The Stormcrow, A Superhero's Tale Options

[Acadian]

Outthought and outfought by NaughtyKris – but not by much. Stormcrow’s a tough bird; even tougher with Cray whispering in her ear. Yay for healing potions! And just as help arrives, her enemy flees. Thankfully without the bombs.

Don’t like those sleeping foes outside though. . . .

Sleep punch!

“Just a little girl talk.”

[Renee]

Outthought and outfought by NaughtyKris – but not by much. Stormcrow’s a tough bird; even tougher with Cray whispering in her ear. Yay for healing potions! And just as help arrives, her enemy flees. Thankfully without the bombs.

Just had to spoil myself, see what happens. NaughtyKris!



Yeesh, back and forth with the blows. Indeed, seems like Endurance might be the deciding factor, along with a bit of Luck. 🎲

Uh oh. A mistake. A trap! Oh man. In her rib cage, damn.

Okay, she's gonna let Jan live. That's good. I mean, she might get away with the bomb. And it's not like she's showing mercy to our protagonist. But at least there's that. The chance is there to pwn her opponent, but she's letting Jan live.

YIKES WHAT the??? Dude. You don't slice nuclear bombs in two, what's the matta with you??

Nitokris swore in Arabic, and then switched to accented English. "This was a trap all along!"

THEES VASS a TRRAP ALLALOCK!!!

Hmm, sounds like she did get away with the first bomb, at least. Not sure if Mercury was able to dummy that one too (probably this has been stated, but my memory sucks).

This post has been edited by Renee: Jul 8 2024, 04:16 PM

[SubRosa]

Acadian: You summed it up. Out-thought and out-fought by Naughty K (that will be her rapper name ). This was a way to establish Nitokris' villain cred, and cement her as a very dangerous opponent in the books that follow. Then again, given that the entire thing was a trap all along, Nitokris too was out-thought by the Mid-Atlantic Coalition - specifically Cray and his Klingon guile. So she's not infallible either.

And of course, January did literally take Nitokris' best move and survive it. The same move that killed Rook. As Nitokris said herself, no else has ever done that. So even though she technically won this round, Nitokris will be re-evaluating January as being possibly the most dangerous opponent she has ever faced.

As ever, January gets through with the help of friends like Kaelin and Cray.

There will be more on the sleeping foes outside in today's episode. It was originally going to be just a few paragraphs. But instead I decided to expand on it, and really dig into the morally complex issue of leaving Nazis alive.

I do like the idea of a Sleep Punch, or perhaps to rephrase, a Vulcan Crow Nerve Pinch. January always seeks to resolve fights with as little harm to her opponents as possible. Especially those who are nowhere near her level.

She is definitely getting better at the super banter. She never would have had a 'girl talk' line in her back in Book 1.


Renee: Nitokris is definitely not being merciful by not finishing off January. Naughty Kris is a professional, meaning she is goal-driven. She has a specific goal in mind, and she is going to accomplish it, and not get side-tracked on other things. She is there for the bombs. Every moment she spends on January she is not accomplishing that goal. In a very real sense, January will win if she just stalls Nitokris long enough, since the rest of the Mid-Atlantic Coalition is right outside after all. So Nitokris was all about getting those bombs while she could.

Nitokris already suspected the worst when she cut the bomb in half. Granted, the worse that could happen would be exposure to radioactive material if the warheads had been inside. That would not have set the bombs off. It is very hard to do that. You have to set off a layer of conventional explosives that encircle the nuclear material with a very exact timing. That creates an implosion that drives the plutonium in on itself, and literally smashes its atoms against one another. If those conventional explosives do not go off, or if they go even a second out of order, there is no nuclear explosion.

As an aside, that actually happened in the Spanish broken arrow incident. A B-52 broke apart in mid air after an accident with a refueling tanker. It's bombs all fell to the earth. The conventional trigger explosives in two of them went off. But not in the right order, so they did not trigger a nuclear explosion. It was just the same as setting off some TNT, and it spread plutonium all over the place.

Nitokris did get away with the first bomb. But as she saw with the second one, it was empty. As January said, they had removed the warheads beforehand. Nitorkis got nothing but an empty bomb casing.



In real life, the Indianapolis and Lexington were both discovered by former Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen's deep sea research group.

In a case of serendipitous coincidence, self-described fascist Nick Feuntes is bemoaning the fact that his cause is nothing but a front for wealthy elites who want to divide the poor in order to enrich themselves.



Book 12.34 - Broken Arrow

The fight was over, but there was still plenty to do. There always was in the aftermath of a battle or similar emergency. First the surviving members of Atomkrieg were gathered together. Mercury used his metal manipulation powers to pull out steel and aircraft aluminum from the battered fuselage of the B-52. At his mental command the metal flowed like water, and reformed into a cage that surrounded the unconscious terrorists.

While he did so, Calypso checked the four remaining neo-Nazis to insure they were still breathing. Their rebreathers were all still in place and functioning. Now that she was up close and had the time, January noted writing on them, along with a logo of a blue wave under a white sky.

"I recognize these rebreathers. They are meta-tech, crafted by the Laughing Man." The Caribbean heroine noted. "They are owned by a deep sea research outfit called Ocean Explorations. I have worked with them and their owner: Alan Pall. They helped me discover the Indianapolis for a documentary. These rebreathers allow people to survive even the deepest reaches of the ocean outside of a submersible. They used them to find the Lexington without me a few years later."

January recognized the Laughing Man's name. He was a meta-inventor like Gadget, with an apparent appreciation for J. D. Salinger's writing. Cray had mentioned that he had built the holographic tech that he and Blood Raven used in their computer systems back in the Raven's Nest. She also recognized Alan Pall. He was an old software billionaire turned philanthropist after his retirement.

"Or maybe he gave them to the Nazis," Mercury rumbled. "Billionaires love to fund right-wing extremists. They couldn't exist without them to divide the masses. Otherwise we peasants would all unite and rise up with our torches and pitchforks to form labor unions and demand a living wage. Not to mention make them actually pay their taxes for a change."

"I am sure Alan Pall exploited a great many people to gain his wealth," Calypso frowned. "But he never struck me as directly supporting Nazis, especially not to commit an act of terrorism like this."

"He might not have known what they were going to do," Hwarang weighed in. "If I have noticed anything about fascists, it's that they have no loyalty. They all turn on one another sooner or later."

Cray said something in January's ear, and she spoke up telepathically to repeat it for the rest of the group a moment later.

"Skorzeny was not at the fight in the museum. Cray just told me that he stole these rebreathers from Ocean Explorations at the same time. He's on their security cameras. They already reported it to the police, and it's on the news now." January noted. "Besides, the Atomkrieg's got other meta-tech too, like those force field generators most of them wear, or Tirpitz's gauntlets. From what I know of the meta-tech market, the people who made that stuff probably had no idea that Nazis were going to end up using them."

"Yes, Etsi has a whole meta-tech category that you can shop in," Silverlight murmured. "You can buy it off the shelf, or have just about anything built specifically for you. If these malakas have billionaire backers—and I expect they do—they probably bought the rest of this stuff off the internet."

"So why not just buy it all?" Hwarang wondered.

"My friend Gadget does this," January offered. "It's how he paid for the materials to make his powered armor, and my original suit for that matter. He makes a lot of force field generators. Rich people always want them, because they make them feel safe. So he can just churn them out without a buyer up front, because he knows they will all sell eventually. But deep sea diving gear? I don't think Gadget's ever been asked for something like that. I bet those are all bespoke, and there might be only a few people who can make it."

"And they probably didn't want to wait while someone built enough of them," Hwarang nodded. "So they just stole them instead. Now it makes sense."

"So where's their boss, Bismarck?" Mercury asked.

"Dead," January shook her head. She nodded back toward the fuselage of the B-52 behind her, where the Rook armor now lay forever motionless. "Rook did it."

"Maybe the rest of them should join him," the Philadelphian growled across the mind link.

"I know how you feel bro, but we can't do that," Ranger was the first to break the long silence following the metal manipulator's words. "The rules of engagement—"

"Fuck the rules!" Mercury practically shouted in January's mind. "You don't know how I feel. My great aunts, uncles, and cousins all died at Treblinka."

"Greek Mythology often comes up in my day job." Silverlight's mental voice was quiet. But it was as unwavering as steel as it reached across the mind link. "Let me tell you, there were never a bunch of fouler beings than some of the Greek gods. They were back-stabbers, murderers, and serial rapists, and those were their finer qualities! They possessed inhuman power, lacked any sense of ethics or morals, and had no one to hold them responsible for their actions. That is why they did the awful things they did."

"The most important lesson I ever learned from Blood Raven was that we do not have to abide by the laws of whatever society we happen to find ourselves within. But we must absolutely have a code of our own that we do adhere to at all times. We cannot allow our emotions to rule our powers, else we will literally become the very villains we fight. That is honestly what separates us from them. They get angry and they kill people, because they can't stop themselves. Most of them feel bad about it later, when they have calmed down. But of course by then it's too late for the people who are dead. It's too late for them too, as by then they are wanted criminals."

"I have never killed anyone, and I'm not about to start now. Not even one of these malakas." Silverlight finished in a voice that was as unyielding as the white marble of her skin.

"Janos Heisen was a Nazi. Not one of these imitators, but an original." Calypso spoke up next. "He wore a suit of powered armor in World War Two, and tried to build an atomic bomb for Hitler. Now he's a voice for peace. Thanks to the schools he created, a kid born in the Bahamas like me was able to get an education, even though I was the daughter of poor Haitian immigrants. He went to Jupiter to bring back ultra-dense hydrogen to fuel a new fusion power plant that Stinger and Zero Point of the Sentinels are building. When it goes online it will provide clean energy for half of North America. With his help we may have also just solved the problem of plastics and other garbage flooding the oceans."

"I don't think any of these creatures are going to earn a Nobel Prize," Hwarang scowled. "All of my life, I have been told that I don't have a right to even exist because of their kind. Even now their friends in politics are trying to pass laws all across the country to make that happen. So trans kids can't have medical care, and the state will take them away from their parents. They even want to make it illegal to say the word 'gay'."

"I know," January finally spoke. "I want to kill them too. I really, really do. A few months ago these very same bastards burned an effigy of me on the steps of an Alabama courthouse. The cops took selfies with them as they did it. That was after Lighthammer, Blood Raven, and I took down the National Socialist League at Motor City Pride. Then I came out, and people like them and their supporters have been screaming for my death online ever since."

"I think we all know the paradox of intolerance," she went on. "If a tolerant society tolerates intolerance, then the intolerant will murder them all. We have seen it over and over again, genocide after genocide. I am trans, so I am the first on their list these days."

"It's not really a paradox," Mercury interjected. "It's a social contract. When you agree to tolerate others who are different from you, then you gain the same right to be tolerated in turn. But when you rip up the contract to be intolerant of others, then you also give up the privilege of being tolerated in return. At that point a tolerant society has not only a right, but a responsibility to protect itself from those who would destroy it."

"Yes, you are absolutely right," January nodded. "That's what we just did here. We fought back and protected our society. But there's a lot of space between fighting back and homicide. Being able to see that is the difference between us and them. To them every problem can only be solved by mass murder. That's what makes them so despicable, that and the fact that they love it so damn much. But we can do better. We are better. We can fight them without losing our souls in the process. Otherwise we just turn into the next Robespierre."

"I have been hated all my life, but I still believe that deep down humans are good at their core. It takes mountains of propaganda and years of its steady drip, drip, drip to turn people into monsters like this. I really don't know how to undo all that reactionary programming, or if it can even be done at all. I don't know if all people can change. But I do know that some people can."

"My first enemy as a cape was Lighthammer. He was also my first ally, outside of Gadget of course. Then I fought the Junkman and Archie. At the beginning of the Battle of Belle Isle they stood alone against the Abyssals on the bridge to the mainland. I first met Gola when she tried to eat a man's remaining years in the old Eloise asylum. She later saved my life at Belle Isle, when she distracted the Hierophant long enough for me to sabotage his summoning ritual. Then of course there's the Technocrat. As Calypso noted, Janos Heisen has been a force for good in this world for longer than any of us have been alive."

"You really think that any of them are going to come to help us one day," Hwarang practically spat as he stared down at the unconscious neo-Nazis at their feet.

"I don't know," January shrugged. "Maybe not. Probably not. But one of them might, and I believe both he and I deserve the chance to find out. We all deserve a second chance to make good on our mistakes. Goddess knows I've made plenty of my own. I used to have the Nine Noble Virtues hanging up in my bedroom. Until I learned that they were written by a guy from the British Union of Fascists."

"There's a big difference between that and these guys." Mercury rumbled.

"I know. But if Gadget had not pointed it out, that might have been the start for me." January looked down to the unconscious neo-Nazis at their feet. "How many of them started the same way, thinking they were being cool edgelords sticking it to the man? There has got to be some way to pull them back."

"Only love can defeat the people that hate us," Calypso breathed. "I do not mean we have to be nice to these monsters, or love them. Our love won't make them better people. I mean we have to hold on to the love we have for everyone else, and for the world we want to live in. We have to love that enough to not let ourselves give in to our own anger and frustrations, and betray our own ideals. That is what they do. They love nothing, they have no ideals. We have to be the light, by not being like them."

"So they can all rot in a prison cell, not a grave." Silverlight's mental voice was as absolute as stone. That was the end of that. January suspected that it was not simply through the force of their unofficial leader's personality. Rather see doubted that Mercury and Hwarang possessed true murderous intent. They just had their dander up, as she did herself. Unlike the neo-Nazis, she suspected that neither man truly relished the thought of taking another's life.

