 The Stormcrow, A Superhero's Tale |
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| SubRosa |
 Jun 22 2019, 04:28 PM
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#2
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 Ancient  Joined: 14-March 10 From: Between The Worlds  |
Acadian: That was a very intense episode, that gives us a glimpse into the turmoil inside January. Everything about her eventually ties back to her gender dysphoria - being a nerd to escape from the 'normal' world, being a fighter, her need to stand against bullies, her ability to feel empathy for others (especially those not born 'perfect').
I also wanted to avoid infodumps on her history. So I am carefully laying little breadcrumbs about it like her mother's near name-slip. A lot more will be coming out in the next chapter. Wow, that is very woke of ESO to include a trans person. Lucky Argonians! At least the Hist knows when it makes a coding error, and fixes it. Actually, it is just a custom ringtone that January set her phone to use when Avery calls her. You can do that with most smartphones. But now you have given me the idea that maybe when he is in Gadget mode, he overrides that, and sends his own custom ringtone down the line. Back in the day when I ran a tabletop Shadowrun game, the team's decker (basically hacker) was an NPC who was usually away from the rest of the team in his lair. He had a whole Man With No Name motif going, with his internet persona looking like Clint Eastwood, his attack programs being a winchester and a revolver, and so on. Whenever he would call the team I would use my laptop to play the theme from The Good The Bad And The Ugly. It was one of his shticks. Gadget could be doing something similar. You can follow along the road trip with this Google Map. Start at the Green House Book 1.10 - Stormcrow Rising January bounded up the stairs to her room. With the door securely shut behind her, she emptied out her old gaming backpack of dice and manuals and stuffed her Stormcrow armor within it instead. Then she was off as fast as the wind, racing out the front door and down the block. Avery lived just two houses down the street. He was just getting into his yellow Geo Storm when she arrived, and hopped in beside him. Once within she focused on the element of Fire, and took a deep breath. Then she thought better of doing her quick change so soon. It would be better to wait until they had reached their destination. Avery drove down the suburban street, with its small houses and equally small lawns. Someone was out mowing their grass, kids rode past on bikes, and ordinary life went on as if a supervillain emergency was not about to unfold. It felt somewhat surreal to January, knowing that something was going to happen, and that she was going to be part of it. Yet the rest of the world was utterly oblivious. Someone's sprinkler was throwing water half way across the street, and January was obliged to roll up her window to avoid getting soaked. The Geo was so old that she literally had to roll it with a hand crank. January wondered if they were still riding horses at the time it was built? Avery drove through a cross street, continued on for another block, then turned onto Dequindre road and headed north. He nodded to the center of the dashboard, where a giant screen had rolled out to display a list of cities and times. It took January a moment to realize that it was the flight schedule for an airport. "Our man Subramanian is booked on a flight for Atlanta," he said. "From there he's got a connection to Antwerp." "He's flying out of Flint?" January stared at the screen in disbelief. "I didn't even know they had an airport. Why not just take Metro?" "Maybe Flint's cheaper," Avery shrugged, "or maybe he figures no one will be watching there." "So how is the decoding going?" January shifted conversational gears as Avery literally did the same with the Geo. He took a left onto Nine Mile, and effortlessly went from gear to gear as the little car leapt forward past the other traffic. January mused that his driving was a microcosm for his life. Avery was all about gears, moving parts, things fitting together. He somehow saw all the tiny cogs and spinning wheels under the hood of the universe. He understood how that machinery worked, and could run it, or rearrange it, however he liked. "I broke the code last night," Avery beamed. "Pharos," he said in a loud, clear voice, "display Subramanian Ledger." The dashboard screen cleared, then a moment later filled with a spreadsheet of names, dates, and numbers. "It took a little while," Avery explained, "but then I realized that like you said, he's not a 21st century man. So I went old school. It turns out he was using a Vigenère Cipher. After that it was easy." "A vagina cipher?" January scrunched her nose in bafflement. "Sounds like every girl I match with on Scissr." Avery laughed. "It's a variation of a Caesar cipher. In a Caesar you shift every letter a certain number of spaces up or down the alphabet. The Vigenère takes it to eleven by incorporating multiple Caesar shifts in the same code. Once I figured out the length of the key, I just had to use frequency analysis to crack each individual Caesar cipher." "Then I had it, a list of all the blood diamonds he bought from a warlord named Ibrohim Alawar. I looked him up. His soldiers hack kids to pieces and gang rape little girls." Avery paused to curl a lip in disgust. "Anyway, Subramanian buys the raw diamonds from him. Then he takes them back to Surat in India for polishing. From there he brings them to the U.S. to sell. He goes all up and down the East Coast, Boston