Zoey Boey

World of Light: the Endless Now (The Ultimate Smash Bros Crossover)

I WAS HERE

World of Light: the Endless Now (The Ultimate Smash Bros Crossover)

Juri Han

Name: Juri Han
Origin: Street Fighter
Appearance:

The Spider

Personality: A cruel young woman who enjoys destroying and dominating. A hedonistic thrill-seeker with a mean streak a mile wide, Juri Han is no stranger to the physical pleasures this world has to offer. And no stranger to death and murder, either. She insults and berates most people around her for their perceived weaknesses. Spend enough time around her and one might discover the gaps in the façade. She finds her life has a lack of purpose and direction. It's her own fault because she pushes everyone away with her hideous demeanor, but she is also lonely.

Juri hates rules and being told what to do. She hates tyrants and authoritarianism. Anyone who is true to themselves and lives for themselves can earn Juri's respect, and she has worked with others in the past to achieve her own ends. Mainly power, or revenge. She has a soft spot for animals, particularly arachnids. She'll kill other killers without a second thought but tends to let other people who get in her way off with a harsh beating.

She has acted selflessly in the past, coming to the rescue of others in need. Ask her why, and risk being insulted, or assaulted should one push their luck. She leaves the truly innocent out of it, and when she spots the truly evil, they disgust her.

Despite her thuggish, short-sighted behavior, Juri is highly educated and well-read.

Juri is no stoic. She possesses an excitable, curious demeanor, if only often to find out whatever the 'problems' are and exploit them. Should something be too boring, she'll immediately discard it and try to find the next thing to entertain her. There's playfulness about her that can make her appear almost innocent. Often times she'll play up the crazy killer role, despite being quite grounded in reality. All this to say, Juri Han is a very complicated woman.

Background:Juri Han was a martial arts prodigy at a young age. Extremely studious, she worked hard to make her parents proud. Even as a young girl she couldn't deny the thrill of destroying her opponents. She loved her mother and greatly respected her father, who was renowned nation-wide in Korea for working as a criminal prosecutor. But when he went after Shadoloo, the evil Dictator M. Bison struck back. In the attack, Juri's parents were murdered, and she lost her left eye. Whatever life Juri Han could have had was over. Juri learned the only real law in this world was the law of violence. Kill or be killed.

Juri sought power, greater strength, and revenge against M. Bison. To this end she joined the rival criminal organization SIN as a researcher. She built much of the technology behind the Feng Shui Engine herself. She worked for Seth, the android. When all out war broke about between SIN and Shadaloo, Juri enjoyed the chaos, and played both sides. Eventually she betrayed Seth, killing one of his last back-up bodies, and took over. She made an attempt on M. Bison's life by herself, but failed. SIN didn't last long under her rule. Despite having actually conned, duped, and backstabbed her way into the power she claimed to be so hungry for, she quickly let it all come to ruin because of the responsibility involved and lack of direction. It's not like she actually wanted to take over the world or deal crazy psycho power drugs or run an army or whatever the hell it was evil overlords did all day. It was way too much work and not her style. After murdering anyone else who worked on the Feng Shui Engine so only she would know its secrets, she left.

Eventually M. Bison's evil schemes caught up to him, and he attracted the attention of the heroes of the world. Juri was no hero but she was an opportunist who took advantage to get revenge. While she did help save the world, and even saved some of the heroes from harm (there's nothing she hates more than brainwashing) in the end the one who got the pleasure of killing M. Bison was that goody two-shoes Ryu.

Part of her chaotic nature is sometimes doing selfless things for no reason. Why she re-programmed and resurrected Seth in a new body and let him roam free, she has no idea. Maybe it was just kinda funny?

No longer having revenge as an excuse for her schemes, she has spent her days since wandering around trying to find something to do, working contract jobs as hired muscle or assassinations. To what end, she doesn't know. There's a sense of tragedy about her, and it's becoming increasingly difficult for her to hide it.

In the Now: Juri is as aimless as ever, but the World of Light has presented her with ample opportunity for distraction. She has been going around stirring up trouble and trying to find ways to entertain herself. Naturally this means finding work to fund her habits. And with Juri almost anything is on the table.

Job: Scout
Specialty: Close-range Rushdown
Inventory: Feng Shui Engine: The artificial left eye given to her by SIN. She can use her ki to empower it for dramatic effect and returns. By itself, however, it is capable of detecting and giving her a general gauge of the power level of a sentient being she scans with it. It's also a universal input and output port for her hacking skills.

Smart Phone: A modern day cellular device capable of long ranged communication, access to networks, currency, a wide host of boring games Juri hates, camera, pictures of spiders, identification, etc.

Sports Motorcycle: For travelling around at high speed. For leisure or business. Kept in Midna's magic garage.

Honorary Mafia Tommygun: Earned for her work with the Chef Mafia, a classic Chicago Typewriter to rattle rats and coppers. Or anyone else Juri feels like shooting at. It was upgraded by Bowser Junior to shoot fire bullets. After finding the new toy below and running low on ammo, she discarded it.

Ghoulsaw

You have obtained:
Ghoulsaw
The cruelest of weapons built for the crudest of Grineer soldiers. Rips through metal like flesh, and through flesh like day-old pudding. It never seems to run out of fuel, and the dextrous wielder can even plunge its blade into sufficiently soft ground to ride it like a deadly skateboard.

LEVEL: 6

Abilities: (Powers, spells, special moves, an iconic piece of equipment, and so forth)

• Feng Shui Engine - Access to the powerful array of abilities her artificial eye grants her, including scanning for a nearby power levels and hacking, and with further level ups, super attacks and techniques.
• Fuhajin Stocks - She can enhance her special moves by doing a ki-enhanced kick. This increases the utility of her special moves in a variety of ways. She can store up to four.
• Drive Gauge - Six internal 'bars' of energy to be used for various Drive techniques. It is expended on blocking, working as a guard meter. The upside compared to say, Sakura or Karin, is that while she has Drive Gauge, she takes no chip damage, and reduced blockstun. She starts with the ability to spend two bars of Drive Gauge to use a powerful Overdrive Art. Overdrive Arts are powerful versions of her special moves, made even more effective if combined with a Fuhajin.
• Drive Gauge II
  
  Parry, Rush, Reversal, Impact
  
  Juri gains the four primary uses for her Drive Gauge beyond blocking and OD moves.
  
  Drive Parry: For a slow but continuous use of her drive gauge, Juri enters an immobile, highly defensive state. Glowing blue, she can parry all strikes and projectiles that come her way without taking any damage. Attacks that move her are halved in their pushback, and the other half is given to the attacker. Parrying will reward her with free drive gauge. Parrying allows Juri to negate damage and pushback from attacks that would normally blow through her guard through power, and the state of heightened focus renders her immune to strikes that attempt to confuse or overwhelm her defense, even against multiple enemies.
  
