Aberrant: 200X - Victoria Crush Charity Extravaganza

[Doryoku]

"Sure. I have nothing to do at the moment. Lead on." Sakurako says, smiling, knowing that this might be a... moment.

"Just... what is this about? Also is the delievery point within 20 kilometers?"

[Contessa]

"I-," She started slofty. Why am I saying this? "I think I know what you mean. About being good friends and focusing on that despite there being feelings there too."

"Oh?" The golden nova looked at her wit han interest that was unlike any that men had given her before. It was a look of genuine interest for her and the moment they were sharing, nothing more. The conversation, the opportunity for him to learn about someone new. IT was refreshing, that was for certain.

"Yeah." She fiddled with her glass a bit, stirring the cubes with her gravity fields again. It was easy for Contessa to 'tune out' the world around her, she'd spent a life time doing it. "That guy I mentioned, Sean. He was a really great guy, although I'd never tell him so, he has an ego like you wouldn't believe." She paused and blushed a bit. The grin that spread across her lips as she stared into nothingness told Alex everything he needed to know but the way she gently bit her lower lip while lost in the memories really drove the obvious home. Contessa knew all about crushes. "I didn't know it at the time, but I really liked him, which was strange because I never really liked a guy before." Alex may as well had been invisible. She was speaking, but more to the world around her than directly at him. Apparently this was something that had been riding her conscience for quite some time and his natural charm had strung the right chords. "I kinda treated him really bad, called him names and stuff, and I know I seriously got on his nerves. Mixie always said that it was my way of flirting with him, but in the end I think he just ended up thinking that my dad was really cool for letting him stay with us but his daughter was a total 'B'. So, like my mom, he left one day, and never came back."

To her credit there were no tears, but suddenly her reverie was broken and the memories of how poorly her and Sean got along (80% of the time) did give cause for a sniffle. "So, I'm not unusual, Alex. I'm just like every other person out there. I wanted to treat someone poorly for all the people who had done it to me, and Sean took every stone I tossed. It wasn't until after he left, that I realized how I'd acted, and then I couldn't blame him. He does his own thing, somewhere now. That was a couple years ago and he's probably better off."

Move. On. Cry on Mixie's shoulder later and listen to how awesome the tablet PC he sent her for Christmas is all over again, but for now, just move on. Don't spoil this awesome moment thinking about Sean. And why did she get the tablet PC!?! Ugh, you're such a jerk McCline. The ice in her glass spun slowly to a halt as her concentration was now back on Alex, who ,thankfully, was 'taken' in her eyes by this Jael woman so it promoted him to 'just one of the girls' and she felt more comfortable sitting with him. Unless she's the jealous type. Oh, crap. She's probably super awesome and super powerful and is going to blast me into next week. She's probably here, I'll bet she is. She's out there in the crowd sizing me up. Contessa's eyes darted about for a moment, quickly taking in the environment and looking for any possible locales of this lurking Jael character. Jail... pretty ominous. She's probably served time and can chew through bars with like laser teeth or something. Wait, laser teeth? Seriously, Contessa? Who would erupt with laser teeth? What? Was she mauled by cyborg beavers and erupted to defend herself? Ugh, this inner monologue it totally sucking now... laser teeth... for crying out loud...

"Contessa?" Alex called her name calmly, noticing she seemed rather lost in thought there for a moment. When she looked at him like a spooked rabbit his tone shifted to concern. "Is everything alright?"

"Hmm?" She looked at him, having been brought back to reality. Completely spazzing out seemed like the appropriate thing to do. "Oh, yeah, everything's okay, peachy, I'm good. You good? I'm good." She sipped her coke, now completely embarrassed and feeling like a complete idiot because she let her imagination distract her from the conversation. "So, you play a lot of OpBox?" She feinted and led the conversation away from... whatever the hell that just was. "I totally need to get your gamer tag. Mine's Calamity Jane."

"Calamity Jane?" The sun nova asked curiously. "Sounds like a story there."

"Don't ask." Her brow narrowed and straightened and she offered her rely in a dull, flat tone, like she wasn't too pleased with the name. "Mixie named me that and it stuck since the 3rd grade. I just have yet to find a way to kill the Chinese girl for it. She's very resilient, y'know. I've tried poison, viruses, knifing her in her sleep, Yoko Ono and Kenny G. Parenthetical, in the Key of G, no less. Nothing works." She playfully shrugged her shoulder and let her arms fall to the her sides. "I'm stumped."

[WhiteRain]

"Here," Skein said, handing the glass of water to her, and placing the bottle on the ground beside her.

Chang took the glass from Skein, held it up and bowed her head, in a way unconsciously familiar to anyone who knew much of Chinese culture. She did that sometimes, not that she had ever attempted to remove her past from showing in her behaviour.

They were all products of their past, through one means or another.

"What I believe I have done is not necessarily the same as what you believe I have done, and I would not presume to know what you feel about it. Just as I would thank you to not presume what I should feel. For what it's worth, you have my deepest apologies for what my action has caused."

She watched Katya speak, listened to the vibration of her vocal chords as she shaped the words, the rustle of cloth as she slipped her arm into Radu's, felt the slight shifts of her step and posture.

Chang gave a placid smile. "What I believe you did is destroy a work of art through good intentions. If you believe you did anything different, you are deluded. And if you still have no idea what I feel about it, then I fear you listen as poorly as you comprehend." Her voice still radiated sadness, and now a great weariness, but not anger. "Still, I accept your half-hearted apology. I have no toleration for bitterness in my soul."

It seemed half-hearted to her, though she supposed it could have been complete, perhaps even the best Katya could offer. Listening further, the only conclusion she could come to was that she had not understood Chang's message at all, or misunderstood it so painfully that she thought what she had done was the right thing. Or, as Chang suspected, she had not bothered to think about the message, and did not really care.

She took a shuddering drink of the water. Cool and clean, lacking the impurities present in natural water. Minerals that were not normally present had been added, and she savoured the taste of those, enjoying what she could of her eruption-born gifts.

Chang emptied the glass, then gaped her mouth around it and gulped it down, as she had with the wine glass earlier. At the same time she pressed her hand onto the bottle of water, and sucked it up into her, drawing it through the palm of her hand. Her forearm bulged oddly as the water bottle slid up her arm, its presence undetectable once it reached her bicep. It slid up, through the shoulder, then slid down through her and wound up in her stomach with the glass and water. She tasted the various chemicals in its composition, even as her body began to digest it.

At a guess, she would have said it was polyethylene. Plastic, being so omnipresent in the modern age, had become a substance she was quite familiar with, and whose tastes she had explored in detail. Chang was not terribly fond of it, but she preferred it to polystyrene, which for all the jokes comparing it to the produce of certain fast food venues did not taste near as good. And that was a damning indictment.

She leaned back in her seat, working her neck this way and that again. Turning her head ninety degrees right and left, until her cheek pressed tight against her shoulder and the skin of her neck bent oddly. Chang felt so stressed.

But she was in company, and most of it appreciated and felt for her loss. And, she hoped, they felt some of the loss themselves. Though her art played a crucial role in her own transformation and evolution, she still thought of it as something which touched people, and inspired them, and so on. What she and Shae had created was born of them alone, but she would have liked for as many as possible to have seen it.

Chang sighed. Ah, for what might have been. Of course she cared most for her own loss, but she wondered idly if in the grand scheme of things the onlookers were the ones who had suffered most. The tapestry had come and gone in less than ten minutes.

She heard Katya's words from then, right after the destruction, almost as if they were respoken. "Too exquisite to last, I fear."

Yes, she thought, studying Katya. There was a destroyer in that one. Not yet come to fruition, at the minute born of thoughtlessness, but that could change. She wondered if it would?

[GDP_ST]

"Well, I won't press you this time, but next time I find you skulking in the corner of a party in dire need of a drink, the price is that story." Alex told Contessa firmly, his smile warm. "My tag's Ray O'Sunshine, which I thought was clever when I was four months old."

"It's cute." Contessa giggled. "Kinda makes you sound like a leprechaun." The thought of Alex wearing a little green hat and talking about his lucky charms in a mock-Irish accent caused the giggling to end in possibly the dorkiest snorting fit in the history of Dorkdom, but Contessa didn't care. She recovered and took a drink of her Coke, leaning companionably on the table and enjoying the company of someone other than Mixie for the first time in, like, forever. "So what games do you play?"

"I'm mainly a casual FPS-er." he told her, taking a sip of his own drink. "Though I did get on Novas! Online once. I tried to make myself up as a character, but it couldn't really account for my Catalyzation ability. I mean sure, there was the absorption ability to make yourself stronger, but I can do more than that." He shrugged and grinned sheepishly. "Then I thought that I might be being a teensy bit narcissistic and stopped. These days I mostly play Battlefield: Elites and Call of Duty 7. How about you?"

[Jael Carver]

“So that was the Crush kid,” Matt said casually, steering Jael away from where they’d mingled with the golden nova.

“That was Sunshine,” Jael said, casting a coy look over her shoulder at the back of his golden head disappearing into the crowd.

“You should have given him something more imposing,” Matt said. “You probably turned him into an eternal wuss with that name.”

Jael’s expression twitched slightly, exactly like the expressions of employees around the world swallowing an angry comment in front of a boss or client. “He likes it,” Jael said mildly instead.

“Yeah, he’d also like to hump your leg,” Matt laughed, “though it’s hard to blame the boy for it.” He flashed Jael a smile. “I mean… I like to hump you, just not your leg.”

“The humping days are done,” Jael said icily.

