Catalysts: IC (Oh the thread is slowly dying...)

Well you've read the OOC, and you've made your character, so now what? You post here.
Now, some info.
We are in the city of New Suffolk on Wake Island. It is a large city. To the east is a beach, because this is a coastal city. To the north is another city, this one deserted. It is being quarantined for a virus which is no longer active. It is easy to get into. The power is still running, but utilities aren't. It is a decently large city with a few large hotels and a (dead) metro system. To the west is a forest, broken by streams and meadows. It is a favorite of hunters for its abundant wildlife. To the south is a mountain range perforated with caves, ending on the southern cliffs which drop of steeply into the ocean.
Now on to the government. The government is a fascist one. They impose color-coded curfews judging on the current percieved level of danger. Red means stay off the streets. Orange means 9:00 curfew. Yellow means 11:00 curfew. Blue means 1:00 AM. They paint anyone who does not agree with them as a "terrorist." The police patrol the streets and will use force to arrest suspicious individuals. When caught after curfew a beating is an optimistic punishment.

Have fun.

David stalked the abandoned metro station he called "The Haunt." Tonight would be a boring one, as there was nothing that had been reported by his few fellow anarchist contacts. He sighed. Just patrolling, tonight. He grabbed his throwing knives, donned his gloves, put on his trenchcoat, took the katana, and prepared for his seventh night of being Nox. The Haunt always seemed gloomy, but the idea of another dreary night made it even more so. He walked up the stairs. He went south, sneaking past a patrol of two guards on the way to New Suffolk. He climbed a pipe up to a rooftop. This was going to be boring.

Winter, hidden amongst some shrubbery, sat chewing on a stick as she waited. This leg of the woods was frequented by hunters, and she needed to be as quiet as possible to escape their detection for... various reasons. The stick was the only thing around to silence her grumbling stomach.

She glanced skywards. It would be past curfew soon, which would mean a whole night spent inside the forest. That had happened once or twice. They were not nights Winter looked back on fondly.

Snap.

She jumped, scarcely believing her luck. Lifting her head from above the leaf cover, she watched as the struggles of a rabbit caught in a trap slowed, then ceased. Grinning, Winter leapt to her feet, efficiently snapped the animal's neck, and removed it from the trap.

She set off back in the direction of the city after smearing the stolen meal in mud to disguise its soon-to-be-horrid smell.

Well fuck. He might as well rest a little bit. He leaned down against a wall, taking care to shroud himself in shadows. Curfew time was coming. He weighed his options: Another night at the haunt, or a night stalking the town. He chose the town. Maybe he would meet someone who had the guts to go out after curfew. Someone like him. He repressed the thought. He distrusted people. People like money. They'll turn in lawbreakers to get money. Best to be safe. He climbed up on a fire escape and sat there, where at least he could see from a vantage point.

Rodney climbed up the loading dock of the abandoned big-box store in the abandoned city. Normally, someone might have taken him for some sort of looter or free-rider; those people wouldn't have known that the back room of this old store was starting to turn into Rodney's personal Batcave.

"Batcave" probably wasn't quite the right word for it; it was hardly a secret lair full of high-tech gadgets, and Rodney was hardly a masked vigilante. However, the spacious storeroom gave him plenty of room to draw things out and experiment with them, so it was really more of a "private playground." He'd discovered the place about four days ago, and he'd been coming here at night to clear it out. Creatively moving things out was half the fun; once, he'd drawn a forklift and drove around with it. Another time, he'd tried his hand at drawing a laser; he'd fired it once, and it shorted out after. Meanwhile, that toilet paper never knew what hit it (because nothing did, and it came out unscathed until Rodney walked over and kicked it while shouting "PEW PEW PEW"). He wanted to get the front half of the place cleared out for use, but the front windows were broken, and they would show the lights were on. The back room was plenty big for the time being, anyway.


This time, Rodney set his backpack down in the office and ventured out into the store proper. He made a beeline for the arts and crafts department. It had occurred to him on the way over that this of all places was the least likely to have been stolen from; there wasn't likely to have been much stolen from there, and it probably had a lot of things he could use. He was overjoyed to find one large stack of posterboard and another stack of poster paper. There were also a few packs of permanent markers in all sorts of colors, and the usual primary color assortment of dry-erase markers. Most of what would pass for paint was gone, probably to graffiti "artist" punks, but there was still some fixative on hand and some child's paints and chalk. In any case, it would last him a few weeks at least, even going at the pace he liked to go.

