We did the PR thing.
There was even a pretty big ship in the background, so it worked out for the pictures.
Emily made a speech about the city entering an era of new hope and possibility, and we all politely forgot that this city is still full of Nazi's and thanks to the new gangs, the number of villains actually went up, if anything.
Then she cut the ribbon and 'opened the bay to new possibilities!'… or something cheesy like that.
Still, Lung and Oni-Lee were a particularly scary combo before they got a tinker, so the situation certainly feels better, if nothing else.
Plus, fireworks are always nice.
Albus even taught me a firework spell, just for that PR event.
…
In other news, I found out that Albus and Tenkō no Tomo found out about the building where my new Lab is at St. Andrews and decided to move in there.
I guess Dragon owns the building and doesn't care about it beyond that her Mech's are left alone, so it works out.
Asuka says she wants the clan to have a territory of its own… but like a heroic one, I guess.
Not protection or anything, but Albus's shack was just a house, and the Building in an area already pretty well covered by the Guild.
But the lab at St. Andrews is a whole base, and in an area with minor importance to a whole region, but no real defenders aside from a mostly theoretical effort on Dragon's part.
So, I authorized them to use any of the cash they'd gotten, plus 100k, which is most of what I've gotten from the money gathering perk, to fortify the Passamaquoddy Bay on my behalf.
It all seemed kinda larp-ish, but I guess Tenkō no Tomo is theoretically a Feudal Clan in service to a Feudal-Lord… aka me.
So, I'm giving them resources in order to protect an area that will be de facto mine in Cape terms.
What with NOVA-HQ 30 minutes away, and my vassal's HQ there, and it being my lab and the storage house of one of my allies.
The whole thing feels kind of strange, but within a few days, I've gone from having never heard of Saint-Andrews, New Brunswick, Canada, to being its Lady-Protector.
Still, everyone agrees that it was basically a sitting duck, being kind of important, but undefended with NOVA-HQ nearby, but still far enough to let villains get away if needed.
Plus, almost everyone agrees that something needed to be there, so it might as well be my personal base, to be looked after by the clan when I'm not around.
…
The St. Andrews thing might have been just in time, too, because a NOVA squad got pictures of Lung fighting a local gang already… in Saint John, New Brunswick.
He barely moved!
Just left the bay for a slightly smaller city nearby.
Hell, it probably would've been St Stephen where the new NOVA-HQ is if that town were a bit bigger!
He literally just found the first port city out of Emily's jurisdiction with more than 50k people in it and set down!
Well, fine, if he does end up settling there (and we don't hear about him getting in a fight somewhere else soon), then I guess it becomes NOVA's job to keep him from really becoming it's King.
What with NOVA-HQ and My Lab only being about an hour away, making us the nearest parahuman support for that poor little Guild Department.
I mean, he was stalemating the BB-Protectorate for years, and E88 at its strongest!
There's no way the locals will be able to keep up…
Spoiler: New Brunswick MapLast edited: Dec 7, 2025 Like Quote ReplyReport Reactions:Andre Chaos and AraurlisOblationDec 5, 2025Reader modeAdd bookmark Threadmarks Threadmarks 95: Friday, July 8st - Starting in New Brunswick Threadmarks OblationProfessional Wet-Paint ObserverDec 5, 2025Add bookmark#101Welp.
Lung is here to stay, and so am I.
---
We've started to build up NOVA in this area around Maine and New Brunswick.
The dream of all of New England and The Maritimes is still a thing, with a few teams still expanding in Vermont and Nova Scotia, but mostly we're a Maine/New-Brunswick organization for now.
As part of that, I tested a bunch of people and handed out the last few non-master Powers I could from Ars magica.
But the best of them was probably Team Leader Valerez, who got Creo-Animal, and Rachel, who got Muto-Animal.
Rachel is over the moon with healing and shapeshifting her dogs, and is willing to put up with the pseudo dog projections Valerez makes now.
---
Albus has been buying up little chunks of land to put outposts in, so we can hopefully make some kind of Rapid Response over to Saint John if needed.
Plus, some of the middle-aged members of The Clan have been seeking out positions in different towns in the area, so we start to integrate and keep an eye on New Brunswick fully rather than just the surface-level stuff they'd been doing.
So far, the main areas that were focused on, other than Saint Andrews itself are that unfortunately placed Nuclear Power Plant and Eastport, Maine.
Eastport is in a similar position as Saint Andrews, except for the part where someone blew up its docks a few decades ago as part of some final showdown between a hero and villain.
Still, its been long enough since then that its a somewhat important local port for the US side of the Border now.
---
On my end, I've mostly just been making a low-key version of my good boots for the clan and a more thematic one for NOVA employees. Plus a bit of armor when I've got the Mana to spare, now that the first iteration of the Wards-armor is mostly done.
Along with using the Money perk on different towns every day to get a feel for the area, and to collect more cash for operations.
Especially since it's been pointed out that Mr. Graham's not a cape.
So there's nothing illegal about him investing in stable stocks to use the dividends like an operations fund for the stuff NOVA can get from the Perk-Generated funds each employee is paid from.
It's been really busy between the different creations, the way school has been ramping up in the hopes of getting me into Online High School this August, and the setup now that NOVA has an A-Class threat to keep an eye on.
…
The roll is great, though I really wish I'd rolled it before all the paperwork for managing NOVA we've all been doing.
Still, team leads and COs will be very nice and hopefully decrease the amount of crap that gets sent upstairs by the grunts.
Home Office - Library of Ruina
Base Cost: 500cp
Lore & Details:
The City is a sprawling corporate meat grinder where miracles, monsters, and body mods are just part of the urban budget.
