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GM Afternoon, Feburary 21st, 2021 The 7th day of the 7th week, in the 3rd 7th year of the 21st millenium Oxford Street, London The teleporter between the British embassy in Freedom City and Haven made it easy enough for Muirne to come visit the rest of the Vanguard, but that didn't mean that she always had the time. Things were busy at Claremont, after all. Between classes, time travel adventures, training and the random super heroics and super villain attacks, she was busy, so when she let Vanguard know that she was going to visit, Mette managed to bring Dee and Karla along for a shopping trip, just the four of them. They had reached Oxford Street, had gone through shops and had now just left Laksamania after finishing lunch. The sky was clear. And something seemed to glitter in the sky, reflections of what came below, every now and again. One would have to be incredibly lucky to look up in time to see the distorted reflections of London above. But no one seemed to notice or care. The sky was clear.

(Shortly after "The Old Girl is Dying on Her Feet") Later that night, with all the dinner dishes done and the guests settled and the kids long asleep, Paige settled herself at the vanity table in the master bedroom. Richard's powers may have kept them both young, but that didn't mean she could afford to skimp on the moisturizing routine. "So," she began, looking at Richard in the mirror as she began unscrewing jars, "we've reassured everybody that the world's not ending. We've told the kids and your mom that nothing's going to change, we've told the crew we're not laying anybody off. I guess it's time for us to figure out what we're actually going to do."

Archetech February 2021 The meeting with Miss Americana's people had gone smoothly. They were professionals, she was a media icon; everybody knew how the game worked and how nobody was going to try and make her look stupid. She'd been the right person to call; a synthetic heroine who herself had been instrumental in defeating a robot invasion, and someone who had been on the show before and knew the ropes. And talking to her was certainly always very pleasant. "It's the damndest thing," Richard had warned his intern Terry, who was new to this particular heroine. "Paige swears it's not anything psychic, and it's not anything biochemical or magic either. Maybe it's just, you know, all that smartness being used to figure out how to talk to people, or...I don't know! Anyway, she's something else." They'd agreed to meet outside of Miss Americana's office, in a small gardened atrium on the Archetech campus that bore the name of a staffer killed in the Deep One attack a few years back. Richard had stopped to smell the flowers already though and was tossing a ball to himself, back and forth, as he kibitzed with the crew in between letting them get set up for the shoot. Miss A's intern was already there, but the grumpy-looking girl with the green and black hair was mostly observing.

February 2021 DuTemps Building "She's a great kid, really," Richard was commenting to David Longfellow as they waited for the arrival of their interview subject. Richard was standing, leaning against the wall and occasionally tossing a tennis ball across the room to himself and back again, trusting the crew to do their jobs and do them well. "She and Will were in the same class back in high school. Which means...she must be, what, almost thirty now? Jeez." He zipped over when his intern Terry arrived with coffee and gave him a million-dollar grin. "Thanks Ter!" A quick sip and "Triple sugar, niiice. " He had learned, a long time ago, under very different circumstances, that you were always, always nice to the people who worked for you, because they were the ones who watched your ass. He zipped back to the windows, looking out from their thirty-story height, and said, "I remember when this place was under construction, back in the day. They tore down a whole block that was mostly these little TV repair shops, but the...jeez." He shook his head. "Damn, I sound like an old fart. Sure, sound check," he said as Kelsey approached with the boom mike. "Let's do this." He was dressed for work, hair slicked back with just a few streaks of grey showing, sunglasses in his hand, wearing a safari vest over a black dress shirt and jeans. "You're not that old," Kelsey commented with a cheeky smile once they were done, "not as long as you sign my paychecks anyway!" He laughed as a ripple of laughter ran through the crew, and watched as the crew finished setting up, trusting them to do their jobs - and sure enough, with the windows behind him shaded enough that he wouldn't be backlit, he waited for Mali's arrival.