Matt frowned. “I have to know, what is up with that? We used to have fun. You goin’ all prude on me?”

“It’s really none of your business,” Jael replied, “just as it was never your business that I was willing to have sex with you.”

“That didn’t make sense,” Matt said. “It was sex with me. I think that makes it my business.”

“I mean, the reasons for having sex with you… you know what? Here’s what you need to know,” Jael said, turning to face Matt. “I’m not having sex with you anymore.”

“Fine,” Matt said with a shrug. “You aren’t the only hot tail out there. You’re not even the hottest I’ve had.”

“Classy,” Jael smirked. His comment stung a little; she reminded herself that he was just an ass, saying anything that might get a rise from her.

“You’ll miss me, when Goldie there starts dry-humping your leg,” Matt smirked. “Especially that thing I do with my-”

“Shut up about Sunshine,” Jael growled. “He might be young, but he’s not retarded.”

“I dunno, he seemed socially retarded to-” Matt’s sentence was cut off by Jael’s hand across his face. The man froze, as did several of the watchers nearby.

“Don’t. Talk. About. Sunshine,” Jael snarled, her eyes flashing dangerously.

The chords of Mean Bitch rolled from the speakers. “That’s my cue,” Matt said, his face angry. “Oh, and it’s been nice working with you, but you know Management won’t keep people who can’t stay on script. Tada.”

Jael sighed once he was gone, her face in pensive lines. It wasn’t like she’d liked this job, but it was so little effort for so much money. You don’t know that they are going to fire you, she tried to console herself. Turning, she glanced around the room, looking for that warm glow. It took several minutes to find it; the room was full of all kind of lights – some nova and some electric – and he was sitting down, not standing. Spotting him, she headed that way, wondering if she shouldn’t just go home. No, she’d been hired for the full event, so she had to stay. Well, she might as well try to have some fun.

When she saw Sunshine was with some blonde chick, she stopped. The flare of jealousy that sprang up in her was as strong as it was irrational. Stop it, she growled to herself, forcing a smile and walking over. “Hey, Sunshine. Hey, new girl I don’t know. Can I join you guys? Or am I intruding?”

[Contessa]

"Mmm." She nodded her approval while her lips were occupied by the straw. "I like FPSes too, but I like the more creepier ones, like the Bioshock stuff, or F.E.A.R.. The Call of Duty stuff I play because Mixie really likes them, but they seem kinda bland ever since they introduced the Elite Warfare that's all people play now. But Mixie and I play Novas! Online, if you wanna give it a shot we're on the Utopia server. I couldn't make an accurate character either, so I made Calamity Jane a brick with serious bad luck issues."

You can do it...

"I um, totally have this hardcore system link set up in my basement, Mixie and I are the only ones who ever use it but it's a four system set up." Come on, he's totally cool, just relax and... "Meaning that there's two spots open." Come on, girl...

"It sounds like you're one serious gamer girl." Alex chuckled slightly impressed.

"Oh gawd yeah, I'm totally hardcore." She admitted with a measure of pride and confidence. Just ask him, he seems like he kinda likes you. Relax, girl, his girlfriend is probably totally cool."And I was thinking that if you were available some time, maybe we could get together and totally tank n' spank for a bit?"

I did it! I just totally asked him to hang out! I, Contessa, am totally and equivocally, without a doubt...

Quote:

“Hey, Sunshine. Hey, new girl I don’t know. Can I join you guys? Or am I intruding?”

... a dead woman.

It didn't take a rocket surgeon or a brain scientist to figure out who this new and stunning blonde beauty was. She had Jael written all over her and as time froze Contessa's lightning fast brain worked to surmise that about all Jael just heard her say to her 'boyfriend' was that Tessa was totally into hardcore, had conveyed an interest to hook up with Alex, and there were to be sessions of tanking and spanking involved in his immediate future.

Calamity Jane had struck again.

Alex looked to Contessa for her approval to have Jael join them and, embarrassed, she simply just nodded. "Uh, I'm Contessa." She offered a lazy wave to her and her hand slapped back down onto the table as she wait for his girlfriend's laser teeth to shred her to pieces.

Awkward...

Click to reveal..

Contessa has the awesome ability to screw up even the most simplest of social interaction. Her intentions were just to invite Alex over fro an afternoon geeky MMORPG playing. Those in certain circles may understand her, but over the talking of the crowd and only hearing bits and pieces of the proposition, it would be totally easy for it to be read the wrong way.

[Magnum Opus]

Originally Posted By: Sakurako Hideyoshi

"Sure. I have nothing to do at the moment. Lead on." Sakurako says, smiling, knowing that this might be a... moment.

"Just... what is this about? Also is the delievery point within 20 kilometers?"

"It's a special delivery for Contessa. She's apparently in the VIP lounge. That should be close by. Why?"

[z-Brawlzilla]

Gladius and Brawlzilla danced around the arena for a time, throwing ranged attacks at one another with abandon. However, both of them were running low on juice, forcing them to move closer and rely on lower-energy attacks. They finally were face-to-face again, standing on a platform high over the arena. They were on a level with the skyboxes now, forcing the guys in the cheap seats to watch the action via the massive monitors.

The two novas stared at each other for a moment, Brawlzilla shiny with her excreted mucus and red-skinned from her damages and exertion while Gladius was panting and bleeding from a cracked lip. There was no mercy or concession in either’s gaze; both were focused on one thing: defeating the other one. The thoughts of charity and even giving the crowd their show were forgotten in the heat of the fight.

Even the crowd seemed to sense that this was the final moments of what would become an unforgettable fight. They fell silent and still, an oddity in the Combat Zone. There was still noise, but it wasn’t at the usual volume. The moment seemed to be grabbing everyone, transmitting the emotions of the combatants to the gathered watchers.

Then they moved. The spell was broken as they lashed out at one another, resorting to brute force. Gladius blocked many of the attacks with his shield, but spent so much time parrying that he wasn’t able to level much of an offense of his own. He still got in some solid blows, once cracking a rib with a particularly solid punch.

It was terribly close. Bookies around the world were sweating as the two went into a wrestling lock, so close to exhaustion that they could only stagger against each other for a moment. The camera zoomed in to focus on their straining, sweating faces-

The end came suddenly. In his tiredness, Gladius had forgotten what a poor idea it was to attempt to grapple ‘Slippery Sally’ – a name never used in her presence, naturally. The tendrils whipped around his shield, catching him about the throat and ripping him off of her. He attempted to hold on, but the greasy excretion that made her so impossible to grapple gave him nothing to grip, as it coated her eufiber, too.

Brawlzilla threw Gladius off the platform, sending him falling toward the hard floor below. Gladius couldn’t fly; he fell, helpless to stop his plummet. Hitting the floor hard, he was rendered unconscious. Brawlzilla went to the edge of the platform and looked down; seeing her opponent down she screamed her victory and thrust her arms into the air.

After the victorious woman had been led away, and they had scrapped Gladius up from the mat and taken him backstage, Bombshell stepped out to the Zone. “We’ll be taking a twenty minute intermission for that the technicians can restructure the Zone. You do not want to miss what we have planned, so pick up your popcorn, hot dogs, nachos, drinks and special, limited edition VCCE memorabilia and get back to your seats!” Thunderous music played as the massive curtains fell to cover the Zone, allowing Bomb to get out of the way as the technicians worked their magic.

Click to reveal..

Here’s how I determined the outcome:

[Carver] 9:26 pm: Someone, anyone: high or low?

[The Bomb] 9:31 pm: High

Carver *rolls* 1d100: 93: 93

[Carver] 9:31 pm: Thanks!

[Jael Carver]

“Or perhaps I am intruding.” Jael’s patience was finite on good days, and the imminent loss of her first real job had definitely moved this day into the ‘bad’ category. Jael froze with her hand on the chair she’d started to claim. “You two seem to be having a great conversation. Maybe I can join? We can talk about my favorite interactions.”

She turned and caught a waiter’s arm. “A glass, please,” she said civilly enough, but there was a glint in her gray eyes that made him move with alacrity.

“We’re having Coke?” Jael asked, sitting down. “Delightful.” Her smile was brittle and hard, and Contessa saw her death writ larger with each passing moment. “So, I believe you guys were talking about hardcore spanking? And tanks? Sounds like fun. But not as much fun as my favorite activity: cutting trespassers into pieces.” Silver claws flickered into life, tapping the table. Even that light motion was enough to put gouges in the surface. “And I’m really, really good at it.”

[Doryoku]

Sakurako turns to knockout and places a hand on her shoulder. "How much do you weigh? I know the total weight of that suit is .25 kilograms. Just please tell me in metric."

She smiles as her long, uncharacteristically brown hair turns silver. "And DON'T break off contact until we make it to the other side. You're about to experience what it's like to be uploaded... and downloaded."

Sakurako closes her eyes and from a wireless point near Knockout's studio, she jumps through IPs logged in until she finds a open wireless port next to the VIP lounge. "So, weight? I got a bandwidth limit."

[GDP_ST]

For a long moment both teens stared at the silvery claws, Alex taken aback for that instant by Jael's sudden aggressive possessiveness. Wait, she thought... 'Hardcore spanking'? Oh... Right. Jael's not a gamer. It was almost funny, but there was nothing funny about her bringing out those silvery claws and staring at Contessa that way. He'd not really seen this side of the woman he loved before, and it alarmed him.

Contessa, on the other hand, was staring at those claws fixedly, her mind working on several levels.

