I went ahead and added clarification. It is no trouble.
Since there seem to be no other objections from anyone else, I think we can call your application approved.
Feel free to move it over to the character tab and get started IC as you please!
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Since there seem to be no other objections from anyone else, I think we can call your application approved.
Feel free to move it over to the character tab and get started IC as you please!
<Snipped quote by Morden Man>
Ray Palmer isn't The Atom, he is Yellow Jacket in Hope's story.. Hank Pym is Van Dyne in this case, yes.
From what I read on Ray Palmer was some type of mutation survival after zapping himself with a shrink thing? Hope and Ray used Pym Particles exclusively in my take on this.
Apologies! I think the "The Atom" beside his name earlier in the "Ultimate" section threw me off a little there. My mistake.
Hi! So you guys need some players, huh?
I like the thrust of this application but I may have introduced Jean Loring as The Atom already – though she is a teenager at this point. I'm not sure how to square that with what you have with Hank Pym (who you have down as a Van Dyne?), Roy Palmer and Hope here, if I'm honest.
Also, the one hundredth post belongs to me. Mwahaha.
Castle Doom, Latveria
The inaugural class of the Future Foundation stood in the throne room of Castle Doom with mouths agape. A mere six months ago the spacious hall had once been Lucia von Bardas’ inner sanctum but now served as a makeshift office for Latveria’s newly-elected president. Though Reed’s life had changed a great deal since the breakout at The Raft, life in Latveria had been relatively stable. Victor von Doom had seen to that. After two decades of suffering, the last thing the Latverian people needed was more of it. Once the nation’s former dictator had stood trial later that month, the process of healing could begin – though Doom had done anything but rest on his laurels in the interim. It was why Reed had chosen Latveria for the Foundation’s first field trip.
Richards stood with his arms gently crossed across his chest whilst Doom made his way up towards the large desk in the centre of the doom. The eyes of Reed’s students followed his every move. He had to admit that there even in this world there was a magnetic quality to the man. His well-tailored suit hung off his limbs freely and the deep green waistcoat complimented it perfectly. Once he’d climbed the steps to his desk, he lent against it in a carefree manner that was almost unbecoming of a head of state.
“Good afternoon to you all. My name is Victor von Doom. I am the president of the Democratic Republic of Latveria and I also happen to be a close personal friend of Professor Richards. When he informed me that he was starting the Future Foundation, I was ecstatic. There are few people on Earth that possess the kind of vision that Professor Richards has – and I knew that no one was better equipped to help craft the minds of the next generation.”
“Well, no one except President Doom but as the five of you may have noticed, he’s a little busy running an entire country at the moment.”
Victor shot Reed a grateful smile for the compliment.
“Latveria is currently undergoing one of the most rapid development programs in the history of our planet. Having liberated my country from oppression, retaken its wealth from foreign corporations, and finally put the natural resources of our bountiful countryside to use to ensure that all Latverians get a fair chance, my country stands transformed – and we have only just begun.”
With an easy click of his fingers, holographic images that illustrated Latveria’s progress under Doom appeared around the throne room. Reed’s students let out an impressed gasp at the fluidity of the holograms – and the achievements that they documented. The Thinker’s white eyes rested on a hologram of a young woman with a cleft lip. She had piercing green eyes and black hair that ran the length of her back. He reached out to touch it but hesitated at the last moment as the image was transformed. Her cleft lip was gone. In its place was a perfect smile.
“For this weekend, all of Latveria is open to you," Doom said with a welcoming smile. "You are free to go wherever you choose. The mountains, the hills, the rivers, they are yours to explore. I want my nation to become a global hub for cutting-edge science – and only by inviting talent like yours to experience Latveria, to see its transformation in person, can we ensure that the rest of the world isn’t left behind.”
There was a smattering of applause from the teenagers, led enthusiastically by Kamala Khan and very slowly joined by the others upon Reed’s insistence. Victor shot them a disarming smile and waved off the applause after a few seconds. He ceded the floor to Reed who looked as if he may have already been regretting accepting Victor’s invitation to bring the Future Foundation to Latveria so early into its lifetime.
“Of course, by “free to go wherever you choose”, President Doom means provided that the five of you stick together and don’t cause any major international incidents that result in the Future Foundation being closed down in disgrace.”
Victor nodded as a comradely show of support for Reed’s concerns. “Of course.”
