Scrappy Quest Begins

Captain Scrappy has disappeared! Again! Her first clue leads Citrus Shocker home to Striga Isle. Stephanie Peebles knows something. And she owns a bar.  

Fire of Saturn Seen in Rogue Isles

After reappearing in Atlas Park, fighting crime alongside the Atlantean champion, Glubglub, and joining the Scrap Pile, the people of Paragon City seemed ready to accept that Fire of Saturn had put her villainous past behind her.

New footage from Port Oakes and Mercy City, however, calls her sincerity into question. 

While no actual members of the Scrap Pile (apart from Fire of Saturn herself -- see below) were available for comment, Hero Corps representative Dean Helm stated that, "The situation as we understand it is that Fire of Saturn was pursuing a group of Marcone Family thugs that were causing trouble in the Argosy Industrial Area." She was, in fact, seen fighting a huge Marcone captain and his henchmen, but she didn't turn him in to any recognized law enforcement authority. "That neanderthal cracked my helmet and I barely survived the fight," Fire of Saturn told our reporter. "You can't count on the court system to handle people like that. I know they'll treat him right at Fort Cerberus."

Despite confirmation that this and several other "arrests," including a nest of Skulls that she cleaned out, did happen, Fire of Saturn's activities in the Rogue Isles were not all explainable as law enforcement of any kind. For one thing, she is known to have visited Mikey the Ear, an information broker known for his shady contacts. And then there's this:

Fire of Saturn dismissed this clear attack on Paragon City Longbow troops as yellow journalism, saying, "Come on! Those guys were assholes. And they're fine! Just a little chilled. I'm not a murderer. Look, I had to work on Arachnos turf to get the bad guys, and it helps keep things smooth if they see you knocking some Longbow dorks around. It's not all green parks and giant heroic statues out there. You gotta play the game to stay alive."

Asked if using her shield drone to take dance selfies in front of Larry's Tiki Lounge was part of surviving on the mean streets, Fire of Saturn rolled her eyes. "Okay, fine! Yes, I went to Larry's. There's nothing like it in Paragon City. I mean, I love the... you know... goodness or whatever, here, but you have to admit, they really know how to party out in the islands. Larry's just rocks!"

Fire of Saturn once again asserted that she is not a bad guy. "Look, I stop criminals. Period. I was up front about all this with Scrappy and Shocker, and they understood. Shocker even said you vultures had given her friends a hard time once about the same sort of thing."

Homecoming

The world was ending. Fleeing to the Shadow Shard, Citrus Shocker, after borrowing some Crey Corporation equipment and making some frantic calculations, believed she had found a way to use the same dimension-spanning threads that allowed Pocket D to exist, to create a quantum mirror of her world and shunt all its inhabitants through the chaos to this new universe. Her plans went awry, fragmenting her own timeline. If any other heroes (or any people at all) were transmitted this way, she never found them. 

Deep in the Shadow Shard, though, the deserted halls of Pocket D flickered to life, and its proprietor, an entity known only as DJ Zero, reappeared. He set to work doing what Citrus Shocker had been trying to do before. After that, it got hazy for a while.

Citrus Shocker found herself in a burning building in King's Row, the fragment of exotic Shadow Shard material still secure in the backpack device she had used before. She was overjoyed to find Captain Scrappy talking to Detective Broyko of the PPD outside. 

Scrappy's memories suggested a different past than Citrus Shocker remembered, one in which they were beginning their careers here after years of struggle. Unfortunately, their weakened powers seemed to support his version of reality. They barely made their way through the district to the Atlas Park train. Citrus Shocker was horrified to learn that Galaxy City, where, in her version of the past, she and Captain Scrappy had first met, had been destroyed. This was already part of Scrappy's past, so it was no surprise to him.

Back in Atlas Park, the pair reconnected with Hero Corps to beat up some Hellions and snow men. Citrus Shocker stowed her failed gadget for further study and built a jet pack. They settled in and started working on finding their friends and rebuilding the Scrap Pile.

