Annette groaned loudly as she watched the news the next morning after she had finally returned back to normal and could go sleep the rest of the evening away.
Of course, more than a dozen people had been recording her less than graceful fall into the bay water… Talk about embarrassing! And some news channels wouldn't stop playing that over and over from different angles!
They also played videos of her towing that one large ship across the bay towards the docks, and then one of her building the ship Stonehenge on the coast just on the other side of the city.
A part of her had been desperately hoping that the news or the public wouldn't turn it into a huge deal, but deep down she knew that was unrealistic. Of course, when a giant woman appears out of nowhere they are bound to take notice! That was only common sense.
She then laid across the couch like an overly dramatic teenager, and said unironically, "My humiliation is complete. My life's over."
"It's not so bad? At least they're saying mostly positive things about you, instead of saying you're a new villain or something." Taylor said nearby, as she was eating cereal. She had gotten up to watch the news with her mother.
Annette glanced over at her daughter. When did the roles become reversed here? Why was Taylor sounding like the mature adult here? Did she pull a roll without realizing it again?
No, she was just in a bad mood right now. She sighed loudly and pulled on her power to see if it could make things better.
>Ding<
Roll 17--Document Modeling. looks at the inherent structure in documents. It looks not at the structure in formatting which is the classic realm of word-processing tools, but at the structure in content. Because document content is typically viewed as the ad hoc result of a creative process, the art of document modeling is still in its infancy. Most document modeling comes in the form of document templates evidenced most often as word-processing documents, fill-able PDF forms, and XML templates. The particular strength of XML in this context is its ability to model document components in a tree-like structure and its separation of content and style.
Effect: Annette now gains the ability to format all her document's styles in a professional-looking way, and knows how to open any document format in any program.
She scoffed loudly at that because that wasn't really doing anything for her. She pulled again.
>Ding<
Roll 8--Christian metal. Also known as Jesus metal or heavenly metal, is a form of heavy metal music usually defined by its message using song lyrics as well as the dedication of the band members to Christianity. Christian metal is typically performed by professed Christians principally for Christians who listen to heavy metal music and often produced and distributed through various Christian networks.
Effect: for eight hours, every corner of the house will loudly blare heavy metal that features strong Christian overtones in its lyrics. Thankfully for the neighbors' sanity, it can be only heard from inside the house. And not outside the house.
"Ugh, mom!" Taylor put her hands over her ears as the sounds of loud heavy metal filled the house.
"Sorry!" Annette yelled back over the loud wailing lyrics.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
None of the Heberts were a huge fan of Heavy Metal music in the first place, and two hours in it was already starting to give them a headache.
So, Taylor went over to visit Emma, and Danny made the excuse that he needed to check in on something at work.
Annette figured that she might as well as head over to her own workplace, with the excuse that she needed to grade some papers or something.. Just to have some peace and quiet for once.
It was there that she found one of her work associates in the middle of mediating a dispute between two college kids. It looked like it was eventually going to escalate out of control, with the two of them coming to blows. He had this helpless look on his face like he didn't know how to get the kids to calm down, and when their eyes met, he mouthed, "help?"
Annette smiled. Seemed like the perfect thing to help distract her from her own troubles. She went over to help. Plus, she had both Youth Empowerment and the various therapy powers on her side… might as well as put them to good use.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
After two days of working at her civilian job as an English Professor, Annette felt better. Now that she had some distance from her…. Embarrassing moment, a part of her could even find it a little funny.
She had managed to convince herself that the whole thing hadn't been such a big deal like she thought it had been, especially when the news moved on to focusing on the capture of most of the Empire 88 members.
Apparently, one or two of the Empire capes must have talked because the PR machines were mostly focusing on how Armsmaster supposedly single-handedly took down every empire drug trafficking ring and other illegal business ventures, like the dog-fighting one.
Armsmaster seemed to have reluctantly agreed that he had captured the Empire capes with help from the independent heroes group Automata, but he had spun things so that he and Miss Militia still largely took most of the credit for taking down most of the Empire capes.
Annette mostly didn't care about looking good in public and all that as long as they got the job done, but she had to admit that a part of her felt slightly miffed that Armsmaster seemed to make it all about himself. How self-absorbed could one guy be?
She couldn't help but wonder if the others felt the same way, as she headed into the Pearl building via a secret tunnel that they had installed so that none of the public could see Annette Hebert coming in and only seeing Kismet come out.
Everyone else seemed to be busy, but Ulala was waiting for her. The pink-haired woman beamed at her as she informed Annette in a very ecstatic tone of voice, "You didn't tell me that you had such a strong online presence! They've been talking about you for ages and they don't seem to have any intention of stopping."
Annette stopped walking at this. "What."
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
After some long moments of talking and long explanations later, Ulala had pretty much forced her to make both a PHO account and a Space Channel Five account (for all her other online needs). For some reason, the woman had been utterly horrified to discover that Annette had completely no clue what was going on online at all, much less what was being said about her.
