Coile

A quote from bash.org (praise bash.org!!)

"i'm going to become rich and famous after i invent a device that allows you to stab people in the face over the internet"

I find two sorts of players distracting to my enjoyment.

First kind is the griefers. I'm not sure how much it has to do with PvP though. These people find it amusing to harass others for one reason or another. They can be antisocial but judging by the language I most often come across I'd say they are just young people. Rude, obnoxious, owning the world and young. For some that wears of during the years, others remain idiots their whole entire life.

Why do they mock roleplaying then? I have no truths but I have a theory that I believe explains at least a chunk of them.

Those players have come to CoH (or any other similar game) to "just play the game". Their characters are just their personal portals into the game world where they experience the game. They probably enjoy the story too, as told by NPCs. They read the mission descriptions and then go bust the mobs (or screw the stories and just bash). To them the world that they inhabit are defined strictly by their personal experiences - enhancements, insiprations, bosses, minions, story arcs. They don't immerse and emphatize with their characters just as I just produce infantry in Starcraft and send them to the slaughter by tens and hundreds. What they see is what they get.

Then they see two people standing by the corner of a building. Players, not NPCs. Why are they there? They can't be waiting for a mate because the mission entrance is not nearby. They are using emotes but somehow they aren't just goofing around. And what are they talking about? They don't talk about their real lives or even about the game like which AT to roll next after thei level this toon up. They talk about some mission as if it really mattered them. They talk about things that suggest personal histories to the characters, social lives, hopes and fears.

That's when the rug gets pulled from under them. They define the game world by what they experience directly. What they now face is a totally new look at how to play the game - by adding your own details, events and stories. Make-believe stuff that does not exist except by some weird common agreement with the other roleplayers.

They simply don't understand or see what exactly is going on. To them the imaginary social context belongs to the kindergarten where they played mom and dad and son and daughter and family dog. It's childish. It's something that they outgrew years, or maybe just year ago. It's stupid and beneath them.

This is where it gets ugly. They don't understand what the roleplayers are doing but they get the feeling that the RP'ers are having fun. They have their own community and "the thing" and they are enjoying it. And the griefers and tools, they have a vague sense that they are missing out on some fun. They get jealous and meanwhile they are too scared and proud to ask what it is that the RP'ers are doing. It's just some stupid child thing anyway, why should they ask about it, and besides their mates would think them sissies.

Lack of understanding, fear of ridicule if they show interest, jealousy over others having seemingly more and a touch of antisocial behaviour lead quickly to resentment and that manifests as griefing.

I know that this does not apply to everyone who behaves in this manner but I think it explains some of it.

This group is sort of simple to handle. There's probably not much hope of talking to them in peace and expecting that reason prevails. While these people are a major annoyance they do go away with time. They are easy to write off as morons and once they get through with you they vanish like a bad smell.


The other group that I find actually way harder to deal with are people whose way of roleplaying differs from mine enough and in the wrong way. To narrow it down here I mean semi-RP'ers, people who merrily mix IC and OOC.

As said complete OOC'er griefers can be dismissed. They don't get a chance to affect the IC life of your character however irritating they might be to your-IRL-self. It's those semi-roleplayers who by their IC actions can affect your character's perception of the world and touch your immersion.

It's people who find it natural to announce their return from afk in Local and with the same sentence resume their IC chat with someone. People who contact you via tells without any regard if your character is available, carrying a phone or even just wishing to disrupt whatever it is that they are doing just to talk with them. People who use in-game terms extensively to describe their world (like the names of the powers) and expect it to make sense to others as well. People who read your bio and refer to the facts stated there as if they knew your secret origin (then again I personally put in my bio only stuff that people could know about). In general it's people who don't stop to think what their characters should know and instead use just what the player knows.

This lot is harder to notice than the griefers and they can wreak some IC damage as well. At the very least they provide some level of irritation when you have to manage their IC input constantly and weed out all the immersion breaking stuff. It's taxing and for me at least something I'm not willing to do as a rule. I can take small amounts of it but that's it.

Considering those two groups I would have to answer affirmative to the question. When I started to frequent Pocket D about nightly some time last September-October there were several weeks without griefers hassling us. Even when they appeared it was a rare occurrence and distinctly isolated incidents. Now it seems they occur more often.

Also the semi-RP'er population was almost non-existent. Now sometimes when I whoosh by I get the impression as if they could be the majority. Granted I have not played with most of them to have any definite opinions but in some cases already the grammar that I see in my local puts me off enough to not even really want to.

In both counts Pocket D indeed has gone down, not even just a notch but a plunge.

I don't go there that often any more myself. Coile has had other things to deal with for the most part of the year and as his social circle has stopped frequenting PD as well so there's seldom a good enough reason to go there.

Tho, the last time Coile went there I had some real good time with Unity Vigil and EVIL.

A new entry in Nightsparrow's Scrapbook is up. Now focus in on Keening Banshee! She here, she's there, she's everywhere! But how come Paragon Inquirer claims that Coile forced her to retire from Militia on the grounds that she's expecting Coile's child? More lies or the shocking truth? Read all about it now!

Also included is more bickering between Diana and Andre, this time about hitting on girls, hitting on boys, their respective mothers and yes, you knew it, more sex education.

Now available in the above link on Silent Tempest forums!

As my belated 2 Inf I'd like to reiterate what I have pretty much always said - give both locations a few fair chances. Anyonbe and any place can have bad nights. Try to spot things and people you find interesting and take a closer look.

Not having attended GG on any sort of regular basis since last September or so I'm far from being an expert of what's up these days but from my ye olde days experiences I can recommend just for example people like Red Commissar, Kitmarch and Shadowe at GG. No, I don't claim to know any of them but the general image I have is that they are nice, humorous and welcoming longtime attendees.