You work as a Fixer, a licensed problem solver who takes contracts for anything that normal people or even syndicates are too scared, too fragile, or too politically exposed to touch.
Every Fixer belongs to an Office and lives and dies by its grade, starting as disposable grade nine fodder and clawing their way up toward the rare high-grade elites who can clash with Wings and urban legends.
Your life is paperwork, debt, and spectacular violence, and every job is a gamble where the payout might buy you better gear and status or just pay for someone else to mop what is left of you off the pavement.
---
You've come into possession of an Office, an entirely independent one. Currently, it's staffed by a modest company of extremely loyal Fixers who are equally adept at administrative work and the sanctioned violence expected of them.
You have 25 points.
A Grade 1 is 13 points
A Grade 2 is 11 points
A Grade 3 is 9 points
A Grade 4 is 7 points
A Grade 5 is 5 points
A Grade 6 is 4 points
A Grade 7 is 3 points
A Grade 8 is 2 points
And you have as many Grade 9s as you have points to spend.
Addons:
-50cp All new employees include confirmable backgrounds and a fund to pay them so long as they stay in your service.
-0cp More Staff 1: +25 points, but no Grades above 5.
-50cp More Staff 2 (Requires MS1): +25 Points, but no Grades above 6.
-100cp More Staff 3 (Requires MS1+2): +25 Points, but no Grades above 7.
-150cp More Staff 4 (Requires MS1-3): +25 Points, but no Grades above 8.
-200cp More Staff 5 (Requires MS1-4): +25 Points, but no Grades above 9.
-500cp +14 Points, no strings attached.
-500cp All Grade 1s are now Colors.
Final Cost: -850cp
Bank: 1200cp
I wish I knew what a Grade 1 meant, but the memories have got nothing here, and since that could be 13 new NOVA members, I just can't risk it…
Luckily, I've got the points for most of the "More Staff" options, so I'm sending 25 Raymond's way, since Firewatch has been taking on a bunch of roles, beyond just bodyguarding me.
I was tempted to make it 50, but I just can't help but remember how much 200 has gotten in the past, so I held back.
So, NOVA just got 100 members who can do admin and fighting!
We're really starting to feel like proper law enforcement at this point…
Spoiler: A/NLast edited: Dec 7, 2025 Like Quote ReplyReport Reactions:anirocksOblationDec 5, 2025Reader modeAdd bookmark Threadmarks Extras Celestial Saga: Lore - Chapter 4: Saga's Earth-Bet's Version of the Movie "UP" ExtrasOblationProfessional Wet-Paint ObserverDec 5, 2025Add bookmark#102Opening. Carl launches his balloon house. Emotional impact: curiosity about why this old man is so determined and attached to his home.
Russell arrives on the porch. Emotional impact: humor and confusion as a cheerful kid crashes into the story and contrasts sharply with Carl.
Early flight scenes. Emotional impact: light adventure and wonder, with the sense that Carl might be warming up despite himself.
First flashback. Young Ellie dragging shy Carl into her clubhouse. Emotional impact: recognition that Russell's energy mirrors someone important from Carl's past.
Arrival in the wilderness. Emotional impact: excitement and discovery as the world opens up.
Meeting the giant bird. Emotional impact: joy and chaos as the cast grows and begins to feel like a found family.
A wedding flashback triggered by the bonding moment. Emotional impact: warmth and celebration, showing the foundation of Carl's happiest years.
Meeting the talking dog. Emotional impact: humor and delight, reinforcing the growing group dynamic.
Early marriage flashback with the adopted dog. Emotional impact: domestic comfort and emotional grounding.
Exploration continues with signs of danger growing. Emotional impact: rising tension without losing the sense of adventure.
Flashback to financial strain and the smashed Adventure Fund jar. Emotional impact: quiet disappointment and the realization that dreams were delayed.
Storm or villain interference destroys the house. Emotional impact: shock and loss as the symbolic heart of Carl's life disappears.
Hospital flashback. Ellie in bed and grieving. Emotional impact: realization that the house represented more than nostalgia and that the dream was tied to her well-being.
Comic relief moment with the dog yelling "Squirrel". Emotional impact: release of tension and a brief return to laughter.
Present cheer up scene as Russell and the animals lift Carl's spirits. Emotional impact: emotional rebound and a growing sense of purpose.
Flashback of Carl cheering up Ellie with plans to travel to Paradise Falls. Emotional impact: direct narrative connection between Carl and Russell for the first time, showing Carl stepping into a supportive role.
Group shifts to actively seeking the blimp. Emotional impact: increased focus and determination, replacing aimless wandering.
Flashback of renewed travel plans. Emotional impact: hope rising again in both timelines.
The discovery that the blimp is the villain's base. Emotional impact: shock and escalation of danger.
Capture of the bird and dog. Emotional impact: heartbreak and fear of failure.
Flashback of Ellie collapsing during attempted recovery, followed by her funeral. Emotional impact: full emotional crash and clarity about Carl's grief.
Carl chooses action without needing encouragement. Emotional impact: character growth as he embraces connection and purpose on his own.
Third arc rescue and airship battle. Emotional impact: triumphant adventure payoff.
Capture of the blimp and adoption of it as the new home. Emotional impact: closure and a hopeful future built on new bonds rather than clinging to the past. Like Quote ReplyReport Reactions:anirocksOblationDec 5, 2025Reader modeAdd bookmark ExtrasThreadmarks 96: Saturday, July 9th - Perk List Threadmarks OblationProfessional Wet-Paint ObserverDec 5, 2025Add bookmark#103One of the Ninjas who got a job as a manager at a canning factory has been making friends with a family who live right down the road from the Nuclear power plant.
