Supermaxx

Sensation & Wonder: An Absolute Comics Roleplay [DC & Marvel One Universe Style Game]

_{SEASON ONE Sensation & Wonder}

SUPERBOY #6 Pull My Strings

---

_{The Daily Planet ♦ Metropolis}

Tana Moon brought Superboy to what she described as her 'office.' It was a supply closet. Cramped to all hell with boxes, shelving and a printer that would've been old a decade ago. The lights in the ceiling hung too low and burned too bright. Toward the back of the room was Moon's whole setup: her laptop set on a stack of copy paper cases, an office chair that couldn't spin anymore, and an empty cork board. He wasn't going to ask about the board, or the accompanying shoe box full of thumbtacks, red yarn and newspaper clippings.

"Can the judgement, cape. Not everybody's a millionaire." Tana called over her shoulder, dropping into the chair and booting up the computer. The back of it was covered in all sorts of stickers: ELLIS 2020, Metropolis U, a vaguely homoerotic sticker of Spider-Man and Nightwing.

"I didn't say anything." He did a 360 around the room in search of a seat of his own. There weren't an abundance of options.

"This is my nerve center. My retreat. The place where it happens." He raised a skeptical brow and she caved immediately. "Alright, so its the only place with a little privacy around here. I'll start combing through the archive, see what I can find on your baddie."

"What am I s'posed to do?"

"See those reports on top of the printer? Those go to the desks with the matching name plates. What? Don't look at me like that. I'm supposed to be working, not helping you. This'll take me fifteen minutes, tops."

He spent the next five minutes zipping across the office, delivering reports, changing ink cartridges and writing emails. Even spell-checked her criminology paper on that serial killer from New York, the Punisher. That was him going slow, too. The next fifteen minutes was him agonizing over how to pass the time. He stopped a bike thief in Centennial Park. Went to grab a pizza from that place on Bleecker street, but they weren’t open yet. Get a frozen one from the supermarket instead. Ate the pizza. Did a lap around the bay to work off the calories. Went too fast, pizza came back up. Took a shower and headed back to the Planet.

"How ‘bout now? You got anything?"

"You think anything changed since the last eighty four times you asked me?! Well, it has. Sit down, I finally got something."

The first public appearance of Knockout actually predated Superman. She tangled with one of those old school, JSA-era capes way back in the day; nobody knew her name yet so the connection was hard to make, but there weren't too many seven foot tall redheads that could bench press a train car running around. She'd appear sporadically over the coming decades, and not always in the States. The name Knockout wouldn't be tied to her until her first clash with the Man of Steel.

"How'd you even find all this? This is incredible."

"I have a friend, Mickey Cannon; he's a real technophile. Had him run a bot through the archive, lookin' for any mention of Knockout or a few keywords that'd identify her. We're actually part of this online group called the Newsboys-"

"-yeah no that’s great, can you keep readin'?"

She disappeared from the public eye after her capture and subsequent sentencing. Most people assumed she was still in Belle Reve, and the prison’s records would’ve backed that up- the only discrepancy was a raid in South America, where a group of costumed villains attempted to assassinate a head of state. One of those villains matched Knockout’s description to a T. That wasn’t the craziest part of this story, though- the craziest part was who stopped them.

"I know that guy!" Superboy all but leapt out of his tights to point to the screen. It was a low-quality picture snapped with a flip phone, but he’d recognize that golden armor and the blue suit anywhere. "That's Guardian! He's- he's retired now, but James Harper- he's head of security at our main facility- he used to be a superhero. I...have no idea why he'd be in South America, though. He was a local guy. A real 'show up to a minor league baseball game' type."

"So Cadmus has gone after Knockout before?"

"No way," he scoffed, "Jim only started working at the lab a couple of months after I was born-"

“-That...timeline works perfectly-“

"After Superboy was born." He laughed a little too hard. "Y’know, my- my rebirth as a hero kind of thing. That was, uh, just twelve or thirteen months ago. No, Harper must've been there for his own reasons." Try as he might, he didn't sound too convinced by his own theory. None of this made any sense.

Moon stared up at him, practically boring a hole into his skull. "Do you know where Guardian got his powers? That fancy suit of armor? I mean, I'm no expert, but something like that would’ve cost a fortune. Way more money than a...what'd you call him- a 'minor league baseball' type of hero- ought to have."

"So, what? You're suggestin' Jim and everybody at Cadmus has been lyin' to me? That they made him Guardian just like they made me, but weren't ever public about it?" Superboy faked a scoff.

