Well, I had a slightly different plan here yesterday. The first quarter of this post I wrote during work yesterday, and finished the rest and most of it at home later. When I clicked “Publish Post,” it posted the first draft, which is the first quarter here. Ugh! I almost threw the computer out the window.
I still want to illustrate the same points, so, DO-OVER! Probably slightly shorter, and with a slightly different bent.
We’ll start back at the beginning.
Fyre did want to talk to Mason, now that he’s Nathan again. She needed to know what he was planning and plotting. She’s concerned for herself, but more for E and especially Jen. More now that it’s been established that the destruction of the Kronos was not the defeat of Strym. She expected to meet him alone. She didn’t want Frost to be hurt or frightened, and she didn’t want E to have to deal with Mason or whatever she may have had to do or say to Mason. Instead, the four of them ran into each other in the hosptial. E was checking test results while Fyre waited, and Mason said he saw them and wanted to “congratulate” Fyre on her “freedom.”
Masonry Redux: Well, it's over, isn't it? You wouldn't be running around if you weren't a target anymore.
Wrong!
Fyre’s reply? Well, part of it:
Fyre Hex: Well, for one thing, some jerk that wants me dead is standing ten feet away.
Aside from that, he wanted to know the current Styrm situation. Apparently, Frost had told him the story, but he wanted to hear E’s version of it. Although, they never really get to that. It was actually the same argument they’ve all had over and over.
Some of the highlights:
Masonry Redux: He [Strym] contacted *me*.
Fyre Hex: And you told him everything he ever wanted to know.
Fyre Hex: How badly do you have to screw-up before they yank you back to the Zig for breaking parole?
Masonry Redux: I haven't broken parole.
Masonry Redux: I don't plan on it.
Brief point here: Fyre figures it’s only a matter of time before he does break parole, and not in a small way, either.
Masonry Redux: So if what Frosty told me is true, even if Styrm's still out there, I don't have anything he wants.
Oh, but Frost does. Actually, he has the arc, which spawns the Kronos Titan the next night, but they don’t know what yet.
Masonry Redux: If I actually sold you out, Fyre, do you think I would have told you I told him?
Masonry Redux: Would I have warned you?
Fyre Hex: You wouldn't have, but I caught you in the act, didn't I?
She, and I, firmly believe that he would NOT have told her, but she caught him while he was doing it.
Fyre Hex: I never did anything but try to help you, Mason, and all you did was throw it back in my face.
Fyre Hex: With a Malta gun behind it.
Masonry Redux: I know.
Masonry Redux: I know I did.
Masonry Redux: I was pissed.
Fyre Hex laughs for a long minute.
Keen Frost smiles. (Poor Frost. Granted, she laughed. But it wasn’t THAT kind of laugh)
Fyre Hex: So it's okay to kill people when you're pissed?
Masonry Redux: No.
Fyre Hex: No? To get someone else to kill them, then?
Fyre Hex: Because, Mason.
Fyre Hex: I've been very angry for a while now.
Masonry Redux: Well you're a better person than I.
Fyre Hex: You think so?
Masonry Redux: And much stronger.
Fyre Hex: I'll agree with that.
Fire shields go up, and the “Evil Fyre” costume comes out.
Masonry Redux raises an eyebrow.
E.VAC: uhh...
Keen Frost looks at Fyre.
Masonry Redux: Pretty demon.
And, dammit, I didn’t realize it until now, but that’s BEN! Ben used to call Fyre “Pretty little Nictus.” I wish Fyre and I had caught onto that then.
Keen Frost: Mase.
Fyre Hex smiles.
Masonry Redux: I'm not afraid.
Fyre Hex: You're not that smart, either, are you?
Masonry Redux: Why should I be afraid if I already know I'm going to die?
Fyre Hex: I'm not a demon, Mason. But the fire burns the same doesn't it.
Masonry Redux: I'm not afraid.
Fyre Hex: Oh, you're know you're going to die, do you?
Keen Frost: Mase...
E.VAC: I'm pretty sure you are, Nate.
Masonry Redux: Yes.
Keen Frost looks down and away.
E.VAC: Afraid, that is.
Fyre Hex: Tell me... us, then, what makes you say so?
Masonry Redux: Because I know when I'm outclassed.
Fyre Hex: By whom? Me? Strym? Someone else?
Masonry Redux: You want to kill me? Be my guest.
Masonry Redux: E? Sure, if you want.
Masonry Redux: Styrm? Tell him to take a number.
Keen Frost: Mase, no...
Masonry Redux looks at Frosty.
Keen Frost: where's Jack...?
Fyre Hex: Who did you mean, then?
Masonry Redux: I don't want to die... but if it ends this.
Masonry Redux: I don't know where he is.
Another aura up: Hot Feet. It’s the one that makes the ground look like it’s boiling.
Masonry Redux: I don't think the hospital guys are going to like the damage.
Fyre Hex: I can afford to pay for it.
E.VAC: Wouldn't be the worst they'd had to clean up.
Keen Frost: Fyre...
Keen Frost: Wait...
Keen Frost: It doesn't need to...
Masonry Redux closes his eyes.
Fyre Hex: For what, Frost? For him to plot to have me killed by someone else? Carnies? The Circle?
Fyre Hex: For him to hand Jen over to Strym? For him to toss E at the next Kronos?
Keen Frost keeps silent, clenching his jaw.
Masonry Redux mutters, "End it."
Keen Frost: [Do something...]
Masonry Redux: You know something?
Masonry Redux: I am getting damn sick and tired of cleaning up.
Keen Frost sighs nervously.
Masonry Redux: If we didn't love Frosty, I would have let you tear him limb from limb.
Fyre Hex: It took you long enough.
The fire shuts off, and Fyre’s back in jeans.
Keen Frost swallows.
Fyre Hex: I thought I was going to have to burn the room down.
Masonry Redux sighs.
Keen Frost: quietly:: [Thanks.]
Fyre Hex: I don't want to kill him, Jack, but I can't let him run around and wait for him to put a real live knife in my back, or E‘s, either.
Masonry Redux: He won't. I won't let him.
E.VAC: Heard *that* before...
Masonry Redux: But if he gets past me --
Masonry Redux: And he has.
Jack never does actually finish that sentence, but it’s painfully obvious what he means.
But, yeah, Jack saves the day. For about ten minutes. They all discuss what to do with “Nathan,” including having Nathan’s soul bound by the Wombat. A couple of the plans could cause the death of “the body” and/or Jack, and that’s not acceptable. Aaaaand, Nathan’s back, and the discussion picks back up.
E.VAC: One honeyed word from Styrm, and you'd step aside so he could shoot Fyre.
Masonry Redux: You never know, E.
Fyre Hex: >Exactly. And therein lies the problem, huh?
Masonry Redux: quietly:: I guess.
Masonry Redux: So you want to still watch your back, figuring at some point I'll stab you through?
Fyre Hex: No.
Fyre Hex: I want to not have to watch my back.
Masonry Redux: See, you all like Jack better. Well being the pansy that he is, he's too weak to keep me back.
Keen Frost: ::quietly:: Shut up.
Fyre Hex looks to Frost.
Masonry Redux: The Guide. The one who doesn't like to get his hands dir--
Keen Frost: Do you want him dead... too?
Masonry Redux: No!
E.VAC: Heh... another name for the list.
Masonry Redux: Then I'd probably die soon af--
Masonry Redux glares angrily at E.
E.VAC sticks his tongue out at Masonry
Masonry Redux glowers.
Keen Frost glares the same way at Mase.
Mason now wants Jack dead, too, if it wouldn’t kill him as well.
Keen Frost: ::quietly:: You're still... jealous.
Masonry Redux: Obviously I say other things and I don't do them, right?
Masonry Redux turns to Frosty
Masonry Redux: What?
Masonry Redux: Jealous of who?
Keen Frost: It never changed, did it?
Masonry Redux looks confused.
Keen Frost looks at Fyre, then E.
Fyre Hex watches Frost quietly.
Keen Frost: You never accepted that.
This actually goes WAY back to the first time that “Ben” tried to kill E and Fyre. At first, then, Mason blamed it all on Ben, and then shortly after, Mason admits that he, too, wanted them dead. Then, he said it was because that Fyre hadn’t responded to his flirting, and that he was jealous of E and Fyre because they were “better” than him.
Masonry Redux stares at E.
Masonry Redux: He refused me.
E.VAC sighs
Masonry Redux: For *her*.
Fyre Hex flashes a smile and nods in acknowledgement.
Masonry Redux: Because he's a pansy.
Keen Frost: Oh, stop.
Masonry Redux: He lets a woman drag him around.
E.VAC: Kick *your* ass any day of the week.
Masonry Redux: Yeah, and you've done it.
Masonry Redux: And she's done it.
Actually, no, she hasn’t. She used an energy drain on Ben to stop him when Ben attacked an innocent by-stander, but Ben immediately backed off and shoved Nathan back out then.
Masonry Redux: But you're weak.
Fyre Hex rolls her eyes.
Masonry Redux: All these women have you - her, Jen....
Masonry Redux: You can't do anything without them.
Keen Frost: ::quietly:: Love has this effect.
Masonry Redux: You don't understand, you never did, and I gave up someone who loved and accepted me for what I was.
Masonry Redux narrows his eyes.
Fyre Hex: You did do that, Mason. Two of us, as a matter of fact.
Masonry Redux: You're turning him like you did with Kit.
Keen Frost: I'm not "turning."
Fyre Hex: No.
Keen Frost: Mase.
Masonry Redux: Well you're making him damn uncomfortable!
Fyre Hex: We told Kit the facts. She made her own decisions, whether you talked her out of them now or not.
Keen Frost looks at E.
Keen Frost: ::quietly:: He will always refuse you.
Keen Frost: Will you destroy his life because of that?
Masonry Redux grinds his teeth angrily.
Masonry Redux: I can't.
Masonry Redux: I want to...
Masonry Redux: I can't.
Keen Frost: You're just pissed.
Masonry Redux: Both of them... I so want to...
Masonry Redux: I can't.
Masonry Redux: More than pissed.
Keen Frost: Wouldn't you rather feel good if he's happy?
Masonry Redux looks up at Frosty
Keen Frost: Anyways... it's not like you'd be alone... you know.
E.VAC: Just more proof that it's not really me he cares about. Just what I can do for *him*.
Masonry Redux swallows.
Masonry Redux: I cared about you!
Masonry Redux: I care about all of you!
Fyre Hex: And you just admitted how much you want to kill two of us.
E.VAC: You only care about yourself.
Keen Frost: I know that, Mase.
Masonry Redux: You don't know how bad.
Masonry Redux clenches and unclenches his hands.
Keen Frost: But... you can't have... all you want. It's just... natural.
Fyre Hex: Finish saying it, Mason.
Fyre Hex: Say it.
Fyre Hex: Finish the fucking sentence already.
Masonry Redux: I want to kill you.
Masonry Redux: I'm angry at them and jealous of them and I want to do something...
Keen Frost bites his lip.
Masonry Redux: And the only thing I'm good at is...
Masonry Redux: ... :: quietly:: killing.
Masonry Redux: I threatened to get his kid killed.
Masonry Redux: And the "woman he loves" ::airquotes::
Masonry Redux: Not if they keep bringing up how I "sold them out" and "want to kill them" and do all that shit.
Masonry Redux: Not if E keeps overlooking me.
Keen Frost: These are just consequences.
Fyre Hex: You just said five minute ago that you want to kill us! And WE won't let it go?
Keen Frost looks at E and Fyre.
Keen Frost: I'd like to... uh, try it.
Keen Frost looks away as he realizes what he's saying.
Fyre Hex: Pardon. I've been hearing a different conversation half the time, apparently. So, try what?
Keen Frost: Forget it.
Fyre Hex shrugs.
Masonry Redux slumps.
Keen Frost: Okay, Mase.
Fyre Hex: He wants me dead. He wants E dead. Not only that, he wants to kill us.
Fyre Hex: What did you expect me to say?
And that’s the point of all the quotes here. I didn’t even realize, and there’s no way that Fyre saw, that the purpose of any of this conversation was to get Nathan back into the team. All the evidence, especially the things that Nathan’s said, points in the exact opposite direction. It’s not because E and Fyre, or their players, are mean and evil and trying to exclude anyone, or their players. It’s because Nathan hates them and wants them dead, in fact, wants to kill them himself, if he thought he could manage it.
Masonry Redux: Let's try. Together. Again.
Fyre Hex: Why?
Fyre Hex: Give me a good reason. Just one.
Fyre Hex: Honestly.
Fyre Hex: I'm not being sarcastic, or insulting, but why?
Masonry Redux: We've gone through so much already.
Fyre Hex: You just admitted that you want to kill us.
Fyre Hex: Not, like, Oh, he took my pen, I could kill him. But, for real, you want to kill us.
Masonry Redux: Well, I just have to get over that, don't I?
Keen Frost: It's not that simple.
Fyre Hex: No, it's freaking not that simple!
Masonry leaves to join with his super group.
E.VAC: I respect you for trying, Frost. I seriously know why you tried.
E.VAC: But it's never going to happen.
Fyre Hex: He wants us both dead. He wants to kill us both. How can we have someone like that at our backs?
Keen Frost: I understand.
Fyre Hex: I was hoping Jack would stay.
Fyre Hex: I hope he's okay.
Keen Frost: I just think... differently, even if I was the one threatened.
Keen Frost: I'm sure Mase will talk to Jack.
E.VAC: You don't know that, Frost. And hopefully, you will never have to find out.
Fyre Hex: Frost, I don't think you would. How can you have an enemy guarding your back? You can't.
Keen Frost nods slowly.
Keen Frost: I don't see him as one, however, but I need to understand how you two look at it.
Fyre Hex: Frost.
Keen Frost: I'm probably missing that.
Fyre Hex: It's how he looks at it.
Fyre Hex: He wants us dead. He wants to kill us. Anytime a weapon comes up for that, he uses it.
Keen Frost: I see.
Fyre Hex: I'm not trying to get you to turn against him, like what he said. But I don't understand what you don't get.
Fyre Hex: I'm sorry, I am. I... wanted it to work, for you and Jack. But I don't see how it can.
Frost leaves, and E and Fyre head down to E’s lab.
And E’s and Fyre’s players head over to the Rogue Isles, where my favorite line of the night happens. Captain Piett has used the term, “meta human,” which Malta use. Fyre questions him about his association with Malta, and isn’t very clear about it, leading to:
Cpt. William Piett looks like a man who suddenly realized he might be set on fire.
The next night, E’s player and I debate on what to do, and decide to work on the Malta arc-- after Blogspot eats my huge, long post, and I get over the urge to throw my computer through the window, into the driveway, and run out to drive the car over it a few dozen times.
Halfway through the first mission, Frost pings E and Frost joins E and Fyre to finish the mission. After some discussion, we decide to catch Frosty up by steal thing as much as we can through the missions he’s missed. Snickering and giggling and running into sappers ensues. Quickly, we get to “Defeat All Wildflower Agents,” which spawns the Kronos Titan on exit.
This time, we wanted to give everyone a shot, and a badge, since it went unexpectedly fast last time. We sent OOC warnings to the Futura channel, and again when we finished the mission. Futura was waiting outside the mission before we even got to the mission, and were ready when we came out. The Kronos lasted longer this time, but still went down easily enough. Yes, with two separate teams.
Masonry, as Jack, came over to talk afterwards. He briefed E and Fyre on the heroin plan, which E agrees is too dangerous. E suggests that he can come up with an alternative. He’s a doctor, after all. They discuss the merits of Masonry, Jack or Nathan, rejoining the team. Jack says that Nathan knows that E and Fyre hate him.
Wait a minute. This phrase keeps coming up. Fyre has refuted it previously. She’s getting tired of hearing it, and now, it unable to argue against it with much strenght, but, as she points out:
“Wait a minute. *He’s* the one who wants to kill *me.* Why does everyone have a problem remembering that?”
They part, planning to think about possible solutions.
The player wants the team together. Yes, including the fill-ins we get from Futura, or for that matter, the Dauntless, or the various places we’ve had people from. It’s fun. Even when someone screws up, we have fun. It’s a freakin’ game. That’s the point of the a game, to have fun. The way we’ve chosen to play, as RP, with “broken” characters, introduces conflicts. Some of those conflicts are minor, some of them have been major. But they’re IN CHARACTER conflicts. Mason and Fyre have been at each other’s throats, on and off, since Ben turned out to be psycho. As Mason’s player and I have both said, they should have probably killed each other levels and levels ago. Does that mean that I want to take a swing at Mason’s player or call her mean names? Nope, not in the least. I like Mason’s player. I like our characters’ interactions (yes, including Mason and Fyre, on occasion) and I like our OOC conversations. I feel the same way about the other players. They all seems like cool people, who I’d hang out with RL without second thought.
Yeah, I’m rehashing something that E posted weeks ago, and has been touched on over and over again, briefly usually, for as long as I can remember. We are not our characters. Our characters motivations are not ours. Their thoughts, feelings, reactions, and words are not the players. More, if I was unable to separate my character’s thoughts and feelings from my own, then I would not RP. Or only RP a shiny happy character with other shiny happy characters so that no drama would arise. Again, that’s not how we have chosen to play the game.
A fun fact to close with: I realized today that I use Mason’s “hands behind the back, look-I’m-harmless” pose around my ex-almost-father-in-law.
Wednesday, June 27, 2007
Monday, June 25, 2007
Weekend Angst
Let's start with Team 3.0
I love this team so far. They lay waste to everything around them, for starters, and I expect that to only get better as time goes on and they get more powers and more slotting. The character's personalities are only beginning to emerge, so it's a little difficult to guess how that's going to go.
Luna and Ryu began a very small conflict. Let me say, I hate snakes. Most people have at least one horrible, totally unreasonable phobia, and mine is snakes. I hate the word, even. I can't watch them on TV without getting freaked, I don't like looking at them in cages. God forbid I come across one in the wild. I hate snakes. The ones in the game, I can deal with. Now. For short periods of time. The sound effects freak me out after awhile, and sometimes I have to turn the sound off. I hate snakes. Luna's not me, of course, but it's okay if they freak her out a little. Lots of normal people don't like snakes. She has a power called Levitate which lifts the target off it's feet (scales? Whatever), and throws them back down to the ground. The snakes look kind of weird when this happens, which lead to a comment about the unnaturalness of flying snakes. Ryu's a dragon, though the other character don't know it. "Flying snakes" was too close to the dragon concept for Ryu, so he protested, and the theme kept up for the rest of the night. I thought it was kind of funny. Ryu was probably offended, and Luna was confused and now thinks that Ryu has some freaky reptile fetish that may name the Bomb look sane. And, by the way, totally missed the Bomb the other night. (And we saved the temp power mayhem mission for him!)
Poor Scarlette. She was probably so glad when she got in touch with Fyre and Fyre told her to take a couple of days off. When Nathan and E had their discussion, Nathan kept edging closer and closer to E. I told E's player, "Mase takes another step, and Scarlette's going to have to get between them, isn't she?" Before I even finished the sentence, Mason was about two feet away from E, when he'd started about thirty feet away. Scarlette jumped between them and told Mason she thought it would be a good idea if he backed up. She was seconds from drawing her sword, and I imagine she had her hand on the hilt, but Mason immediately took a few steps back. She'd already seen them go at each other once (even if it was actually E who did the "going"), and she'd promised to protect E before she knew the whole story of their recent interaction. Now that she does, she understands more the need for protection.
