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 Posted: Mon Nov 09, 2009 3:21 pm
It was, by all accounts, a fairly normal Sunday morning at the Destiny City animal shelter. Tallulah had just finished feeding and watering all of the big dogs and was about to get started on the little ones when she thought she smelled a hint of smoke.
For a moment, she thought that maybe one of her co-workers was sneaking a cigarette behind the building, and if they were then it certainly wasn't any of her business (although it was certainly Not Good that they were). Then she realized it wasn't cigarette smoke.
A moment later, the fire alarm went off and the sprinklers went off, too. A very wet Tallulah ran out of the building, dragging a husky behind her by its leash.
"What's going on?" she asked the first person she could find after she tied up the dog.
"Cat wing's on fire," they replied breathlessly, and ran off. Tallulah followed.
"Did you call the fire department?" she yelled.
"They're on their way, but it could be a little bit. We need to get the cats out!"
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Posted: Mon Nov 09, 2009 3:56 pm
This was it.
Today was the day. Today was the day Simon Ferris would set his life straight again.
That strange pen had been buried in his pocket for a while now - occasionally he'd take it out and look at it, as if all of the questions its existence created could be answered if he stared at it the right way. Most of the time, however, it stayed hidden and suppressed from his thoughts, its owner trying to ignore the fact that he had ever seen it. Because admitting he had it implied some very weighty things about him that absolutely could not be true, in this life or any other.
He was not meant to be a senshi, or anything special for that matter. And today he was going to prove it for himself once and for all. He'd take out the pen, say the henshin, and watch as nothing happened, and then he could go back to being plain old obscure Simon without any fancies about being anyone else.
He held up the pen.
"Atlas Power, Make-Up...!"
And after a bout of sparkles and spinning, gracefully landed on the ground again as Sailor Atlas.
This... was a little upsetting.
He started a long, fate-resigning sigh, but was caught in the middle of it when his ears picked up a faint crackling noise and the sounds of people yelling in the distance. A thick stream of black smoke could be seen from... oh god, wasn't that the animal shelter? Dread sank into his bones at the thought. He bolted in the direction of the blaze, earnestly hoping it was just the shelter volunteers having a bonfire... in the middle of Sunday morning...
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Posted: Mon Nov 09, 2009 6:47 pm
Tallulah had an armful of kittens when she decided to swing by the gates and see if the fire department was on its way. No sign of them - damn it, they were all animal-haters! All of them! At this rate the fire would spread and- Huh. That wasn't a fire truck, but it was certainly not a civilian. That was a boy in a jazzed up scout uniform wearing a tiara.
Tallulah, fortunately, knew what the appearance of a fancy boyscout meant, and, although she still hadn't decided whether or not senshi, as a general rule, were a good idea or a bad idea, she knew that two of them had pretty much saved her from the Crazy Chick in Gray. Although the news and police seemed to have them pegged as terrorists, her experience in the MUN had encouraged her to live life as an Informed Citizen, and one simply could not trust only one outlet as the source of all their media.
"Hold these," she said, and handed the kittens off to another volunteer. She ran to flag down the kid in the uniform.
"Hey! Hey! Do you like kittens or not? Don't just stand there - do something!"
This was, of course, based on her assumption that he a) had magical powers, and, b) was anything like the pair she had seen at Meadowview. If she was wrong, well... She was not in the mood to think about what that might mean.
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Posted: Mon Nov 09, 2009 8:52 pm
Rushing onto the scene, Sailor Atlas had seemingly no intent on 'just standing there'. Sure, he looked hesitant, his posture full of uncertainty and his face wearing the dread one would expect from someone dressed like he was about to get very close to a lot of fire, but this situation inspired something in him that fighting monsters didn't.
Simon was a genuinely nice person, the type to drop whatever he was doing and help if someone in his line of vision so much as dropped a can of peaches out of their grocery bag. And by extension, so was Sailor Atlas.
He wasn't about to ignore the cries of kittens in need.
"Umm..." he started, anxiously, hands in front of him wrung into loose, fidgeting fists. "O-okay. Uhh..." His head dashed around until his eyes locked upon a burning structure - it was one of the older ones that wasn't as sound, and looked like it was on the verge of collapse at this point. There was no display of magic or superheroic catchphrasing; he just dashed towards it and started searching for trapped felines.
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Posted: Mon Nov 09, 2009 9:17 pm
No sooner had he agreed to help than Tallulah had her cell phone out and recording what happened next. Now she definitely knew not to trust Destiny City news sources - would a terrorist rescue innocent kittens? Probably not. She followed him to the entrance, but judged it as unsafe to go further into the burning building - leave the heroism to the heroes, after all. She liked herself not-crispy, thank you.
Hopefully, she thought, her phone would get a good look even with the heat and smoke.
The structure creaked, and it seemed like the staff had done a good job of clearing it out, but in a far cage on the left, six kittens and a mother cat yowled with fright. At the end of the street, the sirens of the fire truck could be heard, but there was no saving the cat wing - all that could be done now was to contain the blaze before it moved to any other buildings.
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Posted: Tue Nov 10, 2009 3:04 pm
It was probably a very good thing Tallulah was not aware this was only the second or third day since Atlas had gained his superhero identity, and only the second time he had ever even used it. Not only that, but it had never crossed his mind to think of his short-shorted self as a superhero or anything with the word "hero" in any close association with it at all. If someone tried to refer to him as such his expression would be undoubtedly priceless.
Star-adorned coattails and silky white gloves did not good fire protection make, but into the building he shakily crept, mindful of the little drops of flame licking the air from the entryway. Amidst the crackling he quickly picked up a symphony of mewling... and at the far wall he found the source of the noise, the low blush-colored light the fire provided illuminating half a dozen tiny furballs huddled against their mother.
