Futuristic Heroes of Tomorrow

[.empathogen.]

B R E A K

But if you really want to live, why not try and make yourself?

can't... stop... now!

the incubus

Will I ever get to where I'm going?

fine again

— seether

mood: done
location: Trev and Andre's Room, Mt. Justice
mentions: Mikey, Andre

scroll

One Week Later...

"Son, what were you thinking?"

Theo sat in the chair nearest to Trevor's door. Jean stood against the window pane, the glass making up for the entirety of the wall. Although they were a reasonable distance away from each other. The two were united in their concern for the events that transpired on his first mission, though they had very different ways of conveying that.

"He wasn't thinking, that's the whole point. You never saw to it to have him interact with other people, so it never occurred to him that he could ask for help instead of prying his head apart and sizzling what sense he does have." Jean sighed, closing her eyes as the rain pattered against the window glass. Trevor sat in silence, staring at the wall hard enough to rip it to pieces if he wanted to. He wanted to cry as he heard their ongoing lecture. Words began to fade into a muffled rythym. He already knew what he did was dangerous, he knew it when he pushed himself that far to begin with. Up until that morning, he was in a coma, medically induced. He had to let himself heal because they could not figure out how deeply he'd damaged his brain when he overdid it. Mikey wouldn't have been able to survive the trauma if Trevor had fried all his own synapses and rendered himself a vegetable.

He couldn't remember what he dreamt about, other than the fact that it was all white.

"He cannot just do that to himself over and over again. This time, he was lucky."

"This is all your fault. You put those walls up in his head...because you were scared of what he could do!"

"FOR GOOD REASON! YOU. DON'T. KNOW. WHAT. HE. CAN. DO! That's a higher threat than you'll ever understand and if you were a good father, you would have ended it at the start!"

"That's enough, both of you," Trevor said, standing up. The words they were saying didn't even phase him, as weird as the dialogue was."I fucked up, I get it. But, I saved some lives doing that. Isn't that what all of this is about? Now, If you don't mind, I'd like to wallow in my sorrows without either of you here. Get out." At the same time, the door swung open, slamming against the doorjamb. Jean was the first to leave, not saying a word. Theo stood and placed a hand on his son's shoulder.

"Call home soon, I miss you," he said, patting Trevor before leaving as well. Trevor walked behind them and locked the main room door. He then padded over to the couch that sat in the living room of his and Andre's space. He waited there for his mystical roommate, wanting to ask him if there were any magical remedies for his mind and the "walls" that were apparently there. It struck him odd that they'd keep something like that from him until now.

But, what was odder was the fact that the two hadn't told him that they'd stopped talking long before that and he had read their minds.

© reveriee

 

[KingofAesir]

Freddie MacNeil

A week of recuperation time seemed enough for most of them. Fred supposed it might have been longer if Mikey hadn’t been able to heal the majority of the group’s wounds. She still hated that he’d done that, mind, and every time she flexed her left wing a phantom pang of pain would shoot down her spine and she suspected it was because it reminded her of everything that had gone down. She had spent most of that week wheeling Kat around like a bat out of hell because of this strange need to make the other woman laugh. Fred had decided she’d rather not look too far into the implications of that, it didn’t matter anyway. The last time Fred had really cared about another person like that had ended terribly and she was frankly a little terrified of it happening again. So, she’d have to do what she did best and steadfastly ignore all her thoughts and feelings about Kat or really any of her teammates. Scribble them away under a leather cover and lock them in a drawer. That’s exactly what she did, in the end. Wrote. Filed away the way her chest ached when Kat smiled at her, and how Lex made her feel a level of comfort in their shared space that she had never felt around someone else before, and the kinship she felt with Jude and their strangely similar outlooks, God she’d even written about Daniel and stupid trust.

But none of those thoughts would ever be spoken out loud to their respective focuses, that’s why they were locked away in that drawer, she couldn’t risk that level of honesty without the potential for it to cause her to lose people she had just started to like. They had already come so terribly close to dying and Fred was all the less inclined to let herself get too close. If she kept that wall up, kept them at a safe distance, it would hurt less if they left. It was becoming more difficult to do so the more time she spent with her team but to hell if she wasn’t stubborn enough. Since the fight Fred had been replaying every decision, she’d made repeatedly in her head. Maybe if she hadn’t tried to run she could have been in good enough shape to help Kat, or warm Jude with her sword (not that she even knew how to make it do all of that magic-y stuff yet), and then maybe Daniel wouldn’t have gotten so torn to shreds and Mikey wouldn’t have had to heal the both of them. It all seemed to just circle back to if she hadn’t tried to run and it was grating on her. She had tried to run, to leave them all behind a kind of singular minded self-preservation instinct that she hadn’t yet been able to shake. It was ripping her up inside that she had almost done that. If that robot hadn’t broken her wing she would’ve run away. But then those thoughts would fall back to the fact that if she hadn’t tried to fly away, she would have died. Somehow that felt like the better option anyway, she would rather have died then watch Daniel carrying Kat’s limp body through the chaos again. She would rather die then ever feel that helpless again.

Freddie shuffled into the training room with a heavy fog over her mind; trying to sort out all the guilt and regret swirling around up there. She was looking forward to hitting something or someone to distract her from those thoughts, but their oh-so-awesome babysitters seemed to have other ideas. The moment Dick opened his mouth and started spewing shit about disappointment and show-offing and dead civilians she wanted to rip his head off. The fog she’d been in was replaced by a hot coiling anger in her gut. What the fuck was this guy even going on about? Several of them had almost died trying to save people and he had the nerve to stand there and talk to them about disappointment. Her gaze flicked over Kat and then Daniel and Jude and her jaw worked painfully. He started calling partners and Fred ignored the sinking feeling in her chest when Kat and Lex were both paired with someone else. She didn’t think much about the pairings as she moved to stand next to Andre and Trevor, arms crossed over her chest, wings drawn tight against her. When he finished speaking Fred decided she didn’t want to be silent anymore.

