"Might as well.  Although being seen with the good Dr. and David may spoil our chances of passing as baselines."  Imp heads over and raps on their door.

---

Spoiler text: (Highlight or hover over the text to view)
if they come out, more dialogue, then Imp will head over to Caesars with whoever else wants to go, the cards and the cash await

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This message was last edited by the player at 03:29, Fri 17 Apr 2009.

"I hope he c-c-c-comes out soon, I'd l-l-like to hear his... un-n-n-nique opinion on the g-gallery."

Dillon shook his head.  "They've got phones and so do we.  Alright.  Art gallery, then cards."  He tried to hazard a glance through the walls, and couldn't see them through the wash of other inputs, radiation, wiring, and support structure.  By the time he summoned the elevator and checked back to see if anyone was following, he was seeing in the usual spectrum again.  The elevator arrived with an inviting chime.

---

Spoiler text: (Highlight or hover over the text to view)
Just wanted to keep things moving along.  Based on Dr. Zero's mention of a restaurant and all that, I am assuming I don't see them.  We can still meet up with them downstairs.

---

ooc: actually he mentioned the walking, could been looking out the window. I'll go with it though.


"Hey doc, we better get back, we are supposed to meet up with the others to go to the gallery and then that novas only club,," David says floating in the other direction now.

"I should probably pick up some sunglasses at a giftshop while we're out and about. Its sort of a pathetic disguise, but hey, it worked for Superman, right?" As if to underscore just how ineffective sunglasses would probably be in the long-run, another rippling wave raced out from his body. Quentin grimaced, not in pain, just in frustration. "Not much I can do about that, though. Here's hoping most of this town is too intoxicated to notice something like that."

The group as a whole wanders down to the lower levels, passing through elegant but not overstated halls on the way.  The people in the Bellagio are a more calm crowd than those in the surrounding hotels. They pay for luxury, and the right to privacy; they expect the same in return.  Though many cannot help but stare at you as you pass by. Full of youthful beauty and chiseled bodies, your group cannot help but draw attention even without your nova identities being on display.

When you reach the ground floor, you find signs pointing you directly towards the art show, making it easy for anyone wishing to visit to find their way. When those attending arrive, they find that the show is apparently dedicated to contemporary art this season.

http://www.bellagio.com/amenit...ery-of-fine-art.aspx

Imp strolls casually through the art gallery, taking not of the strange, the sublime and the surreal.  He likes the work, but it just didn't seem to have enough flavour to draw him in, art never had.  He grinned, it was nice that some things never changed.  He caught the eye of some of the others and nodded towards the doors.  As soon as everybody who was going was gathered he headed across the street to Caesars and went to the cashier.  He pushed a few hundred across the counter and gathered his chips, then headed down into the pit.  Time to see if his ability to read people worked as well as he thought it did.  He walked with an easy swagger, casual, cocky, charming.  The lingering looks from the women in the room made his heart race, his breath quicken.  "Thank god I'm not a pathetic loser anymore," he breathed.  "If I died right now, I'd be happy."  Imp slid into a chair at a 10/20 table, ordered a G&T, and waited to be dealt in.

"God, I'm ranting again, and not even on purpose. You are right. Let us sample the Baseline culture. Do you have any artistic talents, young David?"

At the Art Gallery:

OOC: Does anyone act differently to Z given his 'eccentric' attire?'



Zero walks up to Impetus. "I think I prefer your architecture to most of what I see here, Mr. Impetus. Though I do love Andy Warhol's works. The Sol LeWitt sculpture does please me as well, but I like funny sculptures. Something about the use of space. Anyway, I have a question for you. How much do you think the casinos lose in a night to Novas who... use their gifts to alter the odds?"

"Uh..welll...my mom says I can sing like an angel...guess it worked out huh doc?" David smiling, thinking of his mom for a second I wonder what she's up to about now...maybe I can try to talk to her when we get back on the phone or something...I miss her...


At the museum

David walks around admiring the differents works of art and trying not to feel like a sore thumb, while everyone is staring at him and acquiesses to a few people asking to touch his wings and flapped them for a sad little boy blowing the little boy's hair out of his face.

Samuel watches the baselines crowd around his companion with a smile. "W-Well, now." he gives him a nudge. "Looks like y-y-you've alr-ready got yourself a some g-groupies." He proceeds to saunter around the museum, looking very closely at the various artworks. He finds the underlying textures of it just amazing.