Back in Paragon City

 More updates soon!

The Night Shift

While Skyway Shocker continues to avoid contact with the media, we have word from an anonymous source identified only as a "fan" that she most likely is, as previously speculated, the displaced Paragon City heroine, Citrus Shocker.

Posing as a variety of rescued civilians and fans, our source was able to occasionally speak with the elusive heroine and put a few things together. While Crey doesn't have anywhere near the power here that they did in Paragon City, Shocker believes that a group of their enhanced agents has been able to entrench itself in several Millennium City organizations, creating a web of conspirators able to access valuable technological and financial resources at will. She also claims to know the name of this alleged conspiracy: The Night Shift.

As Skyway Shocker became more visible to the public, the Night Shift or, more likely, random criminal elements that were simply out of her league, made Millennium City more and more dangerous for her, so she spent some time in the wilds of northern Canada, fighting ice demons and other strange menaces.

We don't have a lot of pictures from the Arctic. Apparently our source didn't like the cold. When Skyway Shocker came back, it was with a new costume and some new inventions. Of special note were a sleeker, more compact jet pack and a pair of hovering drones that vastly improved on her previous models.

She has since been seen fighting crime on several occasions in the city, even helping out with a disturbing outbreak of spontaneous combustion.

There has still been no sign of any of her compatriots in the Scrap Pile, and our source has not been able to get her to comment on the matter at all, except for, on one particularly pleasant afternoon, a smirk, followed by, "Tell your friends they'll be along."

Regarding her undisguised operation in areas where this "Night Shift" can easily strike at her, Shocker's attitude confirmed previous assumptions that she was, in fact, eager to see them try. Asked about her flight to the Arctic, she acknowledged that she "hadn't fully accounted for... some things." On another occasion, she confirmed that she "wasn't ready then, but now I know exactly what I'm facing."

UPDATE: Our source turned out to be a shape-shifting robot. It was found on our front step today, short-circuited, with several components missing. A note was left clipped to its jacket that said, "See?"

Stars, Specters, and Super-Powers

Three of the stories in this book (Mister Blue Sky, The Man Comes Around, and Misfits & Mistakes)  feature The Scrap Pile, The Enigmas, and several other characters that we originally created in City of Heroes. "Mister Blue Sky" has a lot of things that will look familiar if you've ever played the winter event. "A Bad Habit" is also a super-hero story, but it's much older than City of Heroes.

https://books2read.com/b/StarsSS

Skyway Shocker

Fleeing the authorities after a run-in with the Crey Corporation that ended with several warrants for her arrest, Citrus Shocker was last seen heading for the Shadow Shard portal on Peregrine Island.

Over a year later, Skyway Shocker was reported to be working with the Champions in Millennium City. The weaponry seems to be  more exotic and possibly more advanced, but Skyway Shocker bears a remarkable resemblance in both face and attitude to the rarely-masked heroine, wields the same lightning-based powers, and even wears a costume similar to the best known of Citrus Shocker's many outfits.

Skyway Shocker has thus far avoided any interaction with the media. If this is the same person, she almost seems to be daring whatever remains of Crey to come after her. If not, well, that would be even stranger. So far, however, none of her compatriots in the Scrap Pile, even Captain Scrappy, have been spotted.

Happy New Year!

Echo of Mercy

Mercy has decided that her old name no longer matters.

In her old life, under her old name, she worked for the Lizard Moll's gang. Nothing flashy - she wasn't a supervillain herself, or even a soldier. She just monitored some of the start-ups around Mercy Island, keeping tabs on potential rivals. It wasn't glamorous work, but she enjoyed it.

Then the Storm came and world started to crack. Mercy Island was torn apart from beneath and sank into the ocean. Swimming desperately for one of the escaping ships, Mercy was caught in a wave of glowing green sludge from some Arachnos experiment and dragged, choking and burning, into the depths.

