[MM3]Sunstormers IC

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Tony Jones
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Re: [MM3]Sunstormers IC

Post by Tony Jones »

"Yes," replies Khemis. "I was trying to think at you earlier, but maybe it doesn't work all the time or something? I don't know how your powers work!"

"I appear to have attracted the attention of the woman of darkness I mentioned before, and whose picture I posted. She was talking to me without being visible. And she calls herself Nemesis. Which is not at all ominous!"

"More alarmingly, she believes and claims she is responsible for the Sunstorm and the powers it brought. She wants people to turn against Sunstormers as it drives Sunstormers to her, and is manipulating Sunstormers into violence to make this happen. She claims and believes she can make Sunstormers even more powerful if they come to her."

"This is all concerning me quite a lot. I think it would be a good idea if we all discussed it, so I don't have to repeat myself or miss anyone out. Do you know how we can set up a meeting with all of us? You, me, 'Peter Kent' and Charger, that is. Not Officer Palladino. I have no idea how she'd react to this. Probably try and have me locked up in a mental asylum or something..."
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Re: [MM3]Sunstormers IC

Post by jmucchiello »

"I have burner phone numbers for them I think," (OOC: DO I?) Deborah says. "Let me contact them. Mr., um, Kent has been here before. I can contact him to stop by after dark."
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Tony Jones
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Re: [MM3]Sunstormers IC

Post by Tony Jones »

"That would be great, thank you," replies Khemis.
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Re: [MM3]Sunstormers IC

Post by Neo-Paladin »

OOC: Yes, you do
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Shadowmask
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Re: [MM3]Sunstormers IC

Post by Shadowmask »

Image

In a rarely used gymnasium inside the Federal Building, Resident Agent in Charge (RAC) Lloyd Price and a half dozen special agents from the various divisions of the FBI were seated emotionlessly in folding chairs; watching Paladino using her power. She really did not expect this. She wanted to practice her new abilities after work at a more private gym, not performing a blasted circus act in front of these suits. But apparently Price made some calls to her superiors at the precinct and to Washington DC as well and that was it.

Fortunately they had some spare sport gear for Helen to wear that also fitted her too.

Helen climbed up the rope for the fourth time, this time around having reached the thirty foot mark above the padded gym floor. Sweat formed upon her brow, threatening to drip towards her eyes.

Not a good thing while being so high up with both hands gripping the rope. She stopped climbing, mentally counted to ten……

…and then let go of both hands as she plummeted thirty one feet toward the floor. A couple of the agents gasped. They were even more astounded when Helen simply floated down safely.

On an impulse she attempted to lift one of the heavier weights scattered about, a large barbell weighing 110 lbs used by athletes for powerlifting. After straining for a few seconds, Helen was surprised as she suddenly lifted it high over her head with only one hand.

Then she carefully balanced the barbell with her middle finger. There was still some weight to it of course but yet was lessened to a significant degree to the point she can "lift" the barbell almost without effort. As if somehow her power allows her to reorient gravity around the physical objects she touches.

Now while she often slept through many of her courses during college, Helen knew enough about physics to know that her gravity power is repulsive rather than attractive in that by generating anti-gravitons albeit within a short range; it can somehow possibly be decreasing and/or negating gravity in the area around said objects, so manipulating this power can allow for things such as enhanced strength and possibly agility, causing things to levitate or otherwise defy gravity as well as leaping large distances.

To test this theory further, Helen began to limber up, stretching her muscles before taking a running start across the open area of the gymnasium.

She leapt up nearly thirty feet, touching the ceiling with her fingertips before falling straight to the ground. She braced for the eventual impact but found she didn't suffer vertigo, upset stomach or dizziness as she landed palms flat on the floor.

Helen stood up and made a sardonic bow.

"Well, coach? What now? Do I have to juggle poodles next or what?" she asked with a smirk.

Special Agent Price held up his hand, his face unreadable. "That will be quite enough, Paladino. You have some control over gravity. Key word is some not total control. Still it is well and good for us. So far, we haven't gotten any recruits as it were though we are currently checking our organization for any sign of emerging sunstormer abilities within our own agents. I'd advise you to look into your own department just in case."

Kincaid, an agent from the Criminal, Cyber, Response, and Services Branch (CCRSB) interjected. "We also have social media to contend with too. We can monitor the 'net for those who show leanings of being a little too sympathetic toward sunstormers, especially the "sunbathers". We have several operatives posing as podcasters and bloggers. We have to be on the lookout for an increase of black market items such as burner phones."