  If she times her parry exactly when the attack will hit her, such as when an enemy's attack is slow, or they become too predictable, Juri will Perfect Parry. This gives her a significant advantage and usually allows her to strike back against the enemy if its a melee hit. Against a projectile it allows her to move without interruption. This also gives her bonus drive gauge. Counter strikes done immediately after a Perfect Parry have a significant damage reduction, encouraging Juri to use the advantage to aid in her positioning or resource management.
  
  If Juri is grabbed during Parry, the attack goes through and she loses a bar of Drive Gauge and the grab does double damage, as well as being a Hard Knockdown she can't roll out of. (Like any Punish Counter grab.) If she uses Parry and no attacks come her way, there is a brief period of recovery where she can do nothing but block, and is still in a Punish Counter state for any attacks that she fails to block, or grabs.
• Passion Dash - Juri's dash causes a small magic burst at its terminus and inflicts Weak, decreasing outgoing damage by 30% for 4 seconds

Skills: (Passive abilities, outstanding ‘stats’, and talents/proficiencies)

• Taekwondo Ki User: - A martial artist of superhuman strength, speed, and skill. Able to easily overpower common force multipliers such as mundane swords, guns, explosives, etc. She can project her internal force and energy out from herself with dangerous close ranged ki projectiles.
• Speed - Juri is incredibly fast and agile, even by Street Fighter standards.
• Skill Name - Skill Description
• Skill Name - Skill Description

Weaknesses: (Practical limitations, detrimental ‘stats’, and deficiencies. Include three)

• Burnout State - Once out of Drive Gauge, she incurs many weaknesses. She takes increased chip damage and block stun, and loses access to all Drive related techniques, making her defense severely weaker and limiting her damage dealing. While in Burnout, a significantly hard impact will Stun her, leaving her helpless for several seconds. Even if she blocks an attack it is possible to Stun her should she hit the environment hard enough as a result.
  
  She loses Drive Gauge when she blocks, when she is hit with a punish counter, or when she is hit with an attack that costs the opponent some of their own resource. Super, mana, energy, focus, whatever it may be, if it is a limited power it will take away some of her Drive Gauge on hit depending on the damage and cost.
• Punish Counter - While Juri is able to capitalize off the mistakes of her enemies with her techniques, there is a tangible benefit from doing the same to her. Catching her in the recovery of performing an attack will sap some of her Drive Gauge and exacerbate the effects of the the attack. For example, an attack that might have normally just knocked her back a few steps may rattle her energy for her to collapse to her knees should it hit her after she missed an attack.
• Short Range - While she has numerous methods of closing the gap that might make her dangerous an opponent who relies on long range, she has no notable proficiency in anything like marksmanship. Her ki attacks are mostly just for controlling space just outside of the range of her hands and feet.

Spirits: (Any spirits your character possesses should be listed here with their type)

• Spirit name
  Sombra

  Spirit consumed:
  Sombra
  The host's skin has darkened a little. Her hairstyle has become more asymmetrical, with a shaved strip along her cranium on the non-pink side along with the loss of one of her hair-horns. The remaining hair-horn has shifted to stick out at the back like a more traditional ponytail. Meanwhile, her hair is longer and thicker on the other side, curling upward toward the end. The pink is a bit more purple, and the black a bit more brown. Her pink eye is also more purple, and there are two electronic implants on the shaved part of her head. Her fighting gloves and footpads now overlay longer gloves and socks of a plastic consistency and bright blue-pink gradient, with artificial nails on top also colored cyan. Her black body tape has expanded into a black and purple undersuit, although the spider design is maintained by masses of pink digits. Her personality is a bit more cool-headed and calculating, a bit more cheeky than downright crass, but no less sarcastic. This spirit confers the ability Hack. She can target an enemy and, as long as she's not interrupted via damage, shut down any equipment or abilities with an electronic component, turning them off and preventing their reactivation for 6s. A holographic purple skull is projected above the target's head for the duration. She can also hack small-to-medium machines to increase their operation speed for a while. This spirit also confers the Weakness Unfair Fighter, increasing the damage taken by ranged weapons by 15%

Rapport: (You can keep track of your Rapport here. As you level up Rapports, consider linking the posts here and listing what they give you)

• Character A / Character B - D Rank 3/5

World of Light

JURI HAN

Level 5: 24/50
Location: Mafia Town
Word Count: short
Points Gained: 1 +3 +3
New EXP Balance: Level 5: 31/50

---

Juri’s idea of applying for a job was finding the nearest local criminal underworld boss and appearing in their office unannounced to offer her services. She thought it made an impression. If this ‘Mafia of Cooks’ place really was just a restaurant then that sucked, but she could always figure out a way to make money off chumps somehow. But she was hoping to get back to Fixing.

After a little snooping, she had a pretty good idea of where to go. The average mafia goon (each one hundred percent identical to the next) was neither very friendly nor articulate, but they did know where their bread was buttered and what was good for them. It quickly became clear that their headquarters lay not on the island itself, but atop the giant plate suspended overhead. Getting there was another story. The water spout was not an option, but Juri was nothing if not resourceful. Her search eventually turned up a cannon that launched her straight to the top, where she landed in front of the mafia headquarters. Juri rolled into a crouch, dusting herself off with a snicker. With only a couple guards posted, getting inside was as simple as convincing them that Juri had business with their boss, and to stand on the two buttons that opened the door. ”Idiots.” She muttered under her breath. Once inside, she found a sleazy mafia-run casino complete with a fully-loaded bar, and deeper within lay an honest-to-God throne room for the mafia boss himself.

The boss, seated on his throne, didn’t seem all that impressive at first glance. He looked shorter than his goons, though he made up the difference with a very tall toque, but he did sport a fancy jacket and mustache. To either side of him stood a statuesque bodyguard with a tommy gun, so similar in appearance that the two of them -the left black and red and the right black and white- that they could’ve easily been twins. The boss did keep a pair of giant cleavers close by, though, and his gaze was surprisingly intense as he eyed the newcomer up and down. “You’ve got guts, I’ll give you that,” he told her, his tone suspicious. “What business do you have with the Mafia?”

Juri had been thoroughly unimpressed so far, but seeing the boss, the look in his eyes, and his bodyguards have given her some hope this might not have been a complete waste of time after all. ”I go by Spider.” She said. ”I’m new in town, thought I might poke around a bit. The pizza’s okay but the security could use some work.” She said, jerking a thumb over her shoulder from where she came from.

”Anyway…” Spider set a hand on her hip and leaned forward, taking a few steps towards the throne. Probably until she provoked a reaction from the bodyguards. ”I got in here. I can probably get anywhere on this island. You need a Fixer who can get anywhere..?” She pointed at herself and grinned.

“You like Mafia pizza? Hmm…” Evidently Juri had accidentally said just the right thing. The boss narrowed his eyes thoughtfully, stroking his goatee. “A spider, eh? I can think of a few ways a spider might come in handy.” A sly smile crept across his face, and he clapped his hands together. “Very well. I’ve already got a job in mind, so let’s see what you can do. Make Mafia proud…and Mafia will make you rich.”

