Paradigm_Shift

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And shaddup Averick! Aren't you dead?

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I had a Funeral for him the Tuesday before last after he was declared legally dead. His body never showed up for the wake. Apparently, it didn't take.

He has really poor taste, not showing up for his own funeral.

The cake was great though. Had "HE'S DEAD! HE'S DEAD!" written on it in pick frosting.

The boy gaped at Harbinger, obviously shocked at his appearance, as if he didn't actually live in the Rogue Isles. Either he was incredibly short-sighted or he didn't get out much.

"Er." He said. "Well. Uh. My name is Millions and, uh...I work with Crey, and uh...We're concerned about the disappearance of several regenerative heroes..."

That should have raised some flags. In the Rogue Isles, the correct term was "vigilantes." And why wasn't the boy making eye contact? He was staring at his feet for crying out loud.

"...And er, we heard that you, a private contractor..." The boy risked a glance. It was obvious he was having trouble believing his own words. "...Were involved with the abduction of another private contractor, who had regenerative powers. I was hoping you could tell me what happened that day. Er. If you don't mind. It would be really helpful.....Please?"

'This guy doesn't look very nice.' The boy thought to himself.

--From the Offices of Crey Industries International: Superhuman Affairs--

To: Gregory Manning

Regarding the recent dispatch of certain offers of employment to certain freelance individuals. We here at the Superhuman Affairs branch have decided it would be a fitting form of field exercise if agent 00916 was deployed as one of your ongoing project's assets. As an employee of Crey Industries, remuneration of agent 00916 for his work will not be of any due consequence to your or your associated branch. You will find that all paperwork regarding agent 00916's is in order pertaining his participation of your ongoing project.

If agent 00916 must be contacted for any reason, his private communication code is *****************.

Sincerely,

Vivian Tucker
Office of Superhuman Affairs, Crey Industries International

***

[u]Port Oaks[u]

A lone boy, looking to be in his late teens wandered down the streets of Port Oaks. This was odd because of the unspoken 'Hide your children' rule that seemed to pervade throughout both the Isles and Paragon city, but also because he was completely unsupervized and therefore a prime target for victimization by...well...anybody, really.

A group of Family actually took notice of him as he approached, and a few of them put hands into their pockets to rest upon unseen weapons. They were all grinning mischievous grins of people who were about to commit a felony.

"Hey, kid!" The foremost button man shouted.

The boy, who had been walking with his head down, broke the number one taboo of the Rogue Isles between normal residents and villains: He looked up and made direct eye contact. The Button Man froze, his smile fading almost instantly into a look of confusion. Behind him, the rest of the mob shifted around uncomfortably as the boy continued to approach.

There was a vague feeling of extreme hostility emanating from him, and suddenly none of them could think about much except for the odd thought that messing with this kid would be a SUPREMELY bad idea. Why they thought this, not even they truely knew. It may have had something to do with his appearance.

He wore light khaki pants, a dark grey, plain t-shirt covered by a particularly long fleece jacket, (even though it was in the upper 70s) and had unusually long and black, curly hair. If anything though, the most prominent feature about him was his brilliant and startling eyes. They were a sharp, cold Turquoise, and they seemed to gleam with something the thugs could not pin down.

The boy stopped three feet away from the Button Man who had called him, whose mouth was now slightly ajar. He had a slightly stunned expression about him.

"Move." The boy said simply.

And the Family member did just that. The boy walked past him, and the Family thugs moved out of his way as he walked right down the center of their group, stopping at the edge of the crosswalk that led across the street. Even though there was no traffic at all, he waited patiently for 30 seconds until the light signaled that he could cross the street. All the while, the Family goons watched him, confused and bewildered.

After walking a further two blocks, the boy suddenly bent down and picked up a rock lying on the sidewalk before turning around and casually chucking it back down the way he had come.

Two blocks away, the Button Man who had blocked his way felt something hard smash into his head at high speed right before he blacked out.

***

[u]Port Oaks Medical Center[u]

"What do you want." A rather grumpy nurse asked.

"Er. I'm reallysorry to...uh...Bother you." The same boy stood at the front desk, looking rather sheepish. He was hunched over now, and was not making direct eye contact. Thus, the nurse mistook him for just another Rogue Isles citizen. "Err. I'm looking for Harbinger Daemon. I think he is still here after being hospitalized a few days ago..." He risked a glance at the nurse.

