Heritage

Despite herself, part of Grim was thinking that they'd been through the worst part of the Warden's death trap and lived, but then the tiny paranoid mini-Grim that lived in her head got to wag her little finger and 'say I told you so'. "Oh crap - deadly robo-spiders. Or maybe robo-rats; either one could fit his theme, I guess. This totally sucks." Her claws spring out as she makes ready to defend herself from the inevitable attack.

Gossamer squints her eyes and gives her host a playful 'Oh you clever rogue' look, then laughs. "I suppose you're right. One of the problems with having an advanced education is you can't turn it off; overthinking comes to me as naturally as breathing." After a few moments, a thought strikes her. "You know, we should probably work together from time to time, patrolling and what not." She extends her a lock of hair so that it gently rests against the silver skin of the Emissary's cheek. "Complementary metallic shades are going to be huge this season; Donatella told me so herself." Estelle grins, but the hair remains for a few seconds as the sensitive pseudo-nerves in each fiber thrill at the unusual texture of man's face; the blond heroine looks slightly mortified as the tendril is withdrawn. "I'm so- I mean..." She sighs and makes a fluttery wave of the hand. "Ah, what the hell. The wine is delightful and I find you very intriguing; no more apologies, right?" Gossamer closes her eyes and sighs contentedly. "I also think we should do a charity concert; I can brush up on my guitarwork, make a few phone calls and see if we can get the Liberty Dome. I think that would be fun."

Still in her Foreshadow guise, Grim leaps through the kitchen door just in time to avoid whatever freaky power the Asian girl was laying down; once in the living room, she rolls to her feet in a battle stance, fists ready to fly.

Gossamer looks slightly embarrassed as she prepares to take her turn in the Wreck Room. "I'm not sure how impressive this will be, but I'm certainly excited to test out my powers in a bigger, more controlled environment; this room really puts the testing lab at Albright to shame." Before she leaves the control room, she tugs an iPod out of her bodysuit (where exactly was she keeping it?) and nibbles on her thumbnail. "Is there a place to plug in? I find the right music really helps the workout. It's track's twenty-six and twenty-seven." After planning a detailed program, the blond heroine steps into the center of the room, swinging her arms and legs and rolling her neck to loosen up; as she does this, her hair expands, contracts, stretches and twists itself into a series of bizarre shapes. Various hoops, bars and odd projections slide noiselessly out of the walls and ceiling, and Gossamer holds up her hand and nods that she's ready. It's often hard to guess someone's musical tastes; to look at Dr. Estelle de Havilland, one might imagine classical, jazz, maybe Norah Jones. Something sophisticated and vaguely high-brow. One typically doesn't expect the Offspring. :? The jagged opening guitar riff of 'Genocide' rips through the air of the Wreck Room, blasting from the recessed speakers high up in the walls, and in no time Gossamer is leaping about as though she were on fire. Two glittering tendrils shoot up some thirty feet in the air, wrap around a set of rings and yank her up as well, while her hands...are playing air guitar. Now the sequence begins, as hard plastic spears, spheres and jagged polygons are launched at her from all sides as the skate punk rages and Gossamer howls along. "One, two, three, four! Dog eat dog Every day On our fellow man we prey! Dog eat dog To get by Hope you like my genocide!" She easily deflects the various missiles, swatting them aside as she does a few simple acrobatic moves as she swings across the room, up and back. Four combat drones wobble onto the Wreck Room floor, and Gossamer drops like stone towards them, golden lines snapping out to slow her descent so she lands in a smooth three point crouch. The first drone she deftly strikes with a sharp whip, nearly tearing the thing in half. The remaining three adjust their tactics, trying to stay out of her reach, but she closes the distance by swinging; the snags the nearest drone and flings it at one of its fleeing companions, destroying both units. The last drone is trickier than its departed brethren, and it scoots across the floor as Green Day's 'Holiday' starts playing, followed by the return of the launched missiles; with her focus split, Estelle grimaces as she must keep her eye on both the mad gyrations of the drone and the nasty sharp objects hurling at her from all directions. And why exactly did I pick this program again? :shock: There's no time for air guitar this time; finally, after a few endless minutes of constant sensory assault, she manages to grab one of the spears out of the air and fire it right into the last drone's optic sensor, causing its head to explode in a shower of sparks. As the last chord of the song fades, Estelle stands panting on the floor while the hoops and bars slide back into the walls as quietly as they entered and the last missile clatters to the floor. "Wow. That...that was intense."

