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An Introduction to the Fabulous Flying Fox
Episode 1
Episode 2
Episode 3a
Episode 4a
Episode 5 |
Episode 5: "Pajama Party"Raven and Heather are at the Honolulu airport, waiting to pick up their friends, Josie, Belen, and Sylph, who've just returned from a vacation in the Middle East. They're both dressed in outfits that draw appreciative glances from male passers-by. Heather has just learned that Raven has started up a relationship with Steven Lord, and suggests to Raven that she's going to have to decide fairly quickly between Steven Lord and Jackson Andrews. Heather says it's never a good idea for a woman to to try to keep more than one lover at a time. Men can sometimes get away with that sort of thing, but women can't. For a woman, it's always going to be one man or none. Raven doesn't buy Heather's argument, and doesn't see why she can't have several different boyfriends. Which is not to say that she's interested in any more than the two she has now, just that she wants to keep her options open. Heather looks askance at Raven, tells her it's men who like the idea of "keeping their options open," and reminds her she's not a man. Heather says women just don't think that way. Raven suggests that Heather just wants Jackson for herself, and Heather replies a bit angrily that Raven is exactly right. After glaring at each other for a moment, Raven and Heather start to giggle, and end up hugging each other. Raven promises, if her relationship with Steven works out the way she hopes it will, to give Jackson to Heather, but Heather admits that "giving" Jackson to her probably won't work unless it's his idea to start with. They decide that they're very lucky to be such good friends that they can be so honest with each other without straining their friendship. Raven adds that if she were a man she'd want Heather to be her girlfriend. Heather strokes Raven's face with her fingertips and replies that it doesn't bother her that Raven's not a man. However, before this can lead to anything, there's an announcement that the flight has arrived. Out of the corner of her eye, Heather has already noticed half a dozen suspicious-looking men who seem to her to be waiting for something, and realizes that she's seen a couple of them before. So she and Raven are not taken completely unawares when Sylph, Josie, and the very pregnant Belen disembark and these people attack. There's a brief fight, during which Raven is obliged to go into action in her civilian clothes, Heather hustles Belen to safety, and Josie reveals herself to be an accomplished martial artist. Sylph also joins the fray, and even though for the first time in her life she doesn't actually have to be careful not to resort to lethal force (a fact which relates to her loss of her shape-shifting abilities, and which is specifically commented on by one of the attackers) she still reflexively pulls her punches and ends up being seriously wounded. While Sylph is getting medical treatment, the paramedic comments on the extraordinary blackness and thickness of her blood, and is told to stop yammering and start medicating. A short time later, Steven Lord arrives on the scene with a few of his people, and starts asking questions. Even though she's not forthcoming with Lord, whom she treats with a nice familiarity combined with elegant disdain, Sylph has already figured out that the attack had to have been orchestrated by one of her enemies in the Inner Circle of DEMON. Moreover, Heather has remembered where she'd seen the two she recognized, and lets it slip to Sylph that these were probably some of Jackson Andrews's people. Although it seems unlikely to Sylph that Andrews himself was involved in this, she does agree that it's a matter of some concern. What's of even greater concern to her is what she sees passing between Steven Lord and Raven Gold. When she finds out from Heather that Raven has started splitting her evenings between Jackson Andrews and Steven Lord, Sylph grins and tells Heather that's very, very interesting. Later, the girls are having a pajama party. They take turns talking about girl things, including boyfriends, jobs, husbands, babies, and the very impressive new body Sylph got as an "engagement present" from her new fiancé. In regard to Belen's baby, Josie carelessly almost lets it slip who the father is, but Heather quickly covers saying that what Josie means when she says it's "Raven's baby too" is that since Belen doesn't have a husband they'll all five have to pitch in to help out. Sylph tries to deflect the conversation by asking if it's true what Heather told her about Raven having two boyfriends now. Sylph suggests that with two boyfriends, if Raven gets pregnant she might have some trouble figuring out which of them fathered her baby. In response, Raven giggles and replies that Jackson's brought up the subject a couple of times, but even though he's really nice and Raven really likes him, there's no way she's going to have a baby with someone who's not her husband, and there's no way she's getting married to someone she doesn't love. Besides, now that she's the Flying Fox, she wouldn't have time to take care of a baby. Sylph isn't pleased to hear this. She glares at Heather who calmly suggests that maybe this would be a good time for Raven to model her Flying Fox costume for them, and tell Sylph about all the adventures she's been having. Raven agrees and runs giggling into another room to change outfits. This gives Sylph an