trans_9 | Building a family [hella open]

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Building a family [hella open]

Slobo had been puttering around the ship for an hour, thinking and looking. He quickly found that if you looked hard enough, between W&P and the City itself, you could find anything. In the end, he was standing outside a Courtyard by Marriott hotel about a click outside of "Escherville" with spraypaint and a very large block of stone. At first he had thought about the Vatican, but it was too wrecked from the zombie fight. Plus, this place had an indoor pool. He spraypainted a large message on the wall next to the door, red with black outline.

"OUTSIDERS
COMMUNITY SERVICE
FIELD TRAINING

PEER COUNSELING"

On the sandwich board tucked near the door, he wrote "~~12-21?~~ Info and Tryouts inside" and left it out in front. Now, he took his large rock into the lobby and began carving. And waited.

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"Nope, I can work with that. Let's ya get into those hard to reach places, like locked rooms, I bet. Anyway, vilcomen. Or however 'ze Germans' say that..." Static stuck his hand out for a traditional 'welcome aboard' handshake. Come to think of it, this was the first recruit he'd offered a handshake to, including Slobo...

"As long as it's not completely sealed up, I can get in." Shadow Link answered. He just needed a little hole or something and he could get in. "...and who are the Germans and what's vilcomen?"

He looked at the hand, seeming almost confused by it for a few moments before grabbing his hand and shaking it.

"Nation of people where Slobo and I come from. Very uptight since they lost the second World War... Vilcomen is supposedly how you say welcome in German. Dunno why it seemed appropriate..." he shrugged. "Anyway, take some time, look around, meet the others. I'll be in here if you need anything, and Slobo ought to be out working on his statue for the rest of the day."

"A....World War?" Shadow Link said, frowning. "Got the whole world involved?" He certainly didn't know a war where EVERYONE was at war.

"What's the statue for?"

"well, they call it that, but it wasn't really the whole world. Just the major world powers, but that meant every continent was involved, so it did span the whole world, split into two side - axis and allies. But, that's all history; that was, like, 60 years ago now. The world had already recovered from the third wold war when I was pulled from it." He sighed. When you thought about it, there was always some big thing going on, superheroes or not.

"Slobo's statue is going to be one of Brainiac Five, the guy who sacrificed himself for all of us taking the bridge. It's kind of a tradition where we come from; someone sacrifices everything like that, the team builds a statue in their honor so we never forget."

"THREE world wars in sixty years?" Shadow Link said, looking horrified. There was usually more of a break than that.

"Ah....well, that sounds like a good tradition," he said. It was. Kind of...nice.

"Mm, we do what we can. And it's actually been closer to eighty years since the first world war. The second spun out of the ashes of the first, and the third one was only a little while ago. Taught a good lesson, though; never piss off a superhero who has his own country."

"....isn't a superhero supposed to be a good guy? Why does he start a war?" Shadow Link asked, the look not waning. Jeeze, it was one thing to enjoy violence, but a world that went to world that easily was just pure chaos.

You can't rule pure chaos. And heroes aren't supposed to encourage violence.

"Because people F%^#ed with his country. He was one of those 'used to be a villain, became a hero' guys who was always walking a thin line. But, I wasn't there, so I don't know too much about it."

Pure chaos indeed.

"Well, defending his country is certainly a good thing. Just usually heroes don't encourage much bloodshed, but if he was a villain..."

Yeah, he could see that.

"It can be a thin line, and once you've crossed it...well, I speak from experience when I say it's hard to come back. Me, Rose, Slobo... at one time, we were all villains on our world. Admittedly, Rose and I were both brainwashed into it, and it was before Slobo became Slobo, but we all still have to wrestle with that part of ourselves. That's actually one of the major reasons for this group; to try and help each other from falling back."

Shadow Link was silent for several moments there.

"....what about villains who don't want to be villains and aren't in for that whole 'hero' thing?" He made his voice casual, but the pause said quite a lot that maybe it wasn't so casual.

Static paused for a minute to mull it over. "Well, the way I see it, 'hero' and 'villain' arn'tpolar opposites. If you do bad things with intent, that makes you a villain. We were brainwashed, but Rose and I still knowingly did bad things. Villains. Do good things with intent, Hero. Do good things period, hero. Intentionally avoid doing bad things, not a villain, and therefore a hero. The way I see it, being neutral and simply not causing problems does make you a hero, because you arn't doing bad things. But true heros, those are the guys who give up evrything they have, put their lives on the line, for the greater good. Personally, I try and do that, but I fall short every time. It's why I don't consider myself a hero... kind of a double standard, but, well, it's a work in progress. I just think of myself as a 'cape'; someone with powers."

It's obvious Static has spent a long time muling this over, trying to create a rationale for why some of the world's best heroes do some of the worst things, like Wonder Woman did a few years ago. It's also obvious that he's still working out the details.

"That's a general way to define heroes," Shadow Link commented. "Odd to have something that took a lot of thought to be optimistic."

"Yeah, well, if I let myself get too depressed, bad things start to happen. Controlling ambient energy around you can have some nasty side effects if you arn't paying attention."

"Ambient energy? I thought you just controlled lightning," Shadow Link said. "With a name like Shocky and Static, anyway."

"I absord and control ambient electromagnetic energy." He smiled. "The electricity in the air. Like Static electricity."

He just gave a blank look at ambient electromagnetic energy. "...I'll take your word for it."

"The lightning comes from the air, basically. If it's not controlled properly, things tend to become airborne or stick to me."

"Why would lightning make thin-no, no, not going to ask. This is going to be a science answer, I bet, and I'm still reading up on that stuff," Shadow Link said, waving a hand in the air. "Most of the people's worlds are centuries beyond what technology there is in Hyrule."

"...yeah, the answer really gets down to the nitty gritty 'make of the universe' stuff. Electricity is actually smaller than the eye can see, and is all around us. We only see it strike as lightning when you get a whole bunch of it together." Well, it was quasi-truth, at least. "We really do have a lot of different techs and cultures jammed together here; I mean, this ship is centuries ahead of us, too. But, if there's any sciencey stuff you want to know about, I'll see what I can do. I gotta get back to work, anyway." He turned around and started back for the office. "Seeya later, Shad!"

That's right, you've already got a nickname.

"I learn better on my own. The media library has files on it," Shadow Link said, still looking confused at the explanation. Lightning was everywhere? That made him nervous, with how bright it was.

"Bye," he said before he processed the name, looking more confused. "...Shad?"

...now he's wondering if this whole 'trial period' is just gonna confuse him like this had. He supposed he'd have to wait and see.

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Building a family [hella open]

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