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etcelsior2015-08-22 08:10 pm
maskormods) wrote in etcelsior2015-08-22 08:10 pm
Entry tags:
The power is in your hands
TEST DRIVE MEME
Considering apping into MASK OR MENACE? Want to dip your toes into the setting and get a feel of whether your character will fit into it? Or maybe you're just cruising and want to play around? Then you've come to the right place!
Pick any of the following scenarios below or feel free to make up your own, but don't be afraid to throw yourself at someone else's thread, either!
And remember to have fun!01. Your memory might be a haze still and you might even feel frustrated or anxious by the sudden news that you are no longer in your own world and that the Porter scientists and military cannot send you back. You don't get a chance to linger long in the underground Porter lab, but something is clearly amiss; light patches on the floor indicate something else used to sit in that spot in the room. Parts of the wall, floor and the tables look as if they have been refurbished in the past few months -- something happened in here some time ago. Something big.
You're ushered out quickly and then suddenly, you're enveloped in a faint blue blue light before you find yourself under the bright Floridian sun. Another soldier steps toward you with a smile, directing your attention to a car near a large gate. She mentions she'll be debriefing you soon, handing out a brown folder and a pamphlet. You don't see the digital tattoo on your wrist, but it's quickly explained on your way over to the car as you realize there are other confused faces nearby, all holding files of their own.
02. The city of Heropa is what one might expect from a small, bright and cheery place. The locals are friendly enough and local shop owners might offer a free drink to help cool you down in this awfully nauseating heat. Some of the locals might thank you for always lending your service to the nation and others might not say anything. In fact, some people might back away from any imPort who quite obviously looks like they aren't from around the neighborhood. Once in a while there's a look of disdain on someone's face and hushed voices. Something about "the outbreak" and "the government's gotta crack down on their medical files". "Some of them can't be right in the head" says another.
03. De Chima, Virginia, is a large city with a healthy economy, and though it's quieter, there are just as many citizens awed at your presence. Heavy winds have people grasping at their newspapers and constantly brushing hair out of their faces, but that doesn't distract them from crowding you in excitement if you're obviously from a different time or world, or just let it slip that you're a newcomer. Children and young teenagers are especially likely to ask for an autograph and a photo.
Some locals seem less enthused to see you. They never make an approach, but they can be overheard scoffing and muttering something about cameras. "Who do they think they are?" or "I don't like it... it reminds me of the government corruption back in the eighties." What could they be talking about?
04. Maurtia Falls, Pennsylvania, is normally known for being a little more on the apathetic side, but there's been tension in the atmosphere lately. Nobody will outright state what it is that's rustled their jimmies, though you might find a newsstand with articles on recent and aggressive vigilante behavior within the city. "ImPorts: loyal to the cause of their own?" reads one newspaper article.
People are not as friendly in this city and go out of their way to avoid walking down the same sidewalk as the more obvious looking imPorts pass through. Local cops say nothing, but they scowl at those imPorts and utter something about "no badges" and "acting like authority figures".
05. Nonah, North Carolina, is the liveliest of all cities. It's loud, busy and there's some kind of energy in the air that gets everyone buzzing with excitement. Anyone who they come to determine an imPort is bombarded with all sorts of offers; job offers, advertising gigs, spokesperson for advocating children stay in school, etc. Anything and everything! You name it. Shops offer discounts for food and clothing, whatever they need. People flock in droves with questions, but they all say the same thing. Thank you for your service to this country, Hero. You saved a lot of lives. Wow, feels great to be a hero, doesn't it?
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I've never been so confused to find myself in Florida.
[ Honestly... he tries to avoid Florida. ]
What have they told you?
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[ 'united states' wasn't on the map he was familiar with either, and when he went looking for 'gilboa' all he got was a mountain. which isn't inaccurate, but not entirely truthful either. ]
A technological miracle of a machine pulled me out of my "world" and into this one seemingly at random, more like an act of God done while drunk, and now I have superpowers.
[ 'what they told you' the man had said, like he has his suspicions about the government. certainly, a lot of it is shifty, but still not so much that he's willing to take the trip back from whence he came. however, this man seems to have a good head about catching where he's being played, and likely would end up useful. ]
Nothing that sounds any less like an acid trip.
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[ Now that's odd. He hadn't gotten anything new, per se, he just assumed he was chosen for the reason that he had powers already. Like maybe this world was lacking mutants. ]
You don't seem too bothered.
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[ a shoulder lifts and falls. surprised, yes. concerned, maybe, but not about the actual powers - more what else might have been medically done to him while people were screwing around with his biology enough to put them there.
or, maybe, what cost whatever divintry implanted them is expecting him to pay for the boost. ]
Why should I be? They're things that would make my life monumentally easier, and haven't seemed to have any adverse effects thus far. [ and he got free coffee. because he sure did already blow the stipend the government gave him. whoops. ]
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Jealous locals?
More often than not, I've seen ignorance become hatred, and hatred become violence.
[ Kind of a huge adverse effect, if you ask him. ]
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What, the whispers and sneers? I've heard worse from children under 10.