I had to take her to Brickstown for new enhancements not long after, and it was the perfect opportunity for her to make an emergency call. If Nathan getting loose wasn't one of the "emergencies" that Fyre had laid out for Scarlette, I don't know what would have been. Shortly after, Scarlette took her leave after vaguely explaining to E. Unfortunately, I had to come up with some kind of lame excuse why Scarlette would have to leave in order for Fyre to join. Believable? Not really, but I didn't have any choice. Stupid game limitations.
I'm sure Fyre was as happy to see E as he was her, but she feels guilty for having to leave, so she tried not to make it such a big deal that she was back. E's illness has suddenly and inexplicably become stabilized. (Hmm, can't imagine why.) Fyre considers that good news because he's not getting worse for the first time in months. She imagines the next step will be for him to begin getting better. I won't go into the Malta plot line or the Titan story, because it's already been covered better elsewhere. Fyre, however, is better able to fight them than before she left. She's involved with much scarier things than Malta soldiers, unfortunately. It bumps the Malta fear-factor down a few notches. She's still not comfortable at all, but she's able to face them much easier.
Yes, Serra's gone. She's been gone for a couple of weeks. Since the night of "Bargains," as a matter of fact. (Still waffling on deleting the level 43 Warshade that I really have no use for, except the fact it's a level 43 toon) For awhile, Serra was simply inactive, and that was when E asked her, so she never lied. But she never enlightened anyone when the situation changed, either.
And yeah, that's the "Evil Fyre" costume that I played around with a few times awhile back. I used it because I could, not because she's "Evil Fyre." She's more... "Morally Ambiguous Fyre" currently. She is more dangerous now than she used to be, for various reasons, and the costume does help illustrate that. A plot point? Nope. Ambiance, maybe.
She'll be hanging around Paragon for a couple of days, or until a little after the time Kronos AV mission. Unless things change, the way they tend to do around here. Then, she'll be heading back to the Rogue Isles (unless things change, etc.), because it's too much fun not to play Captain Piett and Dom-Fyre aka Fyre-Hex (and yes, the player has realized that she should have picked a different ID, but it's too late now.)
I love this team so far. They lay waste to everything around them, for starters, and I expect that to only get better as time goes on and they get more powers and more slotting. The character's personalities are only beginning to emerge, so it's a little difficult to guess how that's going to go.
Luna and Ryu began a very small conflict. Let me say, I hate snakes. Most people have at least one horrible, totally unreasonable phobia, and mine is snakes. I hate the word, even. I can't watch them on TV without getting freaked, I don't like looking at them in cages. God forbid I come across one in the wild. I hate snakes. The ones in the game, I can deal with. Now. For short periods of time. The sound effects freak me out after awhile, and sometimes I have to turn the sound off. I hate snakes. Luna's not me, of course, but it's okay if they freak her out a little. Lots of normal people don't like snakes. She has a power called Levitate which lifts the target off it's feet (scales? Whatever), and throws them back down to the ground. The snakes look kind of weird when this happens, which lead to a comment about the unnaturalness of flying snakes. Ryu's a dragon, though the other character don't know it. "Flying snakes" was too close to the dragon concept for Ryu, so he protested, and the theme kept up for the rest of the night. I thought it was kind of funny. Ryu was probably offended, and Luna was confused and now thinks that Ryu has some freaky reptile fetish that may name the Bomb look sane. And, by the way, totally missed the Bomb the other night. (And we saved the temp power mayhem mission for him!)
Poor Scarlette. She was probably so glad when she got in touch with Fyre and Fyre told her to take a couple of days off. When Nathan and E had their discussion, Nathan kept edging closer and closer to E. I told E's player, "Mase takes another step, and Scarlette's going to have to get between them, isn't she?" Before I even finished the sentence, Mason was about two feet away from E, when he'd started about thirty feet away. Scarlette jumped between them and told Mason she thought it would be a good idea if he backed up. She was seconds from drawing her sword, and I imagine she had her hand on the hilt, but Mason immediately took a few steps back. She'd already seen them go at each other once (even if it was actually E who did the "going"), and she'd promised to protect E before she knew the whole story of their recent interaction. Now that she does, she understands more the need for protection.
I had to take her to Brickstown for new enhancements not long after, and it was the perfect opportunity for her to make an emergency call. If Nathan getting loose wasn't one of the "emergencies" that Fyre had laid out for Scarlette, I don't know what would have been. Shortly after, Scarlette took her leave after vaguely explaining to E. Unfortunately, I had to come up with some kind of lame excuse why Scarlette would have to leave in order for Fyre to join. Believable? Not really, but I didn't have any choice. Stupid game limitations.
I'm sure Fyre was as happy to see E as he was her, but she feels guilty for having to leave, so she tried not to make it such a big deal that she was back. E's illness has suddenly and inexplicably become stabilized. (Hmm, can't imagine why.) Fyre considers that good news because he's not getting worse for the first time in months. She imagines the next step will be for him to begin getting better. I won't go into the Malta plot line or the Titan story, because it's already been covered better elsewhere. Fyre, however, is better able to fight them than before she left. She's involved with much scarier things than Malta soldiers, unfortunately. It bumps the Malta fear-factor down a few notches. She's still not comfortable at all, but she's able to face them much easier.
Yes, Serra's gone. She's been gone for a couple of weeks. Since the night of "Bargains," as a matter of fact. (Still waffling on deleting the level 43 Warshade that I really have no use for, except the fact it's a level 43 toon) For awhile, Serra was simply inactive, and that was when E asked her, so she never lied. But she never enlightened anyone when the situation changed, either.
And yeah, that's the "Evil Fyre" costume that I played around with a few times awhile back. I used it because I could, not because she's "Evil Fyre." She's more... "Morally Ambiguous Fyre" currently. She is more dangerous now than she used to be, for various reasons, and the costume does help illustrate that. A plot point? Nope. Ambiance, maybe.
She'll be hanging around Paragon for a couple of days, or until a little after the time Kronos AV mission. Unless things change, the way they tend to do around here. Then, she'll be heading back to the Rogue Isles (unless things change, etc.), because it's too much fun not to play Captain Piett and Dom-Fyre aka Fyre-Hex (and yes, the player has realized that she should have picked a different ID, but it's too late now.)
Fyre and Mason
In a couple of hours, Fyre and "Nathan" are going to have a confrontation. Mason's player and I have scheduled it, after Fyre ran into Nathan at the Steel Canyon train station. Part of the reason she's back is because "Nathan" is out. That, especially from the way things were when she left, constituted an emergency. She's not happy about him being loose. He's tried to and threatened to kill her before, both as Ben and as himself. He set her up to be killed again recently, with no outside influences. She can't just let him run loose to plot her death, or E's, or Jen's. It's almost down to a "kill or be killed" situation, isn't it? As she's said, death sucks, and she's not looking forward to dying again, and she's certainly not going to let Nathan be the direct or indirect cause of E's or Jen's death, either.
But, you know what? I don't really want to do it. Not the confrontation, not whatever fight might ensue from it. I've cheated the character out of a lot of moments of high drama that she really should have had, though, because my own personal feelings. I tend to save RL drama for when it's necessary. I'm laid-back about most things, but once I stop being laid-back, it's over. So, yeah, Fyre has some of my traits. I think it's impossible not to put some of your own personality into a character when you've invested this much time into it. Sure, I could play someone completely different for short periods of time. But, after hours and hours, day after day, some of the "you" creeps into your character. No, Fyre's not me. But she has reacted to some things as I would, whether I mean it or not, whether I want her to or not. No, certainly not everything. Not even most things. But I've pulled her back, more than a few times and sometimes way too hard, when her reaction should have been more extreme because of my avoidance of "melodrama" and tendency to edit myself when I have the time to think about it.
Fyre and Mason haven't gotten along for about twenty levels for more than about twenty-four hours at a time. Fyre, to be true to the character, probably should have smoked Mason about ten levels back. She keeps forgiving him, and she should have written him off a long time ago, really. But her player wanted to keep the team together, so I duct-taped her mouth and tied her hands behind her back... and doused her with a fire extinguisher. I see now, and I've been thinking about it since back when Kit put the idea in Fyre's head that they should cut Mason loose weeks ago, how much we've forced the characters to do so many things that they probably would never have done. Maybe that's why they seem to be rebelling so much now.
I like our team. I like the people we play with. I even like the characters, though it's hard for Mason to be lovable after he was blithely willing to sacrifice his best friend's nine year old daughter for his own peace of mind. Fyre, however, has no reason to hang around people she should dislike and distrust. She's got no reason to hold herself back.
So, in a bit, Fyre and Nathan are going to have a confrontation that should end badly, judging by the situation as Fyre knows it. She doesn't know what Mason has up his sleeve, and I don't know what the player has in store, either. And, Fyre's imperfect player is still in control. So as always, who knows what's going to happen?
But, you know what? I don't really want to do it. Not the confrontation, not whatever fight might ensue from it. I've cheated the character out of a lot of moments of high drama that she really should have had, though, because my own personal feelings. I tend to save RL drama for when it's necessary. I'm laid-back about most things, but once I stop being laid-back, it's over. So, yeah, Fyre has some of my traits. I think it's impossible not to put some of your own personality into a character when you've invested this much time into it. Sure, I could play someone completely different for short periods of time. But, after hours and hours, day after day, some of the "you" creeps into your character. No, Fyre's not me. But she has reacted to some things as I would, whether I mean it or not, whether I want her to or not. No, certainly not everything. Not even most things. But I've pulled her back, more than a few times and sometimes way too hard, when her reaction should have been more extreme because of my avoidance of "melodrama" and tendency to edit myself when I have the time to think about it.
Fyre and Mason haven't gotten along for about twenty levels for more than about twenty-four hours at a time. Fyre, to be true to the character, probably should have smoked Mason about ten levels back. She keeps forgiving him, and she should have written him off a long time ago, really. But her player wanted to keep the team together, so I duct-taped her mouth and tied her hands behind her back... and doused her with a fire extinguisher. I see now, and I've been thinking about it since back when Kit put the idea in Fyre's head that they should cut Mason loose weeks ago, how much we've forced the characters to do so many things that they probably would never have done. Maybe that's why they seem to be rebelling so much now.
I like our team. I like the people we play with. I even like the characters, though it's hard for Mason to be lovable after he was blithely willing to sacrifice his best friend's nine year old daughter for his own peace of mind. Fyre, however, has no reason to hang around people she should dislike and distrust. She's got no reason to hold herself back.
So, in a bit, Fyre and Nathan are going to have a confrontation that should end badly, judging by the situation as Fyre knows it. She doesn't know what Mason has up his sleeve, and I don't know what the player has in store, either. And, Fyre's imperfect player is still in control. So as always, who knows what's going to happen?
Friday, June 22, 2007
Team 3.0 and Poor Scarlette!
I haven't posted much the past few days because I don't really have much to talk about.
Is there Angst? You betcha. But it's not "my" angst. And by that, I do mean not my character's angst. Fyre has taken off to places unknown (to the team) and Scarlette's angst-less, and slightly frightened by the others' angst.
Why in the world is she staying with that team, anyway? Well, I've got a theory on that, but I'm not talking yet. Scarlette and Fyre and I have to talk it over first. It'll make Fyre look bad again, and she's getting enough bad PR lately. It makes so much sense, though, I think I'll have trouble not using it.
Ah, Team 3.0. Our villains. I mean, you know, for-real villains, not just heroes misbehaving. Anyway. Lunatrix. I actually came up with the name first. From where? No idea. I was thinking it would fit a dark/dark corruptor, or even a dm/da brute. But I've played a dark/dark defender for 2 years, and I don't know how long a brute would entertain me-- I've never gotten one past 12. I'd thought about a fire/fire dom for villain-Fyre so I was in the "dom" mindset (No jokes, please). I'd tried the mind/psy before and never gotten far with it. Not because of disinterest, just because I'd never gotten back to it. I have entirely too many alts and not nearly enough time. I've been trying to use that "Psych" pattern on something forever and the trenchcoats still amuse me, and I thought it'd be fun to try to use a color other than black for a change. So, I had name, powersets, costume.
And there I was on an RP team with a character with no backstory or personality.
After hitting buttons for awhile, remembering some of the powers, and listening to the others, inspiration struck.
Luna is a former con-artist named Elise Lancaster who's con was that she was a psychic healer and clarivoyant called Luna Lightbringer. She was good at it and "Luna Lightbringer" started to make a name for herself. Being famous as a con can be dangerous, and bad luck caught up to her. After a near-death experience (possibly a client didn't like being fooled? I'm not sure yet), she woke up with real psychic powers. One of those powers was the ability to hear thoughts from other people, and it nearly drove her insane. She hid away from people until she was able to control her powers. On rejoining society, she quickly found out that she was wanted for fraud in several states. She came to the Rogue Isles in order to avoid a jail sentence, and to rebuild her bank account. She hates to be touched, as physical contact makes a psychic connection all but impossible to avoid. The severity of the connection would, or will, vary, depending on the type of contact and the thoughts and emotions of the other person.
I love Kain X's costume. I like the subtle neon green detail, and the pieces he's put together. Suicidial Bombadier is... entertaining. Every other thing he's said makes me laugh. Me, not Luna. Luna's slightly frightened. She was a con-artist, not a violent criminal. She's probably going to be a little over her head with a lot of things in the Rogue Isles. Ryu is interesting. Mysterious. Mason said in the blog that Ryu was a dragon, and I'd forgotten that E did say that, but I'd come up with a similar theory on my own. Not the same, though, so I was wrong. And I'm usually so observant. I give myself an "F."
Fyre will be back for the Kronos Titan (Note to self: check Wiki for exactly when the AV shows up), but right now, she's in the Rogue Isles with Captain William Piett (on Virtue). Those two are going to be fun. Fyre's a fire/fire dom, and the captain is a something/something mm. He's got a machine gun and soldiers. They were in the snake hatchery mission and Fyre's being grossed out. "Omelet?," the captain asks after exploding an egg. "Just... don't talk," Fyre says. "Yes'm," he replies and goes silent. Fyre's finally got someone who listens to her? Great! Or possibly really bad.
Oh, and E finally got the chance to use his "Miss Fyre" joke. Glad I could help out with that.
It looks like I'll be logging into a red screen a lot.
Is there Angst? You betcha. But it's not "my" angst. And by that, I do mean not my character's angst. Fyre has taken off to places unknown (to the team) and Scarlette's angst-less, and slightly frightened by the others' angst.
Why in the world is she staying with that team, anyway? Well, I've got a theory on that, but I'm not talking yet. Scarlette and Fyre and I have to talk it over first. It'll make Fyre look bad again, and she's getting enough bad PR lately. It makes so much sense, though, I think I'll have trouble not using it.
Ah, Team 3.0. Our villains. I mean, you know, for-real villains, not just heroes misbehaving. Anyway. Lunatrix. I actually came up with the name first. From where? No idea. I was thinking it would fit a dark/dark corruptor, or even a dm/da brute. But I've played a dark/dark defender for 2 years, and I don't know how long a brute would entertain me-- I've never gotten one past 12. I'd thought about a fire/fire dom for villain-Fyre so I was in the "dom" mindset (No jokes, please). I'd tried the mind/psy before and never gotten far with it. Not because of disinterest, just because I'd never gotten back to it. I have entirely too many alts and not nearly enough time. I've been trying to use that "Psych" pattern on something forever and the trenchcoats still amuse me, and I thought it'd be fun to try to use a color other than black for a change. So, I had name, powersets, costume.
And there I was on an RP team with a character with no backstory or personality.
After hitting buttons for awhile, remembering some of the powers, and listening to the others, inspiration struck.
Luna is a former con-artist named Elise Lancaster who's con was that she was a psychic healer and clarivoyant called Luna Lightbringer. She was good at it and "Luna Lightbringer" started to make a name for herself. Being famous as a con can be dangerous, and bad luck caught up to her. After a near-death experience (possibly a client didn't like being fooled? I'm not sure yet), she woke up with real psychic powers. One of those powers was the ability to hear thoughts from other people, and it nearly drove her insane. She hid away from people until she was able to control her powers. On rejoining society, she quickly found out that she was wanted for fraud in several states. She came to the Rogue Isles in order to avoid a jail sentence, and to rebuild her bank account. She hates to be touched, as physical contact makes a psychic connection all but impossible to avoid. The severity of the connection would, or will, vary, depending on the type of contact and the thoughts and emotions of the other person.
I love Kain X's costume. I like the subtle neon green detail, and the pieces he's put together. Suicidial Bombadier is... entertaining. Every other thing he's said makes me laugh. Me, not Luna. Luna's slightly frightened. She was a con-artist, not a violent criminal. She's probably going to be a little over her head with a lot of things in the Rogue Isles. Ryu is interesting. Mysterious. Mason said in the blog that Ryu was a dragon, and I'd forgotten that E did say that, but I'd come up with a similar theory on my own. Not the same, though, so I was wrong. And I'm usually so observant. I give myself an "F."
Fyre will be back for the Kronos Titan (Note to self: check Wiki for exactly when the AV shows up), but right now, she's in the Rogue Isles with Captain William Piett (on Virtue). Those two are going to be fun. Fyre's a fire/fire dom, and the captain is a something/something mm. He's got a machine gun and soldiers. They were in the snake hatchery mission and Fyre's being grossed out. "Omelet?," the captain asks after exploding an egg. "Just... don't talk," Fyre says. "Yes'm," he replies and goes silent. Fyre's finally got someone who listens to her? Great! Or possibly really bad.
Oh, and E finally got the chance to use his "Miss Fyre" joke. Glad I could help out with that.
It looks like I'll be logging into a red screen a lot.
Monday, June 18, 2007
Double XP and an Outside View of Team Angst
Okay, so it's obvious by now that Fyre is going villain-side. No, she's not going evil, dammit. She's not evil or bad or even especially a bitch. Somehow, Fyre has become the villain in the group, and even though Masonry is evil, now (again?), everyone kind of still feels bad for him, don't they? E can't be the "bad" one because he's suffering. Frost is entirely too quiet and good and sweet, so it's Fyre by default, I think.
Fyre is simply someone overwhelmed by terrible circumstances. She can cry in a corner or go catatonic, or she can try to "pick up the shattered pieces of her life and move on." Maybe she's not doing it the way someone else would, but she is trying her best. Now, she'll be moving to the Rogue Isles (after a cameo appearance against the Kronos Titan) not because she's "evil," but because she's making a huge sacrifice to save someone she loves. It won't work out the way she thinks, of course, but that's not her fault. The road to hell is paved with good intentions, and she has only the very best intentions.
So after Saturday, I started playing Scarlette Blade. Both for story-line purposes and for xp-gain purposes. Not because I decided to take my character and go home. Also, I like Scarlette. (Again, not that I don't like Fyre.) She's happy, and like she told Jack, she doesn't have any "inner demons." The only thing that might be a sticking point for her is keeping her secret identity. No one knows who she is at this point, though that might change. Plus, I'm happier being a scrapper right now, especially a /regen scrapper.
Before she took off, though, Fyre was completely devasted because she's finally completely accepted that E is dying. He's losing his hearing and having black-outs. She was quiet because she was about to burst into tears. Her player practically was, too, if that helps to show how absolutely shattered Fyre actually is. To keep the bargain she's made that is supposed to save E, and to keep the promises she made to E to keep Jen safe, she's hiding out. Character-wise, no one knows where she's gone, not E, and not Scarlette who she's roped into replacing her as E's protector and as a member of the team. There's a small chance I might not use her for Team 3.0, too, so I'd like to leave the "definate" up in the air for a bit longer.
