For all the Character Development stuff that just doesn't fit in the other threads.
This message was last edited by the GM at 21:10, Fri 30 Aug 2013.

How did she end up here?  It seems like only a few months since she was back at college, finishing up her sociology degree, excitedly waiting on a reply from the CIA recruiter she had spoken to right before finals.

Fast forward 7 years, and the excitement was still there, but instead of anticipation there was only fear and disgust.  Her cover was blown, and the little eastern european hell she'd spent her last 6 months in looked like it was going to become her grave.  Of course, the traders in stolen Russian weapons that she'd infiltrated would make sure she felt a whole lot of pain before she died.

Really, she kind of felt like she deserved it.  Not that she wouldn't break her bonds and kill all of the bastards in this fucking place on the way out if she could, but there was a certain justice to it.  She screamed for help, but she was ignored... Just like she ignored the screams of countless other men and women, carrying out her roles, looking out for the "greater good".  She'd been betrayed by one of her own, like she'd betrayed so many people that had trusted her, whose only crime was being desperate, being victims of the vicissitudes of fate.  And now she would be tortured, just like she'd watched others be tortured... Hell sometimes she'd helped work them over; women can add a certain touch, makes men think of their mothers, sisters, wives... some it pisses off, some it comforts, but both can be used...

Shit. Her mind was starting to wander. If she wanted out of this, she'd have to stay aware. The drugs they'd put into her were already working.  Hopefully they'd kill her, she didn't want to be sold to somebody, or worse, a whole lot of somebodies... Wandering again.  How nice of them to leave the TV on... even more of a distraction... great, the Galatea exploded, there goes the space program for another decade... Goddamnit, focus!

The door opened.  The men that she had been flirting with, screwing, and stringing along looked at her with rage and hate.  She Knew how they were going to take out their anger.  She felt herself go cold all over.  Fuck.  There wasn't going to be any way out of this.

She glared at the wall, pushed away what few feelings she had left.  She put a bullet in the part of her that was still a person, still capable of responding like people are supposed to respond.  She watched from outside herself as they beat her.  She felt nothing but cold inside, her pain was far away, her memories a distant reminder of the normal life she had left behind.

So cold.  Her head exploded... Had they even hit her?  She must be suffering from shock, maybe a concussion.  Good.  Hopefully they kill her by accident, before they've gotten to have their fun.  There would be a certain cold joy in robbing them of their little revenge drama.  Too bad they hadn't waited longer to start, her people might have gotten her out alive...

God! The pain in her head was blinding, like someone had driven a spike through her brain... Her body was going numb, cold. She was still, she didn't even feel them beating her.  In a flash, she saw the life she had lived, dispassionately looking at the path that had taken her here.  The people she'd abandoned, the loves lost, the little pieces of her humanity that were stripped along the way here.  These thugs couldn't touch her in any meaningful way, she'd already destroyed herself far better than they ever could.  All she could feel at this moment was icy contempt, for herself, and for these little tyrants that ruined the world around them so casually.

The TV replayed some scene of a fireman saving people from a school bus.  People cried, people screamed, people cheered the hero.  All she felt was cold.  The heat was a joke, the flicker of a candle that would gutter and die in the cold wind of life... So... fucking... cold.  So cold it burns.

Were there even people in the room with her?  All she could feel was ice flowing through her head, her body, her blood, burning away everything she was, everything around her going still and silent as the burn of the cold gave way to numbness that encased her, engulfed her.  Were her eyes open or closed?  Did she even have eyes any longer?  There was only emptiness, a vast blackness...

Her world exploded.  The calm shattered, sound and light and heat came rushing back to her.  Her eyes flew open.  She was greeted by the cold beauty of a room completely coated in frost, the glow of the florescent lights reflected and refracted by every surface in the room.  Her attackers were merely man-shaped sculptures of ice, their features hidden behind crystal.

Her mind was clear as fresh snow, calm as a the heart of winter.

She had her life back.  This was a new beginning.  But sadly, Amanda died that night, before she could live her second chance.
This message was last edited by the player at 00:57, Fri 22 May 2009.

