[Meta Heroes] Inbox

[faceguy]

Hello? Hello? ...Ah-ha, just kidding! Leave a message after the beepity beep~

Comments

[faceguy]

your legs broken or smth?

[purplexing]

I'm busy and I know you're not doing anything

[faceguy]

excuse you! my time for doing nothing is super valuable!

[purplexing]

See, you're only proving my point

[faceguy]

[Leo going "UGH!" at the top of his lungs can likely be heard through the wall.]

fine ill get your coffee but only because im the best brother in this and all possible worlds

[purplexing]

[Victoryyyyy. Leo can't see it but Donnie is totally smirking while he continues to browse through sites.]

uh-huh

[Could he have just asked him to come over there or just gone himself? ...yeah. But what fun would that be?]

[faceguy]

[The fun would be in Leo not having to be his errand boy!

But fine, he's going to the kitchen and getting the coffee. While he's in here he might as well grab a soda for himself before heading for Donnie's room.

It's a little tempting to throw the coffee at Donnie once he gets there, but knowing their luck it'll conk him in the skull and the last thing he needs is more head trauma, so Leo walks over nicely and clunks the can down.]

Alright, what are you so busy with that you can't walk thirty feet to the fridge.

[purplexing]

Research.

[Naturally Donnie doesn't even look up as he scrolls through a laptop, glancing between that screen and the holo-one hovering in the air above his forearm.]

-thanks.

[He at least remembers some manners, though he frowns at his screen while he reaches over to pick up the coffee can. There might be some names that catch Leo's eye if he looks at the screens, particularly D'Amico.]

[faceguy]

[Just a one-word answer, wow. Leo is pretty happy to be spared any infodumping, and is about to be on his way, just offering Donnie's thanks a hum and a slurp from his own drink. That is, until he catches a glance at that screen, and...]

Wait, the D'Amicos? What are you looking them up for?

[That's definitely not a name he expected to see.]

[purplexing]

[SLuuuuuurping coffee.]

Mm? Oh. Well technically I wasn't looking for them specifically...

[He sits back a bit from hunching over the laptop but the holoscreen continues to scroll and click through things as he sips his coffee.]

I know I've heard the name around but I never actually looked into them until now.

[Finally Donnie does cast a look at Leo, out of the corner of his eye.]

You're familiar with them?

[faceguy]

...Not directly.

[At least, he hasn't gone looking for them. Even though he learned their name, he didn't go after revenge. And so many other things have happened since then, it ended up low on the priority list.

But now Donnie is looking into them, for... some reason. Which worries him, mainly because...]

Remember when Huv got shot? That was them.

[purplexing]

[That effectively gets the movement on the holoscreen to halt as Donnie turns his head to look at Leo.]

Oh. Ooh. ...

[He grimaces a little as what snippets of that heated conversation he'd caught between Leo and Huvrye that night surface in his mind. Not that it hadn't become clear enough that the D'Amicos are dangerous the moment he started pulling up articles.]

[faceguy]

Yeah.

[Though he hadn't actually learned that from Huvrye. Getting any info from him about it had been like pulling teeth. And without that source, Leo had had to look for another.

Which leads him to the most obvious question:]

But why are you suddenly interested?

[purplexing]

Uh.

[There's just a slight hesitation, but Donnie turns his attention to the screens to pull up some key windows as he does what he does best, infodump.]

Well, I was looking up info on a completely different group called the Bronze Owls. They were a big deal back in the past I guess, but I'd never come across the name in the present. Turns out the daughter of the original leader of the Owls ended up marrying into the D'Amicos.

[faceguy]

The Bronze Owls...

[Never heard of 'em. But it sounds like a classic case of one crime family merging with another via marriage.]

So what's their deal? Did you have a run-in with them back in the past or something?

[purplexing]

[It's a pretty obvious assumption but Donnie can't help but look more than a little guilty as he quickly flicks a look back and forth from Leo to his compiled research.]

Errr...

Kind of?

[faceguy]

[Yeeeaaah... he doesn't like that answer at all.

Immediately Leo is leaning into Donnie's space, sliding an arm over his shoulder.]

Gonna elaborate on that?