"If you trust your company so much then why are you in my supply closet instead of asking your boss yourself?" Tana stood from her seat, taking a step up to him. There was barely enough room for one of them to stand in here, let alone two. Superboy didn’t respond to her. He couldn't meet her gaze. Tana took that as assurance she'd hit the nail on the head and pressed on, "Look, you obviously care about this woman or you wouldn't be here. And I'm going to be honest with you, s-boy, things don't look too good for her. Cadmus wanted her badly enough to send you after her in public. They tried the same thing two years ago when they sent Guardian after a U.S-backed death squad in Southern America."

"It sounds crazy. Batshit, if I’m bein' honest."

"And yet..." she shrugged.

"...what should I do about it?"

"The superhero's asking me that?"

He turned away, running his hands through his hair. His chest hurt. Ribs, too. Mind was racing quicker than he could keep up with it- a million difference possibilities, none of them good. Too big a question, too many potential answers, and no way to contextualize which ones were worth his time. "Maybe it ain't obvious yet but this is the first time I've done this on my own," he sighed, frustrated. "Always had a support structure, marching orders. All I ever had to do was hit what they pointed at. This, though? This is way over my paygrade."

Moon grabbed a notebook off a nearby shelf. Had to try three pens before one would write, but then she started to write. Furious, quick as hell, and barely legible to anyone that wasn't her. It might've impressed Superboy if that look in her eye didn't make him squirm with discomfort. She had a plan, alright. And he could tell he wasn't going to like it in the least.

"Unless you're willing to come out as a source we can't go traditional with this. If somebody leaks the story online, though, you bet every major paper in the country will be tripping over each other to cover those allegations. I can make a few calls to friends of mine and get this trending everywhere. Cadmus can't hide then."

His jaw all but hit the floor. "Are you out of your gourd, Tana? Do you have even the slightest idea what'd happen to you if you got in the middle of this? You could get hurt. Bad."

"I'll cover my tracks. We can't just let these guys get away with this, and I'd bet everything its only the tip of the iceberg." Her own jaw was set, never wavering.

"You don't understand." He shook his head furiously. "Listen, Paul Westfield is- is a good man, okay? Complicated, intense, but the- the superhero stuff is the real deal. I wouldn't be here without him. I owe him everything."

"That corporate ghoul wouldn't know good if it slapped him in the face. There's an angle. There always is with those rich guys."

"I didn't take you for the cynical type." He narrows his eyes.

She narrowed hers back. "And I didn't take you for a coward."

Superboy started for the door. "Maybe you were right earlier. Maybe I shouldn't have come here and maybe- maybe I should just ask the man myself."

"You're making a mistake!" She yelled after him, but he was already gone.

Sensation & Wonder: An Absolute Comics Roleplay [DC & Marvel One Universe Style Game]

MCU Disney garbage

@Dead Cruiser

cringeth

Sensation & Wonder: An Absolute Comics Roleplay [DC & Marvel One Universe Style Game]

_{SEASON ONE Sensation & Wonder}

SUPERBOY #5 Pull My Strings

---

_{Three hundred and fifty miles above the surface ♦ Earth's upper atmosphere}

They called it the thermosphere. It was by far the largest layer of earth's atmosphere, ranging from sixty miles up to over three hundred and seventy. Near its zenith the air was so thin it was practically a hard vacuum. What gas particles were up here, though, were packed with thousands upon thousands of degrees of heat. They absorbed solar radiation like sponges. The electrical charge those particles carried were what bounced short-wave radio transmissions back down to earth. Those transmissions played in Superboy's ear through a receiver implanted into his cochlea. Hundreds of songs, voices, and sounds smashed together in a garbled mess of sensory activity, but he could still make sense of it. His brain was designed to intake vast amounts of data all at once, storing the best of it for later in his long-term memory. He had most of Wikipedia stored in his hippocampus, thanks to Cadmus. They'd thought all that knowledge and processing power meant he'd come outta his vat a genius.

'But I'm a capital M moron,' he sulked, soaking in the morning's rays. He'd spent the better part of the night way up here, just a short flight from the International Space Station. His lighter injuries were fully healed by now, but the heftier ones- like that lower right rib- required medical attention. Doctor Roquette could've had him good as new in four hours, tops. She also would've told him to report in after last night's brawl.

Somebody was bound to yell at him for letting Knockout get away. And for letting her kiss him. 'Didn't even ask me first.' Still, it was a hard thing to complain about. He'd never met anyone quite like that before...

'Not what's important right now,' he reminded himself. 'Need to figure this out.'