It was another morning in Freedom City, and the SuperCrime! crew were back at the TV studio. Yesterday's cold, clear weather had turned into miserable, sleety drizzle today, enough that Paige had needed to change her clothes and redo her hair and makeup as soon as she arrived. Since the studio space they'd borrowed didn't include a dressing room, she wound up hiding behind the blue scrim pretending to be the set's side wall while wriggling into a dry SuperCrime jumpsuit. "Okay, I know we've got a bunch of these to run through, remind me who's up first today," she called. "First up this morning is Jill o' Cure," Fred reminded her from the other side of the curtain. "Healer type, local to Freedom City, was on the Interceptors during the infiltration." "Ah, right." Paige paused in her dressing a moment. This interview would be a little bit tricky, just by the nature of secret identities and the super community. Paige Cline knew Ellie Espadas through a score of Nicholson family nights and Saturday field trips over the years, but that was an entirely different thing from Paige Cline the television personality or Hologram knowing Jill o' Cure. That family guarded their identities well enough that Paige only knew because Richard and Will had gone to a party at Fleur de Joie's place once and met Ellie's brother Erik, who was Jack of all Blades. Secret identities could get very confusing but Paige did her best to respect them absolutely, even to the point of concealing them from her crew. Paige stepped out from behind the scrim and finished toweling her hair before going for a quick makeup retouch. "I'm going to keep this interview loose and see what she wants to say, then maybe prompt her a little," she explained to Fred. "Be ready if I call for a break, I don't know if we'll need one, but this stuff can be difficult. We all ready to go?" "Sure, just don't make us go outside again," Dave called from his camera. "We're ready to go whenever."

GM The Neighborhood Bodega near Claremont Academy February 1st, 2021 Afternoon, after classes had ended It was time for some of the newer students to take a trip to the neighborhood bodega. Danica thought so, at least. She had rounded up Luke, Leon and Muirne and off they went for cheap junk food! The weather was quite nice, if a bit chilly. It had started snowing a few hours earlier, and was still going, but the snowfall was light and inobtrusive. The group was just exiting the bodega with their bounty in hand when a strange wind blew through the street. It was warm, cutting a path through the falling snow, with a strong smell of ozone and rust along as it went. In a flash, an armored vehicle appeared, driving through the tunnel in the snowfall at full speed, tearing down the road. It was not alone. Seconds later, a pair of Omegadrones appeared in the same manner, flying straight after the vehicle.

One of the perks of having a show on the Discovery Channel was a generally cordial working relationship with public broadcasting systems all around the world. It was especially nice in cases like this, where instead of doing interviews on the street or in a rented conference room, they were able to line up a cozy little interview space at the FCTV studios right downtown. The SuperCrime crew had piled all their outdoor gear in an unobtrusive corner and taken an hour's break to thaw out, eat lunch and back up footage of the morning's work. Now Paige was redoing her makeup in front of a mirror in the corner, covering up a slight case of windburn with concealer while the crew did light tests and their waited for their guest to arrive. The studio was not very large, a living-room themed stage area big enough for perhaps four or five people maximum. It was set up with two comfortable chairs cheated towards the camera with a low table between them for coffee cups and looked very much like a thousand different news program sets. The crew already had all the cameras set up and ready to go, and the smell of coffee floated invitingly through the warm air.

Under the circumstances, it was a beautiful day. The circumstances being Freedom City in early February, that meant clear skies and biting cold air that kept the SuperCrime crew of five huddled around their portable heater whenever they could get a break from setting up the outside shoot. It definitely wasn't the weirdest or most uncomfortable circumstances they'd shot in over the past fifteen years, but they were none of them as young as they used to be, not even Paige herself. They'd set up a small working area in a quiet park, a couple of portable chairs, several cameras, and a little canopy over a knot of equipment and monitors. "All right," Paige began, checking things off on her tablet as she spoke. "This looks like a standard two-camera interview, over the shoulder and with the overhead boom plus lavs. Is that all set to go, Fred?" The second unit director nodded, barely looking up from his own tablet. "I'm going to be doubling Kelsey on sound to try and kill some of this wind noise, but we'll have to handle it in post. It's too bad there aren't fifty thousand buildings in this city we could've gone inside for this..." Paige laughed. "His first suggestion was on a rooftop of one of those buildings; this was a compromise. Speaking of which, what's the hot dog situation?" "I sent Vivi to the cart," Fred confirmed, "they'll be back any minute. We'll have to keep this tight," he reminded her, "we still have that other one this afternoon." "No problem," Paige assured him blithely. "We've done this a million times."