Ok, I'm confused. Dr Archeville is clearly reacting to an impressive show by Captain Wonder, but nothing was posted by Shazam other than that he's going inside; are we assuming he's going to go edit his previous post to include his demonstration?

Wow, Whispigrim rolled totally craptastic! Whisper's roll

Lynn's head suddenly snaps up and to the side. "Whoa, whoa, whoa, I can hear Icarus; he's flying and he's right over there." She indicates the direction with a jerk of her head.

Grim nods as she continues chewing her chicken. "Yeah, I'd say things are going well; we need a tech guy and another full-time girl, no offense, Vel, so I can have someone to talk to, but yeah, we got a good start." Suddenly she stops and looks around. "Hey, did Sen disappear on us? Man, he's a sneaky guy!"

Almost without thinking, Lynn reaches out and takes Ren's hand and gives it a little squeeze; she doesn't lift her eyes up from the ground, but there's a hint of a smile on her lips as she rubs the back of his hand with her thumb.

I'm so sorry I've been absent so much recently; between my two jobs and GenCon prep, i've been tired and/or uber-busy pretty much constantly. Gonna post a bunch today but then i'll be out of town until Sunday, unless I can post during my annual GenCon Kinko's run to print out character sheets and handouts.

Whisper had been in the casino for a while, or rather Grim had been at first, shifting between a few forms as she moved through the crowd, playing a few slots as a Jersey retiree at one point. She did this for several reasons, among them having a better look at the security people, but also to see the patrons as people, to remind herself of how important their lives were, no matter insignificant they might seem. It's my job to make sure no one dies here today. As the time for the actual robery approached she went invisible and entered the cage, making note of the safe's combination when one of the bosses made a deposit; once she had it, she slowly made her way towards Ghost. When the planned chaos began, she felt a sinking feeling in her stomach; there were so many ways this could go horribly wrong. And once the frickin' demon made his presence known, she felt even worse; she prayed that no one tried to be a hero, and that everyone made it out safe. From off to Ghost's left side, there comes a soft emotionless voice. "I have the combination." Whisper then rattles it off as her unseen eyes fill with worry.

We lost power last night during the bad storms (we even hid in the basement during a tornado warning), so I was unable to post. The skies look clear today, so I should be able to post later.

Congrats sir! I'm glad to see the adminship in such capable hands. :clap:

I'll be taking pictures, too - it's literaly the highlight of my year. :D

Belated thanks to you all; it was much quieter than I planned ( a few plans fell through), but just having a day off from both my jobs was a great gift in and of itself.

Being overdramatic has it's time and place, and this is both of those. Welcome back, Cos! Very happy to see you. (P.S. Look for a PM from me!)

Soory for the long gap in posting, I'm on this now.

A smile slowly forms on Gossamer's lips, and when the Emissary is finished with his heartfelt 'pep talk', she nods; her golden strand politely retreats from the vicinity of the wine bottle without any comment from its owner. "Fair enough. At the very least, you need to meet my sister Sunny, better known as Soliel de Havilland-King, wife of the US ambassador to Japan; I think you would get a kick out of each other, and she has a lot of leverage in the family." The blonde heroine sighs and closes her eyes for but a moment, and the levels her earnest gaze at the Utopian ambassador. "There was another reason I came here today, and that was to seek out your advice; this so-called hero business is somewhat baffling to me, and while I doubt you're the sort to bandy about that label, it does seem to rest confortably upon your shoulders." She leans forward as she warms to the subject, carefully depositing her glass on the sideboard. "How should I best spend my time? What is the most effective use of my powers? The charity event was a good start, and I enjoyed that and felt we did some tangable good, but I must admit I've felt a bit out of sorts since then. It's as though...nothing else seems as worth while as that. Should I spend my day swinging about the city, hoping something horrible happens? That seems grossly inefficient and entirely too reactive of a strategy." Gossamer throws up her hands in frustration. "Being a good person I understand, and it comes to me naturally, but this...this is very hard work, which I like, but I don't yet have the tools to figure it out on my own." She shrugs. "So, I turn to you for guidance in my hour of need."