David smiles a little at Samuel, "I wouldn't say that but at least no one is chasing me with a pitchfork or anything,"

At no point in Dillon's life had he ever truly been exposed to fine art.  A picture in a history text.  Images in an advertisement.  That was all.  He didn't know what to do with himself at the Art gallery, so he paid for an audio tour wand and made his way from painting to painting while other patrons stared.  Dr. Zero's arrival didn't help.  He did find himself strangely attracted to the geometric forms of George W. Hart, but everything else seemed stupidly irrelevant.

"So you used to do this stuff, Solitaire?" Dillon asked in the gift shop.  "Art I mean."

Sameul's smile turns to a confused frown. "You g-g-gonna tell m-me 'bout your p-p-powers yet? What's all th-this Heaven and Hell b-b-business?!"

"Well as far as my blessings go, we can discuss those back at the base, but it's your soul you're concerned about, I'd be glad to discuss verses with you at the hotel, in fact I was going to search for a church that I could attend, I'd be happy to let you know when I'm going to attend.  Oh! Perhaps a good bible study might be more up your alley..." David trailed off a bit "Let me find a good few passages to share with you, I'll let you know later."

In reply to Comstock (msg #30):

Solitaire wanders absent-mindedly, taking in the whole place, though mainly focusing on Warhol and some Lichtenstein. She loved they way he took completely mundane and boring objects, and made them fine art. She was staring at a painting of soup cans when she heard Comstock's question.

"Huh? Oh, yeah, but I've got nothing on these guys.  Still, its something I enjoy. " She turns back to the cans. "He definitely had, something." Solitaire says with admiration. She looks back, and spies the headphones. "Not much of an art person, eh, Dillon?" She figured it was better not to call people by code-names right at the moment, this would likely be some of the last anonymity they would get, pity to spoil it so soon. She catches Imps nod out of the corner of her eye, and follows. "Well, time to go play some cards."

Solitaire takes the seat across from Imp, smiling. This is gonna be fun.

With little or no background in art beyond poorly drawing ellipses on planes to represent orbits, Quentin had never developed much appreciation for art in general. This went double for modern art, which lacked the historical value many "classical" pieces did and were often, in his opinion, just random crap that someone was trying to pass off as professional.

He tried not to look bored, and mostly failed. Instead he looked restless, uninterested, and eventually excused himself to a gift shop to purchase the sunglasses he'd mentioned previously obtaining to hide his obviously inhuman eyes.

The other visitors at the show flock around Dr. Zero, assuming him to be some artist's commentary on the emerging nova population.  Or perhaps a stylized representation of the Great War.  Or maybe he's one of the artists, disguised so that he can watch people viewing his work... People comment on what Zero "really" is, and then move on by.

Quentin is less of a success, and people instinctively shy away (unless soothe is in use) as he comes near.  While they often don't immediately point and scream (people really don't expect novas, or anything "supernatural", so they often miss obvious things like the ripple of space and the black eyes), they do walk the other way, and cluster more tightly together, at his approach.

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

The low dollar card tables are active tonight (the high rollers have yet to come out apparently), and the place looks to be a bit understaffed this evening.  The tables are largely full, and there is a line to get chips.  The crowd is a talkative one, more so than normal (perhaps there is a convention, since many people seem to know one another here?), and you have a bit of trouble finding two chairs at the same table due to the lack of dealers (though you eventually manage if you so choose).

In response to Zero:
"I'd imagine that's only gonna happen a couple times before they hire one of us to watch out for that kind of thing, and to deal with someone who uses their powers like that."  Imp smirks.  "Good think I'm not one of those n'ere do wells."

At Caesars:
After working their way through the crowd and finally finding some seats together Imp grins back at Solitaire.  He pick up his cards and, as he loosens his control on his powers, he becomes even better looking than he was moments ago.  Appearance shifts slightly for everyone watching to become that much sexier, mannerisms become those guaranteed to seduce, but unconsciously so.  Imp enjoys playing here, surrounded by people.  The convention that many of the people were here for, "The impact of Novas on the economy and what it will mean for the rest of us" seemed to draw many mid-sized business owners, wealthy enough to be able to afford losing some money, grasping enough to try to win it back.  They never did.  The hands that Solitaire didn't win usually went to Imp.  He didn't have her obvious experience with playing cards, but he was soon able to pick up on the subtleties of the game.  The chips kept stacking up in front of him, and people at the table didn't even seem to angry about losing. This was heaven.
This message was last edited by the player at 12:27, Sat 18 Apr 2009.

Of note, while Impetus is killing the table, Solitaire is mostly just making sure that her money doesn't leave too quickly.  Her appearance occasionally distracts someone into losing their money, but on the whole she's just not keeping up with the Imp...

