There was an overpowering desire to dissolve into a wash of bees and climb throughout the costume, to truly explore it's secrets and confirm this wasn't some weird trick; Stephanie's mind struggled with the logistics of Buccaneer Shoecannon even while her plan involved superhuman powers.

Though her instinct was to pull her hand away she held fast until the animate outfit had said it's very Pirates-y piece before sliding back down into her seat. Karl's hand on her leg was nice. It was a comfort.

Unsure how exactly to speak to the pirate costume Steph just nodded and smiled politely before turning her attention back to Bex.

"I have been," she admitted of Bex's accusation, her voice warm with culpability and apology. "I'm not... out yet as a person with powers." Steph explained, forcing a pained smile, "I haven't decided that going public with it is the best way for me to make a difference."

She sipped her tea before glancing back to Becca.

"How old are you, anyway? Fifteen? Sixteen?" Truth was, the hyper-friendly nature, the airy disposition, and the fantastical friends and figments all made Bex feel young to Stephanie. Which was a concern when it came to sharing her secret. She remembered being a child, remembered not appreciating the gravity of certain secrets.
This message was last edited by the player at 16:09, Sat 07 Aug 2021.

Bex considered Karl’s comment. She didn’t really feel frustration anymore. Ever since…

“Most people always ignored me, or made fun of me, or laughed at me. I don’t really blame them, though. I am kinda weird. But that’s okay, too! My mom always encouraged me and I’m pretty good at teaching yoga and stuff so I feel good about that!” Becca smiled again and looked over to Stephanie. “I’m sixteen!” Something she said made Bex’s tilt her head to one side, in a facsimile of a golden retriever.

“I don’t know what you mean,” she admitted brightly. “But someone took pictures of me while I was in my backyard a little while ago. And they left pictures so I guess it was some kinda boomer with a Polaroid. Or maybe a hipster! Either way, I don’t know that I can do any good. All I can try to do is make friends and help people feel better, you know?”

Polaroids? Uhhh...

“Someone you don’t know took pictures of you...at your home.  And left some too?” Karl looked at Steph to see if she was having the same first impression he was.

“Not to alarm you but that sounds kind of freaky to me, real stalkerish. Be careful, and let your mom know. As for the other part Karl smiled, relaxing a bit “I think helping people feel better can do a lot of good. If you’re making people smile and helping them feel better that seems like a good thing to do to me.”

"Yea, Bex that's not... that's not harmless fun. People shouldn't be taking your picture without your permission and then leaving it for you..." Steph said, adding on to Karl's concern. She shared a glance with him before scooching in closer so they could provide a more unified front. And to get closer to him, which she enjoyed doing.

"You should maybe tell your mom about it, just to be safe." Steph agreed. "Especially with your online presence... it could be some weird stalker guy."

"I showed my mom first thing," she reassured them.  "It didn't even look like sex crime stuff.  Do you want me to get the pictures for you?  Here."

A gnome crawled out from beneath the table and wiggled onto the bench.  A blue tunic and a large red hat, giving him similarities to lawn gnomes.  With a bulbous nose and pronounced mustache, the small gentlegnome... well, he seemed like what you might've come to expect from Bex's friends.

"Smeddly actually brought me to meet Karl today.  He's really nice!  Smeddly, did you get the pictures that creeper took?"  The gnome offered a manila envelope, still cold from the outside.  Smiling, she gave him a hug, and he wiggled back beneath the table and disappeared.  Undoing the metal, Becca offered the pictures over to the two adults.  "I didn't think they were, like, sex crime-y stuff or anything.  Just kinda whack. Mom was going to go to the police about it, but she was all 'what am I gonna tell the police?' and I don't think she did.  And then Smeddly stole the pictures to bring here, so I guess she never sent the pictures in."  Becca shrugged.