As things are I have almost about as little clue about PD these days. Last fall I was there pretty much every night or close enough but some IC crapola with my main has kept him busy elseplace, like lost in a robot dimension, tied to a bed in EVIL's headquarters, locked up in isolation ward (twice), round the bend with some nasty brainwashing or brooding in Moth Cemetery by the final resting place of his wife. Still, I'm confident that with large mix of different styles present you're bound to find what strikes you as fab in no time at all. Plenty of characters ways to do stuff present.

As for GG / PD I don't think either place is better than the other in the grand scheme of things. It's all up to what you thirst for.

Growing up

"Seasons are changing
And waves are crashing
And stars are falling all for us"
- The Red Jumpsuit Apparatus

Right. Coile. The last time I recapped anything was ages ago and a few things have happened. Most important things are listed here briefly and might be expanded on at a later moment as needed.

Things to happen to Coile aka Andre Kraft after the dreamwalk with "the three girls in his life"...

- Coile's wife Melanie (Nightsparrow) wanted to leave him and asked his father to hide her away. Zirgei did as asked and sent Melanie into Biodome 5, a location operated by Hand of Andros.

- The apartment of Andre and Melanie was destroyed in an explosion and Melanie was seemingly killed in it.

- Diana Bright (Love Angel) took devastated Andre to stay with her family for a while. It pays to mention that Nadia Forester (Sword of Truth), Andre's former lover, asked Diana to do that. This would be a relevant point when Nadia was feeling jealous.

- Another subject that needs to be said, although longer explanations can be found in previous recaps, is that Diana and Andre have some history in sharing the bed and nothing else. After Andre moved in the bed sharing became a norm.

- A word about Diana's parents, Jane and Nigel Bright. Don't tick them off. Just don't. They are terrible when angry. They are very, very strict and control their own lives with almost religious fervor. They don't like the boat to be shaken.

- Andre and Diana got caught sharing the bed in the middle of the night. Oops. Still, after all the raised voices, angry huffs and sweat droplets of pure fear Andre got to stay in the house on permanent basis if he paid rent and chipped in on the bills and there was no forbidding of them sharing the bed in the future. This left the youngsters baffled and they still haven't quite figured out what the hell is going on. In case it feels important, Andre is 20, Diana is 17.

- You think that scare made the day a bad one? That same day Melanie died for real. Her death was recorded by Andre's father Zirgei and shown first to Diana, then to Andre. This death was no hoax, there was a burial and the character has been deleted. That same day Zirgei's enemies lured him into a trap and used mucho gusto and bombed the living daylight out of him. What once was the robot farm is now a crater.

- Right before the explosion Zirgei took the recently discovered body of ND-4 that had been missing for months and months, transferred it's memory cores into the soul holder and tranferred that whole into ND-5, a new, penultimate model in the ND series that was capable of true AI capabilities with a full range of emotions. This in effect concluded the two decades long project to revive the dead mother of Andre and Andrea. When ND-5 came to Paragon City to look for her son, Diana was less than pleased about it. She thinks ND units are unnatural and harmful.

- Elsewhere Andre's now impossible, temporally misplaced granddaughter Angelique (Darksparrow) had gotten sick. When her NIGHTSPARROW AI vanished when Melanie died some of her dormant cybernetics activated. One effect was to anchor her to a time where she no longer belonged. The other was to mess with her body so that she was dying. A timely intervention by Andre and ND-5 turned the tide in the end. Talk about a weird family tree. Three persons from four generations of direct lineage with the biggest age difference being no more than twelve years. ND-5 is physically the same age that she was when she died (27), Andre is 20 and Angie was 15 when she was sent back in time to our present.

- Back to personal front: Tygerboy and Phiseeque are both madly in love with Diana. Too bad for them that Diana doesn't feel the same for either of them. It also irks them both a bit that night after night Diana curls up next to Andre, even if there is nothing indecent going on.

- When Nigel left for work travels he named Andre "the man in the house" which still keeps baffling our young Captain Picard look-a-like. Jane in her corner made Diana buy condoms "just in case". When Jane's brother James Waldén came for a visit Andre had to let go of the guest room and move in with Diana. As he already slept in the room it was not a big chance, but still imposed on by Diana's parents. Are they grooming Andre to be a son-in-law, or do they have some more insidious plans cooking? In any case now Andre and Diana live together their daily lives in Diana's pink and white room. No, they are not a girlfriend and a boyfriend. Just ask either of them. And, uh, would be good if you didn't ask anyone else, to prevent mixed messages...

- As for operations, Crown gave Silent Tempest a slip and vanished. Good riddance. The rogue elements of Hand of Andros either ended up dead or went to hiding for now. Seeing how Melanie's killers are still on the loose all that is needed is the slightest tip about them to cause waves. Elsewhere Crey is keeping up with their evil business. Now it was found that their project Trojan Queen has advanced. Their first prototype was to clone Nadia Forester making the Sword of Truth that has been with the Silent Tempest a full year to have been replaced by a clone around last August Now they are using that template to produce a new line of Revenant Protectors. Last year Coile who otherwise is firmly against killing no matter what the situation saw to it that no Revenant Protector that they came across could be classified as living after he and Nadia were done with them. Now there are standing orders to 'wipe them out to the last'.

This, in brief, is what has been going on for the last month - month and a half. Well, the most major events, anyway. I hope.

Now I should recap last night but I'm hungry. Maybe later.

-> Pious: Huh? Just to make it publicly known, I was not referring to any of your characters, in case you thought so. See the PM for more details.

As has been said, there is a wide variety in how kids behave. Some are little darlings, some are antisocial killers. Then there's the gap between them where the rest of them fall.

Playing any of them is as valid a choice as any other, adult, werecat or a demon. Some characters are nasty IC. Some of them might be kids. That's the way it goes.

Although, it pays to point out, in extreme cases of kids misbehaving enough for others to get annoyed it is equally valid to contact an NPC instance like child care or police which would have consequences for the kids. As with any RP it would be good if people causing ruckus would be ready to pay the piper according to their actions.