For some reason, that just really offended Ulala on a personal level… she had ranted endlessly about the importance of always being aware of the public perception of yourself, and so on forth. How that was important as a newscaster, and more so for one who broadcasted the news over the internet in outer space. To be honest, Annette had tuned out for some of those parts.
Honestly, what was the big deal? So she didn't browse the internet habitually and barely used the email she had as a college professor unless it was for college-related matters. So what? She had never placed much stock into PHO because it just seemed like a place to spread around baseless rumors about capes.
And now Annette was given "PR homework" by Ulala to look up everything about Kismet online… and she did mean EVERYTHING on the internet.
Truthfully, Annette was wishing she hadn't seen half the crap on the internet out there about her today. Already there was lewd fanart of her swimming in the bay as a giantess, without any clothes at all… the only thing she was wearing was her helmet with the visor. And of course, most of them tended to exaggerate the size of her body parts… her boobs or butt certainly wasn't that big!
And Annette hadn't known that there was such a thing as a giantess fetish, but she wished that she could unlearn that. Especially when she just had become wank fodder for those guys with that particular fetish. And many of them were terribly disappointed that her armor had actually scaled up with her instead of breaking apart to leave her exposed.
Annette hadn't even thought about that possibility at all, but she was very suddenly glad that her powers had been thoughtful enough to scale up her armor along with herself. She couldn't have taken the humiliation of being so exposed like that…. More so if her helmet hadn't scaled up along with her. Imagine being outed in the worst way possible like that! Ugh.
She buried her face into her hands as she imagined that happening. Ugh, if that ever happened, she'd just crawl under a rock and never come out again. She then dropped her head into the desk with a loud thud.
>Ding<
Roll 19-- Self-conscious emotions. Self-conscious emotions, such as guilt, shame, embarrassment, and pride, are a variety of social emotions that relate to our sense of self and our consciousness of others' reactions to us.
Effect: Annette gains a Body-Language-Reading Thinker power, as well as knowledge about how self-conscious emotions are important to humans in a wide variety of ways, such as a child's development into an adult and in social situations. It also causes Annette to be more self-aware about everything she's feeling, and why she feels the way she does.
She suddenly felt calm, as she realized that what she was feeling was perfectly natural...of course, she'd feel strange about a bunch of internet strangers fantasizing about her like that. A part of her even felt a little… flattered over that? Even if some of their fetishes were weird as hell.
And, it wasn't as if she had been completely innocent on what the internet was really used for besides communicating with others. She knew there had been plenty of porn out there on the interwebs. That's just… she hadn't expected some of it to be so weird. Yeah, that was what had unsettled her about the whole thing.
But moving on, it was time to browse PHO.
Thankfully that was mostly a porn-free environment, so she wouldn't have to worry about running into weird porn fanart of herself. Hopefully. There were somebody who took the single-word username Kismet already, as such was the nature of the internet. Somebody out there always already took all the good names so far. And it didn't look like they'd be willing to give up the username over to her, considering how much time and effort they put into their posting history. So she had to sign up with something that would let them know it was Kismet posting,. Hmm… ah, she figured out a good online handle for herself. She typed it in and then signed up.
She took the few extra steps to verify herself as a cape with the mods themselves, which was surprisingly easy to do on webcam as seeing most of them recognized her. And with that, she was ready to post.
■
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■
♦ Topic: The Automata Family
In: Boards ► United States ► Massachusetts ► Brockton Bay ► Capes
Bagrat (Original Poster) (Veteran Member) (The Guy in the Know):
So. That happened.
Unless you've been living under a rock or something, then you know about the newest addition to Brockton Bay's skyline. Namely, that huge sci-fi looking skyscraper that's bigger than Medhall building itself! Image of it can be found [here].
Normally, a massive building like that would take years to be fully constructed. But somehow it was built from the ground up in seconds. Somebody recorded it happening, which you can watch [HERE]. Seriously, that looks like a time-lapse video of a normal building being built. you wouldn't think that it was the actual speed at which it was being built. Crazy.
It was then that the family of capes revealed themselves afterward to the news reporters on the scene, declaring themselves as a family of independent capes who were ready to tackle Brockton Bay's crime problem. I'll say this, They sure know how to make one hell of an entrance.
The family in question--
Hermes, The father of the group.
Kismet, the mother of the group.
Karma, the daughter.
There's evidence suggesting that they might have more members in their group, but I'm not going to speculate on that until we have evidence and confirmation that they have other official members in their group.
Edit: Okay, so it turns out that they had been seen in public earlier before all of that happened. They could be seen hanging out with Armsmaster and some PRT agent at a cafe. Pictures and thread found [HERE]. Apparently, Kismet and Armsmaster hang out a lot there judging by the other thread?
Double edit: Here's a gallery and videos of Kismet from when she was a Giantess three days ago.
(Showing page 1 of 40)
►RunGun:
FIRST!!
