The Stormcrow, A Superhero's Tale Options

[Renee]

Somewhere on the internet (or on some show) there is a guy driving a tank through ordinary traffic, yes. One of those car chase shows.

Whoa, look at this timeline. I'm actually gonna copy-paste that! Should make a good reference. Hmm, I already have it copied. But not since July of 2022. Heh, Crystal Death! 💀 Also, that's a nice gap from July 18 to August 8. Nice to know she got some time "off".

Also, interesting to see that Hannah really wasn't that long ago. ... Hannah, aka Yoko Nono.

Uh oh. The emergency ringtone. Yeah, that's clever, not bringing phones along. I know Jan doesn't have a smartphone, but does anybody else? Like, what about Avery? And Ryo? I'm gonna guess Avery does. He's the technology guy after all.

Dalmart!

Sheesh that's crazy. It's like Okami made her insubstantial. This is very CW-ish, all this flying and whatnot.

Look at all this destruction. Here's a situation during which normal police and even military can't really make a difference, not immediately anyway. Military would have to mobilize some solution. Hence, somehow Jan and Ryo are going to make a diff.

Cripes. Oh my gohs. Gosh.

[WellTemperedClavier]

A friend of mine thought the Napoleon movie was pretty good. Personally, I'm kind of over worrying about what history nerds think, despite ostensibly being one myself; a movie's a movie, not a documentary. I can understand getting upset over a particular stance a movie takes, but when it comes to nitpicking over historical minutiae, I'm just over it.

And yeah, I think it's a loss a lot of people go through. I live in a pretty big metropolitan area, so some of my friends stayed in the area. Not all of them, though. Plus, people can drift even if they live near each other.

Unfortunate the surgeon was so rigid in that. Seems rather baffling from my perspective.

Yeah, Josh's situation sounds a bit different from Cotard's. I'd have guessed more general survivor's guilt, but that's just my layman's opinion.

Thanks for the timeline!

Hm, I suppose super training equipment would need to be a lot more durable than normal.

GLA moves fast!

Huh, interesting the Army would transfer heavy armor in response to the incursion. I'd actually guess Detroit is one of the less likely place to be attacked like that again, but I can see the military's logic. Sort of.

Looks like the network system works pretty well.

Yeah, the Junkman encounter does feel far back. So much has happened...

That's one good thing about going after a tank thief: there's no way for them to hide it. Can't think of anything else good about it, but that's one.

Oh damn. No surprise that the tank's doing tons of damage, but actually seeing it is something else.

I like that January's thinking about the rescue. Usually you see it where the hero just swoops in, but at these velocities, that'd have a good chance of killing the civvie (and possibly the hero as well).

And oof, that's a hard brake. But needed to be done.

Wow. January's probably the first person to survive a direct hit with something like that. Though I bet a lot of governments would love a way to mass produce armor like hers.

Bad as the M1147 is, maybe it was better to get hit by that (as a superhero) then by depleted uranium. Regardless, January and Okami have their work cut out for them.

[SubRosa]

Acadian: Wiley Coyote is exactly what I was going for with the image of January being thrown through several objects. I do want this to have some humor, as well as the serious stuff. Superhero stories are supposed to be fun after all.

As ever, thanks for being my unpaid editor and finding that nit.


Renee: I have not thought about exactly what her emergency ringtone is. A crow cawwing? No, that would be too obvious, especially if other people are around when it goes off.

Jan has a smartphone. Everyone does these days. Hers is just cheap is all.

The military could bring out a helicopter gunship and destroy the tank with a missile, killing the guy inside, and anyone unlucky enough to be nearby. But that is obviously going to be the last resort.


WellTemperedClavier: The Detroit Armory is part of a larger complex that includes the US Army Tank Command. It is the administrative command of all the US Army's armored forces. Right next door a factory where the M1 Abrams were built. I think there were two factories total, and this one made half of them. That was back when they made them. They stopped making new ones a while ago, and the factory got sold off and repurposed to civilian manufacturing. But the tank command is still there. I remember seeing a bunch of M1s on a railroad siding a few miles away at the General Dynamics plant up the road as well.

So while Detroit and Michigan don't really have a lot of military bases, and certainly not infantry ones, we do have a few tanks that are sometimes here. After the Battle of Belle Isle, I imagined that the Army decided to beef things up in and around the city as a show of force, if for nothing else.

I was originally going to have it be one of the depleted uranium shells that hit January. But it just became too much of a mess writing the aftermath, given the toxicity of the dust particles that they create. Odds are it would give January cancer in 20 or 30 years. And in the short run she'd have to find some way to decontaminate both herself, and all her attire, and the place she was shot. I didn't want to deal with all that. So I went with another type of ammunition. That is when I discovered that new M1147 round, and used it instead.








The Amassona Hub can be found on the Stormcrow Map

Amassona Interior Pic

Another Amassona Interior Pic



Book 12.12 - Broken Arrow

Lighthammer flashed by overhead in a streak of white, blue, and silver. Gadget took a moment to toss a pair of palm-sized surveillance drones into the air for Cray to follow the action through. Then his armor loosed another stream of colorful ions as he rose to the sky to join the other man. January spread her wings and followed them into the air. Once she got up high enough to see past the wreckage of the cement lot, she was able to trace the path of the tank beyond.

It led directly to a massive building next door to the concrete business. It was a giant, rectangular structure that looked like a warehouse or factory. The structure was made of white-painted cinderblocks, and its front face was partly dotted with windows on either side. Several garage doors were set in the center of the mass, large enough for trucks to drive in and out. Numerous pedestrian doors lay to either side, some set in the plain walls, others within glassed areas that looked like lobbies. A sign ran atop the upper story of the building, proclaiming it was an Amassona.com hub.

"Ok, I've got the skinny on our joyrider," Cray's voice came over the communications link. "His name is Joshua Nelson. He's a US Army vet, same as me. But unlike me, he was infantry, and served in Afghanistan. Oh no... He was working a checkpoint in Kabul a few years ago, and passed an ambulance through it. It was packed with explosives. It went off a few seconds later, and killed over a hundred people. Our man was hospitalized afterward for six months."

"Is he disabled?" Lighthammer's voice sounded in January's ear.

"Physically, no," Cray responded. "His injuries in the blast were negligible. He was diagnosed with severe PTSD and depression. He blamed himself for the blast. It says here that he was not even sure if he had survived it at all, or if he was really dead and imagining everything since."

Gadget whistled, echoing January's own feelings.

"Oh crap, it just gets worse," Cray went on. "The Army gave him an honorable discharge, since his hitch was up by the time he left the hospital. He came back home and became a maintenance man at an apartment complex. He also joined the Army Reserve. He was doing his two weeks annual service when Belle Isle happened. He was there, on the bridge with Blackhawk. He's one of the people who were turned to stone by that Abyssal throne; the thing made up of all the spinning rings and wheels."

"Son of a bitch, this poor guy can't get a break, can he?" Blackhawk sighed over the comm. January glanced around for her, but the First Nations heroine had yet to arrive on the scene. Living in Toronto, she had a long way to come, and she could not fly nearly as fast as Lighthammer. No one could.

"He's a victim, not a bad guy," January murmured as she sped forward after the tank. She was just in time to see him crash directly into the side wall of the massive Amassona building. Cinderblocks shattered under the impact, and their remnants went tumbling aside. The tank did not even slow down. It just smashed right through, and disappeared from view.

"He is a victim." Ôkami agreed. "But he is going to turn other people into victims too, if we do not stop him."

In spite of being the only earthbound member of the team, the samurai/ninja was the first one into the building. He did not need to use a door, or even the massive hole that now gaped in the side wall. He just leaped through white cinderblocks and vanished within.

"We can't let him shoot that gun again. He might use depleted uranium next time." Lighthammer warned. He darted into the building an instant later. He did use the hole that the tank had caved into its side. Gadget followed a moment later. January brought up the rear, still trying to fill her lungs with air.

The interior of the building was an open space that looked big enough to park the Hindenburg within. It was a combination of a warehouse and assembly line. A forest of industrial storage racks rose up six stories high near one end. They were packed to the brim with pallets loaded down with boxes and bound up in shrink wrap. A sea of workstations sprawled out across the floor beyond these great cliffs. Each station's tables were loaded with scales, computer screens, label printers, and the like. Surrounding them were stacks of folded boxes and wheeled racks filled with goods stored in yellow plastic bins. It was everything you would need to box up and ship an order.

Conveyer belts stretched out through this ocean like causeways, and down them rolled box and after box, like blood through arteries and veins. These were deposited at collection points farther on, where they were loaded up on pallets or packed directly into waiting trucks.

Within this industrial forest hundreds of people toiled. Many were clad in bright yellow high visibility safety vests. But others wore just jeans and tees and the like. They came in all ages, ethnicities, and gender expressions. They were a veritable smorgasbord of the working class.

Most of these people quite prudently went running and screaming as the M1 Abrams crashed through the packages and pallets at their workstations, and sent both folded and assembled boxes hurtling everywhere. Goods from books, to gaming consoles, to microwave ovens were crushed under the tank's treads. It was instant mayhem.

"Are we sure it's only one guy?" Lighthammer asked as he zoomed down near to the ground. He gathered up a woman in his arms who was about to be crushed by a falling rack of televisions, and zoomed away an instant later. "It would take more than that to drive it and shoot the gun."

"There is only one man inside the tank," Ôkami stated clearly. "I can sense his aura. He is a meta. I believe he is a rigger."

"A what?" Blackhawk asked over the link.

"Someone who controls vehicles through a direct neural interface," Gadget explained. "It's a cyberpunk and gaming thing."

"Okay, that'll be his cape name then: the Rigger." Cray said calmly. "Ôkami take him out. You can get in the tank the easiest. Everyone else is on rescue duty. Keep the civvies out of harm's way."

"Ryōkai," the Japanese-American acknowledged. He prepared to leap toward the tank. But Gadget set down beside him an instant later, and stopped him.

"Fastball!" the powered armor hero cried. He then picked up the samurai, and hurled him across the massive warehouse. Ôkami soared directly at the tank. But then it swerved and fishtailed into one of those six story tall warehouse shelving units. The armored vehicle's rear end smashed through one of its corners, and sent the entire thing toppling over.

Ôkami hit the ground where the tank had been moments before, even as it sped away. Rather than go after it, he ran in the opposite direction. That sent him down the quickly shrinking canyon between the falling industrial rack and the next one over. He grabbed up two workers there, and faded out of reality with them. A stack of wooden pallets crashed into the space they had occupied a moment before.

"Speckt!" Gadget yelled, and darted to the spot. January got there before him, just in time to see the first rack topple into the next one over. In her mind's eye, she could imagine the domino effect that was about to happen, and send them all careening over one after another. There were far too many people underfoot for them to all escape the coming deluge of merchandise and wooden pallets. This was about to turn into a disaster.

She grabbed hold of the second bank of industrial shelves by one of its steel uprights, in one corner of the structure. She shoved back hard against it. Her wings beat furiously against the mass of the falling storage rack, and momentarily halted it. But the opposite end continued to go, twisting the entire thing around beneath her hands. Worse, a waterfall of boxes and pallets crashed against it from the first rack to tip. That struck more of the same in this rack, and started another chain reaction of objects falling to the floor.

Then Gadget zoomed past with a trail of ions, and he took up the vertical support at the far end of the shelving unit. With the two of them pushing, they were able to stop its fall, and finally slowly tip it back toward the way it had come. But many of the pallets and boxes within it still went crashing to the floor below in a waterfall.

Thankfully Ôkami was still on the scene. As he had just done previously, he snatched up people in the way and faded them through the avalanche of merchandise. Then he darted back again to continue his rescue mission. January could only glimpse Lighthammer out of the corner of her eye. But it appeared he was doing the same across the building, lifting up people from the path of the rampaging tank and whisking them away to safety.

Where was Blackhawk? They really needed the mistress of magnetism now, more than ever.

The First Nations heroine announced herself not with words, but through action. Suddenly the first rack to tip over reversed itself, and rocked back over its original place. The steel of its bent and broken uprights seemed to turn liquid for a moment. They flowed back into their initial, unbroken shapes before turning solid again. A moment later the rack that January and Gadget pushed against tilted back onto its feet as well, and stood upright on its own.

January breathed a sigh of relief, and took a moment to look out over the warehouse. It was a scene of pandemonium. The tank had driven a looping swath of destruction through its interior. Workstations, conveyor belts, stacks of pallets, and the like had been crushed underneath its treads. That created a chaotically winding river through the massive collection of merchandise.

"If aliens get lit, that's what their crop circles must look like," Gadget noted wryly as he flew up beside January.