A year after her eruption, and they still thought they could get her back.

"Listen Amanda-"

"I told you that's not my name anymore."

"Fine then, Frostburn.  We need you.  I know that last job went south.  Really, I know what you went through from personal experience.  But this is a huge opportunity, and nothing like what you were doing before.  There's no danger of-"

"Damnit, it's not about the danger, or the work, or anything you think it is.  I wasted 7 years of my life on this job, and what did I get out of it?  I'm free now, and I'm staying that way.  I don't know what I'm going to do with my life, but it won't be working for you."

"You wouldn't have to work for us, just send us occasional updates, let us know what's going on, how things are developing.  Utopia is actually thrilled to have someone with your background working with them.  Hell Am- Frostburn, you wouldn't even have to be on the main team, you'd just be support, an auxiliary member.  They want you to eventually train people, after you've had a little time with your powers."

"..."

"See, I told you it was worth listening to.  We're working with Utopia, setting up a trade of sorts.  They get a training base in America, we get some say in how their next team goes.  And you, well, you'd have someplace to go, be able to use your abilities..."

"Who'd be running things?  I find it hard to believe you'd give the U.N. control over anything on U.S. soil."

"Walker.  You guys got along pretty well... It's a perfect fit.  Please, just think about it."

"I'll think about it.  I'll... think about it."

)))))))))))))))

Utopia was supposed to be different.  So why did all of the missions she was called in for end up being the nasty ones?  The self-righteous bastards on T2M got to do all the public service, while she went in and cleaned out the stuff too sensitive or too dirty for the media.  This was shit.  And after all her work, when she does end up on a mission with the primary team, they treat her like a damned beginner... She could give them all lessons for christ's sake.  And Pratima had the gall not only to criticize her for being unprofessional, like what she did after hours was anyone's fucking business, but she acted like she had the right to judge the work she was doing.

Yeah, it was dirty, but Pratima never had to hunt down a Nova serial killer, or break up a slave trade ring... After infiltrating it. No, she always got the pretty jobs, like taking out a terrorist cell, or cleaning up an oil spill.

Fuck them all.

))))))))))))))))

"You know Walker, I'm not sure I want to go along with this.  I mean, its been almost two years since I signed on with Utopia, and nothing I was told when I signed up went the way it was supposed to."

"Yes, I know things have been hard for you Frostburn.  But I promise you, this will be different.  You won't have to do the kind of work you've been doing.  It will be strictly training from here on out.  I picked you specifically for this slot you know."

"Great.  Glad someone respects my work."

"I have a great deal of respect for you, and not just because of your work.  Though I will say, your after hours activities have been worrying some... It's been suggested that I choose someone else.  The psychologists suggest that you have a problem.  But I told them to go to hell, and that drinking and letting lose in off time was pretty much mandatory for people in our line of work.  I hope you won't let me down..."

"God damnit Walker, why is everyone suddenly so concerned about what I do with my off time?  I just want to have a good time, forget about all the shit, and live a little.  It's not like I've ever screwed up a mission.  Hell, I've never even been late to work."

"That's what I said.  As I've already told you, there's no one I'd rather have working with me.  Just say "yes" and get this over with, so we can go get a drink."

"Fine... Yes, I'll do it.  But if this goes anything like my last 2 years, I'll fucking kill you."

"You know better than that Frostburn.  My schedule is far too busy for me to die until at least 2015.  Speaking of schedules, I think its about time for drinks.  Hotel bar?"

"You always know how to make a girl feel special... yeah, hotel bar, just give me few to clean up and put on normal people clothes."

"I'll be waiting..."
This message was last edited by the player at 00:59, Fri 22 May 2009.