Also, what the hell is with that building? It looks like a creepy hand holding a globe. Weird.
►ThatDude:
It does! Weird. I wonder what that's supposed to symbolize?
►SenorEel:
The Illuminati confirmed? Very bold of them to come out into the open then… hmm.
►RunGun:
Come on, the Illuminati wouldn't be so open like this. The point of the Illuminati is that you don't know anything about them!
►Bagrat (Original Poster) (Veteran Member) (The Guy in the Know):
Okay, so it turns out that the building is supposed to symbolize a dragon holding a pearl in its mouth. It's officially called the Pearl building by the Automata group.
It's supposed to be based on some Asian folklore.
►ThatDude:
Uh. They're going with that, with Lung around? Wouldn't that be offensive to somebody like him, or am I just overthinking it?
►WhiteFairy (Original Poster) (Veteran Member):
I'm sure it'll be fine. It's not like some Asian gang has a monopoly or copyright on fairytales from all over the world. That said, Kismet did pretty much declare war on all the gangs, and then she has that Pearl building… was that a message to the ABB specifically? Does she have a grudge against them?
►ThatDude:
Well, I'm glad to know I'm not the only one overthinking things. *snerk*
►Aloha (Original Poster):
We now have two cape families in Brockton Bay. We need a VS thread on New Wave and Automata now. *smirks*
Well, off to make that thread...
There were a few more comments down there before Annette had to press the next button, and while the comments had started off normal it just got weirder with all the "memes" and whatnot.
And the jokes about her and her family being part of the Illuminati came out of nowhere! What the heck was with that?
And the latest posts around 20 to 40 pages into the thread was about her time as a giantness. Ugh.
She wondered if she should post anything, trying to explain what happened that day in order to try to mitigate some of the embarrassment she felt. Or would that just encourage them to keep on talking about it when she didn't want them to? Hmm.
Well, it couldn't hurt.
She typed out a message and then hit enter. She then read her post with a critical eye, looking for any errors.
►~Kismet's Luck~ (Verified Cape) (Automata) :
Alright, I finally got around to checking this thread out. I see that you all have a lot of questions about what happened three days ago.
I suppose it's only fair that I answer you all. Well… as you all know, my family are all tinkers. I'm one too, as well, but I've got a somewhat different specialization than my husband does.
My husband Hermes tends to specialize in both armors and robotics. Our daughter's followed in his footsteps mostly, while I have a different tinker specialization. My specialization is a tad complicated to explain and would take up entire pages so I won't go into it too much. But I'll say this-- the effects that come about when I use it, it tends to be very… random. It enlarges, it shrinks things or brings about a unique parahuman effect. Take the Pearl Skyscraper for instance. My group had the intention of building up a home base, and we wanted to have some space for expansion. However, the object I created for this purpose ended up being too much. I underestimated how big it would build itself… heh.
While I wanted our base to be big, I didn't want it to be THAT big. But, what's done is done, right? And all things considered, it's not such a bad building.
During one of our patrols, my daughter and I ran into the Empire 88 capes having a very public spat with each other. They were clearly working out some personal issues between themselves judging by some things I overheard them say. We could've left them alone, let them sort out each other, but they were causing a lot of property damage.
Those twins Jenja and Kenja were ramping up and on their way to becoming giants, so I thought I'd try to even the playing ground and take care of them with something I had been wanting to test out. But like the skyscraper, it made me a little bigger than I thought it would. And unfortunately, the thing I used to giantize myself wasn't working the way I wanted it to, so I couldn't reverse or control my size at the time.
And I couldn't just stand in one place without worrying about breaking something, so that's why I walked over to the bay. I figured that if I just stood out there in the water, then I wouldn't accidentally destroy any buildings or harm people while I was waiting for it to wear off. I didn't realize how uneven the ocean floor was though, and I ended up falling into the water when I lost my footing. I'll admit, that it was somewhat embarrassing.
It was there that I was waiting for the effect to wear off, but when it was taking longer than I thought I couldn't stand to just wait around while the rest of my family was out there taking care of things for me. So, I decided to do something constructive, like clean up the bay.
That's it, that's the whole story. Any questions?
There, it was mostly the truth too, even if she had to fudge a few things.
And… already there were a few replies to her post.
She settled in for the hour to answer a few questions.
So, uh… turns out that the internet people took Annette's forgetfulness when it came to names as a deliberate diss against the Empire capes.
Menja and Fenja, huh? She had to admit that it hadn't made sense that one of the Empire twins would've named herself after a game where one stacked blocks on top of each other until it fell. So no more calling them Jenga or Jenja … got it.
Although, if she was remembering her Norse myths correctly, The names they actually called themselves weren't any better at all… considering that they were Norse Myths known to fall from power and all because some king completely squandered their power for his own selfish ends. So it was like they were doomed to fall anyway with that kind of name reference. Heh. But then again, The Nazis didn't strike her as a bright group to start with anyway.