I have no big problems with child or childlike characters if they are played consistently. By that I don't mean that a meek character should never get aggressive, or anything similar. One person can plausibly act very differently if the situation calls for it.

What I do find myself to be at odds with are characters who seem to fluctuate too much (in my personal opinion) with their maturity. On one hand they seem to be oblivious to the most basic facts of life, on the other they are well trained ninja spies who vanish to the four corners of the Earth to conduct secret, highly dangerous tasks for various organizations and are just cool with that. If their responses to any situation seems to be more dependent on the mood of the player than the chosen theme of the character it becomes hard to have consistent interaction with them.

As for Tygerboy, well, as a time traveller I'm not sure what his current background story exactly is (as my characters affected the present and changed the future where he originally is from) but previously it was a 30 year old mind in the body of a 15-16 years old. To my experience the character has been consistent and yes, he can be a nasty bugger IC. I'm sort of dreading the day my character meets the business end of his claws.

One childlike character that I find to work very well and to be consistent is Love Angel. Physically she is 17 but some of the actions and reactions seem to belong to a bit younger person. It has been so for half a year and the character has experienced IC growth. This growth might not be as apparent from her IC diary, mind you.

I even have a character in the similar vein of my own, namely my main Coile. Physically he's an adult but he started as a whiny brat looking for a place in the world. Although educated at least to high school extent he lacked a lot of real world life experience and that meant making terribly stupid mistakes along the way. There has, however, been growth and it's now somewhat rarely that he has childish tantrums or encounters social situations where he has no idea what to do. The success and consistency of Coile I leave others to be judged.

Pocket D as a place resides in another dimension and allows in humans, gods, demons, aliens and whatnot. From the Isles side in pours a whole flock of scum and villainy and I find it hard to believe that they get carded. Also, young characters can walk into Pocket D at will so the way of least headaches is to accept that. One way to look at the situation is to expect US laws to be applicable. The other way to look at is to assume that it is not so. People are free to choose, but the fact remains that there will be underage characters in Pocket D. Personally I choose to accept their presence as an IC fact and assume that the rules in fact allow this.

[ QUOTE ]
hehehe, 8 days shy of a month between posts here.

Are recaps dying? Or are they moving to more private boards?

[/ QUOTE ]

I would like to do recaps, but even if broken into plot chunks they would be massive, ridiculously so. I considered recapping just Melanie's wake and funeral, but that would have required explaining how she died. That would have lead to her apparent death in Founders' Falls and her real death in Biodome 5. That would have screamed for a more detailed look about what the hell Hand of Andros was up to, why they did the things that they did...

I'd spend two days writing a recap because everyhting I would say would be tied to something that has not been mentioned in my recaps before. Like how come Andre is living with Diana now. How it came to be, which things changed and why, and what is the situation now?

It's an endless and bottomless bog.

However, I hope that after the last ad about Scrapbook I might now feel secure enough that people can check Diana's diary for more info and then resume my own recaps assuming that people who are interested are up to date now. Well, at least they can be, it's up to them.

If I make recaps I post them both here and Tempest forums. At least with Coile I am more likely to use this thread than the Pocket D one even if events take place there, because they probably are part of stuff that would belong to this thread better.

About others I can't say much. I know that Love Angel makes the recaps in the IC diary and occasionally in Scrapbook and that takes a lot of time each day.

Tho I guess you're correct with the estimate that if no one else recaps, it puts others off from it as well. I'm just a lazy bugger with writing sometimes. Lately I haven't done many stories, no recaps and generally just been thinking of writing instead of writing.

Well, there is one bit that I wrote during NaNoWriMo that's self-contained enough to work on its own, and presentable enough for Creative forum. A for Android: Enemy Mine

Summa summarum: I try to mend my ways and post more often.

(( Takes place during the summer of 2000. Coile aka Andre Kraft is almost 16.

By a coincidence Andre's robot mother is called Nadia as his first girlfriend in paragon City would be, in a few years. Despite same name they are not the same person. ))

Enemy Mine

It was a dark year for humanity. Mankind's bleakest hour had fallen two months before when the alien invaders had struck.

The assault had been unprecendented in history. One day ominous glowing discs had grown out of nowhere all around the world. Their nature had remained hidden save that they were dangerous. Anything that passed through them disappeared and was never seen again. This had happened in world's hero capital Paragon City as well as in various metropolises around the globe.

For three hours it had been calm before the storm. For one evening the Earth stood still, daring almost not to breath. Then they came. The Rikti.

They poured through the portals like a lethal rain. They fell into the cities by the thousands and tens of thousands. No military could quell their tide. Even the mightiest heroes could just fight a losing battle. In one night the nations of the Earth took an almost shattering blow. The war had started.

All around the world superpowered heroes fought and died. Even the premium groups like Freedom Phalanx and Midnight Squad took heavy losses. Headquarters destroyed, ranks decimated but unyielding in the face of oblivion. Scores of old heroes fell against the vicious Rikti invasion. What the humanity needed was a surge of new heroes to take their places at the vanguard.

And they came. All around the world new heroes rose up to the challenge when duty was calling. Many were not ready, many lost their lives despite the training that they received when they enlisted into the frontline battle. That did not stop them. The true measure of a hero is not risking life when survival is probable. The very measure of a man is to stand fast in the face of a certain death.

"But mom, I am ready!", said Andre in a voice that was best described as whiny.

"Ready for what, exactly?" ND-2 did not bother to turn around while arranging spare parts on the shelf. This discussion was nothing but a rerun. She had long since recognized that Andre's tactic was to reiterate the same discussion over and over looking for a loophole he had previously missed.

Andre was standing near the doorway letting the sunshine in into the gloomy storage shed. "I am ready to fight the Rikti! They need new heroes, Nadia."