He returned to the back room and found the section of wall he was after; there was a three-view turnaround of a forklift there, rendered on a dingy gray wall in black house paint. He put his hand on it and concentrated, and a few seconds later, the drawings on the wall disappeared. Next to him, a dingy gray forklift with a few black parts appeared next to him. He loaded a pallet onto it and drove it back to the crafts department. He loaded the pallet with everything useful and hauled the whole thing back. If anyone was taking particular care to watch, they might have seen Rodney's flashlight guiding the lift; he wasn't being especially careful, since he was already making noise.

When he got started, he was going to have fun tonight.

Nox decided against the populated city after some deliberation. The abandoned zone would enable him to be back to his urban playground. He had been scoping out an abandoned warehouse type store. Quoetly as he could, he began to walk through the woods. He was walking through the brush when he stepped on a twig. Snap.

Winter jumped. She'd been stepping on a lot of twigs, but the noise she heard just now seemed to come from somewhere off to her right. She froze and ducked down as quickly and noiselessly as possible.

Yes, there was definitely something there, moving through the undergrowth. Too big for a rabbit, too small for a deer, and its movements sounded humanoid. Worst case scenario, it was the hunter, who would be very pissed off to find his kill stolen.

...No. Worst case scenario, it was a policeman. Winter gave an involuntary shudder.

The rabbit carcass gave a quite voluntary squeak.

Winter jumped. DAMMIT that was careless. She really, really needed to learn to control that. Shrugging off the sudden weariness that fogged her mind, she shouldered the rabbit and booked it through the forest, all thoughts of making it to town before curfew abandoned. Maybe she could lose this hunter or policeman or whatever he was in the abandoned city.

Nox ran after her, his speed raised in the dark of the forest. "Hey! Wait up!" He was just curious as to who it was now. Damn, she was fast. He broke into a full out sprint. "I mean you no harm!" Wow, that sounded stupid. Awkward, even. He really needed to work on his "people skills."

This was unusual - the police usually led with gunshots, not words. Winter considered stopping, yelling back, even just looking over her shoulder, and decided against all but the latter. One glance, however, led her to realize that she did not exactly have a choice on the subject of avoiding a confrontation.

She had seen some things move, but this guy was something else. He would imminently outpace her.

Giving up her flight, Winter grabbed the oak blackjack she kept slung from her belt and adopted a cautious but not overly-aggressive stance. Attempting to hide the mud-coated rabbit cadaver - this man was most definitely not of the police force, but he might still turn out to be a hunter - Winter slowed to a halt and spun round to face her pursuer.

"Just who the hell are you and why are you after me?" She narrowed her eyes, suspicious of the fact that she could not quite seem to be able to focus on the man.

He stopped in his pursuit. "Well, you can call me Nox, and you just seemed different from the rest of the hunters." He eyed her cautiously, and saw she was carrying some form of club. He pulled a couple of knives from his jacket. "Let's not get too hasty, now." He sounded odd and he knew it. He wasn't good with people- scratch that, he REALLY wasn't good with people.

"Well then. Nox." Winter kept her blackjack raised, eyeing the knives Nox had retrieved from his jacket. "You can call me Winter. I've been trapping in this area for months. You don't seem like one of them, so we can be straight with eachother, yes? I'm heading to the ruins to pawn this off."

Lies lies lies. Better for him to think her a respectable hunter, with connections in the powerful gangs, than a common thief. Of course, if he did turn out to be with the government, she'd just signed her own death warrant. But something about this Nox suggested the exact opposite.

"Where the devil are you headed, armed like that. Hmm?" Even if he was a fellow outlaw, Winter'd been double-crossed, assaulted, and beaten too many times by her own kind to let her guard down just yet.

"I prowl around the city at night. I'm heading off back to an abandoned store I'd like to check out. I hang around in the metro in the ruins. Good to see another urban explorer." With that he put the knives back inside his coat. "Now I believe there is no further need for hostility." He turned to walk away, flipping the peace sign and looking over his shoulder only once, a smile on his face.

Perplexed, Winter stood with her head cocked as Nox walked away back into the cover of the forest. She lowered her blackjack.

