My story is about a young girl who becomes a vigilante. I know I want the story to start off with her intervening an injustice (in her civilian form), but I'm not sure what kind of injustice she should intervene with first.
My best advice would be to think about what kind of hero you want her to be, what kind of principles she stands by, and what drives her because the “origin story” will likely heavily influence that. For example, if she were to stop a drug dealer from killing someone she might focus on trying to rid the streets of the drug cartels. If she saved someone from being raped she might go on a crusade to make sure that nobody ever has to worry about being assaulted in that way ever again. If she caught wind of a scammer trying to take people’s life savings and leaving them without a home, she would be targeting those people and more white collar type injustices.
So answer this questions: What is the thing that would motivate her to risk her life to solve an injustice in the first place?
There was a dilapidated hospital in Buffalo, New York. This hospital was here before the Fall, before the Cards, before all of these stories took place. The weathered building laid here---abandoned and closed down on 400 Forest Avenue. It was a disheveled mess...disgusting and horrid to the eye. In 1990, no one thought it would be the setting of world changing events, some amazing and some horrible. That is to say, no one could have predicted what would happen years in the future after this building, with its terrible past, would come to be the home of heroes, of gods, and of change.
In the July of 1990, a young man by the name of Felix Eriksson, fresh out of the military, and his aspiring counterpart, Annabelle Lee, arrived at this old asylum, deed in hand and a mission; he was ready to turn this place into somewhere where freedom, justice, and family can prosper. The renovations began in 1991, and in that same year the first addition arrived, who was a memorable young pixie boy. Then 1992 came, two more arrived, a fish-man with a smiling soul, and a Warlock with mystery and charm. In 1993, a detective arrived to investigate the new protectors of the city---she too decided to stay. 1994 was the year the team had finally made their true mark on the city, and their home watched as they made history.
These six had become the new masked vigilantes of Buffalo; and the old hospital was their base of operations, affectionately called, “The Basement”. They had been swooping in and saving those in immediate need. In a twist of fate, some of those souls would join their fold.
It was a quiet September night when the team was on patrol, and the heroes were engaged in a heated discussion.
“This isn’t a bloody rat infestation we’re discussing! We have roughly two thousand restless spirits mucking about in our home!” Warlock insisted.
The Detective let out a contemplative hum of agreement.
“Much as I'd like to avoid another night of fruitless argument, the conjuror has a point.”
Nightflyer gave an exasperated huff. “Sorcerer, Panda. He gets all fussy when you get the two mixed up.”
“Right, anyway it would be wise to perform some sort of exorcism or cleansing if we’re going to continue living in the asylum. At the very least, we can dispose of all the ashes.”
“Millions of jars of ashes to sort through, angel-fish,” the human-fish hybrid known as Arthur commented. “Might be a bit of a handful, even for Merlin here.”
The team continued this discussion well into the night. As the waining moon rose higher into the sky, Nightflyer noticed someone was absent from the conversation.
“Sniper?” she called into her communicator. “You’ve been awful quiet tonight.”
“Shhh,” came the response from the marksman.
Nightflyer noticeably sputtered and dipped in her flight path. “Did you just shoosh me?!” she said outraged.
“Quiet,” he replied. “I’ve got something.” A familiar ‘click’ could be heard over the secure channel as Sniper prepped his trademark rifle.
Nightflyer immediately shifted into a serious tone. “What do you see?”
“Three perps, all male, one possible victim, female, alley way. Girl looks under the influence,” Sniper reported.
“Clear shot?” Nightflyer asked.
Sniper let out a small hum of confirmation. “Don’t I always?”
“Take care of the blighters, but try not to paint us as maniacs please,” the Detective requested.
“Alright, I’ll clip the furthest one from the entrance. Flyer, drop on contestant number two. Warlock, try and hex the middle one. He’ll have the easiest shot at injuring her if this gets ugly.”