January 2021 The same message had gone out both electronically and mentally to the whole family - Hi, everybody. We need everyone who can make it home tonight for a family announcement. This is important; not a drill, 616. In other words, by words and the numeric code at the end, this wasn't a life-or-death immediate emergency -but it was certainly something serious. Downstairs in the living room, Holly Cline focused on the act of psionic creation while watching her stepbrother watch Daniel Tiger while sending a message out to her brother. I don't know what it is either; they're both locked down tight. But it must be something. Nana is here. Her eyes flicked over to her father, who with his eyebrows set and his arms folded across his chest, had that look that meant he wasn't talking about anything more serious than the weather. In the kitchen, Anna Cline was honestly looking better than Paige had seen her in years - she'd found a shade of blonde for her hair that wasn't quite so obviously a dye job, and her complexion had improved now that she was living somewhere that she didn't get quite so much sun. She had arrived not long after her summoning and had proceeded to pop a tater tot casserole in the oven freshly after walking in the door. It was - well, it was more grandmotherly than she usually acted.

cw: difficult stuff January 2021 Angelic sat in the conference room in a student intern's chair and watched as the super-geniuses talked. With a clear disciplinary record at Claremont going back past the Thanksgiving holiday, she had finally won a full-on evening internship for her senior year at Claremont that she had long coveted. That she was in a conference room shadowing Miss Americana rather than her laboratory working on her internal upgrades had not produced any complaints - "I understand," she had told Miss Americana before everyone had arrived, "that human interaction is as important for the scientist as is research." So she sat, dressed in a pencil skirt and bulky sweater that were a far cry from her lab gear, gleaming silver earrings and green-black hair the only concessions to her usual fashion sense, looking as human as anyone else in the room as some of the greatest minds in the world talked business. She was currently engaged in recording the conversation, constructing a three-dimensional model of an internal framework that would sustain internally concealed titanium networking, and in tasting the coffee she had poured for herself to blend in.

GM A Tuesday afternoon in early February, 2021 Claremont Academy "I don't know why I gotta bring the punk along, sorry about that, Miss Cahill." Travis Armstrong seemed to shift between being in a great mood, and, well, being in a spectacularly bad mood. The good mood seemed to come whenever he looked at Judy, and the bad? Well, he obviously wasn't a fan of one Luke Landers. He was leading Luke and Judy down a hallway in the administrative building. Ashley was there too, of course. Travis Armstrong was not about to take Judy's bodyguard away, especially not now. They stopped inside the room, where a screen was on, showing a group of people somewhere in Southside, holding signs. Some kind of demonstration. The signs were hard to make out, but one in particular was easy to make out, with big black letters on white: "WHERE IS JAYCEE?" "It seems like you've gotten quite a following, Miss Cahill." Luke would recognize the young man holding the sign. His name was Matt Wagner.

January 2021 Claremont Academy Shortly after Pan dragged Leon away from Judy... "Why exactly are you here?" Pan had finally stopped under a tree, turning to face Leon, his arms crossed over his chest. "What are you trying to do? Be the one that everyone will hate or watch? Do you steal and cheat because you can? Take from whoever you want, just because it is fun?"

Wednesday, January 13, 2021 4:03 Unlike many private schools Claremont Academy did not bombard its alumni with requests for donations long after their tuition had been paid. It did, however, lean upon the spirit of community service it instilled in its students to ask for a bit of their time toward mentoring the next generation. Considering how many times her brother had agreed to host whole gaggles of teenagers at his dojo - even thought he never even went here - Ellie Espadas would have never heard the end of it had she declined. Besides, the short briefing she'd gotten about Danica Holmes had piqued her interest from a medical standpoint alone. Hopefully she's not disappointed she didn't get a flashier mentor. Or one who's technically younger than her. She'd put together her best business casual, smart-and-successful outfit and done her homework before arriving at one of the Academy's public areas, sitting on a bench that circled around a large planter, to wait.