Cadmus's Acquisitions department had sent Superboy to capture Knockout. Not detain her until the cops show up- capture and return to their facilities. Why, though? Was it just because the police would've had a hell of a time holding someone like that? Maybe. That still didn't explain why she was a priority in the first place. She hasn't been an active threat to anyone for years now. Even had some kind of deal with a high ranking government official to wipe her slate clean. Far as the law was concerned, Kay Fury was an innocent woman.

'Until we demolished a chunk of Hob's Bay beating on each other.' So many people's homes, their business, all that public property- just destroyed because he was more concerned with having fun than protecting people. He seriously needed to figure out this hero thing.

There was something he was missing. A piece of the puzzle left out of the box. If he knew more about her past maybe he'd be able to draw a connection between her and Cadmus. Whatever it was, his creators hadn't deigned to give him that piece of information. It wasn't a name he'd known until yesterday. Could just fly back to the tower and google her, but...

'They're gonna be monitoring the place, dummy. And its not good for your health to let the bosses know you're snoopin' around behind their backs.' Okay, so where did people go for information they couldn't just look up online?

_{The Daily Planet ♦ Metropolis}

The Daily Planet was the last bulwark of decency in New Troy. No matter how the rest of Metropolis changed around it, for good or for ill, the Planet remained stalwart. A lighthouse on the shore, guiding ships to the harbor of truth. A symbol carved from brick and mortar of the City of Tomorrow's best future.

It was also, unrelated, closed.

It turns out truth does, in fact, sleep; specifically between the hours of six PM and eight AM. Those doors wouldn't open for another half an hour. Time wouldn't pass any faster the longer Superboy stared at them, either. Maybe this was a bad idea. Maybe the library was open earlier-

Somebody rounding behind him. Couldn't see, about to bump into him. He's half a foot to the left before they even know he was in the way.

"Ahhh shit. Shitshitshit." The woman hiding behind a stack of coffees and breakfast snacks grumbled to herself, trying to find an angle to grab the door. Was going to drop everything. No two bets about it. Superboy slipped the key from outta her fingers and opened it himself and had the keys back in her hand in the time it took a butterfly to beat their wings.

"Thanks, pal. I'd be dead meat without ya." She walked into the lobby, and he followed after. The place was empty, save for the dull roar of printers spinning in the basement. Quiet talking from a back room behind the front desk. Just a handful of people, all too tired for their own good. That was where the woman with the coffees and snacks was bound.

Superboy gave her time to finish up with that before bothering her further. One of the men waiting on her was her boss. Older man, upset that she'd taken so long. Stupid, though. Coffee came from a place on the other side of midtown. She'd made it back in record time. Probably broke a few traffic laws to do it. Not sure it'd matter to him, though.

The boy spent the next few minutes unsure what to do with his hands while he waited for her to get back. Pockets on the jacket were fake, crossing his arms made him feel like an ass. How'd people stand around like this all the time?

Door opened again, and the intern stepped back out. She was short, built for track. Brown skin, dark hair, and a cheap purple blazer over a pink button-up. There was a dangerous sort of curiosity burning behind her eyes when she finally looked at him. "Tana Moon, Daily Planet. You can't be in here." She all but had to climb atop the front desk to stick her hand out to shake his hand.

He took it, awkward as all hell, but he took it. "Uhh, right. Sorry. Name's Superboy-"

"Wow, really? Couldn't tell. You only own the one outfit? Same one from your rampage last night, got all the same cuts."

"Ah, great." He sighed, and threw up his hands. "They already uploaded it? 'Course they did. Man I am so dead."

"Trending since midnight. You and that redhead've been the talk of the town. You wanna make a statement about that, by the way?"

"God, that means they know about the kiss, too." He started pacing. He paced when he couldn't fly, and he flew when he was nervous.

Tana pulled her phone out of her pocket. "Kiss? What kiss? You kiss someone?"

He stopped, turning to look at her. "They edited it out?! What am I saying, 'course they did. Man. Rex'll have my hide...What're you doing? Are you recording me?"

"What? Nobody's interviewed you since the incident and you just dropped an exclusive."

"Do not run that!" Before she could argue he'd taken the phone, deleted the video and handed it back. Papers flew off the desk as he came to a stop. "You have no idea how much trouble I'd be in if that got out. Seriously, I'm talkin' nine lashes kinda bad, here. Please."

She paused to mull it over. "Never touch my stuff again and you have yourself a deal."

"Thank you. Now, I need your help-"

"-Sure, anything-"

"I gotta find the reporter who worked the old Superman beat."

Tana cocked her head. "Uh, you tried the White House?"

Felt like his whole head was about to explode. "What?! Since when?"