The aforementioned heroes confirmed the plan, and Sniper squeezed the trigger. Before the young lady could muster a full scream, one assailant fell to the ground while gripping his leg the other disappeared in a flash of violet wings, the final one, brandishing a knife, prepared to fight his way out, when suddenly his entire body seemed to lock up. Sniper reloaded and signalled the other two to fall back. “Alright, Detective you’re up. She’ll need to see a friendly face,”
“Boss?” the Detective started. “I believe she has other plans,” she finished as the young woman bolted into the street.
Just as two vehicles approached.
“Stop her!” Sniper ordered.
The Detective ran out as fast as she could, halting to delay one car successfully. The other one was not as quick, and the sickening sound of tires squealing and flesh against metal sounded into the air.
Silence filled the channel, until broken by Snipers now shuttering voice, “Detective, get her out of the street, Arthur, Warlock help the driver and any passengers… I’ll be down there in a moment.”
This was their first incident as a team, and it shook them all, they had become too assured of their abilities. Now someone was hurt, and they couldn't have stopped it.
Detective was immediately at the girl’s side, waving off the driver and attempting to access major injuries. Sniper had dropped down to the street level, watching with a heavy weight on his heart.
“Report,” he requested mechanically.
The Detective hovered her hands along the girl’s back. “Massive spinal trauma, broken pelvis as well as two ribs. Boss, I don’t have the tools to handle this in the street, she needs a proper hospital.”
“Fine. Warlock, can you port her there?” he asked. After a moment of silence he snapped. “Warlock!”
The sorcerer had been frozen in place, uncertain of his magic’s ability to help in the matter. “I can try, it won’t be easy to avoid making her injuries worse.”
“It won’t do her anymore good to wait on an ambulance. Do it,” the marksman ordered.
As his team tended to the injured girl, Sniper pulled out a phone and began altering his funds. “I need a name,” he said without looking up.
The Detective tentatively searched the girl’s pockets. Finding her wallet, she slipped an I.D. card out. “Ginger Ackerman, fifteen years of age. Blimey, she’s just a kid,” she said.
Sniper managed to keep a professional stance and entered her name. Instantly, Ginger’s financial accounts were filled with enough funds to provide plenty for any medical treatment she would need upon arriving at the hospital.
“Doesn’t look like she has any immediate family connected to her information. This is going to be hard to explain,” he commented.
“If she lives,” Warlock muttered as light emitted from his fingertips.
“She will make it,” Sniper said in a deathly low tone. “There’s no ‘if’ to it, understood?”
Warlock nodded before disappearing in a flash of light along with the girl and the Detective. Nightflyer landed beside the team leader and crossed her arms.
“He looked like he was ready to faint,” she observed. “You didn’t have to grill him like that,”
“She’s going to make it,” Sniper affirmed. Nightflyer observed him carefully, before sighing and placing a supportive hand on his shoulder.
“Yeah, she will,” she assured. Whether it was just for him or both of them she wasn’t sure.
=
The team returned home, shaken by the revelation of their first true defeat. The Basement offered some comfort, but most of the heroes found themselves anxiously awaiting news from the hospital.
They would later learn that Ginger’s recovery would be far more than a matter of knitting broken bones.
The damage to her spinal cord was catastrophic, and the emotional trauma of the night before plagued her mind. Felix had many networks of innovative investors, granting him access to medical procedures otherwise the stuff of science fiction. Ginger would walk again.
Whether or not she would have the will to was another hurdle all its own.
The young woman had been struggling long before paralyzation was even an issue. Possessing potential all but unseen by her parents, she had run away at a young age, living on the streets and falling deeper and deeper into a destructive lifestyle. It took months of coaxing in her recovery, but Ginger honestly believed if the crash hadn’t occurred she would have been dead anyway.
In their first failure, the team had found their greatest triumph.
Thanks to the charity of a brilliant neurologist along the warmth of the Basement and her tenants, Ginger eventually joined the team.
In the eyes of a young blue pixie, now only nine and known as Clinic, they were more of a family.