Monday, January 11, 2021 3:26 PM "C'mon, this'll be great!" An offhand comment about being a bit underwhelmed by the variety of vegetarian options in the Claremont Academy cafeteria on Utsuwa's part had been all the excuse his roommate needed to drag them into the downtown of the Freedom City. Ryder promised he knew a little place in Riverside that did every imaginable variation on a lentil bowl under the sun and was evidently worthy of quite a bit more effusive praise even after Utsuwa has assured him he was convinced. The street they were walking down had done its best to fit as many businesses as possible into its limited space, street-front real estate divided and subdivided, skinny little stairways leading up to second floors and hand lettered chalkboard signs competing for space with pedestrians and bicycles. The soundscape was no less overbearing, from the halves of cellphone conversations to the wailing toddler in the stroller across the street, from the young woman busking with an electric guitar on the corner to the mishmash of chimes, bells and electric chirps that sounded as every door opened. From the way he was grinning Ryder might as well have been strolling through a meditation garden. "Look at that blue sky! Hope you're hungry bud, I know how you feel about American portion sizes. Here we go!" He stopped in front of a vertical sign with red block letters on a black background reading 'LentALL'.

GM FCU Campus 3PM, January 6th, 2021 It had been a normal day for Jennifer. Which meant classes. Lots of classes. While leaving the final class of the day, she had been joined by the professor, one Martin Stillwell. He was a relatively new teacher at the campus, having taken over Jennifer's Computer Forensics class just a few months ago. He was somewhere in the early thirties, with short black hair. He was supposed to be something of a genius in his field. He pocketed his small round glasses as they left the building, heading out into the campus proper. The afternoon sky was starting to grow darker, with grey clouds hanging overhead. The forecast had the possibility of snow, but nothing so far. Stillwell was silent for a short while as they headed in the same direction, before finally speaking. "So, what do you want to do after your studies are finished? Any specific field you're hoping to enter?"

January 2021 Claremont Evening Eira had managed to reserve one of the art studios for a project in the evening period, and indeed project it was. She busied herself as she waited for Davyd, deploying fixed cameras around the square space in the front of the room where the model usually stood. She raised a hand and a few drone-cameras took off from her bag, humming softly as their internal magnetic drives activated and left them to zip around the room like tiny rotorless helicopters. She activated her connection to drones and cameras alike, eyes unfocusing slightly as she took in the three-dimensional view. She had only spoken to Davyd once since their return from Christmas - but there was no doubt in her mind that he would show up. After all, a substantial portion of her holiday allowance was at stake.

January 2021 Claremont Academy now the family is parted; will it be complete one day? The red SUV looked like any other car pulling into the Claremont drop-off lot this January as students returned from the end of their holiday break. It was a full two months since the whole entire goshdarn world and parts of space beyond had found out what Judith Claudia Cahill was, even if the fact that the President's daughter was a Claremont student was a rather more closely guarded secret than most people would imagine. Judy stepped out of the SUV, her denim dress almost brushing the snow-dappled ground, with a black cat-faced backpack on, her Bible tucked under her arm, and her trusty bodyguard at her side. She'd admitted being scared in the car, scared to death as a matter of fact, but as she and Ashley exchanged a smile she decided she was ready for her very last semester of high school. No more secrets now she thought as she turned and led the way onto Claremont's campus, a pink-haired Ashley following.

GM cw: gun violence Early December, 2020 Hanover The email was encrypted, and the encryption was custom puzzle nonsense, which was the kind of thing Mara did when she wanted to make sure an important message wouldn't be unraveled by someone who wasn't qualified to read it. Possibly, up to and including the intended recipient. Mara was like that. Once puzzled out, it contained the following:

Late December 2020 A beach south of Freedom City It was a time, Sea Devil had assured everyone, of great importance. Hydra in her wisdom had provided a great blessing here in the coldest, darkest time of the year, a gift of food, and light, and shelter. Aquaria had guided her people to the site and with a little help from the Freedom League, the nearest tribe of Deep Ones had eaten well - and without conflict with surface-dwellers or Atlanteans. But most of that tribe was gone now, migrating out to the deep waters off the coast that stayed the same temperature in any season. So it was just Aquaria, her friends, and a few straggling Deep Ones to commemorate this rare blessing for her people. She had begged, pleaded with those she loved to help make this occasion a truly special one, and with a few promises of cleaning here and quiet there, she had won the help of important allies for a rare, glorious holiday amid a site made holy by the occasion. The best part was - it counted as community service hours, just the thing after the last time she'd gotten in a little trouble with the law of the Surfacers earlier in the year. Come to think of it, Indira had been there for that one too - maybe why she'd come along this time? It was hard to say. And so it was in late December that Sea Devil and Singularity crouched inside the almost completely skeletonized remains of a beached whale that Aquaria had assured all her Surfacer friends had been dead before her arrival there a couple of weeks before, Sea Devil wearing a crown of teeth and other bones and not much else to mark the role she played in the ceremony as Dagon, Jessie wearing - well, Jessie had preferred her own garb for the celebration and Aquaria could hardly blame her, the traditional Hydra garb not really being suitable for a great many reasons. Still she was here, making a sacrifice out of love, and as usual Aquaria was touched by emotions too profound for words. Crouched inside the skeleton, Aquaria laid a wet hand on Jessie's and hissed "You are the best friend anyone could want." Then she began to sing; a short, ponderous song about the blessing of the cold dark sea, and how in certain very special times of the year, Dagon and Hydra awarded their children special tokens of their esteem before she popped her head out of the rib cage and bellowed at the top of her lungs before adding a translation for the benefit of the humans in the audience - mostly a few volunteers from local communities and a couple of students from Claremont: AUSPICIOUS SEASON! Back inside, she turned a joyful smile on Jessie, an impressive sight indeed, and raised her two thumbs high to encourage Jessie to take her part. - Outside, Nightscale's extra credit project was certainly giving him something interesting to talk about. He was the oldest student there for once, a few first-years there in the company of Mr. Sadler, a parent volunteer who'd been a hero back in the far-off days of the early 1990s, being his Claremont escorts. There'd been music, and food already - hot apple cider brought over from the nearby small town, all of it locally caught fish fried over hot coals, though the 'locals' on the scene here were scaly fish-frogs that looked like they could bite his head off. The Deep Ones he'd seen in Claremont lectures had been fearsome beasts laying waste to Freedom City and fighting superheroes; the half-dozen here (besides Aquaria, the Deep One hero) didn't seem interested in much other than eating fish and watching the ceremony - though he was conscious occasionally of big black-and-gold eyes cast his way.

GM 5:30 PM, December 7th, 2020 Riverside, not too far from Riverside Park The Never-Ending Story was an interesting place to be. It was a small bookstore in Riverside, one that was known to be just the place to go to find rare books. Before his passing, Adrian Eldrich himself had been a common visitor. The book store was rarely busy, but it did well enough. The owner Andrew Orlando let his cats roam free among his book, while the portly gentleman puttered about. It was a peaceful place to be, it was a happy place to be, especially during Christmas time. At least, on every other day than today. Today, the sounds of struggles and things being pulled apart would meet a trio that just so happened to enter the building at the same time...

GM Wading Way, Freedom City November 22nd, 2020 3:00 PM The outside of a bank almost exploded as man in a golden battlesuit smashed through the windows, a large briefcase in his hand. He landed heavily on the pavement, looking up at the people on the street around him, quickly followed by a trio of people in silver colored battlesuits, all holding heavy suitcases of their own. The battlesuits appeared to be inspired by medieval knights armors, aside from the helmet of the golden one, at least, which sported a large red eye in the center of the helmet, which otherwise had no features. "We got the gold boss, now what?" One of the men in silver armor asked, drawing a groan of irritation from the man in the golden armor. "Then we run you idiot! Back to the headquarters, like we planned!" With sirens wailing in the distance, all four took off from the ground, heading through the city with powerful boot jets.

Hanover Bypass Thursday, November 26th, 2020 2:30 pm Lulu checked her reflection for the upteenth time in the rear view mirror of her Honda CR-V, making sure her hair was just right. It was going to be her first time meeting her boyfriend's parents, which young women are taught to treat very seriously in rural Alabama. Her makeup was perfect, her coppery tresses draped over her right shoulder in an artful cascade, and her green sweater and red pleated skirt were both flattering and tasteful. And in the back seat, her secret weapon: Southern cooking! Carefully secured to prevent movement were hearty portions of her Aunt June's green bean casserole, her mother's buttermilk biscuits, and her Grandma Grace's pecan bourbon pie. The smells that rose out of the containers were positively heavenly. "Your momma did say 3pm, right, hon? Not 3:30? Ah know ah asked before, but mah brain's turnin' cartwheels right now."

