Nevada: Las Vegas

Unable to fully grasp the magnitude of what made the girl known as Signal so...Significant (pun intended), Synapse resolved to use what little knowledge he did have and move from there. A background check revealed the woman's name was "Lucy Lagrange", and Synapse could use sources to backtrack the girl's journey across North America. The trail ended (or rather, began) in Sin City, USA. Still incognito, Synapse concocted an entire persona to accompany the new appearance: Nicholas Eniac.

Standing on the outside of the residential area, with the girl's goggles in tow, the man began his search for answers and for the girl's family. He suspected that the girl could quite easily become the most powerful meta-human in existence with her supposed powers, and resolved to do...something, lest the world become South America's...well, South America.

Somewhere around Nicholas, a stylized eye surrounded by an intricate magic circle began to fade into life; you'd have to look for it to see it, the circle itself being about as a big as a half-dollar.

If there was one thing Sigil could reassure she knew, it was that she had eyes all over the city. Or, she could place eyes all over the city, but trying to see multiple points at once gave her headaches so she resorted to cycling viewpoints. It was from one view, within her own neighborhood no less, that she began to take interest.

Tourists usually didn't go to Vegas to go to the neighborhoods unless they were a) moving to live here, b) visiting family, or c) drug dealers, and quite honestly this new guy didn't seem to fit any of the criteria. Switching off her view (the eye and circle fade to nothing, its purpose fulfilled), Sigil takes out from her jacket pocket a tiny if thick black book and seemingly pulls off a symbol from one of its pages. It was the symbol of the planet Mercury (☿); she slides it to the heel of her left shoe and a copy of it appears on the right heel.

With that, she's off running towards this man at speeds noticeably faster than what would be considered the norm for someone of her health. What informed her that this guy didn't meet any of the three criteria was that this guy had Signal's goggles in his possession.

His Spidey Sense heat sensors indicated a projectile of some sort growing gradually hotter as it approached him at superhuman speeds. It was roughly the temperature of the human body (or might have been, had it not been picking up friction heat), but it's acceleration and heat made him rather wary of the incoming...thing, more than likely some sort of ranged weapon to super-fast metahuman, the latter of which he had not yet encountered. Goggles secured by a strap around his neck, the man braced himself for impact.

Usually getting attacked almost immediately after entering a city would be grounds for suspicion, and suspicious he was. His questions would have to wait until this was dealt with.

As soon as she saw the strange man with Lucy's goggles around his neck, Sigil skidded to a halt. By the time she completely stopped, at least an half an inch was removed from the heels of her boots and she herself was inches away from the man. The woman of 29 stood up properly; she was at least at tall as him (maybe like two inches shorter, but still pretty tall for a woman).

"Welcome to the neighborhood, stranger," Sigil greeted Nicholas, then turning her vision towards the goggles. "Judging from what you have in your possession... something happened to my cousin, I guess? She wouldn't separate herself from that horrid thing even if you paid her to."

"Your cousin..."

Strange, it appeared the goggles were more recognizable than the android first postulated. Out of all the people in Las Vegas, this meta-human came to the goggles. Did she have some sort of homing beacon in it?

Now that the woman had stopped, the android noted a faint glow around the woman, the same glow that the android used to identify meta-humans at site. It had some tweaks to be made, it would seem, for this woman's aura was different from the others he had observed, and he couldn't detect some...things, like the vampire back in Eagleopolis.

"Yes, your cousin...Lucielle Lagrange, correct?" He knew many mundane details about the woman, and this woman, being a fellow meta-human, would probably have all the answer he'd need.

"I came here for information about the woman who called herself Signal. I assume you know about her...and about what recently happened to her, correct?"

"Signal? Is that what she's calling herself? It works, I guess. I mean, she's ripping off my one-word title shtick, but whatever." Sigil shrugs. But as she hears those last words, the woman answers, "Er... no? I heard Lucy was heading towards Eagleopolis last time she called home and, well, the news was more than willing to tell of how far down the shitter it went in just a few hours, though after a certain point, they just... stopped reporting of the city there."

Something really didn't seem right. And don't officials usually say "what recently happened" when it's terrible? Did... did the worse really come to worst? Oh man, this isn't gonna be good. Especially for Lucy's folks. No one wants to hear that they outlived their children.

"If you want info like the origin of her powers, I can... well, I actually don't know how she got them; you can ask my uncle, though, he was there when she got them. But if you want to know how they work, that I can easily tell you."

"Yes, that would be favorable."