January's mind was pulled from the philosophies of anti-fascism and redemption by the presence of that strange bird, that strange, living bird. She once again felt it in the astral, not a crow, or a raven, or a rook. It was not even a jackdaw or magpie. It was all manner of corvids, all mixed together and breathing with magical life.

January could not resist it. She had to see what it was. So even as the others looked on dumbfounded, she unfurled her wings and flew out into the inky blackness. She traced the path back toward the cockpit. She passed over the shattered remnants of the landing gear that she and Bismarck had plowed through. Moments later the cockpit of the B-52 once again loomed in front of her. It remained lit by Hwarang's illumination arrows, but they now guttered noticeably fainter than before. Still, they gave off enough light for January to see that the wreck was even more crumpled and damaged now, thanks to her and Bismarck's crash into its roof and the following battle with Rook on the upper deck.

She pulled up short of the wreckage. Instead she feathered back her wings against the water, and planted her feet into the thick silt below. She reached down into the mire, and drew forth the uncanny corvid from it. She dusted off flecks of muck as she pulled it out of the mud, and held it up to her face.

It was called the Ravenwing. The enchantment upon the bird told her that the instant January set her fingers to it. The enchantment! It was a not a living bird after all, but a magical artifact. The reason for her earlier confusion became clear as she studied the Ravenwing in the astral. Among other things, it was made from numerous feathers and bones of once-living corvids. January felt ravens, crows, rooks, magpies, and so on, all mixed up indiscriminately within the relic. It was all those things, and more.

"You are bleeding," Calypso's voice was strong in her mind. January glanced up to see the aquanaut floating beside her. The spiny fins around her head created a halo, and made her look like a sea goddess looming from the darkness.

January glanced down at her chest. The slit that Nitokris' sword had made in her breastplate had regenerated thanks to Mr. Blackwood's meta-materials. Even the paint had grown back over the spot. There was no blood in the water, at least not that January could see. But her chest still ached underneath.

"Nitokris really packs a wallop with that sword," January murmured. "Just a flesh wound though."

"You really do not have to put on a brave show for us," Calypso said. "We all know that you are not completely invulnerable."

"I know," January sighed. "Conveying that persona just comes natural when I'm in the cape. I am fine. I will be at least. A healing potion from our alchemist sister fixed me up, mostly at least. I can sleep off the rest tonight."

"You found the mysterious bird then?" Calypso changed the subject, and nodded down to the Ravenwing in January's hands.

"It got knocked loose in the fight." January explained. "It's a magical artifact, made from real birds. I think there's metal in there too. The enchantment on it might be the most complex thing I've ever seen, outside of the sanctum in the Witch House at least. Whoever made this was an artist, or a genius, at least at enchanting. It might contain some clues to Rook's identity."

January fished out the bag of holding from her waist, and tucked the Ravenwing inside its plain brown folds. She would want to study it later.

"I thought you said it was alive?" Hwarang asked across the mental link.

"It is, in its own way," Silverlight answered before January could reply. "Most magic items are simple. Think of a pair of socks that are always dry, or a cup that keeps your coffee always hot. They are useful. But they have no real impact on the world, so they are just objects with a tiny amount of power invested within them."

"But true artifacts, like my staff Mene, or Blood Raven's sword Samhain, or Calypso's staff Bagua, those are different. Through time and deeds they grow to be more than just tools. They not only have great power, but names, histories, predilections, and even personalities. They evolve beyond we who made them, into their own beings."

"So are they, you know, aware and intelligent?" Mercury asked. The vitriol that had so recently filled his mental voice had been replaced by genuine curiosity.

"No," Calypso answered. "Well, I at least have never known a magic item to say: 'I think, therefore I am'. They don't talk and converse with us, not in the normal sense. But they do convey their personalities, their histories, their essences, across astral space. It can feel like a voice whispering in your head. But that is more a matter of how we process the experience than anything else. They aren't really conversing."

"But give our staves a few billion years to evolve, and who knows..." Silverlight mused.

"They might be writing Shakespeare, or at least comic books," Ranger murmured. "There's a new one called Artemis Argent and the Secret of Mystery Hill that really slaps. I can't wait for the next issue."

"I know the writer," January smiled in spite of herself. "Well, I've met her. I can get you a signed copy."

"That would be rad!" the soldier cried with delight.

"Rad?" Hwarang's mental voice was tinged with obvious amusement.

"My dad says it all the time," Ranger replied. "That and cowabunga..."

"In any case, it is time we depart," Calypso declared.

January looked from her waterborne sister, to the lights of the fuselage in the distance. She could see the others clustered there in a group, waiting to go to the surface. January would be happy to leave. While she could not deny the forbidding beauty of the abyssal depths, she could also not escape the fact that she did not belong here. She was meant for the sky, like any other crow.

But it felt like they were not finished. Her eyes turned back to the wreckage of the cockpit. It was not hard for her to pick out Bismarck's body on the deck of the upper level. His cybernetic limbs were gleaming silver, and glinted brightly in the fading light of the flare arrows. What remained of the original crew also lay scattered around him now: helmets, boots, dog tags, and the like that had withstood the vicissitudes of time and tide.

"You are thinking of bringing back the bodies, all the bodies." Now it was Silverlight's voice that rang in her head. It was not a question, but a statement.

"It is what Blood Raven would do," January insisted. "She would bring them home to their families."

"We cannot," Calypso argued. "This is a gravesite already. I mean that literally. It is a violation of international law to go inside and disturb it. You and Bismarck already did that once in the fight. That was not your fault. The battle took you in there. Going back a second time, that would be unethical, even to remove him. If the United States government wishes to recover the remains, whatever may be left, that is different. But that is not our decision to make. I agree with what Silverlight just said about not needing to be slavishly devoted to the laws of nations, but this is one worth following on its own merits."

"Remember, just because we can do something, does not mean we should," Silverlight joined in. "This isn't the same as cleaning up a state park after a battle, like we did at Belle Isle. I'm an anthropologist. Dealing with human remains sometimes comes up in my field. It raises not just legal, but ethical and moral concerns. People have very visceral reactions to this, and you can cause a great deal of harm, even though you think what you are doing is right and appropriate. My profession has a long and very sordid history of doing just that. Sometimes it's better for everyone to just leave the dead where they lie. Please, take my word on it. I don't want to repeat the mistakes my colleagues have made in the past."

"I... suppose you are right," January sighed. She understood her sister's words. But it still felt like she was leaving things unfinished, just walking away.

"I do not understand your reluctance," Hwarang's mental voice came over the link. "Why are you so hung up on this. It feels... ghoulish."

"My brother was murdered recently," January explained after long moments. "I stood there and looked at his face after he was dead. I had to, otherwise I don't think I would have believed it was him. I had to see it, and my mother had to see it, to know it was real. I just... want to do what's right for the families of the people who died here, even Bismarck. If he's still got any family, they deserve the chance to have a funeral and bury him."

"I'm sorry about your brother," Hwarang's telepathic voice was somber and muted. "But Calypso is right. This is not for us to do. They are buried already. Think of it like any other burial at sea. It is a thing after all."

"I honestly think this is what Blood Raven would do," Silverlight chimed in. "She would mourn them. She would inform the families. And yes, that is a thing we can do. But they belong to the sea now."

"Ok, ok..." January finally relented. She did not look forward to doing the latter. Telling her mother that Julian was dead had been wrenching. Telling the family of the man the Hierophant had slain at Gull Island—Rafael Laurenti—had likewise been soul-crushing. To give people the worst news of their life, it took something from you. Even when they were total strangers, they were still people. You did not have to know someone to feel empathy for them after all. It was easy enough to imagine how they must feel, and conjure similar feelings within oneself.

January flew back to the others with Calypso at her side. They moved in silence now, the weight of the situation as heavy upon their shoulders as the literal weight of the water above.

Once back at the remnants of the bomb bay, January looked through one of the many holes in the side of the fuselage to the Rook suit within. She did not sense any physical remains inside the armor. As Calypso had noted, the ocean had taken care of that. She could sense the magic within the suit however. The enchantment upon it was as strong and complex as that within the Ravenwing. Now that she had studied both, she was certain that they had been made by the same person.

It was clear that Rook had been a very gifted enchanter. It was too bad he had not stayed in that lane. He could have lived a long and fruitful life. The same was true of the others who lay dead here. January suddenly felt the urge to cry. All of this suffering had taken place because of arrogant men and their blind ambitions.

* * *

[Acadian]

Much effort here to the aftermath. Some sober thoughts on the meaning of life and such, rendered more melancholy I’m sure by the beautiful but natural ‘gloom’ of their inhospitable environment.

They were right to leave the crew in place. The owners of that B-52 have plenty of divers and beancounters to take care of that if desired.

’Think of a pair of socks that are always dry, or cup that keeps your coffee always hot.’
- - I’ll take one of each.

[Renee]

Ah I see. So maybe she wants to off January, way deep undersea, but there's no time for that.

If those conventional explosives do not go off, or if they go even a second out of order, there is no nuclear explosion...

So she knows technically that the bomb won't go off if cut in half, but still... some things you just don't do! Ask Alec Baldwin, he can explain...

Wow (about the B-52). And those shipwreck websites, gonna check those out later. Fascinated with that stuff.


So before reading, I have a Stormcrow moment to share. Was near 100 degrees yesterday but I went to the park after work anyway, because I knew hardly anyone would be there. Solitude is golden after a day of customers, ya know? Also, Even though it was super-hot, there was a near-constant breeze blowing.

Anyway, here's the first Stormcrow moment. The bird flew right up and perched on the opposite side of the bench I was sitting upon. I was in shock! I just sat there. Didn't move. I figured the bird would remain perched a moment and then leave. But it stayed.

I picked up a book, began reading, being nonchalant, you know? Bird kept sitting there. So then I went for my phone, my cheapie Nokia flip-phone, which was stuffed into my pack of course. The phone kept slipping out of my fingers, took me like 4x to grab it! Finally, got the pic above.

The bird flew away, toward the lake. A minute later, came right back! I grabbed a second picture, this time portrait instead of landscape.

It flew away a second time, this time toward a pavillion. A minute later it came back with a friend. The second crow decided not to land, though. But the bird on the bench, it began croaking. Those things are really LOUD when they're sitting right next to you, my gosh. 🦅 We actually had a conversation, me and the crow. It'd go "crraawk" and I'd answer "craawwwk!"

I figure the avian creature was after food! Must've been, right? that's the only thing I can come up with, because I'm not like January, no magic was involved. But next time I go to the park I'll make sure to bring some crackers.

------------------------------

Cool, glad the fight is over. What're they gonna do with the nazis?

Ah-ha, she's got Ravenwing, cool. Nice, this relic sounds fantastic.

January's still bleeding, sort of. Yeah, y'all need to get out of there, magic or not. Very dangerous situation, that far underwater. Listen to Calypso, hon. This is her domain, and even she's telling Jan it's time to go! ... But anyway, if the artifact contains clues to Rook's identity that'd be interesting to learn about. He was one of the antagonists I still got questions about.

Ha: "'Tis just a flesh wound!"

"It is what Blood Raven would do," January insisted. "She would bring them home to their families."

"We cannot," Calypso argued. "This is a gravesite already. I

Agreed with the Caribbean; get the heck out of there. Plus, I don't think Branwyn would really go that far, but you know her better than I.

Silverlight joins in, wow. I mean, I can see if Hwrang or one of them lost their lives; obviously yeah, they'd bring him or her to the surface. There's just nothing for Bismarck, or any of the Nazis though. One team won, the other team lost, that's it.

The final paragraph is very pertinent. Rook could've done so much better. Wonder if we'll get to learn more about his story. If not, it's okay. Just curious.

This post has been edited by Renee: Jul 17 2024, 02:59 AM

[SubRosa]

Acadian: The bottom of the ocean is a lot like the surface of the moon, in its stark beauty, surrounded by eternal night. As Buzz Aldrin said "magnificent desolation!" Though the ocean floor is a desolation that is filled with often hidden life.

January's musings on the cause of all this suffering is something I often feel as I read or listen to history and biographies. So many awful things in the world were done by people who had a choice, who could have just been a crappy artist living in a halfway house in Austria, but instead decided to be a dick.

There is always a lot for January to do after the battles are over. In movies they just fade to black once the last punch is thrown. I want to show the aftermath, so the readers can see that January is committed to every aspect of the cape life, even the onerous parts.

I would love an ever dry top, so I would not have to pull out the hairdryer to dry mine off after I get it soaking wet washing the dishes.


Renee: What amazes me about many of these WW2 and earlier wrecks they find at astonishing depths is how intact many of them are. The paint is still on them, and you can read their lettering on their hulls or crates on their decks.

That is an awesome moment with your local crows. Corvids are very intelligent and social. They remember faces, and individual people. If you make a friend with a crow, it will literally tell its buddies about you, and they will all be nice to you. If you get one mad at you, it will do the same, and every crow in the neighborhood will hate you. Given that it was in a park, this one is probably used to people, and getting treats from them. If you bring it nuts or bird food, you will make a friend for life, and probably have other crows coming to see you as well.

I was originally going to leave Rook's background a mystery. But then I decided it bore further exploration. So there is indeed more we shall learn about Rook, thanks to January bringing back the Ravenwing. That is not all. The Ravenwing is going to become a regular feature in the stories going forward.







Major Trevor Stevens will be played by RL Aldis Hodge

Jason's appearance was inspired by Michael Fassbender in Prometheus

Annie was inspired by RL Annie Liebovitz



Book 12.35 - Broken Arrow

With that they gathered on top of the makeshift cage that Mercury had built for the neo-Nazis. Calypso unleashed her magic, and the waters around responded to her command. The metal cage shot up into the inky darkness overhead like an undersea elevator, as the waves carried it and them aloft.