The tank had stopped. Blackhawk hovered in the air in front of it. Her banded steel armor was painted blue and green, with a large medicine wheel emblazoned in the center of her chest. It was bisected by a cross, and each of the four sections that created was a different color as one went around it: white, yellow, red, and black. A white thunderbird was set in its center, and three black feathers fell from its underside. Finally, a golden dragon was emblazoned upon one of her shoulders, as it did upon the uniforms of all the members of the Great Lakes Alliance.

The tank went quiet then, and January realized that its engine had shut off. One of the hatches in the top of its turret creaked up, swung over, and then finally clanged open upon its surface a moment later. From it emerged a slender man clad in green fatigues. His hair was short, and his fair skin was weathered and drawn tight over sharp features.

"It's... it's you," he gasped, clearly referring to Blackhawk. "Are the monsters gone? Is it over?"

"They are gone, we stopped them." Blackhawk said softly. Her armored frame remained upright as she floated through the air toward him. Finally she came down to stand upon the turret directly in front of him.

"It's over."

He began to shake, and an instant later he collapsed into her arms, even as tears streamed down his face. Clearly all the fight had gone out of the man, merely at the sight of the First Nations heroine.

"You're going to be ok now." Blackhawk insisted. She wrapped her arms around the other man. It might have been as much an act of pinioning him, as it was an embrace. In any case, it accomplished both at once.

She was right. Just like that, it was all over.

January dropped down to the floor alongside Gadget, and breathed another sigh of relief. A glance down at her chest revealed that Mr. Blackwood's meta-materials were slowly but surely regenerating. The hole in the fabric layer of her tunic had shrunk to half its original size, and the strips of metal that made up her breastplate gradually flowed together and reformed into one, solid piece.

Blackhawk took charge of the Rigger - Joshua Nelson. January could see that he was a meta-human when she viewed his aura in astral space. She imagined that his power was geared toward controlling machinery, and perhaps only vehicles at that. Otherwise he was an ordinary man. And to be honest, he looked all too skinny and unhealthy to be an actual physical threat to anyone.

He seemed to be almost entranced by Blackhawk. Given that he had literally fought right next to her on the bridge to Belle Isle, it was not hard to see how he might have built up a sense of trust in the First Nations woman. January had heard many veterans of the bridge battle express that openly. They had named Blackhawk the Rock of Belle Isle.

January recalled that while she and the rest of the capes had followed Blood Raven inland to the foot of the gateway to the Abyss, Blackhawk had remained behind to hold the bridge with all the mundane defenders of the city - military and civilians alike. She had fought the entire battle at their side. She was their comrade-in-arms, their leader, and their inspiration.

Blackhawk reminded the police that Joshua needed to be hospitalized. Obviously that would ultimately be up to a judge and mental health professionals to decide. January certainly hoped that would be the case though. He had nearly killed her, and a lot of other people. But it was clear to her that he was not an evil man. He was a broken one. Besides, he had literally been a member of the Army of Light. That had to count for something.

In any case, the First Nations heroine did not simply pass the Rigger off to the police. Instead she got into the back of a police car with him. From there she accompanied him the rest of the way to his incarceration.

That left the rest of them to finish with the aftermath. It had become a standard part of every event now, along with the other more obvious phases, like the mobilization, and the actual action itself. As ever, she and the others worked side by side with emergency services like police and firefighters to comb through the wreckage. They made sure no one was trapped or harmed, and were sure to get the latter to paramedics.

Thankfully there had been no fatalities, and the worst of the injuries were no more than a few bumps and bruises. January imagined that her breastbone had fared the worst of them all. Granted, no one else had been shot by the tank. She made a mental note to add that to the list of attacks she had sustained. It was a new one after all.

But there was still more to do. Afterward they had to return to the Raven's Nest and write their after action reports with Cray. It was not glamorous. But those reports did provide them with an ever-growing list of dossiers on every villain they had ever faced, and might someday face again. Even if not, there was always something to be learned from every encounter. Part of the process would involve them all going over the drone and suit camera videos to review what they had done well, what they had not, and how they could improve. The super life was never as simple as it appeared in movies or comics!

[Renee]

That sucks. He allows the explosives ambulance past his gate and so he feels guilty. Not his fault, but I bet he beats himself up for it every day. Yup, "he blamed himself." How can you not, in a way?

That's right, he served at Belle Isle, best he could.

and she could not fly nearly as fast as Lighthammer. No one could.

Interesting. Who would you say is the slowest flyer?

Yeesh, Jan needs to take a break. She gonna have a heart-attack! ... I bet Joshua's gonna beat himself more once he realizes who he shot.

Off-topic a bit, but my nephew's in the army. He was telling me about one of our Bradley tanks, recently defeating the most brand of expensive Russian tank in the war, a T-something. David versus Goliath story, basically. But he also mentioned the Russian tanks are waaay inefficient. They use too much fuel, and therefore haven't got as much range. Something like that.

That would be hot, getting an unexpected ride from Lighthammer! 🦸‍♂️ Sign me up! - It amazes me there's still people walking around this complex. Place must be noisy or something, if they can't hear an Abrams coming their way. Edit: I forgot tanks nowadays can move really fast. Highway speed. My nephew actually just told me this the other day.

Uh oh, here he comes out of the tank, and he thinks he's done good. It's like he's still stuck hallucinating the monsters of Belle Harbor. Heh. Well, he won't be too pleased if can grasp the real reality of what just happened.

"The super life was never as simple as it appeared in movies or comics!"

Indeed not.

This post has been edited by Renee: Feb 13 2024, 04:58 PM

[Acadian]

Oh noes! I hope this doesn't mean my Amassona order will be delayed!

Neat how Cray jumped in to take charge and direct a good plan. Uh oh. . . you know what happens to plans as the focus quickly changes entirely to casualty mitigation. Each member of the Alliance was in good form, doing what they do best.

Blackhawk’s metal manipulation really helped save the day. Even better, her mere presence triggered Josh back toward reality. Perceptive of her to ‘get’ what was going on in Josh’s head and play along – even to the point of going with him in the police car as support and to help make his case.

I’m sure the Alliance makes plenty of points by their habit of sticking around to pitch in with the clean up after their rather messy encounters with baddies. Then back to the nest to review the tapes.

[WellTemperedClavier]

Ah, thanks for explaining the stuff about the tanks. Makes sense.

Looks like the GLA has a lot of eyes in the sky, which is good standard practice.

Belle Isle is the gift that keeps on giving. But these kinds of events are never done in one. Even if the instigator's gone, the effects will remain. Sadly true to life.

Huh, wonder if the Abyssal Throne's transformation sparked his powers?

Oh no, there are tons of people here. I suspect they'll need to have at least one super to direct the crowd as best they can. Or move really fast to stop Joshua from doing any damage. Tall order either way.

Most of these people quite prudently went running and screaming as the M1 Abrams crashed through the packages and pallets at their workstations, and sent both folded and assembled boxes hurtling everywhere.

Had to admit, I chuckled a bit at how you described that.

All right, they're definitely keeping an eye on the crowd as they usually do. Good work all around.

Makes sense Okami would use Shadowrun terminology.

Blackhawk to the rescue! Magnetic powers can be quite useful.

"If aliens get lit, that's what their crop circles must look like," Gadget noted wryly as he flew up beside January.

Ha!

Whew, glad Blackhawk knew what to do here. The guy doesn't want to fight, he just needs help to stay stable, and to control his powers.

I like the detail that Joshua Nelson (misread that as Norton at first, which would be... interesting) knew and trusted the GLA from the Battle of Belle Isle. Glad they got that wrapped up. Wonder if Nelson will be joining the GLA after some time to cool down. His power could be pretty useful.

You know, I'd never really thought of it, but being part of a hero group probably would involve a lot of paperwork. Disturbingly realistic.

[macole]

Monsters from the Id are difficult to defeat, permanently.

[SubRosa]

Renee: Right now Gadget is probably the slowest flier, because he is still learning. His suit has the capacity to go fast, he just needs the time and experience to get used to using it. But at least he's not running into trees these days...

You are right in that once Joshua comes to his senses, he won't be thrilled to learn that he just threw down against the good guys, his allies in fact. That's not going to help the depression or guilt he already feels over the bombing in Kabul, or the trauma from being petrified by an Abyssal at Belle Isle. They poor guy really has been given a shit sandwich.

The Bradley is a weird thing. It was supposed to be an armored personnel carrier that would replace the older M113s from the Vietnam era. But as they designed it, they kept throwing more and more things on it. Let's put a gun on it, let's put some missile launchers on it. Let's put this on it, and that on it. Well There's Your Problem did an episode on it, with a guest who served in one. It's not a bad vehicle. They just want it to do too much and wound up over-designing it.

TBH, all modern main battle tanks are horribly fuel inefficient, because they are insanely heavy and at the same time need speed, so they have massive engines. The M1 Abrams gets about 1/2 a mile per gallon. It weighs 70 tons and has a literal jet engine with 1500 horsepower. Even with that it can only do about 45 mph at max speed. That is fast for a tank. But slow for anything else.


Acadian: Don't worry, I am sure Geoff Bezo will force the workers in the Amassona Hub to work overtime without pay to make sure no orders are delayed.

It was a good plan that Cray had. As you noted it lasted about as long as any plan does. This was one of those fights that was not about the fight. It was about saving lives from an unfolding disaster. Blackhawk's reaction to Josh here was part of that. He's not the enemy, he's a victim too, and he needs their help the same as everyone else. Even if he is also posing a threat to everyone at the same time. I liked writing this, because it is an extremely complicated situation. How the Alliance handled it reveals what kind of people they are.

The Alliance sticking around is definitely becoming more and more of a regular feature. Blood Raven was not one for that sort of thing. It sort of clashed with the mysterious loner dark avenger lurking on Gothic steeples motif she had going. But January and her pals are not the same. As the cleanup of Belle Isle showed, they are all about helping, not simply fighting. Honestly, that was one thing I liked about the most recent Batman movie. In the end he was not fighting a personal vendetta against crime, but simply helping people during a disaster.


WellTemperedClavier: The ghosts of Belle Isle keep on haunting. The fallout from that battle is still not over yet.

I had not thought about being turned to stone activating Josh's powers. I had not really thought of when they had in fact. But that would be ideal timeline-wise. So now that was his inciting event as a super.

Josh would be a good driver for a team vehicle, if the team ever gets one Or just a drone operator, like many Riggers in Shadowrun. Right now though, I don't really have an any plans for him. I don't think he is mentally up for it, or likely to be any time soon. I could see him one day operating heavy machinery like a back hoe or those giant cranes they use to build skyscrapers, where you need to be extremely precise with a massive vehicle. I can imagine him doing this with his eyes closed.


macole: Sadly, you are correct. Josh's mental health will likely be poor for his entire life. As much as I would like to put him in action again as a hero in the future, I think his mental state would be just too fragile. January is in a similar boat with her PTSD. I don't see her ever being 'cured' of it. I don't think anyone ever is. At best she will just learn to manage it as best as possible, and go on in spite of it. She is lucky, in that she has a strong support network of friends that she can lean on.












January

January's Poe miniskirt

Avery

Ryo

Eleni/Silverlight

Xochitl

Kensia/Calypso

Jeri/Riven

Kaelin

Harper




Book 12.13 - Broken Arrow

August 18th (Sunday)

The back yard of the Witch House spread out around January. The grass under her was soft and springy. To one side the concrete driveway ran back past the house, along the side of the yard, and ended at a detached garage. Avery's yellow Geo Storm was parked in front of it. Beyond rose up a line of tall trees. Those oaks and evergreens went on to ring the entire yard on three sides, and blocked the outside world from view. The Witch House itself stood behind her to complete the ersatz atrium and conceal them from the street.

January knew that other houses rose up to either side of them. But the trees and bushes blocked much of them from view. The far end of the yard however, simply melted into a forest that stretched out to the nearby Clinton River. She knew from her past sojourns that the system of nature trails back there stretched out along the river for miles in either direction.

But even without all the trees and the looming presence of the house, they were shielded from prying eyes. The magical defenses throughout the Witch House and its grounds insured that. All it had taken was the magical equivalent of January flipping a switch, and the wards around the property had gone into dark mode. Now the arcane security system obscured all within from any form of surveillance and intrusion: visual, physical, magical, or electronic.

It was nothing obvious, like a giant glowing wall of impenetrable energy. Instead the wards used the existing landscape - such as the trees, bushes, house, and garage- and painted in all the blank spaces between them to trick the eye into believing that nothing was there. It reminded January of a magical camouflage net that concealed all within from view.