I guess it's a big enough deal that it has its own history of villain attacks.
Which is lucky since apparently the ABB has already been sniffing around.
It's all the more reason to have people in the area, if only to keep Lung's people away.
---
For myself, I've been looking into the local area and the points of interest where NOVA will likely need to focus our defence.
So far, what I've found is:
1. Point Lepreau Nuclear Generating Station - The big target
2. Trivium Packaging Canada - less important, but isolated and would hurt the locals a lot to lose it.
3. Charlotte County Hospital - Near NOVA HQ
4. A.F. Theriault & Son's Fish Boat Factory - A large part of why St. Andrews is a regional port, and the others aren't.
5. The Ganong Chocolate Factory & Museum - Near NOVA HQ
6. St. Croix River's Hydroelectric Milltown Dam - Important but no known villains particularly close to it.
And a few that were going to need to hope the Guild can defend.
Because even if we went straight over, our response time would still be like an hour, unless it's small enough for me to deal with on my own.
1. Irving Oil - Multiple locations, all vulnerable to villain attacks.
2. Saint John & Saint Joseph Regional Hospital - Multiple locations, all vulnerable to villain attacks.
3. Port Saint John, New Brunswick, Canada - Largest Port in The Maritimes, and it's just as vulnerable as the one in BB, but would be MUCH more devastating if it were blocked off.
4. Saint John Airport - A bit further away, but still a concern.
---
The perk this time was pretty helpful, even if it's a bit low-key.
If nothing else, I can finally show people what it's like to roll, so long as I remember to keep them away from that damned powers list and its revealing of my secrets.
Celestial Grimoire - The Celestial System
Base Cost: -25cp
Lore & Details:
The Celestial Grimoire isn't written, it is grown.
A living book that grows new pages whenever it's chosen dares to ask the universe a question.
Every page is a bargain, inked in starlight on one side and in quiet personal cost on the other.
It whispers patterns, designs, spells, and devices that have never existed before, yet each revelation pulls its wielder a little further from the life they once knew.
Those who bear it do not just learn, they are rewritten until they match the Grimoire's Glory.
---
A self-updating list of all your accepted perks.
Includes a summary of the Perk, the date it was accepted, and the CP cost. Also allows you to refer back to the exact wording of any Perk and to have a physical object to interact with for rolling and considering new perks.
Addons:
-0cp Standard Stranger and Recall-Function for the Celestial Grimoire
Final Cost: -25cp
Bank: 525cpLast edited: Dec 7, 2025 Like Quote ReplyReport Reactions:anirocksOblationDec 5, 2025Reader modeAdd bookmark Threadmarks Threadmarks 97: Sunday, July 10th - Ethen/Assault Interlude - Movie Night Threadmarks OblationProfessional Wet-Paint ObserverDec 5, 2025Add bookmark#104Spoiler: Alternate Up Outline
Movie nights on their days together kind of grew in sideways, and Ethan never really remembered when they had officially become a thing, only that sometime in the last few months Saga stopped standing by the door the whole time and started actually sitting down while the movie played.
The apartment showed clear signs of a full evening already, with pizza boxes pushed to one end of the table, soda cans clustered like little monuments, and Missy's math notebook half open on the chair near the hallway where she had clearly abandoned it the second Ethan had said they were done.
The only light in the room came from the TV and from the dull glow of the city sliding in through the window, which made the whole space feel smaller and warmer than it usually did.
He sat in the middle of the couch like always, partly because the girls liked that and partly because it let him reach things without getting up, one hand still holding the remote loosely, the other resting along the back of the cushions.
Elene owned the right corner, tucked into it with her feet up and a blanket over her legs, hair pulled back in a way that meant she had written off the possibility of leaving the house again tonight.
Missy parked herself between Ethan and the coffee table, cross legged, popcorn bowl in front of her like a tiny fort, another blanket draped over her shoulders.
Saga had taken the old spare armchair by the window, the one that was technically just furniture but had become hers by habit, and she sat in it with her socks still on and her arms folded, close enough to be part of the shape of the group while still clearly separate.
The movie was already running, no logos or menus left, just the old man in his tiny house doing the same morning routine with the same grumpy determination, and Ethan watched him bang his cane against the floor and adjust his glasses and felt that little uncomfortable twist of recognition sit in his chest.
He thought briefly that if any of them pointed that out he might actually walk out just to make a point, then admitted to himself that he probably would not, because the couch was comfortable and the kid leaning against his side was warm and he was tired from the day.
Elene's face was calm but not blank, the way it got when she was watching people more than plot, and he could tell from the way her eyes tracked the old man's movements that she was already locked in.
Missy was doing her usual thing, staring like the TV might quiz her later, mouth moving as she silently repeated parts of the boyscout's little speech about helping seniors, probably editing it in her head into something she thought would actually work better.
She had been the favored one in her old house, showered with toys and treats every time she made a noise, so watching a kid work this hard to be helpful hit somewhere strange in her, halfway between admiration and confusion.
Saga sat back in the armchair with that not quite relaxed posture that said she was here because she had chosen to be here, not because she trusted the situation yet.
The old man yelling at workers and the kid falling off the porch did not get much of a reaction from her, maybe a little tightening at the corner of her mouth when the old man snapped, but that could just have been annoyance.
Her parents had saved their soft voices and gentle faces for Missy, and for Saga they had kept the sharp looks and the tones that cut, so old people being snappish on screen probably slid off her defenses most of the time.
