I had a rather pleasant run in with an Elf today -- quite literally -- by the name of Garry Bache. The man had traipsed about the city, nose buried deep in a book when he bumped into me. He was quite taller than I, so it was rather interesting how taken aback he was.
We exchanged a pleasant conversation about professions, interests and hobbies. He had stated he was the Professor of (several ink dots lie along this line, as if the writer had trouble remembering something) Fine Arts, I believe. And the Administrator of something or other.
While I was rather annoyed at first, the exchange we shared doused the flames of my rage. We began on what he was reading -- a light romance novel -- something I would never be caught reading. Eventually, the conversation steered toward our professions and what either of us enjoy doing in our spare time. Aside from hunting, there was not much in my area.
He suggested I try submersing myself amidst nature, such as in a tree, and write a poem, or whatever comes to mind.
Can’t say I’ve ever read poetry.
However, perhaps if I were to borrow a few tomes on it from the library...
Anyhow, his points were rather well made, and I may be taking them to heart quite soon.
It is rather strange of me to state, but I wouldn’t mind meeting with him more often.
Its been some time since I last saw Sage, I was not surprised that this encounter ended with the promise of work and the welcome talk of a new ship to sail. Air or sea, it makes no difference so long as I feel the wheel in my hands and the wind in my hair. It seems she mastered some new tricks in my absence, including the usage of some curious magics that seem to function through a deck of cards. They were not her prized triple triad deck as I had first thought. The details were sparse, but I do not expect or need to know everything. Just what needs to be done. I trust her to put me in position, just as I know she will place me where I can sate my hunger for a good scrap. I do not mind being used if I get what I want from it.
Regardless, it was good to see her once more. It made me wonder just what became of the rest of the lads and lasses that once made up the Manticores. Its been some time since I last saw Silver, the ending of Kei’s venture has likely seen her strike off for new work elsewhere. Spook vanished with the closing of the Skytrade. I had seen Squint in passing, in a position that seemed far better suited to his talents. Sitches and Subtle cannot be far apart, a time or two walking the streets of Ul’dah has given me the faint scent of one of Subtle’s favored lotions, but never strong enough to track before the wash of citizenry foils the trail. Shear may well have followed Silver’s lead. But the others? Save for my Jet, I must assume they are spread far and safe. To think otherwise incites a fury in me. The kind that once drove me to fight without regard for my life or my enemies. Its no longer my life to squander, though. It belongs to Shade and hers to me. A possession neither of us will willingly give up.
I met a fellow Seeker today, I would wager she may be about my age though its difficult to tell as mum did not mark the passing of my years. X’majho, tall and scarred from battles with beasts. It was an absent thought, but I wondered if she would have been named Stripes for the claw marks scarred across her arms. We spoke for some time over meat and ale but her words do not belong in my journal. Should she wish to record it then that is her business, not mine. She is to be tested by Kei and I see nothing in her to think she will fail the trial. I welcome it. Once she succeeds then she will be part of this new crew that I feel forming. And we will have the excuse to help her wreak bloody vengeance on those that wronged her.
I expected to tell the difference from one captain to the next, but the change was surprising. A great deal of it was dull. No talk of hidden treasures or pitched battles, no tales worth reading to Jet. Careful notes about plunder and how it was split. I expected the careful effort to record the routes we sailed. But one focused far too intently on punishment leveled against rowdy crewmates. Most likely written by Gheest. He insisted on discipline and had a heavy hand with the lash, it was no wonder he did not last long. Though discovering just how unruly some of my old mates were in their youth was interesting.
There was always a distance between those men and my crew. I had thought I knew them well, but these rotting pages proved me wrong. Orders passed down through our superiors made those men and women our allies, or our foes, depending on the message they were ordered to deliver. Ambitions were obvious in what they chose to pass on to us, I could recall the disposal of unfit leaders that these pages cleared of guilt, unless the captain penning the entries filled the journal with lies. Both were possible, but I find the captains more believable.
Regardless, they make my own failings as a leader apparent. I was a fool to think simply by serving under them that I knew well enough how to imitate their leadership. My own weakness kept me from taking from those writings the many lessons that their success and failure could have taught me. But I know that not a single member of the crew died beneath me. I count this as a success.
Emma was not often a creature of attention and highlights at the best of times. At most, she wanted to be put away and never thought about unless it was for her day job. But as the bills mounted every time she had a big fight with some supervillain or powered person and her clothes ended up ruined, Emma realized she had to do something. She couldn't keep spending all this money, and she couldn't keep destroying her favorite clothes.