January wore her Poe miniskirt, printed with numerous passages and images from the 19th Century writer's works. She left her legs bare underneath, and wore a black tank top above. Silverlight looked like a real estate agent in her business casual jeans and blouse. Ryo wore a simple black tee. Xochitl was clad in a colorful sundress. Calypso looked like she came straight from the beach, in a pair of cut-off shorts, sandals, and a strappy tee.

Riven was clad in mom jeans and a New Kids on the Block top. Kaelin was her normal punk self, in a plaid miniskirt, multicolored hose, and a halter top. Harper sat beside her, in their usual blend of masculine and feminine styles: a pair of skintight black pants, and a checked sport coat over a white shirt and black tie. Even Avery was present, clad in a plain white tee and cargo shorts.

They all sat in a circle in the middle of the yard. Standing in the center was Silverlight. January was still not used to calling her Eleni. Given that none of them were suited up, it really was appropriate to think of her that way however. Sitting on the ground beside the cultural anthropologist was Avery. His phone was laid out on the grass beside him, and he was listening to something on it through a pair of earbuds. He seemed to be in his own world as Eleni gave her lecture.

"The world we know - and think of as reality - is not the real world," Eleni began. "It is only half of it, if even that much. Right beside our world of material reality is another world, one of magic, and power, and feeling, and will. It is inextricably connected to the mundane world, so much so that the two literally cannot be separated. For one cannot exist without the other."

"Now I call this otherworld the aether, the aether realm, aether space, or the aetherial," Eleni went on. "Most other magical practitioners these days refer to it as astral space however. As all things magical, everyone has their own terminology. No one is right or wrong. What is right for you is all that matters."

Xochitl shot up her hand, like a student in class. Eleni nodded to the young woman, who then spoke eagerly. "This is like, As Above, So Below right? What happens in one plane, flows to the other, and vice-versa?"

"Yes, exactly, that is what that statement is all about," Eleni said. "As best we know that came from the Emerald Tablet. It was a stone tablet which was commonly referenced by Arabic sources as early as the Eighth or Ninth Century. Later it was widely adopted by the European Hermetic traditions. The idea goes back even farther than that of course, being built upon Greek works from the Second or Third Century BCE. These referred to Hermes Trismegistus - the 'thrice great' - whom Hermetic Magic is named after."

"No one knows if Hermes Trismegistus was a real person or not; or if they were an extension of the god Hermes; or if they were just made up by someone. It does not really matter, because modern Western magic is founded upon his ideas and works, not his birth certificate. Even if he was not real to begin with, he is now, in every Westerner who uses magic. We made him real."

"But I digress..." Eleni glanced down at the fully modern tablet in her hand. It was the computer kind of tablet of course, not the ancient stone kind. Clearly she had this lecture written down there.

"In the Latin the Emerald Tablet is read as: 'Quod est superius est sicut quod inferius, et quod inferius est sicut quod est superius'. In English that translates to 'That which is above is like to that which is below, and that which is below is like to that which is above'. However, in the earlier Arabic it is actually: 'That which is above is from that which is below, and that which is below is from that which is above'."

"Note the 'from' in the Arabic version. I think this is more accurate. For these two worlds are not simply mirrors. They are connected, two sides of the same thing. Actions in the aether ground down to directly affect the physical. Actions in the physical rise up to alter the aether."

"Now magic itself is inherently aetherial in nature," Eleni continued. "The aether is the ultimate source of all magic. By this I mean aion, or raw magical power. Or you could say teotl, or mana, or mojo, whatever you want to call it. People love to argue this, and point out that the earth is where magic comes from. Where I can attest that the moon is where it comes from, as I can directly harvest power from it with my staff when it is in the sky above."

"You have a moon rock on the head of your staff," January noted. "I mean, a real stone from the moon, brought back by the Apollo astronauts. As those of us who have read about sympathetic magic know, things which have been in contact with one another maintain that link, even when physically separated. So the head of your staff is still part of the moon, right?"

"Exactly," Eleni agreed. "I see someone has been reading their theory. But we digress once more. What I was working towards was that the earth, and the moon, and the rest of the universe, all lie parallel to the aether. There is no place in our universe that does not touch the aether, and vice-versa. So when one feels energy rising from the ground, what they are really feeling is it rising from the region of the aether that overlaps with the ground."

"Everything in the physical, mundane world casts a shadow in the aether," Eleni continued. "So when you sense in the aether, what you also see here, you will see there. But it will not be the same. Inanimate material, especially that which has been removed from its original settings and reshaped and worked by humans, is only a pale, transparent shadow. Take a brick wall for example, or a wooden chair. In the astral they will barely be there at all. You can look right through them."

"Other inanimate objects still in their natural environments - like sand on a beach, or stone in a cliff face - will appear more solid within the astral. Eventually enough of it will block your sensing, especially if you are looking straight down into the planet. This goes back to why some people say magic originates from the earth. Eventually the aion welling up from that part of the universe simply blots out everything else. It is kind of like looking around under the ocean, eventually the water clouds over everything, and you cannot see farther."

"Living things however, will appear solid and tangible in the aether. In fact, they will typically glow with an inner light. This is all living things, from microbes to elephants. Though you might need to fine tune your sensing to detect the smaller stuff. But put enough of that in one place, and it is hard for even an amateur mage to miss."

"Algae and phytoplankton blooms are like that," Calypso - Kensia Toussaint - nodded. "They can be blinding in the astral. I have to work hard to not see them."

"Every living thing has an aura that is visible in astral space," Eleni nodded to the Bahamian woman. "Every aura is different. Think of it as magical DNA. It shows everything that we are. Our sex, our gender, our age, our eye color, our current physical and emotional states, the old scar on your finger, the chicken pox marks on your forehead, every freckle, everything. It is all there in your aura."

"It is a lot to take in. It takes time and practice to get so granular that you can see it all, and more importantly, understand what you are looking at. Some things are simple however. A meta-human will stand out starkly when compared to a mundane. So too, will a magician stand out from them. There are vast differences between all three, which are always clear and present in the aether."

"Okay, time for some hands on practice." Eleni said. "I would like you all to sense into the aether now. You may find it easiest to close your eyes, and if possible, even cover your ears or other senses. I know some of you are old hats at this. But for our new students, sensory information from the physical world can fight with that from the aether. The two together can become very confusing and even jarring."

"Avery here has generously volunteered to serve as a guinea pig... erm, artistic model for us today. He's here because he is not a magician, but a meta-human. I would like you to study him in the aether. Compare what you see in him to the mundane plants and animals around us, to the rest of us mages, and even to the inanimate objects like the driveway. You will see the differences between magical, meta, mundane, and artificial."

Eleni motioned down to the young African-American who sat nearby. He nodded his head to whatever it was he was listening to through his ear buds. Not being a mage himself, this lesson was not for him. As Eleni had said, he was the equivalent of a model who posed for artists to draw. He seemed to realize that he was being talked about, because he lifted his eyes to the crowd around him. He smiled and gave a peace sign. Then he went back to listening to his smartphone.

January did as Eleni asked. She closed her eyes, and felt for her magic. It was there, as always, a calm pool of energy deep within her being. She brought it up through her body, and imagined that she was a tree. She slowly inhaled, and the mana flowed up through her trunk like sap. Then it spread out through her limbs, and suffused her body with power. She exhaled just as slowly, and now the energy dripped off of her skin like dew. It fell to the ground and soaked into her roots. From there it rose back up into her body with her next breath, to begin the cycle all over again.

Over and over, she practiced this simple exercise. She had read it in one of her books on Wicca and Witchcraft. She could not remember which at the moment. It had served January well ever since. Not only did it help her feel and use her magic, it also was just a nice, calm way of relaxing herself.

As Plato had said, it was a way to remain silent in the presence of the divine. It removed the clouds from her eyes and enabled her to see by the light that issued from herself. Not to see what she thought was good, but what was intrinsically good.

Then she stretched out into the astral. All around her the yard sprang to brilliant life. It was colors, it was sounds, it was smells, and even touch. She could smell the power within the mages around her, pleasant as the aroma of freshly baked bread. She could feel the life within each blade of grass beneath her legs. She could hear it as a symphony within the trees all around, and the river that twisted and turned nearby.

Avery was a bright, but monochrome image before her. Right beside him was Eleni/Silverlight. The cultural anthropologist was a brilliant flame of color, just jumping at her brighter than a 4K television screen. So too were the other mages around her. In contrast the trees and grass were soft gray shades. Avery's Geo parked in front of the garage was barely visible. It was just a transparent set of lines, like a dim wireframe display on an old computer game.

The garage itself and the Witch House behind her glowed with energy, much as the mages did. Each witch bottle placed within the house or around the grounds shone as a nexus of power. Rivers of mana flowed from them to link one bottle with another. They created a spider web that surrounded first the property, then the house and garage, and finally the individual rooms within the home.

This magical energy was impermeable within the higher realm. January could only sense through it all because Blood Raven had taught her to connect with the wards and control them. She knew that for the others, the barriers they created would be impenetrable. Well, at least unless January chose to lower the protection of the wards. Like any security system, they could be turned on and off.

Eleni then moved from one of her students to the next. She lingered the longest with Xochitl and Riven - whom January had recently learned was actually named Jeri. The latter two struggled to sense into the astral at all. January waited patiently as Eleni coached them to simply relax, and attain a state of gnosis.

It was that condition where you both lost yourself, and track of the world around you. It was like when you were driving, and forgot that you were driving. January had read that in ages past this was the most important part of all magical workings, the key to accessing your innermost powers. But Tunguska had changed all of that of course. Whatever else that mysterious event might have been, it had also been a wakeup call for magic. Ever since the Siberian fireball, it had become far easier and quicker for mages to manipulate magic, and the resulting effects were more powerful than ever.

Yet January had learned that the old ways and techniques still had value. Things like gnosis were a good way for one to get to know one's magic. Just like Plato had said, it helped one to remain silent in the presence of the divine.

A crow came down from the sky and landed on January's lap. She took a moment to study it there in the astral. In fact, she took more than a moment. She stared deeply into the aura of the bird. It was a gray thing in the magical realm. Its life gave it solidity. But there was nothing special about it. It was just another bird, neither magical, nor meta, simply an ordinary part of the world around her.

Or was it so simple? January took to heart what Eleni had said about one's aura showing you everything that they were. Surely this bird was a masterpiece of evolution? After all, billions of years of random mutations and chance and genetic drift had resulted in this one being before her. Generations upon generations of life had culminated right here, with this individual on her lap. That was nothing to scoff at.

She felt down into the crow, which looked calmly back at her. She could sense its stare. She could feel down into its eyes, into its brain, into its heart, and it unfolded before her like a rose.

January caught her breath sharply as the crow came to life before her astral eyes. No longer was its aura just a plain blob of gray. Now she was able to parse out individual colors. It was like white light that had been shot through a prism. Now she could see all the colors of the rainbow within the bird's magical self.

Thanks to her newfound level of awareness, she could separate each aspect of its aura into clear, discernible threads. There were its bones. There were its muscles. There was its blood. There was the oxygen that flowed through its veins. There was even the mush of the worm it had just recently eaten, bubbling in the acid within its stomach. It was a canvas of color before her eyes, and a symphony of sound to her ears.

It was beautiful.

She looked up to see Avery. He too, was no longer just a bright image of gray and white in the astral. Now he glowed with vibrant shades of color. Again, she could see the lines of power that told her that he was African-American, that his hair was curly, that he was a man, that he was gay, it was all there. So too was a curious violet cord. It stitched its way all through his aura, like veins through marble. She glanced back to the crow, and the grass underfoot. That violet was not there. She looked back to Avery, and realized that this was the marker for his meta-humanity, at least in her astral eyes.

She looked to the others. They too, were works of art, masterpieces within the magical realm. Unlike Avery, they were stitched with threads of gold rather than violet. She noted Eleni looking back at her. Her eyes were brilliant silver holes, and January realized that the other woman was looking back at her through the astral as well. January smelled a cloud of emotion roll off the woman. It reminded her of vanilla. It smelled like satisfaction.

"I sense that you have had an epiphany January," Eleni said. "Can you describe it to everyone else?"

"I can see... everything," January said quite honestly. "I can feel everything. It's like a painting, like a really bright, colorful one. Like a Van Gogh, the way his colors just vibrate, and pop off the canvas. Each brush stroke is a story of our lives. I can see where you broke your arm as a child Jeri. I can see that you ate fish for breakfast today Kensia. I can see that Avery is thinking about his boyfriend Corey, because he's, well... I can see how satisfied you are Eleni, because I actually got something out of this."

[Renee]

Right. I think for Gadget, flying is maybe not as intuitive. Jan had her mistakes for instance, but overall it seems like the process to fly was almost like she adapted into it. Almost like a spiritual process. Whereas Avery, seems like he can only glimpse the process by expanding what he knows from a gadgetary point of view. Hope that made sense.