“I don’t know what fucking battle you were watching, Dick.” Fred never spoke much louder than a decibel above a loud whisper, but she was projecting now, making sure everyone could hear, “We were majorly outnumbered, those things were programmed to kill specifically us and half of us were minutes away from dying when the fucking cavalry finally decided they’d better wake the fuck up.” She had kept her gaze trained on a spot on Dick’s face right below his eyes but she chanced to move them up now, “Daniel almost died saving our teammates and Mikey pushed himself way to far healing us. We didn’t need your disappointment speech, Dad, I think that whole trauma-inducing experience was enough.” Fred sucked in a breath harshly through her nose, turning on her heel with a glance back at her partners to the day and leaving the room before she let herself say anything else.

Fucking stupid.


Mentions: Kat a z u l a , Lex hery , Jude birth of venus , Daniel Fill , Andre Xen6n , Trevor .empathogen. Interactions: Dick u suck dick

coded by: @s e v e n

 

[Xen6n]

CODE BY SEROBLISS

André Le Vaughn

Sorcerer & Scientist

"You seemed troubled, Andre"

Andre's astral form floated beside Maitreya as they both basked in the view of the Himalayan mountains across them in Shambhala. It's been a week since their failure of the mission in Star City and it's been bothering Andre for a while, something Maitreya seemed to sense halfway across the planet when she asked him to meet her in Shambhala to talk. It always surprises him how well she knew him, it was as if she knew him more than Andre knew himself, and he was proud to be taught by such a wise figure. So when Andre went to meet her, he had expected her to be disappointed in him but instead, he was met with a warm smile as both of them said nothing to each other, just enjoying the natural view of the vast scenery.

"Aren't you disappointed in me, from what happened?". Andre finally broke the silence with a look of guilt and concern as he turned to face Maitreya who seemed unphased by his assumption, continuing to enjoy the view. "And why should I?". Her response ticked him off, she was his prized pupil and he couldn't even function properly out on the field, going against everything Maitreya taught him. Remembering everything from what he did on the mission made him internally cringe, what was he thinking casting a banishment spell on a horde of robots knowing more would come, and that's not all, he barely had any energy within him and almost killed himself for being reckless. As if reading his mind, she spoke before he could.

"A failure is not always a mistake, it may simply be the best one can do under the circumstances. The real mistake is to stop trying. When you attempted your first invocation to summon Cyttorak's Crimson Bands, did it work?". Maitreya questioned him when she turned to face him as he shook his head in reply. Andre knew she was right, he didn't, even to this day he gets no answer when he invokes the Vishanti. He wasn't trained to be a superhero, so it's only natural that he wouldn't nor the others would be good at it.

"So stop sulking in your room and talk to someone. And please get some sleep, I taught you the spell to keep Nightmare away countless times and you have Phantasos' Draught to put you to sleep to help with your insomnia."

"Fine, but I have to get going", knowing if he didn't, Maitreya will personally yeet him in another dimension when she finds out he stole the Sands of Morpheus from her.

"Alright, and make sure to eat too"

Andre's astral from soon disappeared in front of Maitreya as it went back to his body at the speed of thought. Feeling hungry from the trip, he went to his fridge to look for something to eat and he groaned as he saw the only meal he had was dead, multi-dimensional parasitic worms in a bowl. He didn't groan because of the worms, but because they were dead. "Really, now I have to eat you when you're dead". He muttered to himself and took the bowl out of the fridge, setting it on his table as he grabbed a fork from the small kitchen drawer in his room, ready to dig in.

Andre devoured the worm-like creatures like he haven't eaten in days, which was accurate. It was a revolting sight to any but he had to eat it, from constantly using magic, his body changed to only receiving mystical foods and other dimensional nutrients (whatever that means). And the taste didn't help at all, it was like eating rotten meat that was covered in maggots. But he eventually got used to it, so after his little "lunch", he walked out of his room to see if the actual kitchen in Mt Justice had anything to wash away the sour taste in his mouth. Only to be met with Trevor sitting down on the couch within their living area in their dorm, a place he rarely ever so visits.

"You okay?", he asked Trevor when he saw Trevor sitting down looking conflicted and deep in his thoughts. Ever since he lived with the psychic, Andre thought of them to be the most tolerable in this place and began developing a liking for them, which he won't express for reasons. He assumed that they might be thinking about the mission and how terribly embarrassing it was for all of them. I mean, who wouldn't, they were utter garbage out there and they couldn't do anything to reverse the damage.

.empathogen.

 

[.empathogen.]

B R E A K

Claim it all, Nothing gold can stay

discover/the/end

the incubus

Will I ever get to where I'm going?

fine again

— seether

mood: done
location: Mt. Justice
interactions: Freddie, Andre

scroll

It was like a wave of near haptic reassurance hearing Andre's voice coming from the left side of their shared space. The level of corcern jolted Trevor from his hazy thoughts, bringing him back to the sharp sense of reality. His head still buzzed though, frantically searching for answers to a question that had yet to reveal itself. He decided to give it up, at least for now. Nothing good could come from a demise of stability in a place where the word "stable" was little more than a last bastion for those clueless enough to think it could apply to themself. He smiled sheepishly at Andre. It was good to see his face, sometimes.

"Yeah," he replied, stretching out and forward with his weight pushed on the balls of his feet. "But, I have a question. Say, someone wanted to block you from using the fullest extent of your powers...could that be done? Like...lately...I feel like my mind is breaking apart sometimes. And, I just heard my dad and Ms. Grey saying something about ending things from the start." He sat back, head facing the ceiling and blinking back tears that threatened to well up and spill over into the mess that he was becoming.