The statement was met with muted silence from his five students. He’d become accustomed to that over the past week. Though he was only in his late twenties, the second Reed had self-identified as their “teacher” he had become an authority figure – and, perhaps outside of Kamala Khan, his students treated him as such. He was no longer “Reed” but “Professor Richards” and with that came a necessary distance. It also meant that Reed could no longer fool himself into thinking that he was young anymore.
Despite being close in age, there was something about Victor that was still boyish. He could tell from his student’s eyes that they didn’t consider Doom in the same way that they did Reed. Perhaps it was because his armed struggled in Latveria had been splashed across every newspaper in America for the past two years. Perhaps, though Reed hated to admit it, it was because he was simply cooler than he was.
As Doom approached his students, Reed directed him towards the Future Foundation’s first recruit. “Victor, this is Michael Holt.”
Doom extended his hand towards Holt. “Ah, yes. I understand that you’re a dab hand at making weapons, Mr Holt. In fact, I’ve been lead to believe that half of all the stick-up artists in America have you to thank for their equipment. That’s certainly some claim to fame.”
“Yeah, well, people change,” Holt said as he shook it reluctantly. “Once upon a time, you were just some nerd with a silver-spoon in your mouth that spent all his time sat in the Baxter Building reading books. Now you’re president. Who knows? Maybe I’ll be president one day.”
Holt had lost none of the spikiness to his voice – nor the chip that he seemed to carry on his shoulder everywhere that he went. In different company, that spikiness might had caused some discomfort. Victor von Doom seemed unperturbed by it. He shook the boy’s hand and inspected the athletic young man closely with his dark brown eyes. A wry smile appeared on his face after a moment or two as if he had found some quality in Holt that confirmed that he was a kindred spirit.
“Maybe you will,” Doom shrugged. “Though, I am compelled to correct you on one point, Mr Holt. I may well have been a nerd and I certainly attended the Baxter Building with Professor Richards, but silver spooned? I was an orphan. And I can assure you, to be an orphan in Latveria is several measures harder than in America. So perhaps next time you should avoid making judgements without having all of the evidence available to you. It would hold any political ambitions you might have in future in good stead.”
“I couldn’t agree more,” Reed murmured as he lead Victor away towards Amadeus Cho but found Jean Loring planted firmly between them.
“Jean Loring,” the teenager said as she thrust her hand out towards Doom expectedly. “It’s a pleasure to meet you. President Doom. I can’t say that I agree with your politics, but my father always taught me that there are two kinds of people in this world: men of action and me-”
It was the first time in Loring’s life that someone had looked through her. Her Ivy Town upbringing had not prepared her for the embarrassment she would feel at being all but ignored by the president. Doom passed her by and instead approached the dark-skinned fifteen-year-old that had clapping raucously after he’d finished speaking. With every step towards he took, the girl seemed to shrink with nervousness.
“And who might you be?”
“Me?” Kamala asked as she looked around the throne room with shock. “My name is K-... my name is Kamala Khan.”
Victor placed a supportive hand on the girl’s shoulder to help calm her nerves. “It’s wonderful to meet you. Professor Richards has told me so much about you. I understand your powers work similarly to his. You’ll make a formidable superhero one day if you take his tutelage to heart.”
Despite all of Doom’s encouragement, Kamala seemed to shrink even more into herself with every second. Reed took a step towards them, hoping to help her find her voice, but an assured glance from Victor kept him planted to the spot. He placed his other hand on Kamala’s shoulder and lent towards her with a paternal smile.
“Is something wrong, Ms Khan?”
“Wrong? What? No, no, there’s nothing wrong,” Kamala babbled incoherently. “Absolutely nothing wrong at all, gorgeous, woke European president with rippling muscles. Why would anything be wrong? Oh god, did I say that out loud? Please tell me I didn't say that out loud.”
An oversized hand came stretching across the room and ushered Victor away from Kamala before the president could respond. The proud smile on his face was matched only by the horror that Kamala sought to mask beneath her thick black locks. Loring had almost instantly set about tearing into Khan for interrupting her conversation with Doom once he’d moved on but the younger girl seemed too busy wishing she was dead to humour it. Finally, Reed brought Victor to a stop before the Thinker and Amadeus Cho.
“And you must be the Thinker,” Victor murmured as he inspected the hologram. “Which would make you his trusty sidekick, Amadeus Cho.”