Wow, you sure know your military! I get the feeling you didn't have to wiki any of that info about Bradleys and Abrams and so on. I watch that video later. Gotta comment on Stormcrow, and then go back to High School first.

Nice, look at Jan. WHOA look at Avery. Shesuz if I was 20 again... *ahem*. I look at the rest later. Too impatient to see what happens with Joshua.

Ryo: looks like a bandito gangbanger, que pasa?
Silverlight: Classic suburbanite. I'd guess her for a real estate agent.
Xochitl: Other than a highschool student she reminds me of America Ferrara
Calypso: Looks like a dancer from In Living Color. One of the Fly Girls.
Riven: whoa. Soccer mommy. ⚽
Kaelin: cutie behind the counter at the record store or book shop.
Harper: Like a concierge, but really it's the garb she's got on in the picture.

Again, I love Jan's security system. It's insular. No outside parties involved. How close are the neighbors?

*Likes Silverlight's sermon* Emerald Tablet. Gonna have to read about that later. Sounds facinating. "In the Latin the Emerald Tablet is read as: 'Quod est superius est sicut quod inferius, et quod inferius est sicut quod est superius'. In English that translates to 'That which is above is like to that which is below, --- Love that part.

This is fascinating. I'm limiting commenting on everything just to save space. But the back and forth between all participants has me engrossed. Her lecture confirms things I've read in other texts, other books, etc.

Edit: Such as: how close do dreams come to astral? Or are they always completely separate realms? What is an example of a bleed-through? Bleed-throughs are moments when other realms bleed into our everyday life here on Earth. Anyway, that's what I'd ask.

Avery's got earbuds in during a personal lecture. Sigh, Millennials. Sure Gen-Xers might do this too back in the day, but usually only the stoners.

For Jan, going into the astral is second-nature by now, but even she seems to be fine-tuning her perceptions, right? I wonder what Xochitl's experience is gonna be like (if it's written up). She seems the least experienced, besides the techno-oriented Avery.

"I sense that you have had an epiphany January," Eleni said. "Can you describe it to everyone else?"

"I can see... everything," January said quite honestly. "I can feel everything. It's like a painting, like a really bright, colorful one.

Supposedly, a lot of these senses blend once we're outside of our material world. Colors have sounds associated with them, smells can have colors. And there are other senses outside of our Five as well.

Van Gogh. Was just down at the museums in D.C. this past week; they've got three or four Van Goghs. Immediately I teared up. I can't look at his work without sobbing a little (nor most of the Impressionists' work). Roses got me this time. According to the lady who was giving the tour this time, the roses were originally red, but Van Gogh's brother supplied the paints at the time (Van Gogh himself didn't have any money), which were all cheaper paints. So over the past century they've gone from red to white. 🌹

Anyway, great write-up. Time to go back to High School now.

This post has been edited by Renee: Feb 19 2024, 05:44 PM

[Acadian]

A wonderful review of what the various members of this growing alliance look like.

As with all your detailed descriptions of things magical, I enjoyed Eleni’s instruction. Totally helpful I’m sure for Xochitl. And, we learn, for Riven as well. Even Jan leveled up her astral sensing. Buffy is jealous that Jan can do this without having to ‘lay on hands’ to sense the true nature and physical medical history/condition of another.

Importantly, Jan can now discern magicians from nonmagical metas.

[WellTemperedClavier]

Glad the stone-activing-powers thing was helpful!

Good point about Josh. He's dealing with a lot of trauma, and being a super probably wouldn't help him (or anyoen else) right now.

Dang, the Witch House sounds nice. And maybe not too expensive, given the location? Sorry, I'm in California and even the crummiest house here is absurdly overpriced.

Sounds like a pretty effective and convenient security system.

Hm, so is that the rule with supers? Real name when out of costume, hero name when in it? Makes sense.

Good history lesson here regarding magic.

The "from" here definitely matters. And fits in with larger ideas about interconnectivity.

The stuff about inanimate materials on the astral reminds me a bit of Gnosticism, though in reverse (kinda).

Was Avery supposed to be listening?

It's funny how difficult it is to shut out sensory stimulation. I'm sometimes able to do it when I'm really focused on something, but I'm not usually able to control what I focus on.

Normal or not, the crow feels like a good omen somehow.

So this magic is like full spectrum imaging almost, but more powerful. Interesting.

And all is one!

[SubRosa]

Renee: Avery's picture is Shameik Moore. He voiced Mile Morales in the recent Spiderverse movies, among other roles.

Jan lives in a suburb. So her neighbors are as close as any others in a burb. Basically right next door.

The Emerald Table is real, and as Eleni said, it is one of the foundations of Western magic. That is why I included it. I like bringing real things into the story to keep it more grounded in reality. Or at least in a sense of reality.

I never thought about dreams and astral space. I have no idea really. Maybe someday I will explore it, if I have a character that it pertains to. Like Dreamer from the Supergirl TV show.

I have always liked Van Gogh's work. I love his colors, their vibrancy, and how they flow across his canvases. He is one of my favorite artists. I did not know that about Roses! Well, if I did, I forgot it. I only have so much room in my databanks. Sometimes I have to delete old info to make room for new things, like knowing what the kids today mean when they say something is "dope" or that "it slaps", and the like.


Acadian: This was originally a longer lecture, but I trimmed it down to the parts that are going to be important to the story. Otherwise I was afraid it was going to be too droning and lose the audience. January's leveling up of her astral senses is going to matter later on. So to the discussion of undead and the stone tape theory in today's episode.


WellTemperedClavier: I don't think there is any such thing as a non-expensive house anymore, with corporations buying them all up and just sitting on them forever to drive up their value. I just did a quick search of Sterling Heights houses, and they tend to be in the $400,000 to $600,000 range. The Witch House is big, so it would be at the top end of that, if not beyond.

Avery was not supposed to be listening. He is not a magician. So he is never going to be able to sense the astral. He is there simply as an artistic model, so the mages can see what a meta-human looks like in astral space. I went back and tweaked the text to make that more clear.

One problem I have always had with working in corporate america is shutting out all the people around when I am in cube city and trying to concentrate on my work. I usually put in earbuds and listen to music to drown everyone else out. Otherwise their conversations always distract me. It is one reason I prefer to work alone.

Crows are always good omens for January.

Everyone perceives magic and astral space differently. It all depends on one's personality, and how one relates to the universe. I imagine a Khajiit would perceive much of it through smell. An intelligent shark mage through their electrical sense, smell, and other senses. Jan's own perceptions are very visual, because that is an important sense to her, given her avian nature. But even she still smells in astral, feels in it, tastes in it.

That is even more the case with Xochitl, as we are about to see. She is an artist. So the world to her is one of colors and shapes and brush strokes. If we saw it from her perspective in a movie, it would shift from live action to animation. To her astral space is a literal painting, sort of like that Oblivion quest where you go into the painting.






Starry Night

Wheatfield with Crows

Sunflowers


The Stone Tape theory



Book 12.14 - Broken Arrow

"I can see it!" Xochitl shouted. January felt power rise to a height she had yet to see before within the young woman. As with Eleni, she could sense that her apprentice had shifted her senses into the astral. "It's like you just said: Van Gogh. He was always my favorite. This astral world, it's like one of his paintings. It's like that copy of Starry Night you have, or Wheatfield with Crows, or Sunflowers. I can see the brush strokes, and each line is a different facet of one's aura. It is all light and color and tones and shades. It's beautiful."

"Excellent! That just leaves you Jeri. Still having no luck?" Eleni asked. But January knew that she already had the answer. She could see that Jeri was not sensing within the astral, unlike all the others now.

"No," Jeri answered curtly. January could see the dissatisfaction spread across the other woman's aura like a bitter dark cloud. "This wiz bang stuff is just not for me. I'm a fighter, not a spell slinger."

"I have an idea that might help," Ryo surprised January by speaking up. He rose to his feet and walked over to Eleni and Jeri. "I watched the video of you fighting on the MacArthur Bridge. You have a way of knowing when an attack is coming from behind you and blocking it. It is like you have eyes in the back of your head."

"Yeah," the older woman said. "It's sort of a danger sense I've cultivated. I listen, I smell, I sense air currents, it helps me feel when someone is sneaking up on me."

"It might be more than that," January spoke up now. "A while ago Blood Raven told me about astral sensing. She said that you could sense emotions and even intent within someone's aura. Magic moves lightly about a person who is filled with joy, and darkly about one intent upon cruelty. She said that some had even learned to hone their astral senses in order to feel impending danger. Some did not even need to be actively sensing in the astral to feel incoming threats. They just knew it was coming, and responded to it automatically."

"That kind of sounds like it," Jeri considered. "You think that's what I'm doing?"

"The Spider over in New York could do that, back in the day." Kensia said. "But he was a meta-human, not a mage. It was just one of his in-born abilities."

"Stand up, and we shall learn," Ryo insisted. He paused a moment, and peeled the t-shirt from his body. In the astral, it was nothing but thin gauze, barely there at all. He handed it to Jeri, and motioned to her face.

"Put that around your eyes," he said. "So you cannot see a thing."

"Okay, I think I've seen this movie." The San Franciscan heroine laughed. But she did as the younger man asked, and tied the black cloth around her upper face. "Should I feel the Force flow now?"

"You should fight." Ryo declared. His left hand snapped out, and tagged her on the chin. He was not hitting hard. January could see that in the astral. His energy was tightly constrained. It was just a love tap really.

Jeri's head snapped back, and the others all scrambled to get out of the way. Even Avery looked up and sprang to his feet with a look of concern. But January held him back. She thought she understood what Ryo was doing.

"Hey, what was tha-."

Ryo jabbed again, only this time Jeri slipped aside at the last moment. That left his hand whiffing nothing but empty air, albeit just inches from the side of her head.

"You said you are a fighter, so fight," Ryo insisted. He went with an uppercut at her midsection. She blocked low with her forearms, and stopped the attack. She replied with a combination, leading with a left jab that caused Ryo to slip to one side to avoid it. Then she followed with a right cross, aimed directly at the spot he had moved his head into.

The blow would have connected. But Ryo faded from reality. Even in the astral, his aura dimmed and nearly vanished from January's senses. He had become a ghost. Jeri's hand went straight through him, and he did not fade back into reality until she had withdrawn it.

That was new. The last time January had sparred with Ryo - and they had really gone full out with their powers - she had been able to hit him. That was thanks to the magical nature of her attacks. Clearly, Ryo had worked hard enough that he could now fade from even arcane assaults. Or maybe January needed to upgrade her fists to +5 weapons in order to defeat his new defenses?

Ryo - now once more clearly visible in the astral - followed with several low kicks aimed at her knees and shins. Jeri jumped back out of range of the blows, hands up in a defensive position. When he pressed forward and went for another jab, she easily parried it with one hand.

"There, you know it's coming," Eleni declared. "Now see it in the astral. Don't think about it. Don't try it. Just do it."

Ryo pushed forward again, bringing his punches up to Jeri's face. January decided to up the ante, for better or worse. She leaped skyward, and came down behind Riven. She led with her elbow. That elbow, the one that ended things: Ragnarok. But before she could connect, Jeri ducked and rolled aside. That left January falling down to her knees upon empty grass, and her elbow struck nothing but air.

"I can see you," Jeri said, when she sprang to feet once more. "I can see you!"

January smiled and rose to her feet to face the older woman. She threw a few half-hearted punches her way. But Jeri easily slipped and sidestepped each one. Finally January held up her thumb to her nose, and waved her fingers at the other woman in a ridiculous gesture.

"I can see that too!" Jeri now laughed.

"Okay, that's enough mortal combat I think," Eleni said.

"How did you know that would work?" Jeri asked. She peeled the shirt from her face, and tossed it back to Ryo.

"As you said, you are a fighter. Your natural inclination is to meet force directly. I have a friend who is a lot like you." Ryo glanced sideways at January. "But you are even more that way than she is. It is who and what you are. It is all over your aura. So it stood to reason that fighting is how you would find your way."

"So now that we are all seeing in the aether, time for more lecture," Eleni declared. That brought a chorus of groans from all, and they all settled back down into their teaching circle, with Eleni in the center...

"This is important kids, so pay attention," Eleni wagged a finger dramatically. "Now we know how to sense into the aether, we know how to interpret what we detect there, at least somewhat. We know that magic fills this space. It gives it that steady background glow it has, even in the middle of the night. We know that magic moves from one plane to the other, and that includes spells. I can cast a spell at you through the astral into your aura, and its effects will ground down into the material world, and cause actual physical wounds. That is essentially how the arcane bolt spell works. It is probably the most generic magical attack there is. It cannot be stopped by mundane armor, because it is inherently magical and aetherial in nature."