This was a new angle. ND-2 set the parts in her hands back on the shelf she had just picked the from and turned to look at the boy. "You are no hero, Andre. You can't control your powers, you don't have a license and you are nowhere near ready to be a fighter of any kind. Now, where did you hear about heroes being needed?"

Zirgei had ordered a news blockade in the house. That coupled with the children being taught at home exclusively had been supposed to guarantee that the bleak truth of the situation remained hidden. They were slowly and meticulously groomed towards a heroic future but it all had to happen under control.

For some youngsters getting attuned with their new abilities came with ease but such was not the case with Andre and Andrea. In the early days Zirgei's colleague had constructed regulators that prevented a fatal buildup from occurring. Both kids wore them on their faces, a metallic plate that ran from under the right eye to the hairline. It connected through the temple and cheekbone with nerve clusters and made sure that the body would not have to deal with more energy than it could take. It was hoped that in time they would be able to survive without the plates.

This was exactly the reason why Zirgei had wanted to suppress the grim news that poured in, to create a bubble where the war did not exist. It would have been hard to instill a heroic mindset on the children while preventing them from acting according to it. ND-2 held her gaze waiting for a reply.

Andre squirmed but could not evade giving an answer. He was not very good at lying and just in case that he got better his robot mom was equipped with quite effective lie detection system. Giving untruths would backfire immediately. The answer came out in bits and pieces as he tried to stall but it formed a whole. "I met this guy from school and he said that we're losing the war and that most of the heroes are dead."

ND-2 assumed the sternest possible mode. "Since you have not been going to school for two years and it is summertime I must conclude that you have met this said friend during your free hours. With the curfew it means exactly these early evening hours. It is regrettable as it has been beneficial for you and your sister to have some personal time off from the farm but under current situation that can no longer be allowed to continue. You are both confined to the farm at least until this on-going Rikti threat is over. Concurrently your friend Kitia must accept these same rules and their spirit if she is to be allowed to come here again."

There was no softer tones involved. Andre was being lectured at the full capacity of his robotic mother. "In practice it means that you and Andrea are not allowed to wander beyond the farmland without me or your father personally present, not to meet any people without prior and specific approval and not to try to access any information that is not being clearly distributed to you either by me or your father. Do I make myself clear?"

This all was so farout that Andre did not know where to begin. Confined to the farm! Not to meet anyone! And if Kitia did not comply she would be banned. This had to be some sort of sick joke. "But mom!", he exclaimed. ND-2 did not budge one bit. "None of this is negotiable. I will take measures to ensure compliance if I have to. Is this understood?"

He was rendered speechless. She meant every word she said! Within a minute his secluded existence had changed into imprisonment. Until the Rikti threat was over. "But the war can continue for ages! Years!" He was soon sixteen! He knew for a fact that there had been younger heroes than that. It was an outrage!

ND-2 towered over him, stepping closer. "The conflict will come to an end soon enough but it might be really the best if you both would remain here until your respective eighteenth birthdays." Andre felt like complaining but something in Nadia's demeanor made him just shut up.

"No further than our lands, young master. Now, I believe Andrea is over at Kitia's. I want both of you back inside this house by nine. Kitia will come to have a little talk with me tomorrow morning. After that it will be decided if she can continue seeing you." This one struck home. Andre and Kitia had been involved for a year now, starting a year after their powers were discovered. It had not progressed beyond some kissing but unless Kitia conceded to these insane conditions it never would, either.

Having said what she had needed to ND-2 turned away again. She had no wish to act as a jailor and according to her basic programming as well as emotion mimickers she would have preferred not to but as circumstances were there was little choice. The children had to be protected until they were truly ready, apt enough in handling their abilities.

Some spark of defiance made Andre mutter, perhaps to himself, "But I am ready." and this launched ND-2 into action. A lesson was clearly needed, a lesson with undeniable proof, something that no words had a hope of delivering through this thick skull. She grabbed him by the arm and pulled with her out of the house and to the training range behind the robot barn. Only there did she release her hold.

Andre rubbed his arm. Not because it hurt as ND-2 had applied just the right amount of force but because he was annoyed, still partially in shock and just a little scared. Nadia seemed to be acting somehow agitated. She pointed at a man-shaped and -sized target ten meters away. "Ranged bolt, left shoulder, enough to knock the target down."

It was nothing new and nothing fancy. In fact it was a piece of cake. He set the other foot further back leaning on it, bent the knee of the frontmost leg, aimed with the right hand with the left one at the same time providing support, checked the line of sight and let go a decisive blast of concussive energy. It hit the exact mark sending the target swinging around and to the ground. If this was all that he needed to do to prove himself he could have done this months ago. Andre looked at his mom and smiled. "See mom, nothing to it."

ND-2 stood still and sent new activation signals to the training equipment. The model sprang back up and it was holding something. A knife. Andre froze where he was standing. This was new. A defeated opponent stayed down. This was not how it was supposed to work. Just as he decided to show his mom and blast the model down again it started at him at a fast speed.

He did an equivalent of shooting from a hip. An energy blast left from his hand but went well past the charging model and then the time ran out. The model was upon him and slammed the knife to his side. Andre screamed. He recoiled and fell to ground holding to his side in sheer disbelief.

The model stood there, motionless now. ND-2 spoke. "It's a theater knife, young master, quite non-lethal in nature. However this shows how badly you are prepared for an enemy that is attacking back. Do you need more proof?" Fury was building inside him. He wanted to prove himself so badly. "It surprised me! It won't happen again. I'm ready for anything!"

She would have sighed if she assumed it did any good. Stubborn, reckless, unfocused, obsessed. That's what he had always been but it was growing worse by the age. A further demonstration was required, an example that he would remember for months to come. "Fine.", she just said and activated two new targets further down the training field.

Andre jumped back up and was already finding a bead on the closer target. However ill-prepared he still was he had also learned something during the two year long hard training. Something blocked his view for a brief moment. When he could see again the targets were moving but he could still aim and blast with reasonable accuracy. It was a direct hit and the target was slammed to the ground.