Juri shifted her eyes to the side. She hadn’t actually stopped to grab a bite of pizza on the way in here. ”...Yeah..!” She managed. She’d probably end up trying it later. ”That’s what I like to hear.”

《 Super H.E.R.O. 》

Backup

Hero Three

---

Backup was, and she didn't say this lightly, the best freerunner and parkour expert in the world. Nobody was better at it than she was. So as she cracked her knuckles and shoved her way out of the reception area, she turned her attention to the building she had just exited.
It had been a while since she had scaled HERO Three, she realized.

She hopped onto the overhang over the front door and pulled herself up. Then she hopped to the lowest window sill, climbed to the top of the frame, and used that to leap to the next window. While doing this, she noticed the power went off inside. That immediately set off alarm bells. Backup pulled herself higher and was just beneath the roof. She heard the distinctive chatter of mid-mischief henchmen. Somehow they had missed it- Hero 3 was under attack. Since the fuck when were they so unaware of their surroundings? Maybe they had come to be too over-reliant on that damn robot.

What to do? Whatever they were guarding, she had to turn it off. She thought about calling the British guy, but he was kind of a dick. Plus she wasn’t sure if she could tell him without alerting the people on the roof with her whispers. And what if he was in on it? From the sound of it, there was three, maybe four of them up there. Backup bounded, hand over hand, to the left. The goal was to have the sun at her back, so it would interfere with the vision of the bad guys.

She heard a noise, and looked down between her legs. Ah! It was Wiseman. Going from the conversation, he was the primary target of this little assassination attempt. She could probably kick all these guys asses before he climbed up here. Look at him. Little window crawling nerd. Haha.

Backup moved her hands up to the edge of the roof and unhooked a cylindrical stun grenade from her belt. She unhooked the safety pin, the little metal ring falling to bounce of Wiseman’s head. She bounced up, took a quick peak to survey the field, dropped, and then bounced up again to toss her stun grenade and follow with it. It would hit the middle of the group and rattle their skulls, ring their ears and dazzle their vision with a loud flash of light. Backup rolled onto the roof in hot pursuit, breaking out into a sprint. She moved past the helicopter and to the nearest goon, jumping onto his back and riding him knees first to the floor.

She rolled off of him and was back to standing. ”Surprise, bitch!” She called out with a grin, heart racing. This is what she lived for!

The next merc was too stunned to react to Backup’s approach, and with a quick flurry of strikes she sent him spinning away with a kick to the face. The next two, she would be to slow to reach before they recovered and started shooting. In fact, the one on the left was holding the trigger down and cutting a line across the pavement in her general direction already. She reached to her belt and flung out two metallic Bolas, or two heavy metallic, magnetic balls on the end of a string, aiming towards the guns. They wrapped up around the guns and knocked them out of their hands.

”C’mon, let’s fuckin’ party!” She said, getting into a bouncy fighting stance. She was more than confident in her fighting skills to take on two bad guys at once. She’s a superhero, after all. Taking down henchmen was like, her whole job.

The senior grunt was pissed at Rodriguez inwardly, like his questioning of the plan had somehow manifested this annoying monocolor girl into existence. “Get her!” He shouted, and they both attempted to rush her, drawing out lethal knives with broad blades.
Backup cleanly sidestepped and grabbed a wrist and pushed hard on the elbow, forcing Rodriguez to body block the other grunt for her as he fell to the ground. Before the leader could swipe she fired her boot out like a piston and smacked into his face. Backup cackled, ducked under a horizontal swipe, and broke into his armor with a painful kidney shot. She fired a straight punch towards the sky that cracked his jaw against the rest of his skull, and sent him defeated to the ground.

Rodriguez set upon her from the side, slamming the knife towards her. She caught it, the blade going right through her palm and out the back of her hand. Backup wrapped her hand around his and twisted, cracking the bones within. Dark red blood leaking from her hand, she let out a rotten giggle, peering into Rodriguez’s widened eyes. With her other hand she grabbed his collar and kicked out one of his knees. Then she headbutted him once, twice, three times, before retracting and letting Rodriguez have nightmares about her until he woke up. She pulled the knife from her hand and casually flicked some blood away. It would heal up within a half-minute.

Backup peered over the edge of the roof down at Wiseman. ”You comin’ or what?” She asked. She gestured with her hand, sending some more of her blood his way. She stepped away and peered at the helicopter. There didn’t seem to be anyone inside. And what was up with that symbol? She scratched her head, wondering if she could recognize it. To be honest there were so many goons and henchmen all over it was hard to keep them all sorted in her memory. Then she looked at the weird, stupid gadget they were protecting.

Casually, she kicked it over, and started stepping and stomping on it. Backup liked breaking things. Especially expensive things.

World of Light

Seas the Day

Therion’s @Yankee, Captain Falcon’s @Double, Juri’s @Zoey Boey, Ms Fortune
Word Count: 2249 (+3)

Though a little worried about the Avenger’s deployment system, especially having experienced its rather terrifying pickup system first, Nadia wasn’t about to show weakness in front of Juri. Just having the nasty woman around would be enough of a bummer without giving her extra ammunition. It helped that the feral happened to be a virtuoso in the art of putting on a brave face. She didn’t mind the other two who’d be traveling with her to Mafia Town, at least. Captain Falcon was a new addition, but from their stint together in the Film Those Freaks minigame he seemed solid enough. In a twist of fate, the two had been tied together by a vital secret, uniting them in their efforts to make sure it stayed under wraps at all costs; that secret being the fact that both had gotten themselves ‘killed’ by stationary laser grids at the end of that minigame. Therion, meanwhile, Nadia counted as a friend. They’d proved themselves birds (or rather, cats) of a feather during their campaign through the Under. After shooting her fellow thief a cheerful smile, Nadia climbed into her hellpod, watched its lid close above her, and waited for launch with a racing heart.

Of course, isolated in the hellpod’s cramped confines, she need not worry about anyone else hearing her screams of terror and excitement when the metal deathtrap finally shot out of the Avenger’s underside, hurtling toward the earth like a speeding bullet. In the chaos of a freefall like that, only one thing was sure: the roller coaster at the New Meridian Boardwalk had nothing on this.

Miraculously, the hellpods -and their contents- survived contact with the ground, thanks to a potent combination of retro rockets and shock absorbers. Of course, Nadia’s heart was still pounding her chest by the time the pod’s lid popped off and the mechanism inside thrust her up into the morning sunlight. Once she recovered from the dazzling brilliance of the bluest sky imaginable, Nadia could breath in the refreshingly salty sea air, listen to the lap of waves against the shore, and feast her eyes on the funny little island called Mafia Town.