"But there are also creatures that live in the aether," Eleni went on. "These are magical beings, which can sometimes move from the aether, down to the physical. Elemental spirits are one example: think of undines, salamanders, and the like. They often reside entirely within the aether. But they can also move themselves down to the material world if they wish. I know some of you have had personal experiences with them."

January silently nodded. It had taken the entire Alliance to defeat the fire elemental at Gull Island. In fact, that was the first time Blackhawk had joined them. Then later she had met Kensia while fighting a lava elemental. It had taken the Bahamian, January, and Viuda all working together to stop the creature. It was safe to say that both experiences were burned into her memory.

"There are other beings as well. We often call them nature spirits. Mishipeshu is one example, the Underwater Panther that came to my aid during the Battle of Belle Isle. These beings can come in all shapes and forms, with all manner of motivations. Not just confined to the more specific examples of elementals."

"Then there are undead spirits," Eleni said. "I know some of you have encountered them as well. Some are literally the spirits of the dead, continuing on within the aether. Some are confined to that place. But many can move down to Mundus - the physical world - or at least project themselves into it in order to act there."

"People love to argue about undead at the Aura," Harper spoke up. "Are they proof of life after death? Or are they just a lingering impression in the astral, created by strong magic and emotion? Or is it both? Can someone's consciousness continue on after death, either in a physical body or an astral spirit? When that is destroyed, do they finally die for good, and meet whatever reward we all do, which might be nothing at all?"

"Ah yes, the stone tape theory is one of those ideas," Silverlight nodded. "Emotion, energy, and will do have a direct effect upon astral space. They alter it visibly. Go to a concert, or football game, or revival meeting, or any gathering where a crowd of excited people are present, and you will experience it. If it goes on long enough in a specific place, that can create a lasting impression in the astral. Believe me, you don't want to go to a prison or a death camp. Astral space is a dark cloud of the worst emotions in such places, even long after they have been shut down."

"But beyond creating a general impression within astral space, yes, an individual can leave a lasting impression on the place they died. I don't believe this is permanent however, as astral space has a way of recycling itself over time. But it can seem like a long time to those with our life spans. You can tell these cases because the stone tapes are essentially stuck in a moment, endlessly repeating it and reacting to others though that lens. They can't break free of it, or even do things like hold a separate conversation with you. They are like a song playing on repeat."

"The thing about all this is you have to take each and every case individually. We do know that undead beings exist, and that some have consciousness and will. On the other hand, I have had personal encounters with undead that I could only describe as walking puppets, possessing no agency of their own, and nothing to their auras other than the spell used to animate them."

* * *

[Acadian]

As we have seen in the last couple episodes, there seems to be more unique ways to sense and interact with the astral than Baskin Robins has ice cream flavors!

Very cool how Seven of Nine Jeri can sense attacks coming even without seeing them. And no surprise at all how Xochitl sees the astral. Ryo is a bit of a one trick pony but my goodness, his ability to fade and unfade is stunningly effective and valuable in so many situations.


Nit: I think you want a closing set of dialogue quotations at the end of your very last sentence.

[Renee]

Van Goghs.... 🤦‍♀️ Starry Night. What is it about his work? It's like you can see into Vincent's turbulence... and then it's like: damn, this guy never even got paid. Yet we all know about him. Something about Van Gogh. Manet, too. Manet's very intense. I mean, cripes, look at this painting. It's so evocative. It puts you right there, right in that room from 150 years ago. Look at the expression on her face. Cassat... Mary destroyed me a couple weeks ago, in the museum. Anyway.

Xochitl's getting a glimpse. Yeah, that's it hon. Whoa, Jan can see Xochitl's other self.

Next is Jeri. Jeri can't see it. It's fine though. Not everybody can. Some folks just aren't built that way. Others are very attuned to other realities.

"Stand up, and we shall learn," Ryo insisted. He paused a moment, and peeled the t-shirt from his body.

This is the CW moment when music changes from calm to dramatic! Yah, Ryo's a badass. If some gangbangas saw Ryo they'd either look to see if he's got any colors, or they'd try to recruit him. Not that he would join, but just saying. Thing is, he's got his energies turned the right way. He's doing the right things (imo). This edpisode's intense. Episode's.

And yet, Jeri is able to sense a few things. She just doesn't know how to focus them, yet. It's really good being able to picture them all, seeing their faces side by side like was posted last week. OKay, that's really cool, how they're all able to help Jeri/Riven get to where they're at. Nice!

People are groaning because of more lecture. Does the aether have anything to do with those little patterns I am able to see when I close my eyes in a quiet room? I see these patterns, sometimes in color, sometimes just images. I can make them more intense just by thinking of making them more intense. If not; if they are not looking into the aether: What are those patterns? That's what I'd ask Eleni.

Whoa, yikes. Creatures in the ether. Yeah, first thing I thought of was Jan when she went to the volcano, and fought that salamander. But that's frikcin' scary. If that's true, it negates ALL of the stuff we've told our children. "Monsters are not real", for instance.

Great question, Harper.

"Are they proof of life after death? Or are they just a lingering impression in the astral, created by strong magic and emotion? Or is it both? Can someone's consciousness continue on after death, either in a physical body or an astral spirit? When that is destroyed, do they finally die for good, and meet whatever reward we all do, which might be nothing at all?"

First question: I'd say they are proof of life outside of life. As in, our life here on Earth.

Second: don't know.

Third: I think we do continue "after" death, although supposedly Time is an Illusion. Which means there is no after.... only Now. Sort of. But I think there's too much energy involved just getting us to Earth, with all our faults and Intelligence and quirks, all of that is energy. It's foolish to think we don't come from somewhere else, therefore we're not going somewhere else.

Supposedly the Astral is just a state of being, tied to our physical existence. There's more out there than just that 'one' state, there are zillions of states, as many states as there are stars in all the galaxies. Meaning: there's more than just an astral spirit. 👻

Fourth: We never die for good. Well.. our physical body does, but everything else continues. Always exists. Which makes no sense to me, but let's see what Riven's response is.

Ah yes, the stone tape theory is one of those ideas," Silverlight nodded. "Emotion, energy, and will do have a direct effect upon astral space. They alter it visibly. Go to a concert, or football game, or revival meeting, or any gathering where a crowd of excited people are present, and you will experience it. If it goes on long enough in a specific place, that can create a lasting impression in the astral. Believe me, you don't want to go to a prison or a death camp. Astral space is a dark cloud of the worst emotions in such places, even long after they have been shut down."

"But beyond creating a general impression within astral space, yes, an individual can leave a lasting impression on the place they died.

YES, what she says about lasting impressions is true. There's this feeling which continues after a great event like a concert. It can be negative too, like the feeling which lingers after an argument.

I don't believe this is permanent however, as astral space has a way of recycling itself over time. But it can seem like a long time to those with our life spans. You can tell these cases because the stone tapes are essentially stuck in a moment, endlessly repeating it and reacting to others though that lens. They can't break free of it, or even do things like hold a separate conversation with you. They are like a song playing on repeat."

Sorry for the Quote-a-rama. This is important, though. Interesting what her answer is there. "astral space has a way of recycling over time", wow.

Interesting that she's using that term Undead, too. Alright.

Time for High School.

This post has been edited by Renee: Mar 1 2024, 05:13 PM

[WellTemperedClavier]

$400,000-$600,000? That's cheap by southern California standards (at least in the cities). Yeah, things are bad in that regard. Another part of the problem here is that most of the metropolitan area is already heavily built up. For the last few decades we've been building out, but that creates its own issues--longer commutes and damage to natural habitats (which is why coyotes are so common in the cities now).

Los Angeles is at least subsidizing some low-income housing. Not sure if there's much hope for San Francisco. That city might just price itself out of existence.

Sorry for the digression.

I love the way you describe Xochitl perceiving the astral. It's a great way to show how personalized the interpretation really is. Makes me wonder how I'd see it.

Ryo's impromptu sparring with Stormcrow is a good demonstration of sensing danger through magic. And how it ties into a person's natural inclinations.

All this talk about cursed locations and undead feels like foreshadowing.

This post has been edited by WellTemperedClavier: Mar 1 2024, 05:55 PM

[SubRosa]

Acadian: Magic is an intensely personal thing. So it is different for everyone. Embracing that diversity has really helped me with fleshing out individual characters, since everyone will interact with magic according to their own personality.

It is funny you mention Baskin Robbins. I just watched the Ant-Man movies, and in the first one the protagonist - who is fresh out of prison - tried to work Baskin Robbins. But they found out about his ex-con past and fired him. He goes back home and his roommates are all saying: "Baskin Robbins don't play." and "Baskin Robbins always finds out." Like they are this ominous evil corporation.

Ryo is indeed stunningly effective in his niche.


Renee: Doctor Who had a really good episode with Vincent Van Gogh. It always makes me tear up. The thing that makes great art great is that it makes you feel.

As Acadian noted, Ryo is stunning in his own way.

A lot of what I am using as the basis for Astral Space in the Crow-verse is inspired by the table top RPGs Shadowrun and Earthdawn. Some of the people who wrote those parts were modern neo-Pagans/Witches, like Steve Kenson. So its a mix of real world belief systems bound up in the game's systems.

The stone tape theory is real (as in it is an actual idea, not that it has any basis in scientific fact), and there was even a movie with the same name back in the late 60s or early 70s I think, made in the UK.


WellTemperedClavier: You would see astral space according to your personality. If you are very visually-oriented, you would receive a great deal of visual information. If your sense of smell is keen, you would smell much of it. If you are big aficionado of music, it would be notes and songs. Etc...

Riven is a weapon-master. She's a high level fighter. Since that is her personality, her means of unlocking her talents had to come through fighting, and really being pushed by someone.

All the talk of cursed locations, undead, and the stone tape theory will be very important once we finally get to the wreckage of Keep 19 and those missing nuclear bombs.










Senpai of the Pool Meme


George Takei's comebacks to trolls



Book 12.15 - Broken Arrow

August 19 (Monday afternoon)

January sat at her desk in her bedroom, eyes glued to her computer's monitor. Her fingers flew across the keyboard. Characters scrolled across the screen as she plunged on. She was on a roll now, and the words just came as if conjured up by magic from the depths of her brain.

Her main character Alexandra DeWitt navigated a world that was so much like January's own, but yet so different. It was a place where women seemed to only make up a quarter of the population at best. Where no one grew up remembering their mother, because women always died either in childbirth or soon after. That was of course when they were not dying in order to directly motivate men to take some form of action - usually of a vengeful nature against their killers.

In other words, it was the world of so many fictional stories, where women were not people, but rather things that only existed to advance a male character's story. Or even less than that, they only existed as an afterthought. They were simply proof that the main character was indeed virile and desirable, and perhaps more importantly of all: heterosexual.

Her own protagonist Alexandra was slowly realizing that something was very wrong with all of this, and that she was perhaps not what the writer had intended her to be. Could she break free from the shackles of misogynistic writing, even as she watched all of her friends from school die in just their twenties: from childbirth, car accidents, cancer, and of course, murdered by supervillains and stuffed into refrigerators. Could she create a new world, where women were not disposable objects, or ready-made victims, but actually people in their own right?

Her phone rang. It was just the regular ringtone, not from a friend, and definitely not that ringtone: the one for cape-related business. So she just ignored it and plunged on. A few moments later her phone dinged with a new text message. Again, it was not the important, look at me now tone. So she continued to ignore it and pressed on.

Being on a roll - really in the zone - for her writing was a good thing. Some days it was a chore that she had to slog through, and she had to struggle to put out even a few pages. But in times like this, hours just vanished. Half a day could go by before she even considered coming up for air. It was nice, and not an opportunity she wanted to waste.

After all, she would be back in school in just a few weeks. She glanced down at the date and time in the corner of her screen. It was less than a few weeks in fact. Her first day at Lane State would be the next Wednesday. Once that started, she was going to get busy. She would not have the same amount of time for writing side projects, not to mention things like gaming, or otherwise having much of a personal life. She imagined it would all be Artemis Argent and school projects that she worked on.

Not that she minded working on the comic book with Rus. She liked Artemis Argent as much as she did her other characters. She was even considering writing a novel just about her. But it was nice being able to move between Artemis' magicpunk world of an imaginary 1800s, and Aela and Loria's completely original fantasy world, and whatever else came up, like Alexandra DeWitt's literally fictional world. Variety was the spice of life after all.

Her phone rang again within a few minutes. She glanced over at the cheap Hamsung that lay on her bed. Again? Finally she rose with a sigh and walked across the room to stare down at its screen. She did not know the number. Still, it was not too surprising. She had been expecting something like this sooner or later.