opportunity to lay into Heather for not doing a better job with her assignment. In addition to keeping an eye on the girl, wasn't Heather supposed to make certain Andrews got Raven pregnant? Heather replies that Sylph misremembers the assignment. In fact, Heather was instructed merely to encourage Raven to get pregnant, and it was not required that Jackson be the father. Heather frankly thinks that Jackson Andrews wouldn't be a good choice, particularly when Raven has an opportunity to sink her hooks into someone like Steven Lord. Belen agrees, saying that giving Raven to a lesser Morbane like Andrews would have been a waste of a valuable resource. Josie says it's a much better idea to use Raven to corrupt the head of Hawaii's special forces division of the state police. Before the conversation can be taken any further, Raven comes back. She models her costume for them and tells them how much fun she's been having as a superheroine while they were away. Heather tells Sylph that this Flying Fox business is very important to Raven, and it would be a big mistake for Sylph not to allow her to continue doing it. Raven is a bit puzzled by this comment and points out that Sylph doesn't have anything to say about it. Heather ignores Raven and suggests to Sylphs that among other things Raven has a huge crush on that handsome Steven Lord, and that being the Flying Fox is important to her long-term strategy for landing him as her husband. Raven protests that Heather's way off base, and that she doesn't have that big a crush on Steven Lord. But Josie says Heather's right, and Belen giggles that Raven's eyes light up whenever anyone mentions the guy's name. Sylph thinks about it, and says that in principle she doesn't think it's a good idea for Raven to put herself at risk trying to be a superheroine. However, if it's part of a strategy to land Raven a husband, she could not only go it, she'd be willing to bend every effort to help. In the meantime, she wants to hear about some of the adventures Raven's had as the fabulous Flying Fox. Raven is bemused by Sylph's comments and tells her she's taking a rather presumptuous attitude, but provides her nevertheless with a brief summary of events, including a slightly off-kilter version of her encounter with the Mental Master, complete with a description of how he erased her memory of the incident. This last part confuses Belen, who doesn't understand how, if the Mental Master erased Raven's memory of the encounter, she can be telling them about it now. Raven shrugs and replies that a complete memory wipe is not that easy to accomplish. Because Raven knew she was missing a big chunk of time, she had a strong incentive to piece together the scattered fragments of what she did remember. Heather whispers into Sylph's ear that this ability to reconstruct the past is a very interesting talent. Sylph whispers back that she takes Heather's point. Sylph declares that she's considered the question, and decided that if Raven is serious about being a costumed heroine she's going to need to make a few changes in the way she operates. She instructs Belen to start the process by designing a new costume for Raven, something along the same lines as the one she's wearing now, but darker and more mysterious. She instructs Josie to start helping Raven develop her combat skills. And she instructs Heather to work with Raven help her learn how to take better advantage of the power her beauty gives her over men. If she's going to set her sights on a confirmed bachelor like Steven Lord, she's going to have to pull out all the stops. Furthermore, as regards this superheroine matter, it's obvious to Sylph that the Flying Fox has thus far been coasting along on raw talent, energy, and cuteness. And while that may have been enough for her to handle a third-rate villain like Pele, she's going to have serious trouble if she ever has to go up unprepared against a really dangerous threat. Raven takes exception to Sylph's reference to Pele as a third-rate villain, but Sylph doesn't back down from that analysis. She points out that Pele had one gimmick, used it mindlessly, had no grasp of tactics, and had a glaring weakness that at first Raven didn't even see. To Sylph's mind, that's a second-rate hero's response to a third-rate villain. Sylph tells the girls that within two weeks, she wants to see a very different Flying Fox standing in front of her. She wants to see her pretty Raven Gold take on the persona of a dark, dangerous, and sultry creature of the night who's fully capable of taking on anyone who get in her way. As to how this relates to the Steven Lord question, Sylph knows from experience that a sudden and dramatic change in appearance and attitude is often all it takes to get a passionate response out of a man. If she wants this fellow, Raven needs to knock him off balance and be ready to catch him as he falls. Raven looks askance at Sylph and says she isn't quite sure she likes the sound of that. Heather assures her that if it produces the right result, she'll love it. In the meantime, while all this conversation has been going on, Belen has been studying Raven and making a sketch of a new costume. When she's satisfied with it, Belen shows it to Raven. And to her own surprise, Raven likes it. She's going to reserve judgment until this costume is more than just a design on paper, but she has to admit that if it comes out the way Belen's drawn it, this sexy new costume will make her darling Steven look at her in an entirely different way. |