Click for music

Located off the World of Light’s southeastern shore, at perhaps the southernmost part of the region known as the Deep Blue Seaside, Mafia Town offered a climate of tropical warmth and humidity, featuring a colorful abundance of corals off the coast and plenty of palm trees on the island itself. Very little of the island remained natural, however, as most of it seemed to be paved over and built up into a densely-packed, multi-level maritime fortress of orange mosaic tiles, stone bricks of milk-white or chocolate-brown, and roofs of dazzling silver or shingles as azure blue as the sea itself. Each layer of buildings became the ‘ground’ for the one above, creating a winding upward path from the docks and shipyards past bustling markets up through narrow lanes between tall apartment buildings with hanging laundry lines and flower boxes on their windowsills. Toward the top things evened out and opened up a bit more, offering rooftop greenbelts among fountain plazas, poolhouses, and clock towers. Even that wasn’t the limit, though. At the very top and middle of Mafia Town there appeared to be a water source of supernatural proportions, not just feeding the high-speed aqueducts and cascades and that washed down through the town’s channels to the sea, but a spiraling geyser that seemed to hold up a massive plate like a support pillar. Whatever lay atop it couldn’t be seen from down here, but like an umbrella it cast a great round shadow over Mafia Town that traveled throughout the day, offering its many residents a little reprieve from the beating sun.

Most remarkable, perhaps, were the smells. Mafia Town boasted an abundance of restaurants and eateries, and even at a time when most folks would typically be thinking about breakfast, the island’s food industry was already in full swing cooking up meals for the day. It wasn’t just the briney tang of seafood on the wind, either. The aromas of fresh baked crust from Possum Pizzeria, savory sauces from Seaside Spaghetti, and so forth all filtered their way down to the inhabitants on the breeze, tantalizing their tastebuds. There was even one restaurant that floated on the water itself, Bancho Sushi.

Of course, not everything was one hundred percent food-oriented. Even around the little seaside plaza where the Seekers slammed down, they could see a lovely flower shop and an art display. Beyond the town itself, hot air balloons and sailboats gave both sky and sea a wealth of color. A large sign by the plaza read ‘Mafia of Cooks, #1 at Everything’. This place looked lively, lovely, and a little bit silly–all of which applied to Nadia Fortune as well.

The feral couldn’t wipe a smile off her face as she took in the scenery, sea breeze, savory smells. “Mafi-awesome!” she exclaimed after a moment. “I could get used to this!”

”Hmm.” Captain Falcon murmured as he rubbed his freshly clean-shaven chin in thought. ”Doesn’t exactly strike me as the ‘hive of scum and villainy’ I thought it would be. How dangerous could this place possibly be?” His attention was drawn specifically to the Mafia of Cooks sign. So the “Mafia” this town was named for was just a gang of chefs? Suddenly he got the sinking feeling that he wouldn’t be finding nearly as much bounty hunter work here as he thought he would. Well, at least this place was promising some good meals if nothing else.

Therion would have liked nothing more than to take a few extra minutes in the pod to cool down after literally being shot out of the sky, but unfortunately the way they were designed prevented that from happening. So once he was forced up and out, he begrudgingly dragged himself over to the others. Balloons up, metal death traps down? Inhumane... he thought to himself. He had one of his fused spirits to thank for their apparent love of heights, because otherwise he probably would have had a heart attack already.

Once with the other three he smoothed his facial features into cool indifference, but if anything now that his tail was fluffier it gave him away more easily. Since there was more fur to puff out, it was clear when it was standing on end since it nearly doubled in width. He flicked it from side to side, trying to quickly get it back to normal while he surveyed the area. He found himself agreeing with Falcon, but felt he had to point something out that had stood true for Therion's entire stint as a Seeker of Light so far.

"You'd be surprised how easy it's been to find trouble in places like this," he told the pilot.

Juri had been grinning, flattening some stray strands of hair from the drop pod's turbulent descent. ”I think those Lost Number people hate the environment.” She said. The smile faded into a disappointed frown, shoulders sagging, as she looked around.

”Places like this? It is a lousy tourist trap! She gesticulated at the ridiculous water fountain in the center of town. ”I mean what the hell is that thing?!” She paused, and then tapped her chin.

”Though, on second thought, maybe they used slaves to build all this stuff. Lots of tourist traps are pretty exploitative…could be something like that!” She rubbed her hands together. ”This place could be rotten to the core.” Having maintained a sense of enthusiasm she jogged ahead. ”Maybe there’s a black market!” Juri felt like she was pretty good at picking out shady characters, so she was on the lookout for anything seedy or suspicious. Or maybe there was a dealer or a fixer or…anything, really. She doubted one of these ‘Guardians’ would just be out and about, all nice and honest about it.

Nadia breathed deeply in through her nose, then out through her mouth. “Thanks for your ‘input’,” she told Juri, her tone measured. As pretty as this place was, she attempted to put aside her intrigue for the moment, and study Mafia Town from a more objective purr-spective. Though impressive in its own way, this island didn’t seem that big. Both Carnival Town and the Home of Tears had been easily four times this size, and Limsa Lominscuttle Town not much smaller, though this place seemed a little bigger than Gerudo Town, at least. It was hard to imagine this place hiding a whole lot of secrets, and even a half-dead streetwise alley cat like her couldn’t immediately assume that darkness lurked behind these bright colors. In a way she felt bad for Juri. Wow, she’s pretty far gone, Nadia thought. What a bleak world she must live in.

Naturally the feral couldn’t take everything here at face value either, especially given her run-ins with another mafia in the past. She would definitely need to take a trip up to that structure in the sky at some point, and thanks to Asgore she now knew that only continuous warfare could keep societies like this one alive. On the other hand, though, this already felt like a vacation. Mafia Town reminded her of Limsa in all the best ways. If the Seekers couldn’t find any objectives on the island itself, they could just wait for mission-relevant hints to wash up from the ocean. Wherever ships came to port to load or unload cargo, rumors and legends abounded. A bar in Little Innsmouth might as well have been a theater for the fantastical stories one could hear from the mouths of drunken sailors, and Nadia doubted that Mafia Town would be any different.

“So, we’ve just gotta lay low ‘til we hear from the Lost Numbers,” Nadia summarized, peering around. “No need to stick together and draw more attention, but we could still meet up once in a while to check in and go over whatever we find, I guess.” When she turned to address her teammates, she ignored Juri, figuring that the thug didn’t give a crap and would just go off doing her own thing no matter what. “Oh, we could get lunch together! How about over there?” She pointed toward a nearby restaurant with a recognizable octopus mascot, Seaside Spaghetti. “If you guys don’t find noodles pre-pasta-rous, that is. Oh, oh, and the last thing we talk about every day could be where to go for lunch tomorrow! Of course, anywhere’s good with me, long as it doesn’t cost a pretty penne!”

At the mention of money, though something occurred to her, and her eyes widened slightly. “Wait…if we’re gonna spend a week here, am I…gonna have to get a job?” Nadia groaned. “What a pain. When it comes to job skills, I cannoli do so much…” Her expression of dismay transformed into one of mischievous glee in an instant as she punned.

”I was hoping a place called ‘Mafia Town’ would give me plenty of bounty hunter work I could do.” Cap said, sounding a little disappointed. ”But now I'm not so sure. Won't know for sure until I look around some more, I guess.” He looked over at the spot Nadia pointed out and added, ”After breakfast.”