Impetus has somehow managed to collect the majority of the money at his table, and have everyone like him at the same time.  An impressive feat indeed.

Solitaire sits at the table, having a blast, even if she's only managing to win just enough to stay in the game. That was enough, she didn't care about winning, it was only the game that mattered. She usually managed to walk away with about what she started with, and so never really lost anything, but nor did she often win, and tonight was business as usual. Still, it had been ages since Solitaire had such a game, and was enjoying every minute of it.

After a couple hours, and a few thousand dollars up, Imp decides he's had enough.  He nods to Solitaire and gets up, gathering his impressive stack of chips while he does so.  He tosses the dealer a hundred dollar chip and, as he's about to head to the cashier, gets a key slipped into his pocket by one of the women who've been watching him.  Imp gets Solitaire's attention, mouthes "Meet you at the Archon" and heads to the elevators after cashing out.

Solitaire sighs with a smile, and gives Imp a wave. "Have fun." She calls after him. Leaving Caesars, she wanders down the strip in the general direction of Archon, taking in the sights, the lights, the art, the people, whatever Vegas deigned to show her. It was fascinating, in a way the stories couldn't quite capture. She strolled past pirates, half-naked dancers, tourists, gamblers, and a couple people who defied easy description. It was a interesting place, Solitaire would give it that much, and she wanted to see what else it had to offer.

"Nah ... not much of an art person," Dillon muttered to himself.  He dragged Phantasm, Quentin and anyone else who was interested through the halls of the Bellagio, finding the indoor botanical gardens ("this is always awesome at Chinese new year"), the Chilhuly Glass sculptures ("The word is that Steve Wynn is blind, and this thing always looked like mushrooms to me"), and the forum shops at Caesars ("expensive as hell").  He hadn't been to the strip in about a year.  Felt good to stretch the legs and see the old sights.

On his mind was Phantasm's surreptitious note, at odds with the frank sincerity of her amnesia claims.  At an opportune moment, away from Quentin and the others, Dillon nodded awkwardly to Phantasm.  "Alright ... so, is this a good time to ask questions?"  He wasn't a stranger to lies and slipping away.  Tall ceilings and a crowd made for some decent privacy.  "I mean, I don't want to pry into your memory or anything but, but you know, if you need someone to talk to or ..."  Smooth, moron, now she's going to think you're creepy or worse.
This message was last edited by the player at 18:17, Sat 18 Apr 2009.

If there is one thing that almost all professionals in the sciences share, it is an acute ability to recognize patterns. It doesn't take long for Quentin to recognize that people are, perhaps even unconsciously, avoiding him. Despite his eccentric attire, they do not seem to have the same problem with Dr. Zero. Prodigal's wings also seemed to fascinate people more than repel them. His brow creased briefly, though he forced himself to relax the expression - no need to provoke anyone by making them think he was also angry.

He tried to calm himself down to see if he could, at the very least, stop the spatial rippling that seemed to plague him. He really couldn't do much about his eyes other than hide them. Fortunately, some people in Vegas did things far more eccentric than simply wear sunglasses indoors or at night, so this was remarkably ordinary for the city. Still, it wouldn't do to be scaring people while they were out and about enjoying themselves, so he tried to focus himself on negating the rippling effect and generally calming down. [Private to GM: This, of course, constitutes spending the 1QP to activate Sooth which, I should note, has a 10m radius.]

As Solitaire and Impetus left, phantasm mumbled a bit.
"I... but I was going to play too..."
Phantasm seemed disappointed, but the art was interesting, and the poker was somewhat intimidating, so it only lasted a moment.


"You know, this is all so different than you see in art books.  Textures are such a huge part of the art.  I don't think I'll ever bother with pictures of art again."
Phantasm sweeps the room with her eyes as she says this, rapidly taking in everything she sees.  She moves closer to a few pieces, examining them from different angles. Those watching her would probably assume she was uninterested in the art, because of how little time she spent looking at it, but she stood around staring of into space for a long while as the rest of her group was finishing their tour of the exhibition, just contemplating it.

As she noticed Dillon coming over, she realized that she would have to talk to him about that note soon... Was that a good idea?  She had to talk to someone, couldn't just keep this up without someone to help.  Phantasm was smart enough to realize that trying to go it alone would drive her crazy.

"Thanks Dillon... I gave you that note, so you aren't really prying.  I gave you that because you seemed like a nice guy.  You kind of remind me of my older brother.

You have to keep this to yourself though.  If you don't promise me that you won't say anything, then I won't be able to say anything more.  Even though I'd really like someone to talk to."
This message was last edited by the player at 21:37, Sat 18 Apr 2009.