what he had to do. He knew what he needed. It wasn’t about pride, it wasn’t about integrity, it may have been about ounces of fear inside him; one hard look at the payphone was enough for him to suppress that. In the cold he grabbed the receiver and chucked a coin in, dialing a number he had the good sense to never write down. His hands shivered in the Wisconsin cold. Someone picked up and Mike knew better than to ask too many questions about the person who was taking this call. He just had a simple thing to say.

“Hey, uhh I know when we talked back den, I said some, I said that some of those tings, I said I maybe wasn’t interested in ‘em. Well, uhhh I think maybe now I’m thinking I might be, I think I can give you some ‘elp with ‘em, you know. All you gotta do is let me know what you need done.”

̸/̸̅̅ ̆̅ ̅̅ ̅̅𝙴𝚃𝚄𝚁𝙽 𝚃⌖ 𝚂𝙴𝙽𝙳𝙴̸/̸̅̅ ̆̅ ̅̅ ̅̅

For your consideration:

(Former) Officer Michael Dambrauskas

Title	☞	He was a bully hiding behind a police badge, stacking up illicit cash and enemies he knew wouldn't dare touch him, but now that he's off the force, he has no friends, no steady income, no restraints, and plenty of foes.
Name	☞	Michael “Mikey” Dambrauskas
Age	☞	43
Sex	☞	Male
Business	☞	At this moment, Mikey has no full time employment. He still has some part time work as a security guard at the rougher bars around town, but that isn’t enough to pay his mortgage. When he was a cop, he had some good sources of extra dollars, seizing cash from people that looked like they were up to no good, making drugs go missing from the evidence locker, collecting a “good will donation” from local businesses that either wanted more or less attention from the cops. If you knew him well, then for the right price he’d give you a tip off when police action was on the way or let you peek at some files, for real pals he’d have a conversation with someone who needed a bit of a reminder (no actual violence unless they were dumb enough to take a swing at a cop). A few times, when he spotted something real juicy in a store window, he’d come by at night and do a nice smash and grab followed by fencing the goods. Not much of that money was saved up, because whenever it was good, it was time for sports bets, rounds of beer for the boys, and some gifts to make him look like a bigshot with the ladies.
Savvy	☞	Mikey knows how to fight and how to shoot, those were the only police skills he actually liked to practice. He certainly isn’t beating anyone in a footrace or wowing people with his deductive skills. He also likes to drive his car fast; it’s one of the pleasures of being able to talk his way out of a ticket. He’s gotten good enough at it that if he didn’t know how to handle it he’d probably be dead. He’s also got some skill at making fake paperwork because he has had to make a lot of BS look right over the years, he’s not a master forger that could copy difficult things, but if you need a backdated report, Mikey is your guy. Mikey’s not a skilled analyst, and his eye for when someone is lying is far worse than he thinks it is, but the one talent he does have in the psychological department is knowing how to make a threat in a way that causes people to take it seriously. Lastly, he likes to fish, hasn’t come in handy yet but he wouldn’t give it up for anything.
Ruin	☞	If you ask Michael if there were any positives to growing up with eight siblings, he’d tell you one thing: you learned to protect your stuff. That came in handy on his street on the Southside of Chicago, where business was settled with fistfights, and if you could fight, then there would always been plenty of business that needed settling. Right and wrong were relative things, what Mikey learned quick was to sense an opportunity, whose bike you could steal, which stores you could shoplift from, and who was better off not being messed with. Life was about walking the fine line between being a bitch and being a big enough problem that someone decided to deal with you. On a whim one day after high school, when he was getting tired of waiting for a job with the pipefitters union that his friend swore was coming, Mikey put his application in with the Chicago Police Department. Could he do well on the written test? No. But what they thought about him was that he had the mind of a cop. He had a way of just looking at someone and deciding if they were up to no good. How often was he right? That’s the best part, it didn’t matter for the Chicago PD. Those years taught him skills he’d rely on for the rest of his life, he knew when to beat someone within an inch of his life and when to almost burst into tears about how it was all just self-defense, when to decide someone was the kind of person that belonged on this street and when it’d best to give em a forceful reminder that they didn’t. Some would call him a bully, but that’s what made him so natural at it: in Mikey’s mind, he wasn’t a bully, he just had an eye for who needed fixin’ and the power to do it, and the world would be in shambles without guys like him. In normal times, it would all be smooth sailing, he just had to suck up to the right people and avoid any foul-up that would make the papers, but this was Chicago in the 60s. Even when social unrest had them