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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Shayuri" data-source="post: 3651654" data-attributes="member: 4936">Thessaly listened to the sound of the desk behind her creaking and snapping as it disintegrated and wondered, not for the first time, what the hell she was doing here. Hana, in particular, wouldn't just have a cow if she knew...she'd have a Texas longhorn. Sideways. It might have been the first time that Thess was actually glad Hana wasn't around anymore.The amplified, electronically modified voice of her opponent boomed out."You're a little quicker this time, but I can fill this whole bank with this stuff if I have to!"His name was Red Death. He'd nearly killed her last time they'd met. And that's why she was here. To put away a personal boogeyman, in a way few people ever had the chance to."Quicker's not the only thing that's new," she called back. As she rolled to her feet, Thessaly reached into the little pouch at her side. There he was. Polished red armored suit, helmet that looked like a red skull. Two big tanks strapped to his back, and connected by flexible tubes to orifices built into his arms. He whirled as he spied her movement.She threw the contents of the pouch at him...little glittering crystals seemed to hang in midair as she concentrated and brought her hand sideways to her heart, the last two fingers curled. She inhaled to speak......the two gas-spewing nozzles emitted a loud whir as the pumps that drove them clicked on....syllables rarely spoken aloud for more than a thousand years pass Thessaly's lips as she invokes a warding spell. She feels a cold fist knot in her gut, and knows it's working.Hideous crimson gas, streaked with black rivulets, pours from Red Death's machine. He howls in laughter as it billows forth. he doesn't see the salt land at his feet, drawn by magic into a strange diagram. He DOES see the gas stop in mid-gush and rebound, as if hitting an invisible, curved wall. "Wha... What's happening? What have you done?!"A superhero, Thess knew, would have a good comeback to that. Something smug and casual. Her mind was blank though. The gas didn't fill the warded area completely before he shut it off, so she could see his sihouetted outline as he pounded against the barrier."FOOL! This does nothing! My mask protects me! Release me!"Mask. God, she could see how it worked now. The catches were in the back, revealed when he twisted around. It would be easy to just twitch them open, let the mask fall off. Give him a taste of his own medicine. Surely that was karma, right?Goddamnit. She forced the memory of the gas back, how it had smelled, how her muscles had clenched on touching it, how it had seared her throat, her lungs, her eyes. Using magic to expose him to that wouldn't -technically- be black magic...but she knew it was coming from the same place. Damnit.Time to finish this.Thessaly pointed at the Red Death and took a deep breath to clear her mind and focus her will."Blood to thicken skin to freeze, mind to slow and muscles seize, movement ceases all in kind, your strength is sapped, your bones I bind."Usually she incanted in Greek or Latin or some other impressive sounding language that hardly anyone knew. But sometimes she liked for the target to know what was happening, and why.Red Death stiffened and started to look back...then slowed. Stopped. In a very awkward-looking posture."Nnnngh!" he grunted, unable to move his mouth or tongue. Only his heart and lungs were exempt from the paralysis. He repeated the noise a moment later when sirens could clearly be heard.That was her cue. Thess didn't like spotlights. For one, she was paranoid about someone at school recognizing her despite the costume. Voice, hair, eyes...this was the real world, not Supermanland where a funky curl of hair and a pair of glasses could hide your identity. For another, she just didn't want to have to deal with the questions. The probing. She wasn't after celebrity or fame. She was just doing the job that came part and parcel of being a white witch. Protect and guide. ...not that a little recognition wouldn't be nice. More trouble than it was worth assuredly...but nice.She darted into the office, knowing the cops would have the place surrounded. Reaching into yet another pouch at her side, she produced a piece of chalk and a little perfume bottle. As she started writing strange sigils onto the door she'd just come through, that separated the bank from the office, Thessaly hummed to herself. Helped keep her focused, she found, when things were down to the wire.Through the door, she could hear the cops burst in and demand that Red Death freeze and get on the floor. Since he was frozen, he couldn't. Then they seemed to realize