When the first flashback hit, the one with the little boy stepping into that broken down clubhouse, Ethan shifted his attention away from the screen on purpose and watched his people instead.
The little girl in the movie swung in on a rope and started talking about adventure and the wilderness and all the things she would do, and Missy lit up like someone had flipped a switch, eyes wide, face softening, body leaning forward without her realizing it.
That kind of wild freedom and that kind of fearless joy had never really been encouraged for her either, because her parents had been too busy buying her things to really watch who she was, and seeing it on screen clearly scratched some itch in her.
Elene smiled, not a big grin, just this small real curve of the mouth that said the energy of the kid on screen reminded her of a younger Missy or maybe a younger version of herself that never got to run around like that.
Her thumb rubbed slowly over the back of Ethan's hand where it rested near her hip, and he realized she had tangled their fingers together somewhere in the last few minutes without him noticing exactly when it happened.
He squeezed back a little and she did not pull away, which still felt like a win even after all the years they had been doing this.
Saga watched that clubhouse scene with a different kind of focus, and Ethan saw the way her eyes went sharp when the girl showed off her scrapbook full of places and dreams and big hopes that had clearly been there for a long time.
Saga's childhood had come with rules and punishments and long stretches of being ignored until someone needed someone to yell at, not scrapbooks and words like someday and we will go there together, so that scene probably hit her less like nostalgia and more like a catalog of things she never got.
He saw one of her fingers start tapping against the arm of the chair, quick and nervous, then stop dead when she noticed it.
The balloons lifted the house into the sky, bright colors throwing moving shadows across their living room, sliding over the pizza boxes and the framed photos and the old lamp they kept meaning to replace.
Ethan watched the old man's face shift from anger to something like quiet joy as the house cleared the cityscape, and he felt his own chest loosen a hair in response, which annoyed him more than he could explain.
He checked the girls again instead of thinking about it.
Missy leaned just that bit more against his arm as the house drifted through clouds, her fingers tightening on the edge of the blanket, eyes wide with the kind of wonder he wished she got to have more often.
She had spent too much of her childhood in the back seats of cars going from one appointment to another, one activity to another, or hiding in corners when her parents' parties got too loud, so simple wonder still felt like borrowed clothing sometimes.
Elene had that look she got whenever a story teased the idea of choosing your own path, a kind of hopeful sadness that he had seen on her face in real hospital rooms and at real funerals.
Saga's shoulders dropped a little during the balloon flight, barely noticeable, but enough that Ethan could tell the constant fight or flight tension in her had eased one notch.
She had never had a house that felt like a safe place, much less one that could pick up and leave when the world got too loud, so maybe there was something in the image that worked for her, even if she refused to smile about it.
The jungle scenes came in with the weird bird and the dog, and the whole tone shifted around them in the room.
Missy actually barked out a laugh when the bird knocked the kid over and tried to eat his chocolate, then clapped a hand over her mouth out of old habit before remembering nobody was going to tell her to hush here.
Elene giggled more quietly, shoulders shaking once, and even let a soft snort escape when the talking dog introduced himself, which made Ethan grin because he always liked it when she forgot to be composed for five seconds.
Saga's mouth twitched upward at the bird, the tiniest tug, almost more of a memory of a smile than the real thing, and Ethan caught it because he had been watching.
Her eyes crinkled just slightly when the dog started talking about his collar and how he was a good dog, and for a few seconds she looked less like a kid waiting for the floor to drop out from under her and more like a teenager who just genuinely liked that the dog was stupid and kind.
She caught herself, though, and the expression smoothed away, arms folding tighter, body pulling back into the safe habits.
Then the movie swung back into one of those flashbacks again, and the wedding rolled in all at once, and the air in the apartment went softer just like before, even though nobody said a word.
The couple from the clubhouse, older now, dressed up, nervous and smiling on that little hill surrounded by people who loved them and wanted to see them happy, and the music swelling in that way that was simple and honest.
Elene's fingers tightened on his as the vows started, and Ethan let his thumb rub slow circles over the back of her hand, feeling the tiny tremor there even while her face stayed mostly calm.
She had never really had an easy clean family backdrop for their own marriage either, family who did not quite get capes, coworkers who thought marrying a colleague was asking for trouble, higher ups who saw them as a scheduling nightmare waiting to happen.
Watching a wedding where nothing went wrong and nobody scowled felt like a weird kind of fantasy even beyond the talking dogs and floating houses.
Missy watched that scene like she was trying to memorize it, eyes shining, mouth parted, blanket nearly slipping off one shoulder.
Her parents had loved to throw parties, big loud ones with too much food and not enough boundaries, but the tenderness on screen had never once shown up in her kitchen or living room growing up.
When the cartoon couple sat together on their little couch afterward, eating cake from a shared plate and looking at their new home like it was the best thing in the world, she inhaled sharply, as if the idea of affection that quiet hurt as much as it healed.
Saga's expression did something tight and strange during the wedding montage, and Ethan knew that look from the times he had pushed too hard and hit some landmine by mistake.
There was anger there, and something like grief, and also this flat kind of disbelief, because everything on screen screamed this is normal, this is how it should be, and that had never been her normal.
Her parents' idea of family had been control and punishment and turning her into a problem every time she breathed wrong, and watching a world where a kid like the bride had grown into someone loved for all her loudness and strangeness was probably getting under her skin more than any tragic plot point.
As the story moved through the years for that cartoon couple, showing them fixing up the house, working, laughing, hitting those slow and fast patches, the reactions in the living room stayed out of synch in a way that made sense.