"How about January, the same time every president's been inaugurated since, like, forever?

"Since FDR, actually."

"You know that but not who the current president of the United States is?" She scoffed.

Great, he was one wrong step from leaking the biggest secret of his life to some nosy reporter, and he sounded like the dumbest know-it-all alive. He hadn't bothered to learn just about anything about the government since stepping out of his vat. Politics were a strict no-go zone for him. "The...news is...for losers. Obviously." Good save. Suspicion avoided completely.

Moon held back a snicker. "The news is for losers, but FDR facts aren't?"

"FDR facts are cool and for everybody!" He pointed at her. "You're gettin' me off track. Look. I gotta find information on one of Superman's old rogues, and the Planet's the closest to a first-hand source on all that save for the big guy himself. You're no Lois Lane, but-"

"-Hurtful, but true-"

"-but can you help a guy out?"

"Sure. We've got a digital archive of every paper since World War Two. Follow me!"

Sensation & Wonder: An Absolute Comics Roleplay [DC & Marvel One Universe Style Game]

<Snipped quote by Roman>

It was a damn good post. Looking forward to Frank's arc.

@webboysurf

Seconded. Always love in-character reactions to events in other parts of the world, and Castle's a grad-A grump about it

Sensation & Wonder: An Absolute Comics Roleplay [DC & Marvel One Universe Style Game]

You IKEA lookin bastard

Sensation & Wonder: An Absolute Comics Roleplay [DC & Marvel One Universe Style Game]

<Snipped quote by Cybermaxx>

You want more?

@Sep

spare me pls

Sensation & Wonder: An Absolute Comics Roleplay [DC & Marvel One Universe Style Game]

<Snipped quote by Sep>

You'd have to be mad. Or maybe...super.

Super duper.

@Cybermaxx

Having a normal one

large image

Sensation & Wonder: An Absolute Comics Roleplay [DC & Marvel One Universe Style Game]

Imagine posting daily.

@Sep

You'd have to be mad. Or maybe...super.

Super duper.

Sensation & Wonder: An Absolute Comics Roleplay [DC & Marvel One Universe Style Game]

_{SEASON ONE Sensation & Wonder}

SUPERBOY #4 Pull My Strings

---

_{Hob's Bay ♦ Metropolis}

Two superhumans battled their way across Metropolis. Buildings crumple as bodies smash through ceilings and support beams. Streetlamps become blunt instruments. Cars are taught to fly. Anything not physically part of the earth becomes either a weapon or a projectile. They batter, bash, bump, thrash, choke and cut each other until they're black and blue. Cameras mounted to flying disks record the entire, violent affair.

They've been at it for near half an hour, and Superboy was tiring. He'd thrown everything he had and then some at Knockout and she'd just kept on coming. No amount of damage left her on her back for long. The first time he'd put his fist through her chest he'd thought he'd killed her, but the woman had just howled with joy. It was off-putting, to say the least.

This wasn't as fun as he thought it'd be.

A storm was upon him. Blows raining down on his face. Nose cracks like thunder. Pavement snaps like twigs under the vestigial force. Hands up, bat away the punches. Redirect. Head feels like jelly. Slip under a haymaker, body compresses like a slinky- pop back up, head rockets into her jaw. Knockout stumbles back. Gives enough room for Superboy to leap back, clear to the other side of the street. Need a moment to breathe.

"Damn," words heave from his chest alongside a glob of blood. Every breath burns. Muscles ache. Red, sticky fluid flows down from an open wound over his eye. No amount of blinking clears his vision. Swimming in red. "Damn!" Superboy hoots, slamming a fist against his chest. Another batch of blood comes crawling out of his mouth. That was all of it. Airways were clearer, now. A glance toward one of the cameras. Gotta keep up appearances. Can't let them see he was struggling. "You're really rockin' my world, baby."

On the other side of the street Knockout stood, jaw in her hand. She pushed it upward, and a sickening snap followed. Worked to the left, then the right. Thing went from hanging by a handful of sinew to fully functional in seconds. "Ooh yes!" Her whole body shook. Fidgety energy kept her bouncing on her heels, her fingers curling. "It has been so very long. Pounding ears, chest swelling. Racked with pain from head to toe. Transcendent! Ecstasy!"

"You're a chatterbox, y'know that?"

"The pot accuses the kettle!"

"Close enough." His feet were off the ground and he was racing toward her. Can't give her too much time to recover. She healed through everything he threw at her. He could take more punishment, but anything that got through was permanent. Gotta find a way to pin her down.