[purplexing]

[Donnie tries to lean away anyway, making a face before pointedly looking anywhere but Leo-wards.]

...as in I may or may not have thwarted a bank robbery they were involved in and ended up getting the attention of their leader. And kinda sorta gotforcedintobreakingintothebanktogetwhatshewanted.

[faceguy]

[He’s liking this less and less.]

“Got forced into” as in… [Leo pulls his arm off Donnie’s shoulders, but doesn’t fully move away.] She threatened you?

[purplexing]

Well. Ye~s?

[Donnie still remains leaning away, his expression souring slightly at the admission. He let down his guard and isn't particularly proud that he'd gotten caught but he's not about to tell that part to Leo.]

-anyway, saying yes was about the only option at the time, short of trying to fight off her whole gang.

[faceguy]

[Donnie’s thinking of how he let his guard down, and Leo’s thinking about how some gang leader got ahold of him and Leo didn’t even know. She didn’t hurt him, but if she had…

Leo takes a deep breath before his mind runs off down dark paths. Donnie’s fine, he’s right here. It’s not like he never ran afoul of villains without Leo or the others around before.

(They just feel a lot less invincible, these days.)

Leo straightens up and out of Donnie’s space, but still puts a hand on his shoulder. He’s here, he’s fine.]

…So what did she want?

[purplexing]

[Not mentioning the bat to the head, nope!

Donnie tenses slightly under Leo's hand before relaxing again. It really isn't too difficult to guess at where his brother's train of thought might have gone. He just hates the delayed guilt in not having let Leo know about it, but he still figures it wouldn't have made much of a difference. Things had happened, he'd managed to get out of it and more importantly, avoided further trouble.

Leo's question prompts Donnie to reach for a sheet of paper he has tucked under the edge of the laptop. He holds it up, a listing of seemingly random numbers, frequencies, one can determine by the Hz written after each. Some are crossed out, others circled with question marks.]

It was in a lock box. I realized all the circled numbers are within the range for ultrasonic sound, but I'm not sure to what purpose. But I figured if it was in a lock box in a bank and a crimelord wanted it so badly, it probably wasn't something to just hand over.

[faceguy]

[Probably for the best if he doesn't!

Leo takes the paper, finally letting go of Donnie in the process. He looks it over, sipping his drink while he does. Unsurprisingly, this all means jack shit to him, but Donnie has it figured out already so that helps put the numbers in... at least some context.]

And then not-Godfall happened and we all got out of there. [He hands the paper back.] Ultrasonic means... the frequency's too high for people to hear, right?

[So a list with some values crossed out and some circled with question marks... maybe the results of a test? Or maybe a specific frequency is needed for... something. But if Donnie doesn't have any ideas, Leo sure doesn't.]

I wonder if not getting her hands on this changed history at all...

[purplexing]

[Donnie's just glad Leo hasn't focused on the part about him breaking into a bank. He nods, reaching for his can of coffee again to sip from.]

Yeah, anything above twenty thousand hertz is beyond the range of standard human hearing. But the application isn't purely in sound, but in vibration. Anyway, there's a broad potential for it and not knowing exactly what it was intended for is all the difference, in this particular case.

[Frowning again, Donnie, pulls up some articles he'd grabbed from his research endeavors. He taps at the picture that comes up in one of the windows, a grainy picture of a blond-haired woman in a fitted business suit.]

Halone Reach. She was head of the Bronze Owls, which was made up of both metas and normal humans, a big name during that time in Central. From my digging, it seems she had it out for Atomight in particular, and not too long after we left, she personally went after him but it ended pretty badly for her.

[She hadn't died, but reports mention Atomight had saved her from the building collapse, though unable to avoid saving her leg from being crushed.]

[faceguy]

[They destroyed millions of dollars worth of art in one night for a “team-building” exercise, Donnie breaking into a bank is the least of his problems.]

So her daughter stepped up. Joined the D’Amicos. And they have beef with that Red Hood guy, which is what lead to Huvrye getting shot.

[And he’s totally unrepentant! Though… Leo hates to admit it, but he doesn’t think the guy is a monster. Just a jerk.]

Nobody knows you have that, right?