January stared silently down at the landscape they left behind. It was a pool of darkness, lit only with the guttering lamps of Hwarang's arrows. Soon those faded into the void, and left them surrounded by inky blackness. If not for the sensation of water rushing past, and the sight of the ever present marine snow falling about them, it would not have been possible to tell they were moving. There were just no outside landmarks to gauge their progress against. It was all just blank nothingness all around.

"You probably think I'm a monster after what I said..." Mercury murmured as they quickly ascended. He stared down at the unconscious neo-Nazis in the cage that they stood upon. "It's just that... people like this really, really make it personal."

"I know. I am no different from you." January nodded. "A few days ago I was about to throw hands with a bunch of cops. They just had me so... outraged. Thankfully Ôkami was there to hold me back."

"You?" Even across the mind-link, Hwarang's words rang with incredulity. "I thought you were like, the kindest, most empathetic super in the world. Everyone says that Blood Raven's the ruthless one. Or at least that she was."

"Take it from me, Blood Raven's killed more Nazis than any single person on the planet. And not just Nazis either..." January chose her words carefully. She knew that there were limits to what she could divulge about her former mentor's activities during the Second World War. "But I think she regrets it. She told me the same thing that she did Silverlight: we all need to have a code of our own. I think she learned that the hard way, by breaking hers. It's why I'm glad I have friends. There will always be someone like you guys to hold me back. We all need that sometimes."

Soon the void around them faded to purple velvet, and eventually vibrant blue. Finally they returned to the world of light once more. January breathed a sigh of relief to have emerged from those sunless depths. In some ways it reminded her of those ancient heroes who journeyed to the underworld, then rose again to the land of the living afterward.

January imagined that they had risen straight up from the wreckage. Because of that Calypso's sailboat was nowhere to be seen. However, another boat was there instead. Or was it a ship? January had no idea. It was a battered, rusted workhorse of the sea. It looked like a big tugboat. It had a wide-bellied hull that was festooned with old tires. A bulldog-like superstructure rose up from the foredeck, and a large crane trailed away from the back of that toward the stern. The vessel's black and blue paint was chipped and peeling away, and revealed numerous dents and scratches from hard use. The name Long Island Warrior was stenciled along the stern of the ship. January suspected that this warrior was long due for retirement.

The deep thrum of helicopter rotors came to January's ears. She looked up to see that the heavy utility helicopter that had ferried them out now hovered in the sky above. More choppers had now joined it. Several were heavily-armed Apache attack helicopters, the same kind that had participated in the Battle of Belle Isle. These lurked off to one side, to give them a clear field of fire across every inch of the ship. Finally there was another giant transport craft that loomed directly over the boat, with its rear cargo hatch sitting open. High overhead jet fighters streaked across the sky, and left fluffy white contrails behind them.

Far above them the distinctive arrowhead shapes of two B-2 bombers loitered among the clouds. Did they carry nuclear weapons, to use against the Atomkrieg if all else failed? It would certainly be ironic of the Air Force to use nukes to stop other people from stealing the nukes they had lost in the past. But given what the stakes were, January could understand why someone might make that call.

Finally she noted a guided missile cruiser sliding its way over the horizon, and closing in on their position. Clearly, the military had not been about to leave anything up to chance here.

Along the deck of the tugboat January could see several men in tactical gear. Most were bearded, and looked like they spent more time at the gym than away from it. They gathered around as Calypso steered their cage to the side of the boat. Then they all stepped back when Mercury did his thing, and caused the steel to creep up over the gunwale and flop over onto the deck.

January and the others leapt or flew up to the deck, depending on their preferred mode of travel. Ranger took point in dealing with the soldiers. Well, it turned out that they were Navy SEALs, rather than soldiers. They quickly learned that the boat was a salvage vessel from New York City, which the Atomkrieg had hijacked and brought with them to carry the bombs back to the mainland.

"I suppose that makes them pirates," Hwarang observed.

The neo-Nazis on board had not been meta-humans or magicians however. Like most of the rank and file terrorists whom they had fought at the Smithsonian, they were entirely mundane individuals. Like them, these men did possess some meta-technology in the form of force field generators. However, that had not been enough to prevent them from being overwhelmed by the SEALs.

Silverlight smiled as another military man descended from the superstructure. January noted that his beard was not as long and scruffy as the others. Instead it was a fine black mist that clung tightly to his heart-shaped features. Piercing eyes stared out from under his helmet, and his brown skin showed the first creases of middle age.

She also noted from the identification on his gear that unlike the others he was not Navy. He was Air Force, like the people who had ferried them out there on the massive helicopter. Unlike the chopper crew however, he looked like he could run a marathon without breaking a sweat, and probably still have the energy to wrestle an alligator afterward.

"Trevor!" Silverlight smiled at this newcomer stepped forward. She reached out and took his hand in a warm greeting. Then she turned to January and the other capes. "This is Calypso, Stormcrow, Mercury, Hwarang, and of course Ranger. Guys, this is my contact in the Pentagon, Major Trevor Stevens."

"It's my pleasure gentlemen, and ladies," Major Stevens nodded like a proverbial officer and a gentleman. Then he turned back to Silverlight. January noted the warmth in his smile, and wondered if their relationship might be more than just professional?

"I take it we have you to thank for all of this?" she asked him.

"It's what the general pays me for," the major replied. "Please tell me you have good news for us?"

"I have more than news," Silverlight proclaimed. She took a moment to step aside from the military operators, and moved back to the rail of the boat. She seemed to pause there for a moment. But January could feel her call out in astral space. It was not with words of course, but with magic.

Her power was answered by Neaera. In just a moment the water elemental rose up from the waves beside the boat, standing atop a pillar of water. In fact, she was the pillar of water, as her legs just sort of flowed down into and melded with the rest of the sea. She hovered there in space for a moment in defiance of gravity. Then she leaned forward over the rail of the ship. With a further contempt for physics, she did not come crashing down to the deck below as any normal wave would. She just hung there in the air.

Then her form widened. January could see some large object travel through it, causing it to expand even more. Finally a large, silvery form was disgorged from the elemental's body, and plopped down onto the deck. A moment later a second such device moved through Neaera's body, to be spat out on the deck beside the first.

Both were generally cylindrical in outline, like giant bullets or artillery shells. But they were pinched in the middle, like an hourglass or a peanut. Lines of screws ringed their ends, revealing where they might be opened up to get at the treasures within. From the way the deck groaned underfoot, it was clear that they weighed several tons apiece.

Only January did not want to get anywhere near what was inside those warheads. She raised Sága and tapped on the computer's screen. A moment later she breathed a sigh of relief when she saw that its sensors showed no signs of radiation. Given that the two nuclear weapons had been sitting on the bottom of the ocean for sixty years, they were remarkably well-preserved.

Clearly, they did not make them like they used to.

Major Stevens whistled at the sight. "Damn, I've never actually seen a nuclear warhead outside of pictures."

Then he turned back to the men under his command, and a new group came up from the depths of the ship. These men were dressed in full NBC chemical suits, and they quickly sealed up the warheads in shiny metal containment barrels. Then they loaded them into the cargo helicopter directly overhead via a set of descent cables they lowered down. January was tempted just to fly up with them and load them into the aircraft herself. But she did not want to spook the guys with guns, or the helicopter gunships nearby.

In the meantime Silverlight dismissed Neaera. The water elemental did not return to astral space however. Instead she sank back into the waves, and vanished from sight. January hoped that her future encounters with elementals and spirits would be more like this one. It had certainly been nice to meet a spirit that she did not have to fight for a change.

"So what next?" Hwarang asked.

* * *

Next was a meeting with General Millar at Joint Base Andrews. He was the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. January recognized the name. He had been in overall command of the military during the Battle of Belle Isle. At the time he had been under orders to use nuclear weapons if necessary to stop the Abyssals. Now here they were giving him two more such bombs. Once more, the irony of the situation was not lost upon January.

They returned to the base in the same wide-bodied utility helicopter that had taken them out to the ocean to begin with. It still carried Hwarang's motorcycle. A caravan of other aircraft went with them on the way back to Joint Base Andrews as well. That included the helicopter carrying the nuclear warheads of course.

January was getting used to these meet and greets, to the point where she was thinking of them as such. She remembered how nervous she had been the first time she had encountered the police as a cape. Even after that had turned out to be an entirely ordinary experience, she had still been tense and excited to meet her state's attorney general, then later the governor.

But now, well, the shine of meeting authority figures had certainly worn off. After you had shaken hands with Janos Heisen, you realized that unless they were a near immortal brain within a fully robotic body, they were just regular people after all. They just had more responsibilities—and more opportunity to abuse such responsibilities—than most others. But they still had bad breath, or used too much body spray, or ground their teeth, the same as anyone else.

The surviving members of the Atomkrieg were whisked away under heavy guard. January was glad to be rid of them. But it still reminded her of Bismarck. Would she be seeing his face in her dreams now, along with that of the Hierophant? She was not looking forward to finding out.

Calypso passed on the GPS coordinates for the site of the Keep 19 wreckage, so that it could be officially logged and placed in a graves registry. Major Stevens promised to take care of it. From what January gathered, he was some sort of intelligence agent for the Air Force. But it was not clear exactly what he did. January imagined that such ambiguity came with the territory of being a spy.

Finally there was a press conference. January was thankful that she only had to stand in the background for it. Speaking with the press was exhausting. The general did most of the talking, and Silverlight took up the rest. DC was her home after all, it was only right that she take the forefront in this case.

As much as she was glad to meet new people such as Mercury, Hwarang, and Ranger, January was relieved to make her goodbyes afterward and leave. But not before Cray took another team photo with one of her drones of course. That was another keepsake to put up in the Raven's Nest.

Her chest ached with every beat of her wings when she finally was able to take to the skies once more. That was not a good sign, given that she had half a continent to cross before she was home. She resolved to use the teleportation waypoint in Baltimore to save time, and she swung her flight path to the north.

That is when she remembered the Transgender Equality Project. Damn, she had completely forgotten about them! A glance down at Sága showed that she was many hours late. Probably far too late for her to just show up and go ahead with everything. But she did not want to completely ghost them either.

So she banked sharply to the left, until Washington DC filled her vision. The streets and buildings sprawled out through the angle between the Potomac and Anacostia Rivers. It was all familiar territory now, and January easily navigated past the Navy Yard and over the Mall beyond. She continued past the White House, and finally paused at Dupont Circle to double check the address in Sága.

She found the nonprofit just a few blocks east of the large traffic circle and the memorial fountain within it. Like much of DC appeared to be, it was on a street of town houses of varying sizes and shapes, all scrunched up tightly against one another. It made it seem like the streets were all buried at the bottom of tall, artificial canyons. Behind them was a large green park, with nearby tennis and basketball courts.

She feathered back her wings and came in for a landing on the sidewalk out front. The Transgender Equality Project's building was a multistory sandstone affair. Its ground floor was fronted by large picture windows with rounded tops, while rectangular windows took up the upper stories. In spite of the stone structure, the numerous windows gave it an open, airy feel. It felt welcoming.

January was thankful for that, given how unwelcoming certain parts of her day had been. She strode into the lobby, and everyone stopped to stare. She had to remind herself that she was in the super suit. Otherwise she would have been afraid that a roll of toilet paper was hanging down her backside, or that she had committed some other form of faux pas.

January strode to the receptionist and forced a smile to her lips. "Hi I'm-"

"Stormcrow!"

The voice of a man walking down the steps from the floor above brought January's head around. He wore a dark blue double-breasted Havana suit over an equally dark turtleneck. His hair was short and wavy, and had rakish tilt to one side. If it had not been for her astral senses, January never would have guessed that he was a trans man. So it seemed that her mundane gaydar was as poorly tuned as ever.

"Hi, I'm Jason!" the newcomer exclaimed. "We talked on the phone before."

"Jason, right, like the Argonauts." January was glad he had introduced herself, because she had completely forgotten his name. It had been a busy day, and even without all the punching and shooting, there had been a lot of new names for her to learn.

"We were afraid you weren't going to make it," the man said.

"To be honest, there were a few moments today when I was afraid of that as well." January glanced down at her breastplate. It was perfectly solid and unscratched, thanks to Mr. Blackwood's meta-material construction. But her chest ached underneath. "I'm sorry I'm late. We had some excitement at the Smithsonian, and later under the Atlantic."

"We totally understand," Jason nodded. "It was on the news. I guess you don't get all the excitement over in the Dragon City after all."

"Oh no, Silverlight really knows how to throw parties," January murmured. "You might even say they're the bomb..."

There was some more chit chat about Silverlight and Blood Raven as Jason led her up the stairs to his office. It was all coming easily enough for January now. Like the meet and greets, it turned out the super small talk was really nothing extraordinary after all. It was just the same as regular small talk in the end. She just had to be careful not to say too much at times. Such as how she could not comment on if Blood Raven had actually retired or not.

Jason made a quick phone call. Then the two of them launched into the paperwork, and Jason explained it all step by step as they worked out the details. In the middle of it all a photographer came in, looking breathless. She was a pale-skinned woman in her prime, whom January's astral senses also clocked as being trans. Her brown hair was long and straight, and a pair of glasses was perched upon the prominent nose that jutted from her long features.

"Hi, I'm Annie Leib!" she practically gushed. "I'm so glad you made it after all. I was just about to leave. I can't say how much it means to have you here. You're a real inspiration."

