Heroes: Shadows over Millenium

[Cynical Cat]

"Yeah, well I have my own opinions on that emotion, but my circumstances are unusual. And I don't like to sound like a whiny loser-boy. Good luck with it. I hope he becomes the man you see."

[LadyTevar]

"You could never be a loser, Blackheart." Lei answered, again looking straight into his eyes. "You are too strong for that." She reached out and touched him, something that teeps and empaths rarely do. She blinked, feeling the 'humming' from the tumor far stronger, but squeezed his arm gently. "Perhaps that is why Garth needs a prop, and you do not."

-trust-

She left him with that lingering emotion, walking towards the door, which slid open via a shadow tendril. It was one half her trust in him, and one half a wish for him to trust in the future. If he trusted her, that was his own decision, and not something she would press on him. Then she was inside, slipping onto the arm of the couch to check on Saibot, making sure he had not passed out from all the alcohol he'd imbibed.

[Charon]

Legacies watched the room as Argent returned. No doubt done informing Blackheart of what had occured on the roof. His blank gaze watched her the same as it watched everyone in the room. But it was not with the same disinterest as with the others. The gaze watched, waiting for a slip-up.

And then there was the creature that Kyosuke had summoned up. A shape-changer much like the crocodile, yet different. There was something there that defined it, he could almost feel it. But it was beyond his ability to grasp, and it annoyed the silver figure down in the depths of his being where none could see. An old quote crossed his mind as his thoughts delved deeper. 'Better to be thought a fool than to speak and remove all doubt.' Legacies sat back in the chair and continued to watch with the same alien disinterest.

[LadyTevar]

As if feeling Legacies eyes on her, she looked his way. She leaned down to whisper something to Garth... yet her voice came from the shadow next to Legacies.

"Blackheart said that he understands.. and has many ghosts. If the worst happens, what is one more ghost?"

[Cynical Cat]

Blackheart went back inside. Well, well, well. The kids were up to stuff. "Hey, Eighteen and a Half. Slow down on that. Enjoy it." He walked over to where Blast laid passed out on the floor. He tsked. "Kids these days." He picked him up and laid him down gently on the couch, making sure his head was at an angle so if he wasn't in danger of suffocating if he vomited. He went to a closet and brought out a blanket and put it on him.

[LadyTevar]

Lei watched Blackheart gently care for Blast. "And you tell us to hate you?" she quipped, gently teasing him before nodding in Gravitas' direction pointedly. The Nova was doing... something... around Em. What she couldn't tell, but perhaps Blackheart could discover more.

[SirNitram]

"Poor kid." Gravitas murmured as he wiped away the sweat, looking at Blast. "Aw well. Tomorrow he'll know why the rest of us aren't drinking until we fall over." He shook his head, and exhaled slowly, looking at Em. Seemed to work. He looked to Blackheart. "I've done what I can." He said simply. "I need some water." He murmured, going in search of the kitchen.

[Cynical Cat]

"Yeah," he said to Lei, "hate me. This is just the nice stuff. I do the nasty stuff too." Images danced through his mind, memories of burning child soldiers, bleeding men begging for mercy that he couldn't give. He gestured over to his fridge. "There's a Britta full of cold water inside," he said to Gravitas.

[SirNitram]

"Thanks." Gravitas nodded to Blackheart, and a pause. "Quite a sideshow you're running here, boss. A kid so young he should be worried about the prom instead of saving the world, mystics, turncoats, an alien, and even a guy who hates Metas..." A pause, as he looked to the singing Saibot. "....When he's not singing with them." He amended. "To say nothing of me. I'm probably an ulcer all by myself. What the hell lets you do it?"

[Cynical Cat]

"Fuck you think I wanted this job? Or am even qualified for it? You would think they would give the team leader slot to someone who doesn't have a 'negative empathic field' in the power side effects box." He shrugged. "The job needs to be done. If that means I've got to do it, then I'll do it. I've done worse. And you're probably the least of my problems."

[SirNitram]

"Heh." Gravitas shook his head. "You sound like me, fifty years ago." A pause. "Well. Fifty years ago from my view of time. Nevermind." He shook his head, heading for the water.

[Cynical Cat]

"Fuck," said Blackheart. "How old are you? Personal timescale."

[Charon]

The silver figure almost seemed to smile for a moment as it looked at Gravitas. "If the boy remembers tonight." The smile faded as the chilly and blank face returned to it's norm. It did not face Blackheart as it spoke again.

"We have all done terrible deeds Blackheart, we all will do terrible deeds. Such is the way of things."

[SirNitram]

"Born in 1970, original timeline. Erupted.. That is, developed my powers on N-Day, the beginning of our time of superhumans, 1997." Gravitas replied. "Left home timeline approximately 2061 when the war came to a halt by the humans threatening to incinerate us from orbit and flay our minds with psiads, spent a few highly subjective years getting everyone I knew and could convince to leave to safe universes.. And then came here. I've been here two years."

Gravitas exhaled, and levitated a glass full of filtered water to himself. "By the void." He muttered. "I'm getting near a hundred. I should be telling you lot to get off my lawn, were I still human."

[Cynical Cat]

"Holy fuck," said Blackheart. "Toss me a cider."

[SirNitram]

"Holy fuck," said Blackheart. "Toss me a cider."

A cider floated over as requested. "And I still have my girlish figure." The Nova commented. "Advanced biologies do that. Well, after you survive hard-vac, age is nothing, right?" Gravitas smiled wanly. "So. I've kind've given away my reason for being here so willingly. If something isn't done, there is a war so terrible one side will be forced to leave this precious cradle, our home. Some left for other timelines, like me. Others just went to a distant star. Some.. Folks who always called me mad for siding with the humans.. Created their own universe to live in, no humans to hate them. And some.. Folks who called me evil because I embraced that I was not human and never would be.. Went off to make a world."