short-staffed, they were always wary of putting Mikey on a riot detail because deescalation wasn’t a word in his vocabulary. Then came the day when he had to explain why he thought it was a good idea to put a bullet through the back of the head of an unarmed activist. Mikey walked into that meeting all confident, he had spent all night concocting a story, but Mikey’s last 45 minutes as a Chicago Police Officer would be spent having the lieutenant scream at him before ripping the badge straight off his uniform. The next day Mikey took a road trip to hit up every town between Minneapolis and Chicago large enough to have its own force. He gave them all the same pitch: he was a tough Chicago cop, so tough he could just breathe and see the crime rate drop as small-town punks went pale, and he was looking for a place with a slower pace of life and people with their head on straight. It took him hundreds of miles on his Dodge Polara before he hit 𝙼𝚒𝚗𝚗𝚎𝚗𝚘𝚘𝚗𝚊 and they bought into what he was selling. He quickly learned the rules: Don’t touch anything related to the steel mill, keep the punks out of the nice part of town, and always make be able to make a few quick arrests if people got feeling uneasy. Mikey had a good thing going, he learned which hoes were worth asking for freebies, which hustlers were dumb enough to keep cash on them that he could skim whenever he picked them up, which business owners would be willing to give a few extra dollars to a hardworking officer, and which people were the ones he could arrest whenever they needed someone to stick on a crime and needed someone plausible to arrest. The worst thing about life in Wisconsin was that people would sometimes hassle him for being a Bears fan. When the economy got tough and the layoffs began to mount, Mikey didn’t worry, he noticed that the extra cash he took in was a little lighter, but his gun and badge were just as heavy as ever, and all of the people he ticked off just accepted him as a fact of life. One day the chief called the whole department into one room, and the ones who read the paper already knew what it was about. Mikey didn’t and did his best to hide his bewilderment when they told them how many officers would have to be cut from the force for budgetary reasons. The atmosphere changed that day, because everyone knew whose name was going to be top of the chopping block. No matter how much he intimated that he had dirt on others, it was an empty threat; maybe some others weren’t on the up and up, but there was no doubt who had the most to lose if someone started looking into police affairs. So, Mikey had to start thinking about what he's going to do when he is no longer an officer. Is he gonna actually worry about how he’s gonna pay the bills, keep himself out of jail, and deal with the years of blowback that’s gonna be coming once the crooks realize he can’t back up any of his threats anymore, or is he just gonna go fishing and ignore the storm brewing in his life?
Cred	☞	"What good things can I say about Mikey? He's never gonna rat on me the chief cuz I know he's done worse, he's good for picking up tabs after work when he's in the mood, and I can bet he'll be ready to kick down a door and check my six if I tell him there's police action needed. What bad things can I say about him? Don't get me started." "Mikey's the kind of cop we need. I show him some money as a sign of respect and he makes sure any shoplifters know they'll be on crutches for weeks if they try my store. Only questions he asks is if I got the cash and who needs a lesson." "First lesson for crime reporters around here is to never believe a word Mike Dambrauskas says. If you want be a pulp novelist then go ahead, ask him about Chicago and he'll give you so much bullshit you could make a whole series out of it, but I'm printing the news not some 25 cent paperback. The moment you fact check his stuff you'll see everything he says comes straight from his head where he's some kinda hero who can do no wrong. Don't confront him about nothin' neither, that won't go well for anyone." "There is no such thing as a one time transaction with Mikey, if he figures out someone is good for money once, he’s gonna keep coming back again and again. Best you can do if you've got a racket and need his help is never let him know how good the money actually is, because he'll want more." "Fuck Mikey. Don't matter how much you pay, don't matter what he did in the past, if he's feeling the heat or mad about something he'll lock you up or beat the tar out of you in an instant. Flipping on him won't scare him either, he's lyingest sonuvabitch north of the state line, but when it comes to court they all act like that uniform means something and he'll get damn creative with his story on the stand." "Why ain't nobody ever laid a hand on Mikey? Because no matter how many times he backstabs someone, people know how the pigs are. Go after one of their own while he's still with 'em and they'll bring down hell on you. Nobody wants to throw their life away to because they got wronged by Mikey Fuckin' Drambrauskas, it's like setting your house on fire because you can't get that mouse infestation out."
Ilk	☞	THE ACTION IS THE JUICE, COULD'A HAD CLASS

