She takes a bus to the rendezvous Miss Militia had mentioned, getting off and finding an alleyway nearby to change in. She's not sure what she'd do if she had to actually change out of and into clothes, but the Equipping process her powers used only took a moment; blink and you'd miss it. She played and equipped her
Swiftfoot Boots first, practically as soon as the alley was empty. The rest of her hand had a
Night // Day, a
Moldgraf Millipede, a
Deputy of Detention, a
Circuit Mender,
Healing Leaves, and
Rookie Mistake. The cards she draws when drawing to replace the boots are a Forest, which she plays, then another Forest, another one played, then after a third minute of waiting, a Brockton Bay Central Library, which she plays and activates: she draws a Forest, and discards Night // Day. She then plays the Forest, then draws
Zask, Skittering Swarmlord. She checks her graveyard, yep, Zask is still there, too, from when she summoned him to talk this morning. This is her first time seeing both copies of that card. She draws a
Brigid, Hero of Kinsbaile, then uses BBC Library to draw and discard a Hunter's Edge. She draws and plays a Forest, draws and discards an
Ironshell Beetle, then draws and plays Homeward Path. She draws
Hidden Predators and plays it, feeling its protection wrap around her at the edge of her senses. She draws and discards
Nantuko Cultivator to hand size; then draws
Crawling Sensation, she mulls it over for a moment, then plays it. She gets the feeling she didn't get its full effects last time, no insects under her control, at least. This time it mills 2 Forests, and she draws a
Kraul Harpooner, which she discards. Then, finally, she draws her
Leather Armor, plays it, and equips it. Goodbye Taylor, Hello Wildcard.
She considers whether to summon Zask or Brigid, but she doesn't have much time before she's supposed to show up. Would it be enough to meet and get comfortable with this Brigid? Zask was inhuman, but dealing with them had become more familiar as she'd had a few goes at it. Better to stick with what's familiar, and maybe summon Brigid if we needed help. Notably, there were only 4 cards left in her deck; and as she considered it, Crawling Sensation went off! It was like she accidentally poked it mentally and suddenly half her remaining library, a Winslow High School and a
Caustic Caterpillar, were in her graveyard. On the other hand, she felt a new sense unfolding, an entirely intuitive second perspective joining her own, she noticed a quartet of plump flies that her second perspective's vision and awareness seemed to conglomerate from. She could direct them to move with a thought, though as they raced away from her she felt their 'signal' get weaker. She'd guess they'd stay reliable out to... 60 feet? She couldn't seem to tell them to separate from one another, they flew as a small squad, adjusting only for obstacles and walls in their flight path. Enough experimenting with her power, according to her PRT phone, she has 2 minutes to walk 3 blocks or she'll be late.
She summons Zask and informs him "Today we'll be patrolling with 2 known heroes; I don't expect any trouble, but we'll likely intercede in any trouble we find."
"Understood, Master."
"And don't call me master, call me Wildcard."
As the girl in full leather armor and gleaming silvery boots was accompanied by the many-legged insect that rivaled her in size, they walked out of the alley and up the road towards the designated intersection. Ahead of them, she could see Miss Militia alongside a recognizable blond girl with a green visor. It looked like she'd be patrolling alongside Vista. She could see the moment Miss Militia spotted her, followed by Vista turning to take her in. And then she could see the moment after that, when Miss Militia registered the giant insect following alongside her, by a widening and then tightening of the eyes. She must have said something to Vista, because with the visor the girl displayed no visible reaction to being approached by her and Zask except to wave and smile. "Hello Wildcard, my name is Vista. It's always an honor to meet new heroes."
"Hello Vista, Miss Militia, um, this is Zask, they're the summon I've got to join us today" Taylor replied.
"It's good to see you again, Wildcard, if it's fine with you, we'll be taking a walking route in through the Boardwalk and towards the vicinity of Clarendon High. The plan is for our route to stop and turnabout at Clarendon Park, cross the park, and come back three blocks north of where we came out, finishing up just at the intersection up there, but if that's too long for you or we run into any trouble, you can back off at any time. We'll finish out the route and it'll be no sweat." Miss Militia explained.
"Did you name Zask yourself, or did the name come with your power?" asked Vista once you'd gotten underway.
"They came with that name, and they can answer your questions themself" Taylor offers, eager to help the younger heroine.
"They can talk?" Vista exclaims.