Not that she cared to correct their assumptions about her post… it had gotten a few neo-nazis banned from the board after all. And the fewer nazis that frequented places where kids went to online, the better.
Now if Ulala could actually let her post answers without hovering over her shoulder and telling her how to type up PR-friendly answers. So annoying!
But while Ulala was educating Annette about how to answer questions in a PR-friendly way, She did take the opportunity to brush up on what the other gangs were doing.
Surprisingly enough, PHO was actually a good source of what was going on with the gangs despite being a gossip board half the time. Who knew?
It seemed that Lung, that guy who had recently united all the Asian gangs under one umbrella only a year ago, had seemed to realize that the Empire was tearing itself apart. And now it looked like he was on the move to capitalize on the Empire's weaknesses. So, that was something for the Automata group to keep an eye out for. More so since he was one of the few capes who had soloed against an Endbringer and nearly came out on top. Annette wasn't so sure they could take on somebody like that.
The merchants on the other hand? Well, Annette would be lying if she said she didn't feel some vicious, petty happiness out of hearing that Squealer's car was still transformed as a Micro-car and that it still stubbornly stayed that way no matter how much Squealer tried to change it back. And that it was something that had aggravated Squealer to no end at all. Deserved her right.
On the downside, though, the Merchants were also getting a LOT of use out of constantly recycling that space rocket over and over for both parts and fuel. Apparently, Squealer was getting some ideas for newer vehicles thanks to tearing the rocket apart for parts. Which wasn't so good.
They'd need to find some way to reclaim the rocket back… maybe find a way to move it elsewhere so that the Merchants couldn't gain access to it anymore?
"Hey, are you even listening to me?" Ulala whined loudly, snapping Annette out of her train of thought.
"Oh yeah, I was. Number one, maintain a good relationship with the press. number two, never rush to answer an answer right away. If needed, say things like 'we will look into that and get back to you'. Number three... Be proactive, not reactive." Annette quoted all that she could remember when she hadn't been overly focusing on the PHO boards and answering the questions as much as she could.
"Well, okay." Ulala seemed mollified by this.
Annette frowned slightly when somebody online started badgering her about the robots that her husband and daughter were making. Most people were just asking her basic questions about the Pearl building, and why she chose that design for the building… but this person in question was… odd. Even odder than all those people asking her stupid questions.
She looked at her computer screen again, as she gestured at Ulala to check out the situation. Ulala moved to look at the screen as well.
(Showing page 52 of 52) 1,2,3,4,...52
Topic: The Automata Family
In: the Boards ► United States ► Massachusetts ► Brockton Bay ► Capes
►PloofyPants (Original poster):
Could you move your fucking tower a bit to the left? I used to have a great view of the Bay but now I don't even get any sun. I paid a premium amount so I'd get an apartment with a good view of the bay, and now all that money I paid upfront is wasted. Thanks a lot!
►SunshineOfTheMind:
What would happen if you took giant money out of your pocket and set in on the shore before you shrank back down? Or a packet of crackers?
►LordRust (thread-banned):
Hey, can you go giant again? Except, you know, naked?
Edited by Tin_Mother: Don't bring your fetishes and perverted questions out of the NFSW boards. You know the rules. Don't do it again, or you'll be temp-banned from all of the boards. You have been warned.
►XxX_Void_Cowboy_XxX:
Who would win: Menja vs Giant You?
Edited by Tin_Mother: Take it to the VS boards, this isn't the right discussion for this thread. This is also the tenth forum you've gone completely off-topic in. Don't make me give you another infraction.
►JammyRodgers:
Pfft. Menja wishes she could get that big in an instant. Kimse wins every time!
Edited by Tin_Mother: Take it to the VS boards, this isn't the right discussion for this thread.
►Saint-George (Temp-Banned)(thread-banned):
You said your daughter and son can build robots? Do they possess the capacity for artificial intelligence?
►ThatDude:
Oh boy, here we go again. Saint Greggy just showed up... PHO veterans, you all know what this means. *sigh*
►Whitecollar (Cape Wife):
Uh-oh.
►~Kismet's Luck~ (Verified Cape) (Automata):
@SunshineOfTheMind: Well, the effect would eventually wear off for them too I suppose, unless somebody were to eat the giant crackers…?
@::SaintGeorge: Well, yes. In fact, one of our support backup members, Tech-fire, is currently working on AI right now that would help puppet the robots that we're building. Not to worry though, we're ensuring that they will fully empathize with human beings and other living creatures as much as possible, and that they will act like living people who can relate to humans, so there isn't going to be a Skynet situation on our hands.
►ThatDude:
I knew it.
@~Kismet's Luck~: you really shouldn't have told him that. Around here, Saint Greggy tends to have a berserk button when it comes to technology, especially robotics and artificial intelligence.
►Saint-George (Temp-Banned)(thread-banned) :
Have you not heard of the parable of the paperclip? If you let AI have too much room to evolve, they could turn the entire planet into Grey goo!