Scarlette got a good introduction to Team Angst on Sunday. They were quiet at first, and Scarlette thought that might be because they didn't know her. (Also, Mason/Nathan wasn't there to fill natural silences, like he usually did.) Scarlette actually did most of the talking. Jack/Mason made a good impression on her. More than E did, even. Especially after E flipped and tried to strangle Jack/Mason in Infernal's altar room. Jack was pleasant, talked to her, asked about her. Everyone likes to talk about themselves. It's a psychological truth. Jack showed caring and wisdom, and any part that might have been Nathan sailed right over Scarlette's head. Most of the angst sailed over her head, probably. She didn't understand what happened in the altar room, and she certainly didn't understand what happened in the Carnie cave, either.
(I am glad what Fyre wasn't around for what happened in the altar room. She'd have been torn between seperating E and Masonry and helping E kill Masonry. Luckily, she and I weren't faced with that choice. Thank you, Scarlette.)
E and Scarlette talked later, and Scarlette understands the situation better, but it's hard to overcome a first impression. It should be interesting to see what happens to her with Team Angst around.
Fyre is simply someone overwhelmed by terrible circumstances. She can cry in a corner or go catatonic, or she can try to "pick up the shattered pieces of her life and move on." Maybe she's not doing it the way someone else would, but she is trying her best. Now, she'll be moving to the Rogue Isles (after a cameo appearance against the Kronos Titan) not because she's "evil," but because she's making a huge sacrifice to save someone she loves. It won't work out the way she thinks, of course, but that's not her fault. The road to hell is paved with good intentions, and she has only the very best intentions.
So after Saturday, I started playing Scarlette Blade. Both for story-line purposes and for xp-gain purposes. Not because I decided to take my character and go home. Also, I like Scarlette. (Again, not that I don't like Fyre.) She's happy, and like she told Jack, she doesn't have any "inner demons." The only thing that might be a sticking point for her is keeping her secret identity. No one knows who she is at this point, though that might change. Plus, I'm happier being a scrapper right now, especially a /regen scrapper.
Before she took off, though, Fyre was completely devasted because she's finally completely accepted that E is dying. He's losing his hearing and having black-outs. She was quiet because she was about to burst into tears. Her player practically was, too, if that helps to show how absolutely shattered Fyre actually is. To keep the bargain she's made that is supposed to save E, and to keep the promises she made to E to keep Jen safe, she's hiding out. Character-wise, no one knows where she's gone, not E, and not Scarlette who she's roped into replacing her as E's protector and as a member of the team. There's a small chance I might not use her for Team 3.0, too, so I'd like to leave the "definate" up in the air for a bit longer.
Scarlette got a good introduction to Team Angst on Sunday. They were quiet at first, and Scarlette thought that might be because they didn't know her. (Also, Mason/Nathan wasn't there to fill natural silences, like he usually did.) Scarlette actually did most of the talking. Jack/Mason made a good impression on her. More than E did, even. Especially after E flipped and tried to strangle Jack/Mason in Infernal's altar room. Jack was pleasant, talked to her, asked about her. Everyone likes to talk about themselves. It's a psychological truth. Jack showed caring and wisdom, and any part that might have been Nathan sailed right over Scarlette's head. Most of the angst sailed over her head, probably. She didn't understand what happened in the altar room, and she certainly didn't understand what happened in the Carnie cave, either.
(I am glad what Fyre wasn't around for what happened in the altar room. She'd have been torn between seperating E and Masonry and helping E kill Masonry. Luckily, she and I weren't faced with that choice. Thank you, Scarlette.)
E and Scarlette talked later, and Scarlette understands the situation better, but it's hard to overcome a first impression. It should be interesting to see what happens to her with Team Angst around.
Friday, June 15, 2007
Team Angst and the Pinch Hitter
tSo for about the first half hour that I was logged into the game, E's player and I talked about what to do next. Start Team 3.0? Well... no one seems to know who or what will be on Team 3.0, and some of those decisions hinge on what happens to Team Angst. A new team of alts would work, but we'd be abandoning the characters where they are now, and that just doesn't seem quite right.
We knew there was still going to be more fall out, so we decided to continue on, for now. E and Fyre would have spent most of the night talking and plotting and planning. Mission-wise, we did a couple of very profitable Carnie missions, with E sk'ed up to Fyre Hex's 50. Granted, it was only on Heroic, but it was nice and easy. Very easy. We'll have to remember to ratchet up the the difficulty maybe two clicks if we do that again.
Frost shows up, and out of character I head to Wentworth's to sell my loot, and E does the same. We run into Frost outside of Wentworths, and a second later, Frost says, "What took you so long, Jack?" Fyre turns around, and there's Masonry. We all thought that meant that Frost lead him there. E punches Masonry, and Fyre's auras go up as soon as she sees him. She was going to wait for Mason to make a wrong move, but she was more than willing to make sure he didn't make another.
They move into the Night-Watch's base and "Jack" begins to explain. Although he doesn't seem to like to "explain." Fyre is going do her best to make him spell everything out whenever they meet. Jack's already proven that he lies by omission, so she's going to ask for very complete explains. For example, when they asked him how he found them, and he said, "I'm a Pathfinder," that wasn't enough. It wasn't an answer. One thing didn't necessarily relate to the other.
Fyre doesn't exactly trust Jack, but she's able to recognize that he's not Nathan. When she, E, and Frost talk later, she's willing to accept him into the team. She also wants him around for if and when Nathan breaks back out. She figures he's going to be more angry than he was before Jack locked him up. She doesn't intend to kill him, but she plans to make sure that he's not able to hurt anyone, whatever that entails. Jack said that he would stay until E was well, and as long as Fyre needed his help. Fyre barely acknowledged the second part of that. No one else has tried to help her, in her mind, so why would Jack be the first?
Frost and E both agree to accept Jack, as well. Fyre feels bad for Frost, she really does. Mason broke his heart, and he doesn't even feel comfortable talking about it. She thinks, though, that if they draw attention to that, it will make Frost feel worse. She'll keep an eye out for him, but she won't be obvious about it.
If E had refused the replacement of Jack, Fyre probably would have gone along with it. She did remind him at one point when he was getting angry that Jack was standing there, and not Nathan, to try to curb any violent urges, but had E wanted him gone, she would have made sure he went. She resents that Mason has once again taken the focus off of E, when E's the one who really has the big problems, and is going to try to make up for that.
When Fyre sees Kit again, she's going to have a hard time not saying, "See?" Fyre thinks that Kit hung on to unreasonable ideals too long, and that's why she got hurt. She does, though, have sympathy for Kit, but she's glad that Kit didn't get hurt worse, by which she means physically hurt, which isn't something she'd put past Mason--uh, Nathan.
I'm really going to have to work to get the names straight in my head. Thankfully, Fyre has the same problem, so it won't seem odd when I type the wrong name, and she tries to correct herself.
Double XP weekend should be a good time to get Team Angst moving, if not start Team 3.0. Or at least earn some Influence for a nice, orange Devastation set.
We knew there was still going to be more fall out, so we decided to continue on, for now. E and Fyre would have spent most of the night talking and plotting and planning. Mission-wise, we did a couple of very profitable Carnie missions, with E sk'ed up to Fyre Hex's 50. Granted, it was only on Heroic, but it was nice and easy. Very easy. We'll have to remember to ratchet up the the difficulty maybe two clicks if we do that again.
Frost shows up, and out of character I head to Wentworth's to sell my loot, and E does the same. We run into Frost outside of Wentworths, and a second later, Frost says, "What took you so long, Jack?" Fyre turns around, and there's Masonry. We all thought that meant that Frost lead him there. E punches Masonry, and Fyre's auras go up as soon as she sees him. She was going to wait for Mason to make a wrong move, but she was more than willing to make sure he didn't make another.
They move into the Night-Watch's base and "Jack" begins to explain. Although he doesn't seem to like to "explain." Fyre is going do her best to make him spell everything out whenever they meet. Jack's already proven that he lies by omission, so she's going to ask for very complete explains. For example, when they asked him how he found them, and he said, "I'm a Pathfinder," that wasn't enough. It wasn't an answer. One thing didn't necessarily relate to the other.
Fyre doesn't exactly trust Jack, but she's able to recognize that he's not Nathan. When she, E, and Frost talk later, she's willing to accept him into the team. She also wants him around for if and when Nathan breaks back out. She figures he's going to be more angry than he was before Jack locked him up. She doesn't intend to kill him, but she plans to make sure that he's not able to hurt anyone, whatever that entails. Jack said that he would stay until E was well, and as long as Fyre needed his help. Fyre barely acknowledged the second part of that. No one else has tried to help her, in her mind, so why would Jack be the first?
Frost and E both agree to accept Jack, as well. Fyre feels bad for Frost, she really does. Mason broke his heart, and he doesn't even feel comfortable talking about it. She thinks, though, that if they draw attention to that, it will make Frost feel worse. She'll keep an eye out for him, but she won't be obvious about it.
If E had refused the replacement of Jack, Fyre probably would have gone along with it. She did remind him at one point when he was getting angry that Jack was standing there, and not Nathan, to try to curb any violent urges, but had E wanted him gone, she would have made sure he went. She resents that Mason has once again taken the focus off of E, when E's the one who really has the big problems, and is going to try to make up for that.
When Fyre sees Kit again, she's going to have a hard time not saying, "See?" Fyre thinks that Kit hung on to unreasonable ideals too long, and that's why she got hurt. She does, though, have sympathy for Kit, but she's glad that Kit didn't get hurt worse, by which she means physically hurt, which isn't something she'd put past Mason--uh, Nathan.
I'm really going to have to work to get the names straight in my head. Thankfully, Fyre has the same problem, so it won't seem odd when I type the wrong name, and she tries to correct herself.
Double XP weekend should be a good time to get Team Angst moving, if not start Team 3.0. Or at least earn some Influence for a nice, orange Devastation set.
Thursday, June 14, 2007
The Beginning of the End
This is a long one. You might want to pack a lunch first. Go ahead, I'll wait.
Okay, backing up a step before I cover the Big Stuff. But, quick-like, because it’s not really that important.
The Carnies/Malta mission was just fun. I threw on all the fire auras, which I usually can’t do for very long because of the end drain. Thanks to Speed Boost, that wasn’t really a problem. I didn’t even remember Malta being in that mission, so it definitely surprised Fyre. She was scared, hence the fire. I’d think she was probably pretty scary, too. There was so much going on, though, that I don’t think anyone noticed either.
And then, on to the Big Stuff. Did you ever see the film of an atom bomb, how it wipes out everything around it, sort of vaporizes everything, and there’s the huge mushroom cloud, visible from miles and miles away? Yeah, it was like that.
Yeah, when I logged on, I did get aheads up of what was going on. Mason and Strym were talking in Pocket D. Fyre wouldn’t just wander into Pocket D and come across a meeting like that by chance, would she? Ehh, probably not. But, if she’d had people looking out for such a thing… Well, she did used to spend some time in Pocket D. It’s not stretching it that someone, an employee or just a regular customer, would call her, either with or without being paid off. In fact, it makes perfect sense. So, Fyre found Mason talking to Strym.
She came up behind Mason without him seeing her, in full view of Strym, though. “Well. Isn't this cozy? Can't imagine what's going on here,” she said. She’s practically ignoring that Strym’s even there, she’s so furious with Mason.
“You can, but it would be wrong,” Mason replied. This was about the last point in the conversation that Fyre, and I, held out hope for Mason. She, and I, hadn’t heard any of the previous conversation. Maybe it wasn’t what she thought?
Not exactly, but just as bad.
Strym continues talking to Mason, and Mason responds at one point, “But, you know, when E dies...I could care less what you do with the kid.” It seemed like every time he opened his mouth, he just made it worse.
Fyre even gave him a bit of chance to save himself, early on. “Mason. Were I mistaken about your intentions here, you would be doing absolutely nothing to change my mind right now.” She wanted to be wrong. She wanted him to at least try to cover. But, it just kept getting worse.
Like, a minute later, when he said, “Because if I turned over the brat, he'd never forgive me and probably fall on a sword somewhere.”
Fyre’s reply: “E fall on a sword? I don't know about that, but if you go near Jen, Mason, you'll wish you had it that easy.” Fyre figures that E would kill Mason first. That is, if he’s still alive.
Strym and Mason both think that Fyre is threatening Mason for herself. Strym tells Mason that if Mason joins him, she can’t touch him. Fyre, though, is more than up to the challenge, “If he hurts Jen, I promise, if I have to go through hell and back, he'll regret it. Strongly.” She meant it. Literally, figuratively, completely.
Strym doesn’t seem to like being ignored by Fyre,, and she was practically ignoring him. She knows what to expect from him, and she’s so furious with Mason, he’s just not important right now. But Strym’s paying attention. “And if you want to see Hell again... “ And he “points a finger to the back of his neck and makes a *bang* sound.“ That should have scared her a lot more than it did at the moment. But, she does have an ace up her sleeve, or a weight around her neck, maybe, but between that and how angry she is, she just laughs at him. She doesn’t properly think it out, but she (and I) does a little better later. What she wonders later is if Strym was more personally involved in her death. Was he there? Could he have been the one to pull the trigger? Maybe not, but it’s something she hadn’t even thought of before.
Mason says she’s not afraid of anything and makes his “marble” allusion again. Fyre can’t believe he’s still talking, still making an effort to dig his own grave. Mason says he’ll shut up. We all know how how unlikely that is.
Strym starts talking about Fyre’s demon and her ancestor. It sounds to Fyre as if Strym thinks that Katherine and the demon would be on his side. Fyre is entertained. Strym is scary, but he’s not on the demon’s level. And Katherine’s not interested in making deals. “You’d just be as much kindling as anyone else.” Strym keeps on for a minute, and Fyre tells him, “I'm sure she'd be interested to see what color you burn.” After a minute, she adds, “In fact, if you'd like to step outside, we can just find out now.” Strym just laughs and refuses. Fyre never thought he’d agree, of course.
Fyre knows, too, that soon she’ll have nothing to lose, and she won’t be afraid to go after Strym, or through anything to get to him. It takes some of the sting out of his threats. She over-plays it, and tries to use her apparent lack of fear to throw Strym off. Does it help? Probably not.
Strym leaves. And leaves Mason to Fyre. Jack appears momentarily, but Fyre immediately tells Jack to put Mason back out. She and I both expected Jack to refuse, and she was prepared to do whatever she could to make him, but Mason’s back instantly.
E shows up before Fyre can rip into Mason. And Mason tells an extremely short version of what happened, which doesn’t make him look that bad. Another few mintues, though, and Mason admits that he told Strym that Fyre knew where Jen was. And not just admits, but practically brags. He could have saved himself here, too. At least a little. An apology, admitting that he’d made a mistake, offering a way to help fix it… any of those would have “saved” him, to some degree. But he doesn’t do any of it. He doesn’t try to rationalize, or apologize, or even shift the blame to someone else.
“She wants to be the one with all the answers, then let her deal with being the one who has to answer the questions,” Mason says, proving to E and Fyre that Mason set Strym on Fyre on purpose. And with malice.
This is about the point that Fyre wants to see what color Mason burns. She doesn’t because it’s Pocket D. No violence. There’s a teleport dampener, so more than likely, there’s a some kind of power-dampener, too. And she knows that if she starts, or even thinks too much about starting, she won’t stop until he’s not moving any more. I didn’t even put any the auras on, because she wouldn’t have stopped at just hurting him a little. (And, running powers in Pocket D is just annoying. Almost as annoying as the constant NPC babbling.)
Even here, though, Fyre is expecting Mason to try to apologize, or say Strym tricked him, or something. Or, on the other hand, admit that he wanted her dead, so she can write him off for good. Okay, okay-- kill him.
E is no less angry. He doesn’t have Fyre’s anger-management problem, though, so his anger is calmer, and better expressed, since it does’t revolve around setting Mason on fire. He verbally writes Mason off, more than once.
Fyre’s still waiting for Mason to push her toward killing him, or (and the possibility gets less and less) excusing what he did. Or at least to try to get her to excuse what he did.
While she’s thinking, though, she realizes how well Strym set Mason up. The way Fyre sees it, Strym has gotten Mason to sign his own death warrant. Either he steps up and stands against Strym with the team, and Strym gets to kill him. Or, he continues his betrayal, and either E or Fyre kill him.
Mason keeps saying at Fyre’s people will protect her, or deal with Strym. Fyre won‘t show fear in front of Mason, especially not now, but she wants to make it clear to Mason that she realizes that Mason intends for Strym to kill her. “Mason, Strym has ten times the people that I do, and they're a lot meaner. I surprised him with getting Jen out of the way, that's the only reason it worked.”
And then they all begin to think about what everyone else will think of Mason now. Starting with Frost. Mason finally seems upset. Fyre does feel bad that Frost will be hurt, but she thinks it’s much better that Frost finally figures out how Mason really is, before he’s hurt worse, or physically hurt.
Mason gets stalled by another riff about how he doesn’t care about Jen. Definitely not the way to win E over. Mason says that Jen isn’t E’s daughter. E’s done. He can’t even speak, and he leaves.
Mason tries to “shoo” Fyre, but she’s still looking for a final reason to kill him. Or possibly at this point, a reason not to kill him. She may have already made up her mind.
Mason’s drinking heavily, and Fyre realizes later that he’s trying to make Jack come back out so that he can hide.
Fyre’s also seeing a chance to twist the knife. She can’t shove the knife in right now, but she can definitely twist it, and she’s going to enjoy it. Mason’s caused enough pain and grief, and she doesn’t have any reservations left in doing the same to him.
Mason does start to try to rationalize, a little. But, he doesn’t try hard enough, and it’s too late, anyway. The reasons don’t make logical sense, either.
“Everyone has a threshold,” Mason says, which makes no sense to Fyre. But she comes back with, “What’s yours?” She’s more than willing to help him find out.
“What would you rather have me do? Have him pepper me with questions, get me confused and then get the information anyway?” Mason asks. Yes, Fyre would have been happier with that. She would have still been angry, but she wouldn’t have been ready to kill him, like she is. It would have lacked the malice that Fyre sees now. Ignorance and stupidity can be excused. Evil intentions can’t. And that’s what Fyre sees in Mason now, in his willingness to sacrifice her, and Jen, and even E to Strym, in trade for Strym leaving Mason, and possibly Frost, alone. Evil.
Mason goes on about allegory involving Anton LeVey and the Garden of Eden. That didn’t help his case with her at all, and it didn’t make sense to her, either.
But it gives her time to prepare to twist the knife more. She lists people, his “friends,” and asks him how they’ll feel about him once they learn what he’s done, this time. Actually, she wouldn’t be surprised if they forgive him, or dismiss what he did, once again. But, she’s not going to present that option to him. She wants him to worry, to suffer. And she realizes that if they do feel the way she does about Mason’s actions, and cut Mason loose, that’s the worst thing that could happen to him. She doesn’t have to “hurt” him. He’d have hurt himself.
Mason tries to call Jack out, and Jack doesn’t respond. If Jack’s abandoned him, then Mason’s completely lost.
Mason’s losing focus, as well. He tells Fyre that Strym said she had “cracks.” “He said that you weren't as strong as I think you are,” Mason says. And that’s absolutely the truth. But Mason either doesn’t believe it, or won’t acknowledge it, and Fyre’s not about to prove it to Mason, and tells him that.