to Chicago, New Orleans to Orlando, and every big place in between. He's got every sale listed here, to shops and individuals. He's making millions, even after all the bribes he's got listed to customs officials." "Do his bosses know about it?" January asked, staring at the list of buyers, and all of the zeros besides their names. Her head swam. "There's no way to tell," Avery shook his head as he turned at Burger Baron and got onto the service drive for I-75. "He's making real business trips for the cartel at the same time he's slinging the blood diamonds. They aren't listed in the ledger, but I was able to get it from going back over airline records for the last six months." "So we have to stop him from getting on that plane," January mused, "and get the police to search him and find that ledger, and whatever diamonds he has left." "That's the plan," Avery said. He finally got onto the freeway, and immediately had to brake to avoid running into a massive Oldsmobile that suddenly cut into their lane. He down-shifted with ease. Again January was amazed at how expertly he made the machinery sing for him. "Great driving Grandpa!" he shouted out the window. Then he turned back to January as if nothing had happened. "Just to sweeten the pot I'll dump the entire thing onto social media. Imgrr, Twitt, Instantgram, Eyebook, MeTube, even Pr0n Hub. I've got bots set up to completely saturate the internet." January mulled that over. Avery could expose it all. But unless they stopped him from escaping the country, Subramanian could go to ground anywhere in the world. With his diamond money, he could vanish into a black hole and never be seen again. She had protected him. She had helped him. Now she was going to stop him. January knew she had to prepare herself. No more mistakes. No losing her temper. No allowing her frustrations to control her. So she pulled her feet up onto the car seat and folded them across one another in a lotus position. She closed her eyes and breathed deeply in and out. She focused on her Wiccan energy exercises, and cleared her mind. In time the rest of the world fell away, and there was only her heart, her breath, and the energy of the world flowing through her. "We're here," Avery's voice snapped January back to reality. She looked around to find that they had already left the freeway, and were headed down a surface street toward the airport. A massive parking lot stretched out to her right. The terminal rose up to the left, behind a smaller lot and a partial screen of trees. They passed under a large green sign that said "Bishop International Airport" in large white letters, with arrows that pointed out the parking lots. But what January really noticed were the crows. They crowded almost wing to wing along the length of the metal sign. They all took flight when they drove underneath, in a vast murder that winged its way toward the airport. "That is really creepy you know," Avery murmured, staring at the black shapes as they soared away. "I think that is my cue," January said. She focused on Fire. A second later she was clad from head toe in her Stormcrow gear. The sound of an explosion rang out from the left, and a thin stream of smoke began wafting from the terminal. "Don't slow down." January cranked down her window, and flowed through the open space with the ease of water spilling out of a tap. Balancing herself against the wind, she leapt onto the roof of the car. For a moment she stood there, practically surfing atop the Geo. She crouched down, then leapt skyward with all the strength she had in her legs. Rising into the sky, she put her arms out and hit the twin triggers in her gauntlets. Her cape snapped out into a pair of wings a moment later, catching the wind underneath them. She was getting better at this. Banking to the left, the long terminal building stretched out before her. It had a very modern look, with multiple scalloped overhangs curving up one over the other along the side facing the street. A driveway broke off from the nearer parking lot to run along the side of the terminal. It was directly beneath the lowest scallop, which shielded it from sun and rain. The walls of the terminal facing the drive were entirely of glass, as were those at the either end of the massive building. A pair of flags fluttered in the breeze outside. One was the Stars and Stripes. The other was the blue Michigan state flag, with its elk and moose facing one another. The far side of the terminal was more prosaic concrete and steel. A narrow tube-like structure - too big to be just a skywalk - jutted out across the tarmac from it, and joined the terminal to another huge rectangular building. The latter was free of decoration, unless you counted the multiple jet bridges that jutted from it, like pins from a cushion. Farther out stretched numerous concrete taxiways and the two actual landing strips, which were set at a right angle to one another. January banked to the left, and followed the swarm of crows down toward the overhanging scallops that lined the terminal. A row of trees seemed to leap up in front of her. For a moment she panicked, and visions of impaling herself upon their branches flashed before her eyes. Then she was back in control of herself. She raised her head, and arms with it, tilting the angle of her wings upward. She lost speed, but gained lift. The top leaves of one tree scraped against her belly. Then she was past the vegetation, and one of the massive metal overhangs loomed in her face. January ducked, and angled her wings downward. She dove for the concrete driveway below, and the scalloped overhang slipped by harmlessly