... Well. I have a great deal of reactions to write, and not a lot of free-time to write it in due to these being the most stressful days of the year...
@Old Amsterdam Indeed, it seems we need to do that to prepare. Collab or just summarization or whatever. Hah. The ones to tag are me and @SkinnyTy. Oh, geesh.
@Pikmin Eye Nicely posted. A charm to a dark insect-and-anteater infested underground devoid of people, eh. Heh. I can believe it. Alright, I see your strategy. Let's see what I make of it.
@Joshua Tamashii Nicely posted. Heh, does make me happy to see Amelia amazed at things. Now, then. Given your discussion, I'll wait until Eklispe has posted before I post for you, and then I'll see what I can do. Heh.
@Pikmin Eye I noticed something dumb. I know how the cavern should look and what's in it, but I hadn't properly drawn it. Last post, I made a PNG file to post to the net... but forgot to save the actual files I was working with. So I had to do it again. And comparing... this isn't near as good. I'll be redoing it again, it seems. XD
Anyways. You have an option of finding a Heatmor closer to your level if you wish. Or just head on, that works too. Heh.
@Rune_Alchemist Alright. Now let's see. Do you have something in mind to do?
Heatmor stared squarely at Martin as he returned Goldeen and made his apology, and kept watching him until he was a bit away before turning back to its ants. Seemed like Martin had gotten away without being pursued.
Going deeper into Vast Underground, he quickly found out that what just had happened wasn’t anywhere close to an isolated incident. There were Durants running around, digging and climbing walls, and every so often there were Heatmors pursuing them. There were far more Durants than there were Heatmors, many holes too small for Heatmor but just right for Durant, but that didn’t mean the Heatmors had any trouble finding ways to get what they wanted. They torched tunnels, causing the Durants to flee, and the Heatmors took advantage…
The levels on the Heatmors varied dramatically. Some appeared far more powerful than others, while others weren’t quite as intimidating, and the latter were more likely to be in a group of other Heatmors of similar level. But, for Martin this meant that although he perhaps made the right choice not to engage the last Heatmor, it didn’t mean all of them were above his level. It just meant that if he wanted to engage one, he might want to make it escape a smaller pack, first.
Huh. This rock looks peculiar.
Martin found an Everstone!
… So, as he wandered, Martin might realize he faced a gigantic crossroad. The “main path” was branching off, gigantic halls of darkness dug out from a huge explance of rock. In the direction to the left, he could hear the flow of running water. To his right, the air felt a bit colder. And straight ahead was… a deep echoing noise, something smashing against something else, something powerful.
Alright. What would Martin do now? The crossroad would still be here if he decided to hunt Pokémon instead.
The Absol came to a stop, some distance away from the clones but keeping his eyes focused on Ralia where she had landed after jumping off him. Then, Ralia made her Growl. Stefan looked mildly annoyed at his slightly reduced Attack.
‘… Right. Leer!’ Yvonne commanded from the other side, and Stefan aimed a particularly penetrating stare at Ralia, decreasing her defenses. A Leer for a Growl, bringing things back to an equal level.
‘Alright. Now let’s dodge the last move, and then you know what to do,’ Yvonne commanded with authority, frowning with her muscles a bit tense, looking at Ralia.
‘Absol.’ Stefan confirmed, nodding as the two faced against Ralia, keeping an eye on where the real one was.
There we go. I did ask the GM first if I could do the sending of messages to elsewhere in the world. It sincerely felt like the most reasonable course of action after learning of Patriarch's power and considering Sheila's current position in life.
If I did anything I can't, yell at me. Otherwise, yeah, that's about that. Heh.
Edit: Also, I had a realization while writing that post. Like, I was reading her character sheet to find out how she looked and had the reaction of "Wait, I made her parents Irish?", which I had completely forgotten, and then was like "Should I have taken that into account whenever I made her speak?"... ... ... Hah! Anyways, yeah. Decided that "Nah, she has lived her whole life in America, hopefully not", I'll just keep playing her as I have. Hah.