This was shooting! Yeah! The thrill of the combat whispered to him and he felt alive, ready to blast the next target down, and the next and the next if they came. An energy load was gathering in him, drawing from every cell and building up someplace in his chest, looking for a way out along his arm and through his hand. It swelled and churned and was suddenly bristling in every fiber of his being.

Something was horribly wrong.

ND-2 stood motionless holding his faceplate in her hand. His powers were out of control. The levels doubled and tripled without check and he was starting to hurt. Every spot in him was pleading for a release. The target was closing in. The blast that was released ripped the model in two sending the upper half flying fast over twenty meters away. ND-2 was caught in the blast and thrown to her back despite the massive frame that she was sporting. Andre fell to the ground feeling cold and numb.

His mother got up, came to him and gently placed the plate back in place. Slowly he began to come back to his senses, the energy flow back under regulation. "Young master, Andre, you still have a distance to go before it is safe for you to take part in fighting the good fight. You still need to learn more about your powers. In combat a lot of things can happen in split second and you need to be ready for all of it." She waited for a comprehending nod and added then. "You can't watch your sister's back otherwise."

She helped him up. "Now go get her, and remember to ask Kitia to come over tomorrow. Don't be too late out, you both really need to be inside before the dark." Andre missed it but there was concern present and Nadia's sensors kept scanning the surroundings. There was some real reason for worry but inside the defence perimeter they should have been reasonably safe.

All this had set Andre enough back so that arguments had ceased. Sure Nadia had her point, and of course he should still practice. It was just that the Rikti war was going on now and despite what she said there was a call for every capable superpowered being to join the fight before it was too late.

Surly he walked from the farm and along the road towards where Kitia lived with her aunt. His mom and father would never let him join the war effort, that much was clear. On the other hand he knew that was the right thing to do. If he could not do it permission he would do it without.

He diverted his path to the woods. It was a shortcut that bypassed the big hill altogehter, all he had to do was cross a stream by hopping on a few slippery rocks.

Tomorrow morning it would be too late. If he tonight returned to home he knew that that was where he would spend the remainder of the war, or possibly until his coming of age.

This was it then. He would have to run away tonight but first he had to go see Kitia and Andrea. Ask them to come with him. Andrea would put up a fight about it and he was not too convinced that he could actually talk her around. Of Kitia he was more confident but still not a hundred percent certain. They were both a year younger than him and sometimes so immature. This was their chance to show that they were not kids anymore.

He would go alone then and show them all. He would go to Andros City and catch an eastbound bus all the way to the coast. When there the trip to Paragon City would not be too big a deal. He would look Statesman up and offer his skills to the war effort. He knew that he could fight the Rikti if he wanted, he had trained two years for it already.

He came to a clearing. And stopped, still hidden in the shadows. There was a weird creature in the middle of the clearing. A Rikti. Two meters tall, wearing a long helmet and full body armour. It was crouched over a man who was still struggling.

Andre had never been that scared in his life.

The man was pinned to the ground by something like a pitchfork with only two forks. They were pressed into the ground leaving his throat in the middle and rendering him unable to get up. The Rikti was cutting away his clothes, methodically and calmly as it had all the time in the world.

This was it, the first real chance to use his powers, to strike at a live enemy and even a deadly one. On top of that he would save a life since surely the man was in danger here. Andre was frozen still.

When the clothes had been removed the alien invader pressed its heavy hand on the man's chest and set the tip of the blade on the stomach. The man was screaming. there were no words that Andre could make out, it was just gibberish. The shrill voice carried all the terror a man can have inside. Andre knew that he would have to intervene now. Soon it would have been too late. His limbs did not work.

The knife cut long and the scream rose in pitch to a shriek. Andre felt warm wetness spread in his pants. In front of his eyes a man was cut open and he did nothing. Nothing at all. He could not move his hand to help, he could not even look away.

The Rikti pushed its hand inside the man and when it pulled it back out it held a lump of something wet that was supposed to be inside a human. It smelled the lump and then set it on the ground pushing the hand again in to get another lump, and then another. The shrieks first grew in volume but started to weaken and finally died out completely. The Rikti seemed to pay no attention at all to the sounds that the man had made. It just picked the gut clean of all the lumps smelling each of them.

Andre stood in the exact position that he had stopped at when he first spotted the alien. He reeked of fear and pee and wanted to do something, anything but yet again did nothing. The alien got up, having completed whatever it was that it had done. The dead man lied there his innards spread around him in a neat half-circle. Then the Rikti simply walked away never once looking back.

Finally the all-permeating fear released its hold so that he could feel other things. Andre vomited, time and again. He was furious. He hated the Rikti. He hated them with all of his little might and he would train as long and hard as he needed and then he would rid the world of them, to the last. He clutched his arms around himself and succumbed to his knees.

He felt cold and dead and empty and please feel empty but then the tears started to roll and there was no hiding anymore. The bitter tears tried to wash away his despair and disappointment and guilt but they were now embedded into his being. He cried until he finally ran out of tears and felt no better at all.

Then he slinked back home, slipped into his room and talked to no one. Andrea had returned by then on her own.

Nightsparrow is dead but the good work continues now with the combined effort by Love Angel and Coile updating the Scrapbook!

In the latest addition it's a step towards back to basics with headlines and added paraphernalia spiced by comments from both Diana and Andre, and for the first time comments about comments!

I have to say, helping to make this entry was a bundle of fun leaving even a barrel of monkeys to the second place.

And in case some of the scraps tickle your curiosity, why not take a peek at some totally subjective descriptions of events in Diana's secret diary? Either from the beginning, the entry about Coile's and Nightsparrow's apartment being destroyed or
the talk about contraception as hinted in The Glow.

Annoyingly my Paragon Inquirer reporter is stuck outside as well. Just as she has an interview lined up with unsuspecting vict... targets. No, guests. Yes, guests.