Jason groaned as he opened his eyes.  The white fluorescent lights above him may as well have been magnesium flares, the light burned into the backs of his eyes and sent fresh new waves of pain into his head.  How that was possible, he had no idea, but he was in even more pain.  He moaned, and tried to move his hands up to his head.  He couldn't.  He could move his shoulder, but couldn't bend his elbows.  He also couldn't turn his head and his body felt like it was being crushed.  He opened his eyes a fraction and looked around.  A hospital.  Hunh.  Where were the drugs that should be pumping through his veins right now.
"Nurse!"  he croaked.  His voice broke in the middle of the word.  that hadn't happened since puberty.  well, not even at puberty really, his voice had always been a raspy squeak.
He tried again. "Nurse!" he called, loudly enough to make his head feel like it was imploding.  even through this fresh new hell of sound he was surprised and worried.  His voice sounded deeper.  what the hell???  And what had been that cracking sound when he drew breath to call out.
the nurse came over.  "I'm here Mr. Tybolt. What's wrong?"
"Please God give me some drugs." he whispered softly.  Her breath hissed in, surprise or anger he wasn't sure, he never was around women.  Probably both.
"Your cast is all cracked.  How did this happen?  Who did this?"  He heard her push the emergency call button beside his bed.  How had he heard that?
"Please stay still, sir.  You've broken nearly every bone in your body and suffered massive damage internally, please don't move or speak.  You shouldn't even be awake.  Why aren't the drugs working?"  He heard her fiddling with the I.V. drip beside his bed.  A gentle feeling of euphoria came over him, and the pain eased slightly, but other than that, nothing.
the sound of running feet announced three people, one of whom was female, who was overweight and smelled vaguely of weed, cheese doodles, and juicy fruit.
They were talking rapidly in medicalese, sounded worried, and seemed to think that he was going to die.
"Umm, other than being in incredible pain, I don't feel that bad.  I'm probably not dying.  Oh, and these drugs aren't working worth a shit."  his voice was deeper--deep, manly, and almost oozed sex appeal.  It was like he was a white Barry White.  He laughed.  that hurt.  Fuck did that hurt.
"Seriously, I can move my arms and legs, sorta, and nothing seems to be moving around inside that shouldn't."  he experimentally flexed an arm and felt the plaster give.
Eventually they cut the cast off him--he was a massive bruise.  Not only that but he was a good foot taller, his hair had changed from tightly curled puke orange to a lustrous sandy blond, and his once weak muddy brown eyes were now a striking grey. He heard them whispering, but he knew before they did.  Nova.  he was a fucking nova.  Homo sapiens nova.  Fucking awesome.
It took a few days for the bruising to fade, during that time he ate more food than he had eaten in the last month.  Anything even remotely digestible was fair game.  He tasted more too, flavours were subtler, richer, more striking.  He was putting on weight at a terrifying speed.  50lbs in 3 days.  How the hell had that happened when he had only eaten 45 lbs of food.  He quit school after writing a dissertation the night after he woke up.  His brain was overclocked, his metabolism was overclocked, he looked like a human blueberry.  time to go home.
He arrived in Seattle and walked right up to his old man without the old boy even recognizing him.  No reason for him to, his son, Jason, looked nothing like he did before.  His bruising was starting to fade, along with much of the pain and his face was as different as the rest of him.  For starters he had a chin.  And a jaw line, a manly tough looking jawline.  His nose, once stubby and bulbous, had straightened and evened out.  He was fucking hot.  Even his teeth, long since dyed a permanent shade of gray from years of binging on coke and pizza and weed while playing dnd in his parent's basement, were dead even and dazzlingly white.
Two weeks after his accident his appetite subsided to roughly double human norms.  Roughly.  He was 6'3, 200lbs, and ripped.  Well, not ripped, chiseled.  Carved out of granite, muscles big, symmetrical, perfectly formed.  8 pack abs.  It was the first time in his life he ever wanted to wear something that wasn't big and baggy.
He went shopping with what little money he had saved.  he walked into the mall and people were looking at him.  girls were looking at him.  Not with the dismissing boredom he was used to.  Staring at him.  Grabbing their friends and turning them around so they could look too.  Jason blushed crimson.  this was fucking weird.  And awesome.  Fucking awesome.
He went into a small boutique shop and approached the girl behind the counter.  "Hi, can you help me find some clothes?" he said.  She stared at him.  Didn't say anything for a long minute, then shook herself.  "Umm, yeah, clothes.  We have those."  She helped him find clothes that fit and that looked good together, things he had never worried about before.  She really liked checking the waist of his new jeans to see if they fit snugly.  Really liked it.  He was in Heaven.  He left the store with two new outfits, and the first girl's phone number that he wouldn't have to give his credit card number to use.  Amber.  Amber Jones.
He had sex for the first time that week.  Well, not the first time, but he didn't want to think about the other time.  Couldn't think about it without a ball of shame and guilt welling up inside of him.  he'd never do that again.  Ever.
His old man was a plumber, hardworking, honest, salt of the Earth.  He had no idea how to talk to his son anymore.  Not that he had talked to Jason much before.
His Old lady was sweet, quiet, and slightly absent.  she was shocked by her son's appearance, but then quickly got over it saying that he could get a nice girl now and get married.
Married.  Hah.  A nice girl.  hah.  He was going out to clubs and picking up different nice girls every night.  Sometimes there was competition to see who could take him home.  Not that it was difficult to convince Jason to go back to their place.  Far from difficult.
During the day he figured out how to slow things down and speed them up using just his mind.  He still had headaches, but they were getting easier to manage.
He saw advertisements for Project Utopia on the news.  He decide to join, but not right away.  he became a fashion model, made big bucks, way more than he could have before.  He moved out of home.  got his own place.  Life was good.