"Honestly, people like yourselves are an inspiration for me, just by living your life," January said without thinking. "When I was younger that seemed like more than I could ever hope for. The things other people took for granted, that was like an impossible dream to me."

A photo session followed. There had been hair and makeup people, but they had left hours before. Granted, with her helmet January did not really need the first. Still, she sometimes let her long hair fall out the back of the headgear, either loose or in a braid. She tied it back into a ponytail now, and just let it hang between the wings folded up on her shoulders. As far as makeup went, she simply touched up her lipstick and was ready to go.

It was not glamorous. Not like movies and TV shows tried to make such things seem. Annie was not a miniature tyrant who bullied her staff, not that she had one. Nor was she a disaffected dilettante thoroughly bored with it all. She was not even a snobby artiste. She was just a professional doing her job, which was mostly shooting January as she moved from one artificially heroic pose to another.

January was glad to take a break while Annie found another SD card for her camera. She took a moment to lean against the frame of one of the windows, with one arm held high. She stared out at the street below. But she did not see the cars or people. She saw Bismarck, half of his face silver metal, the other half pale skin. She saw the empty Rook armor loom overhead and lunge forward. That frightful, serrated claw—really a sword—lashed out. That was the end of Bismarck. He had been an evil overlord one moment, and nothing but red meat the next. Even now the hagfish were probably feasting upon his corpse.

A bright light flashed in front of her eyes. January blinked, and saw Annie standing before her, camera raised.

"That's it!" the photographer beamed. "That's the picture I was looking for. What were you thinking about then?"

"Death," January replied honestly. "I watched a man die today. He was an evil man. The world's no poorer for his passing. But he was still a person. And now he's... not."

First it had been Julian. Then it had been the Hierophant. Now it was Bismarck. They were all dead, with no one but themselves to blame. January just wished they would pick someone else to die around.

"Oh," Annie's smile turned to ash. "Sorry. I guess with what you do it can get pretty grim, can't it?"

"It can," January sighed. "Don't get me wrong, it's worth it every time I help someone. Every time I save a life, or just inspire someone to make things better. But other times, it's not a celebration..."

"I'm sorry, it's been a long day," January forced a smile to her lips. She hoped it did not seem as lame to Annie as it felt. "It's been a good day though. I'm glad I was able to make it here, and meet you all. You do good work here."

"Oh I'm just a freelancer, I go wherever the pictures are." Annie lowered her camera. Her voice had lost its previous enthusiasm. Now she just sounded... empathetic. "Say, do you want to stick around? It's around dinner time. We could order something. You could just take a moment to unwind and recharge your batteries..."

"Dinner!" January slapped a palm against her armored forehead. "I was supposed to cook tonight! My roommate is so going to kill me!"

"Oh, you have a roommate," Annie's face fell flat at the revelation. January could not imagine why. "Of course you do."

"I mean, who can afford to live alone in this economy?" January murmured. "He only moved in a little while ago, but it already makes a difference."

"He?" Annie looked confused. "I thought you were a... you know... lesbian?"

"I am." January could not contain her confusion. Then what the other woman meant finally dawned on her. "Not that kind of roommate. He's just an old friend. One of my D&D buddies. I don't have a girlfriend."

Not anymore at least.

"Oh yeah, that was on Gilda Gadfly," Annie frowned. "Sorry about that too. I keep putting my foot in it. This is why I get paid to take pictures, not talk."

"Your feet are just fine where they are Annie," January insisted. "Punching giant spiders is easy. It's real life that's hard."

* * *

[Acadian]

A nicely detailed ‘aftermath’ as the foes and bombs are safely put to rest.

I loved your description of the battered, old but hard-working tug.

’It had certainly been nice to meet a spirit that she did not have to fight for a change.’
- - I can imagine!

Nice that Stormcrow was spared a speaking part in the press event. I am concerned about her lingering chest pain though. That was quite a wound she took.

"Oh yeah, that was on Gilda Gadfly," Annie frowned. "Sorry about that too. I keep putting my foot in it. This is why I get paid to take pictures, not talk."
- - This wonderfully crafted bit made me chuckle.


Nits:
’A moment later she breathed a sigh of relief when she saw that its sensors showed no signs of a {lose the ‘a’ perhaps?} radiation.’
’It was no {lose the ‘no’ here?} perfectly solid and unscratched, thanks to Mr. Blackwood's meta-material construction.’

[Renee]

Yeah, I just watched a documentary on the Andrea Doria (I think, might've been some other ocean liner). The boat is not too deep, scuba divers can get in there. The main 'treasure' they've brought up are the one-of-a-kind dinnerware pieces, which has bonafide Andrea Dora logos and artwork. Folks have died trying to get just a plate or a teacup if they don't know what they're doing.

Corvids, okay. I think I did become its friend for sure. Went back another day last week, sat at the same bench. I sat there for maybe 15 minutes before the crow returned. This time I had some Ritz crackers! Funny thing was though, once it ate a couple crackers it flew away, and didn't come back.

But I do think it remembers faces for sure.

Aww, Annie Leibowitz. She kinda reminds me of Shelley Mars.


------------------------

The cage shoots up toward the surface, does this mean those Nazis got their blood all messed up? Too much nitrogen or whatever? Not that I care for them. But ... Hmm, maybe not. They've got their own magic (edit: meta-technology), after all.

Ah, a tugboat. Why is that ringing a bell?

Whoa, all kinds of vehicles up here on the surface: helicoptors, boats, bombers. Wonder if this has anything to do with Calypso's boat not being around. I mean, I know the ocean's a big place, and maybe it drifted off. Can't remember if it's anchored, or if that's even possible at the depth they were at. Or did someone stay behind to make sure it wouldn't drift away?

Sorry. Talking to my laptop again. And alright. Sounds like Silverlight and maybe Mercury know who the newcomers are. Phew.

hen she leaned forward over the rail of the ship. With a further contempt for physics, she did not come crashing down to the deck below as any normal wave would. She just hung there in the air.

Interesting.

Here's a thought. Way out here in the open sea is perhaps the first time January has been able to save the day without zillions of cameraphones pointed her way. Even when she was in the Caribbean. In the more populated areas there was a news crew, if I recall correct.

Yes, people in authority are just people, very true, January/Stormcrow. Still, I've had a few moments too when I met someone famous, or powerful or whatever. That is true there's this 'moment'. Like: this person really is just a person.

"Oh no, Silverlight really knows how to throw parties," January murmured. "You might even say they're the bomb..."

Ha hurr.

My gosh, a photo session. And all of this takes place on the same day? Yeah, she must be exhausted.


Whoa, all right YES. Alright. So, sounds like Annie's got some interest. I hope so. Because goodbye Hannah, if so. Yeah, go for Annie, hon. Your roomie dinner date can get pushed along... (Unless it can't!)

This post has been edited by Renee: Jul 22 2024, 08:45 PM

[SubRosa]

Acadian: The aftermaths are now old hat to January. But something she still has to be part of, given that she has chosen to be an open and engaged part of the entire process.

When it came to describing the salvage boat that the Atomkrieg had stolen, I thought of the boat that the protagonists had in the movie Ghost Ship. That is where I got its name as well. In the movie it was the Arctic Warrior (since it is set in the Bering Sea). So I made this the Long Island Warrior, as it is based out of Brooklyn.

One of the tightropes I walk with January is that she is a tank. She shrugs off attacks that would annihilate others. She did go to the Rocky Balboa school of wearing down her opponents by letting them punch her in the face a zillion times. But if she is completely invulnerable, then there are no stakes. So while I do endeavor to show main battle tanks literally bouncing off her, there also need to be foes like Naughty Kris who can still seriously harm her. So far it seems to be working.

As usual, thanks for finding those nits and helping me fix them.


Renee: Just recently a diver here in Lake Superior died while trying to explore a wreck as well.

The neo-Nazis have those breath masks that they stole, so they don't have to worry about decompression sickness. Just as the heroes do not.

Calypso's boat is not around because they came straight up from the wrecked plane. Remember, they had to walk a bit across the bottom to find the airplane. So Calypso's boat is just over the horizon. She did not anchor it as the water was too deep. But she did heave to, setting the sail and anchor to oppose one another. That is an old technique that keeps a ship in the same place on the ocean.

January has had a few fights that were in private, like the one against Gola. But as you noted, usually they are in public, just due to the nature of being a superhero. She's often fighting against baddies that are menacing the public, like the giant spider at Ferndale Pride, or the Nazis at Motor City Pride. Often she finds out that there is a situation because it is on the news or social media in the first place, like the salamander on Montserrat. A news helicopter was showing it live, and it was on the TV at Blackwood's place.

As the kids today would say, Annie is thirsty for January. Not that January has any clue. She won't realize it until a week later, at the very end of this book. She is like me that way.







Book 12.36 - Broken Arrow

August 22 (Thursday)

The next day January slept in late, at least for her. That meant waking several hours after sunrise. Thankfully the soreness in her chest from being stabbed by Nitokris had abated. Along with it had vanished the general aches and pains accumulated from not just one, but two meta-human battles in a single day.

January silently thanked Freyja for the healing trance that Blood Raven had taught her after their battle with the National Socialist League at Motor City Pride. More to the point, she also thanked Blood Raven. Since then the regenerative sleep ritual had proved to be worth more than its proverbial weight in rare-earth minerals. Even the nightmares—such a common companion to her nights—had retreated. She might have to consider using the trance more often, just for that if nothing else.

After her morning ritual of feeding the crows, bathing, and eating a bowl of vanilla almond cereal, she decided to take it easy. She pointedly ignored both her phone and computer. She did not want to see the comments on Twitt from Patricia Fine's army of trolls, whether human or bots. Well, that part of her that wanted to slow down to look at a car accident did. But the part of her that valued her mental health absolutely did not.

She was tempted to just quit the platform and delete her account, as so many other celebrities had been driven to after being targeted by hate mobs. But she was not going to give them the satisfaction. The bullies had not run her out of school when she was younger. They were not going to do so now.

She needed to take her mind off it. The day before Ranger had said he liked the Artemis Argent comics. She had told him that she could get him signed copies. Living up to that promise would be a good start at keeping busy.

So she went to a small pile of boxes set against one wall of her bedroom. She opened one to reveal a stack of identical copies of the first issue of Artemis Argent and the Secret of Mystery Hill. She pulled out one and went to the next box, and then the next, until she found a container filled with copies of the second issue. She fished out one of those as well, and took both comic books over to her desk.

She pulled a sharpie out of one her drawers, and sat down before the first book to consider how to autograph it. She should be used to it. She had signed nearly every copy she had sold through their Jumpstarter campaign and mailed away. Her ego liked to think that these would be worth a bazillion freedom bucks some day. Her cynicism reminded her to slow her roll.

Then she remembered some of the old 90s slang that the soldier had dropped the other day, and she knew what to write.

"To one Rad Ranger, from January Ryan." She finally signed the first, using her new last name, even if it was not quite legal yet. For the second issue she simply wrote: "Cowabunga! From January Ryan"

Then she slid the comics into a mailer, printed out a label, and sealed it up. She made her way to the mail box straight away so that she would not forget. Eschewing the stairs, she simply leaped over the banister that surrounded the second floor balcony and dropped to the ground floor of the rotunda below. From there it was a long walk out the front door and down the extended driveway to the mailbox beside the street.

By the time she had walked back to her bedroom, January already had her mind on just the thing to make her really forget about the trolls online. Not that she was fixated upon them or agonizing about what they were all saying about her. Not one bit.

Now that she was back inside and safely out of sight, she called up her Stormcrow suit. Now clad in the armor, she pulled out the bag of holding from one of her belt pouches and reached into its depths. From it she withdrew the Ravenwing. The artifact still dripped with salt water. She carried it into the spacious bathroom that directly adjoined her bedroom. There she rinsed the bird-shaped magic item under the sink to rinse away the salt. Afterward she flicked it a few times to snap some of the water off. A towel took care of the rest.

When she was finished she stared into the gleaming onyx eyes of the bird. It both looked and felt so real, that she half-expected it to leap up out of her hands and fly away. She was a little disappointed that it did not, but only a little. There were secrets here that begged to be unraveled. She intended to do just that.

She made her way to the semi-circular loft that faced the driveway in the front corner of the house. There she reached out to the wards around the building, and used them to dispel the illusion that obfuscated the stair that led to the sanctum above. Then up she went, into the very heart of the Witch House.

As ever, the sanctum was a wonder. It was every size and shape at once, a sphere, a cube, a rectangle, and so on. The pebble mosaic set into the floor flowed into the strips of metal set within the walls, and finally wended through the beads that hung from the ceiling. All melded seamlessly into one another, and created a new reality every time one looked up on it.

January set the Ravenwing down on the mosaic floor, and sat down cross-legged before it. She closed her physical eyes, and opened her astral ones in their place. The power of the sanctum immediately assailed her magical senses. But as she had learned to do around intense sources of arcane power, she blocked that out. By now it was as simple an action as applying a filter to a picture on her phone. Only this one removed the excess information that would distract her. That left the magical artifact the only thing in her awareness.

As both Blood Raven and Silverlight had taught her, she focused her awareness tighter and tighter upon the strange bird. It really was a bird. She could see now that was literally made from the feathers and bones of numerous corvids. There were crows, ravens, jackdaws, magpies, and of course rooks all wrapped up within the artifact. There were no blue jays however. She wondered if the creator had known that they were corvids too?

This was why she had thought it was a living bird when she had first sensed it upon the ocean floor. It was made from real birds, and the magic within it had breathed a certain form of life into the artifact. Blood Raven had spoken of this in the past, how enchanting things gave them an existence beyond that of their creators. Silverlight had explained the same thing the previous day to the Mid-Atlantic Coalition after their final battle with the Atomkrieg.

