"I know you don’t care. I know that. You’re a Crook — you don’t have to give a damn about my feelings but you’re always just—“ He shuddered again. “I know I’m fired. I don’t care. But I can’t — not today, okay? I just can’t play along today, all right?"
“I’m sorry, maybe I never explained something to you,” Leather hissed. “You don’t add people to my plan without telling me!”
"...Chapman’s not babbling. He’s asking questions. He won’t stop asking questions.”
“Isn’t that literally what an interviewer does?” the brown haired bagman asked.
“No. An interviewer follows a script — maybe digging a bit deep here and there, but not too much. All he wants are easy answers he can write up to everyone’s satisfaction. You read a couple’a issues of Amplifer, right? Those things are PR. We talked about this. There’s never surprises.”
“And?”
“And Chapman’s asking questions.” Marco was frowning. “He isn’t putting together a breezy little five page publicity exercise. He’s trying to understand. He’s actively trying to understand.”
The Steve was frowning. “Marco’s right,” he said. “He’s…”
Pieces fell into place. “Oh shit, he’s a journalist,” the Steve said, softly.
“Four henches?” Chapman looked around, then looked right at the Steve. He clearly hadn’t even noticed the Steve was in the room before now.
“Yeah, he’s on the job tonight too. He’s Steve.”
“His name’s Steve?”
“His job’s Steve. Every job needs a Steve.”
RTW – Rock the World Television! – and RTV NEWS presents RTV News Closeup: The Pentad of Guardians! Meet Empire City's newest heroes and learn their secret origins! (Transcript.)
“One day?” Marco asked. He paused. “Oh shit, you got a bite.”
“A bite?” the brown haired bagman asked.
Leather beamed. “Yes I did, Marco! Yes I did! That brings me to the next item on the agenda…
“Or sometimes it’s just… it’s just what they do, and I have no idea why. I mentioned Bandolier? He loves Paramount City. And he really wants to kill the Beacon, but he’s also… he’s a friend and I don’t want to bag on him, but he’s… protective of her. He hates her but doesn’t want to hear shit about her. I know it’s not sexual or romantic or stalker-twisted-things-its-romantic. I just don’t know what it actually is. It’s like… rival baseball teams, only it’s a hero and villain and the villain builds a lot of deathtraps.”
Shades of the old posting style, it's Interviewing Trey #21! And in less than forever this time, no less! Exclusive to Patreon subscribers for the first twenty-four hours!
I often model out my characters as references and because I like doing it. Here's two renders -- one of Landon Moore and the other of the Artifact, both from Motivation.
CONCLUSION
“I came out there for my sister’s funeral, and to help wrap up her final affairs. And you know what I found out?”
“What did you find out?” Bryce asked, quietly.
“I found out that Julie was... the smartest person ever. And she was nice and kind and never forgot how to sew. She liked to cross stitch and she looked good in peasant dresses and I watched a Chief Technology Officer break down and cry over her, and... and the thing of it is, no one cares. To everyone else? She was just... an appendage. Something strapped to the Artifact to give him depth or some kind of... Jesus. Backstory.”