"I'm so fucking tired. I've been doing this since I was a kid. I have no friends...no family. And, I'm supposed to pretend that it's all okay...I'm tired of being 'okay'. I want to be great, one day. Even if it's for one grand moment, if it'll make up for all of this." He then burst out in a fit of uncontrollable laughter. Trevor was afraid he was losing his shit. He stood up, facing Andre with a blank stare. He then took the man's hand and clasped it in his own. "Thanks for listening." he said solemnly, kissing his fingertips then letting go and wandering out of their unit. As he marched briskly down the hallway he licked his lips, Andre's taste comforting him a little.
---

Great. Trevor could just feel the vivid range of emotions rolling off of Freddie as they were paired up in a mock attempt to inspire comradire. To him, this seemed rushed and, frankly, he just wanted to sleep a little before he had to help prepare the meal for that night (it was theraputic for him to be involved in as many tasks that required his complete attention as he could get). At least the Sorcerer would be involved. And so, the thought was as simple as it was brilliant. If he could not get any shut eye, he'd get as close to numbing his mind as possible while fufilling the bonding drill: Group Meditation. He blankly followed Freddie out of the room, beckoning Andre to follow close behind.

After her outburst, the woman seemed a little bit on edge. They came to the Rock Garden, which Dick tended to with keen precision. Lines and grooves drawn in the rock bed looked...calming, and orderly. Trevor stepped out onto the pattern, one foot at a time. He liked it, the controlled chaos of his own making, bringingsomething different to the norm. It was liberating, even though it was a run of the mill Zen Garden.

"Come on," he called out to the others, who followed him out to where he planted his butt in the rocks like a sunflower. "Now,"he said, looking at them with a pseudo-guru look in his eye, "I was going to suggest that we...meditate. Empty our minds and relax today. Then, afterwards, we can share thoughts, feelings, and all that shit. Any other suggestions?" he asked, giving them a chance to back out. Freddie still seemed pissed, to the point where Trevor was starting to feel just a tiny bit pulled into her emotions from his empatic side of his powerset. 'Nothing to worry about,' he hoped as he looked at his friends.

© reveriee

 

[KingofAesir]

Freddie MacNeil

Trust was a fragile, small thing. Fred’s hands hand never held something so fragile. Her fingers had been curled too tightly around it and it had withered and died under her pressure. But that had been okay, she didn’t know it was dead. Schrödinger’s Cat. If she didn’t open her hands to look it would never really be dead. But the disappointed tone in Dick’s voice and Donna standing behind with an expression Fred hated looking at had forcibly pried her hands open. Now she knew that fragile trust was dead. No more cat.

Anger was a familiar feeling to Fred, but it was often no more than a low simmering in her chest that she could easily stoke down. Now it felt like fire in her throat, like if she opened her mouth, it might spew out and burn everything. It was strange. She couldn’t even begin to understand why it was so intense. Or maybe she just didn’t want to.

Freddie’s back was ramrod straight and her chin was tilted up and back as she walked. The walls were white. She hated this place, really. Everything was so perfectly pristine and new. It was a strange, sharp contrast with the only other form of home she had ever known before. Her childhood had been dark corners and musty wood, this was gleaming walls and wide windows. A cave might be more comfortable for her. They had spent weeks here, training, living, existing together and all the comfort, all the trust she had managed to cobble together with the people around her had been so fragile. The logical part of her knew that Dick and Donna hadn’t sent them out so blind, so vulnerable like that on purpose. Knew that they hadn’t known. But there was still that small girl, watching her father put the barrel of a gun to her mother’s head. It felt like betrayal to her, and Dick’s parental speech had only made it worse.

Fred was an old, crumbling house, and belladonna was growing in her cracking façade. There was a snake in the garden. Judas had turned his back. Et tu, Brute? There was a heart beating under the floorboards, but was it her own or someone else’s?

The air felt charged and staticky as the three of them stepped out into the rock garden. The moment before a lightening strike. Damocles sword hanging above her head by a string. The vertigo of standing on the edge of a sheer cliff. Freddie’s fingers pressed into her palms in her pockets, sickle shapes in her skin. Trevor was suggesting something about meditating and Freddie could not feel more disconnected from everything. Sitting there and closing her eyes with him would require her to think about the storm of feelings sitting heavy in her chest. She did not want to think.

“Any other suggestions?” Trevor asked and Freddie felt his eyes skip over her and Andre. She had several suggestions, most of which included destroying Dick’s stupid rock garden or maybe just him in general. But she couldn’t say anything like that without sounding like she had lost her mind. There was only one spirit here. It was wavering in and out of visibility somewhere off in the corner. If she stared hard enough, she could see the soft curve of a jaw, the hard line of a brow. A woman, she decided. It wasn’t looking at her. Instead, its focus seemed to be trained somewhere off in the distance. Fred did not try and follow the gaze, tearing her eyes away from the shadow.

“Yes, actually.” Freddie started, carding her hands aggressively through her hair, “Literally anything else but this. God, who does Dick think he is? We’re disappointed in you.” She scoffed, feathers bristling against her back.

“What a load of fucking bullshit. I don’t know why the hell I’m here listening to high and mighty idiots tell me what the fuck to do. Tell me they’re so disappointed in me like—like he’s my goddamn parent or something.” She was growing more and more frantic by the second, pacing about like a caged animal, “We all almost died. Died. Dead. Gone. And he has the audac—” Freddie cut herself off, stopping abruptly.

“This is their fault. They sent all of us out there without any…without any knowledge or anything. They should have known, right, it’s their job to know shit? It’s their fucking fault and I want to rip his throat out.” Fred breathed sharply through her nose. Her hands laced together at the back of her neck and she cast her gaze up at the ceiling.

They should have known. Their fault.

Daniel smiling past his bloody face. Mikey breaking himself repeatedly. Jude, cold on a gurney. Lex wide eyed against the chaos. Kat laying in a hospital bed, broken and quiet. Freddie didn’t think she’d ever be rid of those images. She hated them.

She wanted to rip their throats out.



Mentions: Kat a z u l a , Lex hery , Jude birth of venus , Daniel Fill Interactions: Trevor .empathogen. , Andre Xen6n

coded by: @s e v e n

 

[a z u l a]

Kataly'a.

determined — outfit — red team — everyone

Time had passed and yet, the smoke and ash of Star City's rubbles still hung heavy in Kat's lungs. Everyone had properly healed and resumed training activities, but each member of the team seemed to not have the same drive they'd had just a few weeks ago before their first mission had gone to absolute hell.