Worlds Collide: A Merged Universe Superhero Roleplay

Clea

A L I A S
C L E A

^{"As the ancient mystics have told us, Live, Laugh, Love. Or maybe that was something I saw at Target. Eh, does it matter?"}

C H A R A C T E R P O R T R A I T C H A R A C T E R P O R T R A I T _________________________________________________________ _________________________________________________________ C H A R A C T E R S U M M A R Y C H A R A C T E R S U M M A R Y _________________________________________________________ Clea Strange _________________________________________________________ Indeterminate, in the thousands | Married (Open Marriage) _________________________________________________________ Affiliation(s) [If Applicable] | Dark Dimension Citizen N O T A B L E A B I L I T I E S & T O O L S N O T A B L E A B I L I T I E S & T O O L S _________________________________________________________ [+] - A B I L I T I E S ▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔ ◼ Highly skilled with magic and knowledgeable of the arcane arts, further augmented by being the current holder of the title of Sorcerer Supreme ◼ Faltinian physiology render her ageless, more durable than a normal human, and naturally generates magical energy which is one of the sources she can rely on for her spells - T O O L (S) ▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔ ◼ Cloak of Levitation, Strange's signature cloak that allows for flight and is durable enough to be used as a shield ◼ The Eye of Aggamotto, a magical amulet that enables telepathy, astral projection, and reveals knowledge. Strange's soul currently inhabits it, and he can currently communicate with Clea and perceive the world when she uses it, but his ability to cast spells is limited as he is not used to this form. ◼ The Sanctum Sanctorum contains other magical artifacts that, while they are not commonly carried outside of the house, may prove useful, such as the Book of the Vishanti and the Orb of Aggamotto - N O T A B L E S K I L L S & T A L E N T S N O T A B L E S K I L L S & T A L E N T S _________________________________________________________ [+] - S K I L L (S) ▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔ ◼ Deep mystical knowledge ◼ Highly skilled at telepathic combat ◼ Some hand to hand combat training - T A L E N T (S) ▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔ ◼ Heightened ability to perceive magic due to her physiology -

T H E S T O R Y S O F A R... T H E S T O R Y S O F A R... ________________________________________________________________________________________ Both Clea and Strange come from backgrounds that initially precluded them from becoming great sorcerors. Strange was a prideful and exceedingly capable neurosurgeon, a man of science, who only turned to the mystic arts when a hand injury shattered his career and the life he had built. Clea was born to the mistress of the Dark Dimension, Umar, and her disciple, Prince Orini. She was kept away from the outside world, intentionally discouraged from ambitious pursuits that could lead to her challenging her mother or her uncle’s power. Her mother raised her from a long distance, seldom appearing but always judging and adjusting, letting it be known what she wanted. Umar saw Clea not as a child but as a project; perhaps a bad choice, but one that she might eventually come to love. When she met Strange on one of his trips to the Dark Dimension it was the first time her eyes were opened to another path in life. She followed him out of the Dark Dimension and they built a life together, each pursuing their own mystical knowledge, teaching one another, and fighting against threats. It hasn’t always been the easiest relationship, they are often competitive when it comes to knowledge, at odds with one another due to cultural differences, and not always faithful, but in the end Strange and Clea have realized that they are meant to be together. The last series of events came when Clea saw her mother do something she thought that she never would: ask for help. Shuma-Gorath, the devourer of dimensions was at the door, and threatened to devour the entire Dark Dimension; if successful his tendrils would begin to reach the earth also. Dormammu was too proud to beg, but even he knew what had to be done. Strange, Clea, and the Faltinian siblings rallied their allies and the entire Dark Dimension against the invaders. The combined front held, and Shuma-Gorath was banished from the land. In the end, it seemed like there might be a chance at lasting peace, to perform the final sealing spell, Strange, Clea, Umar and Dormammu had to form a magical pact that would intertwine the essence of their beings. Trying to fight after that would be a bad idea, but Dormammu launched a surprise attack against Strange and magical backlash began to erase the fabric of their beings. His physical form was shredded in an instant, but with some quick thinking Clea was able to grab the soul of Strange and contain it within the Eye of Agamotto; Dormamu was not so lucky and seems to be fully gone. With Clea and Umar remaining and not wanting to test things further, it was decided that the Dark Dimension would experiment with a new concept: representative government. Umar has accepted her new role a politician and plutocrat rather than godqueen, though if she’s ever elected and given enough power she promises to bring back the old times of absolute rule. It remains to be seen how popular that platform will be. Clea is now living in New York, having assumed the title of Sorcerer Supreme and living in the Sanctum Sanctorum. She spends he days attending to the business that Strange used to take care of, and looking for a way to restore his physical form. P L O T ( S ) & G O A L ( S ) P L O T ( S ) & G O A L ( S ) ________________________________________________________________________________________ I’ve always liked the magical side of comics, and Clea is someone I’ve been wanting to write for a while. Her personality has been more variable over the years of her comic appearances, for my portrayal want to build a personality that combines naiveity to the ways of the world along with a desire to do good, but an upbringing that has been shaped by the ruthlessness and egoism of her mother’s values. She is someone who might start off of the wrong foot, initially acting unserious or unconcerned, but she ultimately comes to her senses and realizes what has be done when the situation calls for it. I want to explore some of Strange’s anxieties when he is in the supporting role, he’s still wise, still egotistical, and still able to help, but his lack of physical form is something that he will have to adjust to. I stuck fairly close to the comic history but made some slight changes to Clea’s upbringing just in case anyone is lore-nerding here. I want the tone of this to be on the lighter side, I want to tell a fun fish out of water story, ask questions about what it means to belong in an unfamiliar world, and get creative with the ways magic interacts with everyday life. Clea herself has a lot to learn about people, being over a thousand years old but never getting to live a normal life. There will be plenty of time for cool fights, big threats, and the like, but I think those will be reserved for times when she helps out in a crossover or the occasional highlights, not constant features. Plot ideas: The Dark Dimension has come to bargain…a trade deal. These things can’t be all that complicated, can they, so Clea should just be able to handle it and patch things up with her mom, right? Once again, nothing is as simple as it seems. In the quest to restore his body, Clea comes across some secrets that Stephen has been keeping from her, secrets that will need to be confronted to succeed, but they are the sort of thing that could make her question if she actually even wants to restore him.