One day he decided to head to a daycare that he knew about.  There was somebody he had to see.  He walked up to one of the ladies working there and gave her his best smile, quelling the butterflies in his stomach.  "Hi, I'm Jenny Campbell's uncle, can I see her?" She is so going to think I'm a pedo he thought to himself.  I'm her uncle, fucking lame.  Oddly enough she did bring him to the little girl playing on the swing set.
"Hi Jenny, what are you doing?"
"I'm flying."
"Flying, hunh, that's cool."
"yeah, it is.  Can you fly?"
"Not yet, but I will real soon, I promise."
"Really, you can do that?  Are you a nova? Do you work for Team Tomorrow?"
"Yes, I am.  My name is Impetus.  And I will never let anybody hurt you.  I promise."
the next day Impetus went to the Mazrim Rashoud office in Los Angeles to sign up.
This message was last edited by the player at 10:45, Thu 14 May 2009.

Workout
__________________________

Fifty reps, five-hundred and fifty pounds.

The powers exercise played back and forth in Comstock's head.  He picked it apart, looked at it differently, agonized over the mistakes.  It hadn't started out that badly.  It had ended with sixteen people in critical condition from Comstock alone.  Some of them were their own damn fault -- morons switching to full-automatic to fire on a man made of metal and eating their own rounds through the legs or chest.  Others he'd punched so hard they would never have walked again.  At least not without Dr. Jansen to make things right.

Fifty reps, six-hundred and fifty pounds.

Subduing the soldiers was the only reasonable course of action.  If they had opened fire on others or each other, the bloodshed would have been worse.  But Comstock had screwed it up.  He wasn't careful enough.  Compared to him, they were like field mice.  He should have been pulling his punches more, should have, should have, should have.  Briefly, he wished he were a healer.  So he could have made a real difference.

Fifty reps, seven-hundred and fifty pounds.

The on-base gymnasium was empty at 4:00 A.M., save for the bench Comstock occupied.  His bench-press bar groaned under the mass resting on it.  After sixteen reps, it snapped at the center.  Comstock cleaned up the mess and tried to continue with another bar before that one failed the same way.  Disappointed, he sat in silence for a few minutes, eventually using the two remaining weight bars together, one in each hand like bar-bells.

Fifty reps, eight-hundred pounds.

The others were psychotic.  Toasted.  Fucked in the head.  They had every right to be.  All had reasons.  The weird 2D-specter-thing had just given everyone a reason to let go for a bit.  Let some frustration out.  That didn't matter anyway.  What mattered was what Dillon ... what Comstock was going to do about it.  Every one of them was a serious danger.  A potential one-person war.  Today proved it.  If they didn't pick up some discipline and control, humanity was fucked.  The team would scrag whoever they were supposed to be saving.  Vietnam over and over again at bargain prices.