The reality of hero work had almost crushed them before they'd begun. On Almerac, Kataly'a did not have to worry about protecting her fellow soldiers pr civilians because they were all equally as strong and capable. Not to say that her human partners weren't, but she was capable of much more damage here and that meant she had to be much more careful.

To know that her collision with those two buildings had resulted in death weighed heavy on her overly compassionate heart. She found herself walking around the base instead of flying, her mood too low to lift herself or her spirits off the ground. She tried to keep up a chipper appearance for her teammates, but she had never been good at lying.

There were brief moments of joy, like when Fred and Jude pushed her and Daniel down the hallway in a race, or when her friends were able to find the strength to smile or laugh. That always brought a smile to her face.

But Kataly'a knew that she would not feel better until she was back on the battle field again, able to prove that she was not just a destructive mess. The thought of being back on the field and screwing up again loomed heavy over her, because while she could bounce back from one big mistake, she was not sure she would survive another.

So when the alarm rang to signal another mission, Kat's stomach twisted with a bittersweet sense of hope and doom. It was time for the Heroes of Tomorrow to show that the Justice League had not made a mistake in picking them as their successors.

"We are receiving two strange signals from the outskirts of Star City. The coordinates lead to two abandoned warehouses, no signs of life have been detected yet. This is most likely a taunt from the person responsible for the Star City invasion. This could very well be a trap, so be on your guard." Donna explained the situation, completely calm and reassuring. Kat respected how well she held herself together, how much she believed in the Heroes of Tomorrow even after they had monumentally fucked up.

"You'll be splitting into teams of two. Red team is Damion, Daniel, Kataly'a, Freddie, Kai, Mikey, and Jude. Blue Team is Lex, Andre, Reese, Sybil, Eli, Mika, and Trevor."

Kataly'a looked around at her teammates, trying to categorize their strengths and weaknesses to come up with a battle strategy. She felt much better to have both Freddie and Daniel on her team. Daniel had saved her during the last mission, risking his life to help everyone and paying the price. Fred was...well Fred was very special to Kat, and a strong warrior.

With murmurs of apprehension and tight smiles, the two teams split into two sets of zeta tubes. They had agreed to split into two smaller groups upon arrival, one team going around the back and one in the front. The warehouse was large, and Kat floated beside Freddie as they approached the back entrance. Through the comms piece, Daniel counted down from five, and Kat charged through the metal door at full strength, knocking the door off its hinges.

The moment they stepped inside, the trap sprung. The warehouse was set up as a maze, and even flying up towards the ceiling Kat could not see her comrades on the other side.

They were trapped, but at least this time they had known what they were walking into. They had faced the worst, and now they were prepared.

Robots came quickly towards them from around the corner of the maze, but not nearly in the number they had been in Star City. This fight would be different.

"Comrades! Let us be victorious!" Kat cried before throwing herself directly into the nearest robot.

This time, they would win.

 

[KingofAesir]

Freddie MacNeil

There was something painful about feeling so helpless as Fred had the weeks after their fantastic failure. A painful pressure had begun to build around her head to the point where she felt like her ears might pop from the strength of it. It was the same feeling she got when she ascended from the ground too quickly, a foggy cloud over her mind. The out of tune, haunting melody that had been guiding her was rising to it’s shaky crescendo. She was restless. Everyday that passed without an opportunity to redeem themselves was agonizing. Freddie had never been a particularly patient woman and the building feelings of failure were helping nothing. She tried to imagine what her brother would say to her with his gentle, carefully chosen words. Nothing would come to mind.

The spirits that often inhabited the halls of Mt. Justice had been annoyingly active. A man, who Fred had decided must have been from a time far before them with his out-of-date mannerisms, had been particularly nagging to her. He stationed himself in her shared space with Lex, always standing just in her vision like he knew it got on her nerves. Freddie felt bad for him, she did, his form was shaky and flickered in and out of existence like he might cease at any moment. But there was nothing she could do. Fred didn’t have time to go traipsing around trying to help wayward spirits. She had living people to worry about now. So, she ignored him to the best of her ability until one day he wasn’t there anymore.

The nightmares hadn’t been particularly pleasant either. Not that she wasn’t used to them, Fred had been plagued by nightmares since her abilities manifested. Spirits tended to bleed into the unconscious and their memories and feelings haunted her sleeping hours just as much as her waking ones. But these were not the dreams of ghosts. No. The nightmares she had been having since their defeat were solely her own. They were mostly comprised of the worst outcomes, Jude’s fire fizzling out, Lex’s light snuffed away, Daniel fallen, Mikey broken, Kat—Fred tried not to read too far into them. A wicked darkness was curling around the edge of her consciousness, and she feared she knew exactly what was causing it. The fractured memory of her father hung in front of her, a reflection of things she had tried so hard to avoid.

When Donna had called them all together, it had been a welcome relief from her own thoughts. It was comforting to know that what they were walking into could be a trap. They would be prepared this time. Fred thought, with a sense of relief, that they wouldn’t ever be surprised quite like that again. Donna seemed far more assured as she sent them out on their own again and Fred found solace in her assuredness. It helped that the team she had been assigned to was one she herself felt confident in. This time would be much different, it had to be.

Fred’s heartbeat was steady, and her hands hung loosely at her sides as she made her way up to the warehouse, Kat at her side. It remained steady as Daniel’s voice filtered through the comms, counting them down. Kat wasted not a second once he had finished and Fred followed swiftly behind, hand curled around the hilt of her sword. Fred marveled for a moment as the doors flew off their hinges, but her appreciation for Kat’s destructive abilities was quickly interrupted by the expected. It was a trap. Freddie cursed, loudly, as those same damn robots descended on them. It was a very unwelcome reminder, but Fred’s movements this time around were much more confident. She knew how to handle them. There were wires in their necks, a vulnerable area that Fred could take advantage off easily with her sword. Decapitating robots, Fred grinned as she spun into action, a wonderful way to spend her time. Fred shoved a few metal demons away from her with a flick of her wing and glanced up at Kat.

