It’s nearly two months after the cordon was erected on May 15th. You all have gotten to know each other and have been surviving together for at least a few weeks. Some of you might have worked for other gangs and had a falling out, some might have worked for other groups that were destroyed in recent gang wars, and some might be loners who finally decided they needed at least a few occasional companions to survive. Whatever the cause, whether or not you like each other, you've come together, not only for survival, but for being around others with the same mindset and abilities.

You've taken to spending a few hours a day on the roof so that you can get some fresh air and sunshine while still remaining relatively safe. This afternoon was a bit different. Not only was the sky fairly clear, but a couple blocks over your attention has been drawn to sounds of actual gunfire. With ammo being in short supply, almost as rare as fresh food, you figure there has to be a big reason for so much being expended out on the streets.


OOC: Please give a short description of yourselves and what you have been up to, and what brought you to gathering with the others at this place. Then, it's up to you how you react to the gunfire. :)

Rodrigo...well, what used to be Rodrigo moved about the roof. He was collecting rainwater in bottles. After all, drinking water was a rare thing nowadays.

Whatever he was now, he did not need the water. Nor any food. The liquid was for his sister and mother, who had come to this country for a better life. Now they where trapped in this city during an alien invasion. Worse, the family member who raised the money to bring them to a city under siege had been transformed into something inhuman.

Rod, or the Earthmover as the papers called him, was a statue made of loose earth, rock, and glowing veins of some sort of heatless magma. Speaking was very diffcult for him, as he had no lungs and the bare minimum for a voice box. Plus he did not know English very well.

None of that mattered anymore. After that alien device had transformed him, he tired to get his family out of the city. Yet them being surrounded by other metahumans seemed like the safest place for them. At least with hostile invaders running around.

When he heard the bullets flying, he moved to act. There might be a stray shot that hits Maria or Mom. He proceeds to throw himself off the roof, and slams into the street below. Rather than injuring or breaking any part of himself, his body turns into a mud like substance. He flattens with the impact, and then reforms into a humanoid state in seconds, no worse for wear. Then he shoots off at over 100 mph, sliding along on a trail of mud on earth. He almost looked like he was surfing.
This message was last edited by the player at 15:28, Fri 21 Oct 2022.

Rei Takanaka, ex black ops of a once ingenious Corp once known as Q-Max. Rumor has it that one day they shut down after all of their execs and human “experiments” turned up dead but a few of them were missing. If you dared to survive going down that “Rabbit Hole”, You’d find Project Elemental, a project that was supposed to create Super Soldiers based on the elements. It was rumored these “Elemental Warriors” would’ve put Q-Max on top of the conglomerate “food chain” but before the process could be perfected, the project was leaked to the other corps and assassins from them were sent to end Q-Max and their super soldiers… all except for one who was too fast for them to catch. Rei had lived on the streets since then but before she escaped, managed to save her “mother” and engineer of her suit known as Silverlight. By far, they are the only survivors of this massacre. The Q-particles coursing through her veins are still imperfect but Silverlight was made to slow walk them into maturity. Since both have been in hiding, Rei has been playing “hero”, believing it was the right thing to do, her mother obliged as before joining Q-Max, Rei was a decorated vet, putting her life on the line to save civilians in harms way while her comrades took care of the rest, that is… the Pew Pew Boom Boom Booms! Doing all this heroing led her to joining ranks with others like her.

Deep in thought, Rei was broken from it by the sound of gunfire.

“Gunfire is getting close. You gonna investigate, Rei?” an older womanly voice spoke inside Rei’s mind.

“Yes, ma. Just stay put and hidden!” Rei answered after touching a node underneath her earlobe as she spoke. After laxing her hand to its side, Rei looked towards the sound of gunfire, assessed where the civilians were. She leaned forward from her chair on the rooftop then jumped into the skies towards the streets near Earthmover. Her landing created a small creater in the ground but she wasn’t hurt—Silvetlight’s durability makes sure of that.
This message was last edited by the player at 03:39, Sat 22 Oct 2022.

Push, as usual, was doing a lot of thinking. Watching Rod collect rainwater by hand set one track to how she could automate the process - once she had working electronics, and chip printers weren't exactly growing out of the ground. The gunfire was troubling in a distant, mark-the-checklist sort of fashion. Ever since she'd stopped wandering and moved into this particular safehouse, she'd tried to use the stable environment to get more work done, but components and the need for protection were infuriating bottlenecks. Another consideration, a constant one these days, was monitoring communications, and it leaped to the forefront of her attention as two of her room mates, for lack of a better term, leapt from the roof.

"I'll check the comms and then fo- and they're gone."

Securing the straps of the heads-up display and wristbound computer so they'd remain attached while running at high speeds, she waved at the air in precise movements that told the haptic sensors she was trying to locate any radio signals within a mile.

And then she started walking down multiple flights of rickety stairs. One part of her pondered the implications of modifying local gravitic forces, while the other just wished they'd installed a trampoline or a pile of mattresses somewhere near the bottom.