• Level One: Gee, interesting the way light plays on those. They seem to be some construct of energy in coherent form rather than animal-like talons. And see how they cut without apparent effort. Memo to self: If you survive this encounter, never use gamer-speak in ambiguous circumstances again.
• Level Two: She's called Jael, she's done time, and she's about to do more for cuttin' a bitch. Mix, I love you and I want you to have my stuff. Dad, I'm sorry I squeezed the toothpaste from the middle. Sean, I wish I'd had time to tell you how special you are, and not in a 'ride in a short yellow bus while licking the windows' kinda way.
• Level Three: Sharp! Pointy! Stabbity! Eep! Don't move and maybe she won't be able to see me.
• Level Four: This level of Contessa's consciousness is closed due to panic. Normal service may resume soon, if she's still alive. Have a nice day!

As all things do, the paralysed moment of 'Oh, shit' (or in Tessa's case, 'Oh, shoot.') came to an end as Alex laid a hand over Jael's, his touch light as he meant to reassure, not actually physically restrain. She broke off her gimlet-edged stare from Contessa to look at him.

"It's not what you think." he told her gravely. "Contessa was just-"

"I got the idea." she interrupted dryly, the edge still in her voice.

"I don't think you did." he smiled despite the seriousness of those talons mere inches from his hand. It wasn't bravery so much as the rock-solid belief that Jael wouldn't deliberately hurt him. "We were talking about OpNet gaming." He watched the flicker of wariness shifting to puzzlement, then lingering suspicion as Jael glanced at the petrified Contessa.

"'Tank n' spank'?" she asked, eyebrow raised sceptically as she looked at Alex. He nodded, a smile quirking his dimples.

"It's a term from the MMO's. It means that the person who can absorb the most damage and last the longest when the enemy's focusing on them -the tank- keeps the enemy focus while everyone else stays back and either heals the tank or spanks the enemy." he said with the casual assurance of someone who'd probably never been called a nerd before tonight, and wouldn't give a hoot if they were. "I've not really tried those games because to get the most out of them, you need friends. Contessa's got a sweet hardcore rig set up, and she was just inviting me round to hang out and play. She wasn't hitting on me, Jael." he told the woman he loved soberly, as he poured her some Coke with his other hand. "She's not like that. I came over to talk to her, because she looked like she needed a drink and was all alone at a party."

"So... Yeah, Contessa, this is Jael - who I told you so much about. Jael, this is Contessa, who's really nice and doesn't deserve to be cut into pieces of any size." There was a firm note in Alex's glorious tenor voice, despite the warm smile he gave both women. He removed his hand from atop Jael's as he sat back, watching.

[Magnum Opus]

"I don't... uhm... give that out... can't we just walk? I mean, it's right over there..."

Knockout's voice trailed off as she realized this was an argument she was going to lose, so she just closed her eyes and tried not to think about the dead-clone theory from Star Trek.

[Doryoku]

Sakurako withdraws her hand and her hair changes back to a brown color. "Hmm... you're right. this isn't a rush job I suppose."

She itches her nose in embarassment. "Also I shouldn't have tried to pry that out of you. My apologies... Anyways let's run that package to whoever needs it." She says, smiling. "If it's not far, why waste the juice."

[The Mariner]

Mary wakes up, the sound from the attendees is just too loud for sleep. Then again, the headache has abated to tolerable levels. She also notices her stomach growling.

"Damn... empty tank... what do they got here..." Mary says low, scanning the various sandwiches still on the tables, drinks, snacks, all with a hungry eye.

"Ah hah... fancy ham and cheese." She walks over and grabs three... four... five of the sandwiches and grabs a large glass and fills it to almost spilling from the punch bowl.

"Hehehe... yum." she mutters before turning about, seeing a couple of the caterers looking at her with a disdainful face. "What? I just went toe to toe with a wrecking ball and won... I deserve this." She says with a gaze that would petrify air. "You're still getting paid for your services... so chillax."

She walks back to her couch. "That and everyone's already had their fill and the show's just now half-way over..."

[z017]

Shae returned the slight smile and nodded to Katya. She was still sorting through all that had happened and what her spouses could supply her with from her time disorientation. She stood up, teetering enough to stumble forward and catch herself by wrapping an arm around Tomas' waist. The other arm reached out, her fingertips brushing gently down Saori's back; her appreciation and love for her mother/wife flowed through that simply touch.

*Thank you, my loves. I'm alright, though. Chang and I....I cannot describe, but there is truth in what Katya said. I might have been able to hold on longer, but I might have lost myself that way as well. You were patient with me, taught me when I knew little and corrected my mistakes. Give her the same benefit.* The mental voice became wicked and licentious, *And the same instruction, at a time of our choosing, no? Her touch was...glorious, the touch of a goddess, it was simply too much for me then. Her mistake to paint on another's canvas, my weakness to be ruined by it. We're both young.* Her words betrayed a simple truth for the family, though: over the past year, Shae had grown quite a bit. Xe was no longer the scared, running child of a forgotten past.

Aloud, the red-haired beauty said, "Yes, I would like that, Katya. But not now, I think." Her lips quirked in amusement as she continued to lean on her sidhe husband, "Perhaps we should turn our attention to the scheduled events for a bit and give the room some time to settle?"

[Contessa]

One could have cut the sudden tension with a knife and like a scolded child Contessa simply lowered her head into her shoulders slightly. When Jael began rapping her 'nails' on the table each tap, although Contessa was completely enraptured by the scientific applications of the material her node could create, she winced slightly at every *tap* on the clothed surface of the expensive table.

A sigh of relief came when Sunshine spoke first and she certainly did appreciate they way he covered for her and defended her. By this point her face was so beet red that Jael, who was rather exceptional at intimidation, could see Contessa was about as frightened of her as any weaker animal on the food chain could ever have possibly been.

"I, I, uh, uh, I..." Sunshine watched as every higher function in her brain broke down at once. This didn't seem the girl he was talking to a moment ago. "I am so sorry, Ms. uh, Jael. We weren't, I mean, I wasn't, you know, trying to. Oh.... boy. Uh, I, I should probably get going, I've done enough damage here." There was the hint of moisture swelling in her eyes as she stood up and managed the one of the most forced smiled the two people had ever seen. "I-it was nice meeting you Alex, um, you too Ms, uh, Jael..."

She hesitated for a moment, her hand moving back and forth at her side as if she were fighting with her self to offer it to Alex for a polite shake but there was certainly a fear that Jael might remove it.

In stead she settled for a upraised hand that remained close to her body, she didn't wave it, just sort of shook it fearfully. "Uh, bye."

She spun one hundred eighty and, for a geek in heels, sure seemed to be able to walk swiftly. Within a moment the white of her outfit was consumed by the sea of shadowy tuxedos and evening dresses.

Click to reveal..

Knockout/Saku - Since you two are headed that way, you could easily bump into Tessa while she moves through the crowd to get away from Crazy Jael Lady.

Those who can track (via scent, colactive perception, lo-jack or what have you), if tracking is needed, will find Contessa in the ladies rest room balling her eyes out for being such an idiot and embarrassing her self and Sunshine in front of his girlfriend.

[Jael Carver]

“God damnit,” Jael growled as Sunshine leveled his blue eyes on her. Despite her cursing, her expression was rueful as well as contrite.

“I should go-” Sunshine started, only to stop when Jael laid her hand on his shoulder.

“No, I should. I’m the one who got it wrong,” Jael grumbled, rising. “Just go make some more friends, only guy ones. Ugly guy ones, ok?” Still looking annoyed – though that was at the situation and herself more than anyone else – she wove her way through the crowd. Damn, that girl can book, Jael sighed as she began to pick the girl’s scent out of the mass of humanity and novanity.

“Oh, come on, are we in a John Hughes movie?” Jael snarled when the trail led to a bathroom. “Argh…” The annoyed nova drew in a breath, preparing herself. It’s easy, she coached. Just walk in and say sorry, explain you’ve had a bad night… maybe… maybe invite her back to the table. Jael braced herself and walked inside.

“Uh, Contessa-” Oh, fuck me, she’s crying. Jael cast about, desperate for an out. But there was no escape from the sobbing girl. “Look, uh, Contessa, I’m-”

“Here to beat me up,” the ditzy blonde said, sniffling. “And I understand.”

Jael paused and blinked, struggling to deal with the sudden change in the conversation. “You… no, you don’t-”

“Think you’ll go easy on me,” Contessa said, her lips trembling as she lifted her chin. “I wouldn’t expect that. I totally deserve it for speaking to your boyfriend and inviting him over to my house.”

“Can you pl-”

“Stand still? Yes, I can, how about here by the sinks, so I can get the blood out of my clothes immediately,” Contessa said, scurrying over. “Oh, this is a good spot.” She turned and bravely faced Jael. “I’m ready.” She immediately squeezed her eyes shut.

“Are you done talking?” Jael asked, feeling a pinprick of pain start behind her eyeballs.

“Yes. You can hit me now.”

“Thank you, only I’m not going to hit you,” Jael said. She crossed her arms and said, “I had a shitty night and heard the wrong thing, so I thought the wrong thing. My bad.” Say it. You can! “I’m sorry.”

[Magnum Opus]

As they were walking into the crowd, Danielle fought the urge to go incognito. She only really had one "normal her" and it wouldn't do to let everyone know what it looked like.

So the stares fell on her, as they always did. Danielle proceeded forth, stopping behind Contessa. She coughed, to clear her throat.

"Contessa! I have a - a something here, from a secret admirer of yours! Uh, here it is." Danielle held out the box with the rose in it. "Nobody read my mind or anything, okay? Let me repeat that, nobody read my mind."

