Manhattan. New York City. Earth.

It's late fall, brushing up against winter. The holiday lights have been strung, the ornate displays placed into retail windows, the massive tree stands in Rockefeller Center, attracting tourists from far and wide. Also, it's cold, and NY1 forecasts a Nor'Easter is on its way. But it hasn't arrived yet, and that means there's still time to patrol, or work your day job, or relax, go on a date, sleep or...

Or find yourself suddenly summoned.

Torpedo, please roll me 2d6. I will cross-reference this on the Meetings list.
Dazzler, please also roll me 2d6. This will be cross-referenced on the Events list.
Don't worry about the lists or how they function; these rolls are going to help us set the parameters of our story. Once you see something you can use as a prompt, run with it until something else is needed. Essentially, we're building our world together.

00:15, Today: Torpedo rolled 9 using 2d6.  Meetings Roll.

I'm gonna hold off on a descriptive post until I see what the results of this roll are.

Alison Blaire smiled at her audience assembled before the auditorium stage of The Larry Bodine Youth Center. “Hi, everyone! My next song is dedicated to a very special guy I met years ago, and to a very special Christmas we shared in Australia.” A quick hand signal cued a popular holiday tune that took 25 years to hit the Billboard 100.

The soft peals of jingle bells kicked off Mariah Carey’s “All I Want For Christmas Is You”! Ali swayed slowly with the opening, a silver glow building as the song picked up the tempo.


“ I don't want a lot for Christmas
There is just one thing I need
I don't care about the presents
Underneath the Christmas tree
I just want you for my own
More than you could ever know
Make my wish come true
All I want for Christmas is you, yeah
I don't want a lot for Christmas
There is just one thing I need
And I don't care about the presents
Underneath the Christmas tree
I don't need to hang my stocking
There upon the fireplace
Santa Claus won't make me happy
With a toy on Christmas Day
I just want you for my own
More than you could ever know
Make my wish come true
All I want for Christmas is you
You, baby
Oh, I won't ask for much this Christmas
I won't even wish for snow
And I'm just gonna keep on waiting
Underneath the mistletoe
I won't make a list and send it
To the North Pole for Saint Nick
I won't even stay awake to
Hear those magic reindeer click
'Cause I just want you here tonight
Holding on to me so tight
What more can I do?
Baby, all I want for Christmas is you
You, baby
Oh, all the lights are shining so brightly everywhere
And the sound of children's laughter fills the air
And everyone is singing
I hear those sleigh bells ringing
Santa, won't you bring me the one I really need?
Won't you please bring my baby to me?
Oh, I don't want a lot for Christmas
This is all I'm asking for
I just wanna see my baby
Standing right outside my door
Oh, I just want you for my own
More than you could ever know
Make my wish come true
Baby, all I want for Christmas... is you
You, baby
All I want for Christmas is you, baby
All I want for Christmas is you, baby
All I want for Christmas is you, baby
All I want for Christmas is you, baby
All I want for Christmas is you, baby!“

The Dazzler lived up to her name with a jaw-dropping array of green, gold, crimson, and silver colors in the illumination of the rec hall! “Come on, you guys! Let’s GO for it!” Much of the audience sang along, mutant & human alike. Somewhere in her manor, Mariah clucked her tongue as an assistant played the livestream. “I still don’t know her!”
This message was last edited by the player at 22:01, Thu 17 Dec 2020.