Enter one Blonde Blazer at SDN (@blondebl4zer), who, after a request from Emma, had given her an entire list of tailors to call. They, Blazer had said, could help. That day, the redheaded phoenix of a woman left work feeling...shockingly excited, though hell if she knew why. Maybe it was just the anticipation of saving money...but, more likely, it was the idea of getting to have her own hero outfit, a pleasure that Emma had steadily denied herself all her life. Ashelin would've been so damn jealous...but she wasn't here, and Emma didn't have to worry about her older sister's harsh judgements anymore. Grinning, Emma got into her car and, without giving herself time to think, phoned the first person on the list. Then the second...then the third...
It took Emma a shockingly long time to find someone who would help her; even with Blazer's recommendation, most of the people on the list were full up on work for the next...foreseeable future. But the last person on the list, a guy who went by the name of "Flannigan", agreed to at least meet Emma and see what he could do for her.
So here Emma was, pulling up in front of one of the oldest houses she'd ever seen. Don't get her wrong, the place looked well cared-for, but it was just... It was like someone had tried to transpose a house from the 50s or 60s to the current day, and had forgotten to update the style. It was complete with a blue-grey roof and the outside was all painted to look like red brickwork--no wait, that was red brickwork. It made Emma scratch her head, but she didn't leave. It wasn't shady, after all; it had a cute little garden out front and a gorgeous bay window off to the right side with spotlessly-cleaned glass.
Emma parked her car in the driveway and got out. Down the street, she could hear the sounds of children playing, and the sun was inching itself towards the horizon little by little. She approached the front door, and it was at that point that she couldn't help but be struck by something else: the smell. Was that...vanilla? Yeah, it was. It was faint, but it was there, undeniably. Confused, and feeling a little out of place, Emma rang the doorbell, and waited.
Silence stretched out, and more than a little part of Emma wanted to just bolt then and there. This was dumb. She hated being the Phoenix anyways; the attention, the eyes all on her, people judging her, being jealous of her, being angry at her... and the worst part was, she felt like she deserved it. Why should she, of all the powered people in the world, get something as nice as a super suit? Especially one like Blonde Blazer's; Blazer was akin to a living legend!
Just as Emma had resolved to turn and leave, the cream-colored door to the house swung open, and there stood...maybe the single oldest man that Emma had ever seen. No, really, the guy looked ten years older than Chase, and Chase looked ancient as it was. Silvery hair kept short, wearing an ugly abomination of a sweater and a pair of jeans, along with some spectacles so sunken into his face that he looked as though his eyes were pressed against the lenses, or near enough. He stood there surprisingly tall, and...he had four arms. Emma had to blink at the four arms.
"Mmr." The man mumbled, gruff as could be. He stroked his little white beard, almost like a wispy cloud the thing was, and he looked Emma up and down. "...You must be Emma, then." One of his arms produced a cane, which he leaned on a little. Emma said nothing, just...nodded slowly, and the man--Flannigan, Emma assumed, motioned her inside.
"Come on. Let's talk." It was only now that Emma noticed the very slight english accent.
Once inside, Flannigan had offered Emma some tea (to which she'd agreed) before leading her into the room with the bay window. A sunroom, if Emma had to guess, but it looked like Flannigan had converted this room to his personal office as well, for one reason or another. What if someone broke in? What if a villain wanted to attack him? What if-
Emma was brought out of her thoughts when her eyes landed on the framed images on the walls, images that detailed what Flannigan's seventy-five year history had been like since he had first acquired his powers. "THE MAN OF HERCULEAN STRENGTH," "A MAN WITH THE ALACRITY OF FOUR" "THE LEGENDARY FOUR-ARMS SAVES STUDENTS FROM SCHOOLHOUSE FIRE" and other such articles all sat on the wall that led back into the house. They were relics from another age, newspapers that had been painstakingly cut out, preserved, and then framed.
Flannigan returned just then, and settled down in the chair across from Emma's. It prompted her yellow-gold eyes to refocus on the four-armed man now that she was able; the newspapers and what they said weren't any of her business.
"Tell me about yourself," Flannigan said with a groan as he settled down in the chair, laying his cane, an exquisitely carved wooden thing, in his lap. "Not about the powers, girl, we'll get to those. About you. Are you a professional hero?"
Emma blinked. Wasn't this a business meeting? What did he care about her life? Still...no one else on Blazer's list had even bothered to see her, so she decided to at least indulge him.