During 1995, the team’s anonymity was quickly disappearing as more and more people attempted to photograph and record the heroes behind the stories of valor. Some wanted to seek the truth, others pursued profit, while many simply wanted to give thanks to these courageous individuals.
The next year was rather quiet, the calm before the storm as fate would have it. Although they had been aware of the paranormal elements of the world, the Basement’s team was in for an abrupt introduction to it first hand. In the form of one John Gabriel.
A Nephilim, an angel human hybrid, John was struggling with his place in the cosmos. Determined to make good of his existence, and inspired by the work of Sniper and his band, he fell in Buffalo in a thunderstorm, eager to throw in his lot with theirs.
Sniper agreed, on the condition that he kept the thunderstorms to a minimum.
By 1998, the team had galvanized from a group of altruistic strangers to a well-oiled, crime fighting crew.
Seeing through the glamour, Sniper saw the need for an honest element to his team. He’d spent years molding them into a unit, and countless hours during that time bringing them closer into something more. He was sure of their support in choosing someone new.
His choice, however, was not well received.
=
“This is a joke, right?” Anne pressed.
Felix gave no indication that he was anything but serious about his choice. However, he was showing signs of an oncoming headache.
“When have I even not been serious regarding who we bring into the fold, Anne?” he questioned the spirited woman.
Anne crossed her arms, eyes blazing in disbelief.
“Since when do we recruit from prison? Hell, young as this punk his it’ll probably be juvenile hall!”
“His record shows nothing beyond a slap on the wrist from the authorities, a couple weeks at the most,” Felix continued.
The idea did not go much better with the other members of the team either.
“He’s gonna die,” John said bluntly.
Warlock and Detective, in their civilian identities as Jonathan and Samantha, were debating whether their new recruit would serve as a practice dummy or cannon fodder.
Even Clinic, devoted to Felix as the little nymph was, looked puzzled by his surrogate father’s judgment.
“He looks mean, and like he’d get hurt a lot,” he spoke honestly.
Arthur slicked back his hair with a webbed hand. “Yeah, chief,” he spoke slowly. “Doesn’t seem like the type we usually go for. Guppy’s probably just another thug to be.”
The rest of the room said their agreements, until Ginger, who decided she enjoyed the name Tabby better knocked a vase to the ground with the tail like extension to her new spine, to get everyone’s attention. Her face was set in a neutral yet accusatory look.
“So what? A kid’s background is a little rough, so he’s not good enough for you all? Maybe you should just keep the pretty street kids,” she put bluntly.
No one seemed to have a reply for her.
“Look,” Felix caught their attention. “We’ll keep the kid under observation a while longer if it will help convince you, but I know potential when I see it.” His expression softened a fraction. “Even if it's harder to see in certain people, you just have to dig a bit deeper.”
The room bashfully came to an agreement. Even if some doubt lingered, no one was going to be the first to pick a fight with Felix and Tabby.
So it was decided; their newest member would remain under watch until Felix determined he was ready.
The kid in question? A gutter-punk from Boston with a chip on his shoulder, a foul mouth, and a bleeding heart.
❛ i want a tattoo of a ufo on my ass to represent how it’s out of this world ❜
( source: accepting. )
she raised her brow, a soft, low chuckle leaving her lips. slender fingers grazed the pages of the magazine as colored orbs scanned the art that filled each page. she was mezmerized by the designs, its uniqueness and quite intrigued by how some of them had some sort of meaning behind it.
the two had been discussing tattoos for a while. what they’d get and what they would possibly mean. the other went on and on about her ideas while poppy just sat there and listened. she too wished she could get one but father had forbidden it. it made her upset, but he was only doing it in her best interest. plus, it only made sense not to get anything done. poppy had gotten her metal parts skin grafted not too long ago. it was the finest of the finest. used up almost half of her fathers income to get it so in a sense she did understand.
“I’d love to see that happen.” poppy scoffed, playfully eyeing the other briefly before her eyes fluttered back to her book.