“Be careful, they could’ve sent another aluminum one again! Watch your back!” Freddie seized one of the machines by its neck as she rose into the air with a wing beat and flung it bodily at another one approaching her teammate from behind. The clash that sounded was pleasing her ears. "You're welcome." She grinned wildly at Kat before she returned to fighting

“I am really getting fucking tired of goddamn robots.” Another metal head fell to the floor with a clunk.



Mentions:Lex hery , Jude and Mikey birth of venus , Daniel Fill Interactions: Kat a z u l a

coded by: @s e v e n

 

[Twin Fantasy]

maki

• .
• .
• .
• .
• .

• ,
• how are you feeling?

  fuck this shit fr
• outfit
• location

  warehouse maze
• mentions

  Red Team

  interactions

  none yet
  this thing scrolls whee

“Warning: If you are reading this then this warning is for you. Every word you read of this useless fine print is another second off your life. Don't you have other things to do? Is your life so empty that you honestly can't think of a better way to spend these moments? Or are you so impressed with authority that you give respect and credence to all that claim it? Do you read everything you're supposed to read? Do you think every thing you're supposed to think? Buy what you're told to want? Get out of your apartment. Meet a member of the opposite sex. Stop the excessive shopping and masturbation. Quit your job. Start a fight. Prove you're alive. If you don't claim your humanity you will become a statistic. You have been warned.”

Maki had been out-of-commission. It was probably lucky on her part, since apparently her cohorts absolutely borked their first mission, but no doubt they could've used her assistance. Maybe they wouldn't have been beaten within an inch of their lives if she hadn't sprained her ankle in an extremely embarrassing incident that involved a tennis ball and a plate of Chinese take-out. She finally rolled up to receive her first mission only to realize that it was a goddamn teamwork exercise. You've gotta be fucking kidding me.

Still, she rolled up to the abandoned warehouse that the Red Team had gathered at after being given a hasty command from Donna, who had a look on her face like she nearly forgot Maki existed. Checking the material of the walls, it seemed to be regular metal, so she could easily pop right on past it. So she attempted to sense the floor just past the wall and popped right on through... And she was stuck. Whatever material had been used to construct this maze trap, she could get inside just fine, but couldn't get back out. Her portalling would be restricted to being within the walls of this maze -- something she was NOT used to.

Most buildings, y'know, aren't built using specialized materials to prevent superheroes from cracking through. Fair amount of foresight, but these kinds of materials were becoming more and more available, at least as far as Maki had heard -- it keeps villains from shooting eyeball lasers through important buildings.

"Tits." She grunted in irritation. Without much attempt at pre-planning, she ran ahead towards the robots, managing to land a strong kick against ones big stupid piece-of-shit face. It wasn't downed, but it did seem at least a little stunned. Unfortunately, the warehouse ceiling was further than 20 feet from where Maki was standing, so she couldn't just send them all falling to the ground one-by-one. Of course. Nothing could EVER be easy.

As another bot closed in, she hit it with an elbow. The solid metal impact made her hand fall asleep, but she just had to deal with it for now.

coded by reveriee.

 

[kevin]

Damion Greywolf

Failure. Weak. Disappointment. Those are the words that were engraved in Damion's brain after failing the last mission. Agatha didn't go easy on him when she heard the disappointing news. It made him spiral into a mild depression. He mostly spent his time in his room, avoiding talking to others, and barely eating. He knows it also had a very negative impact on the others and it made him feel even worse. Not even the brightest ones were able to lighten up the mood. But not only was he just wasting in his room but Damion also had been reading every single book he could on magic in combat. He did okay on the first mission but not well enough to help the others succeed. Every night he closes his eyes, it's the same nightmare. Him being crushed by bots, his throat burning as he screamed for help at the top of his lungs, and the sharp pain of his bones breaking. It was horrible for him but he was going to have to recover because he'd never be a true hero if he shut everyone out and go ghost every time they failed.

When Damion heard the siren go off again, he panicked. He was scared. He wasn't sure if he could do it, but he knew he had to. Going into his bathroom, he splashed water on his face and examined the bags under his eyes. He laced up his shoes and made his way out, squinting as the bright light from the outside hit his face. He followed everyone else and listened to their new mission. Robots, again. His stomach turned and he suddenly felt sick. He didn't want to face them again but it was time. They had been split into two teams and he found himself on a team of skilled people. He knew they would do well if they put their minds to it. Damion and the others made their way to the warehouse Donna told them to go to. It was quiet at first when they approached it but that changed very quickly.

Bots came flying out and his teammates got to work fighting. He flew straight up into the air and got to work. His arms moved faster than last time, he knew what to do. He now could take on more than two at a time, now he could take on 4-5 at a time. He moved his hands in different directions, shredding through the robots like paper. He let his anger take control as he remembered the outcome of the last mission. It was getting a bit easier for him as he flew back and forth, ripping apart bots and helping his teammates when too many came out at once. Being up in the air made it easier for him to see what he was doing and he was doing a good job getting these bots down.

coded by: @s e v e n​

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[.empathogen.]

B R E A K

Claim it all, Nothing gold can stay

discover/the/end

the incubus

Will I ever get to where I'm going?

I'm Not Made By Design

— Nothing But Theives

mood: focused, 110%
location: Undisclosed Warehouse-B
interactions: Team Blue

scroll

Trevor grunted, pulling himself up the side paneling of the warehouse as the rain began pouring over him. This time was gonna be different. He was the camera, giving Sybil, the team's eyes, a chance to decipher the layout for everyone else. Trev scaled the rooftop, silently taking out a goon without touching him. The evolution of his powers was growing each and every day without his mentors' help.

"You guys getting this?" He asked over comms, one less strain on his mind--though it did feel stickier than using his powers. The goons were human at this location, which wasn't an advantage. There would be no room for error, even less than the "Robots from Hell". Trevor slipped down onto a few beams beneath an air shaft. He watched as the goons carried machinery toward a super computer. On the farther side of the building it seemed like they were trying to boot up some robots but were having a hard time with the computations.