They talk another minute or two, and Fyre says, “Goodbye, Mason.” She doesn’t expect to ever talk to him as an ally again. She hurries outside to E, and apologizes to him for letting Mason distract her and make her angry. E thinks “nothing will be okay ever again,“ but Fyre assures him that they don’t have to worry about Mason anymore. Fyre does acknowledge that Strym probably would have come after her eventually, that Mason just put that on the fast track, but it doesn’t make it better.
They would have talked more, but Kit was around, and Fyre wanted to tell her what happened before Mason got to her and spun some story, making himself look good, or at least not so awful.
Fyre suspects that Kit has more than friendly feelings for Mason, and figures Kit is the most likely to get suckered by Mason. (And she was available.)
Between the two of them, Fyre and E explain what had happened to Kit. Kit seems angry. Well, a little. She seems more concerned with “helping” E and Fyre. But, Fyre still expects Mason to win Kit over, and is more than hesitant to tell Kit plans, figuring that Kit will eventually tell Mason. Fyre believes that Kit would do it with good intentions, but the results could still be bad, very bad. Fyre tries to explain to Kit that she’s not asking for help, just trying to help protect Kit from Mason, but Kit seems to take offense, and Fyre realizes she can’t explain her reasoning to Kit without offending her more, so tries to just stop talking.
They do discuss Mason’s reasoning briefly. Fyre thinks a big motivating factor for Mason is her death. She hasn’t always believed that Mason wants her dead, but she does now. When Mason killed the people who tormented him, he had a psychological excuse, and the drugs were affecting him. When he tried to kill E and Fyre, the first time, he could blame Ben’s influence. Now, he has no excuse. There’s no reason to hold back on him, this time. She figures that Mason either isn’t willing to take the consequences of killing her, or that he thinks he’s not powerful enough to do it, so he’ll have Strym do it for him.
Kit comes up with another motivation. Explaining her ideas, she says, “Well, one of them has him flying in with trumpets blaring and shouting ‘I'll save you, ma'am!’" She says that his quest for glory might make that a possibility. Fyre thinks that’s unlikely, and it’s nothing like anything she’s thought of.
So, what happens to Team Angst? It’s been broken before, but this time it’s shattered. There’s No Way that E or Fyre will ever trust Mason again. Right now, Fyre, and possibly E, is more likely to kill Mason than talk to him. I can see some far-out scenarios that might get Mason back in on the fight against Strym. Very far-out. At least partly because I know that E's player wants the team to beat Strym (aka the Kronos Titan) before the team moves on.
I don’t know what’s going to happen next. I didn’t expect any of what happened to happen, either. Isn’t that why this stuff is fun?
Okay, backing up a step before I cover the Big Stuff. But, quick-like, because it’s not really that important.
The Carnies/Malta mission was just fun. I threw on all the fire auras, which I usually can’t do for very long because of the end drain. Thanks to Speed Boost, that wasn’t really a problem. I didn’t even remember Malta being in that mission, so it definitely surprised Fyre. She was scared, hence the fire. I’d think she was probably pretty scary, too. There was so much going on, though, that I don’t think anyone noticed either.
And then, on to the Big Stuff. Did you ever see the film of an atom bomb, how it wipes out everything around it, sort of vaporizes everything, and there’s the huge mushroom cloud, visible from miles and miles away? Yeah, it was like that.
Yeah, when I logged on, I did get aheads up of what was going on. Mason and Strym were talking in Pocket D. Fyre wouldn’t just wander into Pocket D and come across a meeting like that by chance, would she? Ehh, probably not. But, if she’d had people looking out for such a thing… Well, she did used to spend some time in Pocket D. It’s not stretching it that someone, an employee or just a regular customer, would call her, either with or without being paid off. In fact, it makes perfect sense. So, Fyre found Mason talking to Strym.
She came up behind Mason without him seeing her, in full view of Strym, though. “Well. Isn't this cozy? Can't imagine what's going on here,” she said. She’s practically ignoring that Strym’s even there, she’s so furious with Mason.
“You can, but it would be wrong,” Mason replied. This was about the last point in the conversation that Fyre, and I, held out hope for Mason. She, and I, hadn’t heard any of the previous conversation. Maybe it wasn’t what she thought?
Not exactly, but just as bad.
Strym continues talking to Mason, and Mason responds at one point, “But, you know, when E dies...I could care less what you do with the kid.” It seemed like every time he opened his mouth, he just made it worse.
Fyre even gave him a bit of chance to save himself, early on. “Mason. Were I mistaken about your intentions here, you would be doing absolutely nothing to change my mind right now.” She wanted to be wrong. She wanted him to at least try to cover. But, it just kept getting worse.
Like, a minute later, when he said, “Because if I turned over the brat, he'd never forgive me and probably fall on a sword somewhere.”
Fyre’s reply: “E fall on a sword? I don't know about that, but if you go near Jen, Mason, you'll wish you had it that easy.” Fyre figures that E would kill Mason first. That is, if he’s still alive.
Strym and Mason both think that Fyre is threatening Mason for herself. Strym tells Mason that if Mason joins him, she can’t touch him. Fyre, though, is more than up to the challenge, “If he hurts Jen, I promise, if I have to go through hell and back, he'll regret it. Strongly.” She meant it. Literally, figuratively, completely.
Strym doesn’t seem to like being ignored by Fyre,, and she was practically ignoring him. She knows what to expect from him, and she’s so furious with Mason, he’s just not important right now. But Strym’s paying attention. “And if you want to see Hell again... “ And he “points a finger to the back of his neck and makes a *bang* sound.“ That should have scared her a lot more than it did at the moment. But, she does have an ace up her sleeve, or a weight around her neck, maybe, but between that and how angry she is, she just laughs at him. She doesn’t properly think it out, but she (and I) does a little better later. What she wonders later is if Strym was more personally involved in her death. Was he there? Could he have been the one to pull the trigger? Maybe not, but it’s something she hadn’t even thought of before.
Mason says she’s not afraid of anything and makes his “marble” allusion again. Fyre can’t believe he’s still talking, still making an effort to dig his own grave. Mason says he’ll shut up. We all know how how unlikely that is.
Strym starts talking about Fyre’s demon and her ancestor. It sounds to Fyre as if Strym thinks that Katherine and the demon would be on his side. Fyre is entertained. Strym is scary, but he’s not on the demon’s level. And Katherine’s not interested in making deals. “You’d just be as much kindling as anyone else.” Strym keeps on for a minute, and Fyre tells him, “I'm sure she'd be interested to see what color you burn.” After a minute, she adds, “In fact, if you'd like to step outside, we can just find out now.” Strym just laughs and refuses. Fyre never thought he’d agree, of course.
Fyre knows, too, that soon she’ll have nothing to lose, and she won’t be afraid to go after Strym, or through anything to get to him. It takes some of the sting out of his threats. She over-plays it, and tries to use her apparent lack of fear to throw Strym off. Does it help? Probably not.
Strym leaves. And leaves Mason to Fyre. Jack appears momentarily, but Fyre immediately tells Jack to put Mason back out. She and I both expected Jack to refuse, and she was prepared to do whatever she could to make him, but Mason’s back instantly.
E shows up before Fyre can rip into Mason. And Mason tells an extremely short version of what happened, which doesn’t make him look that bad. Another few mintues, though, and Mason admits that he told Strym that Fyre knew where Jen was. And not just admits, but practically brags. He could have saved himself here, too. At least a little. An apology, admitting that he’d made a mistake, offering a way to help fix it… any of those would have “saved” him, to some degree. But he doesn’t do any of it. He doesn’t try to rationalize, or apologize, or even shift the blame to someone else.
“She wants to be the one with all the answers, then let her deal with being the one who has to answer the questions,” Mason says, proving to E and Fyre that Mason set Strym on Fyre on purpose. And with malice.
This is about the point that Fyre wants to see what color Mason burns. She doesn’t because it’s Pocket D. No violence. There’s a teleport dampener, so more than likely, there’s a some kind of power-dampener, too. And she knows that if she starts, or even thinks too much about starting, she won’t stop until he’s not moving any more. I didn’t even put any the auras on, because she wouldn’t have stopped at just hurting him a little. (And, running powers in Pocket D is just annoying. Almost as annoying as the constant NPC babbling.)
Even here, though, Fyre is expecting Mason to try to apologize, or say Strym tricked him, or something. Or, on the other hand, admit that he wanted her dead, so she can write him off for good. Okay, okay-- kill him.
E is no less angry. He doesn’t have Fyre’s anger-management problem, though, so his anger is calmer, and better expressed, since it does’t revolve around setting Mason on fire. He verbally writes Mason off, more than once.
Fyre’s still waiting for Mason to push her toward killing him, or (and the possibility gets less and less) excusing what he did. Or at least to try to get her to excuse what he did.
While she’s thinking, though, she realizes how well Strym set Mason up. The way Fyre sees it, Strym has gotten Mason to sign his own death warrant. Either he steps up and stands against Strym with the team, and Strym gets to kill him. Or, he continues his betrayal, and either E or Fyre kill him.
Mason keeps saying at Fyre’s people will protect her, or deal with Strym. Fyre won‘t show fear in front of Mason, especially not now, but she wants to make it clear to Mason that she realizes that Mason intends for Strym to kill her. “Mason, Strym has ten times the people that I do, and they're a lot meaner. I surprised him with getting Jen out of the way, that's the only reason it worked.”
And then they all begin to think about what everyone else will think of Mason now. Starting with Frost. Mason finally seems upset. Fyre does feel bad that Frost will be hurt, but she thinks it’s much better that Frost finally figures out how Mason really is, before he’s hurt worse, or physically hurt.
Mason gets stalled by another riff about how he doesn’t care about Jen. Definitely not the way to win E over. Mason says that Jen isn’t E’s daughter. E’s done. He can’t even speak, and he leaves.
Mason tries to “shoo” Fyre, but she’s still looking for a final reason to kill him. Or possibly at this point, a reason not to kill him. She may have already made up her mind.
Mason’s drinking heavily, and Fyre realizes later that he’s trying to make Jack come back out so that he can hide.
Fyre’s also seeing a chance to twist the knife. She can’t shove the knife in right now, but she can definitely twist it, and she’s going to enjoy it. Mason’s caused enough pain and grief, and she doesn’t have any reservations left in doing the same to him.
Mason does start to try to rationalize, a little. But, he doesn’t try hard enough, and it’s too late, anyway. The reasons don’t make logical sense, either.
“Everyone has a threshold,” Mason says, which makes no sense to Fyre. But she comes back with, “What’s yours?” She’s more than willing to help him find out.
“What would you rather have me do? Have him pepper me with questions, get me confused and then get the information anyway?” Mason asks. Yes, Fyre would have been happier with that. She would have still been angry, but she wouldn’t have been ready to kill him, like she is. It would have lacked the malice that Fyre sees now. Ignorance and stupidity can be excused. Evil intentions can’t. And that’s what Fyre sees in Mason now, in his willingness to sacrifice her, and Jen, and even E to Strym, in trade for Strym leaving Mason, and possibly Frost, alone. Evil.
Mason goes on about allegory involving Anton LeVey and the Garden of Eden. That didn’t help his case with her at all, and it didn’t make sense to her, either.
But it gives her time to prepare to twist the knife more. She lists people, his “friends,” and asks him how they’ll feel about him once they learn what he’s done, this time. Actually, she wouldn’t be surprised if they forgive him, or dismiss what he did, once again. But, she’s not going to present that option to him. She wants him to worry, to suffer. And she realizes that if they do feel the way she does about Mason’s actions, and cut Mason loose, that’s the worst thing that could happen to him. She doesn’t have to “hurt” him. He’d have hurt himself.
Mason tries to call Jack out, and Jack doesn’t respond. If Jack’s abandoned him, then Mason’s completely lost.
Mason’s losing focus, as well. He tells Fyre that Strym said she had “cracks.” “He said that you weren't as strong as I think you are,” Mason says. And that’s absolutely the truth. But Mason either doesn’t believe it, or won’t acknowledge it, and Fyre’s not about to prove it to Mason, and tells him that.
They talk another minute or two, and Fyre says, “Goodbye, Mason.” She doesn’t expect to ever talk to him as an ally again. She hurries outside to E, and apologizes to him for letting Mason distract her and make her angry. E thinks “nothing will be okay ever again,“ but Fyre assures him that they don’t have to worry about Mason anymore. Fyre does acknowledge that Strym probably would have come after her eventually, that Mason just put that on the fast track, but it doesn’t make it better.
They would have talked more, but Kit was around, and Fyre wanted to tell her what happened before Mason got to her and spun some story, making himself look good, or at least not so awful.
Fyre suspects that Kit has more than friendly feelings for Mason, and figures Kit is the most likely to get suckered by Mason. (And she was available.)
Between the two of them, Fyre and E explain what had happened to Kit. Kit seems angry. Well, a little. She seems more concerned with “helping” E and Fyre. But, Fyre still expects Mason to win Kit over, and is more than hesitant to tell Kit plans, figuring that Kit will eventually tell Mason. Fyre believes that Kit would do it with good intentions, but the results could still be bad, very bad. Fyre tries to explain to Kit that she’s not asking for help, just trying to help protect Kit from Mason, but Kit seems to take offense, and Fyre realizes she can’t explain her reasoning to Kit without offending her more, so tries to just stop talking.
They do discuss Mason’s reasoning briefly. Fyre thinks a big motivating factor for Mason is her death. She hasn’t always believed that Mason wants her dead, but she does now. When Mason killed the people who tormented him, he had a psychological excuse, and the drugs were affecting him. When he tried to kill E and Fyre, the first time, he could blame Ben’s influence. Now, he has no excuse. There’s no reason to hold back on him, this time. She figures that Mason either isn’t willing to take the consequences of killing her, or that he thinks he’s not powerful enough to do it, so he’ll have Strym do it for him.
Kit comes up with another motivation. Explaining her ideas, she says, “Well, one of them has him flying in with trumpets blaring and shouting ‘I'll save you, ma'am!’" She says that his quest for glory might make that a possibility. Fyre thinks that’s unlikely, and it’s nothing like anything she’s thought of.
So, what happens to Team Angst? It’s been broken before, but this time it’s shattered. There’s No Way that E or Fyre will ever trust Mason again. Right now, Fyre, and possibly E, is more likely to kill Mason than talk to him. I can see some far-out scenarios that might get Mason back in on the fight against Strym. Very far-out. At least partly because I know that E's player wants the team to beat Strym (aka the Kronos Titan) before the team moves on.
I don’t know what’s going to happen next. I didn’t expect any of what happened to happen, either. Isn’t that why this stuff is fun?
Monday, June 11, 2007
Angst Force Sunday
Quick, quick. I'm between things, but I want to get something up before I get home later and new angst makes me forget the previous angst.
Angst Force Sunday started kind of slow. A couple of nice missions, though the warning, "We have a story for you!" had already come across in tells. A bit later, the point of the warning came through: Futura, prompted by Mason, had come up with a potential cure for E. Nanites. It was a brilliant idea!
But.
The only thing I heard was the grinding and knashing of gears as a monkeywrench was thrown into the plot. E and I came up with a plot that let him play his Mastermind as "Fyre's people," and would get Fyre over to the Rogue Isles for Team 3.0, Villain-Style. We'd turned it over and around and checked for leaks, and realized it left so much open for us, it was just about perfect. It left all kinds of freedom to run characters as heroes, villains, and things in between. And, of course, created angst. Practically perfect. Or at least as close to it as we were going to get. But... well, maybe not.
So, I blanked on a lot of stuff that happened right after that. I was too involved in thinking of a cover, or a way around. And, I got one. What if it's already been done? After some talking and a bit more thinking, that was the answer:
It's too late.
Mason, as can be counted on, upped the drama and much angst ensued, quite a bit of which that neither Fyre nor I were present for. Mason, E, and Frost will surely cover it.
Brief overview of the highlights (again, I'm on the clock here. Forgive me for the skipping around and anything important that I completely skip): Kit played counselor/peacemaker, and seemed to (almost) have an impartial view. Mason had an epiphany that he never asked anyone want they wanted, and he was making a lot assumptions about a lot of things. He asked E what E wanted from him, and E gave him some guidelines, including not picking fights with Fyre. That's going to be tough. And it's going to get tougher. Fyre is not going to be easy to be around. You know, more than usual.
Skipping ahead to the end of the night, Mason went to give E and Fyre "hugs" in his light-form. Fyre backed up, because she doesn't trust him, of course, but also because she was afraid of hurting him.
Frost, the character and/or the player, is getting too observant for my and Fyre's own good. It looks like he's catching a lot of those things that Fyre almost says but then stops herself, or covers over (hints? Well, sort of, but not necessarily meant to be).
Also, Mason's use of the word "veneer" is a good description for Fyre, as much as she and I hate to agree with him. A veneer is a front, or a cover, right? A thin over-lay. That's what Fyre puts up, more now than ever. Mason was way closer to the mark than he would have thought, I think.
And, TIME!
Angst Force Sunday started kind of slow. A couple of nice missions, though the warning, "We have a story for you!" had already come across in tells. A bit later, the point of the warning came through: Futura, prompted by Mason, had come up with a potential cure for E. Nanites. It was a brilliant idea!
But.
The only thing I heard was the grinding and knashing of gears as a monkeywrench was thrown into the plot. E and I came up with a plot that let him play his Mastermind as "Fyre's people," and would get Fyre over to the Rogue Isles for Team 3.0, Villain-Style. We'd turned it over and around and checked for leaks, and realized it left so much open for us, it was just about perfect. It left all kinds of freedom to run characters as heroes, villains, and things in between. And, of course, created angst. Practically perfect. Or at least as close to it as we were going to get. But... well, maybe not.
So, I blanked on a lot of stuff that happened right after that. I was too involved in thinking of a cover, or a way around. And, I got one. What if it's already been done? After some talking and a bit more thinking, that was the answer:
It's too late.
Mason, as can be counted on, upped the drama and much angst ensued, quite a bit of which that neither Fyre nor I were present for. Mason, E, and Frost will surely cover it.
Brief overview of the highlights (again, I'm on the clock here. Forgive me for the skipping around and anything important that I completely skip): Kit played counselor/peacemaker, and seemed to (almost) have an impartial view. Mason had an epiphany that he never asked anyone want they wanted, and he was making a lot assumptions about a lot of things. He asked E what E wanted from him, and E gave him some guidelines, including not picking fights with Fyre. That's going to be tough. And it's going to get tougher. Fyre is not going to be easy to be around. You know, more than usual.
Skipping ahead to the end of the night, Mason went to give E and Fyre "hugs" in his light-form. Fyre backed up, because she doesn't trust him, of course, but also because she was afraid of hurting him.
Frost, the character and/or the player, is getting too observant for my and Fyre's own good. It looks like he's catching a lot of those things that Fyre almost says but then stops herself, or covers over (hints? Well, sort of, but not necessarily meant to be).
Also, Mason's use of the word "veneer" is a good description for Fyre, as much as she and I hate to agree with him. A veneer is a front, or a cover, right? A thin over-lay. That's what Fyre puts up, more now than ever. Mason was way closer to the mark than he would have thought, I think.
And, TIME!