Fifty reps, nine-hundred pounds.

He frowned.  If he didn't pick up some discipline and control, there would be more human pancakes splattered across the landscape.  If the others were nuts, he would have to be straighter than them.  Keep them focused and on task.  Every time Harley got out of line, Comstock would have to be on the other side pushing him back in.  Same for Zero or Prodigal or any of the others.  Am I really ready for that?  Why the hell should it be me?

Fifty reps, one-thousand pounds.

Because Frostburn wouldn't always be there.  To bail their asses out or tell them what to do.

He set the weights down.  This was heady business.  A few months ago, he was drunk off his brain and embarrassing the Army.  Now he was lifting trucks and resolving to keep crazy people from diving off the deep end.  Worse, when he started to panic about it, that thing in his brain clamped shut again and he felt ... not better, just nothing.  Calm.  This life was weird, and he'd had just about enough, but no matter how much weight he piled onto those bars or how many baskets he shot from half-court he never woke up back at home next to the old Air Force base.

He was the metal man, now.  Dillon frowned again.  In a few hours, he was going to be a ball of sunshine, trying to keep everyone on their toes, pushing them to train harder, and being the biggest damn hero he could so everyone would have someone to look to or lean on.  Right now, he just wanted to sit and admire the quiet.

[OOC: This is really for anyone that wants to come along. I suggest ensuring that 'Warp Factor 1' is in the Subject of your post to help differentiate it from any other asides that people may be writing. I'll wait about 24 hours for other people to register interest. If no one joins him, I'll then write a conclusion. If people do, then we can finish playing out the scene.]

Quentin had to stop himself from running out of the building the team had been assembled in and take a more leisurely pace. He was excited, nearly giddy, to test the theories he'd put together. They jived with some of the other theories he'd work over during the team's Vegas weekend, which only helped to cement in his mind that this crazy plan would work.

He stopped briefly by the pool complex the team had created only a week previous and hijacked a beach ball to be his first test object. With his testing material secured, he headed off to the area of the base that the team had almost totally demolished earlier in the day.

He put the ball on the ground to free up his hands and rubbed them together, trying to get his quantum juices flowing. "Ok," he said grinning like a madman, "here we go!"

"Wait for me!  I wanna watch!"
This message was last edited by the player at 06:34, Thu 28 May 2009.

Zero followed, highly interested in the potential in folding space.

Dillon had to stand around for this.  "So ... if it goes wrong, like what's going to happen?"

In reply to Comstock (msg #9):

"We die. A lot."

"That's possible... sort of. But it'll be fine," he hoped. He smiled reassuringly, "Trust me." Besides, he thought to himself, if it does get so bad that it kills us, it'll probably take out most of the western United States as well.

"Given that I'm expecting and trying to open a worm hole, I think that's the most likely result," he ignored, for the moment, that this statement was rather circular.

"Ok," he said, closing his eyes. He held out his open palms apart from one another by about 90 degrees and started to generate a pair of small gravity fields about ten yards apart out and away from himself.

In his mind he noted that solving the triangle would show that these were almost exactly 7 yards away from himself (or more specifically, the square root of 50 yards), though he was somewhat irritated to find that he'd solved the triangle reflexively and without actually caring how far he was from the event he was creating.

Debris in the area began to swirl as he pumped more power into the twin gravity fields he was creating, eventually jerking larger detritus into the air and eventually pulling it into one of the two points he was concentrating on. A swear broke out on his brow as he tapped his node for more and more power sending it out and concentrating it. More and more he focused as the force of the gravity wells he was making grew. They remained invisible, abstract points around which burnt wood, desert sand, loose trash, and anything else nearby began to swirl and then collect and compact.

Eventually the gravitational pull started to get strong enough that the others would begin to feel their effects as subtle tugs towards these points. "Just a little more," he advised the others through clinched teeth, "Then I have to figure out how to connect them."