"Okay, some of you can follow me up here and some can choke the opening ingress, making sure no one escapes. There are currently no bots, yet, so take it easy on em. The goal is to get whatever is on the computer. That's where their concentration is at." He said quietly, pulling out a set of knunchucks as he crept up on a ledge above the workers.

© reveriee

 

[Fill]

Daniel B. Spencer

Five. Four. Three. Two. One.

Daniel's fists reverberated against the simulated enemies. His feet slamming into the sides of faux-opponents. Weeks of training in the sim lab had been spent. Every night. And those same nights, Daniel erased any and all data of his presence being there. He didn't want his teammates to worry about his lack of sleep or how he constantly strained his body and mind. No, they were better off not knowing. They'd try and stop him, he thinks. And he could not let that happen. Not when he had been so close to failure last time.

People nearly died because of him not being strong enough, fast enough. Not this time.

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Five. Four. Three. Two. One.

Daniel awoke to the alarm. Another mission. Of course. The one day he decided to sleep in after training his ass off. Daniel pushed himself to sit upright, groggily wiping the sleep from his eyes. Immediately, his alien suit morphed around his body, forming a pair of pants and a shirt along with socks and shoes. At least he would not need to dress up. Daniel opened the doors and hoped no one would notice the small bags under his eyes.

There would be two teams to breach this warehouse. The red team comprised of Damion, Kataly'a, Freddie, Kai, Mikey, and Jude, and himself while the Blue Team held Lex, Andre, Reese, Sybil, Eli, Mika, and Trevor. It seems someone would need to be the team leader for each if this were to go well. Daniel simply raised his arm.

"I guess I'll lead the charge for my team."

Why not? Someone had to take point on this.

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"Five. Four. Three. Two. One. Go!"

So much for the silent approach. Kat's propensity for gunning for the enemy loud and proud would need a little work in. The rest of the red team followed with Damion and Freddie being the first to watch Kat's back and follow her into the warehouse. He almost stepped in after them before stopping. The lenses of his mask widened and his sixth sense began to tingle a little. Danger. Danger inside not dissimilar to . . . Robots. And a giant maze began to form and shift around them. He should stay outside, find a way to pull his friends out of the maze, just in case.

And leave them to die? Like he almost did last time? Last time he had to run in and pull them out of danger. It went-. No, this time he would keep them close. Time to go in. Firing two lines of webbing on either side of the door frame, Daniel pulled back before slingshotting himself through the narrow doorway. He soared through the air, far ahead of his teammates before firing two web-lines at the ground and launching himself toward the ground before slamming both his fist and feet into the ground, creating a shockwave around his person. A black-gloved hand snapped out and snatched one robot by the head, twisting it to the side before snapping it. Daniel then picked up its arm, letting loose a small amount of purple-shaded bio-electricity. The bot's gun began to go off.

Daniel smirked before he began aiming at the other parts, running and gunning. He was working his way back to his teammates. In a way, it was like a pincer attack. He fought them form behind and his team fought them from the front. A good strategy.

He tapped a finger to the comms, feeling a little like cracking a joke might help elevate the mood, "I dunno, Freddie. I feel like I look kinda sexy when I trash these bots."

He fired a web-line at one before yanking it off the ground and spinning it over his head before tossing it at another group, knocking them down like bowling pins.

"We should bet something on whoever trashes the most bots. Anyone else want in on that action?"

Interactions: Red Team, Freddie MacNeil - KingofAesir

Mentions: Red Team

coded by: @s e v e n​

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[jones573]

They'd talked to her about this- Joining missions more directly. It would be 'valuable experience' and 'good for team building' and some other things that Sybil had ignored, too focused on her indignation to be paying attention.

So it wasn't a total surprise when Donna announced her as part of the Blue Team. It was still pretty damn annoying though. Obviously, they'd ignored her argument for why she shouldn't join missions as much as she'd ignored theirs for why she should. As far as Sybil was concerned, the most she could do in-person on a mission was get in the way. Plus, she didn't really trust their mentors to run the tech aspect of the mission- A criticism she'd had no issue voicing, though it hadn't gotten her anywhere.

"I'll keep an eye on everyone," she announced.That was another thing she'd been talked to about- Apparently, borrowing her teammates' eyes without asking was 'rude' and 'practically spying'.

She didn't really see the point in asking permission- With a few exceptions, it wasn't like they were going to know she had done it, so what was the harm? And it did help her, to be able to see in color and from multiple angles.

Like just a minute ago as she sulked through the zeta-tube to their destination, she'd been primarily watching through the black eye painted on her outer blindfold, and using her cane to make sure she didn't bump into anything. But when she'd shifted her vision to include her teammates' sight as well- It became much more obvious where she was going, and she'd collapsed her cane into its baton form for better defense.

"Hearing you loud and clear," Sybil told Trevor, camped with the others outside the warehouse. They were huddled against the outer wall to try and stay out of the rain, but water still ran down her hair and face, creeping under her dark glasses and soaking her blindfold. Ugh.

They were next to one of the warehouse's side doors, secured by a scanner that had to be badged through. Sybil had already attached a small computing device to it and entered a series of commands, and it was humming slightly as it worked.

She pressed a button on the watch-like device she was wearing, and a holographic display popped up. She immediately began drawing on it with a stylus, sketching out what Trevor was seeing.

He was- annoyingly- pretty good at being her eyes, looking at things long enough that she could properly gauge them, but still making sure to get every possible view. She'd avoided looking through him up until this point since she figured he'd be able to tell, and wondered if he was a naturally observant person, or just being intentional because he knew she was watching.

"Computer is here," Sybil pointed on her drawing. "People bringing stuff to it are coming and going along here- There's lots of tall shelving covering this section," she said, drawing a large circle that encompassed a good portion of the layout, "As well as the walkways on the ceiling across the whole warehouse, so plenty of places for you to get the jump on someone."