Gesturing towards the military jeep he borrowed, he invited the woman to show him to the residence of her uncle. He couldn't scan for him even if he was another meta-human, the human density of the city rivaled that of New York, which it self rivaled that of Shanghai. He hypothesized that unless some pruning went on with the human population and vagrants kept piling up in the same spots, those areas would rapidly become unlivable. That issue would have to be rectified later.

"Apologies. I have not yet introduced myself; I am Captain Nicholas Eniac, officer of the United States Military and was present at the situation."

He noted how often people used euphemisms to feign sympathy while still making it quite clear what had occurred and adopted the technique. The boy had called his speech patterns "inhuman". These new ones might mitigate the issue.

"So, tell me. How does your cousin get her powers?"

"Sure, why not." Sigil follows Nicholas into the military jeep, relaxing a bit. She had considered, at some point, lending her powers to the military, but was soon talked out of it by Lucy (she figured that they'd just kidnap Sigil from her post and experiment on her or whatever). "My uncle's home is just down this street; it's the house with the yard full of cheesy flamingos wearing football helmets."

Sigil chuckled at Nicholas' introduction. There was nothing funny about it, per se, just that (wouldja look at that) a military official drops by wanting info on her super-powered cousin. Precisely what Lucy herself feared.

"My name's Virgilia Balentine, but my folks call me Virgie so that's what I ask of others. And to the supers, I'm just Sigil. As for how Lucy got her powers, again I don't know. Again, I wasn't there when she got them; hell I wasn't even living here until "Coin Girl" was a well-known face in Sin City."

"Right, of course...Vergie. Do you think you could tell me exactly how her powers...work?"

Of course, the android knew exactly what words he wanted to say at all times, but artificially inserted pauses into his speech to simulate thinking about one's speech. He started the jeep's engine and began driving, though he was still somewhat wary of the metahuman. Eventually he'd have to inquire about her supernatural speed, too.

"Certainly. Her powers work, for the most part, by absorbing energy. This energy comes from thought waves. The happier the thoughts, the more energy she can collect. You can put her in a hippie circle or something and she'll be fighting for hours on end. This energy is then translated into a kind of psionic manipulation, so she has a very good grasp on telekinesis. She can also create fire and electricity, but she's not as good with controlling them. She can also create radiation, but... that's what she told me; for obvious reasons she didn't want to demonstrate."

Sigil, in deep thought, began tapping her thumb and ring finger together. "Ah, right. She can also wipe thoughts from her head—like brain bleach but better—and she can enhance her strength with it. It's a really flexible kind of power, but she mainly uses what she can have fine control on, which is her telekinesis. This is what she told me. Shame, kind of; if she had more control on her other powers she could be a force of nature!"

Contemplating what the woman had told him, he reasoned he was likely being deceived somehow. How could she convert "happiness" into energy and perform the way should could at Eagleopolis? No, something didn't add up. He, in fact, still wasn't sure she was her cousin, but still, the goggles were apparently important.

Stopping at a building, probably the home of Signal's uncle, the man exited the vehicle and nodded in understanding. For now, he'd assume the woman was telling the truth. However, this "Sigil" brought up more questions than she answered.

"Tell me, Virgie, how did you find me in this city? My presence here was quite brief and it seems a bit peculiar that you would come to me and not the reverse."

"Simple. I can places eyes anywhere around this area and I submit whatever that eye sees into my own eyes. Watch." As Virgie got out of the jeep, she made a flicking gesture with her hand and the eye popped up on the top of Synapse's hand. "I do a routine watch cycle of the city bi-daily. If I see a new face that doesn't fit my... criteria, I personally greet them. Well, not in the way I did with you, per se, but I do greet them."

Virgie waved her hand again, and the eye would be dismissed as soon as Synapse got a good look at it. Man, these stupid flamingos. One day, she'd get rid of them all. But not today. Maybe next month.

She steps to the door, takes out some keys and opens the door. "Please, after you, I insist."

"Right, right..."

Stepping through the doorway, the mandroid surveyed the area as Virgie followed close behind.

"Could you tell me...how your powers work? And what you use them for? It was my understanding that that sort of behavior might be considered an invasion of privacy...are you affiliated with this town's law enforcement or...?"

He left his sentence unfinished to goad him into telling him more. He needed to know if this girl was friend or foe to the city and if he'd have to step in.