January sensed more than just raw magical energy locked within the Ravenwing's enchantment however. Another form of power was woven into the artifact as well. It wafted gently past her face like a cool summer breeze. It froze her like an icy winter wind, it warmed her like a hot desert simoom. Across the astral it spoke to her of windy peaks, roaring hurricanes, and fearsome tornadoes.

It was Air, in the most capitalized sense. This was not the ordinary stuff that January breathed in and out of her lungs every day. It was primordial and powerful, the very magical essence of the element of air, distilled into its purest form. The Scripta Mortis had written of this. All of the magical elements could be found in their primal forms, hence their names: primordial air, earth, fire, etc...

Her mind turned to the Gaia Sisters at Belle Isle. They had healed and rejuvenated the blasted landscape using primordial earth. They had infused that purest elemental power into the land, and used it to grow grass, brush, and trees where there had been nothing but dust and ash.

The Ravenwing shone with primordial air within the astral. It laced the bones and feathers of the artifact. The elemental force came to life under January's astral touch, and the bird rose up to float in the air before her. She was not even trying to direct the artifact; it just felt her power and responded to her.

Now she did turn her will upon the artifact. She pushed her senses deeper within its weave. It resisted of course. There was a hard shell of defense around the item. One would expect so. Otherwise anyone could come along and use it as easily as picking up an unsecured phone. January would have to either use brute force to crack the artifact's metaphorical password, or she would have to be more subtle, and find a way to convince it that she was its rightful owner.

January took the subtle path. The Scripta Mortis had spoken of this as well. It detailed all forms of enchanting. It was an old book, so it was far from up to date on the history of magical practitioners or events. But it was a solid foundation in the theory and praxis of all forms of magic. Blood Raven had been correct when she had said it was perhaps the most valuable book in any magician's library.

Thankfully January liked to read. She had devoured Silverlight's annotated English copy of the Scripta Mortis like a djieien at a fly-eating contest. It had told her everything she needed to know in order to master this artifact.

Of course she had a built in advantage. Deep in the heart of her being, January was a crow. That was her touchstone, just as the moon goddess Selene was Silverlight's magical compass. January used all the elements of course, but it was air that was most sacred to her. That was where she belonged after all, high up in the sky. It was where she drew her lightning from. It was where she felt most free and alive.

The Ravenwing was the same. Like all magical artifacts worthy of that title, it had character; one might even say a personality. It was that of a bird, and not just any bird, but a corvid. It was a cousin of hers at least, if not a sister. It had been made to be so, apparently by the mysterious Rook. January still did not know who that man had been under the cape. But it was plain that he liked corvids, and that he was an extraordinary enchanter.

If only he had stuck to these lanes, he might still be alive today. Even now he could have been living out a comfortable retirement in some skyscraper, or at least a tree house. Instead his reach had exceeded his grasp, when he had tried to steal two nuclear weapons.

Rook was part of this puzzle, even if he was not its focus. He had crafted the Ravenwing, and set its original pattern. So he mattered, even though he was dead and gone. The magic item had grown beyond him and continued on, like a child that had outlived its parent. But the parent was still the one who had birthed and raised that child, for better and worse.

January tried to imagine that she was Rook, as he crafted this artifact. He had clearly poured his love of the sky—of birds in general and corvids in particular—into it. It informed every stitch of its magical threads. She followed them, and imagined it was her hands that had shaped them. She imagined the very act of doing so, as if she had traveled back in time and sat behind Rook's eyes. She followed his magical fingers, saw how he stitched and melded his power into the physical being of the artifact. How he took that primordial air and likewise laced it through the warp and weft of its design. She soon was able to anticipate his moves. She knew where he would loop his power, where he would knot it, where he would weave it back and forth into a lattice of energy.

It all came very easily to January. Even though she did not know Rook, it somehow felt as if she did. There was something about his magical touch, his footprint if you would, that seemed familiar. The more and more she felt of his magic, the more and more convinced she was that he was no stranger, nor his affinity for corvids an accident.

He was family!

The flash of inspiration hit her like a lightning bolt from a clear blue sky. She did not know how she knew. She just did. Now that she looked back over the Ravenwing again, it was more obvious than ever. Nátthrafn, Blood Raven, Stormcrow, Rook... there was no escaping their blood.

Then she was in, and her familial epiphany took a back seat to a newer discovery. The Ravenwing unfolded for her like the petals of a flower. Its magic responded to hers, and joined with her freely. It was a corvid, she was a corvid. They were sisters. It wanted to fly with her, just as January wanted to fly herself. That was why it existed, to be part of the sky, to soar, and dive, and live among the clouds.

More than that however, they were kin. Just as Blood Raven's sword Samhain knew her, so too did the Ravenwing. She could swear that the artifact recognized her blood, and responded to her as such. In a way, they were meant for one another.

It was an aircraft! This new realization hit January like a semi-truck. She had not been expecting that. She had not been expecting anything really. She had gone into this with no real idea of what the Ravenwing was. But now that she was connected to its aura, it was all so plain to her. She could sense its functions, its flight systems, its life support, all tucked away within the weave of the enchantment. She still could not reach them directly yet. Instead she sensed that they were locked away behind a specific control interface within the craft.

There were two commands she could reach however. One was to enlarge, the other was to enter. She reached out with her magic, and willed the first to respond. The Ravenwing immediately grew to life before her. It was like a balloon inflating. It spread out in all directions, and doubled and tripled in size, and still it continued to expand. January had to leap back to avoid being bowled over by the body of the craft. Her wings snapped out, and she used them to frantically fly back through the air as the craft continued to enlarge.

It finally stopped at the size of a small airplane. She guessed it might have been fifty feet long or so from nose to tail, and perhaps a little over ten feet wide at the thickest point of its chest. Then its wings spread out. They must have stretched a hundred feet from tip to tip. She moved in close, and ran her fingers over one wing. It was made of feathers, just like the glossy black feathers of her own wings. She stared at one onyx eye of the craft, and now understood that it was a canopy. She looked down at the clawed feet, and saw that they served as landing gear.

[Renee]

Aw, sorry to hear. Oh my, here it is, he drowned exploring the Arlington, a 'bulk carrier'.

Yes that's right; the fight against Gola was in that abandoned building, iirc.

Whoa... Jan's really distracted! If she's unable to read Annie's signs. Then again, it's been a heck of a day.

Am really glad they're back on surface now. Yeah, good idea avoiding the social meridia. What does she feed those crows (just so I can maybe treat my park bench bird)? What cereal would Jan typically eat? I remember she feasted on frozen waffles long ago.

Lemme come back in a few. Been up since 7 this morning, gaming & editing Vicious.

[Acadian]

Nice nod to the legacy of Blood Raven as Jan ponders both the healing and sleeping assistance being provided to her thanks to the older heroine even now.

Jan keeps a sharpie in her drawers? Oh. . . wait, those kind of drawers. Er, nevermind.

The magical excursion into the Ravenwing was brilliantly done. I was fascinated as Jan gradually learned more and more. Midway through her probing, I believed Ravenwing would manifest as a crow familiar. Her realization that Ravenwing is an aircraft hit me just like the semi-truck that hit Jan. I was not expecting that! Then I began to recall that Rook’s approach to the B-52 was aboard such an aircraft and the pieces snapped into place. Blood kin! Who knew?

I'm jealous of how masterfully you crafted this entire episode. Pure Awesomesauce!


Nits:
’…dispel the illusion that obfuscated the stair that lead to the sanctum above.’
- - stair that led to? or perhaps stair leading to?
’She had had {one extra ‘had’} gone into this with no real idea of what the Ravenwing was.’

[SubRosa]

Renee: January is January. She is unable to read the signs even when she is not tired and distracted.

I think I established that January usually feeds them nuts. I have read that crows seem to really like them. Corn is fav of their's too, which is why the stereotype of farmers having to erect a scarecrow in their cornfields. Fruits like grapes and apples seem to be popular with them as well. Even dog or cat food, especially in small pellets.

January's favorite cereal is vanilla almond, the store brand of course, since she cannot afford the Kellogs Special K version. Her favorite everything is usually vanilla. Ice cream, cake, body spray, etc...


Acadian: January is finally at a point in her career where she can now look back on the things that she has learned. Not that she is not still learning new things. But at this point she really is a seasoned pro at the cape life.

Writing January's attunement to the Ravenwing was challenging. Often in RPGs you spend experience points and it unlocks the next rank in a magic item's powers. I wanted a way to portray something like that in a real world fashion. I wound up falling back upon something like hacking a computer or phone. Then combined that with sewing, as January followed the weave of the Ravenwing's design to get a better sense of Rook, and how he made it.

Yep, we have fully looped back to the beginning of the book now. First we met and dealt with Rook on the bottom of the sea. Now January has unlocked the secrets of his ravenmobile, that allowed him to attempt his bomb heist in the first place.

I was not originally going to make Rook a relative of January. But the more I wrote him, the more it felt right. Especially given the corvid associations. We will have even more about that coming up soon, when Cray is able to crack Rook's secret identity.

As ever, thanks for the nits.






The cockpit of a P-51 Mustang was an inspiration for the Ravenwing's controls.

Riggers in Shadowrun


Book 12.37 - Broken Arrow

That of course meant that she could go inside. She felt through the enchantment's aura, and touched upon the second available command, that to enter. When she concentrated upon it, she discovered a branching tree of options. There were three entrances. One was a large cargo door in the rear, the other two were small, circular hatches. One of the latter was set in the bottom of the fuselage, behind the head of the plane. The other lay just behind that in the roof.

She took the easy way, and with just a thought the rear hatch slanted down to form a ramp beneath the tail feathers. January pulled in her wings and folded them up on her back. That caused her to drop to the floor. She landed lightly, and strode up the ramp. It felt solid under her feet, like metal rather than bone or skin.

Within was a cargo bay, large enough to squeeze a van or small truck into. She was immediately reminded of Viuda's spidercraft Charlotte. But the Ravenwing was a simpler affair. There were some jump seats and a single folding cot built between the metal ribs and stringers that ran around the interior walls of the craft. But it was not as fancy as the Puerto Rican heroine's vehicle. For example, there was no microwave or refrigerator. There certainly was not a terrarium for a pet tarantula.

She reached out to the bare skeleton of the craft. The ribs and stringers were plainly metal. Where the rest of the craft was glossy black, these were gray or silvery in color. January imagined they might be steel, or titanium, or even aircraft aluminum, perhaps varying mixtures of all three in different places. She would have to ask Avery, he might be able to tell. Or maybe she could fly over to Philadelphia and ask Mercury. He had a way with metals after all.

Like the Charlotte, the floor contained insets with metal rings that one could use to tie down cargo. January walked over these to the front of the plane. Here it narrowed at the throat of the bird-shaped craft. She came across the two small hatches, one in the floor and the other the ceiling. Both meshed so seamlessly into the hull that if she had not sensed them in the astral first, she might not have noticed them with her meat eyes now.

Within the head of the craft she found the cockpit, which narrowed as it went forward. It had three chairs laid out in a pyramid. The two in the rear hugged the walls of the fuselage to either side. That left a narrow passage between them that led to a single seat up front. All were made of ebony steel with black leather cushions.

The two rear seats were plainly for passengers. The pilot's seat up front was special. Its headrest was covered in glossy feathers. Those were solely from ravens, though from several different individuals. Protruding from above the headrest was an onyx helmet. It was shaped like a raven's head, with a long, heavy bill that protruded from the face.

January squeezed past the rear seats and sank into the depths of the pilot's chair. It felt warm and welcoming, like it was made just for her. Instrument panels were laid out in front of her. There was not a single electronic screen among them. Instead it was all switches, knobs, dials, and analog readouts. It was not the Christmas tree of controls that modern planes possessed either. Instead it was practically austere.

On the panel straight ahead were a six pack of round dials for altitude, speed, heading, attitude, and the like. Rising from the floor between her legs was an old-fashioned control stick, like something from a World War Two fighter plane. To her left was a throttle, again right at her fingertips. It was just a round knob set atop a lever. She could somehow sense that pushing it forward would give her more speed, and pulling it back would stop it. If she had not known better, she would have thought she was sitting in the cockpit of a P-51 Mustang, or some other ancient craft.

A handful of other controls filled out small panels at the base of these flight controls. January just knew what they were the moment her hands touched them. The aircraft wanted her to know. She belonged to January after all.

She glanced up. There was a third, narrow instrument panel overhead. It bore switches and other controls for the aircraft's utilitarian needs, such as the door controls, or to shrink and enlarge. She reached up and flipped the toggle for the cargo door. An instant later she not only heard, but felt the ramp rise up and seal tightly against the tail feathers of the craft.

Now she looked at the raven helmet perched atop the headrest above her. She reached up and took it in both hands. It easily came free from its mount atop the chair, and she pulled it down onto her head. It was big, roomy even. January recalled that the Rook armor had possessed a helmet. So he must have made it to accommodate for headgear. Even as she considered that, the Ravenwing's flight helmet grew to accommodate the extra space for the wings on the Stormcrow helm. At the same time other parts of the flight helmet shrank, until it conformed perfectly to January's armored head.

Clearly, Rook had thought of everything, at least when it came to his creations.

January felt herself meld even more deeply with the craft now. She did not need to sense into the magical realm to feel its aura. It was just automatic now, like the plane was a part of her. Out of curiosity, she completely withdrew her senses from the astral. Gone was her connection to the aura of the craft. But now she no longer needed it. She had a physical connection to it. Its body—and hers—were one in the same now.