"I think some of the pictures are really nice, actually.  Like... I wonder what kinda camera the creeper used?  It really got my cheekbones."  The pictures, cold to the touch, revealed Rebecca in her backyard with a number of her friends.  Karl recognized some of them.  The anthropomorphic greaser with the belt buckle shaped like a fish, the felt man with the oven in his stomach, the duck with the bowtie.  The sheep, caught mid-bounce.  But also a thirty foot gummy bear, what looked like a spider made of cotton balls, a sagacious turtle, a clothing iron with a mustache.  There were about two dozen pictures in the manila envelope, showing the day's array of frolicking in the backyard.  Judging by the angle and such, someone must've been directly outside of the fence to take those pictures.

"See?  It's totally okay.  Nobody was, like, tryinna peek in my window or anything.  I was just playing with my friends!"

Speaking of creepers Karl thought as the small...person came up from under the table.

Yeah, a thirty foot tall gummy bear is kind of a giveaway even with a fence.

“What would a...no never mind. I can see someone taking pictures of all that, sure. Leaving some without talking to you still seems weird. But I guess I’ve experienced stranger things lately. Still be careful.” Karl figured if something did happen that gnome could apparently whisk her away so she was probably a lot safer than your average distracted teen.

"Jesus!" Stephanie cried, startling back from the sudden appearance of the gnome as he emerged from below the table, literally out of nowhere. For just a fraction of a second the girl dissolved into a cloud of bees as she started backwards from the creepy little man, ultimately hitting the back of the booth bench and reforming. Despite any cutesy appearance he may possess, a man of any stature climbing from beneath the table she was sitting at was startling and frightening.

"Seriously??" She accused with a scowl, as much angry for embarrassment as for the very real possibility someone had seen her, despite the late night sleepy coffee shop being reasonably empty at this hour in the midst of a snowy Chicago night. "You... you can't just have a creepy little many crawl out from under the table, Becca!" Steph growled, crossing her arms beneath her chest.

"But those photos are definitely weird. You... you should definitely go to the police with your mom." she said, softening dramatically. "People don't drop anonymous manila folders of photos to you unless they're trying to scare you." But she looked to Karl. "If they were following her before, they might still be stalking her right now."

Bex tilted her head to the side again, the opposite side from the last cant, but she nodded.  "Okay, I'll let my friends know not to come out from beneath tables in the future.  Got it."  The comment about going to the police made Becca nod, but slowly.  "I guess I just figure, if they wanted to scare me, they would've tried to scare me, you know?  Like... somebody took some snapshots of me playing games with my friends.  And my friends wouldn't ever let anyone hurt me.  So... I don't really mind?  I guess?"

Still, she gestured across the table to Stephanie.  "I think I get that pun Karl made earlier now!"

As startling as the gnome’s arrival was, Steph’s dissolution was even more so, though it was only for an instant. Even more impressive for that fact, that she was able to go back and forth so quickly.

“It’s not just tables Becca, it’s the surprise in general. Other people don’t know them like you do. Rumblesteak suddenly being behind someone in an elevator or one of them popping out of someone’s bag or suddenly being in the backseat of their car, whatever, it’s startling and could be scary. Sometimes it’s better to ease people into things.”

Hopefully if anyone was watching they would associate the momentary blur around Steph as just another thing Becca was doing.“If she can just appear places she would be pretty hard to follow.” Karl mentioned. “But home is home, and they know that spot. This person probably won’t be the last to come around especially if you keep flaunting your friends like this. People will recognize from your Tiktoks and videos. Once they see it’s not just some special effect...I don’t know. But you should really seriously consider if you want to keep things online or let everyone see the works in real life. Not all the attention you’ll get is positive. It’s your choice just be careful.”

For the most part Stephanie just nodded along in agreement with Karl as she looped her arms back around his own and leaned in against him. She liked his warmth. And his strength. He knew way more about this public image stuff than she did and was speaking strong wisdom.

"The Queen thing? Yea. I can turn into them. I can talk to them." She explained without being more specific. But there was a bit of a restrained smile, as if she were proud of it and trying to hide it. Stephanie thought really strongly of bees. She really admired them. She thought there was a lot to learn from them. "But you really should be careful, Bex. Not everyone you wave down is going to be as gentle as this big lug." She said, pointing with her eyes up towards Karl.