overhead. Losing altitude had given her speed. She briefly noted that everything with flying seemed to be a trade-off between one thing and another. She really needed to practice flying more, maybe even read up about it. The blare of a car horn rang out in her ears, and she spared a glance to one side in time to see a giant pickup truck barreling toward her from the right. She pulled back once more, tilting her wings so far up that they were at a right angle to the ground. That stalled her forward momentum. The truck kept on coming, and sped past her with a rushing of air. The red, white, and blue cloth of a massive American flag mounted behind the cab snapped against her nose. Then her feet touched down upon the truck's long bed. Without really thinking, she took a running jump, and used the steel bed to launch herself back into the air. People were running everywhere. Some paused to shout and point at her, and the murder of crows that preceded her. Most just ignored her however, and got as far away from the terminal as quickly as their feet would take them. Now before January was a long glass wall facing the driveway, punctuated by occasional glass doors. She followed the cloud of black birds through a shattered plate glass window and finally entered the building itself. The main floor lobby stretched out to either side, and ran the length of the building. Essentially a wide open hallway, it was carpeted in red and blue. Shining metal baggage carousels jutted out from the far wall. The one before her was even decorated with a bronze statue of a man wearing an old fashioned suit and hat. She saw the name Chrysler set into the plaque at its feet, and imagined that he must be the guy the car company was named after. To her right there was an actual car, cordoned off by a low glass barrier. January could see that it was a Buick, because it said so on the rear quarter panel in big letters. Past that on the ground floor were the ticket counters and rows of seats. But before the ticketing area was an escalator that rose to the second floor. January could see a gallery from that floor running the length of the lobby, partitioned off by a chest-high glass screen. January banked sharply to glide down the length of the lobby, and followed the crows. There were more people here. Some ran. Some tried to hide behind the columns that held up the second floor gallery, the car, and the Chrysler statue. In spite of her pick-up truck assist, January found herself quickly running out of altitude. That gave her an idea as the car came near. She aimed for its roof, and triggered off her wings just before it slid underneath. She hit the roof running, and leapt straight ahead. The escalator ran at a right angle to her path, rising to her left. Her leap took her high over it, directly into a sign with arrows pointing out directions to ticketing and parking on the first floor. She rolled into ball, and hit the sign with her feet. The crows wheeled around her, winging up and to the left. She sprang out and to the same side, and not only rolled but twisted in mid air as she bounced sideways off the sign. That put her at the top of the escalator, right between a pair of men. The older one was dressed in flannel and had a full beard and cowboy hat. The other was much younger - perhaps the first man's son given their similar faces. He wore a t-shirt with an American flag brightly emblazoned across the front, and tribal tattoos crowded the length of his exposed arms. "Excuse me," January murmured as the two startled men almost leapt out of their boots. January imagined that few people were prepared for a girl in a crow costume to come flying out of the sky and land inches away. Let alone the murder of crows that croaked past and scattered in all directions, only to vanish completely just a few moments later. The onboard computer in the Gadgetmobile is named after the Pharos Lighthouse Vigenère Cipher Ibroham Alawar is based on RL Ibrahim Alawad Flint Bishop Airport Flint Airport aerial view A closer view of the terminal and parking lot The reverse view, from a model in the airport The terminal The baggage pickup inside the terminal. The escalator and Ticketing are visible in the middle distance The escalator that January leaps up -------------------- |
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Posts in this topic
SubRosa The Stormcrow Apr 19 2019, 11:34 PM
SubRosa [b]Chapter 1 - Stormcrow Rising
[center]Early May... Apr 20 2019, 12:04 AM Renee Hee hee, this is awesome! She's doing medi... Apr 20 2019, 02:21 PM
SubRosa
Hee hee, this is awesome! She's doing med... Apr 20 2019, 03:27 PM Acadian Oh this was a hoot! January, her crow fan cl... Apr 20 2019, 06:32 PM Grits I’m very excited to see Stormcrow so soon! (... Apr 22 2019, 06:17 PM SubRosa Renee: I went to MCC for a while, so it was my go-... Apr 26 2019, 04:32 PM Acadian ’Naturally she did what they said to never do.... Apr 26 2019, 06:33 PM Grits Awesome, a fight and flying sequence! I though... Apr 28 2019, 11:29 PM SubRosa Acadian: Courage + questionable judgement sounds l... May 3 2019, 09:35 PM Acadian I’ll take your wonderful Two Steps from Hell mus... May 8 2019, 07:31 PM Renee Whoa, she's wearing her superhero outfit in pu... May 9 2019, 03:55 PM SubRosa All: I created a Google Map of all the Stormcrow l... May 10 2019, 10:05 PM Acadian Neat Gadget Cave! Replete with ingenious tech... May 11 2019, 09:10 PM SubRosa Acadian: The Gadget Cave is a fun setting. I have ... May 17 2019, 04:41 PM Acadian What a fun episode, as the plot thickens with more... May 17 2019, 09:54 PM Renee There's a Beverly Hills in Michigan!