[Doryoku]

Sakurako knows she's walked off the deep end now... it would be better to stay quiet and let Knockout do her thing then get the frigging hell out of this shark tank. Something about the atmosphere here didn't feel right to her, and Knockout's body language wasn't helping the situation.

Then there was this other woman... Crying...

Some serious shit went down and Sakurako just stands there. Looking like a red sportscar, all speed and looks and no real substance.

Then Knockout having to go head first wearing that pink number...

Oh dear Sakurako... I think you just messed up. She thinks. Not considering the fact that if there's sensitive enough novas around... that sentiment might have broadcast.

[Christian H. Blues]

Whilst Mary Masters was feeding her nova appetite, whilst gods and monsters argued and railed against one another in the Talent Lounge, and whilst Jael Carver was apologising(!?) to a beautiful blonde who'd invited her Sunshine over to her cellar for some nefarious purpose, there was one present at the party who did not care for food, or art, or jealousy...

He watched as a handsome man finished speaking with a godling with a swirling auric nimbus and an angel's smile, and was approached immediately afterwards by a thickset, fortyish man with glasses and a balding pate, who was accompanied by a dignified, slim woman of the same age with white hair and a handsome face.

"Julian!" Dr May turned as the older man grabbed his hand and shook it. "Glad to see you here. This is Anna Garbinia, Mayor of Minneapolis. Mayor, this is Dr Julian May, one of my most promising and talented proteges."

"Professor Harris does me too much credit." Dr May said, shaking hands with the Mayor. "Or is it Director Harris, now. I heard you're to head up the Minneapolis Facility. Congratulations."

"And you're a senior trainer now." Harris beamed. "Julian was always the best of us at helping young novas into the right frame of mind to focus their abilities. Very much a people person, and an excellent grasp of the way an M-R node is steered by the will of the nova using it." he confided to the Mayor, who smiled approvingly. "If it hadn't been for N-Day, Julian would be a much sought-after educational psychiatrist."

"So the Project must have liked the work you did with Triton." May observed in a pleasant tone. "What was it, exactly?"

"Structural analysis of late-stage nodes." Harris said. "We made some fascinating breakthroughs with the help of our volunteers." A short distance away, a pair of eyes narrowed slightly. "I'm hoping that, as Director, I can continue to work closely with the Triton facility in the city and continue to push back the frontiers."

"Excuse me, Director." The three turned to look at the neat, slim little man, Harris's aide, who approached with a phone in his hand. He leaned close to Harris and murmured. "There's a Beta-clearance call for you. It's the Facility. You're to call them back from a secure location."

"What, now?" Harris asked, then sighed ruefully. "The downsides of promotion. The more you make, the more they take - in this case, time. Julian, look after the Mayor for me, would you?. Madame Mayor, I shall be right back." His aide led the Director to his private skybox, locking the door as Harris pulled out his own OpPhone and hit the button for speed-dial to the Rashoud Facility. It was answered on the third ring by his secretary.

"Jenny? What's the issue?"

"Director?" The woman sounded confused. "What do you mean?"

"What do you mean, what do I mean?" Harris demanded a little crossly as he cast a glance at his aide. "You're the one who- Dear god!" He dropped the phone and stepped back, the woman's voice calling "Hello? Director? Hello!?" clearly audible in the horrified silence. Harris's eyes were glued to his aide. Or rather, to whatever had been wearing the shape of his aide.

Flesh rippled and restructured, skin peeling back and the raw muscles underneath writhing like a nest of snakes, small tendrils of fleshy matter fronding into the air as the aide's whole body, clothing and all, seemed to shiver through a controlled explosion and reformation. It was like watching a living person unravelled and then put back together by trillions of microscopic surgeons, and was just as disturbing to watch, even though it took a mere three heartbeats before the form resolved. Harris took several running steps back as he recognised the figure before him, backpedalling incontrollably into the vitrium-panelled, one-way glass of the skybox.

"You." It should have been an exclamation, but Harris couldn't manage it, the word instead coming out as a dull, frightened moan.

"Me." replied the other in an ominously calm tone, stepping forward onto the phone, which crunched beneath his foot as though a potato chip rather than hardened plastic. "I am glad you remember. It makes things more fitting."

"Oh my God." Harris fell to his knees, looking up at the handsome features above him. "You're here to kill me. I swear, we were trying to help you! You have to believe me."

"But I don't. And thus, I don't." the pleasant-faced young man dressed in a casual dark blue suit said in reply as he reached for the Director. "Your aide went quickly. You won't die anywhere near so fast." Horror built on horror in the doomed man's eyes as he realised what the other meant.

"No!" he squealed, and tried to rush to his feet, to push past the nova and reach the door. He may as well have tried to push over wall. Inhumanly strong fingers gripped his shoulders and forced him back to his knees as the fat man squealed and screamed for help. But in the soundproof skybox, the only answer that came was the distant roar of the crowd, as though approving of the scene taking place on the plushly carpetted floor. Harris tried to plead.

"You don't have to do this. You don't! You can't! I'll tell you everything you want. I'll confess to it all. Plea-" A hand clamped over his mouth as the nova leaned over him, dark eyes looking into his.

"I don't want your confession. Someone higher up will be dragged in front of the world naked to confess, but not you. But you are right - you will tell me everything."

C.H. paused for a moment, savoring this moment, the first step on his chosen path. The frightened man's sweat, his piggy eyes rolling back and forth in pain and panic as he started to beat futilely against Christian's legs and stomach. He remembered how those eyes had regarded him as nothing but a thing to cut open, a tool for research with no more importance than a petri culture.

"If I were a tragic Frankenstein's monster confronting his creator, now would be the time I would rail against you, asking you why. But you didn't make me, little man. You simply poked and prodded, cut and sliced as I writhed in agony on your lab table. I do what I do here, not because you and the other men with their drugs and acids and electrodes made me the monster, but because I choose to be the monster." He saw incomprehension in the man's eyes, and sighed. "It might come to make sense to you over the next week or so."

He reached down into himself, feeling the node pulse rhythmically like a second heart. As he had been taught, he leaned on it, flexed the quantum muscle in a way that would make it protest, and thus grow, spilling enormous power though his body. This had to be perfect, the end to the stalk, his prey kicking and fighting against the inevitable darkness - baseline frailty overwhelmed utterly, fodder for the Monster.

He lifted his hand away and grabbed the man by the shoulders once more, lifting him into the air like a pillow as Harris began kicking and screaming once more. How like a pig he sounds C.H. thought absently as he pulled the corpulent body against his own and melded, pulling the Director's cellular structure into his own, keeping the man's body and consciousness encased within the quantum matrix of his body.

Normally this took seconds, but this time it took a couple of minutes, because C.H. wanted it to be slow. He wanted the Director to scream and weep, to rage and wail, to experience every painful moment of his body being pulled apart and assimilated whilst he still lived. The feet and hands were the first absorbed, frondlike tendrils of reddish-black matter latching onto them and drawing the limbs slowly into C.H's body like a stick slides into water. Then the legs and arms, then the hips, stomach, shoulders, and lastly the head, protruding from C.H's chest blubbering and crying out for mercy as a mesh of tiny fleshy tendrils wrapped around the fat face and, finally, pulled it in, leaving only silence behind.

*You can hear me now, can't you?* he told the panicky little mind sharing his body. He felt the other consciousness try to steal control of the 'shared' cells and laughed. *Ah-ah, don't try it. I'm much stronger than you. Spending years in Bahrain does that, you know. Alone, helpless, in pain and darkness. I lasted seven years. You will last one day for each of those years, Harris, as I absorb the sum total of you.*

His weight had more than doubled, though he showed no sign of the extra biomass that was part of his quantum-enhanced frame as he turned towards the door. Flesh rippled, red and black fronds again waving in the air as Harris's aide re-merged and exited the skybox, leaving an empty room and a flattened phone. Moving with an eerie, uncanny economy of motion the neat little man with the fussy-looking face made his way to the exit, smiling for the cameras in the lobby as he went.

C.H's work here was done, and he had no need to remain.

Click to reveal..

Power Maxing: taking 1 Taint, spending 3 qp to add 4 rating to Incorporate.

Spending 3 qp to Incorporate the Director

Incorporate Roll Roll: [10, 2, 4, 5, 3, 4, 9, 1, 6, 8, 1, 8] + mega [7, 3, 8, 2, 9]. Total Successes: 10.

Director's Willpower Roll] Roll: [7, 7, 9, 8, 4]. Total Successes: 4.

C.H's WP roll to reduce Taint channeling cost

Roll: [3, 2, 9, 6, 5, 5, 7]. Total Successes: 2.

-1 quantum to channel Chrysalis

Spending 6 qp

+1 Temp Chrysalis

[WhiteRain]

Chang studied Katya and Skein, sensing some unspoken resentment between the two. It seemed quite unimportant, though. Everything did.

Before her, Shae stirred and stood, finally regaining her feet and shaking off the emotional storm caused by the break. She turned to Katya.

"Yes, I would like that, Katya. But not now, I think. Perhaps we should turn our attention to the scheduled events for a bit and give the room some time to settle?"

Chang could feel her emotional typhoon blustering out. She had peaked and shattered, and now her colder side had stepped back in. Shae and her family had brought her surprises a-plenty, and pleasant ones. She appreciated that.

Now, though, she felt ennervated, drained. Even her emotions seemed dull and lifeless. In the aftermath of her tapestry's destruction, she felt emptier than a broken glass. Emptier than the glass even now digesting in her stomach.

