[IC] Marvel’s NuHumans

Yancy Street - August 17th 2020

”Why do you have to go to work Daddy? I thought we were all supposed to stay at home?” the little girl with her bright blonde pigtails asked as her father pulled on his jacket.

”Because sweetness, daddy has to go make sure that the school is ready for all the little boys and girls that will be coming back soon. It has to look nice so that they can enjoy themselves. I won’t be long, just an hour or so. How long is an hour munchkin?” He held up his hands as the girl used her pinky to touch six of his fingers. ”That’s right, sixty minutes. Count that long and I guarantee daddy will be home as soon as you get to the end” He kissed her forehead and kissed his wife before leaving out of the back door and the girl began to count:

”1,2,3,4…”

Thirty three year old Jake Spiegel was born and raised on Yancy Street yet he had a great desire to leave it behind. However it seemed as if destiny or fate had extremely different plans for him. He had been a bit of a hard kid, as were most of his compatriots from the neighbourhood. It was a tough place to grow up and the only way to survive the mean streets was to join the Yancy Street Gang. Jake was enamoured with two neighbours of his names Daniel and Ben Grimm. It was a hero worship and he was so desperate to be just like them. He had spent most of his youth scrapping with his rivals under the Brooklyn Bridge and trying to work his way up the ranks. 

It was as if Jake never really grew up as even by the age of twenty five; he had done little with his life other than fight. It was in one such fight that his world changed. The Yancy Street Gang was in a heated brawl with one of their rival gangs when Jake was stabbed. As he lay bleeding out on the sidewalk; he watched as a rock-like creature stopped the fight; later he would discover this to be his former neighbour Ben Grimm, now known as the Thing of the Fantastic Four. While recovering from his wounds in hospital; Jake found out he was going to be a father which would prompt him to attempt to turn his life around and finally grow up. 

With the help of Ben, Jake managed to find steady employment working at the Baxter Building as a maintenance man. Whilst here, he spent a lot of time chatting with his former neighbour as well as Reed Richards, through which the intuitive Jake began to learn a little about science and other higher subjects. When the Fantastic Four were to be called off world for a mission; the Baxter Building would be shut down and Jake would be back on the unemployment line; thankfully an opening came up at ESU for a groundskeeper and Ben and Reed put Jake up for the job; where he stayed for several years.

Empire State University

The sky was turning dark high above Jake’s head and it sounded like a storm was coming in very quickly. He just had to finish with that little bit of groundwork and he could go; after all he did promise Layla that he would be home in sixty minutes. As blue droplets of what he thought was rain began to pound down onto his skin, Jake began to feel heavy; really heavy as if something was pulling down to the ground like a weight tied to his chest. He tried to work a little faster but the storm came in fast and soon he was trapped in a downpour. He glanced down at his hand through a rain fogged lense and it looked as if his skin was melting towards the floor. He could no longer move at this point and as he tried to let out a scream for help, he realised that no one would hear him; he was the only one there and no one else would be there for quite sometime thanks to the pandemic. From the ground beneath his feet, Jake could feel something cold climbing up his leg and up his arms; it felt like ice but he dared not look down. His gaze remained skywards at the storm above his head and as that frozen feeling entered his mouth and climbed over his eyes he made a last gasp for air;

”Sixty minutes…”

January 10th 2021

”There is a tide in the affairs of men.
Which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune;
Omitted, all the voyage of their life
Is bound in shallows and in miseries.
On such a full sea are we now afloat,
And we must take the current when it serves,
Or lose our ventures”

Professor Nathaniel Bloom stood atop the podium quoting Shakespeare to the first and second year students gathered around him. The Day One Expo was designed to be a joyous occasion; there were arts and crafts, science projects, school clubs being formed; its purpose was to invite interaction and conversation amongst a group of young people who have had a hell of a year; a pandemic, race riots and of course, global terrigenisis. 2021 was a new year and it was up these kids to make it better than the last one.