Comstock reflexively went heavy to resist the pull of the gravitational events, which only increased the bizarre feeling of falling towards two points in space.  He backed away.  "Okay Gravitas ... that's cool ... what's next?"  He eyed the base, hoping that Dr. Zero had been screwing with him about the dying thing.

"Uhm," he said, concentrating on the two fields, "I combine them somehow. Someone grab that beach ball. If it looks like a wormhole - and no, I don't know what a wormhole looks like - throw it through to test it."

Gravity was, on some level, a bending of space. He tried to extend the two fields towards one another. After another minute or so of concentration, it seemed to work.

There were blossoms of blue light as the abstract points of attraction met and joined. Each of them opened separately, a swirling vortex twisting the light around the edges to highlight its existence. Abruptly, the effort to maintain the two points dropped off. Quentin examined his creation with his special sense for gravity fields and dropped his hands back to his sides, his mind racing and assimilating the understanding of how he had opened this gate.

[OOC: My mental image is something like the DS9 wormhole but instead of just emitting yellow light uselessly you're able to see through to the other side (which is a component listed in the power)]

Phantasm tosses the beach ball at the hole with a big grin on her face.

"One small step for nova...

One giant leap for nova-kind..."

The beach ball enters one side and pops out the other unharmed. It is buffeted by a bit of wind that is being churned up by the vortexes, but otherwise lands without incident. "Well... that went well." Curiosity overwhelms him. He takes a few steps, speeding up from a trot to a jog and then jumps through...

...only to pop out the other side instantly. The warp irises shut behind him, flickering out of existence. His face displays an expression of pure glee. "That was fun!"

He readied himself for trial number two. "Going to go for a bit more distance this time. I'll see if I can't get back next to the dining hall - anyone that wants to come can! Its a bit disorienting, but cool as hell."

He points with one finger and his brow furrows in concentration again. It takes much less time for something to happen this time and within a few seconds a new vortex has opened. Its other end isn't anywhere within line-of-sight. Without further adieu, Quentin jumped through.

[[OOC: This mostly ends this viginette, I encourage at least one more post by others but it isn't really required. Transport time through a warp is instant and, in this case, Quentin's targeting is a bit off, so you actually end up in a cramped storage room somewhere in the mess hall building. A somewhat inglorious begining to a new world of mobility. :P]]

Phantasm watches the success without commentary.

So all one has to do is apply enough quantum energy, and you can rip open a passage between two points...

Comstock smiled wide.  "Dude ... it works!  Holy fff-... you did it man!"  With some trepidation, he followed Quentin through the next warp, knocking over some brooms in the process.  The awesome novelty of the event precluded comments about aim.  "So ... how far can this thing go?"

Quentin moved his mouth a bit, not actually saying anything and tried to get out of the way so any others following him through would be able to exit. He groped around for a door. "You know... I'm not actually sure. Probably going to have to test that during the week."

One in the morning, Wednesday night, week 2 of T2M Nevada.  Comstock dribbled a ball and made shots from half-court, trying to wind down and get used to zero sleep.  He'd been told that his lingering feelings of drowsiness and fatigue were almost entirely psychological, but given how poorly the Utopia physicians understood the silver-gray matter in his head he wasn't sure he believed them.

He made another shot and missed.  Tonight, he was supposed to play basketball with Phantasm.  Or take a walk.  Or something.  Everyone was under stress, and Comstock was sure P could use a little breather and a chance to be herself for a bit.  Dillon sure as hell needed a minute.  He'd been banned from the weight room, on account of breaking equipment, and had just destroyed one of the baskets trying to slam dunk.  Even break-time was an exercise in control.

Imp was wandering around the base, forcing himself to stay awake.  Sgt. Smith had been sleeping soundly when he left her, her feelings hopefully would be assuaged by the note he had left if she woke up before he got back in the morning.  He heard the sound of metal tearing and Comstock cursing coming from the basketball court and headed that way.  "Hey buddy, getting in some late night practice?"  Imp yawned.  "good to see someone else isn't sleeping, makes it easier to stay awake when you have somebody to talk to.  How you doing with all this?"