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^{All formatting originates via the work of Lord Wraith}

Mage The Ascension: Illusion and Reality in the City of Sin

Collab with @Mistress Dizzy
As the others pulled out their weapons and made plans, Kalen's gaze darted into the distance. His stare went vacant for a moment, as he tried to read the future. Something to give the group an edge, some way to know what the best choice was, or - "Ow!" A twinge of pain was all that greeted him, like a bright flash of light in a dark room. Swearing mildly, he shook it off. It happened sometimes - Time magick was not infallible.

"New plan, then. I'll stall for time." He calmed himself with a few deep breaths, neatened his hair and clothes the best he could. Making sure his rosary was present around his wrist, he stepped out the door.

With a charming, easy grin and a clear stare, he greeted the group in suits. "Good evening. Have you heard the good word of our Lord and Savior?"

There were five of them in total, dressed far too formally for the occasion. One could see the unease in the way they looked around at every passing shadow, uncomfortable with the environment they were in, unsure what they were looking for. One walked ahead, careful in his stride, poking around with a flashlight. The other four men walked behind in perfect sync, dressed nearly identically, down to creases on their shirts. The first one saw Kalen and approached.

He chuckled, a weak chuckle, but an honest one; a way to defuse the tension. “Sir, I’d be happy to talk about that but as a government employee I think it’s important to be neutral in those matters when I’m on the job. Besides, I don’t think people like it when the tax man hangs around their church too much. Right guys?” He said, as he looked around and

The men beside him looked unamused, silently displaying their discontent, not even acknowledging his joke, eyes still intensely fixed on Kalen.

“Hey guys, uhhh, d’you want to say something? I don’t know how you do it in your department, but this guy does want to talk to us.”

Still they were silent, but watching for sudden movements

“Well, anyway, I’m agent Henry Barlow, with the IRS. I know, I know, odd for me to be poking around a junkyard, but we’ve got a lead on someone casino related fraud, and was wondering if you’d like to talk to us. Ain’t that right guys, come on, introduce yourselves already.”

The other four spoke one at a time, each in a monotone, in perfect order one after another

“Agent Smith, FBI”
“Agent Johnson, DOJ”
“Agent Williams, Nevada Gaming Control”
“Detective Brown, Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department”

They had nothing else to say after that. Even Barlow looked confused by them.