Quietly, carefully, Atlas tip-toed towards the cage and knelt in front of it, and fumbled the latch open.
"Hey..." he started in a low, passive voice, tentatively reaching his hands inside. He didn't want to make any threatening moves. The poor cats were probably twice as terrified as he was.
The senshi had been in the shelter for a good few minutes now, and there was no noise or flashy magic displays indicating he was doing much of anything.
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Posted: Wed Nov 11, 2009 5:52 am
The kittens scurried towards Atlas, with the mother cat following cautiously behind. They took up roost in his arms, with the mother cat curling around his shoulders.
And then there was a mighty snapping sound, and the ceiling began to cave in.
Outside, Tallulah clamped a hand over her mouth to stifle a shriek and kept recording.
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Posted: Wed Nov 11, 2009 2:44 pm
The senshi huffed a sigh of relief when he noticed the cats were being receptive to the concept of him trying to rescue them. He had been worried for a moment that the mother cat would get overprotective and try to claw his face off, so it was a welcome relief when she instead slinked up onto his shoulders and allowed him to scoop up the rest. That was one step taken care of, now to get out of--
That snap was not the normal crackling of fire.
When the first chunk of wood clattered to the ground, the resulting rush of panic made Atlas feel as if the structure above him was giving way in slow motion. His eyes darted around in search of a closer exit, and was quickly reaffirmed that the only way in or out was through the sunlight-flooded rectangle clear across the room.
Without a blink of further hesitation, he ran--
the mother cat's claws dug into his collar at the sudden burst of speed--
and then he was careening out the door, a theatric instant away from a discombobulated wall of wood and plaster crashing to the floor behind him.
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Posted: Wed Nov 11, 2009 3:10 pm
It was like something out of a movie. The shot was perfect, and the way the roof fell in behind him - she couldn't believe he'd gotten out in time. He'd gotten out in time! And with the cats!
A terrorist wouldn't be rescuing kittens.
Tallulah squealed and ran over to take the kittens from him. "Oh my god," she stammered. "Oh my god oh my god oh my god." This was really happening. Holy s**t. And she was still filming.
"Thank you," she said, balancing the cats in one arm. The fire department had arrived and begun trying to put out the blaze, but she wasn't even thinking about that anymore. "Who are you?" she asked. This was important journalism.
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Posted: Wed Nov 11, 2009 3:24 pm
One of the kittens was a bit reluctant to leave Atlas's arms: after the crisis was over, it had discovered the senshi was adorned with a few Shiny Things, and had started batting at the little golden apple that clasped together his tie before Tallulah took it away. Sailor Atlas was a tiny bit disappointed to be separated from them as well. It wasn't very often that Hillworth students got to handle animals, and when it was it was normally in the form of dead pests caught in traps.
"It's no problem, really," the senshi answered, a shy smile flickering across his pensive face for an instant. "I'm just glad they all got out okay."
For a mysterious, elusive sailor-suited suspected terrorist, this one didn't seem to mind the start of what could end up to be a small barrage of questions. "Suh..." he started, then hesitated-- or, rather, stopped himself, realizing not a split second too soon that he pretty much had a secret identity now. That was weird to think about.
"S-sailor Atlas," he corrected himself.
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Posted: Wed Nov 11, 2009 3:59 pm
"And you're some kind of superhero?" asked Tallulah, struggling to hold the kittens and keep her phone somewhat steady at the same time. He didn't seem to mind being recorded, or maybe he just hadn't noticed yet.
"Thank you so, so much," she reiterated. "These guys owe their lives to you. Are you okay?"
Superheroes never needed medical help in movies, so it hadn't occurred to her to think he might. Now that the crisis was mostly contained, she was beginning to think logically again.
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Posted: Wed Nov 11, 2009 5:38 pm
"Umm," Atlas answered, fidgeting a tiny bit. There was that word, hero, which he considered to be the oil to his water. Such a label just wasn't meant to stick to him-- and yet, he said, "I guess so? I-I mean, well... I wouldn't c-call m-m-myself a bad guy..."
"N-no, really, it's no problem," he reiterated back, timidly holding up a hand as if to stave off more unnecessary thanks. A cliche humble hero move if there ever was one. "And I think I'm f-fine."
And, looking back at the bundle of felines in Tallulah's arm, he added, "Your c-cats were all r-really nice. That must mean you take really good care of them..."
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Posted: Wed Nov 11, 2009 5:48 pm
"Oh, we try," said Tallulah, squirming as a cat tried to climb down her shirt. At that moment, her phone beeped that her memory card was full. "Ahh!" she exclaimed, as a kitten hooked its claws into her shoulder.
"I gotta go get these taken care of," she said lamely. "Thank you again, so so much. Bye."
Scrambling to not drop a cat, she bolted towards the area where the staff was gathering. That was such a lame end to an otherwise brilliant encounter... now all she needed to do was figure out what she would do with the video.
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Posted: Wed Nov 11, 2009 6:00 pm
Well... it looked like that was it, then.
Atlas wasn't sure what to think. He wasn't about to leave the animal shelter thinking he had Saved the Day or any comic book lines like that, but on the other hand, that had definitely been one of the bravest things he had ever done in his entire life. He never would have thought he'd run willingly into a burning building before this-- then again he'd never exactly had a reason to willingly run into a burning building before this.
It didn't really mean anything. It was just a coincidence this had happened a couple of days after being given that magic pen.
After giving himself a sigh, Sailor Atlas left the shelter. There wasn't anything flashy or heroic about it; he just used the front gate.
[FIN]
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