Sheila sighed as she arrived home, pulling off her blindfolds and letting the hood fall as she revealed herself only first after she had completely entered the building. Obviously, she found Viola at the computer, dressed in a purple hoodie. Her little sister spun around and looked with somewhat worried eyes at her.
‘Oh. You’re back. How did it go?’ Viola asked, looking at her.
‘… I was unsuccessful in making the Rockers leave town. Damn it. Why do they think they can match the Community? They’re flies compared to the Community,’ Sheila said with a frown, annoyed by their decision. Despite herself, she had grown just the slightest fond of the Rockers, if only in comparison to other villains. Certainly more so than the Community.
‘… We’re going to need to put our eggs in more baskets,’ she commented, causing Viola to raise an eyebrow.
‘I might need your help,’ Sheila continued, now causing Viola’s eyes to widen in surprise, for Sheila had never requested her help with a mission before.
‘How do I look?’ Sheila asked, standing still while turning her head slightly, inspecting as Viola walked around her with a frown on her face.
‘You look… freakin’ weird,’ Viola commented, making Sheila shiver. ‘No, this won’t work. I can see that it’s an image, and the places you’re trying to fill in in-between the images look twisted and unnatural. People’s going to see,’ she continued, sighing a bit as she frowned to her sister.
Sheila nodded back, she could see it herself. One of the bonuses of her power was that she could always choose to see herself, no mirror required, just light redirected to her eyes. She discarded the printed images she was holding. They had tried to use images of a stranger on the internet taken from a variety of different angles as a basis for Sheila to attempt to reconstruct as a 3D image around her face for everyone else to see in public, using her power to try to fill in the blanks. This to create disguise for Sheila to use in public, but apparently it wouldn’t be that simple. Probably could have done it if the person was physically within her range, but unfortunately that range was a whole meter.
‘Damn,’ Sheila cursed. She really wanted to use a public computer for this, and school-computers used passwords. The problem with that, was that Sheila would be appearing in public, and she’d rather not be identified if the worst came to be. Viola, though, was giving her a strange look.
‘Hey, sis,’ Viola had a sneaky smirk. ‘You control all visible light, right? … So, how about you divert some light and control your hair and skin-color?’
Sheila blinked, slightly stunned. Oh. She hadn’t thought of doing that. So, the only kind of disguise she could possibly realistically do with that would be to make her skin dark. … So she did just that. Using her power to watch herself, she watched as she diverted large amounts of light from extending from her skin… but not all of it. Before her, the color of her skin changed. First to a weird unnatural grey, but then she balanced it by letting some yellow and red pass through, making brown… then a few tweaks here and there to make it look more natural, progressively making her skin darker… made her hair black by just cutting away most of the light…
And there she stood. Sheila Hopkins, except considerably dark-skinned, close to completely black, and with black hair instead of blonde white. Not unrecognizable, but would definitely throw off someone that was looking for her. Viola had jumped back and watched the odd transformation taking place before her eyes. She extended a thumbs up.
‘Nice. You’re now a literal black irish!’ Viola quipped, grinning at her.
‘…’ Sheila stood silent for a second or two, inspecting herself. Without her ponytail, she looked a lot different than she normally did while in public, and the darker skin did even more to that. But, that was still her facial-structure. Someone who knew her power could still identify her. Also, maybe it was just her looking at herself, but as someone who was genetically irish despite having lived her whole life in America, looking black was weird. … But ultimately nothing genetics couldn’t explain, nothing that would attract attention in public.
‘It’ll do,’ she said, settling for this.
‘Alright,’ Viola nodded with a grin. ‘Let’s do this.’
Before the mission start, Sheila went and stole a couple walkie-talkies. One was given to Viola, the other Sheila kept. They’d be discarded after the mission, regardless.