The end of the world is coming, and it shall be at the hands of an AI!
►ThatDude:
See?
►~Kismet's Luck~ (Verified Cape) (Automata):
Sorry?
But seriously, we've been working around the clock to make sure our robots and AI are perfectly safe. Why else do you think we haven't been showcasing them in public yet? The only thing we've showcased was our Robot dog, which can turn into a motorcycle, due to the fact that it's got very low intelligence and isn't sapient. It's programmed to follow only the members of Automata.
►Hermes-Of-All-Trades (Verified Cape) (Automata):
What my wife said. We've spent so much time testing and double-testing everything to make sure there weren't any fatal flaws that could send our robots into a killing frenzy, or worse, take over the world even if unintentionally. We want to be able to make robots that help out humanity, but we're making sure that those robots will have the ability to empathize with all of humanity, both good and bad, first.
►Saint-George (Temp-Banned)(thread-banned):
Such fools!!
You honestly think you can give machines human attributes that'll make it love humanity? You're just antromorzing machines, and letting the machines fool you! Just wait, you'll turn your back on them one day only for them to stab you in the back! And then they'll take over the world!
Please, give up on this foolish endeavor!
►~Kismet's Luck~ (Verified Cape) (Automata):
@::SaintGeorge: No offense, but I think you've watched one too many horror movies?
As we said before, We're keeping all the worst case scenarios in mind but we also want to have some faith that our creations will turn out to be wonderful instead of some monsters out to massacre humanity.
If we let our fears hold us back, we might miss out on something wonderful.
►Hermes-Of-All-Trades (Verified Cape) (Automata):
Well said, my dear.
►Saint-George (Temp-Banned)(thread-banned):
[comment have been deleted]
Edited by Tin_Mother: This is, what, the thirteenth time you've earned a temp-ban? You've seriously got to learn how to control that temper of yours. It's not right to do personal attacks on others.
►~Kismet's Luck~ (Verified Cape) (Automata):
Um, on that note, I think I'm about ready to call it a day on the Q&A session. Until next time.
"Huh. I wonder what it was that he said that got him thread-banned? It had to be really bad if they had to delete his comment." Ulala wondered.
Annette just shook her head. "There's always going to be a few technophobics, huh? Ironic though that they have no problems using the internet."
Ulala just nodded her head at this. "We had them back in my universe too. No matter what the timeline or universe, it seems like some things never change at all… But that's human nature for you I suppose."
Annette got up to stretch and--
>ding<
Roll 12-- The Emotional Intelligence Appraisal. a skill-based self-report and 360-degree measure of emotional intelligence (EQ) developed as a measure of emotionally competent behavior that provides an estimate of one's emotional intelligence. Twenty-eight items are used to obtain a total EQ score and to produce four composite scale scores, corresponding to the four main skills of Daniel Goleman's model of emotional intelligence.The Emotional Intelligence Appraisal was created in 2001 by Drs. Travis Bradberry and Jean Greaves and comes in both booklet and online format, allowing participants to choose their preferred method of test taking.
Effect: Annette gains a Thinker power that tells her whenever somebody is still childish at heart or not, and how to treat them accordingly.
"Huh."
"What is it?" Ulala looked back at her as she sat down at one of the computers.
"Nothing, just noticing that my power seems to be going with a theme lately."
It was bedtime when Annette finally got to chat with her husband Danny face to face, and he couldn't stop laughing for some reason when she mentioned all the weird stuff about her online that Ulala had made her lookup as part of her PR homework.
"Come on, it's not that funny." Annette pouted slightly as she crawled into bed.
"It is, a little. I mean… people get off on women becoming giant-sized and squishing cars with their bare feet? Or wrecking miniature buildings while being naked? People seriously get off on that?" Danny chuckled slightly as he got into bed himself.
"That was some of the more mild stuff. There were some… weird stuff in there. Weirder than the normal internet stuff that is. I'd rather not describe them though." Annette mumbled as she curled up against her husband.
"Fair enough," Danny said as he turned off the lamp and the two of them got comfortable to close their eyes.
After a long period of silence, Danny then said out loud, "I wonder what kind of art they did for Hermes."
There were long moments of silence after that before Danny couldn't take his idle curiosity anymore and pulled out one of the high tech gadgets he had made. It was a cross between something like a phone and a tablet.
Annette just groaned at this and rolled over to shut the light coming from the tablet as her husband silently browsed the internet on his device in search of Hermes fanart and fanfiction.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The next morning, Annette greeted a bleary-eyed Danny as she made coffee for the two of them.
"Had an interesting trip through the internet tonight, I take it?" Annette smirked slightly.
"Apparently, the dark side of the internet seems to think I'm into a poly relationship, or having threesomes," He mumbled, not sounding happy about that.
Annette couldn't help but smirk slightly at that.
"For some reason, Armsmaster features strongly as the other person we have a relationship with inside their stories and art…?" Danny sighed. "Probably because we kept on meeting up with him so much at that cafe. People online read way too much into that and … well."