"I doubt that you don't have a week's worth of funds," Therion said, then turning to Captain Falcon. "And same goes for you." Or else what had he done with all that prize money? Surely he couldn't have been racing just for the glory.

He looked over to where Juri was going, the woman already almost out of earshot. Now she was probably broke, if he had to guess.

Therion touched a hand to his ear, intending to make sure Juri got the memo, before realizing that she wasn't connected by linkpearl like he and Ms. Fortune were. Cap wasn't either, as far as he knew, unless Primrose had distributed them at some point when he wasn't around. He let his arm drop down and held in a sigh.

"But sure, daily lunch." He agreed with Nadia's suggestion of keeping apart as well. He flicked his gaze up to the highest parts of the town. "Assuming they've got more than one inn here, we should stay in separate places too."

Nadia nodded. “Yeah, sure. Oh, and if Juri starts making trouble, don’t be afraid to kick her ass. I know I won’t!” She clapped her hands together, then rubbed her palms. “Welp. Guess we’ll get goin’ then, huh? Good luck you guys, ‘isle’ see ya ‘round!” With that, the feral turned and scampered off to explore the sunny seaside.

《 Super H.E.R.O. 》

Crane

Outside Fixeon Municipal Recycling Plant

---

Crane was also much stronger than she seemed, which was saying something because she was 10 meters tall and built like a brick wall. That being said, this obviously wasn’t sustainable. Menace did seem entirely focused on her, though, which was good. At least she had confirmed that.

”Oaow!” She cried out with a grimace as her joints began to strain. Crane would have to do something. She pushed through the pain and planted her feet, forcing Menace backwards. When Menace adjusted his stance, she aimed to thrust her knee into his sternum. From a distance it was like the two were fighting in slow motion, but up close it became clear her knee was moving as fast as a car on a highway. These strikes would cost the city tens of thousands of dollars each.

There was a shockwave and a burst of air from her knee attack should it connect. ”Rah!” Crane had limited experience in battling creatures her own size. Let alone humanoid ones. She had tried to prepare for such an eventuality with reading and doing stances in her own time. But there was no way to practice or spar. That was the disadvantage of being big all the time, instead of being able to grow and shrink at will.

So if her knee connected, she would keep doing it, and even if it was blocked she would do it again. It was the easiest attack she could think of in the extreme heat of the moment. Hopefully Mire could handle the crowd control, and the others could handle that massive explosion, because the giant rabid gorilla monster was taking up all of her attention. Even as a few stray lizards crawled up on her legs and tried biting into her durable flesh, she had to ignore them.

World of Light

The Round Table Discussion IV

Word Count: 1451 (+3)

After taking stock of the discussion Sandalphon spoke up once more. “We’ve covered a lot of ground so far, sharing intel on Moebius, the Organization, and the World of Light itself. Our next step is to solidify a plan for what to do next, including what regions and guardians to target, since our main goal remains unchanged.” She paused, her pupils turning to V symbols. “Before we can do that, however, I must share something of my own.”

Sandalphon straightened up, her arms crossed as she stared at the geoscape before her. “This morning, when I received reports of the Machines massing for a full invasion, I made a number of calls. I reached out to every point of contact I could, including the Sector 07 Militia, my YoRHa androids, the Lateran Church, the Hermits, our allies from the Vandelay Campus raid, Neuron,
and Psych-OSF, both the main force and the rebellious Seiran Garrison. While Shinra consolidated his forces, and we delved deep below his building, an army of our own marched forth to meet the Machines in battle before they could lay waste to the city. Ultimately, our forces were victorious, but victory came at a price.” She paused again, her pupils becoming stress marks. “When the Seiran OSF took the field, they deployed their ace in the hole: their Other Weapons, humans-turned-Others rehabilitated in their secret research facility. Among these Other Weapons was Peach. Following the battle, she…was among the casualties.”

Goldlewis gritted his teeth, downcast. “God, no…”

More than anything else so far, the news stunned both Tora and Poppi. “Peach-Peach…” Nadia stared at them, then back at Sandalphon, swallowing as a chill ran down her spine. This was the first revelation that left her stunned, and for once in her life her cheerful facade was gone.

Geralt looked as if he’d been struck in the face, but he quickly composed himself, closing his eyes and letting out a deep exhale. Zenkichi, on the other hand, looked at Bowser and the Koopa Troop worriedly. He definitely remembered that name in the context of video games, and he was pretty sure Bowser wouldn’t be taking that one easily.

Primrose and Therion hadn't known the princess save for sharing a picnic with her in Twilight Town, so they stayed respectfully quiet. It wasn't the first and surely wouldn't be the last time they lost a member of the team, but the knowledge was sobering all the same. Pit and Roxas stared at Sandalphon with wide eyes. Elsewhere, Captain Falcon silently slammed a gloved fist on the table in front of him, then bowed his head with eyes closed for a moment of silence. And in his own mind he wondered how in the world they would be able to break this kind of news to Mario and Luigi, since he couldn’t imagine they would take the news very well.

"No way, Princess Peach was...?" Pit knew that Peach had become an Other, but they were going to find a cure for her. They were supposed to go back and help her once they'd figured out how! Now she was gone? His heart clenched painfully, but he found himself looking to the Koopa family who had unquestionably known her best. Blazermate was in the same boat, a sad look on her face as she looked at the koopas, knowing Bowser had a very strong thing for Peach. Sectonia was also looking at the koopa family with a worried expression, as she picked up on all the signs of what had been going on through the brief interaction she had seen. Ganondorf was silent, and instead simply watched Bowser in case he needed to stop him from doing something stupid in his inevitable anger.

What he saw was at first simply a look of collective shock, then Bowser began shaking, claws digging hard into the geoscape table, damaging it as he did so and then of all things turned on Midna while roaring ”You! You did this, you left her with them and now she’s-” fists balled up with fury, while Kamek tried and failed to stop him with a ”Sire, wait!”

Midna took a half step back but stood her ground as she yelled ”I didn’t know! They were supposed to help her” back at him, venting her feeling of betrayal at him in the same way he was venting his rage and Peach’s death at her.

By then, half the Seekers in attendance had sprung to their feet, Goldlewis among them. While Tora equipped his shield, ready to jump in and protect someone if needed, the veteran took a more proactive approach. Goldlewis fearlessly interposed himself in front of the giant, enraged dragon-turtle, his bare hands raised. “HEY! Sit your ass down before I seat you myself!” he bellowed. “I get you’re mad, but if you think takin’ it out on us is gonna fly, you got another think comin’!”