>>>#STATEMENT: THAT IS CORRECT#<<<
The fourteen-year-old was so distracted playing with the coyote pup between his hands that both Doom and the Thinker’s statements had been lost on him. It was only several seconds afterwards that Cho heard the words ‘trusty sidekick’ playing back in his head. It was clear from his face that he strongly disapproved of the suggestion – and any deference to Doom came a distant second to his consternation.
“Wait, what? No, I’m not Think’s sidekick,” Cho protested as he used the puppy in his hands to gesture towards the hologram. “If anything, Think is my sidekick. And anyway, what would that make Kirby? Because if I’m a sidekick, there's no way I'd have a sidekick of my o-”
>>>#STATEMENT: VICTOR VON DOOM IS MAKING AN ATTEMPT AT HUMOUR#<<<
Cho’s annoyance at the Thinker cutting across him seemed to melt away upon realising that the hologram was right. The playful smile on Doom’s face confirmed it. More than anything, it appeared that Cho was disappointed in himself for letting the joke pass over his head at great speed. It wasn’t a sensation that the boy genius was used to.
Amadeus made no effort to disguise his disappointment. “I can’t believe that you were doing a thing and the disembodied AI that can’t speak without saying ‘STATEMENT’ or ‘QUERY’ before it opens its mouth got it before I did. Wow, I’m really good at this first impressions thing.”
“You are an impressive young man, Mr Cho," Doom demurred. "I wouldn’t concern yourself with first impressions. They’re rarely as important as people make out. What matters is grit – tenacity – and I understand that you have both qualities in abundance. Especially for a sidekick.”
For the first time since arriving at the Franklin Storm Institute, Reed saw a sincere smile flash across Amadeus Cho’s face. The boy offered no quip in return, but instead seemed to accept Victor’s compliment in earnest. With the gruelling set of introductions done, Reed was about to suggest that he and Victor retire to their conference as planned, but the sound of an alarm from the phone in Doom’s inside pocket seemed to achieve that for him.
“President Doom and I need to get going. We’ll be gone for around eight hours. It bears repeating that I do not want to exit the conference to “BREAKING NEWS” from this little outing of ours, so try to behave yourselves. Not many outsiders, let alone teenagers get given the opportunity to explore Latveria with the expressed blessing of its president. I’m choosing to trust you. Please don’t make me regret it.”
One again, Reed failed to receive the reassurance that he’d hoped from his students. They stared at him, varying degrees of unimpressed by his constant reminders to behave themselves. Could they blame him? Holt had gone out of his way to insult Doom, Kamala had very nearly expressed her dying love for him, and the Cho-Thinker double act had made a pretty caustic assessment of Victor’s sense of humour – all this in less than five minutes. What would they get up to with an entire day to themselves in Latveria? It almost didn’t bear thinking about.
As they made their way towards the exit, Doom felt the need to end on a more positive note. “What I think Reed is trying to say is: have fun.”
Hey, y'all. I'm bowing out the game. Free time has become a premium for me since I started a new job last month and I have an additional writing project/RPG I'd like to work on so, UOU drew the short stick. Best of luck with the game, folks. And for the love of god keep on posting!
Seymour, Indiana
In the small motel room that passed for Rachna Koul’s temporary Seymour residence, Johnny Storm was observing the pieces of evidence the scientist had brought with her to Indiana. There were journals, almost half a dozen of them, and folders full of pictures. It was almost too much for Johnny to take in. His blue eyes ran over the words, daubed in a handwriting that felt faintly familiar to him, trying his best to hear his father’s voice in his head. Every now and then he would have to remind himself that the words weren’t coming from the mouth of his Franklin Storm, of his father, but in the moment it didn’t seem to matter at all.
There was no smoking gun amongst all it all but it was clear that foul play had taken place. SHIELD were keeping tabs on Franklin. The man was a genius, maybe the second most intelligent man on Earth, so if he felt the net closing in around him, chances are that he wasn’t making it up. The pictures of unmarked cars following his every move, the financial irregularities, the autopsy notes that had been tampered with.
Koul seemed to sense that Johnny Storm’s mind was opening to the possibility that SHIELD had murdered Franklin. “Do you believe me now?”
“Holy shit,” Johnny whispered as he inspected one of Franklin Storm’s journals. “You weren’t making it up. SHIELD were up to something.”
“I don’t know that something quite does it justice, Johnny," Koul murmured as she produced the most recent journal. "These journals arrived at my parent’s home last week. In all my years at the Baxter Building, Franklin never even met my parents. I don’t know when he sent them but if he did, it was because he wanted me to know what was going on. The last entry is from the morning Franklin apparently committed suicide.”