Annette just scoffed loudly at that and shook her head. "That's it. We're definitely restricting Taylor's access to the internet if all people online are like that."
Danny simply nodded in agreement at that.
Annette was feeling somewhat lazy and felt like she didn't want to cook today. She then wondered if her power would give her another dish like the pressed duck that one time...
Annette cracked her neck, stretched, and then pulled at her power--
>Ding<
Roll 6--De Karmeliet. De Karmeliet is a restaurant in Bruges, Belgium. The leading chef is Geert Vanhecke.
Effect: For six hours, both Danny and Annette now know how to cook all the dishes from this restaurant in Belgium.
"Damn." Annette frowned. "Guess that's my power's way of telling me to cook for myself and quit being so lazy."
Danny smiled. "I'll cook breakfast this time. I don't mind."
Annette shook her head. "Nah, let's do it together. Much faster that way."
The Hebert family ended up having a large Belgium breakfast together made entirely of waffles, sausages, and the like. It wasn't exactly authentic, as seeing they had to do with whatever they had on hand instead of using traditional ingredients that they would've had all the way in Bruges. However, Taylor sure didn't seem to mind, and happily went off to school after eating her fill.
After that, the adults were off to work.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Annette's day at work was mostly uneventful, save for one incident.
She had just gotten out of her class, where she had been teaching her students about the many meanings that a classic novel like "Picture of Dorian Gray" could have, and the symbolism such a story represented when she heard angry voices shouting in the courtyard of the university.
As she moved closer, he could see some blond boy screaming at a dark-skinned woman, "You Bitch! Why the fuck are you leading me on if you aren't interested in me, huh?"
" If you could just calm down, you'd realize there's clearly been some miscommunication--" The woman tried to say, but she was cut off by one of the boy's friends.
"Yo, don't be going on about misunderstandings. I saw how friendly you were with him… you were definitely leading him on!" The boy's friend butted in.
Okay, she clearly had to butt in here too since things looked like they were about to get out of hand.
She cleared her throat loudly, as she walked up. "What's this about? What's with all the screaming, hmm? Don't you realize you're disturbing the other students on the campus?"
The rest of the students just muttered angrily at this, while the dark-skinned woman looked relived for the interruption.
Annette then stood by the woman and raised her eyebrows. "Okay, it looks like you all need to cool down, alright?"
As the boy and his friends left, Annette turned to face the woman. "You alright?"
The woman just nodded. "T-thanks."
"What was that about anyway? Oh, I'm Annette Hebert, the English professor from Classroom A-1, by the way." She asked.
"I'm Sabah. Nice to meet you. As for that…. Well." Sabah sighed loudly. "I didn't really mean to lead him on or anything. I honestly thought we were just platonic friends. But out of nowhere, he starts pressuring me to be… well, more friendly with him if you know what I mean. Seemed like he mistook my normal friendliness for flirting? I don't even know. And then he got mad at me when I tried to explain that I didn't feel anything for him."
"Ah." Annette simply nodded. That was a very common problem a lot of women usually went though, so she understood where Sabah was coming from.
She then said, "If it helps, you aren't the first woman to go through something like that. Even though I'm married to a very lovely man myself, I have to say most men are idiots… at least when it comes to relationships. Not many can seem to tell the difference between a platonic relationship and a romantic one at all."
Sabah smiled wryly at this. "Thanks for stepping in when you did though. I was honestly scared that those boys were starting to become violent with me."
Annette then placed one of her hands on the woman's shoulder in a reassuring manner. "If you have any problems with them, come talk to me, okay? We'll see if we can't work things out."
Sabah nodded. "Alright, I will."
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
After that university workday was over, Kismet and Karma could be seen patrolling the boardwalk together with their robotic dog Rusty. Hopefully, this patrol was going to be less uneventful than the other one was… knocking on wood there.
They got stopped by the occasional tourists who wanted a picture with them, which they gladly posed for.
But otherwise, this day hadn't been so bad, so far.
Of course... Things just had to go terribly bad just when Kismet was starting to relax. There was the sound of an explosion in the distance.
Kismet tapped at the comms device in her helmet. "Give me an update status."
Rock.exe was the one to answer instead of Roll.exe this time. "Seems that Lung and Kaiser are really going at it ten blocks over nearby where you are. Lung's vying to take over all of the Empire's territory now that most of the Empire's capes are in PRT custody, while Kaiser's desperately trying to make it seem like he's still the so-called king around here by dueling Lung on his lonesome. Seems a tad suicidal if you ask me."
Kismet blinked at that. "That's a very succinct rundown of what's happened so far. Thank you."
Rock.exe then sighed loudly. "AND…. it seems that the Merchants caught wind of this showdown between capes and had the bright idea to try to take them out at the same time… so that they'd have complete control of the city. Both Squealer and Skidmark were sighted in one of their new armored vehicles speeding over to where Lung and Kaiser are."