"Gotcha," she confirmed with yet another nod.  "I just wanna make friends with the whole world, you know?  And like... we all need people who're nice to us, right?  And I wanna be that for folks, if I can be.  It's why I do the, um, the YouTube tutorials on mindfulness and yoga and stuff.  It's healthy, sure, but like-- it helps you really... um, really understand the world.  You know?  I dunno.  I just..."  Bex sort of squirmed a little in her seat, and Buccaneer Shoecannon patted her shoulder.

"I just wanna make the world happier if I can, I guess.  All of my friends make me happy, and I wanna be friends with everybody so I can make everybody happy, too.  Sorry if I scared either of you, or if my friends did.  We really didn't mean to."

A sudden flash draws the trio's attention to a nearby window, where they spot a man with a professional-quality camera snapping photos of them from outside the cafe.

“I’ll have to look up some of those videos; I could use some relaxation techniques I think.” Karl started. “It’s just been coming so fast, the plane, voices in my apartment” a gentle elbow poke at Steph “your friends and so on. I know I kind of need to keep riding the wave, it’s going to be there no matter what I do, but I’m glad to have some quieter moments like this to catch my breath.”

Not for long though. Even towards the back in a darker booth away from the window it seemed clear they were the subject of the photographer.  Becca’s stalker or someone else? It seemed doubtful some random passer by would spot them this deep in and have a camera like that ready, so either a lucky tip-off or he had some way to find at least one of them, probably Becca.

“Do one of you want to handle that or should I go out and try to see what’s going on?”

"I think that's really sweet," Stephanie said to the younger woman, and she meant it, </goldenrod>"I just don't know if everyone can be brought to the same table. It's fine to serve honey in your tea, but sometimes people don't want to play nice. There's a lot of bad men out there who might take advantage of your kindness."</goldenrod> How did one explain the sometimes rapacious arm of the patriarchy and human cruelty to a wide-eyed teenie-bopper with living imaginary friends?

Steph's reverie was broken by Karl's nudge but she only had time to look up at him and smile before there was a flash going off outside.

"Hey!!" Steph shouted, standing up, indignant. She didn't wait for a vote, she slid out of the booth, detaching from Karl, and went stomping over towards the source of the camera and the flash. "What gives??" she shouted at the figure through the glass, throwing her hands up into an indignant Windy City shrug. There was nothing fantastic about her other than her outfit which was most certainly on fleek, if people even said that anymore; sometimes Stephanie was too busy minding two course loads, her little brother, three languages, the very thin façade of innocence, and the restaurant to keep up on what was hip to say in English anymore. She was just a pretty, fashionable, early 20s Filipina enjoying a coffee with Chicago's new superman and a Tik Tok sensation with real-life imaginary friends. By comparison she seemed really out of place. She hoped.

Becca, meanwhile, flashed the camera a smile and did a peace sign.  When Stephanie and Karl reacted negatively, she looked at Karl--Stephanie was now up near the window, after all!  "What's the, um... what's the goal of stopping the pictures from being taken?  You're both super pretty and you're super famous now, so like..."  Bex shrugged.  "Aren't people gonna be interested?"

The concerns about people taking advantage of Becca's kindness definitely gave her pause, but she wasn't sure what to do about it just yet.  Instead, she filed that away in her expansive file of 'stuff to think about later,' and then went back to the issue at hand.

"Oh!  Ohmigosh.  Speaking of sending you videos!  We should take some selfies!  Ohmigosh, people would be so excited if we did a quick video.  It would do numbers on the 'grams."

The man with the camera snaps another burst of photos, then hurries away down the sidewalk out of sight.

The handful of other customers in the cafe stare at Stephanie. A few of them whisper to each other while glancing toward Karl.

Bex looked around, and Shoecannon slid back over and returned to being her costume.  "Why's it feel like there's a buncha tension in here now?" she inquired, looking around.  "Is everybody okay?"

Though it was amusing seeing the cameraman run off by the decidedly non-threatening Stephanie, Karl frowned at the whole scene.