"...Kind of?" She began, before shaking her head and correcting, "N-not really though; I run a private detective agency. I don't use my powers to make money, not explicitly. I...help solve problems for people, and I make money that way." Flannigan hummed and gave a nod in response. He took a sip of his tea, and followed up his first question,
"Why don't you work with the police, then?"
Emma winced at that one. She shifted uncomfortably, thinking about her parents, about how they'd encouraged her to do that very thing. But then...how many friends had been hurt or brushed off by the cops when they had problems...?
"...Let's just say that I've had some experiences," Emma tried to be careful in how she worded this, "that have led me to believe that the members of the police don't have the best interests of everyone at heart. I'd rather work in a setting where I don't need to compromise my morality for the sake of my job. I've seen too many cops who couldn't say the same."
Again, Flannigan just nodded. Emma finally felt comfortable enough to sip her tea as well--it was quite good. The smell of vanilla still filled her senses, too. Overall, Emma found herself surprised at how relaxed she felt, being in this stranger's home. Still...it was a little lonely in here, with just Flannigan here. Emma's eyes caught the way the light glimmered off of a single gold band on one of Flannigan's left hands.
"Do you enjoy using your powers to help people?" came Flannigan's voice again. On instinct, Emma shrugged, which got Flannigan to raise a brow. He did not speak again, and the silence stretched on for a minute, then another, then another. Finally, Emma elaborated.
"...I enjoy helping people, that's why I opened up a private investigator's agency. But truth be told, sir," she didn't know why she was tempted to call this truly wizened man 'sir,' but there it was, "...I don't like the attention. I mean don't get me wrong, it's fine I guess, I'm not bothered by it either, but it's not...the attention's not why I do what I do."
Emma paused, staring down at her tea, and her reflection in it. Thoughts swirled in her brain, and Flannigan must have seen it, since he continued waiting. Emma remained quiet, this thousand-yard-stare on her face.
"...I wake up every day and hear how people all over the world are dying, mister Flannigan." She finally said, voice barely a whisper, "I wake up and hear about how people are hurting and suffering and constantly in a state of pain and misery, and I wake up knowing that a metal spike could hit me with all the force of a bullet and it would bounce right off without leaving a scratch on me, and I feel tremendous guilt. I wake up knowing I am undefeatable, and I wake up feeling like I...like I don't do enough, even though I spend my every waking moment helping people. I wake up feeling like if I'm not doing something with this power, all those people dying become my fault, and I feel like I'm...like I'll never be good enough to bear the debt I got saddled with. It's this hole in me, that I can't fill."
A pause. Emma doesn't know when the tears started rolling down her face, but they did. She doesn't stop them.
"They call me Phoenix," she swallowed hard, "because when I fight, my shoulders ignite with fire and my hair starts to glow like it's made of flame. And I...I hate it. I hate the attention and the popularity, I hate how I can't even get scratched except by a scant few things, and I hate how in spite of that I feel so insignificant. Like I can't help anyone, not really. I'm still just one woman."
Flannigan nodded again, and the silence stretched on. This silence, Emma allowed to go on. Realizing Emma had finished, Flannigan put his tea down on the table. One hand gently pat Emma on the shoulder, and he said, very quietly, "...I think I can put something together for you." When Emma looked at him, wiping her tears and clearly confused, he just smiled and said, "...I don't take very many clients these days, miss Emma, and that's because I like to know about my clients before we begin. I get...selective, shall we say. Come with me, I have some designs I think you'll quite enjoy. We can get started on your attire's design this evening."
Emma blinked away tears and, still feeling slightly numb from exposing such raw emotions, she stood up, following Flannigan to another room in the house.
This room, however...it stole Emma's breath away. Hundreds of different suits of various heroes sat on hangars situated on giant racks around the room, each one having its own story, and each one belonging to a hero that Emma had at least heard of before. All around the room, different materials and little testing stations that, surprisingly enough, Emma recognized; her mother, ever the scientist, had testing stations just like these for identifying and testing the durability of any foreign materials. In this case though, Emma thought it was just for testing suit durabilities.
Flannigan moved to a large desk, where he get out a pen and some sketch paper. Then, sitting at the desk, it was as though the old man had transformed, as though he had always meant to sit at that desk, sketching designs with not one, but three different hands, the fourth one holding the pad in place. In mere moments, he had a whole catalogue of outfit designs prepared for Emma to look at, each one colored and looking absolutely beautiful. Reds, oranges, blacks...colors that complimented her.