Wisp
Sheila Hopkins
Public Library
Later, Sheila arrived at the public library in order to use a public computer, with a skin-color close to completely black by use of her power. Just a young, dark-skinned teenager wanting to make use of the public library. She wore a blue jacket that would be discarded after this, and a dark skirt, her visually black hair intentionally hanging free and combed to somewhat hide her face, just for extra protection. Because using a public computer while in costume would attract attention, but there was the possibility that she’d be tracked while doing this, so she’d rather not appear as herself. To stay black required continuous use of her power, but Sheila was well-versed with continuous use of her power. She wouldn’t even be confused by changes of light, she could make it bounce off naturally, adapting.
She blended in. She found herself an unoccupied public computer in a corner. As she sat down, her fingers started moving to create a new email-address and then type down a message from it. She had a simple goal.
Ensure the Protectorate and PRT elsewhere, in as many cities as possible, get messages detailing Patriarch’s power and influence on Denver. She made a couple posts on different forums with “rumors” of Patriarch’s power, to sow the seeds. She included other public heroes or hero-teams who had mail-addresses that could be found. She had let Viola find the emails and forums where Sheila was the most likely to connect to as many people as possible. So now, with all that done, Sheila began typing. Notably, she excluded the local Protectorate or any local heroes. They could already belong to Patriarch.
Several times while doing this, she reached into her jacket’s pocket and pressed a button on the walkie talkie. It slowed things down a bit, but soon enough, she had her message typed.
From: anonymouspersoninperil@mail.com
I am a scared and anonymous inhabitant of Denver.
The local villain Patriarch of the Community is a high-level Master/Striker who can rewrite an individual’s mind with a single touch, the touched still remaining the exact same person but with a sudden allegiance to the Community.
Anyone, cape or not, may become his minion if he gets his hand on them. He recently announced to his underlings that he used his power to recruit Rahul Marios, owner of Denver Post and Abraham Achim of the city council, as well as Sonika, local parahuman villainess. There could be any number of unsaid individuals that he has already laid claim to but hasn’t announced.
I urge you to deal with the Community and their leader quickly, before the situation worsens. He’s the kind to slowly build his forces before until he’s unstoppable. Nobody in Denver can necessarily be trusted, depending on how much we’re underestimating him. Master protocols don’t help against him when those he claims are able to perfectly remember the codes. Anyone could be his servant, just pretending not to be until the time is right.
I have no proof backing my words or that I haven’t already been claimed, but please, consider this a high-class threat. For if you do not, he might eventually become one.
Alright. Something like that. She didn’t hide the “sent-to” section, all of those who received the mail would see all others that received that. Satisfied, she clicked “Send”.
Now, Sheila sat still. … If someone sent back a reply, she wanted to be there to reply with further information. That would increase the perceived validity of her claim, hopefully.
But, paranoid as she is, she couldn’t help but imagine that somehow, SOMEONE would be able to track her location to this library. And if they did, they weren’t necessarily doing it with her well-being in mind. Sheila used her powers to get perfect 360 degree vision, all around her, suspicious of every single movement, feeling a mild panic brewing. She wasn’t even sure she’d see an attack before it’s too late.
Which is why she had Speedrunner on standby, by walkie talkie, fully dressed up as Speedrunner in an alley, battle-staff at the ready. Once every minute Wisp reached into her pocket and just pressed the button to let Speedrunner know she was still there. If Speedrunner failed to get an update, she’d send an empty text-message to Wisp’s phone, which would then vibrate a little in her pocket. If then Wisp didn’t quickly press the button to confirm she was still there, Speedrunner was to assume she was in trouble and dash in quickly to retrieve her.
Speedrunner also watched the walls from the alley intently, because the second and more immediate signal that Sheila was in trouble was simply an extremely powerful burst of light, which Sheila had been gathering ammo for before she even embarked for the library.
Now, there was a possibility that Sheila was just being massively paranoid. … But she was putting herself in a situation where she was potentially making herself a massive target to the Community or even local heroes that may have been touched by the Patriarch, if they had tinkers that could track her, and she’d much rather be safe than sorry. Much rather.
Savo,
Xaltwind,
adncod,
ppppppp,
Framing A Moose,
Ariamis,
Not a Sayan,
SkyeOfStars,
Remram,
Apollosarcher