Emotional highs had never been her natural environs. Her husk had been a calm, quiet thing, and like all Novas she took much of her habit and demeanour from the fragments of the husk not blazed away by the quantum inferno of eruption. That scream... her own scream... it echoed in her ears. She could hear them, even feel them, through senses she had not had in the past. A sound that pained lasted for a long time.

She thought that, if she died soon with her dreams unfulfilled and her potential unexplored, that sound would be her ghost's noise. A heartfelt, burning scream that contained every conceivable might-have-been and never-will-be.

Chang leaned back in her chair, thinking.

That sound... could she reproduce it? Perhaps. If she could remember it, she could reproduce it, her throat was more nimble than that of any Nova she had ever heard of, let alone met. There were few sounds she could not reproduce if she were in the mood to do so.

The tricky part lay in the resonance, the emotion. Part of her hoped she never would be able to reproduce those feelings. Contrary even to her own belief, she was not a huge glutton for punishment. She did not want to suffer, even though it aided her artistic endeavours at times.

Still... she could work that into the new album.

Something new began to stir in her mind. That scream could be the basis for a whole track. If she could put that moment of agony onto record, and share it... Perhaps she could redeem even this loss.

Chang rose from her chair, soundlessly. She did not feel needed here. It seemed the others wanted to return to the evening's activities, to the XWF matches and interviews and whatever else was planned. She needed to think.

Leaving them talking, Chang moved to the back of the room, and left the Talent Lounge.

She rested against the wall, leaned back and stretched her torso out until her hands touched the roof. Again, she felt little bits of stress leaking out. She twisted herself until her torso looked almost like a length of rope. Chang uncoiled and twisted the other way, feeling yet more stress leaving her with the delicious tension of her body.

The air filled with the sound of creaking flesh as Chang unwound and retracted, until she was just a woman again, leaning back against the wall, eyes closed yet watching all. Not that there was much to see.

Out here, in the through-space between here and there, nobody dallied. Everybody was going somewhere.

Right now, though, nowhere felt like a good place to be.

Chang tried to relax, to let her node sponge up the quantum in the atmosphere, to stir herself back to life again. Most of all, she needed to recapture that sound.

She focused hard on listening for the echoes, imprinting them into her mind as vividly as she could. And the echoes, those as well. The final sound would be made of the real thing and its echoes.

A faint smile crossed her lips. Scrambler would no doubt have thought she made a ridiculous spectacle of herself, and laughed.

Maybe so. But she hoped they remembered. Not the talking, the wasted words that would change nobody's mind about anything, not the drinking, the repetition of a meaningless action out of habit alone, and not the bickering that seemed to be threatened. She almost hoped they forgot she had ever been there... just so long as they remembered that tapestry.

It could not be retained, no. Quantum limits alone guaranteed that. The impulses of one Nova and the inexperience of another had sealed its fate still more. But it could be remembered by those who witnessed it, those blazing beings the world called Novas, with unlimited potential and for whom life could be forever.

She hoped that would be her destiny, sometimes. A memory of art, never forgetting, never diminishing. An unfading footprint, going on forever and ever, until the end of time.

[Firanis 'Fi' Flux]

Katya gave Chang a small, sharp smile and a slight, gracious bow of the head, but otherwise remained silent. Apparently an honest apology without tears and dramatics wasn't enough for her and she wasn't inclined to faked them as a sop. Pity. I rather liked her music and it would have been nice to talk with her for a bit. No bitterness, but she sure wields a mean, passive-aggressive whip.

Out of the corner of her eye, she watched Chang consume her water, glass and bottle and all, rather intrigued with the way her flesh distended to incorporate them. A shift of perspective, and she could see the orange-red warm radiating from Chang, and the relative coolness of the plastic bottle sliding through it. As new experiences go, it wasn't one she fathomed trying, but it certainly was interesting to watch.

"Yes, I would like that, Katya," Shae said, leaning against the lithe, dark gorgeousness of Tomas. "But not now, I think. Perhaps we should turn our attention to the scheduled events for a bit and give the room some time to settle?"

"You are quite right, Shae," Katya agreed, with an answering curve to her own lips. "As it stands, my own offering to the Event is due to be presented soon, modest as it is, compared to... others. We'll be in... touch soon." She gave each of the Mansfields a nod and if she felt any resentment towards any of them, she hid it well behind a charming smile, a fetching dimple, and sparkling eyes.

She glanced at Chang one last time, who seemed to have descended into introverted contemplation, then stepped through her Portal into her skybox with Radu on her arm. With a muffled snap and a flare of green and black light, the portal vanished.

"That was rather unwarranted, Katya," Radu opined in a low murmur, his escort's sharp hearing catching every inflection.

Katya concealed the rolling of her eyes by heading to the wet bar and mixing them a pair of drinks. She glided to Radu's side, were he stood looking down on the Combat Zone, handing him his drink, then taking a sip of her own.

"I believe it was warranted, I just wish it hadn't fallen out as it did," Katya countered in a voice like velvet. "That art of flesh and will begged to be touched, so I touched it." A pale, slender shoulder rose and fell in a wistful shrug. "I do regret the outcome, but then again, neither Chang Zha-Yang nor Shae made an iota of protest until after they... unraveled. How was I to know my gift for theirs was unwelcome?" Katya waved a hand in a sharp gesture. "Enough! It is done and cannot be undone. Time to move forward. Oh, look! Jason is back on stage and about to showcase my offering."

**********************

Jason sauntered back on stage after the Kombat Crew drained the Combat Zone following the Wet and Wild match. It had been a hard fought battle, and even if she did think he was a dick, Crimson Light earned his props for the fight, both for the win and the entertainment value.

"Well, folks, you demanded wet and wild, and Crimson Light delivered in spades. It was a great win, and looked fun too, but I wouldn't have wanted to in this get-up." Jason gestured down at her evening wear and heels, then tossed a crowd a teasing grin. "Though I sure you would have." The boisterous, and mostly male, roar gave answer to that."

"Now we have something a little more... esoteric up on the block. A fantasy. That's right, any fantasy you can imagine can be yours to experience, with the full spectrum of your senses. With but a touch, a good friend of mine, Katya Skovskaya, can let you experience any fantasy you have ever dreamed about. You can be the president, be a nova, travel the rings of Saturn and something more... scandalous. Strict confidentiality has been assured, and you need not even speak your desires - a simple touch will suffice for it all."

Jason heard the questioning murmurs running through the crowd and clucked her tongue, quelling them with a waggling finger. "Ah-ah! Don't be fooled, guys. I've been on the receivin' end of Katya's hands. The fantasy will be as real as reality, and no less so for being confined to the inside of your head. You'll see it, hear it, smell it, taste it, feel it. Only knowing it's Katya's doing will let you know it isn't really happenin'. And further, you won't be pestered by that doubt while experiencin' your fantasy. So... who wants to make their wildest dream come true, at least for a little while?"

Soft, anticipatory music permeated the arena and on the displays, the bidding counter flashed into existence, along with a pair of feminine, emeralds eyes and a pair of luscious lips pursed in a promising smirk. Jason recognized them as Katya's, mysterious and seductive, perfect fit to the offer of an indiscriminate fantasy.

"The bidding starts at..."

[WhiteRain]

She felt 'finished'. This event had filled her time with surprises and twists, things she could never have expected, but Chang viewed the night as over. What else could possibly come next that could equal what had come before?

Yet as she rested against the wall, feeling the soothing touch of quantum flowing into her node, calming herself by degrees, Chang's enhanced perceptions picked up Jason's announcement of the next 'item'.

"Now we have something a little more... esoteric up on the block. A fantasy. That's right, any fantasy you can imagine can be yours to experience, with the full spectrum of your senses. With but a touch, a good friend of mine, Katya Skovskaya, can let you experience any fantasy you have ever dreamed about. You can be the president, be a nova, travel the rings of Saturn and something more... scandalous. Strict confidentiality has been assured, and you need not even speak your desires - a simple touch will suffice for it all."

Chang opened her eyes. Now didn't that sound like an interesting experiment? She had worked so long and so hard to better understand herself... but did she know her own heart's desire?

She had experienced Katya's touch, briefly enough but with searing intensity. Her sense of touch was enhanced far beyond the ken of most Novas, after all. If her emotions still ran roughshod, Chang imagined she would have declined to have further contact with Katya. Their first meeting hardly omened a good future. She was not superstitious, though. There existed only two paths for Chang Zha-Yang. One led her to taint-ridden madness and an ignoble end. The other...

Well, there existed nobody who could guess where that path led. And that reduced all things to a simple morality. That which led her on the latter path was permitted, that which led her to the former was denied.

Through Katya, Chang supposed she could learn directly about herself. She could come to see and know how successful her journey had been to date, and from that she could see where it was leading her.

"Ah-ah!" Came Jason's eternal cock-tease voice. Don't be fooled, guys. I've been on the receivin' end of Katya's hands. The fantasy will be as real as reality, and no less so for being confined to the inside of your head. You'll see it, hear it, smell it, taste it, feel it. Only knowing it's Katya's doing will let you know it isn't really happenin'. And further, you won't be pestered by that doubt while experiencin' your fantasy. So... who wants to make their wildest dream come true, at least for a little while?"

It seemed the bizarrest thing that now, when she felt calm, tired, and intellectual, that her body would again be stirred. Her clothes rippled a little as her shaft stiffened up a second time, pressing up into her small triple breasts.

She wondered if she could inspire such lust with her voice alone. Perhaps another challenge to undertake. Another day.

Chang pushed off the wall and headed back into the Talent Lounge, her gait determined and steady. She walked directly to the quartet.