"Contact the IRS to track down any possible money trails from any suspected sunbathers. Anyone caught illegally helping the sunstormers will be declared domestic terrorists. They will also be audited and their assets frozen." Price said coldly. "The IRS loves to seize money regardless of the method or means.

Well, that wraps things up for now. This meeting never happened."
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Re: [MM3]Sunstormers IC

Post by pathfinderq1 »

Vickie Pulaski (Charger)

Vickie continued to work through her volunteer shift at the plaza, focusing on each task that she was assigned and just letting the day roll on. She made no particular attempt to avoid Emily, but neither did she try to stay particularly close to the other girl. Like Khemis, she kept a wary eye on the crowd, watchful for another incident like yesterday. But the hours passed and nothing really noteworthy happened...

Before she even realized it, the shift was over and Vickie was on the bus back to campus. She spent most of the trip curled around her phone, exchanging texts with a variety of people- her roommate, some of the other members of the track team, a few friends here and there. She debated sending a text to Khemis and the others whose numbers she had collected last night- but she decided to hold off for now. She wanted to pick up a prepaid phone from Walmart, just to be safe. Preferably a Walmart in upstate New York, or maybe Kentucky or something- but that would entail waiting for nightfall.

For now, though, she had plenty of "normal college student" tasks to attend to...

>OOC: Just checking in for now
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Re: [MM3]Sunstormers IC

Post by Neo-Paladin »

//What's the rest doing?
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Tony Jones
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Re: [MM3]Sunstormers IC

Post by Tony Jones »

OOC: Deborah and Khemis are still talking as far as I know...
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Re: [MM3]Sunstormers IC

Post by Neo-Paladin »

//And the others?
kenmadragon
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Re: [MM3]Sunstormers IC

Post by kenmadragon »

Sunny

He hadn't spent long in the hospital after the last message from Deborah. The idea had stuck with him for a while, though - "Hearts and Minds". Sunny had heard it a few times before, but he could recall when it had really been lodged into his skull and made a truth of the world: he'd been watching TV. Person of Interest had once had a crime-boss character named Dominic "Mini" Besson who had been astonishingly intelligent and cunning for a thug. He was a drug-lord and ran a gang, but Dominic had also realized that while he could gain power as a criminal through violence and intimidation, the way to keep his gang and his organization from being obliterated by others and by the police was to win the loyalty and respect of the common people in whose neighborhoods his gang operated within. Public Relations as employed by a criminal - Dominic's plots and schemes had always had the affect to ensuring he won the loyalty of the everyday people who lived around his gang, even if they would never be part of it. But he had won their hearts and their minds, and thus Dominic could count on regular, good people who were not willing to be criminal gangsters, to at least shelter and protect him and his, out of loyalty and respect. Because those people would simply never believe that Dominic and his Brotherhood would be bad people, despite the fact that they were drug-running gangsters.

Now, Sunny wasn't intent on becoming a criminal in such a manner. In fact, his criminal life was settled instead on the route of the vigilante, as far as Sunny was concerned. But the lesson... the lesson was still valid here.

Sunstormers were like mutants in Marvel - they could be anyone, and they had powers beyond baseline humanity. They were a small portion of the populace, but their abilities made them... well, he hated to admit it, but Sunstormers were "superior" in that metric. Evolutionarily, they had powers that would allow them to out-compete others of the species in various ways. Even if one didn't frame it in such a manner, the regular people would realize it as an instinct. Sunstormers were capable of doing a great deal, both good and evil... and people would only see the evil if they weren't shown the good. And given how politics had been in the last few years, especially in the United States, it was more and more likely that politicians would use hate to gain power. And it would be so easy to hate that which could be easily classified as "Other". Before, it was about race and religion and political ideology and money and all sorts of other means of creating an "other" to be hated and fought. Now... now it would be all too easy to classify Sunstormers as the "other".

After all, they had abilities that baseline humans didn't. And recent events had only helped to show how they were dangerous to "regular people". Sure, Thermal-Man had been pushed into a corner, driven to a temporary bout of madness by what was clearly a powerful telepath. But regular people... they probably wouldn't see it that way.

There were already ideaological factions being created online, as people started to veer into different camps of opinion about Sunstormers. There were those who thought it was a good thing - something to be excited about as the world entered a new stage of growth and evolution. There were the fearful, who saw the Sunstormers as dangerous and terrifying, and who were scared fo being hurt and left behind by this new breed of individuals who could do things other people couldn't. And then there were those who had no idea what to think, and were ripe for influence into either camp.