Kismet couldn't help but facepalm at this. "Have the PRT been notified of that?"
Rock.exe nodded on his virtual display inside her visor.
"Wonderful. Well, let them know that we're on the scene to try to evacuate any civilians still in the area to safety, should the battle get too out of control."
~~~~~~~~~
Turns out that evacuating all the civilians in the area was easier said than done.
Oh sure, most had the common sense to leave when they were told there was a dangerous cape battle in the vicinity… but there were way too many people who wanted to stay to record the ongoing cape fight with their phones for her tastes.
In fact, some people might have stayed because they saw her coming and were hoping to capture Kismet giantizing herself on film? Argh.
She silently pleaded with her power to give her something that could easily persuade all those stupid people to get out of here before they got hurt. She pulled to see what she'd get--
>Ding<
Roll 25-- Nanny Ogg. Gytha Ogg (usually called Nanny Ogg) is a character from Terry Pratchett's Discworld series.
She is a witch and member of the Lancre coven. The character of Nanny Ogg is based on the Mother stereotype of the Triple Goddess myth. Nanny Ogg has been married three times, with fifteen children who survived their early childhood, and has many grandchildren and great-grandchildren. What makes her the Mother, however, is her mentality. People go to Granny Weatherwax for help when they have no choice, but they go to Nanny for advice all the time. Granny is respected, but Nanny is actually liked. Nanny Ogg has a talent for getting along with people and fitting in. As described in Maskerade, people, after knowing her for fifteen minutes, feel as if they have known her all of their lives.
Effect: Because the roll went past 19, This old lady is restored back to her thirties in age, is sufficiently boosted back to full health, etc. She also has all of the powers as a witch at her beck and call, and those are significantly enhanced as well.
A plain-looking woman whose face could only be described as a friendly pumpkin face, wearing a medieval-looking dress with a witch's hat popped out of nowhere. She blinked owlishly as she looked about herself.
"Well, what's going on here? Last I remember, I was laying down to rest one final time with all of my children and grandchildren all around me. Tiffany Aching was attending to matters for me, and I was having a chat with DEATH as I was on my way to meet Granny Weatherwax in the afterlife…" Nanny Ogg muttered to herself. Somehow, Kismet could hear the word "death" in all caps when the woman said that.
Kismet ran over and said in a breathless voice, "There's no time to explain everything thoroughly, so I'll make this fast. I was the one who summoned you here when I was asking my power to bring me something that would help persuade all those people to get out of here and towards safety. You see, this dragon-man and another man who controls magical swords are duking it out over there in the distance, and they're causing a lot of damage. Can you please help me talk those gawkers into leaving so that I can safely deal with them without anybody getting hurt, please? I promise to explain everything in deep detail later on after this is over."
There were a very loud explosion and a pillar of fire in the distance.
The woman grew solemn at this and nodded. "Alright then. Let me see what I can do."
With that, she sauntered over to the crowd of on-lookers as they recorded the Lung VS Kaiser fight.
Nanny Ogg hadn't done anything that Annette thought she would do. Instead, she had taken off her witchy pointy hat, putting it under her arm as she sauntered up to the rest of the group acting the part of a curious onlooker.
She quietly observed the Lung-Kaiser fight for a few minutes, noting the way Kaiser's swords seemed to heat up brightly in the presence of Lung's flames as Lung ramped up becoming more dragon-like by the minute. She then very loudly started talking about what a hot heated sword could easily do to a normal human being should it be accidentally flung in their general direction.
"Mind ya, that'd be so terrible if it happened… but phew, wouldn't that be quite the sight? I heard that at temperatures of more than 2,200C, It's enough to burn through steel or asphalt. On human flesh, it can burn down to the bone within seconds. Not even any emergency healer would be able to save you in time when that happens. But oh, what a way to go, eh?? Am I right? People would forever remember how you went out… that lad, he wasn't afraid of nothing, they'd say. Didn't run even when there was a piece of hot heated steel flying their way!" Nanny Ogg said all too cheerfully.
Around her, the onlookers recording the fight was starting to look very uneasy, as if they were rethinking being this close to a cape fight.
"You know what? I think there's a rooftop nearby that I can record the fight from…." one of the men said, making excuses to leave while pretending that Nanny's words hadn't spooked him. He wasn't scared of anything, of course, and he was simply going to find a better place to watch the battle from. He wasn't retreating to a safe distance, no sire! The other cape fanatics would make fun of him for doing something like that.
The other cape fanatics murmured to each other, making similar excuses as they slowly moved away.
"Wow. They wouldn't even listen to me or mom when we tried to get them to move away." Karma sounded mildly impressed.
The woman smiled and pointed at her head. "It's the headology at work, you see. You've got to be able to get into people's heads, see what makes them tick. Ask yourself, what would get them to move, and what makes them stay? Then act accordingly to that. Now, what are you gonna do about those two? They seem to have no intention of stoppin'."