She put her ciggerette out on the desk. "Look, kid." She said. "I've never heard of this guy before. It could take years to sort through all the files to work out if he is here, and it is against regulations to just let anyone in. You have to make it worth my...that is, you have to make it worth the Hospital's time to allow you to come and go as you please. And you're just a kid. Come back when you're earning minimum wage and we'll work something out." She then blew a smoke ring in his face.

The smoke obscured his face, but they failed to obscure the boy's brilliant, peaceful and serene green eyes. 'Huh. Nice eyes.' The nurse thought absently. And the deeper she stared into them, the more guilty she began to feel...

But the boy turned away before she could change her mind and walked back to the waiting area. He was struggling not to cry. 'Stay calm. Don't panic. Don't be weak.' He thought as he sat down in one of the cheap chairs. 'I'll find a way. There has to be somebody who can help me...'

See, I'm not even going to TOUCH this one.

Which makes sense. I'm not part of the Whitmoore thread.

So the point of this post was. Uh.

I'll take a rain-check on that.

"Stay focused." Egregore said to both Isabelle and Flashpoint. His goggles were currently tinted green with the use of IR Vision, which scanned all the visible rooftops. "And Krueger? I'm seeing heavily armored, cloaked, possibly robotic snipers up on the roofs. Would these be some of those class three fellows you told us about?"

OOC:

I am here. What am I supposed to respond to? Khell's amazing silent treatment?

"That's it?" Legion replied coldly to Toy Dispenser. "You think you can earn our trust with words alone? Words are fragile things. You may speak the truth, but even so, any information you give us is either irrelevant or useless. We would not care even if you could tell us how to effectively square a circle on a flat plane without rounding. Allow us to rephrase our earlier sentiments:

What do you plan to DO to directly aid us to make us trust you, given that there is nothing you can SAY which can do so?"

OOC:

Good as always Brawler, but this thing almost looks like a confession to me. Like you have been playing WoW instead of CoX recently. *If so, you are a filthy, FILTHY heretic and are dead to me*

I mean, seriously. Dark elves? Not to stomp on your parade, but I honestly mean it when I say that Dark elves break the suspension of disbelief when it comes to CoX. And we are talking about CoX here. Perhaps its just me and my tastes, in which case I would advise you t disregard my ramblings and ask somebody who knows EXACTLY what to say in a way that is constructive and not destructive towards your creative process and reasoning.

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Or if your character is a Rikti Spy, I suggest you run the Kelly Uqua arcs, first...

Redside: 35-39: Nerva.

It should help with some of the flavor.

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Interesting case there, she still has a habit of throwing in :'s every once in a while. Not too obvious at first but it's a dead give-away to some. Guess her translator is only mark 2.5

In the offchance you may be able to use this, mark 3 translators are vastly superior to old prototypes. No odd sentence structuring.

Of course, if you NEED the old translator...KHELL. GIT IN HERE NAO!

"This unit has indeed ceased all detectable emissions." Legion said. "But how do we know that we are not being watched even now? Any sufficiently organized regime will have masters of the arcane in its employ, and our sources can list a number of very simple yet effective scrying rituals undetectable by ourselves. And then, assuming we are in fact not being eavesdropped upon, we look forward to learning HOW exactly you intend to earn our trust."

That's pretty much it. Only select heroes/villains would know, unless told off-hand. (And let's face it,you'd be skeptical unless you actually saw it)

They are both complete secrets. Only time travelers have access to one, and the other is filled only with people who fight in order to preserve and protect magics/etcetera. Both are invisible to the public eye, even to some of the major villain groups. I'd think the inter-dimensional ones like Malta, Arachnos and Longbow know about them. *And Nemesis.* And interaction would be pretty nominal. I think both organizations would treat members of any group exactly the same. Mrs. Liberty has access to Ouroboros for example, and she can also use the pillar.

"Zeo is correct." Legion stated. "If gleaning information from this unit is indeed impossible or impractical at this stage, strapping explosives to its chassis before dumping it overboard would be optimal. The possibility of it tracking us is simply too large to allow it to exist. As an added bonus, a powerful enough blast could destroy the tunnel and prevent followers. The cyborg has many nuclear blast modules which we may employ for this purpose..."

OOC:

THE CONSPIRACY! IT LIVES!

Huh. So there must be Xin Ken for every alternate version of Earth I guess. Interesting. Wonder if his story is more or less the same or drastically different.

Flashpoint was lucky. Legion had just come floating in from the last car. Zeo flicked him unsuccessfully, the little drone hovering just out of reach.