"Wait!" she called out after a spell, but it was too late. The man had faded away like a wraith, and was most likely out of earshot. The only sounds were of the wind in the trees and a chorus of insects.

With a small hmmph, Winter re-sheathed the blackjack and turned to look at the city. It being well past curfew, she might as well head into the ruins for the night. She knew of an old hole-in-the-wall that she had taken shelter in once or twice. Well, shelter in that it was secluded and offered at least the illusion of protection from the elements.

Regrettably, she would not be able to cook the rabbit until morning. A fire at night was asking for trouble. Hoping that it would not have gone too bad by then, and that she could keep her hunger at bay, Winter began to trudge as noiselessly as she could manage in the direction of the abandoned city.

Nox turned, his senses heightened by the darkness. Winter had yelled something. He began to run back, glad for a chance of more conversation. As he stopped beside her, he looked at her. She looked thin, and somewhat moody. Being as amiable as possible, he asked "Do you have a place to stay?"

Woah. What the fuck. Now this Nox guy was starting to freak her out. She had been certain he'd left, and now just as she'd fully lowered her guard and began to think about other things...

Winter almost tripped. One moment, no Nox. Then, Nox. She hadn't even heard him approaching.

"Of course I do," she snapped, too flustered for politeness. Truth be told, she was immensely curious as to the man's origin, but she wasn't about to say so. Covering her curiosity with anger, "I'll have you know there's a very nice... And anyway, what's it to you if..." Winter faltered, eyes widening unintentionally as she felt the familiar energy drain. The rabbit's corpse gave a barely perceptible wriggle.

She quickly severed the connection. All fake annoyance having now abandoned her face, she attempted to regain her composure. Emotions trigger it. Dammit, I have to remember that.

After a moment, Winter gave a small sigh. "You scared the hell out of me. Damn police would've had me in irons or worse for being out tonight, and the hunter's wouldn't be too pleased, either. This here's yanked from one of the poor suckers' traps." She no longer felt it wise to lie to this man.

"Hey, you just seem like you could use a decent place to stay. By the way, nice rabbit. " Oh awkwardness, damned be ye. Now he just sounded stalkerish. He blushed, painfully aware of how he'd just sounded. The thoughts echoed in his head: "That was stupid." He weighed whether or not it was too late to save face and walk away.

Meanwhile, in the back room, Rodney was busy sketching away. His stock of foam-core and dry-erase markers meant he could draw as much as he felt like without having to use up wall space or paper. He was drawing cartoons this time; good classic-style cartoons that you didn't see often amidst the assortment of government-apprroved educational programs, but that if you knew where to look, you could still find them. He had finished a sort of drippy blue ooze critter, a slightly ditzy-looking red dog, and he was working on a brown bull. He wasn't sure what he'd draw next. Maybe a gorilla or a cat... oh who was he kidding? He was allergic to those things.

Nox decided to walk away. He felt an odd scramble of emotionjs within him, some normal such as worry and some new to him. He knew he wanted to become better friends with this huntress. That was for sure. But why did he have to be so awkward? He decided. "I have to go, but if you ever need a place to stay just find Metro Station 233." After that he started to walk away, his head down. He was irritated by his awkwardness. VERY irritated. As he slowly walked away, the shadows began roiling arouns him, to the point of forming an "aura." He needed to think. He needed to be alone. He- well, he didn't even know. And that was frustrating.

After finishing the bull, Rodney decided he'd had enough for the moment; might as well get right the stuff that he had already started. First, he touched the dog and summoned it; it literally jumped straight off the board and shook itself. As the forklift had been before he put it back, the dog had most of the appearance of the material it was taken from; namely, it ranged in color from dark red to pinkish where the marker had colored in unevenly, with a few spots of black/streaky gray that were drawn in.

It reared up on its hind legs and began licking Rodney's face, and Rodney had to take a half-step backwards not to be knocked over.

Maybe I should have drawn a corgi, not a lab, he thought. The dog felt real in most respects, but not quite convincing. The slobber was real; that wasn't very hard to imitate (except that it looked like it had been drawn on him with a dry-erase marker). The fur felt a bit flat though, like it was supposed to feel like fur on the outside, but underneath, it was just a homogenous blob of material.

He petted the dog and pried it off him, and it went off to sniff around.

"Don't go too far," he told it. Whether or not it heard, he didn't know, but it seemed to obey.