Bargaining
Stumbling through the front door, she had the presence of mind to be glad that she wasn't someone who redecorated often. Had she moved furniture lately, she would have tripped over something as she crossed the room without turning on lights, blinded by tears. She hadn't cried again on the way back from the hospital in Steel Canyon, but something about the comfort of her own building, even the elevator that always smelled like someone's cigar, had loosed enough tension that the tears had started again.
She reached the corner near a window and sank against the wall. In short order, she wore herself out and sat curled up in the corner, staring blankly across the wall. She'd stayed at the hospital in one of the waiting rooms until the nurses had chased her out just before daybreak. No one had been able or willing to tell her anything. Phone calls had been one thing, but her presence had irritated them more. The only thing she'd managed to accomplish was gaining a hatred of vending machine coffee.
The slowly brightening light beyond the window glass gained her attention and she climbed to her feet, crossing the large room to the desk with the laptop on it. She turned on the computer while she stood, impatiently waiting for it to load.
Suddenly, she picked it up and threw it at the nearest window, yanking cords with dulled snaps. The computer bounced off the thick glass, making a muffled thud as it hit the carpet. Nothing on it helped. Megabytes of e-mails and copied research, and none of it accomplished anything.
Weeks. Days.
She felt heat in waves and smelled burning synthetic as the carpet around her smoldered. The smell intensified as she stood still, trying to regain control and catch her breath. The room shimmered through waves of heat and a glaze of tears.
It was too risky for her to drink now, but there was still the odd bottle of wine and liquor around that she hadn't bothered to get rid of yet. She walked to the kitchen, leaving a trail of slightly melted carpet. She found an unopened bottle of zinfandel and one of the large glass wine goblets, a corkscrew, and, after a moment of disorganized searching, a large butcher knife. On the way back to the living room, the burning slowed under her focused concentration.
She cleared the low coffee table of papers and a candle centerpiece with a sweep of the hand holding the knife. Calling a demon was something she'd never wanted to know how to do, but with an evil sorceress bumping around her head, it was something she hadn't even had to try to learn.
She knelt on the floor next to the table and took a moment to open the bottle, pouring a little wine into the glass. After a moment's hesitation, she raised her hand above the glass and pressed the blade to her wrist. After all, when the demon showed up, it would be thirsty.
She reached the corner near a window and sank against the wall. In short order, she wore herself out and sat curled up in the corner, staring blankly across the wall. She'd stayed at the hospital in one of the waiting rooms until the nurses had chased her out just before daybreak. No one had been able or willing to tell her anything. Phone calls had been one thing, but her presence had irritated them more. The only thing she'd managed to accomplish was gaining a hatred of vending machine coffee.
The slowly brightening light beyond the window glass gained her attention and she climbed to her feet, crossing the large room to the desk with the laptop on it. She turned on the computer while she stood, impatiently waiting for it to load.
Suddenly, she picked it up and threw it at the nearest window, yanking cords with dulled snaps. The computer bounced off the thick glass, making a muffled thud as it hit the carpet. Nothing on it helped. Megabytes of e-mails and copied research, and none of it accomplished anything.
Weeks. Days.
She felt heat in waves and smelled burning synthetic as the carpet around her smoldered. The smell intensified as she stood still, trying to regain control and catch her breath. The room shimmered through waves of heat and a glaze of tears.
It was too risky for her to drink now, but there was still the odd bottle of wine and liquor around that she hadn't bothered to get rid of yet. She walked to the kitchen, leaving a trail of slightly melted carpet. She found an unopened bottle of zinfandel and one of the large glass wine goblets, a corkscrew, and, after a moment of disorganized searching, a large butcher knife. On the way back to the living room, the burning slowed under her focused concentration.
She cleared the low coffee table of papers and a candle centerpiece with a sweep of the hand holding the knife. Calling a demon was something she'd never wanted to know how to do, but with an evil sorceress bumping around her head, it was something she hadn't even had to try to learn.
She knelt on the floor next to the table and took a moment to open the bottle, pouring a little wine into the glass. After a moment's hesitation, she raised her hand above the glass and pressed the blade to her wrist. After all, when the demon showed up, it would be thirsty.
Sunday, June 10, 2007
Over-due Angst
I got home late last night and I was tired. But I'm pretty determined to get that freakin' Essence of the Furies without paying 4 million influence for it. That means a PuG, at least. I hate PuG's eighty percent of the time, though, and want to kill them after about half a mission. Sometimes less. The last one I was on, I was targetting teammates for fun after the second teamwipe. I left after the third. I didn't used to have such PuG-hatred, but since I'm used to a consistant large group of players that know what they're doing, I have less patience with stupidity.
Anyway, hooked up with a group of the usual suspects instead. I think it was a Council mission I joined in the middle of. It was pretty quiet, really. Mason and Fyre have ignoring each other down to an art form, and everyone really seemed to have missions and the game more on their minds than characters or RP, which was absolutely perfect for the mood I was in.
During a Banished Pantheon mission, I got Hamidon Goo! Oh, guess that's not really the important thing to note, though. Mason whispered for Frost, "Ask her how E is." The emphasis is mine. If Fyre heard, she ignored him. Frost told Mason to wait until they were done. I think it was a mission after that, while they were waiting outside, Frost asked Fyre if she'd heard from E. "No," she says. And nothing else. Frost says that E's normally with the team around now. Fyre acknowledges that's true. Guess she did hear Mason ask Frost to ask? After a minute, she relents and realizes that Frost probably wants to know himself. She says that E's back in the locked ward in the hospital, but that's all she knows. Star asks who E is (she's lost her memory), and Mason says, "their friend." Blood question the "their" and Mason says E doesn't need him. Blood mentions E being grumpy the other night, and says, "The man is dying. He is going to be moody." Fyre bolts for Ghost Falcon and ignores the rest of the conversation.
Well, most of it. The Best Line of the Night Award goes to Blood, again.
Bloodshot: So, Mase are you a quarter or a dime?
Masonry Redux: I don't understand what you mean.
Bloodshot: Well you flip like a coin, just trying to find out like which one.
A Hydra mission is next up, a couple of missions later, and Red Pulsarion joins up. The rest of the team waits forever for Frost and Mason. Everyone's just kind of sitting around inside the mission. (out door map, plenty of space). Frost and Mason finally get there, and wonder where everyone is. "Fyre's there," says Frost. The rest are on higher ground on a rock. Red asks about Fyre, "She OK?" Fyre says, "Yes," just as Frost starts to say," She's bee-" I'm so glad he stopped. She would have yelled at him, and I really don't want her going off on Frost. It'd be like kicking a puppy. A sick, injured puppy.
Red starts working on me and Fyre early:
Red Pulsarion: (chuckles) Wow, Fyre.
Fyre Hex: What?
Red Pulsarion: They're just all on the floor before I'm even starting.
I love doing damage, especially after that wanna-be damage the Warshade did. I love lobbing a fireball into a group and watching all those orange numbers float up. Yeah, I know, but I can't help it. It makes Fyre feel useful, and the acknowledgement makes her feel appreciated, neither of which she's felt much of for a long while.
Towards the middle of the mission, Mason comes up with:
Masonry Redux: Fyre, what are we pissed off about each other for this time?
Huh? What? Burning Hydra here.
Fyre Hex: I haven't said a word to you, Mason.
Masonry Redux: Which means you're pissed off at me.
Fyre Hex: Those are the only two sentences you've said to me, also.
Masonry Redux: Now why, I forget.
Masonry Redux: For three days.
Fyre's screaming in her head to herself something like, "Because you're a jerk! And if we talk, we're going to fight, and if we fight, we might kill each other!" But she doesn't say anything in order to not scream at Mason.
The rest of the mission goes pretty smoothly. They even took out a Shadow Cyst Crystal without any fatalities. As soon as everyone zones out of the mission, Mason flies over to Fyre.
Masonry Redux: Hey. I'm sorry.
Fyre Hex: For what?
Masonry Redux: He's dying.
Fyre Hex: Mason, shut up. See? You "apologize" and then try to antagonize me again.
Masonry Redux: I'm not antagonizing you.
Masonry Redux: I'm stating a fact.
Fyre Hex: Leave me alone, Mason. You're not trying to help at all.
And she takes off for the next mission.
Mason and Frost explain a little to Red, and Fyre completely ignores them. Red tries to give Mason some advice, but who knows if it sticks. The longer they talk, the harder it is for Fyre to ignore them, so she finds some stuff to beat up so she can't hear them. Nemesis, Malta-- perfect. And this is the Malta I remember. Two white-conning Gunslingers and some blue minions knock her right out of the sky. I unexemp, and hit Rise of the Phoenix immediately, and she wipes out the now-grays. Red tries to get Fyre's attention. She asks if they're ready for the next mission, but continues attacking things. Red tries to chase her down.
Fyre Hex: Don't follow me, you're going to get hurt. Just let me know when we're ready.
She runs straight into Blood, who's come up on her with his stealth suit on, but she sees the boots when she practically runs into him, and Red comes up from the other direction and asks her to stop.
Red Pulsarion: (gently) Fyre. Can you slow down just a minute?
Fyre Hex: What?
Red Pulsarion: I just wanna say one thing. Then I won't bring it up again, OK?
Fyre Hex: ::warily:: Okay...?
Red Pulsarion: My wife... she died of cancer about a year ago now. (clears his throat)
Red Pulsarion: >50 years, almost.
Fyre Hex: I'm sorry to hear that, Red, it must have been tough.
Red Pulsarion: (nods, seriously) Yeah, there--well, there were a lot of times I didn't know how I was gonna keep going.
Red Pulsarion: More when I was pretty sure I didn't want to.
Red Pulsarion: But here's the thing I want to say. You're--not alone. You understand?
Red Pulsarion: You got people around you who want to help you. Don't be afraid to let them try. They'll screw it up sometimes, like Mase did.
Fyre Hex: ::gives a short, hoarse laugh:: You know, ye-- Nevermind, Red.
(She would have finished with, "You know, yes, I am.")
Fyre Hex: I am sorry about your wife, though. It's good that you're getting back in the game. You're a big help.
Red Pulsarion: (quietly) Fyre?
Red Pulsarion: If you ever need someone to talk to who knows what you're feeling--
Fyre Hex: ::looks away and mumbles:: Thanks.
Red Pulsarion: (sighs and nods) Alright, then. I've said my piece. What you do with it, well, that's up to you.
Red Pulsarion:For what it's worth, though, every minute is--precious. EVERY minute.
Fyre Hex: ::smiles a little:: Red, your hearts in the right place, but... well, it's hard for you to get an idea of the situation after hearing about it for ten minutes, you know?
Red Pulsarion: I heard about it a bit this mornin', too. And I've fought alongside him. But you're right, I'm kinda shooting blind here.
Fyre Hex: And, god knows, if Mason tells you that something's black, check for yourself before you believe it.
Red Pulsarion: ... (shakes his head slowly) Fyre, Mase can be a little clumsy, sure. But I'm pretty sure his heart's in the right place, even if his mouth isn't.
Red Pulsarion: (smiles to himself) 'course, you just said the same thing 'bout me, didn't you.
Fyre Hex: Yeah? You think? Because for the past three days he's been going out of his way to *prove* how much he doesn't care about E, and now he's all apologetic and crap. Because he has an audience. It'll be back to normal by tomorrow.
Red Pulsarion: Fyre. (scratches his chin slowly) How many guys have you gotten to know in your life? Not romantically, just--gotten to know.
Fyre Hex: ::laughs:: Mason's a jerk because he's a guy? No way. Sorry.
Red Pulsarion: (smiles) I'm trying to explain, Fyre. He's not trying to be a jerk at all.
Red Pulsarion: He's building walls, see?
Red Pulsarion: He can't deal with how much it's getting to him, and he's trying to get it under control by putting up a wall.
Red Pulsarion: Not entirely unlike some fiery ladies who've been flying all over blowing stuff up.
Fyre Hex:You know what? I don't care about his "walls," I really don't. Except that he feels the need to lob cannonballs from the tops of them.
Red Pulsarion: (nods) Well, I had a word with him about that. And if I hear he's done it again, he and I will have a few more words.
Red Pulsarion: But if he didn't care, he wouldn't need to put up the wall in the first place, Fyre. Might help to keep that in mind.
Fyre Hex: This is what I'm getting sick of.
Red Pulsarion: Hm?
Fyre Hex: I'm supposed to ignore all his bad behavior because he's got "issues." Fu-- forget that. We've all got "issues." I don't have the... patience to keep dealing with his. There ARE more important things than Mason.
Fyre Hex: It's like... we're supposed to give him a time-out and a slap on the wrist. "Now, Mason, you really shouldn't do that."
(Fyre'd had a very similar conversation with Kit the night before, or at least that's what she'd gotten from the conversation. Like someone said, it's like, "Poor Mason, he's so deep, you all just don't understand him.")
Red Pulsarion: Course there are. (smiles) And I didn't say to ignore anything. If he gives you grief, kick his behind all over the city.
Red Pulsarion: Just keep in mind while you're doin' it, he's got his own issues he's trying to deal with. That's as good as you can do, sometimes.
Fyre Hex: He doesn't have... compassion for anyone else. Let everyone else play enabler for him.
Red Pulsarion: ... Fyre, not to be blunt, but at the moment I don't give a rat's ass about Mase.
Fyre Hex: No? That's not the impression I was getting. I was hearing... well, something different, apparently.
Red Pulsarion: I'm more concerned about a young lady facing the toughest thing in her life. You don't need to defend how you feel about him. Not to me, anyways.
Red Pulsarion: Apparently so. (sighs) Lemme try again. Shorter, maybe.
Red Pulsarion: Your friends want to help you. Let 'em know when they're screwing it up. Loudly, so they get it. But--keep in mind, they're there for you.
Red Pulsarion: Don't push 'em away. It feels mighty good, because you're mad. But--it doesn't help.
Fyre Hex: *I* don't *need* help. And no one is offering it. Even if I did. If anything my "friends" are doing their best to cause more problems.
Red Pulsarion: (quietly) Alright, then, Fyre, I'll stop bugging you. But--just for the record--I AM offering help. You can take it or not, that's up to you.
Fyre Hex: Thanks, but... ::looks away:: Thanks.
Red Pulsarion: (nods) You're welcome.
Red Pulsarion: (looks around) I do believe I managed to blab all our fighting friends off to sleep, though.
Fyre Hex: Oh. Huh. The comm is quiet, isn't it?
Keen Frost: We're alive.
Fyre Hex: ::startles slightly:: Oh. Guess there are still people around.
Red Pulsarion: (surprised)
(Switched from Team to Local)
Red Pulsarion: (apologetically) I didn't realize. I'm sorry.
Fyre Hex: I didn't really, either, I guess. I was.. thinking about other things.
(And I totally wasn't thinking about the conversation being in-team or "on the comm." Between it being late, and the conversations we've had in the team channel but the other characters hadn't "heard," and just being involved in what I was doing, I never thought about it. I don't know if the other characters "heard" or not.)
Red Pulsarion: (nods) Yeah, there'll be a fair amount of thinking about other things in the days to come. (sighs) I wish I could tell you otherwise.
[Team] Masonry Redux: Hello.
Fyre Hex: bites her lip and looks away:: Maybe.
[Team]Keen Frost: ::clears throat::
[Team]Red Pulsarion: Mase, Frost.
Red Pulsarion: (nods) Well, one day at a time, right?
Fyre Hex: tries to smile and fails:: Yeah, guess so.
Red Pulsarion: (gently) Fyre? I know this isn't much, but...
Red Pulsarion: Right up to the end, there's good. Sometimes days, sometimes minutes. But they're still there.
Fyre Hex: ::turns her head away:: Nobody's talking about an end.
Red Pulsarion: (quietly) Course not. And you both keep fighting for as long as makes sense to. Who knows, might even pull a win out of the hat.
Red Pulsarion: If the time comes when you need to change how you think about it, you'll both know it.
Fyre Hex: softly:: He said weeks. Days.
Red Pulsarion: (looks down) Well.
Red Pulsarion: Then lemme make a suggestion.
Red Pulsarion: Don't spend your time listening to an old windbag like me. You don't have much time, maybe. So make the most of what you do have.
Fyre Hex stares at the ground and shakes her head without saying anything, refusing to acknowledge the tears
Red Pulsarion: Fyre...?
Fyre Hex shakes her head again, still not saying anything
Red Pulsarion walks up tentatively.
Red Pulsarion puts a hand on her shoulder quietly.
Fyre Hex lets out half of a sob before backing away and looking past Red's shoulder.
Fyre Hex: I can't... I have to go...
Red Pulsarion: (nods) I understand.
Fyre Hex: I'm-- Thanks.
And she took off. I imagine she went off and cried in corner somewhere, then went to the hospital to wait until she could see E or someone chased her away.
I don't think she's completely out of her denial, but she must be mostly. She won't acknowledge anything outloud, at least. Red showed concern for her, and that doesn't happen to her very often. Mason may have for a minute or two during her first Malta freak-out, but he ruined that about twenty-four hours later. E has, but, not only does he have more important things to think about, but she wouldn't accept it from him right now, because he does have more important things to worry about. Other than that, pretty much never.
Fyre's not "deep," or complicated. She wants to be cared about, but she's never been, so she doesn't expect it, and has a hard time dealing with it when someone does. She's got some of that "I'll hurt you before you hurt me," but she's not a mean person, so that doesn't come out too often. It's not hard to figure her out or figure out what her reactions will be. Sometimes that makes her too easy to set up or set off.
"Angst Force Sunday" should be... interesting.
Anyway, hooked up with a group of the usual suspects instead. I think it was a Council mission I joined in the middle of. It was pretty quiet, really. Mason and Fyre have ignoring each other down to an art form, and everyone really seemed to have missions and the game more on their minds than characters or RP, which was absolutely perfect for the mood I was in.
During a Banished Pantheon mission, I got Hamidon Goo! Oh, guess that's not really the important thing to note, though. Mason whispered for Frost, "Ask her how E is." The emphasis is mine. If Fyre heard, she ignored him. Frost told Mason to wait until they were done. I think it was a mission after that, while they were waiting outside, Frost asked Fyre if she'd heard from E. "No," she says. And nothing else. Frost says that E's normally with the team around now. Fyre acknowledges that's true. Guess she did hear Mason ask Frost to ask? After a minute, she relents and realizes that Frost probably wants to know himself. She says that E's back in the locked ward in the hospital, but that's all she knows. Star asks who E is (she's lost her memory), and Mason says, "their friend." Blood question the "their" and Mason says E doesn't need him. Blood mentions E being grumpy the other night, and says, "The man is dying. He is going to be moody." Fyre bolts for Ghost Falcon and ignores the rest of the conversation.
Well, most of it. The Best Line of the Night Award goes to Blood, again.
Bloodshot: So, Mase are you a quarter or a dime?
Masonry Redux: I don't understand what you mean.
Bloodshot: Well you flip like a coin, just trying to find out like which one.
A Hydra mission is next up, a couple of missions later, and Red Pulsarion joins up. The rest of the team waits forever for Frost and Mason. Everyone's just kind of sitting around inside the mission. (out door map, plenty of space). Frost and Mason finally get there, and wonder where everyone is. "Fyre's there," says Frost. The rest are on higher ground on a rock. Red asks about Fyre, "She OK?" Fyre says, "Yes," just as Frost starts to say," She's bee-" I'm so glad he stopped. She would have yelled at him, and I really don't want her going off on Frost. It'd be like kicking a puppy. A sick, injured puppy.
Red starts working on me and Fyre early:
Red Pulsarion: (chuckles) Wow, Fyre.