After a long discussion, the Allies had all decided to release an abridged version of the Hierophant's journal to the press. They had removed all the parts about the Rauðskinna, and how the Abyssal summonings worked of course. Likewise, they had removed the real name of that terrible manual's creator: Nátthrafn. They could not take the chance that someone researching him might discover the Rauðskinna, and follow in the Hierophant's footsteps. There was no removing Nátthrafn entirely of course. He had been far too prominent at the Battle of Belle Isle, as well as within the Hierophant's own motivations. So instead he was referred to as the Shadow King in the edited text.

Finally, every mention of January and her brother Julian's blood relationship to the newly christened Shadow King had been removed. However, this still left plenty of mentions of them both within the journal. It still included everything about how the Hierophant had manipulated Julian and turned him into his henchman: the Summoner. The key to that having been Julian's bigotry and imagined sense of persecution of course. All of which had coalesced around January, his trans sister.

So she had been expecting to hear from the press again after all. It was only natural that they would want to circle back around for more comments from January Ward, the sibling of the Summoner. She was tempted to let the call go, but it was well-trod ground by now. She had been through it over and over already with reporters. She knew what was coming, and had all her answers rehearsed long ago.

So she walked over to the bed and picked up the phone.

"Hi, this is January!" Her perky phone voice once again slipped its tether and galloped loose.

"Hi, this is Priya O'Neill of Channel 5 News." The voice on the other end of the line was quite familiar to January. She had spoken to the other woman numerous times now, but always as Stormcrow. Not as just herself. This was definitely odd. "I was wondering if you would like to comment on Patricia Fine's recent statements."

January's heart doubled its rate at the sound of the other woman's name, and her free hand clenched into a fist. Patricia Fine had been the third host of the Crow Tales Podcast. Just two months ago January had been a guest on the show. There she had been subjected to a torrent of transphobia from Patricia, much to the consternation of her two co-hosts. In the end January had hung up on them, only to redo the entire interview a day later without Patricia.

They had fired her from the show in the interim. It was a podcast - a labor of love - so fire was perhaps too strong a word. Kicked off might be more accurate. January had not heard anything about Patricia since then. Granted, she did not read the magazine that she worked for, and she certainly did not seek out transphobic content creators out of habit.

"I don't know what you mean?" January wondered aloud. "Is there something I should know?"

"Oh boy, you haven't seen it yet then?" Priya replied. "You should look. She wrote an essay for her magazine: Vanity Bazaar. But they refused to publish it. So she went ahead and posted it online herself. It names you specifically. Vanity Bazaar dismissed her afterward. Now she is all over social media and the talk shows saying that she is under attack by cancel culture. Vulpine News just had her on the Sean Carlson show."

"Oh no, it's the consequences of my own actions!" January could not help but to sarcastically ape in a snotty English accent. It morphed into a snotty Southern accent, because she was not at all good at that sort of thing. Blackjack would have done both much better.

She walked back to her desk and sat down in front of her computer once more. She paused to set her phone to speaker, and laid it down in front of her monitor. She took care to save what she was working on before she opened up a web browser. In no time at all she saw what Priya had intimated.

Priya had been generous in describing Patricia Fine's work as an essay. The now former reporter's piece was a full-on manifesto, in true Unabomber style. It was a long, rambling screed on the dangers of trans people. How they threatened women by invading their spaces, how they were all just pretending to be women so they could rape 'real' women like herself, how doctors were mutilating children to make them trans, and so on.

January only skimmed it. It was nothing surprising. Not even the claims that all trans people were pedophiles was original. However, the insistence that what Patricia referred to as 'transgenderism' had to be eradicated from public life entirely - at every level - was new. Though granted, the genocide rhetoric was the next logical step in the moral panic that she was repeating and amplifying.

And then January's name came up, along with her addresses; physical, social medias, and old fashioned email. That explained why her phone was ringing constantly. She made a mental note to get the number changed. The rest, well, she could delete emails in bulk. As far as her home address went, she looked forward to any fascist acolyte rolling up on her at home. That would be a great way to work out some anger issues...

Patricia claimed that January had forced the Crow Tales Podcast to fire her, in order to silence her voice. Because Patricia spoke for all women of course - never mind that no one had actually said that or appointed her to do so. She then went on to accuse January of forcing Vanity Bazaar to do likewise, and claimed that she was part of a vast conspiracy of transgender terrorists. It was all part of what Patricia termed the so called 'Radical Left's' plot to destroy the family, women, and America.

"Would you be willing to take part in an interview?" Priya's voice soared from January's phone. That nearly caused her to jump out of her seat. She had forgotten that she still had the phone on. "I would like to get your side of the story out there."

"I..." January briefly considered the idea. She just as quickly shot it down. "No, I don't think it would be a good idea for me to say anything right now. It wouldn't be fit to print, or air on television."

"Ok, I understand that," Priya responded. "But if you change your mind, call me back at this number. Oh, and are you going to be at your mother's fund-raiser tonight?"

"Yes, I was planning to," January murmured. Her eyes were drawn back to her computer screen. It was like looking at a train wreck. It was ugly, and it was about her. It named her specifically. She had the gnawing suspicion that this was probably going to get worse, before it got better.

She reached out and ended the call. She could not help but pick up her phone and open her Twitt app. As usual, it took forever for the social media site to open on her cheap phone. Once it did, she saw that she was already getting comments. She had never seen so many on her feed. It was not hundreds of replies, or even thousands, but tens of thousands. Some were positive and supportive. But the vast majority called for her to be raped, tortured, and murdered. That was aside from a torrent of bigoted slurs of course.

Her hands shook, and she dropped the phone. Worse, she nearly crushed it when she caught it and held on too tightly. She did not need to be buying a new phone. She had enough bills as it was, and it would be hard finding another phone cheap enough for her to afford. This one had been $50, but it had been years since she had bought it. She imagined that even the most budgetiest of phones were more expensive than that now.

She tossed it on her bed and stormed off from her room. Literally as it turned out, as lightning lit the windows, and the door slammed loudly behind her. She did not bother with the stairs. She simply leaped over the balcony that ringed the second floor, and dropped to the wide tiles that crisscrossed the rotunda below.

She made her way to the gym that she and her mother had set up in one corner of the house, on the opposite side of the front wall from the foyer. She stepped up to the punching bag and let loose. Thankfully it was made of Armex steel and dragon silk, because she was not holding back. She gave it everything she had, and more. Punches, kicks, elbows, knees, she worked over the bag from top to bottom. After a while, she lost track of time as she simply pummeled the heavy bag.

Finally, she rested one hand on the top of the bag, and used that as a springboard to leap up into the air. What went up, had to come back down again. When she did, she brought down her elbow hard. The super steel chain that held it aloft snapped, and the dragon silk bag rocketed across the room. It crashed into a rack that held her free weights, and sent them flying like bowling pins around the room. One of the iron weights came straight back at January and bounced off her face. But she did not feel a thing.

Ragnarok. Blackjack had been right. It was a good name for the elbow drop. After that, it was all over.

She sighed and strode out of the room. At least it was more slowly than when she had entered. She walked past the utility room and bathroom that flanked the short hallway from the exercise room. That put her in a little intersection. To her right lay the rotunda in the center of the house, with the foyer and front door directly beyond it. To her left was a family room in the back corner of the house, with a fireplace, tall windows, and nothing much else right now. Finally dead ahead of her lay the kitchen, and the back door of the house at the far end of its attached dining nook.

January turned into the rotunda and stalked up the stairs to the second floor. She found Ryo sitting on the balcony above, just outside of his room. He was literally perched with his knees folded up, balanced on the thick wooden banister that overlooked the steps below. As January climbed up, she saw out of the corner of her eye that he rose to his feet. He walked along the thick wooden handrail, and made an opposite circuit of the octagonal space.

He finally hopped down to the floor and met her at the top of the stairs. It was in the little intersection between her bedroom, another large empty room in the corner of the house, and a bedroom kitty corner to that. Ryo's face looked stoic. Well, his face always looked that way. But this was more somber than usual, if that was possible.

"You saw social media then?" he asked plainly.

"Yeah," January fumed.

"Did you break something downstairs?" he went on.

"Yeah," January once again replied.

"Are you going to say something stupid online now?" he pressed.

"Yeah," January repeated.

She pushed past her friend, and walked back into her room. She noted that her phone was no longer on her bed. She turned back to Ryo, and she now saw that he held the Hamsung in one hand. She walked back and reached out for the phone. But Ryo simply faded from reality, and took the electronic device out of reach with him.

"Damn it, Ryo, give me that!" she cursed.

"Not until you promise to not do anything stupid." His voice issued from the shadows that now loomed in the doorway of her room.

January sighed again, much more loudly this time. "Fine," she snapped. "I promise not to do anything stupid."

"Now say it without lying," Ryo insisted.

"Arrrgh!" January turned around and stomped to her bed.

Once more, thunder rolled and lightning cracked deafeningly outside. Through the windows that lined the back wall of her room she could see the back yard, and the tall trees that rose up to form a screen around it. Several crows flapped through that space. They joined those who already sat upon her windowsill. More came by the second. She even noted a few magpies among them, as well as a rook and raven.

For some reason, that brought her a little peace. Crows did not care about social media. They did not care about bigots spouting hate speech, no matter how blatantly genocidal. They did not care about hate mobs on the internet. They lived lives blissfully free of such things.

But they did care about her. At least January had them, and friends who didn't let her get in her own way.

"I have a pretty good perception stat." Ryo's voice floated from out of nowhere. "I have noticed that you like to meet force head on, with your own force in direct opposition. It is the Rocky Balboa approach. You break your opponent's fist with your face. However, in judo we learn that rather than meeting opposing force directly, we use that force against itself. We divert it, and subvert it instead."

"Oh wise senpai of the pool, what is thy wisdom then?" January's voice dripped with sarcasm. Granted, Ryo was not the kind of person to realize that. In spite of the 19 he had rolled for his perception attribute, he did not pick up on that sort of thing.

"I have always admired George Takei and his online presence." Ryo stepped out of the shadows, and held out the phone before him.

"George Takei?" January wondered, "the old Star Trek guy?"

"Yes, I follow him," Ryo said, as plainly as ever.

That brought a raised eyebrow from January, one that a Vulcan would have been proud of. Aside from the Knights of Nerddom, January did not know that Ryo followed anyone. In fact, for someone whose literal job was computers, he spent almost no time online at all. Which January reflected probably made him the sanest of them all.

"His replies to bigots are some of the best," Ryo explained. "He does not stoop to their level. Instead he has some simple, wry comment that turns their words back on them. Usually by laughing at something they said and turning it into a joke. Failing that he just corrects their poor grammar."

"Now I see why you like him," January nodded. Ryo was always the "well, actually..." guy that everyone just loved at parties.

"When I am angry and upset, I try to be more like George," Ryo insisted.

"Okay, okay, you convinced me," January said. She held out her hand to her peer. "I'm not lying this time."

Ryo handed her the phone. She took the discount Hamsung in her hands and waited for its screen to unlock. Then she waited even longer to start Twitt, and even longer to open a window to make a new post.

She considered what Ryo had said. Her mother liked to say something similar: "Don't wrestle with a pig. You just get dirty, and the pig likes it."

So instead of matching the cruelty, or getting in a shouting match, she needed something simple. She needed something to laugh at, something to make Patricia look as ridiculous and full of it as she actually was.

Then she had it.

Wow, if I knew I was such a villainous mastermind I would have gotten myself a cool spinning leather chair, a cat to sit in my lap, and learned to speak with an English accent. Maybe I can at least find a used monocle cheap on Ebuy...

* * *

[Acadian]

Jan is busy writing a new story! Hey, I have a Hamsung phone too!

I don’t think I’ve ever seen her so angry! Bang! Bam! Bong! Grrr! Gosh, you couldn’t pay me enough to have a public persona.

Ryo, despite his nerdism, does seem to have a maxed perception stat. And his advice to Jan is spot on. Wow, George Takei’s editing skills rival my own! Seriously, when I'm tempted to vent at someone online, I always try to bite my tongue and remind myself of my interweb rule #1: Be Gracious.

Her ultimate post in response is brilliant and perfectly done.


Nit: ’It was a place where women seemed to only made {make?} up a quarter of the population at best.’

[Renee]

Doctor Who. That's a Tardis, right? In the beginning. The guy with the red hair kind of looks like Vincent. There it is, Starry Night. YEAH, the redhead, that's what happens! Standing there tearing up in public.

Phew. Okay, never played Shadowrun or Earthdawn. I wanna text one of my old group from H.S., see if he ever did. Outside of the DnD-type games we played, he was also into a lot of the Avalon Hill stuff: anything to do with our Civil War or some of the earlier wars from the 1800s & 1900s. But I'll send him a text. Anyway, that's neat you're basing some of the Crow Show on lore from those games.