"The most heavily armed people appear to be guards of some sort, flanking the computing unit," she said. She assumed they were guards at least, because otherwise they were extremely lazy workers, just standing around while the others did all the ferrying and building. "The rest of the workers do have holsters of some sort, so be cautious- But it could just as easily be for a parts scanner as a weapon, bit hard to tell from above," she admitted.

"In this far corner are our robotic friends," she said, indicating where she'd written in an 'R' for each of the bots she'd counted. "They aren't on and I'd love to keep it that way- Ideally, they don't activate, we don't have to destroy them, and we get to take one home to study."

She'd been dissecting the parts they'd manage to salvage from the first bot attack and while she was certain their base model was designed off Lex Corp schematics, it wasn't a lot to go on. Especially since the software had been remotely wiped by someone much better at erasing things than she was at recovering them.

"And Red Team," she said, momentarily shifting her focus to check in on their counterparts. A robot went careening across Kat's field of vision. "Is probably not going to be any help with that particular goal," she concluded.

"If you go in the main entryway," she said, pointing to it on her layout. "Stick to the right- Otherwise you'll risk being seen by the fellows working on the bots."

"As for the other doors- They need a badge to get in and out of," she explained. Her mini computer stopped its humming and beeped quietly. Sybil went over to it and scrolled through a few options before making her selections "Or they did. As of right now- The warehouse can be entered via any of the side doors, but not exited. So. You know. Go wild. Good luck or whatever."

Sybil didn't really have much for parting words of wisdom, but she gave her teammates a half-hearted salute as they headed for the doors or scampered up the side of the building to follow Trevor.

 

[a z u l a]

Kataly'a.

in awe — outfit — everyone, fred, daniel — KingofAesir

Kataly'a had never seen anything quite so beautiful in her short time on Earth. The local park looked like a tiny solar system, twinkling lights were twined throughout the space, casting her friends in a heavenly glow.

After their outing at the nearby park they were going to put up a Christmas tree at the base. Kat was not sure why they were bringing a tree into Mt. Justice, but she was nonetheless excited to hang sparkly lights and ornaments with the help of her friends.

Christmas was a foreign concept to her. There were not many holidays on Almerac, the few that they celebrated were to honor hard won battles, not a round man who broke into houses to leave presents. She wondered if the jolly criminal would try to break into Mt. Justice.

Even if the fat man didn't break into their hideout, Kat had begged her friends to take her to the mall so that she could shop for them. She had never done Christmas shopping before, she didn't know what humans typically gave each other, but she had found many wonderful things to gift her teammates on her shopping spree.

"When do the snow angels appear? Are they friendly?" Kat tilter her head as she looked over at Fred, a light dusting of snow covered the tip of the Thanagarian's wings. The first snowfall she'd experienced had been wonderful, though the amount of snow she'd eaten had given her what the humans called "freeze brain". Fred had been very stern when she'd told her to stay away from the yellow snow, so Kat had incinerated every pile of discolored snow they'd seen.

The two women walked side by side as they followed behind the rest of their team towards the ice rink in the center of the park. Daniel had challenged the alien to see who could skate the fastest around the rink, and Kat was confident that she would win. After all, how hard could it be?

 

[KingofAesir]

Freddie MacNeil

If she reached far enough back in her memory, Fred could see the wisps of images that clung to her subconscious from nights long ago. They were liquid smoke in her fingers when she tried to grasp on to them, but the sensations were strong enough to remain. A soft piano melody drifting up over the stairs as the morning crept up the steps. Lights twinkling across her version, blurring past like she was running. The smell of maple pancakes and her mother’s perfume dancing together in the air. Soft fabric running between her fingers, a blanket wrapped tightly around her shoulders. The hint of heat rising from the fireplace, a smell, sweet and fruity that makes her teeth ache. Feathers on her fingertips. Her brother’s laugh. Her mother’s voice.

There were no memories of her father there. Perhaps that was because he had always spent Christmas morning locked away in his study, too preoccupied to notice it was even morning at all. Fred cherished those memories that she had left. A brief escape of time where she could pretend that he had not been there at all. Her mother had always put a great deal of work into Christmas. It was, she said, because she found it endearing and warming to her heart. Fred thought now that it might also have been because her father was always brighter on the holidays, she never cared to learn why that was. But when her mother was gone Christmas went with her. It had been years since she had done anything remotely close to celebrating the holiday. It felt strange to be doing so at all.

It was cold and Freddie’s wings were drawn close to her back, the deep burgundy colored sweater beneath them did well to trap in her body heat. Still, they fluttered every so often to flick an accumulating amount of snow off her feathers. Kat was walking in synced stride next to her, but Fred’s eyes were cast out in front of them, on swivel like a trained guard dog. She had been on high alert anywhere outside of Mt. Justice for a while now. If asked, she’d blame it on the robots. But, in truth, she thought maybe she had always been like this having a tangible reason only amplified it. There didn’t seem to be much to be concerned about though. Fred twisted the ring on her right thumb around and around as her eyes tracked the figure of a spirit flittering back and forth in front of a park bench. A man sat there, smiling at another man bent down a few feet away piling snow into a poor excuse of a snowman. His smile didn’t quite reach his eyes. The spirit caught her looking and darted suddenly right in front of her. Fred’s head jerked back just as Kat’s voice drowned out the spirits faint one, crackling like a weak radio signal.

"When do the snow angels appear? Are they friendly?" Fred cast her gaze sidelong to meet Kat’s eyes so earnest in her questioning. She found herself chuckling a little at the question, forgetting her thoughts of maple pancakes and her mother’s perfume somewhere behind them. The spirit reared, loud, and indignant for a moment before it disappeared.

“No, snow angels are-“ Fred ran the back of her hand over her mouth, teeth catching a knuckle, “They’re something you make.” She decided, gesturing to the ground below them in a wide sweep of her arm.

“You lay in the snow and move your arms up and down and it makes what kind of looks like an angel in the snow. Snow angel.” Freddie grinned sidelong at her companion, sharp like they always were. “I don’t really get it though. It’s cold and gets your clothes all wet so then you’re even more cold when you get up.” A shake of her head. This would be the kind of ritual that her father would have frowned upon. Not that it mattered much anyway, Freddie had never been very good at doing what she was told. She shook her head again, dislodging him from her thoughts and letting him tumble out into the cold.