what was going on. Their voices were blunted by masks, so Thess released the warding. Scuffling noises. Cops yelling to get him down, get his tanks off...something rolling... Good.Just as the footsteps were coming her way, and she knew they were searching the place, she finished the last mark, and sprayed the incense in the air. In Greek she called on Hermes to speed her to her destination on winged feet...then opened the door and stepped through....to her bedroom.Thessaly closed the door and collapsed on her bed, heart hammering. But coming up through it all was joy. She'd -gotten- him. Dicey...there'd been a close moment or two...but the warding spell -worked-. It stopped the gas! She laughed, the tension releasing itself from her body. As she did, the green gown and cloak she wore, the green mask that looked like it was one solid carved emerald...it all evaporated. Underneath she was just Thessaly, not 'Viridian.' Beige cargo shorts and a t-shirt with a vest over it. The pouches were real though, and she started working them off her belt.Her face was frankly gorgeous, with the full lips and graceful nose of a woman, but the wide eyes and slightly rounded cheeks of a girl. Her hair was in fashionable disarray, with about three inches being pink and the rest down to her roots were dark brown. Around her neck was a twisted leather thong and a rune-encrusted pentacle wrought from some silvery metal that didn't tarnish.After lying and basking for a moment in her victory, Thess flicked the little TV across from her bed on and started undressing to get into her PJ's. She had just got the baggy flannel bottoms on when the TV image changed, and with it, maybe everything else."The world is a dangerous place, as anyone who watches the news can attest. But you have begun to do your part. To distinguish yourself. We have taken notice of you. We wish to offer you an opportunity. Heroes can accomplish great things alone, but far greater things in groups. Groups of heroes can accomplish great things, but groups with the right resources, connections, and organization can truly change the world, and turn back the rising tide of evil. It is this that I offer you. It you are willing to pledge yourself to bringing super-criminals of all varieties to justice, then at midnight, go to parking lot 17 of the Freedom Colosseum, and find a black van with the license plate 7DX510B. There will be a keypad on the side. Type your Social Security Number into it, and it will open. Go inside, and close the door behind you. Others like you will come. At 12:30, you will receive directions as to where to drive to meet us. Now, back to your regularly-scheduled programming." Thessaly ran a hand through her hair and sat back in bed as she thought furiously.Scam? Villain? Black witch?Honestly though, why HER? She was small potatos as supers went. Her main focus was still on school. She'd never, to her knowledge, been interviewed or photographed very well...not beyond a few blurry shots of her in action once time. She'd put away a few guys, including two...make that three now...super villains, though of the somewhat less than impressive power level, all things told. Red Death, for example, had a couple of different gasses he could spray, and an armored suit, and that was about it. The cops didn't even call for paranormal backup. Just gas masks.So how did this guy and his mysterious 'we' know about her? And know well enough to send a picture straight to her TV? That smelled a little magical to her. Except she didn't feel a thing. Not a tickle, not a tingle. If someone had cast a spell on her TV, or even a spell to make something happen anywhere NEAR her, she'd feel it. Unless they knew how to conceal magic...but that was getting way into freaky-deaky lalalandy the-illuminati-are-coming-for-us-all-ville.There was, as the Scooby Gang said, only one way to find out.Hana would SO freak if she'd known."No rest for the wicked," Thess muttered, and pulled her belt of tricks back on. The shiny green outfit shimmered back into view around her, and she started drawing on her bedroom door. There were worn places in the wood from her drawing on it so much. A minute later, she was gone......and stepped out of maintenance door in the Collesseum, not far from lot 17. A quick look around, no buzzing on the magic sense...feeling a little foolish in her elaborate getup, she ventured into the parking lot. There ahead was the black van, as obvious as daylight since it was the only van anywhere near lot 17. Right under one of the lights, it was easy to identify even at night.And she wasn't alone. Reflexively she reached up to grasp her amulet in her right hand, and ventured closer to the van.</blockquote>

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