Fyre Hex: What?
Red Pulsarion: They're just all on the floor before I'm even starting.
I love doing damage, especially after that wanna-be damage the Warshade did. I love lobbing a fireball into a group and watching all those orange numbers float up. Yeah, I know, but I can't help it. It makes Fyre feel useful, and the acknowledgement makes her feel appreciated, neither of which she's felt much of for a long while.
Towards the middle of the mission, Mason comes up with:
Masonry Redux: Fyre, what are we pissed off about each other for this time?
Huh? What? Burning Hydra here.
Fyre Hex: I haven't said a word to you, Mason.
Masonry Redux: Which means you're pissed off at me.
Fyre Hex: Those are the only two sentences you've said to me, also.
Masonry Redux: Now why, I forget.
Masonry Redux: For three days.
Fyre's screaming in her head to herself something like, "Because you're a jerk! And if we talk, we're going to fight, and if we fight, we might kill each other!" But she doesn't say anything in order to not scream at Mason.
The rest of the mission goes pretty smoothly. They even took out a Shadow Cyst Crystal without any fatalities. As soon as everyone zones out of the mission, Mason flies over to Fyre.
Masonry Redux: Hey. I'm sorry.
Fyre Hex: For what?
Masonry Redux: He's dying.
Fyre Hex: Mason, shut up. See? You "apologize" and then try to antagonize me again.
Masonry Redux: I'm not antagonizing you.
Masonry Redux: I'm stating a fact.
Fyre Hex: Leave me alone, Mason. You're not trying to help at all.
And she takes off for the next mission.
Mason and Frost explain a little to Red, and Fyre completely ignores them. Red tries to give Mason some advice, but who knows if it sticks. The longer they talk, the harder it is for Fyre to ignore them, so she finds some stuff to beat up so she can't hear them. Nemesis, Malta-- perfect. And this is the Malta I remember. Two white-conning Gunslingers and some blue minions knock her right out of the sky. I unexemp, and hit Rise of the Phoenix immediately, and she wipes out the now-grays. Red tries to get Fyre's attention. She asks if they're ready for the next mission, but continues attacking things. Red tries to chase her down.
Fyre Hex: Don't follow me, you're going to get hurt. Just let me know when we're ready.
She runs straight into Blood, who's come up on her with his stealth suit on, but she sees the boots when she practically runs into him, and Red comes up from the other direction and asks her to stop.
Red Pulsarion: (gently) Fyre. Can you slow down just a minute?
Fyre Hex: What?
Red Pulsarion: I just wanna say one thing. Then I won't bring it up again, OK?
Fyre Hex: ::warily:: Okay...?
Red Pulsarion: My wife... she died of cancer about a year ago now. (clears his throat)
Red Pulsarion: >50 years, almost.
Fyre Hex: I'm sorry to hear that, Red, it must have been tough.
Red Pulsarion: (nods, seriously) Yeah, there--well, there were a lot of times I didn't know how I was gonna keep going.
Red Pulsarion: More when I was pretty sure I didn't want to.
Red Pulsarion: But here's the thing I want to say. You're--not alone. You understand?
Red Pulsarion: You got people around you who want to help you. Don't be afraid to let them try. They'll screw it up sometimes, like Mase did.
Fyre Hex: ::gives a short, hoarse laugh:: You know, ye-- Nevermind, Red.
(She would have finished with, "You know, yes, I am.")
Fyre Hex: I am sorry about your wife, though. It's good that you're getting back in the game. You're a big help.
Red Pulsarion: (quietly) Fyre?
Red Pulsarion: If you ever need someone to talk to who knows what you're feeling--
Fyre Hex: ::looks away and mumbles:: Thanks.
Red Pulsarion: (sighs and nods) Alright, then. I've said my piece. What you do with it, well, that's up to you.
Red Pulsarion:For what it's worth, though, every minute is--precious. EVERY minute.
Fyre Hex: ::smiles a little:: Red, your hearts in the right place, but... well, it's hard for you to get an idea of the situation after hearing about it for ten minutes, you know?
Red Pulsarion: I heard about it a bit this mornin', too. And I've fought alongside him. But you're right, I'm kinda shooting blind here.
Fyre Hex: And, god knows, if Mason tells you that something's black, check for yourself before you believe it.
Red Pulsarion: ... (shakes his head slowly) Fyre, Mase can be a little clumsy, sure. But I'm pretty sure his heart's in the right place, even if his mouth isn't.
Red Pulsarion: (smiles to himself) 'course, you just said the same thing 'bout me, didn't you.
Fyre Hex: Yeah? You think? Because for the past three days he's been going out of his way to *prove* how much he doesn't care about E, and now he's all apologetic and crap. Because he has an audience. It'll be back to normal by tomorrow.
Red Pulsarion: Fyre. (scratches his chin slowly) How many guys have you gotten to know in your life? Not romantically, just--gotten to know.
Fyre Hex: ::laughs:: Mason's a jerk because he's a guy? No way. Sorry.
Red Pulsarion: (smiles) I'm trying to explain, Fyre. He's not trying to be a jerk at all.
Red Pulsarion: He's building walls, see?
Red Pulsarion: He can't deal with how much it's getting to him, and he's trying to get it under control by putting up a wall.
Red Pulsarion: Not entirely unlike some fiery ladies who've been flying all over blowing stuff up.
Fyre Hex:You know what? I don't care about his "walls," I really don't. Except that he feels the need to lob cannonballs from the tops of them.
Red Pulsarion: (nods) Well, I had a word with him about that. And if I hear he's done it again, he and I will have a few more words.
Red Pulsarion: But if he didn't care, he wouldn't need to put up the wall in the first place, Fyre. Might help to keep that in mind.
Fyre Hex: This is what I'm getting sick of.
Red Pulsarion: Hm?
Fyre Hex: I'm supposed to ignore all his bad behavior because he's got "issues." Fu-- forget that. We've all got "issues." I don't have the... patience to keep dealing with his. There ARE more important things than Mason.
Fyre Hex: It's like... we're supposed to give him a time-out and a slap on the wrist. "Now, Mason, you really shouldn't do that."
(Fyre'd had a very similar conversation with Kit the night before, or at least that's what she'd gotten from the conversation. Like someone said, it's like, "Poor Mason, he's so deep, you all just don't understand him.")
Red Pulsarion: Course there are. (smiles) And I didn't say to ignore anything. If he gives you grief, kick his behind all over the city.
Red Pulsarion: Just keep in mind while you're doin' it, he's got his own issues he's trying to deal with. That's as good as you can do, sometimes.
Fyre Hex: He doesn't have... compassion for anyone else. Let everyone else play enabler for him.
Red Pulsarion: ... Fyre, not to be blunt, but at the moment I don't give a rat's ass about Mase.
Fyre Hex: No? That's not the impression I was getting. I was hearing... well, something different, apparently.
Red Pulsarion: I'm more concerned about a young lady facing the toughest thing in her life. You don't need to defend how you feel about him. Not to me, anyways.
Red Pulsarion: Apparently so. (sighs) Lemme try again. Shorter, maybe.
Red Pulsarion: Your friends want to help you. Let 'em know when they're screwing it up. Loudly, so they get it. But--keep in mind, they're there for you.
Red Pulsarion: Don't push 'em away. It feels mighty good, because you're mad. But--it doesn't help.
Fyre Hex: *I* don't *need* help. And no one is offering it. Even if I did. If anything my "friends" are doing their best to cause more problems.
Red Pulsarion: (quietly) Alright, then, Fyre, I'll stop bugging you. But--just for the record--I AM offering help. You can take it or not, that's up to you.
Fyre Hex: Thanks, but... ::looks away:: Thanks.
Red Pulsarion: (nods) You're welcome.
Red Pulsarion: (looks around) I do believe I managed to blab all our fighting friends off to sleep, though.
Fyre Hex: Oh. Huh. The comm is quiet, isn't it?
Keen Frost: We're alive.
Fyre Hex: ::startles slightly:: Oh. Guess there are still people around.
Red Pulsarion: (surprised)
(Switched from Team to Local)
Red Pulsarion: (apologetically) I didn't realize. I'm sorry.
Fyre Hex: I didn't really, either, I guess. I was.. thinking about other things.
(And I totally wasn't thinking about the conversation being in-team or "on the comm." Between it being late, and the conversations we've had in the team channel but the other characters hadn't "heard," and just being involved in what I was doing, I never thought about it. I don't know if the other characters "heard" or not.)
Red Pulsarion: (nods) Yeah, there'll be a fair amount of thinking about other things in the days to come. (sighs) I wish I could tell you otherwise.
[Team] Masonry Redux: Hello.
Fyre Hex: bites her lip and looks away:: Maybe.
[Team]Keen Frost: ::clears throat::
[Team]Red Pulsarion: Mase, Frost.
Red Pulsarion: (nods) Well, one day at a time, right?
Fyre Hex: tries to smile and fails:: Yeah, guess so.
Red Pulsarion: (gently) Fyre? I know this isn't much, but...
Red Pulsarion: Right up to the end, there's good. Sometimes days, sometimes minutes. But they're still there.
Fyre Hex: ::turns her head away:: Nobody's talking about an end.
Red Pulsarion: (quietly) Course not. And you both keep fighting for as long as makes sense to. Who knows, might even pull a win out of the hat.
Red Pulsarion: If the time comes when you need to change how you think about it, you'll both know it.
Fyre Hex: softly:: He said weeks. Days.
Red Pulsarion: (looks down) Well.
Red Pulsarion: Then lemme make a suggestion.
Red Pulsarion: Don't spend your time listening to an old windbag like me. You don't have much time, maybe. So make the most of what you do have.
Fyre Hex stares at the ground and shakes her head without saying anything, refusing to acknowledge the tears
Red Pulsarion: Fyre...?
Fyre Hex shakes her head again, still not saying anything
Red Pulsarion walks up tentatively.
Red Pulsarion puts a hand on her shoulder quietly.
Fyre Hex lets out half of a sob before backing away and looking past Red's shoulder.
Fyre Hex: I can't... I have to go...
Red Pulsarion: (nods) I understand.
Fyre Hex: I'm-- Thanks.
And she took off. I imagine she went off and cried in corner somewhere, then went to the hospital to wait until she could see E or someone chased her away.
I don't think she's completely out of her denial, but she must be mostly. She won't acknowledge anything outloud, at least. Red showed concern for her, and that doesn't happen to her very often. Mason may have for a minute or two during her first Malta freak-out, but he ruined that about twenty-four hours later. E has, but, not only does he have more important things to think about, but she wouldn't accept it from him right now, because he does have more important things to worry about. Other than that, pretty much never.
Fyre's not "deep," or complicated. She wants to be cared about, but she's never been, so she doesn't expect it, and has a hard time dealing with it when someone does. She's got some of that "I'll hurt you before you hurt me," but she's not a mean person, so that doesn't come out too often. It's not hard to figure her out or figure out what her reactions will be. Sometimes that makes her too easy to set up or set off.
"Angst Force Sunday" should be... interesting.
Thursday, June 7, 2007
Thoughts on Team 3.0
I’m not a planner. I haven’t really planned out characters, either RP or straight game-play. Maybe that’s why I’ve deleted so many?
I haven’t sat and planned directions for Fyre, ever. Yeah, I’ve had some vague ideas. Some, I’ve used. More, I’ve thrown out, because the “plot” just didn’t go in that direction. I have a couple of vague ideas of what might happen next from where we are now, but since I don’t know what everyone else is planning, and it’s apparent that there are Plans, I don’t know how Fyre will react. And, Fyre often has ideas of her own, and doesn’t bother sharing them with me until the last possible moment.
All this means that I have no concrete ideas for “Team 3.0.” That is, if Fyre exists for Team 3.0. E’s said that there won’t be an E3. (And then two minutes later, he pitches ideas to me of what E might evolve into for Team 3.0. Way to firm up those plans! ;) )
I have a very hard time imagining Fyre without some kind of fire related powers. In CoH, that pretty much limits me to a fire controller, or a fire tank. The idea of Fyre as a tank, or a fire tank in general, doesn’t excite me at all. That leaves a fire controller. I could do that. I’ve had various alts with the Kinetic powerset, but I’ve never managed to get them very far, so I still have interests there. I also see the Empathy powerset as a possibility. But, can I think of a reason why Fyre would suddenly have “empathy?” Not really.
I think, though, that Team 3.0 is leaning much more heavily toward CoV. Talking to E, I had said that Fyre doesn’t have the capacity for sustained villainy. And, I still don’t think she does. Fyre could kill someone in a fit of rage. Accidentally, or purposely. She could kill someone to protect herself or someone she cared about. Could she sit and plan out the death of, or a crime against, a disinterested third party? No. If there is a villain-Fyre, she’s going to have to be A) coerced, B) possessed.
E and I had vaguely kicked around the idea of Fyre being a type of guardian for Jen in the Rogue Isles. I have problems with this because, if Fyre’s in her right mind, there’s no possible way that she’s going to let Jen roam around the Rogue Isles, or even be there in the first place. If she’s not in her right mind, then there’s no way Jen is going to be safe around her.
I had an idea of Fyre being possessed by Katherine, either part of the time, or totally. I don’t think I could play “Katherine” for long, so that leaves a part-time possession. Either back and forth, or starting as Katherine, and then Fyre regaining control and finding herself stuck in the Rogue Isles. Also, Katherine does not play well with others. Except maybe like how a cat plays with a dead mouse. Unless someone has a way to control her, she’s only interested in destruction.
If somehow the character makes it to the red-side, there’s a fire brute, a fire dominator, or a fire/thermal corruptor. Katherine could be (and briefly was) a fire brute. Fyre? Well…maybe not. A fire dominator would work. A fire/thermal corruptor would totally work. Absolutely perfect… BUT. I have a level 41 fire/thermal corruptor. I think I could do it again, though. It’s been a long time since I’ve played the other, and I could switch up powers and slotting enough that it would be interesting. Maybe. And… Fyre’s suddenly healing people? That might take some explaining, and I can’t exactly think of an explanation.
And we run into another thing to think about here. If Team 3.0 is anything like the original team or Team Angst, this is going to be something that I’m going to play just about every day, and something I’m going to want to play AT LEAST to level 50. I don’t want to get stuck with an uninteresting or frustrating AT, or, worse, character. On good days, Fyre is interesting, to me, among her other qualities. Is she going to continue to be interesting? Well, I think that’s one of those things that’s impossible to predict, because it depends on too many variables.
Another big stumbling block that’s been brought up is keeping a team of villains together. Why would “bad guys” hang out together for long periods of time? How can they continue to relate to each other without causing each other grievous bodily harm? We’ve had a hard time doing that with heroes, much less “villains.”
I haven’t sat and planned directions for Fyre, ever. Yeah, I’ve had some vague ideas. Some, I’ve used. More, I’ve thrown out, because the “plot” just didn’t go in that direction. I have a couple of vague ideas of what might happen next from where we are now, but since I don’t know what everyone else is planning, and it’s apparent that there are Plans, I don’t know how Fyre will react. And, Fyre often has ideas of her own, and doesn’t bother sharing them with me until the last possible moment.
All this means that I have no concrete ideas for “Team 3.0.” That is, if Fyre exists for Team 3.0. E’s said that there won’t be an E3. (And then two minutes later, he pitches ideas to me of what E might evolve into for Team 3.0. Way to firm up those plans! ;) )
I have a very hard time imagining Fyre without some kind of fire related powers. In CoH, that pretty much limits me to a fire controller, or a fire tank. The idea of Fyre as a tank, or a fire tank in general, doesn’t excite me at all. That leaves a fire controller. I could do that. I’ve had various alts with the Kinetic powerset, but I’ve never managed to get them very far, so I still have interests there. I also see the Empathy powerset as a possibility. But, can I think of a reason why Fyre would suddenly have “empathy?” Not really.
I think, though, that Team 3.0 is leaning much more heavily toward CoV. Talking to E, I had said that Fyre doesn’t have the capacity for sustained villainy. And, I still don’t think she does. Fyre could kill someone in a fit of rage. Accidentally, or purposely. She could kill someone to protect herself or someone she cared about. Could she sit and plan out the death of, or a crime against, a disinterested third party? No. If there is a villain-Fyre, she’s going to have to be A) coerced, B) possessed.
E and I had vaguely kicked around the idea of Fyre being a type of guardian for Jen in the Rogue Isles. I have problems with this because, if Fyre’s in her right mind, there’s no possible way that she’s going to let Jen roam around the Rogue Isles, or even be there in the first place. If she’s not in her right mind, then there’s no way Jen is going to be safe around her.
I had an idea of Fyre being possessed by Katherine, either part of the time, or totally. I don’t think I could play “Katherine” for long, so that leaves a part-time possession. Either back and forth, or starting as Katherine, and then Fyre regaining control and finding herself stuck in the Rogue Isles. Also, Katherine does not play well with others. Except maybe like how a cat plays with a dead mouse. Unless someone has a way to control her, she’s only interested in destruction.
If somehow the character makes it to the red-side, there’s a fire brute, a fire dominator, or a fire/thermal corruptor. Katherine could be (and briefly was) a fire brute. Fyre? Well…maybe not. A fire dominator would work. A fire/thermal corruptor would totally work. Absolutely perfect… BUT. I have a level 41 fire/thermal corruptor. I think I could do it again, though. It’s been a long time since I’ve played the other, and I could switch up powers and slotting enough that it would be interesting. Maybe. And… Fyre’s suddenly healing people? That might take some explaining, and I can’t exactly think of an explanation.
And we run into another thing to think about here. If Team 3.0 is anything like the original team or Team Angst, this is going to be something that I’m going to play just about every day, and something I’m going to want to play AT LEAST to level 50. I don’t want to get stuck with an uninteresting or frustrating AT, or, worse, character. On good days, Fyre is interesting, to me, among her other qualities. Is she going to continue to be interesting? Well, I think that’s one of those things that’s impossible to predict, because it depends on too many variables.
Another big stumbling block that’s been brought up is keeping a team of villains together. Why would “bad guys” hang out together for long periods of time? How can they continue to relate to each other without causing each other grievous bodily harm? We’ve had a hard time doing that with heroes, much less “villains.”
Interlude: Research
Alexandra found herself in a position that was becoming more and more familiar with, sitting in front of a computer a desk. Granted, she was dressing a velour jogging suit, with her hair tied in a messy knot, she was barefoot, and one leg was curled under her, but it was still a desk, with a computer. She snorted. The reading glasses perched on the end of her nose were just around the corner. She squinted at the screen thoughtfully. Nah, not yet.
She reached for the coffee cup beside the laptop and took a drink, instantly making a face at the room temperature liquid. She didn’t remember how long it had sat there to get that way, but she’d been involved in the things the on the screen.
Every day, sometimes every hour, more and more reports and research crossed her e-mail. Almost every day, some other type of reports and research were added to the growing virtual stacks. Some of it was deleted as unimportant. That pile was small. Some of it went aside to refer back to later. Some of it was sent on to be delved into further. Or, like the pages on her screen at the moment, sent to someone who could make more sense of it. The scientific jargon that looked more like nonsense words to her would come back to her in wording she was able to understand, if necessary.
Her accountants and business manager were baffled by the sudden and severe increases in her spending. Good people weren’t hard to find, just expensive. And even more expensive if you wanted to keep your interests to yourself.