Virgie closed the door behind her. She moved a hand through her scraggly hair. "Eheheh. My powers are magic, pure and simple. Well... for specifics I have magical energy, but to focus and use them, I channel them through symbols, a little like how wizards may use wands or staves. I use them for my own personal gain; really, who wouldn't?" 'That's why Lucy left town, after all.'

"...oh. Right. 'Superheroes.' Ha. And I use my eyes on public places: parks, highways, crossroads... I COULD use them in private places, but outside of casinos I don't think I'd like what I might see, and most of these casinos have already banned me from ever entering their premises." Of course, that doesn't mean they don't employ Sigil for her services. It's easy to plant an eye and it's just as easy to replant it. It's how she's made good money in this city. But the house always wins. That's just how it works.

Virgie sighed when Nicholas mentioned the police. "I'm not affiliated with this town's law enforcement. I'm actually a former villain. With no heroes in Vegas to challenge my crimes, though, robbing bookstores and pranking the businesses has just gotten tiresome; at some point in time the police just gave up on me. However, just because I'm a villain doesn't mean that, should my home be in danger, I won't protect it. At the end of the day, all I want to catch up to my... backlog and wait for when good ol' Cousin Luc– no, wait, Signal calls home."

For now the woman didn't seem to be a threat, but she herself claimed to be a reformed villain. He'd keep an eye out for any specific suspicious signs. He still did not understand "magic", though of course few people did. He insisted everything and anything could be explained with science, but he'd need time to find the links.

He glanced around and nodded when the woman ceased talking.
"That's great. I myself would rather the long explanation. If your uncle isn't here, it would give us something to talk about until he got here, right?" Internally, he complimented himself on a very human sounding inquiry. Who says machines can't learn?

"Nah, my uncle doesn't come back until well into the evening. Same with my aunt. And a long explanation of my powers... um, the symbols I use are imbued with my power as I focus on them. However, it has to be a symbol that is commonly associated or related to something, and the effects work differently depending on where I place the symbol except when a symbol is deemed to have a universal effect. Additionally, if a symbol changes meaning then its associated powers change as well. They're very simple rules." She takes out her little black book again and flips a couple of pages until she finds what she's looking for. She drags an image of the symbol she wants (♇) off the page and it floats just above her cupped hand; it glows a sickly blue.

"I'm sure you recognize this symbol, right? Of Pluto? Now, do you see that potted plant over in the corner by the TV? Watch."

Virgie blows the symbol away, floating towards the plant like a leaf on the wind. It reaches, and then touches, the plant, fading away and for a second or two encompassing the plant itself. And then it rapidly begins to wither and decay, leaving a shriveled shell of what was once a very nice plant.

"Each symbol I use is associated with a deity, or with a power, or anything, and with my magic I can harness that into whatever that symbol can do. So as you just saw, Pluto's symbol invokes deterioration and death. Technically, that would be Mors, but thankfully he and Pluto are interconnected. If I wanted to, Mars' symbol can do the same thing, just in a different manner.

"And don't worry, I've never actually killed anyone this way... or anyone at all, really. What fun is a challenge if you can just end it like that?"

"I understand."

He looked down at the goggles in his hand and played with them. "Deterioration and death" he thought. Adonis was known as an avatar of life, death and rebirth. Could she...?

"With you and Lucille being related, tell me: are your peculiar abilities related?"

Until the vampiric incident, Synapse (or rather, Captain Eniac) had not personally known magic or it's extent. Mythos implied that they were dead organisms, animated in an unorthodox way. This Virgie, she too was rather unorthodox. Unorthodoxy would be of use to him.

"Nope. I got my powers from a book, but Lucy's was just given to her." Virgie got up and headed to the kitchen. "Anything you wanna drink, Mr. Eniac?" she asked him. "I mean look at me, entertaining a guest and I don't even offer anything!"

As she stepped into the kitchen, the happy look on her face shrunk to one of scrutiny. Something wasn't... right about this guy. Maybe he's a guy of the government, sure, but that name...

"No, thank you." Synapse probably could've predicted a situation like this; if he ever had to spend extended time with a person it might be suspicious that he never ate or drank or slept. He resolved it was a necessary flaw, for fixing it would beget actually implementing those behaviors into his day. Next he'd be simulating sex and pooping, and then making crude jokes about them on Comedy Central. A complete and utter waste of time.

"Where did you get the book, then? And where do you suppose your uncle got the power to give superhuman abilities? And why, pray tell, do you not share them?"

A book, that makes sense. It couldn't really be a book, of course, just a highly advanced interface, and maybe there was even a convoluted city-wide structure that she controlled with that interface.