She craned her head to one side, and the head of the Ravenwing mimicked the motion. She imagined flapping her wings, and again, the aircraft complied. She willed herself to rise, and even with the wings still, it rose up into the air. She wanted to go forward, and the bird rocketed ahead. She had to bank sharply to avoid plastering herself against one metal-traced wall of the sanctum. Then the room opened up before her, and gave her a vast cathedral of space to fly about within.

January whooped with joy. It reminded her of her first time flying. Well, her second time. Her first time had just been falling really. She felt the wind under her feathers, and the air itself infused within her being. She was part of the sky, in a way that she had never felt before. Not even since she had learned to create her wings from pure magic and will.

It was the primordial air. She could feel it all around her, bonding the craft to the sky, and granting her mastery over it. To put this to the test, she gave up any pretense at aerodynamics or physics. She just stopped, and hovered in place in the air. She had no forward thrust, nothing to oppose gravity. But she just sat there in the air and did not move an inch all the same.

She willed herself upward, and the Ravenwing responded by lifting gracefully into the air. She willed herself down, and it again complied. She backed up, then pushed forward again. She did not have to flap her wings, or do anything a normal bird or plane or helicopter would need to. Space was hers to move through however she willed it.

She did not have to touch a single one of the controls to do any of this. She surmised that they were a backup, a manual control system just in case this psychic link failed. She put that to the test next, and pushed the Ravenwing's helmet up from her head. It slid back and locked in place atop the flight chair above her.

The craft immediately wobbled under her. She instantly grabbed for the flight stick with her right hand, and went careening to one side as she overcorrected. She began to spin, and had to counter that as well. Sweat began to break out across her forehead. But she did not relent and pull the helmet down, at least not yet. She forced herself to learn the manual controls the old-fashioned way, by fiddling with them and seeing what happened. Thankfully there was nothing she could break here in the sanctum.

Eventually she got the hang of it. Even with the manual controls, the Ravenwing did not possess anything like a normal aircraft's power source. There was no engine, there were no standard control surfaces like a rudder or ailerons, and there was no need for continued thrust to keep it aloft. The primordial air infused with the body of the craft took care of all that.

As she expected, January soon learned that the manual controls allowed her to manipulate that primordial air, and the enchantment of the Ravenwing in general. They just did it slower and more clumsily. For example, how she had opened the rear hatch with a toggle switch. If she had been wearing the helmet, she could have done it with but a thought.

Finally she pulled that flight helmet back down over her features, and once more bonded with the machine. It reminded her of a rigger in the game Shadowrun. They jacked their nervous systems directly into the vehicles they controlled and became a part of them. She was doing the same thing, just with magic instead of technology.

That made her mind turn back to Joshua Nelson, whom they had christened the Rigger in the team's files. He appeared to be able to do the same thing with any vehicle, thanks to his meta-human abilities. She hoped that when he got out of the hospital he would be able to put that power to positive use. Maybe one day he might become the operator of one of those giant cranes that they built skyscrapers with, or he might use his abilities to steer a boat, or race cars, or even drive a truck.

But this was no time to let her mind wander. She had more experimenting to do. She found that she still retained her other magical abilities while interfacing with the craft. She proved this by reaching out to the wards of the Witch House. They responded to her command as ever, and the door to the sanctum appeared in one wall and swung open in accordance with her will. She gunned it forward, and aimed for the doorway.

That is when she remembered that she was still the size of an airplane. With a thought, she willed the Ravenwing to shrink to its original magnitude once more. At her command, it contracted to the size of an ordinary raven. Thusly reduced in size, she flitted through the doorway with ease, and dove down the stairs to the second floor of the Witch House.

She darted through the irregular-shaped loft below, and out into the rotunda that took up the center of the house. She found Ryo there, walking around the balcony that ringed the second story of the large, open space. He must have just emerged from the shower, because his chest was bare, and a towel was wrapped around his shoulders. He slipped his head to one side like the practiced fighter that he was as she buzzed past, and she heard him cry out in surprise even as she sailed past him.

She banked hard, and followed the banister that ringed the balcony. She zoomed around in a tight circle and passed her own bedroom. Then she hurtled down the rail of the steps of the grand staircase that curved down to the floor of the rotunda below.

She found Avery there, climbing up the stairs. His eyes widened with surprise, and he lifted his hands to bat away what he must have thought was a mad bird loose within the house. January cackled with joy, and circled her best friend for a moment. Finally she turned back and soared up the steps to the top of the staircase.

There she brought the Ravenwing to a halt and deployed its landing gear. These were of course its two taloned feet. She felt them wrap tightly around the wood of the banister and lock the craft in place. Then she pushed the helmet up off her features, and rose from the flight chair. With an afterthought she reached out to flip the toggle for the rear hatch.

It was an odd sight, looking out the wide opening that formed in the back of the plane. Everything was so huge! It was like the Witch House and everything in it had grown by multiple orders of magnitude. That included Avery, who now towered seemingly as high as a skyscraper as he lumbered up the staircase toward her.

January imagined this was how shrinking supers like Stinger felt when they reduced their size. Everything around her felt so unreal, it was like being in a different world.

She wondered if she would have to return the Ravenwing to full size in order to get back to normal. Or could she do that on her own? Well, there was only one way to find out. She stepped out of the hatch.

That is when she remembered that she had landed on the edge of the top step. There was nothing but empty space under her feet. She instantly plummeted, dragged down by gravity's avaricious paws. But her wings snapped out by reflex to arrest her fall. She would have been fine, except she was suddenly heavier, too heavy for her small wings. She plummeted again.

Small wings? What was she thinking, they were large wings, even as she was large herself. January surmised that the shrinking power was confined to the interior of the Ravenwing. Once someone exited it, they returned to full size, even as she was doing now.

As it turned out, she was doing it poorly. One of her larger feet struck the next step of the stair, even as her wings struggled to gain purchase upon the air. The next she knew she went tumbling down the steps. At least until she sprang back up a quarter of the way down, right in front of Avery. Now her wings worked again, along with the rest of her. The full-size rest of her that was, for she had returned to normal. Growing up was clearly something she would have to practice. She was sure that given a few more tries, she would have it down.

* * *

[Acadian]

Wonderful job, bringing the Ravenwing to life in a way that seemed both natural and magical.

The aircraft does indeed bear some similarities to the Charlotte.

Jan’s first white-knuckled time trying to use Ravenwing was reminiscent of her first attempts at flight - scary but funny.

As does the Charlotte, Ravenwing certainly opens up possibilities. I’m sure it will easily carry her lunch, motorcycle and several super friends.

Nits
’There was {a} third, narrow instrument panel overhead.’
’Space was hers {to} move through however she willed it.’

[Renee]

Ha! Yeah, I get it. Example is a box of Corn Flakes costing OVER FIVE DOLLARS these days. I mean, what the hell??? I can afford such prices, but almost always I prefer to wait until they've got one of those deals, like 2 boxes for $7.00. Or I'll buy the generic brand like Jan does. If we all pay the inflated prices all the time, then General Mills or Kellogg's or whomever will just keep raising the prices.

Yeesh, that plane's got swatikas on it.

That's crazy she's related to Rook. Did not see that coming at all. Indeed, the fact that he took the Evil path.. he could have avoided that. See, and this is why upbringing is so important. I think that without her mother especially, let's say mom was out of the picture and her ratched dad was the only parent raising her; chances are Jan might've turned out as one of these Evils as well. Angry and defiant at the world, because she was also bullied at school.

I mean, her brother turned out Evil too. But that wasn't entirely his fault, from what I remember, right? He got hoodwinked.

January squeezed past the rear seats and sank into the depths of the pilot's chair. It felt warm and welcoming, like it was made just for her.

Uh oh. Red Flag. 🚩

January just knew what they were the moment her hands touched them. The aircraft wanted her to know. She belonged to January after all.

Crap.

Even as she considered that, the Ravenwing's flight helmet grew to accommodate the extra space for the wings on the Stormcrow helm

Okay, you need to get the HELL out of there, dear.

Maybe I'm wrong, but red flags all over this chapter so far... I mean, maybe the Ravenwing is True Neutral; it doesn't possess any sort of morality or whatever, it merely melds to whoever's flying the thing. Hope this is so. Because it does sound as though it's hella fun for her to fly the thing, even in Sim mode.

Lol when she flies into her own Witch House! Bet Ryo's surprised. My gosh, her perspective's all messed up. What a silly scene portrayed on the CW this week.

This post has been edited by Renee: Aug 4 2024, 04:12 PM

[SubRosa]

That P-51 Mustang was restored about 20 years ago, and repainted and renamed to match the P-51 flown by an ace of the Tuskegee Airmen or Red Tails. The swastikas on it are for the Nazi planes her pilot - LT Col Lee Archer - shot down in WW2.

[SubRosa]

Acadian: The Ravenwing's intricacies were fun to write, if challenging. On one hand I did some research into aircraft cockpits from the 40s and 50s in order to bring a sense of verisimilitude to it all. On the other hand its not a normal aircraft, so it just ignores the laws the physics. Because of that many of the normal instruments just don't exist on the Ravenwing. She is made of elemental air. She is part of the sky itself. So she does not have an engine, or use rudders or ailerons and the like. So flying her is like playing a flight sim in arcade mode. You don't have to worry about all the really complicated stuff that real pilots like you always have to.

The Ravenwing and the Charlotte both serve the same purpose: they are the transport for a cape and their team. So they do have a lot in common. They need to have room for storage to carry stuff, and people, as well as convey their users from one place to another. Since the Ravenwing was built in the late 50s, she has a lot fewer frills. So far.

The Ravenwing does have plenty of room to carry lunch! I see her as becoming the standard way of the team getting to and from their missions in the future. As well as just for any sort of long range transportation. So January does not have to make the old joke about how she just few in from Detroit, and boy are her arms tired!

As ever, thanks for spotting those nits for me to fix.


Renee: Yeah, there is even a name for it: greedflation. It's just corporations being greedy.

If her mother had not been in the picture, January would not have survived her suicide attempt when she was 12. It was mom who came in and found her bleeding to death in her bed, and called 911 and did emergency first aid. Dad didn't want anything to do with January after she came out and said she wanted to live as a girl. So he never would have walked into her room to see what was happening.

January's brother Julian was always a bad guy. He was a narcissist, who was jealous of January even existing. He was the older child, so he was using to having all the attention from his parents. Then January came along, and suddenly he was not the sole center of his parent's world anymore. On top of that he was a racist, homophobic, transphobe. As always, that made it really easy for someone to manipulate him to do violence, as the Hierophant did.

No red flags dear. The Ravenwing is just an enchanted airplane. One that is very good at what it does, given that it was created by one of the most gifted enchanters to ever live. One who was related to January.

It was a silly scene of her flying around the inside of the house, shrunk down to the size of a normal bird. One thing I don't want to lose in the Crow fic is a sense of wonder and fun. At their core Superheros are basically wish-fulfillment. Wouldn't it be cool if I could... (fill in the blank with whatever your heart's content - fly, walk through walls, fight back against the bullies, make the world a better place, etc...). It is supposed to be fun. I think people like Zack Snyder who try to write supers as all doom and gloom all the time have lost a major point to the whole genre.







Battle of Unsan

Marvel Whiteside Parsons - January's great-grandfather on her father's side (Blood Raven's side of the family)


Book 12.38 - Broken Arrow

January plunked the Ravenwing down upon the surface of the table computer. A holographic window immediately popped up over it. It listed the artifact as an unknown device, and requested further information. Around them lay Cray's computer domain. It was ringed with cabinets that brimmed with servers and networking gear, along with smaller, traditional workstations with chairs and ordinary monitors, printers, and even an old fax machine.

That was only one quadrant of the Raven's Nest of course. Around one corner of the marble block that took up the center of the space was the waypoint, amid the Victorian sitting room. The teleportation pad lay dormant now, invisible to the naked eye. It merely awaited the touch of January's blood to activate.

Around the other corner lay the trophy area, and the freight elevator in its far wall. January could feel Y Ddraig Aur there—the sword, not the dragon—slumbering quietly in its display case. Even broken, the shards of the weapon hummed with power in astral space. Finally, the far side of the block of course held their rec room, complete with pool table and old-fashioned arcade games. Along with them was a brand new picture of January with Ranger and the Mid-Atlantic Coalition.

"So this is what I found inside the Ravenwing," January explained. She did not wear her armor. Instead she was clad in a simple white mini dress with spaghetti straps that left her shoulders bare.

She reached into her bag of holding. It had been Blood Raven's final gift to her, and had already proven to be quite convenient. Like the Witch House's sanctum, it was bigger on the inside than the outside. In fact, January had yet to discover the limits of how much she could store within the plain cloth bag.

She pulled out a ring of keys, a cracked and worn leather wallet, some loose change, and finally a full set of clothing. The latter included a pinstripe suit jacket, shirt, trousers, and even a pair of wingtip shoes. Finally she tossed out a plain fedora, and a pair of browline sunglasses that looked like something Malcom X might have worn.

"Did you travel back in time?" Avery wondered. Like January, he was dressed in normal clothes, in his case his Ohm's Law tee and a pair of shorts.

"You could say that," January murmured. Holographic windows popped up over the coins, displaying information about them. She noted that all of them had been minted before 1960. "It was all in a locker in the cargo bay."

"He must have never learned the quick change power," Ryo noted. Like the others, he was dressed in street clothes. In his case an ordinary black tee and sweat pants.

"This looks like something from an old Sinatra movie," Cray murmured as he looked over the old suit. The elder hacker was of course impeccably dressed in a thoroughly modern pair of slacks, Oxford shirt, and tie. The creases on his pants looked sharper than Nitokris' sickle-sword.