Fist connects with her cheek and she's keeled over. That one would've knocked anyone else's block off, but all it did was slow her down for a few seconds. This close up it was hard to ignore how she was taking all this. Every inch of exposed skin was covered in goosebumps. Every strike either of them landed made her tremble. Air around her stunk of estrogen, dopamine, oxytocin, and norepinephrine. Her limpic system was practically cannibalizing itself from hyperactivity. That same healing factor that was keeping her alive was restoring neurotransmitters faster than her brain could kill them.

'She can't build up a tolerance. Every high's exactly as intense as the very first.'

Knockout was back on her feet and swinging away at him. Every one of those punches would've been devastating. Even the air around her fists was crackling with heat from the sheer force of her movement. Superboy was fast enough to play keep away, but for how long? If she tagged him and brought him down, would she even stop? Something's wrong with her brain. Like somebody'd gotten inside and switched all the wires for violence and sex around.

Idiot. Dumbass! How'd it take him so long to see this?

"Really hate to be the bearer of bad news, lady, but you've got a condition." He wasn't even throwing punches anymore. Just batting her arms away to redirect the most of the impact and dancing back, quick as he could, to make some distance. Knockout kept right on top of him. She was a flurry of savagery. None of the skill she'd shown in the beginning, just a barrage of strikes- most of them weren't even killing strokes. She was just trying to make contact; every successful hit produced chemicals regardless. There was laughter on her lips.

"They knew what drove me." She struggled to speak between fits of giggles. They must've been involuntary. "They knew I could never be loyal to anything but my own..." It looked like a great deal of effort, but she managed a disappointed scowl. "...Needs."

Superboy faltered. He'd been going about this all wrong.

She finally caught him.

A left hook clipped him on the chin, and a right knocked him in the temple. She stopped swinging long enough to grab a clump of his hair and heft him into the air, delivering a dozen body blows with her free hand. Crack like thunder. Broken rib. The rain beat down, down, down. Down into the ground. Split the earth, spray of dirt and concrete and pavement. Air stunk of pheromones and blood.

She drops him. Pleasure crackles like lightning through her veins. A rush unlike any she'd felt in so many years. "I tried." It takes momentous effort to speak between heavy breaths. "I tried to find a substitute, but there is nothing on this earth like it. The writhing flesh of a dozen demigods, pounds upon pounds of your recreational drugs- I was a fool to believe this could be replaced." Her hands were shaking, demanding to be laid into flesh. Knockout was doing everything she could to control herself.

Superboy didn't even bother trying to get up. It was hard enough to just lay there and speak. "I'm sorry."

"What?" She frowned, puzzled.

"I-" He coughed. "-I knocked ya off the wagon. Me'n my stupid- shit, that hurts- stupid ego. So desperate to prove somethin' I couldn't see it starin' me in the face."

"You're kind, but a fool. I am a warrior. My actions are my own. No boy could make me do anything I did not wish to." She wasn't going to hold it together for much longer. "Truth be told you were an easy excuse to indulge in something I have dreamt of for so long. And now I've ruined everything. Gods above. I was given a chance and I threw it away."

"You quit before. How? Why?"

Knockout smiled wistfully, trapped in a memory. "Your predecessor humbled me. Delivered me to Belle Reve, where I was to rot for my crimes. I was given a chance at penitence: serve your country in Waller's death squad and earn a clean slate. T'was not true redemption, but it was my path out of prison."

"So that's it?" He sat up on his elbows. "You just went cold turkey?"

"I would have returned to my old ways in under a week if not for..."

"Liana."

"Liana." She nodded. The shaking in her hands had lessened. "The sweetest creature in this galaxy, or any other. She was the only human to never fear me. It was her that convinced me I could...I could be more than what my creators intended."

That was all she needed to push through, freeing her mind from its chemical haze. Demands for more were shut out, for now. Willpower was only a temporary solution, but she proved strong enough to shackle her worst impulses- this time.

'Will need to find her help later. Real help.'

She took a step away from Superboy, lowering a hand to him. He took it without hesitation, expecting to be helped to his feet. Instead he was hefted into the air and wrapped into a too-tight embrace. They were both a mess of sweat, blood and dirt. But they'd be fine. Eventually. "You have been most helpful, Son of Krypton. Thank you for reminding me of who I am meant to be. You are an adult, yes?"

"Yeah, I guess. Why-"

Then she dropped him into a pile of rubble and walked away.

Sensation & Wonder: An Absolute Comics Roleplay [DC & Marvel One Universe Style Game]

That image took more time to make than the rest of the fuckin post. Anyway, left you suckers with a cliffhanger- expect some punchin people in issue #4.