"Ah well." Virgie poured herself a drink. Nothing like a club soda to keep her head clear. She comes back to the living room and sits down on the couch, eyes kept straight forward.

"The book was passed down from my great-great-great-grandmother. Apparently she practiced witch-craft, and uh... well, she at least lived longer than the other people in her home town until they found her, haha. And my cousin's parents are normies. The guy who gave Lucy her powers was just an old dude, at least according to her accounts. Like he'd be old enough to just drop dead at any minute, 'cept he died the moment he relinquished his powers onto her.

"I don't share my powers because, well, as a wise man once said: a person is smart; people are stupid. I could imagine the government, with this kind of stuff, just attaching the radioactivity symbol on anything they'd want and blowing shit up. Discreet with no trackable source, yet cheaper to produce and place than any bomb they could ever make. On the other side, you could have extremists gaining these powers and being able to sneak past any security guard that doesn't know what to look for or isn't magically attuned and, well..." ...Wait a minute. "Oh! You're wondering why me and Lucy don't share powers! It's because they're not the same. Lucy's powers primarily come from her mind; you can say mine comes from my soul."

"I thank you for your patience with my persistent questions, but I still have some for your uncle. You have told me quite a bit already and I thank you for it, but if I could just talk to your uncle, I'd be out of your hair."

For a split second, he considered using the phrase "I'd leave", but ruled his use of metaphors would sound more organic. So far, so good. That child didn't know anything about anything, he thought, and dismissed his criticism.

"Like I said, my uncle doesn't get home until well into the night, but I can give you the name of the place he works at. It's called the Golden Nugget; it's somewhere on the strip, but you'll find it. They use an old prospector as their mascot of sorts." Virgilia gets up and opens the door, telling Nicholas one last thing:

"If you're wondering where the book is, I burned it. I don't like this generation too much and I certainly don't like the prospect of anyone getting their hands on that magic. If you want to study that magic through me, well... ha, you can try to catch me."

"That won't be necessary, ma'am. I'll be in contact with you if we have any more questions."

He climbed into the jeep and smiled at the woman, giving a small wave. Yes, he smiled, America would not be outdone by Japan regarding androids, no siree.

With that, he drove off into the city, in search of the Golden Nugget that Virgie had told him on. The woman didn't seem to be a threat for the moment, but Signal might definitely be a wild card, especially with her becoming what some would call a "lady of the night'".

Eventually reaching the [bar/casino/whorehouse/idon'tknowwhatitis], the man inquired if anyone in the area had heard of a "Lucy Lagrange" and "Virgilia Balentine".

The Golden Nugget was, compared to the other casinos on the strip, pretty modest in size. It's still a pretty big place, yeah, but it's not one you could get lost in if you didn't pay attention or anything.

When asked of anyone who may know of "Lucy Lagrange," the results were lukewarm. She was known around here as Coin Girl because, well, that was her job here: mascot-slash-superhero. Some of the regular patrons could testify of who she was, particularly of how helpful she was with token thieves and the like.

When asked of "Virgilia Balentine," however... well, the patrons themselves still responded in a way that can be described as lukewarm, but the authorities (such as the dealers and security guards) were much more weary about anyone mentioning her. They explained that she would often cheat when she first came to the casino; after being kicked out, people would often enter the casino suddenly being able to win against the house many times and it was revealed that she was hired to help them; those people were either thrown out or, well... afterwards, if any patron enters the casino (particularly if they look too confident), they know exactly what to look for and where to look for it.

Still, they do both mention them a little fondly as they're the children of Marcus Lagrange, probably one of the best damn bartenders in the city and, despite their past, they're still nice people.

It's just that Virgilia is never physically wanted here for playing games again and and Lucy will always have a job here.

Lucielle's popular reputation sort of reassured the android that she was truly heroic, as the accounts of the locals and Wikipedia article on her had prior suggested. However, he would be totally reassured once he understood how the girl's powers worked and where they came from. The ability to seamlessly convert energy would be a tremendous boon to...well, everything. Imagine converting the geothermal heat that powered the Hot Springs Harbor lab into energy with 100% efficiency. Imagine being able to absorb the rays generated by the fluorescent lights and convert them into genuine thought and increase one's IQ. The possibilities were literally endless.

He sat down at the bar and ordered a Pink Lady, and specifically requested the bartender bring him Lucielle's father while he was at it. When he was sure no one was looking, he poured out a little onto the counter and cleaned it with a napkin to make it appear as if he was drinking some of it.