The hacker pulled open the wallet. He tossed the bills with it down on the computer. Once again, they all were from before 1960. Then he drew forth a California driver's license. Unlike a modern license, it was made of paper. Under the standard letterhead, the personal details had been filled out by a typewriter, except for the handwritten signature at the bottom. There was no picture either, but a thumb print lay in one corner.

Cray placed it face down on the computer. Given the age of the license, it obviously did not have a magnetic strip or data chip. But the computer did scan the image, and then displayed it in a hologram above them.

"Marcus Lynch, born 1934," Cray read off the window. He moved down the computer, opened up a new window to work within, and began to type furiously. "He was reported missing in late January of 1961. That matches up with the Keep 19 hijacking. There's no birth certificate on file. It was probably never digitized and put into a modern system. But I have other ways to find out what I need..."

"Okay, the missing person's report was filed by his mother Grace. She probably didn't know about his cape life. I've got a California license for her on file, the most recent copy is from 1996. Plus a death certificate from 1998. She died of heart failure, at a ripe old age of 85. Pretty good run old gal."

"Okay, I've got a wedding announcement from a Pasadena newspaper in 1934, for Grace and Greg Lynch. Greg was a lieutenant in the US Army. Here is a birth announcement in the same paper from a few months later. It seems dear little Marcus Lynch was brought into the world, the son of Grace and Greg."

"Greg went on to serve in Europe during World War Two." Now Cray was going through a series of service records. "He was a vet of the campaign from Normandy to Avarica. He got some promotions too, up to major at the end. When the Korean War broke out he volunteered for combat duty. They made him a colonel and gave him a cavalry regiment. He was there at the Incheon landing, and then the drive north to the Yalu River in winter of 1950."

"Cavalry?" Avery asked. "As in horses?"

"No," Cray shook his head. "Well, his unit was back in the 1800s. The Army loves tradition. They keep the unit titles forever. But by then it was just infantry. It became airmobile with helicopters later on."

"Uh boy, this is bad," Cray frowned as he read on. "Greg was at the Battle of Unsan. It was the beginning of the Chinese counter-attack. His unit was outnumbered, cut off, and overwhelmed. Only a handful of South Koreans and Americans broke out and escaped. He was killed in action on November 1st, 1950, the first day of the battle."

"Rest in Peace brother," Cray intoned solemnly. That reminded January that like Greg Lynch, Cray had served in the US Army.

January was amazed at the how quickly and thoroughly Cray had shredded Rook's secret identity and laid every facet of his life bare before her eyes. All around the table computer, screens now glowed with life revealing various details about his family. From state and federal documents, to newspaper columns, to school records, it was a gamut of sources.

"Ok, so Rook himself," Cray cleared his throat and went on. "There's not really much on him. He tried to join the US Army in 1952, when he was eighteen years old. But he failed the psych evaluation. It cites narcissism, inability to work with a team, and issues with authority figures. Someone even scrawled here in the margin that he's a snot-nosed punk who thinks he's better than everyone else."

"I've got the address from his license," Cray went on. "It was an apartment building. But it was torn down in the 70s, and replaced by a tire shop. That got torn down in the 90s, and now it's a Burger Baron. So that's a dead end. Same with his car, it went to his mom after he disappeared. She sold it to a used car lot two years later."

January frowned, but not just at the picture it painted of Rook. She glanced over the Ravenwing, and one hand reflexively reached out to stroke the feathers along the miniaturized vehicle's back. Again, she could not deny the sense of kinship she felt with the craft, and with its creator. Her blood called out, and felt itself answered.

"There's more to it," she insisted. "Are we sure that Greg was the dad?"

"What are you thinking?" Ryo asked. His eyes turned from January to the forms that filled the air before them. His eyes narrowed, and January could see that he was putting that razor-sharp perception of his to use. "Grace was pregnant with Rook when she married Greg."

"So, it happens, especially back then," Avery shrugged.

"Maybe," January still frowned. "But I can't help feeling like I know this guy, like he's family. I can feel it in my blood. It's like you said once Avery: Nátthrafn, Blood Raven, Stormcrow, Rook. When my family picks a lane, we stick to it."

"He didn't turn up in Blood Raven's genealogical research," Cray shook his head. "There's no mention of him, or his family."

"But someone else was in California at that time," January snapped her fingers. "Jack Parsons, my great-grandfather. Look back nine months before Rook was born. Where was his mother then?"

"Pasadena Junior College," Cray answered after a moment, as a new waterfall of school records flowed down one of his holographic windows. "Grace was working on an astronomy degree. She got it too, and went on to work at some pretty swanky observatories later in life. She even discovered a new asteroid in 1967. And let's see, where was Marvel Whiteside Parsons at that time..."

"Pasadena Junior College," January read it even as the transcripts ran across the holographic window.

"Rook was your great uncle," Ryo stated it as simple fact.

January knew it was true. Like so many things about magic, it was just so plainly obvious to her. There was no escaping her blood.

"So Jack knocked up Grace, but didn't marry her," Avery reasoned. "Instead Greg did. Pretty solid of him. Sort of like Mary, Joseph, and Jesus."

"It was the same with my great-grandmother Alice." January noted. "She lived at the Parsonage for a while after World War Two. She and Jack never got married, but she had a daughter by him. That was my dad's mother Livia."

"The Parsonage?" Avery raised an eyebrow.

"It was Jack's house," January explained. "He divided it up into apartments and it turned into a big free love polycule. My great-grandfather was a rocket scientist by day, and a wizard by night doing sex magic in the desert. He was a free love libertine before the 60s made it cool."

"Damn, that guy must have been spitting some hot game," Avery whistled. "How many other kids might he have had off the books?"

"There is no telling," January frowned. Most people would be glad to learn that they had a long lost family member. But for her, family was rarely a blessing. It was usually an atavistic horror. Her bloodline was the key to Nátthrafn returning to the world after all, and devouring it.

* * *

[Renee]

Okay, I see. So each swastika = a Nazi down, I get it.

true, Jan's mom is the main reason she's around today, sounds like. She's the positive influence, and ah, okay. So the brother was Evil from the very young age; this wasn't just Higher Pants' fault.

And Ravenwing is more like a True Neutral, then. It's just, the way that scene was going, it sounded as if the plane was taking over her mind!

The contents of the Bag of Holding are amusing.

The creases on his pants looked sharper than Nitokris' sickle-sword.

Hee hee!

Wow, Cray's really tearing into the identity of Ro0k. Everything, it's all available to him, that's intense. Rook = Jan's great uncle. Sheezus, what the heck? Small world.

Most people would be glad to learn that they had a long lost family member. But for her, family was rarely a blessing. I

Very true.

This post has been edited by Renee: Aug 15 2024, 05:10 PM

[Acadian]

Wow, scary how much crap Cray was able to dig up with his technomancy.

As ever, love the bag of holding.

Sex magic? Oh, yes, practice of the lascivious arts. Typically by a carnalmancer.

Well, I’m glad Stormcrow favors Blood Raven’s side of the family. . . .

[SubRosa]

Renee: The contents of the bag of holding are just what Rook wore in his civilian identity. I looked back at Men's fashion from the late 50s, and that is what was popular at the time.

Cray's Oxford shirts and cardigan sweaters are his superhero suit. So they always look the best.

Once again, a villain is a member of January's family. Her blood is often a curse.


Acadian: Cray really shines in this book, because he has several opportunities to do what he does best, hack the shit out of people's activities and identities. A lot of this is freely available information too. A subscription to Newspapers.com gets you access to digital archives of newspapers all over the country (and maybe even the world? Not sure about that). If you know what terms to search for, you can find a wealth of information. Like Cray did with wedding announcements and obituaries.

Sex magic is a funny thing. In some magical traditions - like Theosophy - they believe that you have to a pure in order to do magic. So no drinking, no smoking, no drugs, and absolutely no sex. Like what a classic high school football coach tells their student athletes. But in other traditions sex and drugs and rock and roll is literally part and parcel of doing magic. You do sex to raise energy, and then you send that energy out into the universe and will it to create the change you desire.

Needless to say Jack Parsons fell into the second camp.

Actually, all these villains are from Blood Raven's side of the family. Blood Raven is Nátthrafn's daughter after all, and the rest are her and his descendants:Jack Parsons, Rook,Julian, and of course January herself. Though Blood Raven's mom Saoirse and January's mom Barbara's sides have some necromancers in the family too however. So it is not all coming from Nátthrafn's bloodline. Just the really prominent ones.

One of the things I really picked up on reading HP Lovecraft is the very common trope he uses of Atavistic Horror, and being part of a Cursed Bloodline. In many of his stories the protagonist is a completely ordinary person. Then suddenly some horror comes out of their past and engulfs them. The Rats in the Walls, the Case of Charles Dexter Ward, The Shadow Over Innsmouth, a lot of his greatest hits play on this idea.

My original idea for the main quest in Season One concerning the Abyssals and Nátthrafn was based on the Case of Charles Dexter Ward. I was originally going to use it directly, and have January be a descendant of Charles Dexter Ward, and have that story be something that really happened in her past. I eventually decided to abandon that idea however, and instead work on a history that was all my own. Which I am glad for, because it came out better suited to what I am writing. But January's last name is still Ward because of that original plan. And I did keep that sense of Atavistic horror, since it still works with the new history I created.







The view from 70,000 feet


Russell Watson - Faith of the Heart (the Star Trek: Enterprise theme)



Book 12.39 - Broken Arrow

August 23 (Friday)

Just a day later January felt confident enough to take the Ravenwing out for a real test drive. Not around the back yard, but across the continent. In keeping with her promise to Cray that they be more careful with their transitions from civilian to super identities, they started from the sanctum, and used the teleportation network within to teleport to the waypoint a few miles away, in the woods behind the movie multiplex.

From there she and Gadget boarded the ravencraft. January nestled herself into the pilot's seat, while Gadget sat in one of the chairs behind her and to the side. Both were clad in their capes: January in her Stormcrow suit, and he in his powered armor. This was not just for fun, but a work mission as well after all.

"You know, maybe we should test this out some more, in a controlled environment like the Raven Bunker," Gadget observed. He rubbed the back of his armored neck, the sure sign that he was nervous. "You know, something could go wrong."

"Well, the best way to find that out is to get it up in the open sky," January insisted. "If anything's going to happen, it's going to happen up here."

"That makes absolutely no sense at all..." he murmured.

"Don't be a spoilsport." January stuck her tongue out at her best friend. "I spent all day yesterday practicing with it. I've uncovered all of its surprises. Just enjoy the ride."

"I'm just saying, maybe you should take this more seriously," Gadget argued. "You only found this thing a few days ago.

"I know," January replied in a somber tone now. "I am taking it seriously. I spent all yesterday working with it in the house and the back yard. If it had any surprises, I would have found them already. It's time to take it out on the road. Besides, it's family. Sort of like an aunt. It likes me."

"It likes you?" Gadget said incredulously.

"Yeah, it likes me," January insisted. "Can't you feel it? It's like Blood Raven's sword Samhain. It likes me too. It knows me. We share the same blood. It's something like that with the Ravenwing. Magic items like these aren't technically alive. But they do have a personality, and a sort of life of their own."

"Yeah, you said that about Y Ddraig Aur too. How it's grown beyond its original design." Gadget twisted around and turned to look back at the cargo bay behind him. "This thing does have a lot of potential. We could stow Ôkami's hoverbike back there with ease. There's plenty of room for the whole team in fact, and then some."

"I'm glad you think that," January said. "I was thinking this could be our official team vehicle from now on."

"Yeah, if it doesn't have any issues, it would sure beat us all flying or riding separately." Gadget mused. "Some of us aren't the best at the flying part after all."

"Aw, you're learning," January argued. "Lighthammer's a good teacher. He taught me after all, and look no hands!"

January raised both of her hands up in the air for dramatic effect, and grinned.

Gadget was unimpressed. "Since that thing has a psychic link, that's not saying much..."

"You can take the stick," January said quite seriously. She sent a telepathic command to the Ravenwing, and the flight helmet rose from her armored features. "It does have manual controls. So even though you're not a mage, you can still fly it."

"Do you have to be a wizard to use the psychic interface?" Gadget asked.

"I don't know, let's find out!"

January climbed out of the black steel and raven-feathered pilot's chair, and shimmied back to sit in the empty passenger seat opposite Gadget in the rear of the cockpit. The powered armor hero threw up his own hands in near panic, at the sight of her just abandoning the controls like that. But the Ravenwing continued to fly straight and level, so far at least.

"Go on, give it a whirl," January pointed to the now empty cockpit. "If nothing else, it'll be good practice for you to fly an actual plane."

"I don't think a magical ravenmobile qualifies as an actual plane," Gadget murmured. But he did clamber ahead when it was clear that January was not going to return to the pilot's seat. Instead he lowered himself down within it. January noted that just as when she sat in it, the furniture seemed to morph to conform to his size and shape, in order to fit him perfectly. In his case, the chair visibly expanded to make space for his powered armor.

"So do I need to take my helmet off?" Gadget wondered.

"Nope," January leaned forward and took the raven-headed flight helmet in both of her hands. She moved it off the headrest of the flight seat, and gently nudged it downward. It slid over Gadget's armored head with ease, and once again, morphed to fit itself snugly in place.

"Ok, what next?" Gadget asked. She could see his head move back and forth, but nothing obvious happened.

"You should be able to sense the Ravenwing's control interface," January explained. "I could."

"What does it look like?" Gadget asked. "Is it like a heads up display on the inside of the helmet?"