Tara sat on the parapet of the roof knees pulled up under her chin, she somehow looked in place there looking out over the city. Perhaps it was the easy way she fitted into her surroundings, having lived on the streets most of her life, even before the invasion, she looked at home there.

She was dressed in her tight fitting body suit of charcoal grey over the top was her ever present chocolate brown lined leather aviators jacket. fingerless gloves and pixie boots folded at the ankle finished off the look. Her hair was spiky with the left side shaved the right long and loose.

She went by the name Lemon Juice these days, Lemon to her friends. Though her powers were not what one would call traditional but they definitely were interesting. She'd developed them before the invasion had been using them ever since to help those that needed it.

As the shots broke the silence she stood. It was only then that her ful height became evident, she stood just over six foot and was wiry of frame with an athletes build and there was a natural almost slick grace as she moved.

she clocked the others reactions and stepped up onto the parapet then stepped off. somehow she defied gravity and slid now the side of the building onto the ground below

Running diagnostic, Progress 0%
Clearing cache
Memory Integration Routine Engaged
Running diagnostic, Progress 10%
Running diagnostic, Progress 56%
Memory leak detected.
Asimov Compression Algorithm Initializing
Running diagnostic, Progress 99%
Memory leak detected.
Asimov Compression Algorithm complete.
Diagonistic complete.
Memory cache cleared.
Reinitializing....

PRIME DIRECTIVE:  REPORT TO OMNICYBER LABS ALTERNATE SITE
PRIMARY SITE NO LONGER OPERATIONAL

The unit looked both bizarre and non threatening like this.  It was just a bare metal skeleton-like object.  But a skeleton was clearly human.  This was on the other side of the Uncanny Valley, definitely not human at all, just aping man's bipedal, upright carriage.  It had limbs of a sort, roughly analogous to human ones.  What could be called the left hand was plugged into an array of wet cell batteries.

It was a curious machine the others had found in the building.  It initially looked concerning, but it really didn't do much at first.  It could talk.  It only seemed to talk in one language, but at least that language was English.  Then one day it vanished, and when it reappeared it had two Twinkies, which of course it did not eat.   But it did ask an organic unit if it would provide input for a confection.  Assuming someone said yes, it asked the very basic questions of what is the current location of the organic unit, what is the status of the location, and then the third question would be weirdly personal, like where is your mother.

And it was quiet.  But it kept going out, and coming back.  Sometimes with a little something, sometimes not.  But if it found anything useful, it would trade for input.  It didn't seem to mind the others in its building.

It was a curious machine, moreso now than ever before.

Threat assessment:  Unknown.
Risks: Small Arms Fire, other unknown.
Opportunities:  Weapons, Input, other unknown.
Tactical analysis:  Reconnoiter.
Protect the Innocent.

The strange machine punched through a piece of drywall, producing something it had found and kept hidden until now, a rifle.  A very civilian looking one by the look of it, something someone had drug out of a closet, long forgotten, when all the insanity touched off which the machine had recovered.  It was literally a machine using a machine.

It began to move, its strange metallic feet whisking smoothly down, then across, then with horrible agility straight up the wall.  As it moved, it shimmered a bit.  Soon there wasn't a weird metal sort of human, there was a starving refugee in rags, betrayed only by the fact he sure was booking it in a hurry to do reconnaissance.

An assortment of plastic toys scattered across the roof of the multi-story building in Manhattan did not seem out of place in this neighborhood.  To a casual observer or passing overhead drone, it would have suggested that there children living in the building with access to a rooftop outdoor playground that might keep them safe from the threats down on the streets.  The actual purpose of those toys was to serve as a clever form of camouflage for a particular resident to enjoy being outdoors without drawing attention to himself -- a man who happened to be at the same reduced scale as the toys himself!

Mr. Small reclined in a molded plastic replica of a lounge chair that was originally included in a beach-themed playset that was intended for a fashion doll.  The toy chair had been placed on top of a crate to better protect its occupant from someone accidentally stumbling over it or stepping on it if had been at ground level.  While it did not put him at eye level, it made it easier to interact with those who wanted to keep him company.

At some point in the past, an afternoon like this would have been ideal for a rooftop barbecue.  The complete lack of availability of meat such as beef or pork made that only a dream from the past these days.  If they were lucky, maybe they could catch some type of wild bird... even better, if they could track down one of the gangs that may be hiding a secret stash of roosters from when they held those illegal fights.  It all depends on the level of desperation.  He didn't want to think about the rumors as to what may happened to the strays and family pets.

The calm afternoon was shattered by the sound of gunfire.  Fortunately, it didn't appear to be directed at them, but it did raise a level of curiosity among the residents in the house who took direct action before they even had a chance to discuss what this meant.

"Are you freaking kidding me?" he said to himself as several members of the group went over the roof in broad daylight.  "Why don't we just put up a flashing neon sign on the side of the building that says 'Secret Hideout'?!"

"Too bad.  This place had potential,", the miniature man said as he leapt to his feet and descended to the rooftop to the stairs in his usual careful, stealthy manner that would not draw any more attention to either himself or this building.  "I hope that whatever we find down there was worth it."