"...chatty bunch." Kalen's grin widened slightly as if laughing at his own joke. "Mr. Barlow, Mr. Smith, Mr. Johnson, Mr. Williams, Detective Brown. My name is Brother Keegan, it's a pleasure to meet you. Now then." All of his Sunday school classes, every single Mass he'd attended and slept through. All of them were practice for this.

With his voice pitched louder, he began. Hopefully, the others could hear him through the door. "All scripture is inspired by God and is useful for teaching, for refutation, for correction, and for training in righteousness, so that one who belongs to God may be competent, equipped for every good work." He made eye contact with each agent, even though it was unsettling to look them directly in the eyes.

"That's 2 Timothy, Chapter 3, verses 16 and 17. You see, gentlemen, your choice of profession doesn't dissuade me. You are all trying to do what's just and fair and lawful, correct?"

Barlow said

“Well, Brother Keegan, I appreciate your willingness to work with us. I don’t know if you’re the casino type, but we are wondering who else is around this junkyard this time of night. We think some people might be trying to do a deal with some items that they shouldn’t have in the possession, legally speaking. Would you know anything about that?”

When describing the details of what they were looking for, it seemed that Barlow himself was a little confused about the actual nature of the investigation, trying his best to describe something he knew little about.

"Illegal? No, sir, not that I saw." Kalen sounded a little shocked. "Then again, most people who don't slam the door in my face usually tuck any paraphenalia out of sight." A half grin appeared on his face. "I don't know why. I'm certainly not perfect, I am only human. Been trying to quit smoking for some time. Nasty habit, and yet I have fallen off the wagon many times. But, God forgives." He had to keep this going as long as he could.

"As many times as you fall, God will pick you back up if you let him. As many enemies are against you, be it one man, **five men** or five hundred, his will strengthens you." He lifted his voice just so, hoping that at least one of them was listening.

While he was talking, one of the other agents (Johnson?) got on his phone and began to talk, standing off to the side for some privacy, but good luck let Kalen hear a few of the words in the conversation. The words were “Named Keegan…Look into Rosa’s people first… Maybe Choir? I don’t know, is he anyone?” With one on the phone, and one talking to Kalen, the other two fanned out and looked around, no longer bunched up.

Mage The Ascension: Illusion and Reality in the City of Sin

When Brian Card built this office he had one overriding demand, that it have the best views in town. That’s why it was in the Stratosphere Tower, in a room left off all of the building plans, built in a manner that would make geometry scream. It was far too big to be hidden the way it was without hypertech compressing space, and he made it even trickier by demanding massive windows that still somehow remained unobservable outside despite giving him a perfect view. He only got it done in the first place by calling in a lot of favors from the Void Engineers, they were still grateful for helping him with the whole Groom Lake business over the decades.

On another hidden floor was the nerve center of sensors, watching, probing, keeping Vegas safe, a frenzy of activity and spartan finishings crowded with personnel and electronic gear. This place was the opposite, spacious, grand, furnished with his personal favorite mix of mahogany, marble, gold accents, and fine leather furniture. The only difference between it and the gaming floors of so many of the casin’s he had shepherded into the world was the lighting, he liked to keep it dim to appreciate the skyline outside, rather than assault the senses. He got up from his position on his desk, appreciating the small miracles that they had cooked up like a wood finish that would never be smudged when he rest his fine Italian shoes on it, or how invisible forces shepherd his papers into the exact drawers after he had finished with them (Card was still skeptical of too much work on the computer). After checking his appearance in the mirror and confirming that age, wrinkles and weight gain still hadn’t diminished his million dollar smile, he walked down the hall to the conference room.

Card was several minutes late to the start, as always; that sent a message to anyone who thought the schedule was more important than the man himself. He timed it perfectly, having worked a little of his own tricks to walk in right as Bennett was going for his own power play of trying to convince the rest of the attendees to start without him, moves like that were for amateurs. The conversation died down quickly when he took his seat at one end of the table, flanked by an overabundance of empty seats around. As he looked at his Patek Phillipe on his wrist he said “Well, I know Gita said she couldn’t make it, but it looks everyone else is here except our guest. She should be here in a few minutes.”