Bowser snorted flames in response as if to say “I’d like to see you try” before reeling his fist back and preparing to strike, only to stop as Jr grabbed his leg with a ”Papa wait”, Kamek to grab his upper arm with a shadow clone of the king himself, pupped threads linking it back to the mage, while Rika stepped forwards with much less alarm to grab his shoulder with a ”ah, what they said”

Blazermate began to think for a bit on how to help reduce the tension in the room so they could figure something out. Even if it was temporary it’d help. And after thinking for a bit, she came up with an idea. Now if it was good or would make things worse, she wouldn’t know. ”Hey… wouldn’t she just resurrect at one of those resurrection circle thingies here soon then? Although we’d need to find her, friend heart her, and catch her back up to her missing a week of events…” Blazermate said, putting the admittedly cold idea out there. Her point was, it wasn’t a permanent thing. It was more… a medabot swapping bodies.

”They’re right, your furiousness, we can fix this, we just have to win this, and we need everyone on side to do so!” Kamek agreed/insisted as Bowser tugged his arm against the grip of the doppelganger of himself. As always, the inferior copy was no match, and he wrenched his hand free. He did not lash out however, but instead simply shook it out and replied with a not at all happy sounding ”Fine”

He started to turn away to return to his spot, only for Midna to step around Goldlewis and tell him that ”I’m sorry. We’ve lost too many people” causing Jr to subconsciously reach for Omori’s hair stick that he was wearing, before insisting ”They’re right. We can fix this” as she brought out the Eliacube and symbolically used it to repair the damage he’d done to the Geoscape.

The moment was slightly undermined by how the cube seemed to draw the eyes and attention of those who saw it, the strange artifact claimed from Nox seeming to radiate an inherent importance.

Though Sandalphon found her gaze lingering on the Eliacube, she forced herself to look back toward the Koopa Troop after a couple seconds. Though the artifact’s secondary function had been unintentional, Midna had managed to help de-escalate the situation by providing a potent distraction. “If you must blame anyone, please blame me,” Sandalphon told Bowser. “I failed to consider all the possible ramifications of my actions this morning.”

“Look, it’s fine,” Nadia cut in. “I know you goody two-shoe types are always itching to take responsibility, but it’s the fault of whoever transformed her. Simple as that.” She sighed. “She was my friend, too. When we fought together on the seaside, I saw that she was a good person, just in over her head and trying to do her best, like all of us. We’ll all keep our eyes out for a new Peach out there, okay?” With what the others said about dreams, plus her own dreams of dying, it seemed like reincarnation really was on the table, albeit with memory loss. Still, a part of her wasn’t so sure, even if she made sure not to give voice to it. She glanced at Sandalphon. “Any more bad news?”

The archangel shook her head. “None on my part,” she lied, her expression mildly pained. “All that remains is to construct a plan for what to do next.”

《 Super H.E.R.O. 》

Crane

Outside Fixeon Municipal Recycling Plant

---

First, came the lizards.

Then, came the mushroom person, who dealt with those lizards.

Then...came even more lizards. A lot of lizards.

The third part, the bit with the even more lizards, was where Crane really started to get involved. The sheer number of them was staggering. It was enough to make Crane nervous. She was tough, sure, but without support, she could imagine a future where she made one too many mistakes and let herself get overwhelmed. Fortunately, she had her first time allies with her. She had to prove herself a worthy asset. "Here I go!" She said, taking up a position that left her back towards a part of the city. Crane would be the living wall that kept the Terrazards from spilling into the civilian populace.

Crane leaned over slightly, taking a wide stance with one foot forward, her weight on her back foot. When the Terrazards approached, she clapped her hands together, creating a dizzying shockwave that kicked up dust and rung ears the ears. "Clap! Clap! Clap!" Crane called out, doing this several times. This was the advantage of having super strength and super durability to go along with her super size. it Even if Crane was shrunk down to normal size, she would still be much stronger than the average person. These gifts were special, and unique, and it was all that Crane had to offer to the world.

Well, Crane thought in the back of her head. That, and she liked to think, her sunny personality! She didn't want her inner monologue to think that her self-worth was tied up in her strength or usefulness or anything like that. Crane just liked to be helpful! And helpful she was, as the stunned mutant lizards failed to overcome her powerful shockwaves. Crane had developed many techniques like this before becoming a hero. It was a good AoE attack that affected many enemies at once, while being mostly non-lethal. At least, that's how she imagined it in her head. So it was good to see her hypothesis pay off.

Crane slammed her fist into the ground, creating an explosion that launched several back at lethal speeds, or just flat out squished them beneath her knuckles. "Yah!" She yelled. Then she swept her hand back and forth in a slapping motion, sending lizards flying away.

Everything was going well, until the GIANT MONKEY appeared. "Giant monkey?!" Crane called out in alarm. She was still taller than this thing, but it was the biggest thing Crane had ever seen in her life that wasn't a building. The Terrazards would have free reign over Crane's territory as she took a step back, eyes wide as the Menace charged towards her. Crane's thoughts raced. Was this thing stronger than her, in the same way a monkey was stronger than a human? It was entirely possible. On the other hand, she could be stronger than it. The only way to find out was to act with caution and restraint.

Crane widened her stance again, her strange, large heart pounding in her chest. One hand was forward, the other one was up, like a scorpion's tail. Her first idea was to redirect all of its energy and send it spilling onto the floor. Or dodge the creature. But she realized that was too risky! What if it kept running? What if it went into the city? Or what if her teammates ran by and got squished by a giant monkey? She couldn't rely on Menace's anger to cause it to be entirely directed at her exclusively. If she dodged it, anyone could get involved.

There was nothing for it, then. Crane would meet the beast head on, and hold it here. Keep its attention entirely on her.

Her stance shifted, from one of evasive strategy, to one of solid, defensive strategy. It was obvious to anyone with martial arts experience what the thoughts were in Crane's head. First, she was ready to dodge, then she glanced over her shoulder at the city, and her priorities changed. And now... Crane lowered both her hands hand wide, palms out, like a wrestler. Her lips pressed together and she winced, bracing for impact. There was a mighty collision as she slammed her hands into the shoulders of the beast and tried to grab it to prevent it from tackling her.

World of Light

JURI HAN

wordcount: 1,887 (+3)
Midna: level 9 EXP: //////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// (132/100) (+1 bonus pending)
Location:
Warp Charges: 1

warp locations

Virgin Victory teleport room
Top of the Split mountain
Outside the Convent of Our Lady of the Charred Visage
Tostarena Town
S.O.U. Building
Seiran Clinic
Underground Roadway (Seiran Rebel Base Outskirts)
Below City of glass entrance (plate maintenance tunnel)
Vandelay Campus (Alleyway)
Arahabaki’s entrance
Deep Ground - the Source

Fusion done, and everyone having finished their trading, all that was left was to crush the remaining spirits in order, which Midna got right on.

for Midna

Royal War Fan A fan outfitted with blades and usable as a versatile dexterity weapon. Its attacks are supplemented with minor wind damage, which can also create gusts or small wellsprings, or allow it to be thrown like a sawblade

Daora Gem An organic gemstone formed from gradual deposits of impurities deep within the bowels of a Kushala Daora elder dragon. Its glow is breathtaking, and it could be used to forge Daora weapons of highest quality

She let out a twittering whistle as she turned and examined the glowing gemstone that seemed to be soaked with familiar draconic energy, before flicking it up and into a portal, adding it to her list of crafting materials. The fans too, were a prize for sure, even if they were rather odd weapon wise. The little practice gusts felt right, charging some new well of power she had gained from fusion. Combined with the ability to quickly draw their bladed forms, they were a fine addition to her collection.