Missy winced slightly when the couple argued and then worked it out without anyone getting screamed at or belittled, because that was not how fights usually ended in her old house.
Elene smiled softly at the little quiet moments, hands brushing, inside jokes, weather reports that meant more than the words, because she recognized those from their own life.
Saga stared hardest at the scenes where disappointment landed and nobody blamed the wrong person for it, and Ethan could see her trying to process that concept like a foreign language.
Then came the storm, and the crashing, and the moment the house really broke, and even though Ethan knew it was coming this time, his body still reacted like he was in some beat up transport again.
He felt himself lean forward, like he could take some of the hit with his own shoulders, and when the house finally fell and scraped and lay ruined, something behind his ribs punched outward in a way he did not enjoy.
His eyes burned, and he told himself he could just blink it off, but one tear slipped anyway, hot and annoying on his cheek.
He swore under his breath, not quite loud enough for anyone to call him on it, and lifted his hand to wipe it away.
Before his fingers reached his skin, the air on the rug in front of him rippled, and a large grey shape pushed through.
The wolf appeared in that quiet way they always did, one second nothing, next second big body, thick fur, long legs, claws tapping lightly against the wood under the rug.
Its eyes went to Saga first, just for a heartbeat, and Ethan saw the way Saga's gaze met it, sharp and focused, the same way she looked at incoming threats on a mission.
For a long time, these wolves had only ever walked up to Saga herself, or to Missy, when those two cried, and even then only after Saga allowed it.
This time the animal flicked its attention from her down to Ethan instead, and then moved toward him without waiting for any hand gesture or spoken word.
That tiny shift told him more than any speech would have.
The wolf sat in front of him, solid and warm and way bigger up close than on nature shows, and it pressed its broad head against his knee with a kind of stubborn patience.
Ethan stared at it for a second, feeling his heart beat a little too fast, then dropped his free hand into its fur because not doing that would have been weird at that point.
The coat was thick and surprisingly soft, and the simple weight of the animal leaning into him grounded him faster than any breathing exercise he had ever been told to try.
He lifted his eyes to Saga again and saw that she had not ordered it away.
Her shoulders were tense and her jaw tight, but she watched him and the wolf with this small wary softness that he did not see often.
She could have called the animal back with just a thought if she wanted, he had seen it happen before when strangers were around, but she did not.
For the first time, she was letting this strange comforting part of her power reach past herself and Missy and touch the adults too, and that meant something she probably would never admit.
Then the hospital scene started, and the whole tone of the room dropped right along with the movie.
The wife on screen lay in that too bright bed with too white sheets, and the old man sat beside her like the ground would fall away if he stood up.
The sounds in the apartment shrank down to the movie audio and the quiet breathing of four people trying to keep it together.
Elene made a small broken noise when the camera caught the look on the wife's face, that mix of tired and apologetic and still loving, and tears jumped to her eyes so fast it looked like someone had turned on a faucet.
She had sat through too many meetings with doctors and too many calls from hospitals over the years, for teammates and for kids and most often for him, and this scene poked straight at that.
Her eyes overflowed, and tears ran down her cheeks, and she did not hide them, but she did press her hand hard against her mouth for a second, like she did not want to scare anyone with the sound.
Ethan squeezed her fingers tighter, shifting his knee so the wolf's head bumped her ankle a little, because he wanted her to feel that weight too.
The air by her feet shimmered then, and a second grey wolf padded out into the room, just as real as the first.
This one also glanced at Saga for that tiny instant, checking the source, and the girl in the chair gave another small nod, almost grudging but still clear.
The wolf moved around the coffee table carefully, then lowered its heavy head onto Elene's lap, laying it there so that she could feel the warm pressure and fling her free hand into its fur without searching.
Elene did exactly that, fingers diving into the soft coat, clutching like she might fall over if she did not hold onto something.
Tears kept rolling down her face, not dramatic, but steady and honest, and she murmured something into the wolf's fur that Ethan did not catch, maybe just his name, maybe a thank you that she was not about to direct at Saga out loud.
The important part was that Saga sat and watched and did not pull the comfort back, letting the wolves stay where they were.
Missy's breathing had gone shallow and quick by then, and she was visibly fighting with herself, trying to decide if she was allowed to cry at a cartoon or if that made her silly.
Her own childhood had taught her that crying made adults annoyed or made them throw trinkets and treats at her as a distraction, never that it brought anyone close with no agenda.
Watching Elene cry without hiding and watching wolves appear just for that pain scrambled all her old rules.
Her mouth trembled, and her eyes finally filled all the way, and when one tear slipped and then another, the wolf between Ethan and the coffee table shifted its body sideways on its own.
It pressed against her shins too now, sharing that solid weight between them.
Missy blinked, looked down, then let out a little shuddering breath and put both hands into the fur like she had been waiting for permission to collapse.
Saga had not shed a tear yet, but by now her eyes were bright, and the line of her mouth was all wrong for indifference.
She had never seen real illness in her family handled with gentle care, only ignored pain or snapped commands to toughen up, so seeing a partner choosing to sit and hold hands and share that burden felt unreal in a way she had not prepared for.
The fact that the wolves were comforting the adults, that she had let that happen, meant she was watching the scene from somewhere closer than she would ever admit willingly.
The dog yelled about squirrels, and the tension cracked, just like it always did, and the room let out a breath in different ways.
Missy did that messy laugh sob hybrid that kids do when their emotions are way too full, and wiped at her face with the back of her hand while still clutching the wolf.
Elene snorted mid sob and then laughed because the timing was absurd and cruel and kind all at once.