"Wait," Emma shook her head, "before we start, don't you--I mean, I should like...pay you, yes?"
"I told you I don't take many clients, did I not?" He hummed, "...You need not pay. I do this for...well. Don't worry about that. You need not pay." Emma looked struck dumb, utterly confused by this man and the sudden kindness she'd found herself in. Still...best not to look a gift horse in the mouth, right? Instead, Emma came over to peek at some of his designs. They all looked good, but...her lips quirked. One of Flannigan's hands twitched, and one of his eyes flicked to look at her.
"...You see something you wish to speak on." He didn't phrase it as a question.
"...I'd prefer to lose the sleeves. I'd like gloves. Long ones, up to about middle forearm. And I like that design the most." She pointed to a design that had red material coming up to her neck, like a turtle-neck, but which then turned to an orange beneath her chest, and which then became a black material below her belt. Red material went up the legs, mimicking the image of thigh-high boots, and as Emma looked at it, Flannigan made edits to the outfit so it seemed to be sleeveless, with a pair of forearm-length black gloves. Flannigan looked up at her, Emma nodded.
"Yup, that's great. That's...me." A simple nod from Flannigan, who moved to a much larger sheet of graph paper then. "Do you have a specific logo you'd like?" He said, and by his expression, he had already guessed what her answer would be.
"...I don't, but...maybe a yellow bird symbol on the chest?" Flannigan stopped and raised a brow at the statement. Hadn't Emma just gone off on a tangent about how she hated being the Phoenix a few minutes earlier? Emma shrugged in response.
"I dunno, it's like..." she bit her lower lip, thinking on how to word it, "...If I can, I'd like to try and embrace the name. Maybe it'll...make me hate it a little less or something." A small smirk came to the old man's lips, and with two of his four hands, he began to sketch a logo design of a rising phoenix.
"Very well. Do you have any further edits you'd like to make to the attire before I begin work?"
Emma paused...then shook her head. "No...I think that's it. Thank you, Mister Flannigan. Should I expect a call, or--?"
Flannigan shook his head. "Just come by...mmm...Wednesday, around this same time. I should have it finished by then." Nodding, Emma turned and left. And for some reason, she felt...just a little bit better. Maybe having a hero outfit wouldn't be such a bad thing after all. She'd...just have to wait until Wednesday to find out.
That one word was all that the Queen could hold onto. Hope that she could someday be unfrozen. She thought endlessly about Bail, she felt his presence nearby. Where were they now? Coruscant? Certainly not Alderaan, nor Naboo.
The agent was perched at the edge of her bed, head hung and shoulders hunched. It had been a year, a year to this day and Peggy thought she would be fine, but the deaths were stacking up against her and this anniversary had come to soon.
“I miss him and I don’t think anything will fill that void” the agent spoke up into the silence that had settled. “It feels wrong that we get to live without him here” Peggy spoke, finally confessing what was making her heart so heavy.
“I can’t do this Howard” her head turning to stare at her friend.
“You are strong, you can, Pegs” the scientist tried to confide.
“I’m not strong-” she started to speak before being cut off.
“ no, you ARE strong. ” Howard spoke, giving the agent no other option but to smile sadly at him, thankful he had her back even on the darkest of days.
001. -- Today I’ve decided to begin keeping record of my forays into the unknown. I’ve long since dabbled in the arcane in a trial and error method, so it’s past time I begin to keep track of my discoveries for future reference. This ‘Book of Shadows’ as it were will just be my space to write my experiences as they happened.
With anything in my craft, I began with a simple ritual. After rendering myself bare, I laid down the confines of my circle and instantly the lines began to glow with arcane energy. I have become accustomed to this sensation, but the feeling of being recognized by the elements will never grow tiresome.
I blessed a basic candle with the dragon’s blood, its entirety soon dyed red. The heated wax I used to paint a seal on my body and instantly was engulfed in the warmth of flame. Yet my skin did not burn. In this state I fell into a deep trance, the experience of which I cannot put into words. The memory of this sensation alone has been enough for me to summon a small fire within my palms. This has currently only proven useful for mundane tasks as lighting candles and my oven, but obvious further experimentation will follow.
The flames have since dispersed, leaving the protected areas unharmed. Unfortunately, the circle I drew was not perfectly closed so I will have to attend to the minor smoke damage on the floor later. I again stress the imperative nature of laying down thick unbroken lines to myself for future reference.