How cruel of you. It’s the holidays.

Freddie’s grin faltered for a moment, but her cursory glance around revealed nothing. That had been happening far too often for her own liking recently. She feared she was on the precipice of losing her mind. It’s Christmas. Stop. You’re going to freak her out with your weird skittish shit. Fred pulled the corners of her mouth back up and turned her head to Kat again.

“Snowmen are better anyway.”


Mentions: Ghost of Christmas Past Interactions: Kat a z u l a

coded by: @s e v e n

 

[birth of venus]

jude rivera-carvajal.

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Defeat was as bitter as the cold. It dug its teeth into her bones and under her skin, and unlike most of the pain in her life, this was one that Jude could not live with. The world moved on, even if she couldn't. Outside her bedroom window deep within Mt. Justice, an icy frost began to stretch across the glass in sharp shards of spectral light, and she figured if nature would continue on then she had to as well.

She wasn't sure what compelled her to agree to leave the warm confines of the mountain in favor of stomping through snow and frozen grass to reach an ice rink she was certain she wouldn't enjoy. Winter was an enemy that Jude had yet to surpass, it crept under her thick layers of clothes and fundamentally disagreed with her biology. But the longer she had been with the team, the more she began to understand that her powers were a balance to be achieved. Through daily exercises of controlled breathing, exposure to the elements, and reflecting back on how easily she had been incapacitated during their first dreadful mission, Jude had achieved a better grip on temperature control. It was an ebb and flow, the conservation of heat and redistributing it as needed. To those with a keen eye, they'd see her skin in a halfway state of matter, thickened to nearly the texture of rock and keeping the cold out as much as possible. Every so often, a puff of steam would escape the thick black scarf wrapped around her neck and pulled over her nose and mouth. Drawn over her forest fire curls was a matching black beanie, topped with a battered pair of overhead headphones. Sure, Jude was participating in group activities like a proper teammate would, but she made it well known she wasn't happy about it. Her walking pace matched the kickdrum beat in her ears.

Chunks of ice crunched under thick boots as Jude meandered at the tail end of their group, gloved hands dug deep into the pockets of her jacket. It was nice, though she'd be hard pressed to admit it. The townspeople had decorated the park with a particularly large pine tree, drizzled and dressed up with snow and colorful bulbs and decorated with ornaments like a tiered wedding cake. Fluffy and white, twinkling lights, and resurfacing memories.

Christmas reminded her of her father. It was a family holiday almost always spent between just the two of them, making a decadent feast of a dinner on Christmas Eve and waiting until midnight to open each other's presents. Always punctuated by twinkling lights, the measly little battery powered star of their dusty plastic tree. Jude wouldn't change it for the world.

Jude figures there's not much she wouldn't do to have her father back for one more Christmas.

But there was no use dwelling. There was only now, and now was enduring cold wind chafing the exposed skin of her cheekbones and watching Fred and Kat walk along merrily in cahoots. They were god damn adorable. Kat's sunny disposition almost felt unearned for Jude, she never understood how she deserved her comradery but welcomed it nonetheless. And witnessing her childlike wonder at learning Earth's holiday customs was fun enough to make their outing today worthwhile. Ice skating, though? She wasn't sure if she could even do that.

"I think I might stay off the ice,"

Jude said with another puff of hot steam floating past her head, picking up the pace to walk near the pair.

"I think I might have to. I don't know how to skate anyways."

today

smashing pumpkins

♡coded by uxie♡

 

[jones573]

"Treetops listen and children glisten," Sybil sang along to the music echoing through the enormous kitchen. She generally had a nice, clear alto tone, but the effect was mitigated by the fact that she was mostly singing under her breath, and that she was absolutely butchering the lyrics.

This was the first Christmas she'd celebrated in three years, and definitely the first ever when she'd had access to a kitchen with multiple ovens and so much counter space. The wide kitchen island was covered in sugar cookie dough and a pile of cookie cutters, there were gingersnaps in one oven and peanut butter blossoms in another, and the pattern of white snowflakes on Sybil's red apron was hidden beneath the layers of flour and sugar she'd spilled.

"Eww, it's snowing again," Sybil announced when she glanced out the window. Luckily, it seemed to be the light, fluffy kind that just slowly drifted towards the ground, and she doubted it would hinder her teammates who had decided to go ice skating. Which was good, because if they came back too early the sugar cookies wouldn't be ready to decorate- Shit. She still needed to color the frosting, she remembered, and added it to her mental list as she stirred the chocolate currently melting in the double boiler.

Sybil had elected not to join her peers, because she'd gone her whole life without ice skating and saw no reason to break that streak now. Also she still hadn't bought a good winter coat, and the idea of bundling up in sweaters didn't appeal to her anymore than putting on the makeup she usually wore when she went out in public. Around the base, she'd taken to just wearing a soft eye mask and a white bandana with an eye drawn on it. Possibly she was growing to trust her teammates- Or possibly she was just lazy.

Sybil looked over at the island counter- There was some sugar cookies already baked, lots of dough rolled out, more dough in the large bowl, and a second thing of dough in the fridge.

"Y'all better have the superhero appetites you've been claiming to have, or we're gonna have cookies into Febuary," she said. The timer went off on the gingersnaps, and she visibly startled. "Shit, forgot about those," Sybil admitted, pulling potholders onto her hands and taking the trays out.

"I suppose we could always foist some off to others. People could take some home," she suggested, then paused. "Assuming people are going home to visit their families for the holidays. Otherwise, we're gonna have partycrashers at Orphanfest: Christmas Edition."

Bing Crosby faded away in the background, and Sybil groaned when he was replaced by a tinny child's voice. "First gingersnap goes to whoever changes the song," she announced, as she transferred the warm cookies to a cooling rack. In Sybil's opinion, the worst Christmas songs were the ones with children and the ones that sexualized St. Nick and 'I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus' was both.