He looked at each of them individually, skipping over the cloned assistants standing in the back, those were the equivalent of office furnishings. Jack Bennett was seated closest to him, looking sour as usual, like he just wanted to be back at his desk working on more deals and financial models. No matter how perfect he could wear a suit and fill a seat, Bennett was never a people pleaser. On the other side was Janice Sulkowicz, with a perfectly content expression on her face. That was how she always was, ol’ dependable Janice, never one to make waves, never one to break the rules, and certainly never one to fail to look proper on a formal occasion. Further down the table was Ronaldo Tavarez, wearing a suit he clearly didn’t care about, poor fit, unsuitable color choice, but it was something he rarely had the occasion to wear. Card saw him twitching while in his seat, with anyone else this might make him worried, but that was how Tavarez was, the computers in his head were probably running more optimal combat simulations even now and they didn’t let him rest. If the meeting got to be too long, Tavarez could be on his way in any case.

Lastly, at the furthest end of the table was the newest member of the amalgam, Braden Lang, only twenty two years old. He had a fine tailored suit and a carbon fiber Richard Mille on his wrist, but Card always had trouble getting over the kid’s broccoli perm haircut. Braden looked around the room casually with a mix of amazement and confusion, despite his attempts to clench his jaw and keep a stone expression on his face, Card knew the kid was still taking it all in. Amusingly, of all the things the kid was looking at, he hadn’t paid much attention to the Vermeer on the wall that was officially still classified as “missing”.

After a little more awkward silence, all eyes naturally concentrated on the elevator, waiting for the guest of honor. A late guest of honor. Down below in the haze of Vegas sun, heat, and concrete that guest of honor stood near the western pedestrian entrance of the upper parking garage, closer to the entrance to the amusement park than to the casino, watching Ubers and Lyfts and delivers come and go, pale plums of thin smoke inking out across the air around the figure as they concentrated on nothing more than base level observation and bringing cigarette to lips, and back to off to the side of them.

The last time Tessa was in Las Vegas, it wasn’t the weed capital of the United States. She watched two hotel workers pass a spliff between each other, their conversation kept to the volume of just between the two of them, not that it stopped her from eavesdropping on their tit-for-tat rants about their low-grade direct supervisors. Just the cathartic vents of the underemployed and underpaid, judging by their choice of smoke.

The tourists were either smoking cigarettes or vapes, there didn’t seem to be much in-between. It was, like far too many things in their shared reality, a matter of means. When they caught her eyes, their gazes became pensive, defensive, and temporary, quickly moving from the woman in the corner behind the benches wearing white linen Armani; button-up sand silk blouse with sleeves pushed up to the elbow, top button unbuttoned out of comfort, not flirtation, her three inch heels close toed, gold buckled, and base a light wooden grain rather than the off-white cream of the rest of the show.

There was no handbag, and there was little guessing where she’d even gotten the cigarette from as she flicked it out and watched it fuzz and fade from what constituted her immediate reality. It wasn’t fair to say she made the meeting reluctantly, it was just a matter of process and procedure. It was next on the schedule, even if she had a harder and harder time caring about such things the further, the longer, she dared to go on her journey. Eventually the end would come, and she knew the mirror at the end that awaited her.
It was as discomforting as it was absolute to know exactly what the monster at the end of your road looked like.
The way to the elevator wasn’t familiar, but it wasn’t unknown, either, a quick pace with one hand neatly, casually, folded into her pants pocket, the other tapping the rose gold metallic slender device with white frosted tip mid-length fingernail as she stepped into the elevator that went to the floor that wasn’t there if you wanted to continue existing as you currently did.
Without authorization, anyway. The doors opened to the expected sight of the man, to which her lips gave dutiful upward tug towards, “Card,” Tessa found herself saying in a typical sing-song half-sigh as she closed the distance and regarded the surroundings and the other attendees with the interest of an art critic breezing through an upper east side gallery, wondering which she’d erase first, “what’s going on in Sin City?”

At the end of the question, her head cocked just, barely, to the side, her subtle red glossed lips encroaching into smile territory like a slow burning fire threatening to skip a fire barricade and go full wildfire. She knew she needed to be here. Control made that clear, it was the details in-between that she didn’t know yet.

