Wolfram

"A man died, and we're calling that a win?" Morpheus108 cut in. "Ladies and gentlemen, I think we need a sense of perspective here. There may be no official state of war between the United States and the Etoile Isles, but surely we can all see that a war is being fought.

"Have you ever taken a walk down to the south end of New Overbrook, or, if you have clearance, visited Siren's Call? I have, and I have seen Arachnos troops occupying US soil. Condemn the heroes of the city for fighting back if you must, but ask yourself: if they did not, who would?

"I'm not going to condone beating a helpless prisoner who has surrendered willingly. But I also don't think we've heard the whole story yet. To what 'deal' was the Reverend referring in that recording?"

An avatar in the form of an elderly man with tanned skin, wearing a tailored suit, enters the room. The name "Morpheus108" hovers above his head. He looks around the room before speaking with an Italian accent.

"Sorry, I hope I'm not too late. Is it possible for me to see a log of what's been said, so I don't start repeating it all?"

((Morpheus108's personal data is mostly empty, stating only that he is male and resides in Paragon City.))

See you around, Pious, take care.

[ QUOTE ]
Stone-Fist turned toward Officer Sula, "Do you want to take Vanguard? I have some...unfinished business with Dr Aeon." He clenched his fist.

[/ QUOTE ]
Vanguard. Great. Jennifer nodded. "Alright, let's go see what we can get out of them." She was no fan of Vanguard, but something about Stone-Fist's manner told her his issues with Aeon Corp were rather more serious. She made a mental note to do some reading on Aeon; she'd never heard more than vague rumours about his misdeeds, but then she'd thought the same about Crey, once.

* * *

The Vanguard operatives were rather begrudgingly cooperative. Jennifer did her best to mask her hostility as they talked to the soldiers who'd had guard duty outside the DPO in the past few days. They admitted having seen a man come and go from the hotel, frequently jumping from a sixth-storey window and returning the same way. They'd basically ignored it, on the grounds that it was common behaviour for some super-types, and much as Jennifer wanted to call them on it, they did have a sort of point. She noted down their description - a large, dark-skinned man usually wearing a black suit with a yellow shirt - and they returned to the station to deliver their findings to Hicks.

((Sula would be me. ))

Jennifer approached the hero who was asking after her, photocopied files in hand. "Excuse me, sir? Are these what you're looking for?" She held them out for him to take. "Don't worry about the lieutenant. He's just had a very bad day." And deserved it, a bit.

"No!" Jennifer shouted, sending a wave of randomised disruption toward where the car had been. There was no target to aim for, nothing but the remote hope of scrambling whatever had hidden it before its escape was complete. She cursed, and relaxed the power, putting her gun back in its holster. "You got any idea what the hell what the hell we're dealing with here?" she asked Gnash.

"We're under attack!" Jennifer threw out a hand toward the charging man. A haze of light shimmered around her as she tried to form a cage around him before he got close enough to land that punch.

[ QUOTE ]
“ Officer Sula care to join me ? (( recall friend )) ..”

[/ QUOTE ]
"Whoa, what the - " Jennifer stumbled slightly as she rematerialised near to Gnash, and looked around. "Oh. Right. We're watching to see if he... she... tries to get out this way, detective?"

Jennifer grimaced and lowered her sidearm, listening as Hicks made his announcement. She'd only ever met one shapeshifter before, and he hadn't made a good impression. Could it be the same one? She wished she knew more about Cyril and his organisation, but this didn't seem like their style. She sighed, and looked around to see where the detectives had gone.

Jennifer blinked, confused by the manager's sudden change of attitude. She took the book from his hands, frowning. "Thank you, sir. You've been most helpful."

She turned to Pious. Had he done something...? No, there was no way he'd be so irresponsible. She shrugged. "Ok, let's head on up. I've gotta warn you, it's not a pretty sight up there."

Jennifer turned to the manager, choosing her words carefully. "Sir, I'm sure you're aware that it is an offense to obstruct a criminal investigation." Not that his refusal was actually obstruction, but then she hadn't actually accused him either. "Now, we can come back tomorrow with a warrant and turn this whole hotel upside down looking for what we need to solve this case. If you decide to cooperate with us right now, you might save us both a lot of difficulty."