Once everyone was all sorted with their own itemizing and such, and starting to drift out of the room, Minda found herself at a loss as to what to do with the time she had left before that meeting, only for her gaze to slide across and then flick back to Juri. The princess had something of hers after all, and it would be best to hand it back over rather than leave it languishing in her pocket dimension. It was also a good excuse to try and get to know their stylish newbie, with the rush to get both her and the captain’s vehicles stored in time for departure she hadn’t said more than a few words to her, so setting out to kill two Kees with one arrow she strode her way over to the streetfighter

”Hello again“ she said with a wave as she approached, before pausing for a half step, reaching up, and removing her helmet so they could actually talk face to face. That was going to take some getting used too, she thought, as she tried to work out what to do with it (it would hardly do to leave a corrupting artifact of doom simply sitting around after all) and settled for tucking it under her arm right in time for her to arrive.

Juri was taking a look around the place, getting acquainted to her new surroundings. She was also looking for insecurities and places to exploit, but she kept that to herself. These people were real trusting just to let anyone on board. If they let her on, let’s be honest, they’d let anyone on. That was when Midna made herself known to Juri. The street fighter turned away from a computer keyboard and casually leaned up against a wall, looking the Princess over.

”You’re the one who vacuumed up my bike, right? Everyone’s kinda changin’ faces around here. You guys should probably invest in some name tags.” She said. As if to memorize Midna’s face, she leaned really far forward toward Midna.

”That I did“ she confirmed, before assuring Juri that ”You’ll get used to it“ with regards to fusions. Then leaned in the rest of the way so they were almost nose to nose, her lips turned up and open just enough to expose a pointy toothed impish grin that had somehow survived all the fusions ”Soooooo, tell me about yourself. What got you and Miss Fortune cat fighting and then onboard, hmmm?“

Juri sized Midna up and tilted her head, before standing up straight and turning to lean up against a doorframe. She propped her feet up on the other side of the frame and floated in mid air. ”Fortune’s a nobody who doesn’t know how to mind her own damn business.” She said, checking her ‘fingernails’ which were now covered up by her suit. Or rather, gloves, as she found the seam at her wrists. When she let it go, the fabric merged right back together.

”You’re the Seekers, right? Like hide and go seek? Since everyone else got hit by the brainwash beam I’m assuming you’re trying to do something about it.” She said.

”That’s what organization XIII called us, but they never did explain why. Cryptic, and up to their own schemes that lot“ Midna explained, though her voicing of that oddity was more or less the first she’d thought about the strangeness of the granted name. After which shea attempted to rationalize it while filling Juri on their plan and progress.

”But we do intend to bury the light that devoured all our worlds, and for that, we need to destroy the guardians safeguarding it. We have 6 down, 7 more to go. Then we crush Galeem, and put an end to this cruel death driven patchwork of a reality“

”Organization what now? You mean you didn’t pick the name?” Juri frowned, displeased. ”What kinda band of wimps doesn’t even pick their own name? It can’t be that hard if you’re already almost halfway there.” She said.

”Nobody jumps me twice.” She said. ”Big stupid ball in the sky. Once all these guardians are down we just need a big enough gun to shoot a big laser right up where its sun doesn't shine. Probably can’t go two feet without stumbling over one superweapon or another.”

”What you do is more important than what people call you. The heroes crushing Galeem’s minions beneath their heels doesn’t exactly have a nice ring to it, but it's far more descriptive, don’t you think?“ she said, making the motion of grinding the mechanical and dragon clawed heel of her new footwear into the floor.

”Can’t say Galeems left too many of those laying around, nor, it seems proper goddesses who could meet it on its level. It's not that stupid sadly, though I think someone did mention that there was a demon who’d trade spirits for secrets, so who knows. Maybe we just didn’t dig deep enough“ she sighed. That would, after all, make things a lot easier. If only they could get all the pieces of her fused shadow, or the triforce, this would all be a lot more straightforward.

”Wouldn’t be surprised. None of you here strike me as the snooping type.” She said. ”Just going by the fact it hasn’t blasted everyone again already, ‘Galeem’ can’t be all powerful. I think the answer lies in just getting a big enough gun, or spell, or whatever.” She waved her hand vaguely and dismissively.

”And these Moebius people are, what, its cronies? Its cultists? We can play hit and run all day long and take out its top members, way I see it.” She knocked against the walls of the Avenger. ”But this thing is a bit obvious. That’s why the bike’s important.”

”Not cultists. They seem more or less roped in or self serving to me. One just wanted ‘fun’ chaos, the other had his own scheme of some kind to do with ascending to godhood“ Minda replied, ”Least that’s how the two in Midgar. The one who chased us after we left, I don’t know, but he seemed a bit more commited“

”As for this thing, well, it snuck up on that pursue pretty good at the very least, and seeing as they’re now pursuing us I’ll take speed over trekking across the land like we have been any day of the week“

Juri rubbed her chin and rolled her eyes. ”Typical. Okay, self-serving assholes who suck up to the biggest bad they can find in a vain attempt to find power. I’ve seen it all before. Hell, I’ve done it myself.” She said casually.

”Alright. I want to see some action, and soon.”

Minda raised an eyebrow at that admission, particularly because of how unflatteringly she described those who did it. If she where to hazard a guess as to why it would be ”and it never works out for them, does it?“

At that, Juri tapped the side of her head. ”If they’re anyone but me, maybe.”

”As for action, well, I think a lot of people are getting close to their limit after or last bit of action and are going to want to rest up before striking out again. Best you’ll get is a spar for now I think“ she then said, implicitly offering. She could do with testing out her reconstituted body and fresh powers.

”Real action. The kind with blood in it.” She said, getting out her phone. ”Wonder if this place has wifi. I’m gonna poke around.” She switched gears pretty fast, and took off down a random hallway.

”Prickly and proud, now won’t that be fun to work with“ Minda said to herself, unintentionally putting voice to her analysis of Juri a bit louder than she thought given that her hearing was making her misjudge her own volume.

Juri stopped and turned over her shoulder. ”What was that?” She asked.

Minda looked more confused than concerned about being overheard, before shrugging and saying that it was ”Just my first impressions. Please, do, feel free to prove them wrong“

”Don’t mumble, sweetheart.” Juri turned away. ”That’s for broken people.” She stalked off down the hallway to explore the inner reaches of the Avenger.

”Not doing well so far“ Minda, who was psychologically unable to take that cruelly delivered ‘advice’ even if she wanted to, replied before stepping into a shadow and sliding through the ship that way. She could only hope their other new arrival was more personable when she checked in on them.