Card said

“A lot, Tess, a lot’s new. This city’s like on of ‘em deep ocean fishes, it just starts moving and it never ever stops, even when it wants to rest it’s still running. I still remember what you said about it last time, and I’ve been puttin’ some stuff for the highbrow crowd around. Look down the strip, got buildings by Pelli, Foster, Liebeskind, public art by Ai Weiwei, hell I’m even classin’ up Fremont Street. No more off brand Disneyland, it’s about class, vice, and making vice classy.”
David got up to walk and talk, as liked to do. He didn’t feel like he could make the point as well without adding some motion to his delivery

“Rest of the business is going well, I was worried for a bit when the big ‘ol VPs got that whole legal gambling thing through, but with Bennett here as my money man things are better than ever, and he even found a way to get some of that national money to flow back here. I know I rag on him cuz he doesn’t always take the classy approach, but he never fails to deliver results. Janice, well she’s got all of the normal government busybodies and newshounds on our side, can’t say much about that either; and whenever crazy stuff pops up Tavarez shuts up down real fast. Braden here, the kid’s new, but I’m sure he’ll be alright once he gets something to do, you know the RD activity has been kinda quiet, they’re all a little scared after we busted up their little club at the Luxor and neutralized that crew.”

“I always keep my mind on the big picture, and right now I’m tryin’ bring some of that tech money to the outskirts, Graff’s the biggest whale out there and I know I’m close to getting him to open up his pocketbook, when he does the amount of cash he’ll drop on the area will make that time I got Mr. MSG from the big apple to drop a cool 2 billie on that big ‘ol eyeball look like a $2 off coupon for Applebees. Other stuff, well you know I got that eyesore Xanadu out there that just can’t quite get finished, and but the town is smooth, people bitch ‘bout homeless people or make up stuff about killers cuz they don’t remember how bad it was, like the days when the mob was running wild. Coulda always used your help of course, maybe some bad times wouldn’t have hit if you were here.”

Card made a gesture and Janice pulled out a tablet that she handed to Tess. It contained the briefing on suspected reality deviant activity. As she handed it over, she shot Braden a nasty look, who only then realized that he was supposed to join her in reviewing it. David never stopped talking during this

“Anyway, I know I gave my whole spiel about how it’s all so rosy, and I know you’re gonna ask for the files and rip me a new one over some unresolved threat that ain’t so bad, but before you do, I got one thing to show you. You’re about to see the finest work of art in the whole city, and I ain’t talking about this ‘ol Vermeer missing it’s home in Boston that you got me.”

He tapped the desk and some of the wooden panels in the wall slide away to reveal a hidden compartment. The rest of the people around the table looked barely amused, like they had seen this trick before. In the compartment was a tank full of stasis fluid holding an inanimate human body inside it, one that looked like the spitting image of a younger David Card, perfectly healthy and vigorous. If one had known David in his younger days, they would realize it wasn’t a perfect replica, it had been cleaned up in ways the original lacked. A stronger jawline, a few extra inches of height, fuller hair, toned six pack abs, like a perfected version of his younger self. Card said.

“Ain’t he perfect? Gita worked on him extra hard, I looked over every follicle myself, wanted him to be right if I’m gonna do the whole mind transfer thing, cuz we can’t all age as well as you, Tess. I’ve been doing the whole backstory thing for him, couple glamorous photo ops, some stints at elite schools, a party here or there, just enough to plant him but not overexpose him. I figure I’ll make the jump to the new body soon, just gotta put the ink on a really great deal and figure out how to give myself the most Vegas funeral you’ve ever seen. If I’m gonna start walking around with Junior on my name, I gotta send the original out on a high note”

It felt to her like Card had delivered the punchline before he even told the joke, as inspiring to her as a Top 100 list. Her dark eyes took in the painting as relaxed as a cat regarding an old scratch post, flickering to the tank again, and then to the attendees once more. “Revisionist history, Card?”
She asked, blinking back to the man, remembering the young Card. She hadn’t changed much. She wasn’t always certain why, at that, but when the mirror watched and waited as you forced a smile and waved goodbye to life as any regular soul might process it in the whirs and proton exchanges of the universe, you just kinda went with it.
Not Card. “Do you think he does it for a joke? Maybe there are oaths involved?” The crack came at the detriment, or benefit, of the kid at the table. She could see the new-ness, and she could recall the file, several hours or several years, it was all about as equally bleak at that point in a Technocrat’s career.
The kid probably even thought he had a real chance at being somebody. Whatever that meant. Her eyes went back to the offering of the tablet as she started to focus, her tone half-present, half-consumed by what she read, barely able to respond to his poke at if-only she’d been present more, “yeah, my fault, becoming Control’s boogeyman fills up a planner.”
She could feel it. It was there. Where? She scrolled, white frost tipped fingernail going fast and faster, until she simply sighed, and set it on the table before her, and placed her rose gold ‘phone’ on it, her fingers tight on the phone as information hyperspaced from digitized bits to her brain, and through it, her reality-stretching intuition.
It was Janice that Tess turned her eyes on next, intensity firing on quantum levels of brightness, the very hue of her following tone dangerous enough to make the inherent danger or who, and what, Tess was painfully abundant, as if there was no Card, just a senior investigator and an analyst who was about to be blinked,

“Expand on recent deviant history. Focus on clustered activity.”