Then it was time for another experiment. He'd done something like it before, on accident, but that was when he was figure drawing; there hadn't been any drastic changes because of it.

He picked out the muck creature and touched the picture, but this time the effect was different. The creature didn't separate from the page immediately. Instead, the image blurred and started taking on a fleshy color, and Rodney turned blue and lost definition. Over the course of a few seconds (he felt like taking his time), the image started to look like him, and he started looking more and more like the image, until they both snapped into final form. On the board was a perfect representation of Rodney in marker, and Rodney was a marker-drawn goo monster.

Rodney laughed inwardly. It had worked! Now what?

He walked a few more feet before essentially collapsing against a tree trunk. He needed to think. He felt weak. He felt a little weak in his knees. He held his temples, mind working away at his feelings feverishly. He trusted Winter already, on a hunch. But he knew logically it was a bad idea. He felt an all-too-familiar stinging in his eyes. Thank god his hair covered his face. He sat there, bewildered and driving himself mad from within.

Rodney's transformation attracted the attention of the dog, and all Rodney knew how to do was sit there as the dog sniffed him and tried to lick his eyeball. Fortunately, the eye was made of the exact same stuff (what was it supposed to be, anyway?) as the rest of him, so it didn't hurt. He just felt his surface get dragged upwards a little bit, which was a bizarre feeling in and of itself.

This must be what it feels like to be an ice cream cone.


Eventually the dog lost interest, and Rodney tried to figure out how to move as a blob of goop. He had a sort of eye-thing that he could look around with, and there was a definite seam that wanted to stay in a certain position relative to the eye; that was supposed to be a mouth. Otherwise, it wasn't as though he had limbs to move, or anything that could even be construed as separate parts. His sense of proprioception was completely and utterly buggered. He was vaguely aware of being a puddle with a bit more mass than he had as a person, but that was really it.

Lacking any other option, he picked a fist-sized portion of himself and tried to wave it about. Wave it about he did, rather erratically. So he tried to move about the room like that, a clump at a time. Going at it by handfuls seemed tedious... perhaps he could try to have legs, sort of. He gathered himself into two clumps and tried to shift one ahead of the other. He oozed forwards on his left side... so far so good... now the right... and moving the right half shifted the left half back where it was, like his center of mass was determined to stay where it was.

And then, just like that, mental breakthrough. He was effectively a liquid, therefore he should just move like one. So if he just leaned a tad forward... his "body" responded "naturally" and flowed forwards, picking itself up behind him as he went. If it was going to be this hard every time he tried to shapeshift, it was just going to be tedious.

After Nox mentioned the rabbit, Winter thought it was to simply clam up. After all, the last thing she wanted to do was let her secret slip, and what with the new metahumans she'd heard rumors of...

Well. It wasn't to say that she was scared, as Winter hating admitting to fear of anything, but she was in fact scared. Scared of these urban legends, scared of the government, scared of herself.

She grunted a farewell as Nox strode off. Metro Station 233. I will remember that. Without a backward glance, though with a plethora of backwards thoughts, Winter continued on her way to the abandoned city.

He stood up. No use in this. Now where was he going? Oh right, back to the derelict metro. He was walking the empty streets when something cought his eye: a disc. There was nothing marked on it, making it even better. The more storage the better. He walked the familiar roads, eventually coming to a stop in front of a large store. Did it have a pharmaceuticals area? What was in there? The idea proves tempting and he strode in.

After about half an hour's walk through the forested area, her progress slowed by her desire to remain undetected, Winter found herself on the ruinous outskirts. She had to be careful; here is where a majority of gangs would be preying on stray travelers. Luckily, no such bands appeared to be present, but if there was one thing the years had taught Winter it was never take things as they presented themselves.

Further sneaking and darting from cover to cover found Winter at her self-designated hideout, an out-of-the-way little hut hidden in a back alley. It was wedged, uncomfortably, between the cadaver of a cafe and what once might have been an apartment complex. She sighed and, not daring to surrender the precious food to the room's only cupboard for fear of flies, rats, or worse creatures, hugged the mud-caked corpse to herself as she nodded off to sleep in a corner.

He strode out of the store, picked clean by looters. He headed off to his metro station. As he had before, he walke slowly. When he arrived it was about 5:00 AM and time to get a good day's sleep.