《 Super H.E.R.O. 》

Backup

Hero Three

---

After the psychologist returned to her commandeered office space, the ICOSA agent guided TJ to his, which was not unlike the other little office area in HERO Three: blank, dull, and mostly to be used for non-superhero HERO employees that didn’t want to make the trip out to HERO One but still needed to finish filing some arbitrary paperwork before the deadline. Randolph took a seat at the desk, leaning back in the cheap office chair and placing both of his feet (he was wearing expensive-looking loafers, of course) on the table. From there, he twiddled his fingers in the air above what appeared to be a small stack of a few manila folders, swiftly sliding one out from the pile and opening it. He looked to all the world like some type of business exec reviewing last quarter’s reports.

“Ms. Jennings,” he said with a coy grin as he appeared to flip through a few pages inside his little folder. ”A good few years of service, some interesting assignments, and of course, a very unique powerset. I’ve done a lot of reviews over the years and I haven’t seen anybody quite like you,” he said with an unbearably smarmy tone in his voice. Maybe it was just the British in him. ”Of course, as I’m sure you’re aware, I’m afraid I haven’t called you in just to compliment you.”

”Aw, you sure?” She asked.

”Quite, in fact,” Randolph said as he reached within his folder, he pulled out a few Polaroid-style pictures. Pictures of a woman that bore a striking resemblance to TJ (because they were, of course, of her) participating in a variety of prize fights and the like. After he laid his metaphorical cards on the table, Q. Spencer Randolph reclined back even more in the chair, pushing the office seat to its breaking point. ”I’ll give you a chance to look at these, and then describe what you think those are. Oh, and answer carefully.”

"...They appear to be images of an extremely bad bitch." She mused thoughtfully, scratching her chin. She leaned forward and set her arms on the table, looking the photos over. TJ didn’t sleep much, and there wasn’t as much crime to fight when the fighting rings were putting on shows. The people liked seeing what a powerless person could do against superpowered fighters. The way TJ saw it, it might as well be her, who will have a blast, and not someone who won’t bounce back.

”Amusing,” he responded, though his face didn’t shift from its cocky grin in the slightest, like it was frozen onto his face. ”I’ll go next and tell you what I see. I see somebody who is being paid to fight crime, in fact participating in criminal enterprise.” Randolph picked up one of the photographs, examining it closely (or at least, pretending to for dramatic effect). ”In fact, ICOSA’s code governing hero conduct prohibits any employed hero specifically from participating in unsanctioned activities that involve the use of physical force, including but not limited to street fighting, prize fighting, unofficial martial arts tournaments, duels, and jousting, ” Randolph recited. ”...the rules were written a while ago; they’re meant to encompass a lot of different possibilities. The point is, all this-” He gestured at the table covered in pictures, ”...all this is very much against code. I could easily order you to pack your things-” He snapped- impressive, given that he was wearing gloves. ”-like that.”

”In the interest of fairness, I’ll give you a chance to offer some reason why
shouldn’t have you laid off now.”

TJ rolled her shoulders, cleared her throat, and then suddenly flung herself onto the desk between them. "Oh no, please!"

"Please don't fire me, all-powerful bureaucrat! You've really got me figured out! It'll never happen again!" TJ rolled onto her back, the back of her hand pressed against her forehead.

"Just give me another chance!" She begged, reaching out to grab pathetically at his sleeves.

Randolph casually pulled his feet off the desk and pulled his sleeves comfortably out of grabbing
distance. ”Frankly, I don’t know why I would ask that question. It was pointless,” he muttered, mostly to himself. ”This is the situation for you. I’m well-within my bounds to effectively banish you from this city and make sure the best-paying job you ever get again is ‘backing up’ peoples’ cars as a valet.” He sniggered at his own pun. ”Oh, but of course, you are only a pawn in this game. Frankly, you barely qualify as a pawn. You’re more like a speck of dust on the chessboard, technically speaking. I have no interest in you. What I do have interest in…” The ICOSA operative leaned in, ”...is the fact that this whole ‘fighting and racing’ charade has been allowed to proceed unimpeded by the administration. I’m fishing for the biggest fish, Ms. Jennings. ” He reached into his coat pocket, procuring a pen and a small notepad. ”All I’m asking for is a written statement that Director Powers and the HERO bureaucracy knowingly allowed you to participate in your little hobbies. Or, even better, that they told you it was alright.”

He now stood, pacing back and forth on his little half of the mini-office. ”Sure, I suppose it’s stretching the truth, but it’s mostly accurate! And, more importantly, it’d be just the thing I need to build a case against this foolhardy organization. Just that statement and maybe a couple hearings back in Switzerland. And as for you…” Randolph shrugged. ”HERO, or whatever we rebuild it as if we change the name, would be under strict eyes for a while, but I could transfer you to the South in the meanwhile. Or Europe. And you could engage in all your little antics to your heart’s content. A bit over the line, sure, but I could stomach it.”

Randolph pushed the pen and notepad across the table. ”Just give me a little story, and you can walk out of here without anything really changing. Perhaps you might even get a promotion out of it, somewhere down the line!”

TJ deflated, laying on the table, still. No fun. She raised an eyebrow at him. She seemed oddly unbothered by all of this. "What are you, nuts? Nobody cares, dude."

"Maybe in la la land or wherever you come from ‘fighting and racing’ is a big deal. But in Castleburg, this is ‘administrative leave’ at worst. If you think this is enough to bring HERO down, this city will eat you alive." She said.

"Just fuckin’ relax. You’re goin’ full psycho over nothin’." She was talking like she was trying to explain something to a naive, overly-optimistic person. Which despite all this guys smugness, TJ thought he was. An excitable pencil pusher trying to make some dream come true. "Like. Banish? What year is it, 1350?"

”Oh, Ms. Jennings, I’m afraid you’re the one in la-la-land. I anticipate that big changes are going to be made around here soon; big changes that are the result of collections of details..” The man sat back down in his seat. ”Well, I’ve given you the chance to be on the right side of history in this case. I’ll even give you some time to come to your senses and make the most rational choice.” From his pocket, Randolph flipped out what appeared to be a playing card (it was, in fact, a four of spades), with some type of faint red etching onto the back. ”You’re free to use that to reach out to me. It’s what I call a conveyance rune. I have the receiving end. Once you realize that you want to be on the winning side, let me know.”

”Until then, though, I think it’s about time you got your arse out of this office,” he said with a cheery tone that betrayed the acerbic nature of his comments. ”Would you agree?”

TJ was looking down at her playing card and the rune on the back. "Testing, testing." She said, speaking into it. "Testing testing one two three. Like that?"

"Alright, well, see ya around…" She pointed in his direction, trying, genuinely, to recall his name. Had she ever gotten it? She couldn’t remember. "...you. " She nodded sagely, opened the door, and shut it behind her.

Looking to the other people in the room, she stretched. "Alriiight. That was more fun than I thought it’d be. What a fuckin’ prick." She said, definitely loud enough to be heard through the door. Getting out her mask, she put it back on, and headed out of Hero Three to get back onto the streets. She was pretty confident she’d be doing this no matter what.