Janice scowled, but internally she lit up. She spoke with a monotone, summoning precision and speed like someone that knew these words by heart. She said

“If you will look at the filings, tracking deviancy is a tertiary responsibility of mine, as we have elected to follow structure 7E of the approved amalgams standards specified in the Precepts of Damian, code section 97865.234.2357.9mu, current revision. This structure was reaffirmed at our all-hands on January 8th, 2019, with unanimous signoff. 7E specifies that our termination division will hold primary responsibility for tracking deviancy, and as the lead of our administrative affairs division, my tertiary responsibility requires only that I log known deviants I encounter in my normal conduct, and you will find quite extensive descriptions of every known or suspected encounter I or someone beneath me in our org structure has determined to be suspicious, sparse as such encounters have been given my duties. Our structure splits the termination division among two branches, a syndicate specific branch and a non-syndicate action group, and specifies that both are to share the responsibility equally. Tavarez is the head of the action group, and the syndicate duties would lie with Card, but he has used his right to delegate to give them to Bennett, who has in turn used his to give them to Lang, with considerable vacancies in between. I apologize about the state of record keeping for their work, but as specified 97865.234.30097.9phi, if I were to work their records that would require executive level approval to avoid violating information integrity protocols. I wish to inform you that Tavarez has repeatedly invoked protocol 97865.111.3588.9xi, a formal request for modification of record keeping standards to maintain tactical readiness. He has not informed me as to whether the request has been granted. The syndicate branch has not filed such a request.”

It came to her lips like blood, the metallic taste of it her first realization it was even there, “…nephandi?” Her eyes blinked, her feet took a half-step back as her heeled feet clicked on the polished floor of the conference room. The phone came off the tablet, her eyes might have been on Janice, but her gaze was barely still in the same spectrum of light as the rest of them, the very floor and walls of the room beginning to hum, like the deck and hull of some great ship vibrating from the power of its engine deep within and under foot. And then it stopped, and Tess found herself sighing.

And wanting another cigarette. There wasn’t another note spoken to the assembly, just a quick heel turn and suddenly she was walking out, tossing an afterthought behind her at the group, “The kid is with me until further notice.”
We’re all going to fucking die in this city.

Deviancy Report #32456, author Ronaldo Tavarez

Deviation: Gerta von Ohlhausen
Affiliation: Order of Hermes
Deviant Level: Priortiy One
Case log:
Fuckin german hermetic bitch shows up what the fuck we just 86’d the whole black pyramid what she want.
bitch stop hiding in your house come fight me mfer
what the fuck she turned that dude to liquid how tf she strong
fuck you card let me fight her i swear the city will be fine you can clean it up
fuck idk what now..why i have to make report anyway

Deviancy Report #32522, author Braden Lang

Deviation: Suspicious Deaths in sewers
Affiliation: Unknown
Deviant Level: Priority four
Case Log: AUTOMATED REPORT

Extreme psychological deviation led suspect to commit multiple homicides with no conceivable motive. Level of violence and suddenness consistent with nephandi standard operating procedure, indications of possible manipulation
---AUTOMATED FOLLOW UP, ACTION TAKEN----
NONE
---AUTOMATED FOLLOW UP, ACTION TAKEN----
NONE
---AUTOMATED FOLLOW UP, ACTION TAKEN----
NONE
---AUTOMATED FOLLOW UP, ACTION TAKEN----
do I have to write none here? will it stop?

Mage The Ascension: Illusion and Reality in the City of Sin

When Ezekiel saw the men on the monitor, he jolted upright. He gave the monitor a whack to make sure it was reading right, then started rummaging through the scraps beneath the table for a canvas back, before practically running to another corner of the van's interior. The whole time, he was talking. He said

"Spooks are here, always bad news, and I've had enough run-ins with them this week. None of this crew look like the really scary ones round here; word gets around about them, but usually the no-names are the first wave before the big guns come round. If you want to just get right out of here as quick as you can, I can help with that, but it'll mean leaving the tower behind, more evidence for them. If you buy me a few minutes, I can scrap it and we can all head out in the van. Just do whatever you're gonna do quickly."