No, I'm not giving the names away just yet but a subtle hint would be "the bald and the beautiful".

I hope GM's sort her back inside Pocket D soonish. Otherwise it's going to be a conference call.

And it was a good thing I was sitting when I looked out of the window and saw a hideous tentacle monster flying by. Didn't land on my butt only because I had my tush down already.

I can pretty much just rehash what's been said.

For me it'd depend on if the magical resurrection was a one-shot and not the magic's gone, or if it is still present.

If the magic has become a part of her and still manifests through the powers then I'd go with magic origin.

If the magic was a one time occurrence and now it's up to the suit to keep things going then I'd choose technology.

Some of these events are again almost a month old. Go figure.

Memory, walk with me

"I'll be there when your heart stops beating
I'll be there when your last breath's taken away
In the dark when there's no one listening
In the times when we both get carried away"
- +44

The crude brainwashing attempt had left Andre (Coile) in command of his actions but his emotional responses to people and especially those he had before considered his allies were leaning heavily towards negative. One of the main aims of the conditioning had been seeding deep distrust against potential allies and that was something that Subaiku could not get rid of that easily.

During this time Andre did not go home thinking that a meeting with Melanie (Nightsparrow) would lead to an inevitable and destructive clash. Subaiku had said that she could arrange dreamwalks with some select people and mend the trust issues with them. He reasoned he would stay at Nadia's (Sword of Truth) place until the dreamwalk with Melanie would be done.

Nowever, as if to add insult to injury, Andre decided that the first dreamwalk was to be with Nadia, not Melanie. He had plenty of reasons, each sounding at least partially plausible. One of them was that he needed to feel that he had an ally that he could trust within Silent Tempest.

The dreamwalk took place in the same warehouse where Subaiku had kept Andre for a few days while she fixed his mind as best she could and placed trust for herself in there while at it, among other things. There was a bed which was surrounded by intricate drawings on the floor. The instructions were simple. Both would have to concentrate on positive things, things that brought them together. Seeing how three months before Andre had left Nadia rather abruptly and bluntly it could have been a tall order but Nadia had had difficulties of letting go of her former lover and had already sacrificed her health for him in the robot dimension (with the added bonus of Tempest Virus). Another issue was that Nadia would have to trust Subaiku. In fact the most trivial part was Andre whose main input would be his memories and the images that they brought to the dream. The success or failure rested almost solely on Nadia. Oh, and then there was one more instruction. Strip. Both did as commanded, and later on Melanie would be simply delighted to learn that in addition to her having been sidelined in dreamwalk order Andre and Nadia had slept naked in the same bed.

The ritual included chewing a root that had been dipped into some blackish goo. I feel confident in saying that the less anyone knows about what Subaiku uses for her spellcasting the better, but I'll give a hint and whisper "blood magic". Ok, maybe "tribal magic" but some ingredients are still plain icky. All participants had henna-like tattoos painted on them. The root tasted of earth and mushrooms, Subaiku's chanting voice of words that were not English filled the room, lights seemed to recede and the drawings on the floor began to shimmer. It was time to dream.

The dream itself was not overly complex, it was just a setting. There was a grey, lonely island in the middle of a sea And Nadia standing there. There was a bright sky and a neat apartment on Talos Island in which Andre was. Flying through the grey Andre went to get Nadia and took her back to their one-time home. Images. Feelings. Happy times. There was a hurricane that was pulling things apart, and two people who saw their common life fleeting past them and held onto each other. No matter how hard the world tried to pull them apart they resisted, their common bond being finally too strong for any force to break it totally. Then there was an empty beach at dusk and a slow walk along it, until morning came and the dream became a blurry collection of images. Subaiku was long gone, or hiding in her shadow form. Eventually the two remaining dreamwalkers put their clothes on and went to get some morning coffee.

In a few days it was time to repeat the ritual with Melanie. However, even the very beginning was off to a rocky start as Andre and Mel met about an hour before Subaiku got there. The discussion was both heated and nasty, accusations and insinuations filled the air and most hurt were dealt with undeniable truths. When Subaiku finally appeared Mel was already on her way out. However, some stubborn quality, or perhaps love for her husband made her stay.

The ritual side of things was the same. The roots, the painted lines and the words "memory, walk with me". The dream began. It was horrible. Andre's doubts and negative feelings didn't weight much, they were what the ritual was supposed to purge. What was important was Melanie's state of mind, and it was bad. She had developed an innate dislike towards all things dream magic and thus her inner trust towards Subaiku was non-existent. In the dream what counted was the subconsciousness. In the dream Melanie fought against every effort made to restore Andre's trust towards her and as the task had been very difficult to begin with the whole attempt was doomed to fail.

When they woke up Subaiku was again nowhere to be seen. No words were spoken. Melanie got dressed and went to a corner to vomit. As she moved towards the exit Andre snapped out of his stupor, put on his clothes fast and rushed after Melanie. He tried to downplay the utter failure which both were aware of. Mel was walking along the street and Andre pointed out that they were neither in no shape to walk, and the baby would benefit from a cab. It was true, both were mental wrecks and physically totally exhausted. Mel called two cabs and told Andre that it was over. There was no marriage anymore, there was no common home, there never had been. No matter what he said she didn't reconsider her stance. The two cabs left to different directions.

The last dreamwalk to take place, despite initial plans for more, happened shortly after with Diana (Love Angel). Now there was a change in the setting as Diana refused to appear naked, no matter how grave the situation was and Subaiku had been a little unprecise with her instructions. Nakedness at the time of the ritual was not needed, only for the paintlines to be drawn. With these alterations the third walk began and the faint lines on the floor shone in the dark.