She rubbed her temple. Another stress headache, or she’d been staring at the screen too long. Maybe the reading glasses where a good idea. She picked up her coffee cup and concentrated on the screen, taking more effort to get around the headache than it should have. In a minute, the coffee was steaming again.
She remembered how many coffee mugs she’d shattered trying to learn the fine control it took to do such a little thing. But, that was a long time ago. Before. She hadn’t been able to do it at all, for awhile, after she’d met Serra. Now, it was second nature again. She paused, watching the steam rise from the mug. She hadn’t made a conscious effort to reheat it, had resigned herself to drinking cold coffee. Apparently, her subconscious disliked cold coffee more than she did. She shrugged to herself and moved on to the next e-mail.
A report reporting nothing. Those were becoming more and more common. She clenched her jaw. Hitting walls was becoming more and more common. Lack of information, information that didn’t apply, information that had already come through from another source. It wasn’t accomplishing anything.
As hard as she was glaring at the screen, she barely noticed the smell of burning plastic. A second later, the mug shattered in her grip, suddenly boiling liquid splashing across the desk, the computer, her sleeve. She heard the faint echoes of maniacal female laugher. It was a familiar sound, and becoming familiar again.
Refocusing was much harder than it should have been. Coming back to herself, she saw the deep melted indentation under her hand, across the keyboard and the touchpad of the laptop. It was the second one she’d melted in the past week. She wiped wetness from her face. Instead of coffee, her hand came away coated with blood that leaked from her nose.
Her headache was gone.
She reached for the coffee cup beside the laptop and took a drink, instantly making a face at the room temperature liquid. She didn’t remember how long it had sat there to get that way, but she’d been involved in the things the on the screen.
Every day, sometimes every hour, more and more reports and research crossed her e-mail. Almost every day, some other type of reports and research were added to the growing virtual stacks. Some of it was deleted as unimportant. That pile was small. Some of it went aside to refer back to later. Some of it was sent on to be delved into further. Or, like the pages on her screen at the moment, sent to someone who could make more sense of it. The scientific jargon that looked more like nonsense words to her would come back to her in wording she was able to understand, if necessary.
Her accountants and business manager were baffled by the sudden and severe increases in her spending. Good people weren’t hard to find, just expensive. And even more expensive if you wanted to keep your interests to yourself.
She rubbed her temple. Another stress headache, or she’d been staring at the screen too long. Maybe the reading glasses where a good idea. She picked up her coffee cup and concentrated on the screen, taking more effort to get around the headache than it should have. In a minute, the coffee was steaming again.
She remembered how many coffee mugs she’d shattered trying to learn the fine control it took to do such a little thing. But, that was a long time ago. Before. She hadn’t been able to do it at all, for awhile, after she’d met Serra. Now, it was second nature again. She paused, watching the steam rise from the mug. She hadn’t made a conscious effort to reheat it, had resigned herself to drinking cold coffee. Apparently, her subconscious disliked cold coffee more than she did. She shrugged to herself and moved on to the next e-mail.
A report reporting nothing. Those were becoming more and more common. She clenched her jaw. Hitting walls was becoming more and more common. Lack of information, information that didn’t apply, information that had already come through from another source. It wasn’t accomplishing anything.
As hard as she was glaring at the screen, she barely noticed the smell of burning plastic. A second later, the mug shattered in her grip, suddenly boiling liquid splashing across the desk, the computer, her sleeve. She heard the faint echoes of maniacal female laugher. It was a familiar sound, and becoming familiar again.
Refocusing was much harder than it should have been. Coming back to herself, she saw the deep melted indentation under her hand, across the keyboard and the touchpad of the laptop. It was the second one she’d melted in the past week. She wiped wetness from her face. Instead of coffee, her hand came away coated with blood that leaked from her nose.
Her headache was gone.
Little Drama, Little Update
The drama’s been pretty quiet. Don’t worry, I’m sure it’s just the calm before the storm.
Mason and Fyre haven’t fought for two whole days. Fyre’s not talking to Mason. She doesn’t trust herself. She doesn’t want to upset E, and she doesn’t really even want to fight with Mason. She knows the chances are good that someone’s going to get hurt if things escalate anymore. She’s afraid of saying the unforgivable, but she’s more afraid of doing the unforgivable. She’s honestly afraid of killing him. No, she doesn’t want him dead, or even maimed. But control has never been her strong suit, and she can feel it slipping even more. He seems especially interested in pushing the bounds of the control she does have, so she’s trying not to give him the opening to start pushing again.
(By the way, I thought Mason’s Carnie outfit was hilarious, but Fyre was trying her best to ignore Mason’s entire existence, which was not easy with those pants involved.)
During the Malta mission, she chose to “space out,” rather than give the fear and anxiousness a chance to break the control she did have. I heard music running through her head as she tried to be anywhere but there, mentally.
E’s been questioning and hinting around Katherine’s and the demon’s return. I can’t deny their influence, but I won’t say how much they are influencing her. I can’t. She’s not even sure how much is her and how much is them. She’s… “stressed” doesn’t even begin to cover it… beyond belief, and she’s trying to keep it all bottled up. Is it going to find a slow release? Will something be able to simply dissipate it? Is there going to be a huge, fiery explosion? Aside from outside events that I can’t predict, a lot of that depends on the direction of Team 3.0.
Mason and Fyre haven’t fought for two whole days. Fyre’s not talking to Mason. She doesn’t trust herself. She doesn’t want to upset E, and she doesn’t really even want to fight with Mason. She knows the chances are good that someone’s going to get hurt if things escalate anymore. She’s afraid of saying the unforgivable, but she’s more afraid of doing the unforgivable. She’s honestly afraid of killing him. No, she doesn’t want him dead, or even maimed. But control has never been her strong suit, and she can feel it slipping even more. He seems especially interested in pushing the bounds of the control she does have, so she’s trying not to give him the opening to start pushing again.
(By the way, I thought Mason’s Carnie outfit was hilarious, but Fyre was trying her best to ignore Mason’s entire existence, which was not easy with those pants involved.)
During the Malta mission, she chose to “space out,” rather than give the fear and anxiousness a chance to break the control she did have. I heard music running through her head as she tried to be anywhere but there, mentally.
E’s been questioning and hinting around Katherine’s and the demon’s return. I can’t deny their influence, but I won’t say how much they are influencing her. I can’t. She’s not even sure how much is her and how much is them. She’s… “stressed” doesn’t even begin to cover it… beyond belief, and she’s trying to keep it all bottled up. Is it going to find a slow release? Will something be able to simply dissipate it? Is there going to be a huge, fiery explosion? Aside from outside events that I can’t predict, a lot of that depends on the direction of Team 3.0.
Tuesday, June 5, 2007
Keeping the "Angst" in Team Angst
I should have just called this post, “Shut up, Mason.” Fyre’s going to have a big posterboard signs printed and posted around Paragon, just to save time.
First, something I probably should have covered yesterday.
I won’t say that Fyre is getting over her Malta issues, but she’s so distracted and angry that it’s been pushed to the side, for now. Also, our Malta missions have been pretty easy. I remember Malta being a lot tougher. But, then, we ran Team 1.0 on a higher difficulty. Gunslingers were usually red to us. Is she going to freak again if there’s a team-wipe? Is she ever going to freak again if there’s not a team-wipe? Well, I don’t know. We’ll find out together, I guess.
And, I totally missed one of the best lines in the game, but I just caught it in the logs: [NPC]Reformed Freak Proprietor: L00k, w3'r3 r3f0rmed! W3'v3 g0t l1v3s n0w, 4nd 1'm 4 buz1n3ss Pwnz0r!
Freaks are funny. Well, until you do one of the missions where the Freaks leave body bags all over the place. Then, not so funny.
Okay, let’s talk about Fyre’s… fire. Yeah, I’m still frustrated with the WS, probably. But, now that I’ve done it, I’m not sure how or why she’d go back to her Warshade powers. I hate to abandon it at level 43, when 50’s around the corner. But…it’s a 50 I’d probably never play, anyway. Here’s the thing, though: one of the best things about a Kheldian merger for Fyre was that her evil ancestor and the demon may as well have been nonexistent. Thanks to Serra, not only could she not “hear” them anymore, but she could barely even sense them. By repressing Serra so much, she’s opening herself back up to them. And her anger, fear and stress are opening her further. It’s possible their influence could even be making those feelings more intense, creating a cycle with an incredibly dangerous and destructive climax. She’s seeing those possibilities, but doesn’t see any way, or maybe even any reason to find a way, around it. No one else has thought of it, either from not having the knowledge, or just not adding it up. If they do, she’s going to brush it off, especially if it’s E. She’s certainly not going to add to his worries. Or at least try not to.
When Fyre joined up with Team Angst, Lodestar was subbing for Mason. That made Fyre’s night. Much easier to deal with. Unfortunately for Fyre, after a relatively quiet Nemesis mission, Nate-Mason was back.
Oh, right. Mason’s tail. I won’t go into that much, I’m sure Mason will. Fyre thought it was pretty funny. When they had a minute alone, she tried to explain to E that Kheldians don’t go into heat, but she didn’t have Serra around to ask, so she wasn’t entirely sure. Mason and Frost are “going steady,” as Fyre said, or something equivelant. Fyre wished them good luck, and Mason seemed surprised, but Fyre figures they, especially Frost, are going to need it. After all, no one will argue that Mason is anything like stable.
During one of their Nemesis missions, E teleports into a group and sets off EM Pulse, which makes them all fall asleep. It actually worked really well, game-wise, but it practically gave Fyre a stroke. She jumped in right behind and Inferno’ed and knocked them all down, then yelled at E for being reckless. She’s not happy about him running with them, because she thinks he’s not up for it and ought to be taking better care of himself.
On a side-note, when Team Angst met up with Futura, it was pretty fun that Star “smelled smoke” from Fyre three quarters of the way through a mission, after she’d Inferno’ed two or three times. Fyre would never say, “Well, duh,” to Star, but she was probably thinking it.
So, relatively calm Carnie mission, and then All Hell Breaks Loose. You know, as usual.
E reveals the Scary As Hell costume to Kit and the others, and admits to Kit that he’s dying. Yes, Fyre is in denial still. I don’t know if Mason is just being contrary, or is somehow trying to push Fyre out of denial, or what, but snarling, “He’s dying,” at her isn’t going to force her out of it. She’ll keep saying, “Shut up, Mason,” until she’s hoarse, at the least.
Before I gloss over it, I want to note that Bloodshot signed on to the team that’s going to go after Strym (Um, when they do. If they do. Uh, whatever). Bloodshot sort of scared Fyre before. If she wasn’t exactly afraid, she still at least wasn’t sure of what to make of him. After his immediate response last night, though she may not completely trust him, he definitely went up in her estimation. (“Do we have names? Cuz I have bullets.” Loved that!)
Also, in the midst of Mason and Fyre working themselves up at each other (as usual lately), E brings up that Strym might have a cure for E. That gave Fyre some more ideas. I don’t know if she or I will act on them, or if they‘re even feasible, but it gave us both some ideas.
It’s been hard to tell recently whether Mason has been intentionally making Fyre angry, or if it was just a side effect. Here, it wasn’t hard to tell at all. Mason and Fyre were so intent on fighting with each other, they barely noticed E struggling to stay on his feet. And maybe that’s why they are fighting so much, because it takes their minds off of E. Fyre did try not to get sucked into the argument, but Mason just kept pushing. Kit got to see Mason in action, and seemed a bit shocked by the things he said. Fyre starts fighting back, and Mason comments on the faint quality of her insults. Now, Fyre has thought of some very hateful, hurtful things to say to Mason, and she hasn’t. She came close last night, but didn’t. Those things border on unforgivable, but if Mason keeps pushing, I’m not sure that she’ll be able to keep holding back.
E says that he’d really like to hit Mason, but he’s probably not strong enough to do much damage. Fyre protests that if anyone gets to hit Mason, it’ll be her. Mason offers to let either of them have a shot. Fyre says that she shouldn’t right now. Mason keeps on the same track, and suddenly Fyre start laughing, and keeps laughing for a minute or more. Mason doesn’t understand, she says. She thinks that Mason figures her “shouldn’t” is because of not upsetting E, but it’s really because she’s pretty certain that if she does take a shot at him, she’s not going to just “beat the crap out of him.” She just might kill him.
If Kit doesn’t exactly settle them down, she get them to stop for the moment, though it takes quite an effort. Eventually, Fyre manages to stop and she takes E back to the hospital in Steel.
Things haven’t looked good for Team Angst often. I don’t think it’s been this dark before, though. Team 3.0 should be all shiny, happy people all the time. Will it be?
Not a chance.
First, something I probably should have covered yesterday.
I won’t say that Fyre is getting over her Malta issues, but she’s so distracted and angry that it’s been pushed to the side, for now. Also, our Malta missions have been pretty easy. I remember Malta being a lot tougher. But, then, we ran Team 1.0 on a higher difficulty. Gunslingers were usually red to us. Is she going to freak again if there’s a team-wipe? Is she ever going to freak again if there’s not a team-wipe? Well, I don’t know. We’ll find out together, I guess.
And, I totally missed one of the best lines in the game, but I just caught it in the logs: [NPC]Reformed Freak Proprietor: L00k, w3'r3 r3f0rmed! W3'v3 g0t l1v3s n0w, 4nd 1'm 4 buz1n3ss Pwnz0r!
Freaks are funny. Well, until you do one of the missions where the Freaks leave body bags all over the place. Then, not so funny.
Okay, let’s talk about Fyre’s… fire. Yeah, I’m still frustrated with the WS, probably. But, now that I’ve done it, I’m not sure how or why she’d go back to her Warshade powers. I hate to abandon it at level 43, when 50’s around the corner. But…it’s a 50 I’d probably never play, anyway. Here’s the thing, though: one of the best things about a Kheldian merger for Fyre was that her evil ancestor and the demon may as well have been nonexistent. Thanks to Serra, not only could she not “hear” them anymore, but she could barely even sense them. By repressing Serra so much, she’s opening herself back up to them. And her anger, fear and stress are opening her further. It’s possible their influence could even be making those feelings more intense, creating a cycle with an incredibly dangerous and destructive climax. She’s seeing those possibilities, but doesn’t see any way, or maybe even any reason to find a way, around it. No one else has thought of it, either from not having the knowledge, or just not adding it up. If they do, she’s going to brush it off, especially if it’s E. She’s certainly not going to add to his worries. Or at least try not to.
When Fyre joined up with Team Angst, Lodestar was subbing for Mason. That made Fyre’s night. Much easier to deal with. Unfortunately for Fyre, after a relatively quiet Nemesis mission, Nate-Mason was back.
Oh, right. Mason’s tail. I won’t go into that much, I’m sure Mason will. Fyre thought it was pretty funny. When they had a minute alone, she tried to explain to E that Kheldians don’t go into heat, but she didn’t have Serra around to ask, so she wasn’t entirely sure. Mason and Frost are “going steady,” as Fyre said, or something equivelant. Fyre wished them good luck, and Mason seemed surprised, but Fyre figures they, especially Frost, are going to need it. After all, no one will argue that Mason is anything like stable.
During one of their Nemesis missions, E teleports into a group and sets off EM Pulse, which makes them all fall asleep. It actually worked really well, game-wise, but it practically gave Fyre a stroke. She jumped in right behind and Inferno’ed and knocked them all down, then yelled at E for being reckless. She’s not happy about him running with them, because she thinks he’s not up for it and ought to be taking better care of himself.
On a side-note, when Team Angst met up with Futura, it was pretty fun that Star “smelled smoke” from Fyre three quarters of the way through a mission, after she’d Inferno’ed two or three times. Fyre would never say, “Well, duh,” to Star, but she was probably thinking it.
So, relatively calm Carnie mission, and then All Hell Breaks Loose. You know, as usual.
E reveals the Scary As Hell costume to Kit and the others, and admits to Kit that he’s dying. Yes, Fyre is in denial still. I don’t know if Mason is just being contrary, or is somehow trying to push Fyre out of denial, or what, but snarling, “He’s dying,” at her isn’t going to force her out of it. She’ll keep saying, “Shut up, Mason,” until she’s hoarse, at the least.
Before I gloss over it, I want to note that Bloodshot signed on to the team that’s going to go after Strym (Um, when they do. If they do. Uh, whatever). Bloodshot sort of scared Fyre before. If she wasn’t exactly afraid, she still at least wasn’t sure of what to make of him. After his immediate response last night, though she may not completely trust him, he definitely went up in her estimation. (“Do we have names? Cuz I have bullets.” Loved that!)
Also, in the midst of Mason and Fyre working themselves up at each other (as usual lately), E brings up that Strym might have a cure for E. That gave Fyre some more ideas. I don’t know if she or I will act on them, or if they‘re even feasible, but it gave us both some ideas.
It’s been hard to tell recently whether Mason has been intentionally making Fyre angry, or if it was just a side effect. Here, it wasn’t hard to tell at all. Mason and Fyre were so intent on fighting with each other, they barely noticed E struggling to stay on his feet. And maybe that’s why they are fighting so much, because it takes their minds off of E. Fyre did try not to get sucked into the argument, but Mason just kept pushing. Kit got to see Mason in action, and seemed a bit shocked by the things he said. Fyre starts fighting back, and Mason comments on the faint quality of her insults. Now, Fyre has thought of some very hateful, hurtful things to say to Mason, and she hasn’t. She came close last night, but didn’t. Those things border on unforgivable, but if Mason keeps pushing, I’m not sure that she’ll be able to keep holding back.
E says that he’d really like to hit Mason, but he’s probably not strong enough to do much damage. Fyre protests that if anyone gets to hit Mason, it’ll be her. Mason offers to let either of them have a shot. Fyre says that she shouldn’t right now. Mason keeps on the same track, and suddenly Fyre start laughing, and keeps laughing for a minute or more. Mason doesn’t understand, she says. She thinks that Mason figures her “shouldn’t” is because of not upsetting E, but it’s really because she’s pretty certain that if she does take a shot at him, she’s not going to just “beat the crap out of him.” She just might kill him.
If Kit doesn’t exactly settle them down, she get them to stop for the moment, though it takes quite an effort. Eventually, Fyre manages to stop and she takes E back to the hospital in Steel.
Things haven’t looked good for Team Angst often. I don’t think it’s been this dark before, though. Team 3.0 should be all shiny, happy people all the time. Will it be?
Not a chance.
More Music
Before I get started on the drama, I think I’ll back up a few steps. I had brief random thoughts awhile back, that included some music randomness. And it caught on. My original thoughts, though, were so brief and random that I’m doing it again, more comprehensively this time, though.
Originally, I had a play list for both CoV and CoH. Then, each game had its own. Now, both of those play lists have grown and morphed, and have overlap. I won’t post the entire lists, both because they’re long and they don’t entirely stick to the subject. I’ll hit some of the highlights of both, though.
CoV:
Rob Zombie, “Living Dead Girl,” “Girl on Fire,” “Super Beast.”
Yeah, I kinda like White Zombie and Rob Zombie. And a lot of fits CoV, both musically and lyrically.
Billy Idol, “Body Snatcher”
Off of one of his later albums, possibly the last. Again, perfect for CoV, especially when I was playing my Necromancer MM, who was, of course, deleted.
Snake River Conspiracy, “Homicide,” “How Soon Is Now?”
System of a Down, “Toxicity”
Marilyn Mason, “Long Hard Road Out of Hell”
The Donnas, “It Takes One to Know One”
Nonpoint, “In the Air Tonight”
A re-make of a Genesis (Or was it just Phil Collins?) song that I’ve always liked. The newer remake speeds it up some and adds more of that “dangerous” feeling.