"Pictures in general, sure...I think we are worried this is the same guy who took pics of you earlier, which raises questions on how he found you again, out away from home."

He sighed, as some of what Becca was saying did make sense, though he was still concerned about the particular photographer.

"Yeah, sure, some selfies would be great. But let's not get her" he indicated Stephanie "in them unless she wants to. Ah, I don't know what to really say right now for a video though..."

"Paparazi, right??" she said, briefly catching the gaze of the staring individuals, "Total creepers." She added in a tone that co-opted their participation in the situation as agreement with her. "And yea, he's the guy." she said, getting out ahead of it. "But he's had a long couple days and we're just trying to grab coffee with our friend."

Then she turned and returned to the table, sliding back into the booth and under Karl's arm. Absolutely keen eyes might notice that she slid through his arm to get under it, body-dissolving into bees and parting ever so subtly on a need-to-change basis, but she had the benefit of the angle and the booth.

"I don't mind. I'm not a secret, just my powers." She said, nodding up at him before smiling in preparation for the pictures.

[OOC: Steph is using both the Subtle and Selective feats on her Swarm Form to slip through his arm instead of looping it over her, the result is ultimately the same though.]

And lo, with the bubblegum and pep she had in infinite reverse, Becca pulled her phone out and started to take some pictures.  She turned around to take pictures of herself and the couple, and then got over into their booth to take more selfies with the team.  Some of the pictures involved Shoecannon's glove holding the camera while she posed with both hands, but those were relatively rare.

"Ok, so...anything else? Or should we call it a night and see what fresh chaos tomorrow brings?" Karl asked when the pictures were done, including a couple from his own phone.

Internally he was thinking of whether to post them himself and what to say. He was getting a start on the organizational side and felt he did OK in interviews so far but the inherent celebrity side of celebrity was still very new, as new as his abilities. They'd both take some figuring out.

When the selfies got underway a softer, maybe even younger, side of Stephanie came out. A side that knew all the filters and poses that made for great selfies. A side that was collaborative and instructive in a warm and passionate sort of way. It was easy to forget she wasn't all that old herself under the double major, near full-time work and volunteer activities. Her favorite filter proved to be the Faux Freckles, especially on Karl which made her laugh and fall against both of them for how out of place they looked on him.

"Oh," came her response, rich with surprise. "We can... if you want." He wasn't wrong. She still had a few hours of school work to do and she was hoping to do some yoga. But she also really enjoyed his company and it was obvious from her body-language and tone that she was disappointed at the idea of an early parting. He was the one who'd dragged her back out after they'd said goodbye after all.

"I'll go ahead and head home," Bex confirmed with a nod.  "It was super nice to meet you both!  Sorry about being weird.  It's okay.  I've always been weird."  She beamed at them back and shimmied out of the booth, before heading off towards the bathroom door again.

"Yeah you too Becca. Sorry if I may have overreacted to some things, just...not used to them yet." Karl gave a wave as she departed.

Turning to Steph, "Take you home, or is it better for you to slip in without potential gossip?"

To: Atlas solo thread or Karl & Stephanie thread
This message was last edited by the player at 11:17, Wed 25 Aug 2021.

"Oh, sure, cya Bex!" Steph said raising a hand to wave her off. As she lowered the hand she looked back up at Karl and shrugged, obviously disappointed. "Split the difference, I guess. We can walk out together and then go our separate ways. My parents think I'm asleep in my bed but if Chicago's new super-man drops me off they might get the hint otherwise." she said, patting his arm with her hand, tracing her finger down the sleeve.

"But I'm not tired." She lamented. What she meant was I like spending time with you and now that we're together again I don't want to split up so soon because I just might miss you... But that wasn't what she said. Instead she said "But you've had a big couple days. I bet you could use a good rest and some time to yourself." Then she leaned up, trying not to sound too glum and mopey and for the most part succeeding, kissed him on the cheek, and slid through his arm the same way she'd slid under it, and out of the bench.

"C'mon." She encouraged.

[OOC: I figure we can just fade the scene to black there?

<To: Stephanie solo thread>]