Even Saga let a rough breath out that could almost be a laugh, and shook her head, which for her was a lot.
As the story climbed back into movement, with the old man deciding to keep going and try to fix things, the wolves stayed put, holding their positions like seasoned support officers.
They were not draining Saga, Ethan could tell, because her posture was still tense in a normal way and there were no signs of the faint sagging he had seen after big power uses.
This was not a physical cost for her, it was an emotional choice.
She was sitting there and letting the manifestations of her strange power born gift sit at the feet of two people who were not her and not Missy, and that was new.
When the movie twisted again later and the blimp was revealed as the villain's home and the bird and the dog were taken, the whole apartment went still.
Missy flinched hard, because losing something bright and fun that quickly pressed the same button the social worker meetings had, and her hands tightened around the wolf's fur.
Elene pressed her lips together, tears mostly done but anger now joining the mix.
Ethan felt that familiar old protective anger flare, the same one that came out whenever someone took something from kids just because they could.
Then the last big flashback arrived, and Ellie collapsed on screen, and that was what finally broke Saga's fragile hold.
She made this low sound that he almost missed, a half breath and half curse, and then tears flooded her eyes and spilled over so fast she had no chance of catching them first.
She tried anyway, dragging her palm across her face, but they kept coming, tracking down over skin that was never allowed to look like that in her parents' house.
Her shoulders hunched forward slightly, a posture he only ever saw when something cut very close to her own memories.
The floor near her blurred again, and a third wolf stepped into the room, already looking at her like it had been waiting its turn.
This one did not glance back at anyone else first, it went directly to Saga, then pressed its head against the side of her leg.
Saga froze for a heartbeat, then let out a breath that shuddered and dropped her hand onto the animal's head, fingers curling deep into the fur.
For once she did not shove the tears away, did not snap at the wolf or at anyone, she just cried quietly into the space between them while the movie walked the old man through the funeral.
It hit Missy even harder to see her sister like that and to see the wolf at her side, and she started crying again, softer now but more constant, her empathy spinning up on full speed.
The wolf in front of the couch bore it calmly, letting her clutch at its fur while still keeping its shoulder pressed hard against Ethan's shin.
Elene 's tears picked up again too, though not as violently as before, like a tide that had gone out and now came back to reach one last line on the sand.
Ethan sat there with his hand buried in wolf fur and his other hand still wrapped around Elene's, and tried to wrap his own mind around what had just happened.
For months, maybe longer, he had watched Saga's wolves come for Missy whenever she got overwhelmed, and sometimes for Saga herself, and never once for him or for Elene, even on the nights where he knew they had gone to bed with their own eyes burning.
He had figured that was a boundary she was not ready to cross, that in her head the wolves were for the kids and for herself only, because letting them comfort the adults would mean accepting that this mess of a situation was something like a family.
Tonight had blown that line wide open without any speeches or agreements.
A wolf had come for him when his throat had closed up at the house crashing down, and another had come for Elene in that hospital scene, and both had checked with Saga first before settling, and she had said yes.
Quietly, without words, she had accepted that they were part of her circle, at least for this couch, this room, this night.
When the old man on the screen finally stood up after the funeral and decided to keep going, promising the kid they were going to get their people back, Ethan felt that line land in the room like a marker being put down.
He watched Saga lift her head and wipe her face with the heel of her hand, watched Missy lean a little toward her, watched Elene straighten her spine and breathe deeper again.
The wolves stayed a while longer while the movie turned loud and silly and triumphant, then faded one by one as everyone settled.
When the credits finally rolled and the TV light softened, Saga was the first to move, which was normal because she always had a clock in her head for when she needed to be gone.
She scrubbed at her eyes once more, then pushed herself up out of the chair, joints cracking faintly in the quiet room.
Usually at this point she would grab her bag, and be halfway to the door before anyone could try emotional anything.
Tonight she paused beside the coffee table first, glancing at Elene and Ethan and Missy in turn, and the look she gave them was tired and raw but not closed.
The wolves were gone, no paws, no fur, just a bit of shed hair on the rug, but their presence still hung there in the same air.
Ethan met her eyes and did not say a thing, because anything he tried would probably turn into something too big for this moment.
"See you next week" Saga sent in the IRC, and the way she sent it made it sound less like checking and more like staking a claim on the time.
"Yeah," Ethan answered, keeping it simple because adding more would have been too much, "same time, same couch, same terrible snacks."
Missy nodded quickly, clutching the blanket, and Elene gave a small smile that said she had heard the real question in that line and was answering yes to that as well.
Saga looked at them all one more time, then grabbed her jacket from the back of the chair and headed for the door, shoulders not quite as tight as when she had arrived.
Ethan listened to the soft click when the door closed behind her and sat there for a second longer, the room smelling faintly like popcorn and city air and something wild that always lingered a little after the wolves left.
He knew she was going back to a place that still did not feel like home yet, and he knew Missy would probably message her before bed anyway, and he knew that letting the wolves help the grown-ups had cost Saga something pride shaped even if it had not tired her power.
He squeezed Elene's hand once more and bumped his shoulder against Missy's, and decided that whatever exactly they were building here, it was real enough that even a girl raised on cruelty and suspicion was beginning to lean into it.
For a weekly movie night at the end of a long day, that felt like more than he had any right to ask for.
Chapter TextSo… something really weird is going on with the perks.
It's been in the back of my head that nobody's commented on how familiar some of the perks are. Like, taken directly from Aleph imports or sometimes directly from things that exist in media here on Bet, like Star Wars.
