Ontario: Escrimer

A city torn about by constant gang warfare.
The first is lead by a woman who calls herself Fenêtre (caret included), a woman very adept with technology, who can seemingly take matter out of existence. She calls her gang The X's for whatever reason. She had usurped another gang called "les Androïdes" (les included). Some people still call themselves that as a sign of loyalty. She lets them be because she is rather comfortable with her power, except for her rival.

The other gang is lead by a lady called Pomme, who appears to have a similar power to Fenêtre but executes it very differently. She called her subordinates "Eyes". Their gangs often clash in the streets, and despite the X's and les Androïdes' superior equipment and organization, the Eyes put up quite a fight with their artistic license.

The only person foolish enough to defy not one, but both of the gangs in a man who calls himself "Sir Verrière". What sort of game is he playing?

Agent 58664 woke up as the train rattled to a stop. He hopped out and saw the Canadian flag.

"Fuck," was his only thought.

Not sure what to do with himself, 58664 stowed his gear inside the hoodie of the large jacket he'd... acquired previously and set about walking around the town of Escimer

(We buddies now, eh.)

“E..excuse me…sir.” The small voice prodded, seeking the figure’s attention.”
“I need to ask you a question…sir…” The voice started again, the owner of it looking up to a tall figure, more drenched in his trench coat than wearing it. The owner of that small voice reached forward before suddenly that tall figure flipped around to face him, that coat loudly twisting and flapping up into the air about the tall form. The figure turned to face him, yet as the boy looked up to the man’s head he would see no face to speak of, it was simply blank.

This took him aback a bit, the boy backing away from the tall, ghostly figure.

“Well…what do you want, kid?” The man asked, spoken in a voice reminiscent of those old detective noir movies. “I don’t have all day you know.” He continued, head tilted down towards the boy, the only indication that he was looking at him.

Baxter was looking quite nervous as he looked up to the long dead detective, his hands shaking as he tried to clasp them together.
“Well…I…wanted to ask you…if you knew anything…about the arson at 555 Av—“ The boy was suddenly cut off as he found his eyes suddenly open though he could swear they already were. He also found himself lying down when he could have sworn he was standing. Suddenly he sat up, upper body careening upwards quickly before suddenly stopping as his head came into contact with a quite solid surface. With a few rubs of his head and his eyes, he finally got a good look at where he was.

Slowly Baxter crawled out of the crate, looking about the alleyway to make sure he was alone, his tired eyes detailing his lack of restful sleep. He might have grown an unkempt beard by now, but it didn’t seem like the boy had hit puberty yet. He made his way out of the crate and rubbed a hand over his face before sitting down on top of the crate, slipping his mask back over his head. He didn’t need the cops after him once again. For now he would drown his identity, and blend into the mix of the rest of the superheroes.

The only problem was that he wasn’t that super. So far all he could do was have some very insightful dreams. Despite this he had grown no closer to finding out what happened to his parents or who did it in the first place. In fact he spent all of his time during his last session attempting to do such and because of that he had no leads for the day. Perhaps he would just wander the streets until he saw some crime being committed. Though that wouldn’t help as there wasn’t much else he could do. Having the upper hand by knowing what was going on elsewhere, or elsewhen, was pretty much all he had. He couldn’t even stay out of sight from everyone’s prying eyes because he couldn’t swing through the rooftops or fly about. At best he could be a sidekick, but that didn’t seem likely either.

With a sigh he stood up from the crate and began to walk out of the alley. For now he would just have to discover who he was. That’s how comic book heroes usually found their way.

It was time to define himself.

A falcon transforms into a cloaked figure and crouches in the forest at the edge of the city. Piercing green eyes inspect the concrete jungle, now from the ground, with great trepidation. What is this place? Why is the forest so devoid of life? What are those strange shining creatures that race by the hundreds between the even stranger structures? They feel so...lifeless. The humans that she can see are dressed strangely as well.

Neaera lowers her hood, puzzled. She catches sight of a stray cat, confirming that this is a creature that would go unnoticed here, and transforms herself.

