nexus_sages | (no subject)

"Oh." That's a lot less amusing than what he was picturing. "Something like that happened in my universe too. It didn't go well. My parents don't talk about it much but I did learn about it in school."

This is the joy of talking with a literalist: she frequently misses the joke.

"Registration is too bad of an idea to not share, I guess. I'm glad you don't have to deal with that."

"Me too. There are a handful of heroes in the League who were publicly 'unmasked' during the whole thing and that's not really something that can be undone. Dad's never told me any specifics, but he had that happen to him once and had to travel back in time to stop it because it went really bad on him."

Verity winces in sympathy. "Things didn't go so great when we tried it, either. Like, predictably bad. Sometimes you really have to wonder why people think this sort of thing isn't going to lead to someone getting shot."

"Sadly, I'm pretty sure some people who were pushing for it were counting on 'capes' getting shot. At least one person did die because of it."

"This was a 'capes' elderly aunt. Not even someone who had a choice about any of this ever."

"That's even worse. At least people who choose this kinda life know what sort of risks they're taking. Someone who is just friends with or related to a superhero has nothing to do with that. They might not even know."

"Yeah." She gives him a long look, but it's not remotely her place to lecture him about these things. The story will be enough of a warning, she hopes.

"You're lucky your family's so durable."

"Not all of us are. My youngest three siblings are adopted, so they didn't get any of the family toughness. And Dad was adopted, so my grandma's an ordinary unpowered human."

"That's why it's really important to me that I have a good secret identity."

"Oh. Then, yeah, it'd be good... maybe you should go with something that doesn't tie you so closely to your family? If one of you gets found out, and people know you're related... The more people trying to keep a secret, the less safe it is." A sad truth, but an important one to keep in mind.

"Yeah, that is a good point." He's not stupid; he's not going to pretend that it's fine. "Though on the other hand... my power set is close enough to Dad's that it won't be a stretch of the imagination to link us either."

"Oh, they're pretty specific to your family? That would make it a moot point."

She glances at his notebook, curious but not prying. "I could show you some costumes people wore where I'm from. Maybe that would give you some ideas?"

"We don't have a monopoly on it or anything, but that specific combo isn't super common."

He definitely looks interested in her offer. "I'd be up for that. I haven't even decided if I want to go maskless or not yet."

"I've got some on my phone." Which is, of course, in her pocket. She rarely goes anywhere without it. A little poking and prodding brings up an album of classic terrible costumes from the 616. The Hawkskirt starts the parade.

"Okay, so these are more, what not to do..." She offers him the phone so he can have a look. "I've got more recent pictures too, but these are always good for a laugh."

"Oh my god, that's awful," Jon says, with a big grin on his face. "It's like Conan the Barbarian but worse."

"Yeah... that's my brother. And it was the seventies." How about some classic Power Man with tiara to take his mind off Clint's fabulous legs? "This was also the seventies. Pretty much that whole decade can be written off as 'everyone forgot how clothes work'."

"Ugh," Jon says, looking through the pictures. "It reminds me of vintage Warrior Angel comics. Warrior Angel is cool, but the artists went through a really bad phase."

"'Warrior Angel'? Let me guess: gorgeous in an androgynous sort of way, with big feathery wings and a flaming sword?" Have some Nomad next. Seriously, everyone in the seventies lost their freaking mind.

Jon laughs. "Oh no, he's bald and middle-aged, actually. Whether or not he had wings or a cape depended on who was doing the art, too."

Jon raises an eyebrow at the picture of Nomad. "Was there just something really appealing about V-necks that went down to the belt back then or what?"

"Really? Huh." That's surprising. But then, most of the comics where she's from were about real people who were almost uniformly gorgeous. She has some weird expectations.

"I really don't know. You'd think people wouldn't want to make themselves vulnerable there."

"Seriously. My dad is bulletproof and even he thinks it's a dumb idea to have a 'shoot me here' target on him anywhere."

~~Aside from the big symbol on his chest?~~

"I hope you never find out if you're bulletproof. But I hope even more than you never find out you're not." He's a sweet kid and she kinda likes him. This is high praise from her.

One last bad costume before they get back to business: 3-D Man.

"Yeah, I can agree with both of those."

Jon makes a face at this picture. "I don't even know what this reminds me of but it definitely isn't the most attractive outfit I've ever seen."

And yet, he's volunteering for the lifestyle. Did he ever really have a choice?

"Yeah. Honestly, I don't even know what his power is supposed to be. All I know is, headache city." They can move on to some nicer, newer pictures. Lots of sleek designs and no pouches. The Avengers could look pretty slick when they wanted to, and the X-Men offer some good ideas on how to do variations on a theme. Sometimes.

He looks at the next pictures with a lot more interest, now that they're moving past the weird stuff. "This looks a lot better. For the most part."