Test your limits [Complete]

[pretendytimes]

Characters: Tom Talbot FX and whoever wishes to stumble upon a failing hero.
Content: After hearing that powers get nerfed in this Manhattan, a certain superhero goes out to see just how much his did.
Location: Around Broadway.
Time of day: Early afternoon.
Warnings: None so far.

Comments

[atleasticansee]

Was that a jet engine? No way. No way. First a helicopter, and now a jet. People were looking for them. They were going to escape. They were going home.

Tara, already out on the streets, ran to the last place she heard the engine come from. All manner of thoughts, including whether or not she really wanted to go home, were rushing through her head. But if the jet had really landed and it was safe from the parasites, no doubt everyone else would be rushing towards it, too. She wouldn't be alone. It was so much easier to make decisions when you weren't the only one making them.

She turned the corner hard with a strange mix of apprehension and excitement pumping through her veins. But... there wasn't a jet here. There was just some kid. What? Where did the jet go? What was going on here? All those feelings disappeared almost immediately as a wave of disappointment washed over her.

"Did you see where that jet went?" she asked whoever it was without even trying to help him up. Yeah, way to prioritize.

[pretendytimes]

"Note to self: jet is not a good idea," Tom mumbled to himself as he sat up and clutched his head. Honestly, it was a good thing neither Jack or Vicki had been around to see that. That would have been plain embarrassing and Jack would never let him live something like that down.

Now he was feeling woozy and his head hurt, just great. There was nothing like seeing imaginary stars to make one's day even better. But at least now he knew what not to do next time. It was a small mercy no one had been around to see that embarrassing blunder...or at least that's what he thought until a girl suddenly appeared.

Still a little dazed, he could only stare at her for a moment before he actually processed what she was saying.

"Huh, what j--...Oh, sorry. That was me." He rubbed the back of his head sheepishly as he gave her a somewhat lopsided but apologetic smile.

[atleasticansee]

...What. "Uh. How?" And yeah, there was probably a rational explanation for it, but Tara only knew shapeshifters who could turn into, y'know, living things. She'd never heard of any power that let somebody turn into a jet, so it wasn't exactly first and foremost in her mind.

Oh hey, you know what, maybe checking to see if he wasn't hurt would be a good idea. She walked over to him and bent down, offering a hand to help him to his feet. "That's not that important. Are you okay?" If he had been the jet, somehow, then that fall had probably been pretty nasty.

[pretendytimes]

"I'm alright," he replied as he gratefully accepted the hand offered to him and pulled himself back onto his feet. "Thanks." Although standing on his feet proved to be a challenge as a spell of dizziness hit him, making him a little wobbly on his feet.

It wasn't even the after-effects of the fall but that strange wooziness he had felt before upon his arrival that was making his vision swim. The fall actually hadn't been that bad. He had dealt with much, much worse.

"And I used my powers to do that," Tom explained once he had regained some of his composure.

[atleasticansee]

Tara did what she could to help steady him once he was standing up again, putting a hand to his chest to try to keep him up. When she figured he would be okay, she pulled her hand back and waited for his answer to her first question. It was good that he wasn't hurt, at any rate. Setting wings, she could do; setting limbs, probably not. Not out here, at least.

"Your... powers?" It wasn't like she didn't understand what powers were, but -- well, yeah, she never thought someone could have the power to turn into a jet. Now that there wasn't anything else to worry about, she could at least focus on that possibility. "So what, you're a superhero?" She'd seen less likely candidates for superheroes. It wasn't that bad of a guess.

[pretendytimes]

"Yeah, I am." No point in hiding it, especially since he was wearing his uniform and that pretty much made it blatantly obvious. Besides, he was pretty proud of his superhero status although he couldn't say he was feeling very much like one at the moment. Not after that blunder.

Though more importantly than that; he had finally found someone! Sure, there had been people he had been talking to over the network but it was so much better actually seeing someone alive in this place. It was a great relief.

"I'm FX," he said as he held out his hand for her to shake.

[atleasticansee]

Yeah, well, the way people dressed around here, you could never be too sure. There was a lawyer who looked like a Cyclops knock-off, for one. She shook FX's hand and grinned. "Okay, so. Cyborg is a cyborg. Batman is a bat man, or perhaps some sort of man-bat. And FX sounds like effects, so you must make sound effects." She was brilliant! But to what end? Aye, there's the rub.

Nah, she could figure that part out, too. "Sweet power, dude." And she was -- for once -- not being sarcastic in ending a sentence with "dude". "My name's Tara."