"No it's just... there, in your mind," January said. "It's easier if you sense into astral space, but you don't need to. It's just... there."

"I don't see anything," Gadget shook his head. "I don't feel anything."

"Well, I guess that answers that. You have to be a magician to jack into the ship." January mused. "Try the manual controls then. Those will still work. I think Rook built them as a backup, just in case he was having trouble with his magic, or he could not concentrate."

"Or maybe he built the manual controls first, and then added the mind link later," Gadget mused.

He wrapped one hand around the joystick between his legs. He pushed it over gently, and the next thing January knew they banked sharply to one side. She had to throw her hands out to grab hold of the fuselage in order to keep from flying out of her seat. Just when she regained her balance, Gadget overcompensated, and they ship heeled over in the opposite direction. Again January had to hang on for dear life.

"Spleckt!" Gadget cursed. "This thing is sensitive. It really maneuvers though."

"Yeah, it's agile," January murmured. Now she hurried to strap herself in. For a moment she had second thoughts about putting him behind the controls. But that only lasted a moment. She knew that her bestie could handle this. He had spent his entire life playing video games. If he could fly a Spitfire in Sky Wars, or a biplane in the Black Baron, then he could handle this.

Besides, the altimeter said they were at 70,000 feet in the air. They were not likely to run into anything that high.

"You know, this is really not that hard after all." Gadget's words practically said what January had been thinking. "It's like playing a video game in arcade mode. Over half the normal controls aren't even here. There's no rudder, or ailerons, or oil pressure, or fuel gauges, or any of that fancy stuff. The plane just goes wherever you want it. It's like an anime character; gravity is not a law where it is concerned, just a guideline."

"That's true," January noted. "I already found that last part out. It will hover in place indefinitely if you want."

"Wow, the view is something else too," Gadget breathed.

January looked over his shoulder, and saw what he meant. This high up, the clouds were a white cotton carpet far beneath them. Only occasionally could they make out the plains below, or the mountains in the distance. The latter were just tiny humps from here, rather than towering masses.

"That reminds me..." January undid the straps that held her down, and rose up to stand behind the pilot's chair once more. She reached up to the control panel overhead, and flipped one of the switches there.

An instant later the walls, ceiling, and floor of the aircraft just vanished. The seats, and controls, and everything else inside were still visible however. But the fuselage had turned invisible. January craned her neck back, and saw that the hull around the cargo bay remained normal. So it was only the cockpit that was affected.

This gave them a totally clear and unobstructed view all around. It was just amazing. It felt like they were living in the sky. The curve of the earth was clearly evident along the horizon. The sight of it was breathtaking. It was a white arc along the edge of the clouds below. Then as one looked higher up, the color deepened to soft teal, a deeper baby blue, dark velvet, and finally near blackness. January knew that they were nowhere near the height of satellites or the International Space Station, but it really felt like they were at the edge of space.

"It's like in a video game, where you can make the cockpit disappear to see better," Gadget murmured. This he spoke more clearly and gazed around. "I guess this must be what it feels like to be Captain Picard."

"It's been a long road, gettin' from there to here..." January sang softly.

"That was Captain Archer," Gadget noted.

"I know, but I still have faith of the heart," January smiled.

Gadget edged the stick forward, more gently this time. The Ravenwing slowly nosed down this time, and gradually took them lower into the atmosphere. In time the blanket of clouds below became a white fog that enshrouded them. He kept on going lower, until they finally broke from the white fluff and could see again.

The Great Plains states spread out beneath them, the Dakotas, Wyoming, Montana, and their neighbors. They were a flat dish of green that just went on and on forever. Here and there a narrow ribbon of blue revealed a river. Dead ahead lay the Rocky Mountains. They rose up sharply, like a vast, jagged stone wall meant to keep out King Kong. But even those lofty peaks were far, far below them.

It was to here that Gadget guided them, and soon enough they left the plains behind, and soared high over the peaks. He eased up on the throttle. Once more January marveled that it was a simple round knob on a lever mounted on the left side of the cockpit. January noted that while they had been going Mach 2, Gadget now slowed down to less than the speed of sound. That made it easier to pick out features in the ground below. Well, it gave them more time to do so at least.

"Ok, we need the very north of Idaho, in the panhandle," January glanced down at Sága at her wrist. The mini-computer revealed her location on the map, and where they needed to go.

"This thing's very retro," Gadget noted. "There's no GPS, not even a single electronic display. The airspeed is an old-timey dial."

"I like the old analog systems, they have character," January insisted. "But you could still add some things. Put in some cameras and a link for Cray. Maybe even set up a remote control, so he can pilot it like a drone when we're out of the cockpit."

"We can do that?" Gadget wondered. "I mean, it's magical, won't that break the enchantment?"

"I don't see why," January mused. "I mean, yes, it's a magical artifact. But it's also a plane. Well, and a bird. It just uses magic to fly. But look at these controls you are using. They are all just standard flight instruments from the 40s and 50s. I would swear some of them came from a P-51 Mustang. I compared them to pictures yesterday. I don't see why you couldn't add more. I'll make sure it doesn't get hinky with the magic."

"You think so?" Gadget said.

"I know so," January insisted. "Magic items are not static objects. They have a certain form of life of their own. They grow, they evolve, given the chance. Look at Y Ddraig Aur. It's a different sword now, broken and all. The Ravenwing can grow too, beyond what Rook had intended for her. With us, she can have a second chance."

"Yeah, yeah, yeah, 'Let's do some Good' says the Paladin!" Gadget laughed.

"Hey, it's true," January insisted. "I've got a really good feeling about the Raven here. She's going to take us places."

"Oh, so she's a 'she' now, is she?" Gadget teased.

"Of course she is," January insisted. "She's a higher life form after all..."

Gadget snorted, and lifted the raven-shaped flight helmet up from his powered armor helmet. He was not using the Ravenwing's telepathic interface anyhow, so it did not make a difference.

"Ok Miss Higher Life Form," Gadget said. "We could put a satellite uplink in here so Cray can interface with the systems and pilot it like a drone. We could probably add a real time map, and maybe some stealth technology so we don't show up on radar."

"We already have stealth: the size control." January insisted. She pointed a finger to a toggle switch in a small instrument panel above Gadget's head. "We can shrink down to the size of a raven, and no one will give us a second glance."

"Even if they pick us up on any kind of sensors, they will just think we are an ordinary bird..." Gadget nodded. "Ok, that Rook guy was pretty smart. I was thinking he just made it shrink down so he could carry it around with him. But now I see he was thinking about who might be watching. Stealth tech before there was stealth tech. How could that guy have been so smart to have built this thing, and so dumb to have gotten himself killed over an asinine stunt like stealing two nuclear bombs?"

"You know, the more I read of history for the podcast, the more I am seeing that the people we like to call geniuses and 'Great Men' were really just regular dudes. They happened to be good at one thing, like math, or playing the stock market, or getting rich people to give them money. Because they were good at that one thing, they thought they are good at everything, and they knew everything. The truth is they weren't though. Once you dig deeper you find out all the things they screwed up, that the historians don't talk about it, because it doesn't fit their hagiographic narrative. In reality they were all just a bunch of schmucks muddling through life, and failing upward thanks to their privilege. Or crashing and burning once that societal support system was gone."

"Maybe you should get a History degree, instead of an English one," Gadget mused. Then he cocked his head slightly to one side, and his tone became more business-like. "If I'm reading my helmet's HUD right, we should be close now."

The Rocky Mountains had closed in all around them some time ago. Below it was all peaks and valleys, going on from horizon to horizon. Here the mountains were low enough to be blanketed in green forests, rather than snowy peaks, as Mount Shasta was farther west.

A lake spread out at the bottom of the wide valley that Gadget flew them into. It snaked around one way and then the other, in a jagged crescent. It sort of reminded January of a silhouette of a seahorse, the way it gracefully wended one this way and that. January noted civilization huddled along the northern shore, in the form of a small town at the western edge of the vale.

"Okay, that is Sandport and Ponderay," Gadget noted. "That means the farm is to the north and east."

He eased on the joystick, and they heeled over sharply to the right. Once again, January had to thrust her arms out to brace herself against the fuselage to avoid falling over. Gadget did not over steer out of it this time however. Instead he eased back more gently to flatten out his flight path, once he had the direction he wanted.

"Sorry," he said sheepishly. "I'm still getting used to maneuvering this thing."

"Don't worry about it," January insisted. "I'm a crow. I can handle a few aerial maneuvers."

The town quickly vanished behind them, almost as soon as they left the shores of the winding lake. Now the valley transformed into wide, flat farmland. Tilled fields stretched out in squares, rectangles, and other geometric shapes. Between the clearly delineated farms rose patches of evergreen forest. It was nothing truly dense, just strips and clumps of trees sometimes up to a mile long, and if lucky half that in width.

Gadget slowed down again, and brought the Ravenwing down to a wobbly landing. He set the enchanted aircraft down on a narrow, but paved driveway. It ran past a large country house and terminated at a tall barn made of corrugated steel. A small, grassy lawn surrounded the immediate area, and a small copse of shade trees stood to one side. Then the land gave way to a sprawling field of leafy green plants, all laid out in low ridges. January imagined there might be potatoes under those emerald leaves. This was Idaho after all, did anything else grow here?

Unlike a regular plane or helicopter, the Ravenwing was silent. She did not have jet or piston engines after all. Her primordial air kept her in flight. The only sound she made was the mechanical clank of the cargo hatch swinging down, and becoming a ramp that finally terminated at the asphalt driveway below.

So January was not surprised that their sudden arrival had not garnered any attention from the farm. Unless someone happened to be looking, they never would have noticed. She took a moment to stretch out her senses into the astral. The crops growing in the nearby fields sprang to life in her vision, along with the copse of trees. Closer still the barn ahead contained more life forms on four legs, which January took to be cows. A human moved among them, going from one to another, and depositing something in troughs before their faces. Finally January detected two more people in the house. By the posture of their auras, both were sitting.

"Ok, my scanners tell me one in the barn, two in the house," Gadget replied. So apparently he had used technology to do the same thing that January had accomplished with magic.

"Let's get them all together, so we only have to explain things once," January decided. She stepped off to the barn, and Gadget clomped after in his glowing powered armor.

"So how does this go?" he asked as they walked up to the open door of the barn. "I mean, how do you break something like this to someone?"

"Break what? Who..." A man stepped out of the barn, and his words stopped abruptly when he took one look at who was standing before him. He dropped the metal bucket he had been holding, and what January took for cow feed spilled out across the ground from it. "You're, you're..."

"Stormcrow," January forced a smile to her lips that she did not feel. "This is my friend Gadget."

She extended a hand to the farmer. He looked like your stereotypical Western dude. He was dressed in jeans, a flannel shirt, and even wore a cowboy hat and boots. He could have stepped off the set for any cowboy movie, or paper towel advertisement.

"Umm, I'm Joe," the farmer said once he had found his voice again. His head moved like a swivel, as if he was looking for a hidden camera. "Is it really you? I'm not being punked am I?"

"We do a lot of things, but punking people is not among them," Gadget assured. He stepped to one side, and gestured with one hand to the Ravenwing. More than anything else, the bird-shaped aircraft spoke of their sincerity. It was not like anyone was going to cosplay that after all.

"We'd like to talk to you about your uncle Kaleb," January said somberly, "better known as Bismarck."

"You're barking up the wrong tree." Joe leaned down to grasp the bucket, and spent a moment trying to push the spilled feed back into it. But that just shoved as much dirt into the container as actual food. Finally he gave up, and pulled his work gloves off. "I haven't seen him since I was a kid. He disappeared back in the 90s, went to prison. He's never coming back here."

"You haven't heard then?" January looked to Gadget. Worldwide Network News, and pretty much every other news source, had been talking about practically nothing else for the past two days. It was not every day that a neo-Nazi terrorist cell attacked the Smithsonian, and then tried to steal two nuclear weapons from the bottom of the ocean.

"Heard what?" Now Joe looked as puzzled as he must have been astonished by the sudden appearance of two superheroes in his driveway.

"I'm surprised the press has not been calling you," January wondered aloud, "or been here yet."

"We got an unlisted number back in the 90s, after my uncle tried to blow up that federal building." Joe explained. "What's going on? What's he done now?"

[Renee]

70,000 feet, lovely. Yeah, I agree with the Gagd. Controlled environment, I'm with Avery. Really am leery of this new craft they've got, even if it can do some really wonderful things. Then again, I'm not a superhero. But neither is Gadget, really. Although he's dabbled a bit with flying. He's more of a tinkerer. A behind-the-scenes sort, or at least he was.

"That makes absolutely no sense at all..." he murmured.

Mm hmm, I'm with ya buddy. Sounds as though his suggestion's not going to get followed, but let me shush.

"Do you have to be a wizard to use the psychic interface?" Gadget asked.

"I don't know, let's find out!"

My word. I mean, I'd trust January more than I'd trust Stockton Rush, but still...

... the dialog between the two friends is quite amusing. Love Avery's fears and doubts, and also how he's not magically inclined like Jan is. Yeah, Spleckt indeed.

Cripes, the plane vanishes.

Although I loathe referring to ships as "she" or "her" (I call Rivet City "it" for instance) I can see Ravenwing having gender. The plane's got Intelligence after all, so why not sexual traits, in a sort of way?

Ah, that's clever. Indeed, any radar is going to ignore something the size of a bird.

He could have stepped off the set for any cowboy movie, or paper towel advertisement.



Okay, so this farmer is related to Bismarck. Yikes. Is this a death notification? Yep, seems so.


This post has been edited by Renee: Aug 19 2024, 01:12 AM