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rosipheleeA deliberately silly snippet. I intend to do an 'opening sequence' like this for all of the second era of Atlantean heroes. So first of all, meet Pimpernel...
Thanks to ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif){kind=small}
alintaflame who suggested the name.
7.30pm, 13th May, 2451, Central Atlantis
Jasmine Komiyama, it was rumoured, was bored of diamonds. The news rushed around Atlantis, from the boutiques of high fashion to the penthouse apartments of the rich. Some greeted the news with amusement; others with dismay. Highly-strung heiresses packed away their grandmother’s treasures and went in search of opals and pearls. Venerable jewellers began to think wistfully of retirement homes on Colony. Several beautiful but impecunious young men with wealthy fiancees suddenly became far more amenable to shopping for rings.
At last the news reached Azur, where Jasmine Komiyama was dining high above the island city. It spread across the restaurant as a sly murmur amongst the soft conversation and the click of cutlery. A society matron leant backwards to whisper to the table behind and pulled the heavy velvet drapes with her, exposing for a moment the garish lights of the city below. At last someone dared step across to Jasmine Komiyama and ask the question.
She tilted her eyebrow, took a sip of her wine and said languidly, “Diamonds are never passé.”
The jewellers sighed, the young fools blanched and Jasmine Komiyama continued with her dinner.
A young wit paused by her table to pay a fulsome compliment.
Jasmine smiled politely and toyed with her asparagus.
Her companion, an old school-friend of her brother’s, waited until he had gone and said, “Darling, your ennui is quite excrucriating.”
Judging it, rightly, to be a compliment, Jasmine laughed delicately and said, “Modernity is so tedious.”
“Would you rather have lived in a more romantic age?”
Jasmine shrugged. “A more mysterious one, perhaps.”
“And what would you have been?” her brother’s friend asked lightly. “An Incomparable, perhaps? Or an Empress? Or a second Helen, sending the ships out of Troy.”
“Aulis,” Jasmine murmured.
“What was that?”
“The Greek forces sailed from Aulis. To Troy.”
The brother’s friend looked slightly alarmed. Jasmine sighed faintly. The friend laughed stutteringly and said, “What do you think, then? What would you have been?”
Jasmine considered it, her pink lips pursed and her dark eyes intent. A waiter was moving across the restaurant towards their table. At the moment it became obvious that he was approaching her, she smiled and said, “A body-snatcher.”
The brother’s friend choked on his drink.
Jasmine expounded on her subject. “Think of the thrill. A secret adventure in the dead of night, all in the name of science. Many of them were highly respectable by day, remember.”
“But – but, my dear Jasmine-”
The waiter was at her elbow, murmuring, “A message, Miss Komiyama.”
She took the folded page, running her fingers across the thick paper. It was creamy in colour and when she unfolded it she saw it was blank, save for a small, red flower embossed into the bottom corner. She held it up so only she could read it and a single phrase appeared in ornate black script. After a moment the pixels rearranged themselves and the words faded from view.
Jasmine folded the paper and tucked it inside her bag, a one-off designed by the father of an old schoolfriend, often cited as the most influential designer of the twenty-fifth century. Then she rose, gathering her coat around her. “I’m afraid I have to run, dear boy. Lovely to see you again.” She unleashed a full smile and turned to the waiter, “Charge the family account, please, Noel.”
She made her way out of the restaurant with graceful and deceptive speed. Once outside she turned towards the stairs as if she was about to go down to the taxi rank. However, Jasmine Komiyama turned up, glancing idly at the security cameras as she went.
Those cameras did not record how, after the first turn, she was no longer carrying her handbag or how, after the second turn, her coat had vanished and she was running. She had shaken her hair down around her face and she could have been any fashionably dressed young woman, late for an appointment.
On the next floor she slipped into a maintenance room, the lock clicking open at the brush of her fingers. She closed the door behind her and strode across to the window, checking that it opened. It swung wide on her touch and Jasmine Komiyama laughed, a hearty sound that would have startled her erstwhile dinner companion.
Minutes later the superhero Pimpernel swung over the streets of Atlantis. Her cream cloak swung out behind her and the red flower on its corner glowed as brightly as the streaks of rust on the walls she passed.
On the rooftops above Sophos Square, Tiger was waiting. The leader of the superheroes of Atrlantis turned as the other woman landed, her black hair fanning out around her.
“Pimpernel,” she said gravely. “Ever prompt.”
“Tiger,” Pimpernel said and there was little sign of Jasmine Komiyama’s drawl in her voice now. “Where are the others?”
“They’ll be here soon,” Tiger said tranquilly. “Just wait.”
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Date: 2011-09-16 12:33 am (UTC)