She awoke under a pier in Millennium City, a strange shore in an alien world. The city was being attacked by insectoid aliens. Some new form of Rikti? Nobody recognized that word. The humans here, who seemed shorter than humans in her world, called them Qularr. One of the creatures came at her and the flailing arm she threw up to fend it off went right through its carapace. At first, she thought they must be incredibly fragile, but soon she realized that the people weren't small and the bugs weren't weak. She was the one who had changed.

She joined in the fight, helping to drive away the bugs, and someone asked her who she was. She meant to say, "I'm the echo of Mercy Island," but all that came out was, "Mercy."

While she had never had any great respect for the law, Mercy was a survivor. She had been accepted as a hero when she helped fight off the Qularr, and she found that this was a comfortable life. No reason to put all that at risk by robbing banks or trying to rule the world. She found that she had a violent temper now. She suspected that some of this came from the chemicals that had transformed her, but she was also angry and frustrated at the loss of her home, her family, and her friends. Taking that frustration out on criminals, however, was enough. She sometimes wonders what it would be like to go farther, but so far has not seen any reason to try it.

On Halloween, the dead rose, and demons clawed their way through the veil of worlds. Millennium City felt like home for the first time.

In the chaos, Mercy stumbled across a thrilling revelation: she was not alone.

Fighting her way through a horde of zombies, she found herself in a group of other heroes who had done the same. Together, they dove into the portal and confronted the demonic entity beyond. One of the heroes was from Paragon City.

Despite her elation, of course, Mercy had to conceal some of the details of her own origins. Still, after a long chat over pumpkin-spiced cocktails, she found out that she and Aleph-Ka weren't the only survivors. Several other heroes, and possibly other not-so-heroic sorts, had washed up on these shores over the past year.

It was good to make a connection with someone from her home world, but it was even better to realize that she could make a connection, period. Maybe this world, this life, could be more than just bearable, after all.

Snow!

And hey, while I was working on that other post, Google noticed that this picture could use a little more snow so... Happy Holidays from Fire of Saturn, I guess.

Lizard Moll Gang Considers New Name

The Lizard Moll (popularly known as Zombie Lizard Moll, but this reporter was sternly notified that "we don't use the 'Z' word here") is considering some changes to her supervillain team, The Bad, The Ugly, and The Mutagenic. Of particular interest is her intent to change the name.

"Nobody wants to chew through 'The Bad, The Ugly, and The Mutagenic' in the middle of a sentence, and I've already had to dissolve three people in acid for calling us 'BUM' so I think it's time to accept that the old name isn't working. A lot of people have already been calling us 'Lizard Moll Family' and similar things, so I thought, with that being the case, and the fact that we have a couple of exiled gods and several post-human members like myself and Apocalizard, why not go with Gods and Monsters? Pretty catchy, don't you think? And just because it's a house run by a 'monster' doesn't mean everybody in it has to be a monster."

Several members, including early recruit Fire of Saturn, support the notion."Oh, definitely! I mean, I'm not any of those things either way, but I'd rather be lumped in with the new ones than the old ones. I was framed or I wouldn't even be in the Rogue Isles, and I'm not ugly or mutagenic either." After a pause, the high-tech villain misunderstood adventurer added, "God, I hope I'm not mutagenic. Living in this place, though-- Do you have a Geiger counter handy, by any chance?"

Co-founder Partying Animal, however, expressed some irritation at the prospect of change. "This group was forged in the fires of our early struggles and triumphs together. It may have been the Lizard Moll's privilege to provide the original name, but I don't think that entitles her to blithely toss it away in favor of some some flashy buzzword."

The third founding member of the villainous enterprise, Firetemple, was away on an extended photo shoot and could not be reached for comment.

Valiance Pre-Alpha

And while you're waiting for City of Titans, here's another potential City of Heroes successor to check out:

http://valiance.shogn.net

They've even got an open pre-alpha running. You can download the client here. So far there's not a lot you can do with it, but it's kind of fun to poke around.

City of Titans Funded!