[ jack's heard a lot of terrible things said about him, or in his presence, or about his family, etc etc. said plenty on his own. if all it is is ignorance and hatred, welp. same shit, different day.
violence, however... he leans in some, a bit conspiratory. ]
What can they do to us? We've been gifted powers they can't possibly touch. If it came to a point of Them or Us, a combined effort from the ImPort community would wipe them off the map. One sizeable enough weapon advancement can make or break a war. They have to know that too.
[ he's just saying. ]
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Powerful or not, I don't want to inherit an Earth that is completely rubble.
[ Not yet anyway. He'll change his mind within ah, ten years or so. Hard times. ]
The world I'm from, it's like this one. I imagine the people aren't too different.
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[ jack's been in a war before, a long one, a gory one, and he's no more excited to return to it. but the standpoint of force against force, from a purely tactical angle, still proves true. ]
Just that the threat is null. What point is them attempting violence against us when they know they won't win?
[ like throwing a rock at a bear and being surprised when it mauls you. it'd just be stupid.
then again, there weren't any powers in jack's world, and the only kind of discrimination he knew was something he couldn't physically fight. ] How did things happen in your world?
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It didn't start with powers. For me it started with my religion. They used us and countless others as scapegoats, and tried to erase us, citing our beliefs, or our parents' beliefs, or anything they could to prove we were the monster they'd created for us to be.
I came into my powers and I think of it as a gift. But I saw the same hateful looks, and fear and uncertainty, that I saw and never understood as a boy.
If something happens to this world, they will hate us, they will turn on us. But you are right; they will lose.
[ Ya but they won't go down without a fight. And nukes. And Erik's prepared for another war, but he's not ready to face one. ]
hitting back all his old threads, since i am actually going to app him this round, deeerp hi :T
and then jack, and all that he was that his world wouldn't accept him to be, because of what he was created as. it wasn't even that his father thought he'd chosen something wrong - the words were what God made you. Meaning, God made you wrong. Made you wrong, on purpose, and you will not leave behind the scorn he similarly bore on you for it. ]
Faith's a killer. [ jack mutters, a bit distantly, numbly. religion's always been at the center of every dispute in his world. he's never seen so much pain and suffering come from something that claims to mean salvation. it's like a farce, but jack's the only one laughing. he swallows, listening on to the rest of what erik says - about the powers, about the same looks he'd been given, regardless of the supposed cause. ] It doesn't matter what makes you different. Just that you are, and anything that isn't them is wrong.
Reasoning applied in the aftermath. Excuses are easy to churn up from nothing.
derp hi again!
They will hate us for this too. You haven't had your powers for too long, but you'll see it.
If the time comes, we will need to stand together.
Your differences are not wrong. They are the ones who are wrong.
[ I mean, he's assuming Jack wasn't discriminated against for his religion, per se, or his genetics, but whatever it is... he sympathizes. To an extent, he empathizes. ]
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Then they can hate me. I'm done apologizing for it.
[ his jaw tightens, hand on his coffee having turned to a thumbnail dragging a scratch across the cardboard cuff to ward off the heat. he's heard that before - your difference are not wrong, but from people either like him, or burying someone like him. the reverend, standing over joseph's coffin, and looking over to where jack stood, separated from it. he's told himself that, before, and wanted to believe it. and yet, there stands his father and mother, at the seat of power bestowed to them by god, disgusted with him. with all of the city's voice behind them. so how much can his little mantra really mean in comparison? ]
You don't know my differences. I could be completely abhorrent to you. [ there's a kind of hollowness in Jack's tone, and when he looks back up to Erik, it's without the guise of charming smiles and easy nonchalance. ] Everyone has something they hate - being persecuted doesn't exempt you from persecuting.
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Don't tell me. It's personal, I understand, I'm just a stranger.
But there's a lot you could confess to me, and I wouldn't find you to be a monster.
You don't murder children, do you?
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there isn't his father, and the press lurking around every corner, to worry about. the general tone of this world seems to be much more lax about... what he is. he'd even seen a government official supposedly married to a man. of course, that one, holiday, was also very suspiciously locked away in a mental institute. so who knows. ]
No. I don't murder children. [ only grown men. mostly in war, but the one minister... well, let's not think about that. it chills even him to think of the spreading pool of blood on the council table. that wasn't him. it shouldn't have been him. but it was. that's what he'd become there - just one more sacrifice he'd made to becoming the man he'd thought he'd needed to. Add it to the pile. ]
I sleep with men. [ he blurts out, less because he wants to test if Erik lives up to his word and more because he's tired of hiding it. ] Being honest about that probably would have meant exile, at home.
[ not because that's a national ruling, but because his father wouldn't have allowed it out. he'd rather pretend he never had a son than have a queer one. ]
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I believe it's a felony on my planet.
Good thing you didn't end up there.
For the record, I don't care who's in your bed. Not even a little.
[ But maybe he shouldn't have ruled out murderers because, well, that's something they'd get along about so... ]