From the perch that is the outcropping of a snow-capped skyscraper, the Shroud stands, absorbing the sensations of the city. Even if he can’t see it, he can hear it -- cars bustling in the streets, couples arguing in the night, drunks singing as if no one can hear them -- and smell it -- buses burping fumes, a woman’s fragrance -- and taste it -- the trendy Mediterranean food across the street, the buck-a-slice pizza place on the corner, the price-gauged hams -- and feel it -- the air crisp and cool then polluted in alternating breaths, a chilly breeze across his face from all the way up here. It feels like it could be just another night, and maybe it is. This is finally a reprieve from the last few months tracking the bad-guys who held that twisted game of baseball in Yankee Stadium late in the summer (sending along the info he collected to the heroes who conducted the actual capturing, pleased to stay in the shadows, whether they knew he was there or not). It was good to have a moment to reflect, even if he could be preoccupied by how that awful Mariah Carey Christmas song and its horrendous ubiquity always seem to ruin a holiday season. And yet the city was tranquil, for the moment. He will take that moment.
This message was last edited by the player at 11:00, Fri 18 Dec 2020.

It's another holiday night in the City That Never Sleeps. Concerts are being performed, theater goers are hustling through the cold, tourists stop in the middle of sidewalks in rows of threes and fours, blocking the people that are simply trying to get from point A to point B while they stop to pose for selfies or check their texts or simply take in the view.

The pure white snow is an altogether different color here in Manhattan, for the most part grey or brown, melting and gathering around the curbs, pushing pedestrians further into the street to avoid filling their shoes with freezing water.

Just another holiday night.

Until...

The scream of rockets and metal tear the sky. From Times Square or Rockefeller Center or Hell's Kitchen or Madison Square Garden you can see it. A massive ship, falling through the night, trailing black smoke through the city's neon glare, fire blazing across her hull. The ship looks like nothing born of Earth, and it's falling directly towards Central Park.

Brock Jones laughs politely at yet another bland joke made by a career pencil-pusher at the Delmar Insurance Corporation's annual Christmas party. As the vice-president, he has no choice but to attend. Really though, Jones would much rather be patrolling the streets and stopping crimes as the costumed Torpedo. The hours slowly crawl by as the various salesmen, marketers, and human-resources managers rub shoulders with a man who is nothing more than a retired athlete and their vice president to them. The thought of their reactions if they ever were to find out that the vice president of Delmar Insurance -- the all-American, Super Bowl winning, quarterback -- was actually a superhero brings a small smile to Jones' face. With this thought the only thing keeping Jones awake, the hours creep along until the monotony is finally broken by a streaking fireball flying outside; standing out like a sore thumb against the night sky.

Jones' eyes go wide on seeing the burning object hurling through the air, towards Central Park. Quickly excusing himself -- with the excuse of having to call his wife and kids -- Brock Jones retreats to his office on the top floor of the Delmar Building to change into the Torpedo suit. With the armored suit on, the Torpedo leaves the Delmar building through the roof access and takes flight; chasing after the unidentified burning object.

"What the--?"

Sam Wilson looks up to the sky from his perch atop a grassy knoll in Central Park. Redwing's shriek of alarm is still ringing in his ears as a huge shadow falls over the area. The practice drills the Avenger and his bird have been running will have to wait.

"Let's go, partner!" he says, tapping a button on his wrist. In an instant, the plain jacket he's wearing shifts into his iconic flight harness. Wings made of hard light extend from his back and he takes to the sky, his sidekick in tow.

Whatever's up there, it doesn't look good. The Falcon and his ally move in for a closer look at the strange object...

The Shroud turns from his perch. The most breath-taking view in the city is lost to him anyway, more from his apathy for such inconsequential things than his sight. And the criminals are scurrying like vermin in the darkness on the ground, not in the majestic heights nearer to the sky. The night is still young and justice must be meted.

But as the questionable hero leaves his roost, an event escapes him and everyone on Earth: a conflict happening deep in outer space, so far away that it registers as barely a fraction of the faintest, instantaneous flicker in the sky even to a focused, trained eye with the most advanced spectating equipment, but a happening that could lead to great consequence to those on this planet and every other, with the most unlikely protagonists standing between glorious life and certain doom for all throughout the galaxy. Then, like the Shroud, the minor spectacle is gone, removed from sight, but the danger, far from this view, remains, somewhere out there.