"Please refrain from touching the drone. It has a durability rating of five. A stiff breeze could destroy it." Legion said coldly. "As it were, we just expended most of ourselves on getting the train to move and THAT." Legion hovered slightly closer to Toy Dispenser, as if in indication. "If we attempt any more actions, we shall not have enough capacity to continue trying to pacify the exterior source. The cyborg wakes up. Hell breaks loose. We need twenty four hours before we can respond to the current situation, which will most likely not REMAIN as such before then. You will need to find your own method. I will advise that it would be prudent to IMMEDIATELY remove any form of tracking device or beacon from this unit's apparatus to prevent from being followed by enemy forces."

A giant thunderous roar echoed down the tunnel as a giant THING of electricity suddenly erupted from the rails right before the train and threw a literal tsunami of solid power at the clingy Toy Dispenser. But not with the expected intent. Legion could hear everything Toy had said. If he was a high-ranking official, he would make an excellent hostage, or at least a source of information. Robots were suckers for getting the information plunged from their memory banks.

The tsunami of power, if it hit, would unleash a massive, self contained EMP around Toy Dispenser in the hopes of shutting him down while also tossing him ONTO the train, where all the nice men with large guns and angry super-powered individuals were waiting for him...

Toy Dispenser's magical bolts of electricity were effective at making sure he could keep pace with the train while also closing in on it, but unfortunately he had attached them in the first place by attacking the magnetic sections of the railway.

Legion was not amused with his antics.

The rails underneath Toy Dispenser suddenly sparked, gigantic and surprisingly solid fences of electrical energy roared upward to surround him. Should he allow himself to be immobilized, either the train would grind to a dead halt or he would snap like a twig, whichever of the two happened to have more force behind them currently.

In the meantime, the magnetic fields powering the train along strengthened, sending the train hurtling even faster down the rails.

OOC:

The dragon being larger isn't a problem because of how fast the train is going right now. Make it as big as you want. The train will punch a hole in its gut and be on its merry way. This is why bullets work. (Humans being several hundred times larger in mass than a bullet) Imagine a tank shell going through something slightly larger than it. (Not hard to do so) The tank shell is the train. Any questions?

Now knowing you, I'm not going to argue further. If you think the dragon can stop the train just by being large enough, go right on ahead and do that. I will not complain.

And there was movement.

Trains NORMALLY started to move slowly, gradually picking up speed as they went. Legion was not going to have ANY of that nonsense. The train would be departing at full speed from the moment it started to move. A risky proposition, since there was no guarantee the train would not instantly derail. It was a good thing, therefore, that Legion was not actually making the train itself move. No. They were making the tracks force it along, while also forcing it to stay on-track, so to speak.

They magnetized certain areas of the track, those directly below the wheels of the train, and magnetized the wheels as well but with an opposite charge. Then they just moved the location of the charged sections of the railway forward at great speed...

The train went from full stop to full speed in zero time with the aid of questionable physics, and unfortunately for the dragon at the head of the tunnel, the entire situation had changed. It was an unstoppable force meeting a not-so unmovable object. If it attacked the train, it would keep on moving without slowing down and the creature would be splattered. If it turned around to run away in the narrow tunnel, it would be splattered. And it being splattered would not slow the train down one bit.

OOC:

*Ahem*

Am I allowed to move the train yet?

OOC:

I can't do anything until Krueger tells Legion to get the train going.

Which I assume you do not want to happen as long as you are not on said train.

My computer was sent into the shop before I13 hit and I'm not getting it back until later. Can somebody explain to me the new mechanics of base building? I do know that items can now overlap, but how are you getting all the floating/elevated items? In I12 doing some of those stacking jobs would have been impossible. Also, I have seen wall items placed horizontally on the floor and floor items placed vertically on the wall.

A linkie or explanation would be much appreciated.

Also, these base photos have inspired me to invent geocide by chocolate. (ice cream)

"Affirmative." Legion replied before floating over to the controls.

Conflict resolution with th exterior source terminated. Modifications to prime directive canceled. Source: Legion.

The red power drone's use in combat was a density module which helped to increase the density of various assorted things (mostly people) without slowing them down, allowing them to hit slightly harder and take a bit more of a beating than normal.

This was merely their tertiary purpose. Their secondary purpose was a personality backup for Egregore Device. And their primary purpose...If anybody were to open the engine room door, they would find the drone to be missing. But once th go-ahead came in through the walkie talkie, the train WOULD start moving unless any other physical impediments manifested before then.

Too much altisis. My characters die off so fast they rarely reach their first birthday. Cept for a couple of them. And they usually don't celebrate christmas.

Now I feel terrible. *runs off crying*