I u... May 24 2019, 07:07 PM SubRosa Acadian: Now we know that things were not quite as... May 24 2019, 10:18 PM Acadian This was a wonderful episode that sleuthed the sto... May 25 2019, 06:41 PM SubRosa Acadian: Working in the pop culture references is ... Jun 1 2019, 05:09 PM Acadian "I think I forgot to pick that at character ... Jun 1 2019, 07:17 PM SubRosa Acadian: One fun thing about writing January and A... Jun 8 2019, 04:52 PM Acadian Clever how she got her Crowsuit into the house.
... Jun 8 2019, 10:38 PM Uleni Athram A superheroine who actually knows her Marty Arties... Jun 11 2019, 03:27 PM Renee Ah, typical Renee has fallen behind. :blink: Life... Jun 11 2019, 04:30 PM SubRosa Acadian: I used the old window trick to sneak thin... Jun 15 2019, 04:58 PM Acadian January shows us plenty of raw emotion in this pow... Jun 15 2019, 07:13 PM Acadian Nice job here, setting the scene and stakes for wh... Jun 22 2019, 07:18 PM treydog The way you weave “existing” tech in with poss... Jun 24 2019, 05:46 PM Renee
Nice.
Also, the whole time her family's ha... Jun 24 2019, 06:52 PM SubRosa Acadian: This will be the crescendo of the chapter... Jun 29 2019, 04:15 PM Acadian Despite the superhero tech, you rendered everythin... Jun 29 2019, 06:21 PM treydog Most excellent fight scene! And again, very h... Jun 30 2019, 12:34 AM SubRosa Ooops, I forgot to add some links. I went back and... Jun 30 2019, 06:48 PM Acadian Thanks for the additional links and update.
I ... Jun 30 2019, 07:36 PM treydog I tend to agree. While on the one hand, it is fun... Jun 30 2019, 08:33 PM SubRosa Acadian: That Carotid Slap was something I filed a... Jul 6 2019, 03:49 PM Acadian Another intense fight! It was very neat how ... Jul 6 2019, 06:38 PM treydog A most enthralling fight! Then there is the d... Jul 8 2019, 04:36 PM Grits Catching up with January and Avery has been quite ... Jul 12 2019, 12:28 PM SubRosa Acadian: This two part fight forced me to think cr... Jul 13 2019, 05:08 PM Renee Lighthammer has force fields! That's cheat... Jul 13 2019, 06:34 PM Acadian It just struck when you referred to January as Jan... Jul 13 2019, 07:46 PM SubRosa As an editorial note, given that I have decided to... Jul 13 2019, 11:56 PM treydog A nice bit of calm after the Stormcrow (sorry). B... Jul 15 2019, 12:19 AM SubRosa
Side note- still looking at early Boston. Did fi... Jul 15 2019, 02:50 AM SubRosa I bought Boston in the American Revolution: A Town... Jul 17 2019, 02:03 AM Grits Excellent shirt! I’m a fan, even if Freya do... Jul 17 2019, 03:28 AM Renee
“fine-toothed search bot” :lol:
Ha ha I li... Jul 17 2019, 03:40 PM SubRosa Renee: Lighthammer's not a cheater! :lol:... Jul 20 2019, 05:06 PM treydog The thing (okay ONE thing) I like about this story... Jul 20 2019, 07:15 PM Acadian The bus ride and encounter did a couple of things ... Jul 20 2019, 09:35 PM Renee I think I want an African Goddess next to me, if I... Jul 21 2019, 02:12 AM Grits Not Cthululemon? :P Good idea to stash the backpac... Jul 23 2019, 01:10 AM SubRosa treydog: Inserting the human element into these st... Jul 27 2019, 04:35 PM Renee
:lol:
Yes, how apt a description, the handing ... Jul 27 2019, 04:51 PM Acadian A superbike for a superhero - hopefully. Unfortun... Jul 27 2019, 11:00 PM treydog Quotes first and then observations.