Johnny saw Koul’s lip quiver somewhat as she flicked through the journal's pages. The scientist tried several times to read from it and each time her voice died in her throat. Johnny had been so busy thinking about his own strange non-familial relationship with this world’s Franklin Storm that he’d forgotten that he’d been like a father to Koul. He could only imagine how traumatic all of this must be for the scientist.
“SHIELD are watching me. I know that. I feel their eyes on me. Nowhere I go is safe. Not even my own home is safe. It is not enough that they have taken my children from me. Now they are intent upon ending my life. If you are reading this, they have succeeded. Be careful, Rachna. They will come for you and Victor too eventually. They will come for all of us. Be careful.”
It didn’t make for pretty reading – or listening. Johnny gritted his teeth through it. It was either the paranoid ramblings of a delusional man still reeling from the death of his children or a desperate cry for help from beyond the grave. Perhaps it was both. Johnny didn’t know what to think. Coupled with the other coincidences scattered through the documents, it was hard to deny the weight of evidence staring him in the face. Yet the mention of one name amongst the passage Koul recited seemed to pique his interest more than the rest.
“Victor?” Johnny said with a suspicious look. “As in Victor von Doom?”
Koul nodded. “Yes, Victor von Doom. He studied alongside us at the Baxter Building. A brilliant scientist – though he seems to have traded it all in of late and become something of a leftist firebrand in Latveria. Not that I’m surprised. There always was a crusading zeal about him.”
“And you’re sure that there’s not some way that maybe Doom was involved? Not to completely disregard old Franklin’s words there but Doom being behind this all seems to make a lot more sense than Nick Fury holding the smoking gun.”
“What?” Koul sighed as the scientist's face seemed to crumple with displeasure. “No, Victor would never do that. He and Reed were like best friends. They worshiped the ground that Franklin walked on. There was no way he would ever turn on him. Loyalty was kind of Victor's brand.”
To see the way that Rachna had leapt to Doom’s defense was to think that Johnny had insulted Mother Teresa or Mahatma Gandhi. Koul seemed so offended by the prospect of Victor turning on them that Johnny was reminded just how difference this world was from his own. The Fantastic Four could barely sneeze without stumbling into some deathtrap set for them by the iron-masked Latverian. In this world though, Victor was anything but a villain. Though he hated to admit it, having read up of Doom some more since leaving Latveria, Johnny might have admired him – if he’d not had a lifetime of experience that told him that anything and everything connected to Victor von Doom was evil.
The pointedness in his response seemed almost reluctant. “Well, it wouldn’t be the first time that old Doom turned heel on us out of nowhere.”
“What am I meant to do? Pretend that I don’t know all of this? I work for SHIELD. I’ve built a career within the organisation that murdered a man who meant everything to me. Am I supposed to walk away from this and act like it didn’t happen? It doesn’t feel right. Franklin sent me this because he wanted the world to know what SHIELD had done to him – because he wanted justice.”
“Or maybe,” Johnny began quietly. “He sent it to you because he wanted to protect you, Rachna. Maybe he wanted you to get out whilst you still could. I mean, it’s right there and black and white, isn’t it? ‘Be careful’ – I really don’t think he wants you to go all Snowden on this one.”
Johnny watched as tears welled in Rachna’s eyes. He wanted to cross the motel room and reassure her that everything was going to be alright, but he couldn’t do that anymore. He wasn’t sure that things were going to be alright. His world were gone, the Fantastic Four had disbanded and one of these days Darkseid was going to arrive looking for retribution for what Thor had done to his herald. The days of distributing hugs and comforting words were gone. Instead he watched whilst Koul’s tears wet the pages of Franklin’s journal.
“What would you do?” Rachna asked as her bloodshot eyes fixed on Johnny Storm. “Tell me what I’m meant to do with this information.”
“Look, I don’t know if I’m the right person to be asking this kind of thing. I’m not exactly famous for my self-restr-”
Koul lobbed the journal across the room. It smacked into Johnny’s chest and then fell to the ground in front of him. “What would you do?!”
“Is that what you want, Rachna? You want me to give you permission to not give a damn?” Johnny shouted. “Or maybe you want me to tell you that it’s alright for you to throw your life away after a man that’s been dead for two years. That it’s worth risking having whoever murdered him coming after you just so you can have a clear conscience?”