Jennifer's vague reveries about places she felt like kicking Lieutenant Hicks were broken as a familiar voice called out across the hotel lobby. She looked up, startled. "Wh - Reverend?"

She hurried over to meet him, her face breaking into a smile. Though this wasn't the first time a friend had come back from the dead, and she'd had some warning, it was still a whole other thing to see with her own eyes. "It's good to see you," she said, lowering her voice as they drew close enough for conversation. "I'm afraid I'm just here for crime scene security, though." She indicated her uniform. "The detectives are all upstairs already. I can show you up there, as soon as I get the register from the manager?"

Jennifer tried not to show her anger and discomfort at Hicks' appraisal, concentrating on the task at hand. "Yes, sir," she replied, turning away as Detective Nash addressed the lieutenant. She moved briskly to the lift and headed downstairs in search of the manager.

Smithers passed on his message and took up position in the corridor as Jennifer moved into the room. She tried not to look directly at the body. It seemed wrong to her that it - she - was still lying there, but the rules about crime scenes were pretty strict. She approached Hicks. "You wanted to see me, sir?"

Standing outside the door to the room, Officer Jennifer Sula nodded to the representative from forensics, and went back to concentrating on not being sick. She'd seen some damned distasteful things in her time as a cop and a hero, but the sheer brutality here...

She wondered whether to consider it providence that she'd been posted here on security detail. They must have been short-staffed to call her in, but at least now she could pick up some details. Maybe Jack would be able to help her piece them together into something she could work with.

Time for another update:

Global Name: @Wolfram
Server: Union mostly.
City of Heroes/City of Villains
RP Characters (varying degrees of active-ness):
Sebastian Wolfram - Sorceror extraordinaire of the Knights Exemplar
The Portent - Conspiracy theorist/spy/detective/gadgeteer-type
Jennifer "Wavekite" Sula - Police liaison officer of the Militia
Ray "Mr. Sandman" Kim - All-purpose amateur computer expert and Warshade
Hank "WarpLocke" Delacroix - Amoral nihilistic techno-vampire and supposed "nice guy" of the Cadre
Zajin - Eugenically-engineered extra-dimensional shapeshifting assassin, property of the Cadre leadership
Operative Alasdair Reeve - Loyal Arachnos crab spider soldier

Type of RP: Pretty much anything, but favour IC missions/TFs, plots and intrigue.
Can be contacted: The Militia Forums, PMs here (maybe) or in game.
Times on: Wednesdays for Militia meetings; Thursdays for Cadre; semi-frequently at other times. Away from the game as of the time of posting until the 27/03 or so.
Timezone: GMT

And I went and missed the finale.

Many thanks to Pious and Damsel for all the good fun had. If anyone's interested in keeping the matches going just for fun, I'll be up for it as soon as I get myself back in front of a CoX-capable computer.

I can offer Jennifer Sula/Wavekite for this plot if wanted, although she's generally stuck behind a desk when working for the PPD due to her mutation. Also she's currently unavailable in-game due to geographical displacement on my part.

You can justify it by pointing out that while boxing can be done just by copying over the brawl animations, doing it for all the other powers would require 500 BAB clone slaves chained to desks to create the hundreds of new animations for no money.

I have considered doing it, but when an opponent has just wiped the floor with you without breaking a sweat, it's hard to muster the enthusiasm to turn the experience into a story...

Being serious, if any of my opponents want to do a write up of a fight, I'm up for it.

So is this on this evening? Think I might actually be able to make it this time.

Very nice. Excellent work, as always.

It's an interesting subject, and one I probably should have been bringing up for a while IC, but it raises a fairly important question: how far do we let real-world politics enter into the game? Obviously this would be an election year in-game, the American political system is quite rigid like that, but is it generally accepted that the candidates and the incumbent in the game world are the same as the ones we've got in the real world? Just interested to see what people's take is on this.

Wavekite, my only eligible voter who's sufficiently developed to have a political stance, will be voting Democrat anyway.

Wolfram glanced at the business card he'd been handed, shrugged, and idly flicked it away. "We can confirm that this is more than simply a tidal event, then? There is evidence of undermining of the divide?"