The pavement feels very odd on her paws as she explores this unfamiliar world.

58664 wanders through the city, taking int the sites. He sees a building offering touristic information. As information is always invaluable, Agent wanders into the building to ask about the town, more specifically, about the current going's on.

The tour agent working seems to explicitly suggest you leave town if you can help it.

"We're proud to host...ahem...a very realistic war re-enactment...one that took place here way back right now, in fact. I recommend checking out our very immersing trains and buses, if you can find one. I'd show you, but I'm rather stuck here, along with some of others."

Grabbing at the edge of a fence in an alley way, Baxter kicked and swayed his legs until he finally managed to pull himself up over it to hop (fall) down to the other side. He scrambled clumsily to his feet before looking around, less to see if his cover was blown, and more to see if anyone saw him making a fool of himself. The alley was empty, besides a few cats, he was safe.

He struggled to make his way through the city undetected, but also without hurting himself. He more or less made it unharmed to his destination, and from several meters away looked on to a secured graveyard. Well...the gate was open and the only person in the graveyard was one little old grounds keeper, but that was enough to keep him at bay.

But no, he had to get in there, he had to see something for himself. So he made his way to the gate, once the grounds keeper had turned away, and snuck his way inside to hide behind one of the mauseleums. He peeked out from behind it. The old man appeared to be gone. He moved to press his back against the stone structure once again, letting out a sigh of relief.

"Is that the new fashion trend you kids have going on these days?" A feeble old voice suddenly sparked.

Baxter nearly jumped out of his skin. He turned to look to his other side to see the grounds keeper standing right next to him. He was terrible at this. He turned away and fell back, looking up to the old man. He was slow to get to his feet, but quick to think, even under this stressful situation. Quickly he reached up to pull his mask off before standing up, facing the man with sad eyes.

"...hi, sir. I just...visit...grave..." He managed to spat out in his tiny voice, the groundskeeper just looking at him with a smile.

"Son, I didn't get any of that. But if you're here to visit, go ahead, I won't get in your way." The old man said before shuffling off.

Baxter simply blinked at him before making his way through the lot, looking through the gravestones. Eventually he came to a stop, his fingers finally ceasing to nervously twist at the mask he held in front of his chest, only for his hands to drop to his sides. He stood in front of two tombstone, placed close together which read "Johnson Banes" and "Martha Banes" both having the same year of death.

The boy stared at it for a while, his eyes starting to glaze over as he lost touch with reality and...

The tall figure, drenched in that trench coat stood over two graves, staring down at them quietly, some eerie fog setting in over the area. Baxter slowly walked up to him from behind, this was a huge chance, this usually never happened to him while he was awake, but it was almost as if something here pulled him from his body. He parted his lips to speak to the tall figure.

"You don't belong here." The figure said, before Baxter even had a chance to speak.

"Okay..." Baxter said before turning away and walking off. He walked out of the graveyard without so much as a lead.

The nature spirit becomes increasingly afraid as she wanders. Nothing is the same as when last she awoke. The rhythm of life seems muffled here by steel and stone. One of the great, metal, lifeless monsters almost hits her, and Neaera turns into a large tiger in fear. It swerves to avoid her and the humans in the area begin to scream.

The vehicle comes to an abrupt halt before it can touch the beast. The people in the streets begin to panic and hide while a man pokes his head out of the rolled down passenger side window, armed with a Tommy gun. He begins opening fire at the tiger.

"Eat lead, kitty!"

The driver responds, "Eddie, whatcha think yous doin'? Dems an endaynja'd speeshus dem is!"

Eddie stops firing to respond.
"Quiet Charlie, ya let one wild animal go and it goes around wrecks da joint; mauling dem tykes and whatnot."

"Iunno, Eddie seems like a bad idea t'me."

"Well have it chyour way den. Why dont we pull on outta here and let dems fine folks deal wit dat wild animal."

"Well, okay, fine. I guess we can't have dat."

Content with his argumentative supremacy, Eddie contiues firing wildly and eventually gets carried away and op[ens fire on some people hiding behind parks cars. He cackles wildly as Charlie decides that's enough and backs up, then peels out, neither of them checking to see if the tiger was injured or even hit.