"May I borrow your phone for a moment?" She asked Saori.

The oriental handed it over without question. Chang's thumb flashed across the keypad, inputting the number for donations. She kept the phone at her side while it rang, listening to the tone easily enough, her mismatched eyes focused on the screen, and a possibility that had not existed until this announcement.

"Hello there! You've reached the Victoria Crush Charity Extravaganza bidding number. Currently up, your, yes, your innermost fantasy. I'm sure you're curious to find out what it is, but the question is, how much do you value that?"

Chang raised the phone to her ear. She had some cash lying around. Best to put it to use. "Might as well start at two million. A Nova's especial talents should never be sold for cheap."

She hung up and handed the phone back. "My thanks. Well, there's my hat in the ring. I wonder who else wants to learn about some of their own secrets?" She watched all four of them at once, but her eyes were fixed on the screen, on Jason, while her mind raced ahead to a possibility, a way to make the impossible... possible. Because if Katya had some way of controlling the effect she had on someone, and she probably did, she could recreate conditions.

Katya could make her scream again. The corner of Chang's mouth twitched a little. Who needed beautiful philosophy given form, when you could revel in its annihilation instead? Why experience rapture, when you could suffer?

There was a song in the offing, here. Oh yes. And quite the song it would be.

***

Up on the stage, Chang's bid came in first, and for a while, stood.

Two million dollars, right out the gate.

[Contessa]

The lovely blonde, saturated as her eyes were, spun about at the sound of someone other than Sunshine calling her name. "S-secret admirer?" she repeated Danielle's sentence like some twitterpatted anime character as she accepted the gift and examined it. Of course it was just a rose, but she seemed to gaze at for a moment like it was something more.

"I, um..." She seemed confused, like she wanted to leave immediately but was compelled to remain because simply walking away would have been rude. "... I really need to go. Um, thank you, Miss, uh, whomever you are."

She politely offered a wave to the two ladies, despite it being obvious that she was hurt in someway and just looking to escape the scene, and wandered off again through the crowd.

Several moments later, in the ladies room...

Quote:

“Thank you, only I’m not going to hit you,” Jael said. She crossed her arms and said, “I had a shitty night and heard the wrong thing, so I thought the wrong thing. My bad. I’m sorry.”

With here eyes squinted tight Contessa braced for a beating that never started. She relaxed a bit, her eyes going from tightly shut to to just closed rather slowly until she finally opened one eye and looked about to assess the situation.

Sure enough Jael stood there, arms crossed, waiting for the young woman to calm down.

There was the click of a lock sliding over and one of the stall doors directly to Jael's right opened. Contessa peeked her head out and looked at the blonde woman. "Um, seriously? You're not going to beat me up?" Although it was obvious she'd been crying, Jael noticed the rose she was holding close to her.

"So, do you still need me here, because that shrimp out there looked really good." The Clonetessa asked her creator. "I can still take a hit or two if you need me too, it's no biggie."

Wiping her tears away, Contessa just shook her head. "N-no, it's okay. I think I'll handle this one on my own. Thanks." She sniffled and it made the most unattractive sound Jael had ever heard. For such a gorgeous woman, Contessa was certainly not sexy.

"Cool beans." The Clone said and walked around Jael towards the door an the shrimp that awaited her outside.

"Look, I'm sorry for the deception." She said to Jael, still keeping a healthy distance. "I just, um, I have this phobia of being torn to shreds..."

Nice icebreaker... please God don't let her kill me... please God don't let her kill me...

[Jael Carver]

“Sounds reasonable to me,” Jael said easily. Being torn to shreds wasn’t high on Jael’s list of fun thing to do on a Saturday night. “I’m not tearing you to shreds. Sunshine likes you – that gives you a lot of leew- what now?”

“I didn’t mean to make your boyfriend like me!” Contessa blurted, looking like death was going to come raining down in a flash of silvery claws.

“Not like like that,” Jael sighed, feeling the headache that had started to ease coming back. “Like as in he feels more kindly toward you than most other humans, which he generally has warm feelings for all the time. He likes you as a person, and not how he likes me as a person.”

“Um…”

“I have no issue with you, Contessa,” Jael assured her. “Normally I’m a little more centered – at least a little – than this but I think I slapped my way out of my job tonight, and that was after getting groped by an ex non-stop for the first two hours of the event. So yeah, I’m a little upset and my fuse is shorter than normal.” Before Contessa could reply to this information overload, Jael added, “Who gave you the rose? You didn’t have it at the table.” It’s probably that someone threw the flower at her because she was crying. She is pretty enough for that. Probably has men throwing themselves at her all the time…

And I bet she never notices.

[Fahrenheit]

She had been growing weary and restless over the last months. Even though Scripture had advised to keep in the background and wait she couldn’t wait any longer. Especially since the events last year her attention was always brought back to everything related to the “crush”.

It was like an obsession or maybe an itch. Maybe it was just the long absence of her father that forced her to find something to distract herself with. A new focus to keep her mind grinding.

patience…, she heard Scriptures words again and again.

Patience, she was tired of it. The candles on the candelabra were melting and bending to the sides as the temperature around her increased dramatically - a direct response to her emotional state and a rare display of losing control. Right now she felt it was about time to leave the confinements of her haven and end her passive and isolated life. In the end it was her decision and no matter what her mentor thought he would accept her choice as long as she wasn’t indulging an unnecessary impulse. But that was also part of her nature - a fiery impulsive force. Like a volcano.

Even though the Charity Event had been announced several months ago she only decided recently to go there. Her senses extended to every source of fire within the vicinity of the Arena. Employees taking a smoke outside to get a break but also the gas ovens in the kitchen which were running non-stop to satisfy the needs of a nova appetite.

The crimson skinned exotic nova remained patient as she observed from several vantage points but none was close enough for her taste. She wanted to get as close as possible to the VIP lounge but the whole area was for non-smokers and thus finding some kind of source for her to travel quickly to the place was limited.

Fortunately someone was taking a break in the men’s restroom and had decided to take a smoke without bothering to get outside. Fahrenheit concentrated and squeezed her quantum filled essence through the fire materializing right next to the unsuspecting guest who dropped his fag the moment he saw her. The tall exotic woman had chosen a black mini-dress made of leather with matching over knee boots. A fine row of silvery clasps pathed its way from her right breast down to her thigh both accentuating her curvaceous body and underlining her general aggressive appearance.

She gave the man a brief smile and swiveled on her high heeled boots straight out of the restroom and found her way to the VIP lounge. As she entered the large room she drew some looks and stares as her appearance was relatively unusual - even for a Nova. Her crimson red skin, her long raven black hair and mostly the phoenix like anima that followed her wake simply demanded attention. There was some whispering about her name and her affiliation but within a few minutes and thanks to the OpNet enough data was gathered. The new arrival was Fahrenheit, self proclaimed Daughter of Mal and a member of the Teragen with some influential friends in the higher ranks of the movement and she was approaching the only other Nova in the Lounge who simply couldn’t be looked over - Sunshine.

The enigmatic red skinned Nova stopped taking a glass of champagne and took a small sip of it while her eyes stayed glued on the gorgeous young Nova. Approaching him directly would’ve been too obvious so she remained at a distance trying to catch his attention and maybe make him curious enough to approach her. It would be interesting to see if someone tried to stop him and also to know who that someone was.

Fahrenheit smiled at him as she took another sip of her glass - the invitation was out in the open. All he needed to do is come over to her and… talk.

Click to reveal..

Activated Awe-Inspiring as she entered the Lounge

[GDP_ST]

“...make some more friends, only guy ones. Ugly guy ones, ok?”

Jael's words rang through Sunshine's mind as he noticed (and really, how could he fail to notice?) the aggressively beautiful nova striding into the room in high-heeled boots and a dress that skirted decency as it hugged her curves. A aura similar to that of a fiery raptor flared and danced ghostlike in the air around her, and faint flickers of plasma rippled across her crimson skin. The baselines present stared openly, torn between awe and terror, and Alex couldn't really blame them. The woman had presence as well as eyecatching quantum expression. Some of the novas present shifted uneasily as her name was whispered by the ones that recognised her, coming to Sunshine's ears along with the word 'Terat'. Another Terat, though she seemed more... energetic than the others, and had a vibrant primal air that neither the artistic Chang nor the refined Quartet had possessed.

Not a guy. Not ugly. Sunshine told himself firmly, quashing the urge to go over and talk to the dangerously-interesting red-skinned woman with a little regret, though not so much because she was beautiful. She was, but she also looked interesting, and was obviously an energy-wielding nova like himself if the anima and colouration were anything to go by. And she was a Terat: he was curious how she would differ from Chang or Shae. He sighed and refilled his Coke glass, wondering when Jael and Contessa would be coming back- if Contessa was coming back. He hadn't realised Jael would be so possessive that she would threaten another woman like that. She must really not want to lose him. He tsk'd mentally, shaking his head as he sipped his drink. She'd never lose him - didn't she realise that? He looked around to see if the girls were returning.

Fahrenheit was looking at him.

Not glancing his way. Not letting her eyes rest on him as she talked to someone else. She was looking at him. Staring at him with a glass of champagne in her hand and a faint smile on her full lips that, for some reason, made Sunshine a little nervous. Okay, a lot nervous. This woman wasn't like Contessa, who was sweet and nice, or Katya, who was playful and puckish, or Jael, who was... well, Jael. Actually, she seemed more like Jael than any of the other nova women he knew. Especially the way she seemed to be looking at him.

Uh-oh.