"I̸ ̴c̸a̵n̸ ̵s̴p̵e̷a̶k̵" Zask's chittering voice sounds, and she has no trouble understanding them, but Vista replies:
"Is that supposed to be legible? I didn't catch any of that"
"I̵t̷ ̸m̶a̴y̴ ̷b̶e̵ ̸t̸h̴a̸t̸ ̸o̵u̵r̷ ̷c̴o̸n̴n̴e̶c̸t̶i̷o̶n̶ ̷h̷e̷l̸p̴s̶ ̴y̵o̶u̶ ̵u̶n̶d̴e̷r̸s̷t̷a̴n̸d̷ ̸m̴e̷" Zask explains, which she parrots:
"Zask thinks my power helps me understand him, but he's able to communicate with me at least, and he can understand you just fine."
"Cool, I wish my power came with a teammate."
...
"You know, it'd be awesome to have another girl on the Wards. We just got Shadow Stalker, but she doesn't seem much like the friendly type." Vista chirps into the quiet that had settled.
"I don't know, I think I've had enough of teenage drama for a lifetime" she explained her honest objection to the idea of the Wards.
"It comes with lots of benefits, not just the 6 digits of pay, but training and experience you can't get anywhere else."
Response Vote:
[X] For now I want to avoid the Wards, they involve too much oversight (sugarcoat that for Vista, explain that you want freedom).
[X] Let's permanently avoid the Wards, you summon your own team.
[X] Do they have trial memberships? Could you change your mind once you've been at it for a month?
[X] Would you have to tell your Dad about your powers? What would it take to keep that under wraps?
It's as they've been patrolling for a little over an hour and have passed out of the nicest, touristy part of town into the still-nice, but more practical neighborhood just north of the Towers, that something goes amiss. The first sign of trouble is the faint drone of someone on a loudspeaker a block away from their path, at what the sign indicates is an electronics store, 'Jake's Electronics & Repair', it reads. She sends her flies to investigate.
As soon as they're around the corner and they can see what she can, Miss Militia barks out commands like this is what she was waiting for, "Vista, get us in close; Wildcard, send Zask with-" glass shatters at the storefront as a wild arc of lightning momentarily blinds them. The civilians are doing a fairly good job of getting themselves out of the way, so you're blinking your eyes to see the culprit standing proud with arms wreathed in a electricity over a wire mesh. He's wearing a yellow and black jacket under that and one of those rubber full-face masks that's supposed to look realistic, with fake stubble shading a mostly bald head above a mustache and goatee, but you recognize his voice:
"Try the neon, bro! Just focus and shake loose a blast or two!" Leet yelled/shrieked, which must mean that the other one, standing taller in the doorway with a black coat that he filled out well and a red beanie over his mask, also with wire mesh around his arms, would be Über. They made a career off of being too ridiculous to take seriously, and streamed their video game-themed crimes to an audience of thousands. Their 'antics' in the past had included baiting and then viciously beating prostitutes in one extremely sick example of GTA 'gameplay', and she wasn't eager to see what they were up to today. Fortunately it seemed less sinister than beating innocent prostitutes, but she still intended to stop them. "Can you send Zask ahead with me and tell them to follow my orders? I'm going to try to take down Leet before any more lightning is released." Miss Militia asked in a clipped tone, not taking her eyes off the incident ahead. "Will you follow behind us to engage Über and keep him from making off with the merchandise? Vista, you are to maintain second operational distance as a first priority, and support our efforts only as a secondary priority."
Engaging Über and Leet Vote and Sub-Vote:
[X] "Zask, follow Miss Militia's orders, help her deal with Leet. I'll accost Über", choose a plan to engage Über from those below or Write-In
- [X] Command your
Hidden Predators beast to engage on him.
- [X] Get close and distract him, then when he tries to respond hit him with
Rookie Mistake.
- [X] Summon Brigid to provide ranged fire on Über.
- [X] Summon a
Circuit Mender and, while you distract Über, have it weld their bag of stolen goods to the street. It should only take a moment.
- [X] Summon a
Moldgraf Millipede and have it tackle him!
- [X] Summon your
Deputy of Detention and send Über on a trip out of this reality.
- [X] Write-In some combination of cards to use or implement a plan without cards.
[X] "No, listen up, Zask is disposable, and I'm tough, so we'll take the frontline, both of you stay back to provide ranged support. See if you can make the lack of an intact shopfront window a good thing, huh?", choose a plan for dealing with Über or Leet, and tell me how Zask is going to engage on the other, OR, Write-In something completely different.
- [X] Have Zask scare the shit out of Über and get him away from the merchandise, while you try to take down Leet using a well-timed
Rookie Mistake and mundane hand-to-hand (Hey! You were in a self-defense class! Once... Years ago...)
- [X] Have Zask use a calculated dose of venom to disable but not kill Leet, you can fix it with
Healing Leaves later, you think; or leave it for Panacea. Summon an
Ironshell Beetle from the graveyard using Zask to buff ourselves up, then give Über an old-school ass-kicking.
- [X] Write-In
[X] "Write-In what to say and what to do"