Filter, “Hey Man Nice Shot”
Limp Bizkit, “Click, Click, Boom”
Gotta be on pretty much every CoV play list. As well as:
Drowning Pool, “Bodies”
I think I’ve seen CoH/V movies on YouTube with both of those songs.
Godsmack, “Voodoo”
Joydrop, “Beautiful”
Nine Inch Nails, “What You Are”
CoH:
Full Blown Rose, “In the Light”
Nope, even I never heard of this group. It’s off the Elektra movie soundtrack.
Lacuna Coil, “Swamped
Gwen Stefani, “Danger Zone” “What Are You Waiting For?”
Not particularly “heroic,” not that a lot of these choices are. The first, I just love the lyrics and the upbeat music. The second is a song that helped get me out of bed at 5am for all day long, intense training classes.
Bonnie McKee, “I Don’t Need Anybody”
Kelly Osbourne, “Save Me”
Audioslave, “Show Me How To Live”
Beastie Boys, “Fight For Your Right”
Nickelback, “Hero”
Well, duh.
Garbage, “Go Baby Go”
Garbage comes up an awful lot on both play lists. And pretty much every other play list I’ve ever made. One of my favorite groups.
Janet Jackson, “Black Cat”
Bon Jovi, “Have a Nice Day,” “It’s My Life”
Boomkat, “The Wreckoning”
The Offspring, “Defy You”
Evanescense, “Everybody’s Fool”
Poe, “Control”
Poe also sings “Angry Johnny,” that one of Sybil’s thug henchmen is named after.
Prodigy and Sneaker Pimps, “Fire Starter”
Same song, two totally different versions
Miranda Lambert, “Kerosene”
Yeah, I listen to country, so what? But, not a lot of it made it on these play lists.
Maybe I should have added a disclaimer here in the beginning. These play lists are made for game play. Some of the lyrics or song titles may apply to characters, and I may even think of some of as theme songs for characters, but they have little to nothing to do with RP. If music is on during RP, chances are really good that I’m not even going to notice, much less pay attention to it.
Originally, I had a play list for both CoV and CoH. Then, each game had its own. Now, both of those play lists have grown and morphed, and have overlap. I won’t post the entire lists, both because they’re long and they don’t entirely stick to the subject. I’ll hit some of the highlights of both, though.
CoV:
Rob Zombie, “Living Dead Girl,” “Girl on Fire,” “Super Beast.”
Yeah, I kinda like White Zombie and Rob Zombie. And a lot of fits CoV, both musically and lyrically.
Billy Idol, “Body Snatcher”
Off of one of his later albums, possibly the last. Again, perfect for CoV, especially when I was playing my Necromancer MM, who was, of course, deleted.
Snake River Conspiracy, “Homicide,” “How Soon Is Now?”
System of a Down, “Toxicity”
Marilyn Mason, “Long Hard Road Out of Hell”
The Donnas, “It Takes One to Know One”
Nonpoint, “In the Air Tonight”
A re-make of a Genesis (Or was it just Phil Collins?) song that I’ve always liked. The newer remake speeds it up some and adds more of that “dangerous” feeling.
Filter, “Hey Man Nice Shot”
Limp Bizkit, “Click, Click, Boom”
Gotta be on pretty much every CoV play list. As well as:
Drowning Pool, “Bodies”
I think I’ve seen CoH/V movies on YouTube with both of those songs.
Godsmack, “Voodoo”
Joydrop, “Beautiful”
Nine Inch Nails, “What You Are”
CoH:
Full Blown Rose, “In the Light”
Nope, even I never heard of this group. It’s off the Elektra movie soundtrack.
Lacuna Coil, “Swamped
Gwen Stefani, “Danger Zone” “What Are You Waiting For?”
Not particularly “heroic,” not that a lot of these choices are. The first, I just love the lyrics and the upbeat music. The second is a song that helped get me out of bed at 5am for all day long, intense training classes.
Bonnie McKee, “I Don’t Need Anybody”
Kelly Osbourne, “Save Me”
Audioslave, “Show Me How To Live”
Beastie Boys, “Fight For Your Right”
Nickelback, “Hero”
Well, duh.
Garbage, “Go Baby Go”
Garbage comes up an awful lot on both play lists. And pretty much every other play list I’ve ever made. One of my favorite groups.
Janet Jackson, “Black Cat”
Bon Jovi, “Have a Nice Day,” “It’s My Life”
Boomkat, “The Wreckoning”
The Offspring, “Defy You”
Evanescense, “Everybody’s Fool”
Poe, “Control”
Poe also sings “Angry Johnny,” that one of Sybil’s thug henchmen is named after.
Prodigy and Sneaker Pimps, “Fire Starter”
Same song, two totally different versions
Miranda Lambert, “Kerosene”
Yeah, I listen to country, so what? But, not a lot of it made it on these play lists.
Maybe I should have added a disclaimer here in the beginning. These play lists are made for game play. Some of the lyrics or song titles may apply to characters, and I may even think of some of as theme songs for characters, but they have little to nothing to do with RP. If music is on during RP, chances are really good that I’m not even going to notice, much less pay attention to it.
Monday, June 4, 2007
Death and Dying and Team Angst
I retired the Warshade for the most of the weekend, for a few different reasons. It's going to be hard to go back to it. I don't like it. I just don't. Maybe I'll get over it. Probably. Maybe.
I played Cass for part of the weekend. I didn't realize how much I missed it until the first time I hit Unstoppable and tanked an EB. I played Blaster-Fyre over the weekend, too, and I love the damage, but there's just something about running into a group and cutting them down one by one... at heart, I'm a scrapper, I guess. Who would have guessed? (That's sarcasm, folks.)
Cass is different to play, RP-wise, than Fyre. Yes, game-wise, too, but that's obvious. Cass was kidnapped as a child by the Circle of Thorns and trained by them to be a new type of warrior for them. There were others trained as she was, but they either didn't survive or simply disappeared. Later, she was given to Crey to work for them, as what amounts to an assassin. Cass hasn't been socialized. She doesn't have friends, hobbies, or any kind of a social or "normal" life. She's usually teamed with Scrapper-Vagz. She does not "play well with others" so she doesn't end up in big teams often, and when she does, she doesn't have a lot to say. No, she's not shy. She just doesn't care. Like E remarked, Cass is very rarely amused, entertained, or even interested. It's all a job to her, one she's done for as long as she's been alive. She works as a hero, for now, because it suits her needs. (Vague thoughts relating to Team 3.0: If we were to do villains, and say one of our heroes became a villain, Cass would be the most likely to "go rogue." Not because she's evil, just because it's pretty much all the same to her) She gets along with Vagz partly out of habit. She makes some border-line sarcastic comments and he simply laughs. He knows what to expect by now, I think. She trusts him explicitly because he's proven himself to her. If he said to jump off the bridge, she'd jump and trust that he had reasons and a plan. It can be a little difficult to play her, keeping that dead-pan tone and perfectly even temperament. Still, she can be a lot of fun and was a nice change from drama-bogged, hyper emotional (not to mention squishy) Fyre.
When we first joined up Team Angst last night, I logged in the Warshade. After thinking about it for two minutes, I switched back to Blaster-Fyre. Why? Yes, partly because I'm frustrated and annoyed with the Warshade. But, more importantly, because it fits Fyre's disposition right now. She's scared, threatened, and angry. Fire is her "natural element." It's part of what she is. She feels more comfortable like that, and she knows she's more powerful and dangerous that way. In the Malta mission the other night, Mason told her, (paraphrased) "Make me afraid of you," while he was trying to amp her up to fight Malta. Well, if that's what he wants, she can do that. Yes, she's still angry with him. Is she going to forgive him? Well... not after the rest of the night.
Scrapper-Vagz stayed with Mason, Frost, and Fyre for an Anti-Matter AV mission. It was the four of them against an AV. An AV's a little tough for four people. Fyre died three times. I used an awaken I had, Vagz gave me one, and I un-exemplared for the two seconds it took to use the self-rez in Fyre's epic powers. I'm sure it made her grumpy. Frost got stuck with one of those buggy auras that you can't lose until you zone out, and the character freaked. He's already spending half of his time fighting off radiation sickness, and then Anti-Matter hit him with a good one. Mason freaks because Frost is sick.
Now, I won't go into it, but I've had some Haz-Mat training, both in chemical and radiation. I know a bit. Enough that I've been twitching every time someone talks about contamination or decontamination. Radiation in Paragon is incredibly common, so I'm sure some procedures are different, especially when dealing with super-humans. But, I felt safe in contributing some information in the decontamination process, and tried to let the players and characters run with it from there. Any mistakes or misinformation, though, should be attributed to me, and I apologize for anything that wasn't clear or was unnecessary. (If E or Frost ever explode radiation all over the place, I'll be glad to break out some charts and we can figure out how big the evacuation area should be and in which direction we should place the green-zone staging area. ;) ))
Fyre has an extreme fear of hospitals, so unless she heard screaming or some other horrible ruckus over the comm, she was waiting outside. Would she have gone in if they needed help? Yes. Even if it was Mason that needed help. But she would have been... "unhappy" and "uncomfortable" only begin to describe it.
While she was waiting outside, E come stumbling down the stairs. She stops him and tentatively starts talking to him, asking him how he is. Mason notices and comes rushing over, practically running over top of Frost to get to E. It's obvious that E's sick. Fyre thinks at first that E has "escaped," and tries to establish if that's true, and from whom or what. Mason's having a panic attack and Fyre doesn't have the patience with him to settle him down, so tells him to shut up. Yes, she's been saying that a lot lately.
I'll skip most of the details, because E and Mason both covered them well. Let me say, though, that when E popped off his helmet, it was a pretty scary sight. Heck, it scared me, the player, much less Fyre. You can see what the player did with the "costume" when you take a closer look, but from a step back, and probably a bit of imagination once you see what the player was going for, it's scary as hell. My first impression was, "Oh my god, E's a flaming corpse." I can only imagine what Fyre saw.
E finally admits that he's dying. I suspected, because of conversations that E's player and I have had. (By the way, the fact that Star and her player figured this out already, especially given the amount of time the character has been with the team lately, floors me. I swear, she must be psychic) Fyre, though, is shocked. She goes into complete and utter denial. She's likely to stay there, too, until, and if, something shocks her out of it. Yes, as Mason, character and player, has pointed out, her first reaction is to throw money at it. It's the easiest course of action, but not the only one Fyre has thought of or plans to take. She's in denial of the "dying," but not that there's a serious problem. They touch on a magical cure, and though E vehemently opposes the idea, Fyre is not above forcing it on him for his own good. She mentions that she knows some people and she may be able to "cut a deal" of some kind. There are possibilities here, but I'll see what happens before I explore those. So, if those are the "denial" and "bargaining" stages of grief, Mason gives her the perfect outlet for the "anger" stage. (Um, five stages of grieving: denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance. But you probably already knew that.)
Mason is having his own personal issues with E's revelation. Maybe he's going through his own stages. But he's hit "acceptance" at this point, and doesn't seem to want to let Fyre linger in the "denial." I really, really thought they were going to get into the "throwing punches" stage here. Fyre's not going to take the first swing, though. She doesn't hate Mason. I don't think. But she is really, really angry at him right now. He has a special knack for waiting just until she's forgiven him and trusts him again, and then hitting her wherever and however it hurts the most. Fyre is... fiery. Yeah, it's a stereotype, or whatever, but I wrote it in, and try to stick to it. She feels things strongly, maybe not for long in some cases. Right now, she's angry and hurt because of Mason. But she's completely devastated by E's news. I'm sure she spent most of the night crying in a corner somewhere. (No, she didn't show much sign of that while the team was together. She's angry enough at Mason that she's unwilling to show a "weakness," and she wouldn't want to upset E) Again, even though she's in denial of the actual "dying," it's impossible not to recognize that there is a serious problem. But if setting Mason on fire takes her mind off of E's plight... well, that's alright with her right now.
She's going to continue looking for a solution or a cure. We've seen that she doesn't always take completely legal routes, (hiring someone to hack into Longbow records, for example) and I expect that to at least continue if not grow. She's also going to treat E as if he's glass, both physically and emotionally.
So, is anyone in Team Angst going to even make it to 50? E is... very Not Well, Frost is maybe dying, and Fyre and Mason are going to kill each other. Of course, that's if Strym and Malta don't kill them first.
I played Cass for part of the weekend. I didn't realize how much I missed it until the first time I hit Unstoppable and tanked an EB. I played Blaster-Fyre over the weekend, too, and I love the damage, but there's just something about running into a group and cutting them down one by one... at heart, I'm a scrapper, I guess. Who would have guessed? (That's sarcasm, folks.)
Cass is different to play, RP-wise, than Fyre. Yes, game-wise, too, but that's obvious. Cass was kidnapped as a child by the Circle of Thorns and trained by them to be a new type of warrior for them. There were others trained as she was, but they either didn't survive or simply disappeared. Later, she was given to Crey to work for them, as what amounts to an assassin. Cass hasn't been socialized. She doesn't have friends, hobbies, or any kind of a social or "normal" life. She's usually teamed with Scrapper-Vagz. She does not "play well with others" so she doesn't end up in big teams often, and when she does, she doesn't have a lot to say. No, she's not shy. She just doesn't care. Like E remarked, Cass is very rarely amused, entertained, or even interested. It's all a job to her, one she's done for as long as she's been alive. She works as a hero, for now, because it suits her needs. (Vague thoughts relating to Team 3.0: If we were to do villains, and say one of our heroes became a villain, Cass would be the most likely to "go rogue." Not because she's evil, just because it's pretty much all the same to her) She gets along with Vagz partly out of habit. She makes some border-line sarcastic comments and he simply laughs. He knows what to expect by now, I think. She trusts him explicitly because he's proven himself to her. If he said to jump off the bridge, she'd jump and trust that he had reasons and a plan. It can be a little difficult to play her, keeping that dead-pan tone and perfectly even temperament. Still, she can be a lot of fun and was a nice change from drama-bogged, hyper emotional (not to mention squishy) Fyre.
When we first joined up Team Angst last night, I logged in the Warshade. After thinking about it for two minutes, I switched back to Blaster-Fyre. Why? Yes, partly because I'm frustrated and annoyed with the Warshade. But, more importantly, because it fits Fyre's disposition right now. She's scared, threatened, and angry. Fire is her "natural element." It's part of what she is. She feels more comfortable like that, and she knows she's more powerful and dangerous that way. In the Malta mission the other night, Mason told her, (paraphrased) "Make me afraid of you," while he was trying to amp her up to fight Malta. Well, if that's what he wants, she can do that. Yes, she's still angry with him. Is she going to forgive him? Well... not after the rest of the night.
Scrapper-Vagz stayed with Mason, Frost, and Fyre for an Anti-Matter AV mission. It was the four of them against an AV. An AV's a little tough for four people. Fyre died three times. I used an awaken I had, Vagz gave me one, and I un-exemplared for the two seconds it took to use the self-rez in Fyre's epic powers. I'm sure it made her grumpy. Frost got stuck with one of those buggy auras that you can't lose until you zone out, and the character freaked. He's already spending half of his time fighting off radiation sickness, and then Anti-Matter hit him with a good one. Mason freaks because Frost is sick.
Now, I won't go into it, but I've had some Haz-Mat training, both in chemical and radiation. I know a bit. Enough that I've been twitching every time someone talks about contamination or decontamination. Radiation in Paragon is incredibly common, so I'm sure some procedures are different, especially when dealing with super-humans. But, I felt safe in contributing some information in the decontamination process, and tried to let the players and characters run with it from there. Any mistakes or misinformation, though, should be attributed to me, and I apologize for anything that wasn't clear or was unnecessary. (If E or Frost ever explode radiation all over the place, I'll be glad to break out some charts and we can figure out how big the evacuation area should be and in which direction we should place the green-zone staging area. ;) ))
Fyre has an extreme fear of hospitals, so unless she heard screaming or some other horrible ruckus over the comm, she was waiting outside. Would she have gone in if they needed help? Yes. Even if it was Mason that needed help. But she would have been... "unhappy" and "uncomfortable" only begin to describe it.
While she was waiting outside, E come stumbling down the stairs. She stops him and tentatively starts talking to him, asking him how he is. Mason notices and comes rushing over, practically running over top of Frost to get to E. It's obvious that E's sick. Fyre thinks at first that E has "escaped," and tries to establish if that's true, and from whom or what. Mason's having a panic attack and Fyre doesn't have the patience with him to settle him down, so tells him to shut up. Yes, she's been saying that a lot lately.
I'll skip most of the details, because E and Mason both covered them well. Let me say, though, that when E popped off his helmet, it was a pretty scary sight. Heck, it scared me, the player, much less Fyre. You can see what the player did with the "costume" when you take a closer look, but from a step back, and probably a bit of imagination once you see what the player was going for, it's scary as hell. My first impression was, "Oh my god, E's a flaming corpse." I can only imagine what Fyre saw.
E finally admits that he's dying. I suspected, because of conversations that E's player and I have had. (By the way, the fact that Star and her player figured this out already, especially given the amount of time the character has been with the team lately, floors me. I swear, she must be psychic) Fyre, though, is shocked. She goes into complete and utter denial. She's likely to stay there, too, until, and if, something shocks her out of it. Yes, as Mason, character and player, has pointed out, her first reaction is to throw money at it. It's the easiest course of action, but not the only one Fyre has thought of or plans to take. She's in denial of the "dying," but not that there's a serious problem. They touch on a magical cure, and though E vehemently opposes the idea, Fyre is not above forcing it on him for his own good. She mentions that she knows some people and she may be able to "cut a deal" of some kind. There are possibilities here, but I'll see what happens before I explore those. So, if those are the "denial" and "bargaining" stages of grief, Mason gives her the perfect outlet for the "anger" stage. (Um, five stages of grieving: denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance. But you probably already knew that.)
Mason is having his own personal issues with E's revelation. Maybe he's going through his own stages. But he's hit "acceptance" at this point, and doesn't seem to want to let Fyre linger in the "denial." I really, really thought they were going to get into the "throwing punches" stage here. Fyre's not going to take the first swing, though. She doesn't hate Mason. I don't think. But she is really, really angry at him right now. He has a special knack for waiting just until she's forgiven him and trusts him again, and then hitting her wherever and however it hurts the most. Fyre is... fiery. Yeah, it's a stereotype, or whatever, but I wrote it in, and try to stick to it. She feels things strongly, maybe not for long in some cases. Right now, she's angry and hurt because of Mason. But she's completely devastated by E's news. I'm sure she spent most of the night crying in a corner somewhere. (No, she didn't show much sign of that while the team was together. She's angry enough at Mason that she's unwilling to show a "weakness," and she wouldn't want to upset E) Again, even though she's in denial of the actual "dying," it's impossible not to recognize that there is a serious problem. But if setting Mason on fire takes her mind off of E's plight... well, that's alright with her right now.
She's going to continue looking for a solution or a cure. We've seen that she doesn't always take completely legal routes, (hiring someone to hack into Longbow records, for example) and I expect that to at least continue if not grow. She's also going to treat E as if he's glass, both physically and emotionally.
So, is anyone in Team Angst going to even make it to 50? E is... very Not Well, Frost is maybe dying, and Fyre and Mason are going to kill each other. Of course, that's if Strym and Malta don't kill them first.
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