Marvel had shown how easy it was for normal people to hate mutants for something completely out of their control - how easy it was to hate someone for being born a certain way. Sunny had seen that in the real world too... but now he worried about how the governments of the world were reacting. And how those politicians and other figures in power would seek to sway the public to whatever designs they wished - for politicians existed to consolidate power, and people who had power were very much averse to just giving it up. It was undeniable that Sunstormers were now the new power of the world - the two in African and in Ukraine had shown just how valuable a powerful Sunstormer could be to the military. Sunny himself was a similar breed as those two - someone who could change a battlefield if employed strategically and with proper training. Human weapons... And governments would want to control them. Or see them destroyed lest Sunstormers take over through superior force. And they would employ public-manipulation to do so.

So, Sunny hoped that Deborah would take his advice, and employ her skills in dealing with the masses of people world wide, to influence them to instead see Sunstormers as humans and not as "Other". That they weren't any different from regular people, powers notwithstanding. That they didn't deserve to be treated as the "Other" to be hated or hunted or exploited. That they were normal people too... and that they could help without being forced to serve the agendas of those with more power than they ought to have. And that perhaps other Sunstormers around the world could take the example and do good with the powers they had.

Sunny did his best to put good into the world while he had the time. Zipping around the city took some doing, keeping his flight patterns pseudo-random as he hunted for trouble. In a city like Chicago, there was plenty of trouble, but not all of it was something that Sunny could really deal with. He broke up a few fights, stopped a half dozen attempted-muggings, knocked out and tied up a couple of hooligans who had smashed in a store window that had been closed while their power was out, and so on and so forth. He didn't have a superhero name in mind yet, so he couldn't figure out how to take full credit for his work, but he did it anyways.

All that in a couple hours, after which he landed in a maze of alleys and walked back to his apartment. Once inside, he checked his phone and his laptop for notifications. Work had come in for him again, more things to be done. So he logged back on and did his job, like nothing in the last few hours had happened, and as if he were always sitting at his desk.

Every so often, Sunny glanced at his phone, and wondered why he felt so anxious. He wondered how that interview that Deborah had Khemis turned out. He prayed that they would take his advice, and try to win the hearts and minds of the people, to spread that message of hope and embed the idea of equality in public consciousness. To sow the seeds of a defense for those Sunstormers who would come under threat in the future.

...And, quietly, some part of Sunny hoped that the phone would beep with another text from Deborah, even if it was just an update on how the interview with Khemis had gone, just because he wanted to have another conversation with her.
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Re: [MM3]Sunstormers IC

Post by Neo-Paladin »

//Alright, I would fast forward 2-4 hours now...
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Re: [MM3]Sunstormers IC

Post by jmucchiello »

"I think we got it," Deborah says. The recording of the interview is done and they are still sitting in the recording "studio". "That was great. I'll edit it later tonight and hopefully put it up in the morning. I might make a teaser for it to release around dinner time."

One of her assistants comes in with a iPad. "I thought you might be interested in these videos." The three videos are short telling of three separate muggings that were stopped by someone who seemed to be able to fly. The eyewitness accounts disagree on most of the details of who the vigilante was or what they looked like. But Deborah thought one of them was Sunny. Deborah includes Khemis is viewing the videos and asks, "I'm going to probably reblog these videos with positive comments. Want me to forward the links to you in case you want to do the same?"
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Tony Jones
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Re: [MM3]Sunstormers IC

Post by Tony Jones »

Khemis looks closely at the videos. "Is that 'Peter Kent'?" she asks. "Good on him, if so!"

"But yes, if you could forwards the links I'll see what I can do..."
jmucchiello
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Re: [MM3]Sunstormers IC

Post by jmucchiello »

Deborah says, "Peter Kent? Oh, you mean Sunny. He's very private so I wouldn't feel too bad if he gave you, or maybe me, a false name."

"So, now that I have the raw footage, it's time to edit it into something 'professional'. I'll be doing that personally. You're welcome to watch but it will be repetitive and boring quite frankly."
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Re: [MM3]Sunstormers IC

Post by Neo-Paladin »

On the news front, meanwhile, there is mention of series of attacks on officials in Hongkong where the victims have been drained of blood and other fluids. Little more is known at this moment, probably because the Chinese government is clamping down hard on any attempts to report on this in detail.
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