She smiled wider when he looked at her, the dark eyes matching the curve of her lips in silent invitation. But an invitation to what? That was the problem the young nova was having right now. If he hadn't wanted Jael to threaten Contessa, he definitely didn't want her to start a fight with a Terat with a name like 'Fahrenheit'. Sunshine wasn't clueless: the crimson woman wanted him to go over there, obviously. But why?

He smiled back regardless, because Sunshine was Sunshine and therefore willing to give anyone a chance to be friends, and also a young nova man, and when beautiful women smoldered (in this case literally) at him from across the room a bit of him enjoyed the attention. But he really didn't want Jael to get mad at him for approaching another beautiful woman right after she'd popped her claws to frighten off the first. So he stayed put, and minded the table for when his friends returned. If Fahrenheit wanted to talk to him, she'd have to approach him - it wasn't like there weren't spare chairs at the round lounge table.

[Contessa]

Originally Posted By: Jael Carver

“Who gave you the rose? You didn’t have it at the table.”

"Oh, well, you needn't worry, Ms. Jael," Contessa assured her as best she could muster. "Guys never like me the way they would like you. It's the upside of being a really uninteresting person with nothing to bring to bring to the table, it keeps me off most guys radar."

"This?" She held it out for the two of them to look at it. "I-I don't know honestly. She said it was sent to me by a secret admirer." Contessa shrugged. "Could be anyone I guess, no one's every given me gifts before, well, except this guy I know who used to live with my dad an me a couple years back, but he doesn't count. Roses aren't his style, the guy practically hates me."

Look, um," She brushed a loose strand of hair behind her ear. Frustrated she removed her white hair band and let her hair fall down loose over her shoulders. It should have been illegal for a woman as young and silly as her to be so beautiful. She began to fix her hair, putting it back in the hair band as she spoke. "I'm glad that, you know, you don't want to eviscerate me or remove my flesh from my bones via some form of quantum ablation, despite how cool that'd look, I'm sure. Uh," she stammered, building the courage to speak with Jael. "If it's, you know, okay with you, um, I'd still like to spend some time with Alex."

"I swear," She looked Jael in the eyes as her own got wide and assertive. "Nothing will happen. I'm boring, guys don't like me! I have to wear low cut shirts just to get the guys I tutor to stay awake and learn something."

[Tomas Saint-Etienne]

His arm around Shae, the green-eyed monster watched the screens as Bombshell introduced the next auction item. His lip curled in disdainful humor as the silver-haired beauty outlined Katya's talents and what was on offer.

"We make her a god, and she fritters her gift away on baselines whilst ruining the endeavours of her fellow novas." he said with a soft snarl in his tone.

"She didn't mean to, you know." Shae said in a quiet voice, her fingers stroking his back and shoulders soothingly. "She just wanted to be a part of it."

"She was clumsy, then." Tomas said with a shake of his perfect head before brushing his lips over Shae's. "That might be forgiveable, but the distress she caused you was not. You soared, my Shae. You soared and we watched you. It was incredible." He hugged her closer, smiling a little. The image to the onlookers, so recently terrified by his malevolence, was a jarring contrast of gentle sweetness. He looked at Saori and Edward, his cheek resting against Shae's.

"I don't particularly feel like being further surrounded by zips tonight. Especially seeing as I have to behave myself." he told them. "However, if my beloveds wish to stay, and wish me likewise to stay, then I shall."

Then Chang borrowed Saori's phone, entering her bid before returning it. Tomas turned his gaze to his fellow Terat, equal parts amusement and frustration dancing in his glittering eyes.

"I am well acquainted with my secret yearnings and fears." he said with a sinisterly inviting smile. "And could acquaint you with yours no less easily than Katya could. But it is your money, and perhaps she will learn something from it as well." His smile widened barely perceptibly at that, as though something amused him greatly.

[Dozer]

Dozer, after changing out of his costume for the battle, and wolfing down a late dinner consisting of hyper-ration bars and lots of sandwiches, re-dressed in a black custom-fit tuxedo with a black bow-tie, a white shirt, and black cummerbund. His cufflinks were made of platinum, with a bulldozer engraved on each one. He entered the VIP lounge while the room appeared to be distracted with another new entrant, Farenheit.

Dozer appeared to be talking to no one in particular, while he said, "Yes, I understand that the pay is spectacular, Ms. Dreyfuss, but why me? Why not a more worldly nova?" Looking a bit closer at Dozer, it was impossible to miss the bluetooth headset on his left ear, which was blinking. He then blinked himself, and said, "Ms. Dreyfuss, I'll call you back. I just spotted someone I need to speak to." After a couple more seconds, Dozer reached up and shut off the bluetooth, even going so far as to take it out of his ear and put it in his pocket.

He smiled and began making his way towards the nova youth that had been found in the direct aftermath of the Crush. He stood about 6 feet away from Sunshine, cleared his throat, and nodded to the young nova, "Mind if I join you?"

[Jael Carver]

Jael was torn between laughing and crying. The former would be hysterical giggles at this situation; the latter a release of emotional pressure. She really didn’t want to let this girl anywhere near Sunshine. But wrapping him up in a box and hiding him from the world – or the world from him – was exactly what Utopia had done. She’d hated it then, on his behalf. She couldn’t be the one doing it to him now. There were lines even Jael would not cross.

She had to let him grow, even if it meant that one day her kind and generous Sunshine would realize how unkind and hard-hearted she was. Jael hated these emotions, these sensations. She’d never had an issue with who she was before. She’d never been afraid she’d lose something just by being the person she was, but Sunshine made her fear that outcome.

“Sunshine can be friends with whomever he likes,” Jael said, doing a really good job of hiding her real feelings on the matter. “However… you’re far from boring, Contessa. If you were boring, I wouldn’t have just threatened to skin you alive.” There was no harm in planting scenarios in the girl’s head to keep her in line, right? Surely Sunshine wouldn’t mind some ‘friendly’ ‘girl-talk’. “And if you were unappealing to men, you wouldn’t be walking around with that flower in your hand. Someone likes you.” And there was definitely no harm in firmly pointing the girl at someone other than her Sunshine. “I mean… secret admirer? Hon, that has ‘someone has a crush on Contessa’ written all over it. You just have to figure out who.” She gave the girl a wicked, conspiratorial grin. “What a criminal justice major to help you detect who?”

[Fahrenheit]

Originally Posted By: Sunshine

He smiled back regardless, because Sunshine was Sunshine and therefore willing to give anyone a chance to be friends, and also a young nova man, and when beautiful women smoldered (in this case literally) at him from across the room a bit of him enjoyed the attention. But he really didn't want Jael to get mad at him for approaching another beautiful woman right after she'd popped her claws to frighten off the first. So he stayed put, and minded the table for when his friends returned. If Fahrenheit wanted to talk to him, she'd have to approach him - it wasn't like there weren't spare chairs at the round lounge table.

Something is holding him back…, Fahrenheit could tell by the look in his eyes. There was curiosity and the desire to talk but then he changed his mind. A typical reaction she concluded but it still angered a part of her which made her plasma eruptions on her skin dance more wildly than before.

Yet she remained calm… at least for her general condition. Patience… - there it was again. It had become a mantra which she both loved and hated. The enticing beauty took another sip of her champagne making her every move and gesture painstakingly slow, as if she was making herself aware of every single passing second. Her eyes wandered through the room but always found Sunshine’s whenever he stole a glance.

She wouldn’t make it that easy for him and she was too much of a predator to give up this early. Fahrenheit slowly walked through the lounge always staying in Sunshine’s peripheral field of vision while she faked interest for the other people who were present. Sometimes she lazily watched one of the big screens not really following what it was showing.

Sunshine could feel that she was seizing him up but she never came closer. As Dozer entered the scene he could see a brief annoyed look on her face but it quickly gave way to her predatory smile. He could also see something else that was far deeper than mere annoyance, a mixture of pity, sadness and anger. She forced herself to show patience but he could tell that it was taking a lot of her concentration to stay calm. The fire and plasma eruptions that danced over her skin were telltale signs of what must’ve been going on inside her. It was evident in her body language and the way she carried herself. A primal force with predatory cunning and intelligence and he was the center of her attention...

[WhiteRain]

The one called Skein turned his amazing green eyes on her, those endlessly deep eyes that seemed to contain everything and nothing and offered just that on uncertain terms.

Unthinking, Chang turned her head to look into those eyes. Then she turned away. She had forgotten her courtesies.

She had heard him speaking to Shae, telling her how she soared, and how pleased they all were. Chang Zha-Yang felt proud to have been part of that. How could she not? She and Shae had done something here, crafted something beauteous beyond thinking. It still hurt to know it had ended.

"I am well acquainted with my secret yearnings and fears," he said, with an inviting smile that seemed half offer and half threat. "And could acquaint you with yours no less easily than Katya could. But it is your money, and perhaps she will learn something from it as well." Something about that idea amused him, but she could not have said what.

Chang had known nothing about his abilities, but that knowledge would not have changed her decision. She wrung her hands, focusing on the screen which showed her two million dollar bid still standing, still being muttered about in the crowd.

"It's odd," she said, uncertain of why she even spoke, "I never cared for this event or its purpose. The fate of the baselines in the Crush was not my doing, nor any of my concern. Yet now I've donated, directly or accidentally, near twenty million dollars to it. A funny quirk, no?"

Her eyes narrowed, relaxed, narrowed again. They all seemed interested in her words, Shae most of all. "I am... wounded, by what happened here. I bleed. But I cannot merely cry. That would do no justice to what we made here, Shae and I. It was Katya who brought me this pain, who ruined what we made. I cannot resurrect that beauty, but I can make something enduring of its end. Perhaps you could do what Katya does, but you should not. In this instance it must be Katya. I cannot have my tapestry back, but I will have the scream it birthed. I'll make music of it. I'll make the world grieve for what it will never see." Her voice had grown low, now, and intense, and dark.