If one didn't know any better, they'd think these guys were New Yorkers. But no, you're a cat.

Neaera does not know what to make of the foul magic that fires from the belly of the metal beast. It barely registers that there are humans inside of it before a shot pierces her shoulder. She lets out a mighty roar of pain and dives for cover, transforming into an unharmed squirrel and scampering away.

After some minutes of silence, some brave subjects are able to get up out their hiding spots and see neither the car nor the tiger, and continue going about their day. There had been a single person observing behind a window and taking notes. Notes of how the tiger had transformed into something he couldn't quite see from up there on the seventh floor.

Perhaps things would finally get interesting around here.

Shots of gunfire echoed through the streets.

58664, never being one to shy away from a chance to observe supers in action, headed towards the sounds of gunfire.

However, whatever happened was finished before he arrived.
He tried questioning people who'd been in the area about what had happened.

Most of the locals merely shied away from the inquisitive hobo, but one of them merely told him that some of Pomme's men were passing through and had a run-in with a tiger. He then went about his merry way. He seemed to think that the stranger was one of Fenetre's men, what with his combat gear and stuff. He seemed to really take this stuff to heart.

The man up on the seventh floor smirked. That wasn't one of Fenetre's men, she'd dress up her goons in some crazy aerodynamic outfit in case they needed it or something. And Pomme's men would be dressed with a bit more flair. Why was he dressed like that?

Baxter stood near the edge of the busy part of town, eyes closed as he leaned back against a wall with his mask back on now. Maybe he was going about this all wrong. It was selfish for him to use his abilities for his own gain after all… Not that there was much he could do with them in the first place. Maybe he could witness a crime and call the cops..? Just thinking about the limited possibilities of what he could do bored him into a glazed over daydream. At least he was easily distracted enough to go into day dreams frequently so he could actually use his powers!

He found himself standing in the streets, blue overtone dressing the city, gentle fog rolling along the ground. It almost felt like a spirit waiting room. Fortunately that tall figure wasn’t around to tell him off this time. Maybe it was because he was doing the right thing now..? Either way he slid his hands into his pockets as he began to stroll along the spirit plane. Or he would have if his ass hugging suit had pockets. Why did heroes wear these things..?

He walked the spirit plane, looking for trouble, though trying not to loiter around for too long. It wouldn’t be hard for him to spot it in the large city, as once he came upon it he would notice that it was missing that blue overtone the rest of the area had. It looked like it might have been some other plane besides the spirit plane. Actually, it just looked like the world looked normally. Perhaps he didn’t have to enter the spirit plane to view about the physical world..?

As he waited around, something moved over head, casting a shadow over him for a moment. He ignored it however, assuming it was a bird or a plane.

Stroking the beginnings of a brand new hobo-beard (shaving on a train seemed risky), 58664 wondered who the hell would name themselves Apple.

He began slumming it and asking the less favoured elements of society about this 'Pomme'.

Most of the hobos were more interested in finding work in the town or, failing that, getting the fuck out. One recommends the latter specifically.

It seems like no one wants to be around the funny smelling guy with combat gear and guns.

Surrounded by a blue haze, Baxter wandered through the spirit plane along the streets of the city. He wasn’t sure what he was looking for exactly, but he’d know when he found it. The buildings seemed to be there only as a suggestion, a suggestion of where their physical counterparts would be in the material world. This meant that the spirits, and the bodies they were bound to, were more visible than anything else.

And each of those spirits seemed different in their own ways. He didn’t have the time to research it further, but he noticed that some of these differences matched up with differences in other people. With some more research he could probably match these up, but for now he just wandered the streets until he found some particularly interesting spirits.

One odd man in a building that stuck out from the rest of the souls there.

And one…that was in the shape of a spirit, but was colored differently than the rest. A completely black form.

Noting these locations he returned to his body, suddenly sparking back to life to find himself standing outside of a strip club. This wasn’t where he was when he left his body…this was definitely not where he would be. The door suddenly opened and a woman stepped out. Baxter’s face began to melt beneath his mask.