GM Millenium Mall, Midtown, Freedom City Early June, 2021 10:34 PM The sky was clear and dark above Freedom City on this particular night. The half moon shone among the stars, illuminating the night. Micah had been the one to first catch the news of a new movie coming out for the summer season, and he had suggested to Pan they should see it. Pan had brought Eira, and Eira had brought Lulu. The movie's title was "The Forever Boy". It was yet another retelling of the story of Peter Pan, and of course, they had to see it. It had all been very exciting, dark and gritty. A boy abandoned in Victorian London, found by Fae and whisked away to Neverland, flying and fighting pirates in great flying pirate ships, joined by Wendy and her family. Spectacular, visually impressive, but it didn't offer much new to the story. The climatic final scene had Peter Pan and Wendy teaming up to fight Captain Hook as his flying ship sailed across the sky above London, almost colliding with Big Ben, Tower Bridge and other sights along the way. As they left the mall, Pan was talking excitedly about it, holding hands apart while he mentioned how something was much smaller in real life. And above, in front of the glow of the half moon, a pirate ship sailed through the sky, towards the Millenium Mall.

GM An Eastern Seaboard Bank in Wading Way, Freedom City October 19th, 2020 11:45 AM It was peak hour, just around lunch. Everyone wanted to get banking done today, it seemed, and the bank had been stuffed when the gunmen arrived, rushing out of two armored vans and into the bank. They moved quickly, efficiently. They were trained, not just the run of the mill thugs, and they had the equipment to back it up. They were all dressed in black body armors with blacks masks that left only their eyes free. It wasn't quite clear what had happened inside, but a single shot was fired, followed by a burst of gunfire, and then, the hostage situation began. Ten minutes later the police had barricaded the bank. All they knew was that if anyone entered, the gunmen would start shooting the hostages. No demands, nothing. It was a stalemate.

GM Claremont Academy October 15th, 2020 5:00 PM Sebastian Shields had not been happy about the events of the day that he had returned to Claremont after the summer. No, the way everyone had acted, like he was not better than him? It was simply not acceptable. He had been busy, since then. If the newly enrolled students wouldn't give him the respect that he deserved, then he would teach them why they should respect him. He would be better than all of them. All he needed was a team. Eddie Fell was the logical choice. Of course Sebastian needed Chump. Any good team needed some muscles, and Eddie was loyal. He wouldn't even need a nudge to help. Charlene Hart had been by Sebastian's side for a while. The two had often been seen together, at least ever since he had convinced her to go to prom with him. He had helped her, he had calmed her down. She was loyal, would never disobey him. Toxin got to be the second member of the team, her mere touch would be enough to stop anyone from messing with him. Sebastian quickly decided that he didn't need more boys for his team. No, Chump was quite enough. Melanie Cutter was a good choice. No powers, but she had extensive training and she was a killer with that bladed whip. He even liked her codename, Stinger, even if the redhead would probably challenge him a bit more than he would like, but that was fine. Sebastian would enjoy convincing her otherwise. Finally, the team needed some legitimacy, so of course he made friends with Cassie Dugan. Having the vice-principal's daughter on the team would open doors, and she filled in the much needed spot of a flier. She didn't really want to do it, but she did like the attention it would get her. Bluebird probably wouldn't cause too much trouble for Sebastian. So, his team had been set, and on October 1st, Sebastian made a big show out of presenting his group to everyone. Of course, no one else needed to do anything anymore. After all, they were the new big team at Claremont: The New Young Freedom. They had been busy in the few weeks after that, breaking curfew, fighting bad guys and punks. Not really any super villains or anything like that, and of course they did it in secret. Not like anyone would tell on them, that would just get others in trouble too. But... there were rumors. Maybe they had beaten up some kids for just causing a bit of trouble. Maybe the kids had not really done anything really bad, at least not something that deserved that? Maybe it was just a rumor. After all, they were heroes, right? Maybe not everyone trusted Casanova.