But nobody's brought it up and I just kinda moved on without thinking about it… until I actually showed them a roll, and watched in real time as Emily glaised over the source.
Emily is WAY too good at attention to detail to do that, much less on an important detail like this, but when the perk explains where it's from, she (and everyone else) just kinda… skim past it.
And I mean EVERYONE!
Even Angeles and Dragon couldn't figure out what I was trying to get them to see.
The only silver lining is that I guess when you look crazy enough, they don't put you in M/S, they just call it Powers BS and move on:
---
Oh, and I don't normally include the reject perks, but since it was relevant, what with having a bunch of people read it, I'll include this one:
What I see:
Visage of Terror - God of War
Base Cost: -50cp
Lore & Details:
In God of War, there is a man who once broke a pantheon and now tries to break his own rage. The woods know his name even when he will not speak it. Old gods stir. New gods whisper. The father walks. The son learns. The world breathes around them as if afraid to wake something deeper.
---
Your form hijacks the primitive fear centers in anyone who sees you so hard that dislike gets overwritten by raw panic and obedience.
Addons:
N/A
Final Cost: -50cp
Bank: 1100cp
What others see:
Visage of Terror
There is a man who once broke a pantheon and now tries to break his own rage. The woods know his name even when he will not speak it. Old gods stir. New gods whisper. The father walks. The son learns. The world breathes around them as if afraid to wake something deeper.
Your form hijacks the primitive fear centers in anyone who sees you so hard that dislike gets overwritten by raw panic and obedience.
-50cp
I also got a perk that I accepted, which inspired the rest of the day.
SCP 1425 - SCP Foundation
Base Cost: -150cp
Lore & Details:
The Foundation's basically a cosmic janitorial squad keeping the weird stuff from licking the planet. Most days, it's babysitting a smug toaster or bribing a duck that refuses to die. Sometimes the interns whisper. Sometimes the walls do. Nobody asks questions because questions bite. Everyone still clocks in since the alternative is letting the anomalies out of HR.
---
For 1 hour per day, you can create stories of impossibly fantastic quality, so long as they include some sort of subliminal message.
Addons:
-50cp 2 Hours per day.
-100cp 3 Hours per day.
-150cp 4 Hours per day.
-200cp 5 Hours per day.
-250cp 6 Hours per day.
Final Cost: -200cp
Bank: 1100cp
So… I might not have told them about the additions once I knew they couldn't see them.
At the time, this was mainly just because I didn't want to get assigned to make PR slogans super effective for 5 hours a day.
(Plus, I was right, immediately after this, they made me post something under the official accounts of a bunch of heroes with the subliminal message of "I'm trustworthy and likeable.")
But the sneaky idea that occurred to me was this power's potential for chaos.
My first idea was to reinforce that old "Assault and Battery are siblings" meme, but that's a bit mean for people who've been really decent lately.
But thinking of people whose opinion of me doesn't matter, I asked Vicky if she was dating Dean currently and after the rant was done I asked if she could give me a list of the times he had done that 4-D chess trick of his by having "Gallant," (aka someone wearing his armor) show up at a charity event run by his family.
(It's 4-D chess because it helps Dean, but also counts for Gallant's PR duties simultaneously somehow.)
So list in hand, I slammed together 5 chapters of an actually pretty tame Dean/Gallant smutfic, but made sure to line it up with the dates and times of the actual events and had it as a romance in the backstage moments at these events.
Now, I'm no stranger to Capefic, I don't think anyone who's entered an Earth-Bet middle school in the past decade is.
But usually writing even ok, stuff takes time, so slamming out 8k and 5 chapters in an hour and a half was a really wild experience for me.
Practically an out-of-body experience, what with how I just kept focusing on the subliminal message, yet the fic kept getting written at lightning speed.
That message:
"This really happened."
Good luck Dean… XD
Spoiler: Question for ReadersLast edited: Dec 7, 2025 Like Quote ReplyReportOblationDec 7, 2025Reader modeAdd bookmark Threadmarks Threadmarks 99: Saturday, July 16th - Ode to Brandish Threadmarks OblationProfessional Wet-Paint ObserverDec 7, 2025Add bookmark#107So Vicky found out about the new power and apparently made up with Dean in the meantime.
I took the fic down, but it seems I underestimated just how popular supernaturaly good fanfiction would be since it was back up in a bunch of copies within the hour.
Vicky seems to think I should be using the power for "good."
That was all fine up until she got to brainstorming, and we realised the difference in our definitions of "good".
My definition leans more towards what I would call Chaotic Good, whereas Vicky leans a bit more towards a Lawful Good.
Not Lawful as in US Law, but lawfully as in, she has a moral code and thinks those who break it, regardless of whether they have a different code, should be treated as evil.
Specifically, she wanted me to make a fic to convince people that Triumph's Cousin was a psycho and shouldn't be trusted.
This actually became a whole thing and was the first time I really used my "Queen" title on the IRC since I ended up muting everyone in the Wards Chat (including mods like Vicky) for an hour and just pinned a comment saying that, like it or not, I'm not going beyond pranks on comrades.
Even when said comrades are across the country, and maybe or maybe not got your Mom killed unnecessarily.
That said, Vicky (and Eric, who had joined in) are my friends, so I ended up putting 5 hours over the last 3 days to make a full "life of Brandish" biography Speaker For The Dead style with her "technically not a murder" at the end in plain sight with exactly zero obfuscation of who did it.
(Well, her cape name, I'm not gonna out her and go to jail, but I put her cape name in plain English, and mentioned her signing up and getting forced to her new city immediately afterward.)