[pretendytimes]

"That's right," he practically beamed at her. It was so good to have someone get it right away, explaining his power was always rather hard. And because, just like she said, a hero's name was also a simple way of summing up what they were or what they could do and this showed he had picked the right name. Or well, Jack had. Sort of.

"Thanks," he said humbly. He still wasn't sure why Zeus had picked him out of all people but he wasn't about to complain about it. He loved his power and he couldn't agree with her more. It was pretty sweet. "It's nice to meet you, Tara."

[atleasticansee]

Yeah, sometimes Tara wasn't totally stupid. But only sometimes. "Nice to meet you, too. So hey, you don't rely on that whole secret identity thing, do you?" she asked, probably already able to guess the answer. "There's a bunch of other superheroes around here and it'd be kind of awkward going around calling them Pixie and Wiccan and... okay, I don't know Starfire's real name, but you know what I mean."

Realistically, Tara didn't have much of a hope of getting his real name out of this. But what he didn't know was that she'd already given away her secret identity. In fact, her superhero name was probably more secret than her real one around here. "I'm just saying, is all." Real strong argument.

[pretendytimes]

"Uh, I did back home," he offered. He could already see where this was going and he didn't like it. Although he could see her point, he really wasn't sure about revealing his identity. It probably didn't matter much here since this wasn't home and nobody knew him anyway but still...The whole secret identity was part of being a super hero. Not to mention Jack would probably have his hide if he ever told anyone else.

But the girl - Tara - seemed nice enough and would there really be any harm in telling her?

Tom honestly didn't know and the conflicted feelings showed on his face.

[atleasticansee]

"Hey, if you don't wanna give it up, I totally understand," she said, putting up her hands defensively. "But chances are around here, the Legion of Doom isn't gonna jump out of nowhere and start kidnapping all the people you care about." No, there was a completely different shadowy organization for that. Which was totally better!

She figured it was probably time to let him know why she was asking all this stuff about supers. Otherwise this conversation would get weird fast. "I'm kind of retired, myself." By necessity around here, rather than choice. "They used to call me Terra." She didn't expect him to have heard of her. Or rather, she hoped it.

[pretendytimes]

"True." Tom grimaced a little. She really had a point - he didn't even have any of his friends or family here - and he wasn't sure why he was being so hesitant when he had nothing to lose. Maybe it was just the habit of it or maybe he was being weirdly sentimental or something. But whatever the reason he was soon distracted from his thoughts by what she said next.

"Really? You're a super hero?" That certainly surprised him, pleasantly so. But then that meant she had given her real name right off the bat and even though she had said 'retired' Tom felt like the least he could do was return the favour of giving his first name. "...Tom. My name's Tom."

[atleasticansee]

"Rolls off the tongue a lot better than FX," she said with a joking smile and a tone to match. "Yeah, I used to be one. I was kind of freelance, I guess? Turns out it's not really for me, though. Don't get me wrong, I like helping people," she quickly followed, again throwing up her hands defensively, "but... well, we didn't all get to keep our powers around here." He probably already knew that. He didn't have to know how relieved she was not to have powers to worry about, though. She was sure to look a little bummed, but not depressingly so.

[pretendytimes]

"Yeah, it does," he replied with a good-natured smile of his own. With a tilt of his head Tom simply listened to her explain next, nodding here and there to show he understood.

"Spider-Man told me about the power thing and I guess I sort of found that out just now." He grinned a little sheepishly. He was so very relieved he hadn't lost all his powers like Tara seemed to have but there was definitely something off about them. "It really sucks."

[atleasticansee]

"Spidey's here?" Somewhere in the back of her head, she was pretty sure she knew that, but getting confirmation was always good. Plus, Spider-Man, dude. Totally awesome. "Sweet." She was kind of glossing over the whole "isn't it terrible not having powers" thing and trying to look totally casual while doing it. Whether or not it worked was up to FX. "Who else is here? Do you know? I know a couple people from the Young Avengers are around." Did he even know the Young Avengers? Probably not, but it was worth a shot.

[pretendytimes]

Tara did actually accomplish her goal of distracting him from the powers issue as the subject of other heroes always managed to grab his attention completely. "Yeah, Spider-Man's here aaaand," he paused for a moment to remember the names mentioned in his entry. They had all been unfamiliar to him but since Tara knew Spider-Man, they might be of more use to her. "Iron Man, Pixie, Wiccan and I spoke to someone named Danny Phantom. That's all I know of."

And yet again an unfamiliar name was tossed to him and he was almost starting to feel bad for not knowing. "Young Avengers?" He echoed.