Have known... Jul 28 2019, 03:06 PM SubRosa Renee: I had no idea the 'Gucci Biker' lin... Aug 3 2019, 04:35 PM Acadian A nuclear powered Stormcycle emerges from the Gadg... Aug 3 2019, 07:47 PM Renee
He put a nuclear reactor in her motorcycle? :O
... Aug 4 2019, 12:30 AM treydog :lol:
Loved all the dialogue- this is the way... Aug 4 2019, 01:05 AM Darkness Eternal Chapter 1 - Stormcrow Rising
What a great way to... Aug 6 2019, 02:30 AM SubRosa Acadian: I did a lot of work on developing power s... Aug 10 2019, 04:13 PM Renee
Yes, I was thinking of buses. :) Fusion-powered ... Aug 10 2019, 05:43 PM Acadian This episode drew me in immediately and was a joy ... Aug 10 2019, 07:53 PM Darkness Eternal Chapter 1.2:
I get what you mean. The crows did i... Aug 10 2019, 09:41 PM treydog :blink:
Jan is certainly in a position to und... Aug 10 2019, 10:43 PM SubRosa Renee: This chapter is set about a week after the ... Aug 17 2019, 05:07 PM Acadian The beginning of another Crowventure assigned to h... Aug 17 2019, 09:03 PM Renee
Yeah, totally. He's like that voice over the... Aug 18 2019, 03:05 PM treydog
"
The interactions between Gadget and Cro... Aug 18 2019, 03:47 PM Darkness Eternal Chapter 1.3:
I like how you mentioned how deep-ro... Aug 19 2019, 02:17 AM SubRosa Acadian: I had not really thought of doing more be... Aug 24 2019, 04:32 PM Acadian Thanks for your peek/insight into the future of th... Aug 24 2019, 06:44 PM treydog More excellent Crow-Girl action! The fight wa... Aug 25 2019, 10:11 PM Renee Nice. She plays Fallout (or at least knows of this... Aug 27 2019, 08:16 PM SubRosa Acadian: I enjoyed writing the fight between Janua... Aug 31 2019, 04:23 PM Renee Yes there is some reason why our armed forces ofte... Aug 31 2019, 07:01 PM Acadian Another wonderful episode!
I liked how her ... Sep 1 2019, 07:29 PM Darkness Eternal Chapter 1.4: There was plenty in this chapter that... Sep 2 2019, 03:06 AM SubRosa Renee: Gasoline is much quicker to burn and explod... Sep 7 2019, 04:15 PM Acadian Gosh, I'm learning a lot about Michigan and De... Sep 7 2019, 07:17 PM Renee We recycle. At least I do. Where I live it seems l... Sep 9 2019, 12:16 AM treydog
A lesson my A and A team are learning (slowly). ... Sep 9 2019, 01:13 AM Darkness Eternal Chapter 1.7: Heh. Good question honestly. What is ... Sep 14 2019, 01:55 AM SubRosa Acadian: I know you were joking, but the reason I ... Sep 14 2019, 05:30 PM Acadian With a name like Wilhelm Wundt, it is indeed hard ... Sep 14 2019, 08:31 PM treydog Way back when we were reading Gawain and the Green... Sep 15 2019, 09:15 PM SubRosa Acadian: I still remember my Into to Psychology cl... Sep 21 2019, 03:33 PM Renee Yeah, I don't think she'd be able to conce... Sep 21 2019, 04:34 PM Acadian Another fun episode as you ever so smoothly show u... Sep 22 2019, 12:09 AM Darkness Eternal Chapter 1.10: Great thing you provided us with th... Sep 24 2019, 02:51 AM SubRosa Renee: You are right, even if she tried to ignore ... Sep 28 2019, 04:58 PM Acadian Looks like the stealth approach was a good call as... Sep 28 2019, 07:45 PM Renee See, where is Lighthammer during all of this? It m... Sep 29 2019, 03:27 AM treydog Caught up again- yay! And also phooey, becaus... Sep 30 2019, 11:30 AM SubRosa A minor note. Thanks to tredyog correctly identify... Oct 2 2019, 10:02 PM Darkness Eternal Chapter 2.1:Ah, Jan has been meeting some ladies a... Oct 4 2019, 03:33 AM |
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