”This is your first step into a brave new world; a world which in the past year has undergone a metamorphosis and emerged something completely unique and different much like yourselves. College is a place for you to undergo your own metamorphosis, to go through your own change and become the person you were meant to be. Look around you at the faces in the crowd; these people will be your friends, they will be your family and some may even be your enemy but they will, no matter what, be part of your story. No doubt many of you harbour much trepidation at the fact that we are welcoming those called Inhuman by the media into the school; I must stress that we are taking every precaution to keep you safe but I also must unequivocally say that Inhumans are not dangerous. To be Inhuman is simply to be something new and exciting and wonderful. Do not fear what you do not yet understand, embrace it, learn from it and our future will be that much brighter. Welcome to Empire State University and Welcome to the Day One Expo!”

Location
🌀 ESU.

Interactions
🌀 None.

Returning to school after a series of life-altering events was never going to be an easy or even pleasant experience. The Casper stepping through the threshold of that dorm room was not the same individual who had called this academy home in the past, neither in body, nor mind. It would have been somewhat foolish to claim that changes made to him had not altered who he was on an emotional level, but the core of who made ESU’s aspiring archeologist remained very much the same. A curious and adventurous young man, indeed, whether his skin was white or blue. 

One often claims that pride ought to be closely tied to your features, a statement Casper always found somewhat odd. How could he be proud of something he had no control over? Something he had no hand in? It was not pride that washed over the inhuman as a glimmering and glittering glow emanated from his exposed skin beneath a dim, dark dorm room. Rather, Casper would christen it satisfaction. Where countless others despised their transformation, most of all his own kin who shared the physical aspects of terrigenesis, Casper was nothing if not content.

Often considered the ‘emo kid’ due to a particular hairstyle and oftentimes choice of attire, this was ironically the only facet of Casper that had not seen any alterations. A truth he was reminded of as the inhuman began to slowly unzip his traveling bag to produce clothes where they were neatly filed into drawers. He would only pause once he reached his trousers, each one now modified with a single slit in the back for an obnoxious tail swaying from one end to the next as if it had a life of its own. 

Likely the least adequate addition granted this young inhuman, and there were a few options to consider. Casper’s razor teeth prevented him from enjoying gum, his glimmering skin mimicked a starlit sky whenever light vacated the premises, and those claws had robbed him of fingertips. A taloned, needle-like spike at the end of each digit did not an easy trial make. 

Rising to his feet, Casper turned towards the empty bed behind him. Was he going to have a roommate? As of yet, the young man was quite unsure. He wasn’t particularly looking forward to the notion, if honesty held any value. Would they pair him up with another inhuman? We’re there even any other people like him at the school? Casper was well aware of his inhuman kin, but thoughts tended towards those who shared his more unique traits. As of yet, he had not come across anyone fitting that description. However, others surely found staring at the ‘inhuman freak’ a plausible pastime. 

Casper did not mind, and of that he was adamant. However, trouble did arise when words were abandoned in lieu of fists. A language the young man despised. Was he to defend himself with newfound powers, however, Casper could clearly predict the outcome. He would be labeled the aggressor, and understandably so. Humans feared the unique, the different, and most of all, that of which stood above them in the food chain.

This was likely why Bloom had allowed for Casper to be his assistant. A position which allowed the professor to keep an eye on the inhuman creature. It was an appreciated position, to be sure, and it made it possible for the jokingly self-proclaimed mythological creature to attend ESU full-time. 

Bloom, he was a peculiar individual, indeed. Casper had only to attend the expo to come across this confirmation. It was what had resulted in a pleasant speech, if somewhat on the theatrical side. Passionate was a fitting descriptor if aimed at Bloom, and it so often was. 

Viewing the man alongside countless other students, Casper’s main focus was to prevent his tail from slapping into others. A full-time job, according to the mutated entity whose large, black obsidian orbs were set on the stage. This year was going to be vastly different from what he had experienced in the past. He simply needed to expect the unexpected, and perhaps maintain a higher level of vigilance, which was additionally cemented by the many eyes pointed in his direction.

BrutalBx

Shard