Now it was Christmas, the days when Andre and Diana had had their best time together. There was the Christmas tree that Andre had cut down and the scents of various foods that Diana was preparing. Except that the sensory input was of too great intensity. The lights were too bright, like in an over-exposed photograph. Then Subaiku and Diana were there, Diana shining so brightly that she is hard to look at. She shot arrows and Andre and the warm white light washes over and through him, taking away his conditioned distrust towards Diana as well as the base hostility and negativity that the drug enhanced process had instilled into his frame of mind. Then Subaiku withdrew and let the dream continue on its own course. Diana dreamt of her special place on a side of a mountain or a hill with grass and lots of flowers. They spent there talking for quite a while about small things and big things.

Upon waking Subaiku true to her nature and habits was again gone. While the dream had come to an end the intensity had not and it threatened to spill the words and pronounced feelings of the dream into the regular world. However both had their own codes to follow. Diana had the image of the perfect first kiss and it did not take place in a dimly lit warehouse. Andre was married. Besides, such kisses didn't belong between two very close friends, not even if they knew each others' hearts and were probably closer to each other than to anyone else in their lives. Decency maintained clothes were donned and the two fo them left the house.

What remained was to mend things with Melanie and the dark thoughts ripped from his soul Andre believed that he could do it, with time if not immediately. He went to see his wife who appeared indifferent and set with her decision. He tried to argue his points, explain why certain things had went the way that they had but nothing seemed to be able to budge Melanie. In the end, perhaps just to get rid of her soon-to-be ex-husband she promised to rethink, once more. As it was already late night he could come back the morning after the next one and then they would talk.

The next night there was an explosion in the apartment of Andre and Melanie. Andre was elsewhere, waiting for the next morning and the talk that would settle his life one way or the other. Melanie, the police confirmed soon after, had been identified from the remains in the apartment.

"Past and future entwine. What was, will be again. Memory, walk with me."

- Aww man! There's gonna be a murder, a frigging murder.
- So what else is new?
- No I mean for real. You won't believe what I saw last night!
- Try me? I'm not easily fazed.
- You know the rep that Big Lunk has, right? He wants to break your spine, your spine breaks itself just for being scared. Well, last night in Pocket D down at the dancefloor his wife was playing hankypanky with hands with a guy.
- Heh, when you're right you're right. That guy's toast.
- I'm not even at the good part yet! Do you know who the guy was? It was that guy from the papers, the one who put that hero woman in hospital and screws sexbots. Coile's the name. And Echo wasn't enough for him! There was this young jailbait all over him, pink glasses, blond hair. Could be it was just a dressup but I hear that guy likes them young as well.
- Blimey. The minute Lunk hears about it he'll go nuclear.
- Get this, he was there, on the second floor opening and watching it go down. Murder in his eyes. When I got a glimpse of him I almost crapped myself. Zero's rules or no, I didn't stick around to see what goes down.
- I'll bet by tonight that guy will be the year's most colourful crime scene. If not, maybe Lunk's losing his touch.
- I agree. Unless Coile's gone so bad he joins their posse and this was some weird European initiation rites. Damn outlanders, who know about them, right?

...as spoken by two guys in the early evening of 9.4.2007 in Pocket D and the story circulating during the evening in more and more distorting iterations

Dragonfly caught and acquited! Keening Banshee hospitalized! Coile exposed (now with pictures)! Nightsparrow blown to bits with extensive collateral damage! Brit and Brat-Pack kick sitting muscle!

All this and more in the latest entry of Nightsparrow's Scrapbook

Devastation in Founders' Falls!

PARAGON TIMES - The evening of 4/4/2007 in Founder's Falls was disturbed by a loud and devastating explosion. The police are as of yet uncertain of the exact chain of events but a a bomb or a series of bombs is suspected.

The explosion devastated the whole topmost floor of the so called Skyclock Tower. Eleven floors below it suffered considerable damage and the whole building was evacuated. It is not yet known how badly the structural integrity of the whole building suffered but the tenants are not allowed to return before the building has been declared safe.

The catastrophe mobilized the fire department, police and a few heroes who made sure that the imminent danger was over. However much of the damage was done immediately after the explosion as rubble rained down accross the Founders' Falls.

The results of the explosion are vast. There are broken windows within eight block radius. The falling rubble dented or outright destroyed at least 43 vehicles. The material damage to the skyscraper itself and to the nearby buildings is extensive.

Unfortunately an upheaval this big is almost certain to cause loss of life, and it was not avoided this time either. Remains of a body were recovered from the destroyed apartment. 72 people in the stories below were killed by collapsing ceilings or walls or the ensuing fire, with 173 more people being injured, 39 of them critically. Two police officers just outside the apartment door were killed while their partner sustained only mild injuries due to being on the street level as the explosion occurred. On the streets below 11 more people were crushed by falling rubble with 53 more being injured. Various other injuries were sustained by people being cut by flying glass shards or in traffic accidents ensuing in the chaos.

There has been no confirmation from official sources but it is suspected that the charred remains in the ground zero belong to Melanie Kraft, resident of the destroyed penthouse. According to the surviving police officer guarding her she was in the apartment fifteen minutes prior to the explosion and she did not leave the apartment in the meantime.

Melanie Kraft was more famous as a vigilante called Nightsparrow due to her ongoing trial. She is survived by her husband Andre Kraft with whom she married earlier this year. Nightsparrow belonged to a supergroup called the Militia.

It would be indeed easier for me to list the "facts" that were actually accurate, one of them being that the dream walk with Andre and Melanie did not go well. I'll write a proper recap of all that when the situation with Love Angel has been settled.

No, we're not leaving for LOTRO. (Although one of us is quitting the game, at least for now.) No, there is nothing between Crown, Hand of Andros and Octavo. All of them are perfectly separate problem sources. Kingdom Come was a reference to a badass villain group that we had in SWG. (Coincidentally one of the most successful campaigns that I ever co-wrote and ran.) Subaiku didn't die. Darksparrow is not dying (or if she is it's not my fault!) Doctor Temporis is not a Crown agent (the mind boggles at the sheer thought, really). And no one got to become a god.