“H..have a nice day.” He said before suddenly taking off down the street towards the apartment building.

The fully dressed business woman had no idea what just transpired, seeing only an oddly dressed geek running off down the sidewalk. It was time for her to move from this town.

As his large coat no longer seemed to conceal his gear, 58664 dropped all pretense and threw the coat away.

He kept an eye out for oddly-dressed characters as those tended to be in league with Supers.

The man in the building paid close attention to what was going on in the streets below as a strange feeling that he was being watched washed over him. They (being the streets) probably would've returned to normal by now, or as close to normal as they'd get, but there was a strange person dressed in combat gear. Who was that?

Resolving he'd waited long enough, he left his apartment, descended to street level and shifted into stealth mode, keeping his distance from the alleys and tailing the bearded man, who seemed to just be frightening some more locals. Something was really off about this guy, and it wasn't just the way he was dressed.

Meanwhile, Charlie and Eddie had told their colleagues about the tiger they had found earlier, but they were dismissed for the nearest zoo was a town over. They were always making up stories anyway. One of them voted to go back and see if it was still there while the other shot him down for being stupid.

Moments later Baxter ran up to the building he scouted out earlier. He stopped out in front of it and stared up to the windows from across the street. He blinked a bit as he wondered if the person was still there, as he of course could not see so while still in his body. He would just have to check inside to see. He started to run across the street before stopping and turning back, whistling innocently as a police car rolled by. He made his way over to the crosswalk and continued to cross there once the appropriate time came.

He made his way up into the building and onto the floor that he found the weird man at before slowly walking up to his door. As Baxter stood there he realized there wasn’t much he could do once in there. He simply stared at the door for a moment before slowly leaning in to press his ear against it. He closed his eyes and listened for a moment before determining that no one was inside. Did…the guy know he was coming? That would be scary…and quite ominous… Maybe he just went out for groceries?

Baxter slowly left the building before looking around the streets a bit. He lost his target, so he decided to head for that other interesting soul. That man drenched in darkness. He dove into the alleyways in an unnecessary stunt before running off after the other man, if he hadn’t moved too far away from where he last saw him.

Neaera quickly realizes she has not healed despite transforming.

Where is the power the worshipers of the Earth mother provided all spirits like her with? She should be able to heal and transform effortlessly, yet she is tired and injured like any mortal.

She transforms into her human form, unable to make much use of her squirrel form when it is too hurt to climb and scamper.

Clutching her shoulder, she staggers out of the alley she had wandered into and begins to look for this strange village's shaman for healing and information.

Dashing his way through the alleyways after his target, Baxter found himself suddenly stopping. Less because he was out of breath, and more because he found his eyes aching as if some bright glare from the sun was focused on them. He had no idea what this meant, but it almost felt like it was affect his astral form more than his actual body.

He turned his head away a bit before slowly summoning up the strength to turn in the direction of the source of the overpowering glow. His eyes eventually began to adjust, and he found himself looking towards an odd looking woman, dressed in what appeared to be rags.

His spirit said this was some sort of deity.

His spaghetti said "NOPE."

"Warm blessings!" Neaera greets yet another person, an awkward looking boy. Hopefully this one will not simply give her a strange coin and walk off. "Please, I am injured and lost and would very much like to speak to your peoples' shaman. Can you take me to see him?"

Baxter's mind was racing. He had obviously stumbled upon some sort of strange spirit displaced out of time or space who was in trouble and needed some sort of care.

But more importantly, and more taxing on his mind, was that a woman was talking to him.
What should he say? Greetings? Have a nice day? No he already said that once today and it was totally stupid. It's sort of difficult thinking while she's staring like that, sort of really difficult. What should he do? What does she want? What does she expect?

"Hi."

He was so smooth.

Neaera looks confused by this response. She had asked to see the shaman and had received a greeting? Perhaps...
"You are the shaman?" She asks. This man looks nothing like one but everything else looks nothing like it is supposed to as well.