August 19, so this is the next day. Goodness. Alexandra lives in a horrible world. Good thing the phone rang. Yeah not that ringtone.

Whoa, she's going back to school, wow.

Hamsung! Yeah, somebody's really trying to get a hold of her. We all know the feeling, hon. Wonder who it could be, though?

Why did they need to release an abridged version of the journal? Is it to keep others from trying to do the same nefarious magics? Sort of like when the Pentagon (or whatever agency) releases classified material, they black some parts out. Because they don't want certain segments of population trying to know the secret to some bomb-making or whatever.

Let me shush.

Good gosh, Patricia released her info to the world? What the??? That's beyond annoying, it's dangerous. Criminal, maybe. Does Patty know Jan = Stormcrow? Hmm, doesn't seem so.

Wow. She's getting hammered by all this nonsense online. Didn't see this coming in the story! When that phone call happened, I initially thought it might be Hannah, calling from a different number.

I love the little conversation between Jan and Ryo. Already, they're talking like housemates: terse sentences, because they know each other so well. It's like a borderline argument because he cares.

The end is true. Ha ha, "spinning leather chair...." All of that is true. .jpg]Dr. Evil had the hairless cat, even.

I don’t think I’ve ever seen her so angry! Bang! Bam! Bong! Grrr! Gosh, you couldn’t pay me enough to have a public persona.

I know, right? So glad we didn't grow up in today's world. My kid's way into social media because she grew up with it. I'm glad our generation didn't, though.

This post has been edited by Renee: Mar 4 2024, 07:18 PM

[WellTemperedClavier]

That makes sense, regarding astral space.

Ah, was wondering when we'd get back to that missing bomber...

That's as good a description of writing as any I've read. Amazing how fast your fingers move once you get into it. Or maybe it's more the feeling of ideas leaping from your mind to your screen.

Ah, was wondering if that's what January's idea was leading up to. Good call.

This reminds me that I should probably get a specialized ringtone for people I know. I do have specialize text chimes. But yeah, way too many scams out there. Smart of January to be careful.

I hear her. Some days it's easy, others it's a chore. Just have to keep at it, regardless.

Juggling superheroics with school at least gives January some preparation for the working world's reality of not having time for anything.

Wise of the Allies to redact their findings. Though that reminds me: they'll have to be careful about anyone snapping a photo of the writings (either of this, or some other questionable tome). If someone does, it'll be pretty easy to spread the word online.

Huh, at some point does Sean Carlson interview Putin in a desperate bid for relevance?

Oh no. But I have to say, January's taking this in stride. She knows what actions to take. It's sad that she had to be so prepared. I do not blame her for being angry.

Online discourse so often seems to default to toxicity. Obviously you have to stand for what's right. But sometimes it's also best just not to engage directly.

In fact, for someone whose literal job was computers, he spent almost no time online at all. Which January reflected probably made him the sanest of them all.

Ryo is wise! And Takei does have quite a wit.

Good start for January here!

[SubRosa]

Acadian: I also have a Hamsung phone! Like January's, it was one of the cheapest ones I could find.

Sadly, you don't even have to have a public persona to be the victim of these attacks. Like Nex Benedict. I included this side quest because this is just becoming such a common thing IRL. Also to reintroduce Patricia Fine, who will become much more prominent in future books.

On a cheerier note, Keanu Reeves and puppies

Ryo always has a 19 Perception in the D&D style games I create him in.

George Takei is a great editor! I am glad I have you to fill in his shoes for me!

I had to work for a while to come up January's response. George Takei was the key, I looked over how he handled trolls, and eventually that led me to Jan's Dr. Evil-like reply. Then I added the stuff with Ryo bringing up George Takei afterward, since it seemed only fair to acknowledge the inspiration.


Renee: The blue phone box is a Tardis.

Alexandra's world is literally that of the vast majority of movies, books, comics, and other forms of fiction. Count the number of women in the next action movie you see, and then see how many of them are also the romantic love interest of the white, male, cisgender, heterosexual protagonist. And note how many protagonists do not have a family, because they were all murdered by the bad guy.

Yes, they don't want to put everything in the Hierophant's journal out there because it would teach people how to summon Abyssals. Not to mention it would tell them that January's blood line is the key to obtaining the Rauðskinna.

What Patricia is doing is extremely dangerous. It absolutely gets people murdered. But sadly, acts of stochastic terrorism like that almost never see any criminal charges brought against the people who commit them. Chaya Raichick, who whipped up her followers to murder Nex Benedict even bragged about it openly. She has faced no charges for doing so, and I do not believe she ever will.


WellTemperedClavier: We will get back to the bomber, I promise. We just have to get through this last side quest, before the main quest picks back up again.

That is the problem with the internet. It makes keeping secrets really, really hard. It is why Blood Raven refused to turn over the Hierophant's journal in the first place.

Sean Carlson probably will do exactly that! Or maybe it will be Tucker Hannity. It's hard to keep track of them.

Unfortunately for January, her feud with Patricia Fine is just starting, and it won't remain on just the internet.










Detroit Riverwalk


The Roosterbeak is based on the IRL Roostertail


January in her fancy outfit

Avery being fancy

Ryo's gold and black outfit

Barbara

Cray




Book 12.16 - Broken Arrow

January stared out the window of the huge ballroom. The Detroit River spread out before her. Its waters gently lapped against the stones that lined the shore at her feet, beside the Detroit Riverwalk. At its simplest level it was just a wide concrete sidewalk that ran beside the river. But given the cafes, parks, pavilions, and the historic lighthouse that lay along its route, it was really an attraction, or a whole series of them linked together.

The Riverwalk stretched down the shore for miles to January's right, went past the Renaissance Center, and only came to an end near the Ambassador Bridge at West Riverfront Park. She knew that particular place well, because she and Blood Raven had staked it out during the River Days festival back in June. They had been concerned that the Hierophant might strike nearby. That was where Ryo had officially decided to become Ôkami, and the three of them had assisted in preventing a truck accident from turning fatal on the Ambassador Bridge.

To her left the arches of the MacArthur Bridge stretched out across the river to the shores of Belle Isle. Right in front of her lay the island's south-western tip, the site of the recent battle. A battleground that January herself had fought upon. Thanks to the most recent efforts of her friends and allies, the once blasted and ruined landscape had been restored to one of bucolic natural beauty. Grass waved over gentle hills, and trees rose to meet the evening sky overhead.

Of the buildings that had once graced this portion of the island, there were still none left. The Police Harbormaster that had sat to one side of the bridge was just completely gone. The same was true of the Boat House - which had really been a massive event space. Now only grass and trees remained. Even the concrete streets that had once crisscrossed the end of the island had disappeared, subsumed by the reinvigorated natural world.

Most evident of that reinvigoration was of course Y Ddraig Aur. Her eidolon rose hundreds of feet into the sky. That made her clearly visible from anywhere on the river. As near as January was, there was just no missing her. Her light literally spilled across the water, and competed with the electric lights overhead to illuminate the space within which she stood.

It was the Rooster Beak, one of the biggest, high-classiest event spaces in Detroit. January had heard about it all of her life. It was the kind of place people held weddings or proms at, and radio stations did shows from for events like the hydroplane races. All of this made it the ideal place for January's mother Barbara to hold a fundraising event.

She had rented out an entire floor of the massive event hall. It was all very white. With a white peaked ceiling high overhead, and narrow white posts between the ten foot high glass windows that lined two sides of the space. The round tables that filled the event hall were likewise covered in white tablecloths, and their chairs sported ivory cushions. However, LED lights set in the ceiling bathed the walls with a soft shade of lavender, and the chandeliers that hung down from the ceiling threw off an orange glow. All of this competed with the warm yellow aura that streamed in from the dragon that towered over the river nearby.

The dragon that towered over the river nearby... Even for a magician like January, that still took some getting used to.

"What a difference a month makes," Avery murmured from beside her. "Detroit's gone from being the Motor City to the Dragon City."

January turned to look at her best friend. He cleaned up well, and was dressed a blue-grey tweed sport coat over a black shirt and tie. A diamond stud (well, January knew it was actually zirconium) glittered from one of his ears. Ryo too was done up in style, clad in a soft gold sport coat decorated with diamond-shaped patterns, over a black turtleneck.

January imagined that if Blackjack had been there, he would have been sporting his tuxedo t-shirt. Too bad he was off making his movie. Then again, making a movie was a much better way to spend a night than at a political benefit.

January herself wore her best outfit. It was the same one she had worn to her first book signing at the Warren Library. It was a pink floral A-line dress, which she slung a long, dark velvet blazer over. She had upgraded her strappy flats from that appearance to a pair of stiletto heels. Her mother said walking in them was turning into a lost art. January would not want to fight in them. But she did love how they made her legs look, and how they clicked on the floor when she walked.

She was glad that Avery and Ryo were there. Otherwise she would have been bored senseless by all the old people that filled the hall. It was a fundraiser after all, that meant people with money to spend on a plate for a political candidate. That pretty much ruled out anyone else from her generation attending, or even the generation before hers.

As it was she could not stop thinking about her phone, and the melodrama unfolding on Twitt. Part of her wanted to reach out and swipe her phone from Ryo's back pocket to check it. Another part of her was thankful that she had given the device back to him. She did not want to see the train wreck that her online life had turned into. All because some disgruntled fifty-year-old woman had found out the hard way that the world did not revolve around her.

Well, part of the world still did. And that part was up in arms. They were always up in arms. If it was not for outrage, they would not feel anything at all. Without Vulpine News and other propaganda outlets like Len Schapiro and the Everyday Wire feeding them a constant stream of rage porn, they would have nothing live for.

The dinner part was over now, as was her mother's speech to the audience. It was nothing really outstanding, except perhaps that January knew that her mother was actually earnest when she talked about medical care being a human right that needed to be available to all, rather than a privilege reserved for the wealthy. Or that the prison-industrial complex was a clear and present threat not only working-class people, but all people. Or that a basic, livable wage should not be a thing to remember from ages past. Or that women's bodies were theirs, and theirs alone. Not objects for others to legislate over, and force them to give birth - or be sterilized - against their will.

Ok, some of that was downright radical in America. But in the rest of the developed world it was all taken for granted. Her mother's positions had her labeled as an extremist by some. But an actual leftist would have laughed at that. It was not like she was calling for making landlords illegal, or the redistribution of land to the poor, nationalizing corporations, or erasing borders; much less wheeling out a guillotine for the oligarchs.

Privately, January thought that if the billionaire oligarchs and plutocrats were smart, they would listen to liberals like her mother. Giving the common people enough to live on with a modicum of comfort and security was the surest way to avoid a revolution. Squeezing them until they literally could not survive under the current system left people with little other options. When you had nothing, you had nothing to lose. January had read enough about the Russian and French Revolutions of late to understand that.

But if January had learned anything about the upper class, it was that their wealth and privilege isolated them from reality in a truly stunning way. So it was not surprising that none of them had learned a thing from Nicholas II or Louis the XVI. They lived in a different world from people like her. Not even an invasion from another universe could wake them up. At least not until the guillotine blade came down...

Revolution and murder, January sourly considered that they were truly wonderful thoughts to muse upon for a Monday night. She wondered if she should share her insights with the hoity-toity boosters that filled the event hall. Then she thought better of the idea.

At least she no longer had to play the role of the dutiful daughter standing beside her mother and looking serious. Now she could just kick back and do what, party? That was not something she did even on her wildest days. Not even at the two end of the world celebrations she had been to recently at the Aura. Maybe she could break out some dice and get Avery to run his Shadowrun campaign...

Avery's chuckle brought January's head around. She raised an eyebrow of Vulcan incredulity, and leaned over to look over his shoulder. He had his phone out, and was scrolling through a social media feed. All the while he giggled with satisfaction.

"What?" January asked. "Did someone post a video of a kitten riding a lamb?"

"No, even better," her best friend crowed. "You know how Twitt refuses to take down any of the threats and slurs against you that clearly violate their terms of service? Well someone hacked the site. Now all those people just got doxxed. Their real names, phone numbers, addresses, emails, it's all appended to each post they made. Best of all, their statements have been forwarded to all of their contacts on and off the site. So now everyone they know can see what pieces of spleck they are."

"I suspect they already knew that," Ryo observed.

"Maybe, maybe not," Avery murmured. "I mean Patricia Fine worked for Vanity Bazaar, and they didn't know about her until she went out of her way to show them."