She shook it off. "I feel it is time to leave. Whether you stay or go, I hope you all enjoy your evening." She pressed her fist to her palm, and bowed to them.

Then she left the talent lounge, in search of the one called Sunshine. There remained a little unfinished business to resolve, before she left. There would be nothing left undone.

[GDP_ST]

Originally Posted By: Dozer

He smiled and began making his way towards the nova youth that had been found in the direct aftermath of the Crush. He stood about 6 feet away from Sunshine, cleared his throat, and nodded to the young nova, "Mind if I join you?

"Huh- Oh!" The distracted youth blinked as he looked round, then up a little. Even at six feet away, this nova - Dozer, he remembered from the fight with Andy - was massive. He was bigger than Einherjar, who to date was the largest nova Sunshine had ever met. For a long moment he just stared, then the gorgeous features split into a delighted smile. "Sure you can. Dozer, right?" He stood up and offered his hand, and as the big man came forward to clasp it smiled up at him. "Wow. Were you this big as a baseline? Or did your size come with eruption? I'll bet you have to eat tons of food." He seemed genuinely fascinated by the large brutish-looking man who nevertheless had a gentle handshake and a broad smile. Sunshine had a tendency to be infectious.

"Come on and sit." he invited. "I'm minding seats for friends, but-" he flagged down a passing waiter. "Can you get Dozer here a bigger chair? Or maybe one of those Ottomans from over there? Thanks!" he smiled at the man, who beamed back and went to get someone to help them. Smiling, Sunshine glanced around...

Quote:

...he could see a brief annoyed look on her face but it quickly gave way to her predatory smile. He could also see something else that was far deeper than mere annoyance, a mixture of pity, sadness and anger.

He sighed a little, turning back to Dozer. He wasn't going over there. He wasn't. He knew all about women like that - Jase had warned him. Cougars, they were called. Hot older women that tried to get good-looking guys alone. He'd narrowly escaped with his virtue from one woman's skybox earlier. She'd come alone, which was strange for such a beautiful nova, and then as soon as he'd shown her to her seat she'd placed a hand on his arm and asked if he liked warm caramel in a voice that left him in no doubt as to her intentions. She'd probably brought some along just in case.

As it happened, he did like warm caramel. But only in specific company.

The Ottoman was duly brought over and Dozer was made comfortable, and Sunshine settled back into his seat. The beautiful red-skinned woman was prowling in a loose circle around his table, talking to people and appearing to socialise, but the radiant solar nova felt almost stalked as he chatted to Dozer. Finally he decided he'd had enough and began to stare back, his glorious features impassive and sky-blue eyes narrowed a little, an air of challenge in his gaze.

[Fahrenheit]

There! A primal instinct, a challenging response., she liked the way he looked at her. She enjoyed the feeling the challenge gave her, a thrill she hasn't tasted for awhile.

Yet, he was playing the polite host as he exchanged pleasentries with the XWF-Nova - and there it was again, that odd contradictory look in her eyes, the same mixture of pity, sadness and anger but it had nothing to do with Snshine, it was directed at Dozer.

Unfortunately the only way to find out was to ask her but that required him to come over to her and ask her. She had time, she could wait...

patience

patience...

[Contessa]

Originally Posted By: Jael Carver

There was no harm in planting scenarios in the girl’s head to keep her in line, right? Surely Sunshine wouldn’t mind some ‘friendly’ ‘girl-talk’. “And if you were unappealing to men, you wouldn’t be walking around with that flower in your hand. Someone likes you.” And there was definitely no harm in firmly pointing the girl at someone other than her Sunshine. “I mean… secret admirer? Hon, that has ‘someone has a crush on Contessa’ written all over it. You just have to figure out who.” She gave the girl a wicked, conspiratorial grin. “What a criminal justice major to help you detect who?”

"You think we could?" She aked Jael with a skeptical scrunch to her face that made her right nostril flare in a strange way. "Okay, I'm up for it. Um, I'm not sure who the women were though." She gave Jael a description of the women, which thanks to her flawless memory was a list of just about every detail feasible during the short meeting she had with them. "They were both really nice, but I was sort of emotionally trainwrecking, so I didn't stop to really catch names."

She followed Jael like a lost little tagger on. For a girl with so much pep and energy Jael could tell she was devoid of a serious social spine. "I appreciate the compliments, Ms. Jael. You know, that guys might find me appealing, but honestly that's really all they notice. The comic book body, and that's about it. Talking to Alex was really cool because he actually looked me in the eyes when he spoke to me. I was pretty taken off guard, that's for sure. Oh, and thank you for not flaying me alive in a blood soaked rage of death and viscera. Don't worry, message was clear: frisky with Alex equals numerous punishment upto, but not including, missing limbs and or death. Got it." She nodded her head once very assertively to communicate the point that she understood Jael, in her own little way.

"So, um... where do we start?" She asked.

[Bombshell]

Bombshell raised an emphatic brow as the bid went from five digits to seven, two million flashing large and bold on the OLED screens imbedded in the vitrium protective paneling. Turning smartly on her heels, she flashed the crowd a surprised, scintillating smile and gestured gracefully up at the bid with game-show hostess perfection.

"I guess someone really knows what they want, even if they don't know exactly what they are gettin', eh?" Jason commented with a wry grin. "C'mon, people! Don't let this auction be over before it really got started, just because of one little... well, okay, actually very big bid. Surely there's someone else out there who wants a fantasy made real. At least make this a challenge, make our big bidder work for it. Let's see that counter spin a bit more."

The audience murmured in a rising clamor, enticed by Bombshell's mellifluous voice and persuasive presence and yet, the bid stayed resolutely at two million, despite her exhortations. After ten minutes without any movement, the counter flashed, the auction closed. "And there you have it, one fantasy sold for the tidy sum of two million dollars. To whomever is the lucky winner, the people of the Crush thank-you. Katya Skovskaya will be in contact with you shortly to make the arrangements."

The Combat Zone because to alter and shift in response to Sakurako's program, Kombat Krew technicians flowing onto the stage, Bombshell gliding through the organized chaos with fluid grace.

"Another auction down. Now, it's for something a little more action-packed. Next up, we have...."

[Jael Carver]

“Well, that sounds like Bombshell or Knockout,” Jael said as they wound their way back to the table. “And I dunno about the Japanese chick, but pink hair isn’t that uncommon. Did you say natural pink? Probably a nova, which means that she’ll be on N!Watch, more’n likely.” Jael whipped out her phone from somewhere on her person and surfed out to the opsite. “Lemme know when you see her,” Jael said as they started flipping through the images.

“There, her.” Contessa pointed at one Hideyoshi Sakurako.

“And according to Nova Watch, she’s here tonight.” Jael said, after a tap on the screen to trace her known whereabouts. “And Bombshell’s been down on stage… Knockout’s doing something… Ah. She’s taking small favor donations.” Jael grinned. “There’s one of two ways we can do this. We can ask her, but if it’s anonymous, then she probably won’t say. Or, we try to hack her donation email account.” The women parted to surge around a handful of men talking and drinking in a knot. Neither noticed the stares that followed them. “Or we try to get her out of the room she’s using and check the computer ourselves.”

Sunshine wasn’t alone, of course, but he seemed to have listened to what Jael said. I was frustrated, joking. Why does that bother me? But even as she recognized that guilt, she felt her heart rise at the sight of him. Sunshine always did that to her – made her feel a little better. “Hey,” she said, stopping next to his chair, leaning against his side and curling an arm around his shoulders. It could have been a casual gesture between close friends, but Jael wasn’t projecting friendliness at the glowing man. Her fingers casually wrapped around his hair, feeling its soft texture against her skin. “Hi, Dozer. Long time. Cleveland right?” Jael gave the big nova a wave and a friendly smile. “This is Contessa. Contessa, Dozer.”

[Silvertalon]

Silvertalon walked the hallway getting many looks and stares from the humans around her. A few photo if not a good deal of photos were taken of her. She just giggled softly as she kept her graceful walking pace allowing such amusing antics to take place. It was a strange feeling being the focus of many she could feel the energetic nature and curiosity pouring off many. A few novas even took the time to casually look over towards her as she passed.

She was indeed a very unusual sight to be hold a fox looking humanoid nova with four tails. Her ears twitched upon her head as those four tails swished behind her. Her arctic white fur blended nicely with her traditional white kimono with sky blue highlights. Her silvery eyes casually looked over the crowd of humans following her as she stopped and looked at them with a faux like smile and soft giggle. She finally spoke greeting them in Japanese which of course confused a good deal of the humans and only a few understood what she said.

She casually strode down the hallway as she saw the signs for the talent lounge and VIP lounge. But what caught her attention was whom was between the two lounges with someone she has yet to meet. A soft rumble welled with in her chest as she approached and respectfully with a bow and gave a very proper traditional greetings to Sakurako and her company. All the while speaking in japanese not breaking her characters stride.

[Doryoku]

"Oh... Hello again, SilverTalon." Sakurako says with a polite bow. She blushes slightly since she's not as fancy-dressed as the Kitsune-Nova.

"Forgive the outfit, I just thought I'd join in the fun with Knockout... she was kind enough to wear the outift I sent her for her little charity thing and... well... I thought fair was fair and decided to help out a little. My duties tonight have whittled to nothing..."