Kismet nodded. "Right, trying something again…"
She pulled once again.
>Ding<
Roll 3. Because one got a roll 3, this means she gets three automatic rolls.
Square-Cube Law+Shrink Ray Gun+Sense of Wonder.
Roll 18+10+19= 47 divided by 3= 15.
Effect: Annette summons a shrink ray gun to her hand, which now can shrink people down to smaller size proportional to the square-cube law. This also has a mild master effect where it gives people a strong sense of wonder about everything. It's a very durable, retro sci fi-looking ray gun with dials on it. It seems to have a setting on it that allows people to return back to normal once they're shot with it again.
Annette/Kismet blinked as she suddenly found out that she had a shrink ray gun in her hand.
Right, that could solve everything, she supposed. Oh! Wait, this would be a good way to cover up the fact that she was a summoner of sorts… she could just shrink people with her ray gun showing it off in public and then return them back to normal. It would give her some credibility with her cover story.
She silently thanked her power a lot, as she aimed it at the ramping dragon-man and Kaiser.
But before she could shoot them, Squealer and Skidmark came roaring up inside their souped-up, armored tank that had clearly been a jeep once.
And worse, they weren't alone. Merchants in all colors and sizes came up behind them in their vehicles, screaming and jeering all the way here.
At this, Lung and Kaiser quickly moved away before Kismet could shoot them. And she didn't want to shoot wildly at them, out of fear of accidentally shrinking buildings and other things around them.
"Damnit." Kismet cursed out loud. She had known they would be coming, but still. She had hoped to deal with those two men first before they came, that was all.
She spun around to face her daughter and told her in a very firm tone of voice: "Karma, get out of here, please. Take this woman with you, keep her safe. I've got to deal with those people."
"But mom~!" Karma protested, but her whining died down when she saw the look her mother was giving her. She then groaned. "Alright. But I'm calling up dad so that he comes to help you!"
Kismet nodded at that, and her daughter left with Nanny Ogg.
Once they were more than 80 feet away, Kismet started pulling as much as she could, hoping to get something helpful alongside her shrink ray gun.
>Ding<
Roll 20--Feminist science fiction. a subgenre of science fiction (abbreviated "SF") focused on theories that include feminist themes including but not limited to gender inequality, sexuality, race, economics, and reproduction. Feminist SF is political because of its tendency to critique the dominant culture. Some of the most notable feminist science fiction works have illustrated these themes using utopias to explore a society in which gender differences or gender power imbalances do not exist, or dystopias to explore worlds in which gender inequalities are intensified, thus asserting a need for feminist work to continue.
Effect: Annette gains a strong thinker power that has to do with high technology and the way it has an impact on women's everyday lives. She gains knowledge of strong feminist themes in many science fiction works.
Wow. That was kind of interesting, and probably would be very helpful in teaching her literature classes, but man was this ever useless here.
>Ding<
Roll 19--Black Knight (Manga). Japanese manga is written and illustrated by Kai Tsurugi. It is licensed in North America by Blu Manga, the boys love division of Tokyopop, which released the four volumes between July 2006 and February 2009. Library Journal, reviewing the first volume, noted that Black Knight "does have a plot", but was disappointed at several minor characters having too-similar character designs. Holly Ellingwood, writing for Active Anime, found Black Knight to be "heartwarming tale of love in a harsh time of deadly warfare" and that Black Knight had both "style and substance", due to its many-layered plots, feeling that the manga would work just as well regardless of the sex of the couple.
Effect-- A very pristine and durable box full of the entire Black Knight manga set fearing romantic love between a prince and his knight, appears at Annette's feet.
Kismet sighed loudly. What happened there? Her power had been so helpful there for a second with the shrinking ray gun!
>Ding<
Roll 30--Chornaya tubenose goby. The Chornaya tubenose goby is a species of goby endemic to Crimea, Ukraine where it is only found in a short stretch of River Chornaya. Water is extracted in large quantities for irrigation could cause the stream to completely dry out in summer and thus poses a critical risk of extinction in the near future.
Effect: They were actually extinct on Earth Bet, but they're not anymore. Thanks to the roll 30, they've been awarded the ability to breathe outside of water alongside breathing underwater. and to fly through the air like a school of fishy superheroes. They still need to be near water as to not dry out, however. They also need to breed underwater in the wet soil. As they've been pulled in from a dozen Earths, there are now more than 40 million of them swimming in the air.
"The flippin' fuck? I don't remember taking drugs today.." Skidmark yelled as millions of small swimming fish suddenly appeared. They floated and swam through the air as if they were still underwater, but they darted away as they startled at the sound of Skidmark's voice.
Annette just shook her head. Screw this, she was just going to use her raygun while everyone was distracted by the fish. It was clear that she wasn't going to get any good pulls today besides this handy little gadget in her hand.
She shot the first thing she saw, and that was Squealer's tank-jeep thing. As it slowly started shrinking, Squealer rolled out of it as she screamed, "Not again!"