That being said, even if people were being suspicious of all the plot twists most still bought on some level the part about a mass exodus. This was particularly confusing to those who were said to be a part of it...

Just so that this does not cause confusion beyond the April 1st I'll remove the bogus recap from this thread. However it will be still available on Silent Tempest forum.

So, sorry, no mountain express to godhood!

PS: judging from the feedback I got at least some of you. Teeheehee...

Not yet recapped but there was a dream walk thingy with Nadia already. It worked. Tonight there is one with Melanie. Taking bets if Andre's and Mel's marriage survives the night. When all the paranoia is stripped away the ugly truth of how much real problems there still are will be revealed.

Taking also side bets if Andre survives the night.

Things go bump in Coile's life. Mostly it's when various people hit his head for one reason or the other.

Rough love

"Holding on -- letting loose
Don't you feel that you are confused
Too many words -- not spoken out
Too many things you've not thought about"
- Accept

Friends are people who like you despite yourself. Friends are also people who take the opportunity to clobber the seven kinds of hell out of your hide when you go all mental at them, for your own protection. Not too long after Melanie kicking Andre's hide for the good measure Subaiku took her turn at the favourite pasttime of "all Coile's women".

The new battle suit didn't provide the buzz, or indeed the drugs that the shadowy background villains wanted to administer them. Not wishing to be a rotten spoil sport Andre wanted to find his original suit and asked Subaiku, his only true ally if she should have the faintest clue where it had been taken from the warehouse. Sure she did, having stolen it with Samuel Blayne a little while ago to be examined and then hidden into the tunnels under Paragon City. Andre demanded that Subaiku take him to it and she agreed, but since there was no reason to take the other suit underground Andre could leave it behind. This was a hard sell to make but eventually the paranoid maniac agreed to relinquish his only means of protection at the entrance to the cavern system. Subaiku took that suit to Silent Tempest base and returned to Andre.

Then she smacked him unconscious. What's remarkable that the guy who was perhaps the most distrusting man alive at the time never saw it coming. Says a few things, really.

After that Subaiku ruffled a few feathers by letting the Tempest know that their erstwhile leader was found and under custody but at the same time refused to reveal his location. Which was good since some time later they hit the shore on Rogue Isles. There a medically trainer person checked that despite all the dire warning the patient was not under immediat threat to his life and then he got relocated back to Paragon City into yet another warehouse.

There Subaiku worked her magicks and took a dream walk into Andre's mind. Oh boy what a mess. Lots of conditioning, eroding the trust and beliefs, hidden embedded commands and the like. In the end she did what she could which was a far cry from fixing it all but also barely enough to let Andre go after the treatment. He'd still be distrustful, probably cold and in a word a mean man but at least he wouldn't anymore summafrily try to kill people who stood in his way.

The next order of business was to meet with Nadia. That evening was an eventful one and contained a lot of shouting, blaming, yelling and a broken parkside table. However it didn't end in a clear disaster as Andre was granted a refuge by Nadia in her home. Goes to show that the history really repeats itself.

The next evening saw a close repeat of the former with Love Angel playing the third wheel. Again teh negative things hit the surface fast and Andre was busy digging a deep hole for himself. It has to be said for the guys doing the brainwashing that when they wanted to undermine Andre's reliance on his friends they did a top notch work.

One thing that came up was that Andre had not contacted Melanie yet. His opinion was that he didn't owe that <insert a few expletives> skanky ho anything. At the same time he just waited for an invitation to go to sleep at Nadia's for yet another night. To Love Angel's apprehension Nadia presented the said invitation as the meeting came to an end.

At this point Andre was desperately fighting his suspicions that he knew by experience to be wrong but that he just could not shake. Nadia was the safest haven that he had and the history had shown to what lengths she would go for him. That's how he reasoned that he could stay at her place until situation improved. Then again the situation with Melanie was volatile enough as things were and a meeting before he had his head in a better order was a sure fire way of bringing utter destruction to whatever little hope they had of salvaging their marriage.

So, he actually reasoned that a way to improve the odds of saving his marriage was to sleep in the bed of another woman for the time being. Maybe Andre isn't stupid at all. Maybe he's uncannily clever to brew such schemes.

Nah, didn't think anyone would believe that. But I had to try, eh?

Ammon pretty much summed up my thoughts, but in a calmer manner than I could have managed.

If a plot makes someone to think about quitting, perhaps the healthy option then would be indeed to quit.

I just wanted to express my belated thanks for the opportunity to get this badge last week. Thank you ever so much! It was four badges at once. Awesome!

287 and counting...

"Hey, pay up!"

"Pay up what?"

"The bet we had, some months ago. That hero guy whom the papers said beat up his women."

"What, when... oh you mean that old thing? He's been in papers again, then? With actual proof?"

"No no, but get this. My sister works in Independence Port Bell hospital and she told me that the same guy beat a woman straight to intensive care. She said it was in a nick of time that she was brought in or she would've croaked."

"Eh, are you sure it was that... what's the name... Coile?"

"Sure I'm sure. So, I bet the story was true and that he beats up women for fun, and here we have a woman in hospital beaten up by him. I rest my case."

"Oh hell. Can't really argue with that. What was it, a pint and ten bucks?"

- as talked about the subject by two men on the evening of 27th March in Pocket D, upper hero bar

I've been swept along on some PvP team while badging for pillboxes. I'm not an avid PvP'er but I never complain about such encounters while in PvP zone, and the few times I've been in a group I've had fun. Could be I'm there next Thursday too, and could be it's less for pillboxes and more for some *fragadoom*.

My lag is horrid and I'm a pure beginner in PvP but I'll put up a fight before I go down. See you in RV.

(( Zarquon! I blame a tiring day. I tried to straighten the paper by rubbing the screen. Just how silly is that?

Heh, I didn't know such a thing was coming up. Maybe the next version has a reward for "dear or alive".

I don't know where this is headed, but I'm positive I'll have a blast finding out. ))