Normally January was not in favor of doxxing. It could do more than just embarrass someone. It could get them killed. But given that Patricia had literally just did it to her, turnabout felt like fair play. She was glad that the mysterious hacktivist had done the same in return to Patricia and her hate mob. Maybe she would feel differently about it later, but not today.

January could not deny that it felt sweet right now. Let people see them for who they really are. Stripping away their anonymity was literally the least one could do. Especially given that the social media app it was taking place on refused to act on it. They had not even suspended Patricia Fine's account, even though she was committing stochastic terrorism on their platform.

Who knew, maybe a few of the hate mob might even get fired from their jobs. Granted, that was a big assumption. But unlike Twitt, it appeared that other employers did not want to be associated with people making death threats. That could come back at them legally. January did not doubt that was why Vanity Bazaar had fired Patricia in the first place, rather than any sense of empathy or loyalty to marginalized people. Corporations were soulless entities after all, whose only interest was self-interest.

"That's not all either," Avery went on. "Over half the comments were by bots, and three quarters of them all go back to troll farms. Most of the people attacking you are fictitious."

"As usual, it is a small group of reactionaries pretending they are the silent majority," Ryo noted. "In actuality they are the very loud and obnoxious minority."

"Well, that's something," January murmured. It did feel a little better know that most of the outrage against her had literally been manufactured, but only a little. Seeing it all in text had a way of short-circuiting her rational, logical brain, and just punched her right in the emotional gut.

"So who is organizing the trolls?" She wondered.

"Think of the usual suspects," Avery reasoned. "Ever since Gamergate, a right wing pundit singles out someone to attack, and their followers blindly do so. Once it gets traction, billionaires like the Kuhn brothers and hostile foreign powers jump on the bandwagon, and add their troll farms to the mix to destabilize things even more."

"Since the pundits are paid by billionaires, it happens quickly," Ryo added. "Len Schapiro, Peter Jordanson, and the like are all directly supported by the Kuhn brothers, through their think tank the Augustus Institute."

Divide and conquer, January considered. Her recent presentation on the Labor movement had made it eminently clear that this was an ancient tactic of the ruling classes. Find ways to set the working class against itself, so they cannot act in common purpose. It was how they broke strikes and wrecked unions. And that was just for starters of course. It always got much worse.

"At least by now we've seen it before, and know their game plan," Avery went on. "Our mystery hacker was definitely ready for it."

January took a moment to wonder who that hacktivist might be. Her first glance was to Avery of course. He definitely had the chops to pull something like this off. Then again, there was also Cray. If Avery was a hacker, Cray was an uber hacker.

But she had been around both of them the entire evening. Neither had the time or opportunity to craft and execute such a complex cyber attack. So maybe it really was just some anonymous hacktivist out there, doing what they felt was right. Cray and Avery were not the only keyboard commandos in the world. It might just be that she had more friends than she realized, as well as fewer enemies.

During so many of their team's actions, January and her friends had been the ones to swoop in and rescue people in danger. It occurred to January that now she knew how that felt. Well, she knew again. She never would have survived school without the help of others after all. Only this time she had no idea who her mysterious benefactor had been, and she imagined that she probably never would.

"Your mother is on TV." Ryo noted. "Tell her to mention the podcast."

"I am not going to tell her to plug our show here and now," January rolled her eyes.

"You should," Avery said. "That is how capitalism works. Today you plug your podcast. Tomorrow you have the CIA lead a coup against a democratically elected leader because he gave unused land to poor people."

"Yaay me, the United January Fruit Company." She ambled over to where her mother Barbara spoke to Priya O'Neill. She came along in time to catch the end of it. From what her mother was saying it was plain that Priya had asked about the recently released journal of the Hierophant. It of course had included much about Julian and his motivations to become the Summoner, and assist the Hierophant with the Abyssal summonings.

"...I don't know if I will ever move on from my son's death, not exactly." She heard Barbara say. "It's so... difficult to come to grips with. I suppose I can take some solace in the fact that he did not directly kill anyone. It was the Hierophant who did that. But Julian still helped him do it. He was a part of it, and he knew what was going to happen. He made a conscious choice to do terrible things. I feel so badly for the people he hurt, and the people they left behind. I never imagined that he was capable of that. But I suppose every mother says that about their child. If I had known, I would have called the police, or better yet Stormcrow. She'd have stopped him."

"Still, this should stand as a stark lesson for anyone else out there right now who might be tempted to go down the same path. You might think you are a mastermind, and that you are playing 4-D chess with the authorities. But in reality you are just a tool, nothing but a useful idiot for someone else's harebrained scheme, just like my son was. Eventually you will end up the same - betrayed and murdered by your 'friends' once you are no longer useful."

"Even the Hierophant was no different. He thought he was a genius outsmarting Blood Raven and the Allies. But in the end he was nothing but a pawn too. His own journal showed that there was a trap in the ritual he used to summon the final Abyssal: the Shadow King who led their army. He thought he was so clever finding it and reversing it. Yet it still killed him in the end."

"Because Stormcrow reversed it back," Priya pointed out.

"Because he did it in the first place," Barbara countered. "He did all of it to himself, after he did it to other people. He voted for the Leopards Eating People's Faces Party, and then the leopard ate his face. I am sure he was narcissistic enough to be shocked that his actions came right back to him. But no one else is."

"I was just joking, you don't have to talk to her," Avery murmured into January's ear as she strode over on clomping heels to stand beside her mother. He reached an arm out for her shoulder, to lead her away, but January held firm.

"I may as well say something," January whispered back to him.

She forced a smile to her lips when the local news reporter turned to her. She saw her giant, red-haired cameraman likewise turn his TV camera to her. The light on it indicated that it was still recording. Priya lowered her microphone to her side, and smiled at January.

"Would you like to make a statement?" she asked. "I can't guarantee that the station will run it. But I can try."

"I guess so," January said. She had decided to do this, but could not feel enthusiastic about it.

"Ok," Priya turned back to the camera, and raised the mic to her lips. "This is Priya O'Neill of Channel Five News. I am here today with January Ward, the daughter of Michigan senatorial candidate Barbara Ryan. Miss Ward has been undergoing an online assault today, conducted by followers of gender critical activist Patricia Fine."

"Let's be clear, there's no such thing as 'gender critical', that's just garbage," Barbara interjected. That prompted Priya to turn to hold out the microphone to her. "She's a transphobe. There is nothing special about her. She just hates women. Trans women like my daughter are just the easiest to attack and get away with right now. But the fact is that bigotry against any women, is bigotry against all women. It rolls down on all of us in the end."

"Take these bathroom bills. They are supposedly meant to attack trans women. But there are a lot more cis women than trans, and a lot more of them don't fit a bigot's idea of what a woman is 'supposed' to look like. So more of them are harassed, outright assaulted, and arrested then actual trans people. That's not to say it's ok to target minorities of course. It is simply proof that you cannot truck in this nonsense without it harming everyone else too. I don't think that is an accident either. It is a deliberate attack on all women."

"Look at the people who support her," Cray spoke up as well. "They are all anti-women, anti-feminist conservative organizations that actively work to roll back women's rights. Some of them even proudly self-identify as fascists. One is the dictator of a hostile foreign power. It's not a flex to have people like that supporting you. It should be a wake-up call that what you are doing is wrong."

"January, what do you say about Patricia's Fine's allegations that you had her fired from her job at Vanity Bazaar, and her previous podcast?" Priya turned back from Barbara to her daughter.

"Utter bollocks!" January insisted. Thanks to Blood Raven's genealogical research, she knew that she had some English ancestry. Apparently she had channeled one of those forebears to come up with that particular remark. Or maybe it was just that Ravi Prasad - one of the hosts of that very podcast in question - was a Londoner with a habit of saying the same.

"The Crow Tales Podcast asked me to come on their show as a guest. I did so, but was ambushed by Ms. Fine, who continually made transphobic slurs about me, and even the characters in the fiction I wrote. I hung up rather than be subjected to that. The other hosts of the podcast contacted me afterward, and insisted that they did not know she was going to act that way. They kicked her off the show, not me. I did not even find out that they had done so until after the fact, when they asked me to come back on the show and re-record the episode, which I did the next day."

"I honestly have not thought about Ms. Fine since then," January continued. "She's nothing special, certainly no one memorable. It's not like she's ever created anything in her life, or did anything of note. I had no idea that Vanity Bazaar had fired her over her manifesto, or that it even existed in the first place. The first I heard of it was when you called me this afternoon. Honestly, I had forgotten all about her."

"So how do you feel about her allegations, and of the mob of people online who are now inundating your Twitt account with threats and insults?"

"It's bulldrek..." Avery rumbled from the background.

"I feel pity for her, and them," January replied. That was not exactly true. She felt like breaking their faces. She was sure that she would have done exactly that, had one of them been in front of her. But Ryo had been correct when he had observed that sometimes the best way to meet force was not head on, but rather by subverting it.

"This is all they have in life. The only way they can feel good about themselves is by punching down against communities and individuals that are already marginalized and oppressed. They hide behind the internet and spread hate-speech in mobs. All they have is cruelty. I pity them."

"By tomorrow I won't even think about this," January insisted. It was not true, but she was not going to admit it. She knew better than to show weakness to bullies. Her mother had taught her that in junior high school. "Patty Cakes and her trolls are not worth thinking about. I have things to actually do with my life. Like my writing career, and the podcast that my mother and I create. By the time I wake up tomorrow, I won't remember any of this."

"You have a podcast?" Priya asked. She looked genuinely surprised. January wanted to smack the palm of her hand against her forehead. In fact, she did just that before she could stop herself. Could this day get any worse? Now she was going to be all over TV looking like some gauche, shameless self-promoter.

"Heroes and Villains," Avery piped up from over January's shoulder. "You can find it on all podcast apps."

"Ryo Kuroda is our audio engineer and editor," Barbara added, motioning to the young Japanese-American standing beside January. "Blackjack Schwartz of Epic Fail did our music. Avery Green here is moral support, and apparently our hype man. And of course January and myself research and present the podcast."

Well there it was, she had plugged her show after all. January hoped that Avery and Ryo were happy. It was another victory for capitalism.

Then a soft blue light crept into the room, and January turned her head to find its source. It was Gadget, and his powered armor gave off its ionic glow as usual. Striding beside him was Stormcrow. The superheroine wore her black armor with its white Raven Banner insignia upon its flat chest plate. Her large, ebon-feathered wings folded in as January watched, and tucked up tightly against her back like a twin-forked cape. Finally there was Ôkami, clad in his black, white, and gray samurai armor. As ever, his katana Chujitsu rode at his hip.

January had to blink at how uncanny it was. She stole a glance at Avery and Ryo beside her. Yes, they were still there, just as she was. She looked back at the three newcomers. They were not cosplayers, but the real deal. Those wings on Stormcrow's back were plainly real, as was the Gadget armor, the katana at Ôkami's hip, and everything else.

But more than that, they were the right height and the right proportions. Stormcrow's eyes behind her helmet were the right blue color, and the bare skin around her mouth was the right pale shade. They even spoke in the right voices as they came over to Barbara and the others.

"Ms. Ryan," Stormcrow said as she walked up, and offered Barbara her hand to shake. Then she looked to January herself, and echoed the greeting. "Ms. Ward."

January shook Stormcrow's hand, even as the television camera rolled. Introductions were made all around. January did not have to pretend to be star struck. She just had to let her all-too natural feelings of literally meeting a double of herself take over. It was so very, very weird, and strange, and just uncanny. It kind of made her doubt reality.

This had all been her idea of course. It was a plot she had hatched after seeing Kaelin create a potion that had polymorphed her into a hyena. Just as she had suspected, with some samples from herself and her friends, the alchemist had been able to make potions to perfectly mimic them as well. This would go a long way in protecting all of their secret identities going forward. It was living proof that they were separate people after all.

So in a way it really was Stormcrow, Gadget, and Ôkami that stood before them and wished her mother good luck in her senate race. In the very least, it was perfect duplicates of them, wearing their real super suits. There was really no way to tell that it was actually Kaelin, Harper, and Lighthammer under those suits, at least not without some serious magical senses.

January did not detect anyone with such powers as she looked out across the crowd of boosters. They were just as amazed and excited as her mother Barbara, if not more so. So far as she could sense in astral space, none were mages. Well, a few did possess some minor magical talent. But none were sensing in astral space. Certainly none would be able to see through the ruse. They did begin to crowd in closer and closer however, as everyone wanted to meet the capes.

They barely managed to get in a group photo before the trio of superheroes had to leave. Barbara's campaign manager Frank - January still found it strange thinking of Cray by that name - stood back to take the picture. The TV cameraman did the same with his professional video camera. He promised to send everyone copies, so they could post them online or put them up at home.

After all, it was not every day that ordinary people like January got to meet real superheroes, was it?

* * *