Congratulations to Missing Worlds Media for their successful (more than double the goal!) Kickstarter run. I can't wait to see what they do with it. I'm taking the status widget out of my sidebar now, but I can't bring myself to completely do away with it, so I'm just gonna let it sit in this post. It's going to be a long two years!

In the meantime, I still have a lot of old City of Heroes screenshots and the stories behind them to post here. I'm also occasionally playing Champions Online, which isn't ideal, but it has its good points and it still helps quell the super-hero addiction shakes. Maybe I'll tell some stories around that too.

It'll be a couple of weeks at least, though. I'm really busy with Qalidar right now.

The Phoenix Project Steps Up

It's time! Get over there and pledge now! 

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/missingworldsmedia/the-phoenix-project-city-of-titans

After the End - Links and Stuff

Found this tribute to CoH webpage, which is nicely done but so depressing to read:
http://ourcityofheroes.com

Also, if you didn't already know, there's a program called Titan Icon, which gives you a way you can log in and run around in Paragon City and the other places in the game. There's no one to talk to or fight, but you can look around. Also depressing, but it's kind of nice to revisit old haunts sometimes, even if they're deserted.
http://paragonwiki.com/wiki/Titan_Icon

Finally, if you want to see the spirit of the game find a new life, consider supporting Missing Worlds Media's Phoenix Project. I think they've got the best shot at building a viable successor. They're planning to launch a Kickstarter on September 8th of this year.
http://cityoftitans.com/

Before Its Time

You think it'll last forever - people and cars and concrete - but it won't. One day it's all gone, even the sky. My planet's gone... before its time.

--The Doctor

Sarana and Her Amazing Friends

Citrus Shocker at the End of the World

The End

Well, actually, I'll probably post some more pictures here. I've got a bunch that I always meant to post with some kind of article that I never got around to writing. I said, "the end" because I wrote this bit about the end of City of Heroes:

http://www.christinalea.com/2012/11/requiem-for-paragon-city.html

Why post it there instead of here? I don't know. Get outta my face, kid; ye'r botherin' me.

Who is Void Razor?

After a mysterious shadowy figure was seen carving up Longbow in the shadow of Fort Cerberus, everyone is asking, "who is Void Razor?" Sources indicate that she has been seen many times coming and going from Fort Darwin, possibly taking orders from Kalinda. Even more ominously, the shadowy killer's appearance in the Rogue Isles seems to coincide with the disappearance of the former heroine Bright Wing from Ziggursky Penitentiary.

Bright Wing's fall is a tragic story. "She was as good-hearted and inspiring as her name implies," says Paradigm, one of her former comrades. "She was just a little headstrong, and the one serious mistake she finally made just snowballed into... I'm sorry... that's all for now."

After charging into a villain conclave without clearance, Bright Wing seriously injured an undercover Longbow operative. She was, of course, suspended pending a hearing where it was to be decided whether to discipline, fire, or prosecute her. She never made it there. Corrupt elements within the Hero Corps organization tricked her into thinking she was to be escorted under guard. They then kidnapped and sold her to a Council laboratory on Striga Isle, where she was tortured and experimented upon for months. She lost most of her powers during this time, including her ability to fly.

She eventually began to mutate on her own, however, surprising even the mad scientists who caused her transformation. Because they weren't prepared for her new powers, she was able to escape and return to Paragon City. Unfortunately, word had gotten out that she was coming to kill the mayor and perhaps several prominent figures in the Hero Corps bureaucracy. This was not true, but it was enough to put Longbow and the heroes of Atlas Park on alert. Although she probably would have been able to convince them of her innocence at this point, Bright Wing was terrified of being captured again - by anyone - and resisted arrest violently. This time, she was sent to Ziggursky.

There, both her mind and her body grew darker. Her journals indicate that she blamed not only the Council agents, but everyone she felt had failed her, even civilization itself. And then she was gone, vanishing in an Arachnos raid on the prison along with several other super-powered inmates.

Could the shadowy blade-wielder shown here be the fallen Bright Wing? For now, no one is sure.