Sorry, with GenCon coming up, I've been working on my two events for that; look for post here (and throughout the site) over the course of the day today.

Grim mumbles an apology as she rubs her face; Nightrival's muscles are indeed as taught as they look. For a while she crawls along behind him in silence, her whole body quivering from a near state of shock but at last her true nature reveals itself as she speaks in a quavering voice. "Okay, I know we can't kill him, because it's not...the way we do things, but I have...have to process this somehow, or I'm just gonna curl up into a little girly ball and cry my eyes out." She's quiet for a few seconds, then begins speaking again, but with a hair more confidence. "What I would like to do to Warden when we catch him, by Grimalkin, grade 6. I would like to cover Warden in chips and dip, then leave him tied up in a New York sports bar during a Yankees game. Feel free to join in here, boss."

Estelle chuckles mirthlessly as she takes a fairly substantial gulp of wine. "Mmm. I exposed my family to legal censure, and far worse, public scrutiny; the De Havillands are supposed to close ranks when the family is threatened, but instead I panicked, ignored years of training and conditioning, and sought professional help when I was exposed to illegally-procured Grue DNA at one of our labs." A tendril of hair spirals up to take her empty glass as she rubs her eyes. "And I'm the one who's done something unforgivable." She sighs and leans her head back against her chair. "At least my sister Sunny still speaks to me, and Mother, when she's not too sick. Arthur and the twins won't have anything to do with me, but that's hardly new, at least for the twins; we've never really gotten along." A thin strand of gold stretches across the room to fetch the bottle and give her a refill. "I'm sorry, I've wandered into your house and seem determined to be drunk before noon; I'm a poor guest indeed."

Gossamer shrugs. "Well, that might be a bit melodramatic on my part." She swirls the glass and raises it to her nose. "Mmm, very nice." She takes a small sip and nods in satisfaction. "The licensing deal is going to go a long way to helping me adapt to the special needs of my new lifestyle." And here her hair rises up en masse before lowering back down; it never quite touches the ground, but instead twitches just above it like the tails of twenty playful cats. "When Father cut me off from my inheritance, it wasn't so bad at first; it reminded me of my years at Harvard. My tuition was covered, of course, but I had to agree to work a part-time job for any spending money; Father thought it would give me 'real world experience' and develop character." She smiles as she rolls up the sleeve of her jumpsuit to show a large burn on on the underside of her right forearm. "I got that from the door of a pizza oven; I loved it there, despite all the sweat. Got good tips, too." Estelle flutters her eyelashes and laughs, but then it quickly fades. "Of course, back then it was voluntary; I wasn't being frozen out of my own family." She sighs and has another sip of wine. "So, a little extra income to buy a few things; nothing more."

Gossamer dimples and smooths down her hair like it's a dress. "Well, that's certainly nice of you to say. The truth of the matter is I shouldn't speak ill of anyone today, since I'm finally getting back on my own feet financially." She gingerly uses her hair to extract the cork from the bottle, not unlike a squid prying shellfish from their homes, and fills both glasses before depositing the bottle on the side cabinet some distance away. "I received my first wire transfer from Development Concepts; apparently the Gossamer Glitter collection is selling even better than anticipated." The blond heroine grins wryly and raises her glass in a toast. "To selling out without selling your soul...hopefully."

I'm doing each post separately now, in an effort to start posting here on a regular basis; Thev, I'm going to bring Velo into one of the other posts (most likely Blaster's) once I finish it; keep your eyes peeled for her dramatic entrance!.

It takes only the work of a few seconds for Velocity to find a nice length of extension cord to bind the unconscious youths, and in the blink of an eye they are trussed up like Thanksgiving turkeys. Her work done, she darts off like a yellow blur in search for other foes.