There was no answer from the scientist. Johnny suddenly raising his voice had shocked her into silence. There was fear in her eyes. Johnny felt a pang of guilt hit him as he realised he’d managed to terrify the woman that had travelled halfway across the country to confide in him. If Sue were here, she’d never let Johnny hear the end of it.
“I’m sorry,” Storm whispered as he knelt down to pick up the journal. “I shouldn’t have raised my voice.”
Koul shook her head and a weak, waifish voice escaped from her mouth. “It’s okay, I shouldn’t have come here. You left New York to get away from all of this, it was wrong of me to try to drag you back into it. I understand that now. I understood it before too but I guess I just ignored it.”
Johnny handed Koul the journal. As she clasped it with her prosthetic hand, Johnny’s hand remained glued to it. He looked at her shattered features and realised too late that the tears in her eyes were far from the first she had cried this week. That only served to intensify his guilt.
“I mean,” Koul sniffled feebly. “I don’t know why I expected you to care, really, he wasn’t your father after all, and he definitely wasn't mine.”
It was true. It wasn’t his Franklin Storm. But then, even Johnny’s Franklin hadn’t quite been his. He’d died when Johnny was so young that he could barely remember him. For all intents and purposes, Sue had been both his mother and father growing up. Yet stood there staring into Rachna’s teary eyes, Johnny felt the pull of responsibility across time and space – as if the Johnny of this world was imploring him to act. He tugged the journal out of Koul’s hand and waved it in front of his face.
“You want to know what I’d do? I’d keep pulling on these threads until the whole damn thing unravelled. SHIELD? Fury? The government? I’d take them all on – and more – if it meant finding out what happened to the person I loved. And that’s what we’re going to do.”
The scientist’s teary eyes beamed with joy as she heard the words leave Johnny’s mouth. “You’re serious? You’ll really help me?”
“I’m serious,” Johnny nodded. “Though if you ever refer to anything other than base villainy as being Victor Von Doom’s brand again, you and I are going to have a major problem. Do we have a deal?”
A confused expression appeared on Koul’s face but she shook Johnny’s hand all the same. The pair of them made their way to Rachna’s bed where all of the evidence was piled and began to sort through it. Johnny tried his best to lay it out in a way that was sequential. Even once it had all been assembled, there wasn’t nearly enough to get either of them the answers they wanted.
“It’s not going to be enough,” Koul sighed as she inspected it all. “If we want to find out what really happened, we’re going to need people that can substantiate Franklin’s accusations – put some real flesh on the bones of all of this conjecture.”
One of Johnny’s eyebrows cocked at the talk of witnesses. “That doesn’t make any sense. I mean, if there were witnesses, we’d know about it already – or SHIELD would have got to them too. Who could possibly know more about this situation than we do? We’ve got Franklin’s entire back catalogue right here in front of us.”
It was clear that Rachna had the answer to Johnny’s question. Clearer still from her face was that she knew that Johnny wouldn’t like it. He couldn’t bring himself to ask for the name on the tip of her tongue, but eventually the scientist sighed and let her head fall into her hands.
When she spoke from the edge of the motel bed, Johnny’s fears were all but confirmed. “We’re going to have to speak to Hector Hammond.”
TFW you're @Morden Man who has worked his ass off planning this Season's MME with @Master Bruce and @Byrd Man and we assholes aren't posting.
I mean, I didn't want to say anything but if this game doesn't reach at least 500 posts, I fully intend to visit a plague upon all of your houses.
I feel like the rut of waiting ruined my muse for a bit and then someone saying 'buy Red Dead Redemption 2' kinda killed off my muse a little bit. I'm posting tomorrow, and then I'm aiming to return to my usual status of annoying the hell out of everyone in the OOC. It's just been a tough couple of weeks so rather than escapism by roleplay I've done it via Xbox.
I've definitely done the same in the past when I've either not had much going on or things haven't gone my way, so I completely understand. Do feel free to shoot me a message if you want to talk.
Good news about the post too. I've been fiending for some more action from the Rogues.
Man here I actually thought for a second you could tag everyone in a game. Nope, just a clever hyperlink by Morden.
You'd think so, but that would make far too much sense – but without our resident town cryer @Sep around, I had to get inventive.
See, you gotta be smart. I saw this coming years ago so I just did the obvious move and never bought a PS4.
@Everyone You hear that? The man flat out refused to buy a PS4 half a decade ago because he knew this game was coming.
This is the kind of commitment that I expect from you the rest of you.
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