I guess there's some kind of politics going on in the Protectorate and PRT about my eulogy, but all I've seen of it was a crying hug from Vicky and Emily telling me that, while disapproved of by national PR, it was an unfortunate necessity for team cohesion, so she'd made sure I wouldn't get any blowback.
---
Oh, and as a pallot clensor after all the drama and biographing I've been doing, I wrote up the first few chapters of my Archer's Bridge Merchants fanfic.
I honestly couldn't think of a way to make fun of them, so in the end I decided to do the opposite in the hopes it'll make the real thing seem even more sad.
Specifically, in this hypothetical world, the gang is actually a psy-op for a shadowy cabal/Illuminati-type group that I'll work out the details of later.
So, as a result of this, each member is actually some kind of hyper-competent black-ops agent type whose role as bottom of the bottom-of-the-barrel gangster is actually a super detailed act designed to slide them under the radar as they slowly expand the reach and strategic control of the Illuminati.
It's early days, but the idea is that the Illuminati doesn't actually want to rule the world directly.
They just want to puppet it, so they set up a series of groups that control some of every city so that they can exert wide-scale influence on entire regions at a time.
The only real question for now is if I decide to go hard or soft with it.
Going soft would be a fun SCP-style Illuminati that's just barely hanging on to its influence with the changing world of parahumans.
Going hard though…
Cauldron.
Like straight up, Dr. Mother, Contessa, and the rest, and I just mask off Culdron and see what happens.
I mean, it's REALLY risky, but if I'm trying to use this power against Evil, I can't really think of a bigger one than Culdron, save for something like Ziz.
But everyone knows she's evil, while Culdron is still basically just a meme, for all the damage they've done to people like Weld and my new teammate, Elisa.
I am REALLY tempted…
Spoiler: Question for Readers Like Quote ReplyReportOblationDec 7, 2025Reader modeAdd bookmark Threadmarks Threadmarks 100: Sunday, July 17th - Big News! Threadmarks OblationProfessional Wet-Paint ObserverDec 7, 2025Add bookmark#108So, I guess I'm in Starfleet now, what with the whole "To boldly go where no one has gone before" thing.
But I should explain…
So I was using the fanfiction power, since I'd decided to start sprinkling references to Cauldron in, when an old woman walks up and asks me not to.
Now, this wouldn't be that strange, except for the part where I was in my lab in New Brunswick at the time, which meant this woman had snuck past the Ninja clan, plus the security already good enough for Dragon's mechs.
So I was a bit out of sorts when she apparently did all that just to ask me to stop writing a fanfiction, which is why it took an embarrassingly long time to put things together.
But yeah, Contessa.
Or, well, Fortuna apparently, since she's "dead."
It's kind of confusing, but "Contessa is dead, my name is Fortuna."
Is a pretty blunt way to say you've retired from cape life, I guess.
But it makes sense, since the memories say Scion should've shown up in 1982, not 1965, like really happened that Contessa would also be 17 years older than she would be, meaning 60ish, not 40ish.
But more to the point, she kept an eye on the late 70's Dr. Mother still, and I was about to give her a heart attack…
Also destroyed Bet's economy if I really managed to take down Cauldron, since I completely blanked on the Numberman being one of them.
So… I'm glad she managed to overcome my anti-thinker thing, I guess.
Oh, that's another thing, apparently she can't path me, just path making my fanfiction not exist and even then the path just told her to ask me and didn't give her exact steps once we were in the same room.
Cool.
But as to the Starfleet thing, I guess Fortuna actually looked me up, since she couldn't just path the ideal outcome for once and realised that I had one of those really boring but rare powers that are perfect for her division of the Government.
Translators.
As in, instantaneous translators who don't need weeks to figure things out, just to offend people, even then, with some ultra-specific grammar thing turning a normal word into an insult.
Like how A tiny grammar tweak can turn "I humbly ask" into "Do this, peasant."
It… makes a lot of sense actually, I mean it's not something I've thought about much, but in bird form I can talk to people if I touch them.
I got that from the same perk that gave me the bigger bird form.
The only interesting thing about that is that I guess I talk to people in their own native language, not mine.
They even found a guy who didn't know basically any English somehow, and we talked just fine.
So Starfleet, or whatever its "real acronym" is, are apparently the government department for handling the places where the space between worlds gets thin, and things can slip through.
It makes sense, it's been happening since before capes started showing up, and if they miss a bad one, then a bunch of monsters might slip through, so I guess it makes sense there's a government agency for it.
Plus, Cauldron, with their multi-world thing being involved, also makes sense, even if Fortuna insists she hasn't talked to the rest of Cauldron since around when I was born.
---
Now, normally, I have the common sense to avoid this kind of thing, even as my inner geek would cry with sadness for the missed opportunity, but…
"The portal fox came through. Was that you?" I asked on my tablet.
"Yes, that was one of the first I confirmed personally after leaving Cauldron." she replied
The thing is… without Fox, I'd be dead.
Both from the emotions and the damage to my neck.
Fox, he saved my life, back in December…
And without her, we'd have never met.
---
So Cont Fortuna gave me this fancy phone-like-doo-hicky, then told me that it would let me spend a week in a world, but only 7 hours would pass over here.
But after that, I would need to either move on, which would let the thin space develop on its own, find a place in both worlds for a stable portal, or block the world so they wouldn't flood into each other.
She then told me there was a world she was "pretty sure" was safe that she thought I would be uniquely suited to confirming, and made a portal for me, before hitting the random button on hers and entering into some kind of fantasy landscape with floating islands, and leaving me alone with the mysterious portal…
---
So without further ado, I went into bigger bird form and leapt in.