[Cynical Cat]

"Things are getting bad here. Not all of it visible on the surface, but yeah, its getting to be a rougher ride. Far as I'm concerned, all us sapient bipeds are in the jackpot together and I can't think of a better thing to do with my life than try to get as many of us out of it as possible. And the supercharged metabolism makes me a damned expensive drunk." He twisted off the top of the non twist top cider and saluted Gravitas before drinking.

[Charon]

Legacies listened quietly as the ancient meta known as Gravitas went on about parts of his history. His home was gone now. At least, to him it was. What was interesting though was that the metas of his universe had been so powerful that the creation of new universes was in the realm of possibility. Truly a curious turn of events that mortals could have that sort of power.

"But you had been human, yes? That is why you sided with them in the conflagration?" The silver face almost seemed to have a quizical look on it as the face turned to look at Gravitas.

[SirNitram]

"I see them." Gravitas sighed, as he sat down and drank slowly. "I hear them. I watch them. I try and change it, but I'm too mired in ninety years of my past to change myself enough to do what is needed, I guess, because I can't divert the flow."

He rubbed his face. "The one godsend is that the superhumans here aren't demonstrating the scale of power that Novas did back home. And there are Novas here, I should clarify. The Mazarin-Rashoud Node exists as a mutation in this timeline. It triggers much less regularly, and with far weaker outcomes. If you see some guy whose chief power is being able to take a punch like a pro without training, but nothing else? Nova. Or Aberrant. The latter is popular."

"But it will come. I know how the War will end. Nuclear fire or everyone who is more than human leaving. No middle ground. And it's.. Just me, knowing it's coming. Like an ordinary guy trying to push back a freight train."

A pause. "I shouldn't be this morose. I've not drunk nearly enough."

[Cynical Cat]

"Grab yourself a cider. Or a vodka. Or whatever," said Blackheart. "It ain't over until its over. You can't win unless you fight and you can't change the future unless you try. And if we fail, we fail as men." He took a long pull from the cider bottle.

[SirNitram]

"At least this time around," Gravitas sighed softly. "I only have Tarot to fear in a straight confrontation. Michael Donagal is.. From some investigation.. Just a man who lived his life estrangled from the man he loved, not a god driven to madness by what he acheived. And the same goes for the folks who I mentioned building universes or worlds of their own."

He drank deeply of the water. "I prefer sobriety. For one thing, it lets me go.. Home.. For bed."

[SirNitram]

"But you had been human, yes? That is why you sided with them in the conflagration?" The silver face almost seemed to have a quizical look on it as the face turned to look at Gravitas.

"I was an idiot." Gravitas muttered. "I tried to straddle the line." He explained to the alien-man hybrid. He met the gaze like it wasn't disturbing. It probably wasn't. "See, shortly after we started popping up after N-Day, a guy comes along, talking about how we aren't Human. We're More. We're stronger, faster, smarter, healthier, able to live longer.. All of it's true. We have powers from legend. This also, true. We are more than human, other than human. Humans, therefore, have no authority over us. We're gods."

The Nova turned the glass of water around. "See, me, I hear that, and I think this way: If I'm a God, I want to be the good kind. The kind that sees the sparrow falling, and then goes to catch it. The one that stops the horrible things from happening. I find some others like me, we do the best we can, yea?"

"Over the years, there's a divide in our kind. We're either gods, or we're normal people a little better. And the gods care about themselves, and the people-and-then-some do the protecting. And I'm just caught in the crossfire with those I drew to me. When the War came..." A deep shudder.

"Accelerated development of the Mazarin Rashoud Node causes aberrations. Physical.. We develop mutations. Also mental, however. As the gradual evolution of thousands of years is compressed into a few decades of metamorphasis, the mind can't take the strain of this thing pressing against the brain, of channeling power. They start snapping. One guy stands in the middle of the American Midwest and detonates, destroying all crops to a level where shit won't grow ten years later. Two guys fight purely within the optical worldwide data network.. ANd obliterate it in the process. For pride."

"And I did what I could to keep entire cities from being destroyed. Be it by a Nova gone nuts, or by a nuke sent to try and bring down the nutbar. And in the end.. I'm just one of Them. Get out. Or we fire the orbital weapons." Gravitas stared at his glass some more. "There's more. But that's personal. No one would give a fuck."

[Cynical Cat]

"Hey, I thought you uber Nova system could handle a ton of booze. Oh well. Travel safely and all that. I'll make sure the drunk people stay safe."

[Rukia]

Emiline sighed, she wondered if they knew that se knew what they had said about her on the roof. It didn't matter. Lei may have thought that she knew what brought on the attack but she didn't. Em had lived for nine years with out memory, on the streets. She knew what certain things did to her and how they affected her powers alcohol did not cause her barriers to go down, she'd been wasted enough to know.

The voices now a very low hum, just an annoyance nothing more. She took a beer and sipped it. She had felt Gravitas doing whatever it was he was doing to 'help' and The japanese guy was staring at her hard. Then she got a look for his.. pet.

She looked pointedly at Blackheart. -We need to talk- Damn he was hard to get to.

[Cynical Cat]

"Excuse, duty calls and all that," Blackheart said and turned towards Miss Torture Alot. He was pretty stealthy for a big guy. "You feeling alright? You put away a lot of booze."